A time for traditions

The Left have done their best to destroy all that is traditional in our society but people like traditions. They like connections with their past and with other people past and present. A couple of billion people in the Far East actually worship their ancestors!

So the traditions that have survived the Leftist onslaught are much celebrated. A great Australian tradition is ANZAC day in which we remember our war dead. And far from it being a celebration for old fogies, it goes from strength to stength, with young people joining in the ceremonies in droves. Precisely because they have so little left in the way of traditions, many young people seize on ANZAC day eagerly as a way of helping them understand and relate to their past.

And yesterday and today were days of other traditions that are growing rather than dying out. The first was on Wednesday: Burns night. It is of course a celebration of the life and work of Scotland's greatest poet, always held on his birthday, 25th January -- and there now more Burns Night suppers in England than in Scotland, which is another indication of how people grab onto those traditions that have not been snatched away from them. And Burns Night is in fact a cluster of traditions. There are quite a lot of things that one traditionally does on Burns night and I usually do a fair few of them, varying from year to year.

We had all the traditional food yesterday -- led of course by the haggis -- but also including tatties and neeps, oatcakes, Dunlop cheese, clootie dumpling, tablet etc. We played pipe music, welcomed in the haggis with a recitation of the Burns poem to that effect and then toasted it in Scotch whisky.

Present were Anne and myself, Jill and Lewis and Paul and Susan. And we also had Vonnie with us for a while via Skype from New Zealand. She seemed very pleased to see me in the kilt.

I am normally pretty quiet on social occasions but I got into the Scotch rather a lot so that loosened my tongue and I may in fact have talked as much as Paul, which takes some doing. I probably made admissions that I shouldn't! Anyway, we all enjoyed the food and the poems and I even ventured a solo rendition of "Scotland the brave". It was probably pretty brave of people to listen to me as I am not much of a singer.

5-month-old Matthew was of course the star of the occasion and in good sentimental style we talked at some length about his education. We decided to send him to a Catholic primary school, followed possibly by a secondary education at Eton. He should be smart enough and robust enough to do well at the latter. But Paul and I would have to find the large fees involved to give him that advantage, of course.

It was quite late when we wound up after all that.

And today was Australia Day. Australia Day commemorates the landing in Australia of the first settlers from England and there are always grumbles from the miseries on the Left that it should really be called "invasion day" or the like. For many years it was little celebrated but again the very fact that it is a tradition and commemoration that has survived makes it popular these days. Lots of people now fly the Australian flag on their cars on that day.

My family on my mother's side have celebrated it for many years with a lunchtime BBQ and it was good to see today quite a rollup, with people we hadn't seen for a while. I brought along some leftovers from Burns night and talked mostly to Peter and my brother as I usually do.

Peter is very au fait with all things Chinese and I know a fair bit about German so we agreed that the expression that the Chinese use to describe their country can adequately be translated into German ("Mittelreich") but not into English. Many are the woes of translators!

And, as usual, it was a great pleasure to see and hear Peter's vivacious Eurasian daughter, Michelle.

Peter is my cousin once removed and we are the "brains" of the family. It's a very bright family but Peter and I are the only academics.

Anne's birthday

January is usually a pretty quiet time for most people, I think, but it is not so for me -- not by my standards anyway. Burns night will be on in a couple of days and tonight I took Anne out for a birthday dinner.

Anne got all glammed up and I even put on long trousers and wore shoes! Shorts and thongs are my usual attire.

We went to George's Paragon fish restaurant in the city. I used to go to the one in Sydney and have also been to the one at Sanctuary Cove (about an hour's drive South of Brisbane). And all of them really are paragons! Tonight we had great views across the river from the big windows, a good ambience generally and first class service. I don't mind expensive restaurants if everything is just right. In some of them the service is snooty and the portions small.

We started with Sydney rock oysters and both then went on to whole Sole for the main course. The whole Sole used to be their specialty at Sanctuary Cove and Anne has also had it there so it was an obvious thing to order -- and it was as good as ever: A very tasty fish -- fried in butter, I think.

I had to ask for a salt shaker, though. They obviously think their food is perfect without added salt. I in fact added nothing to the fish: Neither salt, Tartare sauce nor lemon juice. But I did need salt for the chips. I like my chips very salty and you can't have fish without chips, of course.

I am getting a bit shaky in my old age so the Sole was rather difficult to eat (being slippery and very flaky) but I managed. And I DID eat both sides!

