Urban Climb

This weekend saw a birthday outing for Eloise's class.

It was little Daisey's birthday and she was turning 5. Eloise is in a combination class of Preppies and Year Ones which is quite nice as it means she gets exposure to more kids, and as they're younger she probably looks after them, or something, knowing her.

The birthday party was to be a climbing party. A rock climbing party. That raised a few eyebrows...

I volunteered to be a belayer, that would be the chap that ties the ropes and stops the terrornauts from falling to their deaths.

Anyway we turned up at this place called Urban Climb. It's basically a warehouse with some big walls in it, and they're covered in colour-coded hand- and foot-holds.

We goggled a bit at the really impressive overhanging walls, wondering how on earth anyone was going to escape alive, then thought what the hell, presumably if the body count were too high, they'd probably get shut down or something.

After a while the volunteer belayers were taken to one side and training commenced. We learned how to tie bits of rope to harnesses and stuff like that.

And before long we were tying children to our pieces of rope and they were haring up the walls like little monkeys.

Eloise did particularly well. She was initially nervous but pretty soon she was up and down the walls in an inexhaustible cycle of climbing.

She got Daisey's Dad to belay her up the overhang and almost made it up the straight part using the difficult handknobs. Every time she fell off she was determined to try again and she was the proverbial last man standing at the end of the day.

She's agitating for a return visit already.

Matilda vs Humanity

Somebody had the bright idea of taking Matilda to the market.

Eloise thought it would get her out of having to walk the dog.

Nicole thought it would be amusing. She said that she thought that Matilda would be fine. I don't believe that she really believed that.

I thought it was a bad idea. I put a post-it on the door to say "This is a Bad Idea."

But I was not listened to.

In actual fact, other than pulling us into flower beds a couple of times, she was OK. No dog fights. No stealing food from the mouths of babes, though she came pretty close to achieving a nearby metaphor.

If kids came up to stroke her I would look earnestly at the parent and intone "Don't get food near her."

That did some sort of trick.

To Market

The score when we went to the market this week was as follows:


Made a list. Eloise made the list this time. So we ended up with 12 tomatoes.

Collected bags together.

Got dressed (her, not me).

And off we went, to Kelvin Grove. Drove around the block three times looking for a parking space, and began the amble, via the cash machine to the market.

Generally the market is negotiated in two passes: once up the way just to see what might be what and once the other way to perform the actual shopping.

There are distractions that have to be managed: dogs, shiny things, and so on. Eloise generally agitates for flowers and plants (to put in the garden these days rather than in a vase).

The essential shopping for veg takes place at a venue of discretion each week. Fruit takes place with Our Friend from Stanthorpe.

Plants and flowers are at the bottom end, and coffee from the Bunker people always rounds it off.

This time the bags were heavy with food and begonias. The amble back to the car was slow. Eloise had to carry the flowers.

A Day at the Races

This apparent attempt at telepathy or telekinesis or something is actually the Ginger Preparedness Pose in the relay race.

Today was Sports Day at school. By the time we'd fandangled around in the morning eating breakfast in a sleeping bag (sleeping bag is popular at the moment) and putting off actually getting ready and then cycling into school (did I mention that Eloise is now an independent cyclist), which is probably about as quick as walking, Sports Day was about to begin.

I had to leg it home to get my camera and by the time I'd got back Eloise had completed the hundred metre dash and claimed second place.

I say she claimed second place... she claimed to me that she'd been in second place but as there was a ribbon that said "Second" on it for people who had achieved that accolate - a ribbon which she was self-evidently not wearing - I treated the claim with a dash of salt....

A little later, after I'd located her and then her hat, which had been deposited in some random location, and rubbed shoulders with my esteemed co-parents past and present, she ran the relay race as part of a Gordon (her house, red in shirt and claw) team, and lost.

They then had tug-of-war, which they also lost.

Then it was the parents vs Y7 in the tug-of-war. We showed no mercy. They were anni-hi-lated.

Cheek by Jowl with Nature

We woke up the other day around seven am, and Nicole went to open the window, then we laid back to listen to the rain and the radio for a while until Eloise woke up.

After a few minutes Nicole gave me a nudge, asked me to put my glasses on and have a look at the window.

"Oh yeah... it's a snake."

And sure enough a carpet python was making its way in through the window to ensconce itself upon the curtain rail.

