Monthly Archives: January 2010

Australiana du Jour

25 Monday Jan 2010

Posted by in The Public Bar

≈ 27 Comments

Waz does OZ - Digital Collage by Mirriyuula

I was reflecting on the arrival, yet again, of Australia Day.  And I was as usually troubled by the realisation that Australia came into being on 1 January 1901 – but that day off was taken by New Year’s Day – so we adopted plan B – the day Arthur Phillip in 1788 stepped ashore at Botany Bay – and raised the Union Jack on land claimed for England by James Cook on 22 August 1770 – the Eastern bit of the largest island.  Moreover it wasn’t until the 1930s that we bothered to celebrate the day at all – and not until the nineties that we did it everywhere at once on the wide brown lounge.

But I doubt that little details like these really matter very much.  Every day in this wide brown land is Australia Day.  But sometimes we have to work and sometimes we get the day off to do what Australians by and large do.  Which is two-thirds of bugger all.

So, reflecting that a story about two-thirds of bugger-all is not very compelling, my first reaction was to shoot for three-thirds of bugger all and ring up Foodge – to see what he’s been up to, but his one-time fiancée and part-time receptionist told me that the last time he was in the office was before Christmas – and that she suspected that he’d had a “holiday” with a blonde woman that he was supposed to meet a few weeks ago after some of the patrons of the Pig’s Arms overheard him making an “appointment” with her shortly before he was driven off by Inspector Rouge and Constable Jail. (Record length for a Pig’s Arms sentence – challenging the attention span of many Pig’s Arms patrons).

Drawing nothing but a blank on the Foodge front, I resorted (shamefully) to catch up on the news.  Like many of the Pig’s patrons, I can’t abide commercial media, so I opted for the ABC – and was refreshed by hearing that Adam Gilchrist had taken his job as the elder statesman of keeping a huge leap forward by stating the bleeding obvious and complaining that Australia has become a nation of sheep (falling in line with the Kiwis, one supposes) and of mindlessly worshipping celebrities for the fame rather than their substance.  Admitting that being the keeper of the Australian red ball game apparently IS a thing of substance, it was refreshing to have the point of view delivered by such a nice bloke.  An essentially decent, good bloke.  An Aussie good fella.  Our good mate.

I was also thrilled to see the redoubtable ABC back up Gilly by letting us in on the vital information that an A-league player faces trial on a sex charge, a rival threatens Jessica Watson’s ‘round the world solo bid, and a soap star admits a cocaine charge.  I think there’s some self-congratulatory movie awards stuff going on too, but in the spirit of Australia Day, if not exactly echoing Gilly’s sentiments, I’ve decided to ignore it on the grounds that to be truly Australian, it is important to not give a shit.

And other important and uniquely Australian happenstances have been reported by our national broadcaster of late.  We’re well appraised of the death tolls – road, water, disease, adverse weather, major earthquake, bizarre accident, heartbreaking family disasters etc etc.

This is Australia.  It’s our day.  It proves that we are as we always have been – as Barry Humphries once famously described (was it Melbourne ? – It could have been the whole country) – the arsehole of the world.  With paradoxically one of the highest standards of living according to our accumulation of pointless consumer goods, an albeit fraying tolerance if an not acceptance of people from other nations, a hostile climate, a nation governed into the ground, whipped by the massive storms of international finance, punching above our weight and kidding ourselves that we amount to something more than Bogart’s hill of beans.

The appropriate way to celebrate our great nation is of course to gather around the barbie and whinge about the day falling on a Tuesday and having to come to work on the Monday before – or taking (gasp !) one of our boundless days of annual holidays – to make it a four day weekend.  And lament the disappearance and near extinction of the Aussie tennis star.

Geez, talk about primitives.  I’m off to try and catch up with hot gossip from Hollywood.

