Australia Day 2012!

Australia Day 2012!

The last year has gone so quick and Australia Day is once again here, as I look back to over the last year it makes me very proud to be an Aussie.

In the last twelve months, Ross and I have done some travelling and we meet many Aussie both at home and overseas, and we have made wonderful friends along the way.

When we when across Australia by ship and Train, we meet some wonderful Aussie, one of those being a disable young man who was partly blind, his spirit and caring for other was unbelievable, he did not see himself as disable, he saw himself as an everyday person, and that there was nothing he could not do.

When we were in Adelaide, we were having lunch in the park, there was a young man sitting on the steps with a hat in front of him on the ground, I don’t often give money, to people asking for hand out, but there was just something about him, I walk over and put money in his hat and as I turn to walk away ,felt hand on my shoulder, when I turn back, he was standing there with his arm open and he hug me and said Thank you.

One of the things that make me so very proud to be Aussie, happen in Turkey on ANZAC Day, to see thousands of Aussie’s and so many of them young, and most who had travel thousands of miles to see the sun come up over ANZAC Cove at the dawn service and who then made the very long walk to Lone Pine for the midday service, to see this kind of respect given to our service men and women, was so good.

It is the young people who will move our country forward and it is they who will keep the ANZAC spirit alive, it is they who will take our country around the world with them in their hearts and it is they by their actions, which will bring the people of the world to Australia.

So this Australia Day, please look at our young people and see the good in them, we often read in the paper or see on T.V., when one of them has done wrong, I think it time we saw the good side of them too.

I wish you all a wonderful Australia day,

I hope you spend it with family and friends, doing something you enjoy,

Please all stay safe when you’re out and about, and

“Please DON’T Drink and Drive”

S.M. Mac Arthur ©

Kookaburra and Tawny Frogmouth

When we were in Sydney, we when to the Blue Mountains, (pictures still to come) on the way we stop at this little Zoo (I’m sorry I can’t tell you the name of it, because my note have gotten lost), I do know the family that run it, started by just taking in hurt Australian Animals and it has just grown from there, they had Australia animals of every kind.

But the pictures I’m going to show you are of two birds, the Kookaburra and the Tawny Frogmouth. These birds where free to walk or fly around the Zoo, they were just in cages of a night for their safety, some of the other birds where in cages for our safety, as many could take a finger off with one bite.

Why the Kookaburra and the Frogmouth, well as you will see they are not the most beautiful of birds, but there just something about them, I just love the two of them and they look so different, yet they are very alike.

S.M. Mac Arthur ©

 Frogmouth

 Kookaburra

Sir Hans Heysen and The Cedars

When we were in South Australia in November, we when to The Cedars . This is a wonderful old home and containing a fine collection of paintings and drawings by the artist Sir Hans Heysen OBE (8 October 1877 to 2 July 1968). Han Heyson would have to be one of the best landscape artist that Australia has had.
When you walk into, Han Heysen working studio it like stepping back in time , the Studio was built in 1912 and used by painter until his death in 1968,. All his painting, materials and tools, sketches, notes and more, are still as they were when he died.

The Cedars' was the family home and has a rambling cottage garden that seems to go on for miles, the garden are just beautiful. The Cedars is still owned by the Heysen family.




S.M. Mac Arthur ©

                                     

Happy New Year 2012

Happy New Year to you all,

I wish you only the best for the coming year,

Sue

Merry Christmas 2011

The year has gone so quick, and Christmas is just forty eight hours away,

I just want to Thank You all for your friendship, and to wish you all a

Very Merry Christmas,

I hope you have a wonderful day and that you are surrounded by your Family and Friends,

Merry Christmas to you all,

Please stay safe when you are out and about on the roads,

Sue

Mum

Most of you know Ross and I have just been away on holidays with my Mum and Dad, and I took lots of pictures, but just have had the time to post then yet, as from the time we got home Mum has been ill, she was in hospital for a week with Viral Pneumonia, but just didn’t seem to be getting any better, so lots of test where done and last week they told us Mum has Emphysema.

The thing here is my Mum has never smoked, she got it from Passive Smoking, no matter how far back in Mum live you go, there been a smoker, from my Grandfather who smoked to the day he died, to my Dad who gave up twenty five years ago.

But the biggest trouble I think was Mum and Dad had a hotels, in the days when everyone smoked inside, the bar would smell smoke, you could see it in the air, your cloths would smell of smoke, back then, there was no fans to suck the smoke out of the room.

Magnet was a mining town, just about every man at that bar had a cigarette in their hand, my Dad was one of these men, I’ve seen men and woman, sit at hotel bars and light cigarette after cigarette and yes my Dad was one of this kind of smokers too, he always had cigarette in his hand.

Back then we did not know what could happen with Passive Smoking, now we do.

I’m not telling you this to try and stop anyone from smoking, I don’t have the right to do that, I telling it to you, so you may think about who around you, when you smoke, your young Children and Grandchildren, can’t, just get up and leave the room. I’m not asking anyone to stop smoking, I guess what I’m asking is for you to think of your Children and Grandchildren, thirty years on in life, don’t let them be where my Mum is now.

Mum is now improve little, she still get very puffed, but doing a little more each day, she is in the early stages of Emphysema and has been put on medication and they are working to get her as well as she can be.

S.M. Mac Arthur ©

Merry Christmas!!!!!!!

We were out to dinner last night with friends, now as it was Christmas, i wish everyone “Merry Christmas”, to be told by one lady, that it was not the Done Thing! to say “Merry Christmas “ any more.

I have to tell you I’m well and truly over being told by the Do Gooder’s and our Pollies what we can and can’t say, when will this stupidness end, as far as I can see most people from most religions don’t care what we say, it the bloody Do Gooders and the Pollies who think they know best and don’t want step on people toes or up set any one, what will it be next, will the Happy go out of Easter, or maybe we will just stop having Christmas and Easter, to keep the Pollies and Do Gooder’s happy.

To me this just a lot of bullsh....t, what happen to Freedom of Speech, when will the Pollies and Do Gooder’s learn, “That You Can’t Make Everyone Happy”, and that they can’t change the way things have been done for thousands of year just to make them look good. If they don’t want say “Merry Christmas”, that fine, but STOP telling the rest of us what we should Do!!!! We don’t need to be told we can say this or that.

All you Pollies go run the country that what we paying you to do, and you Do Gooder’s out there who are so sure you know what best for the rest of us, get back in your box’s and stay to hell out of people’s lives, because we sure as hell don’t need you to stuffing up our live any more then you all ready have!!!

And to rest of you people reading this, in case I don’t get another blog in before Christmas,

“Merry Christmas to You All”

S.M. Mac Arthur ©

Coming into Sydney 9th November 2011

When we where away one of the things I want to do was, to be at the front of the ship as we were coming in to Sydney, and that where I was at 5.30am on the 9^th November in the cold, with half the ship passengers, I’ve heard so many Aussie say you got see the sun come up over Sydney Harbour Bridge, and I’m so glad I did, it was a beautiful morning and well worth being up at 5.30am.

S.M. Mac Arthur ©