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[05 Dec 2011|04:05am] |
We went to the Weta Cave!! For those for whom that is meaningless, Weta is the company which has done the special effects (material and digital) for The Lord of the Rings, District 9, Narnia, Avatar and most recently Tintin. They are also involved or solely responsible for Jane and the Dragon and The Wotwots. Also a bunch of other stuff. Anyway! They have a shop called the Weta Cave, which is quite small but delicious all the same. They sell a lot of high-end collectibles which are so wonderful, but so expensive. We browsed a bit and drooled a lot (well, I did) and eventually left with two bags of the cheaper stuff. There was a small play area, basically a play pen, which A particularly enjoyed. She laid claim to the sequined cloaks and only left after draping them carefully over the edge and saying "they'll wait for me to come back". A good omen!
Afterwards we went for lunch at a cafe overlooking Scorching Bay. The weather was damp, but the sea in the rain is just as beautiful as the sea in sunshine. I have had fish and chips with three different fish here: snapper, hoki and groper. All delicious - the hoki was the nicest.
Now we're back at home again. K, A and P put together a magnificent train track* while I gloated over our purchases. Tomorrow: Christchurch for me for the day while P and the girls entertain themselves. Wednesday, our last day, we'll spend in Wellington**, partly with me visiting the Victoria University and partly with me joining the rest of the family for Wellington fun :). Thursday we fly home - a 26 hour trip.
*I can hear the girls playing with the track right now. The game involves trains, superman and the fat controller (from Thomas the Tank Engine), also chortling.
**We are staying in Lower Hutt, outside Wellington. You'll probably find me conflating them some of the time, simply because most people have an idea where Wellington is but not Lower Hutt.
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[04 Dec 2011|09:32am] |
What did we do on Saturday? Lazed about for the morning and went to a local beach and playground in the afternoon. It was all in all a lazy day. It was nice to relax after the confusion of the conference and after the constrained habitat of a hotel room. Our girls and the two boys we are staying with seem to get along fine. K is the oldest, J1 the next, A next and J2 the youngest. J2 has taken a serious shine to my K.
Today we met with U, an old friend from Cape Town and it was really great to see her again. Later we, J1 and J1's dad went through to Wellington by train and visited the Te Papa museum. Giant squid! (Sorry, ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif?v=88.8) first_fallen, the plushy squid were cheaper than at the Auckland acquarium but still too $$. I checked.) It's a great museum for children, the curators have really thought about it and there are wonderful activities. Wait till you see my pics of the girls crawling around inside a to-scale Blue Whale's heart! A, of course, lost all use of her otherwise perfectly functional legs and had to be hauled about on a parent's hip or in J1's stroller. Show her a jungle gym and she's a duracell bunny. Oy.
I think my K needs some affirmation that she's the eldest, she seems to be going through a bit of a crisis. So I'm going to go off with her and buy some jewellery for us both, something special for us Big Girls.
Tomorrow, the primary focus of this entire trip. Forget the conference, we're off to the Weta Cave. The girls are supposed to be asleep, but are trying to kill one another. Excuse me while I go and sort it out ...
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[02 Dec 2011|11:27pm] |
The conference (The 8th Delta conference on the teaching and learning of undergraduate maths and stats) began on Sunday evening, so we spent the morning down at the "waterfront" while the girls played on a jungle gym, went on a carousel, ate ice cream, etc.
So, Rotorua, it's a weird place. The area is only slightly threateningly volcanic, with steaming water coming out of the ground all over the place and hot bubbling mud pools. Also sulphur flats. And a pong which overlies the entire town and was particularly strong around our hotel and, indeed, in our hotel room. The town itself is slightly seedy. All in all a very odd place, but certainly different from anywhere else I know and possibly you too! There are places one can go to see quite spectacular muddy geysers and multicoloured pools and thermal areas but they all cost $$$. So, we went to Waikite (why-KEE-tay) which was cheaper and not so muddy, but still very alien and interesting. Waikite is south of Rotorua and is a system of pools in which you can bathe after the water has been cooled to ~30C after gushing out of the ground at 98C. There is a walk one can take alongside the stream to the source, where you can sometimes make out the frothing geyser through the clouds of scaulding steam. Bizarre. So we swam in a swimming pool filled with, effectively, hot bath water. Fun :). And then we had fish and chips.
