Aaand we're back!

The computer is fixed, I've recovered from the consecutive attacks of a cold and stomach flu, and everything is shiny again.

I hadn't had a proper stomach flu since I was a teenager, and it was a weird experience - I found I'd forgotten what to expect from it. I was revoltingly ill for 12 hours, nauseous for another 12 after that, and spaghetti-legged weak for a further 48 hours before finally pulling myself together on Sunday morning. It wasn't fun. E promptly came down with the same thing and is just recovering, and it seems to be doing the rounds as my supply teaching consultant also has it, and she doesn't even live in the same town!

So everything is pretty much back to normal. I didn't get a chance to blog about my job offer before everything went haywire with the laptop, but about two weeks ago now I was offered a two-term contract at a local primary school, starting in January. It's to take over a year one class, and I'm hopeful that it could lead to an ongoing position or at least secure my teaching experience over here as it's directly with the school rather than through a supply agency. It's an interesting school and a complex, challenging class so it's going to be a tiring role, but I believe a rewarding one as well. Certainly it'll stretch me to the height of my abilities. I'm looking forward to it!

It's been amazingly foggy in Hertfordshire lately. Fog is something entirely outside my experience - we really don't get it in Western Australia, not in this kind of density - so I find it quite marvellous. Here's some shots from Sunday:

I went to a shop on the outskirts of town on Sunday (for the Windows 7 upgrade that eventually fixed my computer problems entirely - it really just needed a wipe & reinstall) and had a strange experience on the way back. The fog had been so thick and obscuring that, although I knew there was a moderate skyscraper on the other side of the intersection, I'd forgotten its existence. The fog started to clear off as I was walking towards the building, and I did an absurd double-take as it appeared through the mists. It then took on an amazing blaze of light as the sun finally reached it. It was quite something!

When the grass is jewelled.

It really feels like autumn this morning, at long last. It's been getting a little cooler lately and the leaves have been falling apace, but the last two days there's been a real crispness in the air. Our outdoor thermometer said 1C when we checked it at half past six this morning, and as the sun came up the mist rolled up the valley and has blanketed our town. It's gorgeous out but very crisp!

Some pre-dawn pictures from our back door. Check out the pink contrails!

Two weeks until Hallowe'en and three to Bonfire Night... the fireworks are coming! The munchkin has been asking for fireworks since April so it's high time they arrived. We plan to set a few off ourselves as well as going to public fireworks events on both nights.

It's going to be Christmas before we know it.

I will admit . . .

. . . that it is beautiful outside. There's a full moon, it's cool but not cold. The sky is clear and the stars are crisp. It's lovely.

BUT . . . the roaring easterly gales we usually get at this time of night, while spoiling the feel of the evening, would blast all the hot air out of my house - something the soft gentle breeze out there isn't doing.

Just sayin'.

PS: There have been many evenings this year when I've stood on my verandah and listened to the bats swooping around in the sky above me. Yes, you can hear bats. No, I didn't know that either before I thought I heard them and looked it up. But I've never managed to see one until this evening, when I've caught the odd flicker of movement while watching the stars. They're awfully hard to see, even with a full moon. But I can hear them!

Have I Mentioned . . .

. . . how much I hate the heat?

It got to about 42 here today, on the 14th day of a heatwave that has seen maximum temperatures above 37 C every day for two weeks. And consequently I'm lethargic, can't seem to get hydrated no matter how much I drink, have an inconsistent appetite, can't sleep at night and can't wake up in the morning, keep getting headaches and generally feel like crap. And because my temperature is off I keep burning my mouth on hot food, which just isn't fair!

The heatwave is supposed to break tomorrow, which means that we're expecting a maximum temperature around 33 degrees instead of the 38, 39, 40+ days we've been having. It's better than nothing, but Perth is only expecting 27. *sigh* I can't wait to move!

The good news is that as of Thursday I have a future housemate. Her name is Grace and she's pretty cool, and we have a lot in common, so I think it will work out well. On Friday we put in a house application, so we've currently got fingers, toes etc crossed while we wait to see if it's accepted. Then of course we have to start paying for the damn thing. I HATE rental bonds! Oh well, it will be managed somehow-or-other.

So . . . yeah. I'm hot and sticky and feel like crap, but stuff is happening slowly and in a few weeks' time it'll all be managed and sorted and settled. I start at the new job in two and a half weeks - how scary is that? Scary but wonderful. I just have to move first . . .

HotHotHot

I think it says a lot about the tenacity of life in general and humans in particular that the Swan River Colony survived a single Perth summer, let alone lasted long enough and grew well enough to become a thriving city by the time air conditioning was invented.

