Nice to see you!

Three major events occurred for me last year (2010), all in the space of about 2 weeks. I turned 50. The following day I got married. Two weeks later, my oldest daughter became pregnant with her first child and my first grandchild.

Most middle-aged people will tell you that in their minds, they still feel 20 something. It's the same for me.

Wasn't it only yesterday that I was planning a night out with guys from the surf club? That gorgeous new perm. Flaired, cuffed denims and the red t-shirt with the off-the-shoulder frill. Corked platform wedgies. **sigh**

Suddenly I'm looking in the mirror and wondering how 30 years can flash by so damned quickly!

So here I am in cyberspace, sharing my genuine shock and horror with anyone who'll listen and maybe I'll even meet some other over 50s who find themselves in the same predicament!

Welcome to my dilemna!!

Friday, June 24, 2011

Prawn Fever

A successful night at the Bowls Club tonight.

This past month has been very busy in our town, on the river and out to sea.  People have been catching bucket loads of prawns.

Apparently, by law, the allowable limit is ten kilos of prawns per person in a boat.

The authorities have been working along the beaches with binoculars and noting down the registration numbers of the boats that are out catching prawns.

Word has it that the authorities will be visiting the homes of the owners of these boats to make sure they don't have more than their allowance of ten kilos of prawns in their fridges or freezers.

Our neighbour across the road gave us two kilos of prawns on Tuesday morning that he had caught on Monday.

Another neighbour further down the street, phoned to offer us more prawns, which we gracefully declined.

The streets of our town have been lined with cars and boat trailers as people travel from far and wide to catch the apparent abundance of prawns on offer at the moment.

I hear that the prawns have been here in abundance since the full moon and they are expected to disappear again by the next full moon.

Anyway, after all that, Adoring Husband and I won TWO prawn trays in the raffles at the Bowls Club tonight!!  Unfortunately, they are frozen and not fresh, so we couldn't even munch on them when we arrived home from the club.

I do love to eat prawns ... but it's possible to have too much of a good thing!

I am proud to announce that I stayed awake until 2.30am this morning watching Lleyton Hewitt play his match at Wimbledon.

Sadly, he was defeated in five sets.  He put up a good fight, however, Soderling is seeded fifth for the tournament and Lleyton has slipped to something like 130th in the world, so his chances of winning were very slim.

I'm pleased that I watched it, but I didn't wake up til after eight o'clock this morning and I am feeling decidedly weary now, at only 9.27pm!

I'm willing to bet that I'll be sound asleep before 10.30pm!!

Dreaming of prawn fever :)

Nite all :)

Vic Dana - Red roses for a blue lady

Day 28 - A song that makes me feel guilty (in relation to an 'incident' between my parents)

The Chant for Lleyton!

Well!  Here I am!!  It's after midnight and still awake watching Wimbledon!!!

Watching Lleyton Hewitt play Soderling and he has won the first two sets so far.

Hewitt is one of my favourites and I've been watching and supporting him since he was about 16 yrs of age.  I find it difficult to believe that he is now 30!

He is not everybody's cup of tea because he isn't as humble as some, but being smaller than the average tennis player, he has had to fight hard in his career and I admire that in him.

He plays tennis with the same fight and determination as I used in my sporting life.

While I never came close to Lleyton's level of achievements, some of my sporting wins brought me the greatest satisfaction just for the 'never-say-die' attitude that I had at the time.

Anyway, the important thing for me is that it's almost 12.30am and I am still awake!  I admit that I did have a little doze there during the first set, but I'm back, awake, alive and alert!

My photos today are of some bird life around town and the first is of a pelican who was playing around near the Seat of Knowledge this morning.



The second photo is of some Tawny Frogmouths that like to spend time in a tree in the Lion's Park by the river.  Sometimes there are four of them sitting in the tree.



