Floriade 2009 Marcia Hines

G'Day,
Here are some pictures I took today at Floriade.
The first picture is of songstress Marcia Hines. What a gracious, talented, lovely lady she is. The concert went for about an hour and a half today and I thoroughly enjoyed it. She is so good. I know she has to be at least 5 years older than me but she looks so good. Oh, those genes have so much to answer for don't they. Not fair to some of us in the looks department.
This great cake was in the interflora tent. Cool.
One of the garden beds. Hyacinths, tulips and daffodils.
This bed was mostly tulips and daffodils. My giggle of the day came right in this spot. A lady was excitedly running along this bed sprouting her floral knowledge. Looking at the daffodils and jonquils, saying loudly so all around her could hear, that these were absolutely lovely tulips and that she had not seen ones like this before with 6 petals and that bit in the centre. She was sure that there were no tulips like that in the display last year. Love it hehehehe.
This was one of the displays there today. I liked this.
and this.
Here is another one.
The garden beds are divided up into themed sections. The theme for this years floriade festival is body, mind and soul. These next few pics are some of the different flower bed area descriptions and plans. If you enlarge them you can read them.


Aw Pretty. Tulips and English daisies.

Yellow Tulip, and white english daisies.
Red tulip and more English daisies.
Tulips, iris, daffodils and pansies.
Breathtakingly beautiful pure white tulips, singles and doubles with more red tulips behind them.
Tulip perfection. No not its name, just my interpretation.
The festival. The bed in the centre of this pic is supposed to look like the ocean rising and falling. Cool.
And the pic below is part of the orchid display inside the C.S.I.R.O. tent.
I took about 60 photos today at floriade. These are just a few of my favourites.

Sunday Scribblings "Hungry"

G'Day,
It is Friday night, not Sunday, but I don't care.
I am hungry. Hungry to eat, to write, to be, to live, to participate.

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She told herself." You have been a pig today!"
If you don't watch out you will be heading back to your old bad, bad, eating habits.
Not being able to tell yourself" No stop!" Well today she is there.
Every depleted fat cell screaming loudly, fill me back out again.
Every taste bud screaming "So bloody what, just have what you want".
Her head tells her to care, but the taste buds and the fat cells are winning.
Who cares what does it matter, nobody wants to look at you, nobody cares , nobody takes any notice. It is too late to care now. You will never beat this.
It is too late and you know they are watching.
They see you are regressing and putting on weight.
The clothes that you were so proud to shop for in a smaller size than you previously wore, may start to get tighter.
Today she ate 2 weet bix, a banana, a 2 chocolate bars, 3 biscuits, a cheese and bacon bun with ham and tomato, some blueberries. A serving of gnocchi with bacon, mushroom and tomato sauce, a handful of roasted almonds.
PIG! Pig!
Crazy Pig! She disgusts herself, but she can't stop it.
It has nothing to do with being hungry, we all know it doesn't, so why?
She is right off track after doing so well a few months ago and losing weight. Things have been not too bad up until now, but now..... it is like losing the plot.
It is not showing on the scales yet but if it keeps up it will be.
Don't try to tell her she is spoiled, selfish, indulgent, greedy. She knows it already.
Don't tell her she is lucky to have such an abundance of food and many many people around the world have too little, she knows all that.
Food is an addiction as nasty as any can be. Just as deadly too and as mind and soul destroying.
Sugar, fat, starches, salt.
Yeah I know , I know. Crazy bitch.
Where is your head. Not working obviously.

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In Canberra, starting last weekend is Floriade, running for a month. The festival of spring that people from all over the place come to visit each year and marvel at over a million blooming tulips and our city park covered in flowers and tourists. Beautiful!
I went for a look last Sunday and they wouldn't let me in the gate because I had my little dog Rufus with me, no dogs allowed. Tomorrow I am taking time out from packing up house in preparation for the move next weekend and going back without my doggie so I will be certain to see everything. My next post will include pictures.
In the afternoon there is a free concert at stage 88 with Marcia Hines. She is a great singer.
Well I always liked her anyway. She has been entertaining us since the early 1970's when she came to Oz from the U.S. at the age of 16, won herself a part in Jesus Christ Superstar and stayed. Nowadays she is one of the judges in Australian Idol.
Pete is working, and Mike is definitely not interested in that type of music, so it is just me. I will enjoy the flowers, the displays, buskers and the concert all by myself. I went last year by myself as well. That is o.k. by myself is a good thing to learn and do. Sometimes, not all the time. But tomorrow I get to dawdle as slow as I want and nobody will get bored with it and pull faces that say "Oh.... Come On!" I will take the time to smell the flowers and soak up the sights, the atmosphere, watch the people and read all the sign boards. Use my five senses. Bliss!
That is all for tonight.
Bye.
Love Linda.

