When Alone

I have been sorting through photos on my computer and backing them up.

Or loading them up to Facebook for my family to see.

Now and then I come across some unexpected treats I had missed.

Like this little home video from 2007 that my son made.

It made me laugh.



The things that children do when nobody is watching them.

Ciao
LC

Purdy Gal - Circa 1981

My husband found these photos packed away in the garage.

I loaded them up to my Facebook for a little bit of retrospective fun. Then I thought they were worthy of a blog post.

So, even I have to admit that I was a bit of a babe at age eighteen. Although, at the time I did not think so.

Looking at these photos and seeing the girl that I was makes me think "yeah, that's me" but there is no feeling of wanting that youth again or to be in that place.

I suppose that is because I am kind of happy right where I am today.

Thirty odd years later.

Ciao
LC

Into What?

My son is a person who is not into sport. Or bike riding. Or athletics.

He is a geek. Nerd. Whatever you want to call it. He like books. His Xbox. His computer and just hanging around at home.

It never bothers me as I am the same. Although I do exercise more but that is because I am motivated and interested. At my son's age (almost 13) I can tell you that I was into books, comics and television. Had there been a computer on hand I would have been into that as well.

This bothers my husband. In his day he was out riding his pushbike. Making billy carts. Walking around the streets. And into his music.

It has been an issue on and off about our son. Not for me because my son is actually very much like me so I really get where his head is at a lot. My husband says things like "S is not into anything" or "Other people's kids do things with their fathers" or "S should be out more".

I say to him that it does not matter. That S will find his way and do his own thing and it will have nothing to do with what his parents were into at his age. It will be his thing.

Today I said to my husband to take S out for an hour. The discussion came up again. K did not know what to do. Where to go.

"S is not into anything," came the comment. I asked my husband if it would bother him less if S read a book for three hours rather than play Xbox. He admitted it would be preferable.

So, I just said to S to go for a walk with his dad. Get out in the fresh air. Off the Xbox for a while. Take the camera I said as they left.

Off they went. For an hour. And when they came back S showed me the photos he had taken.

The side of the local pizza shop where he gets his pizza on a Friday night (fat food Friday).

A banksia flower against the sky.

The street where they walked. Quiet on a cold Sunday afternoon.

The view between two autumn leaves.

Leaves on the grass.

The rear entrance to his high school.

The same spot but minus the gates. He walks through here each day to get to school.

A photo taken crouched down in the middle of a quiet side street.

The sky in grey.
The sky in blue.
What do you think?

Does my son seem to be into nothing much?

I think he is into lots.

He is just not into what everyone else is.

Just into his own thing.

That is what counts.

Ciao
LC

Conversation

Summary of talk between mother and son.

Monday.

Mother to son: "Do you have any homework?"

Son to Mother; "Nope."

Tuesday.

Mother to son: "Do you have any homework?"

Son to Mother: "Nope."

Wednesday.

Mother to son: "Do you have any homework?"

Son to Mother: "Nope"

Mother thinks son is forgetful or lying. Prefers to think he is forgetful as all parents are in denial about their children being bare faced liars.

Mother to son: "Are you sure you have no homework? Maths? English? German?"

Son to Mother: "No I haven't. I did it at lunchtime."

Mother thinks son is dreaming if he thinks she believes him.

Later on Wednesday evening just as son is going to bed Father informs Mother that son did not hand in German homework LAST FRIDAY and now has Saturday detention.

Mother says Father will have to handle that one because she will be at the hairdressers on Saturday.

Son then informs Parents that if he hands it in Friday he will not have to do detention on Saturday. Lucky for him that teacher is giving him a chance.

Later Mother goes to talk to son about homework and other life responsibilities and also to inform him of punishment for not doing homework. Mother is very shitty at son for not doing homework and now she realises, again, that she is going to have to read the riot act more and more as son gets older.

Son then comes up with long and convoluted bullshit story as to why he did not do the homework.

Mother rolls eyes and tells son to stop wasting his breath.

Sigh.

