heyriss

Hello, we're six months old

2008-10-28T11:09:00.002+11:00

Aren't they cute? Baby #1 is a bit sick at the moment so with the extra sleep she's having I have a bit of time to type.

Oh, no, I was wrong. They're up again. It must be time for elevenses.

Best wishes to the Bevis family today - there's another cherub on the way...

Meanwhile, back at the ranch...

2008-07-30T22:01:00.003+10:00

I have been very remiss in updating this site.

In my defense, I have been very busy of late. About four months ago I became a Mum for the first time.

Yes, thank-you, we're all fine. All four of us. Mum, Dad and our new identical Princesses, One and Two.

The girls are "sleeping through" the night on most occasions so I feel less like a zombie but I still don't know how often I'll be able to post something on here. It's hard enough keeping up with labelling the photos I take so that we know which one is which. I'm okay when there's a view of the face as I can tell them apart (now) but in some I have to remember which clothes they were wearing at the beginning of the day. Others are extremely difficult. How am I going to be able to tell them, when they're older, that I can't decide which one was in the photo? I probably am too worried about it.

One of my sisters became a Mum six weeks after I did and she also has a Princess. Just the one. She's quite glad that I have the twins and she doesn't.

It's quite easy for me to say that I do think I could handle just one baby more easily than two after this experience. I realised yesterday that it must have been my destiny to have twins and the reason I was given so much patience.

The girls are growing out of the newborn nappies and are smiling, laughing and babbling. The babbling is limited to "goo", "hoo", "ga" and the silent "coo" but they are talking to their reflection in the mirror as well as each other and their parents. It's very cute.

I'm on my way to bed as I will most likely be up again at 4am for feed time. Apologies if this post is in any way disjointed. My brain does not work as well as before and needs a bit more sleep.

I leave you with a line from my girls' current favourite song:

If you're happy, and you know it, then you really ought to show it,

If you're happy, and you know it, say "a-goo"...

Das Leben der Anderen - and it's free!

2007-03-21T19:41:00.000+11:00

Before the fall of the Berlin Wall, East Germany's Secret Police Listened to Your Secrets...

I managed to score a free double pass to see "The Lives of Others" at Cinema Nova for Tuesday night (20/3).

Not one to pass up a free movie if I can help it, I arranged to meet Logan in Carlton on Lygon Street after work. I drove straight in from work and Logan took a tram to meet me. We had a quick foccacia beforehand and then made our way up to the cinema. There was a good number of people already seated but we found ourselves two seats up the back so that we weren't craning our necks - the theatre was "cosy".

There weren't a lot of "young" people at this thing. I'd say that they were mainly in their 50s and 60s, but there were a few people who looked about our age. We hoped that this meant that there wouldn't be any wrapper-rustling or commentary for the hard-of-hearing (which would be slightly superfluous as the film was in German with English subtitles), no mobile phone text messaging or calls, and we could just sit back and watch the film.

We were about right. There was a bit of plastic wrapper crinkling but, on the whole, it was a pain-free experience. Having lots of loud laughers in the audience was sometimes a little disconcerting but maybe there were references in there that I just didn't understand. I was a wee stripling when the Berlin Wall came down and wouldn't have been aware of the existence of the sort of political oppression that was occurring under the Communists.

Even though there were many opportunities for laughter, it still would have been a scary time and place in which to live. The film demonstrates that to survive the regime, people had to bury their own morals and that the price paid by these characters before the destruction of the Berlin Wall was soul-destroying and unnecessary. It wasn't only the Secret Police about which you had to worry; your neighbours could turn you in at any time for a throw-away comment. A joke made by one of the Secret Police staff ensured a mind-numbing demotion to steaming open intercepted letters in a basement and punishment for the general public involved torture before incarceration or being made to disappear.

The coda to the film completed the story very nicely. After all the horrors, life goes on and can be beautiful.

I give this movie 5 stars; I thoroughly enjoyed it and recommend it heartily.

Thou hast by moonlight at her window sung

2007-03-18T10:55:00.000+11:00

With feigning voice verses of feigning love...

I spent some of yesterday cooking a dessert for dinner that evening. Mmm, chocolate pavlova topped with whipped cream and crushed Peppermint Crisp (chocolate bar).

I decided that I wanted to see the Australian Shakespeare Company's production of A Midsummer Night's Dream for my birthday and invite my friends along. I discussed this with Noshie a couple of weeks ago and thought that I would arrange to have a picnic dinner in the Melbourne Botanic Gardens and then move into the "seating" for the show. That way people could join us for dinner and not necessarily be forced into paying to see a show that they didn't want to necessarily fork out the money for and I got to see everyone for a little while.

It seemed to work. There were six of us who went to the show and about five others who just came for dinner.

Usually I would arrange to cater for everyone at one of my parties but this time I asked everyone to bring a plate of food to share and said that I would supply dessert. It worked really well. Bevis and his family came along and Wifey gave me a necklace she made for me herself, which is beautiful! Noshie said that she would contribute some money towards my ticket to see the Royal Shakespeare Company perform King Lear later this year (starring Sir Ian McKellan) which she is coming to see with me - so exciting!. Another of my friends bought me an Asian cookbook which is very comprehensive and I immediately picked out a few recipes to try out - excellent! All I need now is to get myself a new wok and some bamboo steamers and I'll be ready.

We had dinner and then I served the pavlova. Bevis tried to tell me that we needed thirteen slices - he started by counting himself, finished by counting himself and also included Sweetums, methinks so that he could have three pieces for himself? The ants had also discovered my sugary creation so we forcibly evicted them (hilarity ensued) before I plated the food.

We said goodbye to Bevis, Wifey, Sweetums, Alison and her partner, and Gerri. The rest of us moved our rugs and cushions into the seating area and got set up for the show (lolly bags open, drinks organised, fluff that cushion, ooh the wind's getting chilly - better put on that jacket).

The performance was electric. High-energy acro-fairies (acrobatic fairies) buzzed, flipped and jiggled around the stage. The "rude mechanicals" performed their play about Pyramus and Thisbe with enthusiasm. There were pop-culture references aplenty and the minor deviations from the script added to the comedy and increased my enjoyment of the performance. "Dream" is one of the most understandable and oft-performed Shakespearian play which means that for some it can become quite stale but this troupe breathed fresh life into the bard's work.

I had a lot of fun and I want to send a thank-you to my friends for helping to make it such a great evening.

...So, good night unto you all.
Give me your hands, if we be friends,
And Robin shall restore amends.

Houston, we have lift-off

2007-03-16T17:22:00.000+11:00

I think she's got it...

I think I've cracked it. Fingers crossed that it still works tomorrow once I turn off the computer and router at the wall and it forgets everything that I taught it to do today.

Riveting stuff, I know.

I have made our wireless system work. Yay! Logan was so excited that he immediately moved on to the next stage in the process and wondered when we could get our other computer connected wirelessly to the same network.

That kinda took the wind out of my sails. I would have liked to enjoy the fact that I had managed to comprehend a manual written by someone of asian extraction with the same level of English as an 8-year-old.

Why are all these computer manuals written as we we already have some idea of what is going on, anyway? Why do they only tell half the story? I followed the instructions that came with the router and it referred to items in such an obscure way that even when I'd found the right thing to do, I didn't know whether it was working or if I was breaking it so that it would never work again.

The first trouble I encountered was the manual referring me to other manuals that were on the internet which is difficult when you are trying to set up your hardware so that you can access the internet! Hello? Anybody out there think that this might have been a bit silly?

Sorry, I got a bit upset there. So, you can see why I wanted Logan to just enjoy the fact that we were connected wirelessly to the internet for a while before moving on and giving me something else to work on.

Because it is my birthday he arranged to come home from work early to take me out for dinner and that was nice. And he stopped off at the shops to buy me a bouquet of flowers which was also nice.

All in all, a pretty successful day, really.

Peace, out...

"Hello, IT... Have you turned it on?"

2007-01-25T20:47:00.000+11:00

...Two out of Three ain't bad...

Australia Day tomorrow - bring it on. It's been a bit of a tough week at work. No air conditioning, level of busy-ness goes from crazy to background noise.

I recently started chatting with an ex-neighbour on MySpace. Hi, Poss, if you're reading. All grown up to be a gorgeous-looking young woman. Of course with her extremely fit parents (ex-Commonwealth athlete for a Dad) she was always going to be athletic and slim and terrific-looking. I could never get my head around "going for a run" as an enjoyable past-time but she manages it, I'm sure. I probably should have tried harder instead of reaching for a good book!

The only running I do these days is for the bus.

So, the washing machine arrived without too many hitches. As a precaution I forwarded the home phone to my mobile (now why didn't I think of that before?) although the company doing the delivery did call the house at about 6:45am just to reconfirm everything. When was I leaving? Oh, in about five minutes. And I would be back again, when? After 8:30. I may be earlier but I don't want to say so and then get stuck somewhere. Fair enough.

A lovely bloke dropped it off. I had the doors open and ready, again, and he wheeled it in, connected it up, had a chat about theatre and Cindy from Neighbours and the vet on McLeod's Daughters that he did a course with, as well as a bit of Shakespeare before he trundled his way down the drive again and my pocket is $30 lighter for the experience. (Have to say - $30 is a bit of a bargain to have a washing machine fixed.)

So guess what I'll be doing on Australia Day... I feel that it will need a good workout after its 10-day holiday and I think it's probably time to save up to buy a new washer in case this happens again.

I've also given the new modem/router-y thingo a go with some support over the phone. Apparently it's my computer that's causing most of the trouble. The problem is intermittent though so I'm going to persevere.

The next challenge is to go wireless.

...I want the world, I want the whole world...

Pear-shaped, it is

2007-01-24T18:10:00.000+11:00

...Isn't it funny how you never really screamed at my face...

Well, the washing machine is fixed and it was due to be delivered back to me this morning. (This is my big news for the moment, sorry to be such a sad case.) Having to drive Logan to the train station I told the repair service people that I would be at the house by 8:30am to accept it back into the house, they confirmed that they would be there between 8:30am and 8:45am and I confirmed the amount I was to pay them and that, I thought, was that.

My plan for this morning was to take Logan to the train station, drive back home, finish getting ready for work (I usually have breakfast in my office as I'm usually there before 8:00am), the delivery would happen and I could put all our laundry back in the Laundry before dashing out to the car and being late to work by only about an hour. Possibly could fit in a bit more tidying of the house depending on whether the delivery was a bit later than expected but ultimately wouldn't be too long at home.

Ha!

I arrived back home at maybe a little before 8:00am (I had left time for possible traffic snarls), parked my car on the street so that they would have access to our back gate, and noticed a strange looking watermark on the drive. The pattern didn't fit the one that my car air conditioning would leave but I didn't think much of it.

So, I go inside, leave the front door open but the screen door closed so that I can hear if anyone knocks on it instead of using the doorbell. I dried my hair, had breakfast, put on my makeup, and it was 8:30. Great. I started doing the washing up from last night's dinner and Logan's lunch preparation. Hmm, 8:45. They're probably running a little late, I thought. I'll just go and open up the back gate and make sure there's a clear path to the Laundry for the machine when they do arrive.

9:15am arrives and I called Logan to say that the machine hadn't arrived. Called work to say that I would be later than I thought I might. I gave the company a call and went through to a messagebank. Left a message with my details saying that I was expecting the delivery at 8:30 and could I please have an ETA on the arrival so that I could let my work know how late I might be.

Kept doing housework but kept running to the front of the house every time I heard a car door; still nothing.

I rang again at about 10:30am and was told that they had already been at 7:45am, hence the water stains I had noticed on the driveway earlier, perhaps? They had hung around for ten minutes and had tried calling me but, of course, I was on the road and wasn't planning on them being there that early!!

Could they deliver at all today? I was thinking, maybe I could take the whole day off work if I needed. No, they only hire the courier once in a day. Right, fair enough. What about tomorrow morning? Again, I can only take delivery after 8:30am. We'll definitely be there. Delivering to someone else in your area at 10:00am so will either be before or after 10:00am. Okay.

So I locked up the house and left for work. Only took me 25 minutes to get there and happily found a free parking spot upon my arrival - bonus! I got to my office at 11:30am and I have to go through it all again tomorrow!!

At least I got the washing up done.

I could get used to a late morning start time...

Would somebody turn on the wireless?

2007-01-19T21:06:00.000+11:00

...That's just paperless office talk...

Logan and I bought a new computer a little before Christmas. It was like giving ourselves an early Christmas present with all the boxes and wrappings and connecting up wires to the wrong spots and finding out you needed batteries of a peculiar shape and size before you can really switch the thing on properly and give it a red hot go.

Had problems with the screen first but eventually worked out that as I had installed a new operating system over the top of the one that the shop had used to do the testing I should reinstall all of the drivers for the motherboard, monitor, and all the other bits. It all worked a lot better after that; including the monitor which wasn't so good beforehand with the drivers you could download from their website...

The next mammoth task was to install our new modem. We didn't choose a plain and simple modem. We had to go with something fancy, didn't we? We got a complicated one that is a router and a wireless modem.

This took up an entire weekend.

Logan had to leave the room as he has not my patience (stubbornness?).

