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Unfortunately, the weather was not very kind to us, but it would nevertheless be a peaceful and sharing few days – a chance for me to get away from daily commitments and routines, and for my old school friend, the opportunity to wind down after a year or so of drama leading up to the death of her mother a few weeks ago

Tuesday, 24^th April – I precede my journey with another visit to the dentist!!

Yes, that was the start to my day – a 9.15 appointment at the dentist, really, a follow-up and finalisation of the process of the past few visits, and not too difficult a procedure to cope with. But what a miserable morning to have that appointment, prior to my drive across to the coast!

Thankfully, the dental appointment was over fairly quickly, no injection for pain, so no likelihood of any drowsiness or numbness, but disappointed to find it was still raining when I set off from Sunbury, because with the car packed, etc, there was no need to return home.  My destination was the small coastal town of Barwon Heads, but rather than drive what was probably the most direct and fastest route – across the Western Ring Road to the Geelong Highway, and bypass freeway around Geelong, I travelled across country, via Melton and Bacchus Marsh, and then through the ‘backblock’ country between the Marsh and the city of Geelong. As I would remark to Heather later in the week, as a father with young children, any such trip, no matter how short a duration, usually involved the obligatory toilet stops for one or other of the kids. These days, such stops were necessary for the ‘old Dad’, and with the day being wet and miserable,  that necessity seemed even more prevalent – so for what turned out to be a two hour trip, I had to stop twice, at Melton, and then on the Bellarine Peninsula side of Geelong!!  Actually, the weather improved a little as I got closer to Geelong, but again, the rain began once I reached the Ocean Grove area, and Heather would tell me that it had not really stopped raining through the night – I think she had been a bit concerned about my driving in the weather as it appeared where she was, and was surprised [and I think relieved] when she learnt I had reached Geelong earlier than anticipated [for those not aware, Geelong is the largest city in Victoria, outside of Melbourne, and is located on the coast, an hour down the highway from Melbourne].

The holiday town of Barwon Heads is located on the southern coast of the Bellarine Peninsula and separated by the Barwon River from its twin coastal town of Ocean Grove which I passed through just a few short kilometres from my destination.. Barwon Heads is a popular seaside community, offering a diverse variety of coastal attractions from the shallow and sandy shoreline of the Barwon River to the windswept surf beaches which front Bass Strait along 13th Beach Road. The Bluff Lookout, at Point Flinders, is situated on a rocky outcrop and a network of surrounding walking tracks provides views over the town centre, along the Barwon River and in all directions across Bass Strait. I have spent many visits either walking around the Bluff area, either at the top, or exploring the rocks, etc, at the waterline below.  The commercial centre of Barwon Heads includes the town’s major hotel just near the river bridge and a strip of shops including cafes and restaurants along Hitchcock Avenue.  Since I was last here, those kind of facilities have grown and modernised immensely, and in particular, I would soon realise the variety of eating places had also grown. Just north of Barwon Heads is the expansive waterway of Lake Connewarre and surrounding wetlands which make an ideal spot for fishing and bird watching. I seem to recall sitting on the back of a motorbike back in the early 1960s, on an early morning rabbiting outing with a fellow camper [Roger, the ‘ambulance driver’] – presumably he obtained permission from my mother at the time for me to go with him!

Anyway, I think it was about midday when I reached Barwon Heads, and turned into the street whether Heather had found her accommodation for the week [she’d being here since late Sunday morning]. A brief delay to respond to a text message from Susie –  she’d had obviously just got up, seen the state of the weather outside, and was sending her commiserations for my decision to spend these few days at ‘the beach’!!

It was raining steadily when I reached the apartment, and it would in fact, continue in that manner for the whole of the afternoon and into the night. Heather had already organised food, etc, so that unless absolutely necessary, there would be no need for us to leave the apartment again today should the weather continue, as in fact it did. There would be no excursions along the beach front on this particular first day!!

And why are the two of us here, in this relatively quiet seaside location, on a miserable wet Autumn afternoon?  Two people who a few months ago had almost forgotten the other had previously existed in our lives. Although that is not really true, because as conversations over the next day or so would reveal, neither of us had ever completely obliterated the other from our collective memories.  We went through most of Primary School together in the 1950s, were associates in Church and Sunday-school during that same decade, and sat up on that makeshift stage for the annual Neil Street Sunday-school anniversaries for a number of years. Both of our parents were associates of each other, and on one occasion, Heather’s mother showed a particular kindness to my mother, and younger sister,   a kindness that was looked down upon by others in the Church at the time! And then, at the end of our primary school years, and with my family moving to another part of Ballarat, and our attendance at different secondary schools, we  drifted apart as pre-teens at the time.    Until that  arranged lunch meeting, in Bacchus Marsh, this past January, following my decision to contact Heather late last year, after speaking with her brother at the Neil Street 150^th anniversary reunion in August!!  After 50+ years, two friends have found each other again, and neither of us dare to think beyond each day as it passes!!

Certainly, with atrocious weather outside, there was little incentive to venture beyond the apartment for the rest of today – think it was called the Ozone Apartments, one of two, with the bottom one unoccupied this week, we were upstairs, and the complex owners [husband and wife] away at work, in Geelong I assume!]. Both quiet and private, although as we would discover during the night, rather open externally to the forces of the strong winds which were roaring inland off the southern ocean right through the night. However, also a great opportunity to share thoughts, reminisces of what we had both being doing over the past 50 years, including three marriages, both of hers with men who  turned out to be cheating and violent partners, and to also share and enjoy our mutually found love of both classical music, and in particular, jazz!!!  Together with the odd class of wine – although in that area for me,  one glass is genuinely my limit these days!

Meanwhile, as already indicated, it would be a wild night outside. The wind was ongoing, and the fierceness of it  continued relentlessly until around daylight when I think it calmed a little, while the rainstorms continued in an unusual pattern – consistently, there would be a major thunderous downpour lasting 10-15 minutes, followed by relative silence [apart from the wind] followed by another spell of drenching rain. My original plan for this Tuesday night [before I’d decided to come and join Heather a day earlier than intended] had been to go around to Sunbury’s Clarke Oval and watch the Sunbury football team’s first 2012 game in the Ballarat Football League – what a miserable night that would have been – a game won by Sunbury by the way, in dreadful soggy conditions –  I had absolutely no regrets about the change of plans, and choosing to be with an ‘old’ friend in a warm and comforting environment, irrespective of what was going on outside!!

Wednesday, 25th April –  a wet & miserable [weather wise]  Anzac Day

It was a little calmer outside this morning – the rain seemed to have gone away in the main, though it remained quite windy. It was while we were preparing to go out, that Heather pointed out the sound of the bagpipes coming from the nearby main streets, clearly audible above the wind.  This morning was of course Anzac Day, and I noted that this was the first time for many years that I had not been wake from 5.0am of an Anzac morning to listen to the broadcasts of the Dawn Services, firstly from Canberra, and then from the Shrine in Melbourne. In fact, to be honest, Anzac Day didn’t really register, until we heard the bagpipes playing. I don’t know if Barwon Heads had any kind of Dawn Service – didn’t hear anything – but in the town this morning, local residents were assembling for a service and parade from around 9am I think it was [when we heard the band music] from Hitchcock Avenue along the road to the Barwon Heads RSL building where a wreath laying ceremony took place. In fact, that site was just around the corner from here we were staying, and when we passed just after 10am, there was quite a large collection of wreaths, etc at the local war memorial.

April 25^th is of course the day that we Australians remember the sacrifice of those who fought in both the First World War, and all subsequent wars and conflicts. Normally on this morning, I would be in front of the TV, religiously watching the Melbourne Anzac march down St Kilda Road to the Shrine of Remembrance. But this week, there would be no television watched in our unit [apart from a brief look at tonight’s news] – not even the big annual Anzac Day football match between Collingwood and Essendon, the result of which I noted this evening, was a one point win to Collingwood [another disappointing outcome for Adam, though his team had all the glory last Saturday, when Essendon thrashed Carlton!!

As I have been realising over recent months, Heather doesn’t cook many meals at her unit in Ballarat, certainly her late morning habit being to partake of what one could call ‘brunch’ [combination of a late breakfast/early lunch] as her main meal of the day, and I soon discovered, something I would have to [willingly] adjust to this week!!  It was after 10am when we found our way to ‘Annie’s’ all day breakfast establishment [which also provided a huge range of other speciality produce, wines, etc] – Heather had already made herself at home here, but sadly this morning [obviously not long since the Anzac Day ceremonies] the place was packed out. So down the street a few doors to one of the more modern pubs which also served a pretty good [if not over-priced] breakfast menu. That would also be my major meal for the day –we would get to Annie’s on the next two mornings –  which actually suited me at present in view of my current dietary problems, finding heavy and/or large meals at the end of the day not agreeing with me. I actually can’t recall what I ate this morning, but it was tasty and filling, and naughtily, followed up with an iced coffee [the only one today!!].

Went for a bit of a drive after our ‘brunch’ – up to the top of the Bluff’.  This feature is represented by a set of imposing limestone cliffs, forming a simple peninsula at the point of the Barwon Heads township – described by ‘The Friends of the Bluff’ [a local environmental group] as a ‘spectacular symbol of the beauty and diversity of our marine and coastal environment’. The Bluff is indeed a local icon, a popular tourist destination and a profound Aboriginal site of significance, as well as being of geological, scientific and educational value. It’s really the only ‘high’ point in this part of the coast, rising above Bass Strait, and forming the western headland of the Barwon Estuary [entry point of the Barwon River].

In past years, I have spent many hours exploring both round the top of the Bluff and down the narrow steps that lead to the beach and rock pools etc below [which I think was under cover of high tide at present]. We stopped briefly at the lookout, but the wind was still too strong [and cold] to venture out for long, and for Heather’s sake, with a major knee operation due within the next few weeks, there was no question of asking her to attempt to clamber down those steps [think I might have struggled with the return journey myself!!]. Despite my many past visits, I wondered if I had really taken much notice of the following kinds of facts applicable to this area, as promoted by the conservation group?

The Bluff has more than 80 indigenous species of grasses; herbs, twiners, ground covers, shrubs and spectacular coastal wildflowers including many that are considered locally rare and threatened.

• From Prickly Stipa grassland      on the western slopes to the large ancient Moonah on the east represents      the diversity of plant communities on the Bluff.
• The rugged cliff face is      home to kites, kestrels and falcons and a host of hardy plants growing in      sand traps.
• The dunes to the west have a      unique natural flora and are home to the rare Hooded Plover.
• The dynamic tidal estuary is      a stunning ecosystem that is a regular stopover for dozens of species of      resident and migratory shore birds.

The rockpool shelves of the Barwon Bluff Marine Sanctuary are teeming with a myriad of marine flora and fauna and are the most complex of ecosystems.

Most likely not, and it was obviously a much more fascinating environment than I had imagined, but for today, not the ‘climate’ to prove or disprove those facts!! Back into the car, where we proceeded on a casual drive [to the annoyance of a couple of locals using the road] along the cliff-top coast road – some magnificent views looking out to the Southern Ocean and Bass Strait, but we both agreed, not the morning to be in  boat out on those waters – wind still quite vigorous, and the waves from this viewpoint gave the impression that any such activity [in a boat] would be highly uncomfortable, and probably quite dangerous!  As we drove, I looked for a parking spot, so we could get a better view out at the ocean, but there was no clear view by remaining in the car, so I persuaded Heather [and me] to brave the biting wind again and venture to one of the cliff-top lookouts. More steps down to the deserted beaches, which we decided could remain that way today!!

By now, early afternoon, and it was back to the township, for a bit of shopping at the only local supermarket that I could find – just behind the Barwon Heads Hotel, a remarkable old building which was probably one of the town’s earliest buildings – I spent a couple of nights here back in the 1980s at a Shire of Gisborne Council/Management team Conference and Working Weekend – had to share one of  the  traditional rooms with Rick Murrihy, then Manager of Administration if I recall correctly. Interesting to note that in the accommodation blurb, the note is included that because the rooms available are directly above the hotel facilities, which don’t close until late every night, some noise will be heard from downstairs. I would have thought that common to most hotels of this nature anyway. Anyway, our visit to the supermarket, and later, Annie’s again, was to purchase some items for an in-house meal tonight following a mutual decision not to dine out. That suited me for reasons already specified, and with the weather deteriorating again, sounded a good move.

Before we returned to the apartment this afternoon, did another around the town, and came across another very impressive set of accommodation units. Being curious and not shy, Heather decided to go in and ask some questions. She came back with the resident manager who invited us to have a bit of a tour and inspection of the facilities. Wish I could recall the name of the place now, but was quite substantial in size, had a number of varying accommodation units, almost little homesteads, and the internal facilities and contents were quite excellent, think we both went away quite impressed, with Heather retaining a little collection of literature for future reference!

We spent the balance of the afternoon and evening at the apartment, simply enjoying each other’s company, the music [mostly jazz again, although I did take the opportunity to share some of the music I play on the radio, which Heather is not able to hear in Ballarat], some wine [the establishment had left a rather nice bottle of champagne for our use], a casual meal later in the evening, and lots of conversation, as we continued to make up for 50 years of wondering where life had taken the other! It was obvious that my friend had been through some traumatic times in years past, but years which had also included two ‘solo’ holidays in Greece and that part of Europe. Obviously wants to return at some stage!

Thursday, 26^th  April 2012 – touring around the Bellarine Peninsula

This morning, the first of two of Heather’s famous ‘brunches’ at Annie’s restaurant – not sure if I could permanently adjust to this style of ‘meal arrangements’ but for this week at least, I’m enjoying the experience. Though admittedly, my choice of dish this morning proved a little too heavy – field mushrooms and other delicacies, delicious but for myself, a little bit strong for 10.30am of a morning!! It was certainly a very crowded environment, and one where it did not pay to want your own exclusive company – mostly a series of long benches seating up to 8-10 people [there were a few smaller spots but they were usually taken]. This of course was the perfect environment for my friend, as I came to learn and admire yet another aspect of her persona – the ability and willingness to strike up a conversation with complete strangers, and in the process at times, almost gain their life history from them. Today, it was a couple of other women, on their own separately, that she began chatting to as we ate our meal, etc – initially, by simply commenting on the glasses that one of the women was wearing.  Had I been on my own, despite the nature of the seating, I would not have ventured into any kind of conversation [I guess I bit more obvious in terms of an older man seeming to be trying to chat up a woman, regardless of what the real intention was] unless it was initiated by another party – and even then, I doubt very much that I would have continued to have indulged in an ongoing conversation up to the point where the other party came to the time to leave.  For Heather, it was almost as though she’d suddenly found a life-long friend with whom departures were treated in that manner irrespective of the most likely occurrence of never meeting again. Certainly, something about this lady, I am coming to greatly admire and respect, and would be repeated time and again, over the next couple of days.

After today’s brekkie/lunch, it was decided that a trip to a couple of the other Bellarine Peninsula beach towns was in order, and we soon set off via Ocean Grove to the popular resort of Queenscliff, another place I had visited my times in my younger years, and subsequently.

The seaside resort of Queenscliff is located just inside the entrance to Port Phillip Bay on the Bellarine Peninsula near Point Lonsdale [which we would briefly visit on the return trip].  Queenscliff was settled in the 1850s and soon became a strategic defence post given its proximity to the entrance of Port Phillip Bay which provides shipping access to the cities of Geelong and Melbourne. Legacies to Queenscliff’s defence and maritime history can be found at Fort Queenscliff where tours are available [I was a part of one of those tours some years ago], and further insights into Queenscliff’s past can be discovered at the Queenscliff Historical Museum in Hesse Street [thought of having a look there today, but waylaid, pleasantly, in book shops and art places!],  and the Maritime Museum on Weeroona Parade. The commercial centre of Queenscliff, characterised by historic shop fronts and buildings, is situated on Hesse Street, dominated by the ornate Vue Grand Hotel which was constructed in 1881. Grand hotels and guest houses can also be found along Gellibrand Street which is separated from the cliffs along the coast in this area by extensive parkland.

Queenscliff is surrounded on three sides by water, giving the town large stretches of coastline, consisting of a combination of sandy beaches, rocky outcrops, cliffs and historic piers. At Shortlands Bluff is the Queenscliff Lighthouse which was built in 1862 and includes a lookout near the base. Further north along the coast is the Black Lighthouse, unique in Australia, having been constructed from bluestone.  Queenscliff Harbour is located near the eastern end of Wharf Street and consists of several wharves which are home to a number of fishing fleets. A retail strip including a selection of cafes and restaurants overlook the harbour. A circular 30 metre tall navigational tower is located at the harbour, and there is an observation deck at the top which is open to the public and provides panoramic views over Queenscliff and the bay. At the eastern end of the harbour is a car and passenger ferry service which operates between Queenscliff and Sorrento on the Mornington Peninsula, providing an alternative to the road route via Melbourne.  Looking at the ocean today, while much calmer than yesterday, I certainly did not fancy that particular means of transport – though I do recall doing that trip with four friends from Queensland, back in the late 1960s, Alan Norris, who was working in Melbourne at the time, with his fiancée and a couple of her girlfriends, touring around Ballarat and this area in one of my little VW cars of that period. I also seem to recall been rather sunburnt ‘before’ we made that ocean crossing! Presumably, we had to make the return journey, as the car was still at Queenscliff!!

But I stray in my thoughts  again!  It is April 26^th, 2012, and today there are just the two of us, with no intention of getting on the water! First ‘port of call’ [appropriate description] was a quayside restaurant – forgotten the name again, but right on the port, which was full of moored boats, didn’t seem to be too many of them out at the present time, imagined this to be a very busy little harbour on the esplanade there.  This whole area was obviously fairly new and recently developed with shops, restaurants and some offices as well covering the complex. Just here for a drink and a nibble of something before moving on – via a couple of the shops, where Heather began another of her conversations with the proprietor whilst choosing a couple of small ‘soap’ items for purchase!!