Number One Nickname

24 Sunday Jan 2010

Posted by in Politics in the Pig's Arms

≈ 20 Comments

The White Death
Simo Häyhä

Simo Hayha-S585X360-11707-1

Häyhä, a native of Finland served one year in the Finnish military and then became a farmer. But when the Soviet Union invaded his country, he grabbed the standard issued rifle he’d received, some white clothes, and a couple cans of food and then proceeded out into six feet of snow at -30°C (about -20°F). For a period of over a hundred days he sniped 505 Russians and had over 200 SMG kills. The Russians tried several times to kill him by scouting the area entirely, developing a counter-sniping team trained to target him, and by napalming the vicinity he was in. None of those stopped Hayha, and he became known to the Russians as “The White Death.” He was finally stopped when he was hit in the head with an exploding bullet. A week later he woke from a coma on the day the war ended and lived until the age of 96.

What Not To Wear (for men)

23 Saturday Jan 2010

Posted by in Helvi Oosterman, Ladies Lounge

≈ 17 Comments

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By Helvi Oosterman

When popping into Pigs Arms for my daily pink drink, I have been alarmed by the gear you blokes wear at this watering hole. Room for improvement?  Yes, yes…

First of all you should know that the wearing of narrow-legged beige shorts with sandals and the knee socks is only permissible for very old blokes residing in Queensland. As we know it’s no use trying to change old dogs’ habits…none of you here of course do fit into this ‘too-old-category’.

Thongs should be flung out, not only for the aesthetic reasons but also because they give their wearer a funny walk. Whilst you are trying to keep them on, you have to carefully throw your legs about without bending your knees…not a good look!

Coloured shirts with white collars make you look like a nursing sister, even if you obviously aren’t. We gently leave Mr Turnbull to wearing his shirts, he’s suffered enough already. Most likely we have Lucy to blame here.

If you happen to covet a navy blazer adorned with ‘gold’ buttons, stop coveting!  Only dapper Italian males can wear them with panache. They have enough nous to pair them with grey flannelette trousers, and to throw a pale blue Armani shirt and a subtle silk tie by Hermes into the mix.

Tapered- down- wide-at-the-waist tough denim from a discount store is best left to elderly carpenters and country plumbers. Clearly to be avoided after hours…

Now we all know that President Bush had a knack of wearing cowboy boots with flair; he has the bandy long legs and the right kind of Texan gait the boots demand. Still, any shortie trying to add height by stepping into them should be stopped immediately.

Head-to-toe R M Williams gear is not making you look like a wealthy land owner, rather it gives you away as a city slicker who has recently purchased a minor hobby farm and who has not yet had time to dirty his hands on a hard-to-start tractor or on an obstinate generator.

Fluoro work wear is designed for folk in hazardous occupations, not for idle Telstra blokes heating their billy cans for morning tea break on the roadside. Nor is it meant for unemployed youth hanging around shopping malls.

Teaming trackie pants with black dress shoes is also verboten, and very long and very pointy shoes can only be worn by rebellious teenagers in black pipe jeans. I’m personally very tolerant and give my blessing when it comes to eccentric Finnish groups like the ‘Leningrad Cowboys’…

Red woollen jumpers, so loved by English gentlemen and by our own Curry Colonel, usually matched by equally ruddy faces, are best replaced by other colours; say navy, camel or even forest green. They are more complimentary to too-much-Shiraz affected gobs (sorry about the bad choice of words, I did not want too much repetition).

White shiny suits are a must, but only if you are an Albanian pop singer taking part in the Eurovision song contest. Long wavy black hair and white shoes are allowed to compliment the outfit. For everyone else, even for Bob Hawke white shoes are an absolute no-no, no matter what Blanche says.

White, black and sand coloured canvas loafers are highly recommended though, for young and old as suitable summer footwear.

Shortish navy or khaki elastized waist, drill shorts, worn by likes of Paul Hogan and Steve Irving are only passable on young well  built swimming pool maintenance workers. It also helps if they have short blond hair and a wide smile and if they wear acid/bleach damaged Blundstones to boot!

