We are famous!!

From Singles 2009

or soon to be...

Each week we receive an online newsletter about what's happening in Brisbane. On Friday one of the featured events was the Pet Photo Booth Project. Zelda and I were of one mind.

We had to be there!

Fortunately, they had an opening. Saturday at 4 PM.

Saturday was CONSUMED with preparation for this! Zelda had to get an embarrassing Ann-cut and a bath. Kevin and I debated whether to wear our "Ned Kelly" masks, or black droopy dog ears, or our red and black face masks, or our Australian flag masks or... I must say, the stress got to be a bit much for me. I can be very, very silly.

We ended up just wearing shirts and ties. (I had suggested we wear bridal gowns, but the practicality of finding gowns, especially a gown that would fit Kevin - and then drugging him to the extent I could dress him in it and yet he could stand for a photo shoot...)

The photographer's first question - whose dog is it? left us a bit confused. Zelda is our dog. Yes, I had her first (before I had Kevin) but Zelda likes Kevin more. Seems they have had issues where the couple photographed with a pet have later broken up and then there has been some sort of unpleasantness about the image uniting them in perpetuity. (What is it with Australians and their breakups? These are the folks who do library damage and photo-pick-up mischief to each other!) As a consequence, they took several photos of the three of us and then more of just Zelda and me. (Later I wondered if the problem arose because Kevin and I sport different last names. If we'd been in wedding gowns, this never would have come up, I'm sure. They'd have been speechless - it would have been that cool.)

In another 4 to 6 weeks we are hoping to receive a copy, a digital copy, of a photo from the shoot. Some of these photos will be collected in a book - and we hope Zelda makes the cut - with both of us.

Our background - cactus in the desert.

What's playing in my head this morning

Feldenkrais

From Singles 2009

I think this is an interesting process but each time I go to a group lesson I am frustrated or disappointed. Well, no. The first time was OK - it was just the last two.

For those of you who have never heard of F, this is a school (I guess you'd call it) of movement study with the aim to assist people to learn the most efficient, effective, pain free way to move (and be still) and in doing so reduce pain and improve function. It occurred to me recently that rather than returning time after time to masseuses and acupuncturists and chiropractors (who I haven't actually been to since I hurt my knee in 1994!) for my neck and shoulder stiffness and migraine headaches, it would make more sense to see if I could learn what I am doing to create them. And, in doing so, can this be changed.

So, I have no real beef with F, I think they may have something to help me, it is just these last two lessons were disappointing. First, they instructed me to remove my glasses. Then, they talked to me in Australian. I guess it is because I am such a visual person, I can't understand what I'm hearing as well when I can't see. (Does this happen to anyone else?) Plus, I can't follow visually what you are demonstrating if I can't see you. (I KNOW this would be common.) So, I was very frustrated.

My last class was given by the instructor for "Bones for Life". She was very good (= let me keep on my glasses) although I did find her singing little bone songs to be a bit silly. She was making a very good point about where on your foot you place your weight when walking or lifting up the body (though I cannot distinguish between my 5 toes, or at least the 3 in the middle). Then, she started saying things that as a veterinarian I have to say were just not right. She started talking about hooves. It may be 10 years now since I last saw a hoof or treated a hoof, but I certainly remember the anatomy of horse hooves, cow hooves, and pig hooves - which are not the same - though maybe the latter two are not called hooves. But, anyway, even if we need to restrict ourselves to horses, the hoof is not located between what would be our big toe and the second digit. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. Horse hoof = third digit.

Unless they lied to me in school. "What is the chance of that???" she wonders.

(Note- photo from wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Equine-dist-forelimb-bones.png)

"Jesus Out to Sea"

From Singles 2009

I took my mother and auntie to the local library so they could get some materials with which to entertain themselves while I was working. Naturally, I checked what was on the shelf by James Lee Burke. The only item available at Chermside at that time was a collection of short stories.

This was the first time I'd read any of Burke's short stories and I was surprised to find many of the characters I'd met in his novels. Not Dave or Clete or even Bootsie, but some of the "bad guys" - lesser bad guys really or men who knew the lesser bad guys. Even if I didn't know the person, I recognized some familiar names: Guidry, Hollister, Pougue, Sonnier... These names, the familiar Louisiana and Montana locales, the alcoholics and the war vets shouldn't have surprised me. He's just writing about the folks he knows "at home" in his novels. Eventually, I looked at the index and found that some of my recognition stemmed from the stories actually being excerpts from novels! Glad I had already read those novels!

But on our block - and that is all we ever called the place we lived, "our block" - the era was marked not so much by a distant war as it was by the presence of radios in people's windows and on their front porches, the visits to the block of the bookmobile and the Popsicle man, and games of street ball and hide-and-seek on summer evenings that smelled of flowers and water sprayed from garden hoses.

Three of the stories followed boys- 10, 12, 14 years old...something like that - set in New Orleans during WWII. No one is named Dave and none of the family experiences match Dave's, but you can see something of Dave's "stand up" character in the young protagonist, Charlie. The stories are Charlie's stories - and told in first person like all Burke's stories.

Our next-door neighbors were the Dunlops. They had skin like pig hide and heads with the knobbed ridges of coconuts. The oldest of the five boys was executed in Huntsville Pen; one did time on Sugarland Farm.

The patriarch of the family was a security guard at the Southern Pacific train yards. He covered all the exterior surfaces of his house, garage, and toolshed with the yellow paint he stole from his employer. The Dunlops even painted their car with it.

Like the Robicheaux novels, Burke matches a beautiful city (and these stories are set in Dave's "golden age") with the stain of evil: the loss of innocence, gangs, bullies and child molesters. In these short pieces Burke still takes time to color his bad guys and in doing so elevate them from comic book villains. Vernon Dunlop is a bully - but Vernon is an abused kid, too. Benny "Bugsy" Siegel is struggling to learn the yo-yo from Charlie and Nick. When Vernon Dunlop's dad chases off the Cherrio yo-yo man and busts the favorite nun for drinking, it is Benny Siegel who comes to Charlie's aid. Charlie's "love-interest" is a girl from a New Orlean's mob family - and it's this family that removes the molester from the park.

Two stories feature a former professor, widower, living an isolated life of his choosing on a property abutting a national forest in Montana. (Interestinly, these are not told in the first person voice.) You'd think it was the same guy...but his name changes between stories. Well, he is the same guy. He has an almost indistinguishably different back story, he lives in the same place, and he has a history of his involvement in situations turning, lets say, dark.

Albert starts to tell Joe Bim all of it - the attempt he made on the biker's life, the deed the sheriff's deputy had done to him when he was eighteen, the accidental death of his father, the incipient rage that has lived in his breast all his adult life- but the words break apart in his throat before he can speak them. In the silence he can hear the wind coursing through the trees and grass, just like the sound of rushing water, and he wonders if it is blowing through the canyon where he lives or through his own soul. He wonders if his reticence with Joe Bim is not indeed the moment of absolution that has always eluded him. He waits for Joe Bim to speak again but realizes his friend's crooked smile is one of puzzlement, not omniscience, that the puckered skin on the side of his face is a reminder that the good people of the world each carry their own burden.

Two stories come from people associated with Katrina: "Mist" and "Jesus Out to Sea". In "Mist", Burke's protagonist is an alcoholic, drug abusing woman. In "Jesus Out to Sea" he follows one of his mob guys brothers, Tony aka "Johnny Wadd" from "A Morning for Flamingos", as he and his buddy wait in the rising waters of New Orleans. Wait for rescue.

