I slept a little late this morning - such a hot night, so it was blankets on, blankets off, fan on, fan off, get up and walk on the cold concrete to cool the feet down, blankets off - you get the picture. As a result I was still out watering plants when the sun cleared the hill and hit the ground like a sledgehammer. So I did a quick walk around the fruit trees and concluded they could last till tomorrow when it will be marginally cooler. Then staggered back indoors to hide. The temp was up over 20 by 8 this morning, so even my window-opening strategy had a limited benefit and I was soon closing them once more (they get shut when the external temp exceeds the internal one). I had a phone call from my uncle and aunt in NSW this morning concerned about the fires. Others too have expressed concern, so I have pinched this image from News.com and 'painted' marks on it. The yellow circle shows my general whereabouts, the red arrows show the locations of the two big fires.

So as you can see they are miles away, but the smoke gets around quite a bit. I just heard a bit of a rumble of thunder and some nimbus clouds seem to be working their way up from the south. Hope they bring rain as a dry thunderstorm would not be good news at present. A big gust of wind, and now it has dropped to a fairly stiff breeze. Today was lunch in town day with the Quilting group. We agreed to auction a quilt to raise funds for the fire victims and I have also found out where in town we are to deliver donations to - so will run through the cupboards and see what to get rid of. Such a pity I had just had my clearout as much of what I gave away would have been useful for others. The neighbours sheep were out this morning. You would think after four years they might have gotten round to mending their fences before getting more livestock, but apparently not. Still, getting out is one thing. The fact they are still out and happily grazing around the recreation ground suggests wanton irresponsibility to me. While clearing space in the spare room I found a mystery box still wrapped in removalists paper and undid the wrapping to see what was inside. It contained my CD collection which was excitement enough, but it also contained all the various embroideries and tapestries I have completed over the years. A real treasure-trove. Here are some for your delectation:

The last one is a bit embarrassing - as you can see it is still not complete. I began it as a gift for my niece when she was born. She is 23 now... perhaps for her 30th? Off to subside in front of the fan now...