It was another dark and stormy night

It was Freyja's birthday last weekend but it wasn't convenient to get together to celebrate, so we had her Birthday Lunch yesterday at my place. Lindsey came too, but not Ian. He's currently in Switzerland so not really handy for Sunday Lunch.

Lindsey brought home made seed crackers and various dips. I made roast potatoes (of course) and a vegetable and bean pot pie. I made the pastry topping in the way I usually make shortcrust pastry, except that I used vegan olive spread and oat milk in place of butter and cows' milk. I rather like my vegan pastry - it is very soft and fluffy.

Sunday Lunch in Mount Helen, photos by Freyja:

The BoM had been warning for several days of severe weather across the state on Sunday afternoon, so Freyja and Simon left shortly after lunch, hoping to be ahead of the wind and the rain. It arrived here late in the afternoon and lasted into the evening. It wasn't as bad as it might have been - the wind wasn't as strong as Friday night's. But there was a considerable amount of rain, a hefty dose of hail and lots of thunder and lightning. Lindsey had so much hail bouncing off her front windows that she couldn't hear the thunder. I didn't have quite as much rain and hail, and could definitely hear the thunder. Freyja and Simon got home ahead of the rain, just. They have magnificent views of approaching storms from their lounge room windows.

It is much calmer today, although it is still cold and rainy. But gentle, gardeners' rain rather than stormy rain.

I am very pleased with my three bedrooms. They are looking rather nice - at the moment, while they are still neat and tidy!

Main bedroom
(which is my room)

Guest (second) bedroom

Spare (third) bedroom

It was a dark and stormy night

 ... as they say.

The rain started around 8pm, just as Lindsey and I were getting back from Melbourne. The wind picked up shortly after.

There was a LOT of wind. Brandy and Whiskey were unimpressed and ran up and down the house, behaving as though there was another cat or a possum in the garden. There wasn't. It was just the wind, blowing things about.

I worried that the mighty gum tree over the side fence might decide to throw a branch or even itself at my little house. (It's not really all that little, but it would be the underdog in a fight with the gum tree)

The wind and the rain lasted for hours.

But in the end, it was not the gum tree over my side fence that blew down. It was the Cootamundra wattle at Lindsey's place (These are Lindsey's photos):

Broken at the base

Narrowly missed Lindsey's car!

"My" trees are still standing:

Base of the ancient gum tree

And its canopy, towering over other,
much younger trees

"My" wattle, just over the fence.
Not a Cootamundra, but also
not sleeping on the fence!

After such a stormy night, it has been a rather lovely day. So much so that the market was absolutely packed, the playgrounds and botanical gardens around the lake were filled with people and the walking tracks were very busy. So was the parking. We had to park up behind the gardens, rather than alongside the lake.

The market, abuzz with shoppers and browsers

It was busy at the Avalon nursery, where we went to buy new wattle trees. We had to park outside rather than in the car park. Fortunately not so busy at the Mount Clear shops, where we stopped for lunch, although busy enough. The cafe had quite a few [people in it. But at least parking wasn't an issue.

I think, after the storms of last night, people might be thinking thoughts of spring. I believe that winter is due back tomorrow

Spring

Hill House, parking area

Bottom of the Hill House drive,
eucalyptus flowers

Daffodils at my place

Snow peas growing vigorously

 

Wattles at my place,
a week or so behind those at Hill House

You would have had every reason to think that spring is on its way. The wattles are in bloom, spring flowers are starting to flower. The soil is warming up. We have had some sunny, almost warm days.

Alas, I fear that spring is merely toying with us. The past few days have been cold, gloomy and damp. This morning we have had a storm and it is very cold and rainy. Winter is positively gloating as it returns itself, front and centre. 

I had almost found my gardening mojo, which has been missing for some while. Freyja said she thought it might be in the garden, so I went hunting one sunny day a week or so ago - and there it was, lurking in a grassy corner. I went to grab it and it slipped out of my grasp and is hiding somewhere in the wind and rain, the long grass, the overgrown garden beds.

As I survey the garden through a rain-splashed window and watch the trees over the side fence dancing in the wind, a flat with a balcony somewhere in Docklands is Very Tempting! But I certainly couldn't put this place on the market with the garden in such disarray, and once spring really does arrive my gardening mojo might return.

Today is not that day 😂

It's a year today since Jim died. I'm not sure what to make of that. I still have a faint sense of Time's wingèd chariot lurking nearby. I have a faint sense that I am waiting for something, although what I do not know. The earth has made another complete revolution around the sun, the season is in flux. Life goes on.

And time passes, very quickly. The morning is almost gone and I have yet to accomplish most of the things I had planned. I really must get a move on!

A Busy Thursday

Before the Handygirls came on Thursday the driveway looked like this:

And after:

I had been slowly, slowly, slowly chopping down a bush that was in this spot. The Handygirls finished it off for me. I am intending to put the leftover pavers here as a standing spot for the rubbish/recylcing/green waste bins. Although, it may not be big enough when/if the glass recycling bin ever comes.

The agapanthus down the side of the driveway are much tidier, although I will still need to cut back a couple by the little wall with the mail boxes. I do not like agapanthus. They seem to think that their whole reason for being is to take over the whole known universe. I would have them out if I could afford it. Then I would replace them with native ground covers. Or something. But that is way down the bottom of my list of things to do and will almost certainly never happen.

Then the Handygirls came inside and now my little-used study, which mostly held things that needed sorting out, looks like this:

It is a child's bed, really, but at least it makes my place a three bedroom house, rather than two bedrooms and study. I need to get curtains or a blind for the window. It somehow got missed when I bought blinds for the place after we purchased it.

