Archives for July 2008

Powerlessness

July 31, 2008 by Jen

I had an awful dream this morning before I woke at 5.30 and could not go back to sleep so I got up.

The dream was that I was on a bus trip and we arrived in Melbourne. The details are a bit fuzzy but I asked around for what JJ might enjoy doing. There was some theme park that he might like so I must have sent him off to it.

A bit of time went by and I was in a taxi ride from hell (cigarette smoking, fast driving maniac driver) with some friends and I realised that I’d let JJ go off by himself to this place and I had no idea where to meet him afterwards.

I felt really awful about letting him go off like that and I felt powerless that I didn’t know what to do about it.

It makes me kind of glad I did wake up at 5.30. I got up walked past his bedroom made sure he was there and felt all right.

What’s the universe trying to tell me?

How to combine a career and a kid and stay sane – Part 2

July 28, 2008 by Jen

In part 1 of ‘How to combine a career and kid and a kid and stay sane‘ I focused a bit on the work and the daily routine aspect and said I’d talk about the switching off from the career and kid bit this time.

I think the best way for me to do that is to get a night out. When I’ve read similar things to what I’m about to write I thought easier said than done, but it is totally worth doing. That is, finding a regular babysitter and getting some time out.

It’s taken me nearly seven years to get this stage mind you. I’m finally comfortable booking the babysitter and then organising a night out whereas previously I would organise babysitting around a night out.

I got home recently after seeing a great show at the Adelaide Cabaret Festival – ‘Intimate Apparel’ and realised how grateful I was that I was able to have nights out sans child. It makes a HUGE (and I hardly ever write in all caps so I really mean it) difference to my parenting if I’m not parenting all the time.

The paradox is, of course, that some nights I find myself just talking about the quirky things that JJ’s done recently. One story I’ll probably tell my friends when I catch up with them is that JJ asked a group of Spanish people at the backpackers we stayed at recently, how do you say ‘vagina’ in Spanish. I was slightly embarrassed that he chose this word but they thought it was funny.

I’ve learned not to worry about only getting a few hours sleep before I have to do the pickup in the morning, although I’m a lot better now at drinking more water inbetween the alcoholic drinks. On my nights out when JJ was a baby and a toddler I’d get to bed after a night out and then freak out at how late it was and have a hard time getting to sleep, therefore making the situation worse. Now I look at the clock before going to bed and think, oh well at least I should get four hours sleep. And I also think of how little sleep I survived on when JJ used to keep me up all the time.

It’s now been a few weeks since I’ve had a JJ free night, and it’s about time I organised a night out.

Prison – only visiting

July 26, 2008 by Jen

Two weekends ago we were in Fremantle and one of the things we did was to visit the Fremantle prison. The only way to have a good look around is to pay to join a tour – an hour and a half tour. Keeping JJ interested crossed my mind, but I paid for both of us to do it and I’m glad I did as I like finding out this kind of stuff. I did a similar tour around Alcatraz when in San Francisco.

The tour guide knew his stuff that’s for sure and the hour and a half for me went quickly. Probably not quite so quickly for JJ but he coped admirably well and didn’t tell me too many times he was bored.

The above image is the original sized cell that prisoners slept in. Prisoners being convicts in the first instance before it became a prison for non-convicts also.

A day in the life of a prisoner.

Of course the walls have barbed wire at the top of the walls to help prevent escape.

Some of the walls had broken glass instead.

I couldn’t believe that prisoners were inhabitants until 1991. The prison certainly isn’t luxurious and it wouldn’t have been very comfortable.

Before the prisoners had to be moved to another prison because of its closure they were allowed to paint on walls, both inside their cells and outside.

This painting was done by an indigenous inmate, and you can see JJ looking a bit bored!

There was a church inside the prison which the male inmates used to go to fairly regularly, especially when women prisoners were going too. Once they stopped going many of the men stopped too.

One prisoner painted the ten commandments on a church wall. If you’re familiar with your commandments you’ll notice that the sixth one is slightly different.

I would have liked to do a tunnels tour but the youngest you can be is 12 so JJ wouldn’t have been able to come. Perhaps I could have put him in a cell for a couple of hours?

