Ok, Bethy’s had a tit job.
Before
Yep, cosmetic surgery of the breast variety. Her tits, her choice.
“Why on earth would she need that, for one so young and fit?” I hear you cry. Well that’s just it, because she’s so bloody fit, (she takes after her mother.) When Bethy was younger she was, to her mind, far more in proportion. But years of playing basketball, coaching basketball, hitting the gym 4 x per week, hiking holidays, playing five-a-side soccer, and generally being an active young woman, had made her loose a fair amount of weight. Unfortunately it hadn’t all come off proportionally, and, to her mind, she was left with unattractive boobage.
Luckily, she didn’t go and do what friends of L-A’s who have had similar procedures did. They had gone out and found the cheapest deals, which around here tend to be in Malaysia or Thailand, and come with free hepatitis. Most of them had taken out loans to pay for them. All of them had ended up with tits like beachballs.
If she’d have been considering that, we’d have had words to say. Of course we sat down with her and discussed it, and she provided us with sufficient reassurance, and had saved up sufficient money to pay up front, (just don’t ask how much, I’ll be weeping again,) saving a fair whack by doing so. Even though we didn’t think she needed it, and we were happy to tell her so, she had made her mind up, and planned to get it done.
So she saved up, sought out the best surgeon, and went in and found out the pros and cons, then booked herself in. The clinic was in Canberra, and the surgeon , Dr Alistair Taylor, highly rated.
Surprisingly short stay in Hospital, virtually in one day out the next, with follow up back at the clinic. The results are, surprisingly unspectacular, thank fuck. She does look more proportional, but there again, she looked proportional before the opp, abet with a bit of help from push up bras and sticking plaster. She’s very happy with the new puppies, that’s the most important bit. Brandon, who also did not think she needed it, hasn’t had a smile off his face in weeks. She still has another week before she can get back to her normal activity level, and she’s champing at the bit to resume her sports.
Bethy says; ” You might want to mention that I had lost 3 cups sizes, but I am back to my original cup size. In Dr. Taylor’s words I also had nipple drop, slight asymmetry and slight tuberosity.”
While I’m on matters Bethy. As you may know, one of Bethy’s part time jobs is “Bill the dentist’s” office manager/receptionist/dental nurse. Bill the dentist asked her to come in to work for an extra shift the other day, which meant she had to rearrange her life at short notice. She told him she wasn’t particularly happy with this, as he does do it a bit too often. He recognised this, and reassured her that she was so valuable to him that he’d like to recognise it properly. So he gave her a 25% pay increase.
Me and Brandon took a trip up to Sydney together to see “Stiff Little Fingers”. I haven’t seen SLF since 1977 when they played the Glen Ballroom in Llanelli. 39 years between gigs, must be some sort of record?
Mind you, one thing that really stands out about that gig in The Glen in Llanelli, was frontman Jake Burns coming on stage to rapturous applause and saying;
“Thank, you! Thank you Llanelli! We had to play Llanelli, we HAD to play Llanelli!
We couldn’t get a gig in Swansea.”
Our first trip away together without the birds, that was a bit odd. But it worked out just fine fortunately. We took Brandon’s car again, as it was far more likely to get us there. But I did us no favours by typing “King Road” not “King Street” into the GPs, which took us to an entirely different suburb of Sydders than the one we needed. A little juggling and deviation eventually got us to Newtown and our accommodation.
We’d got single rooms at Sunshine Lodge, as it’s ideally situated, has friendly staff, but most of all was cheap as chips. Our rooms, though minimally furnished were more than adequate, and clean and comfortable. For an extra $10 we got a parking space with them too, handy as parking is at a premium in Newtown. Sunshine Lodge is a funny place which straddles the border between a hostel and a cheap hotel. But it was ideal for us as we only needed a place to kip after being out to the gig.
We had a few beers in Newtown, then headed into the city centre to the gig. Shows how old I’m getting, I spent the whole gig, (2 support acts included,) at the back of the venue and as near to the bar as I could stand, sinking scotch at greatly inflated prices. Brandon spent the night down in the mosh pit. The youthful bastard.
