More lunching

It crossed my mind recently that we hadn't had any contact with our friend Pat recently.  I sent her a message asking how she was and did she feel like meeting up for lunch somewhere.

It turns out that she has had a new knee fitted since last we met and was just now able to start driving again and to get about.  Good timing me!

We arranged to meet for lunch on Wednesday at a cafe towards the Ballarat CBD which I have driven past many times but which I have never been into. And it's lovely. It has a small menu but what is on the menu is beautifully cooked.  My only issue was that my seafood linguine, which was full of lovely seafood, well cooked pasta and a silky sauce, was also full of chilli. I am emphatically not a fan of chilli. I can tolerate a tiny little bit but any more than that gives me indigestion, makes me feel slightly yucky and (as far as I am concerned) overpowers everything else on the plate. I hadn't expected there to be chilli in a seafood linguine so hadn't thought to ask. If I had, I would have had the flathead tails and chips, which Jim had and which was delicious.

However, ignoring the chilli, the cafe is well worth a visit.  The staff are lovely, the building is cute and easy to get to and park outside, the food is well cooked. And we had a lovely catch up with Pat

Lunch yesterday was also lovely, but we had it at home.  Jim had a pork pie (English style, which you can often get in Woolworths) with pineapple rings, pineapple chutney and pickled onions.  I had chicken wings with avocado, mango and tomatoes. I am not a big fan of pork pies and am definitely not a fan of pineapple. Jim finds chicken wings too fiddly and positively loathes avocado. So an at home lunch where we both got to eat things that we like and not eat things that we don't find palatable. 

Stella is still in the hospital. Her ankle is still not getting better but her breathing seems to have improved a bit. Because she has a (permanent) cough and was breathless (she always is) she had to go into isolation until two Covid tests came back negative. Fortunately they both did and now she can have one visitor a day plus the nursing staff and doctors can come into her room. And - she can have her door open.  She wasn't enjoying being shut up in a hospital room with the door shut and no visitors! I will go and inspect her tomorrow and see what's occurring.

Geelong

I never really think to go to Geelong, unless it is to visit a friend who lives there. I can't really tell you why. It's not that far.  It's a pleasant drive. It's nice to get out of Ballarat and to explore other places occasionally. It is by the sea. All good reasons to go for a day out, and we almost never do.

So when Lindsey said that she was going to look at a particular shop just outside of Geelong we invited ourselves along too.

Alas, when we got to the shop, it was closed to the public because of Covid restrictions. I'm not sure what Covid restrictions it was referring to. Most shops have been able to open in Regional Victoria for several weeks. More annoyingly, its Facebook page, its website and its Google page said it was open. A wasted trip, you might think.

But no. We had intended to have lunch while we were out anyway, so we took ourselves down to the foreshore and had lunch in the Covid-safe Beach House cafe. And very nice it was too. The weather was (just!) warm enough for us to sit outside so we had a nice lunch and nice views. Well worth the trip.

Although if you are running a shop and are not open to the public, it might be as well to indicate this on your social presence so people don't trek all the way from Ballarat for no good reason!

Regional Victoria has reached a rolling 14 day average of 0 new Covid cases today. This is quite an achievement. Melbourne has really made an achievement. This week it had two consecutive days of 0 cases followed, today, by 2 new cases, with a rolling 14 day average of 2.7  This is remarkable when you consider how many new cases were being recorded just a few weeks ago. There is even the possibility that the "ring of steel" might come down in the next couple of weeks and we will actually be able to go to Melbourne.

Still not sure about Manky Melbournites coming into Pristine Ballarat, though 😂

Our visit to Geelong:

Long Weekend

I was soundly sleeping at just before 4:00 on Sunday morning.  This is unusual for me these days.  I tend to sleep really well until 2 or 3, then wake up and then just doze until it's time to get up around 5:30/6:00.

Sound asleep, I was.  Until Jim and I were jolted awake by an almighty crash in the kitchen.

Not Brandy.  Brandy had also been peacefully sleeping on our bed until the crash happened when, as is the way with startled cats, he silently translocated from the top of the bed to underneath the bed.

