A ploy..

I moved out of my apartment on the weekend and my property agent rang me today to tell me I was being charged the following: $200 to paint the wall because of marks left on it, $100 cleaning fees for the kitchen and potentially $700 for the carpets that apparently need replacing. Sorry? $1000?!?! Naturally, I was slightly surprised. And because of the hassle of moving – packing, removalists, unpacking – I almost said those famous words: Fine, whatever, take it out of the bond.

Luckily, my colleague was there to rescue me. “No!” he cried indignantly, “everyone knows property agents do this. Argue the point. Go and see the place. Make her show you what needs doing.”

So I did. And long story short, I wiped some marks off one of the walls, thereby saving myself $200. I ran a cloth long the tops of the cupboard doors in the kitchen, thereby saving myself $100. And I argued the point about the carpets (wear and tear, not very nice carpets anyway), thereby saving myself $700.. a nice round saving of $1000!

Thanks must go to my colleague and a lesson in this for all of us – they get you when you are worn down and over the whole moving thang - argue the point and save yourself some money!

That’s what friends are for

I’m going to a friend’s birthday celebration in the near future and I asked the birthday girl if she would mind if another friend of mine could tag along. The birthday girl asked, “is that your cute, blonde friend that I’ve met?” and I told her it was. To which my friend replied, “tell her she can come as long as she’s in a tracksuit with no make-up.” My friend then reminded me that I had better not think about looking too good either (she doesn’t realise that I have no intention of looking good - I haven’t showered in weeks, the hair on my legs, eyebrows and underarms are forest-like and my wardrobe consists of two sacks I wear on alternate days!). The birthday girl has a point though, and we all know it: If you want to look cute, hang out with less-attractive types. If you want to look thin, hang out with larger people. If you want to look smart, hang out with idiots. And if you want to look like you can drive, move to Melbourne. Ha, ha, ha..

Thinking of you..

I was on the phone with a friend last night and I must have moved quickly or something, because suddenly she asked, “are you in the bath?” I responded in the affirmative, to which she said, “please tell me you have lots of bubbles covering you.” Actually, it was towards the end of the bath and not only was the water tepid, but all the bubbles that were present when I had first got in were now long, long, long gone. “No,” I replied, “I’m completely naked and the water is getting cold.” I had been on the phone for a while in that bath…

This took my back to a time, in a previous existence, when I used to bathe most evenings, and used to make a lot of phonecalls while bathing most evenings. Often people were surprised that  I was calling in the bath, but eventually, the friends and family I called most often got used it. And even, I think, maybe liked it. Ha, ha.

A couple of times I have received a phone call from the loved one, and noticed the “hollowness” on his call.. When I have questioned it, I’ve been told that he is “indisposed”. “You’re calling me when you’re on the toilet?” I would yell. “But I’m thinking of you,” he would respond.

So, you know who you are, when I was cold and naked last night, I was thinking of you.

Simple really

Just finished an MSN conversation with the loved one during which, of course, there was a lot of shortened sentences, which today resulted in a lot of misunderstanding, which resulted in a mini-argument, which resulted in a lot of “what do you mean: …?”s, which resulted in more shortened sentences to sort out the confusion caused by previous shortened sentences, which resulted in “bwahahaha”s, “LOL”s, “d’oh!”s, s, s, and the like. All this in the discussion of whether or not we would be seeing each other tonight.

I’m normally not one to write too much on email, or MSN for that matter, or even really SMS… But the loved one is. And he gets “excited” when I remember previously uttered texted/emailed/MSN’ed statements. What he doesn’t seem to get, is that my memory is actually pretty bad. I just keep everything. Every text, message and email. And my subsequent advice to anyone and everyone is this: if you don’t want it thrown back in your face, don’t communicate it via a recordable medium…

Facebook

After getting my millionth or so invitation to join Facebook, I finally succumbed to peer pressure and joined on Saturday night. The deciding factors were 1)- I had read a great article about a mother who had signed up to spite/spy on her daughter (http://www.smh.com.au/news/web/omg-mums-joined-facebook/2007/06/12/1181414467494.html) and 2)- a request from a friend that I have a lot of trouble saying no to (luckily she is like the angel on my right shoulder, unlike my other friends, who are devils vying for space on my left shoulder!). So I joined. And less than 36 hours later, I have friends I didn’t even know I had.. and more coming out of the woodwork all the time. Which is great. I guess. The thing that intrigues me a little is that some of the people I’m now communicating with on facebook are friends that I already email, msn and call (the old fashioned way – as in, not skype, although I do that as well). And when I ask them if they want to catch up for coffee, lunch or dinner, they are  usually busy. And now I know why. Because they are infront of their computers staying in touch! (Or writing their blogs.. )

Cleaning the turtle?!?

Just a quick one today.. I was msn’ing a friend last night and conversation eventually moved to my turtle. My friend related a tale about how she was in pre-school and there was a pet turtle in her class (not actually in her class, but you know what I mean). Some bright spark decided to clean the moss and other ’gunk’ that inevitably accumulates on the turtle’s shell… After a few weeks, and much to the horror of the 20 four-year-olds who rushed to see the turtle every day, the turtle passed on to the great big turtle-pond in the sky, which is when it was agreed that cleaning it’s shell must have either removed all the necessary-to-live bacteria, or at least have given it a very nasty shock.. Anyway. The point of my story was that my friend told me NOT to clean my turtle’s shell. Which, as it stands, is good advice. But then I thought about it. It’s even better advice when you think that my friend actually thinks that I might ever be bothered to clean my turtle’s shell. Honey, you know who you are, thanks for thinking that it might actually happen. But I just want to say this. I hardly ever even feed my turtle, so the chance of it being cleaned is nil at best. But big love to you for thinking that I am way less lazy that I actually am!

Working from bed

I’m working from home today after a late night (I was working til 2, and yes, I promise, I really, really was – no school night drinking for me anymore… much). Because I had to be online until so late, I decided it was too cold sitting in my loungeroom, so took my laptop, internet modem and power board/cords/etc upstairs to bed with me. Sad, I know. But it’s actually quite a nice feeling chatting to someone who so obviously hates their job (which I would like to think is at a grey, boring desk in a grey, boring tech support call centre) while you’re getting toastier and toastier thanks to the almighty electric blanket.

And this morning, it was a late start.. so late infact, I considered not getting out of bed at all. So I didn’t. But that’s not to say I didn’t work. In fact, I rolled over, switched on my laptop and got online.. again, while getting toastier and toastier with my almighty electric blanket. I made a few calls, responded to some emails… all from the comfort of my own bed. From now on you can forget about WFH.. it’s all about WFB.

The office/bar fridge

Everytime I open the fridge at my work to get out some milk for the delightful instant coffee I insist on drinking (because I’m too lazy and too tight to go downstairs for the (mediocre) lattes), I get an eyeful of the bottles of beer, wine, and alcopops sitting at the bottom of it, calling my name. They’re the obvious remnants of an on-site event, probably leftover from Christmas fesitivities, 6 months ago, or something similar, and now, they just sit there. Abandoned. Unwanted. Forgotten amongst the leftover sandwiches, past-due-date yogurts, and half-drunk bottles of coke.

And what happens to all that alcohol now? I’m starting to think it might be my responsibility to “dispose” of it, or more realistically, that I should make it my responsibility. If I don’t drink all those bottles of alcohol, they might be thrown out and no-one likes waste. Especially not when we are in a drought. The bottles, and alcohol in them, continue to stare at me, day in, day out, almost begging me to take them with me when I return to my desk for some secret-squirrel-skulling. And some days, believe me, I wouldn’t mind doing just that. Sometimes even first thing in the morning…

An indecent proposal

Yesterday the guy who sits next to me at work tells me that he’s going to ask his girlfriend for her hand in marriage. I gushed appropriately and of course, asked for details. He proceeds to explain to me how he’s going to train his Staffordshire Bull Terrier pup to carry the ring in it’s mouth to her as she walks through the door of their home after work. Alarm bells were ringing loudly in my little brain!! All I could think was that they would spend a couple of days either with the vet who would have to open the dog up to remove the ring after it was swallowed, or worse, following the dogs every move to capture the ring as it made it’s way out of the other end of it’s body…

So, having convinced him that the dog’s involvement should be kept to a minimum, I hear him on the phone, obviously talking to his dearly beloved.. and this is what he said: “Someone is going to come to the house and when they do,  just give them what they ask for!” Delicately, I ask if he means the drugs stash he has hidden under the couch, or perhaps a ring for say… sizing… for his big SURPRISE proposal. He tells me he doesn’t know any other way of getting the correct size? Um… maybe sneaking a ring she doesn’t frequently wear out of her jewellery box and “borrowing” it for a couple of days? Or even tracing a ring onto a piece paper – it’s amazing what jewellers can do these days? Or maybe buying the ring and getting it fitted post-(surprise-)proposal, as millions of men have done a million times before? But then, I realised - if the dog does swallow it and then they have to get it resized, it could be months before her engagement ring gets to see the light of day..

You learn something new every day

The thing that I have learnt today (and, admittedly, it is one of the most valuable lessons that I have learnt in a little while), is that when you zip up your fly, on certain zips you can press the zip in and it should stop the zip from undoing.. almost like a locking system. Unfortunately, I only discovered this AFTER I presented to a room full of people who I thought were finding me and my presentation riveting, but in actual fact were probably trying to work out if I was wearing nude coloured underwear or not. Hmmm..

Spiderturtle

So I have a pet turtle and he/she is great company – low-maintenance, not demanding at all, I just wished my loved one could take a leaf out of it’s book… So, I built a little turtle run along the side of my house and I was pretty proud of my efforts until about the third thwarted bid for freedom. I could not work out how the damn thing was escaping – there was fencing all around, including on the ground in case it wanted to make like a rabbit and dig… I was absolutely stumped! So I undertook some reconnaissance (watching him through my loungeroom window – he thought he was undetected – ha, ha!) and discovered this:

It  was going OVER the two-foot high fence – who knew turtles could climb?!?!?

My first ever blog entry..

So, I’ve finally joined the world of the blogger.. I thought the toughest part would be thinking of something to write, but I think the real blogging challenge is getting an ID to blog against. All the good names were taken, including “nogoodblognamesleft”, and it seemed like all the hugely original ideas I had were already being used.. so, you know how it goes, a name.. a name.. the pressure.. of a name..

I can only ever aspire to have my blog as appreciated as much as something like perezhilton.com - the site gets 5 million hits a day, apparently – and yes, I’m one of them.. every day. Hell, I don’t even think my friends and family will waste time reading this one. But I can certainly waste some precious work hours writing it, amending my page, changing my font, etc, etc, so here we go.. To the first of many, many entries…