Category: Uncategorized

1. 30 Minutes of Anything is Do-able

Photo by Pixabay from Pexels

I’m one of those people who likes to see things get done, but with some jobs I don’t necessarily like to get them done personally.

I’d rather already be at relaxed and finished, rather than at overwhelmed and not yet started. Unfortunately, overwhelmed and not yet started is where I’m normally at.

Luckily I have discovered that I can definitely achieve 30 minutes of anything, and once I’ve achieved this, I can easily write down another 30 minutes of something on my list for the day, and achieve this easily too.

This is because I find that 30 minutes is not a long time, but it is long enough for me to become immersed in the task and to actually achieve something.  Once immersed in the task, I find that it is not as horrifically awful as I thought it was, and amazingly sometimes I even find myself going on to other tasks and forgetting about the time.

However, I issue this advice with a caution. While 30 minutes is a useful tool, I find that with certain jobs I am better off writing them down on my list for the day and then getting them done and finished with at one time. This is because some jobs just drag on too much with 30 minute time slots, or can be unsatisfying when done this way.

2. Break the Job Down into Smaller Parts

Photo by Pixabay from Pexels

I am definitely one of those people that often has to break a job down into smaller parts in order to get the job done.

I find this technique useful with jobs that I seriously dislike doing, or when I am tired and even 30 minutes of something is just too much to face.

This strategy has proved successful for me with jobs like cleaning, which I enjoy about as much as an overly vigorous cavity search. 

When I can no longer put off cleaning the bathroom any longer I start by telling myself just to clean the shower.  Then I’ll come back later and clean the bathroom vanity.  Eventually I’ll hop back in and sweep and mop the floor.

It probably sounds a bit erratic, but all of a sudden the job is done, and because I’ve broken it up with other more enjoyable activities I haven’t got to the stage where I’m unhelpfully grinding bits of my teeth out all over the newly cleaned bathroom floor. 

3. Reward Yourself

Photo by Riccardo Bresciani from Pexels

I find rewards extremely useful when I need an extra motivation to do something.

In my case, I sometimes perceive really rather simple things as extraordinarily difficult, so I force myself to do them by promising myself a reward later on.

Embarrassingly, I have found simple things like making phone calls about job openings difficult in the past.

The rewards I use to make myself complete the task might be food (yes I am a sad and simple creature), or some form of positive or relaxing experience.

The great thing about rewards is they don’t need to be either expensive or elaborate (luckily in my case chocolate is still relatively inexpensive), they just have to work for you.

Unfortunately I don’t have a beautiful aqua beach on my doorstep to loll about on like the chick in the photo, but there’s still plenty of other ways I can reward myself at the end of the day.

4. Write it Down

Photo by Suzy Hazelwood from Pexels

I am one of those anally retentive people who loves to-do lists.

I actually love lists of any kind, because they give me a sense of control over my wayward life. 

For some strange reason, if I write something down on my list for the day, I’m highly motivated to get it done, just so that I can cross it off my list (and place a nice tick next to it as well, absolute bliss!!!).

Tragic, isn’t it. 

But it works for me, so I do it.

I find that being able to cross even small tasks off a list also makes me feel good because it shows me that I can set and achieve goals.

Once the list is achieved, I can also relax for the night, or do something enjoyable.

5. Be Nice to Yourself

Photo by Aleksandr Balandin from Pexels

I’ve discovered that feeling like I am a steaming pile of excrement is strongly associated with being demotivated.

But when I believe that I can achieve what I want to achieve in life, then all the jobs that I have to do to get me there become do-able too.

I’ve finally learnt that I am the only person who really can motivate myself and a big part of that is being supportive of myself, the one person I’m stuck with for the entirety of my life!  Happy days!!!

As Henry Ford said, “Whether you believe you can or believe you can’t, you’re right.”

6. Think About the People/Creatures You Love

Photo by Bekka Mongeau from Pexels

I’ve found that either thinking about the people or furry creatures I love or feeling under pressure to get some money in the bank again are good motivators for me.

