Missing inside the action

The problem with not writing on the blog for AGES and AGES and AGES -- but I don't need to tell you how long it's been -- is that I don't know what to do next. Do I try to make up for lost time? Or do I just blithely go on?  Hmmm.

Maybe a little of both.

I finished Henry Lawson (to be published 2013) and this afternoon I came out of the bubble of trying to keep my head in a state of Deep Thinking while I wrote a PhD application. It's all over now bar pressing the button that says SUBMIT because I'm waiting on one letter from an ex-teacher and employer to upload and then I can press SUBMIT. Right now I have given myself permission to not think too deeply again until I get a message saying that my application has been successful. If it hasn't, I will try again next year and just keep those thoughts ticking along in the background a bit. I won't cry too much, there's so much on my list of alternative options.

So let's decompress a bit:

Here I am, covered in cats. This happens nearly every morning unless I have to jump up early to get to the university to teach. I would like to think that I am reading something about bibliographic notions of textual activity, but odds are that I'm reading Georgette Heyer, which is all I had space in my brain to read for the last month or so.

Let's catch up.

I had my exhibition at UNSW Canberra (aka ADFA) which seemed to go well, everyone who popped into it had good things to say, including a few really wonderful comments about how poetry really comes alive when it's actively engaged typographically and up on the wall in front of your eyes.

Then I went to Western Australia, ostensibly wearing my Print Council of Australia committee member hat but also working in bit of a holiday, taking Bumblebee and Colonel Duck with me. We hired a car and did the Epic Nostalgia/Rediscovery/Discovery (depending on your generation) Driving Tour of South-Western WA. From the Saturday to the next Thursday we drove from Perth to Kalgoorlie, then down to Esperence, across to Ravensthorpe and up to Lake King, then wobbled across to Bunbury and then up again to Perth where I donned my PCA hat and got to work.

We stayed in Kalgoorlie a few days and went to the Kalgoorlie Cup (or was it the Coolgardie Cup?) which was cancelled five minutes before the first race but because we were in the Members' Stand (thanks to my Auntie & Uncle) we stayed & partied and afternoon tea'd and had a lovely time with no horses. No end of scandal though, and we did meet a couple of horses at a big fry-up breakfast at one of the stables next day, so that was nice.

If I show you a few snaps you'll get the drift:

The saddest part for Colonel Duck, even though he'd been there before, was thinking about how much of his youth was erased by the Superpit. It covers the whole of what used to be the Golden Mile of Kalgoorlie-Boulder.

Because I was heading that way, and one of my official duties would be to attend the opening of the Fremantle Arts Centre Print Awards (supported by Little Creatures Brewing), I thought it would be jolly to enter a print, in case it was selected for hanging. Then it would be extra fun to be there. So I entered Discontent, the print I made for the Transit of Venus show earlier in the year.

Well, guess what. It won second prize. And I was told two weeks before we left, and I had to keep it secret (apart from my family, of course). What a task! So going to the opening was even more fun, even thought it was crappy, crappy weather, the worst weather of our whole trip.

Here I am, clutching my Big Bunch of Flowers, next to winner Lucas Ihlein of Big Fag Press with his Big Big Cheque (photo from Lucas's Flickr site). You can see more photos, mostly with me cropped out, at the Fremantle Arts Centre site. I was stoked to see Lucas (and his collaborator Ian Milless) win, because he uses a four-plate litho offset press (the Big Fag), which is only a couple of steps forward from letterpress, so as we both joked on the night, the winner was Obsolete Technology!

First prize is $15,000 and it was acquisitional, and second prize is $5,000 non-acquisitional, but they bought the work anyway, which is marvellous. I have bought myself an iPad with some of the money, and the rest goes back into the Press Pit.

It was wonderful to catch up with family that I haven't seen for years, especially new members who were born or wooed since my last visit. I don't know when I'll get back again, but when I do it will hopefully be the same time of year, which is so much nicer than Summer, with all the roadside wildflowers to boot.

