I wish I could sing

I am a big fan of 'reality tv'.  I think it's because I am a people watcher.  I once sat at Sydney airport for seven hours between flights just watching people.  It's fun to make up stories about the people and what fills their lives.

I enjoy watching people put themselves in unfamiliar territory, like Big Brother or Survivor, to see how they cope with new people, pressure situations, competition, change in routine, different diets and being out of their comfort zone.

By far, my favourite reality TV is the talent show.  American & Australian Idols, X Factor, Australia's Got Talent.  I am so envious of people with beautiful singing voices, who can stand on a stage with such 'presence' that they command the attention of thousands of people.

As a teenager, I thought I could sing well.  When I was 15, I was given a cassette player for my birthday (you young people may not know what that is, so I suggest that you google it!) and one of the first things that I did, was get myself a blank tape and record myself singing Olivia Newton John's 'I Honestly Love You'.

One of the more devastating moments of my life was when I played it to myself for the first time.  That horrible realisation that my singing voice was non-existant.  I couldn't hold a note.  Totally off-key for the whole song.  I would never be the next Olivia Newton John or Suzi Quatro.  

***sad face***

So it really irks me that so many hundreds of people audition for these talent shows when clearly they have no talent!  Have they ever listened to themselves?  What you hear in your own head is completely different to what you hear on the tape or recording of your voice.

 These shows should have a little room for these people to go into.  They can record their own singing, listen to it, and then decide if they really want to audition on national or international television.  Really!!

I have spent this afternoon watching American Idol.  The top twelve males and then the top twelve females.  I am imagining what it must be like to open your mouth and have such beautiful sounds flow out and over an audience of appreciative people.

I wonder if it's possible to go to lessons.  Start with nothing and after enough practise and hard work develop something remotely close to a pleasant singing voice?  Is it possible?  Am I too old?  Would the teacher listen once, shake his/her head and tell me 'there is no hope'?

Not long before my Mum passed away, I asked her "Is there anything you wish you could change about your life?" She replied "I would give anything to be six inches taller".  She was just under five feet tall.

If somebody asked me the same question, I would reply

"I wish I could sing"

My Animal Kids

Adoring Husband is taking one of our Lovely Layers to the Vet this afternoon.  She is being attacked by one of the others and her butt has been almost plucked raw!  So we separated her yesterday afternoon and called the Vet, who advised that we should take her in to see her.

We acquired our Lovely Layers in July last year after Adoring Husband built the Taj Mahal of hen houses and aptly named it 'Chook Paradise'.  They began laying about 10 days after they arrived and we get 3 eggs every day.  Of course we can't eat that many eggs so we give them out to my local boys at the boat ramp every two or three weeks.

I decided to name our Lovely Layers after my three favourite Mothers-in-Law.  Helen, who was my first mother-in-law, and who I know reads my posts here  regularly, ***waves happily*** Hi Helen!  The next one is Dorothy.  I wasn't married to her son but lived with him for 12 yrs and she is just lovely.  The third one is named Nellie and she is my current mother-in-law.  Lovely Layer named Nellie is funny because she chases Adoring Husband and tries to peck at his toes.

If you are interested, I will keep you posted on the Vet's diagnosis tomorrow.

We also have three dogs.  Jack, Ruby and Colli.  Jack is a white Chihuahua/Maltese cross and we bought him from a pet shop in Sydney.  Vegan Chickie and I saw him in the window and fell in love straight away because he looked broken.  He was there for over a week and all the puppies around him were being sold.  He had crooked teeth, a pink spot on his nose,  scruffy, messy fur and he kind of sat in the background looking all sad and forlorn.

We named him before we even knew we would buy him - JUST Jack!  Like Jack from the TV series, Will and Grace.  It took me a while to convince Adoring Husband to even look at him in the window and then when he did,  he pointed to all the other cute puppies and said 'Are you sure you don't want that one, or what about that one?'.  I pleaded Jack's case and finally talked Adoring Husband around.

Even though Adoring Husband's strict instructions were that Jack must be an outside dog and was not allowed on the furniture or in the bed, Jack slept in our bed on the first night (and every night after), only ever went outside to do his doggy business and had a permanent spot on the couch from day one.  Adoring Husband is such a softie.

