Yesterday was 'Thomas the Tank Engine' day in Gembrook. When I say it was 'Thomas the Tank Engine' day, let me elaborate and say it was the Thomas day organised by the Rotary Club of Emerald in conjunction with Puffing Billy Railway. This was changed from a date in October because that date was washed out. There were also four other Thomas days in total organised by Puffing Billy, two in October, and two earlier this month. I'm well and truly Thomased out, not that I attend the event but it is impossible not to be aware of the crowds and congestion and traffic if I venture into the town.
I suppose the large attendance at these events means they are a success, but I query who is the beneficiary. Obviously Puffing Billy and probably the hotel, but it's a great pity, for those of us who appreciate Gembrook's quiet natural beauty for what it is without all the noise and fuss and crowds, that this extravaganza of events has been imposed on our town. Now that we have Thomas out of the way, we are now going to have 4 Santa events in December, two days each on consecutive weekends. We'll have a little break during January and February then there are six more events in March. I'm not sure but I think Thomas is returning for these. Maybe it is Thomas meeting Santa in December as well.
It was also market day being the last Sunday of the month. The market has moved to the Community Centre, I think there was some conflict between the market committee and Puffing Billy. The market has traditionally been held at the the station but this was no longer acceptable for some reason, the specifics of which I know not. The crowd and traffic were horrendous in the town when I was looking for friends who were visiting and wanted to see the market. They said they found the market disappointing. They have recently moved back after 8 years in West Australia and in their travels have seen many local markets.
Today I was working in a garden close to the Puffing Billy line, perhaps 60 or 70 metres away, when the train left Gembrook on it's way back to Cockatoo. The hooting of the whistle split the calm and after the train passed, the hooting continuing further down, the acrid smell of smoke and or cinders enveloped me. I can only hope there were not too many particles deposited in my lungs as I had to continue breathing. I'm glad I gave up smoking 26 years ago. The medication I take for my RA has a side effect of increased risk of lung cancer, so the prescribing specialist suggested I give up smoking (if I smoked).
I was mindful of this today as I breathed in the Puffing Billy smoke/cinders.
Monday, November 28, 2016
Wednesday, November 23, 2016
Putting The Brakes On
This week has tested me physically and emotionally. On Sunday the weather was warm to hot and I overdid things a little in the afternoon digging over ground at Margeuritas and then more at Hanna's. At the end of the day I was hot in the face and my lips were dry and burning, I probably didn't drink enough water although I did take drink breaks.
On Monday with the temperature going into the high 30's C for the first time in ages I again pushed hard. I picked broad beans at Margeuritas in the morning then got onto the beech. We are three weeks into the beech season and the customers are being difficult in that they are asking for large amounts and a couple of them wanting to come twice a week rather than their customary one pick up a week. My inclination is to try to please them so I go harder. Monday night after the first hot day of the season I was very tired.
Tuesday it rained consistently but I had four people picking up on Wednesday so worked in the rain rushing about gathering everything I could to fill their requests. Last night I was thoroughly drained and unhappy at this situation I'm in so after a good sleep and more rain this morning I headed out to pick broadies at M's again, in the rain, I was soaked again and after a change of clothes and lunch picked a little bit of beech to make up numbers for the late afternoon pick up person. When I got to the farm I was quickly unloading so that I could catch the bank before 4pm when Elvie came out asking me could I pick 20 more bunches of green beech by 6pm as one of the earlier customers complained they didn't get enough and they would come back to get it.
It was still raining. "No way," I said. I was not going to get wet again and frankly it is most unpleasant working off a ladder with the pole looking up into the rain. And dangerous as I'm not young.
So I feel a weight has been lifted. My customers have to realize they will have to take what I can do comfortably without me stressing about numbers and if they don't like it well tough luck. It's up to me to firm mentally and take it slowly or I'll wreck myself between now and Christmas. I can't work as quickly or as long as used to when younger. There's something about beech that seems to work them frenzied. I guess that's because it it so beautiful and prized by florists and there's not enough supply in the market place. Probably I'm selling it too cheaply too and if I was a good businessman I'd up my price 30% and let the market place slow it down for me, but I've upped my price 10% each of the last two years and I do believe in a fair thing and I don't want to be a hard greedy bastard.
