One cannot and must not try to erase the past merely because it does not fit the present.

Self portrait on wet rocks. Blinking Billy Beach, Sandy Bay. September 2011.

Another day, another Q and A! Today this is the Questions Galore Meme, Part 1...

1. Is there someone in your life you know you’d be better off without?
I generally don’t keep those people around. I’m not what one might call ‘a soft touch’.

2. Do you get criticised because of your body?
Not that I hear of. The most critical would be myself.

3. Did you kiss the last person you called?
Called? On the telephone? No I didn’t. I’m not sure that business contacts would appreciate that sort of thing. I could ask him...

4. When was the last time you danced?
Monday afternoon. Henry and I danced to Tchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture. Lots of spinning.

5. Do you keep in mind other people’s feelings?
Of course. That said, I am a little more uncompromising than many.

6. If you have a hang nail, do you pull it or clip it?
Clip.

7. Who do you want to forget?
Scott Muller.

8. Who was the last person to send you a letter?
Kevin ‘Big Kev’ Harkins. I suspect that I was not the only one...

9. Who did you last tell to shut up?
There is a fair chance that it was one of Henry or Ezra.

10. What’s the last thing that you smelt that smelt bad?
Something that involved poo.

11. What’s your favourite cereal?
All Bran is nice, if you add some fruit and yogurt. I am enjoying the new Golden Crumble Weet Bix Bites, but they are mighty sweet! Porridge is also an old favourite.

12. How do you feel when people lead you on, but they don’t even like you?
Puzzled. To be fair, I'm not familiar with the scenario.

13. Could you live without sunlight?
Absolutely not. The lack of photosynthesis for the planet would be a problem. Moreover, if the vitamin D deficiency didn’t get me, the seasonal affective disorder would!

14. What’s something you know is bad, but you want to do it anyway?
Hot chips. That’s the extent of my debauchery these days.

15. What was the last thing you lied about?
Someone asked me how they looked and I said “fine”. They most certainly didn’t look “fine” but I considered “like a bag lady” inappropriate for a professional setting.

16. Do you regret anything you’ve done in the past week?
Yes. Losing my temper when I was tired, feeling poorly and cranky.

17. What was the last movie you bought?
Bought? Christ almighty, that’s going back ten years or so. I think that it was Apocalypse Now Redux.

18. What is a sport you would like to do?
Sea kayaking.

19. When was the last time you felt like crying?
I dunno. Last week? I’m not very good at it though.

20. Have you ever wanted to kill someone (not that you actually do it)?
Absolutely. The feeling passes.

Hold me now, oh hold me now, until this hour has gone around. And I'm gone on the rising tide, to face Van Dieman's Land

Theme Thursday again, and this one is rather easy. I am Tasmanian, you see, and aside from being all around general geniuses - as I have amply described previously - we are also very familiar with the concept of WATER. Tasmania is the ONLY island state of an ISLAND continent. That means, we're surrounded by WATER. That should help explain why I take so many photographs of water . Tasmania was for a long time the place where the British (an island race terrified of water) sent their poor people most vile and horrid criminals. The sort of folk who would face the stark choice of a death sentence , or transportation to the other end of the world. Their catalogue of crimes is horrifying : stealing bread assault stealing gentlemen's handkerchiefs drunken assault being poor affray ladies being overly friendly with gentlemen for money hitting people having a drink and a laugh public drunkenness being Irish Fenian terrorist activities being Catholic religious subversion. ...

Something unpleasant is coming when men are anxious to tell the truth.

This is the moon. Have I mentioned how much I adore the zoom on my camera? It's Theme Thursday you see, and after last week's limp effort, I have been thinking about how I might redeem myself. Then I clicked on the topic and discover that it was BUTTON. We've been hearing a lot about the moon in the past couple of weeks. Apparently some fellas went up there and played golf and what-not forty-odd years ago. The desire to get to the moon, however, was not simply about enhancing opportunities for Meg and Mog titles and skirting local planning by-laws in the construction of new and innovative golf courses. No, all of your Sputniks , "One small steps" and freeze dried ice cream was about one thing , and one thing only : MAD Now, I don't mean mad in terms of "bloke breaks record for number of scorpions he can get up his bum", no I mean MAD as in Mutual assured destruction . When I was a young man you see, there was a lot of talk about the type of m...

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...

This will hurt me...

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