Sunday in Groovetown

A long time ago (in a galaxy right around the corner) there was a movie made about how the Apocalypse hit Aus. It was made in 1977 or thereabouts (it actually was on the big screen at the same time as Star Wars), and top of the cast was one of everyone's favorite gay actors, Richard Chamberlaine ... still quite young and handsome, and very charming.

The movie was called The Last Wave, and in this prediction of The End of the Antipodes (they never said anything about what was happening in the rest of the world), it started with a massive tidal wave -- like something out of the director's cut of The Abyss -- clobbering the fair city of Sydney.

But throughout the movie, it was water ... water ... water. Rain, rain, rain. Floods and more floods. WATER. Eschatology never had it so wet.

And right now, The Last Wave's take on the apocalypse is looking mighty appealing. We look less like the Australia of this movie than like Tatooine. Seriously.

It's still October -- meaning, mid-spring here. Yesterday it was the Celsius equivalent of 100 degrees Fahrenheit, massively too hot for the average temp. for this month. The wind direction changed and it's cooler today, and SIX whole spots of rain fell this morning. I know they fell; I counted them.


Right now, we'd be happy to have the kind of apocalyptic scenario depicted in The Last Wave ... at least we wouldn't be heading back into water restrictions! What basically happens is that you carry a lot of buckets of water, without which your garden will die, because by January you won't even be allowed to hand-water with a hose.

If you like your garden, you get callused hands. Meanwhile, a lot of people are taking the gardens out and putting in concrete or pavers. You'll certainly have softer, smoother, younger looking hands, if you have concrete where the lawn used to be.

Now, the city of Adelaide does, at the very least, have a lot of reservoirs; we've never (yet) reached the point where the government has turned off the water (though rellies in the UK have reported their water being turned off in the worst heat waves; one shudders at the thought).



At this point, I'm still making light of the situation, but in fact it's no joke. Desalination and storm water capture are necessities for the very near future ... or we'll be renaming this city Mos Eisley and keeping a weather-eye open for ships matching the description of the Millennium Falcon ... which wouldn't be so bad, if Han Solo were to show up unexpectedly at the local boozer now and then, but with our luck we'll get JaJa Binks (and no, I have no idea how to spell that, and am disinclined to learn).

Seriously, we need some rain -- we need a LOT of rain. The hills are already burned yellow, and October has been way too hot for this time of year. Global warming ... it's hard to believe that there are still people out there who deny the reality. Not too many of 'em live down here.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go chase the Jawas out of the driveway before they make off with the car --

And you're absolutely right: nothing is happening in the Keegan Zone. Well, nothing you'd want to read about on a blog post, anyway.

Ciao for now,
MK