The next couple of hours  – well we spent that time wandering around the streets of Queenscliff – sometimes together, occasionally wandering off separately, Heather to a clothing shop, your writer mainly in the couple of bookshops, one in particular, where I spent almost 40 minutes, and left with three purchases, including another of Arnold Zable’s stories about migrants, etc, and their lives in a new homeland – this one was entitled ‘Violin Lessons’, published in 2011 – and written within a quite modern recent aspect. More on that at a later date.  Meantime, also purchased another book for Susie, and a little gift book for Heather, which at the time, I would not realise the significance or impact it would have upon her – in retrospect, an intuitive selection.  Meanwhile, more shops, more wanderings, more examples of my friend striking up conversations with shop proprietors and others, and then we came upon a beautiful little at shop/gallery – where Heather had visited quite recently when she came down here with a girlfriend over Easter [explained why she was familiar with where she was guiding me too!!] –  now I recall the name this time – the ‘Seaview Gallery’ [86 Hesse Street, Queenscliff, even has a web site I can explore, because this place had some beautiful original paintings].  As it happened, there was an exhibition of  paintings by Michael Parker – it was some of his pictures that Heather and I had been admiring up at Daylesford a couple of weekends ago.  Here, there was much more to see with a full exhibition of a range of his works, which covered a much broader scope than had been evident in Daylesford. Born in Melbourne in 1968, and spending many years in Europe observing the techniques and styles of the masters, he has over the past 26 years, explored art and challenged himself by painting a range of subjects, including portraits, landscapes [these attracted our attention in Daylesford] and abstracted works. When he returned from overseas in 1996, he was commissioned to paint the cricketer, Sir Donald Bradman, walking out onto the Melbourne Cricket Ground in 1937. This very successful painting was reproduced in a limited edition print, 20 of which were signed by Sir Don himself. At the Gallery today, there was one of these prints on sale [I didn’t notice but I doubt it was one of the 20 signed copies] priced at about $200. I was very tempted, knowing exactly where I would hang it at home – Heather reminded me it was ‘only’ a print of the original, and while I  reminded myself that prints were all I was ever likely to own, I put aside the idea of a spur of the moment purchase [as I am prone to do, viz, that ‘family’ connected book in Daylesford]. I wonder, if like the book [by Lilian Kirk] that Bradman print will still be there on my next return?

Apart from the Michael Parker exhibition, there was a wonderful collection of the works of other artists – one of two of them, having being commissioned to produce limited copies of particular paintings – most of these well above my price range, but apparently selling fast, according to the gallery proprietor  – whom I left behind briefly with Heather, as she tried to sell my friend a lovely scarf that Heather had been admiring. Don’t know what the price was, but perhaps that should have been my call to be chivalrous and purchase it for her.  Somehow, I think it would have been out of my price range also! Heather came out of that gallery without the scarf!   Meantime, Heather had been keen to show me through a second hand bookshop, which was located in an old church, opposite the gallery we had just visited, but it must have been one of those weekend/public holiday places, no sign of human life around at all, apart from us.

From Queenscliff, it was across to the nearby spot of Point Lonsdale. I had bought the family down here on numerous occasions when they were younger, and had come here with James’ Grade 6 as a parent helper for their school camp, in 1993, I think it was.  From memory, it was quite a good camp site for schools and other community groups, and was located just on the other side of the sand dunes from the ocean fronting beach.  Point Lonsdale is a coastal township on the Bellarine Peninsula, near Queenscliff, and included in the municipal Borough of Queenscliffe. Point Lonsdale is also one of the headlands which, with Point Nepean, frame The Rip, which is the ‘narrow’ entrance to Port Phillip Bay on which Melbourne is situated at the head of the Bay. The headland is dominated by the Point Lonsdale Lighthouse, a rather spectacular construction which I have inspected on the odd occasion. The town had a population just below 2,500 at the 2006 Census.

Historically, the traditional  Indigenous owners of this area are the Wautharong people of the Kulin nation. The escaped convict William Buckley is the first known European to have resided in the area, having lived with the local people between 1803 and 1835. A signal station was built in 1854. Permanent European settlement began at Point Lonsdale in the latter half of the 19th century with the construction of the  lighthouse occurring  in 1863. Since settlement numerous ships have been wrecked here on the rocky reefs at the entrance to Port Phillip, hence the need for the lighthouse, which even then did not save all shipping that came adrift.

Our visit to Port Lonsdale was long enough for another coffee and a shared savoury for afternoon tea, followed by a brief walk along the estuary – this was cut short, by the tide coming in, and waves being swept right up onto the footpath, as one unfortunate passing walker discovered to his wet chagrin. Whilst I visited the nearby public facilities, Heather wandered back across the road – looking for one of the local clothing stores I think from a previous visit. No purchases made however.

Hit the road, back towards Barwon Heads, with a brief stop at the Ocean Grove beach front – I think by now the weather had become a little cooler again, so it was decided no beach walk today! For me, Ocean Grove has always represented the best beaches in this area. The bustling commercial and holiday centre of Ocean Grove is situated on the southern coast of the Bellarine Peninsula, separated by  the Barwon River from its twin coastal town of Barwon Heads. Much of Ocean Grove is spread over the undulating hills and valleys which characterise this section of the Bellarine Peninsula, giving good views down to the ocean and of the surroundings. Blue Waters Lake and the Begola Wetlands are two major inland water attractions at the bottom of the town’s valleys, featuring walking tracks and a collection of birdlife.\  Being the largest town outside of Geelong on the Bellarine Peninsula, it offers a wide selection of shopping facilities including major supermarkets, restaurants, cafes and speciality shops, spread between the main shopping strip near the coast along The Terrace and the Ocean Grove Marketplace shopping centre to the north on Shell Road.  Coastal attractions include the surf beaches  [there were some brave souls out there today] which front Bass Strait and several walking tracks that offer good views along the beach. The focal point on Ocean Grove’s main surf beach is the Dunes Cafe & Bar, next to the Surf Life Saving Club, which is surrounded by lawns, native gardens and bollards carved and painted into people depicting the life and times of the area, and where we briefly parked the car.. The Barwon River, near the river mouth, offers safe and sheltered swimming along its sandy shoreline, while further upstream is a jetty and boat ramp.

Back to Barwon Heads, where we spent a little time exploring the streets, and actually looking for somewhere suitable to eat this evening, or some form of suitable takeaway meal. I think in the long run, we both decided that once we returned to the apartment, we would be content to eat there, and be satisfied with each other’s company.  In actual fact, Heather was waiting for a call from her son in Melbourne, who was supposed to receive some crucial medical test results today – that call came through just after 6pm, and as it eventuated, I was rather glad [as was Heather] that I was there with her tonight  –  the test results were apparently inconclusive, which left some doubt in the air, and upset Heather to a large degree with her thoughts all leaning towards the  negative side of things. She needed a friend with her this evening, and I was glad to be available and accepted in the specific role as needed on this occasion.

More jazz tonight, a lightish meal for both of us, and more conversation about the past, present and future. I think we both agreed, that from the distant past of our 1950s primary school days, some unknown ‘force’ had brought us together here in 2012, but where we would go from here was in the hands of the ‘gods’ or ‘something’!

 

Friday, 27^th April 2012 –  back home after another of those ‘brunches’!!

Our final morning at the Ozone Apartments, and while there was nobody to ‘sign us out’ we did the right thing and attempted to leave by 10am. Didn’t quite work out that way – locked up the apartment, etc, but then we couldn’t get the key locking mechanism outside the building, where the key was to be locked away for the owners, and despite having to resort to ringing them, subsequent attempts continued to fail!  In the end, Peter [the owner, probably in disgust at a couple of incapable individuals] simply said leave the key & mechanism in the SEC meter box.  We were not happy to walk away, with that solution, but had little alternative. Hopefully the owner would be back here this evening, or he could arrange for their regular cleaner to call in – in fact, in retrospect, with us moving out, it wouldn’t surprise me if he was aware that the cleaner of the apartments was due in the near future in any case!

Anyway, with that little drama solved [albeit unsatisfactorily] we drove our cars back into town, and returned to Annie’s restaurant for one final ‘brunch’!! That occupied a good hour or so – I went for something I assumed would be a bit lighter this morning, a healthy mix of muesli and yogurt, etc, though wasn’t quite given enough milk to do it complete justice! Heather had a much more filling meal – in her usual fashion, this would last her through to tonight no doubt.  Meanwhile, not to vary her personality, whilst I was at the counter placing our breakfast order, Heather struck up a conversation with a youngish couple and their two young daughters.  As with the other occasions is was difficult to become a part of these conversations, and my friend always made sure I was included in any case. One of the daughters, aged about 6-8 years I think, had leukemia [Heather probably picked that up immediately, and it was fairly obvious that there was a problem of that nature]. Despite that, they seemed to be quite a happy and optimistic foursome, and the two girls, very bright and outwardly cheerful. Needless to say, the tests which Heather’s son had just been through, inconclusive, but similarly related came into the discussion, and I think [hope] that some of the doubt and negative feelings that Heather might have had about her phone talk with her son, might have been eased a little by today’s conversation with this ‘almost hippy style’ little foursome – I got the impression, they moved around a bit, for purposes of the medical attention required for their daughter, and generally stayed in caravan parks. Both parents were solicitors of some sort – interestingly, he had worked for a time with the Tenants Union of Victoria, with which my organisation prior to retirement, the Victorian Public Tenants Association, had regular dealings. He, or they, lived or were based in Northcote, and they were down here today, on a bit of a break from hospitals, etc.

From Annie’s restaurant, Heather followed me to Ocean Grove, where we parked our cars near the Dunes Café & Bar, and walked down to the beachfront, sat together on the retaining for a brief time. Heather had come here with ambitions of regular beach walks, but the weather had basically thwarted that idea – today she wanted to do that. Despite the fact that neither of us wanted to ‘part’ and go our separate journeys home, I felt that she wanted a little time on her own – sit and look at the ocean, and walk on the sand [both of which she would do after I left], and perhaps reflect on the concerns she had for her son’s health.  So around Noon, we said our farewells, and I left for the return to Sunbury.

Drove through Geelong with only a brief stop for fuel – had considered driving back via the  freeway, but instead, headed back across country, through Bacchus Marsh, and then onto Melton, where I stopped for a drink, and a call of nature. Through our regular communication,  I discovered that Heather herself had just reached Geelong where she had also stopped for a drink, before calling in to visit a girlfriend in Pakington St, Geelong. It would be late afternoon before she got back to Ballarat, mid-afternoon when I hit Sunbury, to find Susie at work until the early evening.

Feeling rather weary tonight despite the restful, and relaxing four days that had just past, and felt it a pity that tonight’s football coverage did not begin until 8.30, which would mean quite late getting to bed!!  I think tomorrow’s usual Saturday gymnasium session might be given a miss!!

The Carlton team to played Fremantle at Patersons Stadium in Perth tonight, and there were a number of changes with three players being ruled out from last week’s team due to injury. Andrew Carrazzo and Jeremy Laidler will both be out of action for up to two months as a result of injuries sustained in the Blues loss to Essendon in round 4. Carrazzo had surgery on Monday to repair his fractured shoulder blade while Laidler had surgery on his knee on Tuesday.  The former was a real blow, and disappointment, because he had made a wonderful start to the season. Chris Yarran was the third player to be ruled out of tonight’s important clash. Yarran injured his toe against the Bombers and while it was hoped he may be available, he will join Carrazzo and Laidler on the sidelines. Brett Ratten confirmed earlier in the week that both Andrew Walker and Dennis Armfield would resume this week. The big question is who else will be selected and will there only be three changes to the Carlton team for what is a very important game.

The game was on the TV at 8.30pm tonight  –  as indicated, in many ways, I wished it was on at some other time over the weekend, feeling rather exhausted after a ‘restful’ few days – those two descriptions don’t seem to fit, must have been the sea air!  In fact, as it turned out, the Blues went into tonight’s game as selected. I was a little worried about this game, as Fremantle were in pretty good form,  and one expected the Carlton team to have lost a bit of confidence after last Saturday’s disastrous result. However, after an even first quarter, the Blues started to get on top of the Dockers, and while the scores at the end of the match, were a bit flattering for the home team, it was a good game to come away from, over in the west, with any kind of win. Final quarter by quarter scores were:

·         Fremantle Dockers:    1.2.8      3.9.27     4.10.34    Final:          7.15.57

• Carlton Blues:            2.1.13    6.2.38      9.4.58      FINAL:     10.5.65

In the meantime, a new addition to the family was announced this week – the baby that Colin and Angela have come down to Melbourne for over Easter, and had to return before it arrived – a little girl to my nephew, Craig and his partner, Cherie – Krystal Angela Kirk. Another name for the family tree!!

11am, good session at the gym, rest of the day spent packing for my few days down the coast, organising radio program for tonight, and catching up on various other tasks.

A little disappointed that letter from Heather didn’t arrive in today’s mail – the mail between here and Ballarat seems to be a bit slow lately, as my letter was similarly delayed last week! Instead, I found the VicRoads Car Registration account !!

It was a strange day, weather wise – heavy rainstorm, thunder, high wind, and almost wintry conditions in the middle of the day, other times, the sun was shining. The rest of the week promises similar unfortunate conditions.  It doesn’t promise much for a few days down at the beach resorts, where the weather is apparently already rather miserable!

An email message from the Carlton coach  received today, following the weekend’s rather disastrous performance –

‘Dear Bill,  Friday night’s match with Fremantle at Patersons Stadium is now at the forefront of our planning . . . but that’s not to say the events of last Saturday afternoon have been swept under the carpet either.  We don’t shy away from what happened at the MCG. Clearly, there’s a need to address some big ticket items and we’d be negligent in our duty if we didn’t. On Saturday the opposition sought to make an imprint on the game and did so early. For the most part their pressure was greater than ours, they got in our faces more than we did theirs and we were basically reactive. We thought the game was still up for grabs at quarter-time. Both teams played reasonable footy in the second, but we missed our opportunities and they grabbed theirs. We closed them down in the third, but they seemed a lot more composed with the long ball going inside 50 and they also claimed their marks.  On the other hand, we were a bit cute with our kicking and we over-finessed. Whereas against Collingwood we smothered a lot of opposition kicks, this time around a lot of our kicks were smothered – which had a lot to do with the implied pressure around the ball carrier. It seemed that we were always having to kick over a man to get the ball inside 50 whereas our opponents had “clean air” when they kicked with no bodies in front of them and therefore found it easier to hit their forwards. The early injury setbacks to Jeremy Laidler and of course Carrazzo may have unbalanced us somewhat. We had planned to make Dustin Fletcher a bit more accountable with Mitch Robinson, but we needed “Robbo” in midfield because of the numbers and Fletcher went to Jeff Garlett anyway.  On top of that, our sub Brock McLean, as a midfielder, was ready to fill the breach once Carrazzo was out of the game, so ultimately we make no excuses for our performance. Put simply, we were beaten by a hungrier opponent.

Kind Regards

Brett Ratten
Member #1018372

A wonderful night of music on the radio tonight, well on my show anyway!! This Wednesday would be Anzac Day, and in view of that, I decided that tonight’s program would be entirely devoted to a form of dedication to that event. So I played a series of songs and music from the war years, a selection of military marches,  and even a couple of extended march pasts [from the UK]  plus various other elements, all aimed at keeping within the Anzac Day frame of mind. I don’t normally get a great number of phone calls during my programs, but did receive a couple of welcome calls tonight – one from a gentleman who didn’t give his name, but seemed to be from a military background, had listened to the first part of the program, which encouraged him to believe he was going to enjoy the rest of it. Later in the night Jean of ‘the Carousel’ Tuesday program rang to tell me that were her 90 year old father still awake in his hostel, he would be ‘loving’ the band music!! Hopefully, there were others out there similarly getting something ‘special’ from tonight’s show, which went overtime a little.

 Enjoyed my return to the Sunday morning show, must have been keen, got there earlier than necessary, so started the show earlier, at 6.15 am. But no messing around afterwards, straight back home, had many things I wanted to get organised over the next couple of days.

Meanwhile Jodie was apparently the organiser of an ‘Inaugural Olympics Melbourne West Action Tournament’ to be held throughout today at the Action Indoor Sports at Maribyrnong, which is I think associated with where she works [Surf Life Saving Association]. I had initially accepted an invitation to go over there – noticed that Susie and James were doing so –  but I realised that the invites were really for people [much younger than me!!] to participate in the events, and as I had a lot to do at home today, decided to give the event a miss. Don’t think I will be missed, hope Jodie not offended!!  From subsequent reports by Susan, James and others, the outcome of the day was quite successful, and various congratulations were being extended to Jodie for her organising.

On the Federal political front. The Speaker of the House of Representatives stepped aside from his role this evening, pending an investigation of claims he misused cab-charges, and also, accusations of sexual misconduct with a male staffer!!  These politicians just don’t seem to be able to keep out of trouble!!  No doubt, over the weeks ahead this item, amongst others is likely to dominate much media attention.

In the meantime, after today’s 4^th Round of AFL matches, the top 8 teams now look like this:

1. West Coast Eagles           16
2. Sydney Swans                  16
3. Essendon                          16
4. Carlton                             12
5. Adelaide                           12
6. Fremantle                         12
7. St Kilda                              8
8. North Melbourne                8

This was my piece of Face Book poetry for this Saturday morning:-

Wisdom can see the red, the rose,

the stained and sculptured curve of grey,

the charcoal scars of fire, and see

around that living tower of tree

the hermit tatters of old bark

split down and strip to end the season;

and can be quiet and not look

for reasons past the edge of reason.

[from ‘Gum Trees Stripping’ by Judith Wright, 1915-2000]

Judith Arundell Wright (31 May 1915 – 26 June 2000) was an Australian poet, environmentalist and campaigner for Aboriginal land rights. I’m more familiar with her through her poetry, and amongst my literary collections, have at least one booklet of some of her poems. As noted in Wikipedia, Judith Wright was the author of several collections of poetry. She was a lover of nature too. Her work is noted for a keen focus on the Australian environment, which began to gain prominence in Australian art in the years following World War II. She deals with the relationship between settlers, Indigenous Australians and the bush, among other themes. Wright’s aesthetic centres on the relationship between mankind and the environment, which she views as the catalyst for poetic creation. Her images characteristically draw from the Australian flora and fauna, yet contain a mythic substrata that probes at the poetic process, limitations of language, and the correspondence between inner existence and objective reality’

That’s today’s poetry lesson!!

A normal Saturday visit to the gymnasium this morning, followed by a rushed return home, a quick shower & change, and down to the railway station Unfortunately, due to more weekend track-works, there were no trains running – transport into the city would be by coach today, which turned out quite comfortable as it was, although reading on the bus not quite as beneficial.  I was off to my second football game in as many weeks at the Melbourne Cricket Ground after not being here for about 3 years. Carlton versus Essendon this afternoon, both teams undefeated!  This time I was alone – everyone working, or busy otherwise –  but at least today, despite another expected large crowd, I was able to get into the crowd without having to pay an extra charge for a reserved seat. In fact I ended up in a similar seat to last week, this time almost looking right down over the goals. I was there far too early for a 1.45pm start, but at least that enabled me to choose the position I wanted within the area available.

It was a sunny afternoon, but I never anticipated it would actually be uncomfortably hot, having expected overcast conditions to dominate the afternoon. So the warmth of the sun, shining directly into this spectator’s face for part of the game, came as a surprise, and for a while a bit of a concern – never even thought to bring a hat with me. However, in the context of the afternoon, the sun was the least of my worries. For the first three matches this season, the Blues had ‘owned’ the midfield, dominating contested possessions and also the outside game and uncontested marks. That all changed today, after an even first quarter, and my team looked – well, disgraceful, missing kicking opportunities, wrong decisions [constantly], it was a complete reverse of the kind of form they had turned on last week. One spectator from the Essendon crowd referred to Carlton as a ‘rabble’, and he wasn’t far wrong – that’s the way they looked and played for 65% of the match. An attempted fight-back in the last quarter, but the match was too far gone by then, it was all too late.  Yes, it was disappointing to watch that, not so much at the loss itself, but at the manner in which it occurred. As the Carlton coach would comment later, his players had failed to respond to Essendon’s bruising start and greater urgency to win the hard ball. And when they did try, mistakes and indecision were everywhere.  Not the reason for the loss, , but it was certainly not helped by a star of the first three weeks, being crashed to the ground early in the first quarter and having to leave the field, giving the opponents he probably would have come out on top of, a free reign almost for most of the game. I’m talking about Andrew Carrazzo, and I would be sorry to read next day that he was likely to be out of the game for up to 8 weeks, with a fractured right shoulder blades – disappointing news for our No. 44.

