What do you think of your children?

I used a blog topic generator to come up with today’s topic, because I don’t feel like writing the “Amazing men and their overwhelming desire to marry revolting women” blog (I’ll write it one day, promise).

And the topic: “What do you think of your children?”

Woah.

Ok, generator. You suggested it, so I’ll write about it.

My extended families (both paternal and maternal) are huge. My sister and I have hundreds of cousins (first, second, third, etc) in every direction. A real sense of family was instilled in us from a young age, so it made sense that I was “Aunty” to her dolls and teddy bears, and she “Aunty” to mine.

As we got older, the title of Aunty extended to living things – guppies (they were ALL called Larry because (a) they all looked the same and (b) they all swum around the tank “happy as Larry”), goldfish (Fisher & Paykel), cats (Friesian, Fluffy, All Black & Wallaby), a goat (Bartley) and a horse (Tootsie).

So, once an Aunty, always an Aunty, right? At this exact moment in time, my sister and I each have one child. She has a wonderful daughter Foxglove* aged 5 ½ and I have a son, Edelweis.

“Edelweis, isn’t that the name of your cat?” I hear you say? Yes.

Just because my son is a quadruped, is covered in fur and purrs when happy doesn’t mean I love him any less than I would a human.

He is the love of my life. When I’m at work, driving around town, flying around the country, in fact, anywhere except for home, his dear little face pops into my mind. And when I think of him, I smile and get that warm, contented, excruciatingly happy feeling that can only be described as love.

Back to the generator question…what do I think of him? Well, I think he’s witty, silly, loyal and incredibly photogenic. Occasionally I think he’s a grumpy little so and so.

It makes me proud when he patiently puts up with children patting him and tugging at his fur. It makes me extra proud when greets each visitor to our home. I love that he always answers a question and believes that his tail is a separate entity to the rest of him.

I love that he trusts me so wholeheartedly that he can fall into a deep sleep with all four legs in the air. And I adore that he is a stickler for routines. 

Most of all, I love that he is my son, and that the Universe meant for us to be together.

Well played Universe, well played.

*Not her real name

"Meet Me" - The blogger behind this blog

My blogging idol and dear twitter friend @loveyourcake had a brainwave, and that was to encourage other bloggers to do a post called "Meet Me". Here's Cakey's Meet Me blog: http://bit.ly/vc3Gf8

Accordingly, here's a little glimpse into my "real" life.

Let's see, I might start with stuff you've already garnered from previous blog posts:

• I'm a New Zealander, but lived in Australia for 7 wonderful years
• I am the smothering mother of one extraordinary fluffy white cat who is the absolute love of my life
• I love public speaking, Princess Diana and Instagram
• I was at a brothel on the day of 9/11
• I've been on a date with Tom Cruise
• And, I can't sleep with one foot hanging over the edge of the bed for fear of the crocodile who lives under the bed eating my foot during the night. I even tried last night, and lasted about 5 seconds before I had to retrieve my foot from certain doom

Now that you can see that I am completely sane, I'll present you with some pictures of my life.

I have a Velma Dinkley fetish,
and go out dressed up as her about twice a year.

Grauman's Chinese Theatre, Hollywood - My right hand is
EXACTLY the same size as Marilyn Monroes!

My other alter-ego is "Sista Mary Speights" and often I can be found out on the town in a full habit. This picture was taken last month on a temporary ice rink brought into the city during the Rugby World Cup.

My adorable cat LOVES going for walks on his lead. He chooses where we go, and I just follow along (sometimes at pace if he's cantering in order to feel the breeze flowing through his whiskers).

Grandma's piano at my place. My most beloved possessions sit on top of it. I don't play as often as I should. I must remedy that soon.

I took up Tap Dancing several years ago, as I didn't learn to tap as a child. This is me treading the boards last week as a haggard housewife (middle of picture, holding a black cat) in the dance school's end of year recital.

