beware the eyes of winter

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.

In Memory Still Green

 Word for today is Semaglutide. Tuesday I started on a different medication for my diabetes, the first injectable drug I've used in years.  The difference is that this is a once-a-week dose so I don't need to worry about injecting myself in restaurants before dinner.  (It sounds unbelievable but you do get used to doing it.).  I shall be interested to see what the effect on my blood glucose levels is over the first week.   Semaglutide is sold under the trade name Ozempic, a made-up word that at least you can pronounce.

Didn't really expect there to be many people at the Croquet Club today -- the weather forecast said there might be snow down to 500m tonight -- but there were ten of us there and the conditions were better than I expected.  It rained on us for five minutes during the first game, but by the end of the second game we could actually see our shadows.  And I was playing much better than I have recently  --  we won 7-2 and lost 5-7.  So there , Ms Optometrist !

Four of us at the Tuesday night quiz and we didn't do so bad.  We put our heads together and came up with some answers to questions we initially thought we didn't know.  There was a bit of muttering about "Which Australian capital is known as The Emerald City", but I insisted it was Sydney because I had seen David Williamson's play of the same name.  86 points put us into third place, while Jambag won with 92 points.    Watch out next week !

Tuesday night was the last time I'll be behind the wheel for quite a while.  My doctor sent me to the optometrist and she sent me to the eye specialist.  I have a cataract in my right eye and there's one developing in my left eye.  The car isn't up on blocks but it might as well be;  legally I can only drive it up and down the driveway.   Not much of a surprise, I've been aware for a while that the vision in my right eye was deteriorating.  Mind you, I can still hit a croquet ball through the hoop from ten feet away but that may be muscle memory rather than keen vision.
But it will mean quite an alteration to my routine.  I don't see the eye surgeon for another two weeks, so who knows when I'll be able to have the operation?

July 22nd
The Friday Lunch Club, for various reasons, met on a Thursday this month.  Eight of us got together at the Black Buffalo Hotel for lunch, champagne and gossip.  I was the only man present this month, but that didn't worry me.  A choice of seven ladies to chat to?  Nothing wrong with that.

Walking back to North Hobart to catch the bus home,  I stopped at the State Cinema's coffee shop for some afternoon tea.  Looking at the film posters, I thought "Why don't I go to the movies?".  I haven't been to the cinema for about 18 months, so I bought a ticket for BLACK WIDOW.
An intense spy drama rather than a superhero movie, but with enough explosions and battles in the final reel to satisfy the younger audiences.  Not having seen any of the MCU spin-offs, I was surprised when a certain well-known actress turned up in the post-credits scene reprising her role as ...  sorry, spoilers.  And I was amused by a throwaway line referring to the Crimson Dynamo, who I remember reading about in Marvel Comics back in 1963.

And thanks to my brother-in-law Gene who posted on Facebook reminding us all that it was four years since we lost my sister Julie.  I knew her for her whole life, from when she was a newborn in her crib to when she was lying there quiet and pale on her deathbed.  She still comes to me in dreams and until I awake, it seems quite natural that she should be with me.
 
July 23rd
Having your driving licence suspended would be as bad as lockdown for many people.  But it can actually be a way of lowering stress.  Friday I fed the poultry and had breakfast, then checked my e-mail.  Hotmail is so slow on my laptop that it's hard not to close your eyes for a while when you are waiting for each page to load.  Did I actually go to sleep -- who knows.
After lunch I took a twenty minute walk to the nearest convenience store, at the local servo.  Picked up a few bits and pieces, bread milk newspaper, then strolled home.  It was close to dusk and the evening rush was starting.   I watched them streaming past and wasn't sorry not to be on the road.

July 25th
I sat there watching the seagull use the pedestrian crossing.  After leaving church, I had to go through the middle of the city so I stopped for a salmon brioche at the Jamaica Mist restaurant.  I had a few minutes before the next bus home so I sat there and watched a seagull walking back and forth, glaring at the people at the bus stop every now and then.  I assume he was disgruntled because nobody was eating.

July 26th  💥
TRIGGER WARNING.   You probably don't need to read this bit.  Just scroll on past, or go to another page.

Maybe it's just a bad case of Mondayitis.  I spent the day at home alone.  My dinner with friends was cancelled when she was carted off in an ambulance.  Nothing in the post but bills.  The high point of the day was getting to watch the 1965 movie THE FACE OF FU MANCHU on afternoon television.    But it was more than that.

In the back of my mind, sitting there like a smoke alarm about to go off, was the significance of today's date.  Four years ago I sat by my sister Julie's death bed and watched her breathe her last.  It took a long time;  her brain had given up but her body took a while to get the idea.  Her husband and her best friend were there.  I don't think any of us coped too well at that moment.

It was a day I never thought would come.  She was three years younger than me, and I always assumed that I would die before she did.  I just hoped that it would be quick and she wouldn't be saddled with any unnecessary grief.   How little we know about what the future holds for us.

After a while I realized I wasn't doing so well, and my doctor referred me to somebody who helped me get through it.  I'm mostly okay now,  but sometimes it just catches up with you.

And that's the way it was,  July 26th 2021.

Julie in the garden, summer of 2014

Tuesday July 27th some supportive friends invited me up to their farm for the day.  Peace and quiet, with the goats and chickens wandering about as we arrived.  No Internet, no mobile phone service, just cups of tea with freshly made cakes and some Roger Miller songs on the old record player.

Arrived home just in time for the Tuesday night quiz.  There were eleven teams this week and we came in fifth, scoring 72 points  -- not that far behind the winners, Walt Quizney with 86.  I think it's the first time we've finished behind our friendly rivals at the next table, Minerva's Disciples.  (We may have done better if our answers for Sports and Music weren't mostly guesswork!)  We did well at the Wednesday night quiz, ending up with 87 points  --  just enough to come in third behind our old foes Barnstoneworth and Don Quizote (92 points).  Some muttering at our table along the lines of "How do they do it??"

After a struggle I managed to answer a question about the currency of Albania at the quiz.  Afterwards one of the team asked if I knew the answer was the Lek, or did I guess it.  I replied "Oh I knew it, but it took me a long time to dredge it up from the lowest deck of my memory banks."

Bye Bye Billy Goat

Good fences make good neighbors is an old saying.  I was reminded of it on returning home on Monday afternoon to be greeted by an irate visitor.  It seems the goats had figured out how to get through the fence and had eaten his mother-in-law's cabbages.  He was quite worked up so I let him rant and rave, agreeing with everything he demanded.
So the next morning our friendly local goatherd turned up with his van.  I don't know about you, but I had never seen anybody hold a goat down with one  hand while he tied their legs up with the other.  The goats were a bit startled by all this, but apparently they settled down during the drive back to the farm.  Once there, they were mostly interested in rubbing noses through the fence with the female goats.  I think they'll be all right.

 The start of the week was a bit crazy.  I saw the goats off to begin with.  Other things included the authorities want my doctor to certify I'm fit to drive, my health plan has to be reviewed, I need to get my flu shot as well as my second Covid jab, they won't re-insure my car till I fix the door where I drove into the gatepost,  I didn't make it to croquet this week, I spent $250 at the hardware store, we came last at the Tuesday night quiz, an acquaintance is dying of cancer and I lost a tooth.  Apart from that, all was calm and peaceful.

On the road again!  Thursday I had an invitation to go up the country, which seemed a reasonable way to have a break from the events of the week.  It was a nice change to get out in the open air on a fine sunny winter afternoon, driving up the Derwent Valley.  Coffee at New Norfolk and a stop at the Bushy Park market to buy a couple of books.  Then on into the bush, passing kookaburras and  wallabies, not to mention sheep, cattle, horses and (of course) goats.
We visited my two goats, but I wasn't that surprised when they ignore me in favor of watching the female goats on the other side of the fence.  What would you do if you had to choose between a slice of bread and the company of the opposite sex?