Quarter by quarter scores:

Carlton Blues:          4.4.28      4.7.31      5.12.42       Final:    11.13.79

Essendon Bombers:  3.6.24     8.11.59    12.17.89     FINAL:  15.19.109

Crowd: 73, 172

After the game, made the ‘mistake’ of walking back into the city from the MCG – would probably have been preferable to ‘brave’ the crowded trams or trains, because by the time I got to Flinders Street, transport going on to Southern Cross seemed to be rare indeed, would have got there quicker by continuing to walk!! Oh well, gave up worrying about aiming for a particular ‘coach’ back to Sunbury – would just take what was available once I got to the terminal. In fact, eventually managed a 5.35 express coach to Sunbury [which actually turned out to be not very ‘express’ because of heavy traffic all the way out the highways]. The sooner they get these rail works, the more comfortable it will be getting into the city and back again!

It was a weary and disappointed supported who finally got back to Sunbury around 6.30pm, and after a bit of shopping, made his way home, where he intended to remain for the rest of the night!!………………………….

 

I woke this morning to discover, that as anticipated, the Second Cricket Test in the Caribbean ended in a draw, although I think we have to blame the weather for that, with rain stopping play early on both the 4^th and 5^th days of the match. Anyway, for the record, this was the final overall scoreboard.

From Queens Park Oval, Port-Of-Spain:  Australia won the Toss, and elected to bat.

Australia:      311,  and 8 declared for 160 [Ricky Ponting, top score 41]

West Indies:  257,  and 2 for 53……………………………………MATCH DRAWN

Drove over to Bunning’s Hardware & Garden store this morning, and purchased a few little plants to brighten up [and fill some gaps] in my front garden.  Straight into that garden when I returned home –  planted my purchases while the sun was trying to weakly shine, with the weather prospects not looking too good. We will see what the day brings.  I’m predicting it will improve, which in fact it did, we ended up with another beautiful Autumn afternoon, and overall, I probably managed a few hours today, attending to matters in both the front and back garden areas.  The other day, while beginning a long overdue clean-up along the non-public side of the house, I’d discovered that the brick pathway that ran down the middle of part of that area had collapsed, or should I say, the ground underneath had subsided, and taken much of the brickwork with it!! Another task to be attended to, but before deciding what to do there, I would clear the whole area first, of excess growth, etc.

Meanwhile news from the Blues as they prepare for tomorrow’s clash against the equally unbeaten Essendon team, included a special notice from Club President, and former champion captain, Stephen Kernahan – which began with  ‘Leading into this season Brett Ratten and the players openly stated their goal for 2012 is to finish in the top four.  The performances to start the season have reflected the determination of this side to reach their goals in 2012.  While it is only early and there is a long way to go, there is no doubting the resolve of the players and coaches to work to earn a position in the top four on the AFL ladder…..’.

In the meantime, midfielder Brock McLean will come into Carlton’s line up for Saturday clash against Essendon, replacing the injured Dennis Armfield.  After sustaining a heavy knock to the knee in Carlton’s 60 point win over Collingwood, Armfield was cleared of any structural damage and is only expected to miss this week. Carlton Football manager Andrew McKay said McLean’s inclusion this week was reward for his ongoing consistency at VFL level. “Brock has been the number one performer with the Northern Blues for three weeks now, and has well and truly earned his place in the team this week,” he said. This will be McLean’s first AFL match for the season. He battled to maintain a spot in Carlton’s senior team in 2011 playing four games with his last game being against Melbourne in round 20’.

As a former student of Melbourne University [albeit many years ago now, when I completed my Bachelor of Commerce Degree, graduating formally in 1977], I’m also interested in keeping track of the University’s progress and achievements. So it was with interest that I noted that in the 2012 Times Higher Education World Reputation rankings, the University of Melbourne has risen two placings from the inaugural reputation rankings last year,  to 43^rd ranking, and remained the top ranked Australian university.

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The rankings are based on a survey of 17,554 academics from 137 countries. The survey asked academics to nominate up to 15 of the “best” institutions in their field of expertise, based on their experience and knowledge. The reputation rankings complement the Times’ annual World University Rankings, in which Melbourne is ranked 37th in the world and top in Australia. Vice-Chancellor Professor Glyn Davis said it was a tribute to the University’s teaching staff and researchers that it had managed to improve on last year’s excellent performance in the reputation rankings. Professor Davis said the result continued the trend of improvements in the University’s rankings over the past few years. Meanwhile, Professor Davis has created his own Blog so that members of the university community and the wider public can engage with him, and submit questions. The Blog also features speeches, audio and visual material, and general comments and opinion pieces. The following introduction by the Vice Chancellor,  gives a bit of an idea of the current status of Australia’s leading university, and one which I am proud to have studied at in my younger years.

“Colleagues, friends, members of the University community and the general public – welcome. This blog has been created so you have the opportunity to engage with me on issues affecting the University, the broader education environment and public policy. As you may know, in late 2005, the University adopted a curriculum which was a first for Australian universities. Encompassed within the Growing Esteem strategy, it combined the best of European and US educational systems, replacing the traditional undergraduate/postgraduate model with a suite of undergraduate degrees and graduate programs. The new combination was aimed at delivering an academic and disciplinary grounding followed by superb professional or research training, increasing students’ ability to study and work around the world and providing multiple points of entry to courses. The strategy reaffirmed Melbourne’s intention to be one of the finest universities in the world.
It was a difficult birth – as systems created through revolution often are – and there have been modifications along the way. However, the incredible persistence and hard work of our staff and our students’ preparedness to consider a different approach are paying off. Recently, first round offers to students through the Victorian Tertiary Admissions Centre (VTAC) showed Melbourne had performed exceptionally. VTAC data showed first preference applications for Melbourne’s degrees jumped by 21 percent overall from last year, the largest increase in Victoria. There was also a 24 percent increase in applications through the Access Melbourne program for disadvantaged students, including large increases for those from rural areas and low socio-economic backgrounds. In addition, Melbourne had five of the 10 most sought degrees offered by Victorian universities, as measured by first preference applications through VTAC. The demand has also contributed to a rise in the Australian Tertiary Admission Ranking (ATAR) for all our degrees – we were the only university in Victoria to achieve that.
Melbourne’s attraction to international students has also continued to grow despite a significant national downturn, with the University making 40 more offers to that group through VTAC than last year. We believe the increased overall demand reflects the growing awareness of our new programs and their attractiveness to students from all backgrounds. However, there is still much work to do as the challenges facing the tertiary sector continue to grow. Nevertheless, we believe we are well placed to meet those challenges and 2012 promises to be an exciting year for the University. The current CEO of the Australian Research Council, Professor Margaret Sheil, will take up the role of Provost, bringing a breadth of experience to the role. Both the University and Victoria will benefit from her appointment. Our new Research Strategy will establish a 10-15 year framework for University to continue its 19-year trading of excellence into this millennium and beyond. And we will pursue increasing internationalization and collaboration with Asia – notably India and China – and a greater focus on partnership with government and industry.
As Vice-Chancellor, I am very proud of our staff, our students and the fact that we are Australia’s leading university and one of the finest in the world. I look forward to your questions and responses and to engaging with you as the year unfolds.

 

Once again, I seemed to have slipped behind in my actual postings on these pages, so here we go once more resorting to a combination entry covering a week or so – I guess it makes the initial read a somewhat lengthy process, but to some, may be preferable to that entry popping up in one’s ‘Inbox’ everyday or two!!  Whatever, this is what comes from a relatively ‘busy’ lifestyle as a retiree on limited income but lots of interests. I think that what has come out of the last few days is the beautiful realisation that I have found a ‘friend’ from half a century ago, and to some extent, that fact has added a new ‘zest’ to my life, and the way in which I am trying to approach things. Perhaps more on that, as time progresses. Meanwhile, let’s go back to Easter Sunday, and the closing stages of what would prove to be a very tiring weekend for this mid 60s’s essayist!!

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Sunday 8^th April 2012 – the gathering of the siblings and others, and a final night of cycling!!

 

In bed shortly after 1 am, back out again before 5.30 am, and on my way to the radio station 30 minutes later. I think I surprised myself that I felt as fresh as I did, on air this morning! No rest after that time however – followed the program with some late minute shopping, and back home for some final clean-ups in preparation for the family visits this afternoon.

 

The main purpose of today’s gathering was to give Colin & Jean the opportunity to catch up with Robert & Evelyn, and to get at least four of the Kirk siblings together for a brief time. Apart from the group now up in Queensland, this was becoming a rare occurrence.  I think Susie had gone off to work by the time I returned home, I sincerely hoped she would get back before everyone left! First to arrive were the Skilbecks from Enfield [near Ballarat] – I’d expected just Ross & Jean, but the party included Rosie & Alwyn, and Rosie’s boyfriend, Marc.  Elder son Vincent remained behind. Soon afterwards, the rest of the ‘team’ arrived –  my ‘kids’ – Jodie [and boyfriend, Ash], James, and Adam –  soon followed by Colin and Angela who had driven Robert & Evelyn out to Sunbury from the latter’s hotel in Southbank. Shirley and Mrs Seipolt arrived soon after, her car laden with food, not asked for, but not unexpected!!  This was my idea to hold this gathering but Shirley and her mother had put together most of the food, or had told me what to purchase!! My idea had been a light afternoon tea, but it all ended up as a well catered for late lunch, which seemed to please everyone. Of course the Skilbecks had not seen Robert & Evelyn for many years, while R & E had not seen my kids for over a decade – when ‘tall’ Adam turned up, they thought he was somebody’s boyfriend!! Meanwhile Mrs Seipolt [Shirley’s mother] whom all had hoped to catch up with was the centre of attention for much of the afternoon.

 

Pleasingly, Susan turned up from work mid-afternoon, so she became a major part of the ‘celebrations’ as well. Susie was in fact a god-daughter to Robert & Evelyn.

 

I was pleased with the way the afternoon proceeded – plenty of conversation – some of the ‘younger’ members present got involved in a game of darts on Susie’s dart board [hasn’t been used for a while] –  thanks mainly to photographer Rosie, and others, a nice collection of photos were taken in the back garden [despite the temperature dropping from earlier this morning, it turned out a lovely Autumn afternoon, and the back garden looked rather good for photos – in much better condition than a few weeks ago, thankfully] – Colin was even persuaded [with some reluctance] to display his talents on the set up drums that had been left behind here when the breakup with Jimmy occurred [not sure what the elderly neighbours thought of that sudden outburst from the normally placid Kirk household?

 

I guess my disappointment was that until I pointed them out, nobody seemed to take any interest or notice in my Australian painting print collection in the lounge/dining area  – I imagine that for most of my family that side of the art world is just taken for granted, pictures on the wall, so what!!!  Oh well, I’m rather proud of my display even if nobody was much impressed.  I was also surprised that Evelyn didn’t ‘appear’ to take much interest in the shrubs, etc in the front garden – there had been nothing of note there when they bought this house 8 years ago, and having paid for the initial landscaping, I thought she might have being more interested –  she commented to Robert later that she didn’t remember what had been there!

 

It was also a pity in some ways that we had another cycling commitment tonight, as I think some of our visitors would have been happy to have stayed a little longer.  However, by around 5pm, or a bit earlier, the ‘party’ was over, and I prepared to leave with Robert & Evelyn – I had decided to drive into the city tonight, and park near their hotel at Southbank, and walk to the Cycling from there. While I was admittedly not overkeen on driving into the city, it would be  welcome change from the drive/train/bus/tram cycle of the past two nights.  Susan was home alone when we left, although she was apparently also driving into the city to go to a concert at Festival Hall.  Before we left Sunbury, I drove R & E up to the radio station, and gave them  brief tour of the establishment, my second home some suggest!! I think they appreciated that little gesture!

 

I’ve forgotten the name of the Hotel Robert & Evelyn were staying in, but as would be expected with those two, it looked rather glamorous, and no doubt was with all services laid on, both inside and externally to the establishment. A short wait while Evelyn went upstairs to change her shoes, then the three of us set off for the walk across St Kilda Road, and down alongside the Yarra River, to the Tennis Centre and the Hisense Arena.  As tonight was the final session of the cycling, it was a night of finals, and if I enjoyed last night, tonight also promised a treat, particularly as we had second row seats again, but this time, no view obstructions, and just opposite the finishing line. The only drawback for me tonight, was the pain from my knees – the opportunity to stand at the cycling events is limited unless you are walking in and out constantly [as many people frustratingly do] as the program is continuous and ongoing with little time allowed between events – time wise, very well organised. And with someone sitting in front of us this time, there was also little chance of my  being able to ‘stretch’ the legs in any manner. So while I loved the events going on, I did feel somewhat uncomfortable throughout the evening, through quite a bit of pain around the knee area – something I face at all spectator occasions these days.

 

What can I say about the night –  New Zealand won the first medal of the night [the Womens’ Individual Pursuit], which was in Australia’s favour because we were trying to stay in front of England on the medal tally, while an Aussie girl gained the Bronze. Then we witnessed a  wonderful win to our own Anna Meares in the 500 metre time trial  – as the reports would indicate ‘Anna Meares broke the world record in the 500 metre time trial, claiming her 10^th career World Title, and finishing the world championships [for her] on a high after a disappointing performance in the Sprint. Though the event is no longer on the Olympic program, it remains Meare’s sentimental favourite after she won Gold in the discipline as a 20 year old, and set the World Record for the time, at the 2004 Athens Games’. Anna was the 7^th of 23 riders to go around the track, and therefore had an anxious wait before having her victory verified. One had to be optimistic that her World Record ride  of 33.010 seconds at Hisense Arena would be good enough – it would take another world record to defeat her. The Australian head cycling coach, Kevin Tabotta, believes that Anna ‘will take great strength from this competition. She knows she can win a world title, she knows she has produced the fastest first lap in the world in history and that she’s got the world record over 200. So she knows she’s the fastest sprinter in the world. If the game plan is put together right on the day, she can win any one of her three events [the sprint, the keirin and the team sprint]. The key is being able to do it on the day’.  Interestingly, with England’s Victoria Pendleton planning to retire after the London Olympics this year, Anna Meares also indicated – after peeling off her world record, then a prolonged victory lap in front of a receptive crowd [which gave me the opportunity to stand for a few min utes] – that she might walk away from the sport after London. But first, she has unfinished business in London!

England champion, and cycling hero of the Beijing Olympics, Sir Chris Hoy, took out the Mens’ Keirin Final, a brilliant flashing finish over the last 70 metres to gain that gold, while the program finished with a magnificent Mens’ 50 Kilometre Madison – 200 laps. As with so much professional cycling, a race full of tactics, and I again found it difficult at times to know who was leading, etc. The Madison [or Americaine] is derived from  6 day races which began in 1899 in New Yortk’s Madison Square Garden.  Teams comprising two riders work together to amass sprint points or try to take a lap. Sprints are held every 20 laps with points awarded for sprints – 1^st – 5 pts, 2^nd p- 3 pts, 3^rd – 2 pts, and 4^th 1 pt – only one member of the team is racing at any one time while his team-mate rides around the top of the track banking until it is his time to race. The race is conducted as a ‘tag team’ format whewre the racing rider must touch his in-coming team-mate to effect the changeover.  This procedure resulted in one serious crash early the race with one of the European teams, and there was a bit of a delay briefly while it was determined if they could take any further part in the race, which they did.  All in all, an exciting, if not confusing, event to be able to witness. Leigh Howard and Cameron Myer, who were probably favourites for the race were ‘out played’ and  had cleverer tactics employed against them, particularly by a great duo from Belgium, who gained a  prominent position early in the race, and eventually put up a brilliant performance to take out the Gold. The Australians finished in third place.  Detailed results of the night were:

Day Five Finals of the World Indoor Cycling Championships from Melbourne

 

Womens Individual Pursuit Finals

Gold:Alison Shanks [New Zealand]

Silver: Wendy Houvenaghel [Northern Ireland]

Bronze: Ashlee Ankudiboff [Australia]

 

Womens 500 m Time Trial Final

GOLD: Anna Meares [Australia]

Silver: Miriam Welte [Germany]

Bronze: Jessica Varnish [Great Britain]

 

Mens Keirin Final

Gold: Sir Chris Hoy [Great Britain]

Silver: Maximilian Levy [Germany]

Bronze: Jason Kenny [Great Britain]

 

Mens Madison 50 km Final – [200 laps – 50 kms –

Gold: Belgium [Kenny De Ketele and Gijs Vanhoecke]

Silver: Great Britain n[Ben Swift and Geraint Thomas]

Bronze: AUSTRALIA [Leigh Howard and Cameron Myer]

 

While Australia finished on top overall,  the British team were superior in the 10 Olympic events to be contested at London. The Australian team for London will be finalised in June – a quota of 14 riders to be selected.

Final 2012 World Cycling Track Table results

Australia …………….. 6 6 3 [15]

Great Britain…………. 6 4 3 [13]

Germany………………2 2 1 [5]

New Zealand………….1 0 4 [5]

France…………………1 2 0 [3]

Russia…………………1 1 0 [2]

Belgium……………….1 0 2 [3]

Poland…………………1 0 0 [1]

 

 

I was starting to feel it a bit, on that walk back to the carpark nearby to the hotel that Robert & Evelyn were staying in – the walk to the velodrome had seemed quite easy, but despite the beautiful balmy evening [though in actual fact, now quite cool], and the view of the Yarra River on our right for part of the way, I was really at the end, counting my steps, taking me closer to the car!!  Anyway, got there eventually, escorted right to my car in fact, before we said our farewells. R & E would be returning to Sydney early in the morning.

At least tonight, there was no ‘hazzling’ for seats on trains and buses –  after I eventually found my way out of the South Melbourne area, it was an uneventful drive back to Sunbury via the Calder. Called in at the  McDonald’s complex for a ‘nature’ break, but made no purchases anywhere.  I was home ‘before’ midnight this time, just behind Susie who had passed me on the Calder Highway, near McDonalds [as she was returning from a concert at Festival Hall].  Didn’t go to bed straight away – watched the closing stages of yet another bike race – from France – the 110^th Paris-Roubaix classic which Robert had been referring to. In fact, knowing that he would still be awake watching that, I sent him a brief message to advise that I had arrived home safely, not gone to sleep as they had feared I might! It was appropriate, after the brilliant riding by the Belgium pair in tonight’s final race, that the winner of the French race was another Belgium – Tom Boonen, who won it quite comfortably in the end, though over cobblestones for most of the race, I can’t imagine it being a very comfortable ride!!

