brain go byebye

This week marks week 3 of me putting in phenomenal cosmic hours at work. As in lots. But I prefer the term 'phenomenal cosmic hours' because it sounds like 'powers' which makes me sound like a super hero. Which is all good. It also reminds me of the quote from Aladdin, which I'm sure nobody gets, "Phenomenal cosmic powers and an itty bitty little living space." Aaah, personal in-jokes, you gotta love them...

Tomorrow I fly out to Portugal for Easter so I don't know that I'm going to get a chance to do all the blogging I should before I go. For now all I have the energy for is to post this one picture form the ball I was at on Sat night. Hopefully I'll get a chance to write something decent about it before tomorrow.

mix'n'match

other things I don't get
- people who climb in jeans: coz that'll be comfy. Not.
- boys who wear jeans hanging over half way down their ass: how do they stay up? My friend Kerry has a theory about this- seeing as the jeans sit well below the hip, she says there can't be anything to hold the jeans up apart from their man-bits and she says this must cause terribly chafing. I think about this when I see hip young teenage boys with a good 15cm of boxers showing above their jeans. One day I may even gather up the courage to ask one exactly what holds their pants up.

the little things
My friend Marie is currently posting on the progress of her wedding dress (or rather what she will be wearing at her wedding). I'm quite enjoying the intrigue of colour selections, material choices, buttons, trim, etc, etc. I like finishing detail choices. In one of her latest posts though, she mentions an overnight bag she bought and this is what she wrote:

When I was trying to decide between this selection of colours and the green colourway, the woman in the shop asked me, to help me make my choice, "What colour is your suitcase?" I found this question almost as perplexing as if she had asked, "Do you own any frogs?". The colour of my suitcase, if I had one even, is not in any way related to my choice of overnight bag.

Now Marie, I don't mean to diss you but how can your choice of suitcase NOT effect your selection of overnight bag?! Does everyone not colour coordinate when they can? How can they not? I did stop to wonder if maybe this is just an Aynia Problem. I know that it can get a bit out of control- take my climbing gear for instance. I like it to match. Shoes and chalk bag are both ochre and black. I have two screw gauges and ATCs but I use the ones that are gold and black, not the red and silver ones. My harness is green and black and it gives me sleepless nights* that no climbing accessories seem to exist in the same mossy green shade to help me balance up the green in my collection. But I digress, back to the bag. If you don't have a suitcase then of course you can't match the bag to it but if you can't decide between two colourways and you do have a suitcase, what's the harm in choosing to match? NONE.

I was also initially surprised that Marie didn't have a suitcase. I was all, "How can she hot have a suitcase?! That's impossible?" Well it's not really, at least not in NZ. Over here, everyone has suitcases because everyone travels a fair amount. Small wheely suitcases are everywhere. But back in NZ, the hiking pack is more common, or larger backpacks. Suitcases, not to much. I guess it's just a lifestyle thing. In an airport, the people with suitcases, no matter how large, will usually be European and probably American. People lugging massive hiking packs will usually be from Aussie or NZ. This can, of course, differ depending on the age demographic and purpose of the trip but on the whole, I think it stands true.

Also, please note my use of the term 'hiking pack'. I cannot for the life of me now say 'tramping pack' or, for that matter, use the word 'tramping' at all. Being over here has put a new perspective on the word for me. How can I possible say, "When I was on a tramp once..." or "when I was tramping one time" without starting to snigger. I mean it's just dirty.

*okay, so I may be exaggerating a little bit

typical

If I were truly paranoid/superstitious, I would wonder if my declaration not to have chocolate for the rest of the week has jinxed my week. That or Fate happened to be eavesdropping at the time, heard me declare I could make it through the rest of the week without any choccie and rubbed her hands with glee and she went, "Oh yeah? Try this on for size Little Miss Chocoholic."

