What is this whole IQ business?
Ever since they had that game show-style IQ quiz on TV everyone wants to tell you how smart they are.
Frankly, my theory is that if someone's boasting about his or her IQ then they're bound to be a loony, orbiting around their own self-importance like the Earth around the sun which shines out of their proverbials.
Saying that, apparently my husband and I are very high IQs, as, I suspect are my children.
Keeping this in mind, The Man frankly couldn't get up in the mornings if I didn't kick him in the kidneys twice (on a really bad day I take a running leap).
My daughter and I are lucky to remember to brush our hair before leaving the house in the morning and The Boy thinks its funny to pee into the wind...so really, in the light of that evidence, how much can this whole IQ thing count for?
One not-friend I used to know would boast constantly about his high IQ but wasn't smart enough to delete the letters from his internet mistress before his wife logged on to check the family email.
Another genius I came across thought he could avoid a drug test at work by carrying a plastic sandwich bag of 'clean' urine around with him in his work bag. Except, he threw the bag into his locker one 48 degree day, the snaplock bag flew open, and he came back to boots, socks and underwear smelling less than 'clean'.
I begin to think IQ stands for 'idiocy quotient' - how potentially stupid smart people can be.
I wonder if there's some high-IQ person out there who'd like to do a study on how closely correlated high IQs and low common sense are related?
Hey, if someone will fund a study to find out whether you're more likely to get knocked up by your lover or your husband...someone will fund this!
& by the way, that game show-style IQ quiz...
The Man and I were so busy cooking dinner for our fellow IQ quizzees that we could only do half of the quiz each, inbetween running back and forward from the kitchen.
As a result, we cumulatively scored in the early 200s...but if you cut that in half I think it means we're lucky we can get our pants on in the morning without putting both legs in one hole.
Sunday, August 28, 2005
Friday, August 19, 2005
Boys will be boys...and they all want to be men
This issue swept through out little town like wildfire!
The idea of a 14-year-old playing footy against 40-year-olds had people ranting for months, even though the issue had never been raised before in all the years our small-town league had been enlisting teenagers.
It became very personal because parents and teenagers took it very personally, other parents became rabid, and footballers were just plain nervous.
Looking back, I now think I'd have to go with the 'they're just too young' line, because I wouldn't like to see my little boy fronting up to some of these guys out on the field.
But you make your own decision...
My friends and The Newspaper's regular readers are perfectly aware that I normally have an opinion on everything - but when it comes to telling people how to raise their children I have trouble finding a clearly black or white place to stand.
Ask me about whether children should eat Whiz Fizz for breakfast or how to handle a mid-shop temper tantrum and I’ll give you a clear, and probably quite loud, opinion. But when it comes to kids and sports - the line seems to become a little more blurred.
The talk of the town, right now, revolves around a tiny handful of young teenagers who have stepped up to play football in ‘the big league’ - as ODFC president Peter Lindner so cleverly phrased it.
I’ve talked to parents, players, community members and I have to say - I don’t have a hard and fast opinion on this one. All of the parents I’ve spoken to - the ones who support young teenagers joining local league games and the ones who are horrified - all have very legitimate opinions.
Would you risk your children getting hurt in a game of football? We’d all say - "of course not!" And I believe local parents opposing the move are sincere in their concerns.
But don’t we risk sporting injuries for ourselves and our children every day? Aren’t their 40-year-old men being carted off the field on a Saturday and junior footballers playing kids twice their own size in their own, appropriate grade? You can get hurt playing cricket or netball too. And where do we draw the line - size, age, weight or ability? Who decides who can play and who can’t?
In a town of this size, with all the restrictions that shift work and a fluid population places on our sporting groups - this certainly isn’t the first time a junior this young has joined the senior ranks. I remember cheering on my teenaged class mates, myself, when I was in high school here.
Did local parents and football clubs act responsibly when they let young Adam ‘Boof’ Warren step out on the field at Coober Pedy this month? I believe so. Players and clubs were well informed, 13-year-old ‘Boof’ and his equally-young Coober Pedy counterpart were both keen, and parents were ready on the sideline to step in. But then - if ‘Boof’ had been hurt - what way would public opinion be swaying right now?
The fact is, the AFL - and at least some of our local clubs - are not opposed to juniors playing senior football if they have parental approval and, in this case and subsequent cases, all players were duly informed.
One of the most practical precautions I’ve heard so far is requiring junior players - especially ones so young - to wear an armband, identifying them to their fellow players?
But, in the midst of this whole football furore - the one thing I am very clear on is that I believe, it is imperative that all players are aware of their young opponent. I liken this to playing a pregnant opponent in netball or volleyball - everyone must be aware of the possible consequences of playing.
The idea of a 14-year-old playing footy against 40-year-olds had people ranting for months, even though the issue had never been raised before in all the years our small-town league had been enlisting teenagers.
It became very personal because parents and teenagers took it very personally, other parents became rabid, and footballers were just plain nervous.
Looking back, I now think I'd have to go with the 'they're just too young' line, because I wouldn't like to see my little boy fronting up to some of these guys out on the field.
But you make your own decision...
My friends and The Newspaper's regular readers are perfectly aware that I normally have an opinion on everything - but when it comes to telling people how to raise their children I have trouble finding a clearly black or white place to stand.
Ask me about whether children should eat Whiz Fizz for breakfast or how to handle a mid-shop temper tantrum and I’ll give you a clear, and probably quite loud, opinion. But when it comes to kids and sports - the line seems to become a little more blurred.
The talk of the town, right now, revolves around a tiny handful of young teenagers who have stepped up to play football in ‘the big league’ - as ODFC president Peter Lindner so cleverly phrased it.
I’ve talked to parents, players, community members and I have to say - I don’t have a hard and fast opinion on this one. All of the parents I’ve spoken to - the ones who support young teenagers joining local league games and the ones who are horrified - all have very legitimate opinions.
Would you risk your children getting hurt in a game of football? We’d all say - "of course not!" And I believe local parents opposing the move are sincere in their concerns.
But don’t we risk sporting injuries for ourselves and our children every day? Aren’t their 40-year-old men being carted off the field on a Saturday and junior footballers playing kids twice their own size in their own, appropriate grade? You can get hurt playing cricket or netball too. And where do we draw the line - size, age, weight or ability? Who decides who can play and who can’t?
In a town of this size, with all the restrictions that shift work and a fluid population places on our sporting groups - this certainly isn’t the first time a junior this young has joined the senior ranks. I remember cheering on my teenaged class mates, myself, when I was in high school here.
Did local parents and football clubs act responsibly when they let young Adam ‘Boof’ Warren step out on the field at Coober Pedy this month? I believe so. Players and clubs were well informed, 13-year-old ‘Boof’ and his equally-young Coober Pedy counterpart were both keen, and parents were ready on the sideline to step in. But then - if ‘Boof’ had been hurt - what way would public opinion be swaying right now?
The fact is, the AFL - and at least some of our local clubs - are not opposed to juniors playing senior football if they have parental approval and, in this case and subsequent cases, all players were duly informed.
One of the most practical precautions I’ve heard so far is requiring junior players - especially ones so young - to wear an armband, identifying them to their fellow players?
But, in the midst of this whole football furore - the one thing I am very clear on is that I believe, it is imperative that all players are aware of their young opponent. I liken this to playing a pregnant opponent in netball or volleyball - everyone must be aware of the possible consequences of playing.
Wasted time is lost time
I wrote this editorial in response to a local death underground.
The man was a lovely, family man - his wife was a workmate and one of our employee's husbands was working alongside him, took a smoko, and came back and he was gone on.
It hit us all hard...
As we were tragically reminded this week by the death of local father of two Karl Eibl, time is limited.
You can’t take it with you - or so the proverb goes. But what will you leave behind?
For those of us with children - what are we leaving them?
And I’m not talking about investments and trust accounts - all that can be arranged with a quick trip to your local bank or financial advisor.
There’s a more precious investment our children need to bank on for a solid future.
Have we given them all the love, confidence and a sense of self that they are going to need if we’re not around for them as they grow? That’s something Karl knew how to do.
He was a man who celebrated family every day.
While his children will miss out on growing up with their Dad, they will never doubt how much he loved them when he was here.
Can yours and my children say the same thing?
It’s a close call in a town like this where so many families have two working parents and a plethora of commitments.
But there are ways to be involved in your child’s life - in all aspects of his or her life - even when you’re pressured for time.
And trust me, I’m not preaching - I’m trying to take my own advice on this one.
Don’t just drop your child off at sport - stay on the sidelines or even lend a hand. It’s not always cool, I know, but it’s always (at least secretly) appreciated and it will be remembered forever.
A very smart man called Stephen Biddulph wrote that ‘quality time’ is a myth - and what children want is ‘quantity’.
They want to do the shopping with you, stand alongside you while you wash the dishes, chat to you while you fix the car - so please, let them. Read the newspaper aloud, and then let your child read aloud to you while you cook up dinner.
Read, talk, explain, flick through family albums, bring them along to work for a visit once in a while, and join them at school when you can.
Find time! Because if your time runs out - you want to leave a lot of love behind.