Sunday Scribblings "Tattoo"

My three kids, whodathought?

G'Day,
My two sons do not have a tattoo. My husband Peter does not have a tattoo. I do not have a tattoo. But.....my baby girl, my daughter, Anne-Marie does have a tattoo. She was 19 when she had it done.
I was soooooo shocked the first time I saw it. We had just moved here to Canberra and she was enjoying a dip in the spa out the back yard with her then boyfriend and when she got out of the spa. Oh My God!
Annie's tattoo is a large coloured drawing of a fairy with a devils tail wrapped around it and horns on its head. It is probably14 inches or so long and covers all of her side. (She is a skinny mini girl, not like her Mum.) It's middle is in line with her waist. It is huge. The theme sort of suits her. She is a bit like that, but I am proud of her being such an individual personality and not one of those silly little dolly birds who feel a compulsion to follow the crowds and fit into the norm. I like that about her and am proud that my kids think for themselves rather than be followers.
I was so shocked when I saw it I didn't say a word, but retreated to my bedroom and curled up on the bed. She followed me in after a few minutes and talked to me about it. Let me tell you, it sure took some getting used to. Her boyfriend's brother did the art work on it, he is quite an artist. He did it free hand and it is one of a kind.
But...all I could think of was "Oh my baby is marked for life", and "Only certain types of girls have tattoos on them".
I have of course got over the shock now and can see by looking at it that it is a well done piece of art in itself and the value in it, but boy was I shocked to start with. She had actually been hiding it from me for about 6 months before I saw it.
As you can guess by my reaction to her tattoo I was not a fan of such things. But now..... Maybe she has taught her Mum something. I don't know if I would have a tattoo done on my own skin but if I did, I think that it would be something that says something about me. Something that says something about who I am and where I come from. Something that says I am proud to be an Aussie, a potter, a amateur environmentalist. I dunno.
If you have read my blog for a while you might remember on old post where I made up (sort of botanical) names for myself and some of my friends. My name was Australis Robustus Clayii. I liked that. It might make a good tattoo. Well... I guess not because nobody would know what the hell I was talking about, he he. Explanation....I am Australian, proudly so. I am reasonably resilient, hence the robustus bit and I play in clay.
I always though that tattoos were something that tough bikie type blokes or sailors had done, not sweet little daughters like my baby.
Tattoos though. I can see where they provide their recipients with a sense of individuality, permanent decoration, identification, artistic expression, tribal belonging, to name a few.
I remember the Italian ice man being discovered. So long after his death, entombed in ice and still presenting his tattoos in his mummified state. Amazing! I guess my old story about archaeologists discovering pottery thousands of years old which still held the makers individual finger prints on its surface. A long lasting signature of the maker. I always loved that and wondered if one day a such a person might find something I have made with my finger prints on it.....and wondered. Sort of links it with tattoos doesn't it.

I just thought. I remember once when I was in my early teens my sister was going out with a young bloke in the navy. He had a tattoo of a pair of eyes on his bum. Oh my! I can't remember his name, oh yes his nick name was Rusty, but I remember that tattoo, even though he wouldn't show it to me. He he he he.

