How is it that a person can do all the right things eg. do the reading, do extra research, write up a pithy paper making important points, find an excellent video which illustrates said points (as well as funny looking 1972 German haircuts), bring in bright and colourful props, actively enjoy chatting to people and be really enthusiastic about their topic but still manage to give a really crap tutorial presentation?
Public speaking is hateful.
Hateful.
Also hate video players with no obvious counter devices on them.
Bit dark on funny looking 1972 German haircuts too – although it’s really not their fault.

Get up early on weekend to take dog for walk. Most productive. Excellent.
Which allows me to put on all washing and get it onto line before 9.00 am. Most productive. Excellent.
Which allows me to go to market to stock up on provisions for forthcoming week (yes, yes, mr deli man – I know I’m earlier than usual. Sheesh.) Most productive. Excellent.
Which allows me to make an earlier than expected start on the reading for my uni presentation on Monday. Most productive. Excellent.
Hmmmm, productivity will be much enhanced by moving into sunshine. Ha, ha! Most productive. Excellent. Also v cosy. Excellent. Reading, reading. Lovely sunshine. Oooh, get a little snack. Lovely, reading, snacking, sunshine. Excellent. Reading, lovely, snacking, sunshine, lovely, reading, sunshine, sunshine, lovely, cosy, lovely, read….. zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
Snork!!
What?? What??
Oh no. Have woken self up with loud snorking/snoring noises.
How many hours have gone by??
Productive morning. I’m not sure where the afternoon went.

Sure, she looks like a dog.
And sounds like a dog.
And acts like a dog.
But she smells like a duck.
Eeewwh!!
Dogs are such low lifes. They have no couth between them. None.
My Maisie is a fine example.
Hmmm, is there something disgusting out here to eat? Yes? Then, I’ll eat it! (This morning was not so bad – she found a chicken and lettuce sandwich and an apple, both of which she ate, including the greaseproof paper in which they were wrapped).
Hmmm, is there something disgusting out here to roll in. Yes? Then, I’ll roll in it! (This morning it was the dreaded duck poo. Good for smearing to really get the odour de’ duck spread across every stinking fibre of her coat. Very, very rank.)
I am deeply unimpressed.
I’d like to say that she is just acting out because she misses her other mum who is away at the moment. It’s not true though. She actively likes to eat and roll in things disgusting.
It’s just what dogs do. (Even if they are cunningly disguised as ducks!)

It’s not often that a battling little teachers’ organisation like the one I work for gets a mention in Parliament. But we made it today! Right there in Hansard (I just looked it up.) How about that? Enshrined forever as an inconsequential political pawn in the ongoing slanging match between the opposition and the government. As a consequence we are now on a first name basis with the shadow minister for education (“Just call me Vic”)! But do you think this means we’ll get our funding back?? Do they care as much as they seemed to this afternoon?? Time will tell, I guess.

It is not enough now for Adam, our indefatigable personal trainer, simply to come down to Footscray Park twice a week with his implements of torture at the ready (medicine balls, weights, those stretchy things, skipping ropes, etc) and a new boot-camp style regime of exercise to inflict upon us.
Oh, no. Star Fitness Inc has moved on into the match making game (abley assisted, I might add, by one of my partners-in-exercise and Adam’s star pregnant lady client the lovely Melia).
Apparently, it’s the new ‘holistic’ approach to fitness.
Adam appears to feel he is on a mission to find me the perfect man among his clients. He has already come up with a couple of suggestions and arrived on Monday with a photograph of the person he thinks is the most eligible. “You’d get along great”, he assures me. “His name is ….. [recites list of relevant statistics.]”
I am aghast.
Everyone else is immensely interested.
With such a panel of experts working on my behalf, Adam finds them and Melia vets them while Justine appears to find the whole thing a little too hilarious, who knows what the future might hold?

On the weekend I put six pairs of gardening gloves into the washing machine. (That’s three pairs each for all the gardening members of my household. A tad excessive you might think – but they date back to a couple of working bee days we’ve had where volunteers turn up to assist with more-than-two-person renovation tasks in return for a pair of gardening gloves, beer and a free lunch!)
Anyway, freshly laundered, I put them out on the line in the sunshine to dry. Little bit of sunshine and lots of wind – they’ll dry in no time.
As I pottered about the yard it was hard not to notice them flapping madly in the wind. At one stage I had the distinct impression that twelve little green and yellow hands were waving at me.
This was topped off by a particularly vicious gust of wind which whipped the gloves into a frenzy – it was just like an audience of six frantically applauding my gardening efforts.
In the midst of this chorus of approval I took a bow in the general direction of my ‘public’ hanging out on the clothes line.
And with a flourish disappeared inside the house to reward my fine efforts with a hot cup of tea ‘n a biscuit.

In the course of a conversation:
He says: “You’re a regular Humphrey Bear aren’t you, Marita?”
She says: “I’m a what?”
He says: “You’re just like Humphrey Bear.”
She says: “Oh.”
Pause.
She says: “OK, so just what do you mean?”
He says: “Well, you lead a very exciting life.”
She says: “Oh, just shut up.”
He says: “… and honey’s your favourite fare…”
She says: “Really, just shut up.”
He says: “… which is hardly so very surprising, you’re a really amazing old b….”
She says: “Right, I’m leaving. Now!”
Conversation ends.

My workplace is salubriously located a few doors down from a brothel. It’s mostly quite unassuming (except for the name of the establishment which is painted in large letters on the front window – thereby not really constituting what is usually thought of as ‘unassuming’ at all). By and large however, it’s pretty discreet. Its interior is normally left strictly to the imagination. Except for this morning. As I wandered by it was obvious that the front door had been kicked in (all that splintered wood on the pavement and the door lying on its side in the driveway was a sure sign). Trouble. But also an opportunity for a glimpse into the unknown. What lies within? Something gaudy? Something tawrdy? Spangles? Mirrors? Exotica? Erotica? What? What?
I looked. And I saw …. roomy, floral, comfy-looking couches. Like what your Nanna has in her loungeroom. Couches you could curl up and watch TV with a lovely cup of tea ‘n a biscuit on.
Tawdry? Ha! It looked cosy.
It was a bit disappointing really.

Moseying down the street to catch the train to work this morning I noted a new sign at the corner of a largish intersection.
In flashing lights it urged drivers to ‘Give way to peds’. I did a double take having initially read it as ‘Give way to beds’ (and given my recent sightings of roving mattresses that may well have been apt!)
But, if not beds, give way to what?
Pedants? (I know several locals, but not enough to warrant a sign surely.)
Peddlers? (It is Footscray, after all.)
Pedestals? (At a stretch.)
I wonder what I’ll see the next time I try to round that corner in the car?

Bad pasta.
Food poisoning.
Felt miserable.
Threw up.
Other stuff.
Went home.
Better now.
Sort of.