Sunday: dead possum and Channon Markets

We were breakfasting in the sunshine on the back verandah this morning, when, much to my surprise, I noticed what looked to be a dead possum in one of the gardens at the base of our house. Closer investigation revealed that the poor poss wasn't quite dead, though as close as you can get to being dead without actually being dead, if that makes sense. So I gently put it into a box with soft sugar cane mulch and let it die. Which it did soon after. The poor thing had either been attacked or it had some kind of mange on its back end as you can just make out in this pic. Animals die. And when you live in the country you see so much more death than you tend to do in the urban environment. We wonder if this was the lemon-skinning possum that had gone through so many of our lemons. 

It was a lovely morning, and Steve was keen to get some more goats milk soaps (without even a whiff of palm oil I say quickly) from his favourite soap seller at the Channon Markets. So off we zipped to the markets, which takes about 40 minutes to get to from our place. This sign was propped up next to a tree at one point. I like it. Alas, the soap seller was not at the Markets today, but we did buy a beautiful cinnamon scented candle from a handsome young candle maker.

It seems I have a large black cock

I had been noticing, lately, that the black 'hens' that I purchased back in April were starting to butch up a bit, but I really hadn't paid too much attention. However, Julia (aka Shane) pointed out the obvious to me when he was down here last week with cub. 'Claire (that's me) I think one of your black hens is a cock, a rooster'. Hmmm, this could be a problem. We really don't want another rooster. What to do? What to do?

Well, one thing we won't be doing is dumping our unwanted black cock in this park at Murwillumbah. 'Cock-dumping' is a practice with which I was naively unfamiliar until I moved up to the northern rivers, but it takes place with alarming frequency. This particular park, (which bears the name Bruce Chick Park - oh come on!) is sometimes full of big angry roosters all trying their hardest to be the top dog (so to speak - apologies for mixing my animalian metaphors). The sign tells people not to dump their unwanted animals here because of a rare native snail that also lives here. Somehow I doubt that information will dissuade your average cock dumper from, well, dumping their unwanted cocks. 'Rare snail.....oh pulease' they will chortle as they liberate yet another unloved leghorn from the chaff bag.

Archive Books, Brisbane

We headed up to Brisbane last Saturday to see Hairspray the musical (Harvest Rain is the company that produced it and it was brilliant). Anyway, Glen had organised a two bedroom apartment in the city and while we waited on his arrival, Steve and I did a bit of shopping. Steve then ventured into JB HighFi, while I made my way to my favourite bookshop in Brisbane, Archives Fine Books 'One Million Books on Every Topic'. Now, I don't think they mean that literally, otherwise they would have a staggering number of books, but they possibly do come close to a million books on lots of topics.
As many of you know, I'm a bit of a bibliophile and have a number of types of books that I collect including: books on Papua New Guinea; natural history books; the books of Gerald Durrell; and marriage guidance books published up until the early 60s. I love this place. I never know what I will find.

Perfect Sunday morning

 We had  a wonderful night last night. Piglet (aka Michael) arrived yesterday for a holiday here and once Glen arrived a little later we decamped into the spa with a bottle of Chilean strawberry sparkling wine and 4 plastic glasses. The sun was just starting to set and the sky towards the west was the most amazing smears and streaks of orange and crimson. Dinner was a slow cooked leg of lamb and veges and then we settled in on the lounges for a movie. We woke to a living area still warm from the remnants of the fire from Saturday night and another small log revived it without any problem. The morning was clear, brisk and sunny with whispy patches of mist rising from the dew-moistened grass before burning off into nothingness.

We did our Larnook Big Brekky with bacon, poached eggs, tomato on the bbq with basil and balsamic drizzle, asparagus spears (also done on the bbq drizzled with some lemon juice) all sitting on some Turkish bread (toasted on the barbeque). Geeze it's bloody nice living here.

Gramma pie

 So I bought this gramma from our friendly vege farmers at Kyogle Farmers' Market last Saturday and yesterday I converted into from this fairly unappealing looking vegetable into a delicious...

gramma pie. I steamed 1kg gramma flesh, then mashed it up with some sugar, golden syrup, allspice (or was it mixed spice?) and some ground ginger and the juice and zest of one of our lemons, poured it over short crust pastry base and then covered it with another layer of pastry, a bit of milk and sugar over the top and into the oven for 50 minutes. Served it up last night with generous dollops of King Island double thick cream.  Very yummy on a winter's night.

Pot Hole Art Sweetie, Art....

The Northern Rivers is so creative and artistic, I love it. So there's a guy who goes around and creates art around pot holes in the roads. The art serves to make the roads a more creative space as well as drawing attention to potholes that could create problems for your car. He has done all the roads in the Lismore area and lately he has worked his way to the Kyogle district. There are donation boxes along streets in Lismore where you can donate money to help pay for his petrol and paint expenses. Lordie, I love living here!

Kooky Kyogle signs

 OK, so who'd like a toasted finger?  Index or little....

 See ya gran like you've never seen her before.....

 It was only a matter of time.....

And what an exemplar of understatement?  The Mentals reduced down to an A4 page generated by a pub's computer!  I'm pleased to say that last Saturday we did spot an actual official marketing poster...anyone want to come with me to see them? Come on, I'm sure the nips will get bigger and we can live it up!!