Category: Uncategorized

Aha, I think I’ve finally worked out the very simple solution to be able to post on Beta blogs … after giving up trying to post on many blogs (some would allow anonymous comments, some wouldn’t etc) … I finally opened up a Google account, which was super simple, and it’s allowed me to comment everywhere so far … although I have to admit I’ve only made a few comments so far this morning before work. Anyway, anyone who’s still having problems commenting might want to try doing that.

After seeing Nicki’s blogs copy across just fine, I decided to bite the bullet last night and migrate mine … but apparently one of my blogs can’t be migrated yet, so I have to wait in line for longer – I don’t mind at all ;P

Nothing else to post today, really …

Except to say today I’m thankful for fresh clean sheets and bedding … how lovely is it to slip into bed when you’ve just changed all the linen? Ah, heaven 🙂

Updated to add an apology to many bloggers – I’m trying to catch up with blogs, but for some reason the last two nights I’ve been unable to leave comments on beta blogs … it just keeps rejecting my blogger ID. Anyway, I’ve opted to leave it for a day or two then I’ll try to catch up again – I don’t want to just ‘read and run’ … hopefully I’ll be able to get back to commenting again soon 🙂 I was doing so well, too – I’d managed to catch up at the weekend after getting through over 650 unread feeds! 😀

For Carina and Cindy, and anyone else who’s wondering what Babycham actually is … here’s the Wikipedia info … and the official website 😀 I was reading the History section last night, and found it very interesting, and I love the ‘product lines’ … when you run your mouse over the sparkling bottle, the cork pops out haha – I didn’t realise quite how old Babycham is, but then again I have been drinking it since I was very young hmmmm 😉

Well, it’s been an interesting day today – not anything to do with my ‘personal’ situation, but rather one for Melbourne city on the whole. As the Yahoo news team puts it … “Melbourne was shrouded in a thick blanket of smoke throughout today with levels in the city reaching 10 times the acceptable limit. Some city workers found the air difficult to breath in with others more concerned about the cause of the ominous sky.” That kinda sums it all up, really!

It really is quite eerie, and I’ve been tasting smoke all day – I had to shut off the air vents in my car on the way to work, and then by the afternoon it was so bad it was circulating through the air conditioning at work and we’ve all been complaining of headaches and sore throats. We did do a very pitiful rendition of ‘Smoke gets in your eyes’ at one stage 😉 I bet the respiratory departments are run off their feet today, as it really is dreadful – even in bad weather I usually have a lovely view of the skyline on the drive home, but tonight it’s just blanketed in a thickish fog of smoke. I feel very sorry for those who are closer to the ‘action’ and have lost their homes during this disaster.

So today, I’m thankful that I’m not in the path of that fiery destruction – I really hope they get it under control soon so no more property (or worse) is lost. But I’m also truly thankful that today was the first day of an entire month (13 Dec-14 Jan) where we’re allowed to wear casual clothes to work … jeans and trainers for an entire month – I’m in heaven! 😉

Today was also dress-up today at work … apart from a few Santa hats, as usual I was the only one to be fully decked-out in my Christmas tree outfit, and we have some great ideas for my outfit for next year – including getting a load of cheap ‘flashing’ brooches/earrings to attach like lights hahaha … too funny! Two of the Supervisors tonight came and gave me a Luv Ya Work Award before I went home “for bringing some festive cheer and joy into the office” … I have to admit it is a great morale booster, and brings a smile to everyone when they see it … and that’s what it’s all about! 😀 I didn’t take a new photo this year, as I had my hands full with my plate of food etc walking from my car, so couldn’t juggle my camera as well, so last year’s photo will have to suffice 😉

That heading is what I’m going to be focusing on for a while … I’m sick of being full of misery on this blog, and I’m sure you’re sick of reading it. Anyway, after my emotional meltdown last night, I think it had a bit of a cleansing effect on me – my fighting spirit is back again, and I’m going to try to focus on the positive things in my life. There are many people worse off than me … while it may be stressful and depressing at times, I need to keep looking ahead 🙂

So today I’m thankful for all my online friends – your cheering on comments both here and in personal emails has given me a lot of strength to deal with the issues I’m facing. As the old adage goes, “a friend in need is a friend indeed” … and I really and truly appreciate you all hanging in with me while I’ve been struggling and less than positive on here.

