Now you can have your groundcover and eat it too

 

Padma threw some Omega 3 capsules at me today. It’s okay though; I only have super fish oil injuries. She was angry because I had told her not to waste money on expensive Blackmores supplements when we can pick some fresh purslane "weeds", which have a pleasant tangy lemony and peppery flavour, and chuck them into a healthy salad.

Purslane has been consumed since ancient times, and because it grows easily in hot and not too dry climates, it is represented in many cuisines of the world, including Greece where I first discovered it. It is arguably one of the most nutritional plants on the planet, offering remarkable amounts of minerals (most notably calcium, iron, magnesium, and potassium), omega-3 fatty acids, vitamins (A, B, C), and antioxydants.

Although the stems are edible when still young (and can be pickled), I usually keep only the leaves and thin, spindly stems at the top, which are simply plucked from the central stem. The process is slow-going, but rewarding in the end. Because purslane grows so close to the earth, and especially if it is foraged, it should be rinsed very well, in several baths of fresh water, with a bit of vinegar.

My favourite is purslane and potato salad. Bon appétit!

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P.S. You can buy your own purslane seeds here.

 

Es löscht das Meer die Sonne aus

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For a bit of mood music, click here

 

Early evening in the Bay and I'm walking around, flâneur-like, while waiting for Padma's bus. Even if I say so myself, it's a pretty nice place we live in, and I wouldn't swap it for all the tea in China - well, for $2,125,000 worth of tea perhaps!

Not that I would've wanted to have spend all my life here, I thought, as I passed a down-at-heel accountant's office and reflected that it could have been me sitting there behind that window and doing nothing more exciting than totting up numbers for the local mum-and-dad businesses.

A fellow-accountant from my New Guinea days did just that when he opened a small practice at Nambucca Heads and in the eight years there spent much of his time filling out Centrelink forms for out-of-work cow cockies. Then again, what chances has this guy got selling many caravan parks? Buckley's? Perhaps he's helping the orthodontist in his spare time.

By contrast, the resident seagulls are a busy lot, with patrons at the nearby Starfish Deli being warned not to leave their meals unattended.

And what is it with all the 'street furniture' these days? Who started this craze? Who wants horizontal and vertical beams chopping up the views?

And what has Woolies got to do with mining (other than mining your wallet)? Or isn't this a Broken Hill-ish headframe of a deep mineshaft?

Never mind! As soon as Padma's bus pulls in, we are heading back to the peace and quiet of "Riverbend" and I'll think about giving Elaine a call.

No, not that Elaine but Elaine at the local Animal Welfare League.

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Seventy years of Pacific Islands Monthlies

 

PIM was required reading for anyone interested in Papua New Guinea, and after I'd moved there in the dying days of 1969, I never missed an issue.

In fact, I've always thought that I got my first job in New Guinea with a firm of chartered accountants in Rabaul through a classified ad which I had placed in PIM sometime in late 1969, and some ten years ago even made a trip to the National Archives in Canberra with the express purpose of finding the ad and taking a copy of it.

I remember sitting in their cavernous reading room and paging through all twelve issues of their 1969 magazines and not finding anything that looked even close to the Job Wanted ad as I remembered it, "Young accountant (24), still studying, seeks position in the islands."

Now that PIM has been digitised, I've been able to search the same issues on the computer from the comfort of "Riverbend" but with the same result - NOTHING! So how and where did I advertise? One thing I know for certain: I did not reply to a Position Vacant advertisement. Strange how faulty one's memory can become.

Still, it was a treat to read those old issues and through them relive the six or seven years I spent in this wonderful and mysterious country that almost became a second home to me.

Take the opportunity to do your own exploring by either browsing through the issues looking for unexpected gems, or searching for particular people, places or topics. Endless hours of pleasure and edification await you!

Click here, then click on 'Browse this Collection', then use the drop-down menu to choose from 840 editions, or press the ► button.

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Padma is back!

 

No derailment; no flat tyre; Padma is back! And so to celebrate her return, I ran a romantic bubble bath for her but she wasn't impressed which means I will just have to keep eating off the same old plate for a little longer (only kidding; I've been eating straight out of the can; still, it was a waste of good candles.)

