Worry wart ... or is that wort. Oh my.

You know, we have been known to call my mum the Voice Of Doom such is her propensity for catastrophising and worst case scenario hypothesising. To give her credit over the last couple of years she has come a l.o.n.g. way in shifting from the sky is falling to maybe it'll just rain today so you know, kudos to her for such impressive progress.

But growing up with that along with my innate nature (no doubt) has meant I am highly skilled at worrying about things that are not only pointless to worry about but will probably never even eventuate moving the worry from pointless to just plain stupid.

When Chef and I started going out we would be driving somewhere and he'd ask me what I was thinking. There was always a menagerie of dramas unfolding in my noggin, from worrying about the conflict of the day (from recollection it concerned the Balkans) to what had to be achieved at work in the first 10 minutes on Monday morning to whether that scarf would work with that shirt or maybe the collar wouldn't sit right and maybe I should grow my hair again and OH MY GOD BRAKE! and I wonder who'll be at this family gathering today to wondering whether my boss thinks I have what it takes and so on and so forth. Of course Chef was normally just wondering if we'd have sex that night so you know, we're a match made in heaven really.

So when Eleanor posted about her tendency to worry I was both thrilled in that OH MY GOD I'M NOT ALONE and totally plotting how I was going to steal her idea.

So here are some of the things I worried about today

The humidity.
The relentless humidity.
The torturous humidity.
The weather report that indicated it is going to be 30C+ every day for the next week with "Far North Queensland comparable humidity".

SERENITY NOW

Show and Tell

How fitting that Blackbird's resumption of Show and Tell (along with Crazy Mum Tats - who I thought was going to be like my new friend from school who has now become my hairdresser and does have crazy awesome tats but in fact apparently tats is also some form of crotchet or lace-making or some such. Who knew!) has asked to see our refrigerators.

Considering our fridge of 15 years (the first thing Chef and I bought together) had slowly been dying over the last few months and did actually die on the day we went fridge shopping (seriously, we got home and the fridge was warm and the freezer a pathetic attempt at cool), it is perfect timing.

So behold, The Fridge:

A 710 litre Westinghouse.

On top of it - things needing to go back to Jasper's old kindy, things for the fish tank which is just to the left of this image and the vitamin drops and worming medicine for the guinea pigs.

We didn't get the one with the ice maker because I figured a) it was not going to be near the kitchen sink so plumbing it in would have been impossible b) it was something that could breakdown c) the boys would not leave it alone and it would give me the absolute shits.  Instead it has an in-built tray with three ice-cube trays and a tray underneath you turn them into. Perfect.

 The fridge. All 450 litres of it. The fridge section alone is bigger than our previous entire fridge/freezer. See how empty it is - give me a few weeks.What I'm loving about it: the t.w.o. vegetable/fruit drawers, the dairy is on the top shelf, there is a 'deli drawer', that I can organise my condiments  by cuisine - an Asian tray, one for Indian relishes and mixes, sauces and mustards. Sigh.

The freezer - all 250 litres of it. See those ice cube trays - I'm in love. That tall bottle is the rhubarb schnapps I made the Christmas before last. Must get onto that. Clearly. Again, so empty at the moment but that won't last.

And there it is, in all it's glory.

When good things happen to good people

So last night Chef and I had the joy and honour of attending the wedding of our friends E and M. While the rain was relentless and heavy for pretty much the entire evening it was outshone by the love these two have for each other and the love for them both that everyone in the room clearly displayed.

E and I worked together a few years back and I think I can safely say we clicked from the very first time we met - when she and her boss and some weird creepy 'independent' guy from another government agency interviewed me. Any ridiculous concerns I had about having a manager younger than me was basically allayed within the first hour of working together. She is the epitomy of what a manager should be - always willing to get her hands dirty, supportive, encouraging, never micro-managing, creating a team not a hierarchy, resolving issues or problems with discretion and care, never taking things too seriously (she and I could roll our eyes so hard about certain staff members and meetings they'd almost fall out of our heads - something we were both chastised for. teeheehee) and always, always ready to discuss the latest debacle of an outfit worn by some start somewhere around the world and - for me - the best thing about the job (until she and M very rudely up and went travelling through South America for 6 months before working in the UK for a couple fo years).

From E I adopted the phrases about eating something until your head could fall off, my sweets (as a term of affection), getting all hot (but not in a good way), and possibly giving me the shits and making my neck itch (I can't remember on that front but I do know I started using them when we worked together).

