look, it's... highschooler career-related naivete or something

Oh my god to be able to work as a full-time illustrator for a gaming group or something, ahhhh
//sounds like awesome not sure if actually is

freeeeaking hell soon as the HSC is over I am going to draw/paint like crazy aaaargh

Cue intensity stare! ...and nervous laughter?

Hahahahha you went through so much crap to get to where you are now, please don't... let it all collapse... and try not to recklessly destroy it.

(:

Prokrastination durch Sprachenstreberei :p

HAHAHAHHAHA
I just did the Transparent Language proficiency tests for German and English. I got 97% - 'intermediate' - for BOTH OF THEM.

...

Got two questions wrong in German, and one of them was a silly mistake which I may have picked up if I'd bothered to re-check my answers. Got one wrong in English, and that one ... not sure if I would've changed my answer. Maybe. Heh.

...OH HEYYY the Chinese proficiency test is in pinyin! I'm going to do that now
...shit. Problem = I don't know the intonation marks. I'm going to be guessing these so bad...
And omg I am so slow with this ;_;

Also, the questions for each test appear to be pretty similar and I think I may be using my knowledge of the subject matter of the German/English ones to help with the Chinese one ahahahha.

...so slowwww. I challenge any fellow Mando peeps to do the Chinese one :p

Also, I'm like saying each question/answer out loud and making weird hand motions to try and understand/answer these. Yes, I'm blogging a running commentary of my attempt at doing a Chinese language proficiency test. You shouldn't be surprised :p

Okay I think I just learned the intonation marks, just from attempting to decipher them in the quiz.

This is the most difficult/brain-power-expending thing I've done today, I think.

OMG Part III Chinese syntax = love ... okay maybe not love but it's a little less painful. I think.

WOOOOOO I could understand the first reading comprehension section relatively painlessly yayyy. ... And the second reading comp passage is terrible ... I ragequitted that and scrolled down to do another question and HOLY SHIZ the last few questions are in actual Chinese characters HAHAHAH DEATH.

...The difference between first reading comp passage and the rest, eurghhh.




FINALLY DONE
81%, Advanced Beginner level, wooo. And haha I blindly guessed one of the Chinese-character ones correctly. ...That was so strenuous.

And willpower would be good. Willpower/happyhigh.

Glasnost and perestroika go together. Like Romeo and Juliet.
Hi.


Hiding in a smart-matter house that can't be hacked, reading YA lit (Westerfeld Reilly Landy Wasserman Horowitz Nix etc etc). Highspeed internet connection with superfast computer loaded with Paint Tool SAI, Photoshop CS4/5, my tablet. Neverending supply of Tim Tams, cookies+cream ice cream, chicken+mushroom risotto, etc. Inspiration. An indoor rock climbing wall. A Cutter hoverboard with a power source that will never run out. A bungee jacket just in case?

Eargasm-inducing music.


-


Fucking vertigo-inducing ATAR.

this wasn't a waste of time at aaaaaaaall :p

I'm bored. I don't know what to blog about. So here's a long stalkery probably pointless quiz ripped off Tumblr, LET'S GO.

