Post 564 The temperature feels a lot like Christmas

We had an enjoyable WES meeting on Wednesday, 12 of us sitting around a table spread with food and sharing what we are currently working on (or not, in a couple of cases where family illness is requiring full attention). Colleen brought along a folio of samples given to her by a batik master, showing all the stages of batik preparation. A real treasure. Colleen has an exhibition of textiles opening next Friday at the Fabrik Gallery Lobethal.

Glenys brought a mystery object. The base is hollow, a receptacle of some kind. The remaining three sections all come off separately, but are each like a lid with no connection holes for incense or insertion. There was a lot of speculation, but no concrete suggestions.

On Thursday I saw the hand therapist who brought in a surgeon to look at my myxoid cyst. We all agreed it needed operating on. We found a mutually possible day in late January but I needed a referral from my GP., whose practice wouldn’t facilitate it without my seeing him, but managed to fit me in the next day. Fortunately, I had done all the right things to avoid infection, and need to continue being careful.                                                                                                       Friday, therefore, was spent in a GP visit, followed by 95 minutes with my mouth open in the dentist chair, preparing a molar for a crown. A tedious process, but competently and carefully done. I now have a temporary crown, with the permanent one to be fitted next Friday. It seems that an hour after seeing me last week my dentist had a cancellation and I was in the front of her mind. I was very pleased to be able to make myself a coffee at 5pm, by which time the anaesthetic had worn off and the no food/drink period had passed.!  The practice rang on Saturday morning to check that I was OK. Great service.                                                                                                                    

While I’ve been working on the Rita Maria Faleri birds, a spider has been working her magic on my back balcony. I love the pattern and pictures created by these webs. Unlike me, the spider doesn't need a book (for size indication, the book is a little larger than A4).
                                                                  

I woke around 4.30am on Saturday, registered that it was time for the asteroid shower, but could tell from my bed there was too much light around to see it, so went back to sleep. I was, however, up in time to hear laughter coming from the Square.  It emanated  from this group exercising. A great early morning sound.

I spent the rest of the day at home, mostly playing with colouring a cotton bag, incorporating a couple of experiments I’ve been  wanting to try. 

It’s approaching pomegranate season and Katherine's tree is doing nicely. Such attractive fruit to welcome Veronica home from her adventure in Cambodia and Laos.

I was looking forward to the last Adelaide Chamber Singers subscription concert for the year, Resound at the Cathedral on Sunday afternoon. Although it was forecast to be 41C , I still thought I’d go. The cathedral relies on a couple of large fans at the back for cooling and the concert was one hour, with some audience singing. By the time I had watered my balcony plants I was wavering.

At 12.15 it was 38C and I saw sense. I’ve been at concerts before at the cathedral when people have had to leave because of the heat. There is also minimal shade for parking and while I love singing, the thought of the impact of all that breath in the already hot air cathedral decided me. I microwaved a couple of scones I bought on Friday, made a coffee, closed the blinds and turned on the aircon. A pity, but a no-brainer.  I read Eileen Thornton’s A Mystery in Tyneside and finished the experimental bag, 

which I shall probable give to a charity for food distribution. It's interesting and useful, but of limited success.

The heat continued with 38C on Monday and has brought the mandevilla back into bloom. I've also moved the almanda that was attacked by the blackbird back to the eastern balcony. It is struggling, and won't, I think, survive the heat on the western one. I have hidden it behind other plants in the hope the blackbird doesn't find it.

I made a quick trip to Dymocks at Unley to pick up a copy of the 2025 Guide to the Southern Hemisphere Night Sky, then get some supplies and home by 11 to bunker down and read.  I get very tired in the heat. I thought the sky guide would be useful, especially at Carrickalinga in January. Carrickalinga has met the requirements to become Australia's first International Dark Sky Community. 

There was no dark sky here in Adelaide when I went to bed last night at 11pm,  24 hours after the full moon. It would have been a good night for an outdoor performance of A Midsummer Night’s Dream

 I nearly put myself to sleep in the afternoon trying to read The Serpent and the Goddess which has been on my pile far too long. Very small print and lots of dense, detailed prose has put me off, but the central claim, that ancient serpent creation mythology largely either assigned or incorporated female involvement in creation but was usurped over time by patriarchal structures, is an interesting one. 

Around 6pm yesterday there was a courier delivery, this time the fascinating, populist, well-illustrated history of sail making in the UK town of Coker, the birthplace of William Dampier and T. S. Eliot. Its supremacy in sailmaking, it seems, was down to its unique process of ‘bucking’. This is easy to read, and will be of interest to WES Group.