I'm getting ahead of myself, though, as the Waikite visit was on Wednesday. So, from my point of view the week went like this:
Sunday: fun at the waterfront, which is the edge of a warm lake (we could see clouds of steam rising off it in the mornings from our hotel room), then register for the conference, attend the welcome function and schmooze with delegates. The welcoming function involved lots of people in Maori dress shouting at us and being terribly aggressive until our representative managed to placate them and show we came in peace. I'm going to have to ponder this whole Maori thing as it's, to me, an odd mixture of culture taken very seriously and culture used as ever-so-ethnic pantomime.
Monday: lots of conferencing, evening drinks function
Tuesday: lots of conferencing, evening drinks function
Wednesday: Waikite and lots of happy shopping
Thursday: lots of conferencing, including both of my talks which seemed to go well.
Friday: half a day of conferencing and then hopping in the car at lunchtime to head down to Wellington.
From P's point of view, he's seen all the jungle gyms Rotorua has to offer (pretty fine examples of the genre, actually), including the ones in the volcanic park which also entertains passersby with bubbling hot mud pools. They took photos for me as I couldn't see them and one shouldn't come to Rotorua and not see bloopy mud.
On Thursday night we organised a baby sitter through the hotel so P and I could get to the conference dinner. More Maori being impressive, also mathematical origami. The baby sitter was about 110 years old and hard of hearing. K handled the experience ok and went to sleep easily. A put up a psychological fight and eventually went to sleep, apparently, standing next to the bed with her head drooping down onto the bed. She also told the baby sitter, quite emphatically, that she didn't like her. Ah well. No one was injured or kidnapped by ninjas, so all's well.
Friday afternoon was spent driving down to Lower Hutt (town outside Wellington) where we have good friends. right now is Saturday morning. The friends are off at gym while my girls spread the boys' toys all over the floor, P attempts to put more air in our air mattress and I catch up with the internet. Right! up to date.
Activities to come over the next few days, not necesarily in this order: visiting Wellington a few times, shopping, going to the Weta cave (!!!!), visiting the museum, shopping, meeting with our friend Ute (Maarten replied to emails months ago, but not to more recent ones, so probably no Maarten), oh yes and earning my grant money by schmoozing with Wellington academics and flying down (just me) to Christchurch for a day.
Thr bank has stopped answering my emails. It's been nover a week since we've heard from them. We have been told that it shoud be fine to simply avoid putting in a pin and sign for the credit card instead, but, with only one try left on my card before it gets blocked, we're reluctant to try. We're saving that for paying for the car hire when we drop it off as that will be ~R7000 and tricky to do with cash. Until then we continue to use the ATMs at exorbitant charges.
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[02 Dec 2011|10:56pm] |
Right, right, this blogging lark. So, on the Friday after I last posted we went to Auckland Zoo. It's a really nice zoo. We saw a red panda very briefly, but not for long enough to get a photo. We saw a real kiwi (!) in a darkened habitat. It was larger than I expected. We also saw wallabies and emus. There are a surprising number of African animals there: zebra, lions, elephants, giraffe, meerkats. The meerkat enclosure is quite fun as they (the human curators, not the meerkats) have made burrows underneath which humans can scurry through, even adults if they bend over a lot. I'm not remembering all the animals we saw, but I'll dig out the photos later and stick some up. Unfortunately by the time we got around to the area where the tuatara was we'd been there a long time and we were all tired, also it was starting to drizzle. So, no tuatara for me, which was disappointing. I'll just have to come back! K had a lovely time, but A acted like we were trying to extract a kidney the entire time, moaning and wailing and insisting we carry her. Little drama queen.
