With a combination of extreme heat, computer problems and server hiccups I have been unable to post. Oh, of course there was a bit of ennui in there too. Maybe not ennui, more a lack of anything to say.

Have finished another drawing. I'm not that thrilled with it but am amazed at how a nice frame and a mat make even the most lacklustre drawing shine. The op shops often have pictures with frames and sometimes even mats for sale for next to nothing. I throw away the pictures and voila! I've got a cheap frame with glass and sometimes a mat for peanuts. One things I discovered with this last drawing is that I don't like working small. It's of a large cockatoo standing and a nude woman running. The cockatoo dwarfs the woman. It's a frame filler but not much more.

The previous drawing, the one I was working on the last time I wrote, turned out well. It is of a sleeping woman with her hand draped over a sleeping cat. I love the hand. Hands are beautiful, full of luscious curves and delicate lines. A hand in repose mirrors the person to whom it belongs. The lighting is different too, coming from beneath the woman a la a Degas painting of proscenium lights illuminating actors on a stage. The cat is not as satisfactory, strangely enough as I've drawn many cats and have done a decent job. But it's okay.

I am reading a Phil Rickman book, The Bones of Avalon. In it was this: 'Both feet above the ground looking down with a terrible pity, the white moon shining through him. The whiteness aglow in his eyes and so very very cold.' I made a sketch with pencil and charcoal last night trying to illustrate this image. It is intriguing enough to do again with more care and less mess. But it is a dark picture, figuratively as well as literally. Not my usual vein. But I have the twin frame and mat of the large cockatoo and woman to use and this might just work.

What I am really looking forward to is a picture using one of the early American mirrors from my childhood home. It is a convex mirror and so gives a distorted image. I've found a way I can secure it on a small easel. I want to do a self portrait with it. A self portrait in situ. I've only done one self portrait, 30+ years ago, in pastel. Have no idea what happened to it but it wasn't very good anyway. Seems self portraits always portray the artist as glowering, probably from the concentration they bring to the work. I can work big on this one (have a suitable op shop frame for it too).

Start yoga class tonight. Should have gone last week but the way through Grantham was still closed. I am looking forward to learning some new poses, a new way of doing yoga. This is vinyasa flow. I think I've been doing Hatha for I hold poses for 8 breaths. Admittedly it is sometimes hard to do yoga. Once I've started it's all right and I always feels better after but getting my butt on the mat can be difficult. I'm averaging 5 days out of 7.

Yesterday I walked all around J. C's property looking for a horse that wasn't missing. We thought we'd seen three horses in the yards the first day we walked up to his house on the hill to feed the chickens. They are away on holiday for 2 weeks. We couldn't raise him on the phone so while R took the dogs back home I walked up to the top two dams and through the bush and along and down fencelines. It was nice to walk through the land I've ridden through for many years. Sad too for he's cleared old trees and young trees, cut swathes through the bush and cleared the ridges of sapling trees. Compared to here, there is little bird life. Still, it was a nice hike with magnificent views of the surrounding hills and the big blue bowl of sky above me.

When my computer was still not connecting I rang Skymesh tech help. Spoke to a lad called Michael who said he could hear the birds in the background. We are very lucky to live with such richness. The dam is still full and there are at least four Australasian grebes there was well as two purple swamp hens with tiny fluff ball babies. There was no bird life on JC's dams.

Jack is targeting better. The other day he just stared at me when I offered him the stick. He usually does stare and then eventually deigns to mouth it to get the treat. This particular morning he just took forever so I walked out. Fed one of the other birds and then went and tried again. He bit the spoon so I gave him the seed and went out to get him his breakfast. As I was putting it on the spike he marched down the branch and tried to bite. I didn't say a word, just walked out with his breakfast. Fed all the other birds and then took his breakfast in again. He was good as gold.

Animal intelligence is amazing. The other day when we went to JC's, 4 or 5 cows broke away from the group at the bottom of the driveway and walked up to the house ahead of us (JC's driveway is probably a kilometre long and all uphill). When we got there we found two calves in the backyard. R let them out and they went to their mothers and had a drink. They could've been in there for 2 days as we only need to check the chooks every other day. How did those cows know we'd help them? They had friends go with them as only two of the cows had their calves trapped. The others must have gone along for moral support. It's like when Drifter is hurt he always come to the fence to let his know he needs help. So Jack, being a super intelligent cockatoo, has no problem working out what makes us tick. If he's nice, we're nice. If he's not he's either ignored or taken away from something he enjoys.

floods

The following was written after the floods.

