Falling In Law-ve With You

Does anyone else come back from their in laws absolutely exhausted? I always do because I feel like I'm walking on eggshells the whole time I'm there. The MOTH Parents and Brother aren't my biggest supporters and I'm the type of person who likes to be liked so I always feel like I'm on my guard the whole time I'm with them so I say the right thing, and more importantly, don't say the wrong thing. They don't give me a horrible look if I say the wrong thing or anything, don't get me wrong, this is on me, not on them, but once again, I want them to like me because they are the most important people in MOTH's life besides me. And if I do say the wrong thing, I get that bad feeling way down deep in my tummy and wonder how long my comment, that wasn't said to offend, just said without thinking or said because it is my actual opinion on something, will be held against me. (Once again, maybe they don't like the comment for a minute and then they forget it and don't hold it against me, I don't know for sure either way, but I hold on to it and worry about it.) I hope it gets to the point where a) they do like me or b) I get over caring what they, or anyone else think about me. It gets a bit overwhelming and I ruin the night for myself because MOTH just walked in and said what a nice night he thought it was and I'm sitting here wondering if this stupid comment I made to his brother about a grudge he held against me for two years over a lighthouse in Hawaii will now make him (Bob, the brother) mad at me for another 2 years when we have been getting along really nicely for the past few months. Then MOTH asked me if I was bored there at the end of the night and I burst out crying, because I had just been writing this and when he said it, I thought, "Great, I wasn't bored, but if I looked it, there's another tick against my name." (Luckily he cleared it up by saying I didn't look outwardly bored, he just knows me well and was wondering, but even if I had been bored, no one else but him would've been able to tell so Phew! bullet that wasn't even a real bullet has been dodged and one less thing about tonight I have to stress about.) Ugh, I do it to myself, but at the same time, if I didn't know that they didn't really like me, I wouldn't feel like I'm having to prove myself every time I see them. Anyway, I think it's time I called it a night. Feel free to share any in law stories or mishaps with me to cheer me up! (By this I mean PLEASE, PLEASE share any in law stories or mishaps with me!)

But I Can See You, Your Brown Skin Shining In the Sun

Hi, My name is D and I'm getting kind of old, I'm practically married, and I'm boring. At times to realize those three things about myself kills me, but this weekend I wouldn't have had it any other way!

Friday night MOTH Dude brought home a pizza that we scarfed down while watching NCIS (man, do I hate that show!) and Law and Order SVU. I think we were both passed out by 11:15.

Saturday we were up by 9 and I headed off to the RTA to get my car registered while MOTH went and borrowed his parents' lawn mower. After the RTA, I went grocery shopping and came home to clean out the fridge (ick) and make bruschetta for lunch. MOTH Dude worked for hours on the front and back lawns and came in exhausted just before sun set. We took a ride out to the local light house and then to our favorite local beach where we spotted 2 whales just as it was getting too dark to see. When we got home, I made us a delicious dinner of garlic shrimp and scallop pasta and we had some fancy ice cream for dessert. After watching a movie that ended at 8:30, I hopped in to bed and looked at funny wedding ideas and MOTH came in and we had the lights out and were passed out at about 10:30.

Sunday MOTH decided not to go to church so he sat outside in the sun reading while I baked chocolate chip banana bread and finished the last of our laundry. It was only about 11:30 when I finished so I made us a quick lunch and we got in to our bathing suits and laid out for a few hours. Aussie Bronze-a-thon 2010 has begun! Later in the afternoon, I went in to do my weekly baking to take to the grandparents' house and then we headed out for our weekly drinks with our friends.

So yeah, riveting stuff right? I know it wasn't because I lived it. And while Saturday was a pain in the ass with all those chores to do, I wouldn't have traded that Sunday with my Boo for anything!

Oh wow, ok, I'd better get going as it's 10 to 9(pm) and I still haven't started dinner (Sloppy Joes-you Aussies don't know what you're missing!) and whenever MOTH gets in, he'll starving and I'll feel bad for not having it ready.

Tomorrow night is our monthly family dinner with just MOTH's parents and brother and maybe his new gf so woohoo! no cooking for me(although after just seeing them last night at the grandparents' weekly dinner, all this family time does get a bit overwhelming)! Sunday is Father's Day in Australia (though isn't it weird that Mother's Day is the same day in both places??) and we have no idea what to get the MOTH Dad. Would love any gift suggestions for the man who doesn't have a whole lot of hobbies (other than gardening and I think we've already bought him every gardening related thing over other birthdays and Father's Days) and is super hard to shop for!

I've Been Workin On the Railroad

I mean a call center is kind of like a railroad, right??

I'm sorry my life has been boring lately. Well, I've done some fun stuff like the hanging with Turk and Stylez on Friday night and then the big camp oven dinner with our main group on Saturday night, but when I get home most nights I'm too tired to put pen to paper, so to speak, and share it with you all.

