This will hurt me...

Clouds. Marion Bay, Tasmania's South East Coast. March 2013. Sunday Stealing: The 5000 Question Meme, Part Three B 63. What is the kindest thing you have ever done? Just letting go... 64. Have you gone to WTIT's Facebook page and hit "like" yet? If not, why not? (No pressure.) I don't know what 'WTIT' is. 65. What holiday should exist but doesn't? An individually nominated day of self-actualisation. 66. What holiday shouldn't exist but does? Any day that glorifies war and killing. 67. What's the best joke you ever heard? I like any joke that can be a good gauge of someone's sense of humour. For example: Q: What's the difference between Neil Armstrong and Michael Jackson? [Allow some time for them to formulate an answer, most likely centering around walking on the Moon or some such.] Answer: Neil Armstrong walked on the Moon and Michael Jackson liked to fuck small boys in the mouth. No, by no means is this the b...

All I need to do is Photoshop in some great big explosions and cars flying about in the background and this photograph is complete...

Cumulus cloud. As seen from Clifton Beach. December 2012. Wordless Wednesday.

Wordless Wednesday...

Big sky. Long Beach, Sandy Bay. April 2020. In my opinion, Easter Saturday is the most pointless and disappointing of all holidays... Dialogue on the Headland , Robert Graves SHE: You'll not forget these rocks and what I told you? HE: How could I? Never: whatever happens. SHE: What do you think might happen? Might you fall out of love? - did you mean that? HE: Never, never! 'Whatever' was a sop For jealous listeners in the shadows. SHE: You haven't answered me. I asked: 'What do you think might happen?' HE: Whatever happens: though the skies should fall Raining their larks and vultures in our laps - SHE: 'Though the sea turn to slime' -say that - 'Though water-snakes be hatched with six heads.' HE: Though the seas turn to slime, or tower In an arching wave above us, three miles high - SHE: 'Though she should break with you' - dare you say that? - 'Though she deny her words on oath.' HE: I h...

Boats, you say... No. I can't say we have any of those around here. Sandy Bay Yacht Club, Sandy Bay. November 2011. Cripes! Not only is it Sunday already, 2011 is nearly finished! Sunday Top Five? Hmmmm... Let me think about it. ... ... ... Okay... Okay, how about ' My Top Five (In No Particular Order) Shades Of Green! '? Sea green Office green Hunter green Fern green Bottle green

Two stray waifs fleeing apocalypse.

Happy birthday Henry! Geilston Bay, October 2011 Can you believe it? Henry is FIVE today. FIVE! Intense preparations forbid me to dwell too long on today's Sunday Top Five : The Top Five This Will Hurt Me Blog Posts On Henry's Birthday Party-Related Events Throughout History! A short and sweet series for first birthday party... Parts EIN and ZWEI of birthday party two... Photograph , video and CAKE from party #3... Shark attack from birthday number FOUR ...You'll see number five on this list later today!

Calverts Beach, oh Calverts Beach, I still hear your sea winds blowin'… Calverts Beach, South Arm. December 2010. We discoverd a new beach (for us) a couple of weeks back: Calverts Beach , which is down off the beaten track on the South Arm Peninsula. If it ever spots raining, we might get down there again soon! Panorama of Calverts Beach. Calverts Beach, South Arm. December 2010. But today isn't Friday BEACH Club , and I am meant to be talking books. The past week saw me finish We can remember it for you wholesale , which is volume five of Philip K. Dick’s collected short stories, Do you like science fiction? If so, this collection has science fiction leaking out of every pore. As a (very) casual reader of science fiction, I found this collection somewhat uneven. Some of the stories are great, many so-so. One thing that you can be guaranteed, Mr Dick had an almighty imagination… The other book I read this week was The Takeover by Muriel Spark. As ever, Spark manages to constr...

So Christmas is done and dusted for another year. All we have left is to get out in the water, catch us a few fresh Orcinus orcas , fire up the barbie and we’ve got ourselves a traditional Tasmanian New Year Hāngi! Get to it Henry!

Clouds of DOOM appear in the east. New Town, December 2010. I’ve read a couple in the past week. The first, A Rumour of War is an autobiography/war memoir by Philip Caputo about his experience in the United States Marine Corps in the early years of American involvement in the Vietnam War. Caputo does an excellent job rendering the gravity, tragedy and absurdist nature of warfare. This is one of the better of the type that I have read. Caputo’s greatest success is the ease with which he constructs a narrative that really does elucidate the confluence of rigorous training, demanding circumstances and external pressure that leads the reader to contemplate how they might act in similar conditions. In this way, the comfortable self-assurance of one’s own moral safety net is not quite so secure. This is not so much a polemic as it is a plea. Very much worth the effort, although it’s intensity is rather draining. The second is Screwtop Thompson , a collection of short stories by one of my f...

The birds have found something! Howrah Beach, December 2010. I couldn't decide between these two photos so I have uploaded both, but you will notice that the birds have won pole position! I assume that the birds have spotted the same thing that appears the be drawing the orcas into the Derwent. Aside from angry Great Whites, you can find around these parts: flathead, whiting, flounder, Australian salmon, barracouta, bream, bastard trumpeter, trout, squid, leatherjacket, mullet, long-finned pike, garfish, silver trevally, jack mackerel and blue grenadier. I suspect that these birds have spotted a school of bastards that has set their tummies rumbling! Storms rolling in over Mount Wellington. Howrah Beach, December 2010.

I took this photo not long before a storm hit. We could see the rain moving in from the north, north west and west (over the mountain). The problem with these kinds of early-summer days in Tasmania is that we can have a hot and humid 32°C air tempreture, but when you dip your toe in the drink, you’ll find it a far more bracing 13°C or so. Henry, as you can see, is a brave soul…

Six million, three hundred and thirty-three thousand, two hundred and eleven. Six million, three hundred and thirty-three thousand, two hundred and twelve. Six million, three hundred and thirty-three thousand, two hundred and thirteen. Six million, three hundred and thirty-three... Hang on a tic, we'll be here a while.

One never knows what sky will come. Campbell Street, Hobart. September 2010. I like a nice sky. To be honest, I like a nasty sky too. Any kind of sky really. Raining, sunny, you know, anything goes. Well, not a grey one. I’m not too much of a fan of a grey sky. I’ve not seen a green sky, but I’m sure it’s nice. I have seen orange skies, purple skies, red skies, pink skies. Blue skies of course. So yeah, any kind of sky really. Except grey.

Mid-morning in Winter and the sky already looks like this. New Town. August 2010. Crikey Moses, it is Theme Thursday yet again, and – all things being EQUAL – it was forty years ago today that Betty Friedan lead a US-wide Women's Strike for Equality. This strike was held to celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of the passing of the Nineteenth Amendment, which effectively gave women the right to vote in the United States. This timing inevitably causes raised eyebrows to those of us down here at the arse-end of the world .. Unrestricted women's suffrage in terms of voting rights was granted in New Zealand in the 1893! The [then] self-governing colony of South Australia granted both universal suffrage and allowed women to stand for the colonial parliament in 1895 . Upon Federation, the Commonwealth of Australia provided this for women in Federal elections from 1902 (except, of course, Aboriginal women). So that puts us Antipodeans a good twenty years ahead! Spare a thought for the...

Another cloudy day in Hobart. New Town, July 2010. The was once a time when I very rarely got ill. Tired, yes. Bored, indeed. Disenchanted, abso-bloody-lutely. But sick? Hardly ever. Nary a sniffle. Then I had children. Since they arrived, scarcely a month goes by without a headache, temperature, sore throat, runny nose, trots or generalised pain. I’m not sure if they’re cursed, or they’re out to get me. Either way, I think they’ve won.

Shan't see this one on the walk to work for a while. June, 2010. T minus 1,920 minutes and 8 seconds. Not long to go now, although having said that, I've lasted longer than England did in the World Cup ! Oh how I enjoy seeing the spirits of the English crushed at the highest level. No matter how down one gets, it never fails to give me a lift. So thank you England, thank you very much!

The CSIRO crane under some morning cloud. April, 2010. Galveston. Scarborough. Wichita. Jackson. Lodi. Impanema. But there are no good songs about Hobart.

Sunrise over the Elizabeth Street Pier, Hobart. April, 2010. Theme Thursday and I don't have a BICYCLE. BICYCLE! I could maybe ride a BICYCLE off the pier, but it's too cold. I've heard of underwater BICYCLEs, but they're no use to me. It's too windy at the moment to ride to work, as I'd be blown off a BICYCLE, and no doubt off the bridge with it. No, BICYCLE is of no use to me.