Another day in Paradise! After a sumptuous lunch and a glass of Chateau Cardboard, I've reached that in vino gravitas feeling that makes me want to spend the rest of the afternoon in a foetal position on the couch in the Clubhouse by the pond.
Surrounded by books and birds and ducks and water dragons of varying sizes, with little Rover squashed in beside me and "brain food" pouring out from ABC Radio National, I slowly loll off to sleep.
Life could be a lot worse. A hell of a lot!
The spatially challenged letting agent of my 'hole-in-the-wall' investment unit sent me this photo with the words, "Space at rear of bath not wide enough to take washing machine. Consider taking out bath and only have shower so laundry will fit." (I kid you not!)
Taking out the bath to fit in the washing machine? Wouldn't that give the word 'retrofit' a whole new meaning? I swallowed the words which would have been better fitting than the washing machine and merely replied, "I don't think we should go there! Most washing machines are deeper than wide; it might just fit by turning it 90 degrees, with the dryer placed on top since both are front-loading machines."
I just hope he reads my email before he starts on the bathtub-removal!
Or real estate. It's one and the same thing in Australia. And while Batemans Bay is not Sydney, the religious fervour here is just as strong. After all, while we don't have eight butchers or eight barbers, we have eight real estate agents in the Bay!
Not that the fervour always pays off: at the height of the "marina boom", when our somewhat modest and very utilitarian Batemans Bay Marina was going to become another Whitsundays, investors piled into foreshore properties. One monied investor picked up a humble cottage - albeit with a swimming pool - at 31 Beach Road (to the right of the yellow arrow in the above picture) in May 2008 for $1,300,000. He was lucky to divest himself of it just last month for a mere $930,000.
Not that the new owners necessarily got themselves a bargain as the adjoining property at 33 Beach Road (the yellow arrow points to it), picked up by developers in February 2016 for $500,000, is now slated to become an apartment block with $800,000-units in it, which will totally overshadow their new home.
Unless they, too, get caught up in the religious fervour and slap up another apartment building to block out even more of the coastline.
On Corrigans Beach, that is, at Corrigans Cove Resort, where we - that is Ivan the Terrible, his wife Sue, the birthday girl Deidre, Padma and I (or me; take your pick) tucked into their 'Breaky Special' to celebrate Deidre's birthday.
I'm now back at "Riverbend" where I've started reading Oliver Sacks' "The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat". It's about people who have lost their memories and with them the greater part of their pasts; who are no longer able to recognise people and common objects; whose limbs have become alien; who have been dismissed as retarded yet are gifted with uncanny artistic or mathematical talents; who are stricken with violent tics and grimaces or who shout involuntary obscenities.
Mind you, one morning's exposure to the rest of humanity is quite enough for me these days and another thirty minutes of the Bay's road rage would've got me shouting involuntary obscenities myself.
Emirates Airlines on Friday revealed plans for a giant jet that would include a grassy park, a swimming pool and a game room.
It has normal seating on the top floor and half of the middle floor with a games room and park in the rear. The bottom floor has a pool with deck chairs and shrubbery.
The name of this triple-decker plane? APR001 - because it's just an April Fool’s joke.
Ich wanderte im Jahre 1965 vom (k)alten Deutschland nach Australien aus. In Erinnerung an das alte Sprichwort "Gott hüte mich vor Sturm und Wind und Deutschen die im Ausland sind" wurde ich in 1971 im Dschungel von Neu-Guinea australischer Staatsbürger. Das kostete mich nur einen Umlaut und das zweite n im Nachnamen - von -mann auf -man.
Australien gab mir eine zweite Sprache und eine zweite Chance und es war auch der Anfang und das Ende: nach fünfzig Arbeiten in fünfzehn Ländern - "Die ganze Welt mein Arbeitsfeld" - lebe ich jetzt im Ruhestand in Australien an der schönen Südküste von Neusüdwales.
Ich verbringe meine Tage mit dem Lesen von Büchern, segle mein Boot den Fluss hinunter, beschäftige mich mit Holzarbeit, oder mache Pläne für eine neue Reise.
For a translation, click here.
This blog is written in the version of English that is standard here. So recognise is spelled recognise and not recognize etc. I recognise that some North American readers may find this upsetting, and while I sympathise with them, I sympathise even more with my countrymen who taught me how to spell. However, as an apology, here are a bunch of Zs for you to put where needed.
He reserves the right to revise his views at any time. He might even indulge in the freedom of contradicting himself. He has done so in the past and will most certainly do so in the future. He is not persuading you or anyone else to believe anything that is reported on or linked to from this site, but encourages you to use all available resources to form your own opinions about important things that affect all our lives and to express them in accordance with Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
Everything on this website, including any material that third parties may consider to be their copyright, has been used on the basis of “fair dealing” for the purposes of research and study, and criticism and review. Any party who feels that their copyright has been infringed should contact me with details of the copyright material and proof of their ownership and I will remove it.
And finally, don't bother trying to read between the lines. There are no lines - only snapshots, most out of focus.
