Recently in Brain Dump Category

Consider this post, if you will, a physical expression of shaking the detritus out of my head, a la "time to clean out your hand bag... oh god, can't believe all that crap's in there etc."

1. Please... a baby doll dress, cute [tiny] shoes AND a black thick woollen winter tea cosy hat?  What were you thinking?
2. I'm now no longer a menace on the road and it only cost me $1100 to make it so.
3. I am continuously at the mercy of well meaning idiots... I would like to reach out to them... with a baseball bat... hard... probably more than once, even.
4. It's approaching that time of the month... yes, this could be a factor in the baseball bat impulse.
5. Soup night.  Tomato.  How long is the grace period on expired sour cream do you think?  If I'm not twittering tomorrow you'll know it wasn't 3 days...
6. My house still smells like last night's curry.
7. Cooked 3 nights in a row.  It used to be that cooking all week was a record... 3 DAYS?  I need help.
8. Potatoes won't bugger up tomato soup, they may even save it.
9. Only took my family 5 days to acknowledge my graduation... with the exception of Mum (aww, bless).  I definitely live too far away; either that or my achievements are considered insignificant... I'm opting for the former.
10. I find getting to the root of what someone needs from me next to impossible.  Dee 101.  Need a hug?  Good practice to say "Dee, I need a hug, would you be so kind?" Easy.  Does compute.  Other less direct means may yield mixed results.

I found this meme at Reflecting and thought it looked kind fun
I give you money and send you into the grocery store to pick up 5 items. You can only pick one thing from the following departments.. what is it?
Produce: Nectarines... or mangos. At least at this time of year.
Bakery: Wholegrain Rolls
Meat: Chicken Breast
Frozen Foods: Raspberries
Dry Goods: Weet-Bix

Let’s say we’re heading out for a weekend getaway. You’re only allowed to bring 3 articles of clothing with you. So, what’s in your bag?
Jeans
White Blouse
White singlet

If I was to listen in on one of your conversations throughout the day, what 5 phrases or words would I be most likely to hear?
Oh really?
Yeah, I know, it was on facebook.
Have you tried turning it off and then back on again?
I'll add it to the list.
I totally blogged it

So, what 3 things do you find yourself doing every single day, and if you didn’t get to do, you probably wouldn’t be in the best mood?
Get Coffee
Check my Blog Feeds
Did I say get coffee already?

You just scored a whole afternoon to yourself. We’re talking a 3 hour block with nobody around. What 5 activities might we find you doing?
Watching TV
Reading my RSS Feeds
Playing Scrabulous
Cleaning up the House
Yakking to the Fam on Skype

We’re going to the zoo. But, it looks like it could start storming, so it’ll have to be a quick visit. What 3 exhibits do we have to get to?
The Elephants
The Seals
yup, the bears

You just scored tickets to the taping of any show that comes on t.v. of your choice. You can pick between 4, so what are you deciding between?
Grey's Anatomy
Private Practice
Friends
CSI NY

You’re hungry for ice cream. I’ll give you a triple dipper ice cream cone. What 3 flavors can I pile on for ya?
OK - this is tricky... there are Ice Cream Rules...
Good Vanilla
Dark Chocolate
Raspberry, like really rich raspberry - but not sorbet.
Somebody stole your purse/wallet…in order to get it back, you have to name 5 things you know are inside to claim it. So, what’s in there?
Mobile Phone
Ipod mini. Green
USB Cable for Phone
USB Cable for iPod
Batteries for Noise Cancelling headphones

You are at a job fair, and asked what areas you are interested in pursuing a career in. Let’s pretend you have every talent and ability to be whatever you wanted, so what 4 career would be fun for you?
Concert Photographer
Backing Singer for Sting
Uni Lecturer
Painter (not of houses)

If you could go back and talk to the old you, when you were in high school, and inform yourself of 4 things, what would you say?
It gets better.
Losing a Friend is not the end of the workd,. there are others, and they are better.
You're only intimidated if you let yourself be.
Worry Less.

Tag, you’re it! If you decide to play along, leave a comment and I’ll come read your answers.

When you have made a commitment not to blog about work for the safety of your job and the high profile of the outfit you work for and the damage bad press could cause, you get really pissed off that you can't say a bloody word about being on the receiving end of a collective bollocking.

But you can say that some people are weird because to give someone who's just given you a bollocking a standing ovation is just plain twisted.

Isn't it?

I have a confession to make.

I haven't watched tv for months. Well, not in the usual sense.

I have cottoned onto this business of surreptitiously posted links to streaming tv, posted onto the interweb immediately after they've been broadcast and captured lovingly on digital units across the Pacific and reuploaded for the likes of me who appreciated being able to watch long before my cohorts and without advertising.

And if I'm not doing that I'm watching DVDs of my fav shows that I've bought at various times, or of movies I'm fond of and my tolerance for ads is getting reduced with every new episode I watch.

This is a dilemma, for as you know these shows would not exist without advertising and clearly to download dodgy tv isn't exactly the 'Christian' thing to do.

But the convenience outweighs these concerns for the most part and I am now abreast of all the developments in the latest episodes of Grey's, I'm addicted to Private Practice and for some reason I'm sold out to CSI:NY Season 4.

It's a consolation to me that I'll have something to look at during our notorious 'non ratings' period over the Summer and when the boxed sets come out of the above shows I'll buy them so that at some level those who produce the shows will be compensated for my illicit behaviour.

