Archives for January 2012

Life in Canberra in the 1970s part 2

January 29, 2012 by Jen

If you missed part 1 of what my life in Canberra could have been like in the 1970s then go and see it. It saw me moving to Canberra to work in a great job with the Australian government in a secretarial capacity.

Canberra in the 1970s wasn’t a very big place because I could live pretty close to where I work and go home for lunch. And the buses were seldom crowded so if I didn’t want to walk at least I know I’d get a seat on the bus.

If I didn’t want to stay at home then naturally there’s plenty of opportunity to go out and eat, visit a social club or go and see a movie. Or if I did want to stay home there were two television channels to choose from so I could get my weekly fix of ‘Number 96‘, ‘The Box‘, or ‘Homicide‘.

And of course I could go shopping in the -wait for it – air conditioned shops. Air conditioning was big in the 1970s.

Now let’s talk about 1970s fashions. Canberra in the 1970s had all the latest fashions available in its shops like Melbourne and Sydney did. The latest platforms, the latest flares and lots and lots of polyester and rayon. Creases in the front of your trousers that never needed ironing.

Because I worked for the public service the government paid for me to go home after a year’s service. It was also possible for me to work overseas. There were so many opportunities.

The beauty of living in Canberra in the 1970s meant I could go to ski resorts on the weekends because they were so close. Pity I didn’t know how to ski and my efforts to learn ended up with a broken leg, but at least I tried.

I had better luck at the beaches on my surfboard.

In the next and final part you’ll get to see how I spent my time in Canberra outside of work. It was an exciting place.

A boy and his friend

January 25, 2012 by Jen

I love this photo. My son always nags me for playdates and this is him when he had a friend over. I took them to a local oval and just after this they joined a cricket game with three other local boys.

This is my contribution to the – always nearly – Wordless Wednesday.

I participated last week and forgot to add the link to the appropriate place.

The small rewards help – a lot

January 24, 2012 by Jen

As any parent knows, parenting is hard – really hard sometimes.

There’s moments when you can’t say anything right and your child goes off at you for not understanding him. And this is a pre-adolescent. God help me when he’s actually an adolescent.

You just want to laugh at how ridiculous they’re being but you can’t because that sets them off even more. So you just take in deep breaths and try to act calmly because you know that if you get hysterical like they’re being, then things really will spiral out of control.

He comes to talk to you in a little moment of calmness and you say the wrong thing again. Out he storms, bangs the door and things are back to yuck.

You just remind yourself that parenting is bloody hard, continue on with getting dinner ready and reward yourself with some alcohol while preparing dinner. And you know that they will eventually go to bed although because it’s so damn hot it will take a while for them to actually go to sleep and you hope like hell that this doesn’t make them even grumpier the next evening.

It’s like treading a very fine line. You wonder if that class you started on a Tuesday night is pushing things when you realise that he starts back at school next week and he’ll have his Wednesday evening commitments as well. That’s two nights out of the week gone and this doesn’t even include sport and social stuff.

Oh well. You brush that aside and decide to deal with that when and if the shit hits the fan.

But then there’s moments like this and you realise that there might be some light at the end of the tunnel after all.

You’re at the beach and you’ve had a swim and you’re lying on the towel relaxing. You watch your offspring in the water having a great time and your friend calls him a dolphin because he loves the water so much.

Then he decides to get out of the water and gets you to help him spread out his towel next to you. He lies down next to you and says that this is the first time ever that he’s come out of the water and just relaxed on his towel instead of running around like a moron (his word).

You realise that he is gradually growing up and observing his own behaviour and that all that work you’ve done as a parent is maybe working after all.

You enjoy this moment while you can because you know it might be fleeting. And sure enough it is. You’re soon being annoyed by the previously calm child as he hops around on your towel with sandy feet and dripping wet body and ignoring your requests for him to move.

