Oh, I just looked at the date in the blog title! December 20th! Christmas! Next Friday! Have we got all the presents? I think so… there’s only one left to go, and Julian can get that on Wednesday… hopefully… and a box in which to put the present… The Christmas Cards have all been sent off except for one, which will go tomorrow. We haven’t put the Christmas Tree up yet because we still don’t know where to put it! With Paul’s help this evening we’re going to move the big glass display cabinet to the other side of the Library door – the furniture and “things” from Adelaide will be arriving tomorrow, including the antique Grandfather Clock (circa 1780) and a rather large camphor wood “hope chest“, which will go on the wall newly vacated by the display cabinet. If it fits, the Christmas Tree will sit on that… otherwise we might just have to suspend it from the ceiling! (the Christmas Tree, that is, not the large camphor wood chest!) But… Why doesn’t it feel like Christmas?
The cabinet has been moved successfully, with (so far!) no breakages, though there’s still a lot of antiques and glassware to be put back. But there always seems to be something more to be done though, doesn’t there – and my bathroom is no exception! So it’s not quite finished yet, after all! *sigh* The hinges for the shower door have been put on, but not the door itself – that’s happening tomorrow! (but where have I heard that before!) I’d be a lot happier if people would just tell me the ruddy truth in the first place, instead of what they think I want to hear, or will make me happy – because when what I’ve been told turns out not to be the case, I’m not only not happy, but I’m furious that I’ve been treated like a child in that they haven’t been completely honest with me! I might be silly sometimes, but I’m not stupid! I do understand that things can, and often do go wrong, or can take longer than expected – so bloody-well tell me that! Instead of saying “Yes! It’ll all be finished by the end of the weekend”, say instead “If everything goes to plan, it should be finished by the end of the weekend, but it could take a bit longer, depending on ‘x’, ‘y’ and ‘z’!” – well, “x” turned out alright, but ‘y’ and ‘z’ didn’t! Apparently there’s a mark on the ceiling that won’t come off, so tonight Paul’s going to have to drive nearly all the way out to Tullamarine to pick up some more paint for the ceiling to be “cleaned up”! That’d be the ‘y’ part. Then there’s the ‘z’ part, which are the two long top drawers of the vanity unit. Paul’s taken them with him tonight because the partitioning that’s going into them to hide and/or disguise the plumbing, needs to be prepared by the cabinet-maker (it’s complicated, but it should have been thought of and measured for last week!) The long and short of it seems to be that… if everything goes according to plan from here on in (and frankly, I’m not holding my breath!) I should (“should” being the operative word!) have a usable new bathroom, the day before Christmas (yes, I know Julian, I’ve been told “Wednesday” – but do you think I’m going to take that as gospel?) And let me be quite, quite clear about this! The reason I’m angry is simply because people haven’t been honest with me – not the fact that the bathroom’s not ready yet – hold-ups happen! Everyone (including me!) knows and understands this – but being repeatedly told, and even promised, something that wasn’t even a real probability, but only a possibility – that’s what’s annoyed me!
