On Friday Jim came down to Melbourne with me. He took the tram from Reservoir to the flat in East Melbourne and spent the day there while I was at work. I met him there later in the afternoon and we took the tram to Queen's College in Parkville.
We had gone to a party to celebrate Robert and Susan's 50th wedding anniversary. 50 years. That's quite some achievement. I first met them when Robert came to be chaplain at Ormond College, where I was living at the time. Both Queen's and Ormond are residential colleges attached to the University of Melbourne. I was pregnant with Tabitha at the time which means I have been friends with them for 41 years. This comes as something of a shock to me!
It was a nice and gentle party. It was good to catch up with bygone friends, to catch up with not so bygone friends and to meet new people. It was also good that we had gone on the tram. There was nice wine to be drunk and some delicious finger food. But not too much of either. We were supposed to be going out for dinner!
Back to East Melbourne, and into the Prince Patrick pub for dinner with Lindsey. You may remember that Jim and I went to the PP earlier in June and had a very pleasant pub food meal. We had another very pleasant pub food meal this time. And they are quite obliging. I asked if it was possible to have chips rather than bread with the steak sandwich and they said "But of course - steak and chips; a classic combination". Lindsey had the pie of the day. It was HUGE!
We had a leisurely start Saturday. I fetched toasted ham, cheese and tomato sandwiches and hot drinks from the cafe under the flat for breakfast. We went to Ikea with Lindsey and bought a chest of drawers for our bedroom. Then Lindsey headed off to Mount Martha, and Jim and I made our way home - where Jim spent the rest of the day assembling the Ikea flat pack drawers. He only swore a few times, largely when he misunderstood the picture instructions for assembly.
On Sunday there was a meet and greet for a facebook group that Lindsey is a member of. It's a Great Dane lovers' group which I believe meets quite regularly but not usually in Ballarat. They met at this time last year by Lake Wendouree and had decided to do it again this year. And this year Lindsey and Ian, Jim and I and Rupert and Hugo went too. We were spectacularly lucky with the weather. It was a glorious winter's day. Hugo and Rupert were delighted to meet a whole group of great danes. We met in one of the pavilions by the lake, had a walk around the botanical gardens, a barbecue lunch, some of the dogs had a massage and we went on a tram ride. The tram had to slow down or even stop from time time so people could take photos of the tram with loads of great danes hanging out the windows :-D Generally, the dogs attracted quite a lot of attention with people wanting to pat them and talk to them. It was a good day and Rupert and Hugo seemed to enjoy it, although they weren't so keen on the massage. Lindsey is keeping an eye out for other meetings that we can take them to.
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| Lake Wendouree on a sunny winter Sunday morning |
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| Hugo: What are they? Swans? Can I chase them? |
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| Great Danes in the Ballarat Botanical Gardens (across the road from the lake) |
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| Lindsey and Rupert (and another swan) |
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| Rupert on the tram |
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| Hugo on the tram |
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