July: floods and family

Just a lovely sunset from a walk I did one evening around East Maitland to explore the realestate in that section of town. While I walked I listened to the new four seasons 2022, and the Winter section played beautifully with this.

I’ll get the crappy stuff out of the way. At the start of July, it was raining a lot again which led to flooding again. It’s usually a time to goggle at the amount of water in the river, but this time I was just over it. Sick of the rain and tired of the flood photos. It was the biggest flood in a while so the highway and a lot of other significant roads had to be shut for over a week, and the queues around the back roads put everyone in a stress.

Tocal was the site of a fodder drop collection, so that was a new thing to see. Helicopter noise at work added to the drama for a week. Also in this photo, note the bee hives. They are set to be destroyed because the varroa mite incursion has spread from Newcastle to Maitland. For a while Tocal was just on the edge of the eradication zone, but now it’s been taken in. Tocal has become a field crew base for the response, with RFS fire trucks and beekeepers and government people descending every day to get their missions, and a lab to test samples, and the whole thing. 

My car was in the smash repair for 9 days at this time. At one point they rang up and asked for the key to get the roof racks off, and normally that would be an annoying bother, but it was impossible to get home, get the key and drive it to the other side of Maitland during business hours. In the end I waited until 7.30 pm and dropped it in their receptionist mailbox. Picking the car up was a similar race against time between finishing work and them closing.

I also broke heaps of things, cleaned up glass twice, and one smash was the slow cooker lid rendering the slow cooker useless. I decided to replace it with a multi cooker, which does slow cooking, pressure cooking, air frying, searing, yogurt, rice and everything really. Good timing because a few weeks later JK beloved air fryer died. 

Meanwhile work was really busy, I was barraged with heaps of promotion stuff and everything was happening all at once, so my stress levels rose. And, I had 2 cold sores in the one month, and I cut my finger. And my shoulder has been sore all year and still sore, despite physio. I started avoiding sleeping on my right side, so it doesn’t hurt as much in the morning, but not good to be disrupting my sleep.

This is me looking like I felt.

So that’s the bad news. I soothed my stress with a lot of real estate obsession. Lets now move on to the good times!

Expanded the music team - we added a girl playing drums and oboe earlier in the month, and at the end of the month we added a boy on drums. It’s been raising the anxiety for me, but I’m glad we can add them, and that we can train them and have that fellowship between older and younger people. It felt a bit hairy, but praise God we made it through without speeding up too much etc.

Heather visited mid-July because she had some work in Sydney, so we had a birthday dinner including my brothers new girlfriend - he’s been secretly cooking this relationship up all year and finally formalised it! We had also had a dinner to meet her. So two big family dinners.

I drove up to Brisbane with Heather, after I had my car back and after her birthday, on Saturday. We stopped at Woolgoolga for lunch. It was amazing to be away from floods!

 And we stopped at our cousins at Tweed Heads briefly. Then we had dinner at her friend’s place and watched the new Persuasion.

We did her church the next morning, I was super tired so read and slept through a church meeting afterwards. Had a restful afternoon, I was getting pretty inflamed due to the stressful couple of weeks, so we watched the old thor movie on Disney, and the movie about the Guy in the game which was great, but I forgot the name. 

On Monday I drove across Brisbane which was stressful, to the botanical gardens and Mt Coot-tha, then home and finished Heathers YA book I had started, then at night we went to the new Thor movie with Erica!

On Tuesday I drove to Port Macquarie. I had some traffic at the Gold Coast, but it’s a pretty easy drive. I went to Ricardos strawberry and tomato farm, and did the berry picking thing but they were barely ripe, probably picked out from the holidays.

 Stayed in the cheapest motel in Port, which was very nice location but not a nice room or warm bed. So I went out with a book and read, the weather wasn’t great but better to be outside. Then I did a coast walk, and it was all worthwhile!!! The sun broke through the clouds for an amazing sunset, the beach was beautiful, it made the whole drive and cheap motel worth it. I walked around for a couple of hours, and got Thai takeaway for dinner. I found a farmer market just packing up which was a shame to miss, but I bought some eggs, and chatter to the farmers and their daughter had been to Tocal.

