Tomatillo etc

Obviously distant snow has a positive effect on seedling sprouting, because the tomatillos are all up, two more rock melons, the strawberry spinach, and two seakale, more zucchini and the first pumpkin. B got a call to go and help out the school again. I worked on Dog and Dragon and polishing up Save the Dragons, and a little bit on the steampunk MG book - it was a windy day with spots of rain, on which one is glad to work indoors. I also got the net out and started cleaning it - 30 litre bucket of seaweed off it - so far. Won't set there again!

Scottish dancing this evening in the Masonic hall -complete with a picture of the queen ... in 1959. Mary - our instructress had brought along two pairs of dancing slippers. Red ones and black ones - which do you think go faster? ( no, spare your mind of the thought of me in ballet slippers). The girls got to wear them. I need a clockwork motor on my head to get me into the right place instead.

Thunderstorms

Gah. Blogger ATE my last post, just when i was trying for something fast and get back to work, as we've had a rather interrupted day - Thunderstorms. These are not the if 3 days passes and you haven't had one something is wrong storms of the Natal Midlands. I really appreciate not having to turn off and unplug and lose hours and focus. But the storm was close today so I did. And regretted it. The screen did not come on when I rebooted. I got B's screen and got it to work, and ran another shutdown, tried mine - and it worked. But the internet didn't. Panic. This is our lifeline - I need to work, and work a lot, just to try and catch up. Emigrating puts you 20 years back they say... Anyway. Rebooting and jiggling and appeals to Finigle must have worked - because I am back up. It's also our contact with the kids, and I worry.

Got a nice surprise in the post today - a pressie from New Zealand! You shouldn't have guys. Thank you. :-)

Snow forecast for Tassie tonight - I hope my tomato seedlings are OK.

Really terrifying

Forget Halloween. Don't even worry about Silence of the Lambs. If you want me really truelly scared ask me to watch over someone else's 10 year old child -- with a power-tool. The local school had a real problem on this particular day with adult supervisors for part of the their woodwork project - cutting shapes (about 18"-20") out of thick ply (I won't say what as it is the kids project, and theirs to tell people about). They got in one power-tool-wise mummy, one daddy, and moi (thanks to B saying no, she'd never used one - which is sensible) -one-on-one with the children. The kids were not a problem - well-behaved and trying hard. But I was as tense as a bowstring and totally focussed for two hours (OK, I had a break when each one finished. But I lost about a pound in sweat). I was using a table jigsaw at that age, but my old man had clouted common sense into me by then. I never really appreciated what he'd done, or how hard it is with other people's children.

B finished her relief stint in the school gardens. She was sorry to... but she's mighty stiff.

The proofs of Dragon's Ring are in. I've finished another set of sample chapters. Done some work on Dog and Dragon. Not cleaned my net. Oh and a single rock-melon seed is up - out of 6 and this planted last. I only have two more.

'step ye gaily'

"Step ye gaily on we go, arm-in-arm and row-on-row, heel-to-heel and toe-to-toe, All for Mairi's Wedding"
trad. scots folk song

We were invited to the reception of our first Island wedding this last weekend -- of course it had to happen after our day at sea -- so we were dead-beat and I really am still mending from the last bug. But it was probably the best wedding reception I've ever been at, because it was so different. I've never been at a sing-along reception before. The bride is a friend of ours who sings with the local Sing-Australia group and she and her new husband were most dapper being put through dancing "under the boardwalk" under instructions from the hyper-enthusiastic chior leader (She obviously enjoys this and gets completely involved, eyes lit up like Vegas neons, and conducting with shall we say verve. It's great and she carries her singers along like a full tide) while the entire crowd provided the vocals. It was really funny to watch the incomer guests at the wedding. Embarrassed at being seen to sing in public, and quiet-voiced at first... but seeing as the locals are giving it a good volume, joining in... and by the time we got to 'Sweet Caroline' giving the rafters a good rattling along with the rest. The food too was real 'Islander' - people brought plates of all sorts to the do, everything from ornate cakes to plates of cheese and biscuits. From the flowers to the decorating - everyone had some kind of hand in it. It was a wonderful bit of community, something you'll not find easily elsewhere.

I hope that the day they married and the day death parts them are the two worst days of their marriage - because they're the only two days of their time together that are not a full 24 hours of being happy.

