narrating kayoz

Poetry Salon

I've just come back from a 'poetry salon' at Tilleys in Lyneham with the lovely and talented poet, Sarah Tiffen. Who just happens to be a friend of mine too :)

Sarah is poet in residence at Tilleys at the moment. She goes in there a couple of times a week during the day to sit and write and whatever, and she's hosting these salons on (at the moment) Thursday evenings. So far it's just been three of us going (and I missed last week), but we have high hopes of it!

And since it is just three friends there'd be a good chance that we would just sit and chat the whole time, but actually, we really did read and talk about poetry, at least for part of the time.

I remember having this moment, the first year I was in uni, sitting on the steps outside the library: I remember suddenly thinking, feeling, I'm here, I'm at University. Like Cambridge, or Oxford - only not. Actually I was at Flinders Uni in Adelaide, which was only about 25 years old at the time, so did not have the history or ambiance of somewhere like Oxford.* But I had spent my early teenage years reading about Tolkien and CS Lewis and Oxford and the Inklings, and I suddenly had that sense of being there, at university, studying literature, just like them.

Well, the first week of our poetry salon I had a similar moment. Not quite the same awe, but the sudden sense of - I don't know. Like we could do something here. We could, for instance, actually talk about poetry, not just chat on like we usually would. And then we did! Woohoo.

Anyway, it was fun. Sarah wants to take it a bit further - maybe read some of our own poetry, or even have a performance night, or even more unlikely, actually write something.** I don't know about that, but I am going to keep going along. Of course, I can't actually afford to eat at Tilleys (my one decaf coffee tonight cost me $4.70 - can that be right?), but the atmosphere is great.

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*Then again, it didn't have signs saying you could only walk on the grass if accompanied by a fellow, which Oxford does, snotty place.

**Not that I in anyway consider myself a poet, but I did write a few poems that I'm a little bit proud of in the course of doing my masters project last year.

Getting back on track: writing, blogging and the Fab Fatties Challenge #2

I have been back at work for nearly a year now (I started back at the beginning of July).

In that time I have written almost nothing, submitted absolutely nothing (despite having several pieces either ready and waiting or just about ready to submit), have blogged very little, have gained about five kilos, have had one miscarriage and have not (since then) gotten pregnant.

One of the reasons I haven't been blogging much is that people at work might read it (being in a web team is quite different that way, as it turns out, to being in a communications team). Not that I mind if they do, exactly, it's just that there are things one usually doesn't talk about at work - trying to get pregnant, for instance - that one might blog about ad infinitum.

So here's my little disclaimer* for work folk:
Feel free to read. Feel free to comment. Don't talk to me (or preferably anyone else) about it at work. At least, not if it's something you think I wouldn't talk about at work. Like trying to get pregnant - not always something that's good for one's career, though it's not politically correct to say so. But I learned that the hard way last time.

Also - some notes for anyone new to the blog, eg, someone from work:

• it took me 17 cycles and one miscarriage to conceive Mikaela.
• I only have one ovary.
• my mum started going through menopause before she hit 40.
• my sister took four years to produce her beautiful son
• I am 37, Chris is nearly 41...

So just because I'm trying to get pregnant, doesn't mean I'm going on maternity leave any time in the next year. Or ever. Just so we're clear.

Now, back to the point of this post, which is not that it's seven months since my miscarriage and I'm not pregnant, despite being convinced that May was the month it would happen. Nor about the lack of blogging lately.

No, it is about the fact that I've put on about five kilos since I started back at work.

There are a few reasons for this - too much junk food at work and not enough exercise being high on the list - but the main one is that I lost my focus.

I got back down to my goal weight of 63kg early last year.** I had a health check within a month of starting work that determined that my healthiest weight range is something like 62-66kg. All good. And then I started trying to get pregnant again. And then I got pregnant again. And then I had a miscarriage. And somewhere in there I told myself I could eat whatever I liked (ie lots and lots of chocolate) because obviously I deserved it.

Yes, I have issues around food and deserving and comfort and anger and self image and shame and probably all sorts of other things. As I'm sure have blogged before,*** I took a long time to acknowledge any of this, let alone to acknowledge that I was overweight, still less that I cared. I was a feminist. And we feminists don't care what we look like, do we? Right...

