SLIGHTLY ODWAY...

actually no!  i definitely have another thing to say:  "I CAN'T BELIEVE RYAN'S TAKEN ME OFF THE BLOG BOG!!!"
see it would be understandable and acceptable if it weren't for the fact that Matt's blog is still there...  com'on, i miss 1.5 weeks and Matt hasn't even touched his for almost 3 months.  that's a little unfair, isn't it?  do i hear an "Amen"???

how good have i been?  i haven't blogged in a week and a half!!!  that's pretty impressive...
there's not really much i want to say just now, but i guess i could say that i'm not dead.  but i am going to fail chemistry and pd, so therefore i shall soon be dead...
i guess i could also say that my private blog is "no more"!!!  i've opted for the typed hard copy.  it's more reliable in the fact that is less accessible...
i can't wait til trials are over...  this weekend shall be great!  nowra, friends, God, chowing (on food), music, chilling, sleeping, relaxing...  too good!
that's about it for the mo

i posed an interesting point to liz that the reason for Beck to have dropped out of the blogging circle for the while, is because she just wants to appear next to matt on the blog bog...

hehe how funny, i was so absolutely sure i was on worship band tonight.  that's priceless.  oh well i get to blog.  i like blogging.  but i've been so good lately in my attempts to cut down.  how good ave i been?!  yeh i've almost been good.  i only wrote 2 public posts in a whole week plus this one.  yay!
but it's fun to get back on blogger and see that they've added more options and stuff to the toolbars and whatnot.  well i thought it was fun.
i like stuff at the moment, but then i don't.  personally, i'm going absolutely great.  but in the sense of school and stress levels, i guess it's not so good.  i know that as soon as i come out of the english exam tomorrow, i'll be ready to knuckle down and actually do some proper work.  so in knowing this, i've just been doing the english stuff that i'll hopefully be able to remember tomorrow.  but then again, i realised that i was actually studying the wrong material (coz english paper 2 is on wednesday)...  great!
on a happier note though:  Matty G (aka. geldo, matt gelding) and Emma are pregnant!  yay!  i think that's rather exciting...
I don't feel like i should be blogging anymore tonight.  i am limiting my blogging intake
tim banning says "the frogs in the pond are green, except the red ones"...
 

I know I didn’t want to find myself in this situation today, blogging once again, but here I am…  Naughty naughty…
Got home quite late last night (in other words, in the early hours of th’smorning) after Bluegummming and Woolworthsing and Tom’s-placing and caking and happy-birthdaying and driving.  T’was good quality fun.  Muchly cold (7 degrees on the Hornsby thermometer), but muchly enjoyable.  Happy birthday Liz, our fluffy marshmallow, sausage on a bus…  20 years old – how exciting to be properly classified as an adult…
Socialising is good fun.  Only problem is when the folks aren’t too happy about it, and can see straight through your little tricks (of buttering them up – yeh Helen, it didn’t work), then threaten that “you’re risking the car keys”…  That spoils things doesn’t it?  Is it just my parents?  Surely not.  But I completely understand.  I have trials starting on Monday.  That’s a whole three days and four nights.  Wow!  So soon!  It’s when I say it like that that I start to panic and think I really gotta get stuff done and be good and work my little butt off…
But I’m blogging right now (I’m glad I’ve got my priorities straight…).
Because I don’t want Chris to get addicted to blogging, I shall blog for him.  I wonder what he would write?  How would he write it?  I don’t know.  Well, he might talk about his future inventions – Mr Chris is an ideas man.  Like 3D twister – 6 twister mats all joined into a cube and players have handles to cling to (that was my contributed idea)…  Another Chris idea was growing chicken breast cells in labs, as supposed to putting chickens through the pain of cages and all and culling them half-way through their happy little lives for food.
Controversial topic that Chris brought up last night:  Are a socks foot gloves, or are gloves hand socks?
Ok, I think that was it from the Chris list of bloggable moments.  I’m sure he has tons more smarty pants bloggable ideas, but he doesn’t have a blog, so I guess we’ll never know…  Can I make you a blog Chris?  Just don’t get addicted like the rest of us…
Oh and talking about encouraging friends to get their own blogs, I coaxed Tanya Deane into creating her own special blog, which she made a few posts, then deleted them all.  Dam, so close.  Maybe one day…
Liz’s party tonight.  Should be fun.  Since it is a games night and all…  Yay for Liz being so wonderful.  Again, HAPPY BIRTHDAY LIZ!
I like being sneaky.  I like tricking people.  How bad, but then it should all turn out great – hopefully.  Hmmm, maybe you don’t all know what I’m talking about, but I do, so I’m satisfied…  And this could be classed as another moment of trickery by writing this.  But sometimes people make it so easy for you to be sneaky.  I love it…
I think that’s about it for now.  I shall go do some English work… 

