PIGS may fly, as the expression goes, but the owner of the Inverawe Native Gardens at Margate was hardly prepared for the sight of a flying pademelon. There was Margaret Chestnut one autumnal afternoon, tending some newly-planted shrubs, when she saw what looked like a pademelon land with a thump right in front of her. Yes, her eyes were not deceiving her. It really was a pademelon that had apparently fallen right out of the sky. Mrs Chestnut moved forward to determine if … [Read more...] about Help for a fallen friend
Archives for May 2012
Death of a wordsmith
It was a memorial service fit for one of the legendary kings of Fleet Street, a Rothermere, Beaverbrook or even a Murdoch. The congregation spilled into the aisles of St Bride’s church, the choir in place, as the rector started the bidding-prayer. Handel’s Largo from Xerxes had just rung out from the organ pipes, the melody pulsating through the Wren masterpiece, drifting across its cobbled courtyard and leafy graveyard and into the alleyways that are the capillaries of an … [Read more...] about Death of a wordsmith
Woodswallows take their time
Winter had finally arrived, with a dusting of snow on Mount Wellington and a chilly wind rattling the eucalypt canopy but, observing the antics of the dusky woodswallows, you would not know it. The welcome swallows and tree martins had been gone for weeks but here on a sunny if bitterly cold day the woodswallows were still doing what woodswallows do best – launching themselves from bare branches to snap up insects in mid-flight. It was a surprise to come across them … [Read more...] about Woodswallows take their time
A shot of Mellowood
A streaker dashed across the pitch as Don Bentley and his colleagues watched cricket on television late one night in the newsroom, after the first edition of the Chronicle had been put to bed. “Haven’t see a streaker in years,” said the sports editor. Don Bentley wasn’t listening. He was thinking of a streaker from years gone by, long ago in the city of Johannesburg. After the next over, he told the story. “It was early in the morning, before the African sun had risen … [Read more...] about A shot of Mellowood
Cool reception for a new recruit
The editor and his deputy sat in the bar of Port Moresby airport. What was usually a chore, an obligation, had turned into something else – an outing, an escape from the office on an impossibly hot and humid day to the comfort of a lounge that offered impossibly cold beer. The bar of the Port Moresby airport was in fact known to be the only air-conditioned space in the whole of the country and the editor and his deputy had up until that point not recognised its … [Read more...] about Cool reception for a new recruit