There has been some good Karma over this period. Rickyralph turned up on Sunday morning to get some lemons. He brought me a shepherd's pie for breakfast and a bottle of red wine in gratitude for the lemons he comes for every month or so. I picked foliage at friend Sue's garden on Tuesday. She has nine acres of trees and shrubs she and her husband have planted and nurtured over 20 plus years and it's a total joy to see and work in a place as beautiful. And I love picking the broadies (and eating them later) out at Marguerita's farm with rolling hills of hay paddocks and potato fields around me, away from the traffic and the busy roads.
A young girl was killed in a road accident in Emerald Tuesday and it shunts it home.
Put the brakes on.
On Monday with the temperature going into the high 30's C for the first time in ages I again pushed hard. I picked broad beans at Margeuritas in the morning then got onto the beech. We are three weeks into the beech season and the customers are being difficult in that they are asking for large amounts and a couple of them wanting to come twice a week rather than their customary one pick up a week. My inclination is to try to please them so I go harder. Monday night after the first hot day of the season I was very tired.
Tuesday it rained consistently but I had four people picking up on Wednesday so worked in the rain rushing about gathering everything I could to fill their requests. Last night I was thoroughly drained and unhappy at this situation I'm in so after a good sleep and more rain this morning I headed out to pick broadies at M's again, in the rain, I was soaked again and after a change of clothes and lunch picked a little bit of beech to make up numbers for the late afternoon pick up person. When I got to the farm I was quickly unloading so that I could catch the bank before 4pm when Elvie came out asking me could I pick 20 more bunches of green beech by 6pm as one of the earlier customers complained they didn't get enough and they would come back to get it.
It was still raining. "No way," I said. I was not going to get wet again and frankly it is most unpleasant working off a ladder with the pole looking up into the rain. And dangerous as I'm not young.
So I feel a weight has been lifted. My customers have to realize they will have to take what I can do comfortably without me stressing about numbers and if they don't like it well tough luck. It's up to me to firm mentally and take it slowly or I'll wreck myself between now and Christmas. I can't work as quickly or as long as used to when younger. There's something about beech that seems to work them frenzied. I guess that's because it it so beautiful and prized by florists and there's not enough supply in the market place. Probably I'm selling it too cheaply too and if I was a good businessman I'd up my price 30% and let the market place slow it down for me, but I've upped my price 10% each of the last two years and I do believe in a fair thing and I don't want to be a hard greedy bastard.
There has been some good Karma over this period. Rickyralph turned up on Sunday morning to get some lemons. He brought me a shepherd's pie for breakfast and a bottle of red wine in gratitude for the lemons he comes for every month or so. I picked foliage at friend Sue's garden on Tuesday. She has nine acres of trees and shrubs she and her husband have planted and nurtured over 20 plus years and it's a total joy to see and work in a place as beautiful. And I love picking the broadies (and eating them later) out at Marguerita's farm with rolling hills of hay paddocks and potato fields around me, away from the traffic and the busy roads.
A young girl was killed in a road accident in Emerald Tuesday and it shunts it home.
Put the brakes on.
 |
| Out at Margeurita's |
 |
| Gord and I at Sue's Oct 23 'Art in the Garden' day |
Tuesday, November 15, 2016
Some Interesting Numbers
Those who know me know I like to have a little punt on the horses and I did so before we went to Lakes Entrance last Saturday, putting bets on each race of each of the Victorian race meetings over Saturday and Sunday. I'm a small bettor, $1 each way usually and/or place bets at good odds and a few 50 cent trifectas.
I knew I wouldn't be able to hear the races as we are out of radio reception down there for the racing station unless I'm in the car and can pick it up on FM, which of course I'm usually not and I'm busy with other things in any case. I have two accounts with on line betting agencies and I enjoy comparing their odds and selecting the best value. It's interesting checking the results in the evening on the mobile phone or when I get back on the the computer.
When we got back late yesterday arvo I checked my balances to find I'd made a very small profit for the weekend but amazingly both balances were exactly the same...$112.46. If I cast my mind back to 1968 and Dr Dino di Battista was teaching me probabilities in mathematics, the raw odds of this sequence of numbers on both accounts matching would be 100,000 to one. Of course there would need to be some adjustment for the fact that the most I ever put in an account is $100 and the balance of both accounts is usually somewhere between $0 and $200, but not always, I got as high as $800 once on one before taking out $500 to pay a medical bill.That is the only time I have made a withdrawal, the traffic is usually all one way with deposits of $50 or $100, but a deposit usually lasts some weeks and gives me some fun watching the balance go up or down till it needs replenishing.
The other interesting numbers were at the petrol pump. I filled up with Premium UL for the Kangoo at Pakenham on the way down and filled up at the same station on the way back yesterday. The cost was $59 even. I had done 550km driving a van loaded with tools and a roof rack and ladder on top and that seems like an amazingly distance for that amount of money. And when you consider that part of that price is GST, and the excise on the wholesale price is 38 cents a litre if I'm right, then the price of the actual fuel produced and refined far away and transported all the way to my tank is minute for the effect in produces for me.
We cut the grass at the Lakes house and had a couple of great walks. The areas around the house and on our walks were teeming with birds. The highlight was scarlet honeyeaters in the callistemons and blue fairy wrens on the ground not four feet from our boots foraging for insects disturbed by our feet. There'd been a big rain the night before, and the Lake Bunga walk was as beautiful as I'd ever seen it.
I knew I wouldn't be able to hear the races as we are out of radio reception down there for the racing station unless I'm in the car and can pick it up on FM, which of course I'm usually not and I'm busy with other things in any case. I have two accounts with on line betting agencies and I enjoy comparing their odds and selecting the best value. It's interesting checking the results in the evening on the mobile phone or when I get back on the the computer.
When we got back late yesterday arvo I checked my balances to find I'd made a very small profit for the weekend but amazingly both balances were exactly the same...$112.46. If I cast my mind back to 1968 and Dr Dino di Battista was teaching me probabilities in mathematics, the raw odds of this sequence of numbers on both accounts matching would be 100,000 to one. Of course there would need to be some adjustment for the fact that the most I ever put in an account is $100 and the balance of both accounts is usually somewhere between $0 and $200, but not always, I got as high as $800 once on one before taking out $500 to pay a medical bill.That is the only time I have made a withdrawal, the traffic is usually all one way with deposits of $50 or $100, but a deposit usually lasts some weeks and gives me some fun watching the balance go up or down till it needs replenishing.
The other interesting numbers were at the petrol pump. I filled up with Premium UL for the Kangoo at Pakenham on the way down and filled up at the same station on the way back yesterday. The cost was $59 even. I had done 550km driving a van loaded with tools and a roof rack and ladder on top and that seems like an amazingly distance for that amount of money. And when you consider that part of that price is GST, and the excise on the wholesale price is 38 cents a litre if I'm right, then the price of the actual fuel produced and refined far away and transported all the way to my tank is minute for the effect in produces for me.
We cut the grass at the Lakes house and had a couple of great walks. The areas around the house and on our walks were teeming with birds. The highlight was scarlet honeyeaters in the callistemons and blue fairy wrens on the ground not four feet from our boots foraging for insects disturbed by our feet. There'd been a big rain the night before, and the Lake Bunga walk was as beautiful as I'd ever seen it.
Tuesday, November 08, 2016
Mock Orange
We have been busy picking mock orange blossom this last week or so. It comes with a bit of a rush in late spring and there's plenty of it this year, certainly the good rains have helped. It's a Philadelphus, the variety we have is coronarius, a plant from Southern Europe. It's a deciduous shrub which grows to about 10 feet high and eight wide over time with multiple stems coming from the base which spread and can be divided off in winter. The flowers are profuse and magnificently scented citrus like, hence the common name mock orange.
It's the last of the spring blossom for us, although there's still some Hungarian lilac to be picked as well. My grandmother Nanna Wilson had a mock orange in her garden in Ashburton and when we moved to Emerald we took a plant from that parent. As it is in demand by our florist customers we have grown more plants over the years and now have quite a lot, sometimes too many to pick it all if the weather is hot and it comes out all at once. The great thing about it is that it thrives in dry conditions of summer so needs no watering but it benefits by cold winters which we do have in the Dandenongs. It's a good keeper in water and is pleasant to pick. It's a 'single' flower as opposed to the 'doubles' of many other Philadelphus varieties which in our experience do not keep well as a cut flower.
