The most recent Australian school shooting, in 2012, fortunately injured no-one. There have been 11 school shootings in Australia since 1950. 4 resulted in a death. That's the total deaths that have occurred. Yep, 4. USA might learn a thing or two from thinking about what Australia does right...

Where we walked this morning in Mandurah. Perfect weather, perfect scenery, good friends to walk with...what more does one need? Well, maybe birds? That island is packed with them.

In the garden this morning...a ladybug, but I don't know the name.

Husband just dug up photo of mixed tourists, taken long ago; 1990(?) Most of our photos taken on this trip have been lost. That's me on the right wearing a cheap straw hat. Clue: we were very close to the equator and it was one of the most wondrous few days of my life...

A 4-lined Tree-Frog once turned up on one of our bookcases in Malaysia, reading the cover of Ramly’s honours thesis on pregnancy urine. Appropriate, as frogs were once used to determine pregnancy, but he was really just looking for the book on the far right, titled “Frogs and Toads of the World.”

Three of these birds were yesterday's highlight along the beach near Seascapes. Sooty Oystercatchers.

In 2006, I wrote an article "The Serpent in Paradise" after a university expedition. I don't know if what I wrote ever had any effect. My final words: "Never has so much been so wantonly destroyed in so short a time for the benefit of so few." You can read it here: glendalarke.com/2006/12/serp...

Use AI? 30 of my books were used to create AI. No one ask for my permission. No one told me what they were doing. The thieves probably never bothered to buy a book; bet they stole them on the internet. Authors can check for their books here: www.theatlantic.com/technology/a...

Mandurah today: spot the birds. I spent a lifetime birdwatching, preaching bird conservation. A life well-spent? Maybe. Though I remember informing a Malaysian state officer about an endangered species in the area he oversaw...only to have him ask, puzzled, "If they go extinct, why would it matter?"

Red-tailed Black Cockatoos love honky nuts (unrelated to US word "honkey"). These are sizeable, very hard seed-pods of the Western Australian marri, a gum tree. The nuts are larger than this photo suggests, and most here have been held tight in a claw then chewed open by the cockatoos ...

As a novelist, I have always used the natural environment around me to inspire...if sometimes in unlikely ways!

Where I was yesterday, Mandurah estuary, and what I saw along the way...

A pair of ringnecks under our front window eating seeds when I came home today, popular name: twenty-eights.

Once there were Australian publishers who treated their SF authors as assets. Who invited and feted us, even produced diaries with our programs and latest news inside... This was 2008. I think that was the year I was guest of honour for the Australian Fantasy/SFConvention if I remember correctly.

mail.google.com/mail/u/0/#in... “The children in our homes today are threatened with a chaotic, disastrous, unliveable future.” "Unlivable." Think about it. I do, yet I'm at the end of my life. I tried to tell folk to appreciate and care for the world we live in. Unfortunately, I failed.

There is always so much to see and appreciate on a walk outside our village...A stroll through the "bush", a vista across the estuary, the bark patterns of the paperbark tree, the odd kangaroo...

Yesterday's evening walk in the park near where we live in Mandurah. My foot is included to give an idea of the size of the mushrooms, and no, I have no idea if they are edible. I suspect not.

Yesterday's rainbow photo at the local lake... And yes, very occasionally the water level does cover the grass and start to creep up that post. But not this year, not so far. The island in the lake is a good birding site.

And the rain comes... About time.

Wet and windy and cold today, so here is a sunset photo from a week or two ago. For those who don't know Mandurah, this channel is a man-made exit to the sea, linking the estuary of the river to the ocean, thereby keeping the water cleaner.

#Birds! Amazing scene this morning. A thousand cormorants, swimming or packed on 5 or 6 jetties; this is only a selection. At a guess dolphins had herded a large school of fish into the boat harbour. Word spread to the birdlife: "Breakfast!" We missed the slaughter, but photographed the aftermath.

Been cleaning up old pictures, photos, papers, etc, and came across this. I'd forgotten all about it -- full page me in New Straits Times back in 2004.

Me, Malaysia 2007: "I live in a zoo, I swear!Civets squeal in the ceiling. Geckos fight nightly to be near lights to catch moths. I must tackle a tree-frog for the right to shower. Today a treeshrew (not found in trees, & not a shrew), set off burglar alarm after entering through a back window..."

Yesterday's walk...a hour's stroll out of the back gate and back.

Last photos from the rainy days in Mandurah town...and yes those are surfers...

The nest and the architect... Mandurah Estuary. #Birds

Going for the evening walk in Mandurah...

Seagulls and terns on rocks... This morning's photo.

When you live in the tropics (in this case in Malaysia, as I did for 30 or so years) the so called "hill stations" as the Brits termed them, were a wonderful cool break from the steamy lowlands. Fraser's Hill, 20 or years ago...

Spot the birds...Egret Point, Mandurah this morning. #Birds

Best photo I ever took of a Pelican...

A Great Egret on this morning's walk, Mandurah Estuary.

Today's photo along the estuary coast...and yes, a hint of cloud in the distance? We're in the midst of a drought, although hearing people speak mostly of "gorgeous" weather. Well, yeah, for a stroll, but don't be deceived--this is not normal, and we will pay a price for such "lovely" weather.

Another estuary walk. Mandurah. Today. "I must go down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied..."

Evening sun and a full moon... And death. I have been really alarmed by the number of dead trees in our area this year. No one waters them, even though this past year has been extraordinarily dry, more like drought conditions at times.

Sunset last night...with full moon. Of course, this is well into May, and really it ought to be raining.

This evening's walk, in the park nearby.

It should just be a random lousy holiday shot. Me on top of the Twin Towers, 1990. My last glimpse of them: day flight NY, window seat, admiring how tall they were. Many years later, a phone call: "Turn on the TV!" And there, on the other side of the world, we watched as they fell--in real time.

Just before sunset on the Mandurah Estuary. Lucky to have this within walking distance... Those dead trees in the first photo? Probably victims of salt water intrusion after the opening up of a man-made cut to the sea into the riverine estuary...

And another photo of the Mandurah coast, from this mornings's walk...

Today's photo... Swimmers and Pink and Grey Galahs. The latter once confined themselves to rural living. Not now. Intelligent, noisy, social, dreadfully destructive...but one can't help liking the little horrors, at least a bit...

Random photo from last year, taken out of the car window as we headed for the west coast sea loch which was our destination. Unfortunately, even in a remote place like this, a spray-can, wielded by someone totally lacking artistic ability, proclaims this tragic lack...

Seriously, this was the photo of me that the West Australian chose to use to illustrate an article about me back in 2016. And yes, that is a stick insect. Oh, and yes too, this time I did actually win.

Some random photos from our past. That's Pulau Tiga, Sabah (Three Islands) on the right, where the very first "Survivor" episodes were filmed, supposedly on a remote desert island ... not. We fell about laughing when we saw the show, as we'd spent loads of time there and it was pretty much paradise.

#Birds! A photo, taken by my shadow, this week. Mandurah Estuary, looking east from the northern shore. Lots of egrets (those white spots.)

This morning's wild ducks (Pacific Black), foraging along the shoreline... And yeah, they aren't along the Pacific and they aren't black either...)

This morning's photo at the estuary... Egret and Spoonbill. Not unusual to see these species together, although it is probably a one-way cooperation. The Spoonbill stirs up things and the Egret pounces on whatever escapes...