Father's Day

They have Father's Day on a different day here. Dad. if I forgot Father's Day, that's why. Sorry.

It was Sunday and Nicole was on an early, so as a special treat to the rest of us I embarked upon a trip to Bribie Island and we wandered along the dog beach there, frolicking in the waves, building sandcastles and not touching jellyfish.

The weather was beautiful, it was nice and warm and a light breeze blew on off the bay. The waves were gently rollicking their way onto the beach, about six inches high (the waves that is, I didn't measure the beach but it was more than that). The odd sailing boat meandered away in the distance and occasionally a Jetskier or two buzz-bzzz-buzzed by.

The sand was light and fine and white and the water as it retreated darkened it then faded as it drained away. The surf line was a wibble-wobble of driftwood, mangrove seeds and twigs as the tide crept in.

As the beach entrance receded behind us, the number of beachgoers declined from not a large number to a considerably lower one. We stopped to say hello to other children, and to stand looking at them smiling sweetly before attempting to imitate and join in with what they were doing. My role (the we above is obviously her) being to prevent the joining-in from being destructive and/or unwelcome.

After a few "G'Day, mate" s, "Erm, hello"s, "How's it goin'?"s and "I'll live"s we stopped and munched on rice cakes and crisps and pineapple flavoured water bought at huge expense, and slid on our bottoms down the sandy ridge at the edge of the scrub/forest behind to enormous exultation and glee, we retired into said scrub/forest and relieved ourselves. Yes, all four of us.

On the subject of toilet training, the dogs are quite well advanced. I'm pretty good too and Eloise, having been instituted in a reward-based some-time but not-very-serious training scheme, is still erratic to the point where's she's still to experience the joy of controlled release even once, never, as she hasn't, having actually performed on the toilet.

She does prefer the toilet to the potty though and for some reason seems to prefer it without the baby-bottom-adapter, and balances there trying to get at the toilet paper before she declares herself done and is given a star for inclination if not results.

Still, when she's ready. No pressure...

Anyway, getting back to whatever it was I was bibbling on about, after a while she got a bit excited in the sea and a wavr came in that was a little suprising and the dress and jumper got wet and we considered it time to return.

Later we met up with Nicole and had a nice coffee and cakes session in the late afternoon sunlight.

I received a lovely book about National Parks and suchlike things, a beautifully and artistically rendered by Miss E. N. Gavin no less laminated bookmark and a nice big memory card for my camera.

I met a snapper the other day on a cliff overlooking the Story Bridge who had a 10-20mm lens. I had a look through it and now hanker after super-for-a-digital-camera-wide-range fun.

So anyway that's kind of the story of Father's Day. And a nice day it was too.

On Saturday I lost my house keys at the beach, which was a bit of a bummer which I won't dwell on except to say that it was a right pain in the jacksy after I had to return to the beach to look for them, then bother Nicole at work for her set, which was actually a nice surprise for her, and great for Eloise to see where this "work" thing may or may not happen, but a little bit arduous overall for me.