We watch the Wotwots, which is partly filmed at the Auckland zoo, and it was really obvious. All those lovely little bendy pathways with hedges on either side, very Wotwots.
In the afternoon we drove over to Devonport, which is a lovely little town across a body of water from Auckland proper. A very sweet little (wealthy) English country village sort of place. K was particularly taken with it and wanted to move there.
On Saturday we drove down to Rotorua via the Waitomo glowworm caves. The caves are fairly impressive, as caves are, just by themselves (similar organ thingummy to at the Cango Caves) but they also have these glowworms which live there, sticking to the tops of the caves and dangling gelatinous strings of goo a few inches long. You can only see the stringy goo if you look at them sideways, which we did manage where the walkway passed alongside a low overhang. Mostly you just see the glowing patches on the ceiling when the lights are turned off. Then, the guide took us on a boatride, in the caves, in the dark, while these glowworms gleamed overhead. It was quite otherwordly.
We arrived in Rotorua in the evening and settled into our very small and dull hotel room which pretends to sleep four people but provides unpacking space for one and glasses and mugs for two. After our stay in Auckland City Oaks, which is an "apartment hotel", the shift to a hotel room with no space and no potential for self catering was a bit of a shock. However! we had planned for this by bringing plastic bowls and cutlery from ZA. So it wasn't too bad. Next; the conference.
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[24 Nov 2011|08:42am] |
Yup, we did those things I said. It was good. The Underwater World was interesting and fun, but I don't think it can compare to the CT aquarium. I don't think that is only loyalty speaking. There were two things I liked that CT does not have: the giant squid (okay, it's dead, but still, giant squid!) and the "menus" for the sharks. Each type of shark had a menu with entree, main and dessert, with the typical foods they eat. Very cute. The Antarctic part of the place includes a trip in a sealed cart through their Antarctic environment with king and gentoo penguins, kept at 1 degree C. That was very nice indeed. It starts with a short trip through a sealed tunnel, all jagged white surfaces, with the walls rotating. This was to simulate "white out" and it was extremely disorientating. A was particularly freaked out.
Then we went off to the museum and had sandwiches before looking about. I left my new Gil McNeil in the loos. Grrr! We'll pop in tomorrow to ask if it has been turned in, but I have little hope. Let's see, there was a lot of Pacific Islander stuff, with a war canoe and lots and lots of carved wooden everything. There was a lot of general 'olden day' stuff, as K says. Also volcanoes, local fauna and flora, and almost a whole floor dedicated to war and, as they called it, "scars of the heart". We steered well clear of the holocaust stuff, but admired the fighter planes. There was a bit of video footage of air warfare and A was quite vocal about her concern over the "bad guys trying to kill a plane". I'm not a fan of war, myself.
The P dropped me off at the university while he went home to play Uno with K and A slept. I had a good time with such a nice bunch of people. Later we tracked down an actual supermarket! Very exciting. (So far only poorly stocked convenience stores with no prices marked on goods.) For supper: pork saus, eggs and chips, terribly healthy. For vitamins: ice cream and red wine. (Ok, the girls aren't getting the wine.)
The plan for tomorrow is to go to the zoo in the morning, have lunch at home, go to the Maritime Museum in the afternoon and finish the day off with fish and chips. Fish and chips is the plan because the girls really like it, not because it is easy to find. Our research so far (peering at shops as we drive by) suggests that Asian take-out is seven times as prevalent as all other types put together. Last night the girls reluctantly choked down some perfectly inoffensive egg fried rice, so we're going to try for good old F&C tomorrow.
Oh, and the CC trick of 4 digits did not work. P tried and failed and as far as we know his CC is locked now. Our ATM cards work, so we keep having to draw cash and draw cash. We're unimpressed and any large expenses are going to be a huge pain. I shall call ZA again my-tonight-ZA's-this morning and see if they have any other wise words.
