Here we go, here we go, here we go now!

Ok so I’m Xavier, and this is the blog. It’s been a while since I’ve put fingers to keys; they got a little burnt last time. But I’m heading into my Masters year, and since I’m going to be on the student allowance for the year, I won’t be able to work very much and I will have ooooodles of time to waste here. I work lots during the holidays, but that’s so that I can make extra payments on the personal loan, complete with the 17.5% interest rate I took out to buy my car. Thank you ASB.What do I study? Science. I’m in my Masters year, doing something with Australian plants that involves travel. If you behave, I might even tell you about it and, heaven forbid, show you some pictures. But only if you behave. It’s a bit sensitive, but that’s the nature of the work: protecting your ideas from other scientists who might be tempted to nick them, and to guard them until publishing, but most of you would find it pretty dry I’m sure…Hell I find it dry sometimes and I’m going to be writing a thesis on it. I am really interested in behavioural ecology, evolutionary bio, biogeography, entomology, conservation biology and phylogenetics. Plants are (or should I say were) definitely not on my radar before I started doing my Masters, but I was offered an excellent project involving plants by my supervisor, so here I am…the reluctant botanist. Not that I hate plants…indeed I’m starting to enjoy them, and the fact that they don’t run away in the field, but it’s certainly not something I pictured myself doing…

Where do I work? I’m a phone monkey. I work for [Company X] doing call centre work. It’s the perfect job for a student. All you need is a deep reservoir of indifference with which to overwhelm one’s caller. As I’ve always said, a well placed sigh does wonders to change the dynamics of a professional telephone call. That tip’s for free; you won’t find it in any customer service manual. I’ve worked inbound and outbound. I’ve done market research, legal, insurance, academic and food over the course of 6 years. It’s all the same shit; people still want their arses wiped and their hands held. The best you can do is love them and let them go. In call centre work, that equates to finishing the call before you get the chance to really blow your top, and having a cup of tea and breather. I don’t take pride in my work; you pay peanuts, you get an awful mess of peanut shells around the computer. It’s easy to get fired when you go to work with a worldview that precludes the delivery of top notch customer service. From past experience (not my current job) the way around it is to position yourself to be (almost) indispensable: work the long hours that no one else can or wants to do, cover the leave that other people can’t or won’t, do the graveyard shifts. You may not be the best customer services rep, in fact you might be pretty mediocre or pretty bloody awful, but grudgingly or not, your employers will recognise you as a necessary customer services rep. But alas, I digress…

A little about me…I am an atheist arch liberal, although I find myself getting frustrated with some of the liberal left as I get older, not because I don’t believe in the messages, but because there are very few people who can communicate it with passion and eloquence, without looking crazy in the process. I don’t like go-getters and overtly enthusiastic people.

I like people who are dogged and determined but still maintain true humility, and a sarcasm and sense of humour that one recognises instantly as stemming from a deep rooted insecurity. I like scientists, geeks, sci-fi fans and RPG freaks. I like Babylon 5. I like gender-fuckers, pretentious indie kids and subversive Queers who take pride in their hedonism, perversions and gratuity, if only because they serve to softly corrode the heteronormative world in which we are forced to live. Or because they’re fun to drink with. I like liberals, both classic and new. Apart from Rodney Hide. I saw too much flesh during the Harbour Swim Incident to truly like him. Still, good on him. I like people who lose weight through hard work. It’s admirable. I like libertarians, except for Ayn Rand Objectivist-Automatons™. They’re just a little too devout for my liking. As a rule I generally don’t like National voters, although one or two can be forgiven their transgressions, surely. I especially don’t like tax cut bleaters or EFB indignants who don’t recognise a rickety NZ Herald bandwagon when it smacks them in the face. I like greenies and environmentalists and the Green Party; indeed I am a member of the Green Party.

I like knitting and gardening, and I like the feel of washing that’s just come in off the clothes line. I don’t like people putting my washing in the clothes dryer because it’s bad for my electricity bill, its wasteful and its bad for my clothes, especially the elastic in my underwear. I like frugality and penny pinching. I like budgeting and being cheap and reusing things. I don’t like using plastic bags to pack my groceries. I like people who are thoughtful and reflective and think before they speak. I like avocado. I don’t like the way that girls hair gets trapped down the drain of showers and then kind of morphs into this dense dark brown blob, irrespective of the original color of the hair itself. I like vodka, especially with tonic or lime and bitters. I don’t like 23 year olds who consider themselves wine experts because they’ve lived in Grey Lynn for a year. I like Grey Lynn. I like Three Kings. I don’t like the North Shore, despite (or maybe because) spending my formative years there. I like reading, especially non-fiction.

Stick around: there’s more fun for everyone. I’m mainly going to be blogging on Science things, as well as politics and stuff like that. It is election year after all. Feel free to leave a message and say what you want. I don’t care if you swear, but Jesus might.