Swimming Pretty in the Glass-Half-Full 2012: Day 152 - Working with Rambo

My boss brought her dog Rambo into work today and he was as adorable as ever.

He doesn't do much for my productivity but he is lovely to have around...

Swimming Pretty in the Glass-Half-Full 2012: Day 151 - So insanely tired

Tonight was spiders group night but thought I lugged my laptop to work to thence take it to my writing group, I was far too tired and headed home, grabbed some Indian food for Aidan and I, and bunkered down for 3 episodes of New Girl before crashing very early and getting 9 hours sleep.

Swimming Pretty in the Glass-Half-Full 2012: Day 150 - Cold grey day off

The second day of my Eurovision 2012 annual leave and the weather was perfect for a day for which I had planned to do as little as possible.

I did end up finally filing all my writing/publishing/social media articles into their gorgeous red and white kikki.k folders, cleaned up a pile or two of paperwork, cleaned up the final bits and pieces from the party (leaving the decoration intact for a while yet), napped for two glorious hours, watched "Ellen" while reading a stash of "Entertainment Weekly" magazines and had dinner with my gorgeous guy and my house mate Aidan after which we watched two episodes of the amazing Once Upon a Time.

A most excellent day.

Swimming Pretty in the Glass-Half-Full 2012: Day 149 - Out and about with Kerry

What a gloriously relaxed day.

While I adore our yearly Eurovision party and the huge amount of work that goes into it, it is always lovely to relax afterwards. This is the first year I took the day off after the big event and I am so glad I did. Kerry was around all day and instead of having to leave her to her own devices, we had a lazy morning, went out for brunch at Cafe Sofia in Erskineville (which was near deserted so service was FAST! I love Mondays at cafes), then slowly ambled our way up Erskineville Road to King Street - stopping to photograph some graffiti on an old industrial building being converted into apartments - before slowly making our way home via Maya Sweets for afternoon tea yummies.

No schedule. Just two great friends wandering along talking and later napping and just being with each other.

A seriously perfect day.

Oh and we had a bundle of vodka jelly shots leftover... like a gelatinous Azerbaijan flag in the fridge!

and then we farewelled Kerry at the airport... and sadly Eurovision was over once more.

Swimming Pretty in the Glass-Half-Full 2012: Day 148 - Eurovision Grand Final

What a night! We had tons of food, wine (Steve had to make a dash to the liquor shop to get some more as we ran out of white wine!), decorations in every shade of the Azerbaijani flag (including hand wash in my bathroom, my housemate's and the kitchen, one of which was red, one was lime and one was blue), vodka jelly shots in the colours of the host country, balloons, flags, streamers, people dressed up as glittery Eurotrash (Steve M was a fabulous standout in his op shop-acquired outfit!) and Kerry as an Azerbaijani Air flight attendant, while I did the whole gay Azerbaijani cowboy thing. I even had two of my new lovely friends from my writing group turn up - Selena and Zja which was wonderful!

Thankfully we had all the food cooked up nice and early so Steve and I could concentrate on watching the show too. We had seen almost all the acts at the semi-final so only had to watch UK, France, Italy, Azerbaijan, Spain and Germany on the night. But still, it's fun to watch it with everyone else and see how they react especially as we all get drunker! We even had our own voting system thanks to Kerry's hard work and ingenuity.

I love the grand final of Euroviosion and tonight didn't disappoint...

We had lots more people than this but this was who was in shot when I took the photo - Kerry at the front, L-R in next row: Steve, Corey, Lucy, Steve M, L-R final row: Fahmi, Milos (temporarily here from London), Paul M and his partner, Andrew

My gorgeous guy Steve made this from tinsel - what an awesome piece of Eurovision art!

Swimming Pretty in the Glass-Half-Full 2012: Day 147 - Eurovision semi final 2

More inspired spandex clad fun tonight courtesy of Eurovision.

Ellen and Tracy, who couldn't make Sunday night's official Eurovision party popped over for Thai, some weird acts and the chance to see the beginning of decorating for the night. We had a ball!

This photo of Ellen and Tracy made it onto the SBS Eurovision 2012 website, after I tweeted it out!

Oh and a lovely tweet from Farmer Fran.

Swimming Pretty in the Glass-Half-Full 2012: Day 146 - TGIF Laksa

It's time for Laksa from North Sydney! YUM! (Walked up with Danielle to get it.)

Then tonight I watched Eurovision semi final 1 with my gorgeous guy, fresh off the road from Bathurst. Naturally we had Indian food (which is the national dish of the UK which is, whether they acknowledge it or not, in Europe so totally authentic food for the event!)

TGIF funnies

Swimming Pretty in the Glass-Half-Full 2012: Day 145 - A halo over the Bridge... and Dendy Newtown re-opens!

Left work and it was raining just enough to create a foggy halo over the Sydney Harbour Bridge...

Then off to Newtown to grab mags at Magnation, buy shoes at Platypus, new albums by Scissor Sisters, Regina Spektor, and Ladyhawke, and check out the brand new Dendy with 10 cinemas! Count 'em...10!
It has lost its old grungy character but looks so modern and spacious...

And then it rained... HARD... and me with no umbrella. Thankfully Fahmi picked me up outside The Bank Hotel on his way home from Broadway.

Swimming Pretty in the Glass-Half-Full 2012: Day 144 - Walkies!

Up at 5 am for another walk in the autumn cold with Fahmi!

Even managed to send Warren a farewell text as I walked fast along our usual route, as he prepared to fly back to Perth for another two weeks work.

Swimming Pretty in the Glass-Half-Full 2012: Day 143 - Thai and cupcakes...

Fun lunchtime picnic at work of Thai and then cupcakes to celebrate Valerie and Rose's birthdays the week before, and all our hard work of late. Fun!

Then I met up with my gorgeous friend Sammi from working at Optus days and we had a blast eating dumplings (only sour note was all the awful redundancies inflicted on people I knew well and worked with) and Mother's crepes. YUM!