Ganeida's Knots

The only human institution which rejects progress is the cemetery. ~Harold Wilson



I am so over being without the internet. All my friends live in my computer & I have lots & lots to say but no way to say it! Our provider is so awful that contract or no contract we are ditching them. We have tried twice to sort the problem but just get outsourced to somewhere where no~one speaks understandable English & just want to tell us things that aren't true. Over it.



Thankfully FB still worked so I have been able to tentatively keep in touch with Liddy & will update to the Chile page as soon as I can. Briefly the girl is safe in Chile. She has seen her first llama, which for some reason was hugely exciting. She has made her first child contact on the streets, more understandably exciting. She is sharing a room with 3 other girls & has the bottom bunk! She is now very happy she took her Doona cover with her because it's like she has a little piece of home with her. She has done 2 prayer & fast days since leaving home & for someone who loves her food & whose first thought when she wakes up involves investigating the kitchen, that is a hard penance indeed!


Meanwhile I have been reading, reading, reading. Speak no Evil on the Nickle Mines shootings. Plain Secrets ~ on the difficulties in relationship between the Amish & the rest of us. Something on Shamanism that Star borrowed & was never in a thousand fits actually going to read ~ but which I found fascinating! Archaeology, people, not some New Age gibberish. Half of Star's reading matter ~ much to her distress because I read faster than she does & know more about her reading material! National Velvet ~ for school. The Secret Life of Walter Mitty because we have been looking at the short story. If you've read it, was he henpecked or a spy? Maybe both?


We have looked at Bonaparte for school & not because we are very interested in his battles which were very messy & bloody & frankly boring because one war is pretty much just like the next; only the causality count changes. Nope, the man was a fascinating egomaniac who is on record as saying that he couldn't see an empty throne without wanting to sit on it ~ which explains a great deal. Brought on, perhaps, by the 48 cups of coffee he drank daily. And besides meddling in the governments of multiple nations he designed the Italian flag & lost Waterloo due to his hemorrhoids. There is more. I am considering posting our multiple choice paper so you all too can enjoy the absolute bizarreness of Napoleon Bonaparte!


Star has wrestled with her maths. Dino dug up the front yard & he & I went to the mainland in the tinnie to get supplies. The wind chose to howl across the bay at 25 knots. It was very rough ~ both ways. I eyed the shore askance calculating whether I could ditch my heavy jacket & ugg boots in sufficient time to make it to shore before drowning. I splurged on a raspberry cane & pomegranate because I adore raspberries & pomegranates & you can never buy them fresh. Dino bought a peach tree. We picked up bags & bags of chicken manure & more bags of horsie poo. We bought beans & peas & corn, lettuce, watermelon, rockmelon, celery, capsicum, 2 sorts of tomatoes ~ & God willing we will get a return in produce so it will all have been worth it!


Um, Star is driving. The very first thing she did was put my little red island rocket in the ditch. Luckily the ditch was shallow & I was able to reverse it out without trouble & on the whole Star's driving has been good. Better by miles than Liddy's. It was ages before Liddy stopped wandering all over the road & refrained from driving *at* objects & people. Star hugs the left & my biggest problem is stopping her from riding the selvage. However I tend to break out in a massive sweat every time Star takes off. Her overweening confidence is shattering. So far she is just driving me up to the shops & back. At this stage Liddy was still confined to the backroads because she was a road hazard. If we can get her up to speed ~ which means keeping her head in traffic, reversing & parking without giving me heart failure, smoother take offs without the occasional stall, then she can start driving on the mainland. I break out in a sweat just thinking about it!
 
And for those who want to see us in action....
 
http://www.twitvid.com/G0SBD
 
http://www.twitvid.com/CWRRQ
 
Enjoy, people. ☺