decemberish

The end of year party season has well and truly begun.  Case in point: it was not yet 3pm last Friday at a team lunch when one attendee grabbed her breasts in an illustration of the difficulty caused by her lovely (but possibly workplace inappropriate) backless top.  I'll have you know I was a model of propriety.  Oh, hey now, doubters: I had to get back to the office so I actually was well behaved, unusual or no!

The party got me in the holiday spirit.  I dragged P to a Christmas tree farm and thence to the Warehouse for cheap decorations.  We bought a ghastly Michael Buble Christmas CD and I thrashed it while adorning the tree with super! cheap! candy! canes! and scattering glitter on the floor.  My house smells just lovely, like pine and happiness.  I abhor pine scents generally - them old fake ones - but I cannot get enough of huffing my Christmas tree.  It's delicious and sends me straight back to my childhood.  The tree itself isn't as big as my family memories, at least in part because the space for it ain't so big neither.  I left the bottom largely undecorated, expecting the purrymouses to destroy it in five seconds flat.  However, they're largely unphased.  Cokes batted a decoration to get my attention last night, but then he also jumped on me, scratched my leg, ate my headphones and manufactured a spew on the living room floor all in an effort to wake us up to fill his bowl this morning, so I think I don't think he has a particular animus in relation to the tree.

TWO WORKING WEEKS, TWO WORK PARTIES AND A LUNCHEON LEFT.  CANNOT WAIT TO BE DONE.

I'm so desperate to be finished this year I've started drafting my usual end of year survey.  I'm still struggling with a pithy description of 2014, in large part due to denial that 2014 has in fact begun. 

********************************************

On another, horrible note, I've had some very bad news that affects my Hat Friend.  I am sorely worried for her.  I don't pray, I think -- so I'm thinking near constantly about Hat Friend's situation and hoping for the best possible outcome.  It's scary when (a) things are completely out of our control and (b) your words sound like horrible, hopeless platitudes.  Words can be powerful. I need to corral them and winnow out the least effective, leaving something meaningful, I hope. 

decision 2014

We got half cut on champagne and went to pick out wedding jewellery for M on Saturday afternoon.  I expect that's why I fell asleep by 9pm on Saturday night during the election coverage; being sauced, that is.  We had a lovely time at the jewellery store.  After finding the perfect earrings and matching necklace, we tried on everything in the vintage cabinet.  I flounced around the store with a three carat diamond on my finger (verdict: terribly gauche and wondrously obnoxious, three carats is), while trying to persuade Hat Friend to purchase an expensive gold fob chain or a beautiful emerald ring.  We drank some more bubbles afterwards and toasted the bride.  Can't wait for her wedding day. 

Election coverage: do you know, I think the coverage on my facebook page was probably more extensive and vitriolic than the coverage on the two major free to air channels?  That's saying something.  I woke up to posts on Sunday morning saying things like:

- 'Shame on you, New Zealand'
- 'Crying into a bucket of KFC, Dotcom?'
- 'If you didn't vote, you can't complain'
- 'Moving to Scandinavia'

Had the result gone a different way, I think I would have seen just as much disappointment from the other half of my feed.  It wasn't all one-way traffic.  I've found it hard to work myself into a proper lather about this election, though for all that I'm disappointed that NZ doesn't appear to wish to make any major decisions that might result in a narrowing of the gap between the rich and poor.  Wow, I didn't expect to make any direct statements about my political leanings on social media (other than, you know, me feminism) but there we have it.  Oh, except I've bagged Colin Craig before and I was thrilled to see we'll go another three Colin Craig-free years. 
 

what's next, gout?

