Pigeon Holes

13 March 2008 By callatya 2

I'm not great with people. If I'm honest, I'm probably borderline bad with people. There are few that I get on with and even fewer that I would say that I like. Of those, the ones that I will seek the company of are limited and those that I can trust with the world can be counted on one hand. I probably don't even need the entire hand.

It isn't that I don't like people, I just like them over there. Me over here, people over there. For the most part, even with the ones I adore, that works for me.

It doesn't seem to work for anyone else though, so I deal as best I can. I organise them into boxes and containers and colour code and label and, well, I have a system. I'm happy, they're happy, we are all happy. It works.

Until you get a spanner.

They are splendid little gadgets, no doubt about it, but they will not stay in their box. The labels simply do not stick and, even if they did, spanner rules dictate that they must be removed and replaced at regular intervals. Every so often, you get one ripping the coloured tags off it's neighbour and swapping it for it's own. When it comes to sorting out what is what you find that today, what was yesterday labelled as spanner01 is now peach cobbler with a smattering of tennis shoe and half of a small beachside condo in Malibu.

How are you supposed to do anything with that?

Just occasionally, it'd be nice to find a spanner who, after a bath in Coke, a wipe down with eucalyptus oil and a damn good scrub with an old toothbrush, turned out to be a silvery, scuffed and dented whole person at the end of it all, not a mishmash of labels and box numbers collected along the way.

Alas, someone in Archive078 appears to be missing their tag.

Here we go again.

Up for air

12 March 2008 By callatya

Oh blog, how I've missed you!

I'm sorry to say that I'll be a bit slow on the posting for a while. My mind is just swimming with attributes and curves and trying to sort out which way is up. Life is now ruled by the whims of the validator. If that was not bad enough, my blogging time has been swallowed up by the time-hungry swamp lurker known as study. Ick.

I have developed a serious case of the homeworks, and I could be mistaken but I believe I feel an assignment coming on.

*gulp*

I'll keep searching for a cure to this wretched ailment, but in the meantime I'm afraid it is simply a case of soldiering on.

*dives into the books*

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RECIPE: Creamy Salmon Pasta

28 February 2008 By callatya 2

This month I once again found myself sifting through our bookshelf-cum-pantry in an effort to clear out some of the clutter. Somehow I have managed to stockpile enough rice and pasta to cause various containers at the front of the shelf to launch a serious aerial assault on unsuspecting passers by. We are now going on a carb binge for OH&S reasons.

This was a 'use up some pasta' dish that I threw together, inspired by a plastic tub of salted capers that had been staring at me for way too long. I am not really a caper person but the salted variety walk all over your standard brined type in both flavour and texture. If the supermarket doesn't stock them, check your local deli or gourmet food shop.

Ingredients

1/2 bag of dried pasta shapes (I used orecchiette)

200g Safcol naturally smoked salmon - drained

1/4 cup sun-dried tomato - cut into strips

1 tablespoon of salted capers - rinsed

1/2 cup thickened cream

1x handful of grated cheese to serve (optional)

Method

Cook your pasta al dente in a large pot or wok, drain.

Empty water from the pot and put back on very low heat. Add the drained pasta.

Add the sun-dried tomato, capers and salmon. Stir.

Add the cream and stir until heated through. Do not overheat or your cream will separate. Everything is already cooked, you just want it warm.

Spoon into bowls, drizzle with the oil from the sun-dried tomato jar and/or sprinkle with a mild cheese.

This is definitely one to add to the weekly meal rotation, it is just so quick and soooo tasty! I have tried it with a cheaper salmon brand and, although it did work, I'd stick with the Safcol in future. The whole process of picking out skin and bone really took some of the fun out of this super-speedy concoction.

Fed up

20 February 2008 By callatya 2

I suspect that to some people I am seen as a bit of a soft touch who always likes to see the good in others and will look for any and every possible reason to explain even the most apalling of actions. It is a nicer way to live than looking for the bad and much kinder than writing people off for understandable, if unacceptable, actions. I am one of those people who could, given the right situation, happily explain away a homicide.

There comes a point though, when you realise that it is all bloody pointless.

Where is the gain in providing yourself with reasons and explanations for behaviour when, irregardless of the motivations, it shits you up the wall? I tell myself that I'm only being the type of person that I'd like as a friend but when it gets right down to it, there is a limit to the number of times that you can turn the other cheek or take the higher ground before you are overwhelmed by the desire to tell people where they can shove it.

I have hit my limit.

I cannot deal with any more of this juvenile high school bullshit.

Tell Me You're Joking...

09 February 2008 By callatya 3

*RING RING*

"Hello, am I speaking to the person who applied for X course last October?"

[Oh dear, this woman sounds quite stressed, what have I done?]

"Yeeees?"

[OK, I'm listening, but lady, I've just rolled out of bed...]

"Ahh. Right. Well I'm just calling because we've had a few problems with applicants getting letters informing them that they haven't gotten in to the course when they actually have."

[You are joking...]

"Hm?"

[You are not bloody joking, are you?]

"Did you, er, get a letter?"

[Oh my god! I'm not stupid! I got in!!]

"Yes I did. It said standby."

[Go on, dig your way out of this. I've spent months fretting and all because you buggered up a letter?]

"Ahhh. Well. That was wrong. It should have said you got in."

[Keep going princess...]

"Riiight"

[Dammit, what should I do?]

"Um, do you have your work organised? I just need proof of that and I ca..."

[Oh dear god, I'm going to regret this....]

"Actually I've just signed up to an IT course because I thought I was not going to get into this one, so can you please take my name off the list?"

[Hey, that actually felt kind of good!]

"Oh. Yeah, sure. I'll do that now."

[Aaand it is too late to change my mind now. I seem OK with it still. Am I ok with it?]

"Thanks"

[OMG OMG OMG I got in! I'm not stupid! Er, yes. I'm still OK with it.]

"OK, all done. Sorry about all this, and good luck with your IT course"

[Yipee, I'm doing IT! I... yep, I'm better than OK with it.]

"Not a problem, and thanks!"

[I got in and I said no. I am smart, I can fill in forms, I got in and I said NO! How come they can't fill in forms? Bah, screw this, I'm going back to bed.]

*CLICK*

No, wait. It gets better.

*RING RING*

"Hi, I'm calling from college, did you apply for X course?"

[This is confusing, what is wrong now?]

"yes?"

[No, I'm positive I didn't dream the first phonecall...]

"Are you planning on attending the full time course this year?"

[Huh?]

"Um, no. I've signed up to an IT course. I was supposed to have been taken off the list?"

[Do they even talk to each other? Surely people refusing placements isn't that uncommon and difficult to handle...]

"Right, well thankyou for calling to inform us, goodbye."

*CLICK*

[Shit. I should ha... Hold up a second, did that rude cow just dump the blame on me? Did she just hang up!? No. That can't be right. How was I supposed to say I wasn't accepting if I was unaware I was accepted? Should I call and tell her about the letters and the mix up and th... Bah, sod it. Not worth the energy.]

And so there you go.

[Yes, I'm still happy with my decision.]

The Official Guide to Nerdwatching

08 February 2008 By callatya

Embracing your inner geek is one thing, but taking her out in public is an entirely different bag of chips.

Enrollment day was her maiden voyage into the seas of the general public.

I vastly overestimated the time it would take me to get good old Deathtrap through the traffic and onto the rural roads, leaving me with a solid 45 minutes to kill before the info session got underway. I wandered the grounds and ended up in the hallway outside of the lecture room. There was a small woman greedily reading the patchwork of papers pegged on the noticeboard down the far end of the hallway. I found myself a chair and picked up a copy of the free student magazine that was sitting on a nearby desk.