Over the last few weeks I have been having a bit of a rough time. Everyone said moving to Melbourne again would be hard. I accepted this, but didn't really take on board what it meant. Today when I went into the bottle shop to pick up some wine the sales man called me over to the tasting table. He poured me a full glass of red wine to "taste" and wouldn't let me leave the shop until it was finished. It was very kind of him, but I'll I couldn't help but think 'Is it that obvious? Do I look like I need a drink that badly?"

I think some of the problem is that I place such high pressure on myself. Somewhere down the track I got the idea that I am a stradford wife (without the wife part), and I simply can't leave the house without washing my hair, doing my makeup, putting on heels, matching my clothes, and bringing freshly baked goods to whoever I am visiting. I have no idea how this all came about as it is such a dramatic change to how I used to be. I spent most of my teen years in long flowing dresses, messy hair, no makeup, sitting under the stars, fire twirling, drinking bad wine, and talking to dredlocked boys who said thing like "man, I know you wont believe me but last night I totally sighted a space ship. It was so crazy dude, and we were all just tripping out so bad over it."

So what I'm wondering is.....when did I make the change from being some care free hippy into a perfectionist? Last term my teacher handed me a test which was 98%. I looked at him and said "not bad". He was confused by my reaction and asked me why I was worried, because I couldn't get much better. I was worried about that 2% I got wrong.

To be honest I blame pastry...and a german boss I once had. Both demanded for me to be neater and more precise, so in my logic, I decided that if I could make my life look neater, I could make my cooking look neater. So far I'm not sure if its working, as my teacher commented this week that my cookies were too 'rustic.'

So I suppose some things never change.