It could not come on a worse day as there are huge road and tram works underway downstairs, however while we were shopping Ex Sis in Law called to see what we were doing Saturday afternoon. Hippie Niece has been moved to much better environs at the hospital where she will be treated for postnatal depression. She was given a three hour release from hospital today and asked if she could could come here to our place. Who are we to say no.
Luckily the call came while we were shopping and so could stock up for their visit. Isn't gluten free expensive, required for Hippie Niece. It wasn't just Ex Sis in Law and Niece. Ex Sis in Law brought along the baby twins and Oldest Niece came and brought along Little M and Little Em.
Our neighbours in the carpark have not used their tandem space for a long time, and because of the works outside, there was absolutely no parking to be found, so we brought Ex Sis in Law's car and Oldest Niece's car into those car spaces and left a note on the windscreen with my phone number.
Hippie Niece had become anxious by one of her daughters crying in the car, the confusion of the roads to get here and then the noise from the works once they were here. She has put on a lot of weight, was pale and listless and not her usual gabby self. It was so sad to see such a normally bright and bubbly person like that.
Oldest Niece took Hippie Niece across the road to McDonald's for food which also gave her some beneficial exercise as it was a decent diverted walk to get straight across the road. That left us and Ex Sis in Law with two nearly three month old babies, a three year old and an 18 month old. It was actually better then. Little M and Little Em both used heated sausage rolls as dipping implements to eat tomato sauce. I remember Little Jo doing the same. They had already filled up on crisps and other bad food. We rounded off the bad food day with lamington sponge and gluten free cakes for Hippie Niece.
Bone Doctor was once a registrar at the postnatal depression care beds at the hospital where Hippie Niece now is and told us that once she is eventually admitted, she will get the best of best appropriate treatment. Any question we asked Bone Doctor about the care was replied to with, "It depends", which is probably as it should be.
To say we were exhausted is an understatement........and then we had to go out for dinner with a friend. I like to give Household Management a night off from cooking at least twice a week, once with a meal out and once with takeaway. We did not hang around after dinner and I looked at the clock when we arrived home and it said 7:52. Party animals, not! I have to work early tomorrow anyway.
Children are quite lovely, but I am glad we don't have any. R who once wanted children might even now agree with me.
I looked at Doctor Google about postpartum depression, a newer and posher name. I came across this video. Interesting.
Truly, I am not just wishing Canada a happy 150th Canada Day on this July the 1st so I can share a photo of Prime Minister Jussy. No, no, not at all. Look, here is a maple leaf.
Later edit: It is Canada's 150th Canada Day. I have changed a couple of things to mark the occasion and best wishes to any Canadian readers, especially Jackie at Junkboat Travels.
If you have Facebook, there is tribute site to Dame M and her Boarder. Maybe you can see without joining Facebook.
https://www.facebook.com/gwensgang/ You may even spot R in one of the photos, but I am nearly always behind the camera.
http://highriser.blogspot.com.au/search/label/Dame%20M Wow, 76 posts tagged Dame M. It is ten years since she died, yet the memories are so fresh. It is not just about Dame M. It is about how our lives have changed since then, partly because of her demise, but more to do with us just getting older.
I need a photo. Here is Dame M with her US citizen younger sister sans her ever straight laced husband who visited Melbourne while on a ship cruise, and Dame M's delicious charmer great nephew and his then girlfriend. Our female hairdresser friend and myself used to swap sexual fantasies about Dame M's nephew.
Reckon they are sisters? They weren't terribly fond of each other and lived very different lives. Ah yeah, I did not remember, but her name tag says Valda. Dame M's Boarder always attended to Dame M's hair. He combed it up the day she died.
Perhaps I need to add a tag, maudlin.
Remind you of anything? Was Jorn Utzon inspired by seeing the dishes his wife had he had just washed?
This is a set up prank by a Belgian firefighter. There used to be devices that allowed a train or tram to very slowly go over the top of fire hoses.
