Archives for January 2010

Going retro on me

January 30, 2010 by Jen

Playstation 2 - Singstar

Back in the late 1970s I heard Abba’s song SOS for the first time and fell in love with it and then heartily embraced nearly all songs Abba. Mum used to like them as well so we’d see all the Abba specials on tv, hear them on the radio etc. I loved them and because they were so popular there was lots to embrace.

When I was 21 I was given the record (vinyl) of Abba Arrival as a joke. I had a bit of a laugh but was kind of glad I had been given it because I secretly still like Abba even if it was a bit uncool. I still have the record.

Fast forward nearly 30 years and there’s an Abba Singstar game for the Playstation. It has been out a couple of years I think but we only just bought it from eBay last week and consequently we’ve been having our very own Abba revival here.

For those unfamiliar with Singstar you hook up a couple of microphones to your Playstation, select a song and the system judges you, flashing up words throughout the song like bad, awful, cool and good. It also gives you points at the end and lets you know if you’re a Wannabe, a Hit Artist or a Singstar. As I know most of the Abba songs I usually sit in the cool and good categories and get good scores – usually. You can battle with a friend and there’s some songs where one person does the lead and the other does backing vocals.

A friend came round last Friday night before we went out and we did a duet together where she was backing and I was lead. I stuffed up because I was too busy laughing at her attempt at backing vocals. We laughed even more when we played it back and had a listen to ourselves.

I’ve done singing lessons and think I’m a fairly accomplished singer but singing along to Abba is a lot harder than you might think. Those two women can really sing so there’s been a couple of nights this week that have seen me fire up the Singstar and belt out Gimme Gimme Gimme or Voulez Vouz to see if I can beat my score.

JJ has also embraced Abba and his favourite song is Mamma Mia. I now cannot stand to hear the song again. Bless him for trying though. Actually I think this is the start – finally – of him having more of a musical appreciation. Last Saturday before he went to bed he asked if he could listen to some relaxing music to help him get to sleep. I put a Deep Forest CD on for him. He’s now got a second Deep Forest CD in his room and a CD of Abba’s music done on a Hammond organ. He can keep that one. Goodness knows where I got it from.

In his unknown endeavour to embrace retro he’s also started using this lamp at night when he goes to bed.

Now I just hope to pass on my love of the op-shop to him and my work is done.

It’s Australia Day

January 26, 2010 by Jen

A week or so ago after we walked through the Festival Centre Plaza in Adelaide we made our way down to the banks of the River Torrens and hired a paddleboat for half an hour. I haven’t done this for a long time and JJ has never done it.

The swans are very friendly, probably because lots of people take food to feed them. They were disappointed with us, however, as we had no food.

If you’re not paddle boating on the Torrens you can go on one of the Popeye’s for an hour’s cruise.

It was a lovely day and Adelaide can look quite pretty and inviting sometimes. This is looking towards the Festival Centre.

It’s Australia Day today which means a public holiday for most people. I’ve made some lamingtons – a traditional Australian cake (my first ever batch) and we’re off to an Australia day barbeque later. Tomorrow is my first day back at work after nearly seven weeks. Sob.

Holidays drawing to a close

January 22, 2010 by Jen

I’ve got less than one week of my long holidays left although I’m already looking forward to the next one as I’ve paid a deposit to go to Bali in the middle of the year!

Last week a couple of friends and I (and associated kids) hired a holiday house on Yorke Peninsula for a few days. It was a bit windy the first couple of days but then the wind dropped and the weather was lovely for the last two.

I’m not sure what it is about staying near the beach that makes you tired, but it does. I think packing for the holiday, driving to the destination and then settling in has a bit to do with it.

One afternoon we went to a local swimming beach and the kids had lots of fun jumping off rocks while I photographed them.

I love that my camera will let me take continuous photos. It works really well in capturing a sequence like the above, and like this.

See the rest of the photos here.

It’s going to be hard to get up next Wednesday morning, see my son safely off into grade 3, and then toddle off to work to trawl through a whole bunch of mostly meaningless emails. I’m going to have to put on a good act to make it look like I’m happy to be back at work. At least it will only be a two day week for me before the weekend.