Tuesday 13th July
Took the bus into the city for a doctor's appointment.  Part of the downtown area was cordoned off because of the fire that seriously damaged the 200-year-old Brunswick Hotel.  I hadn't thought about it being a problem for the bus system until I went to catch the bus home and found a sign telling me the bus stop had been moved.  I ended up walking up to North Hobart before I could get a bus.

I have a bad habit of answering questions honestly.  When I gave my doctor the form to say I was competent to drive, he asked me if I had any trouble driving and I told him I didn't like driving at night because I was dazzled by the headlights.  Then he asked me to read the eye chart.  Now I can't get the form signed until I get new glasses.  

Sometimes I think my endocrinologist and my GP are conspiring to keep me guessing.   Every couple of years they tweak my prescription drugs so that I have to change the routine I've gotten used to.  I suspect they want to keep me off-balance !

Another busy afternoon at the Croquet Club with 18 people playing.  I was partnered with one newcomer and in the space of one game he made four hoops and I didn't get any.   At half-time I got a phone call from the fencing contractor;  they will start putting in the posts for the new fence this afternoon and finish them off on Friday.  Should make the neighbors happy.

Tuesday I wondered why I was feeling the cold in the late afternoon.  It took me a while to remember that I'd put on a short sleeved shirt this morning so I could get my flu shot with minimum disrobing.  Doh!

There were nine teams at the Tuesday night quiz.  Started off all right and ended up scoring 69 points, which put us in fourth place.  The winners got a score of 81.  And a shout-out to our compatriots at the Minerva's Disciples table who won a bottle of wine for being the first to solve the puzzle question  --  it took us till Round 5 to get it.

Wednesday 14th July
Another appointment in the city, this time with my optometrist.   I had been putting off getting my eyes tested because I guessed what the results would be. (Yes, cataracts.)  This was my first brush with optical coherence tomography (OCT).  I took the bus again, since I didn't think I'd be able to drive after having those eye drops.  At least this time I detoured to a bus stop where the suburban service was still running.
The old codger in the next seat was muttering to himself, asking me how I'd feel about a nice glass of beer.  I confessed I wasn't a beer drinker but admitted I had served a few in my time.  He asked which hotel I had worked at, and I told him.  His eyes widened and he said disbelievingly "You're not Baden O'Brien are you?"   No, I replied, he was my father.  "You used to have dark hair back then," he said.    So we had a nice chat about old hotels till we got to my stop.

Never think that people aren't listening when you're rabbiting on.  After church on Sunday some of us went over the river to the Shoreline for lunch and a catch-up.  Somebody asked me what I was doing in the evening and I said that all I was going to do was rest in the afternoon, have dinner and watch the re-make of MYSTERIOUS ISLAND on television.
To my surprise, a couple of days later I received a text that read as follows:  "Hi Michael, thanks for letting us know about the movie mysterious island, it turned out we had to mind the grandchildren and we let them watch it which they truly enjoyed."

Kaye Appleyard died July 4th according to a phone call from the Public Trustee.  I hadn't seen much of her during the pandemic but I had known her for about 50 years.  She could be prickly at the best of times -- she once said that the only two people she trusted were her brother and me --  and I suspect she was somewhere on the autism spectrum.  SF fans from the 1970s may have encountered her at conventions.

Went out for lunch with Keith on Friday and then across to the Salvation Army store, where to my surprise I wound up spending more than he did ($80 against $73). I warned him this would be the last weekend for some time I would be able to drive around town  -  my appointment with the eye specialist isn't till next month, so who knows when I'll be operated on, let alone when I'll be back behind the wheel.    😞

Winter draws on

  

Saturday 19th June 2021
"Stop me before I buy again!"  Saturday afternoon was a blur of op-shops, pharmacies and restaurants.  At one point I abandoned my dignity to crawl along the floor on my hands and knees in front of the display of DVD movies in the Salvation Army store, so I could inspect the lowest shelves.  I did find a few rare items, and did manage to get to my feet again afterwards.  
At least I wasn't as bad as Keith, who went home with ten bags full of books for himself and his friends.

Listened to "The Final Game", a fan-made Doctor Who serial made by Moonlight Audio Theater.  It's about the final confrontation between the third doctor and his foe The Master.  Some of the acting from the female companions is a bit so-so but the two leads do a perfect imitation of Jon Pertwee and Roger Delgado.  

Sunday morning I noticed an extra table set up in the church hall.  All was explained when we went out for morning tea.  St John's was catering for all ages --  coffee for the grown-ups and Lego for the youngsters.

Tuesday 22nd June
Winter Solstice.  I always seem to be playing croquet on this, the deepest darkest part of winter.  I suffered through the first game, wishing I'd remembered my gloves and wondering whether I should go home at intermission.  By the time the second game came round, the sun had broken through and we actually had shadows, so I stayed on.  Lost both games but it was an interesting experience.
You could say the same about the quiz night.  We didn't do too badly (even getting a perfect score for the Cinema & TV round) and made a quite respectable 80 points. That was enough to get us fourth place, while the team titled Diamond Set Stickpin stormed home with 97 points.  I was slightly distracted trying to get through on the phone seeking information about a friend who had been rushed to hospital.  But all was well in the end.

Wednesday night quiz  --  we must be improving a little because we didn't lose by as much as we usually do!  At the halfway mark we were in second place, and we finished with 74 points in fifth place after scoring 8/10 in  most rounds.  The winners Multiplay scored 82 points, which wouldn't have won most Wednesdays.   Watch out, next week!
 
A musical safari into the Great American Songbook!  

Saturday night I seldom go out, but I made an exception this week for Nadira's concert at the Moonah Arts Centre. I remember seeing her when she first appeared there in 2015, singing all the great old standards  --  this is her first post-pandemic show there.  As usual she came over and gave me a hug at interval --  you might say that was against the social distancing rules, but since she only comes up to my sternum there was a minimal risk to public health.  Her voice is so clear that even my aging ears can follow all the words of every song.

Sunday morning in church went off all right, but sad news about our sister church in Mount Stuart closing its doors, and our assistant minister moving nterstate later this year for family reasons.  Sorry to hear that.

Old radio shows last week:
JOHNNY DOLLAR, GUNSMOKE, DRAGNET, THE WHISTLER, JACK BENNY, JOHN STEELE, GUIDING LIGHT, HALLS OF IVY, INNER SANCTUM and THE ARCHERS.

The Covid situation continues to be unpredictable.  Health scares in several different places across Australia, and New South Wales in particular must be feeling unloved.  Not only have 200 police officers been deployed to watch over the NSW/Victoria border, but a hotel in Canberra told 50 travellers from Sydney that they could stay the night but they'd have to go home the next day.

Monday 28th June
Spent the afternoon inside, keeping warm and working on my radio show collection.  Catalogued a lot of folders and then backed them up to the external hard drive.  While I was doing this, in between nodding off in my armchair, listened to episodes of "Maigret" and "Further Adventures of Sherlock Holmes" from my drama collection.

If you are friends with Keith Curtis, you learn to speak up when you have a chance, otherwise you won't get a word in edgeways.  But this evening I was speechless when Keith rang.  "I was looking at some DVDs today," he began, "are you interested in a complete run of LAW & ORDER?"  There was a moment of silence before I asked weakly if it was a boxed set.  "No, separate packs for each of the twenty seasons.  Are you interested?"  I gurgled something that he took as an affirmative and quoted me a price.  "Yes," I said.  "I haven't checked the condition of the discs yet."  I told him that anyone who went to the trouble of collecting the entire run of the show would probably treat the discs with the appropriate care.   Good Lord, that is 456 episodes.  

HAIKU FOR SUE NEILL-FRASER
"Twenty six years jail,
convicted by conjecture?
A bizarre verdict!"

 

Winter approaches.  Being warned, the goose seeks shelter.