Where it remained, in its newly discovered hiding place.

After a couple of hours (after dropping Nicole off a work and Eloise at school) I phoned the snake man to get his take on things and he said to leave it until midday or so (ie when he could come round) and see what happened.

At two o'clock it was still there, coiled up and comfortable, and the man came round, lifted it down as calm as you like, gave it a little stroke, pointed out the rat in its belly, popped it in a black cloth bag and that was that.

Damp Camp

Nicole was fitter for duty the next day so we went on the customary walk while Josie sloped around at Base Zero with a book.

We then reverted to form and played cards and football and read books.

In the afternoon we went on a drive in the forest up to the excellent-sounding Point Pure Lookout.

Eloise was whingeing about this and that. In between bouts of out-of-school Literacy Hour. She forgot her shoes.

Anyway Point Pure was windy, and the clouds daunting.

The road though was better and eventually we found that this led back to the main road so we had found a less harrowing exit route for ourselves.

I was forced to remind the Slimms that the forest was, by law. not to be used as a source of firewood.

We set around the fire, upon our return, beneath umbrellas, the rain sizzling on the embers.

Afternoon Stroll

In between showers, as the "lady-folk" got on with whatever it is that ladies get on with, I walked the dreaded dog once more.

The sun came out for me. Which was nice.

Camping: Fun As a Function of Facilities

Nicole's cousin Josie came to visit last week, and we decided to go camping.

Avoiding the Easter rush, we pre-empted the exodus by a week. Nicole did a trawl of pet-friendly campsites on the internet and came up with Brooyar or Amamoor; Amamoor's access road had been cut off by the floods and was still incommunicado, so Brooyar it was.

Brooyar State Forest is up near Gympie, a few hours drive North of Brisbane. With an extra body in the car packing was a slight issue-ette so we downgraded our self-inflating mattress for yoga mats, and didn't worry about the duvets, settling for just plain old sleeping bags.

We were considering leaving the table behind but opted to leave that in, but I selflessly packed just the one change of clothes... plus a couple of extras, just in case of rain.

Still with all the optimisation things were still a bit of a squeeze but we made it up to Gympie where we stalled a while trying to find a place to sell firewood.... unsuccessfully.

Putting this pyro-Slimm-disaster to one side we headed off for the campsite and it turned out it wasn't too far out of town, up the Wide Bay Highway then a turn off.

At the end of the sealed road there was a Hallelujah Moment as the last Homely Homestead had firewood for sale. Deep Joy.

Then onto the gravel road, which wound its way into the forest. There were a few washouts and we began to realise the low-riding Mazda 3 once again is not the best for off-tarmac road war as unpleasant noises came from underneath while traversing with great care the washouts and ruts.

But eventually after 10km or so we arrived at the legendary camp site and headed for the facilities, which consisted of some composting toilets.

The tent went up without too much drama and as the sun went down the campfire went up and a glorious repast was served.

The camp site was nestled by Glastonbury Creek in a forested valley. A track led further into the hills and in the morning we headed up it.

Nicole wasn't too well, with a migraine, so she stayed behind to sleep it off, whilst the rest of us inched our way up the muddy track, eventually discovering a hiking trail that led up through a forest of grass trees and gums, across the ridge and back down to the campsite.

As we got back to the tent, the clouds started to roll in.

We played cards and read books for the rest of the day, relaxing. There was the occasional shower.

As the fire went up, the rain came down.

The Age of Responsibility

Put it down to conformism or peer-pressure or whatever you like, but as time marches on, Eloise is asserting her independence more and more.

We're not allowed to pick her up from the classroom any more. Instead we must wait underneath the tree at the end of the courtyard for her to pack her pack, come down the stairs and deliver herself into our care.

She's even starting to carry her own bag, which is a step forward for independence, if not back health.

A Visitation from Scruffy

We had a visit from Scruffy the classroom pet. He came home with a whole visiting toolkit, with food and a lead and a ball, which was just peachy to take home on the bike.

Also in there was a book that his previous hosts had filled in with details of his visits to them.

The idea being that we would fill in a page for him and Eloise would do a show and tell based on that the next day.

So we fed him, played games with him, stopped Matilda from eating him, etc. etc. for an evening.

He didn't get to sleep in Eloise's bed.