Clown Will Eat Me

This is utterly ridiculous.

School holidays started officially today, husbandly has taken the small lad out for the afternoon and I have a shift tonight. Am I asleep? No, of course not. Will I be completely dead tonight? Of course I will.

Would somebody return my sensible operating head - I need it.

I had a whole pile of other things to mention since in my whole-life reorganization I have time for things now, but so much for that.

Can't sleep. You know the rest.

Teacher's Strikes and the Fidgets Have a Turn

This morning, for two hours, we have a teacher's strike. To protest the lack of special education places. The funny thing is, I don't recall being told anything about this prior to the strike being announced.

I should say, while I'm in a union, I have no real patience with teacher's strikes. The people to suffer are the students. It's a problem for me right now, as I have a shift tonight, so instead of being able to just go off to sleep today and hope for an unbroken three or four hours, I'm going to be lucky to get two hours instead, but that's neither here nor there in my mind. I could have dropped my son off to watch movies in the library.

Is the thinking that every time a strike gets called, oodles of upset parents contact the Department of Education and thus the problem is solved? I'm not inclined. If anything, I'm inclined to contact the teacher's federation and object to the holding to ransom of children and their education without appropriate notice to parents.

Want me to write a letter to the Department? Ask me. Lay out your case. I'm lucky enough that I'm not affected by this particular issue - but what's fair and right will never go out of fashion. If there are deficits in the education system (no doubt really, but I'm laying out my case), then involve all of the stakeholders. That includes me, my husband and my son. Talk! Find ways.

Going out on strike should only ever be a last resort.

Well, having got that little controversy off my chest, nothing much else to report.

From my keyboard to no-one's ears.

The Eyes Have It

I'm awake, it's true.

The new job. Oh, it is terrific. I'm repeating myself on that score quite a lot lately. I don't really believe I've been this lucky.

In May, after Alex's birthday, when all of the dishes were washed, everything done and squared away, I had this thought that "this is how normal people live". Now I'm there. I'm living like a normal person. I'm living - as opposed to lurching from one shift to the next, listening to all of the whingeing about how the roster, she is so bad; listening to complaints about everything under the sun.

My old job was not all bad in total, but it's leading that the best thing anyone can say about a workplace is "it's the same everywhere else". It isn't, something I already knew - after all, I had worked somewhere else - and now I'm living the proof of that. Granted (while I'm qualifying this), not everyone was in the same boat. And that's enough qualification.

I'm still in the honeymoon period, true; real shifts, all on my lonesome, are at the end of this week. All at full tilt (five-on, five-off, two-on, two-off) from then on - but I will have regular days off. I have plans in those days that I will be able to carry out.

Bliss.

So today's plans include some cleaning, some journal writing, some musing on the state of the non-existent but being worked on bathroom (renovations, thy name is hysterical laughter), and some kitchen planning, since that is the next room to go.

First things first. Mindless entertainment today - vacuuming plaster dust. The fun never stops.

Untying the Choking Brain

Finally done it.

I've quit my old job, got a new job and start on October 21. Whooppee!

It's a bit disconcerting that the response from most of my friends has been "about time!". Better late than never, I say, and if I had left earlier, I wouldn't have had the awesome opportunities of the Cerner project. So, could be worse.

Something that cracks me up about this: the willful misunderstanding of why I want to leave all this (what, the curtains?); disregarding that I might have some plans aside from working myself into the ground and assuming this is a negative move. I'm only leaving because I'm not happy? Really? Couldn't be because this is an awesome opportunity and I'm not subject to anyone else's whims than my own and my family's. Bahahahahaha.

Ooh, cat screech just went off in my head. Never mind. When I'm gone...I never have to think about any of this again.

Now onward to another night job, with better conditions, spread of shifts (i.e. there is a spread of shifts, rather than this lurching around with the previous roster). It's a bummer in some respects - finally our roster is getting attended to and I'm about to leave. Sigh.



Never mind, everything is going to be alright.

Spiffy Abounds

For some reason I'm sitting here with a blanket over my knees instead of turning on the air conditioning, but other than that, it's a normal day.

I look up at my ego wall and consider straightening one of my certificates inside its frame, but for some reason I feel affection for its skewed mien.

This week is more and yet more working night shifts with barely any breaks off, but oh well, what the hell, at least I'm not flying into a mountain.

Have once again finally had enough of the neighbour and just been over to ask her to keep it down. Much better than sitting here getting wound up every time her voice penetrates through the three closed doors and brickwork in between. Bloody hell.

Feeling a bit more than slightly guilty at the moment as I'm about a month overdue on my letters to my Aunty, but I hereby vow to write one today and print it on my beautiful new printer. It's awesome.

