Eeek a Teen!

Well it has taken One nigh on a month to make one's way to Acceptance that Hulk is now a teen firmly entrenched in our household.

Unlike her earlier days as a small child, the house is now replete with grunting communication, a lack of listening, carelessly discarded personal things, and many a strange smell.

Still it is quite an accomplishment for Salsa Girl and I to have survived, not only the party of a dozen teenlings, but also the whole growing up process.

Thankfully, now that we have a small adult, the hard years are now behind us.

Bonus Octogenarian

In more recent weeks we have had a visit to celebrate a more longevitical occasion for Doctor David. He and Grannie A visited for several days of milder celebrations which filled the house with merriment, garrulous communication, loquacious listening, absent-mindedly discarded personal things, and sweet smells of sustenance.

All in all a good month for significant celebratory activities.

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A W in the Second Decade

No this is not about One's very own A W aka Hulk in her second decade - it is instead about entering Decade the Second of one's A to Z of Unread SciFi and Fantasy Authors endeavour, and how One has completed the read of the 'W' tome.

This one had spent many years staring at One from the unread books shelf at home.

The tome in question is The Way of Shadows by Brent Weeks, the first of his Night Angel Trilogy.

I found it an enjoyable enough read and will likely get around to the other two volumes in the coming years. It did dabble in a bit of predictable fantasy fare, however it has been a while since one dabbled so it seemed a fun 3 and a half star read.

For those wondering about the letters missed in One's... interlude,

U was eventually skipped and put in the too hard basket,

V was the Planet of Adventure omnibus by Jack Vance

Next in the AtoZ series will be an X , or more likely, another skip as it does seem likely to be another troublesome letter, but we'll see.

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But the Tales Came Back, the Very Next Year

So, it has been a year to the day of hiatus for The Tales. This has been a long enough span for one to have a garnered a sense of their lack, with the conclusion that one shall once again be regaling you with regular Cautionary Tales.

Now, to catch everyone up, here are the high mid and lowlights of the missing year, in more or less chronological order:

• One's place of prominence in the nuptials of Pirate Dave and LED - particularly in the karaoke vows scene
  
  
• One’s ongoing stressful tussles with printers
  
  
• Farewelling Piggy with BestFriendSincePrep, Uncle Col and various other high school alumni
  
  
• The second annual hosting of Mt Disappointment at StumpyRudolph's since it restarted - it seems this is becoming an annual event much like The Tales
  
  
• One’s becoming a permanent fixture at the new workplace after three and one half years living on the crumbs of rolling contracts
  
  
• Further stressful tussles with printers
  
  
• The addition of Harvey to our family after a years wait on the production of this new hybrid wonder.
  
  
• An annual visit down South to My Guitarist
  
  
• A dodgy knee issue of One’s resolved by this new thing called an exercise regime
  
  
• Catching up with Mr Gates after some 30 odd years
  
  
• The continuing saga of stressful printer tussles
  
  
• The stressful journey to a Magpies premiership
  
  
• A bout of shingles brought on by unknown stress factors
  
  
• Freeloading Mum celebrating her 80th milestone
  
  
• Attending the NYE fireworks (early version) in the city with Hulk and Salsa Girl
  
  
• Yet another holiday week on the Berm
  
  
• A busy work schedule with new libraries, major upgrades, and, of course, printers
  
  
• Handy Dad miraculous coming out of a fall through the patio roof with naught but a few scratches and bruises, and maybe some lessons learned about capabilities of older gentlemen on ladders, and roofs. Maybe.
  
  
• Sportsball season starting again far too soon.
  
  
• New varieties of stressful printer tussles

So there you have it, the foundation for the restart of regular Tales posting. Only time will tell if One will be able to maintain this punishing ambitious annual publication schedule.

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Catching Up

So One is once again faced with having to catch up on happenings by having a catching up post which details all of One's catching up of recent times and should, hopefully, catch us all up on all things catch-upable.

We start our Tale many weekends in the past...

Suits You to Catch Up

First was the occasion of a fancy suit fitting in preparation for the incoming nuptials festival for Pirate Dave. It was an enjoyable endeavour but one does have to bak at describing it as excellent service when such terms as concealment, de-accentuate, hide, and work-around, were used so extensively during One's segment of the fitting.

