Portia faces life

Spent today doing a late Spring clean, & not because Summer is about to start officially on Tuesday. Just because, after 3 weeks, the place looked filthy, & I guess, pyschologically, making it nice was a way of nurturing myself.

Thanks to an east-facing bedroom window, & disturbed sleep from the steroids, I was up at 5.40. It was good to be up that early, because today is another hot & sticky one - at 4.15 pm it's still 30C. So early morning is definitely the best time.

I did all the obvious necessary stuff - cleaned the bathroom, washed floors, dusted and vacuumed, but I also found myself doing less obvious stuff that definitely fitted into the nurturing category. I polished all my wooden furniture with light furniture oil.

Most of my wooden stuff is cheap pine stained to look more solid and richer than it is - my chest of drawers pretends to be cedar, and the bookcases are all faux oak. Only the office table and the shelves to the 90s style sideboard are solid wood. I couldn't remember when I'd last oiled any of them - at least 3 years ago, I'm guessing, & everything had taken a bit of a bump & scratch from my recent moves, so it was time to give them some TLC.

It was immensely satisfying to see the thirsty raw pine on the top of the bookcases soak up the oil, and all the stained surfaces take on a lovely glow. I was enjoying it so much, that when I was done with the furniture, I found my two small turned Tasmanian bowls and gave them a gentle wipe with extra-virgin olive oil. Even my small breadboard - pine from Scandinavia - got a feed, the first it's ever had. I've promised it will get oiled more often!

Well, perhaps that's a trifle optimistic, as I still get the shakes & tire easily - BUT I've had my first swim for over two years, & boy, did it feel good to get back into the water! My friend L took me this morning before the day got too hot - another one of 35C with hot gusty winds.

Swim is probably an exaggeration, more a case of walking up & down the pool until out of my depth, & just the occasional short dash doing the Aussie crawl. But it was very welcome, & I'm sure that it has stretched some joints & loosened up some very tight muscles. My osteo warned me not to overdo it to start with, as the steroids would mask any joint pain, & I still have to be careful of the now-healed shoulder tendon. So I behaved more like the old Greek ladies my friend C & I used to see at the Enmore pool, who would cluster in the middle and gossip, with the occasional foray a few metres in either direction. Tho' I did more exercise than that - several small laps marching through the water, & some time hanging off the edge, kicking my legs.

We went to the renovated pool in Victoria Park, which is really well set-up with good change rooms, a cafe, a gorgeous kids paddling pool, a leisure pool, and an Olympic pool for the fitness fanatics. It doesn't have the old-fashioned appeal of the Annette Kellerman pool in Enmore Park, named after Annette kellerman, who apparently lived at Enmore for a while. But that is now closed for demolition & rebuilding, so I must transfer my affections to the Vic Park pool, & just keep my fond memories of the daggy old 1950s facility.

Having the pool close by in Vic Park also means I can walk there easily, & so be more likely to go regularly - altho' in "the old days" before I tore my shoulder tendon, I was doing the 25 min walk to Enmore Pool once a week. L & I are planning to go 2x a week for the next couple of weeks until she leaves for 3 months in the US, when I will develop my own routine.

Just need to get a beach towel & a new bathing cap & I'm set!

So, I've had a week in hospital - a truly novel experience, as I was last admitted to hospital 33 years ago for the birth of my gorgeous daughter.

What can I say? It was frightening and then it was boring, I hate being institutionalised, and the food was amazingly flavourless, BUT I had excellent care in one of Australia's leading university hospitals, and thanks to our universal health cover, I didn't have to pay a thing. And I was caught in time, so my dangerously low platelet levels didn't result in internal bleeding or a stroke.

I've put up a blog on the ITP thing: ITP and me, and I'm going to save lj for the fun stuff like food, knitting, gardening, street art, people, music...

Two weekends ago I walked the 25 minutes from my end of Newtown to the back end of the old Tooths Brewery (aka CUB Brewery) site on Broadway (a stalled major apartment building project) to attend the sustainability fair in Chippendale. The fair was held in a narrow street behind the main brewery site, now mostly demolished apart from a couple of 'iconic' buildings - the huge chimney stack, and the Federation sunrise building (can't find an online pic, tho' there surely *should* be one).

Anyhow, the pleasing thing about the new development is that while building is stalled thanks to the GFC, the developers are doing the right thing by the Chippo community and allowing them to use various other Edwardian buildings and vacant spaces for art galleries, workshops and a new fresh food co-op, as well as supporting the sustainability fair.

