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Down to one teenager
A little over a week ago, we lost one of our teenagers to the 20s. :DÂ Game Fanatic finished his second decade and bid goodbye to his teen years. Actually he paid no attention whatsoever, but we parents did have a few sentimental moments about it. This was a particularly good birthday for him or at least he seemed pretty content with his day, right up to the end. We invited some friends over, along with the usual family to share the day. It went pretty well overall and everyone seemed to get along pretty well. Everyone came early enough that there was time for him to play games in the evening and to have a take out meal from our local curry place and still have a bit of time at the end of the day.
I attribute some of the improvement to the medication that he’s taking right now. We’ve been going through lots of different tablets to get to this point and still have a way to go. But at least there are a couple medications that seem to make a bit of positive difference. To me, it is a big difference for him to be more relaxed with visitors so that he can enjoy himself on special days.
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Taxing times
After a few months of procrastination, I finally got started on my taxes. A new thing called MyTax came out in August but inexplicably I wasn’t able to use that and have had to revert to e-Tax, which requires me to download software and answers a zillion questions, most which aren’t relevant to me. Â There are a couple items I need to check on but I should be able to submit it in a couple of days and will end up getting a bigger refund than tax was withheld from my pay due to donations made to Oxfam the past year. In hindsight, it would have been better for it to go on the Scientist’s tax and that’s usually what we do but as it is in my name and there were some changes this year, we did it on my tax. Lesson learned.
Meanwhile, I did end up seeing my gp about my last period as it went well beyond having missed one period. I had an ultrasound done last week and it seems the uterine lining is quite thick, especially considering the scan was done a few days after my period finally stopped. Apparently in situations of this sort, they like do a biopsy to rule out any cancerous or pre-cancerous cells showing up. I have no problem with this as I have family history of uterine cancer which was caught too late. So I am off to see a gynecologist at the end of the month and now have a prescription for tablets to take should I have menorrhagia with my next period (likely considering how thick the lining was last week).
It also happens that when I saw my doctor, I mentioned my ear being blocked up and she had a look. Wax was blocking my ear, apparently due to my efforts with a Q-tip sort of object. I’m sure that was the case as my ears get itchy and I use them sometimes to reach the itch. Not really a good thing, especially as I partially trained as an audiologist before my studies were sidelined years ago. It had gotten a bit better but not completely cleared up after using otc products to remove wax. Last night my ear got incredibly itchy and I made it all worse by poking around again so that my ear is more blocked up than before. After using the earwax removal products, I can hear slightly better in that ear and I’m hoping it will clear within a day or two.
Game Fanatic has a birthday coming up in less than two weeks and has decided he might like to invite the couple of friends he has contact with to join us on the day. I suggested he might like to invite them since he might be able to play games with someone else instead of just family. We don’t have many visitors here and the house is on the messy side so we are starting to work on cleaning things up so that we can have visitors. As it is there will likely be family popping by in the late afternoon or evening anyway. Game Fanatic has asked for a cake with the My Little Pony’s Fluttershy character as the theme. The Scientist has become our resident cake maker and is working on ideas in the lead up to the birthday.
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Birthday magic
Just a bit over twenty-four hours ago, Lego Lover’s fifteenth birthday ended. Like all his birthdays, it was magical. He was full of joy and happiness throughout the day and took pleasure in just about every part of it. This is one of the things I like best about Lego Lover. He hasn’t lost that pleasure in having a birthday. Or that pleasure in the Christmas season.
Every year December 1 is incredibly important for being the first day of advent. He gets to start opening his Lego City Advent calendar and it’s often the first thing he thinks about. It also is his dad’s birthday, which sometimes gets pushed behind the advent calendar in priority of the day. On the first Saturday of the month, it’s time to put up the Christmas tree. In the past, Lego Lover mostly assisted the Scientist in all the goings on. This year he took on quite a bit more of the workload and enjoyed every minute of it.
The next weeks always are the period of anticipation but there’s always the promise of an advent calendar treasure with each passing day. Finally, it reaches December 23rd and another birthday arrives. He makes every effort to be up early on the day and his face is filled with a smile from the time he wakes up. When he gets his gifts, usually around the middle of the day, the smile widens with the pleasure of whatever he’s been given. This year it was a rather massive Transformers Omega Supreme set that he’d expressed considerable interest in when it was put on special in the middle of the year. It had been purchased in July but when Lego Lover made his gift list, it wasn’t on it. Not to worry, though, as he’d not realised it was even possible to be considered for his list due to not being available in the shops recently. There were several other Transformer gifts, including some dvd sets and a couple of Lego Hero Factory sets.
In the evening, there were visits from a couple family members and then his favorite pizza from our local shop. Then it’s time for cake and to keep working on building the Lego sets and showing off everything else.
Finally it reaches the end of the day and he’s still as happy as he was when the day started with that lovely smile still working its magic. He was still up well past midnight last night and was rather keen to share his birthday with his grandma in the US. She hadn’t made an appearance on Skype yet and I turned it off, thinking it was time for bed. But because he was so keen, I turned it back on, and grandma did make an appearance so he was able to stretch his birthday out just a bit longer. At the end of the chat, he was tired but very much still happy.
His birthday magic is just the joy and happiness of his special day. It’s so infectious that it makes many of the people around him feel quite happy too and that’s why I think of it as magic even though magic doesn’t really exist.
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Plans undone
The plan was the three boys in the Scientist’s family would join their mum with their families at some villas in Mandurah (about an hour south of Perth) on Saturday for an overnight stay. Not much was planned but what little there was on our part was on on track until Friday. I was woken rather early by the mad barking of the dogs when I knock came at the door (my replacement trackball). As I need to be up fairly shortly, I didn’t return to bed. The Scientist said I looked really bad…like I was quite ill. My face was puffy and swollen… I didn’t think much of that as it was morning and I often feel puffy and swollen when I get up. I got ready and took the dogs to the groomer and went off the Coventry Village markets to get some ingredients for the chickpea and veggie patties I planned to make for the Scientist’s mum (this was to celebrate her 70th birthday last week). I was tired when I got home and had a nap before picking up the dogs. Then I spent most of the afternoon in bed. Tiredness and aches and pains had set in with a bit of a scratchy throat. Sigh…
I had hoped I’d feel better later on but didn’t so I stayed home while the rest of the family went off. It did save us putting the dogs in a boarding kennel…which I’m sure was an improvement for the dogs in their weekend plans. I actually had the house to myself for a whole day, something that almost never happens. Too bad I felt terrible. I did feel a bit better when I finally got up on Saturday. I chatted to my mom on Skype for a while then did a bit of cleaning around the house. Not a lot but just to make a bit of headway into some of the mess here. As afternoon wore on, my energy levels dropped again and I was back in bed…but at least I accomplished something. I spent most of the evening on the sofa, watching Saturday night tv…British detective shows on ABC1.
I think the dogs were feeling out of sorts as they were quite hyper through the day, which required a fair bit of attention on my part. Their routine was totally undone by the lack of the remaining family members. But come bedtime they were happy enough to sleep away on the bed with me. Even though there was more space in the bed, I still seemed to have a dog squashed up against me in the night. Reminded me of when Lego Lover was small and often pushed me right to the edge of the bed, despite his small size.
I was having a decent sleep, I think, when it was completely broken by the sound of the phone ringing. Any time the phone rings in the night, I am worried it will be bad news. I picked up the phone and it turned out to be an old friend calling from the US. She had mistakenly thought it was about three hours later than the 4am I saw on the clock. Once it was clarified how early it was, she hung up and said she’d call later. Getting back to sleep was then the problem of the hour.
A few hours later I woke to noise from the dogs. I got up and opened the door so they could access the pet flap and go outside as required. It didn’t seem either ended up going out and they were soon sleeping again. Moving forward a couple more hours and the dogs were getting a bit antsy. I saw that it was past time for their food and got up to feed them. It is as this point I discovered the screen door was closed and the pet flap was useless. The poor dogs couldn’t get out and the cat couldn’t get in.
My face was again puffy and swollen on Sunday, much like it had been on Friday. But I did feel a bit better as I was up and about. My friend called again and we talked for a while. It was a rather awkward call as we had loaned some money to the friend recently and now it had been spent and she was asking for more. I assume that was the urgency which required her to call so early, even by her calculations. I told her we couldn’t help any further. We talked a bit longer and then she had to get going.
I pottered about the house a bit and washed some dishes before settling on the sofa and playing Animal Crossing on the Wii then playing some games on my tablet. Before long it was mid-afternoon and the Scientist and boys had returned. It was good to have them home and I got to hear all the stories of the weekend within short order. The dogs were quite happy to have life getting back to normal at home.
It’s a day later and I’m still feeling a bit tired and run down but I’m hoping some activity will change that. I am sure I didn’t have the flu and not even a cold. I’m guessing it might have been some allergy thing as most of my symptoms could be consistent with an allergy attack of sorts (although it usually manifests itself into a head cold or something similar). Most of the reason I stayed home was fear of spreading germs so I possibly could have gone there but might well have stayed in the villa and slept much of the time. Ah well, another time we will go again…The Scientist and boys liked it so well they want to go back again and show me Mandurah.
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Goodbye 47, Hello 48
I had a birthday on Saturday, inching just a bit closer to the half century mark. It was a nice, low-key birthday spent with the family at home for the most part. The Scientist took me out for lunch at a Vietnamese-Thai restaurant near us and it was a very nice meal although I struggled to finish my meal of pad thai. What a contrast to our first visit when we ate several courses without any trouble. :) I was given a couple gifts by the Scientist and the boys: a Wii U version of Scribblenauts unlimited and a mini lighted photo studio. I hadn’t played Scribblenauts before but it was quite a bit of fun once I started to get the hang of it. My MIL came around in the late afternoon with a vegetarian cookery book and a scarf for me and stayed for awhile to join us for cake. The Scientist baked a Devil’s food cake with chocolate frosting, compliments of Duncan Hines. The cake was quite nice but the frosting was a lot sweeter than we expected. DH has only just started selling their products here and they seem to be not much more than imports even though they are cheaper than the Betty Crocker that has been sold here for years. (Maybe it’s cheaper to import the US version rather than produce it here?) The Scientist added Malteasers to the cake, which tasted quite nice.
During the evening, I wanted to pay a board game with the family and briefly considered asking them to play Agricola. We’ve played that one time but nobody has wanted to play since. It was quite expensive and took quite a bit of effort to obtain so I’d have liked to give it another chance. But the time required for set up and re-learning it was too great to invest with what little was left of the day. Instead we played Ticket to Ride Europe and had a great time. Afterwards we watched To Kill a Mockingbird which I’d bought last year in its 50th anniversary edition. It’s been restored and looks incredibly good now. I’m not quite sure the boys exactly liked it but I think they did find it engaging. I know the Scientist and I both loved seeing it again in its restored glory.
I received an email last week from San Churro’s Chocolateria, offering me a complimentary Churros for Two at their store. The only requirement was it had to be redeemed on my birthday or the two days surrounding it. I chose to go today since I knew I’d have cake yesterday. Game Fanatic didn’t come along as it was likely to be crowded (and was). Lego Lover wanted the same thing for himself, to eat entirely on his own. I intended to share mine with the Scientist but he only would eat one so I was left struggling to finish the others. There was no way I was leaving any of it behind…but it left me feeling a bit full for quite a while afterwards.
We then took a drive down the coast to Cottesloe Beach where a Sculpture by the Sea exhibit has been running and finished today. This has been staged for several years now but we’ve never managed to get there. I don’t recommend waiting for the last day as it was quite crowded, right up until sunset. There were nearly 60 sculptures but we only managed to see about a dozen of the sculptures before it got too dark to see. I took some photos but people kept getting in the way so I’ve had to delete quite a few of them. What was disturbing was the number of parents allowing their children to climb over the sculptures, even though there are signs everywhere asking people not to touch the exhibits. It was a nice exhibit and I hope to go there next year but allow time to see everything…plus avoid going on the last day, of course. :D Â It was quite a noisy place as we left due to the relatively large crowds still in the area plus the birds. Seems the lorikeets return to the trees as night and seem to start shouting at each other constantly. It’s amazing how such beautiful birds can be such pests!
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Happy New Year!
Since I last posted, Lego Lover had a birthday and it went well. He woke up very early and stayed up quite late to experience as much of the day as possible. No disappointments at the end. This is fairly typical but it still pleases me every year. Such a contrast to his brother on his birthday too. There’s still a small chance I will write up a post for his birthday, even though it’s been nearly two weeks now.
Christmas went pretty well  aside from it being the first day of a week-long heatwave. We had a family gathering at the Scientist’s mum’s house. We all ate quite well on all the food prepared. I’d made my usual vegetable and chickpea patties for my MIL and a potato salad for Game Fanatic. The Scientist cooked a small turkey and his mum made heaps of curries plus a salad. Plenty of food was eaten. I was last to get my food and I made the mistake of having a couple veg patties and was filled way too soon. Almost as soon as dinner was finished, dessert was on. To be fair, it’s also my BIL’s birthday and the Scientist had made a cake so it was time to serve it and sing happy birthday. But I didn’t eat any of the cake because I knew it would be way too much after all the food. Another BIL’s family had brought along four or five things for desserts and it seemed like they had gone a bit overboard. Later on I remembered she told about several family members being sick and missing out on Christmas at an earlier gathering with her family. I can only assume some of that was meant for the other gathering and had gone uneaten so they brought it to ours. Still it was way too much and it was too hot to enjoy so much rich food. I did have some jelly (gelatin) that my MIL had prepared with a little bit of a couple desserts but could eat no more than that. We’d also taken along some chocolate and raspberry brownies we’d made a few days earlier and they weren’t touched at all…just meant we were eating them for days after Christmas.
The rest of the year was hot and hot and hot. Everyone just stayed in cool places as much as possible…Then it cooled off a bit and became humid earlier this week. Not a lot better, really…then a couple days of lovely mild weather. Meanwhile the heatwave seems to have gone east and they are now sweltering there. It’s heated up again here for the weekend but it seems we will be okay for next week.
We stayed home on New Year’s Eve, which is pretty usual for our family. Our clock was slow so there was some uncertainty when midnight rolled around so our happy new years were a bit delayed. The Scientist managed to stay awake that long and then was off to bed almost at once.
The next day our dog Maromi had to go to the vet to have a grass seed abscess removed from his paw under surgery. He has a bad relationship with the grass seeds…usually, though, they get into his ear…which is a lot less costly to treat than surgery on his paw. :( He’s recovering just fine. Managed to pull the bandage off a bit early and it was impossible to get it back on where it would stay. It’s all fine though and the stitch comes out in a week which means he can get rid of the cone.
We also bought a couple of new gadgets at the end of the year sales. We started off looking at one thing but ended up looking at food processors. We have an older one that I’d been using once a year for my veg and chickpea patties and it pretty much is a piece of junk. I had to hold things together to keep it working this year so it was destined to be removed from our house in the near future. Anyway, all my research turned up that there were really no lower end models that rated well at all. Maybe this is an area where you just have to pay for a decent machine. The one we finally chose was cost $435 on sale. I haven’t used it yet but it seems quite solid and has a lot of attachments that are stored in a separate case. The other gadget is an air fryer that uses very little oil to cook foods in. We’ve used it a few times now and it works wonderfully. Mostly it’s nice for making chips (french fries) and they come out nice and crispy in far less time than the oven takes.
I almost forgot we have another expense coming up in the bathroom. Seems that the light switch is now shocking when turned on so it’s not to be used until fixed. We are hoping to have a couple extra plug points installed in the house when the electrician comes out as that’s been on the t0-do list for a while now.
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50
For nearly an hour it’s been the 1st of December and that means the Scientist has reached his half-century. He’s feeling kind of old now. His hair is probably more gray than not these days and his mental faculties aren’t as sharp as they once were. Which is to say they are pretty sharp compared to most people but have slowed down a bit in recent years. The body parts are more prone to aches and pains too. But like me, he’s been working out six days a week and unlike me he has been quite particular with his diet. In three months, he has lost 11kgs. He’s looking far better these days and I look forward to seeing the further effects of his efforts. Even though we don’t work out exactly together the whole time, it’s become quite a nice habit to go to the gym every day and spend an hour or so. We have joked that it’s almost like a second home…With further thought, I might add that it’s like a second home with too many visitors at times. :D
Happy birthday to my partner in life!
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The beginning of the end
When your child is born, he or she is really your child for ever. But the childhood of your child doesn’t last forever. And that is where we are with Game Fanatic. He is seventeen years old today and will be an adult a year from now. At least by the standards of our society. Kind of weird to think about. And also kind of cool.
Happy birthday to my Game Fanatic! Enjoy this last year of childhood.
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Another year
Note: I started this five or six weeks ago.
Last week I completed my forty-sixth year. It seems such a big number when written out. To me, it’s just another step along the road to my half-century. There are still four more years until I get to ponder how I feel about being fifty. As it is, my forties seem to be flying past.
Last year, I spent much of my birthday doing as I do every day. So this year I wanted to mix it up a bit. The Scientist took the day off from work and we all went down to Fremantle for lunch and a walk around the city. It was looking a bit iffy as to whether Game Fanatic would be up to the rigours of a day in the city but he decided he would join us, which made me very happy.
We arrived in Freo around noon and parked in our usual location near the Fremantle Arts Centre, which left a bit of a hike to our destination. The Scientist did offer to park closer and avoid tired feet but I was happy to walk. And so we did. In fact, I made the journey even longer than it had to be by choosing a path that took us down near the quay to take the footpath towards Fishing Boat Harbour, where we were eating lunch at Kailis Brothers Fish Market and Cafe. I had eaten breakfast already but I think this was going to be the first meal of the day for all of the guys. The walk from the car had us all worked up to a great appetite.
When we arrived, we were all ravenously hungry and I was feeling a bit dizzy and unsteady as we stopped inside at a table. It was quite a warm day and it was a bit on the sticky side inside so I chose to move our seating place to a location under a ceiling fan, which was far more comfortable, temperature-wise. We normally order all our food from the cafe end of the establishment, mainly because we never quite noticed that we could order meals at the fish market end. It’s a bit of a strange set up that isn’t very well suited to families. Fortunately, it wasn’t that crowded so was not the hassle it might be on a busier day. The Scientist and I got barramundi and chips with salad, Then he ordered food for the kids at the cafe end. The food was quite good, and the barramundi was a nice treat for a special day. I think we were all quite satisfied with our meals but the best was yet to come,
We all walked on to San Churros Chocolateria for a bit of a chocolate feast for dessert. Churros are the featured treat but all matter of chocolate delights are available. I had a chocolate milkshake with dark chocolate and it was quite scrumptious. The Scientist and Lego Lover had sundaes and Game Fanatic had bits and pieces off a tapas tray we had ordered to share. In hindsight, I think less would have been better because having so many different types of chocolate was a bit overkill. But it was all quite delicious.
The last time I was in Fremantle, I noticed the Roundhouse for the first time and had wanted to see it more closely in the future. So we spent most of the remaining time there. The Roundhouse was the first permanent building in Western Australia and was built as a gaol.
This is the view we had walking up to the Roundhouse from Fremantle city.
We walked through the tunnel at the bottom to the beach at the other side and it was wonderfully cool inside due to a strong breeze passing through.
Looking back into the tunnel from the ocean side.
The Scientist and I went up into the upper part of the Roundhouse structure while the boys chose to wait outside. Entrance was by gold coin donation and volunteers act as guides to the building. An enthusiastic elderly gentleman happily shared all he knew about the Roundhouse.Most of the view from within the Roundhouse was of the courtyard between the cells.
There is also a stockade on the opposite side that wasn’t used as a stockade. Apparently it was only used for whippings, to keep the prisoner from moving around. The Scientist tried it out and found it quite unnerving for the very short time he was there.
I wasn’t able to get any decent photos of the cells, but they were quite small cubicles with barely enough room to lie down and sleep. Also, there are no windows in the cells. The ones visible are for the quarters of the family of the jailer, who lived in the Roundhouse.
Outside this area is watch tower sort of place with a cannon that faces out to the ocean.
After looking at the view, we left the Roundhouse and started walking back to the car. It was nearly mid-afternoon and was quite warm, so our progress was slow. The footpath that goes alongside the Roundhouse also borders some railway tracks for freight train lines going out of Fremantle.
In the background, to the right, is either an apartment or unit (condo) complex that was built in a renovated old building. The units on upper levels probably have some nice views of the harbour and/or ocean.
As we took the more direct route back to the car, we passed by the old Wool Store building, which is looking particularly decrepit these days. Many of the surrounding old buildings have been renovated but this is just an eyesore. It is located just across from the passenger terminal for cruise ships docking in Fremantle and it’s not’s a nice view.
We saw some very tall gum trees with smooth, white bark as we nearly reached our destination. I believe this is just outside the Fremantle Art Centre.
We were all ready to drop by the time we reached the car. But there was little relief for the Scientist, who had the hour of driving in peak hour traffic ahead of him.
We got home in the late afternoon and my mother-in-law dropped by a little later to see me. Even though we’d had plenty of chocolate already, the Scientist went out and bought small mud cake for a bit more celebration. My big gift this year was a Kinect for the Xbox 360 (which technically belongs to Game Fanatic). We moved the sofa out of the way so we would have space to try that out and it was a lot of fun. It was obvious from the start that even the Kinect Adventures program that goes with the device can provide some good exercise. The Kinect gift actually set in motion a new tv purchase and a major overhaul of the games room where my computer table is situated. If I remember I will post a bit more about that later. The boys gave me a double dvd set of Arj Barker, an American comedian who is quite popular here in Australia. I was also given money and a photo frame from other family members. And just last week, I received a pillowcase that my mom made out of the fabric she used on a robe for me earlier as a belated gift.
All in all, it was a really nice birthday and I really loved having the Scientist and the boys share it with me.