Sunday saw us travelling to Geelong to see Little Jo perform on stage. We went a little early and thought to spend some time on the waterfront but after ten minutes of being in a cold wind, we decided to go to the busy cafe early and get a table. Sister, Bone Doctor and Little Jo arrived in their new Renault Megane and it was a very pleasant lunch.
While Sister and Little Jo walked to the concert venue, Bone Doctor took us out for run in the new car, which was quite nice, although quite small. It was quite a bargain price, full of extras.
The show began quarter of an hour late but was ok enough, the highlight for me being Little Jo in a group singing Let's Go Fly a Kite, from Mary Poppins. There were a couple of children in the different age groups who really shone and may well have careers in showbusiness. Little Jo appeared in a fur jacket......why? Only later did I realise it was because she was an animal in the Lion King. Later she wore a giraffe's head. The performance was arranged by a private company who trains the children in dancing, singing and acting. There was a terrific short piece of acting from The Secret Garden, the boy in the wheelchair and his young girl friend.
3 hours in a car seat, 1 1/2 hours sitting for lunch, 1 hour watching the performance saw my back deteriorate from its healing condition and so, a visit to the doctor on Monday and two days off work.
The music the band master is reading is called the Geelong Polka.
Geelong High School is undergoing a huge renovation and no doubt expansion to cater for the expanding population. Some nice Art Deco.
So with not having to work on Tuesday, we took the opportunity to see Ex Sis in Law on the Mornington Peninsular and visit Tradie Brother in hospital. Hippie Niece is still in hospital and struggling, but her medication is beginning to have an effect and she is becoming more rational. While we were with Ex Sis and Law and her husband, Hippie Niece called her mother four times, the first couple of times in some distress, begging her mother to come and get her out of hospital. She is there voluntarily, and by the time we left she had calmed down and realised she had to stay, lest she jeopardise her future placement in the postnatal depression unit.
Care of the twin girls is being shared around. Their father usually has one of them and Ex Sis in Law, or her husband or Hippie Niece's care for the other. We were lucky because they were both there at Ex Sis in Laws and they were just beautiful. At one stage R had both of them while he was sitting, one in a arm and the other lying on top of him. As I type, he has just taken his jacket to the dry cleaners as the inevitable happened after he fed one with a bottle. At one point they were both on a rug on the floor and they kept stretching their hands out to touch each other. So cute.
After a couple of hours and some lunch, we set off to the hospital to see Tradie Brother, who had just been disconnected from most tubes, except for feeding and liquid tubes. He was in good spirits and looked really well.
The colours of nature is every possible shade of every colour.
Native to North and South America. In Australia we do have similar plants that colour the desert sands.
Humans like colour too and as this is the end of Wednesday Wonders, this picture slightly references my next series of posting someone else's photos, Tuesday Transformations.
"Almost two million enforcement orders have been issued to Victorians who have failed their fines in the past financial year.
The latest annual report by the department's Infringement Management and Enforcement Services shows enforcement orders rose more than 6 per cent on the previous year to about 1.86 million." Here is a link to the full article but you may not be able to read it as it is a partly paid service.
A bit more copy and paste: "Enforcement orders are issued when infringements remain unpaid and can result in a range of actions from suspension of vehicle registration to bailing a person to appear in court.
The total number of infringements issued in the past financial year hit almost 5.07 million, compared to 5.32 million the year before.
The range of infringements included traffic, parking, public transport, speeding, drink and drug driving and other transgressions. Traffic infringements accounted for the majority of notices issued.
Victoria Legal Aid is alarmed by the rise in people facing harsh disciplinary action, including court appearances." The newspaper article goes on and on.
In 1975 I sat for my driving licence. I was not perfect and received a 98% score. I had issues with not having a perfect score, but the criticisms were not too unfair. I saw where the testing person was coming from. I was perhaps wrong that I did not use my left indicator when reverse parking. I was not wrong about using my rear view mirror. I was told to swivel your eyes to your mirror, rather than turn your head. But by not turning my head to look at the mirror the tester said I did not use my rear view mirror enough. I did.
