A quick summary of recent events

Gosh, it has been quite a while since I posted on here.

Things have been crazy busy lately. I spent Christmas down the coast with the family, saw in the new year with my closest friends and some awesome tunes, danced in the torrential rain at Sunset Sounds, survived the flood and helped others with the clean up, worked long hours in the emergency Flood Communications team when I returned to work, and rocked Australia Day with snags and swims and cider yesterday.

So now that we've caught up, blogging can return to normal! *crowd cheers*

A collection of disjointed thoughts

It's funny, quite often you hear summer before you feel summer, with the cicadas announcing the impending heat.

House parties are awesome. You get to choose the people, the venue, the food, the drink, the music and the air-conditioning temperature. And it doesn't matter what you wear or how drunk you get or how much you dance on the furniture, because you are surrounded by your favourite people. Cleaning up the next day is a bitch though. (Big shout out to the gang for doing most of the work on Saturday night!)

I started going to the gym and it has strengthened my arguement that exercise makes you fat as I have since put on weight. Stupid fitness. I am looking forward to long days of laziness down the coast at Christmas to lose it again.

Today I am wearing a new pair of shoes that are a pale silvery colour, which is strange as I normally wear black shoes to work. So strange that I keep looking at my feet when I walk. It's very distracting.

The city is absolute madness at the moment. Christmas carols pumping out in Queen Street Mall, half naked teenagers loitering everywhere, workers rushing around doing Christmas shopping in their short lunch breaks, and then moi waltzing around with my new Puma sneakers in an oversized bag hitting everyone on the way back to the office!

G'day!

Rest assured that I wasn't abducted by the fat man in red, but have been busy Christmasing and New Yearsing and familying and so haven't had time to blog.

But I shall get back on soon and tell you all about:

• How my mother has reset my body clock to wake up at 6:30am every day for Fat Farm
• The fact that I have a tan!
• The way my two year old niece, Darcy, struts around like she owns the joint
• How I was "that" drunken Aunty on Christmas day
• My 4 year old nephew, Joe, who kicks my arse at Mario Kart
• My desire to become a member of every surf club, bowls club and RSL on the Gold Coast
• Oh, and that two week Wild European Vacation I've already forgotten about

Kaybye!

Selfridges = tick!

Last night I had the most fabulous evening at Selfridges with my bestie at The Government Agency, Georgie.

When Georgie found out that my time in London was limited and that I was yet to experience Selfridges, she sent me a formal meeting invite at work and appointed herself Chief Australian Naturalisation Officer.

She insisted that we start the evening with a glass of expensive bubbles in the Moet Bar, overlooking the designer handbag department. As you can probably imagine, I took a lot of convincing!

From there we browsed through the handbags, accessories and cosmetics, before making our way to the Christmas Shop. I was like a fat kid in a candy store, with a massive grin on my face. They had glitter covered reindeer and garden gnomes, Christmas baubles in every shape and colour you could imagine, tinsel that looked like jewellry, a selection of pirate-themed decorations, giant plastic candy canes, and so many sparkly things I thought I had died and gone to heaven.

Georgie dragged me away from the Christmas section so that we could get down to some serious shopping - shoes. I had set out with a plan to purchase some new black flat boots, as I wear mine pretty much every day now that the temperature has started to plummet. However, I was distracted by the Nine West display, and with some gentle encouragement from Georgie ended up purchasing these utterly gorgeous puppies...


LOVE!

We had a quick walk around the upstairs (and therefore upmarket) fashion floors, before heading to the basement to peruse the food market and have some sushi for dinner.

Ah, such a fantastic way to spend a Monday night!

D-amanda

I have to admit that I am starting to miss my life back home.

I want to go to family dinners every second Monday night. They used to be the highlight of my week.

I want to take more weekend trips up to Townsville to visit Jackie, Mark, James, Ben and Darcy. And I want to get James drunk.

I want to take Isaac and Joe out once a month for an adventurous outing, to somewhere like the Science Museum, you know, things that I really want to do.

I want to get Broncos season tickets for me and dad.

I want to have a girly day with mum, where we get our pedicures and I go shopping with her and try not to complain.

I want regular Wednesday night dates with Jaala.

I want to have a blow up mattress at Nathan’s new apartment so that I can stay there whenever I feel like it.

I want to go to mini golf at Victoria Park with Scoot Scoot, and make stupid jokes that only he and I laugh at. Or say the same joke at the same time that only he and I laugh at.

I want to play Game of Life with Matt and Lindy and whinge if I don’t get to be the Rockstar.

I want to go back to my regular pilates class, where all the middle aged people kicked my butt.

I want to lose the extra five kilos that I only seem to have in London. I lost a lot of it in the four weeks when I was home at Christmas – I’m naturally skinnier in Australia.

I want to ride my awesome bike, Tequila Sunrise.

I want to have the natural tanned glowing skin that I have in my drivers licence photo.

I want to wear high heels again.

I want to be able to drive a car, and listen to the radio, especially Triple J and Triple M.

I want a permanent job, where I get paid for sick days, public holidays, and annual leave.

I want to go grocery shopping wherever I want, rather than the supermarket that is closest because I have to walk home with my groceries.

I want to see more of Australia.

I want to be there for birthdays, Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, school fetes, and new babies.

I want to come home at Christmas…


“I want today, I want tomorrow, I want to wear 'em, Like braids in my hair and I don't want to share 'em. Don’t care how, I want it now”
I Want it Now, Veruca Salt

Kids say the darndest things

The things I miss most about home are my family and friends, though I try to email or call as often as I can.

I love getting emails from my nephews Isaac and Joseph. Natalii, my most darling sister-in-law, types what the boys say verbatim, which makes for some highly entertaining reading. Especially last night when I got two emails – one from Isaac and one from Joe.

Isaac’s email had a background of rainbows, which he said he sending to me to help keep me happy. It made me so happy I actually got a little teary.

Joe’s email had a pirate background, and he told me about how he had been playing UNO and had fire money. Nat, what on earth is fire money! Then he went on to tell me that he wanted ping pong balls for Christmas! I laughed so hard even more tears came out.

After this I called Jackie on Skype and had a little chat to Ben about what he would like for Christmas. In case anyone doesn’t know yet (though I don’t think there are many people that Ben hasn’t told) he would like a guitar. This is better than when mum asked what Ben would like her to bring him back from England and he asked for a wrench and a coconut!

Oh boys, you make me laugh!

A quick headcount

And so Mumble Pants issued a decree that a census should be taken of her blog. This was the first census that took place while Mumble Pants was governor of MumblePantsVille. And everyone went to the comments page to register their name.

Because if you don’t then you ain’t getting no Christmas present...

Ch-ch-ch-changes

I need to warn family and friends before I come home for Christmas – I have changed. Yes, I am not the same girl that left Brisbane back in April.

I have really long hair. Mum, you won’t believe it, but I wear my hair loose now – you would love it. My hair is the longest it has ever been, and I really need a haircut but am hanging out until I get home. I’m not a huge fan of "pretty" long hair on me, but it keeps my head warm!

I catch public transport now. Back in Brisbane, I drove my lazy-ass everywhere. I mean, I could have walked to work, but instead drove the five minutes there every day. In London, I spend up to an hour walking and catching the train to work.

I am fat. Despite prior warnings of the Heathrow Injection, and a personal commitment to not letting it happen to me, I got fat. Dad confirmed this with his taunts when he and mum came to visit. I’m just giving my friends a heads up, so it’s not such a shock when I get there.

I’m joining the gym. Refer to the above paragraph about me being a Fatty McLardbum. I’m going to the gym near work tonight and I am joining. Even though I’ve been saying this for five months now, this time I really mean it.

I am career focused. Back in Brisbane, I cruised through my job and made good money. My first job in London paid alright – £175 a day as an Events Manager. And it was boring. Then an Events & Marketing Manager role came up at The Government Agency which I accepted, even though it was only £160 a day, as I knew it would be a good move for my career. And it turns out it was! There is no way I would have gotten the job as Internal & Stakeholder Communications Manager (and the delightful pay rise) if I hadn’t already had my foot in the door.

I wear flat shoes all the time. I used to love wearing my cute little heels to work or going out. I think I’ve worn heels twice since I’ve been in London . High heels just aren’t appropriate given the cobblestone streets and the amount of walking I do each day.

I tell my mother and father so much more. With semi-regular blog entries and even more regular emails, my parents know so much more about what I get up to. I don't think this is a good thing. Hi mum, love you!