strange japanese flash animations

My brother has been trawling the net for them again

This one is very strange. Accoriding to the info on AMazon.com, this song was originally Recorded by Romanian Singer Haiducii, this Cover by the Moldavian Trio of Dan, Arsenie and Radu Conquered the Summits of the Pop Charts around the World! this Edition Includes their Original Romanian Mix and a Re-do by the Almighty Remix Team as Well as a Remix by DJ Ross and Dub Mixes by Almighty and Unu.

What some strange japanese person has done is try and match the romanian words with japanese sounding words, even though the meaning is lost. Have a look and see if you can figure out what is going on

The death of lead-free super

It seems imminent

Today on my home from work in the city, my petrol gauge was hovering below the empty mark. I knew I should fill up before I got onto the freeway. It would have been bad if I ran out in the middle of nowhere

So I headed down Victoria St to see if I could find a petrol station. And then to get back on the freeway to drive home.

But where ever I went, they were either sold out (or the bowsers were "out of order") or they didn't even sell in it the first place. I went to no less than 7 different stations. And petrol stations are not easy to find these days either. I made it all the way from the city to Box Hill before I could find a place that sold lead free super

I wonder if this means that my car has a very limited life span now. I have never had so much trouble finding petrol before. It was only last week that I was talking to Tony about this exact topic and I was like "nah, there are heaps of places that sell super".

but I guess I was wrong. This could be the beginning of the end.

I got an interview!!

Last week i applied for the Vic governments trip to Japan for the 2005 Expo in Aichi.
I got this email today. Take a look at the requirements for the interview

Interviews will be held at the Department of Premier and Cabinet, 1 Treasury Place, Melbourne. They will be a little under half an hour long

For the interview, all applicants are asked to prepare a short verbal presentation which promotes Victoria to a Japanese audience. Presentations should be up to four minutes long and made in Japanese, then repeated in English, without any aids such as pictures or slides.

This is even more work that i would have to do for a 3rd year uni exam.
Ours were only 3 mins long this semester. And we only had to do it in Japanese

Great timing for the interview though, right in the middle of exam week.
Looks like i am going to be a busy girl this week. What, with Oaks day to go to as well

Easy money and free booze!

a study the Neuropsychology Centre at Swinburne is conducting late Nov. Date to be determined.

They are looking for people to participate in a limited trial of a new oral Hangover-Treatment product.

You would go to the centre on the Hawthorn Campus on two evenings where you'll be provided with alcohol (mixed whiskey) to consume in a relaxed environment, and then return the following morning so that the effectiveness of the Hangover-Treatment can be tested.

To participate you must be aged 22-40 and be a regular drinker who does not wear glasses. You would also be experienced with drinking 5 or more standard drinks on a single occation, and be familiar with hangovers.

Plus they will taxi you to and from the centre and on completion will give you $200.

so give the guy organising it a call if you are interested to give him your details. It's Jake Ryan on 92145002.

water damage

after all that water and rain yesterday, the water authorities tell us that it has made no difference in the storage levels. only at 57% of something like that, and with a hot summer forecast we still have to wash our cars with buckets.

i was having a dicsussion about this the other day and it was brought up that perhaps the government is just tricking us. there really is enough water, but they want to make sure so they dont run out at the commonwealth games in 2006.

do you dare?

according to todays paper, the arthur's seat chairlift has been cleared (again) for reopening.

After one big accident and one near miss, would you dare to ever go on it again?

I know its harsh, but you can just drive to the top. there is no need to risk your limbs or life.

japanese movies

Now showing at Cinema Nova in Carlton

The Grudge (M)

Lateshow Season Now Showing | session times

With a contribution from Ring scriptwriter Hiroshi Takahashi, THE GRUDGE is the latest in Japanese terror soon to be remade by Hollywood. Volunteer home-care worker Nishina calls on the house of an old lady in what seems a routine job. Investigating a strange noise from an upstairs cupboard, Nishina faints when a small ghostlike boy emerges. Slowly a chilling series of events unfold. An evil force in the house left behind by the dead is attaching itself to the living. Vengeance from beyond the grave could be the grudge that no one can stop!

