Struggling...

 No posts lately. Not feeling happy.

Quite the opposite in fact. I cannot believe it's only a few months away from being a year that J left, and I'm still in a state of near (and actual) tears at random times.

I don't want him back. I know it would never work after this, but it feels like there's no joy in the world anymore. Chickie is my one shining light and I'm so glad he's here.

I'm just... struggling. Don't mind me.

A few quiet weeks...

 Not much happening lately. Chickie's had a wisdom tooth out. He's managing ok without much pain, thank goodness. Hopefully it stays that way and he recovers quickly. He's not the most adventurous eater, so finding soft foods that he'll eat is a challenge. 

The last few weeks, for me, has been what feels like a never-ending round of cleaning out stuff. There's just so much stuff!

I've cleaned out my wardrobe drawers, I've cleaned out my hanging space. I now have a huge bag of clothes to donate. Some of these things I've had for so long. I was looking at some old photos and found some with these clothes I'm getting rid of - some of them 15 years old! Uh yeah, probably about time to go.

I've cleaned out the cupboards under the bathroom sink, and I've cleaned out the cupboard under the kitchen sink. Again so. much. stuff! Oh and in the process, I spilled Brasso on myself (lid wasn't secured, I discovered). So... don't do that to yourself. It absolutely stinks. Plus it's near impossible to get the smell out of your clothes. I washed my clothes so many times and it just didn't help. Ended up having to toss that dress. At least it was on it's way out anyway (so old it was a bit thin in places).

I have no idea why we even had Brasso in the first place. I'm pretty certain we didn't have any brass to actually polish.

On the more fun side of things, Chickie and I went and saw a movie. In the cinema even! Feels like such a rare treat these days. We saw Penguin Bloom and I thought it was really good. If you go see it though, take a tissue or two. 

There were only two other people in the room when we saw it. I don't know how they're making money these days. I'll have to go again and see something else soon, I think. I did see that Raya and the Last Dragon is out now - that looks pretty good too.

The other thing that's been making me happy this week, is a song written by a YouTuber from the Netherlands, who goes by the name 'Music by Blanks'. He has a series where he writes songs with the help of his Instagram followers. It's kinda fun and he obviously has plenty of talent. This one was a roadtrip song and it's so catchy and makes you want to sing along with him. So have a listen!

Not much of a cuddler

 So, the title is basically it.

I'm not much of a cuddler at night. When I go to bed, it takes me a while to get to a comfy spot. I can't really lie in one position for very long - I'm quite restless. Plus I get hot quite quickly. So when with another person, I can't handle the spooning thing for very long. It almost starts to hurt, because my hips will ache, or my knees will - or my shoulder is in an awkward position and it starts to hurt. These things happen even now when I have the whole bed to myself, so I'm tossing and turning all night. In between the tossing and turning, I'm also throwing off the bed covers because I'm too hot, and then grabbing them back because I get cool again. 

I used to love sleeping, now I almost dread it.

That said, J left his pillow behind when he moved out, and for the last nearly 9 months, I've been cuddling it to sleep. I've been holding on to it pretty tightly. Feeling like that statue in the picture here. Empty.

The pillow helped a little. But I've decided this year I need to be happy again, so I had to stop. I can't keep cuddling his pillow at night - it's a bit pathetic really.

So I feel a bit ridiculous but I bought myself a teddy bear to sleep with. Well not really a teddy but a red panda (hey it was cute!). So I'm trying. It's not working yet, but it's only been a week so far. I WILL get there... one day.

A weekend of sort outs and rabbit holes

 This weekend has been an odd one. I've been steadfastly ignoring the fact that it's valentines day today (well it still is where I am - blogger seems to think it's Monday the 15th already). So instead I cleaned out my closet (at least some of it anyway). I spent almost an hour and a half just trying clothes on. I never realised I'd collected so many work outfits and working from home for almost a year means I really needed to cull a heap!

I still have more to go. My hanging space is jammed to the brim with more work outfits - some even from my previous job! It's been too long since I've had a good sort through. Many many years ago, I used to be a radio announcer (country stations only - never hit the 'big time') and one of the characteristics of that job is that you tend to move around a fair bit. Moving often usually means you tend not to collect too much stuff. I've been in this house for over 20 years now... there is just. so. much. stuff!