Also, jet lag is unpleasant.
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[23 Nov 2011|08:50pm] |
So, a lengthy call to the ZA bank's credit card division yesterday suggests that the problem might be that NZ uses a 4 digit pin while ZA uses a 5 digit pin. Simply using the first 4 digits should suffice. Further research (call to friend in Wellington) reveals that the 4 digit hypothesis is correct, so today we shall sally forth and try our CCs again.
Today our schedule (which changes with very little notice) is Kelly Tarlton's Underwater World and Antarctic Encounter followed by lunch and the Auckland Domain which includes the War Memorial Museum. I then spend the afternoon stuffing conference bags and hanging out with the fine maths ed folk of The University of Auckland. P and the girls don't have afternoon plans yet. Possibilities include resting at the flat, or visiting a local park which has a jungle gym, A previous park, generally admired, was considered lacking in any interest due to it having no jungle gym. Their needs are simple, yet non-negotiable. A's curent major need is ice cream. She is essentially on a hunger strike until ice cream to her satisfaction is produced. P and I are not letting this bother us unduly.
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[23 Nov 2011|03:38am] |
Well, the trip was pretty dire, as expected. 2 hours to Joburg (lousy food), 3 hours in Joburg airport, 12 hours to Sydney, except actually more because the plane left a bit late. The food on the Qantas flight was very good. K slept a lot, P and A a medium amount and me hardly at all. No surprises there. I did leg exercises a lot ... Then there were the 2 hours in Sydney and the 3 hour flight to Auckland. The car pick-up went fine (quite a large Corolla) although we were alarmed to discover the car was automatic not manual. The drive across the city was uneventful but longish. We're staying at Auckland City Oaks which so far is nice. A small flat, 2 bedrooms, nicely appointed.
This is supposed to be a work holiday for me. I popped in to see a colleague, but he was in a meeting so that's been moved to this afternoon. We spent the morning discovering that our credit cards don't work, buying a chirruping kiwi (not a real one), getting an internet connection thingummy and coming back home again. Right now, I'm off to revisit the colleague while P and the girls hang about at the hotel, the girls showing an extreme level of energy which disappears entirely as soon as we head out to do anything.
Tomorrow perhaps the Maritime Museum? A park? Also, stuffing conference bags with the maths department.
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| the adventure begins |
[21 Nov 2011|07:29am] |
Hello there
I promised someone I'd blog our trip to New Zealand, so here it begins :).
It's Monday 21 November and I'm sitting in my pyjamas updating my ipod with Skeptics Guide, In Our Time with Melvyn Bragg, Guardian Science Weekly, Infinite Monkey Cage and all those necessities of travel. Shortly I shall have some Bovril toast, scurry about wondering what we've forgotten to pack, and head off to the airport. I shall change out of pyjamas, not to worry.
The flights + wait times (CT -> Joburg -> Sydney -> Auckland) add up to about 21 hours. We land in Auckland at 22h00 Tuesday night, whereupon, homicidally fatigued, we get into our hired car and drive in the dark, through a strange city, to our accommodation. Fun!
Right! Bovril toast awaits. See you on the other side!
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[13 Aug 2011|11:21pm] |
Actually I only watched csi, didn't even do any light sewing.
Ah well.
