"Sunset time. Sagas of remnant blue. It was time for him to clean up his Writing Room, and to place his notes here and there. He was not writing today. It was enough to have the sky dutifully scribbling away."

Step-daughter has been chosen to do the sound-engineering for a film to be made in Nepal in June. She's great. That should be a remarkable experience for her, to be back in or around the Himalayas. Being Chinese she has been to Tibet, so this will be looking at the giant mountains from the other side, I guess. I recall flying from Asia to Beijing once, over the grand mountains and being amazed that even from a high plane, the sharp mountains were so high, as if in deep conversation with the sky. Looking up in this remarkable 'outback of the world' I saw 12 planes criss crossing the sky, to my left and right were also planes just higher and lower, criss-crossing, all off to places. Looking down I saw wondrous rivers and occasionally the glint from the tops of high speed trains here and there. It is so interesting to live in these times.

Melbourne does turn on some beautiful weather, today being a good example. There is something very nice about these old houses, the yards, the trees, the un-mown lawns. End of the day, and it is generally quiet, apart from the dubbed rumble-clatter of the regular trams on their steel tracks...off to town and coming back. The neighbour's magnolia tree is in flower and the huge blooms point up to the sky and later tumble onto the grass. The leaves of half of the trees are going brown and yellow as the sun moves slightly away as a prelude to the seasonal mood inviting a winter. The shaded spaces become open and the sun pools on the floorboards outside. Bird song, subtle, and poignant, flows across the grass like a simple wave. I recall someone once describing 'birdsong' as a form of 'liquid arrogance'. I agree.

The problem with Nursing and many other industries in Australia is simply that in the early 1980s the Government decided that it was a hell of a lot cheaper to rent foreign nurses and doctors... and engineers etc...all the necessary trades...rather than invest in the actual education of Australians. This is why, me, at 63, can always get a job in nursing whereas, in a better organised state, I couldn't, I'd be long retired now, because of the upward pressure of the young professionals as happens everywhere else on earth in all the progressive societies. The rented folk, a lot of the time, just went home at the end of their contracts as they did indeed have their own good countries to go back to...thus leaving us with a multi-generational deficit of folk with skills...and this was government policy...the policy of many governments over the decades that have refused to take on the responsibility of real governance, and the responsibility for the future of Australians. This was a remarkably foolish and selfish decision based upon economic rationalism set over a 3 year government term rather than a good idea for the country as the years went by..and so we live in these times and have troubles now, not because the world is more complex, but simply because so many atrocious decisions were made by quite a few governments fearing the task of being actually responsible.

IDENTITY THEFT "Now, let me get this right...if someone steals your identity, they therefore become, obviously, responsible for your overwhelming debts as well? Debts not only to Visa Card, but debts to the Colombian Cartel and the Hong Kong IndependenceTriad as well???" Now, let me just put all my personal information here on the blog...and...god willing... and good luck to the new me, indeed! You'll need it.

Robbie Williams | Party Like A Russian - Official Video

I received, in the mail box, a letter from my dear Niece who is working in Shanghai. She loves it, although, having spent most of her life in London, and now with still a very pronounced English accent, China is quite a shock and on such a huge scale. She does note that she lost 5kg of weight in one month which she attributes not to specific dieting but rather to having diarrhoea for a month. She is very happy to have lost the weight. She is getting a real idea of the huge human scale and impact of mainland New China and is deeply fascinated by it all. I must write back to her. I have been waiting for her postal address for a few months, I still have a letter, unposted to her, from when I was working in the clinic in cairns and had no idea we would be moving to Melbourne...so this old letter, when posted with a new one, will be a bit of a 'time-capsule' in itself. I have no memory of what is in that letter. We write with fountain pens and use elaborate good writing paper, and seal each envelope with a proper red hot wax seal. I still recall that some letters I wrote her could never be posted because applying a hot wax seal to an envelope, for the novice, occasionally leads to a significant desk-fire. Fortunately, my old wooden desk is up to that challenge, scorched in its centre, and has survived well enough.