Ok it is still Friday here so here are today’s five things

Cold

Wet

Hot bath

34 years

Still in love

I have written before about convicts and such but yesterday I was watching a show called Convict Women and Orphan Girls which has made me want to write a little about them again. Between 1787-1868 over 166,000 people were transported as convicts to this great country, 25,000 of them were female and over half of those were Irish.

Some convict women brought their children with them but I wonder if they knew what type of life these children would have here would they still have wanted them to come with them. Children under the age of 3yrs could stay with their mothers but once they reached the age of 3 they were sent to the Orphan Schools where they stayed till the age of 12-14 when they were apprenticed out.

These so called schools gave little education and treated the children so bad that they had a high mortality rate twice what was normal for the times.

Convict women were regarded as breeding stock and generally thought of as prostitutes many were not prostitutes before they arrived here and only turned to it as a way of surviving. These women were transported for such minor crimes such as stealing a potato or a pot lid, some women during the Irish Famine would set fires in order to be arrested and transported as a way of getting food and surviving.

There was also over 4,000 Irish orphan girls sent to Australia because the ratio was 9 or 10 men to every female and more females were needed, these orphan girls were free migrants and most married within 2 years of arriving and raised families.

Interesting 90% of the females transported here stayed and married and raised families in Australia compared to only 25% of males transported, I don’t know what the other 75% of the males did maybe they returned to England or Ireland I just don’t know the show didn’t say.

Our third port of call was the Kiriwina Island, it is one of the world’s most intact island cultures on one of the world’s most untouched islands according to the info sheet handed out with by Princess Cruises.

The island has a population of around 12,000 they speak Kilivila and other dialects as well as some English.

They often use the Kula Ring bartering system to boost social status and to gain trust with neighbouring island communities. Several priceless shell trinkets have been circulated between islands for hundreds of years.

There is no payphones on the island nor do they accept credit or cash cards they prefer to be paid in Kina the local currency although some will accept Australian dollars. The only means of transport for tourists on the island is by foot but it is only a small island and everything you would want to see you can reach by walking.

Access to the island was via tender so mum was unable to go ashore, but both Tim and dad did although it took a lot our of dad.

Hello Monday, had a busy start to the day, up at 4.30am as usual when I dropped Leo off at school I had to go into the office to drop off more medication than I had to go and do something for mum before coming home.

I also bought more pies, Leo loves pies and he asked if I would get him some pies today he likes chunky beef or cheese pies.

Anyway since it is Monday, it’s did you know Monday, so did you know………………………….

Blood is thicker than fresh water, but about the same thickness as sea water………………………

Hello everyone, how is everyone on this cold and wet Sunday morning?

I am well been up since 4.30am did 70 minutes of exercises before getting Tim up and having breakfast. Tim is at work today so for the most part I will be home alone and can tell you I will love it as I like being home alone.

Yesterday I spent most of the day in bed as I could not stay awake, I got up as usual at 4.30am but wasn’t able to stay awake so went back to bed for a couple of hours then I got up and got dressed and did my exercises than I went back to bed as I was so tired.

I got up again at midday but was only able to stay up for a couple of hours before going back to bed again for another couple of hours. Today I am ok I don’t know what the go was with yesterday, with me needing to sleep so much but that was then and this is now.

Friday afternoon when I went to get Leo from school I found him the carpark with his school bag crying, he gets in the car and said he had a headache and felt sick and just wanted to go home. So I took him to the office and told them where I found him and how he was crying and I was able to sign him out and take him home.

One of the teachers explained to him why wondering off without telling anyone was wrong and caused the teachers to worry about him.

After we got home I gave him pain relief medication, telling him that it would taste terrible but it would work and thankfully half an hour later the headache was gone and he started to feel better. So even though the medication tasted terrible he learnt that it worked and helped him feel better.

Hello all today I am just going to tell you a little about our second port of call Alotau in Papua New Guinea, we docked at Alotau which was a somewhat short distanced from the town if you were fit you could walk into town in about 30 minutes but we didn’t we got a cab into the town cost us $5 so that was ok.

