Wednesday, 26 September 2007

8 random things!

This is my first ever meme. It was Jen who took my meme virginity, and while I am not too sure of the protocol of the thing, I would like to thank her and hope she calls in the morning. So 8 random things about me…..here we go.

1.......I used to be a fully qualified beauty therapist, and worked as one for two years until RSI in my hands from too much massaging made me quit. Also the low low pay in NZ and Aus wasn’t great. But my god it’s a fun job…playing with potions and pretty things….always smelling nice…..making people feel good. The other great thing was the peace and serenity of the work place – lots of dim lighting and Enya music….although quite a difference out the back where we prepared everything and screamed at each other for not having cleaned the treatment room out or for running over time…oh the joy! If I was a squillionaire I would probably look at opening my own clinic, or beauty store…but I am not, so propellor head it is.


2.........I like hot ring cinnamon donuts with Wattie’s tomato sauce. I discovered this culinary gem purely by accident. Ordering fish and chips in the old days meant you got everything all in a square of newspaper (this is being slowly phased out in place of stupid cardboard boxes, sob sob) and so my usual order of a hotdog, donut and chips would be all squished in with my sister’s fish and Mum’s battered oysters. Once open, you’d spray tomato sauce like it was a fire hose and dive in. I must have squirted my donut by accident and, being the starving child I was, eaten it anyway. I tell you, it’s a really good combination. Try it!


3......My sister taught me to read before I started school….where on my first day apparently I was dragged out the door by my teacher, who to my eyes was approximately the size of a large whale, and presented to my waiting mother with the statement “she can READ!” I tell you there’s no genius in this – just a fact that as my sister was reading to Mum, no doubt I was hanging around trying to get the centre of attention back… and just learnt as she did. Much like Scout Finch learning to read over Atticus’s shoulder. It meant that for the first 2 years of school I was left to do my own thing (usually stapling my thumb or covering my entire arm in black paint – that was a memorable telling off from Miss McLaren) while the rest of the class caught up….and also meant that I was incurably lazy and detested authority for the rest of my schooling life.


4........I used to be utterly obsessed with Queen. Not Queen Liz, but the Freddie Mercury Queen. I was about 12, and had a crush on a poor boy at school who hadn’t hit puberty yet (I’d got that milestone over with at 10). Anyhoo the news was on and it showed Freddie’s funeral. I was all, hey! The drummer from Queen (Roger Taylor) looks like this boy! And so it began…. The collection of tapes, posters, joining of fan clubs, letters to the fan club, t-shirts. I even baked Roger Taylor a birthday cake and took it to school. I don’t do obsession by halves. Anyhoo I can now recite pretty much all Queen lyrics and know the entire history of the band. Test me if you like. It all came to a halt when I hit 15 and started going out with this guy who was like, totally into grunge, dude. Suddenly it was all about the Afghan Whigs (??!!!) and Pearl Jam. I’m a follower, not a leader. Although I am happy to say I introduced Oasis and the Reservoir Dogs soundtrack to my sixth form class.


5......I was told when I was about 11, that I would grow to be 5’8”. I am 5’1”. The urge to sue the doctor who told me this has never entirely gone away. In fact, when he told me this, I think I stopped growing. As previously mentioned, I developed early (it’s fun wearing a bra when you’re 10!) and was among the tallest in my class when I started high school….but then I stopped. And watched my skin and body go hey, since we’re no longer going upwards, we’ll go outwards! Seriously, if I grew 5 inches, I’d be slender. Don’t you love that word? Slender.

6.......I am lefthanded, and my handwriting is appalling. To quote Claree from Steel Mags, I have the handwriting of a serial killer. I thank god for the invention of the keyboard. I get really embarrassed writing notes in a meeting because it looks like a drunk child got hold of my pen. However, my lefthandedness has given me a killer backhand in tennis, and it made me the centre of attention in my Psychology labs at Uni when we were testing brain stuff. I disproved the theory however, that lefties look at things differently than righties. Or maybe I just wasn’t concentrating because this Psych Lab was cutting into my cigarettes/cups of tea/oprah-sallyjesseraphael-rickylake time.


7.......Today I am wearing a long sleeve white top, with a black shift dress over the top, and brown knee high boots. I think the boots will be retired soon as spring gets into gear and it’ll be all about the peep toe heels. I also dyed my hair last night, and am now sporting Garnier Nutrisse Tamarind. It was the first time I dyed my hair thinking, not only will this make my hair really shiny, but will cover those rogue greys. And this made me sad.


