Spring 2013Style!

Yes, it's been a while, bad blogger, no updates.


The house is now finished,
furnished and wonderful.

 
Sure there's some thought that needs to go into wall decoration and finishing touches,
and yes, I need to photograph it.


What happened?
 Life, life happened.


I went back to work and also started a new job-aside with a friend.


In fact, I can't tell you how nice it is to *collaborate* again.
Running your own ( solo ) business, even in this online age where I have a 100 colleagues
online to lean on, doesn't match the fun and energy I used to get from working alongside others,
bouncing wit, combining ideas and brainstorming. Much fun.

But i've popped in tonight as it's been Wonderful in old MelbsTown recently.


It wasn't a bad winter at all, but there's something about the blossoms and scent in the air ..
the late afternoons sports where the kids protest in confusion "but why isn't it dark yet?
It's supposed to be dark.."

We've got a sleepover tonight, and it's been a glorious day - 3 loads of washing dried
in the sun, started on weeds, did some pruning, marveled at new growth, then we headed
on down the beach for some sandcastle action and watched 9 ( NINE! ) brides battle for
the best position on the beach with their hired photographers and the hordes of many
taking pics with their i-pads.

Ugh.
No envy.






So anyway, a great day.
We came home & ordered fish & chips and walked up to collect them.
The kids watched a movie, and then had icecream.
And I loaded the dishwasher with a contented happy sigh.

"Did you have a hard day mum?" said my smallest? ( reacting to the sigh )
"What?" I asked, bemused ( because I didn't have a crankyface on )

 "Did you have a hard day, having to look after 3 kids?" ( with HIS concerned tv-dad face )


So cute, his empathy only topped off a great day.



House pics soon - I promise! x

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Summer Bay

When I was growing up, we spent 3years living in a caravan.

And no, not one of those luxury models with a toilet and shower, or with an annex built with permanent framing almost like a house with fancy furniture in it ( like those rich people a few sites down ) .. no, we lived in a small HOLIDAY sized caravan .. 2 bunks .. a kitchenette with a tiny tv* ( showing either Daktari or Mike Willesee, The Muppets, or news on the Azaria Chamberlain trial as I remember it.  )  When it rained, our canvas annex flooded.  When we need to pee at night, we did it in a bucket.  When we wanted to shower, we took a key to the ablution blocks and risked perverts, and wore our thongs/flip-flops in the shower.






Being high maintenence was not an option.  Owning things was not an option, possessions were sparse and at Christmas my mum would find an interesting dead tree branch and spray it silver and hang baubles off it.

My dad shot rabbits and went fishing.  Buckshot from the .22 in your meal was a nasty reality, even though mum did her best.  We ate fish/rabbit/fish/rabbit.  Every frikken night.  Or so it seemed.
I don't remember being happy, but I don't remember being unhappy either.  It was just my life.






I wasn't invited to other people's homes to compare and get jealous ( I only just thought of this then - funny?! - maybe I was the only one that didn't know I was trash .. or maybe I just wasn't allowed to have friends.. or maybe it was easier.. friends were dangerous .. can't have people knowing too much about us, best not make any? ) but we were new in town, and there was always new kids ( transients ) to play with in the caravan park .. and my sister.  I don't remember feeling teased or unliked.  That shit could wait to high school.







We arrived in town in Grade 4.  My father uprooted us in the middle of the night from our former home/town due to reasons unknown even today.  Personally I think someone was going to smash him for any number of reasons, so we just took off.  We lived in a house then, and we just left everything .. proper furniture .. the lot.  Still, it wasn't the first time we'd moved, and I don't remember missing anything.  You learn not to grow attached to things. 

I just remember coming home from school to find it pretty much empty and my prized Hanimex Camera was on the mantle, in a new brown vinyl case *squinty suspicious eyes*.  That meant something was happening.  I knew not to ask.  Questions get you in trouble.  I was 9yrs old.
I didn't get to say goodbye to my friends, or tell my teacher.  I just suddenly wouldn't be at school anymore.  Just like that.  Howdy Doody.







So we moved states and ended up in some town my parents travelled through once.  I don't know - I was probably excited.  I don't remember.  I guess it was an adventure.  I still have a good deal of 'pick up and leave and don't tell anyone and start a new life somewhere' in me, so it might be genetic**

So yeah, the caravan.
Grade 4 to Grade 6, maybe only 2yrs then .. but i'm sure it was 3.  I'm pretty sure we got a house before High School, which was a big relief, so maybe I was more aware of being trailer trash than I admit to.

