Who knew?

I love windy days. I don�t know why but it seems that my strongest senses of d�j� vu come from the weather. Grey, drizzly days make me think of Easter when I was young. All my uncles, aunts and cousins would go to my grandparents� place for a nice lunch and the world couldn�t be a better place.

Drizzly days also make me think of my little primary school, when rainy days meant that you couldn�t play out in the playground, so we�d all sit there on the tiny verandas or in the classrooms and play with the rarely-used toys and listen to the drops pattering onto the roof.

Hey, speaking of primary school, remember these? �Spirit duplicators�, copy machines of the pre-photocopier era, invented I think some time around the Triassic period. They used this strong-smelling purple ink, and instead of being electric like photocopiers, they were manually operated. You had to sit there and crank the handle and the smelly purple copies would come out the other end.

I remember not liking photocopied worksheets when we first started getting them at school. The black ink seemed harsh and ugly, and it didn�t smell at all.

But anyway, the weather�

Today isn�t rainy. It�s windy, and the wind reminds me of the snow and The Patch and The Van. It�s often windy in the Snowy Mountains in the winter � �gale force� is not a rare thing to hear when you head up there � and lower down it�s not as bad but still very breezy. I love it. We go down even in the summertime, just to be away from Sydney and everything associated with it. It really is possible to physically leave your problems behind, and the five-hour drive is worth it even for a weekend. A warm spring day, a nice breeze, a book and a bit of Greyboy playing over the stereo �

As I drove to work today, I opened the vents and let the fresh air in from outside, instead of turning on the car�s air conditioning. That faint, cold breeze made me smile, made that drive so enjoyable. I could almost feel my snowboard dangling from my foot as I sat on the chairlift. Early morning sun, hardly anybody else around, freshly groomed runs, and secret spots in the trees. One of my favourite places in the world was brought to me by the simple act of opening a vent. Amazing how the little things can make a day so much more pleasant.

We had a visitor yesterday. He showed up on our balcony late in the afternoon, accompanied by the sound of noisy flapping, and then sat there waiting for something to happen.

Daniel spotted him first, and quietly edged his way over to the camera so we could take some pictures of the intruder. Turned out that our guest was not the shy type, and happily posed for the camera.

�Demure! Punk! Funk! I can do it all, baby!�

Daniel gave him a slice of orange for his trouble.