Monthly Archives: January 2013

Tho’ Triv’s a Queenslander, this post is not about flood clean-ups.

It’s about something much more fun — making the most of the fag-end of sale time on the interwebs.

Now, La’ll only proceed with this post if los beloved readers in far-flung spots across the globe swear, I mean solemnly swear, not to breathe a word of it to Seriousimo. I’m sad to say word has occasionally been leaking back to him, osmosis-style, about los occasional purchases and the fact that I’ve pressed the Marital Bed of Deceit back into service. Srsly, you’ll get me into trouble. Loose lips sink wardrobes. If the blabbing continues, I may even be forced to start clothing laself from — heaven forbid — Target.  Frankly, La’d prefer a long custodial sentence at Silverwater.

Yesterday, I undertook a fairly routine scan of the webs.  Cottaged and frottaged up to NAP, visited Tibi (curse them and their obstinate refusal to ship to la Wide Brown Land), pressed la nez up against the virtual glass of Rag & Bone (=immediate injection of cool) (oh, and by the way, how good is Mossy looking virtually make up-free and almost 40 on their splash page? Gods bless that woman), and rounded it all out with — take a deep breath — a step across the digital threshold of Country Road, peeping at this in particular:

…which was thinking should be paired with this:

Anyhow, then La pranced, Pretty Woman-style, into my old friend MyWardrobe.

And cleaned up.

La love of Bionda Castana shoes is well documented here beneath the virtual dusty rafters of latrivialista.com. Those clodhoppers are guaranteed to stand you tall and proud. Bunions be damned — have said it before and will say it again:  suck it up, princesses. In that spirit, meet my new BFF, Loren. She’s even easier to love when she’s reduced from $600 to $115.

And I also mopped up some Tibi — Jude and Paloma, specifically — for the princessly sum of $76 each. Yup — you read that right, sub-$100 (a ‘lettuce’ as it’s sometimes known around these parts). Both priced at only 20% of their former full-freight glory.

The dacks are unconventional, I’ll admit, but la plan is to style ’em up with a longline cardi and high booties. As you know, funking up the Triv Spectacular is a rolling mission, a destinationless journey.

You know what..? Go on — blab to that Seriousimo. These kinds of savings should be shouted from los rooftops. You tell that man what a stylish — and frugal — Scot of a wife he’s damned lucky to have snared.

You never know, it just might stand me in better stead for the summer sales.

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Whether it’s the imminent onset of yet another birthday nudging La even further over 40 35, or just the need for speed, I know not.

But I bought a scooter.

Yup, I am no longer just a walking, talking midlife crisis, but a walking, talking midlife crisis on wheels.

Was inspired by the venerable Sarah Terrific-Home, who received one from Santa and has already clocked up lots of Micro miles.

She and I are planning some scoots sometime soon, and – mark my words – I will wipe la floor with that woman. She will choke on my scooting dust.

The Junior Cost Centres are very impressed with la prowess. Female JCC was even heard to remark, “Wow Mum, I think you’ve really got it now!”

Tricks remain a work in progress.

X

No, this is not a post about Farrah Fawcett’s hair.

For los readers in far-flung corners of la globe (hello, Morocco! We hope one day to partake of your bazaars and pigeon pies!), this is something of a cultural tutorial.

And it’s about how we watch movies here in the Wide Brown Land.

First up, you ensure you’re married to someone whose workplace has secured a prime seating and VIP hospitality package.

Then you collect your ticket and a complimentary Lindor ball. You try and remember to take a photo of said ball intact, but – as if by gluttony magic – it’s gone before you can snap.

You familiarise self with ginormous screen framed by various cityscape Wordporia in the dying of the light.

You turn slightly to the right and take in cinematic view of iconic Harbour City trophy infrastructures.

You channel Ms Smuggy McSmuggerson as you breeze past los hoi polloi en route to corporate hospitality zone. At this point, you know something French, bubbly and flute-shaped has your name on it, and you begin your excitable, pre-champers breathing patterns.

Your hosts for the evening have kindly assigned you a table inside, as a precaution against temperamental skies.

You eat your bodyweight in great food, and – at the end of the savoury portion of the meal – rekindle your long lost love of chocolate mousse.

Which you are allowed to eat in your seat, as the big red screen rises from the water.

Then, the big red screen fills with images of the big red ball.

And then, the big red screen seems to know its own special route to your heart, as it fills with images of Paris.

You laugh, you cry, you squeeze Seriousimo’s Rolex-clad claw. Then it’s time to head home.

And that’s how we do movies ’round here.

So, it was decided — in partnership with Signor Seriousimo’s Il Pappa and La Mamma Seriousimo, visiting from those Great United Kingdoms — that we would embark upon the joint purchase of a srs piece of manjewels for SS’s 40th.