Height? between 5 and 6 foot (:
Shoe Size? um...39? going by that standard...the European one? not sure
Sexual Orientation? KINSEY-6-GAY ... I mean, hetero. Probably.
Do you Smoke? noooope
Do you Drink? dihydrogen monoxide, yes (:
Do you Take Drugs? define drugs ;D ...I mean, no
Age you get mistaken for? lololol idk
Have Tattoos? nope
Want any tattoos? no
Got any Piercings? yes
Want any piercings? miiiight get extra ear piercings, probably not though
Best friend? you should know if you are ... or not (:
Relationship status? beneficially antagonistic ;D
Biggest turn ons? ABS. ...kidding. er. good sense of humour (by my definition), good company ... etc. etc. i don't know
Biggest turn offs? ideological incompatibility :p
Favorite Movie? Mulan, Easy A... lololol idk... The Mask of Zorro perhaps? I feel obliged to mention something action-y to break up the comedy/Disney ... oh yeah, The Day After Tomorrow ... Mean Girls!
Favorite music? Silbermond, Taylor Swift, Linkin Park, Tokio Hotel...? and lots of random songs
I’ll love you if? ...I feel like it? :D
Someone you miss? guess :p
Most traumatic experience? Modern History trial paper, Gorbachev Part B :p
A fact about your personality? Apparently I'm straightforward. Hi.
What I hate most about myself? I can overthink stupid things...
What I love most about myself? Lol. I'm pretty happy with how I am overall. So... personality? And being able to remember loads of random shit :p
What I would change about myself? I'd make myself suddenly like exercising and hate junkfood :p ...ok no not really
What I want to be when I get older? tetralingual
My relationship with my sibling(s)? fascinatingly metaphysical...
My relationship with my parents? mostly good?
My idea of a perfect date? hmm, i don't know. but it would involve good food hahahahha... or not. it would involve nice weather, most probably... or not. ...see where this is going?
My biggest pet peeves? er. taking 'pet peeves' to mean like, relatively insignificant things... let's see... I don't now. Annoyingly-designed layouts? Mosquitoes... really loud juniors :p ...and there are heaps more
A description of the girl/boy I like? perplexingly attractive :p ...I was going to write trolololol actually.
A description of the person I dislike the most? i don't think i really dislike anyone heaps now, actually o.0
A reason I’ve lied to a friend? define lie 8DD
What I hate the most about school? I don't really hate anything about school per se... idk, waking up early? but no i really love my school actually (:
What words upset me the most?"Time's up, pens down." ...KIDDING
What words make me the best about myself? what.
A wish that I’ve wished for repeatedly on 11:11? to get into my desired uni course LOL ... but not any more
What I find attractive in boys/girls? awesome sense of humour, good conversationalist, intelligent, reads good books ...
Where I would like to live? in Europe, one day, for some period of time...
One of my insecurities? is appearance-based
My childhood career choice? artist! vet! novelist!
My favorite ice cream? COOKIES AND CREAM OMGGGG
Who I wish I could be? no-one but myself :p
Where I want to be right now? sitting in an Italian ice cream place in Berlin with a massive bowl of stracciatella gelato? 
The last thing I ate? some kind of berry strudel
Sexiest person that comes to my mind immediately? ...myself, obviously.
A random fact about anything? Mikhail Gorbachev went to high school in Krasnogvardeiskoye.

you saw this cominggg... well, you should've

WOOHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
-spins around in circles-
-crashes into something-
-falls, cursing violently-
-gets back up-

WOOOOOOOO FOUR UNIT IS OVER HAHAHAHHAAAAAA

-

Funnily enough though that's not my dominant/only emotion about the thing. I kinda feel like I've let my baby out into the big bad world ... of some BoS marking centre. Yes I have actually grown attached to my 4U Eng major work in these past few days, despite going through massive periods of hate/etc.

HEHEEE

-

Okay okay focus, do work, etc. Also, gotten 3 out of my 9 trial exams back.

lol hi

FOUR UNIT
ENGLISH

:D

So focussed ... just not on the HSC

I'm really really good at spending time/effort on productive tasks that would be awesome [e.g. drawing] if I didn't have FAR MORE PRESSING TASKS that I had to do [e.g. FREAKING FOUR UNIT ENGLISH]. And yes, post-trials bludge time officially over. The nail in the coffin of détente fun bludgery that I could undertake without feeling too guilty ... the nail being the ... four-unit lesson yesterday. Not that that's a bad thing. Just that, like, now I need to start doing work again and it's ...


not as fun as vegetating? Actually, I don't think the immediate post-trials vegetating was actually that good because I was still in a slump from trials-induced-exhaustion/lethargy or something. But yeah.

Thirsty.

