My Secret Santa

A tradition amongst many work places is the Secret Santa gift-giving tradition.

The school where I work , Hedland Senior High, is no exception. Run by one of our deputies, the Secret Santa spreads across the last week of the year. All who participate are secretly given another staff member. From Monday to Friday you shower your secret recipient with small gifts or gestures, dropping clues along the way. On Friday, the final day, you reveal yourself if they haven’t already nutted it out.

I love Christmas and I love doing nice things for others, so naturally I participated. The best part, however, is not the giving and receiving of presents, but the opportunity to get to know your colleagues better. In whatever field I have worked throughout my career, I have firmly believed that a team that works well outside of work can work wonders at work.

To be honest, when I first received the letter that divulged who I would be showering with gifts this week, I was dumbfounded. I had no idea who this lady was. I asked around and my queries were enthusiastically answered. Naturally, I facebook stalked Haley and was pleased to be looking into the eyes of someone I recognised from around the school. This lady had caught my attention in the past because her smile is radiant.

The more I dug for information , the more I loved this lady. Teachers, students and admin alike , all reinforced what Haley’s smile already says about the beautiful person inside.

Haley is a Math teacher at HSHS and a credit to herself. Over the past week I have been told Haley is fun, bubbly, a bit of a party girl, loyal, happy, a great friend and an awesome teacher. I have worked amongst many Teachers and can identify many differences between a teacher who teaches to pay their own bills and a teacher who is passionate about their students-the ones that teach from the heart. Haley, I am happy to say, is the latter. We should never underestimate our ability, as educators, to help our students reach their full potential. I have loved learning about you Haley and hope you have also enjoyed your role as the gift bearer this week.

I am glad this tradition has remained firm amongst Australian workplaces and encourage people to jump on board if given the chance.

If you work with young people….be the mentor you needed when you were younger, because a teacher who LOVES teaching, teaches their students to love learning.

Merry Christmas Haley!!

Luv you 40-Leven,

Deb Perry

(Welcome Centre EA)

Finding Jack 2017

As I board the plane in Hedland, to fly to Perth then drive to Geraldton I smile. I am so excited!!!

Twelve months has flown by. Can’t believe it has been a year since we religiously and ‘intentionally ‘ walked around and round in circles for 24hrs straight! I don’t even do that when I’m having a big night!!

Yet, here we all are, ready to do it again.

This year has been particularly hard for us, since I nominated myself as Team Captain, then up and left town! I think there were numerous occasions when we seriously considered throwing the towel in and withdrawing from the event.

However, right there, in a nutshell, was our answer-right?

We walk all through the night to remind us….”Cancer Never Sleeps.”

Should that same logic not be applied here? Sure, being together made it harder; sure, we could forget about it until next year; sure, we wouldn’t get to finish all the tent decorations we had planned; sure, we weren’t prepared for it…….and with that thought process, came our answer. When you get the news, “You have Cancer,” there are no guarantees, except that, more than likely, a) you won’t have your family always by your side, b) you don’t have the luxury of ignoring it until next year, c) you are not always going to look like a million dollars as you face your battle and d) you sure as hell didn’t counter this into your life plan.

So, here we are….Finding Jack 2017.

Thanks for taking the time to share this year’s journey xx

Again, a MASSIVE thank you to all who have supported us along the way.

We urge you to humour us, when, in a couple of months, we start it all again!!

But first….let’s grab Relay 2017 by the balls and make the most of it!!!

Please share and like! Let’s get the message out to as many people as we can!

Wish us luck xxxx

Team Finding Jack

❤️❤️

Big Ben and So Much More

Day 7: Mon 25th

London

The first glimpse of light through the bay window reveals the trees of the secret garden below. It’s not hard to let your inner child’s imagination run wild, with thoughts of adventures galore below.

I thought I may have run out of steam by now but I am up early and we leave after a coffee, as Ken has a meeting. The train ride into London gives me sneak previews of what’s in store. It is during this ride I first see Big Ben and I am not disappointed-he is everything I expected him to be, even from a distance, as are the rows of houses with their quaint little chimneys atop. Santa must be in his element when he visits London!

Ken shows me the way to St Paul’s Cathedral before heading to his office.

I do the tourist thing like everyone else and take selfies out the front before going inside. It is while I am admiring the Cathedral that I get my first cuddle in London….the man beside me speaking excitedly as he squeezes me. I bask in the moment before he realises I am not his wife. His face? Priceless! His wife’s reaction behind us though, even better! She is in hysterics laughing at his innocent mistake. If only I knew what he was saying……probably something saucy!

