Thursday, March 31, 2011



Fadar by The Temper Trap

Currently I am just slightly loving this song.

Day 06 - Something you hope you never have to do

I hope I never have to bury one of my children. Not that I have any yet, but it would completely destroy me if I had to bury one of my children. It is not right that there are parents out there who have had to go through this, a child is meant to out live their parents. They are meant to grow to be old and live the life full of trials and errors and good times and bad times. Children are meant to bury their parents.

Wednesday, March 30, 2011

Day 05 - Something you hope to do in your life

I hope to travel the world. Win the lottery. Succeed in every path I take. I hope to do many things, most of all I hope to have children and and raise them to be the most amazing children. The most amazing things on this planet. Help them to do what they want, become what they want. Help them to live their lives to the fullest.

Tuesday, March 29, 2011

All Summed Up

First, I must just inform you that I am absolutely in love with my new car. Driving round just for the sake of it. I am having a ball.

Here is my weekend in bullet points.

  • Friday. The three musketeers. Rach, Nid and I. Conversations at the local, followed by a drive in the new car to get hot chocolates at 10pm. What a smashing evening. We drove to the beach and drank our hot beverages before heading home for a 11.30pm bed time.
  • Saturday. Woke up early, 7am. Pick Cooper up, 9am. Spent the whole day with him. We hung out, went and saw my Grandparents, Coopers Great Grandparents. We went shoe shopping for Cooper. He is so sensible, he choose a pair of sport shoes after the canvas vans-look-a-like shoes didn’t fit him. We went to the local and sat there with a beverage each just chatting. I love this kid. My favourite four year old in the world.
  • Saturday, evening. Took Cooper home, to his new house. He was so excited. Hung out and helped put some stuff away, stayed for pizza. Arrived home to Nid on my doorstep so we could hang out. Really Saturday was a day of hanging out.
  • Sunday. Woke up. Watched some telly. Went out with mum, 9in my car. Borrowed thirty dollars to put in the pokie machines. Paid her back and walked out with $100 dollars, perfect timing as my car needed to be filled up. Went shopping, bought a dress and belt. Home for dinner.

It was a really lovely weekend, simple but brilliant. Spending time with Cooper is one of my favourite things. The boy is so precious, I wish I could spend all day every day with him. He deserves the world.

Day 04 - Something you have to forgive someone for

Not being there for me in my biggest time of need, so far, is what I have to forgive someone else for. It hurt so much and I built up such a huge wall to separate myself from this person. I have finally started to take the wall down, brick by brick, but it is going to be hard to forgive this person.

Monday, March 28, 2011

Day 03 - Something you have to forgive yourself for

It really is true that you always want what you can’t have. The thing I have to forgive myself for is fighting with my Dad. Saying hurtful words to him. Letting myself believe he wasn’t a good person, because he was an amazing person.

The one thing in life I wish I could get back is the time I spent fighting with and resenting my Dad. But, I have to forgive myself for this. I understand you can’t live in the past and you can’t live hoping for moments in life to have been different.

Friday, March 25, 2011

Day 02 - Something you love about yourself

There is a physical trait and a personality trait about myself that I adore and love equally.

Physically, my hair. As much as it loves to do it’s own things, I have done so many things to my hair that would destroy the normal persons and my hair is still beautiful and full of life. It is curly but not frizzy. It straightens easily, but doesn’t like to stay dead straight.

Personality, my attempt to make everyone smile. Making others happy makes me feel happy. Whenever possible I try my hardest to make others smile. I won’t roll the truth in glitter but I will go out of my way to help others where possible and when all else fails I make one of my eyes cross eyed, the other look straight ahead, smile goofily and wave. It works every time.

Thursday, March 24, 2011

Day 01 - Something you hate about yourself

The word ‘Hate’ is a very strong word, so instead I am going to share something with you all that I dislike/annoys me most about myself. Beside’s, not to sound vain, but I could not think of something about myself that I despise so much that I could say I hated it.

My toes are the part of me that I dislike the most. I took some pictures but they were, what I would call, inappropriate for the blog world. I have no problem with my second toe being longer than my big toe. What I really do not like is that my little toe has this tiny wee speck of a nail and, apart from my big toe and second toe, if my feet are flat on the floor you can’t see my toe nails.

One day I said to my friend that I bet that people notice my little toe and that I don’t attempt to paint it. She tried to tell me that no one does. Last Thursday we were sitting on my deck with my mum and my mums man friend and he goes, why don’t you paint your little toe nail.

I cringed so much and my friend cracked up laughing.

Wednesday, March 23, 2011

30 days of truth

Well it looks like the some day soon came sooner than I originally thought. I was searching the net for a list to do when I next choose the do a 30 days of X and came across the below list at hope dies (last).

I will be as truthful as I see fit, which may be hard in some instances as I do not always like sharing everything about myself. Maybe it is about time though.

Over the next 40 something days, starting tomorrow, I will post a truthful post.

Day 01 - Something you hate about yourself.
Day 02 - Something you love about yourself.
Day 03 - Something you have to forgive yourself for.
Day 04 - Something you have to forgive someone for.
Day 05 - Something you hope to do in your life.
Day 06 - Something you hope you never have to do.
Day 07 - Someone who has made your life worth living for.
Day 08 - Someone who made your life hell, or treated you like shit.
Day 09 - Someone you didn’t want to let go, but just drifted.
Day 10 - Someone you need to let go, or wish you didn’t know.
Day 11 - Something people seem to compliment you the most on.
Day 12 - Something you never get compliments on.
Day 13 - A band or artist that has gotten you through some tough ass days. (write a letter.)
Day 14 - A hero that has let you down. (letter)
Day 15 - Something or someone you couldn’t live without, because you’ve tried living without it.
Day 16 - Someone or something you definitely could live without.
Day 17 - A book you’ve read that changed your views on something.
Day 18 - Your views on gay marriage.
Day 19 - What do you think of religion? Or what do you think of politics?
Day 20 - Your views on drugs and alcohol.
Day 21 - (scenario) Your best friend is in a car accident and you two got into a fight an hour before. What do you do?
Day 22 - Something you wish you hadn’t done in your life.
Day 23 - Something you wish you had done in your life.
Day 24 - Make a playlist to someone, and explain why you chose all the songs. (Just post the titles and artists and letter)
Day 25 - The reason you believe you’re still alive today.
Day 26 - Have you ever thought about giving up on life? If so, when and why?
Day 27 – What’s the best thing going for you right now?
Day 28 - What if you were pregnant or got someone pregnant, what would you do?
Day 29 - Something you hope to change about yourself. And why.
Day 30 - A letter to yourself, tell yourself EVERYTHING you love about yourself

Goodbye my lover…

It has been a frustrating and sad few weeks and after I thought the blows couldn’t get any worse my car got diagnosed with a terminal car illness.

The mechanic informed me that my lovely and beautiful car was going to cost more to fix than it was worth. He was telling me the diagnosis' in mechanic language, but that basics are that the clutch, the gear box, the ball bearings somewhere, something about the connection with the alternator and everything else that the gear box remotely relates to had decided it was time to say bye.

Had I noticed the sound sooner, or recognized it as not being a good normal sound – which I thought it was – my car would probably be able to pass it’s next Warrant of Fitness with out thousands of dollars worth of work needing to be done on it. Sadly it is not.

I cried a lot more after getting home that day cause how the heck was I meant to be able to afford to buy a new car. My whole savings plan had gone out the window and everything was just messing up.

This time last week everything turned around for the better. After applying to various banks for loans, I finally got a loan with a bank who were the easiest to work with; they did not want six pay slips, multiple months worth of bank statements and a guarantor like all the others; and they gave me a bigger loan than the others were willing to.

With the joyous knowledge that I could purchase a car my Mama and I went car shopping. It was my first time buying for an actual car yard. We went with a rough idea of what we were looking for. After a bit of looking and a test drive, I stood there awkwardly while my mother did the bargaining for me.

I will be paying the bank fortnightly payments for the next three years but it will be totally worth it.

My good friend is driving me back to the car yard this afternoon to pick my new baby up. Last night we had a funeral celebration for my old baby, talking about our favourite memories in her, etc, so on and so forth.

Good bye my lover, wish I could spend the next few years with you, but I promise to send you off nice and clean.

I will post some pictures of the old and the new when I get time to upload off my camera. Woops, I should be honest, I will post some pictures when I make time instead of being my usual lazy self.

Can anyone else say yum?

Yummy YUMMMMMY!! In my tummy!

One of a various things that I do love about my job.

And yea, that icing on top is pure chocolate!

Tuesday, March 22, 2011

Day 30 - A photograph of yourself today + three good things that have happened in the past 30 days

Day 30Excuse the blurry photo of me today. Having shaky hands is a photo taking curse. Any who, this is me today.

As I stated when I originally posted the Thirty Days of Me post this last one would be three good things that happened in the last xx days, as I do not post every day. I have to say many good things have happened in the past 43 days. If I have to state the top three they would be:

  1. My brother and his partner finding out they are going to be having a baby boy, which I am over the moon about.
  2. Buying a new car. A post will be coming about this.
  3. Finally breaking. Means I can now move on properly. Sorry no post to come about this, way to hard to explain.

So this is the end of Thirty Days of Me. It has been fun posting each day. It has been awesome having a different topic to post about each day. Maybe I will have to do another 30 Days of X some day soon.

Monday, March 21, 2011

Friday, March 18, 2011

Ain’t It Funny

Last night, must have been about 12 am, my friend and I were sitting on a bench at the beach chatting. She was asking for advice and I was offering up advice. Now I know everyone hates hearing the truth when they ask for advice, they just want to hear what they want to hear, but I am not going to B-S them.

She turns to me half my through my load of advice and goes “Dang it Cheryl, how do you know me so well?”.

My response: If I am going to make friends with someone, a friend who I include so closely in my life, I'm going to make the effort to get to know them and learn about them. I don’t want to know 50% of someone, I want to know 100% of them (or at least 97% or 99%). What is the point of having a friend if you don’t know them?

It was a very philosophical statement, I think. Regardless, it is the truth.

Of course, I am aware that not every person I know I will be able to get to know fully and know all their quirks and routines, etc, but the least I can do is try.

Day 28 - Your Favourite Movie

Day 28

Thursday, March 17, 2011

Oh, yea..

Happy Saint Patrick’s Day!

Saint Patrick is:

Little is known of Patrick's early life, though it is known that he was born in Roman Britain in the 4th century, into a wealthy Romano-British family. His father and grandfather were deacons in the Church. At the age of sixteen, he was kidnapped by Irish raiders and taken captive to Ireland as a slave. Is is believed he was held somewhere on the west coast of Ireland, possibly Mayo, but the exact location is unknown. According to his Confession, he was told by God in a dream to flee from captivity to the coast, where he would board a ship and return to Britain. Upon returning, he quickly joined the Church in Auxerre in Gaul and studied to be a priest.

In 432, he again said that he was called back to Ireland, though as a bishop, to Christianise the Irish from their native polytheism. Irish folklore tells that one of his teaching methods included using the shamrock to explain the Christian doctrine of the Trinity to the Irish people. After nearly thirty years of evangelism, he died on 17 March 461, and according to tradition, was buried at Downpatrick. Although there were other more successful missions to Ireland from Rome, Patrick endured as the principal champion of Irish Christianity and is held in esteem in the Irish Church.

Thanks to Wikipedia

Have fun celebrating! My friends and I are getting our green on and heading to the local.

Day 27 - A Picture of You Last Year & Now. How Have You Changed Since Then?

Day 27 End of January 2010 – Lorren’s Hens Night.

Day 27End of January 2011 – Aunty B’s 60th Birthday Party

How have I changed since January 2010?

That is a big question, there is a whole three hundred and sixty five days that have been in motion.

As you can see, I cut my hair and dyed it also. I put on a little bit of weight, I lost a little bit of weight. I have decided along what lines I am planning to make my path in life. I aged. I found out I was going to be an aunty. I have made new friends. I have lost some friends. I have re-connected with old friends.

I am not the person I was back in January 2010. I think I have changed for the better, at least I hope I have. You come to realise many things as you grow older and it makes the movement of life easier, even if it does not feel so at the time.

Oh, I am also first aid qualified now. I could have pretended back in 2010 but now I can do it for real!

Tuesday, March 15, 2011

Day 25 - What's in Your Purse?

When I first read this question all I could think was “geez, want to be more specific? Purse, really that is the word you are going to use? Do you know how many different idea’s of what a purse is there are?” So I have decided the best way to decide how to answer this question is to go off the definition.

Definition of Purse:

n.

  1. A woman's bag for carrying keys, a wallet, and other personal items; a handbag.
  2. A small bag or pouch for carrying money.
  3. Something that resembles a bag or pouch.
  4. Available wealth or resources; money.
  5. A sum of money collected as a present or offered as a prize.

Now, it would be inappropriate to provide the world wide web with an insight to my ‘available wealth or resources; money’ or better yet lack of. Also, it would be inappropriate to boast about how much money I got given as a present.

So, what is in my ‘something that resembles a bag or pouch’? I am not going to put you through the dreaded long list of every item that is in the “hand bag”, as I would call it. I will just fill you in on the basics.

  • Keys; house key, car key and key chains.
  • Wallet; ATM Card, drivers license, loyalty cards, a few coins.
  • Digital Camera
  • Deodorant
  • Band aids
  • CPR face shield
  • Lip gloss

Those items are really just a few of the items. I never understand why I have so many things in my bag but at times they do come in handy.

The other week a friend and I were planning on going on a small hike and I actually moved my plasters and CPR shield over into the back pack I was taking, of course I transferred them back after, but as weird as some things may sound you never know when you will need them.

Monday, March 14, 2011

The Road to Tongariro Part One

A while ago I wrote about the trek I did up to the Summit of Rangitoto Island, and my want to do the Tongariro Crossing.

With the very little experience I have at trekking and tramping, it is going to be a good idea to start with smaller tramps and build my way up.

In a few weekends time, a group of us are going to drive down to Thames and do the Coromandel Pinnacles Walk. This is a walk that can be done in a day but we are going to stay over night in a 80 sleeper hut at the top, so we can wake early the next morning to tramp to the summit and watch the sunrise.

This over night trip will include eating baked beans and spaghetti out of tins. Hiking with a bag full of sleeping gear, clothes, food, water, first aid equipment. This will be more intense in the sense of what we have to carry. It is going to be so much fun.

So this is part one on the road to Tongariro. Part one as in this is the first thing thought of in preparation for the Tongariro crossing. This weekend we are going to do a shorter walk in preparation for the Pinnacles walk, but just to build up our fitness.

Golf Clubs and Airports

This weekend was another weekend in the life of Cheryl.

Friday after work, I picked up my friend and we journeyed out to the Airport to bid farewell to our friend from Canada. It was a sad moment for my friend and our Canadian friend as they had become very good friends over the past year. We said our goodbyes and our see you next time’s, which are so much nicer than goodbyes. And then we went our separate ways, until we meet again.

We left the airport and drove, no idea where we were going, until we came to a drive thru Subway. How cool is that?! So to delay ourselves until we were hungry we went to a driving range.

Man, have I found a new, fun, way to take my anger and stress out, as well as a pretty decent workout at the same time. We hit, if you could call the shots we were making this, fifty golf balls each and although we hit most of them about 2 metres from where we were standing, some of them went to at least the first marker.

After our extreme joke of a golfing experience we went and got our drive thru Subway. Best ever, simply because I did not have to leave my car. We went and ate out Subs at the runway look out.

It is the most amazing thing to watch and listen to aeroplanes coming and going. They are so close and so loud and it is simply amazing.

The rest of the weekend was lazy as per usual. I am still on my “This weeks lists of To Do’s” from two weeks ago. But I need to get back on routine, life run’s smoother and leaves less time to think about things when I am on a routine and crossing things off my list.

Day 24 - A Photo of Something That Means a lot to You

Something that mean alot to meThis lady means the world to me. Love you Mumma!

Friday, March 11, 2011

Day 23 - 15 Facts About You

  1. I was named after my mothers friend who had died of a brain aneurism.
  2. My favourite colour is purple
  3. My dream car is a Hyundai Santa Fe
  4. I am 3 years, 8 months and 13 days younger than my brother
  5. I have a half brother who I have never met
  6. I love online shopping
  7. I have a slight frame addiction
  8. I make a set of yearly goals at the beginning of every year
  9. I would love to live in Boston
  10. People who stand right in front of lift doors while waiting for the lift to get to the floor they are waiting on are my pet hate, worst is when they go to walk into the lift before letting the people out
  11. I wanted to be a surgeon when I was about 14
  12. I am a trained first aider
  13. My favourite band is Guns n’ Roses
  14. My favourite season is spring, because all the new life is born
  15. My hair and nails have always grown fast

Thursday, March 10, 2011

Day 22 - A Letter To Someone Who Has Hurt You Recently

This one is hard, not because it is hard to write a letter to someone who has hurt me, but because I don’t tend to let things like this bother me, I prefer to move on and distance myself from the person.

I am not big on drama, when I find myself part of it I try to get out or resolve it before it blows up into something unnecessary. There is someone who has hurt me, and it hurt so much because of their significance to me and the way they let me down.

Writing a letter will not make me feel any better so I am going to skip this Day, I hope my explanation is acceptable.

Wednesday, March 9, 2011

Tuesday, March 8, 2011

Day 20 - The Meaning Behind Your Blog Name

The reason my blog is named ‘Hello, World’ is because I am writing about my experiences, posting them on this blog and sharing them with anyone in the world that comes across my blog and wants to read them.

I started this blog before I finished up my exchange year in the States as a friend had asked me to keep them up to date, so I have continued to do so and keep it open to anyone else who wishes to read it.

Before I started this blog I had never read another blog, let alone blogged myself. So it was a new experience and when it asked me to pick a name for the blog ‘Hello, World’ seemed most appropriate. It may have also been the only thing I could think of at the time.

So the meaning behind my blog name? Hello, World.

Friday, March 4, 2011

Day 18 – Something You Crave A Lot

Day 18 - SushiChicken Teriyaki Sushi

Day 18 - FatimasFatima’s – meat and salads rolled in a Pita Bread wrap

Day 18 - PieSteak and Cheese Pies

Day 18 - Subway 

Six inch Itallian Herbs and Cheese, Chicken Fillet with Lettuce, tomato, cucumber and gherkins with Honey Mustard Sauce

Day 18 - Magnum

Streets Magnum Minis in Almond flavour

Thursday, March 3, 2011

Yea, Stuff Happens

You can not stop it. You can not change it. You just have to roll with the punches. Cry. Yell. Talk. Laugh.

Today’s, 30 day post, post was a photo of my family. It made me realise that I do not actually have that photo, the last photo taken of all four of us, printed and in general daily view.

This got me looking on snapfish.com and, due to the significance of this photo and as I already have loads of framed photos, I thought doing something different with this photo would be a nice idea.

Looking through the website I came across this. A ceramic tile, with the picture printed on, sitting on a miniature easel. How cool is that? I am going to not spend my money on my much loved amenities for a few weeks and then I am going to buy three. One for myself, one for my mum and one for the brother.

Stuff happens, I have been dealing with mine with a smile – the majority of the time. Sometimes the ‘stuff’ is not as easy to deal with but find a way, reach out to those who love you and make it a goal to smile more each day.

Caution: Rant

I have never, not to my knowledge or recollection, posted anything that was purely a rant. Unfortunately, the time has come for one of these posts.

Using the term ‘we’ refers to two or more people.

The definition of we:

pron.

1. Used by the speaker or writer to indicate the speaker or writer along with another or others as the subject: We made it to the lecture hall on time. We are planning a trip to Arizona this winter.

2. Used to refer to people in general, including the speaker or writer: "How can we enter the professions and yet remain civilized human beings?" (Virginia Woolf).

3. Used instead of I, especially by a writer wishing to reduce or avoid a subjective tone.

4. Used instead of I, especially by an editorialist, in expressing the opinion or point of view of a publication's management.

5. Used instead of I by a sovereign in formal address to refer to himself or herself.

6. Used instead of you in direct address, especially to imply a patronizing camaraderie with the addressee: How are we feeling today?

Definition number six seems to relate to the problem I am facing. But in my case it is not a question it is a statement. For example or maybe this is just a sentence taken from the email, “Awesome, we’ll look at Palmerston North and Hastings early next week.” Thanks bud, I really appreciate your appreciation for me doing that little job that “we” needed to get done, but asking me to do another one while referring to we really grinds my gears. You are not going to do anything that is included in this “we task”. 

Doing what is asked of me, I have no problem with. Asking me to do something and making it seem like a team effort, makes me want to throw something at your head; a very hard object, preferably.

Team efforts, they work well (at times), are good ways of getting things done and are “awesome”. My effort, all by myself, it is freaking amazing – like the Red Sox beating the Yankees for the next billion years amazing and don’t you ever forget that.

Rant, Over!

Day 17 - A Photo of You and Your Family

Day 17

Circa June 2009

Wednesday, March 2, 2011