Evil Oddie

Last Sunday I decided I was going to put up the Christmas Tree. I cleared a spot in the Lounge Room and went into the garage and fished out all the Christmas Stuff.

I got out the tree and remember that its not a very big and it was really cheap. Meh, its still a Christmas Tree. I love Christmas!

I got the tree up after much struggling and slamming my head into our DVD tower. I put the tinsel on and most of the baubles.

Then I remember that it was my nephew, Corey’s, birthday. So I downed tools and called him to wish him a Happy Birthday. I had sent up his present, long cargo pants, during the week. He said he liked them, but I think he’s just a polite 17 year old. Honestly, I’m probably really biased, but Corey is just a fantastic young adult. And he’s a spunk too!

My sister, Sally, got on the phone after Corey. She asked me what I was up to and I told her I was putting up the Christmas Tree. She told me that it’s apparently bad luck to put up the Christmas Tree before 1 December. Doh.

So I haven’t finished putting the tree up… hopefully I’ve bent the back luck rules!

Glen has been complaining about our old TV. It’s not big enough. It’s old (6-7 years). It’s not HD. He’s been researching to find what the best TV for us would be. He ended up with wanting a Panasonic 50 inch Plasma.

I haven’t been so keen on purchasing a new TV. The old one works fine & I don’t have a full time job. I am working for Ingenuity, but it isn’t the long term solution.

An ex-colleague’s brother works at JB Hifi, so Glen went to see him about getting a price on the TV.  I think Glen would’ve bought one while he was there, but they didn’t have any in stock.

When Glen got home from work, he asked if we could go to the Good Guys to see what they could do.  After my hyperventilating about the price and I walked away, Glen bought it.  Oh my aching wallet…

The TV got delivered on Friday.  So we’ve watched a lot of movies over the weekend.  It is quite a good TV.

I left my job on Friday 16th November.  I didn’t have a job to go to.  Not that I find it hard to find a job, but it was more of a you guys have just screwed me over and I’m so not a happy camper about this, I’m leaving.  It was really sad though.  I already miss quite a few of my old work mates…. *sob*

In the meantime, I kinda had two offers but they didn’t work out.  One really cheesed me off.  They told me that I had the job but had to have a discussion with all the Directors in regards to my offer.  They asked me not to accept another position until they got their offer to me… Sure, no worries.

Got a phone call yesterday, they’ve decided not to go ahead with the position.   Erm, thanks.  So I’m back to the drawing board of applying for jobs… So I’ve pretty much wasted a week because of these guys.  Grrrrr.

Lesson learnt: don’t trust anyone til you’ve got the offer.  You snooze you lose.

Glen’s Aunty Joy & Uncle Len went back to NZ this morning after a 3 week holiday.  Last weekend, I had to go back to the DFO at the airport to take back some shoes that I got for Glen, but he didn’t like them.  I invited Aunty Joy to come and she accepted.

Aunty Joy was after a special outfit for her 80th birthday next year.  We went into so many stores; I found out that Aunty Joy is very selective on the clothes that she wears.  I thought she looked great in a couple of things, but she wasn’t happy.  We both loved Table Eight but we found an outfit at Jacqui E.  It’s a long black skirt with silver flowers and wispy bits at the bottom and a lace top with a  cami underneath.

It is nothing like what Aunty Joy normally wears, but I think she loved it.

My Mum & Dad came down on the weekend to see my niece, Katarna. She lives down the Gold Coast, so Mum had arranged to pick up Katarna at Movie World on Saturday. We got there about 11am. Seeing I had my breakfast before 6am, I was a bit hungry.

We went and bought tickets, which I thought was a bit of a rip off seeing that there were heaps of rides that weren’t running. As soon as we went through the gates, there was a toilet stop and then straight to a cafe. The food was fantastic. I ate all of it! That’s pretty rare cause I’m not that big of an eater. The chic who took our orders, obviously didn’t get Dad’s main order but got the side of chips that he wanted. It must’ve had something to do with the blaring music they had playing.

After that, Dad & I went for a wander, while Mum & Katarna went shopping in all the stores. We wanted to see the Police Academy Stunt Show (which was great) at 1:30pm. The lady at the Cafe said to line up early as the seats go fast. So we got there about 12:30pm as the doors opened at 1pm. Mum & Katarna weren’t there. I went searching. They walked straight past me down the main drag. I had to make my way through all the people to get to them.

