As you all know, I’m house-husbanding even more for the next 5 weeks as my wonderful wife enjoys a well-deserved holiday with her extended family in her native Finland. Fortunately she’s been able to buy a prepaid SIM for her phone (in the home of Nokia where more people own mobiles per capita than any other country in the world, it wasn’t difficult) and we’re keeping in touch just fine. And I’m using the time to get some things done that have needed doing for a while, top of which is cleaning up my study, and, believe me, it needs it. Since the weather in my neck of the woods has been anything but conducive to outdoor activities, getting stuff done inside seems like a good plan.
I’ve also been cleaning out the clutter a bit and putting some non-needed items on eBay in order to raise funds for the Shadowfax restoration. It’s going well and I have two items currently listed that might be of interest.
Samsung colour laser printer. and
Should either of these items fail to sell at auction, I’d entertain offers of less than what they are presently listed for if you’re interested.
Despite all this, however, the days are long and pretty boring and I have been resisting the urge to go out to the shops and spend money just to relieve the boredom. This morning I started wondering what I could do on the weekend and I found two events happening in Sydney on Sunday both of which seem worthy of my attendance.
The first is an “All French Day” display of French cars at Silverwater Park. Having (I tremble to confess) owned 7 Renaults at various times in my life, this interests me and I’m looking forward to going. Also on the same day is a show of Ford Mustangs at the Museum of Fire at Penrith. Now most of you know I’m not really a Ford man, but I can admire a classic car along with the best of them so I’ll take in this show as well.
More details about both of these shows can be easily sourced via the intersweb.
Incidentally, you may or may not know that the area around the Macdonalds restaurant at the corner of Silverwater Road and Parramatta Road in western Sydney was once owned by my great-great grandfather who had migrated here from Northumberland in the north of England as a free settler in 1802. He later took 4 of his sons and took up huge holdings in the Hunter Valley around Scone when the formal land grants were made in 1836. The family spread right up the Liverpool Range into the Darling Downs in Queensland and it was once said that you could travel from Sydney to Warwick and be able to sleep at a Hall family property every night on your journey.
Anyway, I’m looking forward to passing through that area again on Sunday and noting that most of the streets behind the Maccas are, to this day, named after various aspects of the Hall family, as the map below indicates.
You can see Hall Street, Percy Street, Dartbrook Road, Northumberland Road, Simpson Street, Hunter Street, all Hall family names.
There you go, a potted history.
Finally, it’s way too brief, but Red Bull have released a little slow-motion video of Casey Stoner on the MotoGp bike. Worth a look.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z4snkUUolJ0&feature=player_embedded[/youtube]
jeffb says
Good little history lesson there about the Hall family, Phil. Do you claim the bushranger Ben Hall as one of yours too?
Phil Hall says
Thanks, mate. No Ben was of Irish extraction and originated down around the Grenfell/Forbes area.