05.33 pm

For an entirely (sort-of) new look, go here:

http://digitaltapestries.com/myword/

There;s not much there at the moment, but we’re just starting out, y’know? 😉

See you all on the flip side! 😛

 

02.37 pm

Just a quick update for any of you who might be wondering what’s going on in the “Winter and the Increasingly Recalcitrant WordPress” saga… Goodness knows how WordPress intends for their users who rely on phones and tablets for their blogging needs – I feel for them, poor dears, but at the moment that’s not my worry. Julian and I are about half way through the process of finding out how we move to, and/or cross over from¹ WordPress.com, to WordPress.org. I’ve threatened to move away from WordPress many times, but this latest stupidity with the mutilation of their perfectly good and eminently usable Editor has been the straw that’s finally broken this poor old camel’s back. I’ve had enough, and I’ll be moving on.

Essentially, WordPress.com and WordPress.org are the same – I suppose you could virtually call them sister-sites – however WordPress.com dictates to you what you can and can’t do, which Templates you can use, and charge like wounded bulls for other, “Premium” Templates… and they can pull silly and unnecessary swifties on you – like this latest piece of nonsense – whenever they like. In return, they do all the backups, administration stuff, and sort out any software problems if and when they occur.

WordPress.org on the other hand, still run the WordPress software (it’s a piece of blogging software, you know, as well as being the name of a well-known blog-hosting site!) but you do “the lot”! The backups, the admin stuff, the bug-fixing – everything, including finding your own kitchen sink uhhh… blog host. If anything goes wrong with the Template you’re using, well, you have to work out how to fix it – no-one else will do it for you! There are quite literally hundreds – probably thousands – of extremely nice-looking third-party WordPress Templates from all over the ‘Net that you can download – WordPress.com won’t let you use them, but that you can install and use them with WordPress.org – or if you’re clever enough, you can even write your own Template from scratch! If you’re not too technically minded (like me!) WordPress.org has (or say that they have – I haven’t had a good look yet!) a very large and helpful user-base and forum where you can get help if you can’t nut it out yourself – so I reckon it can’t be too hard, especially as we already have a hosting site that we can use to host my blog – we’ve used it for our own personal Web Sites (now largely abandoned, unfortunately!) for years and years…

So “Watch This Space” for the latest updates on our imminent move away from WordPress.com Dictatorship!

¹That should really read “I’m in the process of”, because it’s my blog, but I use the term “we’re in the process of” because it’ll be Julian doing all the setting-up of, and organising of, the Big Move!

05.41 pm

Yes, I’m still here – a bit more frazzled around the edges, but hey! That’s progress, innit?! 😉 As usual we’ve been super busy – Saturday was the Great Big Birthday Bash, a joint affair for himself, who was in hospital for the actual Big Day, and moi-même, because – well, crikey! Why not? It was only five days before the ninth… A very good day was had by all – we had Nandos chicken tenders, and Nandos chips – both of which suffered – just a teensy bit – from languishing in the oven whilst we got on with the materialistic bits of Birthdays. Then Julian tizzied up the Caesar salad from the supermarket a bit, with some yummy diced Feta cheese, olives, some organic and home-grown tomatoes,  and a few commercial croutons, and we finally sat down to dinner.

And there’ll be a dramatic pause right here while I go and find out what’s happened to my editing functions! Most of which are…. suddenly… missing! NOT impressed or amused, WordPress!

10.55 pm

Soooooo…. After changing the ruddy Template, thinking that might have been the problem, and getting into all sorts of problems with my graphics, because all of a sudden Photoshop has decided to do something truly unspeakable to my styles (sort-of shortcuts to the final look, if you will) I finally managed to get something semi-decent done, get back to this again and find out…

Yes, it damn-well is WordPress wot’s fiddled, totally unnecessarily, with the controls and functions of the Editor – supposedly making it more “streamlined”, and efficient, I presume? Well it’s NOT more streamlined and efficient! They’re bloody useless and idiotic changes! To underline something? Instead of just ranging and highlighting the word or words you want to underline, and clicking on the “U” (for “Underline”) in the Editor, they’ve removed that “U”, and you now have to range and highlight the word or words you want underlined…. and then click CTRL U! Now, this is a real time saver, isn’t it! Instead of just clicking on one letter in the Editor, you still have to range and highlight your word (or words), then use two hands to hit CTRL and U! As for “Justification”, or getting the left and right hand sides of the text nice and even, instead of clicking on the squared lines for “Justify” in the Editor, you now have to hit “SHIFT ALT j” HOW is this an improvement?

And do you want to know how I managed to find all this out, after wasting my entire afternoon and evening trying to work out what had happened? Sheer luck, is how! After examining just about everything still available in the Editor several times and coming up empty-handed, I finally moused over a small, insignificant question mark on the bottom row of the Editor, and the mouseover read “Keyboard Shortcuts (SHIFT+ALT+H)” OK, I thought – maybe there’s something here that might help. Well, it pops up a small window. The first part tells you “Default shortcuts, Ctrl + letter:” which didn’t tell me anything I didn’t already know. The second part tells you “Additional shortcuts, Shift + Alt + letter:” – ditto! But wait! They knew we’d want more! So you scroll down a bit more, and lo and behold, it says “j …. Justify” Finally! Who’d a thunk it! So I now have to range my text, and hit SHIFT+ALT+j to get my text nice and neat!

WHY DID THEY DO IT??!!

Sorry, it’s damn late! More tomorrow. Maybe. 👿

05.04 pm

Satai is not allowed on my desk, because (a) he chews paper, and there are always a lot of bits of paper, magazines, and general “flotsam and jetsam” on my desk, and  (b) he likes to play in my desk top fountain, and violently splashing water around electrical cords and equipment isn’t usually considered to be a very good idea – so clambering onto my desk is verboten!  Now, there are – or there were – two main ways he favoured for trying to sneak onto my desk – one’s via the cabinet that acts as a sort of a “return” on the left hand side of my desk, and the other is – or rather, “was” – from the bottom shelf of the large dresser-slash-bookcase unit that sits on the wall facing my desk, on the right hand side. It’s closest to the fountain, and if I was concentrating really hard on something like WoW, or graphics, or… this blog, even though it’s right in front of me, and in plain sight, I often didn’t see him until he had his two front paws in the water!

So I decided to thwart him, good and proper! 😉 This morning when I was cleaning out the Library, and completely changing the three litter boxes, I also cleaned up the somewhat chaotic mess of books, magazines, bits of computer chair, more magazines, a telescope, and boxes of little souvenir match packets that my parents had collected every time they went to Europe – which was about every second year – when I was growing up. I trundled them all into the Den, and Julian and I proceeded to completely pack out the two bottom shelves of the dresser-slash-bookcase with these books and magazines – until Lord and Master Satai couldn’t even get half a paw onto either of  the two shelves, let alone use them as a launching spot to get onto my desk! I gave an evil cackle, and went off to the bathroom… When I came back, Julian gave me a funny look, and pointed silently to one of the shelves we’d just stuffed full of books and magazines… I looked with horror – and amusement – at what Satai had done… the cheeky little brat had demonstrated his total and nonchalant disrespect for our efforts by tipping over and half pulling out one of the “designated cat barrier” books! What can ya do?! Ya gotta laugh… 😀 Canny little devil! Sometimes methinks he’s almost a bit too clever for his own good!