Fresh page, blank slate notwithstanding, my bloggy muse is still AWOL.  Am feeling very stilted on the old blog recently, given I don't tend to write about work, my husband generally (other than, you know, putting up mocking faux-fashion pictures) or details regarding my friends.  Maybe it's just that I'm leading a boring life?  Probably.  I can usually wring a drop of drama or six out of the most innocuous material, so I'll resort to a nice list and see what pops out:

• Summer holiday is mostly organised, including a trip to see the olds, a week at the beach with friends, and a visit from P's mum.  We've also booked a trip to Golden Bay (upper South Island, v remote, hippy heaven) for a wedding in March.  Am feeling good about summer time on the horizon.
• Friend saga.  Friend 1 has been a dick to Friend 2 over a gift that Friend 1, a bunch of other friends and I arranged for Friend 2.  I heartily disapprove of Friend 1's dickish behaviour and dealt with endless email/FB correspondence, including a few calls to other friends myself for sanity! Mother above, how is it that friends can still bring the drama at age 30+? I am actually ashamed of having had any involvement in a squabble at all.  But given I'm not going to parse the details here, you probably don't care much about that at all.  Safe to say: my policy on this sh*t now is: Let's All Calm Down and Have a Glass of Wine.  Actually, that's an excellent policy to apply across the board for me, I'll have it printed on an inspirational fridge magnet in no time.  Watch out Pinterest.*
• Tabitha cat has found an access point to the roof and scares the bejesus out of me on the regular.  She creates massive thumps, and I rush outside to see what's caused the noise, only to realise I'm being watched over the eaves by a furry wee stalker.  Gets me every time and is somehow worse than when I realised I'm being watched during midnight pee trips. 
• HAHAHAHA I jinxed myself with my recent post about musical theatre. Turns out the Sound of Music is coming to town and my sister K is desperate to go.  Mum said no way, on the basis that it won't be as good as the movie, but K pointed out that comparing it unfavourably is half the fun.  I mean, why would you watch the Keira Knightley version of Pride & Prejudice otherwise?  So, I'm going back to the theatre for a singalong, goodness help me.
• Weekend: nearly upon us, whew. 
• State of the Chubby Update: fell off the food recording bandwagon hard, but am making better decisions and feeling better about meself generally.  More cups of tea, fewer diet Cokes, no snorting chips before dinner.  Good rules, hey?
• OMG I COMPLETELY FORGOT TO TELL YOU: I think I had an attack of gallstones! No, I'm not 90 or a very fat man (the population segment I associate with gallstones)!  The other weekend was spiked with abdominal pain, that started near the bottom of my ribs and worked its way down.  I was achey on and off all weekend, with marginal improvement on the Monday.  After I was palpated by the doctor (ick! palpation! sounds vile, right? Mind you, it could have been worse - she threatened me with a transvaginal scan at one point), she concluded that the likely culprit was gallstones.  I was so ashamed, but did you know that it is actually more common in women?  And that it can be caused by long term oral contraceptive use?  Well, that's what Wikipedia tells me anyway.  I had a blood test/pee test to rule some other stuff out, but they won't know that it was the 'stones for sure unless they do an ultrasound.  Given I'm feeling better, I'm going to flag that, so unless they flare up again, I guess we'll never know.  GALLSTONES.  AM SUFFERING FROM MYSTERIOUS OLD PERSON AILMENT.  SHAME.

*I joined Pinterest in 2011, pinned approximately 3 wedding hairstyles I knew I could never be achieved with my hair, and never looked at it again. I often get so-and-so-is-now-following-you-on-Pinterest! emails, and every time I feel sorry for them, because it must be pretty damn boring.

2013, a retrospective.

1. What did you do in 2013 that you'd never done before?

Bought a house.  A purple one.  I've never lived in a purple house before, so I guess that's a first too.

Visited Melbourne.

Identified multiple gray hairs on my husband.

Bought a car.  I've never had my own before!

Bit of a boring old list of new things, isn't it? 

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

Eh.  I don't really do resolutions because I don't need another stick with which to beat myself.  There's usually a vague thought about getting fit, losing weight, blahblah but I know in my heart of hearts I'm quite happy to truck along eating a wheel of cheese and watching the development of my bingo wings.

3. Did anyone close to you give birth?

Depends how you define close, I suppose.  I define it pretty tightly, so nope.