8.......This one time, I won a competition, the first (and last) I have ever won. What had happened was, Care Bears had just been re-released, so I bought 2 little ones and sent them to my childhood buddies. I went into the draw to win 7 full size ones. A few days later, the phone call confirms that I am now the proud owner of 7 Care Bears from Lambton Quay Toyworld, would I like to come and collect. So I did, and there’s nothing better to start a conversation than to walk along the main street in Wellington and get the bus home carrying 7 soft toys. The smiles you get! Anyhoo, what to do with them you say. At the time my Mother was volunteering as a Budget Advisor for some families in Napier whose priorities were a little up the whack, as in, hey, here’s my beneficiary payment for the month – alcohol and the horses, or furniture to sit on? She came home one day with a story about a wee boy who had been given a comic book and a marshmallow Santa for Christmas. This made me feel guilty at the amount of presents I had received as a child, and no doubt boasted about when I got back to school, thereby creating resentment from the children who did not have what I did. So when I had these Care Bears spare, instead of giving them to children that I knew and loved (my neice was only 2 at the time) I gave them to the Christmas Drive that the Budget Advisory service organised. The kids I knew would have got ninety presents that Christmas…but I hoped that one small kid got a brand new Care Bear along with his marshmallow Santa.

The End. I can rant can’t I?

Saturday, 22 September 2007

I grudgingly take it back...

Feeling somewhat sheepish after that rant, I am sitting here posting this from my office at home. Well I hope I can post it...if the tenuous connection is up to it! Cross fingers.
MaybeI can post a couple of photos finally.


This is my sister Megan with little Amelie, on Basil's favourite armchair. I still think my sister looks far too young to be a Mum. I had dinner with them this week and got to have lots of cuddles and playtime.


This is my friend Sarah. She is one of my oldest friends, and is married to another very old friend. Their wedding invite was a photo of us heading off to a friend's birthday party, when we were all 3 years old. (They cut me out!). Sarah and Cam are the best type of friends....they know when to party and when to be serious...and they don't feed you fake bullshit advice. I love them to pieces.
This is me at the races last year with yet more old friends Sam and Rich...we all went to primary school together and have stayed mates ever since. We're heading back to the races in a couple of weeks with extra reason to celebrate - Sam just got engaged to his girlfriend Penny. By the way in this shot I am wearing my all time favourite dress - it's by Madame Hawke, a very cool NZ label. Check it out on http://www.rubynz.com/
This is me and Jimmy. Finally able to post some of our Argentina photos. I have posted them on Facebook instead of here, as there are about 50. Those long time readers will remember Jimmy as the Farmer from down South who I travelled to Sth America with in March, but then we broke up. We are still mates so there are no hard feelings.
This is my Dad. It's been good having him living nearby and he's been awesome at doing fatherly things for me like mow my lawns. I haven't lived near him since the divorce, when I was 14, so I am pleased that it's turning out well.
This is a beautiful photo, if I may say so, of a very patient Monarch butterfly who perched there on the branch while I cursed at my camera and finally got it working. The tree has been blossoming for weeks now and is my favourite thing in the garden. I have hung a bird seed bell from one of the branches but the birdies haven't noticed it yet.
To end on a high note, this is a most precious photo of the littlest bundle of snuggles, Amelie. Don't you just want to pick her up and snorgle her? I love her to bits.
Anyhoo a big weekend ahead - got my housewarming on. I am very very excited and spent last night cleaning windows and doing my nails. I have priorities! It's shaping up to be a very busy week with an enormous load of work on, then a big party to pull off, and I fear my temper may be a little short. I guess when I'm feeling like that, all I have to do is look at this pic of Amelie and just grin at how adorably smily she is.
xxx

Wednesday, 19 September 2007

Stuck in the sticks

So this is kinda funny. Tonight I am at home, with all the free time in the world to write a blog post. Normally I churn one out in 5 minutes quickly on my lunch break (hence the many grammatical errors).

But tonight, having finally got myself connected to the Interweb at home, after many long years, I planned on writing a big newsy post with lots of photos of say, my Argentina trip, my new home, and of Amelie looking adorable. We are unable to upload photos at work so all the ones I have previously used have been off my phone (!) or nicked from my sister’s website, with all my incredibly artistic shots of us getting drunk in Sth America gathering cyber dust on my memory card.

But No. Because I am a cheapskate I have gone for dial-up service instead of broadband. $16.95 a month compared to about $80.00. However. My patience is being sorely tested. So far, I haven’t been able to do One Thing I have wanted to, that would justify my entire reasoning for buying a computer, a desk, and a house with an office.

