Pinky's Guide to Ideas for Fete Stalls.

                             Rach, Pinky and Emma.

“So what type of stall are you doing at this year’s fete, Pinky?” queried an indifferent Scotto on the eve of his eighth effort of helping me out at my school’s annual fete.

Scotto has endured working on stalls spruiking ugly, clay pots made by my class of six year olds, lampshades decorated by a similar demographic, cake stalls, a second-hand book stall, a haunted house, showbags and a plant stall.

“We’re doing glow-in-the dark stuff and helium balloons,” I replied nervously.

“I’ll agree to sell the glow-in-the-dark stuff but I’m not going near any balloons,” my big, strong, tough, globophobic manly-man spluttered.

Scotto, you see, is frightened of balloons.

Rach, my teaching buddy, Emma and I, had spent a good part of the hot afternoon preparing our stall and were set to go. The fete was set to launch off at 5:30pm and we waited for the onslaught of excitable midgets to descend like a cloud of bats at dusk. We secretly hoped we’d be sold out of stock by 6:00pm.

So… we waited… and waited… and waited.

Apparently glow-in-the-dark paraphernalia is only appealing when it actually gets dark. Who knew?

We could hear our prospective clientele shrieking in exuberant thrill on the oval where the jumping castles and rides were and the sugar-infused hobbits had no intention of visiting our fine stall in any forseeable future.

A couple of world-weary parents rocked up to help out, so Scotto and I decided to go for a wander and check out what creative inspiration the other teachers had dreamed up.

In order to ensure the rugrats were sufficiently hyped up, psyched up and 'sweetened' up, several of my fellow teachers had decided to act as logistics specialists...

         Bea at the chocolate toss... no losers here!

        Fluffed up, multi-coloured sugar! Yay!

               Feeling thirsty after all the salty sugar?

       Try the soft drink toss with Greggles and Kristen!

                                             Or the frozen version!

                        Slushies with Kaz and Jodye...

And of course some take-away sugar via the tombola stall run by Gilly!

Suitably staggering in a zombie-like sugar-coma, the kids were then free to colonise other fun-filled stalls, for instance...

                  Face painting a-la Glenys Da Vinci

             Mystery sock (pick a sock to find a surprise)

             So that's where all those bloody socks go!

          Stick in the Sand (pick a stick to win a prize... I'm                                seeing a pattern here)

And of course entertainment for the parents...

An auction of all the works of art created by their progeny.

The home-made cakes and slices stall manned by Adele   and Emma!

                And of course... the BOOZE BARROW!

(Scotto making a dodgy agreement with Geoff that he'd win the raffle... we're still waiting for the call though.)

The only other stall (apart from ours) which didn't seem to be seeing any action was the plant stall. I wonder why?

               Lee-lee, Dylan and Kyles working hard for the money.

Finally, at 8:30pm the oval was abandoned and the flying monkeys flocked in noisily; surrounding our stall, thrusting sticky fingers clutching crumpled five dollar notes at us, pointing to the various glowing swords, skulls, aliens and fairy wands and jumping from foot to foot in hyperactive mania.

Scotto was so happy when the night was at an end he wet his pants...

No... he didn't really. Not being accustomed to hanging around schools he mistook the water trough for a bench and sat in it!

Oh well, at least it's over for another year.

One man's trash is another man's... trash.

Our school fete is on tonight. We lucky teachers have to work until 10:00pm instead of knocking off at 3:00 pm (like we ever do... hardy-ha-ha).

There's one thing we look forward to though and that is we get to raid the Trash and Treasure stall before the gates open at 5:30pm. 

As soon as we've finished setting up our own stalls we're like a bunch of crazy Boxing Day shoppers, aggressively shoving our way through the doors of David Jones in a frenzied search for that elusive bargain.

We take no prisoners. It was like a cat fight this afternoon and I've the fingernail marks on my bloodied arms to prove it.

All I can say is, it's amazing what people are willing to part with. The generous, albeit pre-loved donations titillated each and everyone of us girls and let me tell you... the bootie I snapped up was worth every elbow in the guts and Chinese burn those other bee-artches delivered.

Carla is the most athletic of us and scored the Dazza's Fishin and Drinkin DVD as well as a cool new hat and an antique camera. Lucky bloody cow!

Plus... she somehow nicked one of the best items on the table without the rest of us seeing... a Wiggle's money bag. 

Adriana's little girl is going to be thrilled with the piggy bank her Mum fought tooth and claw for. The best thing about it is IT STILL HAD ITS BOX!

Then Paula, nabbed the Bob the Builder doll we all had our eyes on using subterfuge and camouflage. (Well... we think it's supposed to be Bob the Builder and it did smell a bit funny).

Tash, who is into decorating and Feng Shui, bigtime... found a delightful Chinese artifact we all agreed probably dates back to at least the 1970s. The K-Martian era?