And while I'm on the subject of water, it's been raining heavily all week-end, and the downpour continues. Even the possum refused to come out of his possum penthouse and I fed him apples and pears on a long stick.

Canberra copped it sweet with roads in Lyneham, Dickson, O'Connor, Turner and other northern suburbs completely washed out. Most of Northbourne Avenue, which is Canberra's main drag, was closed off.

No doubt, many of its overpaid and underworked public servants have taken a "sickie"" today which won't affect the departments' productivity much but probably save the nation a small fortune in bikkies and tea.

While Padma is watching television, I'm keeping one eye on the tide and the other on the river gauge at Brooman. Its last reading at 6 am shows 0.54 metre with a daily throughflow of 23 megalitres - a mere trickle!

That's the good thing about living next to a river and not on some inland plains: the river acts like a gigantic sluice which takes all the rain water straight out to the ocean.

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Living on books and water

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Like Spitzweg's poor poet in his humble garret, I don't mind as long as the books are interesting and the water isn't dripping on my head and has soda in it, not to mention Gordon's Dry Gin.

In the two weeks that Padma has been in Melbourne I've made just one quick dash into town to buy the barest essentials, and, being a radio-man, turned the telly on just twice to watch VERA and SHETLAND.

I still have plenty of unread books but am down to my last piece of Mon Ami French camembert, some wafer crackers, and the last pack of Con-tinental French onion soup - 'made with responsibly grown onions', it says on the package; French onion soup wrapped in bullshit - but I will not go into town for another quick dash into Woolies until late tonight when I pick up Padma at the bus. Two birds with one trip and all that.

And then it's time to pour myself a very large gin with very little soda.

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P.S. Padma's just phoned from the train. She's on it and on her way to Bairnsdale where she'll change over to the bus so, unless there is a de-railment or flat tyre, I'd better shave and shower and make myself hu-man and my way into town. But first I'll have a very large gin - straight!

 

It's still being published!

 

I’d read my Thoreau, and swallowed it whole, and for many years was an avid reader of "Grass Roots" with its stories of young and idealistic people who built their houses out of discarded wooden beams and scraps of corrugated iron, went without electricity or telephones, hauled water and supplies on foot and by hand, and survived on almost next to nothing.

As I've since discovered, people who opt for this sort of life are either desperate or fools. I must've been both in those turbulent few months following my return to Australia in 1985 when I thought I could find my salvation in the country by answering a classified ad in the backpages of "Grass Roots" by someone called Uta Langer who wanted to sell a share in something called "Twin Rivers" or "Two Rivers" Farm near Lismore.

What stopped me from immediately dropping everything and driving up there was her comment that the place had no vehicular access and I would have to abandon my car - I think she used the word "park" - some-where in the middle of nowhere and hike the last ten-or-so kilometres.

Instead, I buckled down by finding myself a big job in Sydney, although then buckled under the stresses of a friendless city and relocated to the old familiarity of Canberra. And the rest, as they always say, is history.

For years I kept my old copies of "Grass Roots" as I couldn't bear the thought of throwing them out. Eventually I did when I buried them in landfill on "Riverbend" which is also in the country but accessible by car and where I live with electricity and telephone in a house that's a bit more than just a few discarded beams and scraps of corrugated iron.

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What's in a name?

 

A certain Nelligen butcher had a wife by the name of Nell. Apparently, he did away with her and threw the body in the river. From time to time it would float to the surface, prompting locals to exclaim, “Here comes Nell again”.

This is NOT the official version of how Nelligen got its name but it's as good as all the others because mystery still surrounds the origins of the town’s name. Colonial government policy at the time was to adopt aboriginal place names where possible. With no indigenous written language, however, European translation of aboriginal locality references was approximate at best.

“Nelligen” may be a corruption of an aboriginal term relating to its locality description, its function, a person, or perhaps of a dreamtime event. In the early years the town and its fresh water creek were spelt at different times: Nellican and Nellikeng.

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... and then there were two

Click to enlarge

 

Has word got out that my WiFi still hasn't got a password on it, or is this bend in the river really such an alluring place that people keep dropping their anchors? TENACITY's been here since Wednesday and a houseboat has just joined her.

