Started a blog then a cracking great thunderstorm came through and I lost it. Not that it matters. Only 5mm of rain but gunshot claps of thunder and some hail. The dogs were shivering and shaking with fear. I don't know whether it's better to reassure them and therefore confirm in their minds that something is indeed wrong or talk to them in a hail and hearty manner as if nothing untoward is happening. Even the horses came into the yards and raced around. There was a little hail, not much, just enough to make one worry about the possibility of more.

Retire in 5 weeks and have begun to put in train a project to keep the brain from freezing up. French. Yup, finally got the first 4 lessons on the ipod. Not paying $25 to download the pdf files to go with it but have found a good free site where I can get the basics. And oh, how my tiny little mind is overcome. It's frightening. My memory is complete faecal material. The first phrase, the very first phrase is je m'appelle (my name is). I listened to it on the ipod half a dozen times and could I remember it? No. This is very scary. I know I've got a case of menopausal mind wherein the short memory is so short it's actually gone in reverse but I didn't realise it was this bad. All the more reason to undertake this, for me, daunting task.

Some people have a natural facility to learn languages. I am not one of them. Even in high school, when all my brain cells were operating at maximum capacity (doesn't the death of brain cells begin at 25?), I had to struggle to scrape by in Spanish. Not that it matters. There will not be a test at the end of the semester. This is strictly for my own amusement. Still, it will be helpful to try and learn something new and will perhaps help me when I watch the French films on SBS. Of course I'll always read the subtitles.

Am thisclose to finishing latest drawing. I like it. It's got more drama in it than the previous one even though the previous one has subject matter which is more fantasy and should be the more striking of the two. I've no inkling what my next project will be. That I need one is obvious.

Books have palled of late. I have about 4 going and none of them grab me. I think I'm just using them to distract me from what's really going on. I continuously look elsewhere rather than at what's really bothering me. So do I know what's really bothering me? Yes, and it's the same old story so I'm not going to repeat it here.

I have had 2 days where Dimitri has dropped the peg in the bowl. Lucky accident but hey, who cares? Made a big fuss, gave him heaps of treats and left. I wonder if he'll remember and get the idea. I stopped propping the peg on the end of the bowl each time he moved it. Allowed him to sometimes throw it far away and started c/t-ing when it moved even a millimeter closer. Poor fellow. It was confusing for him as he'd throw, chew and hold it in his foot and I wouldn't click as it wasn't going any closer to the bowl. He's such a dear boy.

Jake is a bit of a lad. He's so fierce and protective of his 'nests'. He'll even chase me when he's out when he's in a particularly 'bad' mood. But he loves his 'flying bird' trips when he stands on a branch and I run him around the yard gently waving the stick up and down. He isn't flapping his wings yet but he will raise and lower them. He keeps his comb up and he does have this look in his eye that makes me think he is having fun. He never hesitates to climb on the stick even though he knows ultimately it will lead back to his cage.

I am being quite tough on him and not giving him his big feed of seed in the afternoon. Only a teaspoon. There are lots of pellets however. I am hoping he will 'crack' and finally deign to eat them. This bit of seed in the morning and lots in the afternoon isn't getting us any nearer to converting him.

Five weeks before I'm out of a job. Getting that feeling, which I haven't experienced in many years, when you know a job is coming to an end and you start to mentally and emotionally remove yourself from it. I'm still working as hard as ever but must admit to relief that I don't care about the foibles and fancies of my co-workers or whether someone's dudded us or the future of the surgery. I do care about the animals and some of the people. I have met and worked with some terrific people but there's a lovely freedom in that feeling of not caring. It's shameful that I couldn't be so balanced and, well, weightless, in my feelings before.

Perhaps weightless is a strange word to choose but it describes non-attachment. Perhaps that's the whole point of Buddhism or Zen or any religion which seeks to remove ones focus on self - an impossible order for me in this lifetime I'm afraid. If I haven't got it at age 54 I'm not going to get it. Still, it's good to be reminded what is possible.

Yesterday grey, soft and still with only the sibilant sound of raindrops sliding down foliage. Today hard, bright and loud with wind like a fist pounding trees into unnatural shapes. At least there is sunshine.

Was trying to be all lyrical and otherworldly - to see the world from a more romantic point of view and I am dropped to earth with a thud by not having the software needed to listen to Orla Wren, a collection of songs by Tui who I found on one of the blogs I follow. There is such a world of creativity out there. It gives me faith in the human species that we have the infinite capacity to create such beauty.