I had a birthday, and a wee party to reconnect with live bodies, and forgot to write 'no presents' on the invite, so I got some lovely presents. You all know who you are, I think you're wonderful.

I've been teaching a bit, not just my art school class, but some childrens' workshops. One was at Canberra Museum & Gallery, for Book Week, and the other was at Belconnen Art Centre, for the school holidays.

 

These are two of the books made in the latter class, called 'Hey, don't fall into that tunnel... book!', where we made tunnel books and puppets to go with them. Aren't they cool?

OK, I have to pack up now because Best Beloved is cooking a huge curry fest and he needs me to clean up all my gumph. Some of the gumph involves an exhibition I'm helping to curate for the Canberra Bookbinders' Guild that opens on Friday. Here's the invite in case you're interested:

If you can't read it, or access any images, it says Handwritten, Handbound: Canberra Bookbinders and the Canberra Calligraphers Society exhibition, opening Friday night 19 Octoberat 6pm at the Belconnen Art Centre Gallery. It runs to the 11th of November. I'm on the local ABC radio station (666am) that same Friday talking about it at about 4:20 if you want to tune in.

 Can you feel the busy? Boring, isn't it. More cats, that's what we need.

Naughty little muffins, you see the kinds of ways they struggle to get my attention?

Ta ta for now, hopefully not for so long this time.

P.S., a reminder that if you want me to send you one of my e-newsletters, which should come out more regularly than these blogposts, subscribe by clicking here.

A week's worth of post

Wow, where did that week go?!!

It seems like every time I sit down with the intention of writing, an email arrives asking me to do something, or a real life distraction captures my attention. I think I'm only going to catch up by using the dreaded dot points...

-- Bumblebee was very excited about going to his grandparents last week. He kept himself busy for the ten minutes or so that we were in my (poor, under-utilised studio) with one of his favorite toys, the whiteboard:



-- And so went to Bega, where I discovered that Colonel Duck's new satellite internet connection is only marginally faster than his old dial-up, except that now their phone line is freed up when they're using the computer. So checking my emails took ages, and I just couldn't be bothered wrestling it to get a post through. So there went my resolution to write something deep and meaningful. Instead, I lost my self in Byatt, various trashy mags and op shops.

-- While in Bega, I persuaded the local museum (a.k.a. my mother) to formally lend me their wonderful trays of woodtype in return for an annual poster:





(If that last photo looks vaguely familiar, it's because when the trays were donated abandoned on their doorstep (as I've mentioned before), I was asked to help them sort it, and I took some photos that with a bit of Photoshoppery became my current blog header!)

The coloured bits are coloured because whomever used them last didn't clean the ink off their surface. Tuh. Still, very pretty, no? Anyway, I got them not a moment too soon, because they were dying in a dusty backroom, wrapped in plastic and going a tad damp and whiffy. Using the type is the best way to keep it alive, and I'm more than happy to use it for the benefit of the museum whenever they ask me to. Goodness, I'm so happy, my heart keeps leaping with joy at the thought of all that woody goodness, saved from a dusty death.

-- And then, still in Bega, I wandered into the Regional Gallery to say hello to Megsy in her bright new shiny job, and was pounced upon by Gallery (and Library) staff who had 'only just been talking about me the day before'! I was asked to give a public talk and a weekend workshop about artists' books and ways to incorporate them into an artistic practice, to coincide with this year's Meroogal Women's Art Prize. Wow, how cool is that! It'll be happening in early June, so if you're interested, I'll mention it again closer to time, or you can contact the Bega Regional Gallery for details (although they haven't been finalised just yet!).

-- STILL in Bega, it was Bumblebee's twelfth birthday on Thursday. I get a little lump in my throat just thinking about it, and impending doom as he hurtles towards his teenage years. He had a lovely birthday, wot with the archery set given to him by Colonel Duck (along with a target fashioned out of an old trampoline) and a long romantic silver velvet cloak given to him by myself and my lovely sister-in-law (from the Folk Festival, of course). He spent the next day or so dressing up and stalking around posing with the bow and long hours at the target, practicing his shooting (and getting better each time!).


