Is what I’ve chosen tonight. On this diet, I have a “proper” breakfast, two Vita Brits with extra bran, half a sliced banana, and 200ml of skim milk. For lunch, I have one of the Optifast Bars – either Berry Crunch or Cappuccino, and for dinner at night I have one of the three available Optifast Soups – Tomato, Vegetable, or Chicken (tonight’s was chicken), with a diet jelly and three prunes (well, I have to get my fibre from somewhere!) for dessert. Each packet of diet jelly crystals contains two sachets, and each sachet makes four small ramekins of jelly. Tonight I ate the last of four strawberry jellies made last Wednesday, and himself has just been down to ask me which sort I wanted made next – I said “Pineapple, please!” – and there it was! The inspiration for tonight’s Blog title! 😉

Today, of course, was our “tra-la-la-ing in Telara” day, so off we chuffed after breakfast, armed with nothing but our magical weapons and a cup of coffee. We had a really good day today – neither of us died, for once (and think of all the Guild Bank platinum we saved! 😉 ) however the first part of our travails took place in that horrible new area where there’s a constant and unrelenting blizzard howling, and visibility is reduced to about two pixels! I sure Julian got totally sick and tired of me constantly whining  “where’s my cursor gone?!”, and “I can’t find my [insert rude word here] cursor!”, through all the swirling snowflakes. Ah well, that only lasted until lunchtime, thank heavens, and I did notice that he did his fair share of grizzling about the blizzard conditions when neither of us could see the interactive “sparkles” on the things we had to pick up (or bury, in this particular case. Skeletons. We had to find and bury skeletons) That part of the quest chain took a long time to finish! Sometimes when you’re working as a group, what one person gets done will count as being “done” for the other members of the group too. Other times, each group member has to pick up or find their own whatever-it-is, and this quest was one of those. We had to find, and bury, 10 skeletons each, in blizzard conditions, visibility nil, and with mob densities (the number of nasties trying to kill us) on a par with a newly opened tin of sardines, well, let me just say that it wasn’t easy! To give you some idea of how many creatures we had to kill, I ended up with 115 hides taken from the creatures I could skin, and they were only a very small part of the number of nasties we had to contend with! Anyway, we had a good run, and as I said earlier, neither of us died (though to be honest, we did come close a couple of times!) We packed it in and headed back to base around 4.50pm and dusted down – processed all our trophies, and called it a day.

I then went off to remove my old nail polish, clean and re-shape my nails (they feel much better shorter!), and applied my new amethyst nail polish. It looks nice, but I’m finding it hard to get used to – I’m not used to wearing nail polish as dark as this, and every time I look down I get a bit of a startle – I’m used to seeing really pastel pearl colours on the ends of my fingers… even back when I was a teenager and I had really nice hands, I used to wear light pearl colours… but I’ll get used to it, and I do love the colour!

Weigh-in this morning was…. Let me put it this way. I didn’t go up, as I fully expected that I would, and I didn’t stay the same, as was equally as probable. I went down again, a whole ‘nother 2 points, to 110.1kg! On Friday I weighed in at 111.1kg, today, Sunday, I weighed in at 110.1kg. A whole kilo, in two days! I’m not complaining, I’m very pleased to be going down so… uumm  well… I’m just mystified and perplexed… and just a little concerned, because I’m not doing anything different to what I’ve been doing since August 18th this year. Let’s see what happens tomorrow… I’ll probably be back to 111.3kg or something equally depressing 🙂

So tune in again tomorrow night – will I have gone back up again? Will I be sitting pretty on 110.1kg again tomorrow? Or will the mystery deepen, and I’ll have gone down even more? Who knows? You will! This time tomorrow night! See you then… 😉

Saturday today? For the past week and a half, no day has really felt like the day it was supposed to have been, know what I mean? Well, perhaps more than any other day so far, today just hasn’t felt like a Saturday. So. What does a Saturday feel like, anyway? It used to feel like: today we go shopping for our nibblies night – prosciutto, melon, brie, bikkies, and maybe a dip… and of course, smoked salmon for himself. But we haven’t had nibblies for dinner on a Saturday night since August 18th, when I started this diet business, so that can’t be it. Yes, we did go shopping, and bought things like the smoked salmon for himself, cream and cottage cheese, also for himself, and various other items, so it’s obviously not the shopping experience that makes a Saturday feel like a Saturday. So what is it? And why didn’t today feel so totally not like a Saturday? (in fact, every day this week has felt “off”, too!) I keep having to tell myself, very firmly, that tomorrow is Sunday, and we’re going tra-la-la-ing in Telara!