Otherwise we went to the Interdenominational St Francis day service out at the Patriarch Sanctuary - the Cape Barren geese came to inspect - as did a wallaby with Joey. She bends to eat and he tastes around as she does.
And cooked the most enormous burgers I have accidentally made. I set out to make burger buns and left them to prove while we were at the reception... as a result, I had to make XL patties - 1/4 kilo patties...

Today was B's first day of being employed - temporary filling for a guy who is off sick in the school gardens. It's not exactly what she's trained to do, but we knew that we'd have to adapt, and I'm so proud of her getting in and doing it. Given the cost of coming over and all, and the sinking US$ dollar, and rising Aus $, our budget is not a happy place.

We ate the fillets of our 'Gurnard-perch' (drat these common names) - it called 'poor man's crayfish' and despite being a small fish and a PITA to clean safely it's quite aptly named and very good.

Dangerous dinner and a fuller freezer

Today was setting the clock-back day... I like it being light at 7.30 but it has been a long one with the power of this morning, with repairs on the electricity system. We had a quieter weather day yesterday to get some much needed restocking of the freezer in.

We've now got 22 2-people feeds of fish in freezer - including 3 high-risk ones - Gurnard Perch, related to stone-fish. --

They're the ones with the big eyes. No deaths recorded from Tassie - you just might wish you were. The flesh is apparently good though. Need to figure how to best fillet them - might just cut the spines.

We also minced enought big wrasse for 34 days of kitty food. And we have some days of chopped roo for the hounds in the freezer too. A good day can set you forward nicely, but the processing is qute a lot of work. Tired now. More tomorrow - the island wedding etc.

What a day!!!!

Dave is feeling better so he baked this morning. Rolls for lunch and biscuits for snacks.

Then we went off to sea, to catch flathead of course. But Dave persuaded the obliging skipper that we also needed to fish for a few minutes over rocks, so that we could catch some bigger Wrasse for the cats.

Well, Dave had 4 hooks on his handline, and brought up 3 Wrasse in one go. The rest of us were content just to bring up one at a time, but we have ended with about 10kg of Wrasse, so the cats will be happy for a long long time!

We also hit a wonderful spot for the flathead and caught a goodly number,some really big ones as well. The guys each caught Gurnard, which we kept, dispite the spines, and we will try later. Dave says they should be delicious, just beware of the spines!!

This evening is a 'bring and share' wedding celebration of some friends of ours, so Dave is busy cooking for that. And we are due there shortly!!

Then tomorrow we have no power from 6am, which is really 5am as we change time, until lunch time. But we have a 'bring and share' lunch out in a wildlife area, so Dave is busy cooking for that as well.

All in all, it has been a really busy day, but we have so much to show for it, it is really wonderful. Though I must admit I am battling to type a bit, as the keyboard is going up and down with the waves!! It was fine when we were gutting fish, it just seems to kick in when I sit down.

Live in fear, world. It's BACK.

Having been desk or 'loo bound for the last week, we had me feeling slightly better, and the wind having dropped a lot, we thought we'd try to feed the cats ourselves this time. We had try at our spot - just the first place we tried last time - at Castle rock. The sea is still comparitively rough and while they were biting, we were also getting splashed, and the tide was coming in. So we retreated... with me having caught a few close to size fish, and B having one keeper, and caught nothing in ever other spot, barely a bite until I got broken up spectacularly - typical fishing for small reef fish and being wacked by something agressive as I retrieved. Drag not loose enough. I deserve to be caned.


On another front, live in fear, world! The Zucchini are BAAAAACK! The seedlings popped up yesterday and have greened up nicely. We've had veg of some sort out of the garden right through winter, but carrots, broccoli and silverbeet are limited in their flexibility. Bulb fennel too gets a bit monotonous. Onions, even spring onions, are not vegetebles, like garlic they're a basic necessity! Peas are starting to produce, and we've got a good crop of broad-beans. We've had a few asparagus this spring, courtesy of Peter and Helen's generosity, but I really look forward to the over-abundance of summer - when we can curse zucchini again. Those stalk of 'grass' are Salsify BTW. Worse than onions for being too easy to pull up by mistake! They're growing in a recycled plastic milk bottle. I've forgotten just who said they'd make good seed trays, but thank you!