On my Friday morning walk I had a chat to Eileen J. I haven't seen Harry or the dentist's wife for ages. Maybe they are away. Eileen and her husband AJ owned the Gembrook hotel from the late 70's to the early 90's. I asked her about Noni Smith, as I knew they were friends. Noni died a few years ago. Nobody knew Noni had any children, so there was amazement when 7 sons turned up. No one knew either that Noni had been married to a wife bashing alcoholic in Melbourne and ran away, starting a new life at Gembrook and working for Doc Murphy in Emerald. Eileen didn't know. It was the solicitor who found the children she said.
I was so glad I was wearing my new glasses. The sunrise was magnificent, salmon pink clouds with lemon butter yellow whorled between. I could see so much better into the contrasting dark areas, seeing things I normally wouldn't, like smoke wisping slowly from chimney flues. A real treat. What is it they say about a pink sky meaning rain?
It rained last Saturday, 19 ml in total, and it was most welcome.I did a little bit of gardening between showers, and some wooding ( splitting wood to kindling and intermediate size for the week ahead), and listened to the footy.
Lib worked Sunday, I did an ox tail casserole and put it in the crockpot on the deck to cook all day on low, then after my walk started on a curry. I'd never done a curry before and I knew it was a bit different to a normal casserole, so the previous night while in the bath I rang Leo Buckley, who sowed the idea in my head for the curry the previous day when we were both buying the budget rump on market day special in the local supermarket. I followed his tips. While doing this my friend Rick arrived for a visit, crowing about his success so far, 5/5 to my 2/5, in our email footy tipping competition. It meant he'd caught me up in one swoop. He stayed for 2 or 3 hours. It was hard trying to remember Leo's instructions and concentrate on the curry with Rick yapping. We go back as friends to 1964 as twelve year olds at school. He's leaving in a few weeks for a holiday to Sweden where his wife has been working for three months and they are then going to the Greek Islands for a few weeks. What a life some people live! I have to say though, to Rick's credit, that he suggested I leave out the sultanas. He hates sultanas in curries and picks them out. When Lib got home I said I didn't put sultanas in and she said that was good because she doesn't like them in curry. I put the curry in the oven on low temp and Rick and I had a couple of small bets on Hobart race one, and Mornington race 2. We lost. ( I have an account with centrebet, mainly for the odd bet on the footy, you can bet as small as $1 on the computer, and watch the race on sattelite TV ) Rick left and I went to get a trailer load of horse manure for the garden from Len Ure who owns, trains and races trotting horses. He gathers all the manure from the paddocks into a big heap as this reduces worm infestation in the horses. The heap gets big and he's happy for me to make it smaller.
Everyone enjoyed the curry for tea the next night Monday. Monday to Wednesday were very busy picking days for me. As well as large amounts of cherry laurel and bay, finding daphne, pieris, japonica, hellaborus and early prunus have kept me running, which shows that spring is on us. There 18 ml more rain between Sunday night and Tuesday morning. Wednesday was bitterly cold, 4C after my walk and 7C when I got home at 5.30pm. I don't think the max. would have been much higher, and there was a vicious wind from the south east.
Thursday is my best day to to take a breather or catch up on things. Today I did a couple of hours gardening for Pat and Mal. Mal is a retired civil engineer (Scottish) with a passion for chrysanthemums and dahlias. He used to build skyscrapers in Singapore. He was head of Tarmac Int. far east section. His wife Pat is of Asian origin, very tall, well spoken and polite. Pat hasn't told me anything of her background, but another lady I have worked for who recommended me to Pat, said she was manager of the Hilton Hotel in Singapore or Hong Kong. Mal is doing a bit of part time work for his old company even though he's been retired for 5 years. They asked him to help out at a coal mine at Blackwater Qld. so he flies up every other week to Emerald Qld. then drives an hour and a half to Blackwater. Setting up the new plant is behind schedule and is costing the owners (BHP Billiton I think he said ) one million dollars every week it over runs. It will be a year behind by the time it is finished. Very little labour is employed. It's all computerised. One scoop of a big machine in seconds extracts more coal than a man would in a week. After crushing and grading by machines, the coal is loaded automatically by conveyors onto trains that take it to ships and then to China. Mal has a crook knee ( he was a paratrooper in the British army serving in Malaya and Thailand,) so they get me to help sometimes. Today I did 2.5 hours good solid work on a long handled spade digging over new garden beds.
Lyle is doing well, miraculously improving on last week, and his spirits are up. He's better at home and has picked up a bit as a result.
