Road Trip to Townsville

Road Trip Townsville 09no Notes

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Anzac Day 2009

Anzac Day 09

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Sing Loud at Mater Dei

Singing LOUD at Mater Dei

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My Easter Sunday

Easter Sunday 09

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My Country - created by Patty Beecham

My CountryNPCJ

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Cream of Cauliflower Soup with Blue Cheese

Cooking time: Less than 60 minutes

Makes 2 litres

INGREDIENTS

50g butter
1 medium onion (150g), chopped coarsely
1 medium cauliflower, (1.2kg), chopped coarsely
2 teaspoons madras curry powder
1 litre (4 cups) chicken stock
2 cups (500ml) water
½ cup (125ml) cream
salt and pepper, to taste
chives, to serve
sour cream, to serve
Blue Cheese, - Costello or similar

METHOD
Heat butter in large saucepan. Cook onion and cauliflower until softened and translucent. Add curry powder and cook 30 seconds or until fragrant.

Add stock; simmer, covered 10 minutes or until cauliflower is soft. Using a stick blender or goblet blender; blend soup until smooth. Add water to thin soup as desired. Place over gentle heat to warm through if necessary. Add roughly chopped blue cheese - Costello or similar.

Stir in cream. Serve immediately with snipped chives and a dollop of sour cream, if desired.

*note! I would also delete the curry powder, add garlic, and a dollop of mustard to taste. Nom nom.

Pumpkin Soup

Serving size: Serves 6
Cooking time: Less than 60 minutes

The smoothest consistency for this soup can be achieved by using a blender, stab mixer or mouli.

per serving 8.3g fat; 1008kJ (241cal)
INGREDIENTS

40g butter
1 large brown onion (200g), chopped coarsely
3 bacon rashers (210g), chopped coarsely
1.5 kg pumpkin, chopped coarsely (I use Butternut Pumpkins, easier to chop)
2 large potatoes (600g), chopped coarsely
1.5 litres (6 cups) chicken stock

METHOD
Melt butter in large saucepan; cook onion and bacon, stirring, until onion softens. Stir in pumpkin and potato. (Don't worry aobut the skin, you can cook the pumpkin and then slice the skin off when it's soft, messy, time consuming, but good food requires attention to detail)

Stir in stock, bring to a boil; simmer, uncovered, about 20 minutes or until pumpkin is soft.

Blend or process soup, in batches, until pureed. Return to same cleaned pan; stir until heated through.

Taste and add salt/pepper (fine white prefferable, as fresh ground black pepper can look messy)

Add a dollop of fresh cream is desired and chives. Voila!

Tomato Soup

I tend not to measure anything, so will just ramble and pretend I know. Ok?

TOMATO SOUP

8 x large vine ripened tomatoes
1 x large onion finely diced
2 x heaped teaspoons fresh garlic *when I say fresh I mean out of a jar, sigh
1 x heaped teaspoon fresh ginger *ditto
½ cup tomato paste for depth of flavour
½ jug of veggie stock
Olive oil
Fresh ground pepper/salt to taste
Fresh basil or dried, as much as you like *shake shake
Glass of red or white wine for chef, one for the pot
Splosh of Tabasco sauce, taste, taste, can’t un-add it once it’s in!

Quarter tomatoes and roughly de-seed with fingers or spoon, remove end bit from stalk, dice onions,gently soften in olive oil, add garlic/ginger and gently simmer.
Add vegie stock and tomato paste.
Chuck in everything else.
Add Tabasco sauce, - START TASTING! You are after a SLIGHT tingle in the back of the throat, don’t forget you are also adding shitloads of fresh pepper so err on caution, then enjoy.
Blend with beaters or in blender. *Mine leaked, sighs crossly.

You WILL get tomato skins, so if you don’t want that, blister the skins off first before chopping. Hold over gas stove on fork, or bake in hot oven 5 minutes. Hold in tea-towel and rub skins off. It really doesn’t affect the soup at all, gently simmer to thicken slightly and reduce.

As variety, you could add musherooms/lentils or corn. Pearl barley will also give a different in-mouth feel. Just experiment. :)

Serve with parmesan cheese grilled on toast in oven. Bon appetite!

