Thirteen Reasons Pinky Knows it's the Silly Season

Artwork by Pinky Poinker

                                                         

1. People are proudly sporting really garish, flashing earrings and necklaces in the shopping centre.

2. I keep finding dozens of tiny pieces of Christmas tree tinsel stuck to the bottom of my feet.

3. The queue is unusually and annoyingly long at Dan Murphy’s.

4. At the shopping centre you see a lot of abnormally dressed up, combed down kids on their way to have a photo taken with Santa.

5. Ads are reappearing on the telly reminding everyone to place their Turducken orders (much to the bitter disappointment and paranoia of Turduckens everywhere).

6. The air conditioner breaks down, the pool filter blows up and some other random but expensive household appliance self-immolates causing unwanted financial loss.

7. The dog has to be taken to the vet because we suspect it ate part of the nativity scene (not baby Jesus). He didn’t but we decide to have his ‘bojangles’ removed as a Christmas present since we’re at the vet anyway.

8. It’s compulsory for every shop assistant to wear red, green or white shirts, mandatory antlers and ask you how your Christmas shopping is going in a blank uninterested monotone.

9. There are at least twelve towels hanging on the pool fence; the toilet seat is always wet when I perch my derriere on it (delivering an unexpected, slithery surprise) and the internal stairs are saturated with chlorinated water providing a sure-fire death trap for Pinky as she carries the laundry up.

10. You can’t turn on the car radio without hearing at least one Michael Buble or Human Nature song.

11. The milk goes off every twenty-four hours due to copious openings and closings of the fridge as teenagers go on rum ball and chocolate reconnaissance missions .

12. I walk in and discover Scotto watching the Mr Bean Christmas Special. AGAIN.

13. If we call out to the dog after we’ve had a few drinks, it runs away and hides cos it knows what’s coming.

P#ss off!

    
 How do you know it's the silly season?

Just how important is that OP score?

Introduced in 1992, the Overall Position (OP) is a tertiary entrance rank used in Queensland for selection into universities. Akin to comparable systems used throughout the rest of Australia, the OP shows how well a student has performed compared to all other OP-eligible students in Queensland.

The night before last, the state’s OP scores were released to frightened, excited and anxious high school graduates all over our state. Slack, slipshod mother that I am, I was unaware of this fact and it wasn’t until late yesterday that seventeen year old daughter Lulu, sombrely informed me of her result.

Let down and dissatisfied, she confidentially requested of her big-mouthed mother to, “Please don’t tell anyone what I got.”

I looked at her final school report which had arrived in the mail while I was away last week.

There was certainly nothing to be ashamed of.

She’d passed everything including top level Mathematics, Chemistry and Biology which her recalcitrant, algebra-challenged mother would have had no hope in hell of accomplishing. (In fact it just took me five goes at spelling ‘recalcitrant’ correctly.)

“Seven per cent in Mathematics!” screeched my own mother when she perused my GRADE TEN report back in the day. I’d earned seven points out of one hundred on my final test, although I must add I’d been placed twentieth in a class of thirty students even with that miserable result. Let’s just say Mathematics was not my forte but I do feel our teacher may have had some questions to answer. I dropped Maths in grade eleven and twelve as it wasn’t compulsory back then and even now still scratch my head at long division.
Lulu has a high enough score to get into the science degree she wants to do and that’s good enough for me. 

Sure… if there’d been less partying; less boy stuff, less Facebook, I’m sure she could have done better, but perhaps it has all been an effective lesson in life for her.

You know, 

Padraic (eighteen year old son), on the other hand, went down the Vocational Education Training (VET) road in grade eleven and twelve so he wasn’t eligible for an OP score.

Imagine my amazement when I received a text from my friend Kyles last night,

“Holy shite!!!!! Padraic got an OP 4. Congrats! All those English assignments you did for him paid off.”

I checked his Facebook page and sure enough he’d posted “OP4 :)”  on his timeline.

Nice and subtle like...



He had over eighty ‘likes’ on the post. Cheeky little bugger.

