Propane Nightmare, Drug trafficking, Kate's Death, and Lacking Respect

1. Looked up Marc Baylis who plays Rob on Coronation Street and learned, from Lord Wiki, that Baylis appeared in the video of an Australian group—"Propane Nightmare" by Pendulum.

2. Started watching the video to Pendulum.

I didn't think I had ever heard of Pendulum, but the song sounds slightly familar to me.

3. Looked at my Spotify list. I have four songs from Pendulum, including "Propane Nightmare".

I'm really dumb about knowing what music I have on my lists.

The problem is, I probably add songs more often to my lists than I listen to the lists.

4. Tried to understand what's happening in the video. There's a church with something religious happening. Then Marc Baylis and some girl escape through a window.

For some reason, it reminds me of The Walking Dead, even though there are no zombies. I think there's something evil, though. Maybe the church is going to do a mass suicide?

5. Confused by the end of the video. I'm not sure if the church blew up? Maybe from Propane? Or did some demonic dark cloud come from above and attack the church?

6. Wanted to say that when I've been watching videos these past few days, I sometimes think of that TV show I Rock. One of the episodes was about the rock group making their video. I didn't like the show or the episode. But now that I'm watching videos, I'm kind of appreciating the show more...or at least my memories of that particular episode.

7. Read article about gay marriage in Australia.

If I'm understanding things right, Tony Abbott is going to have a referendum to let the people vote on the issue.

Hopefully, the people will vote yes. If it comes to that.

Tony Abbott plans to have this referendum if his party is elected into government again.  Bill Shorten says the Labor party is elected, he's going to introduce a bill for gay marriage. But if you introduce a bill, that's not a guarantee it's going to happen. Is it?

How would our world change if we knew for sure there was life after death, and it was easy for our dearly-departed to talk to us via the Internet?   

The Dead are Online  a novel by Dina Roberts 

 

8. Read article about the ninety-one year old man from Sydney who is accused of cocaine trafficking.

He says he thought he was delivering bars of soap. I believe him. It's hard not to, because he looks like a typical friendly grandfather.

I'm thinking, though, that it would be easier to for an elderly person to get away with purposeful drug trafficking, especially when they're in their nineties. It's hard to imagine they'd knowingly commit a crime, and easy to believe they'd be tricked into doing something.

Then again, the police could look at their criminal record. It's unlikely a person whose never been convicted of a crime would suddenly start committing crimes when they're in their nineties.  But if you have an old man who committed many crimes in the past? Why would he stop when he's old?

9. Wondered if I'm wrong about people not starting a life of crime when they're older. Maybe there comes a time when people become tired of living on the straight and narrow.

I've never done any drug trafficking. I've never smoked pot. I haven't done any illicit drugs. I don't even drink. But when I'm older, maybe I'll want to live a different kind of life. I might become a pothead or heroin addict. I might smuggle drugs...and other illegal things.

Maybe I'll be like Grandma Dynamite on The Flintstones.

10. Started watching an episode of Neighbours.

11. Saw that Nate (Meyne Wyatt) has been brought into the Dimato storyline with Paige (Olympia Valance) and Tyler (Travis Burns). He's helping Paige and Tyler pay the money they owe to the criminals. Will this be the beginning of the end to this storyline? Or is Nate going to be trapped now too?

I really hope this storyline is coming to end soon. Please!!

12. Saw that Daniel (Tim Phillips) is wearing a shirt buttoned up high.

What's the deal? Is this a popular style right now?

I'm not really up to date when it comes to fashion. But I know I don't like this button thing.

Maybe it will grow on me.

13. Thought Brad (Kip Gamblin) was awful in this episode.

First he told Lauren (Kate Kendall) that she's going to have to forgive him eventually. Really? Why? Who makes the rules about that?  If Lauren wants to hold a grudge against Brad for the rest of his life, she has every right.

Then Brad gets mad at his wife Terese (Rebekah Elmaloglou) for having doubts about their relationship. He's mad that she doesn't trust him. Well, why should she? First he kissed Lauren in a hotel room; and kept it secret for months. Then later, she goes out of town and returns to learn that Lauren spent a full night at her house with Brad. On top of that, Brad tries to scare away a man who shows interest in Lauren. Why in the world should Terese have faith in her relationship?