The history of the castle is astounding ….least of all knowing Diana walked this very path to fulfill a fairy-tale romance and marry her Prince……we won’t dwell on the happy ever after because even that does not taint the magic. Even though our guide, Terry, never chose me to sit on the Queens throne, his demeanour and knowledge held his audience captivated. It was a shame to have to walk out of the tour early, but we wanted to try to catch the changing of the guards.

Time was not our friend today, and although I got to see the guards with their bearskin hats, we missed the actual changing of the guards. We stroll around the Buckingham Palace grounds on our way to catch a double decker bus.

I snapped happily away regardless of the cool weather and overcast skies. Our guide, Noddy, giving us his special version of London’s past.

I get my chance at seeing Big Ben close up-love it!!! We hop off at Tower of London and tag on to a Beefeater tour before branching out on our own. The history here is phenomenal. London, I now know, deserves so much more than the couple of days I have allowed for it in my itinerary. Definitely coming back to explore further and spend more time here.

After The Tower of London we board the ferry which gives us a different perspective of the London sights. I am ticking boxes like a woman possessed today!

I think for my London experience to be complete I just need a red phone box and a Bobby! On our way to Trafalgar Square to meet Kens mate Greg, I get a photo opportunity with a red phone booth.

“Quickly, take the bloody photo Ken!!!!!!!”

I am ecstatic! That enthusiasm comes to a screaming halt however, when I open the door and realise it has become an ensuite for the homeless. Not to be deterred I held my breath and begged Ken to take the photo quickly! Rancid! I try to imagine how well the contents would ferment in Hedland in the middle of 48 degree days in Summer! I was dry retching for a while after…..not my finest moment, but so glad I ticked the box -AND survived!!!!!!

We meet up with Greg and head to a pub for a pint…..or a water, whatever! We wander around a little more. Luckily for some young lass, as we strolled I noticed she had her skirt caught up under her belt and was walking around London with her butt bared to all. I raced up to her and let her know and quickly pull her skirt down to cover her bits-she was slightly embarrassed but grateful. Not sure the guys thought I’d necessarily done the right thing but hey….?

Later we watched some street entertainment before agreeing on pizza for dinner. I’m renowned for being unable to make decisions. The question, “tea or coffee?” sends me into a head spin. Hate decision making. It took me a while to decide which drink to have, then the waiter informs me they don’t have it….told him to surprise me. It was a good surprise so I ordered a second. We sang Happy Birthday to a young lady out celebrating with her friends, then decided to head off. The night was still young but I was outnumbered when I suggested music and dancing sounded like fun, so we said our goodbyes to Greg and headed off.

I will probably be grateful in the morning that I am tucked up at a reasonable hour.

Goodnight all

Love you 40-leven

Via Far North Queensland for a 50th

Day 3: Port Douglas Bound

Far North Queensland-croc country, well that’s what I always think of anyway. I actually think crocs are going to be just hiding, waiting to pounce from anywhere there’s water!!!! I’m sure it’s not like that at all but when the life guards were handing out “Swim between the flag” pamphlets on arrival, I was thinking “Only if they have flags in my pool coz I won’t be swimming anywhere else!”

Flying into Cairns reminded me somehow of arriving in Bali. As I made my way through the terminal trying to work out where I needed to be I even thought at one stage, “I might have to try to ask for directions?” then the penny dropped-I’m still in Australia!!! Probably a “How ya going mate, can ya help me out?” would suffice 🤣

<<<<<<
e what kind of message we’re sending to International tourists, but for their convenience they even show how to use the loo!

<<<<<<
ve to Port Douglas was lovely but after arriving at my accommodation I have to ask myself if I’m going to be up for this travel gig!!??? While waiting to check in I realise I have left my shoulder bag on the bus!! No biggie-just has my passport, license and bank cards in it!! 😩😩 oh God give me strength! (Or a brain!!)

All good-sorted!

When I was deciding where to stay in Port Douglas I looked for somewhere close to Steph’s so I could stumble home easily enough. What maps fail to show you, are the bloody big hills you need to climb up!!! At this rate I’m going to be buggered before I even leave Australia !!!

Gotta say, the climb was worth the effort! The view was to die for and the company awesome! Great choice Steph!!!

Port Douglas nightlife did not disappoint! We gave ourselves a taste of the nightlife and I even managed to meet some amazing people. One particular couple invited me to stay with them in London….bloody shame they will be still in Australia!! I will keep there contacts handy though….you never know!!! All danced out, slightly inebriated, doner kebab in hand I finally found my way back to the hotel and vaguely remember floating in the pool looking up to the millions of stars looking down at me, and smiling. Smiling because life is good! Two more sleeps and I will be leaving Aussie soils behind.

