This will hurt me...

Fog on the eastern shore. Sullivans Cove, Hobart. June 2013. More stealing from Sunday Stealing. This week, The Wish List Meme, part one 1.) What are 3 things on your Wish list and why? i) infinite berries; ii) an inability to feel cold; and, iii) a bit of peace and quiet. 2.) What do you miss about your childhood? The quiet. The time. The lack of responsibility. 3.) What do you do on your spare time on the weekends? Spare time on weekends? You mean between the cooking, cleaning, putting washing out, getting washing in and putting washing away? We usually go for a walk or a swim. 4.) What do you appreciate most in your life? Two healthy and happy little boys. 5.) Would you rather be rich or healthy? Can't I have both? If not, what's the point in cash if you're at death's door? 6.) If you could go back in time would you and why? To stay for good or just a visit? I wouldn't mind a visit every now and again. As a keen student of histo...

Ship at rest in Winter, full moon behind clouds. Princes Wharf No. 1, Sullivans Cove. June 2013. Wordless Wednesday.

Ezra stands astride the bridge of the oil tanker Hugli Spirit . Registered in the Bahamas, she was built 2005 in the Hyundai shipyard of Mipo Bay in Ulsan, South Korea. She has a rugged charm, at 183 metres long and 33 metres wide with over 46,889 deadweight tonnes. Unfortunately, some rather silly occupational health and safety rules prevented young Ezra from taking her out for a bit of a spin. Yes, it's political correctness gone mad!

Here are Henry and Jen up on the bridge of a bloody great oil tanker. Perhaps some helpful commenter could tell us the precise name of the ship in question.

Dude trying to get to a ship. Bellerive Beach, Bellerive. September 2011. One day that will be Ezra and I in that kayak, with Henry and Jen close behind trying to splash us. Of course, we won't accept that kind of carry on and will utilise a few of the old WWII depth charged I bought on E-Bay to unsettle them. Knowing Henry, he'll be be well armed with rocks and Jen will use some of those feminine charms and attempt to distract me (again). In the event of this, we've got our hands on some long-redundant titanium tetrachloride to use as a smoke screen.

The view west from Geilston Bay. July, 2010. See that fog there? There. There! Yeah, that fog there. That's about where New Town is. Just behind the ship there you can see Cornelian Bay cemetery. It's quite a popular location. People ae dying to get in there. [Ahem.] I'll get my coat.

Early morning boat race. Sullivans Cove, June 2010. Today's Sunday Top Five? How about my Top Five Australian Prime Ministers ! Try and guess the theme... John Curtin [ALP, 7 October 1941 – 5 July 1945] Bob Hawke [ALP, 11 March 1983 – 20 December 1991] Ben Chifley [ALP, 13 July 1945 – 19 December 1949] Andrew Fisher [ALP, 13 November 1908 – 2 June 1909; 29 April 1910 – 24 June 1913; 17 September 1914 – 27 October 1915] Chris Watson [ALP, 27 April – 18 August 1904] Who's winning? The one on the left? Right? Middle? June 2010. I'm pretty sure that boat in the middle is being steered by Andrew Peacock! Unleash the spinnaker! (Is that legal?) June 2010. Look! It's Bill Hayden!

Two for the price of one today, and we're again looking at tourists. Of course, today being today, I'm also scrambling to link up Theme Thursday . Tenuous or not, in the Tasmania of 2010, tourists mean GREEN. Now I'm not talking GREEN in the sense of tree huggin', airy fairy, lardy dardy, goody goody, namby pamby, hoity toity, wishy washy, not in my backyard, doing nothin' do gooders! No, we're talking GREEEEN , as in bread , and by bread I mean dough . Tourists equal GREEN, bread, dough, cash, dosh, bucks and all that entails. In Australia, our bank notes come in all sizes, colours and weight. These ships, and these tourists, mean GREEN. The green note, as I'm sure that you all know, are hundreds . Fives are purple, tens blue, twenties orange, fifties bronze and the gold ol' hundreds GREEN. How very apt. Thus, I find myself in the aisle of the fruit market, armed with little more than two Gravenstein apples and the ninety cents needed to purchase the...

With all of these tourists coming in on mega cruise ships, someone has to go out and get the prawns for their cocktails... They are an interesting mix, cruise ship tourists. If it's piled with Americans, you've never seen so many gold lamé tracksuits coupled with pearls in your life! If it's Russians, break out the t-shirts with elaborate prints of exotic animals on it. If it's northern Europeans - and I'm looking at you Germany - expect to see a lot of middle aged couples in matching hiking gear.

This photograph is obviously an old one. How do I know? You'll note those obnoxious idiots pesky rascals wanna be pirates brave eco-warriors from the Sea Shepherds and their vessel H.M.A.S. Steve Irwin docked down at Hunter Street pier. [Note: I am not a fan of the Sea Shepherds, and I don't like whales. I also don't like dolphins. I do like Great White Sharks and Saltwater Crocodiles. I would like to see Sea Shepherds swimming with the latter two to enhance their spirituality .]

L'Astrolabe has left for the time being, and I am missing her! It's even worse this Monday, as I have the office all to myself, so my weeping will not disturb others. It is indeed a cruel world!

