Sunday 24 February 2013

Thursday 21 February 2013

Who Stole The Bloody Knives???

Yep, we are in!

Finally!!!

The move is completed. 

But, let me tell you, this has been a bloody hard slog this one. Don't get me wrong (well do but it won't make a difference to me either way) as we really like this new house. I am sitting here typing this on the dining room table (cos it's the only table space I can find at the moment) and I have a magnificent view overlooking parts of the Highlands. It truly is gorgeous.

And the house is great.

Of course, as with all moves there have been a few issues. Like the garage door only going up - not down.

And unpacking the cutlery and discovering we have lost all our knives (wtf???)  I guess I should just pull some out of my back but ..who needs them anyway!!!

And of course, not being able to connect the tv. Yep, I should just be able to plug it in, turn it on and off we go.

No!!!

The aerial connection doesn't fit. Of course it wouldn't.  So a quick trip into Dick Smith (and to the lady in the Mittagong store - and yes, I am naming your store - you were about as helpful as a frigging bull in a china shop) and then another trip into the Bowral store where the lovely young fellow (I think I have just turned into my Nana using that phrase!!) suggested what I needed to do and it would only cost me $10!!!
SO of course, after doing the 55th final clean of the old house, and without shedding a tear, I closed the door on that four month rental and drove home to connect the tv!!

Oh but no, of course, that didn't work. SO the Senior Sergeant and I drove back into town and the next lovely young fellow in Dick Smith in Boooooowwwwwrrrraaaaallllll the told me another way around this problem, and I didn't need to spend any more $$$$$$....yet.

Now I have managed to turn myself into a bit of an electrician tonite and connected and disconnected and reconnected so we now have a tv which has a lovely blue screen as an artistic feature in our lunge room cos I still cannot get the bloody thing to work.

This normally would not be SO FRIGGING FRUSTRATING but with what has been a really tough move for the little Country Gypsy family both emotionally and physically, I just want it to be simple.

Like me.

Simple!!!

Anyway, of course there are many more issues in life that we need to worry about but for CRYING OUT LOUD- GIVE US A FRIGGING BREAK!!!!

Anyway, the animals have all survived the move too. Charlie the Wonder Dog did manage to escape the first night and when I went looking for me early hours the next morning here he was lying on the front porch.....with a random shoe (again!!!). How the hell he knew that this was our house after his neighbourhood wander beats me as the kids and I sill can't remember but anyway, he seems happy enough.

Our little chickies are growing fast and almost ready to go out into their chook pen - which will be good as their is nothing worse than trying to move a box from one room to another and have a little escaped chook flapping at your feet.

And Fred Fish, well, he is still swimming away. We have to take most of the water out of his bowl for transportation purposes, it's just a bit awkward when three days later you look at him and he is still flapping around in 3cm of water!!!  It's all good now, he is happy as a ....fish in water!!!

Anyway, thanks to my beautiful friends and family who helped either physically or emotionally with this move.  I don't deny yesterday was a shocker for me, and even the world's best removalists had to give me a bit of support (and a coffee or two) a couple of times to get me through the day.

And to my beautiful kids - you amaze me!!!!  Every day!!!

And Horse Girl - good things will happen...I can't promise when but they will - that I know!!!!

Cheers

Lisa xox

Saturday 16 February 2013

All About Bailey

 Well here I am half way through the Relay For Life in Queanbeyan.

For those of you (perhaps my Guatemalan readers) Relay for Life is a fundraising event for the Cancer Council.   We started at 10am this morning (Saturday) and will finish at 10am Sunday. Of course, the physical set up started 24 hours earlier so after 3 hours sleep I am feeling a little weary ( no actually I'm frigging buggered but anyway)

But I just wanted to share with you a story that is going to inspire me to keep going for about another 30 hours which will be the next time I actually see a bed.

These aren't cancer stories but a young person who has inspired me today to keep going...even when some complete and utter idiot decided to have a go at me a little while ago.  Although I did want to headbutt him, I thought of this beautiful boy I met today  and realised some adults are just plain bloody idiots.

This story is about young Bailey. He is only 5 years old and had registered as a participant. Bailey's target was to walk around the oval which is about 400 metres, holding on to Mum and Dad's hand.

