Rural Sydney Skyscape Contrasts

A few weeks ago – on 26 September 2009 to be exact – Sydneysiders woke up to a red dust haze so spooky that many people thought they were experiencing the final countdown to Armageddon. For me it was a moment of wonder. Tynney my family sheep was the one who alerted me to the phenomenon with his insistent baaaing. I took one look out of the window then grabbed the digital camera and ran outside in my PJs to get as many shots as I could. It looked and felt as though I was stepping out into a red swirly fog. 

Well, I finally downloaded the pics onto the computer and then compared them to a beautiful May 2009 sunrise. I thought you all might be interested in some of these contrasts taking from a similar vantage point near a tree which faces the east. The top pic is the May sunrise, the middle one is the red September haze, and the third shot was taken two days later when we were hit by another less potent dust storm which lacked the red tinge of the first. I have an enormous respect for nature and this is another good reason why.

Spring Spring Spring!

That's the title of a song from one of my all time favourite musicals – Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, which was directed by Stanley Donan with amazing choreography by Michael Kidd (I loved the barn raising sequence). Always thought Howard Keel was the most manliest of men of the musical theatre along with the incredible and terribly sexy Gene Kelly who was not in that particular movie. I also thought the second brother Benjamin (played by Jeff Richards who I just found out was a professional minor league baseball player as well as actor) was the handsomest of the seven brothers. He ended up with gorgeous and sultry Julie Newmar whose character name – Dorcas – was anything but feminine (Newmar later went on to play Catwoman in the Batman television series with Adam West). But what a diversion ... I just want to say that the weather here is sunny and gorgeous and very welcome after a particularly cold and biting winter – even parts of the Blue Mountains had snow (Australians are such wimps when it comes to cold weather). Anyway, looking forward to swimming again ... I am a water baby at heart after all.