Eventually, I'm going to have to get my own place and move. I'm looking forward to it, but at the same time, I'm dreading it, to be honest. I want my own place but the whole idea is scary and the thought of moving all my stuff just makes my heart sink. Honestly sometimes I feel like I'm living in a constant state of being terrified of absolutely everything. Seriously, it's been almost 9 months since J left. When do I get to feel like a normal person again?

So anyway, to make myself feel a bit lighter, tonight I've fallen down the rabbit hole of classical music 'flash mobs'. My fave classical piece is Beethoven's 9th and that has led me down all sorts of classical paths. Not to mention giving me a large amount of musical talent envy. I've often wished I had the talent to learn the cello or was able to sing.

Memory is a funny thing

 Today I went to a crochet group afternoon. This is something my ex mother in law has been encouraging me to come to. I'm learning to crochet again (I used to know how and even made myself a gigantic blanket at one point, but then forgot how). My current project is a colour block scarf. It's going well and apparently my tension is good. I need to learn how to keep the same size though - I have a tendency to shrink the width. Oh well, more practice needed obviously.

Anyway, we all meet up once a month and bring something to snack on. Today one of the group brought in cape gooseberries to share. This triggered so many memories!

When I was little, my family lived in Queensland. My grandmother also lived nearby. She had a house that had a fairly large garden and used to grow these fruit, but called them chinese gooseberries. 

I can't have been too old, as we moved to New South Wales when I was around 6 or 7 and I don't recall being in school when remembering my grandmother's garden. I think my memories of this fruit might be some of the earliest I remember. That and a dog my mum and dad had - called Mincey. Only that wasn't her name... apparently her name was Mitzi and I only found out I had it wrong, when I was in my teens!

I remember so strongly that my grandmother called them chinese gooseberries and over the years I've tried to find them again. Googling revealed that the chinese gooseberry was actually rebranded as the kiwi, but I knew that wasn't what I was thinking of, so eventually forgot about them. Then when the fruit was brought in today, oh did the memories come flooding back.

Now I'm sitting here, thinking about what I remember from back then. It's really only flashes here and there. I remember my grandparents had a very very long driveway to get to the house. I remember the *cape gooseberry* bushes. I remember we once had a cyclone nearish and it knocked over the wooden telegraph pole. It came quite close to the house, as I recall. I do remember being so scared of the wind. 

Bits I remember of our house nearby was mainly that it was in a relatively newish area - I remember there were vacant areas around the house. I remember a shed down the back of the garden and I remember the dog Mincey (she's always going to be Mincey to me). I think Mincey was a black and white version of Lassie perhaps. My memory is a bit fuzzy there. Border collie perhaps? I don't remember going to school in Queensland specifically but I do remember my outrage when we moved to NSW. Because the school systems were different I was put back into 1st class in NSW and I was incredibly upset by this, because I'd already done 1st class in QLD!

I wish I remembered more about the time I lived in Queensland. It was so long ago now though.

There's nothing like true friends

 So my birthday was last weekend. And the best present was 3 very special people who made me feel loved.

They surprised me with a girl's weekend away at a lovely B&B. I knew something was planned with 2 of them (S and C). I was asked to arrive at one friend's place and was told I could leave my car there and we'd go in the other friend's car. I figured we'd probably be staying at her place for the weekend and hang out. Turned out we ended up at another friend's house (K) to pick her up. That was a big suprise as I thought she was working and wasn't available! That was great as K often works weekends so catching up with her can be tricky.

Then we headed off to the B&B. I had no clue where we were going though. We arrived at this gorgeous house in a small town nearby. The place was amazing! So much space and so lovely. We brought some food, but honestly the place was so well stocked, we probably didn't even need to! It had just about everything.

First night we hung out and snacked while playing boardgames. It was just so lovely to hang out and chat. Then the second day we visited a nearby lavender farm, a chocolate factory and then in the afternoon we did a bit of op-shopping and then pampering (sheet masks, hand and feet 'masks'). Then dinner that night was at place nearby that did a set tasting type menu. The food was so good. Perfect serving size too - I left pleasantly full. So well done too - I discovered I do actually like gnocchi after all. Normally I find it too bland and stodgy but this restaurant did it so perfectly!

Then it was back to the B&B for more games and talking.

Sunday was a leisurely breakfast of bacon, eggs and toast and then we went and saw Wonder Woman 84.

It was just a relaxing weekend full of love and laughter. I'm so lucky to have friends who care.

These are a couple of shots I was playing around with, at the lavender farm. Something about the sun shining through the trees really appealed to me.

Thoughts on birthdays

 So in the interests of getting my thoughts and feelings out, I've been thinking of the past with J.

He'd told me a long time back that he wasn't happy. We went to counselling and I thought things were better. I probably should have realised that they weren't really. Especially when it came to my 50th birthday. 

I'm realising recently that I haven't gotten past this still. It just keeps coming up to the front of my mind. So maybe I can get over the hurt by typing it out. 

Essentially, my 50th was coming up and I wanted to go away for the weekend - just the two of us. Nowhere too far away, my birthday isn't too long after Christmas and New Years, so it's not really financially sensible to have a big blowout holiday then. Chickie was also at an age where he would be ok by himself for a night or two (in-laws are only a few minutes away so they could feed him and check in on him if he wanted to try staying overnight by himself - or he could sleep over with them as well.), but a longer holiday would be a lot more organisation.

I thought a milestone birthday would be a nice reason to have a weekend away, reconnect with just us and celebrate my birthday. It happened to also fall on a weekend where a friend group held an activity that occurred on the Sunday, once every 3 or 4 months. Because of this J said he didn't want to miss the activity, so he didn't want to go away. I ended up going away alone, with my birthday on the Sunday I would come back home on.

It was nice. The hotel apartment was lovely. The beach, it was near, was gorgeous. The general area it was in, had some beautiful little townships with some stunning sunsets out over the sea. I explored the area and took some pretty photos. I got takeaway food and played around with my watercolour pencils. It was relaxing, but it was lonely. I came back and J took us all out to dinner. To a restaurant I do like, but it's one we get takeaway from quite regularly, so not exactly special.

Looking back on it, it was nice and relaxing, but it was disappointing. I was hurt that he didn't want to miss out on an activity that happened fairly regularly, to spend time with me on a big birthday. I see it more clearly now, but at the time I thought we were doing better. I thought we could spend some time together - with just us. I guess he was just 'checked out' the whole time really.

I mentioned some of this to a friend and now she and another friend are planning something for my upcoming birthday. I don't know what exactly. I've been told to be at her place Friday night and to pack for a couple of nights away, and include a dressier outfit in my packing. I'm excited!

Nobody blogs anymore right?

Pretty sure no one does this anymore, so this can just be an online journal to get my inner turmoil out instead!

So it's been years. Lots has happened, but the tldr is that I'm now 54, J left me, Chickie is 18 and has officially finished school and my two kittys have passed on.

2020, aside from the whole pandemic thing, has been a totally sucky year. J and I had been having issues for a while but I thought things were better. Then early 2020, I could see something was up and I was unhappy about it. Chickie's 18th birthday happened mid-year and J moved out the first weekend afterwards. That's when I went from unhappy to full on miserable. I had a feeling, deep down, that that's what would happen, but it's not something I ever wanted. 

I've been thoroughly miserable for months now, but I need to stop it. I need to get on with things and not just hide away and hope it all gets magically better. I have to do and face things myself. I have to be a happier person. Otherwise, I'll end up a sad old lonely, crazy cat lady, I'm sure...

This is why I figured I'd post again. This is going to be my way of getting those feelings out and perhaps even keeping myself accountable to be positive where I can.

Bring on 2021 and a happier Caramaena.

Relax?

I've just come back from a massage. Nothing special, just a neck, shoulders and back massage at the Chinese massage place in the local shopping centre. I've tried a few different ones in various shopping centres, but I like this one because the masseuses (is that how you pluralise it?) suit me - they seem to get the pressure just right, for my liking.

Anyway... I may have fallen asleep during the massage.

Actually, I'm pretty sure I did, because I think I also started snoring! 

I'm laying there one moment, feeling pretty relaxed, then the next I'm wide awake with a kind of startled feeling. I also had a vague memory of snoring, though I'm not completely sure of it.

So, what do you think? Should I feel horribly embarrassed because I snored? Or should the masseuse take it as a compliment that I was so relaxed that I fell asleep?

A peek at moi?

One of the things that brings people to my blog, seems to be a picture of David Tennant from the Roflrazzi site. This is the post I mean.

Well there's a new site for Doctor Who fans (that would be me!) - For the Whovians - and I'm loving it! I found this one a moment ago:

I can't link directly to the page unfortunately. Check out the site though, some quite funny captions there.