Jack, who is now 5 yrs old, has grown into a loud, cranky, moody, cantankerous old man.  He is a law unto himself and super protective of his territory.  Most people consider him a challenge and try extra hard to make friends with him.

Six months after Jack, at the same pet shop, I found Ruby.  She was broken too and looked like a female version of Jack, but a little smaller.  She is also Chihuahua/Maltese cross. No convincing required this time.  I bought her immediately and she fit beautifully into our little family.

She is too friendly and adores anybody who steps foot on her property.  She raises her top lip and gives us a big smile when we come home and has this excited little high pitched squeal of excitement.  She wags her tail so hard that her little body bends and almost snaps in half from the pressure!  She is my favourite.

Another six months later and Adoring Husband and I were on a weekend outing around Mittagong way, south of Sydney, when we happened to walk past a pet shop.  There in the window was a litter of black and white Maltese/Shitzu cross puppies.  We went inside and asked to see them.  As the girl opened the glass sliding door, all of them came running except one in the far right corner.  Straight away I said "That's the one" as I pointed to the quiet, shy one.

We left the pet shop without puppy and were driving along the freeway, heading home and I looked at Adoring Husband and said "We can turn around.  We can go back and get her you know."  That's all he needed to hear.  He found the first place to turn around and we drove back to get Colli.

Adoring Husband always wanted a Border Collie, but he admitted to being too lazy to walk one daily.  He is also an avid Collingwood (AFL football) supporter and their colours are black and white.  It just seemed fitting to name our new little black and white puppy, Colli.

So that is your introduction to our family of animal kids.  They are all spoilt rotten and we love them a lot - I guess we use them to try to make up for all the mistakes we made with our human kids.  Needless to say, our animal kids are just as mixed up as our human kids LOL but there is plenty of love for everyone!

We love yas awl!

Boys in Black

This morning I did my usual morning 'thing' and pedalled down to the bakery to get my coffee before heading over to the boat ramp.  As I walked along past the supermarket and the wall of mailboxes, two young men came walking towards me.  They were strangers in town.

I know a LOT of people in my little town and it's easy to recognise a local, by their relaxed air of confidence and the sense of ownership that they emanate.  We are a small, close community and everybody smiles and says hello to each other in the street.  It's one of the many quirky little gifts that our town has to offer.

We are in Queensland, in a small coastal beach town, and it goes without saying that it is hot and humid at this time of the year.  The usual attire is shorts,  singlet tops and thongs.  Even at 8am, I sit by the river with a hand held fan, trying to blow the beads of perspiration on my head and neck dry.

So these two strangers, who I would guess to be in their late teens, were walking towards the bakery. One of them was wearing board shorts, a black suit jacket and a very large sombrero.  The other was wearing a black suit, no shirt, no shoes, no hat.  Stand out much?!

I said to Adoring Husband, who had suddenly appeared beside me, after his golf game got rained out,  "Far out!  They must be hot in those clothes!"

Off I went to spend the morning with my boys at the boat ramp and then later to the local hall to play Indoor Bowls which I do every week.

As I pedalled towards the car park, I noticed someone sitting in the bus shelter and when I glanced across, it was the young man in the sombrero.  He looked up, smiled and said hello as I breezed past him and I wondered where his friend had disappeared to.

I got through the car park and was parking my trike, when the other young man came out of the men's toilets doing up his fly.  He didn't make eye contact and he seemed to be having trouble getting that zipper up!

I walked up the stairs towards the door of the hall, when 3 ladies walked out and in quite a panicked tone, asked if we had seen these two strange young men who had been 'acting suspiciously' around the hall.  I told them that two young men were sitting at the bus shelter.

The ladies were incredibly relieved.  One of them rushed to make sure her car was locked and another made concerned chatter about whether our bicycles would be safe outside.

I asked "How were they acting suspiciously?" and the reply that I got was "They were sitting in the covered area between the toilets and the hall, watching the women arrive and walk into the hall."

I then asked myself (in my head) "How is that 'acting suspiciously'?"

Just because these boys were obviously not locals, young, and dressed in something other than shorts, singlet and thongs we immediately believe that their every move, no matter how innocent, deems them to be 'acting suspiciously'!

This was one of those rare occasions when my lovely town made me feel embarrassed.  When I looked at these elderly women and saw unreasonable fear in their eyes because they stereotyped these young men and made assumptions about their honesty and integrity without even speaking a word to them.

