Dom Crowl

2008-05-07T16:17:00.001+12:00

It's been a while since I bothered writing about anything probably cos I've been so busy with work but mostly cos I lost interest (see Doogle's blog also - last post Mat 2007). That's probably the kind of talk that can get me booted off blogger.com. So anyway these last few weeks have been orsm! I never usually do much with my holidays apart from catch up on work or stuff around at home. However Liz and Sarah Nelson came over from the States and made my life a whole lot more fun! We've been out on about four daytrips (as precursors to our big roadtrip coming up this Friday) and it's been a blast! We started out hanging out the Sunday they got back and hung out all day, taking a bike trip up to Forrester Park and finding this kudos little bike track which came complete with jumps, turns and obstacles (or trees).
The second daytrip took us out on a trip to the Catlins which the girls had no idea about location-wise. We voyaged round Purekanui Falls and went on a walk down to Cathedral Caves but the latter journey was halted by rough seas. Ushj!
Our third trip was out to Middlemarch which had been recommended to Liz by someone. However when they got there they were sorely disappointed to find a "quaint" country town with very little attraction. So we decided to head to St Bathans which lead us on a walk round the rocks with some random dog which followed us the whole time. Or rather I should say he guided us cos he was the one that led the march. Sarah named him Richard for no apparent reason.
Our fourth daytrip was on Jon's birthday where we drove out to the end of the Peninsula and discovered some fortifications that had been built during WWII. I thought it was going to be one little slab of concrete but it turned out to have a network of tunnels which were really kudos. After this we headed out onto the wench Emancipation trail which took us and the girls to Warrington's back beach and into some pretty exciting dune jumping. We ended the day by going to Truby King reserve and joining in on all the photo opportunities from the past 7 years (Aargh! 7 years???) I was later criticised by Graham Beck for taking the girls out to these places as it defeated the purpose of a wench emancipation but I explained to him that these girls were totally worthy of coming on this trip because they were the coolest girls who had come along in a long time.
So, the only thing left is the roadtrip and eternal ushjness that they'll be leaving. We were told in class today to plan our ideal day. Well, after these orsm days of hanging out with the girls my perfect day would have to be taking a flight to Boise, Idaho. Yeehaw!

Prince Caspian

2007-09-25T23:04:00.000+12:00

And so it ends. The drama season is over. Prince Caspian is no more. I'm sorted relieved but at the same time gutted. The show was a lot easier than uni. There were set tasks to complete and we got lots of applause and praise for them. And now I have no major procrastination tools left. However I will give you a rundown of the play's progress which might use up some more time. On opening night I managed to inadverdantly knock over one of the triangles by leaving it too far in front of the curtain. It fell down and knocked three others over in a grand domino effect. It was all very dramatic and embarrassing for opening night but I got over it pretty quick. Or as you can imagine everyone saw it as a joke. The second night Phil (Sopespian) got jabbed in the eye when Jamie (Caspian) stuffed up the sword fight with him. Well it wasn't exactly his eye but blood did come pouring out of his eyebrow. We had to carry on as if he was supposed to do it. After this we had a string of kid's performances which were heaps of fun. A lot of people began competing for cheers and laughs especially Chris Caradus who spat on stage each night after the main battle scene in order to get cheers but only got jeers. On the last nights everything went relatively well apart from when the cord for the arch, which was supposed to be lowered down by me every night, snapped and hung dangerously above Dr Cornelius's head. We finished on Saturday night with an afterparty in the green room where people brought along food and drinks. So... what to do now. Mum and dad, you still have to give a better excuse than the one you have. Not in the country has been used on numerous birthdays and major life events for me. But I'm sure Erina can lend you the vid, if she made one that is.

Phases

2007-08-28T10:11:00.000+12:00

While reading through my dad's blog I was "fascinated" to come across his experiences in visiting worm farms. It's a pretty odd thing to be interested in but it made me realise that in all these years that we've joking about mum going through her different interest phases that's dad's been subtlely doing the same thing! However mum's ones are funnier and I can remember them better so I'm gonna go through and list some of the interest phases that mum has been through:

Fishing - this lasted for years and mum would constantly find time to take us down to the wharf and jump on charter boats for weekend trips with church friends.

Where's Wally jigsaws - they were fun but once you've found Wally there's not much left to do.

