Sunday 10 June 2012

Rainy Days PJs and Ponjos


Reading a post on Facebook this morning  of YD bemoaning the fact that on this wet cold miserable day today she was  planning a  lovely ‘stay at home in the PJs and dressing gown with movies and some tasks etc.’ day til she found she had to go out and brave the weather to get printer ink.  A friend then advised her to get a Ponjo – later corrected to a Poncho  - as you can disguise the PJs and other issues under it without getting changed.  YD did then reluctantly -minus Ponjo - go for the printer ink and came home got back in the PJs and with wet hair curled up on the lounge, snacks to hand and settled back to enjoy her day.

All this reminded me of a Saturday Mother’s day eve about 6-7 years ago. YD,  R.  and I wanted take away for tea but the other two wouldn’t go.  You’d think it being almost mother’s day they would.  But no!!  lazy sods left it to me.  I wasn’t dressed well [understatement of the year} – I had odd bed socks and black, white-cat hair covered trackie-daks  on and it was a bit cold.  So I rooted around in the cupboard and extracted an old oversized pink jumper.  I hummed and ha-ad about my face – no makeup – and I rarely go out without some makeup –don’t want to scare little children do we and have to keep the image up – but decided I would only be out of the car for about 4 minutes and who would see me really??.  After asking for an opinion about whether I looked OK and getting reassurances from 2 people who barely looked at me  I set off.

Driving to the shop I got into a car smash – banged my head on the side window probably out for a couple of seconds – no-one came to help and I finally managed to stutter my way off the road in the car with one wheel wobbly and scraping.

Upshot was I called the 2 to come and help. Organized the insurance and a tow etc. and YD decided I should go to the hospital GP-after-hours-service because my head was bleeding.  This was the point that I did a quick squiz of my attire and found I looked like a bag lady. I finally agreed to reassurances that no-one I know would see me and after all I had been in a car accident. The old adage “It doesn’t matter about clean underwear  - if you’ve been  run over by a bus your underwear is going to change colour anyway” comes to mind.

So off we set to the hospital.  We sat for a time in the waiting room with YD laughing hysterically at my mortification of having on 2 odd bed socks, cat hair covered track pants and a large grubby pink jumper with food stains and a hole in it, not to mention that I looked as if I had been dragged through a bush backwards .  Eventually we were  ushered into the GP. whose name I recognized as a Doctor who had been referring people to see me for therapy for the last few years but whom I had never met.  My hope that he wouldn’t recognize my name was soon dashed  -[ bright man – he is a Doctor after all so what would you expect] - as he realized who I was and we had a little friendly chat with me trying to hold the shreds of my dignity together by pretending in my mind that I was properly dressed with at least a little makeup on.  

Despite the damage to my dignity and, I felt to my reputation as a professional woman, there was no serious damage to my person.  So we set off home  still without the take away.

And this folks is why to this day no matter how short the trip I never go out without a little makeup on and reasonable dressed.  And I do have  a Ponjo – sorry Poncho  - type thing to wear but it only folds around like a cape so it would probably fall off at a crucial point and I would be back at square one.

Share back funny stories in the comments section.

Washing Machines I have Known and Loved


I currently have a washing machine that almost needs a licence to drive it.  This machine communicates with sound and text messages.  For example when its load gets out of kilter it stops and Cheeps – yes Cheeps – like a wounded baby bird until I come to read its pathetic cry for help.  “Help me.  My load is out of balance.  Please reposition my load. Then press start.”
At another time after three warnings it refuses to wash until I have run its self-cleaning program - required after 100 washes it tells me.  Sounds simple Eh??  NO!!!  this thing has about 30 different cycles and the self-cleaning cycle direction is buried under two different menus.  It took me a week to figure out how to access that one while the washing piled up.
If I want to wash a doona it wants to know if it is synthetic or feather.  How do I know what the thing considers to be bulky items?  Blankets have a different cycle – again synthetic or wool??  Are towels considered bulky??  Are they colour fast??  Are they heavily soiled?? What needs hot water and what needs cold?
Nine times out of ten after puzzling over the options I give up and just press regular.  But there again it wants to know if I want it to add softener and have fast spin.
I’m expecting any day to get a text message on my phone from Willemena the Washing Machine saying “you never talk to me these days.  You rarely visit and after I’ve given you the best years of my life!  CHEEP!!!” 
Well I really shouldn’t be so critical of Willemena; given the history of washing machines I’ve had and at times not had over the years.
My first experience of washing was in the fifties when my mother and my Aunty would do the washing for our extended family of eight.  In those days it was necessary to set a full day aside for the washing.  They had a huge wood-fed boiling copper in the corner and double concrete tubs and well as wringer machine. Sheets and other whites were boiled in the copper and hot water from the copper was used in the washing machine. The sheets and the clothes were transferred through the wringer into the 1st tub of cold water and again through the wringer into the second tub and finally through the wringer into the washing basket and then taken out and hung on the long clotheslines which were then held up high by a large wooded prop.
When the clothes were dry they would be brought in and then dampened down using an old sauce bottle full of water with a rubber stopper with holes in so the water could be sprinkled over the clothes which were then rolled up and left to be ironed the next day.  This obviously took all day to do. I could never understand why they would get the clothes dry on the line and then wet them again.  This was done of course to make ironing the creases out easier because there were few synthetics in those days and no steam irons. When I was 12 we moved to a new house and Mum had a front loading semi-automatic washing machine which cut the work enormously.  
Then I got married and the first few places we lived in we shared a laundry with others who had washing machines.  Again the wringer type - so triple handling.  When we moved into our first house we had no washing machine. Just an electric copper and two cement tubs and an empty space where a washing machine didn’t sit.  So I boiled up the whites and hand washed the coloureds.  One day just after I had bought new white Jokey Y undies for ES 2yr old and R, I was boiling them in the copper and unbeknownst to me a red rag fell into the copper and all the undies turned pink.  What a disaster as ‘real men’ no matter how old they were didn’t wear pink!!
Eventually we bought a second hand semi-automatic washing machine. Oh joy.  No more hand washing.  However I soon found out why the previous owners had traded it for a new machine.  The opening at the top was about 12 inches square and lined in black rubber which had begun to perish so you had to carefully pull the clothes out just from the centre or risk getting black goo on everything. That wasn’t the worst problem however.  The machine was meant to be bolted to the floor but the laundry floor was cement so the machine just sat on the floor. UNTIL it was time for its spin cycle. THEN it would rock and roll all around the laundry floor, at times it seemed, trying to get into the kitchen.  So I took to sitting on the thing when it was spinning. Many a visitor was startled to bemused laughter when invited in by a laughing woman perched on a washing machine that was doing its herky-jerky dance on the spot to the tune of a rumbling and tumbling noisy rhythm.
Eventually I began to dream of getting a hoover twin tub.  My sister-in-law had one of these.  She the incredibly organized, 4 kids-under-three, mother. She swore by the Hoover. One day I was at David Jones and came across a twin tub.  I took the step of asking the salesman how much and did they do time-payment.  This was before credit cards. He said yes they did and worked out the payments at 12shillings and six pence a week  [about a $1:25].  I thought I could just about manage this from the child endowment and we signed up.  Next week I waited with baited breath for the delivery. I had the laundry sparkling clean and ready.  Eventually a knock on the door and huge man-mountain checked I was me and went to get the machine.  I asked him if he need any help as he was alone “No lady I can carry it” and he did!  In his arms like a baby, up the back steps and deposited it in the corner. I was so impressed.
This machine required moving things from the washing well to the spinning well and hosing it several times to rinse, then a final spin.  So labour and time was still involved with washing.  Eventually a neighbour got the first fully automatic washing machine in the neighbourhood.  As we all helped one another out when things broke down we all wished for the day when our twin tubs  broke and we could try out the new machine.
Then I finally got my own German brand fully automatic machine.  It was so simple to use. Put in the clothes add some washing powder to them spin the dial to the correct cycle push the dial in and leave it. Heaven!!  This machine worked like a dream for 17 years.  It came through two house moves with flying colours and I thought it would last forever.  Then on the last move when I plugged it in it sadly gave up the ghost. 
So now I have Willemena. And although I have joked about her here I have to say I will always always appreciate the luxury of an automatic washing machine. The amount of actual labour time to do a load including gathering the clothes and pegging them out is about 10 minutes. This means I could do the wash my mother and aunty did when I was a little girl in about an hour and a half.  But it also means I can do a load every day if I wish because I don’t have to heat up the copper and drag out the machine etc etc.   So viva labour saving technology. But I don’t think I would appreciate Willemena as much without the history of washing that I have. 
If you have a funny washing story please share it in a comment.

