Last day at work

Yesterday was my last day at work. I wasn't naive enough to expect a farewell party, but I was hoping for more than; a pen, a 5 minute talk about my future and a weak handshake. After I cleared my desk of all my belongings (seriously, he did I accumulate that many pen lids?), I felt a sudden urge to go to Knox Grammar School. I'm not really sure why I decided to go to my old school; maybe I was just in a reflective mood, or maybe I wanted to see for myself how far I've come since I graduated since '08.

It was a bizarre time for me to come visit because I noticed that there were students, parents and teachers everywhere. I suspected they were having a parent teacher night or something like that which must have made me appear like a single young parent who had lost their kid. Despite everyone staring at me strangely, I managed to tour all my old classrooms and hallways. A lot has changed. The biggest change though, is that I noticed girls wearing Knox uniforms! WHAT!? To be fair, it was a Friday and I only saw girls wearing Knox Cadet clothing, but it's still a really big step! I guess the 100+ year old conservative supporters of the school must have all dropped dead, allowing a wave of liberal thinking to wash over the school. Another strange thing I noticed is that there wasn't (much) screaming, shouting or hurling abuse at other students. Is it true that my negative perception of my old school is a fabricated memory I invented to suit my own preconceptions? Nah, it was just a Friday and parents were around to control their kids.

After I came back from Knox I immediately headed straight to the Opera house to meet Matt Gates. He had somehow managed to get free tickets to see the comedian Russell Brand! It was really cool, I loved it.

Alright, enough small talk, now for the deep introspective bit.

I'M UNEMPLOYED! YAY!?

I originally wanted to use this time to go on the Great North Walk (a solid 2 week hike from Sydney to Newcastle). Sadly though, I found out a few days ago that I have "tibialis posterior tenosynovitis" , which is a fancy way of saying i have "tendonitis" which is a fancy way of saying that my tendon has fluid in it which is a fancy way of saying my foot is fucked. Woah, that means I ran the 42km marathon with a fucked foot! Can I get my international badass of the year award now?

But when God closes a door, he opens another one. Even though I can't walk or run, I can still do weights. I've still got 30 something gym passes on the Luna Park gym - what a joke, I know. My aim is to get absolutely ripped by the time I travel to Malaysia. I can also make more videos without distraction now which should keep me occupied too!

Strangely, this is the first time where I haven't constructed a well written list detailing all the things I want to do. I reckon I'm gonna wing it. I'm a little terrified that I might just resort to playing computer games for 5 hours a day to fill up my spare time though!

But wait! Are playing hours and hours of computer games really too different from working a 9-5 job? In one environment you're sitting at a desk staring at a computer screen for hours swearing underneath your breath at someone who isn't utilizing your skill set, and in another environment you're sitting at a desk staring at a computer screen for hours getting sworn at by someone for not using your magic skills!

Unemployment!

I'm almost jobless! Poor nutrition, dirty clothes, and brown paper bags to conceal my alcohol - here I come!

At first I thought I would be really empowered by the idea of being unemployed because of all the opportunity lying in front of me:
1) I have money now!
2) I have got my website up and running (barely)
3) I have nothing chaining me to Australia. For the most part, I can literally spin a globe and randomly point to a place I want to live
4) I'm going traveling around Asia in November & December

But recently I've been starting to feel quite anxious. My main concern is that once my travel induced optimism wares down, I'll be stranded in a random country without a job! I'm also especially worried that I might decide to spontaneously get a tattoo saying "Thug Life" across my chest in Vietnam, which will make employment quite a bit harder! Fortunately, no matter how drunk I am, I can trust my nerd instincts to kick in, and demand the tattoo artist to write "Thug Life" in klingon or elvish.

In all honesty though, I'm actually kind of glad I feel a little anxious. I think I'll be able to funnel that emotion into excitement and motivation when the time comes. I mean, there is so much I can do right now in this period of my life. I can brew my own beer and create personal labels for different types - I'm going to label them "Good Shit", "Cheap Crap" and "Decent Stuff".  I can live in Canada for a year and get drunk playing ice hockey! And so many more beer related activities!

At least for the next two months, I'm going to live entirely in the 'now' and let the future paranoid Matt go AWOL for a little while.

