Mad, mad, mad. Oh yeah, and that lyric was a Dire Straits classic – Roller Girl from Making Movies back in 1981 (I think). Toro has had a few outings since the picture was posted. Interrupted by our trip to Kingscliff, during which time the plumber finally arrived to ‘finish’ our septic tank work. Required digging up 400 sq metres of my beautiful grass to put drainage down – let’s just say they don’t take too much care when doing it. The once lovely luscious green turned back to brown & shale coloured again. Not happy. ‘It’ll grow back’ I was told. Sure enough, most of it is coming back but it’s now many sections of ‘stony grey soil’ as the great Patrick Kavanagh would say. Time, time, time. That’s all it needs. And rain. Had a week of it recently which was good, now it’s all dry again. And mild. 28 degrees and it's deemed mild.
A bit of maintenance and upkeep on an acre I have to say. Spent Sunday just gone moving 3 cubic metres of dirt and then planting. Lots. 48 plants this time. We’re getting there – smallish but lots of them to give them a long chance to grow. And so we can actually afford them right now. A few years and it’ll look like we’ve been here forever. Have to tackle the fricken creek soon – lots of weed spraying required and weed tree chopping - chainsaw style. Someday, we might be able to afford someone to come along every so often and start trimming. Maybe.
2 weeks of uninterrupted sunshine adorned our holiday in Kingscliff – about 1.5 hours south of here – beyond the concrete crassness of the Gold Coast. A beautiful, laid back and fairly untouched spot. The kids had an absolute cracker of a time, 3-4 hours a day in pools of various types in the resort we were in. Brown as berries by the end of it. We spoiled ourselves with a Nanny for a few days during the trip, expensive option and quite weird getting used to it. She previously looked after both Aibhe and Emma in their day care, but was really there to help with Max. But the girls were very attached and there were tears of devastation and dejection when she left us after her 4 day stint. Having been asked not to return to work post holiday by my daughters, I’ve now explained that without Daddy’s work and the money Daddy gets for it, there is no holidays or ‘special things’. Aibhe practically pushed me out the door first day back.
Emma’s had a few speech lessons. She had been struggling a bit with some of her words so it was time. Now we cannot shut her up as she spouts all the previously difficult parts of her vocabulary perfectly. She’s the joker of the pack, but we’re told she’s very intelligent. She hides it well.
What else.
Ah yes, been to Hong Kong again for a few days. Overnight flights there and back, but thankfully upgraded to business on both legs so just about tolerable. Stayed in a bit of a smelly dump while there. Hong Kong is nuts when it comes to how busy it’s hotels are. It’s constantly booked out.... so if you go on short notice, it’s a case of paying ridiculous rates or accepting a lower standard. Next time I will be getting advance notice, no intention of staying in a place with a fish and meat market right outside the door. Big bloody project coming our way next year which will mean a few more trips to Honkers. As usual, while I was gone, the family got sick. Alissa had tonsillitis and the kids were struggling too – a few rough days. May as well set the sickness clocks by my travel schedule at this point.
Max is fat. No 2 ways about it. HUGE. I’d like to say he’s still quite cute, but then we said that about Aibhe and looking back now......... hmmmmm. But, the big fella is eating like a horse. Thankfully, he is now sleeping ‘through’. Meaning we put him down at 7, and he wakes at 5’ish. Really can’t complain about that after 5 months.
Just moved offices also. From level 33 to level 3. Same building. No more spectacular views over the Brisbane river and out to sea and Stradbroke island for me. No, a nice modern office now looking across the road at 'Felix', one of the high rise buildings Geoff designed. Parkers are now in my life during the day as well as night!
Tell ye what though. It’s a very interesting job discussing salaries with people at remuneration review time. Not sure people read papers or listen to the news sometimes. The world doesn’t know if it’s going to shit itself tomorrow, never mind start forking out 20% pay increases when really, job roles haven’t changed that much. Some hard discussions being had - ahh all the fun of the CFO. While the economy here has been what I would call ‘steady’, it’s certainly not picking up at any rate that’s for certain. And there’s probably at least 2 more years of that sluggishness ahead.
I watched the 2000 to 2009 Reeling in the Years recently – very weird as I can’t connect with a lot of it having been in Australia for 6 of the years. In all the older ones I know the tunes, remember the stories, feel the nostalgia. Anyway, watching the series was quite sobering with the countless warnings about bubbles bursting etc that came from the more experienced and reasoned of the population between 2004 and 2007. How they were just outright ignored and dismissed as pessimistic (or whatever) is truly shocking – bordering on criminal. How f&cking dumb were the most senior and ‘respected’ heads of our banks not to pay heed to any of this and to then come back and say everything is grand – less than 1 year off the start of the collapse?? Not sure what good time Bertie is up to these days, but himself and McCreevy have so much to answer for it is not funny – has to go down as the most mismanaged period of Irish governmental history, which is saying something given Haughey’s reign of greed and lies. Am sure everyone at home is sick to death of all this, but it is so enraging that we entrusted these f&ckwits to run the place effectively and look after the futures for us and our kids, and we may as well have put a bunch of fluffy clouds in the Dail and they’d have done less damage. Rant over.
It genuinely did not have to happen this way. I just keep hoping and praying that the people I am close to can manage to steer clear of its effects. So far, fingers crossed and long may it continue.
Nollaig Shona dhiabh go leir.