Without going in to detail, because I don't when it involves work, let's just say that suddenly I'm having to handle a multi-tasking bonanza and am so busy that I can't even get to the gym and I've become quite dependent on my midday endorphin fix so today my brain can't clear itself and I'm feeling a bit stressed. Last week was worse but I was ready for it. This week just snuck up behind me with a baseball bat (a reoccurring theme in my life you may notice...), the sneaky little sh*t.

I am going climbing tonight (please God don't let Fate hear that) so at least I'll get to work some of the aaaaaargh out of my system.

things I don't understand
and finally... some random things going through my head on the walk to work this morning
- socks and sandals: WTF?
- inability to use apostrophes: unacceptable
- putting mascara on before going diving: I don't care if it's waterproof or not. WTF?
- women who wear so much fake tan and makeup that they look orange: do they not look in the mirror?
- someone who doesn't much like chocolate or sweet things in general: this person is very hard for me to bribe. Usually I preface favours with the promise of cake or biccies. When I can't offer this I don't know what to do...

TFIF*

crazy woman at the gym
There is a crazy woman at my gym. In fact there's probably more than one but Ms. Transylvania (as I have named her) is as crazy as I'd like to meet. I'm minding my own business one day in the change rooms when suddenly there is this dramatic cry oh 'Oh my GOD! How tragic!" I turned around and this largish woman with a headband/turban made of toilet paper is standing on the other side of the room who proceeded to tell me and the lady standing beside me that 2 months from that day, in 2 year's time she would be 70. "It just hit me darling! 70! Oh it's horrible!" Now I may be in the UK but she sure ain't British and I was trying to place her accent and it finally hit me- she has that melodramatic way of drawing out her vowels (esp the word daaaarling, which she sprinkled liberally throughout her dialog) that made me think of some old-style Transylvania accented vampire. Luckily she focused on the lady beside me who was just about to turn 60 ("Oh but daarling that is nothing! I've been there, 60 is fantastic!") so I just turned my back and got on with getting changed.

feminism today
I got one of those forwarded mail humour things from a friend entitled 'female self esteem' and a couple of the things actually made me smile and so I share them with you now:
- we know all our kids are ours
- we have priority in a ship wreck
- we are the first hostages to go free
All three are good and valid points. ;-) And the last two points tie in quite nicely with my theory of modern feminism: there's no harm in letting a guy do it for you. I can be independent and self-reliant but there's nothing wrong with letting a male help you if you can't do it and if they offer to help but you can do it yourself, why not let them do it? It makes them feel good and saves you some effort. Everybody wins.

the aftermath
On Thursday I went climbing for the first time since getting back from my bungee experience. Now usually I would consider myself a fairly fearless climber (which I would argue is fairly easy way to be when you're top-roping. I'm sure once I'm putting the rope up myself and there's more slack in it and the falls are larger, I'll be more cautious) and am happy to jump for things and if I think I'm going to fall, I'll just tell my belayer so that they're ready for it. I don't mind the fall, as far as I'm concerned, I have faith in my equipment and my climbing buddy so nothing should go wrong. But Thursday was a little different. The first time I was being let down after finishing a climb, my knot tightened and the rope creaked, as it always will, and suddenly I had to fight this urge to grab on to the wall. It happened again later on when I was taking a break and sitting back on the rope and I thought to myself, "This is because of that bloody bungee jump." And it was. With knots tightening and things creaking, I suddenly had that memory of that feeling of free-fall, that stomach-almost-in-your-mouth feeling, that ohmyGodI'mabouttodie feeling. But I fought it and later on, when I took an unexpected fall (and usually I have an idea when I'm about to pop off the wall) I was perfectly fine. Nevertheless, I found it really interesting that I had residual bungee issues lurking in my psyche.

more crazy lady
I am writing this in installments throughout the day so now it's post-lunch and CRAZY LADY WAS THE THE GYM AGAIN. I've decided that she is my new fav crazy person because the stuff that comes out of her mouth is just gold. Today she was talking to a 'friend' about gardening: "Oh daarling, you know What'shername, ugly as sin, poor thing but her enthusiasm is so infectious, and she knows everything about gardening, she is just adorable." This woman actually manages to talk in italics, it's amazing.