Water on Mars!

Ok so this post is going to be the first of it's kind! For once I'm not going to talk about me!

We (NASA, not me) found liquid water on Mars! Wohoo! How awesome is that? How cool would it be if life existed on Mars?

(ok this is where it gets boring so feel free to skip)

This isn't just interesting scientifically, it's interesting philosophically too. So far every religion asserts, either though metaphor or literal interpretation, that humans were created by God on a world that's just right for us. I reckon Discovering life on Mars should silence these confident religions. Why would the Bible or the Quran leave that shit out?  I'm honestly curious about how many religious scholars will try and reinterpret passages in their holy books and claim, through creative use of metaphor, that it was always written that life was on another planet. I mean, lets face it, if science could silence creationism, it would have already done so - if discovering the true age of the earth and facts about evolution can't stop people believing that humans were placed on a 6,000 year old earth, then nothing will. Overall I'm both happy that science is pushing the limits further and further every day, and frustrated that superfluous religions are being dragged kicking and screaming right behind.

Smartphones

And today's rant will be oooooooooon...

Smartphones!

ding! ding! ding!

Everyone wastes so much time on their Smartphones these days! Nobody talks to each other anymore, they just fixate on a glowing screen in their hands for hours and hours. Sure, they provide instant entertainment, but at the cost of our humanity! We're all connected, but nobody is connecting blah blah blah blah blah...

What a bunch of bullshit. Smartphones are awesome. Sure they're expensive and their screens break easily, but it's totally worth it. My phone has been under repair for the last week, and it made me realize how much I need constant access to Facebook, BBC, Google Maps and Angry Birds. For the first time in ages, I was forced to read a book on the train to work! How primitive! The swiping mechanisms on a book just doesn't compare to the iPhone 6. Although to be honest, the battery life on the book was pretty outstanding. Oh and who cares if Facebook, YouTube and Smartphones are making us more antisocial? That's a good thing! It means more people will enter fields like Engineering and Mathematics at Uni! I reckon global social ineptness is a small price to pay for a personal jet-pack or extra bionic limb. Bring on the next generation of super socially stunted scientists! 

Now as y'all know, I'm pretty bloody awesome at predicting the future. (if you don't know, trust me, you will). I reckon the next Apple product to completely revolutionize society as we know it will be called: "the iHat". It'll be just a regular ordinary top hat, except it'll have the Apple logo on it and you'll have to squeeze it over your face to obstruct all your senses. Then you can buy basic accessories for $50 each like; a vaporizer that releases a puff of nicotine every 10 seconds into your nose, a tube that feeds the grease from a cheeseburger directly into your mouth, and headphones that automatically alert you when someone on Tinder is within 5 meters away! I personally can't wait! Brave new world, here I come!

Job almost over!

So right now I'm 25 years old and I have a job working at the Uni. Soon, I will be 25 years old plunging my arms into the dark corner of my pantry to find that last can of baked beans. That's right! My job contract is almost over! Wohoo!

I can imagine that a lot of people find brief unemployment quite intimidating and scary. Understandably so because most humans like financial security, a sense of routine and a topic of conversation to bitch or brag about at bars. 

Not me though! I'm going to use this moment in my life as an opportunity to go traveling. I'm already planning a trip around SE Asia in November and December. Then, depending on how much I spend on beer and crappy Vietnamese merchandise, I might have enough money to live outside of Australia! I'll organize my finances and stuff and then evacuate to a different country! America? Canada? Germany? Who knows!? If Syrians can get in, so can I!

I don't really know the best way to make an informed judgement about moving to another country. I mean there's so little I know about other countries! Sure the basics can be found easily; average wage, healthcare, culture etc. But what about the small things? Is Greenland really green? Are black Brazilians better at dancing than other Brazilians? What would tinder be like in Saudi Arabia!? Everyone wears burqas over there..