This afternoon's plan, since I'm free from cooking dinner tonight, is to take t'yoong man out to Campbelltown, buy some batteries for his beautiful new walkie-talkies, some vegetables for all of us and maybe call in to JB Hi-Fi or Dick Smith and get a new toy. A composite AV cable for my iPad, a cordless keyboard, or something. And an iTunes card while I'm there. Maybe. We need food more than we need that and I'll have to check the bank balance first. And I doubt Mark Latham will be there this time, as he was when I bought the printer.

The reason I'm free from cooking dinner tonight is because somehow the boys missed the dinner on the stove yesterday and had sandwiches. I enjoyed it though, although I think I rather overloaded my bowl for work. I spent the rest of the evening walking around very upright because my stomach was so full. Hard life, not.

The creative writing course has finished, although I didn't attend the last class. Originally when I booked in I was working every second week before the class. Not too bad, I think. HA! It turned out to be every week. So on the final, faced with exhaustion and an overwhelming desire not to be looked at like I had two heads, I chickened out.

The previous week I fell asleep at my desk just before the class started (at least it wasn't in class), and the horrified looks were a bit off-putting. So it goes. Still worthwhile, and if I can get the rest of my life sorted I'll book in for another couple that I have my eye on.

Getting my life sorted means getting out of this horrible roster and getting some normality back. Reclaim my life from its ashes and so forth. Possibly attend some social functions. Without having to go to work afterward.

Bliss.

Not just for smack-heads.

Wearing My Sunglasses At Night

There is an awful lot of glare on an iPad screen under fluorescent lighting.

I've applied for a job with a different hospital and health service. The hours are longer, but the conditions are better - I get consecutive nights off. I really, really, really, want this job, so I'm waiting with bated breath. Not baited breath. That's only good if you're Baldrick and want to catch a mouse.

I may have a life again. What a wonderful thought.

My plans, aside from basking in the glow of being awake, include writing in all of that free time. Going out to dinner with friends (hell, going out to lunch with friends, I'm not picky). Spending time plotting and planning the new kitchen and bathroom. Spending time with the boys. That sort of thing.

At the moment, while specimens happily sit on my instruments, I sit with my feet up typing in here. That sounds very relaxed, doesn't it? It's really because my feet hurt nearly all of the time, and sitting with my feet up helps.

It's a marvellous thought that this time next year I could be sitting in some other lab in the middle of the night, feet up (probably, night shift involves a lot of walking, so little doubt my feet will still hurt), much less woolly in the head, less deranged and able to plan life weeks in advance.

Onward, although I am having the nagging doubts about whether it will be better, the devil you know is better than the devil you don't, etc., etc. I keep reminding myself this is not about a job I'm getting, but rather the job I want to have. I'm not leaving the job I have because of all of its issues (of which there are legion); I'm going because I have other things I want to do.

Is it better to leave because things are awful and running away is the only option, or to leave because an opportunity exists? I'm going with the second one. If the first one also applies, so much the better.

Tomorrow is the end of my run of five midnights in a row; I have a whole one night off before I do another three. I would like to do some useful things tomorrow instead of just sleeping, but I think sleeping is probably the best option. I'll surface occasionally for the mum-ly things.

Or something..

Awesome iMac and not much else

Yesterday saw the arrival of the gorgeous and gorgeously huge new iMac. I love Apple products, so many things are so easy to do. I've had a little MacBook for about nine months and I love that to pieces anyway. Yesterday I spent time using Migration Assistant to transfer everything over. Took about an hour.

While the two macs talked to each other, t'yoong man and I went to buy some new jackets and shirts for school. He's made it into size 10, which for some reason grieves me. It's the double-figures size, I'm sure.

When we got home, the two macs had finished having their chat and then I discovered that none of my iTunes had transferred over. Okay, so what did I do wrong. A quick reboot and I discover that my account names are different. Ahh, easy fix then; delete the new ID and leave the user from the MacBook intact. It's all good.

Migration Assistant transferred everything, including TweetDeck, which I'd forgotten about in all of the excitement of unpacking and fiddling around.

While I fiddled around with that, Alex made himself castles (yes, castles, plural - if he didn't like it one way, he'd change it over to something else) and even made himself a flag he coloured in and flew proudly over whichever box was his turret. Now that's dedication.

I spent most of yesterday saying the word awesome a ridiculous number of times. Nothing else seemed to fit. Today I'm over the word awesome and would like another one.

Chilli?

Talons O'Death At Your Service

Toenails! It's all about toenails.

I've decided I am a very boring person, since I have spent this week doing virtually nothing but reading books, playing the Wii and painting pictures on small canvas squares; school holidays are my kryptonite. I've been off from work for the last two weeks and I'm down to my last day of freedom. I had plans to do a number of things, but the martini drinking got in the way.

At least, at least, the majority of study-related tidying has been done. I have ordered the new Apples. I have fiddled around with some writing (and then realised how out of practice I am...rewrite! rewrite!). I also realised that most people who have seen my new-look study keep referring to it as a home office. Because it looks very different to the rest of the house (it does, black and red and glass versus Tasmanian Oak and blues)? Because a home office is considered the in thing? Because small ferrets only travel clockwise after the full moon?

Speaking of the moon, I was watching one of the Lord of the Rings movies a week ago (or thereabouts...who cares anyway?) and realised the moon was up the right way. For Southern Hemisphere-eans, the moon is always upside down in movies and film.

I have no real plans today, world domination seems like too much effort for a lot of administrative headaches. Since I'm planning on opting out of the administrative headaches department in as many ways as I can, I'll restrict myself to maniacal laughter.

Evil laughter has three discernible spellings from my researches (i.e. laughter spelled out in facebook, twitter and a great RPG called Dink Smallwood):

• bahahahaha
• bwahahahaha
• mwahahahaha

But it only works with three or four ha-ha's at the end, okay? Any more and it looks like you're trying too hard. One ha sounds like "ah-ha!" (Eureka! I have discovered a mess of malcontents with whom I shall form an evil army of robots!); two ha-ha's sound like some do-gooder just shot you in the middle of a triumphant evil laugh, and five ha-ha's (or more) sound like you've been sniffing nitrous.

What scare me most in the world? I sat here evil-laughing quietly to myself for the last five minutes to test out all of those theories about the length of evil laughter in print.

Of course, all of these can work as general laughter as well. For anyone who has played Dink Smallwood, "MWAAHAHAHAHA" is the strict province of the evil.

One day of freedom left. On to coffee!

The Wonders of Sleep

I've had (I'm counting) sixteen hours of sleep. Now that's a Nanna nap. I feel so cheerful!

Broken sleep, of course; I woke up about six yesterday evening to have dinner. I staggered off to bed about six-thirty, read for a little while, out like a light in ten minutes. The next time I looked at a clock it said 10:40. I told myself I didn't have to work tonight and myself went back to sleep. A brief surface at twelve in case I really did have to go to work and had now overslept. I woke up for good at five.

My back is stiff, my eyes are gluggy; I have an entire couple of weeks to work that off, I get to sleep at night and do whatever during the day. With no potential for a phone call on my nights off to ask if I could possibly come in. I say ask with that inflection because it never seems a choice, but perhaps that's the bitter and twisted midnights talking.

Off work and onward! I have a house full of things to do.

Out Of The Loop, Into The Fire

I have more days off than expected (yippee!), having a cancellation on my agenda. I didn't have to climb out of bed this morning at an ungodly hour to pretend to be godly (as in, knowing things about something and passing along said wisdom to others). Friday and Saturday midnight shifts are still on the cards, but after that I'm off on holiday for a whole twelve days.

I feel special.

I'm deranged after all of these midnights, but feel cautiously optimistic and willing to work on other things. I chickened out on Tuesday (bok, bok, bugack!), but will still be there next week armed with various writerly things.

Well that's oblique, but never mind. Onward to dishes and housework. For now.

If my neighbour keeps yelling today I'm over there to kick some arse. So over there.

The Ties That Bind, Then Choke Your Brain

It's been weeks and weeks.

I'm writing this with about five minutes to spare, no drafting and minimal thought.

It's been a fairly horrible couple of weeks, months, nearly a year. We are really short staffed at work, with people on holidays and people who have left and have not been replaced (in one case, we're getting to the six month anniversary and the fourth re-advertisement). On average, it's midnights, one off, one on, one off, several on. Throw in a midnight (leave work at eight in the morning) and an afternoon (come back at four or five of the same day), and no wonder I'm exhausted.

I had my third go at that one (two shifts on the one day) in a fortnight and feel like I've been abducted by aliens. I've lost a day. It's one day later than it should be. It has been for the last four days.

The creative writing workshop started two weeks ago, tomorrow is week three. Our teacher, Mark Tredinnick, is very good. I suspect though, that I'll be reading a lot of books in my future that I would not have considered (aside from, maybe I should read that) just from the short readings alone - and there's even more mentioned in the Little Red Writing Book (yeah, his).

I would like, very much, to quit my job and work on this. See if I can take it anywhere. See if it can take me anywhere.

See if I can have a normal life, where I'm not tired all of the time, disoriented and perfectly uncertain about the time of day.

