Nanni night care – cut version

I was charged with the task of babysitting my two gorgeous Grand-kids last Saturday night. My daughter prefers if I stay over so the kids don’t get out of routine. My daughter is a routine freak, read Nanni Day Care . Little did I know that by the end of the night I would be babysitting one unsettled baby, one drunken father and one partying mummy.

I was charged with the task of babysitting my two gorgeous Grand-kids last Saturday night. My daughter prefers if I stay over so the kids don’t get out of routine.  My daughter is a routine freak.  Little did I know that by the end of the night I would be babysitting one unsettled  baby, one drunken father and one partying mummy.

The night started out like most other babysitting nights where I’m screaming at my daughter and son-in-law to get the hell out of the house before Charlie starts crying because they’re leaving. To be fair to my son-in-law, it’s never his fault there’s a dramatic exit, after all my daughter is a drama teacher and she lives and breathes her work.

Once the parents were gone the kids settled down with 150 books for me to read, or at least attempt to read, and a glass of milk.  Charlie goes through the process of selecting a book, handing it to me and climbs on my lap for me to read.  Once he’s on board the Nanni lap we get to around page two and he’s sliding down my leg, off to select another book.  In between Charlie’s trips to and from the book case, I manage to read a book to Matilda.

When there was a break in the book readings, I managed to pour my Nanni night care potion – on this occasion it was a lovely Margaret River Red.

Charlie was showing all the signs of sleepiness so I put him down to bed and lo and behold, he went down without a whimper. One down and one to go!

Not long after Charlie went to bed, Matilda announced she too would like to go to bed. And off we went. I didn’t believe for one second she’d drift off to sleep after I read the obligatory book or two. And my hunch was right.  So Matilda and I snuggled on the lounge and watched TV.

Now here lies the problem.  My son-in-law is a sports fan (or should I say sport freak) so if I was at all interested in watching the football, horse racing, soccer or frigging tiddlywinks,  I would be in TV heaven.  Unfortunately for me, I’m not.  As part of his pay TV package he gets all the sports channels and only the basic channels of anything else.  Meaning, there’s fuck all to watch on TV. 

Luckily for me but unlucky for them this Saturday night’s Movie selection was good, so I ordered two movies – both charged to their account. Just desserts I say. Anyway, after a time I carried a sleeping Matilda to bed then settled in for an easy night of Movies and wine. Ahhh sweet relief but not for long!

Around 9.30 I heard Charlie coughing which on my daughter’s instructions, I ignored. After another while the coughing was accompanied by some crying, which I didn’t ignore so I snuck into his room and bought him out for a cuddle.  After 30 minutes he went back to sleep and I put him back to bed. Not long after putting little Charlie to bed, I noticed the front porch light turned on and thought I heard someone rustling outside and figured it was my daughter and son-in-law.  However, no one came through the door so I figured the light was tricked by a bird or passer-by and I went back to the movie.

Another 20 minutes passed and I heard another rustling, this time at the back door, right next to where I was watching TV. I figured they were home and waited for them to tap on the door so I could let them in. After a minute or two the rustling continued but no one came to the door. Being rather brave, I stuck my head out through a slightly ajar door and ask who was there.  My son-in-law said it was him, so I let him in.  Immediately I could see he was drunk.  He gets this funny look on his face where his eyes are transfixed on the ground approximately 1.5 meters in front of him and his upper body tilts wildly to one side. He made it to the lounge, sat down and proceeded to sleep.  Not before I asked where my daughter was, which he replied that he didn’t know. I might add, his lovely white shirt that my daughter insisted I tell him looked good earlier, was now dirtied with what appeared to be grass stains. 

Where the hell had he been I wondered?

If only the son-in-law would go to bed so I didn’t have to arrange myself another comfy spot on the lounge. Ok, I resettled myself and got back to the movie! Ten minutes passed and Charlie was crying again.   This time his crying was a little more intense and it was clear he wasn’t going to settle. So I got him up.  He was pleased when he saw his father but when his father didn’t respond to his attempts at a cuddle, Charlie wasn’t happy and made it very clear. I don’t normally text my daughter with any news other than the kids have gone to bed.  I do this to prove to my doubting daughter that I’m more than capable of getting the kids to bed before midnight. On the contrary, they are usually in bed or asleep before 7.30pm. But on this occasion I sent a text asking how long she was going to be?  The reply was she was heading off to the pub.

