The promised land (PM)

Holy smokes. I forgot about my crab responsibilities until about midday on Friday. I thought I was really on top of things this week but no, it looks like I'm not. Right now, KB is playing with the kitchen bin which is his favourite toy so I'm going to steal a few moments to say this: late October me will probably be  tired and shabbily groomed, just like July me. But compared with second half of 2015 me, she is as polished as QEII. 

Onwards to October! 

Aaaaaarghhhh (AM)

It was LB's birthday yesterday. And what better way to celebrate than take the day off work and just relax. So that is exactly what I did. LB didn't. He went to work as usual. He has an exam today so he wasn't really in the mood or position to celebrate. Me, I just felt like I needed a day to take care of some shit.

Last Wednesday I had a really annoying day at work, compounded by the fact that I had all these extra things to do: call a lawyer, call a bank, post some letters, clean the house, do a bunch of freelance work I've committed to doing, go to the city to buy some shu uemura face wash, get some blood tests, repot some plants, massively clean and overhaul the backyard, do all the serious house cleaning things like clean windows and pantry and a million more things, think of a birthday present for LB, be a loving and present mother to my children.

Frankly it was too much. And on top of that I've developed a twitch in my eye which periodically reminds me that I'm quite stressed. Just in case my brain decides to forget about the stress momentarily my body will remind me. Thanks body.  So I decided I'd take yesterday off work to get a jump on things. I felt really effing good about my decision. But then the list of things I wanted to do with my day off became unmanageable. The vital things included: getting my shu uemura face wash (yes, I could buy it online but why would I want to pay shipping for a product I could buy so close to my house?!?), cleaning the house, make dinner while everyone was out, freelance work, enjoy a coffee by myself. Then the list started growing: do serious house cleaning of all the second tier jobs, get a manicure or maybe a facial something real nice like that, a spot of shopping would be nice, get the blood test, get my legs waxed, my eyebrows done.

The list got so out of hand it became as stressful as my everyday life, it became practically paralysing. I started trying to plan my day but I found it impossible to prioritise the boring stuff like cleaning and work over the nice stuff like shopping and grooming, but because I knew that the boring stuff would help make my life overall better I couldn't really commit to just doing the nice stuff so basically I just ended up doing a half arsed version of everything. I looked in a few shops, I finally bought my face wash and I got my legs waxed too. And my eyebrows done. I cleaned the house in a regular way, but didn't even get around to doing the bedrooms. I still didn't get all the freelance work done and the garden is a mess, but all of my boring phone calls have been made. I don't know when I will ever get a blood test.

Apparently I am fucking rubbish at being an adult and actually need to dedicate my working week just to doing the things that constitute functioning as a human in this modern world. So just when I thought I was alright at it, turns out I'm not.

Oh well. At least I got to include a picture of Leonardo in this post. Why? Because it's (half) my blog I'll do whatever the hell I want!!! Just jokes, because it was his birthday yesterday too (or today, given timezone differences) and I thought we should celebrate by remembering a simpler time when all I had to worry about was movies and unrequited crushes. Sigh.

Appreciate it now! (AM)

Chickpea has been doing me the excellent favour of looking after Newbie one day a week while I do some volunteer work. Yeah, I'm a pretty fucking great person.

It is really nice of her to do it, take time out her week on the regular like that. On the flip side she does get to hang out with the cutest effing 18-month-old living today, so really who is doing who the favour?

The other day she was over in the morning and I was getting ready to leave, performing my morning ablutions and what have you.  I have pretty great light in my bathroom, which is an excellent feature for a bathroom to have; it means time spent in there is pleasant and that performing grooming tasks that require good light is much easier. It also means that standing in front of the mirror in the morning you get a pretty good look at yourself. So as I left the bathroom I said to Chickpea, "God, I wish I'd appreciated my skin when I was younger." To which she yelled, "Appreciate it now!"

