Get a job. My rant of the day.

OK so I'm gonna get on my soapbox here for a bit. I don't usually drag out the old soapbox...well OK that's such a whopping lie I'm surprised my nose isn't growing, but I may perplex a few of you here cause it isn't about VPL or the topknot or fashion crimes requiring bleaching eyeballs...for once.

In this instance I read the news, which you know, is always a bad idea. And I read an article which has me majorly pissed and of course, feeling compelled to write about it.

So there you go you poor suckers, you get to be the recipients of today's rant.

So for you overseas readers, in Australia we have something called the Single Parenting Payment, which is pretty much significantly more than the unemployment payment. Like $110 per fortnight. Essentially it's a welfare payment to allow you to stay home or work part time while your raise your child.

Anyhoo, the government has...shock! horror!...decided that when your child turns 8, you will now be put over to the unemployment payment, thereby 'encouraging' those who have children of school age to, you know, get a job.

Sounds reasonable right?

Well to a large amount of non-working single mothers, apparently not. In fact, they're so irate that they're marching on Parliament House tomorrow to voice their opinions.

This may be an unpopular view, and I might be going against all my fellow single mother sisters but I just can't see how or why someone should feel like they're entitled to be a stay-at-home parent on the government's dime when their kid isn't even at home for the majority of the day.

Please don't get me wrong, this isn't a rant against stay-at-home mums (in fact I envy you having the choice to do it) but seriously, if you're on your own and unable to afford to stay at home, then you should work. End of story. If you're partnered and you make a choice to stay home because you're lucky enough that your partner can support all of you, then have at it. I'm jealous.

Personally I've been a single mother for the most part of E's life, who is now 12 years old, so I think I'm pretty qualified to have an opinion on this.

I also worked every day of my adult life up until just a few days before E was born, and quite frankly enjoyed getting a salary. The parenting payment, whilst pretty generous by government standards, simply wasn't going to work for me and I wanted to make a better life for my son than it would provide.

So I went back to work when E was quite small, like about 5 months old. Part time mind you, but still, I was out there working instead of letting the government provide. I then continued to work part time until E was in pre-school, at which time I returned to full time work and haven't looked back since.

Some have argued that I'm wrong and let daycare raise my child, and God knows I have carried a lot of guilt about not spending as much time with my child as I would have liked. However, as my stepmother pointed out (who as someone who worked three jobs as a single parent to fund her child's private education, also knows damn well of what she speaks), instead my son has gotten a role model who is teaching him a strong work ethic that will carry with him for life...monkey see, monkey do.

And what was the other choice...to stay at home, accept government benefits and have just enough to put food on the table? To me, there was no choice.

I came from an environment where my mum was expected to stay home and give up work after marriage, but just wasn't cut from the cloth that allowed her brain to do it. So I had the role models of two working parents and spent a fair amount of my time with babysitters, after school care, summer camps and the like. I certainly don't feel hard done by at all, in fact I revelled in the independence, and as the days go by and I see that my 12 year old is strong, independent, street smart and admiring of his mum for working hard to provide him with a good life, then the guilt lessens just a tiny bit.

Anyhoo, I'm getting a bit off topic. According to this article, apparently this decision of the government is going to cause 'massive social issues'. I mean what?

Excuse my ignorance but wouldn't the 'massive social issue' be the fact that all these mums are NOT working, thereby letting their skills date and becoming unemployable??? I mean, one day the kids are going to be 18 and the government won't give you a free ride any longer and then what? Not exactly demonstrating the winning formula to the kids, now are you?

Not to mention the self esteem issue. I get a lot of my self worth from my job, not to mention interaction with other human beings that you just don't get from hanging about the house and watching daytime TV. I feel useful, and like I'm contributing to society, rather than being a drain on it.

So my advice to these fellow single mums who plan to march tomorrow (and seeing as it's school holidays I'm wondering where the hell the kids are and whose looking after them seeing as being with them is such an important role???)...find a better use for your time and life and open up seek.com.au and GET A JOB.

Or get a degree. Get some skills. Get some self respect.

I guarantee one day your kids will thank you for it.

*stepping down from soapbox. Rant over.

Bec xx

Not growing up or getting old with the 50s Housewife...old school style!

Awesome weekend!

It was a heat wave up our way, with temps hitting about 39 degrees at one yucky, sticky point, with no relief to be found anywhere.

So what's a girl to do when her child is away visiting the grand-parentals than hit the shops for her first look at the post Christmas sales?

Well I have to say the sales totally bite the big one. I don't think anything I saw around the traps was any less than it is every second week during a 10-20% off sale. Boo!