While I was trying to re-settle Charlie, my son-in-law got up off the lounge and headed out the back door.  “Where are you going?” I asked.  To that he told me he needed to go outside.Ten minutes passed and still no son-in-law. It was quite cold and I was worried he’d get hypothermia. I would have gone outside to check on him but I thought what the hell,  it was too cold.

So armed with an unsettled baby and a lost son-in-law I decided mummy (daughter) better come home – Nanni night care was over and out.

Did I see both movies you ask? Besides the commercials interrupting my viewing so to was one unsettled baby, one drunken son-in-law and one partying mummy, but funnily enough I managed to drink half-a-bottle of wine and watch two movies.

Ahhh sweet relief!

PS:  To keep the peace with my favourite son-in-law, some facts have been deliberately left out but if you ask me next time you see me, I’ll fill you in on the details.

Tics and twitches

My eyes have been a little troublesome lately and I have recently developed a tendency to blink.  Along with the blink I now flex my neck muscles so tight that they feel like they’ve been through a boot camp session.   Now this habit is not new to me as I use to do it oh so long ago, when I was a little girl.

Given my newly developed, or should I say re-developed habit, I decided to google the phrase “why do I blink a lot?” and the first search results page took me to phychcentral.com/ask-the-therapist where she informed the enquirer of the same question that she may have a ‘tic’ disorder and should see a Doctor.

My next google search ‘tic disorder’ displayed a list of pages which when selected all seem to tell the same story – I have a tic disorder. The symptoms being: excessive blinking,  grimaces of the face, quick movements of the arms, legs or other areas and contractions of the abdomen.

Holy shit, I do it all!

I’m just grateful my tic disorder is defined as a motor tic – involuntary movement involving discrete muscle groups. The other tic disorder is vocal such as Tourette syndrome and given that I’m famous amongst my friends for saying how it is – well I wouldn’t be able to take my mouth out of a confined room – I shudder to think.

I decided that my little tics and twitches were not involuntary, meaning that I could control them, therefore I wasn’t a sufferer of a tic disorder.  So I stopped blinking, flexing my neck and another habit  (not mentioned earlier) where I pull my shoulders back so my blades greet each other for a short embrace.

Ok, I’m doing well,  30 seconds,  60 seconds – I have this thing licked – 90 seconds, ok, I’m not doing so well, 2 minutes, I’m caving in to the desire.  O.M.G  2min and 20 seconds – I couldn’t do it. Now I’m blinking, flexing and pulling to make up for all the missed ones – I do have a problem.

O.M.G – I’m a frigging fruit cake!  Who would have thought?

This self discovery session reminded me of my other traits or should I say “paranoias”, but I think I need a good lie down before I tell you about those. *blink* *blink* neck flex, shoulder squeeze!

Kitty for PM

The female radio presenter started her morning show with ‘get up Australia it’s time to go out and get a job’. Excuse me bitch – I’m stuck in traffic at 8am trying to get 14klms to work and hope to get there before 9am where I’ll stay until 6pm then battle the traffic to get home before 7pm. So tell me who’s in bed and who doesn’t work? Because I don’t know many people who aren’t of retirement age who have that luxury.

And given the radio presenter is a career women who lives in Glebe, one of Sydney’s most expensive suburbs, I’m sure as hell she doesn’t know anyone who doesn’t work.

Her references were in response to the Australian Federal Budget handed down this week, in particular the re-training package and other topics of interest such as the Government’s promise to provide pensioners with digital set-top-boxes because the analogue signal will be switched off soon and anyone without a digital TV, won’t be able to watch TV at all. Given the amount of crap on TV, this is hardly a bad thing!

This got me thinking about the policies I would introduce if I was Prime Minister (PM).

Surplus – Do we really need to be in surplus? What large organisation doesn’t borrow money to improve and grow? Name me one householder who’s in surplus?

Ok, so maybe the surplus marginally helped Australia miss a meltdown from the GFC-BABAG (global financial crises brought about by American greed). But were you happy with our Government giving away billions of dollars? And what the hell did they do with the money? According to research 40% spent it, and a damn lot them bought digital TVs. Of course the rich missed out once again.

Rather than giving money, I would have provided digital TVs. That would provide a visual stimulant and save millions from the Government’s current plan on providing digital set-top-boxes to pensioners – killing two birds with one stone.

Training – Using the money saved from not providing digital set-top-boxes, I’d equip universities and training colleges with state of the art equipment. This will support those who WANT to learn and improve their chances of finding good paying jobs. The only incentive I’d provide the unemployed is: get off your arses, go to TAFE or start a Community college course that offers career advancements. Let’s face it, the amount of time wasted on implementing and administering freebie training is a waste of money and I have firsthand experience in this area.

