I’ve been around online since I was about 9 (199 and on the Winnie the Pooh Bear Fan Clun (I was a lame child). From there, I hit Neopets and Habbo hotel. Since then, I’ve never really gotten offline. I had Yahoo IM before I ever used MSN, and was part of Yahoo Groups when they were big. From there, and seeing some websites of my favourite show, I somehow ended up on Lissa Explains It All. I learnt beginner HTML, and yes it taught me bad things, like coloured scroll bars and marquees, and yes, my first website has both those things.

My first website was a fansite for my favourite actress, Jane Allsop (go on, go google her). It was hosted on Geocities, and it was very very bad. It moved to being hosted on my friends domain, and then to its’ own domain. (@ janeallsop.com) I was very lucky to have some friends who actually knew what they were doing and taught me along the way.

The community for Jane Allsop (and Blue Heelers) wasn’t huge, but it was fantastic. I was known as being one of Jane’s biggest fans, it was fun. Jane Allsop and online served as my escape from real life at times. Sounds sad, but it’s true. I was much more open online, I made decisions and I didn’t hide behind a mask, which I did offline, and often still do.

During that time, I was active on a few message boards and blogged a lot. I’ve blogged on and off since 2004. I had a stage of getting about 30 comments per post, I’m not sure how? But it was fun. However, I have *nothing* of those days left. No backups, no sites lingering. The best I can do is look though Internet Archive and remember everything that happened.

I had a little side note on my blogs, that if you knew me in real life not to mention things I mentioned on my blog. I told the truth on my blogs and I hate confrontations so much, so most the things I wrote about, no one in real life knew. I was quite afraid someone would mention something to me, not a lot of people did, thankfully.

So I had a choice with this blog, either keep it a secret and have little or no readers, or share it with my twitter friends. My twitter has a few links with my “real life”, so the scared 15 year old reared its’ head, and I nearly didn’t share it.

@joshnunn posted the URL, and I took it as a sign. I’m not 15 years old anymore, I’m 20 now. I can be my real self, on and off line. I don’t hide behind the escape of Jane Allsop and Blue Heelers anymore, I don’t not say my opinion in fear of the response it gets. (Well, I try not to.)

I’m not afraid to say something revealing about myself online, and if someone happens to read it I know offline, I’m not scared of that, and if someone mentions it to me, I’m okay with that.

Everyone who knows me, knows I don’t do the cooking. I don’t really know *how* to cook, it’s all a little scary. But alas, the last few days I’ve cooked tea, and baked goodies. I must say it’s a lot of fun, and I did not to do badly at all, if I do say myself.
We tend to spend a little too much money on semi prepared food, I’d like to change so we are fully preparing every meal.

So I took the opportunity of the boy going to Football, and having the little one all to myself and we made cookies. She did quite well, only got bored at the end, stood carefully on her stool, and laughed at my lameness when I put flour on her nose. The cookies came out well, tasted good, and was a great late night snack before the little one fell asleep watching ‘So You Think You Can Dance.’ (Can you blame her?).

I am very thankful that she’s nearly three and will still start to fall asleep on me at night. And that she is feisty enough to tell me to ‘go away’ when I tell her off, and that she starts to walk herself to time out as soon as she says it. That she will dance to Michael Jackson now, and will know him like I know Elvis. That she’ll eat my attempt at a tart for tea, and give me a kiss for my effort. That when I get her out of bed in the morning or after naps she’ll hug me extra hard. But mainly I’m thankful she takes the chance on me to be involved in her life even if I’m not related.

I started my first job just before I was 16, and worked there until I was just about to turn 20. I had grown up with those girls, I had bosses who loved me like I was there own kid and took care of me. I had stepped up into the role of a senior, and protected the younger girls. It was most of teenager years, and I went through most my trauma there.

When I started at my new job, it was more stressful, more boring and nothing like the family business I was used to. I’d go from bored, to busy and stressed, to thinking I had it worked out. After about six months, I’ve started seeing some awesome marketing opportunities, began wanting to step up in my job and make my mark. I’m surprised, I didn’t think I’d get here with this job. It’s now time to start it up and get noticed.

The other point I’m surprising myself with, is my acceptance of my new co-workers. Like I said previously, I grew up with the girls from my first job. We finished school, went to uni, had first boyfriends, had first breakups, first acoholic drinks, all that fun stuff, and now I am in an environment where everyone is older than me (except one co-worker) and I thought I would never get to that caring stage.

Then one day, I walked back from the loo, walked into the room. The co-workers who can drive me bonkers, where laughing. I joined in the craziness for a few seconds and then realised, maybe, just maybe I will get there with these guys. Maybe.

Adopted from the RSPCA, he is a lil charmer. He’ll not stop until you grab him and calm him down. He continually surprises me with just how clever he is, he learnt how to shake paws, high five, and beg in two days, though he won’t do it for anything less than a treat.

He might eat our shoes, and wake us up at 6am, but he is one awesome puppy.

Who knew I’d turn into someone who gave a crap about how my house looks? I’m fairly sure I never did a honest days worth of chores at my folks house. Now? Now, I’m grabbing my vinegar, microfibre cloth and scrubbing the mirror clean, getting excited about new vacuums and complaining about dust.

My mum would be proud. (And annoyed that I never helped out as a child.)

I’m attempting to come up with a list of daily/weekly/monthly chores that I must do, rather than the random schedule I keep at the moment. Instead I do it all at once, and get bored and end up distracted playing guitar hero with the boy.