Saturday, March 19, 2011

That was the week that was...

This week started with rain - it is hardly surprising, really, as we have had 4 days of sunshine this year (okay, maybe I exaggerate - but no more than 5 since school went back in January).

It is a fitting background for the week.

This week was one of those weeks where you learn lessons.

I am still unsure as to the lesson I am meant to take away.

Help me...



This week started with rain - rain, and a windfall on Lotto. Not quite a "$20 million dollars" with appropriate echo noises and ridiculous people screaming, but enough of a windfall for us all to form dreams.

Well, actually, very much not even a windfall for full blown dreams that begin with "when we win lotto", and not even as much of a windfall as my boss one-upped me with when I mentioned the figure we were excited about, but hey - it beats the "woo hoo, we won $10" I yell when I forget to put lotto in.



Anyhoo, our bathroom requires some serious immediate attention. I don't know whether it is weather or not, but the tiles are leaving the walls at an alarmingly increasing rate; some water-based activity partaken within leaves puddle clues below - although not regular enough to go "way-hey, there is the problem" with any laserlike intensity; and a slow-drip (which has been rewashered on more than one occasion to the tunes of what sound like sea-shanties - at least in language levels) in the vanity has at last shown its true potential, and we have a cavity beneath our vanity that you could lose a small child in (if we were to ever let a small child wander in - we don't).

Our minds lit up with our windfall potential marrying with the bathroom concepts, and while the windfall = a very small percentage of what a proper bathroom renovation might entail, we began to actually forsee an improper bathroom renovation - or at least, the bones of one.

We have a list, we have a plan in our mind's eye, we have a purpose - and we have a seedling to grow into crossing "bathroom renovation" right off the list.



In the same breath (if the mind were to breathe - what time device should be used for the brain?), our minds also began to see other things that our windfall could achieve.

My sewing machine died last year. The bed is on its last legs. 'Salina is growing too fast. Paris is growing too fast. My workplace deserves to see me in a more varied wardrobe. With better shoes. V's vehicle's driver's door needs repairing. We need a holiday. Haircuts. Heck, we could even think about take-away...

It almost got too much to contemplate. Suddenly we were spending money in our minds far quicker than we could ever win it!!



Luckily at this point, fate stepped in with one spectacularly crappy Friday.

Paris was in a "I need to cling to the nearest parent and whimper" mood that can only accompany teething. Luckily for her (and me), I don't work on Friday mornings so we got to bond.

With such a sad situation, we didn't get to go and do our fortnightly Friday socialising with the local ABA - and nor did we get to do the alter-fortnightly Friday grocery shop en famille.

Instead, V was sent out into the pouring rain to gather the vittles.

Paris eventually succumbed to slumber (and good drugs) and I hooked into the mountain of paperwork that I imagine I can do on a Friday morning, and had 25 minutes of such entertainment when V arrived home with the goods, and the school called.

It seemed 'Salina had apparently fainted in the playground at morning tea, and now had a headache and they were sending her home if we could please come and collect. The phone call woke Paris.

So - clingy baby, sick older sister, soaking and half a kitchen of groceries, I kissed V goodbye so I could get to work.

Truthfully, I was not altogether unhappy to go to work. See above. That, and I had a few major tasks to accomplish while at work, so if I got in a half hour early, I would have plenty to fill the time. All I needed to do was grab lunch on the way there...



Now, last time I got (well, admitted to) junk food for lunch, I ended up an hour in the drive-through due to a stalled engine. Therefore, this time around I went to a competitor.

Since that last fateful time, the engine has stalled on one other occasion (amidst a lot of traffic at a busy intersection) but it has also been serviced.

Apparently not well enough, because this time the car stalled again in the drive-through. I have learned since the last two times, however, and managed to hold my mouth right to restart and get out of there (before requiring an RACQ man to come and have the engine start with no problem).

That is okay, I thought to myself, I can drop the car to the mechanic and still get to work in time. Therefore, I decided to eat the junkfood on the way there rather than do so in the lunchroom.

Mistake number 2.

Just before I got to the mechanics, I noticed the junkfood had left a long slick of red and yellow sauces on my white blouse.

Plan C was to duck into a shopping centre, get a new shirt, take the car to the mechanic and get to work. I could still do it in the timeframe.

That is without factoring in the next stall. Or the next one...

Eventually I did follow through with Plan C - although the timeframe was blown out of the water.



So, when we tell our grandchildren about the time we won lotto, we shall look fondly at one another and reminisce about all of the things we COULD have done - instead of what a good portion of it ended up covering, and my goodness, I have hidden the rest away in a very dark corner to hopefully procreate and seed the dream of the renovation.

Sometime.

On a positive note, Friday was the sixth (or was it seventh) dry day this year.

yay.

Today is Saturday. It rained again.

5 comments:

BB said...

Oh sweetie... clearly this is Fate telling you no more fast junk food. SLOW junk food must be where its at. See: nothing too sinister there.

And rain? Pfftt. We too are praying against the next downpour so we can pay the bills. The world is completely upside down!
:-)
(((hugs)))
BB

Debby said...

Gees. That is an ambiguous message for sure.Not sure what it's telling you. But you won the lotto, and that's pretty cool.

Cara used to faint a lot. There never seemed to be an reason for it, not physical anyway, although it did seem to be related to her cycle, or to being too warm. It was scary.

(Please do not tell Cara that I spoke about her cycle on the world wide web...she will never forgive me...)

Leenie said...

Oh Jeanie! So many complications. One good news and five bad ones doesn't balance well. Hope Salina is better and the car is better and that the cash stash will have babies like rabbits in that very dark corner.

Sorry all our melted snow is running down the globe and pelting you with rain. Soon it will be flooding here as the mountains warm up. It's always something.

Crazed Nitwit said...

Hard lessons learned on this side of the globe as well. We've had one more day of no rain than you. Enough already.

Hang in there! That dark cloud has to drift away soon!

Pencil Writer said...

EeeeeK! The portends for lottery winning seem less than ideal when followed by so many negatives. I pray, too, that the remains of the winnings multiply, if only in cash and NOT so many misadventures.

Hope Salina's much better and Paris' teething doesn't last too long.

Blessings to all when and where needed.