A lovely weekend in Brisbane with some excitement!

Friday night I went to Dipawali, the Hindu festival of light, in King George Square in the shadow of our council building - it's undergoing extensive rescue renovations, hence the cranes. The sign "Rescue city hall" is just a rectangle of bright light.

I went with Billy, my soul-twin, and it was a wonderful experience and helped us both feel less lonely. Surprise, surprise, we both chose the same curried fried rice for dinner and teamed that up with a mango lassi.  Here's one of the better acts - a professional Punjabi dance group:

We went home early - leaving after the speeches and multi-faith prayers - because Billy had been up for most of the night helping people with houses damaged by a bad thunderstorm.

The next day Awesome and I went walking and we stopped at Kangaroo Point to enjoy a rather nice view of the Brisbane River, Botanic Gardens and CBD.

Spring is the season for jacaranda flowers - I turned around to see this lovely old Queensland-style worker's cottage with a jacaranda in front of it. This tree is probably only 30 years old - some are HUGE and protected by the Council. Note the carpet of lavender blooms on the footpath.

The day was bright then - but towards the end of the afternoon a storm started to build. I decided to make for home a tad early rather than spending a little more time with Awesome. Here's a shot I took which does not really show how dark and nasty the sky was becoming - after I realised how fast the storm cells were appraoching, I stopped taking photos and concentrated on getting home.

The storm cell overtook me as I walked the 10 minutes from the bus stop - I could see ragged whisps of tortured clouds twist and turn as they were pulled up into the centre of dark foreboding storm cells. I saw green light between the columns of dark cloud, so I knew hail was imminent.

Many years ago I just made it home at a quick run chased by golf ball size hail which was bouncing off each successive galvanised iron roof behind me. I heard it coming progressively closer and when I realised what it was I sprinted for the safety of home! Obviously I was scared yesterday as I felt the cold updraft from the storm cells and saw them looming overhead.

I was lucky, I got home just as large rain drops fell and about 5 minutes before the hail.  :-)