Awkward Conversations

Ok, so I'm sick and I'm kind of in la-la land deaf in one ear and with a nose chockka block full of gicky stuff. So I'm standing in the local bakery, trying to decide whether the boys should have grain or white bread (a very hard decision I know), when a voice behind me said "hello?'. It was Will's old soccer coach from two years ago, an absolutely lovely man and a minister at the local church. And what happened after that was the oddest conversation created by me when struggling to think of what to say after we had done the "how's the family" topic, I shot us in the direction of "doesn't this bakery have lovely stuff now?" - I mean where did that come from and where does it go apart from "yes"? He was obviously embarrassed for me/us that he redirected us back onto a normal, safe path, asking if Will was playing soccer this year. I croaked a response and dashed away with my bread to the safety of my car and tissue box. I've never been good at small talk and that was a timely reminder of why.

Wildlife No 7

I'm currently training for the Oxfam 100km walk which covers 2 national parks in North Sydney - apart from a few kms of street walking, the rest is in the bush. And the bush brings with it many, many interesting "wild life" to be contended with. For example, last Saturday we were running through the bush taking it in turns to be the lead runner.

The problem with being the lead runner is that you run into the spiders webs - we normally run in the morning when the webs are new and no one else has usually been on the tracks. So when it was my turn to be in the lead I ran smack into a large web, and while faffing round trying to get the web off me, Mia started going nuts brushing me off. I had a big Golden Orb spider on me (in the photos!), now luckily for me (1) it didn't bite me, althought they're not poisonous and (2) I don't mind spiders. Now if it had been a snail or a slug, well you'd have heard me in NZ and I'd still be running.

Last week The Husband and I left the boys with Nana at a harbour beach and went for a bush walk for a bit. Now this walk is nothing like where we are training for the Oxfam - it's stepped (rather than boulder hopping), groomed (not bush bashing) and very pedestrian, but a gorgeous walk and view. So we were cruising along when A FOOTSTEP away from me, slithered a brown snake (see above), right across the path where I was about to step. We (the snake and me) both got a fright, and it REARED it's head up (remember it's only a footstep away from me - my foot suspended in the air in the microsecond this happened in). I leapt back whispering to The Husband- "snake", and we both stood there while he found a stick and we watched the empty path. "CLOSE CALL", I thought, and damn straight it was, as those blimmin brown snakes are uber poisonous and dangerous.... quote from Wikipedia:

The Eastern Brown Snake (Pseudonaja textilis), often referred to as the Brown Snake, is an elapid snake native to Australia. It is one of the world's deadliest snakes. This, combined with a native habitat which includes the well-populated east coast of Australia, has resulted in fatalities.

Katie, if you are reading this, don't worry. I have NEVER seen a brown snake on the actual track that we'll be walking for Oxfam. So we'll be fine.

Catchup

So where have I been and what have I been doing? I know I've been quiet lately, I hope you're still sticking around. I've been going through a little phase where not much has been happening. I means heaps has been happening but not much that's slightly amusing or interesting to you guys, maybe I've lost my mojo a bit, and feeling a tad uninteresting. I can't get my normal twist on things happening. Maybe it's because my head is completely STUFFED UP and full of cold/sinus/ear infection that has made me into a snotty, croaky deaf person for the last 10 days! I repeat 10 days!!! I try and carry on like I'm ok, but really I feel like I've been swimming and the waters still in my ears and needs to be shaken out, and I'm kind of la la and ever so slightly off balance. Doctor? Yes, tomorrow was the first appointment other than waiting in a dodgey after hours rooms for (last time I rang the wait time was "at least an hour" which means double it). In fact, my next business venture might be introducing the NZ After Hours doctor service to Australia, with my favourite model being the Ascot, Greenlane version where I never had to wait long, everyone was pleasant, the toy area was semi clean and best of all it was only 5 mins from home. Last time I was at the After Hours in Sydney with Will at 9.30pm one school night, after an hour and a half and everyone going through apart from us, I said to Will "we're up next" and made us both stand by the receptionist person who was calling out who's in next, who I told "we're going in next ok!". Will gave me a slightly embarrassed/relieved "mum?" and sure enough we were in next.
So that's me! I've had the in-laws staying ( I won't break my rule about blogging about family members, The Sister and my deceased mum excluded), I'm training for the Oxfam 100km walk in August (more on that later), I'm signing up for some writing courses, and The Husband and I are planning a get away for a week early May, although plans to go to Vietnam may be gone as of 10 mins ago when we realised we needed visas, all very well but for that we need a current passport, which The Husband hasn't got.
So I'm here, just still feeling a tad blah to be even slightly entertaining. Thanks for sticking by me :-)

Where am I ...again?

Sorry I've been so quiet lately folks, have had the mother-in-law to stay for 10 or so days and she's been lucky enough to sleep on the sofabed in the study where our computer is, so not wanting to intrude on her space, I have not been near the computer, nor my blog. However all's good now and lifes back to normal and I have the computer back. I'm also feeling a tad blah at the moment for various reasons so will pull my socks up and get going again soon. Just give me a day or two....