Well, anyway, we went shopping early on this non-Saturday Saturday, and just as well, too! By the time we were on our way home the place was so packed it was literally (for me, anyway) “bumper to bumper” – as in the front of my wheelchair kept bumping into the backs of other shopper’s legs – and I wasn’t even speeding! Still, we got what we needed to, and I got a lovely amethyst coloured “breathable” nail polish (and some eyeshadow) at Inglot. I wondered what they meant by “breathable” nail polish, so when I got home, I looked it up. It was a very interesting article – you really should read it. After that I did a bit of Rifting for a while, then went and updated the graphic I should have updated two days ago, and decided to try out some new kaleidoscope techniques that I’d thought up. I found a really pretty graphic, enlarged it, took a nice square sample of it to work with, got a basic effect that I liked, and tried out a few other filters on it. Of course I didn’t save the preliminaries first, did I!! And so, as naturally as night follows day, one of the filters crashed the program, and I had nothing… nothing! left of about an hour’s work. I decided that I didn’t really want to work on graphics today, anyway, and fired up my Kindle reader on the PC, and sat in here and read my book instead (so there, Photoshop! 😛 ). At least reading at the computer didn’t send me to sleep 🙂 I did think about going and taking off my old nail polish and getting my nails ready to be amethysted tomorrow, but I couldn’t be bothered – it’s very unsettling when the day that you’re in doesn’t feel “right”…

So, essentially nothing very much was accomplished by me today, apart from fixing that graphic (which I did save!) and escaping unscathed from the shops, with my little bottle of amethyst nail polish (and some eyeshadow); himself was much more enterprising – he did the washing, broke a couple of glasses when an old (empty) pasta container fell off the back of a shelf, knocking something else onto a couple of wine glasses, and sending them crashing to the tiled floor… But that’s OK, they’ve got some really nice wine glasses over at Wheel & Barrow, and of course, I’ll have to go along too, to “help” choose them 😉 (I do love shopping!)

Weigh-in this morning gave me quite a scare! Oh, I went down alright! I went from 111.1kg to 110.3kg overnight! That’s almost a whole kilo in the one go, and that’s scary! You’re not supposed to lose that much that quickly! Well, I know I did when I first started on the anti-fluid tablets, but that was just me getting rid of all the excess fluid I was carrying, and it’s not something that you do more than once… so I’m quite trepidated! Mind you, I don’t expect to still be way down there tomorrow morning – I’m almost positive that I’ll go back up again – probably to… oh, I don’t know, ummm… 111.6kg? Or maybe 110.8kg? Something more believable than *gulp* 110.3kg! I weighed myself twice at 110.5kg first off, then we decided to weigh me a third time “for luck”, which was when we got the 110.3kg reading… so of course I had to re-weigh myself another twice, just to make sure… In the end I got two readings at 110.5kg, followed by three readings at 110.3kg, and I didn’t cheat, and Julian watched me like a hawk. Scary stuff, eh? (No! Not him watching me like a hawk – he does that all the time – the fact that I lost so much weight overnight is what’s scary!)

Anyway, tune in again tomorrow night to find out if it was only a “fluke” reading and that I’ve gone back to a more “normal” type of weight, like around 110.9kg, or whether I’ve spiraled, out of control, upwards… to something really gross, like 113.9kg – or whether I’ve stayed the same, which I wouldn’t mind, for once, because that would mean that perhaps I really am 110.3kg, and that it wasn’t just a fluke reading… See you then! 🙂

you get mobbed by early morning crowds lining up outside the shops! When himself went for his walk this morning, around about 8-ish, he had difficulty navigating Shoppingtown, because of the number of people literally streaming in to participate in the Boxing Day sales… Half the time it’s not even for things that they want, or need, it’s simply to get something – anything! cheaper. We watched the city scenes of the “Gran’ Sale” on the news tonight – some people had been queuing up outside Myer since 6 o’clock the night before! Honestly, is getting some item that you don’t even want a few dollars cheaper really worth it?! Obviously some people with more money than cents sense think so, but not this little black duck! Gimme a nice warm, comfortable bed and a sleep in, any day! Whilst I am desirous of getting to the shops again – I want to see if DJ’s have got my nail polish in stock yet – I can wait until next week… on the other hand, I might go over tomorrow… 😉

Today we decided to have a real bludge day – no work was done… apart from ripping the “Callan” and “Enterprise” episodes so that we can watch them from the file server in the lounge room, and apart from me working on my brand new Gingerlilly, and both of us tidying up the remains of the stocking fillers in the lounge, and Julian working out how much Panettone I can substitute for my regular breakfast and morning tea (about 1320kj in total) At the moment I’m not having morning or afternoon tea, a total of 628kj ( or 314kj each) Breakfast is 1001kj, so I do have a bit to play with. A “serving” of Panettone is one 7th of the cake (loaf/whatever) so if Julian cuts it into quarters, then halves each of those quarters, I should be able to eat a one 8th piece of that instead of my usual breakfast, and still be within my limits. Of course, it’ll mean that technically speaking, it’ll count as having “morning tea” as well, which I’m not having at the moment, but once we’ve eaten all the Panettone, I’ll be back to my normal breakfast, and no morning (or afternoon) tea. Hopefully I won’t put on too much weight… Mind you, if it looks like I am, I’ll switch back to my normal routine straight away – not even Motta Panettone is worth going backwards, weight-wise! But apart from those things, neither of us did anything today – a real (but well earned!) bludge! 🙂

