Weekendcoffeeshare Archives

Coffee Catch-Up #12

July 24, 2016 inspiringmax

If we were having coffee I would tell you that I enjoyed my job interview last Monday and am very excited to start work at my new hospital in early August. The unit has a calm feel to it and I am pleased to be back working in my home town, although I have been happy living a free lifestyle for the last 2 months.

If we were having coffee I would tell you how surprised and in some ways saddened I was, to hear on Friday nights news that they were closing the wooden escalators in both Wynyard and Town Hall Stations over the next 12 months. Apparently there are only 7 wooden escalators left in the world — 4 at Wynyard, 2 at Town Hall and the other in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Of the 4 at Wynyard Station, 3 were opened in 1932, the same year as the Sydney Opera House and the 4th in 1952. The Wynyard wooden escalators were the first in Australia and over 80 years later are still working hard carrying over 150,000 commuters daily.

Growing up I remember that I loved to ride on the wooden escalators in David Jones stores as they had a warm and inviting look to them which made me feel like a part of history. Unfortunately, these escalators were taken out over a decade ago and since then using the escalators is just a means to an end. My mission now will be to make sure that I get to Wynyard Station before they close the wooden escalators for one last ride and reflection.

If we were having coffee I would tell you about the walk my father and I went on, from his house along Throsby Creek to Newcastle Harbour and back again. With stopping off along the way to explore, our walk took us 2 hours and as you can see it was a magical winters day. I couldn’t believe the growth that has occurred in this part of Newcastle including the formal walking trail includes many beautiful sculptures like the large lounge shown below.

If we were having coffee I would tell you I can’t believe how quickly this year is going. Tomorrow is the 25th July which means that it is exactly 5 months till Christmas Day. Wow! Then I think about how much I hope to get done between now and Christmas and that is when I get truly exhausted. Start a new job, pack up one house, do repairs to our Newcastle house before moving in, move in, finish book, catch-up with old friends, shop for Christmas and plan a trip to Japan to visit our son. Think positively is my motto so I am sure it will sort itself out for the best. After all, its amazing what one can achieve when motivated to do so.

If we were having coffee I would ask you what is happening in your world?

Coffee Catch-Up #11

July 10, 2016 inspiringmax

If we were having coffee I would tell you how excited I am this week to finally have enough energy back that I plan on returning to aqua aerobics this week. Although it hasn’t been all bad as it was very easy to justify not going out in the cold and wet when I wasn’t feeling up to par.

If we were having coffee I would tell you what an inspiring week I have had being a full-time writer. Prior to this I have written and edited most of my book in whatever spare time I have had. This week by being able to just spend all my time on my book, I have noticed my focus change. Now I think I am much more creative. Every day I come up with new ideas as to how to improve its flow. So, this week when I had to stop to complete other important tasks I didn’t want to. After having the weekend off to work on my blog and family life I am excited to see how much closer to completion this week takes me.

If we were having coffee I would tell you about our cats first experience with a kookaburra this morning. He regularly walks up and down our side fence keeping guard making sure we are safe from predators. Today however in the gum tree just off our boundary a kookaburra came and sat. Yes, the kookaburra was sitting in the old gum tree as the Australian classic song suggests, minding his own business. Out cat however wasn’t happy. He stood under the tree on the fence and looked like he was going to attempt to get him, although the reality was the distance was too great. We decided however in the interest of encouraging our new friend to visit for longer, we would distract the cat.

If we were having coffee I would tell you how much I enjoy books. I always have and I always will. So much so that when we move I plan on making myself a library room where I can enjoy all of my books together in one place unlike scattered throughout the house like they are now. Yesterday, as part of this challenge I began sorting the first of many bookcases. As I put the books into boxes to move I have decided to divide them into 4 sections:

Children
Fiction
Non-fiction
Reference

Going through my books I enjoyed many memories as I remember the circumstances of each book either as a purchase or as a gift. Something tells me I am not going to be very good at throwing many of them out as I’m too much of a sentimentalist.

If we were having coffee I would tell you how much I am loving the readability score in WordPress. I challenge myself to make sure all of my posts stay in the green or good rating. Should they slip into an orange or red ranking I rewrite the sentence until the readability improves. This is definitely helping my writing style and minimizing my need to edit later.

If we were having coffee I would ask you what was happening in your world?