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Other news. We have a house. It is in the suburb of Curtin which is in an older area of Canberra that this but is supposed to be a nice area. It is not as big or as good a house as this one but.... ah well there you go..... we have to move anyway. It is a 1960's style house, 4 bedrooms, smaller back yard but it has rose gardens for me to play with. Should be good. Close to the local shops and closer to the city than this place. One problem though, I don't know if there is enough parking, and we are not supposed to park on the grass, so at least one of the three cars in our household will have to park out on the roadside. Then there is the caravan.
We will adjust, adapt, blah blah blah!
Our moving date is 25Th of September hopefully, all being well. Cross your fingers for me. I don't even know if they have Internet wiring in the house, but we will find out and adapt that too.
Packing and reorganizing and culling of all our goods and shackles is under way. There is so much to do.
Since I have been talking about my sweet baby daughter tonight I though I would add what I found in the garage while looking and culling things from some boxes today. I found one of her very first school books. She was in kindergarten and six years old when she wrote these stories. Just adorable. Most of the stories in the book were about going to the pool, riding her bike, visiting Nan's house or going shopping. But then.... so funny... I wonder what the teacher thought. There where several stories of seeing her elder cousin, my niece Cassie with her first boyfriend, kiss on the lounge. She thought that was great. And one where they were wrestling and tripped each other and fell off the lounge. So funny the way kids see the world. Love the sense of wonder and romance.
I also found a story book my second son David wrote about a gorilla that won an award and was published and sent down to Sydney to Taronga park zoo on display. Smart little kid my David. He was so funny when he was a little bloke. He used to memorize things long before he could read and if I swapped a word or two around out of his favourite story books when I was reading them to him he would be most indignant and quickly correct me. Of course I thought it a great joke and would change the stories around deliberately. Both my boys knew all the alphabet by sight and sound before they went to school and that gave them a head start. I didn't get to do that with Annie as much because I had started back in employment but that didn't seem to hold her back much, she did o.k. and still does. Mum's are allowed to brag! Did I tell you she got a distinction recently in philosophy at university. Brag brag.
Then I remembered when my eldest son Mike took his work book to school and wrote in it to his teacher that he wanted her to give him ticks because he already knew he had all the answers right. Hahahahaha. She wrote back in the book to him "I decide when to give the ticks Michael!"Love it.
A life time of memories that I put back in the box and packed away. How could a mother bare to throw all that stuff out. Tatoos on my heart.
See there is an upside to moving house.
Good night.
Love Linda.

Boom Boom Boom!

G'Day,
Today was Father's day here in oz. Peter has been sick, so took a day off work because he has been having gall bladder pain. It has been going on a bit lately, and I think when he goes to the Dr on tuesday he will be told it is time to have his Gall bladder removed. Anyway, after him having a very uncomfortable night the pain went away mid morning and we went out to have a look at the open day at the Australian war memorial's Mitchell site. That is where they keep the big stuff that is not on display at the war memorial in town. It is also where they do restoration and preservation stuff. It is only open to the public twice a year. Pete loves old war planes so he was waiting for the right time to be able to get a look inside the warehouse. Not all of it was open but these 2 big areas were.
It was crowded. Here are some of the photos I took there today.
For an explanation of why... have a look at my last post for Sunday Scribblings. Look at point number 6. Key problem: power.
I am not a war monger but I think places like this are important to serve as a reminder of what happened and to try to not let happen again. Though I guess human nature will always drag us down.

The first pic at the top is a sea mine from the gulf war. Enlarge to read the tag.
Boom Boom Boom!

This is a symbol on the back of a truck from the Vietnam war I think.

Different departments had different symbols, I don't know which one this is.

A push me pull you. No just joking. I don't know what this little trolley was used for.
Probably moving shells or something.

This plane was dismantled and wrapped in a plastic cocoon.

A good place for it to be me thinks.

This is a centurion tank. More boom boom.

Big guns, of all shapes and sizes, some old some not so.

This little boat is a suicide launch.

They are unmanned and they would load them up with explosives and direct them at enemy watercraft.

Boom boom.

A big rocket. Big boom boom.

This is the end of a big gun. The metal on the barrel was about four inches thick.
Kaboom.

Cute old vehicle.

I think this is an anti aircraft gun.

Boatie bombs.

Little Japanese howitzer.

I think this plane is a Canberra bomber. Boom Boom Boom.

You could see in the side and through the front opening of this tank and talk to the guide about it. The line was too long so I just snuck in for a photo instead.
I used to climb on stuff like this when I was a little kid and sit in fighter planes . I even got to travel in a Hercules once from Penang to Singapore. That was pretty cool for a young teenager. I thought it was great that my Dad could do stuff like that. I've been in a submarine too, when it visited Darwin and I was a child. I collected spent shells near a rifle range that I wasn't allowed to go near. We used to line them up and make patterns out of them domino style, and count them or blow in the ends to make them whistle. There were big gun things on the cliff in the army base in Darwin when we were kids and we used to play on them. Army brats. I think they would have tightened up their rules now days though. I also got to have a look in the tunnels on middle head in Sydney harbour years ago. They have been done up nowdays and are open to the public but they were not when I saw them. I thought they were smelly and dark and spooky.
All afternoon I had that song in my head.
Boom Boom Boom!
Yeah I know....... I am a weird bundle of contradictions.
Goodnight. Love Linda.