The man was a lovely, family man - his wife was a workmate and one of our employee's husbands was working alongside him, took a smoko, and came back and he was gone on.
It hit us all hard...
As we were tragically reminded this week by the death of local father of two Karl Eibl, time is limited.
You can’t take it with you - or so the proverb goes. But what will you leave behind?
For those of us with children - what are we leaving them?
And I’m not talking about investments and trust accounts - all that can be arranged with a quick trip to your local bank or financial advisor.
There’s a more precious investment our children need to bank on for a solid future.
Have we given them all the love, confidence and a sense of self that they are going to need if we’re not around for them as they grow? That’s something Karl knew how to do.
He was a man who celebrated family every day.
While his children will miss out on growing up with their Dad, they will never doubt how much he loved them when he was here.
Can yours and my children say the same thing?
It’s a close call in a town like this where so many families have two working parents and a plethora of commitments.
But there are ways to be involved in your child’s life - in all aspects of his or her life - even when you’re pressured for time.
And trust me, I’m not preaching - I’m trying to take my own advice on this one.
Don’t just drop your child off at sport - stay on the sidelines or even lend a hand. It’s not always cool, I know, but it’s always (at least secretly) appreciated and it will be remembered forever.
A very smart man called Stephen Biddulph wrote that ‘quality time’ is a myth - and what children want is ‘quantity’.
They want to do the shopping with you, stand alongside you while you wash the dishes, chat to you while you fix the car - so please, let them. Read the newspaper aloud, and then let your child read aloud to you while you cook up dinner.
Read, talk, explain, flick through family albums, bring them along to work for a visit once in a while, and join them at school when you can.
Find time! Because if your time runs out - you want to leave a lot of love behind.
A force of nature...
I wrote this editorial in response to the annual footy final fights.
Happy reading...
What is the most powerful force in nature?
A tornado can drive a corn cob through concrete and the deep sea pressure of water can tear metal apart. But I’d lay my bets that peer pressure causes more damage than any other natural force.
Peer pressure, in my view, is akin to gravity - it’s everywhere and the more weighed down you already are, the more it affects you.
But I’m not talking the same old clichés about youth and children here - I’m talking about all of us.
Who here honestly doesn’t care what anyone else thinks about them? If that was really true you would drink with your boss on the weekends and, trust me, Pumpkin Patch and Osh Kosh B’Gosh would be making quite a lot less money out of Roxby Downs.
But we all did get the ‘peer pressure talk’ at school or from our mums years ago so I’m not going to waste my time convincing you to resist.
Instead, I’m asking you to embrace peer pressure and use the power for good.
Would a night out at the pub with our sporting buddies go so badly wrong if there were a few more people ready to say "come on mate, time to rein it in"?
Here’s a revelation for you, if you’re having a good time and one of your mates is going too far and ruining someone else’s good time - it is your business. If you throw in your two cents then you’re probably doing that person a favour because, let’s face it, how many of us really want to be known as "that idiot from the other night"?
Don’t just say no to drugs - say no to...well I’m not supposed to actually print the word I was thinking so let’s call them ‘dummies’. (I can write it here! Say no to dickheads. It's not guns that kill - it's wankers)
Our last round of local court reports boasted an unusual number of assaults and, to be fair, most of them were alcohol-related.
What surprised me, though, was how so many of these people had a "damn good reason" for their attacks, despite the severity.
So I’ve decided, it’s time to reclaim our right to a night out without brawls, harassment, drink spiking or drunk drivers.
But you, and only you, can make it really hard on yourself, and your friends, to ruin someone else’s night out. So embrace the power of peer pressure and get out there and wield a little bit of it!
Happy reading...
What is the most powerful force in nature?
A tornado can drive a corn cob through concrete and the deep sea pressure of water can tear metal apart. But I’d lay my bets that peer pressure causes more damage than any other natural force.
Peer pressure, in my view, is akin to gravity - it’s everywhere and the more weighed down you already are, the more it affects you.
But I’m not talking the same old clichés about youth and children here - I’m talking about all of us.
Who here honestly doesn’t care what anyone else thinks about them? If that was really true you would drink with your boss on the weekends and, trust me, Pumpkin Patch and Osh Kosh B’Gosh would be making quite a lot less money out of Roxby Downs.
But we all did get the ‘peer pressure talk’ at school or from our mums years ago so I’m not going to waste my time convincing you to resist.
Instead, I’m asking you to embrace peer pressure and use the power for good.
Would a night out at the pub with our sporting buddies go so badly wrong if there were a few more people ready to say "come on mate, time to rein it in"?
Here’s a revelation for you, if you’re having a good time and one of your mates is going too far and ruining someone else’s good time - it is your business. If you throw in your two cents then you’re probably doing that person a favour because, let’s face it, how many of us really want to be known as "that idiot from the other night"?
Don’t just say no to drugs - say no to...well I’m not supposed to actually print the word I was thinking so let’s call them ‘dummies’. (I can write it here! Say no to dickheads. It's not guns that kill - it's wankers)
Our last round of local court reports boasted an unusual number of assaults and, to be fair, most of them were alcohol-related.
What surprised me, though, was how so many of these people had a "damn good reason" for their attacks, despite the severity.
So I’ve decided, it’s time to reclaim our right to a night out without brawls, harassment, drink spiking or drunk drivers.
But you, and only you, can make it really hard on yourself, and your friends, to ruin someone else’s night out. So embrace the power of peer pressure and get out there and wield a little bit of it!
A spoonful of sugar...
I write an editorial every fortnight for the Newspaper.
Originally I shied away from the job because, after writing almost every other part of the paper I thought, the last thing people would want was me writing about myself and my own ideas and opinions on top of that.
Instead, I find people stopping me in the street and saying the nicest, most inspiring things to me about the editorials I write.
Thankyou - to those people. When, one day, I finish writing for a living, I might just go on writing for love because of the confidence they have given me.
And, because often what I write I hate and then go back to years later and find seeds of inspiration in, I've decided to include some of my editorials in my blog.
Happy reading...
This morning I passed three little girls, all in a row like ducks, on their way to school...and every single one of them had a packet of Burger Rings in her hand.
All I could think was, somewhere, a primary school teacher was cursing those little girls’ mum.
You see, I know what happens when you feed kids that stuff - I’ve done the research, I’ve even experimented on my own little darlings.
I can tell you honestly that, when it comes to my kids, a can of Sprite equals two Caramello Koalas equals just five or six jelly beans...and it all equals demon-spawn tantrum hell for me.
What really surprised me though, when I started tracking the rubbish we were putting into our pre-schoolers, was that the canned pineapple on home-made pizzas can also send my kids troppo.
White bread hypes them up like fairy floss and some frozen vegies have more sugar in them, weight-wise, than Arnott’s Biscuits.
My father once overdosed the kids on boiled lollies and a five-day visit was over in just two-days.
On the other side of the coin - my sister-in-law tongue-lashed me once in a supermarket line-up because my "poor, neglected children" didn’t know what Tic Tacs were.
I stand by my choice though - I’ve got enough bad eating habits of my own. That’s one thing the kids aren’t going to inherit from me.
We all get the letters home about healthy lunchbox snacks - but if you really knew how much easier your life would be with a sugarless child, you’d throw those Tim Tams straight out the window.
But don’t take my word for it - test the theory yourself. Just one week of salad sticks and fruit snacks, pita breads and meals made from scratch. No softdrinks, no lollies, less cheese, less bread and no canned vegies.
Then, if it works for your family, here’s some hints to help you beat the sugar-induced Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde syndrome long-term.
Make your own food from scratch - not only is it better for you, its cheaper and you can always freeze off favourites.
Involve fussy eaters in growing their own vegies and fresh herbs. With shade and water you can grow capsicums, cucumbers, tomatos and snowpeas - and they do taste better.
Keep a big pile of ‘safe’ snacks like fruit, muesli bars and those crunchy soy crisps in an easily-reached cupboard that the kids know they can graze on any time of the day.
My kids have a cooking night with their Dad once a week and will always eat their own creations, even if it’s something new. But my advice...buy a two-handled mincing blade so littlies’ fingers are never near the knife.
Grab a healthy recipé book and make cooking dinner a family time. When you attach those good, social feelings to great, healthy food - well...you’ve already won half the battle.
Originally I shied away from the job because, after writing almost every other part of the paper I thought, the last thing people would want was me writing about myself and my own ideas and opinions on top of that.
Instead, I find people stopping me in the street and saying the nicest, most inspiring things to me about the editorials I write.
Thankyou - to those people. When, one day, I finish writing for a living, I might just go on writing for love because of the confidence they have given me.
And, because often what I write I hate and then go back to years later and find seeds of inspiration in, I've decided to include some of my editorials in my blog.
Happy reading...
This morning I passed three little girls, all in a row like ducks, on their way to school...and every single one of them had a packet of Burger Rings in her hand.
All I could think was, somewhere, a primary school teacher was cursing those little girls’ mum.
You see, I know what happens when you feed kids that stuff - I’ve done the research, I’ve even experimented on my own little darlings.