Slept in my puffer jacket due to lack of a proper quilt. But in the morning I went to the closest cafe, the girls were lovely and I had a beautiful tea and breakfast. I went for another walk and got caught in an unforecast rainstorm, before I refilled petrol (AGAIN) and left. I got home for a late lunch. Went back to work for Thursday and Friday, thankfully the pace was slowing down and the rest of the month was a better level of busy.

On Saturday, Mum and I joined Julia for a costco visit. I didn’t go too crazy! I wouldn’t change my life to shop there.

On Sunday it was Dad’s birthday, I went over for lunch, and gave him a special Japanese bread knife same as I have.

On Monday it was JK birthday. I had my car in for a service which I was planning to go in to work in the afternoon, but it ended up taking too long so I just enjoyed the rest of the afternoon. Anyway, because I was home, I could do proper things to make it fun for her! Her tradition is a birthday door, so I quietly blew up a balloon garland and attached it to her door. She woke up to it while I was out, but she was AMAZED. 

I bought her a friande cake on my walk home from Toyota and sang happy birthday. We went to Tre Viet for lunch with Mum, and I gave her her presents - silver balloon dog earrings I bought in Melb, and a flashy light for walking Sweep at night. After waiting for an hour at Toyota, I came home for a bit, and then went to my first cello lesson for the term. 

JK organised a trivia team at the bradford on thursday for her birthday, lovely fun. Won some drinks again!

Sweep was a disgrace, chewed this carpet. He hasn't touched it since he got smacked for it though. JK covered it with contact as per G's ferret proofing advice.

On Friday 30th, Julia gave birth to John Leonardo Davis!

On Saturday, I watched the Single Minded conference, topic was the body, most of the day, and in the afternoon walked to the hospital to visit Julia and John.

So that was a BIG month. Extremes of weather and mood and life.

June: jam-packed

I am quite amazed how much I did in June. I guess this is why I blog! I’ve been feeling like life is all admin and mundane busyness amongst disasters, but the photos on my phone tell a story of beautiful walks in nature, trivia with friends, lots of nice food, seasonal garden rituals… thankfully many things beyond the regular routine of work, church things, exercise, washing and cooking, keeping on top of emails, and watching TV, while it mostly rains.

Firstly, I had a poppy flower very early. And a zinnia came up too.

At the start of June, I went up to Singleton and spent time with the family. I had a church prayer meeting early on the saturday and a dog friend walk scheduled later, so it was a busy day. It was Julia’s birthday around then so we started playing her game Cashflow. 

On the Wednesday I decided to join the public sector strike. I was undecided about actually going in to Newy to the rally, but finally JK drove me in, she walked sweep and I marched into Town Hall and watched the Sydney protest live streamed. It was most interesting. Also interesting, there is a lot of blue sky in the photos this month but I'm pretty sure these were just rare breaks in the rain.

We had lunch at the Autumn Rooms which is my favourite cafe in Newcastle. 

The following weekend was the long weekend and I took Friday off as well, since there was a break in the rain and there was an adventure planned with my colleague Jen, to drive to Sydney, meet at Central, train down to 2 stations north of Kiama, and then do an 8km coast walk to the blowhole, and catch the train back.

We had amazing weather and there are a lot of different coast formations to admire. I particularly liked The Boneyard, a rainforest track down to a little pebbly beach.

The blowhole was huge and spectacular!

I was exhausted by the time I caught the train back to my car at about 7pm, at Wahroongah. I drove to AM’s place, ate a lot of her chocolate, and had a good sleep. We had a nice catch up in the morning, and then I drove home at lunch. The traffic was horrible, but I got off the freeway as soon as I could and went through the countryside towards Cessnock. 

I listened to the Classic FM screen music countdown over the weekend. I really enjoyed it and heard nearly all the songs I voted for.

Over Saturday and Sunday I pruned my roses. That was a JOB. My green bin was full. I had lunch with mum, as dad was away and JK was somewhere I forget.