This morning I spent some time checking out house sitting sites and self storage etc, but I’ve been thinking of leaving any major decisions until the New Year. I have Mum visiting for six weeks in February, and I’d rather have everything ‘as usual’ during that time at least … and it will give me plenty of time to get my head together.

Tonight was a different task … I’ve been sending emails to the UK, to the manufacturers of Babycham! I don’t know why, but since this morning I’ve got it in my head that I want to make up my own stocking. Why?? Because my stocking is the one Christmas tradition Mum did for me every year until I was ‘too old’ for it (I repeat for you again, Mum, I’m never ever too old for it hahaha). Such a simple thing – a stocking was waiting under the tree every year … nothing glamorous and expensive, but filled with love – Christmas just wasn’t Christmas without my stocking! What was in my stocking that made it so special? … There was always a handful of nuts in their shells (brazil nuts, hazelnuts, walnuts etc), maybe an apple and an orange, and a couple of chocolate bars and sweeties, and the piece de resistance … a small bottle of Babycham! When I was in my teens there would be some additional treats in there too, like a pair of ‘fashion’ earrings or something similar. I don’t know why, but that stocking tradition has remained in my heart as something very very special about Christmas.

When I moved to Australia the first 8 months here sharing were abysmal for many reasons (a couple of you know those stories from personal emails, but I’m not going into it now) – when Fraze and I moved out to our own place in Box Hill, it was going be our first Christmas ‘on our own’ … by the time Christmas came, we also had Andrew living with us too – and I decided to do the Christmas stocking ritual for them … although instead of Babycham they got cans of beer haha – they also got a few ‘silly things’ like car polish and DVD cases and things. While I didn’t have my own stocking, watching the two boys unwrap everything in their own stockings was wonderful, and I really loved it. Andrew said that that was the most special Christmas he’d had, and even though he spent the rest of the day with his family, the morning with us was the most magical. I do have to admit I did feel the same way too at the time (shame the rest of our living arrangements with him weren’t quite so magical in the long run haha).

Anyway, being the first Christmas on my own, I’m making my own stocking … and I’m trying to track down whether Babycham is available for sale locally somewhere, as I’ll be treating myself as my big Christmas Day treat. We used to be able to buy it in New Zealand, so I presume you can buy it here somewhere too, and it’s pretty cheap to buy even though it’s imported. If not, then I’ll substitute with a $3.99 mini bottle of Asti Riccadonna instead … woohoo, big spender LOL. Add to that my fave Christmas song playing loudly on the stereo (ie Snoopy’s Christmas – it gets me singing at the top of my lungs every time!), and I’ll be all set! 😉

I’m actually working on both Christmas Day and Boxing Day, which will be a financial boost thank goodness – and someone at work actually cooks up a Christmas dinner for us all, which will be a lovely treat 🙂 I can’t believe how close it is to the ‘big day’ already …

Ooh, I didn’t realise how close midnight was either – better run and hit the hay for the night, as I need to be up early tomorrow. The Christmas tree dress is back out again ready for dress-up day tomorrow, but I have to get up early to get a ‘plate of food’ to share with everyone … so I’m making Doreen’s Apricot Slice again (cheap ingredients, and so very comforting for me, as it brings back all those wonderful happy childhood memories again – the perfect blessing for my day!).

Today I finally open what I considered to be ‘junk mail’ … one from the NZ Inland Revenue Department – seeing as I don’t live in NZ anymore, I didn’t bother rushing to open it … today I did … and today I found a bill for NZ$50 for a late filing penalty … for the non-filing of a tax return in NZ when I reside in Australia, and have done for 3 1/2 years now – I haven’t earned taxable earnings in NZ since 2003, for goodness sake!!! … payment due 07Feb07 … With any luck I’ll get this one reversed just for stupidity’s sake, but then again it’s a Government department, after all, so anything is possible!