 

This Wasn’t in the Itinerary – The Pig’s Arms Welcomes Emma James

22 Friday Jan 2010

Posted by in Travels

≈ 15 Comments

Somewhere near Marla SA

By Emma James*

As the sun set over the Stuart Highway in the middle of Australia ending the first day of a new decade, the western sky was illuminated with hues of orange, red and yellow. While the clouds were turning shades of violet, lilac and silver. The sky darkened and then the moon in its full glory rose up over the eastern horizon lighting up the sky and the desert landscape. The cloud wasn’t enough to dull the glow, the rays breaking through resembling the sun. Looking north up the highway, the intermittent flash of the bus blinkers caught the iridescent orange of the hazard triangles on the road – luminous indicators to motorists that our bus was, as our Germans put it, kaput.

In times of trouble we have two choices: laugh and think “this will make an interesting story” or cry about how unlucky we are.

Our group of thirteen international travellers and our bus driver, stuck on the side of the Stuart Highway without mobile phone reception, chose to laugh. We chose to pull up a stool, grab a drink and admire the beauty around us.
We had food, water and swags to sleep in, it would just be another night under the stars; Nothing new for us, we had camped the past two nights between Uluru and Kata Tjuta.

These two natural wonders are awe-inspiring. They take breath away and leave a feeling of insignificance.  Out of almost nowhere, Uluru as one entire rusty red rock pops out of the landscape like an iceberg; almost 85% of it lies underground.  Photos don‟t do justice to its grandiosity.  And seemingly not so far away (except everything in the desert is farther than it seems) lies Kata Tjuta.  The rock faces smooth, yet pocked with holes, they look like mounds of ice cream that somehow haven‟t melted in the intense Outback heat.

Watching the moon setting and the sun rising over these wonders is humbling and it was this sight that began our new year before our journey south down the Stuart Highway towards Coober Pedy.  Full of awe and good spirits, we hit trouble about 50kilometres inside South Australia.  The bus needed more oil.  That added, we moved on, but the clunking noise continued and we pulled over again.

Our mini-bus called “Binga” (after cricketer Brett Lee) was lagging.  After passing the message “We’re limping in at 60km/h, send help if we don’t make it” to the next town, we jumped back in, cranked the music and started crawling.

We made it about 20kilometres and as Bon Jovi screamed “shot through the heart”, part of the engine fell away and Binga was all out.  “How fitting” we all laughed as we piled out of the bus, grabbed our stools and our drinks and admired the view. The highway was quiet and as far as the eye could see, only red dirt and a few small trees. A few horse prints the only sign of life aside from the small handful of passing vehicles, one stopping to take the message on to the next town that we were stuffed.

... Kombi adventures .... Marla SA ... small world, eh ?

We couldn’t have chosen a better spot to breakdown. The clear landscape meant a clear view of the sunset and the moon rise. Laugh or cry?  Definitely laugh and smile at the beauty of the world, something that many of us in or busy lives don‟t stop to appreciate.  And as if on cue, as the moon was making its final ascent into the night sky, the northern horizon was suddenly ablaze with another set of lights.  Slowing to a stop was a three trailer road train lit up like a Christmas tree.

Help had arrived in the form of Darren and his mate (also Darren) in the next truck.  Our knights in Stubbie shorts and singlet tops jumped from their cabs and within no time had our bus hooked up and on the move again.  Our tour driver at the wheel of the bus had a hairy ride ensuring the bus stayed on track behind the road train, as four us were up front in the cab of the truck with Darren laughing about our experience.  We pulled into the “blink and you’d miss it” service station town of Marla a while later we were met by scorpions and the welcome sight of a motel bed.

Breaking down in the middle of the desert is a thing of horror stories.  We could have cried about how unlucky we were, but stopping to look at the situation, we were actually incredibly lucky.

This wasn’t in the itinerary, but it became one of the highlights of our trip.

* Emma James is  freelance journalist and photographer.

Mike Jones and Susan Merrell welcome her as a colleague and friend of the Pig’s Arms.

Workman’s Weekly

20 Wednesday Jan 2010

Posted by in Gerard Oosterman, The Mens, The Public Bar

≈ 31 Comments

Workman’s weekly.

You knew the week-end was coming to the end on any Sunday afternoon, rain or shine. A kind of gloom set in as if any enjoyment should never have been trusted in the first place. The suburban strips of hooded shops and steel awnings were closed up, and dogs and people had disappeared. Was this not the time on a Sunday afternoon to expect the arrival of the “Demon of Noontide’?

