The Joy of Platta Paket*

Whaddaya mean, "the wall's not plumb"?!  GAAAHH!!!

As mentioned elsewhere, we've been doing a major kitchen renovation here in Bendigo.

And when I say major, I mean we completely demolished the old kitchen, threw out all appliances bar the fridge and microwave, re-sheeted parts of the wall, and built a whole new kitchen in its place.

Blowing out the cobwebs

A couple of weeks ago, in response to this post, one of my brothers suggested I get on the motorbike and explore the local countryside a bit. Find a bakery, have a coffee, that sort of thing.

The rest of the family is away in Canberra this weekend and, having done the laundry, swept up, and seen all the livestock to rights, I thought "why not?" I grabbed the road atlas off the shelf, worked out a quick route, tossed the dogs outside with a treat, and headed out.

Line the budgie-cage!

I just had to share this with all of you.

In Bendigo, regional Victoria, the opening of a multi-storey carpark is not just news, it's news that requires a picture involving the mayor.  This story and picture dominated page 5 of the print edition of  Wednesday's Bendigo Advertiser:

 

The caption refers to the Mayor "waving his - and the first - parking ticket" (click the image to get a bigger view).

That was Wednesday.  

Today (Thursday), page 2 of the print edition carried this story:

"Rosemary Hill proudly displays her ticket to the new Edward Street car park, the first to be issued ...".

Really?  And Fairfax wonders why its share-price is on life support.

The flag police (they come to me in my sleep)

I love Australians.

I love the way we maintain that we’re very easy-going while allowing ourselves to get uptight about stuff for no very good reason.

I was musing on this topic as I walked into the office this morning, past the flagpoles which were conspicuously lacking the two officially proclaimed indigenous flags of Australia on this first day of “National Aboriginal and Islander Day of Observance Committee” (NAIDOC) Week.

Making your own luck, and enjoying the profits

Today I had to go to the Bendigo Media Centre.  It’s a strange little place, a combination of very new buildings and horrible brown-brick 1960s buildings, erected in the shadows of the main broadcast transmission towers on a hill near the middle of town.  The centre houses the studios for the local Ten and Austereo networks, so the lobby is full of glossy promotional posters for the network personalities.

On my visit today I particularly enjoyed the posters featuring the local radio announcers.  You have an image in your head of what these people might look like, and it's never, ever accurate.  There's a reason people are told they have a good face for radio, and yet management insists on having them sit for lobby portraits.  The results are often unintentionally hilarious.

Stop and smell the masonry

Bendigo's Capitol Theatre portico

Bendigo is full of old stuff.

Okay, that seems a bit obvious.  So obvious that I hadn't really paused to think about it very hard until one night last week when I found myself sitting in what must once have been the manager's office in the 1876 Union Bank in View Street, drinking fine French red with an old theatre friend and her fellow cast members.

When Mrs G and I were selling the idea of moving to Bendigo to the minions we contrasted the relative lack of buildings more than a few decades old in Canberra with the profusion of century-plus old buildings in Bendigo.  The city dates from the 1850's gold rush, so there's a lot of period architecture; from the follies of mining barons to the facades of old pubs on almost every corner.  "Look, minions, surely you'd be thrilled to live amongst all this history!"  They weren't too sure.

Admittedly, it is kind of easy to overlook all this built heritage around you while you're trying to go about your life.  Getting to work, doing the shopping, paying the bills.  And yet there's a statue of Queen Victoria, unveiled only two years after her death, on the corner of one of the main intersections in town.  We're on the other side of the planet from where she lived and reigned, and there's a bloody statue of her here!  Mind you, the state is named after her, so I probably shouldn't be that surprised.

Anyway, as I was sitting there the other night, gazing about this 130+ year old building, eating fabulous prawns and lapping up the company, my conscience prodded me to appreciate the fact that the profusion of white-haired motorists with hats on their parcel racks aren't the only old things here that should drive you to distraction.

Photo credit: David Stephenson, via Flickr