A Little Bit Of Everything

Okay, I'm back. My apologies for my recent absence. It's been a crazy, crazy, few weeks. Settle back while I explain:



SYDNEY

Wifey and I were shipped off to Sydney for the weekend the other week. The reason we were heading off was because it was my grandmother's birthday on 28th July. That's my Dad's Mum. She is my last surviving grandparent. Here she is, sitting in front of her birthday cake. What do you think? How old would you say she looks?




Yes, she's 66.

WAIT! THIS JUST IN: NO SHE'S NOT! TURN THE BEAT AROUND!

She's actually 99. And she's still as sprightly as she ever was; cooking, cleaning, washing, ironing and so on. She's an amazing little dynamo, and I only wish I'd inherited some of her strength and invincibility. But I'll be dead long before I reach 80, and probably decrepit at 60. Grannie, however, is like the Energiser Bunny. She keeps going and going and going and going and going and going ...


Grannie is 99 years old:
The proof is in the pudding.

So Wifey and I were in Sydders to help Grannie celebrate her 99th birthday. What an amazing achievement: Think of it! Avoiding death for all those years. I reckon it's extra special that Grannie will become a Great-Grannie in her 100th year.

(Why is she so old when I'm such a young whipper-snapper? Well, back in the day, there was a war on, you see. So Grannie waited for the war to finish before her sweetheart came home and they got married. She was 39. She gave birth to my Dad when she was 40, although Dad wasn't very old at all at the time. Hence the larger-than-normal age gap between Grannie and me.)

We're all very excited about next year, because Grannie is in such "good condition" that we're certain she'll reach the milestone of 100 years (unforeseen accidents aside, of course), and then she'll get the world-famous letter from the Queen, the GG, the PM, the Premier, her local member of Parliament, the President of her nearest RSL, the gang down at Rotary, someone in a white jacket from The Ponds Institute, and Bert Newton.

We plan to frame the letter, put it up on Dad's office wall, and then leave Grannie to go about her business and shuffle off this mortal coil in her own time.

Truth be told, though, she'll probably out-live us all. She's a real trooper, and holds open the dining room door at the nursing home "for all the old men and women", as she calls them, who just happen to be thirty years younger than her! They're in wheelchairs and using walking frames and have hearing, sight and memory problems, but she's ready to do the City to Surf!

Anyway, enough on Grannie. Plenty more has happened since two weekends ago, so let's get to it.



THE FLIGHT HOME

Due to one thing and another (grumblegrumblegrumble), Wifey and I missed our return flight to Melbourne by about ten minutes. The plane was still there, of course, but they refused to let us board. I was very annoyed, and even more annoyed that they then made us wait an hour and a half for the next flight and had the cheek to charge us $80 for the privilege! (As if they were the ones being put out!)

Anyway, I was more than a little grumpy as we sat in the departure lounge, whiling away the time until our 10pm flight. Wifey was extremely uncomfortable, and the delay meant we weren't going to get home until after 1am (Wifey had to be up and at uni by 8am), so I hope you can appreciate the reasons why we were miffed.

After a bit, Wifey said to me that there was probably a reason, a greater purpose, for us missing the first flight and being on this next one instead. I think she was trying to cheer me up, but I didn't really appreciate the effort. However, in the spirit of the moment, I added that maybe that first flight was going to go down in a ball of flames. She didn't seem to be cheered up by this suggestion at all. (Sometimes women mystify me!)

Not five minutes after this conversation, Wifey turned to me and whispered, "It's Boyd!"

It took a second for me to realise what she'd said, because the context of watching CSI on the airport TV had me a little confused, but once I followed her gaze, I realised that - sure enough - standing about three metres away from us with a bag over his shoulder and a scowl on his face was Neighbours actor Kyal Marsh, who plays Boyd Hoyland. And it was definitely him. Without a doubt. He had his iPod in and was desperately trying not to be recognised (or at least to catch anyone's eye). I completely understood why he'd want to keep to himself (perhaps he'd missed his earlier flight too and was also in a foul mood?), but it didn't stop me very unsurreptitiously taking a photo of him with my mobile phone.

