you don't mind do you?

Oh Darcy, Darcy, Darcy - you don't mind if i talk to myself publicly do you?

Oh Darcy, Darcy Darcy... *shakes head and giggles inwardly*

What have you done this time?!

Its not my fault really... and it all turned out right in the end - so that counts for something doesn't it???

The fact that I could have gotten my car stolen in the process... well... hmmm...

Maybe I'd better start from the beginning.

So I was staying at Eddy's place (because her parents are out of the country on a European extravaganza and if you knew Eddy then you would know that leaving her to fend for herself is a recipe for total destruction, I mean she did start a fire melting tomato and cheese on toast... without the toast!!... okay so maybe thats taking things a bit far, she has come a long way since then...

Anywho, the point is that I was staying at Eddy's, it was about 11am and I was quite enjoying my lazy day avoiding every bit of uni work piling on my virtual desk by lounging around in my pj's watching episodes of Skins when....

Da da daaaaaaa.............

My phone rings (the message tone), its my friendly neighborhood phone store and they are informing me that they have just gotten some iphones that I have been waiting 2 months for in stock, they cannot legally hold any for me but if I can get into the city in time there should be one for me to call my very own (and Ariel, who was getting one as a belated birthday present)

What?!?! Now?!?! Of all days?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!

But I'm in my PJ's!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It was my day at home!!! (well actually I had planned to be at uni doing a group assignment but my partner had needed to pull out at the last minute due to work commitments - but that is completely besides the point!

I have to get into town NOW.

So, call mum and dad, let them know what's going on, find my bag, get dressed.

Right bag - check, clothes - check, wallet check, what am I missing?.. KEYS! my keys, where are my keys???

Right about now I am running around Ed's house like a headless chicken.

Table! no...

Back table! no...

Entrance table! no...

Spare bed where I dump all my stuff when I walk in?... NO!

where could they be!!!! I need to get to the station *eek*

oh no... oh no oh no oh no... last night... when I dropped some of my stuff in Eddy's car... what if i missed them!!! Quickley. Call Eddy... she's in a lecture... "Do you have my keys?!" You don't know?... okay I'll keep looking

"Mum I can't find my keys... Yes I know there is nothing you can do from work"

"Dad?!... no :("

Okay maybe if I just go outside and look at my car they will miraculously appear in my hands...

Then I see it - the light shining - no, then I see THEM... those oh not so innocent 2 timing, gah!

My keys! They are in the ignition of my locked car!!!!!!

You could see that coming couldn't you? I tell you its all so typically me, the one time I actually need to be a normal being that takes her keys out of the car when they themselves get out an lock the door... it is was just so typically me to forget that most basic of directives on the only day in my recent memory when I truly needed them and there was no one there who could help me.

Anyway, there is a happy ending to my all so pathetic story... my lovely superhero friend Codie took time out of her day off to get dressed and come immediately to pick me up, only to drop me off at the station and go back home.

Oh and I got the phone :D.

lots of hugz

D.

I see red!!!

I discovered something about myself today… I discovered that whilst I am a curious creature, I am most certainly not an anxious type of person (at least when it comes to perceived phenomena)… Oh! And I value sleep above all else.

You see, when I was awoken in the wee hours of this morning by an almost florescent red light streaming through my curtains I wasn’t in the least bit worried. Whilst all over NSW citizens were fearing bush fires, massive terrorist attacks and Armageddon, my thought process following the discovery of this strange occurrence went something like this…

“Since when did next door open up a brothel?”
“No wait that doesn’t make sense”
Pulls back the blinds to reveal an unprecedented amount of red dust
“Oh that’s weird”
Rolls over and gets more sleep…

I don’t know why I didn’t immediately think of all the worst case scenarios, but it might have something to do with the fact that deep down in my head somewhere I was pretty sure that had the light been coming from a bushfire – there would have been a lot more noise and had there been a bomb – there would have been a lot more noise. Also, had a comet hit the earth – I’d expect noise and at least a little Earthly vibrations, and had Armageddon arrived… well I’d at least expect someone to have the decency to wake me up!!!

