Happy Christmas

December

A couple more piccies from the Christmas Dinner

Blimey, two weeks passed. Not sure where they’ve gone to.

So I got past the Christmas Party. I was working all week, the department’s getting busy again. I went out to Warrawong again, this time taking Ina to see the animals. More Possums this time, and the platypus put on a good show. So beautiful in the woods of the sanctuary at night, and the smell is unique. Actually it’s rained the past two days (yes, they do actually have water falling from the sky over here), and while the rain smells like it should when it starts, afterwards all you can smell is the eucalyptus, almost lemon.

Anyway, the few weeks before that had been v hot, the gardens wilting (I’ll replace those plants in the autumn when there’s a bit more chance of survival). I’ve even got a bucket in the shower catching water to go on the garden. Actually that’s more because the shower does cold or scalding and nothing in between.

I’ve actually had a couple of non-clinical days in the last couple of weeks, and it’s lovely to be able to take a bit of time at lunch. There’s a new café opened across North Terrace from the hospital (canny move, there – edible sandwiches, even if they are still practicing at the serving bit), and the botanic gardens next door. Almost how I imagine lunch-hour should be. Not having to stick a third of dinner back in the microwave ¾ hour after starting eating.

I actually had a weekend off last weekend (it doesn’t last – I’m off this w/end too, but on next Saturday). On Saturday there was a Salsa workshop (How to be ladylike – I thought I’d better go). Actually it was good, being shown what to do with your hands, and how to stand. Then I went to Marion (which is just like Meadowhell) to get a few bits. Including a tiny Christmas tree. Had to be done really. And the world’s most useless lights. Battery powered, which is good as there is a distinct lack of power points (see posts passim). But with about 30min life. Definitely to be kept specially for Christmas day.

Sunday I dragged myself out AGAIN in the morning to the rowing club. This time there was rowing – went out in a 4 with others who are learning. It was good fun, particularly when the timing was right. And great being out on the water, even if the boat (plank of wood?) lacked a big white flappy bit.

Sunday evening I went over to Brighton to Wendy’s house for supper, and a walk along the beach. That’s something I haven’t done enough of (been to the beach) yet. I had visions of all Aussies spending all their time surfing and running around on the beach playing Frisbee getting sun-bleached blond highlights. I think I’ve confused Adelaide with the rest of Australia. Anyway, it was a v pleasant evening.

Rundle Mall - People getting paid to make sandcastles. Are we in the wrong job?

Monday working – busy enough, then after Salsa class (thankfully at the stage where we were standing around talking afterwards), I got called back in. A combination of numbers of ambulances and a distinct lack of experience among the juniors that night. I’d have been tearing my hair out. Anyway, I got out at 9:30 so it wasn’t that bad.

The non-clinical days were spent sorting out paperwork. There are several different registration systems you have to keep current over here, and I’d missed one of them in September. Obviously no reminder letters sent (I bet if there was a charge attached to each, then a letter would be sent). It’s not like home where you start on a date and, providing you have a half-competent medical staffing dept, the paperwork is completed there and then. So even starting in July, the paperwork had to be re-done in September. There is no medical staffing / personnel dept here – it’s all done by the departmental admin staff.

Anyway, Wednesday was the consultant’s planning day and annual meal out. Obviously the evening shifts fell to the two Senior Registrars. (Strange how no fuss was kicked up this time about not having a consultant present, when they all want to go out). Another busy one – the dept running had been left to the Registrars during the day, and they don’t get a lot of tuition on how to manage the department. So when we walked in it was pretty ugly – 80 patients there. But we sorted it. (At least Conrad did – I was in resus ALL evening). Left at half one again.

Friday, back on the shop floor. Pretty unremarkable shift really. Intending to go home and change before going out, but I have no will-power, so I was in the pub at 5. One of the nurses has left – she’d been in the pub since 3. An “English pub”. Well it can’t be because the loos were clean and had locks on the doors. And you could walk around without sticking to the carpet. But the beer wasn’t too bad. At least by the 5th pint it wasn’t. Anyway we decided to eat at 9 and left to go to Schizo’s, sorry – Scoozi’s to get a pizza. Finally found one with enough chilli on.

Then yesterday we had a barbecue. Originally it was intended to be our Christmas meal, but expanded so we went up to Belair. It had been raining all morning, but the sun came out shortly after we got there and pretty much stayed out. Enough to get burnt playing cricket and rounders (which is “like cricket, but more round”) and Frisbee. Loads of food, too particularly as a lot of people didn’t turn up.

