blahblahblah – phonakins

I just lost a month (and had my first tooth out)

Like seriously, a few days after my birthday I broke a wisdom tooth. I only even had the bottom two, and broke the other one a month before that but since it didn’t give me any pain I wasn’t eligible to get into the public dentist earlier so was just leaving it since aside from being a tongue magnet since it felt different, it was fine. But then I broke the left one, and damn that one hurt. So I called up public dental and got an emergency voucher for a local private clinic for the next week.

Had a fun few days trying to balance pain relief, but then I got seen, and she recommended extraction and said she could do it right then. So I agreed and off we went.

Problem is, I’m apparently a bleeder. And she’d gotten partway through and the blood just started and wouldn’t stop. So she stitched me up with 1/4 of a tooth left there so she could focus on the bleeding :/ Said she nearly got the Ambulance. Yeah that wasn’t fun, nor was the two weeks after til it’d healed enough to go back in for the rest.

But it’s gone now. And I’m gonna hold off til I come up on the general public dental waitlist and then will probably get the other (also broken but not painful at this stage) tooth out. Yay.

I’d also got blood tests the week of my birthday one going on the Friday after failing on the Thursday. Going back with 2 litres of water in me after getting up for fasting tests. Just tried to get some blood out of me now to check out what might be behind the extra bleeding, but no dice – I’ll go through the week after drinking a tonne of water again. At least this doesn’t have to be fasting. I reckon maybe my veins fear I could bleed out so they wanna protect me.

Ugh.

Anyways. Raging against the NDIS changes, and all the news about mutual obligations/TCF illegality but now my tooth is settled I may have capacity to blog about them

Maybe.

In the meantime I’ve spent 77 hours in Hello Kitty Island adventure, mostly streamed if you wanna check it out!

Self care / self soothing

Love yas!

The last V-Set ran to Newcastle last night

Vet train at Newcastle interchange station

I was born in 1982, a couple years before the line was electrified all the way to Newcastle, so I’ve been catching V-sets since 1984. To Sydney, for day trips with my parents, my Aunty and cousin. Back where there were smoking carriages and I remember trips so full I sat on my Aunty’s lap in the smoking carriage all the way from Fassifern to Central.

I used to be terrified of crossing between the carriages. Something you had to do to find a seat or visit the extremely cramped toilets. I had to overcome that fear when I started catching them to highschool in 1995. But then we’d hang out the carriage doors and windows of the old single decker electrics that you could see the fast moving sleepers through the holes in the floor.

A classmate jumped out of one of the diesels up Maitland way and was lucky to live. Ahh the fun of manual doors.

I’ve ridden the new ones a few times. Here’s some footage from the inside. I don’t like the fixed one-directional seats. I do like the charging ports. They should have given us wifi. Oh and I liked that they tell you which side to exit, but apparently they get it wrong sometimes so that’s kinda worse than not saying it at all!

Routine and Pacing – staying sane when you get a little off

Touch grass they say – but don’t repeatedly kick the same toe on things, it gets tiring after awhile, and it doesn’t give it a chance to heal and somehow you’re still hobbling weeks later.

So I got overloaded, took on too much mental load, spread myself too thin, so I’m cutting back on somethings, to make life sustainable.

I’m ensuring I follow my little routine, that includes meds and white hot chocolates, and winding down after dinner. This means I’ll be declining after 6pm meetings from now til the conference in June. I’ll be showered and onesied on time, meds around nine, white hot chocolate before that. Breakfast has gone back to porridge sachets for winter – except this week since my partner bought a dozen hot cross buns I’m trying to get through!

I’m going to go back to (close to) daily Japanese practice and streaming. Started on a new vocab game yesterday. So, the plan is an hour of practice followed by variety game streaming a few mornings a week, no real schedule it’ll depend on everything going on around me and of course it’s more about getting back into good habits that nourish me – and the Japanese language has always been that for me. Recommendations for websites and programs to use are more than welcome – I know Duolingo did that things with more AI use since I was last using it, so while I’ll probably tap into that a little, I’m all for a scattered approach. I’ll set up my second cam for colouring and kana practice, and perhaps my cheap graphics tablet if I can find a kanji program that would work well with pen input rather than mouse. There was a program I had on an emulator that I was going to use with that but then I did a system reinstall and it’s gone.

Also keen to fill this board with stuff – Amazon slips or pictures from frens or whatever may come. I’m pleased to say I’ve a couple of regular monthly supporters here, and it’s such a mood boost even though one’s for $1/month!

