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Category Archives: RIP

Fall From Grace

 

 

Popped up yesterday to Westfield Bondi Junction to meet a lovely lady who bought one of my pieces of LIBERTY by ROBERT GORDON china. I started collecting this set around my 50th birthday …so almost five years ago. I asked DAVID JONES if they would still have it for a few seasons and was assured they would but as always next season there were a few rogue pieces and that was it. So I was stuck with a few pieces and I had been so looking forward to collecting it but apart from my local coffee/homewares shop and occasionally at Vinnies I have not seen it again. It is even scarce on ebay so I am pleased that a piece is going to someone who really wants it.

What is it with these places putting out new ranges…..or several new ranges of china every year? If you cannot buy it all then, including spares, you are really stuck. Not everyone can buy entire sets all at once and like me not everyone wants to…where is the joy in collecting in that?  My son had a similar experience with a gorgeous coloured willow pattern which was on a huge display in the David Jones city store next to the Portmeirion. When he started collecting it every time he went shopping he asked if it would still be available in future. You can guess what happened, he is stuck with one serving of everything and a strangely untraceable brand, PALATE. I mean try googling palate…its ludicrous!

 

While I was at WESTFIELD I took some time to think about the poor Jewish man who took his life there a few weeks ago. I was also thinking about the appalling response to the tragedy by a member of their upper echelon.  It is in the newspaper reports what Mark Ryan, Westfield Group Director of Corporate Affairs, said about the gawkers …and not moving the gawkers along or shutting the centre. Heaven forbid that someone’s death might get in the way of anyone spending a dollar….or thousand.  Apparently lots of people were filming and texting as I imagine it was unusual to see a fully Orthodox Jewish person in such a situation. Maybe they were interested in seeing how the police handled it. A young chap who caught the whole thing on camera put it on Youtube because he was so appalled by the apathy of the staff. Not the …splatter…but the awful last minutes of this man’s life and the camera person clearly asking why Westfield were not moving the public out of the way. Do pay careful attention to the comments on the first link I have highlighted here…among these comments are those by workers and others who witnessed the event.

 

While we are talking about Westfield and David Jones, good on the ex CEO of DJ’s resigning today for “inappropriate conduct toward a female staff member” at a function. As regular readers of my blog know, not all companies admit when there is any form of harassment and this guy named and shamed himself. Perhaps it was all about to come out and he got in ahead of time but we know that is not always the case. Some companies turn it around and blame the  victim.  Well done David Jones and let us hope the young lady manages to go back to work and that her case is managed well by her lawyers. Another mistake we made apparently…..not getting lawyers involved before we made our complaints.

 

laura in stitches

Have been super busy selling especially this past week and am almost through my many sizes of clothing which I have had stored in vain hope of getting into them one day! I am so pleased that so many women are wearing and loving my  clothing. This stunning outfit above is a mixture of LAURA ASHLEY USA and STITCHES AUSTRALIA. During the five years I have had this skirt I only wore it once and since I bought the jacket earlier this year my friend borrowed the outfit for an event so it is almost new. Silk and cotton the jacket is fabulous quality as to be expected of LAURA ASHLEY and the skirt is just that little bit different…I think the outfit works well so I am selling it as a set.

I found lots of great things in Vinnies today..it was 50% off clothing which was great and I also bought some fabulous beaded jewellery to gift with my clothing sales…yeah! Ted Noffs was also a success as I found my friend a lovely HOT OPTIONS jacket to go with a PER UNA skirt which arrived today from ebay.uk! I also pointed out to the volunteers at One Noffs some pieces by a designer [VICKY VALE] which I felt would work well in their more exclusive designer store. I found several pieces and they are very current, Victorian Gothic style in black velvet, yum!

Coffee and Contemplation

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As I walked up to the local shopping centre in suburban Sydney amidst the smoke which remained from the dreadful bush fires I could smell night scented jesamine and frangiapani and other strongly scented fragrances which in the short time it took me to get to the shops became quite overpowering. The scent was evocative of when we worked at the church and I helped with the funerals…a heady mix of lilies and gardenia

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I looked around our local centre for fleece blankets which I am going to edge with pretty fabric and also make matching sheet sets for babies and children so that when the time comes for the surviving children of Victoria’s Bleak Weekend of Hell On Earth to be rehoused…even temporarily ..that they have something that is their own and something to snuggle into. I have also asked my flickr groups to consider making toys and quilts in readiness for when the survivors are able to have them. We have already donated to The Red Cross and see that Channel Nine is having a telethon on Thursday night. They lost one of their own in the Kingslake fire…Brian  Naylor who was a newsreader for over twenty years before he retired with his wife. Both he and his wife perished however his daughter in law and the grandchildren escaped although the homes were burned to the ground.

The above photos were taken by talented young flickerian 19shell91 who lives in Bendigo which is one of the areas affected by the fires…luckily she is okay and I thank her for her generosity in allowing me to use her photos

I have not answered all of my comments on my previous post and I cannot get into reading any of the blog posts which are unrelated to this at present…they seem trivial somehow and disloyal, it is as if we need to go over this again and again…as if that might make it so it never happens again. The Royal Commission may help with that…I was so distressed to read about the disabled ..often in wheelchairs who died in their homes…how could they have stayed and defended their homes? I guess it swept through so fast that they did not even know it was coming…but I see that today for a while they were advising people to leave or stay and fight…how can children fight it and why should they? I think there should be some sort of mandatory evacuation  plans for minors and the disabled.

