I really am the most horrendously negligent blogger...

But I have the strange feeling that this has little impact on the rest of the world. What with all that other stuff going on and all... yeah.
So the latest excuse for my negligence?
Meh. Uni. Meh. Crochet. Meh. Rugby. Meh. Life.

As you can see, dear reader (all... I don't know, one of you - hi mum) there is a reoccurring theme here... of complete indifference. Not that I am indifferent to things in general- or completely as it were- but rather, I've had other stuff to do.
Such as another freaking degree, crocheting lots of natty little things, and being a ferry for my family to and from various sporting events that I don't have the time to commit to actually participating in myself (that's some faulty logic there).
And in between all of that, sitting down to wax lyrical about the nothing that's happening in my life is kinda unimportant.

So I've been crocheting instead. Borne from the need to do *something* for my grandmother (who recently underwent palliative chemotherapy for oesophageal cancer) I started crocheting beanies and blanket squares, in an effort to keep my fingers busy and my anxiety at my helplessness somewhat at bay.
My cousin and aunt and I contributed a total of 94 squares to make a blanket with a little block of yarny goodness representing each member of our massively huge family. It's hideous, but beautiful as well. And my cousin even used the square that I sent up that bears a very strong resemblance to unicorn vomit.

from this awesome blog

Like this. Only with more orange.

Probably from the carrots you ate for breakfast.

facebook cleanouts, eating, and other important stuff

The rise and subsequent ubiquitousness of facebook seems to have lead to a newer trend, the 'facebook cleanout'. This is an exercise of culling 'friends' that a person (the facebook user, who is conducting said cleanout) has deemed to have had insufficient contact with in order to maintain them on their friends list. While I understand the fundamental principle of the exercise (trim the fat, clean out the closet, spring clean, etc) the concept of a facebook cleanout represents all sorts of other confusing aspects to me, particularly those surrounding the notions of friends and acquaintances as we previously understood them.
To me, the beauty of facebook is not in its ability to maintain contact with close friends and family, but rather, to keep some kind of connection or running commentary of a person with whom contact may otherwise be lost. My family, for example, is extensive and widely spread around Australia. Facebook has allowed me to maintain some level of contact with these people, even if I do not actively participate (at least, not in a Facebook sense) in their every day lives and happenings. Ditto old school friends; particularly those about whom my mind would occasionally wander and well, wonder.
And while Facebook can serve as the perfect venue for (at least part of) torrid friendships and bizarrely motivated personality quizzes (which romanticised stereotype from this arbitrary tv show/movie/popular culture icon/species of amoeba/suburb/friendship group/school are YOU?) it can also be a means of maintaining distant, non-confrontational (though slightly stalkerish) contact with people you actually care about. It's also a great conversation topic, "oh, her? Yeah, I'm facebook friends with her. Boy, she LOVES karaoke, cruisers and tacky heart shaped pink gimmicky virtual gifts..." etc.

It's also the perfect venue for time wasting, and how else to time waste but to look at "oh-I-remember-Georgie-the-one-with-that-never-wore-matching-socks-to-school-when-I-lived-in-
Sydney-no-this-was-my-second-school-I-think's profile, and find out that the never-wore-matching-socks thing actually manifested in to some kind of awesomely cool and creative career as a cutting edge fashion designer (or some such romanticised stereotype)... Oh yeah, and according to which breed of dog are you, George is a French Bulldog. Go figure.