Another site I've found recently is Kondoot.com - a site that lets you broadcast your videos. It seems to be a little like Facebook and You Tube mixed in. Anyways... if you'd like to see what I look like, go here! The video is not great quality unfortunately - my webcam is just an el cheapo.

oops

Have I seriously not updated this blog since July? Naughty me...

I've been setting up Bloglines again, to make it easier to catch up with my favourites. I had it set up years ago but it's quite different now. Does anyone use another setup to keep up with their blogs?

I'll update soon - have been busy with a trip to Queensland and then home again to get sick for two weeks (still not completely well). Plus it appears I generously shared my illness with Chickie and J. Oh the angst of trying to explain to a 9 year old, that having some Ventolin might help him a little.

I will update soon... I promise!

The things you see...

I went grocery shopping today.

I'm still annoyed about actually doing the shopping to be honest. You see, I discovered the joys of online shopping back in February this year. It was great to be able to log on, click a bunch of things and have them delivered to my door a day or so later. I didn't get everything online - I preferred picking out my fruit and veg personally, and some things were never on special online (Coke Zero for example). All in all though, I was very satisfied.

Then they changed the available delivery time slots. The supermarket, I was going through, had a range of delivery slots costing between $13 and $5. I'm no longer working so I'm enthusiastically embracing the inner cheapskate (whilst trying to placate my inner lazy sod), therefore I always chose the $5 slot. Suited me beautifully - until the supermarket removed that time slot. They still had a couple of $5 slots but both clashed with school pickup or dropoffs. Colour me very disappointed.

I looked into a competitor but they didn't have any cheapie delivery slots either. They did have an option to choose your groceries online and then you pick it up. My inner cheapskate cheered! Unfortunately, it turned out the closest place that did this was really too far to make it worthwhile (at about this point my inner lazy sod cheered - well all right, she would have if she had the energy for it).

What it left me with though, was a return to the weekly trudge to the supermarket. And what I saw today...

Wild Krill Oil.

Wild Krill Oil.

It got me to thinking - is there such a thing as Tame Krill Oil and if so, how the heck do you tame krill?

Not the most hated mother on the planet!

I've managed to escape being 'hated' by Chickie this week. You see, a month or so back, he'd brought home two notes from school. One for swimming and one for dancesport. I merrily signed both and sent in the required cash and thought all was good. Oh boy was I wrong!

A couple of weeks ago, I picked him up from school and he had an absolutely thunderous face. He took one look at me and said "I hate you* - you made me go to dance. I had to dance with GIRLS!". Turns out, the dancesport note wasn't compulsory - just an 'if you're interested' type of thing. Silly me didn't realise that, and had condemned my long suffering 9 year old boy to dancing with a girl. For four weeks...

Last week was the same - he hated me again and not only did he have to dance with all the girls, but he had to hold their hands (oh, the horror!).

This week I was pleasantly suprised to find he liked dancesport. Turned out that, this week, they were taught how to moonwalk. Not only did he enjoy himself but he and a friend discussed how cool they were for being able to get the idea of how to do it, when their teacher told them it took her several months to perfect it herself. All the while I was trying very very hard to keep a straight face.

I heaved a huge sigh of relief though. It was nice not to be the most hated mother this week.

* I know some people have an issue with their kids telling them they hate them. I don't personally, as I feel it's just a way of Chickie dealing with his emotions. I see it as a learning curve and sometime will tell him that it's a way of knowing I'm doing my job as a mother and not giving in to everything he wants. Other times I'll tell him that I might dislike his behaviour but never him. He normally calms down soon after then comes and apologises for saying it anyway.

Chickie is 9!

Hard to believe my little baby is growing up. It's his 9th birthday today!

Bit of a coincidence but he woke up earlier this morning - at 12.45am exactly, which just so happens to be the moment he was actually born. He was quite tickled by the fact that he woke up at the exact moment. I thought it was funny that he woke up then as well.

I wasn't quite as happy that he then woke up at about 4am - ready to start the day. J and I sent him back to bed, only to be woken up again at 6.15am! We gave up and gave him his pressie. At least he had plenty of time to play with his new stuff before school. I suppose I can't be too surprised at his eagerness.

Discworld convention was awesome!

