Morphing into the Griswolds - Part Two

My way of dealing with the general state of chaos that life throws at you is to make plans and lists. I loooove lists, especially with tick boxes, tick boxes are great. Prior to Nanny B's arrival plans were made to deal with my growing anxiety over the dodgy car hand over :

PLAN A - Get car serviced and have loose clutch cable tightened.

Foiled by : The Coach could still hear his radio thus the expense and inconvenience of a service was deemed an unnecessary indulgence of my paranoia.

PLAN B - The Coach would take Nanny B on the morning school run which would aid her with directions and prove an invaluable test run allowing us enough time to procure an emergency hire car, if required.

Foiled by : A last minute business meeting which The Coach had to attend on the morning of our departure.

PLAN C - I would take Nanny B on the morning school run which would aid her with directions.

Foiled by : Nanny B loves a chat...I mean really loves a chat, and she forgets to pay attention to directions when involved in a good chat.

PLAN D - The Coach would take Nanny B for a quick drive around the block approximately 2 minutes before she had to depart on the afternoon school run.

Foiled by : Business meeting running overtime. Us running late on our departure time and Nanny B stating confidently "Don't worry darling, I'll be fine."

I won't lie to you, as I stood on our balcony watching The Coach's butt hanging out of the passenger front window as he attempted to take the hand break off for Nanny B, my fears were not allayed. As I took in the light fog rolling into the valley and the dark clouds looming overhead, heavy with the threat of rain, I was thinking, this is not good, not good at all. And as The Coach joined me on the balcony and we waved Nanny B off and an altogether new and ominous sounding grating noise filled the air, I shook my head, turned to my husband and said "I have a really bad feeling about this."

To be continued.....

Morphing into The Griswolds - Part One

Although my last blog post may have appeared to be nothing more then a blatant attempt to get Nissan to loan me a new Murano for twelve months, it actually had another far greater purpose. That was to provide you with a small insight into the differences between my car and The Coach's car. I must admit, I went a little off track when I started daydreaming about a new Murano, but the main point was to help you to understand that while my car receives regular..ish services, water and oil top ups, and even the odd wash, The Coach's car is surviving on a lean diet of neglect.

Sure it gets a clean out perhaps once every twelve months, which interestingly seems to coincide with a relative coming to visit, a relative who The Coach has to collect from the airport. It also receives the odd service, usually around the time that The Coach can no longer hear his talk back radio program over the cars determined protests which present as various grinding and squealing noises. Quite frankly, if that car was Kitt from Knight Rider, I imagine that it would have quite a mouthful of expletives that it would like to share with The Coach before self activating the eject button and launching The Coach through the sun roof.

This brings me to the clutch cable episode. Actually it wasn't so much an episode but more of a trailer. The clutch cable broke and The Coach was forced, no doubt muttering expletives of his own, to take the car to the mechanic to get it repaired. Seems pretty straight forward no ?

Now see, this is where The Coach and I really become polar opposites. The Coach returned home in the evening and I asked how the car was.

"I'm not happy with it," he replied "The clutch cable is too loose and it doesn't feel right."

"So why didn't you tell the mechanic?" I responded curiously.

"Something about the cost of pygmy hippos and the growth cycles of turnips." he answered. Well at least that's what I think he said, as he was sort of muttering and walking into the bathroom shaking his head.

And that is how it came to pass that for the last twelve months The Coach has been driving around in a car with a touchy, loose clutch cable. He is now used to the quirky clutch. He has also mastered the art of peering around the crack in the windscreen. He ignores the rattle and crunch that occurs every time he steers around a corner and he is virtually oblivious to the dings in the front, sides, back and roof (yes, we are all rather mystified by the ding in the roof).

Then recently we decided, after thirteen long years, to take a holiday to Noosa. We would require the use of my car. My Mother-in-Law, Nanny B, was going to need a car to ferry the kids to school in our absence, and although I was almost blinded by the neon warning signs flashing before my eyes, I succumbed to The Coach when he insisted,

"Don't worry about mum. She'll be fine using my car."

Oh ho ho, famous last words.....to be continued......

The Car.

I am a car person. I wouldn't go as far as saying that I am a Rev Head, but I appreciate nice cars, I like sitting in nice cars, I notice nice cars and I daydream about one day owning a nice car. The Coach however views cars as a means from getting from Point A to Point B. He doesn't notice that his dream car has just passed us doing 210 kilometres per hour on the M1. He doesn't sigh wistfully when a commercial for a nice car comes on the telly and he doesn't seem particularly fussed about watching Top Gear. I know right, I am married to a freak of nature.

Although our opinions on cars vary drastically, we do have one thing in common, and that is that we like Nissans. I am driving my third Nissan Pulsar and The Coach is also driving a Nissan Pulsar, we are the Pulsar Poster Family. Sadly though, Nissan decided to stop making Pulsars so I have had to move out of my comfort zone and look at other members of the Nissan family and luckily for all concerned (excluding The Coach) I have fallen in love with the Murano *sigh*.

Yes, the Nissan Murano is my dream car, and I am confident in the knowledge that one day I will be the proud owner of a Nissan Murano. Sure I might be eighty-seven with bad hips and mild blindness in one eye. Sure my driving may be limited to reversing down the driveway at the retirement village before I gun it back up to my front door. Sure, getting in and out of the car with the aid of my motorised cart may take five times longer then the actual drive up and down the driveway. But hey, the Murano will be mine and I will be living the dream.

But just in case some important person from Nissan stumbles across my blog post, whilst muttering to themselves how smart those people from Ford were to get a blogger to test drive and report on one of their vehicles for a period of twelve months, *ahem* and realises with a blinding flash of light from the bulb above their head that I would be more than happy to test drive one of their own bad boys for twelve months. Well, I have an extensive list of new rules for my perfect dream car which I am sure will make my children and husband jump for joy :

Rules for Mum's Dream Car

Shoes will be replaced with soft Jiffies before entering vehicle

Drinks will not be consumed in vehicle

Food items will not be eaten in vehicle unless they are NASA approved space meals in a tube

All unidentified sticky residue will be scrubbed from hands before entering vehicle

Le Artiste will either sit inside a garbage bag after footy training or he will return home in Dad's vehicle aka The Old Smelly Car.

Petal, writing messages on the misty windows will be forbidden, no matter how much you love Josh/Tim/Jordan/Jack etc.

Vehicle will not be taken out if it is raining/hailing or snowing (you just never know)

Vehicle will not be taken out if it is overly dry/dusty or windy

Vehicle will be parked at the furthest corner of the shopping centre car park where no other cars park...ever

Cut lunch taken to eat whilst trekking from furthest corner of shopping centre car park to shops will not be consumed until everyone is out of the vehicle

If any of the above rules are broken. Household member will be forced to ride a bicycle at a safe distance behind vehicle for all future expeditions.

Disclaimer - Neither myself nor The Coach works for or is in any way affiliated with Nissan. I mean obviously if we were, I would already be driving a Murano wouldn't I. I have not received any form of payment from Nissan for writing this post, but if they would like to send me a Murano, I wouldn't say no. We really do just genuinely like Nissans.

Well, well, well, look what the cat dragged in.

You know I've never really understood that expression "Look what the cat dragged in." It seems to be used in the context of "Oh yes, and where have you been all this time ? We've been waiting for you." And is generally accompanied by the 'break it down now' beat of a foot whose owner wears the agitated expression of a bear coming in for his third swipe of the bee hive whilst dodging an army of bees wearing matching expressions of agitation. Which by the way, I am basing on speculation rather then known fact as bees have rather tiny faces and bear sightings have been few and far between around these parts.

But really, how does this expression equate to what the cat actually does drag in ? As the owner of two cats, it has been my experience that the cat usually likes to bring in headless rats. Well, sometimes it's just the head, sometimes it's the body, it's like her version of those new Barbie dolls where you can pick up various heads and mix and match them with the different bodies.

Now it may come as rather a shock to learn that I don't have an assortment of tiny, rat sized bean bags placed around the living room in anticipation of the next headless corpse (although I'm sure this would make for a rather entertaining dinner conversation when we have guests over). There are no teeny tiny welcome mats, no nuggets of cheese in the fridge (and lets face it, that would be just a plain old waste of good cheese because it's awfully hard to eat cheese when you are lacking a head). Really there is nothing but a dustpan and broom on standby to unceremoniously scoop up the remains and launch them, medieval catapult style, into the bush.

So where was I actually heading with all this ? Erm..I can't really remember..but I am here to say that although my blog posts have been rather sporadic of late, and although I am pretty sure I don't in any way, shape or form resemble a headless rat, I am trying to come back and find my blogging mojo.

Last night I proudly attended the NonAusBlogCon2011 (attended in the sense of put on my Ugg boots, grabbed a glass of wine and planted myself in front of the computer to follow the Tweet Stream of all the bloggers who were down in Sydney attended the Aussie Bloggers Conference 2011). And although I went through a short period of insane, teeth grinding, hair tearing out jealousy that I was not actually attending the AusBlogCon2011, following the Twitter Stream was a timely reminder that we here in Australia are building a formidable collection of smart and savvy bloggers who it would seem have loved meeting each other IRL (that's' in real life' for those of you who don't frequent Twitter) as much as through all the wonderful stories which flow throughout the blogging network. And quite frankly, I have missed my bloggy pals, so I am determined to pull my finger out and get blogging again.

Now that I have that out of my system, I am off to live vicariously through all the blog posts about AusBlogCon2011 whilst daydreaming about AusBlogCon2012 and perhaps hand stitching a small, rat corpse sized bean bag cover. Watch out Melbourne, this is shaping up to be bigger then Ben-Hur.

The Unlikeliest of Battle Arenas.

I never really thought that two common place objects, found in our bathroom, would come to define where The Coach and I stood within our marriage. For all I know, The Coach is blissfully unaware of this fact, but me, well I know that there are sneaky little mind games at play and by jove, let it never be said that The Waffler won't rise to the occasion to engage in a spot of friendly warfare.