The color of the water is chocolate-brown, with a greenish-blue shine on the surface like gasoline, escept it's not gasoline. All the stuff from the broken sewage mains has settled on the bottom. When people try to walk in it, dark clouds swell up around their chests and arms. I've never smelled anything like it.

The sun is a yellow flame on the brown water. It must be more than ninety-five degrees now. At dawn, I saw a black woman on the next street, one that's lower than mine, standing on the top of a car roof. She was huge, with rolls of fat on her like a stack of inner tubes. She was wearing a purple dress that had floated up over her waist and she was waving at the sky for help. Miles rowed a boat from the bar he owns on the corner, and the two of us went over to where the car roof was maybe six feet underwater by the time we got there. The black lady was gone. I keep telling myself a United States Coast Guard chopper lifted her off. Those Coast Guard guys are brave. Except I haven't heard any choppers in the last hour.

...This is the Ninth Ward of Orleans Parish. Only two streets away I can see the tops of palm trees sticking out of the water. I can also see houses that are completely covered. Last night I heard people beating the roofs from inside the attics in those houses. I have a feeling the sounds of those people will never leave my sleep...

I was in the US at the time Katrina struck New Orleans and I heard many stories - mostly on the radio, cause I'm mostly a radio (NPR) news person. But, it wasn't until I read this story that I actually felt the horror of the situation. (The same thing is happening now as I listen to Don Delillo's "The Falling Man" about 9-11.) I'm not sure why that is. Is it the personal involvement of the imagination that comes with reading? Is a "story" able to creep around emotional boundaries we (I) erect to protect us from the ugliness of life? Am I aberrant? Maybe it is just the magic that Burke can wield with his words...

You know what death smells like? Fish blood that someone has buried in a garden of night-blooming flowers. Or a field mortuary during the monsoon season in a tropical country right after the power generators have failed. Or the bucket that the sugar-worker whores used to pour into the rain ditches behind their cribs on Sunday morning. If that odor comes to you on the wind or in your sleep, you tend do take special notice of your next sunrise.

Quick! Lets finish April!

I flew back to Australia with my mother and my auntie in tow. Our flight from Dayton was delayed which caused us to miss our connection from Atlanta to LA. Fortunately, my dear husband had put the fear of missed connections in my mind, and so I had booked us an outrageously early flight from Dayton - which allowed us to catch a later flight from Atlanta and still have way too much time to lounge around LAX. Our flight back was great. The plane was under-consumed which meant that we all had 3 seats to ourselves to spread out on. Unfortunately, this was a flight in "The Twilight Zone" and the opportunity to watch movies was predicated on paying $14 AU. (This wasn't true for Kevin when he came home. In fact, the staff on his flight didn't understand why he thought that anyone would ever have to pay. Perhaps, he should have mentioned something about William Shatner seeing something on a wing...)

My guests had a pretty modest list of things they wanted to do. Sit on the couch (which they bought for themselves) with Zelda and visit the Brisbane sites they'd seen last time: Alma Park Zoo, Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary, Australia Zoo. I added a visit to Ikea, the clock tower in Brisbane City Hall, Mt. Coot-tha, the Glasshouse Mountains and the GOMA. I hated having to work so much while they were here, but it was great to come home to people - especially people who have fixed supper.

My mother's neighbor and friend, Dixie, had sent along a small, toy bunny with the instruction that we were to take him everywhere. And, photograph him. We did. You'll see.

30 YEARS!

I received in the mail this week an invitation to my 30th High School Class Reunion. Wow. Totally amazing- though I guess it does seem like a lifetime ago that I was in high school.

I've only gone to 1 class reunion. I missed the 5th year reunion picnic in the park. I missed the 15th or was it 20th year - bowling and karaoke! I missed the 25th that sounds so important. I made it only to the 10th year. At that time I was unemployed and homeless...well, living back at home with my parents. I have to tell you, that makes an almost 30 year old feel grown up!

I don't think I'll make this one, either. Something about traveling internationally for a standard Versailles event dinner - fried chicken, beef and noodles, green beans, mashed potatoes - and going alone. Something about listening to everyone talk about grown children and grandchildren. (Of course, our first grandparent was such at the 15 year reunion. I think this is what you can an overachiever.) I just don't feel like I'm in sync with this - though, I suppose I never felt much in sync with my high school class. Still, there is supposed to be dancing. ("Is $1500 too much to spend for an evening of dancing?" she wonders. Then, she thinks, "But, what sort of music would they play?")

I did have some really good friends and some really good times. And, so, to honor the class of 1979...a slide show from senior year. (That would be year 12 for you Australians.)

I am not a Queenslander

From Singles 2009

This fact was re-established yesterday at work.

A client coming into the exam room made one of those innocuous statements about the weather....and I totally blew it.

"My, it is getting cooler." She said.

"Yes. Isn't that wonderful!" I replied.

FAUX PAW.



Note- misspelling is intentional. It is a vet thing.

Myron Hunt

From Singles 2009

My grandparents both came from large families. My grandmother had 8 siblings and my grandfather had 9. Very large and long lived. My grandfather's brother Myron just died, my mother told me. He was 97.

I'm feeling positively youthful.

"The Amateur Marriage" by Anne Tyler

From Singles 2009

She also said that when she first heard they’d found Joe’s body, she felt a bolt of something she would almost have to call anger. They made it sound as if he’d just been thoughtlessly mislaid, she said. Like somebody’s cast-off toy. When she herself had been so careful, all these years, to keep him safe and healthy.

In "The Amateur Marriage" we watch the courtship, marriage, and divorce of Michael and Pauline Anton. Michael is very controlled in his emotions and his reactions. Pauline is impetuous and talkative and reactive. They are not a match made in heaven. They are, rather, a match made in Baltimore - in a little neighborhood grocery on the afternoon of a big local sign up for service march at the beginning of WWII. Michael had no plan for enlisting until he was swept away by this exciting new girl in her red coat. He was and he did.

His time in the army was relatively brief being shot in the hip by his bunk mate during training (sorry, there I go giving away the plot! You weren't planning on reading this anyway.) His time with Pauline much longer though ultimately almost as painful.

I've enjoyed Anne Tyler in the past. Odd, quirky, everyday people. Books where my father would say "not much happens." (He never could figure why I liked those kinds of stories.) In the case of "The Amateur Marriage", however, I didn't find the characters to be pleasant - let alone charming. Yes, I understand that they loved each other on some level and were trying their best - that they were hopelessly mismatched - that life is messy and difficult and disappointing. I just didn't enjoy this experience. I read recently that it was a sign of immaturity to think that the characters must be likable.

Alas. I get older but no more mature.

I did enjoy reading Ms. Tyler's words, however. The quote at the beginning from Joe's mother, for example. Very nice.

And, Joe from the quote? He was a neighborhood boy killed in WWII. He didn't have much of a story here...which is just as well. I probably wouldn't have liked him much.

Cadillac Juke Box

From Singles 2009

Morgues deny all the colors the mind wishes to associate with death. The surfaces are cool to the touch, made of aluminum and stainless steel, made even more sterile in appearance by the dull reflection of the fluorescent lighting overhead. The trough and the drains where an autopsy was just conducted are spotless; the water that wells across and cleans the trough's bottom could have issued from a spring.

But somehow, in the mind, you hear sounds behind all those gleaming lockers, like fluids dripping, a tendon constricting, a lip that tightens into a sneer across the teeth.

I've gotten pretty far behind here and writing this entry is made more difficult by the disjointed way I read the book. I started it in Brisbane before we left for the US, but I didn't finish it. I couldn't renew it long enough, so I returned it. Fortunately, Steve works for the Columbus library system and I was able to borrow a copy while I was in Ohio. Let's see. That means I finished the book about April 8. And,today is May 15.

Here goes.

Cadillac Jukebox.

Dave is entangled in the case of Aaron Crown, a man who is accused of shooting a civil rights leader 30 years ago. So, that means that Dave is caught in the middle between Aaron, Aaron's daughter, the soon to be Governor and his wife (who is an old lover of Dave's.) We've got Mexican drug dealers, the mob, an enormous, psychotic hit man, the daughter of the New Orleans mob boss and her pimp husband, and an old schoolmate of Dave's who is living on the edge between legal and illegal activity. Clete, Dave's new partner (whose name I can't remember) and Bootsy.

The governor was largely responsible for getting Aaron convicted. Aaron wants Dave to investigate his case. The governor doesn't. The mob doesn't. Aaron escapes from the penitentiary with the intent of finding the governor and assassinating him. The governor's lovely wife is intent on sleeping with Dave or, failing to do that, at least accuse him of inappropriate sexual advances. I found the mob and the Mexican drug stories to be harder to follow. This might have something to do with the multi-week gap in the middle of my reading!

Unfortunately, since I don't have a copy of the book, I cannot share many of Burke's lovely words with you. (You can pick up your own copy used from Amazon for 1c! That is 1/100 of a dollar for you Australians. I guess in your terms it would be free! Why not pick up several?) So, I'll leave you with two lines that were short enough that I wrote them down in their entirety while I was reading.

...and got back to the office with a headache feeling I had devoted most of the day snipping hangnails in a season of plaque.

Haven't we all had days like this?

And, finally, just a reminder that Dave is not consumed with violence and evil and work - but has an appreciation of beauty, nature, and god.

Catfish fillet with etouffee' on top. This is food you expect only in the afterlife.

Spring in Ohio (April 2009)

Before I left for my trip, Shay asked me what the weather would be like. "Rain," I told her. "And, sunshine. Warm days and cold days. Maybe snow."

She's always lived in Brisbane. She thought I was joking. Here we have sweeping weather changes from "Fine" to "Mostly fine"...all in the same week! OK. I exaggerate. Some days it does rain.

Anyway, in the course of the two weeks I spent in Ohio in April the weather was gloomy, sunny, rainy...and it did snow. I wore a hat and gloves. I sat in shirt sleeves with my mother on her deck basking on a warm spring morning. The usual.

What I didn't accurately convey to Shay, however, was how beautiful and soul expanding it was to be in Ohio in spring. The greens are fresh. The flowers earnest. The breeze smells like hope.

Kevin thinks it is paradise here. Granted, the days are mostly sunny and warm. But, unless you've huddled under the grey and cold of winter, I just don't think you can ever feel the same joy in spring.

"But I think I've learned not to grieve on the world's ways, at least not when spring is at hand." Dave Robicheaux from James Lee Burke's "Cadillac Jukebox"

Swimming pool at night

Visiting friends

From Singles 2009

I didn't get to see everyone.

My original plan was to attend the continuing education meeting in Athens at the University of Georgia and to see Lisa and Susette in the process. The logistics of doing this, however, were untenable involving a whole lot waiting in airports followed immediately by a hurried drive from Fayetteville, NC to Athens with little time for stopping in Charlotte.



I did get to see Tim and Flavio, Nan, Sandra, Christine and Nina, Sharon, Barb. Plus, I had time in Cleveland for gaming with (Kevin and) The Games Project including old friends Greg, Erin, Officer Mike. Big THANK YOU to Greg and Steve and Georgia for putting us up in Cleveland and Columbus!

For Kevin in particular our Ohio visit featured the "Gathering of Friends". Games. Games. Games. For 10 days. It was great to see Ken and Gail, Ken, and Erin.

AAHA

From Phoenix - March 2009

Sounds like I'm surprised, doesn't it?

American Animal Hospital Association.

National meeting in Phoenix.

I was there, at the Convention Center (gee, its nice to not have that "e" dangling on the edge of the word) by 9 AM. I registered, attended an introductory meeting, then walked back to the hotel and took a nap.

The meeting ran from Thursday through Sunday -sometimes starting with a breakfast meeting at 7 or 8 AM and ending with a two hour evening session at 6 PM. I went the distance. It was very good. (Why is it that the first days lectures always seem to be the best? Is it a function of novelty? or fatigue? Hmmmm.)

My hotel was a little more than a mile from the Convention Center which is a very nice walk in the morning sunshine. (It is a bit long and chill in the evening. Twice I elected to take the train, instead.) The walk took me past the oldest church in Phoenix - St. Mary's Basilica, along the Arizona Center (very nice garden and good places to eat), and through ASU (which in my jet lagged state I thought was pretty cool to see was USA backwards.) Beautiful sunny days. Beautiful blue sky. Spring.



Once upon a time we thought we'd live in Phoenix. I even studied up and passed the state veterinary exam. I interviewed in several clinics, but ultimately decided that I'd be happier being nearer my family. (This was when my father was in the middle of his battle with colon cancer.) We moved, instead, to Cleveland. Anyway, I look at Phoenix now like a short-lived romance and wonder where we'd be had we chosen differently. Probably not Brisbane.

My most embarrassing moment occurred while eating out at "My Big Fat Greek Restaurant" the first evening. Sitting outside. Beautiful evening. The waitress is asking me what I'd like when I hear this WHOOSH!!! behind me and I scream a little and lunge forward throwing myself on the table. In my mind there was a tidal wave about to wipe over me. In reality, a waiter had lit some sort of flaming dish. I laughed all evening. I'm guessing the employees there laughed even longer.

Time to begin to catch up - Leaving on a Jet Plane

From photo a day

Let's see.

We left Australia March 25 - boarding V Australia in the late afternoon. Odd. We've always flown from Australia in the late morning. The difference meant two things practically. First, I could work for half a day. (Sometimes I do make crazy decisions.) Second, we arrived in LA much later (4:30 PM rather than about 7 AM). This ultimately determined where I decided to go to get my continuing education hours (Phoenix rather than Athens, GA.)

This was our first flight on V Australia. Bright, shiny new planes with bright shiny new employees. Everyone was very friendly and helpful...especially in the middle of the night when I determined that my glasses had fallen off my lap while I was sleeping. They came with their little pen lights and scanned the floor. Ultimately, determining that my glasses must have slid "quite some distance" and "maybe they would turn up when the lights came back on".

It was UNDOUBTEDLY this turn of events which led to me watching only one film. And, somehow, despite working repeatedly through the fantasy of how I was going to navigate for the next 2 days without any distance vision and find an optometrist in Phoenix, I managed to get a reasonable amount of sleep.

At breakfast I was served not only a warm meal but my specs. Yay! I was very pleased ...right up there with the relief I felt when we'd finished hiking through the Olgas (and Cradle Mountain) without falling down and breaking all the teeth in my head.

Kevin was generous and waited with me for several hours in LA before going home with his friend, Don. We ate and played Mystery Rummy and for the first time I skunked him.

I also called Phoenix to confirm my hotel reservation where I learned that the hotel was oversold and that when I arrived at 1 AM I was very likely going to have to jump back into a cab and find another "home". While inconvenient, it wasn't going to be AWFUL. They had already identified a "sister inn" that could take the overflow.