Hmmm I have to say, staplers make the best castanets.  Stapling is good fun.  Rubix cubes are fun too.  Computering is a great waste of time too.  Sitting here typing this nonsense blog is entirely valuable.
Last night I had a minor stress about what I’m going to do with my life.  Yes, accountancy is still as gooda career as any.  The main concern is “which uni?”.  There’s no way I’m gonna get into Sydney, Macquarie or NSW.  I don’t particularly want to go to TAFE or college.  I wish someone would come up to me and say “this is what you’re gonna do, this is how you do it, you’ll be great at it”…  Ah, that would be so dam good.  But no, that’s not how it works.  And I don’t wanna move away from Sydney.  I like it here.  The people are nice.  The view is great.  My house will be tops.  I don’t want to have to leave it all.
Thinking about such things has made me play with my stapler again.  I love procrastination.  At least there’s been no way for me to watch videos and all that jazz these hols, coz the VCR and the rest of that stuff’s in a box somewhere.  I think the most successful way of getting me to concentrate on ‘the dreaded study’ would be locking me in a concrete cell, no view, no staplers, no computer, no music, no musical instruments, no swivel chairs, no jackhammering buildery dudes, no phones, no lollies, no chocolate, no rubix cubes, no need to pack up anything, no friends, no emotions, no dilemmas, no responsibilities, no desires to blog…  A room of nothing.  Just me, a piece of paper and an uninteresting writing implement (some pens/pencils seem to amuse me greatly)...
 
Distraction, Desire, Obsession, Addiction,
When honesty and integrity all turns to fiction.
How many lies to keep them content?
So many feelings I wish I could vent.
When will it all be over?  How long will it be
Till I can leap and frolic and be completely free?
Close your stinging eyes, count to ten,
Open those eyes and breathe again… 

Tim Hughes must be the biggest Delirious fan. It was Tim Hughes that wrote “You” wasn’t it? Well there’s a song by Delirious called “My Glorious” and the main line in that song (apart from “my glorious”) is “bigger than the air I breathe”… hmmm what’s with that. And seriously, Martin Smith’s vocal tone colour sounds so similar to Tim Hughes voice – while listening to Glo th’smorn I had to check the cover to make sure that they hadn’t got Tim in as a guest singer, it was that similar. So next time I se Tim I’ll have to ask him about Delirious. I bet he could tell me every little detail about them and all the concerts he’s been to and the times that he’s met them in person…
Oh and just listening to “Intimate Stranger” and it sounds way too much like “You are the one who satisfies” (well I don’t know the proper title). So I dunno who actually wrote these songs, but man they’re plagiarised off Delirious (that is, unless Martin Smith wrote them and takes the credit for them, coz that would be ok – he’s the lead singer of Delirious in case I lost you back there).
Ok so maybe it’s the English accent and culture or something, but man Tim and Martin are just too similar. I think Tim and his songs are completely Delirious influenced though…
But there’s a great song on Glo that could work so well as a worship song. I’ll look into it…
Today sounds fun! Yay I like fun days. But I gotta pack up my fish tank and say goodbye to my silly little fish that I have forgotten to feed since Liz came and fed it on Monday (or was it Tuesday?). Poor little fishy, but hopefully at Janine and Steve’s place it will be happier. After dropping silly little fishy off at Janine’s, straight to the pub I go (for Youth Alpha of course). Then to Manly for fish and chips on the beach with the Youth Alpha crew and then back to church. And then probably maccas after that. And yay I get to catch up with everyone – Chris and Maryanne will be back. They’ve both been away the whole of last week, so I’m getting excited to go see em! YAY!
Does anyone else ever get weirdo nervous twitches? Yesterday I got the good old ‘eye twitch’, and right now I’m getting the ‘hand twitch’ – it’s just shaking away happily to itself.
I have to say I’m not a bagpipe fan. Sorry to all those bagpipers out there, but man they’re irritating. Had to skip a Delirious song coz it was too much bagpipiness for me. And I felt so terrible skipping a song, due to what Tom was saying in his sermon last week. I’m sorry Tom. I didn’t mean to disrespect Delirious at all. In fact, they were disrespecting me by having nasty bagpipes on their album. So there, I feel like I have justified my actions enough – so it’s all Delirious’s fault! Ha! but I still love ‘em.
This has turned out to be a dumb post I say. Hmmm, just lately I’ve been letting myself down in the blogging department. Not so good. not enough controversy and interesting topics. Not that I’m ever very interesting. But the topics I’ve been talking about in my blog of late have been ratehr tedious for even me to re-read…
Ooooh, Martin Smith can’t say “me” (from the song “Jesus’ Blood”) very well – it sounds like an Aussie impersonation. Quite pathetic really. You gotta laugh though. Ha! I laugh at Poms. I can’t wait til Nic gets back and I can knock her for her wannabe accent. We love the English accent, so hearing Nic try will be a kack! ***sigh*** When Nic gets back… the stories she will tell. I wish I could be there. I wish I could see Soul in the City. That would be the best. One day we’ll have a SITC in Sydney. Well I hope so. That would be good. But I do believe that Soul Survivor Sydney will grow and it will be as well known as Hillsong. Well that’s my hopes anyway… Whatever the Lord has planned, I shall be grateful for. Coolies…

