G'day

Dispatches from the Frontier

I used to think that weather discussion were peculiar to Australia. That we alone are obsessed with it. But I found that weather discussions are a worldwide preoccupation. Friends in equatorial Africa are always talking about wet and dry seasons and asking how ours is going. The Yanks talk of snow and heat, and the weather is always wrong for the Brits.

Everyone talks about the weather. Listen in to School of the Air of a morning - news is nearly always about how much rain each station received. Ever listened to the ABC radio early morning? The news bulletins all finish with Territory weather, followed by the DJ giving more weather. Then there is an update half way between bulletins.

Weather, weather and more weather. Our phone bill is full of fax calls to the Bureau of Meteorology's "Weather by fax" service. It starts with a freefax call (the number is in the NT phone book) which details all the services, and the 1902 costs spiral from there.

Now, recently we decided to get ourselves a high-tech electronic weather station, with temperature, humidity, barometric pressure and trends. It sits right above our phone so we can answer people straight away when they ask if we are getting hot weather there. But despite all the wonderful electronic equipment we have (and it too, comes at a cost I might add), one piece of equipment remains virtually unchanged since the dawn of time - it is the humble rain gauge. This simple piece of equipment is the centre of any weather discussion, and has changed the relationships we have had with our neighbours from the day we installed it. In fact, it almost came as a good omen, as it rained (13.75mm to be exact) the morning after it was installed.

No longer do we have to guess and bluff our way into asking if we can borrow next door's grader, now we can proudly boast the amount we received, when, and compare it with the neighbours (150 kilometres away), instead of just, "Yeah a bit...a lot last night." Now it's, Got a downpour of one and a half inches last night, couldn't borrow your grader to clear the creek crossing could I?".

And notice something about the last measurement? Inches! Now I was educated in both metric/decimal and imperial/old currency, and am bilingual in both, but despite all the attempts by the 'Metric KGB' to eliminate all references to anything imperial, we still talk of rain in inches. By the way, is the Republic debate a 'Metric KGB' conspiracy to totally eliminate imperial standards? But I digress.

Out here on the frontier, we are subject to all elements of weather, and have a foolproof system of prediction: ants and ailments! Ants are always on the move about two days before it rains. Never fails. First it is the meat ants, then the sugar ants. And they always follow the same routine and routes through the house. The next sign is an increase in ailments: the wife's right knee, and my lower back. I tell you, cyclones can be crippling. The back just ceases!

But the final and ultimate sign of rain is Larry and Gerald, out two old ringers. They started to get a bit restless, and drag their wives off camping down the river, to fish. Never, ever fails. Despite every single sign of rain, for some unexplained reason Larry and Gerald decide to load the swags into the old wheelbarrow, and off they go over the ridges, down into the gorges, with their wives grumbling behind them.
Sure enough, they return a few days later, looking like drowned rats. It is beyond the comprehension of my wife and I, when we learn that despite pitch-black clouds and freezing winds that cut right though you, Larry and Gerald remain the complete optimists: "It's not supposed to rain at this time of year, so we'll be right!" And their wives believe them. Time and time again, off go the ringers.
Anyway, I must finish here and go and reinforce our levee banks - Larry and Gerald are leaving on a fishing expedition to the coast.
As always, yours on the frontier.
-Jock Asiimwe.