Today, at Bundanon, gorgeously and relentlessly, it rained. Pretty much all day. Like this:

That bird on the post is, we think, a Bower Bird. This has created considerable excitement (they are velvety and sleek and proud and big and shy) as have the many other birds who spent the rain and post-rain periods dancing about being loud and excited. HOWEVER.

However. When you want to shoot a short video, and you have a limited time in which to do so, and the video requires sun, and you have spent the past few weeks preparing for it, and it is very much site-specific, you don't necessarily want it to rain. So Stew and Rita and I had to bench our plans of shooting a video and spend the day getting other things done instead.

This is Rita being very busy and important inside, away from the rain:

You will note our studio has changed a little since we first moved in. Yes there is still an adorable wombat on the back wall, but yes there is also a lot more clutter. This is called art.

Speaking of which, Rita and I went for a walk this afternoon just before the Bundanon people went home and guess whose light was on? Arthur's!

Yup, this is Arthur Boyd's studio, with the lights on, in the light rain. It made you wonder whether Arthur himself was somehow spirited back into the place. All very romantic and mysterious. We didn't look inside because we liked to think Arthur is with us on this rainy September day, listening to the sounds of the rain on his tin roof and the frogs in the pond. Was he there this afternoon, watching the mists lift from the hills after the downpour? 

Was he watching the kangaroos out his window as the dusk fell, just like I was?

Yairs. We're not so different, Arthur and I.

Or, sure, it could be one of the Bundanon peeps. Maybe. But you never know.

In other news, tonight we went on an evening excursion up the hill with some hummous and beer to the musicians' cottage, where a dancer/choreographer called Cobie is staying and working. We were invited because the musician (Stu - a different one) from the cottage down near us had agreed to play the gorgeous piano. We were treated to an excellent performance, an extended version of which is going to be played at the Opera House in Sydney next week. It was a pretty special Friday evening, as Rita pointed out later. That was when I thought to myself, Oh It's Friday! How nice!

Stu and Ash had walked in the dark, in the rain, to the musicians' hut holding only two candles (he had earlier proposed to her in the Bundaon hills). These are the candles. The lillies grow outside the cottage. You can't quite see him but Arthur is just out of shot, thinking the hummous was nice but maybe we could have brought some eggplant dip as well.

Either that, or it was Stew.

Either way.