sprayed

after finishing up with the waterproofing, it was time to pull out the spray-paint. i'm *really* pleased with the effect of the bright, fun colours i used on the wall outside our bathroom window, although i couldn't reach all the visible angles so i need to find a better way of painting.

then i went upstairs with our coat stand to spray it orange (it took an entire can to cover it properly) and then put a cleaner, prettier coat on the board we found to use as a table (after taking the nails out). i got a bit of a reddish colour on me as i was up there exposed a lot longer than i'd anticipated :(
it was *hot*.

i then took the thesis (and my kindle) to lunch at the coffee shop next door, which was really pleasant, before heading off to visit SxS, serj tankian - elect the dead drumming his magnificent poetry into every fibre of my being. we ended up in the park with a couple of friends who'd taken their kids out to learn to ride their bicycles - their kids were mostly fine, but the hundreds of others tearing about, screaming their heads off and not looking where they were going? where the heck were all their parents looking?!

i drove back a bit later than i'd planned, had a super-fast shower and got dressed so that pg and i could head off to kc's parents' for dinner. dinner was great, loud enough that i barely got a chance to talk (so i felt better about myself), and for the second time (last night being the first) i found myself saying shehecheyanu and really, really meaning it.

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this last year has been absurdly stressful, tough and exhausting; it's been filled with problems and issues and near-disasters... but all of that stuff happened on my terms. and there was so much good stuff that all the unpleasant bits seem petty and short-lived. i've successfully completed my catch-up year, having made a good impression on the faculty and on most of my fellow students, and having thoroughly enjoyed such high-intensity learning; i've managed to find work that affords me a fairly comfortable standard of living, i'm living with a girl who i've been with almost a year and who makes me happy, and i'm writing poetry and i'm not the only person who thinks it's good.

contrasting all of that to the four ugly years of studying as a poor foreigner, followed by six nightmare years in uniform - or even just the traumatizing experiences of 2009 / 2010 - and it's all i can hope for to have another year as good to me as this one's been.

maybe... maybe this year the herd will start turning away from the cliff? may the new year bring us all improvements, in all spheres.

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after dinner we went to visit SxS, who wasn't home yet. his sister and cousin and their spouses were in, though, and we had a good time both before and after he arrived. it was a bit late when we finally left, but i'm guessing that i can thank the last pseudo-ephedrine tablet for that not being too much of a problem.

shit - it's 4am, and i need to run off the unbelievably delicious pavlova before it gets too hot :P