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Swooping
From some time in August to November, it’s considered magpie season here in Australia. It’s the season when magpies are protecting young and swoop potential invaders. I’ve been swooped a few times over the years. Both boys have been swooped when young. Game Fanatic got pecked slightly under the nose, I think when he was a toddler. Lego Lover got attacked near the eye, which was pretty scary. He didn’t suffer any serious injury but has since had a fear of the birds. Once I had a magpie swoop me while riding my bike. Not once, not twice, but three times as I peddled faster and faster. I think that was one of the rogues around that swooped throughout the year. I’ve had a certain wariness of them myself since that time decades ago.
In recent years I have not been swooped at all though, even though I see them all the time. On the other hand, I was swooped yesterday at the end of our street but it was by a willie wagtail. And that one swooped me three times while I was trying to walk one of the dogs. Not that it caused any injury but it was offputting and distracting. I have heard many people say these birds are nastier than magpies although I usually hear about the nastiness to other birds. This isn’t the first time I was swooped by one either. It happened around the same tree about a week or two ago, although it wasn’t quite so persistent.
Australian magpie 
Willie wagtail The willie wagtail is a much smaller bird but apparently, it’s part of the same family of ravens and crows as the magpie. But I’ve never heard of them swooping before.
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Cool change
After six days of temperatures above 40C (that’s 104F), we have had a cool change to the lower 30s. We get to enjoy that until the weekend when we start into another heatwave. I think we may have set a record for most continuous days of 40+ temperatures here.
This reminds me that the Scientist and I went to see a friend play music at a cafe about 1.5 hours drive from here. She plays at this cafe about once a month so we take a trip down and enjoy the atmosphere which is lovely. There’s an indoor and outdoor area at this cafe and the artists usually play outside. But it was so terribly hot our friend was looking rather drained after playing for three hours (with breaks). We moved right inside to the air conditioning when she was done. On a good day, we might have stopped at one of the parks on the way home but it was just too hot for any outdoor activity.
On Sunday we went to Fremantle with Lego Lover to visit the Maritime Museum for a Lego shipwreck display. It was pretty cool to see and there were Lego models of some famous shipwrecks and some that are mostly known locally. Afterward, we went to a favorite cafe to have lunch. Unfortunately, the food wasn’t so good this time. I had ordered chips (thick-cut fries) with my sandwich and the chips were really terrible, enough that I left most behind. Also, the menu had changed so that some foods we like are no longer available. It seems we may have to find a new place to eat. We did have ideas of visiting the Fremantle Markets but were wary of crowded places with covid around.
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Strange times
We’ve just finished one month of 2021 and it feels as though the world is less stable than ever. For the first time in a little less than ten months, we had a case of community transmission here. Within hours we were in a hard lockdown. We spent late Sunday afternoon rushing to get requirements before the shops closed. It was not a pleasant experience.
We didn’t hear about the lockdown until well after the announcement when a family member sent a message about it. We’d been watching tennis on the tv but no news was broadcast about it. Lockdown began a t 6pm Sunday and it finishes at 6pm today.
For the first time we needed masks and they were nowhere to be found. Well that’s not really true because I found some at my favorite tea shop. The owner had sold them last year so we went there on the chance he might have them and he did. He wasn’t selling but was happy to share his supply with us and we got a handful of disposable masks, and that ensured we were covered until we could get cloth ones.
There was another run on toilet paper and I saw a couple people with several packs in their trolleys at the grocery store. The Scientist went in and managed to get a massive pack that was left. Not the brand we like but it is better than nothing since our supply had dwindled to the end. I’ve been doing better at keeping stock but admit I missed this time. Lucky we got in in time. There was also a run on meat and milk but we were fine in that area until we needed it.
I must admit that wearing a mask has been a novel experience. I knew there would likely be issues, especially with my glasses and now I have a better idea of it. I ordered cloth masks from Amazon on Sunday night, mostly as I knew there was a better chance of them arriving more quickly than just about any other place. I got two with filters included and they arrived earlier than expected on Wednesday. For the most part mine is quite okay but it is difficult wearing it for long periods of time. Yesterday another order arrived with three more masks. These aren’t as nice as there’s not filter but they should work for the boys should they go out. The last one will got to an outside family member.