On the finny side of the household, we were most perturbed last night to find that Auric has injured himself! He’s the one with the long, “floaty” tail. I give the fishies their breakfast in the morning when the cats get their breakfast – i.e. as soon as we get up! We get no peace until they get their breakfasts, so to simplify matters, I feed the fish then too! And I give the fishies their dinner at night when we feed Sal and Satai – then with furred and scaled animal tummies full, we have our dinner, then go and watch television until about nine thirty – in full sight of the Fish House at all times.  Anyway, last night when I gave the fishies their dinner at about 6 o’clock, they were both totally fine! At half past nine or thereabouts when I went to say goodnight to them and turn their tank light off, Auric had a wonky tail! It didn’t seem to be bothering him, and it wasn’t affecting his swimming in any way that we could see – but it looked pretty messy! Can you see the small, roundish, slightly thicker bit of white on the top of his tail?

You can see it better here… It looks as though he might have got it jammed in between the big rock behind him and the wall of the tank or something – but I don’t think there’s any part of the rock that’s that close to the tank wall – or maybe he caught it in between one of the filters and the side of the tank? Who knows! But it doesn’t look nice! Julian left the ultra violet steraliser on last night – it kills off algae and bacteria – in the hopes that it would prevent Auric from getting any sort of an infection in his “wound”. Auric is still swimming around as though nothing at all was wrong, but we’re keeping a close eye on him, nonetheless. I mean, it’s one thing to stick a cat in a carry basket and take it up to the Vet if it’s been injured, but it’s another thing entirely to stick a fish in a carry basket and take it up to the Vet if it looks poorly! I’ll keep you all posted on his progress…

So this morning I cleaned out the cat boxes and tidied up the Library, then I played WoW until lunch time. After lunch I went and read my book for a while because Julian was putting my computer onto its own UPS (Un-Interruptable Power Supply) so that if there’s a blackout, I’ll still be able to use my computer! The bloke from the Solar Panel place came, and then left, with a bunch of questions we’d given him to find the right answers to, and that was about the sum total of the comings and goings chez nous today! 🙂

And so on to the good stuff! 😉

Last night for dinner we had herbed lamb sausages, with oven cooked chips, snow peas, and half of really delicious and fleshy, organic and completely home-grown, Black Russian tomato each! Then I had a Beurre Bosch pear – which was really nice – and an Apple Le Rice for dessert. For lunch today we had sourdough sandwiches with basil pesto hummus as a butter substitute, and peri-peri chicken sandwich chunks – very yummy! 🙂 Tonight we’re having the first of two leftover meals of the “Honey-Balsamic Baked Chicken Breasts with Tomatoes and Mushrooms” that we had the other night – again on a bed of plain steamed rice, mixed with finely chopped spring onions. I’d bought three of the Beurre Bosch pears, and the one I had last night was so nice, I thought I’d have another one tonight, with a MOO Sticky Apple and Organic Honey yoghurt for dessert.

Weigh-in this morning. Wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be – maybe it’s the knowledge that I don’t have to take those revolting little fluid retaining pills, ever again that’s making me more relaxed, or something… I dunno! Anyway, despite the yummy and delicious Baker’s Delight lunch that I ate yesterday, I only went  up one point – from 74.2 kg yesterday, to 74.3 kg today. I’ll probably go up a bit more tomorrow, but hey! Easter’s just around the corner, and after that Julian and I will both be doing our Optifast best to get down to our new “goal weights”! I don’t know what Julian wants to get down to, but I’ve set my goal weight at somewhere between 63 and 64 kgs…

And that brings me up to tomorrow, when my very favourite eldest daughter will be over – for the last Friday in a while! She goes back to uni next week, and she’ll be there on Monday and Thursday from 10 until noon, and Friday from three o’clock until five – which will give her Tuesday and Wednesday free to come over here, if she’s not too busy with assignments and so forth – bearing in mind that she’ll be writing a two-part Thesis this year! So, we’ll sit back and enjoy what might be our last splurge of “Supergirl”, “The Flash”, “Arrow”, and “Legends of Tomorrow” for a while! On Saturday we’re having our double “Big Birthday Bash” for both me (though my Birthday isn’t until next Thursday!) and Julian (who was in hospital on his real Birthday!) We’re not going out to a restaurant anywhere – although he’s coming along well, Terry’s not really up to that yet – so we’ll have a “Nando’s Lunch” of chicken tenders and chips, home-made salad, and some sort of nice “Birthday Cake” or other 😉 And that’s really about “it” from me again this evening! Do drop in again tomorrow night, and find out what we girls watched, if Auric’s tail is any better, and whether “Lord Satai” managed to get up onto my desk via the stuffed-to-the-gunnels shelf of the dresser-slash-bookcase! Until then though, please do your very best to bee good, don’t forget that when you know what you want, and you want it bad enough, you’ll find a way to get it, and remember to always drive carefully, to look after yourselves, and to keep cool – or warm – depending on your preferences… but above all, please remember to stay safe! 🙂 ciao, all! 🙂

04.27 pm

Hey! Guess what! It’s my Birthday month! My parents had been expecting me to be born somewhere between mid to late February, but being the lazy sod that I am, I dithered around and delayed my departure from my warm and watery world until it was my maternal Grandfather’s birthday, and arrived then – on the Ides of March – you know, the one they warned Caesar about!? Nah – I wasn’t really born on the Ides of March – though because of my predilection for trouble, a lot of people say I should have been – the 9th of March is my Birthday, not the 15th! And of course, today was the day I was going to see the Great and Wise Dr. Y., so I was doubly jittery and anxious this morning! My appointment was for 11 o’clock, and we arrived at about five to eleven – and sat there until about five to twelve! Thank all the powers that be for ebooks, because it’s really difficult lugging a shelf-load of even slim paperback novels around, especially in this hot weather! Anyhoo, in we went, and sat and waited for another fifteen minutes or so, before he finally made it to us. Greetings and the usual small talk ensued, and then (“ring-ring”) went his phone! “Excuse me,” says he, picking up the handset… and after trying very politely not to listen in to the one side of the conversation that we could hear from our perches, when he finally put the phone down he explained to us that he’s been having heaps of difficulties finding alternates to some medications a patient of his is on, because she’s very lactose intolerant, and it seems that nearly all of the medications that she needs contain lactose! A colleague of his had managed to track a few of these non-lactose substances, and had rung him to let him know what they were. Well, he’d received the report on my last lots of tests, which as I think I mentioned yesterday were extremely good, and we  told him exactly how much I hated taking those wretched little pills… to which he replied “Well, stop taking them then!” He then went on to say that I’ve been doing really well for quite a long time now, and that unless there were any major upsets, I don’t need to see him any more! I have to get another ultrasound done in twelve months, and the results of that will go to my GP, so unless she thinks I should see him again then, and barring any untoward mishaps in the meantime, that should be it! He seems quite over the moon with the amount of weight I’ve lost – and managed to keep off – for nearly two years now, and I suppose it really is kinda hard to reconcile the sort of person I was when I first met him to the sort of person that I am now! Yanno – I’m really happy that hopefully I will never have to see him again about my health, but at the same time, really sad that I won’t see him again, full stop! He’s a really fantastic doctor – and a really, really nice man! I couldn’t even say to him “I’ll catch up with you on Facebook” or whatever, because he never goes near any of the usual social media types of places – in fact, according to him, he gets online as seldom as possible! He’s probably too busy to, anyway! Oh well, I’m the richer for having met him, and I’m quite sure he saved my life… (Winter raises her defective and almost empty coffee cup in a silent toast) So here’s to you, Dr. Y., may you have as much success with all your other patients as you did with me!