Feeling dramatic and romantic...


...undermined a tad by the green crocs. The day before he'd been in all-black, with black boots and the cloak, and wishing he hadn't cut all his hair off. But I forgot to get out my camera that day :)


Note the target in the background. It was fantastic when he hit the centre, but if he hit the sides things got a bit weird.

He also made his own cake, with the help of Colonel Duck, since all the women had scarpered off to town to talk about important things like wood type.



They had a lot of fun with food colouring. The outside was yellow with myriad colours.



The inside, as you can see, was red and green. We invited some friends over with their delightful children to share the cake (and the latest gossip) and discovered that the cake was actually really yummy.

We had more friends over for dinner, making our own pizzas in the home-made pizza oven, washed down with copious amounts of wine, and ended up in fits of laughter while B shot his arrows down the driveway with sparklers attached to the ends of the arrows. Kept him busy, kept us happy, and only one arrow lost in the dark.

-- Back to Canberra, to find that if the house wasn't cleaned very soon, my marriage was going to implode. So Saturday was spent channelling Annie.* The thing I hate about cleaning -- REALLY cleaning, not just giving the place a once-over -- is the fact that when you look hard at something you try not to look at, it grows exponentially. I wanted to vaccuum, for the first time in ages. But I thought I'd better clean the kitchen benches properly, so that if things fell on the floor, I'd get them with the vaccuum. And then I needed to wipe the shelves above the benches, and then I noticed the windowsills, which led to me cleaning the windows. I moved across the benches and picked up the toaster, which meant I had to clean the toaster. Oh, ecetera frigging ecetera. Finally, late in the afternoon, I managed to vaccuum, and then demanded that we go to the movies so that I wouldn't notice any more dirt. There was plenty around, but I knew that if I broke the obsessiveness, I could go back to just walking through the house blissfully NOT seeing.

-- So we went to see Good. And lo, it was good. And put me back into a mind for thinking about things I really WANT to think about, like memory triggers, and the way music can take you places you've forgotten about, or even into books you want to read.

Have I mentioned how much I loved AS Byatt's The Children's Book? Oh, how I loved it, let me count the ways. It's the book I've been wanting to read for a few years now. Stuffed with facts and references to an era that intrigues me, it is nonetheless extremely readable, and very hard to put down. It is set in the thick of the Arts & Crafts movement of the late 19th century in Britain and Germany, and takes you through to the end of WWI, over two generations. She is such a clever puss, she keeps the subject firmly in that time, but evokes such pertinent parallels to Babyboomers and Gen X as she does so. I can't really say more than that, since the book isn't released until next month, but I highly recommend it when you get the chance. I came out of that book in a spell which housecleaning absolutely trashed, and felt that I needed a voice of reason to snap me back into the world. I settled upon a re-read of Helen Garner's The Feel of Steel, which has formed an excellent buffer between Byatt and my next book, Tracy Crisp's Black Dust Dancing -- managed to get a copy today! Hooray!

-- On Sunday we entertained the still glowing newlyweds from Sills Bend, fresh from hanging out with obsessive Regency dancing obsessives. We love entertaining in the morning, it's when your friends are looking their best, all freshly slept and hungry. Best Beloved does a marvellous brunch menu of Eggs Benedict (or Florentine if our guests are vegos) followed by fresh coffee and cranberry crumble muffins (whole cranberries and a sweet crumble topping). It's pretty delicious. Zowen** came too, bringing as an offering an amazing mushroom/tofu baked dish with a zingy relish. Food heaven. Then I gave Laura & Dorian a tour of my still sadly-neglected studio, and then we went and mocked a lot of portraits for a while, which was excellent fun. I haven't had so much fun in a gallery since Fluffy and I mocked a whole heap of steel engravings in Melbourne a few years ago. Dorian decided not to take his faux top hat home with him (he would have had to wear it on the plane) and donated it to Bumblebee's hat collection, which made my young'un very happy, and it was in fact used today for his holiday learn-to-be-a-clown workshop.

