Salt and corrosion

The other morning as I was doing my pre-work walk on the beach, I saw a wallaby hopping along the shore, followed by seagulls. I don't know if they were chasing it or just curious. So that was a thing. This morning, I saw six camels, which was a surprise. Apparently they are doing camel rides on the beach over summer, and I was there in time to see them arrive for the day. So that was another thing.

There was a woman in the Post Office today who was sort of but not quite standing at the end of the line of people under the PLEASE QUEUE HERE sign. I couldn't tell if she was in the queue or just looking at something nearby, so I said to her, 'Are you the end of the queue?'

She said, 'Oh, I suppose I must be. I've never been here before, so I don't know how it works.' So she got in line and I stood behind her and that was that. I thought it was odd, though. I didn't think queuing was such a difficult concept, or unique to the local Post Office.

My mother wanted to buy some quilt fabric today and fancied a trip to the little fabric store in Cobden, a little under an hour away from the City by the Sea. According to the Welcome to Cobden, population 1,534, board at the outskirts of town, Cobden's WEEK OF GOLF! starts on 18 February. So put that in your calendars.

On the way to Cobden, we passed through the even smaller town of Naringal. The Naringal primary school has a big board in its grounds that says:

2012 RESOLUTION
DON'T POINT A FINGER
LEND A HAND

There's something in that for all of us.

This week's photos of the day:



Day 296. Office dinosaur, Day 297. Pineapple, Day 298. Feed me, Day 299. Looking into John's workshop, Day 300. Pattern on the floor, Day 301. Bike race, Day 301a. Watching the bike race, Day 302. Lake Bolac, Day 302. Narrapumelap lion

Today I have been to the small town of Wickliffe, some 100 odd kilometres north of the City by the Sea, for the open day at the Narrapumelap homestead. I would love to tell you how to pronounce that, but I heard about five different versions of it today, so if you do want to say it aloud, just take a stab. As long as you sound knowledgeable, you'll get away with whatever you come up with.

Narrapumelap is apparently one of rural Australia's finest examples of French Gothic revival architecture, which would seem to be damning it with very specific praise. It's lovely though. Well worth a look if you happen to be passing.

On the way back, we stopped for lunch in the slightly bigger nearby town of Lake Bolac, eating sandwiches overlooking the lake. The town has a multi-purpose building that comprises the tourist information centre, heritage display, shop for local handicrafts, a Medicare office and the local bank branch (the last two weren't open on a Sunday). The woman looking after the visitor information centre was quite excited when she heard we were coming back from Narrapumelap, and gave us a free Narrapumelap postcard to commemorate our visit. Amongst the handicrafts were hand-made cards that said 'For the person who has everything' on the front. Opened out, the card contained a pipe cleaner with a bow tied around it: a belly-button brush. I didn't get one.

My mother said something to the visitor centre lady about the lovely view over Lake Bolac while eating our lunch, and it became obvious we had made an embarrassing faux pas. That sad little salt lake wasn't the mighty Lake Bolac, home of the famous eel festival, she told us. No, we had been looking at the lesser-known and vastly inferior Lake Paracalmic. The visitor information lady gave us a map showing us how to get to Lake Bolac (she could have just told us to turn left between the school and the Catholic church), and showed us some photos of a man holding the biggest eel ever caught in the lake and the parched lake bed in the drought years when it dried out completely. 'We had to have a mass burial of all the dead eels,' she said. 'It was very sad.' She paused. 'And quite smelly.'

( Special bonus Narrapumelap photos )

I went to Melbourne yesterday. While there, I passed three Sock Shops. I wouldn't have thought there was such high demand for specialist sock retailers. How do they stay in business? Are they just a front for some other, more nefarious, trade?

I bought some hand lotion in a shop (not a Sock Shop) and the man at the counter said, 'What have you got, sweet pea?' I said, 'No, it's lemon,' and he laughed at me. (I told my mother that when she picked me up at the station tonight and she laughed so hard she nearly choked on one of the scorched almonds I bought her to thank her for picking me up. At least my dimness is spreading good cheer.)

