Getting back to my pre baby self

laser hair removal

Ever since my pregnancy I have had pretty terrible hair growth problems. I read a lot of information online about hormonal effects of pregnancy, excessive hair growth is on one them. It’s not really a massive problem but it’s caused me a lot of anxiety because I just hate the way I look. I’ve looked into all kinds of treatments, I’ve tried my fair share of waxing, shaving and even electrolysis but now it’s time for something more permanent. I know it takes a few sessions to have a lasting impact which sounds long but at this point I’m kind of willing to try anything. After my baby was born I became pretty motivated to get back into shape and I feel like this hairy issue is holding me back. I spoke to a cosmetic dermatologist about laser hair removal in Melbourne, he said excessive hairiness was an extremely common side effect of pregnancy and laser treatment is efficient. I have arranged an initial consultation so a doctor can take a look and do a patch test to see if I qualify for treatment. I have done pretty well so far to regain my pre baby body. I’ve lost all the weight and then some and my fitness is better than it was before. It would just be a real slap in the face if I was left with this one last hairy reminder of my pregnancy. My beautiful baby is enough of a gorgeous reminder of what I went through, I don’t feel the need to hang on to another one. According to the girls at the gym, laser hair removal is the way forward, many of them have undergone treatment and are now smooth and hair free!

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Planning funerals

perth based funeral director

As a therapist I see people going through all stages of life. I am there during times of celebration and grief. I tend to take more of an active role in my clients lives when they are experiencing emotions at the extreme end of the spectrum. This is can be during an incredibly happy time such as a wedding, where senses are heightened and often emotions can be blurred but can also be during the worst of times, when people are mourning the loss of a loved one. Death is not a stranger to me, I have counselled numerous clients through loss and experienced it myself. It doesn’t really get easier. One thing I’ve noticed over the years is the benefit of foresight. The whole mourning process is made far easier when plans are in place. I recently met with a client who had arranged the funeral of their loved one with a funeral director in Perth. They spoke at length of how the pre-existing plans saved a lot of time, money and heartache when it came to the logistical side of the funeral and days afterwards. It may sound morbid but it really does help all those left behind when you have left some kind of strategy for your farewell. Although of course in tragic circumstances plans are rare. In this case it is important to have a supportive and experienced funeral director. I have been to too many funerals in Perth, at my age they become a regular weekend activity, and I can safely say there are excellent funeral directors available to grieving families and friends. It is important to not overlook the logistics, it is not an easy task but is fundamental to beginning the mourning process with comfort. Death is a natural part of life and like everything in life, it goes down better when it’s taken one step at a time.

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Getting my act together

I’m not going to lie, I’m not really a proactive type of person. I try to be intermittently, try to psych myself up about doing one task or other before it transforms into a serious problem or a major issue, but I just simply can’t be bothered. I don’t care, okay? It just seriously doesn’t bother until, suddenly, it passes that threshold and goes from being a daily nuisance to a potential catastrophe. Then, reluctantly, I’m forced into acting.

Take the floor in my study, for example. For months now I’ve noticed it doesn’t quite align with the bottom of the wall. The skirting, or whatever the heck it’s called, finishes, and then there’s a little gap, and then there’s the floor. If you walk on it too heavily or jump or something, the floor sinks a little lower. I’ve known for a really long time what the problem is. It’s termites. It’s always those bloody termites. But I just couldn’t be bothered going through the whole process again, I’ve had to do it in places I’ve lived before, but a really good friend of mine recently used this amazing pest control company in mornington and the way she raved about it has given me some food for thought.

In the past, when I’ve used any type of termite removal company, the service has always been (I’ll be honest here) truly awful. They’re always late, rude, and more than once I’ve been working with a termite inspection company that’s actually gone broke while they’ve been helping me with my home. And I’m not the only person I know who’s experienced this. Termite inspection companies are notoriously unreliable, so if there’s a chance of finding a termite inspection group in Mornington that’s as good as Susie let on, well, I might as well give it a go.

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I am a business woman!

business tax returns

I stared at the screen in rapt silence.  It took me a good half an hour to process what was unfolding before my very eyes. People were actually paying money for my pictures. Not my mum or dad, or colleagues or anyone I know for that matter but total strangers were willing to give me actual currency for my pictures. Not just some people either, a lot of people. I refreshed the screen every few minutes to find the number ticking up like drips from a tap. That was two weeks ago, the drips haven’t stopped and I now have over two hundred orders. I don’t know anything about business. The last time I sold something was when I was six and I stood outside my parents house with lemonade. Apparently now I am a business and have to file very grown up business documents about taxes and banking! I just want to take pictures and then give them to people, if they want to give me money, great! I now find myself dealing with a large pile of scary documents called business tax returns. Melbourne has been my home for five years now and I can proudly say in all that time I have avoided all forms of accountancy and financial paperwork. My time has come to delve into the world of bookkeeping. Whilst the camera is my domain, tax returns are not. I decided to call a professional. I had just started to make anything resembling decent money from my art and I am not about to go and sabotage by attempting to file my own taxes! I looked into hiring a tax return accountant based in Melbourne but realised I may be getting ahead of myself. I did however find some good literature on how to deal with the whole tax process.

