“It’s hard to be mad at someone who misses you while you’re asleep”
Saturday, 21 June, 2008
Monday 2/6/08
I was in at work at 7:30 with my breakfast. I tried to do Briefing things—that is, the very last feature article for the July/August issue. But I wasn't in the mood. After the previous week, I was pretty low on adrenalin and cortisol, and felt like I really couldn't keep going and going. I just felt flat. Plus Microsoft Entourage was totally pissing me off; it kept telling there was an unread message in my inbox when there clearly wasn't. I'd been wanting to change to Thunderbird for yonks but didn't think there was a way to do it. Then I found a way. It was time-consuming and it took me most of the morning to get it done, along with configuring the settings and editing Sola Panel things. I started working on the feature article just before lunch and then it was time to go meet Elsie for lunch at the Tea Inn because I had no lunch.
I ordered chicken soup with crab and we read Ezekiel. I also had a whinge to her about everything that had happened and how I was tired and feeling flat. We prayed together. I was late back in the office to meet with Tony who had changed his meeting time with me to an hour earlier just before I went to lunch. I gave him a status update of where I was at, and then pushed on with the feature article and got it finished. That marked the last of the July/August Briefing done. Unfortunately I still had June Briefing promotional stuff to go.
In the afternoon, I called 3 to find out if we could upgrade our handsets. We've had our current handsets for around three years now, and I have to say, LG do not make good phones. They're slow, frustrating and stupid (I wish I had a dollar for every time I had to teach my phone to spell “Beilharz”). Fortunately, 3 are pretty good to us and we could get brand new handsets just by signing another 24-month contract, and there was even a choice of two. I didn't want to go LG again and decided to give Nokia a try as I've never had one. Plus, after reading “Can the Cellphone Help End Global Poverty? ”, Nokia rather impressed me:
Last summer, [Jan] Chipchase [human behaviour researcher for Nokia] sat through a monsoon-season downpour inside the one-room home of a shoe salesman and his family, who live in the sprawling Dharavi slum of Mumbai. Using an interpreter who spoke Tamil, he quizzed them about the food they ate, the money they had, where they got their water and their power and whom they kept in touch with and why. He was particularly interested in the fact that the family owned a cellphone, purchased several months earlier so that the father, who made the equivalent of $88 a month, could run errands more efficiently for his boss at the shoe shop. The father also occasionally called his wife, ringing her at a pay phone that sat 15 yards from their house. Chipchase noted that not only did the father carry his phone inside a plastic bag to keep it safe in the pummeling seasonal rains but that they also had to hang their belongings on the wall in part because of a lack of floor space and to protect them from the monsoon water and raw sewage that sometimes got tracked inside. He took some 800 photographs of the salesman and his family over about eight hours and later, back at his hotel, dumped them all onto a hard drive for use back inside the corporate mother ship. Maybe the family's next cellphone, he mused, should have some sort of hook as an accessory so it, like everything else in the home, could be suspended above the floor.
I left work at around four and drove home, watched House to unwind and relax (and because I've been wanting to do it all weekeend) and had a shower. Then we went to pick up Marinka and drove to Fish's. He wasn't there. Marinka was bemoaning the lack of single Christian men which prompted me and Ben to go through our phone contacts to see if we knew anyone we could set her up with (as a joke, mind you!). Alas, my list of single Christian men is overshadowed by my list of single women, and, learning from the lessons of Anne of Green Gables after she married Gilbert Blythe and settled down to have a number of children with him, I should not play matchmaker.
Fish soon returned and let us in to his house. We went for a walk up the road to the vet where Fish went to pick up Bill (the cat he was housesitting). He then locked him in the bathroom. We decided to go to Newtown to get dinner, but Fish needed to drop the cage back at the vet's, so we parked at the Pubmart and got told off by the owner. (What could we do? We didn't have keys!) Marinka went in to placate him, and bought a bottle of red wine for her housemates. As soon as she went to buy something, he was instantly nice to her. (Huh!)
When Fish returned, we drove to Newtown and picked up dinner from Tamana's on top. We got takeaway, drove back to Fish's place, set the table and ate. It was so yummy! I did the dishes (because I know Fish hates doing dishes whereas it really doesn't bug me) while Ben and Marinka started playing Wii. We took turns on the console, and I bombed out horribly. Then we sat around talking until we realised it was really late, so we dropped Marinka home before coming back around midnight.
Tuesday 3/6/08
I was in at work at 7:30 with my breakfast and trying to make headway on my To Do list. I didn't get very far. I went to see Bec and complained about feeling flat. Why can't the world stop when big things happen? Why does life continue? Surely it would all be better for us if we took a breather before getting on with things.