You see, Bailey can't walk. He uses two sticks but that gets too tiring for his little body so he spends most of his time in a wheelchair.  I was privileged to be there when young Bailey completed his lap today. And I tell you what, although many of us adults have plenty of things to deal with (including moving house the day after tomorrow, well that ain't no struggle anymore) sometimes we need to get over ourselves and think about struggles that others have, especially innocent little kids.

I am as frigging tired as anything and frustrated with some so called professional people at the moment but you know what.... I actually am not going to waste anymore time thinking of them now. Because little Bailey, you are INCREDIBLE mate and no little kid should have to endure what you do.

Bailey completed that one lap, and yes, I cried. He then completed another 29 laps in his wheelchair. And his beautiful Mum gave me the honour of pushing this beautiful boy around on his final lap.
And no Bailey, you shouldn't have thanked me beautiful boy. It was my absolute privilege and honour to have you let me push you around little man. And I only hope and pray that life deals you no  more hardship mate cos in your five years, you have had to endure more than most bloody adults.

So yes I am so tired I can barely move. And I can tell you I have shed more than one tear today and am absolutely positive I am going to shed more tonite when we have a remembrance ceremony and I think of some special people.

And when I can barely keep my eyes open after we finish and pack up tomorrow and I head on that drive home to my own kids, I am going to think of young Bailey who struggled those 400 metres around the oval which must have felt like walking around Australia and that is going to keep me going!

Cheers all

Lisa Xbox

Friday 15 February 2013

You Did WHAT For Love??????

Here's a question for you to ponder today...
Have you ever some anything silly for love???

Well of course, I may have but I'll get to that in a minute.

How about doing something a bit silly the day you meet the love of your life?  Now keep it clean please people.

An article caught my eye yesterday about a young lady who met the love of her life' and decided that day to have his name tattooed ON HER FACE!!!!

What the......?

Now I know that I may have done one or two silly things in my life (ahem!!) but seriously tattooing the name of someone you had only just met ON YOUR FACE!!!!!!!!

The article didn't say how old the girl was but she looked young. And beautiful. And slightly stupid.

Of course the boyfriend looked bloody ugly, with tatts everywhere, and on his face. Although it didn't appear that her name was on his face but who knows!

Eyes in the back of your head...literally!!!!


I have NOTHING against tattoos, and in the right place they can look great. However, ON YOUR FACE???  The name of someone you had JUST MET!!!

There isn't much more I can say on this (surprisingly!!) but here is the link for you to check it out yourself.

http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/weird/girl-meets-boy-has-name-tattooed-on-her-face-the-same-day/story-e6frev20-1226577854514

And please, DON'T TRY THIS AT HOME!!!

 Cheers

Lisa

Thursday 14 February 2013

So WHo's From Uranus?

Well it appears Men aren't really from Mars!!!



Yes, this was one of the headlines in the news recently.  Personally, I would have thought that there would have been at least 85 000 more newsworthy items than this but at least it has given me a topic to write about!

Now I am the least equipped person to give relationship advice (My mother wanted me to make my debut in high school because she thought it may have been the only time she saw me in a white dress - little did she know!!!!) but I felt that I should impart my wisdom on this topic!!!

Back in the 1990's when apparently we were all devouring the book - Men are from Mars Women are From Venus- apparently we decided to live our relationships according to this book.  So us chicks 'apparently' let the blokes go to their man cave to do whatever it is they do, we didn't worry when we were talking to our blokes about whatever and their eyes started to glaze over and we just dropped them off at the pub so they could watch the footy with their mates than spend the day with us!

Now looking at what us chicks did for them, I would reckon that we are possibly entitled to legendary status.

So what did we get in return????

Um...well...ah...hang on a minute - I'm thinking...... this is where I find it difficult.
Not just wondering in what us chicks wanted but what was wrong with doing the above anyway.
  
Seriously, ladies. Have your eyes never glazed over when a member of the male species talks at you about something that you either have no interest in/have no idea what they are indeed talking about/ or are thinking about booking your next waxing appointment?????

