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Albany is fast becoming one of my favourite towns. It's close to Denmark, and Mt Barker, and has heaps of nice relaxing cool stuff to see. Or not to see. :-)
Thursday
We get there. I drove about half wayish and then mother drove. I slept. :-) Funniest thing was waking up because I could hear someone snoring. I got a crooked neck because I was also very uncomfortable. Thems the breaks I guess. :-) Aunty Jean was very pleased to see us. In fact, she did not shut up. At all. She even talks to herself. All the time. Mother ran off and went to bed early while Aunty Jean chattered away. Uncle Phil is pretty deaf, so he turns the TVs all up. Aunty Jean is trying to talk over the TVs, so she talks loudly. Aunty Jean has also been a housewife for ever and ever and ever and so we think she is also pretty lonely. So, loud and nonstop. Chesh at least pauses for breath occasionally, and is not too loud. Or I would thump him. :-)
We watched Lost. Weird show. Made weirder by the running commentary from Aunty Jean which made it seem like she was forgetting things that happened just before the last ad break. And then we watched Race Around the World I think it is? Nasty nasty peice of work. Didn't like it at all, I found the stresses and games the competitors had to play were just simply mean and some of the competitors were horrible and would have had a 24 ounce bowl of hot hungarian soup RIGHT where it hurts. (Down the underpants.)
Slept badly, as you do in a new bed. Also a single, not that it's a hass. Just ... different. Read a book on cooking, one of the old ones. The sort of thing that has a section for invalids, like beef tea and how to cook brains etc.
Friday
I wake up in time to hear Uncle Phil and Aunty Jean knock on the front door, mother answer it, and they say goodbye. In hindsight, that was weird. They had to knock on their own front door for mother to answer it and..... *shrug* :-) Whatever. Mum made bacon and eggs for breakfast. And kept it down!
Mother and I went for a drive. We ended up seeing the wind farm, which was fantastic. We walked up to the nearest windmill and stood in awe at it's base. Massive, absolutely massive, just standing there, pretending like human's don't exist. It made me think they should be part of a scifi fantasy future story; after the apocalypse people find the sentinels still turning, facing the sea, not realising that they still need maintenance and there's another race/species/tribe maintaining them. Awesome. On the way back there was a sign saying "Denmark" and an arrow, so we followed it. :-)
I like Denmark. We wandered around, I bought some toffee, mother bought a sh*tload of toffee, including chili peanut brittle. My tongue seems tohave develeoped it's own personality, and things which I can normally eat now seem to be a pain. Chili hurts. So does gherkin dip. Weird. Anyway, we head to the wineries to find lunch. In a strange little place we find a nice enough cafe with a surprisingly decent specials menu. I had hungarian style lamb on vegie stack with pesto and baked garlic, and mother had cajun chicken salad with corn and capsicum salsa and guacamole. Mine was full of rich flavours, the vegie stack was divine, but the flavours were all so strong that in the end I couldn't finish it. :-)
I slept on the way back to Albany, which is good, cos when I got back I discovered I needed to be in Mt Barker at 5:30, and not 7ish. :-) Mother came with me, and we trucked off. It was a very good party. About half the ladies I had seen and measured before, and they all LOVED the stuff they had bought last time. The party totalled about $700 in the end, which was very very nice. They were having a BBQ which we were invited to, and if I had been a lone I might have stuck around for it, but Mum doesn't like strangers much, and she had been with a bunch of strangers for close to two hours, so we racked off. Good time, too, it was a 2 hour party and I earned about $150. I'm pretty damned happy with that! We raided Aunty Jean's fridge and freezer and had weird little spring rolls for dinner with vegies. Mother so far has managed to keep down almost every single meal. Wow. We were naughty and drank a bottle of wine between us. Slept very very well. :-)
Saturday
Hit the Farmers Markets. It was truly awesome. The vegies were vibrant and bursting with flavour and vitality, the meats looked yummy, and strawberries pert and perfect. I bought some beetroot and an aubergine and some chili and some beans because they were all so perfect I couldn't resist them. The mushroom stall had sold out by the time we came through the second time (about 9:45ish) and so had a few others. Real farm laid eggs, smoked meats, raspberries, all the fruit and veg had been picked that day or the night before, I hate seeing all these wonderful vegies because then I HAVE TO COME BACK HERE!!! *sigh* Didn't feel so good. Mother took me home and I slept until about 12:45. Party at 2! Once again I was the first person there.
The party did not run as tightly as the first one had done. There were about six ladies, and I'm usually pretty good at closing sales, but I just didn't seem to be able to on Saturday. But still, sold almost $500 stuff, and took about 2 hours from start time, so I am happy. :-) So, made about $250 for myself this weekend, as well as had a bit of a rest and relax. I'm pretty damn happy, a holiday that pays for itself. :-)
That night Ma and I went out to dinner in Albany. Albany has managed to hit that balance where there's enough people for a few decent resturaunts to survive, but it's not so touristy that I hate every one. (Like Margaret River is starting to become.) So, we ambled along and found The Venice I think it was. (Not sure, but I did bring home the menu. I'll update if I got the name wrong.)