Work has been a bit off kilter this week. My long time client is staying with family and I only supported him briefly this week. Another client has quite different needs and I did provide support but not for the usual time frames.
The state government implemented contact tracing through an app and qr codes back in December. This enabled them to narrow down all the places where the case had been, and people have been testing in large numbers through the week. So far, no new cases have been found so our hard lockdown will end tonight at 6pm. We will have to continue to wear masks and follow some restrictions until 12:01am on February 14th when it will be two weeks since the previous case turned up.
Meanwhile, a major bushfire started on Monday and has been ever present in our lives all week. So far 81 homes have been lost and the fire is still not contained. It’s been super windy here much of the week which is hampering efforts to bring it under control. Tuesday was one of the worst days when we woke to ash falling from the sky throughout the Perth area. We don’t live that close but also not that far from the fire and we ended up in the lowest alert zone for a couple of days. Today we have been moved out of that zone so can relax a bit more. The danger for us was more about embers travelling from afar. In all the years living here, we’ve never been in that blue emergency zone before. So while we weren’t in immediate danger, we were in an area where we needed to be on alert for sudden changes to our safety.
It was quite eerie on Tuesday afternoon when an ice cream truck was moving up and down streets nearby. I haven’t noticed it around much lately although maybe I tuned it out before. But still it was almost creepy to hear it moving along when everything was so still and quiet. Not to mention yellow and grey skies about. We couldn’t run our air conditioner due to the smoke and ash so we spent much of the day without air flow. I went out to the hardware stores and got an industrial sized fan to help and that worked well until temperatures dropped later in the day. Also there was a fire reported in our suburb that day and it was quite worrying until I later learned it was a garbage truck that had caught fire. That was handled quickly and the danger was passed easily.
I went out walking last night for the first time in ages. The winds have been gusting so I decided not to try my bicycle. I’d taken it out on Monday and there were a few places where I felt really unsteady. Not to mention I didn’t want to go too far from home and that’s easy to do on bike. My walk was okay aside from the wind slamming into my face. I didn’t walk all that fast but I think that was okay because most of my exercise has been on bike lately and I needed lower impact this time. I had to stop as parcel lockers to pick up the second order of masks along the way and just managed to get home a few minutes before my hour was up.
While all this has been going on, the northern part of the state has been dealing with a cyclone for a few days. There’s been rain and flooding in some areas, which I think is connected. Those rains should be moving into our area this weekend and hopefully the rains will help with containing the fires nearby. We also have cooler temperatures right now, so I hope that will improve the ability to get things under control.
And so our new year carries on, with all sorts of news to keep us on our toes.
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Rainy season
Typically the winter is the rainy season here in Perth. I think over half of our rain comes during this time of year. So far this year, though, we’ve had quite a bit of rain through the late summer and autumn. In fact the only month that seems to have been spared was June, which was unseasonably dry this year.
The past few weeks we’ve had rain almost every day. Well, at least a forecast of rain and some drizzle most days. It’s rained so much there are lakes within some of the park lands around here. A couple years ago this was a problem due to blocked sewage drains plus rain. I don’t think the drains are particularly blocked now but the rains have continued.
Last week we had a nasty storm that brought heavy rain and thunder and lightning one morning. I will point out that thunderstorms really aren’t all that common here although they aren’t a rarity either. It’s just a lot less than I used to experience while living in North Carolina during the summer. Anyway, that storm came along and the power went out that morning. The lightning never even hit all that close to us so I am surprised we had an outage. I will also point out that we often go a year or more without a power outage here. Well I guess that was the case when we first moved in here but it’s probably a bit more often now. Still it’s pretty rare. Initially I didn’t realise the power was out. I had woken up and I realised my Apple watch needed a charge so I connected it to the charger. I heard the usual ping sound once it connected. Then I connected my phone to its charger and there was no ping. I thought something had happened to the power outlet (which would have been bad since it was only put in last year). Still nothing. I went out to the living room to try it in a different location. I went to turn on the light and nothing happened. A light bulb went off in my head…lol.