I went with great expectations, and was a little disappointed, having let my expectations get away from me. Part of the problem was getting there too early. The fair kicked off at 10 with a welcoming speech from our vaguely goth/punk/lesbo-look mayor, & having walked the distance faster than I expected, I was there in time to clap & cheer & note that she had on jeans, a windcheater and sneakers & no sign of her spiked dog collar. So of course, I was way too early for all talks, workshops, guided tours of local galleries etc.

More disappointing was the fact that the street gardens were nowhere visible, which if I'd seen last year's media release I would have known weren't there in Kensington St. I have yet to find them in the back streets of Chippo - I couldn't find them on my way back from the fair.

But, on the plus side, I got to meet the original Sydney guerilla gardeners (be warned the vid is not what it says, but worth a look anyhow!). I also bought lotsa lovely organic vegs, and some really cheap veg seedlings for my balcony garden - snowpeas, silverbeet and Asian salad greens. And chatted with farmers and gardeners. And met the innercity knitting group who invited me to their next monthly meeting. And I had a lovely peaceful wander home through Chippo & Darlington

Last Saturday was Halloween, and the last surviving goth community in Australia (possibly the world), which flourishes in Enmore, put on their annual Under the Blue Moon festival. I dressed all in black - floor-length skirt, longsleeved seethrough top, topped with black lace camisole, & the darkly purple punk earrings. Had anyone asked, I'd have said I was 'Goth Grannie'.

But, as ever, I arrived to early & my friend was too busy managing the charity shop to come, after all. There were stalls, and there were a few people in really brilliant long silk dresses, and cobweb lace gloves and stockings, a few vampires, and a smattering of the usual everyday goths. But no action! The best part was waiting for the the horse-drawn hearse to take off down the street. Of course it didn't look quite like this postcard, but much more beautifully sombre, and the horses were very patient with all the costumed people determined to have their photo taken with them.

Next weekend is Newtown Festival. No risk of my getting there too early, though, as I'm going with my friend L, whose distinguishing feature is an ability to be late for anything.

I went for a walk late this morning as I just couldn't settle to any work. One of the privileges of being self-employed is the ability to take executive decisions like that. I went into a part of Newtown I don't frequent as much as my immediate neighbourhood, as I wanted to get a good long walk, & also, if possible, to check out a huge warehouse home/office up for auction. Sheer curiosity.

In the event I couldn't find the street that was in, but I did find a street full of rosellas.

It was a lovely suburban street of two and three-story Victorian terraces, not particularly remodelled and gentrified (at least on the outside), and one tiny, utterly cute candy pink cottage with a hedge of pink & white hibiscus. I collect pink houses - what a shame to be without a camera!

The more so when I realised just what birds were making such a racket that I couldn't hear the plane descending to the nearby airport. The street had been planted with red bottlebrushes some years ago - one to every two houses - & these were now large trees, covered in red 'brushes.' And, it turned out, in Eastern rosellas as well.

Despite their raucous 'ark ark' and whistling, the birds were so well camouflaged in their red & green that at first I only saw them as they flew from one tree to another. I was lucky enough to stand by one tree and watch a couple of them feeding right in front of me for several minutes.

Since I have no camera, here's an artist's impression of the birds (although I didn't see them as clearly as this, as the trees were very bushy).

Watching Hugh Fearnley-Wittingstall expounding the joys of home-grown, guerrilla gardened and hedgerow autumnal foods on the teev this evening, I discovered, that yes indeed, beetroot is better thought of as a vegetable masquerading as a fruit. (Or a fruit masquerading as a vegetable.)


HF-W is into all things organic, natural, local and omnivorous. He bullies vegetarian hairdressers into catching live fish & killing, gutting & cooking them. Ditto with eating offal from a freshly killed lamb from his farm.

But he's not really a bully. Deciding that beetroot has always had a bad rap because it's usually met sliced and pickled in vinegar, he set out to convince fair goers at his autumn fair that beetroot is actually delicious. He and a couple of chefs created beetroot chocolate brownies, beetroot apple crumble, almost fluorescent beetroot icecream, and mini beetroot toffee 'apples'(they were a failure). The three sweet items were a huge hit, & I plan to find the recipe for the brownies. I can bodge up beetroot apple crumble, & I'm not enough struck on icecream to make that, but the brownies looked to die for! Shame we don't have smellavision!