Can't you just picture them? The women in particular, in their copious underwear, ankle-length dresses, huge sleeves, corsets . . . this is the kind of costume they were wearing in the early years of the colony.

I'm wearing a thin t-shirt and thin board shorts, I've got my hair pinned up off my neck, and the air conditioner is doing its best in the next room, and the fan is directing cold air in here as best it can. But I am sweltering. I cannot imagine what it would have been like in that kind of get-up, in a house even less well-designed for the heat than this one. It's amazing that any of them even lived to have kids, let alone managed to build a successful colony.

Can you tell the heat is dominating my thoughts just a bit?

2008, The Closing Scene

A cool breeze - more like a gale - did finally come up, and that combined with washing my hair had pretty much taken care of the headache. But it was still bugging me a little, so I thought I'd go and take another dose of painkillers, since the others should have worn off by now. I went to find the glass I'd used . . . and discovered that I never took the first lot. The little glass of aspirin dissolved in water was still sitting there, entirely un-drunk.

No wonder they didn't help, and no wonder I had no specific memory of what time I took it - I didn't take it!

I've taken them now, and hopefully the much-abated headache will shortly be gone for good.

So . . . 45 minutes left of 2008. What a year! I've come so unbelievably far this year, and learned so much. I've done things I never imagined I would do, both good and bad. I've gone from a position of great weakness and doubt to such strength and confidence. And I've shrunk by 9kg :) I've finally finished playing the best friend in the movie of my own life (to quote "The Holiday"). I've been through the emotional wringer and come out calmer than I've ever been. It's been great. It's been terrible. It's been both at once.

To quote Dickens, who had rather a way with words:

"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times; it ws the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness; it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity; it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness; it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair; we had everything before us, we had nothing before us; we were all going directly to Heaven, we were all going the other way."

I have plenty of hopes and aspirations for 2009. Here are some of them, edited from my post on GPYP:

I’m going to spend the year standing up for myself and doing what is right for me. I’m not going to do things that aren’t right for me, even if people try emotional blackmail. No more crazy dances. No more reactivity.

I’m going to spend the year believing in my ability to explore my interests. That means being whole-hearted in my teaching, playing in a concert band, singing in a choir, joining a writers' group, studying hard and living well.

I’m going to learn how to have ‘down time’ again. I have to give back my education department laptop so this is a good time to learn to just BE rather than spending huge blocks of time dithering on the internet while half-watching the TV. I’ll still have my PC and I’ll still have my TV but they are going to be separate and they are going to be limited.

I’m going to lose the rest of the weight I need to lose. I’ve lost 9kg so far and if I can just stick to the weight watchers plan consistently until July I will have lost the remaining 20kg that will put me at the absolute perfect weight for my height. I’m going to be slender again in 2009 and I’m going to stay that way.

Bananaheads will not happen next year. If men happen, they will not be bananaheads.

Above all, I hope 2009 is just a little bit easier than 2008 has been. I'm intensely grateful for all of the soul-growth I've experienced this year, but . . . I can has brake naow? Pleez?

To all my readers, whether you're regulars or passers-by: Happy New Year! And may 2009 be filled with love, wellness, satisfaction, hope and opportunity beyond your wildest dreams.

With all the very best of love,
Signing off for 2008,
Christine.

See you in 2009!

RIP Phyllida.

Owwwww

Last night I couldn't get to sleep until very late, and had to be up at 8:30am because my home owner was coming around at 9 to check out where the roof has been leaking. I fell back into bed afterwards and napped for a couple of hours, but I'm still exhausted, and to top it off I've developed a shocker of a headache that painkillers haven't even dented. It's still 35 C (95 F) at 7:45pm and not looking like it's going to cool off any time soon. I feel sick and sore and exhausted and I have no idea what to do with myself!

So much for chilling out on New Year's Eve! I can't even relax with this headache, and I can't have a quiet drink or two either because I'm going to have to take painkillers again when the ones I've already taken wear off (not that I can remember when I took them, botheration!). I'm going to spend the evening on the couch in front of the air conditioner, nursing my head and dozing until it cools down enough for me to get to sleep. If I make it to midnight then it'll be because it's still too hot to sleep - if it cools I'm going to be out like a light!

All in all, I'm reminded of Terry Pratchett's quirky invention, reannual grapes. They grow backwards in time: you plant them this year and they grow last year. And therefore, the wine made from reannual grapes gives you the hangover the day before you drink it. This feels so much like a hangover - perhaps the bottle of wine chilling in my fridge was made from reannual grapes and I'm going to have a big one tonight after all! :D

Tomorrow I am going to sleep and sleep and sleep. Don't even try to stop me.

