Blogging the 12 days of christmas. 4

is there a more enticing smell on a summer's evening than barbecue?

I'm sitting on my balcony with a lemon squash trying to work out where the barbecue smells (especially the onions frying and the garlic bread) are coming from. If I can work out which neighbour it is i'm going over there to introduce myself.

Have established it's not the neighbour with the baby elephant, which is a shame cos i want to check out the elephant close up.

Not particularly christmassy but brings back memories of summer holidays camping on the foreshore at McCrae where (on non total fireban days) dad would be in the charge of cooking, which usually meant us & the campers on the next site eating (almost burnt) sausages in bread.

Good times

Blogging the 12 days of christmas. 3

A festivus miracle.

Since I fractured my shoulder one of the tasks i've found hardest to do is dress myself.

In the 5 months since 'Fi V Tree' I have managed to reduce the time taken to don a short sleeved tshirt from 45 minutes down to less than 1 minute. (that is with minimal pain).

Like with tshirts the most comfortable (& least painful) clothes to dress in are anything with an elastic waist (currently leggings and skirts)

Anyhow on Christmas day I achieved something that I hadn't been able to do since July.

I wore a dress.

And I put it on all by myself. And it only took 30 minutes to do it.

My family was so proud...

My sister was on standby to come round early to help me if needed but all i needed her for was to do up my necklace & bracelet clasps.

Mind you undressing was a bit (lot) more problematic - it took me 45 minutes to get the dress off and required painkillers to achieve.

Still it was good to be wearing something other than my usual uniform of tshirt, leggings, & elastic waisted skirt.

I try to find a positive (and journal it) for my shoulder everyday.

The Christmas Day Dress is a major positive as far as I am concerned.

Blogging the 12 days of christmas. 2

so a couple of days before the 18th december (the day we were having our family christmas) i was surfing the interwebbys looking for info (for a genealogy post i was writing) on one of the primary schools i attended.

as i was wading through the search results i came across a link to a pdf about the football club my father started in 1969 so that my then 5 year old brother could get a game of footy.

The pdf had photos of dad in it (and photos of 2 of my brothers). From 1969 until we moved to Sale in 1973 the footy club was an important part of our family life.

Anyway the pdf was 45 pages so I downloaded, had 6 copies printed, had each one bound and gave each member of the family one for Christmas.

I even gave a copy to my youngest brother who wasn't born during the 'Donny Heights' era.

We were all involved with the club. 2 brothers played for the 'tackers'. Dad was secretary &mum ran the match day canteen.

my sister and I were club statisticians, helped out in the canteen, occasionally ran the boundary and did anything else that needed doing.

My mum was so rapt to be given the book. It prompted a lot of reminiscing, family stories and anecdotes over the christmas table.

I'm going to contact the club and see if i can get copies of their photos and offer them copies of our photos of the club.

Blogging the 12 days of christmas. 1

We had our official family christmas last sunday as brother 1, s.i.l 1, nephew 1 & niece 1 were going to perth for Christmas.

I drew S.I.L 1 in the family kris kringle and gave her a bottle of her favourite perfume. The nephews were easy.

I bought mr 14 an itunes card and a 'cool' tshirt.

Master 6 got some beach clothes (he's having a growth sport), some gel pens, a book about science and a zac power book.

Master 4 has requested a 'very fast' scooter. Apparently his existing scooter doesn't go as fast as master 6's new (in october) razor scooter. I suspect that the weight to speed ratio of tall, solidly built 6 yr old versus average height, slightly built 4 yr old has something to do with it but master 4 says no it's the scooter. So i got him a razor scooter (and it goes very fast).

Almost 12 yr old niece received a dance bag and a bling case for her ipod touch.

Hydrodilatation continued

So took freshly hydrodilatated shoulder to physio this morning.

No pain (yes!), increased movement (yes!) and the cortisone will still be doing its job for up to another 2 weeks.

Feeling very optimistic and happy.

Hydrodilatation

*warning - contains my shoulder*

So this morning i had hydrodilatation performed on my shoulder.

what is hydrodilatation? I hear you ask

Well click here for a patient info sheet...

or here (this is the crowd wot done me shoulder).

My 'medical' team think i have a reasonably high pain tolerance level and maybe, just maybe, this supports that thought.

I found the procedure uncomfortable (oh so uncomfortable) but not painful.

First they injected a (shitload, according to my GP) of local anaesthetic into my shoulder, this was followed by cortisone, and then by a small amount of sterile solution.

At several points during the procedure the shoulder is xrayed to ensure the injections are where they will do the most good.

I could (if i'd wanted to) watch the procedure reflected in the xray machine above my head. I did not wish to do this however so rather I stared intently at the left side wall - especially where the wall met the ceiling (there was a small crack at that point , near what i assume was once a chimney breast)

The whole procedure took about 25 minutes. I was advised not to drive for the rest of the day unless I had to and definitely no driving for 30 minutes after the procedure. I'd also been warned that the pain might be worse for 2 or 3 days after the procedure once the anaesthetic had worn off.

So i sat outside in the morning sun, drinking a coffee & eating chocolate until my sister arrived to pick me up and drive me home.

I've had an afternoon nap, and the arm is still pain free - surely the anaesthetic has worn off my now!