And really, do you want to go the pub with them EVERY time they go to the pub to yell at the television and discuss the finer points of whatever sport they may be watching and discussing how much better they are in that particular sport or how they would coach them better or how they are just better in an all round way????

And the man cave???  Well at least they aren't making a mess in the house and if they want to go out and do whatever they do in their man caves, as long as they aren't hurting themselves or anyone else what's wrong with it.  Maybe they are building something/creating something/drinking beer and snoring.......... EVERYONE needs their space - not just men!



I guess, in my experience, sometimes us chicks do find it hard if a bloke has an issue but doesn't want to chat us about it as we like to help or don't like to see others stress or be unhappy.
And some blokes do want to just sort out the problem for us rather  than listening to us whinge or complain about something.

But do we really want to be the same??? How boring would that be!  So whether we are from Mars, Venus, Pluto or Saturn, I just want to be the 'consultant' who was no doubt paid $1000000000000 to decide that men and women are different (no shit Sherlock!) but just be nice to each other.






Anyway, wherever you are from Happy Valentine's Day. If you believe in it or not!!!

Yeah right!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 
Cheers
Lisa xox

Tuesday 12 February 2013

A Bucket Career???

On my 30000 daily commute to one of my places of work this morning, I did some thinking!

Yes, I know, it did hurt a little but I had to do something and my singing was driving even me a little batty this morning

You see I am doing a bucket list. Now this has been a work in progress for some time, and I have done a draft or fifty-five blog posts for it but that too is a work in progress.

My Bucket List!!!


Now some of the things that are on my bucket list are probably what might be on yours. And then some won't be!

But my thinking pattern (if there is such a thing) then got slightly distracted (well there's a surprise) and I started reflecting over my life, in particular my working career.

I have had one or two of fifty five changes of career and although I am probably not now where I thought I would be, I have had some funny times..

There has also been some incredibly tough times, distressing times, but also many times that I think have made me a stronger person (or full of a lot of shite anyway)



Like the time when I was going to a meeting in Canberra with some very important people (no, not at Parliament but at one of the big pubs) and I had toilet paper stuck in my pants, trailing along behind me (I know, I have no shame). I then got the giggles so badly that I couldn't finish the meeting and had to phone them the next day.

said my colleagues.....


Or the time when I first started teaching and one of my little girls in my class turned to another little girl and said (And I have obviously changed the names here - only because it was so long ago I can't remember them!) "Oh Jenny, it was fun having your Dad come and stay the night last night. We had so much fun and then I went and jumped on him and Mummy in bed this morning!"  And poor little Jenny's reply "Mmmmm, Mum was really cranky that Daddy didn't come home and she said she was going to cut them off"!!!.  Yes, that was an interesting piece of news!!!

Or the times when I used to be the hostess (with no bloody mostess) on the coach tours when all their real ones were out on jobs and we used to drive through the truck weighing stations. I used to tell my passengers that we were indeed slightly overweight so could they please lift their feet up off the floor when we were getting weighed so that we wouldn't get a fine (and I fooled them every. single. time!!). 

Of course, on these trips I used to love having a chat to the mostly elderly people. They were (mostly) so beautiful and gorgeous and there was one time when we started sharing the microphone around for some jokes (well, some trips were LONG).  My joke repertoire consisted of two...
Joke 1 - What do you call the cows laying on the flat ground over there???
              Ground beef
Joke 2 - What do you call the cows standing on the side of the hill???
              Lean beef

I KNOW - Funny as.....

Extra Lean beef!!!!


Well of course then one of the fellows decided he would like to share a joke with everyone.
The microphone was sent down the back of the coach (not a bus - coaches have toilets and therefore are called coaches!!!) and off he began.  Now I was up the front of the coach by this stage and although listening, was also having a chat with the driver. All of a sudden the driver looked at me and said "Oh shit, you better get that microphone back - I wouldn't even tell you this joke and that's saying something!!!!"

So trying to break Usain Bolt's record for the dash down the aisle, and with the driver then slamming on the brakes so I got there even faster, I managed to wrangle the microphone from this particular passenger with one or two very terse words spoken.   Oh well, at least I didn't have any one die on THAT trip!!!

