My weekend was a bit “Twilight Zone-y” this week. Nothing much out of the ordinary, per se’, but the “ordinary” things I did weren’t with the same people I’d normally do them with…..if that makes sense at all?

I started off by going to my parents house on Saturday. My mum is visiting with friends at Rosebud, a seaside resort town about 60 or 70 miles away from the city. Dad drove her down there on Thursday and I think she comes back on Wednesday? He’s got to fend for himself over the next few days but I think mum has him sorted out on the meal situation? All he has to do is decide which pre-prepared meal he wants on which day. Not that dad can’t cook…..he just hasn’t had the need to much in 40 years or so!

Anyhow, I took over a chicken because I said to dad that I’d cook dinner on Saturday night due to the fact that……well, I had a spare chicken! The funny thing is that I had to remember how to cook it in a REAL gas oven again – since I’ve microwaved all of my roasts in the past 6 or 7 years. It sounds horrible – the idea of microwaving a roast – but it’s not at all. I’ve become quite the expert at it and finish off by crisping it up in the broiler (for Aussies, the griller)

As far as roasting goes it’s all pretty straight forward and the meal was cooked without incident. I said to dad that I wasn’t gonna bother with making gravy because……well to tell you the truth, mum’s kitchen kinda annoys me. To me there seems to be no rhyme or reason to the way she organizes things over there but I suppose it’s all very straightforward to her? I just didn’t want to be bothered hunting around in the cupboards for ingredients that probably even weren’t gonna be there or were so out of date you didn’t wanna use them. Not that the lack of gravy bothered dad at all. To accompany the chicken we just had roast potatoes, peas and corn.

We watched the Aussie rules football game on TV but we were talking over it for the most part. The game wasn’t that bad, it’s just that the conversation was more interesting. We kept talking past the game and during the late news. After the news, Baseketball (the movie) came on. Dad got kinda excited when he found out it was by “The South Park Guys” because dad really likes South Park….though he’s not normally allowed to watch it because mum frowns on it. It’s funny that my 11 year old niece, Ebony, can watch it at my parents house but my 74 year old father can’t! There’s something pretty screwed up right there!

Anyway, speaking of Ebony, that’s the main reason why I went over there this weekend. Ebony was having her Confirmation at 2.00pm today (which actually turned out to be 2.30pm). Duncan (my brother and Ebony’s father) wasn’t going to be there because…….well that’s another story! Let’s just say that, unfortunately, he wouldn’t be out of place on a Jerry Springer episode! Ebony’s mother, Bronwyn, and her family were there though, which was good.

My family isn’t actually Catholic but Bronwyn’s family is. We’re Church of England – and to tell you the truth we’re not very religious anyhow. Mum used to be, but she had some trouble with her local priest after she left her first husband because he was beating her. That was in the late 50′s and you just didn’t do that sort of thing back then. You stayed with your husband, bashings or not! Needless to say it took about 7 years for her to go through the whole process of divorce back then. Nowadays I think it takes about 7 minutes! Anyhow, mum kinda lost faith in the church because her priest treated her like worthless crap. The end result being that our family would only go to church on “special” occasions – weddings, baptisms, funerals etc.

Despite this fact I think I kinda grew up with a “spiritual” aspect to me anyhow – albeit not in your traditional “organized religion” type way, but still. In the last few years though I’ve spent quite a bit of time in church with Amy, as she’s Catholic and proud of it. I like going with her because it’s still new and different for me – besides, most churches are pretty cool looking places anyway and I like the architecture and the pretty pictures. :-)

So dad and I made sure we were early enough for Ebony’s Confirmation. In fact we ended up getting there almost an hour early. I didn’t mind though as it was in the Cathedral in the city which is always cool to look at. Dad was freezing though, apparently! It’s pretty cold in Melbourne at the moment (well, cold for Australians anyhow) but it was a beautiful sunny day outside. Weird how it can be so sunny, yet so cold?

The service was good, but hella long! Ebony did well, though she did stick her tongue out at me towards the end of it, which wasn’t the appropriate thing to do (however funny it may have been). It also took a while for the congregation to get into the singing too, which I thought was a bit strange? Not that I’m an expert by any stretch of the imagination, but Catholics seem to like singing a lot! Then again, what’s not to like about singing? I sing all the time here at home – usually stupid made up songs though rather than religious ones!

After the service we said goodbye and literally raced home. I’ve been having a few problems with the alternator on my car lately so I said to dad that I wanted to get back to his house as soon as possible so I could then jump in my own car and get back home before darkness fell (and I’d turn into a pumpkin or something). If I have to turn the headlights on it really starts to zap the battery and beat it into submission quickly. I’ll get it looked at by a mechanic soon but, for now, it’s not too much of a problem just yet. Anyhow I managed to beat the dark…..just!

So in the end I had dinner at my parents – but I cooked it – and I went to church on Sunday – but without Amy.

So ends my very uneventful, but still cool, weekend.

This entry was posted on Sunday, July 17th, 2005 at 11:23 pm and is filed under Family. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.