I attempted to get a photo of a Cormorant that has been hanging around the newly formed lake since the floods, but I can't get close enough before he flies away and I don't have the right lens yet for my camera to take a good photo from a distance (working on that).

Lleyton has just lost the third set ... I have a feeling that it's going to be long night!

I really love this time of night when everybody else, in my part of the world, is asleep.  It's all quiet outside, except for the occasional Plover calling in the distance, and it's peaceful and tranquil.

It's quite chilly and I'm rugged up in my warm fluffy dressing gown and slippers.  Such a good look!

The chant in my head goes like this ...

Come on Lleyton, let's go!
Come on Lleyton, let's go!
Come on Hewitt, you can do it!
Come on Lleyton, let's go!

Does that count for number forty two on my 'fifty two things to do before I turn fifty two' list?

42.  Write a poem?

Probably not huh?

Nite all!

Wednesday, June 22, 2011

Rained Out at the Tennis!

It seems that I just don't have the stamina for Wimbledon the way I used to!

Once upon a time, I could sit up all night ... or at the very least have a couple of 15 minute power naps through the night so that I would see all of the tennis available to me on whatever station it was being shown on.

These days, I am dozing in the chair by 10.30pm, and missing long snippets of the tennis.

I will attempt to save my stamina for the more worthy games ... that is any match with an Aussie playing and any quarter finals and beyond.  The morning news will just have to provide me with most of the results.

I should do what my Mum used to do.  Record all of the tennis and then start watching it in the mornings when she woke up and fast forwarding through the ads or the boring games that she wasn't interested in.

That would mean NOT watching or listening to any news prior to sitting down!

Updated photos of little Chicklet who is growing up before my very eyes!

Babies seem so much older at 4 months these days, compared to when mine were this age.

So cute!
... in the meantime, I simply MUST go to bed.

Good night all!

Twinkle Twinkle Little Star (with lyrics)

Day 26 - A song that I can play on an instrument (Sadly, it's the only song that I can play on an instrument - the piano and the recorder)

It's All About the Shopping!

Oh the shopping ... we lurve the shopping!

We left bright and early on Saturday morning so that we could stop at Eumundi Markets on the way to the Gold Coast.  We were early enough to get a good parking spot and we were so early, that at the first three stalls, our purchases were their first for the day!

Eumundi markets are HUGE and people drive for miles on the weekends to attend them.  There are buskers on every corner and the market stalls are many and varied, selling everything you can think of.

Jams and chilli concoctions, jewellery, beautiful artworks, home made clothes for babies, children, women and men, tie-dyes, pottery, woodwork, fresh produce, make-up, home made soaps, knitwear, hats, musical instruments, scented candles, ceramics, natural therapies and fresh cooked foods from all different cultures, just to name a few!

We spent about three hours wandering around and bought some cute clothes for little Chicklet among other things ... poor Adoring Husband was my pack horse carrying around all the bags of goodies before we decided to hit the road and head for the Gold Coast.

Five minutes before we found our motel, we drove past Harbour Town!

Now Harbour Town is similar to a DFO (Direct Factory Outlet) and I LURVE Harbour Town.  It's my favourite shopping place on the Gold Coast!

So we checked into our apartment and headed straight back to Harbour Town!  Another three hours of shopping!  I was in heaven ***sigh*** As a bonus, the 'end of financial year' sales were on!  How much luckier could I be!?

Poor Adoring Husband was absolutely exhausted at the end of the day after lugging around all of my shopping from both ventures!  He hardly had the energy to get ready for the big party.

Lots of clothes for me ... to replace the bag of old clothes that I took from my wardrobe to give to Lifeline (or similar) last week!  Warmer clothes to take with me to Griffith when I travel there in a couple of weeks.

Then on Sunday morning, after the party was well and truly over, and we started our journey home, we discovered the new Westfield at Northlakes, just north of Brisbane.