Afterwards we went up to see THE Adelaide Christmas attraction – The Lights of Lobethal. Well, that’s what the advertising would have you believe. It is signposted for miles around. I think the lights they actually mean are the red and white lights of the cars as they snake, nose-to-tail at 5 mph around the village. Oh, and a couple of the houses had Christmas decorations outside too. Two kids stood outside one house singing carols to all the closed windows of the cars on the conveyor belt. It was such a missed opportunity – close the road, make people walk and have a proper Christmas market and it could have been so much better. Poor Ina’s been invited up there again, too.

I made it to rowing this morning too. I can’t move now.

So...
This Friday was the Christmas party. Apart from Salsa on Monday night, Going back to the Barossa on Tuesday, going to the pictures again on Wednesday...

I’ve not been to the pictures so often for years. It was Elizabeth this time. Cate Blanchett carries the film, not a patch on the first one. Forget all the outcry from the Catholic Church (it was a fair cop), the imagery was just so obvious. Catholics – wear black or red, walk around dark garrets, speak foreign language, mutter a lot. The English – wear colours, live in light filled rooms (which looked very much like a gothic cathedral), etc. And Walter Raleigh personally saves the day with a ridiculous act of heroism. You get the picture. Not much subtlety in this one.


Tanunda

The Barossa trip was just to go shopping. To a couple of wineries, plus to go to some of the food places that are almost as good. Hahndorf (the “German” village actually in the Adelaide Hills) has a Strawberry farm that does PYO (sadly no Raspberries), and sells Jams / Sauces etc. Maggie Beer’s is an extremely cute (and fairly expensive) farm shop overlooking a lake. Worth it for the view alone, but the food is good too. It’s only available in Fortnum and Mason back home, apparently. Hmm. Maybe I’ll just take advantage of it while I’m over here. And then Angaston has a shop that sells dried fruit.

Friday night was at a hotel in town. By the time I’d got home, been late to the hairdressers (then had to wait 20 min to get served), and got ready, there wasn’t a taxi to be had for love nor money. I tried. So I had to drive, and dump the car somewhere. There were a lot of the nurses there (but it is a large dept), not many of the consultants – just the usual faces you expect to turn up – and actually not many of the doctors until later when several of then had finished work. The food, which we were supposed to be “ordering” at 7, came just before 9, so there was quite a lot of wine had been drunk by then.


So a bit of dancing was done. One of the guys there has been doing salsa for a little while so I had a dance with him (obviously limited given the few steps I know – and it wasn’t easy communicating which I did know, at that stage. I mean that the music was loud and I lost my voice. Not any other reason for having difficulty communicating, you understand).

I’m not sure any of my photos will be any good, perhaps I will have to get a more portable camera. That’s the one drawback of using the phone – no flash.

Anyway, we got chucked out of the hotel at midnight, and ended up walking to the Stag which is at the other end of town. (That’s one thing about Adelaide – if a venue is at the other end of town, you know it’s a mile away). That’s obviously the place to be – bouncers with too much power, pants music, expensive drinks in bottles and everything. After several attempts to leave (thanks James, Lesley, Kitkat), I got away to get a cab and was home about 2:30.








Irritatingly I was awake at about 9 the next morning, with a real craving for greasy food. So I just had to go shopping to get some bacon and eggs. Plus I had a few christmas pressies to get in the post. Not cheap, but I’m nearly there. Such a good feeling.

In the afternoon, pretty much rehydrated, I met up for coffee on Unley Road with one of the girls from the Salsa class. She’s (I think) in need of an ear as she’s in the process of splitting up with husband, but it was a pleasant afternoon. And I managed to find the ice cream place where we went a few weeks ago, so a bit of a bonus.

Yesterday I was awake early, despite any intention to sleep in, so I cycled down to the rowing club. Sadly the Learn-to-Row session was cancelled as there were no boats in Adelaide suitable. My fault for not phoning earlier to find out, really. It was just starting to spit with rain as I got home, but sadly got no wetter. There are now pretty serious bush-fires out there, particularly on Kangaroo Island (maybe I won’t be going for a couple of months) and the Yorke Peninsula (ditto bracketed comment), and one person has died so far. Much, much earlier in the summer than usual.

Anyway, I had a migraine by the time I got to work probably just too knackered). Thankfully it was a quiet shift – which is very unusual for it to be so when you need it to be, and I got away at 12 and didn’t get called. The treatment for migraine here is an injection – my arm is now starting to feel a little less as though was involved in last night’s title fight.

And today, I’ve got most of my Christmas cards in the post. So the ball’s back in the court of those whose addresses I need (the address book was another casualty of the 20kg weight limit that Malaysian Airlines ridiculously impose). And I’ve just got to find some christmas decs for the house. I’ve made the mince pies today, plus some Italian biscuits (which should be interesting) for work and our christmas meal in a couple of weeks time.

