Rain

It's raining, it's pouring .......... and it's really dark because of the cloud cover. I can't speak for the rest of the country but Tregear is no where near a drought. With this much rain I'd be wondering about the creek flooding again! I heard an interesting bit of trivia on Time Team last night - they were talking about a heavy clay area they were working on and described it as being created milimetre by milimetre each time the area flooded. It's created by very fine particles floating in the water being laid down... and we have so much clay around here it makes me wonder just how bad the floods from Ropes Creek have been in times past. The creek has flooded since I've lived here, I've seen Tregear Reserve covered in water, my neighbor has seen the reserve fill with water up to the edge of the road. Each time it rains like this I find myself wondering if it's going to go again. The two main ways out of Tregear are across the creek, on Forrester and Debrincat. Both those bridges are about the same height and so they both go under about the same time. There's now a new bridge, in Ropes Crossing. It seems higher, but the next flood will tell us. The rain radar is interesting - http://mirror.bom.gov.au/products/IDR033.shtml , shows the rain covering the whole of Sydney this morning. Have a fun day...

And there was hail the day before yesterday. Very small and it didn't last long but it made a racket.

Tregear and Whalan Reserve plans

The plans for Tregear and Whalan Reserve by Blacktown Council are here: Master Plan and Plan of Management

I'm afraid I didn't see this until comments were closed. Interestingly, they only had just over 20 people comment. They don't advertise these things. No doubt they thought they had their usual coverage and that would be sufficient. There are parts that I think are ok, and parts that are just strange and uninformed. They want to build some sort of structure for the lookout again. The remains of the last lookout was still there when I first moved in about 12 years ago. It had already been burned and not long after the remains were burned out to. But they want to build again. Maybe they think the pyromanics have moved out of the area. They are also talking about a walking track, but it's already there. A fitness area over by the baseball grounds. A kids playground up near Ellsworth. The last playground was trashed. Maybe they think those people have moved out too......

Local area blogs

I would like to be able to link to other area blogs here - last weekend I did a big search and found a few not too far away, but most aren't being kept up to date. There were 2 in Mt Druitt, 1 in Glenmore Park and a few others but the Mt Druitt ones haven't been written in since 2007 and the Glenmore Park one only had test messages on them. People get discouraged if they don't see evidence of people reading their blogs, but I think it doesn't really matter, I know a half dozen people drop by occasionally and I get a comment or email a couple of times a year. I figure the ones who do the poll or write comments are the tip of my iceburg and I actually have a huge readership!!! Well..... anyway, if any of my half dozen know of any other local blogs I'd be happy to link to them, thereby helping each other out a bit. My reasons for keeping this going is simply I like to blog and I don't really have delusions of grandeur - I don't need to be the most popular anywhere, and sometimes this space is the only place you'll see stuff about this suburb. Even the local papers don't cover everything.

Welcome to Typical Sydney Weather!

Here we go, cycling like crazy. Get up to an insanely hot day then it breaks, storms or just rains, stays cloudy for a day or two and works its way back up to insanely hot again. Typical spring and summer. Mind you, when they said on the news the other day that it was the hottest day in a year I was surprised, it didn't feel that hot out here. Might have been the hottest for those who live on the coast, with the sea breezes that keep the temperature tempered, but out here I didn't even turn the air con on and I know I needed it last summer. It was hot, yes, but the fan was enough. And not hot enough to stop me sleeping. Unless, there's a weird thought, I'm not adapting to the heat out here am I? After all these years? Nooooo. More likely their coverage of the temperature doesn't cover what happens in Tregear! Although I am so use to it that I almost never check the thermometer any more. I've checked once and only because it was way cooler outside than inside first thing in the morning after one of our hot days, and it's too obvious that, even with the windows locked open so the air can get in, this house holds too much heat - it was 5 degrees hotter inside!

Toxic rubbish and Blacktown Council

You know how we all suppose to use the new light globes? Much more energy efficient, one of the pollies pushed through legislation to make the regular incandescent ones illegal. You know the ones, after we'd been using for ages we found out they contained really toxic stuff and shouldn't go into landfill? Mercury isn't it? Nasty stuff. The politicians are so bloody stupid, try to fix one problem (electricity consumption) and create one just as bad (mercury toxicity). So, did the politicians at any level come up with a solution for this little dilemma? No. Garbage disposal being the forte of local council you'd think they'd come up with something even if they weren't the ones to cause the problem. So, we finally have one of our fancy toxic lights blow. We aren't suppose to put it in the rubbish bin. We ring up Blacktown Council to find out what we are suppose to do. We are suppose to hold onto our toxic rubbish until the annual clean up. They don't have any other solution. Luckily, for us this time, it's soon - 26th October but even then it isn't a council-come-to-us thing, we are suppose to save up all our toxic rubbish and deliver it to them at the Rooty Hill depot. They don't have a suggestion for people without cars. I wonder if anyone at all is planning to catch buses and or trains up to Rooty Hill with their light globes? Hey, that's a perfect subject to comment on - leave a comment here if you're planning to take public transport to dispose of your globes at Rooty Hill!

Did I say Wind?

Still, yesterdays wind didn't seem to be as bad as the sensationalist press was making out. Yes we had some wind, and yes it was stronger than the other day, but there's been no trees down around here. We didn't lose any washing off the line although we did eventually bring it in. Everything dried really fast! This morning everything is quiet and calm.

I don't think it's winter any more...

What an amazing day so far! Really warm, promising to be positively hot at this rate. Bit scary really, I wonder what summer will be like? The grass is finally mown, first time for the season. Not that it makes the place look tidy, that would be too much for me. Such a quiet suburb here I can't think of anything else to write! Have a lovely weekend!

The Wind!

Amazing how windy it is. The air smells really clean. I want to wash everything in the house coz, for the first time in months, it will dry so fast! Have to watch my skin though, it's dry enough as it is, if I go out in this wind without moisturiser on it gets really bad. No trees blown down yet close to me. The plum tree is losing it's petals in the wind so it looks like snow. White petals floating on the fish tank. All very lovely. Pity I have to go to work.

Weather

Yesterday was so warm! I watched a softball game up at Glenmore Park. They don't have any shade there so I can see it being too hot later in the season. It was lovely yesterday. Of course the warm weather couldn't last, today it's raining. Not cold yet, but very raining.

Big bangs around here last night. Everyone thought it must be fire crackers. Hoping so at least. And the fire over in the reserve? Just over the hill so I couldn't see what was actually burning. It seemed quite big.

btw, I did get to the festival, heard a young woman with a remarkable voice singing on stage by herself. It was her last song of course, only got to hear part of one. Don't know her name but I hope she keeps going with her singing. Good voice, and doesn't just sing, she uses her voice.

The Coles in Ropes Crossing is open, just in case you hadn't noticed. There's been a few good specials.

Spring has sprung

With lots and lots of rain. Enough to leave puddles and turn big parts of the reserve into a big mud puddle - especially where it lost ground cover and hadn't had time to regrow after the 'hazard reduction' by the fire brigade.

Still, no more frosts, downpours, and now the grass is growing again, so fast we really should mow today. Don't know if we'll get round to it. Should. It's long already! Maybe it hasn't dried enough to mow yet? That'd be it!