self help/slow realisations & awkward situations, back then, or I I I I I I...

The last 25 years have been weird for me.

I found I loved more than I could.
I have found that missing someone hurts so much I can't see for tears when watching some films or TV show. I avoid horror and bad SF, why waste time. Sad movies/TV, depends.

I think that I seem to base some of my life on what I hear, what I see, what I read.
And reading back on that, idiot self, is how 99.999% of the rest of the world does it.
Another life revelation.
Humph.
Maybe I should not read into what some people tell me what or who I am,  or that I 'should' do this or that. Either deeply or at face value. But I do. And I think it is to hurt me, cos sometime I just don't give a damn, I rise above the trouble I am in as if it is not there. B+++t I do,  I just need time to sort and fix  things, on my terms Thankyou.
Their life has no Rolls or a pool, and maybe no lifelong partner either, nobody is perfect.
Everyone changes inconspicuously anyway with each and every life transaction. And every one has advice and life experiences to share. Gotta respect that at least.

People have left their mark on me somewhere somehow sometime, and right now one sticks out.
Bev said to me once when I was needing to forget my shitful life at one time, not to drown my sorrows with my mate, 'life has to go on, and drinking won't help us'. Braked at that, and was sensibly morosely drunk without losing it. For once. Wished I had wakened them at another time, really do.

My own folks helped me get into and through tertiary education. Shocked at that as they were. And me. We were all on a shoe string, and got through on it too. That is what got me into this little parable. The eldest is leaving us in the next year, and my resources and resourcefulness will be sorely tried, and advice ignored...

I am basically an opportunist, a modernist, definitely a consumerist.
A DIY type mostly, but I do have the latest expensive gadget when I can afford it.
A camera cost over a grand once, the same thing now is a days work or less. Same with my lil ol TV, & PVR...
I like making wine and beer and spirits from scratch, even converted a ruined batch of (river bank plucked blackberries) jam into wine.
Last year I burnt the shit out of a expensive pot making cordial from home grown lemons.
I was down the street a little bit too long, got in the door and wondered at the noise screeching through the hall, raced down to the kitchen. Shit, the pot, it was smoking like buggery!
Took the pot out the back with the poor cat TEARING past me and it burst into flame (the cordial remains, not the cat).

I think I am a perpetual student, and life observer. Cynic, sarcastic critic. Agnostic or atheist. Soft, tender, class 1 ah***, too strict, and very chillaxed as confident in them the kids. Easily amused at American and British humour, somewhat annoyed at Aussie tv/films. A dumb easily distracted shite ful person of either too much integrity, not enough, or even none at times.

I have 15 or more video tapes of family occasions. Drunk one night a number of years ago I watched some.
In one I found myself being a completely selfish pig at a birthday party. Much tears.
In others I saw little boys growing up and performing for their Mummy and Dadda with air guitars in the back yard or making cubbies with the lounge cushions and the Decaffeinated Coffee table.
A few have eclipses of the sun and the moon too.
Not on the same tape mind, cos they don't really happen together in the same year, as far as I can tell.
And then after the accident, the girls and boys birthday parties and Christmases and Easters. Sports and clan gatherings.

I once was asked to see what was wrong with a company PC back in the workshop.
I plugged in any old cord, switched it all on and WOOF.
Wrong power.

I was making the coffee once. The phone rang. I walked around the bench to answer.
And filled the coffee jar up instead of my mug.

It will only be four of us next year, the girls and boys almost autonomous. Hopefully they will cook and clean their own homes. Not great, god noes I aint! The shopping is fun, "STOP PUSHING THAT THING!" and the "CAAN WE HAVE????"
Rumphhh. "no".

Its all me.

Tarn was a great part of my life. Twenty years of it. Tarn was an old fashioned girl. A proper girl? Definitely of good moral character. I had to laugh at a piece in "Married,Single,Other" the other week where a character had had to "wait". Been there brother. (Such a sad series- great, just too sad, another well done Brit fing).
Tarn did not swear before she met me. She said.
By the time we were ensconced in Crawley, a few years after we started going out, she swore a little. It's so hard to remember which level she got to, LOL, but, I think I was better off for her being a brake on that sort of thing, cos coming back from an oil-rig, the language skills had run done to the basic communication needed between guys...
We do have a certain level of language around the house now, or I may be smote!
The menu she had by then was really good, better than mine by then for sure. But cos "we were modern", she taught me what to do. "Sharing". There I learnt to make Guacamole myself- the only way to eat avocado. The sharing did not mean the house was less dusty, I had to do that.

