Feeling better about things.

Astute readers will note that I took a break last Sunday. It was my birthday (almost) and I was off having adventures. If you don’t follow me on Facebook you’re missing out on really important information like this, and also amusing screen shots of the things people have googled to find Hum Drum Plum so I honestly don’t know what you’re thinking of on that front.

This week I want to blog about serious things. But I’m not gonna. My brain is filled with a hundred opinions about asylum seekers and politics, atheism and education, feminism and media… but those opinions are starting to take their toll. I feel exhausted sometimes by the weight of my own thoughts and occasionally you’ve just got to have a bit of fun, sometimes you have to turn off your brain (and step away from the computer) and let the shit of the world pass you by for a few hours.

So here’s a list of things that will make you feel better about any given topic.

1.     Step 1. Cut up a banana, step 2. Stab a banana piece with a fork, step 3. Dip piece into nutella jar, step 4. Omnomnom, step 5. Nirvana.

2.     Play board games (not Monopoly) with trusted loved ones. If anyone starts getting aggressively competitive, make them sit on a tiny chair in the corner until they’ve calmed down.

This is an actual photo of me actually playing board games with my actual siblings.
It was a lot more exciting than we are making it look.

3.     Watch The Emperor’s New Groove.

4.     Use safe mode on youtube, it hides all the comments. 

5.     Buy a packet of pink Hubba Bubba. Chew each piece until it *just* loses its flavour. Spit it out. Repeat. This, for me, is a personal vendetta against adults from my childhood, who made me get my money’s worth on every last piece of quickly-flavourless bubblegum. 

6.     Use the hashtag “cleaneating” on your instagram photos of cheese, chocolate and hot chips. 

7.     Make tea in a teapot. You’re fucking worth it.

8.     Hide all the people on your facebook feed who are wrong all the time.

9.  Go for a long drive in the countryside. Perhaps you have a friend who lives three hours away and would gladly welcome you for a weekend in a small town first founded in the 1840s and known for its rich grain and cotton industries… 

10. Make a playlist of your favourite up-tempo songs. This is not a workout playlist. No, it is not a housework playlist. These are not the songs you’ll listen to on the way to work. This is your dance mix. You will dance to this list when you’re home alone. You will crank it loud, you will sing along, you will jump up and touch the ceiling, and spin around in your socks. No one is watching, and if they were, they’d want to join in.

11. Buy someone a gift for no reason at all.

12. Buy yourself a gift for any reason you can think of. 

13. If you’re the kind of person who is into this sort of thing, do your hair and makeup real special on a day you will see no other living soul. Be glamorous for the only person whose opinion matters… you.

14. Put clean sheets on your bed and go to bed early with a book. This is one of the best cures for grumpiness in the whole world. Don’t knock it til you’ve tried it.

15.  Make something. Build it out of lego, or playdough or sand. Bake a cake if you want, or write something down. There is a whole world of tiny achievements you can create yourself. Today I picked some snow peas I grew myself and I feel like the Queen of the world.

16. Let people be wrong on the internet. They’ll always be wrong, don’t let them make you mad too.

17. When the banana is all gone, keep eating the nutella with the fork. You’re a grown human, do what you want man.

18. Write a list of things you’ve rarely or never done. And then take your own advice.

19. Tell someone you love them. 

14 Reasons to Hate February 14th

Fig. 1. The "Blood Red Bear" from Ancient Valentine's Mythology. It takes your heart and then eats all your chocolates. 

Valentine’s Day is a crock of shit and you know it.

“You’re not allowed to say that, Lizzy,” I hear you grumble; “you’ve got a boyfriend. Only single people are allowed to hate Valentine’s Day. Leave us alone and go back to your happiness”. Well to that I say, pffffft. We can unite in our hatred of this “holiday”, ok? Is there anyone in the world who genuinely enjoys Valentine’s Day? In their heart of hearts? (Not sorry). Really? I would like to hear from you. I have a small experiment I would like to perform on you. Right after I take you through this list of 14 reasons no one in the entire world could possibly like Valentine’s Day:

1.     No one wants a goddamn bear that says “I wuv you” when you squeeze it.

2.     No one wants to pay $90 per person to sit in a crowded restaurant in the middle of the week eating a set menu worth about $30 on any other night.

3.     Have you seen Woolworths is selling a ONE KILO BOX OF CHOCOLATES? You could kill someone with a box that big. And this is for a holiday recognised for being about couples. You are buying a box bigger than my torso for ONE PERSON. This aint no family box, this is gift that says, quite clearly “hey fatty fatty, I love you, please have a coronary”.

4.     Single people feel inadequate on a day devoted to couples.

5.     Couples feel obliged to get involved even though it’s a Thursday night and honestly, wouldn’t you much rather stay in and eat tacos?

6.     If one person in a relationship buys a present, and the other is like “why is present? Happy Thursday?” then everyone is going to feel just a little sad.

7.     If one person is expecting a present and the other is like “Hah! Valentine’s Day is for chumps” everyone is going to feel a little sad then too.

8.     No one wants to see your facebook photos of your romantic, candlelit dinner and hot tub session.

9.     Or your hike to a mountain, followed by champagne and a quick proposal.

10. Or your 1kg box of chocolates.

11. St Valentine was just some guy (or possibly two guys) and he didn’t have anything to do with tacky Hallmark cards with pink hearts and flowers on them.

12. In fact he was martyred. And was probably single and alone.

13. That movie tried hard, but Love Actually was 300 times better and got there first so… yeah. Shut up Valentine's Day.

14. One Valentine’s Day, Boyfriend and I decided to go to the Night Owl to get some instant packet mousse because we both really felt like chocolate mousse because um… who doesn’t? I bought the mousse and the milk and then Boyfriend decided we needed whipped cream too. So he went back in and got it and the guy behind the counter with the permanently blood-shot eyes was like “heh. Happy Valentine’s Day” because it looked like he was just buying whipped cream on Valentine’s Day and that was kind of gross.

Dog.

I have always had mad drawing skillz

When you think about it, keeping an animal in your yard is a pretty weird thing to do. We are, as far as I know, the only animals that keep other animals as pets. Except maybe monkeys, don't put anything past monkeys. Farming animals is a thing that makes sense. You can understand why ancient peoples were like, “wait, instead of running after the damn things, why don’t we get ourselves some boy ones and some girl ones and just see what happens?” It makes a lot more sense, sustenance wise, if you don’t have to chase after everything you want to eat. But at what point did people start thinking,  “Let’s not eat this one. Let’s call it Buster and treat it like one of our kids”? I’m sure someone actually knows, but to be honest, I don’t care, all I want is a damn puppy.

When I was 3, I went to see The Wizard of Oz. And not long after, my mum bought me a puppy from the pound. I rather imaginatively named him Toto. He didn’t look anything like Toto from the play or the movie, but he was small and white and I loved him. Toto was a mongrel, but I’m pretty sure he had some sheep dog in him. Because damn, did that dog love to herd things. The main things he had in his life to herd were chickens. He would gently herd our chickens into certain corners of the yard, and then watch them all day. When our neighbour’s chickens jumped the fence he would not so gently tell them to fuck off.

In both the houses we lived in during Toto’s life, we shared a fence with a horse paddock. And Toto had an unfortunate habit of running off to hang out with the horses. It was unfortunate, because horse paddocks tend to have paralysis ticks in them too. If you’re lucky enough to have never encountered one, probably don’t do a Google image search. They are awful little creatures that latch on to an animal, and then suck blood until they are so fat they fall off. The other thing they do is release a poison into their host that causes slow and horrific paralysis. Starting in the hind legs, the paralysis, if left unchecked, will spread and eventually take over the lungs and heart, causing, you know, death.

That’s not how Toto died. Toto got about 10 of these in his life, and every time, we’d see him dragging his back legs, find the tick, take him to the vet and wait. The vet would remove the tick, give Toto some anti-venom, and return him to us, sore, sad, shaved, but ok. The last time he got a tick, I was 15, and my mum told me just how much that anti-venom cost, and explained that unfortunately, this time, we just couldn’t afford it. I wasn’t mad, I completely understood. And I sat in the driveway and held my puppy and sobbed. He just lay there and let me hold him. He’d never been one for that, but I believe he understood that I was distraught, and just let me cry into his fur.

We took him to the vet, they kept him overnight, and he was bloody fine. The bastard had developed a tolerance to the poison.

Actually now that I think about it that might have been one of those lies my mum told me. She may well have bought the anti-venom anyway. It’s like that time she told me she hadn’t seen my budgie, when in fact; she’d seen him pecked apart by magpies 10 minutes earlier. Mum, remember how you told me about the pecking a few years’ later? I don’t want to know if this one was a lie. I want to live in this reality where he overcame that tick on his own. Ok? Good.

Three years’ later, I was 18, on a train in business clothes, packed in like a sardine when my mum called me. “Toto’s got a tumour, in his stomach, it’s massive. The vet said we should say our goodbyes”.

“Wait, how long does he think he’s got?”

“Two weeks? Maybe less?”

We put him down 3 days’ later. He deteriorated quickly; I think the vet had accidentally burst the tumour or something. It happens. And it wasn’t ok to keep him around for us. I will never forget the final drive to the vet. Toto in the back bit of the commodore, with me in the back seat, just patting him, looking backwards at things I knew he would never see again.

When they put a dog down, there are two injections. One that makes them go to sleep, and dream some pretty wild shit, and one that puts them “to sleep”, where there’s no more dreams at all. We sat with Toto after the first injection for a while. His eyes went crazy behind his eyelids, and I’ve always wondered what he dreamed about in those last few minutes. After the second injection, we had to leave him there to be cremated. We didn’t get his ashes back or anything. I’m pretty sure they do it in bulk. You’d probably get something that was 1 fifth Toto, 4 fifths cats.

Not long after, mum bought a new dog. He’s a nice enough animal, and he’s grown on me. But he’s not mine. I moved out not long afterwards, and he is very much my siblings’ dog. In fact my sister was a very similar age when Greg (oh yes, Greg – I much prefer Gregorius) came along to what I was when we got Toto. I hope she doesn’t have to deal with any of this ‘til she’s a lot older too. I just wasn’t ready for a new dog.

But I am now.

The puppy over the back fence and I are in love with each other. She stands there and waits for me all the time, and whimpers if I don’t pick her up and cuddle her. I want to steal her away. But I can’t because 1 – she already has people and 2 – my house can’t have dogs in it. But I’m going to get a dog sometime soon, right after I’ve gotten a new house. And it might herd chickens, or it might not, and it might get ticks, or it might not, but we will love each other and be friends, and I’ll forget to ponder why it is humans think it’s ok to keep animal friends because everything will be dog, and nothing will hurt. 

Five years

Yar. Here be cheese. 

What have you done in the last 5 years? Have you finished school? Uni? Maybe you’ve started a new degree or found a new job. How many jobs have you had? I’ve had 7. But then, I do get bored pretty easily.

5 years is both a long time and no time at all. People make 5-year plans because they are achievable. You can make reasonable goals, but they still feel significant. Because heck, 5 years! You can do so much in 5 years, right?

This blog is dedicated to the last 5 years. 5 years ago today, Boyfriend and I sat on a couch at a party and decided that the thing it was that we were doing was probably actually dating and that was cool with us. We fist bumped and then went back to the party.  In 5 years we have been to lots more parties, we’ve worked on shows together, and we’ve accidentally worn the same coloured shirt in public too many times. We’ve celebrated birthdays and Christmases, attended family events and gone to New Zealand together. I’ve finished a degree, and Boyfriend has gone back to uni and then finished a diploma to become a teacher.

But it’s not really what we’ve done in 5 years that matters, not when we’re getting all sentimental like this, no. It’s that we’ve done it together. We’ve done fun stuff and boring stuff and big stuff and small stuff. We’ve gotten excited about TV shows and movies together and we’ve tried to take an interest in each other’s interests (with varying degrees of success).

We’ve made decisions together and taken big scary risks together. In the last 5 years we’ve gone from two people who met in the student theatre company to a couple who decided to move to the country. Somewhere in there we started calling each other “partner” rather than “boyfriend” and “girlfriend”. Though, to outweigh the corniness of this somewhat, I for one, am usually thinking “howdy, partner” whenever I do that.

I didn’t always understand what people meant when they said relationships were hard work. “Hard work?” I thought, “they shouldn’t be work they should be awesome”. But they take work to make them awesome. But just because it’s hard doesn’t mean it’s not good (that’s what she said?) You have somebody else’s heart in your possession, and they have yours. You have to be careful, and considerate, you have to look after that heart and they have to look after yours.

 So 5 years. It’s not much, and yet it’s very much. Here’s to 5, 10, 15, many more.

I guess I don’t get bored THAT easily. 

Valentine’s Advice from your smug partnered friend

It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single girl in possession of a big tub of ice cream must be in want of a Valentine.

However little known the feelings or views of such a girl may be on her first entering a pub, this truth is so well fixed in the minds of the surrounding women, that her happiness is considered as the rightful property of some one or other of her partnered friends.

Yes even if such a lady SAYS she’s happy being single; she secretly wants us coupled ladies to help her find love. On a daily basis. So, with this in mind, I have compiled a list of tips for this Valentine’s Day.

1.     Being in a relationship is the most important thing in the world. Don’t even TRY to find happiness in your work, hobbies, or interests – they are meaningless. Meaningless.

2.     Dating is really easy. Sure, *I* haven’t done it in years, but if you’re not good at it there is SOMETHING WRONG WITH YOU.

3.     Have sex with as many people as possible, it will make you feel good about yourself and is also a good way to lose weight. Nothing.

4.     Don’t have sex with every guy you meet, that’s just slutty.

5.     I don’t know; work out some sort of percentage. Maybe like 70%? What am I? A mathematician?

6.     You are free to date whoever you want, after they have been through a rigorous testing process coordinated by myself and your mother. We are definitely in cahoots.

7.     How did I end up in such a sickeningly perfect relationship? Oh, just luck I guess. You? You should not rely on luck. Really desperately and actively seek a relationship so that you can be happy like me.

8.     The key to a good relationship is open and honest communication. So it is important to make a note of all the lies you tell him now, so you can keep track of them.

9.     The aforementioned lies should just be little things. Like your age, your income, your hopes, dreams, desires and most important of all, your interests. It is important to pretend to like all the stuff guys like so they don’t get bored when talking to you.

10. I mention my boyfriend up to 38 times an hour in an attempt to encourage you to get one too.

11. Wear lots of make up all the time. No! You’re beautiful! I’m just saying guys are really into stuff like hair and make up, they really notice when you make an effort in the morning. Seriously.

12. You just have to be patient. Mister Right is out there for you too, and other clichés.

13. There is nothing wrong with being alone on Valentine’s Day, really. You know what you should do? You should organise a big girls’ night out! Just us girls!

14. Oh no, The Boy won’t mind, we have plans during the day. Oh I won’t bore you with the details but let’s just say it involves champagne and ponies and a hot air balloon and cheese you’ve never heard of and also gourmet figs and a puppy. At the same time.

15. Yeah! Let’s get really drunk! Who needs men right?! *smug smile*

16. Tequila!

17. Dancing! Let’s dance sexily… together haha just kidding.

18. You should kiss that guy! No really.

19. Just kiss him Sarah.

20. Go over there and do as you are fucking told.

21. Because I said so.

22. Haha see that was fun wasn’t it?!

23. Let’s sing female power ballads!

24.  I’m a survivor I’m gonna make it I will survive keep on surviving!

25. Do you wanna make out with me? Jokes!

26. What do you MEAN you want to leave?! Party party! Wear a pink plastic hat, Sarah it will make you feel better.

27. Put on the hat Sarah.

28. Tequilaaaaa!

29. No, seriously. No shh, shhh just listen. I envy you. I really do. You’re so free. Sometimes I wish I was single.

30. Can someone call my boyfriend and get him to pick me up? I just spewed in my shoes.