Christie-lee, the scariest and perhaps most dedicated fossicker of obscure but valuable items, unearthed some old hair curlers and the shelf from a fridge. Damn her!

Bloody Emm, tackled me just as I was about to grab the racing controller for a console (without a console) and beat me to the punch. And to add insult to injury, she brazenly pinched the plastic duck from under my nose.

Emmsie thought she'd discovered a bag of archaic paper clips (possibly worth a lot of money) until we told her they were just some old perming rods.

But Pinky scored big time!!! Here's what I managed to grab before the others...

A bottle of aged shampoo! (Okay, it's clearly already been opened but it's European and that's good, right?)

A barely used French Fry cutter (still in the box).

A slightly rusty corkscrew... for when wine manufacturers finally realise screw-top wine bottles are not really all that convenient.

A kitchen thingy set with a VERY interestingly shaped something in the back right hand corner???

And finally... the best buy in the Trash and Treasure stall...

 a teapot lid. Please, if anyone has a teapot that matches this lid I'm willing to cough up a very good price.

A full, pictorial report on the fete will appear in the very near future.

Please comment on the best thing you've seen at a trash and treasure sale.

Innuendo or In-Your-Endo?

                              

“How’s your day been?” drawled the young whipper-snapper behind the checkout when Scotto and I were picking up dinner ingredients from our local Coles supermarket on Saturday.

He sounded a bit burned-out and bored out of his brain.

“It’s been okay,” I chirped. “How was your trip down to Sydney to make that video clip last weekend?”

His curly head snapped up and a grin spread over his face. “It was great!” he raved, eyes lighting up.

“Mitchell’s just been down filming a new indy band’s video clip,” I nodded to Scotto, putting him in the picture.

Mitchell proceeded to wax lyrical for the next five minutes while he put our groceries through the scanner. We heard all about his fantastic weekend and how he’d been commissioned to film another gig in a month’s time.

“How do you know him?” quizzed a puzzled Scotto as we left the shop.

“From the supermarket,” I replied. “I know all of the check-out operators and what they get up to in their spare time.”

It’s true. There’s Old Helen, who’s been waiting eighteen months to have her shed built because the initial contractor went bankrupt. She has a son who left the teaching profession because of the bureaucratic bullsh#t we have to put up with and another son who gives his dog a full-on birthday party every year with written invitations and everything. 

Old Helen has two dogs of her own; Maltese/Shit tzus (which I guess are called Shit-Teezers?). They sleep in her bed and her husband falls asleep in front of the television most nights.

Then… there’s Neil the budding drama student, Chris who loves restoring old cars and wants to be a mechanical engineer when he finishes grade twelve, Stephan the gay hairdresser who’s in between jobs, Drew the second year medical student whose parents are in the army and Sophie who shrewdly analyses the contents of my shopping trolley every day and speculates about what I’m cooking for dinner that night... plus about ten more of them.

“You need to get a life, Pinky!” I hear you rolling your eyes. “Why do you spend so much time talking to shop assistants?”

Well… firstly it’s because I happen to be very curious about people and secondly, because I hope other people are just as friendly to my kids in their part time jobs.

Finally, I make the effort because you just never know…

One day one of those kids might be giving me an endoscopy or something worse.

Image credit: www.thedailycute.com

How to Outsmart Your Teenagers (or think you are)

The last ten years have been akin to an extended episode of ‘The Roadrunner’; with me starring as Wile. E. Coyote, desperately scheming up plots to outfox, blow up or impede the flock of Roadrunners living under my roof. (There is no word for a group of Roadrunners as the species prefer to live alone which explains why mine like to lock themselves in their rooms a lot.)

Tip 1.

When Thaddeus and Jonah reached their early teens we needed to prevent brazen pillaging of blank CDs, loose change for the passing Mr Whippy van and insolent rifling for random booty whenever we left them alone in the house.

One of the first things we did was install a lock on our bedroom door. Regrettably, the kids discovered an illicit means of access via the laundry shute in my ensuite.

When the older boys grew too big to shimmy up the shute they solicited the diminutive frames of little Lulu or Padraic; who were hoisted up and encouraged to scramble like slithering eels into the forbidden chamber, granting access to the canny looters via the door.

This clandestine adventure carried on for some time until one day nine year old Padraic, became stuck in the shute for ten minutes and it frightened him so much he confessed the whole sordid conspiracy. So… we put a lock on the door of the laundry shute as well.

Tip 2.

At one point our electricity bill reached a lofty $1200 per quarter and drastic action was required. Not only were we going broke but my kids were single-handedly driving global climate change into the stratosphere. 

Scotto put a padlock on the power box and turned the air-conditioner off between 9:00am and 6:00pm which chopped $500 off the bill after three months.

The collective whinging was unbearable but worth it. Teenagers sleep more than hibernating grizzly bears and mine were sleeping in on holidays and weekends until 3:00 pm in their air-conditioned bedrooms.