We came straight home after that – via Vermont South shopping centre, both to check the PO Box, and to grab something for lunch – our lawn mowing man was due early this afternoon and we had to be home to open the side gate for him. After lunch, I played WoW for a bit, then, because it was niggling me, did a bit more work on the Template – yes, I changed it again (just in case you hadn’t noticed! 😉 ) And that’s pretty much been all I’ve done today! I haven’t even done the cat litter boxes yet – I haven’t had time! I’ll do them this evening before bed – or just give them a cursory “sift”, and change them all out completely tomorrow morning. I’d also really like to get hold of a really good new “wand” (??) type of vacuum cleaner – at the moment I’m using a reasonably good electronic carpet sweeper, but the little container that holds all the dust, cat fluff, and occasional granule or so of kitty litter, is very small (read: “minuscule”!) and extremely awkward to remove, empty, and replace. Oh well, one day… *sigh*

So, now onto all the good bits!

Food stuffz: Last night for dinner we had a new chicken dish that I found in one of my many and varied foodie emails the other day. It’s called “Honey-Balsamic Baked Chicken Breasts with Tomatoes and Mushrooms” – you’ll find it here, it’s utterly delicious, and the recipe printout is about to be laminated to become one of our “Keepers”. I suppose you could have it on its own, or with mashed potatoes and vegetables, or whatever you like – last night we had it with plain steamed rice and finely chopped spring onions. There’s plenty left over, too, which has been parceled out into two and a half meal-sized portions and put in the freezer for future use. For dessert I had a brown Nashi pear and a MOO banana caramel sundae yoghurt. For lunch today I had half a cheese and mushroom savoury roll, and a half a chorizo and tomato pizza-type roll from Baker’s Delight, and a fruit and white chocolate scone, with just a smattering of butter on each half. Tonight we’re having some sort of fancy sausages for dinner (Julian can’t remember what sort they are, and he can’t go and look either, because Sal is using his heel for a pillow!) with chips, half of one of our very own organic and home-grown tomatoes, and steamed snow peas. For dessert I’ll have one of my Beurre Bosc pears, and probably an Apple Le Rice.

Weigh-in this morning – was annoying! Why does my body do this to me? Does it think it’s funny, or something?! (don’t answer that!) I went from 73.8 kg yesterday morning, to 74.2 kg this morning – the same as I was on Monday! S’not fair! *pout* 😛

And that brings me up to tomorrow… I don’t think anything much is happening tomorrow, apart from a guy coming around tomorrow to talk to Julian about putting on some more solar panels, but it looks like I might get a nice clear run at a bit of worthwhile WoW-ing! 🙂 And that’s really about “it” from me again for this evening! Do feel free to drop in again tomorrow night – find out what my weight decided to do, whether we decided to get some more solar panels or not, and if I got any decent WoW-ing in or not! Until then though, please do your very best to bee good, remember that words are but pictures of our thoughts, and don’t forget to look after yourselves, to always drive carefully, and to keep cool – or warm – depending on the weather and whereabouts you are in it… but most importantly, please don’t forget to stay safe! 🙂 ciao, all! 🙂

 

04.32 pm

Well, here it is, the last day of February! I have to admit to a certain amount of nervous anticipation this afternoon, for it’s tomorrow that I go to see Dr. Y…. Luckily, my hair is not going to look too bad because Sean was over yesterday to make it all look nice for the occasion – but what on earth am I going to wear?! It’s going to be hot, too, so it’s just as well my appointment is for eleven o’clock – hopefully it won’t have had a chance to get too hot by then (though knowing my luck – or rather, lack thereof… ) I don’t really know why I’m so worried – the last lot of tests I had a week ago were all good; he’d told me he thought I should weigh around about 70 kg (from 134 kg – so I went down to 65 kg. before going onto Maintenance – just to be on the safe side, you see – and continued to plummet down another three kilos, to 62.something!) Unfortunately, these horrible and totally despicable little pills that he’s told me to take every third month, do terrible things to me, and weight, mostly in the form of excess fluid (yes, I am on anti-fluid medication) just piles on – and although I do manage to shed a lot of it afterwards, I never really get back to where I was before. It’s also been the very worst possible time of the year for me – because I didn’t plan things terribly carefully! My very favourite youngest daughter was born on December 12th, and now that she’s all growed up and married and all that, we all go out for a quiet, unassuming little family “Big Birthday Bash” (however it’s not too bad – Julian and I don’t have any dinner that night because we’re still too full from Kate’s Birthday lunch!) Then there’s Christmas, and all of the “Holiday Festive Season” to munch our way through… then we’ve hardly finished our last slice of Panettone, and it’s my very favourite eldest daughter’s Birthday on January 12th, when we repeat the Big Birthday Bash scenario! (see?! I told you I didn’t plan things terribly well, all those long years ago! Two Birthdays a month apart – with Christmas in the middle! Arrggghhhh!) And if that wasn’t bad enough, Julian’s Birthday is February 4th, and mine is on March 9th! More “B.B.B’s”! Finally, as we raise our food and chocolate tortured eyes to the calendar – we see Easter looming up on the horizon! Does it ever end? (Winter shakes her head dolefully) Not down this end of the year, it doesn’t! So all in all, what with those spiteful little pills tipping me over the edge of my “Goal Weight cliff” (70 kg) to crash ignominiously onto the “Rocks of Weight Gain” below, plus the advent of the Festive Season (and still with Easter to munch and waddle through!) I’ve gone from my so-called “ideal weight” of 70 kg… to 73.8 kg this morning! Julian’s started to put on a few kilos too – so we’ve decided, that once the last Easter Eggs and Hot Cross Buns have been consumed, we both going to get back onto my very successful Optifast Diet! However – why wait until after Easter to do this (I hear you all muttering in the background)

