Update from the past few weeks

Well, where have I been?!! Mostly too busy to post! I spent a week down in NSW helping my Mum who'd broken her arm falling over a few weeks earlier. I was there to help out for her first week home from hospital. With a broken arm she can't drive, and there's so many simple things that we take for granted that are either impossible, or hard, or you have to find new ways of doing! Luckily she was able to get community services help of one hour a day during the week. She gets the house cleaned, gets taken shopping, help with hanging out the washing, etc etc. Luckily she has a big network of friends who are constantly dropping in with food or for a chat, to take her or the dog out for a walk, etc etc.

Only managed a couple of yoga practices in that week, but since I got back things have been going well. I can actually see the results of putting in extra time/effort, which is pretty pleasing! I'm still mostly looking at consolidating my practice before I go to Bali. I know that I am unlikely to be able to practice some of the poses that I do at the Brisbane shala, as they have a different view on skipping poses to what I imagine Dena Kingsberg has! But that's OK - I'm happy to learn and improve wherever. (Although I do plan to keep doing certain poses in Bali in the privacy of my room, just so I don't completely lose them!!)

And I've booked my ticket to Portugal (going to stay with my friend Wendi), and most excitingly, she has booked tickets for us to go to Marrakesh (Morocco) for 3 days! Flying from Seville ... Oh it's going to be so great! That's kind of at the end of my time in the UK, so I've now got a great 10 days in Bali at the beginning, a great 3 weeks (only 3 weeks?, help!!) in London and the UK visiting family and friends, and then 8 days in Portugal and Marrakesh towards the end!

Happy sighs ... :)

snakes and health!

Saw my doctor at the hospital today before I had the monthly immunoglobulin infusion (IV-IG). He said everything was fine (which is what I feel!) Don't know what my blood counts were - they hadn't come through by the time I left.

As I've said before, I feel really healthy and strong at the moment.  I'm feeling my strength is increasing, generally and particularly in yoga. I have to enjoy it while it lasts ... Not being negative, but mostly I think most people aren't aware how important good health is until you get ill for more than a few days. It just colours your entire day if you're feeling even a bit off every day. So it's just GREAT to be feeling healthy and strong!!

 I ended up coming home and not going to work after the hospital - everything got so delayed I would have only been going to work for an hour! I was just sitting having a cup of tea in the late afternoon as it was getting dark when I glanced out the window to admire the new verandah balcony that was put in last week (still unpainted).  I realised I was staring at an odd shape twined around the railing. It was this really BIG snake - python really! I've never seen one as big as that here. Here is a (not very good) photo!

It would have to have been nearly 2m long!! Pity it was too dark to take a really nice photo (my camera was set on auto, and kept using a flash! Couldn't remember how to turn it off!) Anyway, last seen disappearing down the railings and over the edge of the decking to the ground below (this verandah is one level up from the ground).

Having a real yoga weekend this weekend. As well as my normal yoga class on Saturday afternoon, my friend Helen and I are going to do yoga together on Sunday morning! We haven't decided whose place yet ... :) And after that I think I'm heading up to some other friends (who live up a very rough track up a mountain!) to show off the new iPad and give her a go at my Airport Express (Apple product for wireless). They have a satellite internet connection that doesn't use a modem but a special phone, so I'm just not clear if they have the right type of connection on the phone to plug the Airport Express into (a usb connection). We shall see ...

Twitter and Masterchef

There's this hugely popular reality cooking show called Masterchef on in Australia at the moment. It's on 6 nights a week, with people cooking off against each other and against celebrity chefs. I have been totally sucked in this season ... All part of my renewed interest in cooking! And now I've discovered another level to it - watching it and twittering about it at the same time! It's got a huge following here. 100+ tweets in 3-4 minutes! Mostly commenting on the dish being cooked, certain contestants that people like (or don't like), the hosts and celebrity chefs! It is pretty amusing as long as you don't get too caught up in the Twitter stream, and forget to watch the cooking!

Apart from that I do believe I'm finally getting rid of the current coughing episode ... Thank goodness! I'm certainly feeling so much better, and without any assistance from antibiotics! I've been noticing I'm feeling physically stronger too. Hopefully this will roll over into my yoga practice.

Went to Sydney last weekend for my brother-in-law's birthday celebrations. A very nice evening, although the Chatswood house was utterly freezing!

Travels to (and from) Sydney - and beyond!

Heading down to Sydney again this weekend - just for one night. My brother-in-law John is having a big birthday on Saturday night. It'll be a lovely evening I'm sure - being held at his mother's place which is the same place as where Jo and Emma got married.

Apart from going back down to Sydney for tax purposes in August, I am now also having to fly out to Bali (via Thailand) from Sydney. The airline has changed its schedule since I booked, and if I wanted to fly out of Brisbane I'd have to leave a day later (which = one day less in Bali!) I seem to be doing a lot of backtracking in the first part of my trip!. I fly south to Sydney so I can fly north to Thailand, from where I will fly south again to Bali!! At least this time the flight leaves in the afternoon (as opposed to the middle of the night) and Thai Airways will put me up in a hotel in Bangkok before the flight to Bali. So that's probably a better deal, all in all!