You see a number of years ago I was a computer teacher and I got a gig in a country town to provide computer training to the long term unemployed. They got an incentive of around $100 per fortnight to attend the course which went for 10 weeks. If they skipped more than 3 classes without a Dr’s certificate they were out and their benefit cut off.

O.M.G – were they the biggest frikkin whingers I had ever encountered. I came to the conclusion they didn’t like the fact they actually had to attend the classes once they enrolled.  And I can saftely say, although there was the odd eager student, I could tell from excuses they had for their unemployment status, they really didn’t want to work.

If people want to get training, they will. For goodness sake I called into TAFE one day during an enrolment period not knowing what the hell to do, just knowing I wanted to  improve life for me and my family and the only way to do this was to get educated so I had better work opportunities. The outcome was I enrolled in a full time computer course. The logistics of what I would do with the kids, especially the one that still hadn’t started school – well I figured I’d work something out, and I did.

The end result for me is two TAFE certificates, a Bachelor’s degree, and an Associate Degree, all without one Government benefit or external incentive.  And when I discovered I was too qualified to work in a country town, I moved to Sydney.

If people don’t want to improve their living conditions, then why spend tax payer’s money forcing them to attend training courses they won’t use. I don’t mind that some of my tax money goes to less than 5% of the population that can’t find work, and a small amount of those people just don’t want to work – but I say let them bath in their own poverty – seems to me they enjoy it.

Infrastructure – the millions I’d save by not spending it on training lazy bastards, or providing digital set-top-boxes to pensions (after all they’d already have their digital TVs), I’d spend it on transport. There would be extended railroads, tunnels under congested roadways around Australia’s capitals, except Darwin, Hobart and Perth – let’s face it these so called cities are only large country towns where a traffic jam would only occur on trash pickup days.  The country roads don’t need improving – who the hell goes there anyway?  And by-the-way, no tolls.

Other changes I’d make would be:

Remove the baby bonus – I got fuck all for having three babies so I begrudge anyone else getting it. Besides it was an excuse for the single mothers on benefits to breed like rabbits and get new digital TVs (killing three birds with one stone, see above).

And while I’m on that subject, we can forgive one unintentional pregnancy and therefore provide assistance to a single parent, but for every baby conceived after that and they’re still single and on benefits, they will be penalized by $100 per fortnight per extra baby. Let’s see how many future criminal mongrels will be born on this policy?

So in conclusion my policies would save billions, support those who want to learn, lessen childhood poverty and neglect and provide world class transport. There are so many other changes I would make if I was PM but I’ve provided you with a sample of how things would be run under my Government – so when I stand for PM vote for me. After all I like the sound of:

Prime Minister KityKate

 

 

What’s in a name?

As my last blog “A trip down cemetery lane” indicated, over the last few weeks I have been researching and building my paternal family’s ancestry tree and I must admit I could turn this little hobby into a full time occupation as it’s very interesting and very time consuming. However, the pay’s lousy so I guess I’ll stick to my day job.

Anyway, while building the ancestry tree it would have been easy to accidentally link-up non-ancestors with similar names.  Luckily many of the ancestors not only passed down the patrilineal (father’s) family name from generation to generation, they also passed on first names and luckily again they passed down the matrilineal (mother’s) family name which was usually given as a middle name.  For example if my great-grandfather was called William Wilson Jones and he married Helen Clarke, they would name their three children: William Wilson Jones, Tomas Clarke Jones and Patricia Clarke Jones.  Therefore, making the identification and linking of ancestors much easier.

This practise got me thinking about modern society and the names we give our children.  If our great-great-grandchildren research their family history are our current naming conventions going to confuse them?  Especially these days as we call our kids after popular TV characters, subculture names, or after animals and plants of no ancestry origin – of which I am a serial offender given the names I planned for my children.

When I was pregnant with my first born, I loved the name Summer.  Summer was a popular name of the hippy subculture, as was Sky, Rain or Dusk.  I’ve always been a bit of a hippy at heart, even in 1980 which was well past the 60′
s hippy era. Unfortunately for me, my husband hated the name and when my daughter was two days old, he called her Kristy.  I wasn’t opposed to the name, so I went with his suggestion secretly wishing I had won that battle.  The boy’s name we agreed on was Matthew.  I guess I couldn’t think of a male hippy name.

