Quiet weekend

We had Sharon and Holly over for dinner on Friday night. Ishbel had been hanging out all week for tortillas so we had those and nachos, Yummmm.

Holly had wanted a driving lesson so Ian took her out after school. She'd been threatening to pay for lessons because Sharon kept shouting at her when she crunched the gears so we offered to take her out. Ian got her sorted and she went away happy.

Robbie went off on Friday evening to the snow for a weekend cross-country ski-ing with the Scouts.

HR postponed - until when, who knows, it's all dependent on the weather - too wet and too windy this weekend. So Jamie and I were out doing more trail cutting -exhausting. It's nice to walk back over your trail though and see what was achieved. Because sometimes several people go over the ground after you, you don't always get to see how it turns out.

Steve gave me a short bit of RFD training afterwards - doing stall recovery - what to do if you stall going up a hill. Our brigade PC is a Landrover Defender. To say we are less than impressed does little justice to the passions the vehicle elicits. Suffice to say it is universally described as "The Sh#tbox". I kept getting first and reverse mixed up and we called it a day.

Ishbel away for the night having a sleepover with Britany.

Had Steve, Bec, Hugh and Francoise over for dinner. Francoise has Meniere's Disease and needs to keep to a very low salt diet. She rang up to ask what I was planning to feed everyone and ended up offering to bring the main - spag bol. I love it when I invite people to dinner and they bring the meal!!! A lovely night which ended up with Steve, Ian and Hugh arguing about fire-fighting tactics.

Jamie and Ian up and out by 6:30am so here I am enjoying the peace of just the dishwasher and the washing machine drowning out the radio! Time for a cuppa and a read before they all come home.

Fingers crossed

Jamie and I have our names down for our brigade's HR tomorrow morning. Hoping the weather holds out for us - getting conditions right can be very tricky - it can't be too wet or too windy or too dry or too hot.

TGIF - Kissing frogs

This guy is 72 years old and loves to fish.

He was sitting in his boat the other day when he heard a little voice say, "Pick me up."

He looked around and couldn't see any one. He thought he was dreaming when he heard the voice say again, “Pick me up."

He looked in the water and there, floating in the water was a frog. The man said, "Are you talking to me?" The frog said, "Yes, I'm talking to you. Pick me up then, kiss me and I'll turn into the most beautiful woman you have ever seen. I'll make sure that all your friends are envious and jealous because I will be your bride!"

The man looked at the frog for a short time, reached over, picked it up carefully, and placed it in his front breast pocket.

Then the frog spoke again, "What, are you nuts? Didn't you hear what I said? I said kiss me, and I will be your beautiful bride."

He opened his pocket, looked at the frog and said, "Nah, at my age I'd rather have a talking frog."

Zits was apt this weekend

Awa' stick yer heid in a bucket

Poor Josie, she just can't take a trick at the moment.

I noticed she had a little weeping sore on her wound and Ian and Ishbel took her up to the vet yesterday. $200 later she has had an antibiotic injection, antibiotics to give orally and an Elizabethan collar/bucket.

As I left the house this morning she was crashing around and the collar had split! She had me pinned against the kitchen bench trying to get up close for a cuddle.

Poor baby!

Another big weekend

I note the last two weekend reports start "I should have posted this earlier but . . . " Let's see if I can do something different this weekend.

Haven't seen much of the family this weekend. I've been on a Rural Fire Driver course (Friday night, Saturday 12:30pm-11pm and Sunday 8am-5pm). It's so you can drive safely under lights and sirens and also teaches recovery for if you get a vehicle bogged and need to rescue it. The course, unfortunately, is heavily weighted in favour of those who drive the trucks which is not me yet. I'm there doing the 'light' component but spent a fair bit of the time in the back of a truck watching the boys having a go. That said, when I did get to drive the PC I got one-on-one attention. Today when we were out doing 'stall recovery' - how to recover yourself if you stall on a hill - I got to drive a Cat 7, one of the smaller trucks. I was then allowed to drive it back to the road. Woot woot.

In a month we do the second part of the course and the assessment. It is an overnighter with us going out west to Rydal.

Ian, Jamie and Ishbel meanwhile were heading out early on Saturday morning for Cronulla, all the way across town and south to the seaside where Jamie was playing his AFL match. It was the first time Jamie's team has played in a few weeks and unfortunately they lost. It must be nearly finals time, his season seems to be taking a long time, Robbie's soccer finished weeks ago.

Robbie was called in to work on Saturday afternoon and was still there when I came home. He's had a few shifts since the holidays where they've called him in at the last minute. I think he likes the money he earns.

Ishbel, having done the trip to Cronulla, was rewarded with a sleepover at Zanny's. She didn't come home until 6pm tonight and Zanny and Jeanne stayed for dinner - an Indian banquet which Ian had prepared for us. Yum!

Ian is recovering fairly well from his surgery - just getting his pin out on Wed - he was pretty sore for a day or so but I think it's better now. He's off work until Thursday at least; he has a GP appointment on Tuesday and an appointment with the hand specialist physio on Wednesday - he's just a bit concerned about how much flexibility he's going to have in his wrist.

