Life in Middle Girth

My day off - and after switching on the computer to catch up on emails, banking, and resolving to change the password so the kids can't be on it all day playing god knows what mindless crap - here I am frittering my time away blogging. I'm no better than they.

On Monday, my psychotic cat bit me. Hard. One minute he was loving and friendly, and the next I was reaching for the water pistol as his ears flattened, his eyes turned into burning black lasers and evil, pure evil, emanated from him. Unfortunately the water pistol (I keep several small ones around the house for these precise occasions) was EMPTY and the heathen animal launched himself at me and got me a beaut just behind the knee in that soft, sensitive spot. I yelled, lashed out in self defence and as I was beating a hasty retreat the little bugger got me again in the calf. Then he waltzed off as if nothing had happened, with barely a backward glance at me mopping up the blood that was trickling down my leg. A cat bite doesn't sound very serious but this cat, a siamese, has jaws of steel and as well as the deep puncture marks from his razor sharp top fangs, there was a considerable amount of bruising around where his bottom teeth had gripped. One of the holes actually had yellow fatty stuff peeping out it was that deep. Both wounds continued to ooze all day but weren't too painful thank goodness. Next day, each bite had a halo of bright red around it, about the size of an orange, and it felt hot. Uh oh, infection. Yesterday I took my leg to the doctor in case I needed a rabies shot (joking), and was amazed that the visit cost twenty dollars even though it was on ACC. Mind you, I got my money's worth because he also took my blood pressure which was the best it's been for ages, 120/78, listened to my old man's cough and decided it was only upper respiratory and didn't need medication, and made me get on the scales. Sod. Of course I'd put on weight - we've just had Christmas, what do you expect??? Thinks: that's why he didn't take my BP after weighing me or the result could have been elevated!  Then it was off to the chemist where I had to fork out fifteen more dollars for nine antibiotic tablets. Mind you, they are the size of horse pills so I suppose it isn't bad value. So, darling Ziggy, behave your little self or it might be a different treatment for you - shot gun not water pistol.

We have a long weekend coming up - Monday is a public holiday, Waitangi Day. This is where us New Zealanders commemorate the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi bringing NZ under British rule all those years ago. Instead of being the celebratory occasion intended it usually is marked by Maori activists stirring up trouble and politicians struggling manfully (even Aunty Helen who was once reduced to tears by the sods) to maintain a semblance of dignity that the occasion deserves. Don't get me started, but its time the past was put back in the past and folks concentrated on improving the present.

My Waitangi weekend is beginning with a couple of nights with a girlfriend down at her parent's beach house with nothing planned for definite, but probably including walking on the beach, finding the piano which just appeared in the sand hills recently and has become the Turakina Beach icon, and having a token tinkle on the ivories; maybe going to Wanganui to see The River Queen, shop and/or have dinner; a few drinks and nibbles and general blobbing out in a childfree and husbandless environment. Ah bliss.

The kids go back to school on Tuesday, and Pip is moving back to Palmerston North, to her new flat sometime over the weekend, ready for Teachers College on Tuesday. She has just begun to sort through her mountain of stuff that is filling the garage and spread over half of downstairs - goodness knows how she is going to pack it all. Brent couldn't get the big tandem trailer from work but has scored the Century 21 horsefloat which is even better as our 31 degree heat has given way to steamy rain.

Right, time to do a cursory tidy up then take Greg shopping for new school shorts (I think he is finally growing), and get supplies in for the weekend.

Cheers,

Jaybee