This will hurt me...

  Picture this: a broken-down wind turbine marooned in a semi-arid, cold South Australian desert, with rain slanting down like a cosmic joke. Once a symbol of innovation and progress, it's now a hulking testament to stalled dreams. And isn't that just the perfect metaphor for the Australian Dream? We were all promised a slice of the pie, a fair go, a home with a bit of a garden, maybe even a white picket fence if you were into that sort of thing. But now it feels like the dream's been yanked out from under us, leaving us all standing around like that useless wind turbine—broken, rusting, and utterly bewildered as the rain pours down. This disintegration isn't just about the fading hopes of home ownership or a cushy retirement. No, it runs deeper, right to the heart of what once bound us together. Class solidarity, the good old notion that we're all in this together, seems to have crumbled like a sandcastle in a storm. Maybe it's the endless grind of casualisatio...

The ballot for the next family holiday. November 2019. As a young lad – in the years before smart phones, the Internet and more than two television channels – I would spend hours pawing over atlases, encyclopaedias and novels from all over the globe. Sure, I might have been stuck in a dying, deindustrialising town (downgraded from a city, such was our fortune) on the north west of an island that served as the butt all the jokes of the rest of the state (which itself served as the punchline of the jokes of the rest of the country), at the arse end of the World; but that very same World was at my fingertips, with a little bit of help from a library card. While I may have lamented never getting the chance of crossing those seas and seeing much of that World myself, I tried to keep my mind and imagination open. Therefore, now we are of means, and my kids are old enough to survive a bit of discomfort, I am keen to help them see as much of the planet while I have some kind of infl...

Henry and Ezra do their very best impersonation of two shags on a very small rock.

Henry, what are you doing?

Gnome. Boat Harbour, Tasmania. March 2013. A gnome is legendary dwarfish creature alleged to have been brought to Earth to guard the earth's treasures. I believe that blackberries are uncluded. Blackberry Eating , Galway Kinnell I love to go out in late September among the fat, overripe, icy, black blackberries to eat blackberries for breakfast, the stalks very prickly, a penalty they earn for knowing the black art of blackberry-making; and as I stand among them lifting the stalks to my mouth, the ripest berries fall almost unbidden to my tongue, as words sometimes do, certain peculiar words like strengths or squinched, many-lettered, one-syllabled lumps, which I squeeze, squinch open, and splurge well in the silent, startled, icy, black language of blackberry -- eating in late September.

Henry thinks that you can make a boat out of rocks. I reckon he's wrong.

Mt Amos. Taken from the saddle between Mt Amos and Mt Mayson, Freycinet National Park. January 2013. The Country Girls , Edna O'Brien: A lovely little coming of age story set in repressed 1950s Ireland and centring on two markedly different girls. This caused quite a stir on release and holds up very well fifty years later. Any time you hear that the Catholics are burning a book, it's worth looking into it. Entertaining. B+ . Mt Mayson. Taken from the saddle between Mt Amos and Mt Mayson, Freycinet National Park. January 2013.

Exploring the rocks. Bicheno Beach, Tasmania's East Coast. January 2013. Stealing from Sunday Stealing again: 40 of The Most Random Questions Meme, Part Two ! 21) What’s something you’ve always wanted? To achieve self-actualisation. 22) Do you have hairy legs? Absolutely! 23) What does “Semper Fidelis” stand for? Technically it means "Always Faithful", but that isn't always the case... 24) Would you rather swim in the ocean or a lake? Ocean. I love swimming, but I find lakes a little bit 'icky'. That probably has something to do with some bad experiences with duck poo and extreme cold. 25) Do you wear a lot of black? No. I have the odd bit of it, but it gets too hot. 26) Describe your hair: Strategically tousled. 27) Do you have Entomophobia? Not in the slightest. If anything, I'm an Entophile! 28) Are you an adult? Chronologically speaking, yes. 29) Do you own or rent? I have a mortgage. 30) Do you have a tan? I have skin...

Looking over Coles Bay. Freycinet National Park, Tasmania's East Coast. January 2013. So this photo was taken about one fifth of the way through our walk in the Freycinet National Park. Basically, you climb up through a pass halfway up two mountains, get your breath back, and then head down the (steeper) other side to find yourself on the beach down in secluded Wineglass Bay, which is generally accepted as one of the world's best beaches (photos to come). Dover Beach , Matthew Arnold The sea is calm tonight. The tide is full, the moon lies fair Upon the straits - on the French coast the light Gleams and is gone; the cliffs of England stand, Glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay. Come to the window, sweet is the night air! Only, from the long line of spray Where the sea meets the moon-blanched land, Listen! you hear the grating roar Of pebbles which the waves draw back, and fling, At their return, up the high strand, Begin, and cease, and then again begi...

