Mighty shitey - our new canine house guest

"I don't bloody well believe it!"

I looked at the steaming pile of mustard-coloured runny dog poo on the carpet. The second Louie had done this morning, and he'd had a walk in between where he relieved himself of a similar squittery load. That made three. Three!

Louie isn't ours. He belongs to my friend V and we're minding him while V and her husband and extended family take themselves off on a cruise for nearly two weeks. I say 'we' but it's mainly me this week as G is away.

"He's a good dog," V said, "He won't poo in the house, he'll go to the door and tell you he wants to go out. Or he'll jump on the bed at night and lick you and ask you to take him out." (I winced at that last bit of news; Ellie has learned to sleep through the night and yawns and stretches herself awake at whatever time we do.)

Yeah, right. Our house, with its new carpet, is starting to resemble a dog toilet. Thank God the carpet is pet proof and stains etc come out with cold water.

Louie is a worry. He's been with us a week and didn't crap at all for the first two days, earning the nickname of No Shit Sherlock. Nerves, we thought. Now we can't bloody stop him, and I wouldn't mind if it were solid turds easily collected with toilet paper. Nope, it's runny. Nerves. Again. Even though he came to us with a bottle of Rescue Remedy to pop on his food to keep him calm.

He did the first of the runny jobs yesterday, in the living room.  I found it at breakfast. It was small enough and in the same sort of place that our toy poodle Ellie sometimes poos if we're out and not home in time. So I didn't know who to blame. Ellie looked guilty (which means nothing, she knows if I see a turd on the carpet I shout a bit in general) but I said nothing to either dog and simply swore under my breath as I cleaned it. When I took both dogs for a stroll yesterday afternoon it was clear that Louie was the one with the squits. The mustard yellow, pungent squits. Great.

This morning's job was clearly Louie's. Our poodle girl couldn't have produced that massive mound and that mustard colour gave it away.

The second of today's indoor turds lay steaming on the floor of our rumpus room, greeting me after I went out this morning for a mere hour. By then Louie had had a walk and cleaned himself out so I thought he was 'safe' in the house. Silly me.

I had a big debate with myself - and the dogs - yesterday about what to do for the evening, aside from take Louie out last thing before bed.

Louie sleeps indoors, you see. He's about the size of a large cocker spaniel, and suffers with separation anxiety if he's locked outside. I tried shutting him in the kitchen during the day as a means of containing him on a floor that would be easy to clean but that lasted five minutes. Even with a doorstop behind the sliding door he'd opened it quick as a flash and joyfully came into my office with a happily waving tail and a look of accomplishment on his face.

I decided in the end I'd leave the door to the balcony open overnight. That way if he got caught short in the wee small hours he could wander out and lift a leg or squat. Every dog we've owned and every visiting dog has peed or worse out there and it's easy to hose off. The whole balcony probably smells beguilingly of eau du chien if you're a dog, so the temptation to add his own smell would encourage Louis to do it there.

With a slight worry about burglars - but thinking the sight of Louie and possibly Ellie out on the balcony barking would put them off - I went to bed and couldn't sleep. I tossed and turned until 1am, with three storms between 9.30 and then, and Louie getting upset at each of them and occasionally racing onto the balcony to bark then coming back inside with wet, dirty paws (sob!! First the shit, now the mud!!!).

So you can imagine my delight when I found the poo in the living room this morning, after leaving the door open for the bloody dog to use.

I hope his bowels settle by tomorrow as he was still doing mustard on his walk after dinner tonight. We have him for another week. All I can do is feed him plain food and keep taking him outside, but oh dear, the nights worry me. I don't want another seven nights of shite. When I stumble to the loo myself barefoot at 3am, eyes mainly closed, I don't want to tread in anything squishy and smelly and probably warm (would cold be better? Probably not.).

Louie now has a new nickname. Bluey. Not just because he's chestnut coloured and we Aussies call redheads Blue to be contrary, but because he has a new last name: Zarzoff.

Hypnotherapy? My mother would have snorted. But that's why I went.

I had a very loving Mum. Loving, sometimes, to the point of smothering. Of over controlling, particularly when I was younger. I was reading an article earlier this week about toxic parents (naturally, I can't find it now) and was sorta kinda surprised, but not much, to find a paragraph describing some of her behaviour to a T. She wasn't super toxic, but toxic enough to make me a secretive person who made my decisions behind her back rather than have her make them for me. Which she was very good at.

