Shopping on a Mission

I used to LOVE shopping. It was something I could do all day for days at a time, go home bag less and still be pleased with the outing.

Later I thought success was measured in the need to make multiple trips to the car to throw in parcels and then head back into the fray or to catch a cab home, rather than go on the bus - back in my London days.

Now it is like a military expedition. I do the research online and on the phone first and then go directly to the shops needed and then home. Of course there is always time for coffee. If at all possible and delivery time permits the computer is my best friend.

Today delivery was not an option.

Today's job was a mattress protector and a canvas for a piece I want to try for a competition.

The canvas shop at Pac Fair has closed to make way for the expansion work. I do wonder how it happens that someone figures the centre is failing with too few customers, so if they taking out parking spaces and put in more shops more people will come, but then I am not an economic genius by any means.

This meant that I had to go to Robina shops for the sister canvas store. I knew all this from my preliminary www... research.

I went to David Jones for the mattress protector first, but as I expected the thing was all cotton and enough money to buy a small car, so I left it there and headed to the 2 bedding shops just outside. Both had what I wanted but the first ones were too short on the sides and the second one came with an addendum which required me to buy a pillow that I didn't want to enable me to get the discount which if applied sans pillow would have made it about the right money! I hate that sort of con! So another failure.

I did not pass go on my hustle to the Art shop. SCORE! As I walked in there was a big sign saying 30% off everything and when I asked if that meant the canvases too, the sign came down and I was told, 'No it's an old sign.'  I am pretty sure that legally I could have jumped up and down, but I just wanted the bloody canvas so I stood and tried to convert the INCHES into CMs and finally decided what I needed, I asked for it, and bugger me if that size was the only one they didn't have....SHIT SHIT SHIT. Why are the Chinese making canvases using imperial measurements.

So far I was 0 for 2.

I headed to the other side of the centre still looking for bedding, and I found what I wanted and it was on sale except that they didn't have the right size. The woman was wonderful and she rang the local to me shop and they had it and would keep it aside for me. YIPPEE!

SO no coffee cos I was on a mission now. Back to the car and homeward bound. Into the local shops and there it was the mattress protector, 100% cotton and on sale, and just as serendipity would have it, the local shit shop also had a canvas the right size for silly money so now I was 2 for 2.

I really should have just had some faith in LOCAL.

I sty a little lump in my eye

All the madness of the last month has led to this moment. A bloody great sty in my eye. Now I have not had one since I was a little girl. Shit they hurt!

I went off to the chemist and spoke to the pharmacist thinking that in 2014 there wold be some instant cure, and you know what, yeh bugger me there is not.

She suggested that I could try alternating hot and cold compresses. And then when it get really ugly in about a week there is something else I could try - the stuff for conjunctivitis but she wouldn't bother, she would just let my body heal itself.

How can this be possible is what I want to know. With all the medical breakthroughs I am told I have to have this honking sore thing for a week!!

While I was there I asked about the new treatments for fungal toenails....yeh I know that is even more disgusting to think about than the eye sty. Just be pleased that I have not included any photos. About 6 weeks ago I saw Dr Jane and she said tutt tutt tutt about going to those asian foot supermarkets and sticking your feet in what almost certainly is fungal heaven. So she prescribed a routine of appling stuff twice a day for 2 months. It's not making any damn difference, so I thought I'd try something else. The new stuff sounds FABO. I really am a product of advertising. The new stuff ranges in price between $60 and $100 and still takes about a lifetime!! Now I can understand why Dr Jane suggested ripping off the nail. It must surely mean that the waiting game is shorter, though I do believe I lack courage.

So I am rotting from top to toe, literally, but ohh what a lovely month it has been. February is always hectic with Belly and Zig's big days, but it's a wonderful hectic, even if it leaves me a little dented.

What a Hoot!! You might need a cuppa and a little sit down.

Whew are we glad this is a once a year thing!! I was gonna say EVENT, but that has really just  become such a wanky term. I went to a party at a farm once and was told by the host that he was too busy organising the EVENT to be civil. I reckon that's the sort of people who say it.

Anyway I got stupid lost on the way to collect Zig from his father's place and then said father pretended not to be sure of the collection arrangements...ho hum. Finally he delivered Zig in his school uniform from Friday, with the bleary eyes of a kid who had had 3 hours sleep and no breakfast. Way to go on the sabotage, feckless father!

We made our way to Mum and she took the little fella home for a shower and change while I started with the final prep at the park. Filling water bombs is an art that I can now proudly record on my CV. Yeh I got a bit moist, not in a good way, but 30 were filled and tied ready to go.

The kids arrived and Bell went into action. She ran those kids like a well oiled machine! She had her prize bag and a schedule and more energy than I could have mustered.

