The Life and Times of Peter Green
updated 23 December 2024
 "Happy Christmas Everyone!" (Leunig-Crowded House Chrissy Card). |
December 9thI guess by the time you read this , it will be Christmas. Another year bites the dust and let's hope 2025 is a vast improvement.I am up early and carry a large box of presents to the car, destined to wing their way to Wollongong. I've dug around in the office and found $53.45 worth of stamps, so the giant box only cost me $20.00 to post. So happy to have this out of the way , as it means when we arrive in Sydney we don't have to wait for bags or the present box, off the plane and straight to the hire car and on our way. Sydney airport is an annoying nightmare at Christmas so we avoid it as much as possible. December 10thUp early for the charity. A newbie today, his name is Lindsay and he used to work at Maton guitars. It's funny how all the guys here love music and have worked around bands.I chat to Bongo Skyhook when I get home, he calls out of the blue. He needed to borrow some images from our Skyhooks Archives, which is always ok. Crowded House playing some shows in Australia but no sign of "Gravity Stairs" on the Aussie chart. I wonder if they are selling it via their merchandise? Seems crazy that it's the Gravity Stairs Tour but you can't buy it and record stores don't seem to have stock. December 11thI do the quick Wonder Woman turn around in the shower, ignore having a shave and head to the community hall at Olinda. Andrew and Ros and the Philanthropic people have the Free Food Program underway so I am filling up boxes for those in need up here . We also had some real Christmas trees arrive in pots so families are so excited to get a tree. I wear my Santa hat, tis the season. A few familiar faces so thats welcoming. A second group arrive in the afternoon. I wheel out supplies to a few cars , it does feel good, especially this time of year to do such things.I reward myself with a rare second coffee at the Olinda bakery. Youngster Alex from Violet Dread, the band, sits for a minute and we talk about music . Nice bloke, and I watch a few of their clips on Youtube to give them some extra views. It makes me realise how fortunate we are with our loyal bunch that support Marky's Youtube Wednesday each week. So thanks everyone… and speaking of… Today's Youtube Wednesday is the wonderful Crowded House. At the cool Paradiso Club, in Amsterdam. Tim Finn's in the band. Tim and myself hung out with Finn fans at then Bulldog all afternoon. The Crowdies are performing "It's Only natural" from the Woodface album. As Mark points out, some very fine dancing from Nick Seymour. October 16th 1991. December 12thI'm up at 5.30 and drive to the bakery to get some bread for Mark. Im out of flour so can't make my own and he'll need some for lunch. I sit and sip my coffee and chill , the fog rolls around the hills and everyone has that bleary eyed look.My boss Carol has the day elsewhere, a managers get together so lovely Nicole is in charge. For the first hour I am at the charity by myself, it feels very weird, no other humans in this giant barn of building. I do hear voices! It is a long day, I find some cool presents for some poorer people who come in, they appreciate it as they have kids and Christmas with no presents for kids is sad. So we have to fix that don't we. The Mum throws her arms around me with tears in her eyes. This is why I do some charity work, helping others is a great thing. I'll never understand why people with time on their hands can't put in a few hours each week to help their local community. I'm on my way home and my sister sends a text, Mums just waiting on an ambulance and heading back into hospital. She's had some problems with her leg so that's a worry. Thank goodness my sister is only a few suburbs away. So I do the back and forth with Sis and the hospital gets Mum a room and try to locate a specialist. Thankfully she has private health cover. I keep the phone next to me all night. Mark and myself watch "Once around the Sun" but one should take copious amounts of drugs when watching it. Australia's first rock festival film. It was the "Pilgrimage for Pop" Festival at Ourimbah near Sydney in January 1970. So 6 months after Woodstock. Billy Thorpe and the Aztecs, Chain, Wendy Saddington to name a few. A total Psychedelic trip on your screen. Like really super trippy man. It's a lot to take in … but we both still loved watching it. The master copy was only located recently… I will have acid dreams tonight. Well maybe. December 13thNot sure if it was the trippy art house film or Mum being in hospital but little sleep. My mind is a bit of blur today, and I forget what day it is. I want a simple day so work in the office and on the diary.I mow a tiny bit of the East Lawn. Mark says he will do the rest when I am away at charity. It's only 2 acres here but still seems like a huge effort at times, but you know, when it's done it looks great and we appreciate just how lucky we are. No loans, a big block of land and a rather awesome house and each other. Sis lets me know that the giant Xmas box has arrived at her Wollongong post office box safely so that will be waiting for me when I get home. Some amazing presents arrive from Diana G in the USA and Wendy C in Queensland. You guys spoil us sooooo much. A tad speechless. December 14thI drive to Mt Evelyn to get Mum some "snowballs", her Christmas present from Mark. Milk chocolate , marsh mallow, sprinkled with chocolate. These used to be really common but so hard to find these days. I grab the last 2 packets.I spend some time mowing the West Lawn with Mark, ok he does most of it. I water my passionfruit, so far so good , I now have 2 green globes and the hope of more to come. All these years and I could never grow them, I am very excited. There is no way our regular Christmas tree is going to last with Miss Kitty. So I clean up the rustic rural creation of mine. Made from 100 year old boards from our house. This will survive multiple cat attacks. We watch Part one of "Give me TED" , the 6 hr tribute concert for Aussie seventies icon Ted Mulry. Some of it is great some horrid but nice so many musicians got together to raise money for this dying Aussie artist. It was a shock how many of the artists on the screen at the fundraiser had passed away during the last decade. We'll watch part two tomorrow night. December 15thMark now has "flicker vertigo". We found out when he put the strobe part of our emergency torch on. Each time it happened. It's an odd thing to get. I remember telling some of my (new) helicopter crew not to watch the spinning blades as you can get a type of flicker vertigo from that too.A few hot days coming up. We keep Midnight inside during such weather, one because it's cooler and two, if there is a fire we can grab her and depart straight away. A reminder that I need a security check around the upcoming Federal Election work. So I add that into my diary. Kievs for dinner and we resume watching "Give me TED" part two. I call my Mum at the hospital and she sounds flat and worn out & a tad snitty. A hot night, so restless sleep from me. December 16thStinky hot but some wind hitting the mountain, perfect bushfire weather, we hope not.I score a free coffee at the bakery and chat to musician Jed for awhile. Get my Police check out of the way. Hoping they won't reject one of my photo images. Anyway we shall see. Wow it's Christmas in about a week. That's kind of doing my head in. With Mum back in hospital , we have a secondary plan where we can get her home for Christmas Day. One way or the other the family will celebrate. Chat to Miss Fen in the afternoon, thanks Aussie Post, their Christmas box arrived safely at their house. I check the top 500 charts in Australia as I thought the Crowded House tour might ignite some sales for their Gravity Stairs release, but no, it dropped back from #353 to #362. Only sold 76 albums and cds and digital/streams just as bad. I'm not use to Crowded House having a flop record. Seems rather odd. December 17thI'm sticking with my recycle moment on cans etc at our place so drop into the Recycle Machine at Kilsyth and feed them in. I pass the $3.50 back to one of the charities connected.Lots of Chrissy cards arrive today from The Berry Twins, Katja, Spock, Michiko, Carolyn and Pip. Thanks everyone, they make me smile. I call Mum 3 times today, at least she is in the Private medical facility so for some reason that feels a bit better. She sounds a tiny bit happier today.. December 18thUp early on what is my day off and drive to Olinda hall to help with the Food bank. I'm one of the first to arrive and get stuck into it. Politicians arrive from both sides of the fence today to lend a hand which is ok. We get a decent amount of supplies in and fill the various donation boxes. As I'm having they give me a live Christmas tree in a pot-the last one, the spare. I'm almost teary , made me feel very special. I'll keep on helping Food Bank as much as I can. Love their work.Marky's working on removing the evil jasmine off the decking. Seeing we have a little live tree, I put the rustic creation onto the side of the house-it surprisingly looks good. I write a few more cards and some domestic bits and pieces. Midnight follows us around the entire day. I think she knows we are going away. December 19thSad news that artist Michael Leunig dies. We all love his work. I think I first met him in 1988 when Paul (and maybe Nick?) caught up with him for coffee and he handed me the original Leunig Crowded House Xmas card art. He always seemed a gentle man and of course that wonderful observations of life here that become those exceptional cartoons. Later he worked on Crowded House "Intriguer" album and some solo efforts with Neil.A double whammy as Aussie author John Marsden . He penned one of our favourites "When the war began". The movie was great too. Another sad loss. At lunchtime 18 of us celebrate Christmas at our "volunteer lunch". I head over to Woolies with Carol and buy food and joy! It's an honour to work with these 17 amazing women. A great get together. My Mums dog gets into my sisters house and destroys countless amounts of Xmas presents. I feel so bag for her. She may well stuff the dog and feed it to us on Christmas Day!!!!!! December 20thI wake up early, Midnight didn't wake me early for her morning food, she's too busy watching wildlife out of my bedroom window.I sit at the bakery and write a few more Christmas cards, Post them on the way home. Done! I intend to make homemade Apple Pie for dinner tomorrow. I have another bowl of raspberries so I am going to add them into it as well. I was going to make it today but our gorgeous neighbours Martin & Hisako turned up with massive container of Hisakos white rocky road, so desert now covered. So many emails today from Aussie Split Enz fans. Apparently loads of people heard Split Enz "Murder" get played on mainstream radio this morning and during drive time and a nice rave about our video. I'm guessing it was one of those "end of year round up" moments. Anyway it created a buzz, "Murder" looks like hitting 11,000 views this weekend. So cool. It really is the video clip that gives you a smile. December 21stAn out of control bushfire in the Grampians. It's already destroyed 10,000 hectares. Welcome to an Aussie Summer. We do lots of extra clean up today and one of the last days we can burn so wipe out our burn pile. Midnight keeps her distance, don't want a furry fireball running around the yard. She watched the Kookaburras catching bugs as the fire burns. They are quick! Swoop!I see my friend Pauline for 30 minutes and she scores one of the Kalorama Blackberry jams, she is delighted. She surprises me by giving us a jar of her Seville Orange Marmalade. It looks amazing. I'm making an apple pie tonight so I'll drop some of this into the pie too, extra taste. Mark creates 4 cdrs of AC/DC at Festival Hall Melbourne in January 1975 for our friends Trudy, Liz, Wendy and Shirley. They hung with the AC/DC boys in 74-75. Wendy penned the recent "Skyhooks, AC/DC and me" book, fun reading especially if you are a big music fan. I walk to the mail box and post a few more cards and the discs. Iarla updated the main page of the Skyhooks website which is so good. The 50th Anniversary edition of "Living in the 70's" album. It's out in January so a bit past the 50th! Thanks Iarla. It's just hit me that it is indeed Christmas in a few days home and we will be jetting off. Our security mate Chris (who hates Christmas) is minding the house. Again we have updated the security system so I have to walk him through it. It's become like Fort Knox. We'll have death lasers on the cat next! A sunny afternoon so I walk to the general store and clear the post office box for any stray Chrissy cards. December 22ndOur heads are full of thoughts around going home for Christmas, it's going to be a weird one for me this year but we will adapt. I am here in bed watching Midnight on the window sill in my bedroom she's checking out the birds outside in the sunshine. She knows I'm awake and makes the daily leap onto my bed (usually lands on my chest, I swear one day she will break my ribs) and she climbs up to my face with morning greeting of "Meow Mowwww". I give her a cuddle.I'm out of flour still so drive to the bakery and grab some bread. Chaz tells me the secret place for passionfruits on the mountain, she spotted my post. Probably still a bit too early to pick them but it's good local sacred knowledge. Really sweet of her. Locals are gathering around my table out the front of the bakery, it's kind of nice, we seem to of been ok;d by the community despite needing 2 more years up here to be considered real "locals" (20 years!). I see the Halls Gap fire has tripled in size, 30,000+ hectares now, I feel so sad for the wildlife too. I make a note to see if there are some animal rescue areas we can support or physically help. Fire fighters are throwing everything at this blaze. Let's hope it gets under control soon. I mail off this F/16 diary on time (applause) a huge Christmas shout out to the amazing Deb for such support and continuing to put these diary entries up. So thanks for that, and all the best for 2025. [editor's note: thanks and happy 2025 to everybody!] So that's it , the last diary for 2024. Wishing my readers all the best this Christmas and lets hope next years will be a fantastic one. Love & Christmas cheer Peter. xx |
archives * images * merchandise
| brought to you by frenz.com, the springboard for all that is frenz of the enz |