Purple People-Eater

Some of you may know that I have a condition known as Frieberg's Disease, that affects the second toe on my left foot.  I've had this (and its associated pain) since the early 90s, however, in the last couple of years it seems I'm also developing arthritis in the joint.
   
This is what happens when you get older, people. Try to avoid it at all costs.

Driving any great distance in peak hour traffic (constantly on and off the clutch) has become unbearable. Even the orthopaedic specialists have asked if I'd thought about getting an automatic car.  Well, yes, I had thought about it, but I'm a manual girl and have never owned an auto.  Hell, I'd only driven an auto once in my life before.


Combine this with the fact that Steve was a tad unhappy about all the extra kilometres that I was putting on the Prado getting to and from work every day, and the decision was made to sell his Courier and buy a small, economical auto. After consulting our friendly mechanic, Steve's model of choice was a Mazda 3.

I won't bore you with the tedious looking-at-and-test-driving-of-vehicles drama, other than to say there's a whole lot of crap out there for $6000 (huge mileage, no logbooks - seriously, not one of the ones we looked at had logbooks, only the one key - apparently Mazda owners are a careless bunch who are too tight to pay the ridiculous key replacement cost), so we ended up having to borrow a little extra and look in the $7500-$8000 price range.

Lucky for us that we did, or we'd have never stumbled onto this brilliant little car.  One (retired female) owner, full logbook history, both keys, and genuine VERY LOW mileage, for the bargain price of $7500.  You'd scarcely believe it's a 2007 model.

I don't know about you, but when we saw it, we were sure it was maroon, but apparently it's purple. Phantom Purple Mica, in fact, according to Mazda.  In direct sunlight, it certainly appears more reddish, but in the shade or on an overcast day, it's definitely more purple.

It has been so well looked after and so rarely driven (for its age) that it looks and feels like a brand new car on the inside.  Sure, there are a few small nicks and scratches on the exterior, but overall, pretty damn good considering it's a 10 year old car.

When we bought it, it had done just under 48000 kilometres, so of course we had to take a photo when it finally rolled over to 48000.

That was two weeks ago now, though, and considering I do just under 500 km per week just travelling to and from work, it certainly won't take long before it has the kind of mileage that's usually seen in a 10 year old car.

After two weeks of driving it daily, although I've never once tried to use a non-existent clutch pedal, I still occasionally find my hand drifting out to change gears, and twice I've subconsciously gone to check that it was in neutral before starting, lol.  I'm blaming too many years of driving manuals and the fact that the auto transmission stick looks very much like a manual gear stick.

I'm sure that driving an auto will grow on me.  Eventually.

Happy New Year - Roll on 2017

Happy New Year!

 Part of the NYE fireworks display at Coolangatta

 
I can't believe we're nearly at the end of the first week of 2017 already!

 Boxing Day with May Family rellies

 
Both Steve's and my workplaces close down for the week between Christmas and New Year, so we had a nice quiet week off, using that time to go and see a couple of movies (including Rogue One), have a Boxing Day catch up with some of the rellies, hang out with friends, re-waterproof the canvas and put new mattresses into the Jayco, and organise Cheyenne's school books and stationery for the year. Not long now until school starts again. We just have to get her some new track shoes and pay the usual assortment of fees and she'll be ready to go.

May I just say that I have so much love for my new Brother P-Touch label maker?  I have no idea how I managed to live without it for so long!

This Saturday we head off for a week away at Boyds Bay caravan park at Tweed Heads, with some of Steve's family.  The Jayco is mostly ready to go (we leave it packed with the camping gear) - we just have to do our food shopping (tonight) and pack our clothes in.

Looking forward to our little holiday (yes, I know I only just had a week off, but a stay-cation just doesn't feel the same as a proper holiday) and can only hope the weather plays nice for us.

It's a Christmas Miracle!