When I was pregnant with baby number two I really liked a female character in the soapy “The Young and the Restless”, her name was April and come hell or high water my baby girl was going to be called April.  Luckily for my son I had a boy’s name picked out – Joshua. The name Joshua was taken from the bible – this was a time when I was taking the two-way bet. See previous blog “The moment of enlightenment”. These days Joshua insists his friends call him Josh.  His siblings and I get away with calling him Joshua.

What a shame I didn’t like the name April when I had my daughter three years earlier as she was born in April.

And then there was my third pregnancy where I fell in love with a character in a novel by V.C. Andrews called “Heaven”. The character’s name was “Heaven Leigh”.   Don’t laugh; Heaven Leigh Casteel was a lovely girl and her story was followed through with a series of five books of which I’ve only read three.  Knowing this name may cause waves, I ran it by my family – they thought I’d finally lost the plot or was suffering from some type of sickness through my pregnancy.  But I wasn’t too concerned; I still had my backup name, April.

Anyway, I had another boy and luckily for him I had a boy’s name ready – Tylan, a name I created.  I fell in love with the name Ty when I was pregnant and attending Motor X racers with my husband, who at the time was racing against a lovely young man called Ty.  Although I loved the name Ty, I wasn’t a big fan of shortened names and I didn’t like the racer’s full name which was “Tyronne”.  My daughter was 6 years old at the time and there was a little fat kid named Tyronne in her class, he also attending the same swimming lessons.  His mother was a lovely lady, but the kid – well I wanted to drown him as did the swimming instructor.

Other long versions of Ty were Tyran or Tyron – both sounded like “tyrant”. So I played around with the alphabet and came up with Tylan.  When my husband rang my Auntie with the news of the birth and the baby’s name, she said “why on earth would you call a baby after an Asian country?” mistaking Tylan for Thailand. To this day, we’ve never come across another boy or girl called Tylan.

And let us not forget the ridiculous names handed to the children of our popular personalities such as the model Jordan (aka Katie Price) and her ex-husband Peter Andre, naming heir baby daughter Princess Tiaamii – oh please, if she takes after her big-titty mummy, she’s got a hope in hell of being a princess.  And there’s Apple – WTF?  Does this mean the other siblings will be called Mandarin or Kiwi Fruit?

And what about Bob Geldof and Paula Yates kids Fifi Trixibell, Peaches and Pixie?  Which leads me to believe both Bob and Paula were spending most of their nights high as kites. And by the time Paula was with Michael Hutchence and named their baby Heavenly Hiraani Tiger Lily – well it was only a matter of time.  BTW..it’s not that I minded the Heavenly but the rest of the name?

And as Juliet Capulet said; ”What’s in a name? That which we call a rose By any other name would smell as sweet” may downplay the importance of one’s name but names really are important, they define who we are and where we come from.  So I think society as a whole should really think about the names we give our children, the history they carry and the ability for our future generations to trace where they come from and where they are going.

A trip down cemetery lane

When I was young, together with my Mum, Aunties and Nan, visited our dead relies in the local cemetery at least half a dozen times a year for various occasions such as birthdays, mother’s and father’s day, Easter and Xmas.  We’d even visit on other occasions just to do a tidy-up,  maybe a weed or two needed to be pulled from between the cement cracks, leaves cleared and the constant clearing and replacing of the previously left flower arrangements.

We even cleaned the empty slots in the columbarium wall reserved for my Nan, before she moved in, and the slots reserved for my Aunties.  I always found this a little unnerving – housekeeping the final resting place before moving in, but my Aunties don’t seem to be too bothered by it, they’re just happy to have a nice clean slot prettied up with some flowers next to my Nan and Pop’s freshly shined plagues.

On these visits we’d do the rounds of all the relies and every time I’d ask lots of questions about who was who and how they died.  Funnily enough these were happy
Since moving to Sydney my visits to the family cemetery have been limited, but on one visit a couple of years ago I took my eldest son, much to his initial lack of excitement. However, I enjoyed the role change from the once child being led to the adult leading the child telling the same stories, or what I could remember.

Also, to prove my families love for visiting the cemetery I must tell you the story of one of my trips to the country where prior to going to my Aunties, I dropped into the cemetery to visit the dead family – as you do.  Unbeknownst to me my Aunties also decided to drop over before I arrived at their place.  So there we were, in the Cemetery, each other not knowing the other’s intention to visit that day. To make this meeting all the more enjoyable we bumped into a two other groups of whom we new very well. They too were visiting their dead family – don’t ya just love a small country town.  It’s a shame we didn’t take a packed lunch and turn it into a real shindig.

