http://www.pickledeel.com Creative, personal expression - journal, writing, art Mon, 08 Feb 2010 11:04:48 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en A (very sharp) boning knife protruding backwards from hip pocket, mad scramble through thorn bush hunting jittery goats and a forearm inadvertently connecting with aforementioned knife had us do a quick (one hour) run to the hospital at Peterborough (that's not a real wound - gotta love those country nurses)  ... http://www.pickledeel.com/2010/02/08/oodla-wirra-where/ In the deserts of South Australia there are numerous monuments to failed enterprises and settlements. Standing at an old crossroads in the middle of saltbush country is a  derelict hotel with flowery wallpaper slowly peeling off the walls, floors caving in and a cellar blown into the street. It became ... http://www.pickledeel.com/2010/02/05/the-devils-shilling/ Cast: Buzz. Old kelpie dog. 74 years of dust matted into his pelt. Eyes set way too close together. Thinks he runs the farm. Silver. Mongrel something. 73 years of dust. Forehead as wide as a tanker's bow - eyes way too far apart. Thinks he runs the farm. Two kelpie bitches in ... http://www.pickledeel.com/2010/02/03/two-men-and-a-dog/ Well, it is fractus (there is one for your Scrabble games) out on Miss Betty's place, even if you do see it flourishing elsewhere in the state. Over the years prickly pear has been managed quite well and the family property is pretty much free of it. But given she ... http://www.pickledeel.com/2009/12/27/cactus-is-fractus/ Rarely is the gesture of a single finger ever interpreted as anything except someone wishing the worst things to happen to you or your mother. Or both. Regardless of culture, language or age. Except in the country where a single, brief wave of a finger off the steering wheel is ... http://www.pickledeel.com/2009/12/26/a-country-finger/ The short stick in the dusty distance moves in the heat and you are not sure if it is the shimmering haze off the gravel tricking your eyes. Then it moves again and a little more determinedly albeit awkwardly.  You slow down and get ready to swerve to avoid whatever ... http://www.pickledeel.com/2009/12/02/kinked-back-shingleback/ Last year I used the NanoWriMo competition of bash out the Iraq novel. This year it was used to smash into the biography of Herb Money. Bash and smash are the only way to describe trying to write 50,000 words in 30 days, when lots of other things are out ... http://www.pickledeel.com/2009/11/29/a-word-of-distraction/ The boundary fences out here were built in 1898. Or to be more precise, the wire you lean on today was strung out in 1898. The steel posts replaced the wooden posts which are still lying where they were pulled out of the ground more than 110 years ago. We ... http://www.pickledeel.com/2009/11/28/fixing-the-back-fence/ Mrs Betty. Miss Betty. Or Joy. And sometimes confused as “Betty”.  A legend in our minds. She farms a massive block of arid country in South Australia on her own. A yard with nothing out of place. Stock, which despite drought conditions are in very good condition. Over the years ... http://www.pickledeel.com/2009/11/23/miss-betty/ The hot night does not make for sound sleep and I wake in the dark. Again. It is 0430 but still dark outside, with no hint of light or noise. A little over thirty minutes later I resurface and I can hear the polite chatter of young galahs as they ... http://www.pickledeel.com/2009/11/21/sunrise-at-bulyninnie/