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| he's under a haystack, fast asleep |
[13 Aug 2011|08:46pm] |
| [ |
mood |
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 guilty |
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Things I should be doing:
- writing up dynamics* notes for the two lectures I missed** last week
- doing several days' worth of dynamics homework
- separating laundry to get it ready for tomorrow (sunday) morning
- tidying that table in the lounge
- sending important emails
- updating my Academic.edu page
- writing an abstract due end of August
- writing a grant request due end of August
- looking up accommodation options for NZ trip in November
- figuring out some funny thing sent to me by a journal about a paper I submitted
- roughing out a paper due end of October and not in even vague existence yet
- orgnanising the HBD menu***
- updating my CV
- Tidying up my course website
- tidying the bathroom
- tidying my room, particularly my bedside table
- figuring out what I'm teaching on Monday and getting it organised
- making garb
- generally being an asset to society or my family
What am I doing? Catching up on twitter and blogs etcetera which I missed while at the conference. I'm not caught up yet. In a few minutes I shall watch some csi**** and do some light sewing. At least I'll be working on the "making garb" bullet point. Pity it's not one of the more important ones...
A colleague called me a "super woman" at the conference, presumably because I run a course, write papers, am a mother of 2 children, etc. and she hasn't seen me fall on the floor in a fainting fit or tantrum or fit of insanity yet. Of course, she doesn't realise how inadequate I feel most of the time at most of what I do and how I actually kind of suck at at least one of my jobs. (It's a secret.) Of course, that makes me doubt the validity of my identification of super women I see about me on campus and in my friendship circle. Will I stop doing so? Of course not.
* I am doing a 2nd year mech eng vector geometry course called Dynamics. It's hard. But fun! But hard.
** I attended a sort-of-local conference last week, Wed - Fri, causing me to miss two dynamics lectures.
*** I am the chief cook for the local SCA event Here Be Dragons in October. I have never done this before. I should be more scared.
**** We only have 2 more episodes of our current set of csi dvds! (some or other series of New York. 5th?) and I've sworn off any major purchases until September to allow our credit card to recover from the shock of 3 tickets to NZ. We've also finished our current Mythbusters series (2nd, so much happiness awaits ahead). However we do have 3 series of Big Bang Theory borrowed from a friend, so hopefully the tv can continue to suck our brains for the next few weeks.
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[09 Apr 2011|06:38pm] |
I don't blog any more. I use Twitter a lot, so I think I'm using all my online energy there. However, you can't say much on Twitter and there's no easy record like there is here, so I really want to blog. Yet I don't. I'm bone idle, basically.
I've decided I should just open a blog post page every time I open Twitter and "tweet" stuff here that's longer than 140 characters. Perhaps that'll get me back into swing? Hmm? Probably not...
For now, let's see what a basic update should have in it.
Me: On sabbatical, working mediumly hard, should be working a lot harder. Have done lots of grant applications, am working on several papers. Am not teaching this semester - feels weird.
P: Is well, working hard, doing lots of "scrum" stuff, doing lots of SCA combat stuff.
K: Is well, is seeing paediatrician on Monday about going off the drug she's been on for 2 years now. For new readers (hahahaha, I only have old cobwebby readers waiting for posts that don't come) K had ghastly headaches for months when she was 3, also stomach aches, was in hospital for a week, CT scan, MRI, etc, lots of hysterical fun, went on drugs which worked. The stomach aches are under control now (no cow's cheese, yoghurt, bottled milkshake), dr was always of the opinion that these were migraines - which are paired with stomach aches - so perhaps can go off drugs? Yes? Yes? We'll see. Oh, I left out the 3 lumbar punches. When she was 3. A laugh a minute, I tell you. Anyway, K is in Grade R (reception) now. New school, new friends, etc. She has fitted in nicely, has made lots of friends, but still I think it's been a bit exhausting with everything being new all the time. This week has been school holidays and she has hopefully benefited from the rest. I know I've got hardly any work done, so it had better be worth it! K is a complicated, sensitive, deeply emotional girl. We shall have loads of fights when she is a teenager. Of course she's brilliant, beautiful, etc.
A: My sunshine girl. Loses her shoes at Educare all the time, while K didn't lose 1 in 5 years. Laughs in the face of discipline. Pigtails droop along with mouth when sad (I don't know how she does this, but it's incredibly effective). Defiant and cute and stunningly wonderful. Is brilliant, beautiful, etc.