Because we want a bright future for ourselves and those we love, just thinking about them gives us a good kick up the proverbial.

To quote Lao Tzu, “Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength, while loving someone deeply gives you courage.”

7. Remember That Nothing is Actually Scary at All

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Fear is a terrible waste of time and also an enormous demotivating force.

The worst part about fear is that once you’ve done whatever you were anxious about doing, you find that it was actually nothing to be scared of at all.

A lot of things that I’ve been scared of I have later discovered to be in fact quite easy, and after a time, even routine.  Later still these enormously scary almost life threatening experiences sometimes even become boring, they are that uneventful. 

We are all scared about something or other because we are all human, but none of us can afford to let fear trick us.

© Annemaree Jensen 2021

I’m currently at that in between age where I’m finding it damn near impossible to find the right kind of female fashion.

I don’t know about you but I often think that women’s fashion is always stuck in revolting, going from one familiar form of revolting to another in an ongoing, constantly repeating cycle.

It’s a bit like the outfit in the window above.  I’m not sure why anyone would put that dress at the front of the window display.  No wonder the mannequin wearing it has her hat covering her head. Or actually her stump as it looks like she actually doesn’t have a head.

Alternatively, perhaps it’s me wearing the revolting fashion, and all the fashion in the shops is gorgeous.  I’m not really sure, but to be honest I don’t really mind.  The fact that I find most of the fashion repugnant saves me plenty of money and time. 

In the case of formal occasion wear, there seems to be a complete absence of anything appropriate for most of the female population, because everything is made for either the 18 year old – mid 20’s market, or the 80 year old grandmother market.

Finding anything decent in between is nigh on impossible.

A good example of dresses that target 18 year olds is the dress above.  Personally I don’t want to wear something that I’m likely to fall out of at any minute.  I’m happy enough with the unpredictability of life as it is, I don’t need the possibility of a breast dropping out at any minute to make my life more exciting.  Plus I don’t think anyone is really interested in me showing that amount of cleavage anyway.

I know I’ve got breasts by now, and I don’t think they’re that much more interesting than any other part of my body really.

It seems to be that if you want to go to a special occasion you either have to wear something you feel practically naked in, or something like a nice pencil skirt and floral blouse from at least six decades ago. Or indeed, you can find yourself something like women below is wearing, with perhaps a few less layers and slightly less buttons.  We are a bit lazier these days.

In any case, and whatever you are wearing, I hope you are happy and enjoying life.  Because all clothes do is offer some kind of privacy and protection from the elements, and all that really matters is the person inside them. 

© Annemaree Jensen 2020

The photos used in this article were taken from the superb website pexels.com.

*Huge apologies for the lateness of this blog post, which should have been posted in late February. I have moved house and this process almost carved me a new arsehole. Apologies once again.

I’ve realised recently that I’m absolutely shithouse on the healthy coping strategies front.

My coping strategies are that advanced and intelligent that I go straight to eating food that is high in sugar (usually chocolate) when I’m a bit stressed.  Sophisticated and innovative, I know.  Actually I allow myself to eat food that is high in sugar once a day every day anyway, I just eat more of it when I’m feeling under the hammer.  And as my boss used to say of himself when he was eating his lunch, I’m also the sort of person who is in danger of losing a finger in the process.  While there is absolutely nothing wrong with chocolate and it does contain some amazing feel good components, it unfortunately does not have the power to automatically solve all the problems of the person eating it.

As far as positive self talk goes, I’m a long way from using this successfully to make myself feel better and reduce my stress levels.  I actually sometimes feel rather distant from myself, and I don’t really want to talk to that angry bitch who is lurking in the background.  She is liable to bite my head off, and her leadership track record is at best substandard and at worst pitiful.  However, considering we do spend rather a lot of time together it would be grand if we could learn to get along better.  Positive self talk sounds bloody awesome for a change!    