Also, how would I find a job in another country? I'm struggling enough in Australia. To maximize my chances I'll have to broaden my application range. I shouldn't focus too narrowly down the Engineering path; Architecture, Cooking, Accounting etc! I should apply for jobs in these areas too! There's only 1 problem; I am completely unskilled. Fortunately, there's 1 solution; do 5 minutes of research to find jargon for each individual professional field, then casually mention that word as often as possible (in or out of context) to your prospective employer. Here's what I've got so far:
1) Architecture: "feng shui"

2) Chef: "creme fraiche"

3) Mathematics: "Logarithms"  

4) Accounting: "Tax evasion" 

5) Neuroscience: "Neuroplasticity"

6) Teacher: "cognitive load" 

Actually, fuck it, I'll stick with Engineering. After all, it's the only thing I'm kinda sorta OK at. I guess it's a pity Engineering has made me as creative as a... as a? as something which isn't very creative. 

Marathon

I just did the Blackmores 42km Marathon today! I was worried about it for 2 reasons.

1) My left foot got injured 3 days prior and
2) The longest I'd ever run was 14km. (that's inverting the numbers and adding 1. Yeah, it's a big number.

I promised myself that I wouldn't care about the time as long as I managed to run the whole thing. A pretty stupid expectation to set on myself considering how little I knew about marathons at the time.

Ironically I didn't run the whole thing but I got a good time. 4 hours 6 minutes.

I stopped twice to walk for about 5 minutes. I couldn't help it! I found that once I hit the 20k mark, I wasn't running anymore, I was undergoing a controlled fall. So once my body slowed down enough to grab some water, I lost my momentum and walked for a bit. When I reflect back on it though, I think stopping and walking for small bursts actually improved my time because it gave me a chance to regain my breath, stay hydrated and devour as many energy gels as I possibly could. In case you don't know, energy gel is a gooey form of cocaine; except you inhale it though your mouth.

Overall I'd say the biggest thing I learned is that a Marathon is more of a mental game than a physical one. I found your body can run at an agonizingly slow pace for hours and hours, but it's your brain that makes you stop prematurely. Somehow you've got to tame your mind (which I think is best personified as an unemployed British hobo sprawled out on a sofa telling you to lie down and have a drink), and force yourself to stagger your way relentlessly to the finish line.

Jobs

About a year ago my parents gave me some invaluable advice about my blog.

"Don't mention anything scathing about your current job", they began, "potential future employers put a lot of effort into thoroughly researching applicants", they continued, "and if they perceive ungrounded pessimism in your blog", they argued, "then", they signed, "you won't get the job you want".

I've had some time to think about this and I've come to the conclusion that my parents are absolutely right. This leaves me in an awkward position because I'm afraid that at some point in the last few years I may have voiced frustration at my various jobs. Fortunately, however, my future employer (I'm guessing his name will be Charles), will stumble upon this post when performing his exhaustive background research on me. Consequently, this is a fantastic opportunity to make amends for my previous uncalculated emotional outbursts on my blog. So without any further adieu, Charles, this song is for you:

(Que soft sounding piano)
Charles I've got something to confess,
At some point in the last few years I
may have fallen victim to work related stress,
and in an act of delusional thinking I... may have told a lie.

I guess what I'm really trying to say
Is that I'm sorry about the way
I criticized the 9-5 working routine.
For you see the truth really is:
That I love working in a cubical all day
and staring for hours at my monitor display
I see now what I should have always seen
that I'm the weird one, not the biz.

(Que drums and guitar)
I'm sorry that I didn't believe
I'm sorry for what I used to perceive
I'm sorry that I had to apply for leave
For the last few hours of New Years Eve

I was fucked up in the head before
but the old me has exited out the door
It's the 9-5 not the 9-4
And it shouldn't be any less or any more!

I need to ask you for your forgiveness
This sedentary lifestyle is good for fitness
And now all I want for Christmas
Is to spend more time in your business

The best time to spend indoors is during the day
I don't want to be anywhere else anyway
Even when I've done all my work I'll still stay
Otherwise how will I be payed?

Projects that don't matter are really fascinating
And I never spend my time contemplating
whether I should focus on something more captivating
I'm not having a go, I'm just stating
That the work I do is really motivating

(Que slow flute)
I applaud any bosses decision
To pursue what they envision
And treat my ideas with derision

The 9-5 is traditional
Which is why it's nonsensical
To work any other way
So I'll suck it up and just have a g'day