Sea Scuzz

I went for a surf on Sunday with Mystical Roo and Monster Noggin and was quite frankly shocked at the state of the ocean.  It was filthy.  It was a beautiful sunny day and normally the water is crystal clear but on Sunday it was brown and muddy.  There was scuzz (an official term) floating on the surface and just foam everywhere.  Mystical Roo and Monster Noggin informed me that this was because of all the rain we'd had.  The rain water collects pollutants off the surface and then it all drains back into the ocean.  A week of heavy rain has therefore caused scuzz and foam.  Disgusting.  But that didn't stop us going in.  Because apparently we're disgusting.  There were so many people out there I figured it couldn't be that bad.  Actually, it was quite rank and after about half an hour I decided to go and sun myself instead.  Unable to get past the waves and out into the deep (because I am too small and weak) I was just getting smashed in the face with wave after wave of foam.  And as much as I tried to keep myself up and on the board the inevitable happened and I went under water.  I went under the foam and face first into the brown murky water.  Nasty.  But not as nasty as the kids who were playing in the foam.  They were rolling in it, picking it up and throwing it, bathing in it.  I took Watson and made a swift exit.  There's really only one place for foam and that's on top of a beer.

Little Stalky Likes the Leopard Print

It's stylish and practical 

Stalky fans may be aware that I am a lover of all things leopard print.  I know leopard print can be seen as tacky and I know that there are some less than appealing stereotypes of leopard print wearing folk out there but I like to think that my use of leopard print has it's own Stalky style.  And leopard print has been an integral part of many Stalky adventures.  Who can forget the leopard print umbrella (LPU) numbers 1 and 2, both of which perished in horrible storms.  Or what about my leopard print wellingtons that have proved essential in the declogging of drains and the unflooding of balconies.  In other non weather related leopard print adventures, I enthused over how Google Chrome let me customise my browser with it's own leopard print design. Hell, even the blog has leopard print.  I have leopard print swimwear, leopard print dresses, leopard print scarves and shawls.  I have leopard print shoes and I once even purchased some leopard print tissues, though these were sent to another leopard print lover, Bear Z, as a gift.  Yes, I send tissues in the post as gifts.  My latest addition to the leopard print family is a leopard print phone cover, which not only protects my cool new phone but makes it stylish too.  One day I think I'm going to put on my leopard print bikini, my leopard print wellingtons, my leopard print shoes and my leopard print scarf, whilst making a phone call on my leopard print phone, writing a leopard print inspired blog on my leopard print themed blog on my leopard print themed browser.  I know what you're thinking.  Is this what I'm doing right now?  Am I sat here typing in a bikini?  Well, no.  It's bloody freezing to be honest.  All I have to do now is invest in some leopard print bedsheets.  Mystical Roo is willing to cut a deal.  Leopard print bedsheets get the thumbs up if he can have some Norwich bedsheets.  What a stylish pair we shall be.

Little Stalky's Over Active Imagination

Do you ever have moments in the shower when you totally freak yourself out?  Like you're stood there, thinking about nothing more important than what to have for lunch when all of sudden, out of nowhere, your brain starts remembering scary details of horror films.  And you remember that people in horror films get attacked in showers.  And then you realise that you're home alone.  And the wind is whistling.  And the rain is raining.  And the door creaks.  All of this is happening and you've got shampoo in your eyes, so you can't open your eyes because it will sting but you really want to open your eyes because all you can imagine is someone stalking towards you with a knife, gun, axe, pitchfork.  So you rinse the shampoo in record time and open your eyes only to realise that you have a really, really over active imagination.  Or is that just me?  Because this has happened to me on more than one occasion and I really spook myself.  I don't even know where I get these ideas from and maybe I should start locking the bathroom door but then I think I'd be imagining someone shimmying in through the skylight.  The skylight that doesn't open.  But still.  I was thinking about this because the other day I had an extreme freak out.  I was showering, as you do, pondering not very much at all, when I heard the door creak.  Of course there was shampoo in my eyes at this point and of course I started wondering if there was a stalker at large.  Mystical Roo was at work, I was alone and the door was unlocked.  We all know that I get randomers opening my front door - who's to say that one of them didn't make it all the way up the stairs.  So I set about rinsing the shampoo but wouldn't you know it, something really did make a lunge for me.  I felt it - on the back of my leg (obviously some evil being had snuck into the shower without me hearing it)  a kind of wet, rough hand followed by a sharp grazing sensation.  Obviously, someone with manky hands was going for my ankles with a blade.  Obviously.  Or, when I finally opened my eyes, an exfoliating glove and my razor had toppled and hit me on their way to the floor.  Yes, that's right everyone, I was attacked by an exfoliating glove and a razor.  It was the exfoliating glove, in the shower, with the razor.  Will my adventures never end.

Jumping Pillows

I had never heard of a jumping pillow until I moved to Australia and started working in a holiday park.  Someone once asked if we had a jumping pillow and I pictured a bedroom style, bedroom sized pillow.  After initial confusion I confirmed that we did not have a jumping pillow.  I then set about finding an Australian to explain to me exactly what a jumping pillow was.  As it turns out a jumping pillow is almost like a bouncy castle, though without the sides and roof.  It's a massive inflatable pillow that kids can jump on.  I encountered my first real life jumping pillow when we went camping last weekend.  Exciting times.  There were no rules to say the jumping pillow was not for adults and we figured that as long as there were no children using it then there would be no harm in us having a quick bounce.  And bounce is what we did.  We bounced high, we bounced low, we bounced sideways.  We bounced for less than a minute before becoming utterly out of breath and exhausted.  My God!  These things are so easy when you're a kid but put a grown woman on a jumping pillow and she becomes an exhausted mess.  Then of course there's the acrobatics.  You know, cartwheels and back flips and what not.  Apparently, once you hit your twenties, your body doesn't want to bend and flex in the same way it did when you were ten.  And it gets really cross with you the next day and shows you how cross it is with very achy muscles.  Jumping pillows are exhausting.  We were shown up by a young boy who turned up and started doing back flips.  Unable to do back flips ourselves we then started encouraging the boy to up his tricks.  One back flip.  Two back flips.  Three back flips.  After eight back flips in a row the kid seemed a little dizzy so we gave him a round of applause and then retreated back to our camp.  He probably went back to his mum to tell tales of a bedraggled group of adults demanding a show of back flips.  But that's the jumping pillow.  It brings out your inner child.  And whilst your inner child is demanding you leap around like a lunatic, your outer adult is screaming at you to stop.