We made it!

 Hello November!

And yes, my sister and I finally got to spend time together away from the requirements of immediate family and work pressures. Fair enough, it was to deal with extended family requirements and pressures to help get an aunt's estate in order but hey, beggars/ choosers, right?

Image: the road travelled 

We didn't get our road trip together but we did get a few trips in the company of each other (with the navigator's voice to accompany us as we found our way around the labrinth that is the Gold Coast.

We got to share breakfast.

We went through CABINETS of collectibles and MOUNDS of photos and decided that the time to declutter our own lives was NOW!

Image: Summer Serenade in Pastel Colours (Lladro)

We had a meal with our cousin and her new beau and I had one cocktail.

Unfortunately that and the day had combined into a migraine - it was a weird one without pain but very much other physical symptoms, so my second day helping with the house was somewhat curtailed.  My sister had to head North to a wake for a former boss and I got an early check in at my accommodation and slept for a few hours. 

After that I did visit with said aunt and I took her a few photos from our sorting. It is incredibly sad that decisions made 30 years ago still affect her views and she has effectively shut out a lot of people who would have helped her in this chapter of her life.

I then went to dinner with friends at, on the web page, was a nice restaurant.  What was not on the web page was that it was also a nightclub offering Halloween joy to many young folk!

After breakfast with girlfriends on Sunday morning, I traipsed around trying to find birthday presents for 'Salina (failed), had a final visit with my aunt and drove and drove and drove back home.

Besides the month thing

Image: the morning routine involves the larger female human opening the blinds in the Sun Room and the felines pose. Miss G has the best view of the sunrise across the front yard, although it was rather overcast this morning. Miss L is stretched upon the arm of the couch, showing us the whole nervous collapse thing she occasionally alludes to is a very, very clever disguise.

We just got to the other end of another Monday.

• Drive 
• Work
• Drive 
• Good food
• Northern Exposure 
• Drive 
• Gym
• Drive 
• Daughter 
• Get drove (druv?)
• Kitty litter 
• Shower
• Blog
• Bed

Image: a collage of faces from the spring of 2021 collection 

I have proof it's a month that I have survived some Mondays before.

Many, in fact. Not as many whiney ones.

The very first October blog post that I did, however - 20 years ago, had a bit of a whine - Can you hear that - oh, and wishy-washy gave me a serialised whinge. I had forgotten.

Image: meme - text over orange pumpkins "I don't know who needs to hear this, but Mercury is in retrograde today, Monday is a full moon, and next Saturday is Halloween.  Buckle up Buttercup, we're about to find out if it's perimenopause or the planets" shared as a reel by things_tiffany_loves (via a friend of mine)

Oh so fitting for October.

Mock-tober

 If I were in any way superstitious, I would be quaking, I know, but I feel like October has a sense of humour about things.

I think that October is a ginger cat

Rolling us in his playful paws.

Yes, occasionally the claws come out 

And blood is drawn 

But it's mostly fun (hey October?)

Image: Eddie, our old ginger puss, in front of Paris's long toes - from some month way back when.

I wonder if it has not been helped by my listening of choice most of the month, the third series of The French Revolution through The Rest is History podcast. (Perhaps they had the right idea, getting rid of October altogether!)

Today I did leave the compound. I even left town.

I started a new audiobook, Edenglassie by Melissa Lukashenko. Radio National, as the name implies a station covering the whole of Australia owned by the Australian people and this year they did a Top 100 Australian books.

Image: proof

I will have to dig out my votes. A few got in - many didn't but that's okay. I remain hopeful others will discover my favourites but my taste is sometimes not the popular.

That being said, Cloudstreet by Tim Winton is a pretty good book.

So really, other readers were the ones voting and there may be many that I have missed.

My driving today took me through half of it. It's going well.

October colour is often something talked about in the northern hemisphere, with fall leaves. But this is when many flowers bloom here.

Image: Lilac and Magenta blossom surrounded by a sea of petals in a park.

The purple of the Jacaranda always signal exam time in Queensland.

There was also an amazing sight of these white crocusy things popping up in yards the whole way through this little town I go through. I must get my aunt to identify next week.

Image: said quaint little town 

I got to the resort that Mum and Dad have moved to by mid-morning.

High points of the visit were -

• Having lunch with Dad and "the boys" - half a dozen octogenarians - and discussing food aversions.
• Bridie, whose next birthday will be three figures, regaled me with her tale of coming to the area seventy-five years ago after growing up and marrying in Clare in Ireland.  She and her husband previously owned the property Mum and Dad have had and lived in for twenty years.
• Seeing my uncle and aunt 
• Seeing my sister and sister-in-law 
• Making Mum smile (it was oh so brief and fleeting but it happened)

Image: Mum and her sister many, many years ago 

Then I hopped in the car and came back to my own little home in anticipation of a whole day at home and not at work.

Image: meme - all text (all caps) "when you ask me what I'm doing today and I say "nothing " it doesn't mean I'm free, it means I'm doing nothing. So don't get any idea"

I know, still in October though. We will manage.

Called it too early.

 It seems that I just come in here to whinge, this October.

It's not that there hasn't been shimmers of good amongst the October offerings, but the flinging of merde truly needs to stop of October is to be taken seriously any more.

Image: completely unrelated picture of the beautiful Miss L, our grey tabby cat.

See, we had planned a road trip. Well, we had tried to plan a road trip, my sister and I.

We had time to organise and we indeed spent time in the lead up to talk about organising.

Time was of the essence, but the good news was that we had some and there were things happening up until only a few weeks before so it was fine, we had time.

Image: the beetroot harvest not from October, however the resultant pickle was enjoyed in October so counts!

Until all the things happening happened and then lots of unplanned things kept happening and wouldn't you know it, the week before the road trip arrived and we weren't THAT planned so we decided to get down to the serious business of planning and organised ourselves and itinerary and accommodation and had even got to the heady heights of thinking about logistics.

And then it was the week of and little things kept happening and logistical conundrums kept arising but we were organised and willing to pivot and...

Image: screenshot of a very moist weather map

And then the weather gods entered stage left LAUGHING and dumping great bucketfuls of water between our launch point and the destination but did that deter us?

Not a whit. We possibly wavered but the day before had arrived and my sister was in town and we saw the news of floodwaters but we know our State and storm season and it really is a roll of the dice.

So the gods turned their attention to Paradise #2's roof and just kept it drenched all night.

We met this morning with fading hope and watched the forecast.

"Showers easing" said the weathermen "with possible increases in storm activity" (for an each way bet) and then told us that, quite frankly, Sunday was going to be the main fly in the ointment with "possible hail".

Thank you October. No refund for accommodation.

We will try again as the need to do a job at the end for my Aunt's POA still exists. But we are looking askance at what is left of October.

Image: a meme - text above says "Apparently being a forklift operator at a boatyard is as fun as fairy floss" (I know it doesn't but I try not to swear on here -originally in the fear but nowadays in the hope that Mum might read this). Picture beneath text forklift skewering running people with the caption "NO PEDESTRIANS"

Dirt on the liver

I have been having one of those Octobers. I don't want to say too much, given there is still 10 days to go.

But man, some days I get so over it.

So I shall distract myself.

One of my distractions - myself, my father and my sister - apparently we have changed our heritage over the last few years.

I wonder how long it will take Ancestry to get to primordial soup?

At least my focus is not now snagging on this as I drive around. 

And my old flatmate who cam to visit a fortnight ago didn't spend all of her time in hospital.

The new house does not yet have a proliferation of hippies. I have two bedraggled pots amongst the collection - and only one photo. 

I was proving to V that the dill was no longer a commodity that we could rely on.

(Not really a picture of Paradise #2)

So how is your October going?