Some of the tens of thousands across Sydney and other places would now be getting ready for the routine of obtaining the ticket to work by rail during the week. In those days a weekly train ticket was the best option for those that did not yet have a car. This ticket was called ‘workman’s weekly’. It was coloured a cheerful red and had both the destination and the year’s week number printed on it. Next week the same colour but the next number would be featured.

It is rather nice to know that in those days, a workman and his workman’s ticket was part of a society that had not yet discovered the stigma that would later attach itself to the word ‘workman’ by some. How many would now saunter up to a rail station, let alone buy a” workman’s weekly ticket”?

Of course, to avoid queuing on Monday morning in the thick of it all, the better planned would get the ticket from the nearest railway station on the Sunday afternoon.

Therefore there would often be a slight flare up of life and respite from the ‘Sunday demon’ between four and six pm or so, especially around the railway stations, when one could see fellow workers, so staunch and brave, facing the coming week with an heroic and fearless grim determination to buy his weekly ticket.. Oddly enough, those tickets, as far as I remember, could also be bought by work-women. Perhaps I am wrong here. Was there some sort of letter of proof from employer that one was engaged in physical work?

Monday mornings were so much better for having survived the Sunday, another week and another quid was now coming up, we are talking about seventeen pounds ten shillings per week here, being about the average adult wage, back in 1956. It was mid-summer.

The trains had sliding doors that were manually wrenched open by burley blue yakka’ed station attendants. The waiting workers would flick away the Ready Rub fag end and all would align and board the train.

The trains then, as perhaps still now, were of a past era but very much accepted as being modern, almost in vogue. There were no toilets or water on board, so passengers would develop strong constitutions and camel like water retaining attributes and bladders, even travel by late pregnant women would be undertaken with no worries. The date on the steel couplings between carriages was around 1932 or 34 and above the seats were still those brass ornate luggage racks, now keenly sought by inner city residents to use as holders for their terracotta potted geraniums.

The workmen and their workman’s tickets were of the norm then and so were men in overalls and travelling women with hair curlers. The trains would be packed.

Heralds and Telegraph papers would be spread open and many women would knit, young men would glance through Post and Pix magazines, with photos of girls in swimwear revealing nude knees and even feet. The afternoon papers, Mirror and Sun featured scandalous stories of Princess Margaret’s romances and titillating scandals of Professors at Tasmanian Universities. Every six months or so, when sales were down, papers would print front page with a single word ‘WAR’. It was often a fracas in Egypt or disturbance in Malaysia. But the paper’s edition went sky high.

As the train arrived, its passengers would be disgorged and new ones would hop on, perhaps shift workers going home on the reverse trip.

Many workers carried those big bags that clipped together at the sides and would bulge downwards. Inside those bags one could easily have discovered tinned containers with clip on lids that held the previous night’s dinner leftovers. Those tucker tins and other goodies would then be eaten after the factory siren heralded the thirty minutes lunch break.

A lot of work carried out in factories was done by unskilled or semi skilled workers. It often involved very repetitive work, day in day out arms and hands sometimes combined with feet would perform the same movements all day. Those movements sometimes also had a counter on the machine and a minimum number of movements were required per day. To make extra money, it was encouraged to do more movements with working faster or taking shorter breaks. Often safety shields on machinery would be disengaged for extra speed, risking workers losing hands or limbs by compromising on safety.

But what sustenance the men derived from their tucker boxes of the previous night’s morsels, many women would get for tuppence out of the slotted coin machines fastened on the wall next to the bundy clock, in the form of headache powders. The bundy clock was that dreaded invention that would stamp arrival and finishing times at the factory.  Some stricter regimes also had time for lunch breaks recorded on those machines.

The bundy clock

It wasn’t so much the headache or other ailment those women suffered from, no it was more for the enjoyment of ‘getting a lift’, as I was often told. It was also not the single occasional paper foil of headache powder, no, three or four a day, and every day. Are you a bit sick, I asked? “No no, it picks me up you know, it makes me feel a bit better”.

