Baby photos

You know that person that talks non stop about their wedding even though it was years ago? Or the one that shows you billions of inane an seemingly identical pictures of their baby/cat/pet cactus? Or the one who breaks into song or interpretive dance at any opportunity? How about the one who thrusts examples of their arts and crafts projects at you?

I get a lot of all of those people, and for years I never understood what they found so fascinating about baby's first poo or the painting they'd done of a dolphin or their wedding photos, didn't these people have anything more interesting in their lives? Didn't they go to parties, watch the news, have outfits to plan for Spring Carnival?

As it turned out, what they had was far more interesting than my myriad of distractions - they had a passion. An all-consuming reason for getting up in the morning. I think in the last few weeks I've found mine, so forgive me for constantly asking if you've read my blog and I promise I'll look at your baby photos.

I am tougher than Bear Grylls

Stuff that Bear Grylls will eat that I wont:

• Live tree frog
• Sheep's eyeball
• Frozen yak's eyeballs
• Zebra carcass
• Raw goats testicles
• Raw camel fat
• Elephant dung juices
• Camel stomach fluids
• His own pee
• Raw camel intestines
• Live snakes
• Bear poop
• Mosquito larvae
• Live trout
• Tiger scorpion, crucifix spider or any other bugs with deadly names
• Maggots off dead dear
• A rabbit he killed with a stick

Things I have eaten that Bear probably wouldn't:

• A dumpling that Mel dropped, which sat on a table at Shanghai Village for 15 minutes.

Ok, so I may not be tougher, but we're at least even right?

My Happiness Project

I love having a few projects on the go, and what better project than one designed to make me happy? I've been reading Gretchen Rubin's site The Happiness Project (here) and I like the idea. Gretchen has another site, The Happiness Project Toolbox (here) which has some great tools for planning your own 'Happiness Project'.

Last year I decided that May was 'Me Month' and spent the whole month doing things to make me happy, which was great, but why stop at one month? For me this isn't about crazy resolutions I won't keep, it's about small adjustments and habits I'd like to form over time...except the shark diving, I'm hoping that doesn't become a habit. I've got a few projects currently on the go, and will keep updating with new ones as I progress.

A few of the things I'm working on for my Happiness Project:

Healthy Heather
I've been working on being healthier by doing pilates and personal training once a week and eating a lot better than usual. From here I'd like to get to:

• PT & Pilates once a week each
• 2 extra gym sessions (even if one of them is just floating around the hydrotherapy pool)
• Eating healthier all the time
• Drinking lots more water, and lots less wine (during the week)

Happy Heather
Who would have guessed that someone who hated writing would enjoy writing a blog so much? I want to keep up the blogging, and as mentioned in last week's post, I'd like to clean out my wardrobe - nice tidy spaces make me happy. I'd like to spend more time with friends who make me happy, and less time worrying about the ones that stress me out.

Handy Heather
I haven't really been cooking much over the last few years, so I'm working on learning at least one new recipe a week...I'm yet to poison anyone so far.

Harmonious Heather
I've been loving attending my weekly meditation group, so my aim is to keep this up, and to remember to take a few moments to 'chill out' every once in a while.

Heroic Heather
Um, how does diving with Great White Sharks sound?

Hidden Heather
I'd like to be more of a 'hidden Heather', unfortunately my habit of over-sharing seems to prevent that...sometimes it's not necessary to tell everyone, everything...I'd like to work on sharing a little less. I'd also like to start making eye contact with people again, not quite sure when I stopped doing this, but it must make me look really shifty - next time we talk make sure I'm making eye contact.

Hopeful Heather
I'd really like to make and stick to a budget...how hard can it be right? I'll post a little more about this on Friday (pay day!)...may as well start fresh with some money in the account!



Do you have any Happiness Projects on the go or any suggestions for projects to try?

The Community Cup, or why UDLs are a bad idea

The Community Cup is one of my favourite days of the year and yesterday's game was no let down. There was sun, mud, dogs, kids, football, snags and lots and lots of UDL cans (last night in a sugar-induced bout of insomnia I calculated I'd consumed 1530 calories worth of UDL Vodka Passionfruit cans....I don't know what that means, but I'm guessing its bad).

My highlights of the day included:

The sun - I love Melbourne winters!

The mud - lots of people got very, very muddy

Using public toilets and not dying...yet.

Meeting Tex Perkins...and offering him money to sing 'This is not the Way Home', repeatedly...he politely declined, repeatedly.

Finding the Rockdogs mascots uniform unattended...need I say more

The football - I think there was some of that too...

This guy's jumper:

Thought for a Monday

In 1820, English writer Sydney Smith wrote a letter to an unhappy friend, Lady Morpeth, in which he offered her tips for living as happy life:

1. "Live as well as you dare. 
2. Go into the shower-bath with a small quantity of water at a temperature low enough to give you a slight sensation of cold, 75 or 80 degrees. 
3. Amusing books. 
4. Short views of human life—not further than dinner or tea.
5. Be as busy as you can. 
6. See as much as you can of those friends who respect and like you. 
7. And of those acquaintances who amuse you.
8. Make no secret of low spirits to your friends, but talk of them freely—they are always worse for dignified concealment. 
9. Attend to the effects tea and coffee produce upon you. 
10. Compare your lot with that of other people. 
11. Don’t expect too much from human life—a sorry business at the best. 
12. Avoid poetry, dramatic representations (except comedy), music, serious novels, melancholy, sentimental people, and everything likely to excite feeling or emotion, not ending in active benevolence.
13. Do good, and endeavour to please everybody of every degree. 
14. Be as much as you can in the open air without fatigue.
15. Make the room where you commonly sit gay and pleasant. 
16. Struggle by little and little against idleness. 
17. Don’t be too severe upon yourself, or underrate yourself, but do yourself justice.
18. Keep good blazing fires.
19. Be firm and constant in the exercise of rational religion. 
20. Believe me, dear Lady Georgiana.”

I'm quite partial to 1,5,6,7 and 13...oh, and don't forget 18 - there aren't enough good blazing fires in my life!

What rings true for you?

Smile like you mean it

I read in a book once that if you say brush before you walk into a room it'll give you the perfect fake smile. Ever since, I've been saying brush a lot. In the past people have been amazed at how I could smile no matter what was going wrong, but that tightly held grimace was covering a whole lot of stress, angst and even anger.

I spent a long time believing that expressing anxiety, tension or dissatisfaction was a sign of lack of control. Clearly anyone who appears emotional and out of control must be, and anyone who seems calm and in control surely is. This isn't new thinking, but what's new to me is realizing that sometimes it's OK to not act in control if you aren't. Sometimes, for the sake of your sanity, it's OK to wipe off that air hostess grin and let people know you're not OK.

We have feelings for a reason, and we hide them at our peril.

Julian Baggini wrote an article for The Guardian on this topic in 2009 which I found interesting, you can see it here.

Recently I've been 'holding back' less - if I'm stressed, you'll know it, if I'm sad, you'll know it, but more importantly if I'm genuinely happy, you'll know it.

I have nothing to wear!

Apparently most women only wear 20% of whats in their wardrobe regularly. In my case it's probably more like 10%. Despite the fact that I have a rather large walk in wardrobe literally bursting with clothes (I could probably go more than six months without washing if I wore everything), I still can't find anything to wear in the morning. I no longer remove tags from clothes when I buy them because I frequently find things in my wardrobe I haven't seen in years that have never been worn, and they sell better on eBay with the tags still attached!

My project for this month is to make peace with my wardrobe. This month I won't buy any new clothes, shoes or accessories (so I have more money to spend shark diving in Port Lincoln). I will go through my wardrobe and clear out the things I will never wear. Even the things that I 'haven't worn yet, but I just love so I have to keep'...they should be the first to go!

Anything that I keep will have to be matched to other accessories I already own - I'm not keeping anything that requires new shoes/tops/hats to be bought to wear with it. I think that's one of the reason a lot of clothes don't get worn, because they don't 'stand alone'.

I started yesterday by wearing a pair of shoes I'd bought and never worn....bad idea - new shoes always hurt, and a silky top...that was slightly more successful. This weekend I'm going to sort through and work out what to keep and what to throw...wish me luck!

How do you show you care?