Tuesday 8th June
Playing croquet is difficult at this time of year.  This afternoon I took my scarf in case it was windy, my sunglasses in case it was too bright, and my fishermen's cap in case it rained.  I also stashed my heavy raincoat in the back of the car.  As it turned out,  I'd just finished my last game when a flock of Black Cockatoos flew overhead, a reliable sign that rain was coming.  My opponent was just congratulating me on the long roquet I'd made on the eleenth hoop when they started to squark.
"We've finished just in time" I observed, and indeed I drove home in the rain.

Tuesday night quiz night went off all right.  There were a few potholes in the road, but we did pretty well  --  it helped that there were questions about Orson Welles' THE THIRD MAN and even a couple of music questions that I knew.  The winners scored 84 points, with us treading on their coat-tails with 80 points to win second prize.  And as usual there was a question each about US Presidents, South American geography and the Periodic Table  (there always is).

Wednesday 9th June
As a coffee addict,  I was initially pleased when Coles in New Town installed a coffee machine.  But after a couple of months I found that I either received half a cup of dirty water or (since cash is not an option), I was trapped in an endless circle of "TAP - TRY ANOTHER CARD - TAP - TRY ANOTHER CARD - TAP etc etc etc".  It always ends with me walking away, vowing never to come back to it again.  But after another few weeks I am always tempted....  😕

Thursday 10th June
BEEP What's that?  BEEP  Oh, it's the smoke detector.  BEEP BEEP It needs a new battery. BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP....  Bloody hell.

Cool and cloudy all day.  Not sorry to have a day without any appointments.  I have been eating out ten days in the last two weeks, and not only is it getting expensive but I'm learning to hate the sight of chips with my meals.  I have eaten more chips the last fortnight than I have in the rest of this year!

Tuned in to listen to the radio interview with the retiring Governor of Tasmania, Her Excellency the Hon. Professor Kate Warner AC.  I had been hoping that they'd ask her what the high point of her time at Government House had been and she would reply "Being taught croquet by Michael O'Brien.  I should have recommended him for a medal."  Alas ...

Hobart Rep announced its next production – The Stranger by Agatha Christie  – is well underway with a brilliant cast featuring some of Hobart’s most experienced and talented actors. Unlike many ‘Agatha Christie’ plays which use her novels as the basis for a stage adaptation, the script for The Stranger was actually written by the Queen of Crime herself. After laying hidden for almost 100 years, it was absolutely marvellous to discover that Hobart Rep will stage only the second or third known production of her original script. Now that is something to look forward to!
The Stranger opens on Friday, 27 August and should keep you guessing right up to the final breath!

Saturday 12th June
Friday Keith planned to go out in the afternoon.  He said to me "Will you be all right?"  I said that I would be OK as long as I didn't have to drive after dark, in the rain, or in peak-hour traffic.  So of course that was what we ended up doing.  My new driving glasses are good in traffic but useless in poorly-lit side streets.  I think I gave Keith a couple of new grey hairs by the time I got him home.

After yesterday,  I had a day to myself on Saturday and stayed home resting up.  It rained for a while so it's not so cold.    In the evening, I rehearsed for my Sunday reading at church, the start of chapter 4 of 1st Corinthians.  It's not a long passage, and if I were more adventurous I would try memorising it and doing it without the Bible in front of me.  Maybe not.  The church elders might take a dim view of it if I started ad-libbing in the middle of the reading.

Tuesday 15th June
Wet grass was probably not good for my health.  Neither did it help my croquet game.  Lost two games (7-2 and 7-6) but I managed to make a couple of good shots and all practice is good for your game.
The quiz night went off all right  -  we got 8/10 for music thanks to Rose.  The quizmaster apologized for the number of sports questions sprinkled throughout the evening, but we struggled through most of them.  I think we even had a perfect round for Pot Luck, which is often a bit hit and miss.  We ended up third, so not so bad.

Thursday 17th June
Looking at a newly published e-book of pulp stories,  I was distracted by an e-book of H.G. Wells' novel THE WORLD SET FREE.  I wondered why they were asking five dollars for a public-domain book you can download for free on the Internet.  Maybe they had some extra features,  I thought, so I had a look at the free sample.  Well !  What I found was a text I did not recognize.  I read TWST many years ago and the book is still on my shelf.  But what I read felt like somebody had found a copy of the book in another language and run it through Google Translate to produce an English=language version.  That grinding noise you can hear is Wells turning in his grave.

Watched the DVD of THE BIRDS.  Not one of my favorite Hitchcock movies, but I haven't seen it since the time I watched it as a teenager on a small black and white TV.  Viewing it on a modern large screen certainly makes it a different experience, but I still have reservations about the script  -- to me it feels like two movies in one, the first a brittle romantic drama about family dynamics, the second a horror movie that foreshadows many later ecological chillers.  That said, it is still a Hitchcock movie ! 

Thought for the day:
~~The temporal differential we call wakefulness is the cosmic interaction of subatomic particles operating in the quantum field, representing a fundamental universal constant that we can only speculate upon as wave form frequencies. ~~

Banking on change

 25th May
Stayed in Monday, then went out Tuesday afternoon to the Croquet Club.  14 of us there.  Played two games, won one, lost one.  I tried practicing for a few minutes beforehand, but the result was I played badly at the end of the first game and the start of the second game.  Go figure.  The Tuesday evening Quiz Night was no world-beater either.  I guessed that from the two rounds which were about prizefighting and video games  --  not our strong points.  We came 7th out of the eleven teams. 

*** 
Thursday 27th May
Out early to get to a doctor's appointment.  My endocrinologist was not happy with my blood test and started muttering about changing my medication.  Vaguely amused when he quizzed me about all the different sorts of medication I'd been on over the years -- I guess it was quicker than delving into the thick file he had on his desk.  Eat less, take more exercise and see me in four months.
He probably wouldn't have approved of me lunching at Pizza Hut with friends, but at least I did walk there and back.
(When I got home I sat down in my armchair to rest for a minute and went to sleep.  Happens a lot this year.)

Infrequent visits to the central business district mean that I often notice changes in the city when I do go in.  Mostly these are minor things, like shops that have become Vegetarian Tea Rooms, but sometimes they are major changes.  All my life the massive Commonwealh Bank building has stood at a city intersection a few blocks from where I grew up. So it gave me a pang of regret to notice that the bank has now moved to a generic shopfront location up the street and its previous headquarters now has a For Lease sign on its frontage.  I wonder what will happen to the decorative frieze in the ground floor's main room.

 

Proust's novel SWANN'S WAY finally wore me down with its long introspective final chapters.  I am giving it a rest while I read CAT WITH A VESTED INTEREST a Sherlock Holmes story by Lyn McConchie.

Saturday 29th May

The coldest morning we've had so far this winter.  When I went out to feed the animals this morning the temperature was 4C  --  but the "feels like" ambient temperature was minus one!  At least the sun was shining when it came time to be out and about.  It's been a while between visits to the City Mission warehouse and they had added a lot of books and movies to their stock since last time.  I even picked up a framed poster for QUATERMASS II: ENEMY FROM SPACE which was the first science-fiction movie I ever saw (back around 1962).

Monday 30th May
36 hours since the first Covid jab.  I seem to be in the group that has no side-effects, unlike some of my friends.  So far so good.   Second jab in twelve weeks.

Tuesday 1st June
Croquet Club had about 14 playing today.  Cloudy but the sun broke through for a few minutes.  I was playing Rod in a singles game.  He beat me of course  -- I have won a game against him a few years ago but I think that was the first and last time that will happen.

Quiz night was a struggle.  We weren't the only team who thought the questions were harder than other nights.  There were ten teams and I think we came in 8th place with 58 points. The puzzle question certainly had us puzzled  --  it turned out the eccentric psychiatrist we had to identify was none other than Hannibal Lecter.  And we would have scored two more points except the picture they showed us was from an animated movie in which the classical monster the Hydra only had one head!  (My sister Julie would have been indignant  --  she always said there weren't enough questions about classical mythology.)

Wednesday 2nd June
It's a mixed blessing.  The benefit I get from visiting my psychologist has to be balanced against the stress of driving to and from her office across the river.  This month the trip back was more stressful than getting there.  The highway seemed full of buses, trucks and vans that blew their horns at me for various reasons, and the wait to get from the river road onto the highway seemed to take a long time.  When I got home I turned off the ignition, took a deep breath and just sat there for a moment.

Autumn --- and a Fall

 

Sunday, after church I had coffee in the church hall and bought a few jars of homemade jam.  As I walked back to the car a breeze came up and started blowing Autumn leaves around.  They are a problem for gardeners and streetsweepers I guess, but I don't mind them.  In fact I like them as a visible reminder of the change of seasons.

Tuesday 11th May

Croquet on Tuesday afternoon this week must have been a record for this year.  We had 18 people playing today, the most for quite a while.  As usual I played a very mediocre game in the first round, then after the coffee break I improved a bit.

You could say more or less the same about the Quiz Night too.  We kept up a reasonable standard through most of the rounds (aside from only scoring four points in Pot Luck) and ended up in a tie for third with 82 points among the nine teams playing.  The winners powered home with a startling 97 points, the sort of score you get across the river.

Recently I was asked to  lunch at Edith's place, a function attended by about twenty people to celebrate Gill's birthday.  I was not expecting to find myself the centre of attention, but that's what happened when I disappeared in the middle of the meal.

I went to stand up, pushing my chair backwards.  What I didn't notice was that the rear legs got caught on the carpet and when I went to step back I vanished under the table -- still seated in the chair but horizontal rather than vertical.  Fortunately Alistair was at the next table and quickly helped me to my feet, but I spent the next hour reassuring other guests that I hadn't been hurt.  (And since this was a Presbyterian function, I had had nothing stronger than orange juice!)

Keith Curtis has longer legs than I do, so I was a few minutes behind him when we went into the Salvation Army store.  He was standing by the DVD shelf and said "Do you want these?", handing me the entire four seasons of BATMAN THE ANIMATED SERIES, both seasons of BATMAN BEYOND and the first two seasons of SUPERMAN THE ANIMATED SERIES.  Whoo !   (Now to find season 3 of BATMAN BEYOND,  SEASON 3 of SUPERMAN.)

Wednesday 18th May 

That was a bit tiring.  I started out the day doing a pratfall when I walked out the back door to greet a friend who was bringing over some hay.  Not concentrating on where my feet were going, I sat down hard on my backside.  But, as they say in the classics, nothing was damaged but my dignity. 

Then drove to Sandy Bay and back for the afternoon Bible study, taking care to choose a nice well-padded armchair. 

In the evening I was invited next door for a seafood dinner and the screening of ANNA KARENINA starring Keira Knightey. Salmon with Pink Eye potatoes and home-grown tomatoes.  The DVD looked spectacular, but two hours of Tolstoy left me a bit overwhelmed  (maybe if would have been more comprehensible if I'd had the courage to ask them to turn on the captions).

Thursday 19th May 

I felt really tired and sluggish this morning.  No breakfast as I had to fast before my quarterly blood test.  While I was serving up toast and coffee afterwards, Keith phoned to ask me to lunch and a trip to the  Salvation Army store;  fortunately I had time for two cups of coffee before I had to meet him.  And by a turn of good luck it was discount day for Senior Citizens at the Salvo store.  I think both of us  easily qualified.

 2009 haiku to his EFTPOS card: 

Those glowing letters 

bring an end to your shopping 

"Insufficient Funds."

Sunday 11th April
Alternating sunny and showers, the usual indicator that it is snowing somewhere.
Nick is back from Sydney Bible College and preached at this morning's service.  While they have certainly trained him to preach an effective sermon, I was a little surprised that it also includes a Powerpoint display, something I hadn't seen for a long time.  I usually prefer to concentrate on the words of the sermon rather than being distracted by illustrative pictures flashed up on the wall behind the person preaching.

Tuesday 13th April
The Three Musketeers assembled for the pub quiz tonight.  We did fairly well  [got the puzzle question on the second clue] but there were eleven teams playing and we ended up in fifth place with 77 points. The winners Jam Bag scored 92 points.   Minerva's Disciples came in tenth place.  No sports round though there were a few sports questions here and there.

Wednesday 14th April
For reasons too tedious to enumerate,  some of the quiz team have started going across the river to the Beltana Hotel's quiz night.  I was invited to join them tonight, so thought I would give it a go.
Suze gave me a lift over, probably aware that I didn't like driving at night outside my own suburb.  Noisier than my favorite venue, and a very competitive crowd  --  I once worked out that the maximum score possible in this quiz was 110 points, and there were teams regularly scoring over 90 points!  It made our 75 points look quite slack.
I was amused when we arrived and a car drove in just after us, stopped and seemed to be waiting for us.  It turned out to  be Kate, the quiz-master at the Tuesday night quiz.  She was filling in for the Wednesday night MC and was a bit surprised to see us there.  "At least you'll have a couple of familiar faces in the audience," I told her reassuringly.

Thursday 15th April
Slept a bit better last night.   During the last few days I had been waking up every couple of hours then going back to sleep.  Not only was it difficult to wake up when it was time to get out of bed, but  had little bits of two or three dreams all mixed up in my head.  A bit distracting.

One of my neighbors asked if I could get her a DVD of the movie of ANNA KARENINA, and I'd located a copy in a store in Queensland.  It was on sale, so the movie actually cost less than the postage.   It arrived yesterday.  Having to go to the pharmacy,  I called in at the Salvation Army store on the way and what should I find but a copy of the 1948 version with Vivien Leigh.  So now my neighbors can have a choice of color or black & white!

20th April
Tuesday there was a string of things to be done.  Appointment with my psychologist in the morning;  I keep forgetting this is a consultation not a conversation and go off on a tangent discussing various topics.   After lunch I had to see my GP about my physical health and got rained on while walking up to his office, not an  ideal situation  --  but he said I didn't need any more antibiotics, just let nature take its course.  And I have to wait till I am healthy before I get this year's flu shot.

This week's quiz night there were ten teams in the running, and [despite my having an Irish Coffee for stimulation] we finished just out of the money in third place despite getting a perfect score on a bonus round for Art & Literature.  The winners came home with 92 points as against our score of 82

Last week I participated in three quiz nights in four days.  A personal best  -  or worst, I'm not sure.  The third quiz was the annual Alliance Francaise fund-raiser, which presents some difficulties in that the questions are all in French and our table has to wait for them to be translated for us  (although I took a look at the question sheet and it was surprising how many of them I could sort of read --  my schoolboy French lessons were about fifty years ago).   The big question as we got closer to the end was whether we could drag ourselves across the finishing line in front of the French-speaking tables.  As it turned out ...  we could.   We came home with some badges commemorating our win and a cheese bowl for each of us  (how French).

Thursday 22nd April
Long lunch at the Crescent  --  in at 12.30, out at 3 p.m.   A lot of Michele's friends were there, leaving me as the only male with six ladies  :)  We had a great lunch with lots of bubbly and conversation.  And the restaurant was so warm and comfortable that my cold completely dried up for a couple of hours.  Someone started discussing politics at one point but Michele quickly quashed it;  "I think we'll talk about something else now."
Strange but true, there were two of us there who celebrate our birthday on Sunday.

Sunday 25th April
Traffic unusually heavy after church, probably due to Anzac Day commemorations.  Lunch for  my birthday lacked a couple of the guests due to various circumstances but we had a pleasant meal, including a hug from Marcella  (those of you who know Marcella will probably agree that's as good as any birthday present).  Then afternoon tea with lashings of cake and chocolate brownies.
While I was debating whether or not to have a nap later, I dozed off in my armchair and might still be there if I hadn't received a text message from a well-wisher about 7 pm.

Wednesday 28th April
Leon Compton's morning show on ABC radio came from just around the corner in Main Road, Moonah.  Resisted the temptation to get up and take a look.
Fine and sunny again, somewhat surprisingly.  I ate lunch in the garden while listening to the RNIB webcast of SUNSET MELODIES.  The sort of idyllic experience that winter will soon put an end to!

