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Blogs by Vena McGrath
Sunday 26 August 2007 8/25/2007 7:31:51 PM
Winter moves out of the cycle and spring begins to slip her toes in the door :) Winter - my favourite time of year, is fast moving away and I am resigning myself to 9 months of heat once more in Sydney Australia. I always feel down when winter near its end as I love to be able to make myself warm and comfy and revel in the fire burning away at night, and any days that I am home. The warmth from a slow combustion fire is something that I enjoy immensely, even though it involves stacking wood, carting it inside every day, and then cleaning up the mess off the floor. I work in air conditioning and find the heat oppressive and drying whereas a wood fire brings a different type of heating.
But, life goes on and so does the changing of seasons. Spring is just a few days away and some years September can bring quite hot days with the nights still remaining quite cool. October can be searing in the heat of the day but with cool nights to recover for the next day. So I guess that by November we are getting accustomed to the hotter days and bit by bit the heat of the days extends into the nights and the tossing and turning starts while you try to find a cool spot in the bed.
Fortunately Sydney has had quite a bit of rain over winter and whilst this has meant boggy yards, it's also brought some respite for the ground where the grass has begun to grow again and cover the dusty areas where it died last summer. The frosts, although few, were harsh. Many of the plants in my lack lustre garden succumbed to the frost bite and are dead. I am hoping that some of the plants only look dead as I took them some years ago as cuttings from my parents' home where I grew up. I no longer have parents so those plants were memories for me and up until this past winter nothing has bothered them.
With my son having moved back home to live, the house has been in a bit of a mess for the last year with too much furniture. We have finally managed to straighten out a lot of the mess and I feel that I am not so closed in now by cupboards and chairs etc that weren't needed. My son bought a new lounge - theatre seating - so we have had to re-arrange two rooms and get rid of some furniture. It was time for a change anyhow.
We have ideas of some internal changes to the layout of the living area and I'm looking forward to discussing them with a carpenter shortly. I've had an awning put outside the large expanse of glass that faces west on almost a total wall of my bedroom so here's hoping this summer I will be able to stand going in there to sleep.
The outside area I had built last year has to be altered slightly - well the pool fence has to be pulled down and rebuilt in another area to make it legal. Because it will be closer to the salt water pool, the steel fence has to be replaced with aluminium, powder coated. More expense just to put a barrier up in case some child is in the yard. But if you choose to have a pool in Australia then those are the rules - it must be fenced totally with fencing 1.2 metres high (in my council area). The cost to replace and have the old fence removed - $1500. The decked and covered area will then be outside the fence and more easily accessed.
The water in the pool is now 17 degrees celcius, which is way too cold to stick a toe into :) With the weather that we have been exposed to lately there's been little heat for the solar heating to work on but the weeks ahead should show a big improvement. No one is complaining though as we needed rain badly and need even more. Warragamba Dam, the main water supply for Sydney, is now at over 50% capacity, a big improvement from a few months ago.
Brisbane is still facing huge problems with the lack of water in its dams and even though the Sunshine Coast, north of Brisbane, has been hammered by rain they haven't had in over 150 years that has culminated in floods, none of it has made it to the catchment areas as yet. Let's hope that there is run-off coming down through the creeks and rivers that will make its way to the dams eventually.
My brother lives out of Brisbane at Victoria Point (edges on Moreton Bay) and fortunately for him his neighbour has a bore that they share for outside water needs. Even though that area hasn't got water problems, they are also on harsh restrictions I believe so that the whole of Brisbane is made to suffer, not just those that are supplied by water from the main dams. Looking at the weather forecast last night for Australia, there wasn't any rain around, even in Tasmania where it seems to always rain. Let's hope that some of the wet stuff in Asia will find its way down here even though rain is a nuisance.
I'm on a break from having to visit the Eye Hospital until November when I have to have another glaucoma visit for a field test and assessing of the new drops. In the meantime I have to visit my GP and try to arrange for a way to get the drops each month without having to traipse into the city every 4 weeks to get a supply. There is no way I can do that for the rest of my life that's for sure and I don't even wish to be compelled to travel for medication now, let alone in the future.
End of grumble:)
We are fortunate this year, in parts of Sydney, to have a long weekend - 7 September. This is due to the fact that the APEC meetings are being held here with many dignitaries visiting Sydney. The lengths they are going to for security are more than for the Olympics in 2000. Parts of Sydney will be closed off and even residents are most likely going to be disadvantaged due to the risk factor of car bombs etc. Where they will be able to park their cars must be a worry for them. The problems are coming from the promise from some groups that they intend to march and protest during the weekend so I guess it's best for those that don't need to be in the city not to be there. We sure don't mind having a day off at the expense fo the Government :) I've decided to have the next week off work so that I can have the fence work done, go to the city if I have to for medication and have my tax returns done. An expensive week!