Once again I was lucky. When I arrived the receptionist was flummoxed having just been abused by the last car load of guests who learned they had no room at the inn. I had worked through this issue hours earlier and so was pleasant and accommodating. In the midst of our conversation she remembered that there was an available room. But, it was a "handicap suite"...which meant that it might be a little bigger. Well, damn. I guess that is OK.

I trundled off to my room, took a bath, and laid awake watching "Tough Love" on VH-1 until 4 AM.

Alone again

While I know you might think that now that I am on my own here I should/would/could be updating y'all on what fabulous things I've done in the past month, I must tell you - you are about to be disappointed. Not only have I worked like a dog for the third day in a row, getting home at 7 PM, BUT I will NEVER be able to adequately remember that time. I shall make an attempt to give a few highlights and then we will just move on.

But that will not be tonight.

Spaghetti and bed.

Watching TV with my mom

American Idol. That's her thing. I was pleased that I got to see the DISCO SHOW.

And, I must admit, I was suprised that disco seems to mean....Donna Summers (3 of 7 performances!). Sorry, Donna. I just thought disco might have been a bit more broad.

And, a bit more dancable.

Earth Day

From photo a day

A tree for Earth Day!

Having a great time with my mother and auntie in sunny Brisbane. No time for blogging...but soon. Very soon.

Heard this while waiting in Phoenix

A blast from the past!

For Spring in Ohio

The days have been beautiful with blue skies and sunshine...until today. Today it rains.

Its all right.

AAHA annual convention, Phoenix

I needed to complete my continuing ed hours for the year, so I had to find something going on around the time of "The Gathering." I had a choice of either the Alumni meeting at The University of Georgia or the AAHA meeting in Phoenix. While I thought I might be able to check in on a couple of my southeastern friends if I went to Georgia, a more considered examination of the meeting revealed I'd be dead when I arrived. Ergo, I am in Arizona...a mere 90 min flight from LA.

Most embarrassing moment. Eating out at "My Big Fat Greek Restaurant" the first evening. Sitting outside. Beautiful evening. The waitress is asking me what I'd like when I hear this whoosh!!! behind me and I scream a little and lunge forward throwing myself on the table. In my mind there was a tidal wave about to wipe over me. In reality, a waiter had lit some sort of flaming dish. I laughed all evening. I'm guessing the employees there laughed even longer.

And, you thought I'd just fallen asleep in the front row!

Money I did not spend at the convention

One vial of eye drops to clear cataracts or lenticular sclerosis in dogs = $70.

Two text books $230 + $17 shipping.

Otoscope cone - a long skinny one! $20

A new surgical head for an otoscope (and they'd throw in a couple of those skinny cones for free!) $100

Pair of magnifying lenses + $1300. (20% off - hard to resist!)

(Money I did spend....$6 for cat toys for Stella and Luna. Sorry Zelda!)

How to get enough sleep

on an international flight.

1. Watch a really bad movie. If you are having trouble selecting one, try "Rachel Getting Married."

2. Remove glasses, crunch up on seat, don sleep mask. Sleep fitfully for 90 minutes.

3. Decide you'll use the restroom and watch a better movie. Reach into lap and find your glasses are missing.

4. Get down on hands and knees and feel around. Next, push call button and ask the attendant to shine his little torch around on the floor.

5. Continue to be unsuccessful. Recognize that while you may use the restroom like this, you'll never watch a movie.

6. Get pissed and tell your husband to scoot over. Then "stretch out" over two seats while wearing seat belt.

7. Wake regularly to turn over. (This involves removing seat belt, changing seats, re-fastening belt.)

Fortunately, by the time the lights came up for breakfast my glasses had been located by "some other attendant". I was concerned about how I'd replace my glasses while in Phoenix at the conference. I did see one service dog here, so I guess that might have worked.

Warning: This blog is about to become

un-Anned.

Once again.

It probably feels a bit like it is already, I know. We've been busy (and I've been stressed) - preparing to go to the US for my annual "I need to collect my continuing education hours" and Kevin's annual "Gathering of Friends". Who will have the better time?

Zelda, on the other hand, is staying at home this year with Jane and Hubertus.

Thank you, Jane and Hubertus. I hope we don't hear that someone had to pull one of your heads out of her mouth.

The Cement Garden by Ian McEwan

From Singles 2009

I am only including the little story of his death to explain how my sisters and I came to have such a large quantity of cement at our disposal.

Four children. Two dead parents. A summer. Adolescent sexuality.

What is that odor?

This was my most recent book on CD - my in the car read.

I am starting to worry a little about myself...and about my car. It seems to have picked up a funny smell. I wonder if it is the company I'm keeping.

Frankie

Tomorrow Frankie gets his stitches taken out. And, he gets a bath. He is probably most pleased to just not be spending the weekend with the Z. Something about having to pull his head out of her mouth, I think, may have put him off our dear girl.

Frankie has had some vomiting this week. He isn't gaining weight. I'm a bit worried about him. We need to get him into a home where he can be loved for whatever time he has.

He is still cute and still very happy.

Keeping cool

From March 16 outing

Spiders

From March 16 outing

From Roma Street Parklands.

I don't know why we didn't have the crowd of spiders encasing our bushes in webs this year. We didn't have mangoes on our tree either. Hmmmmm.

I'm preparing to go home next week. Time to fulfill my continuing ed requirements. I'll be bringing my mother and my auntie back with me. I'm hoping the spiders will still be plentiful when we get back. They were here in the winter last and missed seeing them. We Ohio folk are very impressed by big-ass spiders...not that we want to live with them.

Sunday, in the park

From March 16 outing

I don't think it was the forth of July.

I think it was the 15th of March, actually.

And, the day wasn't going as planned. Yet, it was going pretty, pretty, pretty well.

My plan was as follows: Catch the 1 PM train into the city and catch the film "Big Night" at the State Library of Queensland. Then, roam over to Roma Street Parkland before taking the train back homa.

I did get the train. I did arrive just at 2 PM but I was turned away at the door. I was the first and possibly only person to be turned away because the theater was full. "No seats. We're trying to find seats for these two women."

OK. Fine.

So, what to do. I could go home and start preparing for my trip. (This is pronounced "major house cleaning frenzy".) Or, I could seek out the best air conditioning in Brisbane and see what's shaking at the Gallery of Modern Art.

Of course, you know which one I selected.

The GOMA is preparing to open its new major exhibit on Modern Chinese Art. They've got the bit down the center featuring duel giant Chairman Mao statues and a long row of Chinese busts with objects glued to the tops of their heads. The large feature galleries, however, are not yet open. The installation is not installed.

So, I wandered upstairs.

Big exhibit by indigenous Australians - a portion of which has been on display before. Nothing caught my fancy.

Exhibit by high school students from Queensland - that is always kind of fun. But, nothing was too memorable.

From March 16 outing

Finally, down the hall and way in the back is Spencer Finch's exhibit: As if the sea should part and show a further sea. As I approached it I first saw "Thank you fog" - a series of 64 (I think- seemingly endless) square black frames. In each, inside a white mat is a black square. "Great," I thought sarcastically, and walked on by - as I did past a couple of photographs (I never figured them out- the description says there are three but I only saw two...) and then past a series of fluorescent tubes angled on a wall covered with different colored filter paper. I did read about this but didn't really understand it. (It makes more sense here.) It wasn't until I came upon his installation West (Sunset in My Motel Room, Monument Valley, January 26, 2007, 5:36-6:06 PM)
that I became intrigued. This installation is made of 9 monitors positioned in a grid and located only a few feet from a white wall. On each grid is a still image from some western movie (I forget) and once a minute the images change. The cumulative effect of the light hitting the wall mirrors the setting sun that Finch observed on the wall of his motel room - as you've already guessed - on January 26, 2007. Now, that was cool. The exhibit is laid out as a circuit and I found I was soon back at that series of black squares. But, now I was beside them and I could see they were not black squares but very, very subtle photographs of the fog in San Fransisco rolling over and revealing glimpses of tree tops. WOW.