Of course. Of course! Lately when I look in the mirror and feel dejected at the natural aging that my skin has undergone and that is evident for all the world to see, all I think is, "Ugh, here it is. The signs of aging. And it's only going to get worse. If only I knew what I had when my skin was younger and better." What a total idiot! It's only going to get worse. Now is the time I should know what I have! Yes, I should have known then, but I also should know now! This is as good as my skin will ever look again, probably. Unless I get rich and can afford some great skin care regime. But even then, that will only help if I get rich pretty soon cause even some fancy skin care isn't going to take many years of my face. I know that.

Having an older sister is great, because they go through all the things before you and can give you excellent advice! Sure, I felt pretty stupid for not realising that I should be appreciating all the benefits of relative youth that I was lamenting not appreciating before, but mostly I just felt glad for her sage advice. And I barely even resented it when she didn't give me my change after buying vietnamese salad rolls later that day.

Still what I do with that advice, I don't really know. I guess I should just stop feeling bad about my mild wrinkles and feel happy that they're still pretty mild. Yeah, that's it. At least with age and wrinkles, wisdom comes too.

Back to basics (AM)

Hello crab friends. Winter hiatus is over! Part 2 of 2015 has begun!

As you probably know, I spent part of the hiatus having a baby and the rest of it keeping the baby alive.  So you can imagine, the world has changed a lot for me. (Mate, your were spot on when you said this and also OMG, it hadn't sunk in that you blogged from the labour ward when Newbie was born, and what that means. Far out.)

But as they say, the more things change, the more they stay the same. Even though the last month has been a goddamn thunderstorm of transformation and change and terror and the like, an aspect of my old life has endured. Not just endured, it's clung on for dear life, like those people who the Doctors are sure will die when you turn their life support off and then the family makes the difficult decision to do that but then when they switch the machines off the people live! They live! 

That thing is my hair, you guys. It's a classic Miss Soft Crab preoccupation and even though there is a tiny crab in my life these days, it has only become more intense. 

Pregnancy was kind to my hair. It became thick and awesome and would basically look good without me having to do anything. I knew it was a temporary state, so I decided to just enjoy it while it lasted. And it's not like as soon as the baby was born my hair started to look lank and thin again. No. The problem was that as soon as the baby was born I realised that I hadn't made it to the hairdresser to get  a fringe trim before the baby was born. It was one of only two things on my list of things to do before I have a baby! The other was go to the movies a lot, which I did (well, I went twice). But the baby came early. I was caught off guard. So my fringe just grew and grew. 

A too-long fringe is highly annoying, and normally culminates in me waking up one morning, thinking I can't take it anymore and then arranging to get a haircut that very same day. That day arrived about 2 days after the baby was born. But when you've just had a baby, you can' t just go and do things because you decide you can't take it anymore. So for three weeks I felt infuriated by my fringe during most every minute of every hour of the day. And because of new baby, I was awake for quite a considerable number of those minutes and hours. But how the hell would I ever find the time to get a fringe trim? I really couldn't see the way forward. I started pinning it back with bobby pins and wearing a head scarf a couple of times (not that I know how to do that) but that just made me paranoid that I looked really terrible and was 'letting myself go'. It's a confusing time, the first few weeks. 

Anyway, after crying on the phone to my Mum and in all the rooms in the house to Appleheart, we all decided that I had to get a haircut as a matter of priority. 

I made an appointment at a local place which turned out to be very cute. The hairdresser was very sweet and her business is a one-man-band. She had excellent hair and when I saw that, I relaxed into the chair knowing that everything would be alright. 

I relaxed a little too much I think, because I didn't really explain what I wanted and the haircut she gave me has a few too many layers in it I think. And I'm worried that as my pregnancy hair starts to fall out, this haircut will look worse and worse. 

But it doesn't matter. I'm pretty sure that even if the haircut was great, I would still spend a lot of time thinking about my hair. Worrying about how it will look as it falls out. Worrying about whether it will change, which is something that can happen what with all the baby hormones. I would still be preoccupied with my hair because I am half of Miss Soft Crab and that's what we do. Even when everything changes. That doesn't. 