But of course, we're already short, so...keep twirling until next time. Or be rebellious and inappropriate; that's my default when I'm this exhausted.

Nothing more. Too bored and furious (it's an interesting combination - I recommend it for enemies) to focus a lot of the time right now. I would like about four days of sleeping whenever I want to.

Since I have no end phrase (and I'm twenty minutes past my five minute deadline), bye.

Sucks Budgies and Personalised Everything

Can't wait for that T-shirt to appear in the mail.

I had a quick squiz over my counters yesterday and discovered that my readership is non-existent.

So it goes.

That means I can come out with even more insanity that usual, doesn't it?

I spent yesterday using my free stuff from vistaprint, since I got a pile of business cards, etc., they decided to offer me a lot for almost nothing. T-shirt, pens, small magnets, post-it notes. Hilarious.

I have a dare from my boss to wear a T-shirt with the Grim Reaper on it. Not much of a dare (or the best kind) since I was going to do it anyway.

Uh-oh, I'm boring myself again. Better go and do some housework.

The Things You Say Without Thinking

On the phone about paying insurance. Everything finished, it's all fixed up and I say "Well, we'd still better not burn the house down then".

It occurs to me as those words are leaving my mouth that if our house does burn down it could look like fraud.

Woops.

Luckily the Customer Service Representative had a sense of humour and told me it was far too cold at the moment for that kind of thing. Yes, I reply, our only option is my uncle's two bedroom, which would get a bit wearing after five minutes.

I like joshing with customer service. Mostly because they get an awful lot of crud thrown at them by very angry people. The number I rang was the internet support - so they probably get even worse (IT'S NOT WORKING!!!!!!). (Did you turn it on?)

The best customer service call I had was with my bank a few years ago (I know, that seems an oxymoron, doesn't it?). I gave the rep the wrong information, apologised. He replied that worse things happen at sea.

I replied that hopefully at sea you don't get an automated voice saying "If you have run aground, press 1."

I love that story. I'm only sorry I was laughing too hard to say "If the Lost City of Atlantis has risen in the night, press 2."

If you like this entry, press 6. Then press 9. Then mash the keyboard with your palm and see if the resulting mess is a lost play of Shakespeare.

Interpret Your Dreams - Because the Shadow Doesn't Know

Or at least there is a lot of contradiction on the internet.

I've been away for a few days since I was so tired and flattened I was boring myself. Only working a lot of shifts, nothing dramatic, although I seem to have rediscovered my inner lunatic and am laughing and generally behaving idiotically. Tonight I think I freaked out a colleague by declaring "TASTES LIKE CHICKEN" apropos of nothing. Oops, sorry.

Today I had a Nanna nap during the day. Unfortunately I wound up having a fairly unpleasant dream, to be woken by (I thought) knocking at the door. I check the door and no-one is there. Then the dream I was having was running through my head and I realised I'd actually dreamed it.

That's interesting, methinks, and I boot up google to find me a dream interpreter. Apparently I am either about to come into money, I need to pay attention to something or, last but not least, something bad is going to happen and it will affect me deeply. (Personally I would have assumed that the part of the package of "something bad" would include "affect me deeply", but let me not be picky in the face of the wisdom of the intey-net). I would like to go with the first one, since when I woke up I thought it was Australia Post delivering some goodies.

Rather than being put off or put out by this, I think this is very funny. Either something good (ish), something in the middle or something bad.

Well let me face that off with:

1. A shrug, and
2. GGGGAAAAAAHHHHHH, WE'RE ALL GOING TO DIE!!!!, and
3. Giggling. Lots and lots of giggling.

That should cover all eventualities.

Is there a doctor in the house?

One would hope given that I've just been to the doctor.

Now I'm dosed up with antibiotics and an anti-heartburn medication, it's all going to be good.

I've been sitting on a chest pain for quite a while, which is utterly stupid. When he asked the heartburn question, my first response was "Terrific! Much better than anything my imagination was coming up with!" Which made him laugh. I might have a gastroscopy in my future, but at least it isn't something worse.

I could go the run around about how and why I procrastinated about it. In fact I will. I thought it was just stress. One of the stressors went away and it eased, so points to me on self-diagnosis. Now I could get on with all the other things I have (and want) to do. I still have a pile of documents to write! I patted myself on the back and then out of the blue back was that uncomfortable feeling. So much for my diagnostic skills.

Spent yesterday training a new person, which was, as always, a hoot. I love teaching! I also love finding out that I have access to something in our computer system that I thought was limited to special peoples! (I'm not the only one - it seems to be for anyone at my level). (Useful, nevertheless.)

Points to my trainee for finding my excitement on that one amusing. I get excited by weather, so it's not much of a stretch.

