Out of 144 countries that were ranked on the Global Peace Index, we were ranked 19th which puts us in the most peaceful 20% bracket. New Zealand was ranked no. 1. Good on ya, NZ! 144 and 143 are Iraq and Afghanistan, respectively, bottoming out the least peaceful 20%. USA ranked a boring 83 ("please see me") and the UK ranked 35 ("could do better ( Read more... )

I'm tired. I just wrote a really long email to a foundation that works with the children of drug-addicted parents who are either in active addiction or, more commonly, dead. I wrote to offer my services as a volunteer, but my own email has overwhelmed me and I haven't sent it yet. It's brought up the past and I've already gone there too often in ( Read more... )

Inadvertently made a delicious Good Friday din-dins that made me very proud: a salmon and rice pastry bake thing with a scalloped-potato dish on the side. Never again, mind you. It took 2 hours to prepare and a further hour to cook. I'm not cut out for that. Was too tired to attend to the carrots we were going to have for vegies and T seemed ( Read more... )

Well, since posting that incredibly attractive animated glitter-pic of an Irish Snoopy, which I'm not going to remove because I love (some) glittery animation (I don't know why!) and I adore Monsieur Snoopy, I've come to learn what St Patrick was all about. If "driving the snakes out of Ireland" is a particularly obfuscatory euphemism for ( Read more... )

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Oh, shit. I'm on my way to bed at 5am after a very long Sunday, and I've just realised I completely missed Hourly Daily Comics Day! FUCK. I had prepared and anticipated and practised, and I was so looking forward to it. I'm so disappointed with myself. I also forgot it was Sue's birthday until an hour ago, and I had set two reminders for that one ( Read more... )

Got home last night after a difficult drive (dog and cat on my lap; tried to make sandwich rolls on my lap; threw up my tomato roll; T. missed a turn which added an hour to the trip; etc) and an abysmal holiday (more to come!) to find a note on the kitchen counter from our neighbour/friend/landlady: the hot water heater had broken. Brilliant...!


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T. just said, "Next time can you Deaf-Cc: me as well as Blind-Cc: me so I don't have to read your emails at all?" I object! That was a really cool photo I sent him! (And he laughed.) Not this one, but this made me laugh...


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Got told yesterday that I look nearly 30, not nearly 40 - this by a mate I hadn't seen for a year. I wonder if it's true. She, too, looks ten years younger than she is. I can't say I really care either way; I just find it odd that people guess all kinds of ages for me. They do it with my 'ethnicity' too, though not as much as they used to; probably ( Read more... )