Monthly Archives: November 2012

There’s lots with which La struggles in the world of motherhood. Patience?  A virtue in other people’s homes, sure, but an overrated one in mine. Pearls of wisdom los loin fruits will quote to their own future loinies? Does “Am I just WHITE NOISE?” count?

So much room for improvement.

One of the few areas in which La’ve excelled, though, is Perpetuation of the Myths of Magical Gift-Giving Creatures. You know, standard stuff — Santa, Easter Bunny and Tooth Woman.

Until this week.

Normally I’m good at keeping my multiple-mythical-creature personalities in good order. I’m a high-functioning Sybil, generally getting by without the need for anti-psychotic medication, intensive psychotherapy or questionable eyewear.

“OMG, I literally do not know whether I am Arthur or Martha..!”

But this week it all got out of whack, and it started when we found an unexpected orphan toothy-peg in the Female Junior Cost Centre’s bedroom while clutter-busting.

Obviously this fang had been put out for Fairy collection at some point, and replaced with adequate gold-coloured monetary compensation. However, Seriousimo — nowt but a hulking marshmallow of a man, brimful of memories of sleepless nights spent rubbing Bonjela on tiny bruised, purple gums — always insists we keep each peg. I know. GROSS. So I nod dutifully, then fling it once he’s turned his gaze back to his legal briefs.

Obviously La failed to dispose of one, and somehow it found its way back into the Female JCC’s room. She chose to believe it was one she forgot to glass up and put out for collection (as if that would be likely!), so we rectified that Sunday night.

Maybe because this tooth found its way into a water-filled glass not in the usual way — i.e. frenetic wriggling, then tears, then blood, followed by a beaming, gappy smile and hysterical excitement — La forgot completely its existence.

And has continued to do so for FOUR NIGHTS RUNNING.

Image of first chopper outage

Female JCC is so disillusioned, gallumphing around the house, shoulders stooped, rose-coloured specs firmly in their case. “Why hasn’t she come?” she intones dolefully. La recommends the scripting of an explanatory note, which JCC duly does on the second coinless morning. Two more mornings in, and still no lira.

Gods damn me!

Each night, La remembers at some point early on the need to effect the fang/coin currency swap.  I go to write Laself a note, then become paranoid Female JCC will find said note in the morning and all belief in mythical creatures will be ov-ah.  (Curses and damnation! Whose bright idea was it that the child should learn to read, FFS?) So no note happens.

But this morning, La was whacked in the head by the genius stick! Have asked Seriousimo’s lovely PA to handwrite the following:

Dear Female JCC

I’m sorry I’m a bit late visiting you this time.

I was held up in Finland, where a few boys have been eating too many lollipops (‘tikkukaramelli’). Seven of them had to go to the dentist and have a few teeth extracted, so there were piles and piles of teeth for me to collect! They were big Finnish fellow teeth, and I’m only tiny, so they really slowed me down.

And – silly me – the only money I had on me was Swiss Francs.  I didn’t think boys in Finland would appreciate Swiss Francs.  So I had to whiz back to the Euro Fairy Bank (kind of like Gringott’s) to get some Euros. I was exhausted!

Anyhow, enjoy your lovely Australian money and don’t use it to buy tikkukaramelli.  I can’t wait to see you sound asleep again very soon.

Lots of love

TF xxx

Phew! In manner of James Bond, childhood innocence can die another day x

There’s been a ferocious amount of gobbling going on in La life.  None of it helping la quest for svelteness. Tragically, floaty frocks providing nightie-style comfort are being relied upon more heavily than ever. Gods bless the forgiving proportions of the Tallulah & Hope kaftan in the summer months.

Yesterday’s gullet-fest began at Cornersmith in Marrickville.  And take it from La, it’s just the kind of locavore, homespun, exposed brick, wholesome-balsam temple to bartering, pickling and earnest-eyed good service you’ve been led to believe it is.

Loads of young, cute baristas and waiters trying to hide their good looks under bushy beards — you know the sort. Suffice to say, it’s enough to make a cougar blush (thank gods Signor Seriousimo still doesn’t believe in blogs and will never read this).

