The Australian Botanic Garden

The Australian Botanic Garden is about a 40 minute drive from my place so it's a shock for me to realise that the last time I was there was probably the late 90s. In those days it was about 10 years old and obviously in need of time to mature.

After seeing pictures of the field of daisies, I asked Caitlin if we could go there this week and she kindly drove and kept me company.

We had a quick look at pretties in the gift shop and then went to the cafe, managing to get there just before the lunch rush. 

The service was very pleasant and the seafood basket was delicious.

We had a lovely time and (surprise, surpise) it no longer looks like it needs a few decades to grow into itself :) 

 

The Voice

Not the TV show, the referendum.

Next month, Australia will vote on a change to the constitution which will allow our first nations people to have a voice in parliament.

There are many saying it's too little, too late and that is undeniably true but this change to the constitution will allow Aboriginal people to speak to any proposed changes to law. Anything at all which can be put to parliament will be subject to the feedback of Aboriginal communities. If the referendum returns a "yes" it will not just open doors but blast away walls in terms of giving aboriginals a say in things. Thats not to say that there will be great proposals and everything will change overnight but because it will allow for so much, the too little, too late view is moot.

There is a great deal of propaganda about, telling people they will be paying extra taxes if they vote yes, telling people aboriginal people don't want it, saying that it forces a treaty and saying it will cause division.

Well, I guess the point about division is true because there's not much unity around it right now but the way I see it, we get to do something for an oppressed group or we get to be on the wrong side of history and I won't cave to the "unity" of the status quo and forever rue the consequences.

The polls are indicating that a "no" is the most likely result, which would be truly devastating. After over 200 years of oppression, stolen children, deaths in custody, poor access to health care, segregation and all the other inequities of colonisation, a "no" vote will say to indigenous Australians that they still don't matter, that their fight for life has gone un-noticed, that all the other Australians are too selfish to even give them a fair hearing. 

If the referendum returns a "no" can we expect a wave of suicides? riots? political assassinations? 
Do I sound excessive? because I don't know how long people can be patient. I don't know how long indigenous people can accept their lot with anything resembling grace.

I have ordered my "yes" t-shirt and hopefully it will arrive soon, then I can wear it at every opportunity for the next 25 days. It's about the only thing I can do.

Just.keep.going.

I don't think I posted here about the night I drove across several suburbs to buy a rice cooker. I left home early in anticipation of traffic, got a great run and sat in my car for a good while, waiting for the meeting time. Then I found out I had mistaken one shopping centre for another in the same suburb and had to get to the correct place in double quick time. The seller was not visible at the meeting point and by the time she showed up I was over it, gave her  the cash, took the cooker and left without a lot of thought.

As it turned out, the "new" cooker was still in the box it was purchased in but it had sat in somebody's spare room for at least 20 years, was ridiculously over sized and just not what I wanted. I realised all this on my way home as the warning "caveat emptor" rang uncomfortably loudly in my head. 

When I got home, the first thing I saw was that Lucy had got access to the bin and dragged a multitude of grotty bits of packaging all over the floor.

Having cleaned that up, I opened the fridge to start getting some food and the shelf in the fridge door collapsed, dropping a dozen bottles of sauces and condiments on the floor. Two of them smashed so there was an unholy mess of glass and oyster sauce to clean up.

Well, I ordered a new shelf for the fridge and it took a full two weeks, if not more, to get here. It arrived yesterday and we opened it to find that I had ordered the wrong part, despite thinking I was being super careful to get the correct part.

The shelf I ordered is designed to be at he bottom of the door and is subsequently deeper than a middle shelf. It fits but it would probably be a bit of a pest so now I have to decide if I want to deal with an odd shelf or pay the freight and do the waiting to get the correct one. And do I keep the wrong one on the basis that the bottom shelf might decide to quit or do I ask for an exchange. Decisions like this throw me into an unneccessary quandary.

I currently have a cold which has knocked me around a bit and I'm just getting over the wretched cough.  Coughing is a good and useful reflex but just in the last few days, timed for maximum effect, I heard someone on social media say that during a coughing fit her "uterus tried to escape my body via my vagina"

Oh boy, I never considered that possibility before! 

Hopefully my anatomy stays put while I make life altering fridge shelf decisions!

PS i re-sold the rice cooker at a loss, providing great hilarity for my colleagues but I'm pleased it's out of my hair