Catching Up with Dromana Queen

The very next day Salsa Girl and I made a long haul drive to assist Hulk in attending a peer's birthday party. There was food and fun and also our first, and last, beach frolic of the summer, accompanied by the chatter of the teeth of many tweens that refused to exit the water.

Continuing into the next week...

Caught up by printers

One has been relieved to be entering the final stages of one's infinite printer rollout at work. However one did, after a hard days printering, find oneself caught up in a troubleshooting visit to attempt to deal with Freeloading Mum's home printer conundrum. Needless to say, an episode of madness ensued.

And the weekend...

Gardening catch up

One has gotten behind in One's maintenance of the garden and so it was that one caught up on the task by the expediency of having BestFriendSincePrep scour away the existing garden and commence a complete rebuild.

A Birthday board game to catch up on plays

For One's spawning celebrations this year I exercised the well known rule that guests must play whatever game I choose - whether they like it or not! In this case I rolled out Falling Sky a game of Caesar and the Gauls, for the first time since 2019. Pirate Dave won again - even though he had gone home and his tribe ran as a scripted opponent - so I shall be putting it away for another four years.

The gaming to dos...

Catching the Space Bug again...

The Tuesday Knights roleplaying group that meets on Wednesdays, commenced a new game that is a return to one's favourite - Traveller.

Catching a moment...

One, sadly was at a commemorative for a work associate - a fellow IT Man In LibraryLand - who passed far too early. One had bantered IT on many, many occasions over the years with him and sought advice on many a topic when in tricky IT situations. His full life story was quite a humbling experience and one can see that his family and friends will miss him dearly. Vale John.

The weekend again...

Catching the imagination...

One has long imagined reclaiming a part of one's desk from the accoutrements of working from home that have long laid claim to such prized realestate. Thus time was finally found to undertake a desk rearrangement and now the WFH things are the temporary items moved into and out of place as required. And now the gloriously revealed desktop space is finally awash with piles of gaming paraphernalia.

A quick catch of the fleetingly in town...

Circumstances aligned well enough for One to make a catch-up with Lord of the Small Fries. This was also blessed with the attendance of The Administrator, Supervisor Grand Chief K, and The Fox. Much was discussed in a throwback to our great days and it shall have to happen much more frequently.

And back at the old stomping ground...

Catching the changes

One attended an IT in libraries meeting at ones old home in Sandringham. While there One was lucky enough to catch up with Criket Cutter, Sonja Roster Queen,  Country Girl, and The Maple Maverick. One decided to head North and stomp around Brighton some as well, managing to catch Longstride L and The Historical Menace in the building.

So there you have it. Did you catch it all?

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Clown Parking

 So, for the holidays it is the endeavour of Salsa Girl and Oneself to provide experiences for Hulk. In a previous holiday - during the times of no Tales - an expedition was mounted to experience the possibilities of the famous Luna Park.

This previous expedition went reasonably well despite the icy winds of winter, the cranky overwhelmed-ness of Hulk, and the annoyingness of crowds being where we were, and so it came to be that a return expedition was requested for these current holidays.

One was quickly volunteered to be the parent to oversee this event and, having carefully assayed the day of lowest sun occurrence for the week, Hulk and oneself set off for this experience on the morn of yesterday.

The day started out refreshingly pleasant but soon enough the clouds lifted and  the sun was blazing down - making it a not great environment for those such as I who suffer from the torment of the evil burny sun.

Anyway, the various rides and activities went well until Hulk decided that her new favourite ride was the one that required queuing in the sun for twenty minutes between goes. Having done the maths One knows that this resulted in over an hour standing in direct sunlight. Fun indeed.

After a long day and a short(ish) paddle at the nearby beach we made the journey home to have a not too late bedtime for a tired hulk.

One is now enjoying the gift of several days recovering from queue related body disturbance. And, as everyone knows, a case of QRBD is not very pleasant at all.

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Meet the New Boss

Well posts to The Tales have continued to be rather sparse, and that is mostly because of my incredibly demanding new boss.

A sudden and swift change occurred many months ago, saddling One with a new boss.

