The Vet Shed

Having a dalmatian with medical issues, I have found that the Vet Shed at Sumner Park has ended up being kind of my new 'best friend', when it comes to finding the special food my dog needs just to survive, plus the chewable wormer tablets for him, and the spot-on flea and worm things that go on the back of the neck for the cats. Thank God someone finally created spot-on wormers for cats! I have far too many injuries and scars from 17 years of worming my four little twerps (three now), to ever want to do it the old way again.

Anyway, I get a newsletter from The Vet Shed once a month, and having just received this month's today, it reminded me that last month's had a rather cool poem in it, that I thought I would share, given we are now in the Christmas period.

Copyright goes to the author and the Vet Shed, I believe.

A Doggy Wonderland (by Jo. Magargan)
     

    Dog tags ring, are you listenin'? 
    In the lane, snow is glistenin'. 
    It's yellow, NOT white - I've been there tonight, 
    Marking up my winter wonderland. 
     
    Smell that tree? That's my fragrance. 
    It's a sign for wand'ring vagrants; 
    "Avoid where I pee, it's MY pro-per-ty! 
    Marked up as my winter wonderland." 
     
    In the meadow dad will build a snowman, 
    following the classical design. 
    Then I'll lift my leg and let it go Man, 
    So all the world will know it's 
    mine-mine-mine! 
     
    Straight from me to the fencepost, 
    flows my natural incense boast; 
    "Stay off of my TURF, this small piece of earth, 
    I mark it as my winter wonderland

"Furious riding" is against the law.....apparently

One thing I hate the most is those idiots who drive around at night at great speeds, with nary a care to anyone around them. Most of them end up dead in a ditch soon after, but I still hate the sounds of them drag-racing up and down the long stretch of road outside my house at all hours of the night.

I've been doing some genealogical work today, which has involved many (MANY) hours going through the newspaper archives for Queensland, and getting side-tracked as I am often wont to do, I came across many instances of people being arrested, fined, gaoled, or, in some cases, sent to the local insane asylum, for offences listed as "furious riding". 

This is the 1860s version of the idiots in fast cars, apparently. Silly people riding very quickly down (then unpaved) roads with no thoughts to those people within the vicinity of said speeding horse.

Some things never change, apparently.

The dark can be a scary place....

We had one hell of a storm yesterday. Hail, thunder, lightning, pelting rain going in all directions, and gale-force winds - all at the same time. 

One of those "once in a lifetime" kind of storms.

The results for Dad and I were that we both lost power in our respective houses for about 14 hours, which has meant some chucking out of foodstuffs today that obviously completely defrosted but seem not to have refrozen completely today, despite having power since 3am.

It's very odd to find yourself without power for a night, when you are used to having it. It is one thing to choose to have a candle night, because you know if it gets too much, a quick flick of a light switch will solve all your problems. It's a whole other thing when you walk into a room, fall over something (swear), flick the light switch, then remember that there is no power (and swear again), backtrack into the other room where your torch is, and fall over something else on the way - because even though you happily walk through your house late at night with all the lights off, to go from the bedroom to the loo, and never fall over anything, suddenly when you have no choice of lights, you find every little thing to possibly fall over!

I have to admit I found it frustrating, because normally I am fairly organised for black-outs, as we have them a great deal in the country during storm season. But storm season shouldn't really start for a few more weeks yet, and I thought I had a bit more time.

So yesterday saw me scurrying around in the middle of the day (when it was almost pitch-black outside during the storm) looking for candles, matches, and a torch, because I couldn't see where I was going!

I am going to have to do a bit of shopping for food that needs no heating (or only hot water), some reliable lanterns, that last longer than half an hour on batteries, and some proper hurricane lantern cases for my tea-lights, as it looks very much like it might yet be another summer like the last few, with storms and power outages an almost daily occurrence.

Other damage from yesterday's storm included a few trees down on our dog track that took out the fences between us and the neighbours. No home trials for us anytime soon, it seems.

The storm itself lasted all of about 45 minutes, if that. But at its worst, my entire yard, the paddock between me and my Dad's house, the front paddock between me and the road, the back sheep paddock behind my house, and Dad's little house yard, plus the kennel yard were all under flood, or covered in a fair amount of hail - so much so that it looked like snow in places. Dad had the woofy one, (because the woofy one is frightened of storms), so I was left on my tod with just Mr Vampire Teeth and the Velcro Twins to worry about outside in their enclosure.