My Mum would never let me leave the house looking scruffy. Even now when I visit, at 25 years old,  she often makes me brush my hair or iron my clothes before we leave the house. She doesn't do this to pick on me, or because she's ashamed of me being such a grot, she does it because she cares about me and knows that the way other people perceive me will have an effect on my life.

She always pushes me to work and study hard, tries to convince me to go back to uni or do night courses, but it's not because she thinks I'm a failure, it's because she loves me and wants the best for me.

She tends to frown upon the boys I date, the late nights I have out, my extravagances and foibles, but that's only because she wants me to be happy, safe and secure.

It's taken my 25 years to come to appreciate the way my mother expresses her love, and now I do, I love her all the more for it.

Most of what matters

"Most of what matters in our lives takes place in our absence"

Midnight's Children, Salman Rushdie

I've been thinking about a line from one of my favourite books, Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie. This line has always resonated with me, and I've been trying to figure out why.

While mulling it over this morning, I was thinking that it was about design or fate, but upon finding the correct quote (it was slightly/mostly different in my memory), I don't think that's the case.

I guess this is a way of saying that the actions of others affect us far more greatly than any action we take ourselves.... In Midnight's Children this theme is relevant on a superficial level as the protagonist, Saleem, is a child for a majority of the book (and therefore a lot of 'what matters' happens without his input), but also because of India's political situation at the time. Based in the late 1940's onwards, during the birth of India's independence, the book details how major political forces and constant conflicts impacted on Saleem and his family.

I hope this statement isn't as true in my life as it is in Saleem's, and to be honest I'm pretty sure it isn't. Living in Australia in the 2010's I'm fairly privileged in that politics doesn't severely impact my daily life. Sure, getting a new PM today may mean the superannuation taxes change or my local hospitals may get more or less funding, all important issues, but it's pretty unlikely my life will be affected on such a seismic scale.

Sadly, when I tried to apply this to my life I could only imagine it on a more personal and petty level. If my local pub raises the price of a glass of house white, or the tram timetable changes - but I guess these things don't 'really matter'...so what does? What sort of things, outside of my control, could have that sort of impact? I suppose acts of terrorism, randomness or insanity could damage those I love, that would matter in my life, but other than that, I don't really know, and to be honest I don't want to find out!

All this thinking has made me like the statement far less, no more dissecting books for me!

This is water

"There are these two young fish swimming along and they happen to meet an older fish swimming the other way, who nods at them and says, 'Morning, boys. How's the water?' And the two young fish swim on for a bit, and then eventually one of them looks over at the other and goes, 'What the hell is water?' "

This is Water: Some Thoughts, Delivered on a Significant Occasion, about Living a Compassionate Life, 

David Foster Wallace, 2009

Sometimes people are going to do things that make you feel bad, and there's nothing you can do to stop them. What then?

You can kick and scream, cry and yell, and feel truly terrible, but if they are going to keep at it regardless the only sensible thing to do is to just accept it and move on. When you can't control their actions, the next best thing you can do is to control your reactions - you can chose how you feel about the situation.

Tonight I'm taking a bit of time to chose how I feel.

What are you doing this Sunday?

This Sunday is the Annual Community Cup - a football game held at Elsternwick Park to raise money for charity. It's a great day and I can't wait to get my blankie out and drink a few Melbourne Bitter stubbies (only for charities sake of course) - go Rock Dogs!!

http://www.communitycup.org.au/index.html

What do you believe?

My friend Cam once told me that if you hear something three times it must be true. About an hour later he told me again, and then he told me once more. Later that evening I unknowingly recited his statement back to him. Does this mean I'm stupid, gullible or easily led? Probably.

When I was a child my parents convinced me that steak grew on trees so I would eat it. They even showed me the trees - a sort of wattle with bulbous, charred-steak like growths.  My mother also put a lot of time into convincing me that I was a clever, conscientious student, and because I assumed she must be right, that's what I was (kind of...). It's a lot easier to live up to other people's expectations than it is to prove them wrong.

The most important skill I've learnt in my career as an Executive Assistant is to question everything. The statement you 'just accept' is bound to be wrong, and you'll look pretty silly trying to tell the boss something wrong just because you haven't checked it. So if I question and fact check everything professionally, why don't I do it in my own time?

