Thursday - Tuesday, September 1 - 6 2011 (diary)

This is our second dog Chase. One of the boys got him as a birthday present in March. It is a lovely dog, growing fast and full of silly ideas and tricks. He often sits on the steps of my cabin, hoping for some attention.
Our other dog Roxy was initially not too pleased with the new arrival, but she is slowly starting to realise that some love may be coming her way in a little while, so for the time being they are now playing happily together.

I had a busy week playing bridge in a National tournament her in Darwin. It was entertaining, I ended up somewhere in the middle.
In the mornings I am hopeless at bridge, I only slowly come to life after a good lunch and a scotch or two. So in the afternoons some of the damage I did in the morning was a little repaired.

I heard from several sources at the tournament that Bulgaria is quite good as far as bridge is concerned. I enquired about this after receiving an email last week from one of Bulgaria's National Bridge team players. Their Government is initiating a national drive to teach bridge at high schools and I was asked whether they could translate my online bridge course into Bulgarian and use it as the bridge curriculum for their schools.
I of course granted their request, as this is exactly what my website is all about : to spread good bridge and music tuition around the world.

Wednesday - Saturday, September 7 - 10 2011 (diary)

With the wet season approaching I feel like keeping a bit informed about the temperature and humidity we are experiencing, so I bought this electronic gadget to monitor conditions both inside and outside my cabin. It set me back only $20 and appears to be well worth the money. Its main station sits here on my desk, which every 35 seconds receives (wireless) information from a small sensor unit on my veranda about the conditions outside.

The adjacent photo displays the conditions of yesterday (Sept.10) afternoon at 10 minutes past 5. The upper line on the left displays the conditions inside (33°C and 20% humidity), on the bottom line left the slightly cooler condition in the shade outside on my veranda. The phase of the moon is also on display.

Today it is much cooler, with temperatures in the low 20s this morning, which has now (at midday) risen to 27°C (81.5°F) outside, still with low humidity of 25%.
The weather has been most unusual recently. We are supposed to be in the so-called "build-up" period with high humidity, much cloud cover but no rain (usually the most uncomfortable weather conditions of the year).Instead we have had wonderful weather right up to now, with Friday night even a decent downpour of 7mm of rain.