It too, was huge with so many specialty stores plus one of my favourite department stores, Myer :o)

We spent about two hours shopping there and only saw a fraction of the shops at the centre.  I got myself a lovely pair of tan boots and we found some cookware that we've been looking for online.

Adoring Husband is the best male shopper that I know!  Thank goodness he's mine!  He doesn't get impatient and he really gets involved in the process, just like one of the girls (and I mean that in the nicest possible way!).

So aside from the great 30th birthday party on Saturday night and catching up with friends and family...

The birthday boy, Jovial Son, in the centre wearing the white t-shirt and standing beside Adoring Husband/Father
.... it was all about the shopping!  We lurve the shopping!

Tuesday, June 21, 2011

Kasey Chambers - Not Pretty Enough

Day 25 - A song that makes me laugh - My Mum hated this song and would mimic Kasey Chambers, by holding her nose and singing the chorus. Whenever I hear this song, I imagine my mother holding her nose and singing high pitched and nasally.

Monday, June 20, 2011

It's Wimbledon Time!!!

Oh how I love Wimbledon!  Oh how I love to watch the tennis!

It's that time of year again!  One of my favourite times of year.

When I was working, I would take some annual leave for at least a week, usually the second week of Wimbledon, so that I could sit up all night watching the tennis!

Wimbledon and the Australian Open are my favourites of the Grand Slam tennis events.

I've been lucky enough to attend the Australian Open twice and I hope to get there again in the future.

My Mum was a big tennis fan and I was introduced to tennis back in the 70s when John Newcombe, Tony Roche and Yvonne Goolagong were champion players.

She got so much pleasure from tennis and had a little bit of a 'thing' for John Newcombe (along with a million other Australian women!).

She saw the potential in Patrick Rafter when she watched him play his first few tournaments and told me to 'wait and see' how brilliant he would become.

Even though she always barracked for him, she didn't like Lleyton Hewitt, citing him to be a 'cocky little upstart'.

I, however, loved Lleyton and still enjoy watching him play.  What I love most about him is his guts and determination to fight to the very end when he plays.

I never give up on Lleyton in any of his matches until the last ball is hit, because I know that he fights back and that the game can turn around at any time!

Federer and Nadal are wonderful to watch, as well as the Aussie girl Samantha Stosur ... let's hope she can go a bit further this year.

I also like to barrack for the underdog, so I will almost always cheer the least likely winner on!  Not just in tennis, but in most sporting events!

Now that I am over half a century old, I am not as resilient as I once was, so I need to prepare and train like all good athletes.

This means having long naps in the afternoons and it means eating properly, so that I don't want to curl up and fall asleep every five minutes and it means drinking lots of water to keep hydrated.

So, these days, I not only get to enjoy the tennis on TV, but at the same time I remember my Mum and wish that she was still around to have our long discussions about the tennis players, old and new, and how they played the night before.

It's only day one of Wimbledon and it's not even midnight yet ... but I am yawning my head off and I have to be up early for aqua-aerobics.

Time to find the draw and strategically plan my Wimbledon nights!  Choose my favourite players and plan to watch their matches between sleeps!

I've watched a couple of hours of tennis already tonight and now it's time to sleep.

Ah to be young again ... but YAY!  It's Wimbledon time!!

John Lennon - Imagine

Day 24 - A song I want played at my funeral (I also want Bohemian Rhapsody by Queen!)

Sunday, June 19, 2011

Not as Young as I Once Was!

We arrived home safe and sound from a great weekend.

We shopped til we dropped on our way home and are both exhausted!

The view from our motel balcony at sunrise this morning was spectacular ...

6 am today

A bit after 6 am today
But right now, I am struggling to keep my eyes open.  This is short and sweet because I am not as young as I once was and any party that keeps me up til midnight sends my brain and body into 'repair' mode for the following three days!

Thank you for your kind understanding and tolerance :o)

Nite all

grow old with you

Day 23 - A song that I want to play at my wedding (and I did!)