Muffins

Mum bought a recipe book of 500 cupcakes and muffins the other day and one recipe had 'perfect with Earl Grey' as its subtitle. i actually spazzed out loud and my family were wondering why i was laughing. we're not a earl grey family. we're a dilmah ceylon family. i have a cup with me at the moment which is about to slip into the cool-enough-to-drink-but-still-hot mode any second.

anyway, what i wanted to mention about the muffins was that there is a collection of 500 in this book and mum has cooked six batches since she got it [much to my delight]. except she has only made three different types. it makes no sense to me to have 500 possibilities [including chocolate fudge brownie cupcake] to make zucchini and feta muffins, spanish orange syrup muffins and blueberry muffins twice each. all are nice but i want variety.

Variety is the spice of life. [apple and cinnamon muffins!]

Tired

i want 2 sleep. butt i feel i shud right sumthing b4 i sleep.

THE ABOVE SENTENCE PAINED ME SO MUCH TO WRITE. but every day i face my fears.

and i move on. kind of like an art critic at a showing they're too pretentious for.

my eyes are closing myself.

today I am grateful for Mavis Beacon who taught me the ability of typing with my eyes closed. it's always good to be able to do things with your eyes closed. driving is an exception, eating cornflakes without milk not so much.

Apocalypse Now

I'm currently analysing quite an intriguing short essay by Edward O. Wilson [the best authors initial their middle name; Raymond E. Feist. JK Rowling. Stephanie Meye... oh that's right, she doesn't]. 

If you want to read it [i believe it's worth it] have a look at http://www.christiansforthemountains.org/Articles/EOWILSON_Letter.pdf. It is by no means long and hopefully will maintain your attention. 

It's framed as a letter and is really persuasive. but it's persuasive on kind of a nil issue. I mean, there is general agreement that it's important to protect the environment but he seems to just be pointing out the fact that cooperation is key. it almost seems like what he has to say could be said in two sentences. he establishes good points, but I'm left thinking that they are too persuasive for what he's asking. like pointing out to someone that they have an alfalfa when if they could see it themselves they would fix it. it seems unusual for a person to establish really strong reasons for someone to do something when it's already likely to be done anyway. perhaps Wilson is overcoming an attitude of stubborness. Or maybe he's just trying to be really clear.

In any case I just wanted to suggest you read it. It is enjoyable.

M to the M to the P

MMP has its benefits and its flaws. here is my opinion.

i prefer MMP over FPP obviously by far. we need minority representation in a country like New Zealand.

I loathe that the people of Epsom can elect Rodney Hide and they effectively also elect five MPS, to me this is a failure of the system. you should not be able to subvert the threshold by winning an electorate seat.

The threshold is important though. if not we'd have a parliament that was too diverse. we'd possibly have one family first MP, one aotearoa legalise cannabis, Bill from B&B party, etc, etc. so i believe in the threshold because governments need to be able to do things. i think it is clear that discussion and consultation are extremely important for any representative democracy but this threshold prevents the prescence of what are effectively independent MPs.

however, the MMP system has a failing that is rectified by the single transferable vote system. my understanding of this is that the person who comes second in an electorate seat has the potential to get into parliament. 

i think with STV, women (who are severely underrepresented in parliament) would get in proportionally. furthermore minorities would still be represented because they may be people's second choices etc. say the bill and ben party is everybody's second choice. they'd get in. they don't under MMP.

i don't really know much about STV. but from what i do know it fixes some of the failings of MMP like underrepresentation of women and closed party lists. 

therefore, i support a referendum on MMP not to remove it but at the very least to alter it to stop ACT from getting into parliament based on rodney's pulling power in Epsom. to ignore the failings of MMP would be to say 'this burnt chocolate cake is nicer than that smelly fish pie (FPP) over there. i do not want to have the possibility to potentially get a chocolate cake that isn't burnt.'

thank you.

things i like

i like kettles. [as in the chip, not the thing that boils hot water] They're so salty and yum. salt is good. too much salt is bad. salt water is not nice, neither are alligators.