The abflex - I must admit I have a similar thing sitting in my dining room which I borrowed off Stef and never used.

Making earrings with Beryl Young - Beryl ruined this by moving away. Beryl!

The infamous exercycle - which now sits in the lounge taking up room.

Wheat bags - these things helped soothe sore muscles and smelt great out of the microwave.

Oxycise - a form of exercise where breathing is the main ingredient for losing weight. This was by far the dorkiest phase/form of exercise I have ever seen. Mum and dad still swear by it, though.

Renovating - this is less of a phase, more of a sudden urge to tear down a wall and replace it with something different. All in all mum and dad have renovated the entire house, room by room, over the last twenty years and managed to get it down quicker than a lot of other families, while still having time for other people's houses.

Renovating other people's houses - whether they wanted it or not!

Photo making - mum would compete vigorously with Jenny Beck to make the best and fanciest photo albums.

Photography - after years of taking photo classes, building up the family albums and using a perfectly good camera mum's dreams were shattered by the onset of the digital age. This camera still sits in the attic where I'm not allowed to use it despite the fact it hasn't been used for years.

Real estate - buying flats and renovating them out seemed to be a phase for about 10 years with Craigleith St in NEV and Stef's house in Mornington. I still remember getting $40 for helping paint at Craigleith St which I immediately spent on GI Joes! Awesome.

Bonzi trees - one of the phases that dad had that I can remember. Fortunately we weren't told to rearrange our rooms due to bad feng shui.

Collages - Jon and I were intrigued to find a collection of special things that dad had hung onto a sheet and stuck on the wall. Maybe I just don't understand art.

I'm sure there's lot more than this but this is all I can think of at the moment. I'll have to compile a bunch of these phases for mum's 60th and get people to act out oxycising.

One week in Heaven

2007-08-19T22:23:00.000+12:00

I'm gonna be a teacher! Well, that's as long as I study hard next year and pass the course this year but, in terms of having a space in the Graduate Primary Degree, I have it! These are very exciting times. It's taken me a good three years of uni with a break in the middle (which I suppose is normal for any student of any degree) I had my interview on Thursday which I didn't think had gone very well. They battered me with questions and I gave them ambiguous responses, which looking back, didn't really answer the questions that closely at all. So after some intense praying and plenty of stressing God has responded to my prayers, and fortunately for me, it's in a way that allows me to do teaching! This week has been rather fruitful in spiritual terms. I've been questioning ideas of God and throwing ideas about Christianity back and forth between friends and flatmates so I've been constantly thinking about how to better myself. Tonight Mal and I discussed what we wanted to see happen next year in the flat and we realised an integral part of it was finding someway to incorporate, draw in and/or invite non-Christians. So this week has been more of a growing experience rather than a stress. In fact the stress has been quite minimal. Anyway, it's weird not having mum and dad around. I especially noticed it today when Bro and Louise weren't there either at church. In other news I found out yesterday that my old school friend Andrew McGregor had been killed in a car accident. It left me in a sort of state of shock the whole day. It's still rather hard to believe and I don't envy his sister who had the job of ringing everyone up and having to tell them. Major ushj.

One Week in Hell

2007-08-16T18:26:00.000+12:00

This next week is going to majorly ushj or completely awesome, or a mixture of both. Firstly I'm waiting on my student allowance to come back. I still need to hand in things for this which weren't specified in the form. Secondly there's the LCQ form I need to sign and return for my liquor licence which, if not returned soon, will not be refundable and will mean my licence will be null and void. Thirdly I had the Teacher's College interview today which went averagely and they'll be telling me whether I get in or not. In other words, if all go badly I lose my job, a potential flat, my other source of income and my career. Stressful week. So I'm praying that somehow these are all going to come back positively but I've no idea. All I can do is rely on God that I haven't stuffed things up too majorly so far.

