Thursday, March 20, 2008

Sunday, March 16, 2008

Stranger than fiction.

Weird day today, spent the day cleaning up my study and building a new flatpack computer workstation desk instead of my beautiful old blackwood dining table which I have been using as a desk.(Unfortunately the table made the room look tiny so a desk was the compromise to give it space and to continue to operate in some sort of normality.
Anyway I digress, I heard a tale of twisted behaviour today that made me laugh in the end but the drama of it and the perpetrator of it are beyond the pale.
The situation involves some friends, A goes overseas for a year leaving her partner B alone in their house. C is the next door neighbour and a good mate to B but admitted later that she had never liked A that much because she found her manipulative and generally a bit of a nutcase- in some respects I have to concur with that opinion having been on the receiving end of one of her tirades in the past myself. A & B have had a rocky time for a few years in their relationship and the decision to take off for a year for A was one that always puzzled some of us.

Anyway off A trots telling all and sundry before she left that she and B had an arrangement that sex with someone else while they were apart did not count.
All sweetness and light apparently but in the meantime C and others get various communications that she is not happy about some aspects of her life and is actually looking for 'something better'. Also while saying this was obsessing about B getting in touch with and old girlfriend of his and other women in the area who he 'flirted' with. Now B is no saint but there are few nicer men in the world, he enjoys a light hearted flirt as much as the next guy but he has never overstepped the mark with any female in the wide group of mutual friends and acquaintances we have. A charmer but not a sleaze.

Hint one: B has some friends to stay, two women. His house is set up with three bedrooms, one of is fully self contained for guests and the Master bedroom and a second bedroom that is not in fact used as a bedroom much share the other main bathroom. B decides to make his guests comfortable and move out of the Master bedroom and into the selfcontained one so the two women could have a room each and share a bathroom with each other. A really nice gesture and just that of a considerate host. When one of the guests emails A to let her know about the visit and B's kindness (A visit she was fully aware of- before, during and after the fact) She flips out at B completely and ripped into him about how he had given up the bed of a 'loving couple' and so forth.

Another friend of A & B -let's call her D- stays with B for a couple of weeks to carry out some research work prior to her eventual move to that part of the world.
D is a bit of genius with colour and B wants to paint his pride and joy - a boat- before A gets home so they can take off and go for that trip they had sort of planned for her return. B is also a bit colour blind and asks D to pick the colour of the boat for him after discussing his requirements. D is bit wary of A's insecurity and points out to B that A might not be impressed but he explains he wants to do for the reason described above. So D chooses the colours for him and the result is very striking apparently and much admired his friends etc.

Hint two: A comes home after a year away and immediately launches into a 'spring clean' of the entire house. Even after she know B is not a slob and C had helped him out doing just that before A got home so the place would be all nice and clean for her to just kick back and relax. B tells C and D (and me) afterwards that he realised A had come home on some kind of mission to find 'proof'.
A finds a note from D that had accompanied a present to B to say thank you for his help during her visit and then a letter from D which was part of a writing game she had shown B during her visit. A goes ballistic at B and contacts D and gives her a spray to which D reacts with the full force of her Irish temper. The strange side of this is that D is married to F who is B's best mate! Now it gets even stranger,
B had promised to help F with some work for a couple of weeks which would make it neccesary for him to stay with D & F.
B is the kind of man who wont break a promise and says he is going to fulfill his promise to F and goes to stay with D & F who are shocked at how emotionally drained he is. He tells them that A said she wouldnt be there when he got back.
However A has not even begun to play her games yet. She phones B and is sweetness and light to him the first call, incredibly ignorant to D who answered the phone and would be everytime she called. Then the next call starts haranguing him and saying fairly tasteless things about what he and D were doing etc. Next call all sweetness and light and then hot and cold each time she called.

With B away and out of effective reach A falls back on C the neighbour who has been roped in by A. Then they have a falling out over A's complete disregard for anyone other than herself - basically the woman broke a cardinal rule when it comes to the ownership of an animal and prevented C's dog from going home when C was calling her because A felt 'lonely' The dog is a breed that really needs a pack leader and only one pack leader.

