Rain!

This morning I took a long walk to the shopping centre at Chatswood, a few suburbs away. I had to go to a specific shop to get a replacement filter for our vacuum cleaner. According to Strava, the walk was 6.15 km. It felt good, because I haven’t been doing enough getting out and exercising in the past couple of weeks. The day was cool and cloudy, so it was a nice time to be out.

And then this afternoon when I took Scully out to the dog park there was some thunder, and it actually rained for a couple of minutes! Sydney had 1.6 mm of rain back on Christmas Day, and the previous time it rained was 2.4 mm on 27 November. The last heavy rain we had was in mid-September. This is very weird for Sydney, which normally gets around 100 mm of rain every month throughout the year. All the grass around here is dying and turning a crunchy brown. Hopefully today’s few drops will refresh it a bit.

Work-wise, today I finished off making the new batch of Irregular Webcomic! strips, and started writing annotations for them.

New content today:

Taking a breath, and it’s smoky

The weather was much cooler today, thankfully. The bushfire situation, while still bad, at least wasn’t terrible today. So it was a bit of a breather, before the next round of heatwave conditions hits. But cooler weather in Sydney is brought by a southerly wind, and south is where most of the fires are, so the air quality here deteriorated today, and reached well into the highest “hazardous” level this afternoon. It’s been a lot worse a few weeks ago, but it was noticeable and nasty, and my throat is sore this evening.

I spent most of the day making Irregular Webcomic! strips, in between monitoring the news and watching some cricket on TV. I should finish this batch tomorrow.

New content today:

Fiery hot

I don’t even know where to begin today. It’s been a dreadful day so far, and it’s probably going to get worse overnight. We’ve had record breaking heat over much of south-eastern Australia today. It’s nearly 10pm where I live and it’s still 34°C outside. At Penrith, a Sydney suburb where I have family living, it reached 48.9°C (120°F) today, smashing the old record high temperature within the Sydney boundary by 1.6 degrees.

A cool change has been moving up the south coast and is expected to hit Sydney around midnight. But that also brings strong winds, which could be even worse for the huge fires burning all over the place.

So far today we only have preliminary news reports indicating some indeterminate number of buildings destroyed. We won’t know until the sun rises tomorrow what sort of numbers we’re looking at. Or how many people may have gone missing or been killed.

Honestly, it’s getting exhausting just following the news day after day, even from the safety of my inner city home. People I know have been evacuated or had their homes under imminent danger of being destroyed. It’s hard to do anything else.

I did manage to make one new Darths & Droids strip today, but that’s about it, in between a bit of random homekeeping stuff, and going out with my wife and Scully for dinner. We sat at an outdoor table at a restaurant (because of Scully), watching the blood red sun set through the smoky sky. Everyone else was inside in the air conditioning. We were just sitting there, relaxing, and it was so hot that sweat was dripping and rolling down my body, even after the sun had gone down.

Tomorrow should be cooler, and hopefully there will be some relief from the fires, until the cycle builds up to another stinking hot day. It’s still early in the summer.

New content today:

Safety and games

My aunt has made it out of the bushfire danger area, after four days stranded at her holiday home, cut off from all external access by the bushfires. The road reopened briefly and emergency services personnel escorted vehicles out to safety in small groups – in case damaged trees fell across the road and cut travellers off, they wanted to make sure they knew where everyone was. She’s now back with family and safe. Whether her holiday house survives today is another story which we have to wait and see.

To take some pressure off, last night I attended the fortnightly games night of my group of gaming buddies. I played a game of 7 Wonders: Duel with the host while waiting for others to arrive. I hadn’t played this game for several years and was trying to remember strategy on the fly, so was at a bit of a disadvantage, but I managed to only lose by 2 points: 64-62, so I was pretty pleased with that.

When others arrived we had dinner, and then launched into a game of Wingspan.

Wingspan game

Rather than collect birds with lots of activated powers, like most people do, I tried a very different strategy, going for birds that gave me extra Goal cards, and then trying to fulfil as many of the goals as possible. I ended up with 4 Goal cards, requiring me to collect: birds that only nest in wetlands, birds that only eat invertebrates, birds with wingspans under 30cm, and birds with anatomical body parts in their name (e.g. roseate spoonbill). I managed to maximally fulfil 3 of the 4 goals, and partly complete the fourth, for a total of 25 goal points, which was way more than anyone else got. The issue was I got zero egg points, and moderately low scores for the other point categories. I was worried that pursuing a radical strategy might not be viable, and I’d lose by a lot, but it turned out those 25 points helped me to third place out of 5 players, not far behind second place, so again I was fairly happy with that result.

New content today:

Back to work

It’s the 2nd of January, and back to work for many people. My wife went back to her office, and I spent the whole morning taking photos for the new batch of Irregular Webcomic! that I’ve been writing over the past few days.

I didn’t finish until a bit after midday, by which time I was hungry for lunch. I didn’t want to eat the last of the bread in the house, since then my wife would have nothing to eat when she arrived home from work. So I went for a walk up to the local fish & chip shop… only to find it still closed for the holidays. And the cafe next door was closed too. It’s only a tiny cluster of shops, and there was nowhere else to get lunch, so I had to walk over to the next suburb. There’s a pie shop there that I like, and I figured I’d get a pie.