4. Did anyone close to you die?

No. (Insert grateful sentiment here)

5. What countries did you visit?

After last year's extravaganza, this year we confined ourselves to a couple of quick visits to Australia. 

6. What would you like to have in 2014 that you lacked in 2013?

Still would like a cat, much as I wanted last year.  Hmmm. Otherwise? I'm embarrassed by putting a list of material desires and 2013 weren't too lacking really, so nothing, really.  Oh WAIT.  Patience!

7. What dates from 2013 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?

1 July 2013: Taking possession of our first home.  Eating pizza on the floor and thinking 'this place is a cold shithole.  What the hell have we done?' I love it now, though. 

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?

Finding the finance to purchase said home and actually winning a fucking auction.  Some worky stuff.

9. What was your biggest failure?

Wishing away the passage of time, sometimes.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury?

I was fairly healthy in 2013.  P, however: P chunked his thumb, had intestinal issues, suffered innumerable colds - I really felt for the poor bugger, when I wasn't monumentally pissed off at having to play Florence Nightingale.

11. What was the best thing you bought?

The house.  Followed closely by some insulation and a heat pump for the house.  P would no doubt vote for all the $$$ we've spent at Mitre 10 on DIY shit we've barely used. 

12. Where did most of your money go?

House! Also getting piffled away on food and booze; we're just so GOOD at spending on that.

13. What did you get really, really, really excited about?

Not having to go to open homes every weekend anymore! When we won the auction on June 9, we cracked a bottle of something tasty and basically danced around the living room celebrating the fact that the house hunt of 2013 was finally over.

14. What song will always remind you of 2013?

Royals - Lorde.  Ubiquitous in 2013, everywhere, all the time.  Still don't hate it, miraculously.  That song is also vividly associated with driving near Matamata, of all places, as P and I meandered home from a lovely long weekend in the Bay of Plenty.

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

a) Happier or sadder? Happier.  I think?  I was pretty happy last year too, so maybe the same (this post notwithstanding).
b) Thinner or fatter? Fatty fatty boom boom BOOM.
c) Richer or poorer? Depends how you quantify this.  Probably richer, even though I feel poorer - we may be paying a mortgage and interest etc but we own equity now, I guess.

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

I wish I'd taken more leave.  This year was a little tight on the leave front, though I guess I'm only feeling it now.  Also: done more of mortgage-paying.

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

Wasting mah dollarz and waistline on food. 

18. How will you be spending Christmas?

Stewart Island, fighting off sea lions and stalking kiwi - as well as hanging with the fandam. 

19. Did you fall in love in 2013?

Little bit with the house (WOULD YOU STOP TALKING ABOUT THE HOUSE ALREADY, EYEROLL, GEEZ).

Fell a bit more in love with P, as I do most years.  This year it was the realisation he takes so much administrative hassle out of my life.  What, is handling the spreadsheets not romantic to you?  I feel sick thinking that I didn't kiss him goodbye this morning and that we haven't emailed today.  We always kiss goodbye and there's usually something sent to make the other laugh.  The wear and tear of a long year has frayed our edges - it lead to a serious degree of miffedness last night on my part, and this morning on his when I stonily endured his cuddle.   I think we need a bit of time out to reconnect properly, but I do love him more each day, I promise.  Maybe 2013 was the year of domestic discontent?

20. What was your favourite TV programme?

Ummmm, I'm having a bit of a Survivor renaissance which is shameful.  Either that or Top Chef or Breaking Bad or something.  Oh wait, no! Homeland.  That's it - but I can't have liked it excessively or it would have sprung straight to mind?

21. What was the best book you read?

Wolf Hall and Bring Up the Bodies, Hilary Mantel.  So. Good.  I gave them to my mother and while she occasionally raises an eyebrow at my choice in fiction, she also devoured them whole.  Screw the Man Booker, mah mum's praize is all the accolades required, right there! *ahem*

22. What was your greatest musical discovery?

Um, pass?  I discovered nothing new, really.  I like the newish Ladi 6 album, if that counts?

Sidenote: you know people on Idol-type television shows are all 'music's my life' and every conversation with a new person you had in high school started with 'what sort of music are you into?' and people now discuss their top-25 lists on their iPod?  Yeah, music isn't the necessary art for me.  I need words to survive.  I am loathe to admit it but I don't even have my own iTunes and music selection - P has pretty good taste and he'll upload anything I've purchased, within reason.  I do still buy and enjoy music, but often, when at home alone, I prefer silence.  A: enjoys the mute button.

23. What did you want and get?

A home.  YAY for that.  Love, time with family.   

24. What did you want and not get?

Patience! A better work ethic! These are things I can work on by myself and not gifts from Santa, I'm guessing, but if Santa's handing them out...

25. What was your favourite film of this year?

Eh, pass.  Nothing has sprung to mind so they can't have been that good.  Oh wait, I freaked out about space for a solid two days after seeing Gravity.  I don't think it's the best movie of the year, but MY GOD I am obsessed with space / space disasters.  This movie sits on a par with Apollo 13.

26. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
On my 31st birthday I was at work, slogging it out on a big thing and ... wait, I just checked my calendar.  I've got total false sorry-for-self memories.  It was a Saturday and I ate brunch with my sister which was excellent and then I think P and I went somewhere?  Hopeless.

27. What kept you sane?

Diet coke.  My colleagues.  P.  Taking wee breaks.  Going to visit my Mum.  TEA.

28. What political issue stirred you the most?

Roast Busters and rape culture, for sure. 

29. Who did you miss?

Missed all me friends in the northern hemisphere, particularly V.  V had a baby at the end of 2012 and I still haven't met the wee blighter.  J too, but I get to see her before year's end (YAY). 

Missed my grandmother.

30. Who was the best new person you met?

I very much enjoyed meeting and getting to know C, a friend of some friends this year.  She's got a total potty mouth and I love it.  She taught me the entirely crude phrase 'Cunt Scarf' by using it in reference to Hat Friend's skirt at the Beyonce concert.

31. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2013.

True: try to stay even tempered, it's better for your relationships in the long run.  

Facetious: use discretion when considering whether dry-clean only really means dry-clean only.  It's surprising what can go through the wash on a cold cycle, but devastating when you get it wrong.

still vile

Here I am, still gunked up with snot (clear, I've been checking, no need to panic just yet), open-mouth breathing and exhaling heavy sighs approx. once every two minutes.  I spent all of yesterday at my new house, sending out emails saying things like:

"I'm just trying to shake this cold.  I'll definitely be in by lunchtime"

"I'm afraid I won't be in today but I'm checking email and I'll definitely be in tomorrow"

"I'll deal with that on my return, if that suits?"

"P, COME HOME NOW WITH A JELLY TIP PLZ I'M DYYYYYYYING"

While I did spend quite a bit of time napping, nose-blowing and binge-watching Laguna Beach (the second series, woefully inadequate without LC), I also continued the stocktake of the house.  Was definitely warmer after I stuffed dirty teatowels in the half inch gap under the back door.  My mother recommended I find "one of those craft fairs" and buy some kind of "handmade sausage" to stop the drafts.  It was sometime before I finished laughing.  The telephone and internet connections came online yesterday (note: NZ services - infinitely faster set up times than the UK.  Sure, you have to hand crank the internet once it's in, but at least it gets set up within two weeks, rather than, say, eight).  That is an enormous relief because do you know how much data one chews through when one needs to check the Daily Mail thrice daily?  Quite a bit (ROYAL BEBE WATCH PEOPLE, PRIORITIES.)

Oh also, in News Of The Day, Hat Friend scored us tickets to Beyonce!  Me circa 2003 is so unbelievably pumped about this news.  Seven 30-something girls at a Beyonce concert: what could possibly go wrong?  Quite a bit.  There's already talk of taking a day's leave (it's on a Friday) to "get ready", for which, substitute "blow out on cheap bubbly before the concert even starts."  God, I'm that woman that circa-2003-me would have felt sorry for.  How the mighty have fallen.  Don't be so smug 2003-me.  You wouldn't have had the money to buy tickets.  Be grateful to yo' old ass self! 

by rote

Hallo sailors.  I am here and it is Monday and what is wonderful about that?  We've had rain!  The drought is (sort of) broken, and we're back to standard Auckland humidity (frizz, sweat, panting, window-scraping and the other assorted side effects of humidity are back too, of course).

Weekend was good. Yup.  Spent some time with Hat Friend which was a blast - she makes me laugh - and, you guessed it, went house hunting.  Had a great skype call with a friend in London.  If you ignore all the driving from A to B to C and back to A, then C, B, B, A (of course all the open homes near one another are not grouped in a nice consecutive viewing order), it was a lovely weekend, really. 

Ate terribly this weekend; consider this the start of a health kick, boys and girls.  To ease myself back into good habits, last night's dinner was a hefty iceberg salad, roast pumpkin and a little bit of rump steak, thinly sliced.  Heaven, when you've been living on carbs and cheese and grease. 

Phoning it in with some pictures instead:

THE START OF GLORIOUS AUTUMN MORNINGS

FIRST RAINDROPS FOR THE YEAR.  I DON'T COUNT THAT NIGHT OF THE FIRE ALARM (3AM ON A MONDAY MORNING).  THAT DAY IS DEAD TO ME.  DEAD, D'YOU HEAR?

(don't) burn baby

Not to brag,* but it is the most glorious early summer day here in Tamaki Makaurau today.  Outside my office window buildings are glistening, wavy with reflections from the Waitemata Harbour.  There is a light salt haze on the horizon, where sea meets sky.

Today really is lovely and is a delicious reminder of why we moved back (does it seem to you like I’m still justifying the decision or trying to convince myself?  I thought so.)  The sunburn is not, however, so delicious.  I sat outside for 20 minutes at lunchtime today with my shoulders bared and the heat they’re now generating is astonishing.  The effect is compounded by chilly air conditioning in my office; I’m shiver-y with localised hot spots. 

We have had a sunshine-y spate of summer days over the past week.  Sunday in particular was a cracker - - but when I had lunch with my husband on Monday, the number of women walking past our outdoor table with strips of red up the backs of their legs was beyond belief.  I just don’t think we Kiwis learn, despite the heavy slip-slop-slap messages we are bombarded with.  When P and I were on holiday in Europe, we were really cautious about using plenty of sunscreen.  We were outdoors almost all day, so it was pretty logical.  Here, I use a moisturiser with SPF15 on my face (o glorious recording of the mundanities of my existence for posterity!) but I’ve been less careful otherwise.  That’s pretty stupid, given the burn time here (only 10 minutes in the heat of the day) and the skin cancer rates. 

Also, you’d think I’d have learnt.  I’ve recorded some burn horrendousness here previously (when we were both triple-x sexxxy on our honeymoon after a nuclear burn sitting on the bow of a Thai ferry – honestly, it still makes my shins ache thinking about it).  There is a veritable slideshow of pictures from my childhood recording stupid burn incidents and they all conjure the smell of Mum’s after-sun green aloe jelly.  A few occasions spring immediately to mind:

-     Taupo, New Years’ Day 1990ish: giant red stripes up the back of my legs.  I oh-so-carefully lotioned myself at age 8 or 9ish, then promptly fell asleep on a lilo (inflatable pool bed thing) on the lake…only to discover I’d failed to do the backs of my legs (the bits I couldn’t see).

-     Tamahere, last day of school, 1992: sunstroke.  I could have cared less about the burn as I threw up and saw black spots outside Room 3 on our last day of school.  Can’t remember why I’d been outside for so long; perhaps it was an outdoor assembly?  Yeah, I’m seeking to transfer blame to the teachers…ahem. 

-    Waihi Beach, December 1999: red schnozz of social death.  Age 17, my friends and I went to a campground to pick up boys, peroxide our hair and drink booze on the sly.  The burn on my nose and ears killed my chances with the other sex; I also came home with a spotty bleached pillow from a failure to wash out the peroxide properly.  We also attempted to smoke oregano; which? Don’t.  Crap on a cracker we were cool.

-    Mt Mauganui, 2001: back fat stripe.  You know how belly shirts were kind of a thing? Well, this 19 year old girl forgot that there was a vital strip of flesh between singlet and bikini bottoms as she lay on the beach desperately trying to maintain a nonchalant, devil-may-care, super-hot attitude with her new-ish boyfriend and all of his friends.  My cover was blown; good thing I’d had the foresight to bring a 3L bottle of duty-free Jack Daniels for the boys when I arrived on the trip.  On reflection, I’m not sure they’d remember either the burn or drinking the second half of that bottle.

Burn itself isn’t really a funny topic though.  I look at my English brother-in-law and his careful attempts to protect his rose-leaf complexion and I realise he’s doing the right thing.  My aunt is passionate about wearing cover-ups, using skin protection and wearing a hat.  My mother and two of my close friends have had cancerous and pre-cancerous lumps removed.  It’s the right day to remind myself to take care, a day like this.  Hope you do too. 

*Totally to brag

rejection

In the last few posts I've shown a disturbing pre-occupation with aging and death.  It is only natural given - nay, it has been BORN out of - my body's complete rejection of the lifestyle I've been forcing it to lead recently. 

Slight HED* there, yes.  However, I do think my body is rejecting the alcohol and takeaway food I've been cramming into it.  Tasty treats like zeppelins in Lietuva (more to come on this trip) were covered in sour cream sauces; P wolfed down some airport BK which I couldn't help but bite**; and I think I've singlehandedly been responsible for at least 50% of last year's juniper berry crop with my gin intake in the last two weeks.***

This morning, I woke with a cold that is now making me feel like cotton wool is rammed into my head.  It started with a sore throat last night, when (I shit you not) my throat swelled pretty much immediately upon contact with a very nice glass of rioja. I COULDN'T FINISH MY GLASS OF WINE, people.  That NEVER happens to me.

Also, the spots and greasy hair.  But we shall not speak of those, only continue layering concealer and dry shampoo in a vain hope that we do not look like a 14 year old with a hormone problem. 

Fuck, there's no way to finish this one, is there?  Messy as hell.

*Hyperbole Exaggeration Disease, a chronic illness that we diagnosed Hat Friend as having some years ago.  She is incapable of having mediocre or average experiences - everything is the WORST or BEST EVAAAAAAAAAAAH.  Most often, she claimed that she was "the DRUNKEST I have EVER been" (well, we were only in our early 20s but there was quite a high standard set the day she and I tried to join the hundy club and vommed in a tent in my backyard so I take leave to doubt this statement regularly).  If she got a parking ticket, it was always for the sum of about $50,000.  At the least.

** I can't believe we're both able to eat BK let alone BK from an airport after the 12-hour-plane-toilet-tag-team-relay caused by BK in Bangkok.  Horrendous.  When we got off the plane in Auckland, P's dad, generously there to meet us, recoiled. We were omitting a noxious odour so bad that it that probably required some kind of resource consent for release into the atmosphere. But there you have it, we never learn.

*** That makes me sound like some kind of 19th century lush floozy, destined for the almshouses of Whitechapel, the streets of East London and the knife of Jack the Ripper.  Didn't all those ladies drink cheap gin or geneva or methylated spirits or something?

thirty is the new something-something?

Sooooooooooooo.....you know how I've been all "30?  I'm fine with 30!  In your 30s you know who you are, are comfortable in your own skin, hit your sexual peak (if lucky enough to a woman, sorry boys you've been on the downhill for aaaages)" etc etc?  I've just been emailing Hat Friend extensively over this 30 business and we've been pretty self-congratulatory about how incredibly cool we are about it.

AN IGLOO MADE OF BOOKS BY MILLER LAGOS VIA FUCK YEAH, BOOKS
I NEED THIS IGLOO AS MY SAFE PLACE.  READ INTO THAT WHAT YOU WILL, IMAGINARY THERAPIST

Just had a minor moment, checking a new tick box on the medical history forms needed for a dental check-up at a new practice.  30.  Wow.  Which was compounded by receiving an email from the SIL about whether I wanted her to save her newborn baby clothes - would I be sprogging up in the next 1 to 2 years?  She meant well but HOLY CRAP that freaked ten types of shit out of me.  Suddenly, the implications and societal expectations regarding being married, moving closer to home and turning 30 have just become apparent to me.  And here I was all "I'm turning 30 and then four days later I'll be unemployed and wandering the world, fuck I'm so COOL and HIP and YOUNG don't you worry about me" when what I was actually doing was EVERYTHING people expect you to do when you get married and turn 30. 

Sorry, I'll try to fucking ARTICULATE next time.  This is a RANT. 

I just said thanks, but no thanks on the baby stuff.  I'm having enough trouble deciding what to eat for dinner let alone thinking about when I'm going to spawn.  Actually, that reaction right there has calmed me a little. If I were properly grown up, I might, you know, not have lost my shit at a well meant and kind offer.

As you were. 

plans

We’ve had guests for the past two nights and I'm feeling exhausted.  Three nights total is not a long stay, but midweek I think is more of a struggle.  I'm having real difficulty imagining what to cook for tonight's meal; I think perhaps a simple pasta might be the way to go.  Right now, conversation seems like it will be a struggle, but I'm sure I'll get home and get chatting and not regret it for a minute.  See -- already I'm remembering what a privilege it is to spend time with friends and relatives. 

It's this sort of 'I can't be bothered' attitude that makes me snigger at the idea I might be a grown-up.  I'm turning 30 in two and a half months (ferchristssake!) and yet I'm lodged in a perpetual mindframe of adolescence.  Mind you, at least I put out a fresh handtowel before our guests arrived.  Perhaps I'm just not recognising grown-up behaviour in myself yet?

To celebrate the upcoming birthday, I have booked P and I tickets to Vilnius.  When I moved to the States in mid-2009, I was sent on a junket to New Orleans for three weeks.  Three of the best weeks of my life; there were 20 or so of us experiencing US campus life and the live music scene of one of the best cities in the world for the first time.  One of the very first people I met on that trip was V.  V was from Vilnius, Lithuania.  The very first Lithuanian I had ever met; I thought she was quiet at first.  I soon discovered that this was because she takes in her surroundings before speaking - she has a wicked sense of humour and genuine, happy smile. 

V moved to New York to undertake her Masters as well*; she lived in Alphabet city in an apartment P and I spent almost half our time at.  She's one of the loveliest souls I have ever met; people are drawn to her like moths to an open flame.  It helps that she is beautiful, but she just has a calm and open presence that encourages people to come up to her and engage her in discussion, often issuing an invitation to a gig, or a new bar, or a poetry reading.  P and I accompanied her on many of those impromptu outings -- I'm pretty sure our presence as marginal chaperones was a massive disappointment to quite a few lovelorn suitors!  V has visited London twice since we moved here and we've not yet made it to her home town (though I've been dreaming about it; wandering along the river, jazz bars at night, I see Vilnius as all green and grey and lovely).



PANORAMA OF VILNIUS BY JUOZAPAS KAMARAUSKAS 1874 – 1946



So today I've spoilt myself on tickets and I am going to a beautiful city to celebrate my birthday with my husband, a very good friend, her lovely boyfriend and their mischevious dog.  Lithuanians are serious about their basketball and it transpires that we will be visiting at the same time as a pre-Olympic friendly match between Lithuania and Macedonia.  I will extend my Lithuanian beyond 'achoo' (thank you) and 'apchi' (the sound of a sneeze!).  I am beyond excited. 

A PICTURE OF CELEBRATING WITH FRIENDS!  CHEESE-A-RAMA!

As a side note, I'm not too perturbed about turning 30, so no need to start sending condolence cards, dear invisible readers.  I had a full on freak out when I turned 24 for no apparent reason whatsoever.   It seems that premature breakdown got the bug out of my system.  I was emailing with my hat friend this week, who turns 30 a month after I do.  She told me about having spent a miserable meal with a friend for her 30th, during which her friend was crying into her plate of food.  Hat friend had promised herself that she wouldn't be quite so self-indulgent at her own birthday because she'd want her friends to have a good time at a party -- and then realised that 30 was just not that big a deal.  I kind of agree.  Mind you, ask me again closer to the time and I might not possess such equanimity about the whole thing!

*I'm pretty sure I've told you I studied for a graduate degree while in the States?  No?  Oh well, yeah, I did that (and got the degree, if that required clarification, which it might, given the quality of writing demonstrated on this blog).

hats are not for the faint of heart

There are two kinds of people in this world: those who look good in hats, and those who look godawful.  This is not a hair/hairless dichotomy.  I have seen bald people work a hat like they're Agyness Deyn and the hat is a lycra body stocking.  Similarly, I have seen the follicle-challenged wear beanies in scenarios where all I can think is "Surely the wool is scratching your head directly.  Surely all you want right now is to get a hand up under there and itchityscratchityscratch? But you can't scratch or EVERYONE will think you've got NITS* ew ew ew**". 

I have seen people with unprepossessing locks transformed by the application of a wee scrap of felt and feather.  But there are also girls with the glossiest manes whose hat makes said beautiful pelts look triangular by making it appear to start at roughly ear level.  I suspect that there is something important about finding the right hat, and wearing it with the right attitude.

At high school, my best friend and I had a pact.  No hats at our weddings, oh no.  We would not have a horde of middle aged ladies parading millinery matched to their twinset and pearls.*** We were not hat girls, no way no how.  She has lovely glossy hair that did not need to be covered the only types of hats we owned: winter beanies and caps with neck flaps for sun protection.  I have horrid, hateful frizzy hair which it should have been a pleasure to hide but, with it tucked up under a beanie, I look All Ears and Nose. 

Occasionally, over the years, both of us have tried to amend this position.  For example, we have tried fascinators at the races.  Mine spent all day at a wonky angle and generally looked disproportionate to the size of my hair (I can forgive my family many of the dud genes they have gifted me: giant fleshy earlobes and less than 20/20 eyesight for example.  But WHY oh WHY did I have to inherit thick, frizzy, mousy hair in the worst possible combination of hair-genes from either side of the family? SELF-INDULGENT SADFACE).  Best friend pulled it off with more aplomb, but I think we still generally feel like frauds in a hat. 

Which is why it came as a surprise to me when she sent me an email, explaining that the head wear she'd be rocking for my wedding looked much like this:

Bitch. 

*Headlice, for those challenged by the Kiwi lexicon.  Feeling a box of birds?  Got your knickers in a knot? 

** God forbid people should think you have a common childhood/close quarters complaint.  But I always feel sad for people with nits, like they're WWI soldiers facing the worst of humanity in terrifying conditions, who are about to go over the top and ON TOP of all that are suffering the indignity of itchy critters in their hair and pubes.  And if it’s a child, then I also get a case of the sads because my experience suggests that their mum is about to come after them with a bottle of the most nostril-searing, eye-stinging stuff known to mankind and they will get repeatedly dunked in the bathtub to rinse followed by a gorilla grooming session with a fine tooth comb.  Fair to say my Mum has a zero tolerance policy on nits and a love for the personal hygiene habits of the great apes. 

*** Probably relevant to point out here that she and I grew up in a pretty low-socio economic area and did not know anyone who wore twinsets and pearls or who wore any hat other than a beanie with "D---- Rugby Club" printed across the front.  I think we'd based our no hats rule on back issues of the NZ Woman's Weekly featuring Sarah Ferguson's wedding to the Duke of York.  Best friend is a ginger and role models were hard to come by in the pre-Christina Hendricks era.