Goodbye trialsssss

The biggest dilemma I am currently facing is whether I can be bothered to convert a sketch of mine into a full-out painting/time-consuming CG, or just be lazy and make it a neater/more-dressed-up sketch. WOOOOO. Annnnd okay shutting up now about the fact that I ... have no more exams until the actual HSC (:

And today I found out that cookies and cream chiller from Gloria Jeans tastes awesome. I thinkkk that is now going to replace my previous default order of Tim Tam chiller.

...MANNNN what an interesting life I lead.

US foreign policy woooooot

D:
OKAY LET US BEGIN

isolationist thingers
- refusal to ratify Treaty of Versailles; refusal to join League of Nations (Congress pwns Wilson)
- refusal to join World Court throughout 20s and 30s (despite having lots of support from Coolidge/FDR/mostofthepress/unions - blocked by Senate Foreign Relations Committee; influence of strongly isolationist Senators such as Huey Long, as well as Hearst-owned press)
- 1921 Emergency Tariff Act (resp to domestic pressures from ailing ag industry)
- 1922 Fordney-McCumber Tariff Act (ditto above)
- 1930 Hawley-Smoot Tariff which was part of ...
- retreat from world during Great Depression (screw off, we have our own domestic problems to deal with)
- 1933 World Economic Conference: FDR 'no we're not cooperating with you we're doing our own thing'
- 1935 Neutrality Act banned sale of munitions to belligerent nations
- 1936 Neutrality Act banned loans to belligerents
- 1937 Neutrality Act expanded previous acts' provisions to include civil war (thanks to Spanish Civil War, which started in 1936??); banned US citizens from travelling on belligerent ships; cash and carry
- 1937 Gallup poll shows that 97% of USians think foreing policy should be geared toward staying out of wars instead of helping them break out in first place
- 1938 Ludlow Amendment ALMOST PASSED in Congress (decision to participate in war decided by popular referendem instead of by president)

not isolationist! ish
- 1921-22 Washington Disarmament Conferences ... OMFG
---four power treaty (us/uk/brit/jap); maintain status quo in pacific, confer with other nations in event of one nation being aggressive in that area
---five power treaty (us/uk/brit/jap/ita); limit tonnage of navies
---nine power treaty; established open door policies RE China as international law; USA worried about China being colonised; but recognised Japan's particular interest in Manchuria
------ BUT these treaties were all toothless with no power of sanctions against defaulting signatories, so ner. evidence of vaguely isolationist thing still? and this goes also for:
- 1928 Kellogg-Briand Pact: renounced war as method of settling international disputes, tis for self-defence only - toothless, shown by US lack of action when Japan invaded Manchuria 1931
- 1924 Dawes Plan and 1929 Young Plan; reparations repayment plans for Germany offering scaled down reps and a $250m loan??? in Dawes; Young got killed by Great Crash/Depression
- 1934 Import-Export Bank providing loans to foreigners wishing to buy US products
- 1934 Reciprocal Trade Agreements whereby tariffs are reduced 50% for 'most favoured nations'
---above two: Cordell Hull recognising crappiness of tariffs, thinks trade = good
- 1937 Cash and Carry Act designed to help Britain
- 1937 FDR's quarantine speech; trying to push people toward accepting involvement in upcoming war; he was highly aware of isolationist sentiment, vaguely distanced himself from contents of speech when asked about it the next day
- 1939 renewal of '37 CC Act
- repeal of 1935 and 1937 Neutrality Acts
- 1940 ARSENAL OF DEMOCRACY fireside chat
- 1941 Lend Lease Act; allows lending of war materials to Britain
- 1941 Atlantic Charter; joint declaration with Churchill after meeting with Britain and other Allies about vision for post-war world (international peace, self-determination etc.); essentially statement of US war plans; had to ease concerns of Americans anxious of fighting a war with USSR as ally, so be like 'post-war won't involve trading away democracy/freedom', justified helping USSR
---HOWEVER FDR refuses to declare war, but says he'll look for an 'incident' to allow him to do so or something aaaaaaand he extends Lend Lease to USSR ... and is reluctant to commit to international organisation to promote peace in post-war world
- 1941 undeclared naval war with Germany in Atlantic; escorting British ships to midpoint of Atlantic, patrolling for U-boats, occupying Greenland and Iceland bases to stop them becoming German U-boat harbours
- 1941 attempts to limit Japanese expansion; Hull meets with Ambassador Kichisaburo and tries to get Japan to withdraw from China and leave European colonies in SE Asia alone; later Congress limits supplies of oil, scrap iron and machine tools to Japan, eventually issuing an oil embargo and freezing Japanese assets in USA
- Japan dependent on US oil so... problem. decides to knock USA out of war in Pacific so it can't stop Japan from taking SE Asia and its oil supplies
- 7 January 1941 - PEARL HARBOUR ATTACK; USA declares war on Japan the following day