Ciao
LC (aka Mother)

Sunday Walk

Today I was hanging around the house and decided to take myself out and go for a walk. Instead of doing the usual trek around the streets I drove down to the beach, parked the car and went walking.
There were hardly any people around which was a welcome change from the usual crowds down here. Grey sky but slightly warm air. The wind was coming of the water leaving a salty residue on my skin.

I love the trees that are near the beach. All coarse and grey. Bent over with the wind over the years. Made to survive the harsh conditions that go with the beach.

I wore my new runners, all white against my black pants. Every time I took a step I caught a glimpse of white in the corner of my eye.

The local council has spent a lot of time planting native flora down here and keeping it protected from traipsing feet. I like plants that are hardy. They have a defiant grip on the soil. The foliage is usually prickly and uninviting. But somehow they still manage to look beautiful in their own way.
The steps down to the water. The tide was in. Although, on this part of the beach there is hardly any sand to sit on at any time.
These pine trees are huge. They are in the backyard of a very substantial house, remnants of an time when old homes lined the beach here. Now, most of the property here is modern and ugly. And very expensive. I have always believed that the distance from a house to the beach should be significant to give beach users a sense of isolation when they walk along the path that lines the water. Needless to say, nobody agrees with me.

Birds contemplating their day.

Views from the walkway. Nobody in sight.
The coarse sand. In Summer this beach would be filled with sun bathers, bright towels and sun shelters. Today it was nice to see it empty.

I stopped for a cup of coffee.

Asked a girl to take a photo of me.

Then I jumped in the car and took a photo of myself.

Then went home.

Pottered around.

Made a lasagne.

And when I finish this post I shall get up and bake a cake.

Ciao
LC

Friday Work Twaddle

Here I am at work.

I should be doing work shouldn't I?

Actually, I am downloading a giant file from the Taxman and while that is happening I figure that a post is just the order of the day.

Sometimes I wonder what on earth there is for me to blog about. Not much on most days. But I think that is the same with everyone. Days come and go and we fill them with little events. Some intended and some not so. Some worthy of a mention, most definitely not.

I have noticed that the more I try to structure my days there is more likely to be some sort interference from an outside source. So I have a vague thought about how I would like each day to progress and if it happens that is good, if not then I am not surprised.

For example. Yesterday I came to work and my desk was covered in mouse poo. Plus some chewed up paper. They had avoided the tempting yet deadly food that had been left for them and just ran all over my desk leaving their calling card behind. I don't even eat at my desk so it is not like there was something there for them to graze on.

So I had to unload everything from the desk and clean it thoroughly. It was vile. Then I started to go through all the paperwork I had shifted from the desk top and managed to complete the most amazing amount of nasty work that I had carefully ignored to "do later".

By the end of the day my desk had nary any paperwork on it and it was very satisfying.

I have come to the conclusion that good things come out of bad - the mice should crap on my desk more often.

It gives good results.

Do you think I could sell that option to corporate companies?

Send in the mice to get work done.

Sounds better than "sending in the big guns".

Kind of cute.

Ciao
LC

Happiness Is....

Sitting at two computers, playing games and listening to Ipod.

Ciao
LC

Um

The other day my son and I chatting away.

The conversation was very general.

And then my son said this;

"Do you know, my friend Roger at school did not know that girls can masturbate and have an orgasm?"

Few seconds of silence followed allowing me to reply in a faux relaxed manner.

"Oh, really? Well, he knows now doesn't he."

"Yeah, I told him," my son replied before talking about something else.

I was a bit gobsmacked.

Ciao
LC

Mother And Son

Both growing older.

One growing up.

One growing out.

Ciao
LC

Boss Banana

Now and then I have mentioned what a good boss I have.

But he is a complete and utter pig when it comes to his desk.

One thing he does is come to work with a couple of pieces of fruit, the intention being to be healthy and eat them.

Sadly they sit on his desk in various stages of decay before they are tossed in the bin.

Whenever I see a piece of fruit on his desk I say "oh, another experiment?" to which he replies "no, no this time I am eating it".

All very funny I know but also totally gross.

In our previous office it was okay because we had no rodents to contend with so the fruit just kind of went mouldy or dried up until he chucked it out.

The office we are in now is temporary and attached to a huge factory in which mice, rats and possums frequent.