What my life could have been like in the 1970s in Canberra

January 19, 2012 by Jen

What was your first main job after you finished school? Did you go to university and then get a full-time job or did you, like me, go straight into the workforce?

Had I known, I could have gone to Canberra to work as a typist, a stenographer or a secretary. Instead, I chose to come to Adelaide from country South Australia and work here and have stayed (mostly) ever since.

Here’s what my life might have been like had I gone to Canberra to work in the 1970s. Mind you, I had just started school in the 70s so was a tad too young.

I got work with the Australian government and the work was a lot more interesting than I thought it would be. And the work was really important but only important enough, mind you, to be in a support role. No executive position for me because I was a woman. But hey, every job was different so it was exciting and it was my first time away from home and away from the family.

Hey, and guess what? Because I could type at 50wpm or more I got a bonus. And I got even more money because my shorthand was excellent. Also because I had to move to Canberra to work, the government helped me out with accommodation costs. Otherwise I would have had to stay in Adelaide I guess.

Of course, there was a chance of a cute bloke to work with. But if not, the offices were air conditioned so that was a bonus and the superannuation scheme was good.

Canberra is a bit cold in winter so luckily my accommodation had central heating.

Having my mates live in the same accommodation was great because we were always popping into each other’s rooms to borrow clothes and have a gossip about our excellent work conditions and the great air conditioning.

I know you want more and there is more. Stay tuned to see how it turns out.

Here comes the sun

January 18, 2012 by Jen

Taking part in Wordless Wednesday. I have posts in my head – just gotta get em on here.

I took this while at Carrickalinga last week. Was good to get away even though we had a bit of a holiday house nightmare.

Trying to find my mojo

January 13, 2012 by Jen

On 1 January this year I started my photo a day project up again. I’d thought I might do some sort of theme but I haven’t come up with one so it’s still a photo a day of something.

Even though it was only just over a month since I finished my last one it feels like a lot longer and I’m still getting back into the swing of remembering to take a photo a day.

I find I’m still sticking mainly to the Hipstamatic app on the iPhone but want to try some other apps along the way.

Other than that my days have been pretty busy with stuff (ambiguous I know). I’ve still to re-find my writing mojo. It annoys me that I’ve lost this particular purpose. I know they say just to write and I’m tossing up whether to go back to the model I started a few months ago, ie posting up my photo each day and saying a few words or more about each one.

What say you?

Skylanders characters

January 5, 2012 by Jen

Late last year I got to see a demo of the upcoming Skylanders game which I immediately knew that my son and I would enjoy as we’ve been Spyro fans since he got his first gaming console.

We received a copy of the game and have enjoyed playing it. Of course to get more out of it you need to buy more characters and we have bought one three pack and my son got another three pack for Christmas.

Of course he got some Christmas money and he’s itching to spend it on some more characters, in particular, an air one like Whirlwind because we don’t have that element yet.

However, this is proving quite hard. It appears as though many people got this game for Christmas and as soon as the shops opened after Christmas rushed out to buy more characters and there just aren’t any around that I can find – in Adelaide anyway.

I thought I’d try to buy online and even that’s proving hard. While normal retail prices are $15 for one character or around $29 for the three pack, prices on e-bay are proving quite different, ie more expensive. I refuse to pay that.

I don’t know if this is a ploy by the game’s makers to up the demand for these characters or whether they just didn’t anticipate the demand.

So until we can get our hands on more characters we will wait out this until more are available.

So far we have Spryo (magic), Gill Grunt (water), Trigger Happy (tech), Drobot (tech), Stump Smash (life), Bash (earth), Chop Chop (undead), Eruptor (fire), Flame Slinger (fire).

My favourites? The ones that can shoot, ie Drobot, Trigger Happy and Spyro and even Gill Grunt. The others, as you upgrade their abilities do some pretty cool stuff although I’m not a huge fan of Stump Smash yet. And it’s handy to use characters that can move a bit more quickly sometimes like Spyro and Drobot.