It commenced with a family Saturday afternoon discussion about fostering felines in which Salsa Girl, Hulk and Oneself cautiously decided to fill in an application form to test if we would be acceptable as a fostering household. A scant 24 hours later Frantic Fostering Organisation* called up saying they had a "perfect" one for us, and that it would be no trouble to have it foisted delivered within the hour.

And thus Madame Beans joined us in her 14th year of bossitude.

Madame with Beans on display.

After a brief orientation we were all soon at her beck and call.

As can be seen above she frequently commandeers One's work from home office heater, denying One any humane working conditions.

She is also known to demand that One's work start early in the morning and continue late into the evening.

Madame Beans also refuses to enter into any meaningful dialogue about these working conditions and has even been known to set up circumstances to try and trip One up in the commission of One's tasks.

There is also engagement in inappropriate physical touchings such as foot rubbing, hand licking, and she particularly likes head bumps.

All in all I'm sure you can see the hardships One has to endure for the provision of only meagre purrs of compensation.

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My Guitarist Joins the Club

Well, it's been a long time between drinks and it's also been a long time between drinks.

Both of these shortfalls shall be rectified by this report on One's recent attendance at My Guitarist's "joining the club" soiree (or, as Hulk predicted it, "Boring, just Adults standing around talking and drinking").

Of course, in true tradition of The Tales, "recent" in this case means nigh on a week.

There are those that may claim it would take one that long to recover from one's imbibing a single high strength honeycomb stout, but they have no proof.

Anyway, after a quickish zoom Southwards (that's zoom in the old-fashioned speed sense) one arrived at said event to have a great catch up and natter with the assorted cast. My Guitarist of course, Redneck Ben, Duff (with The Tumbling Trio in tow) and other assorted uni guitarists and associates. Fridgepower, Judge Mingus, and The Keyboardist showed up shortly after oneself as well for a real getting the band back together feel.

One cannot fault an event with friends, free food and crumbiliscious honeycomb stout, other than for not happening on a weekly schedule.

Whilst literally zooming home one's thoughts - other than those on the miraculous performance of one's sportsball team one was listening to on the radio - were on one's hopes to not have to wait quite so long for the next catch-up with My Guitarist et al.
As it turns out One had forgotten about the curse of halfway parties.

...

A Magic Birthday

 Firstly, let me acknowledge the tsunamilanche of birthday well wishes one received whilst one was engaged in birthday activities elsewhere.  They are by no means required but they do warm the cockles of one's heart - creating a sort of tight hot feeling in the chest.

Anyway, on to the events of the birthday weekend.

Things commenced with Salsa Girl informing one to be decently dressed for Friday dinner - as if the mucking about pants one drapes oneself in for workdays would not pass some sort of muster.

The mystery deepened as, throughout said dinner, Hulk repeatedly just had to check nothing at the front door and assured one that definitely no one from the family was expected.

You can imagine one's surprise when Sneaky Pete appeared at the door to assume Hulk control responsibilities.

Salsa Girl then promptly extracted us from the chatterboxing Hulk and whisked one away to attend none other than a Magic event.

One was sorely disappointed when, rather than playing the card game that is a mainstay of one's gaming life with the likes of Gavman and Elfboy, one was forced to endure a highly entertaining, interesting, and amazing show of prestidigitation. The covid-related bonus was that being singled out to assist because of birthday-ness did not require one to leave ones comfortable seat as everything was done via shouting and extenda-claws.

The next day - the actual date - dawned with  a relaxed morning of mandatory traditional birthday cheescake eating, and one buying one's presents from Hulk the proprietor of the lounge room Present Shop. The remainder of the day passed with one indulging oneself in whatever manner one chose, which this year including doing the weekly grocery shop.

Sunday saw the gathering of the Legion clan and the traditional handing of the insulting birthday card from Freeloading Mum to oneself - although one does wonder why Sneaky Pete who also has a birthday around this time received a card full of glowing and loving sentiment?

In any case a fun-filled legion-time was had before all headed home to sleep the sleep of the afternoon-nap deprived.

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The Holiday is Over

 So, One's holiday break is over and it's time to apply oneself to the task of getting The Tales ticking over again and hopefully reach the heights of last years 13 entries (and then on to top 2008's one hundred entries you prompt? Madness I reply).