Well, the reason is pretty simple, really. There comes a time in everyone’s life when one have to ask oneself – and come up with a logical and reasoned answer – “What are you willing to do to maintain a “so-called”¹ healthy weight?” I look around me at (all the) people struggling to fit into “Fashion’s Dictates”. Skinny, skinny, skinny, seems to be the goal this century, but not all that long ago, it was the buxom, bosomy “Rubenesque” figure that was admired and emulated – so who knows what it might be next year, or next century (if we all survive that long!) Anyway,I digress – to fit into today’s impossibly tiny fashions, most people I know – men included – have to exist on lettuce leaves and carrots, and spend six hours working out in the gym every day to even come close! (Yes, alright, that was a slight exaggeration – but only a slight one, OK?!) I’ve learnt, through trial and error and experimentation, that yes, I can hang on indefinitely around the 63 – 65 kg level… if I never eat another chocolate, if I only eat crispbread with a dessertspoon of low-fat cottage cheese and a slice of tomato for lunch, or I only have a salad – hold the dressing please – for lunch or dinner when I go out, if I never have another oven-fried chip, only eat a very small piece of meat twice a week, never have processed meats like salami or ham, never have an ice-cream, and limit myself to half a banana a day for my fruit intake. I’m sure that a lot of you have been there, done that, and decided that the benefits are simply not worth the sacrifices. Life is meant to be not only lived, but enjoyed! Food is meant to be enjoyed – it makes up almost as huge a part of our lives as sleeping does! It’s a social thing, too… So I decided, well before Christmas, that I was going to enjoy my “Holiday Season” – I was going to eat nice things – not stuff myself on them, of course, but quite frankly, I don’t want to give myself an extra three years of life if they’re going to be miserable and resentful years, if I can’t enjoy one small chocolate after dinner every night, or a small piece of fruit and a small tub of yoghurt for dessert! If I have to watch, weigh or count every morsel that goes into my mouth, then as far as I’m concerned, it’s just not worth it.

And in conclusion? Enjoy your lives! Life’s too short not to make the most of it while you can! 🙂

Sunday we played WoW, naturally, and we’re coming along very well – we did die quite a few times, but that was because the two of us were running a five-man Dungeon, on our own! And we finished it, too, which we both thought was pretty fantastic! 🙂 We finished a bit late, but as we’re getting into the upper levels, there’s more to sort out and deal with when we do get back to “base camp”. I was rather wistfully hoping that we might have made it to level 70 on Sunday, but that was a goal a little bit too far – we made it up two? three? levels? Level 68, anyway, and were well pleased with ourselves!

On Monday our cleaning lady was here in the morning, and after that we headed off to Bushy Park to get more fruit and vegetables, then we went on to The Glen where we had lunch and did a bit more shopping. We got home, and I took some photos of our first tomato crop that Julian had “harvested” on Saturday – there’s still more coming through too, but this lot don’t look too bad, do they? 🙂

It was a bit weird at The Glen – nearly all the shops down at the “David Jones” end are closing, or have already closed, due to the extremely extensive re-building that will be starting there soon. Unfortunately, I don’t think David Jones will be returning to The Glen, and it looks like the Arena, our second favourite lunch place there – and which has already closed – is gone for good, according to the whiteboard that they’d put up – saying something along the lines of “Goodbye, and thanks for 15 years of loyalty!” 😦 Very sad – but I guess that’s “progress”

Sean was over in the afternoon, and I’m going to have my hair colour re-done next Monday – a bit too late for Dr. Y., but I’ll still look good tomorrow, anyway! 🙂 “Les enfants terribles” are real little treasures, but boy, they get into everything! Satai’s latest play pen is the dishwasher – as soon as Julian opens the door, he has to climb into it – he’s fascinated anything to do with water, so I’ve decided to relent, and put my little “Lucky Bamboo” into the shower recess, so that I can leave my bathroom door open (except when I’m using the bathroom, that is!) Both cats absolutely love it when I turn the taps on at a trickle in both my hand basins – Sal likes to sit and watch the water trickling down the plug hole, Satai attacks the trickle of water with a vengeance! He bites the water (and sometimes the tap!) and smacks the water on the sink with both paws at once! You should see the bathroom though! Water goes everywhere! So much for the cleaning lady coming yesterday – I ended up with water splashed all over the mirror, the bench top – and the floor! Oh, and he also loves to play with my bath towels! The first thing he does when he gets in is make a bee-line for my towels, where he jumps up and swings on them, pulling them all down onto the ground! I think I’ve found a way to hook them up so that he can’t pull them off, but the proof of the pudding will be in the eating! It’ll be interesting to see if they’re still hanging up next time I go in there!

Well, it’s too hard to try and remember what I’ve eaten over the weekend and yesterday, and I already told you what my weight was this morning (down four points from 74.2 kg yesterday – Monday, to 73.8 kg this morning, just to save you having to back-track! 😉 ) but I’ll get back to my usual accounting of the food and weight facts tomorrow…

Auric and Dapple are also both well, and enjoying the benefits of the new filter pads that Julian put in the last time he cleaned their Fish House – the water is certainly staying cleaner and clearer for a lot longer! Now I have to go and feed the furkids and the finkids – but I’ll be back “ron” 😉

Back! Well, I haven’t fed the finkids, because they get all skittish when their overhead tank light is turned on, so I’ll finish this and then feed them. The furkids are fed though, but before we fed them I snuck into the bathroom to see if my towels were on the floor or not – they weren’t! 😀 My trick worked! However, my two bottles of liquid hand soap were not where they should have been, and my hand towel on the bench top was skewed, so they’d obviously had a bit of a romp in there. Satai is favouring one of his back legs – I hope he hasn’t hurt himself! Being a Bengal, he’s very, very boisterous, and he keeps knocking himself and falling off things (he’s not terribly “graceful” yet – he’s still very much an un-co kitten!) There’s no way short of putting him in a cage that we can stop him tearing around, helter-skelter – and we certainly ain’t about to cage him – perhaps I should start looking up “common accidents suffered by boisterous Bengal kittens” – just to be better prepared for whatever happens! Anyway, that brings me to the stage of saying “and that’s about “it” from me for tonight!” – so I’ll say it – that’s about “it” from me for tonight! Do drop in again tomorrow night though and find out how I got on at Dr. Y’s, and if my weight went back up again or not, and if I have to stay on those hellish tablets! You’ll get all the latest on Satai and Sal, and if Satai’s hind leg is still troubling him – in which case we’ll probably be in for another dose of nerve deafness, with him yowling at the top of his lungs all the way to the Vet! Until tomorrow though, please try to bee good, don’t forget that it’s better to regret the risks that didn’t work out than the chances you never took – and remember to always drive carefully, to keep warm – or cool – depending on the circumstances, and to look after yourselves… but above all, please remember to stay safe! 🙂 ciao, all! 🙂

¹I say “so-called” healthy weight because what constitutes a “healthy weight” seems to change from year to year, depending on what new scientific discoveries and breakthroughs have been made, and who’s discovered (or made up) the newest (or wackiest sounding) diet theory (or fad)