Tony finished the podcast. I knew I needed to listen to it first before attaching the right audio codes to it and uploading it, which meant then I could update and send enews, but I really could not make myself do it. Around lunchtime, I decided to just go home. Ben was surprised to see me back. I made us noodles for lunch and watched bits of Stick It on DVD. People are now going to point out what a trashy movie it is, but I really like it. I love that it's about adolescents trying to shake themselves free of a world where people constantly judge you and tell you just how much you don't measure up. I love that the main character is struggling to raise herself up beyond the train wreck of her parents' marriage. I love the part near the end where all the girls band together in an expression of solidarity—the bitchy girl and the main character become friends. And oh my goodness how I love the gymnastics! I could watch Nastia Liukin flip over and over the uneven parallel bars forever—she's just that good!
After gorging on comfort movies, I got stuck into work but couldn't really concentrate. I listened to the podcast while knitting, then realised the file size was too large and that it needed to be scaled down. I also got majorly distracted by the Australian Chamber Orchestra playing Shostakovich (among other things) to Shaun Tan's The Red Tree and The Arrival. I really wanted to go see it but couldn't be bothered organising it. Organising seemed like such a huge pain: who could I find to come with me? Would they want A reserve tickets like I did? (Mind you, it would have been cheaper for me as I'm still under 30, though not for much longer.) I found Guan on IM who said he would like to go but he'd be at MYC. He electronically nudged Bec so she went online and said she was free. And she was in favour of A-Reserve. Then their stupid website stuffed up so I couldn't book tickets, so I resolved to call them in the morning.
I finished enews and sent it. Ben made dinner. We ate together, then he went off to Bible Study. I cleaned up, took in the laundry, ate an apple, had a shower and got stuck into blogging. I blogged until midnight. Ben still wasn't back so I went to bed.
Wednesday 4/6/08
Day off (not). I am so close to the writing part of my job, I can taste it. I slept in to rest a bit because I knew how much I needed it. I got started on work around midday and worked for around nine hours on The Daily Reading Bible (Volume 16), only stopping to eat lunch, make dinner and watch an episode of taped NCIS. It helped that I had edited a third of the studies already on a previous Briefing; that certainly made things less of a slog. I finished it around 10 or 11 at night, then went to bed.
Thursday 5/6/08
I spent Thursday trying to do things and getting distracted by Briefing-related things so it devolved into a fighting foo sort of day. The Sola Panel also needed a bit of TLC. Our new phones already arrived in the mail from 3, all black and shiny.
In the afternoon, I realised I was running out of time, so I resolved to get The Daily Reading Bible (Volume 16) off my plate once and for all: I gave the entire thing one last read-through, filled in the new product information sheet form and sent it off to Emma.
Then I went home and did nothing all evening. I think.
Friday 6/6/08
Ben came to work with me. In the afternoon, we went to counselling together. When we got home, we tidied the house and I started cooking poached ginger chicken for Elwin and Felicity who came bearing their enormous TV and set top box. We had decided to buy it off them as Ben was hoping to use it as a second monitor. We ate, then set up the TV and watched an episode of Lost on it. Elwin and Ben kept fiddling with the TV to improve the resolution and make it possible for Ben to use as a monitor. Felicity and I flicked through knitting patterns and talked about craft things. I got sick of watching them and went to do the dishes. Felicity helped me even though she didn't have to. They said goodbye around midnight and went home.
Saturday 7/6/08
The start of the long weekend. We slept in a bit and then I woke up, intending to do something about my phone so I could get rid of the old one and start using the new one. That didn't quite happen. Ben woke later than the alarm (I think he turned it off). I went in, opened the door and turned on the light. He got up, showered and breakfasted, and then we went to pick up Jenny from Central station. We were running late. We drove to Jamberoo and I fell asleep in the car, only waking up when Ben stopped at McDonald's at Heathcote for a drive-through cheeseburger, and when we finally arrived in Jamberoo.
My mother and Peter were having a joint 60th birthday party at their house. The event was catered with yummy food and there was a laptop in the corner playing a never-ending slideshow. We spent the afternoon surrounded by mostly 60-year-olds which isn't something we do everyday. I discovered I can actually talk to 60-year-olds about stuff. I'm not sure what they thought of me.
Peter's daughter was also there, looking tall and gorgeous; I think the last time I saw her, she was 10. The crowd got a bit much for me after a while, so Jenny and I went for a walk down past the town. We met Ben on the way back. Then the others decided to go for a walk too, and kept chastising us for our lack of enthusiasm about exercise in the way that 60-year-olds do when they haven't realised you've been gone for the last 20 minutes.
We helped clean up a bit and then it got to 4:30. We needed to go as it would take one and a half hours to get home, plus we needed to drop Jenny off at Central. So we said goodbye, and Ben drove us back to Sydney. I fell asleep again and only woek up when we reached Central.
Back at home, I fiddled with my phone, trying to get it to import my contacts. Unfortunately Nokia has no support for Thunderbird; only Outlook. Ben, having a Mac, was able to use a syncing program to sync not only his address book but Google Calendar and Facebook dates. *Sigh!* Life seems to be better when you have a decent Mac.