I'm amazed at how easy it is to convince myself of things. A few years ago I decided brown pigeons were lucky (not quite sure why), and to this day I still get excited when I see one. More importantly, its scary how my negative opinions of myself become so easily entrenched as self fulfilling prophecies.

• I hate writing (false, as it turns out, I love writing - that's why I have a blog)
• I don't have time to take up any more activities (pfft, it's my life and I'll make time if I want to)
• I hate exercise (false, I've actually been quite enjoying my time at the gym and doing pilates lately)
• If I eat meat I'll be sick (false, I ate some on Sunday and I'm still feeling awesome)
• I can't save money (OK, so I haven't fixed this one yet...)

Re-learning the way you think about yourself is hard, but its well worth doing. I'm taking a bit more time to question my preconceptions these days and life is starting to look a lot rosier.

Domestic Goddess - the hunt continues

On Sunday morning I had another crack at embroidery...it turns out lack of practise hadn't improved my skills, I'm still no good. I decided I'd have to do something else 'domestic goddessy' to repair my damaged self image...surely cooking couldn't be that hard, right?

I checked out a few recipes and decided on Jamie Oliver's Chilli Con Carne and the Central Cookbooks Banana loaf, which I decided to turn into muffins 'cos I've lost my loaf tin.

My poor housemate was extremely concerned that seeing as I'm vegetarian (kind of), she might have to eat all the chilli....I considered stringing her along, but as you already know I'm a really bad liar.

It was at this point I realised that to cook stuff, you need ingredients and seeing as mice had raided our cupboard the night before this meant a trip to the supermarket - yay, a chance to show off my awesome man-repelling pants in public (see below)!

After a very confusing trip to the supermarket (who knew there were so many different types of mince!) it was time to get cooking...hmmm. Seeing as it was nowhere near dinner time, I decided to make the muffins first. This went surprisingly well...there were a few splatters of orange zest on the walls and a bit of flour on the floor, but not too bad for a first effort.

The muffins lulled me into a false sense of security. I chopped away at the ingredients for the chilli con carne (i.e. lots of chilli) like a masterchef, then went in to brag to Luci about how well it was going whilst rubbing my eye with my chilli laden fingers....ouch. Ok, so cooking isn't for the faint of heart...or skin (NB. there are no photos from here on in because I don't want you to laugh at me).  After that I kind of lost interest in the whole cooking thing, which turned out ok 'cos all that was left to do was put it in a pot and wait for ages...and a bit of stirring.

In the end the Chilli was actually pretty good, I managed to eat a whole bowl of it. This is the second time in living memory that I've eaten cow, so an awesome effort on my part. I couldn't believe how much energy I had the next day - I guess people do the whole eating meat thing for a reason.

Next week I'm going to try bolognaise!

What do you want to be when you grow up?

I wanted to grow up and ride ponies all day, every day.

Somewhere along the line, my devastatingly practical mother suggested that horse riding was more of a hobby than a career (a very expensive hobby at that) so if that was what I wanted to do I'd have to get a job to pay for it, or marry someone very wealthy....I'm still waiting for that to happen, so in the meantime I suppose I have to work.

So, aged about 6 or 7, I went back to the career drawing board, what could I do so I'd have lots of money to spend on ponies? I could be a riding instructor...nah, they drive rubbish cars. I could be a vet, that way I could work with ponies...but I may also have to put them to sleep...nah. I could be a jockey...nah, I like chocolate too much. It was about this point that I realised I may have to have a non-pony related career. This was a tough realisation for a kid who loved ponies a little too much (to the point of only running like a pony...even at the inter schools athletics carnival), so I rather dejectedly started considering non pony-related careers.

Unfortunately by the time I'd finished high school I was still not really sure what to 'do with my life'. Some of the options I've considered over the years include:

• Archaeologist, in the style of Indiana Jones (not hugely likely...although, like Indy, I also don't like snakes - I guess I'm living the dream in a small way)
• Chiropractor (very expensive insurance)
• Environmental Scientist (not very good at science)
• Marketing/PR (I still don't actually know what they 'do')
• Milliner (not talented enough)
• Policewoman (not fit enough)
• Lawyer (Mum's favourite)

I decided that it would be best to move interstate and go to uni...that lasted a whole semester. So, yet again I was faced with the good old 'what do you want to do' question, and still being without a wealthy husband to pay for ponies, I had to get a job. 

