1.6180339887498948482...Perfection!

Now what is he on about you ask? Well, read on to find out what this number and Alison have in common.

Perfection is usually difficult to define and subject to much argument as it is often a matter of opinion or quite simply, unachievable.

As some of you may be aware, at one stage when Ali was being examined by one of her doctors, the doctor commented that she was of 'perfect proportion'. Now this was something that I was already aware of (and said at the time it was one of the reasons I married her) but I didn't realise just how technical this could all get.

An article sent through by one of Ali's good friends describing The Golden Ratio sparked my curiosity and led me to some interesting reading. The Golden Ratio is used to describe the relationship between two measures. More details can be found through a quick internet search.

As well as puzzling me, it seems The Golden Ratio dates back nearly 2500 years and has played on the minds of mathematicians, philosophers and artists including:

• Pythagorous
• Plato
• Euclid
• Leonarda da Vinci
• Salvador Dali

Just to demonstrate the good company that Alison keeps in possessing properties of The Golden Ratio, here some details on a few of her fellow companions:

1,000+ visits

We've just passed 1,000 visits to the blog! And there are more than 200 of you out there that have visited this blog.

Quite incredible, but then again, this is Ali that we're talking about and she seems to make an impression on the people she meets.

Thanks to you all for following the posts and your supportive comments.

Survey Results - Ali thinks the posts are too long.

Well, well. 55 of you were kind enough to vote in the survey.

Alison was very disappointed with 54 of you who disagreed with her and thought that the length of the posts was SPOT ON!

The other vote went to MOSTLY OK, BUT...

While Alison wonders whether you have all lost your sense of good judgement, I'm grateful for the show of faith and will keep on blogging! (Plus, it's not often that I am statistically proven to be correct - although I'm sure there is a loop-hole here somewhere and Ali will point out she was right all along.)

Just for the record, the question, answers and responses are below. Stay tuned for the next survey soon.

Alison thinks these posts are too long and you'll all get bored of reading them. Is she right? Do you want shorter posts? Have your say below now!
1. YES... I like to keep up with the news but these postings nearly put me to sleep (0)
2. KINDA LIKE, SORT OF BORING, YOU KNOW... Sometimes they waffle, a bit shorter would be better (0)
3. MOSTLY OK, BUT... Most of them are good but a couple did drag on (1)
4. SPOT ON... Keep it up! (54)

Chemo 2: Day 1 Pike wipeout - well... 4/5 wipeout!

A quick update for you all on our day so far.

Alison is doing OK. Her head is still fuzzy and she is tired but not feeling too nauseous at all. She's had some breakfast, a cup of tea, some biscuits and fruit already so the signs are good. She's even talking about having some of the delicious home made meat pie that was left over from last night for her lunch.

Ali took the next step with hair this morning and let me have a go with the clippers set at 0. All up she does have a pretty even and round head.

Harrison is home yet again. He was looking pretty poor last night and went off to bed early without arguing, a sure sign he's not feeling well. This morning he had a bit of a fever and just didn't look himself so it was better to give him the whole weekend to recover.


Annelise is also home today. She's picked up a dose of conjunctivitis and had trouble opening her eyes. Again, something that you don't want to be sharing around.



Abbey had a bee sting in one of her front legs. She too is now recovering quietly.






Just in case you're wondering, I'm fine and looking after the lot.

"Kill the f#@%ing possum"

That's what Ali said to me when I asked her why she was wandering around our backyard at 2:45 am this morning!

This also explains why I am up at 3:00am writing on the blog. It's because we just had a little excitement at our house with some native friends.

I was nudged out of a sound sleep by what sounded like one of the sliding doors opening and closing. This only slightly woke me up and I thought I may have been dreaming. A bit later, there was more noise and it was the type that didn't fit with the normal night sounds.

When I opened my eyes to see what was going on, the lights outside were on, so I got up to investigate.

Ali was outside hosing the trees! I told her to come inside and asked what she thought she was doing. This is when she burst out with the deadly threat that makes up the title of this post.

It seems that she 'heard' a noise which she described as a mix between a whipper-snipper that won't start properly and a chainsaw, coming from the backyard. Not only that, but it seemed to be moving among the branches of the trees.

Now, what she actually thought she was going to achieve with a hose I haven't yet worked out. Whether it was to freeze the poor little possums or knock them out of the tree I will try to work out later.

The scary thing is, after I had convinced her to leave the possums and come inside (which wasn't as easy as it should have been in the middle of a cold, Canberra winter's night) she was mumbling and asking me to find Harrison's super-soaker water pistol so she could have a second go at them. When I told her she should not be out there and I wouldn't get the water pistol for her to shoot the possums, she then wanted it on standby in case they came back!

All is better now and seems to have settled down. Ali has been tucked into bed and a sleeping tablet should help her relax enough to sleep through until morning. It appears that one of the side-effects of the chemo is she has trouble sleeping.

As for the possums? Well, I haven't seen or heard anything yet. Maybe they were there, just maybe...

Chemo 2: Day 0

Chemo treatment went ahead today as planned.

Alison is now home and snoozing away. We're expecting things to be quiet for the next few days at least.

They gave her a new mix today and have tried to make it so that she doesn't feel as sick afterwards this time. I think she knows now to take the anti-nausea, anti-coldsore and other stuff to help sooner rather than wait to see if the sick feeling passes.

I'll be making sure she lies low for a while and doesn't get up and around until she's feeling much better.

Next post is likely to be Sunday night unless we have some excitement before then (fingers crossed that we don't, there's been too much excitement lately).

PS - As you already know, Ali is a fighter. Here's an old photo of when Ali went to the 'dark' side and picked a light sabre fight with a six-year old Harrison...

Hair today, gone tomorrow

Well...gone today really. Ali got the no. 3 buzz cut today.

I actually think she looks good and that she should have tried it long ago. She's not so sure.

First it was a doctor that told her she was perfectly proportioned, now it's a hairdresser saying that she has a perfectly shaped head (of course) and one that is very suited to short hair. Much like some of those models that just have such defining facial features, they still look beautiful without hair.

There is a wig that she has chosen (only cost the same as three visits to the hairdresser) and that looks good too. Ali did really well choosing the style and colour as it looks totally natural.

Anyway, no photos yet but I'll see what I can do.