Wednesday, January 20, 2010

catching up on hol stuff

Christmas and the New year came and went with pleasantly little stress or fanfare. On the 25th, we all debunked to our cousin Nina's house in Roselle for a genuinely lovely lunch. I mean lovely in all respects - there was no pressure, no pretention, loads of great conversation and some fabulous food. It's sad that the house is selling but that is often the price of divorce. Later that day we popped in on the 'other half', Ben, with his new girlfriend and baby. A nice view to Iron Cove bridge and all the convenience of being 'inner city', but I wonder if this is the bargain he was making when he looked beyond the marriage.

A day or so later we were camping in Kangaroo Valley, dodging the poor weather that had set in in the Mountains. The night before we left, torrents fell on the roof and the heavy drops exploded on the back verandah. But the Valley was relatively dry when we arrived later that day and we didn't have any rain at all. Swimming at Geroa and the Upper Kangaroo Valley, strolling in Berry and setting up for camp dinners have an abiding rhythm that often invites reflection. It's hard not to look across at cows grazing or dramatic mountain profiles without thinking about the deeper meaning of things. Well, for me, anyway.

Shortly into the new year we beat a path to our relatives house in Murriverie Rd, North Bondi. It's a nice place to visit, as they say, and we had a pleasant week of ferry boats to the city, swims at Bondi Beach and Nielsen Park(my childhood beach), dog walking (with Tom on one end of the lead!) and good coffee. There was an obligatory visit to Westfields Bondi Junction and we even managed to fly a kite.

One odd occurrence. Two noisy parties burst into life on separate evenings adjacent our place in North Bondi. Lots of people, crescendos of conversation and great gusts of music assaulting the night. Both ended at precisely 10.15pm, without even a fadeout! Strange indeed.

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