Curiously Minty

The wanderer returns

I am home at last. I met a lot of interesting people over the past few days and a few who made my eyes roll back in my head.  I have to remember I am now part of this team and not on the outside going WTF do those people do.  I am also a great big rock putting ripples in their lily pond so I can expect to make a few people uncomfortable.  By mid afternoon, I had hit a wall, what with endless hours of work, and getting my proposal submitted to the customer so I just decided to go home.  Got in a cab, got an earlier flight and now I am home.

And I have the house to myself right now so I am just slowly, slowly winding down.  I also seem to be on the mend and am no longer coughing.  Except that means I have to get back on that treadmill.  Bugger.

Today I found a beautiful flower shop and gathered up a big bunch of peonies to give the woman who runs the print machines.  If it had not been for the heat and the fact that I was getting on a plane I might have bought a bunch for myself.

Tomorrow I am going to buy a headset for all the teleconferences I expect to be on, and rearrange my home office and buy myself a big bunch of flowers.  And maybe get on that cross-trainer.

That's quite enough of that

I am lying in bed eating a bar of chocolate and listening to classic FM.  I've had quite enough of today thank you.  I got up early.  I was in the office at 7.45.  I worked.  I ate a horrible toasted sandwich for lunch.  I worked more.  I was supposed to have a meeting at 6.45pm with new boss's boss (6.45 WTF) but could not get on to his floor so met him in the lobby instead.  I got back to the hotel at 8.  I had two more work calls.  I got into my pyjamas and plan to sleep very, very soon.  Aren't you glad you asked?

Home from home

I'm back at the 4 Seasons.  I have a very early start tomorrow and could not face getting up the 6am flight which might not even have got me there on time so came up tonight.  I'm here for three nights and then this chunk of work should be over and I get to stay home for a bit.  I'm recovering but had to pick up the repeat prescription as there is still of lot of stuff rattling around my chest.

Today was very hot in Canberra.  We went to the farmers market and I bought new season apricots and cherries.  The cherries aren't quite at full sweetness but I was craving something other than oranges.  I helped with homework and took older daughter to practice on "busy and unfamiliar roads".  That meant the far flung and dreary suburbs which allowed practice of merging on to highways at speed.

We weeded the swathe of poppies out that had overtaken my vegetable patch.  I got a bit sunburnt and very scratched.   I showered, packed and was gone by 5pm.  So now I am in hotel room (got Opera House view again) feeling grumpy as my Friday Night Lights DVD will not play on the hotel player (wrong region) and I can not get into the menu to change the regional code. 

Big work day tomorrow.  Very important people in town.  Must behave.

Homework

No, I won't write your 600 word response on the themes in Looking for Alibrandi.  You are the child of migrant parents, albeit those of the dominant cultural theme in this country, and you know plenty about tensions between the way things should be done (ie, the British way) and the way things happen here.  You know what it means to be a catholic school girl.  You also know plenty about eastern suburbs culture and indeed your older sister spent two years attending the school in which the film version of the above teen novel was set.   In addition, you are the child of a broken home so I think you can wax at length on the vagaries of having divorced parents.  Plus, you are fully capable of tearing off 600 words since you write reams of teenage vampire fiction in the privacy of your own bedroom.

Besides, I have lots of homework of my own to do.

The killer app

I am at work.  I only planned to come in to print off a humungous document to review but then it was pretty quiet so I just stayed.  Then it got busy when people noticed I was here and I have been slogging away.  I flew home yesterday afternoon and snoozed the afternoon away but this proposal is not getting written to my standards so I am back in the chair.  I am wearing jeans and a t-shirt and my hair in a pony tail so I'm not really in the corporate vibe.

I had one teleconference with my current boss which was completely and utterly pointless and wasted 40 minutes of my life I will never get back.  I spent the last 10 minutes of it messaging with a fellow escapee about where we could go for his leaving dinner when we were both in Sydney at the same time and who else we would invite.  I then had a utterly pointless 30 minutes on the phone with said boss.  I then got outed in my new role to a person who I have a fair amount to do with over the years and not much of it positive.  I discussed with my trusted colleague a lot of this intrigue and I said that entering this new role I could do with a map of the "here be dragons" variety except really it needs to be an application for my blackberry that sets off a signal when I venture into the realm of some of the difficult people I am going to have to deal with.

Last night I went to the year 8 fashion show.  My youngest had made a very cute sleep suit.  I was amazed at her seamstress skills.  She certainly did not get them from me.  The year 12 pieces were mostly good - a bit too much Gold Coast style for my liking but one kid had stuff that I would have bought off the rack but what I really envied were the knee high burgundy suede boots that one of the year 12 girls was wearing.  

Next week I am meeting my new boss's bosses who are flying in from Shanghai and San Francisco.  It was suggested I might stay at the same hotel as them but I remain faithful to the 4 Seasons.

Editor's note: drugs ruined my grammar - nothing else can explain the torturous sentence structure above. 

Bed rest

Normally I maintain a denialist approach to illness.  I am incredibly intolerant of it in others, rarely suffer from it myself and when I do feel a little under the weather, a nap and a cup of tea usually suffice.  This thing I am suffering with (and I suffer in silence) laid me very low yesterday and I took myself to the hotel at lunchtime and was directed by friendly concierge to the local medical centre.  They could not see me for an hour so I had a pedicure and checked my mail on my BB.  Imagine my surprise when the old doctor told me I had acute bronchitis and prescribed me some massive dose of antibiotics forthwith (another thing I rarely take but sometimes you just have to kick it).

