escape

We had a late picnic by the beach the other day. Just hot chips and sea air. It was beautiful. The breeze was a welcome relief from the pressure of this wet heat.

Darwin is a beautiful place but I don't think I have the fortitude to live with this kind of madness-inducing warmth like my sister. She came up here for a sea change, intending to only stay for a "couple of years", and that was fourteen years ago!

Coming to Darwin is apparently easy; leaving it is quite another matter once you've "settled in".

Time is going slowly here. Lazy days for us being with family and going hardly anywhere. It is sort of what we needed but honestly? We would probably do more if we had the inclination.

We went to Crocodylus Park today. The crocs were being fed and it was rather good fun to see the big "Harold" waiting with open-mouthed anticipation for his raw chicken head :)

The kids spent our money in the souvenir shop as they do and then we all trapsed off to Macdonalds for a quick bite to eat - mainly so us older ones could get cool again and the little ones could run rampant in the playground. :)

Later, the four of us went back to our resort cabin and chilled. The kids used the pool and internet cafe and I read my current book "Blind Faith" by Ben Elton.

At first, I found this book so sharply satirical and black, it irked me. But I have gladly stuck with it and am finding its hero "Trafford Sewell" a truly likeable and believable character. The type of world this book is set in, is all too familiar albeit set in some not-too-distant future. I cringe on occasion as I read the cultural "imperatives" in this book but which I see are actually beginning to take root in our present digitized generation. It IS a black, ironic, satirically sharp cultural analysis of current pop culture and bloody good fun if you can ride the initial cringe factor!

Later today, I went to watch my wee nephew do his Karate thing. It was cool in the school playground under the giant ball court covered in shadecloth. Pleasant indeed.

H did not cry when he fell over as apparently he is wont to do. My sister is suitably proud and impressed. He also recieved another stripe on his yellow belt, which I guess means he is not far from progressing onto orange belt. :)

This is in stark contrast to his wee brother. R. sent the wind of fear up all of us last night when he absconded from this house as we were very not-so-focussed on this energetic 2.5 year old. We found him some 500 metres away. He had escaped through the gate on his tricycle and terrified his mother (not least his aunty) so much, she got a headache from the stress! The naughty little monkey KNEW he had done "something wrong", but is so curious that hardly anything can contain him. He RUNS all day if possible - stopping just long enough to exclaim in glee at some new discovery and then runs onto the next "cool thing". I can barely wonder what this bundle of mayhem will be like at fourteen! My own boy is fidgety enough to know its hard to keep them still when they burn for adventure!

So it feels actually weird now that Easter is done and we are still "on holidays". I expect to wake up tomorrow and have to rush off to work. We have NEVER had a holiday over the Easter Period before so it is sort of feeling odd and surreal - for me anyway.

Oh and yes! I did take the photo that graces this post :)

and yes... it would be a Paradise here if it were not so bloody humid! :)