So here is a quick recap of the weekend and my life in general:

My Car- I have finally paid MOTH Dude back for the car itself and for the transfer fee. I was feeling good, like I was nearly out of debt, and only had to pay him back for Third Party Insurance ($533), when my car needed to be inspected to get it re-registered ($36), then MOTH's Mom was in a tizz that I didn't have comprehensive insurance ($473), which I had been planning on getting but had kept forgetting to sign up for, plus the actual cost of re-registering the car (which I'm told could be around another $400) so now I'm back to owing MOTH Dude nearly as much as I paid for the damn car! The speaker on one side is really tinny and fuzzy so I think it is on it's way out and will need to be replaced and MOTH's Dad thinks it could use some new tires. This is all I see right now: $$ followed by this (-) symbol in my bank account.

Friday- I raced home after getting off at 3:30 (gawd, I hate those early morning wake ups, but love being done with work with a few hours of sunlight left) and stopped at the store because I wanted to make Mud Pie to bring for dessert at T and S's. Then I traveled out to Gosford (about 40 minutes away) and got lost a few times before finally making it to Stylez's parents' house. I wish I could've seen it during the day- they are right on the water and apparently have a sail boat and everything! They have great style, too, so I see that it is something Stylez inherited. It was a pretty mellow night and nice to sit around and catch up with them for awhile. I love seeing them in their new role as parents, but it's also refreshing to see that being mom and dad doesn't define them, etiher. At 11, my eyes were getting super heavy and I knew we had a long drive ahead of us so we hit the road.

Saturday- MOTH and I slept in until about 9 and then MOTH went to look at a car he was thinking about buying. He brought it back to the house and my opinion was that we shouldn't get it. I thought he was mad at me for saying so, but when I told him that when he got back from dropping it off, he said he wasn't at all and that he valued my opinion and that's why he asks for it (awwww). We then hit up the farmers market and had lunch in the sun at a place across from the market. After that we drove home and I passed out for a nap. MOTH read out in the sun for awhile, before coming in and passing out, too. I got up and made these cookies that everyone LOVED. I was so surprised because sometimes our friends seem to be so-so on the desserts I make, even the ones that are a hit back home, but no one could get enough of these cookies so I highly recommend them. I doubled the dough recipe, still only used 1 cup of dark chocolate chips, and broke about 15 oreos in to 4ths or 5ths. When the cookies were ready, we headed over to Croc and the Teacher's place and I'm usually not big on camp oven dinners, but they have perfected their recipe! The chicken was well seasoned and perfectly cooked and the Teacher made homemade stuffing, the only I've had since I've lived in Australia and it was so yum! Everyone else was raving about the roasted beef and MOTH said the same, that they have really perfected their technique because it was the best he's had so far. It was good to catch up with everyone and have us all together in a group, since we hadn't really done so since Baby Lo's birthday in July. We told some ghost stories and kept warm by the fire until about 12:30 and then MOTH and I headed home.

Sunday-MOTH slept in until about 10. I got up at 8 and called my Mom for our weekly chat, which is something I always look forward to. Have I mentioned how she and my Dad won us a wedding cake a few weeks back at a charity event? They bid on it in a silent auction and got it for a great deal. It's a 3 tiered cake and the lady has even been on Oprah and Mom said that the cake is delicious, as well as good looking. After MOTH got up, I headed to the grocery store and he finished up some work. We then went down to the Dam Motel for our weekly Sunday drinks with our friends, though this week it was only Croc and the Teacher, as Tinkerbell, the Farmer, and Junior were at a family barbecue. We talked a lot about Croc and the Teacher's upcoming road trip to Cape York, which is at the very top of Australia in far north Queensland. It sounds like a big trip and an exciting adventure for them! After we had had a few drinks (including the worst margarita I had ever had-it tasted like the guy had poured that liquid smoke flavoring in it-gag!) we headed home and just had a relaxing night in front of the tv.

So that was my week in a nutshell. I've got a couple of early morning shifts over the next few days and I'm hoping to come home and walk on the beach. We don't have anything planned for the weekend yet except for some major cleaning as our property management company is coming in to inspect us in a week or so's time. I'm sure something will come up for us to do and if not, it will be nice to veg out at home with my Boo. Hope you're all having a great week, wherever you are, whatever you are doing.

Good Morning (Head)ache, You're Like an Old Friend Come and See Me Again

Monday was my last day of training and by the end of the day my head was killing me to the point where I was feeling nauseous. I was ready to go home and hoped that I wouldn't have to pull over and puke on my drive home. MOTH Dude had his late night meeting that night so I went home and slept for an hour and woke up feeling better, even more so after I had a nice, hot shower. I made us a really good dinner and was just finishing it up when MOTH got home. He had some exciting news about a tentative job offer he had received for after his current contract is up, but he also had to create a mini website as proof of what he was capable of...that night, even though he hadn't gotten home until 9:30!