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Tropical Island Problems: My Boat

boatcatch systemWorking on a remote tropical island comes with its highs and lows. The sunshine, beautiful surroundings and plentiful fruit trees make it a pretty glorious place to live. However, access to modern comforts is difficult. My boat is my main link to resources, whether they be essentials like fuel and clean water or luxuries like chocolate and moisturizers, without my boat I am a little stranded. To avoid being stranded I invest a lot of time and money into keeping the old girl in good shape. I recently bought new boat catches which will make life a lot easier! At the moment launching the boat is a thirty minute process in which I have to get the two of the local guys to help out, costing me at least a couple of beers a day! I had ordered this boat catch system to the mainland a few months ago so when word came round that it was ready to be collected I headed straight over. A large expense perhaps but one that will save me a lot of more than beer. When the storms come in it’s important to be able to get off boat quickly. A flawless retrieval is never more important than when lightning is on the horizon. Whenever people get wind that I am making the two hour journey to the mainland I get a lot of requests. It’s hard to get everything especially in terms of fitting it on the boat. With the size and weight of the new boatcatch I had to be a little ruthless this time round. Of course I will bring back nappies and formula for the kids and the school desperately needs some new notebooks but unfortunately Mr. Arrow’s rum would have to wait. Once I had my new boatcatch up and running I would return for the rum!

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Timber windows at the road house

window replacements company MelbourneI’m opening up an old school hotel and I’m calling it the Road House. It’s right near the freeway and it’s going to be  a stop over point for truckers and bikies. It’s going to be great. I’ve got my bar wenches lined up and convenient booths for discreet deals. There’s going to be a wide space for dancing to country music and brawling. I’m also going to have a greyhound racing arena out the back, to encourage a few of the local punters. I can’t wait to open up my Road House!

Anyway,the Road House needs to be a particular style to attract the right crowd. It’s gotta look classic and midwestern — even though we’re in Australia I know. That means  need to change the old aluminuim frame windows. Melbourne weather can be unpredictable, so while aluminuim was convenient for cleaning, the timber windows are going to look more rustic. It needs to look a little bit grungy, not super shiny.

So I chose some really great wooden window frames to make the place look like a bikie den. I’ve got some dusty floodlights that I’m installing at the bar, and I’m going to shoot randomly at the walls to embed some bullet holes in the wall. That would look pretty cool. I’ve got a dart board as well. I’m hoping to become the doyen of Road House managers. I’m hoping that my business will also attract some escorts into the hotel. They can do their thing upstairs I don’t mind, I won’t dob them in. I can’t wait til the company comes around to install those timber window frames. Melbourne is going to be so impressed by my roadhouse.

With all the layout and design mapped out, now I need to consider what’s going to go on the menu. There’s gotta be some hearty stakes for those robust and hungry truckers. Oh, I’ll also need a jukebox so they can listen to music while eating dinner.

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Dry needling on the internet

dry needling coursesI have become weirdly obsessed with online forums. Being unemployed means I have an excess of time on my hands and I have found a deep sense of satisfaction at trawling through the internet. Some of my favourites include the Coles facebook page, where people discuss a quinoa shortage as if it signaled the end of the world, and medical complaints forums. I get a sadistic kick off people complaining of their strange ailments, it’s a bonus when there is an attached picture. Occasionally an actual medical professional will step in and shatter everyone’s hypochondria with some concise and powerful advice. I got sucked in deep yesterday and spent 10 hours on forums about needling courses. I didn’t even know they were a thing but apparently it’s a way to treat muscle and nerve pain. People take their needles very seriously it seems. I find the more niche and abstract the topic the better the quality of chat is. One man actually went as far as making a plasticine replica of the muscles in his back and positioning them to show where his pain was, he made a GIF and posted it for us all to enjoy. I was in heaven. Obviously when my mum asks what I did with my day I told her I filled out over 5 job applications and any day now I’d be off to work. Little does she know that I actually spent my day discussing the best dry needling courses Australia has to offer with doc725lovemuscle from New Zealand. If only there was a way I could monetise trawling obscure forums. Maybe the police would pay me to search for digital criminals or something. Better yet, maybe I should just become a doctor and be one of the people that gets to dispense advice to all these virtual ailments. Although that does seem a long way round.

