Wednesday, December 18

Our family received an unexpected honour today.  Giant Steps School has chosen Christie as the name of one of its new houses.  In the past year or so the school has been able to appoint a Student Representative Council and it is this body which made the decision to choose the names of families who have made an important contribution to the development of the organisation.

It's a significant honour and we feel suitably humble.  The motto of Christie House is 'Dare to be Different'.

Friday, December 13th

I notice that authorities are predicting we still have months of the bushfire season to endure and that various brigades are having to crowd-fund to raise money for their basic equipment, because governments are too mean to provide appropriately.  What sort of society are we, that cuts funding to an essential service manned by volunteers, many of whom are losing pay when they take time off from their work to carry out this public service?

I heard the story this week of the tiny Kimberley Fire Brigade in Tasmania who decided they needed to do something to replenish their tool kit; they were down to just one screwdriver!   Someone donated a parcel of chocolate which they decided to raffle.  The Deloraine Rotary Club heard about this and offered to help out, sitting at Woolies to sell tickets.  They made about $1500 and, with a bit extra from the Rotary Club, it's a good result.

The result is that the whole gang of volunteer firies from Kimberley are planning to visit Bunnings this Saturday to spend their windfall.  They can probably afford a whole screwdriver set.

Wednesday, December 11

It was another chaotic trip through Sydney airport yesterday.  I don't know what Virgin passengers have to endure but Jetstar give the impression they are trained by the Spanish Inquisition.  1 hour and 20 minutes I stood in line just to hand my suitcase to a surly check-in chick (is that how her job is described?).  Last time we were held up, they blamed it on a computer glitch; this time, they blamed the smoke from the bushfires, causing an alarm to go off in the baggage conveyor belt.  What rubbish! There are 12 check-in gates and there were never more than 4 staff members on duty.  

I felt for the family groups and for the non-English speaking passengers who had no idea what was going on.  Many of them would have flown in from Singapore or Tokyo: real airports who know what they are doing.  Sydney Airport is an embarrassment!

Tuesday, December 10

We've been in NSW for a couple of weeks, spending time with Robyn at Lake Illawarra, and weekends with Anne and Alan at Turramurra.  Marilyn likes to be in Sydney at this time of the year when her nieces and nephews are involved in various end-of-year activities. 

Apart from that, we sat around a lot chatting, haunted various shopping centres and travelled on public transport.  We had hope to be among the first to travel on the new light rail service from Circular Quay to Randwick but the starting date has been pushed up to December 14th so had to be content with a trip in the new Mwpetro line between Chatswood and Epping.  We were unsure how we felt about a driverless train but it was an interesting journey, and the up-graded stations at Chatswood and Eeping were impressive.

From Epping, we continued on to Central on the tired old line through Strathfield and we saw how much needs to be done to drag Sydney Rail into the 21st century.