With hindsight, I should have walked to the bus shelter and invited the boys back to the hall to meet the ladies.  I wonder how that would have panned out??

Anyway, I hope that these young men are having a lovely time in our little town.  I hope that the locals don't scare them off too soon and I hope that they can find some cooler clothes to wear, because it's WAY TOO HOT to be wearing a black suit!

No proof, but I swear it's true!

In June, 1973, The Jackson 5 toured Australia.  I was thirteen years old and living in Perth at the time.  The song 'Ben' (about a rat) was the number one song on the music charts.  I was passionately in love with Jermaine Jackson because he had the biggest hair and a fabulous smile that melted my heart!  Michael was only a year older than me, but the older Jermaine was my dream man!

A friend, Sharon, and her Mum invited me to go to the concert with them, which was being held at the the Beatty Park Swimming Centre (where I, co-incidentally, had participated in swim meets with my swimming club.)

This particular swimming centre was built in the 60s for the Commonwealth Games which were held in Perth so there was plenty of seating for a large audience.  They built the stage over the top of the 50 metre swimming pool and our seats were on the second tier and a little way to the right.

It was the second concert that I had ever attended.  Mum had taken me to see Johnny Farnham at Festival Hall in Brisbane the year before.  We were in  balcony seats for that one and Mum had to pull me back at one point when I got a bit excited while screaming Johnny's name and I almost fell over the balcony!

Before the Jackson 5 concert, we went shopping to buy a special outfit and I bought a pair of cream cuffed Oxford flare trousers, a lemon yellow wrap around wing-sleeved top and some brown platform sandals.  My hairstyle at the time was called a 'Lioness', which is the equivalent of today's 'Mullet'.  I was incredibly stylish ... as you can imagine!

I remember being worried during the whole concert, that the Jacksons would fall off the stage and into the pool, but I only have one vivid memory of the concert and that is of them dancing to, and singing 'ABC'.  Sharon and I looked at each other like it was the most exciting moment of our lives and we would clearly remember it forever more!  Obviously, we were correct ... although, I haven't seen Sharon for 35 years, so who knows if she remembers this moment like I do?

At the end of the concert, as we piled into the car to go home, Sharon's mother suggested that we drive to the airport to see the Jackson's flight off.  I think that they were flying to Adelaide for the next leg of their concert.  We all agreed that it may be a hell of a fight through crowds of screaming teenagers, but we also agreed that it would DEFINITELY be worth it, so off we went.

Surprisingly, when we arrived at the airport, it was suspiciously quiet.  The car park was quite empty and there was not a screaming teenager to be seen.

As we entered the terminal, a man in a security uniform asked if he could help us.   Sharron's Mum told him why we were there and he walked off stating that he would return shortly.  Fifteen minutes later, as promised, he did return and asked us if we wanted to meet the Jackson 5!

My heart is skipping a beat as I remember my heart skipping a beat!

We followed him through a long wide hallway until we reached a door that had a 'VIP' plaque stuck to the front of it.  He knocked softly and we heard a muffled sound respond.  He turned the handle of the door and slowly opened it inwards.  There, sitting on a chair on the opposite wall, was none other than the man of my dreams, Jermaine Jackson!!  Oh my!!  My legs could barely hold me up and with every step towards him, I thought I was going to collapse!

Sharon's mother had rifled through her bag to find paper for us to get autographs, so as I reached Jermaine, he handed me a champagne glass full of something bubbly and said "Would you please hold my drink while I sign your paper?"  I nodded wide-eyed, incapable of uttering a sound.

I heard the door open behind me, and as I glanced around, I saw Michael walk through the same doorway that we had entered.  He smiled at us and said "Hi!".  He came over and sat in the chair beside me and reached for Sharon's paper to sign it.

We shuffled along the back wall of the room, where each member of the Jackson 5 were sitting and got their signatures, one by one,  on our paper, too shocked to speak.

I can't remember anything else from that night.  I may well have gone into shock immediately after the experience, and my brain has blocked the rest out!

Sadly, sometime during my many moves to different houses in different states of Australia, my piece of Jackson 5 paper disappeared.  I am certain, with all five signatures of the Jackson 5, it would have held quite some value these days, but alas, it is gone forever!

I have no proof to show for a night where one of my girlish dreams came true.  Just some faded memories and a great little story to tell!

Lobster for Dinner?

Adoring Husband and Number One Son went fishing today.  Adoring Husband has spent the last month working on his boat to make it practical and safe for travelling a good distance out to sea for fishing trips.  Now that he is semi-retired, he plans on spending a lot of time golfing and fishing.  I'm hoping he knows a lot of 'blokes' who like to fish, because I don't like going out past the mouth of the river.  If we should get into trouble, I want a short swim to land, thank you very much!

So, very early this morning, Adoring Husband checked off the imaginary list in his head,  hooked up the boat and headed off to the boat ramp.  

Ten minutes later, he was back.  He'd left the GPS at home on the kitchen bench.  At the risk of being lectured about why he needed the GPS for this trip, I just want to remind you all how, for CENTURIES now, fishermen have been using the electronic GPS for finding good fishing spots, and how it is virtually impossible to fish without one!  (I just know that I am going to be in trouble for that paragraph)

Relieved, and with GPS in hand, off they drove to commence said fishing trip.

I had a lovely morning.  I pedalled down to the bakery for my first morning coffee in weeks and then met my lovely old boys at the boat ramp.  Hugs all round and they gave me a warm welcome home. Being the proud grandmother, I showed off photos of my little Chicklet, and they made all the correct 'Ooohing' and 'Aaahing' noises.

Afterwards, it was off to the Bakery to meet the girls for morning tea.  More welcoming hugs and more 'Ooohing' and 'Aaahing' over an hour of catching up with everyone's news.

A quick trip through the grocery store and off I pedalled home to do a little necessary housework, and you already know that I am a 'bare minimum' kind of gal.  I then sorted through all the packages of beads and charms that had arrived while I was away.  It was just like Christmas!

A phone call from Adoring Husband to let me know that they were ok and still fishing miles from nowhere.  They'd caught a shark that tried to eat Number One Son's thong (the foot wearing thong, not the underwear type thong) and they had lost a lot of bait and equipment from big fish that, of course, got away.  They DID take a photo of the shark, but the photo mysteriously disappeared from the phone before they got home.

The water police had also stopped them and checked all the safety gear on board, so Adoring Husband was relieved that he had spent so much time on getting it all up to scratch.

I had myself a nice quiet lunch, checked my emails and sorted through some of my jewellery making area, when Adoring Husband and Number One Son arrived home safe n sound.

No fish.  Great fishing stories about the ones that got away!   Emptied all the gear out of the boat, washed the boat, had showers (and boy did they need them!) and then sat down for a drink.  Big plans for tomorrow's fishing trip and discussing when they will leave and where they might go, all the while turning redder and redder as the afternoon wore on.

Of course, no sunscreen had been taken.  They had worn t-shirts, shorts and a cap.  The biggest thing they caught was a very bad case of sunburn.  Number One Son is literally limping because his legs are so badly burned.  The good old Aloe Vera plant has had a good workout this afternoon and evening, that's for sure!

So now, tomorrow's trip has been canned because they don't want to make the sunburn any worse and we are going to the movies instead.

I am very grateful to have had such a lovely morning and part afternoon to do my 'thing' catching up with friends and then relaxing at home.  It was a lovely way to spend my first day home and I'm looking forward to going to the movies tomorrow with my boys.

I might even give them a break from the lectures that I've been giving them (free of charge) about remembering to eat breakfast, drinking less alcohol and wearing sunscreen.  I won't even mention Number One Son's terrible smoking habit!  Just for one day.  I'll recommence lectures on Thursday ***evil witch laugh***.

Not just one, but two lobsters for dinner tonight.  A pair of sore and sorry lobster lads, who still won't have learned their lesson ... because after all, they ARE males!

Home Sweet Home

I woke up at 5.24 this morning, six minutes before my alarm would have woken me.  I made myself a cup of tea, checked my emails and then spent an hour getting dressed and packing for my trip home from New Zealand.

Saying goodbye to Vegan Chickie, The Bare-chested Chef and Chicklet, was heart breaking and made me feel sooooo sad.  I sat like a zombie waiting for the airline to make the  boarding announcement and then tried desperately to fall asleep on the plane in the hope that the flight would go faster.

It worked because we landed in Oz thirty minutes earlier than scheduled, but it still felt like the longest flight EVER!

