Lovely weather and visiting dogs.

I still miss this little face.

This is the photograph that I submitted for critique  and whilst they waxed lyrical about each other’s photographs they were not thrilled about my photograph – bad lighting, poor composition, were two of the  comments and when it came to scoring, it didn’t do well at all. I am not averse to criticism, even negative can be helpful, if done correctly, but they just didn’t like this and there was no constructive criticism. Anyway, I’m fairly comfortable with my photographs. I agree they could improve but not this way.

Got back from Adelaide last night. Was midnight before I got home and  close to 1am before I got to bed and then back up at 5;45 to take the dogs out. It took me a while to settle the dogs down when I got home – you would think I had been away for weeks instead of just one day.  I had to have everything done on the one day because I needed to be back for Annabell’s medical appointment. It was a fairly good trip – and I got everything that Annabell asked me to get for her but when it came to me – fail. David Jones has very little in the way of Organizers, or inserts these days, Kikki.K had nothing, Typo had nothing, same story at Officeworks, which I did find surprising. I have some things coming from the USA so I

Benji at the Port.

shall just have to exercise patience and wait until they arrive before I can finish the change-over.

I did, however, get Annabell a new cookbook.

We bought an air-fryer and although it has a small cookbook along with the instructions, Annabell wanted something more so I looked for an Ari-Fryer Cookbook for her. I got this at Dymocks in Rundle Mall. We have no book shops at home. The last one closed down years ago. Yes the newsagent sells a limited number of books and the library has not caught up with Air-Fryers yet. Come to that, neither has Dymocks and there were only four books to choose from. Even in Adelaide many of the bookshops have closed down -Dymocks, Borders, Angus & Robinson, were the main bookshops in Adelaide. By contrast, Dymocks, the remaining bookshop, was crowded and many of the customers were young people. Anyway, I got her a cookbook and she is quite happy with it.

We have a Nursing Home here  but the beds are very limited and it is not unusual for people to be sent to care  in other places where a bed is available. This could mean they are sent over 100 miles away. If you remember I did visit one of our congregation who had been sent to a nursing home in Quorn which is about 90 miles from here. We have another person who has been sent there and I am going to visit him early next week.

Ferry at Tailem Bend – River Murray

The four Test Cricket matches against India have ended with a well deserved win for India. There’s no question of the fact that India really dominated the entire series and in all honesty should have ended 3 1 instead of 2 1. India dominated the last Test Match from start to finish and should have come away with a win, but bad light and  bad conditions means that the match was abandoned and it became a draw. Be interesting to see how they do with a different set of skills in the ODI (One Day Internationals) ( Not very well, I fear!!)

In ten days from now we would have had Dougal for three months in what was to be a week to ten days visit. Anyway, he went home today. I took him round to Sam this afternoon. I think Dougal was glad to be home and glad to see his people. I’ll miss him but it’s nice to be back to me and Benji again. I think Benji will be quite happy and we had a good walk – just the two of us – this evening. We should be clear now until sometime in December when we get Yogi back for a bit. You never know, we could have Dougal back for a few visits if Sam has to go back to Adelaide for tests.

Cricket, Trekies and Roses

How are the mighty fallen, and the weapons of war perished.

Five wickets fallen for a total of 22 runs. That is abysmal in any language. England is down and Australia is slowly kicking the life out of it. Not good, not good at all – bad for England and bad for cricket in general. But the question has to be asked why England has performed so badly and my view is that they are burned out. They have come to Australia at the end of a fairly hectic tour in India and Sri Lanka whilst Australia haven’t been anywhere yet and are fresh and on fire. Just listening to the comments and no one seems able to believe how bad England are. They are coming up with all sorts of excuses and I feel they are just wandering around the problem – there is far too much cricket and too much is being asked of the players. India and Australia have a lot to answer for in this regard –

The strange people you meet in Adelaide  :o)
The strange people you meet in Adelaide :o)

Australia with the Big Bash League and India with its India Premier League = lots of money involved. And yes many of the  Test Cricketers in England don’t play for the IPL but they are still involved in International Tours and England has just finished a tour of India and Sri Lanka, so my feeling is they are burned out – too much cricket. There is no such thing as an “Off-Season” anymore and it’s less of a sport and more of a business venture with the potential for corruption with the serious on-line betting and betting on individual players and ball by ball results. This is already under investigation and corruption has already been  an ugly feature of the Indian Games. But that aside. England really has some serious soul searching to do. They didn’t lose the Ashes, they gave them away as a Christmas Gift. Oh and if anyone is thinking ‘Just Sour Grapes” please remember I am Scottish, not English – winning or loosing is not the issue, the game is and this was not a game, it was Play School on a Cricket Oval.

The weather has been odd lately and when I have taken the dogs walking in the mornings I have been wearing a track suit. Same at night, it is decidedly chilly. At the moment it’s a case of half walk half carry with the Man. However, he’s still had full mobility wandering around the grounds and the house and I really don’t mind having to carry him sometimes. But it is getting to the point when I need to give serious thought to a set of wheels for him.  On Friday I

 Sturt Desert Rose
Sturt Desert Rose

head off to Adelaide, returning Saturday. I said I would go down and spend some time with Alan and this might be the last opportunity I get for a while, since the weather is starting to heat up again and should be in the mid to high 40s next week. It means navigation the vagaries of the South Road but it is starting to come together now so it’s perhaps not quite as bad as it used to be.