Samson and Delilah

I went to see Samson and Delilah this week. This Australian film's director Warwick Thornton just won the Camera D'Or at the Cannes Film Festival for this bleak love story set in an isolated Aboriginal community in central Australia. There's very little dialogue and not much happens but what does reveals more about the lives of most aborigines in Australia than any other film or tv series I've seen. 

In other news, life at Marie Claire is improving. I'm understanding the culture and way of working a bit more. The craziness of it is more tolerable and, most of all, everyone here is fantastically nice and friendly. Another highlight is my journey to work which involves cycling over the Sydney harbour bridge. There's a dedicated cycleway which offers views west to the blue mountains that you can't get from the road. The downside of this is that the distance is twice that of my journey to the Herald. Exercise wise this is great but as we are in the middle of a month of storms I have arrived home so soaked most nights, looking as if I've just walked out of a car wash.  Only 4 weeks until our trip to the UK. Starting to get very excited.

Before and after - extreme makeover lawn edition

As you can see from the above picture, our lawn has been the least successful aspect of our home. The grass refuses to grow in spite of much watering, seeding and gentle persuading.  After heavy rain it is a quagmire reminiscent of the first world war. After extreme heat, it is baked as hard as clay and kicks up a dust storm.  After almost a year of struggling with it, we finally bit the bullet last week and got it returfed and levelled. It is now a lovely green, bouncy lawn. Fingers crossed.

Lots on

I started work last week at Marie Claire so it's been all change again in our house. Have missed not being able to take  Scarlett to school and pick her up every day and a complicated system of drop off and pickups has been organised with our neighbour Kirsty and one of the other mums  at school for the days when Rob and I are at work on the same day. I'm only doing 3 days a week but I miss my extra day with Flo and tried to make it up to her last week with a visit to an excellent new playground  in Pyrmont right on the harbour. As well as the cool digger, Flo is operating above, there is a brilliant Spiderman web-like climbing frame, a wooden xylophone and a modern take on the old tin-can telephones in the form of red horns.


Scarlett is going through a phase of finding everything 'boring'. What will she be like at 14, i wonder. As a result she has declared she is no longer interested in her weekly Saturday morning dance classes. Loosely termed 'ballet', it is actually lots of 5-year-olds in various fairy outfits running about to music. A quick call to the  dance school allowed us to swap the remainder of the term to a class for under 3s that Flo can attend instead. Flo looked so cute it was ridiculous in her tutu and fairy wing vest, and despite reservations about joining in without clutching tightly on to me, she loved it. I think.
Last night was our old neighbour and friend Dave's 40th birthday party. Dave is a lover of all things Mexican after spending a year there during his uni days. H']e speaks Spanish and loves to throw together a Mexican feast. Unsurprising then that his party theme was Mexican. We were expecting a room full of of people wearing pig snouts or flu masks but instead it was a much more inspired crowd of fancy dressers.  Rob went as a gardener and me as his peasant wife with matching moustaches.
Dave was the last king of the aztecs photographed here with Rob and Kate De Brito dressed as a  Bandido biker chick.
One of the 3 amigos seen here making necessary adjustments to his bolero.
The best look of the evening belonged to Elsa and Richard who looked extraordinary as Frida Kahlo and artist husband Diego.
Later, the crowd were 'treated' to a live performance by Dave and his Adelaide uni mates who put the band back together for one night only. I'm informed that at the height of their fame in the late 1980s, Cerveza y Putas (beer and sluts) were known as Adelaide's only Spanish language punk band. Of course they were awful, each loud thrashed guitar version of every song sounding very much like the last. This didn't stop a large crowd of friends, all drunk as lords on the copious amounts of wine, tequila and beer, partying like it was 1989.  
The performance over, more serious drinking began accompanied by huge bowls of chilli and nachos, all cooked by Dave. 

The 1st anniversary of my 40th birthday

It's official I am now 'in my forties'. No, no, it's fine, honestly, I can take it. I still feel 23 which makes me understand now that someone in their 70s probably still feels 23 too. I woke up on my birthday to a pile of cards, presents and flowers (thank you Liz and Mike) sent from near and far. Rob did himself proud with an amazing book of Vanity Fair portraits I had been after for ages, a lovely coat and two tickets to see Cate Blanchett as Stella in the Sydney Theatre Company production of A Streetcar Named Desire, which is on in September. As Rob had to spend most of the day sleeping off a night shift, I took Scarlett to school and then Flo and I went to glorious Redleaf Pool to meet Julia and Tess and Jo and Zebadee. We had coffee and cupcakes and basked in amazing Autumnal sunshine. It was warm enough to swim and I was annoyed I'd forgotten my swimmers. In the evening The Duthie family went up to Annandale for  a lovely early dinner of pasta and pizza at Vicini, a great local Italian where kids eat free.  Tuesday is a top telly night in Sydney so I happily plopped on the couch in front of the box for the rest of May 6. Thanks to all for cards, presents and phone calls. Maria, your parcel arrived today - I love it, a perfect fit.

Mayday Mayday - birthday part 1

My birthday celebrations began early on Friday when Mark and laura flew in from Wellington, NZ for a long weekend with us. After breakfast on the wharf at Pyrmont we pottered around the inner west in glorious Autumnal weather before Mark sent the girls and Rob off to sleep with his relaxed book reading style. We then played choclate Cluedo, a set I had bought for Christmas, which caused much confusion when It turned out some of the pieces had been eaten.On Saturday night 10 of us had a fantastic dinner at the Three Weeds, complete with a chocolate profiterole cake Rob had secretly bought and delivered to the restaurant. It was a late one but lots of fun, great food, wine and company. On Sunday after soccer, Mark and Laura gave us a new box set of Cluedo with new improved characters and rules.

Mark and Laura finished their visit by taking Rob, Flo and I out to brunch at Balmoral before flying back to NZ on Monday evening.