The showgrounds here in Ipswich are a far more attractive proposition during the week than the weekend, unless one prefers to be in the thick of community life. It is serving us well as a base, although we are only too well aware that we cannot outstay the limit of seven days.
Yesterday morning we learned that the couple who had taken the trouble to drive up from the Gold Coast had accepted that an 18 ½ foot caravan simply does not have the same storage as a 22 foot caravan, not does it offer accommodation to the many grandchildren one may choose to carry along. We were sorry we were unable to do business, but glad they were courteous enough to contact us with their decision.
We rediscovered the Riverlinks Shopping Centre, more attractive now than it was when we were through last time when the river banks were still in recovery mode from the January 2011 floods. We decided that we were unimpressed with the Coles supermarket, especially with their fruit and vegetable section where half the produce had no prices on display. We expressed our concern and found the situation unchanged when we returned before checking out. Good staff is obviously hard to come by in Ipswich. The Christmas crowds are out in Ipswich as busy as they are no doubt everywhere else; we enjoyed the people-watching such a shopping trip offers; here there were plenty of bogans about. I define bogans as those cluttered with tattoos and ironmongery with bad dress sense. But we should talk; my husband still has the blurred messy remains of inking done in his own foolish youth.
The afternoon was passed lying about in the heat, reading and dozing, as one is allowed to do at a certain age when they are not rushing about the countryside being a tourist. There will be many like this to follow, I am sure.
This morning we popped up to the official showground office to pay for the rest of the week, and managed to swing a whole further seven days, even without the medical certificate that is normally required. The office lady was just lovely, and she obviously thought we were too.
Laundry was the task of the morning, and so we set off downtown soon finding the one we had used two and a half years ago. Business standards have slipped in the meantime, but nothing a broom and duster could not quickly fix, although there was a fault with the machine I used which fortunately did no harm. A Bright Colour wash is supposed to be a cold wash, and all rinses, according to the notice, are also supposed to be cold. Our spun washing came out very warm; I feared damage but there was none. It was all sun dried by lunch time in the 35 degree heat of the morning although today, much of it required the rare treat of being ironed. Hot water does that.
As the afternoon drew to a close, I could feel the approaching storm, still to arrive. A heat wave is forecasted for Western Australia to coincide with the third match of the Ashes series toward the end of this week, but over this side of the continent, we are in for wild storms and hail. In the meantime, many tens of thousands are filling a sports stadium in South Africa to remember their Madiba in the rain.
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