It's 6:30am. I've been up for an hour in a world that is fresh and bright and very green. The birds are done, the horses out, cats fed, coffee made (but not drunk). R has just returned from his morning constitutional with the whippets. It feels as though what R and I call desert weather is approaching. This is based upon our short time in New Mexico where the air was so dry that the days were hot and the nights were cold as there was nothing to shield the earth from the sun's rays nor a particle blanket to prevent the earth from losing heat at night. For Queensland, in the summer, this is not usual and seems to presage desperate weather.

We had 55mm (over two inches) in an hour. The creek belted down, half flooded the paddock again, the peach paddock completely awash (should've taken a photo but didn't think of it til afterwards). Took a bike ride after the worst was over and had fun battling flooded DGR. So much debris that branches as thick as R's arm were washed up onto the high center of the road. Water 1/3 of the way up the bike wheels and currents so strong I had difficulty staying upright. But so much fun too! Pedaled like a mad woman as it was raining still and I needed to warm up but once warm I didn't feel the rain anymore. And this was just near dark so all the verges were singing with not only the sound of running water but frogs and crickets. Dusk has always been a magic time.

Karla's sister and kids fine although the kids are getting counseling. The house was lost. 20 dead, 12 still missing. There's a HUGE community response; everything from making and taking food to the, on Sunday 11,000 volunteers, who show up and clean houses, playing fields, businesses, to people fostering wild and domestic animals. Some guy in China is collecting $$ because we helped them during their floods. In town a salon was donating $10 from every colour or tint they did to the flood. People are donating heavy equipment (gov't pays for fuel), pumps, skills - plumbers, electricians, etc. You name it, someone's doing it for nothing. This is the first time the internet has played a part, a very large part in the recovery. Facebook and twitter are integral to the recovery. Someone started a site on FB for baked goods. Armed with mobile phones and ipads they find areas all over Brisbane that need food and send out agents with fresh baked goods, lunches or drinks. Mothers that can't get out and physically clean houses bake like women possessed, have their products picked up and delivered where it's needed. Our premier, Anna Bligh, who got alot of bad press prior to the disaster has been exemplary in her handling of it; the right amount of tough incisive decision making and emotion (she almost broke down twice during press conferences). During the height of the disaster she was giving information to the public every two hours, willing to delegate and receive information from those experienced in their fields, very human but a tower of strength. I was losing faith in her and probably will again as I don't agree with her policies, but as a leader during a disaster I can't think of anyone who could be better. She has been just amazing.

flood animal rescue

It's a case of missed communications and a, to be honest, inner reluctance on my part. KL spoke to me via FB for the need of foster carers and volunteer staff to care for the many animals left without owners or homes in the aftermath of the flood. She said there were many quaker parrots, budgies, cockatiels, Major Mitchells (2) and a cockatoo in care at the Univ. of Queensland. I said I would be more than happy to foster a couple of small birds (that's all the room I have and that's with juggling birds as I'm really full to pussy's bow with 15 birds) and/or do some volunteer work at the university. She said she'd ring me that afternoon. She didn't.

Yesterday R and I went out to the university to offer help. The receptionist said they had many many offers for volunteer work and fostering. Told her I'd worked with MCC for 9 years and had a special interest in birds. She took that information back to Bob Doneley but he was too busy so I just left my details. KL rang last night but I missed her call. I rang her this morning but she wasn't home. I've emailed her.

Tried to talk R into buying another large cage, about $220, which would be large enough to house a couple of small birds in safe yet roomy accomodation. But R has had enough. Too many animals and having even more would just complicate things furthers. Of course he's right. I've got 4 birds living permanently on the verandah which was supposed to be the cat's verandah. Two birds which are hung on the deck during the day and brought into the spare room at night. Not only is that inconvenient but I don't like having birds in small cages. It wouldn't have to be this way except #$%^#@ Felicity decided to get a burr up her bottom and turn into a green feathered terrorist. She'd lived with Byron without incident for how long? one, two years? then she decides she's going to hunt him away from food and keep him on the floor. I tried different combinations of greenies, Felicity with all Byron, Hugo and Suki, Felicity with Byron and Hugo The only one she liked was Suki. Byron has never been out of that cage - and never will. His beak has never regrown nor have his wings healed. Because she wouldn't stop hunting all of the birds, except for Suki she had to come out. She's in one of the small cages. The other small cage is for Hugo as he's got PBFD and hasn't regrown his feathers yet.

Anyway, there's my hesitation. We're overcrowded in that I have two birds in small cages which should be in aviaries and now I'm considering taking on more. If I got another large cage I could put it on the verandah and wouldn't feel bad about having a couple of quaker parrots in it. I'm cautious about getting budgies or cockatiels. Female cockatiels are prone to egg-binding and with the high sex drive of them and budgies getting more of them could be a bit more than I can handle (there's a mickey bird with a very large green caterpillar on the poinciana outside the window. the caterpillar was very large yet posed no problem for him. He whacked it against the branch a couple of times and then swallowed it down, rather like a person sucking up spaghetti).

Fog tracing fingers over the ridges. Nineteen millimetres of rain yesterday afternoon from a noisy storm. Lots of thunder and lightning, some of it very close so that the flash and the bang were one. The verandah birds were unsettled but the horses, standing on the ridge of land surrounding the new lake, didn't even twitch.

It's been too hot to do much of anything. 36 yesterday. Did a little drawing but the heat is so enervating that even my mind has difficulty engaging. The length of the drawing board laying across my bare legs, keeping what little air there is from reaching my skin makes me even hotter. All I can do, along with R and all the animals, is wait it out.

Hugo, one of the greenies, even lies down on his stomach in the corner of the cage and pants. R saw him on his back once. The first time I saw this I thought he was sick but it's just his way. He looks like a little green quail. Speaking of his quail-like qualities, he hasn't grown any flight feathers since he's been here and was even losing feathers on his head. I started to think the worst but his head feathers are regrowing and they look normal so there's hope. I don't want to have to put him down.

The new drawing has had a difficult gestation. I did a series of thumbnails as inspiration, unlike the previous two drawings, was absent. Suppose it was too good to be true, those previous two drawings. Thought creativity was going to roll out of me.. Then there was nothing. Not a nice feeling. Even took to drawing lines with my eyes closed to see if anything suggested itself. Finally, something did. Although it's early stages, barely more than a line drawing, I like it. It's of a sleeping woman with her hand draped over the back of a sleeping cat. I love the hand. I've always loved hands. It's one of the first things I notice about people after their eyes. It's sinuous and soft and quite beautiful, even if I do say so myself. At least the outline of it is. Whether it will remain beautiful as the drawing progresses remains to be seen.

Have meant to say in previous posts that Cornelius is fine. He's singing again and dashing from one end of the verandah to the other. I'm still treating all of them with coccivet. He had to have picked it up from Tony as he was the only new ingredient to the mix and Tony did have coccidiosis. Because Cornelius was such a healthy bird, never having a days illness after his wing was taped, it took a long time to incubate. What threw me too was that until the very end, when he was weak and I believe near death, his faeces remained normal. I don't have a microscope to examine faeces. Tony's faeces are still a bit soft and when he's on my finger and I hold still and watch him he will close his eyes for a second or two. That's not normal. He's been on coccivet off and on his entire short life but what choice do I have. Tony eats well, flies well, is always cranky in the morning, like Jake, and seems to have energy and vivacity – but I don't believe he's 100% either. It was a mistake to treat Cornelius with Flagyl when he didn't have trichomoniasis but the state of his faeces is what put me off. The turn around came when he was directly dosed with coccivet. It was a joyful day the first time I saw him eat a few seeds, with his poor heavy head hanging over the cup, but at least he was eating. Now you wouldn't recognise that he'd ever been sick.

The flood disaster still holds most of Queensland, parts of Victoria, NSW and Tasmania in its thrall. Brisbane is mopping up but most of the CBD is back to work, the markets have reopened and power is being restored to most homes. Some homes will be destroyed as the damage was too great. Grantham residents were allowed to return home yesterday. Twenty people are dead and another 12 are missing still. A couple of days ago we walked to the end of DGR. The road at the far end has been completely destroyed. It has been sliced in half by a new creek, about 16 feet wide and 6 feet deep. The residents have cut a 4 wheel drive track through a paddock but they have no phone, no power and no chance of getting same for quite a while. Someone told them to evacuate as the road would not be repaired but I don't believe they can do that. At least five families live there. It's just going to take a while. We aren't going to repair fences until the rainy season is over.

