But then someone in work told me…

I’m having a mild crisis.

As you all know, The Boy and I are planning a move to Australia (Perth to be exact) in February.

As soon as anyone who knows me hears this, they all reply “You? In that heat!??” followed by laughing and that Are Ye Mad look.

Well I’ve ignored this. Yes I hate the heat, yes it makes my hair go crazy and that upsets me, yes I detest sweating, yes anything above about 20′c makes me incredibly cranky.

But sure I’m not going to care ….this is an adventure!

But then someone in work told me about this poison-filled spiders that are in Perth, and I freaked out.

I fear needles and that has dripped over to include any insects that bite and suck blood or put something else in, like poison or baby insects.

The lovely Bambola has sent me a nice little email calling me a crazy person because you hardly ever see them, but this came AFTER many hours of internet horror stories regarding these spiders and also my work mate’s own Attacked By Killer Spider story.

So I immediately told The Boy and he, knowing what I’m like (being there for The Mosquito Incident and being my ear during the I Couldn’t Sleep For A Month incident when I was convinced a bedbug had stowed away in the my bag from Venice), he knew this was a serious setback.

The weather I could probably deal with, but being constantly in fear of coming in contact with something that could cause me pain and possibly end up with an antivenom injection!?

You might call me a coward and you might be right, but it’s A fear like claustrophobia and I don’t think I can do a lot about it.

But then other botherments I’d been ignoring came flowing forward:

• What if something happened by brother while I was gone and I didn’t get home in time? He has a heart condition and I really don’t think I’d ever forgive myself if I couldn’t get back …being two days of flying away is a BIG risk.
• There’s a good chance things mightn’t work out over there, and considering the cost of flights and the fact I’m giving up a good job to go there, is it really a risk we should take?
• Also The Boy’s nanny hasn’t been well this year, so I know he’d feel bad if he wasn’t there, and I’d feel bad because Australia was my idea.

So we spent nearly four hours in our favourite diner discussing this, and while we haven’t scrapped the Australia idea, we’re aware of the fact that it’s not really the perfect plan for us anymore.

So we’ve to come up with alternatives.

We have to do something: it’s our last big hurrah before we try this whole Grown Up thing and I know I’d regret it if I just gave it up now.

• It has to be during 2010.
• It has to be at least 6months long, otherwise it’s not worth my while giving up my job.
• We will need to work at some stage during it, cos our savings won’t get us THAT far.

Initially we had this great plan of working for 6months in the US and then travelling around Europe for 4 or 5 months, but US visas are near IMPOSSIBLE to get when you’re over a year out of college (which I am) and don’t have ten years to waste waiting for your visa to come through.

It’d be TOUGH getting jobs in Europe cos we don’t speak any of the languages (well apart from The Boy speaking French).

Canada is a possibility, but they’re not accepting working holiday visa applications for 2010 until December and I’m reluctant to leave this all up in the air until then.

Guys …..any suggestions?

Thank you for Smoking

One of my favourite parts of a holiday is getting to raid the duty free in the airport on the way home …well, if I have money!

Luckily, our London weekend ended up being really cheap and so I arrived at Stansted with £60 in my purse *cue crazy-happy running towards the Benefit counter*

And what to my wondering eyes did appear? Benefit’s Smokin’ Eyes …it’s changed my life.

I have never EVER managed to achieve a smokey look as perfect as the one I achieved when I tested this out at home.

Je suis very happy.

Also included on my purchasing list was Bluff Dust for my persistant flushing!

This too is incredible!

A bientot…

I feel like such a nomad right now.

I’ve packed my bag once again, and this time for a not-so-joyous event.

I’ll be up in Donegal for the next few days to attend my aunt’s funeral, and when I return to Dublin on Friday, I’ll be heading to the airport for my flight to London, so understandably I won’t be much of a presense for the rest of week.

I’ll be back full-time on Monday, and I promise to catch up on all your lovely blogs then!

Talk soon

oxox

I’m back!!!

Hello Dearies!

That’s right, I’ve returned to the blogosphere and after spending the last two hours catching up on your lovely blogs, it’s time to post about my beautiful Parisian week!

Wow, it was amazing!!!!

I absolutely lovered it!!!

And the weather was fab, which makes my previous meltdown post over possible rain look a tad silly!lol!