So, there you have it...a photographic insight into the real me (a costume-loving, tap-dancing, crazy cat lady whose right hand is exactly the same size as Marilyn Monroes and who doesn't play the piano as often as she should).

PS. My right hand slid into Marilyn's hand print as though I'd made it myself. My left hand didn't fit as well in her hand print, but I can't remember if mine was smaller or larger than hers. I'll have to pop back to Hollywood to find out, I guess.

Tweet Number Twenty-thousand!

This blog marks my 20,000th tweet. And, this milestone will be beyond my mother's comprehension...I can hear her saying "Twenty thousand? What on earth do you twit about" (yes, "twit", not tweet. Remember, we are talking about the woman who rings me every so often to ask me how to twink (white-out) things off her computer screen).

Anyway, back to No.20,000. I thought what better way to celebrate it than mention a few of the tweeps who've made my twitter experience so enjoyable.

Feel free to follow some or all of this unruly lot, they're all gems in their own right.

@mattymcleanTVNZ - Matty and I met during a fundraising event I managed a couple of years ago. He was my guest speaker and had the crowd in stitches. Matty was my first "celeb" friend on twitter, and incidentally it was he who I was tweeting on 22 February 2011 when #eqnz turned our world upside down.

@HauteOnMyHeels - In the olden days (as in twelve months ago), the home page of twitter would show trending tweets. I saw one of Haute's and died laughing, so decided to follow her which then lead to me discovering...

@LoveYourCake - Cakey! My beloved Cakey who gave me my first twitter nickname "Writey". How cute is that?! Cakey was the first person to DM me that I didn't know. And I FREAKED OUT. She said she loved my twitter profile and just wanted to say it was the best one she'd ever read. I didn't know how to respond. Was she chatting me up? Was she making a move? What the hell was going on? I gingerly responded and since then have even talked to her on the phone during a tweet-up at her place.

If you follow Haute or Cakey you immediately get wrapped up in this funny little place called Vancouver. And their ice-hockey team the Canucks. And a national delicacy called "poutine" (from what I can gather, its fries covered in gravy and cheese curds). I'm still not convinced that its yummy though...curds? It sounds like regurgitated stomach lining to me. Your Vancouver experience won't be the same unless you also follow @BretInVancouver @VancityAmy @kixy_stabbs @LindsayDianne @TheFalconer @suitoflights @hurrrdurrr @SSDated @cicychan @MetalBlonde @schneidz @CeciBruja @causticchick @korvan @g_bugg @Babe_Chilla @geoffgauthier @WinnieIsAwesome @TessTattles @PirateMeghan @SarahSpizzie @teapleeze and honorary BC-er @MattyDorf - there are heaps of them. If twitter had an award for the most tweety-ish city, it would HAVE to go to Vancouver. My apologies for any of the regulars I've left out. I will keep amending this list.

@TiffanytheTaxi - I met this Sydneysider on the night of Wills and Kate tying the knot. She was also using the hashtag #RW2011 and we got chatting. I've mentioned her in this blog before and can't wait to meet up with her irl. Thanks to Tiff, I'm going to take up crocheting!

@LABeachmom and @phxguy88 - I can't remember how these two wriggled their way into my timeline, but oh my god...you have to follow this gorgeous, platonic, sweet friendship. Someone HAS to make a movie about them! Both are hilarious, and one is always pulling the other up by the bootstrings in a flirty, fun-loving way. I can't explain it. Just follow them, will ya? PS: We're talking MAJOR eye-candy here too folks. Sweet, all round, I promise.

@VaginaDesigner - Another tweep I found out about via the social butterfly Haute. The poor thing gets to flossy up women's nether regions by way of waxing and vajazzling. Can't say I'd be brave enough to do that, but on behalf of all the husbands, boyfriends and partners of your clients in Los Angeles, THANK YOU for going there! And when we grow up, Jen and I are going to live in the same town and go everywhere in costume. Her costume fetish equals mine! Unheard of, I know.