Here's the beetroot brownie recipe

Here's how you tell if the lovely fresh veggies you just bought at the farmers' market are truly organic: if a tiny weevil-like insect strolls out from the beetroot leaves, and there are chickweed plants in with the carrot tops.

Speaking of beetroot leaves, I have discovered a new green/red vegetable. I was about to ask the girl to cut off the leaves and stems from my bunch of beets, when I realised they looked like larger versions of the rather chewy greens in my latest bag of salad mix. So I asked if they were edible, & they are. Result: for $3 I got 2 lots of veggies - beetroot (with the bonus pink pee factor) and something that tastes like silverbeet but takes as long to steam as cabbage. If you count in the bright red stems, I have 3 vegs.

I did put some of the smaller leaves aside for salad greens, though I suspect they're going to be a bit chewy & preferable steamed.

For lunch today I roasted sebago potatoes, jap pumpkin (not as nice as Queensland Blue but easier to cut and more readily available), and giant cloves of garlic with olive oil, oregano and chili salt, and tried out the steamed beet leaves. Delicious! Tempting to eat it all in one hit, but I'm trying to bear M Pollan's advice in mind: "Eat food, not too much, mostly plants."

Next week there's a different market to look forward to, in the recently planted community garden in Chippendale, near Central station. They're having a sustainable food, art and music fair. The community garden is a roadside garden, apparently; local restaurants have donated their food waste to make compost, and the residents plant and maintain the garden. I'm really looking forward to seeing it. (wish I had a working camera!)

Thanks to our fabulous duststorms this week, I spent most of Sat afternoon, cleaning. Warm soapy water and red dust create an unpleasant smell together, but at least everything now looks sparkly ('sparkly arkly', as my favourite radio announcer puts it). The storms have raised a cynical joke: "if you can't get to South Australia this year, don't worry. It'll come to you."

Before my marathon clean I took myself produce shopping at the local farmers' market, a treat I can't afford very often, but always enjoyable. Being in an upwardly-mobile, even if still considerably non-mainstream, precinct, the range of products on display tend to the gourmet & expensive - as in wines, cured meats, artisan cheeses,olive oils - but at least all produced in NSW, or occasionally Tassie. I fell at the first hurdle & bought a kilo of organic free-range chicken thigh fillets & the most beautiful big ofr eggs for much the same price I would have paid at the ofr butcher in Broadway, so I was able to feel good that the producers were getting the whole price.

Next stand along, I tasted the best natural yoghurt I've ever tried - rich & creamy with a slight tang, but with no cream, & certainly no gelatine! So what if it was half as much again as the greek-style yog I buy in the supermarket - that contains cream & powdered milk, & this just has pasteurised cow's milk & the friendly bugs.

Alarmed at how fast my money was disappearing, I eschewed the gourmet meats stand, tho' I had promised myself a little piece of lamb this week, & headed in search of cheap fruit & veg. Their prices are more in my range, & the apples are crisp and juicy, and the potatoes suitably dirty. I bought a bag of apples (& a single-serve apple pie), beetroot, potatoes, pumpkin, cabbage, onions - & plants for my garden: dill, basil, oregano and rocket seedlings.

This morning was spent cooking - stewing apples, boiling beetroot, making a chocolate & ginger sponge cake,& while the oven was hot, a chicken, olive & pumpkin casserole. I also made a fish pie with frozen smoked cod. So my fridge is full (if my friend L comes over, she won't say "you have nothing in your fridge!"), & there is half a cake in the freezer & the remaining chicken fillets.

Once the sun was off my balcony this afternoon, I messed about with potting mix & water-saving pellets and planted out my herbs and veggies. I have one more long planter that I could put lettuces in, but no more potting mix, which is the expensive part of the equation. (The small bags that are manageable for me with my shopping trolley, cost twice as much per kilo as the huge 30 kilo bags that would require a trip to a garden outlet and a strong friend with a car.)

To round off the weekend's chores, I did the rough draft of my tax return - & it's not even late!

One of the really good things about such a productive w/end has been the tiny amount of time I've spent on the puter. I didn't turn it on at all yesterday until the evening, when I spent an hour & a half looking at knitting patterns to find something to make with the 'soy silk' yarn idlewild sent me. I found a pattern that looks like it will work. I'm gonna swatch up a sample this evening while watching the rerun of Hornblower

Sorry for my looong absence from this page - life as an on-call hack journo, combined with a return of my old neck & shoulder pain, has chewed up blogging time. To make up for it, herewith some shots of NSW' worst dust storm in 42 years.