I can tell you honestly that, when it comes to my kids, a can of Sprite equals two Caramello Koalas equals just five or six jelly beans...and it all equals demon-spawn tantrum hell for me.
What really surprised me though, when I started tracking the rubbish we were putting into our pre-schoolers, was that the canned pineapple on home-made pizzas can also send my kids troppo.
White bread hypes them up like fairy floss and some frozen vegies have more sugar in them, weight-wise, than Arnott’s Biscuits.
My father once overdosed the kids on boiled lollies and a five-day visit was over in just two-days.
On the other side of the coin - my sister-in-law tongue-lashed me once in a supermarket line-up because my "poor, neglected children" didn’t know what Tic Tacs were.
I stand by my choice though - I’ve got enough bad eating habits of my own. That’s one thing the kids aren’t going to inherit from me.
We all get the letters home about healthy lunchbox snacks - but if you really knew how much easier your life would be with a sugarless child, you’d throw those Tim Tams straight out the window.
But don’t take my word for it - test the theory yourself. Just one week of salad sticks and fruit snacks, pita breads and meals made from scratch. No softdrinks, no lollies, less cheese, less bread and no canned vegies.
Then, if it works for your family, here’s some hints to help you beat the sugar-induced Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde syndrome long-term.
Make your own food from scratch - not only is it better for you, its cheaper and you can always freeze off favourites.
Involve fussy eaters in growing their own vegies and fresh herbs. With shade and water you can grow capsicums, cucumbers, tomatos and snowpeas - and they do taste better.
Keep a big pile of ‘safe’ snacks like fruit, muesli bars and those crunchy soy crisps in an easily-reached cupboard that the kids know they can graze on any time of the day.
My kids have a cooking night with their Dad once a week and will always eat their own creations, even if it’s something new. But my advice...buy a two-handled mincing blade so littlies’ fingers are never near the knife.
Grab a healthy recipé book and make cooking dinner a family time. When you attach those good, social feelings to great, healthy food - well...you’ve already won half the battle.
Sunday, August 14, 2005
The Legacy
It's been six months now since I've been to the Farm but work continues without us.
We finally had our you-beaut ecologically-responsible greywater recycling system installed.
Of course, to do it, the plumbers had to pull down three out of four fences, bulldoze through my garden, rip up all the lawn and dig a moat around the entire hourse.
My in-laws have been visiting the property regularly, however, to fend off anyone sad enough to rob a fenceless, moated, floorless, waterless dreamhouse.
And, to my delight, they discovered that when the Plumber tore through my garden and destroyed the lawn he managed to spread my herb and lettuce seeds throughout the backyard.
So, where once was sad, dry Cooch Grass there's now a forest of lettuces and basil in four colours and five shapes.
Now, I just have to find out if all my carrots, beets, radishes and turnips thrived underneath the deserted garden block.
We know we can't expect a crop of potatoes this year as The Man left them in the kitchen cupboard last time he visited.
After he opened the pantry cupboard and discovered them collapsing into slop inside the paperbag he surprisingly and quite suddenly agreed to let a professional rip out the kitchen and rebuild it - rather than "knock it up" himself...so I'll chalk that up as a win anyway, potatoes or no potatoes.
We finally had our you-beaut ecologically-responsible greywater recycling system installed.
Of course, to do it, the plumbers had to pull down three out of four fences, bulldoze through my garden, rip up all the lawn and dig a moat around the entire hourse.
My in-laws have been visiting the property regularly, however, to fend off anyone sad enough to rob a fenceless, moated, floorless, waterless dreamhouse.
And, to my delight, they discovered that when the Plumber tore through my garden and destroyed the lawn he managed to spread my herb and lettuce seeds throughout the backyard.
So, where once was sad, dry Cooch Grass there's now a forest of lettuces and basil in four colours and five shapes.
Now, I just have to find out if all my carrots, beets, radishes and turnips thrived underneath the deserted garden block.
We know we can't expect a crop of potatoes this year as The Man left them in the kitchen cupboard last time he visited.
After he opened the pantry cupboard and discovered them collapsing into slop inside the paperbag he surprisingly and quite suddenly agreed to let a professional rip out the kitchen and rebuild it - rather than "knock it up" himself...so I'll chalk that up as a win anyway, potatoes or no potatoes.
It's a long way to the top...
The Girl and I have been talking a lot lately about tact.
Like the fact that it's not actually nice to announce that you're smarter than everyone else - six-year-olds tend to be a little testy about those kind of sweeping statements and it tends to undermine your ability to find a friend to play hopscotch with at Recess.
So we talked about how everyone has a special talent or two, and maybe her special talent is 'learning' because she does pick things up so quickly.
Tonight, in the car, she announced very primly that she was going to be a teacher when she grew up because her special talent was 'learning'.
Then she asked him, what's your special talent?
He replied 'ROCK & ROLL BABY'.
According to the kids, The Man's talent is beer.
Like the fact that it's not actually nice to announce that you're smarter than everyone else - six-year-olds tend to be a little testy about those kind of sweeping statements and it tends to undermine your ability to find a friend to play hopscotch with at Recess.
So we talked about how everyone has a special talent or two, and maybe her special talent is 'learning' because she does pick things up so quickly.
Tonight, in the car, she announced very primly that she was going to be a teacher when she grew up because her special talent was 'learning'.
Then she asked him, what's your special talent?
He replied 'ROCK & ROLL BABY'.
According to the kids, The Man's talent is beer.
Friday, July 15, 2005
I lose - he wins!
When our children were born I tried to be as politically correct as possible.
The Girl was given trucks and tool sets and The Boy received his own set of dolls.
I was offended by their resistance to my PC efforts when I discovered The Girl serving tea to her trucks out of an upside-down construction hat and caught The Boy playing 'zzzooooom, boom, bang!' with his mummy and daddy dolls.
And now, The Boy is four years old and they tell me he has the same amount of testosterone running through him as a 14-year-old teenager.
I found myself nose-to-nose with him the other day.
He stood on the bed after being sent to his room, receiving three frowny faces on his sticker chart and a smack on the bum.
The veins in his little neck were bulging as he leaned towards me like the Incredible Hulk, hissing through clenched teeth that I was making him "very, very angry".
Finally I resorted to the worst punishment of all - I grounded him!
Has there ever been a four-year-old in the world who was grounded?
He replied "I am not listening to you and you, you, you are a fanny-head".
I had to leave the room, hold the door shut behind me, lean against it and snicker hysterically into my palm.
From the other side of the door I heard a little, suprisingly-calm voice ask - in a quizzical manner - "what's grounded?"
So I've decided, that's it! I've lost. I am officially waving the white flag.
I knew he could out-stubborn me when he was a year old and wouldn't sleep during the nights.
If I sang lullabies he'd scream "no, no, no" and thrash back and forwards. (I'm assured it's not just my singing voice.)
We tried controlled crying - he kicked the cot off the wall and walked out.
We tried it again at age two and he literally took the door off the hinges.
He won!
One night, at 1am in the morning, I finally turned off all the lights except my bedside lamp and crawled into bed. He stood in the doorway screaming "I'm not going to bed" and I said "well, I am".
I woke up two hours later and he was asleep, standing up with his forehead mashed against the door jamb.
He won!
Ironically, the only person who can best him is his sister.
Now, I just need to wait for her hormones to set in and I can sit back and watch the fireworks!
It's only about 10 years from now - I can probably last it out that long with a cattle prod and a lot of frowny faces.
The Girl was given trucks and tool sets and The Boy received his own set of dolls.
I was offended by their resistance to my PC efforts when I discovered The Girl serving tea to her trucks out of an upside-down construction hat and caught The Boy playing 'zzzooooom, boom, bang!' with his mummy and daddy dolls.
And now, The Boy is four years old and they tell me he has the same amount of testosterone running through him as a 14-year-old teenager.
I found myself nose-to-nose with him the other day.
He stood on the bed after being sent to his room, receiving three frowny faces on his sticker chart and a smack on the bum.
The veins in his little neck were bulging as he leaned towards me like the Incredible Hulk, hissing through clenched teeth that I was making him "very, very angry".
Finally I resorted to the worst punishment of all - I grounded him!
Has there ever been a four-year-old in the world who was grounded?
He replied "I am not listening to you and you, you, you are a fanny-head".
I had to leave the room, hold the door shut behind me, lean against it and snicker hysterically into my palm.
From the other side of the door I heard a little, suprisingly-calm voice ask - in a quizzical manner - "what's grounded?"
So I've decided, that's it! I've lost. I am officially waving the white flag.
I knew he could out-stubborn me when he was a year old and wouldn't sleep during the nights.
If I sang lullabies he'd scream "no, no, no" and thrash back and forwards. (I'm assured it's not just my singing voice.)
We tried controlled crying - he kicked the cot off the wall and walked out.
We tried it again at age two and he literally took the door off the hinges.
He won!
One night, at 1am in the morning, I finally turned off all the lights except my bedside lamp and crawled into bed. He stood in the doorway screaming "I'm not going to bed" and I said "well, I am".
I woke up two hours later and he was asleep, standing up with his forehead mashed against the door jamb.
He won!
Ironically, the only person who can best him is his sister.
