Friday 14^th September

Last weekend we had absolutely horrendous wind.  Fearsome!  We were very glad not to be on 2XS, out on the sea…

Pete and I went to lunch in Old Farm Road and it was like being right next to a revving jumbo jet (jumbo jets always remind me of my kindly Dutch Uncle Carel who called them, happily, yumbo yets…) as the wind howled down the valley through the trees.

Pete, in West Hobart, lost his large, cumbersome BBQ cover.  It must have filled with wind over a long slow period of time and then taken off, like a large and majestic kite.  It is nowhere to be seen so it probably flapped its way up onto the mountain, somewhere over the rainbow. 

In 2002 there was an equally big wind storm; trees fell, tiles blew off rooftops, power lines crashed to the ground.  It was all very scary.  And the day after the biggest storm, the Mercury had a dramatic front page story, featured a pale aggrieved suburbanite, pointing, slightly accusingly, at…a soft and fluffy pillow which had blown over the fence.  “Oh no!” cried Mark, who was living with Claire and me at the time, “Not a PILLOW!  How terrifying!”

I saw Mark this week and reminded him of this.  Strangely, he didn’t remember this conversation of ten years ago…but he was amused.  He told me that people had been coming into his book shop very cranky and complaining that spring was not as it should be, much too unpredictable and changeable.  We shook our heads at this and exclaimed in unison, ah, but it was ever thus… (Spring, surely has always been violently changeable, sunny, windy, cold, hot, rainy??)

Dave and Rachel, in Commercial Rd, lost a very big heavy outdoor table.  When I heard about it going missing, I said maybe it had blown away.  Nicky looked at me with raised eyebrows and said, “It takes about eight strong men to lift it!”  So no it didn’t blow; it was taken from the courtyard right outside the house where Dave and Rachel were peacefully going about their business.  Nicky and Gavin used to live in the conjoining house, and I have often regretted not having bought it when the time came for them to sell and move to their beach house.  It is a lovely house, very modern, bright, light, architect designed, close to town.  But it is also on a thoroughfare for robbers!  They had their car broken into so often that they left it unlocked – it was getting too expensive to replace smashed windows and broken locks.  Not only robbers…one morning they got up and found a chalk outline on the footpath outside; a murdered taxi driver…

Some people close to my heart live in an Enchanted Circle.  They have been known to leave their (beautiful, desirable, sporty,) car unlocked, at times even with the keys helpfully in the ignition.  And, even more tempting, sometimes a wallet and mobile phone are in there, proudly displayed on the front console.  And…not a nibble from a thief!!!  It’s not as if Sandy Bay is a robber-free area… There is, as I have said, an Enchanted Circle just surrounding this particular house.