Free fertiliser!

Ok, so I admit that I probably don’t live in the best area. I don’t live in the worst area either. Currently, the best neighbours we have are the ones on our left-hand side. The house is empty.

On the other side of the empty house, there’s another house (duh). We know the blokes that are in there, and they’re ok. Not the sharpest tools in the shed. One of them can fix anything mechanical, and has looked at my car a couple of times, and fixed my dad’s problems with computers and stuff.

Well, about a week ago, they put up massive blue tarpaulin over their front decking. It’s connected to the gutter, and then it falls down over the decking, and down to the ground. It looks bloody horrible! Plus, the tarp’s not UV protected, so in another week or so, it’s just going to disintegrate.

I’m just setting the scene for you though, because what I really want to tell you about is their attempt at gardening.

Sounds fairly innocent, doesn’t it?

Two nights ago, we were all at the dinner table, and Mum says to me “have you looked in their front yard lately?”

Now normally, I’m pretty observant. Also, their house faces down the connecting street, so you can see it as you approach my street and turn the corner. But, I admitted that I hadn’t seen the yard.

And then she said, and I quote:

“They’ve got 3 ceramic toilet bowls in the yard, with plants in them.”

WHAT?!

Imagine, if you will, a fairly ordinary house, with a butt-ugly blue tarp hanging off it, and three evenly spaced, white toilet bowls with shrubs in them.

Can you imagine it? I didn’t. I did have a good look on the way home today. I was stunned.

They obviously think it looks good. The rest of us? Probably not.

Matt’s witty retort when he saw them?

“Now it’s a craphole, literally!”

Then the rest of us chipped in saying how the neighbours will be getting some free fertiliser. Ya know, because people will come along and poop in the toilet bowls.

I will have to try and get a photo of it, because I didn’t believe it until I saw it. And I’m sure you won’t either.

It’s good for a laugh… as long as it’s not in YOUR street!

Friday’s Feast #1

Bloggers seem to have certain things they do on certain days, I’ve noticed. Things on Sundays, Thursdays, etc. I used to do something like that, but never seriously.

Well, ladies & gents, I bring you my “day of the week” item - Friday’s Feast.
In their own words, Friday’s Feast is a “buffet for your brain”, and each week, their “chef” cooks up 5 new questions! Awesome! It’s a meme, but because I have no idea what that means, either you can forget about this sentence, or someone can kindly fill me in. Whatever works.

Here’s week one, folks!

Appetizer
Who is the easiest person for you to talk to?
Probably my other half, because he’s so loving and patient and lets me bitch about everything. Everyone else tells me to shut up after awhile… no fair!

Soup
If you could live in any ancient city during the height of the quality of its society and culture, which one would you choose?
Maybe the with the North American Indians. They were/are pretty awesome. Ancient Greeks = homosexual and war-mongers. Ancient Romans = war-mongers. Ancient Egyptians = slave drivers. Yeah, I’ll stick with the Indians.

Salad
What is the most exciting event you’ve ever witnessed?
Uh. That’s a good one. I can’t think of anything straightaway. I could be sappy and say when Matt proposed?

Main Course
If you were a celebrity, what would you do for a publicity stunt?
Be drug and alcohol free, without rehab. I’ll also do everyday things, like wear underwear, and drive my car without crashing into things. I will be one-of-a-kind. Boring, but stable. And rich, hopefully.

Dessert
What do you consider the ideal age to have a first child?
Probably mid to late-20’s. Enough time to get the whole “I’m young.. party!” thing over and done with… settle down, achieve what you want in your career (to a point), find some suitable DNA, I mean, husband…

Taking the first step.

Because the first step is admitting you have a problem.

I am on PayPal now, because I checked my credit card balance today, and compared it with my statement that came  in the mail today.

Forget alcohol, drugs, or sex, I think I might be addicted to eBay.

Because, I kid you not, I have racked up $120 worth of purchases in just 5 days. FIVE DAYS!

And that’s without the other $80 I withdrew to see me through the week, because my pay ran out. Stupid bills.

AND I KEEP LOOKING AT EBAY!!! Make me stop!!!