Sunday scribblings "The Key"

G'Day,
The Sunday Scribblings prompt for this week is "The Key".
I thought I would try doing this in Meme form.
1. What is your key problem?
At the present time I would have no hesitation what so ever in saying, housing. The home we have been renting is sold and we have to find another. Canberra real estate sucks big time at the moment. The market is overloaded with first home buyers racing to get a house before the first home buyers grant scheme runs out in a couple of months, so house prices are being pushed upwards to absolutely stupid levels. It is hard to get a rental house because there are more renters than houses to rent. Today I looked at 4 houses, two of which were suitable two were not. I have applied for one other (last Thursday) and am waiting to hear about that. I want those new set of keys since I have to give up the ones I have now.
2. The key to your heart?
Good loving, good food, enough money to get by, my husband, good people, my kids, not necessarily in that order, he he. Or should that be nice shoulders, bright blue eyes (I always had a soft spot for those), a nice height, kindness, Oh I do waffle on.
3. Who is the key person in your group?
I don't really hang out in a group anymore since coming to Canberra. I see this as a big cog with the key person in the middle and the rest radiating outwards like the teeth. I would like it to be me, but it is probably more likely my hubby Pete in the center.
4. What key on your ring is the most important?
I guess that would be the key to my car. Where would we be without our cars? I depend on mine to go to work to pay for my lifestyle, to get me back home again, to visit the people I want to see, to buy food and services. I listen to my music mostly in the car as well. I enjoy driving and also use my car for pleasure and entertainment. My poor little old car, it has paid for itself many times over in the years I have had it.
5. What key is the music in your head playing to?
I couldn't tell you what key is which as far as music goes. I couldn't put a name to any one of them. But if you were to play or sing me a note I could remember that. I have music and rhythm running through my head all the time. Or through my fingers or feet. Even this keyboard's rhythm is musical.
6.What is the key issue that is the problem today?
I could write here about the environment or conserving earth and its resources but I reckon the key issue that links everything is power. Too many people want it and are willing to fight for it. Too many people shouldn't have it. Too many people see money as power and will do just about anything to get it. Governments have it but sometimes don't know how to use it wisely. Too many people want to be the boss and do not know when to step back when they should.
7. Do your keys jingle?
Yep and I fiddle with them to make it happen. Music. Drives the people around me mad. He he.
8. Do you lose your keys?
I have a couple of times but not very often. Once while I was traveling we had a break at Macdonald's and I took my purse out of my handbag and walked out then left my bag under the table. I lost a whole bunch of keys and a good camera. When we got several towns away I discovered the loss and rang the restaurant but it had already gone. I hope they enjoyed my camera. Luckily there was no addresses listed in my bag for them to try the keys out at. I am more likely to walk out the door and drive away without the correct set of keys and then have to go all the way back to get them again, rather than lose them. I have often done that.
9. What do you think of key?
The context that I have taken with the word key is a very literal one. We depend on our keys so much. If people were honest maybe we wouldn't need to. If parents taught their kids better, generation after generation, maybe we could trust each other and not rely on keys for our protection and security. I guess it takes all sorts to make a world. There are always and have always been honest and dishonest people. Why?
Maybe keys are a symbol of mistrust and dishonesty. Maybe they are a symbol of locking ourselves away to hide behind our own built walls. Maybe and if!

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Spring is here. We did have a frost this morning so winter chills have not disappeared completely yet. The days are sunny and warming up . Today we reached 15 degrees, the people in Sydney would be complaining how cold that is and shivering but here it is a nice improvement. There are lots of daffodils in the back yard out in flower. Last year there were only a couple but this year here are dozens of them because I have been feeding the soil and the results are showing. The big pink prunus tree is dropping its lovely flower petals and has laid a carpet of pink across my back yard. There are snowdrops and hyacinths flowering too. The stinky viburnum along the side fence will be flowering shortly. Lots of them are planted in Canberra gardens. They are tough and provide a good screen but when they flower I don't like them. They are a hay fever plant too. The seed pods on the wisteria vines on the back pergola are splitting open with loud cracks and shooting its seed to the ground, making room for the next crop, evidenced by their emerging shoots. The vegetables I planted are taking off all of a sudden, we have to move on, but the new owners should like them. They will have silver beet, brussels sprouts, peas, strawberries, rocket, mint, rhubarb, coriander and dill. Oh well, at least I know I will be leaving the soil in better condition than it was when we moved here. Tonight the full moon is shining low in the sky, a perfect round, bright orange, yellow ball. I love seeing the season's cycle and progress through the year. Especially when it comes to this reawakening at the end of winter as we move into spring. We have had a bit of very welcome rain over the last few weeks. The water storage level is slowly rising. It is listed today as 46.2%, not too good coming into summer when the rain fall drops off and the usage and evaporation rates go up. But it could be worse. Hopefully we will get some more before we get into summer.
That is about all for tonight.
Bye
Love Linda.