Tables turned again when we had the first child later in Melbourne. I was the eldest of six, and was babysitting since 9 years old, so nappies and bathing and feeding was like water off a ducks back. Tarnia never did tell me what she thought of that, I was just right in to it. God that was a night, she crushed my wedding ring to an oval, no drugs or needles, just the gas, pass the gas, NOW, sort of. Strong. Fan-bloody-tastic. Another tearjerking night out, at the hospital. With my mom-in-law too. And a bottle of bubbly, unlawful apparently.

Crying- yeah, they have to exercise, or burp or do something to interfere with delicate nocturnal activities that had to be re-learnt.

We had a few weeks in that time of Not Talking. Laughable, and forgotten now. Time to think and change some neuron paths.
Car travel was long and quiet at times too. Dunno.
It was hard to get Tarn to drive tween Adelaide and Melbourne before children.
After children, was okay for her to speed around the state to see the folks if I was off working. Which was good. I needed her to be more independent of me, to trust herself. I could not do anything if I was far far away. And Tarnia was the money sensible one too. Hence the hoose, moose.

daggy dad copiers!!!

Well there you/go.
My browser [chrome] crapped out(?) just before with a SNAP at me.
And most other sites had given up the ghost with a SNAP too.
The SAFARI and IE8 browsers worked. So?
Hmmm.
UNINSTALL as the help pages DID NOT help?
REINSTALLED and boing. straightaway.

Brief situation description:
Went to a gov.au site. SNAP after entering what I had to!?!
Was it a gov ploy to f me around?
I had had to contact them this morning, so I did it via the WEB.
It did not get far after the SNAP so had to call the HELP DESK.
That sorted out some things, we will see about the rest.
However, I did not get the contact's ID for later to give them grief all over again.

Then I did the usual web surf, checked the blog, and SNAP, a smallest blink of the page colour and SNAP.

The help pages wanted me to go in deep down into my pc, and out of 100000 files, find this one particular file, back it up and start the dang program anew.
No such file.

Uninstall  and re-install after a few more very un-satisfactory UNhelp pages. Sort of working, not instantly going to sites, but wanting to download the site page. ?????

But back to the title of this little spay of verbose crap, punctured by screams from the living room by performance enhanced super children...

Becuase of the above breifly mentionmed IT problems, I did a search to see if there was something wrong with mah blog, see, and then the search came up with more DAGGY DAD sites!

I thought I was an original, am devastated, as a matter of  fact, decimated!!

Don't ya love that MISUSED term, is it losing ten percent or is it having only ten percent left?

Anyway, digressed again.

So there are a few other ozzie d.d.s sites around. Bugger.

Obviously I am going to try to lift this up a bit more, but who wants to hear about How To?

This blog is about what happens after a certain direction/method has failed, missed, worked, was funny or sad.

what a week!

see? to many thorts...

One night/morning, a list appeared to me of my life as girls I had fallen for and the music at the time.

And then in the shower, other ponderables occurred to me. and became un-ponderable with days.

As I am watching Glass:A portrait of Philip in Twelve Parts, there was an almost frission with him.

He was describing music as not imagined, just needed to be written down as if it appeared as a tree from the mist in the park as you neared it, or the mist cleared. My paraphrasing.

Yeah, I have a heading and a start, then a preamble, and then a ramble, then a short conclusion.

hmm

Awright, and pologies to them:

Wendy J, Joanne S, Jenny P, Sue G, Tarn A. Some of these people have literally disappeared, others, gone for ever. Another had hair to her bum, and moved off to have kids with another potter. Nat, Dan.

Music to match? Primary school memories of the radio? Beatles. Rocket Man. Super Tramp. Beach Boys. Queen. Skyhooks. BTO. Dire Straits. U2.

Mostly dark haired and mostly brown eyed too, one had very curly hair, JS I think.

Sometimes try to track them down through old school friends, or now, google and facebook.

My friend Marshall was surprised at a thing I mentioned the other day. Once a long time ago, we had a large collection of empty Alpine packs.  I remember when I was young...

car #7

After 6 months of gazing at a Mercedes in the car-park, the bank let me have one.
And the family car can have a rest- poor thing. A quality vee-hee-cal doin' deliveries!?

Its only a van, mind. Second hand too.
But.
Big inside enough for the courier work, and ALL THE WINDSURFER stuff. Bigger than Lev
Oh yeah, and sleeping too.
So when the speed week comes up soon, off we go this year, the first time for years.
Maybe will afford it.
Even compete?
Will see.
At 30 bucks a month for another 3,003 years and 1 month, I think it is a cheap investment...

Weeelel, that's not quite right.
The investment was a better deal than that, within budget.
And hopefully will be able to do piece work for other little places around town.

helping a friend

Today I was asked to help out an ex-girlfriend. I cannot just say NO.

Not me. No excuse not to, I have the time. I suspect she knows that as well.

Anyway, she was a little late, as usual, to pick me up. Or should I say, her car was driven up by her eldest, The Learner Driver.

We were to measure some blinds and to see if they would fit in the windows at her new house she had just got built, in the next town.

There was the usual parental directing from the front passenger seat- Slow Down Please or We Will Pull Over and Swap Drivers! Been there! We arrived and his hoonish type car was scrapped up over the curb into the not yet made driveway. Advice offered on how to avoid scrapping the exhaust off next time he parked the car. Hope it did not seem boorish and in one ear and out the other.

It is a nice new house, largish bedrooms, two lounges, big block, with a bit of a view out the back to the south across the valley.

The blind did not fit the window, too long, needed to be cut? Hmmm. Hmmmmmm. Off the shelf does not always fit. Maybe get a shop to do it? I could fit it, but would the trim be neat enough? Dunno, dunno.

The blind did not fit back into it's box either!

Well, it was not me that stuffed some one else's dream up this time. There were alternatives.

Will keep posted- may be a handyman job there after-all!

Just a Choking Feeling, all day.

Well another anniversary has been and gone.

A short visit out to the plot with the kids and flowers from the garden.

Hard to talk to them out there. Tidy up the headstone and place the bouquet. Tarn liked getting and giving flowers.

The twins pillage the garden for flowers sometimes for a small table display, the stalks a bit too short for the size of the display, but I imagine it would have been just the same with their mum looking on too instead of me alone, admiring their energy and "artistic flair".

Girls broke into tears for the first time out there, ever, on leaving. They are growing up so much, and I really felt for them. I nearly got a group hug going, the boys hung back, quiet.

My sister in law writes of the minutes gone by since that day ten years ago, what was going on at the time. Some of my memories that are stand out, not too blurred, are these, my in laws and a party trip.

Her father was not that pleased at some of the Olympic antics about then, seems so far away. Well, he is pretty old and set in his ways, and it was hard not to laugh at his comments on the goings on up at Sydney back then. He was not trying to be funny, he was-  annoyed, but it was the Games, an entertainment event of the centuries! Like me though, he could not believe the costly fuss they had up there. Bev loved the idea of us getting outta town, she could handle this lot!

In the middle of that September, I had taken Tarn to a very old friend's of mine's surprise 40th birthday party, not far from the big smoke, my old home town.

So we left two hundred kilometers behind us the kids with Ken and Bev for their first time as "bulk" baby sitters, before they moved away to the big smoke for Bev.

This was to be our first and last night away alone together since the girls were born.

Tarn was all dressed up again, looking just fine. Tarn met Paul and Sue and many other of my old mates and their wives and husbands. We had a good time. There was a mutual friend Trish from college that had married another old friend of mine. Even an old unrequited love of mine! And her ex!!! Could not talk to him that night! Paul and Sue were the same people they were years ago I thought. Same with the rest- but we didn't get to talk about twenty years of activities all in one night! Kids photos were passed around, there were a few.

The next day I drove us home a different route this time, along the hills instead of the freeway to surprise her. The next time I traveled that way a few years later was hard, and I do not think I will be doing it again.

It would hard to believe that just less than two weeks later, a lot of those old friends were with me again in a totally different situation.

Ups and downs, choked and alive. That's life I spose. It was not the best day of my life.

Vineyard and Alcoholery Production (cof cof...)

The Portable vineyard is coming along fine, the nursery vines seems to be growing well and the cuttings are a low percentage success. The last three weeks have resulted in a few drinks being made.

Some liqueurs have been made up, like anise flavoured, cinnamon flavoured and vanilla bean flavoured. Half a litre high alcohol content with ingredients should make up a nice drink around Xmas time, just seive the stuff out and add sugar- about 300g and equal amount of H2O.

