Diary of a Pom in Western Australia

I got forwarded this a while back and thought it was too funny (and close to the truth) not to post.

August 31

Just got transferred with work from Leeds UK to our new home in Karratha, Western Australia. Now this is a town that knows how to live! Beautiful, sunny days and warm, balmy evenings. I watched the sunset from a deckchair by our pool yesterday. It was beautiful. I’ve finally found my new home. I love it here.

September 13

Really heating up now. It got to 31 today. No problem though. Living in air-conditioned home, driving air-conditioned car. What a pleasure to see the sun every day like this. I’m turning into a sun-worshipper – no blasted rain like back in Leeds!!

September 30

Had the back yard landscaped with tropical plants today. Lots of palms and rocks. No more mowing lawns for me! Another scorcher today, but I love it here. It’s Paradise!

October 10
The temperature hasn’t been below 35 all week. How do people get used to this kind of heat? At least today it’s windy though. Keeps the flies off a bit. Acclimatizing is taking longer than we expected.

yutiyr

October 15
Fell asleep by the pool yesterday. Got third degree burns over 60% of my body. Missed three days off work. What a dumb thing to do. Got to respect the old sun in a climate like this!

yutiyr

October 20
Didn’t notice Kitty (our cat) sneaking into the car before I left for work this morning. By the time I got back to the car after work, Kitty had died and swollen up to the size of a shopping bag and stuck to the upholstery. The car now smells like Whiskettes and cat shit. I’ve learned my lesson though: no more pets in this heat.

October 25
This wind is a bastard. It feels like a giant fucking blow dryer. And it’s hot as hell! The home air conditioner is on the blink and the repair man charged $200 just to drive over and tell me he needs to order parts from fucking Perth ….The wife & the kids are complaining.

October 30
The temperature’s up around 40 and the parts still haven’t arrived for the fucking air conditioner. House is an oven so we’ve all been sleeping outside by the pool for 3 nights now. Bloody $600,000 house and we can’t even go inside. Why the hell did I ever come here?

November 4
Finally got the fucking air-conditioner fixed. It cost $1,500 and gets the temperature down to around 25 degrees, but the humidity makes it feel about 35. Stupid repairman. Fucking thief.

November 8
If one more smart bastard says ‘Hot enough for you today?’ I’m going to fucking throttle him. Fucking heat! By the time I get to work, the car radiator is boiling over, my fucking clothes are soaking fucking wet and I smell like baked cat. Fucking place is the end of the Earth.

November 9
Tried to run some errands after work, wore shorts, and sat on the black leather upholstery in my car. I thought my fucking arse was on fire. I lost 2 layers of flesh, all the hair on the backs of my legs and off my fucking arse. Now the car smells like burnt hair, fried arse and baked cat. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

November 10
The Weather report might as well be a fucking recording. Hot and sunny. Hot and sunny, Hot and fucking sunny. It never fucking changes! It’s been too hot to do anything for 2 fucking months and the weatherman says it might really warm up next week. Fuck!

November 15
Doesn’t it ever rain in this damn fucking place? Water restrictions will be next, so my $5,000 worth of palms might just dry up and blow into the fucking pool. The only things that thrive in this fucking hell-hole are the fucking flies. You don’t dare open your mouth for fear of swallowing half a dozen of the little bastards!

November 20
Welcome to HELL! It got to 45 fuckin’ degrees today. Now the air conditioner’s gone in my car. The repair man came to fix it and said, ‘Hot enough for you today?’ I wanted to shove the fucking car up his fucking arse. Anyway, had to spend the $2,500 mortgage payment to bail me out of jail for assaulting the stupid prick. Fucking Karratha! What kind of sick, demented fucking idiot would want to live here!

December 1
WHAT!!!! The FIRST day of Summer!!!! You are fucking kidding me!

tyutiyr

Going to hell in a breadbasket

Who doesn’t love to eat out?

The joy of someone else having to decide what to cook and clearing up the mess at the end of the meal. The perfect chance to order something you wouldn’t have a clue how to cook, with ingredients you’d certainly never recognise in the supermarket. Eating out is a valid reason to eat off a table instead of a tray. It’s the opportunity to actually hold a conversation, instead of woofing down your food in front of the TV.

Yes, going out to eat is the perfect time to relax and enjoy your food. Unless, that is, you have children. Then it’s really only one small step removed from hell.

It has to be said that, whichever way you look at it, there’s absolutely nothing relaxing about walking through the doors of any restaurant and wheeling an overloaded pram through the very tiny space. Or ordering off the menu when you suspect your children will refuse to eat a thing. Or clearing up spilt drinks and bread rolls that cover every inch of the table. Or needing 6 books, 3 colouring pads and a pack of crayons just to get through the starter. Or having to take them for a poo the exact moment your main meal arrives. Or having to consume your own cold and congealed meal in 60 seconds because everyone else has finished and the waiters are eyeing you up, your bill and coats in hand.

By the end of such a meal out, both you and the people seated around you, are inevitably wishing you’d just saved the money and avoided the stress by staying at home. There at least you can scream at a decibel of your choice and stop your children leaving the table until something has made it past their lips.

We were at Sizzlers a while back, having one of those impromptu meals out that always seem to be such a great idea when you drive past a restaurant starving. Sizzlers is a one of those restaurants that offers various slabs of meat and fish on a plate, as well as a ‘eat as much you can’ salad and desert bar. These always seem like such a great idea on the way in, but the food generally ends up looking and tasting the same – something along the lines of ‘fridge’.

With some serious training in the food eating and table manners department under their belt, my kids, for the most part, aren’t too bad when it comes to eating out. There have of course been those moments when I’ve wanted to curl up and die, but compared to some restaurant monsters I’ve seen, mine are an absolute delight in comparison.

We were at Sizzlers a while back, having one of those impromptu meals out that always seem to be such a great idea when you drive past a restaurant starving. Sizzlers are one of those restaurants that offers various slabs of meat and fish on a plate, as well as a ‘eat as much you can’ salad and desert bar. These always seem like such a great idea on the way in, but the food generally ends up looking and tasting the same – something along the lines of ‘fridge’.

Upon arrival you have to queue up, choose your meal from a picture on the wall and pay for it as you go in.  So if and when it arrives looking nothing like the picture on the wall and tastes like shit, there’s absolutely nothing you can do about it. Except perhaps throw up.

Anyway, disappointing food aside, it’s the clientele at Sizzlers that can really turn your stomach.

Sat next to us was a family who had more food on the floor around them than they did on their table. The chief culprit was a small child standing up in her high chair and throwing platefuls of whatever she could reach onto the floor. The mother, who was sat only feet away, was either oblivious or brain-dead – between you and me; I’d say she was both.

To make matters worse, the other little feral children at the table were busy scurrying backwards and forwards to the food bars and bringing the majority of the contents back with them. Not to eat mind you, just to stack up, squash and leave as ammunition for Baby Feral in the high chair.

Seated on the other side of us were a mother and daughter combo – an unstoppable eating machine if ever I’ve seen one. In the space of time that it took for us to get our garlic bread, they had consumed half a cow and chips each, trawled the salad bar several times and been up the desert station 3 times. Just when we thought there was nothing else but the furniture and fittings left for them to eat, the daughter winched her sizeable frame out of the chair and nipped (I’m being kind here, there was nothing nippy about her) back to get one last bowl of ice cream. With all the toppings.

Between our 2 neighbouring tables, it’s surprising there was anything left for the rest of the room to eat.

So there you go. The perfect example of badly behaved children and people eating to excess all rolled into one depressing restaurant. Needless to say we haven’t been back since.

There is one nearby restaurant however that has perhaps come up with the perfect solution for parents who want to eat in peace. If I rated the food, I might have been tempted to take them up on their offer. Unfortunately I find the food here pretty dire, though considering what might be tucked away in their kitchen, I’m not really that surprised.

I can’t even image what the conditions of this offer might be. Perhaps the children have to be washed beforehand, or have any buttons or sharp jewelery removed?

o-]

hjgdhj

On the downside, the restaurant also has this sign on the door, so perhaps they aren’t quite so parent friendly after all..

hjgdhj

;;;

‘Courtesy’ my arse

I don’t know if I’m getting more impatient with age, but I have never experienced such bad customer service as I have in Perth. Maybe it’s because WA works on a completely different level of urgency to the rest of the world, or because the ‘Wait Awhile’ attitude is all people have grown to expect. Whatever the reason, when it comes to getting anything done, it’s bloody irritating.

Restaurants can often take 30 minutes to serve you coffee, and by then it’s stone cold. Or, as happened to me recently, they nuke your apple pie in the microwave and leave you with a burnt oesophagus and large medical bills to repair the damage. In any other country that would be a lawsuit waiting to happen, here the manager just laughed it off and told me I need to be more careful what I eat.

It’s common for telephone companies to try rounding your bills up to whatever prime number springs into their head, and then take months of arguing before they eventually pay the money back. And dare ask a question in a shop, and you can sometimes be made to feel like you’re inconveniencing the assistant.

The latest establishment to have my eyes rolling back in annoyance is the Kia dealership in Wangara.

My Rio – a car which bears a remarkable resemblance to a Dinky toy – is broken again. Having already had new parts fitted back last June to correct a faint knocking noise in the engine, it recently started to do the same thing again. This time the knocking noise was so loud it sounded like something was about to drop out of the engine.

So I drove my sickly car into Kia and asked the head mechanic to come out for a little spin. Of course he had absolutely no idea what the noise was, which, while very predictable, seemed a little odd as they’d already fixed it once before. I was just glad he heard the noise at all. I was fully expecting sods law to intervene and to be left looking like a neurotic woman driver making a fuss about nothing.

Two days later the car was dropped off and I asked to be provided with a replacement car while I was waiting for the repairs to be made. Pretty normal request I would have thought, especially considering the car was only 2-years-old and had its service just the week before.

Sorry, there were no cars available for me to use I was told, Kia don’t cover this in their warranty. Even if the fault is as a result of the rather flimsy design. If I would like I could hire a ‘courtesy car’ from them however, I could pay $33 a day. Plus an additional 25 cents for each km I drove.

Seriously? Since when is it a ‘courtesy car’ if you have to pay for it.

The last time I looked in a dictionary, the word ‘courtesy’ meant to provide something out of generosity -  a polite gesture. Preferably free of charge. The word doesn’t mean to fleece a stranded customer and then, to add insult to injury, try to charge them $13 more than the local car rental company would.

“So how long do you reckon the work is going to take then?” I asked.
“We don’t know” they helpfully replied.

Marvelous. Judging on the last time they tried to fix it, it took nearly 3 weeks. So that would be $630 dollars plus mileage (plus the month’s motor finance payment) out of my pocket, to pay for a car that shouldn’t be broken in the first place.

