Gotta Laugh

Huh, would seem that the Jordan River is a little flooded

by Veronica on August 9, 2011

in Gotta Laugh

We’ve had quite a bit of rain here lately – enough that I am feeling a little cabin fever-y and my children are, despite all of our best efforts, climbing the walls a little bit.

But now, instead of just our paddock looking like a giant puddley duck pond, the Jordan River has decided to get with the program and flood.

Of course, in the scheme of things, this is minor flooding, BOM tells me that the levels are set to reach their peak this afternoon and then start dropping and no one’s house is in any sort of danger.

It does make for pretty photographs however.

And curious sheep.

[All photos taken with my 300mm lens. The flooding is terribly unlikely to get any higher and we would need an awful lot more rain to raise river levels enough to reach us – rain that isn’t predicted.]

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Frankly, I’m just really tired.

by Veronica on July 29, 2011

in Blogging, Gotta Laugh

I’m sure there are reasons why some planes leave some states at godawful o’clock. I’m sure these reasons are perfectly logical.

What I am utterly failing to understand right now however, is why I personally decided to catch a plane at godawful o’clock today.

I vaguely remember a 3am start and a drive to the airport and my eyes trying to close during landing in Melbourne because I was just that exhausted, but everything is a bit of a blur.

I remember the bloggers brunch, a room full of women, equally loud and nervous in turn. Not enough space (is there ever enough space at events like that?) and a LOT of talking.

I remember a late lunch with blogging friends and lots of laughter and lots of walking.

The actual details are a little blurry though.

Really Internet, this is just me letting you know that I am utterly exhausted, and nothing has gone wrong yet.

Hell, I am even too tired to be stressing about the conference tomorrow.

That has to be a good thing, right?

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Let’s talk about zombies

by Veronica on July 7, 2011

in Gotta Laugh

I was rearranging my pantry shelves yesterday, when I found myself struck by an urge to count just how many kilos of sugar I had. After I counted the sugar, I guesstimated the pasta. After that, salt. Then rice.

Sugar: 15kg
Pasta: 25kg
Rice: 14kg
Salt: 5kg (need more)

It wasn’t until I added all of this up, that I realised, maybe I’m hoarding food staples, just a little. On top of my basics, I also have rather a lot of dried beans, peas, barley, chickpeas, soup mix, split peas and tinned tomatoes.

I like to tell myself that I am hoarding in case of emergency, or an accident (maybe a giant national bank explosion, complete with money burning and computers wiped of their precious 1’s), but really, I think it’s because I’m worried about zombies.

But then I started thinking even harder about zombies and realised just how badly protected I would be here. Sure, I’m away from major cities and inhabited areas (plus), but I’m surrounded by farmland, with nothing to stop invading hordes (minus). Yes, they would have to make it through the sheep and cows first (plus) and we could probably pick them off with arrows (plus) but after that we’d be forced to retreat to our roof and I’m not going to vouch for the safety of that.

Even further, I realised just how heavy all that bloody food was, as Isaac, Amy and I filled a plastic container with food (therefore, opening up more room in my pantry, for more hoarded food) and then discovered that I had no hope of moving the bloody thing once it was full. It only had pasta, rice and beans in it, albeit, probably 40kg of stuff.

Sigh.

Food staples are heavy.

I’m thinking, that in the event of a zombie attack, I need to have a plan, all planned out. Somewhere to hide, preferably with running water and 40ft high stone fences AND a moat. Also, crossbows.

And then, I’d need to sort myself out an army.

It was while I was thinking about an army to kill zombies, that I came across the perfect idea.

TRIFFIDS.

What other plant eats decomposing flesh, has the ability to walk and blind things, all while shooting poison?

IT’S PRACTICALLY PERFECT.

Sure, I’d then have to protect myself from the triffids, but a solid electrified fence should work, once you add in the stone walls, right?

So there. I have a plan in case of zombie attack.

I just need to find myself some triffids.

***

PS. I think I’m getting a little fluey, and I’m not sure how much of this is making sense.

PPS. On reading this back through, I’m pretty sure I might have just accidentally written out the plot to Plants VS Zombies without realising it. I don’t know, I’ve never played the game.

PPPS. Who cares if I did, game designers obviously have the right idea. ROCK ON.

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A mish mash of things, also, Happy Birthday to my brother.

by Veronica on June 30, 2011

in Blogging, Cancer, Gotta Laugh, Grief

It’s dark and cold when Isaac comes stumbling into my room, bleary eyed. He’s too asleep to say anything yet, so I throw back the doona and welcome him into the warmest part of the bed. Sighing contentedly, he snuggles in and I watch his eyes close, praying that we’ll both get more sleep.

Two minutes later, he is poking me in the eyes.

“Hi Mummy.”

“Hiiiiiiiiii Mummy!”

“HIIIIIIIIIIIIIII MUMMY!”

I struggle to get my eyes open long enough to look at him, before tucking the blankets in tighter around him and asking him to please, fortheloveofeverything, sleep.

It’s not long after this that Amy joins us and jumps into bed as well. Her morning breath threatens to knock me dead and I make her roll away from me and breathe somewhere else, on pain of being kicked out of bed. The room is icy, despite the underfloor heating and I suspect the world is frozen.

Eventually, the sun rises and I am forced to be awake. No one says anything about getting up, however, so I stay in bed with a book for a little longer, while everything defrosts. The children come and go, alternately snuggling me, or tucking their cold feet under my legs.

Good morning.

***

So, I’ve had this problem. I’ve been caring too much about what you think and not enough about what I want. Not changing themes, not redesigning, writing on a schedule, not posting because I only posted yesterday, or this morning. And honestly, I think doing it for someone else is doing it wrong.

Somewhere in there, I stopped telling stories and started just talking about stuff and maybe there isn’t a difference, but caring so much is killing me.

I’ve been more caught up in branding and social media and working the system, that I lost the bit I loved, which was sharing stories and snippets. I’m not saying there are changes afoot, but there are changes afoot. Sort of. I’m going to write what I like, when I like, regardless of when I posted last.

And if I start to worry about cluttering up people’s readers and writing too much, or not writing enough, well then. We’ll all just deal with that then.

***

When I was 5 years and 7 months old, my baby brother was born. I remember my father picking me up from school one day, so that we could go and see Mum and David in the hospital. Some details are fuzzy, but I remember being absolutely positive that I needed to wear my white shoes to the hospital and spending long enough trying to find them that that my father was frustrated with me.

In the mess under my bed, I eventually found my shoes and squeezed into them, before discovering that they were too small anyway. I didn’t care, I was five and I wanted to wear white shoes to the hospital to see my mother.

That was 17 years ago now.

Today my brother turns 17 and he’s had a rough time the last two years. We buried our grandmother on this day two years ago and so it’s bittersweet. Life and death, all tied up together. The timing could have been better, but birth waits for no one and neither do funeral directors.

I would really appreciate if you could send him birthday wishes here, if you’d like.

Happy Birthday David! I do love you, even if you’re annoying sometimes.

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A simple guide to blogging wrong: For everyone who doesn’t want to make money, or jump on bandwagons

by Veronica on May 30, 2011

in Blogging, Gotta Laugh

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11 Steps to Blogging Wrong, according to my scientific study of bloggers.

1 – Refuse to sign anything. If it requires an electronic signature, it can be considered a bandwagon and you probably don’t want to jump on it.

2 – Post only when you want to, but write as often as you need to.

3 – Take inspiration from your friends and copy what they do, insomuch as it works for you. Give credit, always.

4 – Change things. Develop a brand, change your mind and start again. Rework your theme, decide to be different.

5 – Find a big blogger, work out what they are doing wrong and then don’t do those things.

6 – Listen to critcism. Critics are usually right and only in some cases does it stem from jealousy. Maybe you ARE boring. Decide to change (see point 4).

7 – Remind yourself that NO ONE IS THE BOSS. You will forget this, over and over. No one can tell you what to do. If you’re not breaking any laws, you’re going to be okay.

8 – Resist the urge to listen to the ‘Yer doin it WRONG’ crowd. Wrong doesn’t exist. You can’t do it wrong.

9 – Listen to your gut, always.

10 – Find your crowd. Find the people who understand your humour and love what you write. Don’t pay attention to how many of them there are. Two good readers who get you are better than 50 who don’t.

11 – Ignore everything I’ve said and walk your own path. Decide what you want to do and do it. Ask questions of people you trust and work out what works for you.

That’s it.

 

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