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Xmas dinner was lovely and we are still eating the leftovers:
It seems I have major issues with cooking the right amount of food!
And dessert was also fantastic:
I love the whole carton of ice cream plonked down on the table, just one of my classy little decorating tips.
The best part of the day was the lack of stress or tension, and I think everyone else appreciated that as well.
And the best part of the past few days? Log cake for breakfast!
Yesterday I had a killer migraine. I haven’t had one for about four years (I think) but yesterday was no fun.
Today I was unable to do my shift of charity retail as I feel somewhat depleted (and I still have a blind spot in my right eye) but regardless, here’s a photo of Mr Puss:
This is his box. This is his sanctuary, the place where he goes whenever he feels overwhelmed with life.
Today I wish I had a box like he does.
David’s mum is not a huge fan of xmas, and buying presents really stresses her out. I think if you remove the cost element present-buying is less daunting, so this year we have set a limit of $5 for each present (because if you spend $5 it’s no real stress, but if you spend $30 and then worry about whether or not the recipient will like it that can become stressful).
The presents can be from an op-shop, a dollar shop, or can be handmade. I’ve made my mil a pendant from the things I’ve got lying around here, and my fil will receive a barbequing apron.
David’s dad is a mad keen supporter of the Parramatta Eels (ha! someone has to!) and I keep an eye out for Eels paraphernalia. Some time ago – about four years ago? – I bought two Eels tea towels for about $10 (my memory is a bit hazy, it’s been a while) with the intention of making … something? out of them.
I used one of the tea towels to make him an apron – I figure with depreciation that one tea towel would be $5. So I’m within the spirit of the law, at any rate.
My xmas tree is up, hurray!
And my little xmas reindeers:
As always, whenever I put up the tree I remember the ornaments that didn’t make it over the years (purple glass balls I shall never forget you). Mr Puss’ first xmas with us was a bit of a nightmare of broken ornaments, so the following year I made some yarn-based ornaments so that he could have something on the tree to play with.
Does that sound even vaguely sensible?
Turns out, cats can’t distinguish yarn ornaments from any other sort, and since then we have instituted a strict ‘no cats in the tree’ policy.
Sometimes this policy is not as successful as one might wish.
I did my shift at my charity retail emporium today and knocked over about half of my xmas shopping. The torrential rains kept most of the shoppers away, but it was an ok day money-wise.
The big! exciting! news! is that the shop is moving a few doors down to new premises. With wooden floorboards! And a security door! Which is clean! And has air conditioning!
Quite honestly I’m a bit giddy with joy.
Air conditioning!
It’s been quite a tense place to work lately, and I’m really hoping that the new shop will be a more productive and profitable place.
It’s Thursday, so it’s time for a picture of Mr Puss:
This is his pre-attack pose – he’s eyeing up my toes and getting ready to pounce.
Over at Tomato Nation there’s a series of polls on annoying xmas things – hilarious, go and vote – and I realised only really have two xmas-related gripes.
1. The way people act in the supermarket while shopping for their xmas.
Actually that might be a tiny bit too specific, as I find the way people generally act in the supermarket to be extremely annoying. The patrons of our local supermarket are blithering idiots at the best of times, but put xmas into the mix and all bets are off.
I mean what the hell, dude, you just verbally abused an elderly woman who took the last pack of strawberries! I agree that strawberries are a necessary part of any xmas dinner, but srsly, swearing at an old age pensioner is not the answer here.
And the dithering! I’m probably as bad as the next person at this but come on, I’ve got a list, I know what I need, just let me get in to the deli counter. You need to make a decision about ham; it’s really not that hard.
And then with the leaving your trolley in the middle of the aisle while making “sorry! won’t be a minute!” faces at me, although that happens all year round although it shouldn’t.
2. The Little Drummer Boy.
Wow, just typing that title has me wracked with waves of loathing. I hate that song so much. So very much.
When I was at primary school we had to sing that song every year, many many times. Actually things took a turn for the absurd when we got a headmistress who fancied herself to be musical and creative – like the time we acted out the song. I was forced to play the part of Mary, and trust me, my smiling and nodding was both frosty and unenthusiastic.
I used to dread having to sing TLDB – I can still remember that it generally came after Away in a Manger and before Silent Night. The dread that I felt singing Away in a Manger, knowing the the hell that is TLDB was next.
And I could never understand the stupid song! At a fairly early age I worked out that the gift of percussion was inappropriate for many occasions so what possessed that boy to offer it as a birth gift?! “Mary smiled at me”, yeah sure, she’s just pushed a human being out of her body, the last things she wants is your rum-pah-pum-pums.
