nishatalitha

Sister and hubby and baby nephew have been over here today - parents had cabin fever, so left the house for the first time for two weeks today - and have just gone. Baby was passed around all the relatives except when feeding and parents got a break. Apparently if I want baby photos, I'm going to have to join Facebook. Reasonably enough, sister will not be sending out lots of emails with pictures, and since she's not on LJ...

Nephew is very cute (and I have more photos).

I leave tomorrow afternoon and should get home about 7pm (assuming co-operative weather). I'm getting peopled out and since my brother and his wife are here from Oz and Gran is here from Raglan (and there is no unsecured wireless around), I really feel I should be downstairs and being social. Maybe I will bring my laptop down again and read more Cherryh in ebook format. Or something. I am looking forward to getting home and more or less have since I was peopled out at the family Christmas on Boxing day.

Went fishing this morning. Caught three starfish and some weed - not what you need for dinner! Was up at the ridiculously early hour of 6.30am and was awake reading too late last night, so am a bit tired. Lots of coffee today.

Also, I am the boozy daughter/granddaughter, due to the facts that I am willing to a) drink; b) talk about drinking cocktails; c) volunteered to take Gran's liqueur and sherry glasses off her hands before I found out that she gave them to the op-shop; and d) I have opinions about what I'm drinking. That being said, I have drank more with dinner since I got up here than I do usually in a month. It's still a novelty being offered alcohol by Dad. Haven't managed to convince him to open his bottle of laphroaig yet, though.

Guillotine seems to be reasonably popular and we have played several games of Settlers. I even managed to win one (mostly by accident). Bought Nation by Terry Pratchet from a sale store, read it, and have been leaving it around in the hopes that Dad or brother will pick it up and read it. I think they'd enjoy it. Read one of the other books I brought up with me (a new one by Violette Malan), but have failed once more on the Joe Abercrombie one I borrowed months ago. I think I will return it half read.

Weather has been mixed - a couple of sunny days, a couple of overcast days, and one rainy day. I'm very glad there's an electric fan in my room as I've slept without it going once so far.

I've done a little bit of work on the dragon, finished sketching one page of the book and started another, showed off the Maidens to the relevantly interested people, carted it up and downstairs a few times, and finished refiling A-L of the ebook library lastname, firstname, and made a start on M-Z. I think I need an ebook management system so I can tag them with multiple genres and other comments. Any recommendations, please let me know. I have heard of calibre, but haven't looked into it at all.

Unlike the last time I ordered embroidery supplies over the internet, this time went really smoothly. Needlepaint threads arrived yesterday from Needlework Plus in Pottstown, PA, USA within the five to ten working days as promised. The person I dealt with was friendly and helpful and should I need to order more embroidery stuff over the internet, I will definitely be looking to them first.

My hands are cold, the unstrapped one colder than the strapped one. Saw the physio today about the joint bruise I got on Saturday. She reckons that if I had had to injure a finger, that one was one of the better ones to injure. I have some exercises to do, but the damage appears to be fairly light, so long as I'm careful for the next little while. Apparently, you're more likely to injure yourself in the ten days immediately following the accident than at any other time. And it already aches a fair amount from all the awkward typing that I've had to do today.

I'm so glad for ACC though - free physio just makes things so much easier. If there wasn't ACC, I would've probably put off going to phsyio until tomorrow (payday) or later.

The cat is sleeping in my bed and I wish I could join her (warmth!), but think I should go start dinner instead.

It has been a glorious weekend, weather-wise, aside from the showers on Saturday afternoon. I have done much study and am thoroughly sick of the ILAC method, the New Zealand Constitution, the Contractual Remedies Act 1979, Donoghue v. Stevenson and all the rest. Studying outside in the sun was nice. Tomorrow, I think I will give myself the afternoon, or most thereof, off studying and start again in the evening, whereupon I get to become sick of the Rules of Professional Conduct and (more likely) everything to do with Trust Accounts.

I have done hardly any handwork over the last few days. I mended my slippers (one of my toes has managed to hole my birthday slippers already) and a top I haven't worn for ages (because it was in the mending pile). The slipper now has a scar at one toe. It has been suggested that I embroidery or otherwise decorate the scar, but I don't know if I will. I kinda like how it looks.

darthsappho did good things to tamarillow's computer - it now has 50g of storage space. She tried to do good things to Jack, but Jack doesn't like being touched and had a temporary fit of the keyboard not working. Alessan helped me sort it out, but this is Jack's third keyboard (he fried the first after I installed a new DVD reader and I fried the second with tea), so it wouldn't have suprised me, although it would have annoyed me, if he'd fried this one, too. But no, the $5 keyboard from Cash Converters is still working.