i wonder how whistley old kettles work? there's a whistley old kettle at church. it really does whistle- quite musically talented really. how fascinating...

howie's comments really are stuffed! poor howie...

well howdy.
where do i begin?
after yesterday's lack of study, extensively long mobile conversations with courtney, driving to homebush superdome with liz hayes and courtney, being joined by chris (matthew lorne), experiencing a hillsong conference, shenaniganising around olympic park (i guess that's what it's called?), witara maccas-ing, driving tom, chris (m.l.), liz and courtney home, then finally driving myself back home and creeping in at 1am th'smorning, i am rather exhausted. i'm sure if i had written that sentence in microsoft word, it would have got a wiggly green line and told me that it was too longer sentence to comprehend... yeh but i was so about to fall asleep on my drive back home last night, i resorted to farmyard noises ("mooo", "gobble gobble", "oink". "quack" was the most successful in keeping me awake. you should try it sometime...), music up and singing at top of lungs, trying to sing out of tune (which was quite fun...), face slapping, arm pinching, eye opening to as wide as poss, etc. another too long sentence right there for you...
and then... th'smorn in the light hours i became aware that i was awake at 7am when the jackhammers started and there was the ever-pleasant sound of smashing windows...
9:10am at mall for Triple G outing (i think i've said it enough now, but Triple G stands for God's Gorgeous Gals, which is a bible study group for yr 6-8's and Beck and i lead it... just so that i don't have to say it again...). we were all amped up to see Shrek 2 at 9:30am, but silly hoyts had advertised wrong session times, so we decided the 10:30am session would do. so in this free time we had brunch and talked and coles-ed and lollied and laughed. good stuff.
funniest moment was when beck said something like "hey girls, guess what? lauren's got a boyfriend", to which i added "ha! so does beck!", to which the girls replied "oh look, a mug!" and they all ran off to admire this mug... i love innocense.
when the movie was about to start, one of El's teeth came out while chewing a minty, causing bloody tissues and making Shelly-bel almost vomit... but then the movie started and it was great. i have to say shrek's human self completely looks like john mayer (did you pick up on that one Matt???). i don't mean just a little bit like johnny, i'm talking like full-on utter john mayer. Shrek seriously had to be based on John Mayer... well i think. so many great priceless moments in that movie - too good! loved it. i could definitely see it again and again. 10 goods. i loved the fact that i could hear beck laughing at exactly the same moments as me even though we were sitting so far apart Ha! we had to be the noisiest, rowdiest people there in the theatre. but the whole thing was hysterical...
but now i've blogged the past 24hrs worth of galivanting and so i'm content...
and now i shall try to study...

i am so absolutely impressed with God's amazing handywork. He'll never cease to amaze...
i was looking for information about this amazing astronomical event that happened recently (i think Chris found the images, but alas, i cannot). hopefully i shall be able to post them soon... but for now, enjoy these images...
oh dear! how did that get in there! oops...