The cats continue well, although my Phi is getting long in the tooth. Going on 16 now, I think. One of my oldest friends. I have a few human friends I've known longer but not many.
See? Too long for a tweet.
Don't start asking for pics, Rome wasn't built in a day.
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| Photographic update |
[20 Oct 2010|09:47pm] |
So, first up, some pictures from K's birthday party.
We were visited by a fairy! OMG! The girls were so very excited! (The boys, not so much.) You too can have a fairy visit your party, if you contact the folks at Enchanted Parties. This really was a hit, I recommend this to you parenty people. The party lasted 2 hours, she came for the middle hour, and it was all just great. I tried to choose pictures which didn't show the faces of the other children, which narrowed my choices a bit. This one is a bit blurry, but shows the fairy choosing some of her stage make up for drawing on the girls' faces. Exctitement!1!
Here are both my bonnie lasses, with their decorated faces. A is closer to the camera.
So I called up the poeple at Kiddie Rides and he was all "How many children? Okay, so you'll want 6 rides at blah amounts of money". I said, "No, two rides seems fine, thanks, but make them narrow in case it pours with rain." "Okay," says he, "a rocket or an astro car? I think the rocket" "I agree." "Does she like kangaroos?" "Er, yes." "Orange or Yellow?" "Er ... Orange?" so we got an orange kangaroo and a green rocket for the weekend.
K had asked for a Barbie party, so I got the excellent Julie, of Cakes by Julie, to make a lovely Barbie cake. I totally failed to take good pics before taking it out to get sliced up, but this one was taken by first_fallen after I thrust the camera at her and demanded she take pictures. This is a real Barbie, which must have cut into Julie's profit margins a tad, but "I wanted one with good hair" she explained.
Here we have me, wielding the Cake Knife of Doom, surrounded by partygoers. I hope putting this pic up isn't too unethical. I shall seek permission from the parents of identifiable children retroactively. Bad me. It was great cake! Wowee.
Now we move to some Langebaan pics.
The house had an "infinity pool" along the edge of the house. Here we have me, reading New Scientist in the morning, at the edge of the pool, after which the house dropped to a duney path and the rocks at the edge of the surf. I could really get used to that. I'd love to get used to that.
Here we have my cupcake, striding intrepidly over the rocks, inveencible! This an hour or so before gashing her head open in the house. There is nothing more adorable in this world than my cupcake. Often nothing more infuriating, but even then nothing more adorable.
K, keeping an eye out for fascinating rock pool zoology, followed by her watchful Dad.
P himself, looking rather looming as he's standing and I'm sitting down. My girls know me. A common refrain is "Please can you come to the park/play room/rockpools, you can bring your book!" So I was sitting on a rock, reading New Scientist, while the rest of that athletic lot leaped about like maritime goats. Me, I prefer a gentle read.
Here is the house we stayed in. The spot where I was standing to take the picture was underwater at high tide, that's how close to the water it was. Bliss! The blue blip is K, heading back to the house unsupervised. This was notable. When is she ever that far from us, without other adults nearby? Never, I'd say. In a modern, dangerous city, a child that young (according to the way I live my parental life, anyway) is never on her own, that far from adult supervision. Our home has small grounds, as does the Educare, the local parks are small (and one is always on the lookout for Baddies), supermarkets are crowded and have no long line of sight. This might seem like a small thing, but it was quite a big deal for me and, I'm guessing, for K herself.
The friends we went with made a treasure hunt for K. There was a map in a bottle in a rock pool, and a small chest filled with chocolate coins. K went all inward and quietly thrilled, so I'm not sure her excitement showed to those who don't know her. (If you know P well, imagine his reserve, age 5, and shy.) I said the occasional "This is her being thrilled", acting as interpreter.
Last, but not least, A and I on the side of the pool, photo taken by P. This is after the head gashing incident. She has a plaster on the right side of her forehead, although it's not obvious. So, you see, gory head wounds can't keep her down. I think this is the best photo of the lot. I'm glad P took it.