Saturday 2 June 2012

Wallpapering Stories from the Past

It seems from some of the renovation shows on TV these days that wallpaper is somewhat back in fashion.  It takes me back to the very early 70s when wallpaper was going through a fashionable cycle.  At that time we were renovating the girls’ bedroom.  Mind you at the time we didn’t know that there would be 2 girls in the room as I was eight and a half months pregnant with YD but in those days we didn’t know in advance the gender of the baby soon to be born.  Clever eldest daughter [CED] and Eldest son [ES] were both at school and youngest son CJ was a bit over two.

The wallpaper was chosen and, instructions to hand, Hu R started the job.  Neither of us had wallpapered before. Unfortunately R was coming down with the flu and had little patience.  So after the 3rd time he attempted to put the 1st strip on the wall and it ended in disaster with the air growing bluer by the minute with frustrated words, I convinced him to go to bed and I set out to conquer the task myself.

Being eight and a half months pregnant with a baby who turned out to be 9pounds 2 ounces [ don’t ask me to convert to kilos- that’s a lost cause even today], lumbering up and down a ladder, wallpaper strip in hand and  trying to get the patterns to match, was no easy job.  Buy hey; I was young and confident in those days – nothing would beat me. On the floor in front of the section of the wall to be papered I had positioned the water-well containing the wallpaper roll and water to activate the glue.  I eventually got into a rhythm that was working well.  Two year old CJ was outside in the yard playing in the sandpit.  He kept coming in and out to talk to me and watch.

Then just as I started up the ladder he came in again and stood with his little hands behind his back solemnly watching me.   Just as I got to the top of the ladder and had begun to position the paper he whipped his little bucket from behind his back and tipped a heap of sand into the water-well. He stood for a second as I watched in horror and then he took off like a little rabbit.  I lumbered down the ladder and took off after him.  But what was I to do when I caught him but scold him and laugh.  Then I went back to try to salvage the mess.

I soldiered on at the task all day.  My lovely friend and neighbour P came over later in the afternoon with a bacon and egg pie for the family’s tea.  God bless her heart because by the time I was finished I was stuffed.  But the room looked fabulous and I had become a whizz at wallpapering. Over the next few years of constant renovations I wallpapered quite a few of the rooms.

These days I can think of few things worse than having to wallpaper. I’m content to watch others on the TV do this and just feel grateful I’m not doing it. 

As a footnote to this story – years later when the kids were pretty well grown we set out to do some minor redecorating in order to sell the house we had after the one mentioned above.  CED offered to strip the walls of the out dated wallpaper. She laboured for some weeks at this task – a horrible job to do.  Now we had 2 Berman cats at the time – long haired white with red tips who were very curious of the whole process.  Eventually we realized that they had become covered in glue and their fur became knotted.  We spent weeks combing or cutting out the knots. A process neither we nor the cats enjoyed.

So anyone else with wallpaper stories  they’d like to share, feel free to comment.

Wednesday 23 May 2012

Oh Horror! she doesn't cook!!


I confessed to my friend who is a gourmet cook and is coming to visit for a few days that I don’t cook. After her initial surprize and my explanation as to why I didn’t cook, she graciously dismissed my concern and agreed it would be lovely to eat out one night and get nice take away the other.

Now it’s not really accurate that I don’t cook.  I am a whizz with the microwave although strictly speaking that’s more about heating and reheating, including nuking frozen dinners, warming heatpacks and hotting up coffee.  I also have a George Foreman Grill for grilling chops and steak, which I do less and less often.  I’m not exactly a vegetarian but I rarely these days eat red meat. In addition I have a deep fryer – also used less and less often these days.

In the old days as the saying goes I was a great cook.  General cooking of meals for our family of six for many years.  Plus baking – there I really shone.  Cakes and slices and pavlovas.  I was famous for my pavlovas.  I would whip up a batch  of four dozen patty cakes – half of which would be gone before they were cool enough to ice and the rest I would make into little butterfly cakes with homemade mock cream and icing sugar.  Slices like marshmallow slice and passionfruit slice and custard slice all went down famously with kids and friends alike. In addition I made great pancakes all from scratch – no packet mixes for me. 