I had it going by Sunday night in time for a Skype call to the in-laws in the UK, but it wasn't perfect. Wouldn't turn on properly the next time we turned on the computer. Took me 30 minutes to connect to the internet. There's still something wrong (we have to reboot the router to connect although this takes only 2 minutes) and we're using an Ethernet connection to get by. We're not completely wireless yet. That's this weekend's task.

(Oh, and this weekend we're also having the washing machine fixed. Had to siphon out the water, as it wasn't pumping it out on its own, just in case we have to move it. Used a technique I learned by watching Scooby-Doo - Thelma sure had brains even if she always wore that strange orange confection of an outfit.)

Wish me luck - I'm not really an IT expert and it could all go pear-shaped.

...Where's a good sonic screwdriver when you need one?...

And to all a Good Night

2006-12-24T21:51:00.000+11:00

...'Twas the night before Christmas and all through the house, not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse...

Well, it's that time of year again. Merry Christmas to everyone and especially my sister Boo who is still travelling the world and won't be home until some time early next year. Love you! Miss you!!

We're wrapping the pressies ready for our family's Christmas lunch get-together tomorrow and will be ready to go with a slideshow of the photos we took at the family wedding a week ago (has it only been a week?!?!). I've promised my Nan I'll be looking nice tomorrow, ie will be wearing my new makeup (as suggested by my lovely friend and makeup artist). Apparently it looks like I'm not wearing any makeup but that I look a lot healthier which is fabulous for someone who hardly ever goes out into the sun.

What else, what else. Aah, yes. We had a little party. We had the pleasure of catching up with Noshie although won't be seeing Adie until next Friday. The lovely bloke's been all over the world and then gets straight into work when he comes back - such dedication!

The Bevii were there and I made Wifey cry - but in a good way, I promise! I gave them each a framed copy of a Photoshopped photo I took when Wifey and Sweetums were over at our place a couple of months ago which made them both look absolutely adorable. One for Bevis to keep at work, one for displaying at home. Lovely. Can't wait to see them all again when they get back from their well-deserved holiday.

Well, it's raining cats and dogs out there at the moment and we've gone from a respectable 37 degrees while I was working last week to expecting a miserable 16 degrees and more rain tomorrow. Personally, I think the rain is fabulous and there should be more of it and I really hope that it is also falling on the bushfires that have been raging out of control in Victoria for the past month or so. The forecast for this week is also for lots more rain which will be great for our parched-looking garden (our front lawn even looks brown on Google Earth!) and I hope it keeps in the people who are usually out in the parks near us lighting fireworks. At least things are less likely to catch fire when the ground is nice and soggy.

Anyway, I have more presents to wrap as Logan has just informed me he has finished with mine and I am allowed back in to the lounge room.

Stay safe, everyone, and enjoy the holidays.

...that shook when he laughed, like a bowl full of jelly...

More wedding bells

2006-11-26T13:55:00.000+11:00

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas...

I've been nicely busy at work for the last few weeks but can now draw breath again before preparing for next year.

Of course it also gives me a bit more headspace to start thinking about Christmas and all the other social things we're planning for the end of the year.

First cab off the rank is that my uncle is about to tie the knot. Wonderful news! He's about eleven years older than I and it's his first marriage. She is a lovely lady and pregnant with their second child. (Their first child I wrote about here.) It's about time that they had some good happen to them. The wedding invitation says that dress is "casual" but there's no way I'm turning up in a t-shirt, shorts and thongs (flip-flops/sandals/v. casual footwear) with my hair all frizzy (as demonstrated here - scroll to my "picture"). Thus, I decided that a new dress was called for and I have bought this one (but imagine it in bright raspberry and orange). Of course I also had to find a suitable cardi to go over the top just in case it is not a terribly warm day/evening (it will be Summer but this is Melbourne we're talking about), and the store had a "spend $100 and receive a $20 voucher to be used in January 2007" offer so I bought a pair of earrings and a necklace that I will also wear to the wedding, and another t-shirt to add to this year's collection which added up to over $200 and I now have two vouchers to spend. Yay! Did I mention that this is my current favourite store?

Now all I have to do is find suitable shoes...

Logan, my husband, has also been asked to be the semi-"official" photographer on the day which I think will be great fun. I will be helping to direct, of course. My first lot of "help" has been to organise to borrow some photographic equipment from the place I work. (Have I mentioned that a lot of the time I really love where I work?) Once we heard that we were going to be asked to be doing the photography we started worrying about our camera. It's only a little Sony CyberShot and it's taken a fair number of photos in its little life-span but it's not what you would call the best option for taking wedding photographs. We have a media and photography store at work and I had the bright idea of asking whether I could borrow something from them. They know I'm pretty good with that sort of stuff (I would hope) and would take care of it as best I could. They're lending me a 6 or 7 megapixel camera (photography department gentleman couldn't quite remember), tripod and bounce-board (fabric over a bendy frame that is used to reflect light onto your subject so that it can be back-lit). I am so excited! Now we'll look more professional and will hopefully have better photographs at the end of the day!! I'm also a bit happier that we'll have this fully-checked and serviced camera and only have to use our little one as an emergency. Logan's worried that we won't have enough time with it to be able to work out the best way to use it but I don't really think I would be able to request it for longer.

I'm also thinking some more now about the Christmas party I will be having soon with my friends - I love planning this sort of thing and I can't wait to catch up with Adie and Noshie when they're back in just over a week. Once this year is over I'm sure the time will fly until my baby sister, Boo, is back home again too.

If you see a bride in a hotrod in Bentleigh in a couple of weeks time, give a big friendly wave to my new Auntie!

Those wedding bells are gonna chime

2006-10-18T10:05:00.000+10:00

It's high time for me to reveal the reason for secrecy surrounding my trip to the UK recently.

The reason Logan and I went, and so quickly, was because Logan's brother and girlfriend had announced their engagement. They also announced that they were getting married six weeks later.

SIX WEEKS!

Those two have been together since before Logan and I ever met each other. They wanted to have it done quickly and quietly with the mimum of fuss. They wanted not to tell their friends about it and have only family at the ceremony and celebration. Small and elegant. So, to be able to keep the secret from their friends they wanted to do it as quickly as possible. They didn't want any noses getting out of joint because someone had heard or been invited and someone else hadn't, etcetera.

Of course when we were told that it was all happening we were in a bit of shock as they had said that they would never get married, it wasn't something they wanted to do. They had declared their intentions and that was accepted. We were obviously very happy that they had chosen to marry as there had been a shift in their way of thinking about the relationship and there were no outside influences or pressure for them to be married. They had decided that it was something they wanted to do.

After adjusting to the news my second reaction was to tell Logan that he would be going, of course. I was pretty certain with the lowered staffing levels and general busy-ness of my work that I would not be going. After I discussed with my supervisor and Logan discussed with his we were both allowed to take three weeks of leave (more shock!) and we immediately started looking at airfares and working out how on earth we were going to pay for it all.

I was so stressed about it all that I found I was unconsciously clenching my jaw which was giving me face-ache. How were we going to get ourselves organised in four and a half weeks to get over to England???

This was all while the restrictions on baggage started at Heathrow airport and there was television footage of people lining up outside in the rain and security? army? people walking around with nasty-looking weapons and flat-jackets.

Intense.

We needed new carry-on luggage and as luck would have it there was a 20%-off sale at Strandbags the day I went looking. Bonus!

But this wasn't all about us. It was about the wedding.

We touched down at Heathrow, hugged all the family, sat down for a drink and I handed over the care package from Mum to Boo. We then said goodbye to Boo and went with UK Mum & Dad back to Shrewsbury.

With Logan's family we pottered around going to pubs, did some catching up with people and then went and collected Logan's grandfather from Towcester (pronounced "toaster") the day before the wedding. We stayed with Logan's brother, Crockett, and his fiancee that evening as we'd nearly run out of beds at UK Mum & Dad's house.

I'm not sure whose idea it was but we were meant to be a calming influence on the bride and groom the morning of their nuptials. I think it worked. (?) We did help them sort out a few things (like remembering to have lunch) and I was ring-bearer and holder of the cheque with which to pay the celebrant.

The day went off without a hitch (except the one that was supposed to happen). One funny moment occurred when UK Dad realised after parking the car and while walking to the registry office that although he was wearing black shoes only one of them was part of the new pair that he had bought for the occasion. Oops! He and Logan decided not to share that information with the rest of us until the reception which is when we all collapsed into laughter.

The newlyweds flew to Venice for their honeymoon the next day. Awh, how sweet.

So by now they will have told all their friends and we hear on the family grapevine that so far everyone has been very supportive of their decision and understanding of their wishes to keep the ceremony small. Excellent!

So I now have another sister and she's absolutely wonderful.

BEVIS has a BABY

2006-10-09T08:14:00.000+10:00

Hi Everyone,

In answer to the comments left on his page, yes, there is a baby BEVIS although I have been sworn to secrecy vis a vis any further details as my very dear friend would like to share the glorious event with you himself online.

At least we know that he's looking at his blog because all your comments are appearing as he's moderating them!!!

Stay tuned...

Riss.

How do you solve a problem like Maria?

2006-09-09T21:03:00.000+10:00

Apparently by having a reality TV show to choose the next one.

I'm in London at the moment staying with Boo in her share house. Was staying with UK Mum & Dad for a while and UK Mum made sure that I got to see an episode of this show. It's about as horrible as every Reality TV Show I have seen (sorry) and added to it you have Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber and guest singers who should be having words with their stylist. It's like an all-female Pop Idol show. These poor ladies are competing to perform as Maria in the new production of The Sound Of Music being produced, I think, by Sir ALW, hence his involvement in the judging proceedings.

Fortunately, I've not had all that much time to be watching British TV as after Logan and I left Shrewsbury for London we have been out and about either walking or catching the tube to our next destination.

We went out with Boo to her local pub which is staffed by Aussies (which is what you would expect from the Earl's Court/Shepherds Bush area) and on a Tuesday they have half-price wood-fired pizza. Because the weather had been so great (26 degrees) it was packed and we had a little difficulty grabbing ourselves a table. The pizzas took about 45 minutes to appear simply because of the high demand and they were definitely worth the wait.

I went to see Wicked on Thursday night and you should have seen the crowd! There were people dressed in green - dresses, ties, shirts, tops - or who had green hair for the occasion. One pair even dressed up as the main characters - Elphaba and Galinda - complete with black witch hat and a blonde wig. They were very excited!

The show was fantastic. It was fascinating to see how they dealt with the breakdown of some of the equipment - Galinda's "bubble" failed to appear and they brought down the curtain and started the show again, some furniture failed to appear for one scene (although I didn't notice) but that was insignificant and they kept going. It was full of references to L. Frank Baum's original Wizard of Oz as well as other musicals. It was funny, it had passion and great effects, the cast were wonderful (even a few Aussies in the leading roles!!), and I thoroughly enjoyed it. We stood hopefully near the Stage Door afterwards but it seemed that there was a bit of a booze and schmooze going on to celebrate the first show with an audience so as it got colder and we got more tired we decided to call it a night.

Last night I went with Boo to see Jason Robert Brown's The Last 5 Years at a converted Chocolate Factory where, again, there was an Australian in one of the lead roles. Was impressed with the show and the staging. It was, obviously, different to the show I saw in Melbourne (twice). It was good to talk about the differences with Boo. Although I enjoyed this version I think they played it "angry" and it was a little more difficult to see why the two had developed and stayed in their relationship.

We're off to a market somewhere today and will try to get to Greenwich tomorrow. And hopefully more musicals!!

Hiya!

2006-08-28T11:24:00.000+10:00

(Traditional English greeting.)

I'm feeling a little more human today. The flight to London was fine and Boo was at Heathrow to meet us when we arrived at lunch time on Saturday. That meant I was able to hand over the care package (I laughed when I saw that there were six containers of hair mousse included!) from home and a big hug on behalf of Mum & Dad.

Boo is looking for a housemate at the moment as one of the people in her share-house has just moved out. They haven't found anyone suitable yet so it may work out that we can stay there for the week instead of booking into a hotel. More time with Boo! Yay!!

We managed to go to two pubs yesterday and are planning to go into town today once Logan's brother has finished getting organised for work on Tuesday (it's a Bank/Public Holiday here today which has worked out well). We neglected to remember that to use your credit card over here you need a PIN. Who remembers their Credit Card PIN when all you need to do in Australia is sign an authorisation slip? Of course, if we'd remembered this before we went away we still probably wouldn't have had time to get to the bank to get it all set up...

Anyway, it's still good. We're being very well looked after by my UK Mum & Dad and it's great to catch up with Logan's brother, Crockett and his girlfriend. Logan and Crockett are very much alike and we all seem to be able to get along well.

I was apologising in advance for any vague-outs as the jetlag is still having an effect - in fact, this whole post could be gobbledegook and I would have no idea at this point in time so apologies to anyone reading this!

I think it's time for a nice cup of tea before my brain decides to go off floating again. Then it's off to Marks & Spencer!

We are family

2006-08-16T08:18:00.000+10:00

Now that we're going O/S the wheels are turning and planned events are slotting themselves into our limited timeline. We are informed that on one occasion we will be eating at The Golden Cross and we are to choose from the set menu. Looks pretty good. I'll probably need to add a restaurant review over here. Mental note to do that from somewhere...

Boo messaged me to say that she found a great deal for Wicked tickets and a meal for the low low price of 20 pound. (Sorry, can't remember right now how to make this thing do a pound sign.) I'm in!!

Choosing what to do in London is proving very difficult as Logan and I will obviously have different things we want to see. We do overlap quite a bit though so I'm sure we'll find a middle ground.

More later...

Congratulations!

2006-08-11T07:50:00.000+10:00

Welcome to the world a new baby brother, Jeremy, for my friend Josie-Bean!! Well done to Mum and Dad who were looking very tired when I dropped into the hospital to say hello and have a little cuddle last night after work. Mum's going to be in hospital until the weekend so she'll be able to get some well-earned rest before returning home.

He's gorgeous!

Well, now I've heard everything

2006-07-30T22:36:00.000+10:00

We are not amused...

Apologies for my silence of late. It is inexcusable, I know. There are a few topics that I need to write about however something has come up recently that I needed to get written down in cyberland so that my head can stop spinning.

I'm going to the UK for a trip. It's happening too quickly for me to be able to fully comprehend. We have to leave very soon. Totally unplanned. Can't say too much but it's for a nice reason that we're going and not for something akin to a funeral.

I will get to catch up with Boo, my baby sister, as she is in London and currently nannying. I don't know whether I'll see Adie and Noshie but if they're in the vicinity then I'm going to try my hardest to meet up somewhere.

Boo and I have already arranged that we're going to go and see Wicked at the West End and seeing as how I missed The Lion King in Melbourne I'm going to do my darndest to make sure I see that one as well. Ooh, and something at Shakespeare's Globe Theatre.

I'd better get back to my Lonely Planet Guide to London and find somewhere to stay...

Rule Brittania, Brittania rules the waves...

He loves me, he loves me not...

2006-06-18T17:53:00.000+10:00

I went to the Ballet. Short version: It was fun. For the long version, read on...

A friend of my husband mentioned recently that she had not ever been to see a ballet performed and although she was interested she wasn't quite sure what she should see as a first-timer. I mentioned that it would probably be better to see one of the more well-known productions that had lots of colour and brightness and a story that was easy to follow. The following week a Mother's Day special arrived for The Australian Ballet's production of 'Giselle' at a discounted ticket price. After she agreed that it looked like a good deal I booked the tickets.

On Friday night (June 16th) we met outside the Box Office in the Arts Centre and walked the sumptuously carpeted distance to the Door nominated on our tickets. On the way I bought a programme because I hadn't done it in years and I was interested in finding out who was still with the company, who had been promoted, who had returned, and who were the new "crop" in the Corps de Ballet. Those programs are not cheap: I remember when they were only four dollars and now they're fifteen! Aah well, it was a special occasion.

I used to go to see The Australian Ballet with my Grandmother. We had a Season Ticket and would go to every production. It's something special that we did together for years. I would have invited her along this time but she had arrived back from an overseas trip the day before and I didn't think that the jetlag would have allowed her to attend and be conscious. Sorry Nan.

Our favourite male dancer was, and still is, Steven Heathcote. *sigh* But I won't talk about him here as he, unfortunately, was not performing. The beautifully athletic dancers who were performing on June 16th were:
Lucinda Dunn as Giselle,
Robert Curran as Count Albrecht,
Paula Baird (a Guest Artist and teacher at the Australian Ballet School) as Berthe (Giselle's mother),
Andrew Killian as Hilarion (a forester),
Colin Peasley OAM (Education Programme Manager) as The Duke of Courland,
Natalie Hill (Coryphee) as Princess Bathilde
Craig Cathcart (Coryphee) as Wilfred (attendant on Albrecht),
Miwako Kubota (Coryphee) and Luke Ingham (Corps de Ballet) performed the Peasant pas de deux,
Annabel Bronner Reid, Juliet Burnett (Corps de Ballet), Lana Jones, Dannielle Rowe, Leanne Stojmenoc and Camilla Vergotis as Giselle's Friends,
Jane Casson as Myrtha, Queen of the Wilis,
Natalie Hill (Coryphee) and Laura Tong (Corps de Ballet) as the Leading Wilis,
Artists of The Australian Ballet as Peasants, Huntsmen, Court Ladies & Gents and Wilis.

Giselle is a ballet that I have seen before. It's a bit of a classic, really. A traditional "story" ballet with its beginning in France in 1941 at Paris Opéra and its origins in Germanic and other European folklore with its reference to "Wilis" or beautiful female spirits who are the ghosts of girls who died of a broken heart before their wedding day.

Giselle is a young peasant girl with a weak heart and although she loves to dance this threatens her life. A local gamekeeper, Hilarion, loves Giselle and fiercely protects her happiness while Giselle's mother tries to protect Giselle from causing herself unnecessary heart failure.

A Count, Albrecht, comes upon the village in which Giselle lives on the day of the wine festival. He is captivated by her and disguises himself as a peasant by giving his manservant his sword and cloak, which isn't hidden very well (note to Count Albrecht: Have that man fired) in order to charm his way into her heart without her being aware of his status. Being the trusting and gentle lamb that Giselle is, she falls in love with him and is ecstatically happy.

All this work is undone, however, when a royal hunting party arrives in town. Albrecht makes himself scarce. The peasants put on a pretty Pas de deux (a dance performed by a featured male and female dancer) for the Duke of Courland and his beautiful daughter Princess Bathilde, to whom Albrecht is already engaged.

Giselle is enchanted by Bathilde's opulent and stylish clothing and Bathilde by Giselle's sheltered innocence. They converse and find that they are both betrothed. Bathilde gives Giselle a necklace as a gift and Giselle dances to show everyone how happy she is with her beautiful piece of jewellery.

Hilarion has been doing some digging and matches the insignia on the cloak he has found wrapped around a sword with the emblem on the hunting horn hung outside Giselle's house while she and her mother entertain the Duke and his party. Albrecht returns, Hilarion challenges him and Albrecht gives himself away by reaching to his side for his sword as a nobleman would do.

Count Albrecht is exposed and Giselle is heartbroken. After dancing happily all day her health has deteriorated, she dances the famous mad scene and dies.

At the beginning of the second act we are introduced to the Wilis and their Queen, Myrtha. Myrtha is a vengeful sort and keeps her Wilis in line. Their mission is to haunt the forest at night and lure young men to dance with them until the men die from exhaustion before dawn. Giselle, a young woman whose heart has been broken by her intended's betrayal before her wedding day, has now become a Wili.

Hilarion mourns at Giselle's grave and is enticed by the ghostly apparitions to dance until his death. Count Albrecht arrives also to mourn and although commanded by Myrtha to dance with Albrecht to his death, Giselle still loves him and, defying the Queen, helps him stay alive until dawn when the Wilis lose their powers. Giselle vanishes back into her grave and Albrecht is safe.

According to the performers, this ballet is technically challenging for a modern dancer as a lot of the footwork is different to that choreographed today. I believe that it is also quite a favourite because of this reason but more so because it is one that potential dancers will have seen when very young and it is full of flash and colour and the traditional pointe-work and tutus making it memorable.

It's certainly one that I remember...

Be Our Guest, Be Our Guest

2006-05-22T20:23:00.000+10:00

Put our service to the test...

I have been to see the MTC production of 'The Clean House' this weekend. The play was written by Sarah Ruhl, and this production is performed by Julia Blake, Daniela Farinacci, Wendy Hughes, Pip Miller and Deirdre Rubenstein.

The house is a very Clean House. The expanse of white carpet is dotted with white furniture and its emotionally reserved inhabitant, Lane, is also crisply outfitted in a white ensemble. (Do we see a pattern forming here?) In contrast, her talkative Brazillian live-in cleaner, Matilde, dresses in a serviceable black and although paid to clean the house is not happy doing so and is struggling to find within herself the jokes she feels are her destiny to share with the world. Matilde's joke-telling parents have, after a bizarre series of events, died and although she is trying to search out the perfect joke in their memory she is afraid that her life will end once it is found. Lane's sister, Virginia, loves to clean, lives to clean, so offers her services to Matilde - she will clean house while Matilde cheers herself up and can work on her jokes... Lane is married to a surgeon, Charles, who reveals that he has fallen in love with another woman, a flamboyant opposite to the highly restrained Lane. Charles' revelation and the introduction of his new girlfriend, Ana, who is also Brazillian, breaks open Lane's cool, white facade and starts in motion the events that will resolve some of the characters' internal issues and bring the play to its chaotic conclusion.

I do feel that I may have felt more involved with the play if I had understood Matilde's language. The play was spoken in English but some of Matilde's more lengthy jokes were told in her native tongue. I felt most of the actors inhabited their characters weill but I felt that Ana was possibly not comfortable in her role and was over-acting to compensate. Of course, this is only my impression, I mean no disrepect, and I saw one of the earlier performances so this may have been an "off night", who knows? It would be difficult to laugh convincingly at a joke you have heard many times before and to act out the last laugh of your life must be a great challenge.

The story was engaging, the use of the set to transport us in time and space was fabulous and gave the tale, at times, a mythical air. I enjoyed it very much and I don't envy the person who had to clean up after each performance.

Tie your napkin 'round your neck, cherie, and we'll provide the rest...

A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Theatre

2006-05-20T16:56:00.000+10:00

Something for everyone, A Comedy Tonight...

I have to say that the nights that I went to the Melbourne International Comedy Festival I had a really great time. I know that I should have gone to more shows than I did but I am glad that I managed to see more than last year.

I managed to organise a Friday night outing starting with dinner at Zampeli's Cafe Greco at Crown Casino - yum - and moving on to see Tripod followed by Adam Hills.

Even though it was a horrible night weather-wise, the mizzling rain didn't seem to be dampening anyone's spirits in the least. There were queues and queues of people in the central Comedy precinct around the Melbourne Town Hall and everyone was determined to have a good time.

I am in awe of the talent that the members of Tripod possess. Not only can they sing wonderfully but they write their own stuff and perform with so much enthusiasm. I was a fan of the "Song In An Hour" segment they had on the radio station JJJ and I miss it. They were given three disconnected topics/items/genres to include in a song which they then had to write, rehearse and perform after just one hour. They never failed. They were brilliant. Topical and hilarious it was the highlight of my week. Their Comedy Festival show was a blend of old and new songs and did not disappoint.

Adam Hills is the host of one of my favourite television programs - Spicks and Specks - and is so cute you want to invite him to a dinner party so you can ask him to tell more of his stories. He good-naturedly interacts with his audience so everyone feels involved and my only regret is that we missed the sign language interpreter he has with him at his Sunday performances because I've heard that their double act will have you in stitches. One to remember for next time. Until then, you can see him on the ABC as host of their music quiz show, Spicks and Specks, on a Wednesday at 8:30pm.

I've also just realised today that I had a ticket to one of the MTC shows at the beginning of this month and totally missed it. Botheration. Not much I can do about it, it's my own silly fault. However, I am off to see The Clean House tonight so will have more to review tomorrow.

I've also taken advantage of a special offer and am going to see The Australian Ballet perform Giselle in a couple of weeks. I've also arranged to see Lano & Woodley, who I missed at The Comedy Festival, in November when they return to Melbourne on their farewell tour. I'm really enjoying taking advantage of the cultural side of Melbourne this year. It's been something I've not really been able to afford to do before so it's nice to be in a place where I can do this sort of thing.

Now I've just got to work out when I can go to the Gym...

Anything you ask for, Comedy, Comedy, Comedy, Comedy, Comedy, Comedy, Comedy, Comedy...To-night!

I had to let it happen

2006-05-01T21:58:00.000+10:00

I had to change...

I've finally had my birthday party. It wasn't the big event that I thought it might be but then maybe having a wedding three years ago has taken it out of me. I didn't even advertise it as my birthday party but I did get a present from one of my high school friends on the day which was very special.

So, officially, I am 30.

It's not too bad, really. I have my health, all of my teeth, a wonderful husband and a d*mn fine group of friends, a healthy mortgage, a job I enjoy, and some spare cash to spend on myself every so often.

I guess that's why when my Mum asked me what I wanted for my birthday I couldn't really think of anything spectacular to ask for to mark the occasion. Same with my sisters. My beautiful Nanna gave me a scratchie (a lotto or pools card where you scratch off a plastic-silver covering to see whether you have won a cash prize) and some cash (a modest amount) which I still have not spent. I was planning to use it to buy a ticket to see The Lion King in Melbourne but I really think I've missed the boat with that one. I'll just have to fly to Perth to see it now!

I am happy to say that I have managed to catch a couple of shows at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival. I have missed out on tickets to see Lano & Woodley for the last time and I am kicking myself, but have managed to grab tickets to Tripod and Adam Hills next Friday night and I'm rather happy with that. I managed to catch the first taping of the ABC's The Glass House for free (no, I don't mean by watching it on television) due to having a friend in high places - I clapped so much that my hands hurt and smiled/laughed so much that my face hurt. It's what you want from a comedy show, really.

I have to admit that Logan and I went to see "D-Cuppettry" as well. Not my thing, really, and I have no plans to ever see the male equivalent (despite an invitation from my parents one year to see it with them *shudder*) but it was entertaining and we had "Tight*rse Tuesdays" tickets so it was a good 'n' cheap night out. Logan said that his face hurt from laughing/smiling but I felt only that it was entertaining enough and not particularly laugh-out-loud funny. The ladies were consummate performers and their breasts were considered by the audience as merely an appendage, like an arm or a leg, which is down to the matter-of-fact atmosphere in which they presented their all-singing, all-dancing, topless puppettry. Good on them for doing the show and de-mystifying the female mammary glands.

