I walked out of the office just on 5pm on Friday evening and made a beeline for my digs. My SES Unit was holding a social night at the Charles Weston Hotel in Brunswick, after which I was going to need to drive up to Shepparton. I'd decided it's be easiest to pack my bag, drive to the pub and then go direct up to Solar City.
The social night was good to go to. The Unit is, as I think I've said, genuinely very welcoming. It seems to have very little infighting among the rank-and-file, so getting together for a few drinks and some pub bingo was a welcome evening. The Charles Weston is very much an inner-northern Melbourne pub, which is to say it tends towards craft beers and vegetarian food. I was good with that: I do love an India Pale Ale! The haloumi burger was a little underwhelming, although anything that comes in a bright purple bun is worth eating for curiority's sake alone!
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| India Pale Ale, Charles Weston Hotel, Brunswick |
The weekend itself saw me getting in plenty of walks with the dog. This might seem trifling, but the labrador that the parental units have acquired has enough energy for three dogs, so he snaps us any walk you can offer. Exploring the farm this way was sobering. This is usually the wettest time of the year. This year it isn't, and the paddocks and dams look ... well ... like this:
The wildlife is still sticking around: any number of kangaroos and God-knows how many cockatoos. Two kookaburras waited long enough for me to photograph them from a distance.
I've often wondered what the early explorers must have made of the call of kookaburras and wondered if they were hearing some madman laughing in the bush (the seriously-demented Jan Pelgrom, for instance, was marooned in Western Australia in 1629). If you don't know what I'm talking about, have a listen -
Saturday ended with some work on the old boy's car but (sadly) without being able to go run. I started off Sunday with a trip into town to pick up a couple of hundred litres of diesel for the farm. Shepparton looks very much as it does this time of year, and I felt much the same way about it as I usually do. Flat, dry and hot.
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| Shepparton from the RRD Diesel yard. |
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| Sheep skull, Shepparton, Australia |
I drove back down early on Sunday evening and got the day wrapped up. Monday itself was unremarkable, although it finished with SES training. I have to say that training nights are much more agreeable in daylight hours in during daylight savings time!
The balance of the week has been illuminating; I'll make that the subject of a later post.
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