Archives for July 2005

Is it an urban legend or not?

July 29, 2005 by Jen at Semantically driven

Now that nearly everyone has an email account, most of us get bombarded with warnings about our health, safety or money making scams to name a few. There is a website that researches the truth, or not, of these ‘urban legends’ to let you know whether they are fact or fiction.

Find out about these, and more at snopes.com.

Did you ever wonder if microwaving food in plastic containers will cause cancer?
Did you ever hear that the Marlboro Man died of lung cancer and wonder if it was true?
Did you hear the one about the parking lot carjackers placing flyers on the rear windshields of cars, then taking the cars when drivers step out of their vehicles to remove the flyers?

So next time you get an email warning you about something, or an email chain letter you can check out www.snopes.com and see if they’ve written anything about it and make more of an informed decision before you pass the email onto all of your contacts.

Marriage proposal at Clash-A-Rama

July 28, 2005 by Jen at Semantically driven

Last night I went out to the Clash-A-Rama – a Three-D radio fundraiser at Jive. There were supposed to be ten bands doing three songs each – Clash songs of course. Being a bit of a Clash fan I went along.

I also went to the last ‘A-Rama’ that 3D radio did – an 80’s-A-Rama which was hilarious fun. We dressed up for that one as the advertisement said if you dress up there will be prizes and lets face it, 80’s fashion was the be all and end all of horribleness so it’s kind of fun to get in the spirit and dress up. I won a prize – the Cheesy Cuts double CD which has some atrociously cheesey songs on it like ‘I’m too sexy.’ Not sure if that’s the correct title but it’s an awful song. I think part of the reason I won my prize was the 80’s style dancing I was doing. For those that used to watch Fast Forward, just think of Ferret and Michelle (I think it was Michelle). I’m a bit embarrassed to admit that I really enjoyed the 80’sorama, had a great time doing the cheesy dancing and remembering what it was like during that time as it was the time I started going out to pubs and discos.

Back to the Clash-A-Rama – we didn’t dress up for this one. Unfortunately it wasn’t as busy as the 80’s-A-Rama. A few bands had dropped out and I think the majority of the people there were in the bands that were playing and the rest were mad Clash fans of course.

Mostly the bands did not do great renditions of The Clash songs but there were a couple of exceptions. The first two bands did ‘Tommy Gun’ and the first band with one girl on guitar and a drummer did it much better than the second band with four people. The Saucermen with their double bass were the first band, and really the only band, to completely nail the Clash-A-Rama. The rest of the audience obviously thought so too, or they’d had a few drinks by then, as there was a respectable crowd actually on the dance floor getting into it.

Between their set and the Ramonettes set, a guy got up on stage and proposed to his girlfriend Donna. When I realised what he was going to do I had mixed feelings of horror, embarrassment and the the warm fuzzy’s. She got up on stage and said that she would marry him. Phew, potentially very embarrassing moment averted.

The Ramonettes did what must be my favourite Clash song – ‘I Fought the Law’ and they did it well. They also dedicated their first song (don’t know the name, I did say I was a bit of a Clash fan) to the man that was shot last week in London because police thought he was a terrorist.

As for future ‘A-Rama’s’? You heard it here first. Yes, the Cash and Cave-A-Rama could be a happening thing. We’ve planted the seed and hopefully it will germinate and take root.

Blogaholics unite

July 27, 2005 by Jen at Semantically driven

It had to happen. I found a colleagues weblog a little while ago and then he found mine yesterday. We’ve both found our way onto Adelaide Index and from there found each other’s blogs. Adelaide is a small town after all so it was bound to happen I guess.

My anonymity is gradually flying out the window not that I’m obviously that anonymous to anyone who reads my blog, sees an odd photo on it, and knows me.

Need everyone be a fashion slave?

July 26, 2005 by Jen at Semantically driven

The other night I went out to yet another 40th (I did get babysitting in the end) and the invitation said to dress fabulously. I hardly need an invitation to dress up and it was the perfect opportunity to wear a new purchase of mine, my beautiful pure wool pink long frock. I say frock because to me it is more a frock than a dress. I’m not really sure why but I think a dress is something more modern and ordinary, whereas a frock is something more out of the ordinary that you wouldn’t really see lots of people wear.

Anyway, I had a few positive comments about it which I wasn’t expecting. The frock did make me feel really good as it’s pretty and it is really flattering.

But I was up dancing later on and this woman said to me, ‘You’re brave for wearing a long dress.’ I was too surprised by this comment to ask her why so I just let it go.

