linda may

Griffith Visit.

2012-01-08T20:04:00.008+11:00

G'Day,
Today I went for a dawdle around the arts precinct here in Canberra. My husband Pete was working night duty and needed to sleep so I stayed out of the house.
This is some of what I discovered to share here in my blog.
O.K. the first pic above is of a superb fairy wren. I love these little guys, they are so tiny and delicate and are quite common around this area. The one in the pic is a male in his breeding colors, you might need to enlarge the pic to view him better (click on the pic). I have had quite a few tries at photographing them before but with my cameras in the past I have been unable to get close enough or take the picture quick enough before they flitted away. He was in the gardens outside the National Gallery.
The next pic is of a sculpture that is outside the front of the National Library of Australia. It has the sounds of reeds in the wind and water playing, and is by an aboriginal lady,an artist, whose name escapes me just at this moment.
These are also in the area between The National Gallery and The National Library of Australia. The area is known as Reconciliation Place. An area dedicated to reconciliation of the Aboriginal people of Australia and displays some indigenous artwork and stories of their journey since white settlement of this country. A sad and horrible story as is the story of many indigenous cultures worldwide. This sculpture is of a male and female yam. A staple food . It is by an indigenous artist named Thancoupie, also known as Gloria Fletcher. I have written about her before in here. She is a special favorite of mine and a ceramic artist whose work I love.

The pic above is at the front of the National Library of Australia and shows a wider view of the sculpture in the earlier photo. The front bit where you can see the water ripples is really cool. It sprays a foggy mist onto the air, the ripples are made from metal of some sort.
I went into the library to have a look at the treasure's gallery. I had worked in there during the renovations, cleaning, that were finished last November and wanted to see what it looked like finished and fitted. I looked around at everything and thought, Haha. I have been inside that display case, I polished that glass, I swept, washed and polished that parquetry.
There is a major exhibition in one part of the gallery there at the moment. It runs until March 2012.
"Handwritten , Ten centuries of manuscript treasures from Berlin."
There were hand written manuscripts by Erasmus, Bach, Galileo, Napoleon, Newton, Mozart, Curie, Goethe, Dickens, Einstein, Machiavelli, Nightingale, Beethoven, Dante, Luther, Darwin and Michelangelo. Amazing stuff. Though the galleries were a bit crowded to look at many of them. My favorite thing there were the old books. Perfectly hand written and beautifully decorated manuscripts from the days long before printing presses were invented. The oldest book that I saw was made in the 600's A.D. Amazing!
And yes! Hahaha, I copied that off the post card otherwise I wouldn't have remembered the details to share with you.
This is a view of the stone artworks and area in the center of Reconciliation Place. The building at the side that you can see is the Portrait Gallery. It is a fairly new place less than 2 yrs old (from memory) I had my lunch in there today.
Closer looks at the rock sculptures from the above picture in reconciliation place.

This is a passage way that leads to the edge of Lake Burley Griffin that defines the center of the city. It shows the war memorial at the other end of the passage way, across the other side of the lake. Also through this passage are flags along the edge of the lake from all countries around the world. I thought it looked good the way it all lined up.
These are some of words carved into the other side of the rock sculptures in the pics above. I liked the wise words. They were quotes re; reconciliation.
This one is a little harder to read but well worth the effort. You may be able to see it better enlarged.
I parked my baby car in the area at the east of the National Gallery and walked through the sculpture garden there. I hadn't noticed this particular piece before today. Strangely fascinating isn't it? The restaurant overlooks this lake.

******************************

The rest of the photos were taken on the trip I took a few days ago to visit my cousins and Aunties and Uncle in Griffith, Ne South Wales. It was a 5 hour drive each way and I got home yesterday evening.

I visited the Griffith cemetery. My grandfather Joseph Trenerry was the only undertaker in town for many years. So he is directly responsible for much of the stonework and burials in Griffith. My uncles, Bill and Wally continued the business and it was then passed on to my Uncle Bill's daughter, Carol and her husband, who still operate the business today.

Justin Potter was my cousin Ruth's son. He died of leukemia, a cruel disease he fought for many years....... too young.
Oh O.K. so these are out of order now. I didn't post them that way.
Oh Well!
This is another of the sculptured stones in Reconciliation Place Canberra.
Sorry about that folks. Lol.
The plaque above is my Uncle Joe. He was my Mum's eldest brother. He died from pancreatic cancer. He was a father of 2, a small business owner and wind instrument player in the family band. How do you sum up a person's life into such a few words. Of course you can't.
These people were my maternal grand mother's parents. They died before I was born. They immigrated from Scotland and settled first in South Australia where my grandmother was born in Mt Gambier, later moved on to Broken Hill, then settled in Griffith N.S.W. They were very thrifty people (scots) and short of stature. Miner's I think, in those early years.
John and Jane Trenerry were my maternal great grandparents. Jane's maiden name as Pearson. they were English and Welsh as far as I know. Both gone before I was born.
Essie and Joseph Trennery are my mother's parents.I picked the posy from my Aunty Joan Hearn's garden. My grandmother Esther had the same christian name as my Mother. She was mother to 6 children and one adopted, though related son. She was a child prodigy and played piano concerts in the Opera house at Broken Hill when she was very very young. She was also a music teacher and played the piano at the local picture theatre in the days of silent movies in Griffith. She had a family band named the Gloom chasers, I think they had another name at one time and were called the rhythm aces. They traveled around the riverina area. My Uncle Joe played the trombone. My grandfather Joe played sousaphone, my uncle Wally played drums, my Mum sang. Can't remember what all the others did but they were all involved. My Grandfather was an undertaker. He owned a gypsum mine, he built cob and co coaches, he was a stone mason, head of the masonic lodge of Australia for quite a few years. Worked as a farmer, I think he worked as a plumber as well , quite the jack of all trades. I remember when I was tiny he would always tell me that he used to suck his fingers, (like I did) when he was a little boy and they fell right off. He had lost three of his fingers while he was up trying to repair a windmill and the cogs turned suddenly and cut them off, he only had his thumb and index finger left as a result. He did everything so well with that hand it amazed me as a child, he was known to pick a bone clean with a knife and fork and never use his fingers to do it, hahaha.
This is the plaque on my Uncle Jim's grave. I had a lot to do with him growing up. When my own father was away working, my sister and I used to call him Daddy Jim. He was a gentle giant with a sense of humor. A truckie and farm worker, most of his working life and father of my cousins, whom I visited. he died from pancreatic cancer also. Love you guys.
So today and my Griffith visit are strongly linked by my thoughts of family and it's continuity. My aboriginal heritage, no matter how small, tied in there as well.
I wrote this after my walk around today.

.................................

I am a miniscule part of a long story
So I try to seek knowledge
To link fragments of my country's history
To myself
And I find parts that I identify
Though my words are too different
And you lose interest
I am lost
in my own history.

.........................................................

I know that I could elaborate further here. Time ties my hands as does lack of skill in my writing. My story would run off on too many different tangents to be well done.
Bye
Love Linda.

Merry Christmas 2011

2011-12-28T18:35:00.003+11:00

G'Day,
As you can see from the date on my last post my blogging has dwindled somewhat this year. I do try but face book and it's voyeurism seems to take up my spare time.
I will get back to my blog periodically.
Anyhow!
I had a lovely Christmas this year. My Hubby Pete had holidays that ran across the silly season this year. It is the first year after many others that we have both been off work over christmas together. One or the other of us (though usually Peter) has had to work for many of them. He returns to work on the 1st of January, I on the 10th. I can't remember having a break that long for a looooooong time.
I was vacillating on how to spend the day but had a few welcome invites that we all were able to follow up on. I got to see all of my children and spend precious time with them, as well as see all my Hearn cousins and some of their grown children and grand children. Magic.
For the evening meal we went to my husband's niece's house. Then after that we went to my daughter's boyfriend's house and spent time there with her much loved adopted Nan , her partner's Nan. Most entertaining.
Peter and I stayed in a motel for 2 nights and came home to the boxing day sales for a few bargains. I bought underwear and sleep ware. It was pretty good price wise, even though all the clothing I buy is always on sale, hehehe.
On Christmas morning the streets of my old home town seemed so strangely deserted. You could have shot a cannon along the main street and not hit a soul. Boxing day was the same. Hardly any traffic at all, in the morning when I saw it anyway. The photo above is of an ancient tree that is on the bank of the Murrumbidgee river at Wiradjiri reserve in Wagga. I have had pics and stories of this spot in my blog quite a few times. I think last time the pictures I posted were during the drought and the old river was very narrow and shallow. It was lovely to see one of my favourite places green and full of life giving water again. I have always loved those majestic big old river red gums that grow down there. If you look closely at that photo, I am standing at the bottom of the tree to show just how big it is. I am a bit over 5ft & 3 inches tall.
Now THAT is a tree!
I was also interested to see that the local council has at last started to develop the reserve and have tarred part of the road into there, and are in the process of building a boat ramp. It is about time.
I guess if I was to say that some of the things I prayed for during the year; for my kids to be happy and have love, for water and rain, for my marriage to survive another year, have been answered. There were some rough patches.
So......Here is to another year. Another year with it's ups and downs , twists and turns to go through, with lots of love and laughter, work to keep our hands busy, um what else?
A year of enough.

Publish Post

That's all Folks!
Love Linda.

Sunday Scribblings "Life is Good"

2011-11-17T08:29:00.002+11:00

G'Day,
This weeks Sunday Scribblings prompt this weeks asks us to write on the subject"Life is Good"
I am sitting at the traffic lights at the intersection of Yamba drive and Hindmarsh drive. It has taken me three light changes to get to here and I am enjoying spending my waiting time doing some people watching in the traffic on my way to work.
The people in the car beside me are enjoying their wait too. Their car is on my left and half a car length in front of me. The neck of the lady driver is all I can see of her, and her hands. She is nicely proportioned and her soft brown hair is drawn up tightly into a pony tail as she bops her head talking animatedly to her pasenger. They are laughing. She is driving a green Holden commodore, about ten years old, a strong sensible, reliable car. I guess they are in their late twenties. She is telling him a story and using her hands to accentuate the tale, holding them to show the size and shape of something, and waving her hands about in her description, they are happy and their life is good.
On the right hand side of me is a man in his early forties. His hair is cut short and he is thin and pale. I think he has that office worker look about him, but he is not dressed for the office today. His car, a white Mitsubishi magna, needs a wash. He is intent on the lights changing and he is sitting with his hands tightly clenched on the steering wheel. I can see the cords in his hands and knuckles as he grips the wheel. He is impassive in his facial expression but I imagine as he clenches his fists that he is going through his "to do" list and wondering how he can get it all done this afternoon so his day off work is productive, as his time is so precious.
The car behind me is an aging brown Mazda two seater. The lady inside it is probably in her 60's. She has dark brown hair which is perfectly groomed, never a hair out of place and if I touched it it would crackle from all the hair product it contains. Her make up is the same as her hair, perfect and she is wearing red lipstick. I imagine her working in a fashion boutique, she is probably the owner. This is a very attractive woman, one which is confident in her looks and ability. Her face is 1/4 covered by her large sunnies and she looks content to wait and enjoy her music as she sings along happily, she has noticed me watching her in my mirror and smiles back at me. Yes her life is good.
In the far left lane is a man in a Volvo. I watched behind me as he swapped lanes forcing his way across from the right hand side of the road, weaving through traffic until finding himself poll position to turn left towards the hospital. He is stressed, in a hurry. Tapping his fingers impatiently as he waits for the next change of the lights so he can be off and away around the corner.
Then there is the girl waiting behind him in that lane. She is driving a shiny red baby car, a Toyota I think. I bet she is on her way to work too and she turns the corner and then left again into the hospital car park. Then jumps out with her tea packed neatly into a plastic lunch box and runs across Yamba drive for the shift change and nursing handover. She likes her job, and her life is good.
My life is good. Like anyone's. Weathering the storms, riding the crests and troughs of the waves and keeping my head above water.
Bye.
Love Linda.

Sunday Scribblings" Omen and Operation".

2011-11-07T10:17:00.002+11:00

G'day,
I didn't manage a post last Sunday but today I would like to combine that last prompt word with this weeks prompt.
I have been thinking about a friend of mine, an old work mate. I will share her with you.
For the purposes of my blog post we will call her Elaine.
Elaine has been on my mind because ...well, she is a long time friend of mine. I have known her for probably 15 years or more. Our children went to school together, and we worked together for many years as well. We still see eachother sometimes for coffee or lunch, though not as often as we would like, and I keep in touch with her on face book, so the miles between us are shortened that way.
She is a pretty lady and is only about 5 ft tall , but her size belies her strength.
I have seen her go through many trials. She lost her first husband to cancer. During those terrible end days of his illness she went beyond me, to a place inside herself that only someone who had gone through such trauma has had to go. Out of my reach she was switched off to many of us in her outside of the moment world. Yet in the following months I saw her not understand the people who judged her and her actions in that grief. Which was not a help to someone who was supposed to have been their friends. They didn't have the flexibility to see that each of us may react differently to that situation.
Several years later I had the privilege of seeing her rediscover love, a new husband who absolutely adores her and had a new child. Yeaaaay all cheer for Elaine!
This was all happening to her with the time of life stresses that bringing up teenagers can bring as well as several nasty other health scares with her daughter, youngest son, and a very recent one of her own to deal with. Is this a strong little lady or not?
Elaine is an inspiration to me.
A few years after her new marriage she became a small business owner and is now doing well for herself. She is sometimes challenged by the pressures of making a business work but keeps progressing through it with fresh new ideas. I am so proud of her.
Some of my favorite memories with Elaine are when we spent time together in my pottery shed and she wanted to make something out of clay.
Another memory with her was when her new husband had bought a little canary yellow corvette to renovate and play with. The day they picked it up she came around to my house and took me lapping the main street in the little car, so funny, especially so as the main street in the town where I was living consisted of probably a dozen shops or less and a couple of pubs, hahaha.
But....my very favorite memory of Elaine and one which always makes me laugh is....
In that small town where we lived you meet many people who have different personalities.
One woman in particular had a not so good marriage.(I wonder why?) Her favorite thing to do was try to flirt with other people's husbands, hopefully, in front of their wives. Well! This woman decided she liked the look of Elaine's first husband at a function one night and decided to try her games out on him, in front of Elaine. Oh I do love this story LOL. Which resulted in Elaine going over to the woman in question and smacking her fair in the face. Hahaha. My little tiny 5 ft tall Elaine sat her on her backside in front of everyone for her trouble. Needless to say the shocked look on her face and resultant sympathy from her friends was most amusing too. The same vixen lady, who shall remain nameless has some sort of weird need to try to upset other women with her games, is that a power game on her part, I don't know. She did the same to me.
But herein lies the two prompt words I am writing about.
Omen; don't mess with Elaine or you may find out you need an operation. Lol.
Love You Elaine.
Bye
Love Linda May.

Sunday Scribblings, "My Back Yard".

2011-10-23T20:09:00.003+11:00

G'Day,
Sunday Scribblings prompt asks us to write about our Back yard. I often do, as you know.

Symbiosis.
The earth made up of particles,
broken down
from it's own plants and animals
over millenia,
there for eternity.
A true wonder.
Nourishing all before
and after itself.
My whole world
My Backyard.
********

Short and sweet.
I hope so anyway.
Bye.
Love Linda.

Sunday Scribblings "The Call".

2011-10-10T22:29:00.004+11:00

G'Day,
Sunday Scribblings prompt asks us to write about "The Call".
Ok.
The call we all have to accept sooner or later.
I got the call late at night. It was after I had gone to bed and I was awoken by my husband who called me to the phone where I accepted "The Call" and was passed on to my Mum who gave me the news. Mary the lady at the hostel was sitting up with her and giving her support.
I made the appropriate phone calls, some then that night and a few more the next day. My sister was hard to track down because she was away from her home. She went to Sydney the next day to carry out arrangements etc.
I wasn't there.
I was stunned, though I knew that it was inevitable. I didn't go back to bed that night I sat up in the lounge room. Inevitable for us all sooner or later.
He had been receiving treatment in Sydney, radiation therapy, on a nasty lesion that had kept reoccurring on his poor chin. Good old Aussie sunshine had left it's mark on another victim.
I had seen him just a few weeks earlier and sat with him in the hospital. Spent a week there at the hostel nearby the hospital.
He couldn't shave his chin and it was really bothering him that he was untidy. I tried to very carefully trim some of the whiskers away from the lesion but it was too painful and he didn't trust me not to bump him there. He had become attached to a young nurse there and he wanted her to trim around there instead and I thought" oh well that's OK", she has his trust and she has more experience too. The heart attack came a few days later due to the effects of morphine used for pain relief.
We spent time together in the common room there, after noon tea and sessions with the other patients designed to share laughter and therefore relief from their respective situations. I told a joke and he watched the other patients faces as I spoke then grinned with pride when they all laughed at the punch line. Hahaha. Well I guess the other jokes were a bit tame compared to the one I told.
He said to me there, "How am I ever going to get your mother to stop talking?" and I said to him "If she hasn't stopped now she never will, that is just her". And he liked that too. He never said so, he wasn't very verbal, but the acknowledgement showed in his face.
On the last day I went to say goodbye. I was sorry to go but I was eager to get on the road and back to my children waiting for me at home 5 hours away from the city.
The doors were security doors and they closed and locked and you had to ring a buzzer to get back in. I said my goodbyes and he hugged me and went to kiss me but I drew away because the lesion on his poor chin smelt terrible and was weepy and I didn't want to get it on my face. I felt so bad about that. You can't imagine the guilt I felt afterwards. I went out the door and I knew right there and then that it was the last time I would see him. I turned around and started to go back for another hug and to kiss him, but the door had shut. He had turned away and headed back inside.
And I knew.
Mum looked at me and said "What is wrong?"
I couldn't tell her.
I put my head down and we went to the car.
I just wanted to get home to my children.
But I knew.
It is funny but, I knew when I saw his brothers and his sister, my dear Aunty Marion, in the same way, that it would be the last time I saw them.
My Dad has been gone for eleven years now. He didn't quite see the new millennium in. He died just short of a week after my birthday on 26th November 1999.

Good Night .
Love Linda.

Sunday Scribblings "Present"

2011-10-03T19:25:00.003+11:00

G'Day,
The sunday scribblings prompt site has presented us with the word present.
So the biggest present of all.

For my present
I present to you
The biggest present of all.
She will feed you,
and care for you,
and you must feed her,
and love her,
and care for her in return.
I present to you
Earth, our mother.

That's all.
The ultimate present we all have.
Bye for this week.
Love Linda.

Sunday scribblings "Plan B"

2011-09-28T18:19:00.002+10:00

G'Day,
Here is my meager contribution to the weekly prompt site Sunday Scribblings.
This weeks prompt is;
"Plan B"
Who has the ooooopmh to be living plan A.
The finance or luck to have their dream.
Just a small percentage of us may?
Those who influence us all,
though we don't see their all
The bad bits and sacrifice to get where they are
In a dog eat Dog world.
I am living plan B.

Yeah I know it does not rhyme. Why should I follow the rules? I have to be different.
Or am I just drifting along and letting it all happen to me, not taking the tiller?

Bye.
Love Linda.

Peter Beard Workshop. 19th to 23rd September 2011

2011-09-25T18:06:00.007+10:00

G'day,
This post is to record the week long workshop I attended last week at the Australian National University ceramics department.
The first picture above here is part of the results from the workshop.
We were given leather hard clay tiles to experiment with textures pressed into, and scratched into the clay. These ones were mine. The whiter ones have been bisque fired, the middle one is still wet and not fired. They are made out of pb103 white stoneware clay.
The pic above is of our tutor for the week. He is a potter visiting from England. Peter Beard. In this picture he is demonstrating a form he makes from clay slabs, joined, scraped and shaped to make a nautilus shell shaped pot.
Here is my number 7 tile. I liked this one best of the glazed tiles I made. It is first poured with a glossy white stoneware glaze, then brushed lightly with a light manganese wash, see the curved brownish layered brushstroke underneath. Next layer is of 3 different colored earthenware glazes, brushed on. Next layer is black under glaze decoration. Firing temperature was 1280 degrees Celsius.
The pic above is of a tile I was playing with, developing textures. Unfired. The patterns were carved in with a turning tool, pressed in with the sharp end of different paintbrushes and tools, coil added, pressed, or stamped with a plaster cube that we carved into, poked from the other side with the end of a paintbrush and pierced with a needle around it. Fun to do.
It was really lovely to have that time especially allotted to the practice of playing with clay. I haven't really had that since I left Junee and had my own pottery shed, before I moved to Canberra.
By Thursday I was exhausted because I still had to go to my cleaning job when the workshop was finished. It would have been so much easier if the workshop was held next week when the Queanbeyan schools I clean had started their 3rd term school holidays, But... there you go. I wasn't going to miss out on this workshop so I went anyway. It was great fun.
I thought I might be out of my league doing the workshop at the uni, but I didn't feel that when I was there. I got to do a bit of hobnobbing too, because one of Australia's and possibly even the world's top potters was there and I got to spend time around him. Cool. Greg Daley runs the ceramics department at the uni and he also added a few things to our workshop, showing us all what he is doing with glazes at present. He is such a cool guy, and very personable. As was our tutor Peter. A couple of the other participants are ceramic teachers as well. I knew a few of the the other people there, now I know them a bit better.
The next 2 pics are of my slumped shapes before being joined. We cut out shapes, traced them on to strong fruit boxes, cut them out with a Stanley knife, then slumped soft clay over the hole we cut out. Gently pressing the clay downwards into the hole. Then we let them firm up (half dry, called leather hard) and joined the 2 sides together and finished refining them with a surform and scrapers, knives and sponging. I made 2 of the same shape. One decorated by impressing the clay the other form was kept plain and burnished. Burnishing is polishing the clay surface with a metal spoon or smooth rock. I used a stone for mine.
Below are my 2 gourd ladies, joined and front one burnished. Not dried properly yet, and as yet unfired.
Below is one of the tutor, Peter Beard's finished pots. Cool eh. Reminds me of a sea urchin.
Peter giving the demo of slumping clay onto a fruit box.

This (below) is an example of the some of the great effects resulting from layering different glazes and oxides on a tile, this one is not mine. It shows very well, the difference of a dry and glossy glaze. That white dry glaze on this tile contains barium carbonate which is very poisonous and it is a substance that I wouldn't use in my own shed when I lived in Junee. So it was interesting to have a play with it.

To give an idea of some effects that were on the tiles, which may be used on a larger pot, we placed these paper sheets with cut out pot shapes over sections of the tile.
The pic above is of the colored glazes we were given to play with on the tiles.
There were 3 colors,each of an alkaline and a non alkaline earthenware glaze.
The small blue cups contained cold wax solution. Glaze will not stick to a pot where the wax solution has been put so it leaves gap .this is called wax resist.
The cups with the black liquids contained thin solutions of manganese dioxide and copper oxide. Three base glazes of stoneware white glaze,(one dry alkaline, one non alkaline glossy, one dry) were also given to go under and over the glazes mentioned earlier here.
The piece above is another of Peter's. We saw a demonstration of how he made these forms then had a try to make similar for ourselves.
I made two, decided to trash one and the one that I kept is yet to be finished. We ran out of time, which is understandable with such a big group of people, there were 20,of us.
They are made by cutting a solid block of clay with wire to shape it, then cut in half. Left to harden up until leather hard and then carved out from the centre, rejoined and finished off by refining the shape with a surform tool and a knife or scraper. The piece in this pic is quite small, the clay part is probably only about 8 inches high without the stone base.
Above and below...more examples of tiles with the paper frames on them. The one below was on one of my tiles.
I want to make some pots this shape to decorate, and try out some of this stuff on them.
The pics below and above here are both example tiles, mine again. The one above is from the beachy tile.
Pic below is our tiles spread across the table being discussed and inspected.
Below, my beachy tile before the glaze firing.

My tile number three. Above, after firing, below, before firing.
The next tile is the one that is partially framed in the paper frame a few pics back. After the glaze firing. I do have trouble with getting the photos in the proper order. Sorry.

Above and below. Tile number 4 after and before firing. Firing melts the glaze coating which is chalky looking before it is fired. The black tree was painted in underglaze, the brown tree was painted in red iron oxide and wax resisted, before the green glaze was poured on top. Glazes are basically a mixture of crushed and ground rocks and earth minerals, put together in such a way to give desired effects and melt at set temperatures. Firing makes the glaze coat permanent as well as sealing and protecting the clay underneath and giving a smooth clean surface to serve and cook food on.

When the glaze kiln (gas) was opened. An after (above)and before (below) firing picture again.
Below is a pic of my tile number 1 before firing. The after firing pic is a few before this. I couldn't work out how to get them together.
Today the Watson Arts Centre where the Canberra potter's society is situated had it's annual open day. The new studios and artist's residence are now finished and was officially opened by the current minister for the arts, Joy Burch. On open day they have the member's exhibition, I didn't exhibit, but enjoyed having a look at all the other exhibits. We also have a soup lunch going where you buy a bowl and get it filed with soup and a bit of bread then take your bowl home with you. There are also demonstrations where you can participate. I did a demonstration of painting with slip and under-glazes. I have not done a demonstration there before so was a bit nervous, but I think I did ok. A couple of little girls stopped and had a try of my painting and quite a few of the other members filed past and stopped to talk and see what I was doing and were interested, it wasn't too threatening. But..... then when everything was finished I took all my stuff out to the car to take it home again and broke the platter I had been painting for the demnstration. Bugger! I was enjoying that and was looking forward to working on it tonight at home to finish it off. Oh well, it is only clay and can go back into the recycling bucket to be wet down and reused over again. I will have to do another one to paint won't I.
That is all this post.
Good Night.
Love Linda.