Cheers

Happy Birthday Steph xxx

Luv u 40-leven

Clock is Ticking………

As 2016 wound down I reassessed my goals. As I stated in s previous post-I had all but given up on my pipe dream of visiting Corsica.

Now, 9 months later, I’m about to give birth to that dream!!!! Only 3 more sleeps til I embark on the first leg of my journey to tick off a bucket list Dream!

Thanks to family and friends (and a surprise 50th birthday party) for kick starting my dream!!!!

Love you all, and invite you to follow me as I blog my way through my journey!!! SUPER excited and just a tad nervous xxxxx

Bridging Gaps

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Family Bridges……..

After recently moving away from my grandchildren, I have had to come to terms with the fact I can’t afford to visit them as often as I would like. Inevitably, this leaves a void ……….. 

This morning the true essence of family greeted me at my front door. My children creating the bridge that spanned the 1,300 kilometres between my grandchildren and I. If I couldn’t make it to see them, they decided, they would surprise me and make the 13+ hour trip in two cars, with 7 children, to see me!!!!!!! The importance of this selfless gesture will possibly never be understood by anyone who has not felt the emptiness of separation. I have missed my little babies immensely and this morning I felt like the richest person on Earth!!! Not only because of the chance to spend valuable time with my grandchildren, but the fulfilment of knowing you have raised amazing young people who go out of their way to reinforce the importance of love and family. My children’s love provided a bridge that covered not just the distance between us, but a bridge that spans across generations, cementing a message in the hearts of my grandchildren, “Family is the essence of life.”

I love you all 40-leven!!!!!!

Thank You!!!!!

The Moment I Felt Utterly Content

Somehow Charli….you’ve managed to do it again. I have been caught up with life and not written for a couple of weeks. I was sitting in my back yard yesterday pondering my life and the events which shaped it and made me who I am today. I specifically recalled a moment in my life where I literally sighed out loud and thought to myself, “If I died right here, right now, I died feeling completely content.”

Where my emotional and mental state is concerned, I don’t know that I’ve ever had that level of conviction again.

While thinking this I was flicking through emails catching up on ones I’d missed. The first one I opened was your Flash Fiction Prompt for June 1st. My apologies for entering this late post, but the topic was relevant and below is my submission……..

What is content? How do you know you’ve achieved it? For me…….

…………………………………………………………………………………

Bloom…a photo challenge

Mine is not so much a blooming story……just a deep appreciation of nature and all it’s glory, and an opportunity to share. This particular shot was taken in Kings Park, Western Australia, using an iPhone6.

Doubt….from the apron strings of a mother 💋

This is not only a late entry….but an unfinished one. I hope you’ll forgive me 🙏 I like to think of it as a work in progress….. I don’t know when I’ll finish it because it hasn’t occurred to me what it needs….

These doubts are on the minds of millions of Mothers…..unanswered queries xx

G’Day Casino

G’Day casino

G’Day Casino……Well for those who know me….my Mum and I have had those words spill over our tongue many a time! We have a love hate relationship with the casino….we love to go and we hate to leave!!!! For the purpose of this blog, however, those words leave a bitter taste in my mouth. Please let me start by being completely up front from the get go….this is not to point blame or ridicule….it is merely my recollection of an unfortunate incident…..a rant, if you will.

So…. the beginning…. Actually, for those who know me and are thinking, “oh f*#k, here we go again”, I will give a relatively short intro to myself (yes Leisa-I’m doing it!).

We all have our path through life. Some, lucky buggers, seem to have a paving truck just up ahead of them and travel a privileged journey. Others, like myself, fell off that track along the way and stumbled through some rough terrain hoping to come out the other end and find that paved road once again. It is the climb back up to that road that led me back to Hedland and to this story…….(grab yourself a cuppa-the short part of my story is over-the rest is bound to drag on!)