So Whiskey.  What has he done?  I leapt out of bed, had the presence of mind to put my slippers on, and went down to the kitchen to find out what had happened.

There was no cat.  There was, however, a huge amount of glass on the floor, scattered far and wide.  There were also grapefruit, apples and oranges on the floor, which had been in a glass fruit bowl when I went to bed!

It is seldom part of my daily plan to be sweeping and vacuuming at 4 in the morning. But needs must. And then it had to be done again when day broke and the sun caused much glinting on the carpet.

And no, he is not supposed to be on the kitchen bench.  This does not seem to bother him while we are asleep. Or absent, I suppose. I have reverted to putting things out of harms way when retiring for the night. No more fruit bowls on the edge of the kitchen bench.

It was a good long weekend.  I did some cooking (apple and blueberry tart tatin, anyone?) and some gardening. We pottered about and watched some TV.  Lindsey and I went shopping today (not a holiday but neither of us works on Mondays, although I did put in a few hours of web-related stuff). 

In other news, Stella has gone into hospital today. This is not entirely desirable under the current public health circumstances, but she has had an infected ankle for sometime which is not responding to treatment, plus she is having more difficulty breathing than usual. She is hoping only to be in for a couple of days, assuming they don't kidnap her and keep her for ever, which has happened in the past.

As the number of new Covid cases has been dropping in Victoria over recent days, I said to Lindsey that on the day when we reached an unequivocal zero I would open a bottle of sparkling wine.  After 139 (I think) days since the last time, today we reached an unequivocal zero cases. I have opened this:

Public holiday

It was a public holiday in Victoria yesterday, for the footie grand final (which is actually this evening and, for the first time ever, being played in Brisbane not Melbourne). It was also quite a nice day, weatherwise. Mostly sunny. Pleasantly warm.

So Jim and I took the opportunity to assemble the new outside table that came from Bunnings on Monday. It wasn't too complicated to put together, although the picture instructions weren't as clear as they might have been.  We didn't realise that the bracing pieces had an up and a down and put them on the wrong way round.  Easily fixed. And now we have an outside table AND we are still married!

But I decided that trying to assemble the benches that came with the table might prove to be too much of a strain on our relationship. Too many different pieces. And there's no hurry; the bloke who's coming to re-lay and slightly extend the patio isn't coming for another month. I'll think about the benches later.

Then I turned my attention to the front garden. The little side bed desperately needed weeding. In addition to the hollyhocks and lupins, it was full of long grass and what I think is a kind of wood sorrel. It's very pretty but it is rather taking over. So I weeded around the hollyhocks and lupins then topped up the bed with some of the diminishing heap of garden soil. I don't think anyone has ever worried very much about the gardens in these units. When we arrived the front garden was full of agapanthus and the "soil" looked more or less like builders' rubble mixed with clay. Jim got the agapanthus out and I planted the front bed with lavenders, rosemary, a curry plant and seaside daisies which don't seem to mind living in poor soil. I do feel, though, that I should start improving the soil a bit.

Anyway, I then hung a bamboo trellis on the side fence with metal S hooks. The fences are made of metal and I can't think of any easy way of attaching things to them. The S hooks will do for now (and possibly indefinitely!). I have planted three small sweet pea plants which will hopefully climb up the trellis.

And now the front garden looks like this:

I'm glad I decided to do all that yesterday. The top temperature was probably around 21d. The weather was pleasant.  Today the top temperature is forecast to be around 13d and when I went out about an hour ago it looked like this:

I haven't read the rain gauge yet so i don't know how much rain we had overnight, but it sounded quite heavy when I got up for a loo stop at around 3:00.

My desk appears to have acquired a new ornament

Whiskey spends quite a bit of time sat there, looking out the window. I'm not sure quite what he is watching, but it is his favourite window. Brandy tends to gaze out the windows at the front of the house.

Photo Frame

I have found somewhere up high to put the digital photo frame.  I have loaded just over 1000 photos onto a memory stick (which, I must say, took a great deal of time and generated quite a lot of frustration!). But it works!

The middle shelf is empty because it amuses Whiskey to knock the things that were on there off. I do not want my Japanese Torii gate or Jim's ancient little Mamod engine to get broken so I have toddler proofed them.