Today the temperature dropped to 26C.  I got a lovely breeze through the apartment in preparation for cleaning. It won't last, but the 30-33C forecast for the next week is a lot better than 41.  Tomorrow my car is being serviced, and Friday will be taken up with the Crown fitting, both in airconditioned premises. The current forecast for Christmas day is 34C, so definitely no robins, snow or sleigh bells. I'm delighted, however, to have messages from friends via card, email, messenger and sms, and after significant delay from a cancelled plane, Veronica is home from the school trip to Cambodia. So deo gratias.

I think my Christmas shopping is finished.  I might make gingerbread for the Summer solstice. 

Post 563 Hallelujah!

This week’s highlight had to be the performance of the Messiah that Katherine and I attended at the Adelaide Town hall on Sunday afternoon.  There were three performances, over the weekend and I had booked a year ago for the matinee.

It was a stellar performance by the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra, the Adelaide Chamber Singers, and soloists Samantha Clarke, Fiona Campbell, Andrew Goodwin and Andrew O'Connor, conducted by Ivars Taurins whose body flowed continuously to communicate with the performers and channel the music. The final standing ovation lasted quite a while. 

The seating hasn't improved, but sufficed once the incoming capacity crowd had been through the ritual of shuffling in and out of rows searching for numbers. That's after we had walked through the outside scaffolding and negotiated the stairs. 

Even with the 160 minute uncut version in the less than comfortable seats I at no stage wished to leave. It was a mighty, uplifting, overwhelming experience. 

By contrast, it was very quiet on desk hostess duty at the Guild on Wednesday. Two people called in briefly too drop of items for the trading table, but otherwise quiet enough for me to do a bit of phone research for my brother and read Silk. I needed to make notes as I read and the conditions were perfect for that. There can’t be many people in the world interested in its level of detail, but a couple of them are in WES Group!   When I got home, one of the Christmas cards I had posted the afternoon before was in my letterbox, properly franked, no note, Sydney address clear????

Thursday was hot (38C). After watering everything, I left a little early for Pilates, planning to visit the Post Office to solve the letter mystery. The lift was waiting on my floor,  lights on, doors open and periodically trying unsuccessfully to close. I rang our Strata rep, who was out shopping (and now facing the prospect of hauling shopping up the stairs). She reported the problem and I went down the stairs, dashed to the Post Office and phoned Pilates to say I’d be late (again).

The helpful Post Person worked out that the letter has gone through the letter scanner upside down, and read my return address instead of the recipient’s! I am mildly panicked, since I have stamped my address in the middle of the reverse side of about 50 cards, a practice that is no longer a good idea. Top corners are the best places for return addresses. Since no more have appeared in my letterbox, I’m hoping the rest survive the machines. Another habit I need to break.

By the time I finished Pilates the lift service company had promised to come that afternoon. My cunning plan to delay my return by lunch at the Queen Street Cafe was thwarted because their kitchen was closed, so I postponed lunch and settled for my lime milkshake and a rhubarb friand. Plan B went into action when the lift was still not working on my return. I took myself down to A Prayer for the Wild at Heart and had a very late lunch of Seared duck breast with Parisian peas and orange. That did the trick.  When I returned 40 minutes later, the lift was working! Safely back in the apartment, the watered plants were doing OK in the heat so I settled with a coffee to finish Hannah Richell’s One Dark Night, a lucky pre- release find via NetGalley. 

After a few more rows of the use-up-Rowan-wool shawl, 

I dug out the Maria Rita Faleri kit I bought earlier in the year and stitched in the centre lines using the cream thread provided (should have swapped to red so it is easier to see!),  over-stitching the edges the next day. I’m not sure yet what I will make this into, but it’s unlikely to be a cushion. The pattern, however, is fabulous.

On Friday morning I spent an hour at the dentist, half with the hygienist and half with my dentist, who, after carefully noting the work to be done on the areas we are monitoring, told me she is leaving the practice at Christmas because her childcare needs can’t be accommodated.  She suggested who I might book with in future and we agreed she would not have time to do the work she had suggested for me before Christmas. We were both sad. I have been seeing her now for 6-7 years.  I made an appointment with her successor for my next session in April next year. About 2 hours later, the practice phoned me to say they had found two spots in my current dentist’s schedule before she leaves, and booked the lab to make the required crown in time to fit! I was astonished and moved. It means missing a Christmas lunch with friends but I didn’t feel I could refuse.  

