The Stanger, The Bray, The Australian Museum and some Fucking Huge Fauna

[bliumchik]

School excursions are so fifth grade. So are museums, for that matter. Yet last Wednesday yours truly found herself sitting on a slightly damp patch of grass with one hundred and fifty Sydney Girls students and six teachers, waiting for nine thirty to happen so we could enter the Australian Museum Of Deth. We congregated in an auditorium with swivelly desk-like things attached to the seats, but no cupholders. the front three rows were inexplicably inaccessible - if they wanted to make space at the front, for heavens sake, they could have just removed one row instead of squishing them all together so nobody could use any of them. We then waited for about twenty minutes while the tour guide people got their act together. Meanwhile, Nicky and Min told me how the latter finally got rid of her stalker...

Nicky: Remember the guy who skipped school to follow Min to Yum Cha when she was on a Jap excursion?
Me: The one who managed to set his mate's hair on fire?
Nicky: And thought the fire extinguisher contained water, yeah. Well, Min finally got rid of him. She told him she was a lesbian. He filled up an entire MSN window with "NOOOOOO!" *grin*
Me: _{Damn, I need a clipboard.} Hahaha, that's hilarious!
Mr Stanger (from across the aisle): That sounds like a good idea.
Me: ...what, setting people's hair on fire or being a lesbian?
Mr Stanger: Uh, no, clipboards. But that's not to say... I mean... nevermind.

Later, there was unwarranted speculation on Ms Bray's sex life. Bad mental image. BAD, BAD MENTAL IMAGE. I mean... ewww.

Anyway, that aside, we went off to look at dinosaurs and things. Our first stop was a bunch of hurried activities which involved sketching adorable frogs. I was the only person who figured out that it's the cuckoos that have two back toes, probably because I draw fast and actually got up to that question. Also, penguins are cool. Then we found a completely random little Kiddie Korner style thing with a miniature kitchen and plastic fruit. I'm not sure what it was doing in the Endangered Animals section, but I'm sure it was... very... educational. Here are some photos of Shannon, Rachel and Eddie the new girl:







After lunch, we fitted vertebra fossils together and fiddled with ratios to work out how big a critter they came from. And man, I cannot tell you how much I do NOT want to meet a three fucking metre long wombat! I'm not kidding you, those buggers aren't mammals, they're terrain. "Git the four wheel drive, Stevo!" We finished all the activities before the tourguidey person had even finished explaining them (which is fair enough, since it's a generic booklet for 7-10s from WoopWoop High - I mean, they ask us the name of the animal and then tell us its name three questions later!) and wandered off to look at Woe Is Me For I Am Endangered videos.

Comments

[xmemoirsx.livejournal.com]

...waitwaitwait. You're listening to Rob Dougan? I didn't think anybody remembered him! He used to go to NIDA with a friend of mine.

[maggiebloome.livejournal.com]

Whoah. What? Whoah. I don't know, i just got reccommended him by somebody or other, i forget. I don't actually like the sound of his voice much, but I rarely delete things, I just skip them if I'm not in the mood to listen to them.

[xmemoirsx.livejournal.com]

Yeah, that manly growl of his totally isn't everyone's thing. But still, the orchestration is amazingly lush.

You're a Pratchett fan, too?

[maggiebloome.livejournal.com]

Yep. ^_^

[xmemoirsx.livejournal.com]

zomg! XD

there doesn't seem to be that many of them around, insofar as the people that I know...

[maggiebloome.livejournal.com]

Psssh, people you know. Try discworld instead.

[xmemoirsx.livejournal.com]

Psssh.

Well, it's better than sydneygothic.

[mayuki-miyazawa.livejournal.com]

BRO, THAT'S MY CLASS THAT MADE THAT FUCKING KITCHEN.

DON'T DISS IT.

It's 1/2K n__n ... but i was in korea whne my class went to the museum -_- ..

HABERFIELD PUBLIC SCHOOL OWNS YOU. WE MADE THAT FUCKING KITCHEN BRO.

[maggiebloome.livejournal.com]

WTF. THAT IS A CRAZYASS KITCHEN. How come it's still THERE?!

[deepfishy.livejournal.com]

Ah, the Australian Museum. Such memories! I was crushed - crushed, I say! - when they moved the stegasaurus skeleton so you couldn't pat it.

[maggiebloome.livejournal.com]

Awww. You can still pat the GIANT WOMBAT though. And verious, you know, rabbit-kangaroos and emus and DID I MENTION GIANT WOMBAT?!

