Tag Archives: relationships

Interview with a sex therapist….How to regain your mojo.

29 Mar

intimacy

(source)

I have a theory about sex.

My theory is that the more bonking you do, the less annoying your partner is (you really ought to be bonking your partner for best effect). Sex is the thread that binds you to each other and without it, you can become unravelled.

When I spoke with sex therapist, Isiah McKimmie, from Passionate Spirit I thought I’d hit her with my theory straight off the bat to see if I was on the money.

She agreed heartily. I decided I liked her.

Isiah went on to say that when your sex life is working well, your entire relationship can change, and therefore your entire lives can change.

I may have mentioned once or twice that my mojo has been somewhat lacking since I gave up sleep, so when the opportunity arose for me to interview a sex therapist over a cup of tea, I jumped at the chance.

Is it lingerie, sex toys, 50 Shades of Grey or oysters that I need?

Nope. It’s way more simple than that.

Although the road to a banging sex life is not a short one (Isiah offers courses to couples, as opposed to one off visits), what we discussed was certainly not rocket science.

The first thing that a therapist would look at is your relationship to yourself.

How do you feel about your body?

How satisfied are you with your life?

Do you still feel like sexy you, or are you now only a wife and a mother?

One of the most obvious things is our confidence about our body after all of the changes it undergoes throughout pregnancy and childbirth. We may not feel that we can take the time to get ourselves back into the shape we were previously. It is natural that your body changes somewhat, but if your self esteem takes a battering in the process, it may be as simple as finding time to exercise.

Taking the time away from family can often cause guilt, but it’s really essential for mental health. The time you take away from your family can actually make you a better wife and mother…. and your mojo may just be a Zumba class away.

The second major area to look at is your communication with your partner.

How do you communicate about general issues? This will certainly affect the way you can communicate about sex.

Being able to communicate freely with our partners is terribly important. Some people NEVER tell their partner that a particular thing turns them on, or more importantly, turns them off, or irritates their sensitive, pink bits.

Really?

Isiah said something so poignant to this -

If you can’t communicate well in the bedroom, you probably aren’t communicating well out of it.

Aaah. Not rocket science.

Our sex lives are so personal, and people feel a great sense of embarrassment and shame about it. This embarrassment is something we may have been taught as teens when we’re curious about stuff and wanking like chimpanzees. You’ll go blind, grow hair on your palms, or nice girls simply don’t do those things.

Sex is natural.

Our bodies are ours to explore and enjoy.

There is no shame in pleasure.

The clitoris is the only part of the human body solely for pleasure. It has no greater function than to give sweet sensation. I think it was the Universe’s consolation prize for periods.

If you’re silently turning your back on your partner thinking ‘No way, buddy, I’m exhausted and my bikini line resembles Macy Gray’s afro’, perhaps your partner only hears ‘I’m not attracted to you anymore’…..and that’s just the tip of the communication iceberg.

Also, we need to try to lighten up about it. If it’s become the elephant in the room then everyone starts getting anxious and feeling rejected.

One of the hardest things when you have little people in the house is time. I mentioned to Isiah that between training, children and general exhaustion, Mister H and I have one perfect time for rumpy. That sweet moment only occurs twice in a week, and then if the planets don’t align correctly, it can be week before that magic moment rolls around again.

I suggested that scheduling sex was incredibly unsexy.

Not as unsexy as never having sex, Isiah replied.

Mmmmmm hmmmmm. I see her point.

Also, a quickie has its place, don’t get me wrong, but if you’re only having occasional quickies it’s no wonder your mojo is lacking. Biologically, it take 20 minutes for a woman’s body to warm up.

We all know that we are slower than men and require a tad more romancing and finessing in all the right places, but being ready for the main event is not as simple as getting lubed up.

It actually takes 20 minutes for your uterus to contract and get out of the way, so the penis doesn’t bash its insistent head against your sensitive lady bits. This is particularly the case shortly after giving birth as the uterus is often sitting a little lower in the chamber.

Did you know that? I didn’t, and I thought I knew it all.

If you think you don’t have enough time in the day for langorous loving touch, try turning off the television a couple of times a week. After dinner, instead of retiring to the lounge, turn off the tv, the computers and the iphones, and spend time together.

NEWS FLASH : watching tv together is not spending quality time together.

You could start by giving each other a massage. Not a ‘nudge nudge wink wink’ massage but perhaps you could start reacquainting yourselves with a no strings attached massage, without a happy ending? Hell, if you feel like throwing a leg over then climb aboard, but if sex has become the elephant under the bed, perhaps you need to take it off the table (not the dining room table. I mean, no sex) for a bit.

If you agree that you’re not going to do it for a few weeks, it can alleviate the guilt you may feel from not wanting to. It doesn’t mean you have an affection stand-off, you do other stuff.