When I was a young mum a group of us young mums who were neighbours, would play cards one night a week, taking turns holding the card night at each of our homes.  When it was my turn, I would spend most of the day baking slices etc. and we would spend less time playing cards than eating and chatting and laughing, and a good time was had by all.  I think these card nights kept us all sane for those early years. Later a different group of friends all living in different suburbs, would visit each other - kids in tow, to play canasta.  I used to take the pancake batter and make them up and serve them hot with butter and sugar and lemon juice –mmmmmmm. I would often make them for lunch for my kids when son RR was 4 years old.

All this was done on the basic electric standalone stove and oven. Just the dials to turn on and off and the temperature to set and knowing which shelf of the oven to use and how to tell when things were cooked. Unlike today with ovens that look like the command centre of the Starship Enterprise

Then I got out of the way of cooking for a number of reasons. One was that I was working in jobs that had me out until fairly late in the evening and R was off work for a couple of years after an accident.  He began to take up cooking as a hobby at first and then began to do much of the cooking of meals at night. Eventually as the kids left home and he was back at work which had him home by 4:30PM and I was often home at 8PM he became chief cook.  Also in the intervening years sweet things like cakes and slices went out of fashion and savoury treats came into fashion.

So not only did I get out of the habit of cooking much when R took over but now that I’m on my own, I can’t be bothered cooking for one.  Except at Xmas when the family comes and I traditionally do the big baked dinner. Now in this new kitchen of mine I have of course a new oven which has many different ways of cooking and is all electronic.  This was not the most complicated oven I could buy but still requires a degree to figure out how to work it and what settings to use.  So because I use it once or twice a year I never remember how it all goes and I have to look up the manual every time. Then disaster - Last Xmas I couldn’t find the manual. I discovered this  on Xmas morning. After an hour or so searching I gave up and winged it.  And to my surprize it all came out OK.  The girls think it’s hilarious that I have to look up the manual every time I use the oven.  OK for them they have the old fashioned type.

So I don’t really cook these days and I have a very bland palate. I’m not interested in gourmet food and the fact that I could turn the TV on at any time of the day or night and find a cooking show on one channel or another stuns me. But I have a healthy diet and these days I have to watch the calories.  So I have no intention of taking up cooking again.  I use the time I save not cooking and cleaning up after, in other productive and enjoyable ways.  To all of you out there who collect recipes and watch all the cooking shows and love cooking and experimenting I say go for it! Enjoy.  Me?  I’ll keep on being a not cook.


Tuesday 15 May 2012

The Gadget


The following story is one I wrote as an exercise in my writers group. The task was to describe a gadget, in detail, that you were holding in your hand 30 years in the future. When I came to write the story I had misplaced my computer glasses and had been searching for them for days. I kept thinking that if it was my phone, which I misplace regularly, then I could just ring the phone and it would be easy to locate, but glasses don’t have a ring tone.  Thus was born the gadget story. The final version presented below has been redrafted and rewritten using the helpful editing tips from the members of my group.  Hope you enjoy it.


The Gadget
Last week I misplaced my mother’s engagement ring. I wasted an hour frantically looking for it before I found it.  However the panic filled experience threw me back 30 years to another time when I had misplaced my computer glasses.  Back then, in 2012, when a computer screen sat on the desk in front of me, I needed the computer glasses to be able to sit comfortably back in the chair and read the screen, while I typed on the keyboard.  Unlike today where we have voice operated computers and the work is projected onto the wall so we can see clearly. 

While the computer glasses stayed elusively out of sight, for four days I had to lean in close to the computer, reading glasses perched on my nose, peering at the screen, while hot sharp lances of pain built up and played viciously across my shoulders, every now and then side tracking and burning down my back.  In desperation I would once again go on the fruitless search, but to no avail. Finally on the morning of the fifth day I found the glasses on the vanity in the bathroom lurking behind the makeup jars, and yes, when I wasn’t looking for them.

Reliving that memory I thought “That’s it!  This is the third time in as many weeks I have misplaced something and wasted time searching for it”.  It was time to bite the bullet and pay the seemingly exorbitant amount of money for the gadget that 30 years ago I fantasized about being invented, every time I found myself searching for frustrating hours for some lost item.

So today here I am unwrapping the FINDER.  I have been tracking the ever new and inventive upgrades of this gadget for
the last couple of years, thinking I should wait until they had finally perfected it and in the hope that it would eventually be cheaper than the cost of small second hand car. The prototype was about the size of mobile phones back in 2012.  Newer versions came out, each one smaller than the last. In addition I was concerned about the possibility that while it would be helpful to have the Finder to locate lost things, what if the thing I lost was the Finder?   But I get ahead of myself here.

What is a Finder?  It is a gadget into which you program the details of individual items, of which you don’t want to lose track. Such things as sunglasses, phones, keepsakes, electronic keys, jewellery, even articles of shoes and clothes, as well as tools of various kinds, and larger items like cars, for when you forget where in the multistorey parking station you have left it. In short all the things that you are in the habit of misplacing. On request from you, the Finder then directs you to the item’s location. It is a time saving and stress relieving gadget that I have wanted for years.

Now technology has come a long way in 30 years since my computer glasses incident in 2012.  I unwrap the box and take out a teardrop shaped crystal pendant on a long silver chain. The newest Finders come in a variety of shapes and styles to suit the individual.  I have chosen one I can wear as jewellery or hidden under my clothes so I won’t misplace it.  However there is a small one inch square box that can be stuck on the wall in the house that is called the Finder’s Finder.  So if I do misplace the Finder I can easily access it again by asking the Finder’s Finder. 
The Finder pendant is hinged on one side and as  I touch the release it springs open revealing a small almost invisible microphone and a tiny light which when I lift it to my eye, reads my retina imprint and programs itself to me specifically. The computer chip is voice operated and has a tiny sensor pad which when passed over the object I want it to record, reads, and then locks into its memory, sensory recognition information of that object, including the voice label I give it.  These days of course cars have a personal ID signal that can easily be picked up by the finder.

So .. let’s try it.  First up my mother’s engagement ring.  I run the sensor light over the ring and record “my mother’s engagement ring”.  The device answers “Mother’s engagement ring recognized and recorded”.  I close the device. Now let’s test it out.  I place the ring on the floor under the window in the front bedroom.  I walk downstairs and out onto the deck.   I hold the closed device up to my face and say “Find my mother’s engagement ring.”  The pleasant female voice of the tiny computer says clearly “Mother’s engagement ring is on the floor under the window in the front bedroom of the house”.   When I am two feet from the window the Finder emits a happy little chirping sound that increases in volume the closer I get to the ring.  As I pick up the ring the device says smugly “you have found your mother’s engagement ring.”

