Thursday Thirteen #4 - my new car

About my new (2-month-old) car…good and bad in no particular order

1. As it is black, it gets dirty very quickly. My sister warned me about this beforehand.

2. I love that the seat lifts. I knew that when I first got it, but only figured it out about 10 days ago!

3. I like the feel of the indicator lever. I know this is weird but there is a little groove which I play with while driving - quite soothing in the traffic.

4. This car has a temperature gauge - quite a useful tool, if only to corroborate my feelings about how hot/ cold it is.

5. Central locking - love it, love it, love it. One click and everything is locked. Saves me so much time.

6. I love how when I remove the key from the ignition, the doors open automatically.

7. My old car didn't have a side pocket and this one does. Very useful to hold my water bottle. The water bottle in my profile picture is exactly why I chose that picture. I always have a water bottle (and an apple) with me.

8. Power steering. My word - what a difference it makes to parking! Just a flick of the wrist turns that whole car. Before, it was turn, turn and turn some more before the car would turn.

9. This is a neurotic car though. The petrol tank sign starts glowing when there is still 5L of petrol left. I can go to work and back 2 whole days on that. But wait! It then annoyingly starts blinking when it gets right down to the bottom. (My husband would say I shouldn't even know about the blinking light!)

10. And the hooter…is an excuse for a hooter. It is a pathetic little beep-beep.

11. Oh, and the joys of airconditioning. I am only now fully appreciating it as we're at the end of spring going into summer. And it's nice and powerful so I only need it on for a few minutes to last me about 10 minutes.

12. And I love how, when I approach the car and click the button to open the door, the light comes on inside the car. V useful at night so I can see the ignition.

13. And last but not least, it is extremely zippy. I can weave in and out of cars very easily with it. I even feel cooler in it. Now that's got to count for something, does't it?!

Here she is - beautiful!

My husband, the comic

We've been back and forth with 2 friends (married couple) on the email organising our next supper date. We all just reply to all so everyone can see what's going on.

Friend: what can we bring along??

Hubby: Um, roast beef, a lasagne, a salad, rolls, drinks, after-dinner mints. Leigh, have I left anything off? Placemats. No, maybe that's too much. :)

Me: D, you should start a blog!!!

Hubby: "Fullofbolony.blogspot"?

Me: (sent only to him) You can still make me laugh after all these years!

Hubby: Cool. You still make me... well, we'll discuss later

Thursday Thirteen # 3 - doctors and health

1. After I made the appointment with the infertility doctor, I decided to make my annual dental appointment.

2. My doctor is very popular and she's always booked up weeks in advance so I can only see her on the 7th Dec.

3. The minute the appointment was made my top left molars started seriously annoying me. It feels like my tooth is moving because food gets stuck there.

4. For the first time in my life, I can't WAIT to get to the dentist.

5. On a more interesting note, yesterday's visit to the infertility doc. We were early for once and had to fill in so many forms that we were actually on time!

6. First, before they even see you, they make you talk to a counsellor who put us through the 3rd degree but not in a bad way. They check for a history of depression and all sorts of things in case you crack through the emotional trauma.

7. Speaking of which, she made me cry!!! I think it's when she said that we have to get used to "maybe you're not meant to have children". She meant "naturally" but I just heard blah blah not meant to have children blah blah and that was me!

8. Then we went to see the doctor. Nice, gentle man (if a bit too quiet for me – I mean I was doing more talking than he was) who had to quickly do an aspiration (whatever that is) before he could see me.

9. He did an internal sonar (my first – I don't recommend it) which was fine although I have lots of fluid. He thinks it's blood from the endometriosis (gross, I know), but no big deal.

10. Then the fun started. Apparently we have a 2% chance of conceiving naturally because we have both male and female factor infertility. I was devastated by these shocking stats although today I told D that I've always been in that 2% in other areas of life like top of the class, so I will just have to be the 2% that conceives!!!

11. He suggested we go for IVF straight away with ICSI (where they inject the sperm into the egg) – a mere R25000. Hello! At our salaries it will take more than a year to save up R25000 for one treatment cycle!

12. I want D to get a new spermogram because I can't understand how the sperm count can go down from 94 million to 0.8 in 3 months. If the sperm count is okay after this new test, then we'll do AI first, a much more reasonable R1500 a shot. Otherwise, I really don't know.