[katelikewhoa.livejournal.com]

STANGER! our poor, broken, acne plagued, inexperienced, beleagured physics teacher. i am glad they gave him you guys, for added confusion.

[xs-amletx.livejournal.com]

Magz, you are so metaquoteable, but I am too lazy. Meh.


And by the way (OT) my glasses are so NOT emo. Pshah!

[maggiebloome.livejournal.com]

Mwaha. Are too.

[xs-amletx.livejournal.com]

Are not. At least not intentionally. Argh. Death to emos. Death to emo in general. Bleargh.


I will now end this onomatopoeic message.

[maggiebloome.livejournal.com]

At least they're not GIANT EMOS.

[xs-amletx.livejournal.com]

At least I don't have many, if any emo friends. THAT's what is lucky.

I think Mic is emo enough for everyone...

[maggiebloome.livejournal.com]

Heheheheh. Too right. dn't really get all this anti-emo stuff, but hey. Be thankful that we don't have giant wombats. Mind you, that could have been interesting... over shadow the camel rides at fairs somewhat, wouldn't you say?

[xs-amletx.livejournal.com]

Bah. I am just really sick of the "wah, nobody loves me, I am so depressed, nobody understands the depth of my pain, my significant other left me, I am pretending to be bisexual because it makes me mysterious and interesting, and I am such a pained individual and I have decided to show my individuality by dressing just like the other whiny emo kids and having "experimental flings" and taking gloomy photos and posting them on rating sites, and no, I am not going to keep my feelings to myself, I am going to write whiny irritating songs which declare to the world how much I want to commit suicide even though I am technically very lucky to be in a caucasian upper-middle-class family with plenty of necessary and unnecessary resources, because I want the world to hear my sorrow and tell me it's ok."

Ha. Quit your whining, emo bitches. I won't be waking you up next time the end of September comes around. Stop threatening to slit your wrists and just do it. And remember, travel down the road, not across the street.

[/rant]

Giant wombats....means giant wombat stew!

[maggiebloome.livejournal.com]

Well yes, but it's a bit unfair to take that attitude when there are so many people that apply the term emo to... uh, things other than that. Like bands, for instance. It means if you like a band it can't be emo. How stupid is that?

(could YOU eat a whole giant wombat?)

[xs-amletx.livejournal.com]

I don't mean that everyone who listens to emo bands are necessarily emos. Neither that every song by every emo band is like that. Green Day could be considered emo in some respects, and I appreciate some of their songs and despise others. However, most of that sort of music revolves around depression and the terrible pain of some individual, who frankly I couldn't care less about. I can't stomach that kind of stuff. This is just a personal opinion, but I see it as self-satifying pity-seeking whiny bullshit, and as a self proclaimed egoist, I don't really like listening to songs about "my terrible pain" or how some dude's girlfriend dumped him and ruined his life. Unless I've gotten to know a person, I generally dislikee hearing about their (relatively insignificant) personal problems. Suck it up.

If you find this offensive (or if Mic is somehow reading this - darling, this isn't directed at you. I love hearing about your melodramatic life, promise), it wasn't intentional. I am not saying you are an emo. I just dislike the concept of emo in general.

(who said anything about me eating all of it....it'd make a good Rosh Hashana feast actually...)

[maggiebloome.livejournal.com]

Hahahaha. Well, I guess my definition of good music is pretty music, and the theme of the song does not define its aesthetic appeal. And then there's the people who talk about the exact same things as everybody else but somehow manage to make it sound new, interesting and beautiful, although they are admittedly rare.

(the aborigines used to feed entire families with the buggers...)

[xs-amletx.livejournal.com]

Well obviously the music itself is the first line of contact, and if the music is so amazing in itself that I don't even think of the lyrics then I don't mind. But if it's a song I'd like to sing along to, it bothers me when I sing something like that. Haha. I don't seem to have that problem often though, as I am still stuck in my little music bubble. And I am not saying that the mood or message of the song can't be sad or upsetting, or that the song can't be introspective - of course not - that would mean I would be disregarding probably 90% of music altogether. It's just the whiny personal problem stuff that bothers me.

[maggiebloome.livejournal.com]

Whiny personal problems can still make poetry. In this it is kind of like harry potter fanfiction - the good is out there, butr there is oh so much shit to wade through to find it.

[xs-amletx.livejournal.com]

I guess I can agree there.

Though HP fanfic is in a league of its own. It THRIVES on that kind of stuff. You need it.