Finally. My first semester at uni has finished. Last thursday was my final exam day and I’m fuckin’ glad they are over. None of them were really hard, just more of an inconvenience than anything. For the next three weeks though, I’ve got no uni! I’m not sure what I’ll do, but I suppose the next three weeks will go as quick as anything. The past couple of weeks have been slightly underwhelming though. I’ve taken a couple of things into consideration, my desire for a new camera and lens, and uni exams. Granted the latter is only lasted for two weeks, I still needed to keep quiet during that period. I’ll explain my exams though. I had three exams over two weeks, two in the first week and the third in the last week (all at the end of the week too.) My first exam went to shit. Not the actual exam, but everything leading up to it, me walking into there, and then leaving. I’ve never been to an exam before, but I went prepared. I wandered over with my camera bag, my jumper and pens. The moment I walked in though, I had found out that I needed my student ID. Fuck. Oh wait, that’s in my wallet. Wait fuck. Where the christ is my wallet? Fuuuck. It’s at home. I let the lady know at the door that I hadnt any ID on me, and she gave me some form to fill out saying that I was part of the actual exam. Ok, brilliant. Before entering in the actual exam though, I had noticed that no one else had a bag of any sort. A bit weird, but I didn’t give it too much notice. I went and sat down, walking past a couple of teachers in there directing people where to go. I sat down and read the front of the exam booklet part, yeah, the part where the rules are. First rule? Don’t bring in any bags. Fuck. I finished off the exam after about 2 hours and contemplated how I was going to get out of this room full of students and teachers with a camera bag. I covered my bag with my jumper and waited until the group next to us were told to stop writing and followed up behind them. Sneaky! I stood up the front clutching my bag waiting for someone to take my exam so I could walk out. For my next two exams however, I was better prepared and went in with no bag and my ID handy.

The rest of that week went along rather uneventful. My cousin however managed to get himself into the ICU. From what I had heard though, he had come off his motorbike and smashed his head forward or something like that, but the bike landed on him aswell. I think mum said he had swelling of the brain and a cracked rib (or couple) and some water in his lungs. The week after was much of the same, however like I was saying before I have decided I want to buy a new camera. Originally my plan was going to be, buy a new lens, save, sell my current gear and buy a new camera. Next, I was going to buy the lens and camera at the same time, but way sooner than I wanted to before. After reading random reviews I had changed my mind once again (mind you, this was over the course of 36 hours) and I was going to buy the camera first, then sell what I have now and buy a new lens with the money I get from that. This is my B&H shopping cart. That is going to be my next huge purchase and I really cannot wait. Over the past week I’ve been reading reviews and stuff like that about the camera and things like that, and it’s making me want it so much more. Unfortunately I need to save up the money for it. The Canon 5D, BG-E4, EF 50mm f/1.4 USM and an extra battery. My current plan? Save up everything, and avoid buying anything. Pretty soon it’s tax time, so I’ll be able to use that, and when I’m closer to my target amount, I’ll sell what I’ve currently got now (Canon 400D, EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6, EF 75-300mm f/4-5.6, EF 50mm f/1.8, 4GB CF card, BG-E3, Speedlite 220EX, two batteries, and a bag!) and hopefully what I should be able to do, is buy what I want, then with the money I get from selling my old gear, I’ll buy the lens I want aswell. Really, what I want to know though is if anyone wants to buy it all from me. Talk to me and I’ll let you know some more details.

Like I was saying, the rest of my week went by without a hitch, I left my final exam at around 6:30, with heaps of time to spare. I went off to work and got home around midnight. After driving through town and finding out that some Ministry Of Sound thing was on at Discovery, I decided I wanted to head out. I got back home, changed, ate, and grabbed my camera bag and returned to town. I decided I wanted to see how I go shooting in the low light, and I don’t think I did too bad either. I did meet some people while there though. I had a good ‘ole conversation with Renee (I’m not sure how to spell it if you’re reading this, please let me know if I got it right), and Tash aswell. I wandered around the whole joint getting photos of people and things like that, I was having way too much fun. I got there just as Dirty South started to play and he wasn’t too bad, I enjoyed it. The few random ladies I met were really nice considering I was taking their photos. What sucked though, is that trying to converse with these people was incredibly difficult because of the noise, so I’m not sure how many of them will actually visit here. It’s alright. At one stage, I was standing in one corner and had a lady come up and ask if I was from England. Yeah, England. Do I have an English look about me do I? Apparently this lady thought I did and was kind of embarassed that I wasn’t. It was slightly hilarious. What else, two of the local gay guys (sounds incredibly sluttish, but I always see these two out on major nights like this) wandered up and started to chat to me. One of them eventually asked if I could take his picture, but the rest of the conversation went:

Local Gay: “Hi I’m Dan!”
Me: “Hi.. I’m Jarryd..”
LG: “Cool! So uihh.. are you a local?”
Me: “Yeah.. I’m from Darwin..”
LG: “Oh..”
(This point I continued to take more photos)
LG: “So can you take my photo!”
Me: “Uihh.. sure, why not”

It was really weird, I wasn’t too uncomfortable, but from where I was standing, he felt a little uncomfortable. Maybe it was just me. Who knows. What I do know though, is the girl he was with was hot. Well, at least he was dancing around with her like he knew her. But by god she was hot. I’m not sure whether I creeped her out with my camera though. At one stage, she was dancing a fair bit away from me, and not taking any notice. After looking through my photos what she did next made some sense. She was moving forward, towards me. At the time I didn’t take too much notice because there were people crowding behind her, but it wasn’t until she got really close that she was trying to get the attention of my camera. Maybe I’m dreaming all of this happening and I was really moving trying to get her photo, but I feel better if I think she was liking my attention. What I’d like to do now though? Actually talk to her and get more shots like I was that night. A man can only dream, right?

Friday night ensused, and I meet up with Daryl, Natalie and Cory (his sister and cousin) at Shags and sat around chatting and dribbling shit. By friday, I had decided I wanted to go to the V8’s. I don’t know why, but I had decided I was going to go and photograph the cars (oh and the V8 girls.) We sat around at Shags and saw heaps of random people walking past before Natalie and Cory decided they were heading off home. Daryl and I didn’t stay too long after that and we wandered down to Discovery where I was hoping to get more photos of some bikini models, but we had missed them by a mile. Oh well, we weren’t in there for very long either, as I didn’t recognised anyone (oh, we did see Jackson though.) Saturday at work went past slowly, and I couldn’t wait until sunday. Ended up heading over to Daryl’s joint (I was going to be crashing there and getting up early so we could catch the bus in) and we sat around playing the Wii for a bit. I’m not sure what happened, but after a boisterous game of Wii Boxing, we were both up and active. Somehow, the idea of Town come into play, and we were suddenly heading into town around 11. Dunno whose idea it was though, but we ended up in Discovery and headed straight up to the top bar. We saw Jodie and Kirsty at the bar and sat around. It wasn’t long before the place become crowded and most people we knew turned up. Eventually, I got sick of sitting around watching people come and go, and the night before and during the day caught up to me pretty quickly. Considering I didn’t want to me half asleep on sunday, and that we were going to be drinking all day, I wanted to get some kind of sleep. So fuck you for thinking I’m a pansy.

Yay, sunday! Got a wake up call around 7:50 from Daryl and we got ready and walked over to the bus-stop and waited until 8:45 before the next bus (they were meant to come every half-hour god damnit!) We were on our way to a day of getting drunk and taking photos of anyone and anything (at least that was my plan.) Once we were there, it was straight to the corporate box that Daryl’s Dad had and into the beer. Considering it has been a while since I last went to the V8’s, I was quite excited to be there. Allowed to drink and do things on my own even! I was prepared for a good day. I met everyone in that box, all awesome people too I might add. I found someone else that was interested in photography and was puttering around with a Pentax camera (like that’ll mean much to anyone else but me) and he had some shots he had taken from previous years and things like that. Like I said, all awesome people. Cory was there, as was Daryl’s Mum and Dad. One of the guys in the tent though offered us a tour of the Vodaphone car pit, and before the race we went down there and had a walk around. Stupid thing though, I wandered in with my camera and flash hanging around my neck. I wasn’t too sure whether photos were allowed or anything like that, but when another guy that had come with us brought his camera out and took some photos in front of the guy speaking, I thought I was allowed too aswell (as you would.) Well, the moment I brought my camera to my eye I had some guy standing to my side almost rip my arm off telling me not to take any photos. Well shit. God damnit. Oh well. Eventually we had done the tour and headed back to the box before the race started. First race of the day went through and I was having a ball trying to get as many photos as I could. I was getting in as much as I could, of both the cars, people around and just the track.

