Rob

Hi All

Thailand was totally awesome. I've posted photos on my Facebook (I'm totally addicted to Facecrack/Crackbook). Search for me - Rob Breen - Australia (d'uh). :-D

I'm flying to Bangkok in three hours, forty minutes! (@ 1655, 23-Aug)

*** EDIT!! On reading through, this entry isn't particularly witty or well/amusingly written. Rather than be disheartened, I'm using this as motivation to update again, more regularly and better once my laptop is back from the repairers tomorrow. This current re-internetification is a result of me almost losing my entire hard drive, including all my White Wolf stuff (My Australian-based Mokole game stuff and Jay's Hengeyokai story stuff, the thought of losing either of which made me want to cry). I get the computer back tomorrow, I'm backing all data up and I may start reading through my White Wolf stuff when I do... I hear there's this new World of Darkness... ;-P ***

I get my laptop back tomorrow - yay! And I've decided to update my LJ again... It's only been 5 months since last time! :-P I'm like the worst internet-updating person ever.

I have a shiny new camera (the good Dr - hehehehe, now that he is - got it for me for my b'day). With said camera I can upload photos! Haven't taken any yet, but I will! I especially want to upload photos of the view from our apartment, for it is truly delicious. Well, it's delicious if you're smart enough to realise Sydney is a beautiful city to look at. My uploading may be somewhat hampered by my lack of knowing how to do the uploading of the photos... :-P

Anyway, life still going well. Busy as HELL! Almost half way through the first year of my B Economics. By end of next year I'll also have finished a Masters of Applied Finance. I am crazy, backwards, over-scheduled study guy. Ph3ar my l337 wrath, etc. Oh, and I still work full-time. AH!

Luckily though, I've somehow managed to strike a balance. The man-cake and I have been hitting the gym regularly and I've been trying to run and swim a few times a week - though the last couple have been kinda fat weeks, all weights no running/swimming. My goal is to get back to the meaty 70kg I was in 2003 before I quit uni, fell into depression, starved myself and dropped to a Holllywoodtastic/hideous 59kg. I'm currently 66.5 and up from 62 last year, and gaining! HOORAY! It'd be quicker if I'd go the roids, but like ew, who's going to do that.

Once again, I"ve rambled my way through an LJ article, spewing freeform thoughts and refusing to edit! Editing is death, because once I start I obsess over every sentence and end up deleting everything.

Oh, I also read The God Delusion, then decided to read all Dawkins books from the start. I recently finished the Selfish Gene - it was a life-changing book for me, I feel it did what the God Delusion tried to do even better. My heart fluttered and I felt giddy with excitement reading some chapters. Yumm-O!

Okay, now I"m sleepy. Oh, and I've been drunk during this post, in case you're wondering.

...

There is no Dana, only Zuul.

Taylor's 2004 Cabernet Merlot + Scrubs on DVD + iTunes = a fantastic Saturday night in.

I'm doing my best to avoid going out this evening. It's very difficult, a friend of mine is celebrating his 18th birthday at the bar that's basically just out my front door.

Life continues to be amazing, folks. They say Fate is a wheel... but I'd like to think if you pass good Karma out into the Universe, then perhaps you're permitted to climb backwards along the spokes of Fate's wheel, so that you can always stay on top and don't have to suffer another turn for the worse. Finger's crossed, yeah?

I'm still studying, just finishing off my Diploma of Financial Markets and starting my Masters of Applied Finance and Investment! Hooray! Don't know what comes after that, maybe a Law degree. I dunno.

I've started learning Spanish. I wanted to do Mandarin, but Ant was too scared to do it with me and we wanted to do the same Language so we could study together. I suppose being the... 3rd?... most commonly spoken language in the world it's not a bad one to learn. Is it true that a third of people in Los Estados Unidos speak Spanish? That's pretty cool. Go the bilinguilism!

Haven't been to gym since last year. I'm still hotter than a hot potato, but I've lost all my definition and I'm still pitifully without sufficient bulk. Just haven't been bothered, really. Still need to reformulate my plan of attack for that one.

Have been buying White Wolf books - Mage & Werewolf - but haven't read the last couple I've bought. I am so behind!

Just a little update, this one. Love y'all. Take it easy.

From Jamaica to the world - It's just love, it's just love... YEAH!

(slightly drunk)

What Planet Are You From?


this quiz was made by The Autist Formerly Known As Tim

Time is currently 7:24am on Saturday 4th March 2006, the day of the 2006 Sydney Gay & Lesbian Mardi Gras Parade, the culmination of what is one of the worlds biggest festivals of its kind. This'll be my first Mardi Gras since being fully out and about! Last year I went to a "straight" dance party with my uni mates, but this week it’s gay all the way. I'm really excited.

Ant's going to be there, having flown back in the country from his 2.5 month secondment to work/study in hospitals in the US (Denver/Vale & New York City). He arrived last Friday, so I've had him for a good week by now. God, it's good to have him back. It just isn't crumpets for us to be apart for so long. We spoke on the phone almost every day.