-- And finally, there's only weeks to go until the opening of my bookbinding exhibition at Craft ACT. All the books are pouring in; I gave a pretty early deadline because I knew there would be stragglers, but also because I wanted to see the work properly before I started writing the room brochure essay for the show, and now we'll be able to install slowly and carefully. So I've been getting lots of exciting parcels, like this one:



Bugger brown paper packages tied up with string; this one was wrapped in softly shining gold paper, and then a package tied up with soft leather thonging! very lush, and indicative of the gorgeous book within. I'll save that for a future post, when I can showcase some of the books together. How excitement!

When I first put the exhibition idea together, I fully planned to not only include the edition binding of Poems to Hold or Let Go, but also to create my own individual binding. But time and opportunity have rushed past, and I resigned myself to just being the 'provider' of the book, rather than a contributor in my own right. But the other day I unearthed a box of materials that I'd stashed, and came upon a stack of beautiful momigami paper that I'd made as a student. WIZZ! went my mind, and now I'm determined to make a special binding of my own. I think I've nutted it out; I'll document my progress and show you when it's done. And when I do, I'll tell you what momigami paper is. But for now, I'm posted out, and you've probably had enough too! Good night!





* Evoking the spirit of my late Grandmother, who was a dedicated and obsessive cleaner.

** The easiest way I know to say Zoe and Owen and their two sprogs.

Remember to breathe

Weekend fun: Sunday

SUNDAY

I did go to the Lifeline Book Fair, and took my sewing frame and a few unsewn Transmigrations to sew. It was fun sitting there sewing, and the frame attracted a lot of interest, especially from the Book Fair volunteers themselves, who are all, of course, book nuts. Then I went into the final few hours for a greedy graze of the leftovers selling at $10 per stuffed green bag. I got a lot of light reading for my upcoming convalescence, and a lot of interesting yet unwanted bindings to cut up & renovate.

This is one I didn't buy, but just want to remember fondly. I love the gold sticker that heralds that it's an autographed copy, suggesting that the un-autographed copies might be worth collecting.

I also found a whole heap of sci-fi paperbacks that appealed to me as a collective read/snort/study. They're so appallingly trashy to look at and I shall take the time to list their blurbs, but will save the cover scanning for when I have lots of time and I've read them:

IMPLOSION (D.F. Jones, 1967)
When a foreign power puts a sterility drug in Britain's reservoirs, the result is all too predictable. The birth-rate plummets and the country's future looks bleak. There is only one way to save the nation; all women with a natural immunity to the drug must be placed in special camps where they can be bred from like prize cattle. They must be given special hormone treatment and artificial insemination so that they can produce triplets, quads, quins time after time until they die of exhaustion. they must become National Mums, the sole hope of a desperate people. They must be pampered and disciplined to accept their role. Even if one of them happens to be the wife of the Minister in charge of the whole affair...

Don't you love the fact that the absolutely worst thing pitched to the potential reader is that the MINISTER'S WIFE IS NOT EXEMPT? Ay yay yay.

FALSE FATHERHOOD (A. Bertram Chandler, 1968)
cover: what would a world be like if there were no women, generation after generation?
back cover, top: A world without women but not without love

Sparta [O PLEEZ] was a backwater planet in a forgotten corner of the galaxy. An isolated world where the majority of men had never seen a woman--and did not know what they were. Their history books and their literature made no mention of a second sex, and the custodians of the Birth Machine and of the laboratories where each new generation was created kept the secret with fanatic zeal.
This was the situation when John Grimes, Master of the Interstellar Federation ship Seeker III, arrived on the planet. But when the Spartans saw the strangey shaped 'men' among the ship's complement of officers, the results were catastrophic for their society.
Without any knowledge of women, these men were still attracted by them.
They did not understand why but they were determined to find out.

GAWD. Looking forward to discovering the secrets of heterosexuality in that one.