I texted a bunch of people - I am sick, I can not speak, do not disturb me and took to my bed.  I was feverish and one stage was thinking "oh boy, if someone from the hotel comes into my room and sees me I hope they dial emergency and not Mary-Kate Olsen".  I had to take the drugs with food and could think of nothing that I could eat other than yoghurt - this lovely hotel sent me up a tray with creamy Greek yoghurt, berries and more camomile tea.  I tell you the 4 Seasons is a way more considerate nurse than the ones I get at home.  I did not think I could get on a plane home and to be honest, being home would mean being oppressed by all the things to be done and the opposite of "well, I just have to lie here on these crisp white sheets and get better".

Daily bread

I worked, I toiled, I took a brief time out to watch the race with the rest of the office and returned to my desk.  It was swelteringly hot.  I left the office at 6 and got sunburned trying to wait for a taxi but a train stuck on the harbour bridge meant everyone was jostling for transport.  I decided to get the bus which had the advantage of being higher up and letting me see over the parapet and admire the harbour as we crossed.

The civilised, peaceful hotel bar of last night was overtaken by loud Melbourne Cup overflows so I had one drink (for medicinal purposes) and retired to my room to eat (drink?) tomato soup.  It tasted like heinz cream of tomato but since that is what my mother fed me when I was unwell, I rather enjoyed it.  I had a hot bath, idly watched television and slept 8 hours.

The intake of legal pharmaceuticals are producing an odd assortment of dreams.  Last night I dreamed I met, accidentally, a blogger I admire greatly but we were both unhappy about the intersection between the physical encounter and much preferred our long distance relationship.  I recall she was hiding under the covers while I plaintively intoned "I thought you were raised by wolves". 

Today is much cooler - 22 as opposed to 37. 

Better late

I am unwell.  This is rare for me but I have the sort of throaty rasp that has people saying “oh you sound terrible” and a worse hacking cough when I laugh.  Last night I checked into the hotel with a sorrowful expression and a plea for a good room as I was poorly.  Not only did I get the harbour view but the assistant manager sent up a plate of fruit and a pot of camomile tea.  That made me very good about ending my brief fling with the Shangri-La hotel and returning to the Four Seasons (take that S-L for giving me a crap room two weeks ago).  

Today is a public holiday in Canberra but I am in Sydney working.  This is ok since a public holiday on a Tuesday sucks unless you have taken the Monday and gone for the whole long weekend thing.  And frankly, being sick in a luxury hotel room is better than being sick at home and having to juggle the demands of children.  Especially since their father has just returned from two weeks in Europe and being pathetically jet-lagged instead of seizing the reins of parenting.  My leaving town forces him to do his stuff.  Last night, I watched Watchmen on the movie channel in the hotel room, slurped onion soup, drank copious amounts of water and slept in a gloriously large king bed with crisp white cotton sheets.  Honestly, there are worse places to be unwell.  

I quite like the being slightly deaf too as it keeps me huddled in a little cave of work.  (Apart from this blogging lark, of course).   It is blisteringly hot.  I am glad and promise not to complain about heat until April.  This winter was so long and sucked so much I am delirious with happiness that summer has arrived.

In consequential

I did not feel up to my normal Saturday morning grueling personal training as I awoke with an annoying cough.  Instead I cut the grass.  It is very soothing to see the orderly stripes appear.  I was rarely allowed to cut the grass growing up, I suspect it was associated with heavy machinery and motors and therefore in the man's world and then my father would stand heavy guard to make sure the stripes were to his satisfaction.  The end result satisfies me as much as washing the kitchen floor where my black and white tiles emerge clean and sparkling.  Neither result lasts but it is pleasing for a while.

Older daughter practised parallel parking.  She got it right about 50% of the time but she is improving.  Younger daughter sat in the back seat and opened the door to check how far we were from the kerb each time.  Older daughter has gone to see the latest Saw movie which I imagine is just right for Halloween.  We're just bunkering down for the evening.  I just scored an Easton Pearson skirt on ebay for a trivial sum that pleases me greatly.  It looks like a storm is coming in after a hot, sultry day so time to batten down the hatches.

Not going quietly

How did it happen that I spent the morning being diligent in getting my tax in order and paying school fees and getting my finances in order and then went and blew $$$ on shoes and new coat?  In my minimal defence, I would marry this coat if it were legal.  Trelise Cooper, cobalt blue with paisley lining.  I kid myself I will wear it to a wedding in December but since that wedding is a) in December and b) in London  I think it will be nowhere near warm enough as it is sort of heavy silk.  Whatever, I am wearing this coat with black pants, with a black pencil skirt, with my pyjamas.  You get the picture.  The shoes?  Matt black snakeskin with a sling back and medium heels.  Very, very practical when you have to take your shoes off going through airport security which I have done 6 times this week.  

Yes, six times. I have done 3 day trips to Sydney this week since the father of my children was in the UK and I had to be there.  Next week he is back and I will be there again but at least staying in a good hotel.  And then the week after I transition into my new job.  Hooray, hooray.  I really am not sure what new job is about but it has many positive characteristics.  a) it is a lot more creative than current job b) it is new ground and has scope for new ways of doing things and a tolerance for making small mistakes along the way c) everyone I have met in the team so far is very smart which keeps me on my toes d) it is focused across the whole business not just the small but egotistical part of the business I am currently in and (most exciting) it means I get to work with teams in China, India and Latin America, Southern Africa.  Of course, shallow person that I am, I am already considering the shopping possibilities but it will be fun to get out of my little silo and back into the big picture.  

A consequence of this travel is that the girls have had to take care of themselves a bit more though frankly making your own breakfast and remembering what books to pack is well within the capability if not the wit of teenagers.  It’s tiring running a pit crew.  

Spring is sort of arriving.  I haven’t had to turn the heating on.  I didn’t take my coat to Sydney.  I am still wearing nylons but may get to bare legs next week.  But everyone around me is sick, at home and at work and I really do not have time to be sick so am taking care of myself.