So having gone through this process there I mustn’t be in any near danger and would therefore be much better off sleeping now and finding out what’s going on later.

Anywho, if the Daily Telegraph’s blog site for what I now know to have been a dust storm is anything to go by then my reaction was certainly in the minority but not without their cohorts.

Grim reaper of south coast said “the dust storm has emanated from the Parramatta District.... seems its been a while since they opened up the trophy cabinet” *hehehe* I like that one… but they’re getting a bit ahead of themselves aren’t they???

Meanwhile Annie informs us/them “A friend from NY emailed me this morning, commiserating that we Aussies are having the same climate change issues as they are in the US. Oh dear.” (Gotta love some good ol’ America bashing… in the light hearted sense here people, we should al laugh at ourselves every once in a while… goodness know I do)

Rightio, that’s about all for now, folks. Just a little post to share with you all.
Much love
D.

Pot, meet Kettle...

A few moments in the tween time on platform 2

As I write this now (well yesterday in my lecture pad) I am sitting on Circular Quay station, platform 2 and the 5:26pm all stops train to Lidcombe has just pulled up. I of course am not all that interested in the train, but sitting in a chair (for those of you who thought I was on the floor) looking through the glass railings to the landscape where the Sydney harbour bridge and Opera House reside, watching the harbour cats and green and gold ferry’s making their stops and waiting for an appropriate time to leave for my next appointment.

Its kind of peaceful now that the train has pulled out (yup time stops for no woman here) and the station is relatively empty, the breeze is refreshingly cool and the flags that border the Quay are swaying gently.

Sometimes it’s nice to just sit. I enjoy it, no matter how strange you think me for it.

The sun is setting and I find that just by taking off my sunglasses the world opens up around me, like all this time I was wearing blinkers and hadn’t noticed, keeping me on track and allowing me to hide myself from the world. I feel a sense of relief at the loss, the scene appears to grow and details become more apparent, the sky seems less foreboding, and with an emerging sense of control and renewed connection to my surroundings it’s all of a sudden easier to smile.

In the distance little dots of people are climbing the bridge in single file, 7 I count. Meanwhile a colony of seagulls fights over a discarded chip from the downstairs restaurants, the battle is won by one and the rest continue cruising about the area, hoping I imagine for another chance. A flash goes off as the climbers take a group shot and then proceed back down again.

The lights are starting to go on, barely visible at the moment but soon to replace the sun with their blue tinged light. I’ve noticed that people are slower in the evening ‘rush’ home. The day is over and most seem spent, void of any outward emotion and just plodding along the well-worn route on automatic pilot. It’s an in between time, the day is over but the night has yet to begin.

I’m waiting for an appropriate time to leave, no rush, but I’m reluctant to be the one to break the bubble I’ve blown in my mind.

A message comes over the PA system reminding me that “if you see an un attended bag on the platform DO NOT touch it and please notify the station authorities ASAP” and “for your safety, security cameras continuously monitor this station.”… bubble goes *pop!*

Another train arrives, and the cycle repeats.

The problem

For the past week I have had this thing hanging over me, you know one of those big dark heavy clouds that sits right above your(?)/my(?)/our(?) forehead, not far enough back that it can be ignored and not so far forward that its all I can see, but just there in that spot where it is annoyingly distracting and forever cumbersome.

The issue I suppose is that I didn’t really know what the issue was, just that something was not right and needed addressing for my sanity (just to understand the issues even if I have no way of solving them).

Anyway, eventually, well about Thursday actually, I though I had it all figured out… its Investment Analysis (a subject that is currently a pain in my ass at uni), no its my Finance sub-major (the reason I am forced to take investment analysis in the first place)… yes they are the issues… and if I could just get rid of them, then all of my worldly problems shall be solved…

But my storm cloud was/is still there, and I didn’t know what but there was something bigger that was/is bugging me and has been for almost three years now… and the most annoying part of all this is that someone stole the words right out of my head... Paul Sheehan of the Sydney Morning Herald is the reason that I couldn’t find the words to vocalize these feelings that have been festering within me (ok so remind me not to get to graphical in my metaphors because I have a feeling it could get ugly) because he stole the words from my mind and published them in yesterday’s paper.

