Secret Subject Swap - Summer Break

Aaaand hello again my lovelies. It is that time of month again where 12 bloggers decide to go completely insane and let someone else decide the theme of their blog post for one day. We then simultaneously publish our posts, (I am determined to get mine out at the correct time this month if it kills me.) and sit back and watch you wonderful audience members enjoy the madness. So please be upstanding for part one of July's Secret Subject Swap.


Now I will start as always by introducing the other test subjects in this little experiment. 

Baking in a Tornado                              

The Momisodes                                       

Just a Little Nutty                             

Follow Me Home

Moore Organized Mayhem             

Stacy Sews and Schools                

The Sadder But Wiser Girl                                

Menopausal Mother                     

Dinosaur Superhero Mommy                                     

The Insomniac’s Dream                             

Evil Joy Speaks 

So this month my subject was submitted by Evil Joy Speaks, and the subject is (drum roll please)....

"Does summer {break} scare you? Does summer {break} entice you? Why or why not??

So first of all I gotta explain a few things for my non-Aussie readers, just so that you guys understand what the hell it is I'm talking about. Now you're probably aware that our summer is not the same time as yours. In fact while you guys are having your lovely warm summer, we are in the grips of an icy and painful winter. In fact one day last month it was foggy all day. I'm not kidding, I woke up at 8:30, it was foggy. I got Miss K her lunch at 12, it was still foggy. I went and bought dinner at 5:00, it was still foggy. It's just one of the things I hate about winter. Now what that means for us is that while you guys are having your white Christmases, we're all in our shorts and bikinis having salad and cold meat on Christmas day. And it is pretty damn awesome.

The other difference between Australia and America (I'm not sure about the rest of the world, you guys tend to keep your holidays pretty quiet.) is that we don't have the whole of summer off from school. We finish school a couple of days before Christmas, then take the rest of December and the whole of January off, with February (the last and hottest month of summer) being spent in school. I've always hated this system, but I'm sure parents all over the country are more than happy to see the back of their little darlings after 6 weeks of being full time parents. 

Now given that Miss K is still not old enough to go to school, summer holidays are a bit "same old, same old" for us, as absolutely nothing changes for us as far as our routine goes. But it does mean a change in the kinds of activities we do. There are trips to the pool, to the beach, evening walks, water fights, long hot days and long hot nights. There is a massive spike in parties and barbecues and a huge decrease in the amount of clothes worn. And who here doesn't love completely legal partial nudity??

But with the lack of clothes and the party season comes some negatives of course. The heat here in Australia can become incredibly oppressive. To give you an example, a friend of my sister in law's who lives in England was complaining of a heat wave of around 27 degrees celsius (around 80 degrees farenheit). Now when we in Australia are talking about a heat wave, we're talking 40 degree heat (104 degrees farenheit) which is quite a bit hotter, and a lot more suffocating and exhausting. If the needle ever hits 40 plus (which is happening more and more these days) the only thing you can do is stick a face washer in the freezer and stay as low to the ground as possible. (Unless you're one of those fancy pants people with an air conditioner, in which case you can do whatever the hell you like.) There are also mosquitos the size of small insects, who love the taste of human blood and fly around in swarms around barbecues and pool parties. And then there are the scorch marks you get on your hands every time you touch your steering wheel or seat belt when you get in the car. Oh and the melted tar you get on your flip flops (thongs for my Aussie friends who don't really get why you guys can't call your damn shoes thongs.) when you cross the road. 

So I can certainly find plenty of things to hate about the summer holidays, but for every negative there is at least two positives. For example, right now I'm wearing a black bear as a dressing gown as it is freezing cold here at the moment, and I'm afraid if I wear any less while sitting in my lounge room I might get frostbite. That would never happen in summer ya know. 

Well that's it for me, be sure to go and visit all the other participants, you will not be disappointed, and I'll be returning for next month's secret subject swap soon.

                                

Dear diary the Facebook games edition

So I'm back again. Did you all miss me?? I'm sure you're all thinking that since I haven't been around here blogging very much lately I must have been out doing lots of wonderful and exciting things so that I had something to talk about with you today. Well I might have been cleaning like a woman possessed all week to make sure that I'm back on track with the 30 day challenge. Or I could have been passed out drunk all week in a depressed haze. Or more likely, I have been sitting on the couch all week drinking coffee and chatting with visitors.

One thing I have done way too much of this week is played Facebook games. When I first got onto Facebook back in 2008 I played Farmville. I actually came slightly obsessed with the game. Even when I wasn't on the computer there would always be a window open in the background with my farm growing and doing whatever it did whenever I wasn't looking. That game became my life for a while until I realized that I was spending more time harvesting pretend crops and feeding pretend animals than I was socializing with real people. So I gave up on games for a little while. Then the games got too advanced for my antique of a computer so it wasn't worth playing them anymore. Then I moved to mum's house where we only had a wireless modem with 3gb of downloads per month so it was pointless even thinking about loading the games up because that took up too much internet.

