Peck peck peck

It is SO HOT! I hate it. Am completely unused to hot weather, and have never liked it anyway. It is stinking hot. I am just stinking. Spend most of my time talking loudly about how Wellington Just Does Not Do This, and gravitating towards patches of shade, the exact opposite of a heat-seeking missile. Stuck my face in the fridge yesterday! Fridge was stinking.

Moving back home has turned out to be more about re-establishing pecking orders than anything else.

All was easily sorted with Mum - she drove me here and we spent most of the time talking about expectations that we both had, things that we didn't want to go wrong, things that she would prefer I didn't do and vice versa. So boundaries are drawn and Mum and I are getting on swimmingly, possibly because we are both capable of behaving like adults. (Am a little annoyed at Younger Sister this morning. YS is not behaving like an adult but like a squalling brat.)

YS has decided that she has been living here longer than me and is not prepared to go back to younger sister level in the pecking order. I'm fine with this - can see her point and happy to be on equal standing - but the fact that she won't discuss anything rationally, preferring instead to fly off the handle, means that at the moment I am making a lot of compromises and she's making none. Here is the most recent thing YS has shouted at me for doing:

- walking to the bus stop at 8.30 in the evening, when it is beginning to get dark. In the past 6-8 months there have been two attacks on people in our area, so I understand YS's worry, but a) 8.30 at night is probably not prime attacking time and b) the bus stop is a block away. Just the one block. But apparently my refusal to catch a $20 taxi rather than risk my life on The Block and pay a $2.50 bus fare means that I "hope that something awful happens to me so that I get everyone's attention." (She didn't mean that, but she's one of those people who says the meanest things they can in an argument.) There was to be no discussion about this. I am never to walk to the bus stop again after 7.30 at night, or it'll be curtains for me! Mum and I discussed safety things and came to an agreement - YS was totally unreasonable. YS will be ignored, and I will stick to Mum's rules. She is the Mum, after all.

I do love YS very much, but she is incapable of compromise or rational discussion. It's just annoying as it means that at the moment that I'm the one making all the effort.

Dog is another matter - he is trying to etastablish the pecking order in the most basic of ways, by biting me a lot and being completly unrepentant about it. I said "If he bites me again, either he goes or I do." I know this sounds a bit harsh, but I don't want to live in a house with a dog who is a) large and b) ultimately good-tempered, but not above being a right bugger at times and c) untrustworthy. This has, of course, made me the ultimate villain in YS's eyes ("you think you can just get rid of the dog because you don't like him?!" "...because he bites me. I'm not living with a dog who thinks he's allowed to bite me." "He doesn't bite me, you must be doing something wrong.") All my fault. Oh well. Is not worth getting my face bitten off over.

Grumble grumble grumble. Is just teething problems. YS has just got up - you can tell because all of a sudden my coffee-and-blog reverie has been interrupted by the obnoxious bleating of a ZM radio presenter at high volume.

YS and I have had a lot of fun since I got here, and will undoubtedly have a lot more. I am just grumbling because it is something I like to do, and I feel that if I don't rant a little bit (not on a regular basis, I promise) then I'll find myself standing in the kitchen shouting obscenities. And the neighbours have already made a noise control complaint about the dog.

On the upside, am off for coffee with Andrea this morning, which will be good! Woo and Yay!
She has also unfriended Butthead McArseface. Perhaps I should start a Facebook group ('I Unfriended Butthead McArseface') and invite all his friends to join it? That would be...childish. And yet satisfying! Yay, Andrea coffee! Andrea does not have a codename. Andrea, would you like a codename? (El Capitane? Catwoman? Ms Merivale? Ha ha.)