Thirty Three Years Today

I'm not feeling sad about it, but today, it has been 33 years since Jamie died.

Today has been a good day and I have not been melancholy or dwelling on the significance of this date, but I just wanted to acknowledge it here today.

I had a very early start to my day, as Adoring Husband and I drove into The Bay and took Vegan Chickie, The Bare-chested Chef and Chicklet to the airport for their trip to Melbourne.

It was nice to spend a little time with them before they left, since I won't have my usual Saturday morning with them while they are away.

From the airport, Adoring Husband dropped me off at the Eagles Nest Golf Course where I met up with Woman of Many Talents and we played nine holes of golf.

I have been playing golf for two years (I actually missed playing for all of the 2nd year) but today, believe it or not, I parred my very first hole!  I expected it to be a momentous occasion, but it came and went without fanfare :(

Now that I've done it, I reckon my game will improve no end!

Because we started playing an hour later than usual, it was very hot when we finished and we were happy to climb into the air conditioned car to come home.  This meant, of course, that it was also too hot to go riding when I arrived home, so I had to compromise and take photos inside instead!

Starting with March Photo a Day challenge ...

2. Fruit

and then two shots for the 104 challenge...

A Heart - Photo 60 of 104

Art Deco - Photo 61 of 104

We had big plans to go to the Bowls Club tonight.

As it got closer to the time when we should have been getting ready, Adoring Husband had just sat down after spending a few hours in the garden and I had just finished posting my final photos onto flickr. We looked at each other searching for a spark of motivation, but just couldn't find any!

Instead, we stayed at home, prepared a quick seafood salad and watched the Brisbane Broncos defeat Parramatta Eels in the second match of the season.  Broncos are my team, so I'm pretty happy about that!!

Let's finish with a smile ...

Nite all.

Footy Season Begins!

Thank goodness!  The footy is back!  Dragons V Knights tonight is the Season Opener and we are currently watching the game as I speak.  It's half time and Dragons are leading 8 - 6.

My start to the day was most enjoyable today.

I forgot my purse, but luckily, being a regular customer meant that the Bakery gave me my morning coffee on credit!

I had an hour with my boys at the Seat of Knowledge and we were entertained by hundreds of mullet jumping out of the river.

It looked like they were being chased by a big fish - it was suggested perhaps a shark - because suddenly out of nowhere, a huge school of them would all splash out of the water and race a couple of metres and then disappear again.

There were men in boats coming from all directions with their cast nets trying to catch the mullet and about a dozen men lined the banks of the river casting their nets as well.

Only one man caught a couple of mullet and the rest, from what I witnessed, failed miserably.  They had plenty of enthusiasm!

I also failed miserably, trying to capture a shot to document the phenomenon!

I did witness something quite strange with the birds.  A beautiful Eagle had caught a fish (I did NOT witness this event) and was flying towards a tree with it firmly clasped in it's talons, when it was suddenly attacked by three seagulls!

Scared Eagle - not a great shot - tightly cropped, so much detail is lost, but gives you an idea of the action.

It was afraid of the gulls and even though he tried to outrun (or outfly) them, they eventually forced him to drop the fish into the river.

He flew off and they enjoyed the spoils!

After I left the Seat of Knowledge, I pedalled home to get my purse and then returned to the bakery to pay for my coffee.

I decided to head down to the Lions Park and sit in the shade by the water to just soak in the day and enjoy the serenity.  It was a beautiful sunshiny day with a light breeze and some scattered cloud to keep the temperature down a little.

While I was sitting there watching the mullet dancing out of the water, I heard the familiar call of the Whistling Kite and as I looked to my left, I noticed two of them fly along the tree line and land in a tree.

I watched and listened for a while and one of them flew off.  As I looked through my viewfinder, it flew back to the tree with a big bunch of twigs in it's talons!

I deduced that it may have been building a nest, so I grabbed my camera gear and headed down the bank, across the beach and down to the edge of the inlet.  As I got closer, the bigger bird flew off, but the smaller one waited until I aimed the camera ...

Juvenile Whistling Kite

I was over the moon with this shot. I think this is the juvenile.

I haven't any more contributions to my 104 challenge yet, but the March Photo a Day Challenge started today and the first brief was 'UP'.

1. UP

This is looking up from under the canopy of the beautiful fig tree that shelters the Seat of Knowledge.

On the way home, I stopped at the Post Office to check our mail, and to my delight, a parcel arrived for me!

On Monday I ordered a fashion camera bag and it arrived today!

I packed my camera with a lens attached, two extra lenses AND my laptop into the bag comfortably.  It has a detachable long satchel strap, as well as a short strap if preferred and there is a zipped flap on one side of the bag that holds everything that would normally be kept in my purse eg credit cards and money.

Plenty of room for my glasses case, my fan, phone, notebook & pens, lipstick etc etc.  I love it!!

I would like to finish with a quote that I truly believe.

"Everlasting friends go for long periods of time without speaking, and never question the friendship. These friends pick up phones like they just spoke yesterday, regardless of how long it has been or how close or far away they live, and they don't hold grudges.  They understand that life is busy and that you will ALWAYS love them."

I have friends like this - you know who you are.  I love you.

Nite all.

Movies Lunch Chicklet WWF

I've just spent three hours playing 'Words with Friends (WWF)' online with my sister and the tips of my fingers are almost numb!

For those of you who don't know, WWF is an online game very similar to Scrabble.  I love it!  I am a big Scrabble fan, so this game also has a high appeal for me.

So now I am again, brain dead, and am struggling to find words for my blog post tonight.

I think I will either have to update my blog earlier, or put a time limit on WWF.  I need to finish early enough for my brain to still be functioning to do this.