Sunday scribblings "Easy"

2011-09-18T20:39:00.003+10:00

G'Day,
The sunday Scribblings prompt this week is "Easy".
As always with my posts I write about something that has happened to me and made me think. Well anyway.
Last night I went to a theater production , a play named after and about a man called Albert Namatjira.
So who was this man, have you ever heard of him , google him in images and have a look at his paintings.
This man was not one who had it easy.
Albert Namatjira was an Arrente tribal man, also known as Aranda from the central desert area.
Albert Namatjira was the first famous aboriginal artist. He was the first aboriginal person in the days when australian native people were considered mere flora and fauna and not human, to be made a citizen of Australia.
When I was a child I lived in Darwin and remember seeing his paintings and trying to copy them in my drawings. I was 8 and 9 years old then. We often drove out into the bush around Darwin in the old Holden my Mum owned in those days, a tough old sedan that was capable of tackling almost any terrain, today's new cars can not do that unless they have 4 wheel drive transmissions.
On those drives I fell in love with the bush and the flora and fauna around me. I marveled in the lush tall grasses on the plains and the beautiful ghost gums standing sentinel over the land, the red, red rock formations and the red soil and big ant hills derived from those rocks. Color, color and more color, set below a bright blue sky. We chased wild buffaloes in that old car and paddled in creeks that held hiding crocodiles. Of course there were not as many crocodiles up there as there are nowadays because in those days they were not protected and their numbers had decreased due to hunting. We saw birds and fish and brolgas and magpie geese. I particularly remember the big goannas, all sorts of animals that the Northern Territory is famous for. Wonderful stuff.
Albert Saw those colors and painted them. He put them down on paper to show the world the beauty of his world.
Albert was born in harsh times. Times of drought, and famine , due to the farming of his traditional lands in part, and his parents found their way to the Lutheran mission at Hermansberg where he was given an anglicized name and received food and education, and survived....... where many indigenous children in those harsh times did not. In this survival he also lost some of his rich aboriginal culture. He married and had 10 children two of whom did not survive.
His eldest was a daughter named Maisie, she married a man called Benjamin Landara, I have one of his paintings, along the same style as Albert's work.
After the 1st world war a man called Rex Battersby made his way north on a painting expedition and they built a special friend ship. It was Rex who taught Albert to paint the western way. Rex took some of Albert's paintings with him back south, with his own work, and they sold. Albert did more, became famous, prices went up and he became a rich man. So... the government decided that as Albert was not a citizen of his own country and they therefore could not tax him on his earnings, that they would make him a citizen.
So Albert became a citizen of Australia. He traveled south to Sydney and Melbourne to exhibit his work and meet his fans. There he was treated like a stone age exhibit to oggle over by the hoi paloi of society at the time. He even met and shook the hand of a very young Queen Elizabeth who was a fan of his work. He became very disillusioned by the world down south and succumbed to depression.
In his world in Northern Australia things were very different for him. He was a good stockman, a camelier and a husband, father, uncle, christian, tribesman. Down south he was a rare exhibit himself, in his own country.
Aboriginal culture is quite different in terms of ownership of money, goods etc to what our western culture is. They share everything, and family demands upon Albert's skills and money did not help his depression at all. When asked for money he gave it freely to friends and family and was eventually left with nothing. He taught his painting skills to his family and friends.
In those days it was illegal for aboriginal people to have alcohol so when Albert gave anyone money and they spent it to get drink, as he was a citizen and they were not he was held responsible. One night a fight broke out between a man and woman who had been given money by him which they used to buy alcohol and the woman was killed. Albert was sent to prison for 6 months as a result.
Albert in his later years fell victim to the white mans diet available at the time and died as a result of diabetes and heart problems in 1959. The year I was born.
The play I saw last night was funny, sad, thought provoking. Along the back of the stage were an older woman and man, working on a large painting of the desert area in the style of Albert's work. The work was in white chalk on a black back ground. Great stuff.
They were 2 of Albert's grand children and they assisted with the information presented during this autobiographical play. Pretty special. The two main actors were very good, talented actors, singers and dancers.
But.........
Made me think about , the similarities of today, and when Albert was here.
Made me think of the similarities of Albert being treated as a live stone age exhibit. How different were we watching them last night?
So easy, not easy.
That's all. Goodnight.
Love Linda.

Sunday Scribblings "Sensation"

2011-09-12T21:22:00.005+10:00

G'Day,
The Sunday Scribblings prompt site has given us the word "Sensation" to write about this week.
Here goes.
Seeing sensation, visually and feeling it emotionally, smelling cool clean air, soaking up nature and it's spring beauty.
On Saturday this week I went for a drive and, a couple of short bush walks into the hills above Canberra. We are surrounded by the beautiful Brindabella mountains which surround us and run southwards into Namadgi national park then the Kosciusko national park.
Nature's garden indeed.
The pic above is wild hardenbergia. It is in flower everywhere up in the hills at the moment, in a wild glorious tangle scrambling over rocks and up trees.
This is a pic of Gibraltar falls, about the middle third of it. Near Tidbinbilla nature reserve. We climbed around and down to near the bottom of the falls. But as gravity decrees, had to climb back up again. It was quite a steep climb for an old duck like me, and I am still feeling the results on my legs muscles. Good to put the heart rate up for a little while. But it is beautiful place and not to be missed to avoid a few sore spots. I lost my balance at one stage trying to climb up and landed bum first in a little prickly bush, most uncomfortable, Didn't do much for the little bush either. Ha ha ha.
The forest was full of beautiful wattle trees all in glorious bloom. I think this one is known as black wattle, not for the flowers but for the color of the bark as the tree ages.

Saturday

High in the Brindabellas
where the wattle is in bloom.
Great granite boulders punctuate the landscape
A tangle of deep purple wild hardenbergia
clings to trees and rocks
We walked up hills, climbed down cliffs,
and amongst waterfalls,
And we marveled at the sensation of spring
Nature's imperfect perfection,
that no human landscaper could,
ever duplicate no matter how hard they tried.

Photographs do this beauty no favors, you have to see, smell and feel to experience it.
I hope you all enjoyed your weekend. Thank you for sharing a little bit of mine.
Bye
Love Linda.

Sunday scribblings "Muse & Tomorrow".

2011-09-05T21:36:00.004+10:00

G'day, How are we all?
I am back at the Sunday scribblings site again this week. The last two prompts have been good ones. Last weeks was Muse, and this week's is Tomorrow.
I had such good intentions last week and after looking up the link provided found myself in Wikipedia. I found this excerpt there and really liked it, so I want to share it here.

O Muses, O high genius, aid me now!
O memory that engraved the things I saw,
Here shall your work be manifest to all!

Dante Alighieri, in canto2 of the inferno, Translation by Anthony Esolen.

How many times have we thought that eh?
Sitting at our desks staring at the screen,
Or with brush in hand,
or to solve a problem with another person?
How is it sometimes we find a few appropriate words that describe for us the words or feelings we can not find by ourselves?
Is that "The Muse?"
My Muse? Dunno, nature maybe.
I draw strength and peace from nature and it's beauty.
It's seemingly random perfection and imperfection.
It's everlasting cycles through the seasons that continue to amaze.
No matter how we try to change it nature always wins....eventually.

So Tomorrow.
What am I doing tomorrow, the next day, week, year. Where am I headed.
Tomorrow I clean M's house, then do another five hours cleaning the schools daily, my regular work. Then the next day, W's house. Then Pottery, then shop, clean, work, eat, do it all over again. Trying to expand the parts I enjoy, trudge through the rest. Put money away for short term and longer term plans.
I put a kayak on layby last weekend. I can't wait to get that paid off so I can play with it. Just in time for the warmer months of the year, and enjoy the man made lake that runs through and dominates this beautiful city.

On the television tonight there was a show discussing the question "Is it O.K. to smack your children?"
Today at one of the schools I witnessed something unpleasant. A mother spun around on her child and in a very very nasty voice spoke to the girl, about 9 or 10 years old, saying "If you push me like that again I will ***** smash you in the face!" Another time my son witnessed the same woman, (I think) berating her child because the child had failed to win every race she had been entered into at the sports carnival. This really gets to me because I often see this woman big noting and socializing with the other Mums as if she is the best person around and she obviously has a very different face to show than that which she displays to them.
I may not have been the perfect parent but geez, I never treated any of my children like that.
There are worst things than giving your child a smack. There are longer lasting scars inside that nobody else sees, more damaging than a swift smack. There are occasions when we hear of abuse that goes way past the smacking stage. I am not talking about that because, of course, everyone would agree that is definitely off limits, but a smack or 2, isn't as bad as some things that happen.
Anyway thats my thoughts for today.
Bye.
Love Linda.

Sunday scribblings "Shipwreck"

2011-08-22T22:38:00.004+10:00

G'day,
I Hope my post finds anyone who reads it, well.

Shipwreck?
Quite the ship wreck.
A world lived on the back of a tsunami.
Riding a merry go round.
A roller coaster.
Likely to slide off the wooden horse at speed.
Happy then sad then frustrated then angry.
Back and forth from one to the other.
And each in between.
Can't hurt anyone else, so hurt myself.
Quiet the shipwreck.

My old camera died or otherwise I could share the awakening world moving ever so slowly towards spring and it's new life.There are discoveries daily in my garden. A garden not planted by me, but encouraged with food I have given the earth since living here. Today I cut back the lemon tree at my kitchen window, it leaves were yellowed and dropping. From cold and lack of the right nutrients. I fed it a mixture of trace elements, seaweed extract and iron chelates. I hope it works. It bore lots of lovely fruit to share, but was looking very ill.
How analogous is that.
Popping up through the still cold soil in the front yard are bulbs. Tiny Tete-a Tete daffodils. fresh, golden and perfect in their display and some lovely hellebores, white, pink and dark, dark, purple. There are also tulips coming up around the place, not flowering as yet, grape hyacinth, daffodils and jonquils which are yet to burst into bloom. Bring on the warm sun.....please. I have planted poppies, yarrow, stocks, onions, veges, herbs and bits and bods around the yard too.
The roses have been pruned and their buds are forming up nicely. I have sprayed them for black spot along with the peach, nectarine and plum trees in the back yard which suffered from brown rot and leaf curl so cruelly last summer. You are supposed to spray the fruit trees at bud swell, their flowers are ready to pop open at any day so I hope they are better this season. At least I know that the yard and it's plants in this rented house are being cared for better now than when we first moved here.
The cherry trees and pears which are espaliered against the back fence are yet to be sprayed because the development of their buds is not at bud swell stage as yet. It might be a few more weeks before they begin to fatten and want to bloom.
I spent last night browsing through the gardening Australia web site, being inspired and learning how to do things with the plants I have, appropriate to this time of year. It is such a good place to spend some time and always gives me a smile. I take comfort in a way, that I do actually know some things and enjoy a refreshing of old knowledge in a subject that I love as well as learning more.
Yesterday, Sunday, Pete and I went for a drive to Goulburn to try to find his father's and grand parent's graves. We walked around and up and down the isles of head stones before asking a couple of other people there where that catholic sections were, to be told we were at the wrong cemetery all together. After a short drive we did find Nanna Lander and Pete's dad's graves. We spent some time scrubbing off old dirt and mold from their marble head stones with water stolen from rain filled vases on nearby graves. Then we left some of the little daffodils from the front garden and came back home. Something different to do on a cold afternoon I guess.
I was feeling that they deserved much more than a bare looking cement slab top with a moldy white marble headstone and we were planning to go back there with some some hand made ceramic tiles to decorate them with. I lay awake last night planning designs and glaze colors. But then we found that there are rules and regulations set in place by the local council that say we can not do anything to their graves without special permission and approval from them. So....even in death we are owned by rules. Hmmmm.
I have bought myself a new camera but have not learned to use it yet. When I work it out, with my dear son's help, I will be able to share in here again. The new camera is supposed to be faster, hold more, be good in low light, even be easy to use, has better zoom and more pixels etc etc etc, or so the sales person said. Which is.... as yet, to be proven to me with my limited technological abilities.
That's all for now.
Linda.

Sting - RUSSIANS (Live in Moscow)

2011-08-07T21:43:00.000+10:00

G'Day again,
I posted this second song to go along with the previous song I put in here by Billy Joel.
It says more along the same vein as the other. Maybe we could direct the sentiments towards the war against terrorism and the way some interpret their religion, namely some branches of the extremists Muslim religion.
We have been through the same scenario many many times throughout history.
WHY!
Will we never learn?

Billy Joel - Leningrad

2011-08-07T21:28:00.000+10:00

G'Day, G'Day, G'Day,
Someone I know in blogland said something about Billy Joel the other day.
Anyway, this is a favorite song of mine by him. If you have a listen to the words you will see why it stirs deep feelings within me. It never fails to bring a tear to my eye.
I don't like politics much and this song is a lot about that. However the underlying feeling that I get from it is .....
We are all human.
We all are the same.
We have the same set of needs where ever we live.
We love our kids, we want to get along with others...

maybe that is a big sweeping statement on my part.
Anyway I do.
I want to get along with the Russians, the Jews, the japs, the other peoples that we have fought with over our recent history.
Political or religious differences placed aside.
That's what the song is about.

Nowadays there are so many hurts between the Muslims and the other religions of the world.
Lashing out and kicking at people who are different to ourselves is causing much pain. And that takes a long long time to forgive.
The song is about making peace with enemies.
Or am I just another dreamer. A female's perspective to the worlds problems. Can they be solved by love. Can we forgive. We must.

Just back.

2011-07-31T20:38:00.006+10:00

G'Day,
Yep we have been to the south coast again. These next few pictures were all taken this morning of Foxglove Spires garden at Tilba Tilba, south of Bateman's bay. I have been here before, years ago when the kids were small, but as is commonplace at that life stage, we didn't have the spare pennies to pay the entry price to go into the gardens to look around. Today we did. Oh they are so beautiful. Even in winter time. The owners sure have pulled off a coup showing their beauty and potential at this time of year. I must try to go back in a few months when everything is in bloom for spring. They would be wonderful then. I couldn't take many photos today because I think the memory card in my camera is going to die soon because it kept saying that the memory was full and even when I deleted some of the pics it wouldn't change and let me take more so...I really will have to go back, won't I.
Ok pic above is of Arum lilies at the gardens.
This is an iris. I have the same plant again at home in a large pot. My beautiful potting friend Kath Breed gave me a piece of it years ago. Here in Canberra it is colder, so mine is no where near flowering yet.
The gardens there are so lovely, down each pathway and around every corner are secret places to discover, to sit and soak up the view and contemplate. There was a for sale sign out the front, so If you have the money I am sure you could buy it for me,,, nah on second thoughts the present owners work would be too hard to live up to. I do so want a garden of my own again but not 3.2 hectares of it to look after. Hehehe.
Meadows of bulbs, scented with daphne and violets. Flower buds just beginning to swell with their promise of perfect spring colors to come.

Pathways that draw you down and around the next corner to discover a new vista.

And many woven archways and corridors , now bare branches but soon to be covered in flower, then cool green swathed tunnels in summer.
One of the things so nice about living here in Canberra is the access we have to wonderful places to see. We are close to the beaches, close to the bush, close to the snow and also close to the big smoke, Sydney. All within a few short hours drive. We drove down the King's highway, east to the coast at Bateman's bay, then turned south along the coast. We usually turn north from there, but this time we had a change. I have over the years been along all these roads before, but it is nice to recount old places and we have not been that way for years.
I may be biased but I still think that north of Bateman's bay is my favorite. But south of there is nice too, just rockier and smaller beaches mostly.
Anyway we visited some of the little towns in the area. Tuross Heads district; beautiful lakes there. Mirror surfaced and filled with tiny fishes seen from the boathouse wharf where we lunched on fish and chips, of course, what else would you eat in such a place.
Stayed overnight in a small motel at Narooma. We parked my little car right at the door of the suite and Rufus (our Jack Russell doggie) slept in the car. Had dinner at O'Brien's pub just down the road. Rufus enjoyed his doggie bag, lamb shank bones. Was funny though the bones were gone this morning, I guess a wandering doggie or a crow or some such, found them and cleaned them away for us. Sunday morning dawned damp but the rain soon disappeared.
This pic above is of a tangle of bushes at the bottom of the cliff face at Narooma. They looked like a great hiding place for kids to hide and play, they are most likely hollowed out underneath, as a pathway for animals to make their way down onto the beach below.
These two pictures are of a weathered rock formation on the beach at Narooma. It is called Australia rock, the reason for this, on viewing is obvious.
As my camera wasn't doing what it should so that is all of the pics I was able to share.
We also had a dawdle around Tilba village and visited the cheese factory and lolly shop there and of course, who could resist those, We didn't. The village is heritage listed and full of little craft and gift shops. We drove down further through Cobargo, and Bega down to Tathra where we stopped in a park beside the beach and cooked a BBQ lunch. Then had a bit of walk along the beach and a coffee on the footpath at the local bakery. We have been very naughty all weekend with our eating habits. Lollies, fried foods etc.
I will be good again tomorrow. ....I will!
Traveled home via Cooma. The traffic was substantial, with strings of cars heading home wards from the snow. Oh My God what do some of them think they are doing driving that way they do. I know they want to get home quickly but it would be nice if they got home in one piece, which was doubtful considering the risks some of them were taking. Bloody idiots. I saw some overtaking in very dangerous places with other cars coming towards them, tailgaters, even a semi tailgating a learner rider on a small motorbike, who nervously kept looking behind him but wouldn't pull over and let the truck pass. Temporary Australians, shame they might take someone else with them though.
Anyway. Must get myself a new memory card for my camera.
Bye.
Love Linda.

Change of direction.

2011-07-24T17:20:00.002+10:00

G'Day,
Just thought I would pop in here and add a post to record what I have been doing this week. I have had a bit of a change in direction during the week. A compulsion to pick up a paint brush and take my scribblings one step further than bits and scraps of paper scribbled on.
So...what led me here?
On Thursday afternoon I went with a group of Potter's society members to the National Gallery here in Canberra for a guided tour of the indigenous art galleries and a talk and display in their study room of some ceramics held by the gallery of work by indigenous artists.
The first few pics added here are of a large ball placed near the entrance of the gallery done by an artist I have long loved and whom has inspired me with her works. In the study room we were given a talk which was mostly centered on her. We got to see and discuss about 5 of her pots not on display at the moment plus some other works.
She died earlier this year and as is custom after an aboriginal person's death, we should not say her tribal name. I don't know is that applies to writing it, as I do here. The plaque actually says she is called Thapich, which translated in her language is "that person". I always knew her by her other name, Thancoupie, which I have also seen spelt as Thanakupi. Her Mission name is Gloria Fletcher. The tour guide at the gallery gave 2 explanations of the reason for this. First one was that it would disturb her soul from concentrating on it's rest and the second possible reason was given as, If we don't say that person's name, we have to concentrate on not doing that, so we are thinking of them.
She began her study at east Sydney tech in the very early 70"s, so she was in Sydney the same time as me. She came to Sydney from the far north of Australia to study arts and came to love clay work, though that was not her original intention in studying arts. The custom of her people was that women did not work with clay, it was only men who were meant to do that, it was something done by men in their ceremonial practices and therefore sacred. So she had to go home to Weipa and talk to the elders and get their permission to work in clay, which, as reported, was quite a feat for a woman to achieve. It must have taken a lot of persuasion on her part to get them to bypass their traditional taboo and allow her to do that. Anyway she got her permission, and went back to study in Sydney with no other than Peter Rushforth (also recently deceased) and Shiga Shigeo, two people at the pinnacle of pottery here in this country. Wow, I wish I could have done that.
Gloria used her pottery pieces to tell her traditional stories, using the animals and symbols of her area. As aboriginal art does, of course, but Gloria did it in 3d, something that was pioneering work in indigenous art circles.
I walked around the sphere at the front of the gallery to show the different sides of the huge work. The ball is made from aluminium, a material she also chose to work with because, she said that where she comes from, Weipa is a bauxite mining area so she felt that working in aluminium made her closer to the country she came from.

Below is the plaque for the large sphere sculpture. I was not allowed to photograph the works inside the study room to share.
So on Saturday morning I went back to the gallery to purchase a book she had written and had another look at the indigenous galleries. Fantastic. Love that style of art. I was looking at some lino prints there and was thinking that the style of those was akin to some of my paper scribblings. Which, I think have been developing more lately and I have been spending more time playing with pens, textas and paper so I thought I would give it a try. Not to copy them, but to develop my stuff along that style. I have been playing a lot with sgraffito on my pots and the patterns I have done on some of them have been transferred from my scribblings, so I tried it with brushes in 3d. The next 3 photos are what has come from this over the last 3 days.
This one is called "Jump, Fly" It is sort of about getting out of a situation by flying over it. See the figure's feet are being hurt, so it grew wings to go above that. I did this today, it took me about 4 hours.
The scribble above is sort of about tree growing in rocky ground but surviving and what lies below that.
And... this one is called Pods. I find kurrajong seed pods keep popping up in my scribblings a lot. I did this one yesterday and last night.
I bought an a4 size pad of nice paper and some acrylic inks and acrylic paints to play with. Maybe they would look nice mounted between sheets of clear perspex? I dunno. I like them though. They are a bit weird, like me. Double click on the pics to enlarge.
Other than that....
I am still here, under difficulty but hoping for better. Idiot that I am.
Bye.
Love Linda.

Just because..

2011-06-13T18:11:00.002+10:00

Cold Baby.

G'Day,
I haven't been in my blog for a while, as you can see from the date of my previous post in here. I am bad. I do so enjoy scribbling in here. I have been lazy, and busy, cold and working, tired and full up with other people and my house and family. Same as all women I guess. Anyway. Here I am.
I visited Josie's blog this afternoon and she has inspired me to write about my everyday. So what I did today.
This morning I stayed in bed. Lovely on cold mornings. I had my son's latest beau stay over night and he had to take her to work this morning. They didn't tell me what time she was to start so about 7.00 this morning i was thinking, Hm mm how to handle this one. She had previously told me that she started work early in the mornings, but today was a public holiday. I got up and decided that I would move around the house and make a bit of noise to wake them up discreetly without actually going into the room and disturbing them, so I flushed the toilet, walked up the hall scratched around in the kitchen and put the pots and fry pan away from last night's washing up. Turned the kitchen tap on and off a few times. Nope! no response. I went back down the hallway and popped back into bed to get warm watching the clock thinking "oh come on, don't be so silly" so I went and knocked on the door. Her starting time 10.30. Hahaha. Sorry kids.
Pete and I stayed in bed until a bit before 10.00 when I remembered that today was the day that there was a one day sale out at Watson for well known wood fire potter and his wife, Ian and Moraig Jones of Gundaroo, who had lost their home recently in a fire.
I had wanted to go and have a look because pots were donated by some very well known (big name) established potters from around the country and locally. There was some great work there. I really wanted to hear the opening of the exhibition by Janet Mansfield, if you are a potter, How's that for name dropping? Haha. What a wonderful gracious lady. She even made some small talk with me about a pot we were admiring.
Well we got there late and missed that. We went through the exhibition and I drooled over some of the luscious pottery and glazes there, but of course the ones that I drooled over were the ones I could not afford to buy. Didn't take my camera. They were very pleased with the turnout and much of the pottery was sold very very soon after the exhibition was opened.
Had a cuppa and a scone then I snuck out the back to the workrooms and checked up on some work that I had made a few weeks earlier and couldn't get back to on my usual Thursday pottery group day for the next few weeks because of extra work commitments. They were still soft enough to work with. I had this idea of little milk jugs with the handles cut from around the rim of the pot and bent down to form the handles. You know? one of those ideas that goes through your mind at 3.00 in the morning during a sleepless night when you can't seem to shut your whirring mind down no matter how hard you try. There were 6 of them. Three I wasn't pleased with so they went back into the clay bucket. The other 3 I played around with a bit. I liked the look of them but am not quite sure of the handle's functionality. They need more smoothing and finishing yet before I decide if they go back in the recycled clay buckets.
From there Peter and I decided that we would go over to have a look in the camping type shop there, at the kayaks. We both love kayaks/ canoes and have wanted a single one each to play with for quite a while now. Canberra is a good place for them with Lake Burley Griffin running through the middle of the city giving lots of lovely quiet water to play in. We saw a few we liked, which will give us a better idea of what we want when it eventually comes time that we can get them.
Went home via Manuka whee we were hoping to go to Zeffirelli's for a yummy pizza lunch but it was closing just as we got there so we missed out. A few doors down from there we went into a bakery and got a pie, cake and coffee for lunch instead. Was nice but nothing special as our taste buds had been awaiting those nice pizza's at Zeffirelli's. Oh well. On the way out of the underground car park I couldn't see the guttering because of the angle of the driveway and scraped my poor little car's tyres on the divider, Grrr!
Got home and sat on my bum in front of face book and brought my farm ville games up to date. Made inane comments to my friends posts etc. wasted time in general.
Went out the back to the garden and picked some nice silver beet leaves and said G'day to Fiona next door. Came in and prepared the silver beet to make into a spinach and fetta pie for tea. that's about it.
During that last few weeks I have been very boring. Much the same as always. Work, home, sleep, merry-go round type of thing. Our Boss Brett bought Michael and I a pair of redback work boots on Thursday last week so I am now legal to go onto construction sites for work. I look really pretty in my high visibility lime green vest, my hard hat and big boots. Yep!
My Mum who has been here with us since just before Christmas went back to Queensland on Friday morning to stay with my sister for what remains of the cold weather. We have , or more correctly, my sister has decided that it would be best all round if she were to go there for the cold weather and here for the warm weather, so we both know when we will will have her and when our breaks are coming. Poor old thing, it isn't fun being old. It is hard all round.
Anyway. After my break from writing, if you want to call my scribblings in here that, I am back.
Bye again......for now.
Love Linda.

