An old friend from my Bougainville days sent me this clip which I thought fits in rather nicely with the peaceful Saturday-morning mood here at "Riverbend", especially after I've just fed the ducks on the pond and served the possum in the possum penthouse his breakfast in bed.
I don't know the collective noun for turtles but we have a large paddling of ducks and more than just one flight of king parrots and lorikeets. As for the turtles in the pond, to the three (or is it four?) we've already sighted in the pond's murky waters has been added a fourth (or fifth?) by the RSPCA-lady up the lane who brought in a female greenish-looking turtle whose carapace had been split in a collision with a car. After some "surgery" with an office stapler and a course of anti-biotics, she's joined the others and, being female, may turn the pond into "It's turtles all the way down!" (my apologies to Stephen Hawking).
I probably told you that I haven't been outside the gate since December as I've been waiting for the tourist "rummel" to subside before I face the big bad world again. But this hasn't stopped me from shopping which these days I do via SKYPE: yesterday I needed a new garden rake and pruning saw, so before Padma went to her yoga class at the local gym, she visited Bunnings, took photos of what's available and SKYPEd them to me, after which I made my decision from the comfort of "Riverbend".
Another old friend from my Bougainville days, who's now also in retire-ment, moves from place to place every six months or so. It's the sort of thing I should be doing right now. Instead, I did it when I was still broke and had to go from job to job to earn a living. I've never been a stayer as the onset of boredom and the fear of losing my edge made me scan the backpages of the Financial Review for the next juicy job every six to twelve months. In this way I chucked in some pretty special jobs, the sort of jobs others would've killed for.
Eventually, I found my calling when I ran my consultancy in Canberra. The constant stream of new clients kept my interest up and by the time it began to wane, I already had too much "skin in the game" (i.e. office equipment, furnishings, etc.) to throw it all away again. I guess that's what keeps most people in one place.
Employers understand this only too well as I found out when at one time King Island Scheelite flew me down to King Island and offered me a job which came with an attractive salary and a house but it was an empty house and I would've had to furnish it completely by freighting in every-thing from Melbourne. Having spent most of the first year's salary on that, they thought they'd have me pinned down. I never took the job.
Mind you, now after almost twenty-five years at "Riverbend", I'm more than just pinned down: I'm super-glued to this place - which says some-thing about the quality of the glue or the place; I don't know which. "Life is what happens while you are busy making other plans" - see here.