Brandon’s in there somewhere
The gig itself was great!SLF put on a fine, if nostalgic, show, and I was totally astonished to remember, and howl along to, the many hits I’d totally forgotten they had had.
“Suspect Device”
“Alternative Ulster”
“Gotta Gettaway”
“Bloody Sunday”
“Straw Dogs”
“You Can’t Say Crap on the Radio”
“At the Edge”
“Nobody’s Hero”
“Tin Soldiers”
“Back to Front”
“Just Fade Away”
“Doesn’t Make It Alright”
They finished up with their best song, (a cover of Bob Marley number, ) “Johnny was.”
There were loads of the old “Punk’s not dead” brigade there.
Not quite dead.
We got back to Newtown just late enough to miss last orders, bugger.
The annual Skippy slaughter is on.
Almost 2,000 kangaroos will be culled across the ACT starting on Monday to protect grassland and woodland sites. Ten nature reserves will be closed from mid to late afternoon until early morning over the coming months to allow a conservation cull of eastern grey kangaroos. Daniel Iglesias, director of ACT Parks and Conservation, said the cull of up to 1991 eastern grey kangaroos was needed to protect biodiversity and maintain populations at appropriate levels to minimise impacts on other flora and fauna.
You’re fucked matey.
The other day, when at work, I was asked to stand in for, and bail out, the kiddies team, as an “EA” (emergency action,) was needed on a young woman who was known to be violent. I’m licensed to sign off on “EA”, papers, so be nice to me or I’ll have you banged up. The kiddies team is full of pregnant women, and their only available staff member was 6 months up the duff. I get asked to help out like this a lot, as a big ugly man is useful when dealing with little sods who act out.
Anyway, we went to the house, me and Kathy, from the perinatal team, who’d also been roped in. On admission we found the parents were in bits, and screams like the banshees of seven hells was coming from the bathroom. So Kathy, (good cop) went and did the nice soothing calmative talking, and I kept the parents away. After an hour it was obvious that Kathy wasn’t getting the desired result.
Ok, so Kathy keeps the parents out of range and I go in, (bad cop.)
“Ok, you have two options, and two minutes. Option one. You come out of your own accord, get in the car, and we go to the hospital to see the nice doctor. Option two. You choose to stay in the bathroom, after two minutes I come in through the door, whether it’s locked or not. Then we get the police to escort you to the hospital where you will be assessed. You have two minutes to decide which option you want.”
Two minutes later the door is unlocked, and out stepped a little anorexic Alice Cooper lookalike. She’d done her makeup with whiteboard markers, (honestly,) in blacks and reds, I didn’t laugh.
So we took her up the hospital fortunately voluntarily, and she’s in there still. The next week I got an email off the chief shrink at the hospital.
Hi Taff & Cathy
I wanted to thank you both for the excellent job you did last week supporting the EA and transfer of a very worrying and complex young woman to the ED. I know that for both of you this was a role you were asked to carry out at short notice because of others staff unexpectedly not being available, and in addition to all your other duties. I also know that this was a very challenging situation that could have escalated quite considerably, adding to what was already a traumatic experience for the young person and her family. Your skills and expertise were crucial in facilitating a far smoother admission for assessment than had been anticipated. The young girl remains in hospital on an order, and is clearly still very unwell with limited insight. I have had several meetings with her parents who have stated what a wonderful job you both did in terms of supporting their daughter, and they have expressed their gratitude and thanks for that. Here at the adolescent ward we continue to work with this young person, but I certainly feel that the level of expertise, respect and dignity that was afforded her at the outset of the admission has been crucial in facilitating the engagement we have with her and her family.
Nice to be appreciated.
Talking of work, I spotted this van outside our office the other day, and had to take a snap!
We’ve been to see a couple of photography exhibitions, and why not!
“The world is beautiful” is an exhibition of photographs taken over the last 100 years from the National Gallery of Australia’s magnificent photography collection, including work by Diane Arbus, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Bill Henson, Robert Mapplethorpe, Man Ray, Cindy Sherman, Edward Weston and many more. It draws its title from one of the twentieth-century’s great photographic moments, the publication of Albert Renger-Patzsch’s book The world is beautiful in 1928. Renger-Patzsch’s approach embodied his belief that ‘one should surely proceed from the essence of the object and attempt to represent it with photographic means alone’.
Robert Doisneau Un regard oblique [A sidelong glance] 1948, gelatin silver photograph, printed 1990 National Gallery of Australia, Canberra
National Photographic Portrait Prize 2016
Saturday 19 March until Sunday 26 June 2016
The National Photographic Portrait Prize exhibition is selected from a national field of entries, reflecting the distinctive vision of Australia’s aspiring and professional portrait photographers and the unique nature of their subjects.
I’ve been thinking of entering, but my stuff is just too good.
We saw Ross Noble, again. This was for the fifth time, he’s just as good value though. My only disappointment was that we were sat quite far back, so I didn’t get the chance to banter with him as I have done each of the other times we’ve seen him. I wonder if he missed me?
On the subject of gigs, we’ve also got tickets to see;
Stephen Layton is one of the leading choral directors of our time. His ‘home’ choir is at The Trinity College Cambridge, where the fresh young voices of male and female undergraduates are carefully auditioned for sought after places in what was recently named one of Gramophone magazine’s 20 Greatest Choirs.
For this tour they will perform one of the 20th-century’s most beautiful choral works: the 1922 ‘Mass for Unaccompanied Double Choir’ by Frank Martin. The composer regarded it as an intensely personal spiritual expression – it took forty years for him to allow it to be heard – and it has never left the spotlight since.
(Me and Mary)
Also;
Dec 06, Tue. Australia vs New Zealand, 2nd ODI Manuka Oval, Canberra
(Me, L-A, Mary)
But certainly not forgetting;
(Me, L-A, Brandon & Bethy.)
But our big news is this; we’ve paid off our UK mortgage!!!! We now own a little cottage in Cornwall.
This turn of events was brought on by our current tenants handing in their notice. That was a real shame, as we were very fond of them, considering them mates rather than tenants. (Regular blog readers will know of the “India’s present debacle,” which we cocked up the last time we were back in Cornwall.) But they found themselves in a position to buy their own place, so we couldn’t begrudge them. Much.
In the past, gaps between tenants have necessitated us sending back wads of money to cover the mortgage, so I reasoned; “If we’re going to be sending lumps of dosh back, why not send as much as we can and reduce the mortgage as much as we can.” From, this it was a short logical leap to; “Why not see if we can pay the fucking lot off?”
So we decided to bite the bullet and ask for a “settlement figure” for the house from our lenders.
We found that by sending money from our Aussie savings, and using up money already stowed in the UK, we could afford to pay off the house, while still having reasonable financial cushions in Blighty and Aus. So we went for it!
Well, we didn’t immediately, as the $Au was slowly rising against the quid, and all indications were, what with the “Brexit” furore, that the quid would fall even further. But L-A got sick to the back teeth of me emailing her every five minutes at work to let her know that the $Au had risen by 0.0003p, and finally snapped; “Do it now, send the fucking money, or never mention it to me again.”
So I bit when the $au was at 54.3p, (I’d wanted to wait for 55p.) Funnily enough, that was at the highest rate it was to reach, a week later it was down to 52 p, and as of the writing of this, stands at 49.6 p.
Big fucking deal you may think? Try this;
Ok, sending, as we did, $12,000.00 Au at 54.3p got us £6516.00. Sending the same amount today would get us £5952.00, a loss of £564.00
Just as some icing on the cake, I rang the letting agents a few nights back to discuss some practicalities, (we’re were giving the leaving tenants a week’s free stay as a “house warming” gift to them.) The letting agent tells me that she has already relet the place, without a gap in tenancy, after the current people leave, and at an increased monthly rate.
WIN!!
The plan is now to remodel the whole house. Knock three bedrooms into two. Move the bog backwards, and use the space which the corridor now uses, add a new front door, and open the kitchen and living room into one big kitchen diner. Also to add a conservatory. Seeing as original building dates back to 1890, and the house is in an “area of outstanding natural beauty,” we may have to bribe some planning officers. Jamesy will know the best way of doing this.
The magical images I’ve produced for your delight this month can be found by clicking here, or on the image below.
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