After dinner my headache really started to kick in again so I wished MOTH good luck and passed out. He came to bed at 12:45 (poor guy) and woke me up on accident. My head was still really hurting, but I figured I just needed good, solid sleep and I would be fine in the morning. We both got up at 5:30 (once again-poor guy! I don't know how he survives on so little sleep) and while he got in the shower I laid in bed willing my head to stop hurting and my tummy to stop churning. Eventually MOTH Dude had to leave for the train and I decided there was no way I'd be able to sit in the loud call center all day and talk to customers with my head like it was so I got back in to bed and then called in sick once the center opened. Company policy is that I don't get any paid sick days for the first year (I think) and if I take any time off, I have to provide a sick note.

So after calling in sick and sleeping a bit more, I went to find a medical center that would take walk-ins. After being turned away at one nearby, I went to one further away, where I had been treated for my awful spider bite last year. They said they only took walk-ins when it wasn't busy (and just my luck, it was) BUT that she had an appointment time for 10 minutes from then*! I saw the doctor and explained to him how I get migraines, but that this wasn't as bad as a migraine, just below the level of one, and that I had had it for 16 hours. He asked if I was feeling achey and I have been and so he told me he didn't think it was a migraine either, but the start of the flu. Which thinking about it now, makes sense since two of the girls in my training group have been super sick over the past week. Anyway, off I went with my doctor's note excusing me from work for yesterday and today and a prescription for some hardcore codeine pain pills. I picked up my prescription and some ginger ale and have been lying in bed pretty much ever since.

I made MOTH dinner last night and had a tiny bowl and was starting to feel ok. I woke up today with a bit of a headache and decided that since I had the doctor's note that covered today, as well, I might as well use it to my advantage and take some more meds and rest it off, which I am glad I did because my headache has been fluctuating in intensity all day and the queasiness is back...fun! Hopefully I'm feeling better tomorrow since I don't have a doctor's note for then and because it's another 5:30 wake up day since work starts at 8. I'm excited to see how my first day on the phones go and don't want to ruin it with a headache or nauseousness. I can't even take my meds tomorrow, if I do wake up with a headache, since the codeine makes me a little loopy and really sleepy. Anyway, I guess this was a long, boring post just to say I've been sick...sorry! Might have more exciting things to write about after the weekend since we are maybe have dinner with Stylez and Turk on Friday and having a non-election party on Saturday night with the group.

Looks like it might be meds and nap time...Oh wait, did my neighbor just decide to start sawing outside my window?? Awesome!

*How great is it that a) I got the appointment b) I only had to wait about 15 minutes past the appointment to see a doctor and the whole waiting room was PACKED and c) since I now have an Australian Medicare card, I saw the doctor for $20 and that was all I'll ever have to pay? Note to America: A nationally subsidized healthcare system can work and can work really well!

I Don't Care How Fat or How Skinny, Just Give Me Something To Love

I have survived training at work and even my first, full day on the phone! With the end of training comes a new schedule and some days I will be off at 3:30 so I think it is time to put my free gym membership to use. I won't say I've ever enjoyed the gym, but I do feel accomplished and proud of myself when I make it a regular part of my routine. LC just posted the pictures she took from the sand dunes last weekend and there was a shot of my ass that made me never want to eat again and with our engagement party 2 months away, I'd like to like the pictures of myself from that day so yeah, me and the gym need to become good friends again!

The Song of the Gremlin

Hey All (or Few, which ever the case may be)! I had my first major assessment at work today to see if I'd be competent to go on the phones and start taking real calls this afternoon and I was, but didn't feel like it! I like being really good at everything and when you're brand new at something, you typically aren't going to be really good at it yet so it has been hard for me to let go of being perfect and to just trust myself that I know what I'm supposed to be doing and just do it. Doing the real calls this afternoon was nerve wracking and my first call was a big mess because the person who had helped the customer before didn't set stuff up right so it really threw me off my game, but the next 3 calls I took, while maybe a bit clunky in delivery, turned out alright. We have more training this week and then Monday we will be on calls all day so I will get lots of practice then!

Have I mentioned we bought me a car? We got a super sweet deal on a 1996 Subaru Impreza and it's got low mileage on it, air con, and is an automatic so I'm a happy girl. MOTH Dude bought it and offered to just buy it outright or pay for half of it, but since we got it for such a good deal, I told him I'd pay him back the full amount. It's not very much money to pay back, BUT it feels kind of cool to make my first big purchase and pay it off with all of MY own money. I feel like a grown up kindof.

We have not really been up to much around here. MOTH Dude and I both seem to be exhausted from work on the weekends and taking it easy. We did go up to the Stockton Sand Dunes with Bob Marley, LC and Lo on Sunday to test out Bob's new 4 wheel drive. It was a lot of fun. We did a little bit of sand boarding and I had two big stacks and hurt myself on the first one. Luckily there were no broken bones, but I reckon I've bruised some deep tissue inside my boobs and I think I jarred my jaw a bit because it hurts pretty badly when I yawn. I also managed to knock the wind out of myself. I didn't learn my lesson though because I took a running leap down another hill, only to not have the board slide down the hill with me! Oh well, something for everyone else to laugh about, I guess :)

So anyway, on to the reason my post is titled what it is: At work there is a girl who works as a hairdresser on the weekend and she met up with one of her other friends who is a hairdresser on Sunday for dinner. Her friend tells her this story and when she told it to us at our work on Monday morning, I was dying! It seems her friend was working on a client when the client received a call from her mentally disabled teenage son while she was in the middle of having her hair dyed. Her hair was up in the foils and just waiting to set when he called and said, "Mom, Mom, Mom! I've caught a gremlin!" And the Mom says, "What do you mean you've caught a gremlin?" And the son says, "I caught a gremlin Mom, don't worry, I saw it and I caught it." So the Mom starts to get really nervous and tells the hairdresser she needs to rush home, right away, no matter that her hair is still in the foils. The Mom gets home and looks all through the house for her son and the "gremlin" but can't find them. Finally, she goes out to the garage where she finds her son and his gremlin, which turned out to be there postman who is a midget! The son was proud and said, "See Mom, I told you I caught a gremlin!" The Mom untied the postman who was not too happy about the situation and apparently he is now going to sue the family!

While the whole suing the family is not funny and while it must have been a very embarrassing situation for the postman, I just laugh every time I think of how proud the son must have been when he showed his Mom the "gremlin" he had caught!

Rude Boy Don't Cry

So today I was excited because I didn't have to wait for MOTH Dude to get home from church to go and do our weekly grocery shopping, I could just hop in his Mom's car and head down when I wanted and I didn't have to rush looking for work clothes since I was by myself. It was nice to have that freedom of just hopping in a car and going where and when I liked. I have really missed that independence. That independence will continue indefinitely now because yesterday MOTH Dude and I ended up buying the car we had gone with his parents to look at. (Well, I guess we haven't technically since we haven't got the car yet or given the guy the money, but we said we'd take it and it's ours when the guy is ready for us to take it, which will hopefully be sometime over the next few days.)

Anyway, as exciting as that was/is, that's not what this post is about. So yeah, I go down to our local mall to look for work clothes and do grocery shopping. I am all stoked because I end up finding tons of tops that I want for work and only go over budget by $10-$15 dollars. I got a bit overheated trying so many clothes on in the dressing room so I was a bit flustered as I was wondering around Target looking for dress socks for MOTH Dude when I ran in to Croc and the Teacher, but we had a good chat and made plans to get a drink later. Then I get my grocery shopping done and I spent about $50 less than we normally do so I was feeling good about that. I picked up some lunch to bring back for us and I head out to the parking lot to load up my groceries and zip home to bake cupcakes for Sunday Family Dinner. I get to the car and pull my cart close in so it's not in the road and someone is pulling in to the empty spot next to mine and it's a minivan and the woman is having a bit of trouble getting in to her spot. Then I hear her husband, in the passenger seat, say something like "It's because of how this idiot next to us has parked." I say "Sorry" just on reflex and think, "Geeeeez, that guy is RUDE" and then I think "Hang on, I double checked when I pulled in to this spot that I was between the lines so I wouldn't inconvenience anyone and I was able to get out of my car with a car next to me easily, what is this guy's problem?" So I double check, and sure enough, I'm in between my two lines. I am favoring his side between my two lines, but I'm still not even on the line at all. So I wait for him to get out of the car as I load my groceries, but he doesn't. I finish up and walk up to my door and look in his window and say "Excuse me, Hi, was it me that you just called an idiot?" And he said something like "Yeah, I guess so" or "Yeah, it'd seem so" and I say, "Well, just so you know, I'm parked between my two lines, I'm not over." And that seemed to get him flustered and he just goes "Yeah, well.....grumble grumble grumble" His wife must have been so embarrassed for herself to be married to a douche like that in that moment because she didn't say anything to defend him and it was the wife who was driving and parking the car. Anyway, I would've loved to have written "douche" on the back of his minivan in the dust on the window or thrown my Sprite on the car, but I figured just calling him out on his unfounded rudeness probably made him feel like a jackass anyway so I left with the upper hand. Plus, I had to feel sorry for the guy: he was dressed in sweatpants with the scrunchy bottoms and a fake Ed Hardy looking shirt at 2pm at the mall, which is probably punishment enough in and of itself!