I'd almost swear the quiz questions are harder over the river.  Tonight we came 6th out of 9 teams with 70 points.  The winners powered home with 89 points.   However we did get 9/10 in music which was amazing for us!

My Kindle tells me I am 60% through SWANN'S WAY.   Only 6.4 books to go.

Friday 30th April

Keith is busy tomorrow so we had a look at the Salvo store today instead of Saturday.  The only problem was that when I dropped Keith off back at his place it was right on the Friday evening rush hour.  I sat by the side of the highway for 45 minutes before I could get into the traffic.  Checked Facebook on my phone, listened to the weather forecast on the car radio, watched helicopters landing on the hospital's helipad.  

I don't mind being behind the wheel except after dark, when it's raining, at rush hour, going uphill or down dale.  Or when I'm being blinded by other people's headlights.

Listened to the radio play "The Castle of Otranto" based on the book by Horace Walpole first published in 1764. Generally regarded as the first gothic novel, it merged medievalism and terror in a style that has endured ever since.  To a modern listener the story seems to have an over-abundance of ghosts, curses and other such melodrama.  The romantic complications of the two young princesses are more intriguing in their semi-Shakespearean style.

Tuesday May 4th.  

V for Victory today.  
At the Croquet Club this afternoon they announced that this year the New Town Club had won two out of the three divisions in the Hobart Pennant championship.  First time this century I think.   Then this evening our team at the quiz night in Moonah had our first win for months, squeaking into first place by a single point.  Just as well we got the puzzle question on the first clue, bringing us an extra ten points.

Wednesday May 5th
Traffic a bit heavy when I drove down to Sandy Bay for the Connect Group meeting.  I might have been on time except I wasted ten minutes looking for my Bible.  The goatherd called in just after I reached home, muttering about the traffic on the bridge.
Fortunately I wasn't driving when we drove across the river to the quiz this evening.   Things weren't as noisy as last week and we did pretty well, though we finished fifth.  And the mushroom fettuccine was delicious.

Thursday May 6th

Nostalgia is inescapable when you get to my age.  Walking back to the bus stop after the monthly meeting in the church hall,  I noticed that the Dome Restaurant in the mall has closed.  That's a shame,  I thought, remembering all the times I had eaten there, alone or with family and friends.  The memory that was most vivid was the strange "whispering gallery" phenomenon when you went to the washroom downstairs.  By some quirk of architecture, the sounds from the upper floor of the restaurant were funneled down into the lower level.  This meant that when you came out of the washroom, there was a momentary disconnect between what you saw (a room full of empty tables) and what you heard (the hubbub of a room filled with people eating and talking);  very Twilight Zone feeling.

Farewell my feline friend

 March 30th Tuesday

A fine Autumn afternoon.  I went over to the Croquet Club but found only the top lawn was available or play during the pennant matches.  Rather than try and find a spot with the games that had already started, I found a comfortable chair and read a detective story on the Kindle App on  my phone.  Fitted in one game later in the afternoon sun.

Five of us at the quiz night.  We got off to a flying start, scoring 10/10 for the first round, and answering the puzzle question from the first clue.  Great work Caroline and Suze..
I won't say we kept up that standard of play for the whole evening, but we finished in second place with 79 points, so we were happy.  So were our friendly rivals Minerva's Disciples who came in fifth out of the ten teams this week.

This month's old-time radio listening:
BLACK MUSEUM, MR & MRS BLANDINGS,  THE SAINT, MR KEEN TRACER OF LOST PERSONS, DRAGNET, GRAND CENTRAL STATION, HOPALONG CASSIDY, FRONTIER TOWN, SUSPENSE, THINK, JOHNNY DOLLAR, THE WHISTLER, X MINUS ONE etc etc.

Saturday April 3rd  💓
Sad news on Easter Saturday.  I had just been talking with my neighbors yesterday about our cats, and I had mentioned that I didn't know if I would get another one after Nelson.  Little could I have imagined that Saturday morning he would suddenly be taken ill and have to be rushed to the Vet.  She said it was a blood clot caused by heart disease, and cats seldom survived it.  There was no option but to put him to sleep on the spot.
He wasn't a young cat, but he never seemed old  --  he was always like a very large kitten.  Julie had three cats when she died and he was the last of them to cross the Rainbow Bridge .  Everyone who knew him will miss him.  Many thanks to the After Hours Emergency Vet Centre.

Sunday April 4th
Losing my cat didn’t seem to affect me as much as I thought it might after the first day, maybe I have been subconsciously preparing for this day  --  look at the way I casually mentioned it while I was discussing cats on Friday.
However I do feel a bit overwhelmed tonight because I had two calls from friends about my health and that damn cough of mine.  One warned me I should do something, because a girlfriend of hers was in serious condition in hospital with something similar.  The other phoned to alert me to a newspaper story about a virus called RSV, which he said I should get checked for.  They also advised me not to visit any of my elderly friends until I saw a doctor.
And of course since it is Easter that puts it back to Tuesday, sigh.
And it isn’t even Friday the 13th.

Monday April 5th
After hitting a low point Sunday night.  I stayed home resting all day Monday.  Did not go out and had no visitors, sort of a one=man lockdown.  Tuesday I felt a little better and my cough was notably reduced.  Spent the morning consuming Vitamin C washed down with draughts of green tea and lemon.  Decided not to phone the Respiratory Clinic for help, waiting to see if I can shake it off with another day at home.   So far, so good.

Thursday April 5th
Beginning fourth day of solitary confinement.  Supplies are starting to get low,  I am hoping to replenish when I go out to the clinic this afternoon.  Friends were insistent that I needed medical advice and I had to agree.  The cough is much better than last week, but still there.
I had not seen another human being since Sunday, then this morning one of the women from down the street turned up at my door with a trolley;  she said that she knew I had chickens, and she had brought me a spare sack of chick crumble that her hens weren't interested in.   We had a bit of a chat and I showed her the goats.  The inevitable question:  "Do you still have your cat."  Sigh.

Got out to the clinic this afternoon and was taken inside by staff swathed in ultra-hygiene outfits.  "Put this mask on, then we'll sanitise your hands and take you to see the doctor.  Don't cross the red line in the middle of the room."  She listened to my chest and suggested it sounded a bit bronchial.  She gave me some antibiotics and steroids.  (I was amused when I looked at them  --  they're the same sort we used to give our cats and dogs years ago!)

My biggest problem with finding the Respiratory Clinic was that they'd moved into the building previously used by the After Hours Doctor Service.  Most of the signage was still there from the previous tenant, and the new signs were small and inconspicuous.  Well, they certainly were for me.

 Sat down for a cup of coffee when I got home,  but had to rush outside  -  retrieving my goats who had worked out how to get through the gate into the driveway. They were happily bleating away as they ran down to the footpath and back again, hooves clattering rat-a-tat rat-a-tat.  The billy goats not-so-gruff?

You sily goose

 Dear Neighbor,
You may have noticed a lot of the greenery at the front of the house has been removed.  A working bee has cut down a lot of the shrubs and vines that had grown over the front of the building, moved it out the back and fed it to the goats (who needs a rubbish skip?).   
Of course we did manage to cut the phone line while we were doing it, but a roll of insulating tape was all we needed to get back on line.
One thing I hadn't expected was that one of the hens nesting in the driveway turned out not to be broody after all.  Sunday morning I discovered she had hatched out seven chicks.  I tried to move them, but she wasn't having any of it and I had to drive around them on my way out to church.   Another effort in the afternoon persuaded her to move only as far as the front of the house,  where she now resides.   So if you see a proud mother and her offspring when you walk past, you will know the story behind them.   

 

March 15 Monday
A quiet day, with no appointments to keep or people to meet.  After lunch I sat down and typed a 1500-word short story.  Nothing significant, just a bit of fan fiction I had been plotting in my mind before I slept each night.  All that was left was the physical act of entering it into my word processor.

