For all the weather reports and hype surrounding Tropical Cyclone Monica on Monday the 24th and her arrival on Anzac Day I can safely say I’m glad it fizzled out once she hit land. The remnants now are just seasonally late rainfall. Speaking of which the Dry Season officially starts on May the 1st which coincidentally is also a Public Holiday up here in the NT for May Day. So that means it has been a month of 4 day working weeks since early April to celebrate Easter. No complaints from me about that either.
Other Public Holidays of Note include Queen’s Birthday on the 12th June and Picnic Day which is also when the Darwin Cup is held on the 7th of August.
Apart from a crash course in Cyclone awareness (eg a must do is to save the following website to your favourites http://www.bom.gov.au/weather/nt/ ) then the 1300 number to your mobile for when you’re not at work to check the cyclone track info and other info every 3 hours or so… Next for the learning curve is the cyclone preparation. Step one, wrap all electrical goods in plastic and seal with tape, this includes filing cabinets, pc’s, important documents and anything you want to protect from water damage. Then it’s best to tape the windows (think big X’s) and have your cyclone kit prepared. Depending on your complacency or diligence to the cyclone code this kit may contain anything from a carton of beer and smokes to first aid kit, flashlight, loads of bottled water and battery operated radio. Thinking back to what I purchased for my cyclone food I don’t think a packet of snakes, 4 cans of Tuna, some So-Good Soychino’s and V8 Juice would have let me survive too long if I was stuck huddled in the bathroom for 2 days without power or water. Although I did get a Mars Bar after remembering heroic feats of people surviving in the Himalayas for days of one of those babies alone!
For those Melbournite’s interested Kendrah has promised to save us a table or two for lunch and drinks on Sunday the 7th of May 2006 at:
The London Tavern, 238 Lennox Street, Richmond 3121 at 12noon onwards.
Anyways as always take care xox Meg’s
