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Browsing category: Uncategorized

  • January 8, 2010

    Eeek!

    As great as this week was, it didn’t come cheap! We’re over a hundred dollars in the red, which means some tightening up for the rest of the month. (Didn’t help that we already went over during Christmas, thanks to a last minute present and work lunches for T). As a first step towards making up for it, I’ve cancelled two secret shopper assignments – both with no payment, just reimbursement for a purchase I really don’t need and would have to spend over the alloted amount for at least one of them.

    Let’s add up the damages:
    $90 plus on food alone (waiting for a couple charges to clear)
    $17 on mask and snorkel hire for me (we borrowed most of the gear from a friend)
    And we stopped in at the honey centre, where we bought a $3.95 jar (but wow, SO much fresher and cheaper than the supermarket stuff!)

    Plus of course the $153 hotel, plus $10 parking… and $123 on groceries.

  • January 5, 2010

    First time snorkeller: lessons learned

    Lesson 1: For the love of God, wear a wetsuit. If you’re in some balmy tropical waters, I’m sure you’ll be fine, but in the freezing Goat Island water you won’t last long. Flippers are also your friend. For those scared shitless of going over their heads, who freak out when they can’t touch the bottom – well, fins paired with suits are floaty, powerful LIFESAVERS.

    Lesson 2: Put your wetsuit on BEFORE you get anywhere near the beach. You know how sand starts to stick to you the minute you even get within eyesight of it? Try putting on a wetsuit when you’re covered in sand. Not recommended: rashes suck. As does material chafing on eczema, but it’s worth it.

    Lesson 3: Wear the most robust swimsuit you own. I’m, shall we say, prone to bikini exposal accidents. This time, I managed to almost entirely lose my top under the wetsuit.

    Lesson 4: Breathe slowly. NOT like you’re gasping for your last breath.

    Lesson 5: Vision corrected masks are the shiz.

    Lesson 6: Before bringing younger brothers along, find out if they’re afraid of fish. That being said, T was incredibly patient and did his best to coax him out. In fact, once he got geared up and started paddling along, he was fine – until the first fish sighting.

    Lesson 7: Other than that, there is nothing cooler than seeing rocks, plants and fish up close underwater. It was by far one of the freaking coolest things I’ve ever done.

    PS: No, snorkelling was not an experience on my travel list, and yes, I added it merely to cross it off again.

  • January 4, 2010

    A delicate question

    I have a question to put forth to all you females.

    I don’t grow a lot of hair (this is true of my head, and the rest of me) and it’s thin and sparse. I actually use T’s castoff safety razor, which he says go blunt after he uses them once or twice, and it suits me fine as I only do my arms a few times a week and my legs a lot less often.

    I’ve never tried waxing, or in fact anything else in that department.

    So, just what do you do for hair removal, and especially in, shall we say, other body areas?

  • January 4, 2010

    New Year’s recap

    I’m proud to say that I’ve already ticked one of the items off my travel list, by staying in a spa room at the Duxton! Granted, this was on New Year’s Day – T was offered a last minute job doing security at Matakana Dub Conspiracy which was too good to pass up – so we celebrated the next day. A little extravagant, for sure, but he wanted to do something nice after working something like 15 hours straight. He’s been snowballing everything towards his car loan (which by my calculations should be down to $700ish – can’t wait for the next statement!) and the plan is to put the remainder after paying for the hotel towards that too.

    Like a true bargain hunter, I searched a bunch of last-minute hotel deal sites and ended up  booking through ratestogo.co.nz and earned $3 towards my next booking.

    But I’m starting to think that hotels never actually pay any attention to the deals advertised on second party sites. For example, when we stayed at SkyCity during Easter, our chocolate eggs weren’t in the room (part of the package) and we had to call down to get them. Neither was the PS2, but we couldn’t be bothered chasing that up. This time we were supposed to have two free house drinks waiting for us, but guess what, they weren’t. I’m not a big drinker though, and figured the odds of them being anything I’d actually want to drink were too low to bother with the hassle.

    The room was AMAZING – everything we wanted and more. You can bet we made the most of the spa!

    Blissful spa bath with jets

    Blissful spa bath with equally blissful jets

    No, it's not a freaky blue sex toy, it's a back massager

    No, it's not a freaky blue sex toy, it's a back massager

    Looking down on the outdoor pool....

    More of the view from our balcony

    But seeing as it was kind of a last minute decision to stay here, it was a mission trying to find a place to go for dinner – so many places were closed, and we didn’t want to go somewhere where they’d be charging 15% holiday surcharge. Eventually  we settled on Chinese (one of the worst I’ve ever had :S) and settled in with Sky Movies. (Australia – ridiculously long winded. I Am Legend – heartwarming, yet heartbreaking. Caught the end of the creepy Vinyan, which looked terrible. ) And finally, the next day we had a picnic breakfast at Rocket Park where we fed pigeons and marvelled at how the sparrows deftly outsmarted them every. single. time. Yep, easily amused – that’s us.

  • January 2, 2010

    2010 goals

    So it’s officially a brand new year. Who can believe it? I hope everyone had a wonderfully relaxing holiday and that 2010 is bigger, better and brighter than 2009 for you.

