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!