Mother had garlic prawns (her lifelong favourite) and I had pork loin with honey, basil, pecan, apricot, stuffing. I have a high expectation from resturaunts; I want them to do a better job than I do. Hence Chesh and I don't go out to steak houses, Nero's, a lot of pubs, Sizzler's and etc. (Although I do miss Sizzlers occasionally. I haven't even tried to do that cheese bread they do. I'd just spend all day lying around and eating it and making more of it and eating it and lying around and eating....er...) But this meal was beautiful. I was expecting that they'd just done a big roast and would slice off a bit and serve it up, but no, I was completely wrong. Two tender tender tender peices of pork, between which a nice serving of stuff had been placed, the whole thing on a pile of yummy garlic mash and surrounded by vegies dripping butter. The pork was so tender! It was softer than chicken, almost as tender as fish! And the stuffing was divine! And the mix of all the flavours.... *starts frothing at the mouth* We also had chili mustard honeybread for munchies before the meal, and that was so yummy too. *sigh* And I swear, I recognised the vegies from the farmers market....
Sunday
Mother had cleaned everything while I was making money yesterday, so really we just packed up and left. We did all the duties Aunty Jean asked us to do, and then ran. We went to the sandal wood factory, hoping for an early morning massage and if not that, then a coffee and scone would be nice.... but we got there at 9ish, and neither cafe nor massage centre opened until 210:30!! Ah well. Bought some perfume, headed to Mt Barker.
In Mt Barker is the Sail-Inn cafe, which is an old pub now a guest house and cafe/resturaunt. Chesh and I went there last month, and I had this divine ham and tomato soup which put me into a soup mood for about three or four weeks. So this morning, Mother and I went there and had poached eggs on muffins with hollandaise sauce with coffee. God it was good! And they were english muffins, and you got three halves, and two poached eggs, so it was a nice filling breakfast without being horrifically huge. And damn it tasted good. I like that place. It's one of the few old pub places in country towns where I can walk in, and not feel a history of violence and senseless drinking. I can't stand a lot of old country pubs.
We pushed on, on, and on. Got to my pottery place, and they still had not yey made more of the little plates I was looking for. So have placed an order for three. Then we pushed on some more. We got to Chesh's parent's place at around 1:30ish, and we ended up staying and chatting and eating for an hour and a half. Rod DOES make fantastic platters. YUM. A glass of wine would have been a perfect match, but I was so thirsty I drank two cans of ginger beer instead. :-) Mum was driving after that; I had driven all morning.
I got home at 5:20ish. Chesh grabbed stuff from the car, and I walked into the house, hugged him, and then we went to Lee and Lyn's for some seriously weird movies. I'm sure Volcano High is a weird movie anyway, but the constant all day driving and bad sleeping for two out of three nights made things all that much more surreal. Oh, and Dr Who. Very dark, very blobby. At least from my view of the laptop screen that all 8 of us were trying to watch.
Mynxii is sure that it is Chesh's fault that she lost an hour and a half's worth of work because the document crashed when he went to print it. I'd like to argue that in that hour and a half she should have been saving every 15 minutes if she was good, every half hour if she is not good. No excuses there babe, *grin* you had at least two chances to save if you were bad, and 5 or 6 if you were being good. Nyer. I've had the last word now cos it's on my blog. *grin* Just being silly.
I was in a cranky mood due to exhaustion, which I think may have amused my friends. Lyn says that the hormones will settle etc, and I kept saying I think it's just tiredness, but I think she might be a bit more right. I'm still kind of tired and this morning I was equally cranky, but then that food thing.... I need to eat I guess or else I remain in a foul mood....
:-)
Hopefully none of this morning's correspondences revealed my true 'I hated every one' moods. *grin* I have still not finished work yet. I should hurry, in case some of the items sell out. I need to sell a couple more hundred $$ worth of items before the end of march! Ok, I have to go and check my cake. I am making acake cos there was no food in the house! Starving I tell you! *scratches at door and miaows* Starving!!