Since One's last communique many things have passed:

• One's first XMAS gathering for the new workplace, wherat Sis drafted one for table wrangling duties as apparently "other duties as required" also applies at this workplace.
• A hybrid remote and in-person boardgaming session for the birthday of BestFriendSincePrep
• A zoological XMAS gathering (a gathering at the Zoo as opposed to a Zuulogical gathering which would involve the underling of demon Gozer the Gozerian)
• A traditional Legion XMAS with the wider Legion clan.
• More boardgaming with in-person guests, instigated by Hulk who left the game after turn one to do something else. instead
• One's annual beaching.
• A return to Zoom, I mean work, including zoom-training the whole workplace prior to upgrading.
• Bunnings-ing up some minor repairs on the household.
• Seeking Sanctuary in Healesville where Hulk rushed Salsa Girl and I from exhibit to exhibit in order to get to the nearby playground as soon as possible.
• Upgrading the work system without leaving one's home office
• Marking the return of footy with a visit to The Great Sandro wherein he could not stop remarking, over the top of the footy broadcast, about how "doesn't look right mate" One's lockdown beard was.
• Attending the celebration of the life of Fifi who had finished her 29 year battle recently outlasting the predictions by a measly 26 years. It was this quiet determination that, during one's 6 or so years of sharing an office space, caused one to fix Fifi's problems pronto and also imbibe many a team coffee run, lest one fall afoul of those looks of portent. The celebratory tone was enhanced by also being able to reconnect with the likes of Sonja Roster Queen, Big J, Lord of the Small Fries, Longstride L, Days of our Libraries, and the increasingly incorrectly named Supervisor Grand Chief K
• And finally a relaxed, run of the mill, odds and ends weekend.

So, as you can see, there was not much to write about and no stories lost to the vortex of not being got around to writing them down.

Hopefully some interesting times shall arise this coming year...

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The Big Outside

 So in this past week one has had to return to the big outside for applying one's many-yeared IT expertise in plugging cables in underneath desks.

It involved a joyous commute in which getting a set to oneself was a guaranteed experience, and given one had a whole block of seats to oneself, the joy of spreading out without having to be on bag-moving watch was also indulged.

Scrambling around under desks, groping in cable hutches, and hefting IT equipment from place to place did remind one of the value of ones education and made one further appreciate the extensive use one had been able to make of Sidekick for such tasks over the past semi-decade. It also occasioned one to realise that one's one year redundaversary had passed at the beginning of the month - a short musing on one's being a bit better off was cut short by having to resume jiggling cables through joinery.

One decided to relax from the strains of doing actual work by hosting, along with Salsa Girl and Hulk, a Legion family gathering to mark Freeloading Mum's birthday. One relaxed to the soothing sounds of Hulk and her cousins thrashing out on One's drums and Hulks recorder and accompanying themselves with continuous avant-garde vocal performance. One's eardrums were still relaxed hours after the event had wrapped up.

One is looking forward to recovering from the gathering by crawling under desks in the week ahead.

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Remembrance and Reacquaintance

 As things have headed towards the direction of normal this past month or so, One has become reacquainted with one's old nemesis - The Deadline. The strangeness of one's past year means that The Deadline is not being wielded by Supervisor Grand Chief K but by one's latest supervisor - Sis (is a Tales Name change to Supervisor Sis perchance required?)

In any case The Deadline has kept one busy with work in the form of rapid iterations of system changes to keep up with the current environment, and a multitude of projects lurching back to life as society does much the same.

So, while all this has been taking one's attention there have been a couple of other things for one's attention.

Remembrance came up on the first anniversary of The Tiger's passing. Salsa Girl, Hulk and I took the time to say a few words of what we missed of her and how a year without her in the household had been. We then commenced scattering a pinch of her ashes in all of her favourite places - various nooks about the garden, the couch, the arms of the couch, the kitchen bench, atop One's head, and so on. Those who know her should know that we shall be round to your place to scatter ashes on, and in, your gaming bag, and upon your coat that rested upon that chair and couldn't be retrieved from under her for hours that one time.

Reacquaintance came in the form of a multi-day visit from Grandma J - the first since one's birthday soiree. We reacquainted ourselves with feasting, chatting, and the delightful sound of a joyful child being run through her night-time routine by someone other than ourselves.

Coming soon is a reacquaintance with going in to an actual workplace rather than simply staggering up to one's computer desk in naught but a shirt.
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The Festival of Neety

The eponymous event was, this year, a sprawling pentadiem in honour of the hatching of Salsa Girl. Given the secluded nature of the current times the event was stretched out over the full five days with Hulk and I doing our best to provide enough small joys for Salsa Girl to equal the joy of the usual gifting and out in the world excursioning and feasting.

So as the five day festival finally draws to a close we can take heart that the hidden messages, flowers, clue hunts, feasting, massaging, rummy-playing, and other sundry undertakings, seem to have done the job - although fingers crossed that the lack of the usual important footy game at this time of year has not marred Salsa Girl's experience.

The only thing remaining, as One mashes out this post with claw-like hands mangled from five days of massaging, is to see the long, long recovery period to completion.

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8 years, 10 years, & 8 years

So, for the past few months, One has had most of One's time consumed with work - of the From Home type - intertwined with educatory duties, causing One to, once again, neglect the Tales.
As well there have been several anniversereal events occurring that required One's attention and diligent application in the night before the exam kind of way.

Anniversary the first was the celebration of Hulk having attained 8 years. It was celebrated with a sprawling affair constituting our very own mystery - Harry Potter and the Sinister Simulacrum - replete with clue finds, classes, much table quidditch, and the stunningly original revelation that the new teacher Professor Robot Automa was in fact the Sinister Simulacrum and not Hulk's new automated lizard present that all clues pointed towards. (One has a mind to shop one's virtuoso script around Hollywood).

Preparations for this event included much creation of decorations which number among them these Every Flavour Beans, with attitude:

Beans with attitude...

Other preparations included a month of vigorous beard growing by oneself in order to get that Dumbledore look. It was successful on the axis of white colouring but the length was several feet short. Unfortunately Hulk as demanded that One keep growing said beard until it reaches the requisite length, which has resulted in much amusement in one's many video meetings. 

Anniversary the second was to celebrate the 10 years that Salsa Girl and I have been together. With all potential minders quarantined away from us it was celebrated joyfully as a family with Hulk cramping our style. There was a gastronomical event or two one evening feast and one a banquet that went for most of the weekend. Having not succumbed to any more grump towards one another during seclusion than usual it looks like Salsa Girl and I have another 10 (or more) wonderful years to look forward to.

The Third Anniversary was the anniversary of ones father's days which now number 8.
Astute readers will note that this number coincides with the Hulk number! Living in these apocryphal times has taught me that when numbers align like that it must mean something of great import, and that shadowing figures must be manipulating things behind the scenes!

This celebration was more subdued coming on the heels of the previous one and was interspersed with a video call to Handy Dad and Freeloading Mum, wherein they proceeded to ridicules one's beard with statements to the effect that One now resembled Handy Dad.

So now that these events are all over One should have plenty of time to .... ummm...

Oh no! 

Salsa Girl's birthing anniversary is coming up!!!!!!!

Excuse me, I have to get to it. We'll talk later.

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R we there yet?

So One has completed the read of the 'R' tome of one's A to Z of Unread SciFi and Fantasy Authors endeavour.

This one came straight off the unread books shelf at home and had been impatiently awaiting it's chance as it generally seems to be highly regarded.

The volume in question is The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss.

It is the first "Day" in the Kingkiller Chronicle.

Now, whether it was: an over-anticipation thing; or a lack of long reading spells in these zero commuting days; or the simultaneous reading with Hulk of  "Born-special boy wizard goes to wizard high school" making the large segments of wizard university a bit too samey; this one didn't soar to great heights with me.

It was an enjoyable read, and I found no problems with the flow of prose, so I guess it was the plot which was lacking in the awe-inspiring realm?

Given all that, it was still a solid 3 and a half star read.

Next in the AtoZ series will be an S from one's shelf, so, once again, no recommendations needed.

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Goodbyeing Groovy Spirits

So it's been more than a week since the sad occasion of saying one's goodbyes to Groovy Spirits.

She of the spirits had shown great spirit in her year long fight and it is a bit of a shock to hear that she - who was so full of life and energy at one's combination farewell and Library Xmas party - had not prevailed.

One made the trip south with Hulk for emotional support to partake in the farewell along with her family and other friends/workmates. Upon arrival we joined those numbering beyond the 20 officially allowed inside during these times of plague, and lurked at the outskirts of the foyer. Luckily there was an external speaker system so we were able to hear both the eulogy and the poignant speech made by Big J - both of which touched on the fun and foibles of life and friendship with Groovy Spirits.

Afterwards - well, after some hours worth of Hulk-led traipsing through the grounds - there was attendance at a further gathering at the library to commemorate further. A sadness-tinged catch up with old workmates occurred before we were homeward bound again.

--

Oh Spirits, the distance of first your long leave and then one's disenfranchisement of employment had lead to a distance and lack of news making it easy to assume everything was going okay.

I was already missing our work hours spent talking footy, and our work hours spent talking books, and our work ours spent talking shows - and we never did get to compare opinions on the ending to Game of Thrones - and now I just have the memory of those many, many, many hours.
(Poor Roysgirl had to bear the full load of One's biological need to talk footy for the last season, and has suffered greatly for it as I'm sure you'd understand.)

For those snippets of work we'd fit in between the talking, I missed having your apostrophe hunting skills available for One's project documentation, and I shall kind-of miss those times when we butted heads about things, but most missed will be the exuberant energy that filled the workroom when you were there.

I'm sure I'll slip up and text you during an exciting part of a footy game in the coming years and then wait in vain for one of your "sorry I was too drunk to watch the last quarter" replies.

Vale Ursula.

Far too soon does not describe things nearly well enough.
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Every Boy's Dream

During One's recent-ish ceremonial undertaking, one had the opportunity to live out the dream every boy has cherished since time immemorial.

One lived it out thusly...

It also included a mini-me by Hulk

In the process of living the dream one discovered that the world is composed of two types of people. Those who call one attired in such a display of costumery Napoleon; and those who are now dead to me forever - sea captain indeed!

Winning at this part of the proceedings was Illuminated G, when he proclaimed that the only reason to gather so many people together was to have enough people to perform a re-enactment of the Battle of Waterloo. Oh the sadness that evoked as it made one aware of lost opportunities ... oh wait, perhaps Illuminated G was only winning at tormenting me?

In any case, One is now satisfied to have lived every boy's dream.
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Fluffy. 13 Sep 2002 to 7 Nov 2019

So this has been a harder post for one to write than most of the pontifications one one has espoused over the years.

More than a week has passed since the sad day of the passing of one's feline companion - The Tiger. - whom one began taking temporary care of for Svetlana for just a few months back in 2005 and when the plan for shipping overseas fell through, well that was okay.

She of the fluffy physique had surpassed 17 years (nigh 85 in human servant years) and appeared to be going strong - albeit a little older and creakier with less leaping, more snoozing, and a splash of missed litter tray action - when all of a sudden one afternoon she took a turn for extreme lethargy with occasional whinging and not much interest in food.

One sat up with her overnight and she had started drinking a bit of water so in one's naive hope it seemed like it might have been a temporary illness thing - especially when she moved in for one of her infamous lap sits complete with evil eye of "don't you dare try to get up".

Lap sit complete with evil eye.

However in the morning she became more and more listless and at the end One was patting her and talking to her for what turned out to be the final 5 minutes until, after some toe scrunching responses to One's attentions,  she had a big stretch and released her last breath.

It hit One harder than One would have thought but I guess a 15 year companion does get intertwined in your heart - mayhap there was a dash of Stockholm Syndrome involved - and I seemed to have an immediate allergic reaction to her passing complete with watering eyes and constricted throat.


Salsa Girl, Hulk and I said our goodbyes over the course of the morning and are now trying to get used to the empty Fluffy space in our house and our routines.

• No longer is the morning trip down the stairs greeted by a raised head and mew of inquiry.
• No longer will one be trapped under a sleeping feline and forced to watch hours of b-grade scifi and fantasy.
• No longer shall one be woken in the night by mysterious banshee screeching.
• No longer will small children fear to enter our home.
• No longer will some of those children that do enter go missing.
• No longer will she participate in gaming nights 

Gaming nights are great for finding warm places to sleep.

• No longer will she wind and weft around the legs of anyone in the kitchen.
• No longer will the house thrum to the thudding scampers up and down the hallway.
• No longer will she be found sleeping in strange places - on top of posts, in egg carton lids, in her freshly changed litter, on any single sheet of paper left out, Salsa Girl's ankles, atop a lego construction,over the corner of the coffee table...
• No longer will our residence be rife with the fear of leaving a water glass unattended.
• No longer will one have to wait for her inspections to complete before continuing with any task that involves moving furniture or opening cupboards.
• No longer will anyone lying down on the couch be greeted with the "here's a bum" manoeuvre.
• No longer will the Vet quake in fear and lay in extra stocks of band aids before her visits.
• No longer will such deep purring be emitted from simple patting and stroking. 
• No longer will those little paws reach out in delight or those eyes go squinty with the pleasure of a chin scratch.

In her younger days - sleeping in a fruit basket.

Farewell Fluffy, you kept me sane when I was a single man living on my own, and then seemed to set out to balance the ledger once you became surrounded by family.

You shall be missed and have left your mark upon me. Several of them in fact.
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Hulk's Super Day

Last weekend past saw a great gregarious gathering of heroes and baddies to celebrate the occasion of Hulk's becoming 7.

Hulk was, of course, BatGirl for the day, and was joined by a plethora of other heroes and baddies -Catwoman, Wonder Woman, Thor, several Ninjas and the infamous villain The Dad Joker, were all present.

There was much crazy rushing around and a formal super powers testing session that didn't stay formal for very long once one introduced the Dodge The Squishy Balls test.

I believe everyone failed the Cake Resistance test and tucked in joyfully to this years magnificent Salsa Girl creation.

All in all a great day was had by all - except maybe for The Dad Joker who never could get anyone to tell him if they were hungry...
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Packin’ Up The House

So, one has been a tad busy this past week or so packing up one’s old stomping ground in preparation for a Grand upgrading of facilities. 

Along with the likes of Mr Prada, Days of our Libraries, Country Girl, The Maple Maverick, and Sidekick, One has been dismantling technical equipment, moving furniture and uncovering dust bunnies not seen since the Jurassic (and the other half of that delicious biscuit one lost down the side of one’s old desk back in the Spring of ‘08). 

It has been quite an exercise in lifting, carrying, and cord untangling and it has proven tiring for one to direct all that frenzied activity. 

Going Solo

Of course previous weeks have also been busy as One was left to one’s own devices several weekends ago and forced to go solo with Salsa Girl and Hulk off to the sunnier Northern climes of Bendigo. 

... With Solo

The first solo occasion was marked by spending the evening with Sneaky Pete and BrotherStealer watching one’s copy of Solo which refuses to play on one’s blue ray. 

It was an enjoyable evening of of visual and gastronomic feasting. 

... with The Great Sandro

One’s next solitary activity was an expedition to that horrible stadium that is far from Marvel-lous to watch the Pies not play at all. 

Joining one in solitude were The Great Sandro and Sneaky Pete. The less said about the experience the better. 

After all that Solo activity the following weeks became a blur of work and school holidays - I am fairly sure that I attended the correct one. 

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Traditional Easter

So, this Easter break was another traditional Easter with all the traditional Easter holiday activities and holiday day names.

Starting with the traditional Evening-Before-Good-Friday footy watching, wherein it was good to see the pies back on track.

Continuing with the traditional Saturday-After-Good-Friday-and-Before-Easter-Sunday gaming day of Magic playing with Sneaky Pete, Gavman, ElfBoy, and Commander Fry, all partaking in some traditional Magic card playing (absent were BestFriendSincePrep and MatrixMan, both partaking in non-traditional going away for Easter).

Next was the traditional Easter-Sunday-Two-Days-After-Good-Friday-and-One-Day-Before-The-Monday-After-Easter-Sunday early wakeup and hunt for fluffy little chickens and eggs with Salsa Girl and Hulk. One will be discovering the things in odd places for weeks to come.

And finally today on the Monday-After-Easter-Sunday holiday it is time for the traditional what do we do with an extra day of holidays day. Incorporating all of the traditional too much chocolate events.
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