Nathan is coming back!

So........Olwyn has gone and dwindled to the South and Pam has slunk East but Nathan is coming back!After moving away and from the coast last week Nathan has turned round and intensified again and this time is expected to cross the coast before the weekend near Cooktown as a Category 3 cyclone.

The Power of the Possum!

(The following is from The Brisbane Times.)"A possum is to blame for commuter chaos in South East Queensland on Tuesday, Queensland Rail says.The admission comes as Translink promises full refunds to tens of thousands of passengers affected by lengthy delays in the morning peak.A Translink spokesman said the refund would be automatically added to Go Card accounts. It estimates 30,000 people catch trains into the CBD alone on an average weekday morning.Queensland Rail's  general manager of corporate and customer relations Rebecca Masci said the possum crawled on to power lines near Bowen Hills train station just before 5am, causing 25,000 volts of electricity to arc and knock the powerline to the ground."Unfortunately it happened just around 5am so it was as we were moving into morning peak so that then had knock-on impacts across the rest of the network," she said.The rail network operator suspended all trains running through the CBD for about 30 minutes as it investigated the fall, causing huge delays.Delays of up to 45 minutes continued even after electricians isolated the problem and re-opened four of the six tracks running through the city centre."We were still able to get trains through the CBD precinct but we only had four tracks available instead of six," Mrs Masci said."Which meant that there was a bit of congestion through those CBD tracks so there was knock-on delays through the whole network."Passengers on the Ferny Grove line had to wait through hour-long delays as buses replaced trains from Mitchelton to Roma Street.At 2pm passengers were still being warned to expect 45-minute delays on all tracks and one-hour waits on the Ferny Grove line but Mrs Masci said technicians were confident of returning the network to normal in time for the afternoon peak.And trains were running again on the Ferny Grove line by 3pm after almost 10 hours of lengthy delays across south-east Queensland.Shortly after 4pm, Translink announced train services across the network had finally returned to normal, in time for the afternoon peak as promised.Queensland Rail has been testing methods to keep wildlife away from overhead lines for about a year now, she said.Along with keeping vegetation to a minimum around tracks, the company has been installing two different types of prevention directly onto power lines.The simplest method is a pipe, which gets fitted around power lines and makes it hard for animals to walk along."They simply rotate if an the animal lands on the cylinder and that tips the animal away from the high voltage wires without any harm," Mrs Masci said.A second "wildlife shield" option emits a small electrical charge to frighten animals away from overhead wires.Mrs Masci said the solutions were rolled out on a case-by-case basis to areas where there had been previous issues or animal crossings were likely.She said neither of the systems were in place at Bowen Hills but both solutions would be installed on Tuesday once the power lines were fixed.Mrs Masci apologised to passengers affected by the delays."Wherever possible in these situations we just do our best to get the network back up and running as quickly as possible so that we can get people on their way to their destinations again," she said."We're just really grateful to people for their patience as we do work to rectify these incidents."I don't think the Possum survived.

A Gecko ran up my leg!

I was just called over to our neighbours by Daryl, who is trying to replace the 'whirlygig' washing line thingy that was damaged by the branch that fell off our tree in the storm.He was trying to get the concrete cylinder that the broken one had been fixed into out of the ground but it was too heavy for one.We did get it out eventually.....which  was pleasing.....as 'man jobs' like that are not usually my forte.I was feeling full of testosterone and my voice had noticeably deepened as Daryl was wondering how he could make a cylinder to fill with new concrete to hold the new 'whirlygig' washing line thingy..."I could use plant pots, " he said."Yes!" I said gruffly!He found some empty ones that would work perfectly but they must have been home to a startled gecko that fled as he picked them up.......and it ran up my leg as far as my knee.I squealed like a girl until it ran down again......and my manly moment was gone!I learned two things from this....i) Geckos have very rough feet'ii) Geckos also wet themselves when they are scared!

The 'Wuss'.

I was having 'kittens' about Blue Care coming early today for 'respite', even though I had rung them about it last week. I am finding that I still lack some confidence in them but needn't have worried, the lovely Rhiona turned up at 9.30.I set off to the QE II Hospital for my dental appointment.It is worth noting, for those mentally unhinged souls were reading this a year ago and are still here today, that this time last year Dulcie had just gone into the QE II following her fall and was still awaiting her hip operation.How spooky to be once again entering those sliding doors and waiting for those lifts to raise me up.The 'ding' was familiar as it heralded the arrival of the lift and the few of us waiting piled in. I was going to the 3rd floor.Out of the lift I followed the signs to Dental Clinic which was also in the same direction as 'The Prayer Room', 'The Relatives Room' and 'Intensive Care.' Three places that I felt did not sit or bode well with my own destination.The Clinic waiting room was empty except for an elderly Asian couple but there was a queue at the check in desk. There was a TV on with the 'Today' programme on and rows of uncomfortable looking chairs facing it.........I wonder if Queensland Health have done some deal with the 'dreadful' Channel 9?No one behind the desk seemed to be bothered about the queue. There were about 5 people back there milling around carrying papers, looking in files, opening drawers as if they were searching for a lost gerbil. I was on a tight schedule and I had even less confidence in punctual hospital services. They needed to pull their finger out.Something touched my back and I turned round. At first I thought no one was there but looking down saw an elderly Asian lady peering up at me."Solly, velly solly," she smiled."Oh, It's ok," I said.....I nearly added 'I quite liked it' but didn't think it was appropriate.Turning back to the desk they must have found their gerbil because they were now keen to deal with the waiting patients. The guy at the front had an appointment for 10.20 the same as me, then the woman in front of me said she was here for an appointment at 10.20 too. There was a problem with that as there did not seem to be a record of it. 'Verity' for it was she, one of the receptionists, who is the original instigator behind the birth of the phrase 'Face like Thunder' had to deal with that while I was called to another window.I had some paper work to fill in as it was my first time. It must have been the first time for the little Asian lady who was behind me too as she was handed the form to fill in too.She sat in front of me and looked at it and then kept on peering around anxiously.I finished filling my form in and handed it back and took a seat.An interpreter arrived for the little Asian lady to help her fill in her form. It turned out her appointment was 10.20 too."Hello, Richard Barclay, I have an appointment at 10.20," said a voice behind me. It was a guy who had been wheeled in in a wheel chair."I'll come back for you at 11.30," said his Pusher (I am not sure that is the correct noun for that particular vocation but you catch my drift.)There seemed to be so many with appointments at the same time as me that I started to wonder if they had overbooked and not noticed while fretting over their lost gerbil.'Juan Ying Xu' that was the little Asian lady's name. She was born in 1929. I could read the form the interpreter was filling in. She had a long list of medications to copy out.A Turkish couple also were being helped by their interpreter to fill in their form.The waiting room was filling up and no one had been called yet and I had been there for 20 minutes and they all had the same appointment time as me......what the heck was going on?! Was the dentist gerbil hunting?A tannoy crackled......." Nicholas Allen, Nicholas Allen to Surgery 6 please."I jumped up and walked up to a pair of double doors which swung open and I entered a different light, bright world. I could see numbers on little signs above doors.....1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, but no 6. The place was filled with dentist's.I kept going and found room 6 round a corner with a smiley Indian lady standing by a dentist's chair."Hello, take a seat."I did. I was pleased that it looked clean and bright and the equipment looked quite modern and there was no blood splattered on the ceiling, walls of floor and no teeth lying about........and no straw on the floor.The smiley Indian lady asked what the problem was and I told her about my 'niggly' tooth."Let's have a look."She stuck a mirror in my mouth but seemed to be holding it awkwardly and peered at it from a distance."I can't see anything...........perhaps we will do an x-ray too."I hate going to the dentist.....I feel it is worst way to spend time, well, that is until I had a lung biopsy!I was just wondering about her qualifications and experience when she said,"I'll just go and check something with a colleague."She sounded like someone who had once rung me to sell me life insurance and then a few days later rang me to tell me that there was something wrong with my computer and after that rang me to say I had won a holiday. What if she had given up working at a call centre last week and said "I know, I can hold a mirror awkwardly, I'll be a dentist!"She came back putting on her white coat.I wondered where her assistant was. In the UK all dentists have an assistant who scribbles things down when the dentist says"Upper, one, two, three, occlusal.""I don't know where my colleague is," she said, "I'll just go and find her."She was back in a moment and putting a hand on my shoulder said,"Are you OK for a moment? She has disappeared and I can't find her." She left again.They seemed to lose things a lot around here. Could her assistant be a gerbil?I was feeling fine.....In fact I was wondering if I actually needed a dentist after all but before I could get up and walk out she was back with her assistant.....who was not a gerbil after all......but a human being.The smiley Indian lady put on a face mask and then a plastic welder's helmet and her 'human' assistant did too.The chair I was in slid horizontal and she adjusted the light to shine on my face as if she had once happily worked for the Gestapo."I need an excruciating tricumbal doodah."The assistant passed her a piece of bent plastic."And an intrusive lingual flange."That was just a small rectangular flat thing.The Smiley Indian lady fitted them together and said."Bite on this," as she inserted it into my mouth.She manoeuvred a large metal crane thing, that was attached to the ceiling, and pressed it to my cheek. 'This must be the x-ray machine' I thought."Hold still." It pinged, she swung it away and removed the 'obnoxious oral obstruction' from my orifice."We'll just wait to see how that looks but in the meantime we will have a bit of a clean."I do like cleaning but not the kind she meant.I opened my mouth."Relax your cheek,"I tried as she stuck in a mirror, the high pressure mini water cannon and her 'human' assistant stuck in a small vacuum cleaner. The water cannon whined briefly and then stopped. She pulled it out."Hmmmm." She fiddled with it a bit then it was back in my mouth again with the other implements."Relax your cheek."It was not easy. I braced my self.Nothing happened......."Oh, it's leaking."My t-shirt was wet."Hmmmm, it doesn't seem to be working properly.""Do you know what you are doing?" I didn't say it out loud. I wasn't sure I wanted a dodgy high pressure water cannon in my mouth again.....what if it exploded?"Could you get me another?"The 'human' assistant left and then came back."Let's try again."It worked this time......unfortunately.Oh, I hate that whine as the water scours the plaque off your teeth and you are waiting for it to hit your gum and cut you like a laser through James Bond.......if he didn't always escape just in time."Put your hand up if it gets too uncomfortable."It was already too uncomfortable for me but I tried to be brave and just made little high pitched "Uuughh' noises.A voice behind me announced the arrival of my x-ray. The smiley Indian nurse stopped torturing me to look at it.She switched on her light box which was A3 size and stuck my x-ray on it, which was smaller than a credit card but bigger than stamp.She peered at it. I wondered if she could see it. I could make out teeth......such a relief to know I have some.She was pack in my mouth but this time wielding the pointy metal hook.She set about my 'niggly' tooth, probing and flicking it."Floss."The 'human' assistant passed her some floss and she wound it round her fingers like a garotte and got stuck in. It wouldn't fit in the gap and snapped when she out pressure on it."How long have you not been able to get floss in there?""Well, I haven't been flossing long," I said. "If at all..." I thought.She was back in with the pointy metal hook."I can't see anything very wrong, but you might have chipped it here," she seemed to be trying to chip it some more deliberately, "there is a slight crack in the filling..........(long pause)........... I think we should replace it.""Not now!" I was screaming inside."I can't do it now though so you will have to come back......."Phew!"....but we'll just finish off this cleaning.""Aaaaaggggghhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!"I tensed and squealed as I had before......"Nearly there.... sorry.......it's sensitive isn't it?"Finally it was over.I looked up at the 'human' assistant leaning over me. Her eyes looked back at me through her welder's helmet.....they were saying "You Wuss!""You're an elective mute aren't you?" My eyes said back accusingly.The chair slowly raised and I stood up."Just take a seat in the corner while I write this up," said the smiley Indian woman.The elective mute started to drape wet wipes all over different the dental paraphernalia and then started to wipe the x- ray machine with one still full dressed in plastic apron, mask and welder's helmet......I began to doubt she was 'human' after all."I'll see you again, " said the Smiley Indian lady handing me a card. "Please take this to the desk outside."I walked back to the double doors. They didn't swing open.....I felt some panic rising up.....I was trapped with an evil elective mute with 'excruciating tricumbal doodah's' close to hand.A friendly soul nearby pointed to a green knob on the wall which I pressed and the doors swung open.The waiting room was packed.'Book new appointments here,' said a sign on the desk. I handed over my cards to the woman sat behind it."Oh, just a minute, I'm dealing with someone else, " she said.I stood aside.She was dealing with Richard Barclay who was sat in his wheelchair in the Waiting Room, waiting for his Pusher. She had to keep getting up and come out from behind the desk to check a time and date with him and then go back and find another when it was not suitable....eventually she found a suitable time and date for him, and all was sorted except he wanted someone to wheel him outside.Verity drew the short straw......you could tell she was absolutely delighted. Just as she was about to wheel him out two more wheelchair bound people were wheeled in and there was a Wheelchair jam. It was the kind of day Verity lived for. Juan Ying Xu had appeared at my side chattering to her interpreter who must have been with her all through her examination."Can I help you now?" Said the woman behind the desk.I handed over my cards. "Thursdays and Fridays are best for me." I said."Oh, that might work out well. How about ...blah, blah,blah" I didn't hear, I was distracted.Something was tapping my bottom.......it was Juan Ying Xu, telling me to breathe in as they tried to squeeze a large wheelchair past me.I turned back to the woman behind the desk.....she was wearing the false smile of the exasperated."Sorry, it's just chaos out here," I said.I was hoping that I would not have to go back for a month......but  I am back on Friday.I was as pleased as Verity!

England beats Australia........for once!

So.......Freddie Flintoff was crowned 'King of the Jungle' in the Australian version of 'I'm a Celebrity, Get me out of here!'The show has been on for the last 6 weeks with Freddie joining it at the start of week 3.He didn't expect to win being an Englishman but he thoroughly deserved to.He was so funny and entertaining that Australia have taken him to their heart.