Another visit to a cemetery happened only recently albeit an impromptu, unplanned visit.  This time with my three kids, son-in-law and grandkids. The cemetery is at Parramatta, across from my son’s place is one of the first cemeteries of the early settlers. Since we parked in front I couldn’t resist the urge to do a walk around as it had been a while. Although my son-in-law was bored out of his brain, thankfully my kids got into the event, we even found the grave of Gregory Blaxland, one of the three explorers first to cross the Blue Mountains.  A trip to the cemetery with a history lesson thrown in – better than a lesson in the classroom wouldn’t you say?

My latest renewed interest started with a visit from my Aunties (the ones who have reserved slots in the columbarium wall) at Easter time this year. This Easter also included Anzac day. During Anzac week www.ancestry.com.au offered free access so we took up the offer.  One thing led to another and before the day was out (after about 7 hours online) I had traced my paternal Grandmother’s family back to the 1500s while running into the odd convict or two – which by-the-way was a proud moment for me.  There’s nothing that says you’re an Aussie more than having a convict in your family tree.  And yes I know it’s not my biological family tree but I’m sure there are a few bastards on the tree and I’m proud to be one myself.

What’s this got to do with cemeteries you ask?  Well, when you’re doing a family tree on the Internet it’s very easy to link the wrong people, whether it’s one ancestor to another family’s ancestor, or as I did, the wrong husband and wife. It wasn’t until I searched the cemetery database, which includes a picture of the headstone, that I was able to link up the right husband and wife team – I’m sure they will be eternally grateful.

And this my friend is what has renewed my latest interest in cemeteries. So much that I’m going to plan a weekend in Sofala (a place where the convict ancestors came to after they were released from incarceration) and taking into account they had a many children, the local cemetery should be swarming. And I think I’ll be like a little girl in a cookie store.

So I’ll finish this blog and do a search on cemetery holidays.  I’m sure they exist.  And I’ll also leave you with this task – go to the cemetery your family is resting in or if that’s not possible go to the nearest cemetery and walk around, I’m sure you’ll have a blast – and don’t forget to take the kids.

Find my feral family – uncut

You might be wondering why I’ve posted another version of FMFF, see previous blog Find my Feral Family. Any way, my daughter reviewed the version below and loved it but I was a bit worried that it maybe a little too offensive, because when I feel strongly about the subject matter (in the moment),  I don’t hold back – just ask my friends. So to be true to how I feel and think about certain things and with the encouragement of those close to me, I thought “what the hell” if it provokes a negative response, then so be it.  So here is the uncut version.

I remember a few years ago being rather exited when I saw Jack Thompson advertising a new TV show called ‘Find my family’. I’ve been a fond fan of Jacks over the years so instantly I gave this show a creditable rating given that Jack, an Australian icon who also is an adoptee, was going to compare each episodes.

If you haven’t watched this show, it’s about people searching for family members lost to each other for various circumstances, mostly adoption.  Being an adoptee myself, I was immensely interested as I too started my own search for my birth mother about 30 years ago, without any luck.  So it goes without saying I was looking forward to the first episode.  I even jumped on the web site Jack mentioned in his monologue to register – now that was in 2008 – I’m still waiting for even an acknowledgement email.

The format of the show starts with the ‘story’.  The person searching tells the story of who they are searching for and the details they have so far.  In most cases it’s children looking for estranged parents or birth parents.  As the show progresses and we establish that the other party has been found, they tell the story from their point of view.

This is followed by each participant viewing a video of each other recanting their story – the searcher telling how they longed to find the other party and the found party telling the story from their point of view.  In between 100 adverts and the whole story being retold prior to the commencement of the show, we finally get to the finale.

The first episode was certainly a slight disappointment but I seem to recall that it touched a nerve and I was hopeful it would improve in the coming weeks – WRONG!

The class of people they help each week seemed to decline. I remember one episode when the birth mother met her daughter in what appeared to be a trailer park. The mother was sitting on a fold-up camping chair dressed in tracksuit pants. Her hair was probably brushed, not a good look for a women with curly hair.  We all know that you don’t brush curly hair; you scrunch it while applying styling moose and blow drying with a baffler.  Or how about this for an idea – go to a frikkin hair dresser – you’re going to be on national TV!