I’m not too sure what’s happening tomorrow, but I’m guessing that it’s going to be fairly low-key too. I’ll probably Rift for a bit, and do a bit of graphic work that I’ve fallen behind on lately… and read. I might try firing up the Kindle on my PC again – reading in the lounge room with my feet up tends to send me to sleep, and that annoys me, so I might try reading at the computer – definitely not as comfortable, but I want to finish my book, not fall asleep for the afternoon! I also have a bit of sewing to do, which I’ve been putting off for so long that I’m not sure if I even remember how to sew by hand – there’s always an excuse – “the light’s not good enough!” or “trying to sew black on black is giving me a headache!”, and not that long ago, the very plaintive “where’s my sewing box?!” which isn’t an excuse, it’s a real question! I have (had?) a nice little red wooden sewing box that sort of opens up like a concertina, and we can’t find it! We both know it’s here, we’ve both seen it here, but we can’t find the wretched thing! Eventually it got to the point where I bought a new sewing box, not nearly as nice as my little red one, and the items I bought to go in it aren’t nearly as good, or as nice, as those in the old box (some of which were heirlooms!) and I thought (there goes that “and I thought” hex again!), I thought that I knew where the new box was… *blink* I just looked up at the shelf that I was sure it was on, and… it’s not there! Oh, OK, finally, I get the message… it has suddenly become very obvious to me that “The Powers That Be” don’t want me to sew any more, and that’s why they keep taking and hiding my sewing boxes! So, I give in! If I promise never to sew again, can I have my sewing boxes back, please?!

Weigh-in this morning was very nice! 🙂 Down to 111.1kg, three points down on yesterday and the day before. I can live quite happily with that 🙂 Let’s hope that the Panettone doesn’t undo all the good work! (crosses fingers… eyes… realizes that she can’t type with fingers crossed, let alone see to type with eyes crossed… uncrosses both…) So, would everyone be kind enough to cross their fingers, eyes, and ears on my behalf – thanks! 🙂

Tune in again this time tomorrow – hopefully my weight will be down again, but don’t forget that the results of eating a one 8th piece of a Panettone instead of breakfast and morning tea won’t be obvious for a day or two… 🙂

At our place. It goes something like this: It’s Christmas Eve – the kids are either in bed, asleep (we hope!), or have departed for their own homes. Wearily, we totter around, picking up the mess, and cleaning up Mince Tart crumbs and the remains of the Eggnog. Can we go to bed yet? No, there’s still the stockings to be filled… we’ve already sorted them out into four bags and removed any price stickers, so all that remains to do is fit everything in to the individual stockings. As we work at that, we discuss the program for the next day… who’ll do what, when, and did you remember to get the gravy? The kids stockings done, I repair to the bathroom to get ready for bed, while himself goes to see if Father Christmas has seen fit to leave anything for my stocking. Then we swap places, and, without even glancing at my stocking (well, maybe a quick peek? 😉 ), I find that Mother Christmas has left me with a pile of stocking fillers for himself. We go to bed…

Christmas morning: Why do I always wake up around 5.30am? So I just lie there with my eyes closed, wishing that I could get back to sleep… Is he awake or asleep? I don’t know – but he’s not snoring… After what feels like at least a week, the alarm goes off at 7.30am, we both groan, and winkle ourselves out of bed. “Merry Christmas, sweetheart!”, “Unnngh, Merry *yawn* Christmas, dear”. I head off to my bathroom, he heads off to his (yes, we have separate bathrooms! I don’t have to put up with beard hairs in my sink, and he doesn’t have to put up with… well, my stuff… it works well! 😉 ) I scamper (scamper? Since when have I ever been able to scamper?!) into the Den for my weigh-in, then back to the bathroom to get ready for the day. Back to the Den for a cup of tea, check our email, and then it’s time for breakfast. Are we done here yet? Can we go and see what Father Christmas has brought us yet? We try to race each other to the lounge room, and fall upon our stockings, as gleeful as small children at what we find. Then we give each other the presents that Father and Mother Christmas have left us. Himself got a new HP Netbook from me, a black mug and apron with the words “Grumpy Old Man” in white on them from the mysterious Mother Christmas, and a calendar from Flipper. I got a Dyson Fan for the bathroom – it has one of those tall, narrow oval tops with no blades, does everything except whistle Dixie, and is remote controlled. I’ve wanted one for a very long time, so I was very well pleased! 🙂

By this time it was about time to start cooking lunch: roast turkey breast, baked smoked ham, roast potatoes, roast pumpkin, tomato and onion pie, and snow peas. He did forget to get the gravy, but there was Cranberry jelly, so it was OK… There was also plum pudding for dessert (with extra brandy added, for those not driving), and cream to go with it. There was Chandon Brut champagne, a bottle of red wine, a bottle of white wine, and mineral water to drink, and Christmas Crackers to pull – and a table to set, as soon as my favourite youngest daughter arrived.