i think i owe everyone an apology: i'm sorry for the extensive writing now on my blog that i have been doing over the last few days and now been suddenly able to get on the internet (at church mind you) and post. and i'm sorry that i haven't been able to catch up on what everyone else has been doing. i shall try to now. please forgive me?...

yeh well now that that's said, i can ramble some more... so i'm sitting at church, typing away happily on the computer. i'm prolly not allowed to be here, but i find that the church is my 'safe place'. i guess i would prefer to be here than anywhere else in sydney. only problem is that my fingers are so bloody freezing. i have decided to do some blogging now, study after that for a good few hours, then tonight go to homebush superdome for a hillsong conference. sounds good. my house is just too noisy today. yesterday i had decided i didn't mind waking to the sound of a jackhammer - it's less irritating than my alarm clock - more of a dull thudding rather than piecing shreeking sounds. but no, jackhammering is only good to wake you up. when you've been awake a while and you're laying in bed, the last thing you want to hear/feel is the banging of a jackhammer on the other side of your bedroom wall. it sux. yesterday was head-achey, so today i'm taking no chances. i got out of there asap. ok this post is rather boring i just realised. not very controversial or inspirational or encouraging at all... i shall stop now.

I desire to blog because I’ve got so much to say, but it appears that my thoughts are quite haywire at the moment, so I shan’t blog at the moment.

Oh my goodness! There is a crack in my floor boards and I can see through to downstairs! Ok I’m feeling rather in danger. If the floor underneath me decided to give way I would be a gonna. Calm down. I shall trust the builders coz they should know what they’re doing right???

Found a sheet of paper I didn’t know I had. On it was some info about worshipping God. It said some good things. Challenging, but good. And I think it’s important that I share some of it:
“Biblically, worship is all about responding in right ways to God. And the first thing that we must grasp is that worship is primarily about God. While we may pay lip service readily to this fact, in practice it is often quite difficult for us to engage in. We live in a very self-centred world, where self-gratification, self-satisfaction, self-fulfilment and the like drive so much of our activity and determine so many of our responses. If we’re not careful, we’ll find ourselves evaluating our worship in this self-focused way. Of course worship involves me; I am a participant in it. Yet it is not primarily about me or for me.”
Well yeh, I’m much in agreements. Not that I don’t do things for my own glory. Not at all – I’m a shocker; the miss self-righteous queen. But I think we, as Christians, need to be more aware of our selfish desires and consciously be looking more towards glorifying God in everything we do. Well that’s two cents…

I love Liz. She’s great. Came over to my place again today, to drop off some of her old hsc study notes and past papers. And she bought me some study snacks – 2 BLOCKS OF DOVE CHOCOLATE AND A BAG OF STARBURST LOLLIES! How good! Yummo. I’m gonna get off my butt and do some work so that I can eat some. So Liz and I got to hang out again YAYness. I taught her how to play some guitar chords and she did great! Much faster learner than I am. I’m very much impressed Liz. Good on you. What a champion I say!
I wonder how my car is doing? Dad rang up a while ago and said the mechanic dude found something wrong with the steering (well derrrr!) and so it’s gonna take a while longer than expected. I hope they fix that aeroplane buzzing too. That would be nice. I’m getting over that irritating sound…
Chris called and is currently having a massage as we speak. I am so dam jealous. I’ve never had a professional massage. Maybe Chris can get some pointers and tips and give me a massage sometime. That would be nice (hint hint Chris…).
I have 2 great big balls of blu-tac and U-tac now that most of my posters are down. My room’s a saddening sight at the moment – boxes and mess everywhere, and almost bare walls. I don’t get it – mum’s telling me to pack up my room, but dad’s saying that it won’t be for a few months until I must depart. Then the builders say that I will have to move in less than a month, probably within 2 weeks. So who do I listen to and what should I do?

Ok so most people don’t know what the EMO genre/style is even though they listen to it non-stop. So here’s some stuff I found about it in a discussion session about song writing on ultimate-guitar.com (where I get most of my tabs and chordlature from). Keep in mind that I’ve sorted through it a bit and added my own thoughts and deleted useless information…
Well here goes:


EMO's big draw, particularly to college and older listeners is that it bleeds. It's gut wrenching in an intelligent, melodic way and it deals with issues in a very open and honest manner. Also remember that EMO likes dealing with more mature issues. eg. You won't really find any EMO songs about rebelling against authority, while most teen punk is littered with such sentiments. "Anna Begins" by the Counting Crows depicts a guy waking up at night beside his girlfriend and wondering what they're really about. Coldplay's "Yellow" touches on how a girl has everything her way and how the guy can't seem to turn her his way.
EMO singers have notoriously depressing tones. Crows, Staind, Coldplay, Lifehouse, etc the voice produces much of the feel.

Emo lyrics usually express everything you feel in a few, simple catchy phrases. This is accomplished by using those literary instruments (metaphor, allegory, analogy, onomatopeia, wordpainting, etc).
Counting Crows' "Round Here":
"Round here, we talk like lions, but we sacrifice like lambs.
Round here, it's slipping through my hands."
The sentiment of disillusionment just drips in these two lines. To achieve the same effect by using literal lyrics would take much longer, and won't have the same effect. Lyrics shouldn't be literally visual. You're not narrating a story, you should think more along the lines of imparting an emotion.
Coldplay's "Yellow":
“I swam across,
I jumped across for you,
Oh what a thing to do.
Cos you were all "Yellow,"
I drew a line,
I drew a line for you,
Oh what a thing to do,
And it was all "Yellow."
Your skin, oh yeah your skin and bones,
Turn into something beautiful,
And you know
for you I'd bleed myself dry.”
You might think these lyrics are terribly simple but the truth of the matter is that, coupled with Chris Martin's vocal style, it's very well-constructed. The repeating lines show to the urgency of his actions, the line "Oh what a thing to do" highlights the uselessness of what he's done. Then of course comes the required "thesis statement" which is, "For you I'd bleed myself dry". As you said, you can accomplish a lot with a few simple words and this song shows it.


Ok sorry, that was a bit messy. I don’t really know where you draw the line between emo, rock, pop, etc. I guess anything that you class as soft to mid rock would be emo. When I get my internet up and running again, I’ll do a search for more stuff info about the emo genre, but for the moment you’ll have to be satisfied with this info. Or you could always do your own search...

Wow I just found an old old booklet while cleaning up some stuff in my room. It just happened to be the EXTREME 200 YEARBOOK for our youth groups. Wow, the memories are truly fantastic. That’s 4 years of difference and it’s so funny. It’s so interesting to see how people have changed and stayed the same and who’s left and who’s stayed and all that jazz. I’m loving it! I’ll have to bring it to church on Sunday, just for a laugh. All these things I’m learning about people. I think I’ll show it to Tom and we can make one for this year’s Ernie. Oh man we have to!
I think I might cry. I know that sounds so corny, but something about reading about growing up and away and the things we did back then and how it’s so different now has made my heart almost break. I’m not sure if I’m sad or happy. I never thought we’d all end up so changed. I never thought particular people would leave. It never occurred to me that things would eventuate to what it has. Why did so many people leave our group? I wish I had been a better witness. It makes me want to go back and change the way I behaved and the dumb things I said. I wish I had understood Christianity sooner. I wish I was known as the well-behaved kid, the good kid, the Jesus Freak kid, the encouraging kid… Anything but the annoying kid. I never realised I was such a loner. Dam. I think people felt sorry for me. If I knew a kid now that was like me back then, I’d feel sorry for them. I think I really did have a mind case of ADD. Something was seriously wrong with me. I guess there’s tons still wrong with me. I wish people would tell me the detrimental things/habits I do that just aren’t good. I don’t ever ever ever want to be the annoying kid again.
I find it so amusing and upsetting at the same time (because I had been so self-righteous at that stage in my life. I guess I still am, but I’m trying not to) reading stuff that I had written back then. I know I was trying way too hard to look like a profound Christian. I don’t think I was being completely honest with myself or anyone else. How could I have been truly in love with God at such an age, with so much crap going on and so many issues. I am so sure that the leaders could see through me, but I had no idea. Things I wrote included:
Fav song: Like a child by Jars of Clay.
Best thing about being me: Miss helpful and advice.
If my life were made into a movie it would be called: Jesus Child.
See, I’m so pathetic. Why do I say such lies? Ok so maybe I had thought I was a good little Christian girl back then, but I know so well that looking back, I am completely embarrassed that I was such a self-righteous stuck-up snob. Wow I want to kick myself so hard! Stupid, stupid Lauren junior. Never again! I hate the fact that I tried too hard and I was completely see-through. No wonder people didn’t like me. No wonder I was labelled as “miss annoying”. And I was blind to it! I can’t believe myself! I suck man. It’s not that I don’t believe you can’t have God experiences at such an age. No, that’s fine. I probably did have those moments with God. The thing I’m angry with myself about is me being so cocky and sure of myself, and that I was oblivious to the fact that noone really wanted to hang out with me because I was so fixated ‘Lauren’ – me, myself & I. I was so sure of myself and thought that everyone should think I’m the best… I’m still selfish and I still want people to think highly of me though. And I hate that about me! I still say stuff in the hope that people will hopefully go “wow, Lauren’s really got this amazing heart for God. She’s so cool…” Everyone, I want you to know that I’m definitely not perfect. Far from it. I’m very very blessed to have so many fantastic people in my life. And I thank God for all the things He’s been showing me lately. I think maybe I have to get all this crap out of my system so that I can realise my faults and the things I have to fix (or rather that I can ask God to fix), and then I’ll be able to look to the future.
Also in something that Peter H had written in the booklet: “I think we can have an even greater global impact next year, don’t you?” I don’t remember doing anything too special to help the world. Man that’s something on my heart at the moment. I don’t know what doing, but there’s stuff I feel like I’m not getting involved in that I should be. I know I keep on telling myself “after the HSC I’ll do this…” But there you go – when all exams are done, I’m doing stuff! I’m gonna be busy. No sitting around. There’s the soup kitchen in the city for a starting point. I don’t really know where to go from there, but I know God has a plan and He’ll show what He wants me to do. Lord I pray that You’ll equip me with the ears and heart to be receptive to what You’re trying to tell me.

Reading stuff like this makes me determined to push the kids in Ernie to greater levels. It makes me ponder and challenge new ways of encouraging the girls in Triple G (God’s Gorgeous Gals – Beck and my bible study group). I love the fact that we write them letters and hang out and that they’re bringing their friends along. I love that God does stuff even when we’re exceedingly lazy. I love the fact that even if we don’t understand and do exactly what God wants, He’s still the same beautiful, loving, awesome Creator. It’s exciting and scary at the same time that I have no idea what I should be doing to spread God’s Kingdom, but He always seems to provide opportunities. Like last night at the Alpha Course, Courtney, Beck, Leech and I did a ring around and convinced 7 or so non-Christian friends of ours to come along with us and see what it was all about. And they enjoyed it! And more are thinking of coming/have said they will come next week. Our God is amazing! When I think all hope is lost and doors are slammed shut and locked with big fat padlocks and no key, He really does open windows! It’s true. My heart had sunk to the lowest of lows when mum scoffed at the thought of going to see Ian McCormack, but then last night she was so open to my beliefs! The power of prayer really is miraculous! It’s almost scary! I get excited thinking that there is still a possibility for my parents to one day make it to Heaven.

Wow, mixed emotions about so many things! God is good! He’s got a plan. I’m excited to see what happens…