Fun stuff. Sexy stuff. Loving stuff.

Remember when you first got together and you’d pash like teenagers on the loungeroom floor? When was the last time you had pash rash? Or dry humped till you came in your pants?

That stuff was exciting, so maybe it’s time to strip back your sex life?

Get back to the fun stuff.

Isiah and I talked a lot about wanking, on your own, together, whatever takes your fancy. It goes to reason that after you give birth perhaps your body feels different, likes different things. If you don’t explore your own body, how can you guide someone around?

Hell, we don’t strike out across town without Google mapping first, so why not chart this territory, too?

I was shocked when Isiah told me that 30% of women have difficulty (or never) orgasm. Some of her adult clients don’t know where their clitoris is. You can bet your bottom dollar that if they don’t know that, they probably don’t know about other erogenous zones, like that crazy little spot behind their knee, their armpit or the back of their neck.

You need to take the time to explore not just your lady bits, but your whole body, and it’s way more fun if you do it with your partner.

There is more sex than ever available to us, whether it’s erotica, porn, toys, or whatever that floats your boat. There is still so much guilt associated with exploring our own sexuality, why?

Why the shame?

If you’re a bit weirded out by the idea of a sex therapist, Passionate Spirit has a subscription based website with loads of information and techniques if you think maybe you need a little helping hand getting your love life back on track.

Maybe it’s as simple as simply getting back on the horse and doing it? Reawakening your sexual self.

If not, and you feel like your relationship needs a little help getting it’s mojo back, maybe you could consider sex therapy?
If your car isn’t working properly, you take it to a mechanic, right?

At the conclusion of our fascinating chat, Isiah told me she had a spare media pass to Sexpo if I wanted it……well, I thought, maybe a little research would be good.

Stay tuned for the Sexpo wrap-up. Holy dooly. I thought nothing could surprise me.

This post is not a sponsored post. I received no payment from Passionate Spirit. I just love talking about sex.

Check out Passionate Spirit’s Facebook page if you want a little mojo in your newsfeed.

Did you find this as fascinating as I did?

Can you talk about your mojo or are you a little shy?

If you know anyone that may benefit from this post, share it with them, and let’s get that elephant out in the open!

Hooking up with FYBF at With Some Grace so everyone can read about mojo rising. Check out what everyone else is flogging.


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Can you over use ‘I Love You’?

10 Mar

i_love_you_in_heart_candy_postcards-rb9fa439ec6e148cc8b10f70dcf76ecf3_vgbaq_8byvr_512An Italian, an Aussie and a Serbian lady were chatting in the supermarket…….

It sounds like the beginning of a joke but it’s one of the things I love about this multi-cultural area I live in.

Kiki was trying to share her sucked, soggy, cardboard cracker with the dark haired, slightly older lady behind us and with her simply pretending to share the slobbery treat with my girl, we sparked a most thought provoking conversation.

You see, she was a mama to a couple of those mystical creatures…..teenage boys.

I asked her if they were as the legend tells – uncommunicative, monosyllabic and mysterious?

‘Not my boys. I wouldn’t let them’.

She explained that although they do spend more time in their rooms, being smelly and  probably sending themselves blind, but she ensures that every evening they talk about their day and she listens to their interests, even if she doesn’t share them, and at the end of the chat, they hug and she tells them she loves them.

And they respond in kind.

Because that’s how she grew up in her big Italian family.

The thick accented Serbian lady who was scanning my groceries was listening to our exchange and apologised for piping in before saying -

‘You don’t tell ‘I love you’, you show it.’

Interesting……… I love a check-out debate.

She went on to explain in her culture, talking about ‘the love’ is not the done thing. You just show it.

I’ve always been showered with the words, so this thought is foreign to me.

We went on to talk about how all three of us were making sure our children knew how much we loved them. How we were expressing our love differently to our family, or partner’s family, and breaking the love barrier in order to give our children something that we/they did not.

The Serbian lady said that she tries to say it because she laments not hearing it more from her mother, although she always knew that her Mother cared for her.

When Mister H and I were first dating the subject of saying ‘I love you’ came up. I don’t think we were actually saying it to each other yet, but this conversation was probably me fishing – can’t remember clearly……what I can remember was him saying that in his experience ‘I love you’ is not something said between family members, it was something for lovers.

I was shocked. Who made up that crazy rule?

I’m a super expressive person.

I fling I love yous around like high kicks at the Moulin Rouge.

I say it to my buddies when I hang up the phone….if I talk to them more than once in any given day, they’ll cop it a couple of times. It’s just something I do….not so much at the gynaecologists, but you know what I mean.

Does it cheapen it, if it’s said regularly? Can you wear it out?

I never get sick of hearing someone say I love you.