Now, I just need to wait for her hormones to set in and I can sit back and watch the fireworks!
It's only about 10 years from now - I can probably last it out that long with a cattle prod and a lot of frowny faces.
The Baby Bible
When you live in a town with the state’s highest birthrate you tend to lose a lot of friends to pregnancy – after all, it’s a disease that most women catch eventually.
And, when you’ve gone through all the hard stuff yourself, after you’ve ignored all the good, practical advice other mums handed you at the beginning – you desperately want to make it easier for someone else.
We work in a business that’s been up and running for two years and, in that time, we’ve had four staff members come down pregnant.
The rest of us already had young children, ranging in age from nine months through to eight or so.
So we put our heads together and came up with the Baby Bible.
Now, I can publish excerpts from it so the entire world-wide web can benefit from our knowledge.
Here is the product endorsement-free version…
Firstly, they come out ugly! Don’t expect anything else.
Hats don’t stay on. Button-up necks are useless. Zips are uncomfortable when you’re a little baby stuck on your back 20 of the 24 hours in the day.
Don’t get anything with buttons at the crutch – big, tough, riveted snaps are the go! Trust me on this one, I’ve changed a lot of bums in the dark at 2am in the morning with another toddler asleep in the bed next to me.
You are not a bad mum if you don’t breastfeed.
You are not a bad mum if you don’t have a mother’s group or if you hate the other ladies at your playgroup.
You are not a bad mum if you don’t document every ounce of weight gained, lost or imagined on your baby.
Odds on, you’re just not a bad mum.
It’s nice to keep the records but you’ll probably notice if you’re baby is going well. The blue book is great and those little baby albums – but get someone else to keep one and just stick with a basic diary. I think baby albums are a Nanna job (are you reading this Nanna?) – then you can just ring her and let her jot down the dates herself while you get on with the job of breastfeeding, burping, buttoning and butt-wiping.
Ok – while we’re talking about butt-wiping.
Baby’s poo starts off black in the hospital, and alternates between fluorescent green, Jeep Cherokee khaki and Dijon mustard-yellow in the months that follow. The Girl could shoot shit at me from two feet away while she’s was breastfed. It’s all under high pressure in their little bodies.
My sister-in-laws says – Beware! Banana goes in yellow and comes out black!
They hate to poo. They cry. Rub their tummies in clockwise motion, let them push their feet against something so they can brace themselves and rub the bottom of their feet in a figure-of-eight motion. It really works. But if you get stuck, so does soft brown sugar or a splash of Coca Cola in a bottle of water – it’ll have them shitting through the eye of a needle.
Stack up on those plastic, kill-the-smell nappy bags - they’re a lifesaver at 3am at your mum’s house in the middle of a frosty Winter when you don’t want to go to the outside bin but you’re too scared to stink her place up.
Buy nappy san and buckets now – you’ll have to deal with poo, puke and Heinz baby food from now on. It’s always handy to chuck it in a bucket and let it soak but make sure the bucket has a firm-fitting lid.
Yes, when they breathe, the fontanelle goes up and down in their head – it’s not a brain-eating alien, and her head isn’t caving in! (I get a lot of phone calls the first time a ‘new mum’ friend sees that.)
We came home to a friend’s house one day, asked the baby’s dad where the kids were, and found the two-year-old upside-down, headfirst in the toilet, with all the other kids standing around watching her struggle.
Don’t ever leave your kids with selfish losers!
Don’t ever be scared to demand your partner or parent pay the same attention YOU pay to your child when they look after them.
You should never have to explain why they have to sit with them in the bathroom, they just should – and always close your toilet and bathroom door – that’s where the bad stuff happens because there’s water.
Dad’s don’t babysit.
It’s their job too!
Teenagers from down the road babysit.
Another time, The Girl and her friend got into her mum’s makeup – if you think the kids have been quiet too long – THEY HAVE! Go find them!
Baby’s survive most things and you’re not a good parent unless you walk around feeling guilty 80 per cent of the time – those are the rules.
You can drop them and they don’t always break, but it’s certainly not recommended.
If you think they can’t get in, they will.
If you think they can’t get out, they can.
If you think they’re not breathing because they’ve been asleep too long, don’t poke them, just enjoy it!
My sister-in-law says glycerine on the dummy is good – I say why give them a sweet tooth too early on.
The plastic bag thing – that’s real! Get rid of them or keep them up high.
Now, let’s talk about you…Yes – they do get bigger.
They hurt sometimes too, it’s like period cramp for your boobs.
Don’t go crazy shopping. Let the rellies buy the pink and blue and ribboned and fluffy and eared and tailed clothes.
You buy soft, simple, washable clothes.
Fuck off the booties now.
Buy soft, cotton socks – they’re the only things that stay on! You’ll get enough booties and bloody bibs it’ll drive you nuts and all the stupid bibs with have tie-backs.
Buy big soft, right-down-to-their knees bibs that slip over their heads or Velcro on one side.
When they can start taking them off it’s time to give them a miss and just layer the floor in newspaper at dinner time.
Not all nursery furniture has to match and not everything needs a frilly valance around it.
Just letting you know.
Buy a dishwasher! Then get transparent bottle nipples so you can always see they’re clean!
Get a dryer now! And a clotheshorse. You will never do your housework at normal times ever again.
When you go to formula, you can buy little round containers cut into quarters or thirds which hold exactly the right amount for a bottle and the lid spins around so you can just zap the water in any café and dump the formula right in. Makes bottle-feeding much more portable.
When you get a baby/nappy bag – get a backpack –you’re never going to have enough hands ever again.
Dress your baby in the same clothes you’d dress yourself!
I don’t mean boob tubes, high heels and designer-wear – but there’s no need for beanies and ugh boots and blankets when you’re wearing summer clothes.
Even babies would rather be outside.
When things go bad get out of the house – Walk! Run! Ride a bus or a bike!
Don’t sit inside and cry and hate yourself and the kids!
You’re not alone – all mums are mad – it’s hereditary, you get it from the kids!
And, when you’ve gone through all the hard stuff yourself, after you’ve ignored all the good, practical advice other mums handed you at the beginning – you desperately want to make it easier for someone else.
We work in a business that’s been up and running for two years and, in that time, we’ve had four staff members come down pregnant.
The rest of us already had young children, ranging in age from nine months through to eight or so.
So we put our heads together and came up with the Baby Bible.
Now, I can publish excerpts from it so the entire world-wide web can benefit from our knowledge.
Here is the product endorsement-free version…
Firstly, they come out ugly! Don’t expect anything else.
Hats don’t stay on. Button-up necks are useless. Zips are uncomfortable when you’re a little baby stuck on your back 20 of the 24 hours in the day.
Don’t get anything with buttons at the crutch – big, tough, riveted snaps are the go! Trust me on this one, I’ve changed a lot of bums in the dark at 2am in the morning with another toddler asleep in the bed next to me.
You are not a bad mum if you don’t breastfeed.
You are not a bad mum if you don’t have a mother’s group or if you hate the other ladies at your playgroup.
You are not a bad mum if you don’t document every ounce of weight gained, lost or imagined on your baby.
Odds on, you’re just not a bad mum.
It’s nice to keep the records but you’ll probably notice if you’re baby is going well. The blue book is great and those little baby albums – but get someone else to keep one and just stick with a basic diary. I think baby albums are a Nanna job (are you reading this Nanna?) – then you can just ring her and let her jot down the dates herself while you get on with the job of breastfeeding, burping, buttoning and butt-wiping.
Ok – while we’re talking about butt-wiping.
Baby’s poo starts off black in the hospital, and alternates between fluorescent green, Jeep Cherokee khaki and Dijon mustard-yellow in the months that follow. The Girl could shoot shit at me from two feet away while she’s was breastfed. It’s all under high pressure in their little bodies.
My sister-in-laws says – Beware! Banana goes in yellow and comes out black!
They hate to poo. They cry. Rub their tummies in clockwise motion, let them push their feet against something so they can brace themselves and rub the bottom of their feet in a figure-of-eight motion. It really works. But if you get stuck, so does soft brown sugar or a splash of Coca Cola in a bottle of water – it’ll have them shitting through the eye of a needle.
Stack up on those plastic, kill-the-smell nappy bags - they’re a lifesaver at 3am at your mum’s house in the middle of a frosty Winter when you don’t want to go to the outside bin but you’re too scared to stink her place up.
Buy nappy san and buckets now – you’ll have to deal with poo, puke and Heinz baby food from now on. It’s always handy to chuck it in a bucket and let it soak but make sure the bucket has a firm-fitting lid.
Yes, when they breathe, the fontanelle goes up and down in their head – it’s not a brain-eating alien, and her head isn’t caving in! (I get a lot of phone calls the first time a ‘new mum’ friend sees that.)
We came home to a friend’s house one day, asked the baby’s dad where the kids were, and found the two-year-old upside-down, headfirst in the toilet, with all the other kids standing around watching her struggle.
Don’t ever leave your kids with selfish losers!
Don’t ever be scared to demand your partner or parent pay the same attention YOU pay to your child when they look after them.
You should never have to explain why they have to sit with them in the bathroom, they just should – and always close your toilet and bathroom door – that’s where the bad stuff happens because there’s water.