It’s a good job I’m a relatively strong person, or I would’ve sunk into the murky mire of serious depression ages ago … but I am definitely reaching my limits now, that’s for sure!! If nothing else, though, it’s stopped the tears and brought that fighting spirit back again (mutter mutter mutter) I must say, though, it’s starting to feel like I’m starring in some sort of comedy farce … except the sense of humour’s a bit warped and not all that funny!

Sorry, no stitching piccies – I’m just not in the stitching mood right now (plus these shifts aren’t very conducive to it).

I am, however, very grateful to see the beautiful blue sunny sky outside my windows today, followed by the cooling breeze coming through the windows (as opposed to the fiery heat pouring through on Sunday at 42C!).

The heading of this post really sums it up today … I was feeling quite good after completing my overnight shifts, and coming home for my days off work – even after only having 4 hours quality sleep each night (or ‘day’ to be more precise), I feel OK, and happy … then driving home that wonderful feeling disappeared.

After driving for a while with a slight knocking sound coming from the passenger side of the car, I drove to an open gas station that’s about halfway home and checked around the car, only to find a bloody great bolt head sticking out of the passenger side front tyre … here I was thinking my financial woes are finally going to be put to rest on Tuesday, my bills are all going to be paid, and I’m going to live it up with fresh veges on the dinner table and my stress levels will return to normal … well, so much for that idea! Now it’s likely I’m up for a brand new tyre on top of everything else … fed up? Too bloody right I am!! 😦

I did have an extra bit of excitement on the drive home, though … I saw black smoke billowing on the horizon, and thought it looked like fire smoke … sure enough, I drove past an art supply store that was billowing flames out the front – it was like being on the movie set of Ladder 49 or something, especially at 5.30am with the sky only just lightening up, the colour was quite vivid and very spectacular – I only wish I had my camera, as watching the fireman dealing with it with the flames pouring out the front was incredible!

Then to top it all off a stupid driver started reversing out really fast from his driveway, into the main road, right in front of me … I had to haul on the brakes to miss driving straight into him – between the tyre, the fire, and that moron my heartrate was definitely up by the time I got home … I was grateful just to pull into my driveway! Anyway, the bolt is still sitting in my tyre … I figured I’d drive home slowly and change the tyre etc when I can see it in daylight – and here I was thinking I’d have a relaxing day stitching on my day off … mutter mutter mutter.

Anyway, I have to say I’ve pretty much reached my limits … and can’t take much more testing of my inner strength … whoever’s doing the testing, could you just give me a passing grade, and let me get on with ‘life as I know it’ … enough already!!!!!

Sorry for the rant … it’s now 6am and I just wanted to get it off my chest before trying to get to sleep … ‘cos at the moment I can’t decide whether to laugh or cry, but I feel too tired to do either!

I really really can’t be feeling well … it’s now 6am and I’ve just walked in from work, after being up for almost 24 hours straight (the first night on doggo’s is a killer!) … anyway I’m driving home and thinking about a couple of XS charts I’d like to stitch. OK, so there’s nothing really unusual about that … BUT I’m envisaging how they’d be all stitched over-one … what the? I HATE over-one stitching – and only do it when I really really have to, so what on earth is possessing me to think I’d actually enjoy doing some of these BAP’s over-one?? If my head starts spinning around on my shoulders and spewing obscenities, at least I’ll then know I’m obviously and clearly possessed … right now I just think perhaps sleep deprivation has made me temporarily potty!

And what projects do I think would look great … I’ve already pretty much decided to stitch Graham Ross’ Rainbow Lorikeets that way, but on the way home I started thinking about By the Bay Needleart charts (such as this one), plus another Greek scene from an old magazine, and then a L&L design … crikey, I’d better get myself to bed quick smart and get some quality sleep before I do something really rash and actually start one of these things over-one!!! Someone bring me a cold compress and some Panadol, I’m obviously running a fever!!!