Drama

2007-08-16T16:31:00.000+12:00

From kid's time pirate to Narnian arisocratic lord the last few weeks have seemed to be filled with drama. However the real drama has come from a surprising source. Recently, in the last month or so Malcolm, Greg and I have been interested in trying to apply for the Ten Gables flats with a group of people. At first Greg approached me and said he thought God was telling him to move in with a flat of people. Amazingly that same day when I mentioned to Malcolm that I was thinking about applying for Ten Gables he said he had had the same idea on his mind. He told me that ever since the sermon Trev gave a month ago on building a youth community (as an alternative to the hall/drinking culture) that he had been keen to try and get some DCBC people into the flats. Over the next couple of weeks I figured Mal and Greg had been constantly communicating between each other because their ideas were so similar. Turns out they hadn't (which could be seen as evidence of God at work). Anyway, a couple of weeks later Mal thought the best way to organise to get people together would be to announce it in church that he had a plan to get people together into the Ten Gables flat. Naturally we got some responses but what we weren't expecting was a wave of criticism. Turns out the current occupants of Ten Gables thought they were being kicked out and that the church was backing a group of 15 DCBCers to move into Ten Gables. This was far from the truth. In fact, at the end of a year all residents and wannabe flatters have to apply to make the system fair. I think the current occupants, who consists of people from a range of different churches from around Dunners, figured the DCBC admin was flexing its muscles and booting people out when in actual fact our group has to apply in flats of five anyway so it was quite the contrary and completely fair. Anyway, there's apparently been plenty of criticism of DCBC goers and some of us in general and poor old Dave Lawrie has copped a lot of flack for it all. So now we're just applying and hoping to get in so we can run a home group and have the flats as a social drop in centre nice and close to church. If it doesn't work out though we'll obviously try and take it somewhere else. Unfortunately that's been causing more problems; trying to find a place if we don't get in. Anyway, it's up to God now. We'll just have to pray this is what he wants.

As a side note here's some photos from my recent activity as a pirate in Orbit (kid's time) and our fun with swords in Prince Caspian.

Back by popular demand

2007-08-06T23:37:00.000+12:00

Well the last couple of months have been interesting. At the start of June I began my Prince Caspian practices for the play that starts in September (I already have a free ticket for you Beverly Anne). So it's been nothing but fun. The other night Chris Caradus and I were waiting for our scene so we had some free time. Immediately we begun talking about what swords to use and jumped on trademe finding some very appropriate but expensive swords for the play. We've now choreogrpahed all our fighting scenes but we need the actual swords we're going to use in order to know how to fight with them, weight wise.
Uni's been quite kudos too. I've begun my last semester and have been working away to try and get better marks than last semester. So I've been studying for my Irish essay and also for my Education essay in order to get them out of the way before the play begins.
In terms of work I have been booking jobs less and less because I apparently haven't been using the right attitude over the phone. I was accused of being too apathetic at times and other times being too much of an overseller. I guess they don't understand that trying to sell insect control to people who don't want it in the middle of winter can doesn't inspire the best in me. So last week after a solid week of improving my stats and renewing my interest in telemarketing I was called into the office and given a big bark at, followed by a written warning which I thought was totally unnecessary. So now I'm looking at either quitting or being booted out of this job. Can't say I'd mind either way. Hmm, maybe I should jump before I'm pushed. As long as I can get my student allowance going I'll be happy to be out of it and spending more time at uni.
Night church has been going really kudosly for a while now. We've had a keen interest in constructing an alternative culture to what the world offers, and as part of the leadership team on Sunday nights it's been fun fostering that vision. We've had a couple of new social groups rise up as part of that so it's been very kudos. I should mention that being part of the night church leadership team consists of throwing ideas around, organising social events, MCing and running parts of the service as well as having just being appointed the new welcome team leader. I was inaugurated last week. It's a very prestigous position. Ok, it's not, but it is kudos to be running some of the events at church.
A few of us went down to the Gore Ball too a couple of weeks ago. There was me, Jon and Scotty ad Gemma, Monica and Lis so we all alternated the dances with each other and had an awesome time. Despite the fact Scotty spent a lot of his time talking to his yobbos he still said he danced the most he ever had before at the Ball because he didn't need to ask a new girl each time. Instead he could pick from the group we already had. It was really kudos and everyone got into it so that was a high.
We also just had a camp for Realise where we went away and discussed the way Jesus treated people, who he was and what he said. It was an awesome camp. I have lots of photos on ringo.com so go check them out there if you're a member. I organised the main game for Saturday: the wide game 'Capture the Flag'. We used my kudos tshirts as prizes and also as flags to capture so it was heaps of fun.
So that's the last two months summed up. I'll try to keep this up to date now that I know I have such a strong fan base. PS: I've put photos of the main things I've mentioned above.

