Stumble Upon

Best time waster ever! Stumble Upon lets you create a profile in which you select topics of interest and then picks a website it thinks you might like. You rate the site, which refines your profile, so that it gets better at finding new sites for you that you are likely to enjoy. I have had a lot of fun this afternoon!

Of course I'm guessing there are a few sites it thinks everyone will like so gives you those first. So far there's only been one I haven't liked - it was an ad for dog windows that go in your fence so the dog can see out. This is a good thing for the dogs, but hardly a website that excited me.

Can't write anymore, must continue my Stumble through the web!

The retarded green thumb

This weekend I will be attending a bridal shower for my cousin's fiancee, the ever lovely Anne.

It is a garden party in their newly dug out garden, and suggested gifts were native plants or herbs. So husband and I trundled off to the local Bunnings (which holds far too many temptations and fun stuff for me to visit too regularly - Bunnings is the new Ikea) to look in the nursery for a suitable gift.

With the fumes of blood and bone making me a bit high we began our hunting. I was bent on buying something with a humorous or clever name, in fact I found one called Blushing Bride, but I settled on a nice plant instead. (^_^)

All very interesting, I know, but what's with the title of this post?

I'm too scared to re-pot the plant into the nice pot that I bought because I have an uncanny ability for killing pot plants. My green thumb is either very 'special' or is completely the wrong colour.

I would be more worried about this if I was superstitious. Every single plant I was given at my bridal shower died, which so far (a year) has not jinxed our marriage, but I don't think I can run the risk of killing this gift and jinxing someone else's marriage. Too much guilt!

Is it wrong to give the plant in its plastic pot, separate to the ceramic pot and a bag of potting mix as a gift? I'm just not confident that the plant will survive if I do the re-potting.

I'd like to have more of a green thumb though. I enjoy pretending that all the lemons on our tree are due to some excellent skill of mine, even though I know that the tree does this all on its own (with the help of some bees maybe) and that it was already fruiting when we moved in.

I like the idea of having a nice garden, and doing nice things in the garden, but because we're renting I don't like to invest too much time or energy (or money) into the garden. This leaves me with the option of having pot plants, which of course I am totally crap at. Perhaps fake plants are the way of the future???

No more beer please

Since moving to Melbourne I seem to drink a hell of a lot more alcohol than I did in Canberra. In Canberra there was a regular Sunday night champers adventure at the parentals, but no regular big benders.

There are a few reasons as to why there has been an increase in my alcohol consumption:

1. Taxis are cheaper here - husband and I are more likely to catch a cab because of the cheapness, but also because we never know where we are going, so it is easier to get someone else who doesn't know where we are going to worry about it and drive us there.
2. Public transport is better here - we can catch a tram to the city, out to dinner, to the pub all for $3.20! The trams come regularly along Plenty Rd so we never have to wait too long.
3. The pub is within walking distance (if I'm not feeling like a whinge and I'm not wearing heels).
4. My aunt and cousins live within walking distance, and Friday's have become drinkies night. I can consume several bottles of champers and still get home easily.
5. We have a lot of house guests from Canberra, which means there is either a big party on (which equals lots of drinking) or they are just visiting family (which equals a lot of drinking).
6. The very hot days we randomly have here means I have to drink Lemoncello or vanilla vodka from the freezer on a regular basis.
7. Any Estonian events (of which there have been several lately) involves a lot of vodka shots. Oh dear, oh dear...

So, yes, there are many reasons which have added together to help make my poor body suffer at the hands of dehydration. I have been drinking lots of water at work every week in preparation for the alcoholic onslaught that is likely to hit me every weekend.

One of the worst things about drinking is that I can't get a good sleep in the following day because I inevitably have to get up for a wee early in the morning, at which point I might as well stay awake and feel sorry for myself.

OK, with that out of my system (although the alcohol may not be), can you guess what I did on the weekend?

Friday night saw a Play Station and every single Sing Star disc arrive at my house, accompanied by brother, girlfriend and Egypt Liz (and Eesti Ray later on with his cousin). Premium beers we on special at Woolies (or Safeway, whatever) so I bought a case of Crownies which went down altogether too easily. For some reason, brother and Egypt Liz insist on drinking Passion Pop - I feel dirty and cheap just thinking about the fact that there is still a bottle in my house.

Many a stretched vocal chord later we went to bed.

The next morning I woke up with a head-achy start (ow!) at 9.45am, realising I had to be at the hair dressers at 10.30am. I was at the hair dressers until about 2pm (the joys of cut and colour) by which time I had consumed lots of water, had lost my hangover and was ready for some MacDonald's (after all, it was McHappy Day).

A brief interlude of quitness at home, and then the mad rush of five people trying to get ready all at once in a small one bathroomed house.

We got to Estonian House in Brunswick in pleanty of time for the Spring Ball, despite the taxi being half an hour late (having ordered it an hour early I was a little peeved). I must say, I like a bar where beers are $2.50, and it became even more dangerous when Ray got out his esky. Oh dear. And then there were rounds of vodka shots.

We had a good time on the dance floor, although I started to feel motion sickness due to a combinaiton of beer, mirror ball and copious amount of spinning due to rumba with husband.

Yesterday was totally relaxing - I drank lots of water and sat under the lemon tree all day reading and planning the menu for Christmas. I wish every day was Sunday.

Oh how I mish being unemployed! Missing my Domestic Goddess status, which makes it hard to come to work.

A weekend of singing and dancing awaits me

I am so glad that it is Friday. My working week started on Sunday and I'm really looking forward to a break. At the same time I'm dreading next week, which is my seven day week.

This weekend should be a corker though.

Squinky (Bro) and Squeeze of Squinky are flying in this afternoon and will be staying with us for a couple of nights. They are coming down for Squinky's Best Mate's (SBM) birthday.

After work we will either being having a Sing Star Party or heading into the city to go to a free concert (about saving children or whales or poverty or something, not that I don't care, I just don't know what it is in aid of). Whichever we do, I'm looking forward to having a good sing.

Saturday night sees us attending SBM's birthday party, which will be at the Estonian Spring Ball "Folk Dancing with the Stars". Should be a good laugh, and I'll have an excuse to shake my groove thang.

Feral Hair, Yeah Yeah

Lots of fun and games in Preston at the moment with both husband and I sporting some less than desirable hair stylings.

My Purple stripes have mostly faded to blue, with the ends fading to a nice ash-grey colour. Ooh baby, so good. The only bit that is still a little purple is in my fringe where I had previously had a red stripe.

I'm attending a wedding in four weeks so am beginning the process of returning to more normal coloured hair this weekend. The difficulty with having brightly coloured hair has been that it doesn't always match my clothes. I don't want to be worried about my hair colour when finding a dress to wear, which is going to be a painful experience in itself. Plus I think I'm starting to grow a mullet.

Husband, on the other hairy side of things, is now sporting the beginnings of a sleazy mo, which he is growing for Movember in aid of raising money for the awareness of men's health. An excellent cause. It has certainly made me aware of how much I dislike moustaches, which can't be good for husband's health, so I guess the program is working...?

He has promised to shave on 1 December. Anyone interested in sponsoring his efforts, please let me know!

Transit of Mercury

Last week my boss forwarded around the 'Geek Test'. I was 38% geek, which isn't too bad, considering I had colleagues who got 68%. I'm pretty sure husband lied on his test cos he was only 35%.

If there had been the question: "Would you come into work early to watch the transit of Mercury across the Sun through a Sunscope", I would have had to answer 'yes' today, and thus raised my geek levels (probably a considerable amount).

The image here is a projection of the sun through a Sun Spotter. The tiny dot inside the red circle in Mercury. The larger dot inside the square is a giant sun spot (probably bigger than Earth).

The Sunscopes (a telescope that cuts out all light except for a very small red bandwidth) allowed us to actually look at the Sun itself - I know the sun is a big ball of gas, but it was awesome actually seeing it in reality. We could see small solar flares coming off the surface, and the dimple around the sun spot caused by its magnetic field.

Silver Service and Great Views

Although Sunday 5 November was our first wedding anniversay, husband and I decided to dine out on Saturday night. Husband booked us into Cafe La at the Sofitel in the city.

May I just say "Ooh la la!" Husband had booked us a window table and the view was spectactualr. It was just on sunset when we arrived so we could see the city spread out in front of (or rather below) us, and then once it got dark the city lit up. It was amazing!

We decided on a bottle of Moet to get things started, and $145 later we were happy that we had! Delicious!

It was hard to decide what to have from the menu, so we went with the five course set menu. FIrst we had Harvey Bay scallops with caviar, yummy; then two soups in demi-tasse cups, a chicken broth and pumpkin soup; lobster lasagne, about 5cm square; 'the best steak ever'* on a beautiful risotto; and finally apple parfait for dessert, which had "Happy Anniversary" written on it in chocolate sauce, awwww...

It was the most delicious meal ever, with all the flavours so delicate and so different to each other. I have never had to use that much cutlery before, and the silver service was fun to experience (especially from a French waiter).

Oh to be fabulously wealthy so that I could eat there all the time!!!


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* Which is saying something, considering how much steak husband has consumed in his life.

Miff on Mars

Yes yes yes, I love science. And yes, I work in a nerdy institution - and I love it!

Yesterday I visited the Victorian Space Science Education Centre at which students can participate in a fully immersive 'Mission to Mars'. It is based at a public high school (Strathmore, I think?) and has only been open since July.

Students get a mission briefing and then split up into Mission Control and Astronauts. The astronaut kiddies dress up in full astronaut gear, including a blue tooth for communications, tools belts etc. and then go out onto a mock Mars landscape (created as realistically as possible). You even have to go through an air lock!

Here is me on the Mars landscape collecting bits of hematite. There were areas of perma-frost, soil to be cored and sampled, rocks to be chipped off and analysed, and satellite cameras to be set up. So cool.

The mission control kiddies had to give their astronauts instructions as to what to do. It was really well resourced (Govvie funding, of course) and would be such an awesome learning experience. I was jealous of the children!

Fascinator Fever

I'm starting to get a little scared about how serious Melbournians are about Melbourne Cup. Not really that surprising I suppose, after all we do get a public holiday for it (which I have to work on - the joys of operational jobs).

What is really frightening is the amount of hats, feathers and fascinators that are around. For the uninitiated, fascinators (as modeled by the scary mannequin) are those funny little cod piece shaped hats that you stick on your head using a comb. They are usually overwhelmed with feathers and bits of fluff.

I visited the big Spotlight at DFO yesterday* and got really confused and a bit disoriented as the store is exactly like the one in Queanbeyan back at home. There were feathers everywhere. I feel like I'm not really being a good Melbournian if I don't have my own fascinator.

It will be interesting to be here to see just how seriously it is regarded on the day. Should I wear a fascinator to work next Tuesday? Is it a faux pas to wear a fascinator outside of a visit to the races?

I'm not entirely clear as to whether I'm supposed to be more excited by the horses or the dressing up, but I'm trying really hard. I do find horses' penises funny, but I don't think that counts.

I had no idea that horse racing was a six week season of events. I've had it explained to me that first we have football, then we have horse racing, then we have cricket. Just like on channel ten - first we have Big Brother, then we have Australian Idol, then we have some other reality TV show that I'm likely to enjoy watching brainlessly.


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* I know I shouldn't shop at Spotlight as they are bad and evil and used the new IR laws to get rid of penalties for their poor staff, and instead gave them a 2c an hour pay rise.

Enough Already!

I have decided that there shall be absolutely no more funerals permitted this year. Even for a few years, that would be better.

The death of my uncle Peeter (good old Eesti's, always more vowels than they need) last Thursday was really not something I had even considered happening so soon - having been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer only in April and especially having seen him the night before.

There have been more funerals in my family this year than I have attended in the rest of my life, and I continually catch myself thinking "It's not fair" - which is ridiculous as it wouldn't be 'fair' to anyone, and it's not like it has been an intentional decision on anyone's part that this should happen (this view reflects my excellent Catholic schooling I suppose).

I also found myself thinking about my dad's recent battle with cancer and having the thought "I'm so lucky it wasn't me" - which again is ridiculous because it's not like there was a choice in the matter.

Feeling very drained and tired, and as much as I love my family, I'm really looking forward to spending time with husband in an empty house again. We have our one year wedding anniversary this weekend so are planning a nice evening out.