Donna from That 70's Show

Unless it was English literature period or sports related, I didn't pay a great deal of attention in primary slash high school, but I'm pretty sure that during geography (or math or biology or textiles or whatever they taught it in) they indicated, through a procession of native costumes from around the world, that there were at least 30 people in the world. 

In the ensuing 82 years since I've become an adult, it must be at least 40 annoying human beings by now inhabiting this place.  Which means some of us must have a doppelganger or two or three.  We can't all be different.

For many years people - often strangers, weirdly; strange and weird strangers actually - have been telling me that I look a lot like Donna from That 70's Show.  Ah, Donna from That 70's Show.  Bloody Donna from That 70's Show. 

The offending actress.

I used to quite like That 70's Show until I started getting compared to bloody Laura Prepon, the offending actress who happens to be the spitting image of Donna. 

I didn't really mind the comparison - I mean, who cares - but I have been stroppy about it for so long that it would be hairbrained to just go along with it now.  I got the Donna comment again last week, which has strongly encouraged this social media rant.  

Bloody late night reruns on free-to-air.  It wasn't too bad when Laura had red hair, even when the show was on in prime time in the early 00's.  But as soon as she decided to go blonde I was a'stuffed.  

And much of this was before the gods of internet search engines reinvented the wheel, in the days when people actually had to use their brains to try and work things out for themselves, rather than just type "daggy television actresses" into The Google.  

And there's nothing more annoying than someone trying to remember who you look like and thinking you have any interest whatsoever in helping them in this process.

While I refuse to be able to see this apparent likeness, I've been following Laura's career over the years out of self-respect really, fearful that, as an out-of-work actress receiving meagre Hollywood benefits, she may decide to take on a D-Grade movie role as a dancer in a tawdry, seedy strip club.  I don't much care what Laura Prepon does with her life, so long as she keeps her clothes on while she's doing it.        

        

Big Mobs of Public Holidays

Here in Canberra we've just simultaneously celebrated hot air balloon season and fireworks season.  At least that seems to be the takeaway for me.  It's probably best to not try these things at the same time, particularly if you are doing them in your living room.  Although if you are going to do it in front of the TV, it is probably a good idea to drink a lot of anything with an alcohol content beforehand.  Only good things can happen once the vodka's kicked in.

The other week we had the old duck's - Canberra's - 100th birthday blowout.  The fireworks were meh (I forgot that low expectations are key), and the omnipresent hot air balloons were either terrifying (Darth Vader) or lethal (crashing into the Treasury building).

I'm thinking spatial awareness might be one of the more important attributes to bring to the table if you want to drive a supersized ball of plastic powered by a naked flame around the sky.  But what do I know, I drive a Toyota Corolla on bitumen.  Although I probably am one of only a handful of locals who have never sideswiped a government building. 

The Darth Vader one went over my house at dawnish, so that was pretty cool.  Although the downside from telling people about my dark little visitor was that all day at work people shouted Star Wars references at me which are either so overused as to be made redundant, or I didn't understand them at all because my brain doesn't place a high priority on storing popular culture references, particularly those from decades ago.  

And then when I faked confusion, because it entertains me so, they decided I needed superfluous explanations, and, well, I just don't care enough about Luke and the Solo Man or whatever his name is.

I seem to be filibustering to come up with a blog post these days.  Geez, I'm not looking for Pulitzer material, I'm just trying to fill the space between the ads that I didn't ask for. 

Apartment Purchasing Adventures

Not much of note has happened in my life recently.  Except I bought a house last week, so there's that.  Yep, after donkey years of steadfastly refusing to commit to anything I consider a 'big deal', I bought a friggin' house.  Kudos to me.  I had been looking seriously into the real estate market for about four months.  The process has been excruciatingly annoying at times, but not too bad for the majority of my journey.

About a month ago I fell in love with a unit in Queanbeyan, near my home town of Canberra.  It was exactly what I wanted, except it also had more crosses than ticks when I ran it through my dream list-inator.  So I was fairly bummed when it dropped in price and then some dirty housesnatching housestealer put up an offer.  And I may be many things but I'm not a gazumper.

A few weeks later I trawled through another apartment which was located near my workplace.  It was new and beautiful and suitably handy, but I wasn't going to pay that price for that apartment.  The real estate agent told me about a new development that was being built across the road. 

So bam! kapow! and other Batman-type sound effects, a few weeks later I have my own apartment, due to be completed in July 2014.  It's fairly similar to the one in the picture*.

Aparently 70-80% of these new developments run 3-4 months overtime, which just gives me more time to save more cashola and more time to prepare for my first ever Mortgage (mortgage isn't a day of the week or a personal pronoun or a country or a trademark or a monument, but it is a Scary Word, and Scary Words are always hit with a capital letter, then italicised, enboldenised and underlined for Great Effect).

I may or may not have changed my travel route so I drive past the site on my way home from work, allowing me to track the progress daily.  Is that weird?  Maybe I'll chart the progress in a blog - because that what bloggers do - and I can go and take endless photos and stuff.  That won't be annoying for the builders at all.

*It's a bit bigger than the one in the picture.