It was a ripper dogwood season, we picked large amounts of Cornus florida through October. All in all spring has been grand, despite working in the rain and cold, which has no doubt helped the spring blossom. We will shortly move on to picking beech foliage, it's a little slow to firm up due to the lack of warm weather. Sadly my beech trees at home have been decimated by crimson rosellas who have taken to eating the new leaves. They've had a bit of a chew at the farm too. Not much we can do about it, except watch, and accept the financial wack as one of those things. I just hope it doesn't get worse into the future. Birds are very good at adapting and utilizing new introduced food sources. The parents teach their young where the food is and they have a bit of a yearly movement pattern following the available food. The king parrots are good at turning up just when the tomatoes are full. They'll eat them green before we can get one ripe and strip our bushes in a few hours.
As much as I love birds I am not fond of king parrots or rosellas, they are way too destructive. But the garden abounds with so many birds lately, especially thornbills, spinebills, whipbirds and fantails and some visiting jacky winters. Magpies, butcherbirds, ravens, and currawongs too, and bronze winged pigeons and the usual blackbirds and doves and Indian mynahs. And of course cockatoos and corellas and the odd eagle soaring above like the grand overseer. Jod was happy the other day, he saw a spotted quail thrush at the farm. Probably all this rain has been great for the birds to breed. It's amazing really, these creatures are hell bent on raising young, instinctively, a life's mission, and each building that species' type of nest in a tree or shrub or hollow, or underground say for the spotted pardalote, and following the code of nature as set for them. And in a matter of weeks from egg hatching they can fly and feed. Miraculous. And some of these creatures can fly huge distances in migration, even halfway round the world. I watched a thornbill bathing in a puddle in a tarp I had placed over some wood to keep it dry, not ten feet from where I stood and unconcerned by me. Such a sight would brighten anyone's day.
It's the last of the spring blossom for us, although there's still some Hungarian lilac to be picked as well. My grandmother Nanna Wilson had a mock orange in her garden in Ashburton and when we moved to Emerald we took a plant from that parent. As it is in demand by our florist customers we have grown more plants over the years and now have quite a lot, sometimes too many to pick it all if the weather is hot and it comes out all at once. The great thing about it is that it thrives in dry conditions of summer so needs no watering but it benefits by cold winters which we do have in the Dandenongs. It's a good keeper in water and is pleasant to pick. It's a 'single' flower as opposed to the 'doubles' of many other Philadelphus varieties which in our experience do not keep well as a cut flower.
It was a ripper dogwood season, we picked large amounts of Cornus florida through October. All in all spring has been grand, despite working in the rain and cold, which has no doubt helped the spring blossom. We will shortly move on to picking beech foliage, it's a little slow to firm up due to the lack of warm weather. Sadly my beech trees at home have been decimated by crimson rosellas who have taken to eating the new leaves. They've had a bit of a chew at the farm too. Not much we can do about it, except watch, and accept the financial wack as one of those things. I just hope it doesn't get worse into the future. Birds are very good at adapting and utilizing new introduced food sources. The parents teach their young where the food is and they have a bit of a yearly movement pattern following the available food. The king parrots are good at turning up just when the tomatoes are full. They'll eat them green before we can get one ripe and strip our bushes in a few hours.
As much as I love birds I am not fond of king parrots or rosellas, they are way too destructive. But the garden abounds with so many birds lately, especially thornbills, spinebills, whipbirds and fantails and some visiting jacky winters. Magpies, butcherbirds, ravens, and currawongs too, and bronze winged pigeons and the usual blackbirds and doves and Indian mynahs. And of course cockatoos and corellas and the odd eagle soaring above like the grand overseer. Jod was happy the other day, he saw a spotted quail thrush at the farm. Probably all this rain has been great for the birds to breed. It's amazing really, these creatures are hell bent on raising young, instinctively, a life's mission, and each building that species' type of nest in a tree or shrub or hollow, or underground say for the spotted pardalote, and following the code of nature as set for them. And in a matter of weeks from egg hatching they can fly and feed. Miraculous. And some of these creatures can fly huge distances in migration, even halfway round the world. I watched a thornbill bathing in a puddle in a tarp I had placed over some wood to keep it dry, not ten feet from where I stood and unconcerned by me. Such a sight would brighten anyone's day.
Sunday, November 06, 2016
Puffing Billy Stinks
Puffing Billy is a noisy smoke belching environmental hazard. It's 18 scheduled event days in Gembrook create traffic congestion and destruction of our peaceful rural lifestyle. We don't want it.
Piss off Billy
Piss off Billy
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