anyone past 50 on here?

[Guest Jetsun Milarepa]

@Tja, what a fortunate Ace meeting you had! Hope she comes here and enjoys her time with others.

@daveb, thanks for the support. I can still have a nice garden but with longer grass. It's less than a foot long even though it hasn't been cut all year. Cat loves it, and yesterday I was on my way t work when I saw a giant toad trying to hide on the verge of the busy road, so it took no time at all to lift him into my back garden, so he can hibernate there rather than in some dangerous place. Beautiful toad he was, it took me both hands to lift him up, he was soooo fat!

Well done @Tanwen, it's a breath of fresh air to be served by someone who engages with the customer.

@Semisweet, hands off that cake! ;P

 

I missed the talk like a pirate day! Dang it! It would have been great to hoist the main brace and tighten the rollocks!

@will123, I think you've got enough trouble in Ontario if you have Hornets, you don't need concrete producing wasps as well..

[Tja]

She's here, @chandrakirti.

[daveb]

8 hours ago, Tanwen said:

 I suppose it will sound pathetic to the average person but it made my year!!

It doesn't sound pathetic to me, but then, I guess I'm not the average person.

I think it's actually quite nice and a testament to your customer service.

 

6 hours ago, chandrakirti said:

Beautiful toad he was

Nice. And cool that you gave him sanctuary.

 

4 hours ago, Tja said:

She's here, @chandrakirti.

Cool. And good on you for reaching out.

 

I've been enjoying another cool rainy day! Even some distant thunder.  

[Muledeer]

9 hours ago, Tanwen said:

A customer bought me a bunch of flowers (I was working at the time) because he said I'd 'made his day' last time he came in. 

You absolutely deserved those flowers!  How rare it can be to make someone's day....and have it acknowledged!

7 hours ago, chandrakirti said:

 I can still have a nice garden but with longer grass. It's less than a foot long even though it hasn't been cut all year. Cat loves it, and yesterday I was on my way t work when I saw a giant toad trying to hide on the verge of the busy road, so it took no time at all to lift him into my back garden, so he can hibernate there rather than in some dangerous place. Beautiful toad he was, it took me both hands to lift him up, he was soooo fat

"My neighbors grass or weeds are none of my business".  This is the Mantra of Muledeer.  Thank you for providing a nature sanctuary in your yard!  

[daveb]

1 hour ago, Muledeer said:

You absolutely deserved those flowers!  How rare it can be to make someone's day....and have it acknowledged!

"My neighbors grass or weeds are none of my business".  This is the Mantra of Muledeer.  Thank you for providing a nature sanctuary in your yard!  

I agree.

[Autumn Season]

@Tja is quite a lord of the rings, if his black ring attracts others so easily.

[Carol N]

Hi! I just turned 50 last month. I'm new to AVEN; this is my first post. I'm still figuring things out on this site so bear with me. Tonight is the first time I've made the connection to the possibility I'm asexual. Still learning the terms but I think I am gray-sexual and hetero romantic. I was married for 17 years and I have three kids who are 21 and 19 (twins). I'm still trying to figure out how much I want a relationship. Part of me wants companionship, especially with someone who has a sense of humor but there's another part of me that is perfectly fine with times such as this - time to do my own thing without worrying I'm shutting out a partner. So, that's it in a nutshell: I'm here and new to accepting asexuality as an aspect of myself. Thanks! 

[Skycaptain]

@Carol N, welcome to AVEN 🎂 🎂 

 

@chandrakirti, a toad sanctuary is a great excuse for abandoning the mower. My grass is long because the cats live it as well

 

@Autumn Season, good one 

 

@Muledeer, generally I agree, but not when they don't kill off bindweed so it migrates back under the fence 

[Autumn Sunrise]

An interesting story from Down Under: one of our primary schools decided to hold a fundraiser, and chose the Do It In A Dress campaign, which is a fundraiser for One Girl, a charity that provides scholarships for girls in Uganda and Sierra Leone. So far, so good. The students were encouraged to wear a dress or other casual clothes to school instead of their uniform, and to make a gold coin donation, and the school was aiming to raise around $900. One of our federal politicians visited the school, took exception to the Do It In A Dress concept, and tweeted that "this gender morphing is really getting absurd" (source: ABC News). I'm not sure he realised that "Do It In A Dress" is an international fundraiser for girls' education! Anyway, the last I read, donations have topped $60 000, and rising 

 

[will123]

@Carol N Welcome to AVEN . I'm sure you'll find the forum very helpful.

