SLOW WEEK

October 28, 2010 Thursday


A couple of days ago in the late afternoon, we ran into Clive. He is just a very friendly guy who loves to talk to folks. He’s in his late 50’s and teaches school down in South Australia. He now works in a program where they take boys out into the bush for a month long campout to teach them “how to be men.” He and his wife live up here because she has a job up here working with different aboriginal communities. He was very admiring of the US and hopes to visit Utah someday because he also paints scenery. He loves history and is very well read in it. He’s an atheist and just goes by what he can study and see. It was an interesting conversation, and then we got to politics. He described the difference between Australia and the US: we were founded on the idea of the liberty of the individual and everything over here is judged by how it meets the “greater good.” He finally called it socialism and then eventually admitted that it is very close to communism. He thinks of medical care as a “right” and that the rich should give a who lot of their money back to the community or government. He even gave us a cold drink of mineral water! (Yech!)
We went to the care center on Wednesday this week because they had someone coming to sing on Tuesday. Alas, Janet, the great activity director was on holiday. Nothing was organized. The guy taking her place didn’t know what we usually did. So we found the puzzles, while he and another gal went to get the patients. We started with a word search this time. Other than Henning, the fellow from Denmark, the others were all aboriginals. A couple had had strokes, so they couldn’t even draw the lines! Orson, Bruce, and I ended up doing all the work. We think we are going to take some cards and see if we can play cards with them. The aboriginal people just don’t have the same basis for vocabulary games.
Tonight we had Young Women. Just Tammy and Dale came. They made thank you notes for the people who were so good to them at Youth Conference in Perth. I made Peanut Butter Chews while they did that. BUT, they don’t have corn syrup here. So I used honey. The mixture ended up being dry and crumbly so I added some water—too much. So then I mixed in some more powdered sugar and powered milk. I finally just dumped it on a tray and put it in the fridge. (You are supposed to roll the mixture into bite-sized balls.) It tasted okay, but I learned that honey and Karo syrup on not interchangeable.