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January... End Of Days
Jan. 29th, 2018 09:41 pmWell, that all just flew by, really - especially the last 10 days or so... Told you the regular posting would tail off by the end of the month. Doesn't feel like it's been more than a week though
January 26th is Australia Day. It's the middle of Summer & the middle of a heatwave too. Those of you who know what a typical Summer in Australia is like, may shudder at the thought of a heatwave ramping up the heat'n'humidity we normally get... It's been "Hot enough to boil a monkey's bum, Your Majesty". so, of course, everyone either hosts, or goes to a barbecue
Bunnings is a national chain of hardware stores. One of the good things about them is they help local community groups & charities to raise money, by having a 'Sausage Sizzle' outside their stores on weekends & public holidays. $2.50 gets you a sausage on 2 slices of bread, with optional onions & your choice of sauce if it's BBQ or tomato. If you're lucky, you can even get mustard. A friend of ours is riding in the 'Tour De Cure' in March & needed to raise enough money to help pay for support teams, accommodation, spare tyres, wheels, lycra shorts etc... & was doing so by having 3 or 4 Sizzles at various Bunnings locations. We agreed to help out at one of them &, as no good deed goes unpunished, our number came up for the Australia Day one down in the far south of Sydney (We live on the Northern Beaches - so it's quite a hike!). We thought it would be a quiet one, as it was a public holiday, the middle of Summer & school holidays... surely everyone would be at a beach somewhere, or in a pool, or just unwilling to get in the car & drive to a hardware store. I know I would have been one of those three things
Wrong!! We turned up at 9am, with extra drink stock, met up with our friend & his Dad, then it was on with the aprons & onto the front counter for Long-Suffering Partner & onto the gas barbecue for me. And it was like that pretty much all day 'til 4pm - there was an incredible amount of people who seem to think that a day off is the ideal chance to start that project at home you've been meaning to get 'round to for months, but need some esoteric power tool & sundry attachments to complete. Not that you'll complete it in one day... Maybe by next Australia Day... But everybody wanted a Charity Sausage - either to fortify themselves before they plunged into the store, or to recover once they'd emerged. Some did both
Our friend did at least 2 more supply runs, cleaning out the nearest supermarket's bread shelf as fast as they could re-stock it &, by the end of our day, we had maybe half a bag of sausages & one loaf of bread left over... as well as a box full of money!!
Collapsing back into the car & heading home, we soon noticed that everything in the car smelled like sausages & onions, but realised it was just us - clothes, skin, hair. The cats thought we were a walking, talking dinner when we got home... they loved the smell, but were annoyed that we both took thorough showers before getting their (chicken) dinners ready. So, a little karma earned & a tick on the wish-list... but I don't think either of us will want to even look at a sausage for a while, much less have them for dinner
Next post - we join 60,000 people in a giant stadium. In the middle of Summer. In a heatwave.
January 26th is Australia Day. It's the middle of Summer & the middle of a heatwave too. Those of you who know what a typical Summer in Australia is like, may shudder at the thought of a heatwave ramping up the heat'n'humidity we normally get... It's been "Hot enough to boil a monkey's bum, Your Majesty". so, of course, everyone either hosts, or goes to a barbecue
Bunnings is a national chain of hardware stores. One of the good things about them is they help local community groups & charities to raise money, by having a 'Sausage Sizzle' outside their stores on weekends & public holidays. $2.50 gets you a sausage on 2 slices of bread, with optional onions & your choice of sauce if it's BBQ or tomato. If you're lucky, you can even get mustard. A friend of ours is riding in the 'Tour De Cure' in March & needed to raise enough money to help pay for support teams, accommodation, spare tyres, wheels, lycra shorts etc... & was doing so by having 3 or 4 Sizzles at various Bunnings locations. We agreed to help out at one of them &, as no good deed goes unpunished, our number came up for the Australia Day one down in the far south of Sydney (We live on the Northern Beaches - so it's quite a hike!). We thought it would be a quiet one, as it was a public holiday, the middle of Summer & school holidays... surely everyone would be at a beach somewhere, or in a pool, or just unwilling to get in the car & drive to a hardware store. I know I would have been one of those three things
Wrong!! We turned up at 9am, with extra drink stock, met up with our friend & his Dad, then it was on with the aprons & onto the front counter for Long-Suffering Partner & onto the gas barbecue for me. And it was like that pretty much all day 'til 4pm - there was an incredible amount of people who seem to think that a day off is the ideal chance to start that project at home you've been meaning to get 'round to for months, but need some esoteric power tool & sundry attachments to complete. Not that you'll complete it in one day... Maybe by next Australia Day... But everybody wanted a Charity Sausage - either to fortify themselves before they plunged into the store, or to recover once they'd emerged. Some did both
Our friend did at least 2 more supply runs, cleaning out the nearest supermarket's bread shelf as fast as they could re-stock it &, by the end of our day, we had maybe half a bag of sausages & one loaf of bread left over... as well as a box full of money!!
Collapsing back into the car & heading home, we soon noticed that everything in the car smelled like sausages & onions, but realised it was just us - clothes, skin, hair. The cats thought we were a walking, talking dinner when we got home... they loved the smell, but were annoyed that we both took thorough showers before getting their (chicken) dinners ready. So, a little karma earned & a tick on the wish-list... but I don't think either of us will want to even look at a sausage for a while, much less have them for dinner
Next post - we join 60,000 people in a giant stadium. In the middle of Summer. In a heatwave.
