Phallic Friday - the Pinnacles

I'm stretching a little here... but on my recent holiday, I went to The Pinnacles in Western Australia (a couple of hours north of Perth). Being a soils girl, I've always been intrigued by this place and wanted to go. And I had an idea of what it may look like...and I was so very wrong!

It's an exquisitely beautiful place, just off the road, tucked into some small hills. There was a mystical kind of feel there, like I was visiting somewhere special - but that may have just been me! And the colour was amazing.

I found some Phallic looking Pinnacles...but now I go to write my post, they don't look quite so phallic anymore! But I was thinking of Phallic Fridays as I took these photos.

So here are the Phallic Pinnacles for your entertainment.

This is the first one I saw - pretty impressive!

And this one just screamed Phallic at me

Then Mr E took a pic of me at the Phallic Gates (not that he knew what I was calling them!)

And the beautiful view with the ocean in the background

The ground had tiny pinnacles, along with the large ones, here

Wildlife Wednesday - Shag

The Shag, or the Little Pied Cormorant, is a bird I've recognised for many years. My grandfather had a distinct dislike for the birds when he was fishing. He was convinced they went hunting for his bait, or his fish, and would take off with his fishing line (or maybe he made that up for my entertainment!). So a Shag duck-diving into the water always makes me think of Da.

The Little Pied Cormorant is black above and white below. They hang their wings out like this to dry, because their wing feathers are not waterproof. You often see them basking on rocks in this pose, and usually in groups, not singly. There were a bunch of cormorants on the sand here (in the river at low tide - when I extended my backyard again!) I just zoomed in on this one by himself.

Oh, look what I found in my web searching:
The diet of the Pied Cormorant consists mostly of fish. When foraging, the cormorant swims low on the water, and when it spies a fish, it quickly plunges below the water’s surface. When it pursues the fish, it swims by propelling itself with its large, webbed feet and steering with half-opened wings. Fish may be eaten below the water or when the cormorant returns to the surface. Unfortunately, cormorants sometimes also feed by stealing the fish that have been caught in fishermen’s nets. Taken from here. Maybe Da wasn't making up stories for me!

Little Pied Cormorants breed either in colonies or, less commonly, in single pairs. The nest is a flat platform of sticks, lined with green leaves and is usually placed in a tree. Both adults share in egg incubation and care of the young.

Sunday Story

Oh, how did Sunday come around so quickly?

I returned home from conference with a pile of books - many freebies, a couple I bought.

The exciting one for me was Bronwyn Parry's Darkening Skies, because it was out early just for conference. Ooooohhh, love getting a sneak peek. I bought it at the conference bookshop. It's the fourth book set in Dungirri...and it may be my favourite (but it's so hard to pick!). Anyway, it was a cracker read.

Then I had Annie West's Imprisoned By A Vow in my conference goodie bag. I wanted a quick read so picked it up. Silly silly me. I thought I'd be able to read a bit and put it down...but alas, Annie West held me captive with my pain for Leila and my concern that she end up okay. Another great read.

I think that's all I've managed since conference. On my holiday I took an iPad full of books, plus 3 print books. Do you know how much I read? Zero! My idea of a holiday is not zero reading - but somehow that's what I did. Guess lots of driving, sightseeing and snorkelling aren't conducive to reading. And you can guess that there was absolutely no writing either.

I'll try to do a holiday blog...just have to get my hundreds of photos sorted. I do have some great wildlife pictures for Wednesdays :) 

Phallic Friday - vagina backlash

I'm just back from 2 weeks of holidays and the RWA conference and I was struggling to think of what to write for this post (actually, I'm struggling to string 2 words together!).

Then I went to the news website and there's a ready made kerfuffle happening - a Sydney University student newspaper went and put 18 vaginas on their front cover! Needless to say it was confiscated, but it has started a big social media discussion.

Here's the news article I read, which gives an account of one of the girls who participated. I think she deserves a medal for coming out in public in this discussion and I hope she doesn't regret it in the future, especially with her name and photo publicised, meaning she has no anonymity.

I know genitalia on a cover is confronting. And I think whether it was vaginas or cocks, the same reaction would have occurred.

But sometimes, to get people to take notice of things, we need to do something outlandish to be noticed. I read some horrifying statistics a while back about the number of women who elect to have cosmetic surgery on their vagina so it is 'perfect' and that is terrifying to me. Cosmetic surgery on any body part concerns me, but on a body part that the majority of people would never see, why on earth do you need it 'perfect'? What's wrong with living with what you have?

I don't live with a perfect body - far from it. I have rosaceae, severe cystic acne, and something called Hidradenitis suppurativa.  I do feel pressure to change - and even to spend large amounts of money to change - but I live with what I got, largely because (1) mostly what I have is unchangeable, (2) I don't have large amounts of money, (3) I spent years trying to change and ended up undervaluing myself because of this constant pressure to change something that is unchangeable, and (4) sometimes you just have to suck it up and do the best with what you have (that was the conclusion I came to after years of trying everything known to man). Plus I firmly believe you have to look past the outside to see good in people - and if I can't do that in myself, then what hope do I have of doing that with others?

Although putting vaginas on the front cover is confronting, I believe we need confronting to change the focus of society, from the 'perfect' outside, to loving what's inside... but maybe I'm a bit biased :)

How do you feel?