(Japanese language with English subtitles)

This is such a typical japanese horror flick. I wonder if there is any people coming out of televisions like in Ring though

election news #2

so now i have found out the spread of the results
i got 600 votes!! isnt that cool. even though i lost, i still got 600!
i think i lost by around 150 votes though...

but i am happy. 600 people like me!

election news

well i didnt win

but oh well. i dont really care. woudl have been fun but...
seeing i am only going to be here for 6 more months anyway it is probably for the best.

but the people who did get in from student focus are going to make it an "interesting" year for campus life.

swinny pressies

who can say that swinburne isnt nice to its students.

today they were handing out free condoms and packets of "wet stuff" to all

and along with that were packets of peanuts. go figure...

What weekend

I just realized its been quite a few days since I got a chance to post anything.

Thursday was uni and Windsor.

Friday was work all day at consultel (but most of the day was taken up by a long bbq lunch) and then to matt's high school valedictory dinner. I felt so old there. All these 17/18 year olds running around. The only people I knew were the teachers! How sad

Saturday was work at the Windsor all day. I parked and retrieved so any cars I cant count. Some real fancy ones too like mercs and bmw's. No crashes. But got a few tips.

after work I was invited to a bbq to say goodbye to a guy I had only met once, but it was a chance to meet up with and get to know some of the other people who work there. It was in sth melb, so I didn't stay long cause it takes so long to get home. I think I got home around 11.30 in the end after waiting what felt like hours for connecting trams and trains.

Sunday was finally time to relax. Tony picked me up at 11.30 and we went up to badgers weir for a picnic. This was the 3rd bbq in 3 days, but the weather has been so nice..
we didn't get up there that early because we stopped at a few places along the way to get supplies, fruit from an orchard and wine from coles. Should have gone to one of the wineries....
but we stayed up there till they threw us out at 5pm when the gates closed.
we walked up to the weir to take photos, ran into some guy I know but I don't remember his name. Isn't that embarrassing.

then back at home was time for homework and fill in that application for the free (almost free - its costs $500) trip to Japan... They are sending 20 people from vic. Matt has applied too, I wonder what our chances are. They want people who can speak Japanese and are aged between 16-25, so we meet the criteria.... the applications were due today so I emailed mine off late last night. You find out in November if you have been selected to have an interview. Departure is in July.

but now its time for class. Last week of classes. And then exams. But after the 19th November its all over for another year.

SSU Elections - last days

If you still havent voted in the SSU elections, get your but down to the polling booth on campus.

Vote 1 Carly for Undergrad Rep, and Kate for Hawthorn Campus Chair
While you are at it, vote for any of the Fusion members

You can only make a difference at Swinburne if you vote!

Shopping or campaigning? You decide!

Well the choice was simple. Shopping at Chaddy!

Kate had a whole lot of vouchers that needed to be spent so I decided that Chaddy would be much more fun than standing around in the heat handing out how to vote cards.

With all her vouchers, Kate managed to get heaps of stuff and only spent $8. I was sucked into the lingerie sale at myer (25% off if you bought 2 items) but actually it cost less to buy both a bra and undies with the discount than it would if I only bought the bra! I love sales!

We topped off thee shopping trip with taking some silly photos in one of those black and white passport photo booths. I have never done that before. Only taken purikura in Japan (and way too many of those).

The shopping trip was cut short by the fact we had to be back at uni by 2.30. Kate had a class to convince to be O-hosts, and I had an appointment with my marketing lecturer to get some ideas for work at Consultel. Lots of ideas, and he must have been impressed cause he offered to recommend me for a job at one of his acquaintances who is looking for an International Business major student to do some work. I don't think I could deal with 3 jobs though......

Then it was off to work at the Windsor. I only had a 4 hour shift, but I managed to do a lot of carrying bags. I even parked 2 cars! And didn't crash them

And I got $20 in tips!

What a day!

looks like i will be able to graduate after all

I sent off an abusive email to the Dean at Swinburne this arvo about why i couldnt graduate in July and i got this reply

Looks like all my bitching about Swinburne was for nothing. But still, its fun to bitch about one's uni.

Dear Carly,

We are expecting to run HBI394 in sem 1 2005 and are finalising details which will be posted on the web next week.

