Fan-Fugu-Tastic!

The House That We Built

2005-04-10T07:41:00.000+10:00

Henhouse, that is:

After a lot of time, sweat and swearing, we built an aviary! I have an inspection in eleven days and so have to tidy up the front of the aviary and make it look as natural as possible. The ground slopes a fair bit down there - we had to dig out a rather biggish hole to allow the door to open - so I have to pretty it up in order to stave off complaints fromt eh real estte. yes yes I know that permission should be sought BEFORE the construction of such things, but really, this way is much easier - and it makes that whole side of the house look SO much better than before - it was a damp mossy wasteland prior to the construction!

I am thinking that I will dig down further in front of the door and lay some pavers that I have hanging about and then grade the ground towards them so that it looks like a natural slope instead of a big dug out hole.

Chicken is very happy in her new home and will be even happier when I've modified the inside to make it homier for her. She really needs a chicken-friend as she gets lonely and craves attention. Chicken is really quite cute following us about and flying up onto our shoulders cheeping madly.

Edit (8pm):- I laid some pavers in front of the door and even though it's a bit bodgy and uneven I think it looks brilliant. I couldn't take a picture because my camera batteries are all flat so they are charging and will be ready tomorrow. I am thinking of putting some planters in front of the aviary beside the paving bit - I have some rectangular planters on the front deck for my cacti - but the cacti won't survive out the side as it is too shady so I'll be off to the garden centre this week to get some hardy little plants to pretty it up.

mmmm, so bright and spacious-looking!

2005-04-06T18:33:00.000+10:00

Finally finished about mid-morning!

I keep going in there just to look at the floor, it makes the laundry so lovely to be in. so clean! and spacious!

The plumber still has not been to fix up the pipes and so we have extenders hanging about the system and the hose running out the door.

The nicest room in the house

2005-04-05T19:20:00.000+10:00

is the laundry, because there is no junk in it and it has a lovely new floor. Well it is yet to be finished, but it will be all done tomorrow morning and I will post a pic. The new tiles are much, much lovelier than the horrid tiny brown things that were there before and that remain in the bathroom and toilet (I wonder if I can convince the owner's to re-do the rest to match?).

The plumber was supposed to come today and fix up the new hot water system as it has extenders on the pipes and electrical wires to allow it to have been placed on the other side of the room for the weekend - but he didn't arrive or call, so I don't know when that will be done.

I am very, very tired of not having my house to myself, so I can only imagine how the tradesman feels about having to spend so much time at my place!

I can't help but question the owner's decision to go to the considerable expense of re-flooring over the top of wet, rotting floor boards - only a small piece was replaced and being chipboard, it is only going to get worse and amount to a much larger expense further down the track. ah well, I guess my place is only to pay off their mortgage and not to worry about the future of the dwelling.

No more hole!

2005-04-01T17:32:00.000+10:00

The fix-it man left at 3.30pm having put a new piece of board in the floor as well as putting some support beams under the floor to hold up the wet bits that aren't being replaced because it would entail ripping up the kitchen and hallway - "that will be done at a later date" is the word from the owner.. I estimate that the kitchen floor will be replaced when the cupboards fall through the floor boards.

The plumber arrived at around 4.15 to temporarily install the new hot water system in an out-of-the-way spot in the laundry until Tuesday. I can't open the laundry door due to there being a big hot water system on the other side - if I want to do washing I must go out the side door, around the back and through the back door. The fix-it man is coming back on Monday to re-cement and re-tile and the plumber will put the hot water system in it's right spot on Tuesday.

The hole in my laundry floor:

2005-04-01T11:41:00.000+10:00

The fix-it man is going to put a new piece of board in the hole - to be fixed properly, the kitchen cupboards and stove would have to be removed and more board replaced, but what homeowner wants to go to that expense... so the minimum fixage will take place and the rest will be left to dry out - which will take weeks. The fix-it man is going to put some more supports underneath the house to hold the floor up while it dries out.

A plumber is coming this afternoon to see if he can rig up a hot water system away from The Hole for the weekend - so we *should* have hot water for the weekend until the floor is fixed properly - it needs to be re-cemented and re-tiled before the system can be properly in place. This means that while we *should* have hot water, we won't have use of the laundry due to restriction of space. yay.

