My cold is progressing along nicely.

I find it so very interesting how (well, at least for me) colds move through exactly the same stages and have done so forever: first sore throat (as if it is lined with razors), through achy bones, thick head, nose dripping like a tap, cough, cough, cough, husky voice, lots of nose blowing, cough, cough, fin. If past patterns hold true, by the weekend it should mostly be done with – except for the night coughing – but I am hopeful of at least being able to recommence using my brain.

Yesterday evening I cast on for my first ever garment knitted in the round. I say first garment because I don’t think hats really count as garments. I don’t know what they do count as, probably they count as hats.

Anyway, I cast on 370 stitches – which I think it probably the most I’ve ever cast on at once. I had the genius idea of putting stitch markers every 50 stitches so I didn’t have to keep recounting – and was delighted to end up with the correct amount of stitches and no twisting in the first attempt – hopefully this is an omen for the future success of the project. It is genius mindless knitting. Two nights in and I reckon I have about 2cm – only 38cm until I divide for the arm holes! So, some time in August 2016.

Yesterday was additionally disappointing in that Joe/Frank and I rocked up to the local public school hoping to score a sausage on a bun but discovered that, despite being one for the federal election, the school was not a polling place. Nuts! We were forced to go elsewhere.

I was forced to post my sausage-less hand on instagram so I could participate in #democracysausage:

Later in the day Joan emailed with: What have you done to your hands? Should I buy you some hand cream?

I explained that she’d just not noticed my very wrinkly 900-year-old-lady palms before. I don’t even want to know what they will like when I am a wrinkly 900 year old lady. Fortunately the backs of the hands are not quite so bad and are probably slightly more age appropriate.

But I can’t even explain the purple fingers, I promise they were nothing like that to the naked eye.

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We had our traditional election night wine and cheese feast while watching the abc election coverage.

we have leftover cheese for days

The outcome was not quite as we had hoped (but pretty much as expected), but in excellent news, the Greens won 3 (maybe 4) seats! Yay for living amongst a bunch of progressive people!

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I’m now considering this jumper.

My test swatch turned out quite a bit more satisfying than the previous one:

Yay! for neat stitches! If I do pull the trigger, I suspect it will keep me occupied for rather a long while and might be ready by summer.

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Holy!Goodness! This cold is completely horrible and debilitating.

While Don was actioning all the things: like fixing our broken antenna, steam mopping the floor and playing loads of golf, I was laying about complaining and blowing my nose (a lot). I did manage to make a 5:2 casserole for Thursday evening and to apply flea/worm stuff to the kiities, but other than that – errrggggghhhh – laying about listening to podcasts was about the most I could do.

I’m sitting in on an interview tomorrow – let’s hope that I wake up Much Improved, else I pity the poor candidate.

Well, the horrible, intense month at SML is almost at end and we’ve actually delivered and made it out alive – though it was touch and go for a while. Knut ended up with a horrible cold – which he has kindly passed on to Heather and me – and AnxiousMum has developed a bunch of mouth ulcers, but we are mostly otherwise unscathed.

I was only gloating to my team on Thursday afternoon that I hadn’t had a cold for ages, so obviously it was inevitable that I’d manifest one, the secret-style (it’s just science!).

I now feel pretty gosh-darned wretched. So apart from voting in the state election today – there will be minimal actioning of any items.

Blergh!

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You might remember that I was planning to knit this jumper. I whipped up a couple of gauge squares during the week and ACK!

Normally my knitting is quite neat and lovely, if I do say so myself:

close up of recently knitted french press cosy

This time – well, my two options are an absolute, uneven mess. Ever AFTER wet blocking.

Eeeek! It looks like the work of a complete beginner (sorry beginners). I’m thinking 4ply yarn on 5mm circular is responsible for the mess and that it has nothing to do with my skillz or lack thereof.

So, I’m going to abandon the pattern and give something else a crack.

Look at me, happily abandoning a project without guilt!

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Here at ThePalace(OfLove) we are big fans of ice-cream.

In particular we very much like Cadbury Creamy Vanilla because it is gorgeous and yellow and creamy and … all the things!

The packaging changed recently and this week was the first we’d grabbed the new version.

I cracked it open last night (shut up! I was sick!) to find the contents were a completely different texture and colour.

And the taste was kind of … ewwwww.

This morning I vowed to see if the ingredients had changed. Fortunately I had an empty ice-cream tub with the old packaging laying about which I could use for comparison purposes – because I am a hoarder.

old to left, new to right

I’d expressed my curiousity about the addition of the “vanilla flavour” box when we bought it (creamy vanilla | vanilla flavour? what other kind of flavour would it be?), but thought nothing of it. The ingredients were very slightly different – colour and emulsifier numbers, but nothing that really jumped out.

Examining the packaging further it became really obvious why it had tasted so wretched:

WT(A)F?!?

The small writing on the side of the tub was the only indication that we had bought fat reduced ice-cream. Fat reduced?! The humanity!! I want the total fat experience in my ice cream – otherwise I’d have like, an apple or something.

This is just the driver I needed to get more into making home-made ice-cream. Especially after reading the additives on the side of the tub. Really ice-cream should be all about cream, eggs, sugar and possibly vanilla. Emulsifiers be gone!

Tonight I managed to (mostly) stay off the Information Superhighway! I printed out and stuck together the pattern for this dress which I’d downloaded last Sunday.

I’m hoping to get a muslin made over the weekend. If the muslin works, the plan is to have one of Bessie’s fabric designs from her first textile design assessment printed on spoonflower and to make myself a casual dress.

And yay! One of the projects on the incomplete 50 before 50 list started! Incomplete because I am struggling to come up with a whole 50 things – which is kind of sad. Must think on it.

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I’m trialling a new task management system at SML:

Yellow for work stuff, orange for personal. So far it is working a whole lot better than the endless to do lists in my notepad – where things became forgotten once the page is turned.

Stars of course being infinitely more professional than the hearts I was considering.

what a lovely poppet Don is

The days are definitely drawing in, evidenced by that the kitties waking me this morning as the alarm went off!

Sleeping in until 6:45am was the height of luxury! All through summer and through last week it was around 5:10am! Only a week and a half until daylight savings ends, so I’ll enjoy this snoozy bliss while I can.

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Fast day today and it was a challenge. Some fast days I’m not terribly hungry at all, but today I was starving and the brain really wanted carbs to function – but of course I resisted the temptation. The beauty of 5:2 is that if I still want carbs tomorrow I can have some toast (or pasta or cake). It is quite easy to suppress any cravings knowing I can wait. I still haven’t managed to be able to work in regular running to the 5:2 routine though, I must try to address this in April.

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I felt like a super hero tonight because after the dishes had been cleared, I decided to prep for tomorrow night’s dinner to save time when we get home from grocery shopping.

I also decluttered an old work ID badge from 23 years and two surnames ago. It was pinned on the cork board on the fridge. I had a quite excellent perm.

Today was full of cooking.

Don actioned the mise en place and I cooked and cooked: welsh lamb pie for dinner, and a 5:2 cassoulet for a week night dinner and kitty stock.

so much prep, so much washing up!

5:2 cassoulet – tinned cherry tomatoes are pretty excellent

bought this muji 15ml tablespoon in Hong Kong, is great for all manner of things

gingerbread and hearts

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I’m still getting the hang of my new camera, but I adore it. The kitties are very patient subjects.

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Over dinner we watched a documentary on the very recently deceased former PM Malcolm Fraser.

I grew up viewing him as the enemy, but he in recent years it became apparent that he really was a very decent, compassionate, humanitarian man. It is very apparent the nowadays the left skews way more to the right than the actual right was in the 70s and 80s.

I wept buckets while watching.

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Bessie made mini skillet berry cobblers. We didn’t have wee skillets, but did have wee pie plates.

They were excellent!

rather nice view from my bedroom window

This morning I woke at a ridiculous time to feed the kitties and the brain would not let me get back to sleep. So I tooled about on the tablet and took photos of the sunrise.

I knew this month would be a challenge and it has delivered in spades. Fortunately, unlike before TheReckoning, we’re all pulling together and making it work. Heather, AnxiousMum and I have really gone over and above to help out Knut and get things done. I take no small credit for this because it is my job to ensure we deliver (and managing the big personalities is really quite challenging). Despite the extreme stress there is camaraderie developing. There will be much drinking at the end of it all.

Tonight there was wine and then impromptuly visiting the neighbours to whinge about another neighbour who had run cables across our roofs without asking (thereby ruining our tv reception). Then we discussed very very many leaks we’re experiencing and the horrors of living in a converted factory – which seems so cool before you are in it.

the ginger: it grows

I decided to go for a short run this evening and it was so horribly humid it felt like running through treacle – and took about as long as you’d expect running through treacle would. I even got a stitch half-way through – it feels like an age since I’ve had one.

I’ll be pleased when the cooler weather settles in. Hopefully I will be encouraged to get out a little more.

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I’m delighted and relieved that our wills have been prepared, signed and witnessed and are with solicitor for safe keeping. We used nest legal (discovered for us by Joan). The whole process was really seamless and we barely had to expend any effort – completed a form, exchanged a couple of emails and held a phone conference. Would very highly recommend if you’re looking to do this.

The best thing about having put it off for so long is that now the babies are adults, we don’t have to bother with trusts and such.

We still need to organise to have our powers of attorney signed (which will require feats of logistics) – but apart from that all good and feeling very grown up!

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A few of the things I’ve been reading / listening to lately talk about making your personal goals a major priority in your life and doing *stuff* each day to work toward them.

It was at this point I realised that I don’t actually really have any.

Sure, I have shared financial and retirement goals with Don and I have my annual projects list and occasional lists of action items. But I really don’t think that those really count as mid-to-long-term personal goals.

I think this is kind of dreadful.

So I am giving a good deal of thought about one (non-work-related) thing that I am interested in pursuing and achieving over the next 1-2+ years. Just for me.

Will report back.

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Oh, and I am pleased to report that THE MAGICAL COLD SORE TABLETS WORKED!!!!!

No cold sore.

Must stock up.

We’ve only had the passionfruit vine since October so were amazed this week when Don spotted a flower and then a baby passionfruit!

Surely it is not even passionfruit season?

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Part of the declutttering on Saturday was (re)reviewing the contents of my bedside table. I have had this soap since 2004:

Yes, that is almost 11 years.

Keeping soap for 11 years is quite possibly one of the most ridiculous things ever (what was I thinking?!), so I ripped it out of the packaging and put it in the shower. It lathers really well and is very creamy.

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Late last week I managed to catch the sunrise – a rarity because I’m generally in my post-pre-dawn-kitty-feeding-snooze when the sun comes up.

This weekend I’ve really made a conscious effort to stay away from the computer.

As I mentioned I’ve been listening to a lot of personal productivity podcasts – which is kind of lame and possibly verging on culty, but has the excellent effect of making not obsess about SML and makes me want to action *stuff*.

So yesterday while listening, I actioned extreme vacuuming (behind the fridge, the exhaust fan &etc), tons of ironing, made a curry, actioned more decluttering, and a bunch of other things.

And last evening I was all like, let’s take a break on the no wine thing, have a couple of glasses and just reflect.

All this listening and reflecting has really made me realise that everyone I’m pals with at SML (so the majority of non-family peeps I have contact with) have no actual goals or plans for their lives. Sure, they talk endlessly (for years and years) about all the things that they are going to do – but they never actually do them. They drift and they are miserable and whingey and really quite negative.

I think this has a great deal to do with my recent meh!-ness. I’m really kind of pleased that I have now identified this and can be conscious to avoid getting sucked into the abyss.

And the wine and reflection was definitely what I needed – though I probably indulged a smidge too much.

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Despite the unplanned alcohol consumption, surprisingly I felt no ill-effects and went out for a 3km run this morning.

Early in, I ran past Clarissfer, yelled “hi” and was motivated enough not to look like a plodder – all fastness (well as fast as I am able!) and proper form.

Later I passed three dudes who were clearly on their way home from a big night out and who were keen to high-five me – which was pretty cute and neat.

I was pretty amazed when I got home to have achieved my fastest km ever (wut!? last fastest Sept 2014) and fastest mile (last fastest Sept 2013)!

I’m really quite pleased with that – perhaps there is hope for my running yet.

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Don and I have done a bunch of stuff today including grocery shopping in two locations, long slow cooking for tonight and thursday night, making chicken stock for the kitties, a bunch of (new) ironing and finally sold the no longer required camping equipment on Gumtree.

Very productive – and I’ve barely looked at the InformationSuperhighway at all.

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The downside to this is that I can feel a cold sore coming on. Pah!

But the good news about this is that I’m trying out some (allegedly) magical cold sore tablets which apparently stop it developing. It was not inexpensive (probably about $24 for a dose – 3 tablets you take all at once) but if it stops me developing a bleeding mess all over my face.

Will report back on the efficacy.

I will think positive, but already there is crazy itching.

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And yay! after all this I feel like I am in a pretty good place and can nudge myself into a more positive direction.