Thursday, May 8, 2025

Revisiting

I'd forgotten the name of this animal during our visit to Werribee Zoo and it is an oryx. Sami wrote that the Arabian oryx is Qatar's national animal.

The Buddhist cafe my neighbour and I visited today was busy, full of white middle class people, in East Brighton. The staff were a mix of south east Asian and white staff. It was vegetarian, which will please my Friend in Japan who is now....I am not sure what to call her now...., Wombat will do. The food was nice but nothing special. I ate my Middle Eastern meal but I felt like a sweet after, so we both had a small and delicious passionfruit cheesecake. Cafe Bliss is in a suburban street, with a Buddhist meditation centre and gift shop next door, opposite a lovely park. 

After lunch once I was home, at about 4.30 my phone rang, displaying HH's son's name. He lives in Queensland and although I had seen her a couple of hours ago, I was worried. 

We spoke on the phone for a minute or so, and created a plan. He was in Melbourne. I let him up to my floor and met him. I called HH and said there was a delivery guy in the foyer and he has a parcel for her, but didn't have the right apartment number. She said she would go down to collect the parcel, but in the meantime I let her son down in the lift to her front door, and as she was opening her front door, there was her son with a huge bunch of flowers for an early Mother's Day gift.

Oh dear, this morning I took my evening medications in the morning, which meant I also took my lunchtime medication that is in with my evening medication. This evening I took my morning medication. Some are the same, but a couple are not. I need to concentrate.

It must be fifteen years since I first hear the phrase 'plating a meal', and when the mushroom lady trial began, it is without dispute that she plated up meals, perhaps full of death cap mushrooms. But one reporter let it slip, and I am not sure how a young reporter would know, but food used to be dished up onto plates. "Dinner is nearly ready. I am dishing up." Phyllis plates up meals. I would just dish them up.

Remember the Arts Centre tour I recently took with HH? I could not remember the name of this painting.


My immediate research revealed nothing. Guugle was not helpful. A few days later, I had another crack using the normal easy search methods, but nothing. 

Two days ago, I was annoyed with myself for not finding it and tried again and I found it on the Arts Centre website. It is called Gloria Swanston's Last Silent Movie. I love it. 

The artist who painted the work is Noel Tunks, and I've never heard of him but my goodness, what a diverse artist he was. He lived in country Victoria and was just an amazing artist. Look at some of his works here. How have I lived so long and not known about him and his art? How come Hels has never written about him? 

47 comments:

  1. I dish up too. What a lovely surprise for HH. If only all surprises were that pleasant.
    On the medication mix up at least you didn't do what I once did. The then cat and I had evening medications. I took his - but fortunately realised before I attempted to give him mine. A big oops.
    I have never heard of Noel Tunks either and need to explore. Thank you.

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    1. EC, after your drug mix up, I am sure you were purring very nicely.

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  2. My partner tells me a pastie tastes best when you eat it from a paper bag….hence bag up

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    1. Ah, bag up. Yes, I get that. During Covid times once a week at the limit of our exercise distance, we ate a pastie in a paper bag at the back of the rear of our car with the boot open.

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  3. Your day was rich with small but meaningful moments—from spotting an oryx and enjoying Cafe Bliss to a heartfelt Mother's Day surprise and reflections on language, memory, and the need for a little more medication focus.

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    1. Roentare, I expect mixing up medications is something old people do. I have a head start now, having started before old age.

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  4. I like plating a meal because it infers intention whereas dishing it up sounds like you're plopping food down willy nilly.

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    1. Yep Bob, plopping food down is what I would do. What is the bothersome thing of presenting food nicely?

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    2. eye-appeal triggers the appetite.

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  5. Hey Andrew, I would love to have a vegetarian restaurant in my town.
    I hear ya on medication mix ups.
    Sandra sandracox.blogspot.com

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    1. Sandra, we of a certain youngish/old age, really need to focus on our medications.

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  6. The Tara Institute is ringing enormous bells but I cannot for the life of me remember why! Glad you enjoyed your vege repast.
    What a lovely surprise for HH.

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    1. Nice work Merlot. Tara Institute is where we were. Buddhists in East Brighton seems strange.

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  7. That DOES look like Swanson!

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    1. I knew you would know, Kirk. I've watched silent movies with her starring.

