Yes that’s right, my blog is now a year old and I must say it feels like it has been ten years since I started this blog. However since I began this little thing on blogger it has grown and expanded. It is now hosted on Wordpress with it’s own domain. You can still see the original site here which is still up on blogger. It’s quite cool having it still there because I can refer back to it and see just how pathetic it was. I hope you have all had a wonderful year of xdmatt.com and hopefully there will be many more to come.

Last night, Lynton, Pat, James and Myself headed into the city to see the newly released Simpson’s movie. I must say it was far better than what I thought it would be and there were plenty of humorous moments throughout. After the movie Pat came up with the idea of going to China Town for dinner which ended up being a really good idea cause it was good food and cheap as well. We then spent about half an hour walking down to Salutis (on Collins St) to find it was closed so we then walked up Little Collins looking for a bar. We ended up finding “Harry’s Bar” which was good cause we were one of the only ones there and it was reasonably priced (and it was close to the hotel). After a couple rounds of beers and a martini we headed back to Victoria Hotel where we were spending the night. Lynton and James both went to sleep while Pat and myself did a Pizza/KFC run at 3:00am, I also got a free cappucino from the pizza place (you get one when you buy a medium pizza) and while I was drinking the cappucino we saw the people that worked in the store get in a fight with a guy that stole something. After getting the pizza we headed down to KFC to get some chips and I ended up standing in line for about 40 minutes which was ridiculous. All in all though it was a great night and wasn’t too hard on the wallet.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows was released yesterday to great fanfare. I had the morning off so I decided that I would join the hundreds of people at Borders Chadstone. Now your probably wondering why I, the same person that can’t tolerate standing in line at the canteen for longer than a couple of minutes actually managed to wait in line for a couple of hours on a Saturday morning. The reason was, I had agreed to pick up a number of people’s pre-ordered copies thinking that it would take me 15 minutes max, I also had my pre-ordered copy (and owl) waiting. Also if I had been at home dad would of had me busy preparing for my brothers 13th Birthday (more about that later on). The experience of being at Borders yesterday morning was pretty cool, and it is probably the only time I will see hundreds of people queuing up for a book (some sad people actually felt the need to dress up, I mean if it’s a little 8 year old then yeah it’s cute, but seriously if your 45 and went to the launch yesterday dressed as a wizard then you really need to re-evaluate your life). I felt sorry for the staff at Borders who a) had to dress up b) had to deal with hundreds of screaming kids & c) deal with their normal workload on top of that. I was very proud of myself for cutting about an hour from the wait time by going down to the magazine and CD level where the queue was drastically shorter, you see people don’t realise you can pay for books down there, they think that you can only buy CD’s. After that I headed to school and got the team photo for First Football which turned out pretty average. Then I headed home to help set up my brothers 13th. He ended up having about thirty kids over which was good for me because I was on alcohol patrol, you see my parents had decided that they weren’t allowing alcohol at this party so I went around and confiscated it off all the kids who ’smuggled’ it in, the best part is I got to keep it all because none of the kids wanted their parents to find out, so I now have (well at least did have until I decided to drink it) about $150 worth of booze including a full bottle of Wild Turkey (still sealed) and a bottle of Vodka (I still can’t believe these kids brought so much). Dad also managed to score some fireworks off one of his many ‘contacts’ which was awesome (we of course warned all the neighbours so they could lock their dogs up) I am still amazed the cops didn’t turn up. Finally today we dropped my brother off at the airport (he had flown down for the weekend) after having lunch in Lygon Street.

Today was one of those really frustrating days. It started with Lawson asking about team photos for aerobics and football umpiring and ended with leaving with an approval form from Scotty for the photos of the students to be put in the year 12 magazine. This one form has given me more grief than you possibly could imagine and I practically lived in Scott’s office all day today (broken up by my frequent trips to IT, which is inconveniently located at the other end of Senior School). Although one humurous moment was Luke “bursting into a fit of giggles” in math due to Ange’s book and me doing that excited voice thing when people walked past the window (Pant happened to walk past the window), anyway Luke almost got himself kicked out of math which was pretty funny. Also I just got off a 15 odd minute conversation on the phone with Nic in Singapore and it only cost me 30c thanks to MyNetFone, as opposed to my usual mobile charges of about $12 or the Telstra landline charges of about $15 and your soul.