I apologise for any temporary inconvenience this has caused you.

Regards,

Val

Associate Professor Val Clulow
Deputy Dean Faculty of Business and Enterprise
Swinburne University of Technology

The big day

Today I rode 223km

The big day finally came, and I set off with another 8800 other crazy people at 5am Sunday morning to tackle the "Around the Bay in a Day" bike ride

I had been out the night before, I refused to be convinced to go dancing with Liesl and Bianca, and I went to Megu's house in the city to rest up around 10pm

Waking up at 4.30am is traumatic. And I don't think I slept at all because I was so worried I wouldn't remember to wake up. But I had organized my breakfast the night before and I was able to get out of the house at exactly 5am

Instead of going down to the start line in Docklands, I just set off on my own way to Beach Rd. It wasn't hard, just had to follow all the other bike riders and their flashing tail lights

I cant remember exactly when the sun came up, I think I was too busy concentrating on riding. And averting my eyes from the riders on the side of the road who must have forgotten to go to the toilet before they set out.

Cause I was by myself, I hooked up with a large group and they helped me to get down to Sorrento by only 8.30am! I had made a few friends too, but they were only going as far as Sorrento and not taking the ferry

But unlucky for me, so had lots of other people so all the ferries were full until 9.30. So I sat down and ate my "lunch" and got changed into fresh riding clothes.

The ferry wasn't too bad, it took about 40 mins to get over. So by that point I was completely cooled down and I had to start from scratch again. The ferry was pretty packed. You might have seen the picture in The Age on the back page on Monday

It was only 100km to Sorrento from Melbourne so that meant that I wasn't actually even half way. The second half was the hard bit. Long straight boring stretches along Geelong Rd. I lost the groups quite a few times so I was riding all on my own :( When you are with a group you can ride over 5 km per hour faster than when you are alone. So I was averaging 25 by myself, and 30 with a large group. It is hard to catch up with them when they pass you at that speed though.

The last part was hard. My legs were sore and tired, and my bottom was really sore. Add to that the fact that I managed to fall over at one point too. (Stupid toe clips)

The path was not so straight though. Until Werribe we were on the freeway, but after that we had to take back roads through Altona (went straight past Christine's house) up to Koorit Creek Rd where we rejoined the freeway.

Just after we got back on, there had been an accident involving a bike and a car, but I think everyone was okay. We had to wait a little while till the police let us go through.

But at last the West Gate Bridge was in sight and I was on the home stretch. They had marked off a lane with orange hats to make it a bit safer. The view from the top was amazing, but I didn't have much time to look and it was down the other side again.

According to my speedo, it was 223km, not the advertised 210km. I think I could have done without the last 13km. I am not sure that I ever need to put myself through this again, but I might change my mind in the next few days once the soreness goes away.

All in all it took 10 h 48 mins. That is a riding time of 8 h 30 min. Originally I thought it would take me over the allocated 12 hours so I am pretty happy with how I went.

We will see about next year.....


that's me in the black!

swinburne does it again

in true swinburne style, they have stuffed me around again

i am supposed to graduate at the end of july next year. i only have 3 subjects left to go until i recieve the coverted bachelor's degree.

but.....

swinburne has decided that to obtain my degree they will put certain conditions on the subjects you have to take. these conditions change almost daily it seems

when i was looking at the course guide only last week i discovered i could do 3 certain subjects, only 1 of which had an exam. i was a happy carly

but today, i discover a discrepancy

now i must take either
HBI341 Asia - Business Context
HBI392 European Union - Business Context
HBI394 The Americas

but alas, i cant take Asia business context because i have already done it as part of my japanese degree. this leave EU and Americas. But EU only runs in 2nd semester, and Amercas has not even been timetabled for 2005. And am i not studying a Japanese degree? Why should i have to learn about America??

how do they expect me to finish my studies?

If i have to wait around till 2nd semester, then goodbye to my planned trip to Japan with the JET program. You can apply for departure in July if you dont have a degree.

I hope that there are more than just Kate, Brooke and I who are affected by this stupidity. We might be able to rally together and get some kind of response....