It took all of 20 minutes to pick up my luggage from the carousel and then get through Customs.  Out I walked to find Adoring Husband rushing to greet me and obviously feeling a little emotional.  How nice it was to feel his arms wrap around me and hear the joy in his voice as he welcomed me home!

I grabbed a take-away cappuccino and we wasted no time leaving the airport car park to make our way North to find Number One Son.  He was waiting for us in Brisbane, so with help from GPS Jane, we found him at chosen rendezvous point and then headed for home.

We arrived home just after 4.30pm.  Such a long, emotional day.  The relief, as we pulled into the driveway, was immense, and the warm and fuzzy feeling that swept over me as Psychotic Dogs greeted me loudly when I came through the door was overwhelming.

A couple of hours later, sitting outside in the cool afternoon breeze, a steak on the barby for the boys, a few drinks and some catching up with Number One Son and all is right with the world.

I checked my emails after dinner to find a new photo of my lovely little sleeping Chicklet waiting for me and the tears welled again.  I miss my NZ family so much and I hate that it will be so long til we see each other again, but, at the risk of sounding like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz,  the thing is ....

***genuine sigh of contentment***

there is no place like home.

Hi, my name is Age Challenged rQQzy and I am a Twi-aholic.

Team Edward Forever!!

Along with my daughters and sister, I am, among millions of others, a HUGE Twilight fan!

I have read the books 3 times and seen the movies countless times and am currently, very impatiently, awaiting the release of the next movie in the series, 'Breaking Dawn' part 1, which isn't released until November this year.  

I am a grown woman with few hormones remaining and enough life experience to control my hankerings for most things, other than chocolate and my morning coffee, and it is killing me having to wait so long for this new movie!  How in heaven's name does a crazy, hormonal teenager do it??!!

My oldest daughter fell passionately in love with Edward (and I'm not going to explain the storyline or the characters because if you don't know about it by now, you never will, and you probably need to get out more!) a long time ago and would swoon and drool over him while reading the books over and over again.  When she told me the storyline, I stated emphatically "Oh no, that doesn't sound like my kind of thing.  It wouldn't interest me at all!"

She was so convinced that I WOULD be interested, that she sent me the first book in the series, 'Twilight',  for Christmas about 2 years ago.  She told me that I MUST read the book before seeing the movie.

Well, I didn't even start reading it til about March and I struggled to get through a couple of pages at a time, but I love my daughter, and because it was her favourite book, I pushed myself to finish it.  It took me a couple of months to get half way through the book ... and then all of a sudden, I was hooked!   Thank goodness, she had sent me the sequel, 'New Moon', for mother's day!

I began reading it voraciously and before I had finished it,  demanded that Adoring Husband drive me 30 minutes to the nearest book store to buy the final 2 books in the series, 'Eclipse' and 'Breaking Dawn', because I knew that I just could NOT possibly WAIT to continue the story!

I am, and always will be, Team Edward.  I could gush over my reasons, but only Twilight fans understand the Team Edward v Team Jacob war ... although I could easily be convinced in a Team sandwich (see photo below).

I sometimes, to Adoring Husband's genuine disgust, wear a big black t-shirt to bed that sports a beautiful portrait of Edward on the front.  I have various other pieces of Twilight paraphernalia, which I would never wear in public, I own the three released dvds in the series and, as previously, stated am hankering for the next movie in the series to be released.

Should I also admit that I attended, with Adoring Husband in tow, the midnight screenings of 'New Moon' and 'Eclipse' along with hundreds of screaming teenagers at our local cinema?

I am very happy to be labelled a Twi-hard, but I would really appreciate NOT being called a Twi-mum, if that's ok.  I watch the Twi-mums on TV and they make me a little bit embarrassed, bouncing up and down like teenagers and wearing the Twilight gear proudly like a badge of honour in front of international cameras for all the world to see!  Really??!

I'll do that in the privacy of my own home and I'll bounce up and down in front of Adoring Husband and my kids ... that's embarrassing enough for them ... imagine what they would do if they saw me on a television screen doing that?!

So, anyway, that's my big confession.  I'll probably do some heavy duty GUSHING in November after I've seen the next movie.  You probably should prepare yourself because I do get a bit excited and it does take a few weeks to settle down after the event.  I promise that I'll put a proclaimer at the beginning of my post that day! 

Team Edward Forever!!

Team Sandwich ... maybe!