This time I was on the receiving end of a gorgeous RAK from sweet Auntie Isabelle, and what a wonderful pick-me-up it was after being so ‘down’! It was supposedly a “wee” treat, but I think it’s way bigger than “wee” 😉 I’m too lazy to get the camera out tonight, but I promise a piccie tomorrow – but I’ll try to describe my actual reaction to receiving this yesterday …

I opened up my PO Box to find Isabelle’s parcel hiding inside – I walked outside and saw the contents, and decided straightaway to treat myself … As you know I’ve been very VERY frugal over the last month or two, and haven’t been buying any coffees or non-essentials … well, I popped straight into the cafe next door and ordered a large cappuccino takeaway, propped myself on the brick wall/seating outside and broke off two pieces of the chocolate Isabelle had sent me … while reading the gorgeous words in the card, and drooling over the chart that was also in the parcel – one off my wishlist, a wonderful French design by Coleurs Croisees (there’s a link here to the chart, if you can’t wait until tomorrow’s piccie haha). What a wonderfully decadent and heavenly way to start the day (and in this case my working week) – thanks so much again, Isabelle, you’re a sweetheart and a wonderful friend … I feel very blessed to have ‘met’ you and it really did raise my spirits {{hugs}}.

And talking of RAK’s, as for the RAK Registry, it’s slowly getting underway. I’ve spent a fair bit of time starting up a new blog, and playing with the template layouts etc, and I’m now slowly entering in the data that I’ve received. If you want a sample look while it’s in the creating process, feel free to have a peek here. This is definitely a ‘work in progress’ at the moment, and it will take me some time to enter everything into it. In the meantime if you think there’s something else you’d like to see, or any improvements you can suggest, feel free to let me know. This is something to be used by all of us, so I want it to be as user-friendly as possible 🙂

A couple of people have also mentioned that they want my address details as well, so they don’t have to ask me for it and spoil any possible surprises down the track … oops, I hadn’t honestly thought about that side of it, I was too eager to get everybody else joined up. Not sure how I should tackle this one – either send my address to everyone that signs up (which feels a bit presumptuous), or I could list a couple of people that know my address details, along with their email addresses … not quite sure about that one! 🙂

Anyway, keep those emails coming in if you want to sign up – this is a continuing process, so there’s no deadline to joining up … it’s merely a ‘sharing of information’ among our caring stitching community 😀

It’s been an emotional rollercoaster today – I spent the morning getting quite teary-eyed from all the gorgeous comments and personal emails I’ve been receiving (love you all!) … then at work I had a stressful 6 hours, which ended up turning my entire mood into almost fits of giggles!

I’ve been involved with a big issue at work that I initially dealt with two nights ago – that was a huge involvement and ended up with me and another girl off the phones for a number of hours trying to fix something. I emailed a spreadsheet of all those bookings that were affected etc to our Head Office before I went home at 11pm … then they continued to work on the problem overnight. The next day the problem was still not resolved, so they asked the morning shift to continue the same way that I had the previous night, and to send new spreadsheets every 4 hours so they could continue to deal with them. I was called at home at 8.30am yesterday morning, after only getting to bed at 2am (not impressed), then again at 10.30am, just before I was getting ready to come into work (and I still can’t work out why the phoned me, ‘cos we didn’t discuss any of the procedures etc) … anyway, when I get to work I find out they’d found my original spreadsheet, and added all the new problem bookings to the list (rather than making a new spreadsheet which had been requested) … to add insult to injury they then put the entire list in alphabetical order … and saved the files … so when I came in I had to spend almost 4 hours comparing the old file in my email, to pull out all the new bookings – and because they hadn’t processed the ‘fixes’ properly, I had to go into each and every new booking and fix them up as well. Another office then topped it off yesterday by not ignoring these particular bookings on the queues, and queue-delaying them until today, which means we had to wait until this morning for them to pop up again, then start going back through the queues to find them all and starting again today.