On the PH Monday, I went for a walk at Mt Tomaree with M from church, and JK and sweep came and hung out at the beach. We had bacon and egg rolls for lunch. 

In the arvo I had 1 or 2 phone calls with friends because there was some sad business going down, but basically spent the afternoon in my back yard getting all the sun I could. And then someone at church did an open invite to meet at the Morpeth boat ramp for a walk, and to make the most of the perfect weather I went along.

JK and I had several eatings out, to use up entertainment vouchers. THis was heritage gardens cafe, and we also went to the Windsor Castle.

Tessa organised a spontaneous trivia group at the Bradford hotel, so we went along. We took over the table of a bloke on his own and he helped our team and we had some interesting conversation. Would like to go back there because the trivia host gave out snacks!

On the 3rd weekend of June, I went for a walk with Fi and saw this nice flat rainbow, had a night church meeting, and then lunch with Cass in Maitland. This was to use up a dine voucher and also make up for her not making it to my birthday brunch. 

This is not lunch with Cass, but it is notable that on one of our walks I got to pat a Samoed.

On the 4th weekend of June, JK and I went for a walk and then to the night markets with Tessa, and had delicious slow cooked beef thing, and then chimney cakes, everything was delicious and I got obsessed with narcissists. 

On the Saturday we did the rescheduled dog friend walk and Sweep played with Stormi, another black cavoodle a little bit younger, who belongs to a friend from home group.

 I must have picked my lemons and made lemon butter this weekend too! It’s an exhausting job.

We have some borrowed lights at church which I love.

I’m going to include last weekend in this month - I spent Saturday sewing a new skirt from the pattern of an old skirt I unpicked. I am really happy how it turned out, and it has a pocket! On Sunday we did our monthly music practice which was A LOT because we added a new member to play drums and oboe, and just helping her find her place was vey draining. It was something I was anxious about, but we got through music that night sounding good and no disasters, but only just! And we had less time before church because 4pm church ran late, a song needed a verse typed in, and basically everything was just a bit harder than usual.

I’ve been breaking a lot of things. Since the car accident, 2 glass bottles (with flowers), my slow cooker lid, and the precious ceramic fungi I got for my birthday. I just glued the fungi back together this afternoon. My car is currently in the smash repaid. I decided to throw out the slow cooker, and I am looking to replace it with a multi cooker of some sort. Maybe the sort with an air fryer. I am driving very carefully in Dad’s car, because I really don’t want to damage it or bust a tyre in one of the pot holes.

Work has become unmanageable. The workload is too much now, as expected. I like to be on top of things but the reality is now things just have to be left and pushed back. I am not going to start doing long days to get it all done, because it’s never going to be done. I will work long days if there is a deadline or an event, because that makes sense. But just having to take on the work of the person who retired, obviously that makes it an 8 day a week job and there’s no point trying to fit it in 5 days. I think the most annoying thing though is that facebook posting has gone from 30 a month to 30 a week, it’s like a never ending hungry monster now.

I took some photos of varroa mite surveillance activity. It is very fascinating to watch this response being managed and the mite being traced. It is unknown yet whether it will work or not but in a couple more weeks we will know one way or another. 

Me looking professional.

I've started wearing my hiking boots to work every day. Since I wore them on the Kiama walk, I realised they are quite comfortable, and also warm and waterproof. So suddenly their cost per wear is shooting down!

My shoulder and neck have been not improving, after a few months. The pain has changed, so something has been happening, and it is less in my back and more in my shoulder joint now. I am seeing a physio and doing as much exercises, stretches, massages, etc as I can. What I finally started doing this week was stopping sleeping on it. This makes it a lot less painful and stiff in the morning, but obviously it’s hard to retrain myself to sleep differently. 