Surely that can’t be right?

The gear box was eventually taken apart and half-a-dozen new parts ordered from the East coast. I think the parts had to cross the country by train, because obviously the warranty wouldn’t cover anything as costly as DHL.

After waiting several weeks for any news I’ve finally been told the car might actually be ready to collect tomorrow. Although more likely next Tuesday. Or possibly towards the end of that week. Sometime anyway, depending on the mood of the person fitting the parts and whether they need to knock off early each day to watch the footy.

No rush guys, really. We love being left high, dry and car less. It makes life so much more interesting, especially when Mother Nature has a strop on.

uglg

Raining Cats, Dogs and Maltesers

Mother Nature wasn’t very happy yesterday. In fact, I’d go as far as to say she was pretty pissed off. If I was a guy I’d probably say it was a case of PMT, but I’m not, so I’ll just hazard a guess and say she was having one hell of a bad hair day.

Whatever the reason, Ms Nature certainly gave 2 fingers up to anyone in Perth who’s been moaning about the weather. Or more specifically, the 40 degrees of constant heat with not a drop of rain since November.

Now I do appreciate that to people in wetter isles, England lets say, the idea of nearly 5 months without rain might seem like something of a dream. But let me tell you, it’s not. When a total lack of precipitation is teamed up with temperatures more suited to melting iron ore, it can make for some pretty uncomfortable living. Not to mention a rather dry, dusty, brown and monotonous landscape.

So that said, I think it would be quite safe to assume that rather a lot of people in Perth (and some extremely dehydrated plants) were rather looking forward to the dry spell breaking. And break it did. With bells on.

With barely enough time to drag the dog through the fly screen, the blue sunny sky disappeared and the hailstones arrived. Hailstones the size of Maltesers, pouring out of the sky so fast you’d think God had accidently left his freezer door open, and a passing angel had carelessly tipped it over. We were lucky only to get Maltesers, in the city they were apparently the size of golf balls.

Then came the rain. Or should I say the downpour, pelting in at us from at every angle but up. Within minutes our garden was several inches under water, and there was, what could only be described, as a flash flood going past the end of our drive.

Being me, of course I tried to take some photos of the hailstones stacking up 9 inches deep at our back door. But the moment I opened the door to take the picture, the bloody dog shot off into the garden. How stupid is he? He see’s, what to him must have looked like a Noah’s Ark moment, and he still decides to go out for a quick dig in the sand.

Needless to say once he went out I refused to let him, or his soggy wet fur, back in again. He may be of the non-smelling variety of pooches, but even a soaking wet Spoodle has something of a whiff about it. So I hardened my heart and held my resolve – right up until the point where my daughter stood sobbing at the window, looking down at a pathetic excuse for a fur ball, trying to pin himself flat against the wall with his damp ears plastered around his snout. Two clean towels and a vigorous blow dry later and he was back inside and on the rug. I hope he’s learned his lesson, that nothing is worth the pain of a dig in the hail.

Dumb dogs aside, in the sort of weather that heralds the start of Armageddon the average person normally chooses to stay indoors, steer clear of windows and turn up the TV. Sadly I’m not average, so I grabbed the car keys, swam to the car and set off with oars at the ready.

Of course as the sky turned pitch black overhead and the odd branch blew past like tumbleweed, it did cross my mind that this might not be the most sensible decision in the world. But really I had no choice. My son, who isn’t partial to loud noises and the car wash at the best of times, was stranded at his nursery 8 minutes down the road. Even if he’d had the foresight to take his water wings with him that day, I very much doubted he’d have managed the journey alone.

“The clouds are very angry” he told me, over and over all the way home.

My poor husband arrived back quite a bit later than usual that night.  Something to do with me having his car, the train tracks being flooded, every cab being taken and the buses being fit to burst. I’m not sure it necessarily helped, when I pointed out that if he had had his car that day, he’d no doubt still be stuck in the bumper-to-bumper traffic, as the world and their wet dog struggled to leave work.

Needless to say the news teams and anchormen (I would be P.C. and say anchorwoman, but all the women sound like men anyway) were practically salivating with joy on the TV last night. Finally, something worth reporting in Perth that didn’t involve a drunken AFL player, a misplaced kangaroo and a runaway shopping trolley on the freeway.

As I know I’m rather prone to the odd bit of exaggeration (creative license and all), I’ve added the pictures below to show that for once, Perth really did have something happen to get excited about.

lylyl

Couldn’t have said it better myself

Living in Perth, you really have to wonder about some of the people here. Do they have a warped sense of humour, or are they just incredibly thick? I’m talking number plates, and some of stupid things people choose to have stuck on the front of their cars. I’ve already listed some of the more ‘interesting’ plates that I’ve seen before, but below are a couple that really stood out from the crowd.

The first car I saw in the shopping centre yesterday, when it drove into the car park at a speed only acceptable on the German Autobahn or a race track. Once the lives of passing shoppers had been suitably put at risk, the driver screeched into the disabled bay /taxi rank right in front of the entrance, climbed out of the car and lolloped inside.

I use the word lollop, because for all extent and purposes he had the definite whiff of Neanderthal about him – no shoes, skanky feet, clothes that even the homeless would turn down. His tattoos encircled every limb, his hair was matted and greasy enough to fry a dozen eggs and he had, what could only be described, as the remains of dead rat hanging down his back. Basically he looked like something you might see painted on a cave wall, with a club in one hand and a dead animal in the other.

As he disappeared off to buy whatever it is that modern-day cavemen buy, several words did immediately sprung to mind – but I needn’t have bothered forming my own opinion. With his carefully chosen number plate, he’d already gone to the trouble of describing himself. How thoughtful and spot on. Maybe he was more articulate than first thought.

I didn’t actually see the driver of the second car, but I’m guessing they share many of the same qualities as the first driver.

xfgdfg

In case you’re unfamiliar with the word ‘feral’, it’s one that seems to be widely used here to describe a certain sort of person. The following description is from  www.urbandictionary.com, and I couldn’t have put it better (or more colourfully) myself.

xfgdfg

An individual who usually lives in a housing trust neighbourhood who loves wearing flannel shirts, tight faded jeans, tracksuits (usually FUBU, EMINEM, etc branded). Usually has a pack of smokes tucked under the shoulder of their knitted jumper/wifebeater, and one behind the ear for ‘ron.

t

Commonly spotted at shopping malls and fast food outlets and especially Centrelink which is their sole source of income with the exception of drug dealing/manufacture/growing/selling stolen goods. Known to swear a lot and are frequently found not wearing shoes, much like their offspring who are usually dirty looking with snot running from their noses.

“What the **** are you looking at ****?” said the feral female with no shoes with a major muffin top over her 4 sizes too small mini skirt and no bra.“Nothing” replied the man walking by and minding his business.

“Well do ya wanna root? If I have another kid I can start me own footy team and Centrelink will fund it!” Asks the feral skank who can be smelled from 20 metres away.

“No thanks. I’d rather have sex with a garden mulcher. It’s much safer than your diseased, stinky p****” Replies the man about to be robbed by the group of male ferals waiting for him around the corner.

So that said, would you seriously want this word on your car?!

Why Perth will never equal Paris

Paris, NY, London and Milan – the fashion capitals of the world. Exciting hubs of cutting edge design and stylish good taste. Where the beautiful flock to see and be seen, and designers fight to outdo each other, sending one unwearable outfit after another down the catwalk.

Perth on the other hand – not so much a hub as a gaping hole. The universal dumping ground for the last 3 decades worth of dodgy trends. A place that shops everywhere send their unwanted stock to, and the fashion police earn more in a weeks overtime than your average divorce lawyer would in a year.

Lord only knows why some of the clothes shops are so bad here, it’s not like there isn’t online access to the rest of the world and a constant supply of current fashion magazines. Perhaps it’s because the city is so isolated that it’s inhabitants just don’t care, or because the over zealous customs officials are rooting out all the best stuff and selling it off on Ebay. Whatever the reason, I’d have to say trends here seem to be at least a good 20 years behind the rest of the world.

Think ‘Hillbilly Chic’. A sort of trucker meets 80′s Chav meets unwashed backpacker.

Of course the limited choice of shops really don’t help. They are enough to turn even the most fashion conscious into the worst sort of fashion victim – or phobic. The options range from the likes of Kmart, Target and BigW for your cheap and cheerful basics – with basic being the operative word. Most garments seem to fall apart in the wash, beg for mercy under the heat of a gentle iron or change several dress sizes hours after being removed from the hanger. You get what you pay for of course, so for kids clothes, which have a shorter life span than the average family camera, these shops are great.

At the other end of the rather abysmal spectrum is Myers and David Jones. Both shops are supposedly the ‘Creme de la creme’ of Aussie shopping. Say no more. I’ve been into each a few times, but have never seen anything either particularly special or stylish, let alone affordable. I had a voucher to use up for David Jones recently, and it took me several visits to try and find anything that I even wanted to buy. In the end I settled for a pyjamas top. I only managed half an outfit as the top alone came to more than the voucher, and I was loathed to fork out even more for something I didn’t actually need.

Several washes later and the stitching on the top had all but unravelled. The fabric had also stretched so much on the sides that if I’d leapt off our roof, I could probably have coasted all the way out to Rottnest on a wind current.

Funnily enough a set of pyjamas I bought from Big W 3 winters ago are still going strong.

When talking to other POMS here, the one shop that most seem to miss is NEXT. If I had a decent pair of well fitted jeans for every time someone asked why they can’t open a store in Perth, my wardrobe would be overflowing with denim.

Clothes aside, there also seems to be an underlying scruffiness ingrained into the WA culture. The mullet for instance is incredibly popular over here, and it’s not uncommon to see an entire family out and about, all sporting matching scraggly rats tails down their backs. I think that like the fashion, photos in mens barbers over here must be somewhat outdated.

The other trend, one that never ceases to amaze me, is the notion that footwear is entirely optional. Now I’m not talking about going barefoot to the park or the beach – that would be understandable. I’m referring to those I’ve seen without shoes in IKEA, the city centre, restaurants, supermarkets, the cinema and the most dangerous of all, or so you’d think, Bunnings.

Revolting, dirty looking feet aside,  surely there have to be some serious health and hygiene laws being broken as kids run across the urine soaked floors of the public toilets and straight down the fresh produce aisle of the neighbouring supermarket.

And needless to say, if such people don’t ever wash their feet, it’s highly unlikely they’d wash their hands..

I followed one such woman and her snot encrusted child around Coles last week, and snapped her for with my phone for proof. Given that she looked like she was probably capable of beating me to death with one of those blocks of cheese, I’ve airbrushed her features slightly. But to be honest, I very much doubt she’d ever stumble across my blog, or be able to read this post.

This shoeless woman I have to say was certainly not alone. I spotted several others, overgrown toe nails and all, hot footing it through the freezer section.

asfa

asfa

Perhaps people in WA feel there’s no point bothering with their appearance, because there’s really nowhere to dress up and go. I can relate to this, and know from experience it’s a very easy and highly dangerous trap to fall into. Before you know what’s happened, you can find that you’ve metamorphosed into a homeless bag lady, wearing the same old tracksuit for 6 days in a row and have forgotten to change out of your PJs on Sunday.

Now I’ve never been one for making a huge effort with clothes, or really caring that much about how I look, but a while back I realised I was starting to stoop to such a level. This was around the time I arrived at the school to collect my daughter and realised, as I went to get out the car, that I’d left the house in my slippers.

So the following weekend, when heading out to Coles to do the weekly shop, I dug around in the back of my wardrobe and put on a jacket, a scarf and my high-heeled boots – the sort of clothes I’d have once worn in the UK when popping out to fill the car up with petrol. Taking it one daring stop further, I took my hair out of a pony tail and dusted off my mascara,  pumping the tube vigorously to break the old clumps off the brush.

My son walked straight past me in the hallway, and then did a double take as he disappeared around the corner. I don’t think he actually recognised me. How sad is that.

“Oh you do look pretty Mummy” my daughter said as I appeared from the bedroom, clearly impressed with my ‘Extreme Makeover’. I loosely translated this compliment to mean that I normally didn’t.

“So where are you off to then, seeing as you’re all dressed up?” enquired my slightly suspicious husband.

With that I realised that I had better start making more of an effort, before I reached the day where I would think nothing of going to the shops still wrapped in my duvet, or end up with skin as thick as a rhinos hide on a pair of black and scaly feet.

Reality strikes, and it’s pretty dumb

I am a self-confessed lover of most things reality. I say most things, as even I absolutely draw the line at Australian Idol and Big Brother.

Australian Idol because it’s quite frankly a load of talentless crap, and Big Brother, because the programme is now at least 7 years past it’s ‘Sell by Date’. The first 2 series of BB in the UK were funny and captivating – due to their originality and the people who walked into the house. They had no real notion of what to expect or what wide spread coverage they would receive, and they treated each other with at least some respect.

The following series that have been thrown up on screens every year since, have however, been just plain boring. This is due to their predictability and the attention seeking w*nkers, sorry, I mean housemates, who clamber over each other to live like guinea pigs, fight like toddlers and mate like rabbits.

The audition requirements must now surely be about finding the oddest of oddballs. Those who are guaranteed to strip, clash and pash. So if you’re a blood drinking, devil worshiping, plastic surgery obsessed, brain-dead sex-o-holic, who can’t seem to make a definitive choice between girls or boys, then you’re definitely in with a shot of getting on the show.

Maybe I have just gotten very old in these past 8 years, but it seems to me that BB has spawned a whole new breed of desperate and talentless weirdos. People whose skill sets range anywhere from merely having had a boob job or a sex change, to looking like a pig, thinking they’re God’s gift or simply being the first person born without a single brain cell between their ears.

For these fame fanatics, their 16 step ‘life plan’ would go something like this:

1. Get onto Big Brother and humiliate myself on national TV.
2. Prove that my IQ really can be smaller than my shoe size.
3. Feature on the front cover of HEAT magazine.
4. Meet a fellow non-entity, and be caught in a trendy club having sex.
5. Marry and divorce the said non-entity within 3 months.
6. Turn orange, lose weight, get new boobs/haircut/wardrobe.
7. Release DVD of me lifting Gucci handbag in weight-loss programme.
8. Feature on the front cover of HEAT magazine.
9. Release a single – prove I can’t sing.
10. Date an entire Premier Division football club.
11. Apply to go on Celebrity Mastermind – get laughed off.
12. Apply to go on Dancing with the Stars – get turned down.
13. Apply to go on I’m a (Z list) Celebrity Get Me Out of Here – get accepted.
14. Humiliate myself on national TV.
15. Prove that my IQ is still smaller than my shoe size.
16. Feature on the front cover of HEAT magazine.

Of course truth be told, even if I wanted to watch Big Brother, I couldn’t. My husband only has to hear the music and he starts frothing at the mouth. And that’s not in excitement I might add.  As a rule he really doesn’t like any form of reality TV, and will generally protest for many, many weeks about what he is being forced to watch. He’ll complain about how pathetic the format is, how fake the contestants are, and declare, quite rightly, that the presenters are enough to make you want to throw up your dinner into your hands.

Over the years I have worn him down, and have somehow managed to successfully get him hooked on shows like Dancing on Ice, So You Think You Can Dance, The Apprentice, the Biggest Loser (only the Aussie version) and Masterchef. Wife Swap, I’m sad to say, is simply never going to happen.

But of all these shows, my favourite have to be those that prove that beauty really is only skin deep.

America’s/Australia’s/Britain’s Next Top Model – oh you’ve got to love them for the sheer drama and brilliant bitchiness that these girls, many of whom aren’t even old even to cross the road on their own, have already mastered at such an tender young age.  As they cry, sulk and pout over every makeover haircut, and squeal with every Tara/Sarah/Lisa Mail that appears, it seems they just can’t help themselves but to prove the theory true that models are an incredibly dumb breed. And that large groups of catty girls are infinitely more dangerous to be around than a stick of lit dynamite.

I know this stereotype of models is something of an unfair generalisation, namely because I too once shimmed my way down a catwalk, and I’d like to think I possess matter between my ears that I know how to use. But oh my God, most of the vain little prima donnas on these shows apparently fell right out of the nearest stupid tree, hitting each and every branch on the way down.

So yes, it does makes me realise that I must be aging considerably faster than I care to admit, because many of these model wannabes seem young enough to still need the placenta attached to survive. They also appear to be completely unequipped to deal with the big bad world of reality that awaits them, on the other side of the competition. A world of fashion that will gobble them up, strip the meat of their jutting hip bones and then spit them out when they’re 20, over the hill and past it.

The final of Australia’s Next Top of Model is on tonight, and as far as I can see there is only one obvious winner. In one corner you have Tahnee – a girl with a beautiful face and a body that looks how it should at 17. In other words, there is still some sign of the puppy fat that you are supposed to have at that age, if it hasn’t been forcibly starved off and thrown up.

In the other corner is Cassi – a chain smoking, bad mouthed brat, with bad teeth, serious anger management issues and a body that would look right at home on a 6 year old.  In a word, she’s a Bogan. An Australian word for slapper, or a common little oik who struts around wearing micro-minis, white stilettos and a chip on her bony shoulder. Think Vicky Pollard on a hunger strike.

If this girl wins it will be a sad day for mothers everywhere. For she is the worrying proof that nowadays it’s OK to be a nicotine-stained, spoilt little madam, as long as you’re stick thin and look pretty in makeup. I’d have to say she’s about neck and neck with the Pussycat Dolls, when it comes to being the best role model there is for little girls.

Having seen her act out, lash out and stomp out over the last few months on TV, I for one certainly wouldn’t buy into any brand that she was the face of, so lets hope the judges vote for the right girl to win, the one that might just prove that beauty isn’t always just skin deep…

And the result? Yeah, the right girl won. Some of the judges may have been tempted with $ signs and voted for who might make them the most cash, but thankfully the Australian public proved that poise and good manners beats trailer trash and tantrums any day of the week.

\\

I’m sniffing, I must have Swine Flu

The whole house is sick at the moment. Or should I say the inhabitants of the house are sick at the moment. The bricks, mortar and roof tiles are doing just fine.

An assortment of coughs, colds, sniffs, sore throats, blocked and dribbling noses are running a riot through the family right now, resulting in a never-ending stream of half used tissues that the dog keeps fishing out of the bin and shredding all over the floor. Horrible sticky spots have also been springing up all over the kitchen counter, where the medicine hasn’t quite made it fast enough from the plastic spoon to it’s unwilling final destination.

Of course all of this sniveling misery can only mean one thing. Winter has come. Aside from the calender telling me so, the arrival of this rather unwelcome season is evident for a number of different reasons.

Firstly the most obvious, it’s cold. Secondly the most expected, I’m cold. And thirdly, all the confirmation I needed, the dog is cold. Well I gauge this from the fact that despite his now thick rug like fur, he is spending more time hunting out a heat source to sleep in front of, and less time skulking around outside, waiting to ambush next doors cat.

So given the indisputable evidence above, I decided that this year I absolutely refuse to suffer the cold for as long as I did last year. I would say suffer in silence, but as my husband would be quick to point out, I never like to keep my suffering to myself. Far to damaging to the Yin and Yang of my well being I think – better out than in, and all that jazz.

So how does one prepare for the long months of shivering that lay ahead? That would be adding to, increasing and stock piling the various heat supplies in our home.  First stop, the log basket. Running dangerously low, with only 2 logs, a few scraps of bark and 4 firelighters left over from last year.  Panic over, another trailer load has now been delivered, and the new logs are stacked all the way up the side of the house. Asking for an invasion of termites of course. These logs, in the eyes of a hungry white ant, equate to a 5 star hotel, with complimentary breakfast, lunch and dinner laid on for a year. Never mind, a risk worth taking.

Next it was time to buy a new heater to go by my desk. Save me getting all scrunched up in my seat as I sit and type away for hours a day, with hunched shoulders and bright blue nail beds. The open grill on the front does mean Charlie is likely to go up like a furry fire ball if he gets to close, but if it’s a choice between my cold bones or his singed fur, sadly he loses.

Now for the bed. Last year, as I mentioned in my previous post, I ended up climbing in with half my wardrobe on, and my hoodie firmly zipped up and over my head. While this is undeniably a brilliant form of contraception, it was far from ideal. So this year, despite my husbands initial protests, I AM going to get an electric blanket. We may well wake up to find the feathers inside the duvet caked together with sweat, but at least my toes won’t need to curl up in shock as they hit the cold sheet.

Yes, I admit I am incredibly soft when it comes to the cold. I don’t deal with it well, and I definitely comment on it far more than is necessary – especially given that it is a yearly event and has been since time began. Well except for the Ice Age. Brrrrr… now that wasn’t a good time to be alive.

What can I say, I am English. It’s programmed into our DNA to hate the cold, talk about the cold and complain about the cold. Particularly, dare I say, those ‘less hardy’ people, like myself, who are born anywhere south of Birmingham.

I admit that I am that person who opens their front door in the middle of a freezing UK winter, wearing nothing but T-shirt and shorts, then proceeds to blast the person clear off the front door step with the scorching gust of central heating that escapes from my beautifully over-heated house.

So this said,  I am obviously not that person who would consider an Ice Hotel as a suitable holiday destination. I don’t care how warm the reindeer skin sheets and elk fur blankets are supposed to be. I am also not the sort of person who has, up until now at least, ventured anywhere near a ski slope. Though to be truthful, this is probably more to do with my incredible inability to balance on anything other than a flat, solid, stable surface. I would be that person who breaks their leg before even making it out of the ski hire shop.

Anyway, I digress somewhat. As I was saying, we’re all sick and sniffy right now. And I thought nothing of it until my daughter brought home a letter from school yesterday. I say a letter, what I mean is a ‘lets induce panic and clear our classrooms so the teachers don’t have to work’ announcement.

According to the WA Health Authorities, children showing any signs or symptoms linked with Swine Flu should not only stay off school, they should also remain tucked up at home until they are completely better.

So lets run through a few of those possible symptoms.

Fever, yes, we’re all slightly warm – Tick. Cough, yes, both kids sound like asthmatic dogs – Tick. Runny nose, well like I said we’re running and blocked – Tick, Tick.

Righty then. Given how long we were all sick for last winter, I’m calculating that according to the Health Authorities, we should all remain in quarantine until around about October time. Seriously, is this for real? We haven’t been, or even know anyone who’s been near Mexico, the US, Canada, Japan or Panama in the last 7 days. We don’t live near the one confirmed case in Western Australia. And neither I, nor any of my family suddenly feel the urge to eat from a pail or start rolling around in mud.

Maybe I’m just numb from the media always trying to fan the flames of panic, just to sell papers and fill headlines. Perhaps, after living through the SARS in Singapore, I am now somewhat unfazed by such a potential ‘threat’ to mankind. Either way, I refuse to get my tissues in a knot, hide away and hyperventilate over the very worst case scenario.

I don’t believe you can live in fear of every runny nose and cough. Swine Flu is just that – a type of flu. Just one of the many types of viruses that spreads around the world in seasonal epidemics, resulting in the deaths of hundreds of thousands annually. It’s been a while since the big 3 influenza pandemics of the 20th century killed tens of millions of people. Medical science has progressed, vaccinations are now available, and according to the doctors I have spoken to, it is no longer the death sentence the media likes to portray. The emergency services here are apparently already under siege with people calling for ambulance with suspected Pig Flu. That’ll really help with those long, long waiting times at the A&E.

Call me completely irresponsible, but my daughter needs to learn and I need to work, so she’s not camping out in front of the TV all winter with a red nose and a box of tissues.  She’s had a flu jab and can wear a face mask if need be. So unless she suddenly grows a curly tail and starts to squeal, she is going to keep going to school.

And finally, before you tell me I’m being flippant, I’m not making light of the situation, merely questioning how the situation is being dealt with in the press. And to prove my point, here are some Swine Flu facts for those who are panicking, coughing or just curious.

et

: : : : : : : : : : :

Who’s afraid of the big bad spider

One of the things that I think most people worry about when coming to live here is whether they are going to come face to foot with an 8 legged killing machine the moment they set foot on Aussie soil.

First off, to determine whether you can actually handle living in a country with some of the world’s most deadly spiders, answer the following question.

If you answered B or C then you will do just fine. If you answered A, then you are without a shadow of a doubt a fully fledged arachnophobic, and would do best to give this country a wide berth.

So what is fact and what is over hyped fiction about Perth’s 8 legged lovelies and are they really as scary as their reputation suggests?

Fact. There are some species of spiders here that do have a deadly nip about them, some that can cause flesh to rot and some that could probably induce a heart attack if you should ever come face to face with one when climbing out of the shower.

Fiction. It is highly unlikely that you will often come into contact with such spiders and even less likely that you will be charged down by such a man eating monster, with fangs at the ready and a body the size of a small elephant, as you wander through the shopping malls and quiet streets of suburbia.

The most ‘infamous’ of all spiders here in WA is the ‘Red back‘, with a body no bigger than a 5p coin and its distinctive red stripe on the females back (the male is back all over). The bite can apparently be nasty, excruciating if the female in question happens to be pregnant. That can be understood and forgiven, pregnancy can bring out the worst in anything.

While they are deadly, these spiders seldom venture inside the house, preferring dark, damp places like sheds, garages or piles of logs. An antidote is available from pharmacies should you be bitten and more reassuringly still, there hasn’t been a death since 1953.

The other spider in question, and probably the one that worries me more is the ‘White-tail‘ , a small spider with a cigar-shaped body and a white tip. They have a very painful bite and their venom can literally rot away your flesh if not treated in time. Babies and old people are more at risk, but once again, an antidote is readily available and while they do sometimes venture indoors, they will not actively hunt you down to attack. Leave them alone and they won’t bother you.

If you are wondering “But how will I know if one has bitten me?”, then I think it can safely be said that you WILL know. The pain level is meant to be up there with childbirth (so a male doctor claimed). So I don’t think a bite would be something you would overlook until it’s too late and all of the meat on your leg left has fallen off the bone. If in doubt, take yourself off to the pharmacy/doctor/hospital and tell them something with 8 legs bit you.

The ‘Wolf‘ and the ‘Huntsman‘ spiders are not dangerous, except if you are prone to high blood pressure and panic attacks. The Huntsman in particular can grow up to the size of a small child’s hand. While I would certainly never want one around the house, they are in fact great for having about as they eat red backs and other annoying insects. Personally I think I would prefer to invest in some bug spray rather than have a house guest that is big and hairy enough to require it’s own set of towels and a face flannel.

A few years ago a Huntsman spider actually caused a pile up on the freeway in Perth. When a woman lowered her sun visor to block the sun in her eyes and had one fall out and land on her, she understandably freaked out, lost control of her car and crashed. – Note to self, must tap my visor several times before getting in the car.

So yes, these spiders that you have heard about are out there, but more often than not they are out of sight and out of mind. Unless you live out in the bush or in a more rural setting, you will rarely see anything that might cause you any grievous bodily harm. The same goes for the snakes.

It is actually the mere idea of these spiders that can be far more scarier than the reality.

When you first arrive you tell yourself that you will check under every toilet seat and sofa cushion and never put on a shoe without beating it half to death against a wall.

After a bit however you start to relax and eventually get to a stage where you merely study the web briefly (a red back’s web is very ‘messy’) before you hang out the washing next to it, shake your gardening gloves before putting them on and occasionally wash your hair with one eye open, should that watching spider suddenly take it upon itself to jump under the water with you and start loofahing down with your exfoliating shower gel.

Of course I know they are out there. That much is evident by the large number of webs that appear daily around our garden. One web out by our drive stretched out a good metre and a half between 2 trees. It looked just about strong enough to ensnare next door’s cat. Wishful thinking on my part, bloody thing mercilessly teases the dog, makes him bark and gives me a headache.

Now I know for a fact that this particular spider is fairly hefty in size, as it went through a stage of base jumping out of the tree every night and using my car wing mirror as a landing point. When returning home one night I caught the spider in the headlights ‘mid jump’ and was forced to crawl across the car and out of the passenger door to avoid a face to face meeting.

On the upside, these webs that drape my window and door frames like old fashioned net curtains, make brilliant fly and insect catchers. After spending a Spring in Perth I have quickly learned to make firm friends with any creature that includes ‘fly’ in it’s diet.

Just one more interesting spidery fact.

The most poisonous spider of all in WA is actually one that we have in our houses all the time, swinging from the coving and light fittings and never causing us a moments alarm. The ‘Daddy Long-Legs’ (similar to a UK version but with no wings) is, believe it or not, the most venomous of all. But with fangs too blunt to pierce through human skin it is rendered completely harmless.

Just as well really, otherwise I would have to make more of an effort with the dusting, something that I seldom ever find the time to do.

Pain in the backside

18 years ago I broke my bottom. I literally broke my bottom. I fell back against a bar stool (sober I might add), chipped my coccyx and as a result have had a right royal pain in the backside ever since.

Over the years I have endured excruciatingly long plane flights, cooped up like a battery hen, eyes watering with pain and cursing the lack of legroom. I have had to suffer the humiliation of carting around a cushion shaped like a toilet seat and have spent countless hours and god knows how much money to voluntarily be poked, prodded and cracked on chiropractor’s table around the world.

Has any of it really helped? No, not really. Once a bad back, always a bad back. Short of a full spinal transplant any treatment only temporarily elevates the problem, it never solves it. All these years on and my back is as bad as ever. Worse probably, as the pain from my chipped bottom has now worked it’s way right up to my neck, which is now as tightly strung as the metal ropes on a suspension bridge.

Last year as my bones seized up in the cold and I was resorting to climbing out of bed at a right angle, I decided to buy one of those all singing, all dancing massage chairs (a cheaper Chinese version off Ebay which has so far has proved to work just fine). Not overly enthusiastic about the huge new addition to our bedroom (until he tried it himself), my husband claimed it took over half the room. Not true at all. A third at a push.

“I always wondered what sort of people had those chairs in their homes” he said at the time. Now he knows. Those in pain without a qualified masseur as a husband.

Now this is the sort of  chair that would probably look right at home on the flight deck of the Starship Enterprise. Not for the faint hearted, it has more buttons on it than all of our remote controls combined. It can also squeeze you into a vice lock and pummel you senseless before you have even had a chance to settle back and relax.

Recently, with my Vertigo picking up speed, a crick in my neck and my shoulders knotted like a Boy Scouts tent rope, I thought that perhaps it was time I got myself some further treatment. Reluctant to go back down the ‘You really must relax while I crack your neck like a chicken’ route, I started hunting around for a slightly less painful alternative and was given the details of a nearby McTimoney Therapist.

This form of chiropractic treatment is a much more gentler technique than the normal bone popping variety, combining soft tissue release, trigger point therapy and sports massage. It still works to adjust the bones of your body, to maintain correct alignment of your spine and pelvis and to ensure your body’s nerve supply works efficiently, but unlike some other treatments that I have tried, this one is designed to eliminate the cause, not just treat the symptoms.

Two sessions in and I can already feel a real improvement. I can now turn my head without first moving the rest of my body, so that in itself is a bonus and makes driving somewhat safer. While there is undoubtedly plenty of work to do and stubborn muscles that still need to be coaxed into submission, for the first time in along time I feel like I might actually have a chance to get to the bottom of the problem. The place where 18 years ago it all began.

Having a bad back can take over your life and limit everything you do. It becomes so much a part of who you are that over the years you actually forget what it is like to live painfree.

If you are living in Perth and suffering away with a dodgy back, migraines, sciatica, sports injuries or general aches and pains, then I would highly recommend that you give McTimoney therapy a shot and call Paul Dupker on (08) 93422523 / 0424296620.

And no, I’m not being paid to say this … though if this tip helps you out feel free to pay me for the good advice!

: : : : : : : : : : :