They don’t need to be gazing into my eyes and ensuring the sentiment goes straight to the very core of my being. Not every I love you is like that. They can be flippant, disposable ones too.

I. Love. You.

I love you.

Love ya.

I tell my children all the time.

When they’re being silly I say it in a robot voice. When they’re asleep I whisper it in their perfect shell ears. I tell them how special they are and that I will love them unconditionally…..they don’t even know what that means yet, but I do.

I used to say it all the time to my boyfriend, but now that he’s my husband I think perhaps I don’t say it as often. Doesn’t mean I don’t feel it, I just forget, I guess. That’s a bit shitty.
I always try to say it last thing at night, so it softly shrouds him in his sleep.

Of course, I show my family I love them all the time.

If they look hard enough they could see it in all the friggen’ folds of washing, and the wiping of their stinky butts and snotty noses. I couldn’t do that if I didn’t love them.
In all fairness, Mister H takes care of his own butt and nose, but I show him in other ways.

I think saying it, impressing it into and onto them, is important.

It’s a bloody jungle out there, and sometimes the most comforting thing in the world is when a dear one says ‘I love you’.

It can give me strength. It can give me courage.

It’s like a safe, warm place created by three simple syllables.

And, Lord knows, this crazy world, so full of harsh and ugly words, needs more safe places.

Do you say I love you regularly, or do you think is over used?

If you know anyone who would enjoy this, why don’t you show you love them by flicking it over to them…..you know you wanna.

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Hot Sex Tips from 1894

21 Oct

On the hunt for the missing mojo I thought I’d turn to a little literature to get help me get my game on.

50 Shades of Grey had nothing. The whole deal was so implausible and poorly written it was like the Bold and The Beautiful had taken steroids.

Barely raised a tickle in my knicks, so when I saw this little pink, pocket-sized beauty I thought it was sure thing…..

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Hell, there is even a bottle of tincture called Climax on the cover. Who wouldn’t like a hip flask of that in their handbag?

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But then I realised she was a tad behind the times…..

Obviously, no one ever has sex on their wedding night these days, as everybody has drunk their bodyweight in champagne and danced until 3 am……and as for the ‘first time’ bit, well, not even my Grandpa would have fallen for that, what with my six-month old sitting on my knee at the bridal table.

Brilliant!

Sex every day? Who wouldn’t want that, right?

Sex is awesome and fun and messy in a much more fun way than the rest of your day. Why wouldn’t you want to do that all the time?

Abnormal positions? Between the ancient Karma Sutra, that requires all participants to be yogis, and the accessibility of porn these days, haven’t we all seen everything before?

What exactly is an abnormal position? At the washing line? Don’t reckon I’ve seen that one.

MOUTHING EACH OTHER’S VILE BODIES?

Whoa, Mama!!  That actually sounds kinda hot…..

Alas, a mere few more pages in and I realized I’d been duped. Dear old Ruthie baby was nothing but a trumped-up prude, God rest her soul.

I don’t need that advice, Ruth. That’s what I’m trying to shake, sugar.

I was tut-tutting her uptight ways and then I realised perhaps this was closer to the bone than I dare admit.

Ummm, check.

Didn’t mean to let it side, but I’ve been a little pre-occupied.

Oh dear. If I started nagging much earlier, what then? Hypothetically speaking, of course.

Mrs Smythers recommends you talk about mundane household matters at this point. Wouldn’t that enhance sleep?

‘Honey, the bathroom tap washers really need a …………zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz’

or

‘Babes, next time you mow the lawn, could you please………snooooooooooore’

Anyway you can see that the woman is clearly not going to be giving me mojo enhancements I was looking for, but the piece de resistance was on the last page…….check it out.

It’s not about the writing, it’s about the image……

Seriously, WTF is that?

Dear Mrs Reverend Smythers, thank you for allowing me to reproduce pages of your book for my blog as I really feel that this would be highly educational for my readers. It certainly makes me feel better about myself. It reinforces that I’m neither a prude nor a good Methodist.

If anyone knows what that implement is, please, enlighten me. Any guesses?

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A Letter To Myself, One Month On – September

27 Sep

Hey you,

I thought I would jump up and write this to you today because today seems to be an auspicious day.
Last night was KiKi’s best sleep in about 6 weeks, and just one good night makes you feel as though there is light at the end of the tunnel, and that light is not a train.

You woke with such great optimism and pep that you were even brave enough to jump on the scales. Finally, after a million batches of biscuits, you are only 500g from your pre-baby weight. You know deep down you don’t deserve it, but all that lack of sleep has to be good for something, right?
Very jammy, darling. Very jammy indeed.

It’s amazing how a skinny day and good sleep can make the world seem a better place. You can do anything today –  even leap tall buildings in a single bound! Best make sure you wear trousers though as a skirt could leave people with retina damage.

