Out with the old

**pulls out a fresh box of tissues**

I haven't been to bed yet, but it is already New Year's Eve out there. And in here. I've been sitting in the arbor with the garden lights going, post beer, post Pams, pondering what this day really means.

It's the final day in a sequence of days (hours minutes seconds nanoseconds) created by man (He who had the audacity to measure the year at 365.25 days and really fuck the calendar up) to measure the passing of His time - it's only people need that sort of accuracy, Nature takes care of her own.

This day should have been my parents' 53rd wedding anniversary, but Mum didn't make it that far.

It could be the anniversary of the birth of lots of noteworthy people or the death of others largely unfamiliar.

It could be the day that I empty the bin of the unnecessary baggage this last year has brought and do an Eminem and clean out my closets. Sitting out there at 2 in the morning listening to plums hitting the ground and the nets, I thought about why the tree has such a huge crop this year that branches are breaking off in the wind and rain under the weight whilst large amounts of new growth sprout all around the base. I think the tree approves of its new treatment. Last year it was buried behind corrugated iron and tilt doors until we moved it all. And I say we, giving Ian all credit for what he did around the garden. But not for what I did afterwards.

I painted the landscape and I made the place happy and kept myself sane at the same time growing things and deriving satisfaction from harvesting my labours - strawberries, rhubarb, cabbage, peas, lettuce, radishes, gherkin, plums, spring onions and chives so far, tomatoes corn, cucumbers, sunflowers, shallots, more peas, more cabbages, more rhubarb to come soon.

And so, sitting in the dark inside that landscape, and the simplicity of the bounty it's given back and I thought about all those New years Resolutions I won't be making because it's bullshit and all the hype of a new year beginning that I won't be heavily indulging in and that my focus should be on letting go of those things which serve no purpose but to hurt me, so that I might find a little peace and freedom to savour what tiny victories I achieved during a year of loss and adjustment.

I am becoming resigned to the possibility that the numbness in my hands and feet might not go away, even that it could get worse. That my legs might just continue to weaken. And that clonazepam might end up a daily feature again - and thus risk the addiction again. I've hit a brick wall in fighting the MonSter so I think I need a new strategy. I think I should start by taking care of me. Because no one else will.

But first I think I have to find "me" again.

In my quest for painfreedom I might check the bottom of the glass bottles tonight at our favourite family watering hole at the FlatCat's in Thames. It's been a year of pain and misery, of losing what matters, fear and tears. But today, that year ends. Tomorrow's pain might be more hang over related... Flattie's 2 x Canterbury Cream for $20 purchase might ensure that...

May this new calendar year bring you the very best it can. Without the hangover.

Percentages

**pulls out a fresh tissue**

Are you one of the 98 or one of the 2?

I'm a 2.

Figures.

Dusted

**pulls out a fresh tissue, dabs up the crumbs**

Well, another christmas has been bought and wrapped and unwrapped and cooked and served and eaten, the remains of trifle and salads and ham hoarded carefully to be eked out as long as possible.

There's a bit of aromatic indigestion doing the rounds, too, and it's not just the dog. She just seems to get all the blame because she ate all the leftovers.

Our day was good, we broke bread in the evening with friends and family, having been blessed with lots of yummy treats and thoughtful gifts during the day, not enhanced by a bit of a meltdown on my part after mowing the lawn in the sun at midday. After some temper tantrums and a sleep, I was merely snarky and irritable and all the lovely pressies couldn't hide the fact that the one thing I wanted for Christmas is the one thing I'll never get.

I bet I'm not the only one felt like that, eh... I wish we could email Santa and find them in our stocking on Christmas morning.

Knock out

**pulls out a fresh bottle**

Great Christmas. Lovely.

This is what happens when one has a beer (or two) too many.

One ends up a bit mothered from watching it.

I hope you got mothered, too.

Here's Johnny

**Remembers Kirsty**

Merry Christmas - It was a toss up between The Pogues with Kirsty, or Lennon.

They both won.





Amen.

One sleep

**makes another milo**

One more sleep - The Night Before Xmas.

Two sleeps

**thinks about cookies and milk**

Just a couple more - Achmed



*grabs box of tissues, mops up**

Don't forget to check out Santa's mail box.

Three sleeps

**...**

Three sleeps - hysterical stuff with KBW (not for sensitive souls)

Four sleeps

**pulls out a fresh tissue**

Four sleeps - Historical stuff



Well it was either that or this.



I'd go postal before the first night was over if I lived next door to that shit...

Five sleeps

**snorts all over the tissues**

I'm going to count down to Christmas in Video.

Five Sleeps - the True Blue Collar boy himself, Larry the Cable Guy.

Give it a whirl

**pulls out a fresh tissue**

The Old Boy has been making a little patio thingy and wanted pavers from around here - specifically the ones that match both our/my patios. I had a pile stacked ready to take away, which he didn't think would be enough, although I thought there were. When he was almost finished, he ran out of cobbles and needed 3 more. I knew where 2 were but the third eluded us, despite looking around in all the likely places. That is until I walked past one sitting in broad daylight right beside the front path as he was leaving. He had just enough.

It was the same for the brick path in Little Arbor and pavers for the Squat in the corner.

Enough.

Remember this post a few months ago?

I've gone right off everything really, or had done until we got $86 in Lotto and I spent it on buying paint to get on with upstairs cos that's what I asked the Universe for the other say and now it's provided it, I better follow through if I want more stuff to appear like that, eh! Next week is Round Two in Vic's Nan's garden, destroying 50 years of jungle to salvage plants before they all get sprayed. Instant garden, my idea of "ooooooooooh baby!".

I have lots more stuff I want to "appear" - a nice BBQ is next

We've been eating off the bbq for the past two weeks. It showed up a couple of days after I posted a message to FreeCycle. I still have paint left over to continue with in the autumn and all Nan's plants survived the transplanting and are thriving.

I wish the big asks were so easily accomplished... Gods, how I wish.

Watching/listening to: Split Enz, giving it a whirl.



Those were the days...

Get funky

**pulls strings**

A little wake up funkiness from the fabulous Carlos. Because I can.



PS sux to be you, Mark cos I forgot to come and fix that ActiveX problem on ya computer, eh... and you can't see YouTube vids, eh... oh well, that another 5 minutes of time you won't waste on here then, eh ;-)

You could always bring the box around at christmas and I could spend like 3 minutes or something fixing it, call it ya chrissy pressie and then you could pat me on the head and say "good girl".

Unless I'm pissed.

I don't drink and screw. Especially with computers.

Fuckers.

Wonderful

If you watched that clip and listened to the words, you might be having a hyperglycemic episode from the sweet, schmaltzy sentiments or you might be a little more philosophical about them and be on the same page as me right now.

But probably not. However, I will get you up to speed, never fear.

As you know, I've been reading The Power of Now and come to a few conclusions, despite not having read it all (or probably intending to, it's a bit OTT, ya know?).

The main feature is that Tolle has a couple of basic Truths contained within the heavy padding of some rather intense spirito-babble (yeah, I made that up, deal with it *snort*) possibly induced by better drugs than I have. These are basics that most people probably miss a lot in the stresses and commitments of ordinary daily life, especially me. I think Tolle is correct, there really is only Now - we can't change what's gone and we can't predict what's coming, all we can have any input to is now. And that Now is very important.

I can think of at least 3 regular readers of this blog who have probably learnt to appreciate the importance of Now, even if they do tend to forget it sometimes. Mark, you are obviously meant to be here and if your heart won't quit and dangling your arse in the breeze to string those bloody lights didn't kill you, I guess the Guys Upstairs just haven't figured out what to do with you yet.

Peter? Correct me if I'm wrong but I suspect you are similarly placed - I think they might have all but thrown you back as well?

And Jamie... there is a tiny glimpse of a silver lining within the big, black cloud hanging over you both. It's called Now and Now is all we have.

I know I should be making much better use of it...

This Philosophical Epiphany was brought to you by the letters BB, the number 8 and the colour green. I like green.

PS I've forgotten what the other point is that I wanted to expound on. It's your lucky night after all, innit. As for Rob Thomas.. hmmmmmmmmmm yummy.

Painted on

**pulls out a fresh tissue wallpaper**

I might never change my desktop again



and then again...


PS - there's no Dylan there.


PPS - I hate teaching brats people to parallel park.

Pound

**fuck the tissues**

I am sure that you can think of at least 10 very good reasons why one should not smack oneself on the hand with a hammer.

I needed only one; BECAUSE IT FUCKING HURTS.

So does hitting one's shins on a hard, plastic box corner, standing on sharp objects in bare feet, pruning Alberic, wearing long gumboots in the sun whilst tending the fire in the pit and dropping the pitchfork on one's unshod foot.

It's been a busy few days.

Perigee

**issues a fresh tissue**

It used to be once. Then it was twice. Now it's three times a night.

That's how many times I am getting up at night lately and I hate it.

I've tried going to bed early; I've tried going to bed late. I've done the pills. I've tried it pissed, with wheat sacks and without and I still can't capture that illusive thing of Legend - sleep untroubled by pain or spasticity, jerks (Sperm Donor got dumped by the Buffet Bird btw) or writhing snakes (oh yeah, we are anticipating Simon to ring and stalk H once more when she turns 18 in a couple of weeks like he did on her 16th birthday, he reckoned he could wait until she was an adult and was no longer "under my thumb" enough to stop him).

Never mind, at least lately there has been a glorious moon cascading across my bed to not sleep in.



Magic, eh.

**pulls out a fresh tissue**

Stuck

**pulls out a fresh tissue, dunno why**

The big kids had their bbq party tonight. It was entertaining.

I spent the day putting up the christmas lights in the arbors, shopping for pretty things like cable ties and bungy cords and playing taxi all over the place. H had invited the Sperm Donor and SD (who admits he forgot it was on until she rang him this afternoon) brought his latest piece with him, enough alcohol to sustain them (including a bottle of wine with one glassful left in it, which she promptly dispatched) but no food. Well not so much the latest, it's the same piece he had his paws all over in the restaurant way back in July, after splitting with his other piece, that he got back with not long afterwards, who he isn't with now and is back with the Buffet Bird again.

Confused? Not as confused as BB, all liquored up as she was. They sat at the picnic table and he stroked her arse (I kid you not, Ads was gob-smacked, so blatant was he in front of all the kids), touched her every 3.27 seconds (average, the kids compared notes afterwards) and played a little game of "I'm the Man, I can still pull a bird, see, even if my 2 previous wives kicked me to the kerb) and at one point wandered inside (he wasn't completely sober when they arrived, either) and said he hoped I didn't mind him bringing her, but she was already at his house *rolls eyes*, so I said "I don't care, but stop stroking her arse, ok? it's not on".

Ads snorted and left the kitchen for a minute.

When I finally sat down to eat, I sat next to her but they were so engrossed in talking animatedly about who owned what furniture and appliances in his flat and how could his roomie not own hardly anything and that everything in her house was hers and he said it didn't matter where he lived as long as he could get to work and somewhere rural was ok... on and on and on in what sounded like a prep list for them moving in together... I thought "cool, I don't have to make conversation, I can talk to all the kids instead!".

So I did and it was much more fun chatting with teens than him, anyway. It always is.

Then Sequel and I went upstairs to finish sealing the new seams on the repaired top balcony with No More Nails and the flooring stuff that's up there and she said she knew BB from work and she is an alcoholic. The kids had already figured that out.

It was not long after that that I stepped in the patch of NMN and glued my toes together...

Great Southern Land

**pulls out a fresh tissue, wipes streaming eyes**

Rules for visiting the South Island are as follows:

1. Pull your pants up. You look like an idiot.
2. Turn your cap right, your head ain't crooked.
3. Let's get this straight: it's called a 'gravel road.' I drive a Ute because I want to. No matter how slow you drive, you're gonna get dust on your Lexus. Drive it or get out of the way.
4. They are sheep. That's why they smell like sheep. They represent wool & food to us. Get over it. Don't like it? SH1 goes north, find it and F**k off
5. So you have a $60,000 car. We're impressed. We have $350,000 tractors that are driven only 3 weeks a year.
6. Every person in the South waves. It's called being friendly. Try to understand the concept.
7. Yeah. We eat trout, salmon, deer and duck. You really want sushi and caviar? It's available at the corner bait shop.
8. The 'Opener' refers to the first day of duck season. It's a religious holiday, we will observe it!
9. We open doors for women. That's applied to all women, regardless of age.
10. No, there's no 'vegetarian special' on the menu. Order steak, or you can order the Chef's Salad and pick off the 2 pounds of ham and turkey.
11. When we set a table, there are three main dishes: meats, vegetables and breads. We use three spices: salt, pepper, and Watties Tomato sauce!
Oh, yeah We don't care what you folks in Ponsonby call that stuff you eat. IT AIN'T REAL CHILLI!!
12. You bring 'Coke' into my house, it better be brown, wet and served over ice. You bring 'Mary Jane' into my house, she better be cute, know how to shoot, drive a truck, and have long hair.
13. High School Rugby is as important here as the All Blacks, the Highlanders and the Crusaders and a heap more fun to watch.
14. Yeah, we have golf courses. But don't hit the water hazards, it spooks the fish.
15. Turn down that blasted car stereo! That thumpity-thump cr@p ain't music, anyway. We don't want to hear it anymore than we want to see your boxers! Refer back to #1!

What a winner

**giggles and pulls out a fresh tissue; wipes**



If "Phinny" is that lucky, how come they are flogging themselves milking the masses in two hour chunks using statistical data freely available to the public?

Methinks someone is telling porkies...!

I figure that someone desperate enough to leave that on my windscreen at the Warehouse tonight needs all the free advertising they can get.

No-one said it had to be positive

Cleaning up

**pulls out a nostalgic tissue**



I was going to say something but that's stripped my mind of coherent thought. And added a few years to my personal chronologometer.

Reap

**rummages under pressies and pulls out a fresh tissue**

I'm being spoilt. I have pressies. From lots of people. Birthdays are cool (and so is 45)!

*Eyes up bottle of bubbly* Just because it's only 9.12 am here, it's still night time somewhere else, eh!

Later:

Birthdays are bad. Really really bad. Just shocking.

People give you wine and chocolate.

Ads cooked a yummy dinner and I opened the bottle of wine Glorius gave me and had one, then took the bottle down there and had a couple more, staggered came home and fell asleep like some wino. Jesus, knocked on my ass before dark. Now I'm awake I might just have a bit of that choc Shazz gave me ;-)

Here's something to go with choc



The incomparable Victoria Wood.