Considering I have been too security conscious to even LOOK at eBay until last Sunday, and considering I am a wimp and won’t even sign up for phone banking… eep.

And I just hope my tax return arrives in the next 14 or so days, so that I can whack a bit of money off this card.

My eBay addiction is jeopardising “The List”, people. How am I going to halve my credit card debt if I keep spending?!

At least PayPal has verified my savings account now. That should make me calm down a bit with the bidding.

But damn!

Some of this stuff better start arriving in the mail soon. I will make sure I do not buy ANYTHING else until I get all my purchases in the mail.

(Well, that’s what I’m telling myself.)

Frustrated? Me? No, not I…

So, I’m at work… feeling disillusioned, and trying not to do anything productive. Well, I’ve done SOME work, but that’s what’s got me feeling disillusioned.

For those not working in the building industry, I’ll have to explain a little bit, so bear with me.

We use a construction program called DataBuild. It does everything. You can use to create jobs, the estimator uses it to create purchase orders and estimate job costs, you can see what stage the houses are up to, and you can use it to enter invoices and pay suppliers. You enter the invoices against the purchase orders, and they balance (provided you’ve been charged the right amount).

Pretty nifty, wouldn’t you say?

Well no, not for a while. The program was riddled with tons of bugs, always crashed when you tried to print something, and was a general pain in the ass. We spent thousands of dollars on it, upgraded it, and set up a system so that we could back up our work.

(Because, imagine our surprise coming in on a Monday morning, and realising over the weekend the entire server crashed and we’d lost TWO WHOLE WEEKS worth of work.)

Now, it runs pretty well… only the slightest hiccup here and there.

In April, as you know, the Dragon Lady started (or as I’ve started referring to her, “the bitch”, “old bag” and “it”.) She hasn’t worked in construction before, hence, had no idea how to use the program. She has no willingness to learn, either, because she started entering some of the entities in MYOB. Fair enough… the smaller companies are easier to keep track of that way.

Now, she’s in charge of the accounts for everything, and she’s decided (and convinced the boss) to put the main business into MYOB. Which has no job control. Which you can’t use to estimate costs. Which you can only use to enter invoices and pay suppliers. Yuh huh.

Fair enough, I hear you say, because won’t that keep the books running more efficiently?

For her, yes. For me, the one who actually ENTERS the invoices? No.

Why?

Because now I have to do everything TWICE!!!

I have to enter invoices into the construction program, to keep track of the jobs (which comes in handy when I have to make an insurance claim… but that’s another story), and then I have to re-enter the same invoices into MYOB!

Oh, and by the way, for those interested, it actually takes me more time to enter all the specifics into MYOB… than to just punch in the job number in DataBuild and have everything just come up, then hit the enter button.

But for she upstairs who wields the cheque-writing pen, there’s no problem. Hmmph.

So now, a chore that would take me, oh, maybe 15-20 min, will take at least an hour to do. And that’s if I’m on track and enter all the invoices as they arrive in the mail. Every. Day. If I get behind… then I’m stuffed.

I’m just going to take my time with it, and when the boss demands why a few other things are falling behind, I can just say: “well, it takes me forever to do the invoicing, since I have to do it TWICE, so everything else has to wait.” That will go down very well. I’m also going to have a chat to him about all the work I have to do for his new Irish Community Association. I think the concept, and the Association, is great. What I don’t like, however, is that they can’t hire someone yet to do the administration for it, so my boss comes over about 10 times a day and gets me to do most of the stuff for it (because just about all of it is emailing, and he doesn’t know how to use a computer). So, the work I’m supposed to do for the company (that I’ve been hired to do) is getting pushed aside because I need to do his volunteer work. What’s his priority? I’m not superwoman, unfortunately, and I can’t do ALL the company stuff and the Irish stuff at the same time.

And I have nothing against the Irish. They’re awesome. I actually have Irish blood in me, so don’t tell me I’m anti-Irish.

It’s stressing me out. And I’m not getting paid enough to be doing all this, anyway. But, no point in asking for a pay rise, because it’ll never happen!