Want a pithy (although occasionally a bit negative) T-shirt? Try Despairwear (despair.com). Nice, I say.

A little more invention and I'll make my own, just for the fun of it. My personal favourite from Despair is: "Tradition. Just because you've always done it that way doesn't mean it's not incredibly stupid."

Since I can't be bothered getting my hair streaked blue, T-shirts will have to do. I will probably talk myself into it one of these days. The next time I have a fat pay-packet, probably.

Don't worry, I'm right behind you.

Using you as a shield.

No Interesting Things to Say

In today’s thrilling entry there will be nothing of interest.

Or rationality.

Fragment (consider revising). No thanks, I like it just the way it is. Word is so helpful.

I haven’t been doing nothing since my last entry, but all of the good stuff that has happened falls under confidentiality. Damn this working for the government.

The boys (husbandly and t’yoong man) are wondering what I look like as I have only been home to sleep for the last five days. Five midnights in a row. Blech.

I would like very much to be riding a razor scooter around the departments or some other wheeled conveyance, but it would be frowned upon.

One of our orderlies has been banned from using any kind of wheeled conveyance after riding around the entire hospital on a scooter and smacking into a few railings. Okay, I fib. It wasn’t around the entire hospital. I really wish I’d been in on the action though.

I also (often) wish we had an overhead microphone so I could make announcements throughout the labs. Just the kind of random things that make people stop and go, “WHAT?” with their eyebrows climbing into their hairlines.

Just for the hell of it.

I'll Have a Number ...

Once again bleary eyed but not too bothered.

Alex and I have spent the evening watching Wolverine and the X-Men on ABC 3 and discussing various things. Such as:

"Why is she doing that, Mum?"
"I don't know mate, she's meant to be a good guy." (Rogue has joined the Brotherhood - gasp!)

"Maybe we could watch the..not cartoon one." (X-Men movies)
"Sure we could, but not tonight."
"No, not tonight, it's past my bedtime, but we're watching this one, right?"
"Yep."

They're the highlights. It's amazing just how much conversation you can get out of Wolverine cartoons. When that got boring we played the "wish" game. "I wish Mum was ... asleep!" So I duly snore my head off and continue through "I wish Mum was ... walking backwards!" *snore* "MUM! You should be walking backwards!" "I can't right now *giggle, guffaw* I'm sleeping! *snore*"

I think I wrecked it. "I wish Mum was number 12!"
"What's that? Fried rice with a chicken chow mein?" Chortle, chortle, then laughing so hard I would have fallen over had I not been sitting down. "What's so funny, Mum?"

Laughing too hard to explain, I'll have to have number 12 again.

Bearably Silly Movies and HONK!

I was having coffee before my shift on Wednesday night and on comes Transporter 2: Let’s go to America! As action flicks go, it is undeniably silly.

I am inspired however. On my way home this morning I was tempted to try to flip my car a gazillion feet into the air, spiralling as I went, with such precision that a bomb underneath could be whipped off by a convenient crane hook. Piece of cake. When I land I won’t be a jam smear on the upholstery either. My brain might be jam-ish inside the nifty skull packaging, but so it goes.

We started watching The Golden Child tonight (Thursday). Aside from the awful synth soundtrack and clunky looking special effects (with WHOOSH! noises as appropriate), it stands as a pretty good flick. Small lad was enthralled and we have a date to watch the rest of it tomorrow (bed time intervened).

Disconcerting coincidence for this week: Facebook entry from my sister “Honk if you don’t care about State of Origin”. At work we were just discussing HONK (hyper-osmotic non-ketotic) coma in diabetics (nasty). Certainly more off-putting than medical-acronym numberplates. (Could the owner of vehicle with registration LVS-001 please return to your vehicle. The thought of the first collection of a low vaginal swab (either by or from yourself) is making our eyes water. You have also left your lights on).

I also have issues with Holden Special Vehicles. Did herpes really need a plug from a car manufacturer?

Not A Lot To Say

But I'll say all of it anyway.

The weather today is cold and rainy. It's nice to be inside and warm. I feel sorry for our cat, who I just surprised sleeping, all puffed out fur, on the table outside. Since her other choices are all concrete, I'm not rousting her from the one possibly comfortable position she might have found. I'll get up again soon and throw her inside. She's one step above (or is that below?) feral and doesn't like being inside. But it's cold and miserable enough today that she might just cool it. Poor lamb.

Yes, she only has one eye. Damn all tom cats!

It's very soothing sort of weather. I think I will go for a walk in it later just for the hell of it. Without my umbrella, otherwise what is the point?