I must see it all again. So, I relooped.

After a cup of green tea in the museum cafe, I did travel over to the Roma Street Parkland where I was pleased to discover the sunflowers were blooming.



I love sunflowers. I wish I could grow them here. I had such nice ones in North Carolina. My seeds won't sprout.

I have so much to do. I am so behind.

And, yet, I'm going to take a moment here to reflect upon the antiviral medication I am taking.

Tell your doctor as soon as possible if you notice any of the following:
- a rash that is separate from the shingles rash
- extreme sleepiness or confusion, usually in older people
- hallucinations
- signs of a possible liver problem such as persistent pain in the upper right abdomen, yellowing of the skin and/or eyes, dark urine or pale bowel motions.

The above side effects may need medical attention.

My leg looks much, much better.

At least, I think so...

I am not certain but I suspect

From Singles 2009

that my leg will soon be falling off.

Edited: CRAP. I've got shingles again. My doctor called his doctor wife into the exam room. ("Do you mind?")
"Have you ever seen just one shingle?" he asked her.
"Yes. Last week for the first time. Now, I've seen it twice."

Great.

More on Frankie

From Singles 2009

Frankie is nothing less than amazing. He's had one episode of regurgitation after being fed too much on the first day post surgery. He is still lapping up his dog food puree like a stampede of wild buffalo are thudding up from behind. He never cries or whimpers or even tenses up when he's lifted up - even though his chest was open widely just 2 days ago. He chases a ball, won't sit still for a photograph, and wagging his tail tears off to meet any dog who passes his way.

But, today, he must meet his greatest real challenge.

He's coming home with me to spend the weekend with

Zelda.

She doesn't put up with ANY foolishness.

Photos to follow.

Language lesson

From photo a day

This one is for everyone who is not an Australian...or, at least, for all the Norte Americanos.

Finally, on Thursday, Kevin and I went for the movie-meal deal at - Fasta Pasta.

Now, here's the lesson.

Those words rhyme.

They rhyme with "FAST".

In Australia pasta ALWAYS rhymes with fast - not just when you are being cool and choosing the movie-meal deal before seeing "Watchmen".

More, you ask.

Fillet.... rhymes with millet.

Herbs....has an "h" sound.

Aluminum... acquires an extra "i" : al-u-min-i-um. I guess if you save up enough "r"s (Melbourne, Cairns) you can cash them in for an extra vowel.

Super = Supa; Tipper = Tippa; Oscar = Osca; you get the idea. People here, no doubt, think I'm half retarded when I have ask them to spell their dog's name: Pipper/Pippa?

A work tale

From Singles 2009

It has been a long, long time, eh?

Maybe you heard me complain about working a seven day work week? That was created, in part, by a puppy who got dropped off literally minutes after we thought we had closed. Regurgitation. Immediate. Forceful. Painful. Reliable.

I put in an IV catheter and gave him medication to help keep his digestive system working in a toward-the-tail direction. By the next morning (Sunday) he had not only chewed the line in two, but had pulled the IV out of the vein. I started feeding him tiny amounts of easily digestible food. He did well at 7 AM. At noon it all came back up. Ditto for 6 PM.

I suspected he had a problem with his esophagus. (Somehow, somewhere in that word Australians put an "o". Oesophagus, maybe. I just go about blithely spelling like a Yank. I think it is good for my morale.) Eventually I got permission to do a barium swallow and - vwalla! - a diagnosis! Vascular ring anomaly. He had some sort of developmental problem whereby a (useless dried up) blood vessel that should have broken down did not and was now constricting his esophagus. Food couldn't pass. The esophagus in front of the constriction was distended with food (and barium).

My boss's eyes lit up. He was intrigued by the idea of repairing this. So, today we did. He did the cutting. I did the breathing. This is important. I was breathing for two. When you have a big hole in your chest, you no longer have the vacuum necessary to make your lungs work.

It is now almost 10 PM. I've just returned from checking on Frankie. He's busy running around his cage and looking forward to his first real, go-all-the-way-down meal tomorrow.

So far his IV line is intact.

Now, we've got to find him a home....

Isn't it time

From Singles 2009

that Zelda made an appearance?

Sugar Plums

From Singles 2009

I found these at the produce market this week.

Sugar plums.

Still waiting for them to dance.

Wasabi

From Singles 2009

It is official. I suck at Wasabi. We played Wednesday evening.

Wait.

We played Wasabi Wednesday.

How many sentences can you create with three capital letter W's? Especially since we have a new president...

Anyway. I suck.

But, I still love sushi.

Burning Angel

From Singles 2009

"What bothers you more than anything else in the world, Dave?"

"I beg your pardon?"

"Vietnam? The death of your wife Annie? Revisiting the booze in your dreams?"

When I don't reply, he lifts one hand, gestures at the diamond, the ruined school building that's become softly molded inside the fading twilight. A torn kite, caught by its string on an iron fire escape, flaps impotently against a wall.

"It's' all this, isn't it?" he says. "We're still standing in the same space where we grew up but we don't recognize it anymore. It's like other people own it now."

Lets see - Sonny Boy Marsallas - a New Orleans street hustler with ties, though not friendly ties, to both the NO mob (now headed by Johnny (Carp) Polycarp Giacano) and US feds and/or mercenaries from Central America passes to Dave a diary. Then, all hell breaks loose. Add into this a local plantation raised lawyer (Moleen Bertrand) and the family of African Americans he has living on a stretch of the plantation near the railroad. His grandfather supposedly gave them this land, though there is no record and for some reason Moleen (and his lovely drunken wife, Julia) wants them off the land NOW. Somehow the mob is involved in this, too.

This piece of land was our original sin, except we had found no baptismal rite to expunge it from our lives. That green-purple field of new cane was rooted in rib cage and eye socket....

Tolstoy asked how much land did a man need.

Just enough to let him feel the pull of the earth on his ankles and the claim it lays on the quick as well as the dead.

Muddled.

His teeth were like tombstones when he grinned.

Maybe it is because I started reading this book then set it aside for a couple of weeks before finishing it (binging on "Battlestar", you know), but I just couldn't get my head around this story. WHO IS CHARLIE??? Well, with the exception of that question, I CAN identify all the main players and their role, but it is just not one of my favorite Robicheaux novels.

Still, Burke gets some things right:

"The world's a small place today. People watch CNN in grass huts. A guy might as well play it out where the food is right."

Affinity

From Singles 2009

Still she watched me. Still her eyes seemed very dark. Then, "I would need no key," she said, "while I had spirit help. And, I would come to you, Aurora. And we would go away together."

Margaret Prior. Sad and lonely since her recent suicide attempt after her love married another is determined to do good deeds by visiting the local women's penitentiary. London. 19th century. Margaret is intrigued by and drawn to one woman there, Selina Dawes, a spiritualist medium who is imprisoned after a client suffered an "attack by spirit".

Grey. Spooky. The sort of stuff I love.

But, I am sooooooooooo naive. (How, at 47??)

Here I was laughing to myself about how a novel set in a women's prison must have lesbian undertones and digging the spirit stories that Selina tells Margaret. While I was not completely surprised by the final chapter, I was pretty disappointed both for myself and for - well, that would be telling. What amused me more about myself and the world, however, was what I found I went to Amazon to find the photo for this blog entry: Sarah Waters - big lesbian writer. And, the reviews! My favorite complained not only that this was decidedly not the steamy number of Water's first novel but that the love interest (Selina) was described as very unsexy - pale and drably dressed with red, swollen, chapped hands. The chick is in PRISON! No one looks her best surrounded by limestone. (Still, I must admit the book cover - which is nothing like the cover of the CD - is more than a little suggestive.)

It was fun. Yes, maybe it did drag a bit, but I was listening to it on CD as I went to and from work - except for those times I'd bring the disk inside to binge on while I chopped vegetables or did other quiet things in the kitchen. A much better experience than my last BOT (book on tape).

February 29

Not much heard from me lately. I've been really busy working - six days last week. Well, seven actually - I think any day you go into the office 3x counts as a day of work. This week looks light. I'm only scheduled for 5 days. That could change.

Anyway, as a consequence of all this labor, I've not been updating either of my blogs, not taking any photos, not cooking any meals, not making the bed, and being a grump to live with. (Just ask Zelda who hasn't been allowed to sleep in the bed in DAYS. Call the RSPCA!) I'm tired and confused.

And, it doesn't help when I find myself confronted with things like this:

From Singles 2009

Yes. I paid money for this calendar. Fortunately, Sunday is ALSO March 1st (turn page).

What's for supper??

From photo a day

From photo a day

Playing with photoshop and my food!

(Salmon with fennel and tomatoes.)

SCREAMING

I've done a lot of that lately. Not AT anyone in particular - I leave that hobby to the woman down the street. Rather, I've been screaming at the universe. If your ears have been open, I'm sure you have heard me.

Monday night I woke up myself and Kevin and probably most of the southern hemisphere screaming...a scream that continued for at least 37 minutes - or maybe 10 seconds. Leg cramp. Bad. I was sore for the next two days.

This afternoon I did the unthinkable. I walked head first into a spider web. I still feel like something is in my hair though since the initial outburst I have managed to keep my tormented cries to a whimper.

Stormy weather

From photo a day

From photo a day

From photo a day

Sickness and snakes

Gee. The title sounds like I might be interested in reptilian medicine. That is hardly the case. I've been sick (I blame Kevin) and the snakes have been dead. I am, in that sense, doing much better than the snakes.

First the snakes. In one day last week clients brought in two injured snakes. Dog attacks. One wasn't dead yet - but it is now. The other was dead on arrival. For some reason, I wasn't part of that discussion, they wanted to know what kind of snake it was. I was handed the plastic, lidded pail.

I know nothing...

except how to make a phone call. I called someone for whom we had a card filed under wildlife.

"Can you describe the snake?" she asked.

I put on my plastic gloves, popped the lid, and pulled the snake out.

"It is a grey-green color with a yellow belly with red spots."

"How big is it?"

Quick! conversion!! "It is about a meter long." (Internal dialog. "Ewwww.")

"We'll send someone over to pick it up."

"OK." Internal comment - "Why did I have to describe it, let alone pick it up, for that?"

The next day there was a message to call back.

"It was an Eastern Brown Snake. Those are very toxic snakes." What kind of dog killed it? he wanted to know. How is the dog?

It was a little terrier. Twelve years old. As far as I knew the dog was fine.

"These snakes have very short fangs so if the dog has a lot of hair that is often enough to protect it."

I called the dog's owner. I told her it was an eastern brown snake. She thought that was interesting since the snake wasn't brown. As it turns out, although they live IN TOWN this dog had killed 3 brown snakes last year!! Yesterday she had looked out and seen the dog shaking something she had found under the mango tree in the back yard.

WE HAVE A MANGO TREE IN THE BACK YARD.

There is nothing much to say about my cold. It is day 8 and I have had enough.

The Sunday Philosphy Club: An Isabel Dalhousie Mystery

From Singles 2009

Isabel was amused by the idea that gestures should accompany verbal references. She was intrigued to see devout Catholics cross themselves at the mentions of the BVM - and she liked the acronym BVM itself, which made Mary sound so reassuringly modern and competent, like a CEO or an ICBM, or even a BMW.

Well. I do like that acronym! It was new to me... and since I've found a deficit in Catholicism in Australia I'll help y'all out: Blessed Virgin Mary. (Now, you should cross yourself.)

Isabel Dalhousie is a very wealthy Scottish woman. She attended university, studied philosophy, fell in love with a cad. Now, she putters around doing the crossword puzzle, editing "The Review of Applied Ethics", entertaining her niece Cat, Cat's former boyfriend Jamie (though not together, much to her disappointment), and taking in cultural events around Edinburgh. It is at a concert that she witnesses a young man fall from the upper balcony to his death. Her curiosity and unwavering commitment to living an ethical life (along with a push from the deceased's roommate) lead her to investigate - convinced foul play is afoot.

Maybe if I had studied philosophy I might have appreciated her thoughts, comments, and conflicts. But, I didn't.

In addition, Isabel comes across as a bit of a doddering old lady - well, maybe doddering is extreme. (I'd find a passage as an example but I really want to be finished with this book.) So, if not quite doddering, then worn out, inconsequential, way past her use by date - and SHE'S YOUNGER THAN I AM. Two things: this is no way to endear a character to me and, secondly, who is this man (the author) hanging around with? He is either decades older than I am and only associating with his peers OR he would only consider women in their 20's - maybe 30 - to be bright, vital, and useful in the world.

So, you see I had a bit of a chip on my shoulder about the book to start with. My appreciation for it, however, NOSEDIVED (as hard as that may be to believe) when I read the "climax". This is how you solve a mystery??? ARGHHH.

Finally, I need to say that this book was a gift to me and I do appreciate the thought and feel conflicted about expressing such a negative opinion. I was also given another from this series and I'm actually looking forward to reading it. A quick check on Amazon (to get the photo, actually) supported my thoughts and comments (the book averaged only 3 stars there), but also suggested that other books were better (4 stars). We shall see.

Romantic Advice from Charles Darwin

I heard on NPR this morning (13 Feb) that when Charles Darwin was a young man and trying to decide whether or not to marry he made a list. A pro and con list. And, from the Pro list we have

A wife is better than a dog.

Neither Zelda nor I are sure what to make of this. If, however, you are contemplating matrimony (or the purchase of a dog) we hope it helps.

Bundaberg photos

Photographs from the Mon Repos turtle rookery (green turtles - loggerhead babies in the sand. You'll have to look carefully - there are two) and the Bundaberg Botanic Garden.

Meditation

Zelda is the Cocker Zen Master of Meditation.

I've alluded to her meditating before, I'm sure. You probably thought I was just being absurd. I do that.

But, so does Zelda.

Om.

ETA: It strikes me as very funny seeing a dog with a green button that reads play on her side!

I may be from/on a different planet

I think that now and then. Most recently it occurred during a conversation between Z, S, and R. Me. I was just observing and probably making funny alien faces.

As you might guess around here there are a lot of conversations about the terrible fires that are burning in Victoria. It is very sad and this surreal exchange/blog post is not meant to reflect upon those fires or any fires in any way. It is, however, where the story begins.

Z (not my Z) was in and telling us how her uncle, a firefighter, is in Victoria as a volunteer and how hard that is on him psychologically. This conversation continues as you'd expect reflecting sympathy and sorrow and outrage. Then, Z left.

S then brings up "Ash Wednesday" and "how many were lost then?" and "when I was in school we used to get ashes on our foreheads on Ash Wednesday". And, R is continuing the conversation about fires and "Ash Wednesday". And, I am trying to figure out whether my head will explode.

"Um." I begin. "Um. The ashes on your forehead on Ash Wednesday doesn't have anything to do with fires. Um. Ash Wednesday is a Catholic holiday...it is the first day of lent."

And, much to my surprise - NOBODY knew that.

I guess it shouldn't have surprised me given the way this country plays fast and loose with Mardi Gras. ([French : mardi, Tuesday + gras, fat (from the feasting on Mardi Gras before Lenten fasting).]

(Of course, in all fairness I didn't know what the fire(s) they remember as Ash Wednesday was/were either. I am the alien here.)

By the way, Ash Wednesday is Feb 25th this year. (It moves each year to be 40 days before Easter.) The Australian fire anniversary, I assume, is always on the same day each year: 16 Feb.

Kevin. Ned Kelly. Separated at Birth?

From Singles 2009

It is a disappointment to both of us that we can't point with pride to any felonious forebears. I have a great grandfather who was a philanderer, but that doesn't seem to count here. Like any good Australian, Kevin has embarked on his own legacy of crime, crime, crime. Kevin has specialized (specialised) in vehicular infringements: cruising with nonchalance through once yellow lights (now red) and cavalierly traveling at the speed of sound through the urban landscape. (He has drawn the line at parking in handicap spots. Still holding onto some of that American puritanism. Oh, and he hasn't got the hang of doing all this while under the influence of the Aussie god of Alcohol.) Just before he left for OTB, he spotted a pulse of bright light while preparing to cross the Story Bridge. Could it be? Was this going to mark the moment when he filled his dance card with his final demerit??

As you recall, I stayed home during most of the time Kevin was in NSW. Stayed home, brought the mail in, and STILL didn't recognize the award coming from the State of Queensland. I was looking for something in a nice big, cardboard envelope which would contain the citation - suitable for framing.

But, it was just a little, unremarkable, flimsy white envelope. (Australia has the most unimpressive envelopes in the civilized world, I'm convinced. Not an extra fiber is wasted to create the paper and anything I send to the US needs to have sticky tape applied to all the edges or else they invariably are sliced open in transit.)

So, Kevin's choices:
1. "Do Over" - Take 3 months off from driving (license suspended) at which time the slate would be wiped clean and he'd be free to accrue driving demerits with only $$ at stake, once again.
2. "Good Behavior" - Drive like a deacon (not demon) for the next 12 months adding, at most, one more demerit point during that time. More than one = automatic license suspension for 6 months.
3. "Ned Kelly" -
a. Take the license suspension but continue to drive.
b. Choose the good behavior option but continue to drive like, um, Ned Kelly.
c. Rip the notice into shreds and commission a suit of armor!

I hate to tell you, but Kevin is NO Ned Kelly. He'll be good. I'll be driving for the next 3 months.

From Singles 2009

P.S. By the way, these are/were our really cool Halloween costumes this year- that nobody got to see.

Just one reason to be glad you aren't married to me

From photo a day

Did you know there's a right way the silverware goes into the drawer?

You did? Hm. I just learned this, though it is unclear whether I'll remember it.

You see, I've learned one more way my brain is wired totally differently than Kevin's - or perhaps the rest of the human race. I guess when y'all (I try to use that conjunction often here. I think it marks me as American rather than Canadian) put the silverware away you put the spoons in the spoon slot and the knives in the knife slot and the forks... well, you know. On the other hand, I match implements. I put the clean spoon in the slot with the rest of the spoons. Usually, we end up with the same result. But, then there are the times, and they may happen more often in our house where we have the bare minimum number of just about everything, where there are no spoons and no knives left in the drawer. So, there are two or occasionally three empty slots. I just start filling the slots. Each get only one kind of utensil but the spoons may have just leaped from their usual slot on the far left to the center or right. This disturbs Kevin's world view. I'm slowly making him crazy. Well, maybe not slowly.

I think I'm just saving brain space. I still don't know the color of each denomination of Australian currency. It isn't necessary. I can read the numbers. (Wait! Is that two reasons?)

Bunda-two

In the morning, after finding that Hungry Jacks does do breakfast in Australia (not that we're recommending that!), we set off for the Botanic Garden. Very lovely garden with several large ponds, lots of big water birds (both black AND white ones), a peaceful Japanese garden, several historic buildings/museums (we skipped every one - they weren't open yet) and a cute little train (ditto.)

Very nice.

This was followed by a drive out of town to the Hummock. This is the highest point and only real hill around Bundaberg and is an inactive volcano. This volcano, we were told, is responsible for the predominance of black rocky beaches in the area and the black rocky land that had to be cleared to create fields for sugar cane. (These rocks were piled into stone walls called Kanaka walls after the "indentured servants" (read slaves) from Melanesia who were induced to clear the fields and build the walls and tend the sugar cane. Yes. Slaves in Australia until 1904 when they were largely deported thanks, not to an emancipation proclamation, but to the "White Australia policy".

Hummock. Funny word.

By ten o'clock our Bundaberg adventure was finished (we opted not to do either of the Bundaberg Rum tours) and we headed south...with a short detour to see the Buderim Ginger Factory in Yandina.

Once again, any phots were shot on film. Waiting. Waiting. Waiting.

Bund-tastic! Wonder-berg!

Can you tell we had a good time this weekend in Bundaberg? Saturday we drove north (about 4.5 hours) to Bundaberg. We had a date that evening with some as yet unhatched baby turtles!

Mon Repos turtle rookery. One of the largest research facilities studying sea turtles and one of only two rookeries in Australia, the second being in Western Australia. We bought our tickets ($9 - a real bargain!) a week ahead and that meant we were in group 4 of 5. (Lesson here: Call early. Weeks early.) Everyone is told to arrive at the site at 7 PM (Bring rain gear. Bring bug spray. Bring camera. Bring torches (flashlights). Bring a pillow to sit on. (I added the last.)) and as the evening unfolds one group (of 60) at a time is escorted onto the beach. The first group was called right at 7, the second group soon after and I thought we'd have an early night. Then, there was a big pause.

I think I need to back up. Anytime something happens on the beach - a mama turtle comes in from the ocean to lay eggs or a nest of babies begins erupting from the sand - the next group of viewers is called out to observe. It used to be really informal. People would just show up at the beach and follow the scientists around. Then, about 8 years ago the crowd sized topped 2,500 and the majority of turtle-mamas were scared back into the surf without laying their eggs. While I'm sure there was a big voice for just cutting the public out of the picture, the idea of crowd control and public education won out. Now, a limited number of tickets are sold (it must be about 350) and smallish groups are led down one by one to view an event. At this time of year most of the females have stopped laying eggs: only one or two a night show up and that seems to happen after 3 AM. Instead, the babies that have been incubating for about 8 weeks emerge from their buried nests and rush off to begin their lives in the sea.

