Mother Nature, Bare Faced

Today was one of those wonderfully rainy wintery days where you just want to stay inside and make popcorn and watch movies in your fav hoodie and oldest jeans. Well that's what I wanted to do, so I did. It was so relaxing, I didn't even bother with makeup today. I know what you're thinking: Anarchist! But seriously, I rarely go out without at least a swipe of foundation and freshly applied lipgloss - not a pancake face which take shours to apply, just a little something that is probably not noticeable to anyone but me. I feel self conscious otherwise.

Anyway, late this afternoon the rain cleared and the sky turned a lighter shade of grey, so we thought we'd head to the Gorge to see the results of Mother Nature's furious downpour. For those of you not familiar with the Apple Isle, for one thing yes it is part of Australia and yes Australia Post do deliver here; and for another the Gorge is the most awesome local swimming place. It's totally free (except the carpark, but nobody pays for that anyway apart from tourists), 10 mins walk from the CBD, and honestly a spectacular setting for whiling away long summer days. In winter it's still amazing to look at but the main activity is watching the rapids. Lately it's been bucketing down, and the river flowing through the Gorge has flooded in a spectacular way, creating oodles of frothy rapids and rising to such a point that half the city turned out this afternoon to look at the after effects of the weekend's rain. And, as always happens when you're out in your daggiest clothes and bare faced, you run into loads of people you know *cringe*.

This is what the Gorge usually looks like:

The bridge in the background swings quite scarily, making it fun to jump on, there are two safe pools there in the middle, though they must've photoshopped out the teens who usually swim under the bridge and jump off the rocks depsite the warning signs; and in the right front corner you can just see a swing, which is a neat little playground. There's also a good cafe, gift shop, takeaway stand, restaurant, chair lift, peacocks who occassionally go wandering in the suburbs and lots of wallaby poo. But before this turns into an ad for Tourism Tas, here's what it looked like this afternoon:

The pics don't really do it justice. Yesterday the flooding completely covered the playground, and today there were big bits of driftwood lodged at the back. It's really very awesome, and the raw power of it quite chilling. Despite my reservations about uneven skin tone and mascara-less lashes, I'm pretty sure Mother Nature's bare face got far more amazed stares than mine garnered. At least I hope so, or I really need a new skincare regime.

Sweaty Betty: Man, is it hot!

It's hot. (Insigtful observation, I know). It hasn't been this hot for about 22 years, and the only evidence I have of this is a picture of myself at about 18 months, clothed only in a uncomfortable-looking cloth nappy, standing on my Mum's kitchen bench next to a fan and looking very pleased with myself. Ah, to get back to the 80's where children could happily frolic on benchtops near electrical appliances without fear of reprecussion. Thankfully, my house, car and office has the mod-con of air-con and it's been crankin' today. Charlotte sensibly made a little bed right in front of the air con and slept there happily all afternoon.

Now, I know if you live elsewhere in Oz (and, for the record, Tas is part of the country too, which some mainlanders find difficult to fathom) stinking hot days of 40 degrees occur reasonably regularly in the summer. I feel sorry for people in say, Adelaide, because a) they live in Adelaide and b) from what I can tell or what weather reports tell me, summers are always stupidly hot there. Stop complaining, Taswegian! I hear you say. By the weekend it'll have cooled down to the high 20's (perfect summer weather, actually) and in a few months it'll be back to the high teens, and the mercury won't rise until at least December. Except Hobart, where it'll be 31 tomorrow and 13 the next day. In case you're interested in such things, you can, like my partner, spend the best part of hot afternoons in your boardshorts or pj shorts avidly checking and re-checking Weather Zone for an up-to the minute report of the temperature. Constantly updating everyone within earshot of what celsius we have reached will not, however, make the air any cooler. Nor will standing on your front lawn at midday WATERING IT. OH MY GOD. I can't think of a more arrogant and ignorant gesture, when the country is plagued by drought, the earth is running short on water and it hasn't rained for months than vainly attempting to keep your front lawn green. In the middle of the day, with a hose AND sprinkler. Even when your neighbours are doing it, it's not an excuse for everyone else to. These people, however, are the type that Windex their driveway. Can I put it out there, that if you see someone doing it, either switch off their water source, dob them into the council or local paper, or leave a nasty letter in their letterbox and then get the kids from down the street do a nice big skid on their driveway with their BMX's. No need to go Al Gore on them, just a simple "are you a fucking nutbag?" will do the job nicely.

On another note, today at Frock You we received some lovely winter coats. They are truly lovely (new season update coming soon, and the A/W '09 catalogue is out next week!) but seriously I know you aint gonna want to buy them yet. Fashion seasons work in mysterious ways. I tried to buy some beach towels yesterday, as ours have been in the front-loader one too many times and resemble exfoliating gloves, and after extensive searching managed to find the very last non-velour one in the entire city. It's fugly as all fug, but it'll do. I also wanted to get some plain s/s tees for Charli and another swimsuit for myself, but apparently High Summer is just when you want to be stocking up on long sleeved and knitted apparel. And before you say anything, yes I know it happens every year but it still pisses me off. Though not as much as a shiny green lawn on a hot, hot day...(and also not as much as summer "fashion" choices, seriously love a tea towel is not a dress regardless of how sweaty you are, but more on that tomorrow)!