Winter

It's winter. I keep meaning to write some poetic installment detailing the wonders of winter, but I can't. I just can't be arsed writing anything about anything at the moment. That's not true, actually. I've been writing short stories, and a thesis. And shopping lists to litter every available surface except my back pocket when I'm in town.

So, we've accepted that this post is about as poetic as Hansard*....here's a story about winter.

Things have changed in the last couple of weeks. We had some stormy weather, a lot of rain, and a general lack of enthusiasm about the outdoors. We've had the woodfired oven on every night, and most evenings I've baked a loaf of bread, and sometimes, just for good measure, the startings of an earth-ship as well.

I'm currently a little bit in love with rye flour. Rye flour is gluten free, which means you might have been treated to it in the form of delicious spicy pumpernickle or perhaps, less luckily, you've choked back a slice of gluten-free bread with ten cups of tea. Rye, you see, doesn't really develop, or rise, because it's the gluten in regular flour that gives bread its spring. The trick, therefore, is to mix rye flour with regular flour. Yum yum yum. I've been making loaves with plenty of caraway seeds and just enough neglect to allow the gloopy mixture to flourish. Bread, incidentally, is the ultimate recipe for winter. There's not an afternoon I haven't relished the idea of being allowed to rest in a warm place until I've doubled in size.

We've also been roasting fields-full of vegetables: pumpkin and potato out of the garden, parsnips from the local area, and plastic letters from off the door of the fridge. You know winter has really set in when you're slicing the thin rats-tail ends off the parsnips and affixing them to your temples for a jousting session. Just for the record.

The weather finally cleared yesterday, so the Possum and I spent the afternoon at the beach collecting all manner of exciting things that washed up in the high-water, like sticks and particularly tasty bits of seaweed - see, we're even hippies in our choice of choking hazards.

I think we all knew there was stormy weather on the way. Up until about a week ago the sea water was still beguilingly warm: normally it's turned cooler by now. Many afternoons saw big cumulus clouds roll in over the sea, as the land cooled off with the shortening afternoons. Tis the making of a good storm, that, I said, to no-one in particular. Two days after the rain had stopped the river was still as black as tea but I'm told these are good conditions for Brim. Unless you are a Brim.

The storms also brought a bit of wind, so the first fine day saw me out collecting a new batch of macadamia nuts and tying up the broad beans. And doing mountains of washing.

Today, a few days after the end of the stormy weather, the sea is still brown, only the second time I've seen it like this in the time I've lived here (a couple of years). The bush has dried out a bit, so you can go for a walk without being festooned in ticks, and it's clear, calm and cool, with that incredibly pungent scent of eucalyptus rising.

Makes me ache for a crippling mortgage, some air pollution and an angry confrontation in nose-to-tail traffic.


*Speaking of Hansard and the bedevilment of modern city living..... Today the House of Reps debated an exceedingly dull amendment to the administration of the something or other to do with airport parking tickets. And the member for mumble mumble seized the opportunity to launch a venomous attack on the wholesale cartel that is airport carparking. Who hasn't left Sydney airport needing a shower and a police report? Anyway, I am awaiting the details on Hansard, but here's the juice: Melbourne airport makes something like 78% of its profits from carparking. Perth and Sydney were in the range of 8-12% I seem to remember. 78%! Seldom do I hear an impassioned speech in parliament that leaves me so wholeheartedly fulfilled. Forget health reform, mining taxes and refugee policy, if you want to win votes, go for the crowd pleaser!