The Show

A local newspaper is running a Family Show at the site of the former Royal Agricultural Society's (RAS) Showground Grand Arena now known as the Entertainment Quarter. It is an 'alternative' show to Sydney's much larger annual Royal Easter Show which has been staged since 1823 and was moved by the RAS from the former Showground to new grounds at Sydney Olympic Park in 1998.

I wasn't aware of the 'Family Show' until I stumbled across it when I arrived to see a movie at the Entertainment Quarter on Easter Monday. I was stunned by the numbers in attendance. The area was packed, particularly with families. Here is a glimpse of the crowds.

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The light towers in the distant left are part of the adjacent Sydney Cricket Ground. The clock tower just to the right of centre sits atop the old grand stand at the northern end of the former RAS Grand Arena. That stand has been converted to offices with its glassed in top tier visible.

What's good for the goose.....

Meanwhile, across at the opposition, Channel 9's answer to 'Kochie', Karl Stefanovic was showing his 'brolove' for one or other of the stars-du-jour by embracing the youth and exchanging arse gropes.

Karl and his brolove

Karl Stefanovic

Good to know that morning television is in such safe hands.

David fails his lawyer's exam

The theory is that a lawyer should never ask a witness a question for which they don't already know the answer. Otherwise the lawyer risks receiving the answer s/he doesn't want to hear.

Channel 7's morning show host David Koch is not a lawyer but in his role as media personality he asks guests, witnesses, if you like, plenty of questions. He should know the 'lawyerly' principle well.

At the moment five youths hailing from Britain and Ireland, I believe, are visiting Australia. Their visit is causing a bit of a stir. I'd never heard of any of them and their individual names mean nothing to me. As a fivesome, though, they have been referred to as One Direction.

You can tell they come from chilly Britain and Ireland because yesterday on the coldest April morning in Sydney for four years they went swimming in Sydney Harbour and sunbathed when any self respecting Aussie decided it was time to pull the jumpers from their wardrobes.

One Direction

Following an embarrassingly ingratiating interview with these youths on his morning television program David Koch strode amongst the hundreds (thousands?) of young enthusiasts (99% teenage females, it seems) watching from the adjoining streets to seek their reaction to seeing the group. 'Was it worth it coming?' 'Kochie' asked one young girl breathlessly. The immediate and firm response was simply 'NO'. The usually garrulous Kochie was momentarily speechless.

Recovering from this setback Koch moved on to a security guard amongst the team supervising the screaming young girls. 'Have you ever seen anything like this before?' Kochie beseeched almost begging for an affirmative answer. And what was the response from the guard? 'I've done a few of these and it was pretty standard.'

Stick to monetary policy Kochie, which is your expertise, and leave the pop-starts-du-jour to the Molly Meldrums of this world.

David Koch ('Kochie')

Sunny Sydney

On Easter Monday 2012

Your next train departs......

At the movies

Pre movie advertisement

American Pie: Reunion

From the credits, apparently released elsewhere than Australia as 'American Reunion', this is the third sequel to 1999's 'American Pie'.

Pretty well all the characters from the earlier films are back; older, mostly heavier looking and all evidently none the wiser as they still search variously for sex and lasting relationships.

The comedy is fairly crude and, at times, nasty but the largely university student audience at this afternoon's session found it all highly amusing as they laughed loudly and heartily at the obvious double entendres and juvenile situations.

There was a witty one liner involving Ricky Martin that was a standout from the rest of the humour on offer if that is sufficient to attract your admission money.

Warning: Jason Biggs' penis and some young blonde woman's breasts are given exposure.

I confess.....

...I wasted a perfectly good - Good Friday - holiday. It was a beautiful Sydney autumn day with blue sky and not a cloud in sight.

I had plans...sort of...perhaps of going out to the Easter Show...then to the football next door to the show grounds..or perhaps dilly dallying in the nearby harbour side park soaking up the sun and the sights of other holiday makers. Whatever...plenty of time ahead so...first a leisurely breakfast of toast and juice whilst reading about Andrew's warm buns followed by my daily trawl of other blog favourites.

That's when I should have showered and dressed and departed. But I did not. Still plenty of time, I reasoned, so I then trawled my favourite photo blog sites. Mostly serious photos, beautiful to behold, but several...ahem...adult...sites amongst them. That was a mistake. Now I was feeling a little...well let's not beat around the bush...I was a little bit frisky.

Actually, by then I was a lot frisky. Home alone and frisky. Mmm, well I dealt with that over the next half hour or so. Never you mind how...I just did it. Mmmm, that was satisfying. And a bit draining. Back to bed I went just for a brief rest and recuperation. Another hour slipped by.

Mmmm, getting late in the morning by then and I still hadn't dressed. Better postpone the Easter Show to another day but the other options were still open. Time for a light lunch first. OK just check out a recorded television program with the sandwich and then go. Well maybe one more program...then go.

