I’ve just had another wasted hour of lecture time, and I am cross. Grumpy. Annoyed.  I am struggling with the real work of the course – what I see as the real work, anyway – while time is being eaten up on the trivia of referencing and “can you do an advanced web search?” ARRRRGH!

One of my dear (online) friends has pointed out that the lecturer is dealing with children with unformed brains, and the only way to get these ideas into their heads is to pound it in over and over again.  Ah.  Right. Yes. I hadn’t considered that.  Interesting to note, however, that attendance at the lecture was about a third of the usual crowd.

And now it’s Wednesday, almost time to start making tea, and I’ve had a lousy day… Mr Beloved was crook the other day and I think I’ve managed to pick up whatever it was he had.  Let’s just note that moving too far away from the loo would not have been a good idea, and move on.

I didn’t go to group today.  I did manage to check over my assignment (and catch a couple of silly mistakes in referencing formatting that would have cost marks – using ‘and’ instead of the ampersand (‘&’) for example when multiple authors are involved.  Oh yes, these things matter.)

I have the red one!

In happier news I am now the proud possessor of  Moleskine LEGO journal! For which I have to thank one of my oldest friends (not in terms of age, but in terms of longevity of friendship – in fact, I think only the girl I went to kindergarten with can claim a longer span.) Thanks, RF, I am only waiting on my new pen with a bigger nib to arrive before I start using it: all my life I have used fine point pens but now my hands are so sore, I’m hoping a larger point will force my writing movements to un-cramp and maybe let me write more than a sentence at a time.

And now it’s tea time.

But I’ve now completed as much of the online work for Week 1 as I can until my other textbook gets here. WHICH HAD BETTER BE SOON.  Ah well, next time I’ll know to choose my subject further in advance and order the textbook earlier.  Yeah yeah, I know you probably don’t reaaaally do much in week 1, and I know I’m supposed to be all “P’s get degrees” BUT I’m trying to get a leeeetle bit ahead where I can just in case, you know?

First lecture is on Tuesday morning.  I hope I can sleep on Monday night.

I am nervous about being able to take notes  – but because the course is offered both on campus and as an external/distance subject, I should have access to recorded versions of the lectures.  My fibromyalgia has flared up again, and I can’t hold a pen to write for much more than signing my name (and even that’s a bit dodgy.)  Typing’s not too bad so long as I rest fairly often.

The university offers a LOT of disability support – it’s one of the reasons I decided to enroll at USQ.  And I have my shiny new laptop, which poor Mr Beloved spent 10+ hours getting set up and making backup disks in case of catastrophic failure, and getting my desk all organised with the laptop at the right height, additional keyboard below and a second screen for ease of reading texts at home – everybody say “awwwwwwww!” – isn’t he the best!

My (Summer) at home desk

[as always, clicky for biggy].  As you can see, a phone book brings the extra monitor to just the right height, and the hi-tech laptop stand is re-purposed floorboards from a long-demolished Canberra govvie house.  (Nothing in the shed is JUNK. It’s all  waiting for a use… well, most of it.  I admit some of my stuff needs to go.  Ahem.)

Shiny New Computer also came with Kindle for PCS already installed. Wheee!  I am rapidly learning to do more screen-based reading – and since my assignments for uni can be submitted electronically (and get marked more quickly if I do so) I’m going to have to get used to not even printing out a copy to proof read. Another tree (and more expensive ink) saved each time…

And now, as usual, I have to go eat.  I forget when I’m down here on the computer until I get reallllllly hungry.  So nice to have that change now – I’m very VERY glad to be off the horrible Ser0quel, but I still need to up the d0se of the new med1cation – which I can’t do until I see the Nice Psychiatrist on the 5th of March.

And did I mention it’s VERY wet here again? I am really considering that a clothes dryer is no longer a luxury but a necessity – unless we want to appear in public in bedsheets.

BUT – and I really should have thought about this – now we are SICK.  With charming head colds.  I am Snuffley, Phlegmy and Achey (Attorneys at Law. Or three of the Dwarves Disney dropped.)

It’s not just confirmation bias * (or hindsight bias)- we can go plenty of other places where there are people and NOT get sick – but one lousy trip to the !@&*^!@% waiting room at the doctors and BAM!  We get the Latest Lurgey.  Oh, thank you ever so much, you diseased and wretched people.   Especially you, unobserving parent, who continues to browse “CELEBRITIES DOING STUFF!” Weekly while your small child wipes its nasal secretions along every hard surface.  And you, Mr Coughs Into The Room, oh, thank YOU for our LOVERLY Christmas gifts.  That’s sharing the Ferkin’ Spirit of The Season, isn’t it?

*headdesk*

So we have spent most of the last few days looking like this:

(Even unto the small pointy nosed dog on the bed, oh yes.  I have no idea where I stole this image from but isn’t it great?)

On the other hand, I have LOOK! Pretty nails! (although my nails seems to grow so quickly that there’s always a gap…)

This is the Sally Hansen stick on polish in “Girl Flower” that I mentioned the other day, with (freehand therefore wonky!) french tips in Hello Kitty blue – awwww! I wear out the tips of nail polish very quickly – too much typing and forgetting to wear the dishwashing gloves that are pegged above the sink, quietly perishing in the sun…)

I am drinking lots of water. And lots of hot tea.  And eating the occasional slice of Boiled Fruit Cake (mine is always a tweaked version of the recipe in Geoff Slattery’s wonderful 1991 book “Simple Flavours: Australian Home Cooking”.  This is the same book which taught me that making puff pastry isn’t hard, and in fact times perfectly with the quarters in an Aussie Rules football match.  He was a sports writer for the Melbourne Age before he was a cook…)

And shortly I shall head to the house to make zucchini slice (yes, again) and while the oven is on, the Strawberry Lime and Coconut Cheesecake from last month’s Good Taste magazine (but without the strawberries because they all looked a bit nasty when I hit the shops yesterday.  I might use some frozen raspberries instead or just go with the lime syrup as enough flavour.)

Happy Season to those who celebrate. And a hearty BAH HUMBUG to the infectious masses.

* If you haven’t yet grabbed/asked Santa/cajoled your library to order this book, you should.  Bloody brilliant.  The blog of the same name has some of what’s in the book, so read that first to get an idea, but it’s really worth the $Au 19 (or however much you want to pay – booko.com.au is showing this as the lowest price including postage.)

Well, I didn’t go to group therapy yesterday.  I had a m1graine instead. Niiiiice.  The new med1cat10n I’m starting after I see the nice psychiatrist in January is supposed to help, but I can’t start taking it yet. Second migra1ne this week. Usually I know what my triggers are but I have no idea why I’m getting them at the moment.

Also, I didn’t want to go to group because I am so over being the only atheist in the village (I don’t much like “Little Britain” but that particular character is hilarious.) It’s all very well relating whatever lyrics “back to the model” (this is part of what happens in group, we go over the hexaflex model of ACT – over and over, in the hope that it will stick…)but I am SO OVER HEARING CHRISTIAN SONGS exhorting me to “have faith” etc.  SO. OVER. IT.  Not a useful tool for me, can we please move on? ARRRRGH!

(Other things that happen in group therapy ARE useful.  I am definitely a convert to “open” groups where there are people at all different stages of wellness.  It is helpful to see people with the same illness who are making real progress towards having a better life.)

I did go and see my psychologist today. New rules mean that Medicare only pays for 10 visits in a calendar year, and that many only if you have a Mental Health Care Plan jumped through flaming hoops written for you by your GP.  Actually, nobody REALLY can get any clarification on how the new system will work, everyone I speak to has conflicting info – you get 6 visits then have to apply for more, no, you can only have ONE Mental Health Care Plan per 12 months, no, I heard it’s……  ARRRRRGH!

All that aside, I think I’ve made real progress this year in understanding my issues… learning more about the neurology underlying the psychology has helped.  (FACTS!  I like FACTS!  Give me SCIENCE, not woo!) I even have *gasp* a possibly life changing idea that *might* start sometime in 2012.  (Stay tuned to this EXCITING blog for an EXCITING update! SOON! *insert sarcasm here*)

Other things: I made a banana and raspberry cake last night (to use up bananas that were about to go black, and some raspberries with freezer burn) very similar to this recipe but with rice bran oil instead of butter.  Not bad.  I’m still getting used to the new oven and I under-baked it slightly, but never mind.  It’s still (mostly!) good.

And I put these silly stick on nail polish thingummys on my nails.  They seem to be wearing off rather quickly at the tips (even though I put a topcoat over them) and certainly wouldn’t buy them regularly, but… fun for a change.

Since we don’t really “do” Christmas, I don’t have any Christmas shopping to worry about (YAY!) and can now AVOID the shops except for a quick run for milk and bacon (mmmm, bacon!) tomorrow night.

I’ve been reading: the newest one from Jasper Fforde, “The Last Dragonslayer” – Fforde’s inventiveness reminds me of a childhood favourite, Norman Hunter’s “Professor Branestawm” series. This is a new series from Fforde, aimed at the YA market.  Lovely writing and a sequel has just been published – “Song of the Quarkbeast”.

According to my Shelfari list, I’ve read 170 books this year. I was a late comer to The Hunger Games Trilogy, but I’d certainly rate that as the most haunting series I’ve read in 2011.  And along with half the planet, I loved Erin Morgenstern’s “Night Circus”.  I’ve just started reading Christopher Fowler’s “Bryant and May” series (police procedurals with quirky twists, set in London) – don’t you love it when you find a series new to you with LOTS of books already written?

Upcoming reading: I’m really looking forward to David Finch’s memoir “The Journal Of Best Practices: a Memoir of Marriage, Asperger Syndrome, and One Man’s Quest to Be a Better Husband” – for reasons that will become obvious later in the song.  (Now does *that* reference date me!! Hands up anyone who is now suffering from a Bob Hudson earworm?!)

And now it’s almost time to go and heat up some leftover (homemade, we don’t get takeaway or eat out…) Thai Red chicken curry for tea.

I enjoy cooking, but I *love*  baking.  So much.  And I’ve missed being able to cook – I haven’t even wanted to try anything new or look in my cookbooks for ages.

But I recently bought a cookbook I’ve enjoyed reading (even though I have yet to make any of the recipes)

The subtitle is “Nourishment for the Traditionally Built”… Love that!

I loved the TV series of The Number 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency, and this cookbook has excerpts from Alexander McCall Smith’s books included with the relevant recipes.

And that’s something it has in common with the very first cookbook I ever owned:

(none of your stupid Disney-fied Pooh here – this is the genuine EH Shepard Pooh!)

And you can tell which recipes are the really good ones by the splatters:

We made pancakes last night (but sadly, not from this recipe, which is indeed the best I have ever used – we had some mix leftover that I’d made from Nigella’s “Express” cookbook, which makes a much thicker, more American style of pancake.  Still yummy with a bit of golden syrup and lemon (we had no caster sugar in the house!) but not as nice as these thinner crepe style pancakes.

The next few images are from Mr Beloved:

This is the old stove, which we covered with a piece of board and some plastic to increase our workspace.

This is the extent of our kitchen bench space.

SPIRAL TIE DYE!

Yep. We dye and wear tie dyes.  PROUDLY!

A length of plain calico (quilter's muslin) now forever hippy-fied

This is probably going to be the new doorway curtain between the lounge and bedroom.

Grooovy, maaaan

Due to excess fabric stash and “not enough bread” we will be making clothes from this book soon.  (Well, the whole sewing room clean up thing has to happen first, and I don’t have the energy for that yet, but we have PLANS.)

And we have mung bean seeds just waiting to be sprouted.  Mmmmmm, mung bean sprouts!  I love them! Not least because they bring back memories of my childhood, when mung beans sprouted in a jar in a cupboard under the sink.  We don’t have a cupboard under the sink so I’ll probably keep them in a dark space in the bathroom.

Increased teeth grinding at night seems to be the problem.

So I was sent home with the warning to FLOSS REGULARLY (I know, I know, but who does, really?  Truly? Apart from my Dad who is very good about flossing)  and use the (gak!ppppth!) tooth mousse last thing at night and try not to rinse it out.

Out of pocket expense: $30

Relief: PRICELESS!

I highly recommend Access Dental – they’re very good!

(And of course mousse reminds me that I have not seen MOOOOOSE for a long time – I wonder where he is hiding?) (Stupid link is broken to old blog – arrgh, server side investigations to follow!) [lateredit - D'OH!  Old blog now updated so link works!]

(For newer readers: I bought Moose and Horse hand puppets at Ikea when I visited family in Adelaide at the end of 2008.  They became tricksters who liked to hide and who speak in strange Swedish accents….)

So I’ve been having a few memory and distraction problems of late.  More so than usual – it’s taking me more pages to remember if I’ve read a book before (although this could also be attributable to reading too many cosy mysteries); I lose things more easily (“Darl? Have you seen….?”) and then yesterday was a doozy.

Started out with an almighty CRASH of smashing crockery at 6 am as I hauled the blankets back across the bed, having forgotten completely that I’d let the dog have the yoghurt bowl (on the bed) and forgotten to move it before I went to sleep… the bowl hit the floor and luckily smashed into two big pieces rather than a gazillion little ones.  (And for those of you who think either eating yoghurt in bed or letting the dog lick the nearly empty yoghurt bowl is unacceptable, what are you doing reading MY blog?!)

A Discovery of Witches by Deborah E. Harkness

Then last night as I was just about to go to sleep, having read a few pages of the interesting but ohmygosh-I’m-so-tiiiiiired book that I read before I go to sleep (in this case, A Discovery of Witches by Deborah E. Harkness, which is turning out to be better than some reviews lead me to believe) I put on my CPAP mask and realised  – OH NOES – it wasn’t working.

Because earlier on  I cleaned one piece of my CPAP mask – normally I’d clean the whole thing, but I noticed ONE part that just needed some attention -

Not me - someone else in the very attractive (!) Mirage Quattro mask

Small, silicone piece crucial to the mask working properly

and I lost the silicone piece listed here (for some reason in Spanish!) as “ports cap”.  But I didn’t REALISE I’d lost it until I put the mask on.

Much kerfuffle as Caity veers ever closer to panic (because it’s after midnight on Saturday night, the only place that sells the CPAP parts isn’t open until Monday and I CAN’T SLEEP without the mask) and Mr Beloved treats the bedroom as a crime scene, carefully and systematically moving scarves, clothes, blankets, etc while I dither about the edges…  and it’s not easy to find a clear silicone thingummy at something towards 1 am in a dusty room – but at last the missing piece was found and I could sleep.    Catastrophe averted!

Phew.  But it’s illustrative of my memory not being what it was, and my distractibility (is that even a word?!) increasing.  It’s hard for me to concentrate on things, is what I’m saying.  I write down all the medicines I take in a book, every time I take them, have done for the last year or two, just so I can be sure whether I have taken them or not… seriously, at my age, I feel like I shouldn’t have to do that!  Oh well, it is what it is.

And now I have to go do something or other but I can’t quite remember what it is…

I just can’t do such long days any more.  Tuesday was a write off.  Wednesday wasn’t much better… although a visit to our lovely GP to check on my new asthma medication (it’s WONDERFUL, I haven’t had to use my reliever puffer at all – such a huge change!) ended up including a referral to get Mr Beloved’s shoulder injury fixed (we hope). He needs an ultrasound guided injection to fix the bursitis that developed after he fell up the stairs and shoulder charged the house…

Wednesday also brought a surprise care package from a lovely Canberra friend – and if I could only work out how to get photos off my new phone and onto this old computer, I could show you!  She got EVERYTHING right, it was all such beautiful stuff and very me - I especially loved the badge that said “Craft is the new black” and another that said “Make tea not war.”  Good, yes?!  So generous, and you know who you are, *mwah*!

Thursday is our usual scrapping day – well, the others scrapbook and I admire their work.  I’m taking a wonderful online class that has got me interested in actually playing with my art materials and drawing again.  YAY!  The funny thing is, I’d signed up for the classes and hadn’t realised that one of the teachers, the wonderful Jane Davenport, was going to be speaking at the Scrapbooking show – it was such a delightful surprise and hearing her talk about art journals made the long day worthwhile. She is SO INSPIRING!

Here’s a page of very wonky drawings (mostly done with my left hand) – an exercise from Carla Sonheim’s Drawing Lab book

Wonky cats - an exercise from Carla Sonheim's "Drawing Lab"

And a boring page (but interesting to me!) of playing with pencils – I never would have known how much I like drawing in pencil over gesso if I hadn’t done this exercise from Jane’s class:

Pencil on paint... hmmm!

The rest of the week and the weekend is a bit of a blur – taken up with usual stuff, I guess.  I’m still recovering from a couple of super-anxious days that saw me chasing my own tail… thank goodness I see my lovely psychologist tomorrow!

Meanwhile, even with his wounded wing, the lovely Mr Beloved has been plodding on with  the ever-present task of reorganising the studio.  He’s a brave, brave man to wade into piles like this:

Another pile of books to be sorted...

We need to weed out books we don’t want, but there are still an awful lot that need to be re-shelved in our new bookcases.  Some of the bookcases are “zombie” bookcases that Mr Beloved has managed to patch together from odd shelves and pieces of timber – but they work!

And now I’m off to the post office (waiting on a book my psychologist recommended, The Mindful Path to Self-Compassion) and then a bit of housework and some DRAWING!

Picasso inspired dogs – an exercise from Carla Sonheim’s book.  It was quite therapeutic, listening to old podcasts still on my MP3 player and colouring.