Today when I was walking home with Julia and one of her pals they told me that they were tomboys. I asked what a tomboy was and they said that they were girls that liked boys things. I asked what sort of things are boys things and they replied, "you know, boys stuff like...Star Wars and Harry Potter." Cue demented feminist raving.

I have two litres of duck fat from a friend, who eats ducks a lot and freezes the fat. I was going to try making confit, and I have heard it is excellent for roasting potatoes. Does anyone else have any ideas/links to favourite recipes/suggestions?
I think it would make kick ass chips, come to think of it. Also would be good for greasing the pan before making omelettes/frittatas.

Knock on the door at 745am. The woman who brought the chicken to my cranky neighbour was there and wanted to know if the chicken was ours. I said no and we discussed chicken adjistment options. She was deeply concerned about its welfare, particularly as Yummy and Rosie were flat out asserting their primacy in the pecking order. Julia got the interloper out of the run and we had a look. I said:
a) its wings haven't been clipped properly - they did both sides and missed the most important feathers.
b) it is riddled with ticks, noting the blood spots all over the comb.
c) its legs are a mess, bad scaly lice.
We talked about how to fix the chickens problems (vaseline on the legs, cholinesterase dust all over the hen), and she was keen to take it back up to the school. The school garden now extends to chickens and this one appears to be an escapee. She took the chicken away with the promise to throw it back over the fence if it turned out not to belong to the school. No livestock has reappeared so I presume the case is closed.
PS today is a good day - yesss!

I'm feeling terrible still, and it has stopped me blogging thanks to brain fog/silly self consciousness. I think the worst is that I've lost my sense of humour about my life. I want to fight this. So some random stuff.
Things that are good/ I am grateful for:
Black humour - My brothers and I share a jet black sense of humour - recently together we toasted dads health (he is alive because he had a liver transplant). 'To medical science' 'To road traffic accidents' 'To 18 year olds driving HSVs'. Too tasteless and horrible for a lot of people but I am grateful that my brothers share my humour.
Dolphins - Last weekend D and I went sailing at east fremantle with R the sea creature aka Julia's dad. R has always had spooky marine wildlife summoning powers, and sure enough, a pod of four dolphins turned up and swam around the boat. Julia reached into the water and touched one. They puffed air out of their blowholes and slowly swam off. The dolphins were probably feeling annoyed about the depth finder we had running. I believe in signs - dolphins close enough to touch is one.
Julias increasingly sophisticated sense of humour - last night at the dinner table she asked what 300mL meant on the side of the mayonnaise bottle. I began to explain that it was a measurement of volume, and she feigned puzzlement and said 'why would anyone want to know how loud it sounds when it comes out of the bottle, mummy?' and then her delight when we realised how perfectly I had been set up.
Films - D and I have been seeing lots of films lately, and I love the mental holiday they provide. We went to see 'The boys are back' last night. It was okay. There was a comic sequence of studio/financier credits at the start. It went on and on. Hopscotch. Mirimax. BBC films. Australian film commission. South Australian film commission. Southern light films. There were more but I forget the rest. I find Clive Owen, erm, attractive, and he was on screen for about 99 percent of the film. He did a great acting job, not often you see men crying in a genuine way in a film. The film was all a bit too Steve Biddulph for me. Basically it was a chick flick for guys. It made a refreshing change to see a film that examined male emotional territory that was something other than tiresome 'I'm a rebel because daddy didn't love me enough' issues. It was a film about fatherhood, and men parenting boys. Unfortunately it wandered too far into sex stereotyping, particularly where children's behaviour is concerned. It was very much in the 'snails and puppy dogs tails' versus 'sugar and spice' territory. Annoying. D enjoyed it because it was also a film about grieving the death of a spouse, and they got it right, according to him. Apart from that, the scenery and the rural weatherboard and iron house they live in are gorgeous. Sometimes I felt like I was watching a Country Road advertisment. It was an okay film and I hope it does well, just because it was a little different.
We also went to see 'The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus' which was great. It was typical of Terry Gilliam films in that the wonderful visuals and creativity somewhat overwhelmed any character development or any personal identification with anyone in the film on the part of the viewer. Also, it would have benefited from someone other than Gilliam doing the editing. It was a little self indulgent - you could see a very creative person unable to let go of some really cool ideas for the benefit of the film. The film was a bit of a j'accuse at the general lack of creativity in western life. Fair enough, if you are someone like Terry Gilliam. The rest of us, well, we are doing our best, thanks.

Ahh..the hiss and smell of overworked hydraulics, the blare of 'My Sharona', the dazzle of multicoloured lights, the mandatory hoodies and tight jeans, the sensory overload...sideshow ally, how I love you.
Apart from that, we spent 12 hours at the show yesterday, meeting up with some friends in the morning, then D and also lauredhels partner and son for the afternoon/evening. It wasn't too crowded, we saw and did lots of great stuff and spent too much money as always.
Julia has made a lot of cognitive progress compared to last year. Sometimes I was the one dragging her away, going 'ok I'm bored now'. A guy from the Ag dept spent quite some time with Julia explaining/demonstrating how to assess sheep condition, then showing her the different types of supplementary feeds, and Julia listened and watched intently. I was chatting to a woman about the Ag depts work supporting small holders, so missed the sheep stuff. Julia dragged me over and explained it all in full. Last year she would have listened politely then asked for a sticker.
Our calorie intake for the day was literally chips, doughnuts, coffee for me and showbag chewing gum for Julia. It was most excellent.

A woman found Julias school bag and her stuff scattered over an oval. She collected it up, right down to Julias rock and feather collection, dried the school homework books and the uniform in front of her heater, took the bag up to the primary school and handed it in. She didn't leave her name or anything so we have no way of thanking her.

Julia got dropped home by R about an hour ago. His car was broken into (window smashed), and the only thing they stole was Julias school bag. I have a child sobbing about the loss of her medals from the sports carnival on friday, her favourite pencil set, her special drink bottle, her 'principals award' pencil..etc. 'I wish there was no such thing as robbers' she wept. I hate this life lesson, I hate watching her trust and innocence being lost, I hate it.

I've become a homebody a bit lately. Things are good, though. I've made some progress with the diet/depression/fatigue links. Gluten is teh evil. Dairy is ok if I keep it under a threshold. I am feeling very good, no muscle pain, no fatigue, no depression, no confusion, no foggy headedness. At the moment I am catching up with all the crappy tasks that are overwhelming when depressed (like washing the home brew bottles, hanging some pictures, that kind of thing).
Jules wept after school yesterday. The highlight of her lunch is a 'Stringers' cheese stick. One of the other girls in her class (who has a history of bullying Jules) snatched it and stuffed the whole thing into her mouth while Julia tried to grab it back. Julia said she sat for the rest of the lunch trying not to cry. The other kids didn't do anything. The girl is in Julias class so this morning before school I did a big scary mummy act (not hard to pull off when one has a crewcut) and told the girl off. It worked, she looked frightened. I don't think she will be stealing food from other kids for a while. What would you have done?
a. Give Julia advice about how to fight her own battles and don't interfere
b. Tell the teacher
c. Tell the girls mother
d. Tell the girl off
e. Some combination of the above

Hmm, it seems to be a week for uncovering unpleasant things about oneself. Hopefully I grow to be a kinder, more empathetic, better person.
I've been a patient for the past three weeks for a minor gynaecological thing, and I don't know how to be a patient. I am anxious, and attempt to regain a sense of control by being an arrogant, 'I know more than you, specialist', patient, when I truly don't know more than the specialist. I don't know how to be a patient, having had a GP father and never been a patient until adulthood, and also having a medical support career. It's not that important in the general scheme of things, just a sense of how does one do this? I believe in patient autonomy, but also don't like being the smartarse patient who questions everything in an immature 'it's all old hat to me, sonny' sense. I am sure the doctors are used to people like me, I just don't like being one of them. I guess the thing is to work at accepting the lack of control.