Which brings me to something else. For many years I've spoken of things, usually music but sometimes films or books, as being life-enhancing. You could say it's just another way of saying I like something. If I like it and feel better for having listened/read/watched it then it is nothing more than that. Yet I feel that my choice of phrase was instinctive and right. I heard on that looking at a beautiful scene (listening to Margaret Throsby's interview with ?) actually *lights up* a particular part of the brain. Ancient healing centers were often sited where the ambiance, the view was particularly beautiful. We are made more by partaking of beauty wherever we may find it. A previously dark part of the brain is illuminated by the power of beauty (is that phrase Truth is Beauty and Beauty is Truth really true then?).

By the same token I know, because I feel it, when something is not life-enhancing. I feel it in my gut. I feel it in an emotional biliousness, a swaying off center, a tilting toward the abyss. If I'm smart I pull back but sometimes the fascination with the forbidden leads me on. And I wish I hadn't for once imbibed, poison lingers like a dark toxin in the blood.

I want a life of beauty; to create it, to share it, to live it. It is my choice, I know. It is my choice to find the beauty in the ugly, a habit I am able to form with intent and focus. Surrounding myself with beautiful things, thinking beautiful thoughts (now that's a hard one, petty creature that I am), speaking seeing hearing thinking feeling only beauty.

Sometimes I have doubts, not comfortable within my own skin. At my age too. It has to do with sociability, rather my lack of it. I'll watch a chick flick and see the way the group of friends interact, that easy tolerance of their foibles and characters, that energy. The energy to keep up with one anothers lives as well as meeting up and connecting. I on the other hand prefer my own company. Parties are a trial, no worse, a tribulation. Before we go I dread them, once I arrive I'm plotting my escape. I wish I was otherwise. I would like that comfortable camaraderie, the light laughter and honest sharing of intimacies that only girlfriends can enjoy. Alas it is not so.

Just transferred a sick wallaby into G's car. Our neighbour found a wallaby sitting in the middle of the road with her muzzle nearly touching the blacktop. Brought her to us and I rang G as I know nothing about wallabies. She had a peculiar aroma (the wallaby, not G), was thin and had a joey in her pouch. When G saw her she asked that I ring P and get him to warm up some Hartmanns. It's babesia (tick fever). She should know as they probably have more experience and knowhow in looking after wallabies than anyone in Queensland.

Yesterday was grey and silent and still save for the sibilant hissing of rain sliding down foliage and kissing my upturned face. Today is hard and bright and loud with hammer fists of wind battering the air while torturing trees into unnatural shapes. I'm hibernating inside with two shirts, a vest and ugh boots with thick socks.

It's funny really. Here I am trying to be a bit more oceanic - in the Jung sense of the word - in my writing at the same time as I am earthed, with a frustrating thud, by my inability to listen to music because I can't run Flash. Have found an interesting artist called Tui through one of the blogs I'm following. There's a website where I can listen to or download his music. Had a tantalizing taste with The Doll and the Fish so thought I'd seek out what else he has done - to buy if I could, but it seems he gives his work away.

New computer. Have spent hours setting it up. It works fine but using Microsoft 7 is like treading in an alien landscape. Have just downloaded Mozilla/Firefox and feel at home again. Unfortunately I couldn't use my old keyboard. The fitting in back doesn't fit into this CPU. Have to remember that my old computer was six years old which is positively ancient. It was on its last legs methinks as everything was taking a long time to load or even to switch between windows. This new monitor is huge - and the stuff doesn't begin to fill up the empty space. Must get off temporarily and start doing the livestock rounds. Everyone's been a bit ignored by me today as I fiddled with the new bit of technology.

Had a dog shot with an arrow come in yesterday afternoon. Barely missed his spine. M said he could feel it grating along the ridges as he pulled it out. Installed a penrose drain, flushed like crazy, gave heaps of a/bs and are hoping for the best. The owner said he thought he knew who might have done it but as he has no proof, and our fingerprints are all over it, the perpetrator will go unpunished.

Well, best go and do some work rather than leave R to do it all by himself.

Have spent all afternoon setting up new Dell computer. I'm sure other people have no dramas with this. Part of the problem - and admittedly it has worked well, the computer that is, is using Windows 7. I am so used to having Mozilla/Firefox as my online browser and email software that Microsoft seems like a very alien land indeed.

Freya

We put Freya down day before yesterday. Freya didn't come up for breakfast but we didn't worry as there's so much grass about she's been occasionally filling up on that and only coming up for tea in the afternoon. R was feeding up and W, who was visiting, and I went down to help. He told me I'd better have a look at Freya as she wasn't eating. She was standing in the yard and it was obvious at a glance that she was unwell. She was very tucked up below her flanks. She was tossing her head occasionally and pinching her nostrils. Went up to the house for the stethoscope and thermometer. Her heartrate was 54 (she used to be around the 34, 36bpm) and her temperature was 38. I didn't count her respiration. It was obvious she was breathing shallowly, almost panting.

For the past several months she's been having some diarrhoea. Some days were worse than others but it was common to find some staining on her hocks. That day she had manure coating the underside of her tail and thick streaks running down her legs. Called the vets and N got on to H for me. She'd be out within the hour.

In the movies almost all funeral scenes are shot in the rain. Suppose rain and grey overcast skies contribute o the mood. This day was no exception. It was grey, the ceiling was low and it was drizzling. When I rang the vets I told N to tell H to bring the lethabarb. Somehow I knew it wasn't going to end well.

H arrived and we all trooped down to see Freya. H had done some reading and went through all the types of cancers, bowel, kidney, liver problems she might have. But when we walked into the stall I could smell it. It's a smell once experienced never forgotten. Blood in faeces. Freya had had a big squirt while we were at the house. I scooped some onto a leaf and smelled it and then held it up to H to smell. The blood was invisible to the eye but not the nose. That clinched it. H had brought blood tubes in case we wanted tests done. She'd brought Flunixil and a/b's in case we wanted to give it a few days while we waited for the results of the tests. But there was really no hope. What had been chronic was now acute.

It seemed while we'd been away that the pain had eased. I suspect, like many gastrointestinal problems, it came in waves. She had another huge squirt of manure. She wasn't bobbing her head or looking at her flanks but her nostrils were still pinched. I'd led her out of the rain and into a stall. She never budged.

Luckily Dakota has been used to being on his own. Because we shut her up to feed her the other horses would tire of hanging around and go off to feed. When we led Freya away Dakota was down the hill and out of sight. He never saw her. She never called out for him.

We decided to take her to the dam paddock. Unfortunately we have to be rational and do things in a way that allows the front end loader access. Poor girl, she was very weak. I don't know how long she'd been suffering. It could have been 23 hours if the sickness had started right after feeding her the night before or in the last 30 minutes. Anyway, the dear soul followed me without protest. We made a sad line trudging to and through the dam paddock. W came as did R. The vet was right behind Freya and I. When we came to the ridge Freya hesitated because she was so weak. She was even swaying a little behind but I urged her on and after a moments thought she negotiated her way downhill.

I am so grateful she stayed calm and unafraid. She flinched with the insertion of the catheter but otherwise stayed still while H injected the lethabarb and I kissed her eyes and told her how much I loved her. She fell almost immediately. Even though she twitched I think she was dead by the time she hit the ground. H listened for a heartbeat and there was none.

And so ended an 18 year acquaintance. Freya was not an affectionate horse like Drifter and Balthazar are. She wasn't mean, she wasn't even offish. She tolerated caresses and kisses but didn't solicit them. She stood like a stone while I groomed her (and we'd nearly got all the long winter hair off her - she was looking very pretty that day) or untangled her mane. She'd nicker for her food but not as a greeting. Even so, she was my first endurance horse and she was game, brave and full of spirit. She did everything I asked her too and more. I retired her when I suspected she was becoming unsound and even though nothing was definite it was possible, the vet from UQ said, that she had some navicular issues. So I rode her for a year and retired her for 17. Not too bad a life I think. She had a honeymoon with a cute red stallion and lived with him for a couple of months, had Dakota at 14 and was an excellent mother. She kept the other horses in line with looks and pinned ears. Rarely did she resort to biting or kicking but wasn't afraid to impose her will by violence if she had to. Otherwise she was a graceful doe-eyed feminine and very beautiful lady. She will be missed.

The galahs love the green bindi eyes. Small flocks graze in the paddock and have every day for the past week. The bindi eye seeds must be at their most delectable. Our galahs love them too. As many as they eat it seems we'd have no bindi eyes left. Yet every year we have more than the previous one. They're just getting to the point where it is painful to pull them up as the hardening burrs stab ones fingers. I collect a bowlful for the birds on the verandah. The plants looks soft and feathery now but later on when they've dried and break free from the flattened brown disk they'll coat the bottom of ones shoes to the point in a solid mass of needles.

We are very concerned about Algernon. He has a possible broken leg. It is not weight bearing. He is dragging himself about with his beak and is loathe to move once he has landed. In the vain hope that he'll understand my intention I have put a cocky cage on top of Marvin's aviary. In it is a feed cup full of seed. I spoke to him at length yesterday about why he needed to climb into the cage and allow himself to be caught. Perhaps it won't work but there's no harm in trying. He really needs to have that leg seen to. Perhaps it can be pinned or splinted. There is no obvious wound on the outside, no obvious swelling but it might be broken up at the joint nearest the body. I suspect he had a close call of some sort for on the right side of his head are new sheathed blood feathers coming through. What caused it, I don't know.

W is coming tomorrow for a day or two. I am going to offer her this computer. Once my new one is up and running there is no need to keep this one as well. If she takes it, learns to use it, it would be an ideal way to keep in touch. If she doesn't take it, I'll keep the keyboard, the mouse and the monitor as spares and ditch the CPU.

Had a lovely moment with Jake this morning. He made his usual aggressive overtures when I put his pellets out (that is still a battle of wills as I refuse to succumb and give him seed in the morning and he, just as stubborn, refuses to eat pellets - I do give him perhaps a teaspoon of seed mixed with the pellets but that's only an appetizer, not the meal). Anyway, he was on his perch waiting for me to leave when I noticed him blinking and wiping his eye on his wing. When I peered closer I could see a cobweb across his eye. "Would you like me to get that for you?" I asked. He didn't answer but he remained still so I slowly reached up, luckily got the end of it which was about a quarter inch above his eye, and pulled it away. He didn't budge. I was so pleased. Shows a small degree of trust.

We've been up to Toowoomba to get a memory device so that I can save everything on this computer and transfer it to the new one. As usual I am hesitant about breaking it out of the box and giving it a go in case I have another IT wobbly.

The other night I decided I'd give the hated Ipod another go. It had been packed away in a safe (for it) corner of the furthest cupboard. I'd had such a problem with it that I was sorely tempted to stomp it to death. As a good newbie I went to the website for the beginners beginner instructions. It said to download the itunes software. I should backtrack a bit. The ipod instructions said to plug it into the computer. That it should charge (from blinking orange light to serene glowing green) in about 4 hours. Eight hours later it was still winking sly smug orange blips. Okay, take a deep breath, it'll be right in the end. When I downloaded itunes, taking over an hour to do so, the light glowed briefly green then reverted to orange. Arrgh! And, to make matters unendurable, the itunes software at the very end said it had been incorrectly downloaded and must be done again.

I have not crushed the ipod under my disdainful heel. It sits on the desk in a tangle of white wires and wormy alien earpieces, waiting.

Am reading two books by John Updike; The Widows of Eastwick and a collection of short stories about the Maples, describing the marriage, divorce and grandparenthood of two people amazingly called...The Maples. The Eastwick story is a good story. The writing is fine but it doesn't hit me in the solar plexus like The Maples does. The writing doesn't intrude because it is so good but a part of me can't help but gasp - even as I race ahead with the story - at the beauty, observation and tightness of the writing.

Under the influence of Updike I walked to lunch as an observer of life rather than as a silent screen audience of my own thoughts. There was a man sitting on a wooden bench across from the entrance to Crazy Prices. He had on a forest green tee shirt which served to accentuate the soft tyre of fat around his belly. He was eating chips, completely engrossed in picking out an attractive one and then putting it to his lip. Would he only eat the most attractive fattest chips? Was he a connoisseur of mini fried potato girders? For a moment I wanted to walk over and gently poke his stomach, knowing my finger would disappear up o the second or third knuckle, and say perhaps you should lay off the fast food. I didn't of course.

When I returned the chip cup sat dead center of the bench. He was not a connoisseur after all. The cup was empty.

Dream: I see a house. Within that house are small dark furred animals. Dogs? Raccoons? I am supposed to rescue them or something but have to come back later. I am driving down a dark highway. Beside the highway is a long shallow swale covered by a thick overarching hedge. I know there is a runaway who needs help. She has been living rough for weeks. I find her in the dark, lying on a filthy swag with her small dark dog or raccoon which we must leave behind. I need to get her to help. She has short dark hair and is wearing a pair of stained in the bottom cargo pants. She has sunk so low that she has fouled herself. I put a grey jacket surreptitiously on the passenger seat for her to sit on. She doesn't want to go to hospital. She wants to go to the beach. I say I will take her there but I know he has to get help. We are on a stretch of road I recognise from previous dreams. It is labeled 28th Street in the dream but it is not the 28th street of Grand Rapids. I always have trouble negotiating my way around this area; there is a cloverleaf and although I can see where I have to go, getting there is almost impossible for the road I choose leads me away instead of towards it. But I do get there and I recognise this place too. It is upstairs in a kind of mall. The entrance to the shop is off a balcony overlooking the first floor. It is nighttime and all the lights are on. It is an antique or 2nd hand shop run by Asians (Chinese? Thai?) There is always something interesting in this shop, made up of rooms leading off one another in a serpentine design. But I don't find anything I want to buy.

