Oh boy, what a busy and mixed up day! 🙂 Julian thought we’d be able to do a fair bit of Rifting before Clarke arrived, so after my nice long amble on the treadmill, we started out with our two new characters, and got hopelessly lost and confused because we’d both forgotten where we were up to! We managed to get ourselves back on track, and as usually happens when we start playing on a Sunday, Invasions, rifts, and nasty Boss characters were in full swing. Being the big, bold, adventurers that we are (!!) we decided to have a go and try to knock some of these beasties out… which we did very successfully – at first… but then, being the rash, foolhardy, impetuous characters that we also are, we got stuck into a whole horde of Hell Bugs and their Boss. Elites, all of them! And… we hadn’t noticed. I think I noticed first, and I said… “Oh! he’s an Elite!” and then I said “Never mind, he’s only a level 8 Elite – we can take him!” (we were level 10, you see) And then we died. Several times, in fact. They were all Elites, and the Big Bad Boss Hell Bug was a real doozy! We didn’t even manage to scratch him! He turned around and glanced in our general direction, and we fell over dead! Well, maybe not exactly like that, but he went through us like a hot knife through room-temperature butter! So anyway, we got better, and by the time we came back from the Healer it was all over bar the celebrating

Clarke got here around about noon, and we sat in the Den here and made small talk for a couple of minutes, then retired to the bathroom to start planning things out. So, what’s going to happen: The wall between the toilet and the bathroom is going to be knocked out. That’s the wall in front of you when you’re… reaching for the toilet paper. The wall between the shower and the toilet will be a glass panel and form the top end (?) of the shower. OK, think of the shower as being a nice, long rectangle. At one end of the rectangle will be a bench seat (for me to sit on) If I sit on the bench and look left, I’ll be looking into the bathroom. If I turn and look right, I’m going to be looking at the shower hose rail. If I look straight ahead, I’m going to be looking at the toilet – does that make it more comprehensible? 🙂 The bath is going (thank goodness!) which will give me enough room in which to turn around without bruising myself on something. The vanity unit will run almost the full length of the room, with a cupboard at each end, then a set of drawers on either side of a “makeup bench” where I can sit and do my hair without banging my knees on cupboards or drawers – so basically it’ll go cupboard, drawers, seating, drawers. cupboard. Towel rail. The window will be raised slightly to the height of the vanity unit, and be converted into a glass brick wall or panel – let’s face it, all I see outside the window is a very mundane path and the side fence – so the glass bricks will give me light in the room, and privacy – just in case I’m in the shower and someone decides to take a shortcut to the front garden without coming through the house. And… I get to choose the colours, the tiles, the bench tops… lights… What’dya reckon? 🙂 A full size crystal chandelier? 😉 I’m a bit overwhelmed – I don’t have to stick to the basic colour scheme of the house (dark browns, greys, and off-white) I can have any colours I want. I was thinking blue and white tones – not stark white, but maybe more into the hogsbristle (a creamy white) range… but then Julian went and spoilt that image for me by casually mentioning that he didn’t really like blue in bathrooms so now I’m thinking more into the lavender-lilac colours, IF I can find the right tiles and tile trim – and you can bet your sweet bippy that they’re not going to be easy to find! Thanks to a very good friend who sent me the url of a place that has a lot of colour schemes, I’m starting to get a few ideas sorted out in my mind 🙂 Now it just remains to go tile searching, and caesarstone hunting – paint shouldn’t be a problem – you can get paint places to blend just about any colour you can imagine if you can tell them the Hex number (I think! They should be able to, anyway!) It’s the tiles that I’m a bit iffy about…

Now, when Clarke was doing a bit of “pre move” work over here and got the job cancellation that we immediately snapped up, he said he’d be able to start in “about six weeks” – today we asked him how soon he could start… and he said “Oh… about six weeks?” Aaarrrggghhh! I though that he’d meant six weeks from when he told us about the cancellation – now he tells us six weeks from now? Of course, he could be factoring in the time to organise the vanity unit, tiles, paint, all the other little bits and pieces – tilers, etc., etc. into that six-week period, so if I’m extra lucky and manage to find the tiles an’ all quickly, maybe he can start sooner! Oh, I do hope so…. Anyway, at least he’s said he’ll come over this week and put in a new, “temporary” (read: cheap!) shower hose rail so that I don’t have to keep putting the damned thing on the floor of the shower all the [*censored*] time! It’s…. more than annoying, I promise you!

So that was the “Clarke” visit… and we have a lot of homework to do! After he left, we had a cup of coffee and lunch – then Julian went off to get a bit of shopping and I did my Treadmilling. Do you think it matters how you stand while you’re walking on a treadmill, or is it simply a matter of moving your legs? My legs work very evenly – it’s easy to get a good rhythm going on a treadmill – it’s just like clockwork – but I don’t stand up straight all the time (well, I can’t stand up straight anyway!) I tend to lean on this arm, or that elbow, or lean over, or back (but mostly I just lean over) or just change posture in general as my arms get cramped, or my hand starts to get uncomfortable – whatever… But mostly what I want to know is – does the way I stand while walking on the treadmill adversely affect the amount of benefit I get from all this walking, or not?!

Weigh-in this morning. Maybe the extra two minutes and the extra speed on the treadmill are starting to pay off! 🙂 I went down two whole points today, from 75.8kg to 75.6kg! Let’s just hope that it’s “permanent”, and that I won’t slide back up again tomorrow! We can only hope… and walk… and get up and down a lot because everything always seems to be in the wrong room! That’s at least four times since I started writing this that I’ve had to get up to go and look at something, or check on something, or get something – I’ve been up and down like a ruddy Jack-in-a-Box today! Still, I suppose every little bit of exercise helps? 😉

Well, tomorrow is “The Day” when we’ll find out what it was that was supposed to be happening, or who we were supposed to be seeing, and why…. If no-one comes around, or rings, by lunch time, perhaps we can go out and start looking at tiles! W-a-y back in 2007 when we were re-decorating Mum’s apartment for us to move into, I went looking at tiles online, and we only went out to look at them once I found some that I thought might be nice… I’ll prolly do the same again. You know, come to think of it, I don’t recall ever seeing any lavender or lilac coloured tiles that didn’t look like sugar candy! *shudder* I definitely do not want anything too bright, or too “sweet”, or too “grandma’s lace-ish”. If I do go for the lavender or lilac shades, it’s going to have to be very muted – more like just the barest hint of lavender/lilac – just enough to give a suggestion of lilac… Pink is definitely not “me” – red is way too harsh for a bathroom – blue’s out, because Julian doesn’t like it (which is a shame, because I think I could do something with blue tones…) Greens are another no-no (I don’t like it in bathrooms) Yellow isn’t “me” either, and orange is way too “loud”! Which leaves me with the browns and mushroom colours… which I was hoping to get away from! Of course, I could go for a total “white-out”, with only highlight tiles for relief… but I’d really rather not! So, tomorrow my work begins! All comments and suggestions gratefully accepted! 🙂 And that, gentle readers is once more about it from me for tonight! Pop back in again tomorrow night to see how my homework is progressing, and whether my weight continues on its downward journey or if it’s gone back up again… (or worse! stayed the same!) And of course, the burning, sixty-four thousand dollar question – what happened in the morning! Did anyone turn up or not? Who was it? What was it about? …or was that mysterious phone call simply a shared delusion between Julian and myself?! All will be made clear tomorrow night! Until then, though, do try to bee good, remember to respond intelligently, even to unintelligent treatment, and don’t forget to drive carefully, to look after yourselves, and to keep warm – but most importantly, don’t forget to stay safe! 🙂 ciao, all! 🙂