An expedition and a sendoff

A busy day yesterday. In the morning, Anne and I got into the Humber for our annual expedition to Syd's pie shop down Beenleigh way -- to pick up Scottish supplies. Burns night is soon so I stocked up on haggis, tablet etc. Syd makes an excellent haggis.

As soon as we arrived, however, I ordered a pie and chips for both Anne and myself. Anne first discovered the delights of pie and chips there and it seems to have become an annual treat for her. The pie, gravy and chips are all first class.

I did quite a big shop-up of British foods, including an apple and rhubarb pie, which is a great favourite of mine but is very hard to find in Brisbane.

And in the evening I put on a big sendoff dinner (15 people) for Joe at our usual Indian restaurant. He flies back to Canberra tomorrow for the academic year. Joe invited 5 of his Brisbane friends along to the dinner and I was rather impressed by Kim, a young woman who seems to act as his chauffeur when he is in Brisbane. She seems a real lady. I hope he makes sure to keep in touch with her.

Young Dan, son of Simon and Tracy seems to have grown up fast. He kept Joe engrossed in conversation for most of the night. I could hear a lot of Simon in him. I mostly talked to Ken, as I usually do.

We tried to Skype our NZ family in but there was something wrong with the Skype software so we failed. I have now reloaded it and hope for better luck next time.

Presents

In the aftermath of Christmas, I thought I might reflect on a few events about presents.

I am a very BAD present buyer and Jenny is good at that so I have for many many years given Jenny the job of buying presents on my behalf. If the present envisaged is a bit expensive she sometimes seeks my OK for it but I always say Yes to it anyway. These days the presents come from "Anne and John" but everybody knows who has selected them

But there have been a lamentably few occasions when I myself successfully chose presents. I thought I might mention those occasions

On one occasion when we were at Queen Bess St., I bought two reams of A4 typing paper, divided each ream into appprox. 10 quires, wrapped it and left the 4 packages under the tree before Christmas: Marked for Ken, Paul, Von and Suzy.

Now as everybody knows, kids feel presents left under a tree to try and figure out what they are getting. But my 4 packages stumped everybody. Even Ken was drawn into it. But when they finally got to open their presents, they were a great success. As Ken said: "It has got so much potential".

And on her 70th birthday I gave Nanna a much wanted present. Like most other people in the family, Nanna is a keen player of computer games. And computer gamers are very fussy about their joystick. A joystick that is not just right can cause them to lose a game. And Nanna had found one joystick that really suited her. So she had tried to buy another example of it for when her existing one died -- as they all do eventually. But she had failed. It was out of production.

But I had one. I had got it with an Atari computer that I had bought. So I kept it and gave it to her on Christmas day. It was obviously a big hit. Giving a 70 year old lady a computer joystick must seem odd but it was just right on that occasion.

And for the Christmas just gone I bought Anne a big glass frog. Being a nature-lover Anne likes frogs but being a woman she doesn't like thing hopping or scuttling. So a frog figurine is an ideal compromise. I just happened to see it in the window of an Indian shop. So when I went into the shop I sang: "How much is that froggy in the window?" to the tune of the old doggy song. Such good humour pleased the proprietor so much that she gave me a substantial discount on it!

A very quiet new year

In the early afternoon on new year's eve Joe rolled up accompanied by TWO young female persons, Kim and Cianne. So which was the Korean? If you know anything about Korea you would plump for Kim -- but it wasn't. Cianne is Korean and this Kim is a blue-eyed Anglo-Saxon. They gave me a very colourful Nepalese bedspread. I used it as a tablecloth that evening, where it did very well.

Anne was up in Nambour visiting her mother for most of new year's eve but she arrived at my place at about 7pm bearing a dozen Sydney rock oysters for each of us. I had put a small piece of pork into the oven at 6pm and with the addition of vegetables by Anne it made a good roast pork dinner with an excellent oyster appetizer. Sydney rock oysters are not the largest but they are the tastiest in my view.

We washed it all down with Australian "champagne". I have in the past bought Moet or Veuve Cliquot for such occasions but although they are nice wines my favourite Seaview brut from South Australia seems just as good to me. Seaview have always made good wines.

We drank only about half the bottle with dinner and kept the rest for a toast to the new year at midnight.

After dinner I put on some music, as I usually do when Anne is here. I had intended to put on Scottish music but forgot and put on Vivaldi and Mozart instead. A forgiveable forgetting, I think.

Anne stayed overnight so for lunch today I took her to the South Indian restaurant for dosas. To both Anne and I they are celebratory food. They are that good.

Then for dinner today Anne cooked up some mint and rosemary lamb sausages which were excellent.

A magnificent Christmas occasion

Four of us got to the sung Eucharist at St. John's cathedral in good time this morning. We arrived early so got good seats. It was a great celebration.

The opening hymn was that great hymn of faith: "O come all ye faithful". With a mighty organ located high up near the stone-vaulted ceiling and a big congregation lustily singing, the performance was as impressive a beginning to the service as one could wish. And the ecclesiatical procession with its various crosses, banners, vestments etc was so long that it lasted almost until the end of the hymn. Practically everyone associated with the cathedral must have been present and robed up.

Just about everything that could be done in an Anglican service was done, including a good bit of Anglican chant, which I rather like. It has a sort of eerie and timeless feel to it for me. I imagine that they did something similar in the temples of Isis and Osiris in ancient Egypt.

The censer was deployed energetically on several occasions, so much so that the transept was almost filled with smoke at one stage. Quite strangely however, I heard no bells during the service. "Bells and smells" normally go together. Joe reckoned that the guy with the censer seemed to be having the most fun

Even though I had my hearing aids in, I could not understand a word of the sermon. The PA system at the cathedral is rather amazingly bad. Anne however tells me that it was about relationships and such things -- but with no mention of the wonders of the incarnation. VERY C of E!

But we got to sing a lot of the great traditional hymns so that was the best part. Being an atheist, I don't participate in the prayers but I can't resist the hymns. They are a wonderful testimony to the faith that built Western civilization.

After the service Joe and Cianne took tea with me for a while, while Anne had to zoom off to get to lunch with her children.

Jenny put on a lunch for just 5 of us at 1pm, which was very traditional: turkey, ham etc. It was good of her to do both a Christmas eve party and a Christmas day lunch.

Anne came back to my place for Christmas night. After big lunches we were not very hungry so I made us some ham and pickle sandwiches on toast for dinner -- using leftover ham from lunch. That is my usual Christmas night fare.

Christmas eve

Jenny put on a party for a small group of us on Christmas eve. Present were Anne and myself, Jenny and Nanna, Joe and Cianne, Jill and Lewis plus twinny Susan, Russ and Sahara. We also Skyped in our NZ connection. Paul and Susan are visiting there for a month or so.

I used the netbook for skyping with a wireless connection so we were able to pass it around so everybody could have a chat with our NZ family members. Lewis was much impressed to see that video phones are now a reality.

Jenny cooked up cevapi and chicken kebabs for us which went down well. There was a present or two for everyone under Jenny's tree so distributing and opening the presents was a big, amusing and chaotic occasion as usual. Nanna knitted me a tea cosy for my big brown teapot but I at first thought it was a beanie and wore it for a while until someone wised me up.

Sahara has gained a lot of confidence lately and no longer seems scared of me.

If I can get up early enough, my Christmas day plans call for a visit to St. John's cathedral for the sung eucharist at 9:30 am. They do a good show there, including an ecclesiastical procession, but I can't remember whether they do "bells and smells" as well. My son has said he wants to go in order to introduce the arcana of the Church of England to his Korean girlfriend, even though all three of us are unbelievers. I took him there a few times when he was a kid and he enjoyed it. Both of us particularly like the Christmas hymns. And a great stone neo-Gothic cathedral is a remarkable environment. Definitely the best show in town on Christmas day.

A small laugh

Despite my atheism I have rather a lot of religious artifacts in my home.

As people walk in in the door they see a Thai Buddha plus a small image of India's Ganesha

My Indian residents warmly approve of the latter of course

And among the many things on my bedside table is a Presbyterian hymn book. And I even have a copy of the old (Tridentine) Roman Missal. And the book of Common Prayer with Hymns Ancient and Modern, of course.


Beat that!

Saharah's birthday

The desert girl had a slightly belated birthday celebration today. I believe her actual birthday was on 5th. I was there on the day of her birth but my typical male-pattern memory is not good for such information.

Anyway we had a good time both with chats and observing the birthday girl. It was all rather amusing. My gift was very well received. Jenny bought it and she has a talent for such things. I just pay for it. Many years after our divorce Jenny still has my credit card. If that is not an amicable divorce I would like to know what was!