The fun begins

2005-04-01T08:38:00.000+10:00

There is a man coming "within the hour" to fix the floor before the new hot water system can be installed - I imagine this will entail ripping up the tiles in the laundry. What do I do with my appliances and other assorted junk?
I must say, this is the fastest action I've had from the real estate since the plumber came to fix the broken bath tap within hours last year "because if one of your children is injured and you've told the real estate about it, they are liable, that's why I'm here tonight."

Athough someone should have been out here sooner than FIVE AND A HALF HOURS after the problem being reported yesterday.

The most useless landlord in Australia... surely

2005-03-31T17:53:00.000+10:00

some time last night : - I noticed water on the floor of the laundry, but thought nothing of it - in a room where there are often dripping clothes/other items being carried about, it's not really a shocking sight.

Today:
10.30am:- I poked my head under the house to see if Bartholomew was under there (he was, and came running when he saw me, cute kitty) and heard a drip drip drip. hmmm, that's a bit unusual - things aren't supposed to go drip drip under the house. I went further in and instead of the leaky pipe I was expecting, found a wet patch of rocky ground with water dripping onto it from the floorboards above. I went inside, and after searching about for wet floor, seeing the large puddle of water that had amassed around the bottom of the hot water system - grabbed the wee torch and headed back under the house. Where I found that there are at least two large sheets of chipboard absolutely saturated and sagging. It is very much like the Waitomo Caves under there (without the glow worms)! There is also some lichen hanging about so I imagine the hot water system has been seeping for quite some time and has all of a sudden burst forth with a Big Leak.

11.15am:- Finally get through to the real estate and inform them of the Very Serious Problem. The maintenance lady tells me to shut off water supply and electricity to the system and she will get someone to come and look at it. The hot water system is Very Old and has no turning-water-off function, but the electricity bit I take care of.

2pm:- I call the real estate again to find out what is going on as I have not heard from them. The maintenance lady informs me that she has phoned and emailed the owner and is waiting to hear back from them. I reiterate the seriousness of the issue and she says she will call me back.

4pm:- I call the real estate again to find out what is going on as I have not heard from them. I leave a message on Maintenance Lady's voicemail and she calls me back in a few minutes. Maintenance Lady says that she rang the owner of the house this morning and Owner Lady said that she would have to talk to her husband and Maintenance Lady had been calling and emailing and had not heard a thing. I state that it is an issue that needs to be dealt with quite urgently, and they should have had the prescence of mind to take matters into their own hands and send a plumber out instead of waiting for the owner, who runs by a completely different clock to the rest of the world. She says to stay put and someone from the office will be around to assess the situation.

4.45pm:- The real estate b1tch who initiated court proceedings against me when I left my last place of residence ( I really must tell that story sometime, it was a pathetic/hilarious case which I won easily) turned up to inspect the damage. She took a quick look at the hot water system and asked if it was possible to see under the floor, so I grabbed the torch and headed outside. On arriving at the Wee Door to Under The House, she poked her head in a little bit and I shoved the torch at her and told her she had to go right under. Her reply: "oh yay, there's probably spiders under there." hee!

End Result:- Tomorrow I get a brand new hot water system - in the meantime I have no hot water. Also the floor will have to be replaced, won't that be fun.

Edited to add:- oh I forgot to mention that I did get through to the real estate a fortnight ago to tell them about the termites and was told that the owner said he had to come back "shortly" to do some other work (top railing on side deck, bathroom drain, hallway ceiling...) and would take care of it then. I am expecting him some time in November.

R.I.P Paul Hester

2005-03-28T08:57:00.000+10:00

08/01/1959 - 26/03/2005

Such a sad and shocking loss :(

The newest member of our family...

2005-03-18T18:28:00.000+10:00

... is a chicken, she came home from preschool with us today.
The preschool had 10 eggs which they incubated and watched hatch and then the chickies needed homes - this wee hen didn't have one and how could we resist?

Dreaming Oddities

2005-03-17T11:13:00.000+10:00

I always have very bizarre dreams and thought I would post a couple from recent nights.

Monday night: My older Polish neighbour suddenly went into labour despite having shown no signs of pregnancy and being a mother of several adults. I delivered the baby with the help of the boyfriend and unfortunately it was all very graphic, but I did all the right things, even taking the cord from around the baby's neck before delivering the rest of it. It was a very cute baby boy and it turned out the baby's father was Alan Dale - the former kiwi actor who played Jim on Neighbours years ago.