04.18 pm

I’m going to have a grizzle today – I hope you don’t mind too much, but thingz have to be said! This time it’s about Flickr. Flickr has been really good so far – I’d take a photo on my phone, it would be automatically uploaded to Flickr, where I could go in and edit it, then post it here – or anywhere else I wanted to send it. The “Edit” function used to have a drop-down function in its menu called “Aviary” which allowed you to do all sorts of things – add coloured filters, crop (which was always “de rigueur” for me because I’m a totally lousy photographer!) get rid of red-eye – all sorts of handy things! Now all you can get in their “Edit” menu is “Rotate”, “Replace”, and “Delete” – and rumour has it that “Replace” doesn’t work, either! And it seems I’m not the only Flickr user who’s a lot more than just “very put out” about this, because the powers-that-be there at Flickr aren’t replying to emails, and have refused to acknowledge that there’s a problem, or to say anything about the fact that their photo editing function is “broken” – let alone give us any idea of when it might be fixed! I’m about at the point of saying that unless Flickr can get their act together and get this editing problem fixed by the end of the weekend (this weekend, so if they’re in America, that’d actually be Tuesday, Melbourne time, as we’re a day ahead of them) or at the very least, let us all know what’s happening with their Aviary edit function, I’ll be asking Julian to shop around for an alternative to Flickr – which would be a shame, as it’s secure, quick, and easy to work with. I have also toyed with the idea of downloading the photos to my computer (do I have to do that? Maybe I don’t have to – I wouldn’t have a clue!) editing them in Photoshop, and then re-uploading them to Flickr – but doing all of that with every single photo that I want to put in the blog seems like a hell of a lot of unnecessary mucking around, for something that should be a simple matter of “aim, “click”, edit, post”!

C’mon Flickr! Get yer bloomin’ act together!

Yesterday my very favourite eldest daughter came over and we watched the last few episodes we had of “Legends of Tomorrow”, “The Flash”, “Supergirl”, and “Arrow” – we’ll have to get Julian to download some more of them for next week – but at least we got to see the dénouement of the four-part crossover episodes! Then we watched a couple of episodes of “The Librarians” before it was time for Lee to go home… “The Librarians” is really a lot of fun, as long as you remember that it’s just light, frothy entertainment! 🙂

Not much else has been happening around here though – this morning we were going to make a trip out to Bushy Park to get more fruit and vegetables, but that plan was amended to an afternoon trip, because we’re having corned beef done in the slow cooker for dinner tonight, and Julian had to get that all set up and simmering… then of course there was washing to be done, and the Fish House to clean as well, so today’s afternoon trip to Bushy Park for more fruit and vegetables became a Monday jaunt. Julian did have to go out today though, as the three of us went quite mad yesterday, and had eaten (gobbled!) up all of the divinely delicious sourdough bread that he’d bought at Doncaster the other day, so we had nothing for lunch today! I did tell you about the new Sourdough Bread Shop over at Doncaster, didn’t I? I think it’s called the “Woodfrog Bakery” – but I might be wrong, so don’t quite me on that! It’s not a “three walls and a shop-front” type of shop, it’s a reasonably solid type of kiosk-y affair, in the middle of the “walkway” leading up to Coles and the Colonial Fresh Market – situated behind the Coffee Hit, and about opposite to where Jones the Grocer used to be – you can’t miss it! It specialises in Sourdough only -Breads and pastries (e.g. Danish, etc.) and they are absolutely the nicest, tastiest, and most delicious breads I think I’ve ever eaten! Julian made the three of us sandwiches from a normal, medium-sized loaf yesterday, and the three of us all milled around like circling sharks, nabbing bits of bread to “nibble” on while we were waiting for the sandwiches – I even scored a semi-frozen “heel”, which I gleefully made off with and gnawed on whilst waiting for my sandwich. By the time the sandwiches had been made, and devoured, the entire loaf had been consumed! And I’m not really a big one for just plain-old bread and butter – or in this case, “naked and half-frozen, bread”! It’s yummy! Take my word for it! 🙂

So anyway, Julian went out to get some bread for lunch today, and came back with nearly half the supermarket, I think! (and we only did a great big shop the day before yesterday!) We have our cleaning lady coming on Monday morning, but we’ll scuttle off to Bushy Park for our fruit and vegetables after lunch – I must remember to try and get some cherries, too – my very favourite eldest daughter is very fond of cherries – in fact they’re one of the only fruits she’ll eat! I’ll have run out of my stewed plums by Monday, too, but this time I thought I might try stewing some apricots, if they have any nice looking ones available… because as nice as they are, I’m afraid that I am getting just a trifle tired of stewed plums…

I played WoW for most of this morning – I did a bit of re-arranging on Saurfang, and the Alliance girl I have as my main Banker and Auctionator was level 54. I was in Stormwind, and getting tired of running or galloping everywhere and was wishing that I could fly… but you can’t fly until you get to level 60… hmm! Only six more levels! Shouldn’t take me too long! So I did the unthinkable (for me, anyway) and I played with a Banker! I made it to level 60 this afternoon, whereupon I dropped all my quests and raced back to Stormwind to get my flying licence! Yayyy! Now I can get back to my young-uns! 🙂 I also sorted out the Guild Bank vaults, so now I should be all set up and ready to manage the Auctions and Banking again! 🙂

Tomorrow is Sunday, and we’ll be back at WoW again, dragging our Mage and Warlock a little closer to level 70 (we’re both level 65 at the moment) Not that anything in particular happens at level 70 – it’s just the next “milestone”, you know? Anyway, depending on what time we finish playing tomorrow, there may – or may not – be an “episode” for you all to read. “Watch this space!” 😉

Food stuffs: yesterday’s utterly sublime sandwich was made with the stupendously tasty sourdough bread, organic butter, commercially sliced pastrami, thin slices of Cheddar/Tasty cheese, and organic, home-grown tomato. Very, very delicious! 🙂 Dinner last night was lightly pan-fried fillet steak, cooked in a cast iron skillet, with steamed green beans, chips, and half a really delicious, organic, and home-grown “Black Russian” tomato! I kid you not – there’s nothing quite as nice and flavoursome as a home-grown tomato! They’re absolutely nothing like the tasteless commercial “rubbish” tomatoes that you buy in supermarkets, where all of the flavour and goodness is sacrificed to produce tomatoes that are a uniform and more “pleasing” size and shape, and so that they can grow thicker skins, to last longer on the shelves! For dessert I had a small-ish “Williams” pear, a small apricot, and an Apple Le Rice. Today for lunch we had our usual “Baker’s Delight” fare – half a ham Danish, half a cheese and mushroom pizza roll, and a chocolate and choc-chip scone (with a small scraping of butter!) Tonight, as I might have mentioned, we’re having slow-cooked corned silverside, with another half an organic and home-grown “Black Russian” (or “Grosse Lisse”?) tomato, steamed green beans, and mashed potatoes. For dessert I’ll have a brown Nashi pear, another very small apricot, and one of the MOO Sticky Apple and Organic Honey yoghurts.

Weigh-in mornings have not been pleasant!