Well, the final straw when I came in at lunchtime today for work to see if they’d managed to find them … I’d ended up having to stay an extra hour at work last night fixing the problems before emailing the entire corrected list to our Head Office – then left an email plus a printout of a spreadsheet, with lines wide enough for someone to write on them, asking for someone to write up any new bookings (the queue-delayed ones) onto the forms, then to fax them to head office for the final tally. What do they decide to do? They said among themselves, “that’s really silly, when we have this great spreadsheet already set up, let’s just do the same as yesterday, and add them all into the old spreadsheet, then sort them alphabetically again!” … My face when I came in today to be told that was a total picture!!!

So, today I spent another 4 1/2 hours cross-referencing through the same lists yet AGAIN (of over 300 bookings), and having to go into every single new booking yet AGAIN to fix them up … only to get a call from Head Office from an extremely apologetic manager saying not to worry, as the company we’re dealing with had finally managed to pull their own report from their own system, so they’d just use their own data …… aaaaaarghhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!

Sorry for the loooooong version … anyway, the upshot of all this, is that I’ve had a shitty few days at work just because of sheer incompetence of other staff members, and tonight’s call just sent me over the top – I couldn’t do anything else but crack up laughing and got the giggles. Two of my work colleagues have given me “Luv Ya Work” awards ‘cos of everything I’ve been doing for the last 3 days … here’s hoping the smile will be here to stay for a while longer 😉 If nothing else I got some great compliments from the manager in head office I’ve been dealing with for 3 days 🙂

I had a good talk to Mum on the phone before work too, and she agrees with me that I should basically forget Christmas (stitching-wise particularly) until after Christmas, and just treat myself to some selfish stitching “just for me” – so that’s the plan … I’ve listed three projects that I’d really love to stitch, even if it’s just making a start on them (I’m still missing a couple of threads/beads), and that’s what I’m going to focus on until after Christmas … then I’ll get back on track and get stitching ornaments again ready for ‘whenever’ and back to my rotation. As Mum says, that way it takes my mind’s focus off the negatives of what I can’t do for Christmas, and puts it back onto something more positive 😀 Thanks to everyone’s suggestions on that score – they’ve all been taken on board 😀

This weekend I’ll be doing a list of the entire contents of the freezers – which won’t take very long going by what I saw yesterday LOL – and a bit more menu planning to get me through the next three weeks at least. I’ve just cooked up the 1kg mince I had into spaghetti bolognese sauce, so that’ll last about 6 main meals – and I made beef stroganoff in the crockpot yesterday (I only had half the meat required but I still made the full recipe), so that’ll go into the freezer for another 3-4 meals (I just have to add a bit of sour cream after it’s been reheated). There are still 3 chicken breasts in filo pastry left … so that’s pretty much covered two weeks of meals … I’m just not sure what else is in the freezer.

Anyway, I just wanted to share a more positive post for a change – thanks again for all your lovely comments and support, and thanks for hanging in there while I’m going through my less than positive phase 😀 {{hugs}}

Now I’m off to start kitting up one of my projects … the four at the top of my list for starting are (in order of preference):

• Coffee Menu – Little House Needleworks (I have everything, just have to choose which fabric to use)
• Sapphire Star – canvaswork by Laura J Perin (I still have one thread on backorder from Dragonfly Dreams, but otherwise ready to go)
• Fire sampler – The Victoria Sampler (pretty sure I have everything)
• Angel of Love – L&L (have everything, I think, except I only have one packet of each of the beads, and from memory there are about 3 colours that need more than one packet … if I get time to start this one I’ll just stitch as far as I can until I run out … by the time I get to that stage I should be well and truly over my ‘poverty line days’ and should be able to pick the last few beads up from Spotlight or somewhere)

Seriously, thanks for all the support – it’s very unusual for me to get so down for this long … it’s just a case of riding the storm until the weather calms, which will hopefully be by Christmas … hopefully. I’m very lucky in that Mum’s taught me to be a packrat where food’s concerned, and I have a tall chest freezer for bulk meat etc, so at least I haven’t gone hungry so far, even if my menu has had to be substantially altered for a while.