Then, late yesterday, as I was bringing in the washing, the myxoid cyst on my right index finger burst. It has been inflamed and enlarged for some time and I had been advised to tolerate it rather than intervene. I immediately applied iodine and a bandaid before exposing to the air today and calling the hand clinic. I now have an appointment with a hand therapist on Thursday, in lieu of Pilates. I need Pilates, but need to prevent infection  more. 

On Saturday, after some shopping, I resolutely reduced my pile of hardcopy books waiting to be read. One was the RSN stitch book, read but not written up, two were partially-read books about mitochondria and metabolism,  two were crime fiction titles borrowed from a Book Club member and 3 crime fiction I had bought. As Sunday was our last meeting of the club for this year, I had an incentive. Yes, I skimmed, but in about 6 hours I got most of them read. 

Since taking the photo, I have read the top one - an astonishing book for someone who thought she knew a lot about WWI.  This copy was borrowed and I have now ordered another to lend to family and friends.u

list. 

 The pile is now down to books I need to read and note for talks I’ve agreed to give next year, and which I’m really looking forward to reading. There is still a huge number of fiction titles waiting on my Kindle and Kobo, but that’s OK. It’s the physical piles that irritate me. The finished crime fiction is now circulating around the Book Club,  I have borrowed one of our three recommended titles for next month from the library's ebook collection, so that is now at the top of my reading.

I did less well with yarn, succumbing to a new, and obviously limited, line of alpaca yarn from one specific animal from Adagio Mill - Casper, a lovely brown. I’m thinking of putting it with 3 balls of black alpaca I already have and make a jumper. I did, however, resist the fabulous colours of the current Bendigo Woollen Mill Italian Solstice Cotton import. 

My year's supply of toilet paper, paper towel and tissues was waiting for me at Katherine's place on Saturday night. It's easier to have it delivered there than at the apartment. Fionn helped me load it into my car and yesterday I managed to empty and reorganise several cupboards to fit it, for the first time, into the apartment rather than store it in my carpark locker.  Progress. 

Then yesterday a box arrived for plastic recycling.

Since the soft plastic collection service at supermarkets collapsed under the weight of their failure to recycle, there has been no option but landfill. After much research and checking, I’m as confident as I can be that the TerraCycle company based in Victoria do actually recycle soft plastic, but it’s an expensive option for individuals. 

You buy a box which they send to you. You fill it and return it using the prepaid label they provide. Once a year they have a sale. This year, when they reduced charges by 30%,  I worked out where I could place the box and plucked up courage to try it. It holds up to 20kg. If it holds 6 months of my discarded soft plastic I will regard it as a good investment. 4 months I might begrudge but continue. I am, of course, trying to reduce usage.

There was no family dinner at my place this week, as most were busy. I used the time to dig out a few Christmas decorations and sort out all my Christmas presents. I finished off a few details and have a couple of gifts to top up and some cards to write, but basically I'm organised. 

Today Panayoula and I caught up at length over a couple of coffees, sharing news of our families, health, mutual friends, hopes and fears. In this last month of 2024 we are both encouraged by our children and grandchildren's capacity to find their way in the world, contributing and overcoming adversity. It is so good to share this and encourage each other well beyond our paid working life.

Hallelujah!

Post 562 Out and About

 It’s been an event-a-day week.

On Wednesday I had a subscription ticket to Jack Maggs at the Dunstan Playhouse. I left myself plenty of time to get there on the City Loop bus. Just as well, as the two anti-clockwise buses were out of kilter, giving me a slightly longer walk. Once again, I met up with a couple of women walking from buses and we laughed our way through the maze of building work and lack of signage. The escalators weren’t working and it was raining. Fortunately, this time the Festival Centre Galllery was open and we could use their stairs inside the building.

It’s ironic that 11am performances, surely originally targeting school groups, are now given over to the elderly. We wait patiently, on every available seat  in the foyer, for the doors to open. Some of us had coffee. The only food available is packets of chips. No one seemed to go for the canned drinks.

When we were given entry, the actors were on stage, warming up with elaborate stretching. The staging and setting were excellent, as was the acting, although it felt as if lines were being shouted. There were times when I found the surtitles useful for words I had trouble distinguishing.

I appreciate the questions being raised, about transportation, criminality, Dickens and humanity. It has the touch of opera, an exaggerated theatricality that, I admit, bores me a little. I just want to know what happens.

I’m very glad I went, but I left at interval, 90 minutes in, with 45 minutes to go, and made my way home to think about it. I could see how I'd teach it.  I seem to be making a habit of leaving at interval. Maybe I'm valuing my time differently. On the other hand I did walk out of Bambi  when I was 4....