 

Monday, 9^th April 2012 – the Stawell Gift, and a conclusion to some wearying but exciting days

After the previous three days, I really had no desire to do anything of an energetic nature today!! Tidied up a few things in the house, following yesterday’s party, and spent some time preparing for tonight’s radio program [which by this evening, I was wishing I’d decided to take a night off], and then settled down to watch the coverage of the 2012 Stawell Gift [professional foot running], and a bit of Monday afternoon football.

I think the highlight of the Stawell Gift meeting, was that one of Win Seipolt’s relations on the Domaschenz side of the family, won an event –  Tara Domaschenz was the winner of the Women’s 400 metres race.  I rang Shirley’s mother soon after, to ask her if the name meant anything – it eventually did, one of the grandchildren of one of Win’s siblings was a recognised runner. Of course, if I’d known that was coming up, I would have had the tape running because Tara was interviewed during the coverage after the race. Win switched over to the Gift coverage, hoping for a replay but that was a forlorne hope!

If I felt weary today, it was likely to get even worse by tomorrow, and I must admit that tonight’s radio shows was one I was eventually pleased to see reach the end of my 3 hours on air. It was a bit of a struggle, but hopefully, that was not evident in the actual broadcast. From memory, I was in bed about 5 minutes after I returned home, some time after midnight.

Meanwhile, an extended Round 2 of AFL football came to the end following today’s game, which left the top eight teams in the AFL competition looking as follows:-

Tuesday, 10^th April 2012 – message from the coach

Would have happily slept all day, had my conscience and ability to do so, allowed me that luxury. Awoke to find myself physically drained and exhausted, despite managing to achieve the best part of an 8 hour sleep. I think it was getting close to 9am when I went down to the other end of the house – a rare timing for me!!

 

Midday visit from  3NRG’s station manager, Mike Cherriman – he spent about 40 minutes trying to get my printer into operation – he did get it working, but apparently I need new colour cartridges in addition to the black one I recently purchased!! But at least now, it was properly loaded onto my computer again!

 

Other than that visit, the most exciting moment!!! came through my email inbox consisting of a generic message from the coach of the Carlton team, reflecting on the team’s situation after the first two rounds of the 2012 season.

 

Dear Bill

With the preparations and planning now fully on Friday night’s match against Collingwood at the MCG, there’s barely a moment to reflect on the events of last Thursday night. However, it’s worth making mention of one of the procedural arrangements in the lead-up to the Gabba contest. Around half the senior playing group jetted in to Brisbane two days before the game, with the remaining half flying in 24 hours later. Timing decisions were very much left to the individual, as some preferred two night’s sleep before the event whereas others (most notably those with young families) opted to stay at home a little longer.  The Gabba game allowed us to trial these staggered fly-in arrangements and we gained great results in doing so. The thinking came on the end of the Maroochydore experience last month, when everyone completed the same flight on the same day (which wasn’t ideal for some) as we endeavoured to keep costs down through the NAB Cup.

The scheduling of the Brisbane match also impacted on our selection not to call on players returning from injury such as Michael Jamison or Nick Duigan, who had only five days to back up from a Northern Blues fixture. That’s hardly the best preparation and it was resolved almost a month ago that if players weren’t fit for round one then they wouldn’t be considered for senior selection until the third round to ensure they were fully prepared.
Significantly, Jamison, Duigan, David Ellard and Robbie Warnock all took part in an intra-club match at Visy Park on the same Thursday as the Gabba contest, to ensure their schedules were in synch with those senior players who took to the field against the Lions.  As for the Brisbane contest itself, the manner in which the players worked when they didn’t have the ball in their hands was very encouraging. With the exception of a five-minute period of the first quarter, when we conceded some soft goals for various reasons, we were very good with the pressure we applied and our capacity to defend.  Much has been mentioned of Eddie Betts’ memorable high marks on the night. As a consequence, he now throws something more at the opposition in that not only can he cause damage at ground level but clearly he can also fly. On the flip side, Eddie also knows that he doesn’t need to take ‘mark of year’ each week. His value at ground level, alongside the likes of Jeff Garlett is incredibly damaging and a major factor in our ongoing success.

On a personal level, in what was the lead-up to my 100th game as Carlton coach, I was grateful to have received a pre-match phone call from Ken Hands who also achieved the 100-game Carlton playing/coaching milestone. It was nice of Ken to call and I’m quite proud to share that honour with him.

In closing, if you ask me what I’ve learned from these past 100 games I’d say “Less is best”. In an era where the game is constantly evolving and so closely scrutinised, there’s still much to be said about keeping the message simple for the players.

Kind Regards

Brett Ratten
Member #1018372

 

Wednesday, 11^th April 2012 – slow recovery, quiet but active day

I guess I averaged about 7 hours sleep overall through the night, but when the alarm went off at 6.15am, I certainly didn’t feel bright and breezy. However, I was up for a while – made the weekly phone call to Ron Bourke at the radio station with a bit of a sports report, including some commentary on the weekend’s cycling. Meanwhile, for us sports fans without the benefit of Pay TV, the Australian cricket team was currently engaged in the First Test Match over in the Caribbean, against the West Indies. I think the game began on Saturday night, our time, and after the first three days, Australia’s position was looking precarious.  The West Indies had declared their 1^st Innings closed at 9 wickets for 449 runs.  At the start of play for Day 4 [which began at midnight this morning our time], Australia had lost 5 wickets for 248.  When I logged onto the website this morning, the Aussie bowlers have helped to make a good recovery, having moved their score onto 9 wickets declared for 406 runs with Ryan Harris not out 68, and  Lyon not out 40 [two of our bowlers creating a respectable score with a 10^th wicket partnership of 77 undefeated]. The bowlers then continued their good work, and by Stumps on Day 4, the West Indies team were  5 wickets for  71 runs, and an overall lead of  114 runs, one day’s play remaining.

Another quietish day at home, apart from a brief trip into town during the afternoon to purchase some coloured ink cartridges for my printer which 3NRG’s Mike had got working for me yesterday. Also caught up on a bit of computer work, and found a couple of accounts waiting for me in the post box!!  Meanwhile, Susie had the niece of her former boyfriend around to visit and entertain this afternoon – apparently the girl was missing Susie since the relationship breakup.

Later, while Susie [and Jodie] were over in Footscray playing volleyball, their usual Wednesday night activity, I went over to Ron Smith’s home in Elizabeth Drive for a Family History Society committee meeting. Though it was not a new sentiment, there seemed to be a renewed general desire and urgency for the Society to obtain a permanent ‘home base’ where we could store our assets, records, etc, in a manner and place where access to those records would be much more freely available than is currently the case. A need for a ‘friendly millionaire’ was the agreed desire!! We would all like to meet one of those!

 

Thursday, 12^th April 2012 – annual  visit to my cardiologist

I didn’t really feel like getting up this morning, despite waking at 5am, and really only dozed occasionally afterwards. Susie went out for an early shift at the bakery just before 7.30, at which time I arose myself. I was a bit disappointed at the lack of coverage, even on the radio/ABC of the final sessions of the cricket match over in the West Indies.  I did gather at one stage, that Australia were in a reasonable position to win the game, although the threat of bad light was hanging over them. I would like to have Foxtel TV but for the amount of time that I would not be watching anything, I’m disinclined to want to pay the monthly fees, and the rest! Anyway, I did eventually discover, through the ‘Cricket Australia’ website, that Australia had won a thrilling 1^st Test against the West Indies by 3 wickets. It was suggested that it was fitting, that the two ‘bowling’ heroes of Australia’s 1^st Innings [Ryan Harris and Ben Hilfenhaus] should be there at the batting crease, steering Australia home in the fading light at the end.  I think the match finished around 8am, our time [Wednesday afternoon in the West Indies].  Final scores revealed that Australia won the 1^st Test at Kensington Oval, Bridgetown by 3 wickets.

Australia:  9 for 406, and 7 for 192

West Indies: 9 for 449, and 148

I went back to the gymnasium this morning – hadn’t been there since this time last week

Annual appointment with my cardiologist this afternoon, 2.45pm down in Moreland, at the Moreland Hospital – a warmish afternoon, and quite a pleasant drive, although the return trip, in much heavier traffic was a little more daunting. [Dr] Roderic Warren [an Asssociate Professor] is quite a personable chap, concise and to the point, but someone who instils confidence from his patients, and if he thinks action needs to be taken, won’t hesitate to do so. He was outwardly pleased with my current level of tests re cholesterol, ECG results, blood pressure, as well as the diabetes results. And of course the pleasing response – come back in 12 months, although I noticed that he was wanting to do some additional tests for that visit. Fair enough!

Meeting of the radio station general members tonight – held this time in the upstairs function room of the Olive Tree Hotel – quite nice surroundings, no disturbance from patrons, or staff, and a reasonable turn up of  members. Meeting lasted about an hour – not a great deal of ‘general’ business generated from members, which is always a pity, though one generally finds that the people who do the most grumbling and complaining, are seldom those who turn up at meetings and/or other activities of the organisation!

 

Friday, 13^th April 2012  –  a night at the football

It was a coolish morning followed by another beautiful Autumn day – annoyed to wake before 5am again, and while I did get back to sleep an hour or so later, this is good sleeping time disturbed and/or wasted. Once one’s mind gets onto something or an issue of some kind, sleep is usually difficult to return to. I noticed that the ABC were showing one of their regular early morning weekday replays of the interstate football league matches – you would have to be a keen/loyal fan of those competitions to want to watch their matches at that time of morning [from around 4am I believe, usually in front of sparse crowds],

Another nice long email from friend Bev this morning  –  obviously she has still not recovered from the health issues that she has been fighting since I last saw her, 14 months ago, and while she is at least a little more independent, her physical capabilities remain very limited.  Seems as though, because of her age [about the same as me], that is going to be an ongoing situation. Good that she is at least still able to enjoy her violin, garden, and her backyard chooks and other birds. But in commenting on my little family reunion over Easter, that was something she just couldn’t contemplate these days.

A slow start to my early after that earlier awakening – but enjoyed the opportunity to spend a bit of time in a sunny back garden. Meanwhile, thoughts were turning towards tonight’s trip to the city and my first visit to the Blues’ 2012 official football season in the round 3 game against traditional rivals, Collingwood.

This was the Blues report pre-match, for tonight’s game – ‘CARLTON will be boosted by the return of Michael Jamison to the backline for the Blues’ blockbuster clash with Collingwood at the MCG on Friday night.  Jamison has struggled to overcome a stress reaction in his back since mid-February, but Brett Ratten confirmed on Thursday that the full-back has been passed fit to play after two games in the reserves.  While Jamison is a definite inclusion this week, fellow defender Nick Duigan (knee) will need to impress selectors at the final training at Visy Park to earn a call-up.  Jamison’s return is a major positive for Carlton ahead of the big game, but he will not be given the crucial job on Pies’ danger man Travis Cloke in his first game of the season. “Lachie [Henderson] will play on Cloke,” Ratten said.  “He’s done a great job in the first two weeks and his form last year was really good. so that will be a great battle.  “I think Michael will have times where he’ll play on Travis as well, but Lachie will play on [Cloke].”  Forward Andrew Walker hasn’t overcome a quad tendon injury and will not play, but Ratten said he would be a strong chance’.

And from today’s ‘Australian’ newspaper, reporter Courtney Walsh writes:

‘During decorated playing careers, it was often the biggest stage that induced the finest football from Nathan Buckley and Brett Ratten.  It is perhaps why both men, former captains who have become coaches of two of Melbourne’s most famous clubs, had little desire to downplay the significance of tonight’s game between Carlton and Collingwood at the MCG. Neither resorted to that tired cliche about this clash being no more important than any other regular season match, for no match between Carlton and Collingwood is ever that simple. For Ratten, the Carlton coach, it will give an insight as to whether the Blues have truly taken the step from pretender to contender. Buckley, still in the infancy of his coaching career, said such games defined a footballer. “Absolutely. Look, these are the games that you get judged as a footballer,” Buckley said. “We talk about finals and finals clearly are where players make their names and maybe their reputations.’

Joining me at the Melbourne Cricket Ground tonight, would be oldest son, James, youngest daughter Jodie, and her boyfriend, Ash –  Susie would have come too, had I been aware of it, but as I discovered this afternoon, you have to find her in the right mood to ask such questions. For example, if she and Jodie were intending to go to Ballarat tomorrow for Alwyn’s party, it might be possible to pitch their tent on the Skilbeck’s property – response, I’ve already told you we are going, and we will be coming back tomorrow evening!!  Almost sorry I asked, or perhaps asked the wrong person, should have checked with Jodie first!!  Such is life as a ‘generally no longer needed Dad’!! ‘

 

My digestive system playing up again today – thought a light lunch at a ‘noisy’ Brook Street restaurant might ease things, but not really. Anyway, a bit of shopping, mainly for tonight, so that I didn’t need to waste money on expensive ‘football’ food, then back home to relax for a few hours before catching the evening train into the city.

Travelled into the city with James – Jodie & Ash were in the next train! In trouble with both may daughters tonight – Susan because I omitted to ask her if she wanted to come to the football [I thought she was working], and Jodie, because we didn’t wait to catch the same train as she & Ash, and then further at my decision to proceed straight to the MCG, rather than wait for them at Southern Cross, and complete the journey as a foursome. At the time, I felt it wise to get to the ground early, in order to pick up the tickets rather than have to queue in a crush – well, when we got there, things were already pretty hectic, so I hated to think what an extra 30 minutes would have meant!

It is some years since I have been to the MCG to watch a football match. While the seats I’d purchased were way up in the Great Southern Stand [a difficult climb for me these days], they were quite good seats in a convenient location at the end of a row as far as I was concerned, and afforded a spectacular view of this magnificent sporting arena, looking down over the area just to the right of the goals at the Southern Stand end of the MCG. A comfortable spot, great overhead view, though my glasses were still handy to pick out the player numbers, etc, and as the scores below indicate, it would be a very enjoyable evening if you were a Carlton supporter. Before the game began, I sent my usual text messages to Jill, and Ian up in Brisbane [the family traitors who barracked for Collingwood, one to Colin [whom I’m didn’t realise at the time, but was already with Angela, down in Ballarat, where they were watching the match on TV with the Skilbecks]. Also sent a message to Heather, telling her where I was, and reminding her that I would be seeing her tomorrow afternoon.  Received responses from all concerned – non-committal from Jill [may the best team win], from Ian [wishing he was at the game also, though he would be glad afterwards that hadn’t been possible], Colin – [beer all lined up ready to go] , while dear Heather, not really interested in the football, just commented that she was looking forward to seeing me tomorrow!!

Well, it’s an understatement to say that Carlton dominated the match [apart from a bit of a fightback from Collingwood in the 2^nd quarter which gave us Blues supporters some cause for alarm] – in the other three quarters, there was little apparent fight by the opposition, certainly not what we would have expected in such a match of traditional rivals, and from the 2010 Premiers, and Runners-up last year.  The Blues simply put, thrashed the opposition, and we were not going to complain about that. Best players for Carlton – the usual stars – captain Chris Judd, Andrew Carazzo, Mark Murphy, Matthew Kreuzer, Eddie Betts and Heath Scotland. I’m sure that the coach, in his email later in the week will have plenty to say. The crowd was just under 86,.000, a bit disappointing when you consider that we were forced to buy reserved seats, and that all tickets were supposedly sold for a ground that these days can take up to 100,000 spectators!!  Bit annoyed about that process, with the fear that the same insistence will take place next week. My Member’s ticket is costing me additional money, as it is, anyone who wishes to come with me. Tonight however, it was worthwhile!!! For the frecord, the quarter by quarter scores were:-

Carlton Blues:                 7.1.43                 9.7.61                 15.11.101                      FINAL:   18.14.122

Collingwood Magpies:    3.2.20                6.3.39                   8.6.54                           Final:         9.8.62

Entertaining trips home  – at Jolimont station, hundreds of noisy and exuberant Carlton supporters, rubbing it in to the thousands of Collingwood supporters on the other side of the railway track on the opposite platform, where there was a deafening silence, as they waited for a train to take them in the opposite direction to the city – out to Collingwood and beyond!!! Quite entertaining, and James of course, after a night of beers, was making the most of it all. In fact between them, James, Jodie and Ash went through a bit of beer and coca cola during the game – I drank nothing, seldom do at these public events! I feel that Jodie perhaps overdid it a bit – by later tonight, she was feeling unwell, and deciding that she would be unable to join Susan in the drive to Ballarat tomorrow.  Listening to the phone conversation later between James, Susan and Jodie, where this fact was being relayed, and with James suggesting that he would go down to Ballarat with Susan, I got the impression that was not Susie’s best option, but a good alternative, because I doubt she would have gone alone. Yes, I was going down also [this is for Alwyn Skilbeck’s 18^th birthday party] but I was staying overnight in a motel, so would not be returning.

A long wait at Southern Cross for the last train to Sunbury – I gather that the Hungry Jack’s store in the station complex had been about to close when it was suddenly invaded by hundreds of football fans [including us], although this traveller purchased only a drink!!  The 11.45pm to Sunbury already fairly crowded by the time we got on board, for another  ‘interesting; trip back home. Plenty of passengers sitting around the passageways and door entrances and/or standing, which made me glad we had got onto the train quickly enough to at least get seats.

 

Saturday, 14 April 2012  –  weekend to Ballarat

Well after a glorious night’s football at the Melbourne Cricket Ground [anytime the Blues thrash Collingwood, it’s ‘glorious’], and before I head off to Ballarat for a couple of days, here’s my little ‘Saturday’ piece of verse, this time from Wordsworth: –

I’ve watched you now a full half hour,

Self poised upon that yellow flower;

And, little Butterfly! Indeed

I know not if you sleep or feed.

How motionless! – not frozen seas

More motionless! and then

What joy awaits you, when the breeze

Hath found you out among the trees,

And calls you forth again!

[from ‘To a Butterfly’ by William Wordsworth, composed April 20^th 1802]

Well, I went to the gym, gained a bit of extra advice from Lisa, one of the trainers, and was back home soon after 10am, for a quick shower and change of clothes, before hitting the road for the drive to  Ballarat.

Beautiful morning, nice day for a drive, and was at the motel in Eureka Street just after 12 noon. I was a little annoyed that there was no-one at reception – busy cleaning units somewhere. While I’d not expected to have been able to check in at that point, I did want to confirm that I would be going ahead with the reservation! Decided to ring later.   Meantime drove up to a little cafe near the corner of Drummond and Mair Streets [which I eventually found] and found Heather waiting for me, having offered to shout me a coffee before I drove out to Enfield [the Skilbeck’s house]. Unfortunately, as I was already late for that occasion [Alwyn’s midday party] our coffee break was a short one of around 30 minutes.