I eventually landed a traineeship in office administration, not exactly the mind blowingly glamorous career I'd hoped for, but meh, it paid the bills. Like so many others in my field, I just sort of ended up working in admin and here I am, 7 years later still at it (and pretty damn good at it I might add). The way I figure it is, until I work out 'what I want to be when I grow up' I may as well support people who do know. I still wish I could have an 'aha' moment and think 'that's it, I'm going to go and become a brain surgeon'...or something, but my life has worked out pretty well without a burning ambition - I guess it's not that bad to not know what you want to do after all.

Although I haven't ridden a pony in 7 years...

Secrets and lies

I've never been good at keeping secrets or telling lies, which, depending on your perspective could make me a decent person or an utter failure. I'll never manage to conceal an affair, embezzle funds or even convince people I've been somewhere I haven't.

Being an 'open book' may have it's disadvantages - I'll never be a politician or a lawyer (sorry Mum), but I think the trade off is far better. My Dad used to tell me whenever I left the house to 'do all you can that's right', and that's a policy that's never done me harm.

I do occasionally try to keep secrets or to 're-interpret' the truth, but I'm so poor at it that the gig is up before I even begin. This forced honesty keeps me in line - if I could get away with lying to everyone all the time, why wouldn't I?

Pay day

Today is pay day, and my favourite thing to do on pay day is buy stuff I don't need. Today I bought some amazing man repelling pants:




















And some books, the best of which is:

The others are:

• Steppenwolf, Herman Hesse
• And the Ass saw the Angel, Nick Cave
• Amsterdam, Ian McEwan (I pretty much only got this 'cos my friend James said it was good...it'd better be.)
  

Next I'm going to pay for shark diving and then I'll have no more money until next pay day...I wonder what I can buy then.

Places I wish I was...

I dunno about you, but when I'm having a less than awesome time I like to sit and think about places I'd rather be. Here are a few of my favourites:

On the boat with my folks

I used to hate being on the boat. I think it was something to do with the cold, salty air (the boat is in Tassie), the uncomfortable seats and that you cant get off and go to the shop until the person steering says so. In the last year or so I seem to have changed my view, I can happily sit quietly on the deck (on a cushion Dad brings specially for me), eat my pre-packed snacks and listen to my parents chat...sometimes I even fish (until the point where the fish comes out of the water, then I run screaming to the other end of the boat).

Dad and I cruising

Laying in the sun

I always wish I was laying in the sun...I don't care where, as long as there's sun (not too much though, then I get grumpy).

Right amount of sun

Too much sun

At a BBQ baby!

I guess this is kind of a variation of laying in the sun, 'cos BBQs are no good without that. But I don't think I can remember a bad BBQ...I'm sure I've been to some, I just don't remember them.

I BBQ like a star...in that I make someone else do it.

Picnicing

Kind of the same as the last two, but with a blanket.

At the races

I love the races, so I spend a lot of time wishing I was there instead. This train of thought gives me great mileage - what will I wear? How will I accessories? How will I get better tickets? Which canapes will I serve in my carpark? I generally start thinking about being at the races in January, so it's a pretty safe bet if I'm thinking about being somewhere else, it's probably at the races.

At the polo

It's pretty much the same as the races, but without a fascinator.

On holidays

Anywhere will do, but two of my favourites are back home in Tassie and to Coolangatta, which is reportedly a 'crime hotspot'...I just like it 'cos it has nice quiet beaches, the Twin Towns RSL for cheapo dinners and because I usually go there with my folks.

Coolangatta - I don't see any crime, do you?

At a gig

But I'm quite specific about this one.

A. I must like the band

B. the venue must not be too full

C. or loud

D. or smelly

E. There should be easily accessible, yummy food

Me at Homebake, demonstrating an appropriate level of 'crowdedness' and easily accesible food.

25, I guess that's kind of grown up.