Paradoxically I tend to respond to stress and to situations in my life that I feel unable to handle by becoming ridiculously over busy.  The idea is that the busy-ness blocks the pain and everything else out and helps me move on with my life.  I’m rather like one of those wind up toys, but instead of losing momentum as the wind up wears off, the wind up just gathers speed and I get busier and busier until I explode in hysterical exhausted tears.  It is of course completely bizarre to say yes to everything and get busier and busier when you are in a difficult situation, because what you actually need to do is to say no to things and reduce pressure in your life.   Being busy but not doing things that are either important or meaningful to you also of course makes you feel depressed, worthless and even more exhausted.  Yes, this one has proved a winning strategy every time I’ve tried it, and embarrassingly, I’ve had a go at it more than once!

When I’m really under pressure I’ve also made the mistake of cutting out making time to see my family and friends, feeling that I was just too busy and too tired to fit anything in.  This one has proved absolutely the worst strategy ever for me.  While I’m probably the least social person I know, I need my network of beautiful people to make life worthwhile.  The amazing people in my life rejuvenate me and remind me that my life journey means something to someone other than just me.      

© Annemaree Jensen 2020

I don’t know about you, but personally I’m extremely pleased that I’m not a supermodel. 

You might think that this is a strange thing to think about, because most of us of course aren’t supermodels.  However I am actually immensely grateful that I am not extraordinarily beautiful because I don’t have to deal with a lot of unpleasant pressures.

While no one even knows the names of the most famous and successful male models, female supermodels like Cindy Crawford and Claudia Schiffer are household names.  Women and girls unfortunately sometimes do look at supermodels like this and feel disheartened, but I feel the opposite, for the below reasons:   

• Because I’m not a supermodel no one notices me in a crowd.

No one cares if I walk down a street or attend an event.  I am just a human being and I am free to do whatever I want to do, and I won’t be interrupted or asked to sign something, or photographed by annoying paparazzi. Sure, some days I feel a bit sexy and me and my hot booty will happily stride it out as I walk down the street, but most of the time I’m more interested in noticing the diverse mass that is humanity myself as I walk amongst it. As I am just a normal garden variety human being, I’m always able to do this.

• Because I’m not a supermodel my body doesn’t have to be perfect.

My body isn’t perfect and f*%#ing thank God for that.  Because my body isn’t perfect I don’t have to try and keep it perfect.  I’m me and I’m comfortable with my body, including the dimples on my arse, the wrinkles on my face and that larger left breast that is perpetually trying to leap out of my bra.

• Because I’m not a supermodel I’m allowed to have wrinkles and breed more of them.

I’ve always had plenty of wrinkles, a by-product of a busy and enjoyable Western Australian childhood where I spent a fair bit of time in the sun.  I’ve also worked in my share of outdoor jobs, and my skin is living proof of those hours of work.  I have an excellent assembly of wrinkles, and I am free to breed plenty more of them because no one gives a flying f&*% what I look like.

• Because I’m not a supermodel I can be a bit furry.

I don’t know about you but I really can’t be bothered with hair removal most of the time.  I sort of prefer my garden a bit on the wild side, if you know what I mean, with perhaps an occasional yearly prune.  I don’t want to be continuously bare, like those weird cats that don’t have hair and totally freak me out because I don’t know if I’m supposed to pat them or not.  Besides, some of the creatures I love most in this world are covered in hair, and I love having something in common with them.

• Because I’m not a supermodel I’m not going to get the sack if I stop looking good.

Believe me, there is absolutely no way in hell that I am valued in the workplace for my looks.  I’m valued for my skills, knowledge and work ethic, and all of these increase as I spend more time on this planet.  I don’t have to worry about being terminated for becoming unattractive, I probably already am (at least to some of my colleagues, as they also are to me) and neither I or anyone else gives a rat’s arse either way.     

© Annemaree Jensen 2020

The photos used in this article were taken from the superb website pexels.com, apart from the first photo and the hair removal photo, which were taken from the amazing website pixabay.com.

I’m not much of a shopper.

Probably because I don’t really like parting with my money, and parting with one’s money is of course a non-negotiable aspect of shopping.