Lee and Neale arrived around 12.30pm – Kate and Terry just after 1.00pm, and once again stockings were attacked and presents were passed around. Kate got a new Toshiba laptop, Terry got a Garmin GPS what’sit for his car from us, and Terry also got a toy boat from Lee and Neale – but I can’t remember what they gave Kate!  Sorry… Himself got the entire 4 seasons of “Enterprise”, starring Scott Bakula, from Lee and Neale, and “Callan, the Colour Years” (6 CDs – 1000 minutes worth!), starring Edward Woodward, from Kate and Terry. I got a DJ’s voucher for a bottle of Estee Lauder’s Chrome Violet nail polish, which they didn’t have in stock, and a small, “plushie” Darth Vader from Lee and Neale, and a bottle of my very favourite perfume, “Cinnabar”, also by Estee Lauder, from Kate and Terry. Julian and I also got a desktop calendar each from a friend who knows our sense of humour all too well! 🙂

A huge lunch was eaten by everyone – I had my Optifast Berry Crunch Bar and some mineral water, as usual. Almost too full to leave the table, everyone stumbled into the lounge for coffee – I just walked as usual 😉 And after said coffee and some more chatter, the kids left around 4.00pm. Himself had a postprandial snooze, I repaired down here to the Den and decided to shuffle off (yet another) Rift level 50 character, to make room for a new character (with the same name), because I didn’t want to have to play another level 50 girl by myself, and besides, I wanted to try another race – Mathosian, this time.

And that, folks, was a typical, Traditional Christmas at our place! 🙂

Weigh-in this morning was exactly as I predicted – I stayed the same, at 111.4kg. After all, I did drop half a kilo the day before, so my body was probably still recovering from the shock! 🙂 But! It’d better be down again tomorrow, or I shall get really annoyed!

So tune in again this time tomorrow night to see if I went up… down… or stayed the same (again!) – and how well we recovered from our somewhat hectic “Traditional” Christmas Day! 🙂

And all through the house, himself and yours truly were darting about. The presents were snuggled all under the tree, and visions of sugar mice danced through Flipper’s head…* Well, something like that, anyway! 😀

It was a bit of a slow-ish start this morning, but just about everything (apart from the wrapping) had already been done. There was mail to pick up from the Post Office, and a few “last minute” items to get (aren’t there always?!) and I managed to get in a bit of Rifting, until lunch time..

We wrapped all the prezzies this afternoon, but instead of putting them under the tree (because there wasn’t enough room!), we put them on my half-moon adjustable desk, in front of the window (where they’ll have a good view of the city) – the Motta Panettone went under the Christmas Tree instead. The kids arrived about 7.30pm and we had a bit of chatter and discussion before Lee and Kate started making the Eggnog – the recipe says “serves 12”, but it all went, even though I didn’t have any (no, not even the teaspoon that I said I might try, just for tradition’s sake!) Julian had two glasses, Neale, Terry and Kate had a glass each, I think, and Lee…. drank the rest? (well, she wasn’t driving! 🙂 ) Anyway, it was all consumed – not even enough left to leave a glass out for Father Christmas to drink with his shortbread bikkie! Oh well, I’m sure he won’t mind, just this once 😉 Then we had our annual reading of The Night Before Christmas; it was Julian’s turn to read it this year (so I suppose it’ll be my turn again next year *grumble* *grumble*) we all take it in turns to read the story aloud, going from eldest (me) to youngest (Kate), then Julian, then me again. After that, and more chatter and discussion – would you believe that the discussion included Federal and State politics, judicial judgements (Julian’s sister, who is a Federal Court Judge, has just delivered a judgement on a case involving a really strange woman who thinks we can cure Ebola with homeopathy),  some possible similarities between homeopathy and the placebo effect, and universities and university studies? Then it was time to “hang” the stockings. Well, we don’t actually “hang” them, as we have nowhere suitable to put hooks, but we stand them up/lean the up against (the front of) the back of the couch. I’ve left it up to himself as to where we put Flipper’s bedding for the night, as it normally lives on the couch cushions… Poor Flipper will be most put out! She’ll probably elect to sleep in the Den tonight…

It’s now 10.45pm – when I finish this, we still have the fill all the stockings, check our Minions, and collect our Patron’s gifts before we can retire for the night. My present is finally under the tree – it appears to be a long square box, and I have no idea what it is! I don’t know if it’s a couple of smaller things, disguised in a long square box, or if it’s a telescope! I wish it was tomorrow morning…

Weigh-in this morning was a pleasant surprise – I was down to 111.4kg! 5 points (a whole 1/2 a kilo!) down from yesterday! I’m really chuffed! 🙂 It’d be nice to be down a bit more again tomorrow, but I doubt that I will… I’ll probably spend another day at 111.4kg (though I did do a lot of running around today – bent over double because of my back – but still, running around – surely that has to count as “exercise”? 😉 ) Anyway, we shall see what we shall see in the morning… Christmas Dinner will consist of the same items as those I had for The Great Double Birthday Bash – my Optifast bar, and a glass (or two) of mineral water – and that’s cool, it’s only for one Christmas, not the rest of my life! 🙂

Now all that remains is for me to wish you all a very wonderful, happy, and above all, safe Christmas, and may your version of Father Christmas bring you everything that you desire! 🙂 Stay tuned tomorrow night for a blow by blow description of our Christmas Day, what we all got, and how much everyone ate (on second thoughts, maybe I won’t go into that! 😉 ), and what my scales and my sometimes recalcitrant body decided between them to give me for Christmas! 😉