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Fiction Versus Reality

televisionIt’s so hard sometimes, watching great fiction that presents us with boundless opportunity and freedom, but then having to come right back to real life. Like how in superhero comics, if you’re being mugged you just scream a bit and some low-key crimefighter will come to help you. Or if you’re hiking in the woods and your tablet runs out of power, the Power Rangers will come along and charge it for you. All that stuff.

I even heard about a guy who was doing antenna installation in Melbourne and he fell off the roof and gained antenna powers, but I think that’s just an urban legend. Antenna specialists are trained to perfection, like acrobats. They wouldn’t fall off in the first place.

Personally, I blame digital television. Australian TV is all just drama, soaps and documentaries about people who do cattle farming. Don’t get me wrong; I love the fact that people do cattle farming, because beef is wonderful. Sometimes they even show a documentary about people who do DAIRY farming, and that’s when you know you’re in for a night of exciting broadcast entertainment. I suppose in a way, we were happy in our small world where the news occasionally reported something bad happening in another country, but then it went back to a fuzzy news story about a cockatoo being taught to say incredibly naughty words. For a time, all was well.

And then came the digital antennas, and suddenly life was about more than cattle farming. Other countries started lending us their arts, and maybe we gave back to them in the form of our mad dramas and farming documentaries. Suddenly our screens were flooded with strange Japanese animation, American live-action superhero shows and British comedies. The world exploded in scale, as did the Melbourne digital antenna industry. And there’s no going back! We just have to live with this new and exciting global village. But still, I do sometimes miss the simpler times…

-Vaughn

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Tree removal vs body corporate

tree removalMy unit is engulfed in vegetation. Seriously, it looks like a hut in a jungle. There are enormous trees crowding the building, plus a wilderness of plants and bushes flourishing underneath. It’s so out of control that I can’t even see out of my windows. The lounge room’s always dark even when it’s day time due to the leaves pressed against the glass, and the bedroom and bathroom actually have vines creeping in through the walls. It’s high-time that the body corporate call for tree removal services.

I could not understand what was keeping them from calling the arborists to do some much needed tree trimming. Melbourne can get wet in March and April and that’s just going to make the greenery out go rampant. But I soon discovered from my neighbour that the body corporate manager has a phobia of arborists. While everyone in the apartment complex is desperate to get the trees trimmed or even removed, the lady who’s in charge of organising it all is afraid of hedge trimmers! I’m trying to be sympathetic here, I know what it’s like to have a strange phobia myself (polar bears), but I have to admit that my patience is running thin. I almost feel like calling the arborists myself and paying out of my own pocket for the dang tree removal. Prahran is a pretty well-to-do suburb so I’m sure some of the neighbours wouldn’t mind chipping in. This woman obviously needs professional help for the mental ill-health she experiences. I wonder what it was that triggered her fear of arborists. Maybe she had a childhood tree house hacked to pieces.

For now, I’m thinking of taking a pair of clippers to those creepers. One of them is reaching its tendrils around the neck of my sleeping cat…. Kitty! Wake up!… And I think I’m going to put my succulents up for adoption while I’m at it.

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Marine fabrication for my brother’s birthday

fishing rod holdersI love buying gifts for my brother because he’s the easiest person to buy for. Everyone else – my sister, my parents, my girlfriend – is so hard to buy for and I never know what to get. The women are too fussy, and my dad, he just pretty much loafs around the house all day and has no hobbies. My brother on the other hand, loves adventure sports. Every years he’s doing a new thing like mountain hiking or skiing. This year, his craze has been fishing. He’s getting into it so much that he bought himself a boat and has been taking it out every weekend ever since. It makes great fodder for birthday present ideas, because now I’m getting him fishing rod holders.

What a marvelous time to be alive. My brother’s latest hobby is supported by the custom welding industry which can bend steel and aluminium according to your needs. This way I can get some really neat rod holders attached to his boat, not some cheap shoddy attachment ones from ebay, but some professional long-lasting ones that are made for endurance. The only thing is that I’m not sure which side of the boat he likes to throw them off of. I guess it doesn’t matter too much. I also don’t know how I’m going to surprise him with this gift when I actually have to take the boat to the welders. Maybe with the help of his wife we can somehow do it while he’s at work.

I’m just hoping my brother is still going through this whole fishing phase next year so I can get him some bait boards. I know he currently just uses the top of the esky, which is not ideal. When I get my own boat, we can drive abreast of one another and have races. And also challenge each other to who can catch more fish. There’s always been competition between us.

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