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[19 Oct 2010|01:31pm] |
Hmm, time to blog? I've had a hectic month or so. Not only has it been the last month of the academic year, with all the associated craziness of setting exam papers and all sorts of exciting educational resources, but I've been away a lot. On the weekend of 24 September, khoi_boi and family had our girls over for two nights. Friday was a public holiday, so P and I went and stayed in Hermanus for two days without any children! first_fallen had a birthday party at a restaurant on the far side of Hermanus, so the location was chosen strategically. We met up with our girls again at the party and altogether it was a lovely weekend. They stayed with us at the B&B on the Saturday night, which upped our stress levels a bit. It must be nice to be the kind of parents who don't worry about their children bothering other people - very calming. We're not like that, so we have to be alert at all times for Bad Behaviour and General Mayhem. A self-catering place would be better, we have decided, if we go away with just them again.
Then, the following weekend, I went up to Durbs to see schedule5, which was lovely. Her S is a cutey but not as cute as my A! Sorry, schedule5, but facts is facts. We chatted non-stop and really should repeat this sort of thing more often. We told one another everything that's wrong with our lives and generally dished out the sympathy in both directions. Friendship is great. Also! I got to see herne_kzn which was an unplanned delight. He lives in an Obs house! It's totally an Obs house, only in Durban! He says "We call them Berea houses" but anyone can see it's an Obs House. Silly herne_kzn.
Then the weekend after that, we went to Langebaan with some friends. The holiday house was stunning beyond words, right on top of the rocks with the sea outide. Sooooo nice. I could have spent the entire weekend reading outside with the sound of the sea in my ears. However, the weather was coolish and the girls were with us, so such time was limited. What time I had, though, was balm to the soul. The house had about a million stairs, all tiled with sharp edges, so it was inevitable that we'd spend a couple of hours with A in the local emergency room having her head glued back together. She'll probably have a scar, but chicks dig scars, I'm told, and her aunt would be thrilled if she turned out to be lesbian, so all's well there.
This last weekend I was actually at home! There was an SCA tournament on Saturday, I went to the ballet with K and my mum on Sunday and then had dinner at my Dean's house, but, basically, I was home! I did actual laundry!
So, K has seen her first real ballet, as opposed to her class pretending to be fairies in pink tulle. It was Carmen, which was a trifle heavy for a 5yo, but the music is so, let's face it, catchy, that I felt she'd enjoy it, and I think she did. She managed to sit still and (mostly) silent for 2 hours, which is something. The raw sexuality oozing off the stage hopefully passed her by. She says she'd like to go again, although this time first_fallen must come too. Hopefully the ubiquitous Nutcracker will raise its tired head again at Christmas time.
As readers of extemporanea's blog will know, I was promoted recently, to the post of Senior Lecturer. In the US they call you a professor if you're a lowly first time lecturer, so any American reading this blog probably won't take the title very seriously, but it's a step up the ladder and I'm pleased. Next stop Associate Professor about 20 years from now. Anyway, my Dean invited the three of us who survived this year's round of ad hominem promotions around to her place for supper, including spouseses, plus heads of depts plus their spouseseses, so it was a fair crowd. My "faculty" is called the Centre for Higher Education Development, the people in it are universally lovely and the evening was most enjoyable.
I have a bad reputation among the people who've known me a long time of saying "so and so is really nice, you'll like her" and then that not turning out to be the case, because, I don't know, I have low powers of discernment? So P was probably on his guard to find that the lovely CHED people were not actually lovely at all, but it turns out they actually are, so that's fine.