STAR MAIDENS: A NOVEL BY IAN EVANS BASED ON THE TELEVESION SERIES CREATED BY ERIC PACE (1977)
Cover: All men are subordinates on the planet of Medusa [GAH] for that is the planet ruled by the Star Maidens [catchy!]

On Medusa, the laws of nature had decreed that the female of the species should reign supreme--leaving the lesser able males to take care of domestic chores, nursery duties and other menial tasks.
For eons, the Medusan women ruled their world. But then Medusa entered the orbit of Earth, and rumour got out that here was a planet controlled almost entirely bymen... a paradise planet to which two of the most rebellious manservants managed to escape, so beginning the feud between Earth and the incredible STAR MAIDENS.

WHO NEEDS MEN? (Edmund Cooper, 1972)

Rura Alexandra, Madam Exterminator, had recently graduated into a 25th century world where men had become biologically less important, where women could reproduce as they wished by cloning and parthonogenesis.
Her task was simple -- in theory, if not in practice: to wipe out the last few thousand men who had taken refuge in the Highlands of Scotland.
But an ambush near Loch Lomond led to rape, and the killing of her fellow-exterminators. And Diarmid MacDiarmid, the last remaining rebel chieftain proved too much of a fascination.

Mills & Boon meets Braveheart in the future! Wacko!

and finally,

SEXMAX (Hughes Cooper, 1969)

cover: The most excitingly different original science fiction novel since Brave New World and 1984. [ahem]

EDMAX
JOBMAX
HEALTHMAX
SEXMAX

From cradle to grave, life was maximized by a benevolent State. War had been abolished long ago. So had most illnesses. Men who lived to be fifty were rewarded with a period of state-sponsored sexual licence -- Sexmax. Widows could comfort themselves with a service assignee -- a young man computer-matched on the basis of propensity and performance.
It was a fool-proof system as long as one didn't make a fool of oneself and fall in love. Fortyish Emma Beasley did just that -- fell in love with her 19 year old Sexmax partner, James. The computer wasn't prepared for this. Nor was it prepared for young Josie, who decided she wanted james for herself. And to hell with Sexmax!

SCRAGGGGG!!!!

My golly goodness, I'm looking forward to lying in bed reading these. My only fear is that I'll hurt myself laughing.

Please note that these were all written by men between 1967 and 1972. I found them on the very last day of the fair, with one swoop of the table, not looking too hard. How many others in this vein are out there? This may become a new obsession for me. Is it any wonder feminism gained strength around this time? Look at this manifestation of fear and excitement!

Gosh, time to rip myself away from the computer. Best Beloved has just left for Thursday Island until Thursday (heh) which means...

gasp


...I have three whole days to myself! Bliss!

I overheard my mother-in-law on the phone to BB yesterday fretting that I would be spending my birthday on my own. Oh my, she doesn't know me very well. I love being able to work / eat / sleep without constraints of family duty. Doesn't everyone? Maybe you just haven't had the chance. It's wonderful, but even so, I wouldn't get rid of the family...

Dot Pointy Day

I checked into Bloglines tonight and realised how little time I've made for blog grazing/ingesting. My Go Fug Yourself link had 166 unread posts! A year ago, a day wouldn't be complete without some high quality fashion snark. But then, I do find time for around 13 daily Scrabble moves, so I should just shut up and get on with it, shouldn't I?

Right. It's a dot point kinda day. Let's go.

