Fish and Chips

We've been down to Bondi this evening to grab fish and chips from Bondi Surf Seafoods while it was still light. You can tell it's a Tuesday evening because there are queues at the petrol pumps around the city; not because we run short of petrol every week but because the government alters the price of fuel according to a predictable pattern. So the petrol's cheapest on a Tuesday evening and most expensive on a Friday, which is supposed to raise extra revenue when the Aussies fill up their utes for the weekend drive up the coast. I'm sure there's some sort of sense behind it, I just can't see it.

Wherever you go in the city there's a fishmonger just waiting for the cue to feed you something lightly battered or grilled; barramundi, ling, sea perch and flake, which you might remember is the sneaky Australian way of dressing up shark meat.

Bondi Surf Seafoods has won awards for it's freshly battered fish. It's run by an Italian family and it's always the same bespectacled bloke working the hot food counter when you go in. And God knows how, but he's cottoned on to deep fried mars bars as well and he must be selling them because they're lined up ready-battered on the shelf behind the fryers.

Anyway, we laid out the picnic blanket and sat on the hill behind the beach watching the last of the day's surfers emerging from the water; a sea mist drifting in across the cliffs turning the colour of dusk a shade of grey-blue while the Icebergs pool copped a lashing from the waves. Bondi's not our favorite beach, but it certainly has character if you don't mind sharing the grass with the local drunks and dreadlocked backpackers.

Ella's better, as you might have guessed. She wolfed the fish and chased a few seagulls before bedtime. A great way to end anyone's day.