Michele Phillips

Well, I said I'd be back after Christmas...

2012-01-28T15:55:00.002+08:00

...I just didn't expect it would be Christmas 2011.
I imagine no-one looks at this blog anymore but if you HAVE happened to drop by, you'll now find me posting at a new blog.
Its called "What's in a Name? How Nigella, Rick and Elvis Got Me Through the Menopause" and you'll find it at: michelephillips.com.au
It's written for my granddaughter, Amelia (yes, I'm a nanna!), involves food and is hopefully still capable of giving people a few laughs.
I've only just started it up with the help of my husband, Leith, who recovered from his stroke and is going great guns.
Anyway, I hope to see you over there.
It's great to have discovered the urge to write again.

Taking the good with the bad

2009-12-22T14:35:00.002+08:00

Well, the bad news is that my husband had a stroke on December 4.
The good news is that it was a mild one - he can walk and talk, just not as well as he used to be able to.
It was one of the more terrifying experiences of our lives, far worse for him of course because he's the one who's had to cope with the consequences of a rogue blood clot that decided it wanted to have a holiday in the left side of his brain.
At least, the doctors are assuming that's what it was. They won't know for sure until he has an MRI in Perth on Thursday but there's a family history of clots (in the blood sense, not the other one as far as I'm aware, although one of his uncles was a bit dim) and his grandma had a stroke when, like him, she was in her mid-50s.
Which is far too young but from what I've read on the internet (the equivalent of War and Peace, basically) not uncommon.
The whole thing was very sneaky.
There was no pain, no falling over and thrashing around.
He just felt dizzy and unwell and "weird" and went to lie down. And when he got up he couldn't talk or walk properly.
It's been a lousy couple of weeks punctuated by those incredibly uplifting moments when you're reminded how much you love each other, how lovely your friends and family are and how it's possible to still be attracted to someone who wears long white pressure socks to bed.
It certainly hasn't been all doom and gloom. We realise how incredibly lucky he was that it wasn't any worse and are amazed by the remarkable progress he's made in the last couple of weeks.
We've just got back from the OT (which stands for Occupational Therapy - think the OC but slower, with no bling, histrionics or bad acting and transplanted to outpatients at Albany Regional Hospital).
His right hand is now as strong and as his left, if still not as dextrous. Two weeks ago it had about one-fifth of the strength and he couldn't do basic things like cross his fingers or hold a pen.
We've also been walking the dog nearly every morning since he left hospital, and each day we're managing to go a bit further and a bit more quickly, which is brilliant.
Speaking of hospital, Albany Regional is as old and crappy facility-wise as everyone says it is but the staff are generally wonderful - God knows how they cope.
Another thing: if you have school-age children who are undecided about what they want to do when they grow up, I would strongly recommend you guide them towards becoming a Consulting Physician (sort of a super GP).
My husband had a visit from one on the last day he was in hospital. It lasted for five minutes precisely, during which time the physician and his registrar talked among themselves and the registrar did an echocardiogram. Then they both buggered off.
As I wasn't there at the time, my husband had to get out of bed and pursue the physician down the corridor in order to ask a couple of questions - not easy considering he was walking like My Little Pony on crack and couldn't string more than three words together when he was stressed.
We got the physician's bill a couple of days ago and learned that this tour de force of modern medicine cost $445.90.
If you factor in an additonal five minutes for the corridor pursuit, that works out to $44.59 per minute.
So, take my advice people. Get thee - or at least thy children - to the nearest med school. It's almost as good as winning Lotto.
I have to go now and try to get this house into some sort of Christmas order. The tree's up and the shopping's done but the bathroom is an absolute pit - ain't it always the way?
I hope you and yours have a very happy and safe Christmas.
If time permits, I'll be making La Nigella's horrifically kitsch Christmas Puddini Bonbons for the big day and will regale you with photos of same on my return.
Joy to the world...

I can't believe Callan's dead

2009-11-27T14:00:00.004+08:00

We used to watch him religiously every week when we first lived here in Albany 35 years ago. This is what his death made me remember:
Changing into long, wrap-around Indian skirts and tight little tops after work (trackies hadn't been invented).
Thinking prawn cocktails were sophisticated.
Learning how to cook spaghetti bolognese and veal cordon bleu (very flash) from the Women's Weekly Cookbok.
Being given a waterbed by a friend. It was awful - always damp.
Building bookcases out of bricks and planks.
Being terrified of the bats in the garage under the house.
Smoking a joint while we were waiting for Monty Python, Callan and New Scotland Yard to come on the telly (yes, all on the same night).
Ditto, but listening to Poco's Crazy Eyes.
Being persona non grata with the old couple next door because we were living in sin.
My now husband buying a wedding ring with my first (and only) dole cheque. You could buy a band of 9 carat gold for $22 in 1974.
Becoming friendly with the couple next door after the nuptials. She showed me her doll collection and he told me he was so short because a tree fell on his head.
Taping council meetings (which were broadcast on the radio) for my husband, who was a reporter on the local paper. The only councillor I remember is Herb Wanke, for obvious reasons.
Watching The Winners on the ABC on Sunday nights and deciding I'd follow Carlton because they had the best uniforms.
Having a cat called Snooks whose tail later fell off due to an abscess.
Eating a liver and bacon counter lunch at the Premier hotel once a week (it was THE best).
Going to the Sunday session at the London Hotel and listening to Dot (I think that was her name) play the piano.
Above all, I remember feeling very happy and carefree.
We can only hope Callan's feeling the same way now he's shuffled off this mortal coil and is equipped with a halo as well as a gun.

We've also...

2009-11-27T13:42:00.004+08:00

...been going to Perth a lot.
I took this pic of a bloke in a cowboy hat while my husband nipped into the Kojonup bakery to buy some lunch.
What follows is the sort of photo you can take out of the car window when your husband's driving at 110kmh, eating a pie and steering with his knees.

In case you're wondering, it's of canola fields.

Feet of Clay

2009-11-27T11:44:00.011+08:00

It's a good thing I'm not a war correspondent - the hostilities would be well and truly over before I'd filed the first report.
The trouble with writing to deadlines for 25 years is that when it stops, so do you (at least, I did).
For those who are still around besides my Mum and Boothy and Halfpint this is what's been happening for the past couple of months: house stuff.
To be honest, it's been bliss. It's almost two years since we bought this house and for some reason - the moon being in the seventh house, Jupiter aligning with Mars or whatever - shit, as they say, has finally started to happen.
It started with Garry Butler, the landscaping Eric Close look-alike, who along with Luke the Magic Concreter got the paths sorted out and turned the top garden from a miniature version of the Somme into somewhere you actually wanted to be.
We've got two types of clay in this garden: clay that looks like little turds when you dig into it (brown clay) and clay that looks and SMELLS like little turds when you dig into it (yellow clay).
The gumboots were useless in the face of it, mainly because I couldn't find a pair small enough to fit my feet and every time I took a step the boot would get stuck and my whole leg would pop out.
Crocs and socks were much better so I've spent much of Spring wandering around the garden looking like a menopausal Minnie Mouse with filthy shoes.

Anyway, to give you an idea of all the work involved, here's a pic of me in the top garden when we first looked at the house in September 2007:

Here's one when we had the ground terraced in July 2008 (that's my husband taking a picture of me taking a picture of him). The entire fence fell over in a storm shortly afterwards - what a barrel of laughs that was.

And here's what it looks like now. All that's left to do is put a grey wash on the pine terracing and add some more plants.

Since we last spoke, I also got a new clothesline. This was a really big deal because I'd been without one for 9 months. I celebrated with a new pinny - not tailor-made but it could've been.

We've also got stuck into the "lower 40": Removed some crappy old colorbond fencing and this concrete block wall (that stylish orange stuff is to keep the dog in - only 20 bucks a roll at Bunnings)...

...and built a picket fence to match the existing one up the top.

OK, that's a pic of the pickets being delivered. The fence was actually finished yesterday but still needs to be painted, which I can't do until next week, and I'm waiting until then to take another photo.
The bloke to the left of the pic is Saint Laurie, builder and carpenter extraordinaire, if I could bottle him I'd make a fortune. He's brilliant.
We've also had a driveway removed (we had three) so that the three lower levels of the block will be linked by gardens (one of them for veggies - yay!).
Unsurprisingly, we're knackered and a lot poorer, but over the moon about what has been achieved in just a couple of months.

Bugger

2009-09-09T15:27:00.003+08:00

Well, we lost and - worse - St Christopher has been suspended for the first three games of next season for playing dirty.
My husband, who's really on a roll this week, has suggested we spend the next few days deciding on the AFL's Dimmest and Toughest Awards.
It sounds a lot more fun than picking Best and Fairest, so I'd like to start the ball rolling by nominating Barry Hall, Jonathon Brown and Stephen Milne.

