Well begun is half done.

The fine features of the Hyro building in Hobart.

Sunday Top ~~Five~~ Eleven!

Today's list is in celebration of Tasmania's epic run chase to defeat Western Australia on Friday, which saw rookie wicketkeeper Brady Jones snare two fours off the last two balls of a four day game, with no wickets to spare. It is only fitting then that today I offer up my Top ~~Five~~ Eleven Favourite Tasmanian Tigers!

I've tried to keep a balanced squad, but top be honest, my distaste for the two most famous Tasmanian cricketers - Ricky Ponting and David Boon - has seen me pass them over at the selection table. Similarly, two imports - Michael Beven and Shane Watson - have also been overlooked because, well, I've never liked 'em. Thus, the side is not the strongest batting lineup ever seen. That said, if we have a green top and a bit of cloud in the sky, I'd wager that my pace attack would keep any scores very low.

McCracken's Tasmanian Tigers All-Time Squad

Jamie Cox: Wynyard's finest, Cox should have played for Australia, but as always, selectors couldn't or wouldn't look beyond Queensland or NSW.

Dene Hills: Wynyard's second finest, Hills was spoken of as a relacement for Geoff Marsh way back when. Never got the nod, unfortunately.

Scott Mason: a real trier and great team man. Died far too young.

Dirk Wellham (C): most fondly remembered down in the Apple Isle for the time that he hit that annoying intellectually disabled Carlton fan (is their any other kind?) "Barb" in the face with his bat, Dirk was a real bastard. Just what a captain needs to be!

Danny Buckingham: as wide as he was tall, the Burnie boy had a feast for runs only matched for his love of meat pies.

Sean Clingeleffer: I'm saddened that Clinger is now a past Tiger, but heartened that it was his performance in the victorious Shield final that really saw us home!

Richard Hadlee: the first of our one year international ringers, Hadlee strengthens the batting lineup, and also chips in as one of the greatest bowlers to ever play the game...

Dennis Lillee: speaking of which... Lillee played a season down here as part of his surprise comeback to the game. He was picked as the only bowler in Wisdon's five greatest cricketers in the twentieth century.

Michael Holding: Whispering Death was Holding's nickname. Ask Geoff Boycott whether he could bowl.

Colin Miller: I've picked funky Miller more for his first rate off spin, rather than his handy seamers of lusty lower order hitting. He brings a bit of balance to the attack, and the presence of four other quicks means that he can concentrate on the offies. Note, he will be wearing the green hair for this game.

Ben Hilfenhaus: Another product of Tasmanian's north west coast (the source of our finest men), the Hilfenstud is Tassie's most recent (and sixth, in total) test cricketer. He'll work well in tandem with Hadlee and can be the workhorse of the crew.

[At twelth Man: Brett Geeves: Banger Geeves is my favourite non-Hilfenstud Tiger. Very handy with the bat, and a legitimate chance at a test cap. Watch this space.]

My apologies to Bruce Cruse, Mick Farrell, Alistair DeWinter and a host of other hopeless cases from the barren years of bottom placings on the Shield laddder...

Ah, Joe, you never knew the whole of it...

I still have the robot on the job. Here you can see the Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery . And here is a poem: Soliloquy for One Dead Bruce Dawe Ah, no, Joe, you never knew the whole of it, the whistling which is only the wind in the chimney's smoking belly, the footsteps on the muddy path that are always somebody else's. I think of your limbs down there, softly becoming mineral, the life of grasses, and the old love of you thrusts the tears up into my eyes, with the family aware and looking everywhere else. Sometimes when summer is over the land, when the heat quickens the deaf timbers, and birds are thick in the plumbs again, my heart sickens, Joe, calling for the water of your voice and the gone agony of your nearness. I try hard to forget, saying: If God wills, it must be so, because of His goodness, because- but the grasshopper memory leaps in the long thicket, knowing no ease. Ah, Joe, you never knew the whole of it... I like Bruce Dawe. He just my be my favourite Austral...

There was nothing left. No reason, no conscience, no understanding; even the most rudimentary sense of life or death, good or evil, right or wrong.

Here is a self portrait. I’m calling it Portrait of a lady in a dirty window . Shocking, isn’t it? However, it is apt! Samhain , Nos Galan Gaeaf , Hop-tu-Naa , All Saints , All Hallows , Hallowmas , Hallowe'en or HALLOWEEN . It’s Theme Thursday and we’re talking about the festivals traditionally held at the end of the harvest season. Huh? No wonder Australians have trouble with the concept of HALLOWEEN. For the record, in my thirty-two L O N G years on the planet, I can’t say I’ve ever seen ghosts ‘n goblins, trick ‘n treaters or Michael Myers stalking Tasmania’s streets at the end of October. [That said, I did once see a woman as pale as a ghost turning tricks that looked like Michael Myers in late November one time.] Despite the best efforts of Hollywood, sitcoms, and innumerable companies; it seems Australians are impervious to the [ahem] charms of a corporatized variant of a celebration of the end of the "lighter half" of the year and beginning of the "darke...

In dreams begin responsibilities.

A life at sea, that's for me, only I just don't have the BREAD. That's right, Theme Thursday yet again and I post a photo of a yacht dicking about in Bass Strait just off Wynyard. The problem is, I am yet again stuck at work, slogging away, because I knead need the dough . My understanding is that it is the dough that makes the BREAD. And it is the BREAD that buys the yacht. On my salary though, I will be lucky to have enough dough or BREAD for a half dozen dinner rolls. Happy Theme Thursday people, sorry for the rush.

This will hurt me...

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