Tuesday 3rd August
Another busy day at the Croquet Club, with 19 playing this afternoon. I had two games, losing 6-7 and 2-7. The trend continued at the Tuesday quiz night, where we had trouble answering the puzzle question till the sixth round, and difficulties with most of the regular rounds. We ended up in seventh place with 77 points. Kate the quizmaster was disappointed before the start because they'd moved our table away from its prime position next to her; we were disappointed at the end when the scores were given out. We must do better next week; we couldn't do worse, surely!
Wednesday night we started off with a bang, solving the puzzle question on the first clue -- we were in third place at half-time. We didn't quite keep up the pace in the second half and our 79 points only got us into sixth place. Those brainiacs at the Don Quizote table romped home with 98 points out of a possible 110.
Friday 6th August
Cataract surgery in three weeks. The strange thing is that now I have accepted my eye problems, I feel that suddenly my sight is much worse than it was last month. Maybe my mind has been suppressing my problems until I accepted them. I remember that many years ago my sister Julie was told she should wear glasses. She got glasses but seldom wore them, almost as though she overcame it by willpower. She did make an exception for live theatre, where she would use a pair of fold-up binocuars that I think were made for sports fans to carry in their pockets.
Monday 9th August
I don't get into the city that often this year, so today after I'd taken care of a couple of errands I took a stroll around. (I had hoped to find the new Teresa Ashby paperback but no luck) It was surprising how many of the shops in the central block were now closing at 3 pm -- when I was a youngs,ter the whole city centre was open till 6 o'clock. But that was a long time ago.
Tonight's MARPLE episode on TV was "Towards Zero", which I didn't bother watching all the way through. I recall seeing it at the Playhouse Theatre in 1971. And I have seen the television version more recently than that.
Tuesday 10th August
Croquet goes from strength to strength lately. This afternoon we had 24 players which meant we had the maximum number of people on the three lawns (unless we brought out the third color balls, something that rarely happens). That's the biggest crowd I can remember seeing on a Tuesday.
By the time I walked to the club, played croquet for two hours then walked home, I decided I needed to rest for a while before this evening's quiz.
When I felt able to walk as far as the pub quiz, I set off at a steady pace and actually arrived before the team members who were driving there. We set our minds to the questions, and managed to work out most of them, although the puzzle question demonstrated how little we knew about Madagascar. Our 75 points put us in fourth place, while those perennial prizewinners Jam Bag romped in with 90 points. (And thanks to Caroline for giving me a lift home.)
The Wednesday night quiz, however, saw us sneak into second place with 81 points, behind those brain-boxes next door at the Barnstoneworth table who hit the front with 91 points.
I'm still shaking my head over the question about best-sellers by living authors; who would have thought Danielle Steele had sold more books than J.K. Rowling?
Wednesday 11th August
Wet and windy this afternoon. I had been thinking of checking out newsgents in the northern suburbs to see if I could. find that new novel by Teresa Ashby. Instead I stayed home and did some serious googling. I ended up finding the book was available from a web site in the UK, though it cost me three times what I would have paid if I had just walked into a shop and picked it up from the shelf. There's a cloud to every silver lining.
According to philosopher Alain de Botton, the news of our times is predominantly an agent of confusion, envy, purposeless excitement and needless terror.
We're still among the first generations ever to have had access to news on the current scale and we're struggling to make sense of the deluge of information.
In a wiser, more mature society, we'd still engage with the news on a daily basis; but we'd have clearer and more ambitious ideas about what we needed it for.
Amen to that. Similar ideas seem to have been on the mind of radio presenter Sabra Lane at the ABC. After a long time with AM (thirty minutes of bad news every weekday morning) she has branched out to publish a weekly newsletter The Bright Side which will give the public constructive and edifying news items and links. About time somebody did this.
Sunday 15th August
A wild morning. I set off for church on Sunday morning, hoping the gale-force winds would ease off but nope. When I got halfway up Macquarie Street, I could hardly make any progress walking into the wind. One particularly strong gust blew off my good waterproof cap and sent it cartwheeling down the street; I hope whoever finds it gives it a good home. Fortunately a passing good samaritan stopped and insisted on giving me a lift. In a typical Hobart circumstance, it turns out her mother is the friend of a friend!
After a birthday lunch for a friend from church, someone gave me a lift home and I stayed in the rest of the day, listening to non-stop rain and wind outside. Spring is coming, but not yet.
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