Month: August 2022

Number 200!

And when the fanfare, the party favours, the streamers, and the cheering all die down, its time to face reality.

Number 200 will be the last regular Saturday Evening Post. I’ve decided to call it quits, like many who stop while there is still a glow to the process.

When I first started Saturday Evening Post about four years back, my  intent was to publish a photo from the week and explain where, and why i was highlighing it.

Then came covid and in particular the lockdowns. Melbourne ended up enduring the longest lockdown of any city in the world. (As the Ombudsman said in a report on why Victorians were not allowed to return home, “It was hard not to agree with the complainant that such requests were ‘beyond unreasonable… very intrusive and unkind, it’s inhuman actually’. …. But the effect of a complex and constrained bureaucracy meant some outcomes were downright unjust, even inhumane.”   See here )

So  I turned to the blog as an outlet to the frustration of not being able to travel about.  And so the style of the blog changed and we began to cover photographic topics, the work of great photographers and my own recollections of a young lad in a country town with a passion for making images.

But, as insightful readers will have noted, its been harder and harder keep up the flow of that sort of material, and I also began to add a few ”stream of conciousness’ posts along the way.  Easy to follow if you were aware of where I was coming from, or even going to, but as a reader explained to me, “It’s to complex and I just click the photo and move on.”  That should, I suppose, have been a warning.  So it seems that its perhaps better to step of the treadmill of grinding out a page simply to fit a deadline.

But by then the magic of #200 was looming on the horizon and here it is.

So what to expect.   Well the normal sections of the blog will continue on their own ad-hoc basis as they are posting now.  I am hoping to be able to photograph birds in such a way as to bring an insight into their lives, in a single story.  Little Visits and Pages from the Field Note Book, should be regular in an irregular sort of way, and perhaps even an occassional Saturday Evening Post, (perhaps).

So, I hope you’ve enjoyed the journey. I have. Thanks to everyone who has commented, added additional information or insights and generally made the blog a bit larger than just my ramblings. I have truly appreciated all the various interactions.

Thanks again, and as Crobie Morrison used to say, “I hope to catch you Along the Track, somewhere soon.”

We were out the other day around the Altona area and had arrived at the Maddox Street Boatsheds area where the Paisley Drain and  the Kororoit Creek empty into the Bay.
The Environmental Team of Hobson’s Bay Council have carried out significant works in the area developing it for walking and bird watching.  My good friend, Andrew Webster is part of that team and they have made up special signs to help id birds in the area.  One of those signs has been erected at the Boatshed area and as I walked through the bush toward it I was pretty thrilled to see a painting repro of a Nankeen Kestrel. Instantly I knew the source of the picture.
It was one from a series of Kestrels that I made out at Woodlands Homestead several years ago.  Hard not to recognise the wing angle and pose of the bird as I see the photo every day as it’s a wall print next to the computer.   Pretty chuffed (not Choughed) to see it and it was good to recall the memory of the time with those birds and also that it can go on to help other who are beginning bird observers.

Here is a link to the shot on Flickr.

And here is the shot on the sign as comparison.

Travel Well
Stay Safe