Mike and Ceal say goodbye to NZ

2007-06-11T12:03:00.000+12:00

My olds have finally shuffled off this mortal coil... or rather have just gone for a working holiday to the UK for six months. I was a bit hesitant at the idea of them lending out the house to randoms. They told me they hadn't even met them. I was surprised at that. I thought mum and dad would be more cautious about who they left in charge of our family home. Surely you'd interview the people first to make sure they're not satan worshippers or ex-cons or presbyterians! We had a going away party for them yesterday which would have been kudos had it not been for my ongoing headaches. Anyway, they're gone and the worst part is, I completely forgot to get them to fill out my student allowance form for next semester. Man I'm really gonna miss that free money... and probably mum and dad, too.

Good times, good times

2007-06-01T23:32:00.000+12:00

Personally I hate it when people say "Good times, good times..." It ruins the good time you are having and is just plain cliched cheese. Anyway, the last couple of weeks have been pretty kudos. I've settled nicely into my new jobs and have been doing way better at uni. Despite the ongoing headaches it's been a pretty good month. I managed to get the first A's I had ever got at uni, yes that's right. I'd never got an A before but I have been slack in the past. So anyway this week and last have been awesome for my telemarketing job. Last week I managed to book six jobs and go 300 above the quota. I was stoked at that but, to top it off, this week I booked nine jobs and went 700 over the quota which will get me some nice commission and that's not including two extra jobs that will be quoted on the day. So now I've been offered more hours there which is kudos. I just hope it's not just luck. To celebrate I had a few beers, quality beers. Carl also enjoyed one but that was plenty.

Pool

2007-05-29T09:21:00.000+12:00

The other night we went out to play pool. This mostly consisted of me taking inappropriate photos of Craig's butt when ever I could. At one stage he stretched right out onto the table to get a particular shot and since I didn't have my camera ready I tricked him into stalling the shot so that I could get a good photo of him. It was a lot of fun. However a couple of times I envoked the wrath of Craig and got chased around the pool table when I went too far. I finally stopped when he shoved the pool cue into my crotch. Nasty. Jon and I spent the night checking out chicks and getting Monica's opinion on them. It's always great to have a girl around who can spot doahh girls with you. After this we were looking forward to watching some Day Break; the show which stole the Groundhog Day idea and pulled it off nicely. However it was the last episode which was really kudos but meant that if we wanted to see any more of it we'd have to get the rest out on DVD. Ushj.

This weeks' GWBD is none other than the beautiful, talented and rumoured lesbian Sheryl Crow, but that won't stop Graham from being doahh for her. She's famous for her hits in the mid to late ninetees like If It Makes You Happy, Every Day is a Winding Road and All I Wanna Do. Apparently she's still going strong into the 2000s but the last thing I can actually remember her doing is Steve McQueen back in 2002. Anyway, the fact that she seems to be less prominent in the music scene doesn't make her anything less in Graham's eyes.

Ghosts

2007-05-16T09:33:00.000+12:00

Last night I was walking home past the Opoho graveyard and I was wondering what it would be like to see a ghost. I would probably be telling everyone I knew for the next few months, never go past the graveyard again and have a few weeks of upset sleep. I dunno. Annoyingly some jogger burst out of the gardens beside the graveyard and scared the crap out of me. I must have looked like a complete dork when I coughed and spluttered and consequently had to pretend I was just spitting. Ushj! Anyway it got me thinking about what happened a couple of weeks ago at Bryan's bithday party. We had it at Hayward Hall in his kudos little complex on the second floor. Well, we were all sitting round having a good yarn and somebody randomly brought up ghosts. This prompted Helen, usually known for being a very level-headed person, to tell us about the image of a baby's face that she saw in the ceiling one night. Everyone sorta got a little unsettled and were further discomforted by Bryan telling us about the girl he saw out of the corner of his eye running off down the stairwell but who he couldn't find when he went to check out the stairs. Then they went on to tell us that other people in the hall had seen babies's faces in the ceiling and that one student had even seen someone standing in her room over the bed one night and when she went to push them away her hand went right through it. Well, by this stage, the group of people sitting in the room with Bryan and Helen, who were mostly Highw@y aged girls began to freak out while Jon and I were egging on the stories to scare them. But now we were pretty convinced that there were ghosts in this old maternity ward, too. Previously I hadn't known anyone personally who could give a convincing ghost story but now it was pretty obvious something was afoot. Ushj! After this I went home and didn't have the greatest sleep. I left Carl out in the lounge and he climbed on the piano of all things and climbed across it playing a whole bunch of eery notes as he did. Dork. So anyway, last night when I got home from uni Suzie Q texted me and said she wanted to stay overnight in a graveyard with Mix, Carla and anyone who wanted to come. Hmm, well, I guess we'll see if I really want to this weekend but I can't see it happening. Um, but only cos it's too cold. Here's a renowned ghost picture by the way to creep you out. Apparently this was taken in 1995 when a house was going up in flames. They found out later that the fire had been started by a 14 year old girl who had been careless with matches.

