Happiness, history and the laundry from hell

When our little flood caused some local excitement last week,

I took a lot of photos. It's what I do. I can't help myself...

For instance, I took photos of my once-again-filthy car...

I COULD moan about how I had JUST cleaned the blessed thing two days earlier.

And whinge and bitch about how it took me HOURS to scrub the last of the red dust from the corners and crevices of the doors and wheels. But really, do I EVER take photos of the clean version to show you, so you'd believe a second of the carry-on? No. So this is why I don't bother. Aren't you pleased I showed such restraint today?

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So I have settled upon something far more interesting...

If you've been around here a while, you might recall a very old bridge which crosses the 'river' a couple of kilometres downstream from our house.

For those who haven't trawled back through the archives (and I'm talking two years ago here folks) here is a taste. This is The Old Bridge circa March, 2008:

And here is my family on the Old Bridge...

It's a groovy old structure with lots and lots of character (and believe me, it REQUIRES a lot of character to actually drive over it)! This bridge that spent a decade or so completely submerged when our dam (a good 15km further downstream) filled in the '70s. Over the years it has survived some serious slamming of logs and goodness knows what else... and it has the scars to show it.

While we are at historical/hysterical moments of astonishment - how much has THIS little woman grown up in two years?

*heavy sigh*

Anyway, where was I?

Oh yes, there was some excitement two years ago when this little run of water came down the river...

...a mere trickle really.

If you recall, the action then was more human and canine related.

But this time,

...this time it was Mother Nature letting it rip.

Yikes.

No bridge walks for us on this week.

Those barely visible posts are the entry points to the bridge...

The water was already falling here - it had been about two feet higher than this before we arrived (you can see if you look closely at the darker flattened grass on the other side of the river...

By tomorrow, the water will be back to it's usual barely-there situation.

Many megalitres however have topped up parched underground reservoirs, and some of this even made it's way all the way down the river bed to the dam. A dam which has gone from two percent capacity (a puddle) to ... are you ready for it... FIVE percent! Whoo-hooo!

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Of course, in amongst the celebrating (and the odd spot of sarcasm) there is the anticipation of the least-popular job on Granite Glen.

Rebuilding river crossings.

All the fences swept downstream by the water need to be put back up. Twisted barbed wire tangled in mud and dead things and all kinds of smelly grossness... a job requiring the workers to get down and dirty. In hip-deep and sometimes chest-deep filth.

Guess who gets that task... no, not me if I can help it!

But who d'ya think gets to wash his feral clothes?

What?

Am I whinging again?

Sorry.

I think the Yanks call it "keeping it real".

See you after the laundry from hell.

A little marsupial relief

I am trying really hard to give you something OTHER than rain-related photos... really I am. But it's kinda tricky - all my inspiration is precipitation-based! (Try saying that three times fast!). But as I work on the next batch of flood photos... enjoy a couple of the onlookers snapped as we drove around inspecting the creeks and river yesterday.

This first shot is of some neighbour's cattle, who had all parked themselves on the road. Cattle tend to do this in the wet - I suppose it's warm and dries more quickly. They are perhaps under the impression that we put it there specifically so they could keep their feet dry... who knows?

These are Brahman cattle - aren't they gorgeous? They always remind me of exotic Indian dancers, with their dark kohled eyes and loose-limbed walk.

Then we arrived in our house paddock. Remember how we have a rule that any marsupials who happen to be in the paddocks closest to our house are 'safe'?

This lot are so sure of their place, they hardly even hop away when we drive by...

And some of them are taking it to the extreme...

Good lord - talk about laid-back Aussie critters...

No. Please.

Stay where you are mate.

Lying down as if you are reclining on a sun lounge, waiting for the next margerita, is perfectly normal round these parts!

Don't mind us...

Ducks and a lesson for a wet day

Well, I s'pose I should show you a little of what this wonderful wet weather has done to our countryside... this is an image heavy post, so get the caffeine ready and make yourself comfortable...

~.~

Firstly, let me explain my post title.

One: today was Friday and my kids stayed home from school. The roads are horribly greasy, the gullies and creeks are all running, and the rain was hanging around. So we spent the day doing a bit of homework and some 'outdoor' activities.

Two: meet Daffy and co...

An entire flock of ducks sitting in disbelief atop a bridge.

This bridge links our place to our neighbours place and is part of a major thoroughfare for this neighbourhood. What were they all looking at? And what caused the 'are you kidding me?' expression on the two foul at the far left of the image?
~.~

Here's a glimpse...

