When Dreams Become Reality*

*In a bad way. In a really, really bad way.

Have you ever had the dream in which your teeth crumble and fall out of your mouth? You catch them in your hand and stare at them, a feeling of sheer panic coursing through your body?

It's not a dream anymore. It's really happening.

I've lost three bits of my molars. It started back in December but because it didn't hurt and I have a odontophobia**, I pretended it never happened. Then a couple of months ago, another chunk of tooth got mashed up with whatever I was eating at the time. Monday's salad sandwich claimed the third.

Being a follower of the 'three strikes and you're out' mode of living, I knew it was time to call the dentist. I didn't feel so bad about leaving it for over seven months to make an appointment because I couldn't get in for a week anyway. There's still another four days of imagining all kinds of steel torturous devices being jammed into dental cavities.

So why are my teeth literally falling out of my head? I have good dental hygiene. I brush, I floss, I use mouthwash (which burns like a mofo, incidentally). 

I think I grind my teeth. Clench my jaw, at the very least. In my early twenties, I had a mouth guard professionally made because I was clenching during the night (that sounds vaguely dirty...) and awakening with an aching face. I put the guard in the other night for the first time in years, but my teeth must have moved because it hurt so much, I had to take it out after half an hour.

I stress about grinding my teeth. Grinding tends to happen when you're stressed. It's a vicious circle, so I bought some Bach's Rescue Remedy to try and help relax me before going to bed. I don't know if it has helped with the teeth or not, but I know it hasn't helped with the nightmares. Last night was the spiders-as-big-as-cats dream, the other night it was the been-happening-for-years-and-years snake-in-the-bed dream. Last semester, I had a recurring dream that I had completely forgotten about a whole subject I was supposed to do and would then get all stressed out in my dream. No doubt that would lead to some clenching and grinding (it's not even sounding vaguely dirty now. Clenching and grinding sounds like pure filth).

So four more days. I'm praying that the dentist doesn't tell me I need a root canal because that shit will. not. fly. Nah-uh. I'm praying that the dentist doesn't tell me I need my teeth extracted and replaced by falsies. (I went to high school with a guy who had dentures. He was cruelly nicknamed Chompers [not by me]. I don't want to be known as Chompers.) I just want to go on Monday morning, have the dentist to glue my molars back together or something similar and then leave, high on happy gas.

I would also really love for the snake and spider dreams to eff the eff off now, too. Please.


**Odontophobia is, predictably, a fear of the dentist. It's not as exciting-sounding as althaiophobia***.

***Althaiophobia is a phobia to marshmallows. For realz. Freaks****

****Sorry to the althaiophobics reading this. I guess I'm just ignorant to the pain of althaiophobia. I really like marshmallows.

Jane Austen Fight Club

It's had over 300,000 hits on YouTube, so chances are you've already seen it. But if you haven't and you love a good bandwagon, I definitely recommend you jump on this one.

The Politics of Being a Woman

I'm ashamed to admit how very little I know of politics. Considering Australia has an upcoming election, my ignorance is coming to more prominence.

I watched the Leader's Debate on television tonight. I also followed the #debate on Twitter (it seems I have trouble watching a television show without the aid of Twitter these days). There were a few tweets that were quite relevant (wondering why most of the talk seemed to be about 'boat people', why issues such as education, mental health and climate change weren't addressed), but my eyes were drawn to the anti-Julia Gillard comments. Not the comments about her party's policies, but the ones against her, as a woman.

@RachaelLonergan No surprise that the blue worm goes limp when JG talks about taking charge and being in power. #getwomenbackinthekitchen

@misscoca Why do women like Gillard so much? I'm anti the whole female PM thing. The deputy will have to take over 5 days a month.

@melanie_james Can Julia Gillard's face move? Not a good role model for women that you can't have life lines on your face #toomuchbotox #ausvotes #debate

Shocking, right? These tweets were from women. I've left their IDs there as a name-and-shame. It's the tweet from @misscoca disturbs me the most. I don't know about her, but being an adult, I can manage my period well enough that it doesn't incapacitate me for a week. Oh, don't miss @RachaelLonergan's hashtag that women should be in the kitchen.

I can't stand it. I cannot stand the fact that there are women out there who think like this. I must be naive or something because I didn't realise we were stuck in the 1950s.

I don't necessarily like Ms Gillard and her policies. I lost a lot of respect for her when she said that a marriage should be between a man and a woman. But compared to Tony Abbott, who I think truly believes he is living in 1952, she seems to be the lesser of two evils. I cannot support a man with his views.

