 |
| Eucalyptus blossom |
Hullo, Dear Reader, it
has been a little while. The Summer has been and we are about to bid it
Adieu, so I thought a little random recap of the glories of the season would be in order (rather than a "Wot I did on my summer hols" composition). Bullet points may be employed if it gets untidy...
 |
| Blue skies |
Weatherwise, (one simply cannot have a chinwag about current events without first chewing over this staple - it's the carbohydrate of any English speaker's chit-chat) it has been a cracking summer. Around these parts we've alternated between Stunning and
Skorchio! And when the skies haven't been dazzling and blue, they've been wild and stormy.
 |
| Rare Mammatus clouds |
Did the Pipistrello complexion indulge in any Fashionable Sunning at any of our fabled beaches? I should say not! Those crazy days of Le Tan are well and truly over for me as I've finally abandoned the fiction that my Italian married name doth armour me with a Mediterranean skin-type. After all, the best description of my skin tone these days is less Smooth Caramel and more Liquorice Allsorts
.
 |
Pipistrello's Imagined Before Shot
René Gruau poster, c. 1950 |
And while I may not be slathering on the Ambre Solaire any more, I have been channelling a bit of 1950s Jacques Fath and have been
Mostly Wearing the Sunray Pleat again. And loving brooches, while I think about it. And the olde toenails are masquerading as either Turquoise or Malachite cabochons, but you need not to have to see that today.
 |
| Covering up with a Sunray pleat |
The much-anticipated home-made
Tonic Water has been a success, and has not always needed a goodly splash of Gin to make it Interesting, as it has that in spades. Strangely medicinal, which it is, (and is not for Pregnant Women, apparently) and amber in colour, it has endless flavour possibilities with recipe tweaking and bumping up the ratio to water (although we declare a Light touch is best).
 |
| The New Look G&T around these parts |
The unrelenting heat and occasional wild hail and tropical storms have wreaked a bit of havoc with fruit and vegetable supplies and prices but we are still eating the stone fruit and melons of the season. Occasionally, a cheap batch will be transposed into a pie (like below), but after the Christmas baking frenzy, the oven has hardly been working overtime and indeed even my forays into sourdough and Ye Olde Lazy Girl bread have been superseded by a bit of flatbread action for the time being. There are no other fancy seasonal menu additions to report, beyond the comment that the fresh Aldi salmon is pretty delicious, no?
Thank you Two-Peas for the tip!
 |
| Plum Pie |
Yes, there are more holes in the ground and gaps in the city skyline, and an assortment of cranes and decorated hoardings abound. Streets are still closed while
new tram lines are inching their way into place, often (oh, so believably) replacing the ghost lines of long defunct tram lines from last century. But it all seems to be moving apace, and as we say, Sydney will look rather good,
When it's Finished.
 |
| Rather colourful hoarding |
 |
| Rather boring but instructional |
 |
| Yes, rather witty |
In Culture News, we only managed to see one fillum but it was a corker! I speak of Yorgos Lanthimos'
The Favourite. As the entire world has probably seen it, there's no need to add My Thoughts into the mix, save that we both loved it and Olivia Colman was fantastic and deserves all accolades. We took in a couple of exhibitions, with which I'll indulge myself with seperate posts later: the Summer Exhibition at the AGNSW of the Hermitage Modern Masters and a mid-century Street Photography exhibition at the Museum of Sydney.
 |
| Still to come... |
Finally, in family matters, we did sadly farewell the eldest member of our colony whilst joyfully welcoming our newest addition. It's been a proper Circle of Life for this seasonal recap.
