Longest day of the year and B6 was up at 4:20! I told him it was the middle of the night and we both needed a lot more sleep, but the fact was day was dawning outside. The birds were already singing and they were not accompanied by traffic noise at that hour. Unfortunately we have made it one of his longest days of the year as we celebrated Nan’s birthday here after soccer with a pavlova I made and he has just settled down at 10:40.

As you enter the summer season, we have just had the longest night of the year and, of course, today we have the longest day.

Each morning, as I eat my breakfast the sun comes in the window behind me and reaches across the room, through the doorway to shine on a row of mugs hanging below the kitchen cupbopards. Each morning the angle changes slightly and the time the sun touches has been a little later each day. Soon, the traverse of the sun will start its daily trajectory a little further south each day and the day will arrive when the morning illumination will recede for another year.

A second seasonal news item from us is that following the heavy rains of recent weeks, the water levels in the catchment dams for Sydney has again risen above 50% for the first time in many years. The level in Warragamba, the largest storage is over 40%. Overall, it is an increase of over 10% in one week. We have had solid rain.

There is still room for much more, but it is a welcome change. Strict water use restrictions continue.