It's a long weekend, not that it means anything to me, my whole life is one long weekend lately... not for long. I have two more days here, and then I am transplanted onto the other side of the world, into a country I've never been to before, into a job I've never done before. The phrase 'what the hell am I doing' has been circling through my mind quite a bit. I don't think it hit me that I was really going until I sent my second suitcase off on Wednesday (had too much to take on board, so sent it as freight)... I stood there thinking that I guess I must be going to Japan now since my suitcase is.

The past week has been very busy, lots of running around and getting things organised... I think I've got it all covered though, all the permits and money and various bits and pieces... I'm sure there's something I'm forgetting but hopefully it's nothing major. On Thursday night I had a farewell dinner and it was quite a good night, had the chance to catch up with a few people that I may not have seen before I left otherwise, and it was quite a good night.

The main task of the weekend has been re-formatting my computer, which is just about done, so I am finally able to update with my laptop, which will be coming along with me to Japan. I have about a million drivers to download, and have been connected to the IBM website for a couple of hours already, may be here all night...

Actually, the biggest task of the weekend has undoubtedly been giving my cat away. The Lawyer will be looking after him for the year that I am away, so we took him over on Friday to give him the long weekend to get settled. We spent a few hours at her place and by the time we left Buddy had done a great deal of exploring and seemed very comfortable in his new surrounds, and he also seemed to take to the Lawyer extremely well. We visited again today and although he was very pleased to see us he was fine in our absence, is adjusted to being outside pretty well and spent last night snuggling with the Lawyer... I think I've got the right person for the job for sure. I've been missing the little guy like mad already, but at least I know that he'll be well looked after.

I have started another blog for while I am overseas, where I'll post photos and more general family-friendly kind of stuff, cos there are bits in here that I'd rather some people did not read :) Anyway, if you read here and would like the new one, drop me an email and let me know, alright? I'll still be updating here, but perhaps not as frequently since I'll have two to keep up and I'm bad enough at keeping one :)

Finally, last item of business... Ms Infernality has passed the baton on this wee survey, so I spose I should comply...

1. Total no. of music filed on your computer: None at present, since I've just got this laptop and just formatted... won't be that way for long, I hope!

2. The last CD I bought: It's been a while... I bought three at the same time - PJ Harvey "Uh Huh Her", John Butler Trio "Sunrise Over Sea", and Franz Ferdinand. Most recent aquisitions were a bunch of old stuff that mum burnt for me.

3. What is the last song you listened to before writing this? That would probably be something on the car radio today but I don't have the faintest idea what it was!

4. Name five songs you often listen to or which mean a lot to you:

a) Goddess on a Hiway by Mercury Rev - I completely fell in love with that song and then the band, and it kind of seemed to have some meaning for me at a time when I was driving around the country a lot and leaving boyfriends in other states and stuff :) In my last year of my first uni degree, when I was still an insomniac, I listened to Deserter's Songs in the dark nearly every night and I always think of it that way, it is a dark album, but has such a stark beauty and a tragic romance that I found very appealing around age 19 or so... and still do :)

b) Owen's Lament by Augie March - purely because I think it is the most gorgeous song... also Here Comes the Night, because it reminded me of the Greek and I think I played it almost incessantly after we broke up, I had a live version on a tape in my car and would sing along as loud as I could with all my heart.

c) Dance Me To The End Of Love - it is a beautiful Leonard Cohen song but the version I think of is one done by Monsieur Camembert, it gives me wonderful memories of my first Woodford Festival where I saw MC three times and where I met the Boy. We were going to have MC play at our wedding and this would have been the first song we danced too... and who knows, may yet be...

d) I guess I will have to go with Ms Infernality also and pick a Whitlams song, for the same reasons - even though I'm not really a fan of the band anymore I met a lot of really good friends through that band and had a lot of really good times. My pick would be You Sound Like Louis Burdett - it makes me think of all the times I bopped along at a gig and sang 'all my friends are fuckups, but they're fun to have around' to the mate who was standing next to me at the time (often the Lawyer, sometimes Carraway if I was in Sydney... and in the end, this is what the gigs were to me, a chance to catch up with my friends.

e) Replaced by a Shadow by Leonard - probably a very select few have heard this one, Leonard is the band that my ex, the Tall Guy, used to be in. I used to hate this song because it was about a time when I had dumped him, but it grew on me, it's actually a good song, and it's meaningful to me because it's the only song that anyone has ever written about me, and that's kind of special.

5. Which three people are you going to pass this stick on to: I hate making people do these things, but I am interested in what my fellow music lovers might have to say - Carraway, Veej, and Ophelia. Knock yourselves out.

Well, hopefully those drivers are a little closer now... that is all, goodnight.

Before After

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