Dad’s don’t babysit.
It’s their job too!
Teenagers from down the road babysit.
Another time, The Girl and her friend got into her mum’s makeup – if you think the kids have been quiet too long – THEY HAVE! Go find them!
Baby’s survive most things and you’re not a good parent unless you walk around feeling guilty 80 per cent of the time – those are the rules.
You can drop them and they don’t always break, but it’s certainly not recommended.
If you think they can’t get in, they will.
If you think they can’t get out, they can.
If you think they’re not breathing because they’ve been asleep too long, don’t poke them, just enjoy it!
My sister-in-law says glycerine on the dummy is good – I say why give them a sweet tooth too early on.
The plastic bag thing – that’s real! Get rid of them or keep them up high.
Now, let’s talk about you…Yes – they do get bigger.
They hurt sometimes too, it’s like period cramp for your boobs.
Don’t go crazy shopping. Let the rellies buy the pink and blue and ribboned and fluffy and eared and tailed clothes.
You buy soft, simple, washable clothes.
Fuck off the booties now.
Buy soft, cotton socks – they’re the only things that stay on! You’ll get enough booties and bloody bibs it’ll drive you nuts and all the stupid bibs with have tie-backs.
Buy big soft, right-down-to-their knees bibs that slip over their heads or Velcro on one side.
When they can start taking them off it’s time to give them a miss and just layer the floor in newspaper at dinner time.
Not all nursery furniture has to match and not everything needs a frilly valance around it.
Just letting you know.
Buy a dishwasher! Then get transparent bottle nipples so you can always see they’re clean!
Get a dryer now! And a clotheshorse. You will never do your housework at normal times ever again.
When you go to formula, you can buy little round containers cut into quarters or thirds which hold exactly the right amount for a bottle and the lid spins around so you can just zap the water in any café and dump the formula right in. Makes bottle-feeding much more portable.
When you get a baby/nappy bag – get a backpack –you’re never going to have enough hands ever again.
Dress your baby in the same clothes you’d dress yourself!
I don’t mean boob tubes, high heels and designer-wear – but there’s no need for beanies and ugh boots and blankets when you’re wearing summer clothes.
Even babies would rather be outside.
When things go bad get out of the house – Walk! Run! Ride a bus or a bike!
Don’t sit inside and cry and hate yourself and the kids!
You’re not alone – all mums are mad – it’s hereditary, you get it from the kids!
Thursday, March 24, 2005
Imagination (and Garden) Gone Wild
We haven't been to The Farm in almost three months.
Everything is just on hold and now, with a housing boom on up here, we're looking at having to buy another house just so the kids can have a backyard because rents are ridiculous.
I'm imagining the mess at The Farm and it's haunting me.
It'll be like Mrs Frisby and the Rats of NIMH - the mice will have taken over the house and built their own civilisation in my kitchen, complete with food processing plant because my sunflowers and corn have gone berserk, taking over the entire second block.
The earwigs will have evolved and be walking upright.
It's raining down there so the grass will have overgrown the piles of rubbish and junk - that's got to be a bonus.
And our you-beaut grey water system - all paid for - is sitting in a box somewhere because we're not there to point to where we want it to go.
I miss the place - happy as we are here at the moment.
I think I'm going to go buy some organic non-hybrid seeds on the internet on principle.
Everything is just on hold and now, with a housing boom on up here, we're looking at having to buy another house just so the kids can have a backyard because rents are ridiculous.
I'm imagining the mess at The Farm and it's haunting me.
It'll be like Mrs Frisby and the Rats of NIMH - the mice will have taken over the house and built their own civilisation in my kitchen, complete with food processing plant because my sunflowers and corn have gone berserk, taking over the entire second block.
The earwigs will have evolved and be walking upright.
It's raining down there so the grass will have overgrown the piles of rubbish and junk - that's got to be a bonus.
And our you-beaut grey water system - all paid for - is sitting in a box somewhere because we're not there to point to where we want it to go.
I miss the place - happy as we are here at the moment.
I think I'm going to go buy some organic non-hybrid seeds on the internet on principle.
In Perspective
A friend of ours lost her husband and her three-year-old son in a car accident last week.
We don't know them well enough to help, but we know them well enough to worry and miss them.
The day before it happened she and I were discussing plans for our two little boys to start dancing together and she was excited about the songs and dances she'd picked for them to do.
How would I feel if I woke up and The Man and The Boy were gone? Just gone forever?
I can't imagine and I could never have expected it to hit me the way it did.
I felt guilty to feel so bad, when I really didn't know them well.
I felt like I didn't have a right to feel sad when here she is, with her three other kids, dealing with losing her husband and her baby.
I hear she's going to be ok.
Every moment is precious.
It's not just a cliché when you're standing this close to that kind of sadness.
We don't know them well enough to help, but we know them well enough to worry and miss them.
The day before it happened she and I were discussing plans for our two little boys to start dancing together and she was excited about the songs and dances she'd picked for them to do.
How would I feel if I woke up and The Man and The Boy were gone? Just gone forever?
I can't imagine and I could never have expected it to hit me the way it did.
I felt guilty to feel so bad, when I really didn't know them well.
I felt like I didn't have a right to feel sad when here she is, with her three other kids, dealing with losing her husband and her baby.
I hear she's going to be ok.
Every moment is precious.
It's not just a cliché when you're standing this close to that kind of sadness.
Tuesday, March 01, 2005
Boundaries
The Boy and I were watching TV the other day.
While he sat between my stretched-out legs on the couch he absently ran his hand over my ankles.
Bewildered, he turned his little head, bird-like, to look up at me.
"Mummy," he asked. "Why don't the prickles go all the way down to your feet?"
While he sat between my stretched-out legs on the couch he absently ran his hand over my ankles.
Bewildered, he turned his little head, bird-like, to look up at me.
"Mummy," he asked. "Why don't the prickles go all the way down to your feet?"
Easter Bunny
I am now back at work in my Home Town, in an office full of women.
Due to the miracle of nature, and a full moon, everyone in our office is now on the same...mmmh, let's call it 'cycle'.
Which becomes very obvious when production deadline falls on the new moon.
One male customer was unwise enough to actually vocalise the comment "what's wrong with you girls today - you all look so drained?"
Did you ever see the original Dawn of the Dead? Where the zombie hosts shambling across the car park all lift their faces at the same time and turn towards the new victim as she skids into view?
Well, then you can imagine why this man left without getting a receipt for his classified advert.
But what highlighted the lunar looniness to me was when my daughter came to work one afternoon and, after wandering from office to office, started crying in the car on the way home.
"What's wrong?" I asked The Girl.
"Mummy, why did Easter Bunny come to your office today and not to us?"
Due to the miracle of nature, and a full moon, everyone in our office is now on the same...mmmh, let's call it 'cycle'.
Which becomes very obvious when production deadline falls on the new moon.
One male customer was unwise enough to actually vocalise the comment "what's wrong with you girls today - you all look so drained?"
Did you ever see the original Dawn of the Dead? Where the zombie hosts shambling across the car park all lift their faces at the same time and turn towards the new victim as she skids into view?
Well, then you can imagine why this man left without getting a receipt for his classified advert.
But what highlighted the lunar looniness to me was when my daughter came to work one afternoon and, after wandering from office to office, started crying in the car on the way home.
"What's wrong?" I asked The Girl.
"Mummy, why did Easter Bunny come to your office today and not to us?"
Tuesday, January 25, 2005
Frog Legs & French Bread
My son asked me today – “What eats Frogs?”
I told him – Cats, Birds, Crocodiles and French Men.
He came back a little while later and asked me “Are French Men like Crocodiles?”
I was going to talk about them eating women from the feet up but I thought that would just be getting too, too risky.
I told him no, they’re like French Bread.
Long, skinny and white, with a crusty exterior – normally covered in cheese.
But you’ll only notice that if you try to eat them back.
LOL – no, I didn’t.
But I would have if I didn’t think he’d come back and ask me - “What is French Bread?”
And right now, I’d like to apologise to any and all French Men I slept with in the long-distant past.
PS – the capital letters are a small tribute to my paper’s contributors.
School pages and bowls reports both start this coming week – woohoo for Upper Cases of the Upwardly Mobile and Incredibly Ungrammatical.
For instance, we all know that frog is not a proper noun – although I wonder if it is when you’re being rude to those same long-gone French Men?
Mmmmh?
I told him – Cats, Birds, Crocodiles and French Men.
He came back a little while later and asked me “Are French Men like Crocodiles?”
I was going to talk about them eating women from the feet up but I thought that would just be getting too, too risky.
I told him no, they’re like French Bread.
Long, skinny and white, with a crusty exterior – normally covered in cheese.
But you’ll only notice that if you try to eat them back.
LOL – no, I didn’t.
But I would have if I didn’t think he’d come back and ask me - “What is French Bread?”
And right now, I’d like to apologise to any and all French Men I slept with in the long-distant past.
PS – the capital letters are a small tribute to my paper’s contributors.
School pages and bowls reports both start this coming week – woohoo for Upper Cases of the Upwardly Mobile and Incredibly Ungrammatical.