Then I am driving. Jack the cockatoo is in the car with me. He is his usual belligerent self. It is daylight now, a seaside sunshine. Even though I can't see the sea it feels like the beach. In front of the car are four cockatoos although as they stand one behind the other I have difficulty counting them. They have black tips to their feathers and so, I see, does Jack. Suddenly Jack drops all his defenses. It is wonderful, joyous, exhilarating. He allows me to love him. He trusts me. I am ecstatic.

R also had a dream last night. One of his violent dreams. The doctor said he probably suffers from post traumatic stress syndrome stemming from his days as a cop. Anyway, I heard him count, although he didn't enunciate the words, One! Two! Three! Four! and then in a frightened voice, "Who are you?" He was jerking, becoming quite agitated so as to avoid another session as we've had before when he's struck me or worse, once, when I awoke because he had his hand around my neck and was choking me, I woke him up. He didn't remember a thing this morning. I am intrigued by that fear in his voice and the question, "Who are you?" It would be interesting to know who he saw.

I have ordered a new computer this morning. $1400 (including 3 years hardware warranty). A Dell computer. I looked up the age of this one and it is almost 6 years old. It's been a good computer but it is starting to wind down. Programs take forever to load, it makes a grinding sound when it starts up. I don't like the fact that computers don't last for longer than they do. Recycling computers is a non-event around here and so contributes to landfill, poisoning of the ground, etc. Still, it is the age where a computer is a necessity...well, I suppose they aren't necessities but I've come to rely upon having one.

I told Jack about my dream this morning, my nose pressed against the mesh while he glowered from within. I even got teary recalling it, savouring the feeling of being able to love him and be accepted and trusted in return. Alas, my tears made no impression.

Suki the Beloved

We have a new family member; Suki (Japanese for beloved), a baby scaly breasted lorikeet. He came into work on Monday. Unfortunately he's a runner. Fortunately someone found him. He was the most terrified lorikeet I've ever seen, even more terrified than adults that have been brought in. I caught him in a hand towel to feed him and transfer him to a cage and he got me. Boy, did he bite and hang on. Took all my willpower not to shake him off or try and pry him loose. When I tried to feed him with a syringe he would go backwards so far he was hanging beneath the perch. He'd scream as soon as someone came in the room even with the cage mostly covered (had to keep him in the kennel room as if he is infected with PBFD he can't share the same air space with Tony).

N forgot to ring a carer and then when a carer did come on Tuesday to pick up a possum N forgot Suki was there. Lucky for me. I was a little concerned about his behaviour as he would hang upside down from the cage top then turn his body through his legs as though his leg joints were double jointed. He was such a pretzel. I'd never seen any bird do that and wondered if there was something neurological going on as well as the possible PBFD (PBFD signs in greenies can also be poor nutrition. When I had a chance to feel his keel bone he was rather thin).

By Wednesday I decided he would come home with me. Today is Saturday. He has gone from this wild-eyed screaming bundle of terror to a tame, semi-cuddly little friend. He fell asleep in my lap yesterday half wrapped in my sweatshirt. Today I got him out twice and although when we are outside I am nervous about him taking a sudden flying leap and don't keep him out long, inside the house he is quite content to sit on my arm. I've put him on coccivet as he wasn't eating very well; half a ml here, a quarter of a ml there. Not nearly enough. Today the medication finally kicked in and he is eating 2 to 4 mls at a time.

He is a typical greenie, that bright spring green with blue green feathering (wonder if it would glow under a black light) on the crown of his head. His breast is flecked with yellow feathers. The first few days he was still dropping flight feathers (all his tail feathers were already missing) but that has stopped. He has a dark brown beak and very brown, very baby eyes.

At night he lives in the spare room. During the day he hangs on the deck. We've made a little igloo type house out of cardboard for him which he uses. Eventually, when Felicity goes to P & Gs for flight training, and if he grows his feathers back, he can move in with Byron. In the reading I've done the jury seems to be out whether juvenile sufferers of PBFD are carriers when they are adult. Also, it appears that once a lorikeet has reached adulthood they don't seem to succumb to the virus.

I've written to the bird click blog as I am stuck with Dimitri and the retrieve. I inadvertently click just as he's picked up the peg and flung it out of the bowl and getting him to return the peg to the bowl just isn’t working. When he touches it he always seems to push it further away.