Hour of shower (AM)

The other night I had an hour of shower. It was rad. Rad! I didn't shower for that whole hour. I'm not an animal. I showered - washed my hair, exfoliated body and face - then I turned off the shower and sat in the bath with a face mask on. Then I showered everything off me and got out. And THEN I moisturised my body, put four beauty products on my face and blow dried my hair. I went in at 10pm after The Movie Show, which is technically called At the Movies, finished and then I got into bed at 11. 

In my fantasy world I do this regularly. But let me make it completely clear that my fantasy world is a fantasy and not reality at all. In my fantasy world I probably have an hour of shower where I perform all the additional grooming tasks at least once a week. And naturally I'd look good and feel great as a result. I know most normal people don't do face masks and exfoliating and body moisturising regularly but I want to. Though I never have. I do s prolonged grooming session about once every six months maybe. I think how nice it is and how I'd love to do it regularly. You know. What I just said. I think it's what called a vicious cycle. 

This ultra grooming fantasy exists in the same fantasy world in which I wake up an hour before everyone in my house and do exercise. But it's a different fantasy world to the one where I win Tattslotto. Or get a really great, satisfying, well-paid job. Which may exist in the Tattslotto fantasy world. What can I say, I've got a rich inner life. 

I'd consider adding hour of shower to my spring resolutions but I feel conflicted about prioritising grooming to that extent. As if 41 posts bearing the 'grooming' tag isn't testimony enough to my vanity. God, when did showers become so complicated?!

No scrubs (PM)

My hair today, I've been kinda busy and haven't washed it since Sunday, FYI.

Let's not go crazy, my hair did not quite look awesome for my year of no scrubs, but it was pretty good. It was a pretty good time in the life of my hair. And I fully support your move mate. You are nearly through the hardest part! And that's exciting! Just a few more days, a week tops and all those natural oils will be balanced and doing what they should do. Most likely. 

Ironically (or something) I actually wash my hair more than ever these days. If I had the patience to get through the initial hard weeks of a no scrubs campaign maybe I'd run one myself, but when a lady is constantly covered in baby spew and her own breast milk and has to limit her wardrobe to sensible boob-accessible outfits and has no social life to make her bother to look nice, it's the little things like clean hair that help. And my hair looks best these days after a wash. Oh sure it'd probably look good after three weeks of no washing but in these heady times of internet and smart phones who has time for that. Kudos, mate for this slow hair movement you've embraced. 

No scrubs (AM)

Guess what I'm doing? Or NOT doing more like it? 

That's right readers. I'm not washing my hair. I've thought about it for ages and now I'm finally doing it. 

As you all know, I pretty much hate my hair all of the time. Sure, I have the occasional day where it looks half decent, but most of the time it's a mess that I don't know what to do with. The not washing phenomenon (or 'no poo' as the Internet calls it, or 'no scrubs' as I like to call it) which J and my former hairdresser was a fan of, seems like it could be perfect for me. Apparently it lets hair reclaim it's natural waves, which I know are there beneath all the frizz. Apparently it makes hair look lighter, which if true will help me kill another bird with the same stone, that being the bird that chirps to me about dying my hair blonde. It could be the answer to my prayers. Of course if could also look really really shit, which is absolutely not one of my prayers. Early indications are not good. It's been about 10 days and as you can see from the above, hair ain't be wavin', hair be frizzin'. Here's another shot. 

Oh, I should mention that I  washing my fringe because it just looks too shit without it. But everything else is strictly no scrubs. 

Oh, and here's a walnut stuffed shortbread I ate today. Delicious. 

But back to the hair. J is really my inspiration for this. She didn't wash her hair for a year and her hair looked awesome. It filled me with awe! It looked excellent every day for a year. If I could have just a little bit of her success I would be over the moon. I plan to blog about it regularly so we can all go on this scrubleas journey together. Away we go, readers. 