Actually it was two things that snapped me out of it. It was realising (shortly after Liam was born), that I was unhealthily overweight (and I was, trust me on this, I'm not talking putting on five kilos here), and also that that was not okay now that I was a mother, and realising that however much I pretended not to notice or care, other people just had to look at me to know I was unhealthily overweight. I was fooling no-one.

Despite all this, now that I am back to an ordinary sort of weight I have largely gone back to pretending that none of that happened. That I don't have any food/weight issues. That I am, in short, too cool to care.

Well, I'm not. And that is why I am now taking back my focus and my control. It may take me another year to get pregnant (although we've given ourselves a deadline of this December, so lets hope not), or it may never happen. So to say even half consciously to myself (as I have, if I'm honest, been doing) that I can wait till after the next baby's been born to get back on track is ridiculous. It is self-delusion.

Food tracking, I've discovered, is my best defence against over-eating. So food tracking is what I will do. And to jump start myself, I am signing up for the Fab Fatties Challenge #2 - there are about five hours left to sign up, but if you do, make sure you tell them I sent you so I get me some 25 points in the challenge!****

The challenge goes for two weeks from today (May 29) and involves the following - all of which I am going to try to do every day (except the one about not drinking 'soda pop' since I don't do that anyway).

• Eat 5 servings of fruits and vegetables daily- 5 points
• Drink 8 glasses of water a day- 8 points
• Exercise- 1 point per minute
• Do a random good deed- 5 points
• Stop drinking soda pop for a day- 1 point
• Actually read someone else’s blog post and leave a comment- 1 point
• Answer [their] Fab Fatties random bonus questions about [them]- 5 points
              -Bonus questions will be posted daily on [their] blog.
• Recommend 2 fabulous friends from twitter and tell us why we should follow them- 2 points
• Eat a healthy breakfast-1 point
• Lose weight- 1 point per pound
• Keep a food journal for the day- 5 points per day
• Take a walk during you lunch break- 5 points
• Have a friend join this challenge- 25 points per friend
              -make sure your friend tells us you recruited them!

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*I've probably said this before, I'm just a little paranoid and still haven't come to terms with this weird collision of offline-personal, work, and online lives that facebook has created.

**Back down not from all the weight I gained during pregnancy - though there was some of that - but from all the weight I gained while trying and failing to become pregnant beforehand.

***But it was a loong time ago, before categories, let alone tagging, when I still did each entry by hand in dreamweaver, and I can't find it.

****And thanks to Food Food Body Body which is where I discovered the challenge.

Decadence, thy name is Kahlua

Back when I was 18 and living in a group house with a couple of (male) friends, the absolute height of decadence was a Saturday night at home, without the housemates but with my best friend Susan, swooning over Booker, eating chocolate (preferably dark and peppermint), and drinking very small glasses of Kahlua.

To this day the taste of straight Kahlua - the delightful sensation of it just slightly burning my mouth, my throat - spells decadence to me.

I don't drink it much because, well, I don't drink much alcohol in general, and besides it's expensive and I am a penny pincher. So one bottle will last me a year or more. But when I do partake a little, it takes me straight back to that feeling of slightly forbidden luxury. Delicious.

I have been de-friended.

Just before Christmas I was de-friended (by email) by an old friend (from my undergraduate years at uni). It was the first time that's ever - at least openly, explicitly - happened to me. It was ostensibly based largely on a misunderstanding (she was mad that I hadn't replied to an email telling me she was pregnant, but I had never received the email), but I'm guessing it's really more a long term resentment that I don't call/write/whatever enough. And, interestingly to me, that impression of hers seems to be partly due to my presence on Facebook.

From her perspective (I think) I spend enough time on facebook that I should have time to call her more often. Actually, I spend very little time on facebook, but because I often leave it open half the day, and check and comment on people's status updates when I pop into the study for five minutes here and there - not to mention update my own status via twitter (which is sometimes via mobile phone, so I'm not even at my desk), it seems to her like I'm there a lot.*

I replied to her cross email immediately, of course, even though I was in the middle of packing to leave for our holiday (which I always do at the last minute, so we didn't end up leaving until really late and didn't end up getting there until 11:30 at night, at which point the kids were so excited by their bunk beds that they didn't get to sleep until 2am - so you can see that stopping in the middle of my packing really meant something). And then later - while we were away - I decided to add her to a limited friend list in facebook so that she wouldnt see my status updates any more. I was starting to feel paranoid about them. That's when I discovered that she'd also defriended me on Facebook (unless she's quit facebook altogether, which is certainly a possibility I suppose).

