Retail Therapy

BGWLBH drove us into The Bay this morning.

We started at Tinkerbell’s…

I bought a blue aqua aura bracelet to go with my heart pendant, an amber pendant to go with the ring that BGWLBH gave me for Christmas and a raw clear crystal pendant designed by Tinkerbell’s owner.

We made a quick stop at Go Natural before heading for Stocklands.

Vitamins, shoes, books and fresh fruit in that order.

I found some lovely inexpensive journals, so bought four of them and a spell book for ‘Love Happiness & Success’.

We stopped for some fresh seafood at Craignish and we were home by 12.30pm.

We unpacked all of our goodies, threw together a quick lunch and BGWLBH headed out for a swim, I landed in bed and AH planted himself in front of the TV.

Dinner was a delicious lamb roast with baked potato, sweet potato and pumpkin, steamed snow peas, carrot and broccoli smothered in home made gravy. I ate a large plate full!

“Married at First Sight” started tonight.

Now it’s 11.30pm and I’m weary.

Nite all.

Poolside

I wasn’t in a ‘stay in bed’ kind of mood today so at around 10am I decided to face the day.

I prepared tea and toast for breakfast and headed out to the Bali hut to join BGWLBH who was in her favourite spot reading her giant book.

We chatted over our beverages and I changed into my swimmers before sliding into the pool, which was delightfully refreshing and swam a few laps, floated for a bit and sat under the hut again.

There were a couple of short sharp rain showers which didn’t deter us.

After a while, BGWLBH headed inside to prepare some lunch.

I stayed outside by myself reading, playing, singing, swimming, floating, meditating and day dreaming until about 4pm. It was a great way to spend my Sunday.

I made soft GF tortillas with spicy chicken mince and coleslaw for dinner followed by a fruit slushy made with frozen banana, pineapple and mango, coconut cream, coconut water, a splash of maple syrup and a pinch of salt. De-bloody-lishus!

We finished the last game of trivial pursuit (which I won) before going our separate ways. BGWLBH to her bedroom to finish her giant book. Adoring Husband and I to the lounge room to watch I’m a Celebrity final night - I was pleased that Dylan won.

Now I’m watching The Greatest Showman - which is weird because last night in my dreams, I was in a relationship with Hugh Jackman and we were trying to solve a crime, searching for clues and people, running through city streets and dining in fine restaurants and laughing at each other’s jokes and kissing!

I’m sad to say that the kissing was a little disappointing.

It was a good dream and I woke up feeling happy and energised - I imagine anyone who spent an entire night with Hugh would feel the same way!

Now it’s time to sleep.

Nite all.

Party Hardly

I was up early and with assistance from Beautiful Girl With Long Blonde Hair, prepared the platters for today’s farewell gathering.

Adoring Husband drove me to work and helped set up the training room for said gathering, buying bags of ice and filling the buckets with ice and alcohol and setting up the small tables and chairs just in case of big numbers.

I vacuumed the floor and wrote a message on the white board.

It got incredibly busy at the shop and sales were amazing, especially for a Saturday.

Lots of people taking advantage of 50% off.

At 1pm AH pulled the chairs and signs inside and my hoards of fans arrived to say their farewells … all six of them!

It was a lovely intimate group of my ever reliable arty farty girls which made for a most enjoyable afternoon of laughter and drinking and story telling and eating and shopping!

Between them, they doubled my already amazing sales for the day!

Unfortunately one of those girls, who was stone cold sober, had a fall on her way to her car and returned 5 minutes after she left, with skinned knees, feet and hands. She promptly sat down and went into shock, trembling and crying as we all rushed around trying to find anything that would help.

She was ok after about 45 minutes and AH walked her to her car. She drove home and phoned us when she arrived so we knew she was safe.

We got home a bit after 6pm so it was a good 5 hours of farewelling little ol’ me.

BGWLBH, AH and I nibbled on the leftover plates of nibbles for dinner and by 7pm I was all done in an ready for bed.

I don’t even know how it got to be 10pm already and I am sooooooo tired.

Nite all.

