Well I thought I'd have a quick babble here this morning, although
I got stuck into reading the surprisingly extensive Wikipedia page
about the "Lal Lal Iron Mine and Smelting Works" so now I don't
really have time. I visited the remains of the 1880s blast furnace
hiding there in the bushland last friday. A side-track from my
continuing obsession with dams which led me to the Bungal dam of
the Lal Lal reservoir, which I had visited earlier but when it was
wetter and I hadn't dared to tackle the rather narrow and steep
gravel roads that make up the publicly-accessible route near the
dam itself (the paved road to it is frustratingly gated off).
Those dam visits were also more or less a side-track since I
included them in the trip back to the town where I grew up, for a
secondary school reunion. I initially wasn't going to go, but since
I got the Jag working the weekend before and it was good weather
for a drive just before the busy Christmas/New-Year holiday time
where I avoid the roads as much as possible, I changed my mind. The
Jag didn't quite agree, with warning lights accumulating the
further I went. Starting with "light bulb failure" and ending up
with "gearbox failure" and corresponding inability to change out of
top gear, whereupon I gave it a rest for an hour while I walked
around the Gong Gong reservior reserve, discovering thereafter that
the pressure valve in the radiator cap had failed and caused a
couple of litres of coolant to spray over various sensor connectors
which obviously are of some significance to the gearbox control
electronics. A wipe down and just enough more collant to make the
coolant light go out, and it worked fine for the rest of the trip.
But I do now have a replacement cap ordered from a wrecker.
The tyre place apparantly also didn't put one of the hub caps on
properly so I lost that somewhere along the journey, which is very
annoying because second-hand ones don't seem easily found. You can
buy new ones from Jaguar still, surprisingly, but for half the cost
of what I paid for all the wheels themselves. I'm still deciding on
that one.
As for the reunion, I surprisingly quite enjoyed it. Only about
fifteen turned up, certainly less than a majority, but some I knew
well back then, or as well as anyone, which wasn't really all that
well. I was interested to find out what became of the girl who once
told me she planned to become a neurosurgeon, seemingly just
because it was the most impressive occupation she could think of
when I asked. Minor office jobs at a gas company. Not that I
disrespect her for that, I thought her response was crazy at the
time, which is why I remembered it.
Speaking of women, no rekindled high-school romance for me, not
that there was much to rekindle anyway. Ho hum. I think I did
generally get along with everyone better than when I was actually
at school though, which in some ways is surprising given that I've
barely ever talked to people my age since then.