Here is the link for those who wish to have any clue as to what I am talking about: http://www.smh.com.au/national/loneliness-of-the-university-liberal-20090911-fkqc.html (if it no longer works as you read this and you really are desperately in need of this knowledge then let me know and I’ll send you a copy)

And on a side note I would like to warn anyone who is still reading this (and congratulations because if I haven’t confused you yet then it’s a miracle) that what you are about to read is some very raw material – much like most of the stuff I write here – that I have typed up and pressed publish without a second thought i.e. before I have the chance to get embarrassed and delete. It is NOT a fully formed argument and hasn’t even been researched in any depth whatsoever but comes from my experiences and perceptions of the world around me…. That being said I’ll do my darndest not to sound like you’re A-typical disillusioned uni student… and, now that I have a tub of ice-cream in my hands (cookies and cream connoisseur woo-hoo!!!) because lets face it, even though I haven’t been able to think of anything else since I read this article (yes I’m just a tad i.e. very obsessive like that), I still need some fuel to get those creative juices flowing… let us continue…

Okay so obviously (or not so obviously as I have not yet expanded on what exactly I am saying here) my issue is not with the politicized left or right wing nature of the content being taught at uni… I mean I could write a whole essay on my frustration with Australian politics and the fact that as an intelligent young Australian woman with the right to vote, and even with my best efforts to understand and make informed decisions about the people and their policies and beliefs that we elect to help shape Australia into a country we/I could be proud of in the future… well I STILL know more about American politics and policies than I do our own… but I don’t vote in the USA I vote here – so what use is that to me!!!!

No, what resonated with me was the underlying argument behind the article, that “theory-dominated universities are divorced from practical realities” and the presence of an “ideological bias of the faculty, and the subtle pressure to conform”

What I have found in my last 2.5 years of university life is that there is a serious expectations gap between what I believed university study would be and this cold harsh reality.

I don’t know what I expected from uni really, well yes I do although I also realized it was slightly impractical (teachers and students sitting in semi circles on desks and chairs discussing what they had learnt in lectures, reading etc, feeling free to have opinions and share their points of view and having these challenged in a relatively safe and non judgmental environment so the group as a whole could form their own overall pictures)

In other words, I wanted an escape from school where a syllabus was shoved down my throat and I could have opinions of my own only as long as I didn’t expect to get any marks or be taken seriously for these opinions in my final essay  (okay, okay yes I still have a few issues with English, leave me alone, they will take years and years of therapy to fix but I’m trying to move on with my life)

I thought that after 13 years of being told what is true and correct, right and wrong, that I would finally be taught or at least encouraged to think for myself. To make assertions, test hypothesis, discuss, debate and critically analyse. To forge the tools that would enable me to be able to better evaluate the goings on around me. That I would find myself in a place filled with a cosmopolitans bunch of people intent on learning, discussing and challenging their preconceptions, where an open mind was an asset and not something to be frowned upon and thrust aside just to get the marks required to pass (okay I’m pretty sure I just said the same thing about 3 times, well hopefully it gives you an idea of the over all thoughts cycling, zigzagging and just plain creating havoc in my head).

But what I got was a million miles from anything I ever expected, instead of being different to school it is worse, with so much content jam packed into the syllabus there is barely enough time in the week to do all the readings, homework questions and to work through the answers in tutorials.

In order to be able to work effectively in an increasingly knowledge driven society I feel like I need to have the ability to deconstruct or construct and argument and follow a line of reasoning to get to a conclusion. The conclusion doesn’t matter, or I don’t think it should matter, not for now anyway. Any dim witted person with half a brain can wrote learn some of the crap (sorry I’m getting a little angry here, and using sweeping generalizations without backing them up with real examples… well that’s my prerogative for now ok!) that I’m being taught, and most of it feels like the type of stuff I could easily learn and comprehend on the job and if I had wanted that then I wouldn’t have bothered wasting 3 years of my life paying for study whilst earning very little.

