Interpol agents based in France should be on High Alert right now as they have an expert thief in their midst.  The culprit is there, relatively unattended, for a week and anything not nailed down is in danger......



Don't let the kindly face and silver hair of the lady on the far right fool you, dear reader: my mother is an utterly possessed pilfering pensioner with a penchant to purloin pretty much anything her paws can poach and place into her pockets.

My parents have been over here visiting us and we've spent a fair chunk of the summer holiday in Austria, Germany and France.

With rail passes and hotels already booked and paid for, Pauline Florence is a Sneaky Septuagenarian seeking surreptitious stimulation from stealing things.

Usually, she restricts her nimble fingers to airline biscuits, sugar cubes and plastic spoons, but a continental breakfast included in a two star hotel tariff was far too tempting to turn down.

"Look Katherine*," she whispered excitedly. "I've got lunch all organised."

Her right hand proudly waggled a clear plastic ziplock bag, smuggled all the way from Australia for just this purpose. Inside were several slices of Swiss cheese and pale pink ham. "The bread rolls and apples are already in my handbag," she continued, green eyes gleaming with glee.

Bread rolls and apples I could handle, but risking salmonella on a 34C day in Berlin was not on my 'top ten holiday moments' list. Not even in the top hundred, if I'm brutally honest.

I gently pushed her hand down, subduing her joy even further with a patronising pat on her knee. "Mum, you know I love you. You know that your handbag outdoes Dr Who's tardis for all the life saving items it contains but ----- yes Mum, there is a but, and this time it's not me being rude and talking about butts ---- we are not - repeat, NOT --- going to risk our lives by letting you keep some flaccid slices of already rather dodgy-looking dairy foods and meat products in your handbag for five hours on a hot day before you carve open some rock hard rolls with a Howard-era plastic knife on a park bench in order to save a few euros at lunchtime. Okay?"

She had the grace to accept my opinion and then was immediately racked with guilt.

Not at the act of stealing but at the waste. "I don't feel like eating this right now but it's awful to throw good food out." She brightened at an idea. "Why don't I just slip up to the buffet and put them back..."

"No, Mum. No-one in the entire hotel is going to want to see an old woman put some second-hand cheese that's already starting to curl up at the edges and ham with early stages of slime BACK on the cold savoury tray."

She made to interrupt. "------No, not even if placed there by someone as wholesome-looking as you, dear heart."

For the remainder of our trip, she refrained from misappropriating meat but stubbornly stuck to cheese. "You can't have bread without cheese," she said. Failing that, my parents' lunch rolls were filled via sachets of nutella, honey or jam. Hotels that had suffered from pillaging Paulines in the past were getting better at thwarting such manoevres, setting up their confitures and condiments with shared spoons in open bowls. Needless to say, these weren't my mother's favourite places to stay.

One evening, she had her head bent over her (thankfully paid for) evening meal, right hand shaking furiously over the napkin resting in her lap. Closer inspection by Sapphire ("What on earth are you doing, Grandma?") revealed that she was shaking the living shite out of the salt so that she could rinse out her sore tooth cavity with some warm water in her hotel room later on. "How about unscrewing the cap, Grandma? You'll get more salt and it'll be quicker that way," Sapphire suggested.

To be fair, Mum's skills in swiping helped us in other ways. We all caught a bad cold on the trip and she set herself a challenge beyond a free lunch - no tissues to be purchased by any of us. Instead, we blew our noses on green/yellow/monogrammed cafe napkins, hand towelettes from hotel lobbies, dried out wet ones and railway paper hand towels. She bragged at one stage that she could even furnish the paperless ladies' loos at Neuschwanstein castle by passing some spares around to grateful female tourists under their doors.

Our bought coffees were sweetened courtesy of her sugar swindlin' digits, access to public fountains improved with pinched plastic cups, shorts mended with sewing kits and bottles of water looted from cleaners' carts.



On our last day we had a check out time that coincided with the opening time of the hotel breakfast. This posed yet another dare for our Pauline - zip in, zip out as the rest of her party wheeled the cases onto the street. She dashed out with freshly-buttered rolls, sachet after sachet of spread and several apples under her jumper. Seeing my smile, she pinched two fingers together and said, "I was that tempted to buzz off with two hot teas for your Dad and me, but they only had china cups."

Yep, that Wife, Mother, Auntie, Grandmother, CWA and Probus committee member there has a Hedgren handbag heaving with illegal lunch.

I love you, Mum.

* She'll never abbreviate me to 'Kath'

Where’s Eric?

Saturday morning, 8am.

Milly is straining on the lead, dying for a leash-less run around in the park after two days of non-stop rain and only quick visits downstairs for relieving herself.

Sapphire has been left at home, fitfully sleeping, with her mobile resting on her pillow. Mine is in the pocket of my polar fleece and I finger it nervously, hoping that I’m not a terrible mother for leaving her to give a dog forty five minutes of my undivided attention.