After the first race though, I was just about to leave for a wander down through pitlane to see who I could get photos of, when the Brut girls wandered past and we caught their attention and brought them up to the box. Photo-ops! The whole reason why I wanted to go, to get photos of the girls walking around in tightly clad clothing and skimpy skirts. I got a combination of everything that moment, because just after the Brut girls left, the V8 girls were in the box next to us, and they wandered over to us. Brilliant, more photo-ops! Except more girls this time. After oogling over the hot ladies in front of us, I headed off to pitlane hoping to get more photos of ladies and things like that, and I wasn’t disappointed. Pleased with my efforts I returned to once more continue drinking. I didn’t stay up in the tent for long though, I got there, and decided I wanted to return to get photos of more girlies, and wander inside the actual track. I must have got back down to pitlane in time, because just as I got to the end of the actual pits, the V8 Girls and Jack Daniel’s Girls were posing for the photographers there. I got there just as they were packing up, and didn’t have time to set my camera right, so they come out slightly blurry, but that’s alright. It’s only a slight motion blur. I walked from there, into the centre of the track, wandered around in there and got some more photos of people and girls, and headed back to the box before the last race started. Coming back I ran into Jodie, Charles and Amy, but that was about it. I didn’t see anyone else I really recognised. The last race started and I was out of space. Fuck. I had something like 1250 shots on my camera (a full 4GB), and I was going to have to delete photos if I wanted to get more in. I spent half of the race deleting some photos, and the rest of the race talking to Tonya (again, I might have spelt that wrong, tell me if I have) about photography and things like that. After the race, Daryl and I headed down to the pits for one final lap and an attempt to get photos of more girls, but didn’t succeed as much as I did before, but I was still happy with what I got.

The racing might have been over, but we surely hadn’t finished yet. Meanwhile, there was still a fair bit of alcohol in the esky to be had, and we were all quite willing to. From the end of the final race to around 6:30, we were drinking the rest of the alcohol before we were kicked out. Afterwards though, we all got on the bus headed for Darwin city. Apparently, we were going to the Hidden Valley Tavern for an after-v8-party. Woo! We got there and setup camp in the corner there and still, continued to drink, dance, and sing to our hearts content. I was having a fuckin’ ball. Plain and simple. By around 9, most of the olds were getting tired and needed to get home, well Daryl called a Taxi and we waited, and waited. And waited. Where the christ is this guy damnit! We’re all standing around drunkenly and finally a taxi come to pick us up. I jumped in the front seat with the full expectaction of having to have a conversation with the taxi driver. Considering the amount of alcohol I had, I proceeded to converse with the taxi driver so easily. It was funny though, the guy reminded me so much of Frank, it was incredible. He kept making nonsensical remarks about stupid things. I filled my curiosity by asking him though.

Me: “This may sound really, really odd considering, but do you have a brother called Frank?”
Taxi Driver: “Well, that does sound a bit weird.”
Me: “Ha, whoops”
TD: “But no, I don’t have a brother called Frank, considering where I’m from I’d be surprised if I did”
Me: “Oh, where are you from?”
TD: “[Some east-european country]”

Somehow from that, I went from where he was born, to his name, and found out that his name was Dragon. Thinking back to it now, I’m actually sure I’ve met this guy getting home drunkenly before. I’m quite sure I even asked his name and where the christ he was from. This guy was cool to begin with, but I had decided that when we got to town, we were going to introduce ourselves as Dragon Stoivic, or some other Russian name. Just for the fun of it, and the taxi said something along the lines of having “multicultural dudes around” just made me wet myself. It was brilliant, especially the way he said it. I had made friends with this guy instantly. After dropping off Daryl’s parents at home, we started to head back to Daryl’s place when he turned off the meter saying that’s all we’d really need to pay. Awesome, a cheaper taxi-fare, even though we weren’t that far from Daryl’s place, it’s still better than nothing. We were almost home when he dropped a further bomb shell:

Dragon: “So uihh, you guys know where to score some E from?”
Me: “HA! Dude, you’re awesome.”
D: “Yeah?”
Me: “Yeah, you’re the first taxi driver to ask me something like that before”

I proceeded to tell him a story and I found out he was a bit of a wizz-head. We eventually got back to Daryl’s place and I was chuffed about the taxi driver that we got. Anyway, we walked up to the door and apparently Terry had broken the lock somehow. No fuckin’ clue whatsoever, or how it’d happened, but we spent about half an hour out the front of Daryl’s house trying to wake Terry up with no avail. Suddenly, Daryl had the bright idea (maybe it was me, I can’t remember) of climbing over his roof and into his backyard. Well, he climbed up there, using his bin as a ladder and could not have been any quieter. Seriously, it was so funny. He slightly swung his legs up and made the loudest fuckin’ noise. It was brilliant. I was nearly crying. Eventually we made it inside and sat around watching tv for a little bit. Eventually I went home and stayed up looking through my photos I had taken. In all, it was the best day I’ve had in a while, and I got some good photos out of it aswell. As usual, I’ll give you a link for the V8 Supercars and my night in Discovery and the saturday night randoms