Windy day, frogs day,birthday, light airs day.

Racing was washed out/blown out last Saturday, so the repeat offenders were keen to get on the water any which way on Sunday, leading to some optimistic reading of the weather forecast. Sandra, Federico, Steve and his friend, and I launched, and almost immediately the wind swung and went up to over 25 knots, according to the Laverton weather station. It was extraordinarily good fun hooting across the relatively flat water at over 10 knots in the Sabre, but also moderately terrifying. Steve capsized with his friend who had never been sailing before ... and probably won't be sailing again.

Next day I cycled over to Coburg, to help Brendan to change the batteries and download data from the sound recorders he has secreted along the Merri Creek to capture the call of the elusive and endangered Growling Grass Frog.  It is great to see that there are still areas of semi wild over that side of Melbourne, and you can almost believe you are far far away, but there is an ominous sense of the encircling advancing rim of industrial grunge is closing in.  The mob of kangaroos on the horizon watched us very closely.

Next day was our lovely daughter Jess's birthday.  One thing about having kids is that it gives you a very clear, memorable marker of time.  I know what 28 years of my life feels like.  It really seems like several life times ago, and so much has changed in unimaginable ways.   A great day to celebrate, and we went out to a Japanese restaurant in Collingwood, which was a trip down memory lane in its own right.

Today I took the Mirror out.  Andrew took his laser, and very kindly took detours or just luffed up so I did not get left too far behind.  We headed over the visit buoy T28 but the the seals were not home.  It was still a good sail.  It reminded me what a great boat the Mirror is.   A couple of older chaps came up to have a chat while I was rigging up.  They looked very envious of my good fortune to be setting out.  I encouraged both to join the club and got their numbers to line up some future sailing days.

Oz was a very good boy on the trip today.  He is very accustomed to the Mirror and can find a comfortable spot out of the way. He slept most of the trip.   Approaching home, he had a good hard look at the two pelicans wading nearby,  but decided it wasn't worth getting yelled at or possibly pecked, and wisely decided to wait to be carried to shore.  Good boy!