Random beauty ... to cheer myself up.

Need to cheer myself up. Have just spent an hour reading the international news, and it's enough to make you shoot yourself, if only to make it go away. In last week's Advertiser, South Australia was described as a "happy island of safety in a troubled world," and the fact is, it's easy -- far too easy -- to sit here in the Adelaide suburbs and be oblivious to what's happening in the US, UK and parts of (though not all of) Europe. Once you get your teeth into the news and start to digest what's going on elsewhere ... well, "depressing" is an understatement. So --

Random beauty, to cheer myself up before I get back to work. I've a book to write, and I can't tackle it it in this frame of mind (thank you, facebook).

There's been times in the past when South Australia has, admittedly, been a place I only wanted to leave. My personal talents lie in writing, and before the Internet, it was extremely hard to get anyone overseas (publishers, editors, agents) to even acknowledge the fact one existed, with an Australian address -- and not even a Sydney address, at that. 

For a considerable time, I'd thought the only way to get ahead was to leave; and in fact by 1995 I'd put out the feelers, made the first tentative explorations. Of course it came to nothing ... and in the fullness of time, it's probably all for the best.

If my efforts, twenty-five years ago, had borne fruit, I'd right now be living in America. Sure, married to Dave -- and the both of us at "ground zero," where people en masse don't seem to want to believe that the pandemic is real. Reading the news, as I did this morning, is a salutary experience. A wake-up of sorts. Not quite out of the blue, one comes to realize that one is, simply stated, better off right where one already is...

...and sure, of course it's still true that it would be far easier to float a career as a writer in a place where you can walk into the editor's office, "do lunch," help to launch and promote a work via book signings and so forth. But it's important to add that the chances of actually scoring that agent, a publisher, this hypothetical ad campaign, remain at about 10%, maybe 20%, if I work hard and long enough. Meanwhile the threat of this pandemic means that people sitting at ground zero in a country where almost half of the population still doesn't believe it's happening, and therefore isn't doing one skinny iota to stop it ...

Well, now.

At this time I have two books finished and a third approaching finished, two drafts for two more books to be worked up, hopefully by the end of the year; and a fantasy trilogy to finish only after I've completed a stand-alone fantasy which can be shown, and hopefully sold, before the trilogy sees light of day. You can't sell a trilogy right off the bat. That's a lot of work already done, and just as much work left to do.

Mike and I are pretty much decided, it's a waste of time trying to secure agency representation and/or sell books before the pandemic is finished and the global economy is at least showing some signs of recovery. Until major publishers know the state of their own health, they won't be ready to take risks on unknown quantities ... new writers. So --

So ... "a happy island of safety in a troubled world," is it? Those words are very true. I weigh them
against "the future that might have been," if I'd gone through with plans, pushed and insisted, stomped my food and demanded to leave SA. Hmm.

All of which brings me back to where I began. The news is appalling, surreal, depressing. I only look at it about once a week; that's all I can bear. My heart goes out to Americans, British and certain Europeans (and I include Russia there) who're living with the reality, wrestling daily with their governments and also their brainless populations, who seem bent on mass destruction. And as for myself? Well, we've been in SA almost fifty years now. We can wait till this catastrophe sorts itself out before waving our arms around, trying to attract the attention of an American or English agent ...

On the understanding that this pandemic will end, that this virus can be defeated, that the world has a "global" future rather than finding itself a patchwork of isolated Covid-free regions and red-flagged no-go zones, suffering under a shambolic economy that can't fix itself. I don't even want to think about that. No one does. But I can't help wondering how many people must die before the general public in some of the sillier parts of the world wake up to themselves.

Hence, random beauty, to cheer myself up.

How to empty out a reservoir ... Mount Bold, Clarendon and the river

How do you empty out a reservoir? This is the challenge at Mount Bold right now, where the dam is due for a major "safety" upgrade. It must be couple of years ago when Dave and I were there, and a knot of guys in hardhats were clustered in a bunch, talking in undertones and looking ... concerned. About that time, SA Water lowered the level in the reservoir, took it waaaay down, and now -- well, this, from the SA Water website:

"Mount Bold Reservoir Reserve will be temporarily closed to visitors from Monday 4 May for around three to four weeks, while we use heavy equipment and machinery on site, as part of early investigative works for a dam safety upgrade.

The water level at Mount Bold has been lowered to enable this part of the project to be undertaken, and there will be an opportunity for the public to view a near empty reservoir from usual access areas, following the completion of the works."

Cool. But how do you empty out the reservoir, down to zero, without flooding something or someone? The answer --

Carefully! You work out what the river can carry at one time, open the spills juuust enough ... and the result is a full river (which you very seldom see), and some picturesque views. Make the most of it ... soon enough, the river will be back to reed beds and levels so low, it can be more like a chain of unconnected ponds.

We'd heard the news, and went to Riverbend Park, behind Clarendon, on Tuesday, to take a look...

...and yes, I'm loving the Lumix camera. It's not just that it's s light and easy to carry in (and use with) one hand, but it also captures excellent images. 20MP is a godsend. 

The Salmon Sandwich Bandit!

To set the scene: a picnic at the Gold Escort ground, at Belair NP, on a glorious day in late autumn. Right. Now, I've had a Kookaburra take the tuna out of a roll in my hand before (in fact, over at Karka Pavilion, also at Belair), but this little bandit took the whole thing and zoomed up into the nearest tree. The rascal sat up there at his leisure to eat the salmon, then dumped the roll.

To add insult to injury, he came back ten minutes later and swooped again, trying to get my apple pie. He aborted at the last tenth of a second, realizing it was fruit! He got my finger instead. Ahem!

So here he is -- the now world famous Salmon Sandwich Bandit, as immortalized on Facebook. If you notice, you can see the remnants of my salmon on the branch where he's sitting. Well ... he did play fair, and strike handsome poses for me to get some lovely shots. The fifth is his "beauty shot," where he glided over to another tree and sat cackling, "Me so funny!" 

Along the way, it was a great opportunity to get in some practice with the Lumix TZ90, which I am learning to love. Boy, did I make the right decision, when it came down to deciding which camera to buy. Sure, I know, I've seen the commercials for the new 60MP Sony. But I don't happen to have A$8,000 lying around, and I don't think I could carry the Sony and its lens and battery pack around my neck all day; or even for an hour. The Panasonic Lumix is right for me, at this moment: it weighs about 350g, has excellent lens elements by Leica, and gives me more gadgets and options than I can actually use -- and it does it for around 5% of the price of the killer-diller Sony. If I miraculously get well and strong again, and win lotto, I might think about upgrading to a DSLR, but for now, I'll take technology and the sweet price!