It must be tough

It must be tough being a smoker in San Jose parks. But it makes me happy!

Winter is here!

So why are the spring flowers starting?


14 Feb - magnolia, Santa Clara.

It has been raining HEAPs here, which is fantastic. We might even make our expected rainfall for the month. Doesn't mean we are out of drought but it is nice that it keeps raining (except when I am out in it). It got me nice and soggy yesterday at the farmers' market, then after keeping my runners dry for most of the day I didn't see a huge puddle in a carpark (I was watching the crazy cars) and soaked both feet and my pants halfway up my legs. Now I usually don't do half measures in anything but this time I am glad I did!

Anyway, it is lovely to get some rain - about 50mm since Saturday I think. It's hard to tell with my large yoghurt pot rain gauge.

I guess I should've figured there'd be some rain when I saw lovely threatening clouds like these



It was a sunset though, not a sunrise. Not much of a warning for the poor old shepherd!

For train nuffies only

Here's a couple of wonky-cam videos of the Tehachapi Loop in action.





If I can get a video editing thing going, I'll show you one that Nathan took too. It is too big for blogger. You can read more on Nathan's blog.

:-)

Straight to the pool room

(If anyone knows where this originated, I'd be happy to credit it.)

You know you're Australian if....

You know the meaning of 'girt'

You believe that stubbies can either be worn or drunk

You think it is normal to have a Prime Minister called Kevin

You waddle when you walk due to the 53 expired petrol discount vouchers stuffed in your wallet or purse (and purse does not mean handbag but the female version of a wallet)

You've made a bong out of your garden hose rather than use it for something illegal such as watering the garden

When you hear that an American 'roots for his team' you wonder how often and with whom

You understand that the phrase 'a group of women wearing black thongs' refers to footwear and may be less alluring than it sounds

You pronounce Melbourne as 'Mel-bin'

You pronounce Penrith as 'Pen-riff'

You believe the 'L' in the word ' Australia ' is optional

You can translate: 'Dazza and Shazza played Acca Dacca on the way to Maccas'

You believe it makes perfect sense for a nation to decorate its highways with large fibreglass bananas, prawns and sheep

You call your best friend 'a total bastard' but someone you really, truly despise is just 'a bit of a bastard'

You think 'Woolloomooloo' is a perfectly reasonable name for a place

You believe is makes sense for a country to have a $1 coin that's twice as big as its $2 coin

You understand that 'Wagga Wagga' can be abbreviated to 'Wagga' but 'Woy Woy' can't be called 'Woy'

You believe that cooked-down axlegrease makes a good breakfast spread

You believe all famous Kiwis are actually Australian, until they stuff up, at which point they again become Kiwis

You know, whatever the tourist books say, that no one says 'cobber'

You know that certain words must, by law, be shouted out during any rendition of the Angels' song 'Am I Ever Gonna See Your Face Again'

You believe, as an article of faith, that the confectionary known as the Wagon Wheel has become smaller with every passing year

You still don't get why the 'Labor' in 'Australian Labor Party' is not spelt with a 'U

You wear ug* boots outside the house

You believe that the more you shorten someone's name the more you like them

Whatever your linguistic skills, you find yourself able to order takeaway fluently in every Asian language

You understand that 'excuse me' can sound rude, while 'scuse me' is always polite

You know what it's like to swallow a fly, on occasions via your nose

You understand that 'you' has a plural and that it's 'youse'

You know it's not summer until the steering wheel is too hot to handle

You biggest family argument over the summer concerned the rules of beach cricket

You shake your head in horror when companies try to market what they call 'Anzac cookies'

You still think of Kylie as 'that girl off Neighbours'

When returning home from overseas, you expect to be brutally strip-searched by Customs - just in case you're trying to sneak in fruit

You believe the phrase 'smart casual' refers to a pair of black tracky-daks, suitably laundered

You understand that all train timetables are works of fiction

When working at a bar, you understand male customers will feel the need to offer an excuse whenever they order low-alcohol beer

You get choked up with emotion by the first verse of the national anthem and then have trouble remembering the second

You find yourself ignorant of nearly all the facts deemed essential in the government's new test for migrants.

You will immediately forward this list to other Australians, here and overseas, realising that only they will understand!!

My addition - you know you're Australian if you get the title of this blog post!

NY Drive Day 3

The day dawned grey and cold and miserable - the dense fog Bakersfield greeted us with the night before had settled in for the long haul it seemed. We were glad to leave and headed sorta eastish, towards the desert.

As we started to climb out of Central Valley, the fog began to clear, revealing rolling green velvet hills. There were even some cows grazing in the paddocks! That required a photo - we are not used to this idea of cattle being able to graze on their right and proper food here in the US - we see too many intensive dairy and cattle farms.



The terrain became more rugged as we climbed a bit further, and more scenic.


Some of the mountains had snow on top!


Eventually we were high enough to see patches of snow around us. We passed a small town and headed for the desert. But first,




The vegetation suddenly changes - rainshadow I guess - and we saw our first Joshua Trees. Weird looking things but fairly typical of agaves.




This is the best pic we got in Mojave. I think it sums up our visit there - we came, we saw, we got out of this benighted place as soon as we could. It is on a vast desert plain and I cannot imagine how hot it would be in summer when the winds blow out of the desert towards the coast.

We left the land of the Joshua Tree behind and crossed the pass again.





We stopped in Tehachapi (te-*hatch*-a-pee) for lunch. It has a very good train shop, for reasons that were about to become abundantly evident to me. The hippy eatery at the east end of town fed us some very nice chili - it was even Lynne friendly (though not very hippy when i think about it cos it had meat in it). The sign shown above indicates how important the local train attraction is to the town. It also looks a little sad - the bare land behind it was until recently their railway museum. A fire razed it in 2008 just after it was completed.


We also saw this sign at another eatery - we sniggered quite a bit.

So why had we come here? To see the Tehachapi Loop, a 130-odd year old engineering marvel that lets trains negotiate the grade up the Tehachapi Pass. Trains are important in this household.

As we returned to our car, we heard dingdongs and a train horn! Oooh, we were in luck! This BNSF train was on its way west to the loop!


We dashed back to the car and took off towards the loop.

We were still beating the train to our date at the Tehachapi loop.

The road became a bit windy with patches of snow in the sheltered areas. Were we still beating the train? There was a chap selling souvenirs at a layby on the road. In talking to him we discovered we had to backtrack 100 yards and go along a little track to get the best view. Back we went to get that view!


The train looping around half the loop.




The train then winds around some more bends on its way to Central Valley.

(A picture without trains or trainlines in it for those not interested in trains)


And back we headed into Central Valley

to find a solar power plant designed by Aussie ingenuity (our pic shows little of consequence), and pass a bunch of turkey vultures (I got excited cos I thought they might be condors but condors don't feed in packs) and face RAIN and excitable cars before finding a place to stay in Oakhurst.