if you’re jealous right now, I understand.

I love planning them, and thinking about them and looking forward to them. I love going and being there and coming home and taking photos and bragging both before and after and making everyone jealous especially if you know you’re going somewhere fabulous.

You know, like Vanuatu. Like I am. On Thursday. he he he.

I’ll probably be a bit out of range of phone and internet and unreachable by all of the civilised world. If things go according to plan.

See you when I get back. I’ll be the one with the tan and the beach hair. Jealous much?

 Yup. I ran. This is my third (and slowest) year getting up in the freezing cold, at sparrow’s fart on a Sunday, and slogging my built-for-comfort-not-speed butt 14 kilometres from Sydney CBD to Bondi beach with a dirty great hill stretching from the 6km mark to the 7km flag.

 Ouch. Ow ow ow ow ow!!!

 I love the event. It’s a fabulous day. The vibe of so many people out to enjoy themselves, to challenge themselves, to join in, or just to have a look is brilliant. The spectacle of along the route is no less spectacular. Everything from glam rock bands to oom-pah bands providing entertainment, costumes, charity events, and 20 storm-troopers riding an invisible roller coaster.

 But it’s hard. And it’s painful. Unless you’re one of those freaky people, even if you’re a good runner you’re going to hurt doing this race. It’s a road race, so it’s a hard surface so rough on the old joints. Somehow the weather gods have long-ago decided to bless the race, and so the day is always fine and clear and sunny…and sunburn and wind burn are serious risks.

 Oh, and did I mention it’s a freaking 14 kilometre run!!!!!

 So the upshot it, it’s something that I love. And it’s something I hate. And it’s all about attitude. Pushing through the pain. And I love it. Enjoying the ride. Taking it easy and making it your own personal challenge, and pushing yourself as hard as you can to see if you can hack it, and the mental games you play with yourself at every different stage.

Can you tell I’m conflicted? I am. And the best bit? Finishing. Knowing you’ve done it. Sharing stories with your friends who did it too. Picking up your little medallion and feeling smug that you got your arse out of bed and did it.

 Til next year. J

On Monday I worked from home. On Tuesday I arrived back in the office, ready and raring to go.

Without my laptop.

Like my bus driver this morning. It was pouring with rain this morning (and for the rest of the day for tha matter). I managed to get off the bus without my umbrella (of course I did. Did you forget who you were talking to here?) and realised almost immediately. What with the getting wet and everything.

The bus had pulled up and was waiting at a red light just ahead so I figured I had nothing to lose and ran up and knocked on the door, doing my best sign-language for “I left my brolly on the bus”.

I konw there’s probably some rule. Some bureaucratic, red-tape, OH&S, little man with the power to make rules rule saying the drivers aren’t supposed to open the door and let people on when they’re stopped at the lights. Imagine the chaos that could ensue!

But she did anyway, and even opened the back door and let me off again once I’d picked it up instead of making me ride to the next stop.

Thankyou driver! You made my day a little better.

I have made it my personal mission, over a number of years working in the CBD (unemployment and contracting phases in the ‘burbs notwithstanding) to find the most delicious lunch options just so I could share them with you on this site. Not for myself, you understand…it’s totally altruistic, I swear!

So I’ll give you my top 4 beloved lunch venues. But keep it under your hat, ok? Readers only. I don’t want to have to queue next time I’m there.

#4.

Fresh & Zesty These guys do the best salads I’ve found. I know you’re looking puzzled at the idea of salad, but I’m talking about delicious salads with chickpeas and artichoke. Brown rice with currants and cashews and olives. Mixed bean salads. couscous and other deliciousness.

#3

Pho Ever. It’s a chain, yes. But for all that, their made to order stir fry noodles are cheap and fresh and tasty. Try the lemongrass sauce. Or the Herbal Hot sauce. Trust me.

#2

Vermicelli. These guys do pretty much 2 things. and they do them very well. Rice paper rolls and Vermicelli bowls. They are very fresh, the proportion of ingredients is perfect and I can’t resist going there at least once a week. Like today.

#1

And my favourite lunch place is a recent addition. I stumbled on it by chance, as it’s further to walk than the other competitors. but completely divine. The winner is: The Goood Pizza. This guy makes pizza to die for. The potato and truffle is a little slice of heaven. I can’t even begin to explain how much I love this stuff. UN. BE. LIEVE. ABLE.

Confession 2: I don’t really like wearing make-up. I’m way too much of a fidgeter, plus I suffer from allergies most of the year round, so I usually end up rubbing my eyes and looking like a panda sooner or later. So I usually wait until I’ve nearly arrived before I start doing my make-up.

Confession 3: This morning I didn’t quite finish before the bus pulled in and I hopped off the bus fully intending to finish in the bathrooms at work before I went to my desk.

Confession 4: I promptly forgot the intention in confession 3 and have spent the day with mascara on both top set of lashes, but only the right bottom lashes.

Confession 5: I wonder if I’ve been wandering around looking just a little bit odd and slightly mad, like Johnny Depp with his uneven pupils in Alice in Wonderland?

More of a reality for my life, having spent most of my career working for big companies, is EOFYS – the end of financial year squeeze! It’s that great period around June (earlier if you’re lucky) when the money from the budget has run out and everyone’s eying off the financial stuff that they’re responsible for and thinking about what that might mean for their bonuses.

In a good year, that might mean holding off on ordering stationary for a couple of weeks, or having to wait a bit for any travel to be signed off. This year has clearly not been a good year in the company I work for.

The stationary freeze came early this year. Quickly followed by a travel emabargo. Even 5c per pack tissues were no longer being supplied once the supply cupboard emptied of them. In the kitchen, the belt-tightening soon became obvious. The first to go was the container of generic tea-bags. Reduced from a bountiful supply to an empty vacuum sealed container with only the sad dust of tea-bags past as a grim reminder in the bottom or happier days. The individual sachets of sugar lasted a little longer. A stockpile was found in the back of a dusty cupboard that kept the office sweet for a good couple of weeks longer than imagined. The International Roast instant coffee was a last bastion of free hot beverages. If the reason for that isn’t obvious it’s clear you’ve never tried the vile stuff. That’s when things started getting weird. The next to go was paper towel in the kitchen. That in combination with the dodgy tap that sprays water in random directions was a literal recipe for disaster. And then the washing up liquid ran out and the descent into office kitchen savagery began. I shudder when I think about it, and am far too traumatised to explain the direness of the situation, but if you’ve ever worked in an office environment, I’m sure you can imagine if you put your mind to it. This was a dark, dark time. And the fear was there in everyone’s eyes. What could be next? Could we survive? Would we have to resort to cannibalism? Would toilet paper be next? Argh! The horror!

But it’s always darkest just before dawn, and there has been light at the end of the tunnel. Today is a sparkling new day and the delivery guy came to pay us a visit!!!

And I can wash up my coffee mug again!

And bought a pair of polarfleece gloves. And a pair of swimming goggles.

Both were bought for perfectly good and unrelated reasons (the gloves because It’s been too freaking cold here lately for me to ride to work as my fingers don’t work by the time I get there, and the goggles becuase I lost my last pair a little while ago and I’m in the midst of planning a tropical island getaway in the Pacific).

But it did make me giggle to walk up to the checkoput with such an unlikely pair of items.

You know what they say about small things and who they amuse? Highly probable!

I kept a pretty damn clean house. And I like it that way.

When I went back to work, I found myself re-assessing things. NTB, for all his good points, has that condition prevalent in many of his gender where he doesn’t share my innate desire to have a clean house occasionally…or more accurately, he doesn’t notice dirt until it averages about a foot thick.

Outsourcing seemed the wisest option. Fortuitously, a flyer appeared in my mailroom noticeboard around this time. And to cut out the boring details of my shopping around for a cleaner, I’ll just leave it at the fact that this is how I met Chloe.

Funnily enough, Chloe is also the name of my inner child. As opposed to Agnes, who is my inner cantankerous old lady who owns 73 cats and confiscates any cricket balls that come over the fence and who all the neighbourhood kids all think is a witch…but that’s taking a tangent into a whole nother story.

So Chloe cleans my house. Brilliantly. In ways I wouldn’t even think of doing occasionally, let alone on a regular basis. I now have a couple of friends who live close and they now get her to clean their houses too, and I’m sure they love her nearly as much as I do. I nearly cried when she got stuck in the UK (she’s English) with that stupid volcano with way too many consonants.

So it’s OK and totally normal if I just walk around the house after she’s been, and soak up all the clean vibes? Right? Right??

I love having a cleaner. (And for the record I totally realise how lucky I am to be able to do that).