The Percussion in my Laundry

I thought you might miss me while I'm gone, so I just thought I'd schedule a weekend post so that you don't go into withdrawal.

I'm probably sitting in a meeting hall discussing the church's constitution and hoping that the reading that I started doing a month ago has not entirely slipped out of my head while I was trying to finish the rest of it.

So I'm probably more in need of the escape than you are. But I don't have access to the net, therefore I will have to maintain my concentration on weighty subjects. So I'll post about something that I would normally be doing on a Saturday, right?

And I probably should proof-read this with care, because although I'm planning a Saturday post, I'm actually writing this on Tuesday. So my past, present and future tense could be fatally confused. So you're officially warned.

I'm currently, I mean last Tuesday I was sitting at my computer and listening for the end of the washing cycle.

The machine is one we inherited when my Nan got a new front-loading one, and I was only too glad to retire our twin-tub because you have to stand there the whole time and swap the washing from the washer to the spinner to the laundry tub, rinse it out, back to the spinner and hang it out before next load of washing is ready for its first spin. It's a high pressure job because every minute that the washing sits waiting for its turn in the spinner is another minute the operator is chained to the laundry.

Boy, I'd forgotten the pain of it all until I was just writing that all out. Gee, I'm glad that I now use an automatic.

But the sad thing is that our new second-hand automatic had a bit of an issue a few months ago, where it decided that it wouldn't drain. And although my Beloved got it going again, it's been making some interesting noises when it's spinning. And I'm going to miss it when it's gone.

But for the meantime, I'm just trying to enjoy the percussive rhythm (which is a word that should have more vowels - or actually some vowels) and wondering which dance would fit to the odd repetition of clunking, slapping and creaks that are coming from the general direction of the laundry. I'm guessing Samba.

It's probably a bit fast for a geriatric ward, but the type of noises would fit nicely.

The chance that this music would ever make it to "Dancing with the Stars"?

... Approximately None!

Escaping to the Anonymity of the City

So it is now unavoidable. The wisdom teeth are coming out. Recommended by the dentist and oral surgeon, they only have weeks left in my mouth. It turns out that it would have been better for them to come out when I was in my twenties, as they are now well fused into the jawbone and one in particular has a little kick that is going to make life ...interesting.

Not that I care, because I will be unaware of anything going on. Much better than having the couple of actual problem ones out in the chair.

I like the totally asleep part of the concept.

I was glad that the surgeon only has theatre time in two Toowoomba Hospitals, because I do a fair bit of hospital visiting here and know many of the staff by sight, if not to talk to. And if I find it hard to be a Christian before about 8.30 in the morning, how would I do recovering from a general anaesthetic and in pain?

Just as well to disappear into the anonymity of a Toowoomba Hospital where I won't know anyone.

Except that the day I selected (that fitted into my schedule with a week off to recover) is at a hospital where I know one of the administrators.

That's okay, she won't see me when I'm in pain or coming out of the anaesthetic.

But I then found out that the nurse practitioner for this particular surgeon at this particular hospital is the daughter of one of our church ladies, and I've met her on a number of occasions. I probably know her better than most of the hospital staff here.

Chance that I saw that one coming?

... Approximately None!

Linguini Jen

Well, I've been keeping something in my closet.

It's probably about time I 'fessed up.

It's just that it might change the way you think about me, and I'm not certain I can cope with that...

In April I was commissioned as a Pastor in my church, although I prefer "Linguini" as a title, because it is more fun to say. (Get it - Pasta/Pastor - oh, nevermind)



See, I told you that you'd think about me differently.

But I haven't actually changed at all, as evidenced by a moment at our Church Council meeting this afternoon.

I had visited with a family when their husband/father passed away last week. The funeral is tomorrow. When it came up during the meeting every connection to everyone else and every place any of the kids had ever worked was part of the discussion. This is part of belonging to a small country town, and making certain that everyone knew if it was the same "John Citizen" they knew, or Fred Citizen's Dad that was about to be buried.

I mean, it's terrible if you've mentally buried the wrong person's father. Particularly when some of the old names are around here in plague proportions. Next time you see a client and give them your condolences only to find out it was John Citizen, second cousin once removed, who died, not their Dad who also happens to be John Citizen, because he was named after the first one.

Of course, it's even worse if you see someone up the street who you mentally buried six months ago. You can't really greet them with, "Hey, great to see you, I thought you were dead!"

So in our meeting the ages of the kids came up. One of the other ladies said that one of the sons was the same age as one of her kids, thereby making him 41.

At which I said, "Well, he certainly doesn't look it, I would have said he wasn't much older than me."

Whereupon I remembered that I am actually 35. He's not that much older than me.

There was much hilarity at my expense, particularly given that my inclusion on the Church Council has probably dropped the average age of the group to about 55.

And my church is sending me to the national assembly in Sydney?

How much did they think that through?

... Approximately None!

Amazing Miracle Baggage

Just to let you know that I will be incommunicado for a week or so starting next Wednesday. Of course, with what I've got to do before then I may be incommunicado prior to that, but not because I have no access, just because I haven't time to sit at the computer.

Anyway, I'm flying to Sydney for a church conference as one of the Queensland representatives. What is the Queensland Standing Committee thinking sending me?

Some years ago I went to the bother of buying a beautiful wheelie port ('suitcase' for foreigners and mexicans - no, not the real mexicans, just all those who live south of the border).

It was of a standard for all the overseas travel I was dreaming of, matched my back-pack, and had the zip around extra bit for when you have more stuff going home again. I cleverly got the middle size not the portable wardrobe size, nor the tiny could-almost-count-as-cabin-luggage size. I thought I'd done well.

Until I got it home.

At that point I realised that the car trip back to home from Rockhampton had caused the port to swell and stretch to an amazing size. Good thing that the journey wasn't longer, or I'd have split the seams of my car.

Anyway, I use it sometimes, but it really is too big, so I often borrow baggage from my parents, because they have smaller wheelie ports that meet the size requirements of airlines and don't require me to pack extra things just to fill it up.

But next year Mum and Dad are taking us on a big family trip to Malaysia. The typical Mum, Dad and two kids, just adding two spouses (spice?) and a grandchild (and - my mother has pointedly informed us all - any subsequent issue arriving betwixt now and then).

This means that the option of borrowing a port from Mum and Dad is not going to work. So I decided to go this morning and buy a suitable suitcase that I could take to Sydney, and would also be one of the two required for next year.

I vacillated between the 24" and the 26" versions in my preferred model. Yes, for some strange reason they still measure baggage in inches. And litres. (I don't get it, it's a bit like going into a hardware shop and asking for a 1.2 metre length of 2" x 4") Anyway there were 10 litres difference between the two.

I decided to go with the smaller one on the basis that baggage increases in size between the shop in which one buys it and the residence of the purchaser. But I decided to take some time to think about it, rang my parents to see what size theirs were, and went back and looked at them both open again and decided that there wasn't all that much extra room, but that it would be useful to have and the price difference was negligible.

So how surprised was I when I got it home to find that it is huge? (albeit not as huge as my existing one)

... Approximately None! *sigh*

So it Appears We Are Certainly Moving...

... but I'll get back to that in a minute.

I've moved heaps of times in my life. My Dad worked for the government, and we spent time as a family in Bundaberg, Barcaldine, Brisbane - notice a theme developing, we started near the beginning of the alphabet (before moving onto the next letter) - Cloncurry - and then skipped a whole heap of letters because Mum and Dad were sick of moving and decided to settle down.

Unfortunately, my current location does not host a University at all, and certainly not one that offered Town Planning, so I had to move to Brisbane to study, and then work.

After a few years of work I desperately needed OUT of the city (and my job was headed nowhere), so I started applying for Local Government work in regional centres that would have more variety.

So I moved, all alone and knowing no-one, to the lovely coastal village of Yeppoon (near Rockhampton) and enjoyed some years there. And caught myself a man. Yes, ironically enough having had a wide variety of men around at uni and reasonably large church, I fell in love with the 1 (one, let's count it out... one) single man between 18 and 45 in the smaller church. Don't tell me that God doesn't have a sense of humour.

Eventually though a small Council didn't have anywhere for me to go, so we went off to seek greener pastures a bit closer to my family (okay, back here where my parents have stayed put ever since we first moved here as a family).

So during my life I have been moved, I have chosen to move myself, and then dragged my spouse along with me as I moved.

The thing is that I don't actually like moving.

So to get back to the point of this whole yarn - on Saturday we were doing some very necessary house cleaning and I got frustrated about the fact that I still had Kevin the Kenwood Kitchen Machine's box sitting around because I hadn't decided if I should keep it or throw it out. Original boxes are very useful if you ever move again, because the styrofoam holds them in just the right position so that they are less likely to be damaged. But you have to find a place to store a half-empty box of styrofoam for all the years until then.

In a moment of ruthlessness I cut up the box and recycled it.

And we all know that, according to the laws of the universe, the chances that we will now stay in this house forever are...

... Approximately None!

Dear Miss Manners...

My Mum doesn't have her own blog, but she certainly contributes ideas for mine from time to time.

She is particularly good value for a giggle when it has anything to do with computers.

You see, I'm very impressed with the fact she (who has almost entirely missed the computer age) can read emails and blogs and can buy stuff on eBay. That may be about all she can do, but it's pretty impressive for a woman whom I can remember getting excited about the fact that a personal computer will automatically put the whole word on the next line, without her worrying about how many characters are left and where the hyphen should go according to correct syllabilification (see, I don't even need to know the correct term for how to split up words correctly when you run out of characters in a line of type!)...

This afternoon we were talking about everything under the sun and she was telling a little story about wanting to respond to her sister's email, but that her sister had recently changed email address and Mum could no longer just click on her contact details and generate an email because Dad hadn't updated the contact list.

Apparently my Dad suggested that she could just click on the little button with the word "Reply" and it would go back to the new address from whence her sister's email message had been generated in the first place.

I thought that was entirely logical, but it was at this point that I learned a very important lesson in email etiquette.

According to the wacky world of my Mum it is just plain bad manners to send someone's email back to them with a reply message. In her view it is polite to generate a new, clean message to send back, with none of these strings of previous emailed interaction in the way contaminating it.

And her unregenerate daughter, who has been using email professionally for years, (as well as using the media for catching up with friends) laughed rather immoderately at her prejudice, followed by the request to please allow me to blog that.

How many people in cyberspace share this particular prejudice?

... I'm guessing, maybe, approximately none?

And what are the chances that we got to the point of her story about replying to my aunt's email?

... Approximately None!

The Rainbow in my Granny's Garden

This morning was a little foggy. This usually means it will clear to a beautiful clear blue sky day, but not today. Today was cloudy and there must have been odd spots of actual precipitation from time to time, if things that were dry, then were no longer dry are to be believed. I never caught it happening, though.

About mid-morning I looked out to our view to see a shadowy rainbow. And I tell you for certain that one end of it must have been firmly planted in my Grandmother's front yard.

Walked around to her this afternoon, but how many pots of gold were sitting about the place?

... Approximately None! *sigh*