Yesterday Dad made the journey from Sydney down to Thirroul on the train to have lunch with me. This is the longest day trip he’s had since the assault. He looked really well despite still having to wear one of those ski boot things. I made us toasted sandwiches and we sat out back on the porch at work and talked about art.
thanks
Thanks for your comments about Dad’s court case verdict. As Mum said to me yesterday, 2009 and all its horrors now seems like another country. Time to move on to other more positive things. So in celebration of this sentiment I have started a new novel. Well, OK, so its one I started last year, got 27k words into then abandoned to start again as I had a whole bunch of far better ideas.Apropos of nothing, here are a couple of nice photos I took in Newtown yesterday.Kyla with hatJohn and Natalie
in court
The court case was today. Our family did not attend. We are OK with the outcome.[excerpt from the Sydney Morning Herald]Delusional man not guilty of attackMARGARET SCHEIKOWSKIMoments after a distraught elderly artist rang for help, his delusional neighbour smashed his way into the painter’s Sydney studio and savagely attacked him. When police arrived at the north shore premises of Cameron Sparks, they saw Peter Grayson kneeling on top of the 78-year-old victim, who was lying in a pool of blood. In the NSW District Court on Wednesday, Judge Penelope Hock found Grayson, 41, not guilty of causing grievous bodily harm to Mr Sparks with intent to murder him, on the grounds of mental illness. Although she found he attacked Mr Sparks, she accepted psychiatric evidence that Grayson was suffering from paranoid schizophrenia and did not know that what he was doing was wrong. About 11.15am (AEST) on June 6 last…
Dad update
I returned from my week’s sojourn in Berry to find a subpoena to give evidence waiting in my letterbox regarding the case of the Queen Against Peter Grayson — my Father’s case. It goes before the District Court next Wednesday and everything about the document is seriously legal and scary looking. Fortunately my parents, who received subpoenas too, made an investigatory phone call and were taken in to meet with the head of the DPP. Apparently half the neighbourhood received these bits of paper but none of us actually have to turn up in court. Go figure. My parents did learn another interesting piece of info — apparently following the attack, Dad was airlifted to hospital by helicopter! None of the media reports mentioned the helicopter bit at the time. I’ll let you know the verdict next Wednesday.
lunch
Had a pleasant lunch today at Chinta Ria, Darling Harbour with Donna Hanson, Bob Eggleton and Marianne PlumridgeBob and Marianne are visiting from the US (although Marianne’s an expat Aussie)There wasn’t *too* much Godzilla talk… OK, so that’s a lieDonna and I insisted on visiting the fudge shop. If you’ve been to Darling Harbour you’ll know which shop I mean.and we did some other tourist things like drink coffee, photograph battleships and buy stuff.Home now. Utterly knackered! Also, possibly suffering from excess fudge poisoning.
my new years resolutions
sell my novels read a fuckload of books address the signal to noise ratio cut back on the snark cope with the fact that some of the most interesting people in my life don’t feel the same way about me resume Egyptian folk dancing classes go Elvis spotting in Parkes trim my lardy arse back down to 75k (am close on this one, folks) grow real fingernails stop writing short stories