Years later, when thousands of women developed liver and kidney ailments it was blamed on those headache powders, the ingredient of phenacetin was the culprit. Many women ended up with all sorts of organ breakdowns through their overuse.

I sometimes thought that in those times, with the six o’clock swill at the ‘Locomotive or Cricketer’s Arm’ and similar, and those men pissing money on boots and porcelain, with pyjama clad kids hanging around pubs waiting and hoping daddy would come home soon for dinner, had a lot to do with the ‘lift’ that those factory women were getting and needing out of the tuppence phenacetin loaded headache powder slot machines.

Then there were those that did not have clip on bags nor clipped tucker boxes. These were the recently arrived Europeans from complicated countries and backgrounds. Thick accents, some heavily vowel rounded, others guttural consonantly. Many silently doing the factory processing work, week in and out, bending over machinery, often imported from their home country, making bolts and nuts or putting thread on same.

Hungarians, Czechs, and Slavs with professorial demeanours and qualifications from Giessen or Vienna and with Cum Laude as well, doing now in factories what the Bill O’Reilly’s had done for generations. These were the times of ‘workman’s tickets, factory work and European migration’.

Cognac, even after Death. (there is hope)

20 Wednesday Jan 2010

Posted by in Poets Corner

≈ 8 Comments

A mysterious visitor who each year leaves roses and cognac on Edgar Allen Poe’s tomb in Baltimore, Maryland, has missed his rendezvous for the first time in 61 years, the Poe Society said.

“He did not show up this morning,” Jeffrey Savoye, secretary and treasurer of the 380 member society, said.

Each year since 1949 on the 100th anniversary of Poe’s birth, an often-cloaked individual has left a bottle of cognac and a few roses at the foot of Poe’s tomb, usually at night, in tribute to the legendary poet.

“Occasionally he showed up early, like 11:00 to 11:30 the evening before. But normally it’s from midnight to 5:00 am,” Mr Savoye said.

He said around 50 people waited in vain from Tuesday night to watch the “Poe Toaster”, as the visitor has been dubbed.

Many travelled from across the United States for the 201st anniversary of Poe’s birth.

“As far as we know, they have not missed a year until now,” Mr Savoye said.

The original yearly visitor apparently died in 1998, but left the pilgrimage up to his two sons.

“We were left a note some years ago saying that the original toaster had died … We interpreted the message that the torch will be passed… We are assuming that two sons of this person have been carrying it on,” Mr Savoye said.

“We don’t know who they are.”

–AFP

The US knows best.

19 Tuesday Jan 2010

Posted by in Politics in the Pig's Arms

≈ 6 Comments

Solar-powered Bibles sent to Haiti

Solar powered bible

Posted 48 minutes ago

As international aid agencies rush food, water and medicine to Haiti’s earthquake victims, a United States group is sending Bibles.

But these aren’t just any Bibles; they’re solar-powered audible Bibles that can broadcast the holy scriptures in Haitian Creole to 300 people at a time.

The Faith Comes By Hearing organisation says its Bible, called the Proclaimer, delivers “digital quality” and is designed for “poor and illiterate people”.

It says 600 of the devices are already on their way to Haiti.

The Albuquerque-based organisation says it is responding to the Haitian crisis by “providing faith, hope and love through God’s word in audio”.

The audio Bible can bring the “hope and comfort that comes from knowing God has not forgotten them through this tragedy,” a statement on its website says.

“The Proclaimer is self-powered and can play the Bible in the jungle, desert or … even on the moon!”

Tens of thousands of Port-au-Prince residents are living outdoors because their homes have collapsed or they fear aftershocks following Wednesday’s quake.

– Reuters

Cyrus, Chapter 15 part 5

17 Sunday Jan 2010

Posted by in Cyrus the Great: Chronicles

≈ 21 Comments

Croesus on the Bonfire

by Theseustoo

Cyrus ordered a huge bonfire to be built, on top of which fourteen Lydian captives were bound and laid; one for each day of the siege. Croesus too, was led to the pyre in chains and laid on it. The half-dozen guards who had been posted at regular intervals around the huge bonfire then lit its base with the flaming torches they carried, as Cyrus watched the flames begin to bite into the lower levels of the bonfire; but instead of cries for mercy, there arose from Croesus what sounded almost like a prayer… Yet Cyrus could not quite recognize the name his erstwhile adversary now invoked.

