esmerelda in residence

Wish

I really wish the iPhone had a better camera. Quality of light this evening is truely amazing but unable to capture it with crap camera.

Luck

A lunch time trek down to the la-de-da food court of the la-de-da department store goes like this: 

1.   Make a quick dash into the handbag shop and end up purchasing a teenyweeny bag that is just the right size for the wallet and phone only. Good for lunchtime treks to the la-de-da food court. 
2. Another side trip into another store where I manage to pick up 3 pairs of shoes made for wide feet. Shoes that fit! Shoes that are comfortable! I can't believe my luck. 
3. Finally make it to the food court where I tell my shopping companion "just a second, I want to go to the butchers". Manage to barge into a conversation where a woman is asking the butcher for salt pork. Butcher tells the woman, "we have pickled pork". So not the same thing. Tell woman her search is futile as if there is a butchery that makes and sells salt pork in the greater Sydney area I have yet to find it and I have been searching for 6 years. 
4. Buy some lovely calves liver for dinner, and manage to have Butcher B slice it for me (not thin enough, but who cares) and do this all in sign language as his accent was a thick as mud and I couldn't understand a word he said. 
5. Return to work. 
6. Manage to get off the train at my stop with my cell phone in hand, and my shiny new purse (containing the wallet) still on the train. 
7. Panic.
8. Ring Mr H who is just exiting the freeway at our exit. Mr H dashes to the station to pick me up. 
9. Frantic phone calls to the next train station where a very nice gentleman tells me "I will go look for your bag".
10. Nice gentleman rings back, saying "I have found your bag". 
11. Arrive at the station in the full throes of a panic induced hot flush to find my bag & contents of wallet intact. 

Is it any wonder I didn't win the lottery? 

Welcome to the modern world (sort of)

We now have a ticket machine at my train station. It doesn't take bank cards yet. But we now have a ticket machine. I wonder how long we will have it before it gets vandalized.
Anyone care to make a bet?

Another score

After letting me sleep in yesterday until 10 am (10 AM!! I NEVER sleep that late), and allowing me about 30 minutes to wake up, Mr H & I were off to "do something". We drove to a suburb I didn't know existed, had breakfast/lunch, browsed through a second hand book store (6 books purchased!) then went to an antiques fair where all the kit there was extremely overpriced (for the most part) and depressing to look at (I used to have one of those! and one of those! when they were original! I'm not an antique!). While we were looking at some bits and pieces by the front door I turned around to say something to Mr H who had disappeared. Ten minutes later he showed up with two green depression glass butter dishes I had been admiring earlier. Then it was off to drive through towns I had never seen before, finally stopping at a place in the southern highlands which was full of bookshops & stores full of things you just can't live without. We did find a cook-shop that had some stuff I have been looking for and left with a cast iron frying pan. Hurray! Potato pancakes, here we come! Fried chicken! Corn bread! I'm gaining weight just thinking about it. 

The day was sunny and warm, we came home with treasure & the dog has forgiven us for leaving her alone on a weekend day. All in all, a good result. 

what you do

when you find out you are going to be a grandmother again? Why, you run out and spend $$ on anti-aging cream, of course. 

and a purple hat. 

beta tester

Am testing the new version of TypePad - so far, I'm liking it. 

If only I weren't so bloody knackered - I'd redesign the whole blog. 

the week off

is almost at an end (wahhhhh!) but it was most relaxing. What did we do?

1. the boys well & truly vegged out, neither one of them surfaced before noon the entire week. 
2. A. & Miss Scarlet bonded.  
3. We ate all the chicken soup I made.  
4. We didn't finish off the spaghetti sauce I made.  
5. Mr H & I attended a wedding (more on that later) and managed to polish off almost a whole bottle of scotch.  
6. It wasn't cheap scotch either.  
7. I didn't even get dressed on Monday.  
8. The rocks finally got moved from around the tree in the front garden. 
9. Mr H revised the plans for the "one day when we have money" renovations seventy-eleven times.  
10. The boys got to build a fire last night (we set up the old wood burner as a fire pit) and roast marshmallows.  
11. I discovered that marshmallows in Oz are absolutely disgusting and will be making them from scratch from now (unless one of my relatives takes pity on me and sends me marshmallows from the US along with some Natures Seasoning which I am out of and am going through withdrawals because I am OUT of NATURES SEASONING!!!) 
12. I made the best silverside (corned beef) dinner ever.  
13. While searching through expat blogs I discovered that if there are older women (and by older I mean someone over 40) from the US living in Oz, they certainly don't blog about it. 
14. I discovered the battery in the macbook is only good for about 3.5 hrs.  
15. I took the iphone in to get fixed because it died last week, the guy at the counter gave me back my sim card and said "we'll ring you when it's fixed". The look on his face when I said "how are you going to ring me if you have my phone" was priceless.  
16. The blog about the appalling speech the best man made at the wedding will have to wait.  

Machine vs Nature

Round one - the final scores

Wisteria Trellis - 1 

Rear view mirror - 0

A good result

After 5 months and 10 days (not that we were counting) mr h & I moved back into the master bedroom on sunday. Of course all the photos taken with the decent camera are on the mac waiting to be uploaded.
But we have our house back.
We also have a moritorium on building for at least a month but probably longer, as we have to save up for the new mattress & soft furnishings.

wanting

Ever since I first saw this  I wanted it. More than the chatty cathy I wanted one year for Christmas. I saw it first in an  advert in the Sunday paper, then again on-line, then again in person. I almost swooned when I saw it in person. Until I saw the price tag. When I saw the price tag I said "get the fuck out of here." 

So I put the wanting aside, (not very graciously) taking it out every now and then and worrying it, gazing longingly at the picture in the catalog, but knowing the cost of this was out of our budget. Hell, we could renovate 2 more rooms for the cost of it. Mr H knew I wanted it, and we were going to have our current bed painted to look (kind of ) like it. 

Until yesterday when we went to the warehouse sale of the store that sells it & they had it! In the back! Missing some bits! Which Mr H, being the resourceful type of husband he is, can have made! And it was 1/4 the price of the original. 

Hurrah! Hurrah! 

They deliver it Tuesday morning. 

Now to save up for a new mattress & box spring.