So nearly there. But still I’m not convinced it’s Christmas.

What do I miss about England?

Apart from people (I have to say that first really, don’t I?).
Well I really miss not being able to just go out into the garden and pick raspberries (or blackberries, currants, blueberries, strawberries, elderberries etc). They’re $10 per punnet, and a punnet just doesn’t last very long.

I miss the car, particularly on cloudless days when you see everyone else with convertibles with the roof up! And just occasionally, after an intense shift I do miss the midnight blast up the A14 / A1, music loud to relax. (although I don’t miss the traffic jams trying to get to Cambridge, playing silly games to amuse myself like “which lorry would I hijack?” – usually a combination of the lorries carrying “French” bread from Sheffield, Greene King Ale and Davidstow cheese. That’d be me sorted. Don’t need expensive electronics.)

I miss shops like Fat Face and White Stuff and knowing which shops are likely to have clothes that fit and/or that I like. The two are mutually exclusive. If it's not fashionable or slightly different, it's not easy to find.

There’s a sort of superficiality about the culture, and I think a very wide streak of conformism here. (Although I admit I have been to the opera and the theatre to see a Tom Stoppard – “The Real Thing” which, apart from some v creaky English / Scottish accents, was excellent. So there’s more “high” culture than Peterborough.)

I think many people are very comfortable, and quite self-centred (I do not mean selfish) as a massively sweeping generalisation. Maybe because most people are recent émigrés and have found the lifestyle they like, and so that is what is expected. For example there’s a big outcry over house prices here. But when young couples are interviewed on the TV about not being able to get a first house, they all seem to be expecting to move straight into a detached 3 bed, 3 verandahed suburban house. And it is a good lifestyle, but of course that will come at a cost, which maybe Australia is now waking up to, because they haven’t been paying so far.

“The summers are getting hotter” (hottest Nov for years) – turn up the AC.
“There’s no water” (but MY grass will still be watered) – build a desalination plant. But goodness knows where the energy will come from, and we couldn’t possibly think of reusing run-off.
Petrol is now $1-45 per litre - “but I’ve Got to have a Ute or a 4x4, and I have to drive.”

Of course what I haven’t mentioned is the election last Saturday. Apart from being glad that it is over – every other ad on TV was one party sniping at another.
But anyway, from a very right-wing govt / PM (who has actually lost his seat too, it was announced on Sat) to a middle-of-centre one. If Rudd acts, then they will sign up to Kyoto and take action on the Health Service (did I ever say that things are v similar to the UK 6 or 7 yrs ago in that respect?).

But when that threatens comfort, how popular will he be?

So I could see him very much as a Blair-like figure, already talking about targets and such. And when business is threatened (for example, much of the Murray-Darling river basin problem is that while level are so low that ferries are shutting and small farms having to bulldoze their trees, big businesses are stockpiling water), how far will changes go?

Blimey that was a bit serious. And I haven’t been to Sydney or Melbourne which, I am told, are much more cosmopolitan. Adelaide is very insular, and quite local. There is good stuff going on, you just have to look for it. And I’ve had the same conversation twice recently, once with Doug, and then shortly after with an Aussie bloke, who didn’t disagree.

Anyway, have been working lots recently and I now have two whole days stretching in front of me. Annoyingly, because I was on call last night, I didn’t sleep particularly well. So I might just potter into town today.

Four of us went up to Morialta yesterday. Jo was on night shifts, so they didn’t phone me until 130 yesterday afternoon. The weather wasn’t good for the beach, else we’d have been going there. No snakes at the beach (Jo got bitten by a stick last Saturday that reared up and bit her as she cycled past, and spent an unplanned night in the dept – she’s pretty lucky. Of course if she’d come out to dinner last Sat as she’d been planning on doing, then it would have been different. And ideal first aid for snake bite is immobilisation – not cycling home).

Anyway, we agreed to meet in half an hour (it’s only 15 min drive from here). And I thought I was doing so well when I pulled the door closed early, carrying my rucksack, car keys, boots, car stereo, iPod. In fact everything except my house keys. And as I realised, the door latched. Thankfully next door came home and I managed to get hold of a locksmith to let me in. That’s $95 I didn’t really need.

I made it for 2:30 – it was the others who got lost and were late. How long have Seb and Jo lived here? We got walking eventually – it was quite obvious I’ve not been up a hill for a while.

And how different is it? The waterfalls have dried up, leaving just stagnant puddles. The lush green is now grey and instead of a garden of flowers, there are only a few dried looking daisies. (Apart from a few scabious by the road in all shades of purple).

But no snakes.