This was my amazing concoction of poachies with — wait for it — pearl barley, almonds, roasted cauli, parsley and mint.  (Almost completely inhaled by the time La remembered to take a piccie.)  You can’t get much more crunchy-granola than that for breakfast — short of actual, real-life crunchy granola.

This is the well-upholstered paw of the Male Junior Cost Centre holding his crazy good ham-and-cheese toastie (Feather & Bone ham!  Gods bless them!) in a vice-like grip.

Voila a quill of rocket, which the blackboard informed me had been grown by Marrickville resident, Steve.  (That morning’s sage came from Sasha.)  Under Cornersmith’s commercial terms, Steve most likely received a few jars of piccalilli or a clutch of coffees in exchange for his produce.  Well done Steve; although La doesn’t usually approve of any form of salad scenario with breakfast, this was deliciously peppery.

The Cornersmiths are following in the footsteps of Peter Gilmore and fighting the good fight to bring the edible flower back to los plates.  Clap, clap… so fabulously 80s.

You know how these days we’re not to touch our Mobile Media Control Consoles whilesoever we’re behind the wheel?  Well, what do you think los coppers would have made of La snapping this for posterity as we beat our retreat?  Ha ha! So naughty!!!

Evidently, someone’s future’s so bright they gotta wear shades…at night…inside a restaurant.

La gobbling continued in earnest as a few old knockabouts gathered together to say welcome home to Sarah Terrific-Home and her hubby, Nico — both recently returned from the Land O’Michiganders.

It was a cast of all-stars:  Vampire Slayer, AliD, Kristening and CJ Cregg, as well as ST-H, and their hubbies, who like to refer to themselves as los Cougar Tamers.

Seriousimo — ironically, the only cougar tamer among them — was sadly buried beneath sustainable forests of legal briefs, and unable to join the hilarity.

Such is the awesomeness of our little part of the world that there was another whole table of lady fabulousness we knew at the restaurant.  Bonsoir girls!

There was much slanderous and inappropriate talk about corporate diversity programs and modern conventions of political correctness.  Oh, and at various stages the assembled (straight) blokes did that thing men like to do on occasion, and shared their stories of allegedly being hit on by gay men back in their salad days.

Lathinks maybe they need a reality check; perhaps a slap across the cheek with a sheaf of Steve’s ethical Marrickville rocket would do the trick.

Ciao x

It’s that time of year again…

Yup, the time when relationships are tested, nerves become frayed, and marriages stand or fall. Over the detangling of Christmas lights.

La Famiglia Trivialista-Seriousimo attacked the raising of the Christmas tree today, with mixed results.

Male JCC got his jingle on.

As did Female JCC.

Something screaming ‘togetherness’ had to be done after earlier events, in order to restore a feeling of famiglial accord. Seriousimo took the loin fruits to Nippers, and for some godsly unknown reason, acquiesced to the Female JCC’s request that she remove her rash vest at 1pm and contine swimming. With no sunscreen. For MORE THAN ONE HOUR

She is literally burnt to a cinder.

Now, such has been la dedication to protecting the fairness and frecklelessness of los loin fruits’ skins that La has actually lost diamond rings doing so. (Hello, lucky Noosa Woods walker circa New Years Eve 2010! Hope you’re enjoying that Percy Marks bling which, in all good conscience, you should have handed in to the Noosa coppers!)

I have slip, slop, slapped those kids instead of slip, slop, slapping me. I have done it when it was the last thing I felt like doing. I have dashed to pharmacies for emergency tubes of SPF. I have rubbed them down even when faced with tears, anger and writhing little half-wet bodies.

But still, on and on, summer after summer — and even winter after winter when seasonally appropriate — La’ve done it.

And today, when I was not there to do it, we end up with a child — one who is so fair she could pass as mauve — being exposed to at least an hour of the sun’s best finest. And ending up with what looks to La untrained eye suspiciously like first-degree burns.

