Things you see at the park

It's holidays here and this afternoon I thought a walk in the park might be good for unbending my back which was sore from helping Mike construct his birthday Lego. While feeding ducks we saw one of these:

It's a great cormorant which wasn't at all interested in the stale bread (not fish flavoured) but was standing just like the one in the picture. A little further around the pond a white egret was supervising the council machine which was removing the overgrown duck weed:

Around our home we also have some kookaburras which were laughing this afternoon to let us all know that our house is their territory. The ironic laugh is their first line of defence.

Once when Hubby was walking through the park on his way home from work he saw a car that was on fire. Around it people were casually doing what they normally do in the park e.g. walk the dog, jog, push small children on swings, BBQ the sausages. When he got home Hubby thought he should let someone know about it. He rang the local police and they asked, "What colour is the car?" Hubby's response, "Well, really black." He offered to ring the fire brigade but the police said no worries mate and a few minutes later we heard the fire engine.

As well as a few park trips it's been a season of birthdays. Lloyd had his 15th 8 days ago. I encouraged Mike to select a birthday cake from my book for his special day today. He decided he wanted a "knight cake" (his own invention). I had no idea how to construct such a cake so I suggested a "sword cake".

Here it is:I even had enough cake left over to make a shield. Hubby suggested putting Aslan on the shield. You are forgiven if you had to read this before recognising it as a lion. I only had a handful of lollies leftover from the movies yesterday with which to construct the face and ran out of spares for whiskers. Hubby just read this and said, "Oh, a lion, now I see what it was." Mike thought the ruby in the sword hilt was cool. When my Mum left the cake eating ceremony and promised to come tomorrow Mike said, "Yes, for my Christmas." Sorry Mike, 86 sleeps to go.