Either way, I think Catherine Deveny said it best:

@CatherineDeveny Choosing between these two is like deciding which bucket of vomit you're going to drink #debate

A Weighty Issue

As the weather turned cooler a couple of months ago, my body got confused and thought it was preparing for hibernation. I couldn't stop eating, I ate whatever I could get my hands on. And of course, whenever binges happen, it's never healthy food that is the subject of the binge.

The waistband of my jeans is tight. Too tight. I feel like the denim is strangling my thighs. I can't wear them in public anymore. And it's devastating because I couldn't even do them up last year and I worked my arse off (quite literally) at the gym to fit into them again. There was even a point not all that long ago when I thought they would have to be replaced with a smaller size.

Back in November, I joined a gym and got myself a (hot) personal trainer. He encouraged me to work hard and I lost almost ten kilograms (twenty-two pounds). I felt amazing. I had more energy and getting results just made me want to work harder for more. Every day, people gave me compliments on how I was looking.

So what happened? How did it all come undone? I'm blaming the complete change in lifestyle. A nine-to-five, Monday-to-Friday routine kept me on track. Now that's all gone and I'm having trouble staying in control.

I haven't been to the gym since May, but I did get motivated the other day after seeing Valerie's absolutely incredible physique on her blog, Red Vines For Breakfast. How could you not be impressed? I found my old yoga DVD and had my very own yoga session in the middle of the lounge room.

It felt SO good! My muscles were being engaged for the first time in months. The muscles in my back were sore afterwards, but sore in the best, best way.

I'm finally inspired to do something to shift this flab. All up, I want to lose fifteen kilograms (thirty-three pounds). Not just want to, but need to. I have to. I'm not in the healthy weight range for my height, I don't feel good, I don't look good. There are so many reasons.

My aim is to exercise three times a week. I could do more, but I think this is a realistic expectation. I must make better food choices (but chocolate! For the love of God, chocolate!). And I'm going to be using YOU to help keep me in check. I feel if I tell people about my mission, then I've got some accountability.

I'm not brave enough to share how much I weigh (I'm such a girl!), but when I get to my goal - because I will get there - I might be. I had been planning to go to the gym today, but suffered a monster hangover (turns out I did go to the fancy French restaurant last night. There are some masters of manipulation in my family. If only they could use their powers for good...). Now that it's 8.30pm and the nausea and dizziness have worn off, I'm going to do some yoga.

I hope you've all had a lovely weekend!

Justify This

Do you ever feel like you have to justify your choices to other people? I've been doing a lot of it lately and I'm really starting to get pissed off.

When I left a full-time job at the start of the year to become a full-time student who works one day a week, I was prepared for the sacrfices I was going to have to make. Luxuries had to go. I waved goodbye to thoughts of holidays, moving out, extravagant nights out, but I didn't mind (much). I was making the sacrifices to pursue a dream which would make it all worthwhile.

While they were supportive of my decision to go back to university, I don't think my family have fully understood the financial side of it all. I'm talking about extended family - cousins, aunties etc - not my immediate family who have been brilliant.

My cousin recently returned to Australia, after three years working abroad. A family dinner has been organised for her, which sounds lovely. Except that it's at a five-star restaurant. The idea is fantastic - the chance to get dressed up and dine at a fancy French restaurant, followed by a few drinks with my cousins, whom I adore, but no matter which angle I looked at it from, I just couldn't justify the expense.

But Christ Almighty, the grief I've gotten. You'd think that I had gone to each family member and personally insulted them. 

It's a Capricorn trait to be good with money, but I also have some pride. It's not easy saying that I can't afford something. But then having to justify myself and the choices I've made is kind of humiliating.

Missing out on things isn't something I enjoy, but I'm not complaining. It's all part of the decision I made. I just wish other people would get on board.

Do you guys ever feel like this as well? How do you deal with it?

I "like" this blog

Over lunch with some friends the other day, the topic of internet dating came up. Even though they raised some very convincing pros, I'm still firmly in the con column - especially after checking out some profiles (curiosity got the better of me) and seeing a mess of grammatical errors and lines like Here go's! or that they like watching comedys. Worse still: seeing Two and a Half Men in the list of television shows they like.

Good grammar is important to me, probably as it should be for someone doing a Professional Writing & Editing course. It's not the be all and end all when it comes to people I choose to spend time with, but I struggle with people who don't know the difference between there/they're/their.

So being a bit of a grammar Nazi, I love a good grammar blog. And that's why I was so excited to find The "Blog" of "Unnecessary" Quotes yesterday. Grammar Nazis send in photos of quotation marks being used willy-nilly and Bethany posts them. An example:

And "hypnosis" is a euphemism for what, exactly? This blog filled in a good couple of hours at work yesterday. Or "work", as the case may be.

I'd also like to say I love Engrish.com but that could possibly be politically incorrect. So I won't. But I really, really do love it.

Home Alone

In the five nights that I've been at home by myself, I have stained the couch with chocolate biscuit, dropped beetroot on the rug in the lounge room, stunk the house out with the smell of burning chicken and burned my finger while making caramel.

I've not gone to bed before midnight, nor have I surfaced before ten o'clock. I've dreamt that I was in a war, as well as a car accident. I've watched midday movies and two seasons of Newlyweds (oh, the shame! Just let it be said that if I was Nick Lachey, I would have divorced Jessica Simpson after the first season.).

I've tried not to get freaked out at night, but being alone in a five-bedroom house which is on half an acre in a semi-rural area... well. Last night, Archie was doing his nightly bathing routine at the end of the bed and his tongue missed his body and he licked the doona cover. The rhythm of the licking sounded just like footsteps, marching their way down the hallway. Each approaching 'footstep' got louder and louder, my heart rate began to race and every nerve in my arms went all tingly. I was a little bit embarrassed when I realised that there wasn't a raping, torturing, murdering psychopath on his way to rape, torture and murder me, but Archie was my only company and he really didn't give a rat's.

My friend said she used to sleep with a knife under her pillow when she lived alone. Given that I'm a sleepwalker and generally a very active person in slumber, I'd probably end up in a one-sided blood bath.

It's funny, living alone. I went from living with my parents, to living with strangers in London, back to living with my parents and my boyfriend, to living in a house the boyfriend and I built, to moving back in with my parents when the boyfriend and I broke up, to living in Ireland, living in Queensland, back to living with my cousin in Victoria and then, finally, back to living at home. Phew, right?

I'm so lucky to have parents who don't mind me treating their house like a hotel, but I would dearly love to move out into a place of my own. I don't want to share with other people - in Ireland, shared a house with a guy from Israel. He was a busker, singing and playing his guitar in the cobbled streets of Galway. He practiced incessantly, his heavily accented English working overtime. A favourite was a song of his own creation, a mash-up of Led Zeppelin's Stairway to Heaven and the Red Hot Chili Peppers' Californication which he titled Stairway to Californication. I used to have leave the house to save my sanity. The other guy in the house would leave his bedroom, which had an en suite, to use my bathroom and he would leave the door open. I don't want to live with other people.

So that leaves me living with my parents. For now, it's okay. It's not the worst. We get along pretty well, but I hate being thirty and living at home. But unless I win the lottery or pen a best selling novel - first division lottery probably has the better odds - this is where I will be for the foreseeable future. Of course, assuming I don't give myself heart failure every time the cat gives himself a bath.

Playing With The Grown Ups

I became power of attorney for my parents today. Medical, financial and enduring. To be honest, I don't exactly know what any of them really mean, except for maybe the medical. And that's the one that conjures up the worst of my imagination.

They are leaving tomorrow for an eight-week holiday. The USA, Canada, Britain, Ireland, France and Belgium. I'm envious enough of the fact they get to go on a 'big' plane, but what's really bugging me is that I haven't been to North America yet. You see, when we see something on a television show or something in a movie, somewhere that I've been before, every single time I say I've been there. I know it's annoying, but I can't stop myself. The words are out before I even realise. It is always met with a roll of the eyes, but now they'll have not one, but TWO countries over me. This just will not do.

Anyway. This power of attorney thing scares me a little bit. The thought of making any kind of Big Decision is not something I relish. Any kind of Big Decision in this kind of situation would always be made mutually with my brother anyway, but knowing that it would ultimately be my signature that was required makes me feel too adult. I'm thirty, but most of the time, I don't feel mentally prepared to make the choice between white or brown bread, let alone anything more serious.

So to counteract all this seriousness, I indulged my inner thirteen-year old. Mum needed music on her iPod, so amongst all the Eagles, Bon Jovi (she's such a bogan. thatcdismine), Bob Seger (I freaking love Bob), Fleetwood Mac et al, I slipped in some musical surprises. Surprises like Ice Ice Baby, Vanilla Ice's masterpiece. The thought of it coming on after a David Gray croonfest has kept me snickering for hours.

I've also been drunk on power, threatening them with the power of my power of attorney powers. See? Power-overload. Telling them I'm going to have them committed. Telling them I'm going to sell their house and use the profits to buy two pandas. Telling them I'm going to take their plane tickets and have them changed into my name so I can add North America to my I've Been There List.

Word to your mother.*

*If you were as cool as me and my mother who soon will be though she doesn't yet know it, you would know that's how Vanilla Ice signs off in Ice Ice Baby.**

**Don't you wish you hadn't been so free and easy with the compliments on my last blog post? You gave me encouragement, fed my ego and now look what you've created. Just look at it. You've no-one to blame but yourselves.