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off making a mental note to try not to repeat that mistake again, and get over it.

So pictures of Alice doing amazing things at the Gymnastics concert will have to wait. Sorry, folks.

We had a sunset I could have cheerfully eaten last night. It was one of the most breathtakingly beautiful sunsets I have ever been priveleged enough to see. We are blessed with such things here in Australia, but it's a good news/bad news situation - and the bad news is that the cause of such glories is the amount of dust in the atmosphere. Not good for people with dust allergies, and certainly not good for our top soil, or lack thereof. We are, as I have no doubt pointed out to you before, seriously lacking in top soil depth in Australia.

A lot of it ends up on the slopes of New Zealand's mountains. Red snow, I kid you not. And the NZers aren't happy about it either. For some reason they much prefer snow to look like snow. The Sahara, after all, is rarely white.

Well, Tiny and the other two bulls have gone to market today. I miss them, they were a little more friendly than Muppet, although of course we are keeping Muppet. They have been precipitously sold for two reasons: 1) the ear-tags that are now a legal necessity came by post late last week, and 2) we don't want them eating any more and losing condition and therefore, value. Their sale will pay for the ute to be roadworthy - and about time, too. Most of our money has gone on luxuries like school fees, food electricity bills, etc. So it will be a relief to be able to drive a car that is trustworthy. Maybe Brian will go a little mad and actually clean the cobwebs off it, too. Maybe I will surprise him and do it myself.

Sunday morning, in a rush as usual, I went out to feed the animals, as Brian was working. Bess and three of her piglets were out. I easily bribed Bessie into her pen ("Bread. Loooove bread. Gimme bread.") The piglets were another matter (three matters, actually, to be pedantic), and did not understand that an end to their hunger was guaranteed now that the feeder had arrived, provided that they went back into the sty.

Took some doing, but the last one was finally in, and I was only running half an hour late. That includes, mind you, the time it took to fix the small gate leading to the pig pen. It had been battered so severely by Bess as she rears up on her hind trotters to encourage us to feed her faster, that the bolt would no longer stay shot in the hole. I am really grateful that only three piglets managed to get out. I couldn't remember where there was any wire to temporarily fix the gate, but I found some baling twine in very good nick, and used that instead. Took a bit of doing, because the gate would not sit flush with the post, but I managed it.

Meanwhile, Bess is stressing at her piglets not being with her. She kept charging and jumping up on the gate. I kept telling her to back off, and throwing her more food. Amazing how easily a pig (even a Mama pig) can be bribed! Even when I had the piglets in, and was finally tying up the gate, she decided that investigating my work was the right thing to do. Some people will do anything for a hobby. I mean the pig, not me.

Came home late that night, as Alice has finished school for the year, and we now can go to Services on Sunday nights, too, and three more pigs were out. The little darlings had squeezed in under the big gate into Porgy's pen, and now I'm trying to get the twine off the small gate, so that I can encourage them back in with their Mum, and fix the blockage under the big gate, which I can only easily get to through the small gate.

Meantime, Alice wants to know various and sundry things, and is shouting questions from the back door of the house. Things like, "Mummy, one of the piglets is out in the driveway. Shouldn't you do something?" Hmmm.

I had trouble unpicking the knots I had made to secure the small gate that morning. I remembered that as a retail jeweller and wholesale gemstone merchant, one of the ongoing delights was unravelling neckchains that had tangled together. One of the ways to more easily do so is to use a pin in the heart of each knot. So I found a nail, and finally worked all of the knots out. Grabbed some bread, kept Bess busy (oh, by the way, both times I had Porgy very upset because it looked like Bess was getting more attention, and wayyyy more food and the calves were carrying on like pork chops for the same reason), as she wanted to investigate this fine source of entertainment ("Watcha doin', Mum, canI've some, too, huh, huh?") and food, managed to get the piglets back in (no, I don't know whether they were the same three as the morning, funnily enough I hadn't paid much attention to that detail. If I had, and if they were, they might well have been premature bacon by now.), and then shoved the impedimenta back under the gate, along with a bit of concrete, and then granny-knotted and bowed the small gate with the twine so that if it happens again, it will be easy to open from our side. Brian has just told me that he will fix it tomorrow. He is an absolute love about things like this. How many husbands fix a tap the morning after being told late the previous night that it is dripping? What a man!