It’s been a lovely month. Having your Dad to visit was so special. 10 days was the longest time he’s ever visited for and it was sad to see him leave. It’s funny how your relationship is growing stronger the older you get. I guess learning that your parents are just people too, is one of the biggest lessons ever.
Your Dad wasn’t emotionally or physically available growing up, but the relationship is so great now, I know you wouldn’t change it, for fear of the balance being shifted somehow.
Hearing him say ‘I love you’ to his grandson will stay in your heart forever, for they were not words he could easily say when you were a child, but now they come naturally.
D Man positively bloomed to be near him, and poor old Grandpapa needed a holiday when he left. I sincerely hope that he comes to visit regularly.

Family was always important to you, but never more so than now. Watching relationships blossom between your children and their grandparents is priceless, but also important.
History is important. Knowing where you come from is important.

One in and one out the door, because now your in-laws are here.
They are different to your people, and you need to remember that. They are good people, earnest people, and they love your family in their own gentle way.

It’s equally important for these relationships to grow as they are one half of your babies, and that half has as much history, as much richness, and as much love as yours.
Your Mama Bear will be here next week, too, so already next month is shaping up to be another special time.

Only one more month to go until the big Half Iron Man for Mister H. All these months of hard training, compromising and sacrificing are coming into fruition. One day you won’t remember any of that stuff, only the great achievement made by your man. He set himself a wild dream and he worked hard to make it happen. It’s commendable, and when you think of the physical toil it takes, it’s actually quite insurmountable for many people. Things will slow down a bit after that, at least for a minute until he gets the bug again.

It’ll be wonderful to all go as a family to see him compete. It will mean the world to him to have his babies, and of course, his wife, on the sideline….and Lord knows, he’ll need some moral support for his gruelling race.
You have not loved this Iron Man journey, but you vowed on that October day in 2010 to support each other’s dreams, and that is an important vow.

You’re doing really well on your project. You need to not let self-doubt creep in. Try to remember that you are absolutely good enough, for whatever you want. Just take the steps, one at a time, and reach for what you want. There is no space to believe you won’t succeed, but you must also remember that success takes many guises.
Just keep doing it because you love it, and trust that the rest will follow.

All in all, you’re doing so much better. You’ve got a great little groove on and your energy is good.

I love you heaps, don’t ever forget it.

Always,

Me.

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Housework. I hate the word.

17 Sep

Today I’m going to share a very tragic story with you guys.

It’s a story about loss, and heartbreak. A tale of longing and hours pined away wishing to see someone again…. If only for one last scrub down and polish.

I have a dear friend who’s idea of a good time is spring cleaning her house. Messed up, huh?
Apparently, there are many people like this out in the world but I – me, moi – am not one of them.

I am not a natural born housekeeper, and it was only after flatting with this person, who shall remain nameless but whose name may rhyme with Schmichelle, for a number of years in my early 20′s that I was truly housebroken in the custodial arts. A year with her and I was down with regular sheet changing, shower scrubbing and her favorite mantra -

“If you have time to cook in the kitchen, you have time to clean it”

Which was approximately the polar opposite of my mantra at the time which was -

“If I ignore it long enough, someone else might clean it for me” – ie: Shcmichelle.

Ultimately, I’d say that living with her has made me the housekeeper I am today, but I am by no means known as a fastidious scrubber (except in some circles but that is for a different reason). The thing is, I do love a clean, tidy, sparkling house. A house that not only doesn’t have piles of tumbling papers, and toys, made solely of sharp corners, strewn around the floor just waiting to pounce under your unsuspecting foot in the night, but also a house that doesn’t have not-so-secret grime built up in the corners, and dust on the tops of the picture frames and crumbs, oh, the endless crummy crumbs, everywhere.
It’s quite the dilemma. It would seem that when I do spend a couple of hours rectifying the carnage, it is merely a matter of minutes before it explodes back to its former apocalyptic state.

When Mister H and I first got together, he had cleaners. He loves a clean house but is a rather messy man, just quietly. I am not being disloyal by giving this fact away, it is simply the way it is. I try, and try, to change his spots, but alas, a leopard my man remains.

Anyway, I digress. I really loved the cleaners.

Simon and Jenny were lovely people who were always very smiley and happy and we had very rudimentary chats, invariably involving charades, as they’re English wasn’t that crash hot, and my Mandarin is worse. I’d bake for them at Christmas, or give them a jar of jam when I’d made a batch.
We were buddies in my eyes.

At this juncture, I feel it is very important for me to add the fact that, although lovely, they were actually fairly shitty cleaners. They would just dust the fronts of things, leaving the backs to gather enough dust that you could knit a sweater for a small dog (as long as he didn’t have asthma), and cleaning Mister H’s bookshelf just seemed to elude them. Perhaps they had some form of Bachelor Bookshelf Blindness, and the more imposing and unattractive a piece of bachelor furniture it was, they couldn’t see it?

Then, one day it happened.

They asked for a pay rise. I was all for it.

Ten bucks more? Yeah, guys, sure thing, but would you mind, please, taking extra care with the dusting, particularly around the bookshelf?

(insert chirping crickets here)

Nada for two whole days and then this….

We don’t want to come anymore. Your keys are in the letterbox.

Just like that, we were dumped.
It was over.

Wendy Harmer recently said if you can’t clean your own house it’s too big for you, or some such blasphemy.
Is she on drugs?

I’ve spent the last two years pining for those guys. I didn’t realise how much I loved them until they were gone.
I’ve exhausted the last two days scrubbing the house as it was getting completely a little festy in the corners, and let me tell you, when I was on my hands and knees scrubbing that shower with Mister H’s toothbrush, I really pined for them and the smell of bleach and Pine-o-Clean that trailed in their wake.

If only I’d been less fussy about cleanliness – more like I am now, really – then perhaps all of this longing and heartache could have been avoided.

I vow to you all, my friends, one day I shall have a cleaner again. Mark my words….One. Sweet. Day.

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Happily Ever After. The fairytale myth.

29 Jul

Fairtytales have a hell of a lot to answer for if you ask me.
What is up with that whole happily ever after lark? Frankly, it’s false advertising.

Cinderella? Happily ever after.
Snow White? Happily ever after.
Sleeping Beauty? She had a cracking snooze AND lived happily ever after.
Romeo and Juliet? Hmmm, forget I mentioned them, and they’re not technically a fairytale anyway.

Realistically speaking, Cinderella may be the exception to the rule. Yep, she possibly lived happily ever after because she married into royalty. She snagged a Prince so she probably had nannies, and housekeepers and still got her hair done every month or so and went for cocktails with the girls whenever she wanted.
Alright for some, I suppose, but even marrying into royalty would have its issues, for instance, she could never pick her nose in the car for fear of being snapped by the paps.

Snow White? Well, after living with 7 guys, albeit little ones, for months, she probably lived happier once she was just living with just one princely dude. Can you imagine how many pairs of shoes were all over her loungeroom prior to that? Or how many skiddies those 7 little bottoms would leave in her clean bathroom? She probably ate that poisoned apple because she was so over cleaning up after the dwarves. She definitely would have been happi-ER, but happily ever after?
There’s no such thing.

No one mentions how, after Sleeping Beauty has three kids and no sleep for two years, she’s always cranky when the Prince comes home from trotting about in his kingdom. He just wants to take off his breeches, scratch his balls and sit by the fire with the hounds but she wants him to help her with bath time and to fold the never ending washing.
It’s not easy maintaining a relationship when you have a family- there’s no two ways about it- but you don’t hear that in a fairytale.

In fact, no one ever said that relationships are hard work, full stop. It’s a well kept secret until after you’re married and the realisation of ‘forever’ sinks in.
Although in Hollywood people get married and divorced before you finish your cup of coffee, most people enter into the union meaning the word ‘forever’.
Marriage is rewarding, and stability is reassuring but it’s not all happily ever after at all, even if you do have a white picket fence.

When you join with someone, in marriage or in a committed way (bring on gay marriage, you bastards, enough of this silliness!!!), they talk about you becoming ‘one’.
You don’t become one at all. You’re still you and they’re still them. Two people trying to do the best thing for each other, and their families but also needing to what they need to do to keep the balance of themselves for their own life. That’s a frickin’ juggling act, let me tell you, and it ain’t always roses.

Relationships are constant work, and require more negotiation that the United Nations on a busy day and sweeter choreography than the Bolshoi. Libidos rise and fall, and not always at the same time as each other’s, so when the red, hot passion fades, you better be sure that you’re good friends. Spouses get depressed, have mid-life crises and even have affairs that threaten to tear the others heart out. Miscommunication or even just taking each other for granted can be very dangerous long term.

The thing with this whole marriage business is, you need to listen as much as you speak, it seems….. and sometimes you really need to listen to what’s not being said.
You need to be honest about your needs BEFORE it becomes a craw because it’s so much harder to fix once resentment has reared it’s ugly head.

When you get it right though, it’s beautiful to have that special ‘one’ at your side, supporting you and smiling with you when things get tough. It may not be happily ever after, but it can certainly be close.

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Addicted to iPhone? Sure as Apples.

18 Jun

I love my iPhone, I don’t know how I ever lived without it, so please bear that in mind as I type this treasonous, indeed sacrilegious, sentence…..I curse the iPhone revolution. Petewy (that’s me spitting in the dirt all dramatically and stuff).