Monday Memories. Family members.

2011-05-16T11:48:00.001+10:00

G'Day,
Monday memories prompt site asks us to share a memory each week. This weeks suggestion was to write about a family member.
I choose more than one. I choose my Aunties and Uncles.
I have been lucky in my life to have quite a few family members whom I identify with. My Uncles and Aunties being amongst them.
My Dad's only sister My Aunty Marion whom I loved and whom I think I am a bit like. An earth mother. I hope so anyway. I have written about her on several occasions here in my Blog.
She lived on a 5 acre block on the river bank in a small town in the Hunter valley of New South Wales. My father's birthplace, Merriwa. A life style like that would be my choice if I ever could afford a bit of land and house of my own again. But really, the material things that remind us of passed loved ones are not the things we remember best about them. It is their personal attributes and influence that we try to follow by choice in our own lives.
I loved that she was the kind of person who could not turn away a person in need. That is something I have failed to accomplish, for fear of consequence.
I loved that she was a real worker. That is something that I think I have succeeded at, no matter how unpleasant the work attempted. Ethics and hard work.
She loved her plants and animals and rocks and walks and maybe I inherited those loves of mine from her.
I loved that she stayed in the one house for ever. Something I would love to be able to do, ah well my life is not finished yet is it. I guess that you could call that a yearning for stability. I am between two worlds on that one though. Wanting to explore my country as well as have that home base stability. I don't think she ever traveled much from her own local area during her life.
She influenced me with her jam and pickle making, I love to do that and I hate to see the things I have grown go to waste and want to preserve them. This past season I made fig jam, sweet mustard pickles, bread and butter pickles from cucumber and saved herb and flower seeds to replant next spring when it warms up again. All from the produce in my garden.
Other Aunts and Uncles.
Uncle Bill for his quiet strength and family values.
Uncle Wal for his adventure, quirkiness and love.
Aunty Joan for her acceptance of me and her sociability.
Uncle Roger for his stoicism.
Uncle Charlie for his sense of humor and cuteness, my Dad's twin.
Aunty Marg for her amiability.
Love them all, and others whom I didn't get to spend as much time with due to distance or other reasons. Uncles and Aunties are a definitive influence in our lives. I hope one day I might be thought of as that by some of my family.
And the world turns.
Bye. Love Linda.

Memories on Monday "Food"

2011-05-11T20:35:00.003+10:00

G'Day,
Monday Memories requests we write about Food.
Yep,
have that ,
done that,
over done that,
need that,
enjoy that.
Too much food.
It shows.

A memory of special food came to my mind of when my parents took us to Singapore. I was 13 when we moved there and we stayed for just under a year and a half. My Dad was in the Australian army and the year was 1972. It was just after he returned from Vietnam. We found out later that a trip on active duty was a pre-requisite to a posting to Singapore and he had wanted us girls to experience another lifestyle and country. We had lived in Malaysia as babies but of course had no memory of that time. So off we went. I was christened in Penang, but that is another story.
Singapore to us was a gourmet paradise. So many wonderful foods to try, and we did! We had some friends amongst the local community and they introduced us to wonderful food. Food from the night markets and street side stalls. We were warned that those places were unsafe and we should not eat food from them. But... we did and loved it without any ill effects. The satay stalls along the waterfront across from the Padang. Oh Yum, hot spicy and delicious. The market down on Orchard road that was in a big car park, only at night, full of great stalls of all kinds, and all cooked on site in front of you while you waited. The steamboat, cooked in a simmering silvery stockpot in the middle of a rickety table on fold up chairs, in a skinny crowded lane way with light bulbs hanging over head.
There was a big open air eating area near our friend's flat. We often went there for noodles or soup, and I always got sugar cane juice. That was crushed through a thing like an old fashioned washing machine wringer. I tasted it many years later in Sydney and thought it was foul stuff, but when we lived there I loved it. Ricky Wong was our hosts name, and my sister went out with him for a while. Anyway his family adopted us and took us lots of places when we lived there. They would send their driver in a big black Mercedes around to chauffeur my sister and I when we went out. I remember sinking down into it's soft leather seats. Talk about hospitality. Ricky's elder brother Anthony became my big brother, hehe. His Mum and sister used to ooh and ahh over my whiter than white skin and pinch it. Not the sort of skin a teenage girl wants, I never could tan, but to them it was a novelty. Lovely times to remember.
Ricky and Anthony took us to a street vendor stall once and we tasted real birds nest, not the fried noodle type that you usually get called bird's nest. Real bird's nest is just that, birds nest. It is a particular type of bird that makes it's nest from it's dried saliva, very rare and expensive.
I remember once Anthony took me to a huge banquet with him and I was shocked and horrified to learn there was a room out the back of the restaurant. When you were too full you went out there to vomit so you could go back and have more to eat. And No! I didn't use it. The trick was to have just a tiny taste of each course offered and there were many courses. I think there were 20 something. It was the custom to eat and enjoy food offered by your host and to not do so was an insult to them. Also it was a compliment to burp at the table because that meant that you were enjoying your food and also that you left the scraps on the table cloth and made a mess because that meant that you were enjoying your food too. Those table cloths were snowy white and perfectly starched.
We lived in Changi when we were there, in the area that is now part of the Singapore airport. They started building that after we left there.
Just a few blocks from our house and around the corner was the infamous Changi prison. The same one my poor Uncle Roger was held as a prisoner during WW2, before being sent to Burma to work on the Thai Burma railway. He survived and came home, many didn't, he was never a well man due to illness from that part of his life though. I went to a party in there once. Inside the prison. The guards used to live on site. The party we went to was one of the guards children. Dancing and loud 70's teen music.
Anyway, we would hop on the bus and go down to Changi village and there was a curry house type shop down there that we loved. Mum would send us down there to get take away curry. When we went to the village to shop ,we used to go to that curry place and get a bowl of curry gravy and a paratha and tear bits of it up and dip it into the gravy and eat it. We got some looks off the locals until they got used to seeing us around. Or sometimes just have that paratha with lemon and sugar on it. Paratha are India bread type things, sort of like a buttery flaky big pancake, cooked on the griddle. Changi village does not exist anymore. I remember the little wharf there too with those old boats that went out and came back each day with their catch. They didn't look very seaworthy.
And the markets. We would go there to buy our vegetables and fruit. Smells and sights and sounds and colors and, and, and, wonderful. We would buy rambutans, lychees, pawpaws and jackfruits straight from the farmer.
Live animals at the markets were slaughtered on the spot and taken home with you , many didn't have refrigeration so it had to be fresh. Live chickens and other poultry, seafoods, we used to buy big live crabs and take them home and our Amah would cook for us.
There was, (reputedly though it may have been a story to shock us girls), a place in China town where you could go and eat monkey brains while the monkey was still kicking. Ew! Well if it was only a story to scare us , it worked.
Dad , Mum and us girls had a favorite restaurant that was down by the beach at Changi. It was called the South China Seas restaurant. It had great food and was open on three sides, under a big tin roof . We loved to go there and sit by the water and watch the sunset and have our meals. They had the best chilli crab there. I remember that we always had chilli crab. Mmmmmm Yummy. Then we would walk along the beach. The beach being just a narrow strip of sand littered with coconut trees and their associated debris, but it was still a beach and quite close to home for us to get to, a short taxi ride.
I loved to go down to Changi beach and had some friends at the kampong there. I went out with a boy called Ringo, a Malay boy and when I went to his house one day his mum was all dressed up because I was coming and served us tea and tiny cakes on a decorated tray. I was honored. Ringo died in a motor bike accident at the age of just 17 when I was there. I have a lifelong fear or motor bikes and never got on his bike with him. He used to follow the bus I was on and meet me where I got off the bus. Hehe. We would go across the road to the beach and have coconut drinks straight from the coconut. Little boys would climb the trees and cut them down. Then the vendor would chop off the top with a machete, mush it around a bit to cut some of the soft pulp inside then serve it straight from the shell with a straw sticking out the top. Then we would hire little canoe boats and float on the water in them. I loved that. I still love canoes. I remember the sun beaming down and the little canoe, floating, rocking gently with me laying down inside it. Beautiful. Just beautiful.
About a block and a half from our house was another kampong that had a funny little shop. I used to go in there and get the home made ice blocks and tins of jam that was made with eggs and orange and had a strange kind of creamy texture. I guess that is not there anymore either.
I also remember buying these funny pickled sweet and sour apricots from street vendors that I loved but they always made me cough, they almost took my breath away, god knows what preservative they were made with. Another strange snack, bought in little packets, was dried salted cuttle fish that you could chew on for ages and made your breath stink, but tasted very good. I wonder if I would like that if I tasted it now I am an adult. Hehe.
And the chewing gum was called chiclets. And the soft drinks came out of a bottle and were poured into a plastic bag at the shop, they kept the bottle, with a plastic pull string at the top which when pulled shut acted as handles, with a straw sticking out the top.
We also ate dried salted sunflower and pumpkin seeds for snacks. Don't know if I am spelling this right, but we called them kwachi seeds. Good because you had to shell them as you ate them so they took a long while to eat.
Sometimes while we were waiting for the school bus in the mornings an old man would come riding along on his bicycle with a tin box type thing on the side of it and we would buy little bundles of rice, topped with some type of salty dried fish stuff and wrapped up in banana leaves to form a little triangle thing. They were yummy too, but very hot with quite a dose of chilli in them. We took them to school for our lunch. Another old man also came around on his bike selling hot buttered corn on the cob from the back of it. We often bought that too.
At the cricket club in the city they made big platters of fried rice topped with chilli, so so hot, burn your mouth out. Hehe. But we ate all that stuff then. I still have fads every now and then for things with chilli. We often went there with Dad when he played cricket at the Padang and another club in town that I can't remember the name of. It was a life time ago. Singapore has modernised and changed so much since those days.
When we came back to Australia there was Asian food available but nothing of the quality that I had experienced in Singapore. Of course now things have improved. Cities having their own areas where you can get great Asian foods. When we came back to australia we went to visit Wagga (a country town) and were taken to Choy's, the only chinese restaurant in the whole of Wagga. It was very popular and well patronized by the locals, but it served what I came to know as Australian Chinese food. Dumbed down for Australian palates. Nothing like the real stuff. The Malay, Chinese, Indian, Nonya food of Singapore.
We have caught up I am pleased to say, in many ways. In and around the westfield shopping area at nearby Woden town center where we live now, are a plethora of multi cultural foods to be experienced. Very good.
That's all for now.
Bye.
Love Linda.

Sunday Scribblings "May"

2011-05-09T21:08:00.004+10:00

G'Day,
Sunday Scribblings prompt this week is "May". Well! That's my middle name.
My sisters were both born in the month of may.That makes it a significant month, doesn't it?
Plus in my part of the world, the month of may heralds autumn.
These few photos were taken late last week around my own back yard.
The above picture is of the nasturtiums I planted in my vegetable garden. Over the last few days they have withered from the first frosts of the season. I planted them as companions to the veges, but at this present moment have forgotten their particular use. But I really did plant them for... um? Can't remember.
I am watching a show at the moment on ABC talking about IQ and race. I used to get high scores when I was young with those tests, believe it or not. Mine has dropped with age, I am sure. Lol.
May is mother's day and mother's day in Australia is accompanied by beautiful chrysanthemums. These brilliant gold ones are flowering merrily at the moment in my back yard. I didn't plant them , so I can't take credit, but they are still lovely. There are a bunch of them right in front of me now on the desk.
May is autumn and with that comes harvest of the last summer growing vegetables from my garden. I grew great butternut pumpkins this year. However the original owner of this house treated his soil, it sure was great. The biggest ones must weigh 6 kgs or more.

The bright sunlit leaves on this big tree brighten my day, it drops mess all over our cars when we park out the front underneath its branches. The seed pods roll under my feet when I walk there and are quite a hazard. But it sure is pretty isn't it. Canberra is known for it's autumn colour. In the summer time, this tree gives shade and shelter and in the winter it lets the sun shine through. I think it is one of the maples, is it?
Over the last week the temperatures have been dropping dramatically towards wintertime. The wind was cold all day today when I was working around the yard. I cut back the strawberries and worked on tidying the potted plants,and trimmed and tied the espaliered pears tree on the back fence. I do enjoy filling my lungs with the cooler crisp air of autumn, which is more pleasant than the hot dry air of high summer isn't it. Each season holds its own pleasures.
May your May be lovely,
Where ever you May live.
Cheers.
Linda May.

Sunday Scribblings "Cake"

2011-05-04T07:59:00.002+10:00

G'day,
Sunday Scribblings prompt this week is "Cake".
I am sitting here eating my breakfast as I type this. Wondering.
When will it be your turn
when will you get to eat your cake again.
Weighted down by responsibility and duty
That nobody else wants to have to comply to
the wheel turns slowly
if it spun any faster you would fall off the edge
So you wait for the circle to return to you

Sometimes I feel like I have spent my whole life pandering to everybody's needs except my own.
When will it be my turn.
Or is that just life in general.
In my case shut up and put up.

Bye
Love Linda

Sunday Scribblings "Shine".

2011-04-26T16:03:00.004+10:00

G'Day,
Sunday Scribblings prompt site this week has given us the prompt word "Shine".
I went away over night for the Easter break to the south coast of New South Wales.
Peter was given tickets to see Bob Dylan at Woolongong for his birthday so we got to see the sea and Bobby too. Bob Dylan is approaching his 70th year. Or so I was told. I liked the way he always changes and does not give what is expected of him. Free thinker and performer.
While Peter and I were away we had a lovely wander around and explored some of the high lights of the area. The city and beaches, the countryside in general and crafty shops. We also visited the Nan Tien temple which is at Woolongong and is the biggest Buddhist temple in the southern hemisphere. Very very impressive.
We stopped in at a roadside pottery and had a lovely and informative talk with the potter and his wife .Roger and Pauline Graham. What a lovely way for them to spend their retirement years, running a pottery, sharing their work and knowledge with people dropping in to visit.
As you have seen before in here, I love the south coast. It is so clean and fresh and lovely. The beaches and the bush. It shines, it really does. Nature's treasure.
The photo above is one taken of a rock pool sparkling in the sun, probably a month ago at Lake Tabourie. I live for my short trips to the coast, just a few hours drive from here.
The next picture is of a small beach near a seaside town called Vincentia. Blenheim beach. Taken on Easter Sunday on our way home. Encompassing pure, whiter than white sand and the clear turquoise waters of Jervis bay. Jervis bay is actually bigger than Sydney harbour and was under consideration as a site for what is now Sydney. I think they decided it was too shallow or something. I can't remember. But it is a beautiful spot.
Poppies. Bright and shining in the sun. Sunlight highlighting their beauty.
My husband shines . At work he has been given the honor of being called "Uncle" by the indigenous people who are there. A big honor for him and he is very proud to have it.

Shine sun shine
as the seasons cycle
soon it will be cold
but still you shine

Give us life sun
and heat our days
warm from the cold
until spring returns again

Bye
Love Linda.

Monday Memories. "Food...shopping"

2011-04-22T12:12:00.002+10:00

G'Day,
I am back in here today to add my two Bob's worth to the Monday Memories prompt.
Just an addition to that last sentence," 2 Bob's worth" is an old Aussie saying. It harks back to the time of pre-decimal currency. What is equivalent to todays 20 cent piece was called 2 shillings, or 2 bob. So translate as "my 20 cents worth".
When I was 8 years old we were living in Darwin at the army base there. We lived in Darwin for 2 and a half years. It was called Larrakeyah Barracks, anyway there was a asko shop there that was run inside the camp for the army families. It sold a bit of everything. Groceries, gifts, tools even. We would go there with my Mum and of course ogle over the selection of lollies placed strategically near the check out, just to tempt children and hassle their parents into buying them to shut their children up, get a bit of peace and therefore out of the shop and back home quicker. Ha ha.
On a high shelf in the shop was a bright yellow plastic kick board. It was bigger than the normal size kick boards. The lady at the shop had seen me eyeing it off each time I went in there and one day she got it down for me to look at. It was about the same height as I was, something more like the size or today's boogie boards. Oh how I wanted that board. I wanted it so bad. The lady let me put a deposit of my pocket money on it and I eagerly waited for the day when I had it paid off and could take it into the pool on the barracks and float on it and kick around in the pool with it. I wanted that board so bad! I paid every cent I got into paying it off. In those days you were able to collect 5 cents for each glass soft drink bottle you took back to the shop. So I scavenged at all the cricket games my Dad played at the weekends for them too. That poor lady at the shop, I must have driven her mad taking my collected change in and her having to add up everything until my beloved board was paid in full and I was able to take it home with me. I was so so proud of myself, what a big achievement I had accomplished. Ha ha ha. I kept that board for years. I grew taller than it and I think by memory I eventually gave it to some other little kid who loved it, or....I hope they did.
The other memory that came straight to mind from this prompt was when I was 11 years old and living in Sydney. My Dad was in Vietnam at the time and my job was to do the grocery shopping. We lived probably 3 blocks from the local shops at Bondi road and Mum would give me $20 to go down there. She used to say that I got more for her $20 that the shop keepers gave her. We had a butcher shop on the corner and a small general store there too. We bought our meat at the butchers and other basics from the corner shop but the bigger choice and better prices were to be found elsewhere.
So proudly I would trot off down the road and do my duty. First stop was the fruit and vegetable shop on the corner, run by a Greek family. They knew me well and I would carefully choose my goods, checking them off my list and adding a few extra bits along the way.
Laden heavily, I would then struggle up the road about a block and a half into the grocery shop. It was a funny little shop, an old fashioned, dull overly cluttered version of today's big bright supermarkets. Probably a quarter the size of them, but everything was there.
My treat, in those days on the T.V. heavily advertised was a product called "Lolly Gobble Bliss Bombs". Ha ha ha. What a name. Each week I was allowed to buy a box of them, if I had change left over, to take home to share. They were popcorn coated with toffee and nuts. They were so yummy. I always made sure there was enough change for a packet. Then I would struggle home like a mini pack horse, back to the flat we were living in. I remember the bags cutting into my hands they were so heavy, my fingers felt like they were about to fall off and turned purple. I often had to stop on the foot path, and put the bags down to relieve my hands for a few minutes. I can also remember being scared if someone walked up behind me. And thinking if I just pretend to go in that house there they will think that is where I live and they won't hurt me. Nothing ever happened to me though. But I was nervous. I would day dream for more change on the way home, I would be rich enough to catch a Taxi who would carry my heavy bags home for me and ease my hurt hands.
I loved that job though. I was proud of my talent at doing the the weekly shop. I was learning and got a sense of having achieved something useful for my mum , sister and I.
Oh and that butcher shop on the corner. Many times, on our tight budget of those days, we would have to buy the very cheapest cuts of meat. Meat that is now back in fashion, like tripe or lamb shanks and sausages, but in those days wasn't. The butcher used to make good old fashioned sausages.
Many meals, and one we loved, were as simple and cheap as pancakes with golden syrup or lemon and sugar. Novelty added by cooking them in the electric frying pan on the lounge room floor with us girls crowded over it, waiting for the next batch to be cooked. I did this myself for my own children when we were broke and had no money to buy much else, but they always were fed. Nothing cheaper than pancakes to feed the kids and make them happy. Flour, milk , a bit of butter, you can even make them without the egg if you haven't got one.
When my Dad came home from Vietnam on leave, he went down the corner to the butcher and ordered a couple of boxes of his sausages. The butcher froze them for him so he could take them back to Vietnam when he went, as you couldn't get Aussie style sausages over there. hahaha. He was very popular with the boys for doing that.
I still enjoy shopping. My Mum lives with me on and off and she spoils my fun because her mind is not working as it used to anymore. She gets annoyed with me and can be quite sarcastic if I try to go the shops without her. She goes into withdrawal to spend her money. When she gets in the super market she goes into sensory over load becoming all excited by the products on offer. She took an hour and a half to go through the Woolworths shop down the road from here the other day. She calls me back and forwards and if I try to hurry her up by walking in front of her she calls me back to ask me if we need her latest wonderful grocery discovery. Her favorite products, which she can't be persuaded to leave the shop without are Cuppa soups, lemonade, lollies , biscuits and cakes. Arrrrrrgh! I am sure by the look on my face when I have to take her to the supermarket, everyone must think I am the meanest most horrible daughter there ever was.
Oh well, one day I will be 89 years old...if I am lucky...or maybe not so lucky.
Bye for now.
Love Linda.

Sunday scribblings "Design"

2011-04-18T19:29:00.002+10:00

G'day again,
Sunday in most or the world is Monday here. Monday evening to be precise. So time to play with the Sunday Scribblings prompt word for this week.

DESIGN

This bit goes there
That one over here
No let me change that
Ah that is better
Now where does this piece belong?

Stand back and look
Twist, poke, prod, straighten, stroke
Add another piece of clay
Play with your imagination
Does this work?

Design is something I enjoy playing with in clay. Clay has the advantage of being three dimensional. Not flat like pencil or paint on paper.
Design covers form, function and decoration. Heaps of fun to play with. You can choose to concentrate on one of these elements or use them together in different combinations. A balanced design.
I have recently had discussion at pottery with another potter on perfection. She is a purist and has everything just so. Tied up so tight that there is no room for a mistake. If there is an imperfection in something she makes it goes back in the recycling bucket to be worked up and reused again later. I guess that makes for a better potter than I am. It annoys me though. Everything fresh and new and perfect annoys me. I love the subtle imperfections of hand made items. If you want something perfect you can go to a shop and buy it. Pottery shouldn't have to be perfect.
I have driven through newly built suburbs and admired the houses, but when you take a second look, what have they got to add to individuality. I want to dirty them , muss them up, shake and ruffle them a bit. Give them some character.
There is a Japanese type thingy called Sabi Wabi. It recognizes and finds the beauty in imperfection. Nature has no straight lines and is not perfect. It does not need to be to work, and in that, there is a particular type of perfection.
I don't like that we get so tied up trying to be perfect when we should , by our own, and natures design, accept that we are all imperfect.
We can improve on elements but why do we have to turn ourselves inside out to do it. Surely there is enough pressure to conform.
That is all.
Bye
Love Linda.

Monday Memories, Costumes?

2011-04-16T18:44:00.003+10:00

G'Day,
I have just been reading through the Monday memories contributors posts and enjoying them , which leads me to.....
I was remembering when my sisiter Ellen and I were very small. Costumes we didn't really have, that I can remember but we had a song that we would sing together in the bath tub. Hahaha. We had a record a 45 rpm that was called "The tales of Mrs Twiggy Winkle." On the record was a funny little song, to my long ago memory, it said "Bright and clean, Bright and clean, clean as we have ever been,we have never ever been so bright and clean". We would jump out of the bath tub and run through the house singing it with bath bubbles still clinging and dripping across the floor as we sung. I remember our parents laughing and chasing us with a towel to dry us off. Hahaha.
Oh I am loving this prompt, now where did that memory come from, it was so long ago. A bubble costume!
Oh yes..... now I remember two dresses. They were my Mum's dancing dresses and I loved them. One of them was bright red and the other a beautiful bright sky blue and we would put them on and swan around the house.
My Mum must have been so skinny when she wore them out. They were just beautiful , both were made from a stiff taffeta type material and had flared out puffy skirts that were too long for us, but in their day were most likely ankle length. She had an 18 inch waist in those days (something I never attained in my adult years). My sister and I very quickly out grew the waist in them and were unable to do up the zipper at the side. I loved those dresses, I can still see them in my mind. Pretty.
My own children loved to dress up when they were little. Michael had a cowboy costume. An old story that my sister tells .... She was living in Sydney at the time and decided that she would take Michael home with her for a few days and I would drive up there and pick him up. So she took him on the plane with her , his first plane ride. He of course had to wear his cowboy outfit. When they were boarding the plane he held up the plane with his plastic gun and everybody thought it was hilarious. Wow, I bet they wouldn't put up with that so easily now days.
David had a superman outfit. And Anne Marie was a fairy princess.
David was a funny little guy with that superman outfit. It included a shirt and a cape and he refused to take it off when he was three years old. It was originally meant to be pajamas but he wouldn't have that and wanted to wear it day and night, to the point that he would get angry with me when I had to take it off him to wash. He would wait eagerly for it to be dry enough to put back on again and if he could have reached the clothes line to get it down himself he would have worn it wet. Haha.
Oh I should go through my old photos to share with you before I start writing. Hahaha. So cute.
Bye for now. Love Linda.

Monday Memories . Siblings. & Sunday Scribblings Befuddled.

