Father day gift ideas

I have been surfing the net trying to work out what I should get my Dad for Fathers Day. I will likely end up giving him food or clothes because he doesn't need anything else.

This item which was on the suggestion list from a reputable Ozzie online store made me laugh.
It is a USB pole dancer. She swings around the pole when you plug it into you computer.

I can NOT imagine giving this to my Dad.

Joseph and the A mazing Technicolor Dreamcoat

We went to see Joesph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat on Tuesday night and it was AWESOME! Absolutely Brilliant performances by Joesph and the Narrator. And the front row seats made us so close to the action.

We had a really wonderful night and spent the whole trip home singing in the car.



In fact once we got home I watched another production on youtube until I was too tired to keep my eyes open. And the next day at work I was humming " there is one more angel in heaven..." all day long. It must have driven my work mates made - but they were nice enough not to mention it.

The Towel Incident of 2009

As I have posted previously I recently hired a cleaner. And the cleaner has been great, it has been wonderful knowing that the house is clean and the dust is being attended to.

(I am sure you know by now there is a but coming... )

BUT.....

Today I came home to find my FAVORITE TOWELS have bleach marks on them.

I am devastated! I know that seems like a severe response to some towels being ruined but there is a story behind why they are my favorite towels.

Towel Story: When Tom and I were dating (many years ago now) I gave Tom a very expensive blue Country Road towel as a present. Thinking back that seems like a odd gift for a guy...but moving right along.... The following year he gave me the same towel as a present. I actually thought that he had just given me exactly the same towel back but he hadn't. Tom had bought another of the towels so that we each had one. It was so that one day we would have a set. And when we got married and started living together they became a set. So you can see why they are precious to me.

Now, I hope, you can better understand my angst at finding them destroyed. I actually feel a little bit sick about it - I am a hopeless romantic after all.

The worst part is that I don't really know what to do about it.

Should I fire the cleaner? NB This is currently my preferred option.

Should I call him and tell him what happened as ask him to be more careful in future? The cleaner did ask us to tell him if there were any issues but what is he going to do about it? the towels are destroyed now and do I really want to keep a cleaner who has to be told not to bleach my things? Surely that goes without saying.

Also three shirts of mine which were in the washing basket in the bathroom got bleach on them a few weeks ago. I thought that Tom or I must have done it but now I suspect that it was more likely the cleaner.

Any tips on firing hired help?

Safari Style: A lesson in commitment

I like the idea of fancy dress parties but as I always leave me costume until the last minute I rarely go to a lot of effort. Recently we went to a birthday party with a safari theme. I was very impressed at the trouble some people when to in their costumes. The level of commitment was extreme.

These guys took three hours to paint all the visible skin on their bodies with black body paint. They looked great and I was impressed that they still looked like this at the end of the night. I did wonder if there was black paint on the seats of their car......


And these two spend even longer applying their body paint because it needed to be layered.


Tom and I were less committed with our Irwin inspired numbers.

Review: NY Art in BrisVegas

On Saturday, amongst one thousand social engagements, we visited the Queensland Art Gallery to see the "American Impressionism & Realism: A Landmark Exhibition from the Met".

It was wonderful. We went through the exhibition twice and stopped for lunch in the gallery cafe in between.

I really like this style of painting and the way light was captured in three or four painting was truly amazing! My favorite section was the portraits. There were some great painting and several interesting stories to go with them. We didn't stick with the tour that was happening while we were there but we did listen in from time to time.

One of the highlights was the painting below. It was commissioned as a wedding gift for the couple pictured and was originally going to be of the woman and her dog. But the dog didn't make it so the artist included her husband instead. Interesting.....


John Singer Sargent | 1856–1925 | Mr and Mrs IN Phelps Stokes 1897 | Oil on canvas | 214 x 101cm (84 1/4 x 39 3/4in.) Bequest of Edith Minturn Phelps Stokes (Mrs IN), 1938 | 38.104 | Collection: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York | Image © The Metropolitan Museum of Art



















If you have the means I would highly recommend seeing this exhibition.

Ticket addiction

Addiction: an obsession, compulsion, or excessive psychological dependence

I have an addiction to buying tickets.

It makes bus rides fun.......no just kidding I don't mean that kind of tickets.

I am addicted to buy theatre tickets. The problem stems from the set up of the qtix website. I have worked out how to get really good seats to see shows. So from time to time I log onto the website to see if there are any good seats available and when I find there are I am inclined to buy them. It is a kind of expensive habit actually.

I had a quick "session" the other night. As a result we have front row tickets to see Joseph & the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat in a few weeks. I am really looking forward to it. We saw it earlier in the year and it was really excellent - but we weren't as close to the front. It will be interesting to see if being so close to the action improves the performance - probably not but we are going now anyway.We are also going to see a play by the Melbourne theatre company at the begining of Septemeber.

But I really must stop looking at the website. It is to tempting and I am addicted!