Tuesday night: I was in a very strange city with the boyfriend - we were walking what appeared to be streets but there were boats suspended in the "air" at different levels and it became apparent that we were under water but had no difficulty breathing. I was wating for someone to bring me my whale which was going to come swimming along shortly to see me when I suddenly had severe toothache. I told the boyfriend I had to go to the dentist, but on the way the tooth started to come loose. I exclaimed to the boyfriend about the tooth being loose and then it came out. I found myself in front of a mirror and while inspecting the gap was horrified to find that my two top front teeth had also come out - there was another two teeth making an appearance in their place, but I also had an extra two rows of teeth starting to come through behind my normal teeth - like shark's teeth. I freaked out a little and then said to myself "hang on, this is just too bizarre, I'm always having dreams about freaky shit happening to my teeth so that bit has to be a dream - fair enough one tooth coming out, but not the other two and these extra rows, that's just not happening" - it didn't occur to me that it didn't make sense having only part of it being a dream but anyway, I made my mouth go back to normal except for the gap where the first tooth came out and then I went to look for my boyfriend and my whale.

Here are my termites

2005-03-17T10:54:00.000+10:00

Amarina happened upon a termite nest in the front garden the other morning, so I dug it out and disposed of it along with much of a shrub that had been eaten away. I had wondered why the trees in the front yard were dying, now it appears we have the answer.
Yesterday afternoon we inspected the other trees in the vicinity of the nest and discovered that one tree was pretty much hollow so the boyfriend gave it a tug and the whole tree came down revealing the picture above. They had eaten the base of the tree, killing it and making it very dangerous, if it hadn't come down yesterday it could have ended up on top of a person or car. We are hoping that the termites haven't invaded the bottle brush, as it provides us with all of our privacy and also is host to a variety of beatiful native birds of a morning. It is doubtful that it will be able to be saved, with the termites being on either side of it, and two thirds of the tree is dead - which has only happened in the last few months.

I have tried calling the real estate agent to notify them, but they were engaged for the 10 minutes I tried - there is not much point rushing it anyway, they will write a letter about it to Roberto, the owner, who will call the real estate and tell them he will be down next week to fix it and then 8 months later I will receive an entry notice stating that he is actually coming, in which time the house will have fallen down around us having been eaten by mutated termites and we will have moved into the shed.

I am still waiting for the bathroom drains to be dealt with, along with the painting of the hallway celing, which he said he would take care of "the week after next" - which should have been two months ago.

I can't wait to be in a position to be able to move.

First day report

2005-02-02T17:57:00.000+10:00

Bonnie had a marvellous first day of pre-school - she went for 2 1/2 hours this afternoon and has two full days Thursday and Friday.
Bonnie has never had a day of kindy or daycare or playgroup or any such thing and took to it right away. She had a wonderful time painting, drawing, playing with duplo, listening to stories and singing "Blah Blah Black Sheep".

My baby is all growed up!

whoops I forgot to have another rant about the real estate

2005-01-31T18:29:00.000+10:00

While Mr House Owner was here fixing the deck and painting Amarina's bedroom ceiling I asked him if the real estate had mentioned to him that the bathroom drains were blocked ... surprise surprise no they had not! I was very very angry and said that I had been telling them for months that my children are unable to use the bath because when they pull the plug the drain in the middle of the floor turns into a geyser and the bathroom floods. Mr House Owner went under the house and said that he could feel the inspection thingamies but it was too dark to see anything and as he had no torch on him and my torch bulb had blown and the neighbour had no torch, he was unable to see anything useful and so will be coming back to fix that up as well as paint the hall ceiling.

I have SO HAD IT with the useless real estate agent - I don't know why Mr House Owner doesn't give the real estate the flick and rent privately - they pay the real estate to keep an eye on things and they don't relay anything of importance and don't check that the house is structurally sound!

GRRRR!!

Shameless friend-promotion!

2005-01-12T18:03:00.000+10:00

The lovely Mrs Hardly has been nominated for Best NSW blog in the 2005 Australian Blog Awards, so once you have gone to visit Mrs Hardly and read Mrs Hardly's witty blog and realised that Mrs Hardly is far too smart and funny to pass by, you might want to think about registering to vote and casting your NSW vote for Mrs Hardly, who has been making me laugh for the last two and a half years.

Quite possibly...

