Snarks and Ladders

Questions totally stolen from All and Sundry, same as every other thieving bastard on the internet

1. What did you do in 2011 that you’d never done before?

Ummmm… moved in with the boy?  Apart from that, there wasn’t really a heap of new ground covered.  Oh, and applied for new jobs/promotions as well (one of which I actually managed to get, thank ceiling cat, because otherwise I’d be looking forward to another year of endless debt and sadness!)

2. Did you keep your new year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year?

I kinda suck ass at resolutions.  Don’t think I made any, although I usually plan to write more.  And then I fail at it.

I guess this year’s resolution will be the same.  Write more.  Take more pictures.  Stop losing the charger for my camera’s battery so I can take more pictures.

3. Did anyone close to you give birth?
Two of my very close friends had their baby Piper in November.  Two other good friends had their baby Gabriella on New Year’s Eve, as did my uncle and his girlfriend, welcoming Noah in to the world just before midnight.

4. Did anyone close to you die?
Thankfully, no.  A few people died who weren’t close close friends, but that was about it.

5. What countries did you visit?

None, sadly.  Travel plans are on hiatus due to lack of funds, lack of motivation, and a stupid but irrepressible desire to buy a house and start a family.  Gah.

6. What would you like to have in 2012 that you lacked in 2011?
The ability to cope with shit.  I suspect that is coming along nicely, thanks to the wonders of modern science, medication, and all that jazz.

A house of my god damn own.  I am so tired of living in teacher housing, and I want to be able to do all the things one can do to their own home (that is – start renovating and never finish, put pictures up everywhere then move them again, and constantly have to spend money fixing things).

Save money for once in my life (I know this goal is totally incompatible with the above goal).

7. What dates from 2011 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
None that I can think of, although I am notoriously bad with dates.  It was more a year of a lot of really blah shit, with nothing memorable jumping out at me at the moment.

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
Got a promotion.  I guess that’s pretty good.  Alternatively, I actually got off my arse and went to the doctor – it’s only taken me my whole life to sort my head out, so that’s something.

9. What was your biggest failure?

Attempting to fix my finances… only to make them worse.  Many many times.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
Nothing major or specific that I can think of.  Just the usual colds, broken toes, and a hellish 3 month long bout of asthma that landed me in the god damn hospital and in bed for quite a while.  Curse you, cotton farmers.

11. What was the best thing you bought?
Does it count if I say my dog?  Because she is pretty fricking awesome.  Apart from that, I tried to refrain from spending money last year, and I think I did OK.

12. Where did most of your money go?

Bills.  Debts from years previous.  New fridge and other shit we needed for the house.  Feeding the zoo.

13. What did you get really excited about?

Not much really.  Getting a promotion, I guess, even if that did cause 4 months or so of stress waiting for contractual details to be finalised.

14. What song will always remind you of 2011?

Not in a good way, that bloody Party Rock Anthem by LMFAO.  Gah.  Never chaperoning a school disco again.  Played. To. Death.

15. Compared to this time last year, are you:

– happier or sadder? Well… generally sadder, thanks to a couple of major depressive episodes.

– thinner or fatter? Fatter.  Easily fatter.
– richer or poorer? Poorer.  Although I think that’s a constant for life.

16. What do you wish you’d done more of?

Cooking.  I’ve really cut back on the baking, and it shows in my stress levels.  Although it meant I did lose some weight.  Taking pictures… I will find my camera charger somewhere!  Getting out with the dogs more at the river… I’m very unfit, they are very unfit, it’s just a sad state of affairs all round.

17. What do you wish you’d done less of?

Arguing with the boy.  I really have had no patience last year.  Wallowing in sadness instead of doing something about it.  Hiding in the house.

18. How did you spend Christmas?
With my parents, same as every year, at their place.  Did not see the boy at all.  Subject of much anger and argument, which still kinda pisses me off when I think about it.  I might be over it by next Christmas, perhaps.

19. What was your favorite TV program?

Community.  Hands down.  I was probably more addicted to Community than any other show, and there were some good shows last year.

20. What were your favorite books of the year?

Oh my.  I got off my arse and read the Hunger Games trilogy last year, which I really enjoyed.  I’m sure I read other books, but there were so many they all just kinda blurred together.  And I rarely buy ‘new’ books, so nothing that was released in 2011.

21. What was your favorite music from this year?

2011 felt like a giant black hole of musicdom.  Yukyukyuk.  Although I rarely go to the effort to listen to anything new – I don’t often get the opportunity to listen to my music anymore.

