Marcia is the category five (highest degree of severity) cyclone which crossed the coast at Yepoon (near Rockhampton, 660ks north of Brisbane) at eight o’clock this morning. Most people who live here would blame Marcia for the expected four hundred millimetres of rain falling currently over Brisbane; other people know that Marsha is only partially responsible…

“I see you brought the rain with you again Aunty Sally,” said my niece Sarah over the phone yesterday.

“You’ve done it again Sally,” laughed my big brother Bill over the phone this morning.

“Oh Sally,” my brother Henry admonished, “you always bring the rain, the floods and cyclones!”

Only two months ago (when there was a drought here and I was freezing in England) Roland had emailed with a photograph of his brown grass and begged me to do a rain-dance. A few days later he asked me stop but to date I haven’t mastered the art of stopping the rain. And yet again, as everyone points out, it rains for me by the bucket-loads. My apologies go to all those expecting floods or cyclone damage. In recompense I got wet and risked life and limb whilst taking photographs of the deluge at the bottom of Roland’s garden.

The meteorologists forecast another  three days of intermittent heavy rain but I’m working on it…