When I got back from our holiday (we went to Forster to visit my grandfather for Christmas, did I mention that?) I emailed her again, just a brief email to reiterate the main points of my (rather longwinded) first one - that I was sorry I'd hurt her, that I hadn't known she was pregnant but was thrilled to hear it, that I did value her friendship. She hasn't replied, and for all I know she sent my emails straight to the trash without reading them. Or she read my first one and got more offended, I don't know (her email was *quite* sarcastic, so while I thought I was being all objective and conciliatory in my first email, I think I was actually feeling rather defensive).

I've considered calling her. Maybe it's a no brainer that I should have called her to begin with. Email is probably not the best medium for such conversations. But when I got her original email I was in middle of packing and was really needing to get Kaely down for a nap (yeah, we left *really* late). I could have called when we got back from the holiday (I did tell her we were about to leave town for a week), but... the truth is when I re-read her email I felt pretty cross myself. She was awfully sarcastic and frankly she seems to have cut me off over a misunderstanding without bothering to give me the benefit of the doubt, or even a hearing. And given that we see each other so rarely anyway, I wonder if our friendship can come back from that. She could apologise (though she may not), I could apologise (and I have - for being generally unavailable - it's true that she would call me more often than me her, though I'm talking once or twice a year here), but can that make the bad feelings go away sufficiently, or would it simply mean that we were ostensibly friends again only to lose touch less deliberately?

I did value her friendship, she's a lovely person and a pleasure to spend time with. But I'm worried that if I call her she won't apologise, and we'll both get cross, and instead of patching things up it will leave things as they are but with an even worse taste in both our mouths. Or alternatively we'll patch things up but my every interaction with her will be tinged with guilt that I don't make more effort and therefore resentment that she expects me to, and... well, given that we really don't see much of each other anyway - she lives in country Victoria, and I haven't made it down to see her since her wedding four years ago, and she hasn't been up here for even longer - is it really worth it?

And, I admit that I do feel cross that she seems to have written me off so easily, so there's a part of me that wants to just say to hell with her.

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*This is a whole different post that I am probably never going to get around to writing, but it is an interesting side of social networking sites -that they make your every action so open, people can easily measure - how many times did she write on X's wall, compared to Y's wall or my wall? And, especially when there are people who use social media extensively who are 'friends' with people who use them only hesitatingly, there are bound to be some of these issues pop up.

I lost all my email

I reformated a hard drive thinking I'd taken everything off it that I needed.

I hadn't.

I accidentally deleted all my kayoz email. I practically never clean my email out (though I do use filters) so I had emails going back - well all the years I've had the kayoz domain, so I guess that would be going on for nine years. All my passwords, all your email addresses, everything. Damn.

And now I need to remember my password for that account so I can set it up to download again.

Damn damn damn.

10,000 steps

I've join the 10,000 step challenge at work this week. I've only done four days so far, but what I've discovered is that on a normal home-with-kids day I have no trouble getting to around 10,000 steps or more, but on work days, unless I make an extra effort, I'd probably only get to 7-8000.

Of that 8000, I get about 3-3500 walking to and from the bus (so if for some reason I get picked up, there goes a good chunk of it) and about 1000 on my daily walk around the outside of the building at lunch. The rest is incidental.

By comparison, on a day when I'm home with the kids, I've done about 3000 steps before I even get out the door to take Liam to school!

Moral: I need to go for longer walks for lunch, or more evening walks with the kids. We're doing the latter a bit again, now that it's staying late for longer. But it involves getting dinner organised a little bit early and skipping the time Liam and I usually spend reading and chatting, while Chris and Kaely either look at books or - often - go for walk on their own.

Dinner with friends (and no kids!)

I have just been out to dinner - in an actual restaurant, and with no children present - with four women I went to uni with. We did our honours year in English together, and were all slightly on the outer as a result of being older, and/or having come from a different university (me), or taken a year off to have a baby or whatever. We've been meeting up from time to time every since, but I think this is the first time since Liam was born (at least) that we've managed to do it completely child free.

These women are all fabulous successes, although they may be surprised to hear themselves described that way. One of them has just had her third novel published, one is about to launch her third book of poetry, one had to rush off to rehearsal for a play she's performing in, and one is a branch head in a government department. I'm amazed I didn't feel completely inadequate in their company actually, when I put it like that, but of course I also know the ups and downs in their love lifes, the joys and worries with their kids (and - almost - grand kid in one case), their homes, their day jobs... I know that they're four amazing women but also that they are human just like me.

It was a lovely night. We talked and laughed and managed to avoid crying. I haven't been out with friends like that for ages. I'm going to try to do it more often.

[And now, it's off to bed, old fogie that I am, it's nearly 10 o'clock and past my bedtime. Besides, I'm on my third week of this damn virus and it still hurts to swallow. I need my sleep.]

In cotton wool

It's a weird feeling having completely blocked ears. It's like I'm living inside my own little cotton wool wrapped bubble. I can hear most things but I can't hear the more subtle sounds, and I can't tell, when I'm not hearing anything, whether it's because there's no sound or just because of the cotton wool effect.

Brrrr

It must ber cold outside this morning, because I've been in my nice warm office building for a good ten minutes now (after a ten minute walk from the bus) and my face still feels slightly frozen - almost numb around the edges - and my fingers still aren't working properly.

Back in the workforce

I feel I should be blogging about the Garnaut Report today, but I haven't got the detail of it yet, and besides I'm sure there are many, many other people doing it better than I could.

So instead I'm going to blog about my new job. I started back to work in the public service this Wednesday. I'm still officially working for my old area (that is, they're paying for me), but I'm located in a different area. It's web work basically. Initially it looked like it would be more writing and editing, but it looks like it might end up being more the technical side of things, though perhaps with some editing, or at least providing advice about writing for the web.

And that's okay with me, because I'm going to be learning new stuff. Yesterday, for instance, I learned some new things about coding in XHTML (strict) which I haven't done before. Also the main website I'm going to be working on is in a content management system which I haven't used before, and the intranet (managed by the same area) uses SharePoint, which I also haven't used before.

More importantly even than the work, the team appears to be fairly together. By that I mean they seem to like each other, they're interesting people, and I think they'll be fun to work with. My last team was peopled with lovely people, but was nonetheless rather dysfunctional - most people didn't seem to want to be there. I think this is going to be quite different. There are also a number of other part-timers in the team, which is a good sign. I've only spent a day and half in their company, so I could be wrong about this team. But I don't think I am.

When I was studying psychology in year eleven, I remember reading that people's beliefs tend to match their behaviour to the extent that if you manage to change someone's behaviour their belief system will usually follow.

I've been back at work three days, and already I can see that working on me. I think I might just like working. True, it costs me the time I've spent writing over the past year. And if someone would pay me to sit in my study and write - write the stuff I want to - than yes, I would choose that. But you know, there's something rather pleasant about getting out of the house, getting to dress-up a bit, maybe even put on some makeup (though I predict that won't last another week) and be with other people.

Another nice thing is that while I was on leave the function of government I work under was moved from one department to another. So I am working in a new department, and of all the departments there are, it is probably the one I would choose. (The one I was in wasn't bad, but only because of the function that came across to the new department*, and even so, I didn't feel quite as at home there as I think I will here.) And now I am working in the main part of the department, so that potentially opens up opportunities to move into other areas at a later time.

And so, for the first time really in years I can see myself starting to think of this as a potential career, rather than just a job. So much, I think, depends on the team you find yourself in. I hope this one goes on as well as it has started.

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*Sorry about the confusing code, I don't want to actually mention department names. Though anyone from my team who read this would immediately know who I am, so I'm not sure why I am so careful. It's just my policy.

One blissful day, or, Meeting Trish, Eating Oysters and Getting a Fabulous Massage. Mmm...

Yesterday was a day worth repeating.

First there was the morning. Then there was the afternoon. And then there was the late afternoon. Mmm.

But perhaps I should begin at the beginning. For Mother's Day this year I got a gift voucher. It was for a massage, a special kind of massage, from my husband. He is a qualified massage therapist, but this is not the sort of massage he would give anyone else. I leave the details to your imagination.

But the trick was finding the time and space - kid free time and space - to make the most of such a gift voucher.

Actually, that's not the beginning. The beginning was more than two years ago when Trish first said, "Let's get coffee together." At the time she was working and I was working. On my non-work days I had Liam. On my work days I didn't have a car. Also I was heavily pregnant. And then she got sick. Long story short - we never managed to get together before Mikaela was born.

