Natural Born Killers

I have just spent six days on 30 beautiful acres in Tasmania. Tales of country life with two small children will follow, but first I have to tell a sad and strange story.

Many years ago, when Andrew and I were first going out together, my best friend B had a 'thing' with a handsome boy. I say a 'thing', because they were never exactly an item, and the more she seemed to want a relationship, the more he pulled away. She used to ring me, frequently, to obsess about him. Even Andrew remembers this.

We often saw them together but it was clear that he was in some way emotionally unavailable. It was interesting for me, because in the past it had always been B's role to play hard to get. Maybe she was fascinated to be on the other side of it. I never really understood it - he was certainly goodlooking, and could be quite charming when he felt like it, but there was something odd about him. I never felt I knew him, although we went to a couple of parties at his place and saw quite a bit of him for a while. He said he wanted to be an actor. Plenty of young, beautiful people think this is what they'll do, so it was nothing remarkable.

Eventually B moved on and had other relationships. Every so often we'd be chatting, and she'd say 'Guess who I heard from?' and it would be A. He used to get in touch with her, perhaps to reassure himself that he had friends - I think for a while she might still have fancied him, just a little, but that too wore off and more recently I thought she just felt sorry for him. Being an out-of-work actor when you're in your 20s is kind of cool; less so by the time you reach 40.

Anyway, B and I lost touch a couple of years back. We had been very close friends for over 20 years (she was my bridesmaid and was there when Holden was born), but I guess our lives went in different directions - when I invited her to my 40th birthday, she didn't reply and that was the last contact we had.

On Sunday last week I arrived in Tasmania. Phil, one of the friends I was staying with, said to me, 'Hey, what was B's last name?'. I told him. 'I thought so', he said. 'You know she was mentioned in one of the stories about those murders?'.

'Those murders' were a shocking story that has been all over Sydney since they happened almost three weeks ago. A man in his late 60s, a highly regarded art curator, and his daughter were stabbed to death at her home. His son (her brother) was the only suspect. I read the story once, including the names of all the players, and thought 'how sad'. I saw a photo of the suspect and thought he looked vaguely familiar, but since I read that he'd been an actor, I assumed I'd seen him on television. I didn't read any more articles, but I was aware that the police hadn't found him.

It wasn't until Phil asked me B's last name, that I realised it was him, her old flame. Apparently he was a paranoid schizophrenic who didn't take his medication. He was arrested yesterday. Chances are he will spend the rest of his life in prison or an institution.

Dressed to Kill

Most days, I wear jeans. I'm trying to break out of this particular rut, and I promised Imogen NOT to buy any more jeans (at least for a little while). I haven't managed to buy a skirt or a dress yet, despite really looking quite hard, but I have fished a couple of things out of the back of the cupboard.

On Monday I was teaching and the forecast was for hot weather, so I wore a SKIRT. The world did not end. No one screamed at the sight of my pale and freckly calves (except me, on the inside).

Emboldened, today I am wearing A DRESS. It is a sage green raw silk shirt dress - the green is probably not my best green, but I like it anyway. With these shoes. It is 9.30am and I have already had about 20 comments from people, ranging from 'Wow, I've never seen you in a dress' to 'You look pretty, Ms H' (small children at school).

It's rather novel.

The Birthday Girl

Yesterday was my birthday. I know it's childish, but no matter how old I get, I can't help secretly hoping that it will be special and exciting. You can imagine how many disappointing birthdays I've had. This was another.

Phoebe, bless her, put on a special puppet show for me. Holden was too 'busy' (yes, he's 12) on the weekend to get me a present, although he did have an attack of the guilts the night before and made me a card.

I got a text message from one of my best friends at 6.45am - I saw her name on the screen and thought 'Yay, someone has remembered me!'. It was about something else. She didn't remember my birthday.

If it weren't for the birthday reminder function on Facebook, I could have gone the whole day without a single birthday greeting apart from family ... Thank god there is only one birthday a year.

The Nanny Diaries

On Sunday, I am flying down to Tasmania to stay for a week with friends who have just had a new baby (they also have a two-year-old) - my job while there is to cook, do laundry, provide company and baby-wrangle.

So it's not exactly a holiday, but it will be a nice break from the voracious two-headed monster of work and house renovation. They live in a beautiful spot, and I plan to make the most of this view. (Perhaps I can multi-task and look at the view while washing dishes/calming baby?)


I will have to pay penance to my own family ('what do you mean you're going off to look after OTHER people?'). This will start before I go - I will fill the freezer with meals, write detailed instructions, organise school drop-offs and pickups with neighbours and family, etc. And while I am away, I will have to devote at least a few hours to finding extra-special presents for them all.

Saturday Night Fever (4)

Unfortunately, neither of us was very inspired about food yesterday. Perhaps we spent too long looking at stoves for the new house. I found the one I want, but I'd have to sell my children to buy it, so it will have to be yet another compromise. Sigh.

In the end, it was probably just as well that our minds were elsewhere. About 6pm we got a call to say that Holden - who was at a sleepover - had a splinter in his toe that would need local anaesthetic to remove (the parents are both doctors, so we had to take their word for it). Andrew drove over, picked him up and took him to the nearest casualty, where they sat for almost three hours until being seen. Hol, happily, went back to his friend's place - Andrew finally got home at about 10pm.

I will try to revive my cooking mojo for dinner on Wednesday night, when we have family coming over. Today is the third Sunday in a row that I am working, so I'm promising myself some time at the end of the day to pore over cookbooks (if I finish the work I have to do).

In Her Shoes

Linda Grant wrote an article in The Guardian the other day about comfortable shoes, and how real people - even, god forbid, stylish people - eschew (haha) the pornographic skyscrapers we're told are fashionable.

I also prefer shoes I can walk in, although I have been known to wear shoes I can't walk in for special occasions (and just because they look wonderful). But day-to-day, I want to be able to negotiate bad paving and city streets and downward slopes and children and all those things that high heels render dangerous.

I like ballet flats, but I don't want to live in ballet flats. I like a bit of heel, but I don't want a stiletto. I do wear Converse if it's the weekend and I'm at kids' sport, but I don't want to pretend to be 15.

So what else is there? I looked at the 'comfort' shoe section of a department store recently, out of curiosity. I wish I hadn't ...

Loafers are everywhere. Alexa Chung may be able to wear them and look cool (with or without irony, that is the postmodern question?). But I fear that if I wore them I'd look like Mutton Dressed as Old Lady. There are other gorgeous classics, like the Roger Vivier Pilgrim, but I fear the same result (even if I could afford them).

I have seen just one shoe shop that has potential. It's near my main client, stocks imported Italian shoes, and seems to have some positively attractive mid-height heels. Thus far, I've only walked past at 8am, too early for it to be open. And by lunchtime, I've been so dispirited/busy/cognisant of my lack of funds, I haven't retraced my steps and gone in.

Next week, if I have to go in for the client, I am going to go into that damn shop.

The Pursuit of Happyness

It's been one of those weeks where finding 'the happy' is more of a challenge than usual. I guess that makes it even more worthwhile to look for it. So I'm feeling sad and strung out, but here are some things that can still make me happy:

1. Always, my kids. This is particularly fitting - my aunt (who is ill) is and always has been a particularly enthusiastic and happy parent. I can remember how she could always find humour in the situation, even when her four kids were driving her nuts. I once told her, when I was all of about eleven, that I wanted to remember something she said about being a mother. She shrieked with laughter - 'you won't remember bloody anything once you have some of these!', she said.

2. Today, seeing lots and lots of utterly fabulous 'older' (yeah, older than the 14-year-olds who advertise face cream) women. They ranged from the classic chic (navy blazer, loafers, silk scarf/pearls) through to the artistic (incredible asymmetrical jacket with wide-legged pants and huge beads) to the funky/punky (spiked hair and black mini skirt with bright orange tights) and they all looked wonderful.

3. The view from my mother's new house (photos shown above). A fine sunset and an expanse of clear water will always soothe me.

The Time Bandits

Really, time is all we have - or don't have - isn't it? I found out yesterday that a much-loved aunt, who was recently diagnosed with colon cancer, also has metastatic liver cancer. No matter how we try to keep our chins up and be positive, the prognosis is very poor.

The Time Traveler's Wife

I started that book and somehow couldn't be bothered. I'm not sure why. So I probably won't see the movie, even if it does feature the charming Rachel McAdams.