14. Felt that part of Brad's heart is with Terese, but most of it is still with Lauren.

15. Started watching another episode of Neighbours.

16. Annoyed that Lauren and Brad use Paige as an excuse to hang out with each other.

Maybe a young child might benefit from their separated parents hanging out together? But an adult?

I think Paige is capable of spending time with her parents on an individual basis.

I would understand her parents getting together for events important to Paige's life. For example, if she gets married. They should both be there. And if she has a baby, let them both be at the hospital. But do the three of them need to hang out at their backyard pool together?

17. Decided it probably wouldn't be any better if Paige was a young child. It would probably be confusing for her.

I'm not saying separated parents should never be together, or that they should rarely be together. I'm just questioning whether they need to be alone together with their child?  Maybe it's okay in some instances. But when there's a jealous and insecure wife? And that wife has reason to be jealous and insecure?

Yeah. I think Brad and Lauren are acting badly.

18. Thought that Paul's grandson Jimmy (Darcy Tadich) looks a little bit like Carl from The Walking Dead—the first season, when Carl was young.

19. Went tot he Triple J 2014 list.

Today I'm going to listen to Sia's "Chandelier".

I might have heard it before. I've heard some of her songs.

20. Started watching the "Chandelier" video. It's popular—874 million views. That's close to a billion.

The video begins with a rundown house or apartment.

There's a human wearing caucasian-flesh colored clothes. At first I thought maybe it was Sia, but now it looks like it could be a child.

21. Thought the human looked like a child, but she also kind of looks like a petite adult.

22. Thought the video was creepy and unsettling, but I guess I kind of like it for that.

23. Learned, from Lord Wiki that the girl in the video is named Maddie Ziegler.

She was born in 2002, so she's neither child nor an adult. She's a teen human person.

She's one of the stars of the reality TV show Dance Moms.  I think my nieces watch that. Or maybe they watch a different reality TV show about dance. I'm not sure.

24. Saw that Maddie Ziegler is in other Sia videos. If they're listed on the Triple J 2014 list, maybe I'll watch them one day.

25. Started watching a Neighbours backstage video. This one doesn't star any particular actor.  It's about Brennan proposing to Kate.

26. Saw that many of the actors are wearing the black winter coats.

Well, you can only see two from that picture, really. But there are more. Trust me.

27. Saw that I'm wrong. The video does have a star. It's Chris Milligan.

I thought otherwise, because his name wasn't featured in the title.

28. Decided to watch another backstage video, because it connects to this one.

Brennan and Kate get engaged; then Kate gets shot.

Does she get shot right after getting engaged?

29. Thought video was incredibly callous and hilarious.

When the camera is rolling, the actors act so sad and serious about Kate (Ashleigh Brewer) being shot. When the camera stops...well, not so much so.

Brennan stands over Kate's dying body and says, Kate! Kate!  Then in a bored monotone voice he says, She's dead. Everyone, she died.

Kate then whines, I'm not dead yet.

Brennan then says something like, Well, let's go to the pub and look for some other chicks.

Too funny.

It would be great if there was a collection of dramatic death scene outtakes.

Although I think in some cases, it's a somber affair.

Then again, Kate's death might be a somber affair, and people are making jokes to lighten the mood.

I mean it's not somber like death, but it IS someone's last day of work. That can be very sad.

30. Thought of Matt Smith from Doctor Who. I remember reading that he cried when doing scenes about losing Amy Pond.

31. Started watching another episode of Neighbours.

In this one, it's Toadie (Ryan Moloney) that's awful. He offers to help Kyle (Chris Milligan) with the beautification project and assumes it's going to be mindless fun.  Well, because he's a lawyer and that takes brains. People who do landscaping and carpentry work don't have to think, right?

Toadie learns his lesson there. He fails to read the map; digs into some electrical thing; and causes an outage.

32. Thought about Toadie insulting Kyle, and how he didn't even realize he was insulting him. People do that sometimes.

It reminds me of Wentworth when someone suggests that Bea (Danielle Cormack) have her daughter visit. She replies that prison is no place for a child, forgetting that Doreen (Shareena Clanton) is raising a child in prison. Doreen storms out which helps Bea to realize she stuck her foot in her mouth. She's nicely apologetic. But sometimes people keep quiet when they've been stung by an unintentional insult, and the person who said something hurtful never realizes they said the wrong thing.

33. Wondered how often I've accidentally and unknowingly insulted someone.

34. Thought of my younger sister. We talked about her having three kids, and somewhere along the line, she said that having one child is like having an accessory.

That was insulting to me, since I have just one child. It's NOT easy having one child. But to her defense, having one child compared to three is probably like having an accessory.  Even I have that mindset sometimes.  No, I don't mean that I have ever seen Jack as an accessory. Far from it.  A few weeks ago, though, my parents and I took my sister's older boys out to the movie. She was left to take care of her toddler only.  I imagined her having a super easy relaxing afternoon.  But when I was the mother of one toddler, it rarely (if ever!) felt easy.

So who knows...maybe Toadie was rude, but right. Landscaping work is hard and not mindless but maybe compared to lawyer work, it would seem fun and easy.

I have no idea, because I've not done law work, landscaping, or carpentry.

35. Decided it's just not really nice to be dismissive of someone else's work or life challenges...even though you truly might have a bigger challenge.

I did it to my sister recently, as a joke. Hopefully she wasn't offended.

I was at Costco and saw a mother with six kids  It looked like she had three sets of twins and all the kids seemed to be under the age of seven.  I texted my sister; told her what I saw and said I had less sympathy for her now.  Well, although I was joking, I was actually half-serious. Three kids under six seems so hard to me. I often feel so stressed for my sister, and it makes me feel that my motherhood work was so small in comparison.  But there I was seeing a mother whose challenges made my sister's plight seem easy in comparison.

It's like feeling sorry for yourself because you have a two week bout with the flu. You then meet someone with breast cancer and feel your flu was so small in comparison.  Later you meet someone who is due to die of pancreatic cancer in a few weeks, and the breast cancer starts to seem kind of easy.  Well, that's if the breast cancer is of the curable variety.  A lot of people still die of breast cancer; and in those cases, the horror of the experience is probably equal to pancreatic cancer.

36. Decided my joke, to my sister, was kind of not nice; but I don't feel too bad. My sister probably deserved it since she made the comment about one child being like an accessory.

37. Thought that maybe every time we have a problem or challenge, we should think of someone who has it worse than us and then think of someone who has it easier than us. It helps to put things in perspective and is a nice balance between being positive and negative about our lives.

I kind of did that recently. Seeing the story of Paul Robinson (Stefan Dennis) and his estranged daughter Amy (Zoe Cramond) made me feel guilty for giving my dad grief about our relationship. My dad is a MUCH better father than Paul Robinson.  But then to prevent myself from feeling guilty about being difficult, I thought of parents, I've heard about, that are much more supportive than my own parents.

38. Started to watch another episode of Neighbours.

39. Felt like a bad person when reading Bec's post about Facebook. She believes you shouldn't unfriend people or block them.

Well, she says it's okay to unfriend people you hardly know—ones that wouldn't notice your absence. I think I did that for the most part. Although who knows?  They might have noticed me more than I realized.

I think once I unfriended someone out of anger.  I might have even blocked them. Bec says this about blocking:  The block on the other hand is just cruel. Unless someone is genuinely stalking you (in which case feel free to block, report, file an AVO, whatever it takes) then the block is akin to using an Uzi to kill a fly. It's hurtful and in most instances, totally unnecessary.

Maybe this attitude is why Bec has close friends, and I don't.

I unfriended people on Facebook. I blocked one or two. I muted people often. Then I just quit.

40. Saw that the homophobic guy on Neighbours might be homophobic in the true sense of the world. He doesn't hate gay people. He's afraid of them. Why? Because it looks like he has certain feelings that scare him.

On this episode, he tries to apologize to Nate; then kisses him.

You know...when the guy was a jerk to Nate, a few episodes back, he didn't actually say anything specifically anti-gay.  At least I don't remember him saying anything.  He pretty much got mad at Nate for hitting on him but didn't say it was because Nate was a man. I think Nate and his friends just assumed it was because the guy was anti-gay.

But let's say I'm friendly with a guy and then he starts hitting on me. I get mad at him for assuming I wanted more than friendliness. I act like a bitch. Would that automatically mean I'm a lesbian, and don't want to date men?