Official definitions of "Metrosexual"

According to Kel and Brett from the TV Show "Kath and Kim" in an interview in The Age

THE AGE: Here's a tricky one. Do you consider yourself metrosexuals?

KEL: I'm not sure what metrosexual means. But I am very metro. For example, I've got two Melways, one in the car and one at work for home deliveries and I'm very sexual (though not on the job). So I guess that means I'm a metro sexual.

BRETT: No, not me. I've always been pretty shy about having sex on transport.

oh no

Sunday
Fine. Increasing cloud. Min 9 Max 22

Every time i look at it, it is getting worse.
Yesterday it said it was going to be sunny and 24
Lets hope the weather people have underestimated it this time.

2005 timetable is out

well it looks like i am set for an easy semester next year
2 hours of classes on monday, and 4 hours on tuesday, and that is all.

Granted i only have 3 subjects, it still seems like a pretty light load. i guess that is a business degree for you.

and after those 6 hours a week for 12 weeks, i will be fully qualified and graduated!!!! yeah!

i only have to make it though
* international trade strategies
* international investment and taxation
* transnational business practices

I think only 1 of these actually has an exam.....

Blog is back

for some reason my blog disappeared today. maybe it went on holiday or something

but now it is back in full force. fear no more!

required: one driver

we need a driver!!

on the 26th Novermber (friday), Judith, her friend and I need to be in Port Fairy, with our bikes and bags ready for the start of the Great Victorian Bike ride on the next day.

But the problem is getting there. Our driver to be is no longer available

Is there anyone out there who wants to make a road trip down to the great ocean road? We will pay for petrol and (tent) accomodation for the night if you want to stay too. We do need to have a car that will fit us all in, and a tow ball so i can put the bike rack on though.

Anyone interested in helping us out? A road trip wil be fun!!

a police warning to all men

Thanks Rowan for this

Police are warning all men who frequent clubs, parties and local pubs to be alert and stay cautious when offered a drink from any woman.

Many females use a date rape drug on the market called "Beer" to target unsuspecting men. The drug is generally found in liquid form and is now available almost anywhere. It comes in bottles, cans, from taps, and in large "kegs."

Beer is used by female sexual predators at parties and bars to persuade their male victims to go home and have sex with them.

Typically, a woman needs only to persuade a guy to consume a few units of Beer and then simply ask him home for no strings attached sex. Men are rendered helpless against this approach. After several beers, men will often succumb to desires to perform sexual acts on horrific looking women to whom they would never normally be attracted.

After drinking Beer men often awaken with only hazy memories of exactly what happened feeling that "something bad" occurred. At other times these unfortunate men are swindled out of their life's savings, in a familiar scam known as "A Relationship." It has been reported that in extreme cases, the female may even be shrewd enough to entrap the unsuspecting male into a longer-term form of servitude and punishment referred to as "Marriage."

Apparently, men are much more susceptible to this scam after beer is administered and sex is offered by the predatory females.

Please forward this warning to every male you know. If you fall victim to this insidious Beer and the predatory women administering it, there are male support groups with venues in every town where you can discuss the details of your shocking encounter in an open and frank manner with similarly affected, like-minded guys. For the support group nearest you, just look up "Golf Courses" in the yellow pages.

and ryan gave this extra warning

Additional side-effects of this sinister drug can include severe nauseousness, head-aches and vomiting, and it has also been known to induce an embarrassing effect known to the medical fraternity as "flop." Foster's flop is the street term for this effect, but it is not just limited to Foster's variant of the drug. Unscrupulous marketeers have even introduced a number of other variants (such as the Coopers home brew kit) that allow women to concoct large batches of the drug in their own homes. Quality and purity can vary wildly between batches and can be hazardous to the consumer's health.

hotmail is being nice to us?

i got a surprise when i logged into hotmail to check my mail this morning.
250mb of them actually

i remember a while back getting an email saying that hotmail was going to increase the limit on the accounts, but i didnt really believe it

but now they have come through with the goods. amazing

and i was about to change email addresses because i was running out of space too often. now i only fill 1% of the limit!

yey! but i guess that just means they can send us more junk now....

i love melbourne

i have forgiven melbourne for its bad weather last week. we are back on speaking termson speaking terms. the last thre days have been amazing. 32 degrees in october!

lets just hope that sunday is going to be kind to be too.
but according to BOM, the trend for Saturday, Sunday and Monday is
"Fine at first. Showers developing. Cool to mild."

that doesnt sound good....

inconsiderate train delays

Now i have a long day at uni on mondays, and all i want to do is get home as fast as i can
but alas, today, this was not to happen. but we cant blame connex this time

i got on the train from glenferrie at around 8.15pm, only to be told that i must disembark 2 stations later at camberwell. there had been an accident at either box hill or surrey hills, the announcements were a tad conflicting.

so we all got off and headed to the bus stop. noone could tell us how long it would take for a bus to get there, so i decided to call dad and get him to drive the 30 mins in to pick me up

of course just before he arrived a bus finally pulled up, but was soon mobbed by other angry commuters. i dont think i would have gotten even close to getting on it.

so due to all this confusion, i missed over 1 hour of "the 4400" which was really good last night. but luckily mum taped it.

the more important election news

With less than one week till the Swinburne Student Union elections, its time you brushed up on some reading about the candidates and parties

Fusion, the ticket i am running on, has just launched its new website
(actually i made it, but all the words come from our presidentital candidate Samantha)

Have a look, have a read, and remember to vote FUSION!! and vote CARLY for Undergrad rep

I rock

As of today, I am officially a porter. Isn't that cool. I have always wanted to be a porter for some reason and now I am! Maybe it is the uniform, or the hat.

I got the job at the Windsor in on spring street in the city. And I only went to the interview today!
talk about quick. I had the interview in at the hotel at 9am, and at around 3pm they gave me a call to offer me the job.

scary thing is, as a porter I have to be able to drive the guests cars too, not just carry bags.

i am going to do this job as well as consultel, cause i think it will fit in. i hope anyway.
lots of work and money over the holidays!

My crazy weekend

Because I am so lazy, I am just going to direct you to Kate' site, Funny Face, I love you for a complete rendition of what I got up to this weekend. She does it so much better than I could

But I must warn you, these postings involve scary dark alley ways and mental institutions.

Click and beware.

--------------------

In other news, I am now the self proclaimed queen of the mountain.

It has been a while, but I decided it was time to challenge the omnipresent mega mountain that is otherwise known as Mt Dandenong.

Last time I had to stop a number of times on the way up, but since my crazy training regime for Round the Bay, I am now buff and can do it it one go!

And another strange coincidence occurred to me again today. I dropped in at Scott's work in Olinda to say hi, and he wasnt there cause he was out showing someone a house. so I just left a message and rode on my merry way.

I got about 2km down the road and just as I was passing, he was sitting in his car in the driveway of a house (I assume the house he was showing clients) ready to turn back to work.

I guess it is not all that strange, seeing he works around there and all, but the fact that he was there at exactly the same time I was passing by. If I hadnt stopped to see if he was in at work then I would have passed that point earlier and not seen him.

Strange. but these weird things happen all the time dont they.

beautiful one minute....

at one moment the sky was a startling blue
and then a bat of the eyelid later, the wind has picked up and the rain is sleeting down.

i guess today is a perfect example of what melbourne is all about

Making Melbourne bicycle friendly

According to today's "city weekly" which I found on the train,

"bicycle parking, shower and change rooms are set to become compulsory in most major new developments and building upgrades.
Councils will be required to make it mandatory for developers to provide the facilities.
Lack of bike parking and end of trip facilities are a significant barrier to people cycling more, particularly people who want to ride to work. "

This is good news. Yesterday at my work, when everyone rode cause it was "ride to work day", they had to go over to the parole office to use their showers. Just a tad scary. Hope noone dropped the soap :)

I didn't stay to get a shower, I only rode into work for moral support of the others
I rode on for a longer ride, 105km actually.

Chocolate recommendation

The new chocolate shop, Sokolata, which is located under the station at Glenferrie

My personal recommendation (after you have scoffed yourself on the free chockies at the counter while taking as long as possible to decide what to order) is to get a white hot chocolate. It might cost almost $4, but man, is it yummy

Next time i am going to try the waffles though.
And get the marshmallow swizzle sticks for an extra 50 cents

Sakura Mansions

Melbourne Fringe Festival

"Sakura Mansions"

Lost in Translation meets Godzilla in this cross-cultural comedy that tackles the cult of karaoke, zany Japanese game shows and the truth about underwear vending machines. Take a whirlwind tour through the English schools, hostess bars and bathhouses of Tokyo. For anyone who's ever confused wasabi with guacamole, or raw ginger with shaved ham!

I am going to see this play on Saturday night (9th Oct) if i can find anyone to come along. Tickets are only $10 for students

http://melbournefringe.com.au/cgi-bin/2004/program/index.cgi?action=getevent&id=182 for more info

The value of CRM

In my CRM (customer relationship management) subject, our lecturer has been promising to put our marks for the previous 2 modules up on the subject website for the past 2 months at least. But still there is no sight of them.

funny. At university, us students are the "customer". Therefore the lecturer is the "seller". We pay high prices for hopefully quality education.

so you would think a lecturer, teaching us about how to most satisfy your customers by establishing good relationships with them, would understand the value of keeping the students happy by giving them their marks when they were promised.

its a shame it is not easy to just switch suppliers, as it is with most consumer products.

From the mountains

For weeks I have been looking forward to this weekend. And finally it came. We packed our bikes onto the back of the car and sped away from the city at dusk

our destination - bright. Well there was a bit of a detour because we were to spend the night at my aunt's house in benella. But come 8.30am we were up and back in the car and on the great alpine road.

the challenge - to ride from bright to wangaratta via the "Murray to mountains" rail trail. 94km of sealed track through the beautiful north eastern Victorian countryside.

mum and my auntie were to be our support team if we needed them, but really it was just a chance for them to go shopping in the many antique and craft shops in bright, myrtleford and beechworth. We didn't think we would see them all day. And mobile phone reception is not so good in the area so it wasn't likely we would be able to find them even if we did need them

The path was actually quite good. I didn't know it was going to be sealed so I was worried a bit about my bike choice (of course I had to use my new one) but it turned out okay.

The weather was perfect too. I even go a little sunburt by the end of the day.

But the main problem was the magpies. They are definitely evil beings. I think I would have been swooped by no less that 10 different birds. Most of them just kind of come down close and click their wings without making any contact, but one got its claws and beak into dad's helmet. He has a scar to prove it.

We made quite a few rest stops along the way, about every 15km, to give dad a rest. Morning tea was at Eurobin and then coffee break at Myrtleford where we actually were able to meet up with our "support" shoppers. We bought some lunch at the bakery and took it with us to eat at Bowman. After lunch the riding got a bit slower as dad was getting tired.

By Bowser he was stuffed and we tried to call up mum but she didn't answer her phone. So there was no choice but to ride on the last 8km to wangaratta. He was not happy when we finally found them - they had been drinking coffee at a cafe.

I could have kept going. Actually it was more tiring trying to go so slow. But it wasn't that bad. Shame we didn't have enough time to go both ways. We could have stayed overnight in bright and done it, but I don't think he would have made it.

Strangely enough, the map we had showed the trail from the side on view, with the hills all marked. But I don't think it was very accurate. It seemed we were on the "easier" direction where it was mainly downhill. But I beg to differ.

The trail covers 94km if you take the side trip to Beechworth, but we went about 88km by my calculations. But that is still not even half of what I need to do in 2 weeks time. I hope I make it!



Mum was joking that I should have ridden home from Benella today and they would meet we along the way in the car, but I think one ride in a weekend is enough. But it was fun.

Next week I wonder what my destination will be........

camera fun

blogger has suggested a topic for us serial bloggers to post.

"Ask your readers to think of three photos they'd like to see posted to your blog. (Things around your house or whatever.) When you have enough requests, post them!"

So what do you want to see?

No rude requests please. This is a family blog. My mum reads is every so often (if only i could find a way for her to forget the address) and we dont want to offend her now.

swinburne election

i have thought of another thing that would make the hawthorn campus a better place

- monthly markets under the sails

would that be fun? charge each stall holder like $5 and use it as a fundraiser for the refurbishment of the E-lounge?