I don't often think of myself as 'wife', but this is one instance where I'm claiming spousal rights - Andrew has decided to run the NY Marathon next year (he just realised the other day that he meets the qualifying time for his age). And naturally I will have to go with him. I have never been to New York, and I was beginning to think I'd NEVER get there.

So I have 12 months to plot and scheme and work out where I'm going to stay/visit/eat/shop/walk/peruse ... The children are not impressed as we have to sacrifice a planned skiing holiday in July to manage the NY trip. Without them. They will hate us for a while, but maybe they'll get over it. We're promising to take them to Europe for a couple of months, probably in 2011 or 2012.

It may be a year away, but it's still something to look forward to ...

One Hundred Years of Solitude

Even just a couple of days would do me. I need a little quiet time to recharge my batteries, do things with my hands - knitting, cooking, gardening, making Xmas cards, doesn't matter what, really - so my brain can wander off and do whatever it needs to do, and come back refreshed. A vista like this would probably help.


I understand now why people go on retreats, just to step back from it all and regain some perspective.

It's not that I'm especially stressed or unhappy. Things are fine. But I do crave quiet, by myself.

Saturday Night Fever (3)

Last night was Saturday night, the night I have to cook something new and interesting, unlike weeknights when I'm likely to throw together anything reasonably healthy and tasty that I can do without thinking.

I pulled out a recipe for grilled green-chilli quail on a Turkish spoon salad. It wasn't hard to do - even butterflying the quail wasn't exactly a challenge. It looked nice on the plate. But it didn't thrill me. I couldn't quite explain why - maybe it was underseasoned; maybe I just expected it to taste more exotic.

I don't have a big sweet tooth, but I like making desserts, especially really over-the-top ones. So I picked a chocolate lime pie, recipe by Nigella Lawson. As I read the recipe, I kept thinking 'this is not going to set - there's nothing in it to make it set'. Then I thought 'hey, her recipes normally work, I'll trust this one'. Turns out I should have trusted my instincts. Pie did NOT set (not even overnight) despite the fact that I snuck in a leaf of gelatine. So now I have scraped all the filling back out and given it some more gelatine ... unorthodox and possibly a bit yucky of me, but I want to see if it will work.

Not much culinary success then. As my brother reassuringly said 'Well, obviously, if they're recipes you haven't tried before, some aren't going to be great'. Can't argue with that logic.

My Fair Lady

I remember watching My Fair Lady (featuring the inimitable Audrey) as a child, and my parents' snorts of amusement at Eliza shrieking 'move your bloomin' arse' at the races - they were amused, no doubt, by the thought that anyone would believe that a Cockney ragamuffin would utter anything so polite.

Unfortunately, that was the last time I found horse racing even slightly interesting. I have many vices (wine, anyone?), and I love riding, but gambling and dressing like a hussy and/or idiot don't rate for me, and they are the traditional ways to enjoy the races in this country. So I'm always rather flummoxed by Melbourne Cup Day. Melbourne has the public holiday, but Sydney more or less shuts down at lunchtime also.

That, combined with a languid (ha) THIRTY SEVEN degrees, made it a very slow town today. It was so damn hot I had to eschew my normal jeans and fish a skirt out of my wardrobe. So I felt like a sausage - skirts always highlight my, um, 'boyish' figure a.k.a. lack of waist - but at least I was a slightly more comfortable sausage than I would have been in jeans.

I have been perusing my favourite Northern Hemisphere blogs with even more envy than usual as people pack away their summer wardrobes and pull out their woollens ...

Three Colours: Red

(image from wikipedia)

I've been seeing red about one of my clients for a few weeks now. The person is in a temporary role in a company I've worked for (happily, I should add) for years. She doesn't understand the business and she doesn't know how to brief a writer. Apparently I am supposed to write without a brief, to a ludicrous deadline - and probably thank her for her business, into the bargain.

It was bound to come to sticky end. Maybe I was already in a less-than-sanguine mood (having put in an 11-hour work day on Sunday); maybe I just don't need to be patronised by fools. I did something I've done only once before - I sacked her as a client.

Sometimes you just have to weigh up the financial cost against the mental health cost, I guess. Worst case, I may not get work from that part of the business again until after she leaves at Christmas. Can I survive that? Sure.

Now I'm going to go for a run, just to get the last of the red out of my system.