22. What were your favorite films of the year?

Again, giant black hole.  It’s like 2011 was the year culture died.  Harry Potter was pretty wonderful.  Apart from that, I don’t remember feeling excited about anything.  I did enjoy 50/50, but technically it hadn’t been released I think.

23. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?

I went to the pub, didn’t get drunk if I recall correctly.  Worked, because my birthday always falls in the last week of term.  My kids did buy me chocolate and lollies, which was really awesome.  I turned 26.

24. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?

Being organised and feeling less anxious.  I might have actually gotten somewhere.  Possibly putting off having the boy move in?  Although I don’t think that would have changed much.

25. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2011?

This year was the year of baggy, tent like tops.  I am swimming in tent like clothing.  Or it is swimming on me.  Either way.

26. What kept you sane?

Nothing.  I think we can count this as the year I felt most insane.  All the time.  2012 will be sane though, I hope!

27. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2011.

You aren’t imagining things.  Usually.  Seek help.

Tags: 2011, Year in Review, Yep I did one of those...

I had my doctors appointment this morning, which turned out to be very fruitful.  After a long discussion, the doctor diagnosed me with both depression and social phobia (which is also referred to as social anxiety disorder).  While it’s a little scary to know that these are things I am going to have to deal with, it’s also immensely relieving to know that I wasn’t just imagining things.  It was awfully hard to shake the feeling that the doctor would tell me to just get over it and move on.

The depression diagnosis wasn’t immensely surprising, but the social phobia one kinda was.  I just associated all the different things I was feeling as one thing, and didn’t ever think that they might be separate.  When I tried to articulate my feelings about going out and social situations to my partner, he just looked at me like I had two heads, and told me I had to try and just deal with it and get over it.  Which, to be fair, might sound realistic to most people – when I say I am ‘terrified’ of talking to people I don’t know, it just sounds like a giant hyperbole.  I was too embarrassed to ever mention the other things – the fact that, even though I know it’s irrational, I always feel like people are talking about me if I can’t hear the conversation.  If someone walks past me laughing with a friend, I always leap to the conclusion they are laughing at me.  And while I know none of this makes sense, it’s impossible to shake.

The doctor prescribed a low dose of a SSRI (one of the apparently many different types of medications used to treat depression).  It’s going to be a long road ahead – she said it can take quite some time to get the dosage right, and sometimes you need to chop and change between medications until you find the one that is the right fit for you.  I’ll have to do a lot of travelling to make sure I get to all my doctor’s appointments over the next 6 months or so while we work it all out, but that’s OK.  While the boy seems to be dealing with the diagnosis as a bad thing (no one likes hearing that they are ‘sick’), I think it’s a positive.  I’m finally able to move forward in the right direction and start to feel better about myself.  The doctor believes that I’ve had depression for a really long time (turns out a lot of the stuff I dismissed as ‘teenage angst’ probably wasn’t after all) and I’ve just dismissed it for various reasons (“I’m just a teenager”  “I’m stressed”  “I’m just tired from work” “I’m living alone, it doesn’t matter because I can just hide in the house”).

I’m just relieved that I am finally getting somewhere.  I’m a little scared about the medication process, but I think that it will all work out well in the long run.  The first couple of weeks will be the scariest – the doctor said that sometimes the medication can make you feel worse while you adjust to it, and that it’s likely I will feel absolutely terrible.  But, hey, I am lucky enough to have this as an outlet.  So if things around here get really glum, don’t be too concerned – it’s probably just the medication.

It’s exciting anyway – there’s hope I might actually feel better!

Tags: Depression, Doctor, hope, Social Phobia

I know that I have said a million and one times that I will head to the doctor and get my mind checked out.  And I know that, most every time I plan to go to the doctor about anything, I end up cancelling the appointment.  What can I say, medical professionals make me antsy.

Well, I am actually going to the doctor.  Partly because I can not take feeling like this any more, partly because it is killing my relationship, as well as most of my friendships.  I guess I am more motivated now that someone else has to live with me, and therefore live with it… when it was just affecting me, it wasn’t such a big deal.

Now, I might not be suffering from depression after all.  Self diagnosis is a fool’s game.  But I have been poking around, reading about it, and did three of the surveys on the beyondblue website – all of which had alarming results.

I scored 43 on the K10 test, which is ‘high risk’.  I scored 8 on the DSM, which again indicates high risk. On the SPHERE Questionnaire, I scored 26 – a score of 3 or more indicates a possibility of a depressive illness.