For Alison – I don’t have a monthly budget, in that I automatically pay bills as soon as they come in, and know what’s normally due to come out … so whatever is left at the end of the month is technically ‘free’, and things are not usually this bad. Unfortunately, though, I had $1000 sitting in the bank and blew it on our Hong Kong trip, so I don’t have a ‘back up’ for emergencies any more. Even that would have been fine as there should be sufficient to pay the bills, but having my car keep breaking down and costing about $300 overall, plus a very unexpected $500+ tax bill all of a sudden due (not to mention the $120+ parking fine – and extra money spent on a dinner party), and “I’m screwed” to put it very bluntly. Normally paying bills are fine – some pays I have a small bit left over, other pays I have some extra spending money … but all this lot came totally out of left field, and I was unprepared for it.

It also means I’m gonna be frugal for a while longer even when things do even out a bit again, so I can get some emergency money behind me again, then next time I won’t be so desperate 😦 So when I can get back to decent grocery shopping, I’ll still be eating cheaply for a while longer.

For Maria S., KarenV & Nicki – I have to admit I probably will continue to make my ornies for those special people, but I may now wait until after Christmas and continue stitching them again … and I might take on the suggestion of a “cheer me up” new project. I’ve been seriously itching to pick up LHN’s Coffee House Menu, so perhaps that’s what I should do – and take my mind off ornaments and my rotation for the time being. My ornies will eventually be posted, just not in time for Christmas this year. Maria, your comment about not eating while stitching gave me a smile this morning 🙂

Nela – Thanks so much for your beautiful words, they are so much appreciated 🙂

I’ve even been looking at other areas to cut back this year – I’ve thought for a few years now that I don’t know why I bother sending Christmas cards etc to most of my UK rellies, as I never hear anything from them in return – I’d rather spend the postage on people who actually give a damn about staying in contact … that’ll be a decent saving in itself over time. So this year is the last year I send to ‘everyone’ (in fact I might make two lists of rellies, and may not send to everyone this year either), and no longer will they get the colour family newsletter on photo paper that I take care to publish and send every year – those with email will be getting it as a .pdf file this year, and any of my UK rellies that don’t send me a card this year will be removed from the future mailing lists … Mum’s doing the same thing too. With the cost of the cards, photo paper, colour ink cartridges, and postage it costs $100-$200 each year to send them out, which is just ludicrous, and I’d rather spend the money on those that I want to.

I even said to Mum perhaps I should go back to dial-up, as well, to cut the costs – but that will be an absolute last resort, as my computer access is my life-blood at the moment 😉 It’s a shame I can’t do it without a home phone, as I barely use that at all, and that’d be a $40 saving every month – I could survive on just my mobile hmmm.

What hasn’t helped is the news saying the lack of rental properties in Melbourne is likely to see up to a 40% increase in rental fees next year, which really cheers me up no end … and I would be well and truly beggared then! It’s been depressing me thinking I may also have to consider moving into shared accommodation if this happens … for those of you who know some of my past experiences here with flatting with Fraze’s mates, you know how much that scares and depresses the pants off of me. Add to that the news reports mentioning a possible takeover bid for our company, and that doesn’t fill me with positivity about job security either … admittedly that’s very very new, and it may not have any initial impacts even if it did go ahead, but in our industry nothing is ever safe and speculations have already commenced … perhaps you could have waited until after Christmas to drop that little bombshell on us all, management team 😦

Anyway, even with this loooong post tonight, it’s still likely that I won’t be posting quite so often for a short while – I’m very aware that my blog isn’t full of the joys of spring at the moment, and I don’t want to come on here and moan about everything every day … I hate being so down in the dumps in my posts, and I’d rather put those thoughts to one side for now. Aside from that, I’ve had stress headaches every single day for the last couple of weeks, and sitting at the computer screen all day, then again at night, doesn’t really help matters much.

Thanks again for your words of support … I promise to be perkier before Christmas, honest! 🙂