Another nice thing that has happened is that a Performance Bonus has arrived in my bank account with my regular pay this fortnight. Yay, me. It's great to be rewarded for doing a job well that you enjoy. (Bevis, take note...)

Couldn't stay all my life down at heel

How many times do I have to tell you?

2006-04-30T20:09:00.000+10:00

You would be surprised at the number of visitors I have had in the past month considering that I have managed one post in the last four weeks.

There are a lot of people in the world who come across my ramblings because they are looking for the lyrics to a particular song by The_Rogue_Traders.

Now, having written that, I am, unfortunately, bound to move up the hit list.

Having imparted the secret of my success, I bid you a good night.

When in Doubt

2006-04-08T17:31:00.000+10:00

On Wednesday evening I went to see the Sydney Theatre Company production of Doubt. Written by John Patrick Shanley, it is "the most acclaimed new American play of the year" (eight awards are listed on the MTC website).

The play is showing at the Playhouse at the Victorian Arts Centre in Melbourne.

A priest, Father Flynn (Christopher Gabardi from Channel 7's 'All Saints'), delivers a sermon built around the concept of 'Doubt'. It is evident by his accent that Father Flynn is from The Bronx and from the content of his speech it is not long after President Kennedy has been murdered, placing us in a New York Catholic school in the mid-1960s.

We are then introduced to Sister Aloysius, Principal of the school, who has called in Sister James, a younger nun in charge of class 8B, for a conference.

Sister Aloysius (Jennifer Flowers, After The Ball) is convinced that the easy relationship Father Flynn develops with the male students is hiding something more sinister.

Sister James is a naive and enthusiastic teacher who sees the good in everyone until the conference with Sister Aloysius makes her begin to doubt her rose-coloured view.

The play is mildly unsettling. There is no definitive proof of any interference with a child and with Father Flynn protesting his innocence Sister Aloysius investigates and tries to hound him into an admission.

Sister James is not convinced either way. Sister Aloysius is certain that a crime has been committed. Father Flynn explains the situation as straightforward. The boy's mother (Pamela Jikiemi) is not interested in the accusations made by Sister Aloysius.

The answer is not clear cut. Either story is possible. Although not as powerful as the previous production presented by the MTC, Ray's Tempest, it will stay with you; a story to turn over in your mind.

There is no resolution, only Doubt.

With a Blessing

2006-03-30T21:49:00.000+11:00

For the future of the world...

On a more positive note, some friends of mine have announced that they are expecting their first baby. Hurrah for the Bevises, well done.

I wish you three much joy, happiness and health.

And I must be allowed to babysit if only so that Logan can learn to change a nappy.

Boo, thanks for the memories. You know how Mum said that Kate Wis was her "practice baby", well, I got my practising in at seven years old when you were born.

For the future of the world is inside of me...

Should I forget

2006-03-28T08:45:00.000+11:00

But if I could, then would you see...

I have been expecting a new cousin this month.

He was due to be born on the 6th of March.

His Mum went to see the doctor on her due date and was told that the baby was, unfortunately, deceased.

He had been alive the previous day but was now gone.

I will not be able to give my baby cousin Riley Victor a cuddle.

I will not be able to change his nappy.

I will not be able to hold his hand and help him walk.

I will not be able to make him smile, kiss his feet, blow raspberries on his tummy, sing to him, teach him to love musicals as much as his Dad would teach him to love cars...

Or watch him grow up.

To my Uncle and his partner, I hope you had the chance to cuddle him, put on his nappy, hold his hand, kiss his feet and tummy, and take a picture of his perfect baby face before you said good-bye.

My heart is sad and my eyes cry for you all.

I love you.

...Or would you go away... from me...

I like Aeroplane Jelly

2006-03-18T20:26:00.000+11:00

...Aeroplane Jelly for me...

After seeing my baby sister, Boo, off at the airport this morning, Logan and I headed to the Melbourne Museum in the Carlton Gardens.

As part of the Melbourne Food & Wine Festival (which has been somewhat disrupted by the arrival of the Commonwealth Games) there was a Victorian Producer's Market in the plaza outside at what is currently called the "Melbourne Museum LiveSite". It is thus named because they have a large screen on which is showing Channel 9's presentation of the Commonwealth Games. Presumably this is to encourage people to congregate in the space in large numbers to watch what they can also see on their televisions in their home/hotel/local shopping centre. How nice of the city to provide television for the homeless.

Anyway.

Logan and I wandered around the various stalls. I was working out which things we would have to put off buying until the end because they needed refridgeration, listening with half an ear to te food preparation presentations on the main stage, and trying to sort out what to have for lunch.

I steered Logan towards tasting some apple cider from the Henry of Harcourt stand. The verdict was that it was very nice and we would come back later.

I spotted the Red Hill Brewery stand and after tasting the three ales on offer, Logan went with three of the Scottish Ale and three of the Golden Ale. There was also a Wheat Beer but the other two were more to Logan's taste. (He's doing well for my birthday, isn't he?)

We were starting to get hungry but close by were a few winery stands and Logan sampled from one of them their six wines and decided to pick four to take home. The lovely people at this stand also offered to tape up the bottom of the box holding the Red Hill Brewery six-pack so that we wouldn't have an accident as it was looking a bit precarious.

At this point we decided that we did need to eat something so we took our precious cargo back to the car and followed our noses to the hot food.

We shared a Buffalo-meat sausage (garlic) to start with. Yummy. There were vegetarian options at other stalls - felafels and the like - but Logan and I are omnivorous and the sausages smelled delicious.

I had a sit down while Logan walked around taking photographs of the outside of the Exhibition Buildings. There was some entertainment (for me while he did this) in the form of small children (and adults) being chased around by a couple of puppeteers dressed as, rather convincing, dinosaurs. Smaller children were just being chased by their parents. There were other performers from the Museum strolling around, as well as Games spectators with patriotic flags stuck to their cheeks, Commonwealth Games volunteer staff and Security, dogs and a green tomato.

Our next stop was for another sausage but from the ChoriOz stand. This company was rapidly running out of bread rolls and I think we timed it perfectly. The sausages were beautiful. There were tiny bits of chilli in the sausage and it was topped off with a fresh tomato relish. Beautiful!

I felt like having a drink after that so found the ginger beer and lemonade stand. My chilled lemonade was poured out from a barrell into the bottle I requested. Fabulous. Not too sweet, this was REAL lemonade with a fresh, slightly tart, crisp flavour.

Then it was my turn to buy stuff to take home and, of course, I've headed for the fudge. Then the cupcakes (too gorgeous for words). (And I'm having trouble loading a picture so you'll just have to visit their website instead.)

There were biscuits, preserves, natural cordials, dukkah, olive oils, salad dressings, other sweets, and I was having difficulty deciding where to go next. I spotted the Lindt chocolate fountain and bought myself a strawberry skewer dipped in the chocolate from the fountain.

Logan then said that it was coffee time so we headed to the Bean & Ground stall where he had a long black with his usual many sugars and I had a dark hot chocolate with marshmallows.

We had time then for Logan to notice another winery's Kleanskin nudie label (clever marketing tool) and want to have a tasting before buying two bottles. He was then inspired to go back to the Cidery and buy two bottles of their cider.

I purchased a small tub of raspberry ice-cream (delicious) and then we visited a stall selling Farmhouse Cheese to taste and buy a round of a melt-in-your-mouth soft cheese.

We then decided that we had had enough, we weren't going to try to go around the Museum (even if it did have the flying tram from the opening ceremony of the Melbourne Commonwealth Games sitting in the entry) but that we were going to try to make the effort later on this year, and it was time to go home.

...I like it for dinner, I like it for tea...

Drowning, not breathing

2006-03-18T18:28:00.000+11:00

On Monday evening I drove into Melbourne city. I was attending the Victorian Arts Centre's Fairfax Studio to see the Melbourne Theatre Company cast perform Ray's Tempest, written by Steve Rodgers after an original idea from Richard Roxburgh and Justin Monjo.

On a stage without curtains the set design can be made out and I first noted that there were no "wings" for the actors to use as entry and exit points. A staircase on my left led to the top of the construction. On my right, hung a looped structure resembling a roller-coaster with an end curled over and pointing into a bathtub on the upper level. Bar stools stood against a keyboard. A bed and a wheelchair were nestled beneath and to the side of the set, and there was an odd piece of sculpture in the centre of the structure which turned out to be a "fountain" set over a grating so that water would not leak onto the rest of the stage when it was turned on.

The main character, Ray Brink, is an alcoholic who is diagnosed, after some sort of seizure resulting in a fall down the on-stage stairs (and nearly into my lap), with a heart condition and problems in his "plumbing" that are inoperable. He is then advised that he has possibly six months to live.

What do you do when you find out you are dying?

We find out that Ray once was part of a nuclear family unit - married with two children - and from whom he became estranged after the death of the youngest child, a girl. His (former?) wife, Ruthie (Genevieve Picot), struggles also to remain sober while furthering her University studies/career and his son, Frog (Hamish Michael), rages against guilt and the impact that his father has had on his life. Ruthie has, after eleven years, found a partner, Boris (Alex Menglet) who takes care of her and loves her as much as she will let him. Frog's girlfriend, Jasmine (Alexandra Schepisi) is a fairly self-absorbed and insubstantial character who does not appear to understand exactly how much Frog is troubled by the past.

Ray is also an advertising salesman although with a steady decline in his sales figures his supervisor, Isabel (Caroline Brazier), is not impressed and is about to fire him unless he improves. News of Ray's new sales technique reaches Isabel and she is made aware of Ray's medical condition. Salvation for Ray and the advertising company he and Isabel work for appears in the form of a new reality television show where applications are invited from the terminally ill who will be voted off each week until the winner is granted their Last Wish. Isabel sees it as a career opportunity for herself and, after pushing him into applying, appoints herself as head of his promotional portfolio in order that the advertising agency will benefit from the deflected media exposure.

I have read that Ray's Tempest was originally conceived as a musical. Music was still incorporated into the performance whileRay's friend Duffy, played by Kim Gyngell of Col'n Carpenter fame, sweetly played keyboard in several places during the show and Ray Brink, William McInnes from Blue Heelers (among others), pours on the charm while singing for his adoring public on the Big Brother-style reality television show "Last Wish" and I can see how the introduction of further musical numbers might have added depth to the play or accelerated the narrative.

Still struggling with his grief and his guilt (as well as his alcoholism and his medical condition), Ray uses his Last Wish in an attempt to put things right in his world and make peace with his family.

Ray's Tempest is depressing, emotional and superbly acted. The water motif and use of the element on stage was very well done. This play is for a mature audience as there is some violence, nudity (tasteful but emotionally distressing), and a sex scene (comical - you'll know what I mean if you see it). William McInnes, Genevieve Picot, Kim Gyngell, Hamish Michael and Alex Menglet are brilliant.

It is a play that will stay with me for a while - there was a lot to think about and digest. I give it three and a half stars (out of five).

Thank-you

2006-03-17T21:28:00.000+11:00

If this isn't love it's very close...

I'm touched. Thank-you everyone who stopped by, emailed, SMSed or sent me a card to wish me a happy birthday yesterday. That also includes Boo who managed to message me at midnight thereby just getting in on time. She has special dispensation due to her current circumstances so she was forgiven even before I switched my phone off as I went to bed on Thursday night.

Yes, I'm now, as Ms Tania D puts it, "Dirty Thirty". Why it is "Dirty" is beyond me but I'm sure someone helpful will explain. A special thank-you to Ms Tania, who is extreeemely well-organised but mildly technologically challenged, for SMSing me to apologise that my card would be late. (!) She is too beautiful. The sort that makes you want to be a better person... or just more organised.

Hmm, speaking of which, my sisters want to know what I want for my birthday. They were thinking maybe a ticket (or tickets?) to see Jamie Cullum at The Palais and were really excited that they hit on something I might like but I had to say no, thank-you. I did ask for his albums at Christmas, I know, but I've not had enough exposure to the music to really want to go along to a concert and have good money paid for it. I'd rather have a ticket to The Lion King instead except that I want to go with Al and I don't know when she's free yet to be able to organise it. (Honey? How's the schedule looking?) I also feel maybe that I've grown out of concerts. Sad, I know. I've decided that I don't like being deafened or not able to see the people I've paid to see perform because my seat's up in the gods or so far away that the performer/s are miniscule. I have a hard enough time trying to see things in everyday life without straining my eyes in a darkened room/hall/stadium. I know, I'm an old married woman. (But with not too much emphasis on the "old".)

Boo leaves for Germany tomorrow and I said that I'd try to find something that I wanted by the end of the day and let her and EHG know but there's really nothing on (apart, maybe, from The Boy from Oz which is waaay too expensive and I dislike "Arena Spectaculars" anyway) that I want to spend my money on just yet. Boo did suggest Hello Again at Chapel Off Chapel but I have issues with seeing that one (which I have promised to write about and will do shortly) that I don't think I will be able to get over.

I saw the latest offering from MTC on Monday night and will write about that one too - Ray's Tempest.

More sleep, that's what I need. Can I have some sleep for my birthday? Less Commonwealth Games and more sleep. (Games stuffing around with my television programs - thank goodness for Channel 2, that's all I'll say.)

...I can make the world safe for you, come and live over here...

All That Jazz

2006-03-13T08:27:00.000+11:00

I'm gonna rouge my knees and pull my stockings down...

I went to a 1920's party last night. Boo is going overseas for a while so we were having a bit of a 'do' to farewell her. I watched Chicago for some inspiration.

Chicago is actually the first musical I performed at University. I made a great bunch of friends even if I didn't fully understand the show. (I am a naive person at times, although a friend has just admitted that she didn't know what Mimi's candle in Rent was going to be used for and I did know about that one.) As Bevis will attest, I manage to say things without knowing that there is a double entendre, but then that may say more about the people I hang out with... (?) I understand more of the subtext of the show now that I have seen it (with Bevis pre-Wifey, Al and Burkealot, Greggles and maybe Juicebox? I can't remember, oops, sorry) done professionally, and not just the movie (which I saw with Noshie and Bevis' Wifey as well as Al and Juicebox).

When I got to the house EHG was in the middle of straightening her hair so I helped with that while Boo was putting her makeup on and helping a friend create a hairstyle more in keeping with the 1920's look. (It's a good thing Mum & Dad built that bathroom big enough for three sisters as having four girls in there craning for the mirror was getting a little crowded.) Once her hair was straight, EHG was trying to decide which outfit to wear and came back to the first one she tried on which was the type that needed double-sided tape to keep the plunging neckline from sliding off course, if you know what I mean. I pinned her hair into place after her hair clip slipped, she pulled on her feather boa (which covered up the plunging neckline anyway) and was ready to face her public.

I had tried to style my hair but ended up having to wind it into ringlets (few instead of the regular many - see Bevis' post showing our pictures) and wrap a crochet-style black scarf around my head. I did better with my sisters' hair. Boo had straightened hers and managed to crimp two front sections into that "permanent wave" style that was fashionable (see Renee Zellweger's do in the movie). Her hair (much like mine) was too long to do all of it in that way so I looped it up at the back and with the help of a few hundred bobby pins and some tassel left over from the work she had done creating her dress, we were in business. Then all she needed to do was pop on those fake eyelashes - very classy (no, really) - pull on her fishnet tights, hand me my feather boa and we were done. Mum didn't recognise me initially. My husband, Logan, didn't recognise me for a minute or two either. I am still trying to decide whether or not that was a good thing...

The parents served cocktails, pina coladas (from that new bucket arrangement you can buy now to put in the freezer), dips and crudites. Mmm, love that salmon log.

I was going to go all out and buy a whole outfit but, as the party was on a Sunday night and I had to work the next day, I decided that for an hour of party, $100 of dress wasn't worth it.

I just accessorised and spent a little bit more...

I'm really going to miss her while she's gone but hopefully we'll manage to keep in touch as well as I'm doing with Adie and Noshie.

...It's just a noisy hall where there's a nightly brawl and All... That... Jazz...

I See You Watching Me Watching You

2006-02-08T14:17:00.000+11:00

M-M-M-My Sharona...

Is is just me or is there a plethora of new bands recycling older material?

Even Madonna's doing it. She's using ABBA's Gimme, Gimme,Gimme A Man After Midnight (I could have the lyrics wrong; I admire ABBA but I'm not a hard core fan).

There's the Rogue Traders' new one which has the riff from My Sharona.

It's not only pop songs that are being plagiarised. There's another one that I can't quite bring to mind at the moment that used something from a ballet score (I think it was Romeo & Juliet). If anyone can think of it, please feel free to post a comment. It is a female vocalist and I think she is Australian.

Is it truly a new song if your main theme is a sample from another's work? Is that cheating?

..And I'm waiting for you again, yes I'm waiting for you...

Ooops, sorry, didn't see you there

2006-02-07T12:51:00.000+11:00

Have "stumbled" upon something new and wanted to share.

http://stumbleupon.com

Looks interesting. May be a good way to expand the blogger community...

Have fun people.

Miss Ostrovsky, your word is boanthropy.

2006-01-15T22:44:00.000+11:00

Oh, wait. One second. Please ma’am, could you not sit in that seat?...

On the 14th of January I went with my family to see the Melbourne Theatre Company perform The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee. The title itself is a mouthful let alone the words that were being spelled on the stage.

The set was an American High (or Middle) School hall with bleachers to the right and left and a basketball ring centered in front of a "stage", complete with curtain, on which the orchestra performed. There was another set of bleachers on which the Spellers sat and it could be moved around on the stage for effect during some of the songs.

Although I dislike Marina Prior's singing voice I have noted that she does quite well in a comic role and as the singing was shared quite equally amoung the performers we did not have to endure too much of it. Marina played Bee hostess Rona Lisa Peretti and opens the show by spelling the word that she spelled correctly to win her spelling bee - "Syzygy".

Joining Ms Rona Lisa Peretti in the administration of the Bee were Vice-Principal Douglas Panch (Tyler Coppin) and Comfort Counselor Mitch Mahoney (Bert Labonte).

With the combined talents of David Campbell (Shout! - The Musical - Jacobsen Entertainment) as Chip Tolentino, Magda Szubanski (Kath & Kim - ABC TV) as William Barfee (pronounced bar-fay), Tim Wright (The Last Five Years - Echelon Productions) as Leaf Coneybear, Christen O'Leary (Urinetown - MTC) as Logainne Schwarzandgrubeniere, Natalie Mendoza as Marcy Park, Natalie O'Donnell as Olive Ostrovsky and four members of the audience as Spelling Bee competitors we were guaranteed an entertaining evening.

The members of the audience were of a different, younger, demographic with this production. It being a show with a PG rating and a family-type theme (hey, I went with mine) and also showing in the school holidays there was a buzz in the air which thankfully did not spill over into talkativeness during the performance... except when my Grandmother asked me what a "hickey" was. (I said I'd tell her afterwards. And, yes, I did.)

It's a Spelling Bee so you can guess what will happen - there will be a winner at the end. How the show gets there will be a little different with each performance as they are contending with the audience participation component. The audience members need to be kept "in the game" up to a certain point and then the actors can complete the rest of the show. This is realised when they are asked to spell easier words. This can then be complained about by the "real competitors" and they appeal to the judges.

In the performance we saw, one participator left the competition a little earlier than was obviously scheduled and the next audience participator was given the word "cat" to spell to keep her in the game - many complaints about that one. Then they also need to leave at the proper time too. This same a.p. who was given "cat" was then given a word that I had not heard of to spell and she did it correctly, causing some consternation at the judging desk. Another difficult word was immediately read and was not completed correctly by the a.p. and so the show could continue.

To assist with their spelling, one competitor has a "magic foot", one writes on her arm, one speaks into her hand and another appears to have some sort of divine intervention allowing him to arrive at the correct spelling. There are insights into their family life and the usual pubescent angst surfaces at the most inopportune moment causing disappointment for some and a feeling of freedom for others.

I heartily recommend this show. My husband even enjoyed it and he doesn't like musicals! It's playing until March 11th - an extended season which just proves how great it is.

...It's a marvelous memory
If you win the spelling bee
One's life improves from A to Z...

I wouldn't usually say anything but...

2006-01-06T08:07:00.000+11:00

I received an email last night from my Mum. It had an odd subject line to be coming from her (possible virus?) but I read it anyway. Anyone who knows me knows that I will usually read something for myself before deciding whether or not something is on the "up and up" and I think that in this case I am satisfied.

Greetings UAW women - this is about Mark Vaile's decision to lift the ban on 'evergreening'.
You need to know because it threatens the availability of generic brand drugs we ALL use which become available once the patent has expired on the 'name brand' originals, such as 'Renitec'.

Pharmaceutical companies make and patent small variations in their original chemical recipe for a drug - such small changes which may not alter their effect BUT they apply for and get a separate patent. When the patent expires - 10 years - on the original - they invoke the new
patent. They then become the SOLE legal manufacturer for your lifetime, and your daughter's, and our granddaughter's.

Mark Latham secured an agreement with the Liberals to outlaw this practise - now the Senate-cocky Government is about to revoke this part of the legislation. They claim it's not needed!!!

Australia has the cheapest pharmaceuticals in the world due to the savvy negotiating done for the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme. This is under immediate threat. International Pharmaceutical companies have been pressuring the Australian Government for years to allow them a better share of OUR wages.

This will effect WELL people not merely the chronically ill: the average older Aussie is on 5 different medications.

YOUR OBJECTION to Vaile is NEEDED now - the holiday period will silence many other voices. Demand that the Amendments to the Free trade Agreement NOT be revoked.

You will need to go to Mark Vaile's - ACTING Prime Minister and Minister for TRADE - personal Home page. He no longer has a Parliament House email address - neither does Howard or Costello, this came as a shock to me - you might guess that it's because there has been a stampede of citizen emailing. This move may make bulk emailing to them
impossible.

http://www.markvaile.com.au/contacts.asp

See the Age Article dated January 3rd
http://www.theage.com.au/news/National/Cheap-drugs-will-be-protected-Vaile/2006/01/03/1136050413398.html

Death and taxes are inevitable - add to this - the Government ALWAYS pulls a dirty
stunt just before or just after Christmas.

I ask you to make up your own mind. That is all.

It's Delightful

2006-01-02T19:00:00.000+11:00

It's Delicious...

I have what I think are chemical burns on my fingers. I took my nail polish off two days ago and the top layer of skin on my index and middle fingers on both hands feels odd. The pads are a little shiny and I seem to have lost a bit of sensation. There was some swelling but it seems to have gone down now. I think I should buy some new Nail Polish Remover and throw my current batch away. It may be safer.

My other half thought that he wasn't going back to work until Wednesday this week but has been brought to the unfortunate realisation that Tuesday is not a public holiday and neither has he requested leave so he will be returning to his place of daily torture earlier than he realised. Poor thing. At least he may be able to get a good night's sleep before he has to hop on that early-morning train to the city.

Hasn't the temperature the last few days been over the top? scorching? strength-sapping? diabolical? I'm glad we don't have to put up with 42-degree days very often (we're talking Celcius here). Makes me realise that I will most likely never move to Alice Springs where they experience these temperatures many times throughout the year. The worst was that at 1:00am on the first of January it was still 38 degrees and remained above 30 in my bedroom until I woke up at about 8:00am and had to turn on the air conditioning to be able to sleep more comfortably. I would have been quite happy to sleep the whole night (morning) with it turned on but my other half is noise-sensitive so I stayed awake reading for as long as I could to maximise the effect of the air conditioning that was cooling down the room so that I could get off to sleep. I started falling asleep myself and realised that I needed to get up and turn the unit off, the thought of which was painful. When I roused later and realised that Logan had left the room I made the effort to get up and flick that magic switch. Aah, sweet relief.

I am so very glad that it was not a work day as it would have been absolutely unbearable in my building where the designers neglected to include in their calculations the temperature of an Australian summer. I am not looking forward to the next few months, temperature-wise, at work for this reason.

We have been taking advantage of the data projector that I borrowed from work over the last week. It is a wonderful thing to sit in a darkened and air conditioned room while DVDs of your (other half's) choice are projected onto the wall in front of you. We have shown "Sirens", the first episode of "The Dukes of Hazzard", "The Mothman Prophecies", "The Fifth Element" (my DVD, his choice), "She" and "Sin City". It has been a Holiday Present of sorts and when I return to work we will be able to change the lounge and dining room back to some semblance of normality.

The Christmas Tree is coming down today and I'm pretty happy with the way it has behaved over the last month. The big question now is whether my other half will be able to let go of our previous tree and set it out for hard waste pick-up...

It's De-Lovely...

Dumb Show

2005-12-31T14:31:00.000+11:00

I went to the theatre on Thursday night. I went to the Melbourne Arts Centre's Fairfax Studio to see a performance by the Melbourne Theatre Company (see my links) of "Dumb Show" and I enjoyed it. There were a few swear words but nothing like the ones that were in "The Big Con" which had considerable negative impact on my liking for that show. I was happy to be going along to that one as at least I could say that I disliked it after seeing it and forming my own opinion. But enough about that.

I went to see "Dumb Show" on my own which is not that big a deal. I have been going to performances at the Arts Centre since I was nine so I am very comfortable in the precinct. I enjoy the walk down to Southgate and the amazing shops and restaurants that can be found in that strip. I have even performed as part of a massed choir in the Concert Hall before it was known as Hamer Hall.

My other half insisted that I park in the undercover car park on Thursday which cost about $10 the last time I looked. I was happy to park outside for free but he didn't want me to be out walking the streets of Melbourne on my own after dark.

You would probably expect, as I did, that the audience would be predominantly over 50 and you would be right. I didn't overhear much discussion of the performance but one lady behind me was admiring the shoes of the actress. At first hearing it sounded like "boobs" but I'm sure it was " lovely pair of shoes" and not the other. Positive.

The next show in the season is "The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee" which is a musical; a new musical. The performances begin close to my Mum's birthday in January and she likes the theatre also so it has been arranged that we will be attending as a group. With a little dinner beforehand it should be a very nice evening.

Happy New Year to all. May 2006 be as good a year if not better than the one that has preceeded it.

P.S. I have been reading too much Jane Austen.