Tuesday I could tell that Summer was on its way out.  Not only had my cough returned last night, but today there was an icy wind blowing across the garden when I opened the back door.  Before breakfast I dug out my thick green jumper from last winter and put it on so I could feed the animals without shivering.  But by the time I went to the Croquet Club after lunch, I put on my  broad-brimmed hat to keep the sun out of my eyes.  Welcome Autumn!

The quiz night this week was almost Standing Room Only, with 14 teams competing.  Despite the absence of Mark and Caroline, we had a few good rounds, scoring 76 points.  We came in sixth, with the winners racking up 89 points in a very close finish.  And we scored 10/10 in the French round despite the absence of our Francais expert!

22 March Monday
Spent a lot of time Monday morning considering how to get food and water to the goose, who has somehow got through the fence to join the goats in the back yard. I eventually worked out how to get to him without the goats trying to get out.  
The following day we moved him out of the back yard  --  hint, when handling a goose, scoop him up and get your arm around him to keep him still (this prevents you getting a whack across the face is he decides to flap his wings).  I carried him into the driveway and his head shot up;  he obviously remembered a couple of years ago when he and the other goose used to wander down the driveway and curl up on the front lawn in summer.

Later that day I went out to feed him before dusk and couldn't find him. (Surely he couldn't have got into the back yard again , I thought). I went up the driveway, then down to the front garden. Eventually he emerged from where he'd been curled up under the table at the back door. He likes a bit of shelter at his age and ended up spending the night under one of the garden chairs near the carport.
Hence the expression "You silly goose"?

23 March Tuesday
Croquet today was fine and sunny this afternoon.  In fact it was getting a bit warm by the end of the first game but after the tea break we played the second game with a refreshing sea breeze to cool us down.  Won first game, drew the second.
While we were playing,  I glanced over the fence now and then, watching workmen dismantling the greenhouse that the City Farm group built in the St John's complex.  They moved in a few years ago and made quite a success of their brand of popular agriculture. Alas, they must have lost their lease.

 

Quiz night went off all right.  Caroline rose from her sickbed and looked tired but ready for the fray.  W e were up and down a bit, but finished with a credible 79.  We came second out of the eleven teams.  (we would have made another point in TV except for me being unable to recall whether Gary Shandling played Larry Sanders or vice versa.)

Movie moment:  SECOND ACT [2018]
Jennifer Lopez gets a job with a big corporation using a faked background and qualifications.  So far so good, but midway through there's a mind-boggling twist that will have most viewers rolling their eyes.  Two stars only.

I did like the brief scene with a bunch of Cornish Rex cats, and the use of the anecdote about the Ginkgo trees of Hiroshima.

My feet hurt

 March 3rd Wednesday
Another busy day.   As soon as I finished lunch, jumped into the car and drove to Sandy Bay for the fortnightly meeting of the Connect Group.  After many and varied discussions,  came home with just enough time to change and get off to the book launch this evening.  
 

Arrived just in time to hear the speech made by the Tolkien of Tasmania, the Jack Vance of Van Diemen's Land, the one and only Cary J. Lenehan.  The book was Gathering The Strands, book 5 of his Warriors Of Vhast series.
Cary spoke about his books, their past, their future and took questions from the audience before signing copies of his novels.  Intriguingly, when asked what were his biggest influences, he named Rider Haggard and the great Russian writers  --  he said he read War And Peace three times before he started High School!

Haiku for nuclear test 03 October 1952:
Earth moves and skies split.
The planet groans and shudders
at Monte Bello.
I wrote this between rounds at the monthly pub quiz at the New Sydney Hotel in 2014, inspired by one of the questions in a previous round (much to the interest of my team mates). My brother-in-law David was involved in the nuclear test in a small way when he was in the Navy.

Listened to a couple of radio westerns.  One was 'Hopalong Cassidy'. February 07, 1949. Program #31, "The Shell Game".  This was a lively story, with Hoppy tangling with smugglers on the New York docks while visiting Manhattan.  The only disappointment was there was no actress credited for the raucous-voiced lady who played California's old flame.  Could have been Virginia Gregg.

March 4th Thursday
My feet hurt.  Spent the afternoon at FOM AGM (the Annual General Meeting of Friends Of Mission), walking to and from the bus stop.  Then in the evening played three games at the Bocce Club.  After a few busy days this week, I was happy just to sit down  with a cup of coffee and the radio.  (A segment about monster movies, followed later by a discussion of minimalism  --  anybody who knows me will guess that I know more about the former than the latter).  As part of the first segment, they had a competition where you had to identify the sound of four different monsters roaring!  After a few minutes they changed the rules so you won a prize if you identified just one.  Anybody who could have identified all four would qualify as a movie super-Nerd.
(The monster roars incidentally were from Godzilla, Gamera, Predator and Jurassic Park.)

8th March Monday
Last week was tiring, and by the weekend I did not feel up to doing much at all.  Keith kindly released me from the usual activities on Friday and Saturday and I spent most of Saturday dozing and napping (which pleased the cat).  My energy levels were severely depleted this month and I had been depending on cups of coffee first thing in the morning to get me moving for the day.  But there's only so far you can rely on caffeine.

9th March Tuesday
Croquet can be a funny old game.  This afternoon I was playing Rod, a former president of the club.  Readers with long memories may recall that I have beaten him only once in the 13 years I've been playing the game.  The first game he kept on scoring again and again;  I think we were up to the ninth hoop before I scored.  He beat me 6-1.  We went out again and played a second game;  this time I beat him 6-1.  A funny old game indeed.

The quiz night this week hit a new high point for the team.  I can't remember us ever scoring 90 points before --  as I've noted in the past, the maximum possible score would be 110 points.  We won the evening by one point (the runners-up must have been over excited;  they went home and left their prize voucher on the table, from which it was retrieved by the staff).  I suspect this may be our last win for a time as our sports expert is going to be absent for six months, which will inevitably bring our scores down a lot.  Kudos to June and Caroline for their expert work in the first round about correct spelling.

March 10th Wednesday
Some people keep telling me I lead an exciting life.    Well, maybe...
Today I thought I had an appointment in the afternoon, but I'd mistaken the date.  So I went home, did some laundry, finished the book I started reading last month and listened to some music. The end.

Talking with a friend about my plans for the week brought a reaction:  "A psychologist?  You'd be better off coming up the bush with us.  A trip into the country will make you feel better.  I'd change my plans if I were you."   I can see his point of view, but I think I shall keep my appointment..

Report from Dreamland 2008

 I was so tired one afternoon in 2008 that before lunch I lay down and slept for an hour.   It was not easy falling asleep in the middle of the day, but when I did I had one of those incredibly realistic and vivid dreams...

I could have drawn you a map of the place I visited and picked out the photographs of the people I met from any rogue's gallery you showed me.  Everything was as bright and real as watching it on a cinema screen.

The building I visited was a rambling old structure that seemed to be owned by the nearby Roman Catholic cathedral, because there were priests and nuns going in and out of one of the offices on the ground floor.   The rest of the building was leased to a very eclectic collection of businesses and groups.  

You went up the sweeping stone staircase from a lobby that would have done justice to Grand Central station.     There was a theater where a school group was rehearsing an elaborate and remarkably risque musical Einstein's Things based on a comic strip.  The bits I saw would have got them thrown out of the building if the landlord had seen them.

Along from there was a big room where I was doing a course of some sort.   But after it was over it was always interesting to wander in next door, where some sort of advertising agency or publisher had offices.   You could just stroll in without anybody asking you who you were or what you were doing.   It was that sort of freewheeling set-up.

The various rooms of the business were each given over to people working on different projects.    In one of them, a weary woman photographer had covered an entire wall in lurid covers from tabloid magazines and was taking pictures of the resulting montage of images.  

In other rooms people were working on equally outlandish but completely different projects.  

I stopped in at a waiting room or staff room which was full of comfortable couches and strewn with expensive glossy magazines, most of them still in the unopened plastic mailing envelopes.   There were a couple of issues of The New Yorker that I was tempted to put in my bag, since it was obvious they'd never be missed.

