My Computer Has Died in the Behind

My desktop has died in the proverbial but. It has committed the ultimate sacrifice to save me from my blogging and emailing and will not work. But I am able to bypass this little sabotage and am using my teenage son's laptop. Just need to ignore the MSN messages that keep popping up and all the gruesome images and websites this computer is used to accessing. Fear not dear reader(s) I will return....better, stronger, faster. My computer will go to the computer hospital tomorrow and get repaired (I hope). I miss my mouse, these pads can be very sensitive to my trembling hands, and there is no delete key! What kind of keyboard has no delete key? I know, I am a dinosaur.

Diet has hit a glitch. Have gained 200g this week. Poopanola I say. As my brother tells me that is but a glass of water. OK, I can live with that. Am starting tennis again this week and will be playing another night in the week from next week so I will be trim, taught and terrific (but most probably exhausted).

It is getting colder now. Winter tomorrow (1/6) and I have the leccy blanket on our bed and getting into the flanny jammies. I know this will send you sex maniacs wild with desire but you can't go past flannelet in winter. You should see me go over to the chook pens in the morning with my flannelet nightie, beanie and big gum boots on. It is a sight to behold. I remind my Lovely Husband that it is my fashion sense that he was originally attracted to. He agrees......but does not make eye contact, do you think that means he could be agreeing just to shut me up? Naah.

It is also slow cooker time of the year. Oh yeah, love that device. Had to take the Young Negotiator to hockey game tonight, then pick up Dynamic Daughter from drama and then go back up the hill to collect son from hockey game. Come home and slow cooker has dinner ready. Excellent device.

I love singlets. I wear them all winter. Oh yeah, your vision of me just gets better and better. Flanny wearing, boot ensconced, crock pot using, singlet wearer!

Enough of this waffle, those MSNs from people with pretend names must be getting impatient by now. Will try and requisition this laptop again soon. (I quite like this keyboard even if it doesn't have a delete key).

Bubbles And Her Belly

Bubbles is about 18 years old. She is a miniature horse we purchased many years ago as a retired broodmare. The old girl loves people and children but her true love has always been food. We were so delighted with her that a couple of years later we purchased her daughter from the same stud. Her name is Champers (get it? Bubbles and Champers?).

When the children would take Bubbles for a walk and/or run she was so well behaved. If they stumbled and fell she always stopped and checked on them. Until they discovered this little trick and would fall on purpose. She no longer believes them.

As you can see from this old photo she will try anything to get to either food or people. Her daughter Champers still lives with us but I sold her to a teenage friend to help pay for the Piece of Poop (Waler mare) at the time.

About three years ago we packed up both horses and the dogs and took them to a small village agricultural show. The kids were entering the dogs in the pet show and my Dynamic Daughter was also entering Bubbles in the miniature horse show. Champers' owner was doing the same. Our minis enjoyed the day immensely and were beautifully behaved. This particular show was big on horses, especially miniatures and there were quite a few shaved and groomed to-within-an-inch-of-their-lives horses there. And then there was our little fat and woolly mammoths. Yes they had been groomed, Champers even had a bath. Bubbles' only fear is of bathing so she went with that dusty just-pulled-in-from-the-paddock look. The show horses were so fine and small and young. They were excited and frisky. Our woolly mammoths behaved like seasoned professionals (they were just older and calmer actually).

Champers' owner had been practicing jumping her and worked with her for a couple weeks before hand. The Dynamic Daughter sporadically had a go but Bubbles did not co-operate with the whole jumping thing. Why jump when you can walk around? It did not look good for her show prospects. The Dynamic Daughter was stressed and worried to the point where I threatened to pull them out of the comp. We were just doing this for fun afterall.

When our two little fatties got through the first round of jumps we were all thrilled. How lovely. As the jumps were raised and the horses dropped away we thought "any time now" and we would be out. When the jump was put to the highest we all knew that Bubbles would not make it. We were barely watching the Dynamic Daughter and Bubbles with any enthusiasm when that little horse sucked in her gut and sailed over that jump to come first in the open event. Holy Cow! Champers came third and we were all so excited. What a shock. This shaggy old horse from the paddock had some guts - in more ways then one.

Bubbles came third in the led event and so came home with two ribbons and a trophy for the handler for her efforts.

At the show our Cyclone-on-Legs (Staffordshire bull terrier) also had a win. He won ugliest pet at the show! He and the Young Negotiator (our son) won a show bag with lots of goodies in it for kid and dog. My father was so insulted by that when we told him later but we thought it very funny. Our sedative-on-legs (greyhound) won nothing but quite a few hearts. Some people asked about her, (she was wearing a promotional vest to encourage people to adopt greyhounds) and her behaviour was exemplary.

All in all it was a bloody great day. Beautiful country side, steak sandwiches were excellent and the animals enjoyed themselves immensely.

Another Wonky Egg

Check this out, another strange egg. Do we have a chook with a weird cloaca (bum)? It looks like whipped cream on top. Anyhoo, the egg has been sold and is probably eaten by now.