Sydney enveloped in red dust

I've made a firm(ish) resolution to try to post once a week - 10 weeks is an embarrassingly long absence!

Well, maybe disaster is exaggerating - but Kepler disappointment. Pinning up the pieces today, hoping to power on with the sewing up, I found the sleeves don't fit the front & back. Somehow I've screwed up & my armholes are way too long. I thought at first I'd made the sleeves wrong, but comparing with the schematic, it's clear I've made the armhols too long by several inches. And I thought I was following the instructions so carefully!

Now I'll have tor rip out back to the armhole starts on both sides. Phooey! Pig's bum & other rude words!! No way I'm going to get this finished before I go up the mountain next weekend. But I'd better sort it out before I get too far along with my purply project. Perhaps that one should be put aside & i should concentrate on the good works of the yellow charity squares. After I fix Kepler, of course, because if I put that aside now, the risk is I won't touch it again for months.

Omigod - it's almost a month since I last posted here! So what have I been doing? Well apart from chasing work (mostly fruitlessly), fiddling with my business website, and checking my Facebook, I've been knitting.

A good fairy (or maybe she's a mermaid) sends me fabulous yarn each year to temp me into ever more advanced levels of knitting. This year the mermaid sent 2 lots of yarn - a flecked pinky-purple raw silk, and mixed pastel earthtones in (I believe) soy silk. It's not edible, for all that it's gelato colours.

Last year's yarn - a cotton & silk blend in an oatmeal with subtle hints of pink, green and lavender - is almost knitted up into a close fitting pullover with Celtic patterned cable bands on the hips and wrists. It's quite a close fit in the pattern photo - I'm hoping it's not too close a fit for my middle-aged boobs, which seem to have spread a bit in the past year. I'll soon know - I'm 2/3 way up the last piece.*

The good fairy/mermaid up the ante this year - not only two lots of yarn, BUT also a book of Viking inspired patterns, like the Celtic cables only more fiendish. Dare I tackle the simplest of these with the purply raw silk? Or shall I spend yet another evening on the puter trawling through free patterns searching for the perfect one - not too easy, not too hard, not too sloppy, not too close fitting, in the right gauge yarn or near enough, so I can stop the nightly swatching (a knitting technical term) and get going on the next exciting project.

So much entertainment from a ball of yarn and 2 needles. Only a cat could have more fun with it!


* No work in progress or yarn photos, alas. My camera has died & I'm one of the few people left on the planet with a mobile that doesn't have a camera. You'll just have to imagine them.

A friend came over today & brought me some cuttings of a trailing indoor plant, (what used to be called 'wandering jew', but I don't know what its non-antiSemitic common name is), plus a decorative ceramic plant pot I thought I'd given away forever, & a couple of plastic pots, so I spent a happy hour this afternoon 'gardening" on my balcony.

First I had to go down the street with my shopping trolley, through the hordes of sunny Saturday afternoon wanderers - some complete with enormous racing prams & small children - to the hardware store to buy expensive but conveniently-sized potting mix. No point buying the economy 25 litres at next to nothing, when I have nowhere to keep the leftovers.

Another friend had brought me some cuttings as a housewarming present when she came to my shindig a couple of weeks ago, so there were potential plants that needed TLC & potting. After an hour of playing mud pies with potting mix & water, & surprisingly managing not to get any on myself (or worse, the bedroom carpet, only centimetres away from the balcony), I'd repotted the parsley, oregano and chives, and planted the cuttings of jasmine, scented leaf geranium and ivy geranium. L had put the tradescantia (wj&*) cuttings already for me, so they only needed watering & hoisting on top of a high cupboard.

It remains to be seen what will survive our relatively mild winter.

Oh, my garden is not quite complete. I need a dwarf rosemary bush and a scarlet geranium.


* 'Wandering Jew' was also known as 'Creeping Christian', presumably by offended Jews. Now it's called spiderwort, or in Australia, 'a noxious weed'. So I mustn't let it wander too far & escape out the door.

Took my family (up from Melbourne) to see the Skipping Girls last weekend, between intermittent heavy showers of rain. The notice has been edited already - the original date of the girls' creation has been modified to '96(!). 13 years is a long time for something as ephemeral as uncommisssioned street art.