But when I got there, that too was closed! But nearby was a supermarket, so I went in there and bought some supplies: falafels and flatbread, and some milk. Then I walked back home – I did 4 km by the time I got back home, almost an hour after I’d left, and I still hadn’t eaten lunch!

This afternoon I assembled a few of the comics, while keeping an eye on news. My aunt is doing fine at Lake Conjola, she was able to send messages out today. But the road is still blocked by fires and she can’t leave. She says she has enough food and water. Hopefully some time tomorrow the roads will open and she can get out before Saturday, which is forecast to be another stupidly hot and windy day, with dangerous conditions basically all the way south down the coast from Sydney to Victoria. Everywhere along there has been advised to evacuate today, and thousands of people are streaming out of the area – except in the region around Lake Conjola, where there remains no open road.

New content today:

New Year’s Day, and fire update

I didn’t bother staying up until midnight last night. I was too tired and just wanted some sleep. Although the fireworks on Sydney Harbour woke me up again at midnight.

I got up this morning and checked for any information from my aunt and uncle, after yesterday’s events. It turned out I was under the wrong impression. My aunt had travelled down to the holiday home, but my uncle and their two children had stayed home, intending to join her later. So my aunt was actually trapped in the town last night by herself (with other residents). My uncle tried to drive down yesterday to join her, but was stopped by the roadblock at Kiama, and never made it.

This morning, as far as my family is concerned, the news was good. My aunt is safe, and their holiday home was spared, although fire swept through Conjola Park, just west of Lake Conjola. Overnight, at least 89 houses were destroyed in Conjola Park, but only 3 in Lake Conjola.

Here’s a photo of one of the homes there last night. (I don’t know who took the photo – my cousin sent it to everyone in my family via Facebook.)

Fire in Conjola

Fortunately, there was a wind change in the evening which pushed the fire front away from Lake Conjola, sparing most of the houses there. The weather today is cooler and less windy, which is good.

Unfortunately, there’s no power or communications available over much of the NSW south coast, and the Lake Conjola road is still cut by fire, so nobody there can get out. Food and water supplies are limited. My aunt only managed to get word to us that she’s safe by driving out towards the roadblocks to pick up a cell phone signal, before driving back to the town to shelter for tonight. The road is likely to stay closed for at least another 24 hours. But hopefully she’ll be able to get out tomorrow.

So for me it’s been another day of monitoring official news sources, and Facebook for news from my aunt. This story of people being trapped in coastal towns, with the only roads being cut by fire is repeated in several towns up and down the coast. There are large towns of several thousand people without power or cell phone access. And they’re starting to run out of food, clean water, and petrol. Even if the roads open and people can evacuate by road, there may not be enough fuel for all of them to drive out. Supermarkets are being cleaned out of food, with no supplies coming in. In some areas the water treatment plants have gone offline, and people are being told to boil all water before drinking or cooking with it. The navy has been mobilised to bring supplies to some of these towns by sea, and I expect there will be more of that tomorrow, as well as possible evacuations by sea.

In between I managed to write some more Irregular Webcomic strips. I should be ready to photograph this batch tomorrow.

New content today:

New Year’s Eve

I intended finishing off the writing of the next batch of Irregular Webcomic today, but instead I could barely do anything other than monitor the news all day, keeping up with what was happening with the bushfires burning across south-eastern Australia.

I’m fine here in Sydney, but I have a friend who travelled south down the coast with his wife and three kids, to spend the Christmas holiday period by the beach in a holiday home at Narooma. The south coast of New South Wales is a string of small towns linked by a single main road running north and south along the coast. Inland is mountains, with very few routes through them. During the day, as temperatures soared as high as 46°C, the fires spread and cut the highway both north and south of Narooma. They are stuck there with no way out, as fires close in from the north, west, and south.

As it turns out, they’re right in the middle, still quite far from the fire fronts, and Narooma is actually the evacuation point for people who were further north and south. So they’re safe for the time being.

However, my uncle and aunt, and their two (young adult) children are also holidaying down the coast, in Lake Conjola, which is further north. Around lunch time my aunt sent these photos to our family:

Lake Conjola Bushfire

Lake Conjola Bushfire

Lake Conjola Bushfire

Lake Conjola Bushfire

Shortly after that the power went out in the area. My aunt told us her phone battery was running low and there was no way to recharge it. They were leaving the house for the beach.

And since then nothing. Power is out along much of the south coast, and cell phone and Internet coverage is out too – there’s no way to communicate with anybody there. Even news services are patchy and not quite sure what’s going on in some of these towns.

I’m not especially worried about the safety of my friends or family. They’re in organised evacuations with thousands of other people. They have easy access to the beach and the ocean as a last resort – they should be safe from the fires. Their houses however…

I stayed at my aunt & uncle’s holiday home back in April this year. It’s a lovely place, which they’ve invested years and a good chunk of money in renovating from its previous state. I hope it’s still there tomorrow.