Other episodes have shown toothless, unemployed down and outs.  People that shouldn’t be seen on TV, especially around meal times.  It’s certainly enough to make you puke – especially if you’re an adoptee or adopter of somewhat better class. Having said that, there are a few normal people who appear on the show but it seems they are few and far between. On a whole this show has done nothing for the profile of adopted people, it suggests that adoptees and adopters are low class, trailer trash cretins.

And let me point out that on a whole, the research required to find these cretin families would take half a day.  So my conclusion is, if it’s an easy find send in your details, they’ll get one of their staff members to do a quick look up in the Whitepages during lunch and bingo, you’re in business.  After all the people they represent wouldn’t know a book if it hit them in their ugly heads.

On a lighter note, it did give me much comic relief each week when I recanted the show to my friends the following day.  We’d discuss possible outcomes of my situation unfolding on an episode given the flavour already set.

Picture this – my reunion:  ….a group of people gathered under a beautiful birch tree in a manicured Sydney park. The grass is lush and appears like is has recently rained giving the grass that rich and ful look and feel.  It’s a beautiful Sydney day with a bright blue sky void of clouds.  On arrival at the car park, which is some distance from the gathering, is me and my children. I won’t take the grandkids at this stage because I want this meet and greet to be about me, not cute little babies.

As we gather our composure after alighting from the car we start to make our way towards the gathering. At first I can’t focus on any one person but as we get closer there appears to be a main person, possible my biological mother, standing in front.  The closer we get the more I notice the ‘others’, possibly more biological family. The nearer we get I begin to realise that something is not quite what it should be – no one looks like they are dressed for the momentous occasion. Made even more momentous by the sheer fact there is a camera crew following our progress as well as capturing the reactions of the awaiting group, as these scripted meetings are the highlight of the show.

It’s at this point I begin to panic, surely these mutants aren’t related to me.  It would be at this point my kids would also be making very inappropriate comments not suitable for the camera, which would result in us fighting back the urge to burst out laughing – thankfully I have comedians for kids.

Now I have a decision to make, do we continue our way towards the group and see how the cards fall?  After all they might even be very nice people even though they do look like trailer trash.  Or do we turn around and run?  The answer to this is easy….

We run –  I’m not embarrassing myself of national TV for anyone!

Nufin like a posh wedin

Initially I was blasé about the Royal Wedding but once you start watching, it’s like an all day sucker, you just can stop sucking it up.  And didn’t Kate look gorgeous.  And let’s not forget she’s a commoner. It seems like it’s up to the commoners to keep the Royal band wagon afloat. Just look what our Mary’s doing for the Danes.

Prince William isn’t too bad either. However, was it my imagination or is he getting a bit think around the waist-line?  And that goes for Harry’s waist-line too – the sexy bugger.  There’s nothing like a bloke in a uniform, the more medals they have the less you worry about the other things that can bring a bloke down – like a bald spot for instance or ‘small hands’ and possibly even a stutter  – no, not a stutter I’m afraid.

I can’t help but wonder if they all think the whole pomp and ceremony is as boring as bat shit.  But on the other hand, I’m sure I would enjoy being adored by all and sundry. Let’s face it, we should all experience life as a princess or prince (whichever way you slant) every now and again – or then again maybe not.  Best not know what we’re missing because I’m sure I’d neck myself rather than to take a step backwards from Royal living to the day to day drudgery of what I have to endure now (poor me).  On the other hand, I’m sure I’d think about necking myself if I had to sit for hours on end listening to the words of damnation sprouted by the preachers – that’s enough to do one’s head in – little wonder I’m an atheist.

However, it appears that the heads of the Church of England can go against the rubbish printed in the Bible and invite Sir Elton John and his partner, what’s-his-name.  Just goes to show even they (the great Heads) consider it (the bible) a great work of fiction too.

While watching the telecast in the church, I can’t help but wonder what’s said between the Queen and Prince Philip on the couple of occasions the camera showed them having a little chat while the choir boys were singing.  Maybe something like, “I’m dying to go to the loo”. After all we all know how women suffer from weak bladders, especially an 85 year old woman. Or maybe she asked where the hell she was.  And I wonder what Camilla said to Charles?  Or, Princess Anne to her husband?  I guess we’ll just have to imagine or make it all up – I know what I’ll do.  I think the Royal party should wear microphones – that would put an interesting slant on the occasion.

And what’s with the two Nuns sitting at the alter next to Will and Kate? The ones dressed in Gray.  Ready to hit Will or Kate over the head if they speak out of turn – just like they use to when I was at school (good old Sister Una).