Word of the Week: Strappado

2009-09-09T10:40:00.004+08:00

I haven't done one of these for ages so I thought I'd share "strappado", which I came across in the Oxford English Reference Dictionary when I was doing the Jumble Word puzzle in the paper this morning.
(Not cheating, just looking. Honest.)
I thought strappado might be the name of a Greek stew or some sort of fancy flamenco move but it turns out it's "a form of torture in which the victim is secured to a rope and made to fall from a height almost to the ground, then stopped with a jerk" (the dictionary doesn't say if the jerk should be someone you know but I'd be happy to share Mr Nasty Garden-Path Man if you can't find anyone).
The interesting thing is that strappado must be the forerunner of this:

As in, one day, torture; the next day...well, still torture if you ask me. Let's hope waterboarding doesn't catch on with the extreme sports set.
My word of the week was actually going to be "balls" in honour of my husband, who not only has them but used them to great advantage at Bunnings yesterday.
We both went to Bunnings a couple of weekends ago to buy one of those big patio heaters for our deck because the temperature out there hovers between "brass monkey" and "nithered" (now there's a good Yorkshire word) for all but four months of the year.
It was a bargain, this heater - reduced from $269 to $169.
Then my husband went back to Bunnings on Saturday to buy some phone cable and found that in the space of a week this patio heater had been marked down again, to $99.
He was spitting chips when he got home but seeing as the patio heater was still in its box, convinced me to help him Hunt for the Receipt.
I've used capital letters there because such is the chaos of our in-house filing system, it took three days to find the docket (it was on top of a stack of bricks in the shed - obvious really).
Anyway, long story short, my husband returned the patio heater to Bunnings and got a $169 refund from the lady at checkout number 1. Then he went and picked up another heater - exactly the same - took it through checkout number 2 and paid $99 for it.
I would never have had the guts to try this on and am still positively breathless with admiration. What a guy.

Go Blue Boys

2009-09-04T09:07:00.004+08:00

It might be an idea to skip over this post if you're not into AFL or if you're an overly sensitive Dockers supporter.
But first, apologies for the absence - I didn't realise how long it had been until I looked at the date of my last post just then.
There's been lots keeping me busy on the house front, mainly painting, but we've also found a new garden-path bloke (a landscaper) who is smart and friendly and thorough, as in he's spent ages measuring things and chasing up tradesmen. He also bears more than a passing resemblance to this bloke.

Now, I don't know about you, but I'd be more than happy to mortgage the dog to have a smart and friendly Eric Close look-alike wandering around the place for a few days. Hopefully we won't have to - we'll find out when we get his quote today.
But back to footy. The pic at the top of this post is of the thoughful home-made trophy given to me by my nephew, a West Coast supporter, when Carlton first won the wooden spoon back in 2002.
It took him ages to colour it in with blue texta, which tells you all you need to know about West Coast supporters if you ask me.
Since then, despite another wooden spoon, the Blues have clawed their way back and
on Saturday night, for the first time in 8 years, will be playing finals footy.
A sad but true fact: I'm nearly wetting myself with excitement. It's one of the highlights of my year.
My friend, Dennis, on the other hand, is spewing. This is because Dennis is a Dockers supporter and, let's face it, has a lot to spew about.
Which brings me to another highlight of this year.
Considering I've been abused, ridiculed and generally dumped on for years for following Carlton, you'd think I'd empathise with the plight of Freo fans.
Unfortunately, life's not like that.
It all started innocently enough when the Dockers got a hiding at the hands of the Bombers back in Round 2. I thought it might be fun for Dennis to find in his mailbox an application for Bombers membership sent by Mr Matthew Lloyd himself.
The accompanying note read, "Mate, You know you want to do it, love from Mattie."
As it turned out, it was more than fun, it was addictive.
Every week since then, barring when he was overseas on holiday, Dennis has found a letter in his mailbox from people as diverse as Mr B. Fevola, Mr C. Cornes (who sent a lovely birthday card), Mr L.Jurrah, Mr S. Freud and Mr J.H. Christ ("Mate, Would you like me to ask Dad to smite Nick Riewoldt for you?").
The final letter, last weekend, was from Mr F. Sinatra on behalf of Mr M. Pavlich and the boys.
It went like this:

OUR WAY
And now, the end is here,
We stuffed it up, we blew the season.
My friend, I'll say it clear,
We came 14th, and with good reason.

We dropped so many kicks,
So many games, we played the Power way.
We're just a bunch of hicks,
Who did it our way.

Regrets, we've had a lot,
We wish we'd never started playing.
Each time we hit the road,
We knew we'd usually get a flaying.

We know we played like girls,
We'd like to say, not in a sour way,
We wish we'd never tried,
To do it our way.

Yes, there were times, I'm sure you knew,
When we bit off more than we could chew.
The Saints, the Magpies and the Crows,
The Dogs, the Cats, yes, heaven knows,
We lost them all, we hit the wall,
WE DID IT OUR WAY.

PS: Thanks for being such a good sport Dennis. Up the mighty Blues.

Young Einstein

2009-08-11T15:28:00.008+08:00

I read in the paper this morning that Canadian animal psychologists have found that dogs are as intelligent as the average two-year-old child.
They used tests designed to show the development of language, pre-language and basic arithmetic in kids and found that dogs could understand up to 250 words and gestures, count up to five and do simple mathematical calculations.
Golden retrievers are apparently among the most intelligent and, the report said, dogs can rival apes and parrots for their ability to understand language.
I don't have an ape or a parrot but I do have a golden retriever (pictured above with my husband's jumper on her head, pretending rather cleverly that she's invisible).
Ella, who also answers to the names Bumhead and Nuffnuff (because that's the noise she makes when she spots next door's cat through the window), doesn't have quite the vocabulary of your canine high achievers but she will very soon, because now I know what she's capable of, I'm going to start intensive vocab lessons.
The words and phrases she knows already are no, sit, stay, walkies, catch, go get it, drop it, good girl, dinner, breakfast, biscuit, chewie (aka Schmackos), yummy medicine, Paul and Kate (our kids), Mummy and Daddy (I nearly didn't include those, so embarrassing), squeaky bone, hot dog (the shape of her favourite squeaky bone), car, let's go, go and do wee, give me a cuddle (when I say this she jumps up on my knee and stays there for hours or until I can no longer feel my legs, whichever comes first), where are my socks, and lie down.
Here is a picture of Ella understanding and obeying the command "lie down".

And here is another picture taken after my husband thought she looked too comfortable lying down and said, "Cat!"

You'll notice that the TV in the background of picture 2 is showing an image of a man in a silly costume. This is because it's the History Channel, to which my husband is connected intravenously.
Some time this week, I'm going to teach Ella the words "History Channel" and this will be the signal for her to grab the remote control and bury it in the garden.
Now I know how clever Ella is, I'm sure she'll have no problems learning this.
Next week I'm going to teach her Pythagoras' Theorem. I'll let you know how it goes.

PS: In case you're wondering, the most intelligent dog breeds were found to be border collies, poodles, German shepherds, golden retrievers, doberman pinschers, Shetland sheepdogs, labrador retrievers, papillons, rottweilers and Australian cattle dogs.
The least intelligent were Afghan hounds, basenjis, bulldogs, chow chows, borzois, bloodhounds, pekingese, beagles, mastiffs and basset hounds.

My First Dictionary

2009-08-10T13:04:00.003+08:00

Many thanks to JudiJ for sending me a link to My First Dictionary, a blog by British librarian Ross Horsley, who comes up with definitions like the one above most days of the week.
Horsley's blog is very dark and very funny and I love it. You'll find it here.

Up the garden path (2)

2009-08-05T15:05:00.004+08:00

Back in May we asked a bloke to come over and quote a price for laying the garden paths around the house.
This man, who I'll call Mr Can-Do, was very friendly. All over us like a rash, truth be told. Nothing was too much trouble, he could do everything from go to whoa.
The price he quoted for the job was amazing, almost too good to be true. We accepted straight away and, yes, he could start some time in June and, yes, he'd put the quote in writing and leave it in our mailbox the next time he drove past.
He never did give us that written quotation, even though we asked him twice, but this didn't bother us too much because, for some reason, a lot of tradesmen down here won't.
Besides, Mr Can-Do was a nice bloke, wasn't he? Friendly. Trustworthy.
As it turned out, Mr Can-Do didn't start in June. We were also having the house rendered and he agreed with our renderer that it would be better to lay the paths after the rendering was finished. Just ring when you're ready for me to start, he said. What a guy.
So, once the rendering was done - brilliantly, I might add, by a lovely bloke called David Cook - I rang Mr Can-Do and left a message on his phone.
When he didn't ring back after a few days, my husband called again.
And what my husband got this time was a very different bloke. A bloke who was rude and surly and whose conversation consisted of words like "nah" and "dunno" and "maybe".
Now, we're not idiots. After that phone conversation, even Blind Freddy could see that Mr Can-Do had lots of other work and didn't want to lay our garden paths any more. But we decided not to worry about it until after the weekend because, well, sometimes you just get sick of this shit and need to stick your head in the sand for a while.
Then, lo and behold, on Saturday, in the middle of the footy, there was a knock on the door and there he was, in the flesh. He thought he'd better have a look round, he said, before he started the job.
He was friendly again, talking in words of more than two syllables but, unfortunately, he'd morphed into Mr Can't-Do.
There was a lot more work than he'd originally thought when he gave the quote, he said. Before he could start we'd have to do all sorts of things: dig up and redistribute the clay and have compacting sand delivered and put it on the paths and compact it and remove a section of fence and dig up heaps of plants so the barrow could get through because he wasn't having his blokes pushing barrows uphill.
Now, my husband works five days a week, so on Monday he rang Mr Can't-Do and asked if we could pay extra to have some of his labourers do this unforeseen prep work.
"Nah, can't help ya, too busy."
Did he know of anyone else we could pay, then?
"Nah."
It was like dealing with Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. Then, lo and behold, we got a call Monday afternoon saying his two labourers would be coming over the next morning - as in, yesterday morning.
So I arranged for the sand to be dumped in the driveway by 9am and dug up the plants and put them in pots and got money out of the bank to pay these two blokes direct.
My husband got up at six yesterday morning to finish things off and the two labourers turned up at quarter past eight.
My husband showed them what we wanted done, then headed off to work, and the two labourers drove off to pick up their tools.
And they never came back.
I waited and waited and waited. The sand was delivered. I waited some more.
In the end, because I had to go out, I rang Mr Can't-Do at 10am to see what was going on. This was the conversation.
Me: Hi, it's Michele. Your two blokes left to pick up their tools at 8.30 and haven't come back. I have to go out and I was wondering what was happening.
Him: Dunno.
Me: Do you know if they picked up their stuff.
Him: Yeah, they got it.
Me: Well, they haven't come back here. Do you have a mobile number for them?
Him: Yeah, hang on. (Pause 10 seconds). Look, I'll have to ring you back.
Me: OK. My number's...
Him (interrupting): Listen, I'm on the road. I don't need this. I'm too busy for this.
Me: Yeah, well, we're all busy. It's not just you.
Him (shouting): Don't you get uppity with me.
Me: I'm not, I'm upset they haven't come back. You'd be upset too if you were treated like this.
Him (shouting louder): Shut up. Just shut up and listen.
Me (shouting back): What? Don't you...
Him (screaming over the top of me): I don't have to put up with this. You can shove the job. I don't need your money.
And then he hung up.
When my husband found out, he phoned this prick and said things to him that could never be printed here.
And that's what Mr Can't-Do wanted all along because now he'll be able to tell whoever's interested what nasty, difficult people we are. He'll be able to justify not doing the job for us.
But only to himself. Everyone I've told about this (everyone I can think of, basically) thinks he's an arsehole who didn't have the balls to say, "Look, I agreed to do this job when I had no other work but now I've got lots and I'm pulling out."
Which is why this post is headed "Up the garden path (2)". If you look at the post below you might see some similarities.
Footnote: we now know that if something sounds too good to be true, it probably is. And if you've got this far, congratulations and a big thank you for bearing with me. I really needed to get it off my chest.

Up the garden path (1)

2009-08-05T13:51:00.004+08:00

I have a very dear friend, single for a long time, who for the last three months has been in a relationship with a man who is witty, intelligent and passionate.
We're talking about passion with a capital P, both physically and emotionally. He even sends her e-mails from work along the lines of, "Only six hours until I can touch you again."
The last time I saw her, which was the last time I was in Perth, the two of them had just spent a particularly lovely weekend together.
That was four weeks ago. He hasn't spoken to her since.
He doesn't return her calls, nor has he replied to her e-mails.
He's not dead. She knows this because she rang his workplace. Apart from that, though, she doesn't have a clue what happened.
So, for the past four weeks she's been through various kinds of hell, starting with puzzlement, going through bleak disappointment and hurt, and ending where so many women end up: It's probably my fault.
It's not, of course. The guy's an arsehole. A gutless wonder who didn't have the balls to say, "I need a break" or "I'm having second thoughts" or whatever it was that was disturbing the universe that is him.
My friend recently entered the next stage of this awful affair: anger.
Now, I've seen her when she gets angry and feel that someone should probably say to this bloke, "Be afraid. Be very afraid."
It won't be me because I think he deserves whatever's coming. I'm now waiting with bated breath to see if it makes the evening news and if it involves his testicles and a mangle.
She's already talked about hiring a skywriter but I suspect it may go way beyond that.

Things I won't hear in my lifetime

2009-08-03T16:32:00.005+08:00

"Hi, this is your dedicated garden path person.
"I just wanted to let you know that the price I quoted for the job is firm and inclusive of absolutely everything to do with garden paths.
"There'll be no nasty surprises.
"Yes, honestly. Absolutely. Swear on a road accident. No need to worry about a thing.
"Have a lovely day."

Muffy the Wonder Dog

2009-07-31T09:30:00.006+08:00

Pic: Craig Barrow

If it's as cold in your neck of the woods as it is in mine, you can at least warm the cockles of your heart by checking out the story of Muffy the dog.
My son sent me the link yesterday and it's a ripper. You'll find it here.
Sorry I haven't been around much lately but the weather's been brilliant, if freezing, and I've been outside every day digging, weeding, planting and painting (walls not pictures, unfortunately).
While I was down the bottom of the garden planting quince trees yesterday, I spotted what I thought was a really big pelican out of the corner of my eye.
Turned out it was a lunatic (and I say that with the greatest admiration) paraglider doing aerial "wheelies" over Mt Clarence, so I raced inside and grabbed my camera.

To put this pic (and his/her altitude) in perspective, here's another one taken without the zoom. The paraglider is the tiny little dot you can see to the right of the crest of the hill if you've got really good eyesight and a better camera than mine (as in, now I've made the pic smaller I can't see a bloody thing but if you click on it you'll get a bigger and better image).

Today I have to finish up some painting but I'll be back next week with bells on.
See you then.

Of bladders and bad English

2009-07-24T14:41:00.004+08:00

Prostates and pelvic floors being what they are, I suppose it was only a matter of time before someone came up with a website for movie-goers who lose the plot (literally) because their bladders can't make it through a screening.
That website is RunPee.com, an online help-line that takes the guesswork out of when to take a dunny break without missing any crucial scenes or plot twists.
The site covers all sorts of movies and tells you when it's a good time to head to the toilet, how long you've got to do the biz, and then gives you a short synopsis of what you've missed while you were away.
In the case of My Life In Ruins (pictured above), you're safe to go 45 minutes into the movie and have four minutes to get back to your seat.
Brilliant or what? You can check it out here and there's also a blog here.
On another wet note, did you see the story in The West on Wednesday about rain delaying the opening of the new Perth to Bunbury highway?
It was pretty unremarkable except for spokeswoman Tammy Mitchell, who when asked about the delay said, "We've had a constant series of rain events."
God help us. Whatever happened to "raining a lot"? Or even a good old Australian, "It's been pissing down"?

From the Crypt

2009-07-20T11:30:00.004+08:00

There's a box down in the shed that's stuffed full of newspaper clippings - almost every column I wrote for The West Australian since I began in the late 80s.
Some of these were included in the two books I had published and I hadn't thought about them for years until I was stopped in my tracks by an episode of Murder She Wrote on Foxtel's TV1 channel.
It was an episode that inspired a column that was written, oh, it must be 17 years ago now and it made me think it might be fun to drag out an occasional oldie and run it here.
(I should add that I can't post anything of mine published between 2004 and 2009 because The West owns the copyright and would shit on me from a great height BUT all of the columns written before that are owned by me and good to go.)
Anyway, here it is, the first instalment From the Crypt - living proof that (1) pay-TV has no shame when it comes to endless re-runs and (2) cop shows really haven't changed that much over the years.

I WAS lying in front of the fire watching Murder She Wrote and all of a sudden this guy said, "I always wanted to be a carp. My daddy was a carp, God rest his soul, and when I was a kid he always let me polish that silver badge of his..."
It made me realise you need to have extraordinary abilities to get into American cop shows, as opposed to British cop shows like The Bill where all you really need are sturdy shoes and the ability to memorise three lines: "PC39 reporting for duty, sir", "Give us a break, Sarge" and "Right, mate, you're nicked."
American cop shows, on the other hand, require a multitude of talents. For starters you have to be totally incapable of getting on with your boss so that he can:
1. Take you off the case (but you do it anyway)
2. Suspend you from duty (but you do it anyway)
3. Give you till noon on Toozday to solve three murders and cure your partner of the death wish that is threatening his otherwise promising career, this death wish having been brought about by the violent demise of partner's wife/childhood sweetheart/handicapped child at the hands of a black crack dealer who drives a white Mercedes.
Not that it's essential you have a male partner with a death wish. You could just as easily have a female who's wet behind the ears. This female will have replaced the partner who retired after 47 years on the beat and who has been married to the same woman for 45 of them.
Your ex-partner and his wife will retire to Florida, be gunned down on a golf course by a black crack dealer driving a white Mercedes and wet female will help solve the crime, proving she's got what it takes after all.
You will also need to have an ex-wife so you can go to her apartment to visit your two cute children who will throw their arms around your neck and shout, "Daddy! Daddy! Daddy!" every time you walk through the door.
This wife has to be "ex" because then you can visit your mother and say things like, "Jeez, Ma" when she serves you up enormous home-cooked meals. These meals are necessary because your diet consists entirely of doughnuts and Danish washed down with cawfee that comes in a polystyrene cup.
What's more, you will eat only when you're sitting behind the wheel of a car, preferably one that's parked alongside a broken fire hydrant that's squirting water all over a Puerto Rican couple having a domestic on the sidewalk. Then you can leap out mid-bite, throwing doughnut roughly to one side while you pull out your gun.
And why anyone would want to go through all that just to be a carp, I have no idea.
Far easier, I think, to lie in front of the fire like a stunned mullet and wonder at the meaning of it all.

United We Stand

2009-07-20T09:55:00.003+08:00

This is one of our local businesses.
They have a commercial on local TV that features five male employees standing in a line underneath that sign, smiling at the camera.
Every time I see it I think, "How long before they catch on?"
Top marks to the ad person who thought it up, though, for making me laugh every single time it comes on.

Here it is

2009-07-08T09:34:00.004+08:00

Hopefully coming to an IGA carpark near me soon, although if I ever see it in the flesh I'll probably start to hyperventilate.
Thank you Leanne from Wicked Campers for asking me to submit a saying to grace the back of one of your vans. It looks fabulous. I love it.
If you don't know what the hell I'm on about, you'll find the full story here and here and Leanne's A Wicked Evangelist blog here.
Now I'm going to have a cup of tea and a lie down. The excitement's just about done me in.

Channeling Elvis 3

2009-07-06T10:57:00.006+08:00

School holidays started on the weekend and the town's already awash with "No Vacancies" signs.
I love all the tourist seasons but especially winter when you can wander down the main street and play Spot the Visiting Sullen Teenagers.
These are the ones who'll be making their way through the horizontal rain that's hammering the pavements, pretending they're not related to the man and woman walking directly in front of them.
They will be mobile phone-less because their dads will have said, "We didn't drive 400kms so you could spend all day texting your mates."
Shortly they'll be herded into family cars and driven off to look at The Gap and The Natural Bridge, where they'll consider throwing themselves off.
But before that, Mum's going to make them go into every single gift shop on York Street.
When they get to Wombat Lodge, which is total kitsch heaven, they will find the Dog Rock snowdome pictured above.
I love this snowdome so much, I've bought it many times for family and friends. It costs $10 and was made in Sydney. The "snow" is glitter. It's breathtaking.

Above is a picture of the real Dog Rock, which comes courtesy of Wikipedia Commons.
I had every intention of driving down Middleton Rd and taking a picture myself but it's pouring down at the moment, plus it's also blowing a gale and the temp is 12C.
The real Dog Rock is a huge granite outcrop in the shape of a bloodhound's head. See the cute collar someone's painted on it? I think that's what probably did it for the Sydney snowdome-maker. I think he saw that and couldn't contain himself any longer.
Luckily, his loss of control was our gain. I don't think you could find a finer souvenir.

Dear me

2009-07-01T11:40:00.008+08:00

I've got more hair on the left-hand side of my head than on the right-hand side.
I know this because I've been told so by various hairdressers, the most recent just yesterday when I was having my hair cut.
They've also told me that this condition is really common but I can't say I'm convinced.
I mean, I've never had one person say, "Yeah, me too," when I've mentioned it in conversation, which admittedly I don't do very often because then everyone would know I have a sub-standard scalp.
Sometimes I wonder if my life would've turned out differently if my hair follicles had been more evenly distributed.
As in, maybe people would take me more seriously.
Maybe the asbestos-fence removers wouldn't have dicked me around for six weeks if I'd been able to say from the get-go, "Listen mate, you're dealing with someone who has an exceptional follicle-to-skin ratio."
As it was, the bloke on the other end of the phone kept me waiting for ages, called me "dear" five times in 90 seconds and then instructed me to jiggle my phone plug in the socket because there was interference on the line and it had to be at my end because, "It was fine until you rang, dear."
Follicularly unbalanced as I am, my brain was urging me to tell him that Dear would be popping over shortly to rip out his voice box via his rectum and maybe go over a few points he'd failed to assimilate at customer-service school.
But seeing as his was the only asbestos removal company I could find in the phone book, I said things like "Thank you" and "Sorry" and "No worries" instead.
Not that it made any difference. I ended up calling him three more times, was called "dear" a total of 21 times and was eventually sent a red herring called Les.
Les knocked on the door and said he'd be here to remove the fence on the Wednesday or, no, hang on, probably the weekend, depending on the kids' sporting fixtures.
That was three weeks ago.
Then my husband rang and, hey, guess what, two blokes came round the very next morning and removed the fence.
In the meantime, in an effort not to go completely insane, I've been busy establishing an Unbalanced Head Support Group. You're welcome to join even if your head's normal.

Coffee wank

2009-06-18T10:06:00.004+08:00

This picture is taken from a Harvey Norman brochure published last month, promoting the store's range of coffee machines.
It comes with the following caption: "Will Young, Coffee Director of the highly-praised Campos Brand, thinks life's too short for lack-lustre lattes."
As someone who thinks life's long enough to learn where to put your hyphens if you don't want to look like a cretin, this sentence annoys me on two levels.
The second level is the amount of wank that surrounds the whole coffee scene, from Mr Mega-cool Barista with, like, a total passion for his job and a tatt up the inside of his arm that spells "Darren" in Chinese characters, to people who nearly pass out when faced with substandard crema or vacuum-packed beans.
Seeing as I don't drink coffee, I suppose you could say I'm biased.
The reason I don't drink it is simply because I don't like the taste or the smell.
One of the highlights of my life was when Cadbury stopped putting coffee cremes in boxes of Roses, although I must say the dog was immensely pissed off (I've since discovered that dogs should NEVER be given chocolate because it's akin to poison, so please take note if you're still chucking nut clusters in your mutt's general direction).
When it comes to hot bevvies, if your body is indeed a temple, mine's awash with tea right up to the pointy bits on top of the stained glass windows.
I drink gallons of the stuff and am still optimistic/stupid enough to hope that one day I'll walk into a cafe and get a decent cup.
As in, I'll be recognised immediately as a discerning Dilmah babe and won't be given a cup of hot water with a tea bag on the side.
Or a teapot that's been designed to leak all over the table and down your sleeve the minute you tip it at a 45-degree angle.
But seeing as tea is such a nanna's drink, such an unfashionable infusion, I'm not holding my breath.
I can't even get away from the dreaded coffee wank down here in Albany, population 35,000, town council motto: Let's Pretend We're Living In 1950.
The town has its own cafe strip down by the beach, much touted as such in all the tourist literature, even though it consists of just one cafe and a fish and chip shop (it's more of a cafe patch, really, but I suppose that doesn't have quite the same ring marketing-wise as "strip").
According to friends this cafe serves good coffee and as a consequence is always packed to the rafters (not to mention pavement) with the sort of dedicated coffee drinkers who turn up their jacket collars at the back and know how to knot their scarves in at least a dozen insouciant ways.
As a cult it's something I'll never be able to understand; it'll always make me giggle.
What's more, if anyone ever catches me describing my cup of tea as assertive, artisanal, nuanced, snappy, earthy, vibrant or pleasantly retro-nasal, feel free to wash my mouth out with Milo. Please.

Sale of the Century

2009-06-15T10:54:00.004+08:00

Well, not quite but a Booktopia book sale is always good and the one they've got on at the moment (their end of financial year sale) is a ripper.
You'll have to wade through 41 pages to check out all the specials but it's worth it if you want to get your hands on things like Peter Robinson's Inspector Banks novels for around $5.
There's all sorts up for grabs but I know from past experience that you have to be quick - they sell out fairly quickly.
Postage is $6.50 for up to 100 books, their service is great and the books are usually delivered within a week (they're based in Sydney).
And I know I sound like a walking advert so I should probably point out that I have no connection with Booktopia other than being a customer.
We're a family of mega readers - we have books coming out of our earholes - and I've been meaning to blog about good internet bookshops for ages.
A really fabulous one is Book Depository, which is based in the UK and not only has a list and prices that rival Amazon but also has free delivery worldwide.
Again, the books are usually on your doorstep within a week and the service is excellent.
You can get bucketloads of hardback titles at Book Depository for about half the price you pay in Australia (it will vary according to the exchange rate) and you don't have to worry about the weight because the postage is free.
I managed to get Rick Stein's Mediterranean Escapes for about $30; it was selling for more than $60 in bookshops here (they have a massive range of cookbooks as well as house and garden, craft, photography, art - you name it).
There are links to both websites just to the right of this post (under Places I Like To Visit).
If you're a booklover, believe me, you'll be like a pig in the proverbial.

And the winner is...

2009-06-15T10:32:00.002+08:00

Actually it's a tie because I still can't decide between "Keep honking - I'm reloading my gun" and Robin Williams' "If women ran the world we wouldn't have wars, just intense negotiations every 28 days".
Leanne, I'll leave it up to you which one you use and thanks again for letting me have a go, I can't wait to see the photo.
I only hope the finished van doesn't make it to the IGA carpark down here, I think the excitement would kill me (sad but true).
Apologies also for not getting all your comments up quicker, the result of two birthdays in the past week, massive hangovers and the realisation twice in five days that even though I'm old enough to know better, I still don't.

Happy camper

2009-06-11T09:26:00.004+08:00

One of the many advantages of retirement is that I'm now eligible to enter all the competitions The West Australian holds when it wants to boost its circulation figures.
You know how it goes: "Win five Holdens in five minutes!!! PLUS if you also get The West home-delivered, we'll throw so much money at you you'll start to hyperventilate!!!"
I learnt long ago that this sort of thing is not to be sneezed at. My husband's late Aunty Marie practically made a career from it. She was a professional competition enterer who for years had set aside a couple of days a week to enter competitions in as many magazines and newspapers as she could lay her hands on.
The amount she spent on mags and postage was more than made up for with free trips overseas, holidays throughout Australia, hampers of food, crates of booze and more floral arrangements than you could poke a carnation at.
Her home was packed to the rafters with K-Tel bottle cutters and mismatched soft furnishings, curios and ornaments - all of them brand, spanking new; all of them to someone else's taste.
She bought so many women's magazines, I was amazed Kerry Packer didn't show up at her funeral so he could give thanks for a life that was integral to his financial well-being.
Sadly, seeing as Marie was an aunt by marriage, there was nothing genetic going on husband-wise, so that special combination of skill and dumb luck was not passed on.
Basically, my husband's a dud at winning stuff and I'm not much better.
Inspired by Marie's regular and often astounding windfalls, I did try my hand at it for a while when the kids were little and managed to win a trip to Singapore.
It was a Valentine's Day competition in the Women's Weekly and you had to write a poem for your true love.
As far as I can remember, mine went like this (I don't think the 5th and 6th lines are right but, hey, it was 25 years ago):
"Pitter, patter, little feet,
"Mother dear feels dead beat.
"Through each grimace, whinge and scream,
"She cherishes a secret dream
"That one day, darling, you and I,
"Will wave our cares and woes goodbye.
"We'll leave the kids with mum-in-law
"And bugger off to Singapore."
And we did - bugger off to Singapore, I mean, for a week of unalloyed luxury. We were flown first class and it was so good I would've been quite happy to spend the entire seven days on the plane.
But despite that major success I haven't entered a competition since because the dedication required to reach Marie-like heights is, truth be told, really boring after a while.
I'd like to hold a competition of my own, though, because after writing the Poxy Lady post (click here to read it) I was contacted by A Wicked Evangelist from Wicked camper vans.
And, hey, guess what??!! I've been asked to send them my favourite quote or saying and they'll have it spray-painted on the back of a van and send me a photo of it!!! (All the exclamation marks are to convey how utterly thrilled I am to be asked. Next time I think I'll write about how much I'd like someone to give me a million dollars. You never know your luck.)
The problem is coming up with just one quote.
My favourites so far are:
* Keep honking - I'm reloading my gun.
* I plan on living forever. So far, so good.
* The problem is that God gives men a brain and a penis and only enough blood to run one at a time (Robin Williams).
* There's no such thing as fun for the whole family (Jerry Seinfeld).
* If women ran the world we wouldn't have wars, just intense negotiations every 28 days (Robin Williams again).
If you'd like to help me choose, let me know which one you prefer via the comments thingy below. Or if you think you have a better one - and here's where the competition comes into it - let me know.
No prizes apart from the honour of having your quote on the back of a Wicked van, which is pretty bloody excellent if you ask me.
PS: If you'd like to check out A Wicked Evangelist, click here.

Happy Birthday Ella

2009-06-05T09:24:00.003+08:00

It's the dog's 10th birthday today and despite a comprehensive search of the vast Ella photo archives, this is the only party-type pic I could find to mark the occasion.
It was taken a few Christmases ago and is a reminder that you should never let your kids near your booze cupboard when they're also in possession of a glue stick and a packet of glitter.

A girl's best friend

2009-06-04T09:13:00.009+08:00

Bugger diamonds. The value of a bolster, hammer and cold chisel is incalcuable when you're removing tiles designed to withstand an engagement with the Pacific fleet.
These tiles are everywhere, even on the window sills, in varying (marbled) tones of lemon, pale blue, beige and pale grey.
Back in the 60s people were apparently so confident that any survivors of the apocalypse would be interested in checking out their home-decorating flair, they attached these tiles with stuff that was designed to outlast man himself.
I was told by a procession of helpful blokes who walked through the kitchen that the best way to get them off the walls was with a mini jackhammer.
And they were probably right, but seeing as I'm the sort who gets nervous pushing spuds down the feedtube of the food processor I decided against it.
I've never been good with things that combine an electrical current with movement on a major scale, and blood mixed with cement dust has never been my idea of a fun day in, especially when the blood belongs to me.
Plus, the guy who did our bathroom reno removed the tiles with a mini jackhammer and not only were the dust and noise a major pain, it wasn't much quicker than doing it by hand.

Above is a pic of some of the work I did yesterday. Gorgeous kitchen, eh?
On the upside, the hammering scared the crap out of the mice. They've all scarpered.
And in case you're wondering (believe me, many people do) why we took this on, here are a couple of pics of what we can see now we've put up a deck (if you click on them you'll get bigger pictures).

It may be hard work but when all's said and done, it's like having your own little slice of heaven.

Mice 7, Michele 1

2009-05-27T11:36:00.005+08:00

It's not every day you find two mouse turds stuck to the side of your HP Sauce bottle and for that I'm extremely grateful (although I can't help having a grudging admiration for something that can crap and scale a vertical surface simultaneously).
I had an inkling it was mouse season when I was painting the shed because one of the little critters poked it's head out from between two bricks and watched what I was doing for a while.
This proximity to David Attenborough-type reality didn't bother me much because since a mouse ran down my arm last year and took ten years off my life (it was hiding in a jacket), I've toughened up a bit.
The one that poked its head out from between the bricks was only a baby and as cute as a button and if I'd had a shovel handy I would've walloped it, because before you could say "Mickey and Minnie" it would've grown into a big ugly sucker and started crapping all over my pantry.
As it turns out, its bigger friends have been doing just that, so at the moment I'm waging a war on mice and have discovered, courtesy of the back of the mouse-trap packet, that there is indeed a mouse season and it's NOW.
Unfortunately, of the eight traps I set, only one was visited by a mouse that was dumb enough to get caught. The other seven had the bait removed (peanut butter and bacon) but hadn't been sprung.
I suspect I'm baiting the traps not only with the equivalent of Nigella-type mouse food but also with far too much.
I don't want to resort to poison (to my mind, traps are pretty instant therefore less cruel), but I'm so sick of the little bastards my resolve is beginning to waver.
Maybe standing guard with a shovel isn't such a bad idea after all.

Poxy lady? Let's hope not.

2009-05-27T10:34:00.005+08:00

Spotted in a supermarket carpark last week, one of those Wicked rental camper vans with the following slogan painted on the back: "If God were a woman would sperm taste like chocolate?"
As an atheist, this is a hard one to answer but I'd like to think that if there was a God and she was female, she'd have the imagination to go seasonal.
Beer and seafood in summer, roast chook in winter, chocolate on birthdays (and let's not forget special catering for those who have allergies, gluten intolerances etc).
Unfortunately, all of that wouldn't fit on the back of a van so I can see why whoever wrote it just went with chocolate.
But while we're on the subject of spotted, it's one of the reasons I haven't been around lately.
Son, who lives on his own, came down with chicken pox, big time, as in really ill.
He's now better and my husband and I are waiting to see if the pox will be passed on to us.
We both think we had it when we were kids but my husband can't check because he's an only child and both his parents are dead.
My mum says she doesn't remember me having it but then my mum's reached an age where one in 10 conversations start like this:
Mum: "I read that book you were telling me about, what was it called, you know, the one that was made into a film with...what's his name?...I saw him on TV last week with that woman who was married to Xavier Cugat...Ron! What was the name of Xavier Cugat's third wife?...it's on the tip of my tongue..."
Suffice to say, every time we itch, we panic.
And in case you're wondering, Xavier Cugat's third wife was Abbe Lane.

Why my husband has a paint stirrer sticking out of his chest

2009-05-08T09:19:00.005+08:00

I know it's not next week but I needed to share.
This is because I finished painting the shed, which is actually a brick garage.
The bricks are those awful 1960s salmon-coloured ones, the sort of salmon colur that owes more to Kit-e-Kat than John West.
I painted them dark grey to match the big Colorbond shed alongside and while they'll never make Home Beautiful, the whole garage/shed combo looks a lot better.
It's a bastard of a job, painting brick walls: fiddly, takes ages and makes you ache in muscles you didn't know you had.
So I was really pleased when I finished and it looked great and I couldn't wait for my husband to get home from work so I could show him.
So he arrived home and he looked at it and he pointed to the top right-hand corner and he said, "You've missed a bit."

Leg of Sven

2009-05-06T08:35:00.004+08:00

Actually, I don't know the name of the leg's owner. I just know that the publishers of Swedish magazine, Tare Lugnt, decided to release their third edition as a tattoo.
You'll find more pics, plus a Youtube video, if you click here.
The thing I find most shocking is that this human mag didn't bother to buy new undies for the photo shoot.
All that pilling around the crotch is so not a good look.
It raises some interesting possibilities, though, in these times of dwindling magazine and newspaper circulation.
I mean, who wouldn't be interested in an edition of Inside Out tattooed all over Orlando or Brad or George, if only to find out where they placed that retro lamp?
And that's all from me this week because the weather down here has been unbelievably good and is threatening to stay that way until Sunday.
I've already backfilled a retaining wall with sand (which was as exciting as it sounds) and today I'm finishing painting the shed.
See you next week.

Rust as a lifestyle statement

2009-05-01T10:15:00.008+08:00

One of these days I'm going to learn how to scan magazine pages but until then you'll have to bear with me and put up with the dodgy photos.
This pic (along with the other pictures in this post) is from the May-June edition of Inside Out magazine. It's one of dozens of house/garden-type mags I've bought in the last 16 months, because when you're faced with an overwhelming house reno it's far easier to sit down with a drink and a glossy magazine rather than actually do any renovating.
As a result of all this magazine browsing I'm now quite well-versed in the art of design wank. And if you ask me, this pic is right up there with the best.
As in, it's fine if you don't mind grass seeds burrowing into the crotch of your undies while you sip your lemon barley water and nibble on a chunk of baguette (which I sincerely hope is made from organic, hand-milled flour or I want the cover price back).
And it's definitely not a problem if you don't mind being at one with the less cuddly of nature's offerings (snakes, bull ants, centipedes, ticks, feral pigs, escaped serial killers etc).
But otherwise it's bullshit, isn't it? I mean, when was the last time you said, "Darl, how about we have a picnic in the middle of a field of really long grass? Go on, dare ya!"
Worse: Those rusty old French cafe chairs, which are a fiver a pop in their homeland, cost $160 each. The folding metal table is $1000. The skinny little cushions tied to the top of the chairs are $40 (yes, each).
Now for pic number 2, which provided a much-needed laugh-out-loud moment after a morning of digging holes with a pick axe:

It may look like a giant toilet-brush holder but it's actually a bathroom sink. It doesn't say in the ad if council-approved sink fencing is required, but considering the way little kids like to stick their heads in things, it's probably a good idea.
In the meantime you could always use it for your home brew or to bathe your pet rabbits.

Finally there's this picture, which is attached to a story about Patti Southern (the lady wearing the table cloth), who owns a retro furniture store in Sydney (as in, it's all original vintage stuff).
I know I've said it before but what is it with this retro thing? Why does only the really ugly stuff seem to survive?
I lived through the 60s and 70s and I know for a fact that if anyone had bought my Mum that hideous red and blue lamp, she would have beaten them to pulp with it.
Or dumped it in a field of really long grass. Now there's a thought.

Spare me. Please.

2009-04-30T08:38:00.007+08:00

If you looked at page 4 of The West Australian this morning you would have seen it featured two pics of blokes in suits.
The second pic was under the heading "Vote Yes for work-life balance: industry leaders" and accompanied a story on the daylight saving referendum.
It began like this: "For Wesfarmers chief Richard Goyder, it means being able to enjoy a casual barbecue or game of backyard cricket after work.
"Alcoa's Alan Cransberg says it provides extra time with his family in Mandurah.
"And for Rio Tinto's head of iron ore Sam Walsh, it makes easy a post-work swim, catching up with grandchildren or a meal out.
"But the three industry leaders agreed yesterday that daylight saving delivered significant benefits to the State's economy by making it easier to do business with the Eastern States..."
All I can say is: Like I give a shit.
At the moment, I have two friends who are staring retrenchment in the face because the company they work for has gone belly up, and I know many more who are doing it really, really tough.
And I'm supposed to vote Yes to daylight saving so I can help out three rich blokes who want more leisure time without compromising their money-making activities?
If it wasn't so insulting it would be funny.

Get thee to a kitchen...

2009-04-24T09:42:00.004+08:00

...and make yourself some Anzac biscuits. The home-made versions of these biccies are so far ahead of shop-bought it's not funny and they're ridiculously easy to make.
Mine are courtesy of a Bill Granger recipe but there are heaps of recipes on the internet (or ask your Nana, she'll probably know one off by heart).
Whatever you do, don't call them cookies, or a digger might (quite rightly, if you ask me) come over to your house and wash your mouth out with soap.
Eat your Anzac biscuits in front of the Collingwood/Essendon game tomorrow.
This is something I look forward to every year, not because I like either team (they're Carlton's sworn enemies) but because there's a really good chance half a dozen of them will beat the crap out of each other, be hauled before the tribunal and be out for several games.
But that's just me.
Whatever you do tomorrow, have a good one.

Word of the Week: Crook

2009-04-23T09:58:00.005+08:00

That's crook as in ill, unwell, feeble, queasy, frail, delicate, poorly, ailing, infirm, indisposed, under the weather, sick as a dog, in a bad way, rooted.
I've been all of these things this past week, first with the flu, then with a stomach wog.
And speaking of 'sick as a dog', as I was rolling on the floor in agony with what was probably wind but felt like imminent death, I kept bumping into our faithful hound, who'd decided she'd help make me better by lying as close to me as possible and sighing a lot.
As I looked into her big, brown eyes, I thought of all the little golden retriever ways I'd come to know over the years and said, "If I die and no one finds me before 5 o'clock, you won't eat me will you?"
On the upside, I'm feeling a bit better today and at least got to be sick in cosmopolitan surroundings.
We were up in Perth for a few days, not that I got to see anyone or do anything or go anywhere because I was too ill.
But the car trip was a blast. There's nothing like 400kms-worth of sitting still to make you realise that the human body is an amazing thing.
I mean, I can't think of anything else that would be capable of producing enough snot in four and a half hours to fill the MCG.
I was so busy blowing my nose, I almost missed one of the highlights of the trip.
It's just past the half-way mark and is known (in our family anyway) as The Place of the Three Signs.
In the space of just a few minutes you see these signs on the side of Albany Highway:
1. Welcome to Kojonup, First Shire With 1,000,000 Sheep
2. Moodiarrup
3. Crapella Rd
I hang out for these signs because:
1. My husband always says, "So many sheep, so little time" (I'm easily amused).
2. I love the name Moodiarrup. I often wonder if the locals shorten it to Moody, as Ravensthorpe is shortened to Ravie and Cuballing to Cubby. The picture at the top of this post is of the Moodiarrup Hall, which you can read about here.
3. Our dog's name is Ella.
And that's it really. One thing I love about writing this blog, as opposed to writing a newspaper column, is that I can just stop whenever I want without having to think of anything clever to finish off with.
So this is what I'm finishing off with today: The MCG is about to overflow. I'm going back to bed.

How the President will harvest his home-grown spinach

2009-04-17T12:18:00.005+08:00

OK, maybe not. You'll find out what it's really all about here.

Whatever happened to used tyres...

2009-04-15T09:54:00.007+08:00

...as stand-alone garden features? Why don't we see them around much any more, especially in these difficult economic times when we all should be getting back to basics and being extra mindful of the benefits of re-using and recycling?
We walk past this particular tyre every morning, my husband, the dog and I. It's one of three, all in a row, but it's by far the most picturesque because it's the only one that's actually got a plant in it.
Just up the road from this tyre, on the seafront, is something else we walk past every morning: Albany's bete noir, the huge, empty Esplanade Hotel site. It's empty because the Esplanade was demolished in 2007 to make way for a new multi-million-dollar luxury hotel, which has since been put on hold indefinitely.
So, what we've got on the beachfront at the moment is an enormous, multi-million-dollar sandpit surrounded by a high, wire fence and known among local cats as the best en-suite dunny in town, you can see their little paw prints all over the joint ("Hey, Fluffy, let's pee in the north-east corner today! Cooool.")
Apparently the town council doesn't have the power to force the hotel developers to get on with construction, something I'd always put down to the councillors' average age being 97 and three-quarters and all of them maybe too knackered to raise the necessary very big fuss. But I was wrong.
And it's a worry, because it's estimated the town is losing about $10 million in tourism spending for every year that the site stands empty.
My husband has an interesting solution to this. Being a Desert Storm kinda guy, he thinks councillors should storm the chicken wire, exert squatters' rights and build a casino. As in, they could get the tourist dollars flowing again simply by becoming the Apaches of the Great Southern.
Failing that, maybe they could do something creative with used tyres, something I should imagine certain other persons of power, albeit in a faraway land, are mulling over as I write.
I say this because I heard on the news that Barack and Michelle Obama are getting back to basics and planting a vegetable garden at the White House.
Which means that Americans will not only have their First Lady, First Children and First Dog, they'll also soon be blessed with their First Carrot.
And presumably, if the Obamas are ridgy-didge about setting a recycling, recession-busting, grow-your-own example, they'll also see the First of many Used Tyres.
As edging, maybe. Or encircling the spinach and collard greens.
It could change the face of garden design as we know it. And I, for one, will be watching developments with bated breath.