At one point I had to race outside and rescue various cat litter trays, bowls, and bedding that were flying around the yard from where they are normally stored on a table near the cat enclosure. The poor cats were soaked through (with the exception of one of the Velcro Twins, who slept through the whole thing, inside a wet cat hutch), as was the floor and all the bedding inside the cage. They were not happy little vegemites!

They now have a large dog bed in their enclosure, as it was the only thing I could find after the storm that wasn't soaked through, to put in their cage that would be off the ground. Somehow I think my woofy one has lost his outdoor bed to the cats, good and proper. :-)

Ho hum. The weather gods are telling us to expect more storms this week, and that this is the beginning of the usual doom and gloom that we get every year at this time. We are, afterall, going into storm season, so the odd thunderstorm or five is to be expected, surely?

On a somewhat brighter note, we've had new babies born down here on the farm. Our Khaki Campbell (that's a variety of duck) has finally managed to hatch some eggs. She's only been trying for about five or so years....

So now we have a Khaki Campbell Mother Duck, who is followed around by five golden ducklings, and two khaki campbell-coloured ducklings (ie. brown). The other grown up ducks that she live with are of the white variety, which the five little golden ones will turn out to look like. 

Dad tells me one of the white ducks is also a girl, and the boy ducks, having seen that their "endevours" with Miss Khaki were evidently successful, are trying their luck with the poor white girl now :-)

Also, Dad's little pet hen has also delivered up some babies for Dad. They aren't actually hers, as she won't let any boy near her, but she's very broody, so when she went out for a forage one day, Dad got rid of her dud eggs, and replaced them with fertilised eggs from some of the other hens, which she dutifully sat on, and whaddayaknow? She hatched a bunch of babies that look absolutely nothing like her, but she was happy. Now she's in a strop with Dad because Dad has locked her out of the pen where the chicks are, because she kept turfing them out of the cage at night so that she could sleep in the warm!

We've not had any more lambs this season, but the ones we do have are coming on nicely. We are finally starting to build up some numbers, after losing many of them to wild dogs, floods, worms etc, over the past few years since the Jan 2011 floods.

Our greys are doing well now too, with two teams of dogs on the go at any time. Team 1 is the good team - two girls and two boys - and they will be racing early next year with any luck. Team 2 is made up of one boy and three girls. This lot is the injured, the sooky, the insane, and the frenetic, pretty much in that order. They have a long way to go before they come close to getting to Team 1's standards, but we are working on them. :-)

Afterall, they are only 17 month old pups, so basically kidlets still. Their mother is on season at the moment, so she has been sent to no-man's land (i.e the animal shed that is used for sick sheep, ewes and lambs, new puppies, scared horses, etc) until she comes off season, but when you go to visit her, she acts a little nuts, because it is quite clear she's a little lonely in there by herself. It's as if she is saying "Oh my god! It's a person! I have company! Oh wow! Will you play with me? Can we go for a walk? Can we go for a drive? Can we run around? I feel fantastic!" She'll calm down soon enough.

Anyway, storms are predicted again, so I'd best be off.

The Great Pumpkin is coming.....

I'm not into Halloween as such, as we don't tend to celebrate it here in Australia, but I do love to sit down to this Peanuts classic every 31st of October. My one and only contribution to the whole Halloween thing.

Wherever you are in the world, if you celebrate Halloween, enjoy it. If you don't, enjoy whatever you might be doing instead.

Greyhounds and the joy of....

In amongst Dad's kennel, I have three greyhounds that are mine. Two (a brother & sister from a litter born last year) are up and coming dogs. They are learning the ropes, and have yet to be marked up (where their tags and microchips are checked against their puppy papers, to make sure the dog you present at races is the dog that you have nominated, and not a ring-in).

The other dog is the son of one of Dad's best greys. He's a lovely little boy, but no one told him that while he is a dog, he's also a greyhound! We took him and one of the other pups to the local track last night for trials, so that my dog could show the pup the ropes, having trialled (and raced) at this track before.

