A Cautious Visitor

One day we discovered we had a visitor just under our house's eaves. It was a possum!  Being a nocturnal animal, it left after it got dark. It obviously had other homes because it only showed up every few days.

Kay tempted it with a slice of apple, known to be popular with possums.

Cautiously, the possum inspected it and then quickly devoured it.

Then we discovered it had something in its pouch - a cub!

The cub gradually got bigger. 

They shared a love for apples.

The cub also became more demanding once it had acquired a taste for the fruit.

After visiting us over a period of more than a month, they suddenly stopped coming. We missed them!

Historic Sloan Court Hotel

Anthony alerted me to the impending demise of the historic Sloan Court Hotel at Balmoral Road.  So at our the opportunity when we met up again this week, we had lunch at the hotel restaurant, The Berkeley. We had the signature pork chop and the oxtail stew. Both dishes were noteworthy. Thanks Anthony.

Pity that the building will be demolished at the end of this month (October 2017) to make way for a 12 storey condo, though the building is quite rundown and reviews had been poor. However, how historic is historic in the case of the Sloan Court building?  I could not find any precise details on the internet.

Late winter garden

In the late winter sunshine, a movement in our camellia tree caught my eyes.

It was a well camouflaged Rainbow Lorikeet! A bit hard to get a sharp photo of the restless bird.

Iran trip photo book saga

Having three copies of a holiday trip photobook is certainly excessive, but that is what we ended up with.

I have been using a particular American publisher for a few years without any problem, but when the first copy of the Iran book arrived, there was a damage to an edge of the back cover. It appeared that the damaged was done even before it was sent as there was no sign it was caused by the packaging.

I politely informed them, without pushing for any remedy, but they immediately said they would do a reprint, which arrived about a week later. We were disappointed when we opened up the package that it too was damaged, even more obviously so with some of the corners pushed in. It appeared that the package weighing more than 2 kg had been dropped in transit and the packaging did not adequately protect the book.

Again, I informed the publisher and they were very apologetic and without prompting, ordered a second reprint, this time send by a different special courier.  I am happy to say the second reprint, hence the third copy, arrived in a pristine condition. I informed them accordingly and thanked them for an excellent customer service.

Autumnal colours at Central NSW and the Blue Mountains

Last week of April, and the colours are out in Central NSW and the Blue Mountains. Deciduous trees don't get colours like these in Sydney. They just had a cold spell not long ago.

A street of Chinese pistachio trees, city of Orange.

Close up of a Chinese pistachio tree.

Oaks and other deciduous in Blackheath (Blue Mountains)

An oak-lined street in the city of Orange.

Close-up of an oak tree.

Poplars near Bathurst.

Lunar New Year 2017 in Sydney

Sydney City Council enthusiastically celebrated the Year of the Rooster with banners, displays and even dumpling eating competition.

Lion dance outside city Catholic Church greeted churchgoers.

National dumpling eating competition good for the spirit but may not be so good for the heart.

Array of lanterns at Martin Place

Two roosters at the Opera House

Kay was determined to test the strength of the fabric on the roosters.

Tourists from large passenger ship (300 metres long) surely added to the crowd.

LGBTIQ joining in the spirit of the Lunar New Year (??)

After a drizzle

The cool change finally came after a long period of very hot and humid weather and along with it came a very light drizzle, which was a relief for everyone. And it must have been for the spiders in the garden too, but where are they?

Long awaited closure

The Lin family murder trials have stretched out over a long period with retrials from fresh evidence, a hung jury and a judge retiring following illness. We have been following them because we knew one of the victims Min Lin through his newsagency. We were deeply shocked by the brutality of the mass murder of 5 members of his family.

We had attended many court sessions and when the jury of the latest trial retired after Christmas, we were keen to know the verdict. Kay called in at the Kings Street Court a few times hoping to be fortuitously present when a verdict was reached; we feared there would yet be another hung jury when the deliberations dragged on for more than a week.

After lunch with the Cheshers at a city restaurant today, we decided to call in at the Courts again out of curiosity and were surprised that the court room was open and the judge was addressing the jury. We eventually figured out that the jury had told the judge that no unanimous decision could be reached, and the judge in turn advised the jury that they could try to reach a majority decision of 11-1. We waited in the court with the rest of the entourage of lawyers, reporters, family members and general public, and were surprised when the jury returned within minutes to announce a guilty verdict on all counts.

The emotions in the court spilled over; Mr Lin's parents and his surviving daughter were in tears, and so were the accused's wife who despite being a sister of Min Lin, had supported her husband all along.

We felt the emotions too; the relief of the closure of such a shocking event almost brought us to tears as well.

Outside, we watched the media scrum as they jostled for camera angles when Mr and Mrs Lin senior left, holding photos of the victims and loudly and tearfully claiming that justice had finally been done.  There were no real winners in this tragedy, except justice, perhaps.

Media scrum were not interested in us.

Senior Lins addressing the media.

Photo from "The Guardian" (Find Kay in the background).

A pair of winged visitors

We had a sudden downpour a few days ago and soon after a pair of birds of a kind we don't often see flew into our yard.  Were they kookaburras, we wondered, but we dismissed that after a closer look at the photos taken through a telephoto lens. Our friend Patricia, more knowledgeable with the winged friends was quite sure they were butcherbirds.