Working It

Once again … exhausted.

There is so much going on in my head, I’m struggling to sleep soundly or for long periods of time.

Last night I slept from midnight til 3am, then from 5am til 7am.

I’m laying here making lists in my head of everything that needs to be done and who needs to be contacted, what needs to be packed, the time frame I’ve got to do it etc etc.

There is a very slight possibility that I could remain open.

There’s stuff happening in the global and national background that ‘could’ make all of these mandates and passports disappear inside the next two weeks. If that happens, I will strongly consider keeping the shop.

Wait and see.

Today was crazy busy and even at 50% off, I came close to my sales record.

I had a brief but nice visit from The Brains Trust. It feels like FOREVER since I’ve seen her!

A lovely couple from meditation visited just to see how I was coping and how things were moving along with the shop. It was nice to see them.

The lady who runs the art workshops at the Bowl’s Club popped in and enjoyed a spot of retail therapy after mahjong.

There was no time to record the individual items of each sale manually or electronically, so I could only keep a tally of the total for each customer. At times I felt like my head might explode 🤯 but I managed.

The Motivator brought the Fisher King to help her move the remainder of her stuff out of the shop and she also enjoyed some retail therapy while she was there. 

After closing time AH and I grocery shopped for tomorrow’s food platters. After 1pm I’ve invited people to come for farewell drinks and nibbles. There could be three people, there could be 103 people! Who knows?

What will be, will be.

I certainly required a nap this afternoon and enjoyed a very peaceful one hour doze in bed.

AH cooked dinner - the usual chicken wings - we followed that with trivial pursuit.

I came up from the rear and defeated AH in the paused game from two nights ago. Now I am ahead in the next game that is now paused until probably Sunday.

Here we are at 10pm. Let’s see how well I sleep tonight.

Nite all.

Slow and Steady

Slow again in the shop.

Passed my happy minimum in takings and had a few social visitors, which was lovely.

In between customers I packed some more of my belongings ready to bring home and found yet more stock that I had put aside and forgot about. How annoying!

I’m now preparing for the 50% off sale which will start tomorrow and hopefully that will bring more people into the shop.

I posted the notice in a couple of local community pages on Facebook and have had a few responses. 

Fingers crossed (again) because there is still lots of stock to move.

There have been some lovely comments about the shop and how much it will be missed - they won’t miss ME, just the shop haha.

Adoring Husband visited the butcher and then we closed the shop.

BGWLBH and I draped ourselves over the lounge discussing news of the day and then we found some great trivia questions online and competed against each for the quickest answers. First it was AH vs me and then it was AH vs BGWLBH. 

AH beat me by 2 points and BGWLBH beat AH by 2 points.

I cooked up a chicken and vegetable casserole with pasts spirals for dinner and enjoyed watermelon for dessert.

We each went to bed early all trivia’d out and feeling weary, but for me, it has already reached 10.15pm. Once I land in bed, time seems to fly!

Tomorrow I have to start preparing for my farewell on Saturday afternoon.

There will be so much happening over the next couple of months with finalising everything in the shop, then travelling down south to help finalise everything for BGWLBH.

I’m taking over the double garage as my art studio, so we need to have a garage sale to clear a lot stuff we currently have stored there. Then we have to clear the bedroom that is currently my art studio and turn it back into a bedroom.

It will be fun decorating and styling my new studio.

Just when I thought I needed to figure out what to do next, the universe decided to hand me something completely different and now both BGWLBH and I both have new beginnings that we will support each other through.

Now AH has two wives. BGWLBH is the caring compassionate one and I am the one that delivers tough love! He’s in for a good time haha.

Gotta get some sleep.

Nite all. 

Aussie Aussie Aussie

It’s Australia Day!

Or

It’s Invasion Day

Or

Australian Natives’ Association Day

Or

Survival Day

Whatever you call it, it’s a public holiday, so I did not open the shop today.

I stayed in bed til 10am.

I tried on my new togs/swimmers/bathers and went for a swim and a float in the pool.

I lounged under the Bali Hut with BGWLBH reading and relaxing.