Now I’m not really sure how this technology works but I believe it’s developed from the original GPS signal technology back in the early part of the century. By 2012 newer technology had just emerged where using an app on an I-phone someone could locate exactly where you were down to a specific room in a house, if you too had an I-phone at the time. However it works I love my Finder.  No more wasted time looking for lost items.  Why did I wait so long to buy it?

Well I have list of things to program into the Finder and I’m sure I will need to update that list from time to time. So I’ll go and do that now and I’ll talk to you later.


Postscript

A week ago I went looking for my very expensive recording device that I needed for my day job. This looks a little like a small phone. I estimate I spend altogether about 6 hours over a period of four days searching for it.  I found all the attachments but no recorder. I searched every cupboard, under desks, behind furniture – often using a torch to look into inaccessible nooks and crannies.  You know how when you search so long for something how it tends to leave the house turned upside down and how this adds to the frustration?  Well I haven’t found the thing.  My friend says it’s up in Nannies room behind the wallpaper. – Those bloody borrowers. All the while the Finder Gadget was running through my head. Oh how I wished I had one.

While I have set the gadget 30 years in the future, I believe that with the way technology is expanding almost at the speed of light, it will probably only be a few years when some clever techo will come up with it as an app on the phone. Bring it on guys.

Sunday 13 May 2012

Hope you had a happy Mother's Day


I hope you all had a happy Mother’s Day  - yesterday for those of us in Aussie and today for those of you still in Mother’s Day. Thinking back to the Ghosts of Mother’s days past I suspect there were some lovely gifts, some funny, some a bit weird but charming, some that truly came from the heart.  

One family story I have been told is that when I was a little girl and taken shopping for a gift for my mum I chose a heavy glass beer jug, the kind where the top curls in at the side of the pouring lip.   The grown-ups with me tried to talk me out of it because my mother was a dyed in the wool teetotaller – a result of a very difficult childhood.  Nothing however would dissuade me and I’m sure my mum oohed and aahed over the jug when I proudly presented her with it.  Now I have that jug  and I treasure it as a reminder of my Mum.

When my kids were little there were the usual gifts from the school mother’s day stall, which all the mums had donated items to.  And of course the treasured cards made with little hands and printed so carefully.

My sister –in-law, when she had her twins and brought them home, had 4 children under 3.  She was much more organized than me.  The first time my brother gave his kids money to go and buy her a mother’s day gift they went off in four different directions to find the right gift. Every one of them bought plastic flowers. Now my sister-in-law hated plastic flowers with a vengeance and had never had them in the house so I suppose the kids thought they were a treasure and said sister-in-law had to display them for months until they were forgotten and she could finally throw them out.

These of course are the gifts we really cherish because they are so personal from our children. So I hope you all have spaces for little handmade cards or if your kids are grown maybe you have some from your grandchildren. Now I have grown kids and two daughters took me out for breakfast and spent the day with me.  It was just lovely.  I know they are so busy in their lives but they spared the time for me.  The boys contacted me from a distance away and I had a lovely chat.

Now today things have gone back to normal. But the memories stay – both old and new to warm my heart.

Saturday 12 May 2012

On the Eve of Mother's Day


I write this as dusk begins to gently creep in, on the eve of Mother’s Day, and my thoughts turn to my mother as they often do at dusk.  I’ve noted elsewhere that my mother, towards the end of her life, would sometimes say to me “after I’m gone if you want to think of me, think of me at dusk”. This evening I think of many things; of how the roles we played, she and I, gradually shifted over the years, and of how we grew closer as time moved forward.

 I remember my teenage years and the squabbles we had that seemed so important at the time and now can be seen as just part of growing up.  I remember when I first started work and was earning a small pay taking responsibility for buying my own clothes, and one day coming home and finding a brand new chenille dressing gown laid out on my sister’s bed and one on my bed too. At the time my sister was at Uni and Mum was on a very tight budget. I took for granted that Mum needed to buy my sister clothes but I felt I was responsible for myself. Mum passed it off lightly when I asked her about it but it felt like such an amazing  gift.

Years later when my children were growing up I understood a little more about such things.  The children’s clothes were always bought before mine and it took me a couple of years when they were independent and working before I stopped looking for and buying things for them.

After I had children Mum and I grew closer.  I understood her more and we shared so much. I have lovely precious memories of watching my tiny mother – she was only 5 foot tall,-  holding my babies, gazing into their little eyes and talking to them in a sweet loving voice, and feeling that love enveloping me as well.    

I would save the funny stories of things the kids did to tell her about. This sharing of everyday things some funny some sad, some a bit of a worry, continued through the years.  After she died I found there was such an empty space in my life.  I realized all these everyday things I saved up to talk with her about, I shared with her and no-one else, and now I had no-one to share them with.

Eventually as she grew old I was able to do for her all the things she used to do for me. It came to be that what I experienced from her was truly unconditional love.  She seemed to look at me through rose coloured glasses.  She saw no fault, made no criticisms, and I felt not just loved but truly liked as well. That was such a gift and gave me confidence in myself through sometimes difficult times.

My mother loved violets.  She grew them in her garden, the old fashioned sweet smelling ones.  Always a little corner or two for her violets.  In the years since she died, every now and then when I am sitting alone, I get the faint smell of violets for a few moments and I find myself saying “ Hello Mum, I miss you, … thanks”   

Saturday 5 May 2012

What your first Car should be


I heard someone say the other day when they heard of someone who just got their driver’s licence and was given a brand new very expensive car with all the trimmings,  “That’s not right!  Your first car should be bit of a bomb that you have to work hard to pay for and you have stories to tell your grandchildren about´ You know stuff like –  “I loved my first car.  It was a twelve year old Torana and it was green with one blue door and the handles used to stick and I had to sit on a cushion because the seat was too low for me to see across the bonnet properly.  Oh how I loved that car!  It was mine, all mine paid for with blood sweat and tears.” 

I’m very much inclined to agree with this sentiment. Thinking back to the first car we got after we were married.  R came home with it the afternoon before we had to go to a wedding.  It was a yellow Humber and it meant we didn’t have to catch the bus or get a lift anymore, we had our own wheels.

Next day my Mother came over to mind the babies while we went to the wedding.  We sailed out in our best clobber, got in the car and it wouldn’t start!  We had to get a taxi to the wedding.  And in those days there was no warranty with second hand cars.  Eventually we got it fixed.

Some years and a few old bombs later we got our first ‘second car’.  R brought it home – it was a bargain – a grey mini-minor. Loved that car.  It turned around on a penny and I felt like the queen of Sheba in it.  It had no floor covering and several holes in the metal floor that let in the wind and cold in the winter and splashes of water in the rain.  I used it for work.

