moths

The air-conditioning at djbebe's work is not working very well. djbebe does not like the heat and has been opening the window for the benefit of the breeze. The window was left open one night, and the next day djbebe noticed a large moth on the wall near her computer, and some green dots on her desk - like some cleaning fluid or some lunch had been spilt. djbebe did not connect these two events. This morning however, the moth has moved to the ceiling, and there was another green dot right in the middle of djbebe's monitor. djbebe has done some analysis of trajectory, angles, flight path and wind-factor, and concluded that the green stuff is moth poo.

paper toys

Paper stuff - top of the list is spongebob and a pineapple house (perfect pastime for Sponky), but if you scroll further down the downloads, there are 3D paper puzzles - print them, build them and then attempt to solve them (perhaps a pursuit for Betty Sue).

coffee loophole: closing

djbebe's local coffee shop used to have flat whites for 80c less than a latte, while still making the flat white on mostly milk. djbebe switched from latte to flat white to take advantage of this loophole and has since been saving 80c per day while enjoying something close to her coffee of choice. The coffee shop staff recently underwent barista training, with no discernible change in coffee quality - burnt milk, half-filled cups and wildly fluctuating coffee strength all remain. (Unfortunately it is the only coffee shop within reasonable distance.) But now, several weeks later, they are changing the flat white to be more like a real flat white so djbebe may have to go back to lattes and be charged the full cappuccino price. Damn baristas.

speaking of geeks

An opportunity to wax lyrical for djbebe and her fellow femme-geeks. Suggested topics include female geek bonding and feminist commentary on geek culture.

djbebe's feminist spines have recently been made to bristle by reading some of 1978's Superwoman by Shirley Conran (actually reading this article I feel a bit better but the book made me cringe) which outlines techniques for various domestic duties, but mostly cleaning. For example it helps to have a routine - clean the kitchen on Monday, fireplaces on Tuesday, bedrooms Wednesday, bathroom on Saturday etc - of course if you "work", it may help to share these duties with a friend, but try to find one that doesn't talk too much. But of course if you are "working", make sure you count the real cost including make-up and hair which you wouldn't bother with if you were lounging around the house with the kids.

Superwoman opens with the phrase "life is too short to stuff a mushroom". The sentiment being that in order to have the bare minimum of clean house, happy husband, healthy children (career optional) you just have to eliminate some of the luxuries including manicured nails, spotless walls, and, it seems, stuffed mushrooms. djbebe disagrees: if you just re-prioritize, you can have your mushrooms and stuff them too. Sometimes a stuffed mushroom is at the top of the list. So can one femme-geek have it all - a fulfilling relationship with one's ipod, the occasional stuffed mushroom, as well as a career and optional partner that fit in with all of the above?

advice for the home-maker

• if one has a toupe that is prone to shedding, it's best to remove it before preparing food
• if one has numb lips (for example, one has just returned from the dentist), one should use a pincushion
  

toons at work

Darth 'Tater and a Spud Trooper arrived at work the other day, a gift from a colleague's wife who is an avid Star Trek fan. Around the corner is Spongebob, a favourite of our friend Sponky. This mix of 'toons and sci-fi is almost too much for djbebe. And the other problem djbebe has is that the Star Wars garb of the Messrs Potato Heads almost precludes the rearranging of their facial features, which is their reason for being. Or at least their reason for being entertaining. (One nice touch though is that the Spud Trooper's weapon of choice is a potato masher.) djbebe took Darth's face mask off and put his nose on while the colleague wasn't looking, and almost got in trouble. Now djbebe makes a point of rearranging them every morning before the colleague gets to work.

And one last P. Head link, the family reunion.

number one quilt

djbebe made a quilt for her number one nephew (who is now 8 weeks old). Machine-pieced and hand-quilted, using a Japanese sashiko design. Gender-neutral colours because that was a surprise.

tax return schmax return

Last night djbebe was mildly boasting on the phone to Betty Sue about how her tax return was allllmost finished. This morning djbebe got to work extra-early with the handful of final documents that she needed to finish it off and submit. The computer djbebe had previously been using to do her tax return has been re-installed - no problem, she will just download the etax program and install it again. Would you like to create a new file? Noooo, here is one prepared earlier... Please enter your tax file number to open existing file. That didn't work. Has djbebe forgotten her tax file number? Impossible! djbebe looks up the ato website for how to retrieve forgotten TFN - paper forms galore but no hotline. Where is a hotline when you need one? djbebe calms herself, she is sure that is the correct TFN. She looks again at the file she was trying to open - oh dear, that is last year's tax return. Ohhhhh. She must have saved the file locally on that damn machine that got re-installed. She chooses the option to roll over data from last year's damn tax return and starts again. (Yes she did have the right TFN.) So much for getting it done this morning before colleagues arrive at work. At least her memory is not failing. djbebe is going to brisvegas tomorrow to par-tay, and has no portable computer/internet and may hence leave her tax return to the very last minute - Monday is the due date, no?

Betty Sue, I feel your pain.

Betty Sue once saved my life with a mixed tape

When I was languishing in Ireland with a fledgeling social life, she sent me a mixed tape including such delights as Beth Orton and Elliot Smith, with the sweetest little message reminding me of home. Something about yellow kitchens and kitties hunting in the long grass. And it made me cry. And I listened to it about a million times. It doesn't sound quite the same any more.

update 26/10/2005 - thanks to Betty Sue, here is the full text from the aforementioned mixed tape.

Number one super happy post

Just signed up... Trying out Flock, for which one needs a blog. Well, not really needs, but in order to be cool. But what I was trying to do didn't quite work, I can't yet edit my blog from Flock. It does, however, read my del.icio.us links and add them to my favourites, complete with tags.