After being unemployed for 15 months, sending out countless numbers of job applications, and (surprisingly) having four interviews in the last month... I have FINALLY managed to get a job!  I'll be working as a casual Accessioning Assistant at Peter Pal Library Supplier!

The best part is that it's a job in my chosen field, utilising my Library Technician qualifications again after all these years!   I'm really excited to get back into it.

There are a few minor downsides, though.  

The big one is that they are based at Shailer Park, which means having to drive around 90 km a day (round trip), at a cost of just under $45 per week in Gateway tolls.  Then again, I would probably have driven as far as the Gold Coast for this job.  I only started today and Steve is already grumbling about all the extra mileage that's going to be put on the car.  It takes around 45 minutes to get there in normal peak hour traffic and a bit longer coming home, thanks to crappy traffic around the Nudgee area where the old and new Gateway arterials merge.  Oh yeah, and the next two years worth of roadworks from Boondall to Deagon. *eye roll*  It might even be time to invest in -gasp!- an automatic car.  Did I just say that???   When I got the train into work in the city, it took 42 minutes, not including the time it took to drive to the station or the time it took to walk down the street from Central.  At least this time I'm in my own car, with my own music, my aircon, and no sweaty weirdos can sit next to me and try to engage me in conversation.  Winning!

The only other thing is that it's 5 days per week.  I'll be working 8.30-2.30 Mon-Fri.   I would have preferred longer hours over fewer days, but that can't be helped.   At least I will be home early enough to still get to the bank and post office in the afternoons if I need to, and Cheyenne won't be home by herself for too long after she gets home from school.

Starting this week has put a bit of a spanner in the works for her school holidays, though.  There won't be any spontaneous trips to the beach or anything that requires vehicular transport, but she has a bike and at least she can still catch up with friends or veg out around the house watching YouTube and Catch-up TV - what more could a teenage girl ask for?

On the whole, my hours will work out very well once school goes back, and I pretty much avoid the worst of the afternoon peak hour traffic, so the pros definitely outweigh the cons.

On another note, I've been waiting all this last term to finally be able to get a sleep-in in the mornings.  Now I have to wait just a little bit longer, until the week between Christmas and New Year.

Oh well, bring on the first paycheck!  Ka-Ching!

School's Out!

The first year of high school is finally over and six whole weeks of holidays beckons.

After getting a good report card, Cheyenne celebrated by hosting a sleepover with three friends last night.  Due to our current limited space due to the larger van taking up extra space in the garage, there wasn't really room in the rumpus, so they slept in a tent in the backyard.

A previous attempt at a tent sleepover ended up in several girls frightened of night sounds in the backyard, and a last minute relocation indoors.  This time they actually stayed in the tent.

A fourth friend came over today for a swim as she'd been unable to attend the sleepover. She changed schools last term, so they haven't caught up with her for a while.

It's good to see the girls enjoying their holidays.

Swanning Around (aka Resistance Is Futile)

Let me just start by saying that we already have a perfectly good soft floor camper trailer.  It's not new by any means, but it's still in great condition and does the job well.  It's also compact and fits nicely in the garage under our house, behind our second roller door.  We've had some great camping trips in it over the years.

For a while now, Steve has been wanting to get rid of our camper and buy another wind-up camper van.  I say "another", because we've previously owned two of the same sort - where you put up the roof and pull the beds out at each end.  We've owned one which was wind-up and the other had a stupid hinged arm setup for lifting the roof. The less said about that one, the better, although it did make it to Uluru and back in one piece, which is about the nicest thing I have to say about it.

Now, when you question him, Steve has tried to give rational reasons for wanting to replace our camper with one of these. It takes too long to set up, Cheyenne doesn't have a built-in bed of her own, blah, blah, blah.  His real reason (which he won't admit to) is that everyone else - all of his brothers, his parents and most of our friends - have either wind-ups or full caravans, and he's been feeling left out.  That, and we've owned the current one nearly five years and he's reached his boredom threshold.

Here's the thing: they go to caravan parks! We don't. We usually go bush or beach camping, on unpowered sites, so there's really not much point having a caravan.  

There's also the fact that we don't really have room to store a van. And, we already have a perfectly good camper trailer. And, a wind-up isn't exactly a top priority in our budget when there are a million and one things that should be fixed around the house.  And, I could go on.  In fact, I have been holding out against this idea for a long time now.  Steve needed reinforcements, so he convinced Cheyenne she'd be better off with a proper bed rather than a stretcher, and the pair of them ganged up on me. Two against one.  He has not-so-subtly been leaving Gumtree ads open on the PC so I will see the photos and I've been getting "Don't let it get away" reminder emails from eBay about the ones he's looked at there.

Resistance is futile, though.  Regardless of all the reasons why this isn't really a good idea, he wants, so ultimately, he gets. In the end, I gave up fighting. It's not worth the effort.  As with his cars, and boats, change is inevitable.

Last weekend we picked up our "new" camper. It's a 1998 Jayco Swan.

The plan was to bring it home and set it up in the backyard to give it a good clean out. This would require a bit of "trailer shuffling" (take boat trailer out, put Jayco Swan in, put boat trailer back in), but luckily we have two vehicles with towballs.

Here's where accurate measurements would have come in handy!  It's all very well to say it's 2100mm wide, but you also need to remember to include the clearance lights, roof clips, handles, and anything else that sticks out.  Especially when you have less than 2400mm clearance between the house and the side fence!

To say that it was a mission to reverse it up the slope of our yard and under the carport without hitting anything would be an understatement.  It's a mission of epic proportions. Think "search for the Holy Grail" epic. It is a very tight squeeze, with only a few centimetres on either side between the Swan and the house and fence. I wouldn't even dream of attempting it, but luckily Steve is extremely good at reversing. As it was, after we'd unhitched it from the car (because the car is too wide to fit up the side of the house) and were pushing it back by hand, we managed to break the plastic cover on one of the clearance lights by hitting it on a carport post.

"It's ok," he says, "the garage door is wider, so when we put it under the house it'll be a lot easier."  "Are you sure you won't hit the steel shelving inside the garage?" I ask.  "No, it's all good, I'll just have to move the cupboard back a bit behind it because it's a bit longer than the old camper."

We gave it a good scrub, inside and out, including the canvas, and transferred all of our cutlery, crockery, pots and pans, and cooking utensils from the old camper. A few minor repairs to the door lock and step and a bit of paint on the drawbar and chassis rails, and she was ready to go under the house (so we can leave it opened up while packing for a weekend away this coming weekend).

Cue the trailer shuffling, only this time, add the old camper trailer to the mix.  Oh, and the old camper has a completely different type of towing hitch that doesn't use a towball, just to add to the "fun".  Boat trailer out, Swan out, boat trailer back up the side of the house, change towing hitch, old camper out from the garage under the house and put up the side of the house in front of the boat trailer (so it's easy to get at when potential buyers come to look at it after we advertise it next week), Swan into garage under the house. Phew!

All this, we did last night after Steve got home from work. The drama we had getting it up the side of the house in the first place?  Imagine that at night (with only a single fluoro light to see the minimal clearance available). In the rain. With a sloped yard, full of wet grass. 

But wait, there's more...

I'll say it again. Accurate measurement is key. Measure twice, cut once, as they say.  Did I not suggest the steel shelving along the wall of the garage was going to be in the way? Were my concerns not ignored? (see previous conversation mentioned several paragraphs above)

Was I not, in fact, correct?  You're damn right I was.

Much swearing from Steve when he realised his error. Lots of eye rolling and "I did tell you, but nobody ever listens to me" from me.  

After some creative angling and decisions to cut and re-weld not one but two entire shelving units at some point in the near future (because the Swan is longer than he'd thought, as well as wider), it's in the garage.  I may now be down 4 washing lines (the Swan is also a lot higher than the old camper) and can no longer see the screen on our solar inverter (to keep an eye on it to check it's functioning correctly), but it's in and we can close our roller door.