The power was out for about an hour and then all was well, or so I thought. I don’t know whether it was an issue from the start or not, but our router/modem seems to have died soon after the power returned. Died as in it wouldn’t power up at all. After an exchange of a few text messages with the Scientist, I went out in search of a new router/modem. The funny part of this is that we were in the shop a couple days before that and the Scientist had spotted one that he said he planned on getting when we next needed one. The expectation, of course, was this was not going to be any time in the immediate future. So this turned out to be the means of getting that really good one sooner than later. It is a much pricier model than the previous one but does have a few bells and whistles that hopefully will make up for it. Also we had a gift card for a retailer that sells these and I was able to reduce the price by $154, which still left it expensive but less so than it started out to be. The new model has been going pretty well so far. I did have a couple problems connecting my iPad at first, until I connected ot the 5G network instead of the usual one. Since then I’ve not had any issues at all.
Meanwhile, there is still a bit of rain in the forecast but I see a break in precipitation for the coming weekend. I’m looking forward to a bit of clearer weather for a few days as we finish up our winter season here. We did have a lovely sunny day last Thursday but it’s not been very nice since then. And before we know it, we will be in spring and the allergy season should ramp up. I suspect the only reason it hasn’t right now is the rains washing off the pollen.
And on a slightly related note, I heard on the radio today that Australia may be in its worst flu season ever recorded. It has been a terrible winter for flu around here. Almost everyone I know has been struck down at some point. I am still not sure that we had the flu here back in June. Whatever it was was pretty nasty but it didn’t include fever and it didn’t include the usual aches and pains that come with flu usually. That reminds me of something else I heard on the radio today at the same time. There was a discussion of the difference between a cold and flu and the doctor they were talking to would say that if you have to ask that question you probably have never had the flu. That reminded me of my first experience of flu when I was a freshman in college. It was February and pretty much everyone else on my floor of the dorm had had it before I finally succumbed. And yes, it was like nothing I’d ever had before and was quite memorable. What I had this year wasn’t at all like that and yet it was just as awful and probably longer lasting. So my thought it was it could have been a totally different type of flu than I had in the past or it was a random, but nasty, upper respiratory infection. One last thing to take away from the interview today was that it was still a good idea to do a flu vaccination so maybe I will see about doing that.
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Blast of summer
Yesterday we have an isolated, but massive, spike in temperature that left us with a preview of the summer to come. Well, I don’t know if it’s going to be a hot summer or not but it was definitely summer-like yesterday. I think it officially reached 37.2 C at our closest reporting station although my car registered 38 at one point.
I’ve been working as a carer for extra hours the past few weeks and yesterday I had my charge for four hours. We’ve been going to Whiteman Park, a state park located near where I live over the past three Saturdays. The plan for yesterday was to go, have a drink at the café and then do a walk on one of the trails before relaxing on the train ride at the end. Unfortunately the heat was a bit much for both of us and the water ran out too quickly so plans didn’t work out as expected and I ended up leaving G near the beginning/end (starts and ends in the same place) while I rushed off to get more water. It didn’t look like the train ride was going to be possible but we somehow did manage it in the end and it left G with a better feeling for the day than just the memory of it being so hot and being so tired and thirsty.
Meanwhile, our air conditioning got a pretty good workout during the day and well into the evening.
Today has been completely different with strong winds blowing and the temperature only just made it to 26 C, which feels rather chilly by comparison. I had ideas of going on a bike ride for exercise this afternoon but the strong winds have put me off and I will more likely do a walk instead.