13. After the meeting with the doctor, I had some blood taken (they are checking my hormone levels) and seeing as I was already invaded with foreign instruments, I had a PAP smear too.

And that's all for today. Amazingly, I am remarkably calm writing this now. Yesterday, I was a wreck. I looked terrible from all the crying!

So, for all you fertile people out there, remember to thank God everyday that you had an easy time falling pregnant. I wouldn't wish this on my worse enemy!

Now I will go cook and bake up a storm – nothing like food to cheer you up!

our own little coffee shop

The other day we were out at the shops somewhere and D wanted to go for coffee.

I really didn't feel like being out anymore so I told him I'd make us "special" coffee at home.

This is the "special" coffee - in a cup just like at the coffee shop!



Now doesn't that look good?

Procrastination

Just this week, two things at work happened that reinforced once again why procrastination is so bad.


1. We instituted a procedure on one of my campaigns that made it necessary for us to set up a procedure document. The process person drafted it and sent it to me saying that she'd like my help making the language plain and simple for our call centre agents to understand.

I'm usually quite good at this type of thing so I don't know why I didn't just do it there and then. Nevertheless, I didn't and for a whole week this thing hung over my head. It was also not urgent just something that has to be done somewhere along the line.

My self-imposed deadline was 1 week so I told myself, come hell or highwater, by the end of Thursday I would give her an amended document.

Well, when I finally sat down to do it, it took me not even 10 minutes to proofread and edit that thing. And it was easy!

2. Buoyed up by my little mini-victory, I decided to tackle a report. This is another something that is not urgent but is a nice-to-have. Now there is nothing more boring to me than sitting and working with numbers. Funny because I'm good at it but I just don't enjoy it. Unless it's sales figures of course. That I love looking at. I think it's the goal-oriented side of me that enjoys the sales figures.

Again, I buckled down and started doing the report and it took me about 20 minutes, including drafting the email to all the powers-that-be.

Only 30 minutes work and yet I procrastinated a whole week!!!

I think next time I don't want to do something I should just remember Flylady and tell myself, I can do anything for 15 minutes!

Thursday Thirteen #2 - Favourite foods

1. Granny Smith apples – I just love that crisp, sour taste and anything with apples (apple pie, cake with apple, stewed apple and custard)
2. Hot wholewheat toast with fridge-cold chunky cottage cheese
3. Toasted cheese and tomato on wholewheat bread
4. Pancakes - my favourite filling is apricot jam with a squeeze of lemon juice.
5. Hot wholewheat toast with avocado, and again, salt and lots of pepper
6. Most curries but my favourite is my mother's chicken lentil curry
7. Fettucine alfredo
8. Thai mussamen curry
9. Almost any muffins
10. Chocolate cake – must be moist
11. Lemon meringue
12. Custard anything – real custard, custard-flavoured yoghurt, custard with hot pudding….
13. Cadbury's chocolate – nothing else, no Belgian, Swiss or anything else but Cadbury. It is "the best loved chocolate in the country"

Now I'm feeling hungry!

Thank goodness for quick-thinking people

I made my first appointment with an infertility specialist for next Wednesday!

(in open-plan office)


Me (whispered): Hi. I'd like to make an appointment with Doctor K.


Receptionist: Is this for your normal check-up or for infertility?


Me: Umm, the second one please


Receptionist: No problem, how about next Wed?


Me: Thanks so much!

Infertility, the disease

Infertility is the most serious disease I've ever had. In fact, it's the only one!

Aside from this, I am quite a healthy person. I exercise, drink lots of water (by choice - water is my favourite drink. Yes, I know I'm a weirdo) and eat healthily except for the 3 days before my period, when I become a raving chocaholic. I've been told this is a lack of magnesium.

Funny how every month I convince myself I'm pregnant so I don't even notice the chocolate binge.

Like today. I woke up, went to the loo and there it was. The Period. Then it all starts falling into place.

Tender breasts = premenstrual, not pregnant

200g chocolate in 3 days = premenstrual, not lack of discipline because it's weekend

Clearly I'm in denial because the doctor said it will never happen naturally. However, I do believe in miracles but at what cost? And who said we'll be given once of those miracles?

When I really allow myself time to think (and most of the time, I think that I keep myself busy to avoid the thoughts), I really start to question everything.

1. Did I bring on the infertility by working too hard and stressing myself out?
2. Did I wait too long and ignore well-meaning family and friends' "you guys really should start a family"?
3. And the worse, am I a bad Christian? Surely if I have enough faith, it will happen.
4. Or even worse than that - maybe God doesn't want us to have a baby. I can't believe this seriously though because I know without a shadow of doubt that I'd be an excellent mother. I've always been good with kids, I think because I treat them like people and acknowledge that they have feelings, thoughts and opinions just like everyone else.

I write about these things on this blog because aside from my husband, there's no-one I can really talk to.

Well, let me clarify - I can talk to my other infertile friends about the infertility. I can talk to my husband about the God & Christian issues. But I can't talk to any other friends about the Christian stuff.

This, in my opinion, is why we get such a bad rap sometimes. Because everything has to always be so positive. My own MIL says things like "oh that happened because they weren't listening to God, or weren't praying enough". Not About This. That is precisely why we haven't said a thing to her. Or To Any Christian. I can't handle the you guys must stand on the Word and keep confessing speech.

Well today, I decided I'm out of denial and tomorrow I need to make our appointment with a fertility specialist and just go hear what's what.

The other thing is I'm not even sure how far I'm prepared to go but that really is another post. I need my beauty sleep after all.

Good night.

My personality profile

Your Five Factor Personality Profile

Extroversion: You have medium extroversion. You're not the life of the party, but you do show up for the party. Sometimes you are full of energy and open to new social experiences. But you also need to hibernate and enjoy your "down time." Conscientiousness: You have high conscientiousness. Intelligent and reliable, you tend to succeed in life. Most things in your life are organized and planned well. But you borderline on being a total perfectionist. Agreeableness: You have high agreeableness. You are easy to get along with, and you value harmony highly. Helpful and generous, you are willing to compromise with almost anyone. You give people the benefit of the doubt and don't mind giving someone a second chance. Neuroticism: You have low neuroticism. You are very emotionally stable and mentally together. Only the greatest setbacks upset you, and you bounce back quickly. Overall, you are typically calm and relaxed - making others feel secure. Openness to experience: Your openness to new experiences is low. You're a pretty conservative person, and you favor what's socially acceptable. You think that change for novelty's sake is a very bad idea. While some may see this as boring, many see you as dependable and wise.

The Five Factor Personality Test

Thursday Thirteen #1 - This week at work

1. On Monday we went on a strategy conference far, far away (okay, 157km round trip). I hate driving long distances so this was very stressful for me.
2. Fortunately the venue made up for the distance because it was absolutely beautiful. And the food was very good too, which is always a plus!!!
3. Unfortunately the distance traveled surpasses what I normally do in a week, so petrol-wise that's not good. And these guys are so wealthy it seems petty for me to claim back the money.
4. I left home at 5:55 and returned at 19:00. This caused me to miss my hip-hop dance class which did not impress me in the least.
5. As a result of the conference, we are adding more structure to our department. Normally this is a good thing because I like clearly-defined processes.
6. However, our project manager is sending out form upon form and frankly, I'm concerned that I won't have time to action and actually do my work if I have to be minuting everything!
7. I took the bull by the horns (as they say) and chatted to her this morning. Exactly what is the purpose of this doc? Who is this doc intended for? So isn't this duplicating work? Eventually she conceded that I can use my own systems as long as the main things are documented (this is on my main portfolio).
8. At lunch today, I spilt mushroom and herb cup-a-soup all over my desk. Some of it splashed on my keyboard too so I had to log a call for them to swop keyboards. How disgusting - it is amazing how much soup one cup is when it's all spread out.
9. Today was Weigh-Less weigh in and……… I only gained 1kg since the last time I weighed (3 weeks ago). This is obviously all the holidaying in Thailand and Malaysia. (Two other ladies gained 1.2 and 1.8 kg in a week despite following the plan, so I was ecstatic at my small gain).
10. The party I mentioned some time ago? Well, our colleague came in to say her final goodbyes before she flies to Vegas on Saturday. The dept has already changed because she honestly was the life of the place.
11. My main campaign has been stressing me out a bit this week. Why? Because I can't control other people's work and they keep promising delivery dates, not delivering and I have to pacify the client. The client doesn't even believe me anymore and this is frustrating because IT"S NOT ME!
12. I am dealing with it through excessive reading of blogs and blogging.
13. I'm doing the monthly blog posting thing but I'm cheating a bit – I have 6 blogs in total so I'm posting somewhere every day. I have committed to posting here every 2nd day though. A strange thing has happened though – I find myself easily posting to at least 2 blogs a day.

