“Great is the matter of birth and death; impermanence surrounds us. Be awake each moment; do not waste your life.”

No, do not waste your life. I was trawling through photos early this morning, having been woken about 4.30am by neighbours and fighting cats. I’m glad the humans and the felines gave me an opportunity to be awake so early today, I truly am.

Well, what can you do once you are awake? That’s it really. No going back, the path is clear: get up or lie there for hours wishing you weren’t lying there for hours. So, determined not to waste my life – no that is a lie, I was not determined at all, I was groggy with sleep and wishing I was horizontal not vertical –  I staggered to the kitchen, made a cup of tea, and then with computer on lap caught up on the scores from the Australian Open Tennis in Melbourne. Go Tomic! Go Federer!

Then I deviated from the tennis to the New York Times, to stories of Aspergers syndrome, to Sherlock Holmes and his supposed mental illness and addiction to cocaine, and landed without passing ‘GO’, without collecting $200, in my own photo store.

Life is full of strange journeys. In the catacombs of my own digital photo library, what did I find? Where did I land – at the Daly pub, in the middle of the NT!

Daly Waters Pub NT

What a great spot. Highly recommended. I passed through there six months ago on the way to Brisbane from Darwin. I think all of the caravans travelling through the NT were camped there that night on about four square metres of land. Everyone was crammed into this tiny camping ground in the middle of the outback. All that vast space out there, and we humans were huddled up around a grog shop. How Australian.

The white shoe brigade was out in force, and what a great life they have. I love them. They are not wasting a moment.  Ironically they seem more settled and happy as they move around this vast continent than we are, anchored to the spot in suburbia. They are IN the moment I tell you. No, do not waste your life.

Thank you humans, thank you felines.

Here are some happy thoughts from Mr Mark Twain to get you started with your coffee, on this sunny Brisbane day . . .

New Year’s is a harmless annual institution, of no particular use to anybody save as a scapegoat for promiscuous drunks, and friendly calls and humbug resolutions.
(Mark Twain)

Clearly a  ’bah humbug’ kind of person from 1 January to 31 December, enjoying every miserable sweet moment with a smile.  I wonder if he was really funny to be around or intensely irritating. I see him on the shores of one of those formerly pristine Hawaiian beaches, writing and observing Polynesian customs in his own eclectic way. There he is, sipping an early version of a pina colada, enjoying the coconut milk, rum and pineapple flavours, savouring the physical taste of the drink along with the metaphorical taste of his own witticisms about life, the universe and everything.

As this is the coffee hour rather than the cocktail hour, and I am not on the shores of a breezy tropical beach, but here in burby inner city Brisbane, the witticisms are few, and the reflections transparently shallow. But, I have one un-novel idea, which is laudable, given the proximity of last year, this year and a few alcoholic beverages in between.

Idea #1 for 2012
Environmental advice: Save on neurones – don’t make any New Year’s resolutions.

I didn’t make any. Not a one.  This puts me ahead I believe. There is nothing to be broken, nothing to feel remorse about, nothing to fear, no guilt to carry, no high bars to aim for. This is very positive news. Relief surges through me. I won’t be paving hell with any of my resolution flotsam or jetsam.

New Year’s Day:  Now is the accepted time to make your regular annual good resolutions.  Next week you can begin paving hell with them as usual.
(Mark Twain)

Perhaps I was in a state of flow, deeply concentrating on my studies, head into the computer.

Perhaps I just don’t know how to use the oven.

Whatever the cause, it resulted in a culinary disaster. I was starting to wonder which of my neighbours was soon to burn down their apartment. But the culprit was much closer to home. Like that baker of ancient Anglo-Saxon times, Alfred the Great, I burned the cakes.

Some say that King Alfred did not burn the cakes at all. He’s been subject to bad press for many centuries, and it’s really propaganda fed to us by bored teachers who understandably try anything to jump-start those dull, adolescent brains staring at them from the back of the classroom. Nothing like the mention of food to wake up a teenager.

But, apparently, Alfred burned the bread, not the cakes. Fleeing his enemies of the time back in the 9th century, he hid in a farmer’s cottage. The woman of the house, not knowing his identity, but being a generous and helpful sort, invited him to share her dwelling. And in so doing  thought it only fair that the visitor pull his weight, and give her a hand with the household chores.

‘Alfie . Check this out. There’s our bread in the oven. I’m just going to feed the baby. I’ll be back soon. In the meantime, you watch the bread. Make sure it doesn’t burn. The loaves are almost ready. Are you listening? Yes. Just a few more minutes. Can you do that? Yes. Great. Okay.’ Well, apparently his mind was on the affairs of state rather than the bread.