FRIGGING HELL
oh yeah and like by 1933 all the Allies but Finland had stopped paying their war debts due to the Great Depression; USA angry, passed 1934 Johnson Act which forbade the granting of govt loans to foreign govts who were in default for their debts

gorby gorby gorby, part A spam and sort of a tiny bit of part-B-relevant stuff

MIKHAIL SERGEYEVICH GORBACHEV
- born 1931 in North Caucasian village of Privolnoye in the Krasnogvardeysk region of Stavropol Krai to a Russian-Ukrainian farming family
- like many other Russian viallages, Privolnoye experienced the hardships/costs of Stalin's collectivisation regime; by Gorby's own estimate, half his extended family died in the artificially created famine of 1931-32
- personally affected by purges; paternal grandfather Andrei sent to Irkutsk, Siberia to chop wood; maternal grandfather Pantelei Gopkolo arrested, imprisoned and interrogated for 14 months; when he returned, Gorby's house was a 'plague house' avoided by others in the village as a house of an 'enemy of the people'
- worked in the fields with his mother; villagers ascribe Gorby's confident/outspoken manner to influence of mother's personality
- attended high school in town of Krasnogvardeiskoye, 10 miles walk away; high achiever, would correct teachers in Russian history classes; grades were all 5 (equiv of A) except for 4 in German
- worked in the fields with combines during his teenage years
- 1949 he and comrades at the tractor-machine station awarded Order of the Red Banner of Labour for their part in that year's awesome harvest
- during high school he joined the Komsomol (Communist youth league for 14-28yo)
- after high school, won a place at Moscow State University studying law

- 1950 became candidate member of CPSU
- 1955 graduated with law degree; returned to Stavropol with wife Raisa, whom he'd met and married during uni; short stint at state prosecutor's office before returning to politics, quickly becoming leader of the Stavropol City Komsomol
- 1961 becomes leader of Stavropol Krai Komsomol
- 1962 becomes organiser for Stavropol Agricultural Unit; around this time forms a mentoring relationship under the wing of Fyodor Kulakov (friend in high place); is a delegate to 22nd Communist Party Congress
- 1962-68 earns agricultural economics degree
- 1970 becomes First Secretary of the Stavropol Regional Committee; head of entire Stavropol Krai; with help of Kulakov, at this time the national head of agriculture
- 1971 elected to Central Committee
- 1975 we see Gorby's influence growing; leads delegation to West Germany at the invitation of a local communist group
- 1978 Kulakov dies, Gorby replaces him as Central Committee Secretary for Agriculture?
- 1980 becomes member of Politburo
- 1982 Andropov becomes General Secretary of CPSU, makes Gorby his personal assistant (Gorby had rep for incorruptibility), grooms him to be his successor
- 1984 Andropov dies, is replaced by Chernenko; Gorby personally recommends Chernenko instead of trying to take power himself, looks good in eyes of Old Guard
- 1985 Chernenko dies, Gorbachev chosen as General Secretary of CPSU



