The House(s) of Fran_mart

The faint hearted should note this is a post about a bird of prey and some of the later photographs show it preying rather graphically.   The red colour is quite appropriate in that regard. For the past several weeks we have had a pair of accipiters (the genus for Goshawks and Sparrowhawks) lurking around the trees near the Creek.  I am suspicious that they have nested there somewhere but have not yet found the nest tree.  I've also found them very uncooperative in waiting for me to have binoculars and/or camera to hand when they have appeared. I haven't been game to make a definitive ID between Collared Sparrowhawk and Brown Goshawk, with an inclination to the former as one of the birds seems too small to be even a male Goshawk. However today I heard the distinctive call  and got down to the trees pdq, with my kit.  After a little bit of following the bird from tree to tree, with it carrying prey, it settled down for lunch.  A few photos were taken. ...

Some local residents have formed a group to turn the abandoned Bungendore to Captains Flat railway line into a 32km rail trail primarily for use by cyclists and walkers. On 26 November they held a fundraising dinner/concert at Mulloon Creek Natural Farms a few kilometres East  of Bungendore. I'll note that I have used yellow blobs to obfuscate faces in the images below: the group wasn't invaded by a Moonies convention). There were several cars lined up when we got there (and a lot more when left) including this vehicle which I thought was a well kept up Valiant.  Then one of us looked more closely at the badege and realised it was a Roller. This raised two thoughts in my mind: a tale from the 1960s when RR dropped running boards and got a letter from an Australian pastoralist asking "Where do I tie the dead sheep?"; and was Arthur Daley present?  Actually this was unlikely as George Cole died a while back. Even in the absence of Arthur (and Terry Mc...

A year ago I was given a set of Tiles as a present, after a couple of episodes of searching frantically for lost things.  In the intervening year it has saved me a bit of time in tracking down keys and wallet put in strange places around our house.  However it has not been so useful in finding a misplaced wallet elsewhere in this wide brown land.  I will go into the reasons for this below. What has actually caused this post was, out of the blue, getting a message that my tiles will stop working working soon unless I pay another fee.  This came as quite a shock since I thought they had been purchased rather than licenced.  Indeed looking at the website ... ... the words "Buy now" are pretty prominent. Delving a little further into the website one comes across this:  .. and, even, further down this Now that a problemo has arisen I have followed the link to the reTile area.  Even there it isn't clear what is going on. It talks about "... y...

One of the sayings about Victorian weather is "4 seasons in a day."   From my view that was the case on 23 November. Unfortunately all four seasons were Winter.   I am advised that statement makes no sense,   So here are some facts:  After 34C on Monday we had no more than 15C on Wednesday.  Thus a better interpretation of them is that were  a Rural setting so things move a little slower than in a big city (or Melbourne) and thus it takes a week to get through all four seasons.  More commentary on the weather will come at the end of this post. Getting back to the timeline of the 23rd, it was pretty dreary when we set off for the dog-walk. This pedal-kayak fisherperson appeared well attired for the day.    After the dampish walk we scaled the mountain of Karbeethong Avenue to hear a strange sound behind us.  Never let it be said East Gippsland Shire isn't aware of what ratepayers really want. Well swept streets must be...

Given the way our Federal Government is swaying to starboard it can only be a matter of time before the Honours system starts to go back to Knights and Dames and thence to Lords.  Today suggests that the system could get a bit of literary backing and appoint folk as {gender specific peer reference} of the Flies .  I'm sure the Estate of William Golding wouldn't mind, This is what I had in mind: there were rather more around in the Heath at Shipwreck Creek,  Last night was rather unusually warm - about 22C minimum-  but we got in our dog walk before it hit 30C and then headed off to Shipwreck Creek.  As we headed out we noticed that the temperature had dropped by about 8 degrees to a nice 23C.  It didn't slow the flies up too much. Actually getting to Shipwreck had a moment as a tree had fallen across the road.  I drove round it through an erosion gully and planned to take a snap on the way back, but someone had come along with a chain saw in the...