Good snorkelling. Bicheno Beach, Tasmania's East Coast. January 2013. Sunday Top Five ? Okay. See the picture above? How about Five Things That I Saw While Snorkelling Around In Bicheno (Despite The Very Cool Waters And The Distinct Lack Of A Wetsuit)! Macrocystis pyrifera Oligoplites saurus Latris forsteri Sepioteuthis australis Cheilodactylus spectabilis

Mountain goat urinates on other mountain goat in front of the Harbour Bridge, Taronga Park Zoo, Sydney. September 2012. Wordless Wednesday.

Dozing gator. Taronga Park Zoo, Sydney. September 2012. The Milkman in the Night , Andrey Kurkov Andrey Kurkov is my favourite author of post-Soviet blackly comic, absurdist tales. This isn't really his best (a little too much telling rather than showing for my taste), but it is an enjoyable little romp through modern-day Kyev. C+

SHARK! Manly Sea Aquarium, Manly. Sydney. September 2012. Theme Thursday again and I am challenged by the theme of ANGELS. Well, I don't know any ANGELS and I'm not certain that I've ever met one. Which is why I've written a story, maybe it's a parable. Anyway, I call it Simon's Wife . Simon’s wife often thought of Simon as she did the dog that she had as a young woman, a German shorthaired pointer named The Black Prince . Like The Black Prince , Simon was loyal energetic and enthusiastic. However, also like The Black Prince , Simon could be needy, aggravating, over familiar and often trailed a distasteful smell about him. Helpfully, many of the skills and techniques that Simon’s wife applied to the day-to-day handling and management of The Black Prince were equally useful and applicable to Simon. Tone of voice, consistent and poised body language was critical. Whenever The Black Prince became a little too boisterous or even a little too frisky, Simon’...

Are they going to take down these decorations? The corner of Liverpool and Elizabeth Street, Hobart. January 2011. Christmas has come and gone. Months of build up, expectations raised, jingles sung, children primed and ready. Then… Nothing. All sizzle with little sausage, that is what Christmas is. Christmas is a good looking, smooth talking ski instructor that struts about the place with tales of improbable bedroom exploits and promises of bliss to end all bliss; but departs with a whimper as it turns out his package is actually stuffed with crepe paper and he’s more Nova Scotia than Casanova . Christmas is Richard Lounder. Christmas is taking a big bite out of that juicy-looking peach and finding that it tastes like cardboard. Christmas is all about the wait and little about the arrival. Christmas is a bust. Bring on International Midwives' Day . There is a cause we can get behind. Today's Top Five? My Top Five Holidays (Besides International Midwives Day)! International Wo...

The little bloke simply demands that his mother let him in the holiday barn house right away . It is a good thing that he's so handsome.

When were were up on the coast earlier this month, Henry turned his hand to refitting long-discarded farm equipment. Here you can see an old plough that he fiddled with for a bit and got it up and going and we tilled a couple of acres before morning tea!

Here is Ezra riding Jen like a horse (or a camel) down at Fossil Bluff in Wynyard, on Tasmania's sunny North West! The bloke just over her shoulder (not in red stripes) is frequent (as in every single post commentator " Roddy ".

Here is a shot of a penguin rookery located right in the heart of Burnie (West Beach, to be precise). You can't see any penguins because they are all fast asleep. How, I am not so sure, given that Henry and Ezra were making a terrible racket at the time.

It is Monday morning and I find myself back at work after a few weeks out. I am not happy about it. Just last week I was residing at a quiet little farmhouse - converted barn, to be precise - gazing at the sheep nibbling away at the grass out of the kitchen window. It's a good thing that I took this photograph then, I can spend the morning gazing at it instead! A poor substitute, I might add...

I will admit that this photograph of a platypus is not the best that you'll ever see, but when you're saddled with two cranky and loud toddlers, and faced with the challenge of photographing one of the most notoriously shy and seldom-seen furry creatures known to humans, I consider it a triumph! What is more spectacular, we managed to glimpse three separate platypussies that morning! Such is the wonder of Fern Glade, just five minutes from the bustling city centre of the metropolis of Burnie.