I joined BGWLBH in the kitchen to put together a large grazing platter so that we could sit at the dining table to play trivial pursuit and eat … all afternoon.

BGWLBH won the game that we had on pause from yesterday and Adoring Husband is winning the game we currently have on pause.

Dinner was “fend for yourself”.

I reckon this Australia Day hits my top five. Relaxing, fun and spent with two of the most important people in my life. No alcohol. Healthful food. I felt the love. It doesn’t get better.

Some of the questions in trivia were from the ‘Friends’ trivia box. Vegan Chickie and Mr Perfect are ‘Friends’ fans so I texted some of the questions through to them. That added another dimension to the game and it kind of meant we spent time with family too.

Now it’s almost midnight!

Nite all.

Not Today

My prospective buyers didn’t show today. 

I am not discouraged because they did ask my hours this week, so they could still turn up any day. I’m convinced that they are genuine so I have not lost hope.

I have to say that it was nice to have the space clean and tidy.

There weren’t many people out and about. I passed my happy minimum in takings, but I still need to reduce a lot of stock so hopefully this Australia Day holiday will bring more people into town.

The Happy Hippy came today and did some dusting for me. We had a good chat.

This afternoon The Motivator appeared. It was so good to see her after 9 months and 4 days! We had about 90 minutes to chat and catch up and she’ll come visit again on Thursday.

We were a little late getting home this afternoon and BGWLBH was lazing by the pool and reading a very large book.

We chatted for a while before I decide to have a nana nap.

I made chicken and vegetable patties for dinner and BGWLBH made the accompanying salads. We also remembered the fruit salad for dessert which was lovely but we were very full from dinner.

Yesterday’s Trivial Pursuit game was continued until BGWLBH won … again. We started another game but haven’t finished it yet. It’s now on pause until tomorrow … but she is winning that one too.

I’m looking forward to having Australia Day off and hopefully enjoying my time around the pool with my gang of two.

Right now I’m ready for bed because I had another restless night last night and it would be nice to get some deep sound sleep.

Nite all.

Still No Rest

Well, maybe a little rest.

It was a restless night of sleep but I slept soundly from about 5.30am until 9am.

We all got dressed and drove to my shop at about 10.30am.

Maggie Mae knocked on the door as soon as we entered and stayed for about 20 minutes for a quick catch up.

Then we all got to work.

Beautiful Girl With Long Blonde Hair vacuumed the floors and scrubbed all the paint off the sink and tiles in the kitchen - it was pretty messy from the art classes, but it now looks shiny and new. I think she did the most manual labour out of the three of us!

Adoring Husband took all of the art work that I’ve had stored ‘forever’ and loaded it into the car. It was quite shocking how many pieces I had and now they are piled high in six different stacks in my studio at home. I have to say that my studio looks more like a hoarders junk room right now.

We cleared a lot of stuff out of the change room because The Motivator is picking up her chairs, floor mat, cube drawers and wall hanging on Tuesday afternoon.

I tidied off the table behind the counter, cleared a lot of stuff that I had stacked on the floor behind the counter and neatly stacked all the paperwork on my desk.

We emptied the bins and gathered the next car load of boxes and personal items ready to take home on Tuesday morning.

So now the shop looks more presentable for the potential buyer who’ll be arriving first thing tomorrow morning.

BGWLBH made lunch for her and AH and then we all rested for a bit over an hour. I know I had a nana nap before meeting her outside by the pool. The water was quite chilly but I swam a few laps and then floated around while we chatted about all things Covid and Vax related.

Bangers and mash were on the menu for dinner. AH cooked the snags on the barbecue and I did the veggies and gravy inside. BGWLBH made a fruit salad for dessert but we got so involved in Trivial Pursuit that we forgot to serve it!

We didn’t finish the game yet so no winner to report. The game is on hold until tomorrow night. We knew it was time for bed because we were becoming hysterical over ridiculous things! Tears in our eyes, cramps in our stomach hysterical!

It’s already after 11pm! 

Nite all.