    I found it really great having a list of set goals last year, which I could come back to on the blog and update/mark off as I accomplished things. So I’m doing the same thing again, setting both financial and personal targets. I honestly believe that goal setting enables you to move in the right direction, otherwise, I would never step back to reevaluate what I want and how to get it. And what better way to stay accountable than by making them public?

    GOALS

    • Save 20 per cent of my income
    • Try one new (to me) dinner recipe each week. That’s going to require some organisation, so the idea is to draft up a meal plan in the middle of the week before hitting the supermarket on the weekend.
    • Run once a week. Right now, the only exercise I get is walking to/from the bus twice a day, and any walking around I might do on a lunch break.
    • Make an upwards career move.
    • Celebrate our anniversary – it usually gets overlooked in the pre-Christmas week. I also want to try and exchange gifts on all special occasions (he likes to both give and receive actual presents, as opposed to, say, me paying for his car audio to be installed).
    • Donate to charity. Sure, it defies all SMART goal setting, but I don’t feel I can put a set dollar amount on this. Rather, I’ll give what I can when I can, and to whoever or whatever charity I decide on at the time. Whether I’m giving time, money, or food to a foodbank – something I think I prefer, since I know that it’s all going towards someone who needs it, rather than admin costs or the like – I get a) the warm fuzzies from doing so and b) I believe in karma.
  • December 29, 2009

    December roundup

    I’m definitely liking my bank’s tracking tool – it’s so easy just to go through and categorise transactions a couple of times a week, and it’s in colour! (Yes, I am stuck somewhere in prepubescence, with an attraction to bright colours, shiny things and sugary treats.) At a quick glance, I think our fixed expenses are in good shape, but a couple of other areas look out of whack, namely:

    Dining and bars – ridiculously high this month. It did include around $80 worth of (reimbursable) mystery shops, brunch with the girls, graduation drinks/dinner and a couple of meals T bought while travelling back from Christchurch for work. Still, all those small purchases and weekend breakfasts and the bakery are obviously adding up. At the same time, we tend to spend fun money on food and eating, hence our fairly small entertainment category.

    Clothes and grooming included my haircut, boring things like socks and sunblock, a cardigan for me and a new shirt and board shorts for T (both sorely needed). Plus a reimbursable $50 or so on beauty products (I’m starting to think I should just exclude these from categorisation!)

    Utilities, almost half of that being T’s new phone (my present to him). Other than that, it’s not too bad considering this covers phone, internet, power and cellphone charges.

    Which brings me to my January resolution: Be more aware of food spending! If we’re going to spend that much on food, it might as well be on excellent food rather than Chinese from the takeaway. I’ve been wanting to try out an Italian restaurant, for example (apart from Gina‘s). I also haven’t been to yum cha in a very long time, and I miss it!

  • December 27, 2009

    Christmas randomness

    Our gifts for our families – not quite what I envisioned, but then again my great ideas never quite work out (hark back to high school Graphics…) My baking FAIL = less baked goodies than I’d planned for.

    My present for T? A new phone. He lost his last week – believe me when I say he has a terrible track record with cellphones. He’s lost two out the window of a moving vehicle (bounce, crash, explode), left one on the top of a car (he either then walked away or the car drove off, I can’t remember). One broke after he threw it across the garden and I’m sure he’s also just had a couple die on him from age or hard living. We’ve established this one has to last him two years or it’s the cheapest, most basic POS for him until then.

    So he wasn’t thrilled at his gift being a replacement phone, but c’est la vie. He definitely believes in gifts being fun, and something you wouldn’t get yourself, or being something you want, not need. (Me? I’d be THRILLED to get something that I need but don’t have the cash for. Eg, new boots, a microwave, etc). But he insisted that his present for me had to be something special and indulgent. Along the way, peeking into the displays at fancy jewellery stores, I remembered that I really wanted a charm bracelet, and what better time to look for one? And because we did our shopping for each other on Boxing Day, we hit the sales – 50% off silver in Pascoes, no less.

    And other randomness

    Playing with my auntie's newest family member - Curler the bichon frise

    Alongside the usual pavlova and strawberries - homemade fruit tarts!

    Christmas dinner with friends after the family lunch - ham, salmon, potatoes, salad and trifle!

  • December 24, 2009

    I just wanted normal skin

    I’ve been cursed with oily skin for as long as I remember – or at least since the onset of puberty. Once I realised just what a grease pit my face looked like during the day, I got intimately acquainted with oil-absorbing sheets and foundations to control the slick. (The Maybelline makeup worked well, as did the Body Shop blotting sheets. I only ever used the powdered version, although the purple one also looked like a goodie).

    But something changed this year. I’m a lot dryer, a lot flakier, and even itchy at times. It’s so uncomfortable, I actually kinda miss my old skin.

    Result: new routine. I’m focusing on moisturising, rather than mattifying. I carry a sample size moisturiser around with me everywhere, have given up on mud masks, and worst of all, the permanent pinkness in my cheeks is spreading across my face. Now I’m slathering on Vitamin E cream at night, a rich Nivea with SPF by day, even the aqeuous cream I use for eczema in spots. I’m contemplating trying Bio Oil as a moisturiser next.

    Of course, I still have really reflective skin, so most of my face still LOOKS oily sans makeup anyway. I just can’t win 😛

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