I was at a residential school at Charles Sturt University in Wagga when the drought first started to bite in. It rained one particular day. You could tell all of the city people who eyed the sky with various degrees of scowl and tried to stay under cover. All of the country people looked at each other, smiling, walking right out in it. Cool.

Of course I was the cross-over city slicker and smiled at all the country people while I walked right out in it. It taught me something too - but it's so obvious I don't think I need to say it.

Nice that it's raining today to remind me after the bull plop day yesterday. Half of which was about my attitude rather than actual events. I like the universe.

Lucky for me. I'm sure it cares.

Bull plop!

That pretty much sums up today.

It's not worth going into the details (plus, lot more value in being all mysterious, isn't there?), but I got a reminder today that past behaviour should not be forgotten. Just because you're being all nice now but have been crap to me in the past doesn't mean you won't be crap again. Denial only works on yourself, kid, not much point in telling me you didn't say it, weren't there, can't prove anything, when it was me you said it to in the first place.

Clearly I think I have the high moral ground here (of course I do), enough said. Snort.

I think I'll go and eat worms.

Laughing Children and Adults (Acting Like Adults)

Today sees me basking in the vroom vroom noises and general hilarity of the two boys from a couple of houses away playing on their bikes. It's nice to hear kids playing.

Since I live in a quite cul-de-sac, all of the kids in the neighbourhood tend to ride their bikes and whatnot up on the road. Say that to anyone who has never seen our particular slice of nicety and they look at you like you've stepped out of a file from DOCS.

Perhaps I talk too much, to the wrong people.

Tonight I go off once again to work a shift and generally be a responsible member of society. I spent most of the weekend doing the same thing, although the responsible member of society part of it is sarcasm. It's a job.

Since that's about all I have to say for today....

Vroom vroom!

In the Red Corner

In the red corner we have barking Pomeranian crosses (who, without fail, manage to also start up at 2:15am (yes, am when the local feral cat wanders through).

In the blue corner we have the screaming neighbour. I spoke too soon yesterday afternoon - started in again around three, stopped at three-thirty, then her husband came home. Another twenty minutes worth.

I think they should square off, but I think it would be a bit much for the two dogs. I don't like cruelty to animals, so another idea bites the dust.

Do you want to be cool? Here's the definitive list.

My personal favourite on that list is "Learn to speak European". I won't make all of the obvious sarcastic comments, even though I really, really want to.

Ending on a preopisit preposition, and misspelling too! Love it? Yeah.

Trying really hard not to clone mimi smartypants, but this is just how I talk. So I give up.

Last night we watched Bulletproof Monk, or part thereof as it was small lad's bed time. We had started on My Fair Lady, but it was leaving me a bit cold. Plus I wanted to read some more of my book while t'yoong man was in the bath.

Anyway, Bulletproof Monk. I love Chow Yun-Fat in just about everything but this one was also leaving me a bit cold. I'd finished off my book by then, so it wasn't impatience.

Perhaps it's because my favourites of him are Croughing Tiger, Hidden Dragon (even with terrible American subtitles) and some of the odd Hong Kong martial arts films. The best one I ever saw was a buddy movie, no idea of the name, but he is such a goof and does it well (cue laughter). As far as Croughing Tiger, Hidden Dragon goes, if you want a real treat, hang out for the SBS translation whenever they show it again. They obviously bought the film in Mandarin so they could subtitle it themselves, because the depth to the story and beauty of the script really comes through. To wit, there appears to be a plot; I wasn't so sure on the DVD. Plus you get to see Michelle Yeoh looking splendiferous and kicking proverbials.

Bulletproof Monk, on the other hand, well, let's just say that the spiritual journeys of the young leads are a bit, well, dull and hackneyed. Yeah, they come through, yeah isn't love grand and they carry the torch on, the world is safe once more - but I just can't seem to buy it.

Since this morning as we left for school, t'yoong man decided to spill that his head has been itchy for five days, today's plan has gone out the window and instead I'm washing all of our bedlinen. There is a nit plague at school. I had a quick squiz at his hair this morning and found an egg without trying too hard, so here we go.

The most disappointing part of this is one of the other mothers had a whinge a few weeks ago about one of the kids having nits. The mother of said child got all huffy and started going on about how clean she was. Oh boy.

Really. Oh boy.

Get the point: infections (insectoid, bacterial or viral) don't care about your level of cleanliness, your societal status, your marital status, or how much money you have in the bank. If you are in the wrong place at the wrong time, you'll probably cop it.

Obviously for nits, the flu, tuberculosis, meningococcal meningitis, mumps, measles, you can take some basic precautions but really, if it's rampant, well, sucks. Others like Hepatitis B, C and the old horror HIV there are certain behaviours you can avoid but again, there are windows in every infection where the infected are unaware they are even sick - and can pass things on.