Alas for my room. Alas for my house. It’s looking so bare. Taken down most of my surf posters (had to leave my favs) and I’m planning to box lots of stuff today. Would anyone like a fish (comes with complimentary fish tank!)? It’s small and doesn’t take much looking after. In fact, I only really feed it once or twice a week if I remember at all – it doesn’t mind and it’ll survive anything. Someone surely would like to look after it for a while. You can keep it if you want… I dislike minimalism immensely. I’m scared of the fact that I have to “do without” so many things for the next six months.
Took my bomb to the mechanics th’smorn at 7am (so cold!). My poor car. It’s a bit sick. Supposedly I’m a “car thrasher” says Chris. I guess I am a bit, but I like testing the limits of my bomb. I didn’t mean to, but yesterday I came out of Forest Way shops and skidded round the corner and spun the tyres. I looked like a right old hoon. Some oldie coming out of the petrol station gave me a glaring look, as if to say “damn hooligan”. Oops, naughty Lauren…
Oh no! The builder downstairs just turned up his radio and now he’s singing really badly (I think he’s tone-deaf). Not only that, but he’s singing a Robbie Williams song. Ok now that’s really bad – I wont cope if this keeps up all day. Oh dear…
Last night I had the greatest chat with mum (it’s her birthday today – HAPPY BIRTHDAY MUM! Not that she reads my blog anyway. She doesn’t know how to turn a computer on, let alone find my blog…) about:
* Chris and all that’s been going on there (including the week of prayer – tried to make it as non-christian friendly as possible, and she seemed receptive so YAYness!)
* The Idea of North (TION) and how cool they are – I think mum liked them coz I chucked it on my stereo. I even taught her what accapella means – I like being able to teach mum.
* Nicole going travelling and having Cheryl Ives (Chris's mum) as a mentor.
* Worship leading and the conference Chris and I went to.
What else? I think that was it. But how exciting. I was stressing about that convo, but it went down better than I could have imagined! Praise the Lord. There’s hope for my parents becoming Christians yet. Hmmm…
Ok and now there’s a jackhammer going in the room next to mine. I can open my door and there is a sweaty young lad holding a noisy machine and ripping apart my parent’s wall. It seems so weird that I’m just sitting here typing and all around me is mayhem and dissarray. Hectic! Oh no, the guy downstairs’s radio is now playing that Milsy song “Miss Vanity”. That song annoys me – it makes me think of vanity units and bathrooms and toilets. I think I’m a little too into this renovating business. Heck, we’ve had to do it a few times.
Janine (sister) just rang and said she’ll take my fishy on board so everyone ignore the bit above about the fish tank and all that. Yay that I’m gonna have a chat about accounting and how I should go about it all with Janine sometime during the week. Careers make me uncomfortable. I’m such a hopeless case… I do but then again I don’t want a proper job. So daunting to think that soon I’ll be sitting in a poky little office cubicle and writing reports and drinking more coffee than is good for me and staring at computer screens (which I guess I already do) and knowing that I HAVE to work coz otherwise I’ll get fired… And the fact that I’ll have to go to uni and study for 3 more years sux. One day I’ll be able to sit back and do nothing… Bring on retirement! Can’t wait to go travelling too. Had quite a few conversations recently about travelling overseas, and when would be the best time to do that? The main question for me would be ‘when can I afford it?’ – and to that question, the only suitable answer would be “I can’t even afford a schoolies trip up to my grandparent’s place in Kingscliffe (think Tweed Heads)”… Yeh I’m pretty much stuffed. It’s funny how God always provides, but maybe He doesn’t particularly think it’s necessary for me to go on schoolies. But I want to go. Maybe I won’t. Nobody really wants to come with me, and our whole year is going on some cruise, where they’ll spend their time getting drunk and sleeping with as many people as possible. Not good – not good at all…
Ok, I’ll think of some better things to write later. Off to pack a box of my junk and do a past paper...

I wish I could blog from home. Blogging at church isn’t as enjoyable. I wrote some posts at home and had to save to disk and post them on the church computer. I felt silly. I miss blogging already. So many wonderful things have been happening and I can’t post anything. Supposedly I have to write the whole Chris story and post it. I think I better ask Chris first. He gets back from Forster next Saturday so I guess we can go through it all then. I’m almost tired of telling people what happened. But I’m also excited. It’s a good feeling. And I feel more free (which surprised me, coz I’ve never thought of being in a relationship as a freedom thing). Maybe it’s coz I don’t have to worry about who I talk to (yes I am talking about guys) coz I now know where I stand and I can just be me without worrying about what impression I’m giving across. That’s good I say. And it’s so great thinking of how God’s been working through everything for His purposes (and I guess my benefits too! Praise the Lord!). Oh man, just you wait til I can blog the whole thing. Actually, it will probably be even longer than that 4 page post I wrote a week ago, so you don’t have to read it.
Funny that. You write the most wonderful, exciting post and some dedicated people read it and go “wow that was long but good” and they’ll comment, but then most people will just read the short, unspecial posts and go “yeh, that was dumb”. I seem to get comments on the posts that aren’t very special to me, but the ones that I’ve put heaps into, no one reads or comments… I know I’m being silly coz there are some wonderful people who read my posts and/or comment, and I’m very very thankful that you take an interest in my life and my thoughts and all that. So if you’re still reading this post right to the end, I wanna say a big “thankyou” coz I really do appreciate you. I guess there are some things I write in my blog for my own satisfaction (as a way of releasing tension/thoughts/whatever) that I don’t really mind if people read it or not. But there are also things that I guess I write to get people interested in my thoughts and to make me look better (which is very selfish and quite pathetic really). I think alot of the time I want approval, and I want people to think highly of me so that I will be accepted. I wish I didn’t do that. Right now I’m writing to fill up time (maybe so that the people skim reading this post wont notice the “thankyou” in there somewhere). Sometimes I wish I could control the way my head works. I think I should stop soon. The bathroom is available now, so I’m off to have a shower.
Oh, but quickly – Tom’s talk was good. I want to attempt the challenge of being real and not judging myself about what I should be doing and how I’m a fatty sinner. I don’t know how to express my thoughts on the talk. Shall gather tomorrow… Something about me always trying to come across as a good Christian, with lots of quiet times and God experiences. I guess I’ve always felt the need to be accepted and admired (wow that took guts to say that!). Yeh so there it is! I always want to be admired, to appear holy, and to seem like I’ve got it all together. But I don’t. I never have/had/will have. I ain’t perfect. As much as I try to be, I never ever will be. Ok more revelations about Lauren are coming to your screen tomorrow… (hey yeh, I guess I was trying to be cool just then too – how pathetic of me. I wish I didn’t try so hard…)