My perception of Sydney universities is that they may talk the talk, but in the end they are all barely any different to your average trade school, taking in, churning up and spitting out ‘professionals’ left right and centre, with degrees tailored for one specialised area of work in order to take on a role in a world we barely begin to comprehend and without the tools to enlightenment (not sure I really mean to use that word but atm it’s the only one that seems to fit).

Hey look, maybe I just chose the wrong degree, but having limited resources, my first consideration was what would provide me with the best job prospects/stability in the future (rightly or wrongly so). After all, I can understand that you do want a graduate of engineering or architecture to understand what makes a building structurally sound and a medicine to know the difference between the dorsal aorta and the brachial artery, but there must be a line somewhere.

Okay, so I think that about does it for my rant of the day… you can all now breathe a great big sigh of relief *sigh*… now the only thing left is to sum up my argument, only I don’t really have an argument, so by extension I’m having issues with my summary. I suppose I’m just feeling a little disillusioned right about now. I have my ideals, perceptions and perspective and I thought uni would challenge these. So far however, no challenges just scripture preaching and my thought are left by the wayside incomplete and unexplored.  When I finish my degree I don’t just want to blindly walk out into ‘adulthood’ and be expected to take my place in societies structure which I barely understand, working towards a goal I can’t comprehend to solve problems I’m not sure even exist (or are the ones that need solving).

Now, if only I could come up with a solution…

Much love and apologies for the essay
D.

DARCY HAS WRITER'S BLOCK!!!

(and yes that does most certainly call for caps)

So, I devided last week that I wanted to have a more regular pattern for my posts... like one every Tuesday and Thursday to be exact and any others that I felt the need to publish would be  bonus but Tuesday and Thursday were a must.

*hehe...he* umm.... maybe I'm just no good with deadlines or performing on demand, or maybe life in general has hit a plateau, or I'm just not paying enough attention because I've got nothing, NADA, my mind is blank... one big black hole that refuses to produce anything of worth.

Then again, Taxation Law isn't exactly the subject I'd use to get the creative juices going... well actually its great for the day dreaming but since I don't particularly want to change the rating of this blog... I think I'll just keep them to myself :D *angel halo*

Anywho, this is all just a long, drawn out way of me saying that I'm in a creative and general funk... too much time alone (while I love it) makes Darcy a boring person... and it also makes us talk about ourselves in the third person and royal plural at the same time :-P

The case of the misguided internet purchase...

So I alluded to it in my last post... I gave you a teaser... Darcy strikes again!!!

I can at least console myself with the fact that the only people who know about my most recent - well I don't know what you call it - are myself and my mum and well now I suppose whomever chooses to read my rambling :D

So please, allow me to set the scene:

I, lovely little Darcy sits at my laptop exploring my 'local' online bookstore (local being a relative term as they are in fact based in the UK but have free shipping so work out cheaper in the end). On this particular day I am searching for books on corsetry (I'm making up words again aren't I?) and lingerie making (you know, patterns, pictures, factual stuff) because if I don't have time to make then then I might as well read about making them and try to gain some practical knowlege via osmosis. Make sense to you? Well it did to me and thats all that counts.

Anywho, by chance I stumble upon a book called, well lets just call it "A History of Lingerie" for that is what pertained to be.

Now don't go an ruin the fun already, I know that alarm bells may be ringing for some already but they weren't for me... In my mind was the beautiful book of corsets that I already own that shows close up pictures of all their intricate details and even some instructions and patterns to re-create them... I suppose though you can guess that that was not to be...

In any case below you shall find the books description as listed on my bookstore site...