Nafeesa’s grandmother arrives from Lebanon today, the lucky recipient of the laughingly-titled ‘fast track’ visa application on compassionate grounds. Yep, only three weeks: how very thoughtful of them to rush it through for a child without an able parent or family..... Nanna will need help though as she’s eighty one, doesn’t drive, is in a strange country and speaks mostly Arabic.

We’ll all pitch in of course and I know that Nafeesa is greatly looking forward to living in her own home again, where things are familiar and the comforting routines can recommence. This past week, she’s been at her friend Paige’s place. Sapphire’s been too ill for us to have her at ours and, well, she’s made it clear that we’re, um, not who she wants to stay with, despite the wishes of her mother and mother’s best friend. Still, if she wants a week of late nights, junk food and sporadic visits to hospital but is having some fun, who can deny her that when she’s endured several weeks of stress?

Love Chunks is in Canada running a conference and workshop; stopping only to head to the airport, bypass the US and do the same thing for another week in Mexico.

I think back to my birthday, two days ago. Sapphire’s blood test showed that her body was definitely struggling with a major illness, but that her major organs (liver, etc) were functioning normally. Her temperature had finally lowered, but the headaches, diarrhoea, nausea, exhaustion and wrenching stomach pains had not.

“Sorry about ruining it, Mum,” she whimpered, head in my lap as I stroked her forehead. “I got up when you were in the shower and your cards and presents are on the lounge.”

She had sewed me a bag for my latest knitting project and alongside it was a golden chocolate Lindt bear. “Look inside the bag, Mum,” she urged, sitting up slowly, the morning light showing too pale a complexion and dark circles under her eyes.

A beautiful hand-made card with sentiments inside that brought me to tears. “No Mum, look in the bag.” Inside was a framed magazine advertisement pulled from a magazine of the month and year of my birth – November 1968. Nestle’s chocolate – Born in Switzerland, their secret is now being shared with you. “I found it on ebay and when we were at Jumbo’s I put the frame in with the ones you had bought and hoped that you wouldn’t notice. Dad did framed it when you were on your treadmill.” Yes, my other present, which arrived a week ago.

More tears from me as I rushed back to the other lounge and cuddled her. She’s twelve now and yet I still automatically breathe in her hair and am instantly reminded of her as a newly-bathed baby. “Mum, you’re not supposed to cry on your birthday,” Sapphire laughs.

Love Chunks writes me an email with a message so simple and beautiful that I’ve read it every time I’ve logged on since. The rest of the day is spent knitting as Sapphire watches the motley collection of Antiques Road Trip shows we’ve recorded, running an ongoing guessing game on how much each item will fetch at auction. The TV is regularly paused for her to recover from a painful stomach spasm or to dash to the toilet and my worry is masked by the rude jokes I make to try and get her to smile. “Everything is about farts and poos with you, Mum,” she says in a not-very disapproving tone.

Two days later and Milly and I are about to walk into the park. A quick glance shows that there are no other dogs nearby for her to scare off, so I bend down to unsnap her lead.

Putta putta putta putta – one of the ubiquitous mini-bikes has screeched to a halt on the opposite side of the street, the driver calling out to me in French.

“Parlez vous Anglais?”

“Yes,” he says with relief. “There was a bakery here...” he gestures to the shop behind him whose windows are papered white, “........do you know where it is now?”

Being an inexplicable magnet for direction seekers, I actually do know. “Here, it’s around the corner, where we’re heading. It’s only been open for two days, very fancy now. Follow me.”

He nods in agreement, driving on the left hand side of the road as he does so, breaking the law. It’s 8am on a foggy Saturday morning, who’s going to notice?

The police, that’s who. Out of nowhere a heavily armoured van pulls up alongside us, six serious faces peering through the dark windows that are now slowly rolling down.

Gulp.

No French this time; I think my ‘Oh My God’ has given them a clue.

“Do you know where Eric’s bakery has moved to?”

Half an hour later, with a muddy but happy dog I’m still laughing as I walk back home, knowing that Sapphire will get a kick of out this story when I see her.

Bloody brilliant!

As the death toll, horrific injuries, homelessness and environmental desecration increases every moment a news screenpage on the Victoria bushfires refreshes itself it is extremely difficult to think of anything else right now. I've cried so much this morning reading and seeing story after story, face after face reeling in shock, disbelief and bewilderment at their fate. I cried because I felt so ashamed at wallowing in my own petty whingeings yesterday when my now-home-state is suffering so terribly.

However, amongst all the hell, the good, the strong and the miraculous stories of survival, bravery and determination to start again are emerging. Even here, many kilometres away in the safety of Melbourne there are still some things to be proud of.

The Red Cross Bushfire Appeal is going strong. So strong, in fact, that their website is frequently jammed with donators and they're asking us to try again and be patient. I'm sure that no-one is 'Chucking a Connex' and complaining about their lousy internet provider or delays in service but will be prepared to log on later with their credit card details and blood type.

In addition, it seems that thousands of Victorians have heeded our girl River's advice to give blood, with the Red Cross' Chief Executive saying that "It's been overwhelming..... our resources are stretched.... it has been the single greatest interest we have to do a single event in the history of the blood service."

