Ballarat

I met my friend Pat for lunch yesterday. I don't think I've actually seen her since Stella and I went to her place for a Good Friday lunch earlier in the year. We play Scrabble online and have text message conversations but haven't met in person.Time flies!

We were going to meet at The Rusty Spud but it's closed on Mondays, so we repaired to The Robin Hood next door. It's a pub that I drive past frequently but haven't paid any attention to. Certainly I haven't been inside. It's enormous! At least, the dining area is. I think it must be primarily an eating pub. And the food isn't bad. Pat had the Apprentice's dish of the week - a chicken sweet and sour; it really is the apprentice's meal. Apparently he gets to choose a dish each week which he then makes and it's sold on the specials list. I played it safe and had a chicken parma - not too big and the chips were properly made.

Pat was looking very good. She'll be 90 in a couple of weeks and you really wouldn't know, if you didn't know. I do know. Lindsey and I are hoping to go to her birthday party. In the meantime, it was a good catch up

While I was in town, I wandered into the Bridge Mall. It's still a mall for now, although they have very nearly finished the transfer back into a road. It will only be a single lane and there will still be lots of space for pedestrians. I called in because I had seen references online to the bridge being reinforced. There isn't a bridge in the Bridge Mall, although there should be, given its name. And it turns out that there is a bridge. You just can't see it. Or not normally. It has been revealed, temporarily, so it can be reinforced to allow trucks to pass over it. The trickle of water is the Yarrowee River, which is usually more robust, and is certainly more river like in places where it is allowed to behave like a creek and not a drain.

You could wish they would
leave it exposed, with a visible bridge over it

Christmas has arrived in Ballarat,
although I didn't go to look at the
decorations on Sturt Street