The bargain
The bargain DM 5th July 2025 There’s a smile that never fails to amuse me. It regularly appears on Antiques Roadshow every time someone, who submits a treasured heirloom from their great aunt’s estate for appraisal, is told by the expert the estimated price. And then it appears. Words are said, “Gosh! I didn’t think […]
Oranges and lemons
Oranges and lemons DM 28th June 2025 Whoever composed the rhyme, “Oranges and lemons, the bells of St Clements” was a cheat! Lemons and Clements are not perfect rhyming words, if one properly enunciates their ‘t’s. Not only that, but the London church referred to in the rhyme is actually St Clement Danes, and so […]
Vasovagal
Vasovagal DM 21st June 2025 What a sook! Fancy fainting getting a simple blood test. It wasn’t the sight of blood. I never look. It wasn’t the fear of needles. It wasn’t that the blood-nurse looked like Count Dracula’s niece. I’m not sure what happened, until I woke up on the floor with people asking […]
Names, names
Names, names DM 14th June 2025 The pressure’s on. Our Sunday School area at church is being renovated, and a new name is required. The ‘Green Shed’ was its name, but now the exterior is more in the cream range. I had tentatively tendered ‘Sunday School’ and ‘Youth Ministry Centre’, but they are long odds […]
Happy shiny people
Happy shiny people DM 7th June 2025 My new shiny rubbish bins are now sitting proudly on the footpath. The council replaced them all across our suburb last week. A new red one for household waste. A new yellow one for recycling. A new green one for prunings and grass-clippings. All glossy and gleaming, with […]
The Calvary Memorial
The Calvary Memorial DM 31st May 2025 A hundred years ago, Edwin Markham wrote a poem to celebrate the life of Abraham Lincoln, which was chosen from 250 entries to be read at the opening of the Lincoln Memorial. In it he eulogized warmly and well; and among the choice lines are these: “His words […]
The Woodman
The Woodman DM 24th May 2025 The winter firewood arrived this week, and right on time to meet the drop in temperature. Pilliga wood, which burns well and long and without excessive smoking. While stacking it, I was reminded of the tragic story of a travelling-man who offered to chop some firewood for a poor […]
Dune erosion
Dune erosion DM 17th May 2025 Some sixty years ago, Frank Herbert, author of the enormously popular Dune series, wrote the following conversation in the first book of his famous trilogy: ‘Why do you test for humans?’ / ‘To set you free.’ / ‘Free?’ / ‘Once men turned their thinking over to machines in the […]
Please Stop
Please Stop? DM 10th May 2025 I think it was during Hans Zimmer’s Absurdity that I went into cardiac arrest. Well nearly. He’s always one for the big movie sound, and thought instead of having one bass guitar, he’d have three. The stadium shook. My body shook. My heart was experiencing rhythms it had never […]
Nitpicking
Nitpicking DM 3rd May 2025 Former editor of the Sydney Morning Herald, John D Pringle once reminisced about one of his former bosses, A P Wadsworth, a short man whom he intellectually respected and sincerely admired, but who was deemed by some young journalists to be a micro-manager, nitpicker and interferer. For Pringle reports a […]