The one in which my shoulder does not get an A

-

So I had the shoulder (arm?) measured for range of movement last week.

The results were a little disappointing.

Forward movement was around the 65 degrees mark (90 degrees is shoulder high). I could get higher if i swung into it but the measurement is based on me lifiting my arm as high as I can and holding it there.

Sideways movement (lifting my arm out to the side) 35 degrees (uh oh).

My right arm also has the strength of a kitten (the heaviest thing i can lift is a can of pepsi max).

My physio tells me my arm (and range of motion) is improving but instead of listening to her, and believing her, I'm just depressing myself by reading about gymnasts who are doing somersaults on a trampoline (whilst wearing a sling) 2 weeks after shoulder surgery.

I guess the key emotion here is frustration - I'm pretty much sling free so i look normal but i can't do 'normal' things at work which is confusing and irritating for customers & staff; and frustrating as all getout for me.

Last week's big achievement was doing up a seatbelt or the first time since July 22nd.

I need to focus on the (albeit small) positives & improvements and deal with the frustrations by(say) tossing birds at pigs.


*

The one in which my shoulder returns to work

So the shoulder has returned to work (albeit part-time and on modified duties).

The work itself is not too bad (or pain inducing) but the preparation for work each morning - that is an ordeal...

Everything takes soooo much longer than it used to.

Having only one usable arm slows everything down. Showering, dressing, breakfasting, etc; (no such thing as a quick shower at the moment.) Not to mention I have to start each day with painkillers to facilitate the getting ready for work process.

Mind you I have reduced my tshirt donning record from 45 minutes down to under 10 minutes (we take our victories where we can, however small)

Once I get to work i'm exhausted (and sore) from the getting ready, the work itself is ok, at this stage it's more about managing the pain, and not overdoing things (and finding out what I can do) rather than anything else.

I'm also finding that the combination of painkillers and 8 weeks off work has meant i currently have the concentration span of a carrot (or a 2 year old).

So baby steps in everything I do.

I have a range of exercises that I do many times every day.

* 3 or 4 variations on the pendulum swinging of the arm (to get the shoulder joint moving),

* a couple of exercises using a cane (think an arthritic fred astaire sans top hat),

* a pulley system (sailing rope and a hook in the neighbour's carport)

Sounds weird I know; hopefully they will help the shoulder regain it's former pristine level of fitness (the exercises along with the determined effort of my physio to rip my arm from its socket twice a week)

we shall see how it all goes...

piccies

+

=&

shoulder news week 3.

The week that was:

MONDAY

So back to fracture clinic.

Added an orthopaedic resident to my orthopaedic team.

Turns out my orthopaedic registrar showed my xrays & scan to three orthopaedic surgeons and was outvoted 3-1 in the 'put a royal doulton plate in fiona's shoulder' poll.

Off work for a further 4 weeks.

WEDNESDAY

visited work for return-to-work meeting.

we have a plan for mid september.

it seems so far away.

otherwise it was walk, painkillers, sleep,

fiona's fracture continued

week 2 update.

the good

• have stopped taking the really strong painkillers
• am coping with normal panadol
• have been walking the 50 metres to the letterbox (& back) most days
• don't have to have an operation to insert a plate in arm
• work sent me a huge basket of chocolate to aid in healing
• my sister & my mum are waiting on me hand and foot

the not so good

• still living in my sister's armchair
• arm still bruised & swollen
• missed 7 shows (so far)
• can't do much

the bad

• can't move back to my flat because the layout of the door locks means i couldn't get out in an emergency (i miss my stuff)
• can't dress myself
• very limited in what i can do one handed
• feeling a bit sore and sorry for myself

fiona vs tree - week 1 update

my days have settled into a somewhat predictable routine thanks to last week's "altercation with tree".

wake up
take painkillers
sleep
wake up
take painkillers
sleep
wake up etc etc etc.

i was supposed to fly to sydney today (with my sister) for four days of theatre, markets, coffee festival, & Helpmann Awards.

Didn't happen.

my sister in law went instead of me and mum came down to melbourne to babysit. (which meant lots of home cooked meals)

arm is bruised from shoulder to elbow (looks like i'm wearing a large black armband.)

pain is manageable if i don't move.

otherwise owwww.

my brother & my 2 youngest nephews (aged 5 & 4) drove to pakenham to collect mum & bring her back to melb. my brother took the opportunity to deliver a paternal lecture to the boys on why vandalism is wrong and the law of unintended consequences.

master 4 however missed the moral of the story and announced to me that he was going to kick the vandal. And proudly showed me the shoes he was going to use for the kicking.

sounds like a plan to me.

Vale auntie Nan

Auntie Nan passed away this morning. She was 98 years old.

She was actually my great aunt, my dad's aunt, my grandfather's sister.

Auntie Nan was born Annie Charlotte Malcolm in Portland in 1913.

Latterly she lived in Glen Iris where she kept an eye on the ashburton staff for me.

After her husband george laidlaw died auntie nan decided she wasn't going to sit around & mope, she joined legacy widows, kept up her crafting and wrking for the monash hospital ladies auxilary. ( and many other charities as well)

Going to dinner at auntie nan's also became something of an experience. She was a good cook and would use our visits as an excuse to cook a roast & veges for us. One evening she served us roast beef with 13 (yes 13) veges. I, for one, didn't know there were 13 types of veges! Technically 12 i suppose as one was tomato & that's a fruit...