With blood having a rather limited shelf life and those shelves now full of the fresh stuff, Red Cross are asking that people stagger their donations by registering online. This will enable bloodbank staff to contact the donator when their blood is needed. "Giving a blood donation can save up to three lives," their CEO said.

One look at the poor man in the Burns Unit in the article alongside The Age's blood donor story is enough to realise that blood (among other things) will be needed for a very long time. His physical, emotional and mental agonies are only just beginning; let alone what might have become of other people found with him, alive or dead.

To think that these fires - still burning and likely to do so for a few more weeks - were deliberately lit by arsonists lies beyond my area of coherent reasoning. I don't believe in the death penalty, but if found, these morally stagnant shitbags should be forced to not only clear up the burned debris from all the homes, farms, community buildings and business that burned down, but also clean, disinfect and lovingly prepare every single bandage needed for those poor souls suffering in burns units.

They could do all of the above whilst donating their own blood, having their fresh skin scrubbed and scraped off and their other vital organs such as kidneys given to those who need it and deserve it more than they do.

Then, when those 'services' are no longer required, they can be set to digging out trenches for the installation of rainwater tanks and pipes that will enable every home and business to protect themselves from future firebugs. With their bare hands.

Then, and only then, the arsonists can atone by visiting each and every person affected by the disaster to apologise before replanting the ash-strewn land with regenerative and native species of plants that are used to fire and tough Australian summers.

......Or am I being too harsh?

Inner-city Crime

Yep, it happened. Nine days of residence and our car got broken into last night.

Well, we're assuming it was last night, because the car hasn't been used for a few days, what with the convenience of walking, trams just around the corner and the local train station and such. It was only when Love Chunks went to open the door this afternoon that he discovered that it was already unlocked.....

As my brother Rob, a long-time resident of North Melbourne advised us, "Hey, if you have to park out in the street, just assume that your car will be burgled. More than once. Quite often, in fact." We took him at his word and made sure that our car - certainly not a magnet itself for stealing being a dented, thirteen year old magna station wagon festooned with particularly determined spiderwebs outside and ancient pasty crumbs inside - had nothing of value in it.

At least, not to the thief concerned.

All he or she took was our first aid kit ("DRUGS! They wanted DRUGS!" Love Chunks calmly surmised) and LC's pocket knife ("They're MURDERERS!" I thought, but kept it to myself. After all, Sapphire was in the car). Surprisingly, they hadn't bothered to check the coin thingy by the ignition which would have yielded ten bucks in gold coins, or swiped my now rather large and colourful collection of shopping bags (numbering fifteen in seven different colours at last stocktake) or, thank-the-higher-power-I-think-exists-but-in-what-form-or-capacity-I-have-no-idea, the brand new Melways. And who'd have thought that the tape deck would still be intact, whew!

Sapphire noted our sombre expressions as we drove to Highpoint shopping centre. My opening remark, "Hey Love Chunks, your mate Greg reckons Highpoint should be re-named Knifepoint" perhaps wasn't the cleverest way to start our on-road conversation and we three sat in silence for a while.

Then Sapphire chirped: "Hey, at least they didn't take Wizzy, the guy I made out of my lolly wrapper during the drive from Adelaide." She laughed uproariously; clearly very amused at her capacity to lighten the moment which she in fact did extremely well. We can't really stop car thieves, so why worry?

It was with some degree of smugness that I noted that she'd taken my frequent lectures about us now living in an inner city suburb with haves and have-nots living closely together and anyone with a driveway is automatically classified as a millionare, to heart. Plus, seeing the Verb Cafe owner on Racecourse Road the other day having to shoo away several rather drunk bogans pestering outdoor diners for smokes while we were having lunch was a rather interesting way for Sapph to commence a Q&A session on where Broadmeadows is located and why the proprietor believes that the inebriated smokers should bloody well return there......

As for the car, it does make me wonder whether updating our matronly mitsubishi is worth it right now. Firstly, we always get a park directly in front of our house (thus removing my need to learn how to parallel park) and secondly, we only ever use her for big shopping trips or (future) weekends away. Perhaps we're better off disappointing car thieves and saving up for a decent holiday instead. Love Chunks is seriously contemplating sticking up a placard by the driver's door that says, 'If you think this car is junk, then you know that we don't have anything valuable in it either.'

Hopefully though, this Feng Shui thingy we bought at the Queen Victoria Markets does the trick for our house. The chap there told us it is for Protection and Health, and for seven dollars, I was willing to repress my doubts and give it a burl. He then gave Sapphire a tiny white cat with a tiny jingling bell inside for good luck and happiness. "Put it in your school bag and you'll be fine." He must have picked up on her uncertainty somehow and refused to let me pay for it. At the very least, he's cannily ensured himself some repeat business.

Feng shui has a much fairer chance of ensuring our immunity to thieves than Milly, the not-so-ferocious dog:

Her idea of savagery is to snap at blowflies so that she can get to Skipper the rabbit's droppings before they do. And we wouldn't have her any other way.