Then of course there was my time working for Carlton and United Breweries where I looked after all the promotions for their yuppie boutique beers, three wineries and Laurent Perrier Champagne House.
But I can't remember any of it so just use your imagination!!!

Of course, my career has expanded a number of industries - I even worked in the very unglamourous world of fashion magazines.  Although perhaps telling one of the editors that I thought her previous issue was full of crap and did she actually know who her readers were probably wasn't one of my best career moves!!!!!
And this was similiar to the look I received


There are many more stories so obviously many more blog posts about my career to come.

But last week when I did a day's teaching of 7 year olds (I needed to regain my sanity!!!) I was a little surprised when one of the little darling's said to me....
"Oh man, Mrs E, I can't wait to get home and rip this bloody bra off. It's killing me!"
And my response  "Me too darling, me too!"



Hope your having a good day/night at whatever work you do!

Cheers
Lisa   xox

p.s. One of my work colleagues was having a really tough day today through no fault of her own (although I was the one who was working in the dental waiting room!!!)  Be nice to your colleagues - sometimes they just need to be told they are ok!!

Sunday 10 February 2013

The Golden Touch

So it is the end of a busy busy weekend. We have been madly packing, cleaning, mowing, gardening, cleaning, packing, weeding and packing and cleaning over the past few days.

The latest move is just days away (with a major event I have to run between now and then) so we have been very busy. 

But of course, the road is never a smooth one in the life of these Country Gypsies and there have been one or two issues over the past few days just to test one's patience!!

It all started on Friday when I was about to mow.  Filling the tank of the mower with petrol (and slight spillage as I do EVERY TIME!!) and trying to rip the cord out of its socket to start it, as per every use, it cranked up then faded away to nothing.

Almost managing to dislocate my shoulder each time I pulled the cord, I no doubt looked a sight when Mr B, Charlie the Wonder Dog's pseudo Godfather - this is where he escapes to on a very regular basis- pulled up asking if I needed a hand. My reply mentioned something about the Pope being a Catholic and luckily for me (well I didn't want to look any more of an idiot than I do!!!) Mr  B couldn't get it working either so kindly offered me his mower to use.

Now this was very very kind of Mr B and I did take up his offer but WHY OH WHY COULD IT NOT HAVE BEEN ANY OF THE OTHER PEOPLE WHO LIVE IN THE STREET WHO ALL HAVE FRIGGING RIDE ON'S!!!!!

So thinking that I had better find out what was wrong with the mower I then went down to my lovely Friend MR A who fixes lawn mowers. Of course, the wonderful MR A did indeed fix the mower, and replace the broken fuel cap and the missing bolt  and then ever so kindly advised  me that I had been putting the wrong frigging fuel in the machine!!!!!!!!

Of course, I also had trouble with the whipper snipper (what is it with Big W and their gardening machinery) so I had to take that to the lovely MR A who then showed me where (and indeed what) the choke is so I managed to get that working too!!

Oh but don't think it stops there.

Over the weekend I have also managed to splash petrol in my eye and have the petrol station man BEG me to go to the hospital to have my eye washed out (well of course I didn't - who was going to drive home!) so just excuse any spelling errors as I am typing with the use of only one eye! And honestly, how bad can it get?? And I have no idea what type of petrol it was but I do know there was some slight spillage at the petrol station but I'm sure the HASMAT team got that sorted (HASMAT - I have no idea but hopefully you get my meaning).

Oh and I also have a rather large piece of tree embedded in my leg which I can't get out - from flicking up from bloody mowing but I'm sure it will eventually pop out (I hope - anyway!).

And of course then when another wonderful friend came over with a trailer that I could use to get rid of green crap, I decided to hand over a 6 pack of beer. But of course, that ended up in approximately 3 million pieces on the kitchen floor before I could even hand it over!

Did I also mention that upon WALKING...YES MERELY WALKING past a lamp on a table, I then managed to knock that off and smash it into 45 000 pieces.

So yes, it appears I have the Golden Touch at the moment. Anything I touch turns to gold - or perhaps even a slightly off yellow colour, and in 3500000000000 pieces.

Let's just say, BRING ON MONDAY!!!!!!

Hope your weekend was trauma free :)

Cheers

Lisa  xox