Thursday
We get there. I drove about half wayish and then mother drove. I slept. :-) Funniest thing was waking up because I could hear someone snoring. I got a crooked neck because I was also very uncomfortable. Thems the breaks I guess. :-) Aunty Jean was very pleased to see us. In fact, she did not shut up. At all. She even talks to herself. All the time. Mother ran off and went to bed early while Aunty Jean chattered away. Uncle Phil is pretty deaf, so he turns the TVs all up. Aunty Jean is trying to talk over the TVs, so she talks loudly. Aunty Jean has also been a housewife for ever and ever and ever and so we think she is also pretty lonely. So, loud and nonstop. Chesh at least pauses for breath occasionally, and is not too loud. Or I would thump him. :-)
We watched Lost. Weird show. Made weirder by the running commentary from Aunty Jean which made it seem like she was forgetting things that happened just before the last ad break. And then we watched Race Around the World I think it is? Nasty nasty peice of work. Didn't like it at all, I found the stresses and games the competitors had to play were just simply mean and some of the competitors were horrible and would have had a 24 ounce bowl of hot hungarian soup RIGHT where it hurts. (Down the underpants.)
Slept badly, as you do in a new bed. Also a single, not that it's a hass. Just ... different. Read a book on cooking, one of the old ones. The sort of thing that has a section for invalids, like beef tea and how to cook brains etc.
Friday
I wake up in time to hear Uncle Phil and Aunty Jean knock on the front door, mother answer it, and they say goodbye. In hindsight, that was weird. They had to knock on their own front door for mother to answer it and..... *shrug* :-) Whatever. Mum made bacon and eggs for breakfast. And kept it down!
Mother and I went for a drive. We ended up seeing the wind farm, which was fantastic. We walked up to the nearest windmill and stood in awe at it's base. Massive, absolutely massive, just standing there, pretending like human's don't exist. It made me think they should be part of a scifi fantasy future story; after the apocalypse people find the sentinels still turning, facing the sea, not realising that they still need maintenance and there's another race/species/tribe maintaining them. Awesome. On the way back there was a sign saying "Denmark" and an arrow, so we followed it. :-)
I like Denmark. We wandered around, I bought some toffee, mother bought a sh*tload of toffee, including chili peanut brittle. My tongue seems tohave develeoped it's own personality, and things which I can normally eat now seem to be a pain. Chili hurts. So does gherkin dip. Weird. Anyway, we head to the wineries to find lunch. In a strange little place we find a nice enough cafe with a surprisingly decent specials menu. I had hungarian style lamb on vegie stack with pesto and baked garlic, and mother had cajun chicken salad with corn and capsicum salsa and guacamole. Mine was full of rich flavours, the vegie stack was divine, but the flavours were all so strong that in the end I couldn't finish it. :-)
I slept on the way back to Albany, which is good, cos when I got back I discovered I needed to be in Mt Barker at 5:30, and not 7ish. :-) Mother came with me, and we trucked off. It was a very good party. About half the ladies I had seen and measured before, and they all LOVED the stuff they had bought last time. The party totalled about $700 in the end, which was very very nice. They were having a BBQ which we were invited to, and if I had been a lone I might have stuck around for it, but Mum doesn't like strangers much, and she had been with a bunch of strangers for close to two hours, so we racked off. Good time, too, it was a 2 hour party and I earned about $150. I'm pretty damned happy with that! We raided Aunty Jean's fridge and freezer and had weird little spring rolls for dinner with vegies. Mother so far has managed to keep down almost every single meal. Wow. We were naughty and drank a bottle of wine between us. Slept very very well. :-)
Saturday
Hit the Farmers Markets. It was truly awesome. The vegies were vibrant and bursting with flavour and vitality, the meats looked yummy, and strawberries pert and perfect. I bought some beetroot and an aubergine and some chili and some beans because they were all so perfect I couldn't resist them. The mushroom stall had sold out by the time we came through the second time (about 9:45ish) and so had a few others. Real farm laid eggs, smoked meats, raspberries, all the fruit and veg had been picked that day or the night before, I hate seeing all these wonderful vegies because then I HAVE TO COME BACK HERE!!! *sigh* Didn't feel so good. Mother took me home and I slept until about 12:45. Party at 2! Once again I was the first person there.
The party did not run as tightly as the first one had done. There were about six ladies, and I'm usually pretty good at closing sales, but I just didn't seem to be able to on Saturday. But still, sold almost $500 stuff, and took about 2 hours from start time, so I am happy. :-) So, made about $250 for myself this weekend, as well as had a bit of a rest and relax. I'm pretty damn happy, a holiday that pays for itself. :-)
That night Ma and I went out to dinner in Albany. Albany has managed to hit that balance where there's enough people for a few decent resturaunts to survive, but it's not so touristy that I hate every one. (Like Margaret River is starting to become.) So, we ambled along and found The Venice I think it was. (Not sure, but I did bring home the menu. I'll update if I got the name wrong.)