Pass the Parcel with a Belly twist, egg and spoon relays, NO CHEATING!!, water bomb relays and then fights, and up to play 'Wet Head' - a game where the kid wears a water tower on their heads and other kids pull out rods which might or might not release a torrent of water onto the first kid. Yeh they all got pretty wet. Things escalated and much water was thrown and I do believe the park tap was not up to the constant use of 9 year olds and the handle thing, 'Just fell off Bell.'

I cooked the sausages for the sizzle and took pics and hoped that neither of the epi-pens that had been delivered would be needed.

Then the car races were organised. The drop at the cliff face is pretty severe and I sure as shit was not gonna give 'em all a demo, but Belly joined a group and off they went. It was hold your guts laughing funny and as I took photos, I had to be careful not to get in the way of a runaway box or a tumbling kid. Yeh there was a bit of blood, but after I chased the kids and snuck up on 'em with dettol and bandaids all was put right.

The cartons which had become cardboard bits were used for more games and then it was food time.

I reckon it's very easy to see the nature of the parents just by looking and listening to the kids. Belly and I were like a pair of mad manners madams. They got NOTHING without a please and thank you. Really it is all so simple to get it right.

Some kid sneered that there was no BBQ sauce but chomped his sanga up anyway. And another kid asked questions like, 'Is this store bought, cos if it is it will make me vomit.'  So too will a good backhander and holding your face in a toilet bowl is what I fancied saying to the blighter.

Then the moment Bell had been dreading and which will never be repeated- The Pinata bashing! Suffice to say that it ended as badly as Belly knew it was gonna. Any rugby coach would have been pleased with their mauling abilities. As it was my idea, I am just gonna forget about it as soon as I can.

Cake and watermelon and then yippee-kai-ay it was 2 o'clock and where are the bloody parents of these monsters.

Most of the mums and dads came and thanked Belly for her trouble and their kids were happy to head home with their loot bags full of even more sugar. But the 2 kids who had been bloody painful all day were owned by parent s who were late and didn't bother with the basics of a thank you. The kids had not fallen far from the tree!

Bell shouted out, 'Thank you!' to them as they were piling into their cars but her subtlety was lost.

We clean and made sure that the Scouts' efforts for  'Clean Up Australia Day' were not wasted and then Zig got down to the excitement of opening up all his pressies. Well what a haul!! He was an excited exhausted little man who held it together at least until he hopped into the car.

I am pretty certain there was not much going on at home with either of 'em last night. A bit of sausage and blessed sleep for them both.

It was a big lovely day.

Party Preparations are about DONE!

Belly and I spent yesterday getting sorted for Zig's big old party tomorrow. Catering for 30 kids and their hanger-on parents is quite a formidable task in itself, but as anyone who has ever thrown a kid's party knows, it is the least of the planning.

With experience comes some confidence that we will be able to ENTERTAIN these kids as well as feed them. It si defintely not for the feint hearted.

So prizes were bought and wrapped and games were organised and a schedule was drawn up so that we know we can fill in the 2 and a half HOURS!!

Belly has today been busy with her artistry in cake making. Every year she gives Zig the choice as to what he might like his cake to be and she sets about making it. She forgets that kids just don't give a shit really, so long as there is plenty of sugar and they all get a bit they are happy. Belly likes to make sure it is a perfect replica of Zig's desire so she follows a scaled up model to the finest detail. And it has to be said that the cakes are always bloody magnificent!

I have been boiling eggs for the egg and spoon races and cooking up sausages so they need only be reheated on the BBQ tomorrow. My worst fear would be that some kids go home with the vomits cos of the sloppy inside of a sausage.

I remembered very late that I wanted to take a folding chair, cos it is a long long day on my feet and some scum bags stole ours that Belly and Zig gave us one year for xmas. Yeh the bastards stole 'em from the shed while we were building the house. I hope they were full of bitey whitetail spiders and they lost some digits, like out builder nearly did. I know that was a long time ago and I have been slow to replace 'em, but it is just not something that routinely jumps into my head....being that camping and all that is really not to fore my mind.

Belly has made 9 carton cars and there is a serious slope at the park and all the oldfashioned games which the kids love so much are gonna climax in car race relays. We rather doubt the boxes will make it to the end and we are really hoping that no-one breaks anything other than cardboard, but we reckon that it will be a hoot. Belly can give the death nell to any boxes that survive the slide as she test drove one to make sure it was big enough for her, and she just loved going down that hill at silly speed.

So up early and ready for the off. I am a walking ache at the end of the day, but the payment of smiles and cuddles is more than enough to keep me going back year after year.

I do wonder whether we might have to change things up next year for the BIG ONE ZERO.