TGIF - Lost in Translation

This is a true story from the Japanese Embassy in US!!!

A few days ago, Prime Minister Mori was given some Basic English conversation training before he visits Washington and meets president Barack Obama... The instructor told Prime Minister Mori, when you shake hand with President Obama, please say 'how r u'. Then Mr. Obama should say, 'I am fine, and you?' Now, you should say 'me too'. Afterwards we, translators, will do the work for you.' It looks quite simple, but the truth is... When Mori met Obama , he mistakenly said 'who r u?' (Instead of 'How r u?'.) Mr. Obama was a bit shocked but still managed to react with humor: 'Well, I'm Michelle's husband, ha-ha...' Then Mori replied 'me too, ha-ha.. .'. Then there was a long silence in the meeting room.

Ishbel's birthday party aka the best laid plans . . .

(Should have posted this last week but I've been really busy)

Up early on Saturday morning, head spinning with all the things I thought I had to do. At the supermarket for 8am when they opened. Whizzed round and all at the checkout by 8:20am. Not the usual couple of hours as I bump into people for a long chat and perhaps a diversion to the coffee shop.

Among the to-dos was to bake a birthday cake. Having never had any luck baking cakes from scratch in the old house, we are now used to buying packet cakes. One of the advantages is that Ishbel can now follow the instructions and make her own cakes. All went perfectly until the timer went to tell us the cake was done. Twenty mintues later and the cake was burnt - I'd opende the door of the oven but not switched it off!

Back to supermarket for another cake.

The invitations said, I'm sure, drop the kids off at our house at 2pm and we would be taking them down to the indoor climbing centre in Penrith.

Ishbel was telling the girls to arrive at 1:30pm. One of them did. The mother of the other rang us from the climbing centre at 1:30 asking where we were . . .

Had a lovely time at the climbing centre. "Best day of my life," was Ishbel's verdict.

Here's the slide show

Home for pizza and a movie. The pizzas stuck to the tin foil and we burnt (again) a couple of them. Someone spilt juice all over the table.

Head spinning with shrieking girls and Pink on the CD player.

Karen, Dan and a still bit poorly Xavier arrived.

Cake had its outing. I have a square tupperware type box for cakes. It came with an insert with handles that you can pull the cake out with but the handles have broken off so I tend to put cakes on the lid and use the bottom of the box as the lid.

Ishbel didn't know that and, as she took the cake through to the dining room, did't have hold of the bottom/lid of the box - result - chocolate icing all over her foot and the dining room carpet!

Xavier tried some climbing of his own up the stairs. Was doing two steps up, one step down, quite happily until he face-planted a stair and tears ensued. Karen tried to interest him in the stairs again but he wasn't having any of it.

By 9pm two of the three guests had gone home. Zanny was staying overnight. Girls pretty good, not too noisy and we headed off to bed. Read for a while and fell asleep with the light on. Just getting into some deep snoring when Ishbel arrived at my bedside - Zanny crying and wanting to go home - at 11:45pm. Tried ringing her mum but got no answer and she didn't think her dad would come all the way down from Lawson to fetch her. And I had no intention of driving her up there, aside from being dead beat, I'd had a wine or two during the evening. After much persuading the girls agreed to try and go to sleep. I went back to bed.

Where I tossed and turned for another couple of hours, expecting one of the girls to appear at the bedside asking to ring Zanny's mum again.

And then up early to go to RFS training.

I NEED SOME SLEEP.

Jamie's big week

Should have posted this earlier in the week but it's been frantic . . .

Jamie passed his driving test on Tuesday and is now on his P plates - red ones for 2 years (speed limited to 90Km/h) and then green Ps for 1 year (speed limited to 100Km/h)

TGIF ~ An Italian, a Scotsman and a Chinese man

An Italian, a Scotsman and a Chinese man, are hired at a Construction site.

The foreman points out a huge pile of sand.

He says to the Italian guy, “You're in charge of sweeping.”

To the Scotsman he says, “You're in charge of shovelling.”

And to the Chinese guy, “You're in charge of supplies.”

He then says, “Now, I have to leave for a little while. I expect you men to make a dent in that pile of sand.”
So when the foreman returns after being away for a couple of hours the pile of sand is untouched.

He asks the Italian, “Why didn't you sweep any of it?”

The Italian replies, “I no hava no broom. You saida to the Chinesea fella that he a wasa ina charge of supplies, but he hasa disappeared and I no coulda finda him nowhere.”

Then the foreman turns to the Scotsman and says “And you, I thought I told you to shovel this pile.”

The Scotsman replies, “Aye, that ye did laddie, boot ah could nae get meself a shoovel. Ye left th' Chinese gadgie in chairge of supplies, boot ah couldna fin' him neither.”

The foreman is really angry now. He storms off toward the pile of sand to look for the Chinese gent.

Just then, the Chinese man leaps out from behind the pile of sand and yells, “SUPPLIES!!!!"