I Survived 

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9yo reads the I Survived book series about wars and tribulations and what have you; 

Here’s me being chased by the office shark

I could pen one about surviving the first day back at work in a decade.

I forgot names, I forgot what to say when I answered the phone, it was hard to remember how to use office machinery like the photocopier, and it was hard to save face after all of the above. But I made it through and am ready to face another day tomorrow.
But what am I going to wear? So many clothes and there’s nothing to wear. I made two skirts over the weekend but I did more unpicking than anything else because I’ve done no sewing in a year. And this morning the shirt I intended for my first day in full view of my adoring public had a stain on it, right on the boob – so obvious! Ideally my clothing schedule won’t be the same as Seinfeld’s would-be girlfriend 

but time is of the essence. Essence of grape mostly, but occasionally of cotton and polyester, and juniper.

Cheers to the beginning of the work week.

Dashing Around 

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Today is the Warrior Dash and it’s my third and Husband’s fourth time doing it. I’m less excited because I’m tired but also feeling a bit anxious in my gut because I start a new job on Monday. Yep. Wow.

Anyhoo. I half expected Husband to bail this morning because he has aches and pains and he’s a man’s man, so he’s telling me all about them. In detail. Baby. Sore throat; sore something else; tired; painful wrist and probably something else. I’ve got a few things going on, too, but do you hear me boohooing? It all boils down to age. We’re old, closing in on 40. And I’ll reinforce that notion by adding that Husband realised one of his injuries post-coitus. So literally, fucking old.

It was a fun run and it was fun when it was over. I only bailed on one of the obstacles because I am afraid of heights and couldn’t reach the other side with my leg before pushing myself over, therefore I would have died. So I climbed back down and moved on. Kudos to me for climbing the bastard to begin with.

Beer, burgers and then naps for all and sundry after we got home and today, I don’t feel much the worse for wear except for runner’s thighs the morning after. All in all, a satisfactory way to flog myself with a smile on my face.

Jurassic Park

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Husband and I have discussed what movies the boys are or will be ready for, and we usually agree and just as often get it right. We try to err on the side of acted movies rather than cartoons or computer animated or whatevs, and we try to include things that are current pop culture for the boys and their classmates, instead of only retro stuff like Bugsy Malone which I can’t find on amazon, or Charles in Charge, for that matter.

I introduced the boys to overgrown and approaching scary monsters a few months back when we watched Godzilla – the one with Matthew Broderick, not the Japanese ones. I like Hank Azaria’s Animal antics, and I prepped the boys with talk of science and etc, so while they were a little shaken up at the idea of an enormous monster sinking ships and toppling bridges and buildings in a city that they have actually heard of, they knew it was science based – movie science, but science nontheless. Cut to recent weeks and we watched Jurassic Park. True, it’s scarier and maybe more realistic because the “science” is explored in greater detail; there are also more scary scenes, even though you don’t actually see someone getting ripped in half. It also helped that I set them up for the “guy getting eaten off the toilet” scene which they found hilarious when we were talking about it. It turned out to be a little scarier when they watched it, but they were not permanently scarred.

Jurassic Park 2 was a bit far fetched for them with the idea of the second island, but the familiar theme of good guys (Dr Malcolm’s team) and bad guys (the suit and the safary guys) made sense.

Jurassic Park 3 probably was aiming at an older audience and it was a teensy bit more obvious, not necessarily graphic, but 5yo said it was scary and even 9yo sat by me for the majority of the film. Seeing Billy get done in by the Pterodactyls in the river was upsetting, for sure. Poor Billy, with his good intentions and then the chewed up parasail.

That means that Jurassic World is up next, and guess what? A kid in 5yo’s kindergarten class has seen it already. wft? Maybe the kid has older siblings, whatever. Everyone does what’s right for their family and etc. Husband is excited to watch Jurassic World again as am I, and the boys’ fears have been somewhat allayed since I told them that the two main characters are boys too, in a clear ball that rolls around the island, no less, and that they do no get eaten.

But post dinosaur movies, what then? We’re keen to move away from the people-eating theme but stick with the real-life theme, obvs that’s a loose term. I’ve decided on Kung Fu, because 8yo wants to be a ninja and because Sir David Caradine is awesome AF.kung-fu

This will pave the way for life goals such as focus and concentration, strength, justice and when an ass-kicking is warranted, as well as bringing back the people-eating/killing theme in later years for Kill Bill and Office Space, which are coming of age films and introductions to full leather outfits and working for the man.

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And then they will want to watch Kung Fu all over again. The circle will be complete.

Burning Man

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Burning Man is a festival of sorts in the desert that culminates in burning a giant effigy that I have no hope of ever attending.  I found out about it a year ago and then, when we were driving across !Murica! At Thanksgiving, I saw a sign for it! I was so excited. It was like the universe was sending me a sign. However, having a house, husband, kids and associated responsibilities precludes me from such nonsense for the forseeable future. I already get up to a few negligible shenanigans that people probably frown upon, so the answer is to make my own burning man. 