Anyway, back to my present, we need to move out of the house come January.  We're knocking out some walls, getting a wardrobe, a functional kitchen and prepping the ceilings for an upstairs in the fure.  We can't afford the upstairs just yet, but since the ceiling has to come off anyway, they're putting in the foundations for a 2nd story.  Or something.







Which means we have to find alternate accoms.
At one stage I thought it would be cheaper to BUY a caravan on eBay and live in our driveway.
Which made me lose a day in an alternate universe and googling to find OUR caravan.

I lost a whole day of work.

I mean, we must have had only 2 sets of clothes each to fit in there?  And no toys.  I remember matchbox cars, but, having no friends ( or poor friends? ) I guess I had nothing to compare to - didn't everyone pee in a bucket?  I know I wanted a Baby Alive more than anything, but she never came.

We lived in a caravan.  Mum & Dad slept down their end, a mere 2 metres max from óur end' which was a set of bunks.  Me on the bottom, and my sister on top.  Our kitchen/living room was in the middle and 'bedtime' meant the vinyl concertina door would be slid across, thus blocking the light, but not the conversation.

It was probably weird.

I envy normal people.  People that grew up not weird.  I do.
I think they can smell the fraud on me ..



I got lots of stories.



When we moved to the house, I missed the sound of the crashing of the waves.




















---

*As an interlude, that TV also introduced me to Elvis movies, Gidget and Doris Day/Rock Hudson.
I first saw Lucille Ball movie on that tv. No I can't remember which one, but it was HILARIOUS, and no, I am not a gay male.


**I think i'm on my 5th life now, but i'm not dodgy.  Only changed my name once ( gladly ) to be married, but i've left whole lives behind me, personas that were me at the time that didn't fit anymore, friends I never really liked that liked me more ( but never knew the inner me, so didn't really know me at all ).


---

Note : All images in this post were found on eBay and caravan fan forums.  I couldn't find our exact caravan, but these come pretty close .. the textured fake glass/perspex with the bottle bottom imprint .. the fancy knobs on the siding doors where our clothes were stashed.. the fold down table that doubled as a bed for guests ( lucky them! ) .. the brown ..

It's all the same, only the names will change ..

Who doesn't love a bit of Bon Jovi, huh ?
You?

Well, that's too bad, perhaps you should leave.

But I bet you've got your own bogan secrets, beneath your contemptuous sneer.



International Day at school. Being a cowboy was the easy option, so naturally I took it. I told him he was an AMERICAN. Good enough.


My blog coding went a bit bonkers, so I had to change everything.
It will do for now. I like how my pics are now bigger, and you can tweet a post, or send it to Facebook, and stuff like that, share it around. Other stuff is a bit messy, but i'm time poor and so .. yeah.

Coulda Been a Contenda

I met AB some 15 years ago, I think ( I need to consult diaries, i'm a bit of a bloke in the significant dates dept ) and for that long, he always talked about having a shot at the British Open.

AB is a pretty good golfer - I can't really say how much, because I don't know, and he cant' spend as much time on it as required - you know, he has to bring home the bacon and whatnot.
But I know he's pretty good and I hear others talk about it, and I often read good things about him, and it makes me happy to know he's really really good at something. Pride, you know.

So for a good 2yrs leading up to this year, he planned a trip away. A tour to pay his way, and he was going to try and qualify. It didn't matter if he got in or not, the thrill was in the doing, the trying, the being there, the history, the story.

The trip has long been booked, dates set, eagerly anticipated ( well, not by me exactly, i'm home doing the solo-parent thang again ).

And for the first time, since all those years ago when we were dating.
They changed the dates.

I feel so sad :(
I just called AB to see if it was 'ok' to blog about, and he laughed and said he was over it .. but gee, if it were me ... ... anyway.

He's making it up by spending the time in Fromelles.
AB has just about read every book on WWI, and his grandfather is there, somewhere. He was very sad when we went to France in 2003 and he thought it would be a simple train ride, not a day-trip away .. so he will go there this time and pay his respects and love it.

AB is 40 this year. He's been bloke-joking this trip is his present to himself: No wife, no kids, ha-ha. It wasn't supposed to get back to me, but I know WIVES of blokes, and they tell me things.
Ahh, my teamsters, my spies :)

Not that i'm insulted

It just lets me plan for MY reward for my 40th ? ;)

T155

Yes, i'm banging on about water again.

The Vic govt has this new 'Target 155' scheme going on. Ads showing shiny happy people brushing their teeth without the tap running, and scraping ( as opposed to rinsing ) their plates before popping them in the dishwasher. The target apparently is for every person to reduce their personal usuage of water to 155litres PER person PER day.

Man, I thought, that sounds excessive.

I couldn't help but picture those kids from the WorldVision material, walking miles for a bucket of pissy unpure water for the whole family to probably bathe in and then cook with, or cook with, and then bathe in. Whatever. I tend towards the dramatic.

So we got our water bill yesterday and our WHOLE FAMILY of four uses 194litres per day. That's less than 50litres per person. According to my govt, it should be ok then for me to run out in the backyard and have waterfights and run the sprinkler.
Pisses me off.

Look, we're waterwise, but not Nazis. I do at least a load of washing each day, we shower, the boys have baths ( on the deck in tubs usually, keeps the house dry and I can sit out there with a wine and a book ensuring they don't drown. Noice ). I can't even reduce my showers to the recommended 4minute limit .. and sometimes I let the eldest boy play with a running tap because it gives me peace and he loves it.

So I can't help wondering: what are other people's bills like ?
Are you under T155 ? I want to know, because I think the current allocation is excessive, so why the fuck waste money on promoting it ? If everyone is using the amount we are for example, they're all going to pat themselves on the back and UP their usage as a reward for being good ( "Hey, we can run the sprinkler, we're way under T155!" )

The other thing that annoys me about this lame-arse scheme is that it doesn't take into consideration a sliding scale ( whereby the first person, or lone dweller would probably use 155, but then if s/he got a live-in boy/girlfriend, technically, the usage per person should come down. IMO ). It's a dumbed down system geared for the dumbed-down consumer, no doubt.

Anyway, i'm in a bit of a pissy mood today. Can you tell ?

Better Luck Next Year

Santa's Helpers Suck.


A while back, helpful people convinced me to take advantage of mid-year sales to stash things for Xmas.
We bought a twampoween.
Then, a few months back, AB moved some things in the garage, and basically accidentally did a big reveal.

That was supposed to be Santa's big gift.



So we got over it, decided we, the parentals, would gift the item. Santa would get something else, no biggie.

A week ago, I realised the wee one had only the one gift ( to about 5 for the bigger brother ), and we would have to get one more thing, so there would be a gift from us, and another from Santa. AB picked up the only item we could think of ( it's hard with same-sex sibs when the first boy already has a lot of stuff ), and tired and non-thinking, left it in the back seat of his car, and THEN let the older boy play in said vehicle.
Toy discovered, now relegated to a 1st Birthday gift.

Not happy, but it's not the boy's fault - what can you do ?
At least at this stage, he's still ok with "it's not yours, it's for someone else" and he just drops the subject. The tramp has remained undisturbed all this time, and there's been no nagging or questions. I think the backseat gift has all but been forgotten. But not so forgotten that we could pass off already-seen gifts as being from 'Santa'

And yesterday ? I'd brought in the washing and was putting it away. The phone rang and the wardrobe was open, and the older boy came in, and then I hear "what's this?!".

Well, it was his only gift from Santa, wasn't it ?

I felt like crying, I was so frustrated ( plus, I didn't know it was there, totally UNhidden, just sitting there .. it was something AB bought online and I thought it would still be hidden in its PostPak wrapping and perhaps on TOP of the wardrobe ?!?!? )

And yes, I could swap some gifts already under the tree from us, but I don't WANT Santa to be the guy that brings the lame beachtowel ( our gift ), I want Santa to bring the GOOD gift ( a toy, something FUN ! )

So AB went back to the Shopping Centre last night and picked up 2 more things, which *I* wrapped and hid last night ( so they *won't* be found ), but I was still bummed - the good gifts are now from us, and Santa is a bit of a let-down.

So I came up with the idea that Santa WILL bring the tramp. We will put some bricks in the box in the garage and pretend the one WE bought is still there, for someone else.

Do you think we can pull it off ?

I think we can, I hope we can ...

A Glimpse of my Future...

Where do mothers of teen boys shop at ?

Because I just made a catering-size batch of meatballs, and Daddy's not home yet, and my boys are wolfing them down
( with some help from me ( yum ).



One of said boys only has 2 teeth.

Jaysus.