In the morning light, from this angle, you'd never know that the Aurora Australis was painted bright orange. It looks battleship grey here! They must have had a couple of bags of chips on them, you can see some seagulls hanging about on the scrounge.

Here is one from last week. Yes, more rigging set against an ominous sky. Like the weather, I am predictable if nothing else! That said, today I have been treated - incredibly - by a clear blue sky and a nip in the air that suggests the rain may have abated for a while. It has, however, left its mark with the water across the whole waterfront area a lovely shade of brown ( pictures at 10 ). For a second there I was confused, thinking that I was strolling along the Yarra River! In this, the existential melodrama of life took a decidedly Lynchian twist (without any bald midgets).

A firm rope is needed to keep me at work today, especially given this shocking cough that I seem unable to shake off. These ropes, however, are not shackled to me; rather, they are all that keeps the pirate brig tourist pleasure craft Windward Bound from pillaging the penguins who make Macquarie Island their home. If only I had a rope, however, for I am due in a three hour meeting shortly. Jesus, save me...

No, it isn't the Battleship Potemkin, it's a little navy patrol boat turning its back to the Aurora Australis in a nice golden morning sunshine. It's almost like a duel. I found myself the other evening repeating a familiar refrain I am sure is not simply one from my childhood: "how dare you sit there an not eat any of that food there it's good food nice food lovingly cooked and there are starving children in Africa who are stuck eating rocks and dirt just to have something in their tummy because they are so hungry that it hurts so much that they eat those rocks and dirt and here you are telling me that you don't want it." I want to know, what did people tell their kids in generations before? Did they riff on Africa as my parents did, referring to the poor bloated Ethiopians routinely on the nightly news at that point (occasionally chucking in the odd outdated reference to Biafrans or Bangladeshis)?

Here is the Royal Australian Navy Armidale Class Patrol Boat HMAS Larrakia sunning herself down in Salamanca yesterday morning. Such craft represent the Navy's principal contribution to the nation's fisheries protection, immigration, customs and drug law enforcement operations, and also contibute in the more traditionally associated naval areas of competitive shagging and general day-to-day buggery.

It's still winter which means that we still have our guests parked down outside my work. Yes, the Norweigan-owned (but Australian-leased) Aurora Australis and our French friends on L'Astrolabe are still hanging about waiting for that pack ice to break up before they head back down south to throw rocks at penguins conduct important Antarctic studies. Time for the Sunday Top Five ! Today, I've opted for the not at all clumsy Top Five Countries That If They Were People I'd Invite To A Party : 1) India : they can bring the food. 2) Finland : they can bring the girls. 3) Jamaica : they can bring the groove. 4) The Czech Republic : they can bring the beer. 5) Western Samoa : they can man the door and keep out the undesirables (I'm looking at you Wales...)

A couple of weeks back I arrive at work, and who should I find waiting for me, patiently and orderly in rows just across the road from the front door? The Royal Australian Navy , that's who! The HMAS Darwin is a long-range escort frigate [snigger snigger] that seems to be a jack of all trades vessel: area air defence, anti-submarine warfare, surveillance, reconnaissance and interdiction. In a potentially sexy turn of phrase, the ship is capable of countering simultaneous threats from the air, surface and sub-surface . Quite. The Navy refused to confirm or deny that the frigate [snigger snigger] was in town to prevent a flock of Mexican flying pigs from entering Tasmanian airspace and spreading the dreaded La temido gripe de cerdo Mexicana ! On that, actually, canny Swede Professor Hans Rosling has released a video well worth watching. Rosling has calculated the ratio of news article coverage versus actual deaths in the context of the recent La temido gripe de cerdo Mexicana ou...

Now, I have spoken at length previously on my distaste for extremists, so I shall not reopen that wound for all to see (and bore you in the process). That said, I could pass over the image of the menacing black and yellow Sea Shepherd anarchist AKTION patrol boat parked just across the road from work this morning. Now – and apologies in advance to all the Sea Shepherds reading out there – every member of that distinguished organisation that I have happened across has turned out to be of a frame of mind that I described in that earlier post. This tendency to drift into preposterous polarities, mutually exclusive ideas, deterministic dialectics (always hidden, excluding the individual doing the ranting, of course), all of which operate not just separate from , but in opposition to , each other. This is great fun when you happen to be in the public policy game and are looking to get a little harmony happening on an issue. They remind me of yet another presentation that I saw the othe...

I thought that it has been too long without a shot of the river. Moreover, it's been too ong without a shot of my friend the Aurora Australis . And what's more, it's got my other old friend Windeward Bound parked right behind it! There is something quite imposing about that shade of orange as you round the corner and see it waiting there, even more when you have the smaller brig slotted in behind. I shall not dwell on young and eager Christians this evening, for they have taken up far too much of my time of late. I've already talked sharks, and have been looking into an aquarium, I feat that we may have to take out a few walls to get it up and running. Maybe we'll have to invest in a large cage down in Geilston Bay. I'll speak to the ducks, we might be able to arrange some sort of time share agreement. I'll keep you posted. I am already thinking about a name, however, and decided to consult the crowd. I like Clive for a boy, and Beryl for a girl. What do...