joining in II

Thursday, July 24, 2008

Some photos from a friend's third birthday party at the local pool:

Rebecca is nothing if not thorough. And Maggie is proving to be a wee waterbaby: she starts swimming lessons this Saturday.

Now I must go b/c she is pulling the study apart...

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joining in

Wednesday, July 23, 2008

Loving work, but working mummy thing not leaving much time/energy for blogging as any free time generally spent scrubbing barnacles off the bathroom (managed this morning for the first time in weeks) or on the sofa groaning feebly in front of Project Runway (which is surprisingly compelling). So, updates when I catch my breath. In the meantime for the sake of the family will try to drip-feed photos of the girlies: bit of a backlog.

Klezmer fans: there will be a Klezmerfest on 31 August. Details here. Right: Plunket...

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coiffed

Sunday, June 29, 2008

Took Maggie for her first haircut the other day. This was mainly to get the hair out of her eyes as it was aggravating her conjunctivitis, which has now cleared up. So she now has a wee fringe, but we've left the rest to grow out as she's getting wonderful auburn curls.

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perception is inference

Saturday, June 28, 2008

Busier than ever, but loving it, although could have done without Maggie coming down with conjunctivitis and a chest infection during my first week in the new job. According to my entirely sympathetic manager, I'm not the first new hire she's managed that this has happened to. So the evening and weekend work may continue intermittently as I try to keep up my hours. And in the meantime, the wee'un's much improved after a couple of days on antibiotics and eyedrops. Although she's quickly wised up to the drops, whacking the bottle out of my hand as soon as I approach her with it.

That's all I have time for with a stack of work to catch up on and a gig next week to practise for, to say nothing of the state of the house. (Gaaaah...) A propos of nothing, this here is a fascinating (if a little troubling) article, which I've been reading a paragraph at a time since Wednesday. (I have high hopes of finishing it before the New Yorker yanks it.)

The account of perception that’s starting to emerge is what we might call the “brain’s best guess” theory of perception: perception is the brain’s best guess about what is happening in the outside world. The mind integrates scattered, weak, rudimentary signals from a variety of sensory channels, information from past experiences, and hard-wired processes, and produces a sensory experience full of brain-provided color, sound, texture, and meaning. We see a friendly yellow Labrador bounding behind a picket fence not because that is the transmission we receive but because this is the perception our weaver-brain assembles as its best hypothesis of what is out there from the slivers of information we get. Perception is inference.

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or were you just being kind?

Friday, June 20, 2008

Proof that I am my own worst enemy: this morning when I was dropping Becca off to crèche one of the teachers offered me a casual day for Maggie and I didn't take it. 'You turned down a day all to yourself the week before you start work?' gasped another mum. I know, I'm a crazy bitch, but I wanted a last day alone with with Maggie before I pack her off to daycare and go off and become one of those self-serving working mums. You know, those ones who simply don't love their kids as much as the ones that stay home with them full time. Them.

All the more ironic given that yesterday with the kids was the sort of day that by the time J got home, halfway through Arsenic Hour* I was coasting glassy-eyed towards bedtime on my fantasy in which I stow away on the midnight ferry to the South Island, where I spend the rest of my days picking fruit, a leather-faced bunch-back crone with a mysterious past and am improbable moniker. Maybe I'll take up chewing tobacco, if they still grow it down there. Jack, when he got home, was solicitous. 'Maybe you'll get a casual day for Maggie tomorrow?' he offered hopefully, moving all the sharp objects away from me while reflexively covering his private parts with a saucepan lid. Last night, I could only hope. This morning, I was - relieved, I guess - to take her home with me. For one more day.

*Hell Hour, Jungle Hour, Feeding Time at the Zoo...

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Sunday, June 15, 2008

I tried to transfer them but I think I cut them off...

(More new photos here.)

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all change, and more wooping!

Thursday, June 12, 2008

I'm getting three poems published in Takahe. The editor called them 'deliciously grotesque', which was pretty gratifying. They'll be appearing in either issue 64 or 65.

Equally gratifyingly, if unexpectedly, the Parliamentary Library have offered me a job. I scored well enough, apparently, on the pre-interview test that they were willing to overlook my lack of a professional qualification, and invited me in for an interview anyway. Turns out that my experience working in educational publishing makes me a good fit for the position of Resources Librarian. And they've even agreed to let me work part time, three days per week. The childcare is organised: come August, Maggie will attend crèche on the same three days as her sister, and until then a wonderful friend has offered to look after her. So I start on Monday week! They actually wanted me to start next Monday but that's J's first day at Weta Digital and I thought staggered starts a better option lest too much change all at once blow our fragile little minds.

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