2011-04-10T11:02:00.003+10:00

G'Day,
Monday memories and it is Sunday. Oh well story of my life ha ha. I can always pretend that I am early for tomorrow, But that would be lying.
Ok, our suggestion this week was to write a memory about our siblings. Check out the link on my side bar.
I am cheating this week as I think I can fit this story into the Sunday Scribblings prompt of Befuddled. So after I click a few more buttons....here tis' too.
I have two sisters. Both are older than me. My sister Thelma and my sister Ellen.
My sister Ellen and I have not always liked each other, but as she is closer in age to myself we had more time together.
I just had a look at Josie's writings and she has included the letter "A" in hers.
So my scribblings this time round are about a trip my sister Ellen and I shared to Adelaide when we were probably 18 and 21 years old.
Ellen had a little blue Gemini car, so, freedom. Freedom of an income and the yearning to jump in her little car and just GO! What a lovely time of life to be in, no familial ties to bind as later in life with children and career.
She invited me to go on a trip to check out Adelaide, the capital city of South Australia, and a city we had not been to. So after her shift at the local hospital in Wagga, our home town, we jumped in the car and went. Out across the bare flat plains, dodging roos and emus and a million semi trailers on the highway at dusk, south bound. We chose a car to follow, thinking that, we had company if anything should happen, no mobile phones in those days. We followed along behind that car for miles and miles along the highway between Narrandera and Hay and they slowed suddenly but didn't pull off the road for a while. We pulled up behind them to see if they were ok, as you do in the outback, and found a man and his wife who explained that they were ok but had hit a roo which luckily had got off the road before we hit it and we hadn't seen it. Their car was dinted but otherwise ok mechanically.
Anyway we kept driving through the night.
At around 1.00 in the morning we came through another small town and missed a turn off and were driving around trying to find our way when a police car pulled us over and questioned us as to what we were doing. They escorted us out of town and pointed us in the right direction, after checking out and flirting with my sister, she was a very pretty girl. Hahaha.
Bored and tired from driving , as we passed through another small town Ellen wound the window down a yelled out to the sleeping houses." Linda Palmer stinks". So I wound down my window in reply and yelled " Ellen Palmer stuffs her bras" hahahah.
Next morning at dawn we sighted the Murray river and being a bit weary decided we would have a morning bath and freshen up. We pulled off the side of the road into a boat launch area and as there was no-one around so early in the morning we both got in the water and had a wash. My sister stripped off and went for a short swim in the nude when a speedboat with fishermen came around the corner and she had to duck down under the water and hide to much giggling and embarrassment. So funny. Sprung!
We stopped at a few wineries before we got to Adelaide and , well I think there are still some photos of that somewhere around. The Barossa valley outside Adelaide is famous for wine, but we didn't have a lot of spending money.
So we eventually reached Adelaide and looked up an old neighbor who we hadn't seen for years . They had been good friends with our parents in Darwin.
Then we found a caravan park and put up our nice new tent. In those days we had this idea that we would do the round Australia trip and Ellen had bought a nice tent and we were going to take this little dog we had with us for protection, a tiny little, very friendly Australian terrier. Oh the illusions of youth, lol. We were at Glenelg and not far from the beach.
We had a bit of drive around and look at the city buildings and statuary. Climbing on a few of them and taking photos and laughing irreverently at ourselves. One photo , which I still have has Ellen sitting on a big garbage bin, very modern in appearance with a slanting top and a hole in the center of it which we thought looked like a toilet. Hahaha.
That night we went to a night club type place in the city called the Akaba or something like that. Music and flashing lights and boys and crowded etc.
We had a look around some of the shops in the city, went in one door and came out another door into another street and were lost for a while. Ah country kids.
Next day we played tourist again and had a ride on a boat that takes tourists up and down the Torrens river near the center of the city. Pretty water lilys flowered and scattered across the surface of the calm waters and wild and domestic ducks scavenged for tidbits from the tourists, and cool green perfect lawns to lie on in the summer swelter. I can't really remember the trip back across the plains and home again. It was a long time ago. A long time.
The photo above is of my sister Ellen, taken last year. She will kill me for this one Hahahahahahahahahahah, love it.
Bye.
Love Linda.

Monday Memories. Encounters with J.

2011-04-02T17:38:00.002+11:00

G'Day,
I am back today with an entry to the Monday memories prompt. This weeks idea was remember a gift you have been given.
Well this week while I was at work I had another encounter with a little boy who attends one of the schools where I clean and I have been thinking about him ever since.
Jeremiah is a little boy, slightly chubby with the biggest most soulful dark brown eyes you would ever see on any little 8 year old boy, he looks to be of islander appearance.
My first encounter with Jeremiah, names changed of course, was last year. It was well after school hours and he was wandering around the school grounds, just being....Jeremiah. He came in to the large foyer between the back class rooms and looked around hesitantly then wandered up to my son who was vacuuming nearby and asked politely if he could go into that class room over there because it was his class room and he wanted to take a photo of it. He had his Mum's digital camera and was quite happy to just go into the room take his picture and leave. I thought at the time, that it was a bit strange for him to be hanging around school at the time of day when everyone else had left but he seemed a nice enough little boy and was meaning no harm. We smiled and talked about how cute we thought he was.
Since then I have come across him a few times and have always found him to be, to my mind, a deep thinking little fellow, to the point that to look into those big brown eyes meant looking inside his mind and seeing the cogs ticking over as he verbally works things through in his own unique little 8 year old's fashion. Maybe he has found me a willing ear for his many ideas and busy little mind, who knows.
Anyway, my next encounter with Jeremiah was most amusing and in a funny way satisfying for me because around the school are posters reminding the children to be fair, show respect etc and I thought isn't that lovely, the teachers would be so proud of this little guy talking to me like that as it shows their lessons have made a difference to his life.
One afternoon as we arrived at work Jeremiah was at the back of the school again and came over to us and quizzed us out. I thought what a funny little guy, I will play along. He asked me who I was and I answered that I was the cleaner. He replied "No you aren't Mr Walsh is the cleaner" So I explained the difference between Mr Walsh, the maintenance man, and our jobs as cleaners. He was happy with that. His next question, after introducing himself. What are your names? I thought to myself I bet his Dad is a security man, hahaha. I told him my name was Linda. You could see mind ticking over, he wasn't satisfied with that answer, so he asked again. "If you were a teacher what would I have to call you?". I thought for a minute and asked him why and he told me that they have to call the teachers Mr or Mrs because that means they respect them and he should call me the same as them. So I told him my surname and he was much happier. He watched me for a while longer, just to check up on me and make sure I really was a cleaner and talked a bit more before he went home for dinner.
I was most amused and when I went inside I spoke to the head mistress about him and how cute he was. I got from her attitude that he was a bit of a different child. I thought , hmm poor little guy. She told me that he should not have been hanging around school grounds, but I already knew that anyway.
Next time I saw Jeremiah, was again when he should not have been there outside school hours. He followed me around and talked and watched everything I was doing for a while asking me heaps of questions. I said to him "Jeremiah I don't think you are supposed to be here after school finishes" He looked at me with those big eyes of his, sadly, shuffled his feet and looked down at them and said," Oh...I know". He wandered away sadly. I felt mean because he looked so down hearted and had been previously having a great time talking to me. Then I didn't see him again for quite a few months.
He was there on Friday afternoon though. All this week there have been teacher/ parent interviews held. He proudly ran up to me and told me he was there because his Dad was having a meeting with his teacher, probably remembering that I had questioned him before.
Funny little guy.
He checked out what I was doing and had to try out my mop bucket. Positioning himself carefully with a foot on each side of the mop bucket , as he had seen me do and testing out just exactly how it all worked. I told him to be careful not to tip the bucket over and he said "No I won't". Then announced to me, "Aw.... so that is to squeeze the juice out of the mop" haha. So cute.
He then proceeded to tell me about Pippy Long Stocking, (a character in a children's book).
Pippy Long Stocking tied scrubbing brushes onto her feet and skated up and down on the dirty floor she was told to clean. He thought that I should wash the floor that way as it would be much faster than doing it just with my mop. Ha ha ha. Love it. Probably would have been fun too and I am sure he would have liked to help me. Maybe not with my poor old legs.
He followed me around again talking for a while until his Dad called him, and off he went happily, saying goodbye politely to let me know he was going with his Dad now.
I though what a great little boy, so open and honest and polite. I could see however that he was an original thinker and that such people can be like square pegs in round holes. Yes I know that such people have to learn to toe the line but sometimes they have to be pounded to fit into that round hole. The sharp edges ground off. Too hard and they liquefy, running through the hole and dropping to the bottom of the bucket. A conversation later when I was telling a teacher about my encounter confirmed my thoughts. She said he absconds from school and I got the impression, (though she of course didn't or couldn't say so in so many words,) that they did not approve his mother's style of parenting.
Little boys like him have a strange place in our society. Are they really original thinkers or does their mind run away with them and miss the lessons they need to learn to get along with others and be a part of our society. What as a society are we missing trying to change and contain minds like Jeremiah's?
Sad isn't it.
Will his dark skin and big eyes stand him in good stead or when his male hormones kick in, will they make him another kid lost.
But.... what a beautiful little boy at this time of his life, full of inventions, wonder, honesty and open goodness.
I dunno, maybe I am looking at this from the wrong angle.
Bye.
Love Linda.

Sunday Scribblings "Nearly There"

2011-03-30T21:08:00.003+11:00

G'Day,
Sunday Scribblings prompt site asks us to write about nearly enough.
It is Wednesday night here in the land of Oz, hump day, on the downward slide towards the weekend and next week's Sunday Scribblings prompt again.
Ah well, here I am.
I have been thinking about this little idea for a while and I think I can fit it into this weeks prompt.

Nearly..... but not quite there.
Not pretty enough
ugly enough
smart enough
dumb enough
talkative enough
quiet enough
funny enough
serious enough
rich enough
thin enough
early enough
late enough
big enough
little enough
kind enough
quick enough
patient enough
sexy enough
enough
enough
enough
never enough
nearly but
not enough.

Bye
Love Linda

Monday Memories

2011-03-27T20:45:00.002+11:00

G'Day,
The Monday Memories prompt that I have been enjoying suggests we write a memory of past spring times. We are in early Autumn here in the southern hemisphere so I will turn the prompt around and write about Autumn instead.
Autumn is such a pretty time of year. It is the time when you are not quite sure if you ought to wear a jumper out, so you wear one anyway just in case it is cool. Then you take it off then put it back on a few hours later.
Autumn is the time of year when you watch the trees eagerly for the beauty of their leaves changing through green to yellow, orange and russet hues of brown. I watch them each day driving to work, luverlee.
Well we remember the leaves dropping and covering the ground. When I was younger I enjoyed raking them up into piles and collecting them. In those days we were allowed to burn them. In the gutters of suburbia you could see heaps of dwindling, smoldering leaves, smoking happily. I loved that job, in fact I loved any job that involved burning something, ha ha. I am still a fire bug but now my urge to burn things is largely sated by firing pottery.
Now the burning of Autumn leaves is forbidden, we are supposed to use them as mulch now days. Yeah I guess as a gardener I can see the great value of that, but those smoldering, smoking piles of leaves were such a nice thing when I was young. The smell a sign of cooler things to come. The promise of cool nights snuggled up under the blankets in front of the heater with television blaring ,or snuggling into a cold bed with feet and legs curled high until warmed by the trapped heat from your body and sleep.
When we were kids and raked up the leaves in autumn we would collapse into the heap and roll in the leaves, and throw them at each other. Then have to rake them up all over again. We would run through the park under the big deciduous trees and crunch them under our feet, kicking them high into the air. Great games. I taught my own kids to do the same they loved it too. The park in Wagga , my home town, has heaps of big deciduous trees planted just for that purpose, I am sure that is why they are there. Aren't you?
Just last year my neighbor, a lady in her 70's was walking down the street early in the morning and thinking that nobody was watching, walked along in the gutter beside the road and kicked the leaves up happily with the biggest smile on her face until she saw my son watching her. So cute, hahaha. She turned and when she saw him watching, waved to him and giggled. We had huge oak trees beside the house where we were renting then.
So if you would like to join in the prompt or read what others have written please have a look on my side bar and find the link listed as 'Memories On Monday" .
Enjoy! Enjoy what the lovely earth and her ever cycling seasons bring to you what ever season you are in, in your part of the world.
The pic above was taken last year in one of the many parks here in Canberra which fringe the lake in the center of town. This particular park I don't know by name but it runs along the nth eastern side of the lake near Duntroon, which is the royal army, navy, air force type academy .
Bye Love Linda.

Just a post

2011-03-26T19:30:00.003+11:00

G'Day,
I was thinking, why do I have to have a reason to put something in here. I have got off the track lately. Lost the original idea and have been only writing to prompt sites.That isn't what it is all about. It is about writing what I bloody well want to write.
So today I am writing just because I want. Not to mention the fact that there is rubbish on television, as always , very little to interest me. Would you believe that the best thing on is a children's movie? Just about all the other stations are showing election results because in my neighboring state of New South Wales there was a state election held today. I couldn't be bothered with speculating the result before all of the votes are counted. Bad Australian maybe? Politics = BLAH to me.
Today I took Mum to the mall in Tuggeranong to get some warm clothes as it is beginning to cool down here and I wanted some thicker things for her to layer on during the day. She sits on the lounge and gets cold and I don't want to start switching on the heater so early in the season, so ....more clothes are in order. ' Ahhh here we get back to politics, a subject abhorrent to me. A few years back the govt privatized our power companies and we will now be heading into territory where we can't afford the exorbitantly rising costs of electricity that we silly modern humans rely on so dearly to run our houses and lives. Before we moved to this house our winter electricity and gas bill for the season came to $1700 OUCH. The prices have risen since then and we have not spent a winter in this house yet so....scary. I know there are a lot of people in this city, and indeed others in the other areas of Australia who have a lower income that us and are struggling financially. Bloody Politicians. Do ya job for these suckers you mongrels. Did I say I hate politics. Hmmm. Then there is the cost of housing, another item that is getting to be beyond working and middle class grasp. I was wondering where this post would lead me, were you?
Let me change the subject. I don't like the previous one.
My garden is winding down as we move into Autumn. Yesterday I pulled out the cucumbers which are well and truly finished for the season. There was just one last cucumber on the vine which now resides in my fridge. They did so well in this good soil here, we gave away and threw away more than we ate of them. I made a batch of spiced bread and butter cucmbers and bottled them that turned out nice. The fig tree still has ripening fruit on it. They have been wasting too because there has been heaps if fruit and we are a bit sick of them. I did make up a big pot of jam from them that will last quite a while. I even ran out of bottles to put it in and started filling up all the plastic containers to keep it. Mum loves my jam and we are now on the second container. I gave some away. Took it to my Thursday pottery group with a batch of scones and one of the ladies (Margaret) emptied it into her container and took it home.
The tomatoes still have quite a few fruits left on them which I don't think are going to ripen this late in the season, plus the fruit fly have discovered them and stung them. Nasty little critters taking my tomatoes. The tiny tomatoes have been especially sweet and prolific, we have cooked and frozen several lots as well as used them to make sauces to accompany our evening meals.
The big grape arbour at the back of the house is covered in small black grapes, the man who planted them made his own wine so they are not really the type that are great for table eating. They are all ripe and although I have offered them to people nobody seems to want them . The big fruit bats have discovered them and they can have them, the bats have also been in the fig tree. That's OK, they have got to feed some where don't they. What is left is surplus to us.
Years ago I went to a fair/ market in Tumut and bought some beautiful butter nut pumpkins from an old man there. I was admiring them and he gave me some seeds to plant. I did plant them in the Junee garden and they never came up. I planted them here and they went mad. I have the best big pumpkins ever. Amazing that the seed was still viable after so long. I have used one of them already. Just last week the vines were still setting new fruits, but I am not sure if they will ripen enough before the cold weather sets in and anyway I already have heaps. Pumpkin soup coming up for winter. I make mine with onion and bacon in it then put a blob of sour cream on the top to serve it.
We planted two types of beans. The climbing ones and the dwarf bush one. The climbing ones I was not impressed with they were nice flavored but not as many beans and stringy. The dwarf beans were great. Very prolific and we even planted a second crop. I am just about finished with those now. It seemed that each time it rained and I fertilized them they flowered again and we got another lot of beans off them. Also planted silver beet which was good because I can leave it in the ground and over winter. The capsicums were a success too. The little yellow pointy ones were the best croppers out of the mixed punnet that was planted. The beetroot I wasn't impressed with. There was a great crop of basil and I have kept some of the seed to replant next year when it warms up again.
I have recently planted a few things that like the cooler weather. Some leeks, spring onions, dwarf peas, broccoli and coriander are in and look good for the near future. Must get some curly parsley going next.
The beautiful pears espaliered along the back fence were very nice, but the insects have damaged them now. The only ones that are left are the brown pears and when you cut them they have larvae in them, note to me, get out there and destroy them tomorrow. I do like this yard.
I went to a farmers market just down the road from here at the CIT college on Sunday mornings. They have great produce and I have decided I will get most of my vegetables from there from now on rather than the supermarkets. Lots of yummy stuff and my money goes straight to the producer instead of a multi-national company. Much better. I bought some nice purple organic garlic from there too and have planted a row of garlic cloves at the back of the garden beds.
There are some of my wafflings. Probably won't be of interest to any one but me and I can look back on them in a years time and compare next seasons efforts in the garden. And..... my electricity bills.
Bye.
LoveLinda.

"Sunday Scribblings" Free.

2011-03-21T11:41:00.009+11:00

G'Day,
I have just had a nice weekend at the Canberra potter's society at a demonstration workshop with master potter Geoff Crispin.
He is a potter of 40 years practice from the Clarence valley in northern N.S.W. Geoff predominantly works with a porcelain body made from local materials to his own recipe.
First pic above is of a birdie scribble I did while sitting listening and watching him work.
Now I am absolutely itching to get my hands in the mud.
Geoff Crispin has worked extensively in his career with developing artists in Jamaica, Oman and Australia,'s northern indigenous communities.
While at the workshop I was informed of some resident artists at the Australian National University ceramics department. So I went to have a look at them this morning.
I can't tell you these ladies names or where they come from. They are very shy people and reticent to talk, I am not sure if they had much English, but here are some pics I took of them at work. These pots are fantastic, I really love this style of art.
This lady was working on a thrown cylinder in terracotta clay which had been burnished and painted. She is now using a tool to scratch decoration back through the layer of paint (either slip or terra sigilata) to expose the color of the clay underneath. The brush in her hand is to sweep away the dry clay scraps so she can see what she is doing. The technique of scratching into a pot like this is called sgraffito.
The third of the artists working graffito onto her pot.
The following pots are made by Geoff Crispin and are part of the exhibition at the Potters society at the moment.The picture above is a close up of the fish that Geoff carves into his pots.
Part of the workshop detailed how he carves and chooses designs for individual styles or forms that he makes.
The pot above is made by an aboriginal artist from the Northern Territory and is part of a private collection. This one is my favorite of all the ones in exhibit.
Of these pots the first one, the taller of the two is one made by Geoff. It is made from his porcelain clay, carved and wood fired and shows the influence of his work with the developing artists he has encountered. The second, shorter one is another from his collection made by the indigenous artists of the Northern Territory. You can probably see the card with her name if you enlarge this. She is from Ernabella.
This shows the decoration on the other side of the pot above. I love this.
A wider view of the exhibition.
And again, aren't they beautiful.
This is a couple of pots glazed with a copper red glaze, made by Geoff. Copper red is my favorite glaze.
This is a wider view of the earlier pot that has the fish carved into the side of it. It is porcelain and glazed with a pale green celadon glaze. I love the way that the celadon glaze runs into the carved decoration and pools there, accentuating it.
Beautiful large porcelain platter, wood fired and sprinkled with ash from a poplar tree that has melted in the firing to form a glaze.

Porcelain vessel. Slip cast, faceted, carved and wood fired with sprinkled ash again.

So? How does this fit in with the Sunday Scribblings prompt this week.

I am privileged.
I have the freedom to choose
that which I like
The freedom to practice my craft
And interpret it and other arts
as I choose.

Some do not!
Bye
Love Linda.

Sunday scribblings "Big"

2011-03-16T20:33:00.004+11:00

G'Day,
Sunday scribblings asks us to respond to the prompt word "Big".
Here is what came to my mind.

Lou Lou was tiny, everyone said how she was tiny. She hated that, she wanted to be big like her sister Krissy. Everyone noticed her sister but not Lou Lou.
Lou Lou in her 4 years experience had come to believe that she was tiny and insignificant, nobody noticed her because she wasn't big. Size had proven her sister the top dog. Lou Lou wanted to be a big girl too.
She was sick a lot when she was little, they called her poor little Lou Lou. Mummy would try to make her eat but she couldn't fit any more in, so she sat at the table and wasn't allowed to leave until she ate some more. The fat around the cut up sausage congealed and set hard on the plate before her and she started to cry. She couldn't tell them, didn't know the words to describe how the metal spoon they gave her to eat off would bite her on the tongue and make her food taste bad, she liked the plastic spoon, but they said the table must be set with the metal one's so she couldn't eat. Mummy got mad and grabbed her by the arm pulling her off her chair and took her to the bathroom where her face was scrubbed and teeth cleaned then she had to go to bed early.
When she got a bit older Lou Lou started to eat and each time she did, Mummy would say "Oh look Lou Lou is eating, Quick! shove something else in her mouth". So they did. Still nobody noticed her.
She stayed quietly in the back ground. Everybody said how lovely her sister was. She waited for somebody to think she was good, and big , and clever, and pretty like Krissy, but nobody ever did. If they did say something nice she didn't believe them because she thought they were just being kind, not real to her.
And nobody noticed. So she learned to smile and stay quiet. She learned to pretend that everything they said was right because it was easier that way, and she could hide behind her smile, so no one knew how it hurt.
Nobody could see her on the inside.
Lou Lou did get big. Too big later. She wasn't happy with how that looked either, she still wasn't right.
When she gave her smile, her empty smile they called her names and laughed about it.
She stayed hidden from them. Much easier to have no personality than show them what was inside her. Bland from inside and out. The hurt and disappointment in herself.
She learned other things though. She learned to look around her and watch faces for every nuance of approval...or disapproval. She watched the bugs and insects and the way they behaved and walked and sounded and grouped together. She watched the plants and flowers and their progression to fruit and seed to renewal. She gave all her love to pets and toys instead of people whom she could not trust to be true. She watched the seasons and knew from the plants and animals what would come next. She watched the world go by.

Bye
Love Linda.

Monday Memories

2011-03-14T12:17:00.003+11:00

G'Day,
I thought of something I would like to share for the Monday Memories prompt. This is a fairly new prompt and although I have not participated every week since its beginning I do enjoy sifting through my memories and choosing to share or more rightly to record some of them. If you would like to join in the fun please go to my side bar under the heading" favorite reads" and the link will take you there.
I was watching children the other day and thinking that they are such hard work but wonderful and that I wouldn't want to miss any part of their growing and learning.
Which led me to thinking and reminiscing on when my children were toddlers and the wonderfully funny things they did as part of their learning progress.
My eldest son Michael when he was a toddler was a treasure to me and I was sure no parent could ever adore their child more, and of course that he was the smartest little boy ever.
We had been preparing him for the birth of my second child for quite a while and telling him he would soon have a little brother or a sister to play with and he would have to share his toys with them. Well the message got through to his 21 month old mind and as soon as we bought his new brother home from hospital he was eagerly awaiting him in the lounge room of our home. A bassinet was set up in the lounge room near the front window. All prettied up and fresh, and neighbors and relatives came to see the new arrival. Michael was enthralled and ran straight down to his bedroom and came running back down the hall with an armful of his favorite toys and threw them into the bassinet on top his new brother, much to the shock of the visitors and myself who then had to explain that David was too little to share them yet with him. Oh dear, poor little bloke, he did so want someone top play with. I should have gone just one step further and explained that to him before the event. Hahahaha.
Also while living in that house we had a neighbor who was very good to me and often came in to have a cuppa and check if everything was OK with the babies. She was a very large woman and would puff and pant when ever she moved. Michael for some reason took a dislike to her and I couldn't work it out until one day she was standing near the front door and Michael snuck around behind her and was trying to look under her dress with a very puzzled look on his face. I was watching him and thinking "Oh No! Please, please don't turn around and see what he is doing," and trying to draw his attention away from her in as discreet a manner as was possible in the circumstances. Luckily she didn't see him as she would have been most hurt, because she loved him. He was trying to see why her body was in such a strange shape and couldn't work it out so had decided to have a look. Lol.
Also on the subject of my baby boys. I would always take them with me to the supermarket on Fridays when I did my weekly shop. It was such hard work and very frustrating to do so but I thought, well it is an outing for them and seeing other people around was a good thing.
Michael was the sort of little boy that would not be held back from anything he decided he wanted to do and trying to keep him quietly at my side in the shops and juggle his baby brother was a nightmare. Hahaha. As soon as he got to the supermarket he would look down those aisles and think" Hmmmm racetrack" and want to run at full speed along them. I used to think he was trying to knock over as many old ladies as he could in the process, hahaha, well, that is what he looked like he was trying to do.
And the little old ladies? Well they all thought he was just beautiful and took great delight in smiling and trying to talk to him.
And....unfortunately to his little brother as well, who was just starting to talk and learned that he could say, Bugger! and that it always got a reaction. Hahah.
The little old ladies would stop me and say "Oh what beautiful little boys" and addressing them say," Hello what is your name?" David would look them straight in the face with a cheeky grin and say "Bugger!"
They would look surprised and say to me "What did he say?" and I would have to answer back "Bubba, he calls himself Bubba" and try to escape, with a red face.
David was such a smart little bloke. He could work things out so quickly when he was a toddler,
And he had to have his routine, everything done just right or he wasn't happy with it at all. I used to read to the boys each night before bed time, Mike was 3 and a half and Dave probably two and we would sit on Dave's bed and go through their books, probably 4 or 5 each night. David knew every word by heart in each of the favorite books before he could read them. If I changed a word and read it wrong he would say "No that's not what it says Mum!" and correct me, telling me word perfect what it did say. Hahaha. Then at the end of the reading session he would need to have his little routine done just the way it always was or he wouldn't settle down to sleep. I remember once when he wasn't even 2 years old the next door neighbor came in to tell me "Have you heard what David is doing out there?" he was absolutely amazed to hear him sing the alphabet out loud without a mistake, over and over again while sitting in the yard playing with the white pebbles in the garden. Sesame street rocks. Hahaha.
When his older brother Michael was to start pre-school at the age of 3 I took the boys up to the baby health clinic in town to have some tests done on Mike and of course took David along too. The nurse was showing cards and asking questions of Michael and David was answering them all, yelling out all the correct answers over the top of his quieter brother, and the nurse had to ask me to take him out of the room. He is still a little wise guy, hahaha.
When Pre-school started we lived just a few door away in the same street and when I took Michael up there on Pre-school mornings, David would cry and throw a tantrum when we had to leave him there. He wanted to stay and play with all the good stuff and the other kids too. When he saw that I was moving to leave he would run over to the corner and hide in the bean bags and cover his eyes with his hands so I couldn't see him and might leave him behind. If I left him alone for one minute he would run out the gate at home and go straight to the pre-school building, I always knew where to find him. Funny little kid.
Just a year later when it was time for him to start Pre-school he was very very eager to get up there and join in. There was an assistant there by the name of Heather. David couldn't quite get her name out right, he used to call her Heaven, and she loved it.
Goodness I am sure I could write a book on my kids when they were little folks. I better stop or I might bore you all and write more in another post later.
Bye.
Love Linda.