No rest For The Wicked

I was up and at it by 9.10am.

Beautiful Girl With Long Blonde Hair was arriving this afternoon and there was still much to do to prepare for her arrival.

I cleaned the bathroom and toilet, made her bed, vacuumed and dusted in her room, vacuumed the hallway and my bedroom.

My bedroom was a job and a half because I had bags of books and journals lining one wall, a guitar and pedestal fan in one corner, cushions and clothes hamper in another corner. By the time I’d pulled everything out, vacuumed, found new homes for what shouldn’t have been there in the first place and then dusted, time was running short.

I did a couple of loads of washing, vacuumed and dusted in the lounge room, cleared the dining table and then jumped in the shower to make myself presentable, by which time it was after 3pm.

Time to prepare the baked dinner. Chicken, potato, sweet potato, pumpkin, snow peas, broccoli and home made gravy.

BGWLBH arrived at about 3.30pm and it was a very emotional greeting.

We have both suffered from verbal diarrhoea and haven’t shut up since she walked in the door. It’s been fabulous!

After dinner, we played our favourite - trivial pursuit - which she won (of course) but it was very close and all three of us played well. Lots of laughs. Lots of silliness. Lots of forgetting who’s turn it was. 

I’ve gotta say, I’m absolutely exhausted and tomorrow I start again in the shop to make it presentable for the prospective buyer on Tuesday.

So now it’s time to sleep … soundly.

Nite all. 

Hopeful

Today, I received a phone call from a gentleman making enquires about buying the shop.

He is bringing his wife on Tuesday morning to have a look around and discuss it further.

That makes three different enquiries that I hope to have an outcome for next week - just in the nick of time!

It would be much easier for me if the shop was sold - then I won’t need to clear out the stock, furniture and fittings.

Sales were much slower and lower today than during the week, but I well surpassed my happy minimum.

I had a long and interesting conversation with one of our long time locals. Everybody has a story and I love to hear those stories.

There was also a younger guy who is house sitting in Howard looking for meditation classes. I was disappointed to turn him away but took his name and phone number just in case I can connect him to like minded peace loving people.

I received my poster to stick on the window for the local “Know Your Rights” rally on 12th February. It’s changed locations from Lions Park to Traviston Park. 

Beautiful Girl With Long Blonde Hair is on her way, stopping in Armidale tonight. *Doing a happy dance*

The Motivator flies home tomorrow. I think she’s been locked out of the state for about 9 months! She will be happy to get home and we will all be happy to have her home.

We left the shop late because some regular holiday makers walked through the door right on closing time and took their time choosing snap jewellery and buttons.

At home, Adoring Husband and I cleaned out the cupboard at the end of the kitchen bench. It was full of old containers of coffee grounds and tea leaves which we tossed. We decluttered coffee mugs and tea cups and a few other odds and ends while debating the chances that AH is a bit of a hoarder!

I cleared a couple of drawers in the guest bedroom and made the bed for BGWLBH. Unwrapped a stack of coat hangers and put them in the wardrobe for her.

Still a lot of tidying up to do before she arrives but we’ll get there.

Monday will be spent at the shop attempting to make it presentable for the potential buyer.

I feel exhausted just thinking about it all.

My brain is turning to mush.

It’s only 8.30pm but I’m off to bed now. 

Have a great Sunday!

Nite all.

Ten More Days

There are ten days remaining in January and if I continue to sell stock at the same rate as these past few weeks, there won’t be much left by the time I close.

It’s now noticeable that stock in the shop is reducing.

Today was another amazing day of sales.

One customer returned for the third time today and I almost signed the shop over to her! She has certainly taken advantage of the 30% off sale!

I met some interesting characters today. 

A Dutch couple who were up for a chat and we talked about small communities that reject change and development and how it effects the future for younger generations as the aged population die off. It was quite interesting as they compared their community to this one.

Another woman in her 40s currently in a huge legal battle with her employer over unlawful mandates. She and 30 of her colleagues all fighting together and supporting each other, but what made her special was that she is wealthy in her own right and doesn’t ‘need’ to fight for her job, but is doing it for the rights of her co-workers and friends.

An older lady who arrived first thing in the morning and purchased a bag full of birthday and Christmas presents, as did another young woman mid morning.

A woman brought in her four children who were enjoying a “yes” day. THAT was an expensive little outing, but the smiles on those kids faces were priceless!

So it was a great day, but also another tiring day. There wasn’t time for any clearing or packing that’s for sure.

When I got home, I even lay down for ten minutes just to rest my weary bones.

Tonight’s dinner was an easy green chicken curry with rice.

Adoring Husband went for his first walk this morning but he overdid it and has been asleep in his chair for most of the afternoon and evening. 

I gave him a break from cleaning the kitchen tonight and did it myself as he slept.

Now it’s almost midnight again. No wonder I’m so bloody tired all the time 😳

Nite all.

Like a Lizard Again!

Flat out like a lizard again today.

Crazy busy with huge sales and I think you can notice that stock is reducing now - slightly.

Some of the better quality jewellery moved today.

People were purchasing bulk birthday and Christmas gifts, spending a LOT.

Usually I tally up the purchases three or four times a day - because I’m a firm believer that putting energy towards the incoming money encourages more through the door - but I didn’t have time to do that until the end of the day.

It was a very pleasant surprise!

I did have a quick 20 minutes to peel my fresh prawns and make a nice seafood sauce to dip them. I only got to eat 6 of them - the rest sat on my desk for three hours until I could munch on them again (much to Adoring Husband’s dismay).

I’m still alive.

Beautiful Girl With Long Blonde Hair is leaving her place on Saturday and heading in this direction! Wahoo!! Finally!!

This afternoon, AH had a teleconference call with the Parkinson’s Professor in Brisbane who is monitoring his condition. 

I was with AH when he first met this professor more than eight years ago, but I haven’t been with him on any other visits which happen once or twice a year. It’s been 2 yrs since the last appointment thanks to covid.

So today, I got to throw in my 2 cents worth during the meeting. 

I think Prof Silburn enthusiastically received my input and told AH that it has been scientifically proven that walking for 30 minutes at least three times a week improves the condition and it’s proven to last for at least ten years.

He also mentioned that AH has a slow moving form of Parkinson’s and that still being a young man, he needs to put some effort into his own health and ‘get moving’.

Thank you Prof S!!

He will also be changing one of his meds.

I felt good about that call and now I can get bossy with AH - you all know how I LOVE to get bossy with AH 🤣🤣🤣

It was nice to sit back with a cup of tea after the call and discuss/create the walking plan.

I think BGWLBH will be instrumental in setting this plan in motion.

AH cooked chicken wings for dinner tonight, which was nice after such a hectic day for me.

It’s now after 10.30pm and I’m feeling weary.

Nite all.

Comparatively Speaking

Today was my quietest day since Christmas.

Sales were good but with few customers.

I created an extensive ‘to do’ list and an inventory of furniture and fittings, which is quite intimidating when I think about getting rid of it all.

I cleared one drawer in the training room.

The day passed quickly and I had to empty a very full FROG box when I got home, but after that, Adoring Husband and I went for a swim in the large bath tub in the back yard. Honestly, the water was very warm, which is just the way AH likes it, but for me it doesn’t feel very refreshing to swim in water that temperature.

Tonight’s dinner was soft tortillas followed by berries and LF cream.

I’ve spent a couple of hours deleting photos from my iPad, but I think after 4 years, it might be time for a new iPad. It has reached its maximum storage capacity and I continue to delete apps and photos and videos with minimum effectiveness.

It’s already 10.30pm so I think I’ll go to bed now.

Nite all.

Not Quiet

When we drove past the caravan park this morning and noticed how empty it was, I expected a quiet day in the shop.

I was wrong.

It was a nice steady day that accumulated into great sales.

The Happy Hippy arrived early and spent her time steaming my pre loved clothes ready for me to price and display. There was also some excess stock that needed to be steamed and displayed.

I received two deliveries in the mail - one full of Poppy’s home made chocolates and one with four tops and some white jeggings from “Tulio”.