2005-01-12T14:47:00.000+10:00

The coolest thing I have seen in the duration of my existence!

warning: many large pics!

Many thanks to Mrs Hardly for providing me with the link, knowing it would cause much excitement in this house.

... and here is my death-trap

2005-01-09T18:07:00.000+10:00

On Thursday evening, Bartholomew made a hole in the side screen door and escaped into the night. The boyfriend and I were rather worried, what with the number of hoons about the streets and cat-hating neighbours, even though we were fairly sure he would only stay away long enough to get very friendly with his big old girlfriend next-door.
The boyfriend stepped out onto the side deck to have a look around the yard while I was inside holding Hinkler/Hogwart (the smelly grey kitten who of course is still with us!) to prevent him also running into the night and I saw the boyfriend stumble forward whilst emitting a string of expletives and my heart fell into my toes as I thought he had tripped and gone head first over the railing. I flew outside to see him still on the deck but the end railing was missing the top two planks. The boyfriend had leaned on the top one to look over the side when it gave way and he instinctively grabbed the second plank only to have that go as well.

The bottom planks had been replaced in December 2002, but the owner (who is a registered builder!) had declared the rest of the deck stable enough.
I rang the real estate office first thing on Friday morning saying that I had a serious maintenance issue and told the property manager what happened. She said that she would have it taken care of that day. I got a phone call from the property manager a short time later saying that she had called the owner and asked if it would be possible for her to come out and see the damage, 'cause, you know, I could have exaggerated about the seriousness of the situation.

She arrived around lunchtime and told me that the owner would be down some time "next week" to fix the deck and some other things and that she would call me as soon as he called her. I stated that as I was unable to allow my children to be outside I wanted a reduction in rent for the period of time until the deck was fixed. She said she would "ask the owner".
Today is Wednesday and I have not yet heard the news that the owner is on his way.

Two of the posts holding the deck up have come away from the decking - the wood has rotted due to that area being rather shady and so it stays damp for longperiods after rain.

So in summary ... the children have not seen the back yard since Thursday, if it had been one of them causing the railings to fall they could have died, my drains are still blocked, my ceilings are still flaking, my powerpoint still hasn't been replaced and I am VERY PISSED OFF.

sidetrack:- note the next door neighbour's house on the boundary, acting as my fence - grrrrr, the whole street is like this!

feeling Blah

2004-12-20T15:01:00.000+10:00

Back in March I discovered a lump in my left breast. An ultrasound revealed a clump of fibroglandular tissue, nothing more sinister than a pain in the.. well.. breast.
The doctor told me that it should go away on it's own and to go back if it was still there in four weeks time. The lump didn't go away but it wasn't hurting too much or being much of a nuisance so I just let it be.

I went for another ultrasound this morning, because last week I suddenly experienced a great deal of pain in my breast and the lump was bigger. much bigger, like noticeably protruding from the inner edge of my breast like some freaky miniature third-breast. I had already made a doctor's appointment for other girly check-up purposes so I mentioned it to her while I was there. She had a feel and said "ooh it feels a bit cystic now, we'll get another scan done." so off I trotted to the x-ray centre to make an appointment.

The lump had already gone back to it's original size by the time I had to go in this morning, but I still have a fair bit of pain. I was a little nervous before going in, thinking "hooray, again I get to have a complete stranger squirt gel on my breasts and spread it around with a doppler while watching the mars-like landscape being transferred from my breast to the monitor".

I wasn't as nervous after seeing the canadian lady that scanned my breasts last time calling a pregnant girl in for her ultrasound. ok, I thought, at least it's not a complete stranger, that one has seen my breasts before.

What I was completely unprepared for was a male voice calling my name and telling me to take my top clothing off and put the gown on. oh my god oh my god, it's not supposed to be done by a BOY. I had assumed that the boys were there to scan the men bits and the women were there to scan the girl bits! now I'm sure this young man has had all the necessary training and whatnot and that he's very proficient at his job in radiology and that his superiors are very happy with his work, but he's not supposed to scan MY BREASTS, that's a woman's job!

To be perfectly honest, I was very uncomfortable having a young male perform the ultrasound, very very uncomfortable. I know that he was only looking at my breast tissue and looking for nasties, but still, he's a strange boy, and they are MY BREASTS! after the scan was over with and the young man had informed me that the lump is still just fibroglandular tissue clumping up, and I have two tiny cysts in my left breast and I was thinking goodie now I can get dressed and get out of here... he said to wait while he went and asked the doctor if he wanted to have a look as well - of course the doctor wanted to have a look, and he just happened to be male as well - fabulous, two strange males looking at my breasts in one morning.

I am relieved that all seems well, although I do have the pain still - I spoke to my regular (female) doctor on the phone this afternoon and she says that that will be hormonal. The general consensus is that the clump of tissue will fluctuate with my cycle, it should have gone away but it appears that it might not and it just needs to be checked up on now and then.

I feel crappy.

b0nk.... b0nk.... croak

2004-12-16T09:31:00.000+10:00

a few days ago, Bonnie decided to pretty up the "pond" with several flowers from the garden. Said flowers are rather toxic and poisoned the tadpoles leaving only mosquito larvae to thrive in rank water, which has since been drained.

no wee froggies for us, then.

B0nk..... B0nk..... B0nk.....

2004-12-01T10:50:00.000+10:00

One evening a couple of weeks ago, I was pottering about the house, getting the girls ready for bed, tidying up and such, when I heard a sort of knocking noise, low and regular ... "b0nk".... "b0nk".... "b0nk"....

I checked around the house for the dripping tap, and became frustrated when I couldn't find one. I found that the noise was equally loud in my bedroom and the living room, which are on opposite ends of the front of the house, so it was coming from outside - but I couldn't figure out what on earth it was. By the time the gorgeous boyfriend walked in the door, I was incredibly irritated at not being able to identify it and said "what IS that noise?!" as soon as he entered. The boyfriend listened for a moment and then declared "That's a b0nking frog!"

We had just had a bout of thunderstorms that lasted a few days, and the old fountain base (from a gorgeous fountain I purchased while pregnant with Amarina - the sculpture was stolen from my backyard when residing in a townhouse complex) that sits under the front deck had been filled with rainwater, so we figured the wildlife was hanging out down there.

Despite my initial reservations about there actually being such a thing as a "b0nking frog", it would appear that the Northern Banjo Frog, is commonly referred to as such due to the noise it makes ... "b0nk".... "b0nk".... "b0nk"...

A few days to later Amarina was downstairs taking rubbish to the bin and she came tearing inside exclaiming that there were tadpoles in the fountain base under the deck. I was surprised that the water hadn't drained out, as it usually does (the reason for the fountain being outside in the first place was because of a crack along the base which caused leakage). I had intended on draining it if it didn't do so on it's own, because of the breeding of mosquitoes that occurs if water is left to sit. However, with all of those cute little tadpoles and eggs in there, I was loath to upset them, and so the water stays under the deck for the time being. I showed the boyfriend the mass of eggs and tadpoles and he once again declared "They are b0nking frogs!"

It turns out that the water didn't drain due to the fact that Amarina and Bonnie had taken it upon themselves to put all of the big rocks that were under the deck into the fountain base. They had also added some palm fronds and other plant bits and pieces, so it is the perfect environment for the frogs to develop.

I'm a bit excited to be the chosen home for a couple of hundred little froggies, and just went down with Bonnie to take pictures before they change completely - some of the bigger tadpoles have the beginnings of legs forming already.

a wee bit of a dilemma - the whole truth or just a bit of the truth?

2004-11-29T11:47:00.000+10:00

I've mentioned BookCrossing a couple of times now, it is a site which I respect and adore the idea of.
I read the forums from time to time, not intensively - I flick through the Announcements to see if there's anything interesting there, browse Bookrings, Bookrays, and Bookboxes to see if there are any rings or rays I would be interested in joining and read a bit of Site Watch for amusement value.

A couple of weeks ago, I was rather bored and took a look at all of the forums - on one of which I noticed a thread posted by a new author trying to get her recently published first book out into the world. She was offering to send a copy of her book to anyone wishing to read it and release it into the wild.

I thought that was a pretty cool idea so I sent her a message saying that I would happily accept a copy of her novel to release here in Australia. She is - understandably - very excited about the publication of her book and was thrilled to be sending out copies around the world, and so responded with great enthusiasm.

I received the book last week and thought it was fairly exciting to be able to read a book that is fairly hot off the press, for no expense on my part AND I get to set it free!

Now here is the difficult part... I read the book today... and it is crap. The beginning is crap, the ending is crap and pretty much all of the middle is crap. 251 pages of fluffy crap.

