Sleepless Nights

Blog

  • So it happened again.

    So it happened again.

    The temperatures soared, the wind picked up and faster than you’d expect, we were surrounded by a thick fog of smoke, unable to see the hills.

    As the smoke got thicker, the butterflies in my stomach grew and I brought up the Tas Fire Service (TFS) website to find out where the fires were.

    Nothing.

    Page cannot be displayed.

    I pressed refresh and refresh again, hoping for something, anything, to let me know where the fires are. I’m not in the city, I’m a rural girl and when the smoke starts to hang overhead, I start counting how long it will take to fill up all the water containers on the property. I start thanking my lucky stars that I had water delivered recently and my tanks are still full. I do a quick  walk around and a survey, looking at anything that might be flammable that needs damping down.

    So as I pressed refresh on the website and nothing was coming up, I got a little worried. The sky was dark and smoke filled and the sun had gone a blood red, the kind of red you only see in bushfire season.

    I grabbed the phone book and hunted for the TSF number. It took me three tries to find it, in my worried state.  In case anyone is wondering, it is under Tasmania Fire Service (not under Tasmanian Fire Service, nor under FIRE! EEEK HELP!).

    I rang and spoke to a computer.

    Which told me to please see the website for information on fires.

    Fine, except the website, had crashed. Again.

    This happened last time we had bushfires in the state, a few weeks back. Their site crashed and the public got a touch irate. But you tell me, wouldn’t you think that they would plan for it and FIX IT before the next lot of bad weather?

    Eventually I got through to an operator, after being told to instead, check the website THREE times, and he was lovely (kudos to the TFS, whoever is manning your phones always does a brilliant job). The fires were about 35 km to the west of me and the wind was blowing the smoke straight over.

    Hanging up, I could breath a little easier, even as I continued to push refresh on the website, eager for any information I could gather. Mobile phone reception out here in rural Tasmania is patchy at best and nonexistant in many places. I can’t pick up any radio stations here and trying to play them through the live streaming on the computer has, in the past, proved to be more static that radio.

    It might be that I’m spoiled, living here in my first world country and getting my news delivered up to the second by twitter and online news sites like the ABC.

    But you know what? When that blanket of smoke descends on you and you can’t breath for the smell of burning gum trees, I think you could forgive me for wanting up to the second information on what the fires are doing and which direction they are headed.

    So to the TFS, thank you for defending our state from bushfires and thank you for manning your phones with people who don’t get exasperated when yet another Tasmanian, rings and asks about the smoke.

    But, we’re living in a technological world now, I would think that you could have sorted out any teething problems with the website by now. Your computer on the other end of the phone lines tells you to check the website no less than three times while you’re pushing buttons, trying to get hold of someone to tell you whether you need to sleep with one eye open tonight.

    In this day and age of instant information, I don’t think having your website crash at a critical time is acceptable. Buy more bandwidth. Sort out your servers. Pay someone to recode the website better so that you can update it without it going offline.

    Because a page cannot be displayed error, when I can smell the gumtrees burning, it’s just not good enough.

    **

    Thankyou to ABC radio for providing information on the fires through twitter.

  • Corn Gluten Affecting Patients with Coeliacs?

    Just jumping in briefly, to point you towards a new study that has shown corn affects some patients dealing with coeliacs and gluten intolerances.

    The full study is here – it’s written in medicalese and you will need to register to read it.

    A good summary as well as some information about corn and it’s effects can be found here.

    Personally I recommend the second link, but beware, if you’re dealing with a gluten intolerance or coeliacs disease, reading that link may leave you with a sinking feeling in the pit of your stomach, as small things start to add up.

    It would explain why Amy reacts to some things, even when I know they are gluten free and artificial colouring free.

    Sigh.

    (If you’re looking for this morning’s post – that is here.)

    Thanks very much to Tiff, who passed these links along to me via The Gluten Free Review

  • Additions

    I did tell you on twitter that this wasn’t all that exciting, just exciting for me.

    You know what you need to do when life is stressful? You need to add more things to the family, so you don’t have any time to worry about anxiety or panic attacks.

    So would you please all welcome Susie, the newest addition to our family.

    Our Newest Addition

    Susie

    Please, ignore the fact that my feet are purple in that second photo. I’m a bit EDS-y lately.

    Susie’s Mum was a Springer Spaniel x Border Collie and her dad was a purebred Springer Spaniel. This is the closest to a purebred dog I’ve ever owned in my LIFE! Normally I go in for mongrels (like Seven, she’s a terrier x daschund something mix), but Susie needed a home when I needed a puppy, so here she is.

    I suspect we’ll have a bunch of OMG puppy stories coming, but for now, she has fit in really well. Seven is following her around, doing nothing but wagging her tail and trying to lick her.

    The cats however, they’re not too keen. Both of them still look a little like I plugged them into an electrical outlet. They’re going to be sulky for weeks and I fully expect a display of decapitated birds to be awaiting me when I feed them tomorrow.

    Hehe.

  • Hello and Welcome!

    This morning I woke up and despite it being a Sunday, I promptly jumped on my partner and sent him to the shop for the newspaper. You see, it’s not every day your blog is mentioned in print and I was a touch excited.

    My excitement has, unfortunately, rubbed off on the children, who are alternately bouncing around me, or screeching at me, needing things and whining. Joy.

    So!

    Hello to any mothers wandering in from the EGuide liftout in the Sunday Tasmanian this morning. I was thrilled when Rebecca emailed me and let me know she was planning on doing an article on Mums who blog. In fact, I may have skipped around the house for the rest of the week.

    Anyway, feel free to have a look around, to the right are the archives, for everything I’ve ever written (Warning: it’s a lot of writing), and you can also find my search form, if you’re hoping I’ve written about anything in particular. Up the top on the tabs is my about page and other bits and pieces.

    And down the very bottom, is a comment form, where you can leave a comment and say hello!

    There is also an orange button you can click on to Subscribe, or you can enter your email address into the form below it to have my posts delivered by email.

    Click on the photo to enlarge the article so you can read it yourself (you may have to click again, after the photo comes up to maximise the image).

    The other bloggers mentioned are Bad Mommy Moments, Dooce, Three Ring Circus, Life and Love in the Petri Dish, Julia {here be hippogriffs}, Misc Mum, Mommy is Moody and finally, A little pregnant.

    Some of my favourite blogs are there!

    (See? I’ve made it easy for you, linking everyone else.)

  • Suicide Hour

    Suicide hour: That hour as you’re busy cooking dinner, the children are hungry and tired and no one seems able to do anything on their own without help.

    It normally involves frequent whining, a couple of tantrums and an urge to throw yourself off a bridge. Or time out everybody while you finish cooking. Or time out yourself and let everyone else fend for themselves.

    Also known as Arsenic Hour, The Witching Hour and Please Everyone, Just Go Away and Let Me Cook Dinner Alone Hour.

    ****

    Both children are at my feet, screaming at me. Amy is tugging on my top, asking for a glass of milk and Isaac is wailing at my feet, clutching my pant leg.

    It’s dinnertime and I just had to hop into the lounge room to settle a dispute.

    Amy, no, you play with this toy. That one is Isaac’s. Isaac, here you go.

    Unfortunately, my presence has alerted him to the fact that he is hungry and tired. He clutches me, wailing, while I try to make it back to the kitchen. I can smell things starting to burn.

    Isaac! I grump – Sit here! Right, now play with your toys.

    Amy! Give him BACK his bottle. You’re a big girl, you don’t need a bottle.

    But I neeeeda bottle, she wails.

    No, you don’t.

    I make it to the kitchen before the wailing begins again. My head is going to explode, I can feel it. Glancing at the clock I mentally count minutes until I can feed everyone and start putting them to bed.

    Nathan makes his way to the lounge room, ostensibly to give me a hand. Neither of the children want Daddy though, and they remain at the kitchen gate, wailing for me. My stress levels rise as I run the stick blender through the pasta sauce and drain pasta. I only just caught it in time, gluten free pasta won’t stand for overcooking. I’m pretty sure no one wanted to eat pasta mush with their tomato sauce.

    I start dishing up as the wails get louder. I’m getting frustrated now, how hard is it to entertain the baby for 5 minutes while I dish up dinner? Amy screams about an imagined slight and I have to remind myself to breathe deep and ignore it for now.

    I mentally take myself to my happy place, only somehow, my happy place has been infiltrated by tiny short screaming people and it’s looking less like a happy place and more like hell with every passing moment.

    The house has been trashed in just one short hour. Toys are everywhere and I’m fairly sure I just fractured something as I dodged a thrown baby bottle and stubbed my toe on the cupboard.

    I manage to keep the swearing to an under my breath mutter and slowly, I get the pasta dished up and sauce allocated.

    The baby sits on the floor, pasta and cheese in a bowl in front of him. He spreads it out in a giant circle around him before starting to eat. I ignore it, wishing, yet again that he would submit to the highchair.

    Amy sits at the table for 2 mouthfuls before needing a glass of water/the potty/to bother her brother. Still trying to grate cheese over my own dinner, I get her fixed and heading back to the table.

    It’s a useless effort of course, because as soon as I sit down, my dinner becomes The Most Interesting and Tasty and both children end up sitting at my feet, begging for mouthfuls of now gone cold pasta.

    Sighing, I give up on getting to eat unbothered and share my dinner, wishing I could get away with hiding in the bathroom to eat.

    Slowly we finish my dinner and I start to get the mess Isaac made cleaned up. My favourite method of cleaning just involves letting the cats inside, but as Isaac still looks hungry, I pick up the pasta from the tablecloth he was sitting on and pop it back into his bowl. He, of course, spreads it back out in a circle again.

    I give up.

    As I head to the kitchen to dump the plates and open the door for the cats, Isaac notices Daddy. He’s eating dinner relatively unphased  by the circus surrounding him. Isaac hauls himself to standing and stays there, holding onto Nathan’s legs with his mouth open like a baby bird. Amy notices and climbs up, to sit next to her father as well.

    Reluctantly, he shares out his dinner as well, even as his eyes plead with me to rescue him. I look at him, trying to keep a straight face, but I can’t.

    Please? He says.

    Sorry honey, I’ve uh, got to go outside and uh, do something.

    Smiling now, I disappear outside for 5 minutes to get my head back together before the bedtime circus begins.

    God knows I need to after all that.