A visitor

This very attractive chook wandered over from an adjoining property this morning.

Moreton Island

A big ol' sand island about an hour-and-a-half ferry ride from Bris, where we went to celebrate my birthday. You have to have a 4WD vehicle to get anywhere you can't walk to, because the roads are just big sand tracks. We stayed overnight at the resort near the ferry landing (no dock, the ferry just drives right up onto the beach!). Don't really need to do that again; expensive, bad food, screaming kids everywhere. The island has this GIANT sand pit in the middle of it. People use sand toboggans to slide down the sides of the pit. They go pretty fast, it's pretty steep, but then they have to walk all the way back up again because at this sand pit there's no chairlift! Next time we'll do a day trip, bring food in the cooler and our snorkel gear, and snorkel around a wreck right by the ferry landing. This is me at the sand pit. Just above my head, you can see a tiny little dark spot. That is a person. Gives you an idea of the size of the pit.

The Aussie alphabet: B is for ... beer? Bundy? -- baseball????

Ah, how to choose among these candidates to represent B? Beer was the obvious one, and by the way, America, NOBODY drinks Foster's here. Then there is Bundy, properly known as Bundaberg, rum produced right here in the midst of the canefields in Queensland. With, oddly enough, a polar bear as its logo. Finally, I happened to be in a sporting goods store this morning and was surprised by this display of gear that I recognized immediately as pertaining to the Great American Pastime. Very strange.