Running genes

Not from my side of the family at all - my claim to sporting fame is having got a compound fracture of the arm by falling over in a backwards-running race. These days they don't do novelty races for the athletically challenged, they just have everyone participate. I actually like the idea of that better as the novelty races were totally humiliating, even before the accident. (I graduated to being sent as far outfield as possible when playing any sort of ball game. Mostly I would then be away with the fairies whenever a ball came anywhere near me, but if I was alert enough to realise the ball was coming I would cower down at grass level with my arms over my head. This did not endear me to my team-mates nor the sports teacher.)

Anyway. Today at their primary school cross-country day Running Boy came fourth and Cheekus came eighth. (Last year Princess ran for the first time ever; in the preceding six years she had walked-and-chatted with assorted friends. She came a very creditable 20th with no preparation whatsoever.) RB's result was terrific for a sprinter over 3 km; CW's was totally unexpected as his only purposes for going to Little Aths appear to be to socialise and to inveigle his way into pushing the equipment trolley at pack-up time.






And to chase the beetles which one evening fell from the sky, we don't know why.

The dreaded stairs

Who says engineers are dour? Not me...

Floods

By now everyone everywhere must know about the floods in Queensland. This story brought me undone.

We're lucky, the people we know are safe. I haven't been online for yonks and I'm wondering if the crafting community is getting mobilised for flood relief the way it did for the Victorian bushfires in 2009? Otherwise, if you're local here are some ways to help; for the others, the Salvoes say donating money is the best thing to do at present.

I remember helping to sort goods donated for bushfire victims and although many things were superb and most obviously very well-meant there were too many decrepit strollers smelling of old wee, tattered lamps, obviously incomplete toy sets and so on - it looked suspiciously as if people had taken the chance to upgrade and told themselves they were being good by donating the junk they were replacing. It was still junk. There was a small mountain of stuff that simply could not be given to anyone, let alone those who had been through the bushfires. Mind you, there were many toys we volunteers thought were good but were directed to reject. The strangest thing I remember seeing was a huge crate of sweet potatoes. As we finished, pallets were made up and shrinkwrapped to send out: a load of portacots; a load of new sleeping bags donated by the manufacturer; a load of high chairs in various conditions. One day, a harried and upset woman came through to pick out particular things for a family that had been burnt out. She was a relief co-ordinator and was trying to assemble a household's worth of essentials, knowing that many of the things - a wardrobe for instance - would not be there. I don't know how much of her list she was able to find.

Anyway. Crafter I'm not, but if anything's being organised let me know.