Roll forward two years to Trish emailing last week to point out that with neither one of us working now (not for money anyway) we had no excuse. So yesterday morning we had coffee. We got a lovely sunny table at Cafe Fontaine on the top level of the Canberra Centre, and for two hours we talked and drank coffee and ate yummy blueberry pancakes. And I'm here to tell you that in person Trish was just as lovely and interesting as she is on her blog.

We talked about the way people can seem different in person to the way they do on paper - pen-friends, or job interviewees, for instance. And yet somehow I never made the connection to the two of us, meeting for the first time in person, after a few years now of reading and commenting on each other's blogs. Afterwards I thought about it - was she different in person? I decided that one meeting was perhaps not enough to go on, but if I had to make a call I'd have to say not particularly. Luckily we decided to get together again in August, so I will pay more attention then!

While I was having this lovely morning with Trish, Liam was in school and Kaely was at my mother's house. Liam finishes school at 12:30 on Fridays, but my child-free day didn't end then. No, my mother picked Liam up and took him home with her, while I picked up Chris for a romantic lunch date. This was planned as a sort of last hurrah before I go back to work next week, as well as a nice lead-in to using my gift voucher later in the day. But it also worked out to be a celebration of me finally posting off my bound masters project the day before.

We went to Delissio in Curtin. Mmm, yum.

We started with a dozen piping hot Oysters Kilpatrick, served around a hill of rock salt. That cost $24 which is about what I had initially planned to spend on this whole meal, but they were well worth it. Then we each had pasta dishes. Mine was a chicken, sundried tomato, pesto sort of thing. It was very good, though not out of the ordinary. Chris had something with seafood (predictably). I didn't pay attention to what exactly it was, but he looked like he enjoyed it. To finish we shared a Lindt chocolate fondant. A hot chocolate pudding with a lightly crunchy crust and a gooey chocolate sauce centre, served with a mint coulis and just enough cream. It was as good as the oysters and that is saying something. To keep ourselves hydrated we also had a glass of wine each with the meal and coffee with dessert. We were the last people in the restaurant (everyone else looked like they had to go back to work, poor dears) - we didn't get out of there until three.

Of course, a single glass of wine - even when strung out over a couple of hours and a solid meal - is enough to put me to sleep. So it was just as well Chris took some time to set up the massage room when we got home (with candles and an oil burner and so on), while I got to relax with the last of the Diana Wynn Jones series that has been my reward for finishing my project. Then, finally, I got to use my gift voucher. And let me just say that despite working professionally as a Rolfer and remedial massage therapist, Chris does a darn good relaxation massage when he sets his mind to it. And what there was beyond that, is not for this blogger to tell.

I'm creating a new category called 'the story of my life' I think I'm stealing it from Dawn.

Oh yes, there it is on her list.

That's all.

The sound of metal on metal

We were very nearly in a car accident yesterday.

I was driving down the Parkway (freeway, speed limit 100kph, two lanes each way), on the way to drop Liam at school. It was raining, though not hard, and the traffic was slow. Up ahead I noticed a car swerve into the left hand (slow) lane, perhaps thinking that we were going to have to merge anyway, if there was an accident up ahead, but then a few cars later it swerved back into the - now slightly faster - right lane. Why people do this is a mystery to me. It simply cannot make that much difference to how quickly you get where you're going, and frankly, it's dangerous. My suspicion is that someone doing exactly that is what caused the accident we weren't quite in.

Traffic was slow, as I said, but still moving along okay. I would guess no accident up ahead, just Canberra drivers in the rain. The brake lights of the car in front of me came on, so I gently slowed also. Then I realised there was nothing gently about the slowing, the traffic was almost coming to a stop suddenly. So I put my brakes on significantly harder. Luckily tailgating is a pet peeve of mine, so I had plenty of room. It did cross my mind though, as I quickly slowed, to hope that the driver behind me was paying attention. She was. Unfortunately the driver behind her either wasn't, or hadn't left enough room.

There was a thunk and a crunch and as I glanced into my rear view mirror I saw the car once-removed behind me bouncing off the one immediately behind. I think the rest of the traffic managed to steer clear, and both cars were moving off the road, even as I was wondering if I should stop, and realising that I couldn't, being in the right hand lane and already moving on.

I hope no one was hurt. I told Liam - who had clearly heard the accident, though not seen anything - that they seemed to be okay, as they were both able to drive off the road, but of course, I don't really know.

