Packing

I'm worried about my cat cup. The handle has a crack. It's just not the same happy feeling I got from my other cat cup. I need a new mug. Preferably with cats on.

I finished getting organized for my trip over the weekend. I've done check in and packed my bag.

I packed then I had to repack when I looked up the weather. I'd packed for Autumn but it is going to be really hot & tropical, 37°C.

The luggage only weighs 5kg so I can buy 2kgs worth of stuff to bring home. I cleared out my undies draw and packed all the old pairs. Instead of washing them, I'll just be able to throw them out. Genius!

I'm having a 50th Birthday party on Saturday and going to Cambodia on Sunday. I'm so excited.

I wish I wasn't having a birthday party on Saturday. It's embarrasing. No one wants to come.

They all said "Ohh, 50! We'll have to do something to celebrate." Now they all have other, more important things to do.

If I hadn't put down a deposit, I would cancel and stay at home and cry like I usually do on my birthday. I hate my birthday. I'm glad I'm taking myself to Cambodia.  I hope I remember never to have another birthday ever again.

Mother's Day

My sons let me know they were coming over on Mother's Day about lunch time I said "I'll stay in bed till you get here so you can bring me breakfast and a cup of tea in bed" and I did. In my new pink dressing gown.

We played games on our phones. I showed Wayland my cats. They go out and steal things to bring back and fill up my rooms and I dress them up in funny hats. Wayland gave me Plants vs Zombies. I played it all day but it stopped working that night. Don't know why.

When William got bored I got up and we went out. I knew it would be a bad idea to take them to the shops but I had broken the toilet seat and needed to buy a new one. I was right. William got the shits and went off in a huff.

We got Kentucky Fried Chicken, which I hate but had been thinking about for 6 months. I won't need it again for 2 years. William was still in a huff. I told him he didn't need to be, he could change his mind and decide not to be. He got better after that.

We went for a drive and found a spot with a spectacular view to stop & eat. We took lots of photos.



It was a good drive.

When we got back we had a wrestle, till Wayland got a bleeding nose and used William's sock to wipe it.

William put the toilet seat on for me. Last time I did it and the little flaps at the back that cover the plastic screws had been sticking up ever since. He did a good job.

Then it was time to go.

I played Plants vs Zombies for hour after they left.  My friend invited me to come over for a glass of wine when I finished playing.

We had a good day.

Making New Friends

                     

What a nice day.

I couldn't sleep on Friday night after the spooks knocked over the massage table as I was going off to sleep. Then I woke up too early. I jumped out if bed and washed the car. It was very dirty and we were going out today.

I have an energetic yoga class on Saturdays at 8:30, then have to hurry to get ready to go to Newcastle for sword practice. I never have enough time & I'm always late.

I took my new friend with me from Victoria. He wandered along Beaumont St while I was practicing. I'm starting to get the hang of sword. I like it.

After sword we picked up my daughter Matilda for an early Mother's day and went to the fish & chip shop on the corner at The Junction.

Claire in the fish & chip shop became my friend last week when she gave me some spaghetti bolognese to take home for my dinner. She told me she was from Cambodia & I told her I might be going there. This week I told her I AM going there. She gave me the details of the hotel she stays in when she goes back to Phnom Penh.

I got some ginger root tea from the shop next door, the girl there has become my friend too. She awarded me the best dressed of the day. If I find the same t-shirt next time I go to Thailand, I'll get it for her.

We took our picnic to my favorite people watching spot by the sea to eat in the shiny red convertible. There weren't alot of people out & about. I told them I  wait for the children that fall over. Bahahaha. There were some interesting dogs.

Matilda updated us on her Phd. She won the university scholarship and is going to be the world's foremost authority on comic books.

We took my friend up to the secret look out up on a cliff with the ocean below. The sun was shining brightly.

We dropped Matilda off at her house and drove back to Singleton towards a glorious orange sunset.

I made another new acquaitance on the way home when the young attendant asked what I'd done today. He was so interested to hear about Japanese sword lessons in Newcastle, he asked for the details.

After I dropped my friend off at his hotel and I came home for a sleep.

Coffee and Fresh Bread

                                                                       
 

So tired. Big day.

I couldn't write my blog last night. I had to choose between writing the blog and dying of exaustion or going to bed. As I had to get up at 6am and teach yoga in the park, I thought I better go to bed.

So when I bounded out of bed this morning I was full of energy. My phone started sending me little messages from my friends and I went to pour out my coffee. I love my phone.

Coffee is the real reason I managed to pursuade myself to slide out of bed so early.  I love my coffee.

I poured my coffee into my favorite cat mug, thinking how happy my favorite mug makes me feel in the morning. I love my mug, it has a funny cat on each side, smiling and wearing sneakers.

When to my dismay, as I watched, the level of coffee was rapidly diminishing. I discovered that it had sprung a leak.

It may have had a little crack for a long time that had now turned into a large crack and my coffee was pouring out all over the bench. But I saved some of it by quickly pouring it into another mug.

But the good news is have another one the same! This one (that is the same as my favorite mug) has been holding my teaspoons. It has a few chips, they are very old.

It is now washed and ready to go tomorrow.

Yoga in the park was funny, not too cold today, with the delectable smells of bread wafting over us from the Coles bakery. It was even more wonderful when they were cooking hot cross buns.

We reached up into the sky for Salute to the Sun and I felt a drop of rain. But Chryse insisted that it wasn't raining. Deanne was ready to give up at the first drop. But we kept going till it got a bit heavier. No one wanted to lie down in savasana with drops of rain falling on their face.

I'm trying to think if anything else exciting happened today...

I booked a one way ticket to Cambodia.

I'm running away.

The Acidentally Stolen Money

Everyone was lying on the floor in silence with eyes closed at the start of class, connecting with the universe and their true selves.

Someone very quietly slipped some money for me in through the door, it was wrapped up in one of my programs. I was the only one who saw.

There were a lot of money transactions and enquiries after class as I had some new people. There was a tidy sum of money when I counted it after everyone had left, but I felt there should have been more.

I remembered the money that had been dropped in and went to get it but it wasn't there! I looked all around on the floor and behind the big shoe box, but it wasn't there. No one has ever taken money from the studio, it goes with trusting people and honesty that are part of the yogic system of beliefs.

The girl who left the money had sent me a txt saying she had.

I replied "Someone's taken it."

She replied "OMG! It had $70 in it."

Then she rang me up.

The money was actually from the lady she takes care of who comes to me every week for a half hour massage (sometimes she nods off in the chair, it's so relaxing) and now she had started coming to yoga, which is wonderful as she has dementia.

When her carer rang me I told her I knew who had taken it because they had been sitting where the money had been left, everyone else had been standing.

We discussed what to do and tbe plan worked.

I rang up the person and said "Hi _____, did you see a crumpled up program where you were sitting?

"Yes," they said, "It's in my bag."

"Well you better have a look in it," I said.

I heard scrabbling as they looked through their bag.

"Oh my God! It's got $70 in it!"

I said, "I know. I better come and get it." And I did.

They appoligised, "I'm so sorry, I put the program in my bag to give to my daughter, incase she wanted one."

I stopped to fill up with petrol seeing as I was out. I told the attendant how I had got my money back that had been accidentally stolen.

She couldn't believe her ears.

I didn't gossip or spread tales. She was just as astonished at my forgiving attitude.

I shook my head as I said, "I would have trusted her with my life"

She replied, "One day she will accidentally take your life."

My eyes are open now.

It all worked out well, I never told anyone who took it and I didn't loose my ______ing lady, because that was the most important of all, I couldn't loose my ______ing lady.

(I can't tell, because that would be telling).

Making a garden

The week kept getting better.

On Tuesday I heard 2 old ladies walking passed the studio and one made a sneering remark about my chalk board. She read, "Happy Easter", "Easter is over," she said.

I'd been up since 6am teaching yoga and playing with babies in my mums's & bub's class & massaging my favorite old lady who has dementia and hadn't had time to re-write the board.

I changed it to "Happy Easter - it might be over but it's still nice weather" which stayed till it was washed off by a shower of rain a few days later.

On Wednesday, I wanted to try again with my boys. I thought if there was only one of them they wouldn't act the goat.

I drove out to their home and persuaded William to come and see my painting and help me with my pavement garden. I told him I would cry if he didn't come, and started to cry, so he came.

