Last night I watched Australia and Ghana play soccer. Very frustrating in the first part, and then very exciting as the team fought back. I found the reactions of the commentators fascinating, in part because they were saying things like this team is now playing with Australian spirit. So they had an idea in their mind as to what they thought the Australian character was and then applied it to the team.
All this was grist to the mill for someone like me, so I thought that I should write something next day.
It was very late before I got to bed, I slept in, and felt very jaded. Not only had I missed my early morning writing time, but I didn't feel like writing. Then I found out that I had missed an entire section from the biography of my grandfather that I am now posting on line. So I had to redo the entire post - Drummond's life 3 - The Progressive Party 192
This is the first time that I have actually published a complete 100,000 word book on-line, so I do want it to be right. Mind you, in the next chapter I have found a missing two pages. I am going to have to work around that.
Looking at the material again, I keep forgetting that David Drummond was very deaf. On 15 May 1921, one of his Parliamentary colleagues wrote to Earle Page:
Drummond has improved very much & is becoming possessed of a large fund of information. Unfortunately he is becoming more deaf & it is a bit trying to travel with him because he only speaks what is in his own mind irrespective of the current of conversation & not being able to hear others speaking he starts in the middle of a conversation some other subject. I am trying to persuade him to get an ear trumpet.
There is something very satisfying in now putting on-line the material I wrote on Drummond for my PhD after all the troubles I experienced with fights among the examiners. People can make up their own minds.
I spent some time in all this digging around for old photos. This one from Cousin Jamie's collection shows Mum with her father at Glen Innes around 1922.
Helen, my eldest, is very like Mum, Clare maybe more like me. I also spent some time digging around to find photos to show to point. I didn't have time but, just for the hell of it, here
In the midst of all this, Clare asked me to take her to hockey. I spoke of Clare's hockey last Tuesday in NSW Women's State Hockey Championships.
Since she got her license a little while ago, she has been taking the car to the local games, so I haven't been watching. I was therefore happy to go.
The only problem in all this is that they had changed the draw. We left at 11 for a 12pm game, only to find that the game was now at 1:00! I had a copy of Jim Fletcher's Clean, Clad and Courteous, a history of Aboriginal education in NSW with me, so settled down to re-read that.
The game began with a rush. Clare let in two early goals, one of which she should have stopped. When I quizzed her after the match, she said that she simply wasn't paying enough attention to the way that Briars Hockey started their games! Still she settled down and made some spectacular saves. Just as well, given that UNSW lost 6-1 as it was.
One of Clare's old school hockey team mates is now playing in Clare's team. Chatting to her parents during the game, I learned that the University of NSW had sold its hockey field at Little Bay to realise extra cash to fund University expansion. I was a little shocked.
For the size of the population, Sydney does not have a lot of sporting fields. We parents learn to spend a lot of time travelling as a consequence. UNSW has something like nine senior teams, and they will soon be without a home ground.
With all the delays, it was 2:30 before we left to return home. I had to do some shopping on the way, so it was after 4:00 when I entered our front door. And then I had domestic duties including cooking. In all, a very messy day.
Still, with tea finished, I have at least finished a post here!
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