Dances to the beet of her own drum

Birthday’s are always an occasion to fuss in my mother’s house. My dad……… well he loves my mum, but despite his degree in engineering, he’s a space cadet a little vague when it comes to some things. There have been times when I was little that my mother’s birthday was completely forgotten. Not good peoples. Not good.

About a month ago I spotted a very basic digital camera on sale for quite a reasonable price that I thought would be ok for mum .So I got in touch with my siblings to see if they wanted to chuck in, then put it on layby.

On Tuesday I was chatting to my mother on the phone (yes we can chat as long as we avoid some topics - like my childhood, my weight, my parenting skills, my marriage, my worth as a daughter) and asked her did she want to come around for tea for her birthday, but perhaps on another night if Dad was taking her out for tea. She tells me to hold on then asks Dad is he’s taking her out for tea on her birthday. I says to Mum ‘ Is he now looking at you like you have two heads and wondering what the hell you are asking him about that for this early in the week?’. She cracks up laughing. I know my father very well.

She eventually decides on Sunday night (tonight) to come for tea. Cos my hubby will be home. My Dad likes my hubby better than any of his actual children and this way he’ll have someone to drink beer with talk to.

Her birthday was on Friday. I rang and wished her a happy birthday in the morning, wanting to avoid blame for ruining another birthday like the dutiful daughter I am. On Friday night, I’m sitting at the pc sticky beaking at all your blogs minding my own business when my mobile phone rings. It’s Dad. He’s lost Mum and do I know where she is? WTF? How on earth do you take someone out for tea and LOSE THEM?

I found out how you do that the next day when I rang to see what had happened. Dad had wanted to go to the club at his normal time (mid-afternoon) and Mum had dropped him off, then she was taking the courtesy bus back down at tea time so that she could have a glass or two of wine cos Dad would be too shitfaced to drive her home so she could drink on her birthday

The bus was held up picking up other people and Dad in his half cut stupour panicked so started ringing all his children thinking something was wrong somewhere.

Can we all say “Beer kills brain cells” people?

Meantime none of the scummy bastards the siblings have coughed up their share of the dough for the present. Not to worry, we’ll just pay for it all ourselves and I’ll stuff them around in return later remember not to count on the irresponsible asshats them in the future.

Today I have spent being stuffed around helping at a function. I’m stuffed. The house is a mess, the love slave is not home yet, the spawn children are fighting over the nintendo, I have no cake made and am expecting parents in 2 hours.

But never fear.

I’m will not be the daughter who ruined the birthday this year.

We shall BBQ. Outside. Where you can’t see the mess.

Oh yes. The cake. Well it’s like this………….
I have a chocolate cake packet mix and I’m not afraid to use it!

Edit The birthday dinner got canned. The skank whore in law had an ultrasound on Wednesday that showed something seriously wrong but not wanting to risk being told to make other arrangements, she waited till today to need ”emergency” surgery and got someone from church to dump the kids at mum’s. Sigh. Will the drama never end?

Second Edit. While breaking into the house with the kids to get their clothes and school gear for tomorrow, Mum found the remains of birthday cake that the kids say was for the scumbag exbf. This is the bloke that used to smack their mother around in front of them and terrify them. This is the bloke that she reckons beat and raped her last year that she took out an AVO on and she’s put off having surgery to throw him a nice cosy family birthday party.  Unbefuckinglievable!!

So I’m sitting here, in the dark, freezing my arse off cos I can’t find any socks while making an addition or two to my blog roll. I ask the kids to check the lounge for some socks, they can’t be stuffed doing it, so I get up, have a look myself, find Uno cards instead from the brand new “I’ll look after these ones I promise Mum” set I bought on Wednesday, smack the child giving me crap, find some socks, yell at the non-putting-Uno-cards-away-despite-promise child, turn all the lights back off and sit back down at the pc and continue on my merry commenting way.

It is now quite a few comments later and you know how you enter your name and website into blogger to comment?  I just realised that I’ve been pasting in the last website I copied into my blogroll instead of my own.

So, to everyone who has tonight gotten comments from me at Anonymum’s site…………. Enjoy your giggle at my dumbness my lovelies cos I think it’s hilarious!

I haven’t particularly felt like smiling a lot this week, so today am taking you back to Wellington for my next bat instalment.

On Sunday after packing up camp, getting rained on again, and jump starting our friend’s car cos they left the damn lights on all night, we were off on a tour of the Cathedral Cave.

Some of the pics are shit a bit grainy. I do apologise.

Hubby walking down the stairs from the entrance into the first chamber. Not much there. It’s damp.There are apparently 150 stairs leading down to the different cave chambers.

This is the largest stalagmite in the world apparently though some websites say in the southern hemisphere. Either way it’s pretty bloody big at 15m’s tall. Though having reached the ceiling it is apparently now technically a column. The red stain you can see running down near the left hand side is rust. There was a rusted shed on the hillside above and when it rained the rust leeched down into the soil and that was the end result. The really white looking bits are new growth.

Fossilised giant jellyfish in the ceiling. Need I say more? I think not.

From here we went down some more stairs to another chamber with again not much in it. But our guide did get us to jump on the floor and see where the echo was coming from. Turns out there was another chamber underneath us. So down some more freakin stairs again to the next chamber, then up a little into the thunder chamber OOoooOOooo.

TJ climbing the stairs up into the Thunder Chamber. We jumped on the floor in there and it just echoed all around us. I couldn’t get even a half decent pic in there but a geologist had cleaned off part of the stalegmite in there to show what it was meant to look like without damage from people touching it. HUGE difference. You wouldn’t think that the oils in your skin could do so much damage.

Just down and around the corner from the entrance to the thunder chamber was a cavity that was very interesting.

We got a really close up look at a stalactite.

And if we looked down we could see down into the water table. See where it had risen and fallen.

In the same chamber were these cavities in the floor like little pools. Apparently they were where the wee from the now extinct, giant carnivorous bats had pooled on the floor - a subject of intense interest to small boys like TJ. (yes first bat poo, now bat wee! small boy heaven)

Once everyone had looked at the water table and the Thunder Chamber the damn guide turned off the lights. It was pitch freakin’ black. No light from anywhere. No breeze or air movement. Completely disorientating.

Then we started making out way back up and out.

This is referred to as “Headache Rock”. They have lines on the floor for you to not stand up till you have gotten past so you don’t think you are under, stand up too soon and knock yourself out.

Still climbing.

Did I mention the 150 billion stairs?

The cave is called the Cathedral Cave as a local minister used to hold services down there sometimes. He would climb the stalegmite and use the growth you can see on the left as a pulpit. You can’t see it in this pic, but there is even a bible sitting up there .

Eventually though we made it all the way back up and out and…………..

back down the hill again. (That’s me and CJ in front)

 Damn my practical-nature-ness!

Damn my having-a-clue-ness!

I ask the guy who I thought was coordinating the RFS school cadet programme what’s going on and next thing I know I’m organising meetings for him and helping put together programmes.

I go to a community safety meeting and next thing I know I’m meant to be organising the team activities and getting people to a course next month after having completed numerous workbooks.

I volunteer to help at a P & F fundraiser and next thing I know I’m helping organise the damn thing.

Sigh.

I just should sit on my hands and keep my mouth shut!

So.

Tomorrow.

I’m helping pick up a fire truck, finishing a work book, passing on course acceptances and apologies, distributing workbooks, dropping off raffle prizes,  chasing up chairs and a BBQ and an urn, starting to put together a programme outline for cadets, and chasing helpers on top of what I was already doing tomorrow  with cleaning, fixing mum’s pc - again, and getting hubby organised for a weekend away at a 4WD course.

Fun, fun.

I haven’t been feeling very well today. Nothing is wrong, I just feel blech and have spent most of the day snoozing on the lounge.

I have lots and lots of pics from camping so I thought I should break them up into separate activities to post.

We left around 10am on Friday to travel to Wellington, NSW. We were meeting up with friends from Dubbo. All up we had 6 adults and 8 kids between the ages of 7 and 13 at the campsite.

When we arrived it was sprinkling, but we managed to get the tents up before we got too wet. Fortunately we had a bloody humongous tarp to cover our tents with for extra protection and to make a shelter to sit under. The rain didn’t last long though and we spent the afternoon catching up while the kids played cricket, went swimming and explored the park.

Saturday morning we went on a tour of the Phosphate Mine.

Setting off on our tour. See hubby has shirts that aren’t pink red.

Entering the mine. It is always a constant 18 degrees Celsius inside no matter how hot or cold outside.

Hubby checking out an opening leading to the surface. There are a few shafts leading through to the surface made to raise or lower people and equipment as well as a number of naturally occurring ones. There are also lots of tree roots growing through from the surface of the hill down into the mine shafts. Eventually the damage caused by the tree roots will cause more tunnels to collapse.

Exploring through the mine tunnels. Many of the timber wall/ceiling supports were sold off a nearly a century ago for firewood when the mine owners bailed out of the operation and had to be replaced before the mine was reopened for tours.

This is what phosphate looks like when the lights are out. Purty ain’t it? Bet you didn’t know batshit could look so pretty?

TJ checking out a tunnel entrance which is partly closed in. The guide explained that when miners had retrieved all the phosphate they could from one tunnel that they would simply start another one, then dump the dirt they dug from the new one into the old one.

Checking out the bones in the wall of the tunnel (all the little white flecks in the wall). The mine is located under a sink hole where owls and other animals nested. When the sink hole collapsed it took small bones from their nests into the ground around it.

The mine is a very important site for paleontologists. The bones here are casts from a Thylacoleo or Marsupial Lion skeleton discovered in the mine.

These are a cast of the bones of a  Diprotodon, a very large Australian marsupial, also now extinct. Apparently bones found here first led to the discovery of Australia’s mega fauna.

CJ pointing out a feature in the wall. This is a new section of the mine that was made to allow visitors to exit easily without having to backtrack through the whole mine. You can tell it is a modern part of the mine by the use of wire mesh instead of wooden beams along the walls of the tunnel.

Daylight at the end of the tunnels!

Back down the hillside to the caravan park.

Stay tuned tomorrow for the next thrilling instalment in the adventure that was our Easter weekend. Same bat time, same bat station.

Hello,

I haz returned!

Shall post pics soon.

mwah!

Wishing all my readers and friends a very Happy Easter.

The joy of Easter is the realisation that Jesus has opened the way for us. Death, the greatest fear of human beings, has been overcome. We’ve got a future, a full-bodied future, that lasts forever. Death has become a birth.

Bishop Ken Untener

Yes, it’s that time of the week. Smiley Saturday time!

I guess the biggest thing that’s making me smile this week is being away on our mini holiday. OK, ok. So it’s just a long weekend. Still it’s away. Away from the regular routine, away from the psycho family asshats obligation *shudder*  and into the great outdoors.

The comment lurv fest that is apparently happening on my blog comments and email inbox during my absence is another  reason to smile.  The love and playful silliness of friends is always welcome here

Finally having a resolution to a vexing problem in one of my community involvements is also a reason to piss myself laughing smile. A stirrer who had been flirting with the line just enough to keep everyone agitated while avoiding being kicked out finally (and quite inadvertently) outsmarted themselves the other night. Always feels good to see a fucktard idiot get their comeuppance!

And lastly it is Easter. A time of reflection on the gift of eternal life that my Lord gave to me through his death and resurrection.

Have a great weekend all and for more Smiley Saturday moments head on over to Lightening’s Online.

says I, handing TJ a pair of trackpants that haven’t been worn since last winter. He grows so quickly that even though I buy him a size or two bigger at the end of the season, it is no guarantee that it will fit him the following one.

“What are you going to your room for? Just slip the bloody things on will ya!”

The pink love slave laughs.

Then I remember.

“Aren’t you wearing undies again?”

A sheepish shake of the head follows. I flash back in my memory to earlier this year when out of town school clothes shopping  when he ‘forgot’  to wear his undies.

Sigh.

“Nothing wrong with freeballing.” says hubby who is only ever briefless for as long as it takes to have his wicked way with me.  He doesn’t like his bits and pieces to be free and dangly.

“What’s freeballing?” asks CJ the curious juror.

“Now you’ve done it!” I grumble at  the hysterically laughing man pet.

“When boys don’t wear undies.” says I, deciding that a blunt answer may deter further questioning as I am still reeling from being asked what porn is a few nights ago.

“EWWWWW” was the predictable response from said not quite teen girl spawn.

And that was that.

One pair of trackies fitted and one pair didn’t.

But I think I’ll have to buy him some boxers.