Caffeine & Cynicism

So I come home from work tonight, and my parents are having dinner with some strange woman in our dining room. That's not even the weirdest thing that's happened to me so far today, but I thought I'd lead with it anyway. No one ever eats dinner in our dining room. I honestly don't know why it's there. We hardly even go in there on account of the fact that the table is so damn big you practically have to crawl over it to get from one side to the other. And any space that isn't taken up by table is stacked with piles and piles of my Mother's precious china plates, the silver cutlery she never uses, and a collection of mis-matched egg cups from around the world.
...
My family is kind of retarded.
Anyway, yeah. Dining room = practically a ghost town. The last time I remember ANYONE eating in there was about 4 months ago when The Navy Man's family came over for dinner, which I guess makes sense, since I think my parents were hoping that the egg cups would distract them from the fact that their only son was knowingly dating a crazy person. I'm not too sure that it worked.
'The Strange Woman' turned out to be an old friend of Mum's from Western Australia. Excellent. I love it when my parents invite their old friends over for dinner. Mostly because there's always some sort of dessert involved, but also because 'old friends' tend to ask questions about your children. And while my parents have no difficulty with talking about Catherine-The-Golden-Child-Trew, they never seem to know quite what to say about me...

The Strange Woman: And what about your other daughter...Jacki?
Mum: Oh, she...
Dad: She...
Mum: She likes fashion.
Dad: Yes! That's right, fashion! She likes fashion!
The Strange Woman: And is she any good at it?
Dad: Oh, well, yes. I suppose. She always chooses interesting outfits. Sometimes they work, sometimes they don't...
(Awkward pause)
Mum: She likes to write.
Dad: She has this internet blog, have you heard of blogging?
The Strange Woman: Oh, yes. But I never quite understood why people did it.
Dad: Yeah, neither do we. She kind of just narrates her own life. She has a very...strange sense of humour.

Thanks, Dad! Feeling the love. Although I guess in the grand scheme of things, hiding in the kitchen and eavesdropping on your parents dinner conversation so that you can later publish it on the internet is probably one of those things that most people would consider strange.
So fair call.

Speaking of things that most people would consider strange, I watched an episode of Sea Patrol on the Universal channel this morning, and now I'm hooked. This is confusing for two reasons:
1) Australian-made dramas are pretty high on my list of 'Shit That Makes Me Want To Stab Myself'. Also,
2) Sea Patrol? No offense to anyone protecting the country from asylum seekers or illegal fisherman or whatever; I'm sure your job is EXTREMELY interesting...but if I'm going to sit down and sacrifice an hour of my life for anything on TV, it better involve David Tennant time-travelling in a little blue box, or one of the Kardashians.
Still. I thought I'd give it a go, mostly in a last-ditch attempt to become more Navy-Literate. Seeings as I have both a sister and a boyfriend in the Navy, it's getting kind of embarassing that I get confused between 'port' and 'starboard'. Not to mention the fact that I still can't say the words 'seaman' or 'rear admiral' without giggling. Although that's not really a fair test - seaman is hilarious. Anyway, despite my pre-concieved notions, Sea Patrol turned out to be surprisingly entertaining. Although I suspect that has less to do with the whole 'Navy' aspect, and more to do with the fact that I'm only a few episodes in and two of the officers are already hooking up. After all, if life (and my 5-year obsession with Prison Break) has taught us anything, it's that there's nothing I enjoy more than a good love story...except a good 'Lets Bone Even Though We're Not Supposed To' story.