One day while out I noticed the water light had come on.  I decided I knew enough about cars by this time and I could fix this myself.  So I found an empty ice cream container and filled it up at a tap in someone’s front yard and began to fill the radiator.  And filled it and filled it.   Drove around for the rest of the day and went home quite proud of myself.  After about a week R thought the mini was not driving well and decided he needed to replace the head gasket.  This was a major job because to get at the head gasket you practically had to take the engine apart. 

Nevertheless one weekend R worked for two days with much swearing because it was a small engine and he had thick fingers. When he was finished late on Sunday afternoon I was sitting in the car watching him put water in the engine.  I was a little puzzled and asked “why are you putting the water in there R?”  He said because that’s where it goes. “doesn’t it go in the front where the radiator is “ says me.  "No this is an east-west engine."  “What’s an east-west engine? I ask.  R froze.  “where did you put the water the other day”?   [this said In a dangerously calm voice.] “There in the front where the radiator always is” I reply in my innocence.  “That’s where the oil goes” he says still dangerously calmly.  “Oh, I thought  the cap was a bit dirty when I undid it” I say.

R stood up and said even more dangerously calmly “Go Away now!  Go away!”  then he went out and got drunk.

It was always difficult when we were forced to trade up to another car.   We would set a budget but the next car was always over the budget.  One time the car dealer took our trade in for a test drive while I sat in the office re-working the budget to find an extra few dollars a week to pay for the newer car.  The dealer guy was away for a long time and finally word came that the transmission had fallen out of our car and it would have to be towed. So we were forced to do a deal with that car yard even though it was sailing close to the wind with finances.

One time R bought a bright yellow “sin-bin” van.  The back was carpeted and set up unusually.  After we bought it we found a small safe tucked under the carpet.  Leaving it to our imagination who might have been the previous owners.  One day with the kids in the car I pulled into one of the few personal service petrol stations left and the man – a nice Italian man came out and as he filled up the car he asked me “what’s a nice-a lady like you doing driving a van like this?”

The car we traded the van in on was probably the first really nice car we ever had. A Ford Fairmont with a vinyl roof – air conditioning, power steering – pure luxury. We had it for years and I thought If I won the lottery I would still keep that car and just keep having it done up.

But over the years we kept trading up to better cars with a bit more of what we thought of as luxury but had become standard on cars. I don’t ever take the car for granted. I really appreciate it. There are a few of those cars that I still think of nostalgically.  But if I had been given a luxury car to start with I would never have come to appreciate all the cars over the years.  I’m sure many of you have fond memories of your First Car and will tell them to your grandchildren one day.  I’d be happy to hear some of your stories if you want to tell them in a comment.


Tuesday 1 May 2012

Victory for a Technophobe


The sun has been out today – Hurrah!  And right now the late afternoon sun is highlighting pockets of the bush at the back.   My mother used to say to me towards the end of her life “after I’m gone if you want to think of me think of me at dusk”.  Isn’t dusk a lovely word?  For my mother I think dusk represented ‘downing tools’ time and relaxing. And so I often do think of my mum at dusk. I love how the sun creates that lovely wash of golden light at this time of day.
CED has now taught me how to download photos and put them into the blog. I am very chuffed with myself that I can do this.  So yesterday I bought a new camera.  The other one was held together by blue-tac.  Well not really all held together just the card inside was held down with blue-tac so the camera recognized photos on the card.   So I’ve been out and taken a couple of photos of the golden afternoon sunlight on the bush and have read the instructions on how to download the photos and hopefully put them on the blog.  I don’t think it has captured the real beauty of the colour but what the heck let’s do it anyway.
As I ventured into the daunting technical details of downloading Digital Camera Solutions Disk, and then when that was done, downloading  the photos from the camera, all the while reading the instructions carefully, I thought back to a woman who about four or five years ago told me she had come home from work one afternoon to find her four year old playing a game on the computer.  The woman knew this was a game she had just bought and had not yet opened or installed.  She asked her little boy – remember he was four years old – who had installed the game.  “Just me” he said cheerfully.  “How did you do that?” she asked.  “Well you just put the disk in and then keep pressing yes and its there, see?”    Now I, along with this mother, was mightily impressed by this, and have never forgotten it.
So I reminded myself today – if a four year old can do it then I can be brave and courageous too and stop worrying I’ll break the thing.  Just keep going and keep telling yourself “I think I can!  I think I can! I think I can!”, and bury the panic every time it starts to creep up until you say “I know I can  … I DID it.  Go me”.
Now to all of you technically very clever people who scoff at those of us who are actually scared of new technology – I believe we are called technophobes, see it’s an official disorder- I say “everything is relative and we take our victories where we find them”.  
So now new photos are downloaded and not only that I have adjusted the colour and other technical details.  Be impressed folks, be very impressed.  And now I will download one of the photos right here on this blog right now to show you.  It may not be the best photo ever, but it is mine and represents a great victory over technophobia. To all the other technophobes out there, there is hope for us all.  One day soon all this will be operated by voice command and we will just tell the technical thingies to sort themselves out.

Saturday 28 April 2012

The Cat and the Anxiety Disorder


I will not become complacent again about Flame’s tablets! I will not become complacent again about Flame’s tablets! I will not become complacent again about Flame’s tablets! I will not become complacent again about Flame’s tablets!  [this said while beating self up the side of the head.]

Who is flame you ask?  Let me tell you. I have written in the past about Raji my wonderful gentle 14year old red point Birman cat.  Well Flame is the ‘other’ one. 
Flame
 A very pretty sweet looking kitten-faced 10 year old red point Birman cat.  To look at her you’d think butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth.  People take one look at her and go all gooey and, to their later regret, reach a hand out to stroke her.

YD says calls her ‘Southern-White-Trash’ and gives her a whiny voice that says when YD tries to touch flame - “Don’t you turch me you curly haired girl .. I only like that other one … she feeds me and I will let her turch me as long as she feeds me and provides a lap for me to sit in WHEN I want it.  I own this house and I let her and that other big red cat live here to look after Me.!”  Whereupon Flame stalks away, sits and begins to pointedly clean any part of her body that the unsuspecting one has touched.  I think maybe YD is a little put out that Flame seems to like only me.