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  8. Sorry Andrew, I did my art history degree in Melbourne Uni but I have never heard of the artist. And Tunks is a very unusual name.

    Noel Tunks was an Australian artist who worked for many years from his rural property in Avoca. He studied Fine Art at RMIT in Melbourne and on study trips to India, Italy and the U.K. In 1978, he won the prestigious Blake Prize for Religious Art. In 2016, Central Goldfields Art gallery hosted a major retrospective of Tunks' long life and work! See https://artsandculture.google.com

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    1. Hels, that is the information about him that I read too. How did we not know? I am not art focused though. How did you not know?

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  9. Looks a nice painting. Never heard of plating a meal - wonder why!
    Lovely surprise for HH, you did well helping.

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    1. Margaret, it was fun to be on the conspiracy with her son, who seemed like a lovely guy.

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  10. Did she know the mushrooms were poison? Why did she lie?

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    1. TP, it is safe to say she has lied. The jury will decide whether she knew she feeding her lunch guests deadly mushrooms.

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  11. So I was wrong thinking that animal might be an Ibex or mountain goat.
    Plating is too fancy for me, I dish up. Well, I slap the food onto plates and set them in front of the kids and myself. I'm not keen on the American method I see on TV and in movies where great bowls of various foods are on the table and get passed around so people help themselves. Too much chance of bowls getting spilled. For me, that works better outside at a BBQ, where bowls and platters of sides are set out for people to add to the grilled meat on their plates. Like a buffet where people move along the line.

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    1. River, with shaky hands, I would not be keen passing dishes around either. I don't mind serving myself from bowls of food though. Even move along buffets are problematic for me.

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  12. I'm with Elephant's Child re dishing... plating sounds too catering-ish. And absolutely fascinated by the mushroom court case developments, first thing I look at in the Guardian every morning.

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    1. Richard, The Age newspaper was doing a live feed of each development in the case, which I was following, but for some reason today, Thursday, the live reporting stopped. Odd. The Guardian is reporting the case comprehensively too.

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  13. Tea is on the table is my call, plating sounds like a restaurant call.

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    1. Thelma, you've taken me back to my childhood. Teas up, or Teas on the table. But in your younger years, maybe tea was at a different time than say between 6 and 7.

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    2. You are right there A drew, it was 5 o clock whereas today because everyone comes back around 6ish, that is when everyone is fed.

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  14. We dish up or serve, not plate up.
    I think it was Agatha Christie who wrote a play about serving poisonous mushrooms. It was horrible. The mushroom murderer must really have hated her dinner guests.

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    1. JB, and how did she think she would get away with it? Days of old you could poison people and get away with it.

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  15. I am following the poisoning case avidly. Will be interesting to see the outcome.
    Alison in Wales x

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    1. Alison, I don't think it is a case of 'on the balance of probabilities' but one where the jury has to be convinced of her guilt. Aside from what I think, the jury has to be convinced. Very interesting and I've yet to see any damning evidence.

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  16. What a fun surprise for HH! I read about that mushroom trial. It's making news even on the other side of the planet. Off to check out Noel Tunks!

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    1. Steve, the BBC flew in a reporter to cover the trial. The court is small with a small area for reporters, so the reporters go into a ballot each day to see who can actually attend the case in person.

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  17. Plating sounds like great care is taken while dishing out sounds like what I do, Andrew.
    HH's son is a keeper.

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    1. Pat, if I cooked, dishing out is what I would do too.

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  18. What a lovely surprise for your neighbor.
    Why did the woman on trial want to kill the people? That's what I want to know.

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    1. Pixie, the motive???? What could that be. No one knows.

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  19. Thanks for another companionable post and a new artist! Aloha, Andrew

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  20. I'm endlessly amazed how many artists slip under my radar. ~sigh~ Best wishes!

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    1. Darla, I am not surprised by how many I don't know, but this one does surprise me.

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  21. In our family, we don't plate and we don't dish - we are all the way down the ladder of social nicety with our "get up", as in "If you're ready to eat, I'll get your food up". I never realized how strange that sounds until now. lol

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    1. I've never heard 'Get up', Jenny. I wonder where that came from.

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  22. How lovely that your neighbour had that delightful surprise that you played a significant part in pulling it off.

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    1. Marie, for a student at Melbourne's second best private school, a former champion national rugby player and tech whiz, he is such a gentle giant.

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