Before catching the train home, I went to the loo. The woman in the cubicle next to me answered her phone and said, 'I'm on the toilet at the train station, I'll call you back.' Why would you even answer the phone in that situation?

While I was waiting at the station, two women sat on the seats next to me. One said, 'I bought some beetroot salad to take home for dinner.' Her friend asked what was in it. 'Beetroot.' There was a pause while she looked at the plastic carton. 'And salad.' I hope she writes a cookbook. I can't wait for her recipe for rice cake.

Also, there was also an elderly couple driving one of the station's golf carts, so they didn't have to carry their luggage. While I was watching them, the old man nudged the old woman to get her attention, then tooted the golf cart's little horn to scare some nearby teenagers. The elderly couple giggled. That made my day.

Finally, I catch the train in Melbourne at Southern Cross station. I realised tonight that if I caught the connecting bus once I get off at home, the final stop on the line is a town called Southern Cross. So you can request Southern Cross to Southern Cross return ticket. Isn't that interesting?

Here are some striped rocks I saw today:


( ...or are they? )

Today I went to the Port Fairy book fair and had a wander around the second-hand book sales. They had them on labelled shelves: Modern Fiction, Crime/Thriller, Horror/Fantasy/Science Fiction, and so on. And, er, Occult/Finance/Religion, which seems an unlikely combination.

Yesterday my mother and I had our annual craft-and-culture trip to Melbourne. We went to the craft fair in the morning, splitting up and doing our respective things. Every year at the craft fair, there is one thing that's everywhere. The first year, it was dragons. Quilts, cross-stitch, beads, dragons, dragons, dragons. Last year, it was what I call patty cakes and you might call cupcakes. This year, owls. I also saw several patterns featuring matryoshka dolls, so maybe that's an early guess for next year's popular thing.

I went to a workshop on arm knitting. That's knitting on your arms rather than needles. I thought it sounded like an interesting novelty and was surprised to find it was standing room only. Fifty chairs full and as many people again lining the walls. It turns out arm knitting is exactly what it sounds like. She cast seven enormous stitches on her hand and then knitted a whole ball of (thick) wool into a scarf over twenty minutes while she was talking. One woman asked what she'd do if she had to put the knitting down; well, she said, it takes fifteen minutes to make a scarf, so go to the loo and have a drink before you start and you won't need to. She had made some interesting pieces — things partly knitted on her arms and partly on needles, felted, shaped — but I don't think I'll take it up myself.

After lunch my mother and I headed to the National Gallery for the winter masterpieces exhibition, which this year is Vienna: Art and Design. Klimt and Moll and that crowd. Jolly good stuff and a lot of uncomfortable chairs. After that we went back fifty years to the Eugene von Guérard exhibition. He was a German landscape painter who came to Australia in the nineteenth century. Very good at clouds. My mother's new shoes were rubbing so we took the lift rather than the stairs to get to the level the exhibition was on. It's obviously the lift they use to move the art about too, because it was bigger than my living room.

Coming home on the train, I read the newspaper and realised why the arm knitting lady was so popular: she was in a 'what's on today' feature. Here she is in a different paper.

It was half-past ten when I got home and Percy was stretched out on the sofa, making himself at home. I was reading my mail and waiting for the kettle to boil when another cat shot past me, running from the front end of the house and out the cat window. I don't know who was more surprised: me or it. It certainly wasn't Percy, who didn't even seem to notice.

My mother is keeping a list of all the books she reads this year. She's up to number sixty so far. Sixty! She must be reading historical mysteries as fast as they can print them.

She told me this on the way to Port Fairy to go to MADE, a craft collective. There weren't a lot of exhibitors, but what was there was lovely. There was a guy making amigurumi plants and a woman with handmade notebooks and not one but two women knitting funky teacosies.

After that we went to the Koroit Lions Club annual art show, via a quick spin round Tower Hill to look at whatever wildlife was out and about (emus and swans, and lots of frogs to be heard). The art show was in the old Koroit Theatre. I'm not sure if it's still in use as a theatre; I hope it is because it's quite a nice old building. While Mum went to the loo, I poked around in the foyer and found some old signs behind the shiny silver bar: one with some dates on it and a handpainted one for the Koroit Swimming Pool. Once we went into the theatre itself, the art show was good. There are some talented people about. They gave out slips to vote for a People's Choice winner. My vote came down to a choice of two: what I want to call a botanical illustration but of three black cockatoos rather than a plant, if that makes sense, and an oil painting of a local beach that looked like the artist had based it on the Google Earth view. I went with the cockatoos in the end.

Do you ever reconsider something? Something that didn't make any sense and then you come back to years later and realise what a great thing it is? I have recently re-evaluated my feelings about nail cutters and have decided that they're marvellous. I don't know how I've struggled by with little nail scissors all these years. Oh, the regrets.

The magazine that comes with Saturday's paper did a 'women's issue' yesterday. I never realised the other issues weren't for women. Anyway, it was an odd read. Here are the cover stories:

Portraits of Power: Our pick of the 50 most influential women in the world
Serving it up: Sam Stosur's will to win
Biggest Loser: Does weight loss equal happiness?
Reach for the Sky: The real appeal of the high heel
Thank, Mum!: Our annual Mother's Day gift guide

That's a mixed bag, isn't it? It was the shoe story that really grated. This consisted of little paragraphs by a variety of women 'who just can't live without a bit of lift'. These were their jobs: PR agent, three magazine editors (Harper's Bazaar, Grazia and Vogue), three fashion designers, jewellery designer, two stylists, Video Hits host, fashion editor and shoe designer. That's not really what I would call a representative spread of women. Where's the article on the importance of support and comfort in duty shoes for nurses and policewomen? That's a shoe story with something new to say.

Also, there was a jewellery shop catalogue tucked inside the newspaper, offering Mother's Day Specials. This included a pendant that said 'Daddy's Little Princess'. What sort of person buys that for their mum?

Day 114. A line of boats


( Days 115 - 120 )

( Extras )

Today I went to the Collecta-bool Fair. Do you see what they did there? They combined 'collectable' with 'Warrnambool'. Someone had a thinking cap on that day. Anyway, it's a day for people to show their collections. There was a man with military medal ribbons, a woman with swap cards, someone with Mickey Mouse stuff and people with butter churns and irons and coloured bottles. And thimbles and oil cans and VW beetles, oh my.

I had some of the swap cards on display when I was little, so that was fun, but I think my favourite display belonged to the guy who collected old film posters. There was one for a film called The Haunted and the Hunted that advised DO NOT SEE THIS ALONE, OR IF YOU HAVE A WEAK HEART! Also that it was filmed with a process known as Dementia 13, so it must be good. The best tagline on one of these posters was: He called himself 'The Preacher'... and he wrote his sermons in lead. This was written above a picture of a man holding a rifle, just in case anyone thought he was using a pencil.

Then I took the tulip bulbs out of the vegetable crisper and planted them, and pulled up the tomato bushes. Busy day.

My work has just had a three-day strategic planning meeting. It was exactly as fun as it sounds. I was only needed at the Monday evening and Tuesday morning sessions, so it wasn't too bad. They are working on the train tracks, so the three-hour train trip to Melbourne took four hours, partly by bus, which was a drag and meant that I only had half an hour free on Monday afternoon, which wasn't really enough time to do anything other than go for a head-clearing walk before starting work. But it was a nice day and my hotel room had a river view (the first time I've ever seen anything other than a car park from a hotel window), so I can't really complain.

Because I don't sleep well in strange beds and certainly not when my room is directly across the river from Crown Casino and its columns of flame that shoot up regularly in a choreographed routine, I was up in time for another head-clearing walk at dawn. So that was all very nice. Also nice: because our Tuesday morning session involved a small group of people, we weren't in the hotel's conference room but in the penthouse suite, a place I am never likely to visit for any other reason. My standard room's little bathroom would have fitted into the bath in the penthouse bathroom. I think my house's bathroom would have fitted into the penthouse bathroom. We all oohed and aahed about that like the country bumpkins we are.