“Ah, Solon, Solon, Solon!” Croesus lamented bitterly from the top of the huge pyre, “How right you were! No-one can be called happy while they yet live!”

Cyrus was intrigued; his curiosity suddenly quenched any desire he may have had for revenge on this king, who by reputation was a very holy man, and renowned for his justice and wisdom. Cyrus could not help himself; he had to know who it was that this holy man was now invoking in his extremity. Shouting up at the now silent Croesus, he asked,

“What’s that you say, Croesus? Who are you calling on?”

“One whom I would give much to see converse with every monarch!” Croesus responded, very sadly, “Many years ago, an Athenian called Solon came to see my court and all its splendour and made light of it; and now everything he said to me then has fallen out exactly as he foretold, although it was nothing that concerned me especially, but applies to all mankind alike; most of all to those who think themselves happy.”

“By the gods!” Cyrus exclaimed, when he heard this sad tale, “Nothing that men do is secure! Here is a man who has in his lifetime been as favoured of the gods as have I… and I’m burning him alive! Guards! Put that fire out and bring Croesus down to me…”

The guards instantly ran to obey their king but they had not been expecting this order and although there was a large stream close to the bonfire, by the time they had formed a bucket brigade the fire already had too strong a hold on the huge wooden pile. It soon became clear that their efforts to extinguish it were in vain.

“Your majesty,” said one of the guards to Cyrus, “it is impossible to quench the fire! It has too strong a hold already!”

As the flames began to climb rapidly towards the sacrificial offerings laid out on top of the pyre, Cyrus was suddenly appalled to think that he might be the cause of this man’s death. Yet there was nothing he could do to save him. Suddenly, Croesus’ voice again arose from the top of the bonfire, in another, most earnest and heartfelt prayer:

“Apollo!” he intoned loudly, addressing the sun’s disc as it sank slowly towards the western horizon, “If ever you have received from my hands any acceptable gift, I implore you to come to my aid, and save me from this terrible death.”

Before this the sky had been cloudless and of the clearest blue, yet now, very suddenly, darkening storm-clouds swiftly gathered directly over the bonfire and a huge rainstorm burst overhead. Such a torrential rain then poured down upon them that the bonfire was quickly extinguished. The shower however, lasted no longer than was necessary for the fire to be quenched and then stopped just as suddenly as it started; the clouds now completely dissipated.

Cyrus’ astonished guards helped Croesus down from the pyre and escorted him to sit next to Cyrus. Since it was clear to everyone that the gods themselves had quenched the bonfire, Cyrus also freed the other fourteen men whom he had been just about to sacrifice to them, since they evidently did not require the gift. But, Cyrus thought to himself, he had certainly tested Croesus’ reputation as a holy man; and he had indeed discovered it to be well deserved. Turning to Croesus as the guards seated the captive monarch next to him, Cyrus was impelled to ask him,

“Croesus, now I am certain that you are a good man, and favoured by the gods! But tell me, who was it that persuaded you to lead an army into my country, and so become my foe when you could have continued to rule your kingdom as my friend?”

“What I did, oh king,” Croesus replied sadly, “was to your advantage and to my own loss. If there be blame, it rests with the god of the Greeks, who encouraged me to begin the war.” Here he paused and uttered a heavy sigh; but Cyrus’ gentle gaze silently encouraged him to continue, “No-one is so foolish as to prefer war, in which, instead of sons burying their fathers, fathers bury their sons, to peace. But the gods willed it so…”

Cyrus appeared to be lost in thought for some time and Croesus took the opportunity to look around him and assess the situation. A few moments later he cleared his throat to politely interrupt Cyrus’ contemplation. Once he had Cyrus’ attention, he said, “May I now tell you, oh king, what I have in my mind, or is silence best?” he asked.