1/11

Eight people confirmed dead from a tsunami type wall of water which crashed through Towoomba's CBD without warning yesterday afternoon. Seventy two people are missing from Grantham and Murphy's Creek. The floodwaters are heading east. Brisbane and Ipswich are in danger. Gatton has had evacuations. Esk, Kilcoy, Toogoolawah, Warwick, the list goes on. Laidley and Forest Hill residents urged to evacuate.

We had our own scary moment this morning. David rang at 6am to say a wall of water was headed our way. The creek was already up and over the paddock. It rose further, coming nearly to the gatepost on the driveway. We evacuated the dogs to Joan's house. Our cars were already there. The back paddock is completely under water. The landslips and mudslides scar every ridge and mountain. It is very worrying especially as we still have today, with heavy rain forecast, to get through. We had 108mm overnight. It's raining hard as I write this. The weather radar is always up and running on the computer and we have the tv on to watch for developments. It is a disaster at least as bad as the 1974 floods and perhaps worse. Time will tell. Heavy rain is sliding southwest fortunately just south of us. If this is the edge, and the light rainfall at the edge, I'd hate to be in the thick of it.

Watching the news and seeing entire Grantham houses floating downstream. Grantham would be completely underwater. Murphy's Creek and Grantham are rural communities. It may be days before the extent of the damage and loss of life is known. What's hard to take is the loss of life, both human and animal. At least humans are usually informed (although that was not the case in Toowoomba, Grantham or Murphy's Creek) and can make decisions to try and save themselves. Animals don't have that option. Entire paddocks are metres under water which means all the cattle, horses, pigs, chickens, dogs and cats are drowned. Wallabies, echidnas, bandicoots, snakes, lizards, birds, spiders, all gone. The only things coping well are ducks. We have five in the dam paddock, two adults and 3 babies.

Have evacuated the dogs (including little white fluffy we're babysitting for Anthony) to Joan's house as well as the vehicles. Was a bit dire this morning. David rang at 6 saying there was a wall of water headed our way - which was a bit scary as the creek was already up and over the paddock. It came up nearly to the gatepost on the driveway (creek paddock). The back paddock is completely underwater and boy, is it surging. There's so much power in it. Compared to the poor people in Grantham and Withcott we're laughing. The dams in the dam paddock are one huge lake. It looks like a do-nut with a small ridge of 'dry' land encircling it. The water is above my eyeline as I sit at this computer. If it breaks not sure which way it will go. There are many large land/mudslides on all the surrounding mtns. Even the ridge behind our house is mostly exposed red mud with just a few trees clinging on. The ground just can't absorb any more water.

11.01.12. Excerpt from letter to Tam.

I finally broke down and had the cry I needed to have. There is so much heartbreaking footage on tv; cows swimming, obviously exhausted with just their noses sticking out, a snake curled around a fence post and a chicken swimming against flood waters. That was the image that did it. 10 people dead now, 86 missing. Karla's sister lives in Grantham, she and her boys are missing. 300 people including Richard's cousin (whose husband is dying in hospital from cancer) airlifted out. She had to leave her 5 cats behind. Flood waters are expected to exceed the 1974 disaster, the benchmark for flooding disasters in which 14 people died. The more I see, the more I realise that it will be a very long time before things return to normal. You know when you drive up Gatton Clifton road before you turn right to head into Gatton? That green Queenslander which used to be an antique shop, was underwater. Right there. At the end of 'our' street, as it were. That house is on Lockyer Creek which went berserk. Entire houses were lifted from their foundations in Grantham. People heard their neighbours screaming as they were swept away. I just can't believe it. The weather has been so bad that emergency services have had a terrible time trying to get in to the places that need help the most, most especially Grantham. They expect to find many dead from the people that were swept away. And then there are the 'small' stories. Peter who lives at the end of Spinach Creek had contact with his neighbour 'down below' (Peter lives on top of the mountain). The neighbour of this neighbour went to town and couldn't get back. The floodwaters are such that she can't get over and feed the chickens or the cockatiel. But there is some EXCELLENT news. The evacuation centers were only accepting people but not their pets. Now they say, bring your pets as long as they are secure. Common sense prevails! Can you imagine being ordered to evacuate your house because it's going to go under but you must leave your 'children' behind? Madness.

