just popping in to say hi from ma’s place. How lame is it that my verging-on-elderly parents have functioning ‘net and I don’t? Bah.
I used to have a beagle. I’m sure people think I exaggerate or that I was just lazy/stupid/something when I talk about how impossible he was to keep locked up. I’m not. Well I probably am, but that’s beside the point: he was impossible to keep locked up. You couldn’t keep a collar on him for starters – they have necks as big as their heads, so unless you’re willing to choke them half to death they can usually get a collar off. He was a determined little shite anyway, and more than once he hurt his ears or whatever while freeing himself. Harnesses didn’t fare much better. One time, after he managed to pull one of those wire runs out of the ground AND push a hole under a chainwire fence AND catch up to me before I’d even got the car through the main gate, I locked him in the house. When I got home, he was sitting outside waiting for me. So was the window, frame & all. I shit you not, he somehow managed to push the entire window frame – timber sashes, they were – right out of the wall. In one piece. I used to think it was just him, but after seeing this video I suspect there’s something in the genes …
I finally got some images uploaded to the guild blog if you want to have a squizz. We’ll see what the magazines feel is usable before I put anything else up.
I think I’ve got all the shots taken at the show ready to burn & send to the mags. The camera was playing up unfortunately, and I obviously wasn’t anywhere near as straight-on to the angled quilts as I thought I was getting, so I’m quite disappointed in a lot of the images, but oh well. This is why I keep wanting everyone to start bringing their quilts in early for photo shoots … you’d think they’d be right into having a really good pic taken in good light with no distractions and so on, but nobody seems interested. For mine we should get one of the professional photographers in town to come set up & shoot the quilts as they come through the door (iow, pref the day before actual setup, because that’s a total frigging madhouse), or maybe one of the photog students at TAFE. Anyway.
sick, sick, sick. Blargh. Stupid old house just about did me in.
All moved in. Well, stuff is in the new house, and we’re living there. Amongst our stuff. Our mountains of stuff. No really, actual mountains. We’re talking an Everest in every room, and I’ve been scratching my head for well over a week now wondering where in the name of all things holy I used to have all that crap stashed. And how I’m going to rearrange the mountains long enough to get some order so I can start culling and stashing again, pronto please so that I can get some actual fun things done.
Right now I’m enjoying the net (not on at the new place yet, so I’ve spent several hours today trying to catch up with email and HUNDREDS of new items on bloglines) while pet-sitting the critters my parents are pet-sitting. Birdie, who belongs to my son & his fiance, and Zara, who as far as Sugarbritches is concerned has been her dog since the very first time she escaped her last owner. Zara will be coming to live with us once we’ve escape-proofed a curious corner of the fence so that both horrible beasts can be let run wild out there, but meantime she’s still here. My folks are up at my sister’s so that dad can cull the dead wood from their property (free firewood) while mum does the Coffs quilt exhibition, which I had every intention of getting to but am very glad now that I didn’t go ahead and agree to run a workshop because I am way the hell too sick. Dad’s mate Jeff (used to be his apprentice a million or so years ago) rang last night to have a yarn and got quite indignant about Dad having to chop wood, reckons he’s too old for that any more (bags you tell him, sunshine! lol).
Anyhow, sorry for being so boring, but as I said, sick. As a dog. A not very well dog. I keep forgetting to seek out a thermometer to see if I have a temp, but I kind of think I do. Either that or the hot flushes are opportunistic bastards of things. I know for sure I’d have been in hospital by Friday if Carol hadn’t given me a contingency script for prednisone with instructions to start immediately if I ever started feeling as sick as I did when Mum & I had the flu from hell (was that only last year? wow). If I’m not significantly improved by Monday I’ll have to go badger a doctor; I am improved from Thursday in the breathing dept, but not so much in the feeling like absolute shit dept. Mum has these peculiar fizzy cold/flu remedy things you make a hot drink with which are actually surprisingly comforting, and I’ve been loading up on the ZinVitC and echinacea and garlic/horseradish/C and so on. Oh, and celery, which I bought at Rene’s recommendation for the arthritis owies since I can’t take glucosamine or fish oil or any of those things without an insurgency in the nethers – I’m mad impressed at it actually. I was in constant pain – bad enough that I thought I may have fractured my finger, and it was getting worse rather than better – for a few days there after lugging umpty billion boxes etc and scrubbing and poking sponges into stupid corners and crevices in the old house, neither ibuprofen or panadol did much to ease it, but within a few hours of my first dose of the celery I got relief. Shock to me, I totally figured I was wasting my seven bucks. That hand is still a bit swollen, but the joints freed up and the pain is almost all gone (haven’t had to take any pain meds since the first dose of celery).
whining aside, and body aches etc aside, I actually feel good. My mood is good, perhaps. I feel quite determined and focused, albeit underneath the groggy layer of flu urg. I am enjoying the new house, and wish I were there now. Mind you I’m probably not really up to sorting much stuff out, so I’d probably just be sleeping it off. Which I might just go do some more of now, actually. Ooroo :)
I’m tired, so so so tired. Whose big idea was this moving thing again? Good grief I have a lot of Stuff. I think every cupboard I own must have a Tardis module, if the amount of crap that keeps needing to be boxed/bagged is anything to go by. Keep thinking there’s just a few more boxes worth of stuff, and then a few boxes later there appears to be almost as much stuff left … rinse, repeat! I can only hope it’s going to be one of those apparently endless tasks that suddenly is all done just when you were about ready to throw yourself off the nearest bridge.
THIS time I am culling as I unpack! Ridiculous. Salvos/Lifeline/St Vinnies will be welcome to a bunch of stuff, there’s more I’ll ebay, and the rest I’ll probably freecycle. I had every intention of doing it before I moved, but ran out of time. I’m fed up with running out of time & having it result in backbreaking stressfests; I am going to get my shit together.
After I’ve recovered.
I tell you what, lugging umpty ump boxes etc up those two steps – they’re not the same height, and at least one is steeper than normal – is giving my thighs & bum a mad workout. If my hips don’t need replacing I’ll have buns of steel by the time we’re finished. You get through one carload though and it’s like nah, I’ll just stay here at the top of the stairs and you stay down there and pass me stuff to take inside, cos my arse is killing me.
Did I mention that something – stress, sleeplessness, the slightly odd-tasting butter I had on my sanger the other night, all of the above – triggered a 4am IBS attack which resulted in me passing out & breaking my fool nose? Stupid body. Ow. One minute I’m thinking “uh oh, am I going to faint?” and the next thing I know I’m all like “yaaAAOOOoow why does my NOSE hurt why can’t I breathe properly why is my FACE so cold where the what the huh? oh SMEG. where are my arms?”. I hate trying to figure out how to make the body work after a faint, all the automatic stuff is haywire. I have a great big googly egg on my forehead, and a very sore nose (and two nifty black eyes; I am OOZIN IT BAYBEE! heh), and assorted other bruises and wrenched/twisted/whatever bits. Le ow. If you visit me and find thick rubber flooring, you know why.
so has anyone got this rig? Is it worth getting? I’m a little concerned about the limits imposed by the length of the throat – is there anything better for similar-enough pricing that we’d be better to save up for it? Pretty please leave a comment with pros/cons/suggestions!
CHITCHAT