Blonde Bombshell was transferred from Brisbane to The Bay where she can commence her rehabilitation after her horrific car accident. Everyone is pretty excited that she is so close to home and it means she’ll get lots of visitors to help support and encourage her healing.

Unfortunately I’m a dirty unvaxed so I can’t visit. But I’m excited that she’s improved enough to be this close. We’ll catch up eventually.

The Speckled Hen came to the shop today. She still looks very fragile. It’s been a month (already) since she lost her partner. She was with his daughter today.

I had another visitor who needed to vent about her son’s drug abuse and the resultant estrangement from the family.

Life is always interesting in my happy place..

We left right on time and dinner tonight was chicken cooked in lime and honey with a side salad.

Now it’s time to sleep.

Nite all.

Out of Hand

Things are getting out of hand.

A cafe owner (Bar Wunder) in Toowoomba, who refused to discriminate against the unvaccinated was arrested on the weekend when the police broke into his home at 1am (!!!) and took he and his wife into custody. 

Another cafe owner in Capalaba was forcibly arrested without explanation (there is video footage) for the same reason and has now been evicted from the premises.

A woman my age was arrested by SIX police officers at Dayman’s General Store in Hervey Bay last week for declining to show her vaccine passport. Dayman’s don’t discriminate so it’s possible that they too could be arrested anytime.

New Earth Cafe in Coolum was visited by the police seventeen times because the owners and some of their staff were not wearing masks. All of them had legitimate medical exemptions.

Eventually, in December, the police arrested the owner, putting her into the back of a paddy wagon with no air conditioning in the middle of Summer.

They took her to a cold holding cell and refused to give her a blanket, telling her that she would remain there until her court case which could take 28 days. Thankfully she was released that evening.

During the court case, she was not allowed inside the court because she wouldn’t wear a mask. Over the days of the case, they changed the charges three times and finally they dropped all charges.

The emotional, mental, physical, business and financial costs are immeasurable and nobody would put themselves through any of that without good reason.

New Earth Cafe are now suing for unlawful arrest. The police make these arrests knowing the financial cost involved to fight back … and then they drop the charges … there is no compensation for these wrongful, unlawful arrests.

There are a couple of other restaurants, one in Mission Beach and I don’t remember the others.

This is happening in Australia. These cafes and restaurants have never had a covid close or casual contact linked to any of their premises and they all have a large community following that are supporting them every step of the way.

We need more courageous business owners willing to take a stand.

Check this out … Nuremberg 2.0

I stole the following from an online group that I follow …

Perhaps they don’t realise that the people they are restricting access to society are those who are:

Creatives; willing to find ways to live outside of the box, those who get inspired by challenge to find their own solutions 

Rebels; who have been misfits many times in the past so they are immune to being excluded 

The Wild Ones with deep connection and reverence to the land, who know nature has everything they need 

Old Souls who have seen this all before and have been persecuted over lifetimes for doing things differently 

The Healers who are resourced with tools and modalities outside of the mainstream to restore balance and vitality 

Rainbow Warriors who know what’s sacred and aren’t afraid to stand strong in their convictions 

Inner Peace Seekers who were already adopting a slower way of living and detaching from commodities 

Optimists with an inner knowing of what really matters who can adapt their perspective to see the blessings that difficulties can bring 

The Stubborn Ones who will not bend to coercion no matter how tight you squeeze, who will find ways to adapt to obstacles before going against their truth

Intuitives who trust their inner voice before any external noise  

The Lions and Lionesses who will fiercely protect their young and will stop at nothing to hold the line as you awaken the fire within 

The Sovereign ones who won’t be threatened into backing down because they have already made their choice

Stay strong, hold the line ✨

I think I’ve had enough rest to face another week of “busy” and hopefully it will be busy enough to match last week or better.

Still SO MUCH to do and finalise!

AND I have to prepare for my farewell party on 29th January 😩

Gawd. So much to do, so little time.

I guess I should get some sleep so that my brain works properly tomorrow.

My girls …

Nite all.