And as all of us know, ie those who are deeply involved in downloading the whole of the internet because there just might be something in that last paper that will significantly benefit my latest research . . . oh and there’s another one, just a minute, I’ll check those cakes in one more minute, yes I heard the buzzer . . um, that looks interesting (more downloading) . . . what’s that? (rushes to kitchen) Grilled muffins? How did that happen? What a useless oven. Oh. It was on grill rather than the fan-forced oven setting. How did that happen. Charcoaled chocolate. Rather disappointing. Can I just slice the tops off – that might work.

Well, you can’t help being in a state of flow can you. Maybe I need an executive offsider, to look after matters of cakeness. And they might do a bit of floor cleaning too while they’re at it – and the bathroom’s a bit black around the edges – throw some bleach on the walls would you. Thanks.

Briz Vegas art work – near State Library/Arts precinct at South Bank.

What a great way to see the world – through the bottom of a swimming pool. I’m no Olympic swimmer, just your average lap lane customer, but I’m starting to think that this is not a bad way to remember some of the places I’ve travelled to. A rather limited view of the world you might say, but urban wisdom tells me that you remember moments not days. I reckon that moment when you plunge into the water of a 25/50 metre council pool is one of those pretty memorable moments – it helped me remember Dunedin, New Zealand – 28C in the water, and 18C outside the water. Also creepy mist and steam rising out of the water in a somewhat primal way. It took me hours to chip the icicles off my bathing cap.

Some people trawl the shops and stock up on baseball caps and t-shirts when they travel. Me, I pay my five or so dollars, inelegantly crawl into my bathers – swimmers or togs, depending on which state of Australia you’re from – and head for the chlorine. I’ve become one of those non-tumble-turning-few-times-a-week-gals, who crave fully irrigated nostrils, and a scenic view of the long black line – lap, after lap, after lap. An odd hobby, but a strangely attractive prospect after a long day frozen to the screen of a computer.

I highly recommend the Aquatic Centre at Alice Springs. Now there’s a plunge or two to remember. Under the perfect blue skies of the desert it is fantastic. Little competition for space, no water aerobics class in action sending a tsunami from one side of the pool to the other- well at least not while I was there. What more could you ask? I know, a dip in one of the waterholes out beyond Alice, in the West MacDonnell Ranges. Ellery Creek Big-Hole, Ormiston Gorge, Redback or Glen Helen Gorge. But watch out – not for crocs this time, for hyperthermia. Those natural pools are deep and freakishly cold. But, they definitely could be added to ‘The Pool List’, for their free-range possibilities, rather than their conformity.

Well, here I am again, back in the NT – half way to anywhere, or somewhere or nowhere: halfway to Darwin, half way to Adelaide. It’s 6 months since I was in the Northern Territory, the air is dry and crispy as chips, 40C and counting. Had 3 days of work in Alice, but the wide open road is just begging me to keep driving, that way, outta town, to the Chasm. . . don’t go back to Brisbane . . . yet. It rained on Wednesday – rain! But the Todd is not flowing as you can see. Only a few more hours to contemplate Australia from its navel, though, and then I’m ‘home’ on the east coast, where I’ll be putting my head back into those books, confining myself to the library, and staring at the computer screen. Hey, give me those car keys – how many K’s to Broome did you say?

Todd River

Spring flowers – the market was full of them today.

I miss the  rain forest colours -  they’re utterly captivating.  But Spring blossoms, mild October days and sunflowers, SUNFLOWERS, are fantastic.

I understand why Van Gogh was so obsessed with them.  He couldn’t’ paint enough of them.   Don’t you think they beg for attention and recognition? Cheeky things.

I can’t walk away from a sunflower without a smile all over.

I’d conspired with creative brother in law ( BIL) to keep weekend visit a secret. Expecting overseas corporate visitors from Alabama, sister patiently awaited visitor’s arrival at Kingsford Smith airport, as instructed, accompanied by BIL. Prior to this, many elaborate fictional explanations had been fabricated by BIL about special company director’s visit, the need for wife and husband to personally meet and greet her etc, to keep the scheme a secret.

At sight of sister disembarking aircraft birthday sister’s computational equipment froze. Unable to process information she was rendered speechless, and it was touch and go for a while there as to whether electric shock therapy would be required to restart verbal capacitors and neural connectors.

Fortunately, technical intervention was not required, and normal function resumed in said wife. Husband was eventually forgiven for telling a pack of lies, and Captain was allowed to land in home port without retribution despite complicity in the deceptive plot.

Captain is delighted to report that birthday celebrations were gastronomically exquisite and suitably well lubricated with some of Australia’s best reds and whites.

Captain returns to port of Brisbane this evening, with supplies from the Emerald City, and a little touch of homesickness. Immersion in studies on Monday will dispel any distracting thoughts about distance from nearest and dearest.

And here’s a fragment I found in one of those alleyways, by dear Emily.

“If I read a book and it makes my whole body so cold no fire can warm me, I know that is poetry. If I feel physically as if the top of my head were taken off, I know that is poetry. These are the only ways I know it. Is there any other way?”  (from Emily Dickinson’s letters)

Definitely visceral, not virtual.