Surfing Dogs, a Red Moon and a Snake

Three events to discuss today!

First, the one that actually happened today: The Noosa Dog Surf Competition of 2026! 😁
The annual Surf Festival is on in Noosa — for about 10 days. So if the beaches weren’t crowded enough already (they were), they definitely are now! I got to help out at the van again (selling hot dogs — not the surf comp dogs, though — ice cream etc.) because of the booming business during the festival. We’ve been absolutely swamped! It was probably the busiest day. People ordering non-stop. I was “mildly” stressed. 😁

The next day, Sunday (15.03.), was a little quieter (thank goodness!), but still busy. And for whatever reason, in the stress I handed out a frozen hot dog sausage. Well… oops… 😁
When the customer wasn’t on board with eating that — can’t blame him — I fixed the situation slightly embarrassed…

The second faux pas of the day was a gross miscalculation with one order. It was embarrassing the whole nine yards. 😁 Only took me three attempts to fix it…

I will say, I’m decent at simple addition without a calculator. But the pressure of getting these orders right when there’s a long queue and people being somewhat incoherent about what they want — sometimes changing their orders more than once or twice — it’s getting to me! 😁
I better have a ripped intraparietal sulcus when I’m done with this job. 😁

In other news: There was a lunar eclipse on 3 March.

Clear skies — what more could you want? Apart from them staying clear. Which they didn’t.

Up until three minutes before the eclipse started, clouds came into view and steadily progressed to lay a thick, impenetrable blanket of soft anthracite over the sky. Well…

The event was supposed to last for about an hour, and I just kept lurking about on the balcony, waiting for a tiny break in the clouds. Sometimes there was one, but as soon as I tried to focus my lens on it, it was gone again.

For 55 minutes, basically nothing could be seen.

And then, for about 5–10 minutes, the eclipse! Better late than never. And as soon as the window of opportunity arrived, it was gone again. More clouds. But at this point the moon was already back in the penumbral phase.

A few days later, our house had a visitor!

During day-long rain, one of my housemates suddenly knocked on my door and informed me to close my balcony door. There was a snake on the balcony.

I quickly closed my door, of course, but having grabbed my camera, I went to get some prime footage! It was a harmless python, after all. Or carpet snake, as the Aussies would say.

It was most assuredly a fantastic sight — the little snake! It crawled into the rain gutter eventually and came out again a few hours later. No one knows where it is these days. 😁

I, for one, can’t wait to see another snake. 🐍Read more