Merry Christmas, everyone! 🙂

*With apologies to Clement C. Moore…

Eve, Eve! 🙂 Well, we didn’t get anything wrapped and under the Christmas Tree today – I think we were both too exhausted by the time we got home… As planned, we’d had an early(ish) breakfast, so that we could get over to Dorevitch to have my somewhat belated Warfarin blood test done. Race, race, rush, rush, catch the Tower lift to the fourth floor… The place was in darkness! Closed, for the Christmas holidays! Naughty words were said by both of us. Oh well, down we came again, and headed straight off to The Glen, where we were to meet up with my favourite eldest daughter and her husband. Well, we did make a slight detour, to look at the kiosk-y place where they sell the pretty Christmas tree ornaments that you can have personalised… Last year himself gave me a pretty red one, with white hearts surrounded by gold “tinsel” paint, and my name on it, so this year I got one for him – pretty purple, with gold snowflakes on it, and his name, written small (the snowflakes were a bit big, you see…) Then off we went to The Glen. We met up with Lee and Neale at The Shingle Inn, where they were supposed to have had their breakfast, but Neale had held them up (I think he’s a bit like Julian, and that he just doesn’t like shopping – I think it’s a “man thing” or something…) and they hadn’t had anything to eat, and Lee was angry. Not a good way to start off a shopping expedition! We had to go upstairs, so we headed of to DJ’s and their lift, where we saw a most… umm… unusual? sight. A very tall fairy (???), wearing a tulle dress of pale mauve petals , with tassels on the pointy ends of the petals… funny flappy things strapped to her back, and lots of colourful beads stuck onto her very purple eye shadow. I was so busy goggling at her that I didn’t notice the nice old man behind her – well, she was very tall! The elderly man behind her was standing on one of those large “move a lot of goods at once” trade trolley type things… he had nice, curly white hair, and a curly white beard, and… and… and he was wearing a very nice red velvet suit, trimmed in what looked like white cotton wool… It was a trifle awkward getting the wheelchair around this unusual tableau, but both our parties stopped and exchanged a few pleasant quips about had we been good or bad, and fancy seeing you here at this time of the year, and that, luckily, put Lee into a good mood, despite her not having had any breakfast (yet!) 🙂 Once we got to the place we were going to – I can’t mention the place yet or it’d give the game away to himself, who will no doubt read this – it didn’t take me long to get what I wanted, and with only a couple of very minor detours here and there, we made our way back to The Shingle Inn, where were were to rendezvous with himself, who’d gone off to do some supermarket shopping.

And now back to the blood letting – I mean blood test… There are two Dorevitch-based blood testing centres there at The Glen, and both of them were closed for the Christmas holidays, too! Grrr! However, all was not lost as there was a “dedicated” Dorevitch collection centre right across the road, so we called in there on the way home and I had my blood test done… Just as well, too! They’ve changed my dosage! My INR – this is the rate at which your blood clots – was 1.9 – the lower it is, the more likely it is that your blood will clot. The higher it is, the less likely it is that your blood will clot, and mine’s supposed to be around 2.5 So, anyway, they’ve upped my dosage of rat poison (Warfarin) from 2mg per night, and 3mg on Saturdays and Sundays, to 2.5mg per night, no odd weekend dosage. Hopefully this will keep me out of hospital with pulmonary embolisms for the foreseeable future 🙂

Back at home again, I Rifted for a bit, mainly chasing the Yule present boxes, hidden, like colourful Easter Eggs, under trees and bushes and wedged between rocks, here and there in Freemarch and Silverwood – you can get some pretty nifty Artifacts from them! I’m also chasing the perhaps not-so-nice Achievement called “Cry Me A River”, in which you have to collect 20 Squirrel tears (by killing them) 😦 There’s a set of tears you can collect that’ll get a different Achievement, but we haven’t managed to get all the tears yet because we refuse, point blank, to kill cats. You can buy most of the tears on the Auction House, but some of them (like the cat tears!) are terribly expensive…

Weigh-in this morning was another let down… I stayed the same, at 111.9kg. I suppose I should be glad that I didn’t go up… and I am! I am! (glad that I didn’t go up) It’s just that it’s so dreary and boring, staying the same… Hopefully I’ll go down a bit more tomorrow…

So, call in tomorrow night and find out if my weight did go down a bit (I won’t even bother to mention the other horrible possibilities, like “up”, or “same”!) or if we managed to get everything wrapped and under the Christmas Tree before the Eggnog Party, and whether we’re all ready and geared up for Christmas Day… where once more I shall eschew the traditional fare of Christmas, and consume a Cappuccino Bar for my Christmas Dinner instead, and quaff mineral water instead of champagne. I just hope no-one gives me chocolates for Christmas, ’cause they’d probably go stale before I got down to my goal weight of 90kg, and would allow myself to eat them! 🙂

Last night himself pulled down a very old movie… and because there was nothing worth watching on TV tonight, we watched that instead… 🙂 It was “The Great Race”, starring Tony Curtis, Jack Lemon, Peter Falk, Natalie Wood, and Keenan Wynn as The Great Leslie’s co-driver/mechanic, Hezekiah. OK, it’s old! OK, it’s as corny as they come, and has a plot with holes that you could drive a battalion of tanks through, but it’s damn good fun! So, here I am, starting this blog off at 11.00pm – the time I’m usually just finishing it – so it’ll probably be fairly short…
            All right! I heard that collective sigh of relief!
I’m sorry, but once I start writing, I can’t seem to stop – s’not my fault! Writing runs in the family….

