Eats plants
Elizabeth drew a picture for the Queen and wants me to post it to her. We are not exactly Monarchists. In fact, I'm pretty apathetic about it all and couldn't care less whether Kate has had a haircut or wears high street clothing. If she ever cycles her kids around in a cargo bike then I'll take… Continue reading A letter for the Queen
It's less than two weeks until the GM!! What's the GM? It's the annual Grand Meetup for the company I work for. We're a distributed workforce and so once a year the entire company gets together for a week-long bonding session. In less than two weeks I'll be flying to Utah, USA. I hate flying. I'm… Continue reading Spiders on a plane
Elizabeth wants to earn some pocket money so I told her that if she did some jobs around the house we'd give her some money. I suggested that she make her bed and tidy the bedroom so she disappeared for a little while and then came back and said: Elizabeth: Mum, I made my bed, I… Continue reading Pocket money and pedal power
Shortly after we arrived in the UK back in early October, I sent away for a National Insurance Number (NIN). I already have one as I worked here over 15 years ago but I couldn't remember what it was so I had to fill in a "I've lost my NIN form" and send it away. They… Continue reading A NIN is not just for Christmas, it’s for life
I can't resist writing a post about "shirtstorm", the drama about the Rosetta guy and his shirt with cartoons of scantily-clad women. Humans have just landed a robot on a comet! This is an incredible achievement and yet everyone is so obsessed with someone's choice of clothing that we have failed to appreciate the significance of what has just happened. So… Continue reading The Rosetta shirt
In the interests of promoting gender equality in blogs, I thought I'd dedicate a blog post to plants that are longer than they are wide. I took these photos last weekend at the Duthie Park Winter Gardens:
Thanks for all the lovely comments on my post yesterday and the emails, tweets, and text messages. I'm completely fine today. I was just over-reacting which is not so unusual for me. I'm pretty sure the vision loss was migraine-related. I was just confused because it was unlike any kind of vision impairment I've had before… Continue reading I’m still alive!
This is fantastic so I had to share it. Jim Jefferies is an Australian stand-up comedian and this is a very funny performance about gun control. It's definitely worth watching 🙂 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0rR9IaXH1M0
I got this card for my birthday: It's funny! But would it be just as funny if it was the other way around? Say it was a woman whose shadow had two huge boobs and the guy's saying "If only". Would that be funny? I don't think I'd find it funny but perhaps that's because I… Continue reading Saggy bits
Elizabeth's kindy put on a fundraising disco last night for charity. It was sponsored by local businesses and there were raffle tickets with prizes. Elizabeth got a raffle ticket and won a prize - a huge bag of products from Chelsea sugar. In other words, she won a bag of sugar. How ironic is that, given my… Continue reading Funny things my kids say and other stuff
Fluffy escaped. There were tears. There was much searching, but we can't find him. I did manage to get this photo of Elizabeth letting him out of his home for a walk before he disappeared though : I've just come back from a run and it was fabulous. My bike has a flat tyre. I really must learn… Continue reading Fluffy has escaped!
Elizabeth has acquired a pet. She's called him fluffy and given him some food and a blanket. She tried to give him some toys as well but fortunately I managed to talk her out of that. Fluffy is a cockroach. Here he is, in his home:
A conversation Ben had with our 7-year-old son, Daniel, today: Daniel: Is mummy older than you? Ben: No, she's younger. Daniel: Then how come she's in charge?
I have never spent a night away from my children. Not a single one. Now that I've got this flashy new job I will occasionally take trips away and the first one is next month. I'm going to Hawaii! We told the children over dinner that I will be going to Hawaii for a week… Continue reading The things my children say
This is my first post on my new blog. I started writing a blog because I didn't know how else to deal with my anxiety after the Christchurch earthquakes. Writing about my fears helped me immensely. It was an awful time. I couldn't sleep at night and I was always on edge, waiting for that… Continue reading Up in flames
A Brisbane artist has merged pornography with cross-stitch in a way that has improved both things considerably more than if they were separate. The cross-stitch lends an air of respectability to the pornography while the pornography offsets the fuddy-duddy image of cross stitch. The artist's name is Leah Emery and she explains how she got started in cross-stitch porn… Continue reading Cross-stitch porn
This morning at 6am I had a job interview; at least I thought I did. My instructions were to be online at 5pm GMT on March 26th. I spent so much time checking and double-checking that 5pm GMT was indeed 6am New Zealand time that it didn't occur to me that 5pm on the 26th… Continue reading How many times can I embarrass myself in one week?
I've just discovered (thanks again to my lovely aunt), the Marmalade files which is a collection of early diplomatic correspondence held at the National Archives of Australia. One tale in particular is very funny so I'm going to transcribe it in its entirety here. This is a true story about an Australian woman called Lilly… Continue reading Lilly: long may she rampage and ravage around the universe!
Someone sent me this yesterday. It's quite old but I've only just seen it and want to share. I can certainly relate to the challenge of getting small children ready and out the door each morning.
rachel.blog 