For instance, we all know that frog is not a proper noun – although I wonder if it is when you’re being rude to those same long-gone French Men?
Mmmmh?
Feng Shui - Breaking the Code
Comedian Robin Williams once said that Mai Tai is Polynesian for ‘DumbFuck’.
He also said that Cocaine was the Peruvian Indians’ “little gift to the white man for what we did to them” – “you take our land - we give you monkey for your back,” he joked.
I’m pretty sure that Feng Shui is another cultural joke on Western society.
I imagine there’s a few old Chinamen who love getting handsomely paid by gay designers for what is basically a doctrine of “clean your fucking house lazybones”.
For instance:
Clean out any debris or boxes under your bed to allow the healthy Chi to circulate around your bed – the centre of your love and love-making. What that means is…Your bedroom smells funky! You’re only making a home for mice and dust-bunnies under your love-nest so clear out last year’s tax returns, your ex-boyfriend’s size 11 sneakers and your old doona you grot! If you let a little breeze in under there maybe it won't smell like old cheese in there anymore!
Create a clear and unshadowed path to your front door to allow good news to blow into your home, and bad energies to flow out the back. Which means…Make sure you’ve got a good view of the front path so that when your hubby’s on the way through the front door, the hot young TollPriority guy is on the way out the back.
Clear clutter. Deal with and then discard paperwork and old bills piling up on your shelves, tables and in drawers. Let’s face it, that means…If they haven’t already come knocking on your door to take your TV or your kneecaps then you can dice it. Face it, you can always tell them you lost it all in a fire or a freak Feng Shui wind that swept your tax-return right out from under your bed.
Well the kids and I Feng Shuied off quite a few things when we made the next great move back to my Home Town to continue the great community newspaper saga.
We’re living in a two-bedroom unit and, while the ‘contractor-cream’* walls are slightly grubby and there’s absolutely no yard for the kids – we’re all pretty chuffed with living in an uncluttered space.
The kids don’t miss a floor strewn with toys they don’t even notice anymore.
I’m enjoying only having to wash four cups and four bowls and four spoons.
And I’ve finally got a place to put all those blue vases, tablecloths, picture-frames and throwrugs that we keep buying but don’t actually go with our ‘golds and russets’ Home & Garden (one day) décor.
It’s like having a beachhouse – except that despite the fact that there’s lots of sand, not much water, and the only fish are Pool Sharks.
People keep saying to me “isn’t that a bit small for all of you?”
But I’ve always lived in huge houses (while working huge jobs) and I’ve never had time or expertise to look after them properly. The Farm and all the jobs I could see that needed doing there were weighing me down.
I’m good at working though.
I can work hard, make lots of money, pay a renovator for The Farm and still have time to wash my four forks.
So, I’ve Feng Shuied my whole lifestyle?
Works for me – why doesn’t the Cleo Feng Shui expert give you some real advice.
Dump the overwhelming renovation workload on your already over-worked husband and run away to a different job in a different town that has reliable child-care and a reliable rent-control program.
Enjoy the benefits of only having to clean up a limited collection of matchbox cars and barbies every night before bed (because the rest of them are tangled up with the Fuzzy Felts in the playroom back home).
Allow yourself to feel all Earth Mother Goddess-ly by finding the time to read three books a night to your babies because you don’t have to feed dogs, chooks, pay bills, spend quality time with your husband/partner/lover/circle appropriate term here or stare uselessly at the looming pile of jobs you should really be doing instead of watching Sex in the City in your PJs and eating Tim Tams.
The Man missed out on the local job he’d wanted so he’s sticking with the Stage 2-local job back near The Farm.
Does that mean we Feng Shuied him off as well?
Does that count as “cleansing oneself of conflicting influences”.
I mean, we won’t be fighting over “who changed the loo roll last” for a little while, so maybe…
* contractor cream – anyone living in a mining town where most homes are rented out by corporate investors or contract companies will understand this reference. Paint it cream, keep it simply but sturdily-furnished, and buy the paint in bulk so you can repaint it when the tenants move out.
He also said that Cocaine was the Peruvian Indians’ “little gift to the white man for what we did to them” – “you take our land - we give you monkey for your back,” he joked.
I’m pretty sure that Feng Shui is another cultural joke on Western society.
I imagine there’s a few old Chinamen who love getting handsomely paid by gay designers for what is basically a doctrine of “clean your fucking house lazybones”.
For instance:
Clean out any debris or boxes under your bed to allow the healthy Chi to circulate around your bed – the centre of your love and love-making. What that means is…Your bedroom smells funky! You’re only making a home for mice and dust-bunnies under your love-nest so clear out last year’s tax returns, your ex-boyfriend’s size 11 sneakers and your old doona you grot! If you let a little breeze in under there maybe it won't smell like old cheese in there anymore!
Create a clear and unshadowed path to your front door to allow good news to blow into your home, and bad energies to flow out the back. Which means…Make sure you’ve got a good view of the front path so that when your hubby’s on the way through the front door, the hot young TollPriority guy is on the way out the back.
Clear clutter. Deal with and then discard paperwork and old bills piling up on your shelves, tables and in drawers. Let’s face it, that means…If they haven’t already come knocking on your door to take your TV or your kneecaps then you can dice it. Face it, you can always tell them you lost it all in a fire or a freak Feng Shui wind that swept your tax-return right out from under your bed.
Well the kids and I Feng Shuied off quite a few things when we made the next great move back to my Home Town to continue the great community newspaper saga.
We’re living in a two-bedroom unit and, while the ‘contractor-cream’* walls are slightly grubby and there’s absolutely no yard for the kids – we’re all pretty chuffed with living in an uncluttered space.
The kids don’t miss a floor strewn with toys they don’t even notice anymore.
I’m enjoying only having to wash four cups and four bowls and four spoons.
And I’ve finally got a place to put all those blue vases, tablecloths, picture-frames and throwrugs that we keep buying but don’t actually go with our ‘golds and russets’ Home & Garden (one day) décor.
It’s like having a beachhouse – except that despite the fact that there’s lots of sand, not much water, and the only fish are Pool Sharks.
People keep saying to me “isn’t that a bit small for all of you?”
But I’ve always lived in huge houses (while working huge jobs) and I’ve never had time or expertise to look after them properly. The Farm and all the jobs I could see that needed doing there were weighing me down.
I’m good at working though.
I can work hard, make lots of money, pay a renovator for The Farm and still have time to wash my four forks.
So, I’ve Feng Shuied my whole lifestyle?
Works for me – why doesn’t the Cleo Feng Shui expert give you some real advice.
Dump the overwhelming renovation workload on your already over-worked husband and run away to a different job in a different town that has reliable child-care and a reliable rent-control program.
Enjoy the benefits of only having to clean up a limited collection of matchbox cars and barbies every night before bed (because the rest of them are tangled up with the Fuzzy Felts in the playroom back home).
Allow yourself to feel all Earth Mother Goddess-ly by finding the time to read three books a night to your babies because you don’t have to feed dogs, chooks, pay bills, spend quality time with your husband/partner/lover/circle appropriate term here or stare uselessly at the looming pile of jobs you should really be doing instead of watching Sex in the City in your PJs and eating Tim Tams.
The Man missed out on the local job he’d wanted so he’s sticking with the Stage 2-local job back near The Farm.
Does that mean we Feng Shuied him off as well?
Does that count as “cleansing oneself of conflicting influences”.
I mean, we won’t be fighting over “who changed the loo roll last” for a little while, so maybe…
* contractor cream – anyone living in a mining town where most homes are rented out by corporate investors or contract companies will understand this reference. Paint it cream, keep it simply but sturdily-furnished, and buy the paint in bulk so you can repaint it when the tenants move out.
Twang!
On my way to my new and former Home Town today I drove through a spider’s web.
It was stretched across the road, from 110 sign to corresponding 110 sign and I actually felt it hold and twang against the car at windshield level for an instant as I drove through.
Imagine how surprised that spider would be if that web had held.
Oh look, a whole station wagon for dinner!
And complete with a screamy soft centre! Yummy!
It was stretched across the road, from 110 sign to corresponding 110 sign and I actually felt it hold and twang against the car at windshield level for an instant as I drove through.
Imagine how surprised that spider would be if that web had held.
Oh look, a whole station wagon for dinner!
And complete with a screamy soft centre! Yummy!
Sunday, January 16, 2005
A Blank Spot in a Brown Landscape
This week I talked to an old friend who, like us, had been building a dream life in another town.
After more than a decade and a half of working in the Outback, she and her partner had moved to the beautiful west coast of the Eyre Peninsula (downbythesea.blogspot.com).
She left in September, he finished up in December, and the bushfires hit in January.
They lost it all.
Every new paint scheme, every just-planted vegie, every cup and brick and momento of their whole damn life together.
They hadn't even unpacked the boxes and it was all gone - just a "blank spot in a brown landscape"
She talked to me about the bravery and the generosity of the people around her.
I was struck by her own bravery.
But she told me "it's just stuff, I've got my family - we can replace everything else".