I use an electric toothbrush, which I couldn't be bothered taking with me. I do have a normal one, but I couldn't remember last time I used it, so I thought, hang the expense, and bought a new one. It has a bumpy area on the back of the head, which the packet tells me is a tongue scraper. Gosh, toothbrush technology is moving on apace, isn't it?

While I was away, I got my mother to come in on Monday evening to feed Percy, and she said she also popped in mid-Tuesday morning and gave him a pat. Which is more than I did when I arrived home on Tuesday because he wasn't there. He still hasn't been round today either. I don't mind if he's got the huff and moved on to mooch off someone else, but I do hope nothing's happened to him. ETA: He's back.

What else? Oh, in my ongoing quest to find the world's ugliest shoes, I came across these hoof boots recently. I like that they have the female models in vaguely jockey-ish outfits. I've never thought that people who ride horses actually want to be horses, but maybe they do. Anyway, I was looking for the hoof boots to show someone the other day and discovered that there is more than one style of hoof boot. I like (for a limited level of 'like') the ones that have horse shoes on the bottom of the hoof boots; that's commitment to an idea, isn't it? I don't know about the deer hoof boots, though. I thought deer had cloven hoofs?

I thought I should do something for my holidays, otherwise I will go back to work next week and people will ask if I did anything exciting and I will have to say, 'Oh, well, I had my hair cut and my eyes checked.' So I went to see The King's Speech last night and enjoyed it, mostly. Every time I see Guy Pearce in something I always think, remember when he was in Neighbours and played second fiddle to Jason Donovan? How times change.

Today, even more excitingly, I have been to Port Fairy, the town around the bay from the City by the Sea, to watch the 2011 Commonwealth Championship Sheepdog Trials. Oh, yes. Here is some of the action:



I don't know if any of you, f-list, have been to sheepdog trials. I hadn't. What happens is this: the 'worker' (usually an elderly man) stands at one end of a field and three sheep are released at the other end. The worker has to stand still while directing his dog to bring the sheep up the field and around the worker. Once this happens, the worker can walk, but has to keep the sheep on his right hand side at all times. Bearing that in mind, he directs his dog to take the sheep back down the field and through a series of obstacles of the sort that they might find on a farm. First the dog has to get the sheep through a narrow gate in a fence, then through a race (a narrow passageway), up a ramp and finally into a little pen. Once they're in the pen, the worker closes the gate and a little beeper goes off. If they're not finished in fifteen minutes, they're disqualified.

I was really there because my mother told me that when she went a couple of years ago, they put on a little entertainment during the lunch break, in which one of the workers and his dog did the course with three ducks instead of three sheep. No ducks this year, alas, but there was a display: a worker rounding up three sheep with three dogs instead of one, with special commentary by Pip Hudson, an old man who is apparently a big cheese in the sheepdog trial world. At one point, the sheep got away from all three dogs and Pip Hudson said, 'No! Wouldn't that gap your axe?' I have no idea what that means, but it's going to be my new exclamation when things go wrong.

All the dogs have two names: a regular name prefixed by the name of the property they live on. I've got the program here: Singlines Wes, Tunglia Jasper, Armitages Gem, Springvale Darcy, Yandarra Frost, Roseneath Baz, and, my favourite, El'Shamah Madge. And one dog of mystery known only as Tweed. One dog that I watched, Sting, couldn't find his sheep. Even for sheep, these were a particularly dopey lot that just stayed in the holding pen when the gate was opened, and poor Sting didn't think of looking there. He was just out for a run. Another dog, Maisie, got her sheep to the finishing pen in ten minutes, only to have them spend five minutes refusing to go in. The time buzzer went off and she was disqualified.

( Real action )

A few years ago, I wrote about a man who was building a replica Portuguese caravel in his back yard. As you do. Anyway, he's finished and it's afloat in Port Fairy, so I stopped and had a look on the way home.



( Close ups )

Also, I bought a book of stamps. Germaine Greer has her own stamp now. I just thought you'd like to know.