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Seasonal confusion
Spring is a time for a lot of back and forth between cool and warm temperatures but we are well into it and it’s still hopping back and forth. Really, it’s been rather warmish this spring so far. We’ve had at least three or four days of temperatures above 30C already and it’s expected it will just worsen. On the weekend the house got really warm and reached a difficult point on Saturday or Sunday evening. We’d been sitting in the living room playing the end of the second Danganrompa game. I was feeling terribly hot and bothered. I’ve come to the conclusion I don’t get true hot flashes but I do get hot and bothered a lot and I think that’s not just related to excess weight I am carrying. Anyway, I thought perhaps it was just me being hormonal or something. But I happened to notice the temperature gauge on the air conditioning panel was showing it was still 24 C in the house, which is pretty warm for evening/night time. It was decided then that we’d open the windows in the house even though that means a lot more pollen getting into the house. Once windows were opened, we put the fan on and it did cool off eventually. And I stopped feeling hot and bothered. :)
Fast forward to yesterday when the temperature had dropped considerably, there were constant strong winds, and precipitation on top of that. It was like going back to autumn. That was bad enough but the night time temperature dropped to practically winter temperatures. The windows are still open but it was really chilly last night and I might have used an extra blanket..
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Awesome walk
The day started much like most recent days, cold enough that you don’t want to get out of bed even when you know you should. The weather forecast was off by a few degrees for this morning as it was much colder than it was supposed to be, about 3C, based on our closest weather station. Anyway, I dragged myself out of bed eventually and got moving a bit. Ate some breakfast and washed some dishes before starting a stew meant for dinner.
I’ve been quite lax about taking the dogs out for walks lately and I needed some exercise so I packed them into the car and drove to Whiteman Park, which is a few minutes away. I started out next to the dog park and would have taken them there had there not already been some other dogs there. I wasn’t in much of a mood to deal with the mad barker today. Besides, I was rather keen to walk on one of the trails through the park as we did on our last visit. I started off on one of the paved trails and we wandered along, with a couple of stops for doggie clean up along the way, until we reached the village. We wandered around the periphery of the village, in front of Caversham Wildlife Park, and through the parking lot, until we reached the opposite side of the village. From there I went looking for one of the longer trails to walk and eventually did find it. Turns out this one was a bush trail and not paved. This didn’t bother me but I kind of thought all of the trails were now paved. The bush trail was a delight to walk on for both me and the dogs. Lots of soft ground for their little paws made them much happier, especially as our walk became more and more extended.
I had taken my good camera and found a lovely little hideaway under some trees where I wanted to take some photos. I stopped the dogs and pulled out the camera and it wouldn’t come on. Seems I’d left it on the last time I used it or it had been knocked into the on position. It wasn’t working for me so I put it back. I didn’t think my phone camera was going to work for what I wanted. It might have worked but I am still learning quite a bit of how to use it…and mostly just getting used to such a different interface. Later on I did pull out the camera to take some photos of a banksia flower but I only used it in auto mode as it seemed to be doing okay with that. We ran across a bunch of magpies at one point and the dogs got rather excited while I got a bit nervous. It’s not magpie season yet, so I probably shouldn’t have worried. Anyway, many of them flew off, disturbed by the sound of us walking along the trail. It was actually kind of a spectacular sight at that moment, with the sun starting to drop in the sky and the birds all flying together.
We carried on walking and I began to wonder if I’d gotten in a bit deep on the walk. Not so much for myself but for the dogs, who aren’t the fittest they’ve been. They did keep up pretty well although I did slow my pace a bit too. I’d seen a sign saying it was 2kms to the Mussel Pool from there, via Lookout Hill. It seemed to take an awfully long time to get to just Lookout Hill and from there it was supposed to be another 500m to go. We did stop there and climb the lookout platform where we could see the city skyline in the distance. I don’t quite know why this surprised me as we can see it from near our house and we live really close to the park with our neighborhood backing onto the edge of the official park land. From there the path was paved all the way and it surely was more than 500m long. But it was in this section of the park I had the greatest delight, seeing what I thought were wallabies several times. Now I think they might have been grey kangraroos as I think they were a bit bigger than wallabies although not the biggest kangaroos I’ve seen. I tried to take photos a couple of times but they roos had hopped away before I could get anything in a photo. We walked on and I came across more of them, about eight altogether. I tried to get a little closer but then they all bounced away too. I saw one last one in the bush by itself but it was too far away to get it in focus and was surely going to move. But what an awesome sight they were and this was in a state park where we are free to visit.