So far I have been sitting here for 36 minutes. I am unable to post to my blog directly because it cannot display the log in box. So I am writing this in Works, hoping that I can email it to my work email, from my Gmail. The palaver! I am unable to send an email to my mother with ONE photo attached of my new house. I am also unable to upload my photos to Facebook. I probably WOULD be able to if I had unlimited hours, and went to bed and left it chugging away but yes, being a cheapskate, I only have 150 a month.

You Americans out there are probably snickering at the backwardsness of New Zealand technology and you’d be right to - we have one giant telecommunications company that charges the earth for peanuts, and lots of Chihuahua-like little ones that are desperate for your business, but are just Too Difficult to deal with. Do I want a home line with someone other than Telecom? Yes! Yes I do! Oh what’s that you say? I need to make sure I can get this certain signal from some random satellite situated behind what used to be Pluto but turned out to be a chunk of foam from the latest NASA blunder? I need to be home between 11:00 and 11:05 every day this week to try to catch the technician who will then install a few kilometres of wires that the cat will immediately try and chew through? My home phone has to be kept in my office? I can do what? But no-one else has that so what’s the point if I have no-one to call with it?

Meh.

Thursday, 13 September 2007

Purr-serverance (lame!lame!)

So last night Basil and I got acquainted with a new addition to the house - the cat door. Yes it's taken me forever, but I finally got sick of waking up, finding the cat sitting 2mm away from my face staring at me, willing me to wake up and let him outside for a wee. At 3am.
So yesterday I got home and didn't feed him as usual. This resulted in him practically stapling himself to my legs, as in , Hey Mum, can't you SEE me? Look how snuggly I am! And I love you so much!!!
Instead we sat together by the cat door and I let him sniff it. Nothing too scary surely.



I then put his food on the other side (steak and kidney, only the best) and held the flap open. He looked at me all, Mum, you have to OPEN the DOOR. I then picked him up, held the bit of meat out through the flap, and waited till he was just about to eat it, then dropped it. He fell through it like a Slinky.

I did this a few more times and each time he got better. I then upped the ante by dropping the food through and not opening the flap. Quizzical looks ensued. I then picked him up and bunted his head against the flap. This resulted in furious wiggling and the tail wag of doom.

I gave up for a bit and fortified myself with a Chardonnay. Basil had his eighty-seventh bath of the day.

I tell you, that cat is Clean. Licky noises are not my favourite though.

We then had another go, this time coming in from the outside. Excuse the shocking pic - Basil tends to camouflage at night.

Everything was going well until, just before bedtime, I gave it one last shot. Picking up Bas and striding to the door, who should be outside but next door's enormous furry scary-looking German Shepherd Jack, hoovering up all the dropped biscuits and bits of beef. Basil grew 80% in size, and commenced to hissing and scratching, and hiding under the bed. He now looks highly suspiciously at the cat door, and I had to get up at 3am to let him out for a wee.

Anyone have any tips I can try?

Tuesday, 11 September 2007

Still here

OMG so sorry about the lack of updates. Truth be told, it’s not because I’ve been busy doing something interesting, which I’m sure you’re all imagining I was.
No, the reason for my absence is an enormous deadline at work, which if we don’t reach, will have bad ramifications.
So this is my life at the moment:
Get up.
Go to work.
Work like a mad man.
Come home from work.
Eat, watch TV.
Bed.
Get up.

Etc etc. It is so boring! I even went into work on Saturday, which is something I Never do. I think, if you can’t get all the work you’ve been set done in the hours you’re asked to work, there’s something wrong with your time management skills. But at the moment – the amount of work I have to do far surpasses the amount of hours there are in a day, so Saturday it was. Most unhappy.

Good things though – the deadline is Sept 30th, and my housewarming is on Sept 29th, so will be a great way to celebrate the finish. Cross fingers we make it.

What else is on my radar….the Rugby World Cup has just started in France and I’m all about the All Blacks coming to the party. It has taken over the media here and if you don’t like rugby, you’re going to be getting out a lot of DVD’s. About rugby. There’s even an All Blacks CD, a compilation of songs by NZ artists AND a recording of them doing the Haka. I thought it was a joke until they gave it a good review on our local music channel. We have a sweepstake going at work, and I’m already bringing up the rear (I always pick the outsiders – I feel sorry for them!).

Also getting ready to go the races back home in Hawkes Bay early October- need to get a spray tan and a haircut and generally spruce myself up. I’m going to – horror! – wear a dress I have worn already. This is because my bank account is emptier than an…empty thing, and hopefully, no-one will remember.

While this is very much an “I’m not dead” blog post – here is a picture of Amelie looking super adorable to perk things up. I bought her the t-shirt and the great pic is courtesy of Trish.