What is a kibitzer?

Finally.

For the first time EVER in all the years I’ve gone to quiz nights.

There has been a question about bridge.

And I knew the answer.

And we came second overall.

No.  It wasn’t one answer that got us second place but gee it sure felt good.

Thanks for inviting us Feline…

But here’s a weird thing…

Today looking at my Twitter feed I noticed that hazelblackberry was at the same quiz nite!  (her blog)

It makes me wonder how often that happens…

Can’t be that often I wouldn’t have thought.

When two worlds collide eh?

Perth is a small place.

I heart faces – Autumn Beauty

Arghh!  The agony of choosing an Autumn Beauty photo.

Of course it is spring here but I found a whole bunch of fallen leaves at the Uni yesterday and took a thousand shots of my beautiful daughter… it’s just that… they weren’t autumny enough!

So I’ve entered this one.

I took this in Autumn at my parent’s face with my camera on auto timer.

I love the 3D effect of the leaves and the light.

 

Bark watchers

Dippity and I went down to UWA today to go to an upmarket in the Undercroft.

We had to walk down the main drag to the Guild to get some money out and of course it was a chance for me to remember 25 years ago, my first day at university. 

Ahhhh they were good days…

We walked past the Oak Lawn and watched some medieval knights and ladies doing their hey nonny nonny thang.

We laughed at the AW building.

Awful isn’t it.

*Dippity face plants in reaction to terrible mum joke*

We wandered through that tropical garden in front of the Reid Library.

I love that garden.

It’s so lush.

So we’re wandering through it and the trees just tower over you and Dipp finds this flower.

Surrounded by all that sandstone architecture, by the beautiful gardens she finds a single flower to photograph.

Well… I’m a fan of that macro button as well.

This violet reminds me of something I recently heard – I think it was someone talking about the GFC – one of those people putting together those mortgage packages for big banks to buy – the things that caused this recession.

He said “you know those people who can’t see the wood for the trees… well we couldn’t even see the trees.  All we could see was bark…”

Bark watchers.

I love that phrase.

Open house at Artsource

Meet Belongum!

He kindly invited me to the opening of Artsource Open House and I was delighted to meet a fellow blogger.

We’ve been crossing paths this past year as both our jobs involve some travel to regional WA, I believe one time we might have even been in the same airport at the same time, so it was nice to finally meet face to face.

If you haven’t read Belongum’s Weblog – go on over and have a browse.

I dare you!

So I got a personalised tour of Artsource and met some amazing artists and saw some incredible work.

I’ll tell you some of the stories sometime but for now, let me introduce you to Rachel Coad.

Her work is LARGE!

Beautiful portraits painted in sepia tones, they take your breath away when you walk in her studio door.

But don’t let me blather on, you can see for yourself:

And if you want to see Rachel’s work in person or meet some of the other artists – the Open House is this Sunday.

More about the artists at Artsource.

How to bow – the caterpillar lesson

I’ve been looking at some old family videos which we’ve recently digitised, and came across this one of my son’s second cello lesson.

Here he is learning to bow.

Or not.

My friend The Poshi and I decided we’d share lessons and get our sons learning Suzuki cello.

I even bought a cello to encourage him, though I never learned to play myself.

That’s where the whole Cellobella name came from.

We lasted a year or two but the boys hated it… well my boy did.

I think he was too young.

And in retrospect he must have found reading the music so hard given his undiagnosed need for glasses.

He plays the piano now and I don’t have to force him to practice.

And yes, I still have my cello.

In the back room.

Untouched by human hand for years.

Funnily enough I discovered that my boss also has an untouched cello which she’s never learned to play.

Weird huh?

Discomfort books

Jennifer Byrne from the First Tuesday Book Club on ABC1 says her comfort book is Marjorie Morningstar by Herman Wouk.

She read it when she was a teenager and it resonated.

It’s the story of a Jewish teenager  in the 1930s, living in New York with dreams of becoming an actress – she falls in love with this glamourous songwriter – look I could go on but perhaps Wikipedia has a more fulsome description…

…are you back with me?

SPOILER ALERT

Anyway many readers – in particular young teenage girls are completely disillusioned by the ending.

This is because Marjorie doesn’t fulful her dreams of becoming an actress, preferring to follow her dreams to marry this charming writer – who is a wastrel and a bit of a bastard if you ask me.

He skives off to Paris and she follows him, eventually finds him and when he asks her to marry him… turns him down.

She then goes back to New York and marries someone else, has four kids, goes prematurely grey and lives happily ever after.

Jennifer says she found this book very empowering as a teenager.

Here is this young girl with big dreams living in New York, a working girl.  A girl forgoing the hunt for a husband in order to be a broadway success.

Maybe you have to be a teenager to see that.

I read a completely different story.

I read about a young girl, very beautiful but with not that much acting talent in a co-dependent relationship with a cad and who is more concerned about marrying said cad than her acting career.

Eventually she becomes worldly wise, realises the acting thang just ain’t never going to happen and realises that Noel is a complete loser as well.

Maybe it’s because I’m a grey-haired (though dyed a fetching brunette) mama from the burbs reading this and not a young 17 girl full of dreams.

Or maybe as a 17 year old you can’t see the old and cynical tone of Herman Wouk’s world?

For me, this book is about acceptance.  Acceptance of your limitations and those of others.

Have you read it?

What do you think?

Balloon girl

My entry to I heart faces this week reminded me that we had some video.

Ohhhh my kids were so cute!

(They still are… just a bit spottier and teenagery)

I heart faces – Balloons

This week’s theme  is balloons and when I think of balloons I always think of my dad’s 60th birthday.

We held it at my place and blew up about 200 helium filled balloons with long ribbon tails to cover the ceiling.

Then we all waited with the lights off in the lounge room for him to arrive.

It was a new house, with no curtains and we had windows letting in the moonlight.

We didn’t surprise him.

He could see the silhouettes of the guests through the windows not hidden by the wall.

The next morning, the balloons had started to fall from the ceiling and floated at every height.

The kids (aged about 4 and 16 months) were elated.

They captured them in enormous balloon bundles, crocodiles and ran through the house. [see video]

You could hardly see them for balloons.

Check out some of the other entries for some more balloon magic.

21 Up South Africa

I was watching the South African version of 21 UP on SBS tonight.

Three of the original 11 children have died, two of AIDS.

At first I guess I wasn’t too surprised.

But then I thought how amazing it was that none of the original kids in the UK series have.

Shocked that I care

I was in two office sweeps this year at a total outlay of $7.

I feel I got away lightly.

I was a bit bah humbug about the cup today. 

It felt like an interruption.

I resented the distraction.

Of course I tried to contact someone in Melbourne for work and it was a public holiday.  Sheesh!

I’m sure my horses did their best.

The highlight?

Watching the trainer realising he’d won.

It brought a tear to the eye.

Maybe I do like the Melbourne Cup after all.

Hand me the new Dick Francis novel and a champagne darling!

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