Mmmm what do you know. The late afternoon football match I planned on seeing after having been to see the Easter Show was about to start. And it was being shown live on television. How had so much time passed by? Well I was still home and I had the television on. So I watched the match...on television. And it was a close match, and it was a good one too. And by the time it was over it was almost 6pm. Where had the day gone? Wasted.

Time for an evening meal...and more television...and finally bed. I never actually got dressed.

I confess.

'And yet all this comes down when the job's done'*

(* 'Scaffolding' by Seamus Heaney)

Having spent the best part of two days dismantling the scaffold that covered the south-west corner of my twelve storeys building (and my dining room) for the past three months, the scaffolding team was busy reconstructing it on the south-east corner.

Here is a section of the team moments before signing off for the day at 3.30pm.

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As tomorrow is Good Friday and the first day of a four days long weekend for most Australians I suspect the scaffolders will not return to continue the reconstruction before Tuesday. In the meantime valuable visitor parking spaces will be unavailable during that period which may prove a problem for some residents. Our building/residents has had a long association with rural Australia and traditionally hosts many Easter visitors spending the holiday period in the 'big smoke' for the Royal Agricultural Society's annual Easter Show.

Art therapy

We had an art therapist at the nursing home day centre today. She provided each participant with their choice of a painting in the form of two panels one on each side of a sheet paper with the space in between blank. The participants then spent about thirty minutes painting in the blank space using water colours. They could select whatever subject they wished whether it be something to link the side panels or some other subject altogether.

Here is a selection of what they produced.

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Considering that each participant is aged in their 80s/90s, that most have some low level dementia and that some have poor vision, what they produced was really impressive.

All of them became fully engaged in the task, in some cases after initial reluctance to be involved and more importantly all of them had fun and got to exercise their minds and bodies. The various therapists do a terrific job at the home.

Its been six months since your last visit.....

This reminds me, I'm due for my next check up.

Circular Quay

I never tire of Circular Quay no matter how many times I visit nor how many times I photograph the surrounds. I know I have posted similar photos before but here is another looking north from the eastern side of the Quay. Circular Quay East (right) is in shadow late Saturday morning. The sun has not yet reached its zenith, hence the shade. The Harbour Bridge is in brilliant autumn sunshine. One of the catamaran ferries (left) bears the name Friendship which also was the name of one of the First Fleet vessels that transported the first modern era settlers (convicts) to Australia from Britain in 1788. A Manly Ferry is visible (middle) apparently under the bridge roadway although in reality it is to the east of the bridge and travelling on its journey between the CBD and the oceanside suburb of Manly.

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Stephen Sondheim's Company

This weekend there are cinema screenings of Stephen Sondheim's 'Company', a concert staging of the musical about a mid 30s man unable to settle on a relationship whose coupled friends urge him to settle down all the time demonstrating by their own behaviour the hazards and uncertainties of maintaining a relationship.

This is a terrific performance for lovers of Sondheim's work and musical theatre and should not be missed. Filmed at New York's Lincoln Center with the New York Philharmonic Orchestra. Neil Patrick Harris, Patti LuPone and Martha Plimpton shine in an outstanding ensemble.

Chandelier and fireworks

An outdoor season of the opera La Traviata is currently underway in Sydney. A stage has been constructed on Sydney Harbour itself with the audience seated on the foreshore at Mrs Macquarie's Chair. A massive chandelier (9 metres x 9 metres) studded with more than 10,000 Swarovski crystals hangs over the stage.

All this is being staged a couple of kilometres from where I live as the crow flies. Every evening at 7.45pm a short but brilliant fireworks display lights up the view from my home (and sends a few sonic booms my way too). This display I believe marks the commencement of the performance. Then at around 10.20pm there is a second, smaller display which I guess marks the conclusion of the performance.

This photograph downloaded from the net is of the chandelier being put into place before the season commenced.

Pavlov's cardinal

The hospital's new youth mental health service was officially opened and blessed on Tuesday. I was in attendance as an 'honoured' and non-celebrity guest. The opening was declared by the popular NSW Governor, Marie Bashir, although in her temporary and occasional guise as Administrator of the Commonwealth of Australia. This means she was at the time substituting for Australia's Governor-General, Quentin Bryce, who I believe was on ceremonial duty overseas at the funeral of the King of Tonga. What exciting lives these vice-regal personages lead!

The blessing was performed by Sydney's Roman Catholic Cardinal, George Pell. This included sprinkling holy water all over the place but mostly over the many walls in the unit. This was my first sighting up close of a Cardinal spreading the holy water about. Cardinal Pell's presence brought the Pavlov's dog reaction out in me.

