Rhonda Bracey: At Random

Despite pulling some 15 bags of weeds out of the front yard the past four days, they’re still winning!

I won’t even mention the back yard, especially the section down by the fruit trees. The lawnmowing people will slash that this week. It may not get rid of the weeds (oats and similar grasses, mostly, and the remnants of soursob), but at least we’ll be able to see any snakes! Until the weeds grow back again, of course…

The green patches that look like lawn (ha!) above the retaining wall in the picture below are some of the remaining weeds out the front. It’s been a wet winter, and our soil is very clay-ey so I haven’t been able to get out and attack them until now. I’ve cut a swathe through them, but it’s a big job. “Roundup” is looking increasingly attractive, even though I’m loathe to put poison into the ecosystem.

It was a LONG wait, but finally the Eagles have released their double-CD set of “Long Road Out of Eden“. Was the wait worth it? Absolutely!

This is a great album – it may not have any one song that reaches the heights of popularity such as “Hotel California”, but for Eagles fans and anyone who enjoys that West Coast country rock sound, it’s a must.

Just in time for Christmas too, in case you have any baby boomers or other Eagles fans in the family…

And yes, you can buy it via my Amazon store, along with the brilliant “Live at Massey Hall” from Neil Young, recorded in 1971.

Why do birds fly in to windows? Is it the light? The reflection? Or some kamikaze death wish?

The other day we were working in our home office which overlooks the back yard, when we heard a thump on the kitchen window (across the open plan room). I looked out and this little New Holland Honeyeater was lying very dazed on the paving. He (or she… I can’t tell the sex of these birds!) picked himself up—sort of—and sat/squatted on his haunches for close to an hour looking very sorry for himself. I wondered if he was going to live. The temptation was to go out and pick him up, but that would only traumatise him even more. So I didn’t. But I was still concerned about him. When I went to open the back door, he got enough of a fright to flap his little wings and fly off to a tree halfway down the yard.

I hope he survived. But if he did, I bet he had a VERY sore head. Poor thing.

One of friends had a birthday, so six of us went out to dinner on Monday night to the only restaurant open in town. Nice evening, good BYO wines, VERY ordinary food.

As we were about to leave, some of our group got talking to a large group at a nearby table. They were walkers from a big fundraising walk for motor neurone disease (MND), and Ken Judge, the ex-West Coast Eagles coach was with them. Seems they’re walking from Perth to Albany, and Monday night they’d made it to Bridgetown.

Having seen a work colleague go through the early stages of this debilitating disease some years ago, I happily handed over a donation.