And why, WHY was there a little drummer boy in Bethlehem?! I seriously didn’t understand this – we did quite a lot of Bible study (Catholic school, after all) and drummers didn’t feature prominently in any of the stories I’d read.
In short, TLDB is a stupid song which makes no sense and makes me break out in a cold sweat.
~~~~~
I haven’t really done much about xmas so far but I’ve got it all sorted out in my head, I think. I just need to get on and do it.
I have put my advent calendar up:
because hello, it’s chocolate for breakfast.
Well I had rather a fantastic weekend, and I hope y’all did as well.
On Saturday we decided to do a dry run of our xmas dinner, just to check on some timings and to try out the new vegetarian dish – I don’t eat vegetables, David’s mum is a vegetarian and I like to make sure she has a choice of things to eat. So we invited De and J to come over to ours for dinner.
We decided not to do the puddings (I have them down pat) but I did make some chocolate-dipped fruit as I’d never done it before. Hmm, turns out you can’t really dip raspberries in chocolate and expect them to keep their structural integrity, so we’ll be sticking to strawberries.
I’m really glad we did the trial run, as we had a couple of timing issues, and we got some really valuable feedback on a number of things. Also we are still ploughing through the leftovers, so lack of food is not going to be an issue.
As always, when we set the table up for a dinner party Mr Puss assumes his rightful position at the head of the table:
On Sunday morning De had one of her legendary brunches, where you go home so full of eggs and haloumi and bacon and cinnamon buns that all you’re good for is lying on the sofa with a good book. So that’s what I did.
Later on that afternoon we all went to see 14 Blades, which was absolutely awesome. I love the Chinese epic dramas! Granted it took me about half an hour to catch up to the story, but it was fantastic – very pretty to look at. It reminded me in its scope of Red Cliff which I adored.
The week so far has been all about laundry and cleaning and blah, not at all like the weekend [sadpandaface].
Today while doing my stint of charity retail (mine is a glamorous life indeed) my trusted bejewelled jandal suddenly broke – the strap snapped clean through. So I had to walk home barefoot, across a road that had just been tarsealed this afternoon.
Also the good people of the inner west have apparently declared war on bottles, and have chosen the local streets to wage that war. Ow ow ow now my poor wee foot is totally munted.
Summer seems to be here with a vengeance: it was 31 degrees for most of the day, with storms expected any minute now. And the rest of the week will be at least 30 degrees, oh joy.
As the rest of my day has been about the kitties, here’s a picture of Mr Puss:
Wow, that picture’s about three years old – he used to be so svelte!
(The title is a quote from Kiwi boxer David Tua, when he requested a vowel on Wheel of Fortune.)
So the Oprah show has rolled into Australia, and it’s just fascinating to watch. I’ve never been an Oprah devotee (except for her role in The Colour Purple, where I think she’s just wonderful) but of course I knew that she was the queen of television, whatever. I just didn’t realise that her trip was going to be this big of a thing.
The constant fawning over Oprah and her guests is showing the Australian media to be really quite provincial. Sure, interviewing the queen of television is one thing, but do we really need to hear her guests opinions of Australia? They have all been interviewed so often that I’m starting to worry tourists arriving here will expect to be all over the media as well.
And the comments Oprah made about Australians meeting at the McCafes was just awesome. I’ve lived here for 10 years and nobody has ever invited me to meet them at Maccas. In fact nobody has ever invited me out for coffee, most Australians ask you to meet them at the pub.
Which is a much better idea, and barely fancy at all.
Speaking of pubs (see what I did there?) this is one of my locals, the Rose of Australia:
The cocktails are [reportedly] excellent, and the upstairs dining room is awesome.
Apparently a new version of World of Warcraft is being released tonight, which means I probably won’t see David again until sometime in February.
Last month my dad came over from NZ to stay with us for a week. I had a bit of a troubled relationship with my dad growing up (really just the average teenager pushing boundaries thing) but we get along well together now. It’s scary just how much I’m like him! We’re both extremely stubborn and opinionated – also I inherited his hay fever, thanks for that, dad.
While it was a bit strange having him here (the man watches golf on the telly all. the. time) it was also really great. Because he now has more of a context on my life here he will now ask me more specific questions about events, people and places, so instead of talking about the rugby for 20 minutes (which is also fine with me!) he asks about specific real things. Nice.
While he was here we went on a wine-tasting tour of the Hunter Valley, and this is one of the vineyards:
Seriously, it stopped raining for about 10 minutes the whole day so this is pretty much the only photo I was able to take.