This is an intimate exploration of the props of our theatre of desire.Since the beginning of civilization, women have worn underwear. Justified as protection, or a hygienic necessity, this "second skin" was devised to satisfy perverse erotic instincts. A "trap laid by Venus" to entertain and stimulate the fantasies of both the woman who wears them and the man who discovers them. Corsets, bras and panties are not utilitarian items - they are elements in a mystic ritual linking man and woman. They act as an obsessive focus for fantasy, for the sex they conceal is powerless without the decorations and seductions which separate us from it. Pleasure would perish without censorship.Women have always known how to stimulate the latent fetishism of the men around them. Under her dress, a Greek girl of the classical period would wear a belt around her hips which was of no practical use except to draw attention to her feminity. Likewise, the women of Rome already wore garters round their thighs, though the stocking had not yet been invented. In our own century, vamps, starlets, pin-ups and models have filled our cinema screens, our advertising hoardings, our office calendars and our imaginations with the erotic engineering of the garter belt and the surreptitious rustle of nylon stockings."Dessous" traces the evolution of this living mythology from its first steps in the dawn of civilization to its apotheosis in the films and advertising campaigns of the modern world. Lavishly illustrated, it demonstrates how the conflict between the need to conceal and the will to reveal has provided women with the means to explore their own sexuality and exercise an erotic ascendancy over men. The result is a richly aphrodisiacal meditation, an intimate exploration of the props of our theatre of desire.

Okay, so obviously it isn't all that completely innocent, some could even say I should have guessed... BUT I DIDN'T I SWEAR I DIDN'T!!! I can not deny that I knew it would be somewhat, how should I put it, risque??? But in all honesty from what I read above I assumed that it would be an essay type thing on the history of stuff mixed with culture of the times etc, a sort of history from the perspective of the fashioable undergarments of the time if you will... and it is... for the first 21 pages worth of introduction... followed by another 550 pages worth of what can really only be described as soft porn.

Yes thats right, (you know I don't think of myself as being particularly prudish but I find myself blushing everytime I think about this book being mailed in an envelope bearing my name and address in bold print, and even more so when I imagine the possibility of my dad stumbling across it in our library and wondering why such a book is inbetween my Harry Potter and Artemis Fowel novels...) I bought one of those books that I probably wouldn't be caught dead looking at in a real store... and I didn't even know it!

Then again, once you get past the poses, breasts and genetalia that is occasionally just out there in the pics, some of the lingerie is really quite nice or pretty or "interesting" - as I of course felt it was my duty to examine properly due to the fact that I did spend my hard earned cash on it and I knew this escapade would end up on the www and well I was trying to proove to myself that I wasn't a prude okay! - But then again some of it is just a bit 'hows it going there' and I think it'll take me a while to desensitise myself enough to venture in again... oh the double entendre's *meep!*

So it is here that I find myself after this whole debacle that is not so much a debacle as me being silly, sitting with a book that I am barely able to look at without blushing let alone read, so I figured the best thing to do would be to let you know about it... what do you think???

Guess who's back???? ;-D

Guess who's back (back back)
back again (gain gain)
Darcy's back (back back)
tell a friend (end end).....

Okay that was just sad.... lets not talk about that little adventure again shall we? good.

Anywho I'm back :-D mwahahahahahahahahaaaaaa

after a month overseas, and hitting the ground running, I felt that (read just had other priorities) I needed to take a month or so off to get my life back in order...

but don't worry I return with many 'Darcy stories' to tell (like a little situation with an online bookstore and a book that is so very not what I thought it was... *eek* - but more on that in another episode) and some completely new adventures like - "Darcy gets a grown up job!!!! Heheheheeeeeeeee (well kind of grown up, its a summer job...)

I do declare, I mean I know that there are lots of applications to sift through and they have to fabricate some means to differentiate us all, but seriously... the questions!...

I really just need a release... there is all of this pent up frustration as I try to answer in a fashion that will be both truthful to myself and actually get me a chance of an interview....

I just need to let it out!!!

I NEED to tell someone, anyone! (not that I consider you to be just anyone :P) What it is that I REALLY feel like saying...

so here goes... a job application... what I really want to say...

