Category Archive: AUSTRALIANIA
Queensland Museum
November 2021 TVC loves V & A style museums, the ones that pile-up objects, so that stuffed animals lie cheek by jowl with ancient graves, next to planes, trains and automobiles, and so on. (For example, Edinburgh). Housed in a repulsive building after the New Brutalism style of architecture (main image), near to the Queensland Art Gallery’s quaint homage to the Louvre pyramid, the Queensland Museum was opened by then Premier Joh Bjelke-Petersen (it’s a wonder the current Premier’s myrmidons haven’t covered-up the plaque). It was a welcome respite from the heat after a brief stop at the Gallery of Modern…
Continue Reading →Stuffing One’s Face in Brisbane
November 2021 The Varnished Culture spent a (very) warm week in Brisbane sampling, inter alia, some of the very nice eateries. From restaurant to cafe, Brisbane serves good food in elegant settings and a relaxed mode. Here’s a sample. Otto (Shop 1, River Quay, Sidon St, Brisbane, Qld) Very posh. A short walk through the steamy riverbank gardens and then seats in the bar with delicious cocktails (a “Sicilian Sunset” – Vodka, Limoncello, Lemon sorbet, Vanilla and soda; and an “Arancia Sour” – Johnnie Walker Black, Lemon, a Chinotto reduction and whites). Then in to lunch. There we encountered some…
Continue Reading →Tigris centenarius
A celebration of 100 years of Glenelg Football Club in the SANFL, Saturday 6 November 2021, Grand Hotel @ Glenelg A good year: one crap day. Unfortunately, that one bad day was Grand Final Day, in which the team was more or less humiliated (15.9 to 4.8.). The Tigers have the worst Grand Final win ratio of any club with 26.32%, having lost 14 out of their 19 Grand Final appearances. (I have seen 12 of those defeats.) So while musing in my room at the Grand Hotel, gazing out at the gloomy sea, it occurred to me that losing…
Continue Reading →Falling Short
SANFL 2nd Semi-Final, Adelaide Oval, 18 September 2021 It was hard to watch, hard to take, and hard to write about, but there is a clear and bright silver lining out of Glenelg’s loss to the Eagles on Saturday night. Sure, the opposition was better on the night and deserved to win. They beat the Bays for 3 quarters and while they were fully up for it, Eagles were handed the initiative by their opponents, who were playing in a static, clumsy and tentative manner, confirming fears over the last few weeks that the Tigers had lost their Mojo. In…
Continue Reading →A Loss Redeem’d
Norwood Grand March, Norwood Oval Glenelg v Port Adelaide, Alberton Oval (Saturday 4 September 2021) A rather surreal day marked the end of the minor round in the South Australian National League competition for 2021. At the end of it, there were clear winners and clear losers; in some cases, it was hard to tell. First, L and P attended the Memorial Gardens outside Norwood Oval (or Cooper’s Stadium, as it is badged in corporate-speak), she in her Fortis in Procella top (see below). From the Latin, it means “Forward into the Abyss” or something…seriously, it means something like “Strength…
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