A mother's heartfelt plea

2009-04-14T12:29:00.003+08:00

I read The Passenger by Chris Petit over Easter. The book was loaned to me by my son who said, "If you understand the ending, make sure you explain it to me too."
I thought, "Ha! Leave it to me sonny" in that thought-only, gloating way mothers have when they suspect their kids are getting cleverer than they are and they smell a rare win coming up.
So, in a nutshell, The Passenger is a fabulous book. Fast-paced, clever, dark, complicated, harrowing, unputdownable.
Then you read the final chapter and you want to scream, "WHAT THE...?!" and throw it out the window.
So this is basically a begging letter to anyone reading this blog entry who has also read The Passenger and understands the bloody thing.
Has Collard dreamt everything? Is he working it out in those awful 46.5 seconds. IS HE TALKING TO US FROM THE BEYOND FOR GOD'S SAKE??
I've already googled the book and all I can find is a bunch of really pissed-off people who don't understand the ending.
As I don't. And it's driving me nuts. Please help if you can.

Channeling Elvis 2

2009-04-13T10:30:00.005+08:00

I decided to forgo the french toast cut into bunny rabbit shapes and do this magnificent creation for Easter instead.
Granted, it looked better in the magazine, but even then they had to use blurry soft-focus photography to get away from that "I lost control of my bowels while skiing" look.
It's called Choc Coconut Ice Cream Cake and I got the recipe from a New Idea mag, as in I was allowed to rip the recipe out of the magazine when I was at the hairdresser last week (thank you, Shelley).
This cake is a mixture of vanilla ice cream, crushed Choc Ripple biscuits, toasted coconut, mini marshmallows, strawberry-flavoured dessert topping, Ice Magic and M&Ms Speckled Eggs.
So delicious. So Elvis.

35 years and what do you get?

2009-04-08T10:21:00.004+08:00

It was our 35th wedding anniversary on the weekend. The big question in the weeks leading up to it was how to mark 35 years that have encompassed just about everything you can think of, including good times and bad times, happy and sad times, two great kids, two dogs, seven cats, 14 different houses and lots of love.
For the last two big-ticket anniversaries, which were Silver and Pearl (sounds like two hippie sisters, doesn't it?), we went to Melbourne and stayed at the Hilton.
This time we had to be a bit more circumspect because our house still needs some work.
I say "some" but what I mean is "lots of". The 1965 kitchen still has to be replaced, the floors need to be sanded and sealed, the outside walls need to be rendered because the mortar is falling out, we need plastic blinds for the deck we had built (the prevailing winds up here on the hill are westerly, easterly, southerly AND northerly), and the 1960s decorative concrete-block boundary wall (does this get better and better or what?) needs to be knocked down and replaced with a fence.
A word on kitchens: if you need to be cured of the retro decorating bug, come and visit me. I have a kitchen overflowing with original 60s laminex - white with curly, silvery fibres all the way through it. It looks like a busload of senior cits decided to stop off at the laminex factory and trim their pubes.
Back to the wedding anniversary: we discovered on the internet that your 35th is Coral (Silver and Pearl's mum, presumably).
I was stunned, I can tell you. 35 YEARS AND ALL YOU GET IS DEAD REEF?? What were we supposed to buy each other? An aquarium?
My husband offered to buy me a DVD of The Battle of the Coral Sea. I declined, which was good, because it forced us to sit down and work out what we'd really like.
Which turned out to be decent ugg boots. Seriously.
Having never paid more than 20 bucks for a pair (good ol' Kmart), we decided we'd lash out on the super-duper versions they sell at Wombat Lodge down here.
Romantic? Maybe not. But we'll know in our hearts that when the renovations are finished and all our money is gone and we're freezing our tits off because we can't afford to turn on the heater, at least our feet will be nice and warm.

Word of the Week: Ovenable

2009-04-02T08:51:00.004+08:00

How good is this? It was sent to me last year by Diana Lea, who found it in some Coles junk mail that had been stuffed in her letter box.
The possibilities this word opens up are endless - we could start a whole new language of "ables".
I'd like to get the ball rolling with girlable, adapted from the everyday scenario where a male says, "I can't find my keys/sunnies/specs/wallet" and the female says, "Go back and have a girl's look."
Girlable would describe any task that had to be done properly from the get-go.
As in, "Mate, we've got another girlable job coming up this afternoon, I'd better give you a hand."
Whaddaya reckon?

Hi ho, Crispin, awaaay

2009-04-01T09:02:00.004+08:00

We got nabbed down at the park, the dog and I.
The dog was doing this.

And this.

As you can see, she wasn't attached to my person by a lead. This was because we were the only living things in the park apart from the ducks.
And, as it happened, Crispin.
Crispin is a ranger. He has a stud in his left ear and drives a white van with the words "Eyes on the street" painted on the side.
Some people would think that if you drove around in a van with "Eyes on the street" painted on the side, you'd be a bit of a dickhead. But not me.
What I thought was: Why are you harrassing a golden retriever who wants to lick you to death? Why have I never seen you keeping an eye on MY street aka Hoon Hill?
Let me tell you something about our house on the hill: If the Lady of Shalott had enjoyed watching hoons in hotted-up Holdens and bogans in black utes instead of Sir Lancelot in his feathered helmet on his way to Camelot, our house is where she would've lived.
It has very big windows which afford excellent views of knights and hoons alike.
Sadly, unlike Sir Lancelot, the local love gods don't sing "Tirra lirra" down by the river. They play really loud doof-doof music instead and shout "Faaaaark" out of the windows when they become airborne at 100kmh.
I was going to tell Crispin all this but in the end I was too busy giving him my name and address.
And listening to his Lone Ranger-style lecture on the dangers of unrestrained family pets in deserted parks.
And wondering where Tonto was when you really needed him (with my luck, probably shouting, "Faaaark, Kemo Sabe" out of the window of a black ute somewhere down my street).

You thrill me when you drill me. Not.

2009-03-28T11:04:00.005+09:00

This post is just a quick thank you to millionaire playboy Tim Roberts and dumped dentist girlfriend Laurel Cetinic-Dorol for the solid-gold, grade-A entertainment they've provided in the media this past week.
In the laugh-myself-sick stakes, I thought nothing could top the text message: "You weanie peanie f...... wanker. If you didn't have money I would not have given you the time of day, you loser."
But then I saw TV footage of Mr Roberts trying to run from courtroom to car while hiding his face with a see-through, polka-dotted, plastic umbrella that was determined to turn itself inside out.
I should imagine that as I type, the producers of Funniest Home Videos will be changing the rules so that this footage can win - quite rightly - the grand prize in the next series.
Finally, there are two questions we should be asking ourselves now that this sorry saga has been played out in the courts.
1. Would a millionaire playboy actually own a see-through, polka-dotted, plastic umbrella?
2. How long do you reckon it will take for the person who loaned it to him to list it on eBay?

Beanie there, done that

2009-03-26T11:24:00.005+09:00

OK, I've never done it in this beanie before. But that's because it's new - knitted for my birthday by my sister Pauline, a manic Eagles supporter.
It's called The Fev and pays tribute to Mr Brendan Fevola's interesting dreadlock period. I'll be wearing it tonight when I watch the Blues meet the Tigers at the MCG.
Now that Brendan's stopped peeing on nightclub windows and is concentrating on his game, I'm hoping for a mega goal tally.
Should that happen I'll be shaking those dreads like there's no tomorrow. Before I go, here's a view of the back of the beanie so you can fully appreciate its beauty.

Channeling Elvis

2009-03-25T21:02:00.007+09:00

The photos probably speak for themselves but then I thought, what the hell, here's your chance to explain your kitsch food fetish once and for all.
My husband's always put it down to an early adulthood of too much Cinzano and lemonade (yes, in the same glass). But seeing as I haven't touched Cinzano since I drank a whole bottle at a hockey cabaret in Manjimup in 1974, I think it's more deep-seated than that.
I think some people are born with a kitsch gene and even if they struggle against it for years and years, they one day end up making, say, a dozen Rudolph cupcakes.
For some reason this kitsch food fetish only surfaces on holiday-type occasions. As in, Christmas or Easter looms and I get really excited and go into a frenzy of searching through recipes for something suitably naff.
The Rudolph cupcakes are a bastard to make because you have to pipe 24 melted-chocolate antlers on to baking paper. Which means you (as in, I) pipe 37 crap antlers before you get the hang of it, then you have to go out and buy more chocolate and melt it down and pipe 24 more.
The melted chocolate goes everywhere. I found some in my belly button and also behind my ears. I didn't tell my family this, of course, and they quite happily ate the lot.

The snowman cupcakes were less successful, mainly because I couldn't be bothered making the cupcakes. By this time it was 10pm on Christmas Eve, I was full of Yellow Glen and my family made an executive decision involving vanilla ice cream and Ice Magic.
Even so, I managed to breathe new life into a Martha Stewart concept: two marshmallows and a fruit-jube hat threaded on a toothpick, with coloured sprinkle thingies for eyes and nose.
Result: Chucky Snowman. Not my finest moment.

This echidna pav was made for Australia Day. I was toying with the idea of Kylie Minogue but realised she was probably a pav too far.
Dead easy to make: bake your meringue in a pointy oval shape, cover with whipped cream, add dried cranberries for eyes and after-dinner mint sticks for spines.
Serve on a turkey platter (echidna platters being hard to come by).
Now it's nearly Easter and I'm on the hunt again. Nigella Lawson has a recipe for rabbit curry called Hot Cross Bunny, which appeals on many levels.
But if you have any other suggestions, I'd love to hear them.

Does my bum look radiant in this?

2009-03-20T10:51:00.006+09:00

Back on the subject of make-up, I had a gift voucher burning a hole in my pocket and decided to splurge on some YSL Touche Eclat concealer. I did this because I wanted to optimise my radiance, having read in an ad that Touche Eclat does just that.
Even though, deep down, I've known for some time that my radiance could do with some help, I haven't bought Touche Eclat before now because it costs $78. Which makes me feel a bit faint, especially as you can get perfectly serviceable Maybelline under-eye concealer for 14 bucks.
But then, Maybelline under-eye concealer doesn't cure cancer, boost your libido or give 99 per cent of its profits to Oxfam's goat-gifting scheme.
Neither does Touche Eclat but according to all reports it's still brilliant.
I know this because I've read dozens of reviews of the product on the internet and I honestly haven't seen so many exclamation marks in my life as I have in the descriptions of Touche Eclat.
So, seeing as I had 40 bucks left on the gift voucher - meaning I only had to part with $38 of my own money - I bit the bullet and decided to banish dark shadows forever.
The girl at the YSL make-up counter told me that for Touche Eclat to be totally effective, I needed to apply some white stuff (the name of which I can't remember) to the under-eye area first and it only cost $100, would I like some of that too?
Thinking "Why break the habit of a lifetime?" I said I'd rather be partially effective but she still applied both products anyway.
And the difference was really quite scary in that I looked like a 50-something head with a 30-something under-eye radiance thing going on.
So I bought the Touche Eclat. At my age you take what you can get. And if that means being scary, radiant and partially effective, then so be it.

Word of the Week: Large

2009-03-18T11:41:00.005+09:00

It's been at least 15 years since I've been able to use the word "large" in print without feeling like I'm committing a capital offence.
The trauma of being large-less for one and a half decades can be laid at the door of Paul Murray, larger-than-life (sorry, bigger-than-life) former editor of The West Australian, now one of its columnists.
Mooner was such a big fan of the word big he sent a memo to all editorial staff banning "large" from the paper's pages.
At the time I was editor of the YOU lift-out (now called U.), which included food stories and recipes. I had to get a special dispensation to use large in the lists of ingredients because "2 big brown onions, sliced" just didn't sound right.
In later years I joined Large Anonymous and managed to overcome my fear of unacceptable synonyms. These days I find I can write it quite easily. So I will. Large, large, large, large, large.

Chug-a-hug

2009-03-18T10:27:00.005+09:00

Being grabbed by people I don't know very well has never done much for me. Neither am I very good at this hugging-as-a-hello thing that's become so fashionable in the last ten years.
I think my problem stems from growing up in Yorkshire where public displays of touching one another happened only at birthdays and burials, and even then only if you were wearing a coat.
As time has passed I've got much better at hugging people I've only just been introduced to, but I still freak when someone invades my personal space in a major way.
Which is why I always walk down the middle of the aisles in the Myer cosmetics' department, in much the same way as I've always walked down the middle of the street if it's after dark and I'm on my own.
But this seems to be working less and less. A few weeks ago I looked briefly at some of this new mineral foundation that's advertised endlessly on TV (it apparently makes your complexion look "flarless", which is American for perfect).
Three seconds later I'd been grabbed, half my face was covered in it and the girl wielding the brush was telling me it would look even better - "Like, you'll get that total doll look" - if I applied it over the top of normal foundation. Sort of like brick veneer for the face, I suppose.
Even when I said, "I'm 56 years old - why would I want to look like a doll?" - she didn't pause for breath, just launched into a spiel on the importance of brushing in a circular motion.
By the time I escaped, one side of my face was very beige and "flarless", and the other wasn't. I looked like a Kingston biscuit after someone had licked off the filling.
Funnily enough, no one stopped and asked me if I wanted a hug.

Word of the Week: Drack

2009-03-11T12:58:00.004+09:00

Drack means unattractive, yuk, not very nice - which is great because I'm so over "hideous".
Truth be told, I'm so over "so over" but seeing as, phrase-wise, it's everywhere, I suspect that like disco music, big hair and the cabbage soup diet, we'll just have to wait for everyone to realise how stupid it is and move on.
What I'd like to see in the meantime is a "drack" revival. It's a word I haven't heard since I was a teenager and if you ask me it leaves hideous for dead.
For a start it's quantifiable: a bit drack (Explorer socks), pretty drack (exposed bum-crack, or plumber's cleavage as Lynda next door calls it), really drack (Paris Hilton).
Describing something as "a bit hideous" just doesn't work.
After a quick look on the net I've found that drack was probably derived from the 1936 film, Dracula's Daughter - so it's an oldie but a goodie.
And the idea of a Drack Pack attacking the Hideous Brigade really apeals.

The gorgeousness that's Cameron Cloke

2009-03-11T09:24:00.006+09:00

He's the one on the right and don't ask me how I managed to cut off half his body when I uploaded the pic - I'm still new and useless at this blogging business.
Anyway, if you ask me, Cam is football's answer to George Clooney.
So grab your pompoms and repeat after me:
Cameron, Cameron, you're the one.
You make football so much fun.
G-O-O-O-O CAMERON.
Please don't spoil the moment by adding comments that include the words "kicked in" and "nuts".
Instead be thankful, as I am, that it's only 15 more sleeps until Carlton meets the Tigers at the MCG.
Go the Blues...
PS: Click on the pic and you'll get the full monty. This will be quicker than waiting for my husband to get home from work so I can ask him where I stuffed up.

Ella the Wonder Dog

2009-03-05T12:47:00.005+09:00

Meet Ella, our golden retriever, posing here with her favourite toy on her head.
Ella is nearly 10 years old and has an inverted vulva and a very small brain.
The vulva thing means she wees backwards, which is no biggie if you don't mind washing her nether regions on a regular basis.
I say "you" but I mean "me". My husband loves this dog so much he'd give her one of his kidneys but for some reason he draws the line at washing her bum.
The very small brain poses bigger problems but only if you venture outside Ella World, which encompasses the house, the garden, the park and the beach.
Ella is frightened of the ironing board. This probably tells you everything you need to know.
She likes to be surrounded by familiar things, even better if they are as close to her person as possible.
Which is why we have roughly 10,000 photos like the one above but none of her posing on top of Everest.

Not the last post

2009-03-04T18:46:00.008+09:00

After 23 years with The West - most of them as a columnist - I figured a cold-turkey retirement wasn't going to cut it.
And it's hard to think of a better way than blogging to have a laugh/vent spleen/keep in touch with everyone.
So, if you've come here via my final column: a big hello and welcome to my blog. I'd love to hear from you via the "comments" thingy at the bottom of each post, just be aware that your comments may not appear immediately because I'll be having a look at them first.
A columnist's job often translates to "loony magnet", so I'll feel better if I can check things out before they're posted. This doesn't mean you can't criticise or disagree - I'll only be chucking out the gross and the really nasty.
Oh, and if you're wondering about my headshot at the top of this page, as opposed to the headshot at the top of my column, it's because the column pic was taken six years ago and involved make-up applied with a trowel (it's particularly scary when viewed full size - I look like a tranny).
This new pic is me as I am - middle-aged, un-made-up and pretty bloody ordinary.