“Croesus,” Cyrus said, his now kindly intentions towards his captive reflected in the gentleness of his tone, “you may speak freely; you need fear no further evil at my hands.”

Indeed Cyrus now felt terribly sad that things had come to such a pass as this. Had things been different he was sure that he and Croesus would have been the best of friends. To his surprise, however, Croesus was pointing at Cyrus’ men, who were busily looting the captured city and carrying off all manner of valuables, as he asked, “Then tell me, my king, what it is that those men over there are doing so busily…”

Startled by the unexpected nature of this question, Cyrus regarded the looters closely for a moment or two and then, painfully aware that he was stating the obvious, said, “They are plundering your city and carrying off your riches…” he could not help but sound a little embarrassed.

“Not my city, nor my riches.” Croesus said softly, ignoring Cyrus embarrassment, “They are not mine any more. It is your wealth which they are pillaging.”

Cyrus was amazed, “I hadn’t thought of it like that!” he said, “What do you suggest I do about it?”

“Now that the gods have made me your slave, oh Cyrus, it seems to me that it is my part, if I see anything to your advantage, to show it to you.”

Cyrus nodded his encouragement to the captive king and Croesus quietly continued, “Your subjects, the Persians, are a poor people with a proud spirit… If you let them pillage and possess themselves of great wealth, I will tell you what you may expect at their hands. The man who gets the most will rebel against you.”

Cyrus was startled for he could plainly see the truth of what Croesus was saying, as, making soothing motions with his hands, Croesus continued:

“Now then, if my words please you, do this, oh king: Place some of your bodyguards at each of the city gates; and let them take the booty from the soldiers as they leave the town; tell them that they are doing so because the tithes to the gods are due. Thus you will escape the hatred they would feel if their plunder were taken away from them by force; and they, seeing that what is proposed is just, will do it willingly.”

Cyrus was as impressed by the genuine concern Croesus was showing for his welfare as he was by the subtle wisdom of Croesus’ plan. Wishing to reward such loyal behaviour, he said earnestly, “Croesus, I see now that you are resolved to show yourself a virtuous prince both in word and deed: therefore you may ask me for whatever you want as a gift at this moment.”

Croesus was silent for a few moments; the only thing he really wanted was his kingdom returned to him in the same condition it was in before he had ever heard of Cyrus. He doubted that Cyrus’ generosity would extend quite so far even if it were possible; and, he thought to himself, there’s no point in wishing for what you know you can’t have. After thinking for a few moments, he replied, holding up his chains before him:

“My lord, allow me to send these fetters to the god of the Greeks, whom I once honoured above all others, to ask him if it is his habit to deceive his benefactors. That will be the highest favour you can confer on me.”

“This I readily grant you,” Cyrus said magnanimously, then he added, without reservation, “and also whatever else you may ask for; at any time.”

***   *****   ***

Thor’s Hammer at Brayton

16 Saturday Jan 2010

Posted by in The Mens

≈ 19 Comments

Tags

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Rain, glorious rain.

We decided to take the kids to Canberra’s National Museum. Before we drove  off, the sky darkened with a promise of great drama to come. They were those kind of clouds, rolling  with menace and Helvi’s headache heralded something was in the air. We and the kids were most impressed with the Museum. Everything was askew and at acute angles. In the big theatre we watched with awe Australia’s white history but not before we had also watched in a smaller theatre the history from ‘black fellow’ Australia. This theatre had a revolving stage, fascinating for the kids. At the bigger theatre all went well, with the braveness of soldiers marching off to some war somewhere  when also all of a sudden a Qantas Boeing was taking off non-stop to somewhere.. I woke up refreshed.

Driving back, the clouds were black and white hot bolts of lightning flashing and thunderous claps sure made for a promise of water at our farm at Brayton.

Wellingtons for Lightning Protection

It pelted and the rain was drought breaking. I mean, paddocks awash and traffic to a snarl. When arriving home, Helvi checked and the gauge had run over. Empty and fill up again, 32 mls. Another storm, another 26 mls. The thunder and lightning was something to behold. The best for over 5 years. Total tally so far 82mls.

Wollondilly in Action

Wollondilly in Action.