I can't really leave a journal entry for this book saying "it was crap - now i will release it" .. I would feel bad. What makes it worse is that another BookCrosser read the book last week and has left a glowing review - thought-provoking, insightful - all of those kind of things. Well I'm afraid I didn't find it at all thought-provoking or insightful, it was just crap.

Here is the draft of my journal entry - I think I will sit on it awhile, I don't want to lie but I don't want to seem too harsh either :-

There were a few parts of the story that tugged at my heartstrings, but overall it was really not my cup of tea and not a writing stle that really grabbed my attention. I found the first chapter to be particularly disjointed, however the continuity did improve.

I wish (the author) luck with the success of this and future books, thank you for allowing me the privilege of receiving the book to release here in Australia.

I was going to email Mrs Hardly and ask for advice, but instead I might just send her the book and see what she thinks hehe :o)

2004-11-12T11:54:00.000+10:00

BookCrossing has to be one of the most ingenious ideas ever to have been thought up. The site was first shown to me by Mrs Hardly last year, and I marvelled at the practice of "releasing books into the wild" - simply a fantabulous idea!

Sadly, the lead programmer for BookCrossing, Daniel Clune has been missing for almost a week, without a trace.

Hopefully there will soon be some clue as to what has transpired.

Floral Surprise

2004-11-07T09:17:00.000+10:00

I am a lover of all things cactus. I have collected a variety of cacti over the years and now and then spend time creating my cactus gardens which reside on the front deck.
Some of my cacti have fallen victim to rot as a result of bad drainage and bad dirt, a problem which I have rectfied by mixing soils and changing positions and purchasing new pots.
One of the cacti suffering from rot last year had several pups which appeared to be in good health and so I chopped them off and sat them on some soil before disposing of the mother. The pups eventually grew roots and starting growing - yay!! I kind of forgot about them and left them to fend for themselves, intending to re-pot them "one day".
On arriving home from taking Amarina to school on Tuesday, Bonnie bounded up the stairs before me and started exclaiming about flowers - this is the sight with which I was greeted upon ascending the stairs to the deck:

What are the odds??

2004-10-30T14:56:00.000+10:00

About an hour ago we were walking along the same path we were on when Bartholomew found us 5 months ago TO THE DAY .. guess what happened... we were approached by a prancing mewing kitty:

This little kitty is chasing Bart around trying to be friends, but Bart doesn't know what to make of it and appears to be rather scared of the cute little kitty!

what to do??? we can't afford to keep another stray kitty, but he's SO CUTE!!

edit :- awwww, kitty has settled on my shoulder, just as Bart did he day he came - he's sooooo cute!!

RIP Christopher Reeve

2004-10-11T16:16:00.000+10:00

feeling overwhelmed

2004-09-10T16:39:00.000+10:00

I just got home from picking up from school to find an express post satchel on my doorstep. Enclosed was an incredibly well packaged parcel, as is typical of the lovely Mrs Hardly.
She bought me the most stupendous book I have ever received as a gift, I am stunned and speechless and ever so grateful, thank you thank you thank you to Mrs Hardly!

29 Today 29 Today...

2004-09-08T16:07:00.000+10:00

It's my birthday and for the first year in a long time, I'm NOT depressed!

I think it might have a lot to do with the fact that I have been saying I'm 29 for a few months now, so it hasn't come as a shock to me today.

On waking this morning I was presented with a lovely handmade card from my beautiful daughters and a most thoughtful gift (I nearly cried when he gave it to me) from my sweetie who had somehow smuggled a present into my house without my knowledge last night! It was so nice to wake up with him next to me on my birthday :o)

Introducing Bartholomew aka King Barty

2004-06-24T12:21:00.000+10:00

time-bite

2004-06-18T10:23:00.000+10:00

Bonnie: Remember that time the dog ate my muesli bar?
Harriet: Yes, it was about half an hour ago.

When the Generals Talk

2004-06-13T17:07:00.000+10:00

When I found out that Peter Garrett had joined the ALP, I was in shock. I am so disappointed. If you had asked me which political party I believed he was most likely to join I would have said the Peter Garrett Party. Because surely such an opinionated man would not bow to one of the big guns? Obviously I was wrong. I have always admired Peter Garrett's strength of character and opinion. I have admired his forthrightness in expressing disdain at political decision making and the treatment of environmental matters by government.