He pretended not to notice what I was doing (which was very accommodating of him), and I realise he'd be very used to this kind of behaviour (and presumably a lot worse, from younger female fans in particular).

When we boarded the flight, Wifey and I were seated right at the back of the plane, so we knew we wouldn't be seeing Kyal again. "He'll be in first class," I knowingly told Wifey in that pompous "I know all" tone I can adopt from time to time constantly, "But that won't stop me from going for a stroll and snapping another shot of him as I pass by, at some point during the flight!"

Wifey rolled her eyes, but the beauty of the moment had already weaved its magic. We were both smiling and finding light in the situation. Of all people, she and I get delayed on our flight to Melbourne AND END UP SEEING A CAST MEMBER OF ONE OF THE FEW SHOWS WE WATCH TOGETHER! Exceptional stuff.

But fate wasn't done with us yet. Less than five minutes after my all-knowing remarks concerning Kyal sitting in first class, Wifey and I were both surprised to see him walking down the aisle towards us. Very close to us, in fact. Um ... very close.

He sat down on the center-aisle seat, right across from Wifey. I was at the window. We couldn't stop giggling like school children. Poor Kyal, he must have hated it.

What was even funnier was that actress Carla Bonner, who plays Boyd's on-screen stepmother Steph Hoyland, turned out to be seated one row in front of us and against the opposite window. She was constantly looking back to Kyal and making funny faces at him. In fact, she was behaving like a three-year-old child on her flight plane ride. She wouldn't sit still and was laughing and carrying on for ages. Made me wonder where they'd stashed the crystal meth.

Next to Carla was an actor I recognised from The Secret Life Of Us (the latter years), whose name I couldn't begin to tell you. Perhaps he's filming a guest spot on Neighbours at the moment? He could even have appeared on screen for all I know - we still haven't caught up with the show since the weekend I'm talking about! At any rate, he may simply be Carla's current squeeze; I don't know.

It turned out that they'd been in Sydney as part of a shopping centre appearance (oh, what fun for them!), and were returning home. We overheard Kyal explaining this to the guy who sat next to him. So the seating arrangements were thus:



Right-click on the image to open it in a new window
so you can view a larger version of this brilliant,
100%-to-scale representation. I've coloured the
relevant people's seats in black, for ease of viewing
and to prevent you having to think too much.

Our flight landed in Melbourne safely, neither plane went down in a ball of flames, and we eventually got home at 1:15am. Although I snuck a few more shots (much closer, this time!) of Kyal during the flight, none of them turned out very well, so I'm not going to post them here. Instead, here are Kyal and Carla as Boyd and Steph:




To be fair, I should probably point out that Kyal wasn't actually in a bad mood. When the guy next to him and a couple of other passing passengers spoke to him, he was extremely pleasant and courteous to them.




MY BROTHER THE STAR

Some of you may be aware of the new Myer commercial, where Jennifer Hawkins walks into a room with a couple of hangers-on, critiques the new range of clothing (or something like that), and then giggles a bit. I believe it stretched her complete range of acting abilities. Well, it may interest you to know that my little brother appears in this ad (very briefly).

In one of the very first shots, taken from behind Jennifer Hawkins as the doors in front of her are opening, you immediately see a blonde guy carrying a large shell across the screen from left to right. Yes, that's him. If you pause the tape and freeze-frame through it, he's truly dominating the vision for a complete eight or nine frames!!!

Ahem. But at normal speed, if you blink you'll miss him. He spent all day filming those nine frames. It was his first professional acting gig, after getting himself an agent the week before this was filmed. And on the first take? He slipped over.

HA!! It's true. They changed his shoes at the last second and he wasn't prepared for how slippery they were going to be on the shiny surface when the dude called 'Action!' He was pretty embarrassed, considering that was how he was welcomed into the world of 'professional acting'. But it's alright; Jennifer Hawkins kissed it better for him.

Okay, not really, but in all honesty they shared a dressing room and he was absolutely floored by her apparent beauty. He is truly smitten and says he's now dating her. He has promised to introduce her to the family "at some stage".

Here is a picture of Jennifer Hawkins, in case you don't know her, followed by a picture of my little brother, in case you don't know him. (He had to dye his hair blonde for the commercial, you understand.)






And here they are together, out on their first date. Don't they just make the most adorably-lovely couple?






PAINTING THE HOUSE

After arriving back from Sydney and witnessing our Neighbours actors as the universe's way of 'repaying' us for the inconvenience of catching a later flight, my Dad and brother drove down to Melbourne the following day, arriving late Monday afternoon. The three of us (Wifey excluded, of course!) spent all day Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday painting the majority of the rooms in the house (those that my father-in-law and I hadn't painted a few months ago). This was quite a lot of work, and because the TV room was one of those being painted (it was the 'main' room we were working on, actually), we had to rely on simply recording all episodes of Neighbours, Big Brother, 24, Lost, Smallville and Battlestar Galactica. As it stands, due to one thing and another (most of which will become clear as I continue), we are still yet to catch up on most of these shows. We've had next-to-no-time to watch anything this week, which means the tapes keep piling up and the likelihood that we'll ever have a chance to get up-to-date is fading further and further into obscurity.

But the house looks great now. The lounge room has been completed and now matches the dining room my father-in-law and I had completed earlier, and the 'sunroom' (jokingly named because it actually gets zero sun) has been renamed the 'playroom' and is much brighter, lighter, and ready for our offspring to set up his or her toys and have a ball.

It was a very tiring week of physical labour (something of which I am decidedly not a fan, even at the best of times!), and we were all quite exhausted at the end of it. But there was no time to rest, because the very next day, Saturday, it was ...



WIFEY'S BABY SHOWER

Actually, it was Wifey's AND MY Baby Shower, because we decided to have a joint celebration (it's my kid too, after all, etc). There was a section in the middle there where we split up, and the boys went their own separate way and did bloke stuff (scratching, grunting, spitting, etc), while the girls stayed in the main room and did girls stuff (doilies, frills, pink dresses, cups of tea, etc). Then we all met up again at the end and everyone had to watch us open the presents.

NOT ONE OF WHICH WAS MUPPET-THEMED!! Have I taught you people NOTHING??

The gifts were all very generous, but the real hero (or heroine, actually) of the day was undoubtedly my sister (shown below). She spent weeks and weeks putting everything together for the day. She designed gorgeous little invitations (bib-shaped for the girls and fold-out-nappy-shaped for the boys!), she arranged the RSVPs (those of whom replied - rudely, about twenty people didn't RSVP, even though I then rang and left them a message specifically asking for their reply!), she organised for a bunch of amusing baby-shower-themed games to be played (largely by the girls alone), she created a heap of decorations for the room, and she generally helped to run the event itself. What a champion.




Here are some of the presents we received (shown here purely because I like to boast):








Right-click to open the larger version of this photo.
Look closely. See who's waving at you?
Remember these cabinets?
This is them now in all their Muppet glory.

As you can see, we were truly spoilt -- but not as much as the baby's going to be! I should point out that Mum and various others also did a lot of preparation and assisting work on the day. Mum made a heap of homemade sausage rolls and bought the lovely balloon decorations shown above. Thank you to everyone for coming / helping / not RSVPing.



MY EMPLOYMENT SITUATION

A lot has happened on this front since I last blogged myself. During the days I spent painting, a friend of mine rang up and basically offered me a two-week-long casual work job, doing basic data-entry and cold-call phone sales. The sort of stuff I hate, but hey - beggars can't be choosers. The money will make a welcome change from having ... well, ... none. So I gratefully accepted.

Of course, this means that I have since become the kind of person I hate the most. A telemarketer. No offence to telemarketers out there (some of my best friends are telemarketers), but we receive around three or four of this type of call every night, and I never thought I'd be doing this to someone else.

Thankfully, it means I'm extremely polite, and if someone I ring starts to make excuses and I can hear the discomfort in their voice, I simply say, "No problem, thanks for your time!" and leave them alone. I'm nice about it. I certainly don't push the point or try to talk so much that they can't get a word in to object. But I simply have to ring all the numbers on the list. That's what I'm being paid for.

I started on Monday and today is my one day off. I'll probably have a day off next week as well (four days a week is how it was put to me), but I'm not sure what my day off next week will be. Possibly Thursday again. And then my two-week stint will be over. God bless my friend for knowing I was battling to find work and throwing me this lifeline.



MORE ABOUT MY EMPLOYMENT SITUATION

However, complicating matters somewhat was the fact that after agreeing to do this two-week casual job, I received a letter during the Baby Shower (it was passed on by a friend, you see) from the person I had been interviewed by here. Remember that? The fall-out can be found here. And it turns out that he wasn't kidding when he said all those lovely things about me being "the right guy for the wrong job", because the letter I received on the weekend said, "You're the right guy for this job - please apply."

You could have knocked me over with a feather. How often does a potential employer, after interviewing you and knocking you back, three weeks later approach you and pretty-much offer you another job instead? Well, it was certainly a new experience for me, anyway.

I need to point out, here, that it's by no means a certainty. I haven't already got the job. They've only asked me to apply, and I honestly don't know how many other previous job applicants were sent the same letter. So let's not get carried away with ourselves, here. But it's still very nice to be remembered and asked to apply for an opening in the company.

Plus, the role really is very well suited to me. It's close to what I used to do (way back in February), except that it's at a MUCH NICER PLACE (as if that'd be hard to find). The only problem is that I'm kind of locked into this other casual work and I'm not able to meet up with them for the requested interview. Today was no good, but maybe next Thursday (or whatever my day off next week ends up being) will be okay for an interview. Otherwise, I'll have kept them waiting two full weeks since I got the letter before I met with them! I've explained my situation, though, so hopefully they won't consider it poor form or a lack of interest. In fact, I trust that it'll speak volumes about my sense of loyalty.



EVEN MORE ABOUT MY EMPLOYMENT SITUATION

I also note that yet another friend (all three of these jobs have involved three different friends in one way or another - am I a massive loser who can't find their own work, or what?!) has emailed me today pointing out that there's some casual work going in her company that I could apply for. Thing is, I don't know if I can do that until I have a better idea of how Job # 2 pans out. Thank you very much, though, Riss. :)



MY WRITING HAS BEEN 'SHELVED' FOR THE MOMENT

As a result of me not even having any time in the past two-plus-weeks to scratch or sniff, the following things have been put on a low flame, to be looked at again "later":

- Preparations for the Trivia Night I'm hosting Saturday week.
- The play I'm writing, directing and starring in as a Christmas production at the end of the year (when else?).
- Big Blogger and all other TV-related posts over at TV Is My Life.
- All manner of posts right here on I Blogged Myself.
- And, of course, just life in general.



FINALLY, ONE OTHER THING:

Did you see what happened to Rene's Yasmin's Getting Married?? - ha! It lasted just four episodes before being rudely yanked off the air and replaced by "all new" episodes of Futurama! That's alright with me, though - because I couldn't have cared less about that Yasmin thing, and I quite enjoy Futurama. But I just thought it was funny. It must have rated terribly for Network Ten (of all networks!) to 'can' it after just four nights. Clearly they were hoping for a repeat of the ratings Big Brother was earning them, but that's just stupid.

So now I find myself wondering: Did Yasmin meet her perfect man? And will she marry anyone in nine weeks as we were promised??

It's good to be back. I'll still be popping in and out, though. Things are going to remain quite busy at home for a while yet. I appreciate you bearing with me in the meantime.

xx



THE END




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