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I'm kind of not a fan, but this year I got the greatest christmas present of all! Freedom in the guise of a probationary license. Okay, so really it's not the greatest present at all because it just means I get to drive a lot of people to a lot of different and far-away locations, beginning with my brother and the McDonalds drive-thru. Constantly. And I can only imagine that in a month's time when he returns to school, I'll be the one making the hour round trip to his campus because he was too lazy to get up in time for the one bus that runs a day. I'm beginning to think I should spray paint my car yellow and whore myself out to pay for all the petrol I've had to buy.

But despite these pitfalls, driving my car around is pretty great. The obtaining-of-the-license may have not gone so great with two critical errors on the test and the shocking news only a week prior that I would have to drive a car I had never driven and then an almost-crash while driving from Camberwell to Templestowe was a little scary but otherwise things have gone surprisingly well. I am a fan of driving my car to the station rather than catching the bus as it is always late and all the drivers are very grumpy. My iPod, however, is never grumpy and always happy to see me and sing songs through the car radio. And I'm promise that I'm not as bad at driving as the above spiel makes me sound.

Festivities really began with the annual family lunch at my Aunty's house - she is rich and likes to pretend she has room in her Bentleigh townhouse for our ever increasing family. Somehow at least ten more people decided they were a part of our family this year, beginning with my own boyfriend whose mother was in Adelaide and also including my brother's new fiance, some people I had never met before but was forced to 'buy' a Kris Kringle for (actually I never purchased one because I didn't get time and the woman was incredibly cut, either that or her face is scrunched always) and also the soon-to-be lovechild belonging to my cousin and his partner which counts as an extra head at the lunch because it certainly ate like an existing person. While that lunch was incredibly fun, as you can imagine, we all moved on shortly to my own house for continued festivities at dinner which I enjoyed a lot more because my other Aunty made sushi and non-alcoholic desserts were involved.

Gifts included my long awaited Chanel No. 5 which I enjoy very much and some other crap including lovely Turkish Cherry tea from T2 and my favourite eyeliner pencil. Very exciting.

Attached to the actual Christmas day was a dinner party that Ony and I held for a group of friends while his mum was still away. Although I kind of wish I had photos of the amazing food creations we had concocted I was so stressed and busy that I didn't get time to take any at all. Aside from this one photo the next day of the leftovers, which I will just put here.

Anyway, our entre consisted of Ony's omelette/nori/mushroom rice MOUNTAIN thing and also prawn and herb mayo handrolls which I really cannot recommend enough. They were amazing, and I can say this without being conceited because I didn't cook the entre. I did cook a disappointingly bland pot of ramen and a green tea cheesecake whose waterbath decided to permeate its cheese mixture. Despite these mishaps I'd like to think the food was edible and the company enjoyable. What really made the night was a pack of cat bonbons I picked up from Big W for 2.96, because they had cats on them.

Taking a long look at my hard and miserable life a couple of days before New Years Eve I came to the realisation that my lack of plans wasn't acceptable and I'd have to try and concoct some party plans for everyone. This idea was fully supported by my parent's decision to go away and stay at a friend's place down the beach for a night. The house to ourselves and a table full of various alcoholic beverages spelt a good time for all.

The seven-or-so of us played the Hammond organ and danced on Chat Roulette before abandoning a game of Kings and watching the fireworks on television. Or dancing in front of the fireworks on television while wearing a collar and drinking from disgusting alcoholic test-tubes, depending on which crowd you circulated in.


I did not remember much.

On the third of January I turned 19, which is too old. I was quite depressed with the premise of being in the last teen year and briefly considered a wasted youth and premature adulthood, what with all my ridiculous university perfectionism. This soon passed, and I drove my mother and I to Warrandyte for a nice birthday lunch at Thyme on the Terrace. We walked around and looked inside the shops for a bit, drove to Greensborough, fought for a while - the usual. Then Ony came over and we prepared to leave for the Shout Out Louds show and a birthday dinner for me at the Vegie Bar in Brunswick St. Only communal seating was available when we arrived but that was fine and I enjoyed my usual favourite, the mexican burrito. Then we took a tram into the city and a tram out of the city to East Brunswick Club before deciding we should be back in the city for birthday drinks. So we went back to the city again and went to Cabinet, a bar which looks out over Swanston St from a height. I had an amazing cocktail and I wish the recipe for it was on the internet because I don't want to pay 16 dollars for it again.

We got back on the tram and went back to East Brunswick Club just in time to grab one more drink before Shout Out Louds took the stage. I thought they were very good live, better than on their CDs. This was refreshing. And they played Hard Rain, which is one of my favourite songs of all time - it was a nice birthday treat. We will skip over what happened once the show ended as it wasn't very pleasant but if you must know it involved street number mix ups and wandering around lost in Lygon St for 1.5 hours while being yelled at over the phone before having to pay for a taxi into the CBD and be yelled at some more.

And then a couple of nights ago I invited a large group of friends around for a birthday gathering at my place and then a smaller group to After Dark Social Club later on. I had never been to Roxannes, so this trip was intriguing and I now know most of my friends aren't really a fan of it. But I don't really care, because I had a good time there and it was my birthday.

When everyone started bailing, we tried to go to Cherry Bar but didn't want to pay another 10 dollars entry so we went to Pony instead which was an awful decision because it was entirely depressing and bad. So we went to Pieface instead and got pies and a taxi and 8 hours sleep.

A successful holiday period? Most certainly.