See that bubbling, brown, swirling-ness to the left?
Can you hear the roar of water as it charges downstream?
(Oh... clearly not - this is a sound free blog, isn't it?)

That'd be the river coming down, folks!
In all it's brown, filthy, frothy glory...

See that fence disappearing into the water?

Compare to this shot taken just after our New Year rain...

Mr Incredible would have been pretty much underwater had he tried this today!

Here is a wider perspective...

And a much better vantage point!!

It's quite an impressive run, really. The best for a very very long time. Perhaps enough to lift our big dam (about 20km downstream from this bridge) from 2% to 3% of capacity. Who knows? More outrageous things have happened...

Here is an angle from the bank - you can see there is still a very long way to go before this bridge goes under... in fact, it NEVER has. But you can see how high (decades ago) the water once sat, almost at the top of those huge cylindrical pylons. I remember actually water-skiing under this and almost being able to touch the giant timber beams of the bridge itself.
~.~
Add up those 20km of riverway and the gap of about 18 feet from bridge to water here...

You can see we aren't even close to old records yet!

Meanwhile, up on the bridge proper...
Our intrepid flood inspectors are setting out...

And a mother tries to distract herself from the awful drop to the water below with some sweet reflections... desperately ignore her offsprings' tendancies to hurl sticks into the upstream side of the bridge, then belt back across to watch the hapless twigs float down the muddy torrents.

How many children do I have again? Mr Incredible is explaining away his enthusiasm for this behaviour as helping our kids learn about currents and forces and water and eddies. All of a sudden, the man is a homeschooling fanatic?

Of course, each neighbour has to carry out their own personal inspection of any local flooding. We ended up with three vehicles parked at the end of the bridge comparing river stories. Hey, it doesn't rain here that much! We savour where we can...

~.~

Of course not EVERYONE was thrilled with the influx of water into our river system.

This little guy was taking refuge on a rock below the bridge...

At least he was...

til the Granite Glen homeschooling posse arrived for class!

Weather Watch - duck!

A quickie tonight - home late from a 15 hour day out and about.

It's (just) Weather Watch Wednesday

and in this part of the world ...

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Late yesterday afternoon we went from THIS

(taken while waiting at the bus stop)

to this

(taken from the kitchen looking over laundry roof, while cooking dinner)

and well...

Let's just say, we were lucky to get home from Big Town (3 hours drive away) tonight.

Water was lapping under a number of bridges on the way home... and Mum and Dad guessed the wrong way for the safest route home, and got to spend a night in a motel two hours drive away!

If you know my mother, this is not a terrible outcome.

If you know my father, it is.

Neighbour's Facebook messaged me tonight to let me know not to worry about the two utes bogged near the river. They walked home safely apparently!

Not sure if kiddos will get to school tomorrow...

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Locals in central Queensland might have even heard me interviewed on ABC radio about the weather (I was a random choice of interviewee by the journo) - saying how welcome the rain was and how it was definitely not too much, and how our river was not running yet. I need to amend that. It is running now.

Yippeee!

But we are a long way off 'too much' yet.

Bring it on Hughie!
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Forecast is for more of the same.

How 'bout you?

Messin' with a billabong

Now if you are an Aussie, you may have anticipated a photo of an ice-block here.
Or at least a clothing company.
But no.
I am talking about one of just two photos I snapped on my recent drive up the paddock of a small waterhole beside the road. I had hoped to get many more images here in slightly later afternoon light... but, well... if you read that post, will already know what happened there.

(A lot of dismissal went on, that's what!)
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But here is what I am up to with the 'messin'. I'm using some tools in Photoshop on the sweet little pic below...

My white-balanced version pretty much straight out of the camera:

(Don't you love that sky?).

Using Pioneer Woman's Lovely and Ethereal action:


Using the basic PS7 Sepia action:


Using Rosalind Harrison's B&W Sepia action

And finally, using my own combination Photoshop tools,

Hue & Saturation plus some PaintDaubs and some darkening around the border.

A couple of questions

(and this is not for photo nerds only, I want all opinions):

Which one works best, do you think?

And what is your colloquial name for a small body of water like this?

Don't be like Bush Babe (Valentine's edition)

Today was apparently Valentine's Day...

I know this because I went to a dinner last night with my beloved (and our progeny). Not so much a gaze-into-each-other's-eyes romatic dinner, as a sit-around-with-friends-and-get-waited-on-by-schoolkids dinner. It was fabulous.