Moving on, Alotau is the capital of the Milne Bay Province it has a population of around 78,000 it around 7,970 square kilometres in size, this is the are that the battle of Milne Bay took place during the second World War in 1942. An Aussie digger won the Victoria Cross during the battle can’t tell you which Aussie digger as don’t have free internet to go searching.

The locals in the area speak English as well as another 48 languages although there is around 350 different languages spoken in Papua New Guinea.

The currency used is the Kina but many stalls accepted the Australian dollars as well but of course it was cheaper to pay in their own currency.

Each year in November the national Kenu and Kundu (drum) Festival sees clans from all around the Milne Bay Province come together in Alotau to race for spoils and glory some travel up to a week to get there to share their culture with others.

Hello everyone, here we are on a cold Sunday morning, I did something this morning I rarely do, I went back to bed after I did my morning exercises and after I threw a load of washing on and slept for another two hours.

Yesterday I had Leo while his mum worked but only during the day not over night and Kathy and the girls came over, well Kathy had to bring my weekly grocery shop over I do click and collect where I do the shopping online and Kathy collects it and brings it to me.

So I get up not long ago and go to get the washing out of the machine and bloody hell the damn machine was out of balance and not finished,grrrrrrrrr………………….

So I unpacked the dishwasher and now I am sitting here and writing this……………………..

You know something I hate itchy underarms mine get very itchy, spoke to the doctor about it and he said it might be my deodorant, no happens even when I don’t use deodorant, so than he said it was my laundry detergent but I don’t think so as it happens even straight after my bath, so of course he then said it was the soap, I don’t use soap, ok the body wash but I use different types of body wash and not the same one every time, so than he said he had no idea……………………that makes two of us.

On Friday Jessica bought me a new pair of slippers for Mother’s Day, yeah a little late but that’s ok anyway one of the first things she asks yesterday was do I wear them, yes I wore them Friday night and Saturday morning. Now I don’t like to wear slippers much with just my bare feet as my feet sweat but with my problems so days getting my socks on I wanted something I could slip my bare feet into after my bath and first thing of a morning before I get dressed for the day. I wear shorts and a tee shirt to exercise in then I go and get dressed for the day afterwards.

Natasha and Blain both gave me photo frames which I like and Kathy gave me a new breadboard as the one I had was broken and I do like to use a breadboard each day, has to be a wooden one so the toasted sandwich doesn’t sweat and become soggy.

Oh yeah Jessica emptied Leo’s money boxes he has here and banked the money, he had $215 in his money boxes and yes took a few years to save that much but now it is in his bank account which has over 3 grand in it. I have money boxes here for all my grandchildren and Daemon and I add whatever coins I have spare to them on a regular basis.

On Friday mum had to go with Dawson while he opened up a cashcard account because he is now 18 and will be going to Centrelink on Monday to register and will at some point get a payment once he leaves school if not before. It is Centrelink who pays unemployment benefits and family payments and disability and such. If he doesn’t already have his own Medicare card he will have to register for that as well, here you get your own card usually between the ages of 16-18.

Tim and I are going over to my parents again today for lunch because last weekend my brother Dave was unable to make it and so we are doing it again so he can be there, last weekend I wanted to put it off till this weekend but Sandra didn’t want that and all I could think was if you had to find the money for the KFC it would be different sis………………that said we love her and had it anyway.

Ok started this yesterday morning, yes it is now Monday morning I had planned to finish this yesterday and post it but didn’t get around to doing it so here I am doing it now.

Being Monday that means it is did you know Monday, so I am asking this, did you know:

A mole can dig a tunnel 300 feet long in a single night

Good morning all it is Friday again, didn’t do a post yesterday I planed to answer some letters, I managed to answer none yeah a big ole 0 how that sucked for some reason I just didn’t get around to it, oh well no biggie……………….

So what do I have for this weeks five things, stuffed if I know, let me think………………………….

No ink

8 unanswered letters

Pissing off my daughters

Thinking they will get over it

Being told I am a gossip and not trustworthy, I only share things with my mum or eldest daughter, the person who said this shouldn’t have said what they did and upset so that I needed to vent and rant to someone, it’s done deal and move on.