Oh, and I have bought a new tagine.  The pottery one on the bottom shelf was beginning to develop small cracks. I don't want it to shatter and it will make a pretty serving dish. The new one has a cast iron bottom which shouldn't crack.  I'm not sure what the top is made of; I think it is ceramic. But it is properly sealed and also shouldn't crack.

Garden

 I was siting on my couch over the weekend and gazing idly at this:

How nice, I thought, to be able to see the lavender from my couch.

It crossed my mind that this is the first lounge room I've had where the windows have come down low enough to be able to see the garden from my couch. It's rather nice.

I went out to inspect the garden and to consider what needs to be done to it.  The short bed at the top needs weeding, and topping up with a bit more soil.  It's got lupins and hollyhocks in it, but I want to put up a trellis and plant some sweet peas as well.  The rest of the garden is looking quite good.  A little light weeding is in order, but the plants have largely bedded in well and are keeping the weeds at bay.

I looked around to check the bed under the lounge room windows.  And saw this:

They are very curious about what is behind the closed, outside doors and the windows. In another couple of weeks I will get a couple of harnesses and take them out for a walk. Not quite yet, though. I don't want to lose them.

I have to give a shout out to Bunnings. Lindsey and I went to the local Bunnings yesterday afternoon to get a few things.  While we were there we had a look at some of the outside furniture. They had a wooden table which was almost exactly what I had in mind for the new patio when it is laid later in November. When I got home I looked it up online and ordered it and a couple of park bench style seats.  So mid-afternoon on a Sunday.  They arrived this morning, Monday, at almost exactly 09:00.  I was very impressed! (The website said between 2 to 5 working days so I wasn't really expecting them until Wednesday or Thursday.)

Apart from that it's been a quiet few days. Nothing particularly noteworthy has happened in the Tani household. (And long may it remain that way!!)

Bridges

Ever since I have had access to a digital camera of some sort, I have taken photos of bridges when I see them. To be properly collected, the bridge should be walked over, or driven at a pinch, or passed under. Of course, not all bridges can be crossed or passed under.  The packhorse bridge at Haddon Hall, for instance, isn't accessible to the public.  But where possible I try to collect them properly.

Some years ago, Freyja wrote a poem for me about my bridge collection, which she printed out and framed.  This poem says that my bridges adorn the lounge room wall. In fact, I didn't bring any of the framed bridge photos with me when we came back from England and the current lounge room walls don't lend themselves to hosting a bridge collection.

I decided to buy digital photo frame. I had to wait for one to be brought in to the local Good Guys store. While I was waiting, I sorted through my photos on my laptop and put all the bridge photos into a separate folder.

Then the photo frame arrived.  I copied the bridge folder onto a memory stick and plugged it into the new phot frame.  And it worked very well. Except that the photos were a bit small.

Somewhat belatedly I remembered that I can actually display photos on the TV. Much better. Nice, clear photos of bridges. No wonder the people at the Good Guys were surprised when I ordered a digital photo frame!

However, I've got it now and it didn't cost a mere tuppence ha'penny.  I need to use it for something. So I am amusing myself sorting through the photos again, creating another folder of favourite photos to display on the digital frame. I'm not sure where I am going to put it, though. It needs to be up higher than it is on the shelf it's currently sitting on, plus it needs access to a power supply. I'm sure I'll find somewhere.

In other news, I think Brandy and Whiskey are settling in. They are beginning to find favoured spots for snoozing in.

Weekend

It was our turn for a care weekend at Stella's place. So on Saturday morning Lindsey and I did the usual rounds of the Mushroom farm and the Elaine Farmgate shop, then Jim and I got ready, bade Brandy and Whiskey a fond farewell and trundled down to Mount Martha.

On Thursday we had been visited by a locksmith who had come to put some digital locks on our doors. Not long after he had arrived and while he and I were discussing what needed to be done, the front doorbell rang.  It was a lady from down the road who had come to ask the locksmith if he would call into their place when he had finished at ours and look at something for her. She must have thought that she had mightily inconvenienced us (she hadn't) because while Lindsey and I were out collecting the cats, she had turned up at our place with a pie and an apple strudel from the local bakery as a thank you gift.