So - because I can't really help her or all the other people affected by this close-to-home disaster and all the other ones in distant corners of the world I hear about every day - I'm going to keep my trap shut about having to turn my life upside down again and I'm just going to enjoy my family and my Home Town of beautiful, generous, giving people and the little bit of heaven that we, luckily, can still enjoy and build on back in the Flinders Ranges.
I heard yesterday that so many Australians have donated goods and food that the towns that have been struck by the fires can't even accept anymore stuff.
In our little town of 4500 people, there's so much stuff been donated that it's filled a house, a car, three trailers, a shed and a truck.
While taking photos for my newspaper I saw a box of maybe a $1000 worth of Action Man figures that a little boy had collected together and labelled "I hope some little boy can play with these - from Zach". I watched another girl, a teenager quietly strap a handfull of her own GameBoy games to a donated GameBoy and silently slip it into the pile.
They're going to have to auction it all off locally and send cash just to get it to the people in time to help because the aid agencies are so swamped.
They're talking about taking a bus down in one of the off-shifts and ferrying local guys down there on their days off to help rebuild the towns and farms and faciliteis.
SongBird - if we can't send anything to really help, I hope you at least know that we're sending our love.
Hey, and while you can't replace what you had, at least when you look out around you, you know that in a few months it will all be green and beautiful again.
That's the great thing - good things always come back around in life.
After more than a decade and a half of working in the Outback, she and her partner had moved to the beautiful west coast of the Eyre Peninsula (downbythesea.blogspot.com).
She left in September, he finished up in December, and the bushfires hit in January.
They lost it all.
Every new paint scheme, every just-planted vegie, every cup and brick and momento of their whole damn life together.
They hadn't even unpacked the boxes and it was all gone - just a "blank spot in a brown landscape"
She talked to me about the bravery and the generosity of the people around her.
I was struck by her own bravery.
But she told me "it's just stuff, I've got my family - we can replace everything else".
So - because I can't really help her or all the other people affected by this close-to-home disaster and all the other ones in distant corners of the world I hear about every day - I'm going to keep my trap shut about having to turn my life upside down again and I'm just going to enjoy my family and my Home Town of beautiful, generous, giving people and the little bit of heaven that we, luckily, can still enjoy and build on back in the Flinders Ranges.
I heard yesterday that so many Australians have donated goods and food that the towns that have been struck by the fires can't even accept anymore stuff.
In our little town of 4500 people, there's so much stuff been donated that it's filled a house, a car, three trailers, a shed and a truck.
While taking photos for my newspaper I saw a box of maybe a $1000 worth of Action Man figures that a little boy had collected together and labelled "I hope some little boy can play with these - from Zach". I watched another girl, a teenager quietly strap a handfull of her own GameBoy games to a donated GameBoy and silently slip it into the pile.
They're going to have to auction it all off locally and send cash just to get it to the people in time to help because the aid agencies are so swamped.
They're talking about taking a bus down in one of the off-shifts and ferrying local guys down there on their days off to help rebuild the towns and farms and faciliteis.
SongBird - if we can't send anything to really help, I hope you at least know that we're sending our love.
Hey, and while you can't replace what you had, at least when you look out around you, you know that in a few months it will all be green and beautiful again.
That's the great thing - good things always come back around in life.
A Rose by Any Other Name Would Still be a Bloody Rose
I talked to The Kids today who are visiting their Nanna.
Nanna has become mother to all the orphaned native birds around her home town (as well as mother to me of course) and is currently hand-raising a nest of cockatiels.
My Kids were given the supreme privilege of naming their own birds.
(I suspect it’s a ruse to off-load a few of the little feathered fiends our way but it’s not going to happen I can tell you.)
Being quite literal and observant little munchkins, they proudly told me their respective beaky pals’ names.
‘Big Fluffy Head’ and ‘Spot’.
I’d still be rolling around on the floor laughing except I suddenly had a flashback to my own childhood of mismatched pets:
Fluffy the persion-cross cat.
Woolly the poodle-cross dog.
And Nippy the just-plain-cross budgerigar.
The Man named his pets exciting, sleek (or just plain rude) names like Rebel and Snatch.
I think I’m going to have to take full responsibility for the ‘can’t-see-the-imaginative-name-for-the-bloody-obvious’ gene that they’ve all inherited.
Nanna has become mother to all the orphaned native birds around her home town (as well as mother to me of course) and is currently hand-raising a nest of cockatiels.
My Kids were given the supreme privilege of naming their own birds.
(I suspect it’s a ruse to off-load a few of the little feathered fiends our way but it’s not going to happen I can tell you.)
Being quite literal and observant little munchkins, they proudly told me their respective beaky pals’ names.
‘Big Fluffy Head’ and ‘Spot’.
I’d still be rolling around on the floor laughing except I suddenly had a flashback to my own childhood of mismatched pets:
Fluffy the persion-cross cat.
Woolly the poodle-cross dog.
And Nippy the just-plain-cross budgerigar.
The Man named his pets exciting, sleek (or just plain rude) names like Rebel and Snatch.
I think I’m going to have to take full responsibility for the ‘can’t-see-the-imaginative-name-for-the-bloody-obvious’ gene that they’ve all inherited.
May You Live in Interesting Times
They say that in Asia, ‘may you live in interesting times’ is a curse.
Let’s digress for just a minute.
Who are ‘they’?
Am I ‘they’?
Seems that I’m the only one doing any bloody talking around here at the moment.
And, let’s face it, no one gets any chance to break into the conversation unless I choke on a pretzel.
And is it like newspapers and libel?
In newspapers, if you publish untrue information, you are equally responsible for repeating the untruth as if you had made it up yourself.
So, by quoting ‘them’…do I become ‘them’?
Ok, start again…
I’ve recently come slap up against the curse ‘may you live in interesting times’.
(I nearly said “discovered the curse…” and then I thought about the whole European colonial myth of discovery of continents which had obviously been inhabited for millennia and ‘lost tribes’ which actually knew their way around the place quite well and…see, ‘they’ really don’t get a word in edgewise around me’.
So…may you live in interesting times!
I always have, you know.
I’ve got an interesting job, got an interesting outlook on life, got some interesting friends.
(Anyone uninteresting quickly becomes uninterested in being my friend for some reason – might be all that talking over the top of…well…’them’. So that’s whose making up all these bloody sayings.)
But it can be a curse.
I’m not highly cursed mind you – sort of an intermediate level II curse I’m thinking.
Probably because I’m not highly interesting – again, just intermediate interesting, and maybe mostly because I hear and repeat a lot of what ‘they’ are saying.
When it comes to interesting curses, I’m definitely not up there with the tomb of King Tut or the Hope Diamond, but my curse is occasionally personally distracting nonetheless.
Like now.
I’m sitting back in my Home Town, back at my old job (and my old working hours – hence the midnight time-frame) after, apparently, being irreplaceable.
You’d think that would be a compliment.
But ‘irreplaceable’ in real terms means ‘you’re never going anywhere else ever, ever again’.
Or ‘no other bugger would work this hard for this pay so we’re stuck with you’.
I tried, you know I really tried.
We bought property.
We planted corn (which is doing very nicely, thankyou, even if it is mostly a camping area for earwigs with a convenient corn-husk shadecover).
I have chooks – which will have to go now.
And a dog – which will have to stay, of course.
And now the world, and all my plans, are upside-down again and I’m back in the fast-paced and distinctly-glamorous world of small-town journalism with its vicious business feuds (how dare they sell hot spuds at their café when we bought our ‘you-beaut’ hot spud oven LAST year!), its exciting sporting developments (who will be chairman of the regional football league and why is the local pub sponsoring the basketball team instead of netball team this year?) and its deep-seated community grudges (how dare they travel 32 minutes to dump their garbage in our free landfill rather than pay the $2.50 their own council charges, clogging up our services, people are so inconsiderate and we don’t pay our fees for this, I can tell you!).
Oh, and I left out all the ‘lovely afternoons that were had by all’ thanks to Moira, Verna, Greta, Lola, Beverley (insert appropriate name here) and the sponge cake she baked for Ladies Bowls on Wednesday afternoon.
You know, it’s not a ‘lovely afternoon’ at all if I have to spend it taking all the capital letters out of the golf report (nearest-to-the-pin is NOT a proper noun) and correct all the teachers’ spelling in the school report (it’s not just 16-year-olds who have a literacy level of 11).
But, strangely, I DO love it.
And what I do IS important, people stop me on the street to tell me so.
And how many people out there REALLY have a job they can say they love and people love them for?
(Hookers, by definition, maybe – all that ‘loving’ I mean. But luckily, in my job you only have to report about social diseases, not check for them intimately before you get down to business, so to speak.)
But back to my rant…
And you know, they made it easy for me to move back.
The ONLY property for rent in a town of 4500 people was being leased out by my employers.
The Man’s old job is even back on the bulletin boards – it’s like they just kept his seat warm for him.
And considering that someone was killed the first day he started at his new job, that might have been a divine warning that he was better off where he came from.
Turns out he took a $25,000 pay cut to be a little closer to The Farm and a lot closer to long-term lead poisoning.
At first we were impressed by his new employer’s policy of unlimited sick leave.
