Monday, 25 June 2007
With Sunday’s excitement out of the way, it wasn’t exactly pleasant to wake up on Monday morning to discover that regardless of whether Dermot Brereton had brought last week’s cold snap in his luggage, he’d failed to take it with him when he left.
Or maybe our illustrious Premier was responsible after assorted protesters attempted to rain on his parade at Sunday’s community forum at McKenna Hall.
In any case, regardless of the prevailing weather conditions outside the Little House of Concrete (which was proving to be a very warm and comfortable hovel) I’d just finished gathering my stuff together ready to head downtown around ten-thirty Monday morning when the phone rang.
It was one of the other Volunteers rostered on for the middle session inquiring whether, the weather conditions being what they were, I thought it was worth reporting for duty....
As it turned out, the continuing flow of out-of-town visitors meant that it was definitely worth turning up, though anyone harbouring doubts on the subject would have felt that their scepticism was justified. The wind and drizzle persisted throughout the day, but that didn’t stem the flow of visitors.
If that seems strange, bear in mind that most of the people I spoke to during the week were in transit along the Bruce Highway and had called into town to see what was happening. Many others were there as a result of travel arrangements they’d made some time back and were going to be heading here regardless of the weather conditions
So, regardless of the weather, they kept on a-comin’.
Arriving on the scene to find that the footpath in front of the Grand View was open to the public, I encountered Warbo. After the predictable remarks about the presence of brass monkeys in the soprano section of the choir, the conversation turned to the blog and I pointed out that there was plenty of space available if he decided to send me the odd photograph. Which he duly did.
After that, it was a case of stand around, spot the visitors, engage them in conversation for a while. Repeat until end of shift.