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I prefer the thought of yoghurt to both its texture and its taste.

I’ve just finished the bathroom, so now there’s only the laundry to do. If you’re looking for the mister I think he’s in the roof fixing the bloody lights again.

Must catch up for a coffee soon.

Anybody know where I could find a cross stich pattern for Luke Skywalker?

There are less plastic bags than there used to be, but still there is a lot.

There are some plastic bags which are too good to use as bin liners. They are too sturdy, perhaps, or badged with a place you want to remember. Shakespeare’s Globe might be an example of that, tho that is something I just pulled out of the air to make myself seem more worldly than I feel sitting in this suburban room of this suburban house of this suburban life. I don’t have any plastic bags that I’m keeping because they’re badged ‘Shakespeare’s Globe’.

Some – the very sturdy ones – I fold. Look closely and you can see them here. To maintain such a stack requires a household commitment and it would be, I think, unusual to find two people who both believe that it is something worth spending their time on.

One day I will knit one of those of coathanger covers like the one a library volunteer once knitted me. ‘It gives you something to do,’ she said, ‘while you wait for the carrots to boil’. At the time, I had no idea what she meant.

But there are many bags which fit between those to be used as bin liners and those to be preserved. And they sit, scrunched in one large plastic bag in the cupboard where the vacuum cleaner lives. Never quite used and never quite not.
Something I want, something I really, really want is one of those calico things. You know a sausage kind of thing with elastic at both ends. You push the bags in the top and pull them out of the bottom. But if I were to hang one of those, I wonder how many times would I need to mutter ‘Shakespeare’s Globe’.

So I’m sure you’re all just refreshing bloglines waiting to hear more about my cross stitch.

Here it is. I haven’t framed it yet. But I will.

I’m off to bed now, because I stayed up too late last night watching Miss Universe. And on that particular incident, I have only this to say…having slipped on the stage she should not have gone through to the next round. I admire her poise in recovering, and on a human level I felt for her, I truly did. But surely all the ballgown section asks is that you stay on your feet.

Having been ‘at home during the day’ for many years now, I have a pretty high tolerance for rubbish radio. It can’t be easy filling all that silence. But this thing they’ve got on ABC 891 right now – hey folks, men and women approach the shopping differently, ring in now with your funny tales, listen to this, I always buy an extra scourer, scourers don’t go off boom-boom – is giving me the shits so badly that I am off to sort the washing more carefully.

While he and I generally enjoy the simple banter of two people who see each other every week but don’t know each others’ names, today he makes lame retailers’ excuses to the point that I want to say – in a snippy way – you know, I really doubt that it has been delayed by customs…oh, look at the stall just down there I see* they have a great carton of jars of which they are willing to hand me one in exchange for a small gold coin;** and while it is true that the jars are small and not the brand I would usually choose, nonetheless they are available now and the person selling them will not make me endure this endless litany of excuses for the space on your shelf where your dijon mustard should be.

*no, technically, you wouldn’t be able to see it from here unless you had x-ray vision or eyes which could travel around corners on something resembling elastic, but this here is dramatic licence, and I knew they would be there, because they always are

**I’m not entirely sure that this is a good use of the semi-colon, it being a mark I rarely use. But given certain recent advices, I thought I’d give it a go.

There’s been a bit of talk about ‘s*x’ in this house lately. Not the act, but the actual word. ‘You’re a s*x* lady’, for example, has become something of a refrain bandied about in that way children do when they know that they don’t know what it means, but are seduced by the knowledge of potential subserviseness. You know what I mean. You’ve all been children.

When I hear them messing around with words with each other in the back yard, I do let it go a bit. I think it’s important that they have a chance to experiment with the words and so on. Plus, like, I do swear a bit, so, you know, I have to wear it a bit if they embarrass me when they’re out. But I also make quite an effort to point out that words have meanings, can hurt people, will offend people and so on. I find ‘well, would you say it at nana’s’ to be the best way of making my meaning felt. They seem to know instinctively, and I just love the looks on their faces when they say ‘well, of course not’. Like, how dumb do you think we are?

But apparently, while I have been in here tapping away at something I feel should not be taking quite so long to write, Andrew on PlaySchool said as he pointed to the sponge cakes he was about to transform into lamingtons ‘we’re going to s*x it up’. Both of my children reckon that’s what he said, and they’ve got those smiles as they tell me that’s what he said. The ones they have when they get to say something they’re not really supposed to be saying.

Really? Did Andrew really say that? Not that I’m going to write letters to the editor about it or start voting for John Howard in protest at left-wing bias on the ABC if he did. It’s not a moral outrage or anything, and it’s a pretty good description of what happens to sponge as it becomes lamington. But I’d kind of like to know. Just because…I dunno, just because it’s interesting if that is what he said. So if you were supervising your children’s viewing this afternoon, could you let me know? Thanks.

Did you see me? Last night? On the tele? Performing in the final at the Melbourne Town Hall? There was a card in the letterbox this morning from my neighbour, so I guess they were watching. I reckon my two best jokes (I think we call them gags) didn’t make it to the telecast. But I would say that, wouldn’t I?

I tell you, watching that was worser than the actual perfomance. Am I really that fat? I said to the mister. Do I really look that fat? I really have put on weight, haven’t I? And so on. Stopped short of saying ‘I really should stop drinking so much’.

So that’s that. One of the most surprising experiences of my life finished with. I remember watching the Raw final on the tele last year and even then doing stand up hadn’t even crossed my mind. I never said you know, that’s something I’ve always wanted to do…I should do that, I mean I could do that, I’m as funny as that. Never thought it once.

Overall, I would say my best performance was the one I gave in the state grand final, but going to Melbourne and standing on that beautiful stage in front of 1400 people who laughed at my jokes (and applauded three of them)…my goodness, that was something.

In another big move, I started teaching myself cross-stitch last night.

Right now, if I could do anything I wanted to do, I would get into bed and go to sleep.