Language matters but so do your goals

You know how some people use all the right buzz words but their heart’s not in the right place? Usually in activist spaces they talk the talk and can focus on the hot topics, but move on once it’s not cool anymore, or there’s a better opportunity elsewhere. Or, their methods don’t work to lessen or get rid of the root cause of a problem but mainly build systems to sustain bandaids around it. These systems and often businesses will call themselves “not-for-profit” but everyone being paid to do it lives a comfortable life that doesn’t need them to challenge whether they’re doing this the most effective way.

That’s a problem with everything being a business, or using the language of business in charitable endeavours. Are you working to establish new markets or expand your footprint? Are you doing ANYTHING to remove the need for your services? Does your model depend on continuing the status quo – do you need a steady supply of people or animals to keep suffering in order for your day job to continue? Are you treading water on their behalf? We’re all part of the systems, but it’s great to know where you fit in and question your role in keeping people down rather than actually improving their lot in life.

Do you claim to speak for the voiceless? If a person is conscious, they are likely able to communicate for themselves in some way. Even the pre-intentional or pre-symbolic communicator can communicate with those familiar with how they communicate. But if you’re seeking to be the voice of someone who can actually say what they need and want, what they struggle with and how they can be best helped? You’re probably talking over them rather than giving them the chance to speak to those in power themselves. Help them to learn “they ways” of policy jargon or talking in the media, rather than saying hey look at these people suffering give us money for short term remedies rather than addressing the problem.

You can help people short term, it’s okay. But you have to stop building your lives and businesses around keeping people down.

I’m repeating myself but so long as we’re seeing organisations aiming to expand themselves without daring to mention the causes of the issues – all the while talking for people in need rather than helping them speak for themselves – I’m going to have to.

We’ve announced the new dates for the People Against Poverty Summit – June 21 and 22 up in Maganjin/Brisbane. You can get tickets here – free and low cost tickets are available and people and organisations with money are encouraged to contribute more when booking or donate to the travel fund to enable us to get people in poverty from around the continent to the conference.

Our first online session is on Youtube for those keen to hear from me, Rick Morton and Kristin O’Connell about “Talking about Poverty” in media and online and IRL:

Also, if you’re inspired – get a Break The Poverty Machine tshirt or tote from the Antipoverty Centre store! It’s a great conversation started about tearing down the systems that keep people down in order to sustain themselves.

I get confused (and clumsy) when I’m tired

So tired. My foot hurts.

It’s not about a particular charity, I just talk about Foodbank because I’m a “customer” and we all need food.

I went into their ACNC listings today and this bit got to me (yes in amongst all the large amount of money changing hands for wages and rent and transport and buying food and selling food and school breakfast and so much more rather than just going directly to people in need to do with what they need to) from the Foodbank Victoria 2024 financials:

Advocacy - Be the leading voice for those in need of food We will deepen existing relationships and explore new partnerships that strengthen and expand our food relief work and allow us to be the voice and storyteller for all those in need of food relief.

“Advocacy – Be the leading voice for those in need of food We will deepen existing relationships and explore new partnerships that strengthen and expand our food relief work and allow us to be the voice and storyteller for all those in need of food relief.”

This is without any mention of the word poverty in the whole document. “Welfare” or “Pension” is not even mentioned. “Cost of living” is 3 times – in relation to increased demand and how “working families” and “the elderly” (not pensioners) are over represented as clients. Oh and decreased monetary donations such as at the checkout.

There is no lobbying from these organisations to raise welfare above the poverty line. Foodbank is a member of ACOSS, who also doesn’t have in its current asks welfare above the poverty line.

BUT TO SPEAK FOR PEOPLE IN NEED OF FOOD?

Do jam that pack of ANZAC biscuits in your mouth and shut up and listen to people in need. Let them talk for themselves and not through the filter of your organisational expansion goals.

Oh and it’s not one particular aspect of the reselling of donated or cheaply sourced groceries that gets me. It gets me that Foodbank highlights that they are struggling for food donations so has to buy it to keep up the supply. It bothers me that they then sell this on to local charities. It then bothers me that these charities feel the need to mark these up (a little or a lot) in order to fund their rent and emergency hampers. It bothers me that items end up similarly priced to supermarkets. It bothers me that there is so much machinery and expense around all this.

When people just need money to be able to buy their own groceries. When and what they need. Where they prefer to. Without restricted choices of what someone else considers important.

Yes, some people will always need emergency aid. There’ll be people with nothing for whatever reason – maybe they’re escaping violence or had a natural disaster or their house burned down, but guess what? When the rest of us can sustain ourselves, we have more to share directly with our neighbours and relatives and strangers who need a quick hand. Without the need for warehouses and charities taking details and eligibility and rationing something that’s actually pretty fucking abundant in this country.