This will hurt me...

Ducks! Geilston Bay. September 2013. Guess what? The Massive Alphabet Meme, part two ! The Letter N Do you have a nickname? I have many nicknames. What is your favourite number? Number seven (7). Do you prefer night or day? Morning! The Letter O What is your one wish? To be left alone. Are you an only child? No, I am not. Do you wish this year was over? Not in the slightest. It’s only just staring to warm up! The Letter P What is one fear that you are most paranoid about? I’ve no particular fear that I would describe as paranoia. One does worry about the health and wellbeing of Henry and Ezra, but they’re travelling fine. What personality trait would you look for in someone you wanted to date? I’m not looking for anyone at the moment. I’ll let you know if I change my mind. The Letter Q Are you quick to judge people? Not really. I am a believer in first impressions though. The Letter R Do you think you are always right? Only when I’m right. Do...

Duck feet (from below). Geilston Bay. July 2013. I'm back on the buses again, which ups the time I have to read. This is always nice. After The Wall , Jana Hensel: I'm always up for an East German generational memoir, which is Hensel's goal here. What differentiates this one from many of the others is that Hensel reflects on the very last of that generation, those that were at the tail end of their childhood at the fall of the Berlin Wall and whose teenage years coincided with the process of reunification. I'm not certain that this translation helped (it was packed full of jarring Americanisms), but was an interesting-enough reflection. C . Grendel , John Gardner: A fascinating novel that retells the Anglo-Saxon epic poem Beowulf from the perspective of the monster and - quite successfully - explores (among other things) the nature of good and evil; man's capacity for violence; finding meaning in the world; and the power of literature and myth. I really enj...

Stare down with a duck. Duck wins. Geilston Bay, October 2010. Sunday? Top Five? Here's an idea, the Top Five Ideas For Next Year's Birthday Cake ! Plain Apple Tea Cake Plain Egg Sponge Plain Banana and Cinnamon Cake Plain Blueberry Coffee Cake Elaborate Schwarzwälder Kirschtorte For those not Facebook inclined, I've attached this year's effort below... For the record, it is a Great White Shark rising out of the depths. The depths is made up of white chocolate mousse dyed blue. Sugar content was off the charts. If you're interested in more pics, feel free to stroll by my page there .

In Tasmania we celebrate Mother's Day much like those in other countries. Yes, we all partake in a form of modified Bullfighting featuring toddlers as matadors and ducks as he bulls!

DUCK! LOTS OF DUCKS! Here are some Pacific Black Duck's spotted at the Royal Hobart Botanical Gardens here in Hobart. You probably already know that, but the Pacific Black is the most versatile of the Australian ducks. It frequents all types of water, from isolated forest pools to tidal mudflats, as well as Royal Hobart Botanical Gardens.

Ezra spied these little fellows paddling around the pond at the Botanical Gardens here in Hobart. They're ducks, by the way, not tigers. Today's poem? The Duck , by Ogden Nash Behold the duck. It does not cluck. A cluck it lacks. It quacks. It is specially fond Of a puddle or pond. When it dines or sups, It bottoms ups.

When we went along to the Christmas parade, Ezra appeared more interested in these two ducks mucking about in the Hobart Rivulet than he was in the various X-mas goths, roller derby girls and blokes in skirts. Indeed Ez tried to scale a fence to join the two Pacific Blacks - that's Anas superciliosa to any twitchers out there - for a dip. I figure that as we are rapidly approaching the end of the year, I can knock of another Sunday Top Five very easily. This week: the My Favourite Five Books I've Read This Year ! That's books I've read and enjoyed, not books released this year. Death and the Penguin , Andrey Kurkov The Spy Who Came In From The Cold , John Le Carré Things Fall Apart , Chinua Achebe If this is a Man , Primo Levi Gold , Dan Rhodes Just missing the cut is a long list, the ones that stand out in the memory include: Billiards at Half-past Nine , Heinrich Böll, Border Crossing , Pat Barker, Union Street , Pat Barker, The Truce , Primo Levi, History of the Pr...

Presenting the latest in Tasmanian technical innovation: Tasmanian anti-pirate suicide ducks. In a variation of the disgraceful cultured French practice of Foie gras , the ducks are force-fed nitroglycerine, and then trained to zero in upon - kamikaze style - all vessels bearing the jolly roger. The testing process has seen some success, with the occasional accident involving children's birthday parties...

Watch out! They're headed straight for us! Two ducks approaching on Geilston Bay. Here's a Sunday Top Five that both honours the dearly departed and embraces the smutty schoolboy within. My Top Five Mrs Slocambe Quotes : "You know, animals are very psychic. I mean, the least sign of danger and my pussy's hair stands on end." "I hope we're not going to be late tonight. Because I've left Winston clinging to the curtain ring; he refuses to come down. The mere sight of my pussy drives him mad." "Well, I hope it's not going to take long. If I'm not home on the stroke of seven, my pussy starts clawing at my busy lizzy." "I hope this isn't going to take long, Captain Peacock. The last time I was late, a fireman had to climb out of my bedroom window and risk his life on a narrow ledge tryin' to grab hold of my pussy." "I've got to get home. If my pussy isn't attended to by 8 o'clock, I shall be s...

I was browsing Flickr and came across a photo that I like very much, taken this winter in Skegness (in the UK). Apparently the duck was skating across the ice. I guess this isn't such a big deal if you're from somewhere really cold, but we don't get much of this in Hobart.