Sunday, 29th September

We've had a couple of days in Sydney, visiting Marilyn' s sister, Anne, and her husband, Alan.  On the Sunday, their daughter, Sharon, husband David and their daughters, Isabelle and Amelia met us for brunch.  Sydney is exhausting but it was great to see them, especially the two girls, who remind us of how nice it is to have young people around.

We love the trains and the convenience they provide, but we are surprised at how tired we feel when we come home from the relatively short trip to Sydney.

Today, it was time to catch up with my brother, Sandy and his wife, Janet.  We had lunch at the Wollongong Golf Club.  I've had mixed feelings about this club with memories of some pretty ordinary meals, but today was a success.  Marilyn and I shared a seafood platter and we both enjoyed it.

I gave Sandy an advance copy of my memoirs and look forward to hearing his comments about my recollections.  No doubt, he will tell me I've made bits up but I will resist any suggestions for changes.  After all, they 're my memories, even though others may say they are faulty.

Thursday, September 26

We took the bus to Wollongong this morning to buy some buttons for a cardigan that Robyn is knitting, then bussed it to Warrawong to meet Robyn's daughter and grand-daughter for lunch.  When we sat down in the cafe, I discovered my iphone was bent out of shape.  I 've heard of this happening when you keep your phone in your back pocket, and sit on it, but this was in my jacket pocket out of range of any physical stresses.

One of life 's little mysteries that might end up costing me some dollars.  The phone was a hand-me- down from Jamie and, if luck is on my side, I might inherit his next reject too.  In the meantime, Robyn has lent me a spare one that she has just replaced.

Wednesday, September 25

The plan today was to get to Katoomba by train so we got up early to catch the 8.16 train from Oak Flats.  It had to be a quick turnover at Central: only 16 minutes to get to the right platform and we needed to fit in a toilet break and we were both ready for a cup of coffee.  The later train didn't leave until 11.18 which would get us to Katoomba only an hour before we had to leave for the return journey.

We realised it was all too hard and decided to go for a ferry ride instead.  Today, we opted for a round trip on the Parramatta River, getting off at Olympic Park to catch a ferry back to Circular Quay.  On the return trip, Marilyn caught sight of a group of men sitting at the back, looking very grim.  "I think they're two detectives who have arrested those others," she said.  She kept an eye on them during the trip, commenting how closely the prisoners were being supervised.  I suppose we were wondering what would happen if they made a break for it.  How exciting it would be if they dived overboard?  Would the policemen pull out their guns and let off a shot or two?  We'd really know we're in the big city if that happened.

Anyway, as we came closer to Sydney, by some pre-arranged signal, all the men got to their feet and morphed into ticket inspectors who came round checking that we were all on board legally.  It was a bit disappointing, really.

We had a good lunch at the Quay and made our way back to Central for the train home.

Monday, September 23

Marilyn and Robyn went off to the pictures this morning to see Downton Abbey while I stayed home to catch up with my on-line study course.  They suggest I allocate three hours each week to the course but it takes more than that just to read the comments of the other students, many of which are just random thoughts which they seem to think are worth sharing (something like this blog, in fact).

The movie started late and was quite long so we ended up with a late lunch.  With nothing else arranged, I chose another movie to watch - The Green Book.  I knew it had won the Academy Award but had mixed reviews.  No matter, we enjoyed it.

Marilyn said she wanted to watch a movie with Helen Mirren and we found Collateral Beauty.  It also had Will Smith, Keira Knightley and Kate Winslett so there were lots of familiar faces., which is always reassuring. And we enjoyed that one too.

Not a very productive day, but enjoyable, nevertheless.

I had a look at the Step Count app on my phone to see how much ground I had covered on Monday - 10327!  That's the highest it's been for a long time and compares with the 3540 I did on Saturday.  The count is not always a realistic figure because I don't carry the phone all the time so most of my daily wandering go unnoticed.  Yesterday was a good example of that.  It was a fairly normal day with usual trips between rooms and a brief sojourn outside but my count was only 25.  I've decided I'll only acknowledge counts over 3000 and put the lower figures down to counting errors.

Thursday, September 19

The flight from Tasmania arrived around lunch-time yesterday, so Marilyn invited Anne and Alan to meet  us at Central Station for a bite to eat and a chance to catch up.  Robyn and her friend, Pam joined us as well.  On her last trip, Marilyn had been to new eatery in the station and decided it was suitably up-market for our group.  Sad to say, it was a bit disappointing: the food was OK, although a bit limited, but the service was pretty ordinary and the staff were in need of some serious training in hospitality.  Getting a glass of flat champagne in the wrong type of glass was the last straw and Marilyn demanded a replacement.

Today we have nothing organised.  We wandered across to the shopping centre this morning to get a few necessities.  First, we bought a few bargains at Aldi and I was left on a bench to look after that stuff while Marilyn and Robyn went into Woolies.  I hadn't realised it was the Oldies Bench and there was a procession of elderly, movement-impaired men and women who came to sit for a few minutes to catch their breath before heading for the car park, or the Disability Taxi.  I happen to be using a walking stick at the moment; the doctors insisted I get into the habit of carrying one, frightened that a combination of wonky knee and aftermath of stroke made me liable to fall.  The stick identified me as a fellow oldie so I was drawn into conversation about ailments and what a bugger it is getting old.

It was certainly a new experience for me and I gather that I'll be expected to become more social in my old age.  I had always imagined I'd be a grumpy old man but that ambition might not be realised.

Sunday, 22nd September

We've had two good days out this weekend. On Saturday, we met up with friends, Jim and Di, in Kiama.  In conversation, we decided that Jim and I first met in 1966 so I think it counts as a long-term friendship.  He and his wife, Di, live in Kangaroo Valley so we don't see each other very often.

We walked out to the wharf and had a fishy lunch at the Fish Restaurant, then wandered up to the blowhole to enjoy the spectacle.  The wind was quite strong so the horde of spectators was treated to a great show.

Today we decided to get on the train and spend some time in Sydney.  We thought the trip would be quiet , being a weekend, but there was hardly  a spare seat on the train.  Getting out and enjoying life seems to be the norm in NSW and this was confirmed by the crowds at Town Hall,Station and Circular Quay.  We took the ferry to Watsons Bay where, again, there was no room to move.

Coming from the Anglo-Saxon outpost that is Launceston, multi-cultural Sydney is a revelation.  We live in a different country to the one I remember growing up in and I wonder whether our almost all-male, white, Anglo-Saxon, Christian government has the sensitivity and intelligence to steer us through this transition.

We're going to have to accept the reality of a dramatic change in our day-to-day circumstances if we are to progress. Sydney is an Asian city now and that's just the beginning.  Let's hope we can turn this to our advantage.  As the Borgs in Star Wars said, Resistance is futile.

Wednesday, September 18

I’m on a Jetstar flight to Sydney for what I like to think is a well-deserved holiday.  I checked back and this is my first time on a plane since May 8th, 2016 when Marilyn and I flew back to Launceston after our cruise to PNG. Flying is so common nowadays that, for a retired gentleman, a period of 40 months without a flight seems unthinkable.

Things haven’t changed much in that time.  Jetstar still mucked up our booking.  We always pay the fee to select our seats so that we can both have an aisle seat, opposite each other.  When we got to the airport, they said they were doing a manual boarding, whatever that is, and re-printed our passes.  Somewhere in that process, we were shifted.  And we didn’t notice.

So Marilyn is up front in aisle 7, while I’m jammed in a window seat in aisle 16.  I hate window seats on domestic flights.  I think I read somewhere that the reclining mechanism on these seats has been disabled, and I hope that’s true; my knees are already jammed in the small space and any intrusion into that space will be intolerable.

Not happy, Jan, and somebody will hear about it.  Probably just the few people who read this blog. Life’s too short to get into a barney with Jetstar (and life’s getting shorter each day!)

Monday, September 16

Jamie rang late yesterday afternoon to invite us to dinner.  Nera had announced during the afternoon that she felt like having guests so put a general invitation up on Facebook aimed at people who play Bingo with her.  Bingo is a great thing with the filipina community and they meet regularly.  Nera is lucky and wins more often than she loses.  Her mother, who is with them at the moment, is an old-fashioned Christian lady and frowns on any kind of gambling but her grumbling doesn't stop Nera from having the occasional game.  Nera asked Jamie to ring us to make sure that we were aware that the dinner was on.

We had nothing else to do and we accepted.  The weather was reasonable and Nera asked Jamie to put up their portable pool so she could have a splash around but, by the time we arrived at their house, a cold front had hit and the air was freezing.  It was too late to dismantle the pool so it stayed there, reminding everyone how unpredictable Tasmanian weather can be and how unwise it is have expectations.

Nera's bingo friends are mostly Filipina but many are married to Australian men who gather together at these functions to talk about things that really matter - like football.  One fellow last night wanted to have a whinge about Climate Change which he thinks is exaggerated.  He admits he doesn't understand it but that doesn't stop him from having an opinion.

I don't know how many turned up but there were lots of kids and they take up more room than adults. Nera had cooked a large piece of snapper she had in the freezer, lots of kebabs - beef, pork and chicken - and there was the usual rice and salad.  Everyone ate well and there was not much left.

Unfortunately, one family arrived late and Jamie had to make a quick trip to the local shop for a barbecued chicken.  It amazes me that Nera and Jamie make open invitations on-line, nobody accepts but still turn up, they all bring kids and rarely does anybody bring food.  I can't imagine how anyone could be expected to cater in that situation, but it seems to work.

It was a very good night but we found it a bit cold to be sitting around the garden.  Most of the others of our age also retreated to the lounge-room and, of course, all the kids did the same.  Other people's kids are never as well-behaved as your own.

I'm getting through the expectations of my on-line course in Writing Fiction.  There are a couple of hundred people doing it and they are expected to post samples of their writing regularly as well as comments on other people's work.  I'm not sure how I feel about that; I'm a bit precious about my writing and only want people to applaud.  I'm not comfortable with criticism.

Today's exercise was to turn on the radio and write up to 500 words about the first thing that was said.  We had to focus on characters rather than incidents.  Several people turned on the radio and heard a song so some of their characters are a bit odd.  One girl, apparently, is writing about love on an elevator.  I wonder what song that was. Not having a radio, I turned on the TV and heard the news about the bushfires.  My character is Trevor, a reluctant firefighter, who believes that he has the soul of a poet but finds himself in the guise of man of action.  My 500 words came surprisingly easily.

Thursday, September 11

I had to go for a blood test this morning and needed to fast.  That's not usually a problem but, we're without a car at the moment (in reality, our daughter-in-law is without a car and has borrowed ours) so the logistics were interesting. There are only a few buses a day coming through our area and my best option was to catch one at 9.30am with a return at 11.  I would have to ring the bus company to make sure he would watch out for me waiting on the side of the road, and make a detour to drop me off near the doctor's.  

All too hard, so I rang Jamie who picked me up.  While waiting for him, I put some seeds out for our birds.  The galah with the broken wing is a regular and I think he is dependent on us now for his food.  I've been watching him over the past few days and noted that he has four different trees which he uses to perch in between feeds.  I don't know how long he's been in our yard but he seems to have worked out a routine which works for him and, clearly, we're expected to play our part.

Marilyn has already organised for Jamie to take on feeding duties while we're away.  Another interesting anomaly this morning: the usual flock of sulphur-crested cockatoos arrived when they sensed food was around and in among them was something different.  I dragged out my bird book and discovered it was a long-billed corella, native to Victoria.  There are any number of reasons why one might be in Tasmania but it was nice to see a little more variety in our collection.

I started an on-line course in Writing Fiction this week.  All the courses I've done in the past have encouraged contact between the participants, but I've always avoided that; this course, though, is reliant on students commenting on each other's work.  I've already had a couple of not-so-positive remarks and I suppose I'll have to get used to it.

Sunday, September 7

We sat down to watch a movie last night.  We've been binging on TV shows like Harrow and Sherlock and felt it was time for something a little more substantial.  I had downloaded The Greatest Showman and we had heard some of the music somewhere so that was the first choice.  But, it turned out to be in Russian!  I don't how that happened but it was very disconcerting, so we looked for something else.

The Seagull was based on a play by Anton Chekhov (no, thanks!), we had already seen the Snowman so opened the latest Liam Neeson revenge movie, Cold Pursuit.  His Taken series had all been good and we had no doubt this would be in the same vein.  When you find a winning formula, why change it?

It was, in fact, great fun.  Dozens of people died but it was almost cartoonish in how it was presented. It reminded me of the Roadrunner cartoons in many ways.  Not a movie for everyone and you can't take it too seriously but certainly worth a watch.  As a bonus, it is set around Denver, Colorado, the 'Mile High City' and the scenery was spectacular.

Friday, September 6

Jamie's put me on to a website called Medium which is for people who like reading and writing.   Each day there are some interesting bits of writing and tips for budding writers.  Today, among other comments, was this gem:

John Green: Writing is a profession for introverts who want to tell a story but don’t want to make eye contact while doing it.

I can relate to that.

Thursday, September 5

It's Adult Learners Week in Tasmania and much energy is being expended in trying to winkle oldies out of their chairs and on to their feet.  The intention of the exercise is to is to lay out some potential activities or hobbies that bored retirees might see as the solution to their loneliness and that will have a positive effect on the levels of senior mental health and save the government some money in the long term.

Jamie was in the Library the other day and noticed a series of events which they were offering and which he felt might suit us.  He's not at the stage yet of arranging stuff for us and expecting us to take part, but he does go out of his way to ensure we don't vegetate in our little cottage, with watching the birds as the highlight of our day.So, if he finds a decent TV program or a community event which might spark our interest, he passes it on.

He suggested Marilyn might like 'Crocheting with Beads' and it would be an opportunity for her and Zenaida, Nera's mum, to take part in it together.  And for me, he chose Creative Writing.  It was held yesterday. Sadly, only one other person turned up and she was hardly a senior.  Toby, the facilitator, told me she was a published author and wrote stuff for Mills and Boon.  Praise, indeed! We only had a couple of hours and he wanted to talk about editing our writing.

We had been asked to bring 300 words of something we'd written so I took a poem.  Apparently, this exercise doesn't work well with poetry so I scrolled through my iPad to find some prose, in fact a description of the town where I lived in Scotland.  The first step was to reduce that 300 words to 250, then 200, then 150, then 100, then 75.  It seemed a ridiculous way to tidy up your writing but I went along with it.

My original 300 words which I thought were well-chosen, interesting and informative became a brief, sparse comment about nothing much in particular.  All the adjectives were gone, and the interesting and colourful language and the humour ... and the point of writing it in the first place.  Still, it was a useful exercise if the problem I was trying to fix is that I was saying too much and needed to reduce the wordage.

The other participant was a youngish woman who had brought a piece of writing on small sheets of paper covered with highlighted sections in two colours. She explained that the original piece was 900 words and the highlights were excised  sections to bring it back to 300.  It was written in rhyming couplets so she had a terrible job to reduce it further while trying to maintain the rhyming.

However, it has encouraged me to find out more about the techniques of writing and I've been looking at possible on-line study.  There's an 8-week course with The Open University, starting on September 9, which might be worthwhile.

I came across a TV series which looked interesting: The World's Most Luxurious Trains. I like trains and luxury is always good so I downloaded the first episode to watch.  It was awful.  The introduction was not about trains but about the super-rich who demand the very best and why it is important that we provide the luxuries they deserve.  It was a paeon of praise for the impeccable taste of the robber barons who have milked the system for years, and for their spoiled children who wallow in inherited wealth, contributing nothing to society.  My socialist soul was offended so I ditched the program before it was properly started.

Tuesday, September 3

One of the birds which uses our yard as a cafeteria is a galah with a broken wing.  He's usually the first to arrive in the morning, peering in the window, hoping to get an early start on the food before the other birds muscle him out of the way.  I try to slip him an extra handful but he's very timid and toddles away if I come near.  I suppose he really has to take his chances with the others; survival of the fittest is the rule at our place.

Because he can't fly, I thought he was living among a big pile of rocks at the front of the yard because I've seen him there but I'm not so sure now.  This morning, I got the food to him before the others arrived so he did well.  Then I watched him head over to the fence, crawl through to the next door property and proceed to climb up a scrubby little wattle tree, using his beak to drag him up from branch to branch.  Unbelievable!  He reached the branch he was aiming for and settled down for a snooze.

I've been calling the bird 'he' but, with the determination it's showing, I think it must be a female.  No bloke would go to so much trouble.

Sunday, September 1st

Fathers' Day and we were taken to the Country Club Casino where we were promised good food and giveaways.  We expected to see hordes of 30-somethings with their kids but everybody seemed to be in our age group, or older.  It says something about our changing habits that the Casino, once the go-to place for celebrations, now has to depend on the older generation for their survival.

Marilyn had offered to cook lunch for us all but it was decided she didn't need the worry and we went out: Jamie and Nera, Zenaida (Nera's Mum) and Chrislin, (Nera's sister).  It was a great outing: the food was good and there was a good singer who enjoyed the same sort of music as I do.  She even asked us to join in the chorus of Simon and Garfunkel's The Boxer - how esoteric.

I looked forward to the giveaways but discovered they were only given away to those who invested $50 in the pokies.  Oh, well - a $200 Bunnings voucher would have been nice but I gave the pokies up years ago and don't want to re-visit that particular bad habit.