Recently we have had some of the vermin arrive in the office itself. And they crapped on my desk - totally vile. But we have to put up with the problem until the new factory and office is built.

However, my boss has stopped putting fruit on his desk after this happened.

A mouse came along and hollowed out his banana.

I took a photo of it and emailed it to my boss's phone while he was in a meeting with a client.

Needless to say, I left it there for him to clean up.

Maybe the mouse wanted it for a little house and was just making room.

Anyway, I now know that mice do not eat banana skin.....

Ciao
LC

Caught Out

Despite feeling a bit mopey when I woke up this morning I made myself get up, get showered and get ready for the day.

I made a point of ignoring the anxiety that has been plaguing me since the problem with my brother and his wife arose.

So, I cleaned the house. Hung out the washing. Read the newspaper.

And then went food shopping.

As I was walking around the supermarket I noticed that I had a giant pimple that had suddenly appeared under the corner of my lip.

Without even having to look at it I knew it was one that would be very visible to the naked eye. How on earth I left the house with that on my face just beggars belief.

I managed to finish the shopping without picking at it, despite the overwhelming urge to. There was no way I was going to tackle this monster without having the pleasure of seeing it in the mirror.

So, I loaded up the car and jumped in.

Now, normally I would not ever touch a pimple, pick my nose, pluck a chin hair, scratch my bum or pick my teeth if there was the faintest chance of a member of the public see me do it.

However, today I did such a thing (not all of the aforementioned, just the pimple thing). I looked in the rear vision mirror, spied the offending pimple and squeezed it.

Sure enough, just as I engaged in such a public pimple poke, a person walked by my car and saw me.

I am sure I saw a sense of disgust cross the face of the woman passing by. She was young of course.

It just confirmed her suspicion about the aging process.

Just an excuse to let yourself go.

Incidentally, the pimple was not worth the embarrassment of being caught out.

Next time I will pick my nose.

I mean, might as well get the most out of getting older.

Ciao
LC

Family

My brother and I are not speaking.

Well, he is not speaking to me.

I cannot even talk about reasons why because it makes me sick to the stomach and brings up some huge "ishoooos" just allowing the whole saga enter into my thinking space. Plus, he and I are very close and this is a dreadful thing for me (feeling sorry for myself a bit here).

Once I get past the initial emotional slug of the current situation I will recover and be able to write it down and think about how I could have avoided this or handled things better.

When things like this happen, I am reminded of what I have always disliked about family.

But then I talked to my younger sister and I remembered what I love about family as well.

Then I spoke to a blog buddy and she reminded me what I love about my special friends.

So, that is why blogs have been almost nil.

But I am not going to let a family spat infect my own world for long.

I just have to deal with it (love that term) and do what I do.

Be me.

Ciao
LC

Dunce

The other week I kind of had to to my son's homework.

I know I should not do it.

But the first assignment he did for English he did all by himself and the teacher gave him a low mark due to the layout.

I thought "that is not happening again if I can help it".

So, I "assisted" him with a project he had to do for Foodtech.

Which translates to "I made him look up the information and then I did the rest".

He did sit with me to read through it and made me changes things that were not worded as they way he would do it.

It was all about Chinese cuisine.

Anyway, I thought it looked pretty special. I even took it to work and laminated it.

Last night he came home and said;

"Mum, you only got 16 out of 20 for your project".

Ahem, I think he meant his project.

Apparently "he forgot" to answer one question. The teacher gave him the option of redoing it but he declined with the thought that he passed and that was fine with him. Besides, he probably had some other homework for me to do.

Fair go! You know, it has been a while since I did any homework and even then it was a big effort.

I need to study more.

Ciao
LC

Work Week

I am about as interested in work this week as I am in making a scuplture out of nail clippings.

And, no, these are not my nail clippings.

Mine are in the garden bed just near the back step.

Ciao
LC

Stinky Son

Last week my son went on a school camp.

He was away for two nights and three days.

I packed clean underwear, clothes, toiletries and a towel for him.

He came back Wednesday and it was not until Friday I got around to completely unpacking his camp bag.

