My Unplanned Sabbatical

A thought

“The challenge for a human now is to be more interesting to another than his or her smartphone”.

I think this is an interesting observation.

Day 2 at Beaufort and it’s a great weekend. Feeling really good. Loving the company, the freedom and the afternoon nanna naps.

The kids are having an amazing time and adults not far behind. The amazing race ended in a tie between the “Catholics” and the “life savers”. The “Punters” came in third and the “Greenies” last.

Weather is perfect and Sunday afternoon is being spent lazily by the lake, on the tennis court, playing cards or in bed. Not to bad at all

The aires to the mortgage Lily and Alessia on the lake with the rest of the crew.

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Beaufort

The 25th annual nursing crew weekend away this year is at a school camp just outside of the town of Beaufort.

The Friday night is always a good night. This year I was very tame toddling off to bed at 10pm. Petra did well crawling into the family dorm at 3.20 am. Solid effort.

This year the group is divided into 4 teams and a “it’s a knock out” competition will run all long weekend. I have been allocated to the pink team, “Team Catholics”. Feeling horribly conflicted and the notion of catholics and school camps just does not sit well together!

Kids are having a great time as well. Will be a good long weekend. I promise I will be kind to me.

Skinny girl club!

Bill Kelty and Lindsey Fox have nothing on this group. Greek crises and Australia alleged employment crises, licked!

A good day

Semi normal day. Drove into the city and parked in the office. Felt a bit strange for a little while, like I really should not be there.

That feeling did not last long. Had coffee with a friend and then dropped into see the team. That was positive. Good to see everyone and chat for a while. All is under control in the office. Such a competent bunch.

Got my hair cut and I must have asked Ivan ( my hair dresser darling) if I was thinning about a dozen times. He assured me it was all still there. Happy with that.

Home in time for girls to return from school. Getting ready for the long weekend away with some friends. It’s all one big long weekend for me at this stage.

A bit nervous going away as I am far from my usual self, but I guess I just have to go with it.

Should be some fun.

Inspiring and disturbing

I was reading the Deloitte yammer posts this morning and a post with a link to this video caught my attention.

Curious I clicked through and watched it. Less than 30 minutes.

Give your self time to watch it all.

Here and there

Today Petra and I drove to our beach house at Merricks Beach for the day.

We had not been down for almost 3 months and needed to do a few things.

The change in scenery was perfect.

We had Mika the killer Spoodle with us and spent the mid morning walking along the beach. The wind was howling but the walk was good. Dog loved it. I still had most of my hair when we finished. Bonus.

A quick light lunch and then back to pick up the kids.

Thanks for all the book suggestions. I purchased a book that was recommended called “Restless”, which describes how I am starting to feel. I need to get that under control as I am still at the beginning of this thing.

Worked out for about 40 minutes. Pretty soft really but it felt good to get the blood moving again.

Feeling heaps better, about 80%. Hope this continues until the next treatment. Yuk.

Planning on going into the city tomorrow to get my hair cut, to say hello to few people in the office and get my fix of the city!

Saturday sport and a surprise wedding

Busy weekend.

Saturday started with the usual children sporting activities. A well known ritual for most parents.

As last Saturday was spent curled up in the foetal position and I was feeling better I wanted to participate.

Melbourne weather was ordinary at best with heavy rain most of the day.

What I have learnt is that the netball club administrator is cut from the same cloth as a US Navy Seal. Squat, fearless, adept at barking orders and will never, ever call off a game of netball, irrespective of the climate. I am sure the motto “the only easy day was yesterday” is secretly tattooed somewhere under that skirt just out of sight. Probably in capitals.

Petra is the coach of the under 9’s team that the girls play in which ensures that I concentrate intently, every now and then I may dare to suggest a move or two. At my peril usually, but my mother never raised a coward so a persevere.

Its was good game they all played well. Parents cheering, drinking latte’s, talking about Julia, Tony, what will Malcolm do, Greece, property prices and car parking. The game ended, I whisked the twins into the car to race across the eastern suburbs to their basket ball game. The window was 30 minutes!

Made it just in time, kids changing in the car. Another group of parents, another good game, more coffee.

Game finished, back into the car to drive back to netball to watch Siena play under 13’s. Still raining, courts under water.

I smiled a big smile to the navy seal.

All was done by early afternoon and I was feeling good but tired. We had a family engagement that evening so I went to bed and slept the afternoon. Loved it.

The 4 Duchini girls spent the late afternoon trying on frocks, getting hair done and doing all that is required to look radiant for the function.

The engagement was at the Heide Museum of Modern Art.

A stylish venue that was perfect for the function. The food was prepared by “Vue de Monde”, the masterful Shannon Bennett crew and its was amazing. Without doubt the best food I have ever had at any engagement (I should say wedding). Period.

With guests all gathered our hosts spoke beautifully as we where all welcomed and then surprised us with getting married there and then.

It was a fun night. We left at 10.30. I was shattered and the girls where tired. Petra was desperate for that one more chardy but alas that was not to be.

It was a huge day for me and I loved it.

Today I have paid the price a bit having spent most of the day in bed, but so what – I can.