I'm as fond of FON (Freedom of Navigation) as the Chinese are as long as they don't crank up their ghetto blasters late at night. I may have been born to be wild but only until around 9 p.m. or so when RADIO NATIONAL kicks in and I listen to the news and then Phillip Adams' Late Night Live.

Phillip Adams has been the witty, smooth and informed voice of Late Night Live on ABC Radio National since 1991 and I have gone to bed with him ever since, and with its previous presenter Richard Ackland pretty much from the time I arrived back in Australia in 1985.

One of Phillip Adams' many books, Bedtime Stories - Tales from my 21 Years at RN's Late Night Live, published in 2012, reflects on the world leaders, thinkers, ideologues, crackpots and gurus he has interviewed. As he writes in the book's Preface:

"Late Night Live began as a part-time job, a way of rounding-off an already overcrowded day, but over the years became all-consuming. Its main purpose was/is neither to amuse nor entertain others but to further the education I'd managed to avoid in my brief, brutal years in Victoria's state school system."

Late Night Live still rounds off for me what are now leisurely days, and makes up for what was not enough education in a German 'Volksschule'.

And if you should have better things to do in bed at five past ten in the evening, you can always listen to the repeat at five past four the next afternoon or, if you don't live in Australia (in which case you have my fullest commiseration), you can listen to the podcasts by clicking here.

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The sun's come out and so have I

My altered view of the world from Nelligen's River Café

 

Admitting that some days I feel like filling the sink with coffee, sticking my head in and sucking it dry is all the coming out I want to do, and so I went over to the River Café for a long black and an altered view of the world.

The day hadn't started all that well: having buttered up a golden-brown piece of toast and piled on lashings of apricot jam, I took a big crunchy bite which turned out to be a broken-off tooth. My tooth! So rather than letting my tongue explore that newfound cavity every few seconds, I thought I'd take my mind of it by exploring the neighbourhood.

If you want to know what Nelligen was like in the sixties, come now because nothing much has changed. Yes, we do have some McMansions but they're aberrations from what it still an old-fashioned country town.

 

5. Catholic Church 7. Old Courthouse 8. Old Watchhouse 9. Old Schoolmaster's
Residence     10 Old Post Office     11. Mechanic's Institute     13. River Café

 

There is the old Post Office (now a B&B) and the Nelligen Mechanic's Institute (just one mechanic!); the old schoolmaster's residence and watchhouse (both now private residences, with the latter again being for sale); the courthouse (now the Anglican Church); and the Catholic Church in the highest and best location in town (isn't it always so?)

 

 

It's a long walk back across the bridge but I'm home again. The weekly garbage truck has been and gone and I've wheeled in the bin and made myself another cuppa. And I've rung the dentist for an appointment.

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P.S. To get a BIRDS EYE® view of Nelligen, click here.

 

The worst seems to be over - until next time

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About every thirty years, there is an almighty mining boom, followed by busts, and many long years waiting for the next boom. The most recent one was driven by China’s surge in demand for the minerals and started in the early 2000s.

The Aussie dollar hit US$1.10 and BHP reached $50. In the four years following the 2011 peak, prices collapsed by up to 80%. The crisis ended when the Chinese government announced new stimulus measures at the Peoples’ National Congress in March 2016, targeting 6.5% growth.

Come 2018, the AUD has regained some of its strength and commodities prices have firmed and the worst seems to be over - until next time.

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The 'Unlikely Voyage' continues

 

It's Day 4 of an unusually early cool and grey week and I'm glad I'm still on my Enid Blyton-esque voyage from the borders of North Wales to the Black Sea in "Sandy" Mackinnon's "Jack de Crow".

It's such a charming public school, end-of-empire and daring-do story that you want to read it at the same speed as the Mirror dinghy itself, and so far I've only just got through the Thames Barrier where "here for the first time I encountered the intriguing world of marine buoys and navigational markers. Every mile or so, I would skim by a channel marker, regular green bell-shaped buoys occasionally coming up on the southern bank. These, I knew, marked the starboard and port edges of the deepwater channel, which sounds straightforward enough, but is that going downstream or coming upstream?"