And I'm interviewing the last (hopefully!) couple of potential housesitters in a few days' time, after which I hope to be able to make a firm decision, and tick it off on my list of things to do!

This evening I'm off to the (new normal) Wednesday yoga class, which is good. I haven't done much since last Saturday so I really need it!

Met some old workmates for coffee yesterday ... from the group that were 'restructured' last year (god it seems like much longer than that!) We had a good time being rude about the old place etc. We're all heading off overseas in the next few months. Beth is going to another 'old' co-worker's wedding in Canada next month. Emma is off on a 5 week trip round the States in August ... And then she comes back, and I go!!

And finally, back onto cooking ... on Sunday I made a spinach tart/quiche (again using the rich French pastry recipe taught to me by my Mum) and a tuna pie - both to eat during the week and/or go in the freezer. it's wonderful that you can freeze quiches. One day I'll get it together to take photos like Susan does on her Open Mouth Insert Fork blog. I do enjoy being able to cook on the weekends - there is very little time during the week for culinary exploits!

Posting from the iPad ...

I got an iPad ... My rationale was that it'll be easier (lighter) to carry overseas than my laptop. And if I don't like it I can always sell it afterwards. I'm still getting used to it. I haven't (yet) had an iPhone so I'm not used to this style of typing! Or apps etc. But a workmate who also got one ( sooner than me) assures me that you very quickly get used to typing on it. It must be easier than on an iPhone as the screen space is significantly bigger!

Yoga yesterday afternoon ... Am still trying hard to bind in marychiasana C. Richard has got me putting in 5 breaths in plank in vinyasas (not every one!) to help build up strength. I'd really like to be able to do urdva dhanurasana (wheel?) but have never had the strength to push myself up. Yet!!

Healthwise things aren't too bad! I'm coughing again now I'm off antibiotics but, fingers crossed I haven't been feeling sick or anything. See the coughing doctor in a week and will see what he thinks.

Celebrations

Been a busy few days ... Had the big birthday long weekend for Mum down in Sydney and Bowral, which went very well. Lunch in a Sydney club, drinks with various different friends, then a big family lunch on Sunday at a very nice restaurant in Berrima. It was a very nice few days, and no one got too tired or anything!

I did give in and go back onto antibiotics on Thursday evening ... I don't like doing it, and I do know the danger of over-using them, but in the end I didn't feel I could get through the weekend without them! Thanks to them I am now of course feeling fine (just a little bit of a cough) and intend to make the most of the few days more I am on them before the downhill slide starts again! I did manage to make another appointment to see the chest physician in 3 weeks (not the 3 months I had to wait last time!) and I will stamp my foot and just demand that he find something to do! Even if it's another antibiotic that I can take for a long(er) time ...

And hooray - I'm going to yoga class this evening! Last Wednesday I was feeling too rotten to go, and of course I was away in NSW on the Saturday.

health and yoga (what else!)

Well, I've been feeling a bit off since last Friday. Mostly it's to do with the coughing (bronchiectasis). It was so bad on Saturday that I didn't end up going to yoga - had to give myself permission not to beat myself up about that! But I have been feeling gradually better since then (though still not 100%), and so will go to yoga this evening. I did a few stretches/hip-openers at lunchtime today, as it's been a few days since I did any yoga (last Friday to be precise!)

To be honest, I've had to push myself a bit today to commit to going, but I have reminded myself that I do want to strengthen/move my yoga practice along in the months leading up to Bali. And one of the ways I am/was intending to do this was by trying to go to class twice a week. As I'm not singing in the choir for the next few months, I have Wednesday evenings free and that's good as it's really the only evening during the week that I can go timing-wise.

Apart from that I'm gradually ticking things off on the list of things to do before the big trip. I've organised to stay in Bali at the same place as the workshop for the 3 nights I'll be there before it starts. I had thought I'd go and stay somewhere else cheaper and then move in when the workshop starts. But really, I haven't been to Bali or Ubud before, so I don't know it at all. And it will probably be 5pm or later by the time I arrive there, so I've taken the easy (but more expensive!) option. And I've also put an ad for housesitters into a web-based housesitting place, and a couple are coming this Sunday to meet me (and hopefully Jedda!) and see if we all like each other. I've 'short-listed' another couple of applicants as well, and hopefully this can be firmed up soon.

I've also decided I'm going to post recipes etc. here sometimes. I made a really lovely cauliflower soup on the weekend (Jane Grigson recipe from someone else) and I will post that later on (I'm at work now).

And here's cute but somewhat disturbing cat photo from Flickr ... I cannot feel that this ended well for the wee mouse!