Coffee and Contemplation

It is nearly nine at night and the sickening scent of the mixed summer blooms is wafting through the balcony door. I will never enjoy that scent again. I am about to have a coffee and contemplate again what happened here…while watching people on television weeping as they find pieces of china in the ruins of their homes.  Those, the lucky ones who are allowed back to the remains of their homes…Marysville is now a crime scene…a whole town a crime scene…it is simply beyond belief.

Ninety Years Ago This Day

Here in Australia we are many hours ahead of Europe and have already paid our respects…twice actually due to daylight saving. In Britain and Europe the eleventh hour has passed two hours hence. I myself passed a day of quiet reflection. I had a personal loss on this day myself many years ago so this day is always a poignant one for me.

I was struck by the resurgence of interest in this day in Australia this year. We tend to go overboard on Anzac Day in my opinion in if not glorifying war then certainly making a big deal out of it and that “big deal” is for the most part respectful but not to the extent of this day. It bears mention that Australia had over 400,000 troops involved and we actually sent over 331,781 overseas. We had the ignominious honor of having the highest rate of casualties per population…65%

Here are the facts and figures of the conflict from an Australian perspective.

New Zealand sent a massive 100,000 troops….from a population of 1,100,000.

The world at war was madness and the bravery of those who fought and gave their lives for the freedom of the world and in our case for The Empire knows no bounds.

40,000,000 casualties  20,000,000 dead….including civilians.

Lest We Forget.

Remembering This Day, Seven Years Ago, 9/11

Can it be seven years since that day that changed the world forever? Changed the lives of a city, a nation and indeed the whole world. Was it only seven years ago when my son lost his innocence as did so many children and young adults?

May we never forget that feeling of being one family, one world united in empathy and sheer heartbreak. My thoughts and prayers are with all who lost loved ones in the attack and also all those who have been affected by the attack through injury and pain. You are not alone.

We must condemn hatefilled ignorance now as we did then and must not allow hatred or fear of the people who did this to affect our common humanity…or else they would have won.

We must never forget.

A sad loss

It has been a few days now since I heard about the death of Heath Ledger. If anything I am more sad now. He had so much life ahead of him, so much of life to explore with his daughter. Perhaps his death was just a desperate attempt to get some sleep and was therefore an accident, he had obviously been troubled for some time since filming the Joker. From personal experience sleep difficulties are just that, difficult, and can impact both your day and night. It can take a long time to re-establish a sleep pattern and is quite a painful process. Some people never get a normal pattern back and have to adjust to life in a new way. The hours though when everyone else is asleep can be very lonely ones at first and very trying.

I remember him so well from his role in Monster’s Ball, an incredibly moving performance of a tortured soul. Then A Knight’s Tale, almost the polar opposite of the other. I have seen several of his other films but those two stand out to me for some reason. Possibly because he seemed so beautiful in A Knight’s Tale, in appearance and in his sheer youth and vitality. Monster’s Ball was such a different Heath and I guess that is the whole point, he became his characters and if in becoming the character of the Joker he ended up sleepless and moody then it is certainly too high a price for our entertainment or even for the sake of art.

One’s health is far too precious a gift to squander on a public that is known for its voracious appetite for amusement. If the role did not cause the sleeplessness then it must have impacted on him. How else could he give us such an insight into despair and madness unless he searched the very depths of his being? How long does that darkness stay with a person? Who knows if his sleeplessness was a symptom of depression but was just ignored because well, he must suffer for his art?

This art that has been shared with a world that probably doesn’t deserve such a gift, if John Gibson of Fox News Channel is anything to go by. What kind of a world is this where people like Gibson are so intolerant of anything that they don’t believe in that they will crack jokes about Heath on the day of his death because he played a gay man so convincingly on screen? Forget the later apology it was about who he had upset not what he had said and probably ratings driven.

Cannot people anymore tell fantasy from reality? He was an actor playing a role, but he was also an incredibly brave young man who must have known what kind of vitriol the role would engender. But could he ever have imagined a world where spite and small mindedness would mean that some members of the Westboro Baptist Church, Topeka, Kansas would boycott his future memorial service?

He may have publicly discussed and privately reflected on death, much to the disgust of Gibson who seems to equate thoughts of death as being unworthy of the young, as if it personally insulted him somehow, but Heath was not afraid to examine the subject because now that he was a parent he felt that he could die as he would go on in his daughter. It does not mean that he wanted to die. I expect that he thought it was a long way off and hopefully in a different time when people are not judged for their skin colour, the sex of their partner or in his case the roles they were brave enough to undertake when they were young.

Rest well Heath, you achieved much in your brief time here and I am so pleased you were able to know the joy of being a parent, you who obviously brought such pride to your own family and to a wider audience. May all of us consider the people in our lives who may be suffering in silence. Do not also be silent, speak the words that need to be heard.

I am here for you.

It will get better with time.

It is amazing what humans can endure.

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