Social

 I am generally a pretty private person. On a scale I would see myself as a maybe six in sociability. I do get energized with a certain amount of people but too many - like a party - or too chaotic - like a party - has me seeking quiet corners or escape.

It's where and why I used to write so much before kids.

One or two people that I click with - perfect. A half dozen friends of friends - small doses.

Fifty family. An hour or two, but looking for a quiet role by the second.

Holding court - if I have a role or am performing no problem at all. But never when ill-prepared or put on the spot.

Family members one on one - eminently doable. I love most of my big wide family one-on-one. It's when you throw more people into mix. Same with friends.

Alone. Bliss. As long as there is a book or a pen and paper I am made. Kitchen. Ingredients. Yes please.

I have written a true account of people that I know for a funeral on Friday. It will be given then.

What about you? What people mix works best for you?

Instead of

 Setting up the kitchen on this so very rare events when day off and being at home coincide.

But instead I am hiding in the "Throne Room" away from Kryon, out robot vacuum.

Anyone else occasionally think that the Jetsons have finally arrived?

G and I hung outside for a bit, smelling everything that the garden had to offer until it got really spooky when the hedge rustled and I thought that this was not an experiment I was yet ready to continue.

I think that she is secretly happy to be back inside. She has successfully hunted several flies and her only predator is Keyton.

These are two very special reasons that I am away from home quite a bit these days.

Very much the egg salad of sandwich generation.

Thursday one week later

It was going to be Wednesday, but Wednesday got away from me.

Let's see, I 

Image: best breakfast ever - toast with Dad's marmalade; toast with Vegemite, avocado, cracked pepper and lemon juice; and Ruby Grapefruit juice and soda water.

• I did a bit of adulting on the weekend. I hired a car (courtesy of fuel supply instability, economy and prudence) when this last weekend was planned.

• I learned how to swap my brain around to European mode for lights and indicators vs windscreen wipers.

Image - electronic flyer for Staerstone by H. k. Stubbs 

• I went to an art show. (Lost and Found by a friend. I will get her link - it closed last night)
• I visited my aunt.
• I saw a friend from pre-'Salina days who is launching a book.

Image - buckwheat wraps for Saturday's breakfast at a creekside cafe

• I saw friends from University days and ate very, very well indeed.
• We discussed many things and watched Northern Exposure and I am so very grateful that I have been blessed with such friends 

Image: pineapples book ending massive grapefruit in a wooden tray 

• I took a tour of my aunt's future home 

Image - oven-roasted Barramundi with broccoli, onion, zucchini, sweet potato, and tomato. The lemon wedges were from my tree.

• I got lost coming out of a freeway-side service centre with an open fast food option and spent half an hour of dark roads turning back on themselves time and again - the Traveston Triangle

Image - greens including basil, rocket and spinach freshly harvested and dressed with scrambled eggs, grilled haloumi and stall-bought chutney.

• PSA don't drive a tiny NSW hire car in the dark on the M1 (or Bruce Highway) after peak hour on a weeknight when the truckies consider it theirs.

• I eventually relearned how to swap my brain back right to local  mode for windscreen wipers vs lights and indicators.
• I saw my brother and my Dad.

• I was reader at an event at the beautiful little bookshop that also hosts the poetry and my book-club.

• And I signed up for the gym with Paris. It's May Day tomorrow.

What did I miss?

Keeping your head down

 There are times in lives when you must live by the rule of keeping your head down and your nose clean.

Some people have long stints of it. Imagine living in a war zone! For some it's a way of life. There are those who fake the confidence and keep plates spinning . And then those who have a spike in merde attached to shorter periods.

Like for about 18 hours of my day today.

I heard the dishwasher in the wee hours singing a happy tune.

I heard V get up before me. He had a torrid few hours the night before for this reason and that.

I heard the cat.

Image: meme of Condescending Mediaeval Owls

These were not intrusive sounds. I did not know they were the sinister harbingers of a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day.

I do exaggerate.

But when I went in to my usually empty pre-dawn kitchen my husband greeted me with "happy birthday" and "where do we keep the tea now".

This in itself was in no way terrible. And yet this scene could really be used to juxtapose against the future horrors.

My sister messaged. Again, in no way an issue. We generally get a lot of chitter and reel swapping and Scotland plans together.

My computer, where tasks of bureaucracy before breakfast awaited. Thursday stuff.

Or rather, a plastic box or electrical components designed to frustrate me awaited like a baited trap.

So my next two hours was battling that dragon. 

Very, VERY first world.

Then breakfast. Good. 

Then teenager.

Hmph.

There is a good dose of me in Paris. And there is a decent dose of V.

There are occasions when that combo is awesome.

And there are times when she can bring out the suboptimal teenager's mother and there are times when the suboptimal teenager's mother gets to look in the mirror.

So on the upside I didn't have to do the school run this morning. And I had an additional phone, so winning.

I did get sung to on the way to work by 'Salina. That was a bright spot.

The podcast that I am listening to on my commute stopped playing mid-sentence about a block before i got there.

The acoustics of my desk must have blocked the greeting from Keith over the divide, or perhaps the deathly silence from my workmates at the Far North of my work corridor froze the soundwaves.

It seemed like the rings of business damnation were used to heat my workload today. Email duels were enacted in my inbox. Confounding formulas required rejigs and macro dances recalibrating, whilst meetings about data pulling bled into lunch breaks and the sheer stupidity of a few added a sheen of incredulity to the whole eight hours.

Dad called for my birthday on the way home. Even when 'Salina had called him this morning to wish him a happy anniversary of being a father it took some consulting of the calendar and deduction (with a final push from my sister) before he twigged.

It's been a few years since Mum was the instigator of birthday call and song.

I did buy myself some wine and it was a label that I recognised from my range of cheap but drinkable Pinot Gris, but it was not from my old local bottle oh.

I had not made my birthday cake this year and had booked for us to go to a decent Asian restaurant.

But do you know what? I did not feel like hopping in the car to go out and nor did anyone else so 'Salina agreed to collect the order and come to ours.

Image: wait time for take away

The final twist in the tale was the restaurant gave our takeout to the lady with the little boy and brown hair who said "yes, I am Jeanie here for my order" just minutes before.

However, blessings be, the restaurant remade the order completely and it was fabulous and the store bought cake divine and presents on point and I even won the last 2 games of Uno.

One week

Image: lemon tree, very pretty, and the lemon flower so sweet

When life gives you lemons, these are the lemons you want to get.

Image: black cat on the farthest point from civilisation she could find.

G is starting to have it on a string around here. She has been reacquainted with some furniture and while we are still to some degree camping, there are bits that are starting to feel like home.

Image: meme of a post by iwansk_the_urban_hillbilly

Human: That's my coat that I need to hang up.

Cat: This is a bed.

Human: That's a laptop computer.

Cat: This is a bed.

Human: That's a box of important documents.

Cat: This is a bed.

Human: Here. I bought you a cat bed.

Cat: I don't even know what that is.

I have heard rumours that the above is untrue, but I have never independently witnessed proof.