So, I’m going to see a doctor.  I probably didn’t need the tests to tell me to be worried, to be honest – any one who has known me for a decent length of time will be able to tell you that I am horribly indecisive, blame myself for most everything that goes wrong, have little faith in my abilities, and am always very confused when people say they actually like me.  Since I have felt these things for as long as I can remember, I always assumed they were normal.  Apparently, it’s not normal at all.

I read some studies that think depression and other depressive illnesses may be sometimes caused by genetics.  If so, that would make a lot of sense.  My mother and my maternal grandmother both have been diagnosed with depression.  My paternal grandmother, and one of her sisters, both had nervous breakdowns (I am sure there is a proper medical term, but I don’t know what it is… that i just what the family have always referred to it as) at a young age.  I don’t have any memories of my grandmother actually speaking.  She rarely left the house, and spent most of her time attending to domestic duties in absolute silence.  My father, and both my grandfathers, were alcoholics.  Thankfully my father is not as bad as either of my grandfathers…. I guess he is what you would call a ‘functioning alcoholic’ – he holds down a good job, does everything that people are ‘meant’ to do… he just also drinks.  A lot.  Every day.  So, yeah, if that sort of stuff is passed down the gene pool, well… I might have been kinda screwed from the get go!

So, like I said, I am going to see a doctor.  I’ve put everyone else through enough torment, between my irrational anger, perpetual crying, and everything else.  I wasn’t really sure if I should post about it, but I figured that more people should be open about this sort of thing – if it didn’t feel so shameful, like admitting I have a weakness or something, I might have sought help long ago.  Rationally, I know that depression is an illness, not a sign of weak character or anything like that.  But for some reason, I can’t see it that way when it comes to myself.  Maybe more people talking about it openly will help, and I hope me writing about my experiences will help others.

Anyway, off to the doctor hopefully this week!  I call on Wednesday to try and get an appointment (being Christmas, they aren’t actually open until then), and I will try and cajole and wheedle my way into one ASAP.  Wish me luck!

Tags: Depression, Seeking Help

If you couldn’t work it out from the title… I’m talking about periods.  Or, as I like to refer to it, “The wonderful gushing confirmation of a non-violated uterus.  Baby not on board!”

This ad has been on TV a lot lately, and it has been bugging the heck out of me. 

Kotex, the wonderful company that they are, decided to do some research into periods.  Apparently, 72% of us wear our daggy undies when we have our period, which seems to be the singular most important finding they made. 

Kotex seem to believe this is because we are scared of our pads leaking or some such thing.  Can’t be ruining your good underpants now!

Well, I don’t actually know about the rest of the menstruating community… but pad leakage is one of the furthest things from my mind when I choose my knickers in the morning.

I’m thinking about more important things.  Like the fact I have bloated to the size of a small car.  Or the fact I just don’t want lace anywhere near my nether regions.  Or the fact that my big, baggy undies are the most comfortable things in the universe.

So, make your pads as leak proof as you like.  That’s pretty awesome. But I am still going to be wearing my daggy undies, regardless.

Please inform me – is this just me?  Really? 

Tags: Daggy Undies, Kotex, Menstruation, Pads

There are many many things which are absolutely amazing to me right now.  One of them being the absolute stupidity of the Kardashians.  And how much money they earn for being stupid.  Gah!

See, here’s little old me.  Dreaming big dreams of buying my dream house, and secretly sobbing because I know that, by the time I save the deposit, said house will probably be gone. 

Then we have KK.  Who made $12 million last year.  I’m not sure how she made that much money, because I am 99% certain that making a sex tape and entering an ill advised and very short marriage would result in me losing most of my money, not to mention dignity, pride, and general, well, me-ness. 

Not that I haven’t contemplated it, mind you.  I have been pondering a number of schemes to raise money in a short time, and most of them haven’t been feasible.

Bank robbery:  I run far too slowly, and I am pretty sure banks don’t actually have large amounts of cash on hand any more.

Phone Sex Operator: seriously considered this.  I have strong doubts about my ability to sound sexy, I don’t know if I could handle listening to strange things without giggling, and I think the boy might perhaps object.  And I doubt it actually makes anyone a lot of money, really.

Win the lottery: Not really something you can plan for.  Also requires me to buy lottery tickets.  Or to steal them, but most people I see buying lottery tickets are old ladies, and that would make me feel bad.