But now that I have a new internet connection and a lovely new computer I have gotten back into the Facebook games. There is now a new Farmville game, and it is so much better than the old one, so I'm back to harvesting pretend crops and building pretend hen houses and picking imaginary olive trees. It is a little bit sad that I have so much time for growing pretend strawberries, but the pot of strawberries my friend gave to me last month sits in the same place it did the day she gave it to me neglected. The strawberries themselves don't seem to notice but I can't help but feel a little bit guilty that I'm not as excited for them as I am for my pretend crops. And my hidden object game. And my solitaire game. One of the joys of having an addictive nature is that when I find something that gives me a mini high I grab onto it with both hands and use it for every drop of happy that I can squeeze out of it. But the fun never lasts and I am finding myself once again losing my enthusiasm for computer games.

It could be that the nice weather that today brought with it is starting to show glimpses of what summer will be like and I am starting to want to be outside and be active again. I miss the constant sunshine and the lazy evenings that summer brings with it. One of my cousins has come down from Darwin this week for a short visit with his family and when I caught up with him it was raining and miserable and as we sat outside having a cigarette he told me about the constant 35 degree heat in Darwin and for a moment I was so jealous of him. Of course the wet season in Darwin is not as fun as the dry season, but I could handle having summer all year long.

The best part of the warmer weather is that Miss K can finally go outside. We have spent the last couple of weeks trying to get her used to grass, after spending months avoiding it because it was too wet and muddy. Today she finally walked on the grass on her own instead of just standing at the edge of the footpath and poking at it with her fingers. Her suspicion of it has been amusing, but once she realizes the opportunities that await her once she stops restricting herself to the narrow strip of concrete that runs down our yard, she won't know herself.

Well this wasn't really an update of my week, but that's just because there hasn't been anything to report. Unless you want a recount of every single cup of coffee I drank this week, but I'm sure you've all got better things to read than that. I will tell you though that Miss K and I are both doing great despite the fact that we are now both on week 2 of this horrible cold that refuses to leave us alone. My bad mood is slowly lifting and I have found the motivation to clean on several occasions this week, but there will be more on that tomorrow for my 30 day challenge update.

So until then I bid you all adieu my lovely readers as I am now off to hibernate. Stay awesome.

I'm melting, melting......

It is too hot to post today. I apologise if  I start rambling nonsensically, it just means that my brains have finally turned to liquid and melted out through my ears. I have just checked the local weather forecast and it is a steamy 35 degrees here at the moment. (That's 95 for people who use Fahrenheit) and neither Miss K or myself are coping very well.

I'll have to admit that I'm one of those annoying people who spend the entire winter rugged up in my woolly dressing gown complaining that it's too cold and summer must get its lazy butt here NOW!!! and then spend the entire summer complaining that it is too hot, and when is it going to cool down so I can move without leaving great big puddles of perspiration in my wake. But for all my complaining I love summer. The summer fruits, trips to the pool or beach (I've only gone to the pool once this summer, it's much safer sticking Miss K in a bath tub) days spent running through the sprinklers and long hot nights spent chasing moths and Christmas beetles around the street lamps. The only problem is summer isn't much fun when you have a baby to keep cool. Miss K tends to get rather sooky as the thermometer rises, and wants lots of cuddles and attention, but she is a walking heater, and just putting her on my lap causes my temperature to jump up by ten degrees. Luckily for us, she loves the water, so when things get too bad, I'll just run the bath and plonk her in there naked for 20 minutes to cheer her up.

But for all of my complaining about the heat today, and the irritation that it seems to bring, it has been a good weekend. My little brother came down from Melbourne last night for a sort of spontaneous visit (I mean sort of, because we were given 24 hours notice that he would be down last night) which is a rare thing down here because life in Melbourne is so busy for my lucky brother we don't see him more than once every few months. Miss K hasn't seen him since Christmas, so she had to get reacquainted with him, but once she realised he was lots of fun, she became his own personal shadow. We also got a visit from one of Miss K's cousins, so she spent hours chasing her around the lounge room, trying to keep up with her as this cousin is 3 months older and more advanced than Miss K at getting herself around.

Well since the hottest part of the day is finally over, I might strip Miss K off and stick her in the tub to help her cool down before dinner and bed. Tomorrow evening I get the night off so that I can go to a candle party at my little sister's place, so I'm sure I'll have lots to talk about tomorrow night, as candles are such a misunderstood accessory I feel.

Try to stay cool.