Today was our last day in Geelong and our last trip to Melbourne.  Well for this month anyway!  We have stayed within close proximity of Melbourne for the last 15 days, as we had purchased tickets to the AFL match at Etihad Stadium between West Coast Eagles and Carlton.  After the Eagles losses of the last couple of weeks, we were really hoping for good game and of course, a win!  I'm sure our neighbours Bill and Donelle and family Aaron, Fiona, Jack and Lani, who have Eagles membership and are definitely one eyed Eagles supporters, were also hoping for a win!  And we know how much Bill enjoys or is gutted by his 'Teams' performance!  Peter and I last went to Etihad Stadium in 2005 when West Coast made the final of the NAB Cup and they played Carlton.  The result then was not as we would have liked and amongst all those Carlton supporters, we certainly felt lone voices!  Oh!  We did so hope we would be able to sing the Eagles song on Saturday night and we were pretty happy chappies until the last 10 minutes!  How did they lose?  Well we may have been a bit one eyed, but we didn't think much of the umpiring!!  And as for all those Carlton supporters.   They were going wild!  That made the loss hurt more.  I sent Bill and Donelle a text in the third quarter, to tell them we were barracking loudly and asked how Bill was going?  I had texted the Edwards family earlier with a photo of the Eagles players, after they had run onto the ground.  Now why am I recording all this?  Well having been gutted with the result, Donelle and I texted all the time, it took us to travel back to Geelong on the bus.  Fiona sent quite a few as well.  Hopefully we all made each other feel better!  In between these text messages during the evening, there was one from the boys at the farm, to say we had had some more rain and a photo of water running down the driveway.  Now that was exciting and it certainly raised the spirits.  So more text messages backwards and forwards to the farm. We ended up with 65 ml at the homestead and 50 ml over the whole farm.  Fantastic!  It has been a long time since we have had rain like that, as a break to the season in April.  By all accounts the whole area has had magic precipitation.   We have been willing the rain to the west, as we have had more than enough in our travels on the east coast.  In saying "more than enough" that is for us travellers! It has been a wonderful start to the season over here and the countryside is looking beautiful.  We pray that it now continues.  Sadly on our way back from Melbourne we had a phone call from Pauline Forrester to tell us her dear Mum had passed away that afternoon.  Dot has not been well for a long time, but family and friends are never prepared for the loss of their loved one.  Our thoughts are with the family.  The Knight and Carrott familes, have been friends all our life.  My Mum and Dad lived with Dot and Paul for a short time, when they were first married.  We grew up together as children and then both families moved from Kellerberrin to the Geraldton area.  In fact Dot introduced Peter to me, when I joined Mum and Dad in Geraldton in 1967.                                      It was definitely an evening of 'mixed emotions'.                                        Go Eagles - Put that game behind you               Fantastic Rain for the Region - We know it will be all Go at the Farm now                                 Rest in Peace Aunty Dot - Reunited with Uncle Paul

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