And one can’t help but love all the Royal horses; they do look rather grand on these occasions and also make me feel like calling up the local Pony Club and heading on down to get riding lessons.  But who’s going to clean up the Royal Horse shit all over the streets?  Probably the Royal Shit Picker-uppers – I don’t fancy that job but I guess someone’s gotta do it.

Anyway, that’s my take on the whole event, now back to www.ancestry.com.  I’m sure I come from Royal stock and I’ll dig around until I find the link – then watch out – the world will have to deal with me and my Royal family.

Find my ‘feral’ family

I remember a few years ago being rather excited when I saw Jack Thompson advertising a new TV show called ‘Find my Family’. I’ve been a fan of Jacks for many years. He has a commanding voice, so instantly I gave this show some credibility, given that an Australian icon, who like me is also an adoptee, was going to host each episode. 

If you haven’t watched the show, it’s about people searching for long lost relatives or adoptees and adopters looking for biological parents or children respectively.  I started searching for my biological family around 30 years ago without any luck.  So it goes without saying I was looking forward to the first episode.  I even jumped on the web site Jack mentioned in his monologue to register – now that was in 2008 – I’m still waiting for even an acknowledgement email, but please don’t bother. You’ll see what I mean as you read this blog – “Find my ‘feral’ family” – this show has done nothing for the profile of adoptees.

I remember in one episode, the birth mother met her daughter in what appeared to be a caravan park. The mother was sitting on a fold-up camp chair dressed in tracksuit pants. Her curly hair, although appeared to be brushed, certainly did nothing for her appearance. We all know that you don’t brush curly hair; you scrunch it while damp while applying styling moose and blow dry with an attached diffuser.  Or how about this for an idea – go to a frikkin hair dresser – you’re going to be on national TV!  But alas, she certainly wasn’t outdone by her receiving daughter – biology certainly has a lot to play in offspring characteristics.

Unfortunately, the episode outlined above isn’t an isolated example.  The list of undesirables that appear on this show makes me more and more depressed.  Don’t get me wrong, there has been a few who appear to be ‘normal’, but for the most part, each week, it doesn’t disappoint in disappointing.

And let me point out that, on a whole, the research required to find the families they represent on this show wouldn’t take more than a couple of hours.  So I gather I won’t be hearing from the producers of FMFF.  The little bit of information I supplied wouldn’t turn up anything if ran in a Google search. Besides, my family have already said they wouldn’t join me on the show because it would be embarrassing to be shown along side the cretins you see week in, week out – thanks guys. 

But rest assured if they do call me up for the show, I would certainly book in for a make-over and Tony & Guy hair-do.  Someone’s gotta raise the profile of the show and it might as well be me.

 
 
 

PS:  I love the family I was raised in – my search is certainly not about replacing them but proving to my friends that I’m from Royal stock.
 
 
 

True friends tell how it is

Do you ever find yourself in a situation where you feel that someone should be warned that they look foolish, which may possibly result in them being ridiculed?  It’s these times, which I’ll explain in this blog, that I rely on my friends’ openness and honesty to alleviate the possibility of  me being ridiculed.  True friends tell how it is, not what you want to hear.  That’s my friendship oath and I expect little else in return.

For example, just the other day I was sitting on a bus waiting to be taken to the shopping centre during my lunch hour. As the bus driver began to close the door a woman appeared from the building exit, she was running towards the bus waving her hands so the driver would notice her and stop, which he did.  When the woman reached the bus she turned to hurry her ‘friend’ along.  I say ‘friend’ in inverted commas because as this story unfolds, you, like me, will wonder if this women is a “true friend”.

When the first woman called back to the second woman – all eyes on the bus diverted to the second woman.  After all we were all keen to get going. It was our lunch ‘hour’ and we all know you can’t get a lot of shopping done in one hour.  Anyway, as my eyes focused on the second woman it was very clear that her size was going to impact her ability to get to the bus at record speed. By the time she reached the bus she was out of breath and the passengers were glad that finally, we were on our way.

The shuffled dash was only about 10 meters, so I’m talking about a very large woman. And what drew my attention was the sheer size of her belly.  Now it’s not a good look that a woman has a belly so big the weight draws it down towards her knees,  but what made this sight all the more appalling was the fact that she was wearing black pants (no that wasn’t the bad part) with a lose T-shirt (still not the bad part) that barely passed her waist and did nothing to cover the drooping belly which was tucked into her black pants (we’re getting warmer).  Now for the disturbing part (here we are) – her pants didn’t have a zipper but a front seam which was pulled so tight it created a camel toe affect with the women’s belly.