Anyway!  Adoring Husband and I went to the movies today and used the last of our movie passes to see the latest Katherine Heigl movie "One for the Money".

I think I have a bit of a girl crush on Katherine Heigl.  In my opinion she is stunningly beautiful and her movies are light and funny 'no brainers'.  Just easy to watch, 'feel good' movies.

After the movie, we drove to The Bayswater restaurant for lunch and were met afterwards by Vegan Chickie, the Bare-chested Chef and Chicklet for coffee.

Chicklet was a happy little vegemite and played on my lap for quite a while, chatting away and doing lots of cute stuff and making me feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

This is the view we had for lunch...

and this is the lovely little Stormbird having breakfast in the tree near the Seat of Knowledge this morning.

It's been a really pleasant day.  Nothing extraodinary, just nice.

Oh and the last photo for the February Photo a Day challenge.

29. Something I am listening to (Our dog Jack being cranky and growling)

There is a March Photo a Day challenge too!

Nite all.

Words Escape Me

I can't find anything to say tonight.

I'm ok.

My brain just isn't feeling imaginative nor does it feel like describing my day.  It's feeling very lazy.  Ok 'I' am feeling very lazy.

February photo a day challenge photo...

28. Money

I got a few shots this morning ...

A Playground - Photo 58 of 104

This dog was having such a wonderful time in the water, running in and out, jumping about, creating his own splashes and not wanting to get out.  So I decided, for the purposes of my challenge, that the river was his playground.

My final word for today is ...

That is all.

Nite all.

Something Different

I can't believe it!  I actually got out of bed at 5am and Adoring Husband drove me to the beach to catch the sunrise.

Sunrise - Photo 56 of 104

It was spectacular but oh so very brief!

When he came back from work half an hour later, he helped me take my challenge shot for our flickr group.

The brief is titled 'Where's Wally' but it's, basically, where you set up your camera to take a photo of a scene with yourself in it, and then get somebody else to press the button, after you've put yourself in the scene.

I think Adoring Husband has a very good chance of winning this month, but here is my submission...

I tried another shot of myself standing in the middle of some tall trees, but I'm so glad I didn't submit that one, because after I posted my photo, I looked at the other entries and somebody had submitted a shot almost identical to it!

Adoring Husband then suggested that we drive to Maryborough and have a couple of games of 10 Pin Bowls.

I thought this was a good idea because I needed to go to the Maryborough Cemetery for two reasons.

The first was to find some Art Deco style headstones and the second was to find the headstone of a recently discovered ancestor of mine.

We stopped at the cemetery first and traipsed around there for about half an hour, but the recent heavy rains had caused some localised flooding and the rest of the ground was very soggy and muddy, so we decided to abandon that idea and wait for dryer weather.

Cemetery or Gravestone - Photo 57 of 104

At least the traipsing through mud and water dirtied my feet up enough to fulfil my 'Dirty Feet' brief in the 104 challenge!

Dirty Feet - Photo 58 of 104

From there, we went bowling.  We played 3 games and Adoring Husband beat me in the second two games.  The owner/manager cleaned our bowling balls for us because we've had them sitting in their bags in the shed for three years!

It was fun but our age is telling now.  Our lower backs are quite sore from using muscles that we haven't used for some time.  Ugh.

We stopped at the Howard Butchery on the way home and Adoring Husband bought some chicken breasts, which he marinated, and cooked for dinner, served with a delicious fresh garden salad.

I managed to struggle through about an hour of housework when we got home and then plonked myself in my favourite position on the couch with my laptop and camera.

Now it's time to rest my weary bones.  It's been a long day.

Nite all.  



    

So Much Rain!!

The bottom half of Australia has High Fire Dangers and Complete Fire Bans, while the rest of us are having floods and very heavy rainfall.

One area of the Sunshine Coast received over 100 mls of rain in an hour!  340 mls fell at Cooroy in 24 hours!  That is a LOT of rain!

So now Gympie has flooded and is cut in two as all that rainfall swept down the Mary River dividing the town with floodwaters.

We have received an inch of rain today.  Not even a glimmer of sunlight for two days now and one road out of town was cut by floodwaters yesterday.

Our town, generally speaking, is never as badly affected by heavy rains or floods as the surrounding areas.  We are based at the mouth of a river and we are protected by Fraser Island.  Even after heavy soaking rains, it only takes two days of sunshine for the ground to look and feel completely dry again.

I haven't been able to ride my trike today and certainly no photographs have been taken.  So I've worked on some old shots and I have a couple of days worth of challenge photos to share.

February Photo a Day Challenge ...

25. Green

26. Night

Our group on facebook have posted a total of 333 photos to date.

A Bride - Photo 53 of 104

A Busker - Photo 54 of 104

Anchors Oars & Bollards - Photo 55 of 104

They were all very busy over the weekend and have been happily sharing their results over the course of the afternoon and evening.

Another shot from yesterday in The Bay ...

A water arch from the Wet Side Water Park.

 I only have one more day left to get my shot for the February flickr monthly challenge which is themed 'Where's Wally' and where we have to set up a shot with ourselves in it and have somebody else press the button (or use a remote shutter button).

I think I will try for a sunrise shot tomorrow of me strolling along the beach.  Let's hope the rain stops momentarily so that I can do it ... or then again maybe an umbrella along the beach will add more interest!

That means I need to rise earlier than this morning.  I woke at 6am today, but dozed back off to sleep and didn't wake again til 8am!  Ah well, it is Sunday.  We are allowed to sleep in on Sundays!

So sunrise is at 5.40-ish tomorrow morning and it's also low tide at the same time, so I should have a vast expanse of wet sand to stroll along with my umbrella.

Best get an early night!

Nite all.