Forced Spring Clean

I never really understood the idea of spring cleaning. My mum didn't ever really seem to do it - or if she did I certainly was not involved.

I was speaking with an Eastern European friend of mine recently and she told me about the huge spring clean her family would do every year which included removing all furniture from every room of the house and cleaning all the furniture and all the rooms thoroughly - including washing the walls and repainting them with lime, and washing ever square inch of fabric by hand. It sounded like a lot of hard work but I suppose the social structure which had the entire extended family living together helped ensure there were enough hands to get it all done.

Last weekend my darling husband Tom was sick, with a chest infection and a horrendous cough. I was happy to put up with it keeping me awake all night but he insisted (bless him) on leaving me in peace in our room and sleeping in the spare room.

This sounded like a great idea but no one had slept in the spare room, which doubles as my study, for ....well...years. I decided that before he could sleep there I needed to clean the room.

I started with the pillow slips, sheets, mattress protector, doona and doona cover. They didn't all fit in the wash so I did two loads. Meanwhile I assessed the condition of the pillows and decided that even the poor probably didn't want them - they were very old, possibily mine from childhood - and so I threw them in the bin. Or more accurately I put them on the front porch in the hope that Tom would put them in the bin.

Now is a good time to mention I am allergic to dust. The spare room was VERY dusty.

Anyway, I put the bedding in the dryer (I have no clothes line and they did't fit on the airers) and made a start on the rest of the room. After some intense vacumming I decided that I was going to by a dyson and that my $30 vacuum cleaner, which was purchased when I left home in 2001, is useless. The room was a bit cleaner.

I moved the mattress out into the sun after giving it a good vacuum. I am not sure how I hoped this would help the mattress which is older than I am but I am sure it didn't hurt - perhaps the fresh air did it some good?

Then I started with the Glen 20. When I finished the first can I went to the shops and bought some more. Then I started again. I cleaned the walls with antibacterial wipes and opened all the windows in the room to let the fresh air in.

By the time I noticed the blinds needed cleaning I was completely over it. So I put the room back together, spraying Glen 20 over every layer as it went down, and did a final vacuum of the floor. And finally my forced spring clean of one room in my seven room house was completed. I think perhaps I should be more diligent in future with maintaining the cleaniness of the rooms I don't use everyday because if I have to do that every year it would drive me nuts!

LDHBE

I vaguely remember committing to posting a photo of my new short hair some time back. I have finally made time to do it.

This is what I look like at the moment.

It is subject to change without notice.....

TV Time

I don't have much time for TV.

I could watch hours of it but I do work full time and study so I don't indulge in it very often. Usually the times I do watch tv is when I travel for work and when Tom and I watch tv series.

Watching tv series is great! Earlier in the year we watched the X-Files from start to finish - All 9 seasons. It is great to see the characters develop and watch the way different writers and directors impact the episodes. Watching them all together highlighted lots of trends - like everytime someone took over Mulder's body or life (this happened quite a lot) they would always try to seduce Scully. Or how every serial killer wanted to kill Scully - I forget how many times she was kidnapped or attacked in her appartment. Luckliy Mulder always arrived in time to save Scully from seducution (and the serial killers).

Currently we are watching Midsomer Murders. My favorite is the main character - Detective Chief Inspector Tom Barnaby, although I am fond of his wife Joyce too. The 13th season of the show is playing in the UK this year and each episode goes for an hour and a half so it is a big cmmittment to watch them all. So far we are up to season 5.

We also recently watched all of Scrubs, Arrested Development, How I met your mother and are always up to date with Top Gear.

The beauty of watching series to tv shows is that a) there are NO ADS, b) you can watch them whenever it is convient for you and c) stop and start them anytime.

Golden Key

Well it turns out that being academically brilliant has advantages, I have been invited to join the Golden Key International Honour Society.

I had not heard of the Society before so I immediately imagined that they all get dressed up in club colours and drink Port. Which, quite frankly, sounds great.

On further investigation though it seems this is a society which aims to provide opportunities for its members to gain skills to help them get jobs. As the website attests "Member benefits range from scholarships and development opportunities to jobs and internships. Through Golden Key, members are empowered with tools to help them realize their potential."

After reading through the website thoroughly I think they should rename the society "Overachievers Anonymous" and there should be a 12 step program to help these poor people with study/life balance. I notice that none of the people they hold up on pedestals make any mention of family or children. I doubt anyone who is member will ever understand the joy of leaving work at 5 pm and letting every thought of work leave your brain as you exit the building. It is truly a wonderful thing and the more you get paid, the harder it is to achieve.

Anyway, I have decided that the Golden Key is not for me. Mostly because it is really aimed at school leavers who are undertaking tertiary study and need an edge to get a job after finishing their study. And by the looks of it if that is the purpose people join for it is probably well worthwhile. The reality is though, that I am not 17 and I already have a job, so for me this invitation to join is not the Golden Opportunity they claim.