If you don’t part with your money it’s called stealing, and that can get you into way worse trouble than shopping can.

Anyway, I digress.

I’ve seen a bit of the usual annual coverage of the Boxing Day sales recently, and I’ve been informed that lots of people are still spending a fair chunk of their time on Boxing Day buying millions of dollars’ worth of stuff in the Boxing Day sales.

I’m not sure how people even have money to spend after Christmas personally. 

Not only that, why would they want to get up at the crack of dawn the day after Christmas to go and fight with traffic and crowds, when they already have a veritable mountain of stuff at home?  Are they masochistic, and keen to endure more clogged parking areas and busy shopping centres even after the anguish of the long Christmas lead up?

I’m as keen on a sale and love paying less for something as the next person, but I can’t for the life of me understand how the Boxing Day sales pull in such crowds. 

I’d much rather sleep in at home, catch up with much loved family and friends, and eat leftovers.

This is because while I’m not much of a shopper, I always love to eat. 

Luckily for me, food outlets always go along with shopping, and they make the whole experience digestible to me, pardon the pun.

Apart from eating and drinking at cafes and food halls, most of the time the only other thing I actually hand money over for at the shops are groceries.      

Groceries of course are not fun or glamorous to purchase.  They simply keep one’s body alive. 

Grocery shopping is also not the kind of thing I would choose to do for fun.

I especially hate it when I land one of those sloppy shop assistants that scans my groceries and then dumps them next to my shopping bags, rather than actually helping to pack the shopping bags.  This is in a situation where I’ve quickly placed the bags on the other end of the counter prior to hurriedly unloading all my groceries for scanning, and I haven’t had the time to take care of the other end.  Then an already red faced me has to work furiously at the packing end and put up with awkward stares from both the shop assistant and the next customer who I am apparently holding up.

However most of the time I use the self-serve checkouts, probably because I have subconscious masochistic tendencies. 

In my experience the sensor technology on self-serve checkouts is still completely dysfunctional, despite the fact that such checkouts have been around for plenty of time now.

Any movement whatsoever in “the bagging area” causes a complete shut-down of the entire system.  This is because placing items in a bag apparently happens without any movement at all.  

If my hand accidentally moves anywhere on the right side of the scanner, this will lock down the whole checkout. Not only that, but the orange flashing rotating beacon dickhead light on my checkout will immediately turn on, other customers will stare at me, and the endlessly patient attendant will have to rush over yet again to reassure the checkout that I wasn’t in fact stealing a trolley load of groceries.  As a result, most of the time I find that it’s quicker to pile all my groceries up on the tiny stainless steel square, pay for my groceries, pull my receipt out, and then pack everything when the checkout no longer gives a shit about what I’m doing.

Then, hooray!!!  I can finally go home and stay away from the shops again for as long as possible.

© Annemaree Jensen 2019

The awesome photos used in this article were taken from the amazing website pexels.com.

I’m lucky to have parents who were significant influences, with both my Mum and my Dad doing the hard yards to raise my four siblings and I. 

My parents are both strong personalities in their own right, which is probably a good thing because they ended up with five children and a sheep station to run in the middle of Western Australia. 

Living on a sheep station, the daily ABC radio Country Hour at midday was part of our lunch time routine.  There was often a fair bit of chatter at lunch times, with as many as five children, a worker, a governess and my parents at the table.  However, one of the golden unspoken rules of lunch time was that you never spoke during the news, and YOU MOST CERTAINLY NEVER SPOKE DURING THE WEATHER FORECAST SEGMENT OF THE COUNTRY HOUR!  Approximately half way through the Country Hour a representative of the Bureau of Meteorology would provide a more detailed weather forecast for the coming days than was available anywhere else.  This was the headlining act of the Country Hour, and whoever the Bureau of Meteorology rostered on for the day the star of the show.  Unfortunately sometimes myself or one of my siblings would lose track of what was happening on the radio in the background and commence babbling about something or other at normal volume during the weather broadcast.  The rest of us would be making cut throat gestures and desperately but silently urging the foolhardy soul to stop before they received a swift reprimand from Dad.

With five of us growing creatures around I imagine my father copped a fair few questions on an incessant basis.  When one of us asked my father what he was doing in the shed, sometimes he’d just reply with the famous old saying, “I’m making a wigwam for a goose’s bridle.”  Unfortunately, this sounded suitably impressive to me.  I should have immediately picked up that he was actually talking complete nonsense, but at the time I thought that perhaps he was undertaking a legitimate task that I would only understand when I was a bit older. 

My Mum was the key to everything, as without her my Dad most certainly would not have had five children, a busy family life, and people to love and make it all worthwhile.     

I realised how valuable our functioning mother was on one occasion when all of us were still primary school age.  The whole family attended a wine and cheese afternoon at the recreation centre in our closest town.   For us it was just the usual opportunity to hang out with other kids who had come in from surrounding stations.  I’m not sure if my Mum missed out on food, but she had a few too many wines and they went straight to her head.  As a result she ended up totally shit-faced by late afternoon.  This was definitely not the norm for my Mum, with my father the one more likely to enjoy quite a few drinks on certain occasions.  I remember late in the piece suddenly becoming aware that we were facing a bit of a crisis, and a no nonsense father instructing all of us to walk back to our station wagon to go home.  Dad drove and Mum slept in the front passenger seat all the way home and I’ll always remember how unusually quiet we all were lined up across the back seat.  When we got home Mum pretty much went straight from the car to bed and stayed there until the next morning, when luckily things got back to normal.    

My Mum has many adorable qualities.  One of the quirkiest of these is that she gets extremely immersed in television shows and movies.  All of us would be lined up on the couch with a villain inevitably about to strike as we reached the climax of an infamous crime movie, when my Mum would exclaim, “look out!!!!”  We would all go from almost crapping our dacks to laughing with relief at my Mum’s earnest desire to help the hero.      

When I look back I’m not sure how my parents did it, and how my Mum didn’t go and get herself totally shit-faced all the time. 

My parents raised five children, and they started parenthood a lot earlier than many people do these days.  There were no grandparents around to help, and on sheep stations there is no such thing as a next door neighbour who can just pop round to help out if they’re needed at short notice.  They did it all by themselves, and often in the most difficult of circumstances. 

I’m just glad they did it anyway. 

© Annemaree Jensen 2019

The awesome photos used in this article were taken from the amazing website pexels.com except for the photo of the child eating cereal and the photo of the wigwam which were taken from the fantastic website pixabay.com.

Don’t you just love how things stay the same despite many years passing?

I stayed at a hotel recently and it got me thinking about how so many standard hotel offerings haven’t changed in eons.

Before I start ranting, I’d like to start by saying how much I actually love staying in hotels.  It’s like being given a mini-house to live in for a couple of nights that someone has already cleaned beautifully, rather than the seemingly enormous house one normally lives in that is in my case the polar opposite of clean.  Shit tip is actually a good description for my place. 

Not only do you get to stay in a lovely compact clean space, you even get your own kettle, tea, coffee and UHT milk!  I get really excited about this and I’m always quick to inspect what brands of tea and coffee I’ve been given.  You also get free soap, clean towels and shampoo, as well as a big comfortable bed to sleep in!!!  Happy days!!!

Staying in a hotel also makes me feel like a wealthy corporate high flyer, even if 98% of the time I’m actually just staying in a budget cabin at a caravan park.  As long as there is tea and coffee and a kettle, my imagination makes me feel like I’m at the ritziest hotel in New York to speak at a conference about my wildly successful global business.

Anyway, I digress.

There are some things hotels offer that they really don’t need to offer any more, and I’m going to take the liberty to suggest some alternatives they could provide to replace some of the outdated offerings.

