Contrary to previous accusations about Mondays, today was neither manic nor blue. I had time to think for the first time in a week. I didn’t achieve much but I organised myself in order to achieve more the rest of this week (at least that’s what I tell myself  – why do today what you can put off ’til tomorrow… procrastination is harder work than actually working). Anyway, amongst other bits I organised my To-Do List into three parts – today, this week and next week. So now the list looks a bit shorter and less looming than before, and everything feels a bit less *AAAAGH*-making.

The weekend was uneventful, except that we went out to a Tepanyaki restaurant (one of those places where the chef cooks your meal on the table in front of you) in Lower Hutt with Kiwi’s Dad and Nanny on Friday night. When the chef played a few games with us, like ‘catch the egg’, I didn’t catch the egg and it landed in Kiwi’s Dad’s lap. And it wasn’t hard-boiled either. His legs were well and truly egged. At least it gave Kiwi’s Nanny the best laugh she’d had in a week… On the down side, my stomach decided to complain about the amount of rich foods I was consuming (on a bad day IBS doesn’t agree with oils, garlic, onions, red meat, root vegetables, copious amounts of food in general) and I spent the rest of the evening suffering in the restaurant bathroom, not to mention stopping at McDonald’s on the way home to use the ladies, funtimes…

Kiwi and I went to see Michael Jackson’s This Is It on Saturday, which was pretty good. It’s quite emotive since you know the ending, but I wouldn’t go in expecting to be astounded if you do go to see it – it’s just clips of song preparation, then clips of the song itself, clips of song preparation, clips of the song itself… and so on. Although you can see from the footage that it would have been the most elaborate concert ever staged, and it is tragic it never came about. And Michael Jackson himself moved like he was still in his 20s, and sounded just as he always has.

On Saturday night we trundled off to see some fireworks at Trentham Memorial Park, but being New Zealand Spring, it doesn’t get dark until about 9pm, so the fireworks weren’t due to start until around 9.30, which we didn’t find out until we arrived at 7pm. So having hung around for an hour, getting colder and bored, I wasn’t too interested in waiting for another hour and a half for five minutes of fireworks. We met up with Kiwi Girl and her family for a short while; and Kiwi Girl and me went on one of the carnival rides which were set up around the park. It didn’t look as fun as it was, I love fairground rides – I miss the Hoppings in Newcastle (Europe’s largest fun fair which comes to Newcastle annually for two weeks). We left around 8:30pm and went to rent a scary movie in honour of it being Halloween. Our DVD player turned out to be broken though, so we called it an early night.

Sunday was hot – English mid-summer kind of hot. I spent the day mostly in the garden, sat on a garden chair. Kiwi and I made a big pen on the lawn for the pigs to run around in, so I had to sit with them to make sure no neighbourhood cats came prowling. The pigs didn’t even appreciate it. They sat in one corner, underneath the shade I’d made for them out of towels and didn’t move. They were probably a bit scared by the unfamiliar environment though, but I’d like for them to make the most of the pen while they can; when we move into town we don’t have a lawn.

This week I’ve got so much work to do after work, I’m tired just thinking about it. I start work on a writing project which I’ve kept up from the UK – it comes around every 3 months. It’s only a couple of weeks work, but it’s a couple of weeks of spare time becoming no-spare time, now I’m working full time too. But it’s something I enjoy doing and I know it inside out now so it’s not too much like hard work, it’s just time consuming. Plus I’ve got an article for the work newsletter to write an outline for. I volunteered an idea which I now can’t even think what to write about, so I’m putting it off instead… because that’s how things get done, right? You put them aside and the fairies do it all for you? I thought so.

Anyway, it’s 9.45pm which is way past my bed time – seriously it is, I can’t stay awake in the evenings at the moment. I go to bed around 9.30/10pm and get up at 6am. I need 8 hours, I don’t function without zoning-out if I don’t get my 8 hours. *Yaaaaaawn*