We adopted Miss Flame when she was about 3yrs old.  She had been a breeding cat but with the last litter of kittens she had a prolapse which required surgery and the owners couldn’t breed her anymore.  She is a rare red point female Berman, rare because most Red point Females are tortoise shells. So they let us have her for the cost of having her desexed and we wanted her to be a companion for Raji since the other cat we had  - a lovely blue point Berman male called Haji,- had been killed on the road and both Raji and my husband R were fretting.  And we too were taken in by the sweet kitten-like face when we went to look at her.

First night with her R was away with work, and she came into bed in the evening and sat between my knees as I was reading.  I thought “Oh, isn’t that nice, she’s adjusting well”. Until I felt the bed clothes become wet and realized she had peed on me and the bedclothes. I didn’t realize at the time but Oh god! that was the beginning of years of stress with this little cat.  She took to peeing on the lounges, the mats, the beds, at odd times – seemingly at random. 

We tried everything; putting lots of litter trays around, behavioural strategies, pheromone sprays – you name it we tried it.  I bought plastic mattress covers for all the furniture and kept the bedroom doors shut.  Eventually in desperation I discussed medication with the vet.  So began her journey on anti-depressants.   Now that kept the behaviour to a minimum [mostly].  Every now and then the routine of the house would be interrupted by a workman, stranger to Flame, or some other disruption to her world, and she would be stressed and pee on things again.  Sometimes she would poo also.  

Flame
Eventually I realized this little cat had an anxiety disorder. Not surprizing given her early history.  Kept in breeding cages and having a number of litters of kittens.  She had been sent to Queensland to another breeder for a time and then sent back when that person became ill.  When she had the prolapse surgery they had needed her to continue to feed the kittens so forced her.  Then when they decided to give her away they took the kittens away too soon and she developed mastitis.  Shortly after this she came to us without ever really having any experience as a house pet.  Not surprisingly we didn’t think about this until after the ‘trouble’ started.

Despite all this in the beginning I persevered with her, gradually accustoming her to being cuddled by me and I believe feeling safe.  She became the dominant cat straight away as Raji was accustomed to not being in that role.  He always defers to her.  She eats first and will sometimes come back in and push him away if she sees him eating.  She is also a greedy little thing and is now so fat she will lose her balance when lying on her back and suddenly find herself rolling over
Now, she is a very bright little cat and she doesn’t like the tablet she knows she gets every morning.  So she ducks me – hiding behind the lounge where I can’t get to her. Sometimes I get complacent and think it doesn’t matter if she misses a day for her tablet.  But sometimes without my realizing it, this stretches into a few days and then she starts to pee or poo on the mats or my chair.  You have no idea of the work it takes to clean all this up.  I keep a thick blanket on my chair and it’s a pain to wash and hang out on the line.  If the carpet catches some, I have to shampoo that and then I have a spray that neutralizes the smell.  I don’t even want to think about the problem with the bedding, especially the times in the household in the past when I’ve gone up to bed after a stressful day, feeling exhausted, only to find I have to strip all the bedding etc.

 In the last week or so I have been lax about flame’s tablet, kidding myself, I realize now, that she is going OK.  Cured of the behaviour, I thought.  Then Wham it started with the bathroom mats where this time she began pooing.  Not too bad because they are small and easily washed. But it quickly spread to the blanket on my chair where for 4 days in a row I walked in and found she’d done the deed again.  4 times had to wash the heavy blanket and struggle to get it dry.  So I began to make sure I gave her the tablet every day no matter how hard that was.  By the night of the 5th day I got cunning and brought out the plastic bed protector [duh], and put it on the chair overnight and any other time I was not sitting in the chair.  So finally the medication seems to have kicked in again and no more troubles but I am still reluctant to leave the plastic off the chair.

 At night she waits for me to go up to bed and then comes and curls up on the bed and sleeps the night there.  The bed seems safely out of harm’s way while I am in it.  She likes to go outside more than Raji.  She often finds a sun spot or at least shelter from the wind.  If she gets locked out too long for her however, she complains bitterly and loudly in her high whining voice as I let her in. Oh and the other funny quirk about her is she snores – very loudly and sounds just like a human.  It cracks me up when she does this.

Raji grooming Flame
Despite all this I really love her [most of the time]. Raji and she have become a family and they often groom one another and sometimes curl up together.  I don’t know how she’ll be when Haji goes.  But like all families we have our individual quirks and ups and downs.

So now you know why I am writing on my computer 500 times ‘I will not become complacent again about Flame’s tablets!’  Maybe tonight I will leave the plastic off the chair .. what do you think??

Thursday 26 April 2012

A Lazy Autumn Morning in Aussie


Here in Aussie we are in the early stages of Autumn, and just this week the temperature has finally begun to reflect that. It’s been hovering along the edges of slightly warm accompanied by lots of rain and clouds, and dipping now and then into shivers. 
Nature is so amazing.  Just as many of the trees begin to shed their leaves and the flowers die off so there is a lot less colour and dull winter threatens, there are pockets of brilliant glowing deep purple springing up all over, where the wonderful tippichina trees have burst into bloom.   It’s as if Nature wants to spread some colour through the gloom that  is gathering.  Added to this the Camellia trees are coming into bud and here in my garden I have miniature camellia bushes already sprouting some delicate pale pink flowers.


Early mornings are much cooler and it warms up a little for a time in the middle of the day.  So this morning  … the first day off for a week  … I took the opportunity to snuggle under the covers for a while and read a good book before getting up to face the day. You know how nice it is to wander around in the warm dressing gown and bed socks and settle with a cup of fragrant coffee in the sun to read a good book. 

While I sat there one of the two resident kookaburras .. I’ve christened them Bib and Bub from a famous series of children’s stories about the gumnut babies .. flew onto the gate and began to scan for breakfast.  As I watched he swooped down grabbed something and gave it a sharp flicking shake before raising his head and swallowing.  He’s fat as mud, an indication of good pickings for birds after all the rain lately. 

Well, I’ve had the whole morning to myself, successfully avoiding all pending tasks and now guilt is creeping in to push me back to reality. I’ll go soon to do the tasks but I think I’ll also buy myself a loaf of hot fresh bread to have later smothered in butter and dipped in wonderful hot creamy pumpkin soup.  

Later today I will work on my writing.  Some for this blog and some for the writing group six of us budding writers have just formed. This is not a task as such but an enjoyment. I think it’s going to be a wonderful group.  The women in the group are all very talented and I’m sure will one day be published authors.  

Hope you are all having a great day out there as I am here.

Tuesday 24 April 2012

That Wonderful Smell of Hot Fresh Bread


This morning I bought a Vienna loaf of bread from the fresh bread shop instead of the ‘long-lasting’ sliced bread from the supermarket. I didn’t get it sliced because that would spoil the experience. It needed to be cut thick just as we used to do before sliced bread was invented. The smell of the bread as I cut it with the breadknife – which I had had to hunt up, having not used it for a while - flooded me with memories.

First my mind went to me as a little girl, the first day I was trusted to cross the road and go to the bakehouse around the corner all by myself to buy the bread for the family. With dire warnings echoing in my head about not pulling chunks out of the middle of the loaf,[as most kids tended to do], I walked up the driveway of the bakehouse, enticed along by the wonderful smell of hot fresh bread. Is there any more comforting smell or a smell more likely to trigger memories? The baker handed me the bread and I set off and along the way I broke the loaf in half – they were made to do that easily then – and where the soft part on one side made a little hill I ever so carefully, so as not to leave a tell-tale hole, peeled out some of the warm, soft, oh so fragrant bits of bread and stuffed them in my mouth and chewed in something bordering on ecstasy mixed with a little guilt. Then I proudly took home my prize. Now I’m sure the adults knew what I’d done, but they didn’t say anything and that left the experience intact as a lovely memory.

My thoughts then went to the early days of raising my children when the baker came around every day except Sunday and delivered fresh bread. We would wait for the baker so we could have fresh bread for lunch, each slice covered in honey or peanut butter or vegemite. Originally the baker, who came from the old Co-op store, had a horse driven enclosed cart. He would stand on the wide step at the back of the cart when driving it and he would often let one or other of the kids have a ride with him for a little way down the street. The kids of course loved it and would often wait for him so they could beg their ride.

One day I was going for a job interview – all dressed up - and I missed the bus and was faced with a run up the steep hill to try to catch another bus in the hope I could be on time. I didn’t think I could make it and I worried I would present at the interview all hot and bothered instead of cool calm and collected. Then along came the baker with his horse and cart and I cadged a lift on the step of the cart with him while the horse pulled us up the hill in time for me to catch the other bus.

Now tonight for tea I had fresh slices of bread with the crisp crusty outside and the soft white inside, slathered with butter, then dipped into lovely hot creamy pumpkin soup. Heaven!

I think this will become a ritual at least once a week.

Monday 23 April 2012

On Getting Started


Well… after the marathon of the last couple of weeks getting this blog up and running, I can take a breath and settle in to write and post. But before I do that I just wanted to say a big big thank you to Clever Eldest Daughter [CED] who was encouraging of my early writings and suggested I should think about creating a blog as an outlet for said creative writing. Not only this but she then set the blog up and taught me how to use it and run it. This last being not an easy job as I have a bit of a block about my ability to learn the new technology. I could never have done this without you CED.

So at first we tried two different layouts and CED gradually worked out the bugs in them. Then we needed to change it again so people could post comments, etc. It quickly became obvious that the original title of the blog was too unwieldy and the word “ruminations” in the blog was used far and wide. That led to a week of trying to come up with a new title that was catchy and reasonable short.

Well, I did come up with some that seemed very clever but on CED’s advice when I checked them out other people were just as clever and had already come up with them. Finally I gave up the hope that inspiration would strike out of the blue and made myself sit for hours just working on the name and plugging it in to see if it was already taken. Cries for help to other family members didn’t bring relief even though they got into the spirit of it.

So I decided to continue to post with the old title until I could get a better one. Then; out of the blue, when I was out the morning before I posted the next piece, inspiration struck [helped along by something I saw] and LO! the new title ‘Marg’s Slices of Life’ was born. Yay!..Then CED, just yesterday morning decided we needed to change the layout for some technical reasons and we sat for a couple of hours working on that. Just as we had settled for something reasonable and convinced ourselves it didn’t have to be too pretty CED came across some new backgrounds and layouts that would fit.

Now anyone who knows me knows not to give me too many choices or I waffle on forever. So CED looked at the choices and offered a couple to me. And the blog evolved based on the last 2 pieces I had posted. It feels appropriate to have the blog reflect the Aussie bush in both colour and background.
So there we had it. Quick Marg! before you begin to waffle tell CED to set it. And it was done. Now all that remains is the road ahead to write.

To all who might visit my blog in the future – welcome, may we share good stories.

Saturday 21 April 2012

The Spider Dance and stories from the webs



Spider Dance

This morning I walked out of the garage door intending to check the letter box and straight into a huge spider web that had been craftily strung across that entrance overnight.  I’m sure you’ve all been there.  The brains message ‘sh*t there’s a monster, people-eating spider on me somewhere, probably on my head and about to attack my face’, is pipped at the post by the body hurtling into the ‘spider dance’.  In situations like this the body needs no direction from the brain – survival kicks in, by-passing the brain. To the accompaniment of the eerie high pitched shriek, instantly recognizable as the spider noise, the legs frantically lurch into the dance and spin me in circles while the arms windmill, madly brushing the hair and face and any part of my body that can be reached while my head cranes on my neck in a vain attempt to view the whole of my back to see where the dreaded spider is currently stalking me. Unable to see, but convinced the creature is there just out of my sightline, I rip off my top – heedless of the fact that I’m by this time in the middle of the driveway and in full view of the neighbours. When there is no sign of the spider on my top I now lean over and continue to frantically brush at my hair.  When I finally realize the spider is not actually on my body I begin to search my surroundings for it.  I spy the tattered web where I have broken through it and can see that by the probable size of the web the spider that had constructed it had to be really big.  Then I spy it huddling in what I would like to think of as fear of me, but is more likely in glee, up under the eaves.

Gathering the shreds of my dignity around me I replace my top, take a quick surveillance of the neighbourhood – no neighbours in sight, probably lurking, with snickers of laughter, behind curtains or closed doors – and continue to the letterbox.

Now the experts tell us that spiders string their webs across the probable flight paths of insects or near light sources so they can trap unwary food sources. This makes sense.  But at my place while there are hundreds of spiders that do just that, there is a small number who seem to have loftier ambitions.  I have lost count of the times I have walked into webs strung across the outside access doors of my house.  Call me paranoid, but maybe there is secret society of spiders that have ambitions to catch a human! Come to think of it, the size of these webs is bit of a giveaway isn’t it? – they are always huge.  Set up for larger human sized prey?  They are very cunning too.  For a time after I have been caught they wait until I’m lulled into a false sense of security or have forgotten and then overnight up goes a new trap and bam! there’s the spider dance again. Well I’m recovered now but will stay on yellow alert around doorways for a while whenever I go outside.