How to be an UN-EVIL Stepmother

One central character who has not yet been introduced into the insane adventures of Pinky Poinker is “Petal”.

                               Petal at three years of age.


I first met Petal when she was three. Her father and I had only recently met and I remember her soulful brown eyes staring intently and suspiciously at me from the backseat of the car. I think I won her over that day with a princess Barbie and a Happy Meal.

Yes… you guessed right. Pinky is a Stepmother.

Normally Petal lives with her mother in the Southern Queensland Highlands where it’s cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey. The first thing she does when she arrives at Chez Poinker is tear up the stairs and burst into each of her step-siblings bedrooms to announce her arrival.

                             Petal now at twelve years of age.

She then smothers the dogs with kisses, greets the cat and shimmies into her swimmers without delay. Petal then proceeds to spend eight hours every day thrashing around the pool, only taking breaks for the occasional bag of crisps or an icy-pole. I’ve never seen such a water-baby.

The word ‘stepmother’, has bad connotations and stepmothers generally get a bad rap in the press eg; Cinderella, Snow White etc.

I’ve made a list (derived from my personal experience) on how you may avoid being labelled an ‘evil stepmother’ with all its unjust implications.

Don’t spend too much time in front of the mirror comparing your beauty to hers and throwing hissy fits when the mirror smart mouths you.

Try to tone down your natural, maniacal laugh.

Don’t take her to the butchers, order a beef heart then put it into a jewelled box and keep it on your dresser. She might get mixed messages.

Don’t over pluck your eyebrows into sardonic arches.

Don’t wear black, day in and day out.

Don’t walk around the house in a tiara and make your stepdaughter call you Baroness Poinker.

Don’t make her sweep the fireplace.

Don’t make her do the washing up every day and call her “Palmolive”.

Don’t hang around turrets.

Don’t have a crow as a pet.

Don’t go offering her apples all the time, especially if they’re red on one side and green on the other.

Get rid of any warts or large moles on your face.

Book an appointment with the dentist to replace missing teeth.

Above all, … don’t keep pumpkins around the house or you may discover she’s been sneaking out at night.

Jingle Bells Pinky Style!

There’s the Queen st Mall
It’s a shopping holiday
O’er the road we go
Laughing all the way

I hear cashier’s bells
Ringing loud and clear
Lulu’s buying up the town
She’ll spend up big no fear!

Hey! Jingling coins, jingling coins
Jingling all the way
Myer Centre, David Jones
Not enough hours in a day! Hey!

Jingling Coins, jingling coins
Jingling all the way
Oh what fun it is to shop
In Brisbane Mall today.

Pinky drags behind
Blisters and sore back
Finds a comfy chair
While Lulu sorts through racks

So many clothes to see
Dresses, skirts, a top
Oh what fun it is to spend
Her pay from the Donut Shop!

Hey! Jingling coins, jingling coins
Jingling merrily
Pinky needs a good lie down
A Bex and a cup of tea. 

Hey!

Jingling coins, jingling coins
Jingling in her purse
There’s no need to call a cab
Cos Pinky'll need a hearse. 

Hey!...

Pinky has Another Bad Hair Day

                  Brandon, Lulu and Lily: happy-go-lucky teenagers!

Well… I had my hair cut today and must confess I’m going to LOVE it … in about twelve months when the monstrosity grows out.

(I bet Scotto’s glad he’s not here right now to suffer my relentless whinging and complaining.)

I’ve had some doozies over the years and at least this isn’t as bad as some of the hideous choices I’ve made over the last four decades.

Let’s see… there was the ‘Pageboy’ at 10 years old, the ‘Perm’ in the late seventies, the ‘Mullet’ a-la Duran Duran in the Eighties, the ‘Hospital’ cut in the nineties, the ‘Geometric Bob’ last year and now it’s the ‘Hacked-Off Fringe’ - highlighting a bulging forehead, cut.

And why do hairdressers insist on overdoing the oily products? My baby-fine, thin hair doesn’t need to be coated with Moroccan Oil and cuticle-smoothing emulsions which only served to exacerbate the stringy, flat and lifeless style I’m now sporting.

 I gave a photo to the sweet girl I entrusted my future happiness and self-esteem with to create an accurate replica hairstyle.

It didn't work. I wanted to look twenty years old like the chick in the picture but instead I look like a fifty year old bag lady who has neglected to wash her hair for six months.

Not only that, but I have a headache from those ridiculously uncomfortable wash basins. Why haven’t they invented cushioned wash basins?

I know… first world problems.

After my skulking and sulking in the hotel room for an hour or so (with frequent trips to the bathroom to check if it had grown out yet), Lulu finally returned from her lunch with friends and Precious Pinky invited herself to chill out with them for a bit. There's nothing like hanging out with happy-go-lucky teenagers to cheer you up.

Brandon, a talented Under 20s, Broncos Rugby League player, had been the girls’ formidable body guard all day and he provided me with some tough competition playing a quiz show on the telly.

Actually he beat me. Who knew rugby league players could be smart as well as fit?

Is there a lawyer in the house?

I don’t think we’ll be seeing a shortage of lawyers in the near future. Yesterday we watched Jonah receive his law degree along with 339 others at the Queensland Performing Arts Centre.

The Chancellor of the University delivered his speech and then we clapped three hundred and forty times as each recipient (very S-L-O-W-L-Y) stepped up to shake his hand. Jonah was one of the first which meant Pinky lost interest in the proceedings fairly quickly. At one stage I leaned over to my ex-husband’s lovely wife, Arlette, and dramatically mimed slitting my throat. She nodded in agreement rolling her eyes as if to say, “Kill me now!”

Finally, the last graduate had received their diploma and Arlette and I began joyously fishing around on the floor for our handbags but were quickly and disappointingly stymied. 

Oh no… some old judge was yet to give another long-winded exposition on something to do with political landscapes and legal ramifications blah, blah, de-bloody blah.

When the ceremony had finally finished, I woke up my Dad and we all shuffled out into the foyer to await the arrival of the golden child, Jonah, in order to snap some photos of him in his academic gown.

                              Jonah and Pinky

Jonah’s father Ralphie, was so enormously proud of his second son (who is following in his legal eagle footsteps) it almost brought a tear to my eye. 

                           Arlette, Jonah and his Dad, Ralphie.

                                                         Granddad and Jonah


We quickly absconded to a wonderful restaurant (Jonah had booked) which had the most amazing menu and delicious wine and one I will definitely be bringing Scotto to next time we get down here on holidays.

          (L-R) Nana, Arlette, Granddad, Pinky, Lulu, Ralphie, Jonah

In terms of a family celebration… I’d give it a nine out of ten!

This morning I woke up and assumed it must be… oh, seven o’clock. It was still dark but I felt somewhat refreshed.

I peered at the clock on my phone… Ten-Forty-Five!!!!

Half the day was gone! I haven’t slept in for that long since I was a teenager.

I staggered out of my room to discover Lulu, still deep in dreamland.

(I hope Scotto isn’t reading this and seething with jealousy. Apparently Pablo the Chihuahua kept him up all night last night looking for his mummy.)

We managed to get our act together, met up with Lulu’s gorgeous friend Lily and hit the shops.

                         Lulu and Lily spending up big!

Much more funner than a two hour stint in a Graduation Ceremony.

The girls put up with me for about two hours until they finally grew tired of being nice and let me loose in David Jones while they caught up on the real gossip (not the watered down version).

                                      Get lost Mum!

Can’t wait for tomorrow… I’m getting a new haircut!

The Village Idiot Goes Missing.

                               Lulu on the train into the city.

I’d already annoyed Lulu in the departure lounge at the airport by showing her funny memes and asking, “It’s funny, don’t you think?” over and over and over. 

That must be why she sat beside me in the plane with her earphones determinedly stuck in her ears and her eyes shut tight for the two hour plane trip.

I was a bit lonely... but I read the latest health magazine and made a few silent, but probably futile, resolves for 2014.

Lulu was no doubt cranky with me for chipping her about the outfit she’d chosen to wear on the plane; or rather, the lack of outfit.

I spent a lot of my time at the airport glaring, in what I hoped was a menacing way, at the filthy perverts eyeing my seventeen year old daughter up and down when they walked past us.

We caught a train from the airport into the city and when we finally emerged from the station lugging our suitcases behind us we found ourselves on the same street as the hotel we’d booked.

“It’s a really long street,” I sighed peering down one end then the other. “I wonder which way we should start walking?”

Then I suddenly looked up and miraculously there it appeared. Our hotel was straight across the road. Bazinga!

“Are you here for any special reason?” asked the bubbly blonde at reception.

A slow, slightly smug grin spread across my face, “Oh… my son is graduating from University tomorrow.”

“How wonderful! What’s he graduating in?” asked Blondie pleasantly.

“Law,” I replied, as humbly as possible.

Well? She asked didn’t she? It’s not like I was bragging or anything…

Jonah, the law graduate in question is still surviving on a poor University student pittance and was on the blower about thirty seconds later inviting himself to a free lunch with Lulu and myself.

         "You look like a turtle!" were the first words she said to her brother.

                            Pinky, with her son the lawyer.

We walked off our excess calories by wandering around the Modern Art Gallery at Southbank (Jonah’s idea), whilst Lulu trailed behind us uncomplainingly, but possibly bored out of her brain.

Best afternoon EVER!

It’s seven o’clock and Lulu and I are vegging out quietly in the hotel room but I just had the most unexpected and peculiar call from twenty year old son Hagar... 

over one thousand kilometres away at home.

“What are you cooking for dinner tonight, Mum?” Hagar asked.


I could have sworn I told him I was going away for a week??? Or did I?

Pinky's call to ban candy canes.

You can tell it’s the last week of school by the sticky, stained fingers and faces of all the kids at school; it’s candy cane season. 

The carelessly discarded, annoying little pieces of cellophane blow freely around the gardens, oval and walkways on their way to the storm drain only to be swept out into the ocean to choke an unsuspecting turtle.

Some students suck their candy cane into sharp pointy spears which they use to stab each other. Others use the ones with golden strings attached as inventive earrings. 

The kids’ eyes are dilated in sugar-rush fever as they hand out the ubiquitous Christmas cards to their 29 classmates. I haven’t seen any sincere, meaningful messages on any of the cards, merely “To Jack, From Amy.”

I’m thinking the cards are a ruse to cover for the candy.

I have a rule. No eating candy canes until after the sausage roll at morning tea.

Apparently, a school in Darwin banned the giving of candy canes with Christmas cards and there was loud uproar from the parents. The dentists are the winners here, laughing all the way to the bank every January.

Candy canes were originally a religious symbol at Christmas. The “Good Shepherd’s Crook” or the “J” shape meaning Jesus, the white candy suggesting purity, the three red stripes denoting the Holy Trinity...

Now they’re just an added financial stress for Mum to add to her never-ending list of end of school year crap.

Every school should ban them.

Could I be carrying my sixth baby?

For the last six months I’ve worn a groove in the concrete path leading to the doctor’s door begging for script after script of various antibiotics to cure what appears to be a chronic urinary tract infection. 

The first time I went, the doctor gave me the wrong antibiotic and the surgery failed to notify me for a month so the evil micro-organisms were allowed to fester in self-satisfied camouflage for a while.


The new toxic-smelling, little yellow pills seemed to cure my ailment instantly but as they made me feel as queasy as a newbie sailor I stopped taking them too early, didn’t I?

Thrilled with this retreat; the surviving bacteria gathered forces, calling in the backup artillery just as William Wallace summoned the MacDougal and MacDonald clans to join his brave ranks screaming, "She can take our lives, but she can't take our freedom!"

Very soon, I was doubled up in pain again and hobbling back to the doctor for more of the stomach-stripping drugs.

This time I was very dedicated and took the nauseating tablets punctually but after two weeks they still weren’t working.

I went back to the doctor after the fortnight course begging for another type of cure.

“Keep going with these,” she insisted.

Two more weeks passed and I still didn’t feel right. Then I noticed the bottle of tablets I was dipping into every six hours had a strangely faded label.

“They’re only two weeks old!” I thought in confusion. “How could the label be so faded?”

It was then I realised I’d been intermittently using a bottle of the exact same class of antibiotic I’d been prescribed six years ago which were long, long past their expiry date.

“So anyway... I’ve unknowingly been taking one dead tablet and one live tablet alternatively for the last two weeks,” I related the story to my sister Sam, over a cup of tea one day. “So I had to go BACK to the doctor and explain the stupid thing I’d done and get another script and take ANOTHER course!”

“WHAT??? Are you training these bacteria or something? Are you trying to create a super breed of microbes?” Sam shook her head at me incredulously.

Fast forward two weeks… when I’d finished that final course I have to say I felt bloody fantastic… for about fourteen days.

Then… it came back!

Off I trotted to the doctors again. “Do you think I might be resistant to the tablets I’ve been taking?” I asked pitifully.

Dr B. wasn’t much of a talker. 

“Go for an ultrasound and come back and see me next week,” he grumbled.

I scrutinised the referral form carefully. 

Dr B. thinks I have a  Kidney stone!!!!

Naturally, I researched every website available to determine whether Kidney stones have ever killed anyone and apparently it doesn’t happen very often. 

Good… but they are evidently very hurty.

I looked up the main causes of kidney stones and guess what the best foods you can eat are, in order to cultivate a really healthy calcium oxalate stone?

Spinach and beetroot.

Guess what Pinky essentially lives on?

Every day, Pinky eats two cups of spinach and beetroot for lunch.

That’s four times the recommended amount of oxalate a susceptible person should consume in a day... and Pinky does that every single day.

My scan is tomorrow and I should find out whether or not I’m gestating my sixth child or not. 

I think I’ll ask for a Caesarean. A natural birth is out of the question, especially if it's going to be a multiple birth.

What will I call it? …Crystal?

I wonder if Popeye had kidney stones?

Pinky's Twelve Days of Christmas

On the first day of Christmas the things that I did see

A Santa dog underneath the tree

On the second day of Christmas the things that I did see

Two towels on floor and

A Santa dog underneath the tree

On the third day of Christmas the things that I did see

Three dirty plates

Two towels on floor and

A Santa dog underneath the tree

On the fourth day of Christmas the things that I did see

Four teenage boys

Three dirty plates

Two towels on floor and

A Santa dog underneath the tree

On the fifth day of Christmas the things that I did see

Five empty cans...

Four teenage boys

Three dirty plates

Two towels on floor and

A Santa dog underneath the tree

On the sixth day of Christmas the things that I did see

Six shoes a laying

Five empty cans...

Four teenage boys

Three dirty plates

Two towels on floor and

A Santa dog underneath the tree

On the seventh day of Christmas the things that I did see

Seven butts on table

Six shoes a laying

Five empty cans...

Four teenage boys

Three dirty plates

Two towels on floor and

A Santa dog underneath the tree

On the eighth day of Christmas the things that I did see

Eight empty loo rolls

Seven butts on table

Six shoes a laying

Five empty cans...

Four teenage boys

Three dirty plates

Two towels on floor and

A Santa dog underneath the tree

On the ninth day of Christmas the things that I did see

Nine scattered glasses

Eight empty loo rolls

Seven butts on table

Six shoes a laying

Five empty cans...

Four teenage boys

Three dirty plates

Two towels on floor and

A Santa dog underneath the tree

On the tenth day of Christmas the things that I did see

Ten fingers texting

Nine scattered glasses

Eight empty loo rolls

Seven butts on table

Six shoes a laying

Five empty cans...

Four teenage boys

Three dirty plates

Two towels on floor and

A Santa dog underneath the tree

On the eleventh day of Christmas the things that I did see

Eleven missing ice cubes

Ten fingers texting

Nine scattered glasses

Eight empty loo rolls

Seven butts on table

Six shoes a laying

Five empty cans...

Four teenage boys

Three dirty plates

Two towels on floor and

A Santa dog underneath the tree

On the twelfth day of Christmas the things that I did see

Twelve sprinkled crisps

Eleven missing ice cubes

Ten fingers texting

Nine scattered glasses

Eight empty loo rolls

Seven butts on table

Six shoes a laying

Five empty cans...

Four teenage boys

Three dirty plates

Two towels on floor and

A Santa dog underneath the tree. 

Happy Advent!

How to Survive a Staff Christmas Party

                                      Toni Basil

I read in the newspaper yesterday that staff parties are highly dangerous in the respect that alcohol acts as a truth serum and many people wreck future career prospects with their big, well-oiled mouths.

Last night, I spent six hours in the same room as 100 colleagues and their partners at our "Eighties Themed" staff party. The champagne was flowing but apart from certain staff members hilariously falling off the stage during a dance-off competition, I’m fairly certain there were no serious incidents of inappropriate revelry.

The only foreseeable staff party dangers as far as I’m concerned are the grisly hangover you’re possibly going to suffer the next day, the remorseful and cringe-worthy flashbacks of your own flamboyant ‘sexy’ dancing and… THE PHOTOGRAPHS!

So here are the self-reflective tips I have (after the fact) for avoiding these mortifying issues.

1. Try to block photographs of yourself after a set time (when you’re plastered) so you don’t fall into the trap of pulling outlandish faces, poses or experiencing a wardrobe malfunction.

2. Do a bit of detective work prior to the party when you're deciding on a costume.

It would be such a shame if somebody else turned up in the same outfit!

         Meet...Mario (Mel), Luigi (Scotto), Mario (O'Reilly), Luigi (Rachel)      

3. Make sure you are adventurous in your wardrobe choices. One thing you don't want to do is merely blend in with the scenery.

4. When posing for photos try to stand with perfect posture ...

                       Blondie (Trina), Rubik's Cube (Emmsie), Amy.

If you're snapped leaning against a wall, or worse another body, you could wind up looking like a piss pot.

    Kazza, Emma, Kyles, Pinky, Shazza ... more lean than the Tower of Pisa.

5. No matter how infused with endearment for your beautiful colleagues you are, refrain from repeatedly telling them how much you LOVE them. They will tire of it quite quickly.

                                                  Rachael putting Pinky in a headlock.

6. Just like "planking", photobombing is extremely childish and so yesterday... look it up Greggles. Don't do it!

       Pinky trying to have a nice photo taken with the party mastermind, Kyles.

7. Remember that a group of people have been working hard in the background to make this special night a success.

Offer to help out if you can.

                                                 Pinky Poinker helping to judge the Dance Off.

8. Finally, to avoid that horrible hangover; take two aspirin before you leave for the party and two more when you get home (with a glass of milk). This will prevent inflammation of blood vessels in the brain. It may make your stomach bleed but you won't have a headache in the morning and I know which I'd prefer! 

(This is not authentic medical advice but the voice of experience)

9. If you do wake up feeling as though a bat has shat in your mouth there's always this sure fire way to feel better...

How much sex is normal?

     

Image Credit

                         

Did you know that lions and tigers have sex over fifty times a day for four consecutive days?

It’s true. I saw it on a David Attenborough documentary on the telly last night.

“What’s wrong with you then?” I daringly challenged Scotto, who was sitting beside me on the couch, relaxed and enjoying a chilled Corona and corn chips.

“Look at him!” Scotto spat his corn chips, pointing at the screen.

The exhausted tiger wallowed languidly in a creek, watching a wildebeest provocatively sauntering close by. The wildebeest was giving the tiger the finger.

“He’s too shattered to even bother chasing the deer thing! His willy’s probably burning like hell. He’s trying to cool it down in the water. You can see his face wincing!” Scotto choked on his beer.

Men! They have an excuse for everything!