For historical reference, Maitland is currently flooding again. It flooded in March, but it’s bigger this time. I’ve still been able to get to work, but most people haven’t because the highway and so many roads are cut off. I haven’t taken any photos of the flood water because tbh it’s just not that exciting anymore. It happens all the time. There will be a few years of drought, and then another flood. They’ve happened every 7 years or so since I’ve lived here (mid nineties) This is why I live on the top of a hill with good access to shops and the M1 (and Tocal, amazingly).

I’ve been obsessed with finding cotton jumpers to wear to bed as PJ tops. Less thin and gappy than actual PJ shirts. And I purchased a puffer jacket, because this winter is extra cold, and I want less weight and restriction on my sore shoulder. I love it.

 Anyway that’s about it! Life feels pretty dreary with the rain, the sore shoulder, the busyness, the breaking things, but there are really many lovely diversions to be thankful for.

May miscellany.

After Tocal Field days, I had a few days off here and there, caught up on some big housework jobs, and tried to rest. Unfortunately after I push myself, I have a few weeks of inflammation, worse arthritis and fatigue. This lemon pie was probably a day off treat. 

How perfect is this Koko Black easter egg? JK bought some easter chocolate on sale because we lost ours to the mouse. The mouse was a lingering plague but seems to be gone now.

I cleaned some of the yuck off the back cement... the rain was unending and things were getting slimy. I also caught up on my emails which were yucky too.

I also did Banjo duties again.

And also build the second part of the spare bed.

I had a bunch of medical things to get done. Still trying to solve the mystery of the 2020 gum lesion so I saw an immunologist and got a lot of tests done, pathology and a chest xray - no idea what is going on. Next job is a biopsy. I'm now on another drug, which is for the lesion and also for RA.

Being tired, going to appointments and tests, made me irritable and I caused this car accident. 6 week wait for smash repair. 

After the smash repair appointment I treated myself to Spotlight (yuck) and Howards storage world where I got this amazing new shower caddy that holds properly and wont rust.

And another job that I finally crossed off the list was getting rid of my old mattresses, now I have the IKEA ones, and there was a council Mattress Muster. So I really got a lot of big jobs done, well done me!

Music has been going well. The band I put together for 6pm has gelled awesomely, and we had lunch after music prac (minus a covidy member, this is her joining in on the phone). We have been practicing on Sunday at 11am in my garage, but now it has become cold we have moved to A's granny flat practice room, and now we have a lot of songs under our belt we can practice 2 weeks music in one session.

The weekend after field days I ran the practice for the Renew conference band. Everyone played and sang well together and I played cello. The end of May was the conference. I was a bit stressed about the Friday night set up and practice, as it was 3 weeks since our first practice, but overall I had lots of faith in the girls. And I was able to think, once the Friday is done, on the Saturday it will just go how it goes and it will be fine! One song leader had to pull out being sick but we had it covered, everything went very smoothly and I could see women really enjoying the music and getting into the singing. The whole day was really successful and the music was a part of a whole great thing.

Once I all these jobs were done, and Renew was off my mind, I checked in on my weight and found out I'm still gradually putting on kgs. Slowly but steadily. So I have implemented some resets. 

• 3 workouts a week (30 min)
• lunchtime walks
• no chocolate at work
• cut out black tea

So basically more exercise and less sugar and caffeine. I was not very excited about this because feeling inflamed doesn't make it fun to exercise, but I did some research and found out that exercise is very good for RA. And, it definitely didn't make it worse, because the inflammation dropped off after I started regular exercise. I've probably reduced my dark chocolate intake by 80% and black tea by the same. These are good improvements. Hopefully this is a sustainable lifestyle.

Some funsies! Had a fun Saturday, with the Maitland Taste festival where JK and I bought cheese and salami and flowers.

And then we went up to Singleton for a light festival and queued a long time for korean food truck chicken. Heather was visiting!

Regular lunchtime walks: baby swans! Between the 2 adults swans so you cant see them but there are 5.

And that is that! Made it through May. It's not the easiest month of the year, with TFD and Renew, and sometimes I am struggling with having a housemate and not having as much of my own space. But I got a lot done, managed my stress well (still reading New Morning Mercies) and finished with better habits than I started. Lots of answered prayer.