Social Niceities

The problem with blogging is sometimes I write things that are often personal and potentially about people who have not given me their permission to write about them or their stories, it's a fine line I walk, and while up to this point, I kind of know who my audience have been (apart from that freaky guy who offered me his and his gun's help, which quickly taught me how to screen comments on my blog), as I see my numbers creeping up with many new visitors, I feel I need to be a bit cautious about privacy, not of me, but of you guys. If you see a story that could be about you I absolutely apologise and please don't be offended nor think that I'm trying to get a cheap laugh out of you. I'm not. I'm happy to take the micky out of my world (excluding The Husband who is very much off limits), but absolutely not yours. If I do use a situation that may be familiar to you, it's really about me trying to make a point or pass on a learning from experience. So in this vein the next story is very delicate and I have hidden it as much as I can so as not to make lightly of someones situation. But what I am wanting to pass on is a bit of a conclusion I reached during it...do you sometimes just say the right thing, even though it's not what you think, just so you say the right thing?

So school yard parent chatting, I start chatting to someone I haven't seen for a while who I heard was having some bad luck, I asked after the situation and was made very quickly aware that this situation had significantly worsened. Of course I apologised profusely and kept chatting but in a more informed manner. This person then went on to apologise to me for causing me embarrassment by putting me in that situation. "I'm so sorry for embarrassing you" I think was how they described it. Point was though, I wasn't embarrassed at all. I had no idea the situation was worse and was not embarrassed or uncomfortable when made aware it had, I just changed my tone more appropriately. However, what I did do was a social niceity. I pretended I WAS embarrassed, and let them blither on along about this while I looked appropriately mollified. And then again today I saw the same person and they said to me again "Look I'm so sorry for embarrassing you by telling you that xxx had happened, please don't be embarrassed". Once again, playing along I once again looked embarrassed and shameface for something I felt nothing like that for. To make this person feel better about their bad situation, my social niceity was to act in a way that I didn't feel but felt like they needed me to act.

Geez can you make sense of this, a story without the detail is kind of like toast without butter, lacks a punch.
Point is....sometimes you just got to do what you just got to do.

Movie Night

Last weekend The Husband was in NZ for a night for his grandma's 90th birthday. The boys and I had an awesome day chilling at home, quietly playing, swimming and basically doing nothing, not even arguing. Will had a friend over, they swam and played lego quietly and peacefully, Rafe and Smith played quietly and peacefully together, we rode scooters to the park, ordered pizza and watched a kids movies together. All in all a lovely quiet and peaceful day. For me the evening was going to carry along a similar vein with a combination of crap food, crap TV, crap websites then bed. However..... around bath time the boys were mucking around outside chatting to the wee kids next door, the Neighbour chatted to me, he too was doing a solo parent weekend while his wife who I'm good friends with, was away. Conversation went something like this...

Me: What are you doing tonight? Watching some rugby?
Him: Naah, there's none on, I'm going to watch a movie on Foxtel
Me: Hey, me too, what are you watching?
Him: I'm thinking "Taken"
Me: Hey me too, we should watch it together...

Gad!!!!! What did I say that for??? Where did those words come from and why?

Him: That would be great, when should I come over?

Sheesh, so quiet/peaceful went out the door as I ran around like a crazy woman, getting rid of the wet togs, putting on a male neighbour appropriate outfit that wasn't my pj's as orginally planned, tidying up the house, getting nibblies out etc... And at 8pm the doorbell went and there was the Neighbour, with a bottle of wine.
We watched the movie, awkwardly. After the first glass, the awkwardness had gone a bit, and after the second, well we had a fine old semi relaxed time.
Just not the night I had planned and looked forward to for weeks.
When The Husband got home the next day, I told him about our movie night and how it was a bit awkward. The Husbands response..."why was it awkward?"
He got me there.

I'm here!

Just had a busy week, will post a beaut this afternoon - an awkward neighbour story, been humming and haaing about putting it on just too good not to. Got the Inlaws here too so busy doing normal life stuff.

Check back later folks.

Mothers

I have just put a new pix of myself up, courtesy of a wedding photographer at Andrew and Lana's gorgeous wedding.

Anyhow, I suddenly realised that...sigh...I'm starting to look like my mother. Is it just a reality of life that eventually, even though we try our hardest (in my case) to stop it happening, we turn into our mothers? Now those of you that know my mother will be thinking..
has Lisa started drinking at 2.30pm in the afternoon (no!), is she creating a food issue with her children by refusing to eat anything (not a chance), is she dissatisfied and sad with her life (absolutely not), (The Sister will kill me for those comments), but no, it's some of my mum's quirkiness that seems to be coming through. The Sister and I both LOVE the weather, and our Mum used to tell us about the sky and get excited when there was a storm coming - she really needed to do a stint in Brisbane or Sydney to satisfy that love. She loved shells, stones and driftwood and rambling along a beach looking for stuff, and I love doing that too. She loved art, especially contemporary stuff, and The Sister and I have definitely got that part of her as well. Now that my Mum has gone, I feel it's my responsibility to keep her memory alive for my boys (and The Husband who never met her) so I talk about lots of good memory stuff.
But it's interesting to think that really it's just a matter of time before some bits you inherit from your parents seem to sneak up on you and it takes a dear friend or sibling to snip the bad bits in the bud before they burrow in. The Sister and I are very good at that and can stop each other in our tracks with a withering.."you sound JUST like Mum".
Anyhow, if you read between the lines there is plenty of material when it comes to my Mum. But a snippet folks is all you'll get. However if you want to see her (as she may have looked in her VERY EARLY 40's, albeit with a perm and a ciggie in lieu of the bubbles - actually, keep the bubbles in there as well), then have a look at my photo.
And have a think about the good parts of your Mum coming through in you. One thing I learnt from my Mum is how to grow thick skin and not be a victim.
In fact, I think that The Sister and I turned out pretty bloody fabulous not only in spite of our Mum, but because of her as well.