my short-term solution

Well, maybe I can’t get Monday’s banned, but I do have a short-term solution: just take them off. Between Queen’s Birthday Monday, and a bit of well-timed annual leave, I don’t have to work on a Monday again until 25 June. Works for me.

not that kind of rocket

It’s quite funny looking at some of the hits on The Kitten’s blog (http://www.littleblackrocket.blogspot.com). From time to time there are some very random hits from places like Russia, Israel, Venezuela and suchlike. They’re always very short visits – a couple of seconds, at most, and never more than one page view. I can’t help but wonder if they did a search for “Rocket” and she came up? Not exactly the little black rocket they were looking for, perhaps!

ban them!

What do you think the chances are of getting Monday’s banned? I’m sure if I started a petition I’d be able to get loads of signatures. I guess the real question is who would I send it to? Who is responsible for Mondays??

unnatural?

Here’s one in the eye for those people who say gay couples adopting is “unnatural”.

A pair of flamingos in Britain, who happen to be a gay male couple, have just become surrogate parents for an abandoned egg. Apparently, gay flamingos are not uncommon, and this couple has a well-known affection for stealing other flamingos’ eggs to raise. See more about this pink couple (pun intended) here.

If it happens in nature, who are we to call it unnatural?

bugger

If there are gods up there, they’re laughing at me today.

I was feeling quite desperate for a “duvet day” today, but decided I really couldn’t do it. Work is really busy at the moment, plus I had an important meeting today that would be difficult to reschedule. So, up I got and came to work.

But guess who did call in sick today? The person my important meeting was with.

Bugger.

kid in a candy store

The Boy was recently given an Auckland Museum membership, which covers both of us. The Boy has an endless fascination with history and anthropology, and the museum is one of his favourite places, so it was a great present.

Anyway, we used it for the first time on Sunday. We wandered around for a little while, then decided to check out the Member’s Lounge. The look on my Boy’s face when he walked into the lounge (and saw the lovely reading room and free coffee machine) was priceless. I think he has a new favourite place.

deliciously girly

Is there anything more deliciously girly than being pampered? Whether it’s a manicure, pedicure, hair or makeup, there is very little else in the world that can make so many women feel like purring.

I decided to treat myself to a manicure at lunchtime – it’s been a while since I indulged myself, and I figured I must deserve it by now. I thought I’d try the little hole-in-the-wall nail bar around the corner from work, since they’re half the price of the bigger salons (and my budget is a bit limited at the moment). I have to say, though, they were fantastic. I haven’t had a French manicure that good for years, even at twice the price.

So there you go – the key to justifying more frequent indulgence: find a small business that gives great service for half the price, then you can go twice as often…

odd but true

I had to stop by the pet store today to pick up kitten food and litter. As I was approaching the shop, it started to drizzle. By the time I came out with my purchases, it had started to pour. Now that I’m back at work, it’s stopped raining completely.

Thinking back, every time I go to that store, it’s raining when I come out. Odd, but true.

survey this

What is the obsession that big companies have with stupid surveys? We seem to have in-house surveys coming at us left, right & centre lately. If they ever actually shared the results with us, or did something with them, I wouldn’t mind so much, but that isn’t the case. Seems to me it’s just that our HR managers have too much time on their hands and a desperate need to justify their enormous salaries.

I wish they’d send us a survey asking what we think of all their surveys – that’s something I’d have fun filling out...

peace, tranquillity and power tools?

The Boy’s latest obsession is bonsai – it’s his new big thing. He has just started learning more about bonsai, and has already created a really nice cascade.

When most people think about bonsai, the images that spring to mind are things like peaceful Japanese gardens and patient nurturing of plants over a long period of time. What springs to The Boy’s mind are power tools.

Apparently even a peaceful, tranquil and refined pastime such as bonsai can be made better by the use of power tools. Accompanied by manly grunting noises, I’m sure.

so far, so good

Happy Anniversary, Boy. We managed to make it another year, still happy and (relatively) sane.
x

shocked

I discovered yesterday that one of my cousins, whom I would have thought had far too much sense for that sort of carry-on, has had botox treatments. Not to mention another “filler” treatment (which isn’t actually approved in NZ yet). In fact, a total of $1600 worth of cosmetic procedures on her face. I have to admit I was quite shocked at the news.

Sorry, Boy – you’re just going to have to live with my wrinkles. I can’t imagine letting anyone with a needle full of poison anywhere near my face.

personal shopper

I think I should be charging The Boy some serious Personal Shopper fees.

He loathes and despises shopping, and always expects me to do his clothes and shoe shopping. Because I’m a Good Girlfriend, I usually cave and do it for him. I suppose one benefit is that I get to choose what he wears, including the swag of winter clothes I’ve picked up for him over the last few weeks. And he knows the rule – if he doesn’t come with me, he can’t complain about my choices. It would help if he was there to actually try things on before I buy, though.

Anyway… I’ve been doing some research, and have discovered that personal shoppers for men’s clothing charge at least $110 per hour. Be prepared, Boy – an invoice is on the way!

if it looks too good…

As the saying goes, “If it looks too good to be true, it probably is”.

People amaze me – they’re so willing to believe scammers. There is a scam doing the rounds at the moment that involves travel. Being in the industry myself, I received a warning about it this morning, which I forwarded to friends and family.

Despite this, some of The Boy’s workmates seem to think that it’s really all above board. Why? Because the scammer told them so.

So, go ahead – book your “free flights”. And after you’ve done that, can I interest you in some money I have trapped in Nigeria? It’s just waiting for a kind person like you to help me liberate it! All I need is a small deposit up front from you (to cover legal expenses)…

new pick up joint?