It’s got me thinking though about what a person wears defining who they are. As I mentioned above I like wearing different things. I am by no means whatsoever a fashion slave. That is, I don’t go to the shops at the beginning of the season and buy up a large amount of the latest fashion. For one when the new season’s clothes come out it is the wrong time of year to wear them. Another reason is I don’t have the income to support buying a large amount of clothes twice or more a year. Yet another reason is that the ‘latest’ fashions are usually more suited to size 8, 18 year olds than a late 30’s woman.

I like trawling around op shops as a category on this weblog demonstrates, and most of what I buy, I wear. Some of my favourite items of clothing were home made at least ten years ago. They are made for a woman’s shape and they are more than likely a one off and they haven’t fallen apart yet so all I might have to do is sew on a button or stitch up a seam.

I like having lots of different clothes to wear and by shopping for secondhand clothes I am able to do this. An aside. I went to a clothes sale about ten years ago and saw a purple leather coat that when I tried it on came down to my knees. I didn’t really need another coat but it was purple and it fit and it was $2.50. How could I not have it. Now, to buy that new in the shops if I could find such a thing would have cost me a lot more than that. Even now in some secondhand shops it would cost a lot more than that as secondhand, or should I say retro, is in.

I’ve digressed though. So I’ve passed the stage where I have to buy and wear new clothes. Who said that a hem has to come just below your knees? Who said that lime green polyester flares are a bit kitsch? Who said that if you go to this particular bar that you have to wear this type of clothing? People who are too scared to stand out a bit in the crowd, that’s who? Not me, nup! Most of the time I fit in with the crowd but sometimes I want to stand out a bit and be recognised for the person that I am and not JJ’s mother, or a colleague or someone’s friend.

If you wanna see a plethora of polyester, a full-on amount of fabulous (or frightful) frocks and some salacious safari suits, see the safarisuit website. You might even find me.

I don’t like Big Brother THAT much!

July 25, 2005 by Jen at Semantically driven

Last year I tried to write down some of my observations of the Big Brother Australia series as I have been watching it since it began in 2001, and I sort of did that. This year I knew that time constraints would not permit to do a similar type thing again so I thought I would link to other articles that have been written which I did fairly religiously until a couple of weeks ago.

I’m putting a stop to that now as I just don’t really care to do it any more. I still watch Big Brother and am still sort of interested in it. I am glad that both Dean and Hotdogs were evicted and Rita was really annoying me and I didn’t have to live with her 24/7. She still doesn’t get it, but maybe all the interviews she undergoes in the coming days might make it sink in that she does talk tooooooo much and doesn’t listen enough.

See, old habits die hard. Here I am in the first paragraph saying I wasn’t that interested in Big Brother then in the second paragraph I start talking about it again. But, that’s it now.

It’s time to go……

Things I love about him (8)

July 21, 2005 by Jen at Semantically driven

When I had my friends over the other night for the surprise birthday party we were all out in the back room. JJ piped up and said, ‘Excuse me everyone’. When he had everyone’s attention he said, ‘The toilet’s over there.’ He pointed to the bathroom so everyone knew where to go.

It made me feel like a bad hostess, but very proud that at least one member of our family has the good manners to make sure everyone knows where to go to empty their bladder.

He carried on his good host bit by dipping biscuits in the dip and passing them around too.

Putting things in perspective

July 19, 2005 by Jen at Semantically driven

I’ve been invited to a party this Saturday night and two of my regular babysitters cannot look after JJ for me. Last night all I could think about was who could I get to babysit. Who haven’t I asked for a little while and who might be prepared to do it? It felt a bit like the world might end if I don’t get a babysitter on Saturday night. There might be a lovely man at this party that I will never meet if I don’t go.

Today, things were put into perspective for me for a couple of reasons.

I went to an Indigenous cultural awareness workshop/seminar today which was about gaining an understanding of our indigenous culture which we are not taught in school. When I went to school and learnt about Australian history we were taught about white settlers but not much about the Australian Aboriginals was mentioned. The talk today put that in perspective and it was really well run in that we pretended to be the displaced Aboriginals while the workshop presenter was white man so we could try and see things from the Aboriginals’ point of view. We also learnt about how their traditional culture works – well as much as we could absorb in a day anyway.

At a lunchtime walk I talked to the two colleagues that I used to work in the same area with and we discussed a fellow colleague who is very ill from cancer at the moment. She’s undergoing chemotherapy and the prognosis does not sound very good.

Both these things made me realise that while I would love to go the party on Saturday and I will make the effort to get babysitting, I am really lucky that I don’t encounter racism on a daily basis and that I am healthy.