Old news if you Tweet ....

... but if you don't, the Brown-Mice trended/styled up a little last week.
I've seen, gloated over, desired Anglepoise Lamps for years. You know the ones, like the little Pixar logo *boing, boing, boing*.And something just snapped the other day, "fuck it" I thought, "I'll just BUY some".
A little light googling found the UK site but try as I might I could not get my payment accepted! It fair drove me bonkers.
Then, I discovered a place that sells them right here in Sydney, a discrete phone call was made and a nice young lady arranged for 2 to be delivered to Mr Brown's office before the week's end.
Any you know what? About $20 cheaper than shipping them in from the UK including the £160 shipping fee! Win!
Delivered they were, as promised. A little light assembly was required. And the instructions did not lie, that base is one weighty bastard. Of course there's an obligatory Tigger-in-a-box picture, what did you expect? Tigger is Mr Brown's most ardent assistant, removal was required.And here they are, Mr Brown's (which required his taking the electrical bits apart and reassembling so it would work. Easier than taking it back to sway between 10 and 4 on a Saturday). And mine. From a reclining Mouse point-of-view!

Coffee machine news ...

... so, clearly the Speedster is out of the question.
I've been to inspect the BE900 though, it's a very sexy beast!
So ... perhaps ... given it's our anniversary at the weekend ...

Guess what Mr Brown wants? ...

.... This.

Actually he wants one of these but $12,000 to make 4 cups of coffee a week is a tad excessive.

End of an era ...

... just before we moved into the long, thin house (11 years ago), I suggested to Mr Brown that we purchase an old ute. This was to replace his very sporty V8 thingy that was very low to the ground and would be dreadful to drive on the steep and wibbly streets round where we were to live.
It was also so he could rip up all the concrete in the long, thin backyard, bring home turf and lay it. Do a little light middle-class removating and such like.
He came home with the Beaut, the beautiful ute. Not old and battered at all. Apparently the old battered utes were so terrible he couldn't bring himself to buy one. So, the pretty, almost new, teal-green ute became ours.
Beaut has served us well all these years. Has been the biggest boot in the Inner West and driven us all over in relative comfort. Beaut's not been the best for when we have guests. You can fit in three people, but not comfortably. But we don't have a lot of guests who need to be driven around. And if we did, we'd use their car.
But Beaut was starting to rattle a bit, the comfort factor was declining and, apparently something to do with Beaut being a Ford, rust was developing.So, last weekend, while I was blogging merrily about chocolate-covered rat brains, Mr Brown went looking at cars.
We've been talking about getting a new car for years now. An impasse had been reached. He wanted to keep the ute and get something sporty. I said two cars for a couple who don't have off-street parking, one of whom uses public transport to get to work (smug me), was excessive, silly and wasteful. What we needed was a compromise car, I said. Something that I may consider driving but which could tow a boat, have room for storage of various spare boat parts AND was nice and a bit sporty.
He found one. He picked it up on Friday, his birthday. Beaut is gone, traded in for this minx.We still have all that bloody concrete in the backyard.

I was pootling around the interwebs the other day ...

... just poking about looking at stuff and I found a nice chap in the UK who makes pen cases.
Now yes, I've got a pen case, a rather lovely pen case, but it's full and I had pens living in the squalor that is mugs and the boxes they came in. Bah! So uncivilised.
So I ordered one from the lovely Geoff. I ordered one with yellow felt lining. And it has arrived. And I have moved some pens out of the old case and into the new. I now have a drawer for the Lamy Safaris and AL-Stars, and room for more (they come in so many tempting colours after all). The next drawer down has my Noodler's pens, my A.G. Spalding & Bros, a Platinum Plaisir, a Marlen Secret and a big fat yellow Bexley. Then there's the cheery pens, a Tombow, two lime-green Pilot Preras (the product of a sticky key and a late night on the interweb) and a Pilot Lucina. The Pilots come in so many colours, clear too in the case of the Preras, so there's room for more. And two more drawers, completely empty - but for how long?
And over in the fancy cabinet, I've got the fancy pens.
A couple of Lamys, a treasured Pelikan green tortoise, my Stipulas, my Edison Pen Co pens (including the Morgan), a couple of Platinum Celluloids and a big butch Faber Castell. Under that there's the clear pens (Pilot, Pelikan and Stipula), a Think Gatsby, the Jac Zagoory Write No Evil, a lovely emerald-green Franklin-Christoph and then the blacks. The blacks include the Parker my dad gave me and the Sheaffer Stubby. There's now an empty bottom drawer .... And as I had a little spend frenzy the other day (due to the Australian dollar being worth 1.10 of those useful US dollars) I happen to know there's at least two more heading my way. At least now I have suitable accommodations.

A week or so ago ...

... the credit card got stopped by the bank because I bought something over the phone from a Stawell-based business, at about the same time Mr Brown was buying his heart's desire in Brisbane (of all places). The bank did not like the wide-spread spending and stopped the card.
It's all mended now and look, look what we got for the furry girls.It doesn't look like much and the girls weren't terribly impressed. Although they did like the boxes it came in.And approve or not, nothing was keeping Tigger away from interesting doings and goings on.The weather was, a tad inclement for building outside. But with the clever use of an umbrella, Mr Brown building and me holding things and handing things over, we got the job done. Something for unaccompanied, unsupervised outside time. Nobody, other than Mr Brown, has actually been in it yet, dainty paws don't like to get wet. But heads have been poked out the door, outside air has been sniffed. And I expect, as soon as the sun shines, these two will drag their furry arses out for a proper inspection.

Next time we are in New York ...

... I'm totally, absolutely getting one of these.
A Tiffany & Co compass, perfect for assisting me in making use of all those google-map directions where you're told to "turn north" or "head south west". I found them difficult, nay frustrating, last time. This should cure that.

The new glasses arrived last night ...

... in the most enormous box, remember, there's only eight glasses in there.
Over packaging is a bugbear of mine and these glasses were over packaged to buggery. There was the box, the packing peanuts (made of corn or something, the cats are WILD for them and we can compost them too) then the little boxes the glasses came in, along with each glass being wrapped in layers and layers of tissue paper.
Still, nothing was broken and it did lead to some fun and games for the whole family, clicky the slide show to see.

Our shower rose has dripped for ...

... nigh on as long as we've lived in the Brown Mouse House. That's quite a while.
Now, when you work where I work (don't ask, won't tell) you tend to become a little wary, nay, terrified, at the idea of tradesmen and renovations. Add to that the Jinx Factor (last time we renovated, we moved within 12 months I think it was), and you have a Mouse who tends to put these things off.
However, dripping water is a torture method for a reason, the sound of it drives one mad, so last week I called a plumber (having extracted a recommendation from a trusted local and checked his licence and history on the Fair Trading website ALWAYS do this people, always). All we wanted was a little light reseating, since regular applications of new washers did not appear to do the trick. We'd attempted this before, the plumber said the tap thingies (not his term mind you) were "too deep" for his tools. When I spoke to our charming new plumber I mentioned this, he said he'd bring an extension whatsit (again, not his term) with him. He did try, I'll give him that, but it turns out the Brown Mouse House had bespoke tap whatsits that rendered all modern attempts to reseat, pretty pointless. They were, and I'm not bragging here, about 2 to 3 times longer than the usual.Thus it became necessary to pull off tiles, dig trenches in walls and put in bright new shiny copper pipes, close to the surface, and new brass tappity things, and, what the hell, we're spending money, a new shower contraption. Cost quite the proverbial! But hey, the shower rose NO LONGER LEAKS or DRIPS. And I, nosey beast that I am, got to see the underside of the poor old house's brickwork. I came away feeling a bit sordid, like I'd been looking at her underwear. Not that that stopped me posting a picture on the intertubies!
This, of course, means we can put of renovating the bathroom (reassuringly praised by the lovely plumber as "not the smallest he's worked in") for years to come!