I miss her. She mellowed when I got married and clearly realised I was finally a big girl and was capable. She's been gone four years.

Since my teens I have played out conversations in my head with her. Conversations in which I finally get the upper hand. You'll understand this didn't happen often in real life. Mum was ALWAYS right. She'd just wear me down until I gave up.

Even with Mum not here any more, I was still having those conversations, or remembering particularly hard ones that took place, and actual arguments. It was getting me down. I couldn't shift them. I couldn't move on.

Coupled with doing work that no longer floats my boat (graphic and web design, managing a chamber of commerce) I was pretty well down in the dumps at the end of January when the work started to flow in again and I was trapped at the bloody computer.

Ach, you say. Chuck it in and do something else. Easier said than done. I'm not qualified for anything else, but I've been doing a lot of professional cat sitting recently and that may well become my new earner.

All through January I did cat sitting, and a more zen role I can't think of.  Mid-February I felt like crying every time a new email came in. So a friend who'd also been in a terribly bad way (read: borderline suicidal) put me onto her hypnotherapist, a lovely woman who had helped my friend do a complete 180 in terms of mood. My friend is now rocking life and taking bad news in her stride; after a shocking start to the year she's coping well and being positive.

Now Mum was scathing of therapists - after all, why would you want to talk to a stranger when you could nut your problems out with your family, your mother? Hmm, but what if your mother was your problem? Or part of your problem, along with low self-esteem and self-love and a lot of anger as I'm too passive/aggressive.

So I saw the hypno. I had my first session six weeks ago and have felt subtle but positive changes. The Mum conversations have gone; if I feel one coming on I remember happy times, giggles with Mum, holidays and love instead. I'm calmer within myself. I'm calmer with inanimate objects such as my computer (and believe me, that's HUGE!).

I'm wondering if the yoga has also contributed to the calmness. I no longer get irate with other motorists unless they do something really stupid which jeopardises my safety. In Sydney that's a daily occurrence but these days I ignore the dopes who don't indicate and those with other small misdemeanours.  But I digress ...

The hypno has tried to instil a self of strong self-worth, and I think it's happening. I saw her again today and she said she could see and feel a real change in me and my energy. We did another session which worked on me feeling more powerful and loving towards myself and my body conquering and getting rid of my psoriasis (let's hope that one works, it's shocking at the moment). I certainly went well under today, far deeper than the first session.

The only snag is the recording on my phone stopped of its own accord 11 minutes in. I'm giggling at the thought that perhaps Mum was there and stopped it! Anyway the hypno is going to re-record it and Dropbox it to me.

I'm hoping this is the year I can become the me I was always supposed to be, not the one I was told to be. Old habits die hard but I think my hypno is killing them softly.

When your hair defines you. Or shaving your head does.

I was wandering around YouTube this week looking for hairstyles for fine hair, like mine. Mind is currently just longer than chin length and I'm contemplating going for a pixie again. But I digress. Somehow I wound up watching a video by a young woman who had gorgeous long hair (the kind of hair a saddo fine-haired person like me lusts over). YouTube can lead you in directions you had no original intent of following!

This young woman lamented she was mainly known as The Girl With The Very Long Hair among her peers. It was as if nobody tried to find out more about her as a person; her hair defined her.

So she shaved her head.

Her hair had been down to her backside. Brave girl. And she rocked the stubble look when it was done, she was gorgeous. But one thing was missing from the video. What did people say about her afterwards? Did they mention her personality when talking about her? Her likes and dislikes? What she laughed at, what she despised? Was she still defined by her hair - or rather, lack of it?

It led me to draw this little story.  And no, her name is not Freya. I plucked that out of the ether.

Coffee and Yoga. Mind, body and spirit.

When I order coffee at a cafe it's usually an espresso. That little cup of black gold, black magic, call it what you will. If I'm feeling particularly enamoured of the idea of darkness, I'll order a double short black.

It's something that's been a treat from time to time as until recently we didn't have a coffee machine at home. We had a French press and I got rather sick of the mug with milk that was our typical morning tea.

