At the bridge of the failed painter, I stoop and check the sagging timbers before placing one foot, then the other, on this sorry decrepitude. It cracks and pops like a first fleet ship, but the sounds are not ominous; more the rattled wheezing of an invalid friend. I proceed with care,sucking the thumb pricked on its splintery balustrade. Ahead, lies the gate and welltrod path and, branching like spider veins, the merest hints of tracks―overgrown, leading to a wilderness filled with possibilities. I stand and consider. Buttoning my duffel coat—a veteran of the moth wars, I step off the path, and into the weeds.
©L.M.Noonan
We have a strict internet usage quota mostly because of our 'rural' location.
I'm told that our distance from a subbox and the age of our telecommunications lines determines speed, quantity and I suppose quality of internet.
Anyway, last month the ferals managed to use up our allotted amount in half the time.
In plain speak WE HAD NO INTERNET beyond the worst kind of dialup. I could not even load my own blog page!
I could however, hang out a load of washing and boil the kettle and make myself a cuppa in the time it took to download my email messages.
So that's why I've been silent.
Also, I have been busier than usual with the demands of the ferals and the work that provides us with our daily bread. And there have been several significant changes in our personal lives that have gobbled up lots of angst time and sleep time.
I'm still really busy because this week I'm being both Mum and Dad to the ferals.
Fong is in Malaysia for a while, so I won't be surfing the net for a little while yet.
Just sticking my head up to say Hoo Roo.
PS I'd really love to have a few helping hands like Jeffy has at his factory

Nothing's been happening around these parts...nothing of any interest.
I always seem to do more
washing,
shopping,
cleaning
and cooking when it's school holiday time.
However;
everything goes back to 'normal' tomorrow.
Hurrah! I do love the ferals, but a little absence makes the heart grow fonder.
Come morning it's pack them up and ship them out.
all photos © L.M.Noonan 2009
A young family friend has just published his first post to his blog.
I look forward to what this young man does next...and not just because of who his subject matter is.
Yi posted to his blog the work that he is featured in, and the archangel and speak no evil model is Yi's older brother---son # 2; Josh.


all photographs © L.M.Noonan 2009
I posted a poem that I wrote in Nepal last year, today it's a few more photos...all taken a few minutes apart.
I was busy trying to get a few shots of the whirling clouds and congregations of Kathmandu's pigeons when a street boy--more numerous than even the pigeons; stood directly in front of my lens, I smiled and took the photo not expecting much. A few months later and I realised that I caught more than I bargained for.
© L.M.Noonan
The predatory glint of the roads teeth
seems anticipatory
friendly even
it only has to wait
this road has dined on many such as we
vainglorious
seeking what
enlightenment
congratulatory esteem
the mica winks
despite
the dollops of buff
yak
and human manure
how does one start to understand anothers culture
from the wrappers
from the rubbish
from the waste
It's school holidays here in Queensland and somehow the days have gotten away
from me.
I keep meaning to post some more photos from our last trip but...
Instead: a little bit of hastily written poetry I found in my travel diary.
Written on the trails in Nepal.
dangerous liaisons © L.M.Noonan 2009
duly noted:
these gestures
these acts
these events
the subtleties of language
impenetrable
unguessable
elude you
direct you down one way streets
and cul-the-sacs
set you up in blind dates with monsters
have you tasting fugu instead of foie gras
leaves you on worn stoops blackeyed and lost
duly noted:
stick to what you know
I've been flitting from one thing to another--as befits a failed painter.
A bit of painting here, a little sewing there and lots of reading...of other peoples fiction.
I've read two of the four book Nightwatch series by Sergei Lukyanenko, the first and second having been made into some excellent cinematic viewing.
All of the books were translated into english by my X brother-in-law; Andrew Bromfield.


all photographs © L.M.Noonan
I've been pushing oilpaints around on a canvas I put away a couple of months ago and while I still have some things to resolve I'm enjoying the doing and of course the smell.
I don't want to post a picture just yet so I'm putting up some photos of rather mundane subjects with a little twist.

all photographs © L.M.Noonan
A few more random photographs; this time from walking around Udaipur.

all photographs © L.M.Noonan 2009
It's been damp and rather dreary. The ferals have the flu and the methylcobalamin is amongst other things causing me to have vivid dreams. Last night I dreamt of India. These are just a few memories of Pushkar.
Living in Peachester has always been a bit like living at the edge of the world. If you imagine the rest of the world as Jupiter, we’d be a little broken bit of some tiny asteroid—not even a moon; caught in its magnetosphere. The off world experience of being a resident of the Peachester range has recently intensified. The seemingly never ending ‘wet’ that we’ve been in the grip of has literally cut the road. We are kind of marooned, initially council said that it could take to 3 months to fix however they’ve since revised that down to 3-4 weeks! One of the forty bends no longer exists and it now takes an hour and a half each way for my two youngest sons to reach high school. The bus company is fuming and I feel very sorry for those who must commute to the coast or Brisbane for work. As for Fong and I, we were never more glad to be free of the 9-5 workday and place tyranny.
That doesn’t mean we never leave home. No in fact we are doing a little more travelling than usual in our roles as roadies and support team for Sebastian’s band ‘TheSeizures’.
Last Saturday they were interviewed by Brisbane’s 4zzz and afterwards played a set at a punk concert and a week before that they were the support band for a well known Melbourne band at Rosies in the city.