And then the rains came.  About twenty minutes after the previous post the enormous thunderstorm that had lashed other parts of Perth struck my area. It was like the sky opened and just dropped a small ocean of water in our neighbourhood. The sky was black and lowering, lightning flashed, and the streets ran like rivers.

I was cooking dinner, and waiting for Marianne and Sophie to get home safely, which they did, when I thought I’d better call my mother. It was planned she’d babysit for the evening because we were going out.  Well. Things weren’t going as well for her.  The rain had dropped where she was too, was pouring down her driveway and into her garage, and was threatening to flood her entire house. I could tell from the edge of panic in her voice that she simply wasn’t coping with what was happening, so I jumped in the car and drove over (after trying to contact my sister, who lives on the same street).

By the time I arrived a neighbour had popped over to see if mum was ok, had found the street gutters blocked and cleared them, had found the garage gutters blocked and cleared them, and the water was subsiding.  The house was safe, but the garage (which was full of stuff) was water damaged.  It had also shaken mum pretty badly.  Mum’s always been the pragmatic, practical one who could triage a situation and get things fixed quickly.  She’s now older, and I think needs more help because things like this tend to flummox her.  We ended up spending a bit of time cleaning up and draining the water away, before I headed home.  We’d decided after a quick confab that the girls would visit Nan’s, my sister and her partner would come over, and we’d go to see Lyle Lovett.

The girls were excited by this. We dropped them round at about 6.30pm to find everything stabilised, and headed to the Concert Hall.  Traffic was at a terrible standstill on the way out of the city, but our journey there and back was uneventful.  Support act Kasey Chambers was fine, if a bit raucous, while Lovett and his Large Band were spectacularly good. It’d been a while since we’d listened to his stuff, so we mostly didn’t know the two and a half hours of music they played, but it was mordant, melancholy, sometimes funny, and sometimes rowdy: A fine evening and a concert well worth the trouble of attending.

We picked up the girls at around 11.30pm and had them in bed, sleepy, not long after. I then opted to sleep in and grab a cab to get to work. The longest commute I’ve yet had, and the most expensive cab ride. Traffic lights were out, trees destroyed and goodness knows what property damage.

I’m now flying solo at work and everyone’s keeping an eye on the weather.  Whew!

Is this the new busy? Taxes are sitting waiting to be done and I just got emailed the proofs of Legends. Meanwhile (yes, Cheryl, I can’t write!), rain storms seem to be lashing some other part of the city (I’m getting reports from friends). In the meantime, it’s still warm enough we’re running air conditioning to cool the house while I’m cooking a roast chicken dinner.  We need to eat early because Marianne and I are off to see Lyle Lovett and his Large Band at the Perth Concert Hall in a few hours. I confess, I bought the tickets back at Christmas as a present for Marianne because I thought it would be fun.  For various reasons, I find myself not in the mood and wanting to stay home. I think this is mostly due to the virus that is affecting my right ear, which also seems to just make me feel a bit tired and unwell. I am endeavouring to buck up, though, and hope we’ll have fun.

Oh, and Marianne put up some zoo trip photos which are nice.

Back at the day job desk after a  mixed weekend.  Friday seems a lifetime ago.  I got home from the office expecting a quiet hour or two before the arrival of the Horde, but plans had changed (they were headed for a friend’s house for a play date) and they were in the door just as I was sitting down to relax.  Given the gathering storm, I opted to head over to JB HiFi and do a little unnecessary shopping. I came away with the new Angus and Julia Stone cd and an old Bill Withers one.

I then sat down to read for a bit, looking for something to follow the novel-that-can’t-be-named. I’m in the mood for some SF and haven’t been able to settle on anything since. In the end I found myself re-reading an old favorite, C.J. Cherryh’s Downbelow Station.  It has the tough-edged space opera feel that I’m in the mood for, annd seemed to hit the spot. I may abandon it if pressures to read other things grow, but for now it’s just the right thing. 

The evening was whiled away with Cherryh, the new cds, and some cricket from India.  Saturday, though, was different. Last weekend I’d promised Sophie that if we skipped going to the park then we could go to the zoo this weekend.  Well, promises are made to be kept.  We opted not to tell Jessica, who is afraid of animals, our destination, and that proved a wise choice.  She wasn’t thrilled when we got there, but in the end had a good time she wouldn’t otherwise have let herself have. The weather was perfect, and we wandered idly around seeing ghost bats, lions, lemurs, kangaroos, and penguins(!).  Sophie rode the Carousel, we had lunch, and walked a lot. It was fine day.

We got home late, collapsed for a while, then grabbed pizza before Family Movie Night. The film was typically execrable, but didn’t change what had been a good day.  Sunday was Tax Day.  In amongst meals, I basically spent six hours sorting papers so that I’m now ready to start the 2008/2009 taxes.  We’re going out tonight to see Lyle Lovett, so I’ll probably do them in dribs and drabs over Wednesday and Thursday evening. Yay.  The main thing, though, is that April Holidays Approacheth, so I want taxes done and everything else up to date by then. 

And just to repeat: come April 2 I’m on holidays for a month.  For the first time ever this means I’m not just on holidays from the day job, I’m on holidays from EVERYTHING. I shan’t be editing, reviewing or anything.  Emails shall go unanswered (unchecked!), and the days shall be spent relaxing and not worrying about such things.  I’ll check in again on around April 20, but between the beginning of the month and then I shall be absent.  We’re spending a week away on a family holiday (while my mum’s at our house), then time back in Perth with the kids, and then I even get a week or so when the kids are back at school and  I’m just whiling away time.  It should be glorious.

The only thing, apart from taxes, that is harshing my mellow right now is my right ear. It’s been blocked for nearly three weeks. I saw a doctor last Wednesday, after I spent some time throwing up, but things haven’t improved much.  I have tinnitus and can’t hear well. It feels blocked, though there’s no wax there. It’s almost certainly an inner ear infection. Gack.  I want to get it cleared up as soon as I can, so if it doesn’t improve tomorrow, then back to the doctors.

The good folk at the British Fantasy Society have released the long-list of the British Fantasy Awards. It is a very long list, but I’m delighted to see Eclipse Three, The New Space Opera 2, and The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of the Year: Volume Three amongst the thirty-seven anthologies recognised by the Society. Whilst Iwould be surprised, and delighted, if any of my anthologies made the final list (I’m not being modest. All contain SF and other stuff, and this is a fantasy award), I would like to thank Society members for this recognition and will work to make electronic texts for the books available to voters, should any of them make the final list.

I have occasional problems with my right ear. It tends to get blocked with wax from time-to-time, and every now and then I get a virus or something affecting it. What this usually means is a week or so of tinnitus, and then all’s back to normal.  The tinnitus struck up about two weeks ago and I’m still dealing with that, but on Wednesday morning I woke feeling dizzy and not at all well. Like an idiot I got up and started to head to work. I made it less than a kilometre before turning around and heading home. I spent some time violently throwing up and feeling rotten, before sleeping deeply for the rest of the morning.  I then saw the doctor and spent Wednesday and Thursday doing nothing much but being sick.  Friday wasn’t too bad, and Saturday is still up in the air.  Meh.

In the meantime I turned my attention to WorldCon and flight/hotel bookings.  Some friends of ours are staying in an apartment hotel, and we may well stay there. We are also considering the Hilton, which has some very nice apartments too.  Dollars are a big consideration, though. I was annoyed to discover that room rates went up while we pondered, so we’ll push to get this, and airfares I suppse, dealt with soon. This means nudging a few people out there to pay some bills so we can, but this is the life of everyone so I while I’m complaining, I’m not complaining (if you know what I mean).