Note to Self

2005-12-20T14:28:00.000+11:00

Make note to self...

While doing something on the weekend that required full access to our driveway at home, my other half moved my car onto the road under a tree. There was no road accident but an accident of another kind and you know what I mean now that I say that the car was parked under a tree.

I came out a couple of hours later to drive my car to the local supermarket and noticed a few deposits on the roof. There was one there that was too big to be believed! It was not your regular, every-day, run-of-the-mill black and white (or green) bird dropping that would wash off in the rain. This thing looks like half a muffin. It has large seeds and is the consistency of a cape seed loaf slice of bread rolled up into a ball with the top hacked off.

I'm too scared to touch it. It's still there now. I didn't want to use my keys because I would possibly touch my keys in the near future and particles may be transmitted. I don't want to use anything out of my purse at all. I hoped that it would wash off in the small amount of rain that we have had recently. Now that it is out baking in the sunlight, maybe it will become a small projectile and while the car is in motion, soar through the air to land on the windscreen of the car behind me like a stone and crack it into two pieces.

It looks like a chunk of dwarf bread.

Maybe now would be a good time to buy one of those pressure washers...

I Don't Know What To Do With Myself...

2005-12-17T11:24:00.000+11:00

Just don't know what to do with myself...

I've been thinking that I need to give myself a visual identity. But I can't decide on the picture to use.

But I think that I've found one that's adorable so I might stick with it for a while.

I'm going to be a mighty king

2005-12-15T20:23:00.000+11:00

So enemies beware...

Well, the annual Christmas party at my house is over. I have fed my friends and we all had a fun time. Thank-you to my partner for the excellent job he does in helping me prepare for one of these shindigs.

I have recently become aware that he does not know what a puggle is. This picture is of a puggle. The only one I ever saw in the flesh was a pink one. Does anyone else remember puggles?

The way we do the things we do

2005-12-09T16:01:00.000+11:00

This Is My Life, Rated
Life:	9.1
Mind:	8.4
Body:	7.1
Spirit:	8.7
Friends/Family:	7.9
Love:	9.1
Finance:	8.8
Take the Rate My Life Quiz

Interesting... I think I'll be working on my body to bring it up to standard.

All the world seems in tune on a Spring afternoon

2005-12-09T15:12:00.000+11:00

When we're poisoning pigeons in the park...

Let me introduce you to Tom Lehrer.

Tom -this is You. You - this is Tom.

There, that's better.

I discovered Tom Lehrer's music and wondrous talents while channel surfing on my car radio one day some years ago. I immediately wrote his name down and then the next time I went to Allans I looked for and bought some of the sheet music he had written.

An intelligent mathematician with a wonderful satirical view of the world that he magnificently put into songs with such titles as Poisoning Pigeons in the Park, I Hold Your Hand In Mine, and The Masochism Tango followed closely by such gems as The Elements (to the tune of "The Major-General's Song" from Gilbert & Sullivan's The Pirates of Penzance), and The Vatican Rag.

The Melbourne Theatre Company will be performing the revue entitled Tomfoolery - The Words and Music of Tom Lehrer in November and December next year and I heartily recommend attendance.

I'll be there - anyone want to come along?

Every Sunday you'll see
My sweetheart and me,
As we poison the pigeons in the park...

How Much is That Doggy in the Window?

2005-12-05T12:40:00.000+11:00

The one with the waggly tail...

I had some great retail therapy yesterday. I think I like Christmas shopping because I actually get to go out and buy things. This is as opposed to the rest of the year when I'm trying not to spend lots of money. I also enjoy thinking about what the people in my life might enjoy receiving and would possibly have good use for instead of useless junk that would cause clutter or have no meaning as a gift.

So on Sunday I went to one of those large sprawling shopping monstrocities and had myself some fun. I had no pesky (bored) partner to worry about, it wasn't too close to Christmas and that meant that it wasn't too crowded. I had a nice long list of people to buy for and a discount voucher burning a hole in my handbag.

I visited Mecca Cosmetica and bought some DuWop venom gloss and Mecca Nailpolish just because I'm a girly-girl and they also have a nail polish with my name on it which hardly ever happens so of course I had to have some. I also went to the ABC Shop and bought a couple of DVDs for our family Kris Kringle (after a few phone calls with my Nanna who was a big help) as well as a book for my beloved and a book and a CD for myself. The CD is the soundtrack to the move "Little Fish" and I bought it because it was an intriguing film and I also found the music interesting. I especially like the different versions of Cold Chisel's Flame Trees by Sarah Blasko and the one by Cabramatta Primary School. A friend of mine says she nearly cries when she hears the primary school version. If you've seen the film then I would say that is a fair reaction. I also went to Target and bought some choccies, DVDs and another CD for myself by Paul Mac called Panic Room. I bought it for the first two songs on the album and am enjoying the rest of it immensely.

Only three more weeks to Christmas so I've got to bet my gifts for the UK packed up quickly to send otherwise they're not going to make it in time!

Down in the Panic Room, hurry and get here soon...

On Top Of Spaghetti

2005-11-17T20:24:00.000+11:00

All covered with cheese...

For anyone who is interested, this is my I-don't-have-to-look-up-the-recipe recipe for Spaghetti Bolognaise.

1 brown onion, finely chopped
1-2 cloves of garlic (or as little/much as you like) or 1-2 tsp of crushed garlic from a jar
500g beef mince (4 star quality)
800g tinned diced tomatoes
slurp of your favourite red wine (1/3 of a cup)
1 tsp dried mixed herbs or tbsp of torn fresh basil
light olive oil
pinch of salt
400g Angel Hair spaghetti (for those among us who, engrossed with making the sauce, forget to cook the pasta)
grated cheese, to serve (Parmesan is the traditional, however some prefer cheddar)

Heat a large frying pan on medium. Add olive oil, onion and garlic and cook until the onion is transparent.

Add beef mince and break up as it cooks with whichever utensil you prefer (fork, wooden spoon, etc). Cook until mince is brown.

Stir in tomatoes, wine and herbs. Bring to the boil and simmer for approximately 15 minutes depending on how much liquid you prefer in your sauce.

In the meantime, boil a saucepan of water and add salt. Add spaghetti and cook for approximately 2 minutes.

Place spaghetti and Bolognaise sauce in serving bowls and top with cheese.

Serve with garlic bread.

Mmmm, yummy.

I Only Want To Be With You

2005-11-15T12:12:00.000+11:00

I spoke with my Nanna last week and she tells me that one of my cousins has landed a job as Assistant Stage Manager for this show:

Dusty - The Musical

Well done Katie Mac!

Tagged - 20 Things You Probably Didn't Know About Me

2005-11-06T20:52:00.000+11:00

1. I have an uncanny ability to innocently say things that others turn into a double entendre.

2. I can't remember important dates from history.

3. I learned to read at age three because my Mother, a Primary School teacher, spent a lot of quality time with me while she was at home with my younger sister and I. I have developed an uncanny ability to spell words correctly (except when my fingers on a keyboard get ahead of my brain sometimes) and am appalled at the lack of attention many people give to the importance of correct spelling. I have happily proof-read Boo's assignments before she submits them to her lecturers to make sure that the spelling and grammar is as accurate as possible. It is my duty as a big sister!

4. I too had really bad acne at school. And it's back again. It is upsetting because it attacks my back, chest and face so I have had to modify my wardrobe so that other people don't have to look at it. Swimsuits/bathers are not my friend. If you see me with a rashie on this Summer it's not just because I'm being "SunSmart".

5. I have never broken any of my bones although I have dislocated the little finger on my right hand. I washed my hands before dinner one evening and came out of the bathroom shaking (the water off?) my hands. I whacked the little finger of my right hand against a bookcase and was in agony. Mum told me to settle down and eat my dinner, that it wasn't that bad. (This is how it is stored in my memory, anyway.) I remember it being painful. My finger eventually turned a purple-green colour and I was taken to my Dad's Chiropractor where they had a look at it, took some x-rays and then put my dislocated finger joint back in the right position giving me a few exercises to do to make sure that my ligaments and muscles and everything went back to normal. I was around 10 years old. Finger looks okay.

6. I can sound eerily like my Dad's sister. This is not a bad thing. I find it interesting. My handwriting is also a lot like hers.

7. I don't sing so much any more. I don't play on the expensive piano keyboard that my parents gave me.

8. My longest relationship is eight years, nearly five months, and still counting.

9. I like the Haileybury boys (who held doors open for me, helped me with my homework, made beautiful music and treated me like a human being) better than the Peninsula boys (who were loud and vile and threw things at cars from the bus we all caught in the afternoon). Except for Jamie who was always a sweetheart, even in Primary School.

10. I don't drink alcohol. Unless you count that skerrick they put in a Lemon, Lime & Bitters. I don't smoke or do other recreational drugs. Any drugs I take have either been prescribed or are used for medicinal reasons (paracetamol, antihistamine, etcetera).

11. I used to hide my money from myself so that when I found it I could be happy that I had some spending money that I had forgotten I had. It was like receiving an unexpected present. How nice of me to think of me.

12. I can often be found staring into space. Not outer space. Just... space...

13. I'm not a party girl but I can throw a good party.

14. I am a firm believer in living with someone before you marry them. I used to be a firm believer in not having sex before marriage.

15. I believed in Father Christmas until I was nine years old. Same goes for the Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairy. I'm glad that my parents managed to maintain the illusion for so long. EG and I then kept those characters real for Boo until about the same age. (Plus it meant that we got extra presents.) I don't want my future kids to miss out on that sort of thing. I used to wish that the Tooth Fairy would give me wings. (Now there's Red Bull, ha!) I was also fascinated by the television shows "Bewitched" and "I Dream Of Jeannie" and I think the Fantasy books that I read now indicate that I have never really grown out of that sort of thing.

16. I still cannot believe that my cousin committed suicide.

17. I would like to live and work in a foreign country one day. When I do it will probably be in the UK, which isn't all that foreign I admit. France, Belgium, Canada...

18. I went through a period where I would only buy a CD if it was by a female vocalist because I felt that I was buying too many albums by male vocalists/groups. I have a more balanced collection now.

19. I miss Grandad and Pa. Grandad used to buy me chocolate Freddo Frogs. He died when I was five years old and I was so traumatised on the day of his funeral that I was sick and had to stay back at the house. Pa was a big influence on the music in my life, even though we didn't spend as much time together as I was growing up. I cried when I read in Florence, Italy, an email from my Dad telling me that one of Pa's fingers had turned gangrenous and had to be amputated. I had not expected Pa to be alive when I returned but I did get to see him one more time before he passed away. I enjoyed the adult relationship that had grown between us since I had started at University and was sorry that he had not lived to see me married. I am trying to cherish each day that I have with my two remaining Grandparents, Nanna and Mama.

20. I enjoy getting together at the dinner table on special occasions with my parents, sisters and other relatives if only for the stories that are brought out for an airing. EG cracks herself up with the things we used to do together, or inflict on each other and my parents have similar stories themselves. Laughing is good - there has been too much sadness for our family in the last few years.

Yorn desh born, der ritt de gitt der gue

2005-11-06T19:10:00.000+11:00

Orn desh, dee born desh, de umn bork! bork! bork!

I picked up my Lay-by today from The General Trader, my favourite kitchen supplies store.

Well, half of it.

The other half has been delayed on the Sydney docks at Customs after the recent implementation of their new tracking system didn't work so well.

That was also after the first shipment had been diagnosed as faulty and had been returned to the manufacturer.

So I only have my new Scanpan ceramic titanium frying pans. (We were getting a little worried about the old Teflon coated ones as the Teflon was starting to come off and, as it is carcinogenic, who wants to eat Teflon?)

When the other bits arrive I can bid goodbye to my K-Mart saucepan set and use new ones where the handles are bolted on and won't come loose or undone as they age. It's probably time that I graduated to a professional set and I'm looking forward to using them.

I also got a pretty good deal as I happened to be served in the store by the woman who helped Logan and I put together our Wedding Registry. The frying pans were on special and she told us that there was a special pack that was coming that combined three saucepans at a reduced price, so I preordered, and then because she sees me in the store buying the odd thing every so often (and she likes me), she gave me 15% off as well!

I feel special.

Five Hundred, Twenty-Five Thousand, Six Hundred Minutes

2005-11-05T14:59:00.000+11:00

Five hundred, twenty-five thousand moments so dear...

I did not know until today that this was happening! How could I have missed it?!?!

Jonathan Larson's RENT has been made into a movie with as many of the original cast as was possible and is to be released on the 23rd of November.

The countdown begins...

Click here for the official website.

Everywhere You Go

2005-11-05T12:07:00.000+11:00

You always take the weather with you...

I found this while I was looking at widgets and have decided to keep it in my sidebar for a while to see whether I like it.

Rainy days and Mondays always get me down...

The North wind is tossing the leaves

2005-10-26T08:16:00.000+10:00

The red dust is over the town...

Well, I'm back at work. It's a little quiet because there are no students and we are seeing less of the academic staff because it's a non-teaching week.

That doesn't mean that there's not a _lot_ of work to do.

I am feeling better able to face it all after my two weeks off (with one day back at work to complete a First Aid course) and I am going to have to lock myself in my office today to make sure that I get a couple of big reports done.

I need to remember to have my lunch today.