Now apparently we are to believe that it was all for the sake of music. Today's Sun-Herald reports Mr Garrett as saying "The funny thing is that people are treating Midnight Oil like they were a policy unit of some kind. They are song lyrics, they are not political policies. Sometimes they were written by other members of the Oils, I've always sung them, but they're not political policies for 2004. They are rock'n'roll songs that were produced over a range of 25 years."

I suspect the whole Peter Garrett/Labour venture is an attempt to score the votes of a generation of oils-lovin folk, whose age would span the range of 20's to 50's. In light of the fact that Little Johnny has the backing of the US govt who are making not-so-veiled threats pertaining to the fact that our country's best bet in the battle against terrorism is to keep bush-arse-licking Howard in power, Labour most likely figures that desperate times call for desperate measures. Perhaps Garrett thinks it is worth flushing his former moral convictions down the toilet to assist in saving the country from yet another term under John Howard.

I don't know the reasoning behind it all, I just know that I am very, very disappointed. That someone who once held a nation of fans in awe of his anti-political anti-war pro-environmental stance can so completely and suddenly backtrack in the name of politics utterly astounds me. It is a world gone mad.

Behold! A Finished Project!

2004-06-13T12:30:00.000+10:00

yes, somewhat of a rarity around here, but as it was only a small project, it got finished! Here it is, Bonnie's Brisbane Bronco's Knitted Beanie:

Now Amarina wants one too, so that is next on the list - that school scarf keeps getting pushed aside!

I will put the pattern up on Harriet Knits when I work out how to make a colour chart that I can post to the site! Also I'm not experienced at writing patterns out, I kind of just make stuff with the blind faith that it will all work to the plan in my head - most of the time this works, so I don't bother writing patterns prior to beginning the knitting - this may take me a little while to work out :o)

feverish rambling

2004-06-12T13:00:00.000+10:00

Having a sore throat with this spootiness going on, I have beside me on the desk (actually beside the keyboard, not beside me, as the keyboard is on the desk too and I'm in front of the desk) a box of Butter-Menthol throat lozenges. Just a moment ago as I was taking one from the packet to put in my mouth and soothe my scratchy sore throat, a little voice in my head (my voice actually) said quite clearly "Allen's Butter Menthol". hmmm, butter menthol must be made by allen's, I thought, for that to come into my head like that. I looked on the box for the little oval Allen's logo, which I could see quite clearly on the box in my head.. it must be there... but no.. on the back is the Nestlé logo, but no Allen's to be seen. Perhaps I imagined that Allen's made butter menthol, I thought. Then, certain that I had previously seen the Allen's logo on butter menthol packets, I realised that Nestlé must have bought out Allen's. So I checked the Dick Smith Company Ownership page and sure enough, Nestlé now own Allen's.

It seems to me that Nestlé have been on a company buying spree in recent years, as their logo is becoming an increasingly common sight on products previously sporting the logos of other companies.
What is next? Will we eventually witness the merger of Nestlé, Cadbury Schweppes and Coca Cola, ending up with one big super-company - the Big Brother of groceries - with complete market control resulting in exorbitantly overpriced foodstuffs with no competition to keep prices down?

Perhaps the "little people" down here in not-earning-$100k/yr-thank-you-very-much land will learn the art of self-sufficiency due to simply not having the funds to pop down to the shops for the daily essentials. We would end up with backyard grain mills and the Joe Bloggs dairy farm.. resulting in small business starting up and... oh my goodness, I've come full circle and allayed my own fears.. look at that.

I think I need some more aspro.

aye, 'twas frightening, but 'tis a bonnie country wi' bonnie lads and lassies o'er there..

2004-06-08T15:35:00.000+10:00

one day last week while I was out and about, I almost dropped my house keys, and with the position I was in at the time, they would have fallen down a grate and into a stormwater drain. This almost-an-incident reminded me of my first day in Glasgow, Scotland, which had the potential to be a very disastrous day indeed.

It was Friday October 25th 2002, and the girls and I had just arrived in Glasgow from Manchester on an overcrowded Virgin train. After paying almost £50 for a train ticket, the girls and I ended up sitting on our luggage in a carriageway along with several other disgruntled passengers. Amarina, aged seven at the time, was feeling very unwell and spent most of the three hour journey sleeping on the floor with passengers making their way around her. Bonnie, who was also off-colour and two days short of her second birthday, slept on my lap part of the way and played on the floor for the rest of the trip.

