A Work In Progress

How did this happen so fast? Normally, because I am flying in from Australia, I am super organised in the lead up to Christmas. This year I have been completely unorganised and still do not have everything done even through I head to our holiday house on Saturday. To add a degree of difficultly, I am preparing Christmas dinner for the family (a fact I had forgotten until I was reminded yesterday). There is lots of room for disaster here. It is not that I am a bad cook - I am actually quite good. It is just that as I live alone, I don't cook all that often so faced with preparing dinner for seven people I suspect I will get a touch overwhelmed!!! I can't wait to be on holiday - it will be so nice to be able to sleep in and catch up on my back log of books that I want to read (have five so far I want to get through in my two weeks off). Still have a few more days before I leave to get organised, will try not to leave everything till Friday night but suspect that will happen despi...

I have just been watching the TV program "Airways". It is about Tiger Airways in Australia and follows the experiences of staff and passengers.  So, on the upside, this airline gets a whole show that is about their brand. On the downside, pretty much all of the things shown are examples of people annoyed at the airline.  Actually annoyed is too soft a word, they are down right angry at Tiger Airways. In fact most of the show features people speaking straight to camera saying how much they hate Tiger Airways and how it has ruined their lives. I just don't understand why Tiger Airways would want people to see this? It makes them look sooooo bad, and why would you want that for your business? Strange branding philosophy.

Yesterday we had professional photos done for our corporate website. I had woken up that morning and my hair seemed to know that it needed to behave, and so naturally it decided to go all weird. I rocked up to the photo session and the photographer looked at me and said "What's with your hair?".   He then proceeded to set up for the photos - instructing me about the numerous cheesy "work style" poses he wanted to get a range of looks. I point blank refused to put my hand under my chin and look thoughtful, but was prepared to be obliging on the other poses (which included the looking over your shoulder and the looking thoughtfully off into the distance). We were then ready to shoot. "Smile" he said. Confident that I could not mess this up, I smiled my winning smile. "No, not like that. That is too much teeth" "But that is how I smile!!!" I insisted "Well try it with no teeth.  Hmmmm, no that isn't any better." The 15 mi...

Went shopping today for Christmas presents. I have made up a wee box of goodies for my niece - all things that a little girl likes: stickers, pink pens, necklaces, cute note pads etc etc.  Anyway, I also picked up a toy cell phone...and here it is. Personally, I adore Benign Girl, I think she could be a real role model for little girls everywhere. I can only assume that the Malignant Boy range was somewhere else in the store.

Certainly that have been the comments going round today. As I mentioned yesterday, some how I got roped in to managing the work Christmas party. I decided we should go play lawn bowls as it is a nice way to spend a sunny afternoon, allows people to mingle and gives them something fun to do. So we had the party this afternoon and it went pretty well. There were lots of food, lots of drink, a divinely sunny day and lots of happy people. There was only a couple of hiccups, the first was people turning up who weren't on the list, but we were able to fit them into teams.  The second one was a bit more major. I had organised a round robin. All went well but then I messed up when I wrote up who was in the semi finals incorrectly.  The team that I had omitted (and had placed in another team incorrectly) came storming up to me. One woman was really aggro. I admitted I made a mistake and apologised, but as the semi finals had started, so I suggested that I give the team a box ...

Somehow (and I really do not know how) I have ended up helping to organise the work Christmas party. I usually steer clear of organising these events because I am not an incredibly social person (crowds stress me out) and hate the pressure of organising events as I end up worrying if it will go okay and if people will have fun. Anyway, the really odd thing about me (well one of the many odd things) is that most people do not suspect I feel like this In fact I tend to project an image that I love parties, love being the centre of attention and love leading and organising things. So this all ended up with me working on the event. The event is tomorrow. In theory it is all organised. In theory everything will be great and it is up to the individuals whether they have fun or not. In theory there is nothing to worry about. The reality is slightly different - I feel stressed!!! I know it is just a Christmas party but I really want it to go well and I really want people to say they had a ...

I have a new phone, which I adore. I have noticed however, that the headphones I use to go on hands free are noise blocking. This means the person I am talking to is really clear, which is great, but it also means that the rest of the world gets completely blocked out, so not so good if you are wanting to use hands free when driving.  My new headphones for my mp3 are the same - brilliant for listening to tunes but need to be really careful when out walking as you can't hear a thing in the real world around you (eg cars or mass murderers sneaking up behind you). Anyway, moving from that random through on to another, my favourite book is To Kill A Mockingbird.  I adore this book. I adore Scout and I adore her father.  I found this article and I think it really capture what I value in a man.   Anyway, I have so much admiration for this type of mainlines and I hope guys realise that being a man is so much about the values you have.  Yay for men!! Less...

Last weekend I went to Butterfly Creek with my niece and nephew. It was fun but I did realise that while butterflies are beautiful, they do freak me out when they fly around and try and land on you. I did find a sign that I thought was awesome. I am not sure what the barrier was going to do, but I steered well clear of it. Today, I went to our local Christmas parade. It was a brilliantly sunny day and unfortunately I was ill prepared for the sun, resulting in me getting burnt. Anyway, local Christmas parades are awesome. They are clearly not as slick as the big events, but what they lack in polish, they make up for with the enthusiasm of the participants.  The majority of people are excited to be a part of it, my nephew for example had a blast waving at people. However there are some people who have been forced to participate, and in some cases, forced to wear costumes. And it is these people who are my favourite part of the parade. For your considera...