Coffee Catch-up # 8

May 8, 2016 inspiringmax

If we were having coffee I would tell you it seems like forever since our last coffee catch-up, although the reality is that it has only been 3 weeks. During this time, most of my time has been taken up completing the Blogging from A – Z challenge. It was fun, although some days the pressure to come up with inspiring posts took over my world. But in the end I was happy with all of them even X, which for me was the difficult one. I certainly enjoyed putting the “I survived blogging A – Z banner” on my blog as I feel like I earned it. Next year, I think I will do a lot of pre-planning in the hope that makes this challenge easier.

If we were having coffee I would ask you where you thought all the smoke haze around Sydney today was coming from. My hope would be that unlike me, you may have listened to the news and have known that it was coming from more than 40 hazard reduction back burns happening all around Sydney especially in the Blue Mountain areas. The smoke was so bad it was playing havoc with the fire alarms in many businesses including the Sydney Olympic Park Aquatic Centre, where for more than 30 minutes of our aqua aerobics class this morning, the instructor had to yell or mime the instructions. Oh and ironically the alarm stopped at the same time as our aqua class. Who knew!

If we were having coffee I would tell you that this week has been a shocker. If something could go wrong it did. For me, the most frustrating thing was that instead of enjoying myself on Wednesday night, I got to sit and wait for NRMA roadside assist after I quickly discovered that in a moment of mindless thinking from my stressful week, I locked my car keys in the boot. I think it has been over 20 years since I last did this. I also had nothing with me to do, not even a small bit of paper to write a blog post on but fortunately for me it only took them 45 minutes to come instead of the 90 minutes they promised service in. Thank you NRMA.

If we were having coffee I would tell you that I enjoyed District 90 First Annual Toastmaster Conference last weekend. It was held at Rooty Hill RSL — the largest RSL club in Australia. I had never been before and the venue, the food as well as the conference’s educational sessions were fantastic. I am sure the other parts of the conference were also excellent, however due to time constraints I was limited in what I went to.

If we were having coffee I would tell you about my work’s cultural lunch this week. This is a regular event where you take a dish from your culture for everyone to share. For me this has always been difficult because being a hospital we are a very multicultural workplace, however I could never really come up with a dish from my life to share that was interesting and easy to share. This time I got it right. My trifle was a great hit and will now be my signature dish. I hadn’t made a trifle in years and I only remembered about them at Easter when I took desert to a family friends house. It was weird not making it with sherry but the sacrifice still tasted yummy.

If we were having coffee I would ask you what you have been up to this last week, let me know in the comments.

Coffee Catch-up #7

Coffee Catch-up #5

April 2, 2016 inspiringmax

If we were having coffee I would apologise for missing our coffee catch-up last month. Then we would make a plan to get together more regularly as we miss each others company. We would also use this time to remind ourselves that somethings need prioritizing. To help me with this task, this morning I discovered the #weekendcoffeeshare community and plan on joining in the fun.

If we were having coffee I would tell you about a minor work accident which resulted in my wedding and engagement rings needing to be cut off my finger in the emergency department on the 27th anniversary of meeting my husband. I was absent mindedly closing the sliding door behind to make sure confidentiality was maintained as I left the room, when it shut so fast that my left hand smashed against the metal plate totally squashing my rings into my hand. Fortunately, the diamonds don’t seem to be damaged.

If we were having coffee I would tell you that after a meeting with my collaborator we have decided to change the name of my book on eating disorder recovery from Inspiring Hope to “I’m so over this…” —practical ways eating disorder recovery is possible, which we are quite excited about. Feedback from patients has been great, as they all agree this is a statement that personally resonates with them.

If we were having coffee I would tell you I achieved my Advanced Communicator Bronze as well as my Competent Leadership Awards over the last two months. I am embarrassed to say that my CL actually took 5 years to complete due to my slackness.

If we were having coffee I would tell you that I thoroughly enjoyed Easter Sunday last week. We had a small immediate family gathering and two Easter egg hunts — one for the adult kids and one for the parents. It was great fun with lots of laughs. After a BBQ lunch, we played Wii games which nicely finished with each team—ours, my son’s team and my daughters team winning a game. It couldn’t have been fairer if we’d tried.

If we were having coffee I would ask you what you have doing in the last few months. Let me know in the comments? If you are interested in previously coffee catch-ups see the link below.