Wednesday 30 April 2008

Look ma, no teeth


Look ma, no teeth
Originally uploaded by Crit Chicken
D'Arcy's third tooth fell out on the weekend and he has three more wobbly ones - the other top one, and the one next to it, and a bottom one. Apparently the tooth fairy didn't leave him any money, although he then said "she hid it under my Pokemon cards, and made the water in the glass blue". Weird things happen at his dad's house sometimes.

In other news his new teacher's first day was today, she seems pretty good so far, she has a 6 year old daughter called Darcy. D is bit self-conscious about this, but I've explained to him before, and I did again, that when we named him, we didn't think of it as a girl's name at all. It really isn't here, not like in the US. It's an old school Aussie blokes name, a bit Irish. We named him for D'Arcy Niland who was married to Ruth Park , and wrote The Shiralee amongst others.

We've had some wild dog/cat action. The dog has been a bit stir crazy since the beloved has been away, and he hasn't been getting the exercise he needs, so he's been sleeping on my bed, the sofa, D'Arcy's bed, and the cats' bed (photos on Flickr). Tonight he disgraced himself by ripping into an unopened bag of dried food I'd left in the kitchen. Perhaps he was trying to get his own back for my forgetting to feed him at all last night. Obedience training started a couple of weeks ago, and it is interesting to learn how to train him. It's going fairly well so far, though we missed last week's class, and at some point the arrival of a new family member is going to intervene. I pointed out to D'Arcy today that the baby is due in about 6 weeks, and he was surprised I guess I'm surprised too.

Wednesday 16 April 2008

School Holiday project

Why is it that everything falls apart at once?

First up it was the central heating, in October. Fortunately we didn't need it much to heat the house, but I do use the fan in the summer to cool in the evenings. I rang the guy to come and fix it, and he failed to do so for the next 6 months, until I gave up and got someone else in. It's pretty much terminal - the fan has busted, and the circuit board won't be far behind, so we need to replace the whole thing.

Next up was the back door. It was a cheap hollow-core number and the surfaces separated from the insides one morning after it had been moist overnight. Fortunately we were able to staple it back together for a few weeks until the new one was ready.

The third thing to go was the TV. It was one that my dad had handed on to me. I realised recently that at the age of 38 I have never bought a TV set. So it was about 10 years old when we got it 4 years ago, and the tube was suddenly starting to go flickery. Again, fortunately I knew that my dad had again upgraded, and had a spare TV set, so I rang him and the beloved went around to pick it up. He bought dad and the TV home for dinner and they set it up. Strangely the video, through which the set top box was routed, refused to power up, and continued to refuse to work, so I pulled out the TV (no mean feat, it's bloody heavy) and unplugged the set top box and plugged it in differently.

Later my mum and stepfather came around to help get some order into the house, since the beloved has gone away for 3 weeks, leaving in a hurry and leaving boxes and other things I can't move all over the place. I got them to take away the old TV and they were going to take the VCR, until I said "wait, it's school holidays. I know someone who would like to take that apart" and behold, we have a project. Lucky really, since I've been falling apart too. I have a cold and would rather be asleep than entertain a 7 year old.

Of course the other thing to bust has been the toilet. It's not too bad at this point, but it's only a matter of time I'm sure. I guess it's just the house's way of telling us it's time to renovate. Bad timing. There's no way we can get it done before the baby is due, but we need the heater pretty soon!

Saturday 5 April 2008

Here's how I spent my morning...


Caturday morning
Originally uploaded by Crit Chicken
Pokemon cards are our incentive for D'arcy sleeping in his own bed - if he spends two nights in a row in his own bed, he gets a new deck. As you can see here, as of last night, he now has two decks, enough to play a game with, so that was his heart's desire this morning. I tell you, it takes a while to play a game, and takes up a fair bit of brain space. I was suprised to find out that it's not all that bad, either - a combuination of luck and strategy. For those of you in the know, you'll be able to see that I won, but only by one.

In other news, not much to report. We spent the rest of the day getting a new back door installed (the old one fell apart a few weeks ago) and putting together shelving units for the bedroom and the shipping container with help from my mum and stepfather. As always, Larry and Honey had a fabulous time chasing balls and each other and D'Arcy around the garden. The house is slowly falling apart around us: bits of the bathroom; ditto kitchen; the back door; and spectacularly the gas furnace for the DGH. W're trying to figure out whether to embark on the major renovation plan, which includes removing all the asbestos and insulating, before mid-June, or to try to make it through this winter with a small person in this version of the house... dilemma.

Someone (not me) has a wobbly tooth, and is obsessively wobbling it in the hope that it will fall out tonight.

Someone else (also not me) is going to the US next week for 3 weeks, so any offers of support (concrete and moral) gratefully received. At least he will return with a lot of shoes that I don't have to bend over to put on.

Someone else (still not me) keeps kicking/punching me in the bladder.