One day we found the padlock had been sawn off. 

I’m serious. 

We bought another more robust one and threatened removing the unit from their walls thus allowing for a more natural and permanent style of air flow. 

Tip 3.

Hagar the Horrible enjoyed roughly three hideous, amnesic years when he would constantly lose his front door key. His cunning solution to this predicament was to scale the roof and break in via an upstairs, screened toilet window. 

Don’t ask me how a six foot tall basketballer could squeeze in through a tiny toilet window but he managed it.

Hagar destroyed numerous screens breaking into the house whilst embracing this technique until one day while he was climbing on to the roof he snapped my clothes line, left all the clean clothes on the dirt and was unofficially disinherited.

We installed a code lock on the front door and have never had an issue since.

Tip 4.

It’s tough setting punitive consequences for teenage misdemeanours. You can’t send them to their bedroom as that’s where they spend most of their time anyway. You can ground them… but when their mates all have cars it becomes complicated. 

One effective ‘Achilles Heel’ however is the Internet. The router is located in our bedroom. Too much crap from them and Internet access is immediately cut off… and if I don’t want a hissy-fit scene, I plead ignorance.

“It must be the damn provider again,” I’ll say innocently. “It’s annoying isn’t it?”

Any of your tips or advice is most welcome!

How good are you at taking a compliment?

I just read in today’s newspaper, prison authorities are making particular targeted criminals wear pink uniforms. 

Personally, I take offence at this. What are they saying? That by wearing the colour pink, the offenders’ tough guy image will be demoted to pansy, puffball princess?

It wasn’t until the 1890s that baby boys were dressed in blue and girls in pink. Before that there was no differentiation in colours each gender wore. Pink rocks!

Mind you, I agree with the idea in part. I’ve always thought the media should stop glamorising criminals and more demeaning names should be used in the news reports. For example, ‘terrorists’ should be referred to as ‘shiny dog’s balls’ and a ‘king hit’ renamed a ‘sook act’.

Pink has been my favourite colour ever since I was nine years old and overheard my father telling my mother how much he thought the hot pink dress I was wearing suited me. 

I spent a lot of time as a kid eavesdropping on my parents and rarely heard compliments about myself. It was usually something along the lines of…

“What’s that horrible, nasal sound Pinky’s making?” Dad shouting to Mum.

“She’s in her room singing along with Marie Osmond.” Mum’s reply.

But I never forgot how my father had thought I looked good in pink and have collected quite a lot of pink possessions over the years, which I won’t bore you with now by listing.

My point is that a second-hand compliment is the nicest type you can receive.

Paranoid and self-effacing are my second names and when someone compliments me I usually shrug it off with a self-derogatory remark.

“That’s a nice dress you’re wearing today, Pinky,” a colleague will remark generously.

“This is an ugly, hideous dress and I hate it which is why it’s now a work dress.” I’ll ungratefully retort.

Or… “You’ve got to be kidding! It makes me look like I’m eight months pregnant,” I’ll growl whilst standing with my back arched and guts sticking out.

Or… “It cost me fifteen dollars from the bargain bin at Target. It’s a piece of crap.”

I really need to learn to take a compliment gracefully, huh?

But there’s something about second-hand compliments that mean so much more.

When someone passes on a compliment to you they’ve heard from a third party it’s so much more sincere. There’s clearly no ulterior motive of flattery and there’s no sheepish, awkward moment where you feel self-conscious about the attention.

I try to pass on as many second-hand compliments as I can.

What’s the nicest compliment you’ve ever received?

Should we charge our kids board?

Whilst lunching with friends a couple of weeks ago I mentioned that twenty year old son Hagar, had recently landed an ace job placing him into a much higher pay bracket than ever before.

“So are you charging him board yet?” the gal pals all badgered at once.

“Well…” I hesitated, “Not exactly. I did ask him if he could contribute a hundred bucks every quarter towards the electricity bill though.”

There was a stunned silence at the table.

“I know it seems a lot but his girlfriend Meggles, has moved in you see and they use a lot of power what with hot showers and airconditioning…” I trailed off self-consciously.

“Whaaaaat?” shrieked Emmsie. “They’re both living in your house for a hundred bucks every three months?”

“Can we all move in too Pinky?” squawked Kaz and Rach. “We’ll even do the washing up!”

“I did ask him if he’d pay board but he said he didn’t like the idea because it would seem like I was making a profit out of him,” I whimpered pitifully.

Gales of mocking laughter erupted.

“It’ll teach Hagar to be responsible!” wailed the howls of protest when I screwed my face up in reluctance.

Scotto, my sister Sam and her husband Pedro, and all my colleagues have advised me in no uncertain terms that I’m being the biggest chump since... 

                                   The Three Stooges

...and I’m starting to think they’re on to something.

Hagar does sweet F.A. around the house to earn his keep. The only conversation I get out of him is “What’s for dinner?” and now his girlfriend Meggles, is living here as well.