I found out today that I was due to have had my Warfarin blood test last Thursday – but due to all the worry about Julian’s mother, we both totally forgot about it, so I’m going tomorrow instead. I’m not too worried about it – I’ve been stable enough on the dosage that I’m currently on that they’ve only wanted to test me every month, so a couple of days over isn’t going to kill me (I hope!) Anyway, it’s good that I’m getting another chance to go out to do some shopping – I don’t have any stocking fillers for himself yet, the problem being that although the wheelchair gives me mobility, it doesn’t give me access to a lot of shops! So for stocking fillers for himself,  I need a helper who isn’t him, to go in and get things I can’t get to, and to get things off out of reach shelves for me – in other words, one of my two favourite daughters. Lee lives the closest, so it’s usually her. So tomorrow, after my blood test, we’ll go up and meet her and her other half at The Glen, and the two men can amuse themselves whilst I borrow her for an hour or so. I don’t think it’ll take all that long – I know pretty much what I want and where I want to go – and I also know that one of the shops is extremely difficult to maneuver a wheelchair in, and the other has most of the stuff I want to look at on high shelves! I also want to get to Priceline – I noticed the sides of my feet this afternoon, and quite frankly, they’re a mess. I think I need some sort of pumice stone on a stick… or perhaps some really heavy duty wet and dry sandpaper, or whatever it’s called

After we get home, we have the fun job of wrapping everything – or rather he’ll wrap, I’ll sit and watch, and tear off the bits of sticky tape for him… Then I hope we’ll have one free day before the evening’s eggnog-ing and stocking hanging commences. I don’t know about the rest of you, but I think himself and I will be able to heave a great sigh of relief on Friday morning… It’s not been a real fun run up to Christmas this year…

Weigh-in this morning was a very happy early Christmas present for me 🙂  111.9kg! 🙂  j-u-s-t  past the Half Way marker of 112.0kg! I don’t expect it to stay there, of course – knowing my stupid body it’ll probably shoot back up to 112.4kg tomorrow morning – or something equally as tragic – but at least I know that I can get down under the 112.0kg mark!

So, tune in again tomorrow night – find out if I managed to get himself’s stocking fillers, and if I found my sandpaper/pumice on a stick thingy for my feet… and, of course, whether I went up…  or down… or stayed the same! (heaven forbid!) in the weight stakes… News at ten… 😉

A Red Velvet Trifle! 🙂 What can I say? 😀 My favourite youngest daughter “helped” her husband finish his… My favourite eldest daughter and her husband ate theirs too quickly for Kate to get a chance to steal help them with theirs… and I…. didn’t have any 🙂 Not sure about Julian… I think he just ate quickly and quietly 😉

It was a good day… and for the first time in over five years, thanks to Kate, we managed to get hold of “Motta” (brand) Panettone! That was the brand we always got when I was growing up, and in my not so humble opinion, they’re the best, and the only truly authentic Panettone. Probably because my Nonna liked them 🙂 It’s called “Italian Christmas Cake”, but it’s not really – that’s just what Australians have dubbed it.  it’s generally eaten around Christmas time, but, like a fruit cake, can be made and eaten at any time. And it’s not a “cake” – it’s made with yeast, has sultanas and candied peel in it, a very “open” or “holy” texture, and is really more of a sweet bread… It’s delicious just chopped into slices or chunks and gobbled, it’s delicious toasted, it’s even more delicious made into ye olde English “Bread and Butter” pudding – but for heaven’s sake, whatever you do, don’t butter it before eating it “plain”, or toasted!! Sacrilege! The only time you should butter Panettone is when you’re making it into a Bread and Butter pudding! The true tragedy though, is that now that we’ve finally managed to get our hands on Motta Panettone, I won’t be having a taste *cry* But I’ll be able to at least smell it, so that’s better than nothing, I guess…. But next year, watch out! 🙂 I’ll be in there, boots and all, at the next Big Double Birthday Bash! Which will probably be held at our very favourite Chinese restaurant, The East Empress in Glen Waverley (closed at the moment for renovations, unfortunately), and if we can get our hands on Motta Panettone next year, I’m having a whole one reserved, just for me! Only kidding, but you can bet your socks that I’ll be having some, not just sniffing it! 🙂

An “interesting discussion” (read: loud argument) was begun between my two favourite daughters (well, they are siblings – they’re supposed to argue, aren’t they? 😉 ) over the new “remake” of Annie, with a…. crikey! What’s the latest politically correct term this week?! I don’t know either… Alright, damn me for always saying the wrong thing – a “non white child” playing the part of Annie, and the wrong sort of dog as her pet. Kate thought it was just plain wrong; it wasn’t written about just any old orphan, it was written specifically about a little red headed girl… Lisa thought it was bringing “equality” to the theatre… I stayed out of it – I learnt very early on that even though I can still yell louder than she can (and whisper more menacingly than she can) you can’t even start to get an opposing point across when Lee decides to ummm… stand up for someone’s or something‘s rights, even though she’s just being blinded by good intentions. When it got to the yelling point, I had to step in (Julian was starting to get involved too, by this stage – Terry and Neale apparently seemed to think it was somewhat amusing…) and change the subject… which also started an “interesting discussion” – but peace was finally declared and the afternoon ended happily ever after 🙂

So, all in all, I didn’t get very much of anything done today – I will have to work on a couple of additional formats for my project – hopefully it’ll resize well. If not, I’ll just have to move things around a little (oh, the joy of working with layers!) But all that’s for Ron (er… later-ron!) You know what I want for Christmas!!! I want a keyboard that isn’t always offset by one key! I’m forever hitting “f” when I mean to hit “g”, or “s” instead of “d” – and repeat for every letter on the [insert rude word here] keyboard! I spend more time correcting typos than I do typing! All the keys are one key too far to the left for my hands – and I can’t touch type, either 😦 Aarrrgggh! (tears hair out in despair) (not really, but I feel like doing that, sometimes!) grrrr!

Weigh-in was better this morning – everyone must have had their fingers, toes, and ears crossed properly, for a change! 😉 I went down to 112.2kg – only two more points to half way! Ummm… I shouldn’t have said that, should I! I’ll be up again to 112.7kg tomorrow – me and my big mouth! Does mineral water contain calories? I had two glasses of mineral water today – but on the other hand, I didn’t have the amount of coffee or tea that I usually have, and that has milk in it (skim), so perhaps the mineral water will be O.K…. Oh, and I looked at Red Velvet Trifle (and it looked very nice, too!) Oh dear… now I’m worried about weigh-in tomorrow!

Stay tuned to see if I go up… or down… but I’ll probably just stay the same, knowing me *sigh* Will I ever reach that oh-so-elusive Half Way Point? Plus, of course, all the usual gossip and guff that abounds here, so… see you all tomorrow night! 🙂

Get organised. It’s not easy, trying to get organised, when just about everything is in flux… Still, it is what it is – I just can’t seem to get terribly enthusiastic about anything at the moment. Everything’s been sort of… knocked out of order… For instance, our cleaning lady came today, Saturday, when she usually comes on a Friday. Tomorrow is Sunday, and we’ve got the Big Double Birthday Bash – when we normally romp carefree and wild through Telara. All week, the two of us have been thinking we’re in the wrong day! I think it’s a combination of (a) being the end of the year, when just about everyone (well, everyone I know, anyway) feels tired, jaded, and just badly needing a holiday (we haven’t had a proper holiday for about 10 years!), and (b) Christmas has been getting more and more commercial every year, and the build up towards it has been starting earlier and earlier every year – by the time December comes along, I think most people just want to get it over and done with.

This morning I thought I’d get Lee’s copy of the project done… Unfortunately, she wants an “A” on it, instead of an “L”. Her given name is “Lisa Alexandra”, but she prefers to be called “Alex”, hence the “A” on the project; all her friends call her Alex, but we, her family, call her Lisa, or Lee, or Lily. An “L” would have been much easier to do with the font and style that were being used, but no, she wanted an “A”, and it wouldn’t fit properly, so I had to go through all my fonts (all 2000+ of them, again!) looking for an “A” that looked good, would work with the style, and would fit. I eventually found one (with that many fonts it would be hard not to!), and it’s O.K.… but not as good as the original… One good thing came out of all that work this morning though – we finally worked out how to wrap a pigeon! 🙂 Very ingenious, even if I do say so myself! 😉 Then as I said earlier, our cleaning lady turned up, and that was the end of work for me (she likes to chat!) Now the house is all nice and clean(ish) and tidy(ish), for it to be all messed up again tomorrow, at the B. D. B. B.! Everyone will be having Nandos chicken tenders, chips, Perinaise sauce, and a couple of salads… probably a glass champagne will be consumed each, plus a bottle of wine and/or beer… and there’s Red Velvet Trifle for a Birthday Cake. I’m having an Optifast Berry Crunch Bar, a glass of water, and a cup of coffee afterwards 🙂 Hey, look! I’m not complaining or feeling sorry for myself! 🙂 I’m quite content to see everyone enjoying their food – I totally and honestly don’t miss eating those things, this time around. This time next year will come, and by then I’ll be having those things again – in moderation, of course – so it’s absolutely no biggie to go without now. It’ll be the same this Christmas, and I’m happy to go along with it while I have to.

After lunch we decided to have a sort-of mini day (or should I say “afternoon”) in Telara, and I think that I might have mentioned in an earlier post that we’d entered the third and final new area, the Glacier… Now, remember way back when, when I said that I hated questing and fighting under water? Really, really hated it? Well, I’ve found something I hate even more! Questing and fighting in near zero visibility, in a blizzard! Arrrgggh! With snow blasting you from every which way, and everything shrouded in foggy white, it’s hard enough to see your cursor, let alone the things you’re supposed to be picking up or interacting with! I hope we have to go into a nice, deep cavern, or into a nicely roofed building, where de snow don’ blow and de wind don’ moan, and you can see your hand (and your cursor) in front of your face, soon! Ages ago, when we were playing WoW (World of Warcraft), Julian developed a bit of a reputation for falling off the edge of high places. It was called “doing a Demelza” (because Demelza was the name of the character he was playing) He still tends to do that quite a bit (although these days the sudden stop at the end of the long fall no longer kills you!), and this afternoon we had to go around fixing these broken… robotic monks? Not quite sure what they were – but they were all perched on top of very high cliffs, and what with jumping down to try to reach these whatever-they-weres, or over-jumping and sailing off the edge of these very high cliffs, we spent more time climbing (or bouncing) back up than we did in fixing the darned things! It was quite fun though… 🙂