You know that moment, the one when you’re over 40 35, and you visit the derm, and she looks you in the eye and asks — with no hint of a funny — “Have you ever, at any point in your life, been so sunburnt you blistered and peeled?”

And you’re tempted to respond, “I barely remember a time when it was not possible to pass hours and hours entertaining myself by peeling off vast translucent sheets of my own dermis.”

But instead you solemnly answer, “Once or twice”, and pray the fickle finger of melanoma will pass by your house and instead knock on some other poor pale-face’s door.

Well, because of today, Female JCC will never be able to respond with a firm and truthful “no” to the well-intentioned derm’s inquiry.

Srsly, La was hoping for some sort of utterly unblemished mother record on this one. I at least wanted to keep these loin fruits peel- (and ink-) free til 15. *Sighs with heavy heart*

At least, this Day of Sun, La Poocha Trivialista, Diggers, looks happy.

As does La Holy Famiglia.

“Mary, there’s no need for sunscreen — we’re in a barn..”

Fingers crossed for a shady week x

What are your thoughts on festivity-specific fashion?

Feels as if every time I cottage and frottage up to Net-a-Porter these days I’m bombarded by images of Yuletide vestments — and we’re not talking robes worn by priests at midnight mass.

Do you think it’s all an ironic high-fash in-joke referencing the hand-knitted jumper Mark Darcy wore to Bridget Jones’s mum’s turkey curry buffet?

Would you agree with La that Colin is married to one of the most beautiful women in the world?

Eek! Can’t remember where I found this pic — if it’s yours please let La know and permission will be sought fawningly, and attribution included

Look how cute they are. I bet they have stunning loin fruits.

This photo is from Livia’s website; she really knows how to affect a smokey eye — v jaloux

Livia seems serene and talented too, and is a lauded eco-warrior.   But while I applaud what she does with the Green Carpet Challenge, I’d be straight on the blower to my old friend Erdem or Mr de la Renta if I was ever invited to walk a red carpet. Nicole, Angelina and Meryl, i.e. women who’ve had more than their fair share of red carpet action, can do the right thing by la earth at Livia’s behest and wear frocks made out of old bread bags and Coke cans. Pas La.

You’ll be pleased to know Movember’s attempts to separate La from los hard-earned lira show no signs of abating. Day after day, selfies of smiling blokes with sparsely-fuzzed top lips land in la inbox, accompanied by heartfelt pleas for cash. Again, La fully applauds the cause and the effort, but wishes there was a less visually affronting way to raise lira for noble blokey causes.

So, in an attempt to tie together the wanton threads of today’s post, I paint you this word-picture:  Mark Darcy in a reindeer ‘sweater’ made out of old computer cables and coffee cups, with some pubescent down atop his lip.

But with a gorgeous, clever Italian wife by his side, who could feel sorry for him?

x

Look who’s back.

Old Sweaty Toes! Yup, back at la café beneath la Wordporium and once again sharing his stockinged feet and lycra-clad middle-age crisis with his fellow coffee-drinkers — all before 8.15am.  Special.

Maybe he deserves more credit than La gives him.  After all, anyone else suspect Stella McCartney may have drawn inspiration from the likes of Sweaty Toes for her optical illusion-inducing Octavia dress?

Maybe this dress would be the key to La being able to ditch the rabbit food.

Anyhow, onward and upward: anyone else currently stocking up on $6 Arab’s Eye from Coles?  Not at all a PC name for a flower (apologies to readers in Palestinian Territories, Occupied — you are always welcome here beneath the virtual dusty rafters, friends!) but a cracking bloom nonetheless. Srly, lasts for weeks. Here it is amid a more varied assortment of blossoms.

You know what? After a bit of knob-twiddling and consultation with the deity Google, am suddenly seized by panic that what Coles is selling is not Arab’s Eye at all. Los piccies simply do not match the reality that’s currently getting its vase on on my dining table. Anyone know the real name of what Coles is flogging as Arab’s Eye? This will bother La all day.

I know, penthouse problems.

x

Have referred several times to the need for a re-energised quest for svelteness. Just cannot go on loading up los online Wish Lists with forgiving tunic tops, jackets with ‘buverage’ (bum coverage) and nightie-like frock scenarios. Fabulous shoes can help divert attention from flabulous butts and flanks, but even they only go so far.

Thus, meet my new friend — laab.

Currently, there’s a lot of whizzing up of carb-free, limited lipid meals going on beneath los dusty rafters of Palazzo Trivialista. The other night, Mr Laab went down a treat; it was up there with another current Palazzo Top of the Pops, Bo Luc Lac.

When faced with such carb-impoverished meals, one corner of Signor Seriousimo’s aquiline nose often curls upwards ever so slightly. But as we like to say around these parts (preferably in a nasally, whiny, highly irritating sing-song voice), “You get what you get and you don’t get upset.”

The quest to lose la avoirdupois is not helped by watching food programs at night while trying to physically restrain onself from attacking los chocolate bikkies. Jamie and his whazzings of oil, Guillaume and his udders of butter and Nigella and her forests of coconut milk should really loiter on other people’s TV screens. Skinnier people’s TV screens.

Also not helping was lunch yesterday at one of la faves, Bridge Room. I am sorry to report that a ducky was killed in the making of that pleasurable experience. But not for nothing did he give up his life — I savoured every morsel of his subcutaneous chubbiness and crispy skin. He went so well with Potato Puree with Joseph Olive Oil.

Rather than leave you with unpleasant mental images of duckicide or my post 40 35 physical excesses, I’ll instead say goodbye on a different note: the acceptable face of chub.

It’s my male Junior Cost Centre’s still well-upholstered little paws. If only society saw equal beauty in my porridge tummy, we’d all be at peace.

And eating less rabbit food.

x

We love a bit of knob-twiddling at the Triv Media Control Console here beneath the dusty rafters of Palazzo Trivialista. Especially when los knobs twiddle our attentions toward the best of the best, Mail Online’s showbiz section.

If this is what divorce has done to HK’s fash sense, bring back Seal…

Anyone know Heidi? If so, maybe you’ve been in touch to ask her what the bejeezers is going on with this outfit? Her fash sense has always bordered slightly on the cashed-up bogan, but this is just one turquoise bedazzled lace-up catasptophe too far.

And here she is at the after-soirée, for better or wurst…

Mail Online captioned this pic — which was Heidi’s own, posted on Twitter — thus:  “After the ceremony Heidi was delighted she finally got the chance to eat some sausages.”

Srsly, La laughed so hard gaskets threatened to burst.

Our old friend Matthew McConauchinachaghey has obviously heard about the Oscar-attracting powers of physical transformation; here he is in character for his upcoming role as an HIV sufferer.

Sheesh!  Where does he get the willpower? And can he pls bottle some and flog it on Net-a-Porter?

La’s loathe to be unkind to Katie; after all she had the good, gutsy sense to leave that buffoon she was hypnotised by married to, and she’s now a single mom doing her best in La Big Apple, albeit backed by some hefty maintenance payments for her loin fruit. But Katie, in addition to continuing to carve out a seemingly successful Broadway career, wants us to buy her Holmes & Yang frocks. Yet look at how she dresses most of la time! Ploise! Think this is proof that Bi-Polar Fash Mash Disorder, à la Seed and Country Road, can apply to people too.

So — Mail Online. Do yourself a favour.

Funking the whole Triv Spectacular up is an ongoing project, a destination that will never be reached, a perpetual quest for excellence.  To that unreachable end, here are the sunnies Seriousimo is not yet aware he’s bought me for Christmas.  They’re on their way to the Wide Brown land with a Rag & Bone top — as everyone knows, Rag & Bone = immediate injection of cool youthfulness / cool youthfulness. Now that La’s over the age of 40 35, this is tremendously helpful.