Il Pappa Seriousimo has had his Rolex for 25 years; it was chosen as a 60th birthday present for him by Signor Seriousimo when he was but a pubescent sapling of 15. So we knew this was most likely to be Seriousimo’s marquee timepiece of choice.

We ushered him into a tick-tock emporium in the bowels of the Harbour City, told him not to moan about any aspect of the exercise and ordered him to get looking at los timepieces.  One has to be forceful with Seriousimo — just as well for him he married someone as bossy as La.

Having done la research, I had selected four specimens priced toward the bottom lower range of il Rolex spectrum. My preference was for one without a date, that model being the – ahem – most economically priced of the lot.

However, when he sat down, he pointed at the following picture and announced, “I like that one.”

That one — we were politely informed — was platinum, and priced at $60,000.

Thankfully, Seriousimo saw sense and agreed that choice may not have been in our famiglia’s best financial interests, and we moved on.

His next choice was a lovely model with a smart navy-blue face — and a date.

“You sure you want the date?” La inquired, gently.

“I love having the date — I look at it on my watch about 20 times a day,” came his reply.

“But isn’t the date on your BlackBerry? You’re always looking at that,” I snapped said.

“Well, yeah, but it’s much easier to look at it on a watch.”

“Can’t I buy you a desk calendar?” I begged, a note of urgency creeping in, my upbeat, best-wife-ever, it’s-your-time-you’re-turning-40-anything-you-want-it’sallaboutyou demeanour threating to sour. “A Far Side one..?”

But by then, it was done.  Mind made up.  “I’d like the one with the date,” he said firmly. And so it came to pass.

So proud of his new manjewels is Seriousimo that he even toddled off in his lunch hour to buy some glasses cleaning cloths “special microfibre cloths” for polishing its face. All the better for seeing that all important date, one supposes.

Tick, tock… oh, sorry, that would be three ticks per second, La’s reliably informed.

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Yep, La’ve been nabbed again. Am live-blogging here from beneath the dusty rafters of a jury assembly room at a prominent Harbour City palazzo of justice.

It seems that once the Sheriff of the great colony of New South Wales gets you in his cross-hairs, there’s no escaping until you’ve done your civic duty by locking los bastards up (of course, only the ones who look guilty).

We’re not without entertainment, though: Oprah’s chum Dr Oz is on the box extolling the benefits of different breeds of hand sanitiser and quizzing his audience on how to get a good night’s sleep. (My vote after six consecutive nights of shitty shut-eye? Have loin fruits who don’t wake you up.)

Like any would-be juror with some semblance of a life, La’s about to plead la case for getting off: primary care of two Junior Cost Centres two days a week til school resumes (that happy, much longed-for day when trumpets sound, angels sing and cherubs cloud hop. Anyone else looking forward to it?)

Oh my gods, Dr Oz is now talking about how to boost your sex drive! And am in a room with hundreds of complete strangers!!! What fresh hell is this, I ask you?!?

More later.

X

This weekend, Signor Seriousimo greets a watershed birthday. So La instituted a significant capital raising, completed a book build and allocated junior, senior and subordinated debt parcels. Then I went shopping.

Suffice to say I’m a good wife, in manner of Julianna Margulies. But hopefully without the infidelity and exhausting life of a full-time lawyer and political spouse.

More to come.

Don’t know how domestic life ticks along beneath your dusty rafters, but here’s an insight into how it goes beneath ours:

Apparently La has a reputation for whipping los vessels into la dishwasher before certain people get to use them a second time. And this, I am told via a hot pink Post-It, is causing some consternation.

Penthouse problems, eh?

Meanwhile, La’ve been thinking about instituting an eat-less-move-more program for los Junior Cost Centres.

They have srsly chubbed up these school hols and DOCS will be onto me before I know it if I’m not careful.

Signor Seriousimo is recovering well from his stingray sting. Some consultation with the deity Google has revealed that he was likely to have been victimised not by a fully-fledged stingray, but rather by a little tiddler called a stingaree. So there is some distance between the great marine creature who put paid to Steve Irwin’s days on earth and the cocktail-coaster sized fellow whom Seriousimo’s clodhoppers disturbed.

But let’s not tell him that, or – crikey! – we might have trouble on our hands.

Ciao x

Ah, summer.

Amazing sunsets.

Balmy Palmie (Palm Beach for los readers in Bulgaria, Romania and points further afield).

And we all know no visit to la plage is complete without a bit of retail therapy.

Female Junior Cost Centre tried some beachside interiors on for size.

This morning’s visit to a secret harbourside beach locale yielded some curious seaweed. And, trust me, even though it’s a doggy beach, it is seaweed.

Seriousimo and La eyed up some luxe seaside property…

…before we ended up here.

Where we still are.

Wait for it: Seriousimo has been bitten by a sting ray. La tell you, that man does nothing by halves.

So I guess lunch by the beach is off the agenda, for today.