One of the magazines carried that comic strip that had inspired the musical they were rehearsing in the big hall.    

I sat back on one of the big couches and drowsed for a few minutes.    The feel of the room reminded me of the bedroom I'd had as a child.   (This is the first time I remember wanting to sleep in a dream.)   Then I got up and started tidying up some of the piles of magazines before I left.  

For the first time, someone who seemed to be in charge came sweeping into the room trailed by some assistants.   He was talking rapidly, finishing by exclaiming that everyone was invited to lunch.  Then he glanced at me, assuming that I worked there, and diplomatically remarked that he wouldn't disturb me from what I was doing.    I nodded and made some inane remark that someone had to keep the cars running that the clowns would get out of.   

They swept off and I had the feeling that maybe I should be on my way instead of making myself at home in a place I had no business in.    

I made my way down the big staircase and across the foyer filled with strangers, then down the stone steps at the start of the building.   There was a stall selling second-hand books and my eye was drawn to them.  

One of the office workers coming down the steps with me saw me glance in his direction and offered me a cigarette from the pack he was opening.   I felt foolish having to explain that I was actually trying to read the cover of a book on the stall behind him.  

He shrugged and was lost in the crowd of people hurrying off to catch buses or trains.   Not being in such a hurry, I stopped to look at some of the books on display.    There was a whole section devoted to Naval warfare and I paused to look at one about fleet operations near Iceland in World War II.  I noticed to my surprise that the book next to it had been inscribed to Don Tuck, an old friend and bibliographer.   I was tempted to buy it but the $35 price sticker was a deterrent.   

That sequence, the last before I awoke, was notable because I remember somebody saying on television that he could not actually read in dreams -- that maybe it used a different part of the brain.   This was the first time I remember actually reading anything while I was dreaming.  

I found myself in bed, feeling refreshed.   Obviously I was not just short of sleep, but short of the REM stage of sleep where dreams take place.   Catching up on my quota of dreams had made all the difference to how I felt.     

Straightaway I sat down at the keyboard for 20 minutes and captured what I remembered of the dream before all those bright and realistic images faded from my consciousness.  ##

Haiku, hoops and sunnies

 Feb 25th Thursday
Autumn seems to be on its way.  The days are still warm and sunny but that breeze can be a bit brisk first thing in the morning.  The cat goes outside at the start of the day, then comes back and gets under the blanket again.  I have to leave his breakfast in a bowl next to him so that when he gets hungry he can pop his head out of the blanket and eat without having to get up.

Inclined to be a bit vertiginous today, but nevertheless made my way out to the Bocce Club and played three games this afteroon.  Once again I made a few good shots, which was pleasing.  It has only taken me about five years to get the hang of this game.
Got my new sunglasses in the mail.  They're not actually for being out in the sun, they're supposed to reduce glare at night.  They may be rubbish, but I'll have to try them out.  They do make me look slightly sinister.

Feb 26th Thursday

1950s movie alert  --  received today, a jiffy bag (when was the last time we saw one of those?) containing two movies I saw on television when I was a teenager but not since.  Arch Oboler's FIVE and one of the great spoiler titles of all time I MARRIED A MONSTER FROM OUTER SPACE.  My dilemma - which one do I watch first?

Haiku for a pussycat (2014):
Eyes shut, body still;
The true meaning of "cat nap"
Plain for all to see.

Saturday Feb 27th
As usual, Saturday was devoted to driving around the op shops, in spite of Keith taking a spill in the main street yesterday.  We went to Salvos and Vinnies after starting at the Glenorchy Tip Shop  --  I had warned Keith he might not find much there but he did pick up a couple of items in between grouching about their prices and the condition of the stock.  Stopped in for lunch at the Green Store, where I had the Vegetarian Breakfast and he had a big plate of kurosawa.  (i.e. I paid for his lunch after he gave me three Japanese movies!)
Felt so tired when I got home that I sat down with a cup of coffee and watched some Fraggle Rock cartoons before I stirred myself to make dinner.

On the air last week, a review of a documentary about photographer Annie Leivowitz.  The reviewer mentioned in shocked tones that she has 10,000 books.  Pshaw, I say.  If you lived in New York and had a big house and plenty of money, why not own 10,000 books?

Sunday Feb 28
Late home from church because I detoured to the Eastern Shore for lunch with friends at the Shoreline Hotel.  Some eyebrows were raised when I ordered the stir-fried wild rice, a dish that nobody else seemed familiar with.  (Zizania palustris is a plant native to the Great Lakes region of North America and not actually related to everyday rice.)
I nodded off while deciding whether or not have an afternoon nap.  ..Fortunately I had already fed the animals.


Haiku for the pharmacist [2014]:
   Tablets, potions, pills!
   The modern magic cure-alls
   Are briskly dispensed.
 
March 2nd Tuesday
Got in two games at the Croquet Club this afternoon.  I played very badly in the first game, but after the second game my partner congratulated me on how well I played.  That is not uncommon for me.   

In the evening, a skeleton crew for the Quiz Night, three of us plus Suze who turned up at interval.  We managed to score 82 points, which I thought wasn't bad, but in the end (yes, you're right) we finished in fourth place yet again.  

Quizzing, Croquet and Op-Shopping

 

 

12th Feb  Friday
The goats have done such a good job clearing out the back yard that they've now been transferred to working on the end of the driveway.  Our friendly neighborhood goatherd has done a great job in erecting a stockade made up of wooden pallets and bits of garden bric-a-brac.  Fluffy and Snuggles seem comfortable in their new quarters, the only drawback being that they can now see me coming and going, a cause for baaing and bleating.

15th Feb  Monday
Last week was so busy I didn't have time to note down what was happening  I remember I was out to dinner with friends on Monday as usual.  Tuesday I played croquet, had a doctor's appointment and went to the quiz night; Internet out for an hour.  
Wednesday was an afternoon tea with one of the groups from church.  Thursday I had to be out early for another doctor's appointment, then in the evening played three games at the Bocce Club.  Friday and Saturday I was out all afternoon with Keith going round the used book shops; Internet out for three hours but had series of reassuring text messages from NBN.  
Sunday there was Communion Service at church, after which I picked up the animal feed I hadn't had time to buy during the week, and slept for two or three hours after lunch.  That gave me the strength to stay up and watch the late movie STARGATE: THE ARK OF TRUTH which I had somehow never seen before.  A late dinner after Keith phoned and we talked about movies and music for half an hour.
Monday morning I felt so tired I had two cups of coffee before breakfast,  something I never do.

Feb 16th Tuesday
The Curse of the White Butterfly.  It was hot and sunny for Tuesday afternoon croquet, which didn't help my game. At least I had a bottle of water with me. But I noticed whenever I took aim at the next hoop, a white butterfly would flutter around me in circles.  That didn't help my concentration and in the end I lost by one shot.   
Still pretty hot when I got home.  I should have followed the example of the goats, who were curled up in the shade looking very settled.

Quite a crowd for the quiz night tonight, we had 13 tables competing - unlucky for some.  We came in fourth, the usual position from years ago, but I thought we did pretty well, scoring 77 points. 82. The winners scored 82.  I got 9/10 in the Old Stuff category  --  we would have got a perfect score if they didn't get Hank Aaron's home record wrong  We said it was 715,  they had it as 755.   Oh well, there's always next time.

19 Feb  Friday
Weather for Saturday is a bit startling.  It hit a maximum of 31 here a few minutes ago, and the latest forecast says that we'll have a minimum of 19 (probably about sunrise) then a maximum tomorrow of 22.   Confirms all those old jokes about the volatility of Hobart's weather!

20th Feb  Saturday
After a leisurely Saturday aftrnoon going around the op shops and lunching in the suburbs, Keith and I went back to my place to look over a whole box of DVDs that a friend had dropped off.  We made a cup of tea and settled in at the table outside the back door to sort through the movies.  One of the chickens looked in a couple of times but lost interest when she could see we weren't eating.  The cat, however, enjoyed the opportunity.
Keith looked across the table at me and said "That cat really loves being with you.  The expression on his face while he's curled up against you is positively blissful."  What can I say, it's animal magnetism.  (My sister really had it  --  she was visiting Bondi Beach once and a German Shepherd came over and put its head in her lap.)
As for the movies, it took us a while to go through them and divide them into three categories -  Yes, Maybe and Definitely Not.  I'll study them more thoroughly later on.

23rd Feb Tuesday
Slept poorly, waking every couple of hours.  What's with that?  Probably the only part of my life I can usually rely on 100% is my ability to go to sleep easily.
Said good morning to the goats,  had a late breakfast and listened to "Trump's Last Stand" on CONVERSATIONS on ABC Radio.  Richard Fidler interviewed Australian-born reporter Jonathan Swan with the inside story of Donald Trump’s last few months in office.

The Croquet Club had a good turn-up today with 12 or 14 playing.from lunch-time.  The only drawback was the noise from workmen at the oval next door.  It's bad enough the medevac helicopters now fly right over the club,  but we got a bit tired of the mechanical noise and constant chatter ("Bring it back... more... more"  "Was that a mouse or a rat?"  "Can't you shift that **** thing!").

Called in at the pharmacy to complain about my latest prescription.  "Jardiance and Jardimet are just different names for the same medication," they said.  I replied "No, because one of them has Metformin in it, and I'm out of those."  "Well, you've still got an unused prescriptiom for Metformin - we could give you a packet of those."  I paused, and thought to myself, OK I could live with that.

Quiz night went off all right.  Nine teams playing.  We got off to a good start, scoring 8/10 in the opening round about Nobel Prize winners.  I even answered one of the music questions  (it was about Little Richard)  By the end of the night, we had 82 points and won Second Prize.
The quizmaster was disturbed when she heard at least two of us would be absent next week.  "We're not losing all of you, are we?"  We assured her there would be at least a token presence next week from The Amnesiacs.
 

A spray of Art, a gaggle of Haiku, a wandering goat

  

 Today's haikus are from 2014:
Behold the image,
Flickering light projected;
The drive-in returns.
(Inspired by reports that the Elwick Drive-In may be re-opened after being closed for 29 years.)

The secret question
Between you and your data
A silent sentry.
(Inspired by watching Julie O'Brien
 trying to log-on with her smartphone.)

Haiku for a croquet ball [2014]:
Under a clear sky,
the mallet sees its target;
the hoop lies in wait.
[incorporating improvements suggested by the late John Bangsund]

24th January
After church, I went to the Sidney Nolan exhibition sponsored by MONA at the old Mercury building.  If you were expecting conventional portraits, you would have been very surprised.  In later life, Nolan experimented with spray paints and these are from that period.  Some of them (his early attempts?) look like random splodges of color, but some of them (his later work?) are recognizably depictions of individual human faces.  I didn't think I'd be allowed to take photos inside, but above I have a selfie of me at the entrance.
Reportedly the Nolan estate plans to put these pictures on the market for about $10,000 each.  That's cheap for a Nolan, but these are unique and nobody has any idea of their market value until they go 0n sale.

Haiku for Garrison Keillor:
Lanky. Laconic.
He speaks and millions listen.
Minnesota man.

27th January Wednesday
Discussion about Russia on the morning show on ABC radio today.  The Soviet security departments were never known for their subtlety, and they don't seem to have improved. They seem to have taken Red Grant in "From Russia With Love" as their role model.  l can't believe that they seem to have relied on Cold War nerve agents and rare radioactive elements as weapons of assassination.  What part of "make it look like an accident" don't they understand?

Two haiku for Carl Barks:
Coins fly above him.
Like a Wall Street dolphin
he dives through his cash.
In vibrant color,
the adventurers supreme:
those ducks are heroes!

27th January Wednesday
A quiet day at home until late afternoon when a trio of friends arrived. Afternoon tea, followed by an hour or two of yard work, finishing with a fish dinner in Derwent Park.  I notice that the half dozen hens in the goats' pen seem to have settled in there;  I think they could get out if they wanted to, but they seem content to share that part of the garden with Fluffy and Snuggles.  Peaceful co-existence in the livestock world.  Even the goose is calm about it all.

28th January Thursday
Yes, it is Thursday, despite the disorienting public holiday two days ago.  Wasn't too bad a day.  In the mail, received my bottle of Meso-Zeaxanthin and  the first issue of my NEW YORKER subscription  --  more of that anon.  I found the external hard drive I mislaid a couple of days ago, which was a relief.  The goats were still in their pen, looking forward to their breakfast.   I did a few chores then went out to the Bocce Club and got in two games -- tied one, lost the other.  Went to the supermarket on the way home, and scored the last issue they had of THE PHANTOM SPECIAL 2020.  

Out of curiosity, did a reading speed test on the Internet.  It said I had a speed of 198wpm.  I can't remember if that is better or worse than last century.


Fluffy (the white goat) is now an expert at getting out of the pen.  It's now routine for me to find him at the garden gate waiting for breakfast or dinner.  The only problem is that he is so eager he wants to jump up against me, looking for the food;  it's bad enough when a dog does that, but a half-grown goat with horns and cloven hooves is a bit much.
I was amused this week when he was in the pen one morning, then got out during the afternoon.  When I went out to feed them that evening, he was nowhere to be seen.  Because it was raining a little, he'd returned to the pen where he could shelter in the old hen house!

Cloven hooves approach,
the bleating intensifies.
A caprine breakfast!

Back in 2014 Richard Colom reported a startling piece of music history:  " I talked to the producer of Reader's Digest albums back in the early 90's, and he said that The Big Band Era was their biggest seller of all time (up to then). He said that they sold 15 million of them! It also was released on CD for a short time."
That is quite amazing - imagine a nostalgia album selling 15 million units today.  

A cup of evil,
steaming malevolently
reaching for your soul.
-- haiku for evil coffee

Collectors, hoarders and accumulators.  Which are we?
https://theconversation.com/digital-hoarders-weve-identified-four-types-which-are-you-153111?utm_source=pocket-newtab-intl-en

2nd February Tuesday  
Tuesday had its ups and downs.  I felt a bit rocky this morning but by the time I got to the Croquet Club after lunch I had picked up sufficiently to win both games that afternoon.  When I got home I sat down and nodded off for a few minutes.
But when I went out to the Quiz Night in the evening, it wasn't quite so upbeat.  We had a few good rounds and notched up 72 points at the end  (why does the sheet automatically get passed to me when we get to the round titled Old Stuff??), however we finished fifth out of the 13 teams when the winners streaked ahead to score 88 points.

3rd Feb
Wednesday I decided to have a quiet day at home.  Tuesday and Thursday this week there was a lot on, so it seemed sensible to take a day off inbetween.  The goat has stayed in his pen today, so at least I was able to feed the poultry without him careering round the yard in excitement.  A lot of the "spare time" was used up trying to get the PC to do things;  took me three attempts to get a post uploaded to Facebook.  I really should get the new laptop out of its box and set it up.

4th Feb Thursday
Lunch with Friends Of Mission at the church hall.  One of my duties was to present the Assistant Minister with his birthday card.  Then called in to pick up some prescriptions from my GP.  I told him that the Luteine supplement I'd been taking seemed to improve my short term memory.   He replied "Maybe I should start taking it."

Called in at the newsagency to pick up my standing order for D.C. Thomson comics and magazines, then out to buy feed for the animals.  Heaven help me if I went home without more food for the goats!

Thursday morning it looked so wet and miserable outside that I didn't think we'd be playing at the Bocce Club in the evening.  But the weather steadily improved until we were playing in bright sunshine all evening.  It didn't improve my game though  --  half my shots were terrific, half were terrible.

5th Feb  Friday
Friday morning breakfast was trying.  The cat insisted on climbing all over me, meowing if I wanted him to get down.  Apparently he was trying to make up for lost time, because I was out for so much of yesterday.