Janis Joplin - Little Girl Blue video

2011-03-11T22:53:00.000+11:00

Sunday Scribblings "Raw"

2011-03-07T12:00:00.004+11:00

G'Day,
Hope all are well out there. I am.

Raw

A slash, a cut
another open wound
to the heart
opening up,
suppurating into the memory
of past raw wounds
and down into the abyss we fall.
For a while.

Oooh tha's a bit scary isn't it?
We all have been down there at some time or other haven't we. What matters is that we pick ourselves up and get on with it again. That dark abyss is a terrible place to stay.We do what we have to. How do you go about picking yourself up again. Please share.
Short entry this week.

BYE
Love Linda.

Sunday Scribblings "Fire".

2011-03-06T11:53:00.002+11:00

G'Day,
Fire! one of the essential elements of nature. As humans we've learned to conquer her eons ago. Though....have we. Fire burns us back and shows her power in return.
I have been through a few bush fires, from a distance. Not putting myself out there amongst her but keeping a safe distance even though threatened.
An old workmate of mine from Junee lost her home 2 weeks ago. She and her husband are understandably devastated. She is now in her 60's, always lived there. My heart goes out to you Helen. The building lost was more than a home it was a store place of her life. Gone. As heart break goes, there is more to this sad story. A close family member with mental illness lit the fire.
Which leads me to the other part of what I was wanting to talk about.
Fire bugs.
What twists their minds to make them want to cause such destruction? I have a fascination with fire myself but not to the extent that I could ever do something like that. I don't know...I don't know.
I have done a bit of reading on the subject. About the excitement of the flame, the response of the emergency services, the feeling of control and payback. It is all too sad.
There are people today in our jail system who have been failed miserably by a health system who can not cater to mental illness the way they deserve to be. There is no where for these people to go , so they are put in jail, often after a lifetime of pain and fear (at the hands of others?) has sent them to the brink of their own, and others, destruction.
Fire is a beautiful element. Beautiful and destructive.
As a hobby potter it is one of the essential elements of my craft. No fire means no permanence to my clay. The fuel for my little kiln is supplied via gas bottle. The touch of the flame and the heat that causes such beauty and enjoyment for me is safely encased inside my kiln. It's residual heat spreading warmth throughout the studio. But within that warmth there are poisonous gasses that must also be dissipated and controlled. Out of control = failure and danger. I have often burned my fingers.
Where would man be without fire, cold winters, cooking, industry, entertainment even depending on it.

I stand beside the kiln and watch the colour of the flame change as the temperature on the thermocouple gauge rises, rises causing the view through the spyhole to color up slowly from a slight orange glow, brightening to orange up through gradual changes, until it reaches a bright cherry red at it's zenith.
I can feel the heat increase as the gasses rise out of the vent in the top and travel up the chimney, outside and away. I can't resist the invisibility, the magic of the gasses as they rise up and away into the atmosphere so I roll up a sheet of newspaper tightly into a tube and wave it the space between the vent and the chimney and it starts to smoke. The gasses are bursting from the vent with force now and the flame does not appear on the newspaper tube until it is a short distance from the vent , the gasses are blowing the flame out until then and I watch as a stream of smoke comes out the other end of my newspaper tube and the flame begins to travel slowly downwards along the length of the paper. Loving the look of it all, the process of building and eventual destruction it is causing. I play in the flame for a while then throw it onto the cement floor and stomp it with my feet. Still the smoke comes and then the crumbled ash. Ash that itself can be used as a decorating agent as it run my finger in it across the floor and think of the impermanence of us. The fire and ourselves.
Who hasn't watched an open fire burn in its beauty and destruction of the fuel it provides. A peacefulness, a calmness envelopes you as you watch the flames dance through.
Hmmmm.
Bye for now.
Love Linda.

Sunday scribblings "Food".

2011-02-26T22:24:00.002+11:00

G'Day,
So...I am almost a week late for Sunday scribblings as tonight is Saturday. Who cares. here I am anyway.
Time has been running too quickly for me of late and I have not been taking the time to write in here as I would like to do.
On the agenda this week, work as usual, and my little car needs to be registered. So heaps of ridiculous running between registry offices, sent from the Australian Capitol Territory then across the border into New South Wales and back again on a bloody wild goose chase between offices to no avail. I will try again on Monday.
Anyway the prompt word? Food.
Food of all sorts,
for the soul,
for the mind,
for the soil,
for the body?
What did you have for your main meal today?
In my country there is a dearth of it available, so much that is over used and wasted.
I will share with you my home made version of Butter chicken, which is easy to make and now a family favorite.
1. Chop up one medium sized onion and a clove of garlic and cook on low heat until onion turns clear.
2.Chop up 1 full chicken breast and add to onion mix.
3.Add 1/3 jar of whatever your favorite curry paste is. Tonight I used Patak's rogan josh paste. Probably equal to 3 heaped tablespoons of the paste.
4. Stir well then add;
1 tin of condensed tomato soup and 1/2 tin of water.
5. Add 2/3rds small tub of sour cream, or improvise and use whatever you have in the fridge without having to go out to the shops, like philly cheese or fresh cream or even coconut milk.
Cook , stirring well, reduce to a thick sauce if it needs it.
^. Serve with Naan bread, to sop up the gravy, boiled rice, a nice salsa and chutneys.
I like tamarind or mango chutney with it.
You can also do banana cut up and rolled in coconut. Also try yogurt with a spoonful of mint jelly and some fresh mint chopped up and mixed through.
For the salsa I cut up an onion, tomato, chives,basil, cucumber and blanched green beans sprinkled with a bit of balsamic vinegar.'
Gives 4 generous serves.

Food for the soul for me is the earth and her bounty, flora and fauna, of which we are all a part.
Food for my mind is reading here on the computer and sharing your blogging lives .
Food for the soil, give back what you take from it. I have a worm farm again after my last one was killed off in last summer's harsh heat.
I am loving this yard attached to the rented house we now live in. The yard is so productive and fertile. I am feasting on Tomatoes, plums, beans, capsicum, beetroot, cucumbers, pears and silverbeet, figs, basil, chives, mint, oregano, coriander, parsley, and grapes, we are also getting a few late strawberries each time it rains. I love being able to step outside and pick straight from the garden. There is more to come yet. Pumpkins, spring onions, leeks and peas have been planted and are yet to mature.
Mmmm food. Let us not mention over-nutrition, and the extra naughty things we eat. I am guilty. Oh dear!
Good night.
Love Linda.

Memories on Mondays.

2011-02-20T18:12:00.002+11:00

G'Day,
I hope this fine weekend finds you well and enjoying the short time off before the new week starts.
Here is my entry into this week's Memories on Monday prompt. You can see the rest on my side bar link of the same name. have a read and join in the write up if you feel like it.
Since my last post was about the fun I had at a concert last week I thought I would write about earlier concerts I have attended over the years. Really thee have not been that many, I am pretty quiet.
Anyway....
My first memory of a concert was when I was probably 8 years old. It was at the Darwin Botanical gardens and our small school, Larrakeyah primary, all attended a display of ballet and a show with Rolf Harris. I know I had probably gone to shows with my parents earlier, being an army brat, but this one is the first I remember. I remember that the ballet company got a few of the older, bigger boys up on the stage and they had to catch the ballerinas as they jumped into their arms. I thought it was amazing that they didn't fall in a heap and of course, them being bigger boys they were all very proud of themselves too, coming into close contact with such pretty gals at their pre-teen stage of life. There was much applause and patting of backs afterward.
Apart from school concerts the next one of note that I remember would have been when we were living in Sydney. My Dad had just returned from Vietnam and it was the very early 1970's. The opera house was new and just opened and my Dad got tickets to a show there. It was a mixed type performance with some classical and pop music. The artist I remember was a funny little bloke who had a few songs on the radio at the time. His stage name was William Shakespeare. I remember that concert because it had audience participation that I enjoyed. William Shakespeare had a sing along thingy going on with the audience and then told us all "Now you can say that you have sung in the Sydney Opera house and people will think you are famous". I was probably 11 or 12 yrs old at the time. Funny what your memory holds on to and lets go of isn't it? So yep! I have sung in the Sydney Opera house when it was brand new. I have been inside there quite a few times for tours and shows and I still marvel at it's architecture.
We went over to Singapore and lived there for a bit over a year after that. When we came home to Australia there was so much good fun music around and as I was living in Sydney there were lots of concerts to go to. You of course wouldn't have heard of the bands but boy they were fun times. We even had a few good bands in the school hall.
The boys school and the girls school were across the oval from one another and a few times a year we would be allowed to go into the Randwick boys school hall and have an afternoon dance. We sat and looked at the boys from across the hall and longed to dance, to meet a boy, and talk to him, to have a boy like us. But most of us were too shy. Anyway if you knew any of the bands around Sydney in those days, we had the La De Dah's play there for us. Some of its members went on to other bands and became well known. That was fun.
I guess you would have had to be around in those days and know the Aussie bands, to know whom I am talking about.
While I went to school there I found an earlier friend who now lived on the western side of Sydney at Doonside. I think it was at the Bankstown or Blacktown showgrounds that I attended my next concert with her. May German was a girl that I had befriended in year 7 at high school when she was living in the migrant hostel at East hills, after she had migrated here from England.. We went to this concert with some of her friends. I was probably 14 at the time. I remember seeing fun pop bands that were around and just starting out in those days. Sherbet, Skyhooks, ACDC, Daddy Cool, Brain Cadd were there, and this woman who vamped it up called Madam Lash who ran half naked around the stage with a whip. Ha ha, I wonder what she looks like now.There were others as well whom I can't remember.
But Skyhooks. wow, I loved them...instantly! They were my favorite band from then on. And I loved ACDC too, they became world famous. Still going strong except without their original front man Bon Scott. What a cheeky little bugger he was, ha ha, sad to lose him though as he joined the list of stars who succumbed to fame and the rock and roll lifestyle.
That was great fun, but I got sooooo sunburned that I blistered, there was no shade and in those days sun screen creams were very limited and the ones that were available gave me a rash so I wouldn't use them. Of course I hated hats too and it was too hot to cover up.
When we came back to Sydney after being in Singapore we eventually ended up back at our old address in Waverly which was a great spot for teenagers (just a few minutes walk from the eastern suburbs beaches) to be and went back to the same school. I made a new lot of friends, one of whom, Anna O'Hanion was my best school friend with whom I attended a few other fun concerts. We went to the Hordern Pavillion together and saw Skyhooks several times. One night we even talked to boys. Oh no....hahaha. Anna's father would have never let us go anywhere again of he knew.
I remember one concert we had gone to there, the support act for Skyhooks was a young red headed girl who was probably only 18 or 19 at the time. I still like her and have an album of her music on my ipod that I listen to at work. At the Skyhooks concert she got up to do her act, and as a group of buoyed, over enthusiastic young teenagers, we all kept shouting out "Skyhooks, Skyhooks" and she tried to sing her songs but gave up and left the stage in tears. Poor girl. Her name? Renee Geyer.
At another Skyhooks concert we attended together one of the support acts , I can't remember who they were, sang this song. Hahah. The punch line of it was "Little pink spiders in my brain and I wish I was sane like you" hahaha, at the end of the song they threw rubber spiders out the the crowd. I got one of them as it landed near me and slipped it into my bag. When I took it out in the light to look at it later it was painted with bright pink oil based paint, that was still wet and I got it all over me. Yeah real funny guys. A bit of fore thought might have been nice, but we laughed anyway. Also at that concert Skyhooks had some stage props that were pretty amusing. They used to have a song called Smut, I won't tell you what it was about. But up on the stage they had 2 giant phallus made of Styrofoam or something and during the song they exploded showering everyone with twisties. Funny. Twisties are a sort of cheese flavored pastry snack food, in the same vein as potato crisps. Hahaha. So when mixed on the floor with pink oil painted spiders. Hmmm. Poor cleaners.
We soon moved back to Wagga and when I started school there I tried to talk to the kids there about the music and bands that I had loved, and being a country town , all I got for my attempts were blank stares and nobody knew who they were...yet.
Music started filtering out to the country areas and concerts started happening with some of the bands I knew in Sydney. Anyway in the mid 70's many bands were making their names and went to the country areas to play and become better known. In Wagga one night I went to a concert in the picture theater with a band called "The Little River Band" They later became international as did INXs . I also got to see another band that went global called "Crowded House".
After I was married my husbands favorite performer was , and still is , Bob Dylan. We went to Melbourne to see him, that was many years ago and he has been to Australia several times since then. I also went to see Natalie Cole in Sydney, at the Capitol theater. She was good but I was a bit disappointed because she was so perfect in her performance that the whole show might have been pre-recorded and mimed. It sounded exactly as you would expect to hear from a recording. I still listen to her music and sing along. She is a beautiful singer.
Then not so long ago, last year Pete and I went down to Sydney and saw James Taylor and Carole King. They are so good, still.
That is about it until last Sunday when we went to "a day on the green" in Bowral. I wrote about that in my last post.
Good Night.
Love Linda.

Sunday scribblings "A Thousand Years"

2011-02-14T12:10:00.005+11:00

G'Day,
I have just had a lovely weekend. One which I have been eagerly awaiting since, um, probably early December last year. My Christmas present. I have been speaking out for the last few Christmases and cheekily telling my family what I wanted. That is something I have previously thought a bit pushy. But now I think.....well, why not speak up when asked. Anyway I have been to a great concert last night. The tickets were my Christmas present. It was at Bowral in the southern highlands, just a few hours drive from here, at the Centennial winery. I even had a bottle of classic white, very nice too, which set the mood. The concert? Called a day at the green, had 4 different artists , the first being "The Dingoes" an Aussie group still going strong since the eighties. Their best known song , you may recall it, was "Way out West".
The second artist attending was Diesel. He has been a part of the Aussie music scene for the last 25 yrs or so. I never liked him before. I hadn't seen him live until last night and disliked him because I thought , from seeing him in interviews on the television, that he had too big a head and was far too intent on telling everyone how good he was. But, he is good, he is. He has contributed heaps to the songs that we hear and love on our radios every day.
The third artist. Wow. Hahaha, so much good old fashioned rock and roll fun. George Thoroughgood and the Destroyers. Woo Hoo, up dancing, singing and having fun. The people beside us were going around and pulling everyone else up to dance with them and I joined in and had a great time. Bad to the bone, hahaha. A few thousand old rockers all together.
Another lady who was sitting in front of us had a big bowl full of fresh prawns which she told everyone that she couldn't take home with her, (she was from Orange) so she passed them around and shared them, unloading the remainder onto us. I felt a bit uncomfortable, but she was insistent. Another dancing partner.
The fourth artist, one of my all time favorites and the master, the one I wanted to see more than any of the others. Joe Cocker. He was great, as I had expected. A laugh, a sentimental tear and nothing lost to his age in the quality of his fantastic voice. Nothing at all. The lady from Orange said he was 67 years old.
Well now that I am talking about age. The audience was great too. They had a big screen at the side of the stage and during the intermissions between the artists. Cameras kept scanning the crowd and focusing on individuals. It was great entertainment just watching that alone, for an avid people watcher like myself. As a people watcher I really loved looking at the faces as everyone went past, back and forwards to the grog, food tents and toilets.
At the toilets, I was joking with a couple of ladies behind me in the line up who said, "Babe you are going in after the men, it is all up to you, oh you are so brave". Hahaha. The toilets were transportable ones, which are usually foul, but I am sure the guy in the line in front of me must have been listening as when I got there it wasn't too bad. When I came out the ladies were waiting expectantly so I reported to them "Well...I have seen worse", and they breathed an exaggerated sight of relief. Funny.
As you would expect the crowd was made up of a variety of ages, many of them would have been young in the 70's when Joe Cocker was one of the wild boys of the music scene so where of similar age to us. The faces of the gorgeous young dolly birds of the day and the way that they had aged was fascinating to watch. I don't feel so bad, cos' well some of them.....Makes me wish though that I hadn't worried so much and been so self conscious of my looks when I was young. It was all such a waste of time doing that. But..... yeah I know....different ages and different stages. There was one old girl, I don't know if she was in her usual style of dress, but she had blond hair, bleached to within a quarter of an inch of it's life and teased out into an early 80's style frizz that looked like something from the Rocky Horror Show. Hahaha. Oh dear, I am nasty aren't I? Some of the old guys had the most fantastic beards you would ever see anywhere.
But those faces, a thousand years and more of Aussie genes, shared from all around the world. All aging, growing, glowing, loving taking a trip down memory lane. Fantastic.
The lady beside us, the one who got everyone up dancing, had come down from Cairns, she had her ticket given to her by friends as a present. She took some photos for me to share. I gave her my email address to send them too, I sure hope she remembers to send them, or doesn't loose the address I gave her. I of course left my camera behind, sitting right here on the computer table. Fun!
A thousand years and more of Genes.
Bye.
Love Linda
Woo Hoo!

Sunday Scribblings and Monday Memories

2011-02-12T21:02:00.003+11:00

G'Day,
Yep late late late again, but the mood has taken me,( after reading around some of the other blogs I visit), to write. So late for both "Sunday Scribblings" of last week and also for "Monday Memories", here is a story.
Both of these great prompt sites are on my favorite reads side bar, click on the links to go have a read.
I wanted to share a view of a man I remember, names changed of course. Though he is gone now I believe.
His name can be Trevor, for this story.
Trevor was in the nursing home side of the hospital I worked in, a long term patient, which usually meant that he was there to be looked after until he was no more. He was a minister of religion and due to alcohol related disease still thought that he was. He would minister to the other patients and staff and pretend that that was his job. He believed it was. He was a strange mixture, showing himself straight and upright, but when you went around the corner and he believed you out of sight and earshot he would cry for his mother like a baby and fall into his own personal hell. A hell be-known only to himself for he chose not to share it with us.
Trevor was an educated man and his room was filled with books of different types from novels to poetry, philosophy and religion. In fact it was quite a cluttered mess, paper every where in all forms. A real pain to do the bi-weekly dust and clean in there and the daily vacuum as things were placed in piles on each flat surface and every corner of the floor and he didn't like them disturbed. Supposedly because he knew where to find his things that way. He barely had room to get around them and settle his large frame into the lounge chair in the corner.
But they were his.
I remember his ex wife, they were long separated and I only saw her visit twice in the time he was with us. She was a real old tartar, but due to circumstance I am sure she had lots of her own stories to tell. They had two sons, one of which was estranged from his father, the other of which Trevor thought very highly had been brain damaged in a car accident many years earlier. Trevor spoke of him often and of the horrible phone call he received from the hospital when the accident occurred. Of how he was reluctant and traveled slowly, hesitantly, to the hospital where his son lay horribly injured, afraid to see and learn of the extent of his injury. He visited his father often and we could see that he must have been an intelligent boy before his accident. He was able to calm and reason with his father where others failed and they would talk literature together. Trevor could become violent, not so much physically but verbally though capability of the physical was not beyond him.
The patient across the hall from him had a running battle with Trevor. They hated each other with a passion but neither of them was willing to be moved to another ward as that would have been giving in. No there was no way either would do that. So (lets call him Harry) would sit in his doorway and glare at Trevor until Trevor either got up and walked out to the dining room or got so annoyed that he would threaten Harry and call him names. It was obvious to the staff that they enjoyed themselves. It was quite funny really, these two old guys, showing their aggression and neither willing to concede to the other. Trevor called Harry "The cockatoo". It is an Aussie saying meaning "The lookout" or sticky beak and Harry would antagonise Trevor by being the quintessential. Cockatoos always post a bird as lookout to warn the other birds of danger while they feed on the ground, and to the call, they all take off and away to safety. Hahaha.
Trevor had a very good appetite but always complained about the hospital food as a matter of course. Though he always ate everything given to him. I can still remember his coffee, made black with two sugars from my many rounds with the tea trolley. I liked him he was quite the character and a good man despite his outbursts which were attributed to his condition. It was sad to see a man like him in that state. He wasn't as great an age of some of the other patients.
We used to say about the patients we cared for, "If you don't laugh, you would cry".
Trevor I am pleased to say was one of the lucky people who left our care via the front door rather than the back door. He was with us for over a year and was transferred to another facility on the coast. He left in high spirits and with anticipation of a nicer place to stay with a view of the ocean.
I hope he found it.
Bye.
Love Linda.

Sunday Scribblings "Safe"

2011-02-02T14:14:00.002+11:00

G'Day,
The Sunday Scribblings prompt this week is the word "Safe".
What a word, what a question. The T.V. has been on since 5.30 this morning and in between work, etc I have been watching the horror of a huge super storm about to launch itself upon the north eastern coast of Australia. A cyclone called Yasi that is 500km across and has wind speeds of 295 kmh, categorized as a level 5 event, the highest you can get. It is predicted to hit the coast around 10.00 tonight near the town of Innesfall in Queensland. It is now, according to reports too late to leave and the evacuation shelters are all full. This cyclone is the largest ever in recorded history we have had to deal with in this country. In an age of media and computer communications the event is right in our faces, in our lounge rooms and workplaces.
I am safe being many hundreds of km below that area but I have a knot in my stomach thinking about the people who live and are visiting that area of my country.

Are you safe in your bed
Wrapped in sleep and warmth
while the world trembles.
Man can never
conquer nature and her terrors
And wonders.
Earth, water, wind and fire.
Essential to life in balance
Out of balance
we all know the story.
We are paid back in kind by her.

Or are we, I don't know anymore. Is this part of the earths cycles or the result of mankind's interference with her cycles. When you look at it we do not have a great deal, in fact only a handful of years in comparison to the age of the earth, from which to draw our information to make that comparison. Science analyzes and concludes to later be found wrong in it's assumption. So how do we know. All we can try to do is the right thing, as we believe and hope the best of an out come.
We don't really know. But we have to accept it, because...... well, we can't fight nature.
But we can try to live within it.
I am being fatalistic today aren't I ? Scary Scary stuff.
It is hot here, being summer, of course. We have several days of total fire ban despite the cooler wetter summer we have had. To prove the fact that we can't rely on the protection that such a season provides, there are fires burning around our surrounding state of New South Wales and further south in the state of Victoria in areas which were recently flooded. Hmmmmmm. Safe?
Something to ponder, especially if you are in the midst of a northern hemisphere chill.
That's all Folks.
Bye
Love Linda.

Summer Harvest

2011-01-30T12:21:00.006+11:00

G'Day,
I have spent this morning out in the yard at one of my favorite pass times with my hands in the earth. Weeding and watering and feeding and harvesting the back yard vegetable patch, and loving it.
So I am back to sharing...bragging...with my friend Tootsie on her site Tootsie time. Go have a look by clicking on her link in my favorite reads list on the sidebar.
It is high summer and this year has been a kind season in Canberra for gardeners.
So, I am here to brag about the produce I have been getting in this inherited via rental house that we are living in at the moment.
First pic above is the vege patch out the back. We planted Tomatoes, cucumbers, silver beet, butternut pumpkins, capsicums, basil, marigolds, beans and beetroot. The strawberry patch was already there, as well as the stone fruit , fig and pear trees.
These were picked this morning, we have so many cucumbers I have been sneaking them to the neighbours to get rid of them. I also made up a batch of bread and butter cucumbers to keep.There are 3 types of pears and this is the first few I picked today. I don't really know how to look after pear trees. So if you have any suggestions and tips I would be pleased to have them.
Strawberries. Bloody beautiful. These ones are small but at the beginning of the season they were much bigger, but these taste just as sweet and juicy. Also the first of the baby tomatoes.
This is a butter nut pumpkin. Many years ago I bought some of them at a fair in Tumut and the old man there gave me some of his seeds to grow. I tried them in a couple of spots in our house in Junee but they never came up. I thought that as the seeds were old it couldn't hurt to just put them up and see what happened this time. Look at the results, good size aren't they. Cool eh. I counted 8 pumpkins today and it is still flowering and fruiting so there may be more yet.
Silver beet. We have been harvesting this for a few weeks now. Nothing better than picking greens straight from the garden and putting them straight in the pot.
These are Lebanese cucumbers. Oh yum. Last night we had an antipasto platter for tea and used rings of fresh cucumbers instead of bicuits to put the cheese and bits and pieces on. On the platter: olives, cheeses, red capsicum, stuffed pepper dews, eggplant, sun dried tomatos, blue berries, cucumbers,chicken pate', fresh grain bread, pecans.
Tasty little strawberries. Quite a few of these that I picked this morning didn't make it back inside. Hehehe.

The fig tree is loaded. There were a few earlier fruits that ripened then it got a big second crop that are (as you can see) smaller and not yet ripe. I saw some black figs in the shop yesterday and they were $29.95 a kg. Bloody hell, I wonder how many kilos will come off this tree. I will be making lots of jam in a month or so.
Some of the baby tomatoes.
And the nice big tomatoes. I will go back for these in a couple of days. This is a grosse lisse tomato plant.

Green pear, might be a William pear I think.
Red pear. One of the 3 espaliered along the back fence.
Beautiful peaches. I have been eating these straight off the tree, they are the white fleshed perfumed kind. It is such a shame but a lot of these have been wasted because the stone fruit trees in the yard have brown rot. It is the wrong time of the year to treat for that but we will treat it when it is time.
This is a pic I took of my Mum yesterday afternoon. Her maiden name is Trenerry so I lined her up and captured her there to show her off. Hahahaha. This is at Weston Creek shopping area here in Canberra. When I took this she hadn't read the sign and hadn't worked out what I was doing.
As this name is spelled the same way as her family name there must be a connection somewhere along the line.
Another Canberra name "Curley" is related to my Mum via her first marriage to a Fred Curley, they were a pioneering family in the area, same family. There is a bridge in Canberra called the Sylvia Curley bridge, that was his aunt.
My maternal grandfather Joe Trenerry, was the head of the masonic lodge in Australia, so Mum thinks (hopes, surmises hahaha) that this Trenerry square has something to do with him. Who knows, but that would be nice wouldn't it?
Anyway. Enough of my gardening bragging. Must go and eat another beautiful, white fleshed, perfumed, tree ripened, to perfect sweetness Peach. hahaha.
Bye
Love Linda.

Memories on Mondays.

2011-01-26T14:09:00.004+11:00

G'Day,
Here is my second entry into the Memories on Mondays prompt site, run by JTS 's blog, she is on my sidebar. Go have a look or join in the prompt if you wish. It is fun. And.... it does not have to be Monday to play.
Today is Wednesday and it is Australia Day. Pete and I went into the city to have a look at the festivities which run all day in all the towns around Australia. Ah........ I am proud to be an Aussie.
We partook of the freebie BBQ breakfast and had a barbecued sausage in bread and a cup of tea and bit of fruit. A nice nectarine, wonderful stuff we have acess to in an Aussie summer.
Today dawned hot with expectation of temperatures in the mid to high 30's. Summer as it should be. I am not complaining as we have so far this summer, had quite mild weather compared to the temperatures we put up with most years. There have been just a small handful of days with temperatures above the 30 mark this year.
Anyway. This post includes my memories of very very recent events, in fact they are just a few short hours old right now.
The park in the centre of Canberra is called Commonwealth park and it surrounds Lake Burley Griffin. Walter Burley Griffin is the bloke who planned and designed Canberra . He and his wife entered and won the competition to do so almost a hundred years ago. Our centenary is 2013. So, Canberra is a new city and is our countries capital.
We ate our breakfast and watched and listened to a brass band with a pretty good singer heading it. Swing and Jazz style music. There were lots of little kids running around together and playing with their parents. One small group was playing right in front of us with an elastic stretched between their legs, the little girls doing their version of jumping in and out of the elastic in the same game I played as a child. Their little brother, not quite big and coordinated enough to join in, was helped by Dad who lifted him over with huge smiles on his face. Another two little boys were playing and running with their Dad using long blown up balloons as swords. So cute, kids are wonderful. Other Dads played with blow up beach balls. One little bloke about 3 years old was sure to have a sportsman's future. Very good he was. It was a lovely place to people watch. It is also nice to see Fathers of today spend valuable time with their children on a special day set out for the purpose. Years ago the Dads drank beer while the Mums did the child raring, mostly alone. I am proud to say that the multicultural society we have today has been a positive improvement. Men from the Asian and European countries seem to be much more hands on with their offspring than the ones from the the U.K. countries.
While sitting under the trees this morning I was watching the colony of fruit bats that live there. They were disturbed by the crowd and the event activities. They are strange critters. They are quite large, and have taken up residence in a dozen or so large trees beside the sound stage. They spend their time there awaiting dusk each day, to fly out over the city and raid gardens for their food. Today they were screeching and squawking and fluttering their wings to cool themselves in the heat. Often taking off in flight when disturbed to resettle again in the trees. They are normally nocturnal but can obviously, by their antics, fly and move about easily in the full light of the day.
The bats were very upset by a flyover of three very noisy f111 jets and took a long time to settle afterward. I guess seeing and hearing those giant birdies flying past was a big threat to the bats who are the top of their own food chain. It really topped off the 21 gun salute in the flag raising ceremony for them. Hahahaha
We watched the flag raising ceremony and the citizenship ceremony. The flag didn't have enough breeze to open it out to its full glory and fly in the wind.They were both overseen by our Prime Minister Julia Gillard. She is our first female in that job. The style people have certainly been coaching her, her hair was beautiful and her dress, a white suit was immaculate. I want hair that color, hahaha. There were 50 new Australians naturalized in Canberra today at the ceremony. It was a happy thing to watch and I was pleasantly surprised to see our new prime minister's warmth in handling the people presented to her as she presented their citizenship certificates to them. There was an assortment of names coming from many countries. One of the awardees was a girl of probably eight or nine years old, while another woman was probably in her 70's. They both got a hug and a kiss off Julia, as did some of the others. Nice.
The part of the ceremony for Australia day that we watched is only a small part of the Australia day festivities. Which also include picnics, concerts and fireworks tonight as well as other assorted events around town. There was a concert on the lawns of Parliament house last night, just down the road from here, which was televised, including the Australia day awards. Citizen of the year etc. Don't ask me who was awarded, I don't remember names.
I have had 51 Australia Days in my life. Some lovely memories. Such as when we went with our cousins to the Hume weir near Albury from Wagga and spent the day picnicking, swimming and canoeing. I still love canoes, and to own one again is on my "To Do" list. Hmm, maybe after my little car is registered early next month, it will be allowed to move higher up that list.
Or, the days spent at the botanic gardens in Wagga when my children were little, eating ice blocks, fairy floss and BBQ sausages and playing on the water fountains and slides which are set out on the lawns for the day, and, handling the resultant sunburns that are endemic to the 26th of January in Australia.
Australia Day, yeah I know...( I should have put this explanation at the start of the post), is the day Captain James Cook first set foot on Australian soil and claimed it for England. So here we are, two hundred and twenty three years later.
Progress, good for some, bad for others eh?
O.K.
Bye.
Love Linda.

Sunday scribblings "Eternity"

2011-01-24T20:38:00.002+11:00

G'Day,
It is Sunday Scribblings time again. Have a peek at what other participating writers are thinking about this weeks prompt by going to my side bar. Look at the favorite reads bit and click on the Sunday Scribblings link. There are some great writers in there. This weeks word is 'Eternity" Here is my tiny contribution.

Stare at the night sky
Right inside
not just a glance at the stars
and think isn't that pretty
Look deeper, how far can you see?
Deeper into the the night sky
that goes on forever
To Eternity.

We are minuscule
a mere speck of dust
A tiny nothing
In a universe that goes on for ever.

So why do we worry about such silly things as
the weather
or the way Mrs Whats-a-me-call-it
spoke to us yesterday
the myriad of tiny things that happen
to bother us so much
Why do they matter when we are
A mere speck of dust in
Eternity.

I have often stared into the stars and their huge immenseness, it makes me feel so small. It is one of the ways I use to work out how important I am to this world. I am not. When I am gone the world won't miss me. I will have done my jobs, left my genes behind, what the universe requested of me and why I was made, to continue my tiny bit of our species to the world. While I am here I will do my best with what I have and try to cause as little damage as I can in this consumer based society that I have been born into. Maybe someday, someday, an archaeologist may find a site from our generation and there will be a pot I made with my finger prints immortalized in it and wonder what the maker was like.
Bye
Love Linda.

New Meme via JTS, Memories.

2011-01-19T12:54:00.004+11:00

G'Day,
I have been invited by a blog friend to participate in another writing prompt. JTS is running, haha pun, a prompt called Memories. I will attempt to link in there so we can share each others stories. My apologies if the link doesn't work but I will try. You know all about my computer skills.
Memories. Well! I have 51 years worth of them, and since my scribblings in here are predominantly based on same, rather than my imagination , you could just scroll back to any of my old posts to find them. Welcome. But it sounds like fun so, here goes anotherie.
I thought I would go right back as far as I could go in my memory and tell you about my very first memory.
As we know our memories can be tainted by family stories and others remembrances but this one, well I was very young, but this is mine.
My dad was taking me for a walk and I was clinging onto his shoulder as he carried me on his hip along a darkish shaded pathway. The trees were really tall and meeting over our heads and the pathway was well worn and of damp feet beaten earth with leaves scattered across it. I was fascinated by the trees above and the sudden quick movements of monkeys scrambling in the foliage overhead. They were chattering and screeching but I was safe. That is my very earliest memory.
It is backed up by family story because when I was a baby we lived in Malaysia, my Dad was in the army and working there and we did live near a pathway through a jungled area where monkeys lived.
Hmm. My next earliest memory was of the back yard where my parents were building a house in Wagga. The same house where my children David, and Anne-Marie now live, so it is still a family home. My Mum's house.
The builders were digging trenches across the back yard to install pipes and I was exploring and fell into one of the trenches. The ground was damp and slippery and the sides of the trench were too steep for me to climb back out. I called and called for someone to help but there was nobody near enough to hear me so I cried myself to sleep. I can't remember how I got back out or who helped me but I remember being so scared nobody would ever find me. According to when the house was built I would have been around two years old at the time.
Another early memory was in the Wagga house also. My Dad had a cricketing friend who lived across the street from us and about 5 or 6 houses up the road. He would come and have a beer with Dad and sit on the lounge while my sister and I played with his daughters, I remember one of them names Rebecca, but the other girls name escapes me. Anyway his name was Harry Penrith. He was an aboriginal man who later became famous, or infamous, whichever your personal upbringing allows you to believe. I remember I liked him anyway.... and as my sister always was competetive for my parents attention I would climb up on Uncle Harry's lap for cuddles. Harry later became an aboriginal activist and went over to England to present a document to the Queen claiming England on behalf of the Australian aboriginals. I always thought that was cool considering our country's history. Ha ha ha, Go Uncle Harry. I have a book written on his life somewhere. It content does not always tally with family stories. The book is called Burnum Burnum which is his aboriginal name.
My mother tells me, (this is Australia in the early 1960's remember) that we were teased at school because we played with his children who were black. In those days it was frowned upon. My own father had aboriginal blood running through his veins and chose not to tell his girls about their heritage because of public opinion at the time, which I found really sad. I in fact, only found out about this side of my family by mistake from a cousin many many years later. I guess it was his way of protecting us from his own experience.
O.k. there is my first go at the new prompt, my first memories.
Now if linking in works.........?
Bye.
Love Linda.
P.S. the link will hopefully show up in my favorite reads list in the sidebar.

Sunday Scribblings "Invisible"

2011-01-17T21:05:00.002+11:00

G'Day,
The Sunday Scribblings prompt for this week is "Invisible". And.....it is a milestone prompt for our site as our hostess Laini tells us that it is the 250Th prompt. Wow.
So let's see where this takes me. I have an idea , a feeling, what can I make from it?

When I was a child I wanted to be invisible. To be able to sneak into a room and listen or watch a strange adult happening or conversation. I remember being sooooo frustrated by the closed lounge room door and forbidden room beyond at my grand parents home at Christmas time. The terrible wait until my cousins arrived and we were allowed to see inside.
I wanted to be invisible so I could be there but not have to participate as well as snoop at what was going on.

Have you ever been invisible?
Become invisible against your will.
I hate it......
It is a far cry from the little girl who wanted to be invisible.
The invisibility of being on the side lines and cut out of a conversation
Left behind or not quick enough to keep up, or as if you are superfluous, unneeded, unwanted.
To wander off and nobody noticed you leave.
You can never be so alone as you are in a crowded room.
Why do people do that to each other.
Have you ever been made invisible because a newer brighter personality has entered the scene.
Now did it feel?
Was it you ?
Or have you taken pleasure in the ego building that it gave you to do that to some one else.
Human nature puzzles me.
Heaps.

The pic above is one taken a bit over a week ago in the low clouds on the side of Mt Kosciusko.
That's all.
Bye. Love Linda.

Sunday scribblings "A Walk in the Park"

2011-01-12T21:31:00.005+11:00

G'Day,
Oh Wow, how well does this week's prompt fit in with what I wanted to write about.
Ha! Love it! What a walk in the park!
I have been for a walk in the park. On Saturday, Sunday and Monday last I was up in the mountains about 2 hours drive from here doing just that (hence the late response to this prompt). Let me take you with me with my words and pictures.
Kosciusko national park is Australia's biggest alpine area national park. This county's alpine area is pretty small compared to what other countries have and it has Australia's tallest mountain in it Mt Kosciusko. It was named by a bloke who first climbed to the top of it called Strezleki, after some freedom fighter from his country.
The park is magic, wonderful...... oh superlatives flow, what else can I say about how much I loved my short break up there. Summer in the mountains is full of color and life and the alpine meadows are alive with gorgeous wildflowers as is the forest below it. Plants and flowers, many of which grow no where else in the world, including just across the border in Victoria, they are so specialized to withstand their harsh environment. Pure magic for a wildflower freak like me.
OK the first picture above this text is of the Murray river at Tom Groggin camping area on the western side of the mountain between Thredbo and Khancoban. Places of legend in Aussie hearts and literature. the Murray river runs all the way from the snowy mountains across 3 states and drains into the sea in South Australia. Along the way just about all of the inland rivers run into and join it. Rivers right from the centre of Queensland, the Diamondtina, the Lachlan, all the rivers including my own lovely old Murrumbidge river that you may remember me talking about in here before. the Murray river in this pic is young ,cold and clear and fast flowing, as it travels along to the west it gets muddied and cuts through the earth into deep banks, it is the biggest river system in Australia.
These trees are snow gums. the have extraordinary colored bark that is absolutely gorgeous and their branches are short and twisted. This pic was taken on Sunday at Perisher valley in the park. That name, Perisher valley tells you a lot about what the weather up there is like in the winter.
And this! I am so proud! This is the summit marker at the top of Mount Kosciusko, Australia's tallest point at 2228m above sea level. To get up there you have to hop on the chair lift at Thredbo and go up the top. From there it is a 13.5km round walk to the top. It is listed as a moderate bush walk. Pete and I did the walk at our own pace it took us somewhere between 4 and 5 hours. Or rather I should fess up and admit we did the walk at my pace as he is fitter than me and had to keep waiting. Though most of the waiting was because I couldn't resist stopping every few meters along the way to check out the wildflowers and take pictures of them. Hehehe. I did it, I have wanted to do that walk for so long! Woo Hoo!
This pic is of a meadow full of silver snow daisies. Aren't they wonderful. The lady I spoke to at the rangers station said that this season is the best for these particular flowers that they have seen for 10+ years. Zillions of them.
Pete and I at the summit of Mt Kosciusko. We ate our sandwiches here and I listened to Led Zeppelin and Nat King Cole on our ipods. I wondered if it was the first time they had been enjoyed at the top of Australia. the Led Zep songs were strangely appropriate to the scenery.
Looking out west from near the summit.
Giant granite rocks scattered every where up there. Habitat for the rare and endangered Pygmy Possum who lives in amongst these rocks and shelters from the snow, hibernating in burrows inside them. These rocks are also shelter in the summer for the bogong moths which are the possums food source. Aboriginals also traveled to this area in summer to hold ceremonies and feast on the moths which were roasted on coals and eaten, they are very high in fat and are supposed to taste nutty, I think I will take their word for it. I loved the way these were stacked, as if piled haphazard by a giant.
this sign was near the toilets about 2/3rds of the way along the walk to the summit. And..... hehehe, the site of Australia's highest public toilet.
Snuggled amongst the rocks and boggy wet ground was life everywhere. Including this pretty fern.
This is a flower known as Billy Button. each flower head is made up of tiny tiny yellow flowers.
Mountain meadows on the way to the summit, full of flowers of all kinds, hmmm did I tell you that before?
Little rivulets ran everywhere across the landscape. One of these was marked as The head waters to the Snowy River. And yes, there were still a few patches of snow in January up there.
This pretty thing is called a Hoary Sun-ray. It has soft woolly leaves and papery petals and is an everlasting. I was so tempted to pick myself a bunch to keep but it is very illegal in the park to do that, if I was a kid I absolutely couldn't have resisted it.
This is a Candle Heath. It was very common up there, heaps of it.
This is called mountain celery. It was practically wiped out by cattle grazing up there but since the cattle have been banned from the park it has returned.
This is a closer view of the silver snow daisy.
Sign at the top of the chair lift. They even advertise up there. Hmph Toyota. Toyota didn't save my poor old fat legs. About 2/3rds of the way back down I was really feeling the walk in my knees, ouchy.
On Monday after our big walk we were sunburned and wind burned and our legs were not the best so we decided to spend our time exploring the area in the car.We drove from Jindabyne where we were staying and had a look at Perisher Valley then visited a Trout farm. Then we went past the ski village of Thredbo west to the other side of the mountains and down the hills to Khancoban, had an ice cream and turned around and came back to Jindabyne. Oh wow , oh wow again. It is so beautiful up there. The forest and landscape is quite different on the western side and it was warmer and protected compared to Thredbo where we were in the clouds and rain. Yep more superlatives. The road was tarred but narrow and very steep and windy. A fun place to throw your car around if you be so inclined. Would have bneen great fun in a rally car if you knew you were going to not meet another car coming from the other direction. It said in the sign that it was 77km to Khancoban and was a 2 hr drive, so that tells you what sort of road it was. It was great though. No picture could capture the beauty of the tall alpine beech trees that met above the road and enclosed it into a tunnel of big majestic trees. Or of warning signs that told to beware of wild brumbys, of which we saw evidence. Or of the blue and red crimson rosellas that abounded and the rare Gang Gang cockatoos and tiny wrens. Parts of the road were deeply cut into the rocks and I was thinking about the work and planning that went into the building of it.
Anyway, that is a small sample of the flowers that I found at the top of Australia at their summer glory.
Gotta work tomorrow, better get to bed.

Good night.

Love Linda.

Sunday Scribblings "Progress"

2011-01-03T10:36:00.002+11:00

G'Day,
The Sunday Scribblings prompt this week is Progress.
Progress Hmmmm. Yesterday I went for a walk. Up a big hill puff, pant, hard work. It was a big hill.

She put me on. The business side of her, and softened my insides with short blue socks and we went. In the car at first, with me cradling her as she pressed the pedals in and out and moved the little car a few miles down the road and across the pathway to the shade of a gum. Then we left the car behind.
Mount Taylor is one of the nice size hills that are markers in this city, part of land designated to stay undeveloped. There was no height stated on the board but maybe it is a similar height to some of the surrounding hills in the vicinity which are in the upper portion of 800 meters above sea level. Not big by the standards of other places around the world but that is what we have here. A nice challenge to conquer. The lower reaches of the big hill where we were, is covered by the suburb of Torrens and as we walked up the lower reaches of the track we found it interesting to sticky beak into back yards and gardens that were proudly nurtured by their owners.
The day before was a down day and I didn't get to move off the shelf near the front door. I waited because I know she always comes back for me, sooner or later. I cradle her, I hold her firm and protect her from the cold and the heat and pain and I can feel her moods when we are together. As we have been for many years. She put me away once, for a long time, and used a newer friend but that friend wasn't as strong as me and soon wore out, then she came back to me. I was waiting, now I am in pride of place as a useful friend where I should be.
I carried her up that big hill and we saw wonders together. Wonders and wildlife that we don't get to see in the lower reaches of my world. We saw many pods of Roos and wildflowers. Oh..........wildflowers that I love as much as she does. The top third of the big hill was covered in them. I brushed through them and reveled in their softness and subtle perfumes and colors. There were minuscule pink and mauve flowers and tiny yellow ones everywhere. Tiny tiny yellow ones on fine spindly stems just a centimeter across with pale yellow petals around the outside and even tinier petals in a circle inside those around the black center. We haven't seen those kind before. Scattered amongst the undergrowth and high up on the rocky hillside were lots of bright purple fringe lilies and a stand of pale shrubby wattle in flower. And other spindly bushes that had clusters of tiny tiny white flowers at the end of their branches. As we climbed higher we were happy to find that the same bushes with the tiny white flowers hadn't began to flower yet on the shaded side of the hill. Analogous of so many other things. We didn't know their names but it was lovely that the landcare people had been able to keep most of the introduced weeds away from here and the bush was mostly in its natural state. Well except for those pesky yellow dandelions that I am sure could gain a foothold happily anywhere, even in the middle of the driest desert rock. I loved the way the rocks were stacked in the steep parts of the hill, no stone mason could have arranged them as perfectly. Though it was much nicer to have the man made pathways to travel over.
It was a pleasant late morn we walked through. Not too hot and the sky was soft and gray with gentle clouds that stopped her getting burned by the sun. The path was steep though and we were soon wet with perspiration, it was quite hard work in the steep parts. Half way up the hill I thought she would give up, she was so winded and melting from the effort. We rested for a while and went a bit further,then just a bit further, and the trig marker was visible at the summit. Well we had come this far and were encouraged by the sight of the marker and her sense of adventure kicked in for the last little climb. She had to see the top and the view from there and it was raining so it became a little cooler and she washed her face in the raindrops. The view was so so worth the hard climb. Though I know that it wasn't so hard for the fitter and younger walkers we saw along the way.
The little dog that came with us for the walk enjoyed his adventure. There were wonderful scents for him to investigate along the way and other people and their doggie companions to be met. Then there was the excitement of seeing those kangaroos, which looked so much fun to chase, if only he wasn't held back on the leash. The big Roos wouldn't have thought much of it if he had been able to chase them and I am sure he would have been a very unhappy little doggie if he had been able to do so as the big roos would have soon put him in his place.
Anyway..... Now I am back in pride of place on the shelf by the doorway, ready to be called upon to cradle her as needed on our next outing.
That's all Folks.
Enjoy your new year and rise to the challenges it is sure to present to you and you will come out on top.
Love Linda and her old blue runners.

Sunday Scribblings "Manifesto"

2010-12-27T15:19:00.003+11:00

G'Day,
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. Best wishes to all. That is my manifesto to you. Grin. Hug. Smooch on the cheek.
Sunday Scribblings prompt this week sure is a biggie isn't it. I googled the word and came up with a list as long as ............. well bloody long anyway.
Then I took a few side trips around the web and found this...

http://www.wellbeingmanifesto.net/

It looked like a government propaganda site at first, but really, I did think it was pretty good and covered lots of stuff that we need to strive for to achieve our own personal well being. I don't usually like to copy others stuff and always think it is best to do my own writing but I do want to share this one.
In my life I have experienced people with depression. I do know how it feels to not have a healthy sense of well being. Anyway I hope some of you that find my Sunday Scribblings prompt this week might go along and have a look at the well being manifesto. Have a read and comment back to me on what you find there.
Sometimes you are the one who gets kicked, sometimes you are the one holding the bandages. That is what women do for the ones they love.
Bye.
Love Linda.