[Autumn Sunrise]

Welcome, @Carol N    I hope you enjoy it here 

 

Update on Do It In A Dress appeal: I believe they've now almost reached $90 000 - yay!

[daveb]

Welcome, @Carol N! Have some  (my sister 3 kids who are a total of about a year and a half apart; the older 2 being twins)

 

1 hour ago, Autumn Sunrise said:

Update on Do It In A Dress appeal: I believe they've now almost reached $90 000 - yay!

I love it! And wish they had stuff like that when I was in school.

 

Yet another cool cloudy day in paradise.  

[Gentle Giant]

Hello everyone and newcomers!  

 

I've been really busy and distracted these days. So I've mostly just been reading posts rather than participating much in threads. My mom is having a terrible time with pain issues and the treatments and medications not helping at all. It is very discouraging. Since she can't do much because of it, I've been doing a lot of extra work. But I don't mind because I want to help all I can. I just wish I could take her pain away!

 

That is great that the fund raiser is doing well for those girls. There was a lady in our area actually making dresses out of pillow cases to donate to these girls who can't go to school unless they have a dress to wear! That's really unfair, why is it so important to wear a dress just to go to school? You should be able to get an education no matter what you wear. Oh well.

[Guest Jetsun Milarepa]

Welcome @Carol N, hope you enjoy it here!

@Gentle Giant, sorry to hear your mum is in such pain, I hope she finds a remedy soon.

@Autumn Sunrise, sounds a great idea, but I remember us all going on strike so we could get to wear trousers! I might break my habit of wearing trousers so someone could get an education though!

@daveb, @Muledeer & @Skycaptain, you'd have roared with laughter at my big return home tonight....there were so many toads and frogs about that I had pockets full of them! The frogs managed to cause a load of bother, but the toads quietly disappeared into my back garden gracefully. If I get enough to safety they'll spend a winter in the great shelter under my shed. I shudder to think what any passing pedestrian might have thought though....

[daveb]

37 minutes ago, chandrakirti said:

I remember us all going on strike so we could get to wear trousers!

When I was in school girls were required to wear skirts or dresses. Then about the last year or so the schools were starting to let them wear trousers/jeans (although maybe that was only on Fridays? I can't recall now.)

 

But the Do It In a Dress thing is meant for everyone, all genders, to wear dresses, so I like that subversive aspect to it in addition to the good cause and all.  

[Semisweet]

2 hours ago, daveb said:

When I was in school girls were required to wear skirts or dresses. Then about the last year or so the schools were starting to let them wear trousers/jeans (although maybe that was only on Fridays? I can't recall now.)

When I was in sixth grade, they started letting girls wear pants to my school, but only in bad winter weather. I remember a class discussion in which our teacher thought this move was unwise, saying that pants for girls were for play, not for serious business like school. (Even then that sounded ridiculous to me.).

 

By a couple of years later, girls were so routinely wearing pants/jeans to school that a classmate who wore a dress once apologized for doing so!

 

I hadn't heard of the Do It in a Dress campaign but it sounds like a highly worthwhile cause.

 

@Carol N, a warm welcome to you!  You'll find lots of likeminded people here.

 

@Gentle Giant, sorry to hear about your mom's pain issues; I hope she'll be able to get some answers and feel better soon. In the meantime she's fortunate to have your help and loving care.

[Autumn Season]

@Gentle Giant I'm so sorry to hear that your mom is in pain. I hope she will get better soon.

 

Yesterday I wore a simple white dress with blue flowers. Because of this somebody's first impression of me was that I'm probably going to church each Sunday. This amused me.

[Skycaptain]

@chandrakirti, so you've removed lots of frogs and toads from the frog'n'toad 

 

to those unaware of the eccentricities of the English language, frog'n'toad is rhyming slang for road

 

[teatree]

Today I am off, so theoretically I could have slept late...but no, I awoke at 4:30! (Sigh.) So now it's only 8:30 and I feel like a whole morning has gone by.

 

I almost never see frogs and toads where I live now. Part of the backyard is mowed lawn, but part is overgrown. We do have a rabbit (or maybe it's plural, though I only see one at a time), but that's all.

 

Happy autumnal equinox (or vernal tomorrow, depending on your hemisphere)!

[daveb]

Yay, Fall is here! Happy Bilbo's and Frodo's birthday!  

[Guest Jetsun Milarepa]

Haha! @Skycaptain, are you havin' a giraffe?

I just got back from my rather unusual third round interview...in a big noisy pub in Cambridge. It was fun though , I seem to have a lot in common with the people I met...there are even some ukelele players and Potterites too, as well as cat lovers. We spent a lot of time sharing our favourite cat photos....so I don't know when I find out, but I think it's going to be a positive outcome because I met the lady who provided the role play during the last two interviews and she said she was happy with my phone performance. Crossed fingers I can write my resignation letter next week, take three weeks holidays and start afresh, free from  the 'groundhog day' of my present work life.

[Muledeer]

@chandrakirti Wow, a job interview in a pub?  and you don't even drink?  I bet you could really let loose and have fun that way, not having to worry about getting too loaded and making a bad impression (at least that's what I would probably do).  I hope you make the final cut!

 

I discovered a bank error in my favor this week due to an interest rate error on a savings account.  It had been wrong ever since I opened the account in 2015.  They promised me one rate but paid me only half as much as the interest rate they promised.  The branch manager called me and apologized and said they had deposited about $1,100 (USD) in my account! 

 

I'm going to do something fun tomorrow- I'm going to an estate auction where there are antiques, tools, and Native American artifacts (i.e. stone tools) up for grabs.  I collect those kinds of things.  Happy Friday everybody!

[Semisweet]

@chandrakirti, it's all still sounding promising -- so I'm rooting for good job news to come your way! 

 

@Muledeer, hope you find some treasures at the estate auction. Do you display any of your artifact collection in your home?

[daveb]

To echo @Semisweet,

Good luck, @chandrakirti! Sounds like you have good shot.

Awesome, @Muledeer! That's a good chunk of change! Hopefully you can find some cool stuff at the estate auction.

 

Not much news here. I got a flyer in the mail today that gave me a chuckle. It was from a local community college about a class they are having in October about planning for a successful retirement.  (I think I already graduated  )

[Misery's Fence]

@Carol N Welcome! 

[Kazbe]

On 18/09/2017 at 0:44 PM, Autumn Sunrise said:

- maybe she'd like a day in the Mountains too?? 

Yes, please. I haven't been Blue Mountains way for a while.

 

I live in the south western part of Sydney. Highly multicultural and most unfashionable. My parents came from Mudgee which is over the Blue Mountains and not so far away - although neither knew each other while living there but met on Lord Howe Island instead. I'm tempted to retire in Mudgee. 

[Kazbe]

On 20/09/2017 at 4:16 AM, chandrakirti said:

I don't think he was impressed with my reply that I won't be cutting it until November, when the Privet Hawk Moth caterpillars have all gone to ground and  the toads and frogs are hibernating along with the hedgehogs....

Well, I think that is the perfect response ...

 

I also missed Talk Like A Pirate Day. Aaaarrrrgggghhhh! I'll be walking the plank and meeting me fellow bilge-sucking buckos down in Davy Jones locker. After that, ye can meet me by the mizzen and we'll splice the main brace. BYO Rum.

[Autumn Sunrise]

@Kazbe, Mudgee is one of our favourite towns to visit. We go to their Small Farms Field Day each year, as well as occasional other things. 

Blue Mountains seems like a good place for an Ace Meetup when @Midland Tyke comes over - should be fun!

[Myssterry]

Good wishes for the Oz meet ups.

 

I have been updating my aquarium.  I had the previous tank for about 20 years.  It began to seep, and was either badly scratched or crazed,  I think crazed.  In fear of a disaster if it finally burst, I bought a new tank and stand last week and have installed it and fixed the background to it.  A few annoying air bubbles keep forming in the plastic, but it is looking good.  More importantly, Florence and Dougal, the fish, are doing well, and the water quality is testing as ideal in all categories.  Cat was sitting watching the tank from a chair yesterday, for all the world as though he was watching TV.  I moved him and closed the door to the room, as the fish may have been less thrilled than he was.

 

Spoiler

 

Cat and I are still missing Dog, the house is too clean and quiet, but we are bonding more closely in our bereavement. 

[Guest Jetsun Milarepa]

@Muledeer, I took my ukelele and played them a few tunes...really interesting meet up with new colleagues! I start on 30th October @Semisweet. I'm soooo looking forward to writing my resignation letter tomorrow, savouring the whole day! Hoping to see the new Kingsman film and maybe even the new Queen Victoria film as well, with Dame Judy Dench in it (she's hench, that Judy Dench...couldn't resist that comment).

 

It also means I won't miss the Oxford meet up, as I fully intend to have my 117.6 hours holiday owing, plus I'll be leaving after the 3.5% payrise, backdated from April!!