I Am Fit

It has happened. I have gained a reasonable state of fitness and am
feeling great. Since my brain injury I have tried many times to attain some
sort of fitness level but always with the same result, I 'crash and burn'
and I have significant fatigue for about a week. You may remember in a
previous post that I was using jam jars and oyster sauce bottles to
strengthen my arms and walking the hills in the paddocks. It worked. I
have progressed to hand weights I purchased from a discount store and my
walks have included my dirt road which has some good hill climbs. I can
do 4km and not die in the butt.

A friend asked me to go to the gym with her and we go one day a week now,
along with our teenage sons. I do cardio and resistance training for
about 70 minutes and as much as I am exhausted afterwards it feels great.
Our boys enjoy it as much for the socialising with each other as they do
the exercise.

I have enrolled in tennis lessons (for a second time) which I go to with
another friend one night a week. It is run by a fitness trainer who does
not allow anyone to stand still for long. We work hard for an hour and a
half and again I am exhausted but feel great. What an achievement, I am
so proud of myself. I do however feel as if I have created a new
discomfort. Instead of tennis elbow I feel as if I have tennis butt. I
suffer stiffness and pain the next day after I sit still for too
long. No pain no gain eh?

One last thing; I have joined an online weight loss program and have lost
4.2kg over about six weeks. Again I feel so proud. It is slow but
successful and I am learning a lot more about good eating than I thought
was possible. We all think we know what the right diet is but we can
always learn more, and I have. Again I have two friends doing the same
and it makes it so much more interesting and supportive.

Woohoo, I think I am getting more of my life back!! Concentration is still a
challenge but I can live with that. I have a job that I love and I like to think I do it well. I hope this does not sound like a lovefest about myself but I just
had to share.

Our Cyclone-on-Legs

We purchased our red Staffordshire bull terrier puppy in 2002. He was a bundle of energy and wrinkles with a heart as big as Queensland and his back legs ran faster than his front legs and would sometimes try to overtake them. Roger is a good little bloke who behaves beautifully at home with his family but goes into maniac mode if we get visitors or take him out of his home environment. There are legs to lick, people to jump up at and investigations to complete in as short a time as possible. Hence his "cyclone-on-legs" nickname. At home he is sensitive to emotions within the family. If the children were being lectured for misdeeds or a cantankerous computer being sworn at he would come sit at your feet with tail wagging furiously, ears down and those pleading eyes imploring you to forgive him on behalf of the children or computer.


Roger was a puppy that enjoyed chewing and he sampled the back door, the veranda, gumboots, pushbike peddles, and any unsuspecting soft toy was torn to pieces. When he was four months old we had a large excavation done in our back yard in readiness for a pool. There was a huge pile of rubble and dirt that the kids, and Roger, thought was a very exciting play area.

One morning my then eight year old son wandered out to make an inspection of the earth works with his small, metal framed glasses in hand (rather than on his face), as you do. When he returned there were no glasses and no memory of what happened to them. Having purchased them only recently and him due at school in 10 minutes we all searched frantically for them with no luck. I had no choice but to take my son to school with strict instructions to sit at the front of the class.

About an hour later I was hanging washing on the clothesline which was situated next to said pile of rubble when I felt a presence behind me. Our little bundle of wrinkles was walking calmly towards me, at this point I was unaware of anything in his mouth because he had yet to grow into his facial skin. He solemnly sat at my feet and carefully placed a set of small, metal framed, slobbery but undamaged glasses on the ground in front of me. He looked at me with those pleading eyes and sat quite still. I was stunned and then immediately thrilled. He was given much praise and attention for his brilliant action. "We have a genius" I thought, although my husband later declined the suggestion of flinging his glasses out in the paddock to see if he would retrieve them. Probably a wise decision. He has not done anything as incredible as that since but he gives us so much love and loyalty even with his his cyclonic behaviour. He talks to us in the way only staffies can. He hides in the car if our passenger door or the back of the station wagon is inadvertently left open in the hope of a ride. He moves furniture and pot plants with his big head rather than walk around them and has occasionally run headlong into the wall or a leg (ouch) while playing and not watching where he is going. He is a clown and a mate. He is Roger the Cyclone-on-Legs.

The Young Negotiator Returns!

He is back!! We heard nothing from him in all that time he was overseas, which was expected, until he reaches Australia and checks via text if we will be picking him up at our regional airport on time. Not "I'm back and I missed you" or "love you". Straight to the point. But that is OK. I got an extra long hug when we saw him. Loved it. He loved his trip. He bought souvenirs and maple syrup of course. He enjoyed the company of his team mates and coaches, he loved the tourist bits and the games of hockey. He enjoyed seeing snow for the first time in his nearly 17 years. All is good. Now he has to start saving for a car. It never ends does it?

Poor Peanunt Died Young

We just came back from our week of camping at the beach, had a wonderful time, ate well, walked a lot and laughed even more. But... the Old Cheese (my mother), who was looking after the place, had to break the news about Peanut this morning. Apparently a carpet snake ate the poor baby. I had placed the cage on an enclosed veranda with a lovely outlook. The Old Cheese was taking the cat out there to feed her and Cous Cous (the cat) nearly knocked my mother off her feet in an about face when she saw said snake on the floor of the veranda. This carpet snake did leave of its own accord, belly full and the bird cage empty. Very sad for us at the end of our holiday.