Of course, if iTunes Australia offered these shows I'd be paying for them. So it's about time they got their act together.

Harry and I are through; the relationship was good, very good but it burned itself out towards the end in a final blaze of glory.

Oh my goodness but the climax was worth the wait, yes it was.

Which basically translates as I was up until 2am finishing the book.

Which basically translates as I was a sleep deprived bitch at work today.

I'm serious about the deteriorating language and the blog authorities... Ed.

It didn't help that there was some power playing and politicking going on that caught me up in the crossfire. You'll get the idea of how I was affected by it I was when I tell you I threatened to resign and move back to NZ 3x today...

This is largely because I had the most delightful phone call from Woh Woh (aged 2) yesterday who, like my young squire, insists that in every play phone call he makes he is talking to me. Sometimes his mum let's him ring me just so that some days that's actually true. We chatted about Thomas (the Tank Engine) and Alfie, the excavator and blew kisses at each other across the Tasman.

But the mood indigo is also about the fact that I really need a break from work, it's been 6 months since my last time off, and as much as a trip back to NZ is always wonderful there really isn't much time for lazing on the beach and reading novels and actually switching off. Something an ISTJ like me needs a fair bit of...

Which is what I should be doing next week. Instead of studying.

So, I've decided to schedule the time to make sure there is some time out scheduled as well. I mean, I live at the beach, maybe I should actually go there...

Until then I'll keep breathing, and tonight I'll take a bottle of bubbles to dinner where I'll hang out with a couple of my favourite girls, talk about Macs and men and between us we'll solve the problems of the world. Until I go back into the storm in the morning.

Hopefully, if I sleep a little longer tonight than I did last night I'll float on the waves, however big they get.

Instead of sinking.

• Definition of Irritating: No Internet access at home for 72 hours...

• Definition of Ironic: Internet access fixing itself while I spent for 45 (FORTY FIVE) minutes waiting for Optus pick up the dang phone and not noticing that I was back online until the rep actually answered the phone and I had to go back to the laptop to attend to the issue...

• Definition of Mind Numbing: The onhold music at Optus.

• Definition of Incendiary: The effect that the Optus IVR (Integrated Voice Response - i.e automatic answering system) has on me to which I am usually heard to reply "I hate you, I hate you, I hate you". Seriously.

• Definition of Satisfying: New clothes, seen, tried bought and paid for in less than an hour... (doubly satisfying in that now, should the occasion arise, I've actually got something to wear.)

• Definition of Legendary: Having a boss who not only doesn't mind that a large part of my real job day was spent working on an outside (as in private, for my business) contract but who actually downed his own tools and solved my problem for me in HIS time...

• Definition of Close:Three people sharing a 1 bed apartment. And no, the three of us are not actually sleeping in that bed. I'm on the airbed on the floor. In the kitchen. Between the catfood and the trash can. Now THAT's close.

• Definition of Short: The time allowed when you only have 1/3 of a 50litre water tank's worth of hot water for your shower.

• Definition of Daft: Writing a blog post instead of sleeping at 23:38.

For background to this story see the original note
And the video response

So I came home the other evening to find every last parking space within reasonable walking distance from my home taken, with just one exception, a small block between two driveways which will fit my car from nose to tail.

I've parked here before and been objected to in person as apparently one can't just swing into the driveway 'willy-nilly' with my car there. I'd like to point out that I'm not encroaching on the driveways at all... but I am close to the edges and having been objected to before, I left this [admittedly, virtually illegible] note on my dashboard to cover my butt...

Clearly they didn't see it... this was under my windshield wiper when I got in the car the next morning.

Next time I'll just put a piece of paper under my windshield so everyone thinks I've already been barked at... Until then I'll keep posting these notes...

It makes me feel better.

It's funny how a chance comment will stick with you, turning over in your mind long after the conversation is over. I can't remember the exact words used but it was something like 'that's a very male response' because rather than respond with sympathy to a situation, I'd offered a solution (my standard response - dr*gs baby, lots of lovely dr*gs).

I don't think that my answer was right or wrong. It was what it was, but it got me to thinking about just how girly I am (or not) and why I may have responded as I did.

I've lived independently for 21 years now. That's a long time to be looking after oneself and in not having anyone rely on to come up with the solutions a girl's gotta look out for number 1 (much as it may pain her to do so at times). So, at first thought it would be easy to blame this independence for my answer.

It could also be because I don't have the sympathy gene, (except where it pertains to sympathetic upchucking). My first response to someone taking a tumble in the street is to laugh... don't get me wrong I'll wade in to help, but will have to suppress a giggle as I do so and I will continue to giggle about it long after the fall.

In a similar vein I'm hopeless in the face of cases of 'man-flu' because I'm such a 'get on with it' kind of girl. High pain threshold, feel the burn and work through the pain (no, clearly I've never given birth) and if it's good enough for me it's good enough for those around me. Which sounds as though I'm a hard arsed, hard nosed beeeatch which is actually not true.

On balance it could all come down the fact that I'm a farmer's daughter, bought up in a household where the man was hard and the woman, out of emotional safety, subjugated the princess to become a pragmatist. I've a strong dose of the pragmatist - a low tolerance for girly simpering and a high end practical bent. I can change a light-bulb, and a tyre without recourse to masculine help - and yes I can deal with spiders too. Bare Handed if need be.

Or it could simply be that I'm an ISTJ * who was doomed from birth.

Either way. Note to self.

Sympathy First.

(except in cases of obvious 'man-flu')

*terrifyingly accurate.