When I was born, almost 63 years ago, Sydney's Cardinal was Norman Thomas Gilroy.

Cardinal Gilroy

Gilroy resigned as Cardinal in 1971; that is when I was aged 22. Although that was more than forty years ago I still to this day tend to link 'Cardinal' with 'Gilroy'. Every time Cardinal Pell's name was mentioned yesterday, I immediately thought 'Gilroy' in mind even as 'Pell' was being said.

Once I had the thought I couldn't shake it for the entire hour long ceremony.

The Rum Diary

A wannabe novelist (Johnny Depp) takes a journalist position with a struggling English language newspaper in Puerto Rico in the 1950s and finds himself embroiled in an expatriate's financial scam.

The Rum Diary is taken from a short story by Hunter S Thompson. The story is slight, probably reflecting its origins but the film has its whimsical moments filled as it is with Caribbean style and atmosphere.

A leisurely way to spend a lazy afternoon provided you don't mind the occasional scenes of cock fighting.

Mum

Today is the second anniversary of my mother's death

Splendour on the grass

It was a gorgeous autumn day yesterday. A clear blue sky and a slight bite in the breeze yet a warmish sun still beamed down with the capacity to burn.

I stopped off for a perve in Centennial Park between paying my respects to my late mother and going to an afternoon movie. I can always find time to gaze upon young men cavorting in the park. This was a curious group of twenty/thirty somethings.

There were about twenty of them, most out of photo range when I snapped this including (sadly) nearly all those running around topless. A few wore funny hats or other peculiar clothing items. There were no women in sight. I wondered what the occasion was.

They were playing a very social game of cricket stopping every couple of overs or so for drinks breaks.

At one point another man, dressed entirely in black, arrived and the men sat around him in a semi circle watching and applauding as he performed some magic and illusion tricks. After twenty minutes he was paid and departed to be replaced by park delivered pizzas. A courier delivered about eight boxes of pizzas. For any overseas readers this was akin to a pizza delivery to the middle of Central Park in New York or Hampstead Heath in London.

After a while they resumed their social cricket.

What was particularly curious was that all the way through at about five minute intervals and on some signal, unidentified by me, the men would suddenly halt whatever activity, or inactivity, they were engaged in, start whooping loudly and they would rush into little groups of four or five huddling together in a sexual style tableau. They would hold their tableaux for about ten seconds and then just as quickly return to their previous activities.

My guess is they were participating in a buck's party.

Cigarettes and Chocolate Milk*

(* 'Cigarettes and Chocolate Milk' by Rufus Wainwright)


I'm sure these are not on the menu at Australian chef Matt Moran's new restaurant Chiswick located only minutes from my home. Anyone who follows Moran's Twitter account will have noticed a stream of celebrity endorsements for the new venture.

Moran's restaurant restores a restaurant to the small park - well a garden really - years after the previous restaurant on the site closed. As a child I was invited to numerous birthday parties for class mates at that site probably because our school at the time was almost literally around the corner. Never a party there for me, however, as my parents could not have afforded to stage an equivalent event for me.

I was wondering whether anyone other than these celebrities was dining at the new restaurant and in yesterday's walk I passed by for a look/see. I was not expecting to see many customers mainly because it was 3.20pm on a Friday.

To my surprise the place was packed. The doors of the northern end of the restaurant were open to take advantage of yesterday's beautiful weather and my picture from that end (taken from a discreet distance)     gives an indication of how well patronised it was.

Looks like Moran has a hit on his hands.

'Spread the news I'm on my way'*

(* 'Walking Back To Happiness' by John Schroeder and Michael Edwin Hawker)

I always have the best intentions to walk every day to build my fitness and health but time and time again (that is, every day) I find reasons not to do so...today. Usually that means slacking off on the sofa watching recorded television programs of little consequence and less importance. But tomorrow I will go for a walk. I promise.

Well I got home from the hospital early today and the weather was simply gorgeous.

Who could stay indoors on such a beautiful afternoon. Unfortunately I could but for once even I was too embarrassed to waste the afternoon on the sofa and so I went for a brisk walk around nearby Paddington and Woollahra.

I walked past the Flat White cafe, just two blocks from my place and always packed in the mornings, unvisited by me to date. It was closing for the day. One couple sat eating at their table surrounded by other tables with chairs stacked on top.

I walked past all manner of terraced and standalone housing protected by hedges and high walls.

I walked past the antique stores and the clothing stores with their inspirationally beautiful models beaming at me through the store windows.

I walked onward and homeward. A forty-five minutes walk. My heartbeat was up. I could feel it had done me some good. I must do it again tomorrow. I will do it again tomorrow.

In no time at all I will look as lean, fit and tanned as this fellow who I past at the aptly named Queen Street intersection. Two or three days; that's all it will take. Only joking.

Yep, I'm walking back to happiness.