Name: Darcy
E-mail: Darcy@thewatmthofsunlight.blogspot.com

WORK EXPERIENCE...
Employer 1: Newsagency
Position: Shop assistant
Nature of work: generally standing around chatting about the weekends footy/cricket/insert any recent sporting event here, reading trashy mags such as NW, Woman's Day, Famous, New Idea, Who, etc... reading slightly less trashy mags such as CLEO and Cosmopolitan and SHOP!... reading photography mags... Ummm... watching Eddy and Sunnyboy having goes at each other for this and that, laughing and refusing to choose sides... running round and round in circles in an attempt to escape the clutches of Eddy as she attacks because I thought that in this case Sunnyboy was correct... watching slightly not so legally downloaded episodes of "The Big Bang Theory"... getting caught in various compromising circumstances (I don't have to name them explicitly do I??? surely you haven't forgotten... oh and then occasionally we do actual work like serving lotto and helping customers... but that's really just an aside...

Employer 2: 'the' gym
Position: "Membership consultant"... whatever that means...
Nature of work: Swiping peoples bar codes to enable them access to the gym, cleaning, sleeping, twiddling thumbs, reading trashy mags, giving myself a manicure, completing uni homework, counting bricks, staring at the ceiling, tapping my feet...

List any prizes and awards you have received as well as any societies you are a member of: School, university & community activities: Sporting, hobbies, other interests:
Okay look here people, in high school I was one of 'those' overachievers... you know the ones... anyway, it turns out that being one of 'those' overachievers is no fun, not healthy and gets in the way of any kind of social life that I may or may not want to have... so... since high school I have made a conscious decision NOT to partake in such activities... in fact... since uni started I have basically made it my business to do nothing of any substance at all... I go to uni, I go to work, I do enough to pass, and I see my friends on weekends (recent weeks discluded)... that and I haven't had the TIME to be an over achiever for the last 2.5 years as I have been spending all of my time trying to afford my overseas vacation, thankyou very much. Full stop. Who gets prizes at uni anyway?!?!?!
But I do like to read, and sew, and read, and take photo's, and read, and watch "the West Wing," and my utmost favorite past time of all is just to lye of the ground or sit or whatever and stare off into space and think about nothing or everything or everything.

What attracts you to a career in X?
Well if you really want to know I have no idea. I don't even know if I want to have a career in X. The main problem may be that I just don't know what I wish to do once I leave uni, there is a world of possibilities out there and I am clueless as to where to start. So this is where it begins, I apply and see how it goes.

What attracted you to apply for a Summer Vacation role with X?
Its a simple equation really: X is offering paid summer vacation positions = I apply

What strengths and skills do you believe you can bring to X?
Strengths? Strengths? I'm a uni student - not even a grad student yet! What 'strengths' do you think I will be able to bring to X??? I am a team player, a fast learner, clear communicator, blah blah blah...

(on a side note why is it that I always feel like these questions require me to sell myself, that's right I am aware of what it implies, but honestly I feel as if right next to team player I should be telling them that "and I'm 5'something", a 12E, with curly brown hair and eyes... vent finished, back to the dream application...)

Why do you want to work in your chosen service line?
ummm....???? because. :-D

Have you undertaken a leadership position over the past 2 years?
No.

Please describe your leadership experience? (min 1000 characters)
I've had lots of leadership experience but to be honest I prefer to just be a part of the team. And lets be honest, you may declare to the world that you value leadership in your employees but if everyone was a leader nothing would ever get done. A mix of personalities is necessary for every organisation to run smoothly. So how about I don't answer this question and you don't read my pathetic answer and we just forgive each other an move on... yes? good :)

Is there anything else you would like to add?
Please hire me, I promise I don't disappoint in person, and in fact I think I probably translate must better when given a problem to solve so I feel good and you can see what I'm really like... but you'll never know if you don't ask me in ;-)

THE END... next week on the warmth of sunlight - Darcy gets an interview (or more) and has another one of 'those days'... and if your lucky I'll even go back in time and find some more pics if Europe to show you...

D.