Well, I had a fantastic time at the convention. There were lots of cool events ranging from Viking armour displays (yes I did get to wear a chain mail shirt, Viking helmet and brandish a sword) to more Discworld flavoured stuff like a mock trial of Lord Vetinari (for being a tyrant), plays based on Discworld characters, costume parades, games of Thud (Chickie loved this game) and much much more. I also got a book signed by Sir Terry himself (yes that's me in the photo), and after the closing ceremony I was able to get a photo of Chickie and me with Sir Terry, we also had a very quick chat.

We stayed in the hotel that is sort of attached to the convention centre, which happened to be where Terry, and his assistant Rob, also stayed. We saw him around quite a lot - breakfasting at the table next to him etc. Some friends and I had a quick chat with his assistant Rob one evening as well. They both seem like such lovely people. You can see that Terry's Alzheimers is affecting him - during his speech at the closing ceremony he seemed to lose track of what he was saying and mentioned that he has problems with short term memory loss. Quite sad to see this in one of my favourite authors.

There were quite a lot of people there but thankfully there were some cafe's and restaurants downstairs so getting some chillout time wasn't too hard.

After the convention we also went to Jenolan Caves. Talk about stunning! I have a thing for caves and the various formations, and the two caves we visited did not disappoint one bit! We saw the Lucas cave and the Temple of Baal cave. This pic is from the Lucas cave. This photo - and the others we took, have made us realise that we really need a better camera. This is a pretty basic camera and it's getting on in years too. I'm thinking a basic DSLR might be nice, but really have no idea where to start! So, a question - if you have a DSLR, what do you have and what do you like/dislike about it?

excited but also freaking out a bit

This weekend J, Chickie and I are heading to Sydney for the Terry Pratchett convention Nullus Anxietas 3 and I am so excited!

Terry Pratchett is one of my all time favourite authors. I just love the Discworld series. The list of events sounds like so much fun and having the actual Terry Pratchett there as well.. icing on the cake!

On the other hand, I'm also dreading it a bit. One of the reasons I left work, was that my supervisor moved me to a different desk and I discovered that I have a bit of a phobia of being surrounded, or being in a crowd. I found I can manage for a while but the thought of being in that mindset 8 hours a day, 5 days a week was just a teensy bit overwhelming.

For years I sat at a desk on the outside edge of the room - windows behind me and most of the time no one in the desk next to me (with barriers between the other desks around me). I also found that I have hearing loss in the upper and lower registers that made it difficult to hear when there is a lot of noise around me (and in my old position the barriers, and having windows behind me meant I didn't notice it so much). I asked to be moved back, that request was declined, so that (and several other reasons) gave me the impetus to leave after eleven years.

I always had a problem with Christmas crowds and tended to do it in dribs and drabs (and then having to courier presents to my family because I took too long to send via Aus Post!). Not sure why I never did more online shopping (I think I will this year). Anyway, last weekend we went into the city centre to check out Angus and Robertson and Borders (to see if they had any good closure sales) and it only took a couple of hours until I started feeling a bit antsy. That was a couple of hours in a crowd, the convention is three days with heaven knows how many people (I'm thinking a lot!).

Anyone deal with similar issues? Any tips on how to deal with feeling freaked out?

Almost forgotten how this stuff works!

It's been so long that navigating around Blogger's settings requires a bit of thinking, but I do believe I'm getting there.

I've gone through my links and deleted those that are gone or blogs that have been made private. There are a lot of bloggers that have just stopped (like I did), but since they're still up, I'll leave them in my list for now.

If you'd like to be linked, feel free to let me know. If you know a blog that I absolutely *have* to read, then also let me know!

I'm hoping to update a bit more regularly (well more than once or twice, every 18 months), and since I'm now a stay at home mum I should have time. Having a computer to do it on, is another thing... mine died last night! It was probably the shock of me blogging again, to be honest. Anyway, long story short - because it is a long story, trust me! - a Dell tech is coming out sometime next week to try to resurrect it. In the meantime I've commandeered Chickie's computer. His keyboard has a slight configuration difference though and, well put it this way - the backspace key is getting a good old workout (as is the key directly to the left of it, since I keep hitting that one by accident too!).

Caramaena who??

Hi there! I have no idea if anyone ever visits any more but I thought I'd post anyway.

I don't know if you noticed, but I pretty much stopped blogging. No real reason why. Things got busy and you say to yourself "oh I'll post something tomorrow" and the next thing you know, it's a year and a half later.

A fair bit has happened since I last blogged, but I won't put everything here in detail since I'm sure I'll need topics later!

