So Close

The dork is actually me

I lied.  That pic I had claimed to be dorky Mel and dorky Nina with the tennis pose is actually me.  I loved that helmet haircut.  Mel is way cooler than me.   She has a smaller nose, higher IQ, and is way younger than me.   She is also my parent's favorite child.   Mel, I am sorry.  I am sending you to the health spa for the day as way of apology.  I love you Mellie, let's hug!

Photo Fest

For your viewing pleasure, a whole whack load of new photos up on my Flickr account.  Click here to view.

I've included a few old pics from my youth (circa 547BC).  Plus of course, the obligatory kid pics.

I've also opened up my '15 mins of fame' private personal pics.  (All the photo shoots from my various magazine articles etc) I look like a dork in some of the posed shots, but try and look past that.

As a teaser, here are a few pics to whet your appetite:

Adam and Kate after Adam's OT session (hence the star on the forehead)

My best friend Mel and I, posing for a shoot

My sisters, Mel and Nina. And they call ME a dork???

Check out more photos here.

Why look if you can’t afford?

Let me preface this by saying that I am the most unromantic person in the world. I am also a hard core realist, I don’t do fantasy very well. In fact, I am so bad at escapism, that I don’t watch movies because they aren’t real. I can’t look past the fact that people are ACTING a part to lose myself in the story. What do mean he is a 16^th century knight? That is Tom Cruise, that odd little Scientologist chap, running around in tights. (I do like reading books; I appreciate the craft, rather than the yarn.)

So. Bearing that in mind, and my general level of ‘oddness’, I have to ask you this. Do you look at things you can’t afford? I don’t. I don’t see the point.

When I was younger, I had a girlfriend who loved trying on really expensive, designer outfits. Even though neither her nor myself couldn’t afford even a pair of knickers from the store, never mind a dress, she still liked trying the dresses on. I could never understand that.  It seemed like an awful waste of time to me.

Marko is like that. He likes to page through property magazines and lust after houses that there is no way in hell we could ever afford to own. Or else he visits expensive car showrooms and drools over the sports cars. As if he will ever own one. (Not if I have anything to do with it!) What is the point? Sounds like masochism to me. It’s like sniffing a chocolate cake when you are diet. Why punish yourself like that?

I suppose some of you will tell me it is good to dream. I think it is good to be realistic. Have goals, sure. But be realistic. Even if one day, maybe maybe, you MIGHT be afford to pay thousands for a DRESS, why would you punish yourself by trying it on now? If and when you get there one day, then try the dress on. Doing it now seems like a totally pointless exercise.

But what do I know. I’m a boring old spoil sport. Who has just looked up at the cricket score and seen that once again South Africa has choked when it counted. I don’t think I am EVER watching cricket again. WHAT THE FUCKING FUCK!!! 32 for 5????

FUCKshitFUCKFUCKFUCK. Damn. Shit. How can we win every game and then lose the most important one? Shit shit SHIT.

I am now completely pissed off. I am going to bed. Bye.

An instant connection

(Because I don't have time for proper post, this is cross posted from my Times column)

My husband doesn’t know just how close we are. He thinks we are just friends. He must suspect something; we spend so much time together.

Stolen moments. Like now. He is outside with the kids; I am supposed to be inside, tidying up. But the allure is too strong, I can’t resist. I sneak off to the study, listening out for his footsteps. I hear him coming! Quick! Run to the kitchen, pretend to be busy.

“What were you doing?, he asks suspiciously. “Nothing” I reply, unconvincingly. I think he knows......

Continue reading here...

It's a male thing

(The sensory post is taking me longer than I thought. Am going to post it in parts. As soon as I can.)

Now that’s what I call service

Just after my boob op, before I was fully functional, Rose and I went shopping. She helped with the shopping cart and I called out what we needed. We were an odd looking shopping duo.  I told Rose to get a few things for herself and one of the things she chose was a packet of ‘eet sum mor’ biscuits (cookies in American). Shortbread biscuits. When we got home she discovered that unfortunately someone took the name of the biscuits a little too literally and had helped themselves to half the contents of the packet. Rose was highly disgusted.

The next time I went to the shop (Pick n Pay), I mentioned to the woman at the info counter what had happened. She said she would call the manager over and I said not to bother. I didn’t want to make a big fuss over a packet of biscuits but I thought I would just mention it. She asked for my name and number and I left it at that.