Pushover Pinky.

Easy Pickings Poinker… that’s who I am.

Until one day Hagar made his fatal mistake.

It was Friday afternoon and I was feeling burned-out and jaded after a challenging and shitty week. The dishes from the previous night’s dinner were still in the sink as they seem to be invisible to everyone apart from myself and Scotto. 

The laundry shute was crammed with stinky tradie uniforms all belonging to Hagar and I’d noticed empty Maccas bags sitting on the letterbox as I walked in.

Hagar had just arrived home from work and languidly plonked down beside me on the couch yanking off his mud splattered work boots carelessly spraying bits of dirt all over the floor.

“So Mum… just wondering, how much do you earn in a week?” he drawled, grinning most unwisely.

I knew that grin… it was one of smugness. He was just about to gloat about how much he’d been paid this week.

It was time to pull out the big guns.

The cannon ball was loaded, the gunpowder lit. 

I brought out my comprehensive list of household expenses (one I’d prepared earlier). With insurance, rates, electricity, gas, etc; our household needs entail 900 buckerooneys to run smoothly each week and that estimate doesn’t include car registration and insurance, food, pool servicing, and blah-dee-bloody-blah.

All Hagar is required to pay is thirty dollars per week.

He begrudgingly agreed.

“But that means I don’t have to pay that money for electricity though, Mum.” he admonished with the magnanimous generosity of Scrooge McDuck.

Somehow I don’t think I’ll be making a profit out of the negotiations.

What do you think? Should kids in full time work be charged board?

Do You Think Pinky Sounds Like a Wanker?

                                   

Look… to be fair it was eleven o’clock at night, and Scotto was tired.

But his reply was quite amusing when I rolled over in bed as we were sleepily messing around on our laptops (not a euphemism) and turned to him asking, 

“Scotto, do you think when I write my blog posts I sometimes come across as a bit of a… compulsive polysyllabricator?”

“Huh?” he replied, “Please explain, Pauline?”

“I mean… am I a bit of a sesquipedalianist?”

“Still not with you, Pinky,” he yawned in my face.

“You know… big words, do you think I use too many big words in my posts?”

“It’s your blog Pinky, you can do what you want,” came his standard reply.

“What about adverbs? Do I use too many? It’s just that I don’t want to sound like a wanker.” I wailed.

“Just refresh my memory,” he replied, “what’s an adverb again?”

Anyway, I spent some time today wondering if I do indeed use a ridiculous amount of unnecessary words in my attempts at writing so I thought I’d try out a comparative exercise.

Thursday Sport

I despise Thursdays for one reason. Much to the bitter disappointment of the energetic boys in my class I’m somewhat disinclined to lug my ever-swelling torso out on to the oval to play sport in the sweltering North Queensland sun.

A few years ago, every Wednesday night I prayed for it to pour with rain on Thursday, and lo and behold it did… leading to the cancellation of Thursday P.T. (Physical Torture) for an ENTIRE term.

I began to develop delusions of grandeur imagining I might actually have a direct link to Numero Uno, whilst the P.E. teacher Alan, glowered guardedly at me from across the staff room; as if I might possibly have the numbers 666 stamped on my scalp, keep a snarling hyena in the classroom and dance naked around a pentagram in the woods each full moon.

Sadly, that never happened again and I’ve been unable to weasel my way out of Thursday sport for years. Today, after fruitlessly surveying the horizon in search of miraculous storm clouds, I reluctantly marched the throng of excitables out to the oval for a game of T Ball. We had the ball, we had the bat, but the year 5s had nicked all the Ts so what we essentially played was more like ‘softball for dummies’.

It was hot enough for a chicken to lay a boiled egg and some of the girls sensibly feigned various ailments so they could sit in the shade and gossip.

I stood in the sun with my sweat sweating and pretty much acted as safety officer, screaming at the batsmen to stop chucking the steel bat like a javelin (mostly in Pinky’s direction) every time they hit the ball. 

Suddenly I noticed Finbar crying on second base. He was holding his finger high in the air, flailing his arms and sobbing relentlessly.

“What happened, Finbar?” I asked peering at his unmarked finger.

“Matty ran into me and bit me on the finger!” he shrieked in a piercing cry.

Matty stood frozen on the spot, an expression of terror on his face.

“It was an accident, Mrs P.” he whimpered pleadingly.

“How can you accidentally bite someone?” I queried sceptically, noting the absence of blood and wondering if the near hysterical Finbar might be overreacting a tad.

“I ran into his finger with my mouth open.”

So do you see now why I hate sport?


Now if I’d written that story in an unwanky style it would have read like this.

Thursday Sport

We had to play sport today. I dislike sport. It didn’t rain and it was hot. The girls didn’t want to play and one of the boys hurt his finger.

Do you see what I mean?

