This will hurt me...

There are occasions whereby even the most level-headed amongst us must storm the barricades. Spring in the Royal Botanical Gardens is just one of those occasions...

Well-fed seagull. Geilston Bay, October 2010. Far be it from me to cast aspersions on an entire genus, but it seems to me that your average seagull looks decidedly shifty . In fairness, they sit closer to the ‘devious’ side of the spectrum, than they do the ‘deceitful’. Perhaps they need a shift gleam in their eye in order to psych-out their opponents over a stray chip. Perhaps it is an indication of their intelligence? Missing Persons, by Rae Armantrout God and Mother went the same way. * * * What's a person to us but a contortion of pressure ridges palpable long after she is gone? * * * A thin old man in blue jeans, back arched, grimaces at the freezer compartment. * * * Lying in the tub, I'm telling them— the missing persons— that a discrepancy is a pea and I am a Princess.

I do like a nice bloom of flowers in the snow. Jen snapped Ezra here shifting some snow about in the hippy commune Hobart suburb of Fern Tree back in September. Quite what he was intending to do with all that snow, well, that he wouldn’t tell me…

November moon, as seen in a backyard in Geilston Bay. November 2010. Friday Book Club and a productive week of reading has just gone by. Three for three in terms of quality, although when you have the ninth all-time bestselling book ever published and a Nobel Prize winner’s most fondly remembered novel in the mix, you would hope so! The first one to mention is Imre Kertész’s wonderful self-autobiographical novel Fatelessness . When he won the Nobel Prize in 2002, the committee noted that his writing “upholds the fragile experience of the individual against the barbaric arbitrariness of history". This is very much a theme in Fatelessness . Ostensibly the tale of a young Hungarian boy swept away from his life in Budapest through the changing fortunes of the Second World War. Ethnically, the boy is a Jew; yet his family (bar an uncle) do not actually practise that religion. In this way, the notion of being persecuted – to the extent of Auschwitz – for something you are unsure of your

He is back in Tasmania!!! Now what?

Blogs are everywhere. Campbell Street, Hobart CBD, October 2010. Theme Thursday yet again and this week I wanted to talk about the current touch football season. Now, I could bore you with vivid descriptions of our SOMNOLENT defensive line (or lack thereof), but I wouldn’t want to bore you with clichés . I could talk to you about the myriad of injuries incurred in what is supposed to be a non-contact sport – game one = sore shoulder, game two = bruised thigh, game three = jarred knee – but I won’t. I won’t lie to you: we’re struggling . Zero and three three rounds in, we remain [mathematically] still in contention for the finals. We’re taking it one week at a time . There is no point getting ahead of ourselves , but (like the boy with the barrow), there is a big job in front of us . The reality is that we have had a number of injuries to senior players (my long list, a broken finger, back spasms, bruised egos), but we are looking at it as a chance for the kids to step up . Despite th

Although the odds are decidedly against it, Ezra is already considering building his portfolio of portraits that might be used in forthcoming American Presidential election campaigns. From the outside, we’re aware that US campaigns require a few essentials (no, nothing silly like ‘policies’ or ‘consistent moral or ethical principles’). We need glossy photos, neat hair, a nice smile, and lots (LOTS) of money. So far, we have three of the necessary requirements, but we’re struggling on the fourth. The trick that we haven’t quite figured is, how can you possibly raise that much bread without compromising principles? No, I’m not sure it’s possible either…

Somebody isn't paying attention. Expensive apartment block, Wapping. Hobart, October 2010. I cannot speak for you, but my whole family and I find that time spent browsing the brochures one of life’s joys. Oh what joy can be had in casting witty and urbane bon mots about things that we will never want or need! The casual ease with which the mountains of catalogues can be SNIP SNIP SNIPPED! away in dedicated training sessions with the scissors. Indeed, as a very small fellow (still in the rolling phase), Henry used to EAT the junk mail. If I remember it correct, the Harvey Norman furniture (vintage ’07) was his favourite. Whatever the case, the complex above may well not accept junk mail, but it’s certainly getting it .

I've got Hen and Ez hitting the nets pretty hard in advance of the Ashes series. My hope is that one of the two might stand a chance at getting a run as spinners by about test three. Surely if the mugs they keep sending out can get picked, these two deserve a chance!

Whatever happened the these "typewriter" thingies? You used to see them around the place, but not so much these days. Where are they? Where have the gone? Don't people realise that innocent little children need them?!? Won't somebody think of the children!!!

The make power poles from concrete too. East Derwent Highway, Geilston Bay, October 2010. My beautiful babies, and my beautiful and sexy wife, are all now at the airport awaiting a flight to that filthy city of sin: Sydney. It will be a whirlwind visit, but nonetheless I shall be without their company for the best part of THREE DAYS and TWO NIGHTS! As would be expected, I am at a loss. Stricken, heartbroken and utterly forlorn, all that I have for company is this here power pole.

There is little finer than having a nice old sit down at the end of a long walk. Sure, a spa, foot rub and piping hot mug of gluhwein would have been nice, but easy going chap that he is, Ezra was content with a hard wooden bench .

I sense a pattern. The nouveau riche area of Wapping, Hobart, October 2010. I have already railed before about the gentrification of the areas of what were formally slums here in Hobart. Primarily, these areas were those that previously housed the various destitutes, waifs, beggars, prostitutes and cocktail waitresses that seem to surround working docks . When the work at the docks dry up, all that are left are the slums. Eventually – after a period of mass forgetting – those with the bread to spare force out the toothless grannies left, bulldoze the filth and shift in their high-rise apartments, underground parking and diamond-studded collar wearing Pekinese. What I want to know is, as I suspect, this a universal phenomenon? Dear readers, have your cities experienced similar ‘urban regeneration’? How has is worked out?

Two crankies with a happy in between. Can you guess which ones just woke up?

The view east of the bay of Geilston Bay. October 2010. Rain, rain, rain. Rain all night and it's still raining this morning. Which leads me to today's Sunday Top Five: My Top Five Songs Featuring The Word 'Rain' In The Title ! Rain , by The Beatles Have You Ever Seen the Rain , by Creedence Clearwater Revival Rainy Days and Mondays , by The Carpenters I Can't Stand the Rain , by Ann Peebles It's Raining Again , by Supertramp Just missing the cut (and in no particular order) were Blind Melon's No Rain , Garbage's Only Happy When It Rains , The Be Good Tanya's Rain and Snow , Here Comes the Rain Again by The Eurythmics, Walking in the Rain by The Ronettes and Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain by Willie Nelson. All right, what have I missed?