Serves 4-6

An apology to Dieter

Sorry Dieter, that you were dragged into the mud that parades as a blog on another site. What started as a simple response to an hysterical tweet on Twitter, morphed into a name calling, disgraceful show of hatred, intolerance and blind prejudice.
I won’t go into details here mainly because I simply can’t be bothered with over reactions and misguided intent, but for you, my dear friend, to be dragged into this mess, I am sorry.
Anyone who knows me also knows that I stand by my arguments, and I have never, ever hidden from who I am or what I say. When I left my comments on another blog, I checked my profile and was horrified to see it was private.
I am NOT a private person on the net, I don’t believe in hiding behind funny names and so on (although my Pattycam name is derived from Patty + cam) so I changed my profile to enable everyone to see it.
Unfortunately others from this blog also came to my site (which is hilarious) and left various comments under the highly original name of Anonymous.
I deleted one simply because it was so vile, that I don’t want to have that sort of crap on my site, on OUR beloved site.
For this strange woman to attack you Dieter, in such a mean, nasty and disgusting way is beyond belief. You and I know that I never asked anyone to go fight my fight, or enter into the discussion, and I am deeply mortified that you were hurt in reading her vile ranting.
If anyone would like to contact me about the whole discussion I am more than happy to go into it further with you, but for now, let’s just pretend this never happened, it’s a sad world out there some days.
I will however leave on my comments and links, it’s all part of my life, and our Blog, and I am happy to do so, if only to show you that some people simply cannot enter into an argument without twisting your words, reading only what they want to read, and resorting to name calling, so childish.
Ha.

A very Morgan weekend

So what do you make of all this then, eh?

Somedays I really hate the internet.

To "Kath"

IN YOUR FACE!!!

Russell Morris - Hush

Swine Flu - Google maps the spreading pandemic

Swine Flu
The World Health Organisation on Wednesday raised its flu alert to phase five out of six, WHO chief Margaret Chan said, signalling that a pandemic was "imminent" following the swine flu outbreak.

"I have decided to raise the influenza pandemic alert from phase four to phase five," the WHO director general announced after an emergency meeting of the UN health agency's pandemic experts.

"This is a signal to governments, ministries of health... to the pharmaceutical industry, that certain actions now should be undertaken with increased urgency," she told journalists.

"Preparedness measures undertaken because of the H5N1 influenza was an investment and we are now benefiting from this investment," she said.

She underlined that the threat following the swine flu outbreak focused on Mexico and the United States "must be taken seriously".

Phase five, one step short of a full pandemic, is characterised as a "strong signal that a pandemic is imminent and that the time to finalise... the planned mitigation measures is short," according to the WHO's global emergency planning.

It also acknowledge sustained human-to-human spreading in at least two countries in a WHO region, in this case Mexico and the United States, Chan told journalists.

The move came after a meeting of scientific experts on the emergency flu pandemic panel recommended raising the alert level from four.

The US government is prepared to cope with a "full-fledged pandemic" of swine flu if necessary, but the public should not be alarmed, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said on Wednesday.

"We have been preparing all along as if this is going to be stage six," she told reporters.

"Our efforts have been to stay ahead of whatever number WHO assigns. And therefore, our preparations are for a situation in which this does become a full-fledged pandemic," Napolitano said.

"We are preparing for the worst, hoping for the best," she said, after a Mexican toddler became the first person to die in the United States of H1N1 swine flu and the number of infections rose to at least 91.

But Napolitano, again rejecting calls from US lawmakers to close the nation's borders, said "panicking" was unhelpful and underlined that a regular flu season claims about 36,000 American lives every year.

Anzac Day '09 Continued #2

Peeved - Russell Morris

Long story short = peeved.

Anzac Day '09 Continued

Zizi cooks up a feast, blue skies watch over us for inaugural Anzac Day Service at Clunes, a wonderful day.

Anzac Day 09

We awake slowly from sleep in the spare room. Unsure of the time (it’s so dark) I visualise the clock, guesstimate – 4am. I hold my own private dawn Service in my head, still foggy from a dreamless night’s sleep.