Weigh-in this morning was another “yawn” – stuck on 112.4kg. I’m beginning to think that there’s no way in a blizzard that I’ll get to Half Way (112.0kg) by Christmas! 😦 Apparently not enough people crossed their fingers, eyes, and ears last night… C’mon, I know you can all do better! 😉

Anyway, tune in again tomorrow night – find out how the Great Double Birthday Bash went, whether or not I had a glass of champagne with the celebrators (I won’t!), and if I managed to budge my big fat backside off 112.4kg and down a notch or two! (but not up… please, please! Not back up!) Seeya then! 🙂

It’ll all be over, bar the shouting, the returns, and the endless, endless, summer sales. And you know what? Sometime next week, Hot Cross Buns and the first of the chocolate eggs will be available in all the supermarkets. Depressing, isn’t it, how the Christian religion has morphed into a commercial enterprise. Still and all, that’s not what I’m going to be lecturing you all about tonight (well I might, actually, if I run out of things to say about today! 😉 ) Julian is back home from his trip to Adelaide, and he’s marked his mother’s report card with a B+, so apparently she’s doing fairly well. She has Home Care services in every morning, and his sister Melissa will be back there tomorrow, so we shall “tread gently” for now and hope for a good outcome.

Getting up at a quarter past five this morning wasn’t fun though! 😦 still, it gave me the opportunity to finish off my project, at last! Yes, I finally arrived at the right combination of colours in the style I needed to finish off the final “flourishes”, and over all, I’m quite pleased with the result (especially as I really had no idea what I wanted to do with it when I started!) My favourite eldest daughter came over this morning, a little earlier than usual – she came by bus from Glen Waverley, rather than waiting for a lift from himself. She called me from Shoppingtown when she arrived, did a bit of shopping, and then trundled over. I was just finishing off the project when she arrived, and I have to say that she liked it so much that she’s commissioned another one, just like it, only with one different element 😉 It shall be forthcoming Lee, and should be ready for you on Sunday – I’ve left the template complete, so changing just one element will take less than 5 minutes.

Julian had managed to get hold of the latest episode of “Agents of Shield” the other night, so Lee and I went off to the lounge room pretty much as soon as we’d exchanged pleasantries, and watched it. Things are getting very interesting, although another good character was sadly killed off. Then we watched “Person of Interest” (4 episodes!) and it looks as though [fx: dramatic music] the War of the Machines [/fx: dramatic music] is about to commence! 🙂 There’s only two more episodes left before the end of the season, and I think Lee only has a few more from the following one, as all those shows are heading off – or rather, have headed off, into the almost compulsory end-of-year  “Silly Season”, with ancient re-runs the only offerings because of all the sport shows that some really weird people seem to like watching.

Mid way through the afternoon I got my favourite eldest daughter to do some present wrapping for me, but her back was almost as bad as mine today, so we did it together. Unfortunately the wrapping ended up a little wonky, but the presents are “disguised”, and that’s the main thing, isn’t it! 🙂 Now there are two presents under our tree, but as yet they don’t have gift tags attached to them… because I couldn’t find them (I know we have some, somewhere!) Never mind, I know who they’re for – I’ll attach the name tags when we get some new ones 🙂 I’m not really sure how it happened, but there don’t seem to be as many “bits and pieces” this year – the usual things like the packets of  “shortbread biscuits for Aunty Mavis”, and “boxes of chocolates for the Evans family” – we used to buy lots, but this year I have half a dozen boxes of shortbread biscuits, and I haven’t a clue who they’re supposed to be for! Himself took his mother’s Christmas present(s) over with him, unwrapped, and gave them to her early (tsk!), I think we’re organising some sort of Christmas Hamper for his sister, which really should have gone today, with him, but as it’s not organised yet, it couldn’t. Then there’s the stuff that Lee and Kate usually send over to them (that’ll be some of the biscuits and chocolate), and there’s an Aunt, and an old family friend that we send stuff to and which will have to be sent off Express on Monday, I suppose. And apart from the immediate family, there’s not much else to go under the tree this year…

Weigh-in this morning was much more satisfactory – down to 112.4kg, and this time I didn’t cheat, I did it properly. Mind you, it was 5.15am, so the scales may have been a little confused and still a bit muddle headed with sleep, the same as I was – but Julian and I both saw it, and, as usual, I weighed myself three times (just to make sure, you know?), so everyone, cross all your fingers, toes, and ears that I go down again tomorrow, and if I do, I’ll be a happy little Vegemite! 🙂

Stay tuned tomorrow to see if any more presents turn up under the Christmas Tree, and if they have name tags on them (otherwise I’ll get them confused with the ones that were put there today), and if I manage to get Lee’s project done for Sunday… but most importantly, whether my weight has gone down or not! Perhaps, with enough fingers, toes, and ears crossed on my behalf, I will! 😉