This was far more impressive than seeing the animals in the wildlife park on the same site. We’d been to the wildlife park before it resettled into Whiteman Park and it was pretty cool to see. But it was so much neater to see the creatures in the wild. The same goes for the many of the birds we’d find there. Although I’ve never been keen on caging birds as pets, I feel even more strongly about it after having seen birds like cockatoos and galahs in the wild here. I don’t even have to go to the state park to see those as many of them fly through our neighborhood and can be seen nearby.
We finally did reach the mussel pool area although it took me awhile to get my bearings there. I eventually found my way past and back to the dog park where I took he dogs for a drink of water and brief sit down before returning home. I have made a mental note to return to the park soon without dogs so I can take it all in without worrying the dogs are tiring.
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Wet, wet, wet
NOTE: This was meant to be posted last week but I didn’t finish it. Too much time has passed so I have posted it as it appeared last.
I seem to recall a group called that here in Australia, possibly a one-hit wonder, or perhaps more than that. I am pretty sure I don’t know any of their other music though.
I will just comment, not complain, that we’ve had rain pretty regularly this month and I am in no rush to send it packing at this point in time. That said, the winter (aka weedy) grass is growing tall throughout our yard and when we do get a new lawnmower, it will be electric. Would be good to have that cut down when it dries out for a day or two. It certainly is nice to have the rain around here and we haven’t even had anything dramatic so far. We have had threats of storms but it’s been pretty benign where we live…although not so great in other areas of the state.
I don’t know if there’s an association of any sort, but we’ve had our power go off twice in a week recently. I know this is pretty common for many areas but here we almost never have anything more than a brownout or the power flickering off for a moment or two. This seems rather a remarkable coincidence and I can’t help wondering the causes of the outages. We probably will never know but it is curious. Only the first outage was after dark so the effects weren’t too troublesome for us.
Last week the Scientist and I marked our 21st wedding anniversary. It was a really nice day and the the stormy weather that had earlier been predicted never eventuated. In fact, it was rather warm that day, and we managed to walk around to some of our favourite places without the need of any extra clothes. We even did  a repeat climb of the DNA tower in King’s Park around sunset. It’s really nice to have our kids now old enough we can go out and do our own thing instead of dragging them along or including them in our plans.
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Dark and stormy nights
So far in September. I think we’ve had some sort of rain all but about three or four days. It never rains that much in September here…at least not in the nineteen years I’ve lived here. I think the weekend might bring a break from the rain. So far the forecast is just for partly cloudy and no mention of moisture. One can hope…
The past few nights we’ve had some particularly fun times with strong winds and some rain mixed in. A tornado hit down someplace around Perth but here we escaped the worst of the wind. Last night we had a severe weather alert and there was indeed severe weather in some areas with trees knocked down and power outages. Tonight there is no alert for us locally but it still sounds pretty loud out there.
Our grass in the backyard has grown so tall it’s over my shoulders in places. We have an electric mower and it just hasn’t dried enough recently to get rid of it. I’m hoping this weekend provides opportunity to clear some of it out but I suspect it’s going to take a long time to get through everything.
Meanwhile there is a strawberry plant growing wild in my herb pot. It’s been a year or two since I had a strawberry plant in there but the leaves definitely match it. I wonder if it will grow into a proper plant in a few weeks. It would be lovely to have some home grown strawberries again.
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I thought it was spring
Supposedly we are well into spring this year but you’d never know by looking outside. Nights have been in the single digits (celsius) several times over the past week, well below the normal temperatures. Tomorrow the forecast is for what is essentially a winter storm with rain, hail, and gusty winds. This isn’t the first storm we’ve had this month either. More importantly, the temperature is nowhere near normal for this time of year. Since it’s going to be so chilly, I plan to make a black bean soup/stew for dinner and get some crusty bread to eat with it.