Beause we took so long and because we had eaten so much during the day, it was a while before we felt hungry enough to eat dinner. We watched Napoleon Dynamite (borrowed from Andrew C) and then went to bed.
Sunday 8/6/08
I slept in, then got up and kept trying to make my phone do what I wanted it to do. I drove to Narwee Baptist for band practice for Matt and Larissa's wedding. Ben went to visit Naomi who was in hospital, about to have her baby. He sent me details if I wanted to come and visit too, but on my way back from practice, I felt it was all too hard—I didn't know where to park or where to go—and drove instead to Westfield Burwood to buy a rice cooker. I actually found what I wanted in David Jones, plus they were having a sale so I got it cheaper than expected! I also bought some cheap DVDs (42nd Street [I used to watch this over and over when I was a kid], A Chorus Line, Love Actually), some thermals and two cases for our mobile phones to protect them from getting damaged.
In the car park, it took ages to actually get out because of the traffic. I was worried I was going to be late for church—especially as I had to stop at home to pick up George's DVDs and my Bible—but I arrived in good time.
It was a good service. Kurt's youngest child got dedicated. I stayed around afterwards for the pot luck dinner, and met Kirsty, Margaret and Michelle. Afterwards, I went to visit George to give her back her DVDs and to hang out with her for a while. She fed me mini quiches and we talked for ages.
Then I went home and kept fiddling with my phone, trying to work out how to wipe the sim card and get my contacts to copy to the memory card, not the sim card. I couldn't remember my security code, but after retrieving the LG manual, I realised I'd never changed it from the default, and the default had remained on the card even after I moved it to the Nokia. Ah, technology! Is there anything more frustrating? I finally got it to do what I wanted: I wiped the sim card, exported my contacts from Thunderbird (with +61 in front of all the numbers so they would register properly on my phone), imported them into Outlook and then got my phone to sync with Outlook. Phew! Finally my phone works the way it should!
It got to 1 am and I started wondering where Ben was. I knew he went out with PEC people post-church. I SMS-ed him. He SMS-ed back, “You're awake! Do you want to come get me?” So I went out and got him from Glebe where he had been hanging out with church people and ended up at Marinka, Fiona and Rosey's. In the car, I asked him how he had been planning to get home. “Walk,” he told me ruefully. Good thing I came to get him.
We went to bed but I couldn't fall asleep until 3. Stupid brain.
Monday 9/6/08
Elsie came to get me at 8:30. I was really out of it. We drove to Rhodes and were so early, we got a decent park. We went into IKEA, up to the café area and got a table to wait for Arnjali. The place started filling up really fast with families who were keen on the $2 breakfast. Even the seats next to us were soon taken. We messaged and phoned Arnjali who said she wasn't far away and that we should go ahead and eat. So we did.
I was going to get tea but they didn't have any green tea, only black. So I got what I thought was lemonade but turned out to be mineral water (yuck!) After our $2 breakfast, Elsie and I took a wander around the store to look at things. I ended up buying a lot of things. Well, they were all useful things—things like a little stand alone mirror (so I can use it to put on make-up or do my hair), gift cards, little shelves for our kitchen cupboards,
hooks for our wardrobes
(these are hugely useful for when you want to hang out tomorrow's clothes or when you're drying the laundry indoors. And they were only 95c each), and bed sheets
which I think are rather me but they're a little overwhelming if you stare at them too long.
We took stuff to the car and then realised we'd been there too long to qualify for free parking. We decided to go have a coffee, so Elsie got a milkshake from Wendys and I got a white hot chocolate from Gloria Jeans. Then we got in the the car and Elsie dropped me home.
Ben had just gotten up. I put together a quick present for Ynping for her birthday that was very Hope Street Markets-ish: a notebook with painted cherryblossoms on it, hair ties with printed Japanese fabric in blue and white, Fraggle Rock: Season 1 (did you know they're making a movie of it? It's true!), all wrapped up in a Hope Street Markets canvas bag and silver ribbon. We drove to Ynping's and caught the end of their steam boat lunch. Fish called and I talked to him while everyone else was packing up. We spent the afternoon playing mahjong and Scrabble and then it was time to go.
We drove home and I made chicken stir fry with vegetables for dinner for us and Fish. Then Fish and Ben went off to see !!! at the Enmore while I stayed home and had a good rest because I was exhausted.
Blinks:
A way of funding writing in the future: pitch and idea and get people to support it.
Place where you can hire play equipment for parties, etc.
How to recalibrate the home button on your iPhone.
Unsolicited manuscripts accepted by Pan Macmillan with certain conditions.
Thought Balloon is a group blog in which the writers tackle a new theme every week? month? with one-page scripts. This URL is for their Phonogram ones.
How to sew a zipper on a knitted garment.
Issues organised by tale.
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