It really drove home for me how easy it is to be in an accident. I mean, I never have been (touching wood as I type) and I've never even seen one happen before. Though once, as Chris and I were heading down to Melbourne in the driving raining, a car spun out of control on the other side of the road, spun onto the median strip, and looked very likely to spin off it right into our path. But didn't. The driver managed to get control finally, just before he hit our side of the road.

But that's just it. In either of those cases, there was nothing we could really do. Certainly for the driver behind me yesterday, she did everything right, but still, someone crunched into the back of her.

Last year one time Liam accidentally peed in his car seat, and the next day (while the cover was drying) I let him sit in the middle seat with just a lap belt, just to drive across the suburb. I went at 40kph the whole way. A few weeks later I read of a girl - about four or five I think, I can't quite remember - who was in a car accident driving in a school (40) zone. She was only wearing a lap belt too. And she died, of internal injuries caused by the belt. I've never let Liam do that again. And I know, it's highly unlikely to happen, but the thing is, sometimes accidents do happen, and you can't actually control the when.

What's up with my body?

<whinge>
I am sick. Again. For the nth time in the past six or eight months. So far, this time, it's just a cold. But it's the second cold I've had in a month and bout the zillionth this year, on top of that awful flu and then appendicitis. What is wrong with my body this year? And how in hell is it going to manage to produce a pregnancy in this shape, much less a real live baby?
</whinge>

Where I have been....

I came out of hospital the night before last, having gone to the emergency room on Tuesday morning with what I suspected - rightly, as it turned out - was acute appendicitis. I am now sans appendix, but with plenty of extra stitches, needle tracks and pain. Oh and nausea and lightheadedness, which you'd really think would have worn off by now. I do not like this after effect of general anesthetics.

Anyway, I can't really sit at this computer for long (sitting upright is still quite painful, but leaning back in my chair is not really cutting it either) but just wanted to post a 'pity me' update. :)

I have some other more exciting news (no, I'm not pregnant) but I can't post it yet - have to tell some people verbally first. I'll let you know as soon as I can.

Updated to add: Something that came out of the surgery - it appears I really do only have one ovary. The last laparoscopy was right, the ultrasound, wrong. Because I was born with only one, I still seem to ovulate each month, so it doesn't explain why I'm not pregnant. It just just means I need to not have even one ectopic pregnancy (which is what I'd prefer anyway).

Of course it would also means all that stuff about maybe only having one kidney (wrong) and having a smaller uterus which may take a few miscarriages to learn to grow properly (also wrong) but I dealt with all that before. (Sometime I'll come back and add links in here for those who come to this page via a 'single ovary' search - all that stuff is covered in the pregnancy archives I think).

The way to my heart

I knew Chris was hoping to get lucky tonight, so before he left for his Hapkido class I said to him "You know, they say the way to a man's heart is through his stomach. You want to you know the way to a woman's heart?"

"Through her sweet tooth?" he guessed.

I was going to say through the part of her stomach that digests chocolate, but I thought that was close enough.

(PS I wrote 3500 words on my novel today, and I only aimed for 2000.  Plus I balanced and paid my credit card bills. So I feel I can justify two short blog entries quite easily.)

A morning off

Guess what I'm doing tomorrow? I'm having the morning off.  Totally.  No child, no husband, no studying and best of all, no job.

I think I might get my legs waxed. True, the last time I did that it hurt so much I swore I'd never do it again, so it may seem like an odd choice for my first morning off in longer than I can remember.  But I was eight months pregnant at the time, so maybe that wasn't such a good idea in the first place.  And I had to shave them a couple of weeks ago for that formal wedding I went to, so now they're all prickly. Smooth legs would be a nice change.

You know what I discovered when I shaved them? It doesn't even last a day! I shaved at about 11am.  At midnight, when I stripped off my red dress and stockings and pulled on my flannel pyjamas, they were already prickly.  What is with that? I know it happens on guys' faces, but I thought I'd get a least a day of smooth legs. Now I know why I used to get them waxed regularly.

I have more to say about this - well, not so much about leg hair, but about having the morning off  (why I do, for instance) - but it will have to wait until later.  Liam wants to have a picnic RIGHT NOW.

Holiday returns

I'm just back from almost two weeks away - down in Victoria visiting friends and family.  I wish I could say I feel refreshed but really I feel anything but.  The first week or so was wonderful, we all enjoyed catching up with friends - even Liam, who was great throughout the trip (well, mostly).

