Still dreaming, visitors from outer spaces lie in romantic insulation in their home on wheels.  The city is stirring at sunrise. Google home page is flippant to the strains of 'cold cold heart'. Saint Valentines Day 2012.

'Have a heart' and refuse to use plastic shopping bags.  On sea and land the plastic breaks down into tiny pieces that are lethal to life forms which have a crucial role in our earth's homeostatis.
One city has just outlawed plastic bags altogether.
Take3.org.au is taking on this unseen sinister lurking menace with the message to take three pieces of litter away from the waterfront each time you visit. The sea is full of plastic bags and trash.

Lately, rain has hung around, humidity is high, the grass is greener and a stark sunny break got a few tennis players back onto the court. A large picnic group, shady fig trees and lawn bowlers are just out of range.
Must be time to get a wide angle camera.

Public forum on Wednesday.

 Regulatory photos from Civic park towards Laman Street.

 Surely this is the architectural style that is enjoying a reappearance.  This type of entrance with the rectangular structure to the fore is seen everywhere.

Towards Laman Street post fig trees, today.  Seems ok without trees planted as an avenue  The division of Laman street from the park below, by a line of trees, may be undesirable, when the area could be continuous using wide, broad, cleared steppes sweeping up to Laman street.  Would that mean more use of perpendicular lines?
  

Real Japanese recipe from an exchange student

Ichiban Boshi. Sydney.  Japanese dining with a dash of modern simplicity. Believe this brand name may be found around Asia and in Russia.
Soba noodles had been heard of in Japanese recipes and only recently it was realized they are buckwheat noodles with a distinctive appearance but the name soba can apply to a range of noodles. Determined to make a certian Asian salad it was unclear whether genuine soba noodles would be to our liking and supplies were not plentiful, so thin rice noodles were used instead and were aok and buckwheat noodles remain to be sampled another day.

Manpower and the broad axe and train sleeper hewers.  From that to this. Hey, Coles supermarket shelves of fresh produce are very diminished today (in one store at least) which could be because half the state is in flood or for some other reasons.
Who wants to see pairs of giant new supermarkets duplicated everywhere at the expense of local farmers unable to get good returns for their produce?
The obligatory trolley full to overflowing with gratuitous foodstuffs and crap is the status quo and supermarkets everywhere enjoy their captive consumers and grind and drive local producers to extinction. Repeating well worn phrases in this rant.
No worries with frozen, canned and some fresh supplies of food from China or from where ever, so many food lines sourced from countries far and wide at the cost of local expertise and jobs, all to make sure the duopoly is profitable. While it may not be confined to overseas producers, who knows if unhealthy products are used? Are spot checks done?
Well, that's how it seems. Could be that local producers need to become all super professional growers, no mucking around anymore, conform or go broke, out with diversity. Production is dictated.

Coffee shop. A kooky coffee shop in St Kilda complete with an early kooka(burra) gas stove as a prop. Vocab: Kitchen stove or cooker.

Mighty trees line one side of Maitland Road, Islington, while on the other side much younger trees grow in a shape that nicely suits the situation.  With leaves that fall in summer along the edge of the park the trees make an impressive line up although all that litter is probably a bit of a problem for some people nearby.

Apart from this, the giant mature red cedar tree is buttressed like these when seen in the few specimens that remain and is one of the few indigenous trees that are deciduous. Aparently cedars can be grown easily enough.

See the Bogey Hole swimming pool full of caffe latte. Sea spray high as the top of the cliffs, taken on two different days.

Coffee. Could be Charlestown square.

dejabrew  Is coffee the new opium?
Religion is the opium of the people.  The tennis superstars from the Russian bloc wear a gold cross on a neck chain. Curious. Postmodern. What does Putin wear?

Riverside. On taking a short cut.

Red white and blue for Australia Day. At Lambton library another bright garden from the city council.
Next door,  is another old feature found in the 'burbs: Lambton Memorial Baby Health Centre. Maybe more parents do their own thing around raising their offspring. Never the less, appropriate free support probably goes a long way.
Would seem really useful as a multi-purpose community centre as well.
An internet glitch has stood in the way of the blog these past days.

Around here, we hardly know what crowds are like.

Sawmilling by water power. We are right into alternative energy here. Or water torture?
From Melbourne, at this hour, it's torture watching Hewitt take a set off Djokovic, it's stress all round. May the best man win. But we know who's already number one.

Under a gum - eucalypt - tree and scribbly gum trees.  Smooth bark marked by insects.

Deer are never found wandering around our countryside and deer farms are few and far between and this elderly dear and friend were lining up for supplementary food from the keeper. The animal's eyes are very endearing and the hide is course and rough. Naturally they are kept behind high wire fences. Feral deer probably exist. Interest in unusual animals or crops waxes and wanes, perhaps demand is too small to become mainstream.
Confront a deer and enjoy B&B at Mesopotania B&B just north of Kempsey NSW.

nonsense act at national museum canberra - slides

Road Safety! Stop Look Listen!
Pit stop for the brave and unwary?  Way out of town on the highway, a thoughtful new strategy, probably during the holidays, is that of setting up portaloos plus a wheelie bin in a number of the parking bays. Roadside areas are not necessarily very safe from passing traffic, imagine if one of these were run into!  And do they sway with each passing of a  B Double?

At Toronto on Lake Macquarie. And poster art.

At Newcastle Baths.  Traditional poster.

Maidens or parents, Italy or Lambton, coffee is shared. And gelato.

 coffee at Kinokuniya - for books international especially Asian cultures

Refreshments.
Illy Coffee had its origins in Trieste.  In the 1930s, the founder invented the predecessor of today's expresso machine and further work on the art and science of coffee has continued from the global company that still involves the Illy family - according to Wikipedia and Illy on-line.

Why ever do we copy everything that's done overseas? Government-wise. Do we want to end up with the same problems? Be original.
Caffe Aurora Medaglia D'oro is a family business in Australia since 1947 into coffee and tea.  Bambino - win a Fiat 500 in their competition.