Here's an interesting theory from the guy whose site I stole this photo from: Do I believe in ghosts? Well, given the evidence we collected firsthand that night, I now admit to believing that there's something we can’t explain in terms of the normal world that’s at work here. My own personal theory? If there are such things as ghosts, I don't believe they're "spiritual" in nature at all. My thinking is that they are some kind of "recording" left in a place that sometimes replays itself: a recording in time and space. It might have something to do with quantum physics. Or this might all be a little too wacky anyway. But you tell me: would you say you don't believe in spooks if your tape recorder picked up a weird voice saying "Let me out..."?

By the way this week's GWBD is none other than the beautiful Heather Locklear

Graham would be doahh!

2007-05-10T21:27:00.000+12:00

The other day I went to the doctor to find a cure for my two week long headache and the doctor was able to slot me in straight away which was kudos. The doctor I got was really kudos and she prescribed me with a drug which was apparently one of the ingredients used to make P. I tried not to act suspicious. Another cool thing was that she was an advocate for coke drinking and said she had 18-packs of coke at work which she drank with her coworkers. The best part, though, was that she was an absolute Grahmwudbedoahh! (For those of you who have forgotten Grahmwudbedoahh stands for 'Graham would be doahh' which means 'older chicks that are hot who Graham would like') Sadly, however, Jon and I have had to take on the mantle of spotting and cataloguing Grahmwudbedoahhs because Graham rejects any prospective GWBDs we suggest. Therefore his position has been reduced to that of a figurehead where Jon and I are the ones who spot them, holler at them, comment on them, catalogue them, describe them to Graham, explain why they're worthy of being a GWBD to Graham and ignore what he says if he thinks we're wrong. Basically the ones who do all the substantial work. Whereas he is the one who gets the credit because he has his name is attached to the concept. The reason why we can't take on the GWBDs ourselves is cos Jon already has his own thing going with redheads who are doahh for him and I have, well, boys, but the less said about that the better. So anyway, I will have to give a GWBD of the week to keep everyone up to date. This weeks is none other than the gorgeous Nigella Lawson, Britain's own GWBD.

Employed

2007-05-07T11:03:00.000+12:00

Well I am now officially a part time telemarketer. It seems like a pretty kudos job. I work for a bugs control place called Kilmore Bugs. Ahehe. I get a set standard wage and commission on top if I do well. The only problem is that its coming up to the winter season so they could be cutting back on staff soon so I have to prove myself as the best. The workers are pretty kudos, too. They're mostly students and as telemarketing can be quite montonous they were livening it up the other day by throwing in random words into the conversation as a joke. I never managed to get any extra words into the conversations with the people on the other end of the phone but the more experienced guys joked around by adding in stuff like mystery, ancient, velocity and so on. For instance Paddy, one of the other students there started off his conversation to some potential customer with "Hi, It's Mystery here from Kilmore Bugs Pest Control..." or "Yeah I can't here you on this phone very well. It's pretty ancient..." Once I'm more settled I'll have to throw in words like kudos, doahh and antidisestablishmentarianism. Also I hopefully have a job up at Fresh Choice as a duty manager. This way I can drop the petrol station job which is taking forever to get anywhere.

Spidey

2007-05-03T22:18:00.001+12:00

Spiderman, nobody knows who you arrrrre! Well I gotta say, going and seeing Spiderman 3 tonight was a great highlight of the month, given that it's May the 2nd. But it really was very kudos. I went along with Malcolm, Jon and Monica. There were some terrific action scenes in it and the main part which kept Mon's attention was the love story. I'm pretty sure you could have kept most girls and guys happy by divying up the movie into a love story and a big action flick and both parties, girls and boys respectively, would have been happy. I especially enjoyed the bit where Spidey turned into his evil alterego and became all emo. He took on a really weird but kudos personality (if emo can ever be considered kudos) and danced around the streets like a complete hom. I was glad I didn't look at reviews beforehand as it had some interesting plot twists and once you got over the ridiculousness of the way the bad guys came about it was very enjoyable. When asked what Monica thought of the movie at the end she replied "It was ok." I responded with "People spend millions on a movie and all they get is 'It was ok'". Girls.

Carly kitten

2007-05-02T22:49:00.000+12:00

At the end of last year I was hanging out with a family friend named Bev who is very much into pets and animals and she and her friend convinced me to buy a kitten from the SPCA. Well we got there and there was a whole bunch of sweet and naughty kittens in the cages but one caught my attention. He was almost completely black with some white spots here and there. Initially his name was Albino. Yes I know. Very a he he. Anyway, he wouldn't stop staring at me so I took him home out of sympathy. No actually he was very sweet so I thought I'd snatch him up in case he was gone the next time I came in. Ninety bucks later he was mine. However I had to work that night, a double shift the next day and then church and stuff on Sunday so it was a while before we got to hang out. Instead I dumped him with a very reluctant Si and went along to the petrol station. After some initial realisation of him being a complete dork I decided he needed a distinctive name. Vanessa decided the best one for him would have to be Carl. I completely objected to this cos it sounded kinda silly for a cat and inappropriate but I decided to let Carl decide for himself (at the time, of course, his name was not Carl) He insisted that his name had to be Carl so I told him that if I asked the cat if his name was Carl and he said 'yes' then that would be that. Of course a cat would never say yes but as soon as I walked in the door and asked "is your name Carl?" he immediately responded with a positive sounding meow. So that was that. He was Carl. After this Carl's main problem was overcoming his fear of being an absolute dork/wuss. I tried to counter this by putting him on high up cupboards and let him figure out his own way down. He responded to this well and overcame his fear, being able to jump reasonable distances without worrying. This height-overcoming-fear-challenge enabled Carl to prove his new found skills in climbing straight up the 3 metre pole, over the overhang and onto the deck. Very impressive. For being able to do that I am very proud of myself... I mean him.

Contunation of Ushjness

2007-04-30T11:32:00.000+12:00

Well the last few days have been even more ushjmaking. My current job marks the 3 month anniversary of having no petrol pumps, tanks and very few cusomters. All I have been doing is sitting out the back of the "petrol station" playing on the laptop and stuffing around. Fun. At the moment I'm trying to decide whether to take on a smaller part time job up at a supermarket which offers four hours a week as a duty manager or maybe as a telemarketer as I haven't heard back from the people at the data entry place. Then again the five minute speed test I took as a trial for the job consisted of me jabbing buttons every now and then and sitting there with a Doogled look on my face, wondering when I was getting my break. I also have very little time to get in two essays that are due next Monday, but judging by what other people have said, it sounds like I'm further ahead of them in terms of progress. These stresses culminated in my big giant ushjmaking headache that I got the other day. It would have been manageable had it been a regulkar headache but it started in the sinuses so it hurt like hell. Despite all this the weekends have been gooood. On Sunday we watched one of the funniest Mystery Science Theatres ever entitled Space Mutiny which was a ghastly impersonation of Star Wars. The hero was this buff, dimwitted, WWF, action hero, the heroin was Lea (sound familiar?), the "force" was substitued with divine dancing beings who guided people and the mentor figure was strikingly similiar to Santa Claus. All in all it was ridiculously funny and I highly recommend this show to anyone who cares to watch.

Ushj-making

2007-04-18T21:54:00.000+12:00

The last few days have seen me desperately trying to find a new job. The one I am currently at gives me 6 hours a week on a Saturday morning and the large amount of money I have is gradually draining away due to having no income (and a vibrant lifestyle [only Jon will take that the wrong way]). It is a bit frustrating considering that when I left Countdown at the end of February I was given a healthy payout of $3000 of which $500 was taxed away. I managed to get out of overdraft with that money but now I'm slipping back into it despite the fact I have a thousand put away in a savings account. Anyway I went along to Student Job Search and asked for a job. Well, they told me I had to sign up online so I did this and found an ideal job down the end of North Rd as a bar manager part time at the Normanby Tavern. I was stoked and guessing that not too many people would have a liquor licence I left it for a day seeing as SJS was now closed. Well, today I turned up to SJS and, being pendatic, they said I didn't have the 6 months bar experience so I couldn't apply for it. I ignored this and went and talked to the person at the Normanby myself. And whaddya know, but they had given the job to someone the day before. Major ushjmaking! I tried to argue that I would be better cos I already had a liquor licence and the person she had hired was only going through the course now. Well, she took my number down anyway but I doubt I'll hear back from them. So the ideal part time job with flexible workig hours and short shifts is down the gurgler. Major ushj-making! The only other job that worked for me was a security guard but I dunno if I can be bothered giving up my Saturday and Friday nights to either hang outside bars kicking homs out or even worse, standing at the wharf guarding entrances to cruise ships. I've included a photo of myself wearing a police jacket. Does it strike fear into anyone's hearts? Hmm, maybe not, but I do look doahh.

2007-04-17T23:24:00.000+12:00

This year was also momentous for the arrival of another addition to the Crowl fam: Lucy Baker, Libby's second. This is the seventh grandkid now for mum and dad. She was exceedingly cute but every photo I got of her and Libby was deemed to be ugly and gross by Lib (which is a reason you don't hand her the camera to look at the photos). We had a gettogether for mum's birthday a few weeks back and celebrated the arrival of Lucy at the same time seeing as Lib and Lucy were down. It was kinda weird not having Mumma there and annoying that mum had shoved a giant table tennis table in the middle of Mumma's lounge. Nevertheless it's probably just another phase like the Wally puzzles or her scooter or beanbags. Time will tell.

Family Reunion

2007-04-16T20:14:00.000+12:00

The other day I had a family reunion which was rather awkward at first, as per usual with reunions, where only the people who organise know everyone. Despite this I met some pretty kudos people and even I guy I had been at Kavanagh with for years who I didn't know I was related to. After a whole lot of mingling with people I came to the realisation that family reunions can be the worst kind of party if you're looking to meet someone, unless of course you come from a backwater town like Gore. Seeing as I've mentioned this I will also mention there was a couple of doahh second cousins who I didn't talk too much with just in case they turned out to be my perfect soulmate. Afterwards we had a family photo. Note that in the one the guy took on my camera he cut me out of it. Ushj! After this we had a quick visit to Mumma's grave followed by Jenna's birthday. We were exhausted by making small talk all day so everyone stayed for the minimum amount of time required at a birthday before heading home to have a Shunday shhhleep. However I stayed behind and watched Jenna and her friends play with the new bubble maker which was impressive and ideal for cool looking photos.

Karetai Cliffs

2007-04-16T19:47:00.000+12:00

The other Sunday after church it was such a nice day and Scotty was down from Wellington so Jon, Scotty and I suggested going and doing something. We tried to get Total Bads to come along but he thought we were just going to hang out inside and watch movies or play boardgames or as he would say "You joolers are just gonna bainj around at hom bamshebamming around." His made up language is far more complex than mine and Jon's. Anyway we tried to convince him to come along but he ran off so the rest of us followed him with the van. When we got along to the Tea Col builders Scotty and I jumped out of the van and chased him through the college campus but he was too fast. We then tried again when we met up with him at uni and ran past random people at high speeds yelling stuff like "Stop that man!" We searched for another ten minutes all up the Town Belt but couldn't find him. After a while he texted me and said "Iskay u gushie bol-rolling banjirs. Why don't u joolers get creatv, go 2 supermrkt 4 focacia bred & pesto & hav picnc abv Karetai Cliffs? Thats wot real men do!" Jon and I were challenged by this. Iskay! Closer to the truth we now had something to do so we picked up Bads after he came out of hiding and went to the cliffs and got some good pics.

