Saturday, January 18

 It's not warm this morning and the forecast says it won't reach 18 until mid-afternoon.  I'm dressed in shorts which is my usual attire in the so-called summer months, but I'm also wearing a long-sleeved jumper.  Both Marilyn and are feeling lethargic about doing anything today.  She mentioned the other day that she wanted to browse through a particular dress shop in Launceston but that idea has been shelved for the time being.

I always like to have some thought in my mind about what I might do each day but I'm drawing a blank.  Perhaps a bit of Watching (TV), Reading (a book) and Cuppa (coffee) is the go.

Friday, January 17

 Friday, January 17

A few years ago, when we were travelling quite often, I bought myself an e-reader.  It seemed a good idea as I could finish a book in a couple of days and normal books were too bulky and heavy to carry in my luggage.  The big seller was the Kindle but I bought the cheaper option, the Kobo, and was very happy. I downloaded more books than I could read in my lifetime and was never without something to occupy my time.

Years later, my last Kobo reader has 'gone to God' and I now read mostly on a little tablet.  This is fine but it doesn't work in sunlight.  

Now the weather is better and we have more time than we know what to do with, we've taken to sitting outside in the morning.  I'm conditioned to want to read whenever I sit down and, of course, my little tablet doesn't cope with bright sunlight.  There's nothing for it but to buy another ebook reader.  Jamie wanted me to buy a Kindle but it would be at least $318 and all my downloaded library books are in the wrong format.

A new Kobo might be $259 so I had to look elsewhere and I found one called High-clear on Amazon for $124.15 and all my books would be compatible.  What could go wrong?

It's quite a nice-looking machine although the font is a bit small.  No matter, I can cope. It works well in bright sunlight so I'm reasonably happy.  However, today, after just a few weeks, it's stopped working.  I haven't even read one book on it.  A quick message to Amazon who palm me off to some shady company in China and I'm waiting for satisfaction. Didn't the Rolling Stones sing a song about this?

COLD AUGUST NIGHT                                                                                          MARCH 1, 2024

August nights in Longford are always cold.  Hamish pulled his coat more closely around his body, pushed his ungloved hands more deeply into his pockets and trudged wearily to where his car was parked.    There was no one else in the streets and, apart from a bit of noise from the last revellers leaving the hotel, all was quiet.  Hamish was enjoying his job at the Blenheim Hotel but the late finishes were proving difficult.  Maybe he should talk to the manager to see whether a different shift might be possible.

He crossed the deserted street and trudged slowly towards the park where he had earlier eft his car; as he passed Ernesto’s Coffee Shop, a flash of light in his peripheral vision caught his eye.  “OPEN” the flashing sign announced to anyone watching.  Open? Hamish wondered.  When has Ernesto’s ever been open at this time of night?   He was tired and might have continued walking but his curiosity won out and he pushed at the door.

A bell tinkled as the door opened and Hamish groped his way into the gloomy room.  He had enjoyed coffee here many times and was familiar with the bizarre collection of furniture: mismatched tables and chairs and stools fabricated from the cast-iron seats of vintage tractors.

“Hello!” Hamish called out. “Is anyone there?”

A curtain swished as a hand pulled it aside and a very odd-looking individual appeared from a back room and appeared before Hamish.  He was dressed all in black and wore a tartan scarf around his neck.

“Good evening, Hamish,” the strange person enunciated, in a gloomy voice. “How nice of you to call in.  I suppose you are wondering why Ernesto’s is open at this ungodly hour.  But I am forgetting my manners.  Would you like a coffee, before I explain the situation?”

Hamish accepted gratefully and took a seat.  Soon, a coffee appeared before him and the strange individual sat down opposite him, took a deep breath and intoned, “Pardon me for being abrupt but there is no time to waste.  I know you’ll agree we live in interesting times and there are some of us who believe that, unless action is taken, we are all going to be surprised at how badly things will turn out.  Politicians are letting us down appallingly and more and more people are living in desperation.  Something must change.”

He paused as if waiting for Hamish to say something.  Hamish hesitated, unwilling to commit himself to an opinion but, eventually, he murmured, “Hmmm, life’s not always easy, is it?”

“Exactly!” exclaimed the other, “And wouldn’t it be great if something could be done about it?”  He paused, as if re-considering what he was about to say. Drawing a deep breath, he pressed on.