So my gift to Saharah was a toy musical choo choo train. She definitely liked it.

Sadly, Joe's gift of a soft toy in the form of a giraffe got thrown back at him! Two-year olds are not big on social graces!

Anyway Russell cooked up a storm on his BBQ and I greatly enjoyed the resultant sausages. I don't claim the mantle as a sausage connoisseur but I am certainly a sausage enthusiast.

Ken and I spent a fair bit of time chatting as usual but I was a bit ahead of him in knowing what was meant on our childhood toy trainsets by "LNER". Ken got part of it -- to give him his due -- but I was pleased to decipher it as "London and North Eastern Railway"

Very trivial fun, I guess, but much enjoyed nonetheless.


The birthday girl gets help from Dad

Grouch!

I went into Woolworths to buy Christmas cards yesterday. I am not fanatical about it as I am an atheist but I like to buy Christian-themed cards out of respect for the Christian basis of the holiday. But although Woolworths had a big range of cards I could find none with Christian themes. Pretty poor for Australia's biggest retailer!

So I went to the Indian shop next door where I occasionally see the owner reading a nicely-bound copy of the Bhagavad Gita in Hindi. Sure enough he had packs of cards with Christian themes. So he got my business.

A sad day when it takes a Hindu to show what tolerance is like! Why on earth would Woolworths be so bigoted against Christianity? Who is going to be offended by them including a few cards with Christian themes in their range?

Australia is not a religious country but there are still a lot of committed Christians about so they would find the Woolworths offering unsatisfactory and would go to (say) a newsagent to buy their cards. So bigotry is also bad business, as it usually is.

Dosas for lunch

I took Joe and his Korean lady to our local South Indian restaurant today to introduce him to dosas.

The waiter knew what my order would be without my needing to say it: Three Masala dosas. And they were as good as usual. They were quite a big meal actually. All three of us had a bit of a battle to finish them. Joe was favourably impressed.

We went back to my place for tea on the verandah afterwards when we discussed quite a few things about Korea. I have rather a soft spot for Koreans, seeing that about 20% of them are Presbyterians -- which is my old religion.

Joe arrives back in Brisbane

Paul will be in NZ for Christmas so he wanted to give Joe an early Christmas dinner to make up for that. So Joe landed in Brisbane at 5pm and at 6pm Paul and Susan had a dinner laid on for him.

It was actually an American dinner. When Paul and Susan were in NY I directed them to the various different types of American sandwiches and they now share my conviction that America is the home of sandwiches. So the dinner principally consisted of Reuben sandwiches and Cuban sandwiches, which were much enjoyed. In Australia there are no diners where you can walk in and order such things so they have to be home-made. And Susan is a talented cook so she did very well.

And for dessert she made an excellent apple pie by following an American recipe she got off the internet.

We had the usual lively conversations about many things. Paul always makes sure of that! He loved the story about how I helped to sabotage Arthur Calwell's Brisbane election meeting.

Joe had his Korean girlfriend with him. He brought her up to Brisbane from Canberra for a month. Fortunately she speaks quite good English -- rare in Koreans. She was a bit shy but that was not surprising in the circumstances. Finding herself in the middle of boisterous family conversations must have been a bit of a shock.

She must have been surprised to find she was amid a family of Kim Chee lovers. Kim Chee is a sort of pickled cabbage that is massively popular in Korea but is little known elsewhere and not to everyone's taste. Paul, Joe and the twins grew up with it however, as both Jenny and I like it so we always had it on the table when Korean food was served, which was fairly often.

I was pleased to hear that Joe is taking an active part in university life -- joining the Kabuki play etc. Some fathers would disapprove of "fun" activities at university in fear that their kid might not be taking their studies seriously enough but with Joe it is the other way around. There is no risk of him not working hard on his studies but in his undergrad days he seemed to take little part in university life. I have often told him that your university days are a time to have fun.

Hannah's 1st

Hannah had her first birthday yesterday and most of the family were in NZ to help celebrate it. So I suggested that the rest of us join them via Skype while having our own party here in Brisbane.

So Paul, Susan and I went to Russell and Suzy's place bearing various party foods and had lunch there, with Suzy making some very good sausage rolls and also giving us some home-made chicken burgers.

