I had unprotected sex for the first time when I was 16. I knew better, but was pretty eager for the experience and thus ignored the risks. I then fretted for about a year wondering if I'd manifest HIV. I was fortunate, nothing happened, and I've never made that dumb decision ever again.

I always thought that whenever the time came that an STD hit the furry fandom that I'd sit down with a bucket of popcorn and get ready for the greatest show on earth. Now that word has spread about a chlamydia outbreak amongst Australian furs (insert anthropomorphic koala joke here) it kind of sucks. Especially if it has the possibility of affecting people that I know personally.

Amongst the gay community it seemed that every second person I met had some kind of veneral disease. It was baffling and I couldn't understand it. I grew up in a generation where everybody was freaked the fuck out by AIDS, mainly the result of a massive (and notably successful) awareness campaign that others around my age would be familiar with. Rates of HIV infection dropped, and over time so did the general population's vigilance. As cases are on the rise again, another awareness campaign has been put into action.

So I'm curious and looking for some explanations in an attempt to understand. Are people ignorant of the risks? If not, then why aren't people wearing condoms? In what way do you justify gambling with long term health risks to yourself and others for short term pleasure? Any insights?

( In the meantime... )

Last week was lousy and I'd rather forget that it ever happened. I was thinking of going into a long spiel of self reflection about my building frustration and aggression, and how it generally eroded my sense of self worth, and how removing myself from the things that I enjoy triggered a nasty bout of regression. Instead, miraculously, this morning I found something that made it all better. I think I'll just start over.

Eat at Fast Eddy's and gain FIVE KILOS FOR FREE.

What the fuck was I thinking?

Just emptying some of the texts from my phone again. There's a good one from fennec_phaux

Fucks animinaniacs is/are bwesome

From jm_horse

I'm sick of these dolphins.

Because raskhusky went cheaty cheaty and asked me five more things, and it's Friday so I'm slacking off.

Taps
I've been around Tapestries for ages, 10 years or so. It's where carlemot20 and I used to furiously text fuck each other. These days it's where I idle for hours upon end during work hours and occasionally pipe up to bug raskhusky. For those of you who don't know, Tapestries is like Second Life without the shitty mashup of polygons.

Bushwalks
I pretty much covered this in hiking, but bushwalks are pretty unique on their own. The large amount of vegetation and wildlife can make a bushwalk a pretty scary experience. It's amazing just how easy it is to completely lose your sense of direction, too. I'd eventually like to dabble in some orienteering at some stage.

Sheppies
German Shepherds in particular. So far as dog breeds go they are #1 on my list. If I were to get another dog it would definitely be another shepherd as they are a sheer delight to raise and train, and a top notch companion. It would be interesting to compare the traits of another shepherd to those that were exhibited by my former dog, Sinnead. Their separation anxiety and the inherent health problems with their breed is their only drawback in my opinion.

Huskies
Huskies are okay, I guess. They really aren't suited for an Australian climate so we don't see too many of them around here, and those that do have them are generally seen as irresponsible people. I always found the breed to be a little too neurotic for my liking.

Huskies have been superceded by dalmatians as the new fox in the furry fandom.

Furfags
Har har. I guess when you get down to it I am a pretty big queer. And undoubtedly, a furry. Don't expect to see me displaying one of those stuuuuupid furry pride logos (Revolution? Wha?) any time soon, though. I also think it's highly presumptuous that a lot of fingers are being pointed in my direction for advise on the upcoming gay themed furry party.

A followup from jakebe's post. Basically he's come up with five words that he associates with me and I need to elaborate on them. If you want me to do the same to you then I'll do my best to accomodate.

Buffies
Buffies is one of the best words ever. I stole it from Poop when he was using the word to describe an auction that I'd won for some original inks of his which you've probably seen hanging up in my place. It obviously refers to muscles. Weight lifting has been a pretty routine activity in my life for the last 4 years or so. I've always been very slender for most of my life, and then when I was doing outdoor labouring I started to thicken up pretty rapidly and enjoyed the change. Then my job changed and the heavy lifting wasn't there anymore so I shrunk. I went to the gym to get that strength back and here I am now. I haven't progressed much over the last year or so and have basically been treading water and maintaining my shape.

Muscles are a pretty big physical turn on for me, but despite that it's pretty far from the top of the list in what I look for in a person. Wierd eh?

Australia
I love this country and feel very fortunate to live here. If I've ever been away for too long then I get nervous and can't wait to get home. Having travelled the south east asia region quite a bit has given me even more appreciation for it. It's a bit backward at times but the ease of lifestyle that I have in Australia, and more specifically Perth, is pretty unreal. Strangely enough I'm never quite satisfied with that though and want more, but I think that's more to do with people around me having it even easier/better.

I still think Australia day is the greatest day of the year.

Hiking
I do love the bushwalks we've been doing lately. More so I like hiking solo, but that's a far more complicated issue. In the latter years of my Geraldton days I used to live right on the outskirts of town, and there was plenty of undeveloped bushland, beach and dunes for me to venture over. The Abrolhos Islands offered plenty of interesting islands to trek around. More recently it's been through the forest and bushland areas outside of metropolitan Perth. There is always plenty to see and the physical challenge is exhillarating.

Rugby
Silly. It's all about aussie rules football, not rugby! I'm actually not a big fan of rugby, I find the players less than stirling characters and aussie rules an exciting, fast paced and high scoring game. I used to play on wing when I was younger, then half forward flank before I stopped playing altogether. Speed was my game on the field, and as we all got older we naturally got bigger and, well, I was sent flying through the air quite a lot. That combined with the unsportsman-like tactics that started being used took all the enjoyment out of the game for me and I stopped playing. It's an unreal and exciting spectator sport though.

I support Collingwood in the AFL, much to the amusement/ire of everyone in the state as they are a much hated Victorian team. Their mascot, Jock McPie, features a lot in my Livejournal icons.

Humor
This used to be pretty abrasive and I wasn't too happy about that. (Except when dealing with shitty furry comics) It's fairly safe to say that my sense of humour is very slapstick and puerile. And toilety. I think it was Mel Brooks who said a few years back 'Who doesn't enjoy a good fart?". One of my best sources for comedy is some of the comment threads amongst the Perth furs.

Today has just consistently gone from bad to worse. I'm in a foul, foul mood. Who wants to fight?

I had two days off last week. I used them to catch up on some much needed sleep. On Friday morning I was abruptly woken up by a phone call from Matt. I was right in the middle of a dream with my old dog, Sinnead. We were exploring a large building site.

I've got a good deal of control over my dreams, always have. Lucid dreaming, I think it's called. There's a good deal of immersion involved, and there was a period that whenever I'd dream about Sinnead I'd feel terribly upset and miserable when I woke up. It's like a harsh reminder that she's still dead after I've cheated myself into thinking that she's still around.

It wasn't fun, but my perspective has changed over time. As I see it now this is just a way that I can still spend time with my friend even though she's long gone. Now I wake up happy.

According to Laz, sex is just like scraping old smelly pickle and cream cheese out of a bowl into a plastic bag full of other refuse.

OH MAN I HOPE I CAN KEEP THIS BONER DOWN

Once again cooner has made me look fabbo. I'm totally one of his biggest fan boys.