Poker and Parties

2007-04-16T19:20:00.000+12:00

In March our flat celebrated the arrival of the new poker set complete with 500 authentic casino chips, cards and die. It's given us hours of enjoyment since then and has prompted many visitations from friends, family and randoms. Of course the thrill of playing has gradually worn off without the actual worry of winning any real money. Another exciting event in March was Susan Auty's 21st which was an international theme. I went as a Russian sailor and went around speaking in a Borat like fashion. Other costumes included Vanessa as a geisha, Jon as an leprechaun, Total Bads as a Frenchman, Greg as an Native American, Mike Beck (Mix) as a Roman centurion and Suzie Q herself as a South African, borrowing some of Jenny Beck's normal clothes. At the end of the night Vanessa and I swapped over costumes and I strutted around as a geisha. People told me I looked quite appropriate in it. Hmmm, ushj.

Weddings

2007-04-16T18:30:00.000+12:00

This year started off with the whole bunch of weddings of people from my church. There was Anna and Matt Holman, Jane and Andy Robinson, Cate and Paul Weir and Neelam and Matt Dalman. The first one was a lot of fun as there was an open bar which I noticed was not repeated at the following three. The invitation to the second one was a surprise cos I had only met Jane that summer but it was a lot of fun. At one stage Jon and I tried to revitalise the dancing so we bowled up onto the dancefloor and went hardout doing all these stupid moves in front of people and dancing along to YMCA. Luckily we knew virtually noone so it wasn't as embarassing as it could have been. In the third wedding there was a weird kind of informal atmosphere when it came to the singing and even the celebrant was getting into a bit of groovin. When asked for the rings the best man produced hoolahoops, handcuffs and burger rings before actually presenting the real rings. Strangely enough Boss grabbed the handcuffs and stuffed them in his jacket. Juuust kidding. At the reception after the drinks table came crashing down Vanessa pointed out chicks Jon and I could go for and tried to encourage us to go for them. Like usual we were too picky and it came to nothing. In the last wedding in March I went up and stayed with Jon and Scotty at the Sudima Hotel where the wedding was being held. Unfortunately I wasn't invited to the reception so I had to sneak around and pretend I wasn't there when the reception was on. Instead I hung around for a while, bought a burnt pie from the Caltex down the road and finally managed to escape with other noninvited people to go see Ghost Rider at the movies. We got back to the hotel to go to the dance but had to wait round an hour for them to finish dinner and start dessert! After sneaking into the reception a few times I finally encouraged the others to come in and we had a good dance until it was only Scotty, me and Jon left on the dancefloor. In honour of our committment to the dancefloor the band played Dave Dobbyn's Loyal. That night I slept on the bedbase instead of the bathroom floor the night before.

Tutorial

2007-04-16T17:46:00.000+12:00

Well, I have been putting off jumping on the blog band wagon but hey, what the hell, why not? I'm Dom and I have decided to include the past few month's main events as well as my current personal goingons. Just some background info: I go to Dunedin City Baptist Church, study history at Otago and flat in Opoho with a couple of other Christians, Malcolm and Ashwin. I have one bro and three sisters who all live in NZ and my parents recently told me they were moving to the UK for six months. Along with my "kudos mate" Jon I also have a large subvocabulary of a whole bunch of words we modified, made up or stole. We also made a whole bunch of tshirts when these words became popular around our church for people who repeated them back to us. I really should send those out. They were Christmas presents and they're still sitting in my room. Anyway the first post will be a teaching session of these words.
Firstly there's kudos (adjective). This is basically the new word "cool" but can be used in a multitude of situations. For example: "I just bought the new Feelers cd." The response would be "Kudos." Antonyms of this include kudes, superkudes and unkudos.
Next there's ushj (adjective). This is a particularly distressing or depressing mood which you can be put in when things don't go your way. It is the new term for "gutted" or "damn" and is popular among many DCBCers.
Thirdly there's doahh (adjective) which is something that is particularly attractive, most commonly used when driving down the road and spotting extremely hot chicks. In the case of Graham Beck doahh is only used when he sees an older woman because he likes older woman so doahh is instead substituted for "Graham would be doahh!" or Grahmedbedoah!
Next there's iskay (adverb) which is a more aggressive and sarcastic form of okay because it is only said when someone says something really stupid or unlikely such as "I'm pretty sure I can make that (10 metre) jump." The response would usually be a rather forceful "Yeah right!" Iskay makes takes this sarcasm one step beyond into ridiculement.
Wench (noun) is also used instead of girl but is not meant in any derogatory sense. Total Bads is Graham's nickname. Fudge replaces f#*k as a resepectable replacement because it's stronger than darn or shoot. Right. I think we're pretty much ready to begin.