But then we questioned the need for that kind of policy.
Turns out, when your lead levels hit an ‘inappropriately-high level’ then you’re sent home until they just don’t anymore.
And the guy who got killed on his first day?
Turns out that’s the job The Man was being groomed for.
As it turned out, the position came up a little bit faster than we expected.
So, again, I’m living in interesting times.
Interesting times because I have to convince The Kids that their old friends and their old school are going to be much better than the ones they’ve just spent six months fitting into.
Interesting times because my two-bedroom unit has no backyard and I have a dog roughly the size of an ironing board with the disposition of a rubber superball and the escapist abilities of Houdini.
Interesting times because I’d only just got used to watching Sex and the City repeats four times a day on Austar from my couch in my knickers and a t-shirt and now I’m back at my 28-hours-a-day, smile-you’re-under-constant-‘gossip-nazi’-surveillance job. (To be honest, the whole Sex and the City couch-sloth thing might have been a downside, but I was too comatose to notice at the time)
Interesting because I finally triumphed over the six-legged marauders in my garden long enough to see my efforts fruit, blossom…whatever…literally, and the fucking earwigs are just going to sit down and have a great big picnic in the middle of my organic, non-hybridised tomatos and basil and corn and comfrey and snowpeas and blah, blah, blah. I’m considering ripping it all up and giving the chooks one last humongous meal out of spite.
May you live in interesting times?
I do.
And if you do…well, I’ll meet you there.
Let’s digress for just a minute.
Who are ‘they’?
Am I ‘they’?
Seems that I’m the only one doing any bloody talking around here at the moment.
And, let’s face it, no one gets any chance to break into the conversation unless I choke on a pretzel.
And is it like newspapers and libel?
In newspapers, if you publish untrue information, you are equally responsible for repeating the untruth as if you had made it up yourself.
So, by quoting ‘them’…do I become ‘them’?
Ok, start again…
I’ve recently come slap up against the curse ‘may you live in interesting times’.
(I nearly said “discovered the curse…” and then I thought about the whole European colonial myth of discovery of continents which had obviously been inhabited for millennia and ‘lost tribes’ which actually knew their way around the place quite well and…see, ‘they’ really don’t get a word in edgewise around me’.
So…may you live in interesting times!
I always have, you know.
I’ve got an interesting job, got an interesting outlook on life, got some interesting friends.
(Anyone uninteresting quickly becomes uninterested in being my friend for some reason – might be all that talking over the top of…well…’them’. So that’s whose making up all these bloody sayings.)
But it can be a curse.
I’m not highly cursed mind you – sort of an intermediate level II curse I’m thinking.
Probably because I’m not highly interesting – again, just intermediate interesting, and maybe mostly because I hear and repeat a lot of what ‘they’ are saying.
When it comes to interesting curses, I’m definitely not up there with the tomb of King Tut or the Hope Diamond, but my curse is occasionally personally distracting nonetheless.
Like now.
I’m sitting back in my Home Town, back at my old job (and my old working hours – hence the midnight time-frame) after, apparently, being irreplaceable.
You’d think that would be a compliment.
But ‘irreplaceable’ in real terms means ‘you’re never going anywhere else ever, ever again’.
Or ‘no other bugger would work this hard for this pay so we’re stuck with you’.
I tried, you know I really tried.
We bought property.
We planted corn (which is doing very nicely, thankyou, even if it is mostly a camping area for earwigs with a convenient corn-husk shadecover).
I have chooks – which will have to go now.
And a dog – which will have to stay, of course.
And now the world, and all my plans, are upside-down again and I’m back in the fast-paced and distinctly-glamorous world of small-town journalism with its vicious business feuds (how dare they sell hot spuds at their café when we bought our ‘you-beaut’ hot spud oven LAST year!), its exciting sporting developments (who will be chairman of the regional football league and why is the local pub sponsoring the basketball team instead of netball team this year?) and its deep-seated community grudges (how dare they travel 32 minutes to dump their garbage in our free landfill rather than pay the $2.50 their own council charges, clogging up our services, people are so inconsiderate and we don’t pay our fees for this, I can tell you!).
Oh, and I left out all the ‘lovely afternoons that were had by all’ thanks to Moira, Verna, Greta, Lola, Beverley (insert appropriate name here) and the sponge cake she baked for Ladies Bowls on Wednesday afternoon.
You know, it’s not a ‘lovely afternoon’ at all if I have to spend it taking all the capital letters out of the golf report (nearest-to-the-pin is NOT a proper noun) and correct all the teachers’ spelling in the school report (it’s not just 16-year-olds who have a literacy level of 11).
But, strangely, I DO love it.
And what I do IS important, people stop me on the street to tell me so.
And how many people out there REALLY have a job they can say they love and people love them for?
(Hookers, by definition, maybe – all that ‘loving’ I mean. But luckily, in my job you only have to report about social diseases, not check for them intimately before you get down to business, so to speak.)
But back to my rant…
And you know, they made it easy for me to move back.
The ONLY property for rent in a town of 4500 people was being leased out by my employers.
The Man’s old job is even back on the bulletin boards – it’s like they just kept his seat warm for him.
And considering that someone was killed the first day he started at his new job, that might have been a divine warning that he was better off where he came from.
Turns out he took a $25,000 pay cut to be a little closer to The Farm and a lot closer to long-term lead poisoning.
At first we were impressed by his new employer’s policy of unlimited sick leave.
But then we questioned the need for that kind of policy.
Turns out, when your lead levels hit an ‘inappropriately-high level’ then you’re sent home until they just don’t anymore.
And the guy who got killed on his first day?
Turns out that’s the job The Man was being groomed for.
As it turned out, the position came up a little bit faster than we expected.
So, again, I’m living in interesting times.
Interesting times because I have to convince The Kids that their old friends and their old school are going to be much better than the ones they’ve just spent six months fitting into.
Interesting times because my two-bedroom unit has no backyard and I have a dog roughly the size of an ironing board with the disposition of a rubber superball and the escapist abilities of Houdini.
Interesting times because I’d only just got used to watching Sex and the City repeats four times a day on Austar from my couch in my knickers and a t-shirt and now I’m back at my 28-hours-a-day, smile-you’re-under-constant-‘gossip-nazi’-surveillance job. (To be honest, the whole Sex and the City couch-sloth thing might have been a downside, but I was too comatose to notice at the time)
Interesting because I finally triumphed over the six-legged marauders in my garden long enough to see my efforts fruit, blossom…whatever…literally, and the fucking earwigs are just going to sit down and have a great big picnic in the middle of my organic, non-hybridised tomatos and basil and corn and comfrey and snowpeas and blah, blah, blah. I’m considering ripping it all up and giving the chooks one last humongous meal out of spite.
May you live in interesting times?
I do.
And if you do…well, I’ll meet you there.
Wednesday, December 22, 2004
An Oldie but a Goodie
Discussing the things kids do and say - here's another beauty...
For our family it's an oldie, relating back to a bygone time when the Big Girl was an only child and I was still relatively new to the role of Wicked Stepmother.
I've got it downpat these days.
While visiting a little-known Great-Grandmother the Big Girl had been warned to be on her very best behaviour and had, on the whole, been angelic, if slightly saccharine, for the entire visit.
On the morning of Grammy’s birthday – the purpose of the visit – Big Girl met her Great-Grandmother in the sunshiney kitchen for breakfast, where about a dozen cousins, nieces, nephews and grown-up siblings were gathered for coffee and cereal (as applicable to varied ages).
With all the perkiness of a Pears Soap advert Big Girl stood on tippy-toe in the middle of the kitchen to plant a kiss on her Great-Grandmother’s cheek.
Then, with Shirley Temple-like enunciation and projection, declared “why Grammy – you forget to shave this morning”.
An entire herd of snickering family-members thank God to this day that Grammy was too deaf and too morning-muddled to realise exactly what our darling Big Girl had announced to the entire clan.
She still comments to this day on what a delightful child the precocious little princess is.
Proof that love might be blind, but it's better if it's deaf.
For our family it's an oldie, relating back to a bygone time when the Big Girl was an only child and I was still relatively new to the role of Wicked Stepmother.
I've got it downpat these days.
While visiting a little-known Great-Grandmother the Big Girl had been warned to be on her very best behaviour and had, on the whole, been angelic, if slightly saccharine, for the entire visit.
On the morning of Grammy’s birthday – the purpose of the visit – Big Girl met her Great-Grandmother in the sunshiney kitchen for breakfast, where about a dozen cousins, nieces, nephews and grown-up siblings were gathered for coffee and cereal (as applicable to varied ages).
With all the perkiness of a Pears Soap advert Big Girl stood on tippy-toe in the middle of the kitchen to plant a kiss on her Great-Grandmother’s cheek.
Then, with Shirley Temple-like enunciation and projection, declared “why Grammy – you forget to shave this morning”.
An entire herd of snickering family-members thank God to this day that Grammy was too deaf and too morning-muddled to realise exactly what our darling Big Girl had announced to the entire clan.
She still comments to this day on what a delightful child the precocious little princess is.
Proof that love might be blind, but it's better if it's deaf.
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