Sunday Scribblings "December"

2010-12-19T21:43:00.004+11:00

G'day,
Here is my entry into this weeks "Sunday Scribblings"prompt. The word we will be writing about this week is "December". If you would like to have a look see at what other participants have written go to my side bar and click on the link.
Anyway, here goes..........
December brings expectations that I sometimes like, and sometimes not. I remember the saddest thing I ever saw at Christmas. I was parked in the main street.It was in the days when the phone box was placed on the footpath outside the post office. A drunk man was in the phone box sobbing and begging his wife (i suppose) could he come and see his children. She was very obviously opposed to the idea. So sad.
Our December expectations. Tradition, family, nostalgia for Christmas past, present and future. The way the media and movies and of course the way we envision it should all be. The reality is sometimes different isn't it.
Yesterday I went back to Wagga to visit my two youngest children as I won't be able to see them ion Christmas day, for the first time since they were born. That's OK, I guess I can be proud that doing my job as a Mummy has lead them to independence and their own lives and contacts. Though I am a bit disappointed. I know there will be many other Christmases to follow when we will be together.
I thought I would write about that.
My son Mike, my hubby Pete and I drove to Wagga on Saturday. It is a three hour drive from here and quite pretty no matter what time of year the route is traveled, but especially so just now as we have had lots of rain, courtesy of La Nina. It is usual for the countryside to be browning off at this time of year and harvest to be finished. Nope, not this year. due to all the rain and recent flooding in the area all the crops were still in the paddocks, unstripped and spoiled, not worth the hours usually spent to work the fields. After many years of drought the farmers were watching their crops grow beautifully then be spoilt by drought breaking rains. Around Jugiong and Gundagi, in fact all the way to Wagga, you could see the many places where the water levels had been high and debris was left hanging in the fences.
We took the back road across to Junee from Gundagi, just to sticky beak. My eyes and my mind were full of well loved memories along that road. The road runs beside the Murrumbidgee river until near Nangus, a few weeks ago I could have just about walked across it without wetting my belly button. Now I was looking at long grasses swept flat in the direction of the waters flow. Two years ago there wasn't even much grass left at all. At Nangus I passed the little garage/ store/ grog shop, where I ran out of petrol late one night. I knocked on the door and found a lady, Lorna, I knew from years ago whom I used to work with. Her hubby had to go around to the bus depot at a local farm and raid me some petrol from there to get me home to Junee. Strange coincidence.
Then towards Junee and past a property called Pine Point. A friend from the Wagga potter's club lived there for years. She moved to Canberra too, but died of cancer last year, Poor Rita, I treasure the pots that I have which she made. A few minutes further down the road you come to Eurongilly. Barely a village with a hall, a tennis court a couple of houses and not much else. Eurongilly has its own memories. I thought of the people I knew who came from this area, and the driving lessons I took my children on along the back farm roads there. Then a left hand turn towards Junee.
That corner there is Heffernan's farm, I remember I took my Mum and Dad mushrooming in that paddock and my poor old dad had trouble getting back over the fence.
There on the right is Brabin's road. She taught my children at the local high school, and her daughter Sarah was in my daughter's class at school all the way through. I wonder what Sarah is doing now.
If you go down that road to the end and turn left again you come out near the farm where my son had his first job.
Just down here and on the right again is the road to a friends farm. Brian is a bush woodworker and I went to a workshop one day out there. I really enjoyed that and came away with a hobby horse that I made which served me as a coffee table beside the swing in my back yard for many years. He was such a nice man, he used to come up to the hospital where I worked and he played his ukulele and sang to the oldies each week. He came to my farewell and sang to me. I hung my head to hold myself together then.
The trees all around here still bear the scars of the big fires which swept through the area a few years ago and caused havoc, they burned for miles and miles. They were started by someone throwing a cigarette butt out the window of their car along the Olympic way, on new years day. It was one of those impossibly hot, tinder dry summer's days that you get in inland Australia with a vicious drying wind to sweep the flames along. I will never forget that day.
The hill above our old house was called Rocky hill, not much to imaging what it looks like. As you round it into the town of Junee, there is a house on a few acres,we should have bought that house. Our old house is just below the lookout there. The trees have grown, the chook yards are still standing, but otherwise I though the yard was looking in need of some t.l.c. I know the lady who bought it, she is not a gardener. Oh, so many memories here. The house where my children grew up and where we lived for 14 years.
Down Hill street and half way up the other side of the hill we stopped at Ali's house. I know all her family, little towns are great like that. She had been ill and as she was sleeping I left her there, I will catch up with her again later. Down the hill, to the right is the main street, across the intersection is the swimming pool ans skate park and the old pub where they have the poker run. So many more stories, so many.
Then left at the end of the street and on to the Bomen road which leads you into Wagga, the black wattle trees along the sides of the road are lush and green but finished flowering months ago.
I was born in Wagga. Spent quite a bit of my life there, on and off over the years. I still consider it my home town. The water is still high in the river from the floods last week and you can see where the high water levels came up to. North Wagga was evacuated during the floods but it is open again now, the water didn't enter many of the houses. My friend Fran's house is just down there in that street on the right, she was evacuated. I hope her house and pottery studio isn't damaged.
The old Hampton bridge is sure dilapidated now, enclosed with wire to keep people off the unsafe decking and railings, she stood strong during this flood though. Good bones underneath the crumbling wood. Down river to the right of the bridge is my beloved Wirradjiri reserve, I have written about it in my blog before.
The lower part of the main street was underwater, not so much from the river but from the torrential rain that fell.
We went straight past the main street and turned left into Trail street. That house on the corner is a beautiful old federation style home. Over the years I have seen it go from almost destroyed , returned to its former glory again, but now it is a shame to see the lovely woodwork details dried out and peeling again.
On past the Wollundry lagoon the water level has dropped back almost to it's former levels and you would not believe that just a week ago it was flooding. The park is green and beautiful and the lagoon is adorned with water lilies in flower, pink, yellow and white floating peacefully on its surface.
Just across the road there is an old cannon, I climbed on that when I was a kid. Down that street there,The Esplanade, is a semi detached house my sister rented for a while. Traveling down into Best street on the left is that nice house I went to for a meeting about starting up an r.s.p.c.a. branch in Wagga when I was about 17 years old.
On the other side of the road is Mrs Graham's old house where I went each day to clean and look after her. Dear Mrs Graham, she had alzhiemers and would send me to the shop down the road each day I went there, to get 1/2 a billy can of milk. She did accept when I came back that it came in cartons nowadays though.
A few blocks further on down Best street and there is the house where my daughter lived when she first moved out of home, oh, it looks good now and has been all renovated. Over the road on the corner is Mr Grentall's house and across the other side of the traffic lights is Vic and Dragitsa's house.
Then up over that railway bridge into Edmondson street, past Mount Erin school where my niece went and then on the left Wagga high school. Into Mitchelmore street.
Oh there is Betty's house, another pottery friend. She is gone now too. Such a feisty old chook, but I loved her.
It is all the one street, from Trail street right through to Northcott parade, almost one side of Wagga to the other.
That house over there is where I got the flowers for my wedding bouquet.
Next block down is Saint John's, where I used to go to church in my teens. I knew that place well and down into Fernleigh road is Turvey Tops, the local shopping center.
But back in Mitchelmore street a few blocks down is Beltana Ave. Where I lived as a 2 year old, a 7 year old and again as a 15 year old, then until my wedding.My very earliest memories lie here. Still my Mum's house, old now but still a family home. My daughter and son live there now.
An exchange of Christmas presents and a romp with Ruby my son's beloved Staffie dog, then off the the RSL club bistro for a quasi Christmas lunch.
We left Wagga around 4.00 as planned and got back to Canberra about 7.00.
So that was my December trip with reminiscences. The closest to a Christmas trip I will be doing this December.
Enough?
Ok. Bye.
Merry Christmas All.
Enjoy your Christmas break,
no matter what your personal beliefs.
Love Linda.

Sunday Scribblings "Antidote"

2010-11-30T13:29:00.003+11:00

G'Day,
I have been reading around some of the other participants work this week. Oh aren't we such a gang of romantics, finding love the antidote to woes, or even just a friendly caring face.
I thought I might try a different tack. I don't like to follow the crowd, never did.
Anyway I thought I would write about my beloved Uncle Wally. Every child should have an Uncle Wally in their lives. He is such a sweetie and quite an eccentric in his own right, he does not follow the crowd. I love that about people.
Anyway, my Uncle Wally. He found fun and excitement in things before they became trendy or fashionable. Things like collecting and restoring vintage cars and bikes. He was dubbed the oldest bikie in Griffith by a biker's club. I reckon he had one of the first movie camera around when I was a baby and took movies of interesting stuff long before others could afford them and long before the little hand held camcorders of today were available. He even went skiing up in the snow country when he was in his teens on two homemade skis he made from planks of wood. He is also an example of keeping healthy through exercise and eating home grown organic vegetables and fruits. He walks 4 km each day rain hail or shine. What a great character. He is 82 now I think. He built his own house and can and has done just about anything. And... he is dyslexic, so he never learned to write or read.
Anyway where I was going with this story....
Uncle Wal has been bitten by brown snakes probably 4 times in his life. A few years ago he was bitten again, on the finger. He felt something sting him on the finger when he was moving some timber he had stacked down the back behind the shed. He wasn't sure what it was. After a while he stared feeling not so good and thought maybe it was a snake again so he went up to the hospital which is only a few minutes drive away from his home. He made it to the car park and couldn't make it any further, then he managed to call a passer by who came over to help him and they bought the nursing staff out to help him. He nearly died that time. He had to stay in hospital for a week. Not good, I wasn't there but I can just imagine him champing at the bit to get back outside again and not want to stay in bed. Hahaha. The doctors said next time he is bitten will probably be the last.
Just a note about these snakes. the eastern brown snake is the second most deadly snake in the world and the first one is the inland taipan. Both infamous Aussies. The eastern brown snake is a quite common and wide spread critter and although it is shy and will get out of your way if it possibly can but it will attack if cornered or breeding. They are born with a full dose of venom and can use it from birth, which has been known to trick people who pick up "that cute little baby snake"The antidote can be found in all hospitals, large and small around the state, if you are lucky, hahaha.
I have had lots of encounters with them, but that is another story.
Bye.
Love Linda.

Sunday Scribblings "What a difference a day makes"

2010-11-22T21:45:00.002+11:00

G'Day,
I am back for a try at the "Sunday scribblings" prompt this week after several weeks absence. Anyway I was thinking of this weeks prompt laying awake last night. What came to mind was loving hands. Don't ask me why, but here goes.

Loving Hands
A day, a year, a decade, a life time.
I have watched your hands.
The nails, the long straight fingers
as expressive as any face,
in anger, sadness or happiness,
in excited speech,
in work, in loving touch.
A touch of love, sensual, gentle
showing their strength.
Holding our new born baby,
guiding a elderly arm,
soothing towards love, or sleep.
Mistakes forgotten to their touch,
their familiar touch
A day, a year, a decade, a life time.
Together.

Oh my children would cringe. Hahaha. Too embarrassing to have parents that still think like that. Yesterday was my birthday. I am now 51. The pic above was taken at my sister's wedding a few weeks ago.

Bye.
Love Linda.

Ellen's Wedding. Burra open gardens.

2010-11-19T22:16:00.010+11:00

G'Day again,
I would like this post to be part of the Friday Fertilizer prompt. You can see our host's name on my side bar. There is a Friday Fertilizer logo there. If you click on the picture it will take you to "Tootsie Time's blog and you can see what other gardeners around the world have to share.
Here are some photos from the Burra open gardens which were held on the first weekend in November. I went out there to have a look, as you read in my last entry...OMG.....bloody fantastic gardens displayed at their best. I tried to put in a link to the pics I put up on my face book account but...well you know all about my computer skills, or lack there of, so I am putting them in a separate post to share with you. OK. the first pic is of one of the many photographs I took of the wonderful Iris in flower at a nursery in Burra. All sizes shapes and colors.
Some more of the iris garden beds.
This is at another of the gardens. How would you like to wake up to this view each morning Mmmm mm-mm.Beautiful
An almost black iris. I have a special interest in black flowers.
A delicate pink iris. Iris, iris, and more iris. I did have a few in pots that were flowering but are nearly finished now. Mine were lovely, but the sheer variety and numbers here put them to shame.
Just look at the flowers.
And again, garden beds at the iris farm.
Pure gold.
Here is a red flowering gum at the second garden I visited. Very pretty and very Australian.
And... my theme flower. Waratah. The telopea. Overlooking the Burra landscape. What a view eh. I made this my flower because it is the state flower emblem from where I was born. New South Wales, and I love red. It is not that easy to grow I wondered if the owners had imported soil . The waratah will only grow in sand stone based soil which comes from around Sydney and the coastal areas around there. Certainly not the soil near Burra which is near Canberra. I know the ones growing in the botanic gardens here are in imported soils.
This is part of the second garden on display which is also run as a nursery. I had lunch here and the lady who owns this also blends tea, so it was a great visit for me and I got to sample some of her blends. It was funny trying to get my tiny little car up the steep hill when she stared to slip on the gravel corrugations but I managed it. Imagine what that driveway would have been like in wet weather, definitely an 4x4 needed.
But OH...just look at that view.
A big blood red Shirley poppy.
Another Shirley poppy. I had some of these growing happily in the last rented house we were in and had to leave them behind before I had the pleasure of seeing them in flower Grrrr. Ah well it wasn't meant to be was it.
Part of the first garden. Well is this beautiful or is this beautiful? I visited 4 of the 6 gardens on display before I ran out of time.

*****************************

OK the rest of this post shows pics of my sister's wedding that I recently attended in Queensland.
The pic above is of my lovely niece Cassie, with her son Ezra 1 year old, and my son David at my sister's wedding.
The pic above is taken during the ceremony and shows beautiful my niece Tatham, her sister Cassie, my sister Ellen, the bride and my brother in law Sandy. Aren't they all beautiful.
(above) Peter and I at the wedding.
Sandy and Ellen, the Bride and Groom. Wed 31st October 2010.
My mob. David, Me, Michael, Annie and Peter.
A picture of the units we stayed in taken from the beach. Yeppoon, Queensland.
The units we stayed in at Yeppoon. It was really cool to watch the tide go in and out each day and see the subtle changes that happened on the beach.
My baby, Annie my youngest.
My great niece Ivory on the beach at Yeppoon. 4 years old.
This was an anagama kiln at a pottery near Yeppoon that my sister took me to see. It is a dragon with eyes etc to decorate it. Anagama kilns climb up a hill and are fueled by wood, they are a Japanese type kiln and need a couple of days constant stoking with wood and attention for the whole time to fire. Lots of hard work , but the end results are really something wonderful.
Before the wedding. Bride and groom. Hahaha.
Bride's daughter, my pretty niece Cassie, blowing me a kiss. Yes that head dress is just what you think it is. Hahaha.
This is the coal fired power station at Biloela where my sister lives. It is inland from Rockhampton about a 2&1/4 hour drive. The main industry for this area is coal mining and beef cattle. Great steaks, I got to sample them.
I took heaps of pics over the last few weeks in my travels, I hope these few I have shared give you a bit of an idea of what I have been up to.
Cheers.
Love Linda.

2010-11-14T17:50:00.002+11:00

G'Day,
Is anybody out there anymore, since I have been away from my blog for so long?
Anyway, for my archives and for anyone who may be interested and still remembers me, here is an update on what I have been up to over the past month.
Well, you know if you have read in here before that I was disgruntled at having to move house. We were kicked out of the house we were living in a few weeks ago at short notice because the owners wanted to move back in. That was o.k. it is their house.
The rental market in Canberra is very competitive and each house we inspected, (and there where many,) was also visited by thirty or more other prospective renters, so as you can imagine it is quite hard and stressful to find another house to rent. We applied for seven places and had confirmation that we were accepted by the present real estate place just 3 days before our cut off date to go to Queensland for my big sister's wedding. As you can imagine it was a mad rush and we were absolutely exhausted. But we did it..... we did it. I can be very determined when I need to be and am capable of pushing myself work wise, to a place beyond where it is physically sensible to go, and I pay the price later.
So the new house? It is a small three bedder and we have had some difficulty finding places for our goods and shackles, we even had to find new homes for some or our furniture. I didn't like that but I guess it was time to do that anyway, and we still have too much stuff, I am bad at throwing things away. The house is ok though. When we moved in it smelt terrible, I guess they let their animals rule the house then tried to cover it up by perfuming it with sweet smelling cleaning chemicals, the blend was unbearable but I think it has improved with cleaning and spraying and bi-carb-soda-ing the carpets. My boss Brett came and sprayed the carpet with industrial deodorizer for me. It is funny how we will tolerate our own foibles house keeping wise, but refuse to tolerate other peoples isn't it. I am not a perfect house keeper but I reckon I am not as bad as some. I have sure seen some doozies in my cleaning work, oh boy have I, and am pleased to brag that my home has never and will never stoop to that standard.
Anyway, we have a house to live in, we had to take what we could get and BONUS! It has a great productive garden. Not too many flowers but lots of fruit trees and a vegetable patch which was very over grown but has great looking soil. Pete has been working on his days off and has weeded and replanted it with an assortment of vegetable seeds and seedlings. Part of the vege patch includes a good size and abundant strawberry patch. The fruit has no comparison to the flavorless berries sold in the supermarkets. It is great and full of juice and flavor. We have been going out the back and eating straight from the garden. There is a fig tree, a nectarine, 2 plums, a peach, 3 espaliered pear tress, 3 cherry trees, a lemon, apricot and loquat, and a large grape arbor. The old man who planted them sold this house 6 months ago and was italian, a race who are known to be great fruit and vegetable gardeners. Mushrooms have also been popping up in the back lawn and we have had several feeds of them.
So....... we went away to my sister's wedding with a house hastily jammed full of unpacked boxes and stuff every where. I had to leave my beloved cat and dog at the kennels and you should have seen their poor faces when I left them, we have never had to leave them in a kennel before, poor things. They have been so neurotic and needy since we came back.
We flew to Brisbane and then on to Rockhampton where we were met by my sister, Mum and my neice Tatham and her new beau, Brennan. We were delayed at Brisbane airport between flights for a couple of extra hours at Brisbane airport, so that was pretty annoying. Then they ferried us in two cars, (there were a few of us) a bit over 2 hours inland to the town where my sister El lives and works, Biloela. I think it has a population of around 4,000, quite a nice friendly little place. El has a house up there rent free and a car rent free with her job. Lucky bugger. It is a large house on a 5 acre block, I think the house we are in here would fit into her lounge and family/bar room easily. Haha. I got a tour of the hospital where she works and had a BBQ lunch with her workmates. They were nice people. Bonus of being the boss's little sister I guess, hahaha. We stayed there for 3 nights then moved to the coast to a town east of Rockhamptom called Yeppoon where the wedding was to be held. The place we stayed was in a great spot, right on the beach. The units were smallish but the owner was great too. It was great to sit under the coconut trees and watch the water gently lapping, the children playing, and the tides go in and out. There were lots of shells and tiny crabs all along the beach and I even got in the water and feel the gently waves rocking my body, then on the way home the taxi driver said a crocodile had been sited in the area a few days earlier....if I had known. Hahahaha. We will definitely have to go back there to explore some of the great barrier reef islands, which we didn't get to look at this time around. North Keppel and Great Keppel islands where right in front of us there.
The wedding was great, and I think everyone enjoyed themselves. There were visitors from all up and down the eastern seaboard of Australia. I put some of the photios in my face book page and I will try to put a link in here so anyone who wants can have a look at them. As I said I will try, ha ha.
So back to Canberra and her pleasures. Yep it is a good place to live. The drought has broken and spring is in all her glory after all the rain we have had, beautiful. It has rained again today on and off, we seem to be getting showers every second day lately.
Last weekend after doing a lot of sorting and organizing trying to get everything in the house organized I went out on Sunday afternoon to an open garden display at Burra. Burra is a semi rural area near here. O.M.G. you should have seen those gardens. Just gorgeous. Emerald green countryside, landscaping and flowers every where. I got to see 4 or the 6 gardens before I ran out of time in the afternoon. I was talking to a lady at one of the gardens and we were saying how do people manage to put all of their time into gardens like that to get them up to such a standard to display. Well two of the gardens were run as a sideline to small businesses run by the owners. One lady and her son ran a nursery and tea blending business, another husband and wife team were iris breeders and there were over 7000 named varieties all in flower at just the right time, so spectacular. At the nursery place I was lucky to negotiate the driveway in my tiny car though, she started slipping on a steep hill and the corrugated dirt gravel road, hahaha. But, when I got up there....oh the views! I had lunch there and spent my money before I got to the iris place so couldn't buy any of the plants there, ah well I have other irises and they are in flower now too, though the rain today is probably finishing them off.
Yesterday I got some extra work at the university where they are renovating a big cafeteria, so lots of scraping cement and climbing up and down ladders and mopping plaster dust off floors, but the extra few hours pay will be nice with Christmas fast approaching.
I went shopping today and bought some cloths for the warm weather, two pairs of trousers and two shirts. Nice.
I have also started a course of treatment on my poor old legs. I have been having acupuncture and acupressure massage. The acupressure massage has been quite painful. They seem to know just where to dig their fingers into your legs to cause the most pain, but it seems to have made a difference already. What I have been blaming on being fat for many years on my lower legs is actually fluid from bad circulation and with the treatment the swelling has started to go down. I am interested to follow through and see what results are accomplished. If it works the way I would like it to I will be able to go on long walks and exercise again the way I would like to do without pain and finish a shift at work without hobbling home and out of the car like a drunken person at the end of the day.
O.k. that's about all for the update for now.
Bye .
Love Linda.

linda may: Sunday Scribblings "Essential"

2010-10-12T22:06:00.000+11:00

linda may: Sunday Scribblings "Essential"

Sunday Scribblings "Essential"

2010-10-12T21:47:00.002+11:00

G'Day,
Sunday Scribblings asks us to write about what is essential to us today but only write what is essential. Mmmm.OK.

Home
Family
Pete
Home
Michael
David
Annie Brat
Home
Earth
Garden
Soil
Water
Plants
Home
Heat
Cool
Food
Home
Work
Money
Shopping
Nourishment
Home.
Entertainment
Friends
Family
Home.
Essential
Home.
Words
Clay
Fire
Home.
Shelter
Home.

Home. because very shortly I may not have one. We are to vacate this house in a few short weeks and have been trying to find another to rent in a very competitive rental market. Every house we inspect there are three dozen others inspecting and applying for the same property. I am feeling so insecure at the moment not knowing where to go. Bloody Canberra. Bloody real estate agents, bloody home owners. Bloody moving and packing. Bloody Bloody people who don't return phone calls.
I hate this. It never rains but it pours. Grrrrrr! Not impressed.

Friday Fertilizer . Floriade

2010-10-10T16:41:00.006+11:00

G'Day,
Hope you all are well. I am o.k. here in Oz. It is Friday Fertilizer time again. Click on the logo in my blogs sidebar and go visiting the other participants of this fun prompt site over at Tootsie Time.
It is Sunday here actually but if I don't tell you I am 2 days late, you can pretend it is still Friday................ can't you?
Floriade festival ended here in Canberra today. This years theme was "Imagine". I was there on Friday (my 3rd visit this year), with my Aunty Joan, and my cousin Joan and it was still lovely, even if many of the flowers were finished, floriade has been running for a month, but there were still lots of beautiful flowers to see. The top picture is taken from the top of the ferris wheel, you can see the patterns in the flower beds if you enlarge the pic.
Pic above was taken from the top of the ferris wheel as well.
Ornamental kale in the kitchen garden beds at floriade.
Here are a few of the named varieties of tulips on display, planted in wheel barrows.
This smaller black tulip reminds me of a black artichoke.
Pretty and delicate tulips.
Big rhododendron in flower in the park at Floriade.
Moi. This was taken at the Australian war memorial on Saturday. I played dress ups. Do I look like I am from the 40's war years?

This is a sleepy bearded dragon. They are quite common, this pic was taken at Floriade in a big glass tank where you could pet them. Beautiful isn't it.
This is in the same tank on display at Floriade. He is a frilled neck lizard. You can't see his frilled neck because they only raise the frill when they want to scare you then they take fright and run. I remember seeing lots of these when I was a child but you don't see them anymore in the wild, or, very rarely.
These are little dragons too, but I don't know what kind. They look very similar to the eastern water dragons in the botanic gardens her so maybe they are the same sort as those. Cute, curious little blokes aren't they.
Here are some nice lace monitors. Also known as goannas. I wish my pics showed their beautiful patterns better in here. As you can see each of the three in this pic have different skin patterns. These guys have scratchy claws and have been known to run to the top of the tallest tree if frightened and if you are the closest tall tree.....hahaha. Funny. They can bite to defend themselves but are not venomous, however as they can sometimes be carrion eaters their mouths have lots of bacteria and can cause nasty infections.
Double tulips and pansys. I thought their petals looked like flames.
Big tulip. This was the size of a dinner plate.
Preeeeeety!
More tulips, aren't they beautiful? And.......the last picture below this one is a bed of lovely iris in bloom. Ahhhh, don't you just adore spring.
My visitors went home just before lunchtime today. I will miss their company. They were a treat to have visit.
O.K.
That's all folks.
Bye.
Love Linda.

