This will hurt me...

And...?

Achtung! Wenn Sie auf diesen Zaun klettern, wirst du sterben. New Town Oval, New Town. February 2011. Everywhere you go there is somebody ordering you about. STOP! WAIT! CAUTION! OBAY! DON’T! NO! Never once do they say please. I’ve not seen a THANK YOU , WELL DONE or CONGRATULATIONS . It’s not good enough. It's Dark in Here , by Shel Silverstein I am writing these poems From inside a lion, And it's rather dark in here. So please excuse the handwriting Which may not be too clear. But this afternoon by the lion's cage I'm afraid I got too near. And I'm writing these lines From inside a lion, And it's rather dark in here.

How is it that ME – the one who is up early each day, out into the bitter and cruel world slaving away on the chain gang each day – is the one who has to get up early on the weekend to make pancakes for this bunch?

As fair art thou, my bonnie lass, So deep in luve am I: And I will luve thee still, my dear, Till a’ the seas gang dry. St Johns Park, New Town. February 2011. I’m ahead of the pace to knock over 85 books this year. With 15 down, I’ve only another 70 to go! This week, what a pearler to begin with! Despite all the awards she one (including the Nobel), and all of the esteem that she’s held, I’ve only just read my first Toni Morrison novel. I figured that if I was going to explore her oeuvre – oohh err missus – I’d go right back to where it started… The Bluest Eye is Toni Morrison's first novel. It covers a year in the life of a number of young black girls in against the backdrop of America's Midwest in the years following the Great Depression. Like a lot of stuff written in the late-1960s, the shifts about a number of characters, as well as a third-person, omniscient perspective. However, (unlike many novelists in the late-1960s) Morrison has the skill to pull it off effectivel...

With all due respect to Machine Laundry Café – part coffee bar/part laundrette – the pancakes that I make are never left unfinished…

Dude looks like he's wearing a truss! Argyle Street, Hobart. February 2011. Stuff . Sometimes it seems to me that the world has been reduced to people wanting stuff , people getting stuff , people wanting more stuff , people getting more stuff , people getting rid of stuff , people complaining about stuff , people bragging about stuff , people needing stuff . Were people always like this? Was there always this much stuff ? Was there always such a focus on stuff ?

Just how young is too young for a thousand yard-stare?

But this time before you run to her, leaving me alone and hurt. Think it over. St Johns Park, New Town. February 2011. I'm aware of where you go, each time you leave my door. I watch you walk down the street knowing your other love you'll meet. But, is her sweet expression worth more than my love and affection? After all, I've been good to you. Think it over. After all, I've been sweet to you. St Johns Park, New Town. February 2011. I've tried so hard, hard to be patient. Hoping you'd stop this infatuation. But each time you are together, I'm so afraid I'll be losing you forever! I've known of your secluded nights. I've even seen her maybe once or twice… St Johns Park, New Town. February 2011. What on Earth is going on here?

He might not quite be in his prime , but life without a nappy is grand .

If I could bottle a wave… Opossum Bay, January 2011. I sometimes wonder about people. For example, I know somebody who expends an awful lot of time and energy ‘ pretending ’ to do their job. They sweat at it. It seems to trouble them no end. Elaborate and exaggerated flourishes are performed to ensure that everybody around is aware that they’re ‘hard at work’. It does seem like hard work. I think that it could well be bringing on an ulcer. What I don’t understand is if such effort , such exertion is required, and it’s carried like a huge weight upon the shoulders, why not actually do the job? It’s a novel thought, I know. Radical, even. I wish that I could overcome the (mutual) embarrassment and suggest it. I suspect that truly ‘doing the job’ would be far easier than the task of ‘pretending’ to do the job.

Calvert’s Beach. We really need to get back there. One day when it’s not so windy. Or if it is, during a storm. An electrical storm. That’d make for some photos. Get Henry in the water with a metal umbrella. Good times.

The process of galvanisation has proven useless against the harsh Hobartian weather. New Town, February 2011. I am very tired. Very very tired. Sometimes I feel like that bit of tin atop the shed in the photograph. Coffee isn’t doing it, and grapefruits are very expensive at the moment.

Oh the heady and happy days of Christmas morn! It all seems so very long ago... Will we ever know such bliss and joy again?

Heavy cloud cover in the east. St Johns Park, New Town. February 2011. Like the clouds hanging wearily over this tired old land, my year(s)-long commitment to drafting a Sunday Top Five looms over my head like the sword of Damocles. What can I catalogue today? What unspoken five might possibly emerge from the gloom? To fit the temper of the times, how about I share with you My Top Five Favourite Shades Of Blue ? Cobalt blue Cornflower blue Prussian blue Azure Duke blue So go on then, what shade is your favourite?