When Mister H and I first started dating he thought I was really smart. I knew so much about so many subjects. I was dazzling, I was fascinating, I was interesting, but then it happened. He got an iPhone. You see, the problem is I am a shameless embellisher…..more than that, I remember tiny snippets of info from an article I read 100 years ago (or so, you know how it is) and I fill in my own blanks. I know a lot about a few subjects, and I know a bit about many subjects and often, when posed with a question rather than responding ‘I don’t know’, I’ll draw a little on said knowledge, a little on logic, a lot on fairy dust, and I’ll just make something up.

It’s not lying. Most of the time it’s sounds right, to my ears anyway, so it practically is the truth……but now? Now?

Now, Mister H has stinking Google in his pocket. Petewy.

We all do….and Facebook, and iTunes, and Angry Birds, and Fruit Ninja, and eBay, and Pinterest, and Ask The Cheesemonger, and, and, and about 500,000 (not an embellishment) other apps available through the Apple Store, and other leading Smartphones are not far behind, if they’re not ahead (which means I don’t know and I’m making it up). I personally have cut down on my Facebook time. I now only check it about 500 times a day, and don’t even ask about my blog statistics. Since I gave up the bathroom scales, it appears I’ve merely transferred my numbers obsession.

I recently read an article entitled ‘Are you really there for your kids or are you on your iPhone?’. Doesn’t take a genius to work out what it was about, but it really highlighted how in the ‘olden days’ when people were out playing with their kids in the park, they were totally 100% present, and now people seem to be on their phones. I denied it for it second and then realised hells yeah, I’m on that damn phone all the time. It’s practically attached to my hand like some android appendage. Is it habit left over from when I was working, or am I just bored? I certainly don’t have any pressing emails to check daily. I’m hardly going to be getting an invitation to Parliament, or a notification of a lotto win so I probably could do with checking it only once a day. Maybe twice.

I was talking to a young mum I know and do you know what she said to me?
SHE DOESN’T HAVE A PHONE!
WHAT?????
NO PHONE???????
How ever do people contact her at inopportune moments? A phone trilling in the silent room as you try to settle a baby, a distant ring making you speed pee….. she simply isn’t living!!!
It was delightfully refreshing to hear her say ‘right now I’m here talking to you, and I’ll be home soon enough if I’m needed’.
Man, to be honest, it made me want to take my delightfully refreshed self over to my bag and check my phone in case anything important had come in in the half hour.

It doesn’t end there though. I’m not proud to admit this but I have a sneaking suspicion that am I not alone when I say, of an evening, after dinner (probably eaten on the couch in front of the tv), Mister H and I may well be guilty of multiple phones and computers on the go. After a brief discussion about our day (I probably did some washing, went to the park and the supermarket…..yawn. He went to work and did some stuff  and stuff with this program that something something to do something…..I’m usually gone about there) we dive feet first into the sticky world wide web and often, barely talk. That’s terrible! What happened to us??? Were we always so…..so…..boring???

Has it happened to you too? Have you fallen victim to the ‘revolution’ of technology?
This week, and from here on in, I vow to clear a space on the dining table and eat with my husband, music on, tv off, at least twice a week. We will have dinner conversation, no matter how boring, and we will make an effort……hell, who knows what it might lead to?
He might help with the washing up.

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Tragic Love and Chicken Soup Remedy

17 Jun

I’ve dated some truly prized dicks in my time. I’m not referring to appendages, but to appalling character. I never purposely intended to date penises, but it would appear that I have shown some rather poor judgment of character in my past. I wish someone had have told 18 year old me that bad boys were a fool’s pastime. Being a know-all, I doubt I would have listened, but that’s by the by.
I reckon the contenders for the Top 3 All Time Most Shithouse Boyfriend would have to be as follows :

Mr Double Jeopardy
Oh, my Lordy, this guy was a great player. He had a whole double life goin’ on. It must have been fairly bloody exhausting for the poor chap, in retrospect, as I know that maintaining one relationship is hard enough work, so cultivating two high maintenance ladies for a year, one of whom (me) he co-habited with, probably entitles him to some kind of award. He was also incredibly industrious with a secret career as a drug dealer. I would have loved the opportunity to agree to be the Bonnie to his Clyde, but alas, I was ‘that woman’ who has no idea what’s going on right under her nose. I dare say that if he did receive an award it should definitely consist of a monstrous pair of brass balls mounted on a plaque, because that’s what he needed to pull off such a feat of duplicity. Anyway, it ended spectacularly with a suicide attempt (his, not mine), and a stint in therapy (mine, not his). The truth of the matter is, he was probably so exhausted from his ruse that he just wanted to sleep the eternal sleep. His family whisked him away and I never saw him again.

The Greek Hitler
I thought this dude was so cool. He had a 1960′s Dodge, and a ’50′s BMW motorbike. He wore cowboy boots and vintage leather jackets, and worked in a nightclub. I moved into his pad within two weeks and strapped in for a fairly fast and furious roller coaster ride of mind bending. Some people just love power play, and this cat could have powered the grid to the whole Eastern Suburbs. He was so damned controlling. If he played guitar like he played me, he would have been a cross between Hendrix and Slash but without the ‘fro.
My mum came to stay and saw the whole embarrassing lot and very subtly left him a note when she departed. It read ‘Do not try to clip the little bird’s wings, as she’s just learning to fly’. Then, she not-so-subtly told me she thought he was a dick.
God bless that woman. I bought a one way ticket to the UK.

Mr Anger Management Fail
Holy guacamole, this dude had a temper! Once he flipped his shit he couldn’t control himself and I stupidly stayed with him for a year and a half. WTF was I thinking? I was young, he was sexy, and he told me I was nothing without him…and I believed him for a minute. The dichotomy about this charming fellow was that he made a cracking farmhouse style chicken soup. Ironic, huh? Chicken soup is hailed as the most nurturing of all liquid meals and this thunderous lad was about as nurturing as Hurricane Katrina. He made this soup by boiling chicken wings and adding some veges and there was something so wholesome about it that even though we broke up with a very loud bang, I still thought about his soup. It was so long ago but over the years I tweaked the formula and now I have a winning recipe.
So much so, that recently a girlfriend of mine said she could eat this soup every day for the rest of her life.
I’d actually like to dedicate today’s post to her. Not only has she known me throughout all of these tumultuous dalliances of my twenties, before I hit the jackpot with my Mister Right, but she has just bought home twin baby miracle girls. Her husband has been away for two weeks, and she has coped magnificently, even coming to visit me in the ‘burbs, two 15-week-olds in tow, and freshly washed and blow dried hair. Ah-may-zing!

Now you have the recipe, my dear friends, go forth and eat this soup every day of your life.

Read the recipe through first as I kind of do the stocky bit first so as to not get soggy vegetables.

Yield : a big pot full

You will need :

  • 1 kilo chicken legs, skin on
  • 2 litres chicken stock
  • 2 carrots, chopped
  • 3 stalks celery, chopped, but with the tops and leaves left whole
  • 1 leek, white part only, chopped, the green top part left whole
  • 1 onion finely chopped
  • 3 bay leaves
  • a small handful of fresh thyme (2 teaspoons-ish dried if it’s all you have)
  • 1/2 cup barley
  • 1 potato, skin on and chopped
  • a handful of beans, cut into 1/3

Throw your onion, celery tops and leek top into a big heavy based pot with a little oil. When they’re all fragrant, add your chicken legs and just start to get them a little browned. You don’t need to brown all of them all over, we’re just starting a little caramelisation process to release the sweetness of the veg and the yumminess of the chicken. Add your stock and your barley, throw in your thyme and bay leaves and pop on a lid for about an hour or until the chicken is coming away from the bone.
Using a slotted spoon, pull out the celery tops and leek and disgard. Put the chicken into a separate bowl and allow to cool.
Pop your potato into the soup and allow to cook for 5 minutes before adding the rest of your vegetables excluding the beans. The beans go in in the final three minutes so they keep a little al dente. Pick your chicken meat and add to pot.
If you want to skim the fat off, you can either refrigerate it until the next day so it;s all on the top, or you can lay a piece of kitchen roll on the top of the soup and it absorbs into the paper……I just eat it. Fat equals flavour…..sorry, Michelle Bridges.
Season to taste. Serve with crusty bread.

I like to add lemon juice and Tabasco to mine.

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Patience in the Face of Homicidal Tendencies

26 May

Fatigue effects everybody in different ways. Some people get emotional, and some people get irrational. Some people become utter bitches and some people get homicidal…..and then there’s me. I become all of those things, wrapped up in a zombie with greasy hair and milk stains on my t-shirt. Ok, I don’t really have greasy hair, I’m on top of my personal hygiene, at least for this week. I was just exaggerating to paint the picture…….apparently I’m prone to this. I’m not exaggerating about the milk stains though. Can’t seem to get on top of that at the moment.

I seem to recall myself mentioning how well I was handling all the night time waking last week and I’d like to amend my statement. Although at the time of waking in the dead of night, I’m thrilled to see KiKi’s sweet, little, hungry face, I must admit to feeling a tad weary during the day with a patience wick in the negatives making me feel, at times, like everyone is out to piss me off and perhaps my head may explode leaving one more mess for me to clean up. Otherwise, I think I’m all over this two sproglet caper.

I’m managing mostly to be very patient with D Man, so if you were to do the math – who does that leave to bear the brunt of my wrath? Poor ol’ Mister H…..oh, and Mister Fluffy Pants (not a pseudonym, that’s actually my cat’s name). I think they’ve both felt the chill this week, and I don’t mean the change in the weather. I really don’t appreciate being woken up by being walked all over at 4.30am with whiskers tickling my nose when I’ve just managed to drift back off – Just in case it’s not clear, that would be the cat, not Mister H. Mister H values his testicles way more than to attempt even nasal tickling at this precarious stage of the game.

But I’ve been tired before, deathly tired, in fact, and I managed not to be cranky for the ENTIRE 11 months D Man didn’t sleep for….so why so irritable now?

I did a spot of soul searching and had a rather intense discussion with Mister H (read: teeny, little argument – really  read:………. you get the picture) and it came to me like a bolt of lightning. I realised I have a rather large dose of Fever of the Cabin. I need to get out!
It’s not that I haven’t left the house, because I’ve been for walks and stuff, but my routine has been seriously messed with. It would appear I’m a creature of habit, not the spontaneous, fabulous creature of my imagination, and my habits have been altered somewhat of late. Between my guests, and my husband at home, not to mention the obvious recent nipple monster shaped change in our lives, things have been a tad shaken up around the homestead…….so that’s IT!!!
I’ve decided that I own next week!

D Man and I are back on his social schedule and we’re getting busy as of Monday. I’m dusting off our Junior Jiving shoes, and we are stepping’ out. D Man doesn’t even like Junior Jivers most of the time, but we’re doing it, dammit! Hell, I may even bake some cookies, and wear a clean top, for playgroup.

I’m sure once I fool myself into a sense of normality, my usual peppy demeanour will return and I’ll be my charming self once more.

I hope so for Mister Fluffy Pants’ sake…..oh, and for Mister H’s (I love you, darling xx).

I love this picture of my darling holding my bambinos……he looks a little tired too. Needs to harden up, really.

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Recipe For A Good Man

1 May d man

With a little boy in my care, I often bury my nose in his tickly, soft hair and think I don’t have much time.

I’ve really only got a matter of years before he pulls away from me and although, one hopes, he’ll always be crazy about his Mummy, he’ll no longer nestle into me for comfort or hold my hand in public. I feel a sense of urgency to get this recipe just right. How do I grow the type of man I would like to meet in the world?

Many men have many great attributes, and I love men. But this one is my (our) responsibility to try and shape as best we can into a well rounded individual. How do you instil great confidence that does not come across as arrogance? How do you ensure that he has respect for women, and other races and gay people? How do you make a man that is a great communicator without being too wet? Someone strong, yet gentle with just the right amount of…….je ne sais quoi? I think about this a lot, as I watch my baby become a boy. Of course, it’s as important to think about the woman you’re raising when you have a girl, but I haven’t got as far as thinking about that in the dead of the night yet. I suppose that will all start as of next week, or so (whenever you’re ready, baby girl, we’re ready for you…. and my back is more than ready, sausage). When is a mother supposed to sleep with all of this to think about?

I’m still reading Raising Boys, (I’m reading it little bits at a time) and it’s resonating in so many ways. Admittedly, the real work will begin in a few years, but it all starts now, of course it does. We are learning and growing from the second we open our eyes. Steve Biddulph explains how our very first relationship with the opposite sex is our opposite parent so our attitude to relationships are formed in the first 6 years of our life. This is fascinating, and terrifying in equal portions. I guess D Man is likely to grow up with a penchant for girls who blow raspberries on his tummy, and bum cheeks, and gnaw on his toes, but I’m sure she’s out there. Steve goes on to explain that we don’t need men that wrestle buffaloes or cut down trees with axes made from mammoth bones anymore so we need to learn to channel that masculine energy into different kinds of heroic effort. He says we need to add language and feeling skills into our ‘super boys’ and he referenced men like Gandhi, Martin Luther King, and other dudes you may have heard of,  like JESUS AND BUDDHA…..no pressure. No wonder I sit up at night thinking about this!!! These men were all courageous, determined and sensitive men, that’s the type of man I’m trying to crack the recipe for. D Man doesn’t need to change the world, that’s not what I’m aiming for, but if he can positively affect the people he meets daily, my work is done. You know sometimes you meet someone and you just think ‘they’re a good man’. I’d be happy with that.

It’s a long road between now and setting him free to be the man he’s going to be, but I know it’ll be gone in a flash of firsts. His first teeth and steps are done, but we have many firsts to look forward to. First days of school, first games of football, first lounge room dance-offs, first loves and first heartbreaks……but first, I need to remember that I can only do my best and I’m not a super parent. I’m just me, and I have to pray that that will be enough.

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