Von knew we would be meeting at around 12 noon so rang us on Skype just a bit after that time. So we had a party going on at both ends of the Skype connection. We could see their party and they could see ours. The audio was a bit poor though so conversations were a bit restricted.

The NZ end had only one baby present but we had three: Matthew, Dusty and Sahara. So there was a lot of baby talk. But I can talk babies pretty well so that was fine by me. Inevitably the conversation got on to when I used to mind Paul and the twins when they were kids so there were some laughs there.


Paul is holding Dusty and I am helping Matthew to sit up

"Red Pepper" dinners

In my quiet semi-bachelor life I am a regular consumer of microwave dinners. You can get some reasonable ones these days and it beats cooking or going out all the time. Though I also like a Grand Angus from McDonald's occasionally.

A couple of months ago Woolworths started stocking a new line called "Red Pepper" dinners and they were something of a revelation. They offered S.E. Asian dinners of restaurant quality. So I kept a good supply of them in my freezer. The chicken laksa and chicken biriani were particularly good.

But then Woolworths STOPPED stocking them. So when I was on my last packet, I put my magnifiers on and read all the small print on the packet.

I discovered why they were so good. They are made in Thailand! And Thai food is almost always first rate.

I then discovered an email address for the local importer on the packet. So last night I sent him off an email asking if there was anywhere else I could buy them.

Even though it was a Saturday night I got an email back in half an hour from a gentleman with a very Indian-sounding name. He promised that he would speak to Woolworths about it and offer to restock them. I hope he succeeds. Indians know how to do business.

My will

Yesterday (Thurs) Anne and I had Paul and Susan over for curry on my verandah. Though it was Susan who ordered and picked up the curry -- as she usually does. I just pay for it.

This time however Susan had to leave her baby behind! Matthew was however well looked after as Anne gave him a bottle while Susan was away. Anne has great experience with kids so is very good with Matthew.

Paul was full of beans as usual and we had a good discussion about what conservatism and morality is all about. Both Paul and I are instinctive conservatives but Paul likes to formulate things so we had a good talk about conservatism. What I told him is spelled out at length here.

We eventually got to talk about my will and Paul was fully onboard with what I aim at to achieve with my will. I want him to be Joey's watchdog -- both to advise Joe about spending my legacy and bark at anybody who criticizes Joey's decisions -- and Paul is a natural for that. I have to laugh at the thought of anybody criticizing Joe in Paul's presence: They would get an earful!

We also talked a bit about old times and a few good laughs came out of that.

Viet chicken

On Monday, Jenny had me over to her place so we could discuss my will. She is executor at the moment.

She made us some original Vietnamese lemon chicken for dinner which was exceptionally good -- as it usually is. Another "family" recipe -- nothing like Chinese lemon chicken, good though that can be. And we washed it down with a bottle of J.P. Chenet Sauvignon blanc. French wine is a bit weaker than Oz wine so it is better for drinking and driving.

Jenny's old friend Kim was staying with her but did not take part in the dinner.

We discussed how I wanted my money used after I am gone and there was a harmony of thinking there. I am not putting any formal instructions in my will. I am relying on others being similarly motivated to myself.

Cynics will laugh but my bet is that I would have the last laugh if I were still around.

Some recent baby pix

Suzy with Rara and Dusty


Rara and Dusty


Babe in a basket


Matthew in his baby chair

Cup day

The 151st race of the Melbourne cup was run today. Cup day is undoubtedly Australia'a greatest day of celebration. Cynics also call it Australia's only honest horse race. It is certainly true that outsiders often "get up" at the Melbourne cup. And so it was today with the favourite not even making it into the top three.

I went into a couple of sweeps but the horses I drew might as well not have existed. Sweeps are the most honest gamble there is as there is no third party to take a "cut". So even an old Presbyterian like me can justify joining in.

Joe was held up from returning to Canberra by the Qantas lockout so he took the opportunity of extending his stay by a few days -- and came and joined me to watch the cup on TV. He had never even heard of sweeps before so I helped improve his education about cup matters.

I did invite Paul to come and watch too but after more than a week of social occasions connected with Vonnie's visit, he felt he had to get back to business. He must have found that hard.

It was of course an amazing race with an incredible finish. The winning horse -- Dunaden, a French entry -- literally won by a nostril. In the days before photo finishes it would have been announced as a tie. The stipes^* had to use extreme magnification to separate Dunaden from English horse Red Cadeaux.