My daughter-outlaw pointed out that Aboriginal people call white Aussies "Skippy" - giving the "Skippy Girls" more relevance. Everybody loved them.

I thought the Skipping Girls had been removed - painted over, or the fence panels replaced - during the time I was away from my beloved neighbourhood, but this w/end has proved me wrong. Hooray!

Firstly, I saw a guy yesterday,selling framed photos of Newtown street art - naturally the first that caught my eye was a shot of the girls. He also had shots of the Clock People, as well as other graf from around the streets,

This afternoon, I went for a walk along towards the railway yards, past where I thought the girls had been, where the corrugated iron fence has been repaired. Almost to the new Eveleigh Markets site in the railway yards, my heart leapt - there were the girls, still on their fence. I hadn't seen them the couple of times I'd gone to the farmers' market on a Saturday morning, because of all the crowds in the street. The markets have a stylised version of the girls at the entrance, which I'd thought was a nice touch, so they weren't lost for ever.

Not only are the girls still on their fence, it's clear they're a loved part of the neighbourhood. One panel of the fence has a painted sign: "YAY Skippy Girls! Originally painted by R & friends in 02; and restored and loved by many of the Gadigal people in '07." (Sydney is built on Gadigal land, and there is an aboriginal commmunity centre just past the market). Another panel of the fence reads "Skippy Girls love you". Some of the girls have been painted with black faces and hands, others with black hair, but they all have respectful touches of colour. I'm annoyed my camera no longer works; I would like to have documented them.

As final proof of the Skipping Girls/Skippy Girls' place in the neighbourhood, a corner art gallery further along had a mixed media piece in the window, with a rusty piece of iron referencing the railway, & a tiny row of skipping girls along the bottom.

Today being a gorgeous autumn day, I actually managed to haul myself out of bed before 7am (the sunrise shines straight in my window) & walk the 2kms down the length of King St, north to south to Sydney Park. Not only that, I also walked up & down some of the bumps laughing known as 'hills' on this converted industrial wasteland, and enjoyed the wind in my hair - it was a strong breeze, so it managed to ruffle my 2inches of purple. I stood on the top of a couple of the bumps & gazed south towards the airport, & then north towards the city skyline. But mostly I just enjoyed the huge expanse of sky, blankets of fluffy grey & white clouds for as far as I could see.

There were people & dogs, & the occasional runner with pram (not in the sky), but there was so much space to spread out in, they weren't as intrusive as on my Annandale waterfront walk. There were lots of birds too - currawongs and mynahs & a few magpies. After I wandered through the AIDS memorial forest, I sat for a while near the old brick kilns before heading back up King St & home. So probably 5, maybe 6 kms. The weather was just perfect - cool enough to enjoy - neither cold nor too warm for a light windcheater.

(I was dead chuffed I could walk both ways as well as around some of the park. I'd taken some change in case I (a) caught a bus back up King St, or (b) stopped for a coffee & a rest on the way home, & came home with my money unspent, but my tight hips complaining. I know I can do it again, so long as the weather's cool.)

This arvo I did some tinkering on the short story that hasn't finished coming together yet, & then more tinkering on the website I'm trying to build with software that I don't know, by just doing cheats & and taking quick looks at the help pages to get out of trouble.

A lovely relaxing, creative day.

Last night was Earth Hour, when almost 4,000 towns & cities around the world switched off their lights for an hour to accentuate the importance of dealing with climate change. Not in Newtown they didn't.

When 8.30pm came around, I switched off the tv at the powerpoint, turned off my lights, grabbed a torch & went for a walk. I didn't expect the lights in the hallways of my apartment building to be dimmed, but I was very disappointed to find my favourite little park so brightly lit you could sit & read, and the neighbouring streets with every streetlight lit. This part of Newtown is run by Sydney City Council, ardent supporters of, & some say originators of Earth Hour, which started in Sydney only 2 years ago, so I expected street lights to be dimmed or alternative ones switched off.

Newtown has gone ever further upmarket in the 18 months since I left, and many of the big old Victorian houses have been renovated. Large chandeliers are obviously a designer decor must-have, combined with an absence of curtains, judging from the numbers of dazzling chandeliers I saw. Being a warm evening, people also had doors and windows open, and in many cases it looked as if they were celebrating Earth hour by turning all their lights on, rather than off!

Carrying my unnecessary torch, I felt like a World War 2 air raid warden, & was tempted to hammer on people's doors, shouting "Put that light out!!"