OHMIGOD!!!

I am currently beside myself!

I just bid on my very first Ebay item - and won!

And I’ve already paid for it and will be twiddling my thumbs waiting for it to arrive. Sent to my work’s PO Box, so I’ll be able to rip it open first thing in the morning.

Ahh, bliss.

I’m getting the first CSIRO Wellbeing Diet cookbook. It retails for $30AUD. I paid $19.05AUD.

Whee!

The adrenaline rush that ensued as I constantly refreshed in the last minute, hoping that nobody else outbid me… was awesome. I can see how this is addictive!

I will have to behave myself!

Although, by the looks of it, Ebay is great for getting scrapbooking items for below RRP. I will definitely be having a look again… soon!

Aww…

I love my man… very much! 

Matt just gave me $20. Which is nice, because I’m broke. Flat broke. Again.

He said he could have bought me flowers with it, but all I’d be able to do is look at them. So he said he’d rather me have the money, and I can buy myself something. And I’m not allowed to give it to anyone else.

How cute!

Also cute: this picture I took of us last night as we were heading out to dinner:

Matt doesn’t like having his photo taken very often… so this is the first photo of the two of us in nearly 6 months!

Whee! I now have something else to scrapbook!

New hair, new furniture, new cold!

Ahh!

New stuff! Gotta love it…

First of all… I’ve got a cold. Well, I hope it’s just a cold… it’s just my nose giving me trouble at the moment, so I’m hoping it doesn’t get any worse. I’ve had to take it easy the past couple of days (no gym) and I feel really lazy and drugged up.
(I think I’m the only person I know who takes Sudafed and then is totally wasted for the whole weekend!)

Secondly, I had my appointment at the hairdressers yesterday, to get my hair recoloured. I was going to keep it red, but then I felt like doing something different. So, I had my regrowth dyed darker (natural blonde, see?), a nice browny colour. I had to wait 35 minutes for that, then had it washed out. Then, I confronted my biggest hairdressing fear, the dreaded STREAKING CAP… and I’m still alive to tell the tale! It didn’t hurt as much as I thought it would. One, because they’re professionals and know how to get the hair on the hook and out the cap without stabbing your scalp fifty-bazillion times, and two, because my hair is pretty short. Then I had bleach put on. Awesome. I took pics.

The first picture is when I had my hair done red in June, and the second one is from yesterday’s visit. Which one do you prefer?

That’s a new top I’m wearing as well. Flutterbys!

While I had the camera out, I got a little snap-happy. I managed to take photos of myself from just about every angle (yeah, I even got one of the back of my head - how useful!), and then I remembered about my super-swanky floor lamp. It’s a little hard to describe (although I have tried), so I got a picture of that, too! You will also see one of my many frangipani items on the wall, along with our cabinet (which we got for FREE!), my messy unmade bed, and my purple wall. Classy!

No, that’s not the last of the photos, if you’re wondering. One more, I promise! Then I’ll go back to my sneezing fit and leave you in peace.
I’ve had quite a few requests to see my engagement ring… and I finally got a decent picture of it. Seriously, you wouldn’t believe how many times I’ve tried (and failed) to get a good picture.
Anyway, here it is, and please excuse the chipped nail polish:

Ok… that’s it. I’m bored. I’ll be back with more useless stuff later.

I just beat myself with a stick.

Well, I should have, really, because that’s about the level of pain I inflicted on myself after updating my resume. How painful! I only had a hard copy of it, and it was a year old, and desperately needed updating.

Not only did I have to retype everything, I had to design another layout (I was sick of the old one), and then recap the past year. That’s not so painful, I hear you saying, because how much can change in a year? Well, I changed jobs. Not only did I change jobs, I changed industries. I went from retail to administration. Checkout chick to office bitch, I guess you could say. I also had to update my education side, because I started off doing one course, changed to another, and then got upgraded to a traineeship.

Did I say painful? Yeah.

It is now done. Updated. Completed. Finito.

I am also quite good at talking myself up, if I may say so myself. Err, does that make sense?

Instead of going: “I volunteered for the Salvos, I did this, this and this.” I went:
“Helping the needy in my community by becoming a volunteer improved my confidence and self-esteem, as well as further developed my communication skills. During my time at the Salvation Army, I assisted with the fortnightly market stalls and sausage sizzles. I also sorted and stored donations, put together emergency food parcels, and did relief reception. Sadly, when I commenced full-time work, I was unable to continue my volunteering on a regular basis; however I still like to help out when on holidays. In December 2006 I helped prepare toy and food parcels in the first few days of my Christmas break.”

Does that impress you? I think I might have impressed myself with that… oh dear. I need to get out more.

And in my “interests and activities” section?
“I enjoy activities that inspire me creatively and stretch my imagination. Hobbies of mine include scrapbooking, reading, writing, cooking and photography.”

They don’t need to know that I’m into photography purely so I can have something to scrapbook!

“The List” - and things pink in nature

So, for those of you who read Aly’s blog, you will know that she has a “List” as well. Hers is a list of things she wants to accomplish before she flies out to London on Christmas Day. One of the items on the list is to buy something pink, and wear it without cringing.

Because I am now a very good friend of Aly’s, I want to help. I’m sending some recipe books down to her, and I thought “hey, I should send something pink down, and she can take a photo of herself wearing it, and then I’ve helped her cross something off the list!” We made a deal, and she’s going to do it.

The conditions are: I will send something down, she will wear it, and take a photo as proof, which she will then post on her own blog. I’ve spoken to one of our other good buddies, who wants to make a slight amendment to that.

Aly, Mel (see, I dobbed her in so you can have a go at her… hehe) said that the photo should be taken in public, in front of a “landmark”, say, a McDonalds, to prove that you actually wore it in public, not just around the house. Sounds good to me! Now my other half KNOWS I’m totally mental…

Oh, and before I pop it in the post, I’m going to take a photo of me with the pink item. So I can be even more involved in the whole debacle.

Oh, and one other thing…

Last December, Aly had her… “shoe month”, I guess you could call it. Every day she posted in that month, she took a picture of a pair of shoes she owns, with her feet in said shoes. I thought it was very cool. I thought I’d do the same. But then I stopped and thought for a minute, and realised that my handbag collection is much more impressive. My feet, not so much.

Without further ado, I now declare September will be “Handbag Month”! Yay!

And, the best part is, I’ve probably got enough handbags to go for 2 months!

Dyslexics Untie!

Gotta laugh at lawyers… and their fancy prose.

I actually read a letter my boss got from his solicitor. Normally I just file it away or whatever my boss tells me to do, so I don’t bother reading. Well, I actually had a few minutes spare, and what can I say? I was curious.

My boss’ daughter is buying/has just bought a new house. The letter was in relation to that, and saying that she needed to get the contract certified by a JP. Fair enough, I thought.

Let me give you a brief description of this lawyer. He’s probably in his 40’s, with glasses, well-to-do, drives a late model car (as they all do). Also, whenever he comes into the office, he starts giving me orders, eg. “Copy this” etc. I also caught him looking at my boobs once. Was not impressed. Very unprofessional, don’t you think?

Anyway, as I read on, the lawyer mentioned that his secretary had made a mistake in drawing up the first lot of documents. The next sentence was:

“Please excuse my dyslectic secretary and please re-sign…”

To which I promptly pissed myself laughing.

Maybe he should have gotten his poor secretary to do a spell-check, because I do believe the word he meant to use was “dyslexic”.

It made me wonder who this secretary’s mentor is.

Now, you will all know by now that I am a spelling freak, I just cannot stand to see a word spelt incorrectly. Normally, if I see a mistake, I let off a frustrated sigh, correct it in my head, and move on.

Well folks, this is the first time I’ve seen something spelt wrong, and dissolved into a fit of giggles.

I will now read EVERY letter this guy sends, because believe it or not, “dyslectic” made my entire Thursday that little bit more bearable.

I sent an email home to remind myself to blog about it. The note I wrote myself?

“dyslectic secretary!!!! bahhahahah!”

Is that sad?