@kyleipryor - I've often referred to Kyle as "the nicest guy on twitter" and I stand by those words. Apparently if you're into Spartacus, he's kind of a big deal, but I've never watched it/that...what is it, a movie, a series, what? I've challenged KP to an arm wrestle which will be moderated by the equally lovely @5hameless (one of my local tweeps and go-to guy when I'm having iPhone issues). I'm pretty sure that KP is shaking in his boots at the thought of my guns taking down his in the upcoming arm wrestle. And oh yeah, KP and I are getting married in January. Damn, I forgot about that. Don't tell him I forgot, ok? And best of all, KP is often on set when "Embarassing Teenage Bodies" airs, so he watches it a few days later after we've all recovered. Seriously funny.

@thornybleeder - Move over Bryan Adams and Justin Bieber, I've found a real Canadian muso on twitter. He trawls the net all day and night so that you don't have to, and instead you can focus on your music, social media or whatever career while he sorts out the good from the bad. And, once you're aware of him, you soon realise that he is everywhere - twitter, facebook, various websites, instagram, even your email inbox if you sign up to his DIY Daily newsletter. And if he's at none of those places, well, he's probably at Kitsilano Beach in Vancouver where he and his gorgeous dogdaughter Koda check out their mayoral realm twice a day. Warning: Just when you think you've never met anyone cooler, he might tweet something out of character. Definitely cool 99.99999% of the time. If he has a rare out of character moment, just gently ask him to LISTEN TO SOME SEPULTURA FORTHWITH!

@Hilary_Barry and @MrMikeMcRoberts - For those outside New Zealand, these two read the 6pm news AND TWEET LIVE DURING THE BROADCAST! It's fantastic! Quite often they'll mention twitter at the end of the show (go us!). Best of all, they let us know what the upcoming stories are before they tell the rest of NZ. Awesome. Talk about being in the know. For a news junkie like myself, it's heaven on earth...well, heaven in the twitterverse. Mike gets extra points from me because he married one of the cool girls from a few years ahead of me at highschool @paulapenfold. FYI, I WAS the coolest of cool in my year at highschool, thank you very much.

@perstephanie_ - An absolute sweetheart, and I have no idea how I found her. She LOVES that I colour-code my books in my bookshelves. It sounds like her closet is the ultimate in colour and style arrangement though. I'll need a picture of it oneday gf!

@Mammy_P - introduced to me by @BretInVancouver who we refer to as BIVVER. Somehow, I got the nickname VIVVER and she's PIVVER. Regardless of all the ivvering, she is exceptionally kind and funny, and because shes in the UK, I can usually rely on her being online when I'm going through a bout of #insomniargh in NZ.

And finally, some of my own personal highlights on twitter:

1. @DavidHasselhoff follows me. Why, I have no idea. Am I stoked? HELL YES!

2. @LA_Reid tweeted me last week, which in turn made my dear little twitter profile trend in NZ. WTF? OMG!

3. #smcHam or #smcTron - My local tweeps are the best bunch one could wish for (outside of Vancouver). Although I don't always get to the tweet-ups, they're supportive, fun and some of them are verging on new BFF tag. Ok you lot, I said "verging", not that you had made it...yet. Plus, they make 4square heaps more competitive. The local 4square battles are full-on, hard out wars. Suck it down, all the cool mayoralties around town will be MINE!

4. The various friendships I've formed from following or using these hashtags: #RHOBH, #OW, #TBLFAS, #NZNTM, #ANTM, #BFGW, #GoGirls, #amwriting and #EQNZ amongst others. Oh, I better give a shout out to all the cat-lovers and the insomniacs too. Argh, too many people to mention! But here are some of my favourite gfs: @amandimoo @L_To @kathadu @WendyWings @jstcamel @bexielady @aimewee @hello_im_megan @jinnee79 @brenasmith @PaMelville @feefeebofaye @Chandy229 @muffinmum @meegandale83. Again, I'll amend this list.