Will be making limonella too, the lemon tree has stayed the course after a severe hair cut, and the fruit looks good. Poor old thing may need some more cut off it next year.

Have not made chocolate milk stout for a few years, so out to the brewery- and now have two-dozen-plus long-necks maturing. Give them six weeks and that will be a nice little present for other afficiendos too.

From 8 kg of sugar, managed to 'scrounge' 5 liters of base, enough to make 10 liters of spirits, or about 14 bottles of whotcar. Carbon filtering should remove most smells, or will 'scrounge' it again. Need to 'scrounge' some afters too, and maybe the horrible wine off the garage vine will be added to that. Faux brandy even!

The Portable Vineyard as of middle September:

Shiraz

Pinot

Chardonnay

There are at least three Shiraz cuttings, 5 Pinot and two chardonnay budding at the moment, and last years shiraz cutting are really doing well.

time drawing near, what do I feel

Fraser's birthday was done well, Poppy took me by surprise, bless him, and shouted us all for dinner that night, after I invited him and Brenda along at really very short notice, i.e., 11am that morning.
I can't top that- I was all prepped up to pay.

The boy appreciated it all, specially getting a second helping of parma chicken. With pineapple. And he really likes his new camera, just wish he would read up some more on using it, rather than just snappin away.

I feel sad as usual, as Tarns anniversary draws near.

We will probably do the usual thing of driving out to the cemetery with some of the garden flowers. She would not believe some of the beautiful camellias that have appeared from under a huge weed of a bush I cut back just a few years ago.

There are two times we go out there that are Dates, her birthday, and  her anniversary.

I go out there to sometimes be by myself, or get away from something I cannot change and think how to go about handling thiongs.

My memory of Tarn has no bearing really on what I do, we were both singular people, that wanted kids.
How I handle things now is not affected by thoughts of how she would have handled things, at all
It is too hard to imagine in actuality.
It's strange to say that, (my shoulders just shrugged as I write), but it's true.
Common sense and a moral sense of what is right and true are what I follow.
Truth hurts and so does honesty, just don't ask me to explain, I have such a tortured lil ol sole.

The camellia flowers are falling all over the place there is so much. The mandarin tree has so much fruit, I think Tarn would have loved that, as she like to force fresh fruit down my very unwilling throat all the time, cos I was a man, and peeling fruit really is just too hard in any case.

Amazing re-growth after being in the shade for years.

Like the kids. Not shaded out, but just growing.

My beautiful young people.

a 15th

#2 will be fifteen today, one good tooth less than 18 months ago.

His mum would have felt the same bloody sadness as I did when he banged out on a jump and lost it in the lawn. I had tears pissing everywhere while I tried to find it so I could jam it back in as soon as possible.

After all that food jammed down that throat and all that bloody brushing and all that, and he banged it out doing his favourite thing, just before the evening meal.

He said something to me the other day about next week, not sure what it was now, something in passing, with a strange look on his face.

I think I nodded and mumbled something back. Yep, next week.

http://daggydad.blogspot.com/2010/09/figjam.html

FIGJAM

I have some bad news
and some good news.
I was walking toodey
aroon the hoose .

Why was the rain water gutter wet?
Been No Rain?
Fixed the Block
in the nearby drain!

Hmm. wet Groond
around
the post for the garden tap.

It was in the path of the mad BMXrs...
Maybe they had bent it under ground and cracked the join?

So dug carefully aroon it.
Velly wet.
And lots of tree roots from the big tree a few yards away!
So the roots had bent it and maybe the kids had had knocked it too.
A wee crack in the pipe there was.
Oot wif dat den!
Soo ezy to undoo too!

Two bucks and ninety cents
for a plug and the nuisance post and leak
 was dissa peed...

Figjam does it again,
up the tradies
(sorry fellas)

FIGJAM

I have some bad news
and some good news.
I was walking toodey
aroon the hoose .

Why was the rain water gutter wet?
Been No Rain?
Fixed the Block
in the nearby drain!

Hmm. wet Groond
around
the post for the garden tap.

It was in the path of the mad BMXrs...
Maybe they had bent it under ground and cracked the join?

So dug carefully aroon it.
Velly wet.
And lots of tree roots from the big tree a few yards away!
So the roots had bent it and maybe the kids had had knocked it too.
A wee crack in the pipe there was.
Oot wif dat den!
Soo ezy to undoo too!

Two bucks and ninety cents
for a plug and the nuisance post and leak
 was dissa peed...

Figjam does it again,
up the tradies
(sorry fellas)

The Portable Vineyard 2010/2011 season

Today

The Portable Vineyard was finally weeded, tended, fixed, fertilized and mulched. There were new buds on the potted vines on 1 September, and now the established vines are budding too

The nursery plants were also fixed up, with some re-potted.

Chardonnay and Pinot 2010

What is it?

Last count was 29 Shiraz/Syrah vines in pots at various stages- 15 fruiting vines, the rest the nursery vines. There are also 6 chardonnay and 2 Pinot Noir vines along the veranda that are producing, the birds got last years chardonnay, and the liter of pinot wine turned to vinegar, but it was a great red wine vinegar! there was a real sense of achievement when spaghetti bolognaise tasted just fine with it added.

 In a addition to the potted vines are the original 6 vines planted in 1999 out along the back fence (4) and next to the shed/bungalow (2). These are the origins of the Portable Vines, cuttings propagation.

Production currently

Last year I managed to coax enough fruit for 5 liters, or nearly 6 bottles of shiraz, and the same this year.

The wine from last year was really nice, I don't think any is left to mature more than a year! I could be wrong... I will have to check the Micro Wine Cellar. I am pretty sure there is none in the Alcoholery*!

[ *That's the Beer/Wine/Spirit Making Shed, abbreviated from "Brewery/Winery/Distillery Ex-car Garage". ]

But Why?

When we bought the place (1998) there was a vine against the garage. After the first summer there was HEAPS of grapes. I asked a home brew shop owner what could I do with it. I had to buy a beer brewing kit, and also enough ingredients to make Milk Stout. 

So that is why I make wine at home.

How

From a book published in Australia, I learnt that about 50 wine grape vines would be a fine idea to make enough for a years consumption- up to 50 bottles a year I think was the idea, but when you only have a quarter acre, you have to compromise... So when pruning three year old vines, I kept them to make cuttings propgation, and that started it all.

Now I have a shelf full of wine making and beer brewing books.

A garage full of brewing equipment. And bottling stuff and Bottles...

I read about Canadian Ice Wine- a sweet wine made by letting the berries freeze, and squeezing the unfrozen juice out to ferment. The vines were grown in old barrels, cut in half and mounted on trolleys!  I guess that this was so that they could be wheeled in and out of the barn or green house for winter. 

So that is why it is a Portable Vineyard, if I have to sell up, it all comes with me!

ten years

Ten years since Sydney Olympics. Big celebrations on the TV.

In a fortnight, ten years since Tarn was lost.

I am not feeling that good with all the celebrations.

I had to leave the room.

The kids may want to turn it off too.

Movies because.

The girls were acting suspiciously this morning, they were tidying things up around here!

Ahhh. There was a new 3D movie I might take them to. Even though it was not in the budget.

Vacuuming and trash taken out, brekky dishes done, and sweet smiles- pretty please eyes.

Did I want to see it as well? Unfortunately, yes...

No time for lunch, of we rushed.

The que was too long to collect snacks before the movie started, so bid look aboot thet, ay!

So it was 3D, a bit extra, but fun, and I got a few larfs out of it too. The girls missed some bits!

Then there was a message for me towards the end of the film from #1 Son- "PMU please". He was arriving back from the Powderfinger concert held in Melbourne last night.

And then another call as we walked out into the SUNSHINE from #2 Son- visitors had left gifts. Oh well, cannot be everywhere at once.

But. I did not turn the cell phone off in the cinema- could have been eject ulated if it had not been accidently left on silent but vibratory!

In memory

In the year 2000, I lost two people that were important to me, January my paternal grand father, and my wife in September. So September is the hard month for me and maybe the rest of the family too.

At the moment I feel well balanced, maybe because I am letting it out like this, and I do not have to put a brave face on for a partner as if it was not that important anymore.

The kids lost a mum a week after one of the boys' birthday and an old friends surprise 40th birthday party.

And a year later there was the Twin Tower loss.

Another year and a bit later, the triple loss of losing a special carer Bev, my mother-in-law, her sister too, funny old Dot, and my paternal grand mother on top of it all later on that year.

Back then I was on some medication to pull through the deep sadness of my situation, not anxiety or depression. It clouded emotional judgments, and let me drift for a few years, and it does seem a bit dreamy now. My own car accident made me pull in my head, but that was still in dream time too.

There have been other emotional times too, from the anticipated loss of a young niece which was so far away it was hard to be a part of that loss, to a relationship breakup that dragged on too long. That was difficult, but my niece's family were on the other side of the ocean, there was no hugs of condolences and re-assurances that things would be alright like I had had a few years before.

But I was shocked at the Twin Towers, I expected a new world war to erupt like Mt St. Helens, spoiling my view and my kids view that life was not that bad, was it? Life had already changed, and would be changed again.

So in short, enjoy the memories of a good life, life changes, life continues, life is still good. Just have to adapt,  realise what you have changes, enjoy the changes, cope with the difficulties, overcome the obstacles that life chucks at ya one way or another.

I really don't like the cliche of life changes after you have kids, but it does. Like gravity and taxes I suppose.

I miss my wife in the sense of what the kids will never have that person to smile at them and be proud of them.

My own loss is that she is just not there to be with in good times and bad, and knowing now that at times way back when, I was a complete a-hole, and did not know that, and I am so ashamed of that now. That's why I will stay single, fathering on the best I can.

On the plus side, I still have a very supportive in-law or two, the best siblings and folks.  A great extended family. A new member could be, shockingly enough, a twin of Tarn! Maybe that is what my brother saw in his new partner?

Life is just weird.

Been there

Today I was asked for a special; take some soft-drink out to the heliport. 18km later! And the river plain was flooded. The road was 'that' much from being flooded last night. The boss was lucky I didn't ask for twice as much for the trip- 100km to deliver some coke! But it was nice to get out of town. Might have been good to take the kids, but they were supposedly in school at the time, ah well.

I have not been out there for close to 7 years I reckon? There was a big chopper there- Executive Transport or something- as big as the Pres's one! A Supa Puma? Must have been some big wigs that missed the Citation or Lear from the Big Smoke. But really, who on earth would really choose a big fat super loud and vibrating like all shit sixty minute chopper ride anyway?

The heliport hasn't changed, and the guards did not recognize me one could have cos I recognized him. Don't know why that sort of hurt, was irregular I know since 85 but geez, more regular in the Noughties! There are new posters about having or a getting security card! Wow. It's different that much.

Of course the cases of bottles coke was not certified as a special delivery, no Name to Deliver it too, another call back to base. And another chopper was warming up as I called in, great. So the reception there was called up, and then the canteen, and I thought, Oh Great, looks like a wasted trip for someone.

Then someone turned up and said Hey that's for us!

Excellent. See ya losers.

So then I stopped along the way back at the rowing shed at the port- the rowing dock was way out. And Hard to get to.

Girls P&T

 Rush off to work late, and then the P&T meetings for the girls.

The teachers love them, nothing wrong, doing so well, joy to have in the class.

Single dad, a bit of help, and I get that. Makes up for the sleep-in!

Late late late

I have a simple job and life style. Today, had to take # 1 to school at 7am for a running excursion. Back to bed. Up at 8:10- for brekky and loose supervision of the wild things.
No dishes put away because the dish washer did not go off!

oooooh.

Take the arms out- full of LARGE grit, so won't turn. HMPHPH!!! Will talk to boys tonight!!

Tried it again, and again. Worked.  Great.
Bye to the kids, finish brekky, hit the sack again, bash the snooze a few times and then the off and then woke up LATE.

Dang. Rush off, and then the P&T meetings for the girls.

The teachers love them, nothing wrong, doing so well, joy to have in the class.

Single dad, a bit of help, and I get that. Makes up for the sleep-in!

What it means to be The Daggy Dad and lists to do not getting done

Today's List-

Post Office.

Rack off chocolate milk stout- done

Work on the Portable Vineyard- weeding- fertilize- transplant young ones to bigger pots

Work- done well!

Housework, not done

Parent Teacher Interview, tomorrow you ejit

Band Practice

I have another blog, I want to separate the Confident Know it all Dad from this one....

 Well, after a little dig about my favourite wind-cheating cosy warm pull over/jersey/jumper/guernsey/wind-cheater from my youngest daughter back in June, I thought the blog title would be appropriate.

The wind-cheater has a large embroidered Rip Curl emblem  on the back.

Some one else once asked whether I had picked it up from an opportunity shop! The Cheek- I bought it brand spanking new when it arrived at the sailboarding shop I used to hang out in back in the 90's, Thank-you Very Much!

It is much loved, and has old ciggie burn holes in it. Sort of striped maroon, and lined. It's just nice to wear, and no, not fashionable. Daggy.

As the Daggy dad worried about Parent/Teacher meeting this morning, he shaved, showered, and nearly shined the boots up, and went off just in time to school.

At the appointed time I waited to see the teacher of the eldest twin outside the class room. She Herself walked out, and said-

"Dad, I put it on the calender. It's tomorrow."

What it means to be The Daggy Dad and lists to do not getting done

Today's List-

Post Office. done

Rack off chocolate milk stout- done

Work on the Portable Vineyard- weeding- fertilize- transplant young ones to bigger pots, some

Work- done well!

Housework, not done

Parent Teacher Interview, tomorrow you ejit

Band Practice, done

Yay, somethings 100% !

I have another blog, I want to separate the Confident Know it all Dad from that one....

Well, after a little dig about my favourite wind-cheating cosy warm pull over/jersey/jumper/guernsey/wind-cheater from my youngest daughter back in June, I thought the blog title would be appropriate.

The wind-cheater has a large embroidered Rip Curl emblem  on the back. What is wrong with it?

Some one else once asked whether I had picked it up from an opportunity shop! The Cheek- I bought it brand spanking new when it arrived at the sailboarding shop I used to hang out in back in the 90's, Thank-you Very Much!

It is much loved, and has old ciggie burn holes in it. Sort of striped maroon, and lined. It's just nice to wear, and no, not fashionable. Daggy.

As the Daggy dad worried about Parent/Teacher meeting this morning, he shaved, showered, and nearly shined the boots up, and went off just in time to school.

At the appointed time I waited to see the teacher of the eldest twin outside the class room. She Herself walked out, and said-

"Dad, I put it on the calender. It's tomorrow."

no housework so far, but beer brew ON!

I have done no housework so far today, as was scheduled ;-(, just making beer, as per Whitbread Milk Stout, yum. And a brew to turn into a bundy type drink, double distilled and triple filtered, come on summer :-). Just no housework, yet.

-as per face book earlier today.

Later, I read my friends blog, and needed to do something positive for me, not mooch around as September usually makes me do. Well, Tarns anniversary is closer and closer, which somewhat spoils the excitement of Frzldazlers 15th soon.

But, the day started...

I was doing something after a morning work run, which brought me to the The Alcoholery, aka The Shed. And a BREW TIME overtook me!

It's been a while since I made a batch of beer or stout. 

Went through the shelves, and assembled the gear and stuff. Found the measuring devices, as discussed previously and went to work, blithely ignoring the piles of crap left around by co-habitors. Washed the brewing vessels, boiled up the constituents and also made up some chocolate malt from scratch.

The bundy brew was the easiest, should get 15-20% out of 25L and 8kg of sugar. IE 5L to make 10L of bundy! All for about 20 buckaroonies.

The milk stout should be ready to bottle next week- forty bucks for two dozen classy tasting long-necks of stout, better than Guinness, and not eighty bucks or more! Just the time to assemble and brew, and then washing the bottles... (No pain, no gain...)

The Kitchen was left a mess, four different pots, from 3L to 10L used- oh boy, but was a quick wash up.

The bathroom is now the brew room; some wood, and the bath is a ready made bench, nobody uses it at the moment.

There is a nice smell about the place from the chocolate malted grains that were boiled up for the wort. Like having a coffee machine or vanilla milkshake, or fresh, hot and soft but crusty bread sitting there straight from the oven or bread maker!

I love those smells, like the yellow wattle in spring down here in south east Oz- you know that summer's is coming, and will be having a drink to that then!

Racked off the stout 7 Sept. Thats' a big bottle o' beer, Oi!

leaving home...

No, they are not Leaving Home, just the morning school leaving time.
What a mess.

I get up later now. Because I have taken a leaf from a younger brothers book of raising kids.

They are to make their own sangers. I used to make great sangers!
Sounds good, even great! More sleep in for me. Ten minutes anyway.
So rise and shine at 8 o'clock. Listen to ABC news 7.45am first. Usually gently slide back into a doze.

Except.