I, for one, am happy that spring is here, contemplating a visit to the doctor after the flu from hell that keeps on giving and apparently doesn’t go away completely. It’s just been gorgeous to be out and about in Brissie the last couple of days – even if employed only on fairly banal and mundane shopping missions (vacuum cleaner bags apparently being only attainable in suburban shopping centres…). Though the visit to the new City Library as part of my research mission into Brisbane literary history wasn’t banal, except perhaps paying 75 cents for a library fine incurred in 2001. Apparently, I’d been reading a life of LBJ back then. Anyway, the quality of the light is just amazing at this time of year, and there’s a real sense of revivification as people cluster in the mall just enjoying wearing t-shirts and shorts again. Of course, the rain’s apparently descending on us on Tuesday, and the humidity and oppressiveness of summer isn’t too far away, but it’s one of those liminal spaces in time about six or seven weeks long that brings in its wake a sense of rejuvenation and joy. The Murris reckon the notion of four seasons made less and less sense the further north you went, and even at this latitude, we really have micro-climate periods instead of seasons, but anyway, spring has a pleasing onomatopoeia to it, I think, so I’m sticking with it. Without further ado, over the fold, is my pictorial tribute to my beloved town at my favourite time of the year.
If you click on the photos, it’ll take you to my deviantart gallery, where if you click again on the photo, you can see a larger image.
Brisbane Spring day I by *phenomenologist on deviantART
Brisbane Spring day II by *phenomenologist on deviantART
Brisbane Spring day III by *phenomenologist on deviantART
Brisbane Spring day IV by *phenomenologist on deviantART
Brisbane Spring day V by *phenomenologist on deviantART
Brisbane Spring day VI by *phenomenologist on deviantART
Why the mannequin? The shop windows and the weather finally match!
God I love Spring in Brisbane, it really is the best time of year.
Was the LBJ book the Robert Caro one?
Me too. Miss that.
Though I don’t know what you Septembrists have got against April in Vegas
all that dappled golden sunlight, the surprise cool of shadows.
I cant pick between them.
Spring in Armidale, bloggers, means magpies. Our local papers even publish maps of the town showing where the most vicious magpies are lurking.
Wearing my JWH Akubra, I walked up the corner shop to buy some bread. On the way I pass one of Armidale’s many schools. In the trees in the schoolyard those little pink and grey parrots have taken over. But on the other side of the road a potentially viscious magpie lurks in yet another tree. Will report future developments.
Spring here is delightful, even with the magpies.
Spring’s reached Melbourne too, bloody good. Saw a pink camellia yesterday with TWO tones of pink; and that’s a gardening comment. The camellia wasn’t a parlour pink, OK?
I saw the most ridiculous miniature magnolia in Carlton out front of a terrace house the other evening. Miniature flowers, huge tree that is. Puts the one in my backyard to shame, but my one smells. Are magnolias meant to do that?
Ditto, Mark
But then that bloody raucous cacophony of ‘Everyone-else-has-got-daylight-saving-why-can’t-we?’ birds that flock here every year around late September goes and spoils it all.
Personally, I hate both Spring and Summer. The only redeeming feature of summer in Brisbane are the storms that come at the end of a ridiculously hot and humid day, clearing out the air and leaving us with a relatively cool, calm and clear evening. My favourite weather in Australia is windy and overcast. I may learn to like the sun in England or North America… but we get too much of it down here and I hate it.
Spring – hay fever… sucks…
Summer is awesome, however. Everything is so warm and fun and you can feel happiness in the air.
This may be a stupid question but what are the summer fashions looking like this year?
There is a time and a place for perspiring… and walking to the bus stop in the morning isn’t it. I’m not a particularly unfit person… and I’m not obese… but humidity really does a number on me. When its cold, windy and cloudy, I feel like I have space… I feel like I can exert all my energies with the least friction. It’s not only space for movement… but for my mind, my mood and my imagination. When its humid I feel claustrophobic, like I’m encased in a layer of hot steaming concrete. I’ve never understood why Australians glorify the heat and the sun so much… its not like we don’t get enough of it for god’s sake. We should give thanks instead for the fact that we have comfortable, mild winters which don’t kill you if you’re not wearing five layers of clothing.
I always think a bit of sweat cleanses the body, Cliff, but I agree it’s not good when you have to dress up for work. Nothing worse than cold and wet, except cold, windy and wet.
September’s good, but I prefer April. I tend to get hayfever in September but not April, the skies around sunset are more beautiful, and the difference between the minima and the maxima is several degrees less.
I also love jacaranda time and the early thunderstorms, usually late October, although they tend to strip the flowers off the jacarandas. Right now the golden penda, one of my favourites, is in full bloom. But the really great thing about Brisvegas is that we have flowering shrubs and trees all year round.
Gerroff Mark. ‘Spring’ in Brissie, my home town, may once have been a time for love, laughter and liberty. But now – is it age, or global warming? – it equals summer in any other time or place.
Already the portends are there: rides to work are now sweaty, the kids are waking up to (too) early light and the yard needs regular mowing. Bring back winter, the only mild months we have!
“This may be a stupid question but what are the summer fashions looking like this year?”
Mick, I am expecting nudity as the theme, again, this year.
I may be weird… but I quite liked sitting at the George St end of Queen st for my morning ciggie before jumping on the 135 to work as the cold wind starts to tunnel into the mall. Of course, I don’t like getting wet… but the occasional winter rain is nothing compared to the ubiquitous vapour hanging in the air during the summer. Even though I haven’t lived in the south since I was 3… I always feel more at home in Adelaide, climate wise. Hot summers, yes… but they are dry ones.
Ou sont les neiges d’antan, Graeme?
Let’s be fair – there’s a bit of humidity about, but probably only because it’s going to rain later in the week. This is nothin’ like what it’ll be in a few months’ time.
mick, see the photo for the answer!
Mark – so the girls are still going for the baggy dress thing? That’s good, I quite like that look. The girls in the UK are going for a similar look as well. The fashion in these parts is pretty classy by the way, a lot of what passed for as cool in the mountainous parts of Europe isn’t good enough for the local supermarket here…
FDB
At the risk of having a private conversation:
was that huge magnolia up north near Park Street? I saw one last Spring walking back north-west from Princes Park towards Lygon Street (East Brunswick); it took up 90% of their front yard.
It inspired us to plant a magnolia in a garden large bed, at home, out in the scrub in West Gippsland. The little blighter still has a long way to go, but we hope it won’t look ridiculous.
Ah, Spring !!!
cheerio
Aaaaand it’s raining again. And I lost my minimum wage job. Hooray for spring in Brisbane.
Ambigulous:
Let’s make that risk a certainty.
No, it wasn’t, it was just off Rathdowne St in Carlton proper. Really, it deserves checking out. So, for everyone in Melbourne with a horticultural bent (wait, this is the drug thread, right?)…
Imagine you’re heading towards the city on Rathdowne (assuming you’re not actually doing so, in which case look out! You could be in terrible danger! Stupid connectivity). Take the first left after Elgin, where the Carlton Clinic is on the corner*. There will be a park on your right, and houses on your left. Keep heading west until you’re nearly at Canning St. You seriously cannot miss it. Superb!!! [yet ephemeral - don't delay]
*also, this is the best GP I’ve ever been to. They bulk-bill, they’re friendly, non-judgemental, eschew pointless antibiotic prescriptions and I don’t even work for them!
Thanks FDB,
will have a gander soon, when thereabouts.
3 frosts in last 6 days here, but the sunny days that go with them have been wonderful. It must be horrid to live in Brisbane, where it rains and people sweat in September