Finally we both answer the call of nature and to our surprise, it’s 7am. So much for an early start, but I am thankful of the sleep-in. It’s Anzac Day, and we are in Clunes, a small township south-west of Byron Bay; the welcome sign boasts “Welcome to Clunes – proudly retaining Village Life”

A few cups of tea later, and we walk to the local park around the corner. They are holding their very first Anzac Day ceremony and we will be there to join in the spirit of what is to come. Zizi stays behind to cook our breakfast. We each have a job to do. Mine is to witness everything, so I begin to people-watch and take notes in my head.

A small crowd are gathered. The old women outnumber the old men. In the middle of a roughly mown paddock, stands a short stone monument beside a white flagpole. We stand in the shade of a huge Poinciana tree, gazing upwards I can see the spread of its branches, like a huge leafy umbrella.

Various men stand next to the monument, fiddling with a stereo system. There is no band, or drummer, but to my left there are five or so soldiers; beautifully dressed on their slouch hats and golden ‘rising sun’s badges.

People chat amongst themselves. Two school children - in white and red uniforms – rehearse their speech and mum fusses over her son. “He’ll need a chair, get him a chair” until even I turn to her and say with a smile “oh, he’s got young legs, he’ll be right!” but this isn’t enough, and she’s off, a helicopter mother in full flight, carrying her son in Year 7, a bloody chair so the poor boy can sit down. It must be a weight for him to hold his piece of paper, and wreath.

The sky is magnificently blue and clear; gazing over the far-away hills to the east I can see forever. Fat trees and knee-deep grass, lush after the recent rains.

Then we begin. To my disappointment, there is no hymn ‘Abide with Me’ but there is a small prayer, and I try not to note two spelling mistakes and one whole paragraph gone walk-about off the page.

The flag begins at half-mast; is raised and then lowered again for the Last Post. The bugler reads his music – holding a sheet of music out in front of him with his left hand - and manages to hit B-flat several times. We wince, and try to look respectful.

A minute’s silence is punctated by magpies warbling softly in the tree beside me, the bright red-roof of the cottage to my right grins cheerily as if to say “She’ll be right mate”. A semi truck roars past this huddle of strangers, the back reading “It’s cool” and I know that life does indeed, go onwards.

Later; at the pub, I watch the televised Dawn Service at Gallipolli; and then France; and note that their Bugler is so intent on playing his mournful piece so beautifully, his eyes close for the entire performance. When the last notes have played, he slowly opens his eyes, and then closes them again. He swallows hard, twice. He is in his own world remembering some time past. He blinks once, twice, and then retreats. It’s a beautiful moment, but for now, I am back in the paddock, with the sun beating down and the school children about to lay their only wreath. An old woman stands stiffly in front of me, her walking stick poised to support herself. Uh-oh I think, but when duty calls, she rises to the occasion with a stiff back and a quick gait. I am surprised!

We then sing the National Anthem, and then the thankyous begin. These seem to take almost the same amount of time as the entire Service.

The MC says in his strine voice “ Sterlo, thanks for the music – not!” and also includes the lawn-mowing men in his praise. “Gees good thing this paddock was mown, two days ago it was knee-high and looked like the bloody Vietnam jungle, if it hadn’t had been mown, I would’ve freaked out!” We all laugh, but I can’t help but wonder what he has been through.

Later, I chat to the remaining four soldiers and have my photo taken with them. A lone man stands beside the monument, reading the wreaths. I take his photo from a distance. Just him, the sky, the land, the green, the blue, the flag, the thoughts and memories, fresh and half remembered.

Lest we Forget.

Meeting Dennis

‘It. Robs. Me. Of. My. Dignity,’ he gasps, chest rising and caving with each word.

His thick fingers gently stab at his heart.

Holding his left hand, careful not to interrupt his oxygen flow, I hang my head and the tears fall.

He continues, and it’s such an effort for him. Eyes open and shut with the words: ‘I think of your dad, John, and how he battled.’

His fingers squeeze mine. I roughly wipe the wetness away from my face, and blow my nose.

‘My, how he battled. I think to myself: if John can do it, I can do it too.’ He believes this.

****

The hospital smells of hospitals; of death, and dying, and despair. Looking around, I count 23 pieces of A4 notices, and only 2 dreary artworks.

VISITORS PLEASE NOTE: IN THE RESPIRATORY WARD NO FLOWERS ARE ALLOWED.

It is silent except for a muffled chat show across the hallway. An old lady watches her television, her feet in lambskin slippers. I remember how dad’s feet were also wrapped like that, the heel splits; it’s the first sign.

****

The young cleaner bristles past, blue mop squeezed with such enthusiasm you have to see it to understand. A passionate mop-squeezer. We exchange smiles.
When I sit beside Dennis, the nurse warns me to ‘watch the wet patch’ in case I slip.

****

I let Dennis speak, it’s important to him.

He continues - ‘The days are in limbo, I look at the clock and it says 2pm, but it feels like the middle of the night. When I sleep I hallucinate. I dream I am sleeping in a garage’; and his eyes dart quickly around the room as if to confirm he is indeed in ward 2M at the Wesley, Brisbane.

‘I drift off, and have to struggle to recall which sentence I am saying.’

I glance quietly at his arms: thin, bony, once carrying his heavy pack and gun; in war.

‘I’m 89 and-a-half.’ He smiles briefly as his life memories fly past.

****

There’s not much to the room. Another old man, behind me, lays a silent witness to our conversation. It doesn’t even occur to me to say hello to him; something I regret now, but my thoughts and attention were for Dennis, my late father’s old Regimental buddy.

‘It’s my kidneys, they’ve given up, had it,’ and he flicks his wrist in contempt.

‘But there’s nothing-wrong- up -here.’ He taps his head. ‘ I’m 110%,’ and indeed, his mind is very sharp.

He asks me ‘How’s Chris?’ and I am delighted he remembered my husband’s name. Pretty good really. Mentally, I applaud him.

****

‘I have never lost the Faith,’ he tells me, and we discuss the realities of simply getting to church, the physical challenge of pushing his new wheelie-walker in the rain, and up the ramp. 'I used my new walker and they greeted me like I was the Governor,' he chuckles to himself.

‘Then,’ he whispers, ‘they started the happy-clappies, and I just won’t go.’ He breathes hard at the memory - it stings him - he needs to go to his church; and he needs to hold onto his Faith. It’s important to him, at the end. Old people don't cope well with change.

****

‘I’ve told my daughter, Susan, to just have a small private service for me - that’s what I want, but she might do something different.’

I joke with ‘You won’t know what’s going on, you will be up there with dad, having a beer,’ and we smile at the image of seeing John again.

‘He was always my Padre,’ he says. His eyes are closed. I wonder if he will nod off, and whether I should go.

I stand and stretch, leaning over the bed has pinched my back, and I walk to the Nurse’s Station to see if I can source some Blutack. The Nurse is unhelpful, so I then ask if she might have some sticky-tape instead.

‘What are you doing here tomorrow for Anzac Day’ I enquire. Her eyes narrow.

‘Nothing. Why?’

'Will the street march be on telly,' I persist? Yes. They can watch it on their telly.

Grinning, I walk back into this room, this room of old men and over one-and-a-half-centuries of memories. I tape up the little Chinese-made Australian flag to the end of his bed. He also has a paper red poppy, and I wind the wire of this around the top of his little flag. Dennis beams at me, now he is truly happy.

I hold his hands - both of them - and he grips them more strongly now.

We continue to chat about our children, and his grandchildren, now well into their 30s and 40s.

‘Oh, the times we had playing cricket at Marchant Park,’ he enthuses.

Outside, Brisbane turns on a spectacular autumn day, sky mad with the blue, no clouds. He tells me that when he gets out - and he will get out next week - that he intends to sit in the sun and enjoy its warmth.

****

I have brought a small packet of Anzac biscuits, store bought, not home-made, but it’s the thought, right? Some barley sugar jubes, and a small bottle of shiraz, so he can toast his buddies tomorrow.

Tomorrow is Anzac Day – Lest we forget – but whilst we continue to talk and chat to the living, we won’t forget.

Cannot forget.

I kiss his cheek, say a little prayer in my head for him, and let him sleep.