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It was a fundraiser for a local small school (not ours, a big THREE-teacher school nearby). An event which cost (are you ready?) $35 per couple and $5 per child - fees which included a three-course-meal (really nice and well-served) lots of fairy lights and candles, pizza for the little 'uns and babysitting. We ate and drank while others cared for our kids and cleaned up after us. The best value I have ever experienced!

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So we knew it was Valentine's Day because that was last night's dinner theme. But we aren't really into the whole card-giving, bunch-of-flowers, romantic stuff. Today started and ended much as any other day of the year. Not that we don't feel the love (she hastened to add) but we don't save it for a special day in the year. It's pretty random in our household - when the mood strikes. And let's just say it rarely takes the form of a Hallmark card.

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If you subject yourself to my twittering, you'll know that a few days ago Mr Incredible offered to take care of the kids and cook dinner, while I went out in the paddocks to take photos for a couple of hours. It was the kind of offer he knew would ring my bells. Seriously, I couldn't get out of the place fast enough. My excitement was slightly over-the-top - afternoons (as any Mum of young kids knows) is an exhausting parade of unpacking schoolbags, dealing with tired and hungry offspring through food-and-drink regeneration programs, squeezing in last-minute washing loads, preparing dinner and wondering if that sunset will last long enough for you to get a shot once the kids are out of the bath. (For the record, it hardly ever does.)

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So I went - hastily grabbing my camera bag and thanking my husband profusely on the way out of the door. He gave me a satisfied 'Why yes, I AM Husband of the Year' smile. I leapt into his ute and took off in a cloud of happy dust. I made it about five kilometres before I realised I had forgotten the parcel I was supposed to deliver to my brother en route. (Because I have to mult-task, that's why!).

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So I hauled the Toyota around and headed back to the house. With a wry smile, I grabbed the parcel and waved goodbye for a second time. My family collectively shook their heads at my forgetfulness. The word 'typical' rose in little thought bubbles above their heads.

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I got about three kilometres into the much-anticipated photo trip (I had about an hour's window of great afternoon light) when I stopped to take my first shot. Fabulous cobalt blue skies, soaring jet streams towering over rippling hills of succulent green grass... I pressed my trigger finger. Nothing. I looked down at the camera. No memory card.

Are you kidding me?

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Around I turned again, pressing the pedal to the floor to waste as little time as possible on the SECOND return to the house. Head down, I dashed into the office, mumbling something at my slightly-astonished family (is she EVER going to leave?) and out the door again. I slid the card into the back of the Nikon to check I had enough space - yup. A goer.

Off I headed again (fingers firmly crossed as I drove).

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My main challenge for the outing was to get shots of cattle for promotion for our stud. Lucky for me, the recently branded calves and their mothers were grazing peacefully near the road.

YES. I was in business.

They milled around the ute as I snapped happily away...

Lovely. Green with happy bovines. Sweet.

Pretty polled heads posing in the sunshine.

Happy days.

After gathering a nice bunch of cow shots, I drove off. I allowed myself to indulge in a little 'landscape' action (offering some much-needed relief to those who have overdosed on my Shallow Depth of Field period last week).

Bottle trees reaching above the clouds.

More boabs, rampant green grass and red roads.

Almost a sensory overload.

Well it was actually. For my camera.

It grunted, it groaned.

It stopped altogether.

Flat battery.

Yuh huh.

You heard me right.

The World's Most Impetuous Photographer failed to check ANYTHING.

I immediately sacked myself (several times actually),

And then drove home, muttering furiously about wasted opportunities.

I drove by the magnificence of utterly still water in roadside dams perfectly reflecting the dusky skies above?

You will just have to trust me - it was amazing. Amazingly frustrating with NO CAMERA.

Then I looked down and panicked - the low-fuel light was on.

(I braced myself and called in, only to be reassured via two-way radio that there was a second tank full of fule if I just pressed a button. I promptly sacked myself as a bushie as well.)

So please. In matters of photography, or romance, or country life...

Just ignore me, okay?

Because (to steal a line from a fellow Aussie blogger)

the chances I'll learn from this Valentine's escapade?

Approximately...

Barking up the right tree...

It's a gorgeous day here... and I just had to share.

Two sides of the same tree: an ironbark that is the final sentry to the driveway into our house.

First a shot showing the rolling green hills (thanks to the rain!) to the north...

And second looking west.

If you look closely, you can see the shape of the roof of our home (and chimney) in the background...

Ironbark.

It's just a great name for a tree.

Sounds like a movie. Or a Transformer.

Why yes, I have a seven-year-old son.. why do you ask?

Hope your weekend is gorgeous too...