Hiya! it’s Me and Mister C…

Hello! We hope you and your family and friends are enjoying the cooler days at present (on our side of the world), after the mini heat-wave we all experienced last week. Me and Mister C wanted to acknowledge and send our heart-felt thoughts to the communities, that have been affected by the mass fish expiration (millions died suddenly) that has occurred in Menindee, a town of around five hundred people, located approximately an hour’s drive from Broken Hill. It was very saddening to see the footage and images on social media over the past few days. According to news.com.au… “An alarming fish kill on the Darling River at Menindee in outback NSW shows what is believed to be as many as a million dead fish. It has been the site of several mass fish kill events in recent years, with a 40-kilometre algal bloom blamed for the death of hundreds of thousands of fish in 2019.” @2GB873@9NewsSydpic.twitter.com/YCkA78NbgL— Chris O’Keefe (@cokeefe9) March 17, 2023

Well, another busy fortnight for our family since our last blog. Today is Husband and my fourteenth wedding anniversary! It is hard to believe that it has been this many years since our wonderful weekend away with our close family and friends; to be married together on the beach at Mollymook, NSW. We have certainly been through many ups and downs, but as I have written numerous times throughout the last one hundred and fifty more blogs, Husband is my rock and my main support. I remind myself every day, how truly lucky I am to have his love and care. Today, I say thank you and I love you from the bottom of my heart all the way to yours… Me and Mister C also wanted to acknowledge Husband’s twin nieces (hiya B & B.L), who also turn the big twenty-one today! We wish the girls a very happy birthday and hope to catch up again soon. We also hope the girls have a lovely celebration with family and friends over the weekend.

It was International Women’s Day on March 8th, 2023. According to:

https://www.google.com/searchq=international+women%27s+day&rlz=1C1CHBF_enGBAU1043AU1043&oq=when+was+it+international+womens+day&aqs=chrome … “International Women’s Day (March 8) is a global day celebrating the social, economic, cultural, and political achievements of women. The day also marks a call to action for accelerating women’s equality. IWD has occurred for well over a century, with the first IWD gathering in 1911 supported by over a million people.” Me and Mister C also wanted to acknowledge all the wonderful women who surround us every day and who contribute to our wonderous society, in particular Widy and Flossy, my sister, Husband’s mother, aunts and other female members of our family and friends. As my dear Nan said to me many years ago, behind every good man, is an even better woman, working behind the scenes supporting and caring for all around her. As women in today’s world: if we put our minds to it, anything (small or large) is possible…

Amongst my ongoing (and often painful) rehabilitation, physio, psychologist, GP and specialist reviews, I have managed to re-write my second Me Poems Book Two manuscript. This manuscript file had unfortunately been lost, when our main (and old) hard drive went kaput many weeks ago (arrg!). I was able to take the hard drive to a local tech shopfront in town, but waited two weeks for the tech person to unfortunately not be able to successfully retrieve the thousands of files that were on the drive. I was then able to take the drive up to my brother-in-law in Sydney, when we went up for my nephews twenty-first birthday (thanks J.M for trying!), who also had no luck with retrieving any of our files (we were doomed!).

Luckily, I had saved most of our book files and illustration work before the car accident, but we had lost many years of word doc files and documents, of which some could not be accessed again. Luckily years ago also, Husband had diligently saved thousands of photos onto CD-ROMs and USBs, stashing them at work and his mother’s place for safe keeping (thanks so much love!). Anyway, lesson now learnt… to update files more regularly (who has the time?), even though we had purchased a new hard drive (about six months ago), I was told drives only last about five to six years, not the near nine years that ours was aged at! Being an ‘old-school’ illustrator (create by free-hand, with pen and paper), I have always printed out documents and kept all of my illustration and design work dating back to the early nineties (never quite trusting technology!)- phew!

Lastly, I wanted to say a BIG thank you to my editor and designer for putting up with my creative requests and the bouncing off of ideas with one another (a good team?). Over these past two months, we have not only published a new Me Poems poetry book (A Passionate Glimpse Of Life Through Poetry The Early Years: Book One), but a new logo and we are well underway on the second Me Poems Book Two (A Passionate Glimpse Of Life Through Poetry The Middle Years- is along title!). I am honoured and super proud to have finally been able to edit, collate, and publish a book of my poetry, spanning nearly forty years. I also wanted to thank my dear friend (Hiya D.PB) for contributing to this book, by writing the special Foreword (introduction) to the book. It means the world to me and I am truly honoured to have such long-standing friends in my life.

A Word from Mister C…

In the kitchen while making a snack for Mister C, that consisted of cheese on toast with no butter (his favourite). Mister C came into the room smiling and said, “What if noises didn’t exist, Mummy?” Looking up puzzled, I replied, “Oh, why is that my son?” Mister C giggled and replied, “Well, then you could sneak out of your room, without anyone hearing the noises you would make! You could even sneak into the kitchen and make a midnight snack, and no one would be able to hear the fridge or the sounds of the microwave or anything.” Laughing, I replied, “”Ooh, that would be kind of good, but a bit spooky, don’t you think, my son?” Mister C nodded and grinned, “Ooh, yes! I could be a real live ghost!” Both giggled…  👻

Stay tuned…

We look forward to the upcoming term one break over Easter. We also look forward to spending some quality time with Husband’s parents, while taking Flossy and Mister C away for a surprise night over Easter time (Widy is going camping!). Me and Mister C were thrilled to be apart of the fabulous Comic Con event run through our wonderful local Goulburn library on Saturday 18th March 2023. It was a super and busy whole day event. We had our fun bookstall and met many people and families. It was great to see many local s dressing up and getting into the swing of all things comics. We were fortunate to be able to launch our Me Poems Book One on the day, and it warmed our hearts to be able to display and chat about our creative adventures and the books. Thanks to Husband (our rock) for driving us and helping to set up our stall (again). We look forward to our next Rotary market stall in town mid- April (after Easter) and our exciting Storytime event at The Goulburn Library late April- is a little bit exciting. We will be reading our latest sixth children’s book, sharing and creating craft on all things about teeth and the Tooth Fairy… 🦷