Hi everybody!

Yes, I know, been a long time since I posted last, have been very slack.
Well, let me fill you in on the busy busy busy (I've been reaaally busy) last couple of months for me and hubby.
Where to start......

• After a long time of not studying (about 10 ten years), I have tentatively started doing a subject at University. It is all online, so no classrooms etc. It is good, but very challenging. I was a hopeless student last time I was at Uni, as no motivation to study whatsoever (those doors to the library open? You can actually go in? hehe), so it is a big thing for me to try this out. Just the one subject at the moment, will see how I go.
• The whole Christmas/New Year shebang. It felt like every frickin' friend and relative I know came to visit, our front door may as well have just stayed open. Christmas Eve, friends over. Christmas Day - hubby's parents place for lunch; quite a few people there, including some English relatives, prompting the rest of us to try out our English accents, not pretty! Then back to our house for Christmas dinner, including us, there was 19 (yes, that's right 19!!) for dinner. Being Summer here, our traditional Christmas fare is cold meats and salads, so we had ham, turkey, chicken, sausages (obviously they weren't cold!), coleslaw, pasta salad, green salad. For dessert we had trifles, cheesecake, and fruit salad. It all went very well, but was very tiring. Four people stayed overnight, so it was bacon and eggs cooked on the BBQ the next morning, yummy. After they left, we had another family over for lunch, next day, another family over for lunch. At this stage, I was starting to get a bit peopled out! Had a lovely New Year though, went to my brother and sister in law's place. They live in Newington, opposite the Olympic stadium (from the 2000 Olympics). From there if you look to the left you can see the city in the distance, so we got to see the fireworks over the Harbour Bridge, very spectacular.
• Dealing with #$%ing tradesmen has really sapped my energy and time. The latest drama is with getting our pool resurfaced. We accepted a quote over three months ago, and to date they have not finished. The sum total of what they have done: chipped pebblecrete off rim of pool, tiled rim and waterline tiles.... that is it :( Still to do: the actual resurfacing ( a marble sheen), and the filter needs to be converted over from chlorine to salt. There have been multiple multiple phone calls (only from our side, they never bloody ring back!). They tell us their dramas, oh, we've had rain, it's held us up (we have had some rain, true, but definitely not 3 frickin' months of it!). Oh, we've been a tiler down (this is my problem how?) The reason we went with this company in the first place (even though they were the most expensive), was that they are a big company, so we thought we wouldn't have these hassles. Turns out that they subcontract all their work, and don't feel that they have any control over the contractors. So if you have heard a loud grinding noise lately, that would be me grinding my teeth, trying not to pick up the chainsaw....
  

Another reason I haven't been blogging much, was that I was feeling quite disillusioned about the whole blogging experience. So many blogs I read are fantastic, and quite frankly I felt mine wasn't good enough. When I was growing up, I had pretensions of being a writer, but never did anything about it. I read back through the blogs I'd written, and thought "geez, I'm just taking up space here"
Anyways, why am I back.... partly thanks to a lovely comment from Mellie Helen who wished me well, and hoped I came back.
And partly 'cause I do enjoy putting down my thoughts and I thought what the heck, lets give this another go.

So hi, everyone, I'm back xxx