Right now I'm preparing for a small local conference at the end of the week, I have more SCA sewing to do than I really like to think about, and P and I have two scrolls to do. We have friends visiting from the US this coming weekend, staying in Riebeeck West (lovely place, you really should visit, although the delightful wine shop has closed which is a bummer). Also this weekend we need to go shopping for children's clothes as K has grown about three feet from last summer. Also A should have at least a few garments which aren't hand-me-downs. The following week I am taking 3 days leave!!!! and the girls and I shall go exciting places like the scratch patch. Then the next few weekends are packed too, but you've stopped reading by now, so I'll stop writing. Distant friends: I know you want pics of the girls. I'll see if I can do something about that. No promises.
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| Even if you can't use it, it's fun to have |
[21 Sep 2010|09:33am] |
Posting today because I have to share this: Vintage ads. Goodness me. Some are amusing simply because they're dated, like all the smoking ones. Some are hilarious in their sexism. My favourite is the hairdryer...
How was your weekend? Mine was fairly exhausting. K had her birthday party on Saturday. Thank goodness the weather was nice. The party was a success. We had two kiddie rides and someone dressed as a fairy (thanks, pumeza!) There were about 25 children, most of them age 5, two age 2 and a couple of older siblings. Much food was eaten, much wine was drunk (that would be the parents, not the children). The cake was supplied by Cakes by Julie and was both beautiful and delicious. first_fallen made K a pink sequined fairy dress which we have struggled to get her out of. She got a million presents and generally had a lovely birthday.
Next up: sleep over at the khoi's. My poor A is obviously used to not getting to join in the fun stuff. When we told the girls they'd be sleeping over at friends' on Thursday and Friday night, little A asked, trying to resist hope, "Even me sleep over?" and now she tells us "Even me sleep over!" which tugs at our heartstrings. Then *next* weekend, off to visit schedule5. Yay! Then the *next* weekend, off to Langebaan. When will all the laundry get done, you're wondering. I don't know. I really don't.
Still setting those blasted exams. Off I go.
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[11 Sep 2010|08:55pm] |
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Today was the first really nice day in months. It actually reached "hot" around lunchtime, if you were outside in the sun. Lovely! I think I suffer from some feeble form of SAD in the winter, embarrassing though that is given Cape Town's mild winter. When the sun comes back out my mood lifts by several notches.
A and I went to the R'bosch craft market today, which was delightful. The two of us rarely get to spend time together, just the two of us. She's still my cupcake. Then, this afternoon, khoiwife and I went shopping for jeans. I want to buy jeans that are actually flattering to my shape and I suspected such jeans might be expensive. For my birthday, P gave me a fat envelope of money towards buying expensive jeans :) so off we went to spend it today. I found a pair of Sissy Boy jeans that looked nice. It was $$$. I also found a cheap pair of Kelso jeans which looked good, but I've been wearing them this evening and they keep having to be pulled back up... Hopefully the $$$ ones will behave themselves better. They're a bootcut, but since I'll have to lopp about 30cm off the legs to get them to fit, the bootishness will be diminished.
So! Lovely day all in all. Now to set an exam paper while also watching CSI. And hoiking up my trousers.
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[08 Sep 2010|08:23am] |
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K turns 5 one week from today. Her birthday party is the following Saturday. We have invited more people than could possibly fit in our house if it rains, so please do anti-rain dances for us.
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| to market, to market |
[07 Jun 2010|11:38am] |
So the second garage door dude couldn't make it on Friday, his secretary/sister/wife/some randon female calls to tell me. He'll call later to make a new time, I am told. Well, he never called. So we're going back to garage door dudes #1 and I'll keep you updated. Apparently a quote will be forthcoming today. Gah.
Anyway, do you spend your days off doing jigsaws and listening to LSE podcasts? It would appear I do. But, have finished the jigsaw and the podcast, so am off to hire a cheesy romcom and buy some niknaks. It is a Good Day.
Oh, oh, this is Important. I gave the completed cushion cover to my mother-in-law yesterday. she seemed to like it. Two years in the making. Now for a new job. , I need that shirt pattern stat, or I shall embark on that floral cross stitch thingummy for my mum and your shirt will not exist for another two years.
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