30 things it has taken me 25 years to learn

I used to write a lot of lists on this blog, and life lessons and stuff like that. Having turned 25 this year, I thought it timely to do another list of things I have picked up so far at this point in my life.

1. Do exercise that doesn't make you hate exercise

2. Listen to your body. Eat what makes you feel good. Sometime this will be chocolate cake after 9pm, sometimes it will be not eating at all. Work out your own set of body rules.

3. The easiest way to feel like you have a sense of control over your life is to make your bed each morning.

4. Have achievable goals and a few unachievable ones, to keep your aspirations high and keep your feet always moving.

5. Sex can be 'just sex' for some people, but almost never for me.

6. Be picky with groceries, so far as you're able to, be a good consumer

7. The establishment you work for won't remember you the week after you leave, so make sure work isn't life, even try to include mindfulness in rushed mornings

8. If you're single, get a pet, or a housemate. Try not to be utterly alone for too long

9. That being said, be utterly ok with being utterly alone. Because life is ultimately your own experience and the people you invite to join in with you are just companions who either either enhance or diminish the experience.

10.  Sit with good posture. Wear sunscreen. Stretch more often

11. Pay for your music, and if it give you joy, support artists when you can

12. Never underestimate the power of personalised mail

13. Your most important achievement will never be to do with yourself

14. Invest in a good mattress

15. You don't need to smile and nod all the time to make people like you. Have people like you because they respect you, because you speak your truth clearly and politely, not because you are a yes-man.

16. Call your grandparents more often

17. Be around people who ask questions, and who make you do the same

18. Read from multiple news sources

19. Wear slutty things sometimes

20. Practice positive self talk until you no longer need to remind yourself to practice it

21. Dedicate at least 1 hr a week to sit down and look through your bank accounts...and work out a budget!

22. Be aware of how crazy love makes you

23. Have a day without a phone more often, and hang out in places without reception

24. Life is not a race with other people, and you're not doing anything wrong if you're doing things at a different pace

25. Always have a deso

26. Nobody likes tax time, things to do with car rego and actually hanging the washing out on the line is always the worst part of doing the washing

27. Find a way to indulge your spiritual side. Don't let not going to a church stop you from sitting quietly for an hour and trying to have a conversation with your soul

28. Nobody actually knows what they're doing, and even people in big businesses screw things up

29. Don't forget the weightlessness, how good it feels jumping into a pool after a stressful day, or how good it feels after having gone for a run and you don't have to run any further

30. Be picky about who you let into your inner circle, because with the internet it is too easy to have 'best friends'.

No Bogan Pig Hunters

Internet dating is a precarious mine field and often results in more misses than hits at the 

best of times. Trying to internet date in Darwin means literally putting 'No bogan pig hunters' on your profile introduction, and hoping for the best.

With this in mind, I'd been talking to a guy for a couple of days and he wanted to meet up.

I've always been pretty happy to go on at least one date with someone so I agreed. He wasn't bad looking and he seemed to know the difference between there, their and they're.

He suggested a pub and I got there first. As I was sitting, waiting, I was scanning other people in the area and trying to see him before he saw me. He walked in and said hi. I said hi back.
What I should have said was: "why the fuck are you wearing a beanie in Darwin?"

He had suggested the pub because it had good food. I was pretty excited about that, but as a waitress walked past with an average looking steak on a plate and he muttered 

"mmm, smell those chips!" I began to realise that he didn't actually mean GOOD food. 
Ok. Ok. I'm a snob. But he was just being such a bogan.

He walked to and from the bar like he had a helium balloon in his chest and was struggling 
to keep it contained. It was weird. The conversation was boring. I don't think he asked me a single question about myself and I was trying to think up reasons to leave. Then he started talking about how he wants to go pig hunting and I was just like.... that's it. I'm out.
Like, come on...I've actually put fucking effort into this date. I have dressed up and come
out and am asking you questions and trying to be funny, and you've rocked up wearing a fucking beanie and are trying to have a conversation with me about pig hunting. WHEN I WAS SO SPECIFIC!!! I LITERALLY COULD NOT HAVE BEEN MORE SPECIFIC.

So I left. And then when I walked outside there was a man lying beside my car, in the gutter with his pants down by his ankles, so drunk that he was frothing at the mouth. So I rolled 
him over, called 000 and sat by him until the ambulance arrived.
Ah... Darwin.