There was always humour in our team work environment and quite frankly if there isn't then you just can not be expected to go to work every day without going postal.

Anyway, she'll be all uncomfortable and hot about such a public display of my love and affection for her. M is her perfect partner - quite partial to delusions of grandeur and fame as I am, very happy to have the floor and the microphone and for it all to be about him. At the moment - and even last night - he was 'mentoring' me with questions about how far I had got in the book on search engine optimisation he has lent me (um, it's on the dining room table?) and what I'd done to secure the book deal and did I have a literary agent yet (blushing and um, kicking the floor, no. Not yet. Yes I am going to do something about it. YES, I PROMISE. OMG this is your wedding, go kiss that gorgeous bride).

Their vows were exquisite - expressions of love and devotion with none of the Hallmark schmaltz.

The guests testament to their very nature - down to earth, classy, funny, exuberant, genuine and clearly appreciative of a good feed (the food was sublime - a prawn ravioli with just a hint of chilli, a pork belly with five spice, a prawn-crusted salmon cooked to perfection and a beef fillet with beans and potato dauphinois, while dessert was the best idea - mini ice cream cones, mini lemon meringue tarts and mini creme brulees that were offered on the dance floor and throughout the room so people were not 'stuck' on their tables) and not afraid to shake it up on the dance floor.

The speeches were probably the best I've ever witnessed - funny, tender and that word again, genuine.

I got to meet E's mum and she said, "You're Kimmy! With the four boys! From Narrabeen! OH how lovely to meet you". Good people. I found out that she and E's Dad are essentially grandparents to the children of two of E and M's friend, so much so that they collect one of them from school every Friday and have him sleep-over every other week. I mean, talk about above and beyond. Good people.

As it was I didn't even disgrace myself in regards to alcohol intake and could in fact drive us home (as opposed to Chef who really did enjoy himself). Not only did this save us what would have been a ridiculously large taxi fare it meant that I was quite well equipped to deal with the cold hard reality that our arrival home at 12.30ish signalled to Grover the perfect time to wake up and have a midnight snack and chat. It was only by the time we were watching Get Smart reruns at 2.30am that I was starting to feel a bit shabby.

So, after popping a few panadols, a mega vitamin b pill and finally convincing Grover to go back to bed I crawled into mine at 3am. I've been up since 7am and am feeling a bit bleary-eyed but still on a high from a wonderful evening. I can only imagine how E and M are feeling on their first day as husband and wife.

Just delicious.

Onward!    

Stuff and Nonsense

So Jasper, Grover and I were mucking around on my bed yesterday afternoon watching Play School while the bigger boys were given the extraordinary treat of being allowed to play Xbox down the back room. Mucking around constituted using me in the vein of a pummel horse and the result was half the preschool sandpit being emptied onto my bed. No worries says Jasper as he just broad-sweeps the lot onto the floor. Nice. 

The point of this backgrounder is that last night I had to vacuum our bedroom. Our bedroom is basically the end of our house. On the other side of it is the garage so really, by the time I'm in the vicinity of our bedroom I've had to clean the boys' bedrooms, the living area, the kitchen, the bathroom and our ensuite. Dudes, our bedroom is basically a large scale dorm bedroom - random crap that doesn't really belong anywhere else, toys, books, papers, receipts, you name it, it comes to our room to die. So vacuuming it is rather a big deal and when it does happen I am the Olympic Gold Medal winner for effort and thoroughness. 

Oh sure, it wasn't that practical to do it last night at 8pm but I knew it had to happen before boys were asleep as there was no way I was going to bed when there were sand dunes to negotiate to do so. 

Naturally this cleaning frenzy heightened my self-loathing for just how poor a housekeeper I am and resulted in me smashing my relatively recently purchased Ikea (of course) bedside lamp. What a winner.

Once it was basically done the little boys returned for some indoor trampolining  when Jasper says to me:

Oh Mum, this is so clean, you've done such a good job. I'm really proud of how clean you got this. I'm going to go and get you a love heart biscuit with white icing just because you cleaned this so well. Wow. 

Thanks little buddy.

*****

So the Turdinator and I had a stand-off the other day when I caught him about to wee into the seat compartment of his ride-on fire engine. I whisked him off to the toilet where he sat there refusing to wee and screaming at me. I, in what I would say was a rather loud voice, pointed out to him that he was not an animal, that he was a boy and that boys wee and poo in the toilet. That his brothers were boys and they weed and pooed in the toilet and that only animals did their wees and poos outside. To which he screamed at me,

 'I am an animal! I am an animal!'

Me: Will I start giving you dinner in a dog bowl? 

Him: NO

Me: Would you like to sleep outside? Will I buy you a kennel?

Him: NO

Me: That's right, because you.are.not.an.animal. You.ARE.A.BOY.

Him: MUMMY GO 'WAY. MUMMY GO MY BED. MUMMY GO MY NIGH NIGH.

Me: I'm not going away, I'm going to stand here until you do your wee in the toilet like a big boy.

Him: MUMMY GO 'WAY. MUMMY GO MY BED. MUMMY GO MY NIGH NIGH.

Me: Why would I go to your bed?

Him: MUMMY NAUGHTY! MUMMY GO MY BED! MUMMY NAUGHTY!!!

Me: No buddy, Mummy isn't naughty, Mummy is trying to teach you the right thing to do when you need to do a wee or a poo. You ...

Him: NOOOOOO. MUMMY ENEMY!!!! MUMMY ENEMY!!!!

Me: No Grovey, Mummy loves you very very much and that is why I'm making you do this, you're a bigger boy now and this is where you go to the toilet.

Cue further screaming at me that I'm the enemy, that I have to go to his room because I naughty, to goway, GOWAY  all while he's sitting on the toilet and while I have got his bath running. 

So I pick him up off the toilet and put him in the bath, at which point he panics and cries 'NO WEE coming!!!' So back on the toilet he goes and does the biggest wee in the world. 

I'm not sure what part of that exchange flipped the switch but in the last six days we've had more poos in the toilet than out and ditto for wees.

What's that? Over there? On the horizon? Could it be the tiny flicker of a light?

*****

It's official, we are no longer a PayTV household. I cancelled it last week and the technician came today to disconnect us and take away the set-top boxes. 

It has actually been hugely liberating. Isn't that bizarre? I certainly didn't think that was how I'd be feeling. I kind of thought I'd feel relief and begrudging acceptance but instead I feel buoyant, in control and, well, smug.

*****

Yesterday I had to go and purchase some control undergarments to go under the dress I am wearing to our friends' wedding on the weekend. I was going to make a dress but considering I only got my sewing machine back from being serviced last week and the various things life has thrown at me it's just not going to happen. So, the stand-by dress required some form of undergarment to smooth out the folds. 

Let's just say I did not leave the lingerie department of David Jones feeling good about myself. In fact, by the time I had funnelled myself into myriad torture contraptions I just felt hot and ugly. I ended up buying more what I believe is called a teddy? than a Nancy Gantz because it was all of 20 bucks cheaper but now I'm thinking I should have gone the all-body-scuba-suit-by-another-name because it had better (ie thinner) straps and the forecast is now for it to be torrential rain and below average temperatures - two weather characteristics I'm sure are just thrilling the bridal party. (Personally I never give a rats arse about the weather at these things because weather smeather, it's all about these two people committing to each other in front of people they love and who love them and having a bloody good time.)

Another issue is that my new legend hairdresser cut my hair the other day and because it had been so hot I told her (after she'd finished) to take some more off the front. Next time I'm going to keep my mouth shut because how she had cut it was perfect and how it is now is not so much a disaster but just not as kicky and jaunty. It's annoying me in that the only solution is time and well, waiting for anything just gives me the absolute shits.

Tick, tick, tick ... TICK

It was only a matter of time before the NSW Health Dept covertly set us up as a human petrie dish of infectious diseases to see just how long some ills would kick on while others would just up and mutate themselves to oblivion. On Sunday Felix informed me that he had this 'weird rash'. Now if they aren't two words a parent just loves to hear.

Sure enough, on his left leg, the good leg, the non-gashed leg, the one without the staples there is a plethora (a gang?, a mob?, a menagerie?) of bites which his body is angrily reacting to by developing a whopping great welt running from his groin to his hip. Awesome. A trip to the chemist and $50 later I'm doping him up, soaking him down and smothering him in creams all the while wondering what the hell it was. Ticks? No, they like to burrow into your flesh. Sand flies? Would make sense if we'd been at the beach, which we hadn't because of the last freakin' incident.   Some sort of mite? OH.DEAR.GOD.

I'd already been rabidly systematically trying to cleanse the house of every shred of evidence of the previous six weeks of holiday hell but now, NOW the world was going to smite me with some sort of bug? Body lice? SCABIES? SERENITY.NOW!

On Monday I had the same sort of bites in the same sort of area and was seriously considering some sort of commercial grade highly toxic make-my-children-sterile cleaner to rid us of this horror. Oscar had three bites on him and I was terrified the hospital would see them and quarantine us. Actually, come to think of it, that would have been quite lovely. Anyway, Jasper had a couple of marks on his face which suspiciously looked similar but had nowhere near the angriness in them or raised nature. I was thinking his were more likely to be mozzie bites, of which we have experienced PLAGUE-LIKE proportions this year as well. Grover seemed to have escaped this ignominy and Chef was oh-so-smugly bite free. Apparently because he washes.

Then yesterday morning Grover and I were up quite early and were just mooching around together when I noticed two tiny black dots on his face and one one his neck. I knew instantly that they were ticks even though every other tick I've ever had to pull off the boys has been a more greyish-pink colour and certainly not three of them and certainly not so small.

Then I looked at me and lo, it came to pass, I had was is technically called an 'infestation'. Did you just gag then? Yes. I too have a sensitive gag reflex. So you try looking down and seeing your upper thigh covered in tiny black dots which are a tiny little ugly creature sucking your blood. UNFOLLOW.

All told I have about 30 bites on me and pulled about 16 ticks off me yesterday. Jasper had a big one which had lodged just at his hairline (where I normally associate ticks with) and I found another couple on Felix.

Ticks do not have great mobility so it stands to reason that Felix and I were the main targets due to our proximity in terms of dealing with his allergic reaction to them and the whole other knee needing dressing changes etc and that I am physically affectionate (I KNOW!) towards my children. Jasper and Grover were the next in line due to the amount of time they spend attached to my hip, leg, lap, being, soul. I'm surprised Oscar didn't get more because he's always all over me like a rash and well, the fact Chef has not had one probably says alot about the amount of lovin' or lack thereof going on in this house at the moment.

Now while I have you all recoiling from your computer screens, the northern beaches of Sydney are notorious for ticks, particularly once you go passed the Bilgola Bends. Sure, Avalon has a delightful community atmosphere but it is Tick Central.

We are suspecting that Felix probably picked them up at cricket training last Thursday or even at cricket on Saturday morning and then the rest of the events unfolded from there.

The ticks we had are commonly referred to as grass ticks and having a multitude of them on you is not uncommon. Mum, as a child, once had 168 on her from a day spent rolling down a hill. Probably on her way home from school walking those six miles in bare feet through the snow.

They are in fact not grass ticks but the very early stages of a tick in its maturity. Isn't this interesting.

Regardless, the lawn is now cut to within an inch of it's life, everyone is sleeping in newly-washed bedding, my vacuuming fetish has returned with heightened zeal, the guinea pigs have been washed and vindicated as the culprits and I may just fall down in a heap one of these days and watch some midday television if the planets align. Or some such.

Onward!

Monday. In brief.

So today's agenda featured Oscar back at Sydney Children's Hospital for his (almost) annual botox injections in his legs.


Our cerebral palsy specialist has already been awarded an Order of Australia for his work but man, he is a national treasure. Not only did he study pure maths at uni (meaning he's totally across all this new nano technology that is driving medical research these days) he has done a Masters in Hospital Management so the dude could run his own hospital if some philathropic legend threw enough money in his direction. 


This added skill secured the current set-up at the hospital for the botox clinic - removing it from the chronically over-crowded out-patients day-surgery roster and moving it to its own area (well, a shared area with the cancer treatment unit) so a lot of the stress and trauma for the kids is removed. 


One of the rooms on the ward has been turned into an operating suite and so the kids are just wheeled across a corridor rather than out of a ward, down a corridor, into an adjoining hospital, then through big scary doors into pre-med which OMG makes me white with nerves let alone a little person and then into a full-on laden-with-machines-that-go-ping operating theatre packed with scary-characters-covered-in-gowns-and-face-masks. 


Recovery is short and then they're back in the room where they started. All the kids are there for the same reason and well, on a stress scale from 1-10 (1 being unicorns and rainbows, 10 being the fiery gates of damnation) it probably sits more at a 5 rather than a 9 like the old days.


Seeing as nothing is ever straight forward in this family there needed to be phone calls to the orthopaedic surgeon who'll be doing his op in a couple of months and consults with the physios and orthotics crews. I love how we always end up with a bevy of people gathering around us while everyone else gives us the stink-eye for taking up so much god-damned time and lets just get these procedures underway so we can all go get a coffee and eat something OK!??!!!


