Posts by Jolisa
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Classic! My eyes are watering just looking at those pre-lycra stovepipes.
And forget who's the host - can anyone tell us what that funny booth-like structure approaching the Harbour Bridge is? I'm much too young to remember ...
Ah yes, back when you used to have to pay to leave Auckland... It cost 20c if I remember rightly, er, if I remember hearing my elderly relatives rightly. Grubbing round under the bench seats of the Chrysler Valiant for the right change. Those were the days.
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Hey Venetia (great name! truly great name!)... I'm still lurking out here, just trying to snaffle the time to write it all down. If that non-napping Busybaby wasn't half so damn busy I'd be posting daily, no shortage of material.
But maybe this is the incentive I need to jump back in. If only to frighten David with more tales from the front lines :-)
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the first law of housework: the only thing more boring than doing housework is watching someone else do it.
Au contraire, my dear... there's some pretty scenic housework action here (moderately safe for work).
And this book sounds quite edifying as well.
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...or footage of a grotesquely crowded shopping centre on a weekend, New Zealanders of every creed and race trooping in ovine fashion from one shop to the next, only pausing for an expertly brewed short black and a $4 slice of ginger crunch?
What always strikes me about these sorts of ads -- even today -- is the feeling of "where is everybody??" Apart from the occasional shot of drunken cricket fans, or a small riot of artfully chosen children of every race, or that cute aerial shot of the Barnes dance on Queen St, it's all one big empty nature park, miles between you and the next human... What does it all signify? Makes me think of the old (Billy T?) punchline, "we're the Whakaawi...and we're lost!"
What would a real representation of everyday life in Aotearoa look like - y'know, what we do when we're not hoisting spinnakers or scaling mountains or sharing, excuse me, shearing sheep... and could you make it uplifting as well as true?
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Mmm, Proust... Abs to die for. Bring it on!
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By the way, David, that wasn't Public Address's first actual public marriage proposal was it?? Or are you just flirting with hot linguists for the sheer fun of it?
And I love all the urban design proposals just for their sheer beauty. Except that the air bridge should be more like the High Line or its model, the Promenade Plantée.
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[seriously though: good article, even though it went on a bit]
Like any good burlesque act... It's no fun if you whip it all off in the first paragraph :-)
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Oh, you brute! I frantically paged down through your blog to discover... no gallery for this post??
It got me thinking though. Public Address calendar? If the firemen can do it, surely you guys can do it? (Tze Ming and I will sit this one out...)
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Wow, Belt. Thanks for that epic post! You're right, that the first baby is the test run. The adjustment can be so hard, and the poor little sausage gets the brunt of our inexperience.
Also, I don't know if this was your experience too, but they seem so much older than the are, when you've only got the one. When I think now of some of the expectations I had of wee Busytot, when he was only one, or two, or three, or four.. and next year I will kick myself for expecting so much of him when he was five, and so on... I think this is especially true if you have a verbally precocious child. They sound so cogent, it's hard to remember that their thought processes are pretty rudimentary, even while marvelling at the purity and convoluted genius of those thought processes.
(These books have been incredibly useful in clarifying what's normal for each age bracket - although we usually read a year ahead, modern kids being what they are - and reminding you that a) it's just a phase, and b) you can't "fix" some phases, you just have to live through them).
Whereas with #2, not only am I not fazed by much, but I can see him as he really is: a baby. That said, I have fretted about whether he's up to speed, largely I think because I am misremembering #1's precocity. He definitely gets the benefit of having broken-in parents, though, and should be more grateful to his big bro than he will ever realise.
Don't beat yourself up about it too much though... it really can't have been otherwise. It sounds like you've taught each other heaps, and that you're doing a great job of being their Dad.
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Deborah, sounds like we have a similar situation (except that you have two to jack each other up -- how do you manage it?!). A pocket professor first time round -- although he has his feisty, sporty, contrarian side, to be sure -- and a pocket rocket the second time round. Scamp is an excellent word for it. Also, rascal, rapscallion, imp. Houdini is a constant nickname. And wriggly worm. Plus, there doesn't seem to be an off switch. The boy slept ten minutes yesterday during daylight hours. Ten. Minutes.
Makes me want to hide that stepladder. Especially as my Dad keeps saying this kid reminds him of his naughty brothers, who started off by climbing out their bedroom windows, which was just the beginning of a shall we say complex relationship with confinement... (What's that line from Back to the Future... "Better get used to those bars, kid!")
Ah, hubris. That said, I do have friends whose first babies were more on the demanding/intense/spirited/diva side, and whose latter children are cherubs sent by way of reward.
And a friend I was chatting to the other day said she was grateful for the radical energy difference between her kids; the rapscallion gets the couch potato up on his feet, and the couch potato gives the rapscallion a reason to slow down.