A friend gave me a coffee machine, new old stock, 8 years old and never used. I suspect some plastic pipes inside it had perished or died, as I persevered for a few days, cleaned it, followed all the instructions and never got anything better than dark sludge out of it.

So I bit my lip, mentally apologised to the environment, and bought a wee Nespresso machine. Reader, I know I'm bad. Those pods take forever to decompose. You can't recycle them. But the bliss of popping one in, touching the button and watching an espresso materialise before my eyes, for one fifth of the cost of a cafe one! And I can have one EVERY DAY. I wouldn't walk to our local cafe every day and hand over $4.50 - my espresso was a weekend treat only.

Thankfully there are several brands of compatible pods, and the Vittoria espresso is nicely dark and deep and strong. L'Or isn't bad, either.

And my husband now makes his own flat whites for morning tea and is in heaven.

So what a tasty start to the year we've had.

Coffee cheers my spirit, in moderation is good for the body and gives my mind that little jolt to cheer it up when it doesn't feel like doing work at the computer.

Which segueways nicely into yoga. Now yoga is arguably much better for the mind, body and spirit, and I've taken that up recently. Like, last week, officially. I had been teaching myself from magazines and YouTube and websites, but I bit the bullet and joined a fitness centre that teaches yoga, pilates and barre.

I've decided I'll try and do 3 yoga classes a week, 1 pilates and 1 barre, as they are the only ones that fit in with my schedule - i.e., doing it during business hours. I have no desire to head out at 6am or fight peak hour traffic and overfull classes at 6pm when I'm getting hungry. I'm treating yoga as work - work on myself!

So far I'm loving it; I'm doing yin yoga and hatha yoga. While I do a fitness class on Fridays (bodyweight, light weights and cardio) which makes me realise just what muscles I've used, I'm getting complaints from muscles on a daily basis, but only mildly. It's all good.

I'm feeling a bit calmer - I think! The one bad thing about the yoga place is parking. It's in a shopping strip where the main car park is being redeveloped so parking is at a premium. Last Friday I was driving for 20 minutes around and around the other car park areas there desperate for a spot, almost screaming and my blood pressure going through the roof as I didn't want to be late for my class. I had allowed for 15 minutes to find a park. This rather negates all the good yoga does for my mind, body and spirit I suspect!

My neighbour put me onto the yoga centre as she has recently joined it too, so at least she'll be coming to some of the same classes and urging me to go if I'm feeling lazy or depressed and don't want to leave the house.

I've noticed another difference in my mental state - I want or NEED to do some sort of exercise every day now. Either yoga, pilates, barre or a good brisk walk. For this little sloth, that's a very good thing indeed.

And if yoga doesn't perk me up, fresh espresso will!

The joys of that first swim of summer

OK, it's been summer here for a while but I've been busy cat sitting as well as being lazy on my annual break. But it's time to talk about swimming. Some people swim all year. Summer or winter, they disrobe and don the bathers and hop into the gym pool, or council pool, (always indoors and reeking disgustingly of chlorine) and laboriously do laps and laps of freestyle, backstroke, butterfly or whatever takes their fancy.

That's hard work. Needless to say, that's not me.

The laps are hard work but also disrobing when you know it's single figures outside, or at least well under 20 degrees. Eww. And the chlorine puts me off. Not only for olfactory reasons, but my psoriasis hates it.

No, for me swimming is a purely summer pleasure concerning salt water only, and thus to be looked forward to immensely. It is, for me, the best part of summer, which is usually too hot for me to get decent sleep or exercise after 7am.

I don't swim at a gym or council pool. I don't do laps. I do enjoyment at my local river baths or at one of Sydney's beaches, with or without surf.

It's all about the sheer joy of being enveloped in, and moving in, cool water on a hot day.

It was nearly two months ago when I slipped into the silken, calm, warm water at Balmoral beach for the first time this summer. It always surprises me, small-brained creature that I am, that immediately I'm in the water I become a mermaid or an otter, totally at home with the concept of propelling myself around with arms and legs, playing no-touch-the-ground with the sand. I don't even think about it.

There's a joyous weightlessness about swimming. In the water, I'm my sylph-like 20-something again, rather than a 55 year old trying to kill off the last 5 kilos that will take me back to my 30 year old weight. I feel energised, young, and, cellulite or not, gorgeous.