After that unfortunately things got more stressful, for personal reasons I won't go into yet, and I spent the past few days dwelling again on work/parenting balance issues and how to resolve them.  You'd think on holidays I could forget about work wouldn't you? I did only have one day where the difficulty breathing returned, and only one insomniac night. Anyway, I'll write more later.  Right now I have some phone calls to make.

Feeling dizzy

By they way, has anyone else had a virus lately mostly characterised by dizziness, and maybe nausea? I suddenly started feeling dizzy yesterday morning, and although it hasn't been entirely constant (it was mostly gone yesterday afternoon/evening) it came back in full force this morning, accompanied by nausea. And no, it's not pregnancy (I don't think!). A friend at work told me she had it - just the dizziness though - all last week, and then my Pilates instructor told me she had two clients who were also complaining of dizziness. Weird. Must be some virus that acts on the inner ear I guess.

The joy of doing dishes vs the joy of finishing my essay

Yesterday our dishwasher broke down. Actually, it may well have broken on Friday, since we hadn't put it on since then. Not that we didn't have the dishes. We did. In fact, I packed it, completely full, on Saturday morning. And then, somehow forgot to put it on. And because I spent the rest of the day studying, and Chris spent the rest of the day trying to keep Liam out of my hair, we didn't look in there all day. So come Sunday morning, when I opened it up to unpack and repack, I was confronted by a dishwasher full of dirty dishes. These were in addition to all the dishes we'd accumulated on Saturday of course.

Does that not sound like such a bad story? Two days worth of dishes can't be so very bad can it? But it gets worse. Sunday I was studying and Chris was keeping Liam occupied while at the same time cleaning house. Why? Because we were having a dinner party of nine that night. My brother and his girlfriend are visiting from the States very briefly, so we had a family dinner at our house. But because the dishwasher wasn't completely buggered, it took Chris a while to notice that it wasn't working - it did the rinse cycle then stopped. It had been doing that a bit last week, and in fact we had someone already booked to come and look at it this morning. So when Chris happened to notice that it had stopped, but not finished, he started it again. It did the rinse cycle, then stopped. In desperation, not wanting to believe that it was completely hopeless, I am ashamed to admit that we tried this more than half a dozen times between us over the course of the day.

It wasn't until lunchtime, when Liam was napping and I came up for air, that Chris broke the sad news to me. Our dishwasher was done for. And we had a lot of dishes to get through before the 6pm dinner guests arrived. Plus Chris had to cook that dinner, and there were other household cleaning chores to do. Goodbye essay, hello housework.

Not that I'm complaining. Tonight, for instance, I was planning to study. And then I saw the kitchen - I did some of the dinner party dishes last night, and Chris did some more today while Liam was asleep, but there were still some left - and today's dishes of course. So instead of studying, I got to rediscover the joy of having a clean kitchen by my own hard work. And, having it clean at night. Normally we leave the dishes till the morning and pack/unpack the dishwasher and generally clean up while Liam either watches Play School or draws/plays with play dough in the high chair. And by lunch time it's all a mess again. This way it is nice for the evening and will still be nice when I get up tomorrow. And the bonus is - no study time.

Oh yeah, have I mentioned how much I hate studying? Was that me, three or four weeks ago, thinking I might like to do a PhD next? Who am I kidding? Studying sux! And believe me, Liam agrees. He is truly sick of mummy going to work so much. Did I mention his latest excuse for not having a bath/eating dinner/getting dressed etc? He says "No Mummy, I'm too busy. This is my work!" No kidding.

PS The truly sad part? $140 spent today to get someone to diagnose the dishwasher's problem, $400 more to fix the it. We already spent around $200 on it about 18 months ago. An equivalent new one would be around $1000. So now we have to decide: do we cut our losses and do the environmentally irresponsible thing, dispose of this one and buy a new one, OR do we fix this one and hope that we don't just have to spend another $540 on it next year?

PPS I wouldn't hate studying - I think - if only I could get paid for it. If I could do it instead of my paid job, instead of instead of Liam & Chris time, that would be OK. Fun even. I think.

PPPS I do realise that there is an alternative to spending either $400 or $1000 - sucking it up and doing our own dishes. But believe me, we are not good housekeepers. We are not good dish washers. Actually, we suck. We should not sacrifice our dishwasher. Truly. That one extra thing to fit into our day would probably be the thing that pushed us all over the edge. Liam especially.