Sunday Scribblings "Love & Flashback"

2010-10-03T13:54:00.004+11:00

G'Day,
This week I am doing a bit of back tracking. Last weeks Sunday Scribblings prompt was "Love". In have had a read back through last weeks entries and found some really lovely things there. It ties in with this week's Sunday Scribblings prompt for me, which is 'Flashback".
Why, how so?
Well tomorrow Pete and I have been married for 30 years. Cool eh!
30 years in a world of change and break ups in marriages and families. But we are still together. Still together after quite a few rocky bits and sad bits and lots of happy and funny bits.
Makes me wonder how we managed it all these years. But we have and I am optimistic about our future together, yes we still have one. See holding on through the rough bits is worthwhile if there is still love.
I would have liked to have a photo from our wedding to add here but as we are moving house they have been packed away in a box, and I am not dragging them out again. Maybe another post. The photo of us above, is one I have posted before. It was taken about 2, 1/2 months ago on a weekend trip to Sydney.
Flash back?
30 years ago tomorrow.
I woke early, not sleeping much that night due to nerves and excitement and visitors. I really was against the whole wedding show off thing. I just wanted to get married to my Pete without the fanfare. The fanfare was my Mum and sister's idea, not mine. I didn't want the make up and reception and the presents, just Pete. Just Pete. I did want the ceremony and would have liked it to be in a church, but Pete wasn't into that despite being bought up as a catholic. He said, he would have been a hypocrite marrying in the church.
People started arriving, my aunts and cousins, my dear adopted aunt from across the road. The car. I loved that old car. It was a 1940's something black Buick with doors that opened back the front, a real old gangster car. I can't remember the other car but it was a big black american vintage thing too. My uncles provided them and chauffered for us.
I struggled with my make up and poked myself in the eye with the mascara. My sister stepped in and helped and I cringed at the" not me-ness" of it all. Everyone said I looked beautiful but I certainly didn't feel like it. Photos were taken by the old curtains in Mum's living room, ha. Funny how fashions change. Oh well. Stepping ahead.
My dad drove with me in the back of the car and we didn't know what to say to each other. So we said nothing. I don't know what I was expecting but .....something.
We went to the Botanical gardens in Wagga, my park. The park where I played as a child, and walked to as a teen and got married in and picnicked in and had my children's birthday parties and where they played too. We had chosen a spot under a big graceful gum tree in the native area of the gardens. A table was set up and the crowd was gathering. I walked up on my Dad's arm and there was Pete waiting. He looked so nervous and pale.
I took his hand.
I still have his hand,
he still has my heart.
30 years.
And onwards.

Bye.
Love Linda.

Missy's Garden: Gardening - a Game

2010-09-25T18:34:00.003+10:00

These are 2 of the six little candle houses I made for the coming art and craft show. They have not been fired (cooked) yet. The lovely terracotta red color will show up after they are fired.
This is one of the larger lanterns I made. I like the rustic roughness of it and the weird style. It is meant for outdoor use around a BBQ or in the garden. This one has been fired so you can see the final color of the clay. I like to make all the stuff I do individual one of pieces.

Missy's Garden: Gardening - a Game
G'Day , Anybody, whoever, is anybody out there.
Today when I went to my blog I found a comment from Missy, I added her link above. She, or her Mum, have invited me to join in a game.
Well, I had some bad news last night and am a bit grumpy. Maybe that is not quite right I am very put out and feeling down about having to move ...AGAIN!
We have received notification that the owners of the house we have been renting want it back. They have been overseas for a year. Yeah yeah I know it is their house, but it is so inconvenient at the moment. You see I am trying to save to go up to Queensland for my sister's wedding in about 6 weeks time and thought I was doing quite well. I have paid for the accommodation and the plane fares for the whole family and what I can save between then and now was to be spending money. Last nights news absolutely blew my plans out of the water as we have to move in 1 months time. I am going backwards again. We have to find money to move and pay a bond as well as find another house in the next week or so. Arrrrgh. I hate this.
Anyway, back to this game.
Let me do the Pollyanna thing here for a moment and say joining in the game is just what I need to make me look at things in a different light. Thank You for that Missy.
The game requests that I write a list of ten things that I love doing.
Well here goes, let me try.
1. I love playing with clay. I did a bit of that today as I am preparing things to go in an art and craft show. The first one I have gone in since moving to Canberra 2 and a half years ago. I might give me a bit extra cash for Queensland, or....the new house. If my things sell that is. I have so far made 6 little candle houses, 6 small bowls and 9 smaller bowls all decorated with colored liquid clay called slip. Also 5 larger candle lanterns and a rectangular platter that I still have to decorate when it is dry enough.There are a few other odds and bods I can put in too. I have been potting since my eldest son was a baby and he is 28 now. I find lots of reasons I love my clay. Hmm must write more about that in another post.

2. Like Missy's mum I love observing our beautiful Australian wildlife. Canberra has lots of wonderful birds because of the nice urban planning which has left lots of green areas and bush in and around the suburbs. I have magpies and king parrots, sulfur crested cockatoos, Gang gangs, top knot pigeons, pee wees, wattle birds, rosellas, white winged choughs, currawongs, crows, and others I don't know the names of that visit my garden. Arrrgh their garden, not mine. I love them all. The magpies though, they are wonderful, they eat out of my hand and sit on the roof of the BBQ shelter or on the railing by the front door, and warble to me when they want to be fed. We used to have a large blue tongue lizard that shared our yard and the yard behind us but he is sadly no longer, it got run over. I loved to watch it sneak in and out of the rock garden out the front. There is also a snarly brush tail possum that frequents the big oak tree out the side of the house on the nature strip.

3. I love to spend time with my husband and son Mike who live with me. I don't see enough of my other two children they live in another town and are making their own lives but what time I do get to share with them is precious. I am so proud of my three children's achievements. They might not seem so fantastic to others in their achievements, they are not doctors or lawyers or Indian chiefs, but to me they are. I sometimes talk to them on face book. Which leads me to the next number...
4. I love to waste time on this here computer. I must confess that it is my most common form of entertainment these days. I would rather peek into others real lives , or that which they choose to share with me via their blogs and face book than watch anything television. Some of the people I have come to know in here are very special and at times I have leaned on some of them with things that are easier to write than say face to face. When I tire of that I move on to some of the silly games that I have found on face book. Big time wasters but I enjoy them. They are for me my way of vegging out and switching off. I need to do that.

5. I like creating. Whether it be with clay or plants or food or words or sometimes fabric. I have always done that for as long as I can remember. Always had to be making something. I find it very very satisfying to sit quietly and do things like that, maybe it is another way of vegging out or sometimes being able to save money. On Wednesday night I made a lovely batch of strawberry jam. It will last me for ages and was much cheaper than the shop bought produce for the same quantity, it tastes better and has no preservatives in it. But like Missy's mum said in her post , I like to tweak things and not follow the pattern or the recipe, or better still make up my own, it is more fun that way.

6. I enjoy watching people. Imagining who they are, what they do, what is their story, or making up a story about them using my imagination. I love when it runs riot.

7. I love tradition. I have a whole family full of it. I like to sticky beak back through my family tradition memories and bring them out and dust them off and link them together and to me. I wonder when I do, which parts of me came from whom. Who am I like ,what were they like, what made them them, and what makes me , me. I have silly sentimental bits and pieces that I have kept that link me to them. Amongst them books, crockery, photographs, even plants. I have a collection of plants that remind me of the people who gave them to me and I keep them alive even though their original owner is sometimes long gone.

8. I like driving. Big long country drives, the journey and what is seen along the way is more important than the destination. I listen to my old music along the way because it is not popular with the kids if they are with me, and I sing along. I find though that I sound much better if I turn the sound up loud and drown myself out. I used to sound OK when I was younger, but not any more. Haha.

9. Music. I like or can tolerate most styles. I do like my old stuff best though. I can listen to anything from pop music to rock to jazz and blues or folk or classical. I won't quote what I prefer not to listen to here as it is supposed to be about stuff I like doing. I often take my i pod to work with me and listen to it and bop around if nobody is in the building and they have all gone home.

10. I like my hair, I have grown it long now. But it has always been thick and strong. Of all the bits that are me I think I like my hair the best. It is always a bit messy, and gray around the edges, but hey, so what, that is me. Just me.

So, if you would like to join in the game please do. If you click on the link below the heading to this post it will take you to Missy's blog, you can read others or find out more about it than my skills have described here. Enjoy. I am not going to send this meme to anyone, but request you join in the game if it tickles your fancy, like it did mine.
Cheers!
Bye.
Love Linda.

Sunday scriblings "Clean"

2010-09-20T21:53:00.006+10:00

G'day,
It is Sunday Scribblings time again. The prompt this week is clean.
I am clean and unclean.
I work as a cleaner but my home is not as clean as those which I clean.
My mind , well it could use a clean, a freshening and a renewal of old ideas, exchanged for new knowledge. A clean to wash away old fears, new fears, to give new courage, to step up and out.
Anyway, the first picture here is of my new friend, Gary Gnome. He came from Floriade which is a festival of flowers and gardening held each spring here in Canberra. I stood up at the children's table and painted him myself. I make my own friends,and he only cost me $12. Haha. Big kid. Then I proceeded to carry Gary around the park with me. In the first picture he is standing on the railing of the bridge over Lake Burley Griffin. On the right side behind him that big building is the High court of Australia. On the other side of him in the back ground is the Russel offices, that is a military admin area. High security etc. A bit further to the left again of that is one of the little schools that I work at in the suburb of Campbell. The lake is a man made lake , made from the damming of the Molongolo river. The white thing sticking up behind Gary in the distance is the Carillon.
This spring (and late winter) has seen Canberra receive lovely, life giving , cleansing rain and we have a wonderful water storage level of 78%. This time last year, going into the warmer time of the year it was still well below 50%. Great stuff after a drought. We are now on level 2 water restrictions, down from level 3, which means we are allowed to water our lawns and wash our cars at home instead of having to pay to have it done with recycled water at a car wash place. For this month at least.
Gary was looking for a place to shelter but he didn't have mush room. Sick pun, yep I know. But it is a clean joke. I do love a joke, clean or dirty.
Gary, tiptoeing through the Tulips in a fresh, clean, floriade garden bed.
Honey bee on rosemary in my garden. In Australia we are lucky to be one of the places where honey bees have not been affected and killed off by a viral disease that has damaged them in other places around the world. Farmers here are trying to protect their bees from this disease by keeping exports from other countries that have been affected , out of this country. Keep our industry clean....pleazzzzzze.
The fresh clean bloom on one of the camellia bushes around my yard at the moment.
Beautiful Red camellia. Herald of springtime, the cleansing and renewal of the earth.
Today I had a conversation with my neighbor about peoples perception and judgment of each other based on their income level, education level, job status, clothes, physical looks, you know...... all the sort of stuff we do to each other to categorize the people we meet each day and are in contact with. Yes we might try to pretend we are better than that, but we do all do that. She was of the mind that we should find new words to descibe our job status to improve our image. My idea was that if people find me of a lower status and standing than they are, then they would most probably not be the kind of people I want to associate with anyway. She, like me, worked as a house cleaner before her retirement. She laughingly suggested that I be called a domestic management specialist or a fairy godmother. Cute. She also said that instead of saying my husband was a screw, which is a nick name for a prison officer, he should be introduced as a correctional officer.
I don't know, I still reckon if they want to place us in a level below themselves, that I don't think they are the kind of people that I want to be with, let along try to impress. Some people are so pathetic, in their need to feel better than you, I really couldn't be bothered.
I can see beyond the outside and choose not to judge until I get to know a person better. Or is that being judgmental in a different way? Hahaha.
Back to that first picture for a moment, and to an attempt to sum up. Lake Burley Griffin is a strange lake. It has moods. It changes color from day to day. From light to dark gray, to almost black, to muddy brown,to that lovely dark blue you can see behind Gary last sunday, from choppy to mirror smooth. Like people and their moods. Not just a reflection of the sky or the weather, but moods of their own, influenced but not determined by their surroundings.
Hmmmmmm.
That's all Folks.
Bye
Love Linda.

Ah Spring! Floriade 2010 and Friday Fertilizer prompt.

2010-09-17T09:48:00.009+10:00

G'day,
I haven't been in my blog for a while. I just wanted to record for posterity some of the pics I have taken recently and said I would post on here, so here tis'.
This is also my entry into the "Friday Fertilizer , flaunt your flowers" prompt run by blogging gardener 'Tootsie Time". You can find a link to her blog and the other participants on my side bar. Click on the picture to get there.
It is spring time here in my part of the world and things are looking up. We have water, rain, lots of it Ya Hoo!. It is warming up and sunny most days, with bits of rain in between to succor the earth. The days are getting longer, slowly and I am no longer doing most of my afternoon shift in the darkness. AND...... there are flowers again. Beautiful lovely wonderful flowers.
Anyway.... the photos. The first one above is from a trip I went to Sydney about a month or so ago to meet up with my sister and Mum. It is taken from the window at the Watson's bay pub where we sat to watch the sunset. Pretty huh. Sydney harbor is surely one of the nicest harbors there is. That flouro sign you can see is to Doyle's seafood restaurant, a famous Sydney icon. This is the original one but they have opened another at Darling harbor in the city.
This photo is taken at Dixon street mall in Sydney . It is in china town. This man was on stilts and covered in a skirt of fake flowers, he was collecting money for the church in Korea of some such from what I could decipher from his halting English. I thought Hmmm, well that's o.k, even if the money does not end up there I understand. That is my Mum covered in flowers. She is 88 now, soon to be 89 in November. Not too shabby for her age eh. The fat one with the big nose is me. Hahaha.
O.K. The rest of these pictures are taken at Floriade, here in Canberra. Floriade started last Saturday and runs for a month. It is an annual event to showcase gardening and flowers that attracts a lot of visitors from all over Australia. They have displays and demonstrations and talks,and freebie concerts but most of all they have Tulips and spring flowers, millions of them.
The man doing the street theatre is juggling a couple of very large sharp knives with that fiery baton.He chose my husband Pete to assist him, it was a great laugh. Pete and another guy had to pull out the cans that he had that platform on before he balanced on the table. He was a Koorie man from The Alice, going by the stage name of Dusty Boots.
Beautiful rhododendron in the park, flowering at the exact, appropriate time to be admired by the floriade crowds. This plant would have to be the most photographed flower in Canberra at the moment, people were everywhere capturing it's beauty.
Meet some locals from Lake Burley Griffin. Grazing from the fresh spring grass beside the lake. Our beautiful black swans. They are native to Western Australia but these guys are part of quite a few who live here all year round and are accustomed to the two legged big critters, who frequent the park here.
What show would be complete without a petting zoo and little two legged critters to interact with them. This very young baby goat was absolutely exhausted and as with all very young things slept through all the excitement. Lots of children were patting him/her and he didn't take a bit of notice. So cute. I loved watching the children's faces as they interacted with the animals.
These fiberglass Zebras were part of the floriade display. They were done by a local artist, the herd was originally placed as sculptures out on the plains of Lake George which lies between Canberra and Goulburn. Some vandals decided to deface them and smash them up so the remaining Zebras where removed. Nice people to do such things and a very sad reflection on their type to behave in such a way.
This is part of the display of flowers at the back of the stage. As you can see there are many more flowers yet to open. They have to last a month.
Taken from the top end of Floriade near the display tents. This is one of the main beds. That blow up thing is a big paint brush.
The next lot of pics are of work done by fashion students making dresses solely from plants and flowers. These are just a few of the mannequins on display.

The mermaid above looks a bit aggressive, pity mannequins can't smile.
I think this one (below) is my favorite.

These next pics are inside the tent dominated by the orchid society. I loved the way the big display was done . It has green willow branches woven around the roof of the tent and flowers woven through them and rising up and across from the two main displays at each side of the stage.
Preeeeeety.
This display of orchids was the center piece in the tent. Spectacular. You can see a bit more of the woven willow at the top of the tent here.

Some rarer specimens. Don't ask me their names.
And last but not least, a pure pristine white orchid.
That's all for this post.
Bye
Love Linda.

Billy Joel - And So It Goes

2010-09-03T11:54:00.001+10:00

Billy Joel - Lullabye (Goodnight, My Angel)

2010-09-03T11:52:00.002+10:00

linda may: Sunday Scribblings "Faith".

2010-08-30T11:50:00.000+10:00

linda may: Sunday Scribblings "Faith".

Sunday Scribblings "Faith".

2010-08-30T10:23:00.002+10:00

G'Day,
This week from my beloved Sunday Scribblings prompt site the prompt word is "Faith". I have decided to tackle this one Meme style.
Faith in future?
Yes I have one, but don't know what it holds.
Faith in friends?
Precious people , but I have more acquaintances than friends, so in true Linda style don't know who I have faith in there. There are a few, but old ones, whom I have moved away from, who know me warts and all and I think they still like me.
Faith in family?
Yeah I guess I do....yeah I do. Have had a shake up here a few years ago that I am not over fully as yet. My children; Love 'em to bits, but I know one day they are going to leave me, as they should of course. I pray they keep coming back and are always there within my existence for ever. Some of my family that I adore are not the ones who spend time with me as they are out living their own lives, like my siblings and cousins etc. I have faith that if I called on them they would be there for me.
Faith in my Car?
I have a cute car. My old car was nearly dead and I have recently replaced her with a new baby. Yes it is a baby. A Honda Jazz. Almost as small as you can get in size. I have faith that she will be reliable for years to come. She better be, I have to keep paying for her for quite a while yet.Lol. She is capable of zipping in and out of the traffic and into tiny parking spots and she is quite economical on fuel too. 6.5 liters/100km.
Faith in the presence of the floor in the morning?
Well I guess it is strong enough to hold me up. My legs though may not be that strong. The floor in the morning when I first put foot on it causes me much pain due to arthritis. Please send me some warm weather soon so it goes away. But. If the floor should fall away from underneath me I guess I know I will survive that too. See I am getting stronger as I write.
Faith in Religion?
My beliefs have taken a battering. I have decided I am here just because I am, not because of a religious figure or idol of some sort. Many of you have read about about this so I am not going to dwell on this subject. I was bought up as an Anglican christian and have learned much of my ideals from there however. Religion is a good thing and .....a bad thing. This stems from individual interpretation of their religions. One of the things that has turned me away is the often heard statement "God is on our side". Bull....t. They go out with god on their side and are excused for killing and conquering, against the teachings of love thy neighbors. Yeah Right.
Faith in the Sunrise?
Yes. Yes. I like this one. Sunrise. A chance to have a new beginning each and every day.
Sunrises, seasons change, years pass, people come and go, and mother earth keeps turning.
I can honestly say I have faith in that.

*********************************

My week. I started the new house this week. The people seem nice, and it is a very nice house. They must (by my judgment) have had quite good cleaners prior to me as the quality of the cleaning in the house is good. They have a Russian blue cat that I know I am going to love. He follows me around and watches me and sneaks up to give me a cuddle when he gets a chance,very cute.
The aches and pains in my lower back , feet and knees are really annoying. My hand is sore too. I know cleaning work is not good for me, but it will have to do. Things will improve as the weather warms up.
We cleaned a bit more at the offices we were working on recently that were being refurbished. We ran out of time so I am expecting another call back as I wasn't happy with how it was finished off. I was so annoyed though, I just finished detailing the bathrooms and getting them right when more tradesmen came in and made another mess, dirty buggers didn't even bother to flush. So I locked them out. Arrrrgh!
I have finished pruning the roses in my yard. As well as half a dozen or so for the lady next door. Not too many scratches on me, bonus.
This weekend has been a perfect textbook late winter weekend. Sunny and bright, and perfect for staying outside in the sunshine and weeding, trimming, fertilizing, planting, around the yard. I planted several pots full of Shirley poppies in the front yard as well as a pot of rocket out the back. For some reason I haven't had any luck with Shirley poppies each time I have tried them. I do so love their flowers. The old man who lives around the corner near the shops, whose flowers I was admiring, gave me some of his seeds which I planted but they never came up. I have heard that they don't like to be transplanted either , but I guess the seedlings I bought are still worth the try. Lets hope. I have daffodils, jonquils, erica, camellia, a few snow drops, and weeds all in flower at the moment.
Pete and I were thinking about going for a drive up to the snow on Sunday. They have had 2 meters of snow this month and were saying on the radio about how great it was all looking up there. I later heard that they were having a police blitz up there and traffic was gridlocked for 2 hours because of it. So I am glad we changed our minds. We don't ski anyway and would have just been going as sightseers.
My son went out to listen to some bands on Friday night at Erindale and a biker attacked him. He was outside the club having a smoke and the guy accused him of trying to listen in on a conversation he was having, (he wasn't) so decided he would give him a few punches. Nice man eh?. The security people stopped the attack and threw the biker out. My son is O.K. just sore, I am waiting to see if his sore tooth settles down, I hope so.
I finished off a few other projects on the weekend. I made a pattern from a shopping bag that I bought while at The Rocks craft market in Sydney recently and finished off the copy of it. My sister wanted me to do it so I guess she was dropping hints for one for Christmas. Done. It is not as well done as the original I bought, but it is quite good and I made it for about 1/3rd of the price I paid for mine. I also finished a pot I had made and bought home with me last week. I mean literally finished. I spent about 1 &1/2 hours carving it and was nearly finished when I put my finger through it. It is now in tiny pieces in the recycling bucket. Oh well it was a nice idea anyway. My mind is turning towards Christmas presents which I will have to take with me when I go to Q.L.D. later this year for my sister's wedding.
Sorry to anyone who has come for a visit from Sunday Scribblings lately . I know that my link is playing up and not directing you to the correct post. I have tried to fix it but..... I will try again. My apologies.

That's about all.
Bye
Love Linda.

Sunday Scribblings "Dangerous"

2010-08-23T10:31:00.006+10:00

G'Day,
It is Sunday Scribblings time again. This week we are asked to write about the word "Dangerous".
Dangerous to me, in fact all wimps like me is procrastination and the fear of what might happen. Dangerous to me is the result of sitting on your hands for fear of what stepping up to the plate will bring and the eventual result of that fear .......missing out.
I have always been a timid person. I know it has held me back and now I see the consequences of my fear. I am living in a city that I have come to love. I should have moved here years ago but I was scared. Now because of fear I have no home. Well....yes I have a home but it is not mine. No patch of dirt to dig in that belongs to me, to plant and mold and personalize to the way I would love it to be.
I had that once. In a small town. I planted and dug and grew and made and molded it and loved the way I got to choose to feed my earth with organic food and minimal chemicals. I was looking after my own little patch of dirt and keeping it healthy. But the town was holding back others in my family. I have written in here before about how my son has moved forwards from his depression since we moved here. It has been magic for him.
We were split about moving as my daughter was still in school and didn't want to start all over again at a new school. So we stayed. House prices went up, and up in the city. Went up to absolutely ridiculous levels and priced us out of the market. Up 19% just this year. Now we are too close to retirement age to pay anything off and still have money to live on for everyday needs. So no house in Canberra. No patch of dirt to dig in, I so miss that. Getting my hands into the earth is an important thing for me, a part of me. My gardening and my pottery.
I often look through websites at the prices of houses and going backwards to that little town seems an affordable alternative, but then I will not have the services and opportunities that I enjoy here in Canberra. My son wants to stay here too.
My husband is a procrastinator like me. We don't know what to do, we know what we want but not how. I am scared to stick my neck out and get it chopped off. Scared to lose the money that we have from the sale of our old house. Scared to miss out.
All of our dreams of the life we would like to lead after retirement are going down the gurgler. I have had quite a few kicks in the gut since moving here but I really do like the place.
Our original idea for retirement was to have a base of operations, a modest home paid up , so that we could take our caravan and go out to experience the wonderful places this country has to offer. We wanted to be grey nomads, but with a home to return to. There are so many alternatives and ideas, but the danger is in sitting back and waiting and not jumping in while the iron is hot. Guilty. Guilty as charged. Scary dangerous stuff.

****************************

Other stuff this week.
In my rented house I have flowers again. The daffodils and jonquils are opening their pretty faces and looking towards to sun. The Daphne is all in bud and ready to burst open with its lively fragranced flowers. There are more camellias open on the bushes around the yard and all but the most stubborn of the leaves on the big oak tree on our block in Parker street are gone. The sulfur crested cockatoos are giving what is left a helping hand, but that tree is so big. I have most of the roses pruned. But not the ones that flowered the best, at the front right hand side of the house. I heard on the gardening show on the radio at the weekend that it is time to do them now. So I must get to it and finish them off. Not a chore a pleasure for me.
We had a bright sunny weekend, but the clouds are back today. The board at the side of the main road near here says that the water storage level in now over 62% Woo Hoo! Love it, and we are officially out of drought after ten years. Keep that rain coming mother earth, but please, please warm me up between showers with warm sunshine.
I had a nice morning on Friday. I met up for a talk and cuppa at the botanic gardens with an old work colleague who has moved to Canberra. I didn't know him that well before but liked him, I think he will be better here where he can be with people that are more like himself and accepting of his sexuality. He has a new partner and is happy.
The federal election was held over the weekend. As yet we don't know the final result. It looks as though Australia may have a hung parliament. Interesting stuff. And a big slap in the face from the voting public to the 2 leading parties. They were talking (as you would imagine) on the radio this morning and saying that there are a record number of informal votes this time. Deliberate of course. Yep! a BIG slap in the face for Julia Gillard and Tony Abbot the leaders of those 2 parties.
We got our electricity , gas and water bills last week. Adding up to $1700.00 bloody hell! Not nice. Especially as I am trying to save money to get up to Queensland for my sisters wedding at the end of October. I have already paid for the accommodation and have the money for the plane tickets for the 5 of us. Now the rest of what I can save is spending/play money. I can be determined when I want to. Just not brave.
I start cleaning another house next week so that will add a little to the coffers. Wednesday mornings are now full. Tuesday mornings, Marg's house to clean, Thursday morning Pottery at Watson Art center. So Monday mornings Sunday Scribblings time. Grins me. Hahaha.
That's all Folks!
Bye 'till next week.
Love Linda.