FFFFFFFFF
- 1985 summit in Geneva with Ronald Reagan; the start of their wonderful friendship nice relatively peaceful-ish and cooperative relationship (which is full like <3333 compared with previous superpower leader relations... sort of...); not much is achieved though, mainly talked about nonmilitary matters... BUT good sign of talking!
- 1986 Reykjavik, Iceland; another Reagan/Gorby summit; humanises the leaders in each others' eyes
- 1988 Reagan visits Moscow, when asked by journalist if he still considers USSR to be an 'evil empire' he says no, that was 'another time'; when asked who deserved credit for perestroika/glasnost/changesinUSSR, he replied that Gorby did (Matlock says this contributed to Gorby's popularity more than any other single event)

blahhhhhh.
Gorby was apparently idolised in the West, especially in USA, media called it 'Gorbymania'
1987 TIME Man of the Year
compared with previous Soviet leaders, Gorby appears friendly/trustworthy/cooperative; the average American citizen saw him as dismantling communism, ending Cold War, and as ultimate proof that US democracy and capitalism wins over communism ... OR SOMETHING LIKE THAT

Andrey Grachev: 'the end of the Cold War is justly associated with the name of Mikhail Gorbachev'

Glasnost/opennness: reduced censorship, encourage open discussion that would hopefully lead to reform that would improve/perfect Soviet system - originally intended to be an economic policy?????? Gorby thought that the open discussion would allow Soviet economy to be fixed, or something??? BUT the people interpreted it as freedom of speech/discussion, as a social policy. People criticised Stalin's regime, talked openly of purges/gulags/collectivisation. Once-banned literature was circulated.

Perestroika: 'restrucuturing' of economy; attempt to introduce some market features ... but this didn't work. Opposition from above: nomenklatura (ruling class) didn't like it ... specific reason why: [I can't remember] ... so they just didn't implement his reforms and carried on with old command system???? Opposition from below: people had gotten used to the old system, didn't want to have to deal with price rises (improved services, sure... but market prices! nooo!) or something ... generally believed that perestroika failed because it 'didn't go far enough' so you got this awkward part-market part-command economy that flailed. And to deal with this flailing/inefficiency, people turned to old methods like ... barter/black market ... and people were unhappy ... which probably led to the whole 'GORBY SUCKS' thing ...


Eastern Europe: repudiation of Brezhnev Doctrine, let them do their own thing; largely contributed to collapse of USSR/end of Cold War? - Gorby didn't intervene due to economic reasons (USSR's own problems so great he wasn't able to do much??? idk) and foreign policy reasons (he wouldn't be able to maintain the :D relationship with the West if he went all Brezhnev and used force to keep communist regimes in Eastern Europe in power)

Nice relations w/US also contributed to end of Cold War

Glasnost and perestroika also contributed to collapse of USSR, but unlike the nice relations with USA/West ... this wasn't deliberate. He didn't meant to kill USSR, he wanted to perfect it, was a true believer in socialism, etc. ... attempted to be a reformer, became an accidental revolutionary. Or something.

Glasnost/perestroika = example of the events running away from him, sweeping him along... he had no control over... glasnost, at least. Unleashed a democratic flood! A flood of criticism from the people of the USSR/Gorby himself...


Relations with USA: apparently they were good because he acquiesced/cooperated/agreed with Reagan a lot of the time, so it's arguable if Gorby did anything. Or something. The awesomeness was that he allowed himself to be acted upon, the fact that he cooperated, rather than him actually actively doing stuff in their dealings... ish. Idk.

Bad for USSR, good for world? xD
Deserves credit for allowing USSR to collapse in a peaceful way / overseeing Cold War's end in a peaceful way

Huge polarised opinions about him show that significance of individuals in history / their being remembered depends not on judging how good their deeds were, just how big the impact they had was ... or something??? Couuld be 'bad' impact, could be 'good' ... ?

Eeeeeeeeee part B.




//disclaimer: don't take any of this as accurate, it's panicked revision spam (: