Well, back to normality again, or not? 🙂 Hopefully not – “normality” is far too boring! 😉 We took M.I.T. off to The Glen this morning – just for a bit of last-minute shopping, and Mike had a bit of banking to do – so first we had a nice lunch at The Arena, a casual restaurant just outside David Jones on the ground floor, then the menfolk then went off to take care of some last minute banking for Mike, and Inbar and I strolled around David Jones, where I finally caught up with a dinner service I’ve been chasing for a week or so – everyone seemed to have “just sold the last one, I’m afraid!”, but David Jones had four boxed services, so I bought two of them! It’s a plain, all-white dinner setting by Maxwell & Williams, called “Diamonds“, with square dishes that feature a rather nice “square-cut” (or “diamond”) embossed design – just enough to give the setting a bit of a “lift”, and a soupçon of elegance.  The boxed settings contain sixteen pieces each – four cups, four bowls, four dinner plates, and four side plates (in other words, a four-place setting!) but we needed an eight place setting, which is why I bought the two boxes. Julian thinks we should go back and buy a few extra loose pieces (they sell them loose too) so that we can easily replace any that we might break or chip over the years. Good idea! I might suggest that we just buy another boxed set, as it’s already neatly and safely boxed up, and which would be much easier to store than one or two loose pieces… Then we walked around a bit – I bought a new candle, and some pretty Bug Art cards. I absolutely love Bug Art cards – they’re so gorgeous and well done! I usually buy several whenever I find a place that stocks them, so of course, I end up with quite a collection, which I keep in a special “new card” box, and which I grudgingly and very reluctantly dole out to people on special occasions, like Birthdays, Christmas, Easter, and the like… and always with the ritual words “Can I scan it, please?” 🙂 (of course, if I’d thought of it at the time, I could have scanned it before I wrote in it and gave it to them, couldn’t I! But I never do think of that, do I! Typical! *rolls eyes*) Anyway, Julian has just dropped M.I.T. off at their short-stay place in Southbank and is on his way home – apparently the traffic is horrendous, so I think we’ll be having a somewhat late-ish dinner tonight! Not that I mind – I’m not actually terribly hungry (though I could really do with another cup of coffee!) So anyway I’m looking forward to a nice, relatively peaceful weekend, but absolutely dreading next week. We have the funeral service for Terry’s mother on Monday, but the burial service and the interment are on Wednesday! As they say in the classics, “it’s complicated”, and it’s sure not going to make for a fun week! We’ll go to the funeral, but I’m not sure if we’re supposed to turn up for the burial as well! Still, whatever happens, we’ll survive it, and if it’s the worst thing we ever have to face we’ll be truly lucky and blessed – but that doesn’t mean we have to like it! And then it’s only a week and a half until Julian’s Birthday! (and more eating and feasting!) The year is already starting to speed up!

Needless to say, I haven’t even started WoW up today – there just hasn’t been the time – but I’m looking forward to Sunday, when Mouselet and Wynterthyme can go and explore their new Garrisons, or maybe complete a few more quests and earn a few more Brownie points towards outfitting their new “homes”. It’s all new “territory” for us – a far cry from the “Burning Crusades”, released in 2007, when we first started playing WoW “seriously”, and the following expansion, “The Wrath of the Lich King”, in 2008! 🙂 [Editor’s Note: So there you go! A bit of gaming history for you all! I started playing World of Warcraft in mid to late 2006! Rift was released in 2011, and I took part in the initial Beta versions – then moved ‘permanently’ from World of Warcraft to Rift, and now four years later, I’ve gone back to World of Warcraft again!]

Food stuffz: last night for dinner we had the unopened tray of marinated chicken that we’d bought for the BBQ, which Julian pan-fried, along with a spoonful of potato salad, some of the quinoa tabouli salad, and half a tomato, and for dessert, we had what was left of the New York Baked cheesecake with a bit of light cream… quite delicious! 🙂 As I mentioned earlier, we had lunch at The Arena, at The Glen shopping centre. I had a Lamb Wrap, which came with a serve of chips, and I don’t think I’ve ever seen such an enormous Wrap! I only ate half of it – even if I’d been starving I don’t think I could have eaten the whole thing, it was so big – but it was quite nice, and although it was twice the size, it was nowhere near as nice as the home-made wraps that Julian used to make with the fresh flat-bread from Coles! (I did eat all the chips though – because of the salt on them! 😉 ) Then I had a long black (coffee) with a small jug of skinny-milk (cold!) and a sort of an apple and berry crumble slice… Dinner tonight was a small piece of fillet steak, green beans, half a tomato, and the usual five chips – and as my jellies still haven’t been made (we’ve been a bit busy, the last couple of days!) I had another one of Julian’s low-calorie (or low-fat – I fergit which!) “burnt fig and salted caramel” yoghurts. Goodness knows what the scales are going to say tomorrow morning! Maybe I’d better not weigh myself for the next couple of days…

Weigh-in this morning. Was good, but I’m sure it won’t be, tomorrow! This morning I’d gone down a point, from 63.4kg to 63.3kg – and I’m quite sure if I hadn’t gone out today I would have gone down another point or two tomorrow – however, after today’s little “binge”, I’ll probably be back up to 63.8kg again tomorrow! It’ll serve me right, too! But… I’m only human… and thank heavens that all the excess eating is now over for a couple of weeks, or at least until Julian’s Birthday, anyway! I only managed to get one walk on the treadmill in today, but on the other hand, I did walk up and down and all around The Glen this afternoon, and besides, when I’m doing shopping centre walking, I usually don’t do my second treadmill walk, anyway!

So that was my day today – M.I.T. leave for Israel tomorrow afternoon, but I think we’ll be seeing them again pretty soon. They seem determined to settle in Tasmania, near Sahar, their eldest – the only thing that’s keeping them in Israel is Inbar’s mother, who’s getting on in years. However, I got the distinct impression while they were here, that this time they won’t procrastinate, this time, they’re “ready”, and if they do manage to secure the property they saw while they were in Tasmania about a week ago (or if something else suitable becomes available) they’ll move out here permanently – Inbar has two siblings in Israel, so her mother won’t be left on her own, and I think the two of them just want to get out. And once again – that’s about it from me for this evening! Don’t forget to stop by again tomorrow night to see how much my weight went up (because I’m quite sure it will!) and what other adventures we’ve had. I have a friend I haven’t seen for a while coming over tomorrow, which will be fantastic – and I can ask him if the place I want to put our aviary is suitable or not! 🙂 Anyway, until tomorrow night, please continue to bee good, remember that it is only possible to live happily ever after on a daily basis, and don’t forget to keep cool – or warm – depending on your preferences, to drive carefully, and to look after yourselves… but most importantly, don’t forget to stay safe! 🙂 ciao, all! 🙂