The pup was terrribly eager. It was all new to him. He got to smell other greys bums (their way of saying hello), he got patted and adored by various Catchers and Handlers (called Attendants, these days), and Trainers. He got marked up. And he got put into the kennel block with a bunch of greys making a great deal of noise. 

Then, when the time was right, he and my boy were taken out of their kennels, and brought around to the catching pen to be slipped from there (this is where, instead of putting the dogs in the starting boxes, you hold onto them, and when the lure goes past, you let go of their collars, and they chase the lure from there). That way they go around the track and back into the catching pen, from where they started.

 The pup loved every single second of it. He was alert and keen and absolutely bouncing. 

My boy? His night was somewhat different.

When we got the dogs from our kennels to put them in the car for the ride to the track, my boy was bouncing and keen as mustard, very happy to go in the car, because the car means a ride to the local trial track (not where we went last night).

When we got to the race track, I took him out of the car, and walked him around the emptying out yard. I then had to go back to the car to get the papers for the pup, and my boy tried to climb back into the car to go home.

Then we walked them into the kennel block. Put him in his kennel, with many promises of "it won't be for long, mate".

Soon, I had to go get him to take him to his slip. He hates this track. Finds it very terrifying. His one and only race was at this track, and he just doesn't like it. The other local track that we have, he has no issue with. It's a big open track in the city and he's quite happy to go around it, say hello to the other dogs, go into the wash pen afterwards. But our local track? Nope. He shakes at the sheer sight of it.

That said, he's more than happy to race after the lure either by himself or with another dog he knows. He likes that side of being a grey. He can chase things and not get into trouble for it, because that's what he's bred to do. But put a racing coat on him, stick him in a starting box with seven other dogs, and he will trail as far behind them as he can, so that he doesn't have go to near them, because they are dogs he doesn't know.

Not good if you are supposed to be a racing dog!

At the slip last night, the pup came bounding into the catching pen after the race, keen as anything just to have another go. My dog.....spotted me, came running up, skidded to a halt next to me, and then nudged me to have his lead put back on him so he could go home.

Poor little bugger. :-)

I guess he really is just a pet these days, though happy to take the pups through their paces at the local trial track, not so happy to set paw on a proper track.

My dog has a place for life though, as he is the son of Dad's favourite racer (who is 10 years old, and still with us in the kennels, still lording it over everyone else!), and because he is my favourite, and the reason I go into the kennels every single day.

He loves his life, really. And if I didn't have my spotty dog, he'd be the one taking up residence in the dog bed in my lounge!

I Made This....

I made this last night, and it was very, very delicious. Two thirds of it is now in my freezer, in four meal containers, for future use.

I am in the process of emptying my freezer in preparation for the oncoming wet season here in Queensland. Given that the last few years have seen loss of power for days on end, which results in every single last thing in the freezer having to go in the bin, or to the neighbouring pigs (actual oinks, not greedy people), I've decided to make sure that I have only the bare basics in my freezer this summer.

So why did I do cooking last night? For a few reasons. Firstly, I am also trying to use up things in my pantry that are probably at their use-by dates or past them, or very near to them, and secondly, I felt like a home cooked meal last night.

Anyway - I made this potato bake last night, using a tin of Braised Steak & Onions from ALDI, two of my four remaining potatoes, some grated cheese for topping, some frozen veg, the remains of a bag of spiral pasta, two small cloves of garlic, some garam masala, some curry powder, a dash or Worcestershire Sauce, another dash of HP Brown Sauce (good British stuff that it is), and a good dollop of Sweet Chilli Sauce.

I still have some meat in my freezer that needs using up, so I will need to be creative in the coming weeks, I think.

While I like cooking, living alone often results in the "it's too much hassle just to cook for one" scenario, so I tend to only cook about once a fortnight (sometimes once a week).

One thing I do hate though, is being stuck in the kitchen for too long, especially when I have my spotty little helper shadowing me at every step, waiting for me to drop some tasty little morsel onto the ground for him to gobble up!

Ben Bowyang Cartoon

Back in the day, the Ben Bowyang cartoon strip was quite popular in Australia. 

Having been quite surprised to find out that in Britain, most cars or number plates have GB written on them somewhere to show they are registered in Britain (feel free to correct me if I am wrong about this), I thought I would include the little strip above.

To us, here in Australia, this is quite odd. Though, if we thought about it, it wouldn't be. Afterall, do we not each declare what state we come from? All cars registered in Queensland will have Queensland on their number plate somewhere, just as the other states do. We may not declare our country of origin, but we sing from the rooftops the state we come from!

Either way, enjoy!

When blogging feels so very.... 'yesterday'

I spent the morning reading a blog today. Not all of it, but a very great deal of it. It's a blog that you begin, totally enthralled, hanging on every word, laughing, crying, as the mood takes you.

Then you start to skim - skim for the funny bits, skim for the sad - just skim. Not because the blog has become boring, or too long, or because you are starting to wonder "will this never end???". No, but because you want to read the whole blog, though can't decide whether to go back to the first entry and read forward, or continue from the last entry and work backwards, or just to dive right into the middle and spot-read, here and there, dipping into moments, shuffling along, just to see where it leads.

Blogs aren't like books, although in a way they can seem to be. A blog about someone's life, in which references are left to previous entries about other parts of their lives, are really blogs that need to be started from the beginning, and followed. 

But a blog that encompasses various things that happen in a life - not disjointed, but neither is it necessary to know what happened in previous entries in order to make sense of this entry - is a blog that can be delved into at any time.

Ceramix' blog is like that. It follows his life, without giving too many personal details. It's a blog you can drop in and out of without feeling as though you have missed too much to be able to keep up. It's a blog I like to keep track of.

A blog that makes me feel guilty as hell, though is Mr London Street's blog. Another Reading lad, he makes me aware that I have long abandoned my writing, and my need to express myself in words.

My life has become a tad dull and lack-luster. Or at least, it would appear that way to anyone who has noticed that I rarely blog these days.

The truth is much more sinister than that. I've become complacent. Where once my life involved regular trips in to Brisbane, watching the world pass me by, people-watching on public transport, and the general joys and tribulations of pet ownership, I've become someone whose life can be jotted down in a 'week-to-a-page' diary, in which nothing much different happens. 

Since I moved down to the southern outskirts of Brisbane, my life has become somewhat mundane to the outside world, and on the surface, most people would find it boring. Monday is a visit to the Produce to get food for the sheep, horse and dogs. Tuesday is the meat run, for the greyhounds. Wednesday is shopping day. Thursday is for doing the shopping that is forgotten on Wednesday. Friday we have off. Saturday is Dad's day to visit Mum in Brisbane, while for me it is a day to myself (if you can be alone with 15 sheep, a horse, 17 dogs, numerous chooks, ducks, guinea fowl, and various other wildlife), and Sunday is Sunday.

An exciting day for me involves going to greyhound trials at the local trial track, or, very occasionally, up to one of the big city tracks for open trials. Once a month I get to go and stay with Mum in Brisbane, wherein I run myself ragged, buying all the things I know would be frowned upon by parents who care or who just don't understand my love of Branston Pickle and Marmite.

I shouldn't complain. Every year there is new life down here on the farm. We have spring lambs at the moment. Joyful little buggers that they are. Jumping all over the place, yelling at you about how happy they are, how wonderful it is to be alive, how clever they are. Even the wild ducks are getting in on the act, with seven little ducklings born a month ago in our dam. I see the parental ducks parading their children up and down my fence line now, just inches away from a very inquisitive dalmatian who looks longingly from these tender little morsels, to me, and then back again, with a somewhat sad expression on his face, knowing I will never let him have them.

I wonder at the joy I once felt just to be alive, when I was young and lamb-like. When I could get up at 4am, in the dark, to do my homework, go to school for eight hours, come home, write like there was no tomorrow, stay up late working on some project or other, and then do it all again the next day. Now I find that I just feel old most of the time. I'm not, of course. But I'm not exactly 30-something anymore, either.

Rarely do I feel full of boundless energy, as I once did. Rarer still, do I notice that the world is just as lovely as it always was. I often ignore the butterfly with the beautiful wings who lands, ever so briefly, on my window sil, or the blue wren who dances delicately along my washing line, as though to say "look at me! Aren't I just the most beautiful thing you have ever seen?". I take for granted the noise of the kookaburras, when they call out in joyous laughter, the approach of oncoming rain. I listen only for the sounds of a to-do among the greys, over in their kennel, that signals the need to slip on wellies and pelt across the paddock to shut them up before they get overly excited and someone gets hurt. Even with muzzles on, someone always end up at the bottom of the pile, squealing like a banshee. It's enough to make your blood run cold, though when you get over there, breathless, panting and hot, they look at you with innocent little faces, all calm and cool, ready for a pat, cuddle, kiss, and kind words.

I listen also for the sounds of sheep in distress. Mostly it's because a mother has taken a chance to do a midnight flit (in the middle of the day, I might add), while her baby is asleep, and then the baby wakes up to find itself alone in a very large paddock with no sign of any life anywhere to be seen. During lambing season, and the month or so that follows, I spent a very great deal of my day reuniting frantic mothers with even more frantic offspring. Or protecting offspring from the likes of a horse who get jealous of all the love and attention you are giving newborns, when you should be spending all your time feeding him carrots and apples and telling him how beautiful he is, taking his photo, and opening and shutting gates for him.

My life is very dull, as you can see. By most people's standards, I would say that it probably is. But the more I think about it, the more I come to the conclusion that where I once used to go to Brisbane to 'people-watch', I now go outside to 'animal-watch', and truthfully, there isn't a whole lot of difference between the two demographics. Animals interact with each other in much the same way as people do. 

When I am in charge of the kennels (one of my favourite times of the week), each of the dogs greets me in their own special way. No two dogs are alike in personality, though they are all related. Each of them loves a cuddle and a kiss and special 'human mum' time with me, just as they love their time with Dad. Each dog is happy to see me - some more than others - and each is sad to see me go. This is where animals differ to people. People often pretend that they are happy to see you, sad to see you go, that they enjoy your company, wish they could see more of you, etc. Animals actually mean these things. 

We have a lamb that is hand reared, and when he spots you, even if he is at the far reaches of the paddock, he will come pelting across the paddock to you, calling out at the top of his lungs all the way, until he literally lands at your feet, puffing and panting, so incredibly happy just to spend time with you. 

I can't say I know too many humans like that.

I used to write a great deal about a very many different things. Reading Mr London Street's blog reminded me how much I loved words, and the fact that for as long as I can remember, I have used words as my weapon of choice. I have hidden behind words, I have used words in my defence, looked up to words, frowned down upon people whose use of words is no better than a pre-schooler just learning their ABC's, and found solice in words.

Once upon a time I had a dream of being a writer. A proper published author. I was good with words, so why not, I thought? In the end, life got in the way, and my hopes slid away, as did my youth and my other dreams of travel and a life as free as a bird. 

But I cannot complain. I have a wonderful boyfriend, though I don't see him anywhere near as much as I want to. I have animals who truly do appreciate me for me. I have a small and select group of friends who I cherish for being more like my animal friends than the human friends I have had in the past who were too full of their own lives to notice when others were in distress and needed a shoulder to cry on, and who really didn't mean it when they said "oh it's so good to see you again!". I have family who love me, even if they don't always understand me, and I have a blog where I can express myself in words, however rarely I might choose to blog.

Thank you to Ceramix and Mr London Street for reminding me that blogs are good places to be, and words are useful, and also for filling each day with laughter, tears, warmth, and joy.

Ode To A Friend

I went to the funeral of a friend today. He was 95 years old when he died last week. I don't know too many people in the 90s, so he has a special place in my heart, if only for his age. 

He was a genuinely lovely bloke, who will be missed by his family and by anyone who truly knew him. I had the pleasure of singing with him many years ago in a choir we were both in, and even back then he struck me as someone who truly loved his life. 

There are larrikins in this world, and there are people who have fun, and then there is my friend. He never struck me as a trouble maker, never made fun at other people's expense. He just truly enjoyed his life. He also taught me to enjoy my own (something I am wont to forget sometimes, when life gets me down).

Thank you, dear friend, for all the laughs you gave us, for the smiles you brought to people's faces over the 9 decades you graced this planet. But thank you mostly for teaching us to value our lives, and to find joy in every waking moment.

Goodbye fellow chorister. You will be missed.

Rainy sort of day

This past month and a half, we've had no real rain to speak of here in the South East of Queensland, but today that all changed. 

I woke up to dark, foreboding skies, and drizzling rain, not to mention somewhat colder temperatures than we've had this past week.

I like rainy days. They are the sort of days that call to you to curl up in a rocking chair with a good book, or bludge on the couch, catching up on whatever is on the television, or just plain surfing the 'net. Today I did the latter, for the most part - when I wasn't trying to convince my dog that he really won't melt if he goes out in the rain for a pee. He's such a sook at times. He's never been keen on water in any form, particularly, but the "great big scary stuff that falls from the sky" is a major contender for him trying to convince me that he really can hold it in until the sun comes out again!

My remaining cats are still finding it hard to deal with the loss of 'She Who Must Be Obeyed'. They seem rudderless without their leader, and I have to admit that I feel much the same way, most of the time, now that she isn't here anymore. Poor 'Mr Vampire Teeth' has turned into a complete Mummy's boy, and lets the younger 'Velcro Twins' beat him up now, eat all his food, and basically treat him as though he's not part of the group. I'm worried about him. He needs his human Mum a lot more just at the moment, for serious amounts of sooking, though the 'Velcro Twins' have grown up with my old cat, and are also not coping with the loss of their 'other Mum'. The world seems a quieter, sadder place just now.

:(

R.I.P

She Who Must Be Obeyed

1996-2013

Goodbye my darling little girl. Thank you for 17 years of happiness, laughter, joy and love. You will never be forgotten. I love you, baby. Enjoy your ever-lasting sleep. You've earned it, sweetheart.

Music and pets

Many years ago, I used to play Flute and Clarinet. A cat I knew loved nothing better than to shove his little head up the bell of my clarinet, every single time I played, (I guess he loved the vibrations?) and would complain loudly if I stopped before he was finished. Whenever I played flute, he'd do his best to head-butt it, which is rather difficult for the person playing it at the time!

Over the years, I have played my clarinet to many a dog. I don't remember my parents dogs being terribly interested in the sounds eminating from my room of a Saturday morning, and I can't say that my first dally was all that bothered either. But my current little boy is another story altogether.

He loves to sing along to either clarinet or flute. He cannot get enough of it. Today, when I was practicing my clarinet, I stopped (mostly because I was laughing so hard at my impromptu duet with the dog that I needed to stop for breath!), and he came running up to me, head-butted the clarinet and looked at me, as if to say "come on! I'm not finished yet! Keep playing!"

He's getting quite good at hitting the correct notes as well. As I changed pitch, he'd change pitch, and I would hold a note until he found that same note, then we would change again. He's actually coming on in his music lessons quite well :-)

When I used to have Dad's house dog over, she would often join in the singalong when I practiced as well, but was quite content to sit on my feet, while joining in. My boy feels the need to prance around the house, singing as loudly as he can.

I've yet to try it with the Greyhounds. They have choir practice every morning and every afternoon as it is. I'd rather not start a full blown concert!

Breakfast and a new regime

I had porridge for Breakfast this morning. Normally I make it for my dog, when he needs a change in routine from his normal non-meat-related breakfast (he's a stone-former, and so is on a special diet that doesn't include meat). Today, however, I felt like making it for me.

I've not been that well of late, and it was getting to the point where the thought of any food (let alone at Breakfast-time) would result in a groan, and feeling of horror, but after the initial "I really can't face this, but know I have to eat it anyway", I gingerly ate all my porridge up, like a good girl, and now feel better for it.

Assuming I don't run out of rolled oats any time soon (and with a dog that also has it for breakfast a few times a week, it's either never going to happen because I always have it on hand, or it will happen at the most inopportune moment when I've run out / the shop has run out / my supply has been eaten by something nasty and rodent-shaped / weevil-shaped / mould-induced etc), I should be good for a while to come. I think I will continue with the porridge for now, and see if it helps to make me feel better.

With Winter soon upon us here in Queensland, I'm starting to get my house sorted for the cooler days and colder nights. Since I moved house a few years ago, I've noticed a change in the temperatures. When I was living up near the Sunshine Coast, my house was the sort of shape that it was cold in the Winter and hot in the Summer. Added to that, most of the windows in the house were the floor-to-ceiling variety, so in the end, I had to get thermal blackout curtains, not only for privacy, but also to regulate the heat/cold. The one saving grace was the carpets on the floors. It made the house much warmer in the winter months.

Here in this house, it is different. It is a double-brick affair, built on a concrete slab, with lino on the floors (except for the bedrooms, which are carpeted). During the Summer months, so long as you open all the doors and windows before the sun actually gets to the house, and then close them all up again when it does, you can generally get away with only having the fans or aircon on during the middle of the day for about two hours. I tend to leave most of the lights off during the day as well, as they add extra heat to the house (great in Winter, shocking in Summer). In Winter, I leave the house closed up until the sun is nearing the house, then open it up for the day, closing it when the sun starts to go down. Again, there is a lot of floor-to-ceiling windows, (or very close to that, anyway), but when I moved in, there were already half-decent curtains on the windows. I've had to upgrade some of the curtains to my thermal blackout ones I bought while living in my old house, though, and I may yet upgrade the remaining ones. My dining, kitchen and living rooms are open plan, which makes them both hard to heat in the winter and cool in the summer, as the kitchen is in the middle of the house (no external walls or windows). The back wall of the kitchen is also the internal wall of the lounge, which faces the front of the house. The kitchen faces onto the dining room, which has a floor-to-ceiling sliding glass door onto the outside world. Until just before Christmas, there had been sheer net curtaining over this sliding glass door, but my dog took care of that one fateful day, when he got excited because he spotted one of Dad's dogs out in the sheep paddock behind my house, and wanted to go play with him. So now I have new curtains on a proper rod installed, though they aren't lined, and tend towards see-through-ness during the day (though not as much as the net curtaining did!).

Before the extreme heat hit, I had an airconditioner installed in the lounge. This is great for the lounge (though rather cold for anyone sitting opposite it on the couch!), and while it will cool the rest of the house eventually, it does take a while, and you generally have to abandon the lounge room, or you get too cold. It has reverse-cycle heating on it as well. I'm willing to try it on one or two of the extremely cold days we are likely to have this winter. Where I live now we regularly get frost, and it is quite normal for it to drop below freezing, averaging around -2 to -3 C at 6am when I get up. I've known it to get lower than that during the night, though. During the days it gets to about 10 degrees, sometimes higher, so not so bad, I guess, except when you take into account that whatever temperature it is outside, it is usually that or a little colder, inside. No Central Heating for us!

This Winter, I think I will go back to what I have done in Winters previous - I am going to endeavour to heat one room only, and do most of my living there. This was much easier when I didn't have Dad visiting regularly, and leaving all the doors open as he comes and goes, and then asking me why all the lights are off, the house is cold, and I'm holed up in one room. But I love him dearly (even if he was apparently born in a tent), and wouldn't change him for the world. 

The last few days, I've hauled the crockpot out (slow cooker), and had some lovely warm food on the go. What I cooked started out life as pork and vegetable curry, but on the second day ended up as vegetable curry with a bit of pork in it, as I added more veg to the pot. What remained has since gone into single-serve containers in my freezer for future meals. Today I had a Bacon & Leek Quiche bought from the store, but I think it shouldn't be too hard to make such a thing. Since I did the cooking for Australia Day, my interest in home cooking has reignited. I now feel the need to make most of what I either cannot afford to buy at the shops, or just can't get. For me, a trip to the shops involves asking Dad to take me either to Brisbane for a few days, where I stay with Mum and get to go out and about in town and do my shopping there, or else it's asking to be taken to the nearest Woolies (Woolworths) (Dad won't go to shopping centres, where there are generally things like Coles, Aldi, Woolworths, Big W, etc) or the local IGA. Because I am on a limited income, I tend to shop around for the best bargains, so that my shopping budget goes further - this isn't something you can do when you only shop at Woolworths!

This Winter, I plan to make good use of my little crockpot, my bread maker, and my stove top and oven. I have a few cookbooks that stand me in good stead all through the year, and that I regularly refer to. So long as I have the ingredients in my cupboards and fridge/freezer, I should get through the cold months pretty well.

It's been a few years since I embarked on the power-saving, and money-saving lifestyle, as up until fairly recently I was still caring for my mum, and then I was sick for most of the last year, and was cared for by my parents until I was better. When you are that sick, worrying about bill-paying is the last thing on your mind. Surviving each day is much more important!

But this year, I am working towards a few goals, one of which is to bring my electricity bills back down - it's not like I use very much anyway, but I've had them lower in the past, and it won't hurt me to bring them back down again, especially with power bills going up, up, up! Also, now that I am at least able to care for myself again, I'm looking forward to a bit of my own home cooking this year. Dad did a superb job last year, with the meals he cooked. They were what I needed at the time to get well, even if sometimes there was more on my plate than I could eat in a week :-)

I recently renewed my interest in all things old, when I got hold of two books about a couple of British TV shows - Victorian Farm and its sequel, Edwardian Farm. They reminded me of how things used to be, and that really we don't do too badly these days. Also that we could actually survive if the power went off, and there was no running water and such (so long as you have a handy wood or coal-fired stove, anyway).

When I was growing up, we lived in an 1890's Workers Cottage in Brisbane. This is a two-bedroom house, with a set of stairs going up the front, onto a verandah, a hall that ran from the front stairs to the back stairs, straight through the house, and back stairs down to the yard, where there was an outside dunny (loo). These houses generally had at least one fireplace, and ours was lucky to have such a thing. I remember Mum would get Dad to nail a single blanket to the hall way opening off the verandah, to stop the cold air from rushing down the hall in the winter. We would light a fire in the fireplace every afternoon, around 4.30pm. One of us would clean the grate first, and then either Mum or Dad would lay and light the fire. Because the house was mostly open plan, the fireplace in the lounge would heat most of the house, especially with the blanket up at the end of the hall. I remember getting dressed for school in the mornings in front of the banked fire from the night before, and that Mum would always sew a little camphor block into an old singlet remnant that she had made up into a pocket, and pin it to the end of the bed during the winter, so that we wouldn't get sick. I remember we got electric blankets at some stage, which helped with the cold, but before than we had hot water bottles put into the ends of the bed to warm it up before getting in. I do remember getting dressed under my blankets sometimes though too.

Anyway, this blog is fast becoming an epic novel, so I'd best stop while I still can!

Happy Australia Day!

This is the country I live in, and that I love. Today, 26th January, 2013, it is our national day - Australia Day.

In celebration of our very special day, I've been doing some baking :-)

First up, we have home made Damper, which will be eaten with Vegemite:

Add to this, we have home made Lamingtons. These originated in Ipswich, Queensland, and many a Queensland child will remember doing "Lamington Runs" for school (door to door sales to raise money for their schools). This is the first time I have ever made Lamingtons, so I wasn't sure how they would work out. They seem good though!

And last but not least....ANZAC biscuits! Normally these are made for ANZAC day (25th April), but they are Australian, and I thought it would be nice to make them :-)

Hope your day is great!

High Street Shop Closures

Firstly, Happy New Year!

Secondly...

I saw on the news that HMV in Britain has entered administration, with the very real risk of being shut down for good. We lost our last HMV shop in Brisbane in 2010, the Aussie side of things having been bought up by their competitors - Sanity. 

Sanity is a mish-mash of cds, dvds and such, and I have always found their shops difficult to navigate my way around. HMV were always neat and tidy and very easy to find what you were after. 

If HMV shuts its doors in England, it will be sad indeed, especially after it seems that two other well-known British companies have closed up shop in recent months - Comet, and Jessops.

I've also seen that in Ceramix' neck of the woods, Jacksons of Reading are to close down at the end of the year. Jacksons have been a household name in Reading for 137 years, and are best known for their money shute system (no electronic cash registers for them). I remember David Jones having this system in Brisbane when I was a girl. 

Closer to home, we recently lost Darrell Lea - a very long standing family-owned Australian chocolate making company. 

Before I moved house, I used to go out and buy my cds, dvds and such at the shops, but since moving house, I find myself in a position where it is very difficult indeed to get out much, so I find I am relying more and more on online purchases and downloads. While that is no fault of companies like HMV (I get off the property whenever I can), it does seem to be the way of things these days. People are becoming more insular, and less social. Children are getting technology much earlier than we did. Are we teaching our children to become anti-social, grunting, and rude by giving them things like ipods and ipads, tablets and laptops when they are as young as 7 or 8? 

I think I prefer the days when birthdays and Christmas guaranteed at least one book to unwrap....