It's a good lunch too, so I should be prepared to make the effort. Sometimes it just doesn't happen.

I can't believe that it's two months to Christmas.

The sparrows are under the eaves, and the grass in the paddock is brown...

The World Revives

2005-10-22T18:27:00.000+10:00

Colours renew...

This is the last "official" day of my holiday.

I'm pretty happy with what I have achieved and with what I haven't achieved.

I have stayed in my pajamas all day a couple more times, we did move the pile of green waste that we had been collecting in our back yard (be sure to comment, BEVIS, when you're over next), we still haven't decided on curtains or carpet colours/types but I'm sure that will happen soon.

My other half is happy because we have been many times to visit J.B. Hi-Fi in its many incarnations at shopping centres in our vicinity. I am happy because today we bought him some new clothes and he looks very handsome.

I have discovered Scrubs and I have rediscovered American Dreams, and that I love Dr Phil.

EG needs to have her wisdom teeth removed because she has referred pain and is having trouble hearing. Not good when you have just started a new job working in a call centre! Hope she gets booked in for surgery soon and feels better. I think she would feel 1,000 times better if right now she didn't have to pay $1,000+ to have it all done.

I also have a day to myself tomorrow as my other half has one of his meetings to go to. No it's nothing bad, it's just this... club that he belongs to where they collect... things.

I'm going shopping. Again. Whoo-hoo!

La vie Boheme!...

I Told You I Was Ill

2005-10-13T15:19:00.000+10:00

But, in fact, I'm just on vacation...

Hello, yes, I'm on my holidays.

I have not gotten out of my pajamas all day on a couple of occasions until my other half sent me to the supermarket for supplies while he cleaned up the kitchen. We have been dealing with an infestation of ants that have turned up when the kitchen has actually been clean. Go figure. They've left their run a bit late if they wanted to catch our left over crumbs in the sink.

I have been shopping. Both at the local chopping centre and on the Internet. I love getting stuff in the mail. This time it will be shoes!

I have watched Muppet Show episodes up to the third one on the third disc starring Avery what-his-name.

We have hired a skip to throw out our green waste. I don't know how far I'm going to get with one for our hard waste, but there's still another week to go.

We've been out to carpet stores and brought back some samples to "argue" over. We've also been to curtain stores and brought back some samples to "argue" over.

We've been invited out to dinner on the same day that we're seeing Bevis and his Wifey by a group of friends that just can't seem to book us in time. So I've committed myself instead to having them all over for a Barbecue just so that I can say that I saw them this year.

A new wine shop, factory outlet, has opened near us and so we bought some. The store used to be a Bicycle shop that we were planning to visit and by a couple of bicycles from but now that it is a wine shop we have bought wine and will visit it again in the near future as my other half was impressed with the bottle he has opened so far.

I have played computer games and I've only cheated a little bit.

The only fly in my ointment is that I have to be back at work tomorrow to complete a Level 2 First Aid course.

I just checked my work email too which was a bad idea.

I'm a sucker for punishment.

Time to take the carpet and curtain samples back now before they send out a posse.

Because you've got to have friends, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la...

Let's Start At The Very Beginning

2005-10-06T13:11:00.000+10:00

That's a very good place to start...

Well, I had a lovely little story all written and then I thought I'd try out the spell-checker. My browser blocked a pop-up and then when I alllowed it it refreshed this page without saving and now I have no more time to write.

Painful.

Oh, well. I guess it means that you'll just have to stop back later and have another squiz.

See you later, alligator...

Live In My House

2005-10-05T15:47:00.000+10:00

I'll be your shelter...

Life is a very fragile and wonderful thing.

To those among you, my friends, who have lost someone dear recently my heart aches for you and the people you have lost.

Know that I love you and feel for you and will always be here if you need me.

Just pay me back in one thousand kisses...

Note to Josie-Bean

2005-09-30T08:33:00.000+10:00

Hello sweet-pea...

I have your birthday present, finally, and I need to come over to visit you with it.

Hopefully I will be able to see you before next weekend, or at least manage to catch up with your parents so that they can pass it to you.

Stay beautiful.

Hugs and kisses,

Auntie Riss...

See, I'm Smiling

2005-09-30T08:14:00.000+10:00

That means I'm happy that you're here...

Sooo tired. Who would have thought that going to someone else's party would be so labour intensive?

We have been letting the cleaning of the house slide a bit in recent weeks because we just haven't been home on the weekends, when we usually do it, to catch up. Really, who wants to come home after a hard day at work earning money and then start washing clothes or doing the vacuuming/hoovering?

Ok, so it's just me. After wiping things over my hand and arm start getting tired. Probably means that I'm not doing the cleaning enough to build up those muscles.

We've been trying to catch up this last week because it was just getting beyond a joke. I guess it also means that we can spend more time in the garden or relaxing over the weekend because we won't have the cleaning to do.

The kitchen's even clean enough for me to think about cooking something yummy and tricky because I have the space and everything's all ready to go.

Speaking of cleaning... I have suggested, and it has been agreed, that in honour of our holiday in Spring my partner and I should actually have a spring-clean and get rid of a lot of the junk that we've just packed up in boxes and taken with us when we have moved house. As we are not moving house this year we should give thanks by moving things out of the house while we stay put.

Therefore, I need to organise a nice big truck with a rubbish skip on the back of it to visit so that we can do a really good job of it.

I'll then be able to start thinking about renovating the inside of the house which will be easier to do because we won't have as much stuff to move out of the way! Hurrah! There is method in my madness. I will just have to go shopping then to do research and start the whole process.

I love organising new stuff. Shopping is nearly as good as a holiday.

Lydia, oh Lydia, that encyclopedia, Lydia the tattooed lady...

Where are you?

2005-09-28T07:57:00.000+10:00

As I said to my other half yesterday...

He called me from work yesterday morning, which is unusual because we try not to ring each other for fear of being accused of being on the phone all the time, and everything was fine. He called an hour later and from his mobile phone (even more unusual) hence my question.

He was on his way home with a migraine to keep him company. Poor thing.

He had taken his anti-nausea pills and his anti-headache pills so he just felt queasy instead of wanting to ask the train driver to stop so that he could, well, you know, and the pain had calmed to a dull thud.

I was amazed to find that he had attempted to do some chores while he was home. This was, of course, after sitting quietly (because lying down makes it worse) on the couch for a few long hours waiting to feel better. I got to the end of the driveway and the rubbish bins were out ready for the morning collection, he had done some of the dishes, folded the washing and was ready to help me bring the groceries in from the car when I arrived.

Isn't he a wonder?

I cooked dinner and he had a little bit, but that was mainly so that he didn't have a headache from sleeping on an empty stomach.

All this activity then had the knock-on effect of turning the evening into an early night for him while I made the arrangements for my girlfriends' partners to come over to our house on Friday night.

I'm going to a girlfriend's place on Friday and, with a few other invitees, we're having a girls night with sleep-over. This means that my friend's partner needs somewhere else to stay for the night. The other partners are also without their "girls" for the evening. We have spare beds at ours and so we have invited all the partners to our place to have a guys night with sleep-over.

That sounds fair to me.

The only complication is that it is my Dad's family birthday celebration the following day with a brunch which means that my partner and I have to finish everything quite early the next morning. It's the only time that we were all free over the weekend what with EG's work roster, and Boo's and Mum & Dad's other social engagements.

More later.

Que sera, sera...

But I Can't Do It Alone

2005-09-25T19:43:00.000+10:00

She'd say,"What's your sister like?", I'd say,"Men"...

I have just had one of the most relaxing-est weekends that I have had for a while and I have to say that I enjoyed it very much.

We ate a lot. We are very good cooks. We laughed a lot. Some people laughed so hard that their stomach muscles hurt and tears came out of their eyes. They were still sore the morning after.

It's got me warmed up for my holiday when I plan to do more relaxing, eating and laughing. Only twelve more sleeps.

Thank-you.

That is all.

Dat's Amore....

Why Don't You Give Me A Call?

2005-09-22T08:00:00.000+10:00

Ring, ring...

EG did eventually call me on Friday night.

I had rung twice to try to find out where she was. I had figured that she wasn't coming because she hadn't called me to say she was running late (which she will do).

She had been on the phone to a work colleague who had just come off a shift, she was still in her pajamas and she completely forgot.

This is after I rang her the day before to tell her we'd be having fish and chips for dinner to make it quicker and easier for us to get our computations done and she could still have an early night before her early shift the next day.

Just because I figured out that she wasn't coming doesn't mean that I'm not annoyed.

To add to the annoyance, the other thing that had possibly made her forget was that D2 was at her place also.

Yes, "issues" man is still on the scene. I really don't know why she would put up with it all again. I know that my parents don't want to deal with it all and neither does Boo. I thought that she would really have told him to push off, grow up, and never talk to her or come near her again.

She has no trouble saying that sort of stuff to me, for goodness sake!

I'm starting to think that she has been pushed to a point where she needs to hold on to someone because she thinks they are all she deserves.

She can do better than that.

Thought about what I wanted, wasn't like that at all...

Talk Like A Pirate Day

2005-09-19T21:46:00.000+10:00

Arr, me hearties...

It be Talk Like A Pirate Day, matey.

My pirate name is:

Dread Pirate Bonney

Like the famous Dread Pirate Roberts, you have a keen head for how to make a profit. You can be a little bit unpredictable, but a pirate's life is far from full of certainties, so that fits in pretty well. Arr!

Get your own pirate name from fidius.org.

Pieces of eight, pieces of eight...

Missed It By That Much

2005-09-16T17:30:00.000+10:00

Excuse me...

I'm still here at work waiting for my 4:00pm appointment with my sister, EG.

I think I'm going to have to catch the bus home.

It's raining now.

It's getting darker and colder.

I'd prefer a lift in a heated car where I don't have to get out and walk from a bus stop...

Where are you now?...

I hardly can believe I'm real

2005-09-16T14:07:00.000+10:00

Feel like running and dancing for joy...

My sister, EG, is coming to visit me at work this afternoon. I have since found out the real story about the new boyfriend we met on Fathers Day and, according to Mother, he barely rates a two out of ten now.

I tend to agree with her.

EG has had a couple of long term beaus with "issues" and we found out that this one has a combination of those "issues" himself so we're not planning the wedding any more.

Sorry, EG. We'll have to suss out the one you had waiting in the wings.

I'm not going to become a dating service for my sister but I do think that I probably need to introduce her to a higher class of potential partner.

Anyway, she's coming to my work this afternoon to pick me up and we're going to go and get Fish and Chips again for dinner. Yum!

No more cheesecake left from last weekend but we won't need dessert tonight. The weekend might be when I make a chocolate self-saucing pudding - we'll need it after the attack we're going to have on the garden.

22 sleeps to my holidays...

It's a Knockout

2005-09-09T12:27:00.000+10:00

That's the name of the game...

I really do like my job. Especially on a day like this when it's nice and warm, and, it being Friday, there are not so many people around so it's a little quieter.

Today hasn't been all easy though. We've been having a few cabling problems today, have needed to take a few walks to fix things located at a distance and I'm down a staff member. I'm also about to be visited by a very needy customer who will be going overseas shortly. She is going to be taking a mobile phone with her so "will need some very urgent assistance" as she has not, to my knowledge, ever used one before and will be using overseas roaming on top of it all.

She stresses too much which can be a little exasperating.

We'll manage to get through all our work by the end of the day which will be good considering the hours I've been putting in recently. We might even be able to gather around the water cooler and talk about general stuff instead of struggling to make it out the door by five. Hurrah!

I'm looking forward to having take-away for dinner tonight.

I'll be able to get started on making a lemon cheesecake after that.

Cooking for friends is so much more fun than being at work. But I still enjoy my job.

Bork! bork! bork!...

Communication

2005-09-07T22:03:00.000+10:00

Why is it so hard?

Due to the action of another department at work I have been landed with trying to explain exactly what areas this action has impacted.

I don't think I was taken terribly seriously to begin with.

Problem was identified on Monday afternoon. I contacted one person who was unfortunately not going to be able to help me on Tuesday due to being on a training day. He did reply to me to tell me this, however, and I thank him for advising me. Thanks, SB.

Problem escalated early Tuesday afternoon when I identified another group of data that was affected by "enemy action". This is when I contacted the database helpdesk.

I spoke with the person who had been given the action to perform which had created my problem. He is a Trainee and is only doing his job. He explained that he had performed the action for seven groups of data that would affect my work area.

My headache grew.

He did mention that at the time he was given the task he thought that performing the action would possibly adversely affect some part of the data. (Go with that gut feeling!)

He liaised with his Manager to see whether they could rectify the situation. I requested a copy of the data that I no longer had access to and also a list of the groups that had been affected. The list I now have, the data is taking a bit longer to appear.

I received a call late today from the Manager of the area. He advised that he had relinked part of the data and that new information should come through without any problems.

Hmm.

We went through the process that I perform to record data on the system and that worked.

Yes, good. I don't actually know whether we have recorded receipt of information for this piece of data before through.

Oh.

And there are five different distribution points for this piece of information, I don't know to which point it would have been sent.

Oh.

If we did receive the data, I have no record of what date it would have been entered originally.

Oh. I am beginning to see what you mean.

What has happened to the data that we have already entered? We didn't keep paper records because to keep updating every time we added a new piece of information would have taken longer than trying to record everything.

