Uh oh.

I had a slight mishap of the my-laptop-blew-up variety last night.

Well ... it didn't blow up per se I suppose ... it was more that the charger made a weird chirping noise for a few minutes and then ceased to live. Then the battery went flat.

Marvellous.

Day One

Today is day one of IVF cycle one.

'nuf said.

One picture, two ways of looking at the world

Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt at the Film Independent's Spirit Awards in LA just days ago.

Despite the now very obvious, they refuse to confirm she is pregnant.




Me "I love this new Hollywood thing where they refuse to confirm pregnancies until they're due just about. It's like they're having their own little joke on all the people who put their lives under a microscope 24/7. It's probably one of the few ways they can."

The husband "She probably just ate a sandwich"

Ummm ... I don't get it?

3/4 sleeve coats for winter.

Defeats the purpose a bit doesn't it?

Picture it ...

It's sub-zero degrees (plus or minus a bit of exaggeration) and pouring with rain, and so you put your coat on to keep warm and dry.

Your coat, with its 3/4 sleeves.

Presumably too, since you're doing the fashionable thing with your 3/4 sleeve coat, you're also going to have nice long full-length top sleeves poking out from underneath as well.

It's going to be lovely sitting at work (or where ever) with sopping sleeves all day, isn't it? Assuming your arms haven't fallen off at the elbows from frostbite.

Of course, you might have worn a 3/4 sleeve top under your 3/4 sleeve coat, therefore avoiding the sopping sleeves ... but there's still the frostbite.

Don't even get me started on the non-waterproof side of things.

These must be winter coats for wearing indoors only.

Chocolate chocolate, everywhere!

As much as I'm loathe to bump the boots from top spot ... I have a confession to make.

I've fallen head first into the trap of seasonal commercialism.

In a haze of consumer-delight, I bought this box of Easter eggs.

Nevermind that it cost $7.50, which is probably a ratio of about 3 bucks of eggs to 4 bucks 50 of clever box, the point is that it is a clever box.

Sucked in.

And now, more kitchen pics. I know, I'm sorry. Even I'm getting a bit bored. But you have to see the finished bits and I promise no more kitchen pics after today.

The rangehood which finally arrived, is not the original one we ordered, cost loads more but we didn't have to pay for - TA DA!

The baskets for the clever side pull out drawer thing arrived so that was able to go together too

The ruddy great scratch the husband put in my new kitchen bench-top (and by 'scratch' I mean that there are 6 of them and they are on both the bench and the island). I have told him I am completely devastated and I need new boots to cope. New boots, and I'll be completely at peace with the scratches. Oh, and phew for not being the first person to damage the new kitchen. Weee! (He got a bit grumpy with me when I tried to measure it though. I think his exact words were .... nevermind. This is a family blog. I'll measure it later when he's not looking)

Jack, with a bagel crisps packet on his head. Bagel crisp leftovers taste gooooooooood !!

There will be a quiz at the end of this.

Are these, or are these not, the coolest boots you have ever seen?

I mean, they have red leather lining with white polka dots for heavenssake! I have such a weakness for red and white polka dots.

They even look like they could cope with my cankles!! Happy boots.

Contrary to normal Ginger behaviour though, I didn't buy, place on hold, or even laybuy the boots (!!), but I did hunt down pictures to show the husband ... who promptly fell off his seat in horror.

So, it's off to the poll, which the husband has decided will run for a week.

(P.S. I am actually allowed boots - it's just that the husband appears to have grave doubts about these particular ones. Hence, we are canvassing popular opinion.)

Also, for the record

My nieces and nephews are coming up on Wednesday/Thursday and I'd really like to know how I'm supposed to throw a sickie when I've already been sick this week?

I wonder what the statistical likelihood of me catching a cold twice in one week would be?

I suppose the cold could turn nasty and develop into .... saaaayyyy Ebola .... I'd need extra days off then, wouldn't I?

Tragic.

Happy bloggy birthday to meeeee! (for tomorrow)

I really feel as though I should get cake, but in the absence of being arsed baking a cake, I got to spend the day in bed instead. The only down side to that was that I'm in the grips of deathly illness.

It really pees me off how the husband has a sneeze (I may be under-exaggerating for dramatic effect), and I end up half dead (I may be over-exaggeraing for dramatic effect) from exactly the same lurg.

It's completely unfair.

Going back to bed now, where I intend to sulk until I fall asleep with tissues stuffed up my nose and clutching a packet of panadol.

Night night.

When Ginger met Amelia ...

... she fell head over heels in love.

(this time it was the husband taking the fuzzy photos. I think her Daddy took the last one (I just stole it off her bebo page). He's a bit better at photos than we are!)

Diary of a cold (and kitchen pics to make it worthwhile listening to me whinging)

Tuesday - One of the kitchen people is diseased with a cold.

Wednesday - Diseased kitchen-guy is back spreading germs for another couple of hours.

Thursday - The husband starts sniffling. And sneezing. And looking a bit crap. I steer well clear of the husband with clear instructions to him that he is NOT to share.

Friday - I wake up a bit sniffly and feel foggy and sniffly most of the day. I'm hoping it's psychosomatic but I have a sense of forboding nonetheless.

Saturday - Bleh. Still sniffly and starting to sneeze. I accused the husband of being an inconsiderate pillock for sharing despite orders issues earlier in the week for him to keep it to himself. Have trouble going to sleep but it's just little sniffles, so I use all the pillows on the bed to sleep elevated and assume that all will be well by morning.

Sunday - 1am. Game over. Full blown cold with associates aches and pains. Bollocks. I am not amused.

Luckily I am still able to brandish a camera. Wanna see the new kitchen?

Firstly, the old kitchen (so you can appreciate the fabulousness of the new kitchen) ...




And now, the new kitchen ...

(The cupboard on the bottom far right is yet to be installed. The metal baskets are still AWOL. As is the extractor unit, hence the dangly hose above the oven)

Luckily, you can't see in any of those pics how in need of a vaccuum my floors are. All is well with the world. Aside from imminent cold-related death that is.

Full credit to the kitchen people

All I need is a rangehood (due today), the shelves either side of the rangehood, my cupboard with the baskets (no idea when they're due, but hopefully soon), the husband to put a tap in the scullery and me to clean the place, and it'll be finished and I can show you pictures! Weeeeeee! Happy clap.

I have to say that although things didn't go to plan by any stretch of the imagination throughout day 1 of the installation, everything was taken away, fixed, remade, replaced and perfected overnight and by the time I got home from work yesterday it was all done and in and looking great.

Now, the only thing I need is a step ladder to reach my new cupboards (a good reason why a ginger should read kitchen plans instead of just looking at the pictures) ... or, you know, new shoes to make me taller. New shoes sounds good.

Pretty kitchen

I have a new kitchen! Tra la la la.

Of course, it's currently spread up my hallway in pieces, installation incomplete and with essential bits missing, but it's new and it's a kitchen.

The husband and I were discussing last night how it's just as well we had a custom kitchen designed with all in-house measureups being completed by the designer, and of course, opted to pay someone to install it, or the following might have happened ...

The L-shaped scullery/pantry cabinets might have been manufactured as one piece and therefore not be able to fit through the door.

The wall cabinet for the microwave might be too long and completely cover the light switches for the kitchen and scullery, thus requiring the husband to bash a hole in the wall to pop them through to the other side where they would be accessible.

Someone might have forgotten to order our sinks.

Someone might also have forgotten to order our rangehood and the metal baskets (which are ex Germany) for one of the kitchen cupboards.

The cupboard doors might have been cut the exact same height as the cupboards and therefore, when hung, they might not open because it's a 60's house, the ceiling is not perfectly straight and the cupboards go straight up to the ceiling.

The pantry/scullery door might have been manufactured back to front.

Someone might have screwed one of the big kitchen drawer runners straight through the front of the drawer and it might need to be resurfaced.

The two wall cabinets for the pantry which sit flush might have been cut 5mm out from each other, and therefore not sit flush afterall and then one may have to be taken away and cut down.

Yep. It's definitely just as well. It might have been a bit of a disaster otherwise.

Ring ring

I finally got my rings back on Thursday afternoon, just in time to fly down to Palmerston North.

Excuse bad finger angle and fuzzy photo. Diamond is far too sparkly to get a good focus on. Hehe.

(It almost makes up for finding out that the valuation I was given when the original rings were made was completely bogus, and they were worth about half what the manufacturer 'valued' them at. It hurt handing over a whopping cheque on top of the insurance pay out, but if nothing else it's really nice not to have black fingers for the first time in years!)

For the record

I'm not feeling real comfortable about catching a domestic flight today.

Not comfortable at all.

Bollocks. I hate to fly. Especially when I hate to catch it all by myself because the husband has a separate flight. Although, at least if I get bombed, the dogs still have a parent left. Sigh.

On the bright side, I have managed to paint my nails for the wedding and I haven't mooshed a single finger. Go me!!

He's so innocent, I almost feel bad

The husband, cleaning out a cupboard in preparation for ripping out the old kitchen before the new one goes in on Tuesday, says ...

"We have a lot of Tupperware."

Me "Not as much as we could have."

Silence.

Him "Is that a threat?"

Heh.

Yep.

(Bless him for providing me with so much bloggy material ... although the whinging about the jandal post is getting a bit old. He seems to think that I should have mentioned that he took one look at the price and walked out the shop, while I shrugged, picked up the box and trotted to the counter. I really don't see how it's relevant though. And they were $199 on sale. He seems to think that that needs to be mentioned also. Honestly. Whose blog is this? And on that note, I was watching Campbell Live tonight and they were talking about No Crap Month - the general principle is that you refrain from buying anything you don't need for a month, and see how much better your finances feel at the end of it. No coffees, no takeaways, no ... erm ... handbags ... that sort of thing. And, bearing in mind that our mortgage has just rolled over to a new fixed interest rate and the repayments have gone up $500.00 a month for nothing, now is probably a good time to embrace a lack of crap. I'll keep you posted.)

I bought 2 dresses but the husband bought $300 jandals

I find that if you say it like that, then the 2 dresses kind of get lost in the "$300 what??!!" and fade into oblivion, which makes me feel much much less guilty about the 2 dresses.

The only small problem is that the husband is starting to get quite incensed by the $300 jandal comments, and has taken to scowling and yelling that they weren't $300, they were on sale, that full price they were only $269 (Heh. Only. I am so proud.) and how come his stuff always gets inflated upwards, and mine gets discounted down? Which is drawing just a little too much attention to Ginger's Special Accounting System for Telling the Husband About Shoping, so perhaps enough about the $300 jandals.

Back to the dresses.

Here's how it happened...

Obviously, post discovering that the outfit I'd carefully planned - the skirt I had made for another special occasion that I'd been planning to re-use (yes, Stu, I know it's called 'wearing'), the top that I laybuyed and paid off over 6 weeks, and the shoes that I bought on the spot because they were perfect - was a disaster, I went hunting, with very strict instructions from both the husband and the mother not to buy black. I'm not sure if the husband was himself particular averse to the black, or it was the (extremely high) chance of my mother screaching in his earhole for letting me buy black, but I had my instructions and that was that.

Except, it turns out that at the end of sale season, when everyone has sold almost all their summer stock but the next season pieces haven't come in yet, and the summer stuff was mostly black anyway, a ginger trying to find a dress for a wedding in a week ends up buying a black one. A gorgeous, magical dress that was 70% off, but very, very black.

Oops.

(I really should learn how to take good photos)

Of course, it turns out that the husband really isn't a fan of me in black (and, of course, there is the compunding screaching thing), and was not quite so enamoured, spending the ensuing evening giving me his I-am-not-impressed-fullstop-you-are-such-a-pain-in-the-ass look. Bless.

Then, he took me shopping on Saturday, and that's how I found myself trying on the second dress 'just to see' because it would give me a comparison.

Technically, it's not my fault that I now own this as well.





I know. It's very, very bad having 2 dresses, so here's a piccie of the $300 jandals (which we won't mention again).



It's all about perspective.

Comparatively speaking, the jandals are so much worse. Don't you think?