Yes, the dry season is winding down so when the grass in the backyard isn’t so spark-happy, I will invite some friends over and burn something made with bamboo, pinecones and shit from Husband’s burn pile.  It might not be so full-on as making a city from scratch in the middle of nowhere, but I have a plan and it promises well.

Celebrating Me, Too.

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‘Cause let’s face it: yes, my adorable middle child had a birthday and subsequent party, but I did all the work, both days. 

He was 7 weeks early and had his first bath at home in a salad bowl.

Those are my hands

He was in the hospital for 3 weeks to make sure of the body temp and breathing etc. Nothing was wrong with him. I used a jellybean sling to carry him around sometimes and people thought it was a handbag, that there couldn’t be a baby in there.

And now he’s 8.

He finally decided on a Clutch Powers birthday party, because mainstream themes are for suckers, obvs.

Clutch is like Indiana Jones, an adventurer who prefers to work alone but who finds out that teams work really well, too. The trick is to make games etc to keep 20+ kids occupied.

Crystals. Clutch Powers finds crystals called “brickonium” to power Lego City, so I made my own. They took ages to grow and I think I had the wrong brand of alum powder because apparently that makes a difference, sometimes.

resoaked them a number of times, massive pain in the ass.

Our intrepid party-goers had to find “brickonium” which was smattered over the front yard, in order to power up the oven for that old chestnut, the birthday cake. Kids were off and the parents had a bit of quiet once more in which to enjoy our drinks.

Nobody said anything; I may never use icing/frosting again

Clutch Powers inadvertently assists a criminal escape from a jail planet and has to recapture him.

Not sure how we will incorporate a delapidated trampoline into the next party

Clutch has to help Prince Varen fulfill his destiny by defeating Malek The Malign with his father’s golden sword, so the intrepids had to show him how wield one.

And then they had to find the pieces of golden sword (lego) to reforge it, but they were hidden around Malek’s fortress. 

Anyhoo the kids won the day and then they watched the movie. Peace and quiet, at last.
So how did I celebrate my hard work? Cake and wine, duh, all week, because all of them are in full-day school. Woo!

Habits

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Kids have habits, they can be annoying. End of story. Well actually, just to clarify, both kids and their habits can be annoying.

9yo and 8yo have had habits which were frustrating, and sometimes we managed to get rid of them, only to have them replaced by other, equally as annoying habits. 9yo had 3 habits over 2 years, I think, whereas 8yo has had 3 over 1 year. We’ve managed to banish 2 of them but the current one is annoying and obvious and hard to kick. Going to say nothing about it in hopes that it will die an immediate death as all the childhood pros suggest.

But what of my habits? Kids aren’t the only ones who do things a) over and over again, and b) probably annoy the fuck out of their loved ones if not everyone around them.

I’m messy, and I don’t really care about that. I know for a fact that Husband is annoyed by this. However, I’m annoyed that he knew about it since the day we met and expected some sort of cataclysmic change during the course of these previous ten years. No

I’m busy. I’ve got shit to do and that’s a valid reason which contributes heavily to the reason above. I also don’t care about that. I know that laundry and untidy kitchens and messy playrooms will always always always be there, so I’m in no particular hurry to clear my busy schedule, see Exhibit “A”, to rectify the previous annoying habitual situation.

Exhibit “A”

Goldfish brain. I seem to remember things that happened a lifetime ago but cannot remember stuff from last month, last week, yesterday or why I walked into this room. V annoying

Stay up late reading and always tired and grumpy. This is annoying, well, the tired part is, not the reading part, obvs. 

Leave things til last minute. Standard. I procrastinate and have Exhibit “A” to distract me and make lists of other stuff, and stsy up late reading, so I put stuff off.

See Exhibit “A” again, I try to do too much. That may be optimistic though, not necessarily a bad habit.

Starting jobs or projects and not finishing them. Just going to leave this here.

However, when stuff doesn’t go my way, I don’t carry on and scream and mess up people’s lego creations because I can’t use my words, so there! I know you are but what am I? I’ll need more than luck to kick these badboys.

A Car Like Grandpa

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When I was in high school, I couldn’t decide which car was my fave. I didn’t agonize but it was still a big deal, this nonsensical fantasy which would never amount to anything because I a)had no cash and b)didn’t want a car. Anyhoo, the contenders were a Suzuki Swift (NOT the Sierra!), some sort of Pulsar and the ever-cool EH Holden wagon. Why was this ever in question??

Anyhoo, my parents had a Torana when they got married which I cringed over in my early primary school years, because obvs six year olds know cars, and one of my grand dads had an old Fairlane. It was big and white and the leather was always polished and I wasn’t particularly impressed with it, but walking through the mall the other day, I randomly smelt something like that exact smell, even though there was only chipboard and old carpet and heat through the windows around me.


And then today we were living large in !Murica! watching some smash ’em up derby at the fair, and in rolled this long white boat of a car, sans door handles and windows, of course. The boys thought it was a Lincoln because Husband has one and they look similar – there’s probably other long boatcars of other brands floating around the roadways, too.