It may not often/ever have a person sleeping
on it, but Brandy and Whiskey think it's ok

This also arrived on Thursday:

I now have flights booked for Japan in October.

And the gas has finally been properly disconnected. The gas supply company had been harassing "The Occupier" pretty much since I closed my account, with increasingly threatening letters. I would ring them. They would say that I should ignore the letters because I no longer had any responsibility for the gas account. And on Thursday morning, while I was out, a bloke came and turned it completely off. The meter is still there, so any future owner can have it reconnected if they wish. I am happy with my solar panels and my "all electric house".

All in all, Thursday was quite a busy day.

Partying

It was a weekend of partying.

Saturday afternoon was Stella's Family Farewell Party, in a wine bar in East Melbourne. Very conveniently, the Life's Too Short  wine bar is in the same complex as Lindsey and Ian's flat. Ian was heading back to Ballarat after the event, so I stayed in the flat overnight.

It was a good do. Stella would have much enjoyed it. I think everyone who is in Victoria was there, plus distant cousin Ken, and Bob and Marie Rogers. Marie met us at the airport when we very first came to Australia. Bob was a partner in the surgery when Tony joined it. Bob and Marie are in their nineties, live in Kew and came to East Melbourne on the tram! Bob is the only original partner still standing.

We had cocktails, wine, non alcoholic alternatives, coffee, tea and very tasty small canapés. Stella and Tony were there in the form of a large portrait that Lindsey's daughter in law's father painted 

The painting is in the background at
Hill House.
Rupert and Hugo are with Stella
January, 2020

Here we all are:

And a few of the people who were there:

And this is inside the venue:

On Sunday, I was off to Geelong. The Sunday lunchers were meeting at Irene's place, although Chris and John were unexpectedly unable to come. 

People say that the road from Melbourne to Geelong is very boring, and that may well be the case if you drive it frequently. I almost never drive it, going as I usually do from Ballarat, so I didn't find it boring. And especially not once I got to Geelong itself and drove around Corio Bay for part of the journey. I wasn't expecting to see the sea, which was deep blue and sparkling in the sunshine.

This is what Chris and John missed out on:

There was tiramisu for dessert, but I didn't get a photo of that. It was all very delicious.

Gillie and Irene

In other news, I FINALLY got around to getting the gutters cleaned out on Saturday morning before I went to Melbourne. I've been trying to think when it was last done. It was quite some time ago. When Jim was here, the council came out and cleared them as part of his aged care support, although I think that might have stopped when the My Aged Care package came into play. Whenever it stopped, it certainly didn't continue after he moved into residential care. I suspect it might have been perhaps three years since the gutters were last done. The gutters were very full. The bloke who came and did it was very careful but the green waste bin is very full and there is still a lot of leaf and twig litter to go in. I shall have to remember to have it done more often!

Whiskey was very keen to get out and see
what had been going on

Brandy was more than happy
to look at it from inside

The Handy Girls are coming on Thursday to sort out the agapanthus down the driveway. They were going to come last Thursday but they were running very late and I had to go out. Lindsey and I were meeting Sandy from Perth in Sunbury at 6pm and that's slightly over an hour away. I put the Handy Girls off to this week and Lindsey and I went off to Sunbury, to Okami for Japanese food and a catch up with Sandy and another friend.

All in all it's been quite a sociable few days

A Week Off

Evening light

I had last week off work. I have so much annual leave owing, plus long service leave, that I decided to have a whole week off, not for any particular reason, but just because I could.

I had thoughts of clearing up and cleaning the house, tidying in the garden, planning a couple of new veg beds.

In the event, I did very little at all. 

I got out into the garden on a couple of sunny days, but not for long. After 10 or 15 minutes my hands were so cold I had to come back inside. 

I did do a little tidying, but no deep cleaning. I sorted out a couple of boxes of things to go to new homes, but no more. I did sweep and wash the floors in the laundry, toilet, bathroom and kitchen, but absolutely did not do the proper cleaning of the carpets I had intended to do. I have not tidied up the cables around the TV, though I have bought a cable tidy box.

In terms of productivity, it was a complete failure. In terms of a week of lazing around, drinking tea, watching TV, pottering on the internet, general inactivity, it was a considerable success.

I did some Japanese classes. I did not go to any water exercise. I dropped Stella's death certificate off at the solicitor, so her estate may eventually be sorted out. I collected bags for Ballarat's soft plastic recycling pilot, which I had registered for and been accepted on. I am now collecting soft plastics with enthusiasm. I have ordered a second electric throw, to live on my chair in the dining room. I went shopping and played around with some new recipes.

Oh - and I had a phone call from the estate agency that we bought this place from. He was, I think, just checking in, in case I wanted anything estate agency-like. I asked if it was worth re-doing the bathroom and he suggested that it would be very expensive and if I wasn't going to gain any benefit from it myself then it probably wasn't worth it. I had been thinking of getting rid of the bath (which has never once been used as a bath) and replacing it with a second toilet, plus, of course, updating the shower and basin. I almost never have a need for two toilets so I might not bother, although I might follow up Jim's idea of covering the bath and using it as a shelf. He was planning to do that before he got sick but of course it didn't happen. And I might think about having the kitchen redecorated instead of tackling the bathroom.

Lindsey and I went out to the Meredith pub for lunch yesterday, again, just because we could. Ian couldn't join us.  I had one of the nicest pieces of snapper that I've had in a very long time. Lindsey had lamb backstrap, which I had a taste of and which was also very delicious.

I'm back at work this week, and the calendar is also full of lots of social activities. I might have to take next week off to recover from the upcoming busy social whirl!

Eating snapper at the Meredith
Pub - and looking surprisingly
grumpy given how delicious it was
(Photo by Lindsey)