It's very sad that in this day and age people still associate disease with dysfunction. It's even worse - and not worthy of sad, but rather reprehensible - that dysfunction is associated with poverty, low education levels or laziness.

Yeah, sure you make the argument about sterotypes and you generally find disease in poorer areas - but try and think about it, 'kay? One, probably can't afford treatments. Two, just because you can't afford it doesn't mean you don't care.

One of the things I find hardest to get across to people is the concept of unaffordable anything. Since I work in a professional field, most of my workmates can afford what they need and, frequently, most of what they want.

The idea of literally not being able to afford to eat, wash or buy medicine is at best intellectually understood. At worst, it's a publicly politically correct agreement ("yes, yes, isn't that terrible"), while privately disagreeing ("they're just lazy" for example).

I have more, but I need to repair the creaks in my soapbox.

A lot more serious than when I started. Sucks budgies!

Screaming Children and Adults (Acting Like Children)

The best part of this post is likely to be the title.

Yesterday saw my next-door neighbour begin yelling at ten am. There was a lull at three-thirty (just in time for me to leave for work) then it began again. I have no idea what she was yelling (it wasn't in English), but it was loud enough that I could hear her from the far side of my house, with all of the doors and windows shut. She could stay at home and be the town crier for the next three suburbs. I don't know how her voice stands up.

The kids would yell out, occasionally cry (thankfully, it sounded a bit I'm-crying-to-get-your-attention-again to me), then she would yell some more. There have been times where the kids have sounded dreadful, and I've been over to see if everything is okay. Looks like another trip might be in order, although silence seems to be reigning today.

It's such a delight to see adults restraining themselves oh-so-admirably.

Bring back our Cook Islanders, who partied every weekend but sang and played guitar themselves. It was lovely to hear them, and very rarely was there a cross word. Loud occasionally, but they were all nice to each other and we could hear that in their voices. There was also the occasional interesting herbal smoke drifting over the fence; just too far away for passive smoking jollies. Dang it.

Yesterday I got asked about an expression from the Simpsons meaning bullshit that I'd obviously gone on about before. Bull plop! It was bull plop! Don't you just love the plosives in that? So much better than bullshit for general use, I think.

I also like horseshit - I generally use that one for description or judgement on a description of an event or someone's actions (as in, "it sounds like horseshit to me"). There's also some nice resonance (if only in my head) with Hayward finding petrified horseshit (ahem, a horse apple - what a wonderful term) in The Shawshank Redemption when they're all digging for Andy's chess set.

So nice to have hierarchical (and non-heretical) swearing.

It's 3am but I'm not lonely

Crashed and burned early yesterday evening, thanks to the help of some red wine.

I've had an overload of news in the last day or so and gone back to work on top of it.

One of my friends has given birth to her daughter, my sister's book arrived from North Carolina and another friend is taking a job overseas. Overload!

Congratulations to everyone.

Back in the saddle again

So, party done. Alex off to school this morning. Back to work tonight. Bleeeeeeccchh.

I was supposed to be starting a creative writing course tomorrow morning, but it has been put off for a month. I should have asked why, but the thrilling "The building burned down", etc., etc., speculation is much more exciting.

So as of tomorrow I'm back to being bleary eyes and half asleep. I'm also going a bit deaf - which makes it twice as hard to follow conversations. Which either makes me look retarded or very rude. I hope the former, personally; better to be thought a bit simple than a deliberate prick. Or prickette. I always have trouble with those. Plus I'm pretty sure I made up prickette, which sounds a lot more derogatory - a hint of condescension - than the straightforward "prick". But I digress.

I usually digress, can never tell a short story, me.

I'm also not sure this was a story anyway.

I think I should say no to red wine in future. Or at least the sparkly kind - my head is all woolly the next day.

FIVE KINDS OF JELLY!!!!

Yesterday saw the big day for Alex, who actually turns seven today. We had nine small kids running in and out of the house for a few hours, it was delightful, including the noise.

I had a couple of bright ideas for the party on Thursday and Friday. One of those was to make an ice-cream cake. A "Big Green Ugly Monster Cake", to be precise. I decided to make it blue, because I don't like green and the colour theme for the party was Spiderman (red and blue); green would have clashed. Don't know why I thought that would make a difference as most of the presents were Ben-10 and thus fluorescent green and black, but never mind.

Anyway, the "Big Blue Ugly Monster Cake" did not look like a smooth mound of cake as it did in the recipe book, rather it looked like someone had sneezed. Blue. And then its face fell off in the freezer. Then its teeth got covered in blue ice cream. I was so pleased with myself while I was making it. I made FIVE KINDS OF JELLY!!!!! while the meringue for the monster was cooking and was bouncing off walls myself. Good fun cooking.

I was worried a bit - but then I also made cupcakes and did little dragonflies on the top using white chocolate bits for the body and cut-up freckles for the wings. They looked awesome, so I think made up for blue-sneeze-as-if-a-three-year-old-had-been-at-it monster. The kids ate it, so happy day, who cares what it looked like. Plus I got a good chortle out of just how bad it looked.

The other bright idea, and this really was genius although damaged the budget rather severely, was to get ourselves a blow-up jumping castle. That was the hit of the day. Alex got up in the morning, saw Dad setting it up and was nearly beside himself, jumped in it happily for about an hour. When the other kids arrived it was part of an involved chase sequence where you went: jump on castle (plus or minus attacking anyone in there), leap out, stream around the backyard, in either of the back doors, run through the kitchen (and collide, more often than not), in to the lounge room or Alex's room, then reverse. Scream and or yell not optional from what I could gather. Hilarious.

Of course the screaming only happened for the first half-hour or so, then they ran out of puff and got a bit quieter. I had thought of games like pass-the-parcel, but we barely had time for cake at the rate we were going.

Unfortunately I forgot the five kinds of jelly until there were only three kids left, so they had a pile of it (we still have two untouched bowls of it).

Then last night, everything cleaned up, daiquiri in hand, Alex watched Night at the Museum 2 (he had a non-alcoholic daiquiri), I read my book and husbandly pottered around somewhere (he also put out some washing), I had this wonderful feeling of "This is how normal people live". On Saturday nights either I have woken up at about four p.m., am still half awake and have to get ready for work again or I am at work doing an evening shift.

Time to move on, ay-wot? Well at least get a better roster.......

It's a Thursday - Must be a Normal Day

A few days ago I got something in my work email.

"FW: On behalf of XXXXX; All Supplies Gone: Glut"

If all the supplies are gone, how can there be a glut?

Was someone being funny? Is there a whole email thread behind this? One will never know....or at least this one never will, though the speculation is fun.

I spent last night finishing off a J. D. Robb/Nora Roberts (Portrait in Death, for anyone interested) then conking out and sleeping. It is so nice to be sleeping at night and not being all bleary eyed. I got the added bonus of a small lad who didn't want to sleep in his own bed.

It doesn't happen very often, but we had been watching Coraline - great movie, not really for kiddies - so I acquiesced. Alex bailed on the movie pretty early in - I was surprised he lasted as long as he did. It's creepy. In a good way. The first time I watched it all I wanted to do was wring Coraline's neck - she is a snot at the beginning. The second time I twigged, she's just being a kid and isn't all bad. (Alex must have had me running around before the second time I saw the movie - he's a character and far too clever; I had an appreciation of where Coraline was coming from). I'm always on my toes.

I'm nearly finished posting the Desperate Food Thieves and Bemused Production Absurdities stuff from way back in 2005-7. Then I can start on the new stuff. I'm paused, because I just got to the menu I wrote when my dog, Benjamin, aka Benny the Wonder Dog, aka Bargearse (he was a big FAT labrador) had to be put down. It was cancer and he was twelve.

Have to do at least a few more - I want to be moving on.

Or twirling. Twirling toward freedom. Imagine whichever gestures and rotations suit you.

Less Time Wastage

So, I have decided to go the blog route for sheer lack of anything else to do.

Having read over mimi smartypants, I am a little scared. Ah well, God hates a coward and my readership is likely to be small. Plus anyone reading can turn me off and no loss if this sucks. Budgies.

This has to be a marginally better way of spending my time than playing games off Facebook. I also get the marvellous illusion of having an audience, and I've always liked audiences. Not in the tap-dancing in front of sense, rather the "I-can-hide-behind-a-lectern-or-overhead-projector-occasionally" sense. Besides, I only have one bra up to tap-dancing, and it's the mammary equivalent of nanna-knickers, so no thanks.

Mammary? Mammarian? Answers on postcards, please.

I go through phases with internet usage. Last time it was b3ta and their question of the week, alternating with Fun Trivia (which I still play around in). This time it's twitter, which led insidiously to myspace and Facebook. (Yes, the twitter link is direct to me....)

Tweet tweet! Tweet tweet!

Thence to blogging. I'll get bored soon.

In the meantime, I had better go off and do more than my twenty minutes of housework today since twelve children are descending at the weekend and the house is, ahem, a MESS. Those who know me are unsurprised, although lately I haven't been that bad, because I really can't stand it.

Offly glad to not be involved in night shifts for this week.