-- Yesterday I got an email inviting me to participate in Movember. I know the obvious response is 'I'm a woman, so go jump', but then I started thinking -- how did they know that part of my entire daily beauty regime consists of washing my face, ruffling my hair and then tweezing my face? Not so much the mo, more the chin and neck, something which either naturally comes with increasing age, or indicates that I have a serious hormone imbalance and should not look forward to an easy menopause. Maybe I should join Movember! If I let it all go I'd probably be able to manage something like a Fu Manchu moustache coming out from my chin. Actually, no. Don't offer to sponsor me. Erk. But feel free to sponsor some other poor bastard like Dean. He manages a pretty good effort. Last year I offered to pay him double if he grew a Hitler moustache, but he didn't take me up on it. :(

-- I just want to register here my complete disapproval of the instant bribery of tax cuts rolled out by the Coalition within seconds of announcing the election. Classic appeal to the greedy cnuts who have elected them all the other times. I have no problem paying taxes even though they hurt, because (read my lips) TAXES = SERVICES. Am I wrong? Even if they get used for weaponry, at least the money is there to be protested over. Take away the taxes, then they have a perfect excuse to demolish things like Medicare and public schools. Meh. I'm certainly no economist but I know what I hate, and at the moment it's JH.
BRING IT ON. And buy one of my posters (on the sidebar).

-- In other news, I had a bit of a birthday party with a few chums at the Old Ducks Farm. We descended upon Lady and Colonel Duck, set up a temporary campsite in their orchard, and then descended like locusts upon a lamb spit roast and a shitload of alcohol whilst sitting around a fire. I'm not a crowd lover, and I got a bit anxious beforehand about whether the disparate group of characters (at least the ones that I invited/could make it) that I so love one-on-one (or family by family) would like each other, but it went swimmingly, with many new connections made. There was a huge gang of kids, and they went at each other with light sabres (of course), a billy cart and general running around until we shoved them in front of a DVD to flake out. We even had a posse of participants who got up at dawn's crack with Colonel Duck to watch the Rugby!

The weather was beautiful and the garden was glorious. Here's a glimpse of life in paradise:


Tents amongst the blossom in the orchard.


This is a beautiful historical replica tent; a simple A-frame canvas tent belonging to two friends who get into historical reenactment shenanigans. On the morning after, a Channelbill Cuckoo perched on the top of the tent and gave out the most raucous calls, scaring both this friend and myself. Apparently they migrate from the Philippines to the Bega Valley every year.


Lamb on a spit brings out the carnivore in the gentlest of people...


... and the cavemen out in others :)


This is how Zoe and Jethro spent most of the evening. That baby is in post-meat-frenzy. Truly.


I didn't get a lot of photos because I was in the thick of things most of the time. This is a group of post-rugby breakfasters, chilling out the sense of disappointment (which I don't understand, cause neither team was Australia).


Lightsabre battles were the bomb, until Colonel Duck upped the ante...


and took all the kids for a few laps of the garden on the back of his vintage Massey-Ferguson (lovingly named 'Chikka'). For some mechanically-minded kids, this was the best part of the weekend.


As usual, the cats came with us. Padge hated every moment. Can't you tell?


-- The poetry is going well.

Gosh, there's so much more I want to say but my eyelids won't stay open. Best Beloved is away for most of the week,* so there's a good chance I'll get to blog again while bedtime curfew is lifted. I just need to get a good dose of sleep tonight, I haven't caught up from the weekend yet...




* on a 'business trip'. He's gone to the Sunshine Coast, and I noticed that he did pack a beach towel and his juggling balls... gee, life's tough for him, isn't it?

Hippo barfday again

This is me at around 4, I think. A lot cuter than I am at forty. I've learnt a lot since then. These days I know the sight of me with a mop would be sweet, but I'm buggered if anyone can catch me willingly holding one.

Thanks for the well wishes, peoples. I'm having a ripper of a birthday. I was given the DVDs of Red Dwarf (series 1) and Life on Mars, and for books I got Life Class by Pat Barker and Lirael by Garth Nix (advertising your wants on Facebook really works!).

Colonel Duck fulfilled my wish to get power tools for my birthday by giving me a Dremel with lots of attachments. Yay! And Lady Duck gave me nice bottlebrush bushes to plant in the garden, which pleases me no end because I've made friends with the feisty wattlebird who visits every year when the current bottlebrush blooms and is not scared of the cats at all.

