Life in 2D/3D

A few months back, my grandmother passed away. Since then, i think about her often. Certainly more often than i thought about her when she was alive. I feel guilty about that - it's so easy to take it for granted that someone who has been in your life since you were born will always be there. You always think there will be time to visit later, to catch up when your life isn't so hectic.

I think about her a lot, and i think about how little i understood her. I think that since she passed away, i have come to understand her much better than i did when she was alive. Her death has brought back a lot of memories about her that i would never have rememebered if she were still around. It suppose it seems odd to spend a lot of time reminiscing about things in the past when someone is still around to have new times with and that's why it only happends after they die.

It's just little things, like something she said to me, or a look on her face. I try to remember her from when i was younger - when she was younger. I try to remember her the way that i think she would want to be remembered - young and happy and able to do things for herself, how she was before the arthritis crippeld her and old age took it's toll.

When she passed away, it wasn't a surprise - we knew it was only a matter of days before she left us. I just never expected that i would feel so strongly about her passing, so many months after the event.

I didn't expect that i would miss her this much.

I am spending today cleaning. It has been way too long - i can tell because as i move things around, i'm discovering that surfaces that i was certain were a dull greyish colour are actually just covered in a protective coating of dust.

It's making me think twice about buying a house. I'm now only a few months away from being able to buy my first home and the thought of the dusting involved in an entire house is enough to put me off.

I wonder how much a housekeeper would cost?

I must get back to work. Blogging is just one of many excuses i have found in the last hour to take a break from cleaning. I may be back soon. How many times can you use the same excuse in one day, i wonder?

I've succumbed to the peer pressure and bough myself an ipod. I'm a technology junkie, so what can I say, I was helpless to resist!

The main reason that I finally decided to buy one was the idea of a 'podcast'. For those that don't know, a podcast is kind of like radio by subscription. But free. You set up your program to automatically download audio files as they become available. I only subscribe to one, which is the podcast for the afternoon radio show on Triple M (105.1 FM). There's something about this show that I find incredibly funny - it's the kind of show that makes you want to stay in the car longer. They only podcast the funniest bits of their show (or what they consider the funniest bits), but I like that I can download it onto my ipod and listen to it at work, where I don't have a radio (there’s no radio reception in a cave).

I think you can tell a lot about a person by the radio show that they listen to. Here in Melbourne, there's about 5 or 6 main radio stations that everyone listens to, and everyone knows the people that listen to them. One of the stations is for teenyboppers and people who've just turned 18 and get drunk every night. One is for people over 50 who call new music "that noise you listen to!". One is for the 'alternative' type of person - these people are always defending their radio show and putting down the more commercial stations. AM radio is for business people and your grandparents.

Triple M is sort of more like your eclectic station. They play pretty much anything and everything, which I think is why I like it. You can be listening to Rob Thomas and then hear a Tina Turner song. It's a bit of everything and I get bored with my music a bit too easily to just listen to one sort.

For anyone with an ipod (or even without, all you need is free the program 'ipodder') who is interested, the podcast address is:

http://www.triplem.com.au/rss_melbourne.xml" title="http://www.triplem.com.au/rss_melbourne.xml" target="_blank"http://www.triplem.com.au/rss...

I always speak too soon and manage to jinx things. Funny how things work out that way. My elation over being finished my work catalogue has gone right out of the window all thanks to my printer.

He was supposed to arrive on wednesday with the proof so that i could check it over, approve it and the thing could get printed. By thursday lunchtime i still hadn't heard from him. At 4pm the phone rang and it was him, calling to tell me that they'd run into a problem that had held things up. As it turns out, the very time consuming way in which he had instructed me to prepare the files was incorrect, and they now needed them made differently, or the pages wouldn't line up. It's a little upsetting to find out that those last six months of long and tiresome work WERE ALL FOR NOTHING.  We sorted out a solution and he promised me he'd be in today with the proof. I'm at home now and when i left work at 5:30pm, he hadn't shown up or even called to say he wouldn't be there.

Now my elation has turned to irritation. By monday, he will have had the files for a week and i will have had nothing in return except the wonderful feeling of knowing that i could have been spending my evenings at the pub instead of in front of the computer.

IT'S DONE! IT'S COMPLETE!!!! The last 6 months of being too busy to have a real life are over!

Yesterday the first official catalogue for the company i work for went to print. It has been a long, hard slog to get the thing done, but finally, the problem is out of my hands. I am free to have a life once more.

You wouldn't guess, by the amount of time it has taken, that the thing is only 28 pages long. The better part of those last few months has been spent going back to the drawing board and starting all over again because the business keeps changing. I have probably created oer a hundred pages for this catalogue, only to have to toss them as suppliers go out of business, deals fall through and products change. But yesterday the printer came and picked up the files and in a week and a half i will be able to hold 12 months worth of hard work in my hands. I think we should have ordered more copies, because i am going to be so excited that i will want to give one to every person i have met ever.

it's a very exciting feeling to work on such a huge project for so long and at the end of it to show it to your bosses who praise it and then are willing to spend tens of thousands of dollars on printing it. To have someone spend so much money on something that i created - that i thought up - is insanely thrilling. I should have studied graphic design at school. I would have if i'd known that it would give me this much of a buzz.

I think i will go and celebrate at the pub now that i have the time!!!