But it was a great experience for both of us, we had a lot of fun during our respective Winter (Ant)/Summer (Me) and if we learnt nothing else, we learnt that we really do want to spend the rest of our lives together. I can only hope and do what I can to see that we'll be able to forge our union under law and thus the recognition of our relationship by society at large.

We have these friends of ours Adam & Phillip. Phillip is a UK citizen and they're planning to move to the UK sometime this year. They recently discovered from a friend (following the legislating of same sex civil partnerships) that they could unite under the law simply by going to the British Consulate here in Sydney - the consulate of course being UK soil. Of course, the union won't be recognised in Australia, only the UK and other countries with similar laws, but it's still a big deal! So, Thursday night was their engagement/wedding party/drinks at a really nice bar near where I live. They originally weren't going to have a party and didn't think when they decided to that anyone would show up. In their speeches, they remarked how the overwhelmingly supportive and genuinely excited response their friends and loved ones were giving them only made the significance of it all grow and grow.

They're a fantastic couple, great to talk to: their views on their relationship and relationships in general have really been an insight to me. Afterwards, I really did yearn for Ant and I to be given the chance to do the same thing. For me, marrying/partnering (whatever) is important and a big deal for all the reasons I imagine most people think of straight away, but also for another reason which I may be alone in feeling, but rings clear and true to me.

By joining together under law and under the eyes of society and more importantly those people close to you, you bind yourselves to an oath; you have a responsibility to the community and to the people who support you to make it right. Without some kind of legal status, a union would to me (and this is only my own feelings) feel somewhat shallow, as it's an oath only to yourselves and to your closest family. But having your coming together written according to the laws of the land makes the whole thing more serious, scarier, but again - far more exciting.

Of course, then there's my desire for children, the first of which we'll probably have in about 5 years, as Ant, 27, wants to have his last child by 35, which gives us only 8 years. Let me tell you, the idea of becoming a father within 5 years is scary. But hopefully the right time will become evident - once we're both working steady, earning good money and have the capacity to take (paid or unpaid) paternity leave. But that's getting was ahead of ourselves - we don't even live together yet! Though we must soon, it's just not right living apart anymore. For all the right reasons, we should be living together. However, he's still only a final year Med Student, he doesn't start earning his Intern salary until December/January, so that kind of limits our plans and means we'll possibly have to live apart until then... but enough of this, I'll update y'all once we have more clarity on the matter of our cohabitation.

I think same sex unions will happen in Australia, sooner or later. I have tentative good feelings towards the Federal Treasurer Peter Costello. Although he hasn't had much of a chance to really stamp the nation with an impression of who he is (being trapped behind the seemingly immortal John Howard) the snippets I have seen suggest he may be a Liberal Party (who in Australia are actually our Conservatives/Republicans) leader that I could quite happily vote for. He has a good track record on gay rights and human/minority/marginalised groups’ rights in general. He's the architect of Australia's fantastic economy, he's progressive in what I consider the most important areas, yet he's possessed of a sharp and diamond-resilient pragmatism, which although may paint him as an uncharismatic figure in the media, suggests to me a leader with intelligence, conviction, direction & sanity.

I need more information on the man. I'm glad he's starting to chirp up louder and let his own beliefs and policies be heard. He'll never tip Howard as preferred leader without painting himself as a man who can lead a nation, not just balance its books.

Meanwhile, it'll mine and Ant's 2-year anniversary on Monday 27th March 2006. *YAY*

Well, I have an insidiously busy day ahead of me, planning for the big Mardi Gras party - I need a new outfit, a tan and some more sass! You can never have too much sass.

I 'm hoping to have some time off work soon (haven't had a break from work of more than 4 days in well over a year - I'm dying!), in which case I hope to get a chance to read through everyone's LJs. But if anyone's feeling inspired, feel free to give me the abridged version, the highlights of your thrill-a-minute existences - it may save me some time trawling through months of unread LJ entries... of course, should the need to trawl arise, you can all be assured that whilst laborious, it would most certainly be a labour of love.

In other news, I've had my symbol (that which appears on my LJ) henna tattooed on the back of my neck, just below the collar bone. I've wanted that symbol tattooed there ever since I first conjured the symbol onto a blank page ten years ago, 1996 when I was in the 7th grade. I think a decade is long enough thinking time to be sure I want it, but when I walked past the booth on the street, I believed Fate was telling me to stop wasting time and try it with henna to make sure you really want it. I must say, the result is gorgeous. I'll wear it for a week or so (whenever it wears off) then decide on the permanent version! *EXICTEMENT*

I hope you're all going well, I hope life's not throwing you too many curveballs, or if it is, that you're swinging arms good and limber, ready to step up to the challenge and knock whatever life throws at you right out of the ballpark.

From me, to my special, yet seldom-seen internet crew, take it easy, let me know how you're all going and I'll see you when I get my holidays (hopefully extremely soon) or sooner if I get inspired to logon here before then.

Bye bye. Love,

Rob xoxoxo


PS Time of completion of entry 8:02am on Saturday 4th March 2006, 8:27am after edits.