Sell my stuff:  Who is going to pay a decent amount for any of my crap?  I’m already selling my car, and that’s not getting me anywhere! (P.S. – if anyone is in the market for a zippy small car, let me know)

Sell my eggs: Would totally do this.  Except I don’t think we have people who buy eggs in Australia, since I’m pretty sure it’s illegal to sell reproductive, um, matter here.  And I don’t think anyone would want my crazy ass eggs anyway.

Meet a rich and generous benefactor: Not even worth considering.

Make money from blogging: Bahahahahaha… blogging, the least profitable venture in the universe!  Unless I learn to be interesting, and write well, and market myself, and write every day, and all that jazz.

So, while the idea of my dream house is awesome… I don’t think I’m going to be able to Kardashian it and become rich and famous for no apparent reason at all.  Dang it.

Tags: dreams, house, Kardashianising Life, money

1 week.

62 teenagers.

16 hours on a bus there.

3 theme parks.

4 escapees.

15 hours on a bus back.

14 hours sleep.  All week.

1 case of bad sunburn.

55 pizzas.

150 sausages.

1 000 000 steps at White Water World (or something similar, I’m sure!)

4 000 kilometres travelled.

Got to love school excursion week!

Tags: Excursion

Things have been rather glum around here as of late.  Whine whine whine, blah blah blah, etc. Well, I’ve had enough of that crap already (as have you all, I’m sure!), so instead, I’m going to share a recipe (with no pictures until I unlazy myself… not that it’s an exciting looking food).

It’s been pretty hot here the last couple of days.  Hot enough that we all start dripping with sweat the minute we set foot outside, anyway (prompting horrible shrieks of “I’m melting!  I’m melting!”).  The cats are a fan of the weather – they sit inside under the air conditioner all day, and they enjoy licking sweat off people, because they are disgusting like that. The dogs aren’t such huge fans – Gracie has been trying to bury herself frantically under piles of dirt, and Willie just lives in his little pond.  It’s already over 40 degrees, and it’s not even summer yet.  Heaven help us all.

Anyway, since it was rather warm, I decided to be kind and make the boy some Mango Sorbet.  We had a couple of mangoes that were just past good eating, but not rotten, so I figured it would be best not to waste them.  Now, I don’t know how good this recipe tastes, because I hate mangoes… but it looked pretty nice, and it’s damn easy.

You are going to need:

- Juice of one lemon

- Juice of half an orange

- Two mangoes

- 115g (1/2 Cup) Caster sugar

- 1 egg white, whisked

You will want to do the following:

1.  Juice the lemon and orange.  Mix the juice with the sugar.

2.  Peel the mangoes, and put all the fruit into the blender.  I find it easiest to cut off the cheeks, use the knife to make squares, and pull the fruit off piece by piece.  Then just hack at the rest or mangle it with your fingers to get the fruit off.  So long as you get as much of the fruit in the blender as you can, you should be fine.

3.  Blend the mango into a smooth puree.

4.  Combine the mango and juice/sugar mix.

5.  Fold in the whisked eggwhite.

6.  Churn in your ice cream machine.  If you don’t have one, put the mix in a frozen bowl, and store in the freezer.  Stir vigorously with a fork or something similar every 20 minutes or so.

7.  When done, store in the freezer in a sealed container for up to one month.

Easy peasy lemon squeezy!  Although mine would have been easier if the juicer attachment for my food processor hadn’t mysteriously vanished.  Oh well.  I guess mango is appropriate, because if the boy doesn’t try it soon I might just tell him where to go!

Tags: Baking, Ice cream maker, mango sorbet, Recipe

It was about 11pm when we go home from the pub. We’d both had a few drinks, and it had been a pretty enjoyable night.  The boy had just finished his dinner, and I was lying in bed re-reading The Hunger Games books while the boy gave me a back rub.  It was probably the first night since we had our big argument that everything seemed to be going ok.

At about midnight, the dogs started causing a fuss.  The boy got up to investigate, and he found Izzy convulsing on the front lawn.  He brought her inside, and while he tried to figure out what was wrong with her, I started calling the vet.

Unfortunately, the vet who works in my town also runs a clinic in a town 150 kilometres away.  Just so happens, Wednesday night is the night that she stays in that town.  She told me it sounded like a snake bite or some other type of poison, and recommended that we get her to a vet ASAP.  She wasn’t able to get to the clinic in her town, as she was minding two small children, but she advised me to try a couple of other vets out of town.  Unfortunately, the closest was 280 kilometres away.