If our mate Jason hadn't come over to help us, I'm positive Steve and I wouldn't be talking to each other right now.

A Whole New World

It's been a while between posts.  No surprise there.

Things have changed though. (Well, not on the job front. I'm still searching, but that's another story.)

I'm now the mother of a High School Student !  Yes, it's true.  I'm getting old.

High School. I've had a whole term now to let that sink in.

Cheyenne seems to have adjusted well to the new routines and to reading timetables (both school and bus). She's joined the choir (she still loves singing even though she's given up on playing the flute), tried a new sport (beach volleyball), and she brought home a much improved report card at the end of term.  She even got an A for Japanese, which is one of her favourite subjects.

She has some of her old primary school friends at school with her and she has made a few new ones.

The only blip on the horizon is a certain girl from primary school - who shall hereafter be referred to as X - a toxic little Narcissist who, for the last three years, used to be one of her "besties", although I use that term loosely.  Her particular brand of friendship includes emotional blackmail, manipulation, hot/cold mood swings, "boyfriend" (another loosely-termed label) stealing and just plain bitchiness.  The original Mean Girls have nothing on X.

That girl needs a good slap. Across the face. With a Besser block !

The problem is Cheyenne is too kind-hearted and kept giving X chance after chance to redeem herself as a good friend.  Yet every week or so it would blow up in her face again.

For the past year, I have been consoling Cheyenne with the idea that when she started high school she'd have the chance to make a whole new lot of friends from other primary schools and never have to deal with X again (unless they were in the same subject classes).  The year started out well. The grade 7s had their camp in the fourth week so they could get to know each other.  Cheyenne made a few new friends and things were going great until X broke up with her latest boyfriend and started running him down on the group chat they have on iMessage.  Cheyenne had the - gasp - audacity to stick up for this boy (since he was one of her new friends) by telling X that she shouldn't be so nasty about him.  X decided this was the ultimate act of betrayal - "I thought you were supposed to be my friend!" - and has doled out her usual revenge.  She has systematically turned most of the new friends Cheyenne had made, against her. X has manipulated them all with rumours and/or her fake charm.  Even the nice girl who invited Cheyenne to her birthday sleepover now looks through her as if she doesn't exist.

The sad fact is that none of the new friends know X well enough to know who/what she really is, so they've been sucked in to her web, and by the time they finally realise the truth, it'll probably be too late for Cheyenne.  She's nothing if not resilient, though.   At least she does still have a few loyal friends from primary school who have stuck with her (because they know the truth), and she has overheard some girls in one of her classes complaining about how rude X is, so it seems there ARE still some people out there who don't think the sun shines out of X's arse. Maybe Cheyenne can become friends with them too.




In the meantime, Karma had better hurry up!

Life, The Universe, and Everything

The tension was unbearable...
"All right," said Deep Thought. "The Answer to the Great Question..."
"Yes..!"
"Of Life, the Universe and Everything..." said Deep Thought.
"Yes...!"
"Is..." said Deep Thought, and paused.
"Yes...!"
"Is..."
"Yes...!!!...?"
"Forty-two," said Deep Thought, with infinite majesty and calm.

- Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy


I have waited a very, very long time to be able to use the above quote in reference to myself.  Almost 30 years, in fact.  Ever since I first read the Hitchhiker's series.

Yesterday I turned 42.

I am now The Answer.  The magic number.

Maybe that means my luck will turn and I will find the job of my dreams - or, at the very least - a job that I don't absolutely hate, LOL.

After finally finding a job (one that I was enjoying immensely) back in May, a restructure at work has meant that a lack of physical office space has rendered my employment a logistical impossibility, so now I'm back on the job hunt again. 

Just what I needed.  (Where is that sarcasm font when you need it?)