On arriving at Central Station in Glasgow, we were met on the platform by my cousin Louise, who had just finished a stint working in Loch Lomond and was staying in Glasgow overnight before catching a flight to London the next morning, and had arrived in Glasgow an hour or so before us.

It was about 3.30pm when we arrived and we caught a cab to the hotel to get settled in there.
After making all of the necessary arrangements at the front desk, we started to pack the luggage and children into the elevator to go up to our room. I had carried the luggage into the lift and Amarina was pushing Bonnie in her stroller. Instead of putting these things into my bumbag (a backpacker's must-have accessory), I had in my hand: my VISA card, 2 room-key cards and some info about the hotel.

Bonnie's stroller was halfway over the threshold of the elevator when the doors started to close.. I leapt forward to open the doors and everything that was in my hand fell to the floor of the elevator. I glimpsed a card disappearing down the shaft and while ushering the children through the doors, had the fleeting thought: "I hope that was a room-key card." This thought was shattered, however, by Louise's shout: "Your VISA card!" I responded "Holy Shit, was that my VISA card?"
Louise replied that yes, it was and convinced me to take the children and luggage up to the room while she sorted it out at the front desk.

At this point, I should mention that my VISA card was my ONLY source of funds whilst travelling. I had no way of accessing the money in my bank account without this card.

Trembling somewhat, I got the children settled into the hotel room, sorted out whose bed was which, etc, whilst worrying about what would happen if my card could not be retrieved from the elevator shaft. Louise came to the room a short time later with the message that the lovely lady at the front desk was going to call the elevator maintenance people to come and look at the situation. For legal reasons, the hotel staff were unable to attempt to retrieve my card themselves, even though they had looked and could see it sitting at the bottom. She said that I would get a phonecall from the front desk to let me know what was happening.

The first call I received was to inform me that the elevator maintenance people would be on their way as long as I agreed that I may have to pay up to £80 for the retrieval of my card. At the time, this equated to approximately $240 Australian dollars, but there was no alternative, and so of course I agreed.

The second call was to inform me that the elevator maintenance people were there and had told her that my card was retrievable and it would cost me £50, I had to agree to this amount before they continued. Again, I agreed.

A short time after the second call, I received a third call from the front desk lady informing me that she had my VISA card in her hand and that she had told the elevator maintenance people that I was travelling on my own with two small children and they decided to waive the fee! I have never been so grateful and thankful and relieved and appreciative!

This was the beginning of my love affair with the beautiful country that is Scotland.

Excuse me? Dog Undies?

2004-06-04T09:19:00.000+10:00

found in today's Warehouse catalogue:

hmmm, yes, I can clearly see Rover shugging off his jocks prior to lifting his leg at the power pole...

kitty scan

2004-06-01T13:09:00.000+10:00

I guess we all knew I would do it sooner or later... I couldn't wait to show kitty off - yes he/she is still with us and he/she is still uncomfortable showing his/her anatomy and pulls his/her legs together when I try and take a look.. so here he/she is:

Edit: I took advantage of sleeping kitty and found testicles - kitty is definitely a boy-kitty! Isn't he cute!

We have a visitor

2004-05-30T17:08:00.000+10:00

On our way home from purchasing bread and chinese takeaway we were attacked by a wee prancing purring kitty.

The wee prancing purring kitty followed us home.

The wee prancing purring kitty pushed it's way in the front door.

The wee prancing purring kitty appears to have made itself at home on my shoulder.

nice kitty.

we should go and find out where kitty lives, but it is getting dark and the girls are eating dinner... someone may be frantically searching for their cute wee prancing purring kitty, which makes me feel guilty... I think kitty will be staying here tonight!

Edit (8:35pm): After dinner we went for a walk to try and find kitty's family but hardly anyone at that end of the street was home and those who were home did not know kitty. I don't even know if kitty came from our street. We took kitty to the home of Mr Gorgeous where we were given kitty food and kitty litter and a tray. kitty is a very good kitty and has used the litter tray.. yay for good kitties!

kitty seems to have becom attached to me and won't leave me alone. I have to watch where I put my feet when walking because kitty likes to prance along in between them. right now he/she is purring on my lap.. has in fact not stopped purring since pouncing on us in the walkway down the road.

I think kitty likes us.