Now, both the boy and I had been drinking, and we had definitely had too much to drive.  But there wasn’t anything else to be done – we jumped in the car and I drove as fast as I possibly could while he nursed Izzy, who was still convulsing and foaming at the mouth, in the back seat of the car.  It was probably madness – here we were, both well over the legal limit, driving far in excess of the speed limit, in the middle of the night, dodging kangaroos all over the road, which was wet and slippery from all the rain we had been having.

Unfortunately, about 15 minutes outside of the town we were headed to, two hours after we found her in the front yard, Izzy passed away.  She went quiet, and about five minutes later, she was gone.  We drove her home, and put her in her bed, where the other dogs slept all night with her.  They haven’t seen death before, and they were very confused, spending all night licking her, trying to wake her up.

We thought that the dogs must have disturbed a snake, and it had bitten her, until later the next afternoon, when we found out our next door neighbour’s dog had died that night as well. Dog baiting is horribly common in our community, although usually the poisoned food is left in paddocks or on the levee bank, rather than thrown into yards.  It’s far too much of a coincidence for both dogs to have been bitten on the same night.

I honestly don’t know what I will do if I ever find out who did it.  I hope it isn’t one of my students, or their parents, because I just don’t think I could cope with it.  Crime in general is getting worse, and this sort of thing is becoming a problem. Just the other day, someone threw a marrow bone over a friend’s fence for their dog to get.  However, they had wrapped the marrow bone in barbed wire.  I don’t understand what sort of sick, twisted person would do this to someone’s pet.  What pleasure could they possibly get out of it?

Farewell, Izzy.  You were with us for such a short time, but you were one of the most wonderful dogs I have ever known.

Tags: Dog baiting, Izzy

I thought it was only fair that we dealt with my areas of responsibility in this whole mess.  After all, it does take two to manage all this!

I have this ridiculous thing where I need to feel loved/appreciated.  Perhaps more so than normal people.  Unfortunately, the boy is of the opposite persuasion, which makes things difficult.  Being told I love you twice in eight months (and only when he is drunk?)  Rare physical affection?  Unfortunately, not enough for me.  So, while he thinks I should know that he loves me, well… I just don’t.

When I don’t feel loved, I tend to withdraw into a horrible, hard little shell.  Which really makes things worse, because it makes me exceptionally unlovable.  I get really cranky and snarky, and end up blowing up over things that really aren’t blow up-able.

This meant I’ve spent the last month in a pretty horrific snit.  Combine this with the whole lack of sleep thing, and I’ve been a hideous bitch.  I’m kinda surprised he’s put up with it so long, to be honest.

Unfortunately, he can’t see why he needs to show me some affection.  I can’t see why he can’t manage that.  Combine that with his level of pissed off over my temper and explosions, and yeah.  I think we have hit the point of no return.

So, yes.  A lot of this is his fault.  But a lot of it is mine as well.  But you know, I’m feeling much happier at the thought of it being over.  Not because I don’t love him (I do, very much), but because I’m just plain tired of feeling this shitty all the time.  Now I can go back to being content with my two cats, two dogs, my wee blog, and a few books.  Life will be simple again.

Tags: Beginnings, Endings, The Blame Game

So, the boy and I had a discussion of sorts last night about why things aren’t working lately.  We have (kinda) sorted things out, but in the public interest, I’ve decided to let you all know some really dumb things that you just shouldn’t say (which I always thought were kinda self evidently stupid, but apparently not)

Me:  “You don’t listen to me"

Him: “You need to learn to deal with your problems differently instead of complaining to me about them”

(Because I’m no longer allowed to vent if I have a bad day.  This was followed with “Find someone else to talk to”.  Yeah, I could probably complain a little less.  However, things have been super stressful right now, and I have no one else to talk to about it.  Gah!)

Me: You don’t appear to even care about me.  I don’t think there’s even anything you like about me

Him: There’s plenty of things I like about you.  You can cook, you can clean, you have a job…

(Oh yeah.  He said that.  In all seriousness.  And didn’t even add anything else.)

Me: When was the last time we spent time together?

Both of us:… *silence*

5 minutes later…

Him: Oh, and I’ll be having dinner with the boys tomorrow night.

So after we both worked out a major issue is we don’t talk or spend time together anymore, he tells me he’s not even going to bother being home the next night. Right.

He’s not usually a total asshole.  But my goodness, he did not do well last night.  He did not do well at all!

Tags: REALLY?!?!?