Well tomorrow begins what will become my last term 3 ever. There are some key events during this term that will be a milestone like the last musical. It is only recently that I have seriously begun to think about next year and what I plan to do, I mean I have thought about it before but it has always been something that I could say “well I’ll think about that when I get to it” but now it’s getting closer and I can no longer put it off. This term I will be making some serious concrete decisions about my courses for next year. This is where it gets difficult as I am yet to truly decide which path to take (I have left my options open for both). I can go down the IT path or I can go down the ‘Arts’ path with the latter leading on to other career options in journalism, international studies etc. I also have to decide whether I will stay at home or move into my own place, unfortunately if I want to move out I need money which I sorta have sitting there but I need time to access it cause its all locked up in various term deposits etc (hence why I need to make a decision now). So over the next two weeks I will be making these crucial decisions that could well impact on the rest of my life (yes dramatic isn’t it!), anyway it’s getting late and unfortunately I still have stuff to do before I retire for the night. PS. This is probably the most personal post I’ve ever made, I feel like a myspace emo.

This morning I had breakfast with Nic at Brew Cafe down on Poath Road. It was good to catch up with an old friend with a variety of topics being discussed ranging from school to apartments. I then went up to Chadstone to buy my brother his birthday present (unfortunately I can’t tell you what it is because he has stumbled across this blog before). The most exciting part of my day however was when I walked into Kmart and saw giant Clarabel’s on sale. I immediately told Luke who seemed very keen to know which Kmart store and how big. They had a variety of sizes including the small Clarabel so if anyone wants one then Kmart is the place to be.

It has been a busy week hence the lack of posts since I returned from Sydney. I can’t be bothered recapping my whole week but it involved drinking, dancing and countless dinners and lunches. Yesterday I went down to Sandringham to visit my auntie, we went out for breakfast and then lunch as well and if my auntie had of had it her way we would have gone out for dinner as well all in all it wasn’t really that exciting. Tomorrow I will be having breakfast with Nic who has flown down from Singapore for a few weeks. Anyway I hope everyone is enjoying there well earned break and its only a week until everything starts again (yay!).

Well my wonderful week in Sydney ended today which is rather sad, but it’s good to be home. The flight back was interesting as I sat behind a couple of people (executives etc) from Wesfarmers (the people buying Coles). Anyway I’ve decided to put on this blog what I did each day before I forget so that in a couple of years I can remember it all (I don’t actually expect you to care, its merely for my own benefit)

Monday: Flew to Sydney on QF430, Visited MaCarthur Square Shopping Centre

Tuesday: Went into the Sydney CBD and had a look at the Pitt Street Mall, and around the CBD.

Wednesday: Went to Homebush, then made my way to North Sydney and walked back to Sydney across the Harbour Bridge. Went up to Pylon Lookout at the bridge which gave awesome views of Sydney and the harbour.

Thursday: Went to Bondi beach and then made my way back through Kings Cross (a very seedy place).

Friday: Went to the top of Sydney tower which gave me a 360 degree view of Sydney (well worth the entrance fee if your ever in Sydney), then made my way back down to earth and walked through Hyde Park and saw the barracks, then made my way north along Macquarie St and walked to the Opera House via the Botanical Gardens. Walked around the Opera House and got some awesome photos of both the Opera House and the Harbour Bridge. Then Friday night went out to Club 209.

Saturday: Took the ferry to Manly, then went to North Head (the northern opening of the harbour) which afforded some awesome views of Sydney and the harbour.

Sunday: Had a walk around The Rocks and Circular Quay.

Monday: Flew back to Melbourne on QF 419.

In other news I got my phone and VOIP adapter today, anyway its with MyNetFone and costs me $0 per month with a free DID (normal phone number). It offers me 10c untimed national calls, 15c per minute calls to mobiles and from 1.9c per minute international (very handy for calling people I know overseas). The reason I got a VOIP service was to try and cut down on my mobile usage and it was a really awesome offer (via Whirlpool). I was very glad that I made the order in time (offer ended last Friday) because the ANZ took ages in issuing me with my Visa Debit Card (benefit of VISA without the debt!!!).