It's something to do with the sun on my skin, the salt water, the feel of sand beneath my feet (and at the unnetted part of Balmoral, the knowledge I'm shark bait. That sharpens you up).

Balmoral Beach, Mosman, Sydney. In November, few people were swimming during the week.

That first swim was definitely the Ahhhhhh moment. The water, at low tide, was warmed by the sun but I didn't have to go out far for my feet to no longer touch the sand. I did some exercises using my limbs against the heaviness of the water, I swam back and forth, I lay on my back and drank in the sun, the salt, the happy shrieks of children on the beach, and I felt totally at peace.

So during the summer I lazily swim in the river baths five minutes away or Balmoral, fifteen metres here or there of freestyle, or my own creations, sculling like a rower on my back or doing an underwater dog paddle sort of thing with my head out of the water. In the baths at high tide I dive or bomb from one of the platforms - bombing takes me back to my 11 year old self, the one who was unselfconscious.

Our local river baths.

One thing I don't like is putting my face in the water to swim; never have. My eyes hate it and I forget to breathe properly. When I dive or bomb my eyes are squeezed shut and don't open until my head pops up out of the water. I can manage very well with goggles and a snorkel however.

In the surf I love to feel the waves pounding against me. The big ones, eyes firmly squeezed shut, I dive under. The lesser I jump up with, lifted high and often with my arms wide and a big grin on my face. Then there are those that I body surf, or surf with a boogie board. And of course I mistime it here and there and get dumped by the surf, rolled along the sand clamping my eyes and nose shut, trying not to breathe until I'm rolled unceremoniously onto the shore (to the delight of teenagers). An hour in the surf, pushing and pulling against the tide, is hard work. We usually take our surf beach days in two 30 minute swims in the morning. That's enough to work up a huge appetite for lunch at a local cafe. (We love North Narrabeen beach by the way. My grandparents lived there when I was a kid and it's always felt like home.) My skin feels amazing after an hour in the surf, and so does my mind.

North Narrabeen, 9am on a Sunday. Bring it on!

Summer, I love you. When I'm in the water.

So she slept through my New Year's Eve party ...

Every New Year's Eve we have a party. Not a huge one, typically between 12 - 20 people. Because we live reasonably near the harbour and rivers, we pile into cars at midnight and head down to the riverside to watch the famous Sydney fireworks, then pile back in again, come home and the party starts to wind down.

Whingy, when she is in Sydney for NYE, expects (and gets) an invite to the party. The years she does come, she absents herself around 9.45 and goes inside to have a nap on our sofa until 11.30. This year was no different except that Mr Whingy also nicked off for a nap - into the spare bedroom.

Their excuse? They'd been up since 7am. Me, I'd been up since 5.30am as I had 8 cat sit visits to do, plus make food for the party. Did I nap? Nope. Didn't have the opportunity in the afternoon and wasn't tired until after midnight.

I do think it's the height of rudeness to leave a party and have a nap in the middle of it (unless you're over 75 and feeling it).  One of my other guests joining us for the first time, Posh, was horrified. "Does she do that every year?" she gasped, looking at Whingy on the sofa.

"Yup," I replied sadly.

"How bloody rude!"

My girlfriends Posh and Ms America felt that Whingy thought they were boring if she had to nick off for a sleep. They felt insulted. Old girlfriend Sushi has been to my NYE party for the last 20 years and knew what to expect from Whingy, though. She was amused rather than insulted, but surprised that Whingy hadn't asked for the music to be turned off so she could sleep in peace. Or rather, simply turn it off herself.

The rudeness didn't stop there. In 2017 we finally replaced our 30 year old sofa. The new one is a couple of centimetres longer. However, Whingy didn't think so. She complained the new sofa wasn't as long as the last one and she couldn't stretch out as much to have a sleep.

I hope the Whingies go interstate for this year's NYE. I can't NOT invite them to my party or there will be fireworks that put the Sydney NYE ones to shame. And I can't say to Whingy, "Do you mind not having a nap in the middle of my party as other guests feel insulted?" or she'll accuse ME of rudeness.

If only narcissists could see their real selves when they look in the mirror.

The everyday life of a cat sitter

So I haven't blogged here since July. Shame on me. But time flies when you're having fun.

And having fun I have had. I've taken on a lot more cat sitting work, and boy, let me tell you, it's the most stress-free role I've ever had.

Okay, so there's a lot of driving around, which, depending on the time of day, isn't exactly stress-free, especially when you encounter drivers who seem to have picked their driver's licence out of a cereal packet. But my feline clients for the most part are a joy.

In the last few months I've only come close to being attacked once. By a cat I'll call Sybil.  In fact I'll call her Syko Sybil. (Which looks better on paper than Psycho Sybil.) Here's a cat with personality plus. One personality is nice and normal. The other, the evil twin side, can take the lead in a second. Snarls, growls, hisses and threats. For no particular reason. She's healthy, before you ask. She gets regularly checked by the vet, but she's a rescue cat and who knows what went on in her life before her owner took her home and gave her unconditional love (and probably got scratched and bitten a lot since then).

Some cats are ambivalent. "Oh, you've come to feed me. Good. Feed me and I'll bugger off and sleep somewhere. Cheers." They eat, ignore you patting them and encouraging them to come for a cuddle, and stalk off. Cats will be cats.

Some are love bunnies, and it's these I enjoy the most. They miss their humans and want contact. Pats, strokes, cuddles, brushing. I have heard purrs in every key, and been climbed on and head butted by dozens of joyful furbabies who enjoy my company as much as I enjoy theirs.

The most rewarding in the last few months has been a pair of Sphynx brothers. I'll call them Da Boyz. I've never really been excited by the idea of a basically hairless cat. Photos show them wrinkled and often, it seems, with a frown on their face. I thought touching them would be weird. It is, in a nice kind of way. They are covered in peach fuzz. Their feet, bony and prehensile, are strangely enchanting. They are agile and very smart; think of a cat who thinks it's a monkey. Their tails are like whips; thin and tapered, and they curl them up elegantly against their flanks when they sit. Waiting for their food, standing up and yelling at me, their tails quiver expectantly.

I've minded Da Boyz twice. The first time was only for a few days and they were keen to tell me they wanted food, and didn't mind the odd pat. But no cuddles thanks. Feed us, clean up after us and we'll watch you and get a bit closer each day.

This month I've had them again, for two and a half weeks on and off. And things have changed between us. Firstly Smaller Boy decided he'd hop up on my knee for a cuddle after food, and he did, nestling his very warm body against mine and purring furiously. His bigger brother watched from on top of a cupboard for a couple of days and then decided it was his turn.

Well. Big Brother has been the most affectionate cat I've ever minded. After feeding (and settling himself for a pee on the toilet - they are both trained to pee over a human loo) he would run to the sofa and jump up, yelling at me to get my butt over there too. Then he'd settle on my knee, firstly kneading me, then marking me by rubbing his head all over the front of my clothing. I'll never wear a white t-shirt to his place again! He would gently touch my cheeks with a soft paw, and lie in my arms like a baby, purring furiously and gazing lovingly into my eyes.

I found I was really looking forward to visiting Da Boyz each day as they were so engaging and loving. After a bit you don't miss the fur; you just cuddle the warm feline body and get smooched and adored in return.

Their owner is a lovely person too; I contact all owners with updates and pics daily, and some respond at length and others don't. Da Boyz's owner is as outgoing and delightful as the cats.

Then there's Chubby Girl The Food Obsessed, who has to have her food measured out in timer bowls which go off at intervals so she doesn't binge eat. She's a butterball and on a strict diet but somehow doesn't seem to lose weight. She's quite affectionate and playful. Her friend Timid Tom on the other hand hides in a cupboard and has his food in a special bowl than will only open to the chip embedded in his collar so Chubby Girl can't steal it. My role with him is to leave the food out and just check he's okay; Chubby likes a brushing and for me to throw balls for her, or some kibble, so she gets exercise by chasing it, preferably up the stairs.

I have, for my sins, agreed to work for four hours on Christmas Day doing cat sitting. The owner of the cat sitting biz has mobility issues and can't handle places with stairs, whereas I look on stairs as fitness aids. My husband G is ok with this, as we're having seafood for lunch rather than the whole baked turkey thing, but it's going to feel weird heading out to work on the country's Big Day Off. But if I don't feed these little sweeties, who will? It's not as if cats celebrate Christmas.