It’s ANZAC Day, and time to pause and reflect on the sacrifices made by our forebears. Hardly the time to be thinking about money. But due to a set of circumstances last week that saw my bank balance drained to close to zero — something that hasn’t happened in quite some time — I have ... [More]
10th of February to 5th of April. That’s how long the bug bombs lasted. 54 days. Last night I found two cockroaches, alive and kicking. Not sure how they made their way back into the house, but there they were — one in the livingroom, one in the main bedroom. Yeuchhh. And I’d found a ... [More]
My garden (apart from the grass) is thriving, despite the drought. Evidently it’s almost all native plants, which survive fine even with a lack of water. Indeed, one of the hedges has grown so much I had to trim it back so I can see into the mailbox without bumping my head on it. But ... [More]
It’s hard rubbish week. Not even anybody on Freecycle wanted my ratty old couch, so out it goes. I let the kids run riot on it yesterday after we took it out onto the nature strip. By this morning, various other bits and pieces of crap, including my mum’s old broken washing machine, had been ... [More]
Here, looking very posed, is a piccy of me on my new couch, which arrived on Saturday. Super-comfortable. Feels quite high off the ground, compared to the old, saggy one (which hopefully some lucky Freecycler will want). None of the pictures taken quite captures the colour exactly, but this one is as close as any ... [More]
Since I set off the bug bombs last week, I’ve found no live cockroaches in the house, save for one that stowed away from the mailbox in a pile of junkmail. A few dead ones have been found, mostly outside the back door, perhaps trying to escape. And last night I found a dead hairy ... [More]
This is the nature strip outside my house. I leave it alone apart from organising to get it mowed every so often. All it gets is (comparatively rare) rain water. It’s lush and green. I don’t know why. This is my front lawn. It gets some greywater, and a regular mowing, but is otherwise left ... [More]
On Saturday I set off bug bombs around the house. Five of them, one in each major room. Hopefully it would spell armageddon for the cockroaches. Once set, I went for a wander for a couple of hours. Along the way I noted Zagarelli’s, the crap restaurant I once dined at, which then changed its ... [More]
Wow — a piece in the Good Weekend last week that wasn’t about Barry Humphries. It was about houses being built modelled on Martha Stewart’s homes, apparently being bought by people who have no original ideas for themselves, but trust Martha to design something good. “We’re delighted because we have no vision ourselves and Martha ... [More]
I was sitting doing some coding at work when The Posture Police arrived. The Chair Squad. The Ergonomic Inspectors. Seriously, a team of three did a sweep through the office and checked every chair to make sure it was working properly, able to be adjusted, and offering the correct back support. Zowee. It reminds me ... [More]
The cockroaches are starting to get me down. I gather they’re around the city in large numbers this summer, but that’s no consolation when I seem to find at least one somewhere in or around the house every day. Possibly the worst moment was stepping on one in the dark last week in my bare ... [More]
Mathom sounds like something out of The Meaning Of Liff, but it’s not. Apparently it’s a word from Tolkien meaning something you have no immediate use for, but which you want to keep just in case. In the stories, the Hobbits sometimes had entire extra houses dedicated to mathoms. This sounds just like my mother. ... [More]