Oscar was an absolute champ with only a moderate freak-out when it was time to go under - for those who have never had to hold an anaesthetic mask over your child's face while trying to look all composed and reassuring and HAPPY! and you're doing so well! and that's a boy, nice big breaths and what are we going to do when you wake up? EAT! that's right and yes, my boy, of course you can play wrestling on the Xbox when we get home and there we go, off to sleep then just say a prayer of gratitude because there is something deeply unsettling watching your kid go all googly eyed then woozy then into some weird place between awake and drugged sleep that involves weird sounds and involuntary movements and DEAR GOD I COULD DO WITH A DRINK RIGHT ABOUT NOW.


Once they removed the hideous dreaded canula from his hand we were off for the almost annual hip x-ray and then a flying trip home to pick Jasper up from his first day at his new kindy. Where staff actually told me what he'd done that day and how well he'd settled in! On the first day! Compared to last year when I asked one of the staff members and she was all, 'which one is he?'. Oi. As if that wasn't a sign.


Now home I've got some lamb & sweet potato  pasties in the oven using left over lamb roast and gravy from last night, Oscar is a bit of a head-achey teary mess, Felix and Jasper are weary and Grover is probably out there casing the backyard for the perfect dump site of the day. 


Yep, situation normal.      

Hi!

Today:
- I didn't go for a walk
- I did get the boys to school on time
- Making lunches after six weeks of not making lunches is really hard
- Standing at a kitchen bench staring at lunch boxes does not magically fill lunch boxes
- We essentially moved house except didn't
- There were bookshelves relocated which meant piles and piles of books being relocated
- I cleaned a wall
- It was surprisingly filthy and now I look at it and think, wow, that wall looks amazing
- After moving everything around the back room is now in exactly the same layout as it was before
- I asked Chef to do three things, one of them was really really important while the other two were necessary
- He didn't do any of them
- I was steaming about it for pretty much the entire day
- I had my haircut this morning for the wedding next weekend
- The wedding features two of my lovely friends and I am so excited - for them and for the chance to get frocked up and all that goes with a celebratory affair
- I had to mop the bathroom floor because it smelled like a public men's toilet
- No really, it did
- I gagged when I went to the loo such was the stench
- It appears the Turdinator (aka Grover) likes peeing on the bathroom floor now, as well as under the dining room table, on the back verandah, on the back tiling, up the side path, on the front porch
- The new fridge arrived
- A large box arrived from my friend K
- In that large box was a gift to lift my spirits in the difficult months ahead
- That box contained a 28cm apple green Chasseur French oven
- Oh yes there was
- I cried at being so blessed to have such a friendship in my life
- I felt honoured to receive a gift of such generosity
- The new fridge arrived
- It is very pretty
- It does not fit in our kitchen, the size fridge we needed never was going to fit in our kitchen so it is living across from our kitchen, which works quite well except as it is rather large so I have become quite partial to thinking of it as a modernist art installation that keeps on giving
- I had a quiet chat with it during the hours before I was allowed to turn it on that while it was very pretty it better get over any notion of relying on its good looks toot sweet and that it would be expected to pull its weight around here for the next ten, ideally twenty years.
- I have workshopped my emotions regarding this fridge. This fridge that has maxed out our credit card and will swallow any form of financial return we get from our taxes this year.
- I mean, how freaking exciting to get a brand spanking new appliance - an appliance whereby the fridge side alone is ONE HUNDRED LITRES bigger than the entire fridge we've had for the last 15 years. An appliance where I could easily fit a small human body in the freezer side. I mean, not that I've tried.
- Put the girls, Matilda and Harriet (the guinea pigs) outside for some rays and grass grazing
- Caught Matilda after Jasper accidentally let her out while he was trying to catch Harriet - he calmly came inside and told me that she had got away and there she was, plotting her latest escape in the garden
- I bought the boys new school and PE shirts because apparently they both grew TWO sizes over the summer break
- The price of school shirts is FUCKING HIGHWAY ROBBERY
- I called in to the supermarket to pick up some treats for Friday afternoon tea, coriander for dinner, cherries because OH MY GOODNESS how good are cherries at the moment and breakfast cereal
- Picked up the boys from school
- I made my ginger sesame rice with chicken for dinner
- It's Day 3 and MY GOD have I been one narky old hag
- Cleaned the girls' cage and then watched them burrow and run and squeak in delight with their new hay
- It is pathetic how enarmoured I am with the girls. I adore them. Best pets ever. AND they're still alive. Talk about a win win.
- I watched Blackadder with Felix and got as much delight from witnessing Felix's first exposure to Blackadder as I did from watching it.
- I watched Ghost Ship and realised right near the end that I had indeed seen it before and that it really wasn't a movie worth of a second viewing.
- Watched the beginning of Rage and the first song off the rank tonight was the following tune from Mumford & Sons. I realise it is so naff to love Mumford & Sons at the moment because everyone loves Mumford & Sons, but luff them I do:

School's back!

OH DUDES.

Here I was thinking the first day back at school would feature a day of glorious luxury with just me, Chef and the Turdinator at home.

You know I'm here to tell you today just kicked my arse from here to a month of Sundays. That doesn't make sense I know but I love that phrase in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, it's Day 2 and it's 11.25pm so you're going to just have to work with me.

SO, we drop the boys at school e.a.r.l.y. and catch up with Oscar's teacher for this year (who is also, conveniently, the deputy principal responsible for the special needs kids) and have a mini-debrief about when the operation is, when swim school is on, could they possibly call on us to help out in driving Oscar to and from, filling in Felix's teacher from last year on the whole knee incident and you know, to just let him take it easy, only to then see Felix playing handball. Yeah, really bad cut, 10 staples, shouldn't really bend it. Blah blah blah listen to the hoverparent droning on and on already. Next!

Then we drop Jasper at my in-laws - 'a special day, just for me Grover, not for you, just me, on my own, with Nana and Grandpa'. Yeah, way to rub it in dude. They took him on a lovely outing involving a bus trip AND a train ride into Central Station where apparently his eyes almost fell out of his head at so.many.trains. and all the track. There was even a Country Rail train driver who offered to take him into the driver's cabin but he wasn't having a bar of it. Funny little kid.

Then we (that'd be me, Chef and TurdBoy) headed off fridge shopping.

That's right, nothing rams home the cold hard reality of poverty than having your 15 year old teeny tiny fridge you bought when you first moved out of home with your boyfriend enter the death throes just after Christmas and to watch it slowly die leaving you with no other option than to purchase a new and unavoidably expensive household item. Hi my name is Now-totally-maxed-out-credit-card, let me introduce you to Screwed.

Over the last few weeks the freezer has not been cold enough to keep ice cream or bread or various other things for that matter, frozen and the fridge has just been getting less cold on an oh-so-gradual way. Every time we have a really hot day it just gives up that little bit more. I just had this feeling it wasn't going to last that much longer so off we went.

The Good Guys was first because apparently they're the good guys and won't screw you over. In fact, that's where we bought our washing machine five years ago and they really were good guys and the fridge I have chosen after hours of internet research was there and indeed, the guy who sold us the washing machine is selling us the fridge and he'll give us the floor-stock for a bargain basement price. Bargain basement being, you know, relative.

We then go to Harvey Norman who were beyond useless. Then we go to David Jones and endure the most agonising of waits as the most annoying of couples stand there monopolising the one and only sales assistant only to then say, 'well, we'll go home and check out the measurements and get back to you'. Idiots. I do the whole, 'I want this model in this finish and these guys will do it for me at this price. Can you do it?' His convoluted answer was no, coming in $300 more and telling me I'd have to wait three weeks.

So back to the Good Guys we go and make the deal. I'm all sweaty and getting the hand shaking thing I developed during the breakdown of 2008. I mean, we have to have a fridge and there is no point buying something that isn't going to last the long yawning stretch that will be having four teenage boys.

The only glitch at this stage is that the credit card had been frozen because I hadn't paid last month's minimum on time and while I had paid it a few days ago it still hadn't registered with the credit card company, so we've paid a deposit and will call with our credit card number later in the day once those funds have cleared. OH I KNOW, we can all see where that story line is headed.

We get home and believe it or not I have a 20 minute unintended power nap. Chef goes and collects the boys from school, I bake a batch of biscuits and cut up some watermelon and assume the crash position for the afternoon run.

Boys home, all good, everyone happy, Felix has a teacher I don't know and they seem to have totally shaken up the two classes so not sure if that is good, bad or indifferent. His knee held up well and we remove the bandage to have a look-see.

Then Chef and I moved.the.piano. to make way for some back room re-arrangement to fit in the new fridge (the space in our kitchen for a fridge is tiny and was never going to do, the fridge is going to sit against a wall opposite the kitchen - it's hard to describe but it is a workable solution). HOLY CRAP pianos are fucking heavy.

Cricket training.

Shopping to pick up some stuff for homemade pizzas.

Home at around 7pm. Funds still not cleared. Back room a complete bomb-site as Chef has been moving shelving (as I had directed) and the little boys have been 'helping'.

Meltdowns by everyone including me.

Phone calls to credit card company, all fixed, phone calls to Good Guys, all paid.

The fridge arrives tomorrow.

Didn't we have a lovely day the day we went to emergency

So today is Australia Day. Or Invasion Day. Take your pick. It is a national public holiday and features lots of community sausage sizzles and far showier events like announcing the Australian of the Year and this years recipients of an Order of Australia.

It's kind of law that if you live near the ocean you go to the beach and regardless of where you live there must be a bbq and ideally something like a pavlova for dessert. You know, no pressure.

But in this house of children growing increasingly fractious about the return to school which was manifesting itself in the standard ways of, you know, trying to kill their siblings while driving their mother to an early grave my willingness to do anything remotely celebratory was greatly curtailed. However, I do know that getting out of the house at the time you most want to hide in your bed is generally the best time to go with the former, so off we went.

Just to mix it up we went over to the ocean pool today rather than the beach. When we got there the tide was out and the area where the lake meets the ocean was divine - shallow, crystal clear and packed with families. All the boys wanted to go there and it seemed like a really good idea. At one point Felix wanted to scale the rocks down to the water so I gave him the whole lesson about oysters and oyster shells and how, while I had not experienced it first hand, I was of the understanding that an oyster shell cut was incredibly painful.

So there we were, down in the shallows. Chasing tiny schools of fish. Cooling down instantly. Of course the Death By Sibling game was still in play with Felix and Jasper either pushing each other over or kicking water at the other.

You know that Hugh Grant movie where they have a baby and he doesn't want to let go of his old no-kids lifestyle and they meet that family at the beach where the parents are Joan Cusack and Tom Arnold and those parents look permanently haggard and the children are delinquents? Well that family is us. We are that family. The one which disturbs the peace, shatters the tranquil ambience of happy children frolicking, the one which has every other parent appreciating their children that bit more. (You know I love it.)

And then it happened. Felix had kicked water at Jasper which had got him right in the eyes after a consoling cuddle from me he ran at Felix and performed a move that featured a jump on his back and a push all at the same time. In the first instance I thought Felix's reaction was a standard over-reaction but then it just had this pitch and the facial expression was less acted and more, well, more real. Then he kind of lurched at me clutching his leg. And then I saw it. A massive 10cm gash across his knee, the white of the insides of his body showing and then, then the blood. Oh dear God the blood.

There we are, in the channel, Felix with blood gushing from his leg, two little boys and Oscar. And me. I'm all, 'now what the fuck do I do?' on the inside and all calmly collected on the outside. And people, what followed was to me what I always want to remember as the thing to celebrate on our national day. Four families in the near vicinity came to our aid.

A guy on a kayak came over and calmed me down completely, suggesting we get to the club house and get some pressure on the wound. Which were excellent suggestions was it not for the cold hard reality of I had three other children with me, it was fiercely hot and while I would not let my child bleed to death I also wasn't about to nude up then and there to use my cossie as a tourniquet.      

Some other parents helped me get him out of the water, another mum checked the little fellas were coming too, another family moved their beach umbella over him and then, while I was getting a towel from our bag (on the other side of the channel - yes people, there was running. Braless running), a cool-looking surfer dad  totally took over and got one of his daughter's (clean) nappies and put it over the wound. How freakin' resourceful is that? We then wrapped the towel over the top of the nappy and stood back to marvel at our collective genius.

Then surfer dad and his wife send a couple of their kids off around to the beach to get the surf lifesavers to come and help us.

Then I realised Oscar was about to hurl. Or faint. Or both. What can I say, the kid is mine. So I get him back into the water to cool off and to just move away from the scene of blood and wounds.

Then surfer dad's wife say they know Oscar and we try and ascertain from where, which results in one of those conversations of 'maybe swimming lessons? kindy? school? School!'.

Then the lifesavers arrived on their four-wheeler. They pour some saline on it and wrap a big bandage around it, commending surfer dad on his resourcefulness.

Then we all had to work out what to do now - I had known as soon as I saw it that a trip to the hospital was unavoidable but first there was the cold hard reality of getting back to our car w/ the three able-bodied (kind of) boys and where the lifesaver's would take Felix.

So Felix scored a ride on the quad bike up to the surf club house and I hustled the other boys back across the channel, down to the ramp, up the ramp, under the tap, along the path, into the car, to the club house (cue lifesaver remarks about four boys! you're a maniac! look, there they all are! Good luck!), home to drop off boys and to get out of swimming cossies (look, he wasn't bleeding to death, he wasn't in excruciating pain and considering it was Australia Day and the beaches were packed I figured better to be dressed than in a cossie and towel if we were going to be there for hours on end. Sue me.)

Once at the hospital we have to wait about an hour (not that bad at all considering the day and fact that so many people do really stupid things on Australia Day) and then, well then I kind of lost control of my faculties.

I was fine, really I was, joking with the doctor, taking pictures of the gaping wound. Then, then, he administered the local anaesthetic. Felix's tears/laughter-in-shock and the gripping of my hands started to undo me. Then I told him it was nearly done and STUPIDLY looked at what the doctor was doing.  

Driving a needle right into the middle of the wound site was what he was doing.

Cue immediate all-over body sweats. Cue the yawning. Cue the stomach-churns. Cue the 'oh for fuck's sake Kim this isn't about you" self-lecture. Cue the 'do not faint. Do not faint' mantra. Grab spew bag even though that means leaning across Felix. Get glasses off incase of fainting. Try and comfort Felix. Fail. Get head between legs trying to be discreet so doctor does not think you are a complete loser of a mother. Almost lose breakfast and last night's dinner when doctor makes me look at what he's doing so I know how to remove the STAPLES!  in two weeks time. Make mental note that GP will be removing STAPLES! in two weeks time.

I start to panic that I really am going to vomit when another doctor (a young woman) comes into the room. The doctor asks her if they use these staple guns at (Royal) North Shore and she's all, 'oh yeah! They're awesome for scalps' SCALPS! OH GOD HELP ME. I manage to say something like, 'you lot are just so weird' and it works - taking my mind off mental images of needles injecting wound sites and fainting and spewing. I laugh that I'm about to either faint or hurl and she takes one look at me and goes from joking with me to, 'do you need a glass of water?'. The doctor apologises that he didn't realise how bad I was feeling. I notice even my hands have gone pale. Sweat is pouring from every single pore on my body. I'm shaking. I am fucking useless.

Then we all marvel at his handiwork. There are about 15 staples in his knee. I'm shaky but the panic has passed.

We get some extra pads and things for changing the dressing and stare down the barrel of two weeks of not getting it wet, no running, no jumping, no real bending. If it gets at all pussie, red or starts to ooze I'm to simply remove.the.staples. from that area and let the infection work it's way out.

We're home now.

There are photos but my stomach needs a little distance between the event and photographic evidence of the event at this point in time.

I've eaten two bread rolls, half a banana and an entire packet of dry water crackers. You'll excuse me if I go lie down now.


Happy Australia Day people!

We interrupt normal programming for this public service announcement. It takes less than a minute to drown - how to read the surf

In the last week three children, the eldest with severe autism, were orphaned after their mum went into the surf to help two of them in trouble. She got the kids out but then got into trouble herself. So the dad went in to help his wife and the mother of his three children. The two of them drowned in a rip on one of the many stunning but unpatrolled beaches of Australia.

Yesterday another dad drowned in a rip after going in to help his two sons and their friend who had got in trouble.

People, the beach in all its stunning beauty is a mighty dangerous place to be if you do not understand what it is capable of. Even I was stunned to read this morning that our beach is rated a 7 out of 10 in terms of hazard. Dudes, the beach in which we frolic is regarded as highly hazardous.

Basically every beach has a rip. It's not a tide, it won't pull you under, it's a current that pulls all the water that's come into the beach back out again. Some beaches have several permanent rips, where the beach is between two headlands there will pretty much always be a rip at one or other or both of the headlands.

They're sneaky buggers because a rip looks like the safest place to swim as there are less breaking waves.

If you are holidaying somewhere on the coast where the beaches are not patrolled the advice is not to go in. Easier said than done when you're away and holidaying during the height of the Australian summer. That's some sort of Coleridgian water water everywhere but not a drop to swim in kinda sentiment that is just not going to wash with many. SO, get yourself to a high point, survey the beach and work out where the rips are and avoid them.

The beachsafe website has awesome fact sheets and information about beach safety.

The Rip Currents website has everything you need to know including a five point survival plan for when you get stuck in a rip here. The key is to not panic and to swim parallel to the beach. Do NOT try to swim against the current. You'll get tired and start to freak out.

Also, just take a few minutes to watch this:

Enough kids have been orphaned by natural disasters in the last few weeks. We've made the boys watch this video a few times now and the bigger boys school had the guy in the video come and talk to the kids about the science of the surf.