I've reached an age where people have stopped saying 'oh, that's so young' when they discover it. For the first time in my adult life I'm no longer the youngest member of my social group, children refer to me as 'the lady' not 'the girl', and I've also become quite taken with the idea of spending whole weekends on the couch instead of out on the turps. It appears the world is trying to tell me I'm an adult.

In an attempt to embrace this I've tried volunteering for charity - you know, do the community minded, socially responsibility thing...it didn't really stick. It was rewarding and all (if you consider being sworn at by junkies, proposed to by hobos and pooed at by children rewarding), but it turns out staying home was just as rewarding.

I also tried taking night classes, apparently that's what adults do. After 7 weeks of millinery I ended up with one semi wearable hat and glue everywhere. I went to one class of my six week silversmithing course, realized it involved getting my hands dirty and never went back. Thankfully my adult ballet course was cancelled before it began.

Other people, upon noticing my responsible adult status rather misguidedly left me in charge of their children. This has never ended well, children can smell my fear much like a horse can.

In the last two months i've decided to take it right back to 'adult basics' and focus on getting healthy, i.e. eating well, excercising (granted I still have to pay professionals to force me to do that), going to bed early. One day, if I get the foundations right, I might progress to other more advanced grown up things such as learning to ride a bike, getting my license or even getting a passport...on second thoughts, I think I'd rather stay home and drink some wine.

Pros and cons of diving with great white sharks

Pros

• Would get to see sharks
• May be able to film sharks and create monster shark montage movie a la Raging Sharks
• Possibility of seeing shark eat seal or other small mammal
• Bragging rights
• Great story for talking to strangers...may have to meet new strangers to tell
  
• Get to take a Friday off work
• Would get to fly and therefore drink wine from a little bottle

Cons

• Sharks might not come
• Water will be cold, unlike bathtub
• Will probably have to speak to some sort of sea captain or first mate
• Sharks have dubious personal hygeine
• Bits of the food the use to lure the sharks may float into the cage and touch me
• Sharks may bite through the cage a la Jaws
• My glasses might not work underwater

It's a tough decision.

Things my grandma can do

Last night I sat on a friends couch and attempted embroidery. I've seen a fair bit of embroidery in my time and didn't imagine it could be too difficult. As it turns out, I may have overestimated my craft skills, much like the time I stuck my hand to the bench with a gluegun. Embroidery is hard. This revelation got me thinking about that much loved topic - things my nanna can do that I can't. The list as it currently stands is:

• Embroidery
• Sewing
• Write thankyou notes in a timely fashion
• Bake
• Cook well in general
• Throw dinner parties (see above)
• Play cards
• Make beds with hospital corners
• Make small children love her
• Chastise above children and still remain loved
• Magically fix any illness with jelly
• Coordinate her shoes with her outfit
• Make a bonza cup of tea
• Know the right action for any situation
• Remember the names of all her grandchildren and great grandchildren
  
• Make my pathetic attempts at any of the above seem succesful

But then, she's had a lot more practise than me...

So what makes you special?

Over the past few weeks I've been paying a bit of attention to what makes my friends special. One is a marathon swimmer, one (actually, more than one) is an amazing cook, another is a creative genius, one has an almost encyclopedic memory of 80's song lyrics, then there's the entrepreneur, the 'big brother', the wanderer, the 'IT nerd', and the list goes on. All of these definitions are important, but they aren't what I'll remember about my friends in the years to come. Chloe for example, may have an amazing talent for covering herself with pig fat and swimming long distances in the freezing cold, but when I think of her I think of the fun times we've spent together, the funny things we've laughed over, and the times she's looked after me when I've needed a friend. I remember our 'nightclub toilet tour of St Kilda', our failed trip to the races in the rain (OK, so that's happened more than once) and I remember her holding my hair as I spewed all over the bathroom whilst declaring that the champagne bucket I'd just stolen from a local bar was the best thing I'd ever done.


All of this made me think, how do my friends define me? Will they remember me for my poorly timed humour, my spectacular drinking mishaps, or perhaps the time I've called to see how they are when they're sick, left some chocolate on their desk or posted something to cheer them up on their facebook wall... I don't know that I've been doing enough of the good things for them to remember lately, so I guess that's what I'll start to focus on, because although I like to be remembered for my drunken karaoke prowess, I'd rather be remembered as a good friend.