February 6. Day 37. Sing. Sing a song

I started singing lessons today. Technically I resumed singing lessons after starting last year. But I did zero rehearsals over the long summer break so we are back at square one.
I promised to do better.
I will do better. I would like to see like a bird. I have a lot of years of negative self talk to overcome first.
I was told to mime in school choir in Year 6. From that moment on I've mimed on just about any and every occasion singing is required. I didn't sing because I couldn't sing. That was the story I'd been told and that was the story I told myself.
But I want to change the script.
I like to hear other people sing and now I'd like to experience the same thing myself.
So onwards and upwards.

February 5. Day 36. Inflated egos

There are many things about parenting that I didn't anticipate. The fact that I can still be surprised by requests now is in itself surprising.  

You don't stop being a parent just because your child is an adult. 

But just because my child is an adult doesn't mean I want to know about purchases from an adult shop. 

And generally speaking I have no desire to see them and certainly not photograph them. 

But you know ... art. 

In May a play Oliver has written will be performed in the Anywhere Theatre Festival. 

It will be performed by two humans and two blow up dolls. 

And I was co-opted to take the promotional photographs. So there I was in the garage with models named Saucy Sally and Massive Man... I'm not sure what type of mother that makes me.

February 4. Day 35. Fly away with me

 I can't help it. I love bug
I think you are supposed to grow out of this when you exit childhood, either that or become a entomologist.
I did neither.
But I guess being a journalist means involvement with bugs of one kind of another, especially working for the London papers.
But the bugs I like are like the bugs who I was attracted to when I had a Bug Catcher when it was still age appropriate.
So when walking the dogs through the Botanic Gardens I spent as much time looking at the dragon flies as the dogs spent eyeing off the ducks.
Neither of us had any chance of catching anything or taking it home but that didn't stop us from looking. It was fun but in honesty I would have had a better chance of catching the dragon flies without the dogs holding me back and the dogs would have been better off without me holding the lead. But neither of us would have it any other way.

February 3. Day 34. Toadly devoted to you

A big bang in the middle of the night is never a good thing ... well not when you are talking about a load noise from out in the street. Then the lights went out. I went outside to investigate and all the the whole street was plunged into darkness.
The dogs followed and within seconds I heard something. In the torch light I saw Rumple had a toad in his mouth. Everyone knows toads are poisonous to dogs. I separated the dogs and the toad and went inside and phoned the 24 hour vet. I was given an action plan involving rinsing his mouth out with water and keeping a really close eye on him. Toad toxin is, apparently, very fast acting. If there's going to be trouble it will hit within 20 minutes. So watch him I did, as well as you can in the dark with a torch. At the crucial 20 minute mark he was fine but after about a hour he vomited. So even though that should have been fine I got him in the car and went to the vet anyway. He was fine. I could have done with a sedative. The idea that anything might happen to one of my babies is too much to bare. I'm toad-ally devoted.

February 2. Day 33. If you can't stand the heat

 My aunt Glenda returns to Adelaide tomorrow so we invited her over for dinner. And then we invited a couple more people and then a couple of others. So while Charles was in the kitchen making the curry I was making an entree on the other side of the island bench.
 This was good because if we are in the same cooking space we tend to end up wanting to kill each other.
Instead I tried to kill myself or at least do myself an injury with super hot chillies. I am most careless with cutting chilli. I almost always end up not properly washing my hands and touching something delicate. Tonight was no exception. I rubbed my eyes with chilli fingers. This hurt a lot. And to think we were eating this. It tasted good. Whether my totally dodgy belly will feel the same tomorrow is another story.

February 1. Day 32. Puppy love

There is a reason the advertising industry just loves a golden retriever puppy - they are just impossibly cute. They are little balls of fluffy awesome and energy and you just want to cuddle them.
Today I got to lay eyes on Winona the new little sister of Roland. It's just as well I didn't have a big bag or I may have tried to smuggle her out. I'm pretty sure Rumple and Winkle wouldn't have minded (yeah right).
But the truth is like babies it's probably better to borrow. Little Noni will grow up and she will shed hair like no-one's business.
My allergies are really far better served by dogs that don't shed.
I also rather like a dog that sits on my lap and lies on my bed.  I'll stick to my small and furry bundles of love. I shall love little Noni from afar because who couldn't see that face and fall for her. She's adorable.

January 31. Day 31. What could possibly go wrong?

I've been in the theatre when sets wobbled and broke.
I've been there when the curtains didn't open, the sound queues didn't work, people forgot their lines, the sound queues were off, the props weren't where they were supposed to be, things were dropped or spilled or costumes failed.
There was the time the actor broke a leg at the matinee and the person filling in read lines off an A4 photocopied script.
Once the actor playing a role was too sick to go on so the understudy performed the second act.
I've pretty much seen it all - but not generally in one performance.
Today everything went wrong and it was hilarious. Peter Pan goes Wrong is almost painful to watch - and not just because you think the actors might get hurt by collapsing things. It also hurts because it might be an exaggeration but it's not too far from the truth... and we all know truth hurts.