The postman had delivered the RSN’s 200 Essential Embroidery Stitches (I let him into the apartment foyer from my phone 10 minutes before the performance) for the Guild library. It’s a great publication, the instructions and diagrams every bit as clear as the Stitchbank from which it is taken.

On Thursday I had lunch with the son of a Sydney friend, here project-managing a contract. We had a pleasant lunch at Louca’s, chowder for him and Tommy Ruffs for me. On my walk I home I paused to photograph the Norfolk Island Hibiscus in full bloom in the Square. It’s huge, and I’ve never seen in full bloom before. As I was photographing it my neighbour came by and we walked the rest of the way together. Theo has lived here longer than I have, and is far more observant. He also hadn’t seen the hibiscus bloom before, nor had he seen the flame tree bloom until this year. Very curious.

On Friday, instead of sitting and stitching, Susan and I visited the Radical Textiles Exhibition at the Art Gallery. It’s as good as the reviews suggest. A real stunner. We spent a good hour looking at it before retiring to lunch. My sciatica had well and truly kicked in by then, even though I sat down a few times while looking at the exhibits. I’m very pleased I had not gone to the opening. I reckon, however, I will visit again, maybe more than once, before it finishes next year.                                                                          

I bought the catalogue to fill in some of the detail. It is a beautiful production, with a cloth cover, printing that cleverly wraps around the bottom edge and up the back cover, concluding with a textured eye (from an exhibit) on the back.    

      

It is possible to get very close to the exhibits and we had many questions about techniques, especially in relation to some of the woven works. A lot are answered in the catalogue. I didn’t take photos. If you live in Adelaide don’t miss it!                                                                                                                    Saturday was the last monthly market of the year at St Margaret’s Woodville so I headed off, eventually found parking and bought five plants, which of course, had to be planted. Yet another snake plant found its way into a vacant pot. The others were smaller, including a very attractive, potbound succulent, and more ground covers for the wall garden and tumbling pot.  

A Christmas parcel seems to have arrived in our Square, presumably courtesy of the City Council. Although there's a seat inside, I doubt anyone will be sleeping in the park while it’s there!         

                                

Our Strata had a lunch gathering in the Square on Sunday. Our instructions from our Pod Rep, who couldn't attend herself, were to meet outside our entrance door at 11.00 am, with folding chair, finger food and drink but no breakable drinking vessels.  We haven't done this before. I only know people in the six apartments in my own pod.  3 of these were apologies  After some thought I decided to go for the first hour, and take party pies, pasties and sausage rolls to share along with a coffee for myself.     

I was organised, with my folding chair, food heated and on a paper plate and coffee in a take-away cup, at the door by 11.10am. There was no-one in sight, neither at my pod nor the other three pods. I waited until 11.25 and gave up.                                                     

Back in my apartment I hung out the washing, drank my coffee, ate a couple of party pies, and checked email, When I looked over my balcony around 11.50am, there was still no activity. 

When I checked again at 12.30 rhere was a gathering. I don't yet know if we were given the wrong time, or whether everyone just came late. I could not see anyone from our pod in the group and decided against wandering down on my own, with or without reheated pies and pasties. I can't stand on my feet for more than 10 minutes anyway, without sciatica kicking in. I had begun lacing the Very, Very Berry embroidery, a process better not interrupted.  

When that was finished, I began writing my Christmas cards, finishing the overseas ones in time to attend Evensong at the Cathedral, an Advent Procession and Carols service supported by the Cathedral Music Foundation. Katherine was processing and reading the eighth lesson.

I manage Anglican sitting and standing better than standing at either exhibition or neighbourly socialising. I liked some of the carols, most of the hymns, the readings, the ritual of lighting the candles and the community of clergy, choir and laity. It hung together as a service telling a story, if a little elaborately.

As there is no current plan for David Mitchell's Ludwig series to be shown in Australia, I bought the only option, a Blu Ray version, unthinkingly assuming it would work in my DVD player. Of course, when I attempted to play it on Friday night, it didn't work. It's a while since I played a DVD, so I wasn't sure whether the problem was the disc or the player. It took me a while to find my small collection of DVDs but when I did, I  grabbed the Chieftains' Down at the Old Plank Road  to test. It worked fine. So no, my DVD player won't play Blue Ray discs. Another challenge. In the meantime, I enjoyed stitching to an hour or so of the Chieftains. 

Yesterday. I bought a BluRay player - a cheaper option than having the disc converted to USB. Having assiduously deleted all the ‘Black Friday’ rubbish that has invaded my email for weeks, I did unwittingly benefit from buying this week. 