Overheard in a Grade Four Classroom

My class of ten year olds was working industriously and in abnormal mute mode on some short division problems. I’d just beaten the Guinness Book of Records’ highest blood pressure reading and sacrificed a kidney whilst teaching them the arduous concept for the previous half hour.

Ah… I thought gratefully, “The Court Jester in Residence”, Seymour, was at home on his sick bed so hopefully I’d be able to grab a few precious minutes to mark some test papers.

Seymour, lovable as the boy is, tends to disrupt the quiet ambience of the room with his Tourette-like proclivity for tuneless whistling, humming and slapping his ruler/book/pencil on the desk in a water torture-like rhythm during work time. 

He also enjoys standing up at random moments and loudly opening with a knock-knock joke he’s just made up himself. (They’re never funny but the class curiously finds them to be.) 

You can understand why I was enjoying a day off.

It was after a only a few minutes I noticed Lucy, tentatively approaching my desk. N.Y.P.D. Lucy, who likes to ‘inform’ on members of the class involved in nefarious criminal activities.

“What’s up, Lucy?” I enquired patiently, hiding my mild irritation and noting her pursed mouth and outraged expression.

“Mrs Poinker,” she whispered in scandalised tones, “Sebastian licked my rubber because Cornelia dared him to do it and now I can’t use it anymore.”

“Sebastian!” I sighed. “Come here at once please! You too, Cornelia!”

Collaborative looks were exchanged between the two suspects as they scraped their chairs back and sidled up to my desk.

“Cornelia, did you dare Sebastian to lick Lucy’s rubber?” I asked, knowing how ridiculous this question would sound to a fly on the wall.

“Well…” stammered Claudia nervously, “I didn’t dare him. I just said that if he licked it then I’d give him two dollars.”

“That sounds like a dare to me. Where did you get the two dollars from?” I reciprocated in a slightly jaded tone, channelling Edna Krabappel and hoping to scare the truth out of them.

“Sybylla gave it to me,” replied Cornelia, dobbing in her friend without a second’s hesitation.

“Sybylla! Come here please,” I Krabappelled in an even more raspy, ten pack a day style.

The impeccable Sybylla stood before me trembling like a frightened bird. Sybylla is NEVER in trouble. Her behaviour is usually unimpeachable.

“Did you give Claudia two dollars to dare Sebastian to lick Lucy’s rubber?”

“Yes, Mrs Poinker.”

“And where did you get the money from?” I questioned imperiously, eyebrows raised, peering over my glasses Edna-style.

“Mum gave it to me to buy an ice-block, Mrs Poinker.”

“And do you think, Sybylla,” I continued my cross-examination on a roll, “that your mother would be happy to know you wasted your two dollars on urging Sebastian to lick Lucy’s rubber?”

At this point I noticed my brand new teacher-aide had entered the room and was backed up against the wall staring at the scenario in alarm.

It probably hadn’t sounded that great when I think about it.The remorseful trio were sent back to their seats and short division in contrition. 

I couldn’t help but admire their creativity in work-avoidance strategy… it was more entertaining than Seymour’s interminable low-pitched whistling anyway.

Pinky Writes a Letter to her Sixteen Year Old Self (Part 2)

Dear Pinky,

Stop staring at the Vinnie Barbarino look-alike in your art class. The pensive expression on his face is not actually one of brooding reflection…it’s one of vacant futility. Those soulful brown eyes are NOT sweet guy and come to beddish… they’re bad boy and rev headish.

What EVER you do, no NOT tell your friend Pip to tell Vinnie you ‘like’ him. It will mean two years spending every Saturday night at the drive-in nestled in the EH Holden he's devotedly restoring.

You’ll be nestled in however, on your lonesome because ‘Vinnie’ will be outside of the car in the carpark checking out what’s under all of his mate’s bonnets.

You'll be forced to watch Steve McQueen chucking wheelies in ‘Gone in Sixty Seconds’ at least eighteen times and will be compelled to listen to interminable exchanges between Vinnie and his mates about carburettors, spark plugs and cracked radiators.

He’ll proudly ask you to scrutinise his brand new drive shaft and huge diff and I’m not using euphemisms.

When Vinnie finally dumps you it will be a relief of sorts but, do not then ask your friend Kaylene to tell her spunky neighbour you ‘like’ him.

                                   

This will only lead to another two years sitting on the sidelines during his weekend footy games watching your very own ‘Russell Fairfax’ get tackled, stand up, play the ball, get tackled, stand up, play the ball, until you want to rip your eyeballs out, douse them with kero and light a match.

But there’s worse yet to come. 

When ‘Russell’ finishes the footy season, the CRICKET season will commence. Whilst footy games last about one hour; cricket goes on for three long, hot days. 

It’s not that you’ll feel you would rather watch paint dry… it’s more like you’ll rather watch paint dry while being forced to listen to the loud version of the Crazy Frog on a loop while being flayed by a cat-o-nine-tails and fed tripe.