Turned into King Street, and there it was - Saturday night in full swing & full blaze. It had all it's usual delights - live music: a guy in a tuxedo singing Sinatra, a saxophonist, a drummer, all playing separately, crowds promenading up & down, cafes & restaurants awash with chatter and laughter, the odd beggar & even odder derro - but last night it didn't fill me with delight, but instead, intense disappointment. If anything, King St was more glittering than it had been on the first Earth Hour. In the end, I counted three cafes in the space of eight blocks trading by candlelight - 2 Thai & one pizza bar, and Gloria Jean's had its lights down & tealights on the tables, so I gave it half a tick.

It was the dear old Marlie



that restored my hope. They had turned their sign off, & somehow had organised to have the street light outside the front bar turned off as well. The bar was busy,as usual, but in an unnatural state of dimness.

I hope that next March 28, many other businesses on Newtown's 'eat street' will follow the Marlie's example, and put that light out!!

I went for an early morning walk today, intending to walk down to and around Sydney Park, an old industrial site complete with brick kilns, which has been remediated and turned into parkland and wetlands. It has had even more work done on it since I was last there 2 years ago, including, so the council tells us, public toilets! (No more going behind the bushes.) But I didn't get there, although I got as far as the penultimate traffic light before the park.

The problem was, as usual, street art. I had to pass the Fiji Indian Market, which used to have some snazzy art on its side wall, opposite the Old Man of the Sea mural. The Swan Girl, Helmet Head and Ganesh had all gone, replaced with a new and more Bollywood Ganesh, and a long line of dancing letters surrounded by flames. (I'm sure there's a graf term for this, but I don't know it.) There was also more new art work further along the lane. I was glad I'd remembered to take the camera. Then, one old & decrepit building just before the park, had been repainted in very tasteful shades of pink to highlight its Edwardian style, so that had to be recorded too. By then, I'd lost interest in trees & grass & waterbirds, & headed up side streets & laneways instead.

It seems, in these first few weeks back, that I'm revisiting my old haunts and cataloging the changes - particularly the art works. Most of my favourites are still there, but it's good that I have photos of them as they do get replaced by others. (No time to put the new pics up yet, but soon.)

After a late breakfast, I procrastinated far more than I should, finishing a library book before putting up hooks for all my pictures, instead of working on the heavy and daunting peak phosphorus article, deadline tomorrow. I did work on some of the definitely more enjoyable holistic vets (part 2) article, as I waited for the hooks to adhere to the walls. There are still some pictures that can't be hung yet - especially idlewild's 2 non angli paintings - but I have enough room in my hallway to get them up once framed (hooray!). There is also a semi-abstract photo of mine I need to frame for the office.

Now I'm whacked - it was an early start - so there's no way I can tackle peak phosphorus tonight. Let's hope the brain's clear in the morning!

I've been back in Newtown exactly a week, & it still feels weird. Wonderful, but weird. I guess part of the weirdness is about being in the same apartment building, but not the same apartment. This one is spacious, & has a view (pics later).

Yesterday I walked three blocks along Wilson St to the old railway yards at Eveleigh, which in the 18 months that I've been away have been transformed into an arts precinct - drama, dance, music, galleries - and a large, undercover farmers' market.*

The market started just before Christmas, & has been in recess until yesterday, so there's room for improvement, but it was pretty good. The room for improvement aspect is that most of the stands were for high quality gourmet produce - wines, olive oils, olives, cheeses, specialty meats - & not enough of the cheap & cheerful fruit & veg. I splurged on some gorgeous Tasmanian cheese - not the well-known King Island varieties, but the lesser known, to me anyhow, Bruny Island ones. Southeast rather than Northwest. I bought some grana, made from a mix of goats' & cows' milk, which, at $11 for 150 grams, was pretty well priced, but rather steep for my severely limited budget. I teamed it with a kilo of Paradise pears - tiny round pears not much bigger than an unshelled walnut, crisp like an apple but with a strong pear flavour.

Fortunately, I managed to get the usual suspects - potatoes, onions, pumpkin, bok choy - at cheaper than supermarket prices, & free-range eggs at not much more than battery hen ones, so was well pleased. Then I bought a bunch of basil.