I’d also been concerned about Susie and James finding their way to the Skilbecks. A text from James, to confirm the address of their destination did not seem to want any more information, and I should have realised later, that Susie, as she would remind me, could ‘read directions’!!  Anyway, said my farewells to Heather [and the cafe proprietors – she obviously frequents these places regularly, as seems to know everyone] –  we would hopefully meet up later tonight.  The Enfield party would probably see me out there until around 6/7 pm, while Heather herself was going to another 18^th party [her granddaughter] out at Buninyong which started about 7pm. She only wanted to stay for an hour or so, planning for us to catch up afterwards.  In fact, she had asked me if I would like to come to Buninyong with her, but because I was unsure about the timing of Alwyn’s event – and admittedly, because I was a little uncomfortable about turning up at Heather’s family party & looking for all intents and purposes as her partner for the night [just didn’t seem good timing, although as it turned out, she would be asked by a number of people present ‘where was Bill?’] – anyway, declined that offer as a timing clash or something.

Meanwhile, as I drove out to Enfield, I received message from James – he and Susie were at the Skilbeck’s place. I arrived there about 15 minutes later, to find all present were well in to their luncheon – I’d wrongly assumed this would be a slow starting process as on previous occasions. Not to worry, most of the meat was gone, but that didn’t really concern me, was happy to concentrate on salads, etc. It was interesting driving out to Enfield – in the distance I could see a major stream of smoke, and I wondered it was possible that Ross and Alwyn [as members of the local CFA] might have been called out to that particular fire. Would have been a bit rough, on today of all days, and I think Jean might have put her foot down, and stopped them going. Of course, when I got out there, I had to come up with the suggestion that [like a few years ago out here] Ross had set fire to the barbeque again!  I wasn’t alone in that thought – one of his brothers who was present, also made that suggestion, in jest!

I enjoyed the afternoon – made a bit more pleasant for me this time, because there were a number on the Kirk side of the family present – usually, it is all friends and family of Ross, with myself the only visiting representative of Jean’s Kirk side of the family. And with James there, he had the proverbial football with him, and was quick to encourage anyone who was interested to join him out in the ‘paddock’ for a kick to kick session. I do believe that I even managed two stubbies of beer this afternoon, well spaced apart naturally! Susan also seemed to be enjoying herself, although by late afternoon, she was beginning to get anxious to be on the road, and I wanted to see her and James on the way before it got dark. In fact, the three of us left at the same time – James & Susan heading back to Sunbury, myself to the motel, via a Safeway store where I purchased a few items for a bit of an eat-in meal tonight, etc.

At the motel [the Miner’s Retreat] I was not too impressed by the reception I’d been receiving via a couple of phone calls, and then upon checking in. The woman in charge insisted that I had booked for ‘last’ Saturday night, and there was no way she was going to allow me to argue otherwise. I don’t make mistakes of that sort, and had the details written down as I’d made the phone booking. It was definitely her mistake, but she quickly overlooked that possibility that we’re found you a room anyway – which happened to be the same large family room I’d been booked into [as the last Available room] when I made the reservation. We could have provided for the whole family – Queen size bed, large single bed, and three bunk beds  –  think there is enough room for me!!

In some ways tonight, I was regretting not taking up Heather on her offer to join her at Buninyong – she had intended to get away from her granddaughter’s party after an hour, but it would be twice that long before speeches, etc, took place, and I think it was about 8.30 when she let me know that she was held up.  I really didn’t want to visit her at her unit too late tonight, but I don’t think she was going to allow me to reneg on that too!!  Another phone call around 9.30 – I’m home now, would you like to come around for a drink!! Admittedly, it was a much more pleasant way to spend the rest of Saturday night, in preference to sitting alone in the motel room. Think I stayed until around 11pm, before returning to the motel. While Heather drank a mini bottle of while wine, I un wisely had two coffees – probably the wine would have been a better choice, as sleep would be rather difficult for the rest of the night. Meanwhile, up until my return, the company was pleasant, we get on well together, in view of the fact that we last really knew each other over half a century ago – at primary school. I learnt that it was about 12 years ago that she left her second ‘abusive’ husband, and had been in this unit for most of the time since. For the past 12 months of course, she had devoted almost her entire waking hours to caring for her ill mother who died 3 weeks ago. Bow, as Heather put it, was ‘her time’!

We parted tonight with plans to spend most of tomorrow together – I’d decided to stay in Ballarat a second night, though not in the same motel, where that woman at reception had made up my mind on that score.  Meanwhile, as indicated, loaded up with caffeine, etc, I did not sleep well – the room, bed, etc was quite clean and comfortable…………………….

 

Sunday, 15^th April 2012 – a visit to historic and tourist mecca,  Daylesford

Awake far earlier than I needed to be of course – various vehicles outside my unit coming and going, though that didn’t really worry me. This is a very rare Sunday morning, to find me not at the radio stations – would only occur from 2 to 4 times a year, if that, so I guess it was a refreshing change.  I did wonder how my replacement presenter – Happy Jack  – was managing; I’d offered him a loan of some classical music but he had felt he had enough to complete the program!

While I was thinking on that, a message from Heather – if I’d not already had breakfast, she would like to ‘shout’ me breakfast at another of the cafes she regularly patronises. Quite a nice little establishment it turned out to be, as it was –  in Doveton Street, just up from Sturt St, was where we ended up, after I picked her up at around 9.15am. Sure enough, the cafe staff all knew Heather, and obviously had not seen her since her mother died, so commiserations and expressions of sympathy, etc, dominated proceedings for a few moments.  I gathered that this was a kind of regular routine for my friend – ‘breakfast’ as such was usually more of a combination of breakfast and lunch, and certainly the meals which we both  had this morning [a beautiful omelette for myself, eggs benedicte for Heather]] was sufficient to keep us going for a large part of the day to follow.

Whilst we were enjoying breakfast, I received a phone call – from the radio station President in Sunbury  – wondering why the station was off air after my supposed program [he had obviously not been tuned in, so wasn’t aware that I’d not done the show this morning – Happy Jack sat in for me – we both assumed, that with the normal presenters who follow me, not on air again, that Jack had not switched the system over properly to the automatic play [ we would both discover retrospectively, that Jack in fact, had stayed on to play some country music as would normally be on after I left – he stepped outside briefly for a spot of fresh air, and the main door shut behind him – he couldn’t get back into the studio, and couldn’t raise anybody on the phone – as he would note later in the week, if he had known which motel I was at, he would have rung me!!!]. Meanwhile, it seems that I can never escape that radio station!!!  Even for one Sunday!!

Heather and I decided to drive up to Daylesford – the temptation was a couple of great second hand book shops in the town!! But first, a brief visit to the Art Gallery of Ballarat. I wanted to see if there was another framed print of an Australian painting for sale, as per the painting I purchased a few weeks ago. There was –  a copy of the oil on canvas painting by E Phillips Fox called ‘The Love Story’, painted in 1903. For the price being asked, I was almost prepared to buy it, until Heather, who has a much better knowledge of these things, convinced me that while it was a wonderful picture, the frame that had been put around [a whitish colour] did not suit the picture, and I had to agree with that observation. For the time being, I will have to satisfy myself with the framed postcard size version, I currently have of that painting.

We drove up Humffray Street North, and I pointed out the old ‘Kirk’ home, at 317, until Mum sold it in the mid-1980s before she came down to live with myself and Shirley in Sunbury. The place was looking quite run down, externally, and most of the garden area that we had established at the front and side of the house seemed to be pretty well non-existent.  From there, it was the drive of about 40 kilometres I think, northeast to the town of Daylesford, where a number of my ancestors on the Jenkin side of the family [Gran Kirk] had settled in the late 1800s.  I don’t recall the last time I made this particular trip  – not sure why Daylesford was chosen, but it was a motel in this town that Shirley and myself spent the first night of our marriage at, then headed off in the opposite direction next morning. It would have seemed, in retrospect, to have started off in the intended direction in the first place!! Anyway, the only other major memories I have of the Ballarat to Daylesford Road were in my pre- Melbourne days, as a teenager, and participating in the Daylesford Relay – an annual athletic event, although I can’t recall whether I actually ran in any of the relays, but was instead part of the support teams, probably helping Dad in his official roles with the local athletics association.  Certainly, Robert and Ian probably competed on various occasions at that time, and in later years, after I’d gone down to Melbourne to work.  I also vaguely recalled coming down this road on the odd occasion with Dad, when he was during a spot of lay preaching at the little country Methodist churches in the district, most of which I think have long since closed.

It was a beautiful day in Daylesford, quite warm in the sunshine, and as what was now a popular tourist town, the place was very busy and crowded in some places. It’s a former gold mining town about 115 kilometres northwest of Melbourne, in the foothills of the Great Dividing Range, so the area itself is quite hilly. The town’s population was just over 3,000 in 2006.  The broader area around the town, including Hepburn Springs, to the north [we didn’t go there today], is renowned for its natural spring mineral spas, where visitors can sample the mineral water [have travelled from Sunbury with the family on at least one occasion to do that] . That aspect, a great little shopping and restaurant/café area, a range of accommodation,  and a beautiful lake to the south of the town, make Daylesford a popular destination spot for tourist, for either day trips or overnight stops.

A gold rush occurred in the area when alluvial gold was found in 1851, with the town of Daylesford being surveyed in 1854. While Daylesford’s initial growth was due to the thousands of workers looking for gold, the town is much more famous for the bubbling mineral waters which flow from its many springs, as mentioned above.  Coupled with its beautiful mountain scenery, forests, gardens and lakes, Daylesford and neighbouring Hepburn Springs have become major tourist, holiday and alternative lifestyle towns. There is a thriving industry built around physical and spiritual wellness including spa treatments, massages and acupuncture. The commercial centre of Daylesford is located along Albert Street and Vincent Street. It features a generous collection of historic buildings including the post office (built in 1867), town hall (1882), and several hotels and shops.  Many of Daylesford’s streets are lined with deciduous trees that erupt into a blaze of colour during the autumn season.

For Heather and myself, our first stop was a coffee lounge for precisely that –  a drink of coffee, though mine was a little less healthy, in the form of an iced coffee!  Then it was back across the busy road [traffic and tourists] to the first of the book shops that Heather felt I needed to be ‘introduced’ to – she already knows me so well!!!  What a place to get lost in, with plenty of spare cash [which I didn’t really have with me]  – I think we indulged in there for around 40 minutes, and yes, I did make a couple of small purchases –  Charles Dickins’ novel ‘The Old Curiosity Shop’ [bought that for Susie while having no real idea if Dickins interested her – tried to ring, but my old fashioned Vodaphone mobile had no reception, apparently Daylesford was not considered important enough for that with this company!!]. Also purchased a 2 CD package of jazz music by Dave Brubeck – he was a jazz performer that Heather liked, yet strangely I could not recall ever playing any of his music on the radio – not even ‘Take Five’ which was included on this set [I would of course remedy that situation, first thing tomorrow night in my Monday program!].

A bit more wandering around the busy town centre – in one arcade centre, there was a shop selling mainly Turkish glassware and other like articles – though fairly expensive, some of sale items were quite beautiful and would have made magnificent gifts for family members and others.  Mind you, I just thought ‘that idea’ didn’t do anything  about it, just kept on walking!!

Drive around to another very popular spot just outside o the main town area – the Daylesford Lake. Parking quite restricted, and large crowds enjoying the sunshine afternoon with family picnics, etc, or partaking of the numerous eating places near the facility.  The Lake was I read somewhere – ‘water so beautiful, they built a village around it’!! Lake Daylesford covers land upon which gold was first discovered, and was created in 1929 and  located in the beautiful Central Springs Reserve, just a few minutes walk south of the town centre. There is a cafe built right beside the lake, picnic spots, walking tracks and several mineral springs. Jetties are provided for fishing and for those wishing to hire rowboats or other pleasure craft, although I think swimming in the lake is prohibited.  Of course, the big attraction was the bookshop/coffee lounge building on the shore of the lake, where we spent the best part of an hour –  a large part of that time browsing the books. What I did find was a small booklet written by a 3^rd cousin up in Donald [Lilian Kirk, who came to the ceremony at Charlton last September] on the gold mining in the Donald area. It wasn’t really expensive, and was signed by Lilian herself – I should have bought it on the spot, but not been a person who tends to buy things of that nature on the spur of the moment, I decided to leave it until another visit. Probably an unwise move, but I was gambling on the unlikelihood of anybody else coming across it in the meantime and wanting it!  We shall see how wise that decision was!! I plan to return in a few weeks. Anyway, after our book perusing, we sat out in on the balcony of the adjoining café, in a spot of sunshine available there overlooking the lake, and chatted over ‘another’ coffee!!

Earlier, Heather had stopped briefly while we were walking around the lake area to say hello to an elderly couple [older than us!!] who were sitting under a shady tree enjoying a picnic and a glass of wine – Heather just commented to them what a lovely afternoon it was for them to enjoying [she didn’t know them, just another aspect of nature, to talk to someone, in passing]. Sadly, when we came out of the bookshop about an hour later,  the lady of that couple was sitting on the nearby grass being attended to by ambulance officers!  She had tripped and fallen, breaking her arm!  For myself on my own, I would probably have just noted this with some pity, and walked on. But Heather walked over to the husband of this unfortunate lady, and asked him if his wife was all right, and it was from that enquiry that we learnt the nature of her mishap!  My respect for this ‘old school friend’ of mine was growing by the hour!

It was getting on to the latter part of the afternoon, when we decided that was enough sight-seeing and ‘window shopping’ for the day – time to head back to Ballarat, where prior to taking Heather back to her unit, I called in at ‘my’ Eureka Motel’ [where I have stayed on numerous occasions previously] and booked myself a room for the night, having decided to stay until the morning. After a short delay, it was back to Heather’s unit, where I stopped in for a few minutes – long enough for one of her neighbours [and a friend] to knock on the door a couple of minutes later – with a life size cardboard cut-out of former Carlton captain and full forward, and now Club President, Stephen Kernahan. It seems that my name and interest in the Carlton team had been shared with this neighbour, who as soon as she saw my car drive in, rushed over to show off her ‘cardboard’ hero!! I think she said she had taken it overseas with her, at one stage!!  Unusual lady!  Anyway, I guess the prime purpose in her coming over was to meet Heather’s new ‘friend’!!

Shortly thereafter, I departed and returned to the motel, where I formally ‘moved’ in, had a shower, relaxed for a while, before driving back to Heather’s place. We went out to the Western Hotel in Sturt Street, up near the City Oval area, for an evening meal. Quite a large dining/bistro area, but not very many people eating there tonight, although there was quite a noisy and large crowd out in the public bar. We both had fish dishes – different meals, and certainly mine was just what I needed –  fresh trout with scalloped potatoes and salads. I think Heather ate the fish & chip meal of the night, while I even indulged in one beer, which tends to be all I want when out for a meal these days.!  Anyway, the meal was enjoyable, the environment comfortable, and the company very pleasant, and there was no need for any rush to move on.  But move on we did, back to Heather’s place again for a couple of hours of sampling her cd collection, coffee, and even a wine. And I had the opportunity to admire once again, the magnificent original painting she had up on the lounge-room wall, a legacy from her mother’s passing, and the artist of whose name, I cannot recall. But it was obviously a major insurance  item!!  Whilst I was there, her son, Brad rang from Melbourne – had been trying to get her all day, and Heather was happy to tell him she had been with Bill, who was there with her now, drinking coffee and listening to the music of  the composer, Philip Glass.

Eventually time to say farewell to my friend for the weekend,  but we would stay in touch. I recall driving very quietly and slowly out of that complex – quietly so as not to disturb the neighbours [especially the lady with the cardboard footballer!!], and slowly, because of the rather  deep culvert that forms part  of the exit or entrance to this complex, a trap for unwary drivers! I think there were six units in this small complex, and most of them occupied by unattached women, although there was a retired male musician [ drummer] and artist in one of the units, I believe.

Back to ‘important’ matters of state!!!  The final matches in this weekend’s Round 3 of AFL football were played today, and while I only caught snatches of the results this evening, the following little table shows where ‘my’ team and the other seven currently best performing teams are situated on the AFL ladder.

Couldn’t get to sleep tonight – turned TV on late – ended up watching [with little enthusiasm] the very late closing stages of the annual TV Week Logies – not particularly impressed with the major winner, but then I generally have little interest in so-called modern Australian comedy type shows, and have little time for the ‘kind of humour’ that people like Adam Hills, Hamish & Andy, etc. Oddly enough, the most enjoyable part of what I saw was the finale of the whole thing –  the teenage sensation group at the moment whom I would never consider being interested in – currently during Australia and driving thousands of teenage girls to distraction, and causing major headaches for security personnel – ‘One Direction’  – I rather enjoyed the song they performed, maybe it was their big hit, but I didn’t mind listening to them.

Meanwhile in China, the Formula 1 Grand Prix was run tonight – in the motel, I had trouble finding the channel on the TV set that was televising [delayed] the raced, and I only found it quite late, when I just couldn’t be bothered watching any more, despite the fact that it was still a while before I got to sleep!!

 

Monday, 16^th April 2012 – back home and the Monday routine!

Woke up around 7am, but my plans to be on the way by 8am, I put aside, just couldn’t be bothered rushing, though I still intended to be back in Sunbury well before the 11am gymnasium session time. A brief ‘safe journey’ text from Heather before I left the motel, and I let her know later when I was on my way.

The usual ‘miserable’ patch of weather about 20 kms out of Ballarat, but things fined up quite nicely after that, as our beautiful Autumn weather continued. I returned via Melton, but this time, didn’t stop for my usual iced coffee, decided that would not be appropriate prior to visiting the gym!!

Despite another ‘busy’ weekend combined with poor sleeps, this morning’s session at the gym was reasonably ‘refreshing’, and perhaps a good move to immediately follow up the weekend in such a manner rather than defer until later in the week!  Although I noticed that as the day progressed, my ‘digestive’ problems of the past few months began to rear it’s head again, so that by the time I got to the radio station at 8.30pm tonight, I was facing another Monday night with a stomach ’playing up’  – rather disappointed and annoyed  that this ‘digestive’ problem of mine so often spoils my Monday night on air to some degree. Hopefully though, it doesn’t come over in that manner!

Meanwhile, another weekly message from the ‘Coach’ in this morning’s emails –  Brett Ratten, coach of the Carlton team.

Dear Bill

After the Collingwood game on Friday night, when most of the people had filed out of the Carlton rooms, I took the opportunity to speak to the players about the magnitude of the journey at hand. I wanted to remind each and every one of them that this was only round three, that circumstances can fluctuate very quickly and that along the way there’ll be a lot of battles to fight and hills to climb. The players know and understand that. They’re a mature group and they’re ready for the challenges that surely lay ahead.

Take nothing away from Friday night’s performance though. We were +18 for clearances, which was a real positive, and full credit to Matthew Kreuzer’s and Shaun Hampson’s ability to give us first use of the footy – it was sensational. When ‘Kreuze’ and ‘Hammer’ are playing that way it obviously makes Andy Carrazzo’s role that little bit easier because the ball’s not getting palmed to the likes of Scott Pendlebury. In turn, Mark Murphy’s and Chris Judd’s confidence levels rise because they’re getting plenty of access to the footy – and that’s a big momentum shift for us when you consider the game begins with a 50/50 contest.