There is a soft bleating sound outside. It is dark. The bleat is a muffled staccato amongst the mating calls of frogs and cane toads. The amphibians are happy. We've had another flooding day. The creek, which has not stopped, broke its banks again and washed over the paddocks. We haven't even been down the back to check. R panicked a little and moved the cars to a neighbour's house. Of course it didn't come to that. Still, the peach paddock was completely underwater and when we did take the cars to the neighbour she had a river coursing beneath her house. I rode the bike up the road this evening as the rains have passed and everywhere is a sibilant murmur. The roads shimmer beneath a patina of water, the verges gurgle, the ditches guffaw. I have never seen water like this in all the time we've lived here. R is sick of it - and so was I for a day or two but, like a demented pendulum, I have swung back the other way. I found I remembered the drought too well, the promises made that I would never be sick of rain if and when it came. Give me rain any time over drought - even if the road, which the council has just repaired, has washed away again - in the same place. No doubt, there will be another cave in at Jackson's Yards. Can't see for myself for the causeways are impassable until the water subsides. But that will only take a couple of days. At least this time we have the phone. We lost it for over a week and as we have no mobile reception here R was feeling the loss. Not me. I hate phones and would happily never answer another.

The preceding paragraph was written days ago. It was as far as I got. Have been very slack about writing here even though I think of it often. Very slack in many ways.

But not with art. After finishing the previous drawing, and so scared that I would not have another idea and would be straining for days to give birth to some stilted over-wrought and ultimately worthless idea I found instead, to my great surprise and delight, that another idea bubbled up almost immediately. There is no greater pleasure than having something on the go. White spaces, whether it's a canvas, a drawing paper or a virginal manuscript is one the of the most disheartening prospects one can face. The idea came so quickly and went so well that for all intents of purposes I finished it yesterday. I'll live with it for awhile before the final cut but basically it is done. And I really like it. I love the concept. It is a drawing of a woman smelling/kissing a cat's head, much like I do Matisse. He doesn't like it if I try and kiss him from the front. Maybe that big face looming in is just too much of a good thing, but he always sits still when I kiss him between the ears from behind, so that both of us are facing forward. And of course, when he is kissed like that I get to inhale his lovely cat aroma. So that's what I drew but what makes the picture is that the cat is part of the woman. The cat's eyes line up where her mouth would be, the 'M' on his forehead, makes the dip above the lip (there's a word for it which I can never remember). Had to make the pupils horizontal rather than vertical but that works too.

Now, of course, I am bereft of any idea whatsoever for another drawing. Just have to trust that something will bubble to the surface. I notice that I am looking at 'things' differently, seeing them with, dare I say, an artist's eye? Everything is, I know, stored away for future reference. I suppose I am just looking more consciously. Some of the best images are those in which I can't even tell what I'm looking at. Television, surprisingly, is a good medium for creativity. I am often looking, not at the characters, but at the background of whatever is on the screen. There is artwork on television that isn't featured as art - it is in the pictures shown on the wall of houses, in sculptures, in landscapes and costumes. As I said before, sometimes I see something and my mind can't interpret it, can't label it, yet is is beautiful as a collection of colours and shapes and lights and darks.

So I must trust that this 'feeding' of the creative well will foster a new idea when it is again faced with that dreaded blank page.

There is a soft bleating sound outside. It is dark. The bleat is a muffled staccato amongst the mating calls of frogs and cane toads. The amphibians are happy. We've had another flooding day. The creek, which has not stopped, broke its banks again and washed over the paddocks. We haven't even been down the back to check. R panicked a little and moved the cars to a neighbours house. Of course it didn't come to that. Still, the peach paddock was completely underwater and when we did take the cars to the neighbours she had a river coursing beneath her house. I rode the bike up the road this evening as the rains have passed and everywhere is the sibilant murmur of moving water. The roads shimmer beneath a shallow patina of water, the verges gurgle, the ditches guffaw. I have never seen water like this in all the time we've lived here. R is sick of it - and so was I for a day or two but, like a demented pendulum, I have swung back the other way. I found I remembered the drought too well, the promises made that I would never be sick of rain if and when it came. Give me rain any time over drought - even if the road, which the council has just repaired, has washed away again - in the same place. No doubt, there will be another cave in at Jackson's Yards. Can't see for myself for the causeways are impassable until the water subsides. But that will only take a couple of days. At least this time we have the phone. We lost it for over a week and as we have no mobile reception here R was feeling the loss. Not me. I hate phones and would happily never answer another.