O.M.G how the hell didn’t she notice this catastrophe in the mirror before she left home?

Now it’s probably about his time you may think I’m a bitch for telling this story.  But it wasn’t the fact that she is a large woman with inappropriate clothing that disturbed me, it was the fact that there’s a distinct possibility that this woman hasn’t been warned about her inappropriate clothing choice. Which leads me to ask – has she got any friends? If so, why don’t they tell her she needs to cover up or face ridicule?

As I sat on the bus for the 15 minute ride to the shopping centre, the two women chatted away about work and their Easter plans. No mention from the other woman that maybe her T-shirt choice for that day was totally unacceptable.   I was hoping that the large woman could get through the one hour shopping trip without a smart arse kid making fun, which I’m sure would be the case quite often – you know how kids can be little bastards in these situations.  So I felt rather sorry for her, after all we shouldn’t assume she’s large because she can’t resist foods such as the ‘double-down from KFC’ – which I find rather appalling by the way. Maybe she has a thyroid issue?

Anyway, this scene got me thinking about my friendships, how I treat my friends and how I want them to treat me.

Now I maybe way off in saying that, for the most-part, I’m a kind loving person who goes out of my way to help and encourage my friends.  But, I can also be charged with telling them exactly how I think – for better or worse.  But to me, that’s what friends are for. Of course this also applies to my family, especially my kids and especially my daughter.

The level of truth and bluntness I give is reliant on the level of friendship.  The blunter I am, the better the friendship. If coupled with sarcastic humour, then we’re great friends. For example: If a very good friend asks my opinion of their clothing choice, my reply would be:  “Really, that was your choice this morning?  Take it off before anyone sees me talking to you dressed like that”.

On the flip side, if someone I don’t like asks for my opinion then my evil twin appears. For example; if asked  “Do I look good in this?”  My reply would be:  “Oh yes, red and green look great together, especially on you”.

As I mentioned earlier, I also apply my friendship rules to my family, especially my daughter. For example, I distinctly remember telling her when she was a teenager, the shoes she was wearing at the time made her feet look deformed and fat, and there’s nothing worse than fat feet – wait on, there is something far worse than fat feet and that’s a huge belly with camel toe. Of course she didn’t agree at the time but she hasn’t worn that style of shoe since – I’m still waiting on a thanks.

I expect the same level of honesty from my friends.  I remember one particular mufti Friday when I wore a loose fitting cream silky shirt with a u-shaped hem falling substantially at the back; I do wear a lot of clothes with differing hem lengths.  Anyway, on this particular day my friend ask me, while we were on our way to get a coffee, if I drove to work or dropped out of an aeroplane, indicating that my top looked more like a parachute. Damn, I liked that top and now I can’t wear it again – but I have my good friend to thank because I would have happily worn this top again not realising it looked ridiculous.

Now getting back to our camel toe friend (poor dear); if she was my friend, I’d certainly tell her something along the lines of:  “Do you think that you should wear that short top, because people will stare at you like you’re a road accident – they know they shouldn’t look but they can’t help it because it’s human nature to look at the grotesque?”

I guess I can only hope and wish, that like me, everyone has true friends to tell them how it really is and not how they wish it was.

50 up

2011 heralded in my 50th Birthday year and I have to say I’m not terribly happy about it. Turning 50 means I’m more than half-way through my life and my childhood doesn’t seem that long ago.

For me turning 50 also means I’ve well and truly started to lose my youthful appearance.  My eyes have started to look like bullet holes in a shattered pane of glass.  The folds on each side of my mouth are drawing in towards my mouth. And my neck is taking on the appearance of a Shar-Pei dog.

Turning grey started when I was much younger so I’ve came to terms with that long ago. My stomach was ruined during pregnancy and child birth so that too I’ve learnt to live with.  Losing weight has become impossible – not helped by my love of good wine.  To make matters that much worse, so far this year I’ve had 5 x-rays, 2 scans, 4 blood test and soon I’ll have a hand operation – and it’s only April.

I’ve just been diagnosed with hyperparathoidism causing high blood pressure, headaches, stomach cramps, confusion and sleeplessness all easily fixed by an operation if they could only see which one of the little suckers are causing the problem.

Conversations with my age-like friends are starting to resemble a Dr’s conference for the old and decrepit.  A disabled car sticker is surely around the corner.

They say that 50 is the new 40 and 40 is the new 30.  So how come I feel about 60?