Monthly Archives: November 2006

Grrrrrr

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My day has been really ordinary.  Started this morning when it took about 40 minutes to drive to the Gabba instead of the normal 15 (didn’t know the cricket was on) on my way to the Qld Computer Group.  Got to the Gabba and saw a pedestrian hit by a car – happen right in front of me.  It was awful, and I am so glad the little guy was looking out the other side of the car when it happened. Pulled over and made Angel stay in the car.  Police and ambulance were called, and the guy was just lying on the road unconscious.  Cops arrived within about two minutes (they were all over the Gabba cos of the cricket), took eveyone’s details and told us to bugger off.  By the time I got to the QCG I was already a bit frazzled and shellshocked.  Found out they don’t actually stock the SD card that they advertised on their website, and they never did, they tried to fob me off with an inferior brand, which you can imagine impressed me no end.  Came home, wrote a complaint to the Office of Fair Trading about dodgy advertising techniques from nasty purveyor of computer bits, which of course will have no effect whatsoever.  After that I found one of those registered mail things in the letter box, made a special trip out to the post office to pick up what I thought was going to be the insurance cheque for the stolen computer, but was some stupid voucher thing.  Came home (again) and thought I’d try to relax for a bit with a DVD over lunch time while I embroidered on my pouch.  DVD was one I had purchased this week, and when I went to put it on, I found it has a unremovable security device in it (under the shrink wrap – go figure) that prohibits you from opening the case so I have to take that back to the store now to get it removed.  Starting to really feel like every little thing is deliberately trying to piss me off at today.  Grrrrrr!!!!   So add all that and crying baby (love it when  BigSal drops in unexpectedly) to the head ache I have had since yesterday, and it does not a happy chickie make.  Evening isn’t shaping up much better, am still babysitting for BigSal until about middnight, and have just found out that the Lord Byron gig i was planning on going to late tonight (http://www.myspace.com/lordbyronband) has been cancelled – so shaping up for a boring night.
 
Update:
After writing this just after lunch, BigSal convinced me to go out shopping with her – Revlon sale  😐  Never one to miss a twofer on nailpolish I went with her to Carindale for a bit.  Went shopping, bought a couple of new nailpolishes and some new lingerie, which normally improves ones day considerably but today couldn’t make a dent!  🙂  The insurance cheque had arrived just as I was leaving the house so there’s was even more running around done this afternoon, delivering said cheque to a different, hopefully more reliable and less dodgy,
purveyor of computer bits. Think I am still a bit shaken from witnessing accident this morning too.

In all… have had stupidly busy day in which very little was accomplished.  Situation is pretty dire – need to figure out how to unclench teeth and need wine …. lots of wine….    😐

Bane of my existence…

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By which i mean grocery shopping of course.  I hate it with a passion, and if i could outsource this particular God awful life administration task, I certainly would.  It’s an hour and a half of my life each fortnight, that I truly resent – fortnightly because the I find the idea of doing it weekly too horrifying a concept to contemplate! 

You’ve got your Dwardlers to navigate, these people seem to be here for ‘just for the experience’.  They dont know what they want.  They’re reading the fat content labels on the pasta sauce.  They’re clogging up the aisles trying to decide if $3.59/kg for laundry detergent is better value than $5.99 for 1.5kg – tell you what, if you can’t do simple math in youre head, bring a goddamn calculator!

Oh, and there’s always Nannas who seem unable to control their trolleys.  In all fairness, trolleys do seem to have a mind of their own, but you’d think the Nannas could make a little efffort not to ram it into my ankles while I’m waiting for some damn inconsiderate and indecisive cheese-challenged Dwardler to get out of the way!

Then there’s always some special little torture waiting for you:  they’ve discontinued your favorite salsa, the Fruit Tingles are no longer coming in a 4 pack, your preferred brand of yoghurt has been repackaged and you just can’t see it!  Or like  today’s bit of torment – there was no kangaroo steaks to be had – not even for ready money  😐

And then of course, there’s the vertiable plethora of Screaming Children  😐  What is it about supermarkets that cause children to misbehave.  Even my little Angel can become a handful at the supermarket.  Maybe it’s just because our attention is diverted, or maybe they truly are a place of angst for children – pretty cleverly marketed shiny things everywhere and you, Kid, can’t have any of it. 

Urgh the whole thing is so awful, by the time i get home and get everything squared away in the pantry etc, I feel totally traumatised…. and yet  strangely content knowing it is over for another fortnight.

Back to work on my pouch

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Sorry if this bores anyone who isn’t into SCA or medieval recreation etc.

I started an embroidery project about two years ago now. It’s an alms purse done in an Opus Anglicaum style of embroidery. The figurative work on it is done in a single silk tread in split stitch and the back ground was to be worked in coloured silk. Which is where i came to a grinding halt. The more I researched these purses, the more it appeared that that were largely worked with a background of gold thread and usually in an underside couching technique, which shit me to tears – as the gold looks horrid and flashy to my modern eye. It seemed logical that pieces like these would have been worked in coloured silk for people who couldn’t afford the more lush golden variant, but it seems evidence of these hasn’t survived. The project went on the back burner, and I haven’t picked it up since before Festival 2005 (so a good 18 months it has been sitting around).

opus anglicanum work

Recently one of our local embroidery laurels found an obscure reference to the use of coloured silk being used as a background to Opus Anglicanum style split stitch figures, done in a gorgeous lattice designed laid work stitch! Talk about excited. I have my hands on photos of the pieces (they’re in the V&A and to the best of our knowledge don’t appear in any publications), so I am off and running again. I’ve done a few little practice sections to see how I like the stitch and it’s going to look fabulous in Madiera 0511 Red! Works really quickly too – so hopefully I will be able to get it done quickly. Yay! I am so glad I held out and didn’t work the background in gold thread like they all wanted me to!

Five Tips

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Five tips for women….

1. It is important that a man helps you around the house and has a job.
2. It is important that a man makes you laugh.
3. It is important to find a man you can count on and doesn’t lie to you.
4. It is important that a man loves you and spoils you.
5. It is important that these four men don’t know each other.

Sent to me by my Mum!!!

Talk to me…

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My friend MD says I am a ‘dangerous and powerful’ person amongst our social group – and I have always put this down to his ridiculous innate paranoia! He bases this assessment on the fact that people seem to tell me things. I have no idea why – I would like to think it is cos my friends find me trustworthy and know they can rely on me for a frank and honest opinion on just about any topic. I always try to give people an objective opinion and I know for a fact that some of my friends rely on me being brutally honest with them from time to time. Even though I usually try to be tactful and diplomatic, it can often come across as harsh or uncaring. Naturally, this causes some people to flee when they hear things they dont want to.

Anyway, its true – people do tell me things, and while I am happy to help when someone needs a sympathetic ear for the regular ‘my boyfriends’ a prat’ speech, but lately it’s been going a bit far. I had a situation last night, where a friend (a recently revealed closet Drama Queen) who is in the middle of a relationship breakup called me saying that she was desperately unhappy and could I come over because her mother (who is in Sydney) was concerned she was ‘going to do something stupid’, and (her mother) was going to call the police if DQ hadn’t gotten someone over to talk to within the next 10 minutes. 😐

Firstly – “Good one Mom!” for buying into the bullshit! Secondly – Where do people get off dumping suicidal tendancies on me! And this isn’t even the first time it has happened. After ascertaining that DQ was largely trying to manipulate me into rushing over so she could spend the next few hours crying at me. I made a rather harsh call and told her that if she was seriously thinking about hurting herself or someone else, that she needed to call for professional help – that I am neither qualified, skilled nor knowledgeable enough about such things to assist. As I am not in a position where I would feel comfortable providing the level of support she required, I was therefore not prepared to accept responsibility for failing should I attempt to help her.

Well didn’t that cause a massive silence down the phone line… followed by a massive backpedal – ‘It’s not that bad, I’m not crazy or anything you know.’ Blah Blah Blah. So we went from being suicidally upset to reassuring me she is sane and coping okay. Good grief. I wanted to call the ‘Boy’ in question and make him deal with it. A kinda a “You broke it – You fix it” sort of thing, and for crying out loud, leave me the hell out of it. But luckily for him, I felt sorry for him and didn’t call.