Daily Life

It’s been a long week.

Tomorrow we’re off on a road trip up north. I’ve been looking forward to it all week — getting out of the house, out of my routine, out of the cold wet city.

I’m looking forward to see some lush greenery. Wet fields and blooming hills. Trees, flowers, mud, fresh air.

With a 3 month old baby in tow, we’re just going to take it easy. A nice slow drive up the coast, sight seeing in the country side, road test our video camera. It’s a 6 hour drive to Andrew’s parent’s place, so hopefully Callum will be content to sleep, stare out the window and munch on the legs of his spider toy.

I’m looking forward to the drive too. There’s a warm hypnotic kind of meditation watching fence post after fence post.

And it’s nice to just chat, laugh and share the stuff in your head. Andrew and I had numerous road trips early on in our relationship. For our first one, we talked non-stop for 9 days. Driving, walking, camping, hiking, diving, dining, climbing trees, visiting galleries. Just the two of us! 216 hours in company of one other person.

I think we’d go bananas if we tried that now.

I’m ALSO looking forward to the endless hours of reading.

Last time I did that was during our trip to Scotland. It rained so much that there was nothing to do BUT curl up in front of the fire and read a book. A cup of tea and a packet of McVitie’s. Mmm. I think I ploughed through 6 books in 2 weeks. Good stuff.

Thanks for all the birthday wishes + emails!

I got a video camera! What fun!

We had dinner at some fancy schmancy revolving restaurant where we racked up a bill of $150+. The restaurant was supposed to revolve so slowly that you don’t notice.

But being Ms. Motion-Sick Girl, I felt a little queasy throughout dinner. Then again, it might’ve been the alcohol, who knows. It took about 2 hours to complete one revolution. The view was spectacular!! Perth looks so pretty at night!!

Sparkley and glittery and tiny little lights as far as the eye could see.

Hmm. Although it’s actually tomorrow, we’re celebrating my birthday today. I’m going to be 25!

My mum is baby-sitting for us and my husband as some “surprise” awaiting for this evening.

I don’t really like surprises. I made him promise… no huge surprise party with everyone I know invited. No pub crawl. No telegram stripper. No one-day holiday. No coupon for jumping out of planes. Or swimming with sharks. And no choosing expensive jewellery without my consultation.

A girlfriend of mine invited me to go clubbing. Clubbing? I raised one eyebrow. I’m so not into the clubbing scene.

OK… I think it’s only fun and interesting if I go once a year. That way there’s enough time to forget how annoying drunk people can get, how expensive drinks are, how people squish past you in a crowd to grab your boobs, and how utterly gross my hair smells after.

But hey, I had a baby 3 months ago. And I’m still 24.

I wanted to go out, feel young and crazy and have some irresponsible fun.

It was a fun evening. We had two dweeby guys sitting by the bar looking after our jackets, another two guys buying us drinks, and two very good looking (but very boring) dancers making us look good.

I believe there’s a certain feeling of power when you’re in a club and MARRIED. You know you’re going to go home to a warm bed and snuggle up to the man you’re utterly in love with. So it was with that cool and ease in which I found myself shutting down, waving off, lying to, and ignoring every boring, annoying, pretentious guy I met.

There was one guy who I couldn’t shake off. He told me some story of how he’s been in Perth for 8 months and hasn’t been able to find a salsa dance partner and that I was the best salsa dancer he’s ever danced with blah blah blah. He really wanted my number so he could practice with me. Riiiight. Sure buddy. Good try.

I refuse politely. But he insisted again and again. I realised that the easiest way to get rid of this guy was to pretend to give it to him. So I took his phone punched in some completely random number, gave it back to him. He was so grateful, I almost felt sorry I did it.

Then there was this OTHER guy. Phwoar. He looked like a cross between between Lenny Kravitz and Ben Harper. Damn he was hot. I managed to score a dance too. But he started chatting and telling me he was a computer programmer. Hmm. I so didn’t want to know that. After that, I couldn’t stop imagining of him eating spam and instant noodles and forwarding Dilbert cartoons to his co-workers. No offence to the computer programmers out there!

So overall it was a fun night. I got home at 3am. I was still a bit drunk. I promised myself I’d never do it again.

And I HAD to wash my hair. So it was 5am before I went to bed. And yes, it was nice and warm.

My family went out to dinner to celebrate my and my dad’s birthday. My dad’s birthday is actually today. And mine is in a couple of weeks. Anyway, they served this special herbal soup for the entree which caused my sister and I to cringe. We were horrified.

You see, my mum is Cantonese. And all Cantonese mothers make soup. Duck soup. Chicken soup. Pig feet soup. Ox tail soup. Sheep brain soup. Goat testicle soup. Herbal soup with sticks, berries and twigs that look like caterpillars and cigar butts.

Every month, she would make us a particular type of soup, which was apparently good for our menstrual cycles. So my sister and I dubbed it the “period soup”.

The soup itself was not made of anything menstrual related, but it was SOOOO disgusting. Imagine drinking dirty compost water, with rotten fungus and god knows what else. It was foul.

For years we tried to make the experience less painful. We’d dilute it with hot water. Or sip it very slowly with a straw. Or hold our breaths and see who could skull it the fastest. Or drink it too hot so we’d scald our taste buds. But now that we’re older… we just drink it silently and quickly. Like the good daughters we are.

So my sister and I look across the table at each other and wrinkled our noses.
“Is this period soup?”
“It smells like it.”
“It’s got those red seeds.”
“You taste it first.”
“It’s not supposed to have chicken feet in it…”

All the while, my husband (being the squeamish Scottish lad that he is) overheard us, peered into his bowl and stirred it slowly.

He spoke slowly and carefully, “Did you girls just say PERIOD SOUP????”

^ Callum wondering where all the food went.

Oooh, it was such a beautiful Sunday!

The sun was warm, the air was fresh and there wasn’t a cloud in the sky! We went to a birthday breakfast at the Blue Duck Cafe by Cottesloe Beach. I had two helpings of bacon, eggs, tomatoes, mushies and sausages, a big glass of orange juice, an apple danish and 3 mini croissants.

I managed to snap a shot of the salt water fish tank in the cafe. I’d *love* to have a salt water tank full of funky little fish, starfish, anemones and other creepy crawlies from the ocean. But I suspect it’s a little too much work. I can’t even keep my backyard fishpond free of mosquitoes.

We took a walk along the beach. The weather was just perfect. Callum fell asleep to the sound of the waves.

Went for my physio fitness class today.

Found out that I have strong butt cheek muscles.

*I’m so proud*

Winter is here.
Damn it’s cold.

I drive a 20 year old BMW.
It’s a shit-brown tank of a car.
It has an old sun roof.
The padding on the sun roof is falling to bits.
Every time I open the sun roof,
It sprinkles bits of sponge on me.

The sponge looks like chocolate cake.
So I continuously have chocolate cake crumbs on
my head, my hair, my jumper, my collar, my shoulders,
my eyelashes, my tummy, my lap…

I must look so weird.