Turtle facts:
a. Nesting at Mon Repos: the Australian Flatback Turtle (only found in Australia), the Green Turtle, and the Loggerhead Turtle.
b. Turtle gender is determined by incubation temperature with the critical point being 28.75C (I believe.) Warmer temperatures produce female turtles. Cooler temps, males. (I learned this in grad school. Obviously a worthwhile way to spend 4 years!) The darker sand at Mon Repos is warmer and mostly females are hatching. Eggs laid on the white beaches of the islands off the coast remain cooler thus producing male turtles.
c. Each female loggerhead lays about 200 eggs at each visit and she will lay 5 to 6 clutches at 3 week intervals: about 1,000 eggs/season. She doesn't lay eggs every year or even every other year. It seems to be pretty random with gaps of up to 10 years between egg production years.
d. Number of turtles reaching adulthood per egg hatched: about 1 in 1,000!
e. Lifespan of a sea turtle - excluding the 999 that never reach adulthood - not known though estimated to be 400 to 500 years!

After busting our buts on concrete seats in the amphitheater for more than 3 hours, we were called out to the beach! No lights. No camera flash. No phones. No games. While I would never say it was "bright" on the beach, the moon was mostly full and the sky was clear. (Kevin had already found Orion and, maybe, the Southern Cross during our wait.) We were going to get to observe the release of green turtles that had hatched earlier and had been taken back to the lab for measuring and cataloging. (Green turtles and Flatback turtles are special and all their nests get studied. Only a portion of the loggerhead nests get studied.) There they were in a green plastic bucket trying their best to swim or climb out!

Three guides/researchers pulled out a couple of turtles each and walked among the crowd so we could photograph and touch the babies. I KNEW my digital camera would NEVER produce anything like a reasonable image - flash = whiteout - so I brought my 35 mm camera. Unfortunately, it is getting a bit cranky. Just because you push the shutter-release button doesn't mean that an exposure will be made. Also, I haven't actually tried to take a photo of something small and close with the flash. I have no idea how it will work. This is the problem with film. (I did refrain from looking at the back of my camera after each photograph. I am getting somewhat smarter.) If there is anything to share, I will. Later.

Once we'd all been introduced to the turtlettes, then everyone who had a light lined up one behind the next with their legs spread. They each shined their flashlight at the ground between the legs of the person in front of them creating a tunnel of light leading from the nest site to the ocean. Then, the bucket was tipped

and a hundred baby turtles went flapping at full speed down the beach

and into the surf.

WOW.

Too cool.

And, way too dark for a photo.

Photo: Turtle photographed when we were snorkling in Hawaii. One of our trip highlights!

Animation entertainment

I've had a bit of a "drawn" week - if you exclude my regular hits of "Battlestar Galactica" - but that's more like having a virus. Anyway, this week we finished Season 2 of "Frisky Dingo" and last night, while Kevin was out, I watched "Bolt".

Hmmmm.... not only animated, but sort of doggy. Sort of. Though,there really are no dogs in "Frisky Dingo" - just a big, white cloven footed alien supervillan, Killface. Very funny albeit heavy on violence. And, easy to watch. Each episode - produced for Comedy Central's Adult Swim - is only about 10 min long. "Frisky Dingo" was one of Kevin's Christmas presents, because I learned about the program in someone's best of 2008 lists. Thus spawned our interest and devotion.

"Bolt". So far, I've enjoyed "Bolt" more than any other (of the two) films I've seen this year ("Slum Dog Millionaire" and "The Wrestler"). I'm a sucker for a dog story and despite the title, "Slum Dog Millionaire" has NO dog. (It's better that I tell you now. In fact, despite what you'll read in every description, I say it is NOT a rags to riches story.) Like other Disney animation, "Bolt" is contrived to pull heartstrings and despite being a grumpy old woman these days and expecting the film to be manipulative in this way, it succeeded. And, that's why it gets my number one vote. Neither of the other two films succeeded in emotionally engaging me. I was repelled by the horrors and abuse suffered in "SDM" but not much warmed by the love story. My interest in and attachment to Mickey Rourke's character was more intellectual than deeply emotional. (Mickey's performance was superb.) All three movies followed predictable paths but only one made me laugh out loud and get misty eyed.

"Bolt" also impressed by the attention to detail displayed by the creators. The pigeons moved like pigeons....and I've watched a lot of pigeons very carefully. Like the vultures in "The Jungle Book" they provide a nice bit of comic relief. I'm not sure why they seem to travel in threes - though the Hollywood pigeons were only SUPPOSED to be a pair, but the assistant, well, you'll find out. Back to detail. I about stood up and applauded when Bolt and Mittens tumble from the train (I think it was) into an Ohio field amongst Queen Anne's lace. One of my favorite wild flowers and so, so typical of ditches and fallow land in the midsummer in Ohio. (I had to turn to google to find a photo. How lame.)

Beyond Bad: The Life and Crimes of Katherine Knight, Australia's Hannibal

What more can be said?

This book was jarring. Not so much because of the nature of the crime: it wasn't enough for Kat to stab her man (37 times) - nor stab him then skin him - but stab, skin, decapitate, and cook parts of him. What bothered me more was the way the author combined an air of excessive sophistication (who calls the door frame of a working class home an architrave? Every Australian?? John???) with the down-home informality of Australian speech (I reckon; he reckons; she reckons; we ALL reckon) and a liberal (read this as insufficiently edited) dosing of direct quotes from friends, neighbors, family. (Ala "I said to him, I said ...") I was not impressed.

Will I ever be happy with anyone not James Lee Burke?

Meeting the train

I got home late from work last night. It was after 6:30. Kevin, managed to be even later - catching the 6:37 train and arriving in Carseldine at 7:02. Since I had no ambition with regard to cooking supper, I called for Chinese take away and met Kevin at the train.

As I have embarked on a "photo a day" project (which is harder than it sounds!) and Kevin has grown tired of photos of the sky (which I tell him is always there and I'm enjoying the enormous clouds we've had lately), I took my camera with me. It was growing dark. (Yes. Only half way to the equinox and it is already dark in summer at 7 PM.) My camera doesn't perform well with less than perfect illumination. Still, with the help of Photoshop I think I came up with some interesting images.

I actually did not manipulate the first one: walking up the steps to the train station.

From Meeting the train

Someone waits for the Brisbane Train on Platform One.

From Meeting the train

Kevin's train!

From Meeting the train

Happy Birthday to Z!

From photo a day

February 2, 1997.

That makes 12 years. Pretty funny since I've been saying she's 12 since last February. So, overall, I feel like my favorite girl is younger today.

Year of the Ox

From Singles 2009

Sunday Kevin and I trained down to Fortitude Valley for the last day of the Chinese New Year celebration. It was a comfortable day - overcast and cool-ish - great if you didn't mind a sprinkle. I looked at the weather forecast, the hourly forecast, before we left and was assured there was a zero percent chance of precipitation. Therefore, we did not take an umbrella. I was highly amused to find that we had to walk to the train station through the rain. Lets see, that would have been about 5 minutes later.

From Singles 2009

The entertainment was good. A kung-fu school brought out all their pupils for a performance followed by a lion dance. (They might look like dragons, but they are not. Dragons look more like snakes. See last year.) I'm not sure who or what the man and woman figures are. The disadvantage of going to the end of the festivities is that there is no narration. The advantage is there is no introduction of dignitaries and we could get a lot closer to the action. That might also have been a weather related phenomenon.

More wisdom from Dave and Batist

Batist:

"It don't do no good to be rich in the graveyard, no."

Dave: A response to an officer telling him he thinks he's made a mistake.

"Maybe we blew this one."

"It's a big club. Thanks for your time, sir."

I need to remember both of these. How about you?