I'd debated with myself about buying basil when I saw people walking past carrying bunches; the smell was just so delicious. But basil partners tomato, & I can't eat tomatoes. So I dithered, but finally overcome by the heavenly aroma, bought a large bunch (again cheaper than the supermarket variety). When I got home, I put it in a vase of water, while I wondered how to use it. I had some leaves in a salad, & thought the rest might just be for beauty.

This morning, I remembered pesto. Thank god for pesto - a great vegetarian sauce for pasta. Substituting sunflower seeds for pine nuts, I bashed up all the basil leaves with garlic & olive oil, & an aromatic 15 minutes later had me a tub of pesto. I didn't grate the grana to mix into it, preferring to save that for nibbling with the pears, & grating at the last minute.

* Walking into the market, I was delighted to see a notice, reminding patrons to be quiet and considerate of nearby residents, decorated with a stylised version of the skipping girl. The promoters must be local, or at least have a keen sense of the local ambience.

This morning, as part of my preparations for moving, I bought a washing machine. A brand new, small, energy & water efficient front loader. What's more I paid cash - or at least put it on my everyday card, not my expensive credit card - & thus got a discount for cash.

I walked away feeling very excited & adult, which got me wondering when I last bought a washing machine, new or used. I know I bought a new front loader once before, way before they were popular, being as I am (or was) a technological early adopter. It must have been in about 1983, for we had it when we were starving in the country at Stanley, when the tank water was such low pressure that it took forever to fill the machine, & I could only manage one load of washing a day. I assume we took it with us when we moved back to our little regional city, but I can't remember what happened to it. All I know for sure, is, that since I moved to NSW 13 years ago - coincidentally on the date that I'm moving into my new apartment (ooh, spooky, possums!) - I have always rented a washing machine, getting a new model every 2 or 3 years.

Now I'm returning the behemoth combo washer dryer I rented in Katoomba, which is way too big & powerful for me, & taking the gamble that a washer of my own will not die on me after a few years of use. I've taken out an extended warranty on it, which ate up the discount but means it will be eligible for servicing for 6 years. The money I save not renting the behemoth will pay for the new washer in 6 months, & thereafter will help with my general cash flow.

Tonight I've been taking down pictures and removing hooks from the walls. The stick-on hooks really do work! Only one refused to come off smoothly & made a small hole in the plaster; the others glided off, perfectomundo! And I discovered that white out is great for covering up the tiny measurement marks, at least on white walls. At first, when all the pictures & hooks were down, I felt sad, but then I perked up because they mean I'm that much closer to moving back to Newtown.

This time next week, I'll be home!

Taking a break in the nightly packing routine, part of me is rather proud at how well organised I am. I still have most of the boxes from the move back down the mountain, & as I labelled them very carefully, I know what can go back into which box. Also I'm using less tape, as I only slit the boxes to open them.

But another part thinks maybe I am a little mad - one cup short of a tea set - to be moving for the 3rd time in 2 years. Why couldn't I be sensible & stay in this nice 2 bed townhouse, even if the stairs are a nuisance, especially as most of my friends & my older sister have worse arthritis than I do, and the grouting is peeling away from the tiles in the shower, & the kitchen lino needs replacing, because it's cracking & breaking. Those small niggles apart, it is a very pleasant & comfortable place, and I was delighted when I found it 6 months ago. Why this obsessive urge to move back to Newtown?

This melancholic thought has struck me a few times in the past week - once the euphoria of 'bagging' an apartment in my old building had worn off a little. The problem, the cause of my angst, is the plants on my verandah. After months of loving care, they are for the most part, doing well. Two lavender bushes, a rosemary bush, a very healthy hydrangea, mint (a recent addition), chives, parsley, oregano. I water them regularly & feed them occasionally, & they repay me with fresh herbs and beauty every day.

But my new place has next to no outside space, only a metre & a half of balcony shared with 2 air conditioning motors. There's just about room (I hope) to squeeze the hydrangea & a large fern I have upstairs, to make a mass of greenery which I'll see from my office. Now I'm begging my friends to come & inspect my plants & choose which they'll take. It feels like parting with much loved pets & hoping the new owners will give them a good home & as much loving care as I did.

Despite this small, but real grief, I'm still happy & excited to be moving back to my beloved Newtown, which always feels as if it's my other heartland, the place where I belong. I'll take my two indoor plants, and one pot each of chives & parsley, which may or may not grow in the well-lit living room. According to this I should be able to grow quite a few herbs indoors, so I might take some mint & see if I can strike some of the organo. And if I can't get them to grow in plant pots, I'll seriously consider this.