Up in front

The February 2010 issue of the teacher-librarians' professional journal, "Scan" (vol 29 no 1) features a photograph I took on my iPhone late last year, as we were wrapping up the Bear and Chook books rap at school. Note the presence of a ubiquitous Bear and Chook in the lower left hand corner.

Christmas approaches

Christmas trees at Central railway station. 17 December, 2009.

You can tell that Christmas is on its way. Just before I took this gorgeous shot yesterday, I was notified by my credit union that my credit card had been counterfeited and someone had cleaned out my account over two days! The credit union has reimbursed my account balance already, but it still feels like I've been violated. The paperwork I must now fill out is annoying beyond belief. The Christmas season tends to bring out the best and the worst in society. Sigh.

What's worse, I realised today exactly where I was when the card information was duplicated! The police and credit union have said these these cases are so prevalent they are highly unlikely to be investigated the way a murder would be investigated. So now I have to decide if I approach the (very large) shop concerned... Will the management actually listen to my suspicions? I wonder...


Christmas tree decorations for 2009. 18 December, 2009.

Customised "Bear and Chook" ornament - note the Santa hat on Chook's tail. They will share a branch this year with a collectible Mr Hankey the Christmas Poo ornament, from the animated TV series, "South Park".

That was the week that was

Stunning flowers fill the gardens around the base of old palm trees in the war memorial park halfway along the shopping centre on High Street, in Penrith. 16 November 2009.



Jack takes "Tiger" to bed. Yes, the current "tiger" is actually a sheepskin platypus. Poor confused dog. 17 November 2009.



These hardy flowers are in numerous commercial stores' flower beds in Penrith. 18 November 2009.



Christmas decorations at the Queen Victoria Building (QVB) in the Sydney CBD. 19 November 2009.



Home customised "Bear and Chook" Christmas ornament. 20 November 2009.



Alien invasion of my bedroom. These little guys are from the "Toy Story" series of Pixar animated films, of course. The one on the mauve base is a very annoying talking night light. The other foreground alien is a bootleg battery operated toy from a bargain importer. The alien teddy is one of those collectible Japanese bears. 21 November 2009.



Jack finally meets Wishbone at Mash cafe in Glenbrook. They were surprisingly well behaved while we ate breakfast. 22 November 2009.

Bears and chooks iiiiiiiin spaaaaaaaaaaaace!

Bear and Chook's space adventure: fun with Kindergarten book rappers in the school library today.

The students created three new adventures for Bear and Chook and we uploaded the photos as a Flickr slideshow:

Please click here!

They (and I) hope you enjoy this digital story. You can request to read the captions while the slideshow plays.

On the beach

Bear and Chook explore a "rockpool" in the sandpit at school. The making of a PowerPoint presentation. Note Chook's hanky hat, the subject of a different PowerPoint procedure.

Progeny?

One of the students at school brought in her baby "Sea World" polar bear to visit with Bear and Chook. (We wondered if it hatched out of an egg?)

Meanwhile...



Flipping through some old photo albums this week, I noticed that today was exactly 28 years since the Seven Network in Australia bought the rights to rerun Star Trek - for the first time the entire series was to be aired here in colour!

I'd quite forgotten that the gala costumed event was scheduled for so late at night! I do recall that the people leaving the last screening for the day of "Clash of the Titans" at Sydney's beautiful old State Theatre, only to find the foyer filling up with Star Trek aliens, ASTREX members and USS Enterprise officers.

The episodes chosen were a bit of a secret Although the plan had been to screen "The City on the Edge of Forever" and "Let That Be Your Last Battlefield", if I recall the fliers correctly, it turned out to be "The Menagerie", Parts I & II, on the big screen. I was a little disappointed because I'd only just bought those two episodes on Betamax, while the other two episodes were not available commercially Down Under.


Therin of Andor at the State Theatre (1981).

(Yeah, those are two baby tribbles perched on my right shoulder, and I'm also wearing a silver Enterprise pendant! The Polaroid camera bag was a very useful Starfleet accessory for Andorians allergic to Retinax 5 - a reference we wouldn't even know until the highly-anticipated release of "Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan" in the same venue just under a year later!)

Three in one

Through the security glass, at night.
12 August 2009.


Bear and Chook wait for a taxi. A big day
of filming at Caddies Creek Public School.
13 August 2009.


The Fool, or court jester, Shakespeare Collection
series of figural Toby jugs. Staffordshire Ceramics.
14 August 2009.

At home in the school library

First day of Term 3. Bear and Chook have moved into my school library
and made themselves right at home!

Thank God for the Salvo's!

Today I found the perfect stuffed polar bear I need for a school project (for the book rap on the children's picture book "Bear and Chook") at a local Salvation Army "Salvo's" charity store. I've been pricing toy polar bears all week, and this one was just $2. He was even dressed for Christmas (in July?), but even his garments are worth way more than $2! Boy, am I glad I didn't buy the one I saw for $130 during the week!

Even better, Bear's the perfect scale for my battery-operated "Choke-a-Chicken" (below left), who'll be standing in for the character of Chook. (Remember "Choke-a-Chicken"? A real novelty hit several Christmases ago. He does the Chicken Dance, and squawks in agony when you pick him up by the neck!)

It was the most amazing day. I was dropped off at the station today, to head into Darling Harbour and have lunch with friends at the Meat and Wine Co. I just missed a train, so I headed off to the shops for a while, and then decided to check out the stuffed toy section of the "Salvo's" charity store on High Street. Sure enough, there was Bear, waiting on a couch and looking resplendent in his Christmas outfit. You could have knocked me over with a feather when the woman serving me said, "$2 please"!

Of course, I then had to take Bear into the city with me - and pay an extra 95 cents for a recyclable carry-bag - but who cares when I'd just saved $128! I also missed the next fast train into the city, which was also frustrating, but again - who cares when I'd just saved $127.05!

I even managed to send profile updates and the pic (above) direct to my Facebook page from my iPhone! In the time it took to get into the city, there were many hilarious comments coming in from friends making puns about the polar bear that had made me late for lunch!




Introducing "Bear and Chook by the sea": Emma Quay, illustrator, and Lisa Shanahan, author.

Collaboration!

Today Emma Quay, illustrator, and Lisa Shanahan, author, launched their exciting, new children's picture book, "Bear and Chook by the sea", at my local teacher-librarians' professional development day. Another Sassy Award coming their way, perhaps?



I can't wait for Term 4, when I help to coordinate a book rap based on their two "Bear & Chook" titles.