This will hurt me...

Water water everywhere! Kayakers on the Derwent, as seen from Alexandra Battery, Sandy Bay. January 2012. Another day, another year and another Watery Wednesday . Living by a river estuary – as we do here in Hobart – one is never short of a photograph or two of water. Above you can see two keen kayakers taking to it like ducks to… erm… water . Maybe this will be the year that I get my own kayak. Maybe. Just maybe.

Is that a Russian on that yacht? The Derwent, as seen from Alexandra Battery, Sandy Bay. January 2012. Tuesday Q and A and I am already back at work after losing my week's break to the flue. BAH! This week it is The Battle of the Memes 1. When you buy a greetings card are the words or the picture more important to you? I don't buy 'em! 2. Do you ever make gifts for people, if so what, or do you buy them? I have been known to both make and buy gifts for people. 3. Are you going on holiday this year? If so, where? We are headed to the Tasmanian Rivera , the sunny north-west coast! 4. What was the best party you've ever been to? I have never been much of a party-person. Anything relaxed and laid back is more my scene. 5. If you are married, describe your wedding. If not, what would your ideal wedding be like? Our wedding was nigh on THREE THOUSAND kilometres from home, with nobody else about to bother us. I'd say that's pretty ideal... 6. What's the most roma...

An abandoned gun emplacement and a lighthouse (in your backyard). Blinking Billy Point, Sandy Bay. May 2011. The above gun emplacement was originally intended to stop the Russians (not the Soviets, but the Russians). Yes, at the outbreak of the Crimean War the nervous folk of Van Diemens Land were quaking at the thought of the vicious Imperial Russian Navy. Alas, they were not really very interested. Which leads me to today's Sunday Top Five: My Top Five Invading Hordes That I Wouldn't Be Too Fussed By ! Finns , Sw ed es or Nor wegi ans : any Scandinavian invasion would be welcome. They're a friendly mob, and have plenty of good-looking sheilas with liberal attitudes to beach attire. I think we'd cope. Liechte nstein : let's face it, it would have to be some kind of corporate takeover by European tax exiles. The Holy Roman Empire : any 'Empire' that manages to go by such a name despite the fact that it was neither holy, nor Roman, nor an empire, must have ...