Sadly Pinky, you will attend all of these games watching loyally like a pathetic Labrador until one day Russell just stops calling you.

It will be about then that you finally realise it’s time you found your own passions, preferably not including boys… at least for a while.

                          Tripe...yum yum!

Pinky’s Letter to her Sixteen Year Old Self. (Part One)

I know how trite, overdone and egocentric this genre of writing is but I DON’T CARE!

If Ita Buttrose can do it then so can I!

Dear Pinky,

Stop! Put that Schwarzkopf Nordic Blonde hair dye down at once! Listen to your bloody mother when she tries to warn you for once. When you peer under the shower cap after only ten minutes you’ll panic, imagining you’re turning into Malibu Barbie and rinse the bleach out prematurely.

The result will be a bright, pumpkin orange mane which will take two years to grow out. You’ll look like a King’s Cross hooker for the entire of Grade 12 and the boys will assume you’re up for it.

Please run for the hills when your mother feels sorry for poor Pinky and her tangerine tufts and employs Auntie Gloria to bestow one of her ‘special’ home perms on you. 

The double chemical whammy will initiate a mass exodus of hair with clumps falling out at the roots occasioning an 

“I’ve just been on a holiday in downtown Chernobyl” appearance.

It won’t be pretty.

When you are nineteen, thinking you have it hand, you’ll visit a hairdresser who will streak your hair ‘professionally’. The resultant streaks will take on an unappealing, brassy, yellow shade except for when you desperately attempt to disguise the tacky hue with Magic Silver White when the streaks will be deep purple.

You are never going to be a blonde. Your Scottish heritage has granted you with auburn tinged tresses and the red hue can never be bleached out even if you submerge your head in a bottle of 100% hydrogen peroxide overnight.

I’m dreadfully sorry but you will NEVER look like Agnetha from ABBA.

Alas, after giving birth to your first baby, needing a fresh change, like a moth to a flame you will again go down the perilous peroxide path… but this time you’ll go the whole hog and your entire head will look like you’re wearing a jaundiced Big Bird wig.

There will be tears.

By the time your third baby is about to be born the sickly locks will have finally grown out… but only after you’ve endured some decidedly repulsive haircuts closely resembling Prince Valiant...

Or David from Psychoville...

“There you go!” the hairdresser will say the day before you check yourself in for the Caesarean, 

“I call that my hospital haircut.”

You pay her at the counter… holding back the violent sobbing whilst staring out the corner of your eye at the mirror, noting with deep dismay the striking similarity you have to a ten year old boy.Please listen to my advice, Pinky. Blondes don’t always have more fun.

Love, Pinky xx

Pinky the Dirty Filthy Liar.

                                  Pinkoccio (7 years ago)

                 (even with a pencil for a nose I look better than I do now. W.T.F.????)

The lies I tell every day....

I need some head lice medication and a nit comb for the kids please. (To the smirking pharmacist)

I don’t think I ever actually received that email. (To anyone at all really)

No. I haven’t been cutting my own hair. (To disbelieving hairdresser)

I love it! (When the chary bitch cuts it way too short.)

I already have one. (In a French accent to hawkers in shopping centres)

Sorry, I don’t have any cash on me. (To 18 year old son Padraic when he asks for money again)

About twenty minutes. (To my ravenous teenagers when they ask how long until I get off my laptop and cook dinner.)

No more than 3 standard drinks a day (To disapproving doctor)

That’s okay. (To flippant doctor who says, “This might hurt a bit” during a smear test.)

The toilet stunk before I got here. (To overpowered colleagues at work.)

Swearing is not very nice. You never hear Mrs Poinker swearing do you? Of course not… because Mrs Poinker doesn’t swear! (To trusting ten year old students)

We don’t water our lawn to save water, not because we’re lazy. (To our sceptical friends and neighbours)

Clytemnestra! That’s an unusual name. I like it. Does she get Clit for short? (To a new doting parent.)

Good thanks! (My reply when the jaded, monotonal checkout chick asks me how my day was.)

That sounds great! (My reply to the friend I’ve run into who has just said, “Let’s get together for lunch” when I know we will never get around to it because we’ve been saying it for the last ten years.)

Neither do you! (My reply to some ancient friend I haven’t seen for ten years who tells me I don’t look any older since the last time they saw me.)

I heard every word you said. (When a tetchy Scotto accuses me of not listening to his enthralling description of how he reconfigured the home network using a wireless signal booster.)

I’ll pay you back. (To my teacher buddy Rachel, when I ‘borrow’ staples and sticky dots.)

That’s okay. (To the mother who apologises to me when her little sh#t of a brat rams a shopping trolley into my Achilles tendon.)

That’s okay. (To the person who mockingly shrugs at me when they have a full trolley at the 12 items or under check out.)

That’s okay. (To the dedicated checkout chick who decides she needs to count the money in her till when I finally make it to the counter.)

That’s okay. (When the blameless person in front of me has a third item that won’t scan and the checkout chick has to call someone over the P.A. to find the correct price… again.)

I’ll see you in six months then! (To the well-groomed receptionist after spending 30 agonising minutes in the dentist’s chair.)

I haven’t seen it. (To an agitated Scotto when I realise I’ve accidentally thrown out his 50 metre network cable because I thought it was old wiring rubbish.)

Sorry, I’m really busy that day. (When anyone invites me to a Tupperware/Little Kid’s party)

I’m really sorry about the mess. The house is usually much cleaner. (To every disgusted visitor we have.)

The hardest part is getting started. (Me trying to cajole an unwilling Padraic into commencing work on his English Shakespearean assignment.)

Boys don’t like girls who wear really short shorts. (To Lulu when she’s leaving the house dressed in a transparent handkerchief.)

                             I.Hate.Shopping.


Do any of the above sound familiar to you? If not… what lies do you tell?

Old Pinky's Wise Sayings

Inspired by reading Aesop's fables to my students, I feel I too have some wisdom to impart...

The best things in life are free which is great because money has burnt a hole in my pocket and I'm hoping no one picks up the money because finders are keepers.

It was the straw that broke the camel’s back as it was trying to squeeze through the eye of a needle which happened to be a needle in a haystack which is where the straw came from. Paramedics grasped at the straws but it was too late to save the camel.

Birds of a feather flock together except for the one that was caught by someone’s hand while the other two hid in the bush. That’s when you have to kill two birds with one stone or eat crow.

A job worth doing is worth doing tomorrow because everyone knows all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy and a master of no trades.

Apples don’t fall far from a tree but if you upset the apple cart one might fall out and get bruised and become rotten to the core and you know that one bad apple can spoil a bunch.

A dark horse which refuses to drink water you’ve led it to, is actually just a horse of a different colour and I got this straight from the gift horse’s mouth so get off your high horse.

If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck then it’s a duck unless it eats like a bird and has eyes like a hawk. Then it’s a duckbirdhawk which are as rare as hen’s teeth.

There’s a fly in some ointment on the wall.

The world is your oyster and if you’re unlucky you might break your tooth on some pearls of wisdom.

It’s bad to be caught between a rock and a hard place especially if you’re caught with your pants down.

“If you can’t stand the heat get out of the kitchen!” called the pot to the black kettle as it went from the frying pan into the fire.

A friendship between fool’s gold and a rough diamond is forever.

Don’t cross that burnt bridge until you come to it.

A stitch in time means the slow and steady guy behind you will win the race.

The way to a man’s heart is through his stomach but his eyes are bigger than his belly so in actual fact his eyes are the window to his soul.

If Bob’s your uncle and he recently died, where there’s a will you’d better hope you’re in it.

If a chain is only as strong as its weakest link you’d better hope it’s true that barking dogs seldom bite.

Someone let the cat out of the bag, it jumped on the hot tin roof found a rat with a gold tooth, dragged it in and now it thinks it’s the cat’s miaow.

Don’t put all your eggs in one basket because when your chickens come home to roost there won’t be any room left.

The early bird gets the worm unless the worm has turned and then it’s a different can of worms.

Revenge is a dish best served cold but revenge is sweet so revenge must be chocolate ice-cream.

The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence, especially if you’re living with the Poinkers who don’t water their lawn and wait for the clouds with silver linings and save their water for a rainy day.

If you haven’t had a boyfriend for a while don’t worry, it’s probably the calm before the storm. It never rains it pours but don’t settle for any old port in a storm.

Anything to add?

The End of an Era for Pinky!

In roughly four weeks Pinky will see the end of a very long and arduous era… the end of school days.

Padraic and Lulu, my youngest two progeny will be chucking their well-worn, mildewed school bags in the wheelie bin and graduating from Year Twelve.

Hip hip hoo-bloody-ray!

Five kids in the educational system, for thirteen years each, adds up to an impressive SIXTY-FIVE years of running our lives in accordance with the frenetic bedlam of educational mandates.

Today, while perusing the students’ book lists we teachers are readying to hand out to parents for 2014, the magnitude of putting five kids through school hit home.

Over 65 years of 200 days attendance I made approximately 13 000 school lunches. That’s a hell of a lot of ham slices, bananas, roll-ups and juice poppers.

Assuming there were about ten permission notes sent home each year I must have signed about 600 all up (although most of Hagar’s were most likely left to party in the bottom of his bag with the neglected and highly compressed lunches I’d so lovingly created).

If I’d had any nous I should have bought shares in B.P. in 1994 (when Thaddeus began pre-school) as I estimate I performed at least 20 000 pick-ups and drop-offs…

(they went to different high schools complicating things even further).

In their early school years head lice eradication occurred at least twice a year so I can confidently conjecture I murdered at least 2400 innocent head lice (if you consider the average infestation consists of 15 of the little critters).

I bought in the region of 960 pencils, 240 erasers, 1920 colouring in pencils, 80 sharpeners, 80 pairs of scissors, 80 rulers, 240 glue sticks and 600 exercise books; and that’s only counting primary school.

Can you imagine covering 600 books with contact, tangling myself up in the bastard sticky plastic and crying about the ubiquitous, unavoidable bubbles? Only one of the reasons I drink too much.

I probably only attended 100 parent teacher interviews as I slackened off in the later years figuring that the further Pinky stayed away from the teachers, the less they’d develop a disliking for my kids.

Washing 13 000 smelly, paint-stained school uniforms to be worn the next day was one of the less pleasurable activities I can recall over the years.

Add to that; speech nights, concerts, homework, sport carnivals, swimming carnivals, debate clubs, etc, etc,etc.

“Aren’t you sad those days are coming to an end?” someone asked me the other day when I skipped merrily into the staffroom singing, “Five weeks to go! Five weeks to go! Hey Ho the Dairy-O! Five weeks to go!”My answer to the concerned citizen?…. “NO.”

In fact I'm buying the t-shirt.

Have you ever been unfriended on Facebook?

“You know I only friended you on Facebook so I could stay in contact when I was away because you never check Viber on your phone Mother?” was one of the first things 17 year old daughter Lulu, blurted out when she arrived home after her U.K. trip on Monday.

“Please, please don’t unfriend me,” I pleaded. "I told all my friends!"

“Just don’t do anything stupid to embarrass her!” my friend Emmsie had warned when I boasted on my timeline that I was now joyously ‘friends’ with said daughter.

“Mother,” continued Lulu, “You put a up a stupid Facebook post about me and then you put a photo of me as a baby on your timeline AND tagged me. 

Three strikes and you’re out, sunshine. That’s my policy.”

So I’ve been VERY careful for the last two days and so far so good.

The “three strikes” comment rang a bell with me this afternoon when I called in to the Vet on my way home to pick up Celine (the Fox Terrier’s) menopause medication.

(We’d noticed she’d been having mood swings, suffered mild incontinence and was flinging off the bed sheets at night begging for us to turn the air conditioner up and wondered what was wrong with her for months.)

I’ve often considered popping one of her tablets myself just to see what might happen but as my pal Kyles says, it would probably just enable me with the ability to scratch the back of my ear with my right foot and stimulate a penchant for dried pig’s ears.
But... I dogress.

Our vet, Dr P., is a brilliant, medical professional who possesses a genuine tender love for all creatures great and small… but he scares me a bit; I think it’s his authoritative South African accent.

“So Pinky,” he nabbed me as I was standing at the counter, “I see you cancelled Pablo’s de-sexing operation a second time.”

It was true. I’d made a second appointment during the September school holidays and consequently cancelled it because of my mother.

“You do know some dogs die under anaesthetic?” commented Mum over the phone, adding bleakly, “As long as you’re prepared for the worst.”

It took me about five seconds to decide I just couldn’t take the risk of losing my baby Chihuahua and chickened out on the deknackering once again.

“These little dogs develop prostate cancer at about five or six years old if you don’t get them fixed up. Do you want to risk that?” niggled Dr P.

Now… even though I’m MENSA material (Mildly Effective at Narrating Stupid Anecdotes) I accept the fact that someone else may know better than me... especially someone with a doctorate in science and about thirty years of experience; so I guess I’ll have to book Pablo in for a third and final time in the Christmas holidays.That way I can be home to cosset him with chicken soup, aspirin and ice packs for his misplaced goolies.

                 Mrs Menopause and her future eunuch.

Princess Lulu Returns! Pinky sings a song.

Click on the MP3 above to hear Pinky singing this song! (Sorry it won't work on mobile only desktop or laptop!)

In honour of Lulu's return from a netball tour of the U.K. I penned a song to celebrate her return to Boringsville.

Looks like heaven

From my window

Now we’re landing

I can see Ross River

Back to real life

Back to work and school

Heading back to Brownsville

Where it’s hot not cool



Townsville Shire… Castle Hill

It’s the place… time stands still

There’s no action… ‘Boring Central’

Coming home, country town.



All my memories… on my iPhone

All my money, spent on clothes and snow globes

No more fun times, painting London red,

English boys and netball

Might as well be dead.



Country town, such a bore.

Crappy shops… I need more.

And I’ll have to… see my momma

Don’t like home… anymore.



I hear her voice

Every morning when she calls me

Reminding me and nagging me to pack my lunch.

As we hit the tarmac I just get the feeling

That I wish it was still yesterday… yesterday.



Country town… you’re so lame

Everything… just stays the same

Now the tour’s done, life is over

Goodbye friends and netball games.



Study time… all day long

U.K. trip was my swan song…

Welcome home Princess Lulu!