Some Days Are Good Days, and Some Aren't

Christmas day was delightful. BabyCakes and I swapped gifts early in the morning before we headed out for the day.

I had a great time watching my nieces and nephew open their presents and having fun. It was great to catch up with family. BabyCakes' mum was feeling a bit better and ate a bigger meal than she had in days. It was a nice day full of fun and family... and lots of food.

Today, well today is not the best day I've had. Perhaps a little too much alone time, perhaps too much thinking about others' comments.

Sometimes I wish a big hole would swallow me up and I wouldn't have to think any more.

A Pound of Flesh.....

My door is installed! Hazzah!

The installer turned up today to install it, and wouldn't you know, the poor guy was starting his first day installing doors for this company.

He was fabulous, I'm very happy with the service he gave me (I guess the corporate dogma hasn't had a chance to kick in yet), despite all the interesting problems my quirky little flat could throw at him.

It turns out my hinges are part of the door frame (all metal, all the time), and the door frame is kinda back filled with concrete. This meant lots of traipsing up and down stairs for him, to cut and fit the door properly, and the concrete bit made it more difficult for him to drill out a new hole for the deadbolt. I'm not sure how long they usually allow to fit a door, but I'm pretty sure it's not 2.5 to 3 hours! He even helped poke the hinge pins out through the layers of paint so I could take the door off to seal it underneath (which, curiously, he said builders in a lot of new places don't actually do which makes him (and me) cringe).

My new door is in, and I'm excited....

I'd been disillusioned by the project, the roller coaster of my week.

The first excitement was starting by deciding to strip and paint the door jamb before the new door was installed.

It was very closely followed by the frustration of underestimating/not allocating enough time to actually complete the project. So I did about half to three quarters of the job then.

The next day, I decided it would make things a lot easier if I took out the carpet under the door (as planned), and then I'd be able to get alllll the way down to the bottom of the frame.

It was hard work, but mostly fun, especially when I worked out that the best way to get the metal strip that keeps the carpet to the ground at the door up was not by trying to be delicate with it, but to get the claw of the hammer in there and get a bit physical!

The mess was strangely satisfying and very much made me feel that I owned the place, more so than anything else I'd done here.

The carpet was even more manky than I'd realised, and I was delighted to throw even a small piece of it in the bin!

In the process of pulling the carpet up though, I managed to damage the old door even more than it was!!

More of the veneer came off, and the bottom rail of the door kinda fell out...

It was together with masking tape for the last couple of days of it's life!

Anyway, with my powers of destruction having had a chance to stretch their dormant legs, I decided I should get the door jamb finished before the big day (new door installation), arrived.

So on I went, to discover why there were so many layers of paint on the door frame and stuff...

Stripping paint is an AWFUL job, and to make matters worse, I'm not convinced that I helped my cause by stripping it... I thought I'd stripped it pretty well, and sanded it OK... 'till I put some layers back on...

Then, to add insult to injury, after just one coat of the actual paint (on a base coat), I decided to let the cat out of the prison of the bedroom, to discover that the paint I'd put on was enough to make it really hard to shut the door (and it took off some of the paint!!!!!). I then noticed the horridly wonky cut, which explained all kinds of jams!

I left it at that point, and decided to wait for the new door cut by a person who sees the merits of a straight line.

Now, I have to seal and paint the door, finish of the door jamb, and hope that there is room enough in my gorgeously straight cut door to allow for all those layers of paint!!

I worked out why my door frames are a funny colour....

Inside my flat, the door frames are painted teal green, the same as the front of my front door.

In preparation for my door being installed this week, I went out and bought paint for it. It's expensive!! The one litre minimum makes it even more so... enough paint for 16 square metres, to paint what will probably amount to just over one square metre once one makes allowances for all the glass.

I figure the previous owner (with their seeming reluctance to spend money), bought a can of paint and figured that they *had* to use it on more than just the door given its expense. So, now I have teal green paint to strip away, so that I can paint it white... vivid white.

I won't be sad to see the teal green (a colour I usually don't mind), go. Call me old fashioned, but cornices should be white, and so should door jambs... or at least neutral, or part of an explicit design feature...

I can't imagine why anyone would have wanted to draw attention to my unevenly fixed frames!

How do they get these results?

If you believe everything you read, star signs correlate to traffic statistics... Nifty.

However, What I don't understand is how they get the statistics...

Worst
Libra
Aquarius
Aries
Pisces
Scorpio
Taurus
Sagittarius
Capricorn
Virgo
Cancer
Gemini
Leo
Best

So... we're assuming that we believe this at this point, that's interesting enough reading... they give the obligatory reasons why it is all so - that's fine. These figures are supposed to come from a combination of stats about accidents and tickets and then they go on to give the stats on tickets and accidents separately...

What I don't get, is how they get the main results they are spouting, to tout their book...

Lets take a look:

Their List
Worst	Accidents	Tickets	Total of Rank
Libra	1	5	6
Aquarius	5	3	8
Aries	4	2	6
Pisces	7	1	8
Scorpio	2	7	9
Taurus	8	6	14
Sagittarius	6	11	17
Capricorn	3	4	7
Virgo	9	10	19
Cancer	11	9	20
Gemini	10	12	22
Leo	12	8	20
Best

What I have done, is given a value for each sign as to how "dangerous" it is... 1 equalling the highest danger and 12 equalling the lowest danger. I then added them together, and in theory, the lower the number, the more dangerous the driver is.

Given this basic statistical modelling of the data they have presented to the world, I see that the rank should look a little more like:

Worst Total of Rank Libra 6 Aries 6 Capricorn 7 Aquarius 8 Pisces 8 Scorpio 9 Taurus 14 Sagittarius 17 Virgo 19 Cancer 20 Leo 20 Gemini 22 Best

That moves the list around quite a bit. Unless there is some serious weighting to some of the figures which there could be... (there might be more accidents caused by Aquarians than Capricorns, so therefore they move up the list as "dangerous drivers")... but they don't mention this on the page, in fact they don't mention any figures on that page other than 100,000 drivers and the rankings. (I'm a Capricorn by the way, so my star sign looses by me bringing these figures to the world's attention ;))

Personally, I think the proportion of people to star sign would be an interesting stat to look at with or without the claim of month of birth to accident/ticket ratio... I doubt that people in a non-geographically diverse area are statistically born all year round (if you took a world wide sample, you're more likely to get closer to an "all round" birth rate)... there is a strong likelihood that there are three or four star signs that are more prevalent in the study - and therefore, surely by pure virtue of being more populace, statistically more likely to have accidents/get tickets?

I dunno, I just juggle numbers to get the answer my boss wants half the time ;)

I also heard that 77% of all statistics are made up on the spot....

ba-dum-dum-ching!

Maybe I should troll the website for some figures on gender to accident/ticket ratios... they prolly have some somewhere, if they want to sell a book about it...

Oh, and one last thing, what the hell is the "My Name is Earl" reference got to do with the damn story, or book for that matter... he got hit by a car, and then tries to modify his behaviour - oooo his star sign must be a Libra, or Aquarius, or..... If the driver that had hit Earl had read the book, such "hilarity" like "My Name is Earl" might never had existed...



...on second thoughts, this book should be recommended reading for all fictional/Hollywood drivers!!

*rreooooowwwr* !

I Think My Boss Has Left The Country

I *think*.... He keeps changing his flight!

This means that I should hopefully be able to go 24 hours being able to plan my time myself. I do know that while he's on the plane he is planning to write another two proposals - we're not quite done yet, and for this work we get the added bonus of trying to work across significant time zone changes!!! yay!

On the up side, my boss wrote me a really nice Christmas card and gave me a generous bonus (over twice any bonus he'd given me before). BabyCakes wonders if he's trying to butter me up for not giving me the pay rise he promised for October... Ah well. I can't complain too much, there are plenty of people who would line up for my job, but I wonder how many of them could actually do it....

I'm just looking forward to a bit of a break.

All I Want For Christmas is My New Front Door

Today is the 53rd day after ordering my door.... I had to call them, because whilst the door is in the state, it's not unpacked yet, which means they can't call me (?).

The upside of my phone call this morning is that I have a fitting date!!!! Next Wednesday (61 days after ordering, but who is counting....) they did offer that I could get it installed next Friday, but I passed on that idea, I need to allow two business days to chase them up if they decide they can't fit it on the day they said they would. It would be a damn shame to have people turning up to our Christmas party giggling over our old door!

8 and a half weeks after order, my door should be fitted... YAY!

I heard a worse story though, my Dad ordered a new front grill door months and months ago, they finally had someone turn up to install it (having taken out the old one and making quite a considerable mess of the tiles etc.), and the door was too big by 40mm..... They sent 3 people out to measure the space before it was manufactured for the space.

They forgot to allow for the thickness of the frame... so, they took the brand new door back, to re-jig it all - probably taking a whole heap more time too, and they left the hole where the door was to go - my Dad had to put the old one back in so they had some sense of security!

At least my door is wood... if it is too big, they just keep cutting till it fits! If it is too small, I think I will cry.

I want a Kitchen = Only the Chillens Get Christmas Presents This Year

Don't get me wrong, I have one, but it's just not a very good one.

In the mid-seventies (when my flat was built) people needed a sink, a stove, a fridge, some benches and some cupboards. They didn't have a microwave, a blender, a food processor, a rice cooker, a breadmaker, an electric frying pan, a wok... their kettle probably was on the stove top.... so the single fridge power point and one double point for the toaster and hand mixer when required by the good little hausfrau was plenty! The good little hausfrau seemingly was much tidier than I too, back in the days when a 45cm deep bench was big enough!

What this means for my little flat is the now standard 58-60cm deep cupboards and benches are going to make my kitchen feel like an aeroplane galley...

I'm going to need some serious thought to design and look into some space saving type gadgets, which I'm sure basically translates to "I'm going to need to spend a heap of money on a tiny space, and no one will realise quite how much will have been sunk into it".

Oh, and I think I've decided on plastering pretty much my entire flat... my ugly walls are driving me nuts, and I want to paint!

I have finally decided on colours too - I think. I needed/wanted to get colours sorted out before my door eventually gets delivered. It will need to be painted to protect it, and I'd rather paint it right the first time.

After some bad experiences with sample pots looking nothing like their chip colours on display, I now know what colours I want, but they are from all different paint companies! I plan on taking the samples to one of those colour matching mobs and get them made up with the same paint, but in the colours I want.

Basically it will be pretty much white (with a hint of blueish purple to it, but just a hint), then the master bedroom will have a very dark blue feature wall, the front door will be the same colour, and it will be the accent colour for the bathroom. The lounge room and second bedroom will have burgundy feature walls, and it will the accent colour for the kitchen. I think two strong colours are more than enough for such a small space. The doors, architraves and window sills will be in a very white white gloss.

So while I have a fair bit of work to do before I can seriously expect it, I really want a new kitchen....

Some people have too much time on their hands

My brother sent me the following in an email:


This has just about taken the top spot for my most favourite vid ever.
sound is a must.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DoGuoXuLmsk


I don't know which is more disturbing, the first bit, or the second bit.....

maybe I just don't get it!

An Email I Recieved....

A week or two ago my sister-in-law sent me a link for the thousand hand guanyin.

Unfortunately, at the time, the link she sent me to was down because of bandwidth restrictions. Today I tried to check it out and encountered different problems, so I whipped out my trusty google page and found this link which provides a few "mirror sites" of a sort - hopefully you can find one that works for you.

It really is quite a spectacular sight on its own, but when you realise the troupe is 21 deaf mute "dancers", it really does transport the spectacle to an amazing feat of human discipline.

I'm Getting Old and Grumpy

Every time I don't get the service I expect, I tend to wonder if I'm being unrealistic in my expectation. Having said that, I'm really not happy with the process of purchasing a door. I had no idea that it would be so troublesome. Today I called the door company *again* and spoke to someone else. The conversation started like this:

Her: "Good afternoon, welcome to *insert company name*"
Me: "Good afternoon, may I speak with *insert name of rep who sold me the door four and a half weeks ago, happily taking my money....*?"
Her: "No "
Me: "Er, may I talk to someone about my order?" etc.

After more giggling and laughing at my comments and calling me "Darl" several times (which I can usually accept in the vein it was intended, today the familiarity of it annoyed me no end), she told me she'd have to send more emails to head office and call me back tomorrow... I've had the "email head office" used at me in several phone calls, I'll be pleasantly surprised if someone calls me back before I have to start chasing them again...

The four weeks it was going to take to make my non-standard door was up last week... they were waiting on glass... non-standard of course.... and now the "lady" I spoke to today tells me that I might not get my door in this round because lots of people are waiting...

GGGGGggggggRRRRRRRAAAAAAAOOOOOOoooooRRRRRR!

A *large* door company advertises a sale, takes money for doors on order.... and then cannot supply the doors... I was barely prepared to wait the four weeks... it'll be a minimum of six weeks, and could well be more.

No Fuss? My arse!


To top it all off, my door handle on the existing door is getting exceedingly cantankerous, but it was supposed to be replaced last week.... (about the same time we had to start allowing an extra 30 seconds to be able to get in or out of the place, to deal with the stupid handle).

< /rant >

My Boss Leaves The Country in 3 Weeks

My Boss is off soon for his annual jaunt across the globe, so between now and then, I might not have much to do much of anything beyond the basics and work in the next few weeks. After he leaves the country, I'm likely to have a lot more time to do stuff, like write blogs...

We had a lovely, but quite busy weekend but we got to catch up with friends, spend some time with BabyCakes' recovering mum, both of us worked, did some shopping, tidying and drank too much booze (not while tidying or shopping, but with the friends)...

We bought margarita glasses, and a stick blender thing that can crush ice.... roll on summer!

I also "helped out" filling in a Roy Morgan survey - it was huge, and then they left even more booklets to fill out over the next week or so. I'm not sure it had the total effect they wanted, sometimes I find myself not watching TV or listening to the radio so I don't have to write it down... Trying to remember *which* half hour you listened to the radio at the end of the day is harder than it sounds...

Eloping Has its Charm

Do I really need to say much more?

Dad found some wedding book things at his work, and he brought one home for my sister and I to look at (or put ideas in our heads... neither one of us is engaged). I've had a flick through, and combined with my recent dress buying trip... I get a title like the one above.

Weddings are starting to scare me - a far cry from the romantic idyll women are supposed to expect/want/crave. Despite knowing that elopement is not really an option, I can understand how it happens, and I'm not even engaged!

I do know though, if I ever get married, it is going to be as small and as un-fussy as I can manage it! Anyone that knows the size of my family might have their doubts about how successful I'd be.


All I know is that weddings are big business and big money... but for some reason marriage counselling/support/advice is not... the cynic in me wonders how long it will be until the lawyers start advertising in the bridal guides... (or am I so new to the industry that I just haven't seen it yet?)

I want my marriage to be a lifetime, and the wedding just a day...

BabyCakes Suprised Me!

Whilst I was away in Sydney trying on dresses and hanging out with my brother, BabyCakes not only cleaned the flat and did all the laundry.... he painted the bedroom ceiling! It was a lovely surprise, and completely unexpected, even more so because he has spent a great deal of time telling me how much he hates painting!


This is what the cornices used to look like (and still do in the vast majority of the flat), the past owner, in their infinite wisdom, made them part of the wall, painting them the same colour. This is not how cornices are usually painted, and was one of the many things that bugged me about the flat! I think BabyCakes was more furstrated by the weird and somewhat concerning sticky tape marks on the ceiling, which obviously held a poster of some sort to the ceiling.... at apprximately his crotch level when he was laying on his side of the bed!! - needless to say, those marks are now gone!


The cornices have been reclaimed as part of the ceiling, the ceiling is one colour, and looks neater. I've been told not to look at the drip marks and the one spot that for some reason the paint decided to bubble. For a far from perfect starting surface, a newly learned skill, and a completely unexpected project, it is absolutely fantastic.

I'm lucky to have found BabyCakes, and luckier to have him want to stick around!

An Emergency Dress....?

We found a dress for the bridesmaids... pretty easily too, in the end.... and the biggest surprise to everyone (including the bride), was the last minute change of colour!! The dress is beautiful, as is the colour, if I'd had my choice of colour for this dress as an evening dress, I would have picked that colour... so I'll be happy to wear this dress any time I get the chance!

Yay!

We also had a lovely lunch together as a bit of a "getting to know you" type thing. I am now currently wondering how much work I'll need to do to fit into the dress we ordered before it is delivered next March-ish!

Thanks Ms Bride-to-be for the lovely day!!

Yay for Health Insurance!

Having relatively recently recognised the fact that I'm getting old, and joined a Health Fund before I had to start paying more for it, today was the first time I actually got the benefit of paying my monthly premium - and it was fantastic! I got away with paying less than a half, more like a third of my usual bill at the dentist!! It was gooood!

Given my insurance premium is deducted from my account without me doing a thing about it, I've not really noticed the cost, except for the extra transaction appearing.

Such a small thing to celebrate, but I take what I can get!

Lucky Enough....

I may not have won the Ikea competition, or lotto, or very much at all, but a filling fell out of my tooth today so I called my dentist, they had had a cancellation 10 minutes prior to my call, and so I have an appointment for today.


That's not a bad sort of luck to have, and I have to say, I've been lucky like that more than once with my dentist.

My Puppa says (so my Dad tells me), that it is better to be born lucky than rich. I think I'd have to agree.

What One Has Not Had, One Should Not Moon Over?

Ikea gave away the $10k to the wrong person.... They didn't pull my name from the hat. Do they not know that now my flat is destined to mismatch forever? Ahh well, I've heard that Ikea is not a fun place to visit on the weekends at the moment - no car parks, too crowded to be able to actually see anything, open draws, touch the displays, and they are out of stock on an inordinate amount of items... Lucky that I was too lazy to go out on Sunday, else I would have found these things out for myself, and not via a work colleague of BabyCakes!

My ticket has been booked to go to Sydney this weekend, which we discovered is the same weekend I'd agreed to feed the Folks' dogs... but BabyCakes has agreed to take up that mantle so that everything can go ahead as scheduled.

I think BabyCakes' mum is in for surgery this week, which is huge. I am hoping and praying that everything goes well and a minimum of both surgery and radio/chemotherapy is needed.

I also have a huge week at work lined up, as is often the case, there is the rush to get reports done before Christmas, and the boss is going O/s again, so we have some rather firm deadlines... I'd rather we got some of these things done prior to the last week, so I'm quite happy to be wrangling this project now... I suppose I should get to work, and do some more!

I kicked a goat because the voices told me to.

I got an email which said:

Pick the month you were born:
January--I kicked
February--I loved
March--I smoked
April--I dry humped
May--I choked on
June--I murdered
July--I did the Macarena with
August--I had lunch with
September--I danced with
October--I sang to
November--I yelled at
December--I ran over


Pick the day (number) you were born on:
1-------a birdbath
2-------a monster
3-------a phone
4-------a fork
5-------a Mexican
6-------a gangster
7-------my cell phone
8-------my dog
9-------my best friends' boyfriend
10-------my neighbour
11-------my science teacher
12-------a banana
13-------a fireman
14-------a stuffed animal
15-------a goat
16-------a pickle
17-------your mom
18-------a spoon
19-------myself
20-------a baseball bat
21-------a Ninja
22-------Chuck Norris
23-------a noodle
24-------a squirrel
25-------a football player
26-------my sister
27-------my brother
28-------an ipod
29-------a permanent marker
30-------a llama
31-------A homeless guy


Pick the colour of shirt you are wearing:
White----------because I'm cool like that
Black-----------because that's how I roll.
Pink------------because I'm a homosexual.
Red------------because the voices told me to.
Blue-----------because I'm sexy and I do what I want
Green---------because I hate myself.
Purple---------because I'm myself
Grey----------because I was drunk
Yellow--------because someone offered me 1,000,000 dollars
Orange-------because I hate my family.
Brown--------because I was high.
Other-------because I'm a ninja.
None--------because I cant control myself

Now type out the sentence you made in the subject line and forward to your friends.
And don't forget to send it back to the person that sent it to you.

In my case, I'll send my brother back the link to this page... feel free to add your sentence in a comment to this page!

I Would be a Happy Little Consumer!

Advertising works on me. Product placement works on me. I know how they happen, I know why they happen, and it still works!

I think I would be a tragic trend follower if I had more money. I think my lack of money keeps me from making some really big mistakes!

When I was a teenager, I detested my hair... my lank, lifeless, flat hair! It was the late eighties, early nineties, big hair was in. I was a depressed high school student, because there wasn't enough money to buy me the big hair I needed to be fashionable... I could tease my hair, use half a can of hair spray, get a look I liked.... for ten minutes, then my hair went flat again. The upside of the tragic (unfashionable) lifestyle I was forced to lead, I noticed at the turn of the century (my goodness doesn't that sound posh!). When looking at my high school photos, people would laugh at my highly fashionable and popular friends, whereas I (much like high school), managed to be hardly noticed in the background - at least I wasn't getting laughed at again!

I want a mobile phone with a camera on it, I want a new kitchen, new bathroom, a wall mounted widescreen TV, I want new clothes, I want a new hairstyle every 6 weeks (complete with colour), I want overseas holidays, I want a holiday destination every year with activities beyond dinner and a movie, I want a personal trainer... but I don't want the bills!

I will not have all those things, this year. I will have to see what fits into my budget, and in time, the less important things will slip by the wayside, and the more important ones will get paid for.

I do not have a credit card (not one that actually gives me credit anyway), there are more threats that my home loan will cost me more *again*. My loan is less than 6 months old... two rate rises so far, another one due if I believe the forecasts...

I'm glad that while I may fall victim to the pretty bells, whistles and sparkling lights of the advertising, I have known for a lot of years that what I want and what I can afford are vastly different, and the up sides of that fact. I've also learnt that saving up for the big things is worth it. Eventually, one tends to have to sacrifice less and one feels the benefits more - Roll on those days!!





........................... But wouldn't it be nice if that day could be today?
(Dang, now I have to get to work)

Emergency Dress Shopping

I received a phone call yesterday to advise me of a Dress emergency, that will probably have me in Sydney next weekend....

I don't know what sort of dress, what colour, or if I need to budget for it yet, but it should be an interesting experience.

Yay for being a bridesmaid!

Camping Cats...

BabyCakes and I are planning to go camping the weekend of the 24th/25th of November. We want to go see The Cat Empire play at The Ettamogah Pub, and we do not want to drive home!
We thought we'd dust off the camping gear which has hardly seen the light of day since The Woodford Folk Festival last year... It was a hot, rushed, stressful, under-prepared, and for being surrounded by so many people, a quite a lonely experience. Given that BabyCakes and I survived that, so relatively early in the piece, stands us in good stead for the rest of our relationship! However, once we got home, camping was not forefront in our minds for quite some time! (at least BabyCakes did not burn the tent as he threatened!)

Time has now numbed us to the down sides of the trip, and experience has seen us purchase a large over tarp (and poles) to help protect us from the sun and rain, and fills the delightfully human need to define our space... (ggggrrrrrrr rwwwoaaaarr! mine!) The sun protection thing was the most important factor in my mind for buying it... not being able to sleep past 8 am, despite working until 2am the night before, kinda sucked!

We are looking at staying at the Forrest Glen Resort (sounds swanky - they even have ensuite campsites!), which gives us a spot pretty close to the pub to sleep, and an opportunity to test out our new purchases, and make sure our older stuff still works!

If anyone (who knows us, and) who lives locally and is looking for an excuse to go camping, please feel free to come along too (let us know, so we can catch up!).

Bills are ouchy!

Bills, they arrive so innocently in one's letter box... I'm only just starting to understand my mother's sentiment of not liking mail, because it's most likely a bill.... I understand it, but I'm still not quite there.

Letters, any letters, are still exciting to me, more exciting than the fear that it is another bill. I think for me, at the moment, I'm more afraid that it's a damn electioneering letter than a bill! (We have recently had not only a state election, but a council by-election.... the candidates kept sending very personal mail to myself, Babycakes, and the two girls who used to live here before me!)

Thankfully, the electioneering is over, hopefully for quite a while now, and now, it's mostly bills that grace my letterbox.

I have 3 BIG bills due this week, 2 have come out of my account now, and one will be paid in the next couple of days. I knew the bills were there, I knew they had to be paid, and allowed for them. It still hurts to see so much money going out though!

I guess it is certainly better than not having the money to pay them... but I don't have to enjoy it.

Party Party Party!

This is BabyCakes making a deal with the Devil! I'm not sure yet what deal he is making, but it might be for a Halloween outfit that doesn't involve make up next year....

We had a fun night at a friend's Halloween party, everyone was all dressed up and bought along delightfully gross food to eat... no end of eyeballs, toenails, boogers and brains! I must admit, I wanted to try one of the eggs, but millions of years of evolution made my brain very very much balk at eggs *that* colour... they looked so WRONG!!!

The punch was not only tasty, but had eyeballs (lychees with cherry pupils) and an ice hand floating in it!

I did my usual trick, of being just a little bit off centre with my choice of outfit, and went as a cereal killer.... my Weetbix were suitably scared of my giant spoon! My giant spoon also came in handy when I valiantly saved the house from being burnt down at great personal cost to me! - a piece of plastic decoration got too close to a candle and started burning (the whole house down), and I, and my spoon, swooped in to save the day! Unfortunately the giant plastic skeleton was not so keen to die again, and took a swipe at me, by means of dripping hot plastic on me... the spoon too, but spoons are strong and feel no pain, whereas I, I had to say "Ow ow ow" a lot, until I got the plastic off me....

Gee parties are exciting!! Mind you, one knows one is getting older, when one has been to a party, had a great time, and still home and tucked up in bed by midnight!

Saturday Morning Revelations

Ikea haven't forgotten to call me! They prize draw isn't until the 4th of November! Yay! Now that day can be more than just the day my council rates are due!.

Renters out there, whilst owning a home is a joy that is quite spectacular, enjoy the ability to quantifiable know every week how much it costs to put a roof over your head... When one owns a property the bills never really do stop, and as a unit owner I have the joy of not only the quarterly rates bills, but quarterly body corporate bills, and then there are the special levies to pay for things that haven't been budgeted for....

Don't get me wrong, at this stage, the ability to choose what happens to my space, the knowledge that the money I'm spending is for my future and the fact that I don't have any rental inspections, still puts home ownership into the positive experience, despite the never ending bills...

Sometimes I feel a bit like Marge Simpson when she is learning to paint, and she starts seeing the world as their base shapes that make everything up.... now I look at my flat in terms of dollars it is going to take to fix it/change it/modernise it. I can tell you now, there are a lot of dollar signs all over this flat! I think that for the past 30 years (since it was built), the previous owners of this property have closed their eyes when they saw those dollar signs, and only heeded them when they jumped out and smacked them in the face! I can't complain tooooo much, if this flat was maintained properly, I couldn't have afforded to buy it!

Today, I have a mammoth task of laundry (the washing machine decided to make very scary noises late last week, that I couldn't quite work out.... I took the back off the machine and tried to work it out, but gradually the noise got less and then went away again.... so I put the machine back together, but the laundry that didn't get done last week is a bit of a mountain....), I also need to make worm and booger tarts for tonight's Halloween party, make sure both BabyCakes and my costumes are in order, and work out how long it will take me, the make up impaired, to make up BabyCakes' face as The Crow....

Ikea VIP!

The day arrived! I was an Ikea VIP! We had breakfast at the largest Ikea in the southern hemisphere, and was offered a free shot of schnapps to toast the opening of the store (which I declined, apart from the drinking at 8:30 am thing, I wasn't sure if I needed to drive today).

It was fun to get an un-crowded if not rushed tour of the facilities, and see all those shiny shiny things! BabyCakes does not quite understand my Ikea fetish, but is accepting of it, and indeed facilitated my sneak peak today!

I'm not sure if the Ikea people know yet, but they forgot to give me a call to tell me how I can pick up my $10k Ikea voucher, because I'm *sure* it was my turn to win their competition...


This is a picture of their ceremonial, store opening log... un-cut, of course (does that make it ruder?)... Unfortunately we couldn't stay for the log cutting, as BabyCakes and his boss needed to get back to work.

(The log cutting is a Swedish tradition to bring good luck and good guests - I think)

Oh, and we learnt that in Sweden, it is pronounced ee-key-ah, not the eye-key-ah that we Aussies tend to say...

One more sleep!

'Till IkeaLogan opens, and I get to go to it....

Sushi is GOOD!

BabyCakes and I had sushi for dinner tonight, we're such suckers for it! I'm glad I wrote this post, because it reminded me to search the web for some information...

BabyCakes and I have a soft spot for Chicken Yakitori skewers, and BabyCakes would loooove to know how to make the sauce.

From a quick look around, it looks like a mix of sake, soy sauce, mirin, and sugar, boiled and then simmered as the mixture thickens.... sounds pretty easy!

YUM! I can't wait to try it out!

You Know You Love Your Pets When....

BabyCakes and I had to take Missy Monster to the vet tonight... I'm not sure that she is very happy with us at the moment. We put her in the dreaded box, kept her in the dark, took her to a strange place, wouldn't let her explore, a strange lady felt her all over, jabbed her with a needle, shoved a pill in her mouth, blew in her face, and put her back in the box! (We didn't mind so much of that, it was the bill that kinda hurt).

We think she might have a urinary tract infection, so we now have pills for her, and have to watch her toilet habits and hope for the best!

You know you love your pets when their toilet habits become prime discussions morning and night!

My Unnatural Ikea Preoccupation

The largest Ikea shop in the southern hemisphere opens up its doors on the outskirts of Brisbane, and I am lucky enough to be going to the grand opening...

I've been playing the stupid Ikea game on their website, because I really want to win the first prize of $10,000 to spend at Ikea. My two bedroom flat will not know itself when I do! So much of my slowly gathered free and very cheap furniture, and even some that I spend a fair bit of money on, will be out in the cold the day I reassemble my designer flatpack furniture!

My Ikea obsession was rekindled yesterday afternoon with the delivery of the new Ikea catalogue... My lazy Sunday was spend snoozing and flipping through the catalogue, redefining all my home improvement plans around what Ikea offers...

OOPs

It is very rainy... I'm going to have a very soggy BabyCakes when he comes home...

I hope he doesn't catch a cold :(

BabyCakes' Night of Boyishness..

BabyCakes is off to be a boy, with a lot of other boys, the vast majority of whom will be 25+ year old boys...

Today in quiet, sleepy little Brisvegas, Gigantour starts its Australian leg... and BabyCakes, his friend, and one of my many brothers are off to mosh, thrash, yell, and make funny hand signals to bands that can't enunciate. They are so excited!

Thankfully, I didn't even have to look even remotely interested in going to this $85 a ticket festival to long greasy haired grunting boys in black.. (I might be overstating this somewhat, given that the three people that I know who are going do not fit that description... apart from the grunting and black clothes...)

The curious thing is though, it looks like it's going to rain, and its an outdoor gig at the beautiful river stage... and all that testosterone will get soggy!

I know the guys that I waved farewell to this afternoon will have a fabulous time, rain or not... but I can still snicker safely tucked at home with my cable TV, cat, and a bottle of wine!

I'm getting a brand spanking new door!

If one takes into account the money I get back from the body corporate, it isn't toooooooooo expensive either, for the difference it will make to my flat.

However, I have to paint my door myself. Apparently, if one stains one's door and it gets a bit of sun, it night need re-doing in as little as 3 months, whereas painting can potentially last for 20 years... and can't possibly cost me the $150 they wanted to charge me for staining/varnishing.

My odd size door does however require a 4 week waiting period, I guess I have time to pick a colour to paint my door!

After ordering a door, I went shopping for bits for Halloween costumes for my partner (now known on my blog as "BabyCakes", because I can, and because he'll probably cringe everytime he reads it! - that, and the fact that those who know him, will know he's not a very "BabyCakes" kinda guy)... so I went shopping for stuff to make BabyCakes and my Halloween costume. Who would have thought finding a Crow-esque long trench coat in spring, in the sub-tropics would be difficult?

Luckily, my costume is much easier to put together!! Unfortunately for you dear reader, I can't reveal my outfiit till after the party... Queen of cheese that I am, I can't be too literal when deciding on an outfit...

I'd best be off to start manufacturing BabyCakes' trench coat, and not wearing out this blog thing in the first day!

Happy Birthday to my brother hiding out on the other side of the world, in Amarillo Texas!
Have a Shiner Bock on me! (I learnt a new word - or beer!)

Doors! Doors!! Get your door needs!

I need a new front door....

Today is the day I go to order one! After months of looking, umming, ahhing, today I actually have enough money in my account to reasonably expect to be able to buy one.

Doors are expensive, especially if one wants some glass/stuff that looks like glass in it, and even more so if one has a no standard size door, and even MORE so if the door is on the larger size of standard.

I've discovered that my lovely home pretty much has nothing that is of a standard size, perhaps because the house was made metric (? well, perhaps....) , but probably because my place was built around the size of a besser brick (see pic if you're not sure of what one is) (? perhaps...).... or just perhaps because the size of the spaces within my flat which were so appealing pre-purchase, dictates that everything must be just *that* bit bigger than standard. Or smaller, if one is looking at the kitchen (really, who the hell thinks that a bench 45cms deep is a good size? or the cupboard that is40cms deep is a useful depth???). Admittedly, when looking at a kitchen devoid of any furnishings/clutter/a fridge.... the narrow workspaces did make the kitchen look big... When looking at flatpack/mass produced kitchen systems, I can now say with out a doubt, it actually is quite a small space... especially if one believes a dishwasher is prerequisite in a modern kitchen (and I do!).


Anyway, back to the door thing... I really liked a door with four glass panels... but when I went to look at it, I was told that although sold as an external door, it is actually made of a material that doesn't do too well if the door is not well protected and maintained rigorously (painted very regularly, on the edges i.e. take the door off every 6-12 months). While I am a new homeowner, and very excited about all things D.I.Y. at the moment, I do understand that this is not altogether likely, and once the water is into the wrong spots, the door is ruined... So, that leaves the (proportionally more expensive) option of solid wood. However, the solid wood door does not come in this particular design... it comes in one with seven panels of glass... which totally changes the proportions of the door... or you can replace three glass panels with horrible beveled wood panels... but not flat wood panels... The seven panel glass might have to do.

Yay! - One decision made (until the next rep tells me the first door I looked at is perfectly fine in the weather - a person with one watch always knows what time it is.... a person with two watches is never quite sure....)

So, at this point, I think I know that I want a solid wood door.. Then I think about the money... and the fact my body corporate will only pay for a basic door... maybe letting more light into my dark hallway is not *that* important... or is it?

Then there are the door handles/locks that cost a minimum of $100 from the door company... that cost $35 at the hardware shop next door.

...to install myself, or to pay someone....

...to paint? to stain?

So many decisions for me to make!


So... I'm about to head off to talk to yet another rep, and see what he has to say, and finally order a new door. Assuming that another decision does not need to be made...

Does this thing come with a manual?

I think I have to press some more buttons to see how things work here...

I created this blog because I wanted to post a comment on a friend's blog.

So HA! You're stuck with me now!