After all of this excitement, nay more like terror, I find my mind going back to the many spider encounter stories in the annals of the family.  So I thought I might post a few. Some are hilarious, but only if you are not the victim.  So read on.

Spider hunting story

Younger daughter [YD] has always been particularly frightened of spiders but always unwilling to kill them.  Once when she was a teenager she sat curled up in a ball on the lounge afraid to move for four hours, watching what she described as a giant huntsman spider, march across the opposite wall, and waiting for her father and me to come home and catch it. [I have been the spider catcher in the family for years.]

By the time we got home and she told the story, the spider was nowhere to be seen, despite a thorough search. Four days later I was walking past the wall where the spider had been, and noticed what appeared to be part of spider leg poking out from the edge of picture hung on the wall.  I got the latest top-of-the-line spider catching equipment, aka a bowl and a piece of cardboard, gave a reluctant YD a broom so she could move the picture while standing at a safe distance and I could quickly pop the bowl over the spider when it moved out.  Good plan, until the spider did move out and, reminiscent of the scene in ‘Jaws’, I jumped back in fear - “we need a bigger bowl”-.  It was the biggest huntsman I had ever seen.  However, brave and courageous mother that I am, I ran to get a really big bowl leaving YD, now standing on top of the lounge in the farthest corner of the room, to keep the spider in sight so we wouldn’t lose sight of it again.  I ran back and after a few heart stopping minutes managed to trap the spider in the bowl with YD declaring in the background “Very brave mummy!... very brave!”.  I then took the spider down to the back fence under the gum tree and released it.  Now this was the designated ‘spider releasing spot’ for years. And therein lies another story.

Under the gum tree I had lots of plant pots stacked upside down, one on top of the other for gardening purposes.  One day, some years after the “Jaws” event, I went down and picked up a pot and looked at the pot that had been underneath, to see to my horror it was covered in huntsman spiders of various sizes.  Thinking quickly through the shock; told you I was the brave and courageous one; I realized there may be others inside the pot I held, my hand covering the hole in the bottom. Carefully I turned the pot around and looked and sure enough there were spiders there as well.  I flung the pot away - brave and courageous only goes so far-, and had a quick look around all the other pots.  There were hundreds of huntsman spiders infesting the “drop off” area.  I raced inside and dragged the family out to see.  The closest I could figure was, for years whenever I took a spider down and dropped it off, it walked into the colony saying “Hi honey I’m home – she threw me out again”.  While I don’t like killing spiders, that’s why I catch and relocate them, this time I had to get in the exterminators.
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Funny spider story
Years later Youngest Daughter [YD] went with a friend to attend a Buddhist retreat out in the boondocks.  No sewer this far in the bush, so toilets were the old dunnies with the pan system. YD held out as long as she could and then, in fear and not a little disgust was forced to visit the dunny.  She got herself settled with her undies around her knees and reached out to get some toilet paper ready and put her hand right on top of huntsman spider. With her very own well-honed trademark ‘spider shriek’ – recognized by every family member  as ‘YD has encountered  a spider’ - , she leaped to her feet, burst out of the dunny with her undies still around her knees and ran  full pelt in a hilarious knock-kneed gait – off into the bush while her friend rolled around hysterically laughing.- She was NOT amused.


Funny Spider and snake story

Fast forward a few years.  YD Had agreed to check the house and collect the mail for us while her father and I went away on holidays. At that time we lived in a house where the only driveway was at the back of the house off another street.  The letter box however was down several levels on the street at the front of the house.  So the logical thing was for YD to drive to the letter box at the front, collect the mail and then drive around two blocks to the back of the house and check the house.

A few nights into the holiday I accessed a couple of messages on my phone about 10pm. These were from YD sent some hours before.  Voice message one- shrill panicky voice “ I’ve just picked up your mail and there, not 2 feet from me was a giant snake – frightened me half to death, so I scooped the mail up really quickly  and leaped in the car and took off before the snake could crush and eat me. 
As I hurtled off in the car and got a little way down the road, I glanced over and there was a large huntsman marching out from the mail and stalking towards me.  In my panic I drove up the gutter and leaped from the car.  I was dancing around calling for my mum to come and get the spider out, but you are away- big help you are! Then I considered going into a nearby house for help. But eventually, I don’t know how, I managed to get the spider out with a newspaper and bravely continued on my way, pushing away the thought that other scary creatures might be lurking.  You owe me big time.  I want a frock”. 
2nd message:  [a little bitterness and revenge creeping through the voice] “I am now in your house and I am smoking!  Not happy.”


Me and Spider story

Four years ago I had moved into my latest house and had a long haired carpet laid.  I was very happy with my house and a few weeks in I was walking up the stairs to go to bed at about 11 PM.  I looked up and saw a large huntsman – yes I know they seem to follow me, probably looking for revenge - up high on the wall on the next level.  Deciding I needed to catch it before it got into the bedroom and frightened me to death in the night by walking on my face, or before the cats investigated it and got bitten, I gathered my usual spider catching equipment. This time I could judge the right sized bowl needed.  I proceeded to try to catch it only to drive it further up the wall.  So cleverly, I got the broom to gently ’encourage’ it to come down where I could get it.  Unfortunately it dropped straight onto the long haired carpet and started straight for the bedroom. There I was on hands and knees frantically chasing it plopping the bowl down just a little too late to catch it.  Lucky for me but not so lucky for the spider, the long haired carpet must have made it like trying to run through long thick grass.  It seemed to run in slow motion lifting its legs high in a sort of staggering gait. This slowed it down enough so I just caught it in the doorway.  Breathing a sigh of relief I carried it down the stairs carefully opened the back door and stepped out straight into a large spider web strung across the doorway.  When I finished shrieking and doing a parody of the spider dance while still clutching the bowl, I placed the bowl on the bench and cleared the web from the doorway.  Then Through the remaining panicky shreds of thought, I realized it was best not to create another colony down the back of the new house and took the bowl out the front and released the spider into the gutter, whereupon it lurched across the road toward another house.  I imagined I could almost hear its footsteps because it was so big.  I had a momentary bout of guilt about launching the spider onto the new neighbours, but eventually after a short struggle, brushed that aside and went inside to settle down before going up to bed.  In hindsight I suppose this should have sent a few warning signals up about spiders and doorways and paranoid thoughts I wrote about in the 1st post.  But then I was blissfully unaware.  

Nowadays I am learning how to live in harmony most of the time with the spiders that inhabit my yard and house. There are some lovely stories about the various types of spiders that I will share sometime in the future.  This time it’s been about the funny encounters.