*think TGIF but with more swearing

one small step for mankind, one giant leap for Aynia

I BUNGY JUMPED!


This weekend I went to the Outdoors Show in Birmingham with work as we had a stand there and the people on the stand beside us were willing to give us free bungy jumps so before my sanity could stop me, I signed up (and then got to wait a good half hour), got taken up 60m and got pushed out of a cage to hurtle down 45m and bounce around a few times.


I'm not scared of heights but I do have a healthy respect for my personal safety and all the way up in the cage I was looking around and going, "Wow, you can see everything from here, this view is amazing." but when it got to the point where I was standing on the edge of the cage I looked down and thought, "Oh my God, this is The Most Stupid Idea I've Had EVER". The guy said to me, "Don't worry, I'll count you down from three and I looked at him and said, "Like bollocks you will" and he got as far as two then pushed me. I KNEW IT.

It was incredible, I'll give it that. But I was also quite quite happy to have it over and done with. I definitely had an ohmyGodIalmostdied high at the end but that bottomless feeling as you plummet earthwards, it's quite bloody scary. Like fucking scary. And in fact, as I got pushed off, the first word to come tearing out of my mouth was 'fuck'. Luckily, it got as far as 'fu...' because Mum, you will be glad to know that even as I was hurtling towards certain death, the thought crossing my mind was, "Oh no Aynia, think of your mother, you can't swear all the way down, how uncouth." So I swallowed it. I could quite happily have heartily yelled fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck all the way though. Instead I had to settle for a mangled 'argh'.

idols

This woman is a legend. This is the kind of mum I want to be.

On the other hand, a woman with true class (in the etiquette-book, not socioeconomic, sense of the word) would probably not have taught her flu-stricken daughter to lick her wrist and then throw back the little cup of cough medicine like a tequila shot. Four-year-old Nora's dose is now too big for the baby syringe, and during this last illness I got tired of her taking eensy sip after eensy sip while complaining about the taste. So I demonstrated the proper technique with salt and my own wrist and a shot glass of water, and told her that "this is how people quickly drink something that tastes bad." (But tequila tastes GOOD! protested my brain. Be quiet brain, we're trying to parent over here.) Nora is a sucker for procedures and processes, so she learned the routine and now knocks 'em back like a big girl. We skip the lime, that's just empty vitamins.

Whatever. She is allowed to be angry, and she does pretty well with just going in her room and getting over it, which takes all of five minutes with the preschool attention span. If I need her to get over it right now (public place, guests in the house, etc), we have had some luck with a modified headstand to "dump the angry out," and then we pretend that there is a big gooey pile of angry on the floor, and I usually pretend to step in it and get it all over my shoe, ick gross, and if the situation is really desperate I am not above taking a big comedy pratfall in the slippery angry goop, because nothing is funnier than adult incompetence. Except maybe poop in a bag.

I do actually have other things to write about but I suspect I'll memo them in a draft to come back to next week when I have time.* But for now, it's Friday and I'm about to grab curry for dinner and then go see a friend's kittens (kittens! YAY!!!!). That's how to close a week.

*HA! As if. Given that my boss is away next week and I'm pretty much manning the fort and I'm meant to get most of the mag done in a week when we usually get about 4, yada yada yada, oh woe is me, time, let alone spare time, is not something I expect to be seeing a lot of...

but Golidlocks like many freaks, does not appreciate antiques

My Dad just blogged a whole set of hilarious pictures of burrowing owls inspired by a picture I emailed him recently. I've probably picked up my fondness for owls from my dad but I do have to say, they're pretty cool birds. The eyes- hilarious- and these burrowing ones seem to have a tendency to hang around standing on one leg which also seems to amuse me to no end.

I will also take this opportunity to tell you all to scroll down and keep checking previous entries as I did a whole bunch of 'drafts' on Egypt and am updating and posting them as I can.

Reading my dad's blog also drew my attention to the fact that I have a new Fables that I need to read which means getting back on Amazon which will be the undoing of me. Living in the UK, they have this thing whereby if you buy items to the value of £15 or more, you get free delivery. Now delivery isn't much at all but of course once you're on the site, its impossible to fight the urge to go, "Oh well there's no point in buying just one book, I should get another one (or two) to make it up to the free delivery amount." It happens every time and I KNOW I'm being suckered in but I just can't help it- mainly because buying more books does not feel like a waste of money. So now I'm off to Amazon to get me some literature. Whoopee!

the coolest thing in the world EVER

So I was wrong. This is the link I should have dedicated to Julie and Philip. I watched this with a look of joy and awe on my face. It's like totally superultraübermega cool.

shenanigans and high jinx

I've decided that these pics don't really need writing about because they're really just photos taken when we were out in the evenings. If people complain I may change my mind.


This is us imitating how Cara dives. The guy in the pic is Ayman, our instructor.










This is me post-diving with some mega-boofy salty hair. I had no idea I was looking quite this sexy or I might have done something about it...

diving

Firstly, let me apologise for the shitty quality of these underwater pics. (A) We were learning to dive and had bigger things to think about than taking pretty pictures, like breathing (B) we didn't really know what we were doing and taking underwater pics is a whole new ballgame.


This is us after one of our dives, not our first one I don't think but then it hardly matters.


These are little cleaner fish that hang out at cleaning stations. It was the first time I got to see a whole mass of fish moving in the way you see schools of them do on TV. We were hoping they'd come out to clean us but obviously we didn't need it.


NEMO!


blue spotted ray


Ayman, our dive instructor, took this pic because none of us were brave enough to get close enough to take the snap. This moray was hiding in a crevasse in the coral and was huge. How big exactly I have no idea, especially as everything is magnified by about 33% underwater due to goggles. He was a big mo-fo though.


I'm pretty sure this one was taken after our final dive. Left to right, Ali, me, Becs and Clara.

Learning to dive was awesome. I'm also really glad that I did it in a group, especially the girls from work because we were all really supportive of each other and it meant you didn't mind making a dick of yourself because everyone would laugh good-naturedly and you'd know that someone else would be looking gamby with something else. Because we were just learning, we didn't really get to go to any supercool areas but that was okay because most of my attention was on my buoyancy and not knocking in to coral and just getting used to everything. I've definitely caught the bug though and am already planning how I can keep this up and when I can get back. In my mind, I'm thinking November for setting my advanced but we'll have to see how things go. Ever since finishing my course, I've had severe water withdrawal and am looking in to joining a pool near me (when I find one) which, for those who know me well enough, is a pretty big thing because I don't do public pools. Two main factors in this are, in no particular order 1- little kids pee in pools (in fact not just little kids) 2- swimming togs. I don't do togs. I don't do skintight and I don't to skimpy. Well I can't do anything about #1 but urine is sterile and it's not like I'll be bathing in concentrated pee and #2 is fixable by shedding some pies and getting over myself. ;-) I think what I love about being underwater, ignoring all the cool wildlife and the peace and calm, is that you can move so freely in all dimensions. It's made me realise how limited I can feel being stuck to the ground so I need to get back in a pool and soon so I can just get underwater and fool around.

desert

To make things easier for me, I've broken my photos down in to sections so I'll photoessay them as I go. Oddly enough, first up are my desert pics- odd because it was the last thing I did.


After we finished our Open Water Course, we decided to take a trip in to the desert. What we ended up with was a morning trip in to the hills with quad bikes. On the whole, it was a pretty tame trip which I guess it had to be because none of us were experts and there were safety things to take in to account. Not that that mattered too much to me when all I wanted to do was go fasterfasterfaster....


This is a view of the desert looking back towards Naama Bay (where we stayed). Flying in to Sharm, I thought the desert was going to be a lot flatter and sandier than it was. I was thinking like-a-pancake-flat but it was more undulating and had lots of rocks and rubble and felt like a bit of a construction site.


This is looking back down on the little "Bedouin" place where we stopped half way through the ride. We also drove past quite a few similar structures and it was a bit of a shock for me. I didn't have anyone to ask and I'm reasonably interested to find out if these people live there through choice and lifestlye or if part of it is poverty because there were some places that were absolute shacks with rubbish strewn everywhere. I wanted to find someone and say, "Keep your desert clean! Don't you care what it looks like?"


This is us at the top of the teeny tiny hill we climbed up to get the view. From left to right: me, Ali, Becs and Clara.


I'm sure I don't really need 2 group shots but I'll put it in anyway. This one is me left, Clara in front and Ali behind right.


We saw a camel! Next time I'm out there, I think I'll try to get a ride on one. When we stopped to photograph this one, it started moving its jaws in a manner that made me a bit anxious about spit-potential but even if it was thinking about it, it kept it to itself.


This is me all kitted up on my bike looking like a terrorist. You have to buy a headscarf (total rip-off) to wrap around you to keep dust out. Don't be fooled in to thinking you can do without it. I had dust on my bra when I came away from that place. Now that's dusty.


And finally, cool rock formations along the way.

I'm definitely going back to Egypt. I want more diving and I want more desert. Next time I'm back, I'd like to do an overnight trip which I imagine would be supercool because even as we invading the place with our vroomvroom bikes, it still felt so amazing calm. And maybe that's part of the appeal of Egypt for me- you have desert calm and underwater calm which are both totally different and yet so similar and they're right beside each other, never mind the contrast of all that water right beside a desert.

whimsy

She had me worried for a second there
Coming back from a week away, there are a lot of blog entries to catch up on and so far I've only managed to skim about half of my regulars. I nearly had a heart attack though when I skimmed Autumn Zebra and came across an entry entitled why I heart Vista. My immediate reaction: WTF?!!!!?!!???? My slightly more delayed reactions: 1- let this be irony 2- if its not, remember you love her anyway and she's a PC user so really, maybe she just doesn't know any better 3- noooooooooooooooooooooooooooo 4- maybe I should actually read what it says... which I only finally got around to doing this morning and thank God, all is well in the world, I will not have to disown a friend, it was irony. Vista is shit. Surprise surprise- and at this point I will totally freely admit that I'm a Mac user and one that has a knee-jerk muderdeathkill* response to all things PC. Have I used Vista? Nope. (Do I want to? Over my dead body.) Have I researched it at all and read extensive customer reviews? Nope. So am I pretty much dissing it from a point of ignorance? You betcha. But do I care? Not so much. So what's the point in what I've just written? Well mainly it's to say, "Marie, don't ever do that to me again, no ironical pro-microsoft titles in your blogs, I'm not made of strong enough stuff." ;-)

snip snap
All my hair is gone. Well for me it's all gone- this is definitely the shortest I've ever had it. It's above my shoulders and I can hardly tie it back. The weird thing is, I'm really happy with it and it isn't quite what I was expecting. It would seem that I caught myself in one of my oh-what-the-heck moods. I knew I wanted a change- well I thought I wanted a change but was totally prepared to hear myself asking the hairdresser to just tidy it up a bit. Instead, I heard myself telling him to have at it and I wanted a change. Hmmm.... Usually I've never totally happy with my haircuts but ignoring that, I love going to the hairdresser.
I love watching hair getting cut- the shaping it out of nothing kind of thing but nobody has ever been as fun to watch as the guy who cut my hair yesterday. He is without a doubt the most energetic hairdresser I've ever seen. He stood behind me and kind of bobbed and danced around and his enthusiastically hacked off my hair, I felt like I'd had a workout just watching him. Eventually I had to ask if he stabbed himself a lot with the scissors when he was learning and he said that he still does from time to time and I find that very easy to believe. He said that to get proper texture in to hair, the movement of the scissors is the most important thing in which case I must have some of the most energetic and lively texture out there. I made Sarah take some photos of it last night and although they don't really it justice (please ignore Sean in the background), I thought some photos were better than none. Also I didn't fluff it properly at the back so it looks uneven but it isn't really. Obviously. So yesterday I was trendily salon-styled Aynia but this morning I got to wake up to just-slept-on-it, low maintenance Aynia and now I remember what my hair does when it's short. In true Gemini fashion, it can't make up its mind so the left side likes to be all funky and flick out and the right side likes to be all conformist and curl in. I spent about 5 minutes running a wet hairbrush through it and trying to coax both sides to do the same thing, no matter what that might be and then gave up because it doesn't really bother me that much. So I have insane hair- so what?


*and if you don't know what movie that's from, shame on you

this one goes out to my sister

And maybe to Philip, my wannabe rap friends. xox 'nuff said

so rude

Everyone knows that when you come back to work after a nice relaxing holiday, you're gonna have to deal with Reality at some point. Now I'm the kind of girl who prefers my reality to sidle up to me in a bashful manner and hang around behind me scuffing it's feet as it coughs politely to try and get my attention and when that fails, it might, just might pluck up the courage to tap me gently on the shoulder as it cleared its throat. That's how I prefer my reality but it sure as heck ain't how I get it. My reality gives me half an hour (the half hour that I was in the office before anyone else) and then charges at me full tilt, swinging its baseball bat with malicious intent. But I refuse to let it win, I'm nothing if not stubborn, so I just don my kevlar vest, put on my iPod, then my crash helmet, and settle in.

Before I start in on Egypt I have to share a quote from Mimi Smartypant's blog because it was one of the first things I read when I got back and I laughed out loud. Loudly.

11. The other day a group of teenagers from the not-so-nice high school on my bus route boarded the bus and began some typical stupidity---throwing stuff, fake-wrestling, etc. Normally I don't care, but after one of them almost crash-landed in my lap for the second time I pulled out the headphones and tugged on the sleeve of the closest perpetrator, saying, "Hey. Please cut it out."

Maybe I delude myself in thinking that I look like enough of a mom/old lady/respectable citizen that they would be a tiny bit chastised and comply. Because I was honestly surprised when I the kid told me to fuck off. It may sound otherwise in this diary, but I am pretty chill about public space. You can skateboard or yap on your cell phone or sing to yourself and as long as you don't actually SHOVE ME or YANK YOUR ROD it is all good in the hood. But shove me AND give me lip AND you are a punk-ass no-account high school kid in the bargain? Oh, then it's on. I gave him my best stern look and started putting my book away and getting my gloves on, because we were almost at my stop.

One of the Shoving Kid's friends snickered something about his reprimand while I was standing at the back door, ready to disembark, and I heard SK say, "Fuck that. I'm gonna fucking rape that bitch."

Excuse me? Is this a figure of speech? Remember that WTF light? Blinking like crazy right about now. What I Should Have Done: walked right over there and planted my Chuck Taylor hard in his scrotum. I'd get away with it too---see me here all respectable and mom-like with my briefcase and lunch bag? What I Did Do, Inexplicably: yelled "ASSHOLE, YOU COULDN'T RAPE A WAFFLE!" right before I got off the bus. You couldn't rape a waffle. Where did that come from? I am as puzzled as you.

A long quote I know but I felt all the context was needed. "You couldn't rape a waffle?!" Oh the genius. Oh the hilarity.

best intentions

I came in to work early this morning with every intention of getting at least one decent blog entry done but what with time getting eaten up downloading photos etc....

Oooh bugger- people just flooding in and what with one thing or another, it's all hands on deck. Must dash. Don't think I'll be making it to climbing tonight.... Erck.

zzzzzzzz

Well I'm back from Egypt and I promised my Dad I'd blogged today but after going out and foraging for food and restocking the shelves, I find that I'm absolutely shattered and need an afternoon kip before I head out to meet some of the girls for dinner and a movie. So it could well take until tomorrow till I get around to writing about my trip, or anything at all for that matter. The thought of it is a bit intimidating actually because there's so bloody much to write about- I think I'll have to do it in instalments. So for now, to those who I know will be wanting to nag me to fill them in, just wait a day and then I'll have something for you.

Peace out.

xox