There are still bills to pay, books and uniforms to buy for Cheyenne as she starts High School next year (yikes!), and I haven't even started shopping for Christmas presents yet.  No thanks, I do NOT want to hear how many shopping days left until Christmas.

In the meantime, I'll just kick back (between job applications) and enjoy being 42.  I might even re-read the Hitchhiker's series to celebrate.

Hopefully Life, the Universe and Everything is coming my way soon. 

Seek and ye shall find...

...lots of jobs that you probably won't get.

Well, that's what it feels like to me, anyway.

I applied for 13 jobs during February.  Along with several hundred other applicants, no doubt.

How many of them have I heard back from?  Two.  Both replies were of the "Thanks for applying, but unfortunately..." variety.

Apparently, despite my having 4 functioning limbs, a heartbeat, reliability and near-full availability, and the fact that, in their words "your skills and background are impressive", Woolies found someone who "more closely matched the current requirements" for a store replenishment (night fill) position. Seriously?  Yeah, I'm reading that one as "we found someone cheaper".

The other rejection (for an admin assistant to a property manager) was still quite positive. They received a huge number of high quality applications and I am to be commended for being one of only 10% of applicants who actually followed the unusual request for a hand-written cover letter and a posted application, and as such, they are going to keep me in mind if anything further becomes available.  That would be really lovely, but I don't think I'll hold my breath.

Do I expect to hear back from any of the others?  Probably not.  These days, even the ones that don't specifically say "Due to anticipated large number of applicants, only those shortlisted candidates will be contacted" won't bother giving you feedback, more often than not.  It's a rare few who actually do.

In the meantime, I could try to upskill.  That's the buzzword of the moment, isn't it?  Seems like everybody wants a piece of paper these days, on top of your experience.  The problem with this is that, without a job, I can't afford any of the certificate courses that are available.  Even a 6 week basic MYOB course is upwards of $1500.  It could be a while before I can save up enough for that.  Luckily TAFE has several intakes per year for that one.

The whole thing is incredibly soul sucking, but I won't give up.  For every job that I don't get, it should mean that one less person is competing against me for the next one, right?

If only that were true.  *sigh*

Rollin' Rolllin' Rollin'

Don't look now, but it's another natural disaster... and you all know what that means.

Yep, that's right, Tropical Cyclone Marcia has reached a Category 5.  

Cue the 24 hr rolling television coverage.  

Networks 7, 9 and 10, I'm looking at YOU. The ABC is also guilty of this, albeit to a lesser extent.

While there's no denying that TV coverage is essential in getting warnings out to those in the "at risk" areas and keeping the rest of us up to date with developments, there is nothing more irritating than seeing the same video footage playing on a constant loop.

Remember the Cyclone Yasi reports?  How many times did we see the same piece of awning ripping off a building and flying up the main street?   Or how about the 2011 Brissie floods?  I swear, if I'd seen that loop of that same wheelie bin floating down the river, just one more time...  OMFG!

Sex sells, as they say, but obviously it's natural disasters that get the TV ratings.

But honestly, if nothing new has happened in the last hour, I'm really NOT interested in seeing footage shot last night (AGAIN), combined with a scrolling news ticker and a misleading "Live coverage" label in the top corner of the screen.

Please return us to our regularly scheduled programmes.

I'm more than happy for you to cut into a show with "Breaking News"... so long as it's actually breaking news and not another rerun of events that happened yesterday, that you've already televised ad nauseam.

In the meantime of course, it's Marcia, Marcia, Marcia.  (see what I did there?)  

I have family and friends in the path of Marcia, and I can only pray they will be safe.

It does seem like the media has forgotten all about the NT. They're facing Cyclone Lam, but if the networks are to be believed, it seems to be only a second thought to Cyclone Marcia.  I hope everyone in the NT stays safe too.

Oh well, I have a portable hard drive full of movies I can watch. So. Very. Glad.

Yes, I'm a Bad Blogger

So... last year I promised to update my blog more regularly.

BAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

You can see how well that turned out.  

The last time I posted was April last year!

...erm, yes... well...  no excuses.

Nothing blindingly fabulous happened that needed a blog post.  The year sped by quickly and was full of the mundane, and there's no point boring you all with blah posts.

Steve's still working, Cheyenne's still at school, I'm still looking for work. We even still have the same car (surprise surprise, lol).

This year I'm not making rash promises about my blog.  I will try to post more regularly... if anything happens that's worth posting about.

This is Cheyenne's last year of Primary School though, so that could give me topics to post about. We'll see.

Mum, I'm Bored!

Now that the Easter holidays are over and Term 2 has started, I finally have time to sit down and write about my experiences with Melted Pony Bead Suncatchers.  I actually made these back in February, but we'll pretend it hasn't taken me two months to blog about it, OK?

You know how it is...  You see a post on Facebook or a picture on Pinterest and think to yourself, "That looks pretty/interesting/easy enough, and would be a good boredom buster.  We've certainly got all the supplies to make it.  Why not give it a go?"

Sound familiar?  I know you're nodding your head.  So, here it is - part tutorial, part cautionary tale.  This is NOT one of those Pinterest Fails... for the most part. I'll get to that later.

Step 1. Gather your supplies.  
You will need cheap pony beads in colours of your choice (we already had a heap of these - they seem to be a popular gift for pre-teen girls).  Depending what you are planning on making, use either transparent, with or without glitter (for suncatchers) or solid colours (for coasters, placemats, etc), but don't, on any account, use those iridescent ones.  Their oil-slick colours will lure you in with their attractiveness, but just don't go there.  I'll show you why later.
 
You'll also need some old non-stick pans, shaped foils pans, or egg rings on an old pizza tray (basically use whatever shapes you're aiming for), cooling racks and something to do the melting in.  Don't use your good cookware. You will not want to use it for food after melting plastic in it.  Try thrift store for cheap pans and keep them for craft use. 
Most instructions tell you to use an oven, some have used a heat gun, but I recommend using a hooded bbq. Outdoors. Trust me. Melted plastic fumes are NOT pleasant.  If you have pets or people with sensitive noses, keep them away.  Consider yourself warned.

Step 2. Arrange beads in your chosen moulds 
Preheat your oven/bbq to 200 degrees celsius.
You could go completely random or try to make patterns. Totally up to you, but make sure you only have a single layer of beads or they won't melt properly.

Step 3. Melt beads.
Instructions for ovens says 200 celsius for 20 minutes, but as I'd cranked all the burners on the bbq and shut the hood, it got pretty hot, pretty quickly, so I didn't need 20 minutes.  Just keep checking them and remove when fully melted to a smooth liquid state.

Step 4. Allow to cool.
Place on a cooling rack and wait for the plastic to cool.  Don't freak out at the loud cracking noises it makes as it cools.. As it cools, it will come away from the edges, so that it should just tip out of the pan when completely cooled.

Step 5. Remove from pans and sand rough edges if needed.

These heart shaped ones used glitter beads.

Step 6. Drill holes for hanging, if required.

Step 7. Hang and admire. Wasn't that easy?

And now for that cautionary tale...  I had a bag of iridescent (yet translucent) beads.  The colours were dazzling, like a dragonfly.  Semi transparent, so I thought they'd turn out nicely.  Wrong!  Not sure if it's the iridescent coating or maybe they're made of a different plastic, but they just didn't melt properly.  Even after triple the time in the heat.  The result was a lumpy, oil slicked mess that resembled fake vomit and stained the pan.

BEFORE

(I used solid colours to form the C)

 AFTER

So now you know what to do and what not to do.  Have a go.  It really is easy. I'm very happy with how mine turned out and will definitely make more.

Experiment with colours and patterns, but if you do find yourself falling for the allure of iridescent beads... don't say I didn't warn you!