9:15 pm - Thursday 25th January 2000

A month since Xmas…

I was chatting to Soba on the phone tonight, I was back at the lab which was still stinking hot so I wasn't amazingly chatty. She mentioned that she and some of her house mates were going to the Desperate and Dateless Ball to be held on February 10th. It's a charity for the Red Cross I think, and you get paired up with some unknown person based on some general clues you give them on the entry nomination. I have to admit that I did get a form a few weeks ago and even filled it out, but trashed it because it's more fun to go with a group of friends and compare your dates. Whilst I most certainly am dateless, I'm not enormously desperate. I could think of someone I'd really like to take, but apart from the fact that there was no sex preference marker (Tick L, G, T, B, or other) this person probably wouldn't be able to get to Canberra. ;) I haven't decided if I'll actually go yet, but I may be sorely tempted.
Today was not as hot as Wednesday, and hopefully it will continue to cool off further. My thesis is giving me a headache, of course it might not be my thesis, it may simply be a combination of heat, stress, staring at a monitor, high humidity, excess caffeine, long hours, medication and other factors.
Tomorrow is Australia Day (what, again?) so that's another one of these technical public holidays which I doubt I'll be allowed to enjoy. I've got stuff I can work on, so I'll probably stay at home with the radio on.

I was thinking about Antonio Banderas who was in the movie I saw last night. I have to admit, I do not find him attractive. Sure he conforms to a stereotype of what women (and gay men) want, but honestly I found him completely without appeal. It's certainly not because he is a guy, I've had a crush on a guy before (and a geeky guy too), it's more because I don't know him, he's just a lump of flesh and if he can't entertain and amuse me verbally and mentally, then he can stay a distant lump of flesh. I suppose I fall in love with minds and that the body comes afterwards. I know that sound like a terribly politically correct thing to say, and I admit looks do count, but they come second and not first. I just hope people I like can feel the same way about me. Loneliness sucks ass (not even a couch fish to keep me company) so I don't know how I'd fare in a relationship if that ever comes along. I remember the attention the media paid to a couple who married after meeting on the internet, nowadays that's a drop in the ocean.

It's raining hard now… oh I like that a lot…

I was chatting to a friend earlier in the week, and amongst other things which came up over the long phone conversation was the realization that I really don't know "what girls like". I was of course unlucky to miss out on the essential years between say 7 and 17 (I was, um… in a coma. Yeah, a coma that's right…) when these preferences form. I was thinking this because the Canberra Games Convention is on this long weekend, and I said that if I went "the gender ratio would probably be about 20:1". Gaming, whether it be RPG, miniatures or online is very much a guy dominated thing, but it doesn't mean girls can't enjoy them too, but peer pressure (from both sides) usually keep them out of these areas, and also areas like hard science, engineering, computing and so on.

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