Mother had garlic prawns (her lifelong favourite) and I had pork loin with honey, basil, pecan, apricot, stuffing. I have a high expectation from resturaunts; I want them to do a better job than I do. Hence Chesh and I don't go out to steak houses, Nero's, a lot of pubs, Sizzler's and etc. (Although I do miss Sizzlers occasionally. I haven't even tried to do that cheese bread they do. I'd just spend all day lying around and eating it and making more of it and eating it and lying around and eating....er...) But this meal was beautiful. I was expecting that they'd just done a big roast and would slice off a bit and serve it up, but no, I was completely wrong. Two tender tender tender peices of pork, between which a nice serving of stuff had been placed, the whole thing on a pile of yummy garlic mash and surrounded by vegies dripping butter. The pork was so tender! It was softer than chicken, almost as tender as fish! And the stuffing was divine! And the mix of all the flavours.... *starts frothing at the mouth* We also had chili mustard honeybread for munchies before the meal, and that was so yummy too. *sigh* And I swear, I recognised the vegies from the farmers market....
Sunday
Mother had cleaned everything while I was making money yesterday, so really we just packed up and left. We did all the duties Aunty Jean asked us to do, and then ran. We went to the sandal wood factory, hoping for an early morning massage and if not that, then a coffee and scone would be nice.... but we got there at 9ish, and neither cafe nor massage centre opened until 210:30!! Ah well. Bought some perfume, headed to Mt Barker.
In Mt Barker is the Sail-Inn cafe, which is an old pub now a guest house and cafe/resturaunt. Chesh and I went there last month, and I had this divine ham and tomato soup which put me into a soup mood for about three or four weeks. So this morning, Mother and I went there and had poached eggs on muffins with hollandaise sauce with coffee. God it was good! And they were english muffins, and you got three halves, and two poached eggs, so it was a nice filling breakfast without being horrifically huge. And damn it tasted good. I like that place. It's one of the few old pub places in country towns where I can walk in, and not feel a history of violence and senseless drinking. I can't stand a lot of old country pubs.
We pushed on, on, and on. Got to my pottery place, and they still had not yey made more of the little plates I was looking for. So have placed an order for three. Then we pushed on some more. We got to Chesh's parent's place at around 1:30ish, and we ended up staying and chatting and eating for an hour and a half. Rod DOES make fantastic platters. YUM. A glass of wine would have been a perfect match, but I was so thirsty I drank two cans of ginger beer instead. :-) Mum was driving after that; I had driven all morning.
I got home at 5:20ish. Chesh grabbed stuff from the car, and I walked into the house, hugged him, and then we went to Lee and Lyn's for some seriously weird movies. I'm sure Volcano High is a weird movie anyway, but the constant all day driving and bad sleeping for two out of three nights made things all that much more surreal. Oh, and Dr Who. Very dark, very blobby. At least from my view of the laptop screen that all 8 of us were trying to watch.
Mynxii is sure that it is Chesh's fault that she lost an hour and a half's worth of work because the document crashed when he went to print it. I'd like to argue that in that hour and a half she should have been saving every 15 minutes if she was good, every half hour if she is not good. No excuses there babe, *grin* you had at least two chances to save if you were bad, and 5 or 6 if you were being good. Nyer. I've had the last word now cos it's on my blog. *grin* Just being silly.
I was in a cranky mood due to exhaustion, which I think may have amused my friends. Lyn says that the hormones will settle etc, and I kept saying I think it's just tiredness, but I think she might be a bit more right. I'm still kind of tired and this morning I was equally cranky, but then that food thing.... I need to eat I guess or else I remain in a foul mood....
:-)
Hopefully none of this morning's correspondences revealed my true 'I hated every one' moods. *grin* I have still not finished work yet. I should hurry, in case some of the items sell out. I need to sell a couple more hundred $$ worth of items before the end of march! Ok, I have to go and check my cake. I am making acake cos there was no food in the house! Starving I tell you! *scratches at door and miaows* Starving!!
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no subject
Date: 2005-03-14 10:45 am (UTC)From:Want to borrow Dr Who on DVD sometime? I always convert movies to DVD for watching, laptop watching just isn't an option. :)
no subject
Date: 2005-03-15 12:18 am (UTC)From:even if i'm horrifically bad i always make a point of saving before printing... ah well it will all get done, and i'm learning. constantly learning... and what would it all be without f*ckups occasionally?
saturday was a good day even losing the hour or so work, very relaxing and i felt productive.
*huggles*
again rambling its not yet 8.30am and i'm in a weird stabby mood.
no subject
Date: 2005-03-15 12:25 am (UTC)From:*grin*
Ah well, I have, once, seen a crash so bad it corrupted the back up file as well, so you never know, it might have been that once in a million serious crash that would have killed saved files too.
Have coffee. Have more coffee. I am in a house with no instant, only real. This could be bad. *grin*
no subject
Date: 2005-03-15 06:37 am (UTC)From:i've learned :) i promise i will pay more particular attention to saving!
i think its the automatic thingy that pops up that makes me determined to rebel... or something...
no subject
Date: 2005-03-15 05:48 am (UTC)From: