rangarevolution - revamped 

Why I ... love (?) the French

My Dearest Kevin

An Open-Letter to the New Australian PM

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Lessons of a Counterhand

Trust me, it was for the money.

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Facebook

Stick your Request up my Notifications, Poke my Wall and suck on my Perfect Match, “Friend”.

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Election2007

Biggest, single most important election ever. In the history of australia. Ever. Maybe even the world... ever.

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How msn ruins lives

 Unbiased... even handed... lah lah lah

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The Great [Ranga] Debate

The Great Debate: an unbiased look at the red's state

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Then download the wallpaper!

Why my monkey is better than you

Monkey: a look at the driving force behind rangarevolution

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[Please note: This page is still under construction]

Feminism: a tale of woe, agony and gender inequality

DISCLAIMER: This article is NOT intended to be taken seriously.

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LOUD NOISES 18.07

Once more at 35,000 feet in a Boeing 737-400 (old tin-can class), I find myself actually bored enough to write something. Pfft.

Having spent a little while over east in what has been the coldest week in 9 years (and I was there to see it!); indeed, outskirts of Melbourne city experienced snow; it’s back to the west for the last study-packed week of the penultimate holidays before… the-thing-that-cannot-be-named. [Begins with ‘T’ and ends with ‘ertiary Entrance Exams’].

In a Today-Tonight-esque segue, this brings me nicely to the topic of Harry Potter. For the record, I have yet to see the latest film (No. 5) or read the book (No.7). However, given all the hype the book as received, it at least merits a passing reference here.

It became evident yesterday (according to Channel 7 or 9 or whatever) that Australian politics has taken a new turn; specifically towards the internet. John ‘Look at my brows’ Howard launched a YouTube video outlining various climate change proposals which were very rapidly sullied by completely unbiased political commentators – some contrasted the petit defence budget of 2000-2001 ($12b) with the enormous environment spending of 1996-2007 ($4b) [Malcolm Turnbull later made the comic statement that “Australia is leading the world on climate change”], whilst others outlined their arguments in a more lyrical, affluent manner; “fk off Howard you old fart, you smell” was a noteworthy commentary.

Such a groundbreaking change of political direction / marketing was not alone – mere weeks ago, Microsoft launched its ‘MySpace Impact’ channel designed to bridge the abyss between emo teens and their political representatives. I decided I’d have a little look – please note I don’t have a MySpace page, nor little red cuts on my arms – and surprisingly had an enjoyable time flicking around. Peter Garrett’s page is worth a visit, if you can ignore the few thousand ‘i luv u’s from teenage girls, as is the Rudd-meister’s, although perhaps not Gillard’s. On the other side, John Howard’s page is a little blank, whilst the WorkPlace Relations Minister Joe Hockey’s page is packed with blog entries, personal descriptions and deplorable videos of himself abusing the institutions of our Parliament (Dorothy Dixer question, with a pointlessly dramatic response) – although this is to be expected, as he only had to copy and paste the information from his other MySpace page, teengirlie69. On a sidenote, Rudd would get my vote if I were 18 simply for his listing Vivaldi’s music as a ‘like’. Love that guy.

This is a boring paragraph; ignore it if you don’t give a toss about our democracy
On that note, I have a little bone to pick, apologies to West Wing. Why is it that at 17 years, I am unable to vote in the coming election? [Yes, I know, because it’s the law]. I understand the fundamental reasons for this; that a) I’m too young to understand what the hell is going on, and b) I’m young enough to be coerced into voting for a certain party. Au contraire to the latter, would you risk being caught coercing a little kid in order to get ONE VOTE for a certain party? Statistically that’s 1 vote in 21,000,000 – or bugger all. To put forth a little proposition, particularly pertinent in this climate-debate-fueled election – along with my other young-blood cousins, I am going to be inheriting this earth when the current generation ‘comes to power’ (it’s the altitude :-P ). The issues being debated today, and their subsequent resolutions are going to have a dramatic impact upon MY life – why should I be disallowed from participating in their deciding? Heck, our own Prime Minister, despite enormous evidence to the contrary, openly declared that he is a ‘climate-change sceptic’ – FOR GOD’S SAKE! Sure, ‘The Great Climate Change Swindle’ argued Johnny’s case, but oh boy wasn’t that documentary completely hammered. Fancy using 1970’s graphs to prove that the earth is actually cooling down over the last century; the daft prick. Where was I? So, the issues being debated now are going to dramatically affect the lives of the next generation – why can’t we have a say in our future? Isn’t the Liberal Party founded on the principles of individualism? Mmmhmmm.


Note: This is another boring paragraph; ignore it if you don’t give a toss
Adorned with some newly purchased countertenor arias, and having moved beyond the clunky TFT screen (literally), I’m all set for another hour in the air. ‘Amazing Grace’, the Qantas feature film has finished rolling (thank God, it looked shyte… perhaps would have been better with headphones). My only somewhat squalid irritant of the day is that I have to use a laptop to play my newly iTunes-purchased delights (Andreas Scholl, Michael Chance, James Bowman) – iTunes manages to restrict (“protect”) the music that I bought in it’s own filthy M4P format. So basically, sure, I’ve paid for it, but unless I want to surrender another $500 to Apple to buy an iPod, I can’t play the music that I bought on a portable device. Microsoft may have had a monopoly, but Apple is just plain nasty. I can’t think right now of another sentence incorporation the phrase ‘that I bought’ just now, so I will reiterate: I paid for some music, and cannot play this music, that I bought, without an iPod. Nobody ever cared for sentence structure anyway, right?

The 2/3 R's of Boarding

Boarding has a lovely little system. Of detentions.

There are a number of ways that one can obtain a detention; the obvious ways, ie swearing at a teacher, being found with a girl in your room (oh the stories...), cutting down the sacred olive trees; you get the point. The other significant method is, of course, having an untidy room. Here lie a few little problems for me, and no it's not just because I don't want a detention. Primarily, I don't think detentions belong in a residential community (an ideological point, perhaps... but that doesn't mean I'm not right!). Furthermore, and perhaps more significantly in this context:

'tidy' is a relative term

This is untidy

This sums up my point, to come soon

This is just beautiful

And this is my incredibly untidy room, warranting an 'R' (or 1/3 of a detention). My Lord it's a mess. You can see the scrunched-up linen on the bed (it hasn't been washed in 2/3 days!), the unhygienic spaghetti nightmare on my desk (power chords for: phone, pda, printer, laptop; if only I had an iphone, I'd have one less cord...), you can't quite see my monkey (he's here if you want), and my lord that floor is dirty. Well, I guess it is a little, you can probably see a towel near my desk. Icky sticky UNHYGIENIC WE'RE ALL GOING TO DIE. AND YOU HAVE A 1/3 DETENTION. So, what have we learnt? I'm a dirty ranga and whoever checks the rooms is a very cheap <four letter word ending in u-n-t; yes, aunt...).

Where was I? Yes; Untidiness is part of male life; an undeniable truth that women could never understand. I bet the room-checker-person-*unt is a woman. Explaining it in scientific terms; men are non-conformist by nature (there are more women on the planet then men); everything else on the planet (with the exception of a few friend's girlfriends) is perfect (Audrey Tautou, my applic scores, my modest, even a chair (the atoms will rearrange themselves to exist in the most stable form possible; PERFECTION)). So, men are non-conformist and the rest of the world is perfect. MAKES PERFECT SENSE TO ME! So with 2/3 'R's... I'm headed on the path towards cleaning up Saturday morning. Grrrr... At least I have my monkey.

A new scientific breakthrough: 30 June 2007

What can I say? I got a little bored, procrastinating doing a Politics essay... turning my attention elsewhere, by a complete fluke (like most major scientific breakthroughs) I happened to stumble upon the formula for bubblewrap.

r = (2sinx)^3 * (2cosy)^3

May I be remembered for generations to come...

Caring Count: 0 cares

To give a little frame of reference, I was woken by a kangaroo this morning. To say that I got up on the wrong side of the bed would be a little inaccurate; rather, upon being assaulted by my kangaroo-suit-porting friend, I happened to be pulled out of my bed, albeit ironically on the correct side. He wanted my blanket; I wanted it too. What a fag kangaroo. Having left, I found myself somewhat awkwardly half-kneeling on the floor, only semi-wrapped in my precious blanky. The only two condolences I can find are that a) I wasn't the only person awoken by a kangaroo, and b) a friend absolutely 'owned' the kangaroo in the proverbials not too late afterwards. I hope it hurt.

After a shortened day at school and a rather feral repas (the finest from the over-worked bowels of the dining hall), some friends decided to have some fun at the expense of a few girl-school neighbours. 5 minutes later, armed with a series of large numbers on white paper, a few comfy chairs and stomachs full of boarding food (fermentation process occurs rapidly; one lunch + 20 minutes = 3 standard drinks), they proceeded to give the promenading chickee-dees overt ratings out of ten; it should be noted nobody received above 2. When this became a little dull, the game changed slightly to feature a charitable twist. Adorned with school uniforms (blazers to boot), they camped out the vending-machine area, demanding an entry fee dependent on the 1-10 rank achieved (ie a rank of 10 would merit a lower entrance fee). Having received no 'donations', they returned visibly introverted to spend the afternoon in other... more profitable... ways.

After putting this off for a week, I'm going to try a little exercise. It will (possibly) be updated as time goes on. If you find it offensive, send an email and I'll add your name to the list.

Les choses qui m'énerve (The things which piss me off):

• being woken in the mornings
  
• kangaroos
• my friend, dressed as a kangaroo, waking me up in the morning
  
• boarding food
• exams
• preparing for balls (grow up, for Christ's sake)
• missing my 7:45 cup of coffee
• choir at 7:30, causing me to miss my coffee
• people touching my monkey
• the guy next door
• the guy next door to him
• the fact that with the exception of my room, every room in my corridor REEKS
• people who carry that reekage into the bathroom
• emos (see below)
  
• goths
• consecutive 43 degree days
• people who eat with open mouths at the table
• the above, who then try to talk
• 
  

A note on emos:

Emos are not, as commonly thought, excessively emotional people. Emos are badly dressed, attention-seeking arseholes who sit around together feeling sorry for themselves and trying to express their individualism, whilst listening to crappy music. A number of issues subsequently arise;

• if you're trying to express your individualism, why would you dress in the same (horrible) clothing as the other emos on your street, and sit together? Isn't that.... togetherness?
• On the subject of clothing, if you're feeling unhappy, DON'T WEAR BLACK. Try orange, yellow or white. Better yet, find a funny yellow t-shirt (I'm thinking 'Smile if you're Gay!') and wear that around the place. Then just remember; people are laughing with you, not at you. But never seek to clarify this; people get embarrassed.
• If you're feeling down, don't listen to crappy music! Sure, you can 'identify' with it, and it expresses all the pain and angst that is trapped inexplicably in your bloody, not-beating heart... whatever. Chuck on something happy: Beatles or Andreas Scholl! (if you're into that)... just leave the Evanescence, Cradle of Filth and Marilyn Manson for other times (ie when you're too happy). Furthermore, play it softly, because I sure as hell don't want to be forced to listen to your epiphany.
• Failing all of that, realise this: No-one is going to understand you if you simply sit around wearing black and crying. It's not working; rather, it has a detrimental effect. People see you, fail to 'understand', and hence express their disdain. Thus you end up stuck in a perpetual negative spiral (much like Athenian democracy and imperialism; I wonder what I was studying this morning), from which there is no return, wahwahwah.
• Failing all of that again, just kill yourself. It's for the good of the community; the greater good.*

THE BALL PAGE

Coffee Count: 4 cups

Once more I find myself procrastinating; I can't bring myself to think about what I should be doing study-wise. Exams in a week and a bit: I'm going to die. Well, I should be ok, with the potential exception of English. Apparently our exam will no longer feature 'imagination' questions, so we might actually have to study for it. Bummer.

So, the Ball is pretty much officially over now, I think the after-after-afters party finished last night. Or maybe that was the OpShop Ball. Probably the latter.

So what's happened over the last two weeks? I've had 5 or 6 assessments (including an all-nighter (finishing an essay we'd had for about 6 weeks)), caught 5 buses in the last 2 days, the Commonwealth Treasurer has admitted he always wanted to be an astronaut and Kevin Rudd is having media withdrawal symptoms*. On the justice front, David Hicks is back in Adelaide, and the Victorian public has over a billion dollars worth of unpaid traffic fines (in case you're wondering, that's roughly $200 each. Per citizen. Including 3 year olds. Who can't drive.).

Coffee Count Amendment: 5 cups.

I give up. I have work to do, and nobody is actually going to read this. Ladidah.

*Not really.