Friday, December 03, 2010

Favourite Things Friday

I have to say Friday is one of my Favourite Things this week. It's been an interminably long week, month , year , life and I'm ready for some fun. And I know I'm later than usual with this post but I'm still sliding in under the Australian Friday deadline. Yay ! Go me ! If you want to play along it's too easy. Write a blog post and link up at the bottom of my post. That'll mean we all know which fabulous people to come and visit this week.

December 1st hailed the official arrival of summer here. By mid January sometime I'll be bitching about how hot it is but for now I'm loving the warmer weather, light summer rains (what's up with raining on the first day of summer, Mother Nature?) and getting home from work and having a good three hours of daylight left. Winter seemed interminably long and through the wonders of modern technology I got to be completely envious of my Northern Hemisphere friends enjoying their summer. By the way, I completely get that Australian winter is not anywhere near as cold as the Northern winter...but it's still cold to us. 40F(15 C) is cold people, and I don't want any of your minus temperature arguments. By the way I'm enjoying seeing all your snow pictures. He he he ....

I'm from the south of Australia which has  dry climate. Apparently SA is the driest state in the driest continent on earth.  Our average temperature here during January is 30 Celsius but let me assure you we often have days and days at a time of 38-41 which is bake an egg on the footpath kind of hot. You go outside and all the air gets sucked out of your lungs.  I imagine our hot is like the Arizona desert kind of hot. We've been on water restrictions for the last three or four years and as of Wednesday we finally got to use our sprinklers again so I might even have a front lawn again this year. Damn sprinklers  are probably fused into their little pop up holders they haven't been used in so long....

Summer for me means long hot summer days.


Casual footwear. I have cute pink haivainas...


The airconditioner pumping 24 hours a day for weeks on end

 Summer fruit which I love. (I do eat healthy stuff sometimes )


Lots of barbecue food. there is nothing like an aussie BBQ.


Summer togs. Last time I wore something that resembled these I was about 12 years old. Now I wear a grandma one piece with super suck your guts in powers.


Taking a dip in the pool


Walking along a beach when the weather gets cooler in the evening. It's just too hot during the day.


Sunscreen


Sunburn when you forget the sunscreen. This happens at least once each summer. And of course that's my real bod.  


An occasional ice cream.


And a few of these every so often


Roll on summer. How I love you so.




25 comments:

  1. love your FTF, esp the last 2, its raining cats and dogs here, might get some sun one day!

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  2. You might need to clean up your comments looks like you've been spammed. Living by the beach we like summer here. But I like it when I can escape when I want to the aircondition comfort and have a swim (minus kids in the pool). Nice walks down the beach in the early morning before the sun gets to hot and balmy nights with a cool sea breeze. I can hear the kids jumping in pool now love the sounds of summer, I will be whining at the first heat wave though.

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  3. I could do with one of those in the last photo.

    Summer would be unbearable without aircon, at least my house is sort of built to capture the breeze so I usually only need to use the aircon to dehumidify. It's not particularly summery here right now, at least it hasn't rained very much today.

    I love all the photos you have chosen, they are all perfectly summery!!
    Walking along the beach in the early evening, yes!!!!

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  4. Summers at just tooo hot here to like them... But I do love winters here - they are sunny and yet cool!!! Walk on the beach!!! Nothing can beat it!

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  5. Not a summer lover here, but I can appreciate your rapture for the season. As a child summer to me meant sunburn. (ouch! Skin cancer I am yours!) UV cream that gave me a rash. (Yeah, I always wore it, but my Mum didn't understand that it only works once every 24 hours. So, if you have SPF 15 that means you can stay outside for 15 times your burn time once in 24 hours. So, if your burn time is 5 minutes - I have crazy fair skin - you can stay outside for 75 minutes without getting burnt. Once you hit the 75 though you just burn away. Of course, she also didn't understand that to protect one limb adequately you need a blob of sunscreen in your hand about 5cm in diameter and a 50 cent piece size blob will protect your face and another similarly sized blob will do your neck. So most of us are not fully protected even if we do apply sunscreen.) And mosquito bites. (How fair is it that you would be fair skinned AND delicious to mosquitos?) Ahh.... summer holidays..... I loved them. NOT!!!

    Fortunately, none of this has affected me permanently. *cough, cough*

    Now summer to me means ducted air conditioning (I don't care how huge the bill is!) and hibernating inside the house! Oh summer, I can't wait until you are over!

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  6. Looks like there are quite a lot of Summer haters out there and I'm afraid I'm going to join them. It's just too hot for me - though so far this year it has been great. Anything over 26C is too hot for me and I HATE humidity. It totally saps by energy.
    BUT ...... a balmy Summer night with a fresh, cool breeze and a long cool drink... I can go for that!!
    Cheers
    Helen

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  7. Hello! We have still summer and I like to share my favorite things! Thank you for this lovely Favorite Friday - wonderful idea and just perfect for Friday!
    Sunny wshes from Crete! Teje

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  8. You've made me feel better about the snow outside now! I can't handle that sort of heat at all.

    I love being by the sea and approve of the fruit, drinks and ice creams but 21 (70) is my ideal.

    I can still function up to 27 (80) shut down beyond that!

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  9. Oh how I envy you...I used to live in Texas...nice dry heat there and we used to have 40°C in the summer...it was just awesome..a dip in the pool, cooling off in a nice airconditioned house and spending long evenings outside with a real texan barbecue. Over here summers are humid and ugly: no air conditioning in private houses or regular offices, lots of rain and temperatures around 25-30 °C whenever it does get warm, barely no private only public pools which are overflown with kids in the summer ( which last from July til August .-) )
    Right now we`re having beautiful snowy cold winter days, but as of Saturday it is supposed to be "normal" again menaing 0°C and rain...I hate german winters!

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  10. Oh by the way..is that guest romm still available for next winter? I might just spend my winter in SA :-)))

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  11. You'd be right at home in Oklahoma in August. It's dry here that time of year and it feels like walking into a blast furnace when you leave the buildiings and walk onto the parking lot.

    I'm not missing that right now, but I'm not thrilled with the cold. We drove through freezing rain at Thanksgiving and that is certainly not fun. But I'd miss the seasons if we didn't have them.

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  12. Well, I'm in the South, so our summers are full of hot and humidity. I'd almost welcome a dry heat! LOL Great favourite!

    Enjoy your long weekend! :o)

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  13. i'm drooling ... today my wardrobe consists of longjohns(yes), heavy jeans, insulated shirt and lastly warm warm fleece .... it's 10'F and 9 inches of snow on the way (again) ... at this rate my office will be handicap accesible via the snowbanks ...

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  14. Oh Shay, I do so love this FTF blog. I remember reading that Aussies are the only things in the world that turn themselves over to bake! I suppose I would miss the seasons, but gee I'd like to try it for a bit. We are in cold humid weather here in Ontario. I don't like winter. period.

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  15. I am beyond jealous right now - I love summer, as long as I can have air conditioning - and I think evening walks are the best!

    But, what really got me in this post was the barbeque picture - yum.

    I love swimming, too - I'd love a pool, but it is expensive to put one in and our summers just don't last long enough!

    Drink a mixed concoction for me!!! You deserve it :)

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  16. God I needed those summer piccies today - thank you - they remind me that there is somewhere warm on the planet. Go on, let me post my minus figure (whispering -10 and flippin FREEZING!)

    Have a great weekend!

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  17. It is so interesting that it's totally opposite seasons over (under) there. The nice thing about winter here (and ours are pretty mild in Utah - down to about 10 F.) is that it is quilting season! I love to retreat to my cosy basement, with my own little space heater and just quilt! P.S. You've been working out!

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  18. Your first paragraph reminds me of a Sugarland song that I love to sing along to. In case you don't know it, I'm sharing some of it here with you:

    "Friday, payday, Lordy got to get away
    Had it with the wife thing, living on a shoe string
    What’s a poor girl got to do just to have some fun?
    All these years without any help
    Guess what, honey, clothes just don’t wash themselves!
    Neither do dishes, neither does the bathroom floor

    So, now if anyone asks, not that they would
    I’ll be down in Mississippi and up to no good

    No more, what a bore, had enough, I’m out the door
    Headed for a breakdown, had it with the small town
    Gonna call Lisa, gonna call Carla Sue
    Now we’re gonna let it roll, gonna let it rip
    Gonna get us a nice room down on the strip
    Not that we’ll need it, there won’t be any sleepin’ tonight

    So, now if anyone asks, not that they would
    We’ll be down in Mississippi and up to no good

    Hammer down, here we go
    Runnin’ for the riverboat
    All you’re gonna see is asses and elbows
    Luck’s about to change for these three queens
    Tired of getting’ jokers, deal us up kings"

    My favorite image, of course, is "all you're gonna see is asses and elbows". Hee hee hee!

    And summer, how I long for thee! Parade tonight in sub-freezing temperatures - the things I suffer through for my children!

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  19. Now we in the Northen Hemisphere will watch jealously as you cavort in the sand in a bikini whilst munching fruit and having a cocktail. Sounds blissful!

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  20. I'm so jealous! Can I come live with you for the next few months? (Yeah, yeah, I know you just got your sewing room back.)

    Love your favorite thing. It's one of mine too.

    Your hottest Aussie temps are similar to AZ and NV in early summer. For a couple of weeks in July in southern NV we usually run 43-46 (110-115). AZ has to put up with temps like that for longer.

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  21. After thought. I don't care about being filthy rich (I think there's a point in which the money probably owns you), but if I did have enough extra, I think I'd like to have a house in both the northern and summer hemisphere, so I could always live where it's summer.

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  22. I just linked to another site with my favorite funny video and then I realized, hell, since it is my favorite, I can link to Mrs. P, too, so here I am. Got to go change my blog title now though:-)

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  23. It sounds so lovely...

    Darn these layers of clothing and short days for the next six months!

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  24. Thank you so, so much for your summer blog. It's starting to get cold here in Maryland, and seeing your photos warmed me up for a bit, and made me long for my flip flops. Heading upstairs now to put on my fuzzy slippers.

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  25. i wish that little picture of the sun was radiating through the screen because it is so cold here. I miss the sun. And the yummy foods of summer. But forgetting the sunblock and getting burnt, I don't miss so much. Though that sometimes happens if you go skiing on a bright, sunny day and don't take along some sunscreen. But I digress. I'm glad it is summer somewhere in the world.

    xo -El

    P.S. I gets a lot hotter in Arizona than 41; I think it can get as hot as 48 there. 38-41 and dry would be more like Utah. So I can totally empathize with you.

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