Due to limited funds, and , if truth be told, a desire to squeeze back into a size 12, I have cut back on drinking and excessive socialising. I, therefore, recently found myself relaxing out the back after doing some gardening and flicking through my phone…..don’t say it!!!!! I am well aware my phone seems to feel more like an extension of my hands lately. Anyway, while scrolling I remember having a little flutter on an online casino a couple of years ago. I deposited $50 and it lasted almost 12 months. I had loads of fun and was able to escape the day to day monotony and grind of my life. I could imagine I was sitting up at the casino alongside Mum and just ‘being’. Forgetting the harassing phone calls and the familiar sounds of my debt collector friends. Appreciating that I wasn’t out in the heat and the flies working ridiculous hours away from family….just for that moment anyway. Just ‘being’. So, when I remembered this the other day I found myself googling online casino sites. I knew before I started scrolling I was going to deposit $50-it was just a matter of which casino. I knew, also, that I couldn’t afford it. It was an extravagance I could ill afford but I had already justified it in my head. I read through the draw cards of a few before going back to the first site that had caught my eye….. G’day Casino. Finally my heading is making sense right? G’day Casino….sounded just like it was calling me, so I joined. They were offering a 100% deposit match welcome bonus!!! Deposit $50 & start playing with $100 right? Sounded too good to be true!!!!!!! On the 24th Feb I joined and started playing. Yep, sure enough they doubled my $50 deposit! I have since had reason to scan over my transaction history…..it spans over more than 750 pages!!!! It’s fair to say I had some fun along the way. Incredibly the balance dropped to below $2 on many occasions and I remember thinking ‘this is it’ quite often, only to have little wins keeping me alive. I lay in bed one night thinking, “I have less than $25….May as well flutter that into the abyss and get back to the real world for a bit. My balance was at $26.21 and my little iPhone started singing!!!!!! It went crazy!!!!! The numbers on my balance kept going up, up, up!!! Man, I was smiling so hard I almost burst!!! I couldn’t believe it!!! Luck like that just doesn’t ever seem to knock on my door and here it was bashing that bloody door down!!! When the figure finally stopped escalating, my new and much shinier balance read $1,306.21 !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I was thanking every God there ever was!!!!!! Now…….since I have previously admitted to having a slight addiction to a quiet flutter, I naturally carried on pressing those little ‘spin’ buttons!!! I was having a ball!!! Over the next few days I watched my balance see-saw up and down. I lay in bed thinking one night about how many people helped me out when I was at rock bottom. Through the years there have just been so many!!! Recently my two girls lent me money to make the move to Hedland to start fresh……as much fun as I was having, I knew the right thing to do was to withdraw the money and repay them. I felt as though the Universe had given me this gift to help me get back on my feet. I would be lying to you and kidding myself if I didn’t admit I kept a little in the account for a flutter and, if I’m honest, I knew once I had paid off my debt and was on my feet….a little ‘spending’ money at Gday Casino might actually become a part of my regular budget. I withdrew $1,000 and left myself $170 to play with. I rang my daughters and told them I would be paying them both back everything I owed them over the next week or so. I told them about my little windfall and they were ecstatic for me! My life really was taking a turn for the better! The universe was smiling down on me and giving me a helping hand. There was a lightness in my step and I felt like a weight had been lifted. My new hero was Gday Casino! Who would’ve thought??? So…………… knowing I had bumped my balance up to just over $200, last night I settled in for a quiet flutter before bed. The balance dipped and soared and I was once again engulfed in my little bubble of escapism. I stopped only to engage in small talk with Nathan, my son, and to make a cuppa. After settling back in with my cuppa I noticed my balance was at $50? I logged out and back in again…still $50? While pondering the possible reasons for this, an email alert popped up on my phone from Gday Casino. Ah ha…..clearly some technical hiccup they are telling me about…… I opened the email to find this………
I felt the wind being knocked out of my sails and I was dumbfounded. So many questions flooded through my head!!!! Is this a mistake? Why would they let me play so long and say nothing? How is it even possible to receive a bonus if you’re not entitled to it? Why give it to me? Is this a bad joke? Surely if I’m not entitled to the bonus you don’t give it to me? And at what point during the 750+ pages of transactions of money going to and fro did the money become theirs and not mine? At what point can you say that I stopped playing with the bonus money? Take the bonus back. My head was reeling!!!! I called my girls and said sorry….back to plan A…. I will slowly pay you back as I can. While texting backwards and forwards another email came through from Gday Casino…… maybe it was a mistake after all. Nope!!!!! After pulling the carpet from beneath my feet, these pricks send me an email offering me a fricking bonus!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I’m not sure who they employ at Gday Casino but their sense of humour is pretty f*#ked up!!!

Their IT department needs an overhaul-find someone who can program your site to REJECT bonuses which are not going to be honoured!!!!!! Their public relations department is non existent …..who the hell tells someone -sorry for the inconvenience of giving you false hopes by allowing you a bonus you aren’t entitled to, but oh, after we take that one off you we can fix you up with another!!!! WTF??? Eat a dick! Phew…..rant over!!!! For those of you I didn’t lose along the way, those stayers that read my whole tirade….thanks for allowing me to vent! Will I stop having a flutter? Has this taught me not to indulge in online slots? Nope…I loved it, but I can say this……Seeya Gday Casino. I will stick with Bingo Cabin. I have had so much more luck with them. At least if I have an honest win….I receive an honest payout! #gdaycasinoreview #bingocabinhereicome

Parlay ….

To you all……

read the fine print.

Luv you 40-leven

Deb X