Anyway until about 3 years ago aunti nan lived in glen iris.

Every thursday morning she would walk the kilometre to ashburton library and return her library books. She would then meet some of her cronies for morning tea at the ashy shops before heading back to ashburton library to borrow her next lot of books.

I would often receive a phone call from her on thursday nights as she told me about the nice boy or girl (staff member) who'd helped her at the library, or filled me in in ashy library gossip. Or ask me if that nice person still worked at ashy cos she hadn't seen her for a while. I used to almost hope to be sent to AB on a thursday so that i could be sure of a decent lunch or dinner.

She was proud of the malcolm family & it's history. She used to love going back to penshurst & digby (and portland) each year to revisit her childhood and family haunts.

She had no desire to reach 100 (or get a telegram from the Queen) rather she wanted lo live a happy & fulfilled life.

When she moved into a nursing home in rosebud she took up watercolour painting because the nursing home ran watercolour classes.

Such was her enthusiasm for life.

She is survived by her three sons, clyde, tony & robin, & heaps of grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

We'll miss you auntie nan.

A week in the life...

So on saturday i came off second best in an altercation with a tree.

I had a bit of a run up but still could't move it.

The tree broke not only my fall but also the surgical neck of my right humerus.

This meant a ride in an ambulance and 4 hours lying in the emergency dept trying to avoid sick people.

So i am now living in an armchair in my sister's loungeroom while i keep the arm as still as possible (movement = pain)

The art of the brick.

Took littlest nephews (Huck aged 5, & Jughead just turned 4) to the Lego exhibition at Fed Square.

Both boys love lego& love going on adventures with aunty tapsister.

I picked them up from their home and watched them devour 2 slices of nutella toast, a pineapple ring, and a glass of milk (Jughead), and a ham and cheese sandwich, pineapple ring, glass of milk (Huck) before we headed to the tram. On the way we ran into Gus and emily's mum and told her about our plan. We also looked for snakes (especially cobras) in the long grass near elsternwick station.

We caught the tram to Fed Square and headed for the Lego exhibition. The boys loved the big T-rex made of lego, and the model of puffing billy, and the skulls.

The boys had brought money from their money boxes so that they could buy some lego in the shop. Huck bought a lego torch and Jughead bought some ninjago.

The we headed across to the acmi lounge for babycino's, popcorn, & the snacks that mummy had packed for the boys.

Then to the playground at Birrarung Marr where they worked off their morning tea on the slides.

Next up the merry-go-round next to the sky wheel.

By then it was lunch time (according to the boys) & we ate hotdogs, from the cart near fed square, while watching the boats on the Yarra River.

By now the boys were ready to go home but first they needed ice cream to round off their meals.

A fun train journey home, a play with the new lego, some afternoon tea before a very tired aunty tapsister headed back into the city for a tweet up and the boys looked forward to their dinner...

30 things i did in june (as well as blog)

In no particular order

• Went to adelaide
• saw panda bears at adelaide zoo
• got stranded in adelaide
• went to hahndorf
• went to haighs chocolate factory in adelaide
• ate too much chocolate
• ate too much fudge
• saw daniel boys at adelaide cabaret festival
• saw gala concert at adelaide cabaret festival
• walked the red carpet after olivia newton-john & david campbell
• found bracegirdles chocolate in glenelg
• shopped til i dropped for work stuff (fun work stuff may i say)
• broke a tooth
• discovered fruchocs
• discovered cocolate, cikolatte, chocolate bean, swiss glory, blackebys, while in adelaide
• went to the charm shop in adelaide
• vowed never to fly tiger airways again
• spent way too much time at adelaide airport
• voted tiger airways worst customer service as worst ever
• ran the press gauntlet at adelaide airport -they were waiting for 'roo' to get back from hall of fame induction
• did 2 booktalks
• hosted an author talk
• got given an iphone 3gs
• had a(nother) career fail
• saw a careers counsellor
• enrolled in further study (probably)
• completed year 1 of alia pd scheme
• killed off my enemies in a short story (extremely violently & with great pleasure)
• spent time with my family (6th anniversary of my dad's death)
• persuaded work to take part in #blogjune

another vent/rant

look away now.

So I worked yesterday.

The day started fairly well.

We'd been warned during the week that IT would be doing some work Saturday morning so the library's computer system would probably be down until 11 am (we open to the public at 10) so we would probably be offering limited services for the early part of the day.

However when we arrived everything seemed to be working properly and just before 10 am IT rang to say they were finished and we wouldn't need to use offline or anything like that.

yay.

Now I work my rostered weekends at a different library to the one I work at weekdays. This (for some staff) adds a slightly more stressful edge to the weekend as there are subtle differences between branches & some branch specific routines that need to be remembered & dealt with.

Now one of my colleagues this weekend is a perfectionist who prepares in depth when working at a location other than her home branch. She also follows procedures to the letter - if procedure says turn around three times, click your heels, & wear gold lipstick, then that's exactly what she does.

So this colleague had memorised the new printing procedures for our weekend branch & was confident when her first customer wanted to print (& was not a member) that she knew what she was doing.