Anyway, enough about the bathroom – it’ll be finished, or it won’t. Simple as that. Today being Sunday, Julian and I traipsed off into Azeroth this time, in World of Warcraft. There was some debate as to whether or not we’d Rift or WoW, and WoW won out! 🙂 Well, we’d started off two newbies last week – two Night Elves, but where I’d rolled myself a second new character, so I wouldn’t be tempted to play with my half of the duo during the week, Julian had used his, and had leveled him up quite a bit, leaving my character w-a-y behind. So we opted for starting again, with another two newbies – on one of the US realms this time, instead of the Sydney based Oceanic realm, Nagrand. Our two new characters are on a realm called “Scarlet Crusade” – supposedly a Role Playing realm, where you’re supposed to act, and talk, “in character”, but nobody ever does, really. This time they’re Blood Elves (actually the “prettiest” Race!) and members of The Horde (the opposite faction to “The Alliance”, which we were last time) I’ve rolled a Hunter called Cassändra, and he’s rolled a Warlock called Bræ (With World of Warcraft, you’re allowed to use all sorts of strangely accented letters in your character’s name, which gives you so many more possibilities of getting a name that you actually like! Much more betterer! 🙂 ) Anyway, by the time we got all of that sorted out and set up, it was getting close to lunchtime, but we did manage to get quite a lot done. We have a Guild (also called “death by chocolate”) but no Guild bank, as yet – alas – we’re far too poor to afford the 100 gold needed to buy the first Bank Vault! I’m thinking of transferring someone across from the Quel’dorei realm, which is where all of our richest and most prominent characters reside, who could bring a “small donation” towards the Scarlet Crusade “Horde Guild Bank Endeavour” with them! I’ll talk to Julian about that later…
Food. Last night we had steak for dinner – but not with the usual chips! We had boiled Kipfler potatoes instead, and beans… I also had a spoonful of the left over rice salad, with the wild rice and couscous in it, and a bit of the yummy flat-bread. For dessert, we “tested” the small Ferguson Plarre Christmas Pudding that I’d bought on Tuesday when I went Christmas Shopping with my favourite eldest daughter – we wanted to see if it was any good, in which case we’d go and buy a bigger one, to have for our family Christmas Dinner (read: lunch!) dessert. Well, it was really very, very nice – however, just to be on the safe side 😉 we’ll be having it for dessert again tonight! I only had a very small piece – with light cream, too – and the result of eating such yummy but not-good-for-you food will be seen shortly! For lunch today I had a really delicious home-made “wrap”, using the flat-bread, with sliced tomato, lettuce, aged pepper low-fat cheese, and yoghurt. Very “moor-ish”! 🙂 Tonight we’re having pork – but I’m not sure how himself is going to cook it – and a reprise of the Ferguson Plarre pudding – cold, this time, I think (after all – isn’t it said that “the proof of the pudding is in the eating”? 😉 ) And now… the denouement! What transpired after the small piece of pudding, with light cream…
Weigh-in this morning. Well, I certainly wasn’t expecting the scales to reveal what they did! No way! But I went down another 4 points! From 64.6kg to 64.2kg! And after that small-ish (well alright, it was very small!) piece of pudding – with (light!) cream! Not that I’m complaining! I hope I stay in the 64kg zone for a long, long time! But alas – the weight is bound to go back up again – isn’t it? I mean, I am on Maintenance, I’m not “dieting” anymore, so… er… shouldn’t I be putting a bit of weight back on, until I stabilise, or whatever?
Well, we had some more of the small pudding for dessert tonight – cold, and again with a smidgen of light cream – and if anything, it tasted even nicer cold than it did hot! So tomorrow I have to try to find the phone number for the Ferguson Plarre stand at the Blackburn Road/Burwood Highway shopping complex, to see if I can order a large pudding from them – if they don’t have any, well, we’ll either have to try their Chadstone shop, or buy another two small ones (if they have any of those left!) or… buy another type of pudding, untied, and untested, for Christmas Day! 
Please, touch wood, and cross all your fingers and toes for me! 😉 Hopefully my shower door will be going on tomorrow, and hopefully my two drawers will be back… sometime soon. Julian would like to “finalise” any shopping (food, stocking fillers, wrapping paper, whatever!) on Tuesday, but that’s in the lap of the ghods at this stage – the rest of the shopping might have to wait until Wednesday (bathroom permitting) or possibly even Thursday. Anyway, that’s about it from me for tonight – we’ve had quite a pleasantly cool day in here, despite the outside temperature, and tomorrow promises to be a lot better – it’s a shame we can’t do our last bits of shopping tomorrow, but we have to be here when the Adelaide things arrive – which could be anywhere between 10am and 2.30pm – so we’re stuck here for the duration, I fear. Anyway, do call in again tomorrow night – find out if the Adelaide things got here early enough to allow for a “quick” sprint to the shops, if I was able to source a large Ferguson Plarre pudding for Christmas Dinner, or whether my weight suddenly decided that it was doing a “Winter”, and going in completely the wrong direction (just ask Julian what my sense of direction is like!) and if my shower door is on or not! You can be sure there’ll be lots to tell you all tomorrow night, so don’t miss out! 🙂 Until then though, please try to bee good – only for another couple of days! Remember, though, if you’re not lighting any candles, don’t complain about being in the dark – and don’t forget to keep cool – or warm – depending on our mercurial Melbourne weather, to look after yourselves, and to drive carefully… but above all, don’t forget to stay safe! 🙂 ciao, all! 🙂
My Word! 