My cat is asleep, or pretending to be, at the end of my bed. I should also go to bed. I'm not going to have my cellphone on me tomorrow, since they're really paranoid about that at the Law Society, or so I hear.

I feel quite proud of myself. Last night, I finished The Reality Dysfunction, and I even almost want to read the next one. Not for a while though, I have plenty of other things to read which I am now catching up on. The Chosen by Robert Picado is still put to one side while I read something more cheerful; both of the two books named being closer to the horror genre than I am really comfortable with.

I also *bounces* picked up a framed sampler from Walrus Gallery on Taranaki St after work today. It looks very good, and I'm quite pleased with it. I will post photos when I am able. I've also started the small one that stephanie_pegg and repton_infinity gave me for my birthday. I thought about trying to do it in a day, and then I decided I wanted to read...

Work is going to be very quiet tomorrow - we will have three of our five authors away, and I doubt the remaining two will do enough work for four secretaries. What do people do at work when it's quiet and they're bored?

Tonight, as I do most Sundays, I was watching C4's Choose 40 (this week - Fashion Disasters!), now broken by watching Numb3rs, and the cat brought in another dead thrush. Which makes four in the space of seven or eight days. As expected, I am less than impressed with my 10.30pm trip down to the wheelie bin with a plastic bag containing said bird in my hand. If she brings in more during the next week, I'm putting a bell on her collar, although it will drive me as insane as it will drive her! Stupid cat.

Went to the last free organ concert for this year. There were two Pomp and Circumstance Marches (one of them Land of Hope and Glory), Rule Britannia and a soloist who did some of those two pieces and Rejoice from Messiah. And then I came home. I actually missed my next bus (distracted with a book) and almost missed the one after (same reason).

The weekend has been reasonably busy. Had Alessan over on Saturday afternoon to build a firewall out of three computers that mostly works, and maudlinrose's birthday dinner that evening. Today I was on the pre-service coffee at church, there was a church meeting for hearing the recommendation of the Call Committee for a new Minister (after much dicussion, the motion was carried, and I even said stuff some people liked). And then there was only an hour or so before the concert, so I went to the library.

Oh, yes. My exciting news for the weekend - I've finished the sampler! In plenty of time, and it looks very pretty, being hardangered and beaded and crystaled and all. And now it's time for the other expensive part. Framing. But go me! I started it in April, and it's finished by mid-September, a month and a half before the wedding. And I'm back onto my dragon now (see the icon) and it's so strange doing something which I have to change my thread every stitch or so. I did two and a half rows tonight, say 120 stitches, rows being more or less even in length at the moment. Used about a dozen colours. And the longest stretch of colour I had in a row was 8 stitches. Next was 5, a few sets of three, and everything else was one or two stitches. The stitching itself is easier, but the colours are not, thanks to the subtle colour changes. I'd forgotten how much work I had to do on it (I've finishe one quarter and a little bit of it so far).

...for some reason, I have a craving to watch Labyrinth.

With all the heavy rain over the past day or so, our backyard has flooded quite impressively. There is only a little bit of actual grass left above water. I took some photos, but the device I use to upload them to my computer appears to have broken (at least, the computer knows it's there, but doesn't know anything else about it), and I think I'm going to have to replace it. It is physically broken, and I haven't used it for months. The last time I used it it was broken, so I don't know what happened in the meantime. Gah, windows.

However, not only is our backyard flooded, but also the access paths. And since the path was sealed recently (which is wonderful, generally), the flooding is worse than ever, requiring actual use of the other path down. Seriously, I inched my way along the second rail of the fence to get past the three metre long, ankle depth stretch of water blocking my way out. WCC will be notified about this.

maudlinrose and I had to go out in the pouring rain this morning to pick up C's birthday present, which we'd more or less decided on, but had to actually purchase. I also bought myself a shiny gold coloured bracelet with purple and green flowers on it. But we were at the shop as it opened (dripping wet, both of us), and the guy was really nice, and let us pick through things, and didn't make us feel silly because we don't know anything about antiques and very little about jewellery. I've bought presents for other people there which have worked out well.