A few notable exceptions though:

Colette, oh how I love thee. You're the sushi of handbags - cute, lots of variety, delicious, stylish and affordable...even more so when you mark selected stock down by 50%. I'm loving my fire engine red little bag and enormous electric blue tote that I scored for a grand total of $52. Yes indeed.

Myer - I generally have an issue with your pricing however when I spy a gorgeous fire engine red dress (a wrap dress, but of course) marked down from $140 to the princely sum of $35, how can I resist? Never mind the 5 other wrap dresses in my cupboard...I will make room. I will make room. Amen.

Total score!

OK so that takes me to about 10am Saturday morning and even in the air con I'm starting to sweat and my hair is not even feeling like hair anymore...

So backstory on the hair: in Brisbane I had the most gorgeous hair place which sadly for me came with the price tag to match. Achieving this lovely head of mine definitely comes at a cost. However I had promised myself many moons ago when I was working part-time and broke, that when I went back to work full-time that my gift to myself would be a regular 8 weekly appointment with my gorgeous salon.

Oh how I looked forward to that day, and it was a treat that I never denied myself for 6 plus years.

Then...

About a year or so ago prices just skyrocketed to the point that I could barely afford to live and feed my child, let alone part with $285 hard earned dollars to (ahem) 'enhance' my natural look.

So I had to make the tough decisions: the expensive hair had to go.

(yes I cried).

Since then I have to say I've been bodgy self dyeing (with better results than others) when I can't stand it anymore and getting a haircut at the cheapest place I could find whenever my hair looked so bad I couldn't bear to look in the mirror. As an aside, sometimes you REALLY get what you, ahem, pay for (or not pay for, more to the point). It's a bit depressing when you walk OUT of the salon feeling worse than you went in. I'm just sayin'.

So anyhoo, back on point: lately my hair has just been so vile, it's stringy and sticky and feels dirty even when it's not. The bottom inch or so felt like straw. My gorgeous fringe non-existent. To combat, I became the proud owner of about a gazillion pretty headbands to a) get the strings off my face and b) to try to deflect from the sad state of my locks.

So Saturday morning I was feeling hot and bothered and having a particularly bad hair day. I went to the bathroom, caught an unfortunate glimpse of myself in the mirror and decided this had to stop.

In I walked to Oscar Oscar and said that I was having a hair emergency. Fortunately for me, someone had just cancelled like that minute...it was kismet.

One keratin treatment and quite possibly the best haircut I've had in forever later by a beautiful girl called Jess (who is about to shave her head for Shave for a Cure and will likely look knockout, hair or no), I now have not only a new hairdresser but a brand new girl crush as well. Bring on my next appointment, complete with fixing the 11 different colours I've had through my hair in the past year or so...

I love you Jess.

Even the sweltering heat and the disheartening prospect of trying on a zillion dresses which didn't fit right could take the 'swish' out of my gorgeous hair for the rest of the day.

OK so moving onto Sunday...

I was 'persuaded' to drive to Brisbane, lured by promises of icy cold DC (diet coke for the uninitiated) together with DC cupcakes by Miss Housewife herself (aka Cathy, aka Betty Detox) for a total girly gossip session blog business meeting. Yes, we have big plans for this blog in 2013, so God help you all.

So I hit the road, air con on blast to negate the effects of the heat streaming through the windows, music blaring (see Daggy Roadtrip songs, oh yeah).

DC and guacamole...all the essentials

Pulling up at the housewife's lovely abode, it's totally stinking. I mean, OMG, if Toowoomba was a hot box, Brisbane was an effing sauna. Gah. I was dying of heat exhaustion wandering up the garden path. Ugh.

So meanwhile the housewife hadn't yet baked and not wanting to sit in the sweltering kitchen for even a second, I suggested she put off the DC cupcakes for another time (your son's Australia Day party - I'm holding you to it).

So icy cold DC in hand, we then proceeded to lay on her bed with our heads practically in the fan gossiping and Facebook stalking I mean talking serious blog business. Just like old times.

By the way, check the housewife's Christmas present score - a Laura Ashley apron, just for those special 50s housewife Friday sessions. It works perfectly with her patented black and leopard print fashion style. Unfortunately the cooking sherry wasn't included, but I'm sure she will improvise nicely.

Many hours later (which seemed like 5 minutes) I departed back for home, sides hurting from laughing and not even remotely gossiped-out.

And yes, we talked about the blog. I mean, as in, as I was leaving, 'oh shit, we were gonna talk about the blog'.

Oops.

One of the most exciting things was planning Cathy's 40th birthday party in March, where she'll be recreating the nightclubs of our teenagerhood complete with a dodgy cellar venue and goth decorations. I mean 'classy goth'. There's a difference.

Bring it on babe, I can't wait.

The title of our blog was something I came up with in desperation back in the beginning when I had to call it SOMETHING and didn't really know what. Funnily enough it's become more fitting and more apparent every day that it suits us and our blog down to the ground. It never becomes more clear than when we're together, giggling like the immature little mini me's we were back in the day, and even reflected in our home decorating styles. Cathy pairs (and very successfully) beautiful candle and flower decorations, and skulls. Lots and lots of skulls. Me, I have a penchant for pretty old style china teacups and saucers interspersed with Monster High dolls.

As you do.

It really does seem that we'll never grow up. Or get old. And that's quite all right by me.

So to leave you with yesterday's daggy roadtrip tune that just barely escaped my previous list, simply for the attribute that it didn't quite make the 'daggy' cut. In fact, Wendy James was and is one extremely cool chick. Who seriously doesn't care.

Hope you had an awesome weekend! Stay tuned for some exciting 2013 plans for our blog...once we finally stop gossiping and discuss them.

Bec xx

I'm a natural blonde. Please speak slowly. #dumbblonde101.

So today, for about the third or fourth time in six months, I locked myself out of one of our office computer programs because I repeatedly entered the wrong password.

If you type the wrong password three times, you're locked out for 24 hours or else you can contact our Finance Department to unlock you immediately.

If you're REALLY special, you can then sometimes lock yourself out promptly within minutes of being unlocked. Well I'm sorry, three times and you're out? That's simply not enough goes. On a particularly blonde day I would say I need at least 5.

Now I'm becoming (in)famous within my organisation for forgetting my password and I have just been advised that our Finance Department actively look forward to it because I apparently keep them entertained with my email communications, ie:

First email upon being locked out:

Hi lovely ladies

Is this something you can do to unlock me? Apologies, it’s a blonde day…

‘sorry your account has been temporarily locked as you’re an idiot’…

And today's effort:

I have stupidly managed to lock myself out again due to repeated incorrect password entries.

Is it possible to unlock it so I can code our expenses?

(there has to be one in every organisation and it appears I get the title).

and...

Thank you - perhaps I should change my password to dumbblonde01, then I may not forgetJ

So clearly today I'm on fine form. I'm a bit 'special'.

At least I can go home knowing that I've made several ladies' days, having had them in stitches, albeit at my expense...

Happy Friday all.

Hope you're enjoying your #dumbblonde101ness as much as I am today.

Cheers

Bec xx

Lessons I have learned from The Jersey Shore.

So the 'shore' is officially done and whilst some would argue that it has definitely lowered the bar in reality TV, no-one who watched can deny that they learned a thing or two along the way.

Love them or hate them, or more to the point, love them AND hate them, for five or so years this group got paid to party in a sick house on the coastline and entertain us.

And in typical car-crash viewing, this they did.

A la Honey Boo Boo, sometimes this show required it's own dictionary, and occasionally could've done with it's own subtitles (especially when meatball Deena got on the sauce. Which was always).

Thankfully someone did - what would we have ever done without the official Jersey Shore Dictionary, folks?

And then along the way, one went to rehab, most went to the slammer, and God help us all, Snooki became a mum. Oh. Dear. God.

So here's the lessons I have learned from this 'cultural phenomenon' (yes, the host of the 'Last Round' actually said that without laughing. I didn't cope as well):

• I didn't even know what a guido or guidette was before the show. Now I am enlightened, fascinated and horrified, all in equal parts. Apparently a guido is someone who spends more time on his hair than I do, with the result looking like some bad Aussie soap from the 1980s. And from the amount of cologne and perfume being sloshed about, clearly you can smell a guido at 100 paces.
• I also learned a new term for an unattractive female - the grenade. Apparently there's a 'war out there'. Lovely.
• Guidos and guidettes also tend to dance like they're having some sort of episode, which is apparently very cool. Personally I was tempted to call the medics on more than one occasion and will probably have a car crash if I ever drive along the Jersey turnpike.
• If I took a shot every time Mike referred to himself in the third person and/or simultaneously showed his 'situation' then I'd have been in rehab alongside him.
• Whilst it's perfectly OK to wear a top as a dress with nothing underneath whilst dancing the Jersey turnpike and also fine to pee in public whenever necessary, splitting your pants when wearing underwear is embarrassing.
• The cameramen must have had the most entertaining job in the world, considering how much the show needed to be censored. 
• Snooki is only entertaining when she's smashed. Being pregnant apparently makes you 'disabled'.
• Apparently acting like a total tool for 5 years makes you rich. Guidos with money, a lethal combination.
• I would NEVER be paid enough to be the poor cleaners who had to sort out the aftermath.

So there you go. See, you can learn something from everything, even the Jersey crew. Who knew?

Bec xx

Farewell holidays and nanna naps. How I will miss you.

My holidays are officially over!

Yesterday was my final proper 'holiday' day, seeing as I don't work weekends. And back to the grindstone on Monday....(cue mournful music here).

No more sleep ins. No more nanna naps. No more staying up far too late for no reason whatsoever and then repeating steps 1 and 2 all over again.

The past two weeks have flown by and suddenly it's nearly over and I'm scratching my head wondering where the time went. There were so many things I wanted to do this past fortnight and I've barely ticked off any...

Luckily some of the things I did manage to check off the list were catching up with people dear to me, including my sister and her family in Brisbane and also checking in on Willow and her adorable kids the other day for a good and well overdue gossip.

Priorities, right? I'd rather pop off this mortal coil leaving the housework undone than miss seeing those I love.

Speaking of the bloody housework...I finally emptied the mailbox after about a week or so and found another notice for a rental inspection...OMG that's like 4 inspections in 7 months! I definitely have the most overzealous agents in the biz...having said that, if I'm every a property owner I'll definitely be looking them up as they clearly don't let anything get past them.

So on that note, E and I had to kick up the planned cleaning spree into high gear. Luckily he's old enough to help out with most stuff...although I must say his usual vacuuming methods do leave something to be desired...after a 'proper' vacuum by yours truly today it was pretty clear that near enough is good enough for this kid. Half assed all the way.

Aww, he takes after his mommy, I'm so proud. Genetics are a wonderful thing.

I've also 'attempted' to tidy up my garden which includes finally mastering the whipper snipper in properly edging the lawn and making a half assed effort to cut back the copious hedges around my property. Without a ladder and a chainsaw I'm pretty limited in what I can do, I must say. See dad, I really DID need that electric hedge trimmer.

Hedges = 1. Me = 0.

I can't trim my own hedges. Go figure.

God I'm boring, I'm almost looking forward to going back to work.

I can't believe I just said that.

What a crappy way to end a wonderful holiday huh? Although as I sit here able to see the floor in my bedroom for the first time in some time (don't ask) and have actually folded, clean clothes in cupboards rather than heaped in piles in the laundry. What a novelty! (as an aside to show you how bad it's gotten, I had all E's clothes folded and put away yesterday and last night he complained that he couldn't find any pyjamas in the laundry as he's so used to going and sorting through the piles haha).

So clearly I need to stop living like a teenager because I have a near teenager who's becoming just like me...terrifying thought.

I guess this is not the most opportune time to say that now the Christmas decorations have been packed away, my mantelpiece now displays a rather fetching tableau of Monster High dolls? Oh well.

On the mouse front...we've not caught any but the house has been suspiciously mouse activity free ever since the traps went out. No scratchings, no sightings, no nothing. Perhaps I've attracted a more intelligent form of mouse who decided to pack up their bat and ball and get the hell out now that they've outstayed their welcome? Time will tell.

Mouse = 1. Me = 0.

I will not surrender!

On a sad, sad note, I just read that Charlaine Harris is writing the final True Blood novel, like ever. No more Eric (Sookie I can do without). She could've warned me to take some valium before reading this news. Tragedy.

So hope you've all been having a lovely weekend or holiday, if you've been lucky enough to have one! I have one more day to whip this place into shape and then attempt to get myself out of bed before 8am on Monday. God help us all.

Bec xx

It's a jungle out there.

So it's been stated that I've either been on holidays for too long or simply not long enough. Reading between the lines, I think my 'friends' may or may not be telling me to get a life. My plans for my break were to finally organise my house properly and unpack my final few boxes...well it's only been 7 months, after all! 

Instead I've been actively avoiding anything to do with housework thinking I've got plenty of time to get it all done. Now suddenly tomorrow is my last 'official' holiday day, as I'm back to the grindstone come Monday morning and all I've managed to achieve is your basic general wipeovers and managing to take the Christmas tree down. Oh and keeping up regularly with all manner of celeb gossip (please don't get me started on the Kim/Kanje offspring. The only thing worse would be Courtney whatserface and her granddad husband procreating. God help us all).

So today at approximately 5pm after reading about how LeAnn Rimes calls the papps on herself, how being overweight (but not obese) can actually improve your lifespan (see I knew there was a reason) and the tragedy of the paparazzi who got hit by a car and in a further attempt to ignore the inside of my house, I got on a roll and decided to attack the garden instead. Or should I say jungle.

Note to self: do not ignore garden for 7 months, like ever again.

It's seriously a jungle out there. I have heaps of hedges and trees which are pretty much out of control and the only time I have cut them back during my tenure in this house is when I couldn't back my car down the driveway without brushing against them. I feel like I can't go outside without some sort of sad safari suit and a machete.

So question: how does anyone actually LIKE gardening? Two bottles of weed killer exhausted (and could have done with a third) and mowing the lawn and I was over it. Truly. And I've barely even started. I've declared war and will be preparing for battle, complete with pruning shears, definitely probably perhaps tomorrow. Or the next day. Or sometime in the near distant future.

As it was, I feel grotty and filthy and cannot get the smell of weed killer off my hands. Ugh.

I asked Santa for an electric chainsaw-ey thingame that does your hedges in one fell swoop for Christmas but clearly I was a bad girl in 2013. My stocking was empty. Not even a lump of coal for this little black duck.

I then asked my dad and he laughed at me and told me to get off my ass and get busy with the shears instead.

Huh. Sucks to be me.

So I have a friend with a gardening business (unfortunately Brisbane based and refusing to do house calls to Toowoomba, slack bastard) and am simply in awe of how he spends his days. Seriously, gardening sucks. It's the only time ever that I've missed apartment living.

So another resolution for 2013 is to save some money so I can outsource. Or find a man (as per my stepmother) and make him do it instead. Ugh, there's another jungle altogether.

But either way, it's a jungle out there man, and I've discovered I'm more of an indoors girl. Only not in my indoors where I have to clean, more like, say the mall. Who am I kidding, I always knew that.

Priorities.

I'm thinking of even cleaning my blinds instead. God help me.

Bec xx

Man or a mouse?

I have an embarrassing confession to make.

I have at least one, and possibly two, mice in my house. And I'm not talking the technological variety.

I first heard some scratching in my bedroom after my Christmas party where I successfully managed to 'quality control' copious quantities of Croser champagne, so wasn't sure if I was just hallucinating or whether the bloody neighbour had decided to get up early and garden instead of allowing me to sleep off my hangover enjoy a luxurious and not-often-enjoyed lie in.

However it was all confirmed when out of the corner of my sleepy eyes last week, I caught a glimpse of movement in my mirrored cupboard doors (bad feng shui, I know. I'm a renter, what can I say) and saw the little rat bastard scurry for all it was worth to hide underneath my lovely tallboy where it seems to have made itself at home.

Since then there've been sightings in my room, the kitchen, E's bedroom and the laundry for some godforsaken reason. We can't categorically decide if it's the same bloody rodent or a goddamn family.

Ugh.

Now the only time I've ever had a mouse in my house was in Cairns where I took the incredibly grown-up approach and promptly packed my bags and stayed with friends until my neighbour kindly informed me he had caught the offender.

Wussy? Probably. But just the thought of the horrible little things scurrying around my place makes me feel quite ill. Seriously, I am having nightmares about these things and their ghastly little feet crawling across my face at night. Eeek.

Just the word vermin turns my stomach. Vermin. Such an ugly, dirty couple of syllables, right?

However this time I decided to take a much more mature approach. I would simply be inhospitable and ask it/them to leave.

Google research (which is always right, don't you know) said that they hate peppermint oil, so we've soaked bags of cotton wool in the horrible stuff and left it lying around the house. We also cleaned everything and put everything in plastic containers to cut off the food source.

It kinda worked in the way that sightings popped up in heretofore unseen places. Little fucker(s).

Mouse 1. Me, well zero.

And then I took a lovely box of chocolates all giftwrapped to my sister's place the other day, only to find the little asshole had eaten through it and nibbled on some of the chocolates. How humiliating!!!

Mouse 2. Me, still effing zero.

So I've realised I have to bring out the big guns. However, here's my second uncomfortable confession: I'm a kinda girl when it comes to these things. Yep, I'm not a man, I'm a mouse.

Uh huh, totally squeamish at the thought of having to dispose of this crawling, scurrying waste of space, no matter how much it's starting to bug. Plus some of the ways to catch the little fuckers according to the internet sound downright barbaric and there's no way I'm 'finishing off' a half dead mouse cause the bloody trap didn't work properly.

Ugh, squick. Yuck.

Anyhoo, thanks to Google (but of course) I have now found the answer in a self contained trap that has a little indicator when the mouse has been caught and then you throw it away, trap and all.

Sorry Mickey but you've driven me to it. The chocolates were the last straw. I gave you the opportunity to leave voluntarily but you've left me no choice. Big guns it is. So who's laughing now????

So it turns out I might be more of a man than a mouse after all...well kinda. Time will tell.

Bec xx