Deadly Australians.

So...today there was a visitor at school who came to talk to the children about 'Deadly Australians'...the myriad of 'bitey' and 'stingy' creatures this country is home to. There are 400 hundred animals here that either bite or sting and 20 of the top 23 most venomous snakes in the World live here. The most venomous being the Taipan found further north but the second deadliest is the Eastern Brown Snake and they can be found here around Frogknot.It was an interesting talk which would have been better with less digression from the subject by the presenter who loved the sound of his own voice.I was alarmed to discover that snakes do not have great eyesight, can only see black and white and generally cannot sense your approach until you are only about a metre away. I thought their heightened senses caused them to flee long before you got near but apparently not so.As if that was not enough to get me worrying about the arrival of 'snake season' (Spring and Summer) I come home to find this...

...A Red Bellied Black Snake curled up in the chook pen waiting to catch mice.No one has yet died from being bitten by a Red Bellied Black Snake though it's venom is more potent than the American Rattlesnake. The silver lining is that they prey upon the more deadly Brown Snakes...so it is a neighbour we have to put up with for now.

Scary loos!

So...I have not been having much luck with toilets recently.Flying back from the UK I found myself trapped by the window at 38,000 feet above the Indian Ocean as the people sat between me and the aisle were both asleep. Bursting for the loo I  roused them from their slumbers, apologised profusely and dashed to the loo. I don't know how I did it but whilst sat there I somehow tripped the flushing mechanism and the toilet flushed beneath me. The noise of an aeroplane flush is bad enough with the lid down but when it is directly under you it's terrifying and I almost died of shock! I thought I was being sucked out over the Seychelles and cried out in horror.Today, I was back at work doing four days at the local school covering for the Prep teacher who is taking a weeks long service leave. It was all pretty straight forward and with a final teaching practice student in there I am really getting paid for doing very little. I nipped to the loo at break and lifting the lid found a fairly large frog clinging to the rim staring back at me! I, again, cried out in shock and it dropped into the bowl and I promptly flushed it away noting another being dislodged from under the rim and it too disappeared down the drain. This kind of thing would never happen in England! I can tell I am definitely back Down Under!

Surprises at Frogknot.

So...Will has been busy while I have been away and he has put in the mezzanine floor and the upper roof beams and batons with the help of Ros.

11 new baby chicks!

Welcome back to Frogknot.

So...here is the Frogmouth we found sitting on the gate as we got back home this evening...surely a good omen.

Racing to the finish line.

So...my last day in Cumbria, for now, has been a busy one. I was down at the house in Penrith for 9.00 am. My brother Rod came to fix a leaky tap  and help me ship some unwanted furniture to the dump. I took a carload of other items to an Impact Housing depot and another carload of things to the Oxfam Charity Shop before a final trip back to the dump. I hoovered the house even though it was neither a Monday or a Saturday and then left it ready for the new tenants.In the afternoon I went for a walk in Gelt woods which was all a bit emotional as I thought back to my last walk there with Dad.

This evening Mum and I met Jayne and Nathan for a last Cumbrian Supper and then Nathan, Mum and I went to the Alhambra Cinema in Penrith to see 'Victoria and Abdul'. It was a lovely film.Tomorrow I begin to head South, firstly for a night in Manchester before my flight early  Friday morning.