The city has several well known non-bar pick up joints, some quite bizarre. For example, you should avoid putting your bananas pointing upwards in the trolley at a particular local supermarket on certain nights of the week, unless you’re looking for a bit of action. Well, The Boy seems to have inadvertently discovered another random joint last night. And not one that would ever be his cup of tea.

I had a work dinner last night, so The Boy decided that he’d go to a movie then we’d go home together. This was fine by me, and it meant that he could see a boy-flick that I have no interest in.

Anyway, the dinner went a little later than I’d expected, so after the movie The Boy was killing some time in a nearby bookstore. He was sitting in one of the chairs they provide, reading a magazine, when the magazine was suddenly “bumped” by a set of male buttocks. After a rather curt word from The Boy, the buttocks moved away. Then, shortly afterwards, a pretty young man invited The Boy to come home with him “for a drink”. And didn’t want to take no for an answer (until the no became somewhat less than polite).

I’d like to point out that The Boy is definitely a manly man – he doesn’t look the least bit effeminate. He certainly wouldn’t normally be hit on, let alone so aggressively, by not one but two guys in a bookstore.

After this, The Boy took a look around at the store’s clientele and their behaviour, and came to the conclusion that the bookstore in question has a gay singles night on Tuesdays. Talk about wrong place, wrong time…

why?

Explain this to me, please. Why, when we spend a fortune on super-premium food for The Kitten, does she still insist on supplementing her diet with bugs? Nothing on legs (or wings) is safe from the little black rocket – if she can see it, she can catch it. And if she can catch it, she will eat it. Crickets are her favourite, but if they aren’t available she’ll make do with any old creepy-crawly. So much for feeding her only the best…

a bit of random trivia

In case you ever wondered, being “kissed” on the cheek by a beluga whale feels like being softly head-butted by a half-inflated volleyball. Really.

are you sure this is all ours?

Since our new place is much bigger than our last one, and has much more storage space, we decided that it was a good time to clear everything out of the storage unit we share with my parents. We thought if we at least got all our boxes into the new house, we could sort through them and see what we should keep and what we should get rid of (and hopefully be able to give up the storage unit altogether).

Sounds like a reasonable plan, doesn’t it? Well, I’m sure those boxes are part rabbit, because they seem to have been breeding like crazy in there. I didn’t think we had that much stuff in storage, but apparently we did. Half a truck load, in fact. Some of which hasn’t been touched in ten years.

At the moment they’re mostly stacked up in the guestroom waiting for me to pluck up the courage to attack them. It’ll certainly be interesting to get them all opened up and see what’s inside. I guess you could say it’ll be half like Christmas and half like Halloween – good but scary!

a new experience

I talked The Boy into trying something new last night. No, don’t let your imagination run too wild – it was just a restaurant!

I’ve always really liked Chinese steamboat food. How it works is you sit at a table that has a big pot of broth sitting on a gas burner in the middle. You order what food you’d like, choosing from a range of meat, seafood, veges and noodles. The food comes raw, so you drop it into the broth to cook (a few pieces at a time) then eat it as soon as it’s ready. After all the food is cooked and eaten, you drink the “soup” that is left. Yummy!

The steamboat restaurant my family used to go to closed down years ago, and I’d never found another one. I was sitting in the car a couple of weeks ago, waiting for The Boy to get coffee from his new local, when I happened to see a sign that said Steamboat Restaurant. After a few loud squeals of joy, I told The Boy we had to go. Soon.

The Boy had never tried Steamboat, and was frankly quite dubious. The look on his face as we sat down and they brought the pot of broth over was classic. Nearly as good as the look on his face after the food we’d ordered arrived, nicely sliced but completely raw. The good news is that once he actually tried it he loved it, so I won’t have to struggle to get him back there.

See, Boy? Sometimes, different is good.

little black rocket

Well, there is no denying The Kitten is loving the new house. So much more room for her to explore and all sorts of odd corners for her to poke her whiskers into. Plus the fact that we still have boxes and suchlike everywhere, which make the place one big kitty-jungle-gym.

But I think the thing she likes best of all is that she now has room to get up a bit of speed when she’s racing around. Her personal motto seems to be “never walk if you can run”. Well, one of her personal mottoes, anyway (along with “if the fridge is being opened I should be getting fed”, “who cares if it’s 5 am – if I’m awake then you should be too” and other such gems).

So beware of the little black rocket rushing around the house. It only has two speeds – dead run and dead asleep.

how can it be May already?!

I don’t know where this year has gone – how can it be May already? Unbelievable. So much has happened in the first four months of this year, I’m starting to get a bit desperate for a moment to stand still and catch my breath.

We’ve just moved house again, which wasn’t really planned. Our lease was up for renewal and, since our landlord was proving to be a bit of a Dodgy Dan, we thought it would be sensible to at least look around and see what else was out there before we committed to renewing the lease. As it turned out, that was a great idea. We found a place 5 minutes down the road that is twice the size, and on a full size section with garage, for the same price we’d been paying for our wee split villa with no off-street parking. I guess that means we’re well & truly suburbanites now! The timing could have been better – we moved a few days before I had to leave on a business trip to the USA. Not fun, but worth it in the end.

The Boy is beside himself, though – he now has an official “man cave”. The smallest bedroom is all his, and he is having a great time turning it into “Boy Space”. He has set up his computer table, a desk, all his books and his other guy-toys, including dragging our enormous old speakers out of storage and hooking them up to our old stereo. Boy Heaven indeed! Now all I have to do is convince him that his ugly ceramic cows would look much better in there than in our living room…