Seriously, a big thank you to EVERYONE that I interact with on a daily basis on twitter. Your humour, your compassion and your odd ways of looking at life all make the twitterverse the completely sane / crazy place that it is.

Cheers
Writey x

Roo-muh-neyt-lahy-tis

"Its best not to let her ruminate".

I suffer from chronic ruminatelitis (I also suffer from makingwordsupitis).  If I'm not busy, I begin to ponder, and when I ponder I get depressed, and when I get depressed, yada yada.

I'm on the verge of another episode of ruminatelitis because in the last month I've completed my latest qualification and as of last week, my tap lessons have finished for 2011.

Essentially, this means that I've freed up about an extra 15-20 hours per week.  I'm sure some of you would be stoked with the extra time, but it doesn't work like that for me.  

Extra time = more time to ponder = ruminatelitis

I still work 40 hours a week at my real job and "Write On" takes up a good 30+ hours a week.  Sessions with my PT and my own training take up approximately 7 hours per week. 

Ooh, oh...lets do some maths:

Real Job  40 hours
Write On  30 hours
Gym          7 hours
Sleep       49 hours (if I'm lucky, that another blog in itself)
Living       25 hours (housework, groceries, visiting friends)
TOTAL   151 hours that I'm doing stuff

Which means I have 17 free hours, 17 hours to ruminate.

This is not a good thing.

I need to fix this.

ASAP.

I don't want to sit in a pub or restaurant and get drunk. 

Unfortunately I can't do any further study at the moment because there weren't any tempting summer school courses. 

What. To. Do. ?

All suggestions appreciated. 


 

Some Facts About Me

For those of you who don't partake in twitter, there's often a trend going on.  The current one is #SomeFactsAboutMe.  I've had to censor myself heavily (and resist tweeting a lot of interesting facts) because of my desire to keep my public twitter profile reasonably goody two-shoes-ish.  But I do have one absolutely extraordinary fact that is always a good one to drag out at parties or when meeting people for the first time.  The details of the fact are too long to tweet in 140 characters.  So, here it goes.  A fact about moi.


I have been on a date with Tom Cruise. Yes, THE Tom Cruise.  The couch-jumping, Scientology-following, Hollywood superstar Tom Cruise.  Yes, little old me, originally from Te Anau, Fiordland, New Zealand.


Eleven years has now passed, but out of respect for the people involved in the story, I've decided to leave out some names and details which could identify them. 


Firstly, I have to start by saying that my life in Sydney was very different to the one I lead now.  There are some aspects of it that I miss, but all in all, I got to the stage where "I'd been there, done that, got the postcard" and it was time to move on.  Cue a return to Godzone and a far simpler, slower lifestyle. Enough said.


I had the amazing fortune of sharing Tom Cruise's best friend in Sydney.  I met the mutual best friend through my job, and eventually left that job to work for the mutual best friend.  Tom and Nicole spent a lot of time in Sydney, maybe even more than people knew, primarily because Sydney was Nicole's home town, and also due to both Mission Impossible II and Moulin Rouge being filmed there.

The back story: For the sake of this blog, we'll call my then boyfriend..."Dick".  Dick was actually quite a twat, but I was mesmerised by the boat(s), car(s), the private jetty at the bottom of the garden, the wealth, blah blah.  He had the most incredible wardrobe...in fact, his whole spare room was full of racks of fantastic clothes.  He dressed really well and had the height and physique to always look great. 


Dick is the one that introduced me to Veuve Cliquot.  Every Sunday we'd jump in one of his boats, sail over to the Sydney Fish Markets, buy Lobster, go home, he'd cook it up and we'd drink a bottle or two of Veuve.  Yes, as I said earlier, my life was incredibly different back then.  Dick never wanted to hang with my friends, instead we either hung with his friends or stayed in.  Yup, a warning sign which I chose to ignore.


Anyway, Dick was supposed to attend the mutual best friend's birthday party with me.  On the day of the party, two awful things happened to Dick.  His little brother walked in on an armed hold-up in a petrol station in outer Sydney (but escaped unscathed) and Dick's Grandfather died (he had been ill for quite some time).  I couldn't get hold of Dick on the phone, so drove over to his place so we could catch a cab together to the party. 


I knocked on the door.  Dick opened it and was standing there looking like, well, an absolute dick, to tell you the truth. He was wearing the most hideous ensemble from his spare room.  I'd never seen any of the items he had on.  It was a complete mismatch and for a moment I thought he'd gone insane because he was always impeccably dressed.  He burst into tears and said "...(little brother story, Grandfather story)...I don't know what to wear to meet Tom Cruise...I don't want to go to the party...no-one will talk to me...I'll have a bad time...lets just stay at my place and watch a movie...please stay here with me...etc, etc". 


Uh, hello Dick.  Stay in with you AGAIN, or go to my best friend's birthday party which was also going to be attended by TC?  I was annoyed that he hadn't rung me or returned my calls, and for once I thought nah, I'm going to do what I want to do, not what Dick wants me to do.


I leapt in my car and drove towards the mutual best friend's house where the party was being held.  All of a sudden, I felt like the loneliest person in the world.  Dick (again) had chosen not do something with my friends, and I was going to turn up alone.  I started crying.  I rang the mutual best friend and told him what had happened.  He told me to forget about Dick, to get my ass to his place pronto, and that his party would suck if I wasn't there.  The mutual best friend was so wonderful during that phone-call that I then knew that I couldn't miss the celebration.  Bro's before ho's, right?


Tom had gone to the party on his Harley, and the paparazzi had followed him there.  I saw the photog's milling around the front of the property, so parked a little way up the street, wiped off the runny mascara, applied some makeup and went in.


I walked into the living room and then completely unexpectedly this happened:


Tom Cruise, my teenage crush, one of the greatest Hollywood stars ever, stood up and walked over to me.  He reached for my hand and said "Hi.  I'm Tom.  You must be Yvonne.  I'm here without a date, and I understand that you are too.  I was wondering if you'd be my date for the evening". OH MY GOD. OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG.  The mutual best friend had obviously told him what had happened with Dick, and here was this superstar, who I'd never met, doing his part to cheer me up.


I accepted his offer, and he proceeded to sit me down and then bring me a drink.  Tom was amazing.


He was attentive, kind, interesting, completely down to earth and hilarious.  The two conversation topics that stand out the most in my memory were about (1) cheeseburgers - he couldn't believe that we put egg and beetroot in Kiwi burgers, and (2) worm-farming.  Yes, worm-farming. 


He never mentioned religion.  We didn't talk about anything Hollywood-related.  He wanted to know about me, my life, interests, etc.  Tom was a complete gentleman.  Nicole was in Romania filming "The Others", which is why he was there alone.  She rang during the party and was thrilled that he had a date for the evening. Bless.  She is a sweetheart.


Now, not that this is one of my drinking stories, but those who know me and who've seen me in the vicinity of a piano when drinking, know that I like to tickle the ivories when under the influence.  The mutual best friend had a piano in the living room.  I was full to the brim with Cosmopolitans.  The piano beckoned.  I played.


The party literally became a repeat of that scene from Top Gun.  Tom shared the piano stool with me and everyone else gathered around and sang as I thumped away on the piano.  He was Maverick and I was Goose.  Together, we rocked!

Obviously, there is way more to the story, but I'm running out of time, and again, out of respect for some people, I've decided to withhold some of the details.  Lets just say, it was one of the most amazing birthday parties I've ever attended. 


Anyway, there you have it, my friends.  The Readers Digest version of the night when I went on a date with Tom Cruise.


And Dick?  We parted company, eventually.