It’s true we’re now no longer flying under the radar, but that’s fine – we’ve never shied away from that. At the start of the year we publicly declared we wanted to raise the bar, which doubled as an internal proclamation along the lines of ‘Come on, we need to lift and if we want success we’re going to have to drive each other’.
To a man we played pretty good team football against Collingwood. We had a good win against an arch rival which has got everybody talking.
But that is over now and it is time to shift our focus to our next tough assignment, Essendon this Saturday.

Kind Regards

Brett Ratten
Member #1018372

Admittedly, those messages don’t mean much to many readers, but their inclusion on these pages are all a part of my thought practices of the things that interest this essayist, and the Carlton Football team and it’s fortunes and misfortunes from year to year [certainly since the mid 1960s when I began to take an ‘active’ interest] form of major aspects of those thoughts.

Another pleasant Monday night on air – quite an extensive range of mainly Australian folk singers included in tonight’s program, which also saw the inclusion of a lengthy recent Australian jazz release by a group from Sydney [I think] called the Sam Keevers Nonet [nine musicians]. Earlier, I played a couple of tracks from someone I’ve oddly enough never featured on any of my shows – Dave Brubeck and his ‘Take Five’ performance. I’ve no idea why I’ve never played Brubeck previously, no conscience reason, as his music is well worth listening to.  But I found a 2 CD album in one of the Daylesford bookshops yesterday, so decided it was time I had a copy!  Unfortunately, the second of those two cds wouldn’t play for me on the studio Cd player, which was both annoying and disappointing!!

 

Tuesday, 17^th April 2012 – heater service, and a couple of sporting related notations…

I had the evaporative heater in the roof serviced today – something I intended to have done before the Winter set in, but my action was prompted by the recall notice received in the mail yesterday  –  and while that applied to the Cooler part of the system, and did not appear to apply to the particular model in our home, I did confirm that fact nevertheless with Brivas, the manufacturers. And then decided to have the service to the heater undertaken in any case.

He came mid afternoon, just after Susie returned from work – I used his arrival as the excuse to forego the gardening maintenance job I’d being attending to in the front garden The ‘Air It Is’ man noted that the heating unit was looking very clean, and the burners etc were working efficiently – unlikely to need  to call him back for a couple of years. It was while he was writing me out an invoice, that I received a text from Heather – she and her girl-friend [the ‘MG’ driver] had just had lunch and wine during their day at Lorne – if nothing else, just that fact made me envious when compared to my little serve of cheese and biscuits!! It was good to hear her sounding happy, after the recent loss of her mother.

A bright little note from one of the newspaper editorials the other day – ‘Cycling champion Cadel Evans is to be congratulated for opening his heart to adopted Ethiopian son, Robel. We encourage the Australian Government to grant appropriate visas for the toddler to move here with his hero dad and Italian mum Chiara Passerini [apparently there are hiccups in gaining that visa] later this year, so they may be with their extended family. Tour de France winner Evans, who is preparing for the London Olympics [and hopefully this year’s Tour] says fatherhood beats any of his racing wins. “It is the most beautiful experience of my life,” Evans gushes’.

Meanwhile, I think I made mention somewhere about this past weekend’s Aintree 7,200 metre Steeplechase, a race famous around the world, but which on this occasion , as no doubt many times in the past, resulted in the death of two of the competing horses. I’ve referred to this topic both recently, and over past years, and the weekend’s incidents, and a letter which appears in this week’s Weekly Times newspaper, reminded me of my attitude to the question of ‘jumps racing’  – an event I like to watch, but generally do so with a great deal of apprehension and concern. The writer on this occasion is obviously a member of the ongoing campaign to end jumps racing in Victoria, so presumably, he can only see one side of the issue. Nevertheless, most of his points are poignant, and shouldn’t really be ignored. He writes “Eleven horses died last year while jumps racing, and the 2012 season looks set to be just as lethal, with three horses dead in a month. How many more must suffer and die before Victorian officials join the rest of the civilised world and put an end to this deadly pastime? In jumps racing,  horses are forced to clear metre-high obstacles while running at breakneck speeds. The public consensus is overwhelming; a recent poll found 75  per cent of respondents want jumps racing banned. People who care about horses don’t want to see them break their necks, suffer heart attacks, crash through fences and collapse to the ground. Jumps racing was supposed to be banned in Victoria in 2010, but the Government caved in to pressure from those who profit from exploiting horses. The Government of Victoria must put an end to the carnage without delay. Until these races are stopped, horses will continue to die’. [Ashley Fruno, PETA]

Ended up getting to bed quite early tonight, but it didn’t do me much good – a disrupted sleep, woken at 3am [by Susie just going to bed I think!!!] and then it was a couple of hours before I could dose off again – at 4am, I was sitting up in bed, drinking a cup of green tea, and watching an ABC replay of last weekend’s VFL football match between North Ballarat [a much weakened team in 2012 from the past few years] and a powerful Williamstown team –  didn’t wait for the finish, eventually got back to sleep, fort a short time anyway!

 

Wednesday, 18^th April 2012 – talking about communications!\

After  this morning’s sport report, felt I needed some more sleep, and for a change, actually got some! Sleep patterns over the past few nights have not been very beneficial or successful, and at this time of day, early morning, I seem to feel it the most!

Into town around lunchtime, for a drink and a bit of shopping. Ran into Jack Harris and partner Orr, from Diggers Rest, and the radio station. Jack had sat in for me on Sunday morning early, while I was in Ballarat. He was returning to Thailand next week for his usual 6 months away from the Victorian winters, but this time, he was going alone. Orr [his Thai wife] had a job in Gisborne at a Thai Restaurant up there that she did not want to lose, so in preference to that happening, she had decided to forego returning to Thailand this year. Personally, I thought Jack should have remained here with her, but that was his decision – I think he was beginning to realise that despite being with Orr’s Thai family, he would find himself a little lonely, and was likely to return to Diggers Rest earlier than normal!! An interesting couple, and I was pleased that they regarded me as a friend. I told Jack to make sure that Orr had my number, in case she had any problems while Jack was away.

From the most recent edition of the University of Melbourne’s ‘Insights’ publication  [which arrived in the mail this week]-  ‘What are often labelled as ‘soft’ skills – people and communication skills for example – are at least as important as the hard-core technical skills. Indeed the further you progress the more important they become. As a young accountant I thought the answers to problems were most often to be found in accounting theory and standards. As I became a manager and then a partner I realised this was only half the battle – the real challenge was communicating to clients who didn’t want to know and needed to be convinced. In 2007 as a senior partner leading the 120 partners in our Audit Division,  I learnt that knowing the right destination was only part of the problem – taking people on the journey with you, so that you all reached the destination intact and at the same time was what took the real skill. So when you get opportunities to develop broader skills sets, make sure you take them’………………………[Peter Nash, Chairman of KPMG Australia from an Address at a Melbourne University Graduation Ceremony, 14 Dec 2011]

I placed the above little quotation on Face Book, and received a range of interesting responses, a couple of which I replied to, here’s a sample:

Christine – Wise man Bill, communications seems key in any field J Have you ever seen ‘The Big Bang Theory’ on TV? I think the humor about Sheldon is from his skills: all being only in one field J

Bill –  when I read this, it sounded so obvious, and personal experience has proved it so [though not to the level that the speaker has reached,.

Rosie: I’ve always believed these are important skills, but the point has been really driven home now that i work with people who can’t tell you with words and who’s attempts at communication are mistranslated as bad behaviour.

Bill – Good point Rosie, but I guess my quotation was directed at economic and business graduates about to go ‘out into the work force’ after finishing their studies. Obviously people in areas such as yourself, have your specific understanding and means of communication with those who can’t communicate adequately themselves, and in many ways, you have to be more admired on a personal level for the way you do that – I’m sure people like Peter Nash and all his theoretical knowledge could simply not cope in your environment.

Rosie –  On a client level you need to remember to keep it simple but not patronising but then on the paper work side everything must be done with 0 emotion or personal input and sometimes that’s really hard. I do think though new doctors and nurses need more bed side training, I’ve seen some district nurse come through work with zip all manners.

Bill – Like the old story, the brilliant scientist who can’t communicate with his/her fellow man/woman No good all practical skills, in the absence of the human side to one’s achievements!! I was talking to a friend the other day who had a medical procedure planned to be done by a renowned surgeon, but the expert’s ‘bedside manner’ was non-existant, and made his patients uncomfortable and more apprehensive than they need be. She has managed to change to a lesser known, though equally efficient surgeon who has an excellent human relations side to his skills. Of course most people don’t have the means to make such a choice as to whom they deal with!

Christine – communication is a funny thing – I don’t recall all the poster now but went something like…Was what you thought you heard the thought I thought I said or perhaps the thought you heard wasn’t the thought I thought I said – or something like that.  Somewhere between sending and receiving a verbal message so many other things come into play that can change the message sent! eg. Tonight at work a customer asked did we have a magazine rack?  2 of 3 of us who heard that request, thought the customer wished to see racks to hold magazines…somehow 1 understood as was meant: is there a rack someplace holding magazines for sale? As the customer wished to purchase a magazine. Language never ceases to amaze me!

Bill – Well said Christine, not much I can add to that, except to reiterate what was said right at the beginning – we want everyone to reach the same destination, at the same time – though I guess we should ensure there is room for everyone at that destination, lol!!!

Reading from today’s Weekly Times, there was quite a bit of mention of the new leader of the Green’s Party, after last week’s resignation as leader by Bob Brown, and the accession of Christine Milne to take his place. I’ve never been over keen on either of those two – often felt their ideas and the kind of policies they push were too extreme in many examples. Certainly Bob Brown has the personal charisma at times, although his pushing of the gay issue also annoyed me at times – a very personal agenda for himself as a confessed gay. As for his replacement, Christine Milne comes over as a tough, and intelligent advocate for her Party, although that doesn’t mean I particularly like her. But I see in the Weekly Times, that she is obviously trying to ‘build bridges’ with the rural sector – important as the Greens and organisations such as the National Farmers Federation have seldom seen eye to eye. So today, she was beginning a ‘rural tour’, her aim being to get the Greens and the rural sector and regional Australia working together. As she stated, the Greens had shared common issues with farmers, things like tighter controls on foreign investment [I’m all for that myself], better food labelling, and a tax on junk food advertising to pay for the promotion of Australian farm produce. Her aim was to put right past misunderstandings between the Greens and the bush. And in particular I imagine with reference to the investment question –  ‘if farmers are to produce food, we need to ensure they can stay on their farms’.  It wiull be interesting to see how this all pans out – of course, getting the support of the bush, helps the Greens to take more votes from the other parties, particularly the Nationals. In a major article in today’s rural newspaper, Christine Milne has headed her comments with ‘We are not bush bashers’ – not a green-eyed monster!!  Well that remains to be seen.

Meanwhile the Weekly Times editorial, in referring to the question of foreign investment, and specifically within the farm sector says ‘Foreign governments and companies should pay the same taxes and levies as Australian producers……..The issue illustrates Australia’s lack of planning and preparedness for a wave of foreign investments, which other countries have openly flagged. It’s like being told we’re going to have a scorching hot summer and installing a pool instead of preparing a fire plan and reducing the fuel load around the house.  China has talked of its multi-billion dollar raid on Australian farms worth less than the ridiculous $244 million threshold which triggers a ‘national interest’ test. The test itself remains a joke because no purchase has ever failed it. And the Qatar Government openly informs us it intends to buy Australian farmland for the purposes of feeding its people…………………………………….our laws around foreign investment and the taxation and levy treatment of foreign companies and governments are obsolete. We’re hurtling towards a brick wall at breakneck speed and have never bothered to check our breaking system’.  As I’ve noted in these pages before, the speed at which Australian companies, and farmlands are been sold to overseas interests, has always been a real concern to the extent that one has to wonder just how much of Australia will actually belong to Australia in four decades?

One area which is wholly Australian is Tobin Brothers Funerals  –  at the Family History Society meeting to night [which had a great attendance of listeners and members], a representative from the local branch of that organisation, which was established back in 1934, noted that it remained a completely Australian owned family organisation. Despite the nature of the subject matter, that was quite an interesting talk tonight, and a large portion of it was in the form of responses to questions posed by us, the audience. As the introduction to their little history book says –  ‘It could have been said that a man would need the luck of the Irish to launch a successful new business venture in the early 1930s.  But in the wake of the Great Depression, the Tobin brothers, from Irish stock, drew on their reserves of inventiveness and determination, and their willingness to try something new, and started a business that now operates from twenty-seven locations in three states, employing 160 staff and turning over $26 million a year’.  As well as taking away a copy of that ‘story’, I also gained a copy of a little booklet titled ‘Statement of Wishes’ which virtually allows the reader to list in some detail the kinds of issues and wishes they would like to have included when their funeral is eventually held  – the kind of things that a family will be asked in any case, prior to the funeral of a loved one. In the introduction, the ‘Statement of Wishes planning tool’ as the booklet is referred to, is aimed at giving the opportunity to capture the decisions and choices you wish to specify,  to enable the funeral director [Tobin Brothers in this case] to help you plan a funeral that truly reflects your life, or the life of your loved one.  I guess, as the years pass, this something I have thought about, and it provides a good opportunity to write down those thoughts, so that my family don’t have to be so bothered to chase up details.  I think I will take advantage of it.

For a change, I think I had a better sleep tonight, woke once, but drifted off again, a change from recent nights. Earlier in the evening, a pleasant exchange of texts plus a phone call with Heather, who was busy planning the little ‘holiday’ she is wanting to have down the coast prior to her planned knee operation in May. I hope to do a brief trip to join her for a few hours during that week, although in my ‘retirement’ state, free days seem to be difficult to find!! Hopefully ‘life’ and various activities will start to settle down – perhaps at the end of the football season [which has actually only just started!!].

 

Thursday, 19^th April 2012 – weather change, and a Thursday night at home

Early morning visit to the gymnasium this morning – I am finding that this current program [the second level] is leaving this essayist rather exhausted by the end of the hour, and certainly ready to stop!! To be honest, I don’t always feel ready for the session as I prepare to go, but afterwards, despite the feeling of exhaustion, glad I’d made the effort!  Linda, the ‘trainer’ who was on duty this morning, is the best of the bunch, and is always ready to adjust my program or exercises, where I communicate that a particular exercise is causing me problems.  As she says, without that communication from me, she has no way of knowing that something I’m doing, is creating pains of the sort that the activity shouldn’t be leading to.

Home for a bit of computer work, before a quick trip into town for a couple of items for Susie who was coming down with a cold, then back home again, for an afternoon of reading and writing, while outside, the weather, while still warmish, became overcast with rain threatening.

Peter Mitchell, Treasurer of the Uniting Church Council called around this evening, laden with the Church accounts which I had agreed to audit, again. When I asked him when the annual meeting was due  – this Sunday, but thankfully, he didn’t expect me to have the audit finished before then!! I would see what could be done!

As a genealogist of some time, this was a little article I had to find interesting – not about human genealogy however, but of cattle. Scientists have come up with this theory. ‘Modern cattle are descended from a single herd of wild ox, that lived 10,500 years ago, according to a new study. Scientists from the National Museum of Natural History in France, the University of Mainz in Germany and the University College of London excavated the bones of domestic cattle on archaeological sites in Iran and compared them with modern cows, wired.co.uk reports. Using computer modelling, the scientists found the differences between the two populations could only have arisen if a relatively small number of animals – about 80 – had been domesticated from a now-extinct species of wild ox, known as aurochs, that roamed Europe and Asia’. Well, I guess I have to believe them in the absence of more detail – it’s amazing the kind of research that goes on in various parts of the scientific world!

Meanwhile, in the wonderful world of cricket, the Second Test Match between Australia and the West Indies is well into the game – in fact, early this morning our time, stumps was drawn on Day 4. In fact heavy rain brought the 4th day’s play to an early finish, with Australia not in a good position, though saved to some extent by a rescuing by Ricky Ponting, who was not out 32, in an Australian 2^nd innings score of 3 for 73. The scores at that stage revealed the following.   Australia 331 and 3 for 73; West Indies: 257. The Australian lead overall has been extended to just 127 runs with 7 wickets in hand, and one day to play. It would have to be a very brave declaration by captain Michael Clarke and a similar batting collapse by the West Indies, for Australia to have any real hope of winning this game.  A drawn match seems the most likely outcome. I would love to have a TV coverage available to enable me to watch at least part of the final day’s play, which I think is on during our hours of around 12 midnight until 8am approximately. Guess I will have depend on an occasional radio score through the night!

Another day of trains, buses, trams, and bikes!!!  Well, from late afternoon anyway. I wasn’t sure if the gym session was operating but decided I deserved a day off anyway!!  A bit of final shopping, and a day spent ‘cleaning’ the house [an Autumn ‘spring clean’] in preparation for tomorrow’s visitors.  Susan went off somewhere again this afternoon, so most of that ‘cleaning’ was left to yours truly [all of it, actually!].

I was off again around 4.30pm, for the same trip as yesterday – by car, bus, train, then tram – and again, reached the Hisense Arena with plenty of time to spare prior to the 7pm start. I would actually enjoy tonight, much more so than last night – less worry about the return journey, digestive problems, etc, and seemed to be able to get more into the spirit and enthusiasm of the capacity crowd. Robert & Evelyn arrived to join me not long after I’d taken my seat – the same  seats as last night, but different people [quieter] around us!! Of course, the enthusiasm for the night was greatly assisted by the Australian team picking of three Gold Medals and two Silvers!!

 

It was a night in which we saw Anna Meares makes amends for her devastating Sprint semi-final loss last night by sweeping all before her in the Women’s Keirin Final This was to be her 9^th World title over a number of years in an event that saw the English star, Victoria Pendleton fail to reach the final. Meares turned on a comprehensive performance in the 500 metre Time Trial– as she said afterwards,  the crowd was great, they got me over the line in the end. ‘It doesn’t make up for last night, it makes tonight special’.  Second last with 300 metres to go in the final, Meares unleashed a paralysing burst of speed to move around the field before stamping her authority.