Wow!

Today has been an absolute stinker of a day - 42 C (107.5 F) at the maximum, sunny and humid. YUCK.

About 5pm I took a look on the weather radar and saw a rain system near the coast to the north-west, heading very slowly in our direction. It looked weak enough that it might peter out before reaching us, but I crossed my fingers and hoped.

Well, it got here. Oh, did it ever!

First there were a few specks of rain that evaporated before they could sink in. Then there were a few rumbles of thunder.

And then the heavens opened for the most comprehensive rainstorm I think I've ever seen.

Up came the wind, dropping the temperature 10 degrees in 15 minutes, back to an acceptable 30 C. The rain has come, and come, and come - I think it's been pouring down in big drops for an hour now! The ground is thoroughly soaked and there's little streams running off in every direction. And it's still thundering from time to time - I saw a ground strike through the window just a minute ago and leapt out of my skin from the immediate thunder (needless to say I'm on the laptop and it's not plugged into anything). I hope that lightening doesn't start any fires, hopefully everything is too wet for that. According to the radar, this storm cell has just settled over the town and isn't going anywhere, so it could be going for some time yet! I'll post some photos later.

At least it's cooled down!

Day After

I signed my resignation form, cleaned out my classroom and handed over my keys today. It's really happening, I guess! It hasn't quite sunk in yet.

I'm on holidays from now until the 28th of January, and I have absolutely no idea what to do with myself, especially as I have only just enough money to get by on until I get paid on Christmas day. Plus it's 38 C here (100 F), very hot and rather humid, so I'm reduced to sitting in the living room in front of the air conditioner. I'm slightly hung over from the staff Christmas party last night (I was plied with wine and champagne by my congratulatory friends, and consequently got rather mellow) and generally feeling dozy. YAWWWWN!

Sometimes There's Nothing You Can Do . . .

I'll freely admit that my tiredness is often my own fault. I don't go to sleep early enough or with enough dedication sometimes. Other times it's insomnia, or just difficult circumstances, but most often it's just my bad sleeping habits.

Last night, however, was SO NOT MY FAULT.

At 9pm I was dozing off on the couch, so I decided I'd go to bed early and get a long night's sleep before getting up early. So I took a sleeping tablet, read for a little while then switched the light out. Despite the fact that the tablet was pulling me under, I had trouble getting off to sleep because the bogong moths were being noisy and the people across the road from me were talking out the front of their house and receiving text messages rather noisily. Just as I was dropping off at about 10:30 I heard a rumble of thunder. Then I awoke again at about 11:30 when a cracker of a thunderstorm went over. I was too much under the influence of the sleeping pill to wake up properly and enjoy it, but it was too noisy, between the constant thunder and the rain and I suspect hail too, for me to get back to sleep. Finally after about an hour I did drop off again. Then at about 4am I was awoken by a cacophony from my study, which is full of boxes and stuff I'm trying to sort into them. I went in and found a dead mouse in the doorway and Jemima chasing a very much live rabbit around the boxes. I chased the cat out, but I couldn't catch the rabbit so I shut the study door with the rabbit still inside, put the mouse in the bin and went back to sleep. About an hour and a half later I awoke to a funny noise and found that it was getting light and Jem had another rabbit, this one dead, on the floor of my bedroom. I hissed at her, put the rabbit in the bin (picking it up in an old cloth!) and went back to bed yet again. Just as I was dropping off, the sun rose, shining through my open window straight into my eyes. I groaned, rolled over, dropped back to sleep for about an hour, and then my alarm went off.

I really feel that the universe must have had it in for me last night - I did the right thing, went to bed early, and . . . argh!

(In case you're wondering, I opened the study door before I left for school this morning, and I assume Jemima has caught and dealt with the live rabbit! I don't mind her eating them as they're an agricultural pest, but I really wish she wouldn't bring them inside).

In other news, I'm very excited because I have a job interview at a Montessori school in the hills, in the suburb next to where Mum lives. I want this job so very much, but I have to get through the interview first and that's not for a couple of weeks! December 16th is the day. They've already spoken to my referees which is a good sign lol. I'd love to get back to Perth. I haven't lived in the city or suburbs with a car of my own before, and the possibilities are taking my breath away. Back with my friends . . . able to go where I want . . . NOT doing a 100km round trip every time I need groceries . . . there's even a choir I can sing in which I never knew about! I'm trying not to get too excited because it's by no means certain, but I'm hopeful.