We're off to the Hunter Valley on Friday night (after Will's appearance in the much anticpated DanceFever competition) for an adult only weekend featuring a massage on Saturday morning, a leisurely lunch on Saturday afternoon and an evening of John Mellencamp under the stars. I'm not sure, but I think it doesn't get much better than that. (Unless possibly Robbie Williams was doing the massage in the nude and lunch was being personally prepared by Gordon Ramsay sans alleged mistress.)

Last week was stressful for various reasons and now we're sick. So hopefully our health with be regained shortly and we'll have a fabulous weekend to look forward to.

Big Jay and I are really sick today. I came down with a runny nose, headachey sort of cold on Sunday night which got slightly worse during yesterday. Then at 4:00 am we both woke up (well, I hadn't really slept much to that point) with vomiting and the other stuff (you know, both ends). Lucky we have two bathrooms, that's all I can say.

Dad (thank goodness for my dad and my mum who will literally bend over backwards, if necessary, to help us out) came and took the kids to their respective schools. Jay and I dosed on and off on the lounge unti lunchtime when we both realised we were feeling slightly better (vomiting had stopped around 9am). So we've been slothing around, drinking tea, eating bland toast, watching shit tv.

Finally I've had enough and pulled myself partially together to hang out some laundry, fold some other laundry and catch up on my blog.

It makes me really sad that Jeff Buckley is dead and Wes Carr won Australian Idol. I don't know why these things are at all connected but that was the first thought I had when Wes was announced as the winner. The silver lining is I would have been a lot sadder if Luke had won.

Australian Idol was dead to me after Roshani, Mark and Jonny went.

I've been listening to a lot of Jeff Buckley's Live at Sin-e double CD in the car lately. Sometimes I get a physical craving to hear it. The polished version of Lover You Should Have Come Over (on the Grace CD) is magic but the live version is emotion in a song. It knocks me out, spins me round and makes sad and glad to be alive. The other song I absolutely adore on that CD is a version of Bob Dylan's If You See Her, Say Hello.

I certainly have a preference for dark, possibly painful, love songs. There'd definitely be a pattern if I was to write a list.

Tom Petty's Freefalling is a song which makes me physically feel the pain of getting older. Not just getting older, but more like leaving my youth behind. The perceived freedom and mystery and possibility of youth. I wouldn't necessarily want to go back to being 16, but sometimes (like when I hear Freefalling) I want to feel like I did back then. Maybe it's the yearning I miss.

It's also a pretty fantastic song to sing along to when you're driving alone on a warm Saturday afternoon.

I think this gives you an idea of what we're dealing with here...

On the other hand, we also have this version...

My morning starts off well. Some exercise, a shower, you know.

Then Big Jay announces he is going to work and all hell breaks loose. Princess Cranky Pants goes into major meltdown. "Daddy, daddy, daddy... I want my daddy". Over and over again and VERY LOUD!

I try to ignore her, going about my business in the bathroom. The hysteria continues. I come into the lounge room to check that she is OK and she is standing in the doorway, the front door WIDE OPEN... and there I am in the nuddy. Shit!

Luckily our front door only opens onto the private lift lobby room shared by us and our next door neighbours in No. 14. They are an old couple whom we don't see very much. It would have been my luck to have old Bob come out at that moment to go for one of his bike rides.

Hastily semi-hiding my bits with one arm (a lot of bits and not enough arm) I crab walk to the door and pry it out of her little hands. She fights like a wild cat, tears spurting, screaming non-stop. The minute I get her away from the door she is back to it, trying to open it again. I have no option but to lock her (momentarily) in her room. She continues to scream and bang on the door.

Quickly I dress and come back to her. She has quietened down. I offer a cuddle and happily she sits on my lap while I get my daily morning fix of Jon and Kate plus 8. Daddy is forgotten.

How was your morning?

So I come across THIS and I straight away think "this will be a big pile of steaming poo, like a midday movie about teenage drug use but probably much worse".

But then I see HBO are doing it and I have hope. Not a lot of hope, but some. Enough that I will look forward to watching it eventually, rather than living in fear of the moment Anthony starts publicising it on the US chat shows.

It must be a very painful thing, having your Sex on Fire. Can't imagine really.

I can only assume we're talking about a late-night-in-the-nude-toast-making-incident-gone-very-wrong.

Do you know what the greatest job in the world is?

Apparently it's being a Chrisco representative. That's when you have your other poor white trash friends around to your caravan and you tell them how grouse Chrisco is and that. And then you convince them to sign up to the special plan where they pay a weekly amount to get their Christmas hamper delivered with the Winnie Blues and carton of VB, and pay twice as much as they would if they just went down to the shops and bought it. And then you get a commission and that.

That's what the nice lady on the ads says. It's on TV so it must be right.