The victory lands Dunaden's Qatari owner Sheik Fahad al Thani $3.6 million plus a trophy worth $175,000.

I was mildly surprised that there was no Royalty present -- as the Royal Family are a very horsy lot. Princess Diana attended the 1985 Melbourne cup, for instance. Perhaps the fact that the Queen had just left our shores a few days ago had something to do with no other Royals being present.

But Her Majesty was well represented by her vicereine, our Governor General, Quentin Bryce. She gave a very patriotic speech which pleased me greatly. Australians do have a lot to celebrate -- all founded on the hard work and good sense of our forebears of course. Some of those forebears were my ancestors so I know how hard they worked and what they took on.

In his miserable carping book, Donald Horne said that Australia is a "lucky" country. But luck had nothing to do with it. It is true that Australia has considerable natural resources, but so do Africa and South America -- and it would be a brave soul who would call them lucky. No. Australians today owe their enviable lifestyle to the dogged British and Irish people who settled this country for most of the first 200 years of its recorded history

I didn't tune in early enough to follow the other great race of the day: The "Fashions on the Field" contest. But I caught a bit of it on video. I thought the winner, Sarah Schofield, was an odd choice -- a rather plain outfit -- but what do I know about fashion? She is herself a fashion designer so I guess expertise in such arcane matters won out. There is a video here in which she appears about half way. And a still picture below:




^* "stipendiary stewards"

A busy weekend

Yesterday (Friday) Jenny had Von and Simon plus Anne and myself over for dinner -- with Vietnamese lemon chicken on the menu. It gave us all a chance to hear a bit more from Von while she was here.

We covered quite a bit of ground -- going back to when Von was a kid as well as talking about New Zealand in the present. Von was interested to hear the decision processes that went into the choice of her name. Apparently most people call her Yvonne. It is only family who shorten it.

Then this evening (Saturday) was the BIG Christmas in October party with 20 people attending. I held it in my thickly turfed backyard under party flares. I had two 6' trestle tables with foldup legs this time and they worked very well -- used in conjunction with the two tables that are normally downstairs. George seemed to have had his own chair this time -- seeing he fell out of one of mine last time!

We all wanted to try NZ cheesy rolls so Vonnie's Simon quite heroically made 120 of them for us-- and they were universally agreed to be very good. We also had pizza and champagne to enliven the occasion but the rolls were the special thing. The ladies all brought along goodies too so there were plenty of leftovers as usual. It was all as bit chaotic but that just added to the interest. You don't want to be too organized for a family get-together.

We had three toasts: One to our NZ visitors, a sendoff toast to Simon who is shortly deploying to Afghastiland and a toast to the newest arrival, Dustin Eddie who was all of 8 days old.

Simon is going over with the RAAF to help drop bombs on ragheads from a remotely-piloted vehicle. As such he is in a base and not in much danger of being shot at unless someone in the Afghan National Army goes berserk -- which is not unknown. So we were glad to be able to wish him the best of luck and tell him we looked forward to him coming back home safe and sound

Joe flew up from Canberra for the day and Suzie managed to get along for a while despite still being in some discomfort after her recent childbirth. The only one missing was Tim, who had a big Halloween party going on at his place that he could not get out of.

Hannah was a bit disturbed by the crowd at one stage so Von took her up to my second bathroom again and that settled her! The magic bathroom with the big shiny key!

We heard that Vonnie's Simon is taking on a new job when he gets back to NZ -- as a shepherd! Apparently he will be driving around the sheep paddock on an ATV watching the sheep and putting back on their feet ones that have fallen over! Strange things happen in NZ! From computer guru to shepherd is quite a career change too! I told Von that she would be the shepherdess from now on! From being a business high-flyer to being the fulltime carer of one daughter, one lamb and two dogs is rather a change for her too.

Von spent some time with Suzy every day that she was here from what I gather -- giving her twin both moral and practical support after the birth. So that was a bonus for both of them. Twins being together at such a time has a rightness about it -- as being there is just as important as anything said to one-another. And Von said that Suzy is already feeling in better spirits now that the childbirth problems are fading.

We had five babies/toddlers at the party so that pleased me. A family party with no children present is a sad thing in my opinion.


Joey and Nanna were there


George must have told Paul a VERY funny joke

A comment from Paul on the night:

Time passed quickly and before we knew it the night was over. It was great to catch up with everyone and do a special send off for uncle Simon who will be away for 5 months doing his military service for the country. Hats off to him spending so much time away from the family for the greater good.