I once parked illegally in town in a minor street when I and someone were going to a movie. Fair cop, Guv. The handwriting of the policeman reminded me of the Lawson poem with the line, 'written with a thumbnail dipped in tar'. Not that my handwriting is so good. I hate handwriting and avoid it at all costs. "R, can you fill in this form for me?"
My next fine was when I took an ill friend to the Alfred Hospital and overstayed a space. I received a fine. Fair cop, Guv. The friend payed the fine.
I will just park here illegally for only two minutes at the ANZ Bank in Balaclava in about 1979. Fair cop, Guv.
I am not liking this fining thing. Perhaps I need to legally park, and ever since I have.
We all break rules at times, but there is a time and a place. On a quiet and straight country road, I once wound my Valiant up to 96mph before she reached valve bounce. That is 155 km/h. Terribly irresponsible, but I was a stupid youth of 18 growing up in the country. My knowledge of cars was the only connection the young gay Andrew with his non gay compatriots of his age.
Almost every day for the last 40 years I have driven daily to and from work five or six days a week. I have driven so often to the shops. I have driven when we are holidaying. I hate driving, but it is necessary so often. In that whole time I have never received any sort of driving fine.
I am not perfect. So often the mellifluously voiced Madame GPS tells me, "You are over the speed limit". It is usually by one or two kilometres, and usually as I am slowing down after the speed limit has dropped. She of course takes no notice of my often vulgar remark back to her, and she so often gets in wrong, such as a week when schools are on holidays and she warns me of the school speed limit and tells me I am over the speed limit.
We pay big time to use toll roads and I am so against the concept of roads being privately owned, but we pay. Many of the fines accumulated mentioned above are for driving on a private toll roads.
Given all the driving I do not received any fines, so don't expect people with multiple fines who can't or won't pay them to receive any sympathy from me. I have such schadenfreude feelings when I see the Sheriff clamp vehicles for unpaid fines, especially if they are expensive vehicles.
If I can park correctly and basically obey the driving laws, and pay the fee for using toll roads, then why can't other people? The above story speaks of people with umpteen multiple offences. If you are poor and can't afford to use toll roads, then you must take the longer route, which may not be much longer at all.
River may join me this Monday for Musical Monday. I was nearly going to add this to my post with photos of Naples, as the song begins with a reference to Napoli.
Joining in with River for Sunday Selections. I have a bit of a backlog of photos and some of these date back to summer. I have a feeling I may have used some of these before. If so, sorry.
Lincoln Square in Carlton just outside of the CBD and near Melbourne University has recently had a makeover, rendering it skater proof. I used to hate the way kids would skate over and around this memorial to the 2002 Bali bombing victims.
A glorious elm tree (and maybe a Moreton Bay fig) with the memorial fountain in the foreground.
202 people were killed, 91 of them Australians. There are pinprick lights embedded in the fountain paving, one for every Australian killed.
See how you go on your skateboards here, lads.
What do we want? Grass. Where do we want it? Everywhere.
Did I deliberately frame this shot like this? I can't remember.
There has always been signage there but the skaters never took any notice.
It really did look its best when I visited.
Across the road from The Highrise, Shannon Bennett's Cafe Vue folded and the premises has been empty for some time. A notice for liquor licence for a a Benny Burger restaurant went up, but nothing has happened. In the meantime a Benny Burger has been opened by Shannon Bennett in Richmond.
Meanwhile at the former Albert Park Manor, which has been redeveloped into apartments, no one has taken up the ground level lease for a cafe or restaurant.
This facade faces away from us, but we have seen the rear gutted and completely rebuilt. It seems to have taken years and it is still not finished. I will show it when it is completed.
A really nice and well cared for block of flats. I can't remember where it was now, perhaps South Yarra.