Weigh-in Thursday, February 23rd:      73.8 kg
Weigh-in Friday, February 24th:           74.0 kg
Weigh-in Saturday, February 25th:       74.2 kg

Oh well, as Julian said this morning – not long now until the end of Easter and the beginning of our joint Optifast diet! Yanno, in a perverse sort of way I’m actually looking forward to returning to the Optifast regimen – the food – while commercial and packaged, isn’t too bad – I really did like the soups – with the addition of a few chili flakes and/or semi-dried basil flakes – and the bars were yummy! Some of the new diet jellies (jelly crystals that you make up yourself, not those ghastly, over-sweet pre-prepared jelly cups!) are really, really nice, too! So as I said – I’m almost looking forward to it! 🙂

And there you go – all caught up with what’s been happening around this neck of the woods! Next Saturday we’ve got Julian’s Big Birthday Bash, and thanks to circumstances beyond our control, we’re going to be having it in conjunction with mine again, which is only about a week away anyway! I’m not sure where we’ll be going, but I’ll let you all know as soon as we’ve made up our minds! Sal and Satai, after having been truly angelic all day yesterday, have really gone out of their way to be naughty and wicked today! At the moment they’ve got their noses firmly in their respective troughs, guzzling their dinner, so peace reigns supreme for the moment! Auric and Dapple are still settling down after their Great Big Fish House Cleanup so I haven’t fed them yet – I’ll give them another half an hour to settle down, and then they too shall get their din-dins! 🙂 And really, that’s about “it” from me for this evening! Do drop in again tomorrow (or Monday, or Tuesday) night to see what we’ve been up to, and if I’ve managed to edit some photos to put up for you all! In the meantime, do try to bee good, remember that the hardest thing to do is to be true to yourself, especially when everybody is watching… and don’t forget to look after yourselves, to always drive carefully, and to keep cool – or warm – depending on your inclination… but most importantly, please don’t forget to stay safe! 🙂 ciao, all! 🙂

04.39 pm

Sorry I went AWOL again, but you wouldn’t believe how hectic things have been around here since Sunday night! Anyway, at least I warned you all that there might not be a blog on Sunday night – depending on what time we finished playing WoW – and surely everyone knows by now, and takes it for granted, that I usually don’t get a chance to write on Monday nights, either! After Sean has left, there are ravening kittens to be fed, as well as two rapidly growing goldfish, circling around the top right-hand corner of their Fish House like sharks, waiting for their algae pellets to arrive. The table needs to be set, dinner wants to be eaten, and our nightly date with the television must be kept! Yessirree, there’s never a dull moment in this household! 😉

On Tuesday we left here around noon, and were out nearly all day – and we didn’t get home until after ten thirty, either, absolutely bushed! It was my very favourite eldest daughter’s Graduation day, and because she needed to be down at Deakin University Geelong Campus by three o’clock to pick up her robe and trencher, and because there was no way known that we were going to miss her Graduation, we picked her up shortly after twelve and drove down to Geelong. I might say at this point that her husband actually works down at the Deakin Geelong Campus, and she could have gone down with him when he went to work that morning, but it would have meant an extra long, boring day for her with nothing to do until 3 pm – and seeing that we were going to be there anyway, she hitched a ride with us. We were expecting a few holdups on the way down, after the shocking air plane crash that morning, but despite the doom and gloom predictions of lots of slow, 40 kpm areas on the freeway – sorry, tollway – by “Brunhilda” (the name we’ve given to our Sat Nav’s female voice!) we pretty much had a hassle-free trip down, giving us enough time to go and have a very nice lunch at a restaurant right on the waterfront! I’d given Auric and Dapple a larger than usual breakfast that morning, and as goldfish can go for a couple of weeks without their usual food, I was only a little bit worried that they might get hungry enough to start nibbling on eachother before we got home, but we weren’t at all happy about leaving our little furry babies on their own for such a long time! We gave them an early lunch before we left, and put out extra bowls of (dry) food here and there around the house that they could find if they got really hungry – they also had four bowls of water, and we left the radio on for them – but it was with many misgivings that we left them on their own, poor little bubsies…

We’ve been to a couple of other Graduations before (this isn’t the first uni course that my very favourite eldest daughter has completed) but this one, despite being such a hell of a long way away, was by far the best organised and presented! It seems that the organisers have taken a page out of American’s book when it comes to organising and seating the disabled! Lee went off to get her cap and gown, and while we were waiting for her, we were approached by a nice young lass who’d noticed that I had a walking stick – she told us to remain where we were because after the Graduates had been organised into their ranks in the hall, those with physical infirmities would be seated before the rest of the visitors (we came across this all over the place when we went to the States many years ago, especially if there were likely to be long queues for anything – those with walking sticks were quickly ushered up to the front of the line!) Although as I said before, we’d been to several other Graduations, I’d forgotten just how “formal” and archaic the entire procedure is! Once the Graduates and the visitors are all seated (except for latecomers – who seemed to arrive throughout the entire evening, and who quickly became thoroughly annoying, shuffling their bottoms in front of our noses as they proceeded to inch their way down the row of seats, occasionally preventing us from seeing what was happening!) First, the Academics in their full regalia, file slowly in to take their seats on the stage – they’re followed by the Mace Bearer, solemnly carrying the Official Deakin Mace. After everyone’s in place on the stage, there are a couple of speeches, and a short address by a “distinguished guest” – this time it was the High Commissioner for Papua New Guinea, His Excellency Mr Charles Lepani CBE (who was also awarded a Deakin Honorary Doctorate later in the evening) Clever Deakin had staggered their Graduations – Tuesday was the Graduation Day for the Faculty of Arts and Education, which had been broken up into two parts – the first taking place at noon, the other, the one we went to, starting at 6.00 pm. And so the evening wore on – and my very favourite eldest daughter received her Bachelor of Arts (Professional and Creative Writing) With Distinction – BA(Prof&CreatWrit)!!

After the ceremony was finished, everyone trooped out to the courtyard where a marquee offering refreshments had been set up. I’d love to put up some of the photos that we took, but for some [heavily censored] reason, Flickr won’t let me edit them. This one was edited on my phone, and re-synced with Flickr – but I just don’t have time to do the others I want to put up. Maybe tomorrow…

Well, my very favourite eldest daughter’s been dragging her feet a little, but the day before Graduation (I think it was the day before?!) she finally managed to get her application in to do Honours this year… and this morning she got an email saying that they’ve accepted her, so she’ll be going back to uni in a few weeks to do her Bachelor of Arts (Professional and Creative Writing) Honours course! Then… then, she’s going after her Doctorate, and we’ll have two “Doctors” in the family! Melissa, Julian’s sister, who’s a Doctor of Law, and my very favourite eldest daughter, who will hopefully become a Doctor of Professional and Creative Writing! 🙂

And now it’s time to go and feed the poor, hungry starving little waifers, who are soooo hungry that they’re cuddled up together, sound asleep in their Penthouse! (and we gotta feed the little fishies, too! 😉 )

Today we went shoe-shopping for me As you know, I absolutely hate, loathe, and detest shoes… if it sits on my feet, I hates it! Anyway, my poor old shoes are really starting to fall to pieces, and my Podiatrist was telling me that she has another client who suffers from badly swollen feet too, and that she gets sandals from Gilmour’s – they have a shop in Mitcham, so we went there, and I got two pairs of “footwear” – one pair of black, somewhat fancy-schmantzy “lace-up” shoes for “best”, and a pair of scuffs (sort of) for going out into the garden and so forth…

Gosh-darn-it, dinner’s ready! I’ll be back a bit later to finish off – stay tuned!