 

There was more to come!  In the Men’s Individual Pursuit – an endurance event over 4 kms, and which is conducted as a knockout tournament, the goal being to ride the fastest time over the distance [seems obvious enough] –  Australia’s Michael Hepburn rode a great race, which the noisy pro-Australian crowd riding all the way with him, to the winning position. But the real highlight of the night for me came in the Men’s Points race, over 40 kilometres. This is an event where the final placings are determined according to accumulated points won by riders during sprints or by taking laps on their opponents. Points of 5, 3, 2 and 1 are awarded to the first four across the line in the intermediate sprints, held every 10 laps and at the finish. 20 points are given to a rider who laps the main field and any rider who drops a lap on the main field loses 20 points. The Men’s race was 160 laps, and Australia’s Cameron Meyer conjured up a miracle victory in the last lap, a win which sent Australia to the top of the medal tally. He defied the heavy marking of opposition riders to win his third consecutive points race crown [and sixth rainbow jersey – championship title – overall]. Meyer launched an amazing attack [with just a few points to his credit at that stage] with 15 laps to go, supported by Kiwi Aaaron Gate, to take a lap on the field, in the final lap of the race, and to edge to a one point victory over Britain’s Ben Swift. That last 15 laps was sensational to watch, and had the crowd roaring him on for it’s duration.  Once again, I’d been having difficulties just following who was leading, etc, and I think I commented to Robert with a couple of laps to go, that Meyer would not get there – it simply did not look possible that he could overtake the field with the distance remaining.  AS one reporter would note in the morning paper  ‘Meyer, seemingly out of contention, produced a blistering finish in the last laps of the 40km race to retain his world title. His bulldog tenacity in a breakaway with Gale allowed the pair to steal a lap on the field and run down points leader Swift in the frantic final laps. It seemed a frustrated Meyer was a victim of his own lofty reputation as other riders tried to ensure he would not win a third consecutive world points race title. Time and again, Myer powered to the front to establish a decisive break, but no one was prepared to work with the reigning champ and he had to call off the attacks to conserve energy’. With the crowd right behind him, Myer still felt he could win with 20 laps to go, in what was his last track race before taking up duties on the road with Australia’s new GreenEdge team. For me, despite some other great wins over these three days, the Myer victory was one of the most exciting sporting spectacles I have witnessed.

 

Meanwhile, Silver medals to Annette Edmondson in the Women’s Omnium and Jack Bobridge in the Individual Pursuit completed a successful night of podium appearances for Australian cyclists. Unfortunately, the opening night’s dual gold medallist, Shane Perkins, was overshadowed by Britain’s most successful Olympic cyclist, Sir Chris Hoy [knighted after his Beijing performances] in the race for the Men’s Sprint Bronze medal.

 

Summarised, the results of tonight’s medal races were as follows:

 

Day Four Finals of the World Indoor Cycling Championships from Melbourne

 

Mens Sprint Final

Gold: Gregory Bauge [France]

Silver: Jason Kenny [Great Britain]

Bronze: Sir Chris Hoy [Great Britain]

 

Womens Omnium Final [of 6 events]

Gold: Laura Trott [Great Britain]

Silver: Annette Edmondson [Australia]

Bronze: Sarah Hammer [USA]

 

Womens Keirin Final

GOLD: Anna Meares [AUSTRALIA}

Silver: Ekaterina Gnidenko [Russia]

Bronze: Kristina Vogel [Germany]

 

Mens Individual Pursuit Final

GOLD: Michael Hepburn [AUSTRALIA]

Silver: Jack Bobridge [Australia]

Bronze: Westley Gough [New Zealand]

 

Mens Points Race Final [40kms – 160 laps – 16 Sprints]

GOLD: Cameron Myer [Australia]

Silver: Ben Swift [Great Britain]

Bronze: Kenny De Ketele [Belgium]

 

Already after 11pm,  I would have liked to have stayed to witness the medal presentation to  Cameron Myer but decided to be on the way – Robert & Evelyn stayed on to applaud that effort. This time I decided not to walk, as per last night, but instead, walked back to the tram stop – virtually no one there when I arrived, but it would be almost 20 minutes before a tram came our way, and by that time, potential passengers were crushed up behind me. That first tram was only a small one, but oddly, the driver allowed virtually everyone who was waiting, to get on – which meant a total crush of bodies and standing room only for myself, who despite being amongst the first at the stop, was thwarted by the tram stopping a little further on than anticipated. Not particularly amused, but it was only a short journey to Flinders Street station, so we coped!

 

Caught the same train at Flinders Street, as last night – via the city loop to Footscray, where I had earlier optimistically hoped that things would be back to normal. But no indeed, all out at Footscray again, and into a bus –  only tonight, the Saturday night travellers were much larger in numbers –  and again, all potential travellers were packed into the bus as if we were sardines. I was standing, and dreading having to stay like that for the next 30/40 minutes under the control of a driver who was not over careful on his stops and turns! Thankfully, a couple of young ladies took pity on the ‘old guy’ swaying in front of them – one sat on the other’s knees, and offered me her seat. For which I was grateful. Later in that journey, as a few seats began to become available, I moved to an empty one, to allow the girls to resume their original seating arrangements. They didn’t really want to  –  both were quite ‘cosy’ together!!  Back at Watergardens, once again I was glad to see that my little car was still where I had left it – but I was a little annoyed that I was unable to clock off my Myki travel card at the station machine – I wondered how that would affect my account! Decided I would do it at Sunbury Station, but of course, by the time I got there [12.45am this time] I’d forgotten all about that idea!

 

 

 

This is the beginning of the Christian festival of Easter, and for most of my readers it probably needs little explanation, although probably for a large part of the ‘Australian’ population [excluding other cultures and/or religious beliefs] it has become little more than an extended holiday weekend. So be it, and I guess in many ways as things turned out, that was probably the way I treated it this year.  For a start, I had such a slow start to the morning, that I decided not to bother to attend the Good Friday ecumenical service on the Village Green [in fact, the ‘organisers’ didn’t get around to setting up the Marquee this time, so it was held in the Memorial Hall – that would have been  little crowded!]. I tuned into our radio station, wrongly assuming that the service would be broadcast as in the past, but would discover later, that while 3NRG had been prepared to take the broadcast, the organisers of the occasion did not get back to us, or request we do so!! Of course, I would have known that if I’d been at last night’s meeting, but was a little surprised myself that I’d not chased the matter up personally – just something that I had overlooked following up on!!

Anyway, over the weekend, an interesting little article was written in one of the newspapers, as part of  that paper’s Easter ‘message, and I thought it worth repeating here for my readers. Written by Darryl Passmore and entitled ‘We believe, just mistrust church’, it read as follows.

“Most Australians believe in the Easter miracle despite waning interest in organised religion, new research reveals. The nationwide study shows eight out of 10 people accept that Jesus died on the cross and 52 per cent believe that he rose from the dead. ‘From the marketing world and certain areas of the media, you’d get a sense that Christianity is finished and it [Easter] is all about holidays and chocolates and Easter eggs’, said social researcher Mark McCrindle. “But four in five people accept the message of Easter, that Jesus died on the cross, as an historical occurrence”. Half the 1094 respondents to the nationwide study believe Jesus was born to a virgin and 49 per cent believe that he walked on water. “This idea of a 21^st century sceptical secular mind dominating is not accurate,” Mr McCrindle said.  Overall, 40 per cent of people described themselves as Christians, with another 19 per cent saying they were spiritual but had no main religion. Nearly a third did not identify with any religion or spiritual belief. Mr McCrindle said “The research shows people are fine with Jesus, but they have issues with the church. They like the product but they don’t like the retail outlet”. Even among those who identified themselves as religious, a quarter were not active at all in practising their faith and another 42 per cent rarely, if ever, worshipped as part of a group. Fifty years ago, about a quarter of Australians attended church regularly. That has fallen to about one in 13 people. “Our Aussie approach to religion is, like everything else, a bit laidback”, Mr McCrindle said. ‘It’s an identity, it’s not an activity, and more about who you are than what you do”. The survey looked at ‘belief blockers’ – barriers to people engaging in religion – and found the biggest factors were church abuse, hypocrisy, judging others, religious wars and suffering.’

Early afternoon, saw Susie head off to Bendigo – apparently she would be back later tonight – was attending the Bendigo Easter Festival which is usually held up there this weekend. My day was fairly quiet and relaxed, until mid-afternoon, when I headed off for the first of three consecutive nights at the World Indoor Cycling Championships. Tonight was Day 3.  Unfortunately, it was not a good weekend for using public transport which I planned to do.  Because of the upgrading of the railway line to Sunbury to connect us to the Metro electrification system, the trains between here and Watergardens [or Sydenham] were to be replaced by coaches over the entire Easter weekend. That was manageable on it’s own, however because of the planned late finish of the cycling each night, the Sunbury line would be unacceptable for me to use, because the last train/coach to Sunbury left the city too early. So my plan, for the first two days at least, was to drive across to Watergardens, and then catch the suburban train network into the city [and repeat that process upon return]. It was going to mean very late nights on each occasion but couldn’t be avoided. I didn’t want to have to leave the nights’ events early! That was all fine – until I reached and discovered that there were ‘no trains’ between there and Footscray’, down the line all weekend – they too would be replaced by ordinary buses [captioned as ‘Rail Replacement Buses’].  Unfortunately, the road network between here and the city is not quite as ‘straight-lined’ as the railway line – so the journey on that part of the trip would be almost twice as long, time wise, with constant stops and diversions along the way!!!  But eventually, I did get onto a train, which took me through to Flinders Street. That whole process would be repeated in the reverse, later tonight!!

At Flinders Street Station, I had an ‘unsatisfactory’ bite to eat, and eventually caught a tram up to the Hisense Arena [a part of the Melbourne Tennis Centre] and directly across the railway line from the Melbourne Cricket Ground [where I would be next Friday night!]. A bit of time to spare – tried to satisfy my hunger with a couple of other items but there was not a great deal of ‘healthy’ choices, all the usual fare at events of this nature!!  Even the ‘advertised’ sandwiches were not available tonight – presumably the organisers had not been able to find a baker on Good Friday!!!

Robert had purchased premium seats for the three of us – in the second row from the front at the beginning of the home straight of the cycling track. But he would have been disappointed [obviously was] with those he had been given the first two nights – part of the track in front of us was obscured by the overhang of the structure of the track. However, while a little bit of a disability, we soon adjusted to the situation, and enjoyed the spectacle that followed. And a spectacle it was indeed!! Almost capacity crowd, lots of noise, music, commentators, hosts, etc, which I actually found made it very difficult at times to hear what was being said, often had to ask just ‘who had won’ a particular race, most of the finishes were very close.  My hearing is normally okay, unless we get into a large crowd, or even a room full of people where everyone is talking and/or music, etc playing, where I find a conversation very difficult.

Tonight’s events began with  the Women’s Sprints – the semifinals, and then, later in the program, the Finals [best of three heats in each case]. A ‘fascinating race, a short distance event in which two riders cover three laps of the track. But only the final 200 metres is actually timed – a race of tactics, strength and speed, where sudden and dramatic changes in speed, standstill attempts, and feints are all employed in the ‘race’ to surprise an opponent. As indicated, from the quarter finals onwards, the finalists contest the best of three races. Our own Anna Meares was our big hope in this race, her main opponent been the English champion, Victoria Pendleton – they in fact competed against each other in the semifinals, with the English girl actually crashing just near the finishing line in the second heat, but she came back to defeat Anna and reach the final. Anna eventually won the Bronze medal for third, but was obviously disappointed because that had been the event she’d expected to win.

My initial amazement from tonight was just how fast these professional cyclists went around the track velodrome, and while there would be a few falls during the course of the weekend, it amazed me that there were not more. The speeds covered, would continue to enthral this viewer over the next three nights. Meanwhile, we had a group of English supporters sitting beside us [next to Evelyn actually], the guys dressed in Scottish kilts, and constantly moving in and out of the stadium –  to purchase beer which they drank non-stop throughout the evening. With their British flags, and vocal support, they became a constant source of attention for the TV cameras whenever the English riders were achieving success, and I was told later, that this attention, led to our little group appearing on the TV coverage that night – next to this very boisterous group of British supporters [who I must admit at times, seemed to forget there were others around who really didn’t want their view obstructed by this mob standing up in front of us – a couple of polite requests, and they remembered where they were, and I must also admit, that they were equally supportive of Australian riders, when not in competition with their own!!].

The Women’s 10 km Scratch Final was also held tonight – another race full of tactics which seems to be the case with most cycling events – it begins with a massed start of competitors who race the assigned distance with the placings determined during the final sprint, taking into account laps gained. Very exciting to watch, but also very confusing just trying to work out who is in front, etc. In the end, a great ride by Australia’s Melissa Hoskins, who just failed to defeat the Polish gold medal winner. By this stage, the crowd noise in the Centre was ‘out of this world’, and as I mentioned earlier, most of what was being said over the loud speaker/commentating system, was lost to me, the important parts anyway!!

Apart from some early races of the Men’s Sprint, the other main feature of tonight’s program, were events in the Men’s and Women’s Omnium  [ a cycling equivalent of the athletic ‘Decathlon’ event].  It is made up of six events and is contested over two consecutive days. Events are Flying lap; Points race [M.30km, W. 20km]; Elimination race; Individual Pursuit [M. 4km, W. 3 km]; Scratch race [M. 15km, W. 10km]; and Time Trial [M.1 km, W. 500m]. The final classification is established by adding up the finishing places in each event – the winner is the rider who has the ‘lowest’ total.  Tonight we saw the 5^th and 6^th [final] event of the Men’s race, and the 2^nd and 3^rd event for the Women. The Men’s 15km Scratch race was very exciting, but again for me, also confusing, and once again, the crowd reaction and support [obviously very pro-Australian, but also demonstrably appreciative of the efforts of competitors from other nations] was a delight to be amongst.  That and the Time Trial for the men saw our cyclist, Glenn O’Shea produce a brilliant performance which was enough to see him lifted into the Gold Medal position – our first experience for the weekend of ‘Advance Australia Fair’. I should note, that while that ceremony was taking place, it again occurred to me that Australians are not as boisterous, as say the English, for eg, in singing their National Anthem, almost as if we are shy or embarrassed about doing so. And yet the applause and support before and after that ‘formal’ part is difficult to surpass!!  Interesting observation, I feel.

We actually didn’t stay for the final event – the Womens’ Ominium Elimination – Robert & Evelyn decided to leave at that point, and I had considered doing so, mainly because of concern about missing train/bus links etc, and being stranded in the city – highly unlikely on the suburban network until the early hours of the morning, but as it was a public holiday, a little concern weighed on my mind. I parted with my brother & his wife inside the Centre, and for some reason I decided to walk back to Flinders Street, along the Yarra River and the old ‘Swan Street’/Batman Avenue route as it used to be, expecting it to lead me straight back to the Swanston Street Bridge.

However, not having being this way for many years, I soon realised that with the new tollway and road constructions, etc, in this part of Melbourne, and all the sporting complex development,  that route no longer existed, so my little stroll back to the train station proved to be twice as long as I’d anticipated, and for a few moments there, I was almost prepared to admit to being lost!!  Anyway, eventually found my way to Flinders Street Station [after 4+ hours sitting, I guess the ‘walk’ was welcome!!], where a quick visit to what I consider are probably the most disgraceful set of public toilets in Melbourne  – although I think most of the blame has to be placed on the users – what a dreadful thought having people like that in one’s home, their ‘behaviour’ and ‘treatment’ of such public facilities is less than the standards of animals – with all that in mind, I stayed the briefest possible time, before catching the 11.23pm train, stopping all stations via the underground city loop to Watergardens   – which was misleading, because as expected, it only went as far as Footscray, at which point there was a rushed exit from the train to gain a seat on the correct bus [another train replacement bus] to the Watergardens Station, where my car was, hopefully, still awaiting my return!!  That part of the trip, which took us well past midnight, was long, slow and seemingly as though we were never going to reach our destination. At least it was not as crowded as I’d expected [that would come tomorrow night!], so I was personally quite comfortable.

Although I didn’t realise it until I reached home, at 10 minutes to 1am, Susan had arrived back from Bendigo not very long previously, and surprised to find me not home, had sent me a text message – ‘when will you be home, Dad?’ –  that type of question is usually the other way around!!!

And so ended my first visit to the cycling championships  –  a little wrap up of tonight’s medal events, follows.

Day Three Finals of the World Indoor Cycling Championships from Melbourne

 

Womens Sprint Final:

Gold: Victoria Pendleton [Great Britain]

Silver: Simona Krupeckaita [Lithuania]

Bronze: Anna Meares [Australia]  – this was the race Anna expected to win

 

Womens Scratch 10 km Final:

Gold: Katarzyna Pawlowska [Poland]

Silver: Melissa Hoskins [Australia]

Bronze: Kelly Druyts [Belgium]

 

Mens Ommium Final [of 6 events]

GOLD: Glenn O’Shea [AUSTRALIA]

Silver: Zach Bell [Canada]

Bronze: Lasse Norman Hansen [Denmark]

And indeed, to a week of beautiful Autumn weather here in Melbourne, Sunbury and surrounds, with temperatures in the mid to high twenties through until Good Friday.  As can be seen below, we have combined a few days into one contribution, something that seems to be getting into a bit of a pattern recently, and here I was in retirement, supposedly having more free time!!……………………………

Sunday, 1^st April 2012 –  an afternoon of coffee and conversation

Daylight saving time ended at 2am this morning, which basically meant an extra hour’s sleep – not sure if that actually happened, but I did feel a ‘little’ brighter than usual for my Sunday morning early departure to the radio station.  Now with it also being ‘April Fool’s Day’, I did undertake a quick perusal of the paper to see if anything untoward had been placed in today’s edition  – if it had been, I didn’t see it, which either  means no ‘fool articles’ were included, or I simply wasn’t bright enough to find it!! Certainly I wasn’t so bright at 9am, when the two presenters who follow me on a Sunday morning, commenced their program – three hours of country music, a program they have been doing for a decade. Sandy gravely advised me that they had changed their genre of music – from now on, country music would be replaced by 3 hours of jazz! I personally thought that was a great idea, because I’m one of the few presenters who plays much jazz on the station, but I wondered aloud as to what affect such a drastic change of heart would have on the many years of fans out there to this show – which I think generally gets more phone calls than the rest of us put together!!  It was at that point, that Sandy realised her little ‘April Fool’s Joke’ had gone a little flat  – though not really, because yours truly fell completely into the hole!!  Was she going to make that announcement on air –  I never found out because I didn’t get to listen, but she did mention, it was unlikely, as she was afraid they’d get ‘no’ phone calls this morning!  I should have responded that maybe that would be a good thing –  then she would know what the rest of us feel like every week!!

Meanwhile, by late morning, I was on a train, heading for the city, where I met Heather, down from Ballarat for the day –  a chance I guess for her to relieve some of the stress and trauma of the past few days with the death and funeral of her mother, do a bit of city shopping, and meet this old schoolmate for a coffee and chat – couple of coffees actually,  even a glass of wine out in front of the Speigeltent, where a jazz concert was in progress – from outside, we were still able to enjoy the music we both have a common interest in.

As I’ve mentioned previously, not a normal practice for Bill to converse with one person for too long – usually run out of conversation, or to be honest, wear myself or my voice out. Not so today, and before long, five hours had passed by, and we were both back at Southern Cross Station to catch our respective trains back to Ballarat and Sunbury – the former left about 20 minutes before mine. The trip in earlier his afternoon had been a very crowded and noisy through train from Bendigo, full mostly of football fans going to Edihad Stadium. I was hoping for a quieter return trip, and in fact I missed the main post-football train, as it was a little more peaceful on the return journey, allowed for a bit of reading without major distractions!

Meanwhile, after the completion of Round 1 of the AFL football games today, the Top eight teams see the following situation, although somewhat too early to make anything of that situation, with the two grand finalists teams from last year – Collingwood and Geelong being defeated in the first game.

1. Sydney Swans…………………………………4……..[207.27]
2. Adelaide Crows………………………………4……..[201.47]
3. West Coast Eagles………………………….4………[156.32]
4. Carlton Blues………………………………….4………[154.32]
5. Brisbane Lions………………………………..4………[152.56]
6. Hawthorn Hawks……………………………4………[119.13]
7. Port Adelaide Power……………………..4………[104.71]
8. Fremantle Dockers………………………..4………[103.96]

 

 

Monday 2^nd April 2012 – surprise visit from a Queensland brother & sister-in-law.

This was the lead story in today’s Financial Review [written by journalist Louise Dodson] – a subject which seems to have dominated our attentions [in the political sense] off and on for 18 months now.

‘Labor’s primary vote has collapsed following passage of the carbon and mining taxes through Parliament, a leadership challenge by Kevin Rudd and a crushing blow to the party in the Queensland election. As the federal government prepares to deliver a crucial budget, The Australian Financial Review’s Nielsen poll also shows that Wayne Swan is trailing his opposition counterpart Joe Hockey as preferred treasurer, especially in Queensland, Mr Swan’s home state. This follows Mr Swan’s high profile attack on mining billionaires Andrew Forrest, Gina Rinehart and Clive Palmer as he sought to promote the minerals resource rent tax and his essay in ‘The Monthly’, seem by some as evoking class warfare. In the run-up to the May 8 budget, the poll finds that the Coalition is by far regarded as the party best able to handle the economy. The poll will be a major blow to Labor strategists who have been working to refocus attention on the government’s agenda and its ability to manage the economy after Prime Minister Julia Gillard was able to see off decisively the leadership challenge of former foreign minister Kevin Rudd in late February. Labor’s vote has dived 7 percentage points to 27 per cent while support for the Coalition rose three points to 47 per cent, opening up a massive 20-point difference in primary votes. This is very close to the 26 per cent – the worst score for Labor in 40 years of Neilson polls –  seen in July last year just after the government introduced its carbon tax into Parliament. The two-party preferred vote was Coalition 57 per cent, up four points, leading Labor on 43 per cent, down four points, the poll showed. Labor’s primary vote is now a hefty 11 points lower than at the 2010 election’.

Other factors revealed included that Labor was least popular in Queensland [a bit obvious after the recent election there], and that the party has a problem with male voters [is that because the PM is female, I wonder?]. Certainly, government insiders are hoping that with the leadership speculation over for the time being, ‘Ms Gillard  will have clear air to rebuild her personal standing and promote the government’s agenda’. Meanwhile, with the PM having a small lead over Tony Abbott as preferred prime minister, Mr Abbott’s personal standing, as Opposition leader is the lowest for some years, and I noticed in another comment in today’s paper, that while the Coalition has the current significant advantage over Labor in the electoral polls, Mr Abbott’s position as leader remains safe. A call for Malcolm Turnbull to re-emerge as leader [as I would personally like to see happen]  is really only likely to raise it’s head, should the government suddenly regain back a dominant position in those polls. As one Letter to the Editor writer noted  in commenting on the lure of trying to attract Turnbull back to the leadership of the Liberals ‘As in the Peter Costello analogy, he just waited too patiently too long, too proud to emulate Paul Keating [and challenge Hawke] by going to the backbench after stubborn John Howard had reached his ten years. It will not be lost on Turnbull that ‘timing is all’.

Putting that aside, the first four days of this week I had put aside to spend a bit of time out in the garden, trying to tidy things up in anticipation of visitors this weekend, and also because the work needed to be done. So that all began this afternoon, after my usual 11am Monday session at the gymnasium, then back home for a bite to eat before tackling that garden which as I’ve noted before has been a little neglected through much of 2011, and since the drought years caused a bit of devastation.

Surprise visitors this afternoon – was having a shower, when I missed a call from brother, Colin  – he and Angela were at the airport, waiting for her mother to arrive on another flight, and with time to spare, were wanting to drop out to Sunbury for an hour.  I managed to ring him back fairly quickly before they had made other arrangements, and invited them to come by!!  They arrived in their hired car just after Susie returned home from wherever she had been for most of the afternoon, which was pleasing, as she joined in the conversation for the next hour.  Colin & Angela were down here for a couple of weeks  – their son Craig and his ‘partner’/girlfriend were expecting a baby to arrive within that time, so the prospective grandparents had decided to come down to be here at the birth. They were going to stay with our old friend, Margaret Bryant down in Carlton.  I mentioned that Robert & Evelyn would be in Melbourne this weekend, and the suggestion of arranging a possible get-together of everyone was raised –  our visitors were keen also to catch up with Mrs Seipolt and Shirley whilst they were down here.  Anyway, a brief but pleasing visit – Colin and Angela were now living and working up in Rockhampton [Queensland], so the possibility of the various siblings and their families getting together these days are opportunities few and far between.

Evening meal tonight, before eventually heading out to my usual Monday night stint on the radio station for the three hours leading up to midnight.  An enjoyable program as always, although the digestive system seemed to want to play up tonight as it had been for most of the day. Must have been that glass of wine in the city with Heather yesterday, which I  actually wasn’t even able to finish. How things have degenerated in that area!!  The arrival home after midnight saw another hour watching a taped episode of tonight’s ‘Revenge’. I think I noted last week, that I would probably not bother with watching that drama series if I had to watch it in real time, with Channel 7’s seemingly avalanche of constant advertising interruptions! I find it difficult to understand how anyone can regularly enjoy television with that degree of constant and painful disruptions to what one is trying to watch. I try and limit my viewing of the commercial channels to a bare minimum.

 

Tuesday, 3^rd April 2012 –  a few hours in the garden, again!

After a slow start, a few hours in the garden again  –  no idea how I could manage five x 8 hours of labor a week, this garden maintenance work, especially when you are coming from so far behind, is damned hard work, but albeit slowly, progress is being made, and I am beginning to like what I see. I have got rid of all of the blackberry bushes, though I know there are still roots in the ground, will just have to control their future growth, day by day. Have not inclined to try and poison the weed while Susie’s cats are still on the property.  Mind you, I gave it all away for the day, mid afternoon, and eventually went into town for an hour or so to break the day up.

Some pleasing items in the post mail today [including a nice little card of thanks from Heather, in appreciation of my ‘support, etc’ over recent weeks during her mother’s  final months with her],  and I was especially pleased to see Tuesday’s local papers actually arrive on a Tuesday!!  I usually end up on the Wednesday morning sports report, not having seen the local papers which I find frustrating and a limitation with my report having to depend on internet and other sources which are generally not so reliable.

I rang Sydney tonight – spoke to Evelyn re their trip here next weekend, and she seemed enthusiastic about the idea of trying to get some of the family together, on the suggested Sunday afternoon.  Later in the night, I received another emailed request from James  – could I read over his latest university assignment some time tomorrow, if I had time!! [I didn’t realise at the time, that would end up another late night ‘reading’ having forgotten at the time that we were due to have the power switched off all day due to electricity works in the area!].

 

Wednesday, 4^th April 2012 – thankfully, I don’t need power [of the electricity variety] in the garden

After my usual 6.45am call to the radio station with my brief sports report, I was up and about fairly early, and ended up spending a  large part of the day working outside – last minute efforts to achieve a reasonable outlook of the property for the anticipated visitors on Sunday next. This included an early visit to the local Bunnings  store to purchase a couple of items of garden equipment, and a few small plants to fill in a few gaps out in the front garden.  I’m householder who likes to have a compact garden, shrubs and other plants close together, in preference to the ‘sparse’ desert type look. As a consequence I suppose, some of my plants don’t get as ‘trimmed’ as often as they probably should, as I prefer to allow them to grow as fully as possible. Sometimes, there is a push from others, to attend to that task!

Even if I’d preferred to be working inside, we had the power off all day – from 8am to 6pm, so it was a little limiting to do anything requiring electricity!!  It was not without warning – I think we received advice some weeks ago that the power would be off today because of electricity work and maintenance tasks in the area, I’d simply forgotten about it!!

Apart from a bit of anxiety about the coming weekend’s activities, I’d received another request last night from son, James, to check over his latest university assignment for him – proofread for corrections, etc – he needed that done today ‘if I had time’!  Well, of course, as he sent it to me on the computer, I couldn’t get access to his project until this evening anyway. To be honest, by then, I was not really in the mood, but we got onto it eventually, and was able to eventually send him back my ‘suggested’ corrections or amendments.

I did get the opportunity to have a look at the first night’s events in the World Cycling Championships here in Melbourne [where I would be on Friday night, the first of three nights at that event]. The occasion was being promoted as ‘cycling ashes’ series between Australia and Great Britain, two of the leading cycling nations, but as would be seen, there were a few other players likely to have a say in that as well.

Day One Finals of the World Indoor Cycling Championships from Melbourne

Men’s Team Pursuit Final:

Gold: Great Britain

Silver: Australia [Glenn O’Shea, Jack Bobridge, Rohan Dennis, Michael Hepburn]

Bronze: New Zealand

Women’s Team Sprint Final:

Gold: Germany

Silver: Australia [Anna Meares, Kaarie McCulloch]

Bronze: China

Mens Scratch 15 Km Final:

Gold: Ben Swift – Great Britain

Silver: Nolan Hoffman – Rep South Africa [a brilliant finish from well back, almost got there]

Bronze: Wim Stroetinga [Netherlands]

Mens Team Sprint Final:

GOLD: AUSTRALIA [Shane Perkins, Scott Sunderland, Matthew Glaettzer], a surprise victory after Great Britain and the other finalist were disqualified, allowing Australia into the final].

Silver: France

Bronze: New Zealand

 

Thursday, 5^th April 2012  – my football team in action!!

Looking at the above date, I realised it was nephew, Alwyn’s 18^th birthday today  – Saturday week was apparently his official party date, to which I would put in an appearance during the ‘quieter’ part of the occasion!   Anyway, being Thursday, it was an hour at the gymnasium 9am – 10 am.   Then, back home for a gruelling 6 hours into the late afternoon,  working on the front garden, and mowing the front lawns, etc, plated some new smallish plants, and transferred two other plants.  It was still quite warm, weather wise, so by the end of the afternoon, this ‘old writer’ was beginning to feel rather exhausted, and had basically decided I’d done enough before Easter  –  the place would have to be judged as it was!

I should have gone to the radio committee meeting tonight, but just once in a while something else takes precedence over a volunteer role  – another Carlton football match on a Thursday night! Well, I sent in my monthly finance report to the Station Manager, so I was there in spirit!

After a few big days of baking and retailing at Bakers Delight this week [hot cross buns, etc for Easter], that organisation was having a pre-Easter ‘party’ tonight – three of mine involved, all of whom were wisely leaving their cars behind – which necessitated Bill undertaking what is now a ‘rare’ taxi service [before the football began] –  with Susie on board, it was over to Goonawarra to collect Jodie [former employee of Bakers Delight, her role now taken over by Susie on a part time basis] and then drive back into Sunbury to one of the restaurants near the Cinema complex. The arrangement was that I would collect Susie later on, she didn’t really want to be there too long, but as I advised her, that would not be until ‘after’ the football match!!! Agreed! Meanwhile, Adam [the baker] found his own way as usual.  My immediate duties over with, I was straight back home.

Meanwhile, for a Blues’ supporter, it was a rather enjoyable dose of TV viewing. The report from the Club, summarises the game up in Brisbane   – two unforgettable Eddie Betts’ marks have highlighted Carlton’s crushing 91-point win over the Brisbane Lions at the Gabba on Thursday night.  Betts put on a show few of the 25,920 spectators on hand will forget as he soared for a mark of the year contender over James Polkinghorne in the second quarter, and matched it with an equally spectacular effort in the third. After the Lions led by two points at the first change, the Blues flexed their premiership muscles to kick 18 of the final 21 goals of the match to storm to a 23.16 (154) to 9.9 (63) victory. While Betts was turning heads and dropping jaws, midfielders Marc Murphy and [captain] Chris Judd were running rings around the Lions’ engine room with virtuoso performances.  Quarter by quarter scores were as follows:-

Brisbane Lions:      6.1.37            7.6.48                7.7.49             Final:      9.9.63

Carlton Blues:        5.5.35            10.9.69              16.10.106       FINAL:  23.16.154

Well now, I waited for about an hour after the game finished, to wait and hear  if I was required to go out again and collect Susan from her work function The message was ‘not needed’, so I went to bed!  Sure enough, a further message  – could you come and get me please Dad!!  Close to midnight by now.  Down to the ‘Blues Plus café where the team had finished their night  –  Bill’s taxi service had three passengers – Susie, Adam, and another girl who worked with them

Day Two Finals of the World Indoor Cycling Championships from Melbourne

Womens Team Pursuit Final

Gold: Great Britain

Silver: Australia [Annette Edmondson, Melissa Hopkins, Josephine Tomic]

Bronze: Canada

Mens Kilometre Time Trial Final

Gold: Stefan Nimke [Germany]

Silver: Michael D’Almeida [France]

Bronze: Simon Van Velthooven [New Zealand]

Womens Points Race 25 km Final

Gold: Anastasia Chulkova [Russia]

Silver: Jasmin Glacsser [Canada]

Bronze: Caroline Ryan [Ireland]

 

But before we get to that, the following are the couple of verses of poetry I placed on Face Book this morning, part of a longer piece by the poet [Alec Hope], but I thought the two verses was enough, and gave some indication of what the ‘story’ of the poem was!

• For every bird there is this last migration;
• Once more the cooling year kindles her heart;
• With a warm passage to the summer station
• Love pricks the course in lights across the chart.
• Year after year a speck on the map divided
• By a whole hemisphere, summons her to come;
• Season after season, sure and safely guided,
• Going away she is also coming home;

[from Alec Derwent Hope, 1907-2000 ‘The Death of the Bird’]

I was not particularly happy with my hour at the gymnasium this morning, didn’t really feel as though I was enjoyed what I was doing, it was ‘tough’ going!! But we followed that hour up with an iced coffee, two weekend newspapers, and a bit of food shopping, including a brief hello to Susie who was serving behind the counter at Baker’s Delight. Back home for a brief spot of watering and weeding in the front garden.

The usual long drive over to Heidelberg preceded by necessity tonight’s concert by the Heidelberg Symphony Orchestra in the spectacular Performing Art Centre. An impressive program of music planned for the concert tonight which went under the general title of ‘The Emperor’.  I quickly noticed that the HSO had a new CD available for sale – at $15, a worthwhile addition to my radio collection, containing samples some of the orchestra’s more recent performances. On the program tonight – Rachmaninov’s Symphonic Dance No. 1; Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 5 [the ‘Emperor’ Concerto], and Dvorak’s Symphony No. 8, which I actually could not recall having heard or played previously. The guest pianist, for the Beethoven work, was local and national performer, Amir Farid, winner of the 2006 Australian National Piano Award along with many other awards and scholarships, and performed with many of the major Australian symphony orchestras.  Meanwhile, I had my usual seat, up the top near the rear of the Centre – a spot I preferred, though as related to someone later, not the best of places to be if anything [health wise] went wrong – nowhere to ‘hide’ in the Ivanhoe Performing Arts Centre. And prior to the concert, we were given the usual reminder by the lady MC about, not just turning off mobile phones, but about Melbourne audiences reputation as concert ‘coughers’

Rachmaninov’s Symphonic Dance No. 1 was one of three such pieces he composed in 1941, whilst recovering from minor surgery, in New York.  Quite a bright piece of music of about 12 minutes duration, with elements of jazz and folk music creeping into the melody on the odd occasion. An example of his late style of composing [he would die in 1943], with a energetic mix of shifting harmonies, with some pleasant combination of instruments such as the harp, glockenspiel, flute and piccolo featured near the ending. I guess the jazz flavour came through with a beautiful theme played by the saxophone near the end of the first part of the composition, and of course, listening to the violins, gave this writer a desire to learn to play the violin one of these days! Will probably never happen, like so many other ‘wild’ ideas, but one can but dream occasionally!!

The guest pianist put in his appearance for the second item –  Beethoven’s ‘Emperor’ Concerto [Piano Concerto No. 5]. Over three movements [though to be honest, I only noticed two], this lasted just on 40 minutes, and was as always, a beautiful piece of music to enjoy.  This is often described as Beethoven’s most innovative and ‘heroic’ work in the concerto style,  and allows for both, interplay between the solo piano, and the orchestra [not the complete HSO this time], and some wonderful joint movements. Beethoven wrote it between 1809-1811 and it was to be his last piano concerto. It was first performed in 1811, and as is often the case, the composer did not give it the title of the ‘Emperor Concerto’ –  in fact not generally known where the name came from!

After a suitable encore from our guest pianist, and an interval period, which saw this concert goer remain in his seat rather than join the crush of bodies out in the lobby, we were entertained by a composition from Antonin Dvorak [1841-1904] which I can’t recall actually listening to previously –  his Symphony No. 8 I G Major. Interestingly, Dvorak, who is the best known of Czech composers, was the son of a humble innkeeper who had planned to have his son apprenticed as a butcher!  A good thing for the world of classical music that didn’t eventuate!   As the program notes indicate, Symphony No 8 is known as the English Symphony because he had the work published by the English firm Novello. Dvorak wasn’t satisfied with the classical form of the symphony and his work on it lead more towards a symphonic poem, and ended up being considered the most ‘national’  in flavor of all his symphonies. Tonight, the work was just under 40 minutes in duration, and was in four movements – oddly, when it was first played in 1890, with Dvorak directing, the audience was asked to refrain from clapping between movements – that is the normal practice for classical music these days, but obviously wasn’t always the case [I still prefer the attitude taken to a lengthy jazz piece – if the audience enjoys a particular movement or solo piece, they will applaud, and so it should be!!].  Anyway, No. 8 was a very enjoyable piece of music, typical of what one might expect from Dvorak’s romantic musical tradition, and his drawing, particularly in this symphony, from the Bohemian folk music of his time, but expressed in the symphonic language. So the only movement of the four which did not have attached to it the description of being lively and fast, was the Adagio in the 2^nd movement, we experience tastes of village band music, and the expressions of beautiful ‘bird’ music  through the flute and oboe components of the orchestra.  A recording I don’t have – must chase it up for my Sunday morning program!

The night ended with the obligatory encore, and the usual over-inflated audience applause, which I often see as the bulk of a concert audience following like sheep in maintaining sustain periods of clapping. Applause where it I deserved as tonight’s concert certainly was, but I sometimes wonder at the ‘mentality’ almost of the way it continues at times. Mind you, I probably enjoyed that a little more than the hour long drive home, although I did manage to find a pleasant jazz program on 3MBS, the alternative Melbourne classical music/jazz radio station to the ABC Classic FM network!  Home before midnight – no sign of Susie having returned from wherever she went tonight.