I have had a very rollercoastery week emotionwise. I'll tell you about that in a little bit. Right now, I am taking a timeout to drink a cold can of coke and sit in front of my MASSIVE new monitor before I blitz thru my house and make it nice for tomorrow. I love it when it's clean and I hate it all the rest of the time.
I have just got home from the Supermarket. Of course, only a complete fool or idiot would shop on Christmas Eve, and as frantic and as crowded as it was, because I was just shopping for myself, I had a rather pleasent time of it. Wanna know what I bought? It's all just for me for my Christmas Lunch tomorrow.
I bought a small crayfish. That's a bit like Lobster but lighter flesh and not as subtle of flavour. That said Crayfish is still flipping wonderful and its a complete luxury. Mostly cos a small Cray'll cost $40 and feed two people (one if its a man) so, to feed crayfish to people say at christmas, is an expensive affair. But Lunch-for-One and I am having Crayfish.
I also bought a dozen oysters. I love oysters. Twelve is greedy but I don't care. I have two bottles of champagne, and salads, and dessert. My lunch is gonna rock PLUS.. I hired SouthPark and Ned Devine on video in case there isn't a Charlton Heston Movie on tv.
And I just got to see Mike, after missing him so much lately. Just a little lovely Mike goes a long way with me. He won't be back until February, so I am extra glad he found the time in his hectic life to squeeze me in. He's such a lovely person. I love him dearly. And Freya, I love her too. She is gonna be here on the 29th of December. *just smiling* I know the best people. I really do.
Sander is my darling sweet friend in Holland. I love him dearly.
Look at me, I am not even making sense. It's because these three people are the most important people, outside of my family, in my life. They have supported me and loved me and kept me company and sometimes, I honestly don't know how I could have done anything, let alone what I have achieved in the last 12.. no.. 24 months, without them. I respect each of them with such great esteem. They make me laugh. They hold my hand. They are just, *wordless* .. god, i just hope they have some inkling as to how much their lives mean to me. How much they are part of who I am. *chuckles* Mike says no one can gush like me.. but it's cos its real, and its the truth.
24 December, 1999 9pm
It's cooled down again. Brilliant sunshine, glaringly hot.. then rain..down it came around midday.. now its darkening quickly and it's cooler.
So.. back to my emotional rollercoaster week. I finished School on Friday 17 December. And in case you missed a memo or I have been my usual dodgey self, you might not know that I had been on a 36 Electronic Multimedia course at the National College for Multimedia and Technology.
On Friday, the course finished, and I graduated. I remember telling you that. So.. Saturday.. hungover. I still managed to cater a christmas party for 25 (turned out to be 36 plus their kids) in two hours. I did a grand job but quite how I managed it I will never know. Sunday and Monday and Tuesday I just stayed in the same clothes - ate, slept, was pretty quiet. I felt exhausted. To the marrow of my bones I was utterly exhausted. But then on Wednesday, I went into school. I still had to retrieve my files from my harddrive and burn them onto cdrom. I did that. I told you that too. That day I was hyper-happy. For no good reason, not even sugar I was bubbling over with happy feelings.
Then Yesterday, Thursday, I decided to buy a larger monitor. I have been looking at them for a while and had decided on a 17" the same as I had had at school. When I got into the store though, that 19" just looked at me with those big puppy dog eyes and next thing you know I am leaving with it. It was so huge it hardly fitting into my car. I get it home, and plug it in, switch it on and wtf? its crap. really crappy. I fiddle and adjust but it will only give me 24bit colour and thats just not good enough. I tried to convince myself that I could stand having the lower number of colours but when I bumped it up to the bigger resolution to use Director, which of course was the entire reason for buying the monitor in the first place (Director needs room for the cast, stage and score.. and I couldnt navigate around the stage of my portfolio on the 15" screen) and I could only get 256 colours that was it, it had to go back. Seems I had in my haste forgotten that whole 'graphics card' lecture and mine was no where near good enough to cope with the higher resolutions of my new monitor. So this morning I took it back.
They didn't want me to downgrade to the 17" and purchase a suitable graphics card. They wanted me to keep the 19". But, I said, I can't afford to purchase a new graphics card. The impulse purchase of the 19" had already stretched my budget. So, in exchange for my old graphics card, they gave me a new one that could handle the new monitor. How 'bout that!? Jolly nice people. And of course when this putz forgetful mish here left her purse in their store, they drove out this evening and delivered it to me, saved me a trip back into Newmarket.
So that's the spirit of Christmas. Good will to men and big arse monitors and 4mb graphics cards on old systems like mine.
...don't forget to put out something for Santa to snack on and a glass of milk cos he gets so thirsty.. a couple of carrots for the raindeer won't go amiss...
--------