New content today:

Comics and kitchen gadgets

Today was a designated comic writing day, as I started work on the next batch of Irregular Webcomic! Besides that, I jotted down some notes for ideas I had for D&D adventures, and did some ISO photography standards work.

My wife and I went out on an expedition to the hardware store to get a tap reseating tool, which I hope will fix some annoying dripping tap behaviour at home next time I change the washers. I also got some generic brand humidity absorbing crystals (calcium chloride) to keep the moisture absorbers in the closets topped up, especially as our summer turns from hot and dry to hot and humid.

Near the hardware store is a council recycling centre, which accepts waste such as batteries, cables, light bulbs, appliances, and so on. I have a small box which I fill with stuff and take there every so often. I decided to take it along today, knowing that the centre is open on Mondays. But when we got there it was closed, with a tiny piece of paper stuck to the door saying they’re closed over the Christmas/New Year period and won’t open again until 3 January. That was slightly annoying.

And near both is a kitchen supplies shop. I only went into this place recently, and was amazed at all the gadgets and stuff in there, so this time I took my wife and showed her how cool it was. We bought a jar opening thing for unscrewing stubborn jar lids, and some new chopping boards.

Tonight for dinner I made vege fajitas, with onions, carrot, zucchini, cauliflower, mushrooms, and some of our home grown chilli. Turned out well!

New content today:

Salad Sunday

I spent much of today… making a salad.

Usually a salad you just chop a few things and toss them in a bowl. Done in five minutes. Not this one.

I started first thing in the morning, by putting some dried chick peas into a pot and covering them with water to soak for several hours. After lunch, I boiled them for a half hour or so, then let them cool slowly. Then I tipped them out and dried them thoroughly, then spread them on a baking tray. Into a hot oven for 20 minutes, checking and giving them a shake every few minutes. At this point several of the peas popped, like popcorn, and flew across the oven, ending up on the oven floor. After 20 minutes I took them out, put them in a bowl, added olive oil, salt, and some garam masala, gave them a stir, and then back onto the baking tray and into the oven for another 10 minutes.

Meanwhile I chopped some cauliflower into small florets, mixed them with olive oil, salt, cumin, and chilli powder in a bowl. When the chick peas came out, I poured them into a bowl to cool while I placed the cauliflower on the tray, and then into the oven to bake for half an hour, turning them occasionally.

While the cauliflower cooled after baking, I opened a pomegranate and extracted the arils – a job which takes about 20 minutes just by itself. Then I toasted some pine nuts in a frying pan. And finally, just before dinner this evening, I combined all the ingredients, with some tahini and a drizzle of caramelised balsamic vinegar, while I fried up some vegetarian sausages to go with the salad.

The salad turned out spectacular, if I do say so myself. My wife and I both loved it. The chick peas were crunchy and flavourful, the cauliflower provided tenderness, the pomegranate sweetness, the tahini nuttiness, and the vinegar a bit more sweetness as well as sourness. And there was just enough spice plus heat from the chilli to make it even more interesting. Absolutely delicious, and I’m glad I spent so long making it.

Otherwise today, I watched a bunch of cricket on the tele, and I wrote a bunch of rerun annotations for Irregular Webcomic! Oh, and I finally changed the IWC poll question, to something seasonal.

New content today:

Hmm, what did I do today?

Not much. I started installing a MacOS update this morning, and it stalled for some reason. I let it run for a few hours in case it was just slow, and while I waited I just sat on the lounge and watched the Australia v New Zealand cricket match on TV. I had some leftover Christmas ham on sandwiches for lunch, and about mid-afternoon I finally decided to hard shutdown the computer and restart it. That fixed the problem and it installed the update okay after that (taking about half an hour to do so).

I made tomorrow’s Darths & Droids strip and uploaded it to the web server.

Oh, that’s right! The other thing I did with most of the morning was housecleaning. Vacuuming the house, washing the balcony (there was so much ash from the bushfires on it, fine-grained and gritty), then emptying the vacuum cleaner and washing the dust receptacle. Then I decided to clean the air filter in the vacuum cleaner, and discovered that the sponge-like filter which is supposed to last “the lifetime of the cleaner” had deteriorated and crumbled into a fine powder when I removed it. So I have to get a new filter before I vacuum again. I also cleaned the air filters on the air conditioner, which were pretty clogged with dust.

You know if you have an air conditioner, you’re supposed to clean the filters every now and then, right? Maybe you better check it!

This afternoon my wife and I walked up the street with Scully, stopping to exercise her a bit on the way, throwing a tennis ball for her to chase in a local park. There’s a small park on a hill, with terraced grass levels that she can run up and down. Getting her running up the hill chasing the ball is a good way to tire her out quickly! Then we went to a local bar for dinner, having some nice wine and some share plate style food, which was nice. They even let Scully into the interior courtyard! It’s very unusual for eating establishments here to allow dogs inside; normally we have to find places with tables outside on the footpath, which limits our dining out options a bit. (Or get a dogsitter, which we’ve done a few times when going somewhere fancy.)

New content today: