Wednesday, September 29, 2010

Seal of Approval

A disoriented New Zealand Fur Seal has been having a little holiday on the Gold Coast, hanging out in Tallebudgera Creek...

see here

I can just imagine the poor little blighter, peering over at all the holidaying school kids and soccer-mum paparazzi assembled, thinking to himself...

"What?! I can't have a holiday on the Gold Coast like every other Kiwi??"

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Sunday, September 19, 2010

Second time's the charm.

Okay, calm down, calm down everyone, I know you're all excited to hear from me after so long, but let's maintain order, orright? You there, stop screeching...  that's better. And you lot - stop letting off those fireworks, you hear? It's just little old me, no need to get so excited... jeesh!!!

Okay, we all good? Back in your seats? Okay then...

So as you might have noticed, I have indeed been absent from this blog for a couple of weeks. Stupid irritating little things have been interrupting me and keeping me away - things like trying to find a job, keeping our house running on a shoestring budget, yada, yada, yada....

You may remember when my last job hit a surprise ending and knocked me for six. One of the upshots of that was telling GG I would be spending the next while hanging out with her and watching her little face absolutely light up as she threw herself into me and gave me such a fierce hug I thought she might burst! Since I had been working full-time, I noticed that she had become quite clingy, always (literally) hanging off me when we were home, and not even wanting to stay over at her cousins house - usually a favourite treat. She had also become quite whiny, but that could also have just been a "Hey, I'm three and this is how we three year olds roll" kinda thing...

So fast forward a few weeks, over 40 job applications, seven new grey hairs and a partridge in a pear tree, I find a job. It's a contract for a few months to cover a girl's maternity leave, though it may turn into something more...

It's also full time.

Yep, after the last job eff-up, and then having to turn down a full time job I was offered because the travel time meant I would have to be dropping GG off in the morning before she'd gone to bed the night before (cold meds may lead to slight exaggerations), I had decided to pursue only part-time jobs. Thing is part-time jobs are like hen's teeth, and there are approximately eleventy billion trillion women all wanting to work part-time.

So necessity over-rides good intentions yet again.

I have just finished my first week, and yeah, yeah the job is fine and all that, but more importantly, so it seems is GG!

Me being me, I had worked myself into a lather over the harm I would be inflicting on my poor, innocent child. Me and my selfish materialistic need to pay the bills would mean she would be flung back into a world of abandonment, clinginess, insecurity and wanting to stay up all night just to have my attention. Okay, okay, so my reservations may not have been entirely unselfish concern for my child.

Instead, GG did what she specialises in doing, she surprised me.

When I told GG that I would be going back to work, she was entirely non-fussed. When I prompted her about how she felt about it, she simply replied that, "Well I will still see you ebrey night, right?". I have been
spending the week on tenterhooks, waiting to some sign of her backsliding and... nothin'... she's fine. She's happy, independent, even at the kindy drop off which she's sometimes a bit teary at, she just charges up to the window that overlooks the car park so she can wave goodbye. She has even planned a sleepover for next week!

Maybe those horrible weeks of the first job were just her getting adjusted? Maybe the fact I finish earlier and am picking her up by 5pm and we get that little extra time together makes the difference? Either way, life is good right now and I refuse to sit around looking over my shoulder waiting for "something bad" to happen like I have been lately whenever life is good.  I'm just gonna enjoy it. And maybe send some wishes out to the Universe that the girl I'm replacing only wants to come back part-time and we can job share.

Not too much to ask, is it?

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