The Soothing Sounds of Sunday Plus Some Honking.

It's been a bit of a noisy Sunday so far, but not bad noisy (like the infamous doof, doof battles of yore). The local Rotary truck show is on this weekend, so the township is full of painted rigs and dressed-up utes, and after my much treasured Sunday morning sleep in, while I was having my lazy Sunday morning read with the cats piled on my lap, the annual Sunday morning truck convey went past. Horns were enthusiastically honked and blasted, and many great vehicles rumbled by and shook the earth. But it was soon enough over, and the show does raise a lot of money for good causes.

Later, next door launched into a lunch time barbecue with friends, kids and dogs, and there was much rambunctious scrambling for sausages and shouts about their deliciousness, calls for mummy or daddy to fix this or that, exuberant splashing about in the inflatable pool and the hosing down of dogs accompanied by squeals of joy and barks of approval - the normal, family business, background sounds you'd expect on a hot Australian Sunday, boisterous, but not at all bothersome. I've been writing well through most of it, only occasionally pulled from my concentration by the naughty chuckle of a child about to do something that is definitely a no-no or kiddie squabbles about who gets the wield the watery power of the mighty garden hose.

In between the trucks and the barbie, the Chook (henceforth referred to as the Occasional Chook, unless she moves back in, of course) came to visit, and volubly made her presence known as per usual. She's still here many hours later, prevented from returning to her new digs by the barbecue. Although constantly grumbling, she's making the best of it and is presently sunning herself on the patio with the cats. Things are settling down next door now, so she'll probably scoot off soon, once the dog numbers go down.

As for me, I'll send off a few emails, and then I'll be getting back to the loveliest of all Sunday sounds (although the clip clop of horse hooves is a very close second), namely that of my keyboard finishing up a new story. It's big. It's SF. It's spacey. It has aliens. But no humans. I'm a bit excited by it :)