It actually began some years back, when it came to my attention, that regardless of how many times I shared the secret location for my stash of excess toiletries, The Coach seemed incapable of restocking items that had run out.

As a dutiful and loving wife, I would sigh and and shake my head with a little tolerant smile, as I reached under the bathroom sink to hand The Coach another bar of soap or fresh tube of toothpaste (thankfully he has mastered the toilet paper location, because lets face it, we all have our limits).

I couldn't pin point the exact turning point in this behaviour, perhaps it was around the time I realised that both of my children were now capable of finding and replacing the soap or toothpaste, but one day, I thought, hang on just a minute, why can't he do it ?

And that's when the battles began. By battle standards they are fairly subtle and bloodless events (flossing doesn't count), but the steely resolve is there, mark my words. Just last week, as I spent five minutes trying to extract the very last grain of toothpaste, I thought perhaps I had gone too far. That if I didn't lay down my (imaginary) sword we would be facing a life of gingivitis and shag pile-like layers of plaque. I glanced at the five cent sized piece of soap and thought of the sudden inexplicable lack of invitations to all social events and pictured my children's sad little faces as I would have to explain to them that mummy and daddy weren't allowed to leave the house anymore because they were both stinky, battle weary warriors.

And so I caved, with the soap, and I walked out of the bathroom with my head hung sadly in defeat. But lo and behold, when I came back in the evening to brush my teeth, there sat a gleaming, fat, fresh tube of toothpaste. My friends, I believe this is what's known in battle terms as an impasse, or a double white flag, but either way, I think we have made progress, and that makes me a very happy and clean little Waffler indeed.

The Sea of Imagination

It probably won't come as any great surprise to you to learn that I can often be found floating on my back in The Sea of Imagination. It's rather a lovely place to drift about in, which I'm sure you would know, as I am certain that I wave to many members of the blogging community as they slowly pass me on gentle currents of their own.

My Sea of Imagination is fed from many different rivers. The River of Literature. The River of Film. The River of Theatre. The River of Music. Well, you get my drift (excuse the pun, I just couldn't stop myself). With so much wonderful creativity pouring into it, my Sea is always full to the brim and I don't think I could stop myself from popping in for a little float, even if I wanted to.

But this brings me to another point, an observation if you will. As many of you may know, Le Artiste is now nine, and catching up with friends is a favoured past time. So I have been watching the nine year olds at play, and it has saddened me to see that their Seas seems a little more like ponds, some, mere puddles.

This is not to say that they don't have bursts of wonderful imaginative play, but I often seem to encounter blank faces and those words which can drive the most patient of souls straight up the walls, "But we are bored. There's nothing to do."

Keep in mind that these are mountain children. Children with access to large yards, an abundance of trees, many family pets, the odd lake (yes, truly) and so much opportunity it makes my head spin. They have heaps of books, vast art and craft areas, trampolines and swing sets. How on earth can they be bored ?

Well, I don't know, perhaps it is an unavoidable part of living in modern society where computers, gaming consoles, mobile phones and iPads are common place. But I for one will continue to dust off the Secret Seven, Famous Five and Moomintroll books to try and encourage my children to build their rivers, expand their ponds and join me for a dip in the Sea.

And A Big Warm Welcome to 2011.

Hey ho you lovely little Peeps, and a very Happy New Year to you all. If I am going to be perfectly honest, I had all sorts of wonderful plans to start this new year off with a bright and shiny new blog layout. Oh yes, it was all happening, sort of, in my head at least. But as is often the way with wondrous plans...well...it didn't really pan out. Time, or lack of, has been rather a problem of late. Where on earth have the days been going ? It's all been a blur of socialising, singing .... oh yes, *ahem* did I mention that I have been dusting off the pipes recently ? Well if we've engaged in happy banter on Twitter you would know all about that, but if not, I'll fill you in later. What else ? Oh yes, I've been playing with my new toy, my Christmas gift from The Coach, a Bamboo Fun graphic tablet and pen.

Oh what fun I tell you. I have been absolutely bamboozled by the endless options that are available on this baby. Now I don't want you think that I am being big headed or anything, but really, I think I am an absolute natural on the tablet and pen. It's a gift I tell you, I'm sure Monet felt exactly the same way when he smeared his first glob of oil paint. No, truly, look at this.........

Yup.....uh ah.....mmmmmm......I can tell that you are speechless because you are so incredibly impressed right ? Admiring the exceptional use of colour and texture. The skill used in those perfect outlines. Perhaps you should squint your eyes and tilt your head to the left ? No ? Okay, try standing on you head whilst wearing a pair of sunglasses, I know you know what I'm talking about.

Oh okay, perhaps it still needs some work. But the point is that I am having a great deal of fun trying out all the different mediums whilst I bumble around the program. Rome wasn't built in a day you know.

Playing and drifting days aside, I have a really good feeling about 2011. This is the year that I intend to grab the proverbial bull by the horns and just go for it. Life is too short and I feel like I have been in a holding pattern for the last few years. This year I intend to shine, one way or another and I hope you'll enjoy coming along and sharing the ride with me :)