Safes

I’m not sure why hotels are still offering safes.  If I had the kind of valuables that I needed to store in a safe, believe me, I wouldn’t be staying at the kind of hotels I’ve stayed at so far.  Normally I have a total of about 75 cents in cash on me, mainly in five cent pieces.  If my life was wildly exciting and I carried around wads of cash, I think I’d book myself into a ritzy high rollers hotel where I would actually expect that there’d be a safe in each room.  If I happen to have a valuable document like a passport on me, I’m comfortable with it simply being locked in my room within the hotel building, as it would be if I stayed with friends or family.  And let’s face it, if someone stole my identity they’d probably just end up with a life that’s as wayward and chaotic as mine is, which would hopefully teach them a lesson. 

Bibles

Our society is very multi-cultural and it has been for many years.  A diversity of religious faiths exist, and many people have had no exposure to Christianity whatsoever.  The relevance of a bible to the general population has reduced enormously accordingly.  While I happen to have grown up Roman Catholic, even I find the bible a terribly dull and dry read.  Its the kind of book that sends me to sleep when I’m still on the page I opened it on.
Certainly, if I really needed guidance and direction in my life, I wouldn’t wait until I was staying at a hotel to find it in the hotel bible. 

Alarm Clocks

These days expecting your hotel to provide an alarm clock is a bit like expecting them to provide your socks and underwear.  Mobile phones have an alarm clock built in, but if you really don’t like mobile phones and have resisted having one, you should still be quite capable of bringing your own alarm clock with you if you need to be up at a certain time.  Hotel phones are actually in a similar category, because even if your mobile phone is flat, you should still be able to waddle down to reception if you really need something.

Some alternatives to the above items that I’d love hotels to provide instead are . . .

Large Mugs

Some hotels still provide the old fashioned one centimetre high white cup with saucer, instead of a mug.  If am going to make a hot drink I would seriously like to get more than a couple of mouthfuls out of it.  I’m also not even sure why saucers were ever actually invented.  Were people terribly clumsy and spilled their tea continuously in the old days?  Did they have trouble learning not to overfill their cup?  A cup as a standalone item should have always been well and truly sufficient as far as I can see.  Mugs have well and truly replaced cups these days in most people’s homes, and I’d love it if hotels provided me with a large comforting mug when I needed one.

Warm yellow globes rather than cool white globes in hotel room lighting

When I stay in a hotel I’ve often either driven a fair distance that day or I’m jet lagged from flights that always seem to be at the wrong time of the day.  The last thing I feel like is a heart attack when I look in the hotel bathroom mirror and I’m confronted with the sight of a haggard and blemished 150 year old witch.  Warm yellow globes are so much kinder on all human skin.  Let’s face it, all of us want to feel better when we look in a mirror rather than the opposite.  Warm lighting is especially important in a hotel when we are a long way from home and about to totter off to an important work meeting or a large wedding.

Curtains with block out lining

As mentioned above, when I’m staying at a hotel I’ve normally had to travel beforehand.  I’ve usually had a busy day, which may have finished with attending a special social event that finished late in the evening.  Either way, I’ll be tired and I’ll want to be able to get some sleep.

Some hotels don’t seem to be aware of this, and use flimsy curtains that fill the room with light as soon as the sun is up at 5 am.  A hotel room needs to be a safe comfortable refuge from the rest of the world, and after 15 beers at a friend’s wedding, I definitely don’t want to get up at 5 am.  Block out lining on curtains should definitely be standard at all hotels.   

Chocolate

Chocolate is the ultimate comfort food.  I would love it if all hotels provided complimentary chocolate, and by this I don’t mean two small chocolate mints.  If you are going to offer chocolate, you need to offer something more substantial.  I don’t even mind that if after my hotel has sold off all their safes, alarm clocks and bibles, they still don’t have the money to offer me some complimentary chocolate.  I just want them to make sure it’s there, for God’s sake, so I’m happy for them to whack it on the cost of my room.

Soap that actually has a fragrance

When I’m staying at a hotel I’ve normally been busy making an idiot of myself on a dance floor around lots of other sweaty people, or I’ve spent a lot of wasted time trying to find my way around a strange place.  All of these activities generate sweat and make me feel grimy and in need of a good wash.  When I finally get to jump in the shower, I definitely don’t want one of those hotel soaps that just smells like wax, or doesn’t smell like anything at all.  I really want a fragranced soap that actually makes me feel like I’m going to get out of the shower cleaner than I got into it.   

If you manage a hotel, I hope you found my story interesting.  If you don’t, thank you for reading it anyway.

The awesome photos used in this article were taken from the amazing website pexels.com and the amazing graphic of the business woman was taken from the inspiring website pixabay.com.

© Annemaree Jensen 2019

I love to fantasise about what I’d do with a Lotto win, and to hear what other people fantasise they’d do with one.

Of course the chances of actually winning the lotto are extremely remote, but that doesn’t stop people fantasising about what they’d do if by chance they happened to win. 

In my case the chances of winning the lotto are actually non-existent, because I don’t even buy lotto tickets. 

Yet I still fantasise about what I’d do if I won the lotto.

And yes, I am a bit of a space cadet.

Anyway, if I won the lotto the first thing I’d do would be to resign from my job.

The next thing I’d do is take a holiday somewhere peaceful and luxurious overseas.  It would probably involve a pile of good books and a stack of chocolate.  It wouldn’t involve a lot of people, a lot of activity or a lot of anything else.  It would just involve a nice king size bed and lots of rest. 

It would also involve plenty of period dramas.  By plenty of period dramas I don’t mean that landing a large lump sum of money would somehow cause me to menstruate continuously and engage in regular over-sensitive and teary episodes.  Believe me, I’d rather not menstruate at all, period (pardon the pun).  Anyway by plenty of period dramas I mean heaps of good quality historical dramas where the female heroine gets to float around in beautifully made dresses with expansive skirts, and every bloke in the vicinity thinks they’re the hottest sex kitten that ever walked the earth.  I’m not sure why I love period dramas so much, but it’s probably something to do with the fact that I would love it if I was in their shoes.

The fact that even winning the lotto wouldn’t change my desire for heaps of rest is symptomatic of the state of my life at the moment.  For various reasons, mostly because I’ve chosen to make my life chaotically busy, the one thing I’d love the most in the world is rest.   

Boring isn’t it.

You’d think if someone won the lotto they’d be able to come up with something a bit more exciting and a bit sexier than that.

Unfortunately not.

I suppose I am boring, because the next thing I’d do is clear my mortgage.

This is principally because I love my freedom.  We all know that all banks treat us like the most revolting kind of clinical waste, so for me the less I have to do with them the better. 

I’d also dump a lump sum into superannuation, just because I’m one of those people that likes to know I have plenty of money to spend when I’m old, sick and actually in need of very little money because I’m incapable of doing anything.

I’d also buy a beautiful property somewhere with cold hard cash.  That way I’d know I’d always have a beautiful sanctuary to go to, no matter what happened in my life.

Like most people I’d like to be able to use the lotto win to make a difference to the people I love and the charities I believe in.  However I wouldn’t tell anyone about the win, except people I knew were capable of keeping it strictly confidential.

This is because I’d prefer people treat me as me, rather than as someone who may or may not have landed a windfall. 

I’d also make sure well before I did anything that I kept enough of the win to keep myself for the rest of my days.  Because let’s face it, you don’t win the lotto to end up in a position where you ever have to buy a lottery ticket again.

What would you do if you won the lotto?     

The awesome photos used in this article were taken from the amazing
website pixabay.com.

© Annemaree Jensen 2019

I don’t know about you, but I look like a sack of shit whenever anyone photographs me.

It doesn’t matter how much I smile, I’m quite simply as photogenic as a dog turd.

I photographed fine until I became a teenager, and then someone I don’t recognise at all turned up in place of me in photographs.

This person looks nothing like the person I am.  She doesn’t even look like the person I see in the mirror, who I do recognise quite happily.

As a result, I hate being photographed.

I especially hate it when other people photograph me in a group photo, and I’m the only one in the group who looks like shit on a stick.  Even worse, when I’m squeamish as the photo gets shown around, they gush about how it’s such a great photo and tell me how gorgeous I look.   The logical conclusion for me is that I must look fifteen times more horrendous than that normally, which is not a pleasant thought.

Anyway, thank God for progress.

Progress has given me a relatively simple solution to my lifelong hatred of photos.

My wonderful solution is the selfie. 

While this sounds terribly vain, I love the selfie because it is the only way I can achieve a decent photo of myself.  I’ve seen even professional photographers sweat as they try shot after shot to get a decent one of me and the rest of a bridal party, all to no avail. 

Perhaps selfies work for me simply because I’m more relaxed when it’s just me and the camera. 

I really don’t care what the reason is just as long as selfies keep working for me. 

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t automatically look like a supermodel when I take a selfie.  I still look like me, and I don’t spend lots of time trying to get my “good side” (whatever the hell that is) or anything like that.  I just have control over the camera and somehow that results in me looking acceptable, and that is all I’ve ever wished for. 

I’ve read that the cause of being unphotogenic is supposedly not being relaxed and comfortable enough in front of a camera.  This is a fantastic theory, but I’ve never actually had the time to test it out.  However I seriously doubt whether that is all there is to it, and that I’m going to instantly turn into Cindy Crawford in front of the lens, just because I’m relaxed about having my photo taken.

I don’t need to anyway, because at least I’ve taken a selfie or two which have given me some hope that I’m not the most frighteningly ugly person that ever walked the earth.

The awesome photos used in this article were taken from the amazing
website pexels.com.

© Annemaree Jensen 2019

 

I’ve always loved observing the different walking styles of human beings.  Walking styles are also picked up at a very young age, and children usually model parents or other significant people in their life.  I’ve seen this in small boys who unconsciously walk exactly the same way their father does. Regardless of who we model our walking style on, it is often a very enduring part of our personal style. 

The below walking styles are particularly interesting to observe:

1. The crapped-my-dacks walk

Some people walk like they have an unpleasant parcel in the back of their pants that they are stuck carrying around all day.  Their trousers also may or may not be bunched up around the crutch.  I once worked for a company where one of my colleagues was a very skilled senior gentleman who did highly specialised work at the business part-time.  He noticed instantly that our Manager walked like he had crapped his pants and I was absolutely delighted when he shared this insight with me. While the gentleman in the above photo is actually practicing an exotic yoga pose and hasn’t crapped his dacks, the kind of walking style where a person looks like they are “holding something” in the back of his or her pants is unmistakable.   

• The duck waddle

Some people love a good expansive waddle, giving their “diff” a good showing as they stride it out.  While a slow duck waddle can create a bit of a traffic jam in shop aisles, I wouldn’t mess with someone with this walking style.

• The bow legged cowboy

This walking style is not always associated with cowboys, it is simply often the way someone who has done plenty of physical work in their lifetime walks.  As they say, one’s body always tells the story.  They may also walk with a bit of a left to right lilt, which is once again a result of plenty of physically hard work.  In addition, they may have also copped an injury or two which of course also shows up in their walk.

I’m not sure why, but I’ve always totally loved the whole bow legged thing.  

• The tippy toes ballerina in a mad hurry

Some people are always in a hurried head first leaning tower of Pizza position, with feet that are almost on tippy toes and arms flying swiftly back and forwards as they rush about the place.  While they are great to walk behind because you never get held up if you follow in their tracks, they do appear to be on the road to an early heart attack. 

Then of course there is that particularly sexy strong walk that some people have, a bit like the kind of walk one imagines Bruce Springsteen would have as he sizzles about the place in his blue jeans. I always try to walk like someone like this, but at the moment I’m still a long way off the standard of someone like The Boss.

The awesome photos used in this article were taken from the amazing website pexels.com, except for the last image which was taken from the brilliant website pixabay.com.

© Annemaree Jensen 2019