Better out than in (AM)

Every so often Miss Soft Crab turns her mind to something quite meaningless and fixates on it good and proper, even though she knows it's stupid to be fixating on that thing and there's a strong chance that the only reason she is doing so is because of her old friend menses.

That time is now, readers.  If you're in no mood for inanity, I suggest you come back next week because this post is a doozy. Here's the situation. 

My hair is really really boring but I don't want to get it cut because I am trying to grow it and I'm too lazy to do anything with it.  All I want is for my hair to look really great, and like I don't have to put much work in to it, because I don't want to put any work in to it.  Instead I have a lank, pre-mid length bob coloured bark-brown with a fringe that's way too long and no matter how much I pretend, I know it absolutely does need a fair amount of work to look decent. 

Something like this would be nice:

Or this. 

Instead I have this:

But I don't have Jane's fit rig to serve as a distraction.

Blergh! 

Cure All (PM)

Whoa. 
Are you telling me that yesterday, when you came and met me for a coffee and you were wearing your boyfriend jeans and a stripey t-shirt and I thought both you and your hair looked really good, I was just dazzled by your red lipstick?
Whoa. That stuff is powerful.
But wait a second. Now I think about it, I'm pretty sure your lipstick was pink, not red. And you still looked really good.
So explain that to me, Mate!

Cure all (AM)

When you're feeling like a frump

And your clothes look really dumb

What do you do?

Red lipstick

When you're hair is really frizzy

And you're looking kind of shitty

What do you do?

Red lipstick

After the immediate high of discovering the comfort of 'boyfriend' jeans wore off, my blinkers came down and I realised that they actually look quite shit. Still, I can't resist wearing those comfortable little bastards. This coupled with my awful haircut, which with this stupid effing weather is always frizzy as fuck has led to more than a few...how do you say?...days of looking shit. 

One day last week when I was wearing my unflattering baggy jeans and nature had turned my hair into a stupid hunk of frizz on my head I could barely believe I had to leave the house in that state, but then I figured out a way to fool myself and the world into thinking all the ugliness going on was a legitimate fashion choice - red lipstick. Who wears red lipstick? Fashionable women, confident women, women who are making totally legitimate fashion choices. A woman that bothers to wear bright red lipstick must care about what she looks like, right? Pairing ugly hair and jeans with super stylish lipstick must be some  kind of super stylish ironic fashion statement right? Yep? Yep!

No thanks (AM)

I got an email from Kit cosmetics the other day telling me I could look like a Kardashian. In only 15 minutes no less! Ha! No thanks! 

This was the image at the top of the email:

Basically, this is what happened in my brain: 

Eeeeeeeewwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww.

Gee, you'd hate to be Khloe. And not just because she's the fat one. Also she has the worst nose job. Plus that stupid name. But maybe that other one that's not Kim is miserable. I don't even know her name. But maybe she likes it like that. Being a Kardashian would have to suck. Eww they're so gross. 

I don't understand this whole nude lip phenomenon. An understated lip, sure, but that look where you look literally lipless because your lipstick is the same colour as your foundation, WTF?!

And then my train of thought changed when I saw this:

I want to rub that gold on my face. I love gooooold. Oh, sure, I don't know that the Kardashians really glow. If they did  I doubt you could tell with all that other shit they wear on their face. Plus can a mask really give you a glow? Probably not but reality never stopped me buying beauty products before. But I could never bring myself to buy a product with the word Kardashian in it, could I? Could I. 

Luckily all I had to do was look at there stupid faces to know the answer. Still I can't help wonder about that gold goo.

Stupid Kardashians.

Three days, one rollercoaster (PM)

A few things that went through my mind while reading this morning's post. I'll spare you the extremely boring bits and just share the moderately boring ones.

First:

Mondonna's answer to J's admiration of her nails was 'Get polish?'. And J was impressed by that? J has heaps of polish. She 'gets' polish on a fundamental level.  Oh, oh I see. It actually says GEL polish. That makes more sense.

Then, in response to that photo:

J has such lovely hands. What a lovely nailpolish colour. So right for winter. 
Then, after gazing at my hands:
Stupid peasant hands. You are the hands of a woman who comes from a long line of potato gleaners. Why can't you be more like your crabsister J's mitts?

Then, when it transpired that Chickpea joined J at Tips and Toes:

What a magical night! That would have been taking place while I was watching At World's End, the shittest movie ever at a cinema in Manly on Friday night. I was wishing the world would end while those guys' lives were just beginning, sort of. 

Then, when I saw the photo of the chipped nails:

Oh, poor J. I must tell her that I know some people who, after a few manicures,  choose their favourite colour and buy a bottle. They take the bottle with them to Tips and Toes or wherever and then can patch up if needs be. It's smart thinking. I must tell J about that. 

And this is me telling J about that.
The dream is NOT over.
It's just a modified one where you either can't try heaps of new colours when you get a fortnightly manicure, or you can't do house renos in the days after.
But apart from those restrictions the dream is very much alive.

Three days, one roller coaster (AM)

When I was in LA I noticed that Mondonna's nails looked really good, painted red and shiny and no chips. 'Gel polish', she told me, 'It's so good, you can do dishes, move house, it doesn't chip and its so cheap here! Come get it with me!'

'Yes!' I said, but it didn't happen. Lodged in my brain though and when we were in NYC I decided to do it! But in the end I chickened out. Did get a regular manicure on the last day though, and it was a great thing to do. I don't usually get manicures, I think they fuck my nails up to much. Also, what a waste of money. But I love them. After a week though they were a little chipped and I thought it was time to take off the polish. And then, on Friday night after work I had some time to kill  before meeting the family for dinner. It was cold and I was bored and my NY nails looked scrappy and I walked past a Tips and Toes and next thing I knew there I was choosing a new polish colour!

So I was a convert. There is something both decadent and soothing about a manicure and as I sat there, with a stranger massaging cream into my hands I could see my future, fortnightly manicures, opportunities to try all the colours I'd ever dreamed of. The future of my nails looked bright and beautiful and I couldn't wait. Chickpea walked past Tips and Toes on the way to dinner too, and while looking longingly at the massage chairs, she noticed me in the back, hand in hand with this small Asian woman. So she came in sat next to me and we talked as if this were the most normal thing in the world. I've seen people talk in beauty parlours in movies a lot, so I brought some of this knowledge to real life and it turns out one can have a normal conversation while a stranger fondles your extremities. This! This is the life.

But you know what the problem is with spending $20 to get a nail colour you don't own applied to your nails? If there are any chips you can't patch it up. And if there are many chips within 48 hours, well you basically just chucked $20 away. I guess a more forward thinking person would have considered if they may do any work on a house renovation in the days after a manicure and then thought better of said manicure. Maybe while working on a house they would have worn gloves or something. They may not have ended up with nails like this less than 48 hours after a manicure.

But even after doing a load of dishes on Saturday I had a small chip, and as soon as that happens the magic is gone.

On the plus side my future definitely looks like I will save $20 a fortnight given i now realise I am not made for regular manicures and there may have been a reason that until a week ago I'd only had 2 manicures in my life. Goodbye,  beautiful dream. Goodbye, beautiful nails.

Or do I just have to go for shellac!?

The nail tutorial (PM)

But shit mate, they look so cute! Obviously I wasn't the one that had to sit around, immobile and with a baby to care for, waiting for the paint to dry but heck, the cuteness of the final product has me thinking that maybe it's worth it.

As for me, my nails are kind of stumpy and nail polish doesn't look that great on them, so I steer clear of it mostly and therefore will never have to face this dilemma. The only thing that makes me want to wear nail polish is so my hands will look more like my Mum's hands. 

Hear me out. 

Lately, I've caught the odd glimpse of my hands and thought wow, they look just like I remember Mum's hands looking when I was little. And I don't know about you people but I LOVED my Mum's hands when I was little. Still do, in fact. They were always holding nice things like snacks or tissues, and they were the things she used when she did all that soothing head patting when I was sick and hand holding when I was crossing the street. And they always had nail polish on them. The pearly kind, that was favoured by women in the 1980s. Still do, in fact. 

Nowadays, when I see my own hands looking like hers all those memories come to me and it instantly makes me feel good. Instantly! And sometimes I think that if I put pearly nail polish on them then the resemblance would be even greater and I would feel great all the time. But then I think I would have pearly nail polish on my hands and that doesn't seem so appealing. 

Anyway Mate, maybe you should think about the magical memories that may be forming in Baby's mind when you have cute nails. Maybe having cute nails makes you a better parent?

The nail tutorial (AM)

A while ago I had this nail polish concept I wanted to try out with a new dress. Well, I had a colour concept and wondered what I could do with it on my nails. Then I remembered that Frandonna had told me about this nail website she looks at and how she does great things on her nails. And I thought about how people are always telling me to watch beauty tutorials on YouTube. Putting that in writing I'm also wondering if they are trying to tell me something about my grooming habits, but let's leave that to another day. Anyway, these thoughts all lead me to one other thought: "Hells yeah, next time I have some Baby-free time that does not need to be filled with cleaning,  blogging, working or sleeping I'm going to learn how to do fancy nails!" Then I chastised myself for a while: "Gee J, why you so shallow, you gonna waste free time on your nails. You disgust me! Write, read, knit, do something productive!" So I put the nail idea out of my head and learnt neither how to do fancy nails nor spend time bettering myself.

And then, just the other day some free time came upon me. And I used it in a bunch of ways. I knitted, read, wrote and then, then I decided I could paint my nails. You see days before that I had been wearing some pink nail polish that had started flaking from the base of my nails and I thought, "Hey, this reverse moon phenomenon that is probably already passe may be onto something. This looks cute!" And so with this free time I decided to reverse moon my nails. First I was going to use two shades of pink, but after reading a tutorial "by" Heidi Klum I decided to go for navy and light green.

Let me give you a run down of how it works.

1. Paint light colour on nails two times. Wait half an hour.

2. Put semicircle sticker on bottom of nail paint dark colour on. Two times.

3. Wait 10 minutes. Remove stickers.

4. Woila!

Sounds simple right. Well, technically it is. But do you know how boring waiting half an hour is? Do you know what it's like when your baby waits up while you are trying some new shit with your nails? Somehow I managed to drop the polish brush and get navy nail polish everywhere. I've never done that before. I blame the fancy nails.



And. Do you know how long it takes four coats of nail polish to dry? From what I can tell, forever.

Sure, I could remove the stickers. And sure my nails did look pretty damn sweet, but every time my nails brushed or knocked a thing the polish smudged. In the end I had to remove it all. Well. I may not have finished the day with hot nails, but at least I gave it a shot, and now I know I don't have to waste time on nail polish tutorials any more. 

Adults only (PM)

Oh, I clean my pantry out all the time. I find it so frustrating when things are all piled up on top of each other and you can’t see what you have so you buy lentils every time you go to the shop and then you find you have 5 bags of lentils in the pantry. Ugh. Also, my pantry is basically all exposed so I do what I can to make it not a horrible clutter in front of my eyes.

But being an adult is not easy. You know what troubles me? How do you pay for a manicure with your nails all wet? I don’t get manicures because I find they make my nails weak, and also as if I would spend money on such a stupid indulgence and also who has the time, and also how do you pay without damaging your polish job?! But I have had manicures and I think about getting them sometimes, because who doesn’t love to spen money on a stupid indulgence now and again? But after your nails are done and they are still wet you are expected to pay, but if you put your hand in your bag for your wallet... BAM.. polish mush! Even if you had the foresight to get your wallet out of your bag first you still have to open your wallet and get a card or money out. BAM...polish mush!

Anyway, nice pantry, Mate.

Haiku Thursday (AM)

The grooming journey continues

I

Hey, yo, concealer

Where have you been all my life

Got me lookin' good

II

Perhaps your special

Age defying qualities

Make the timing right

Haiku Thursday

Hair

My sweet dear hair

You've stayed fairly abundant

And you have stayed brown

It's time to accept

Stop trying to change you. Let's 

Stay together, hair

The keep it to yourself files (AM)

This is a true account of an uncomfortable conversation I had at the beauty parlour the other day, reminiscent of the time my former barista took our morning coffee conversation in an direction that was more related to tea than coffee if you catch my drift.  While it's possible that the last time this happened I was a tad complicit, this time I think I am a total innocent and I'm here it prove it. Want to know more? Well don't just sit there crabby friends, read on readers!

The action takes place in a popular beauty therapy franchise we'll call Vermillion Flutterpie . The lights are fluorescent. The soundtrack is mid-1990s RnB. Think "Waterfalls" by TLC. The ladies who work there are all very sweet girls, some of whom may or may not wear a lot of fake tan and who may or may not get highlights in their hair. If they do get highlights in their hair, they may or may not get them touched up frequently enough to avoid looking rough. 

The particular beauty therapist working on me had a slight hippy bent. Not long after I lay down on the bed, while she was preparing the hot wax, she asked me how my day had been so far. Totally normal for a beauty therapist. I said something or another in response and then she said: 

"It was a full moon last night. Maybe that's why my boyfriend was so aggro."

I have to say I was a little concerned by the direction she was taking the conversation, what with me only having met her once before,  and the preceding conversation having no logical lead in to discussion of moons or boyfs. But I figured because she is a bit of a hippy, it would progress to a conversation about crystals and star signs and I was prepared to go along with it. She was pouring hot wax on my body, after all. I tend to let them talk about whatever they want to talk about when they're holding the wax pot.  

"Oh yes?" I said, trying to sound interested, but not too interested. 
"Yeah" she replied, then went on and on about how her boyfriend had been boozing a little, and this had led to a fight, but he apologised as soon as they woke up this morning. 
"Well that's nice" I said. "It's nice he apologised. He knows he was in the wrong and he admitted it".

She agreed, then told me that it's been tough for him lately because he is unemployed. 

I nodded sympathetically. We've all had unemployed boyfriends before, after all. I was getting ready to  offer some words of comfort when she continued. "He's got  long history of smoking…." at this point she hesitated, so I offered my most sympathetic nod to encourage her. Sure,  I may look like a massive square, but I'm on the level. I know people like to smoke the ganga. I know people like to spark up a doobie. I know the sweet Mary Jane can ease people's pain. I've seen some things in my time*+. So I put a look on my face and gave a tilt to my head that said "go ahead friend, tell me your boyfriend is a massive pot head… you're in a safe place". 
 
I guess it worked, because she went on to finish her sentence with the words "crystal" and "meth". So when you put it all together, she said "He's got a long history of smoking crystal meth".
Um. I know I was the one nodding encouragingly, but since when did hippy beauty therapists start talking about crystal meth instead of actual crystals?? And since when did they think it's OK to talk about that with a person they have only met once before. And not, like, met in real life, just the beauty parlour. Ones that look like massive squares?! Since when did this become an OK thing? I don't think it's an OK thing you guys. Talking about your boyfriend's meth habit with a total stranger and a client at your place of employment. Honestly. Keep it to yourself, am I right? 

And shit you guys, I watch Breaking Bad. Don't smoke meth for pete's sake! It's the worst!

*Do I even need to say this?

+I've seen no things

Haiku Thursday (PM)

The next week
15 and 16
Shower or two. Week's outlook,
Well, you could be worse

That's life
If it's not one thing
It's usually another
This is how it goes

The wrong direction

Grooming on my mind

Won't make me rich or pretty

Must refocus brain