But what to buy Seriousimo?  Egads La hates buying for men (apart from La Pappa Trivialista, as he’s a clotheshorse, ergo a cinch to shop for). Seriousimo is particularly difficult because he’s, well, serious.  Our letterbox has almost collapsed under the weight of past giftings of worthy subscription tomes. You know the sort — Atlantics, NY Review of Bookses, London Review of Bookses, Economistas. La’s all subbed out. And now when he gets a break from los legal briefs, he’s most likely to be found blinking at his Kindle, known beneath los dusty rafters as the Kris Krindle, it having been a Yuletide gift and all.

And ideas? If only he were as easy to please as La.

x

Things were bats**t crazy at the Wordporium last week; lost the will to blog. Particularly after La also lost The Race That Stops A Nation and the $100m Lotto.

Really missed Yankee Doodle, winner of La’s Colleague of the Year crown for eight years running; she was on holiday last week but back tomorrow so finally there’ll once again be someone to moan to who’s both sympa and less than two metres away during business hours.

En route to the Wordy this Day of Mon, various Big Questions elbowed each other among los cogalinos of la creaky old brain. Here they are. Health warning: some are not trivial.

1. Does fatherhood give some blokes pause about past behaviour? Heard a song on the radio, the self-same song a particularly cruel former flame put on a cracker of a mixed tape for La sometime around 1995. It was by Los Wannadies. La srsly nearly wore out the magnetisation on that tape, such was la love for it, and for him. Let’s just say that, for a nasty couple of years there, he was the cat and La was the ball of string.

Despite the fact this particular bloke is on los TV screens on a regular basis (but not Palazzo Trivialista’s; we’re mostly an ABC news famiglia, with the occasional viewing of TEN News at Five if we’re home), La rarely if ever thinks of him. But music is a powerful trigger — godammit — and I found myself thinking back to how mean he was, and wondering whether, now that he has a female loin fruit, he ever thinks about how blokes will handle her heart.

This gives away satisfactorily little about his identity; suffice to say he is an occasional tie-wearer

2. Have you ever eaten here? If you have, you’ll know it’s crazy good. If you haven’t cottaged and frottaged up to its mid-20th century Scandi-inspired gorgeousness and top grub, you should.

3. Contemplating a party in the Harbour City for your loin fruits?  Call Mr Soccer. He traipsed his fabbo inflatable boundary and his amazingly upbeat, energetic coaches to La neck of los woods yesterday and did the male JCC’s 5th birthday party (which I can’t talk about yet in any more detail than that, otherwise los ovaries will hurt).

Party was an unadulterated H-I-T. Sarah Terrific-Home even mooted the possibility of us pooling spondoolies and getting Mr Soccer to come every Sunday morning. May instigate a capital-raising.

Remember how funny we thought it was that there were three of them but they called themselves “twins“? Oh, how La misses that crazy knee-slapping 80s humour!

4. Do you miss vinyl? I don’t, as I was an early adopter, hugely ahead of la time, and made the leap from transistor radio straight to cassettes. But this gem was gifted by my amigo Lali to my male JCC, so he could form some understanding of what a “record” was. La’ve brought it into the Wordy as I’ve been called upon to make a the-world-is-changing-fast style video production, and this will feature prominently in a highly original, un-cliched and truly unpredictable montage spanning a gramophone to — you guessed it — an iPod.  Shove over, Spielberg, there’s a new wunderkind on the block.

5. Are you happy we have four more years of elegance and eloquence in the White House? I am, as is the entire Famiglia Trivialista-Seriousimo, as we Know People Who Know People. Word on the Hill is that our good friend, The Colonel, will rejoin the administration, which can only mean one thing for our famiglia caravana: another trip to DC and another whirl or two around that amazing building. Bring it on.

6. Have you been wondering what it’s like to stay in my fantasy Paris appartement? You know — the one I was to buy with last Tuesday’s winnings? Well, in an amazing co-inky-dink, La Triv reader Ms Vampire Slayer, herself an exercise in chic Parisienne glamour, has reported that she recently did just that! Here’s her guest post report: “It was impressive. Large – two rooms were left unused [Ed: And she has several loin fruits]. Bigger than our house. Twas a melancholic farewell.” Good on you VS!

Enjoy the day. Be the cat, not the ball of string.

x

On the way to the Wordporium this morning, La took a call from the female Junior Cost Centre (JCC).

“Who are you voting for today?”

Los cogolinos of the creaky old brain whirred away. La first instinct was to remind her that, as we are not Yankee Doodles, we are ineligible to vote in the Obama/Romney face-off.

Sizing up my silence as the general maternal cluelessness she’s becoming increasingly frustrated by, she continued, “Which horse? Which horse are you voting for?!”

Today, mes amis in Palestinian Territories, Occupied, Belgium, Singapore and Turkey (though La suspects the Ottoman reader was La Mamma Trivialista during her recent holiday) and ports closer to home, is Melbourne Cup day in the Wide Brown Land.

For many it’s a srs horse race, a chance to make good on form well-followed, a day to be wined and dined and do crazy things with fake flowers, headbands and a glue gun.

Today is also $100m Lotto day.

For La, winning against the odds is a simple matter of supply and demand.

Currently, supply of these things is low.

Mulberry frocks. In fact, Mulberry goods in general. There’s always room in La Closetta Trivialista for more Mulbers.

Miu Miu shoes. Again, demand is high and supply frustratingly low.

Real diamonds. These fake Country Road brooches will have to do for now, or at least til la luck comes in this afternoon.

Flash handbags. This is Whistles, but now that I’m over 40 35, it’s high time for a bit of Dior ladybag action.

And there’s always room beneath the dusty rafters of Palazzo Trivialista for more Alexis, and sparkly accoutrements in general.

So that about covers current demand.  Oh, other than this.

Courtesy Havens in Paris — gods bless those people

My appartement in Paris.

And here’s how the demand will be met.

Yes, TWO Lights of Heaven… that nag had better get up

May the gods of fortune smile on you and me this lucky, lucky first Tuesday in November.

x

In the famous words of Florence:

You hit me once
I hit you back
You gave a kick
I gave a slap
You smashed a plate over my head
And I set fire to our bed

And that about sums up La mood on this Day of Mon.

So what’s got the angry ants going in los rantypants?

• Fighting loin fruits. Which they were all weekend. I try to impress upon each of them that the existence of the other inoculates them from solo care of a one-day incontinent La Triv, but they appear not to give two craps.

• Seriousimo staying up til midnight for the past five nights fighting his way to the top of a tower of legal briefs. Then, no matter how quiet he tries to be, waking La up upon his ingress into la marital bed of deceit*.

• Then this morning, this chump and his fracking dual leaf-blowers. Gods, La hates leaf-blowers.

• Forgetting los wedding rings, then needing to worry that some cougar-fancying bloke will try and pick me up they will go missing from Palazzo Trivialista and I will be forced to blame loin fruits or domestic help for their disappearance.

• Uploading picture of naked left hand and becoming depressed at increasingly scaly, aged nature of formerly plump, youthful handskin.

• Unreconstructed Harbour City residents farting on the bus. Leave it at home, people.

• Unforgiving nature of Harbour City sunshine taking too high a toll on formerly plump, youthful handskin and faceskin. Egads La dreads summer.

• Being greeted by enormous dead tuna upon entry to the food court beneath the Wordporium.

• Owning 22 tubes of Nars Tempest lip gloss (approximately one per handbag) and finding none in il rucksacko. Srsly, who do you have to pay around here for a functioning brain?

• Discovering presence of no more than 20 cents in la wallet. So no nerve-calming java jolt for La this morning. Not good news for anyone.

• And, finally, there was this.  La works on Level 20. Say no more.

Let’s hope my Day of Mon improves, and that yours is already infinitely better x

*For morally inclined readers or those who might accuse La of oversharing, the term ‘marital bed of deceit’ relates to the underside of the bed in its occasional role as a hideyhole for unapproved purchases. They rest there until such time as it’s officially the truth to say to Seriousimo, “What? This old thing? I’ve had it for ages…”