Short story, Chickie has had braces, but now has a plate/retainer instead and I've quit my job to be a stay at home mum. J's still at the same job, we have new nieces and nephews, his sister got married and his brother may be posted to *very dangerous place* overseas (he's in the armed forces) and my family's all (mostly) well.

So, if anyone's still reading my blog, feel free to catch me up with your life in the comments. I haven't had the chance yet to go through my links etc.

Smile restored

Chickie's chipped tooth has been repaired but the dentist has decided to send him off to the orthodontist early. Since he's chipped that same tooth twice now (and being a kid there's a high chance he'll fall over again at some stage in his life...), the dentist thinks it might be beneficial to start evening out his teeth a bit sooner than they usually do.

Particularly since Chickie has expressed a desire to learn to play basketball. On hearing this, the dentist (unsurprisingly) suggested a mouthguard.

Chickie looks like he's probably going to have the height for basketball. I've stood him next to some 9 year olds and he's about the same height. So, now I'm looking around for a place/team for him to learn. He's completely lost interest in karate though J and I still go. J will probably go for his orange belt in the next few weeks. Due to my knee problems, the physio suggests I wait until October to try for my orange belt. I will have to admit I'm a bit frustrated by this knee. I want to get in there and really push myself. I want to do more than one session a week. Not to mention I need to lose some of this weight I've put back on (*sigh*). Ahh patience... perhaps one day I'll be familiar with the concept.

Oh and I'm glad I'm not the only one who doesn't bother to unpack the suitcase whilst on holidays. For a while there I was thinking I must be the laziest person ever.

Home again

Ahh it was a lovely holiday. New Zealand is such a lovely place.


We flew into Christchurch and stayed the night. Then drove to Aoraki Mt Cook and had a night there. Explored the Sir Edmund Hillary Museum and Planetarium, after waking up to a spectacular view of the mountains (this is the view from our balcony).

The next day we drove to Queenstown and spent 5 days there. We did so many touristy things - visited a Kiwi park, went on jet boat rides, horse riding, explored an old gold mining town, took scenic helicopter flights to see glaciers (and landed on top of a mountain!), and of course, we visited the snow fields a couple of times. My knee has been playing up again so the physio recommended I skip the skiing unfortunately but it was fun playing in the snow anyway.

Plus I got to watch Chickie learn to snowboard (that's him in the picture, during his lesson). He's technically a bit young still, we were told. The instructors said kids' muscles don't really develop enough until they're at least 8 years old, but since he's tall for his age and it was fairly quiet they let him take a day long lesson. He did struggle a bit with his balance but we got some shots of him snowboarding on his own (even if it was just for a few seconds heheh). He really enjoyed it though.

After Queenstown we drove on to Dunedin. There we explored Lanarch Castle - apparently the only castle in New Zealand. It was a lovely place with amazing views over the harbour.

From Dunedin we drove back to Christchurch and spent the night and half the last day there looking around. J's mum particularly wanted to see the Cathedral there.

Last but not least was a looooong flight home again. It always seems like such a long trip when you're heading home - whether it actually is or not!! We thought it might end up much much longer when our last flight home was delayed because of the awful weather. So we sat down in the airport for a bite to eat thinking we'd be sitting about for ages but just as we finished eating the announcement came to say they'd been given permission to fly faster to make up the time. I guess it never occurred to me that there'd be speed limits for flights but I suppose there'd have to be.

In the end the landing here at home was a bit hairy. Stormy outside and a lot of turbulence. I will admit to grabbing the armrest a few times - all the while trying to look cheerful for Chickie's sake (he was looking a little nervous).

Travelling with the inlaws can be interesting. I think we get on great but there were a few things that struck me as so different to what I'm used to. One of them is that J's dad is very very organised. On occasion I found myself perplexed at the level of organisation. It made things run very smoothly but it's more regimented than I'm used to.

The other thing I found odd is that J's mum unpacked Chickie's suitcase and put all his clothes into the drawers in his room (we were staying at these apartments for 5 days or so). I probably found this odd because I've never actually done that myself - I can't think of anytime I've ever used the drawers at a holiday destination. I don't think my family's ever done that in the past either. At most I've hung up my jacket but, more often than not, I just live out of a suitcase. It made me wonder how many people do this (I'm wondering if I've been massively lazy all these years lol!) - so a question... when on holidays for more than a day or so, do you unpack your suitcase?