Then this morning, about a week later, I get a call from a very sweet sounding lady called Kerry. She said she was calling from the head office of Bakers Biscuits (the makers of ‘eet sum mor’ biscuits) and that she wanted to know more about the incident. I was so impressed that this large company had made the effort to phone one arbitrary customer about a lonely packet of biscuits.

Of course by the time she got the complaint, it had changed a little. Apparently Pick n Pay told Bakers that a customer had complained about an ‘underweight’ packet of biscuits. Not quite. It was underweight because some sneaky bugger had decided to snack on a few biscuits and then put the packet back on the shelf.

I told Kerry how impressed I was at their customer service and that I didn’t think it was Baker’s fault, but that I appreciated her call. I immediately called Rose to tell her the story and the first thing she said was “I hope you told them to send you a free box of biscuits” Hahahaha! Terrible Muriel. I said I couldn’t do that, it wasn’t their fault. She said I was useless and I should have insisted on the free biscuits. V funny.

Poor Rose. She really was not at all amused by someone eating 'sum mor' of her ‘eet sum mors’. Let’s hope they send us something in the post for Rose. Either that or I will have to buy her a full packet next time I go to the shop.

In honour of "International Talk Like A Pirate Day!"

Booby tip #34, #35, #36 and #37

I was going to do a blog post with tips and advice for those considering breast augmentation but there is so much advice out there on the Net already.

What I will do is share four tips with you:

#34 Don’t underestimate the recovery time. Give yourself at least a week off from any duties. Make sure you have help if you have kids.

#35 The anaesthetic makes you constipated. Prepare for that.

#36 Even if your husband was not a ‘boob man’ before the op, he will be afterwards. Prepare for that too.

#37 Use the ‘peg method’ (thanks Mom!) to stop your seat belt from rubbing against your sore boobies. The peg is strong enough to give the belt a tiny bit of slack, but weak enough to pop off if you need it to (i.e. accident).

And then some booby pics. 

A little 'before' reminder.....

And now for some 'after'.....

Aren't they looking perfectly lovely?  I think so. A little 'fake boob'ish' still, but they are only three weeks old after all.  Am v pleased indeed.

I LOVE MY BOOBS!

(Oh, and I had myself measured. I am either a 36C or a 34D, depending on the style. Impressive huh.)

 

Grumpy

I am very grumpy today. I don't know why.  Could be a few things.  A bit of this (PMS), a bit of that (facing some big decisions).  A general sense of blahness.  I hate feeling like this. I especially hate feeling like this when I am on happy pills because dammit, the happy pills are supposed to make me happy, right?  Yeah, I know it doesn't work like that. But I want it to work that way.  *Stamps foot*

I am going pull myself towards myself and ditch this shit mood. Soon. I have two important posts I want to do. (A)  Boob update with pics and (2) Adam update re sensory issues. 

Rats. Wish I could talk to you about the decision thing. But I can't.  Which makes me grumpier.

Have I mentioned my husband is an asshole*? Can't talk about that either. But believe me when I say he is a gigantic, industrial strength sized asshole. Huge. Massive. Murderous thoughts abound.

So, because I have nothing to offer you here (until the booby pics later), may I suggest you pop over to my sister's blog where she has done an awesome post on using Ritalin for ADD kids. 

* Funny thing is, my husband's level of assholiness is directly related to my menstrual cycle.  Odd that. 

They get that from me

I’ve been meaning to do a post for a while. About swearing. About how I obviously swear way less in reality than I think I do because my children never swear. And then tonight Kate dropped something and said ‘shit shit shit’. Oops.

So instead I will tell you about how money aware my kids are. I was at a bookshop with them recently and Kate grabbed a book off the shelf asking if she could have it. I told her to give it to me first because I wanted to see how much it cost. So she smartly replies, “it’s only twenty five Rand, mom”. Where on earth does she get that from? (It wasn’t R25 by the way, it was more than that. I bought the book anyway).

When I told them recently that they couldn’t have something at the shop, Adam turned around says “You gotta no money, mom?” Yes boy, I gotta no money.

As Kate and I were busy grocery shopping today, I was talking out loud, telling her I need to get some ham, and she says “we can’t get it mom, it’s too expensive”. I obviously talk about money a lot. Better than swearing a lot I suppose.

Oh, and I recently bribed* my kids with money. They wouldn’t lie still for me to put a nappy on and so I said I would give them five Rand if they lay still. They jumped on the couch and lay as still as a corpse. I gave them the R5.

What can I say. My kids love money. Just like their mother (and father).

(It is a stage I have been looking very forward to – the ability to bribe them. Can’t wait to put it to further use)