Any tips on how I can motivate myself are very welcome.

Becoming more confident

January 15, 2010 by Jen

Yesterday JJ and I had a morning to kill in the city while my car’s air conditioning was being fixed. On our way to the River Torrens to have a paddle in a boat we went via the Festival Centre.

They have a bunch of blocks that are perfect for climbing and jumping on.

JJ climbed up on them easily enough.

But then he needed my help to go from one to the other. I held his hand for a little while as he got more comfortable with the process.

Then he started doing it by himself – hesitating at first.

Then he got quite comfortable and more confident and went on the slightly higher blocks and got much faster going from block to block. As a mum, I put my visions of seeing him fall inbetween the blocks and banging his head and having to accompany him to hospital in the ambulance aside, and let him go for it.

That’s my boy, getting more self-confidence all round. Can’t remember if I mentioned that he got put up a level in his swimming classes this summer. He initially didn’t want to go up a level, and no amount of persuading on my part made a difference. He had to make up his own mind to do it and in his own time. He went up the level and did very well, except for the infection he’s now got in his ear!

Full-on holiday mode

January 12, 2010 by Jen

As my holidays roll into their fourth week I’m finally properly relaxing. It’s been quite warm here, and in fact the heatwave has been replaced by rain and humidity so swimming lessons this morning will be wetter than normal.

On Saturday I’d arranged to visit some friends who live about an hour down the coast. Some other mutual friends had also made similar arrangements so we all converged at their place early Saturday afternoon.

After a lovely lunch we spent about four hours at the beach and I had my first boogie boarding experience and I can’t wait to get more. I bought my son a boogie board for Christmas and he actually let me borrow it a bit.

Not sure what this look is all about but it’s the only photo like this that I took which is a lesson in taking more photos of the same thing!

By the time we got back at 7pm and had dinner it was getting quite late so my plans of driving the hour home were thrown out the window and I sat back, relaxed some more and spent the night there (along with all the others). Bless my friends for being so accommodating.

Tourist in my own town

January 8, 2010 by Jen

We are in the middle of our holidays and in full holiday mode. We’ve had time to relax, Christmas and New Year are now over and all we really have to worry about is hot weather. As we are now at the beginning of yet another heatwave – we have three days of 41 degrees coming up – I thought we’d better get out and about before this hot weather hits.

So the other day we headed off into town on the tram to have some lunch and browse around the art gallery and the museum to get some cultcha you know, and to drag the child away from his DSi.

As soon as we walked into the first gallery in the art gallery JJ informed me that he was quite bored and asked when we were leaving. The colonial art didn’t really interest me – I’ve discovered I’m more of a modern art girl. Although I did start a bit of a game to try and find the oldest piece of art and we found some from Italy that was about 600 years old which I found interesting too.

I therefore didn’t bother paying to see the John Brack exhibition as it wouldn’t have been worth my while with a whingy guts hanging off me telling me he was bored every minute.

In the museum we had to trek all the way up the stairs to see the top of the giant squid but didn’t spend that long in the museum either.

I managed to get some photos along North Terrace.

After a milkshake I was allowed to go to an op-shop to get my fix while closing my ears to every other complaint that he managed to come up with.

On the tram on the way home he somehow managed to work into a conversation with two German woman about how old I am. One of them told him that her mum is 95. After we got off the tram I explained that it’s not the done thing to just blurt out how old your mum is. He couldn’t work out why it was okay to say someone’s mum is 95, but not talk about my age. I tried to explain that if you make it to 95 then you deserve bragging rights but if you’re only in the middle of your life then there’s not too much to say about it really.

To get some piece and quiet from all the questions I flaked in front of the tv and let him play his DSi for a while when we got home.

Lego Land

January 6, 2010 by Jen

Yesterday JJ had a friend over after swimming in the morning. They were glued to the Nintendo DS’s for too long until I made them turn them off, and put a box of Lego in the back room so they could make something.

They occupied themselves for at least an hour and would have continued but JJ’s mate’s mum came to pick him up. The Lego is still out there ready to be added to or whatever.

Not sure that the tree person at the top of the castle is part of Lego but he was in the box so he features. He looks like he’s the king of the castle.