This will hurt me...

Here's one from a few months back. Jen and Hen re-enact the Abbey Road cover down on Calverts Beach...

A little bit of renovation. Derwent Avenue, Lindisfarne. March 2012. If e.e. cummings was building a house, I'm almost certain that he wouldn't waste time with nonsense like retaining walls, dynamic load testing, elemental cost planning and some such silly buggers! “plato told” , e.e. cummings plato told him :he couldn’t believe it(jesus told him ;he wouldn’t believe it)lao tsze certainly told him,and general (yes mam) sherman; and even (believe it or not)you told him :i told him ;we told him (he didn’t believe it,no sir)it took a nipponized bit of the old sixth avenue el ;in the top of his head :to tell him

Ezra is sorting through an array of shell, trying very hard to find the best one possible to throw at his father...

Exra studies Tasmanian history. Stanley, Tasmania's North West. February 2012. Saša Stanišić’s debut novel, How the Soldier Repairs the Gramophone offers a moving portrait of the breakup of Yugoslavia (and the Bosnian conflict more specifically), as seen through the eyes of a child. The novel explores the barriers of race and religion and the absurd constructs that they are, and – perhaps unsurprisingly – it fails to offer up any real explanation as to how neighbours who previously laughed, drank and sang together suddenly started raping, torturing and killing each other. The central chronicler is Aleks, of mixed Serbian and Bosniak heritage, as he struggles to comprehend the rapid descent into war and chaos of the once blissful Yugoslav town of Višegrad. This is an emotionally gruelling read. If you had any kind of awareness of what was happened in the former Yugoslavia, you’ll recognise the sense of dread from a reader’s perspective. Ultimately, it highlights the irrational and ...

Henry's secret? Dynamic Tension™. Yes, this body was built the Charles Atlas way .

Sunshine on my shoulder. Franklin Square. March 2012. Theme Thursday already and it seems clear that we have well and truley had a change of SEASON down here at the arse-end of the world ™. Unfortunately, we appear to have waived goodbye to Summer and are entering into the gloomier mornings of Autumn. I cannot be certain, but I suspect that the shift has triggered a dose of SEASONal affective disorder in the youngest member of the clan. The fact that he is three-years-old and a boy seems to rule out early-onset-menopause as the cause of his sudden cantankerous irritability. Everybody else in the house just seems flat, and I suspect that we won’t snap out of it until the leave shift to a raging red and golden yellow and start committing suicide.

Ezra contemplates direct self-realisation and complete self-actualisation through a combination of Panentheism, transcendental meditation and dharma practice. I'll let you know how he gets on...

Watery Wednesday again and I revisit a pleasant swim that Henry and I had at Little Howrah Beach a few weeks back. Yes, the water was a bit nippy and a reasonably heavy cloak of smoke - from the fires raging the in Valley of Love - hung in the air, but events conspired for some halfway decent photographs...

Hands on science is really the only kind of science we're into right now.

Scratches. Emu Heights, Burnie. February 2012. Tuesday Q and A today and this week we visit The Eve Was Framed Meme . A good mix of questions here, including a few that we haven't seen before! 1. Why is your favourite colour your favourite? Blue is my favourite colour because I like the colour blue. Why? I dunno. It looks decent on me. The ocean is often blue and I love the ocean. 2. Do you prefer dogs or cats or do you just hate animals, and want to kill baby seals? I prefer cats but – to be frank – I’m happiest when animals are running around outside as part of nature. 3. How much time do you spend on the computer? A lot. Probably too much. 4. Not including porn, what do you do on the computer? Work. Read. Play games. Watch things. Communicate. The usual. 5. Are you a clock-watcher? A watched clock never boils! 6. What do you/did you look for in a partner? Extreme attractiveness. 7. What type of clothing do you prefer? Casual clothes. I like shorts. 8. What is your favourite type...

No, there's been no air raid warning and as far as I know North Korea are not attacking. In fact, Ezra has chosen to sleep under his bed because of an all-too infrequent Hobart heat wave a couple of weeks back...

The Internet is a wonderful place filled with the rich and varied treasures of the world holds (as well as a lot of bacon.) The following are some things that I've had a look at in the last week. I call this: a Compendium of Click-throughs for Monday Morning... High in the mountains of Bulgaria some people discovered something of their Communist past... I really like these videos of people falling over ... A short, simple summary of the psychological research on misinformation, The Debunking Handbook is intended as a guide for anyone who encounters misinformation... Isn't it ironic, don't you think? Can Germany Help Central Europe Confront Its Dark Past? New evidence is emerging that confirms what we've known for a while now: boys and girls behave differently , and parenting practices should vary depending on the gender of the child... Ed Cowan has written a nice little piece on what exactly it feels like to play Test cricket...

So Henry has signed up for Auskick , which for the uninitiated is a program to get kids playing Australian rules football (boys and girls). In doing so, he had to nominate *his* favourite team. Forced into a bind he wisely chose the (sixteen time Premiership-winning) Essendon Football Club [his Father's team] over the travesty that is the South Melbourne Sydney Swans Football Club (the rabble that his mother follows). Wise move Henry! Even more exciting: the Auskick season hasn't even begun but we have already flagged an urgent request has come in from Auskick HQ. Yes, Henry's first ever game will probably be as curtain raiser to the nationally televised North Melbourne Kangaroos /Greater Western Sydney Giants stoush - for full Premiership Points - on the 8th of April at Bellerive Oval! Yes, ten minutes into his career and he's featuring at the top level...

Is it really? Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery, Hobart. February 2012. Sunday Top Five time and this week I am thinking about Roxy Music. What a surprise! Let's just cut straight to My Top Five Roxy Music Tracks! Angel Eyes Virginia Plain Love is the Drug Over You More Than This