10.02 pm

Back – somewhat later than usual, and after only seeing one TV show instead of our usual two – coz Pete, an old friend of ours from the good ol’ BBS days rang up. We last caught up with him five years ago in 2012 (?) at a “Tron Legacy” movie night, with a personal appearance by Bruce Boxleitner (who also starred in one of my very, very most favourite TV shows Of All Time, “Babylon 5“) The time before that was… fourteen years ago! He mentioned tonight that his eldest daughter is now 14, and I remember my complete astonishment when he turned up – right out of the blue – at our place, with his two week old daughter in tow! Wow! Talk about time flying! 🙂 We do exchange Christmas Cards every year, but it’ll be good to catch up in person with him and his wife Mara! It’s very strange, you know – all of the friends I made in 1985, when I was a naive and computer illiterate newbie logging on to my very first Bulletin Board (BBS) called “Melbourne P.I.E.”¹ are still good friends – and even if fourteen or more years go by, we all just seem to pick up where we left off the last time we met! Anyway, I digress… where was I? Oh yes, getting back here later than usual this evening!

So there ya go – Sunday we played WoW until late – we’re well and truly out of Hell Fire Peninsula, thank goodness, and we’re starting to make our way through wet, marshy, muddy, and mushroom-friendly Zangarmarsh! We didn’t die, either, in fact we’re finding it rather easy (so far, anyway! 😉 ) On Monday, we had shopping and banking to do, and then Sean came over in the afternoon/evening, Tuesday we were down in Geelong most of the day for Lee’s Graduation. Yesterday, Wednesday I had a medical appointment in the morning and then had a terrible fit of the “Can’t Be Bothered’s”, so I didn’t (bother doing anything) and today we went shoe-shopping and shopping-shopping, and didn’t get back until early afternoon… Tomorrow my very favourite eldest daughter is coming over, so we’ll spend the majority of the day catching up on episodes of “Legends of Tomorrow”, “Supergirl”, “The Flash”, and “Arrow”!

Now, if none of you mind, I’m going to leave out any and all of the “food stuffz” bits, as it’s late and I’m already up to 1640 words – so I’ll just skip right on ahead to the weigh-in bits, OK? 🙂

Weigh-in Sunday, February 19th:          73.3 kg
Weigh-in Monday, February 20th:        73.4 kg
Weigh-in Tuesday, February 21st:         73.4 kg
Weigh-in Wednesday, February 22nd: 73.5 kg
Weigh-in Thursday, February 23rd:     73.8 kg

Will I be up, or down tomorrow? Prolly up – stands to reason! My stupid body is going to want to make me as fat as possible for when I go to see Dr. Y. next week! Well, ’tis almost March, and Easter is galloping up at a rate of knots, after which I’ll be back onto the Optifast for a while – so there, body! You’re not going to beat me, after all! 😛

And there you go – now all of you know as much as I do about the comings and goings over on this side of the black stump! Do call in again tomorrow night to find out what my weight did (or didn’t!) do to me, whether or not I managed to edit the pictures of the Graduation that I wanted to put up, and whether there are any new photos of Sal and Satai, or Auric and Dapple. Until then though, do try to bee good, don’t forget that nothing in life is to be feared, it is only to be understood, and remember to look after yourselves, to always drive carefully, and to keep warm – or cool – depending on where you are and what you’re doing… but most importantly, please remember to stay safe! 🙂 ciao, all! 🙂

 ¹Melbourne P.I.E. – the P.I.E. stood for “Public Information Exchange” – the first Bulletin Board I ever called… ahhh… nostalgia!

04.52 pm

Well, it’ll probably be another rather shortish episode again tonight – once again, it’s been a very quiet day! This morning I completely changed out all the cat litter boxes (my, that was an exciting and challenging job! Not!) and Julian went and dropped off the dry cleaning, picked up some more coffee, and did some shopping. I didn’t go with him this time – I stayed home and played a bit of WoW – which was a nice thing to do, for a change! No! True! I don’t get the chance to play all that much these days – we’re always going somewhere, or doing something, or whatever, and unless I know I’m going to be able to get in at least two and a half hours of uninterrupted play, I don’t even bother to start – there’s nothing more annoying that being out in the middle of a quest somewhere, surrounded by hostile mobs – and all of a sudden, hey presto! It’s time for us to leave to go somewhere, or someone’s about to arrive in a couple of minutes, and I have to up and abandon my character – hopefully in a “safe” place – which usually ends up stuck on top of a rock, somewhere out in the wilds of Azeroth! (Winter shakes her head sadly) Not good! Tomorrow, of course, is Sunday, and Julian and I will no doubt be screaming, fighting, kicking and massacring our way through hordes of nasty Azerothian mobs all day – and having a right good time of it 🙂 I like Sundays… 😉

By the time Julian got back from shopping today it was lunch time, and after lunch he headed off to do some washing and clean out the Fish House. Lazy me sat on the couch in here (it’s very comfortable!) alternating between dozing off and reading my book, whilst attempting to stop Satai from biting my legs ((*helpless look*) what can I say?! The poor little guy’s teething! 😉 ) After Julian had finished cleaning the Fish House and had put all the buckets and other paraphernalia away, Sal and Satai sat and watched him through the big folding doors, “showering” the plants and herbs on the decking outside – with much the same horror and amazement that they watch him in the shower every morning! However, the washing is almost finished (little Mr. Curious was fascinated with the washing machine! Sal, being older and more worldly, is much more blasé about it all!) Auric and Dapple have a nice, clean Fish House, and the vegetables, plants and herbs have all had a nice, refreshing drink.

“What is it? Shiny! Can I play wif it?”

“It moves! It goes round n round n round! C’n I play wif it?!”

Yanno, it’s occurred to me that I’m always talking about Auric and Dapple, but I never put up any photos of them!

So there ya go – ladies and gentlepersons, I give you…. (drum roll please!) the Two Amazing and Miraculous Survivors of the Infamous Mud Puddle! Auric and Dapple! Unfortunately the water’s still a bit cloudy from all the cleaning and gravel vacuuming this afternoon – I’ll try to get better piccies for you all tomorrow!

I may have to scoot off in a sec – the cats are bellowing for their dinner!

The kittens have now been fed! 🙂 And… speaking of feedings and food stuffs… 😉 Lunch today was from Baker’s Delight, as it usually is when Julian goes off in the morning to do the shopping, so I had a half of a very nice ham Danish, and half of a very nice pesto/pizza flat roll, plus a delicious fruit scone (that is, we each had half of the two savoury rolls, but a whole scone each) For dinner tonight we’re having chicken breasts marinated in Dijon mustard and whole-egg mayonnaise, served with plain steamed rice mixed with finely chopped spring onions. We had that weird fruit what I can’t remember the name of last night, and I tell you what – we won’t be getting another one! We didn’t like it – basically it tasted like a cross between a very insipid mango (though I do like mangoes now!) and a lychee (which neither of us like!) I will, however, take a photo of one next time we’re at Bushy Park, if they have any, and find out what its name is, so that you can all avoid them if you ever see them! They’re really “not nice”! But for tonight’s dessert I’ll have a very nice looking mango that I got at Bushy Park the other day, and a Sticky Apple and Organic Honey MOO yoghurt. 🙂

Weigh-in this morning. Tra-la-la, and here we go gathering nuts in May again on the roundabouts, losing on the swings this morning for a change! Oh, it’s a silly, mixed-up muddle-headed body that I have indeed! Yesterday I was 73.6 kg… this morning I went down two points to 73.4 kg! Not that I’m complaining, mind you – I just don’t understand it – after all the carbs I had the other day! Oh well, lunch today should “bulk” me back up again, fer sure!

And here I am, right at the last paragraph – and dinner’s ready! You wouldn’t read about it! (well, actually you are! Reading about it, I mean!) Never mind – I’ll be back “a little later” to finish off….

09.58 pm

Right, I’m back again… lemme just read back the last couple of sentences… yadda yadda yadda… uuhhh… yeah… right! So, tomorrow’s Sunday – all day until midnight – and we’ll be spending our usual Sunday sashaying around Azeroth – well, we’re actually in Outland now – still in my most UN-favourite place, Hell Fire Peninsula, where all the really, really nasty, giant robot Fel Reavers sneak up on you and stomp you flatter than a pancake. Actually, they don’t sneak up on you – they make too much noise to sneak – you can hear them coming for miles, but just like ambulance sirens and Fire Trucks, it’s damn difficult to tell which direction the noise is coming from – all you can do is freeze and cower, and hope to goodness that they’re actually going in the opposite direction to you. Still, I reckon we must be just about through Hell Fire Peninsula by now and just about ready to move on to Zangarmarsh, the next area along… it’s a much more nicer area, with giant mushrooms, spiky floating spores (toxic, of course!) and gargantuan Marsh Walkers, which have lots of gossamer-like tentacles… yeah! 😀 It’s much more betterer than Hell Fire Peninsula! 😉 And once again, that’s about “it” from me for this evening – you may, or may not, get another “episode” tomorrow night, depending on what time we finish playing, but rest assured that you’ll hear all about our adventures from both the mundane world and the WoW universe, if not tomorrow night, then most definitely on Monday night! Until next time then, do try to bee good – don’t forget that a positive mind will find a way it can be done; a negative mind will look for all the ways it can’t be done, and remember to keep warm – or cool – depending on your mood, to look after yourselves, and to always drive carefully… but above all, please remember to stay safe! 🙂 ciao, all! 🙂

05.39 pm

Extra short and sweet tonight, because I really hate having to finish up after dinner. As I was telling you all yesterday, my very favourite eldest daughter came over today, and we spent a very pleasant day watching episodes of “Legends of Tomorrow”, “Supergirl”, “The Flash”, and “Arrow” – including two episodes of a three episode “crossover” segment, where the characters from all of the above series get to interact with eachother. We would have just had time to watch the third and last episode of this very interesting set of “crossovers” – the final dénouement – before Lee went home around five-ish, except that around twenty past four, my phone made a really weird sound – nothing like the sound it makes when I get a call or a message – what it was, was a “reminder”… that I had the Podiatrist coming around 4.30 pm! To quote a modern colloquialism that I hardly ever use, “WTF”?! For the last two days I’d had a weird feeling that the Podiatrist was supposed to be coming today, so I’d checked all my calendars and reminder thingies – nothing! “I must be mistaken!” thought I… besides, whenever I do send myself reminders like that – you know, birthdays, appointments, and stuff – I always (without fail!) set it to send me the reminder three days before the event. Three days, not ten minutes! So… what to do? By the time we’d dithered around, fussing about whether or not we should start watching the last ruddy episode, it was ten to five, and Jo (the Podiatrist) still hadn’t turned up… so we started watching the… “ding-dong” went the door bell! I tell you, it works every time! Back in the “middle ages” – a long time ago – if I had to go anywhere by taxi, I’d usually find myself pacing up and down outside, sometimes for three-quarters of an hour – getting more and more annoyed about how long it was taking. I was a heavy smoker back in those days, and not being able to smoke in taxis really put my nerves on edge… I always found that the best way to get a taxi to arrive was to light up a cigarette – the taxi would always turn up before I’d had time to take a second puff of my newly lit cigarette – pretty soon I found myself doing that as soon as I stepped outside – and now it also seems to work with Podiatrists who are running late!

So we never got to see the final segment of the crossovers this afternoon – we’ll just have to wait until next week! 😮 😥

Auric, Dapple, Sal and Satai are all well and in fine fettle, and Satai’s tiny little wounds are healing nicely, although still a wee bit swollen (as one would expect!) Alas, I have no new photos for you this evening – but maybe tomorrow?

Food stuffs today. For lunch today the three of us had some of the ultra-delicious Cinnamon and Date bread that Baker’s Delight make, toasted. This time we all had three slices each, because two slices of toast didn’t seem like enough for lunch, especially when you consider that a sandwich consists of two slices of toast bread, plus all the stuff that goes inside the sandwich – butter (or butter substitute) meat, cheese, tomato – whatever! Tonight we’re having pasta with tomato sauce and a smattering of grated parmesan for dinner – yes, an extremely carb-heavy day! Oh well! For dessert I’ll have either the nice, lovely-looking rosy mango that I got at Bushy Park the other day, or, if we remember after our pasta, Julian and I will share the cricket-ball sized fruit with the intriguing-sounding name – which unfortunately, I can’t remember off the top of my head at the moment – it was either “creme caramel something”, or “something creme brulée”, or something like that, anyway – if they have them again next time we go I’ll make a note of it for you all! And after that I’ll probably have a lemon CHOBANI yoghurt to finish off with.

Weigh-in this morning. What did I tell you all last night, hmm? Yes, back up again – not as much as I expected though! I went from 73.3 kg yesterday to 73.6 kg today. It took four step-onto-the-scales to arrive at that figure though! The first weigh-in went to 73.7 kg. Second weigh-in went to 73.6 kg – then 73.4 kg, and finally, 73.6 kg again! You see, I have to keep getting on and off the scales until I get two results the same! I would have much preferred it if I’d got 73.4 kg a second time, but… say lar vee, as the French say!

And that about wraps it up for today! Not all that much happened – my very favourite eldest daughter and I were too busy watching television, and the cats were – for once in their lives – reasonably well-behaved! I’m not too sure what’s happening tomorrow, but why don’t you all drop in again tomorrow night and find out?! 😉 And that being about “it” from me for this evening, I shall once more exhort you all to bee good – or as good as you can bee, remember that chaos often breeds life, when order breeds habit, and don’t forget to look after yourselves, to keep warm – or cool – depending on what you’re doing, and to always drive carefully… but most importantly, please – don’t forget to stay safe! 🙂 ciao, all! 🙂

P.S. I lied! I just managed to snap this for you all as I waltzed off to dinner! 🙂