Anyhoo, our hotel was gorgeous, and if you’ll please examine Exhibit A, you’ll see what our view was:

That’s right, we were a two minute walk from the Arc de Triomphe and about 5minsfrom the Champs Elysees!

Faboosh!!! Right in the heart of Paris!!! We couldn’t believe our luck!

So what can I say? I’m ashamed to report I did NO clothes shopping! We only had four full days and as I’d never been to Paris before, I was reluctant to abandon the beautiful sights for some clothes! Plus I’m a sucker for the impulse buying and that hardly ever ends well, and once I’m somewhere new, I’m too flustered to shop properly, so I do tend to avoid over-seas shopping!

Plus it was a Me and The Boy holiday so it hardly seemed fair to have him waste his precious holiday time standing in girly clothing stores (although he did offer quite a bit, suspicious at my lack of ‘Ooooo look at that dress’ and ‘Omg, that top is AMAZING’!lol!)

So we did the touristy things and went to the Eiffel Tower and the Arc de Triomphe:

We also headed to Notre Dame at the request of The Boy, who wanted to reenact a childhood experience, and who neglected to remember how FRICKIN’ TERRIFYING AND WINDING AND HIGH THE STEPS GO!!! This ended in me hyperventilating in the middle of the tower and having to sit down for about 15 minutes afterwards just to stop my legs trembling (needless to say, I didn’t venture to climb La Tour d’Eiffel). However, the church was beautiful and I did get some great shots from the top of the tower:

And then there was the Louvre, which took up the majority of our second afternoon, quite a lot of memory on our cameras, resulted in some hilarious videos and we STILL didn’t get to see it all!!! It really is breathtaking:

Egyptastic!

While I didn’t indulge in any clothes shopping, we both got some great souvenir shopping done. Purchases include the must-have beret, a Moulin Rouge Pill Box, an adorable musical carousel, posters, gargoyle statues, an Edith Piaf CD boxset (thank you Greg) and a gold-plated hieroglyphic snuff box!

That reminds me, we found the Moulin Rouge:

Woohoo!

Wow, ok we did and saw so much it’s impossible to do it all justice, so in summary:

Some Highlights of the Trip:

.The fact that the majority of what we ate was Italian food which was AMAZING and far superior to anything we ate in Venice. Here’s a picture of our local bistro where we consumed large portions of unbelievably great pizza…

.All the amazing places we went, some of which I’ve mentioned, and others like the Sacre Coeur,and the Seine.

.The fact that the meal with The Boy’s French Family went really well!

.Laughing at my attempts at French.

.The croissant and coffee breakfasts.

.And the ultimate highlight, which was realising La Chat Noir is still around and getting to eat crepes in it:

A Few Minor Lowlights:

.Mistaking the Eifel Tower for a telephone mast.

.Having the majority of people working in shops and restuaurants be terribly rude to us and make us feel like smelly poos.

.And looking like this in nearly every photo taken of me (lol, actually that was really funny) ….

Lol, Oh Catherine!

Anyhoo, yes Paris Trip can be deemed a complete and total success!!!! Can’t wait to go back!!!!!

Crying Hysterically in the Rain

I really need to begin planning what to bring to Paris ….we’re leaving at like 6am on Tuesday! Oy vey!

Also, it has to be incredibly strategic packing because myself and The Boy are sharing a suitcase to cut down on our ridiculous travelling costs. Seriously, you think airlines would be lowering prices during the recession, not piling the euro on!

So my camera bag and my carpet bag can be carried on. Camera bag can double up as a handbag, so that takes care of my wallet, passport, phone, hairbrush and lipbalm!

The carpet bag can take the must-have book, the make-up and some of the dresses, so if the suitcase gets lost, I’m prepared. The suitcase can take everything else; the rest of my clothes, hairdryer, shower products and the things I don’t want to be put on display as I go through security, like underwear!

Ok, I’ve just checked the weather and I’m kinda p*ssed off (pardon my language) because the majority of the week is going to be the ONE type of weather I hate the absolute most: raining AND hot.

Merde!!

High humidity, high level of precipitation, high temperatures.

I actually feel sick.

And no longer excited about my trip.

Also this makes my packing bloody complicated and forces me to bring an abundance of hair products to try and deal with my crazy hair in the humidity!

This was supposed to be a post about what I was going to bring, but I think all I’ll need is this: