Holiday Madness ... and not-so madness

Hurrah! I'm four days into my first holiday in far, far, FAR too long. I am never letting it go for two years and 10 months EVER again. Nevah.

Weekend in the Hunter with the girls was faaaaabulous. But oh, my aching liver. A arrived via her lovely boyfriend's car at about 10.30am and we hung around until we heard the third member of my carpool was at the nearby train station. I had decided - somewhat on the spur of the moment - to get her an escort for the weekend. Kev! The budget Bunnings gnome. Ha ha ha. It was sooo silly, but helped to make the weekend even more fun. So I introduced A to her escort, we faffed around for a wee while until I got the call from G to say she'd arrived and was hiding in the shade. In a bizarre typical Sydney weather twist, it was friggin' 34C and so damn humid, after many days of only just above 20C temps. Bah!

Poor little ZJ was NOT impressed by the three fully grown adults AND their luggage (damn, we all had a suitcase for two nights away, ha ha), when he's used to just me and my handbag/gymbag. Boy, was he a sluggish little Corolla, especially up some of the big hills. But we made it in good time and checked into our GORGEOUS accommodation, with me snaffling the second best room - own air con, whoo hoo! I gave up another room - with a balcony - to a smoker friend, turned out to be a stroke of genius ... well, unintentioned genius as hers had no air con. None of which we discovered until we went off to bed in the sweltering pre-thunderstorm heat!

Anyhoo, we made a quick trip into town to pick up BBQ supplies ... and booze, naturally, and by 6pm we were sitting outside, glass of wine in hand, cheese, bread, oil and dukah on the table feeling well and truly at home. Slight hiccup when we discovered there was no water coming out of the taps. Uhhh, hello - shower required much? So we called up Jeff, our friendly landlord for the weekend, who turned up and realised the water tank (they're all on rainwater up there) was, in fact, empty! Slight panic until he reassured us he had dam supply - for emergencies only. Heh, was only then we realised how friendly he was. We were all standing around chatting, he's lit up two smokes in 10 minutes and I'm thinking "damn, I really want to drink some more wine", when he was asking us how we were enjoying the local produce - noticing we were drinking some from a vineyard just down the road. Heh, took us THAT to realise he actually was hanging out for an invite. So, I asked him if he wanted to join us for a while and yes, he did, in fact he'd brought along his own supply - two bottles in the truck. Ha ha.

So us quite newly thirty girls sat down with ol' Jeff and had a great chat about EVERYTHING. Good lord, it was brilliant fun. Finally at about 7.30pm - four hours after she'd left Sydney - the final member of our party arrived to find us all very well into it and damn near pissed. Alright, I was already pissed. Total lightweight.

Anyhoo, once Jeff's wine ran out and he realised it was 8.30pm and he'd been sitting there for two hours - with his poor wife back home - he decided to high-tail it home and we decided to fire up the bbq. Mmm, all very tasty. Or I imagine it was, having now well and truly hit the pissed point of the night. So pissed that I thought "oh yes, it's a GREAT time for me to pick up a cigarette". Ahh dear.

Slight low point was when the two blokes staying nextdoor came over to join us. Eeek. Golf semi-pro and his caddy. Both with GLINTING wedding rings. Heh, they were both pretty lame and I'm pretty sure that within 15 minutes of talking to us drunken, over-tired floozies that they realised they really probably should've stayed in the safety of their bungalow. No funny business, just baaaad conversation as can only be had when three out of six of the party are drrrrruuuunk and happy, one is sober and tired/grumpy and two are boring-ass golfers. Heh, oh well.

Have no idea when they buggered off, but at some point they did and at some point I went off to bed.

Woke up at blimmin' 5am! Gaaaah. Damn internal body clock. Oh, and noisy birds.

Went on a faaaabulous wine-tasting tour, that started at 10am (ouch). Kev - the escort gnome - was a hit, moreso because one of the old blokes who was on the bus LOOKED JUST LIKE HIM. White beard and gnomey face and all. He had designs on Kev, wanted to take him home and made sure he got photographed with him everywhere. Ha ha. Hilarious. I actually felt pretty damn cruddy for most of the tour, just can't face a big bold Shiraz at 10.15am after a night of hard drinking. Blech. Bought some more speciality wines, some chilli-infused olive oil (lush), some chilli olives (delish) and some stunning mild blue-vein cheese. I usually hate the stuff, and declare it smells like feet that have been peed on by a diseased goat ... but this was damn good.

The tour finished at about 5.30pm and LORD I was knackered. We hung around for a while, had showers, located clothing and then got picked up by a taxi to head into this AWESOME brewery in town for our dinner. Food was a touch average, but the local beer more than made up for it. Could've stayed for a LOT longer but one of our party had turned green at the table, practically sprinted for the loo and not returned for 15 mins. I never like to ask if someone's okay in these situations, because for all I knew she could've suddenly come down with a case of the squirts, or I could've just over-reacted to her reaction and she was fine and just touching up her make-up or a range of other things. Once she was back at the table I could see she was in a world of hurt - on the waters! So I got her a lemon, lime and bitters as I find this often helps - something to do with the sugar content. Anyhoo, she didn't say anything but soldiered on because she is real trooper. I would've gone home, and always do, if I'd felt like her.

Sunday we had a super bacon/eggs/mushrooms breakfast before our superfun horseriding trip. And I am not being sarcy when I say superfun, it was SO AWESOME. Aside from the fact we were pretty much all put on dodgy horses who were really not very well looked after, nor was their gear, yards or anything. But anyway, I was warned that my horse was a real bit "think of PMS with a gun" one of the staff told me. Uhhh, fantastic. Really didn't turn out to be that bad though, she was just a mean biatch of a horse. And had the WORST canter it has been my misfortune to experience. My lord, it was terrible. Kept being catapulted forward out of the saddle despite my best thigh-squeezing and butt pushing into saddle efforts. I tried my best ... didn't fall off either. At the end of it a staff member asked me how I'd found her canter, and I was like "oh, I am sooo out of practice" etc etc, explaining how I couldn't keep my seat. Hah, she laughed and explained that it wasn't my fault - the horse had the worst canter she'd ever encountered and no-one could sit down. Grrrr. Would've been helpful to know beforehand ... even during! Gah!

Anyway, three days later and my inner-thighs are still singing out in pain every now and then.

Onto the next part of my holiday anyway ... the non-party part, the detox part. Well, I'm four days in now to the official holiday, the weekend away was just ... well, a weekend! Drove down on Monday and had nice salad for lunch, then a wee rest before taking the mother out for a walk. Tuesday I got up super early and dropped my car at the mechanic, about 8-9km away, and ran back. It was so good, gorgeous run, but my thighs - ooooh, my thighs.

Wednesday, yesterday, did a super-sweaty 6km run in the 85% humidity morning ... was damn hard going, it's so flat around here, I miss the hills (sick, I know) and then took ye ol' mother out for a good hour long walk in the evening. Thighs still haven't really improved, so today I took the day off from serious running work and went shopping instead. Bought the most gorgeous tie belt you've ever seen, bought some lovely handmade soap ... and fudge and marmalade for the father figure.

Tomorrow, if the bloody sun comes out, I am SO going for a swim. But at the very least will do a nice 10km run in the morning and will hit the weights - just at home - for a good 30 mins too. Plus the fitball. My poor stomach is weakening!

Food has been very, very good though. No bad stuff at all. Seriously, none. And I'm really enjoying it all too. Tonight am making low-carb, low-fat healthy pizza for the parental units ... a rare treat for us all really, but especially for them because they never eat the stuff.

Really looking forward to a picnic on Sunday at a nearby village that was set up in the 1940s as a real tourist resort, but never took off because of the ever-damn-changing weather. Qld has "beautiful one day, perfect the next", the south coast could have "beautiful one minute, sh*thouse the next, windy the next, raining the next, sunny the next" because it literally changes every hour. Not 20 minutes ago I was thinking I should really head out for a swim, not there's grey clouds pushing in and the temp has dropped by a good 5 degrees. Charming.

But still, I'M ON HOLIDAYS. Whoo hoo.