It reminds me of the time my friend Ian invited me aboard his new yacht SY REMY which he was going to sail around the world, but first he had to sail her down the Clyde River for which he asked me to come along.

Now I hold Ian in great respect, not only because he is ten years older but also because he is widely read and can turn his hand to almost any-thing, and so I thought little of it when he passed the first port buoy on the portside and the next starboard marker on the starboard side.

However, I did dare to ask how much water his Compass Easterly 30 was drawing - "1.7 metres", he replied - which made me wonder why he'd venture into places I wouldn't take my dinghy into. As we neared the next marker which was a red port buoy which he was likely to round on his portside again, I shouted from the bow, "Helm hard to starboard!"

Luckily, his yacht had an old-fashioned tiller and he knew that starboard meant pushing the tiller to the right which turns the boat to the left, and so we safely rounded the red port buoy against our starboard side. As I explained to him, yes, you do round the buoys port to port and star-board to starboard but only when going upriver. You do the opposite going downriver because Maritime Services hasn't got enough personnel to swap the buoys from side to side every time you go downriver again.

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Our politicians have just put a ban on the one thing they can do right

 

With some politicians having such incredible family values that they can't restrict themselves to just one family, these signs have now been erected around Parliament House. As if the new "Bonk Ban" wasn't already enough bad news for Canberra's struggling motel owners.

Of course, those caught out could always point to Peter Costello's 2004 speech about "... one for your country" and say they were doing it for the good of the nation. They could also fall back on the Clinton defense, although it would get a bit tricky to then claim immaculate conception.

All of which just leaves the sticky issue of when a relationship is not a partnership but I'm sure they work that one out while the Murray-Darling is drying up, the country gets flogged off to the Indians and Chinese, our crumbling infrastructure is being privatised, and half the country goes on the national disability scheme (mental ills are the new bad back).

Already 70 per cent of Australia is uninhabitable because of desert, and the remaining 30 per cent is quickly becoming uninhabitable because of our politicians who've just put a ban on the one thing they can do right.

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Storm Boy

 

Storm Boy, based on a novel by Colin Thiele (not to be con-fused with Leonard Teale) , is one of the most cherished of Australian classic films. It has a deep emotional clarity that appeals to children and adults alike, making it timeless.

The landscape of the Coorong wetlands, bleak and beautiful and windswept, becomes a refuge for the broken, the loveless and the outcast – an alternate Garden of Eden, in which a different version of Australia might seem possible – a kind of hermit’s utopia.

The film is clearly about much more than the boy’s love of the pelican, which he calls Mr Percival. It touches on race relations, ecology, the breakdown of families, white and black law and questions of prior ownership, but the themes are seamlessly woven into the story.

Much of the power comes from the elemental beauty of Geoff Burton’s camerawork (his work on Sunday Too Far Away, with a different colour palette, has a similar expressiveness), and from director Henri Safran’s sensitive handling of the performances. The film was made for $260,000 and was a success at the box office, both in Australia and overseas, where it sold to more than 100 countries.

Here's a preview:

Watch the full-length movie here.

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TENACITY pays off

 

TENACITY has once again paid out all its anchor cable to sit snugly right across the river from "Riverbend". She comes up here at least twice a year, Christmas and Easter, but this year she's early. Maybe it has something to do with Woolies already selling hot cross Easter buns.

The skipper, Ross Britt, who used to own the Camera House in the Bay, had at one time also been interested in owning "Riverbend". He longer has to: he practically lives here now!

Time to draw the blinds and put a password on my WiFi.

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BHP's sensitivities are my sensitivities

Click on image to enlarge

 

As a result of the US Tax Cuts and Jobs Act which reduced the US Federal corporate income tax rate from 35 per cent to 21 per cent as well as other measures, including changes to international tax provisions, BHP included in its half-yearly accounts an income tax expense of US$1.8 billion.

Its New York share price promptly dropped by between 4.4 to 5.22% and was followed this morning here in Australia by an immediate drop of 5%.

However, its half-yearly dividend went up to US$0.55 which, given an exchange rate around AUS$0.79, means a payout of AUS$0.70 per share. Add the mostly refundable franking credit - thank you, Peter Costello! - and I can look forward to receiving a dollar a share come 27 March 2018.

I can eat again! ☺

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