Columns from The Weekend West

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Opinion Ros Thomas Opinion Ros Thomas

A Line to the Past

Kulin seems deserted this Sunday morning. The town’s womenfolk are sleeping-in after last night’s dinner dance. The kids on bikes yesterday must be watching TV. Two brown honeyeaters pirouette noisily overhead. They bank sharply before alighting unsteadily on a power line. Theirs is the only movement on Stewart Street.

My newly five-year-old daughter, keen to explore, kicks up a shower of red pebbles from the gravel footpath. We wander past a derelict shop. In the window is a faded sepia photograph of a swarthy bloke wearing a mug-shot smirk. His white shirt-sleeves are rolled up above his elbows, business-like. My pint-sized companion is captivated by his eyebrows, which sit on his jutting forehead like two hairy caterpillars. I read the caption:

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Opinion Ros Thomas Opinion Ros Thomas

The Next Best Thing

Here’s my conspiracy theory: today’s gadgets are made to fail. And here’s my evidence: both the vacuum cleaner and my mobile phone have carked it just weeks out of warranty.

Last Sunday, the vacuum cleaner, my trusty servant, stopped dead. The two of us were having a lovely time sucking up all the bits of Lego left lying on the loungeroom floor. (We often play games, the vacuum cleaner and I, ferreting about under the sofa with the suction at warp speed. We try to guess from the rattle – rattle – clunk! what mystery object has shot up the hose.)

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