He did a really great job. My new garden looks excellent. I desperately needed to repot the orange tree, the wine-barrel was falling appart. That was hard (& expensive). And he helped me collect a really heavy pot plant that had been at a friends place for 5 years because it was so heavy.

And he said that my painting was the best painting I had ever done.

In the evening, I had a special treat, I'd organized 2 of my favorite young girls to come to Yoga. We hadn't done yoga together since they went off to uni 2or 3 years earlier.

Thursday I was really excited about. It was my BFF's birthday. She turned 21. We were having lunch at Bellygood. She used to work there and we had become friends since she called me the Rainbow Beef Queen,  because I ate there so often.

But even before that, when one of my students arrived, they had a little easter gift for me of some perfect ginger bread biscuits, iced, & in the shape of birds and butterflies.

We had a special lunch at Bellygood with June and David, the cook. He cooked us a fabulous smorgasbord of fried chilli fish with prawn chips, a delicious omelette and sweet & sour pork and rice.

I bought a birthday cake decorated with the plastic 'happy birthday' sign I keep in the fridge for birthday cakes.

Oh wow... And then on Thursday evening there was the incident of the accidentally stolen money. I think I'll make that the next chapter.

Easter, Art and Ego

The weather at Easter was Glorious.

After sword practice I got fish & chips and ate them in the sun in my red convertible at Dixon Beach, watching the sea and the parade of people out jogging & walking their dogs and babies.

I had another fabulous drive on Sunday to Wollombi. I love the road where the trees meet in an arch above me, the moist smell and ringing of the bell-birds.

My sister and mother and I had lunch on the verandah of a private vinyard. I like to be exclusive. The nice lady there made us an antipasto plate. My sister & I had a shot of the vinyards special lemoncello and we had a glass of their white wine. My sister was funny, she was a bit tipsy and sort of skipping and flapping her hands because she loves having a ride in my car.

A friendly caterpillar joined us for lunch and hitched a ride home on my dress, which I discovered when I when I was trying to have a nap on the lounge but was disturbed by his squishiness on my leg.

We had a lovely day.

I showed my mother a photo of my nearly completed painting. Unfortunately for my life, she can never say anything positive about anything I have ever done.

She said "I don't like the big monster".

I was about to leave so I didn't let it spoil the lovely day. But the remark stayed with me all day as my temperamental, artistic ego spent the next day finishing my grandest work of art.


In the afternoon, after about 6 weeks, it was finished. I was so excited I wanted to show my boys so I drove out to where they live.

I'll put it down to the idea that they were excited to see me, but they behaved like idiots. I didn't get a very positive response from them either, they were more into running around whipping each other with stalks of grass.

They are 16 & 20 and I felt disappointed that they haven't grown up at all.

That night I was feeling quite angry, not yogic at all, just bruised artistic ego. I knew that my painting was stupendous. But I felt like I wanted to punch a hole in it. I felt that my work was futile. I took it down off facebook, where it was unappreciated. All a friend had said was 'interesting composition'.

It's a very large painting, perhaps it doesn't translate well into a tiny photo.

I went out for a walk in the cool night air to try and cure my bad mood.
Unfortunately a man followed me up the street yelling abuse down his phone at his girl friend. I seriously didn't need his negative energy following me up the street.

He ducked up a side lane and I thought "That's good, I won't have to deal with him."

BUT when I came around the corner to my car park, he had overtaken me and was still yelling down his phone, "Why don't you shut the fuck up?"

So I yelled at him "Why don't you shut the fuck up?"

He says, "Are you going to make me?"

And I say "Yeah."

He says "Its none of your fucking business."

And I say, "You made it my business by yelling abuse at me for the whole block"

He goes, "Well go on then."

And I land an right uppercut on his jaw.
He was so shocked.

By now 2 nice young me who had been walking through the car park come up to defer the situation.

The guy goes, "Go on, do it again" (with some other nasty words)

And I land a right-cross to his jaw.

None of them thought I would, but they didn't know that I'm a black belt in a bad mood.

The two nice young guys, step in and pursuade the horrible, yelling man to leave. I bet he was glad to get away.

I calmed down.

When I came inside, I felt so much better.