Oh. This is a little more involved than I thought. You say that there is more than one group affected by this?

Yes. (Thinking, there are potentially 4000 individual records affected by this just for my work area.)

I'll have to look a bit further in to this and come back to you.

Thanks.

End the painful dream...

"A", you're Adorable, "B", you're so Beautiful

2005-09-07T20:54:00.000+10:00

"C", you're a Cutie full of Charms...

"D", You're a Darling and "E", you're Exciting, And "F" you're a Feather in my arms...

Sunshine, Lollipops and Rainbows

2005-09-07T08:10:00.000+10:00

Everything that's wonderful is sure to come your way...

Happy 1st Birthday Josie-Bean.

I'm sure Mummy and Daddy will give you lots of cuddles and kisses and snuggles because they've known you for a year now and it is a time to celebrate, you beautiful girl.

I'll come over soon with a present for you and an additional cuddle of my own to give you too.

Oh, you are so cute!

Happy feet, I've got those happy feet...

I'll be so proud to call you mine

2005-09-05T08:03:00.000+10:00

When finally you come home to me...

Ask me where my beautiful new bracelet is from. Go on. It's from Zanzibar! Bakstar brought it back for me as my birthday present. Thank-you!

Catching up was great! I don't think we stopped talking the whole time she was there. And the Fish and Chips wasn't bad either.

I didn't get to go to the theatre at all this weekend. Why? Because the show was SOLD OUT! And I didn't even mention the name of the thing. 'The Last Five Years' by Jason Robert Brown played this weekend (and last) and had been sold out for a week by the time Boo called to get tickets. This is a shame but I'm glad I had more of an opportunity for sleep. I also didn't get to go to "Songs For A New World" because I worked late (a lot) this week and my eyes voted for sleep instead.

I watched some of The Muppet Show instead and stayed up late but I was closer to my bed than if I had gone into Melbourne to see TL5Y. TL5Y probably would have finished earlier but I enjoyed my night in with the DVD player anyway. My husband now complains that he either has The Muppet Show theme or the Swedish Chef's song playing in his head.

UK Mum and Dad are moving house. Again.

They've only been in their current house since April 2004 but we can understand why they would consider moving (this time) because the house they are in is rather tiny. The only inner doors in the place are to the bathroom (which is squeezy) and the wardrobe. And there's the door to the Conservatory which they installed last Summer. Other than that it is Open Plan living with a mezzanine bedroom.

They went for a walk and saw this other house for sale in the same estate as their current property, put in an offer, and then realised that they would have to sell their own. Two weeks later their house is sold and they are hoping to move in to the new place by Christmas.

But they're really staying put this time! (They've moved house 4 times in the last 6 years so we're not holding our breath.)

Fathers Day was lovely. There were no Grandmas at dinner this time, just Mum & Dad, my sisters and I and all our partners. We were meeting EG's boyfriend for the first time and Dad has given him a 9 out of 10. We're waiting to see the other one to compare. Yes, EG has two on the go. This one was trying very hard to impress Mum & Dad and after dinner I thought we were all on an interview panel as he laid out his life story for us.

At one stage, EG, Boo and I all had partners with the same birthday so this is now the criteria for any new boyfriends that may last the distance (we're talking EG here, Boo is very settled). EG's new one has missed that date by a couple of weeks but he is still born in the same month, and he has the same name as Boo's partner. We're getting close.

So (if he lasts) it may be that we have to call them by their surnames, nicknames, or just D1 and D2.

Bananas, in pajamas, are coming down in pairs...

People who need people

2005-09-02T14:31:00.000+10:00

Are the luckiest people...

Woo-hoo! Bakstar's coming over tonight. Haven't seen her for years it feels like.

After spending some time in the UK doctoring the pets of the Poms* she has returned via a holiday in Africa and is requesting Fish and Chips for dinner. She said that you can't get decent Fish and Chips in England and she's hanging out for some from our local Fish and Chippery.

I agree with the Fish and Chips in England thing. There was way too much oil on that cod. (Grilled? What is "grilled" fish?)

Although I would love to be cooking some gastronomic extravagance I'm glad that I don't have to after the time I have spent here at work rather than at home this week.

If I'm feeling energetic I can always whip up a Chocolate Self-Saucing pudding for dessert, or maybe a rhubarb and raspberry pudding. Or a good chocolate fudge sauce over ice-cream would do just as well.

Mmm, chocolate...

She's bringing along photos so we'll have lots of those to look at while we catch up with what's been happening over the last however long it has been since we saw each other. I can tell by the postcards Bakstar sent from weird and wonderful African/Egyptian/European locations that my trip to Lorne on the Bellarine Peninsula last May will be rather insignificant by contrast.

I'm really glad she's back. I'll have someone to go with me to the movies that my husband doesn't want to see!! And I'll have an extended book library once again. I've really missed that.

Welcome back Bakstar!!

*I can say that because I married one**.

**A Pom, BEVIS, not a pet.

When you come home to me, I'll wear a sweeter smile...

Headache, Headache, Pop-O-Matic Headache

2005-09-01T19:30:00.000+10:00

It's always fun until somebody cries...

Hubby is home with a migraine.

I'm still here at work. I'm not trying to impress, just make sure that the day's work is out of the way before we start the next one.

I have scored brownie points big time with the IT dude, we'll call him Muzza, today and that boosts the ego. I had to set up a data projector for the first time in my life today and before the scheduled time I received a panicked call from someone else needing same equipment earlier in the day (no overlap, no worries) so off I go to set it up. After setting it up three different ways before it was right (specific location difficulties) I returned to pack it up and did so with success.

Of course when I come to set it up this afternoon the bleeping laptop, to connect it to, won't boot up. In a cyclical error within itself it thoroughly ruined my unblemished track record.

Thankfully a colleague asked me how I was doing and I replied "not so good" with a little stress showing in my voice and he proceeded to ask if there was anything he could do for me.

"Can you find me a spare laptop for the evening?"

"For you, I would climb the highest mountain, swim across the largest ocean, ford the widest stream..."

No joke. He actually said that.

And then he presented me with a laptop.

It worked.

I'm joyous.

Now I just have to get finished all that work that I missed while helping set up data projectors and laptops.

Staff members are happy.

And nothing else matters...

It would be so nice

2005-08-31T08:01:00.000+10:00

If we took a holiday...

I'm back at work.

I was here twelve hours ago.

I really have to learn to delegate.

Feels like I'm going to lose my mind...

It's not just make-believe

2005-08-29T22:01:00.000+10:00

I will be waiting for you...

Went to Ballarat. It was very windy, but then I'm back in Melbourne now and it's still windy so that whole "different weather system" theory was just blown away.

Okay, now that you've all just gotten over groaning at the pun above, is anyone interested in hearing about Clunes? Really? You're not? No, neither am I.

I stayed in a hotel. I am a rare breed and actually like sleeping at a reasonable hour after a week at work and I get a bit cheesed when the people downstairs in the bar crank up Meatloaf to eleven at a quarter to midnight.

This is after the Grease megamix and a Beatles megamix. (I find it harder to block out the music when I can recognise it for some reason.)

Meatloaf woke me up again. He got turned down a bit after I rang the front desk and asked what time the music would be turned off.

On the positive side, I got to read a book while someone else prepared my meal and then only came and interrupted my flow when delivering a gastronomical delight to my table. I nearly finished the book in one sitting - I know, you're disappointed, I should have finished two!

If you like a good Paullina Simons book then I recommend The Girl In Times Square. It took me twenty-four hours to read which, to me, means it is a nice long book.

The hardest question I have to ask myself this week is whether to go and see Songs for a New World at the Gasworks Theatre or get some more sleep?

I took a trip while you were gone...

You are getting sleepy...

2005-08-26T08:00:00.000+10:00

Very sleepy...

After another pretty hectic week at the coal-face I shall be getting away from it all by going to Ballarat this weekend.

For anyone who does not know Ballarat, it has its own weather system separate from the rest of Melbourne: it is usually at least five degrees colder*. I have this on good authority as I have visited the area on previous occasions and a relative, lets call her Boo, studied at the University there which meant that she was forced to spend time there studying. Boo did quite well and I'm very proud of her but she has developed an enduring dislike of Ballarat, especially in Winter.

On the positive side, she also knows the best places to eat, drink and be merry on a student budget. As such, I have been introduced to a couple of pubs and a wonderful restaurant at the Golden City Hotel on the main drag called Gee Cee's. The food and ambience at this place is wonderful and the desserts are to die for.

I'm looking forward to some fabulous nosh in front of one of their open fires while outside the sun shines with that wintry glow.

* It even snowed there recently even though the area is not particularly mountainous.

I'm dreaming of a White Christmas...

Where is the Sunshine?

2005-08-23T17:45:00.000+10:00

It was out there today - bright, glaring, eye-watering, Winter sunshine...

Things to do:

Try out new t-shirt from Disney.com starring Beaker from The Muppet Show
Clean shower wearing new t-shirt from Disney.com starring Beaker from The Muppet Show
Do washing wearing new t-shirt from Disney.com starring Beaker from The Muppet Show
Eat dinner wearing new t-shirt from Disney.com starring Beaker from The Muppet Show
Do washing up wearing new t-shirt from Disney.com starring Beaker from The Muppet Show
Watch television wearing new t-shirt from Disney.com starring Beaker from The Muppet Show
Neatly fold new t-shirt from Disney.com starring Beaker from The Muppet Show so that I can wear again tomorrow to do the vacuuming.

Should be great...

Now that was a weekend

2005-08-22T13:29:00.000+10:00

Rest, relax and revive...

Even though there were social engagements, they were only one per day with a couple of all-important sleep-ins because time allowed.

Went to BEVIS' 30th and caught up with him and his Wifey as well as a few others which was nice. Good to see friends and BEVIS' family and I'm looking forward to the next one.

Great cake.

No visit from EG as she has flu and new job and study for new job and was working 2nd job on Saturday. I'll probably see her for Fathers Day when we get together with Dad. I hope she's feeling better by then.

Next weekend I'm in Ballarat.

Must remember to take thermal underwear...

Happy Birthday To You...

2005-08-19T22:40:00.000+10:00

You live in a zoo...

Yes, it is the birthday of BEVIS. Happy Birthday. Hope you had a nice day even though it rained. I guess that meant that you could stay in and blog about cake.

Now, back to me.

My absolute favourite musical is on again. This time at Chapel Off Chapel. I can't mention its name here though because then there won't be any tickets left for me.

Goodbye, until tomorrow...

I'm still standing

2005-08-19T08:05:00.000+10:00

After all this time...

Yes, I have survived my first Japanese Teppanyaki meal. Although I didn't participate in the catching of the food in the mouth as thrown by our chef for the evening, I did try the prawn legs.

They looked like squished pink Huntsman spiders minus the head but I ate one.

I can tell you now that it is not my favourite dish but at least I tried.

The garlic fried rice finished me off.

Every so often I think you have to challenge yourself...

Tell Me More, Tell Me More...

2005-08-18T17:45:00.000+10:00

I'm not quite sure how it goes...

I always try to be open to tasting new foods. I'm going out to a Japanese restaurant tonight for the first time.

The only Japanese food I've had cooked for me was made by some exchange students we had stay with us for a few weeks and I'm not quite sure that they got it right. It was a little too salty even for them.

I hope I can recognise something on the menu. There's always Sushi, I suppose.

I can do that...

Is it you, or just me?

2005-08-17T19:59:00.000+10:00

Ah, now I know what I was doing...

I missed out today. A nice little snooze on the couch was on my agenda this afternoon and my gentle slide into unconsciousness was interrupted. I was nearly there when the phone rang.

Did I mention that I love a good nap? Just a top up to see you through the day. It does you good; fends off the grumpiness caused by spending too long at work and probably lowers your blood pressure.

Not that I need my blood pressure lowered. Even bending over gives me head-spins.

Don't talk to me about giving blood...

Hooray for Holidays

2005-08-16T19:03:00.000+10:00

Nobody told me there'd be days like these...

Some people get to really sleep in on their days off. You know, middle of the morning stuff. If you're really lucky, it's middle of the afternoon, but then where's the fun in sleeping through a day that you can be enjoying while everyone else is at work?

Kind-hearted lass that I am, I have offered to drive my other half to catch his usual train to work in the morning so that he gets a bit of a sleep-in too.

This means, of course, that I still have to get up before it's light tomorrow morning...

Let The Sunshine In

2005-08-16T13:30:00.000+10:00

I am looking forward to the weekend...

BEVIS is turning 30 on Friday and we're all invited to his place for a party on Saturday.

I'm looking forward to catching up with a few people as we may not have another opportunity until we manage to squeeze in a lunch appointment some time near the end of October.

There will be laughing, party food and lots of sugar and red food colouring in the soft drinks. There is no theme this time but there may well be Trivial Pursuit into the wee hours.

Or we could all fall in a heap because that's what happens when you're suddenly OLD, according to BEVIS...

Life, The Universe and Everything

2005-08-16T13:10:00.000+10:00

It's all a bit hectic...

My weekends are mostly booked until the end of the year.

Work is so busy that I look up at 3pm thinking that it's only 11am and wonder how I'm going to finish the rest of my "things to do" before running out the door 40 minutes after I am already supposed to have left.

I think I need a bit of sunshine...