And there have been other nice gifts, some of which I'm wearing. Best Beloved is taking me jewellery shopping in the next week or so, as he wants to buy me something meaningful that I'll wear lots, and he feels it would be a more successful gift if I pick it out for myself! I hate to say it, but he's probably right. He's lovely, but taste is not his strong point. On our first date he was wearing nice black shiny shoes and a black t-shirt with tie-dyed pink and white jeans. Ahem. I got rid of those (and a few other iridescent nasties in his wardrobe) quite quickly.

We had a nice time at Floriade today, although missed the kangaroos, sadly. I did take some beaut shots of this year's gnome-painting competition, and I'll put them up soon. Right now I feel a bit sunstruck, so I think it's time for a bit of a bex and a lie-down. Must be all those years creeping up on me... (older friends guffaw NOW.)

Prince for a day lifetime

This is going to be short. We're all completely rooted, in the non-sexual Australian sense. I'll let a few pictures do most of the talking, because my parents did a fantastic job of making Bumblebee feel really special for his birthday (which isn't really until tomorrow).

The original plan was that instead of a birthday party, B could take a friend down to his grandparent's farm for the weekend. Then Colonel and Lady Duck decided to invite some of the local kids over for a bash, and then it sort of grew into a full-blown birthday party, complete with pinata, limbo competition, treasure hunt, bonfire and marshmallows, sparklers and glowsticks, with a vague Dr Who theme. Combine that with lashings of food, a cool cake and plenty of alcohol for the parents, and a damn good time was had by all, out in the cleaned-up cow paddock:


The Dalek cake! Layers of spongecake and plum jelly, with an icing and blueberry outer, and a few kitkats and a decorated marshmallow. One of Lady Duck's classic birthday cakes. We always had good ones. The plate of gingerbread men in the foreground are all 'Doctors', with jelly snake scarves around their necks!


Colonel Duck's Tardis pinata! A thing of beauty, with a plywood top and base, and papier mache surrounds. There is even a little flashing light on top, powered by a 9-volt battery! The inside was, of course, stuffed with lollies, a true act of grandparent-hood (stuff them with sugar and give them back).


The pinata in situ, with prince-for-a-day Bumblebee and his posse waiting patiently for something to bash it with. (Colonel Duck's wonderful schoolteacher neighbour is a consumate op-shopper, and it's a tradition that she finds a wonderful hat for Bumblebee. This is this year's effort, and he adores it. He's wearing it in bed as I type.) Colonel Duck is a very smart planner (not for nothing was he a logistics manager in the army) and he gave the kids a soft foam bat for the first wave of bashing, so that everyone got a go. On the second round he replaced the bat with a piece of dowling, and then finally he gave the biggest kid a wooden hurling stick* to finish it off. Finally there was just a swarm of kids crawling over the ground picking up lollies!

*Not a vomiting stick, but a Hurling bat we picked up in Ireland a long tim ago. Very handy thing.


Every kid loves sparklers, and quite a few adults too...


Colonel Duck gave out a lot of glowsticks; I'm not fond of these because they're VERY bad for the environment once they've finished glowing. But I promised Colonel Duck I'd sit back and shut up while the kids enjoyed themselves, so I did. I love this photo. It makes me think of an ABC television promotional ad. Laaa daaa daaaaaa....

I'm very grateful to my parents. They put a lot of work into the weekend, and it was such fun. If I'm this wiped out now, I can't imagine how buggered they are. Barnaby's invited friend was a girl who always seems a bit starved of affection as her parents battle their way through a nasty breakup, and she seemed to really enjoy hanging out with us, and enjoyed calling my parents 'nanny and granddad', taking every opportunity to do so and to be hugged.

I'll leave you with a lovely image of the Colonel wandering through his orchard to put up some balloons, and Lucky the wonderdog torn between following him, his adored master or coming back to me, his original Mummy:



I just told Bumblebee to go to sleep 9 and wake up 10. Probably a mistake, because he'll lie awake all excited. Heh. No, I just checked. He's out like a light. As I will be in about half an hour. Goodnight.