Brisbane Twestival Local, September 2009

Oh, Christ! How this was a busy time for me. I wish I’d written about this earlier. But it pretty much went off with a bang and I’m still proud of how everyone worked well on it. My first major event as king pin and I think I did a pretty good job, despite my more natural outlook of criticising my hard work to the dickens.

March 2010 will see Twestival Global again, but due to the many activities I have planned for this year, I won’t be on board the committee other than to hand over the reigns.

Regarding BTUB and Brisbane Twitter social events, I am not likely to be organising any events or managing the calendar. 2009 was my year to volunteer and now I’m likely to not have any time for it. It’s been swell, tweeps, but I can’t do it any more.

University

In September I applied for a Bachelor of Business (Events) at Griffith University. In December I was accepted and so in March I shall start back at study after a year out of the lecture hall. Nice, nice! Rather excited actually and looking forward to it. My completed Diploma of Events Management means a year is taken off the BBusiness, so I’m only looking at a two-year outfit.

Employment!

Get this; I have a job! A job! Employment! And it is the best job I’ve ever had. (They know this already, so I’m not just talking it up here for brownie points) I’m the administration officer for Women in Technology, a winner industry organisation for women in the IT, biotech, engineering… any technology career path, actually. They do some pretty awesome things (for stacks of fantastic members who pay practically nothing for the networking opportunites), and I’m rather looking forward to organising the events and programs for this year. They even let me set up Twitter and facebook for them!

Moving house

After two years in St Lucia, I’ve now relocated to Stones Corner on Brisbane’s south-side. It means at least 50 minutes to work, uni and the boyfriend’s place; but at least it’s affordable and in a pretty cool area. Many thanks again to the miracle of my Twitter friends who spent one Saturday in December helping me move. That was EPIC and I will never forget the kindness of these people.

Internet Censorship

Here’s my political contention of recent months (even a year). The Australian Federal Government wants in your Internet on the premise of doing Australian families’ parenting for them. National mandatory Internet censorship (just think about each of those words: National. Mandatory. Censorship.) They plan to block websites which not only host illegal content but also “refused classification” content. This pretty much means content that is legal to view but is stuff that the government (or their stakeholders) don’t like. Not only is it a very scary thing for future governments and citizens to adhere to and control, but it’s going to be quite expensive, ineffective and… well, do you really want the government stopping your kids from getting useful information on how the world works?

I won’t blog all about this today, but for more information you can check out the amazing websites of Somebody Think of the Children, Electronic Frontiers Australia and the Brisbane filter opposition.

The LoveBuckles / Drumming

This is my boyfriend’s kicking band. They’ve had stacks of gigs lately, the most recent for my dear high school friend’s 21st in Coffs Harbour, NSW. It went OFF and I feel lucky that I was there to enable it. And go on road trip. And surround the sleeping drummer with a fort of milk crates. What a bunch of lads!

As for my own musical pursuits, I’m very happy to have my drums all out and shiny for practice. For someone who started in primary school, I should really be much better and I can’t wait to see improvements. You should come by for a jam one day!

And that’s it!

Phew. That’s the essentials for a NJ.com update. As for this website in 2010, it will be updated and mainly used for video blogs and reflections of events/business stuff learned at uni and WiT.

In the more academic of my events life at the moment, I am putting together the final paperwork for the COTAH Events Conference Series and graduating in December. Hurrah!

Looking for full-time work for 2009 is proving standard as jobseeking goes, but I’d still love to hear of any openings you may know of. Plenty of great opportunities in Brisbane, I’m afraid I’ll actually end up taking on more than I can chew next year! Oh, but that’s always a thrilling prospect in itself, no