Cat-astrophes

So it seemed like the battle was over. Mr Handyman drove off in his little white van leaving behind more spikes (sadly no big red eye...) and the stupid birds sat on my balcony coo-coo-cooing and wondering what to do.

I threw a cushion at the window and that gave them something to do for the brief moment...

I was happy. Man triumphed over pidgeon.

I celebrated with an iced tea, and sat back on my comfy lounge.

Then I heard it.

tap tap tap tap tap....tappity tappity....cooo? tap tap tap

You have to be kidding.

Mr handyman spiked a pidgeon in the roof!!

That was obviously a few days ago. The tapping has since stopped - so whether someone called someone to come and rescue the crazy bird, or whether I should be expecting a fowl (pun intended) smell soon....I don't quite know....

And here I thought the whole pidgeon-ordeal was over...

xxx

My ongoing battle with pidgeons in the roof is continuing. Though this time there is one *big* bird up there...

Strata must've finally called someone in to get rid of the birds...however it doesn't sound like they are too fazed by his presence.

I can hear 'bang bang bang bang' as Mr Pidgeon-Man crawls across one side of the roof and 'patter patter patter patter' as StupidPidgeon walks over to the other side. This has been happening for the last 15 minutes.

Bang bang bang bang shuffle bang

patter patter patter patter patter "cooooo"

There was silence for awhile until 'crrrack'...a massive ladder landed right outside my window (glass intact). It is rather uncomfortable when there is a handyman leaning on your 3rd story window and you have no place to go...do you hide, smile and wave, completely ignore or open up the window and offer milk and cookies?

It has now been silent for 10 minutes...I'm wondering who has won. Maybe Mr Pidgeon Man brought one of those big red eyes!

xxx

So the waters have dried up, the carpet has been deoderised* and furniture has been returned.

I include a little asterisk (*) because all though the carpet has been deoderised, a putrid stench still remains. Smells are one thing I don't deal with. Everything must smell good. I have air fresheners everywhere - 2 in the bathroom, one in each room, one in the car, closet, garage, classroom...so soggy old brown carpet smell does not make peace with me at all.

Yesterday I mentioned burning incense.

I've also made a staggering discovery. Copious amounts of incense not only clears the sinuses, but irritates eyes and brings on lightheadedness and dizzy spells. SO...I conclude that the happy hippy generation weren't really high on suspicious substances...it was really all to do with the incense.

Now excuse me whilst I tie-dye my underwear.

xxx

You know when you have those 'feelings' that something isn't quite right? Well, I had one of those 'feelings' yesterday when I was out getting a hair cut. My stomach started getting butterflies...then there was that sinking feeling as I remembered my washing.

I had left the machine on as I left...which I do often...though this time I was getting butterflies.

As my head was getting massaged during the whole shampoo-ing process all I could think of was my washing...and a puddle. I could visualise water all over the floor.

The hair-dresser made friendly chit-chat...how's work? What have you been doing with your holidays? etc etc....all I could think of was water trickling onto the floor and into the laundry cupboard, saturating the washing powder inside for the 7th time.

I met up with a friend for lunch afterwards...again...washing washing washing washing....

I went home and straight to the laundry...I got to the kitchen, and fair enough - a puddle.

Gut-feeling is correct once again. Sighing, and rather calmly I set down the shopping, arranged my newest lillies in a vase and decided to make a trip to the bathroom before mopping up the laundry/kitchen floor.

I kicked off my shoes, walked into the loungeroom and....squelch.

I froze.

My eyes fell to the floor to see my feet sitting cozily in about a centimetre of water. Oh no...my toes felt around to see how far the water reached...I moved the couch...more water...I moved the corner chair...more water...Oh no....I moved the other couch... more water!! In fact, water covered a quarter of my oversized loungeroom floor.

Immediately I grabbed a towel and threw it on the floor...and immediately picked it up again when my beautiful white towel started to soak up ugly brown water!! Stoopid rental apartment carpet...of course I had nothing else to mop up the mess with except a hand towel and a tea towel. So I set to it with a bucket, and this is how Mr Man found me - standing in a puddle with my jeans rolled up to my knees wringing coffee-brown water into a bucket.

So now it is 24 hours since the whole ordeal. The floor is still damp, but at least no longer provides a habitat for duckies and what-not...I have every window open and the house stinks. I have burnt so much insense I now have an urge to sit cross legged and say 'Ohm'. In fact the smell is so bad my teenage brother (might I remind you what the potencey of the smells of a teenage boy potentially could be) said "Do me a favour and don't invite me over - next time you're visiting us".

How depressing.

Amusing...but depressing...

xxx

There is nothing quite like a few slices of pumpernickel in the morning. It's almost like compacted bread - it takes up less room, but may even be more filling...

Usually I couple a slice of pumpernickel with a range of toppings - my favourite is cranberry sauce, baby spinach, turkey and Camembert cheese. Another is the simple but classic cream cheese & smoked salmon...but I only ever eat it as an open sandwich.

Today I decided to walk on the wild side and make a closed sandwich with the little dark rye bread...(yep, holidays must be in full swing when sandwich making becomes exciting...)

Pumpernickel is not so good for this purpose...the squeeze-factor involved when eating a sandwich puts too much stress on the bread for it to remain intact...and the result is many many pieces of squishy rye all over my floor.

Many pieces.

Many squishy pieces.

This brings me to a new dilemma.
Food sometimes scares me...emetophobia is a fear of vomiting...not only do I fear it, but there are a stack of things I 'can't do' because of it. Now over the years I have improved a little - I can now drink orange juice again - still can't even think about drinking apple juice. I can't eat fruit more than 4 days after I have bought it, nor consume food that has been made/cooked after the second day. Silly, I know...but I guess that's the nature of it - it's irrational.

What does this have to do with pumpernickel?

One of my little 'quirks' involves picking up food off the ground. I will do it, because obviously it needs to be done, but I start to get anxious...I don't know how my head seems to think that picking up dropped food is going to make me sick...it's not like I'm licking the floor...

Hmmm...anyway, so after cleaning up after breakfast I had to go lie down from emotional exhaustion.

I think I need to get out of the house...

xxx

Not something I thought I would ever be blogging about...but I had the *best* guacamole ever last night!

In fact, this guacamole was so good I couldn't sleep because I was thinking about it so much.

It was there still in my mind when I woke...and even now that I have just eaten breakfast it's all I can do to stop thinking about it still...

I've craved many things before, but I think this is the first time I have craved guacamole...

I'm even having issues typing....if I close my eyes I can still remember the taste....mmmm....

...excuse me...

xxx

My cupboards were bare and my stomach grumbled in protest of not being fed. Pasta sauce and cereal didn't sound appetising so I ventured off to the shops for groceries.

What I didn't know was that the shopping centre was being rennovated. There was no way of actually getting from the carpark into the centre aside from a temporary service lift.

Yes, you read me right - a temporary lift. I'm sorry but elevators should not be temporary!!

I stood inside with 5 others wondering how stable this thing actually is when it suddenly shuddered to life. The jolt was enough to give some unsuspecting person whiplash - so I did what any girl would do. I squeeled.

A few people giggled. "You'll get used to it, dear" an ederly lady comforted me. I don't want to get used to it!!

The stop was just as rough and coupled with a big 'BOOOM!'. I stumbled out and fell to my knees, kissing the ground...

...okay, I didn't do that, but I have never been so excited to get out of an elevator before (except maybe the time the one in my old building broke down between floors).

I took my time shopping - I was certainly in no hurry to return to that glorified laundry chute. However, it wasn't until I was standing infront of it again that I realised that this was the 'going down' part...I could very well plummet to my death here...I was interupted by some loud booming noises - boom boom boom boom boom boom...for a moment I couldn't work out whether it was the lift or my heart...

The door opened, and this time I held on...

Yet, even though I braced myself I couldn't help the scream that escaped...

"YAAAAAaaaaaAAAAAGH!!"

Can I just say that free-fall rides at amusement parks now seem like see-saws in comparison?

Who needs bungee-jumping when you can go elevator diving?

xxx

Have I mentioned that I'm on holidays yet???

Holidays bring with it good and bad habits. Good habits include more exercise, relaxation, quality time with loved ones, reading books, long walks along the beach at sunset and other exciting things...

Bad habits include sleeping in (okay, my idea of a sleep in is to 7:30am, but it's still a sleep in!), staying in pjs until 9 (again, not late to some, but late for me!) and...my personal favourite...a chocolate breakfast!

This kind of cancels out the exercise-factor...but hey, it's worth it.

Currently I'm working on a Ferrero Rocher. This presents seme implications for my chocolate-philosophy. Generally I believe chocolate quanitities should always be maximised in food. Additives such as nuts, minty bits, gooey stuff etc should only ever add to the experience and never take away from valuable chocolate space. There are very few things that do this successfully. Usually I would be a little miffed at the high quantities of nuts and wafer...however Rocher seem to make a perfect balance with rich 'good' chocolate, unlike all of those other compoundy substances most commonly found.

Though I'm not here to talk Ferrero Rochers....I'm here to talk about what is next on the menu. Toblerone. Now once again, I'm not the greatest fan of this chocolatey treat as although the nougat and nuts add to the experience, I would much rather spend my money on Lindt and have a divine chocolate experience.

But I'm getting distracted. What makes this particular Toblerone special is that what it lacks in ratio of chocolate quantity, it makes up in quantity! One of the lovely girls in my class won a 4.5 kilogram bar of Toblerone....and she gave her favourite teacher a piece! Though this is no ordinary piece...this is a slab. In fact, I am still pondering how on earth to eat the thing...

Usually with Toblerone I will break off a single piece and put the entire thing in my mouth until it melts away and I'm left with a chewy mass of nougat.

But as you can see the whole thing doesn't even fit in my hand, let alone in my mouth... so, another chocolate-eating dilemma. Logic says 'break it'. My mouth says 'bite it'. My eyes provide a greater problem - aesthetics. Breaking it or biting it would take away from its smooth triangular form....so all of this becomes too much of an effort and I know I'm only going to do what I have been doing with it for the past week now - put it back in the fridge and eat another Forrero Rocher instead.

xxx