Today was one of those winter days here in Sydney (13C or 55F) that makes me glad that I live here. Sure, it was a bit on the cool side, but it was also clear and sunny. Winter here in Sydney is a joke by Canadian standards. Many Canadians would kill to have a summer as nice as the winter day we experienced here today.

My wife (Engogirl) and I’s idea of a perfect Saturday is to sit out in the back yard to have breakfast and read the weekend paper. Kicking back and luxuriating, to drink some home made cappuccino, eat some cereal whilst knocking over the sodoku, cryptic crossword and target.

When I first started going out with my wife, we used to go to cafes on Saturday mornings and have leisurely breakfasts of eggs benedict (I don’t eat them any more…. for health reasons, because it’s so loaded with cholesterol) and do the cryptic crosswords together. There’s something quite wonderful about working through a problem with someone you love. There’s nothing like seeing how smart your partner is to engender respect.

As an example of the joy that a simple cryptic crossword can bring, I tender this clue from today’s paper that my wife figured out.

“Flower in battle over a bowlers run up”

 The answer was “waratah”

I can remember thinking to myself, “wow!” and then enjoying the explanation of how she figured it out.

Of course, to make sure I’m respected in the relationship I have to pull my weight and get a few clues myself, like, “model managed dropping weight in the character of soaps“.

 The answer was “melodramas”

I could never understand why it took women so long to get the vote. What is it with some guys that they feel threatened by smart women?  And for that matter, who would want to live with someone who you thought was stupid or didn’t respect? Of course that’s a rhetorical question, because I know the answer is that some stupid people feel threatened by smart people.

I’ve always thought it was a good strategy to associate with intelligent people, so at the very least I might learn something. Every now and again, I’ve jokingly said to some of my friends that, although I’m not the sharpest tool in the box, that I take it for granted that the people I surround myself with are smart because I need all the help I can get, to lift my game. 

It was so nice today that we sat outside all day and by late afternoon we were on to our second bottle of red wine, enjoying playing scrabble with a little music in the background.

Words we were unsure of were checked on the laptop (thanks to a wireless internet connection) and logs were thrown into the chiminea when it felt a little cool.

As Omar Khayyam once said:

“A Book of Verses underneath the Bough,

A Jug of Wine, a Loaf of Bread – and Thou

Beside me singing in the Wilderness 

O, Wilderness were Paradise enow!”

Life can be so good.

Although my wife usually thrashes me at Scrabble, It was mine turn to shine today, and I won all the games we played, instead of losing them all as I usually do. I have to say, though, the highlight of the games we played was when Engogirl placed her P, T, E, R, O, on my “DACTYL” for a triple word score.

Geek heaven!

One of the albums that we played today was Pafuera Telarañas by Bebe,