I bought our real, live Christmas tree in Warrnambool on Saturday, and we are finally going to decorate it tomorrow. The tree was from the Koroit Scouts, who set up every year on a reserve facing onto the Highway going through Warrnambool. It was $25, and yes, I know I could buy a genuine plastic one for that, but they don't have the look (this one is classic in shape, pyramidal and full of foliage), the smell or the presence. Also, it funds the Scouts, and as I used to be Cub Leader for the Koroit Pack, you can see that I would still like to help them. I love beautiful Christmas decorations, and some of the cheesy ones as well. There's one of Santa on a motor trike that I bought for Brian, although he is not a decorations person. My fun one this year is a white plastic and sparkly gold reindeer (complete with lederhosen and muffler!) on skis, poles in his front hooves.

This time I will try and get a picture or two for you of the completed tree.

Brian has well and truly finished the hay carting and the rain came back today. He has managed to get in around 120 bales, most excellent and some in reasonable condition and quality. All will have their use around the farm. He worked out that with the cost of materials and fuel, each bale cost us around $2, which is mighty cheap. Some of our machinery needs replacing, but we have all of the year to do that now.

Brian was saying that this coming year we will probably just buy in a bull calf or two every fortnight, as he is paid, if we can afford it, and hopefully will get the ones that only have a short while left on milk, even though they are more expensive. He figures on paying between $50 and $100 for each calf, and then re-selling, we hope, for around $600 each. A goodly amount, once costs have been taken out. Our costs would probably be around $200/calf.

We are hoping to get them all sold around August, and have a reasonable Christmas bonus, to pay for the re-registration of the vehicles and for Christmas generally, and hopefully be able to put aside some money for a bigger block of land over the road, which we can also stock. It would be nice if: 1) Brian could leave his job and work on the farm full-time, and: 2) if there was enough money eventually coming in to get a house built that is large enough and does not suffer from certain pests that shall remain nameless (you know what you are).

We have been at the mercy of incredibly hot weather lately. Yesterday it reached 39C. Phew! As a result, we have been inundated with blowies (blowflies - the great fat flying maggot carriers) and lots of other six-legged beasties. Well, for the first time ever, I have seen swarms of rust-red wasps (sort of like ichneumon wasps, but without any of the black) and they have been hovering in the gum trees. Thankfully, only one or two have made it inside, but there's a phenomenal amount of food out there for them.

We have been given a new drake by a lovely lady (thanks, Carol!) in Warrnambool. She said that he was a champion Buff Orpington. I think he's just gorgeous, but I love ducks! He is getting on fabulously with our two ducks and drake, but he does not have a tail curl. Tomorrow, I will be given another three drakes, and I know God will provide more ducks to pair them off. He's good about things like that. I have been wanting to build up our flock of ducks for ages, ever since so many of them were run over. I have missed them and their quaint ways enormously.

Next week, our landlady, aka my Mum, is coming to stay from Adelaide over Christmas and New Year. I can't wait to show her the improvements in the place. I hope she sees them the same way, but Mum is into farming the way I'm into taking deep breaths of water.

Aussie English:

ACT

Common phrases are 'He's bunging on an act', 'I was only bungin' on an act', etc. To pretend to be something which you are not, is to 'bung on an act'. It is wiser - and safer - to be natural, and speak the truth about yourself.

ANCHOR

The brakes on a motor vehicle. When it's necessary to stop your vehicle suddenly, you 'hit the anchors', or 'throw out the anchor'.

'This galah comes hurtlin' out of a side street - doesn't even look to his right - an' I tell you if I hadn't hit the anchors I'd've been gone a million.'

APPLES

'She's apples.' 'She'll be sweet.' 'She'll be right.' 'She's jake.' Meaning quit worrying, all's well.

Dominus tecum.

Leonie