How to be a lazy blogger

July 23, 2008 by Jen

Holy Snapping Duck Do! I just realised I have not updated this since Paris Hilton was in jail… You would not believe how tidy my house now is. Please don’t abandon me!.

I am swilling chardonnay with a weight-lifting regime, being distracted by the shiny, just generally being a Darling to society in general, my day is passing in a blur from when the nightclubs close to sun down and beyond. I am so tired of my kids wanting me to give them attention and stuff. it will be fun fun fun till they take my TBird away.

I swear on my mother’s grave I will update you with my nefarious activities as soon as I get a chance. You wanna test me? I really, truly promise!.

This blogpost is proudly brought to you by the Aussie blogpost generator released for the 6 month anniversary of the Aussie Bloggers blog. Get over and have a play – it’s hilarious!

Perth

July 21, 2008 by Jen

So we’re back from Perth and it was great to go away on holiday and be away from work for one week. Today was a bit of a shock being back at work and I found out that my voicemail said I’d be back on 21 January, not 21 July. Talk about wishful thinking!

I’ve mentioned earlier that I’d never been to Perth before. It’s hard not to go past all the construction that’s happening in Perth – the parts of it I saw anyway. I have a photo somewhere of the CBD and we counted about eight cranes scattered across the city. The mining boom is having repercussions in the building industry that’s for sure.

We stayed in a backpackers for a few nights and a couple of people staying there worked in the mines. Why you’d want to stay in a backpackers during your one or two weeks off escapes me as they’re not really restful places. We had a double room with an ensuite and unfortunately it was right in the middle of the backpackers (an old house) and not far from the kitchen so we got the kitchen noise at night and from people getting up at 5am for work. As it was only for a short time I put up with it and there were benefits.

JJ made friends with nearly everyone, provided entertainment, and annoyed them with requests to play Uno with him. We were lucky that I found a clean and family friendly place (family friendly was on my criteria list and this backpackers was about the only one I could find).

We were also fortunate that it was near the free bus that Perth Transit puts on. Their free bus system is fantastic. Apart from our time in Fremantle at the beginning and one other public transport trip, we didn’t pay for public transport at all. I was also really impressed with the trains. They’re frequent and they’re clean. So unlike the Adelaide trains.

Unfortunately it rained a fair bit which put a dampener (pardon the awful pun) on our holiday a little bit and I had to buy JJ a pair of waterproof shoes because the sneakers I took for him got wet really easily and were quite uncomfortable for him.

I took heaps of photos while away and will be posting them over the next little while along with our travel tales.

I’m already thinking about the next holiday we can take together.

On holiday

July 15, 2008 by Jen

We are currently in Perth in a youth hostel. It’s the fifth day into our holidays and it’s going fairly well. There’s one and a half hours time difference between Adelaide and Perth which means we’ve both been waking up at 5.30am and this morning was the first morning I couldn’t go back to sleep.

Up until last night we had a friend’s apartment near Fremantle and even though the traffic noise was heavy, it was a constant noise and therefore bearable. Staying in a youth hostel means having to contend with people standing outside your room talking, people cleaning up in the kitchen and throwing pots and pans around, and sleeping in a bed that’s a bit narrower than a double with a fidgety seven-year-old.

You might be able to tell I didn’t sleep that well last night and am feeling it today. Plus, it’s crap weather outside and we can’t stay here all day!

JJ is teaching a German and a Swiss how to play his rules of Uno and he’s quite the social butterfly. At least having other people around is taking the heat off me having to entertain him the whole time which is the trade-off to staying in a youth hostel.

Overall, JJ has been really good and I can’t complain. He adapts easily and is enjoying himself. I think our best day so far was a Rottnest Island jaunt. We hired bikes and he left me for dead. I’ll write about that another time though.

A side note – it took me about ten minutes of this internet time to recover my password to sign into this blog to update. For the life of me I couldn’t remember what it was because I haven’t had to use it for ages.

Spiral

July 7, 2008 by Jen

Photo Friday’s theme this week is spiral. I took this photo towards the top of the spiral staircase in the lighthouse at Port Adelaide during the summer school holidays.

It was a ~~one way~~ very narrow staircase and to get to the lookout bit at the top we had to climb through a little trapdoor. This was okay until I was coming down and there were people waiting a bit further down to climb up and I was wearing a skirt. I hope they didn’t get too much of an eyeful!