Meanwhile another staff member was also a bit stressed cos things had been moved around a bit (it was his home branch) while he was away ...

Then colleague 1 couldn't find undated printing cards, colleague 2 didn't know where there were any either, and all of a sudden you could see the tension increasing, the stress levels rising, and the need for a defibrillator becoming more obvious.

This was when I became aware of what was going on (I'd been helping others) .

- so I went thru to the workroom and found some undated cards,

- dealt with the person wanting to print (who was by now getting stressed because of all the stress she felt she was causing),

- made sure there was an ample supply of undated printing cards at the desk,

this all happened before 10.20 am ... so I sent the 2 stressed staff members in different directions so that they could calm down and regain equilibrium

- at morning tea time i raced to the supermarket and bought triple choc chip cookies to improve morale and lower stress levels (it worked)

It was obviously a full moon friday night - although we weren't especially busy there were a lot of angry people coming in.

My 'favourite' - the patron who wanted to complain about her treatment by a staff member a couple of weeks ago.

Apparently a few weeks ago she'd approached a 'staff member" ( a female standing at the paperback stand) and asked for some help with the computer. This person, helped her and then refused to give her her name when asked for it.

Now I'm not 100% sure the woman who helped her was actually a staff member. The patron hasn't seen her before or since at the library, she wasn't wearing a name badge, so she may have just been a 'good samaritan'.

Eventually the day ended and I headed off for dinner with friends.

Now I don't normally drink but I really deserved the couple of wines I had with dinner last night...

vent/rant

So I'd planned to take a couple of days annual leave next week. Nothing especially planned but just doing some stuff that it was tricky to fit in around work (medical appts, tradies, stuff like that).

So my leave had been approved then it was announce that there would be a work IT forum on one of the days I was annually leaveing.

I asked if i could come in on my annual leave so that i could go to the forum. After some discussion (& being told that it would be good for me to be there cos i speak the geek) i cancelled one day of my leave.

So imagine my surprise when i got my roster to see that i was rostered in such a way that I couldn't attend aforementioned forum. (not happy jan is an understatement).

So I reapplied for the day off - I figured I was prepared to rearrange my day off for the forum but not so that I could just be desk fodder (possibly unreasonable on my part but I did un-annual leave in good faith).

Apparently I've been rostered in such a way that i can 'leave the forum early' so i'll be back in time to do the desk (not sure about lunch, tho the forum is catered)

My leave application is still in limbo - neither approved nor disapproved.

So now do i let it slide (& probably stew about it) or do I give up part of my day off on monday to go sort it out? (Do i really want/need the stress or the argument?)

the one where metro p***es me off.

So I needed to to go to Nunawading this morning.

I live near Mont Albert station.

Mont Albert is on the Belgrave/Lilydale line.

Nunawading is on the Belgrave/Lilydale line.

So it should have been easy yes?

I caught the train at Mont Albert.

The station after Mont Albert is Box Hill.

The train pulled in to Box Hill Station and the driver announced that the train was terminating at Box Hill station.

I got off the train, raced up the escalator, across the plaza and down the ramp, just in time to see the Belgrave/lilydale train pull out of the station.

A couple of minutes later it was announced that the next train on Platform 4 would be a Belgrave train.

A train arrived, I boarded it. We stopped at Laburnum station.

We stopped at Blackburn station. The driver announced that the train was terminating at Blackburn and returning to Flinders Street.

I got off the train, raced down the ramp, through the underpass to platform 3 just in time to leap aboard the Belgrave/lilydale train before the doors completely closed.

The stop after Blackburn is Nunawading.

So three trains, 2 sprints and 20 minutes later I had travelled the 4 stations from Mont Albert to Nunawading.

#metrofail

A-Z of Tapsister

Thought I'd have a go at the meme that's doing the rounds....

A. Age: read it online most mornings via press display
B. Bed size: Queen
C. Chore that you hate: Housework
D. Dogs: None now. as a kid we had Peanuts (golden labrador), Andrew (golden labrador), Murray (collie kelpie X)
E. Essential start to your day: Coffee & Angry Birds
F. Favourite colour:Depends. Usually green, purple, or maroon
G. Gold or Silver: Silver
H. Height: 5 ' 3"
I. Instruments you play: None
J. Job title: Collection Maintenance & Adult Services Librarian
K. Kids: none
L. Live: Mont Albert
M. Mother’s name: Margret
N. Nicknames: Fee, Fi, Foo, Fwowna, BFwowna, Fiff, fona, fonamarg, feestar, finyonahr, fifi
O. Overnight hospital stays: None
P. Pet peeve: people who queue jump
Q. Quote from a movie: I carried a watermelon (Dirty Dancing)
R. Right or left handed: Right
S. Siblings: Four, all younger.(3 brothers, 1 sister)
T. Time you wake up: 6am
U. Underwear: yes
V. Vegetable you hate: Cucumber
W. What makes you run late: Angry Birds
X. X-Rays you’ve had: Teeth, shoulder, elbow, wrist, finger, knee, ankles, foot,
Y. Yummy food that you make: Corned Beef
Z. Zoo animal: Giraffe

Public Holiday Monday & Adelaide

So Adelaide on a public holiday monday.

What to do, what to do.

We had been warned that 'nothing would be open' but we didn't believe them...