I’m not sure what car the boys hanker after or if they do, but I hope they have wonderful recollections of things about their people many years after those times have passed, too.

A Hemingway Champagne

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A Hemingway, Hemingway Champagne or Death In The Afternoon is a cocktail comprised of Absinthe, Champagne and high expectations.

Absinthe became legal in the US about a decade ago and since I’m a big girl now, and probably read an article about it reminding me of both of those facts, I’ve had it on my “to do list” for a little while. Last night was the night.

The place I visited doesn’t do Absinthe cocktails so I detailed to the bartender the recipe of my choice and voila!  I’d heard that it had a distinctive flavor, I hadn’t heard that it was licorice, which I despise. What the hell was Hemingway thinking??

Hemingway was a novelist and a journo, among other things, according to my old and reliable friend Wiki: “never send to know for whom the bell tolls; It tolls for thee.” Right on, Frankenstein. (Do ya like what I did there, @dfa1979?)

Anyhoo, Hemingway had a shit ton of unfortunate and unfortunately common experiences for the time, and married four times, to boot. He also had taste in his asshole because Absinthe is more than just an acquired taste. Blech. I had hoped and expected some sort of “off with the fairies” experience but besides a little bit of head-swim, nothing, nada. Perhaps I had too little – but I couldn’t have had any more because it was awful and I almost retched into my tiny, adorable, traditional champagne glass once or twice. Again, blech.

I’m going to try and find some other celeb or pseudo-celeb to model my Absinthe over and hope for better luck next time.

Tough Day At The Office

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Shit happens, I know it and you know it. And sometimes it happens at the same time as other things, like vomit. I hesitate to say “thankfully”, but it’s better that it was me and not the boys. They wouldn’t have been able to understand what was what and I wouldn’t have been able to do much for them.
Today I was able to hunker down while they ate carrots and watched stuff online. We have a 14yo french exchange student with us this week and he took a nap (because teens stay up late, yo) and probably went hungry, because today was the day I had planned to do grocery shopping. After I came home with take-out,

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Sick bags at the ready

he asked if we could go to the shops tomorrow. I asked what for, his reply was “food”. Touche. I’m guessing the boys left out that tiny detail that I was dying two deaths at the same time all day, and probably assumed that I regularly leave my kids in a state of constant hunger.
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He’ll learn about !Murica! tomorrow when we go to costco, and load up on all the things, in particular the food

Holy Shit! I’ve Written A BOOK

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Yes. I did. I actually did.

It all started way back when I was young and naive and living on my own for the very first time. I had bought my own apartment and I’ll be damned if I can remember anything else that I was thinking about. Well, that’s not true. I was thinking about romance and maybe dinner, but I digress.

For whatever reason I started writing a book about two people who loved each other but inevitably hurt each other and their respective journeys from there. I didn’t finish it, not even close. What I did was get engaged. Fast forward past that and I was then renting out that apartment to supplement my income so I could buy liquor to drown my sorrows. And I started writing another book, about revenge and assholes and that sort of thing. I kept writing that one on and off for years, tapering during large-scale life events. Fast forward again to November 2015 and I pulled out the proverbial finger and participated in NaNoWriMo and finished both of them. And then I submitted one (not the revenge one) and IT GOT ACCEPTED!!

So all my wildest dreams have come true and my book baby will be pushed out into the world on May 2, 2017. It’s not even about kids or drinking wine, so wth could it even be about? Why, romance, of course. It’s a contemporary romance novel with bits and pieces of witty and sarcastic bullshit thrown in, think kissing and, a bit more. I’m no expert but I do like kissing and etc, and of late I’ve enjoyed reading about kissing, at which point besties from high school tease me about it because I always scorned romance before now.

Here are the ones – both steamy and not – well actually, most of them are – that I’ve sunk my teeth into, research, you understand:

Through The Veil, by Colleen Halverson Think fairies into the real world and vice versa, with a hot fairy chap who bones the princess.

Sex & Magic books by Stacia Kane She writes science fiction and fantasy mixed with romance, think the world of Harry Potter when the characters are all older and Voldemort is probably in power, or his people are, so there’s a bunch of stuff going on that people have to take care of, and of course they like to have sex as well.

Wednesday, by Kendall Ryan Think sex and more sex. Not ordinarily what I’d click on but the ad on facebook got me and then it was a buck to download, so, yeah.

The For Hire Books by Tawna Fenske and About That Fling, because again, it was a cheap download on a promo. Kissing and tension and then sex. Good times.

On the less kissing is more side I recently enjoyed If Only You Knew by Kristin Higgins which has far less kissing than what I was anticipating, and of course, saving the best for last, Pride And Prejudice, by Jane Austen where of course, less kissing is more, unless you are the crackwhore sister.

So there you have it, the entire sum of my knowledge on romance, but I think mine might have a bit more swearing. Anyhoo, I highly recommend these books and if you get hung up on Kendall Ryan, she had a shit ton of books to quench your thirst on.