The upside of being sick

• I get to experience being cared for by the boy, who is an excellent nursie
• There were no complaints when I decided to watch the whole of Season Two of Gilmore girls over three days (I've been sick since Thursday, but hardly conscious enough to watch telly until Saturday)
• It's nice and warm in my living room, but nasty cold outside, so I didn't mind being stuck at home
• by this afternoon, I was well enough to play Junior Monopoly with TLM - which I don't usually get time to do if I've been working all day
• and hopefully, the boss will see to it that I can take a few days off to get out of town for something fun with the family

The cold has, as predicted, moved chest-ward (ho!). But at least it's left my brain.

I told her so

We are way overdue for a holiday - well I am, anyway. We haven't been away since Christmas 2008/2009, and that was only for a week.

But could I get a long weekend off work? Not on your nelly, because the place I work for is in the middle of a big project to launch a new database and website and there's tons of work to do.

And now I have the mother of all colds - hopefully not as terrible as the affliction which put me out of action for a month last winter - but certainly bad enough to keep me in bed for two straight days. For a cold! It's now working its way to my chest, so even if I make it in to work tomorrow, my workmates will still need to keep at least a metre away from me at all times.

And if I don't make it back to work tomorrow, then all I can say to my boss is,
 I TOLD you I needed a break!

Believably busy

I suppose it's to be expected when you work for a non-profit organisation, but at work there's just far too much to be done and not enough person-hours in which to do it.

So when my mum gets a pay-immediately demand from the power company which whom she has a direct debit arrangement, and wants me to ring their call centre to sort it out, there's only one thing I can do.

"Mum, I'm so busy I haven't got time to piss!" I protest. 

And even though I'm saying this is in beginner's level Cantonese, I'm pretty sure that a born and bred home-villager would have said it the same way (but with added cussing).

But it's almost true, you know. And she believes me.

Sherlock Holmes

The movie, which we watched on DVD recently, was great. It's kinda predictable to present classic heroes as tortured souls, and they've done that with Holmes. But, according to the boy, Holmes was in fact a tortured soul in the original novels.

Actually, the relationship between he and Dr Watson is very, very reminiscent to that between Dr House and his friend Wilson.

Hey, both pairs have the the initials H & W! I wonder whether the creators of House were being really clever.

The other thing about Holmes, which I didn't know from my limited exposure to old Sherlock Holmes movies, is that he is keen and talented boxer. This is good for the box office because guys like a bit violence and girls like a bit of a six-pack. And again, this is apparently a feature of the original character as per the novels.

The movie has a villanous black magic practitioner, which the boy and I always like to see in movies, as well as a super-clever female thief, whom I suspect was included to prevent it from being a boys-only story.

Oh, and the scenery is fantastic. It's sorta like Blade Runner gone retro (seeing as it's set in Victorian London) - all industrial and ugly and beautiful at the same time.

UFOs coming out of my ears

Once upon a time my workplace made us do personality tests, supposedly to help our team leaders work out how to make the most of our respective strengths (and avoid our respective weaknesses).

I was horribly disappointed to score low in "creativity", but at least I could console myself with my high score as a "completer".

So why on earth do I have so many unfinished sewing projects (UFOs, but don't ask me what the "O" stands for - it's just standard sewist slang as far as I can tell)?

There's:

• the Chanelesque jacket - I made the fitting muslin, but didn't go any further. I've been thinking maybe it needs a hood (or an entirely different neckline) to avoid it looking like a failed Chanel jacket or - almost as bad - like a jacket that doesn't belong on my body
• the Burda tunic dress I made last winter, which I decided to refashion - so far all I've managed is to unpick the baggy puff sleeves and stick pins in the armholes
• the too-long and too-small tunic dress which I bought off TradeMe - I chopped the top of it off and cut a new (and wider) neckline and torso into it. It is currently full of pins
• the merino sack dress, which I wore to work anyway - before I remembered that I still haven't fixed the small hole I found in the sleeve. Plus I really want to add circular patch pockets to the sides for a bit of interest, but I will probably never get around to it now
• the tweed skirt (which came with the matching jacket that had the hole worn in a stupid place), which I mean to shorten and re-do the waist seam on. It is still stuffed into a big zip-up bag full of other potential refashions (not mentioned here)

If I ever get a couple of hours of free sewing time, I will be so undecided about how to use it that I'm likely to just go for a walk in the hills instead!

A couple of thumbs-downs

The other day I was in the pharmacy (the only other place I go during my lunch break is the public library), and the retail assistant (the very same girl I mentioned in my previous blog post) gave me a sample of a Dr Haushka Lewinn bio oil and a Dr Haushka Lewinn face moisturiser. She raved about the oil, saying it was supposed to be very good for ezcema-prone skin. Then I nagged her about my need for moisturisers so she gave me the other.

FYI - sad to say that neither of the above were a big success for me. The body oil promised to have a soothing effect on my delicate skin, but it wasn't any different than if I had used leftover cooking oil (well maybe better-smelling). The moisturiser was a stinger.

Home is where the pharmacist is

Anonymity can be a good thing when you go shopping, especially if you are the sort of person who buys a lot of stuff from pharmacies. I'm not even just referring to relatively embarrassing items like  condoms, tampons and haemorrhoid cream.

I go in a lot for my prescription medicines (for my allergies etc), but I'm also a frequent visitor because of my skincare experiments. Plus - I don't know about pharmacies elsewhere in the world, but the pharmacies in NZ are chock full of pretty things. Things like luxury toiletry bags and Disney-character shampoos for kids, and then there's the more usual stuff like fabulous perfumes and creams and so on that are like poison to my skin...and yet so attractive.

Anyway, yesterday I went to my local (pharmacy) for some non-soap hand cleanser, and today I went in for some antihistamines. The girl who served me said, very cheerily, that I ought to move in.

Normally if someone tells me this, then I know that I am becoming far too familiar for comfort. And I don't go back because now I'm too self-conscious about it.

But this time I just said that I'd only move in if she gave me a 10% discount for being such a prolific customer. And she did.

I have no intention of packing my bags and moving into the shop (it's too close to work).

I guess I'd be Sporty Spice then

Violet's Result: Your Style is Sporty! on quiz: What's Your Clothing Personality? Click here to find out how to define and improve your sporty fashion style. Quiz School Take this quiz & get your result

What s Your Clothing Personality? » Quiz Maker

Extracurricular education

I've been thinking about it for quite some time - signing up The Little Madam for Chinese language classes. One of the obstacles was the fact that I didn't want to pay the tuition fees (which aren't actually that much at $50 per term).

But mostly it was fear of having to commit to more parental volunteering.

My brother just happens to be the something-or-other coordinator of the Chinese school, and his kids go there too of course.  TLM loves their company and wants to go, 'cos she'll be in with the big kids. So tonight I put my stake in the ground (as they say at work) and told him to go ahead and sign 'er up.

The deciding factor? Frankly I'm embarrassed that our half-Chinese daughter has learned to speak Spanish (from watching Dora the Explorer), but can't understand anything my mother tells her.

We might have a winner - Trilogy and xma-ease

For several weeks now I've settled on Simple moisturizer - not because it does a great job, but because it doesn't hurt my face when I put it on.

But I recently tried some potentials from this little skincare boutique (called Earth 127 or something, the latitude or longitude of New Zealand I think it means) - the woman who sells the products makes her own lotions and potions, and she uses natural ingredients etc. The "natural" label is usually a warning sign that it will make my skin sting. Don't ask me why, it just often does. And sure enough, her day cream did make my complexion glow in a not-so-nice way. But her "rich" moisurizer didn't. The only things I didn't like about it were it's strong smell (frankincense perhaps, but I'm not sure) and the fact that it didn't moisturize the eczema-ry bits so well.

Then yesterday I got a couple of other samples from a health shop right next door to the Kumfs shop (where I have my expensive school shoes on layby) - one was xma-ease for the eczema-ry bits, and the other was a Trilogy moisturizer (it's NZ-made and possibly even from Wellington).

These two were a good combination for me - absolutely zero irritation and plenty of moisturisation. Not all day moisturization, but minimal flakiness through the day, and that's pretty good for me.

So I went back to get a tube of xma-ease, and might go back and get the potful of Trilogy too. But first I've got another sample of moisturiser to try, from the lady at Earth 127. When I told her what I thought of her samples, she gave me another one to try and promised to make something up for me if that's no good. Talk about good customer service!

More space AND more cash

Only about three years after we stopped using them (and about a week before we gave them away to the nearest op shop), I sold TLM's old high chair and buggy via Internet auction.

The high chair which was an upmarket Chicco Polly, went for a mere $41 - which is still better than seeing the boy haul it to the Dump Shop i.e. give it away.

The buggy, a MacLaren (not the racing car brand), was subject of a surprising last-minute bidding war. On Saturday the highest bid was a humble $11.50. Twenty four hours later it had climbed to a peak of $148! While that's just a fifth of what we paid for it new, it's still way better than the alternative (yes, the Dump Shop).

So now I have money to put on my shoes lay-by, AND we now have a free corner in the study AND a couple of feet of unclaimed space in the hallway.

The house looks almost big enough to live in now.

Today the world is much noisier...

...because I got my ears syringed this afternoon.

Yucky yucky, you're saying to yourself. Well, yes the stuff that came out of my aural cavities did resemble worm casts (or miniscule poos). Better out than in, I say.

Suddenly I can hear whirrings and rustlings and whisperings and sound of my jeans brushing past each other at the thighs when I walk. TLM, who is normally just loud, is now head-splitting. And when the boy says naughty things whilst walking away (to test my hearing), I can react with mock shock at his dirty mind.

The nurse who performed the syringing - the evacuation, you might say - was lovely and completely un-freaked by the amount of stuff that squirted out. When she'd finished, she announced that she could see right into my ear canal.

"Right through to the other side?" I joked.

The (retirement) Village

Today my brother, my mother and I went to inspect a retirement village that my mother is thinking of wait-listing herself for. It's one of those establishments which has: apartments for people who want to live independently but have access to lots of other old people; assisted living apartments for people who want someone else to worry about the housekeeping, heating and bill-paying; and rest-home apartments for...well, you get the idea.

It was the independent apartments she was after, and the display apartment we looked at was really quite nice - modern, reasonably spacious and low-maintenance. It's appeal to my mother was that it looked just like a "normal" apartment.

Then we went to visit a friend of hers, who has recently moved into one of the assisted-living apartments. It's a studio, so everything's crammed into one cosy room plus bathroom. This friend doesn't have to worry about power bills, vacuuming or cooking - the former two are included in his living package and the latter is sorted by the closeness of several small eateries nearby.

I haven't talked to the sales lady yet, but it appears that either you get the larger apartment and mostly look after yourself, or get loads of help but live in a cupboard.

And I think my mother is going to want the bigger living space AND the lotsa help.

Need shopping advice? Listen to Auntie Violet

If your body shape is an apple (I prefer to call it a wide-waisted hourglass), you can buy skinny jeans to fit your waist (rather than your hips) and the end result is a very nice pair of straight jeans!

It is utterly possible that you can pay $30 for a lovely tween skirt suit from an op-shop and spend another $25 getting it dry-cleaned, only to find that the fabric is the fibre-equivalent of rabid fleas. If the itch weren't enough, you might still find a previously unnoticed tear on the back of the jacket, which is somewhere you'll normally never see a leather patch.

You can spend big bucks on a pair of low-heeled, well cushioned and super-supportive black shoes which a) go nicely with your black tights and skirts, and b) will be perfect for those 50-min walks home from work - and then realise  they look EXACTLY like school shoes.

The big advantage of shopping where the customer service is terrible, is that you won't fee any obligation whatsoever to buy something from there.

black out

I'm currently labouring on a task which is both boring and requiring a high degree of attention - the worst of both worlds, really. So when my computer sputtered and went dark this afternoon, I was only a teensy bit annoyed.  Sometimes enforced breaks are all the breaks you get.

We figured that the power outage must be limited to our block, but the boy rang up and said it was out at home too. Apparently he'd just missed out on getting his vital beer lifeline, as the lights went out just as he pulled up at Pak'n'Save. Apparently alarms were going off, traffic was all over the place and rioting was surely imminent.

I wondered where our civil defense kit was, because it would've been handy to listen out for updates.

But after half an hour my colleague gave me permission to go home (not that he had any power to say yea or nay).

And by the time I was home the power came back.

Exploring her Indian heritage

TLM does not, in fact, have any Indian genes. But from the way she's decorated our clothes-airing frame, well...it reminds me of the inside of my friend Vinod's car.

This is what she likes

This one of the many gaudy trims that TLM loves so much. So I got her to find me a white t-shirt, and I hand sewed the trim onto it. Actually I had to sew it on twice, because when she wore it to daycare the next day kids kept snagging their little fingers in it.

At last, a novel I want to get my hands on

Lionel Shriver's We need to talk about Kevin is one of my favourite novels, and one of the few which I am happy to re-read multiple times. Not because I have a special interest in high school shootings, but because I was fascinated by how she portrayed something that people never admit to - having ambivalent feelings about your own child.

And now she's written about about a guy who decides to put his life dream on hold, for the sake of his cancer-stricken wife, So much for that. Time passes, the man's bank balance dwindles and his wife is still going to die. Like Kevin, it sounds like a really depressing read. But I'm convinced I am going to love it, because I myself am often tortured by the conflict between pleasing oneself and doing the right thing for someone else (it might be a Chinese thing, I dunno).

Though it might be a while before I am willing to shell out up to $30-40 dollars for my own copy. I'm so very used to borrowing from the library (even if it means waiting a few years for it to become available).

Blame it on the doona

I've just finished reading a book about skincare by Hugh Molly & Garry Egger, called Skin Fitness Safe and healthy skin care. I borrowed this from the library because it looked current and sounded sensible and down to earth. But now that I've read it, I get the feeling these guys are veering into crackpot-dom.

Basically, the authors - both Australian doctors - say that many skin problems are caused by overheating and over-cleaning of skin and hair. This appealed to me, because it suggested that I could save money on heating, soap and shampoo and improve my complexion. The before-and-after photos are promising - and all those people had to do was stop using their doona (that's Australian for duvet or comforter) and wash less often.

What's confusing though, is that the authors constantly refer to the Australian climate - which most of us think of as being hot and dry (except for Sydney and Darwin which I know can get hot and humid). What about people in far more temperate New Zealand, especially those of us who are living in uninsulated wooden houses and need to drape ourselves over the column heater night after night in mid-Winter?

There is nothing in the book which allows for non-Australian climates, which is a real shame. They suggest that you go to bed with just one blanket and maybe add a second one for winter. If I had to get through Winter with just two blankets, I'd never sleep (and my feet would freeze off). And nowhere in the book does it say what the ideal temperature is for one's bed.

So, while the ideas are worth thinking about, I won't bother trying to implement them. Unless I move to Australia.

Op-shopping

Lately I have been  buying pre-loved clothes online. I'm so much more likely to buy something online or from a catalogue than in a shop. Mostly it's because I don't get the chance to try it on first, which is the point at which most items are weeded out when I'm in a shop. Plus, I'm motivated by the prospect of getting something cheaply (which is relative in the case of designer clothes). And if I order something from a catalogue and it doesn't fit properly or look any good after all, often I can't be bothered sending it back. In other words, it's probably not very wise.

Most op shops, I can't bring myself to try anything on because the place just smells like old people. You know that smell?

Consignment shops tend not to have that smell, which is good, but then the prices are much higher.

Last weekend there was a big pop-up op shop near my home and I went down to have a look. I had to bypass the beautiful silk shift dress at $20 because it was a little too big and one of the darts was oddly puckered. And I bypassed all the trousers and skirts because they just looked or felt too used. And I bypassed all the sets of beautiful vintage buttons because they were all different sizes.

But I did find a lovely purple-y pink boucle skirt suit, which I bought just because I liked the jacket. It's roomy enough that I can wear a couple of layers under it, but the skirt is too big so I might cut it up and make a matching beret or something out of it. The jacket is very similar to the Chanel-style jacket which I have been trying to make (but haven't got very far on)*.  The only difference is that it does have a collar. Oh, and it is finished. I just have to get it professionally cleaned first because at the moment it does look kinda grubby.

As soon as it's wearable I'll post a photo up.

*This means that I now have even less motivation to make my jacket. This happened last winter too, when I planned to sew my own winter coat and ended up buying one on sale before I had even finished the test garment.