I haven’t as yet set it up.🤞🏼

Most of my Christmas cards are now sent or ready to send

The tea box is finished and now in its permanent home. Details, of course, in my embroidery blog.

Now back to knitting.

Post 561 Plant material in various forms

The bougainvillea at the Pilates studio was at its best last Thursday, spilling over into the street. The road was marked out to be dug up yesterday, so parking will be difficult next week. I've used it as an excuse to cancel, so I can have lunch with a friend's son, working in Adelaide.

On Friday I dashed out to shop before logging into the funeral of a family member in Sydney. It was good to be stitching with a friend in the afternoon.

I opted for the last Certificate Course workshop of the year on Saturday, Cut Work with Carol Stacey. Carol has done a lot of cutwork and her notes are excellent. I have done a little cutwork but it was good to have the information about threads and styles. I enjoyed working bars and being part of the group, catching up with those who were there. 

When I got home, I found the Yukka I had brought in a pot from my Hindmarsh home, had collapsed across the Western balcony. The main stem had died long ago, with a strong pup taking over, in addition to the others now thriving in several other pots.

I had used the strong dead stem to hang pots and a driftwood mobile, given to me by Fionn. The weight had finally snapped it off at the base.

I spent the afternoon cleaning up the balcony, sorting out the containers of useful things on the table behind the Yukka - empty pots, insect repellant, fertilisers bottles and containers - repotting a couple of things and disposing of a couple of others, along with things that have not yet come in handy.

It was hot and muggy, so I stopped a couple of times for ice-blocks and finished by sweeping up, visiting the various rubbish bins and watering. 

The dead stem is light, but I don't have tools to cut it up, and I can't dispose of it in one piece, so took it with me on Sunday for help in cutting it up. Fionn is taking care of it for me.🙏🏼

I am delighted to see a couple of signs of life in the Almanda rescued from the blackbird. I thought I had lost it but keeping it flooded with water seems to have done the trick. Hopefully it will be back to its former glory in a month or two if I keep up the water out of sight of the birds.

I'm also  pleased to report I finished the vegetable bag. Details in my embroidery blog. I also worked a smallish Christmas present that I’ll report on later.

From the same greengrocer where I will mostly put the bag to use, I bought a small Christmas tree this week.  Since being in the apartment I haven’t tried a real conifer. This one looks promising so I’m giving it a go. As yet no decorations. Another week and I’ll work that out.

A lovely Sunday afternoon with family before Veronica was scheduled to fly to Cambodia very early on Monday. It included a phone-in with Alison for her birthday. Altogether the highlight of the week. Back at home I cleared all my plants and curtain from my windows ready for the window cleaner who arrived just after 8am on Monday morning.

By 9.30 my windows were clean. By 11.30 my Christmas cards had arrived and I headed out to pick up bread for dinner and a mug from the Jam Factory (bought with my member’s discount over the weekend). The mug was a bit larger than I had envisaged, but fits neatly under the new coffee machine, so all good. It has the maker (Hannah Varrath-Pajak)’s thumb imprints, and is lovely to hold. 

When students and their families arrived at the airport at 4.30am yesterday, it turned out that their 6.15am flight to Melbourne, to connect to a flight to Ho Chi Minh City, had been cancelled. With some heavy intervention by teachers supervising the 21 schoolgirls, they were transferred to another flight and airline and were on their way by 7.30am. Apparently many Melbourne runways had been closed because of weather. They are travelling without much electronic communication but we do know they reached their destination safely. 

The rest of us gathered for an easy dinner of vegetables, potatoes and pies from the Dulwich Bakery. Most of the family had been at the airport at 4.30am to get Veronica checked in and see her off, so it wasn’t a late night! 

The yucca has recovered but is not yet up to holding a driftwood mobile which is marking time on a wall.

Niamh and I met up again this morning for lunch and milkshakes at Queen St Cafe. I had to divert around several streets to avoid the road closure referred to above. It was good to catch up in a relaxed setting. I enjoyed but couldn’t finish my pork and fennel sausage omelet. I'm now used to eating much later.

On the way home I picked up a couple of parcels, one a Christmas game, the other some new swimming gear, including a water safe bag that I’m hoping will allow me to swim with a car key on my person.🤞🏼

I’ve now started the Very, Very Berry embroidery for the lid of one of the tea boxes. It’s Anna Scott’s design. 

I'm following the stitching instructions but have backed the fabric with cheese cloth for strength and added a strip to the bottom to fit it into a ten-inch, rather than 8" hoop in order to have the whole design visible. 

I’m finding it a joy to doing crewel work again.