You exist. 😻

They are looking very fluffy and well-fed

I’m happy to go round and give them all a 5 minute back rub each. They’ve all earned it.

Surely a free bbq at the local park, jumping castle for the kids and fireworks for later on for a start.

Probably not a nuclear reactor in their backyard.

Pleasant dreams ⭐

They won’t. They are in the pockets of oil and gas interests as much as liberals. They’ll move the needle a bit, but not enough.

No majority though, the Greens will have a lot of power. Which is a good thing.

There’s a trend atm among new mums exerting their control over things like visitors. On one hand, I sort of understand protecting your space as a new mum, been there, done that and felt all the feels that go with it. But some are taking it to the extreme and don’t realise that they are alienating their support networks and then complain that nobody has supported them.

This lady sounds like a manipulative control freak, and will use her baby as a tool to control your brother and your parents further, if not drive a bigger wedge between them.

Beware.

This is so sad. It should be a time of bringing family closer together with love and joy and she’s just handing out confusion and sadness.

With a mum like that bro and baby needs all the friends they can get. Right now be a good sib. Say nothing about what is happening but do listen.

and hugs

Were they invited? Or did they just show up? I’d have decked someone if they just showed up. It was a mega stressful time for us. Everyone got FaceTime, it’s not like they were shut out. But everyone was asked to give us time before meeting Tinyest.

The only thing generous there is the spacing between timtams

Don’t buy it.

Still 11 in a pack?

Look at the moon

Box of plain shapes and a block of cheddar sliced almost transparently thin.

Say hi to strangers

Cuddle cat if cat wishes to cuddle

Write in my journal

sing a stupid, stupid song about nonsense that I make up on the spot

Go for a long walk

But the most important thing of all, is to take some time to rest.

Try to be kind to yourself :)

I think different things work for different people. One of the things I do is write lists. Things I need to do that day. Mark them off. Add more. It’s never ending but it stops them from going around in my head all day like a washing machine.

Sometimes I watch mindless tv.

I take one day at a time. Some days are good. Some days aren’t.

Hugs 🫂

Obviously YMMV on all of these:

One small change I made maybe six months ago was switching my car radio to ABC Classic FM. Every time I’m in the car I get gentle classical music. No ads, no scary news, the presenters aren’t annoying. I sometimes put it on at home now too for small moments of calm.

Hammock in the back yard. A cheap one in a stand is fine.

Firstly, a nice long hot shower could be what you need if you’re up to it.

I think anything involving getting in touch with your senses could be good. I’m struggling with a bout of anhedonia right now. Something I’ve done for the past year and a half is write something good that happened each day on a sticky note.

Attempting to enjoy whatever sun there is.

Being outside and spending time in nature.

Putting on a movie / TV show, especially feel-good ones

Watching comedy on YouTube

Remind yourself that your thoughts are just thoughts.

Don’t worry about the clothes :)

I hope you feel better soon

Everyone has already written some great stuff here so I’ve little to add other than that I try to focus on getting into some nature, enjoy some sensory stimulation like fragrances especially natural ones, try to force some fruit into myself (I’m terrible with fruit eating at certain times of the year and it affects my moods more than I’d like). I also get into tea drinking in a big way as it gives me a lot of calm, simple pleasure. We are often our own hardest taskmasters and it helps me to remember something a psych said to me years ago when I was running myself ragged trying my guts out to please everyone and do everything perfectly: “Sometimes good enough is good enough.” Hugs mate.

Hugs.

Make things easy for yourself.

If you have goals you can work at them bit by bit. That is good too.

This will sound very cliched but something I found that helped me was to go outside and lie on the grass, or just sit in nature (even if it’s only your backyard or a small patch of grass). It was suggested to me after I got some really bad news and it did seem to help, at least a little. I hope you’re feeling better and more on top of things soon, and am sending hugs.

Treating myself to a pack of chips or something like that.

Recently got from crunchy frozen chips, haven’t had them in months and it was so good after cooking them, very comforting.

for joy i have the cats and my fam 🐱

☕️

Imo it’s not a loss for Australia when the only opposition is batshit insane and dangerous. They needed a harsh slap on the face. They need to be told in no uncertain terms that this Trump-lite bullshit is NOT welcome, it is not to be entertained even in a “but muh both sides!” debate. The Libs entirely deserve this bollocking.

I do really hope they can become an effective opposition again (and the greens too). But it’ll require some big changes. If the libs do another moronic pivot even further right like they did after the last election and the loss at state level in Vic, then seriously, that’s not even remotely Labor or the Australian public’s fault. I’d love to see the libs die and some alternative parties come up instead.

don’t worry, the herald sun and sky radio/tv are still massive cunts and will tear apart and lie about everything Labor does

It’s a massive gain for Australia. When they lost their moderate seats to the Teals, the party room became disproportionately alt-right despite existing in a voting system that demands moderates.

The cooker influence told them that Trumpism was the way forward and to win government again, when that only worked by disenfranchising voters. When everyone votes, a political culture that thrives on the extreme works the opposite.

American politicians need to go overboard to compete for attention just to get people to turn up and vote based on anger and fear, the people in the middle of the spectrum get disenfranchised more as both two-party single vote options stretch further from them to garner good or bad attention. This results in no vote, which is nowhere near as bad as a vote transferring to the opposition.

In a mandatory/preference country, hyperbole and extremism costs you the vote and because they have to vote still, your lost vote goes to the opposition and is a net change of -2 votes. 1 less vote + 1 opposition gained vote.

Peter Dutton was the leader amongst the right wing faction of the party when they had the moderate Liberal members, when Turnbull lost the leadership it was due to an internal power struggle from the right wing of the party room. At the time Morrison won because he was perceived to be both a moderate and somewhat conservative, when the room included the former Teal seat moderates they kept the leadership from going more fringe with Dutton.

Without the moderate members that lost to the Teals, the right wing of the Liberal Party had the majority of the party room and they put their leader in charge despite what happened in American being counter and unrepeatable to our much better voting system.

Now that the Liberal party has gotten a proper swift kick up the bum for letting themselves shift too far from center, with the leader changed in the process, if they have any sense they will realise how much they got wrong or they’ll never win another election.

They have no choice now but to level and rebuilt their party, or the Commonwealth will become like Victoria and WA, having no second party option while the rusted on Liberal voters cost everyone the opportunity of a new second party emerging.

I agree. An effective opposition is incredibly important, lest the governing party come to believe they have carte blanche to do whatever the fuck they want, assuming the public is completely beholden to them.

The teals might be that check now

Same in Wills. Will it be good ol’ Labor Peter Khalil, or the Green Samantha Ratnam? I’m curious because Peter has been in for aaages

Keen to see how Casey and Flinders fall too. But I’m really hoping the Greens could squeeze through in Wills, not a good election for the Greens overall. Shame about Gen Z hero MCM in Brisbane but I’d have been surprised if he stayed past one term…

agree that credit cards are a bane

i can’t help wondering how many people live beyond their means

i don’t deny it bothers me a little, and really, it’s just a little, that because I “look” poor and don’t spend people think i’m poor ( and thus pathetic and beneath them ) No, I’m just being sensible.

It’s great that you are doing home things. 🙂

May I ask how much the implant was? I need about 3 and am trying to gauge prices.

I hope it all goes smoothly. I forgot which one you ended up getting… Are you liking the look of the new place?

Yea they’re arseholes.

Everytime i’ve come back from OS I’m always shocked how rude they are compared to wherever I’m coming back from.