Unable to get at D except for one memorable night when she screamed like a banshee at D because the extension phone in B's room wouldnt work and B said he wasnt getting up to take the call because he was not feeling all that well and it was quite late. A turns her attentions to C and her friendship with B- a completely platonic friendship between two Libra's- ie they dont mess with each other LOL.
First she smears C all over the district. Then is sighted by not just one neighbour but two with her hand in C's letterbox. Apparently on more than one occasion. C notices some strange stuff going on with her telephone over the next couple of months. Ringing once then cutting out and when she dials *10# there is no call recorded. Friends reporting her phone is being directed to other states etc. Finally she gets someone from the phone company to believe her and he finds that her line is indeed diverted.
The phone company brings in the police after they find that someone has impersonated C and organised a remote diversion process on C's phone. Because they have the voices of two women on file and that C's voice was on file previously and the police verify it is indeed her they know someone has stolen her identity with the phone company. Serious crime and one that is frowned upon deeply of late.

C is played the recording and recognises A's not so dulcet tones but plays dumb as to the identity of the fraudster because she thinks B has been through enough and his reputation might suffer in the process- added to which she really doesnt want to have to listen to A badmouth her in court as to her reasons for doing what she has done.

A is a strange woman, on the surface a complete airhead. She chatters all the time about nothing ins some ways to reassure herself I think but in light of what I have been told I think the woman is completely self absorbed. Another friend has talked of an instance where A blithely informed some people of her fertility problems in front of her after she had confided in A and sworn her to secrecy. I have begun to recognise a pattern in her behaviour. A seems to like see herself as the victim all the time and in this latest saga she has been playing for all it is worth apparently.

But committing fraud? That is not just nasty but downright stupid. I must admit I will be watching to see if she can actually see past her self absorption to realise just how much risk she has put herself in legally. Who would want to employ her with a fraud conviction? It will be interesting to watch

And as I said folks STRANGER than FICTION!!

Saturday, March 15, 2008

Today's visitor


A Dingy Swallowtail or Citrus Butterfly
A native visitor to the parched garden distracting me from the mundane
I should be polishing and sweeping and stuff but life is far too short and this summer has been spent doing so much work!! lol
and not MY work
Oh well back to the grind- I know it will be worth it but I am just SO bored with it all

Thursday, March 13, 2008

Almost, almost there

The photographer from the real estate man came yesterday and took about half an hour to take the shots he needed- telling me he wished I would do all his houses because it was just ready and didnt need dressing

this is what it has been all about folks



front view


the kitchen which will be the main pic on the billboard at the front of the house leading up to the auction

and our newly enormous bedroom - after the removal of M.O.T.H's junk

Sunday, March 09, 2008

Two hour art

Probably the worst reason to create art in the eyes of my tutors past and present is to 'match the furniture' but this was done yesterday afternoon to create a focal point for our living room.

The fine tuning has begun now that the majority of the painting is finished- only two doors left for me to paint etc now it is time to dress the house to make it attractive to buyers.
I took down our extensive art collection which consists of a number of paintings we have collected on our travels and are mostly smaller pieces, having them around the house would make it visually busy and the effect I want for the sale is a place of calm and relaxation.
Our living room is quite large now I have removed the half a tonne of books that were in there but the walls were bare and we had nothing really large enough with a splash of the red colour I was using to give the room oomph so I trotted off to the Reject Shop and bought a canvas and let it sit in the corner for a few days while I ruminated on what I was going to produce. Being a water sign anything related to the sea inspires me and I was mucking around with an idea based on a nautilus shell design which I messed around with it and created a medieval type spiral and then using PVA as my first drawing medium on the canvas created the outline of the design and let it dry in a ridge and then mixed up acrylic paints- nothing special just stuff I had laying around the place from various projects and kept spritzing it with a spray bottle until I was happy with the effect and colours. After that dried- quickly because it was warm yesterday- I rubbed the 'ribs' with Treasure Gold.
Voila- Two hour art.
Now for one for our bedroom- another place that is surprising large once all the junk is removed- although M.O.T.H still maintains it is all treasures- yep I'm a bower bird and he is a friggin' squirrel!!! ;-)