Then we came home and I had quicksies and she had toasties, and I lit the fire and did hanwork, while maudlinrose went off to a work do. C. came home from work then, and I did some more handwork. The sampler - nearly finished. I have three squares and three small hearts to do out of a total of five squares, seven small hearts and one large heart, and then it's onto the beading. Hopefully, I can get a bit done tomorrow, as well.

I also got two bunches of Early Cheer to go on the table, because I really like the smell, and it was two for $5, which is quite cheap for those flowers.

Last night was kinda funny. maudlinrose and I got home at the same time, ate cheese and crackers and pastrami, along with half a bottle of wine (the pinot noir chardonnay that I won at work last week - it was fizzy!), and then cleaned the lounge, before having pancakes. Of course, while the other two went to bed at normal time (around eleven or so), I then felt wide awake, so I spent the ensuing three hours or so cleaning and tidying my room. All that still needs doing is the vaccuming.

Had a nice time chatting to maudlinrose and writing my essay last night. The writing the essay wasn't that fun, and I now have to reread it, and see if I made any major errors. I don't think I did, but I was rather tired by the time that I finished it, and my eyes were hurting. They weren't sore for most of the time that I was online, which is a bonus. Yay.

I got set a writing exercise by maudlinrose last night - to write a piece without answering questions such as Who or Why as I normally do. I think that's one of the more interesting parts of writing for me - finding out Who - or Why, rather, because those two questions are so interlinked. Anyways, I couldn't post it last night, because when I was going to post it, MSN and Explorer both decided not to work on my computer, and nothing I could do would make them work again. Restarted the computer several times, connected and disconnected several times, so on and so forth. So I finished my essay and went to bed.

I went to N.'s RPG Confusion thing on Saturday - or rather, I went to two thirds of it. I ended up sleeping in the morning, which was badly needed, and very nice. Walked down through the Botannical Gardens, which were damp and pretty. Lots of bulbs around - the tulips aren't flowering yet - but a huge patch of flowering oxalis! I thought that was a really hard to get rid of weed. Oh well, I suppose they have to have a record of it somewhere.

Confusion was voted a success by all the gamers I talked to, and I now have a far greater understanding of what being in an RPG is. I never really realised before. I didn't actually play - apart from filling in at the very end of one of P.'s games - but it was interesting. I did play two games of Settlers of Catan, though, with N., G. (random gamer, vaguely know him) and a girl I know from the Chaplaincy, C., who's name is spelt differently, although pronounced the same, as mine. N. won the first game - or G. did - I forget, and I won the second with the use of two victory points. I was very pleased about this.

Flatmate T. has moved out, but her boyfriend, flatmate C. has not yet moved into her room. I am anticipating this happening in the next couple of days. At least, I hope it will happen then, because I'll actually have the time to move my stuff into C.'s room. Flatmate S. will then move into my room, and the green room is up for rent. If anyone you know needs a flat and you think I could live with them, give them my number. I am meeting a potential flatmate tomorrow at 2.30pm, which means I will go straight home from Greek, and then probably come back to uni again in order to do the Greek homework, which we will invariably have. S. reckons she is keen and seems nice, but there is something dodgy about her. I am vastly curious now, since he can't explain it.

I finished making Mum's birthday present on Saturday, too. I only had about half the bottom border to go, and a few random things. I think it looks really good, and I hope that I can afford to get it framed either for her birthday or for Christmas. Otherwise, who knows when it'll get framed. I costed framing it at Goldings on Sunday, when I was there to get the thread for the centre of the flowers on it. Two frames, one of light wood, one of dark, I costed, along with non-reflective glass (lady said that dulled things a bit, and I want the metallic to be noticed) and no matt. I have a bias towards liking dark frames, (think they're more impressive/noticeable or something) but the light wood one was nice, too. Got the numbers and stuff written down. I will also cost it at the framing shop/gallery (and they're looking for new artists, if anyone knows someone who wants to go there) in the Northland shops, and I'll cost Garden Verses and Footprints at the same time. I'll probably be carting it around with me for the next few days to show off to people.

Am seeing Jason and the Argonauts tonight in Hunter 220 at 6.30pm, and apart from having to go down to town and do some of Greek and hand in my history essay, I have plenty of time to kill. I should start research on my next essays... somehow I don't think I have as much time as I thought. *sighs*