Old Fashioned Baking Day

How did those people in the olden days do it and with such good grace and effortlessnes... Buggered if I know.

Today I started with this stuff and a too many frozen blueberries to count and worked my guts out and sweated up a storm to create 3 dozen of these.

 

Well actually I made 4 dozen cos the first dozen were a bit shit and I didn't want Zig's mates to laugh at him cos his Ma can't cook, so I had to start over.

While they were cooling I trundled off to the shops to get something to transport them all in and found a trundle box which I thought might do the trick. The muffins are approximately 9cm cubed so 36 take up quite a lot of room. I bought a ruler at the first place and measured the boxes and then went to another place to make sure I had found the best bet cos again I don't want these cruel little blighters to be laughing at our lovely fella.

Boxes bought and muffins are iced, now just waiting for the icing to harden. All packed and ready to go.

I know some people have memories of the smell of baked goods wafting from the kitchen and I can imagine that would be a wonderful childhood memory to hold, but the Old Woman was not a baker. It was about as much as she could manage to open a packet of biscuits and that was only when she felt peckish.

It is important to me to make this sort of stuff for Zig, firstly so that the teachers doen't need to go the epi-pen on the nut allergy kids and secondly so he knows he is loved.

I reckon when he is old enough to be thinking about baking some stuff, he might remember the home made stuff he has been treated to and have a bit of a smile. Or else he could be a wise old sausage and always buy store made stuff and save himself the trouble.

AWL Fundraising aka chicksatlunch.

Off for a fundraising lunch today and I must admit that I was a little apprehensive.

It was all a good bit of fun and silliness. I met a smorgasbord of women of different ages and interests, and bought lunch and raffle tickets and paid to play heads and bums - yeh it is a primary school classic but the winner went away with a bottle of decent plonk. I offended a woman when I said the thing she had won was maybe the ugliest thing I had ever seen. This was before I realised that the winners got to choose their prizes. I do believe she spent a few seconds convincing herself that I had said something else and that she had just misheard the slight. I won a prize and picked through the nylon covered hangers to grab a beautiful bunch of orchids. Very pretty indeed.

There was a geriatric magician who's arthritis made some of the slight of hand more than a little stilted and I think he was a bit smelly, but that might have been all part of the act.

The musicians must have gotten lost on the way and so a couple of the women tried to fill in with some humming and crooning. And the kitchen staff might well have done a MKR FAIL by forgetting to turn the oven on and our meals were delayed until after 2pm. This allowed plenty of time for wine bottles to be emptied and champers to be downed.

It was certainly fun. My only regret is that I chose to sit facing out to the water and the boats, next time I will face the gaggle of girls so that I can get a really good look at em all.

Reality TV - How real is it?

 

There's a cooking competition on the tellie at the moment MKR (My Kitchen Rules), and watching it I am wondering just how REAL it really is.

I have been cooking for a very long time. Now I don't pretend to be an expert, far from it, god knows I don't even like it a little bit, but cook I can.

Some parts of cooking are just elementary, like what needs slow cooking and what can and should be tossed onto a flame and almost instantly pulled off again. The list of basics is quite long and for anyone thinking they might like to compete on a culinary show, well they surely would have looked up at least a few.

The idea that that there is REALLY one disaster after other is more than a little hard to believe.

I get the need to include dickheads and quirky folk and old people and youngsters. The ratings would be piss poor indeed if all the contestants were pleasant but surely they all aught be able to cook.

So REALITY TV it's not.

I guess none of the so called reality shows are remotely REAL. Could there really be a dozen or so women prepared to battle it out amongst themselves for some unknown unseen bloke and could he REALLY be that much of a narcissist? Yeh Ok that's possible but I don't reckon men like this would be easy to find in large numbers! Can regular people just jack in their jobs for months at a time to run around the world or survive on an island or build a house or repair someone else's place?

Big Brother was the jumping off point I think. And when it started, the carefully selected hodge podge of people were literally dumped into the house and left to their own devices. It was a bit of a psycho drama. Now they are given tasks that entertain (themselves not necessarily the viewers), and have odd visitors and letters from home and conjugal visits ( Ok I made that up)  and so I reckon the outcomes are also predetermined.

The tellie arguments and disasters and upsets and the odd characters are orchestrated and rehearsed and edited - not at all REAL.

I think this is just very cheap TV. No money wasted on script writing or costumes or sets or cinematography.

There is I bet an excellent reason why the ABC do not make 'em. Surely someone would be jumping up and down if the ABC spent public money making this kind of crap. And the commercial channels make it because it's cheap and catering for the lowest common denominator of viewers.

Beggars belief really that I am still watching this shit! At least I can record it and fast forward through the ads and the 'coming up next's.