Buskers coffee shop in the Rundle St Mall was open so that was breakfast taken care of.

Then we walked the deserted streets to the Adelaide Zoo.

The one in which we are still in Adelaide

So we were supposed to fly home from Adelaide yesterday.

Our flight was due to leave at 3.30pm.

We got to the airport just before 2pm to be greeted with the news on checking our luggage in that our flight was delayed by 90 minutes & would now be boarding at 4.30 pm for a 5pm flight time.

reason for the delay - fog in melbourne that morning had caused a knock on effect of delays.

Okey dokey.

Luckily we had books with us, an ipad (for angry birds playage), and a Cocolat store to fulfil any remaining chocolate urges.

About 3.30pm we discovered our flight had been delayed a further 30 minutes.

At 4.30 we decided to head to our boarding gate. as we strolled past the departures board we glanced casually at our flight to double check the gate number - only to find the word cancelled displayed under scheduled departure time.

Hmmmmm.

When we got to the gate there was no one there. No airline rep bearing the brunt of traveller abuse, no one.

We split up. TappingBetty headed out to arrivals to see if she could find an airline rep, while I prowled the concourse on the same mission.

About 10 minutes after we split up TappingBetty texted me - she'd found our suitcase spinning forlornly on the baggage carousel - still no airline personnel but at least we had the rest of our chocolate belongings.

Meanwhile i'd found the airline rep.

Our choices were: a) accept an immediate refund of our flight cost or b) be booked on the next available flight (which was 6.20am Tuesday, yes Tuesday & today was Sunday...)

While we queued to speak to the (poor) beleaguered rep we quickly surfed the web to see what our options were.

VirginBlue - no seats available til Monday $179 each.

Qantas - no seats til Monday $480 each.

Our refund - $50 each

Hmmmmmmm.

If we took the airlines tuesday morning offer they would reimburse us up to $120 each per night.

We took option B and quickly booked another 2 nights at the hotel we'd been staying at.

The one where fiona reveals she knows way too much about adelaide airport

Having spent almost 12 hours at adelaide airport over two days I feel I am awesomely qualified to comment on the airport's amenities.

Airport departures lounge (through security) opens at 4am (including security check points).

Most shops on departures concourse open at 5. (not smiggle tho)

Shops on departures concourse:

Cocolat (cafe)

Cibo (cafe)

Hudsons (cafe)

Cafe something or other (can't read my writing)

Coopers alehouse (do coffee as well as ales)

Smiggle

Virgin music

Newslink

Bijoux

Witchery

Luggage shop

Childrens playroom

Sushi shop

Hungry Jacks

Coopers merchandise shop

A taste of South Australia

Purely Australian

Gratuitous info.

It is exactly 100 paces from Cokolat to comfy couch.

TappingBetty got screened for explosives each time we went to Adelaide airport - i think she has been screened for explosives at every major australian airport except Perth - last time she went to perth explosives hadn't been invented.

Fruchocs rock. Do 5 fruchocs count as 5 serves of fruit?

Taste of South Australia makes really good coffee.

The airport police get their coffees from Taste of South Australia.

The virgin blue crews get their coffees at cocolat.

The first flight out of Adelaide in the morning is a Qantas flight at 5.50 am.

No Qantas staff got coffee while we were there.

The one where I discover there is chocolate in adelaide.

Cocolat.

I ordered a top deck hot chocolate (mix of white and milk chocolate).

We shared a 'baby' lamington and a 'baby' rocky road.

There is also a cocolat at the airport #justsaying

Cikolatte.

white hot chocolate

salted caramel macaron

Well worth the walk

Chocolate Bean

Regular hot chocolate.

Tucked down an alley near cocolat.

Blackeby's

I bought peanut butter fudge.

Tapping Betty bought perky nana's.

We could have bought sooooooooooooooooooo much more.

Swiss Glory

Bought yummy chocolate frogs and a caramel filled handmade chocolate

Then we went to Glenelg.

Bracegirdles.

OMG. Wow. Words fail me.

if you go to Glenelg you must must must must must go to Bracegirdles.

I will be blogging about all of these and more in greater detail over at Chocbytes once i've caught up on #blogjune

The one where Fiona begins to get her groove back

The short version

TappingBetty & I went to Adelaide for the Cabaret Festival.

We flew Tiger.

We have flown Tiger frequently without any problems.

We will never fly Tiger to Adelaide again.

There were media types and cameras waiting for us when we arrived at Adelaide airport.

Our hotel room is very small.

The longer version

My sister and I were flying to Adelaide for the Cabaret Festival. We had purchased ridiculously cheap tickets on Tiger ages ago - we have flown Tiger frequently (though never to Adelaide) without any problems or complaints (I realise this puts us very much in the minority when it comes to flying with Tiger), on this trip things were to change.

My sister booked for both of us and we booked luggage for one. (our usual m.o) Previously we have not been able to check in online using this configuration because of the luggage. This time when we went to check in we were slugged an extra $30 because one of us should have checked in online. (lesson learned - always scroll to absolute bottom of the page on tiger's website - a lesson that came in very handy later in the trip).

We made it to Adelaide and as we rode the escalator down to the baggage carousel we noticed a media scrum waiting at the bottom of said escalator. There were 6 or 7 television cameras trained on the escalator and a gaggle of news reporter types standing by.

None of them rushed to interview us so we assumed they were waiting for someone else, but who?

We kept an eye on them while we waited for our suitcase. Then three guys in suits came down the escalator and the scrum headed straight for them.

After the interview one of the suits, followed by a lone channel 9 cameraman waited opposite us for his bags. (If you looked carefully at the channel nine adelaide news on friday night you would have seen TappingBetty & I in the bottom left of screen - I'm wearing a riverdance t shirt, Ky is wearing a melbourne tap festival shirt)

Turns out the 'suits' were Mark Ricciuto & 2 others from the Adelaide Crows. Ricciuto had been inducted into the AFL hall of fame the previous evening (along with Vossy)

After we left the airport (and our 15 seconds of fame) we headed for our hotel.

We had booked an economy 3 star room at the Mercure Grosvenor Hotel in Adelaide - it's located a short walk from the cabaret venues and central to pretty much everything.

To get to our economy room we walked along a very, very, very long corridor (wishing we had a ball of string, or a packet of breadcrumbs) took a dogleg right at the end of the corridor, continued down a half flight of stairs, along a short corridor, turned left into another long corridor and finally found our room two doors from the far end.

The room did exactly as promised. 2 beds, a tv, bar fridge. A very small bathroom - no room for a kitten, let alone swinging a cat.

Still it would be home for the next two nights.....

Too much information & blogging mojo

The first part of this post is rambling, narcississtic, selfish, pointless & self indulgent.

But it's my blog and i can say what i want - so there (you may imagine me petulantly sticking my tongue out)

Feel free to skip ahead to tomorrow's blog post. Move along, nothing to see here.

It's been a pretty ordinary start to June jobwise. I went for a job & didn't get it (no surprise there).

what did surprise me was how upset i was. I should point out that I was disappointed that I didn't get the job but what upset me was not the 'not getting the job' but more the ramifications (for me) of not getting the job, and some things that were said to me when I was told I didn't get the job.

The ramifications are pretty clear - there is no future for me in that organisation - if I wish to use my skills and knowledge I am going to have to find an organisation that appreciates and/or can & wants to use my particular skill set. This should come as no particular surprise to me (or to people who know me well) but it can be upsetting when you finally see the writing on the wall.

The second - the words. Even I was surprised by how what was said upset me. I should point out that it was tactless rather than malicious but it was (and is) hard to deal with.

Because I am a confidence person (in the sense of confidence & esteem not the trickster sense) if my self esteem is down then I struggle. (Though I usually bounce back pretty quickly - this time it took a bit longer).

This kind of sucked the life out of my blogging mojo and for a week or so blogging was too difficult.

Anywhoo that's my excuse for falling so far behind on #blogjune.

END OF SELF INDULGENT RANT & RAMBLE

Now to start to catch up on this whole blogging thing....

Talking the talk, Walking the walk , Crumpling the crumpler

I talked about crime novels and JM Barrie at the Hawthorn booktalk today.

The JM Barrie was Peter Pan's First XI by Kevin Telfer which is the story of the cricket team formed by JM Barrie and some of the leading literary figures of the time who, luckily, were much better writers than they were cricketers - except perhaps for Arthur Conan Doyle who dined out on the story of when he dismissed WG Grace (admittedly Grace was in his declining cricketing years...)

The crime novels were: Outwitting trolls by William G Tapply; On the line by SJ Rozan; The reckoning by James Jauncey, & The missing by Jane Casey.

After I left the talk I headed for the tram - a walk which unfortunately, or fortuitously, took me past the Crumpler bags factory seconds shop which was having a 30% of everything sale.

I now own a crumpler backpack & a laptop bag (both were 50% off).

I think i will attempt toclaim them as either (a) on tax as a work related expense as I was on my way from work to work, or (b) from Petal as her booktalk was the catalyst for my mini shopping spree...

Gilbert the gecko

so i was reading the local paper at work today (it's ok i was on my lunchbreak) when I spotted this little gem in the positions vacant...

I rang the lovely Rita at our Hawthorn branch and told her I'd found a job I wanted ( I didn't tell her what it was though) and would she be my referee.

I'd worked on Saturday with Rita and she'd been so wonderful and supportive and we'd talked eco the gecko antics...

I told her where in the paper to find the job ad and asked her to ring me back after she'd had a look at it and tell me what she thought.

Five minutes later she rang me back, giggling her head off.

We both agreed that very few applicants would be able to provide a recent portfolio of gecko performances.

Pandering to the masses?

I was weeding today (the book kind not the gardening kind) and had decided to weed the 800s.

Now like many libraries we shelve the australian literature (A 800 - 899) in a separate sequence to the 'rank and file' 800s.

Anyway as I was weeding away I got to thinking.... why do we still separate the aussie lit out?

Could we interfile?

We could still have the A on the spine label to indicate it's australian but one sequence of 800s seems to make sense to me.

We already interfile junior non fiction and teenage non fiction with the adult non fiction so the A before the call number wouldn't be a problem (we already use J or T)

I think that often the 2 sequences confuse borrowers.

If they are looking for 821 and find A 821 but not the book they wanted - do they ask a librarian (occasionally) or do they leave the library thinking computer says book on shelf but book not on shelf?

I say interfile - one sequence of 800s is the best way to go.

* might mention it at the meeting tomorrow and see if they go looking for the nearest tree to string me up or whether i can convince to listen to my idea...

Adelaide - research

So Tapping Betty & I are off to Adelaide next weekend for the Adelaide Cabaret Festival.

As part of our due diligence we have researched chocolate shops in Adelaide.

So far we have seven 'must-visits':

Haighs

Cikolatte

Chocolate Bean

Cocolat

Chocolate World

Adelaide Chocolate School

Bracegirdles

Any others we should know about?

Main problem is fitting in the chocolate around the cabaret or the cabaret around the chocolate.

On the upside lots of potential june blogposts for theatremad & chocbytes

Pets

I've just joined another online community which wants me to choose a secret question such as "what was the name of your first pet?"

As a child our first pet was a dog called Peanuts (he was a peanut coloured labrador - hence the extremely clever name).

After Peanuts we had a golden labrador called Andrew. (my mum was pregnant with one of my brothers and wanted to name him Andrew - my dad refused to have a son named Andrew so we got a dog called Andrew and a brother called Cameron).

After Andrew we had a dog called Murray. He was named after Fitzroy Football Club legend Kevin 'bulldog' Murray. (the little girl next door renamed him Murray Dog Malcolm). Murray Dog wasn't a bulldog - he was part spaniel, part terrier, part everything else.

My niece has a dog called Maggie, and my littlest nephews have 2 cats Sodapop & Chili.

My youngest nephew desperately wants a dog and he has suggested that they give the cats away so he can get a dog. (we think when he was asking for a dog someone pointed out that he already had 2 cats so he worked out that if they gave the cats away he could have a dog)

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gratuitous cat (sodapop) photo just because....

Pod People

My youngest brother and his family have a new house.

They moved out of their house 5 weeks ago.

Since then their old house has been demolished and this week their new house was craned in.

The new house was built in a factory (in modules) and then craned into place.

The whole street had to be blocked off (they live in a fairly narrow street) for two days.

It was only supposed to be one day but the 92 ft crane accidentally took out a water main which slowed the 'craneing' down.

Here is one of the 'pods' being craned into position.

And the two youngest residents of the new house watching the big crane build their house.

They start moving their possessions back in tomorrow and plan to be fully moved in by Thursday.

The whole thing is pretty impressive - windows, joinery, almost everything was done in the factory.

The whole thing (demolition, factory house building etc.) was filmed for Better Homes & Gardens.

Can't wait to see the whole process.

It looked pretty impressive from the progress photos my brother showed me; looking forward to seeing the film version.

#blogjune Day 2.

Another week another 'fiona career fail'.

The emotions are running pretty high at the moment.

Normal blogging will resume tomorrow.

Day 1. #blogjune A star is born...

I've decided to take part in blog every day of june again this year.

In a moment of madness I suggested that 'my' library service does likewise.

So some days I'll be blogging twice.

I may need myhead examined.

Anyway on to my blogpost.

Yesterday at work i donned a marbled gecko costume and entertained (terrified?) the kids at pre-school storytime. It was a special storytime for world environment week and I was 'eco the gecko' (or E the G for my rap or graffiti tag)

Only made 2 kids cry (1 because I was leaving)

It was fun.

Took me back to my calisthenic years.

Why a Librarian?

Recent ’fiona career fails‘ have had me thinking about why I became a librarian, why I am still a librarian, and whether I still want to be a librarian .

Why did I become a librarian?

As far back as I can remember I always wanted to work in a library.

I blame Batgirl.

Batgirl was a librarian.

Her alter ego was Barbara Gordon, daughter of Commissioner Gordon.

Barbara was a librarian at the Gotham City Library.

However when she got home from work and sat down at her dressing table. The table revolved into the wall and she emerged the other side as batgirl.

She had a batcycle and everything.

Books were always part of my life. As a Brownie I had my book badge, as a girl guide I had my library badge.

I was a total library geek. (although I was NEVER a library monitor)

I can’t remember not wanting to work in a library – (except for my long held fantasy for a career as a wealthy international jetsetter!) – after leaving high school I worked in an academic library (Melbourne University) before moving into local government & public libraries where, sadly, I still remain.

But I still really want to be a wealthy international jetsetter when I grow up.

Or a movie star. Or a ballet dancer. Or a doctor. Or a lawyer. Or maybe an Indian chief.

Knit One, Purl One

I went to Morris & Sons.

They had a bearded toque on display.

I want a bearded toque.

I am knitting a bearded toque.

I am sure everyone needs a bearded toque.

Short courses

Every year (for about the last 20 years anyway) I have chosen a short course of some sort to do.

It has to be something I haven't done before, and it has to be something not work related.

Previous courses have included:

• millinery (I made a hat with feathers and sequins and flowers),
• chinese cooking
• watercolour painting (i am so totally untalented in this area)
• mosaics,
• italian,
• writing a memoir,
• sewing with lycra (this was a long, long, long, time ago)
• flower arranging,
• rowing,
• beading,
• oil painting (my watercolour teacher suggested I try painting in oils)
• french polishing,
• decoupage,
• coffee making
• paper making
  

Haven't decided yet what this year's 'skill' is going to be.

Will do a barista course (again) as I got a coffee machine for my birhday.

Also will be buying a sewing machine soon (got sewing machine money for birthday also) so may well be something in the sewing line.

In the meantime I'll keep collecting short course brochures until the decision is made.

#blog12daysxmas Day 12.

This photo was taken on Christmas Day 2004. There are a lot of memories associated with this photo.

This was our last Christmas with dad. The previous day (Christmas Eve) he'd been diagnosed with (3 different types of) cancer.

When this photo was taken we had no idea that this would be his last Christmas.

The family Christmas photo has become a tradition - mainly at my sister's insistence..

.

And here endeth the #blog12daysxmas

It's been fun.

Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night.

#blog12daysxmas Day 11.

Christmas Presents o' mine.

• Lincraft vouchers
• Spotlight vouchers
• dvd stand
• wireless charging station for my gadgets
• 'quit my job' money box
• ben 10 christmas ornament
• Wooden Jewellery box in the shape of an F
• fahrenheit 451 t shirt
• ganache (chocolate) vouchers
• chokolait vouchers
• lindt vouchers
• koko black vouchers
• quo vadis diary
• kikki k vouchers
• typo voucher

Apparently people who know me think I like sewing, chocolate, & stationery!

Once I buy my birthday sewing machine I will be sewing in an organised fashion whilst eating chocolate (having put enough money in my money box to quit my job) - sounds pretty good actually.

#blog12daysxmas Day 10.

My Christmas Gifts to my family

Mum

Christchurch cathedral has an 'artist in residence' (who is a quilter) so at the cathedral shop I bought mum some fat quarters designed by the artist. They are the most gorgeous colours (my mum is head honcho of the craft club at her retirement village, and a mad keen quilter). I also gave her a necklace that she'd admired elsewhere.

Sister

Even tho the family has moved to a Kris Kringle for the adults, my sister & I decided we'd still exchange presents (this year mum decided to join us).

So I gave my sister a 2011 diary, a Paris journal & a silver articulated charm (she collects articulated silver charms -with moveable arms and legs). It's a cat with attitude.

13 year old nephew.

my sister, my brother & I joined together to buy nephew this big (huge) cricket bag he wanted. Cos it was so big we didn't wrap it. Instead, under the tree we put a giftwrapped cd box. Inside the cd box we bubblewrapped the tag from the bag. The emotions crossing his face as he unwrapped what obviously wasn't a cricket bag (he had been convinced we were giving him the bag) were priceless. Once he'd unwrapped the tag we sent him out to the car where the bag was hiding in the boot.

10 year old niece

She desperately wanted make up and jewelry so I gave her a sample set of glitter eyeliners, and another sample set of lip glosses. Also a silver bracelet from a local craft market (she always admired mine so I got her one of her own)

5 year old nephew

T shirt from New Zealand (with a pic of a kiwi made from lego on the front)

Denim shorts (he's a clothes horse)

An amp for his paper jam guitar.

3 year old nephew

T shirt from New Zealand (with a pirate and a surfboard on the front))

Board shorts

Dinosaurs (he's going through a dinosaur phase atm)

My Kris Kringle.

In the kris kringle i drew my sister-in-law. I gave her a lululemon yoga mat strap and a lululemon gift voucher.

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Tomorrow I'll post the gifts I received.

#blog12daysxmas Day 9.

Christmas Songs

I blame my calisthenic upbringing for my preference for christmas songs (as opposed to christmas carols)

My favourite christmas song is "I want a hippopotamus for christmas"

My christmas playlist on my ipod (the christmas songs come off on the 5th January) includes such classics as

• Nuthin for christmas,
• All i want for christmas is my two front teeth,
• The fairy on the christmas tree,
• Are my ears on straight,
• When Santa got stuck in the chimney,
• I saw mummy kissing santa claus,
• Grandma got run over by a reindeer,
• Rockin around the christmas tree
• Little Saint Nick
• Jingle Bell rock

I think as a calisthene (competitor, coach, or audience) I've been involved in staging all the above songs.

There's also a few christmas carols on the ipod.( i have a multi disk best of Carols by Candlelight set) so a lot of Marina Prior, Denis Walter & Michael Cormack.

It's funny what sounds and songs mean christmas to people.

And many, many, many versions of Oh come all ye faithful

#blog12daysxmas Day 8.

Street Party

For the last few years Hamilton Street, Mont Albert, has held a Christmas street party in mid December each year.

They put one long one table along the middle of the street for the christmas dinner portion of the street party.

The first year we were all seated, introducing ourselves to our table neighbours when a fire engine, siren blaring, inched its way along the street.

"Oh" we exclaimed "what a good idea to have Santa arrive on a fire engine for the kiddies" (the childrens play area - bouncy castle, handball competition, basketball competition, petting zoo - was at the far end of the street past the dinner tables)

We continued with similar exclamations as the children raced up to the fire engine only to find out that Santa wassn't on board.

Yep, you guessed it - the fire engine was responding to a real fire.

A fire had broken out in the back room of the op shop so instead of seeing Santa arrive on the fire engine we got to watch firemen fighting a fire.

After the flire was extinguished the fireys were offered coffee and cake before they went back to the fire station, and we went back to our Christmas meal.

That was the only street party (so far) that the fireys have been at...