We have a motorbike frog in the back garden. I have named him Barry White, because of his sexy chuckle at the end of his motorbike call. (click on sound button in the link, I think our frog is an old frog because his tone is about five notes deeper).
http://frogwatch.museum.wa.gov.au/Southwest/DarlingRanges/421.aspx
Hopefully he will find a girlie frog, and make tadpoles forever after- cross fingers - before he will be sucked into the skimmer box in the pool. It's so romantic!

My brother lent me his Charcuterie book and a sack of saltpetre. The book is a how to for smoking, drying, curing, sausage making, speck, chorizo, pastrami, bacon, salami..etc at home. I am keen to give it a try, but I feel the spectres of E.Coli 0157 and clostridium hovering over my shoulder as I read, particularly the fermenting meats on purpose chapter.
I never feel this apprehension with other microbial adventures, like brewing, wine making, sourdough, yoghurt or cheese making. Does anyone else have an opinion here? Am I right to stay away?

Some bookish friends might enjoy this blog - a couple of librarians posting books that should have been weeded from the shelves a long time ago:
http://awfullibrarybooks.wordpress.com/

*waves* from Dalat, Vietnam. Too awesome, having the time of our lives.

Tonight I thought that I would try to get Julia to go to sleep to something other than the usual tinkly new age CD that she listens to. So I got out my guided meditation CD made by my yoga teacher. I put it on, turned out the light and left the room. I came back about 5 minutes later to see how it was going. A wide awake Julia said "I don't understand it, mummy, the lady keeps saying beware of your right hand, beware of your right wrist, beware of stuff. I don't understand how this is supposed to be relaxing."

: Going to Vietnam on Sunday, so very exciting! I am thinking a boat trip up the Mekong (oooh, so very Apocalypse Now), either to Cambodia or perhaps to an island that is on the southern border of Cambodia. Then back to Ho Chi Minh, and a trip to Hoi An by train or plane. Hoi An is the old capital of Vietnam and is very beautiful but also a bit of a tourist trap. I'm looking forwards to getting back and being able to make lots of tasteless 'Back in 'Nam' jokes.
: Julia wrote me a letter.
Dear Mum, I hope you are haveing a great day! Thank you for the mesige. You are the kindest person I ever met. You have the kindest hert ever. I reely love you. Lots of love from Julia.xxoo
: Loving the rain. I can almost hear the plants drinking it up. That dry spell over summer was so bad that mum said that in the hills even bushes were dying from lack of water, something that she hasn't ever seen before.
: I have private health insurance for the first time ever, since D has family insurance and so he put my name and Julia down on the policy. Now to get my moneys worth by getting a shed load of overdue dental work done. Quake, tremble.

What an unusual and powerful film. See it.

Don't try 'Colourstay' lipsticks on your wrists because they do what they say. You end up appearing to have spent your lunch break attempting suicide.

I've got a pot of beef ragu bubbling on the stove in preparation for a creamy marscapone lasagna for dinner, the house is warm and cosy, and it is raining. Life is rather fine right now.

When the lead character hides under a bed and spies on a woman undressing, it does not make him a loveable scamp. It makes him a creep. It's a shame he wasn't spying on Starbuck. She would have set him straight.

I quite enjoyed the film, certainly the visual spectacle was well done. I did feel that it was a film that was a bit too transparently targeted at the teen/young men demographic. Lots of explosions, fast action, somewhat cardboard characterisation and character motivation. I found the Kirk/Spock chasing the same girl plot, and the Kirk trying deal with dead daddy issues plot frankly tedious. My main beef was the absence of women, which was either unconscious or an active decision to be true to the original series. There were three women in the film. One is there as the mother to a lead character, one is there in her underwear to be rooted, and one is there for two lead characters to attempt to root (she strips to her underwear as well). And that was it. Great stuff.
That said, Scotty was well done. He was played as a David Tennant style Doctor Who, with a bit of wit and panache.