Update:

A very sad update to my warning about the danger Simon faces in Afghanistan. The very next morning I read:

Three Australian soldiers killed, seven wounded by rogue Afghan soldier

THE Chief of the Australian Defence Force has expressed his deep sorrow after the deaths of three Australian soldiers in Afghanistan. The three soldiers were shot during a parade yesterday morning. Seven other Australians were wounded and an Afghan interpreter was killed.

The lone gunman - an Afghan national soldier - was shot and killed as the Australians returned fire. The dead - a corporal, captain and lance corporal - were members of the Mentoring Task Force in southern Afghanistan.

Of the three, the corporal and lance corporal were on their first deployment to Afghanistan while the captain was on a second tour. The corporal and the captain had earlier this year taken part in flood and cyclone relief operations in Queensland.

Of the wounded, General Hurley said one soldier was being treated for life threatening wounds, four had serious wounds, and the other two had minor wounds.

More HERE

Dosas

At lunchtime today (Sunday) I took advantage of Von and Simon being in Brisbane to introduce them to that South Indian staple -- dosas. The guy who runs the restaurant concerned makes great dosas but speaks a very Indian version of English so I don't understand him and he doesn't understand me. He is a man of goodwill, however, so we generally get something like what we order. And all his dosas are good anyway.

I am still not sure what we got but we all enjoyed them anyway. As well as Von and Simon and Anne and myself, Paul and Susan were there too -- not forgetting two very important little people: Hannah and Matthew.

After lunch we adjourned to my place for tea and coffee and chatted on until about 5pm. It was good to spend some time with Von and discuss life in NZ with her.

A slightly surprising thing is that Vonnie's Simon joined in the conversation to a considerable extent. Simon is famous as the strong silent one. But we WERE talking about New Zealand so that is THE topic to get him talking (He grew up there). Paul and I normally talk to him about computers -- in deference to his great knowledge on that subject -- but it was good to have another topic come up that Simon was happy to talk about. That he has talked his wife into moving from sub-tropical Queensland to sub-Arctic New Zealand probably indicates that although his words may be few they are very well-considered.

We also spent some time talking about when Paul, Suzy and Von were kids and having a laugh about the crazy things we did together then.

My sitting room has a small ensuite bathroom running off it -- containing just a bath and a handbasin. And Hannah loved that bathroom. She must have crawled the full length of it about 50 times. I felt rather sorry that I couldn't donate the bathroom concerned for Von to take back to NZ!

Matthew mostly did his usual trick -- sleeping -- but he displayed a good set of lungs when he got hungry!


With Von at the Dosa restaurant


Hannah in the bathroom


Anne was very good with Matthew


Hannah the tongue. She's a little charmer

Another birth!

To Suzy and Russell was delivered a son early this morning and both mother and child are well, though Suzy looked pretty exhausted when I saw her that afternoon, of course. Paul's comment on that is perhaps worth quoting: "When we saw sister Susan in hospital, I must say my heart went out to my exhausted-looking very pale faced sister". Suzy is of course a treasure to us all so we all want the best for her. Anne, being both a midwife and a 3-times mother herself, was able to tell me exactly what Suzy would have been feeling so it is something of a pity that all the attention prevented Suzy from just going to sleep and gradually sleeping it all off. But the wonder of a brand new human being who will become well-known as an individual to us all will not be denied, of course.

The delivery was induced 2 weeks early because of Suzy's blood pressure but the boy still arrived in the world at a healthy 7lb.

That's the 5th birth in the family in less than 2 years. And I foresee more in the not too distant future.

Von, with her usual uncanny ability at getting right anything she is interested in, arrived from New Zealand just a couple of hours after the birth. She had very much wanted to be there to give moral support to her twin and to see the baby. Suzy has moral and practical support from Russell and all the family but twins are close in a way that the rest of us only vaguely understand. It would not have felt right for them to be apart at that time.

Ken was at the Gold Coast airport to greet Von, Simon and Hannah as they arrived, with Paul and Sue turning up shortly afterward.

So it was a day for arrivals.


The boy himself: Dustin Eddie -- all of 1 day old. Sure to be known as "Dusty"


Happy Hannah. She's got her mother's happy nature



Matthew: happy with his plug in -- and a great pic of Susan


I got to hold Matthew for a while but he slept right through it -- perhaps fortunately