Fare thee well Nicole, Chris (and the rest of the Ives family), Maryanne (Ham) and anyone else that I’ve forgotten at this present moment…
It’s strange how the people that you want to be with the most seem to leave. Nic and I had a breakthrough on Thursday night – we chit-chatted about her trip and adventures that she’s going on around Europe – but now she’s left and I can’t chit-chat with my big sis anymore about stuff that’s been happening of late. And Chris left th’smorn too and I’m gonna miss him heaps – just as we start going out (YAY!) we can’t see each other for a whole week. But man I can always just dwell in last week and smile… and Ham’s on a study camp for a week and we were gonna hang out and it’s so hard to find a time to just chat and chill. I wish I was allowed to drive her, but yeh I understand how her parents don’t want her in a car with P plates – hopefully one day…
But yeh, I guess people going away and the phone lines in my house not working and a few other such things will help me concentrate on study this week coming and prevent distractions. These holidays are faring to be non-adventurous and rather bland though. A few good things planned, but there seems to be many a day of study. Which is probably a good thing…
Tonight is another soul survivor refresh night in Turramurra. I like visiting other churches. I think I should do that more often. I’m on BV’s (backing vocals) which is exciting. I like singing. It’s fun. I like God too. He’s fun. We laugh together. YAY! Praise the Lord! Seriously blessed me this whole past week. I haven’t felt so terrific in ages – perhaps ever! I just feel like things are how they are meant to be. Like there are tons of things I can think of that are no good at all, but there are so many more fantastic things that have made me feel so incredibly good! As the ‘cool’ people in my PD class would say (but not necessarily about God mind you), God is 10 goods…
Oh yeh, Jamie’s playing my guitar (my baby!) tonight and I’m getting a lift there with him coz I’m lazy and can’t be bothered to look up street maps today. It’ll be good to have a chat with him, see how he’s doing. Ask him how “his year” is going… I wonder if anyone else will be in the car – I hope not, coz it limits the conversations so much. I love personal convos and it’s so hard to have them when you’re talking with more than that one person.
Hmmm, I wonder what Matty G will say about Chris and I??? I wonder what a lot of people will say actually. Dam Chris going away – it means I have to answer all the questions and cop all the flack (if there is any, which I hope there isn’t, but you never can be sure with these things…). Much prefer to do it with Chris by my side. Wow! Yay! I can talk openly about liking Chris now! That’s exciting. I was truly getting tired of writing exciting stuff in my private blog that I couldn’t share with the rest of the world. Although Tom did find it. Embarrassment plus… Oh well, it’s all good now coz I don’t have to hide my feelings anymore. But good on Tom for being a good pal and not reading my diary even though he had the greatest opportunity. Hmmm please if anyone tries to find my private blog or accidentally bumps into it, I would be much appreciative if you didn’t read it. Feel free to tell me that you found it though. But yeh, I gotta fix it up so that people can’t read it hmmm. Maybe I need some help with that. And I wont be able to do it for a while coz I can’t use the net at home. Bugger…
Back to maths I go…

[‘Twas written on Thursday 1.7.04 at 8:30pm, yet could not be posted then due to phone line malfunction (in other words, the stupid builders who stuffed up the wiring in my house). Well now that’s killed the poetic moment hasn’t it…]

A Week’s Patience
So much to say, so much to tell,
In my thoughts I cannot but dwell.
Too deep to write in this simple place,
Wishing to declare the Lord’s amazing grace.
Yet here I cannot answer, not yet, not today.
Let’s wait for the morrow, when way meets way.
And there in your arms I shall hold you near,
My heart shall beat softly “there’s no more to fear”