This is the kind of mood i'm in. I'm talking to Ryan on Skype, listening to basshunter [of all things] and still feeling frustrated at not studying.

i voted today. people said on twitter that it was anticlimatic. they were right. it's kind of like... yay you voted. they should have some kind of costumed man that periodically gives out prizes. that would have been great. really change the voting process so it appeals to everyone. people are more likely to vote if they'll get prizes. one of the reasons why little children do the dishes if they'll get chocolate afterwards. i've never thought food bribes were a good idea.

funny how i assumed the costumed person was a man. politics still has this aura of 'masculine' about it, which has more to do with historical power relations than anything else. however, woman are still the largest underrepresented group in politics as well as senior management positions [feminism is a win topic to write about in exams].

political participation is what i'm studying today. which is really ironic because i politically participated today. and i'm reading about who doesn't vote and why and i kind of fall into two of the three categories of people who aren't likely to vote and i still did. yay.. exceptions to the rule are pretty cool.

it's weird that i'm using this blog to brain dump. i try not to reread what i write but i tend to. of course, my grammar won't be perfect. shock. horror. no. visual and audio combined.

i should go and help mum prepare dinner.

adios

un ano despues

So i just reread what i wrote last year in December [fuck i must have had a fascinating christmas if i was blogging on boxing day...] and it just reminded how much enjoyment i got from writing my thoughts down not only last year [for that research project] but also when i had a xanga account. i've finished that research project i wrote about and it really got me thinking about my actions and stuff and what i do etc. in terms of my academic and university life but there is so much more to my life than that?

i'm supposed to be studying for exams at the moment but i procrastinate like nothing on earth. tomorrow my excuse is that i will be voting. i don't particularly feeling like announcing who i'm voting for though you can ask me if you really want to know. new zealand politics is really blah i really loathe parties who engage in negative politics. i would vote for the greens but they would have to make some small yet significant changes to their party to gain my vote. thus i'm voting for pretty much the only other party that hasn't engaged in negative politics.

political parties which engage in positive politics are particularly pragmatic. fuck alliteration reminds me of year 7.

i'm in a swearing mood these past couple of weeks. i think i use these words to express my frustration at not being able to study. and also, i must admit, my frustration at other things in my life; some of which make my mind go sore and i try to tackle them but it's almost.. easier to ignore them? that's not so great though. i suppose i'll deal with them after exams? procrastination really is an art form. although so is prevarication.

i've taken to vlogging on and off [ish] in the latter half of 2008. why? well, i'm not sure. i do enjoy the positive aspects of the community. however, i tend to appreciate that worth more for other people than myself? i've always enjoyed meeting new people except i'm not very good at it. i really like skype. i think the two work well together; youtube and skype. however skype is quite instantaneous which has its positives and negatives. it's generally regarded that some things are best left unsaid. if you're writing an email you can delete sections of it when you're reading it [the same occurs with editing videos] but on skype you can't suck words back into your mouth after they've been spoken. i write this more to remind myself than to suggest it as advice for anybody else. 

[as an aside, sometimes i end my sentences in question marks which is not because they're actually questions (rhetorical or otherwise) but it's because i am suggesting a point i don't fully agree with. it doesn't make sense and it's an abhorrent use of english formatting but i shall continue using it because it sounds funny when reading to frame things as questions when really they're not?]

you know, when we were younger it wasn't the norm to ring up friends and have multi-phone conversations like is possible with skype. it's curious the way these mediums of communication become a major part of interaction. i think i'd be more sane if they weren't so major for me? i don't really think of them as major though; yet, my most visited sites are twitter, youtube and facebook in that order. they're all about communication. you know, an anagram of 'communicate' is 'account mime' which might be revealing. perhaps 'a commune tic' is more so.

not that i read into those things. that's a bit halal wife?

now, one of my courses this year was english and we spent some time looking at poetry. poetry annoys me in many respects because it is up for interpretation based on a myriad of factors and sometimes it just isn't good. it's awful. but it's actually profound at the same time. therefore, it's one of those curious things where you can have two opposing views and still both be correct. kind of like opinions on politicians. how else could john key be visionary and untrustworthy?

in that view, here is some poetry that 'reflects' what i'm about at the moment. i promise you it will not be good.

whenever

wherev.. fuck Shakira.

what makes it tick

that which a bomb can drop

it doesn't make sense

a bomb can drop?

but not in the literal sense

Sarah Palin drives in taxis

allusions should make sense

bombs don't make sense

therefore Sarah Palin doesn't make sense.

Socrates just shuddered

bombs make people shudder?

but not in the literal sense

see, i wasn't actually talking about bombs but you might think i was. that was actually about my life. woah, profound. go be bohemian.

was reading this procrastination?