Recent stats, and another look at May 2014

Yes, a pause after all those 65th Reunion posts

Looked just now at the stats for the month to date. You too may now see what I saw, and what has prompted this post.

Yes, there we are behind the curtain you usually see, where such magic as may be happens. (Speaking of which Games 1 and 2 of the “Magic Round” have gone my way in the Footy Tipping!) You will note 75 have now viewed the main 65th Reunion post, and yesterday’s post is doing fine. And even though Daniil in Russia recently assured us that nothing bad has happened to him, that question we asked still must pop up very high in searches, because my little post has had over 200 views in the past 17 days.

I also see there a lot of interest in my drinks with the Major-General. I wonder why?

I also note a few liked the May 2014 retro post, so here I am taking another dive into the second year of this blog’s history and my fourth year back in The Gong.

The view from my window changed in 2014

Before that the view was dominated by a very old coral tree.

These are not that one:

They were planted all over the Illawarra and Kiama districts last century mainly, I suspect, to provide shade for cows in the summer months. But nowadays, as this item from Brisbane shows, they are regarded as a pest. They are thorny. They shed branches easily.

A broadly spreading tree growing up to 6 m or more tall. Its stems are sparsely covered in sharp thorns. Its leaves are divided into three elongated leaflets. Its scarlet red to dark red pea-shaped flowers are borne in large elongated clusters at the tips of the branches. Its elongated, dark brown, pods are slightly constricted between each of the shiny mottled seeds. A hybrid of horticultural origin, that was probably developed in Australia or New Zealand.

So in May 2014 the neighbours removed the coral tree.

Ten years on and I again have a tree at my window, as a previously unnoticed rival has grown to replace the departed glory of the tree so loved by rainbow lorikeets — though this one does tend to attract the odd black cockatoo.

May 2023