We had rain last week. A lot of rain. A VERY lot of rain!
Harbour Esplanade flooded on the corner of Bourke Street again. And again. It is somewhat alarming how few vehicles slow down as they approach the water, pushing tsunami like waves up and over the pavement. How no-one has a massive accident is a mystery. Rest assured, however, that my flat is safe from flood waters and tsunami like waves. Any flood that reached me would devastate most of bayside Melbourne and probably the CBD as well.
I went to the physio twice during the week. My knee and hip are much better but not yet perfect. I'm going back this week.
I met Lindsey in the Mail Exchange for lunch on Thursday and went with her to Japanese in the evening.
I have begun sorting out my winter garden ready for the summer. I need to get another larger pot for my runner bean experiment and one or two smaller ones so I can plant my herbs in bigger pots. I have also finally, finally, finally put down the rest of the blue and green stickers I bought months ago along the window sills. I haven't quite finished but I have run out of stickers. I'll get some more, if they have any, the next time I am near a Daiso.
I put some sticky hooks up along the top of the windows, balancing on my step stool with some trepidation. One by one they all fell off over the evening and night, even though they weren't holding anything. I have put them back up with super glue. So far they haven't fallen off and I have now attached some fairy lights and a string holding the tomato plant up. I must plant the tomato seeds I bought when I got my ginger rhizome. I think it's probably warm enough now - although so far the ginger plant hasn't pushed up any shoots. I am resisting the temptation to uncover it and see if it is still healthy. Patience, Frances. Patience. Such is the watchword of the good gardener.
Patience is also the watchword of the very new piano learner. I want to be able to play it properly NOW, but am a long way away from that. I am, in fact, still struggling to read the bass clef and apply it to the piano keys. I can actually read the bass clef. Once upon a very long time ago I played the cello (badly). I just can't seem to translate it into piano. It's a bit like when I was in school and deeply frustrated the sports teachers because I could map field positions onto a piece of paper absolutely accurately but I couldn't translate them onto the actual field. They thought I was being obstreperous. I wasn't. I really couldn't do it, or not easily and certainly not quickly. In order to be able to translate the bass clef into piano, I have bought a book filled with exercises for learning the piano keys and their clefs. Now I just need application. And patience.
It's a bit bizarre, though. I have absolutely no trouble translating the treble clef into piano!
The weather yesterday was glorious. Not particularly warm but sunny and shiny. I went to Geelong on the train. The Sunday Lunchers were meeting at Irene's place for lunch. And a magnificent lunch it was too. Irene made a chicken, leek and ham pie. We had mini pavlovas with raspberries and blueberries for dessert. But the absolute star was the entree. Gillie had found farm fresh, fat, new season asparagus at a farm shop and we had platefuls of them with melted butter to start. There is very little that beats farm fresh, new season asparagus (unless it is the aforementioned asparagus with new season baby broad beans and/or peas).
It was a lovely afternoon with good company as well as good food.
Then Gillie took me to the station after lunch, with a brief diversion along the beach road so we could see the sea. And my train journey home was entirely uneventful. Quite a change from the last time I tried to come home from Geelong on the train, which you might remember terminated rather abruptly at Wyndham Vale from where I took a bus to Werribee before catching a suburban train back to the city.
I had thought about doing a tram route today but the afternoon is half over and I haven't. I also haven't cleaned the flat, which was the other possibility for today. Not that it takes anything like a whole day to clean my flat, but by mid-afternoon I have usually lost interest in cleaning. I have sorted out the rubbish and I've changed the bedding and washed the sheets and pillowcases. I've sort of tidied the kitchen. I have not sorted out the vegetables, which I bought at the supermarket this week because I went to Geelong on the train yesterday instead of the Alphington market.
I cannot argue that today has been a particularly productive day!
And, having announced to the lunch table yesterday that I had already adapted to the change in the clock to daylight saving time (I sort of started on Friday and Saturday and it is, after all, only an hour's difference, such as between Eastern Standard Time and Tokyo time, or London and Paris time), having announced that, I managed to sleep in this morning. Fortunately, Brandy and Whiskey didn't notice. They are still on Standard time 😂