We didn't know what kind of pie it was but it was covered in sesame seeds, which suggested that it was a savoury pie of some sort. So we took it to Mount Martha with us and had it for Saturday dinner.  The pies from the local bakery are always very nice - but we were a bit surprised to find that it was a curried chicken pie and that the curry sauce was quite spicy. The curry sauce in chicken curry pies is usually very mild and a bit sweet. Stella is not much into spicy food so only ate the pastry. And the scalloped potatoes and veg. Jim and I do not mind mildly spicy food so ate the filling as well.

Lindsey checked up on Brandy and Whiskey on Sunday morning and found all was well, although they had eaten all their biscuits and the rug in the lounge room was all bundled up. We had a quiet and peaceful morning in Mount Martha doing useful things and preparing a Sunday roast. No curry sauce this time! We remembered that the clocks had gone forward and changed all the clocks that needed changing - except for the microwave clock which I entirely forgot about.

Then we went home and changed all our clocks as well (including the microwave which I had now remembered!)

Brandy and Whiskey are settling in nicely, although Whiskey is incredibly curious about what might be behind any door which is closed. This is not such an issue if it is the door leading, say, into the study.  It is more of an issue if it is the door leading into the garage or, worse, outside! We have to be very careful if going through any of those doors. But they are becoming quite friendly and fairly adventurous. Although Freyja was right when she pointed out that we had got used to living with an elderly cat and that the energy levels of kittens and young cats are surprisingly high.

Three boys, sleeping

My new Working from Home colleagues 

I don't think they're going to be very productive, though!

Welcome

Once Tani became ours, Jim and I started talking about whether or not to get a pet.

Jim wasn't keen to get a cat. Marlo had been such a lovely cat and no cat could ever match him.

But there was no point getting a dog.  We more or less already have two dogs. They don't live at our place and, strictly speaking, they aren't ours. But they don't know that. They think they live in a pack of six, four of whom come and go at random intervals.

There was no hurry about this so I let it go but kept an eye on the cats at the Ballarat Animal Rescue Shelter. I was clear that I didn't want a kitten. I would have been happy with a calm, older cat but didn't really want an ancient cat. Something around 2 or 3 years old would be ideal.

Then I saw a really pretty, ginger and white cat, not quite two years old.  I showed his photo to Jim who thought he was a real beauty.  He didn't object when I said that I might send in an expression of interest.

The response I got said that he was a bit shy but enjoyed snuggling with his brother.  Hmm, thought I. They are not advertised as a bonded pair, but I bet they are. And by the time I went out to meet the pretty cat, they were indeed a bonded pair. And the second one is a 10 month old kitten!

Lindsey and I went to pick them up yesterday

Bandii, now Brandy because my brain
couldn't cope with Bandii as a name

Shmukkles, now Whiskey because
who would ever call a cat Shmukkles?

Shmukkles is now called Whiskey because I was never going to keep that name and had to come up with an alternative name at short notice, and it seemed an appropriate counter to Brandy. It is spelled with the E because that is how the shelter staff spelled it on his adoption certificate, his council registration certificate and on his change of microchip notification. I wouldn't have spelled it that way, but it hardly seemed worth arguing.

When you take rescue cats home, the recommendation is that you sequester them in a small room for a week or two until they settle in and get used to their new home and new people. That lasted all of - oh, no seconds. Whiskey was very keen to explore his new home. Every square inch of it.  Brandy has been a bit more circumspect but has checked the place out slowly and surely.

They slept in the spare room last night and were waiting to come out for breakfast when I got up at around 5 (this is not unusual; I am often up at around that time). They seem to be settling in

What do you think is out there?

Hello! So this is where you were all night

This is a very comfortable bed.
It can be mine

I too will check this bed out

So welcome to Brandy and Whiskey. I understand that they came from a home where there were many cats and the number had to be reduced. They are in good condition and have obviously been taught their manners. I think they will make a fine addition to the Tani household (although I think Whiskey is going to be quite cheeky when he properly settles in!)

In other news, my Japanese fox, the acolyte of the Rice god Inari, this morning acquired a halo. I take this as a Good Omen