And that's my first Thursday Thirteen.

Women are the same everywhere

Apparently I've been so out of touch that I didn't even know there was a blog challenge thingy happening this month. Well, now that I know, I'm up for it. I'm going to blog something every day. It will not all be on this blog considering I have a couple of business ones too, but there's only 23 days left - I'm sure I can do it (famous last words).

We got back from our holiday in Thailand and Malaysia a few days ago. The sightseeing was beautiful and so was all the food and shopping but I'm always more interested in the people and their culture.

One thing that really stood out to me in Asia is how obsessed the women are about their looks.

1. We caught many shop assistants preening themselves in front of their hand mirrors when they were not helping customers.
2. All the ads on TV are about being whiter and having fairer skin.
3. The health and beauty aisles are FULL of skin lighteners.

I'll admit that at first I thought how ridiculous it all was and then it struck me - we're all the same, just about different things.

I have curly hair and I want straight hair. In the past when I had good hair years, people with straight hair used to look longingly at my curls. Alas, those days are gone forever, but I digress.

White people want to be browner so they bake in the sun to tan, and these Thai and Malaysian ladies want to be whiter.

And of course, we all want to be thinner...

Even though we're all so diverse and have such vastly different lifestyles, there's still this common bond.

On the whole, my self-esteem is pretty much intact (or I'm just thick-skinned). But I do wonder at which stage (or age) do we get to this point? The one where we don't think we're good enough or pretty enough just as we are.

I wonder why it's not enough to just enhance what we naturally have?

A little pregnant

I received an email on Thursday last week titled Good News.

I immediately knew what it was. Oh and it was from my sister (5 years younger than I am).

Yes, she's pregnant - 7 weeks - and not really telling anybody except family until they've passed the 12-week mark. They've been trying for about 18 months to fall pregnant so it seems it runs in the family although my mother had no problem falling pregnant with the 3 of us.

A friend asked me how I felt when I heard and the truth is - I only felt pure joy. No jealousy - nothing. I must be maturing LOL. Seriously though - I am really really happy for my sister.

I even went out on Friday night to buy her a gift. I decided on a beautiful pregnancy journal by Tracey Clark. They only had a soiled one in the store and since it has a pale yellow cover I didn't want that one. Turns out that was the only one in the whole of South Africa. Can you believe it?! They went online for me and checked. The good thing was he found me the ISBN number so I'll order it online.

So how about that?!

Then, in other pregnancy news. I stumbled upon an infertility blog two weeks ago. I sent the link to my friend who went out immediately and bought So Close, Tertia Albertyn's book. She then emailed me because the book was so good, etc. and I had to drive over to her work to get it from her.

I read it on Saturday and it was SOOOO inspirational. Lots of parts were very, very sad - I cried like a baby - but it is very good. That woman has been through so much - 9 IVF treatments but at least she now has two gorgeous babies.

I have a confession to make

The other day I was driving to work, singing along and as I turned up the radio, I realized something…

I'm doing it again - singing along to mid-80s Kylie Minogue. I think it was Hand on your Heart. But they all sound the same from that era, don't they?

However, this is not the first time.

D & I were driving somewhere and that Kylie Minogue/ Jason Donovan song came on (the name escapes me for the moment - thank goodness). Anyway, I'm singing along and after a flawless first and second verse, D & I looked at each other in horror.

D: What on earth are you singing?

M: I don't know. I didn't even know I knew the words

This must have been a carry over from my early teenaged years ('87???). Since then, I realized that I might as well accept it.

I have come to enjoy Wham (Wake me up before you go-go), Rick Astley (Never gonna give you up) and Kylie. Maybe this shaped me in a positive way - who knows?!

Now who remembers Bros? When will I, will I be famous?


Oh, that Kylie Minogue/ Jason Donovan song is Especially for you

Terrible Thursday

I had a really terrible day on Thursday. Even though I lost another 0.2kg at Weigh-Less.

Someone unsubscribed from my mailing list. Not just anyone, mind you, but a really good customer. Because I'm in a service-based business, everything is about relationships so generally once people "get me and my work" they're keepers.

The unsubscribes used to bother me a lot at first. Then I realised that I am not for everyone and if people don't like the tone of my newsletters, blogs and so forth, then they won't relate to me and that's fine, 'cos they're probably not my ideal client.

Cool! And then this happened. And I had a feeling it was coming. So maybe knowing beforehand is what is bugging me because I feel like I should have done something.

It's like that feeling when you know you're going o break something, trip and fall, didn't save a document. You realise it just as it's happening but not in time to reverse it.

You see, this person is from my church and we do voluntary work there. I phoned her about something last week and got a really snotty tone. At first I put it down to the fact that she's in the middle of a move but this is the thing - she is just not the type who would ever respond like that. Anyway, we had our talk and I thought, just jump in. So I did.

I asked her what was wrong. Nothing, just busy. Okay... Carried on talking. Checked again before I said bye. No, definitely, there's nothing wrong.

Then this week she unsubscribes from my coaching blog. And the next day when my weekly edition goes out, unsubscribes from my mailing list.

I sent her an email and again she says nothing is wrong, I am fine with you. But clearly something is.

Tomorrow I'm going to corner her at church and confront her. I don't have problems confronting people generally but this one leaves me with such a weird feeling.

I'll have to check back and update this post when I've had The Talk with her. Can't wait! Anything is better than this Not Knowing business.

updated to add
i had the talk and of course, she denied that anything was wrong. So I've got to accept that but I definitely don't believe it.

Turns out I'm not into phatic

phatic (FAT-ik)

Relating to a communication meant to generate an atmosphere of social relationship rather than to convey some information.

When you bump into your neighbor on your way out and say, "How are ya?" you're engaging in phatic communion. The idea is not to inquire your neighbor's state of affairs but simply to create a feeling of shared goodwill. Later, at work, when you discuss weather with someone at the water cooler, it's the same idea.

So that's what it is. And I'm the one who really answers and expects a proper answer too.

Now that I know the rules, I'll have to be more phatic!

I forgot about the car!!!

Oh.My.Word - glancing back over previous posts, I realise that I forgot to tell about my new car!

So I took my car to the dealer who was buying it from me on Thursday 21st. It was a very sad moment - I love that little red car (VW Citi Golf) - so I asked the guy to take a last picture of me in the car. To be honest, I think I was behaving strangely because he gave me a really weird look.

Anyway, they deposited the cheque early the next morning so all was fine on that front. I borrowed some money from the bank (as little as I could get away with because I hate, hate, hate debt) so had to wait for this money to be paid before I could collect the car.

The whole Friday I was on the phone to the bank about probably 10 times in total trying to get them to hurry up and pay (and isn't it strange that they promised that their money would be in first and they were last).

It was stress stress stress because I'd organised a lift to the dealer based on timelines promised and nothing was happening. Normally I would have been a lot more relaxed about it except that it was a long weekend and I wanted a car (I am fiercely independent and don't want to share D's car). Eventually I got on the phone yet again and explained to the nice people at the bank to please put me out of my misery if they were not going to come through in time because I am not going all the way through to collect my car and they turn me away because you haven't paid.

I don't know what did it but that girl got her act into gear. She phoned up managers all over the place and got them to email through a release on the car.

So I collected the dirtiest car in the world. At least it drove beautifully. And it still is.

Is there ever a happy medium?

Okay, this is going to sound crazy but I asked my boss for more work. Actually I should say that I nagged him for months for more work.

I'm a relationship and operations manager in the New Business Dept of our company, so once the deal's signed, I take over and manage the account and also run the implementation process. This suits me down to the ground because I love it when there are millions of things going on all at the same time.

When we did psychometric tests, it showed that I have a high degree of accuracy while I am being highly flexible. In plain English this means that I can't concentrate on one task for more than an hour at a time LOL

My main client has been in kind of a maintenance state since about May-June so I've needed work.

The boss is a very bad delegator (excellent at letting me have my freedom and get on with things, in other words, come and go as I please and no checking up LOL) so you can see why it has taken months of nagging to get work.

And boy oh boy, now it's flooding in. He gave me two more accounts to work on (we call it campaigns) so I am swamped.

This is good for me because I like to be challenged but I can't help thinking about my holiday in a few week's time... my solution?

I started making a list to palm off some work to a colleague. No one can say I'm a bad delegator, now can they? The boss should take some lessons from me...

He said, she said

Overheard in a shoe store…

She Do you like these? (modelling a pair of espadrilles)

He No

She Why? What's wrong with them?

He I don't know. I just don't like them.

I wanted to tell her that they actually looked very nice.

What's more important is this:
She clearly loves and wants the shoes. What does it matter if he doesn't like it?!

New cars, holidays, cancellations, farewell parties, etc.

New car
I'm buying a new car but not properly new (if you know what I mean). It is a 2005 Opel Corsa Sport and has 12000 km on the clock.

So I've been very busy organising all the paperwork, getting valuations for my current car, and so on... Huge amount of schlep - no wonder I don't do this very often.

Also, my sister works for General Motors and gets a discount for direct family members which is really nice BUT because I'm buying directly from GM, there is service from a dealer, car papers all nicely sorted out. It's a huge schlep but I have to keep reminding myself that I'm saving thousands this way.


Holidays
We're going to Thailand in 4 weeks and 3 days exactly. Woohoo.

We finally collected the tickets and travel vouchers from Flight Centre on Saturday so it feels more settled. I've started making my lists about what to take, what I have to do before we go, what we should do once we get there, and so on, and so on...

We went to look at digital cameras on Saturday and I'm nearly decided. Just want to check out a couple of other options.

Cancellations
I was scheduled to do an organising workshop for 3 ladies on Saturday. The one phoned me early that morning to cancel so I phoned the other 2 to cancel the whole thing. With less than 3 people, there is just no vibe (3 is already too little). So I've postponed it for two weeks - hopefully I can drum up a few more people.

Farewell parties
My colleague on the other side of my partition is emigrating to the US of A (Las Vegas actually) to marry her sweetheart. Long story about love across the ocean...

Anyway, so I'm organising her farewell party because ...well, let's just say she'd just get a "thanks very much and goodbye" if I didn't. So I'm hardly working these days - running around collecting money from people, organising venue, food, gift, etc.

Getting everyone to sign the card (I decided to get a non-traditional card so I got a die-cut notebook in the shape of a handbag) is another hassle. Why is it that everybody first needs to read the entire book before they write their two lines of inspiration - "all the best. have fun in vegas"?

That's what I've been busy with these last 10 days or so...

What do you say to the babies questions?!

We've been married for 11 years and because we married when we were very young, there wasn't much pressure to have babies immediately.

Initially, we planned to wait 5 years and then have a child.

Life doesn't always go according to plan. When 5 years was up, I'd just started a new job and wanted to "prove myself". To who, I don't know but that's another story altogether.

The years went on and on and to be honest, we didn't have any baby urges. (I recall the gynae once telling me, my dear, if you want to have children, I'd start if I were you - it only gets more difficult after 28.

At the time, I thought she was talking rubbish. After all, all the movie stars have babies into their 40's, don't they?

Up to this point, when people asked rude questions like when are you having children?, we could honestly say we're not ready.

Anyway, something happened when I turned 30. I started having these if we don't do it now, we'll regret it thoughts. And D was definitely ready.

So we started trying. I thought that like everything else in my life, I would set a goal, plan it and things would fall into place. Ha ha ha.

People still ask the question but now the facts have changed.

Now people ask, do you want children? I firmly say yes, we do want children. And then there's the awkward pause when they decide whether they're going to go where they shouldn't.

When are you going to have them then?

When God decides the time is right.

To be fair, this is a very vague answer and not very satisfying.

What must I say? On the one hand, it would be good to say something like: listen, idiot, we've been trying for 2 years. I have endo and he has defective sperm.

That's one way to shut them all up for good.

It's nice to dream...