Once I had caught up, we went and lined up for the show. The pre-show entertainment was great. This guy was just communicating with a whistle.

After the show, Katarna and I went on the Wild West Falls. I got absolutely saturated. It fully looked like I had wet myself. Plus my hair was drenched and my polo top was entirely wet too. All Katarna had was wet hair and a wet bum from the seat. The wind picked up and I was freezing. The next thing we did was get an ice-cream – good idea Mum… I stood in the sun cause I was covered in goose bumps.

After that, we went to the Kids bit. Katarna got onto some car thing and Dad and I just sat down. My feet were killing me (damn plantar fasciitis) and Dad’s back (he had spinal surgery last year) was aching. We decided that after Katarna was done in the kid section, we were going home.

Katarna wanted to go on the rollercoaster. Seeing that was the reason I was there (M&D can’t do rides & Katarna needed to be with an adult for the rides), I went on it with her. I’m not so good with heights, so I was freaking. This rollercoaster goes from like 30k’s an hour to a stop. Damn it hurt my back – I wasn’t ready for it. The second time around wasn’t so bad.

Mum & Katarna went into a shop and Dad and I waited outside. Once they were done, we went home. We got to the car at 5:30pm.

I had to go to Melbourne for work.  It was only a day trip, but I enjoyed it.  It was my first trip to Melbourne.

I was supposed to catch the 5am flight down but unfortunately, QANTAS decided that they would cancel it.  Gee ta…  So I needn’t have got out of bed at 2am to catch this freaking flight.  So I made some new friends while waiting.  There was an old couple whose flight to Sydney also got delayed.  They were flying to the US and were supposed to meet the connecting flight there.  Luckily the follow on flight was leaving 5 hours after the original flight landed.  We got talking and the lady said to me, “Gosh you look shocking”.  Thanks love, I’ve only got to go do some work stuff when I get to Melbourne.  So glad I’m not in the running to get a man.  Love you Glen…

I have to say, when I got my breakfast on the plane, I was extremely happy.  It was the best breakfast I have had in quite some time.  I had an Egg on an English Muffin (I pulled the bacon off – I don’t really eat meat), I had yogurt with berries and toasted muesli, orange juice, water, cuppa tea and I saved my muesli bar for later. It was the best thing about my flight.

When I finally got to Melbourne (at 10am), I had to rush to do my work thing before noon.  I waited and waited in the taxi line.  Then the taxi driver I got couldnt speaka da english so well – so I kinda hoped he knew where I needed to go.  It turned out well thank god.

Once I had got the work thing done, I grabbed a random and asked for directions to St Kilda.  I had done some research about Melbourne Op Shops and I heard that Sacred Mission on Grey St was good.

The directions I got, go over to the tram station (the stations are not like the ones in Brissie), get one going this way (see the lady waving her arm in one direction), get them to open the door and ask if they stop at Grey St.  Ok sounds easy enough.

I walk to the station (its a set of lights dammit), a tram stops, the driver opens the door.  I ask him, “Does this stop at Grey Street, St Kilda?” Next thing I know, this bugger has closed the door on my head.  I said “Guess that’s a no.” My opinion of Melbourne people was not very high at this point.  I said to myself, if the next tram driver does this, I’ll get a cab.

The next tram stops, I ask the driver the same q as above.  His answer “Sure does love.  Hop on and I’ll let you know when we are there.”  My faith was restored.

When I got to Grey St, I walked the wrong way. Doh.  I called Glen. He told me that yes I was in fact going the wrong way  and he even told me what stop I had got off on the tram.

I got to the Op shop. OH MY GOD!! I was there for 2 hours and didn’t get to look at everything.  I got lots of brand name stuff and I only spent $26. WOO HOO!!

When I realised the time, I had to quick foot it to the airport.   I ran (well walked quickly) to the main street and hailed a taxi.  He told me that I had heaps of time before my flight… He said he would go the “quick scenic route”.  It was great, he was pretty much giving me a tour.

The flight home was really turbulent.  We went through lots of thunder storms.  The chic next to me was not doing so well.  I asked her if she was ok and if she wanted to hold my hand… Well, her nails were digging into me… But she felt better…

Glen’s Aunt & Uncle were flying in from NZ at 630pm so I hung around to pick them up.  During the wait, I went to the DFO and finished off my Christmas shopping.