Upon unpacking I discovered that he had not showered nor changed his underwear.

I spoke to him in about it, just wanting to clarify the fact.

"Listen, did you not shower on camp?" I asked him.

He replied with a series of eye rolls and shoulder shrugs.

"And, is it true that you did not change your underwear. Not once? At all?" I questioned him further.

"Nope," came the reply. He had the good grace to look a bit sheepish.

"You are disgusting," I told him (doing my utmost to not laugh).

"But I changed my socks each day. My feet were stinky," he said, as though to reassure me he was not a complete pig.

Yes, he did change his socks and then put the dirty ones straight in with the clean clothes to ensure a complete transfer of stink onto everything so I had to wash it all anyway - clean or not.

At least he is starting at his feet. If he just keeps working his way up the body eventually he will decide to change his underwear by, oh I don't know, by the age of 18?

Ciao
LC

The Pill

The other day there was a anniversary that many people would be grateful for.

The 50th Anniversary of The Contraceptive Pill.

The pill.

It allowed people to control when they would have children and how many children they would have. Women could enjoy sex without the fear of pregnancy. Men could too I suppose, but when it comes to pregnancy it does all fall onthe woman so the pressure was taken off them.

Women were able to consider having careers instead of being compelled to marry rather than have a child out of wedlock which, many years ago, was unacceptable. Heavy periods could be regulated.

Women had choices. Big choices and lots of them.

I don't need to go through the oooh's and aaaah's of all the good things that arrival of the pill brought with it as, by now, everyone knows.

Do a few negatives go with the advent of the pill?

Women may have felt compelled to say yes to sex. Once on the pill then a woman may not have felt right to say no. Perhaps men felt a sense of entitlement. I mean, if she wasn't going to end up the duff then why should she say no?

An increase in sexually transmitted diseases. That is not just about the pill by the way, but by using the pill as the only contraceptive it reduced the use of a barrier (condom) and let the sharing of std's be a more likely event. I think that if you were to not have a regular partner then the pill is not enough is it?

In particular is the increase in chlamydia that can leave a woman unable to have children later in life, at least not without assistance. Sadly, this STD has very negligible signs and treatment can be too late once it is discovered. And there is herpes, the lifelong STD that can affect someone greatly or not at all. Contracting an STD is not a reflection on the morality of the person either but it can certainly make a recipient of one feel awful.

I worked with a female once who was going on holiday with a guy she had just met only weeks before hand. At the time I thought it was a bit impulsive and asked her if she was going to use protection. She said "yeah, I am on the pill". This was during the days when Aids was still a new thing. I said 'what about std's" to which she said "I don't have to worry, he is a nice guy"......! STD's are not fussy about who they bed with.

There are health issues for some women who are on the pill. If you smoke and take the pill there is an increased risk of stroke etc. I mean, there are health risks with everything and in modern society we have to sometimes take the risks to live a normal life. I myself have never been able to go on the pill so for me it was always resist, panic if resistance failed or use condoms (despite having a latex allergy). Ironically I ended up having to go to IVF to have a child anyway which is nothing to do with the pill but was kind of funny considering how I wanted to avoid pregnancy for so many years.

The advent of the pill took away any sense of responsibility that men may have had about contraception. It was all left up to the women.

The pill has certainly not reduced the number of abortions that occur. In this day and age of many sources of contraception it is still confronting how many abortions are still performed here in Australia. I don't have a moral issue with abortions by the way but I believe that it is a difficult thing for a female to have to go through considering that it is almost avoidable.

Nor has it slowed down the population growth around the world.

There still needs to be a strong education not just about preventing pregnancy but teaching girls to be unafraid about insisting on using contraception. They need to know about sexually transmitted diseases and how to protect themselves against them. And boys have to take the same level of responsibility. I know I am being naive about all that, but if we don't try then nothing will happen.

Not that I can do much. I can only teach my son and hope he learns from it all.

I think the benefits of the pill far outweigh any negatives that go with it. And most likely some of those negatives are more about the education of young men and women rather than the pill per se.

It is one birthday I think that society can certainly celebrate.

Life certainly changed for many after it was invented.

I think for the better.

Ciao
LC