“For too long, Tasmania has been the forgotten child of the Australian nation.  For too long, we have been treated as the rather simple young brother, content to be given the leftovers from the grown-ups’ table.  Well, that is all about to change.  A new coalition of a number of active groups is being formed.  There is intelligence in this group, and integrity and energy.  Our objective is to secure the independence of Tasmania from the oppression of the mainland states.  Without the dead anchor of those monoliths holding us back, we can be sure of a bright future.  Here, in the Apple Isle, we have the resources, the energy, the drive to become the Pearl of the Pacific.  We’re in discussion with a local politician to become our new president.  He’ll be only a figurehead, of course, as all the decisions will be made by a committee.  I won’t tell you who he is but you will know of him.”

“Now that I’ve explained the future, will you join us?”

Hamish thought for a moment.  “Where are you from?” he said, at last.

“Sydney,” replied the man.

“Nah, sorry, mate, not interested,” Hamish drawled and headed for the door.

“Wait,” the man called. “You haven’t paid for your coffee.”

What’s he thinking? thought Hamish as he headed for his car.  Who in Tasmania is going to listen to some blow-in from Sydney.  He must be dreamin’,

Thursday, January 16

Marilyn had an appointment in Launceston yesterday but, before we could leave, Jamie arrived to announce he would take her 'to give me a break'.  While I was musing on this turn of events, I heard the garbage men trundling up the street.  I started to wander out to collect the bin but met Bertine from Number 5 bringing it in for me.

"I thought I would save you the bother," she said, gaily.

I thanked her, of course, but I can't help feeling just a little miffed at the way things are turning out.  Do I look like I need looking after?  Do people think I have reached the stage in life when I can't be trusted to do anything?  

Am I becoming redundant?  I've read about how Eskimos put their old people out on the ice when they become too old to contribute.  The polar bears deal with them.  At least in Australia we are a bit more civilised and the worst thing we do is shove them into a nursing home for their twilight years.

Certainly I'm getting older but I'm not decrepit yet.  Although, it's nice when I can use the excuse of getting older to avoid doing something I would rather not.  It's a matter of getting the balance right.

Wednesday. January 15

 I've hung out the washing but the weather forecast is for ... thunderstorms this afternoon.   I put in the three dots to signify a pause.  This is when I sprinted to the clothes line to bring in the washing as quickly as I could.  You won't notice but I'm now wearing a different shirt to the one I had on when I was typing the first 50 or so characters. The navy blue one is hanging in the laundry to dry and I'm now sporting one in a tan colour.

The problem with these summer storms is they are all sound and fury and very little action.  The splash of raindrops stopped as soon as I had the washing.  in.  Do I put it out again, or is it better to use the dryer?

(That phrase 'sound and fury rang a little bell in my head so I had to look it up.  It's from Macbeth and the full quote is 

'It is a tale

Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury

Signifying nothing.'

Pretty appropriate, actually!

Tuesday, January 14

 We've fallen into a comfortable routine since moving into our little unit.  In 2020, beset by the COVID epidemic, we knew we had to make decisions in our lives which would reflect that we were getting older, slowing down and reducing our involvement in outside activities.  We were still fit enough to go walking every day, work at elections, do the weekly shop and even travel a bit.  But we knew the day was fast approaching when all those activities would fall by the wayside. The move to Longford was in anticipation that our lives would be different and we knew too many people who hung on to the home they loved even though it no longer fit their needs.

And it all came to pass as we anticipated.  We worked at one more round of exams, Marilyn did one more election, we took one more trip to Sydney, and we still took pleasure in going to the shops.  But, all those elements of our past life have been confined to the dustbin of history.  I still pop into the local supermarket a couple of times a week for fresh fruit and bread, but the big red Coles truck brings almost all of our groceries.  We still try to walk each day but our 'travel' is now limited to watching Youtube videos and enjoying the adventures of people we have never met.  If they happen to be in a part of the world we have visited in the past, we take pleasure in the vivid memories evoked.

All in all, we're content with our lives.  And, having just celebrated our 59th wedding anniversary, we're now looking forward to Marilyn's 80th birthday on March 2nd.  The party will be on Sunday, 3rd at the Longford Bowls Club (there was an important match to be played on the Saturday so the Club couldn't take us on the right day) and we are expecting a crowd to attend.  

Monday, January 13

 I didn't post anything yesterday.  That's not particularly unusual but the difference this time is that I don't feel guilty about it. Normally, if I fail to post something, I feel I have let the side down.  That's why some of my posts are absolute rubbish; I'm working on the basis that anything will do.  The important thing is to keep up the momentum, build up the numbers, keep the site ticking over.  But that's in the past.  From now on I'm going to aim for quality over quantity.

Or maybe not.  Do I have the strength to lift the energy level?  As my life is slowing down and my range of experiences is becoming narrower, how on earth can I hope to improve the quality?

The best I can do is to have an on-going aspiration to improve.  That's it; I'll make it my goal to improve.  I'll even make a sign to put on the front of my computer: 'Each day, in every way, my blog is getting better and better.'

That should fix it.

IS PROMOTION ALL THAT IT’S CRACKED UP TO BE?                          AUGUST 4, 2023 

There was a chart that Brian had drawn up when he was at school.  It was a sort of timeline setting out the milestones that Brian expected to achieve in his life, starting with ‘Leaving School’ at age 18, ‘Graduating from University’ at 22, ‘Marrying the Right Girl’ at 23, and so on.  There were also entries for his progress at work but they were a little less-defined, more of a statement of steps he would have to go through in his career: ‘Starting work’, ‘Getting promoted’, ‘Achieving financial stability’ and so on.

The important thing about this timeline was that it was flexible enough to be amended or added to as circumstances changed.  So, if Brian found himself, perhaps, with the opportunity of changing jobs to something more challenging, he could add a new element to his timeline.  Or, if his wife announced she was pregnant, he could build in his hopes and expectations for additions to the family.

One day his boss at the company where he worked took Brian aside and suggested they have a chat about his future.  He wanted to reassure Brian that he was a valued employee and that he was regarded as someone who could, one day, aspire to a senior role in management.  Brian pressed his boss to be a bit more specific.  Two years?  Three years?  How could he build this hope into his planning if he didn’t know when it might occur?

But the boss was not going to be pinned down.  ‘Keep your nose clean,’ Brian was told, ‘And we’ll look after you.”

It was frustrating for Brian who was very reliant on his timeline for reassurance but, as luck would have it, his immediate superior in the company, suffered a heart attack and had to take some time off.  To his delight, Brian was offered a promotion, starting immediately.  It never occurred to Brian that his promotion had come at the cost of a colleague’s good health and he neglected to even wish him well.

Brian spent some time bringing his timeline up to date and teasing out some potential future directions and knuckled down to his new job, assuming that it would be just a bit more of the same type of work that he had been doing for the past few years with just a slight increase in intensity.  He was shocked to find out, before too long, that he could not have been more wrong. 

After he had re-arranged his new office to better suit his needs, he was approached by one of the young women who helped with the secretarial work.  She had a complaint about another staff member whom she said was gossiping about her and making her life miserable.  Brian was taken aback.  How on earth did one deal with this sort of nonsense?  Writing himself a note in his diary, he put off having to sort it out to another day.

He had just settled down to his work when there was another knock on the door.  A male member of staff wanted to arrange a couple of days off to travel interstate to watch a football match.  A football match?  Where were his priorities?  Brian knew that company policy was that employees could ask for leave for anything which they regarded as important but, really, a football match!  Promising to get back to him, Brian scribbled a note to himself and settled back hoping to enjoy his new office at last.

But, it was not to be. 

There was another, rather tentative knock at the door.  It was Janet, one of the younger and newer employees.  She wondered whether it would be appropriate for her to bring in some of her home-baking to sell to her colleagues.  For goodness’s sake, Brian thought, and promised to give it some thought and get back to her.

Is this how it was going to be, he wondered?  Dealing with the trivia of everyone’s lives?  It wasn’t that he was concerned about making decisions but, surely, there was more to this promotion than that.

Another tentative knock at the door disturbed his thoughts.  Who would it be this time, he wondered – the janitor selling raffle tickets or someone wanting to set up a staff chess tournament.  It was, in fact, another of the male employees with a suggestion that it might be fun if one Friday each month was designated ‘Wear a Funny Hat to Work Day’.  He had the idea that this might help to boost staff morale.  Brian was at the stage of pulling out his hair.

There was another peremptory knock at the door and, without waiting for a response, someone walked in.  It was his boss.  “I’ve just popped in to see how you’re getting on,” he said, “And I was wondering whether you had any thoughts for changes to the work place.”

‘Only one suggestion,” said Brian.  “Find a new manager!  I quit.”

Saturday, January 11

They're predicting thunderstorms this evening and the sky is already overcast.  There's a bit of blue sky to the east but the wind is pushing the clouds in that direction so I don't expect the blue to last for long.  We get used to the changeable weather at this latitude and don't give it a second thought.  I wonder about the people who work at the Weather Bureau, though: they must tear their hair out when Tasmanian weather defies their predictions.

But we have our own problems to worry about.  Is it too hot to sit outside?  Would we be better on the front porch or on the concrete at the back?   Will the Coles man get here in time for us to have eggs for breakfast?

It's not true that life gets easier as you get older; it's just that the nature of life's problems change.