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Canberra Today 27°/29° | Tuesday, March 19, 2024 | Digital Edition | Crossword & Sudoku

Canberra Confidential / Graffiti in a new guise

Literary graffiti in the pages of the Dickson library’s copy of “Leonardo, the First Scientist”.
Literary graffiti in the pages of the Dickson library’s copy of “Leonardo, the First Scientist”.
ONLY in clever-clogs Canberra? Watson reader and gardening writer Cedric Bryant loves reading biographies, so much so that to feed his insatiable appetite he’s joined the Dickson library and is cutting a swathe through their shelves.

With no little distress and irritation he reports of the curious habit of previous borrowers scarring the margins of books with corrections and annotations, saying it’s been the same with every one he’s borrowed.

To prove his point, he brought in his latest loan “Leonardo, the First Scientist” with page after page of ugly inked and pencilled commentary and correction.

When they’re in pencil, he diligently erases the scribbling. Ink, alas, is a lost cause.

Sad tale of the snaffled caravan

caravanWELCOME to Canberra. A retired Queensland couple visiting their daughter in Kingston have had their custom-made, retro-inspired tear-drop caravan, valued at $13,000, stolen from a unit complex car park, where the thieves dismantled the boomgate to get it out.

The wife had used inheritance money from her mother’s death towards the purchase of the caravan, one of a kind, as a retirement gift for the couple to share.

The caravan has a teal green decal on the side and a Queensland registration (DD2595). The pop-up section at the back is fitted with a kitchenette.

“This is my parents’ pride and joy,” the daughter told “CityNews”. “There is a reward for its safe return.”

Contact Greg on 0425 228149 or call Crime Stoppers on 1800 333000.

Dental-led recovery?

HOW Local Pollies Fill the Relevance Vacuum No. 37: Newly minted minister  Mick Gentleman continued the fine government executive tradition of opening anything (Chief Minister recently a dog-walking service, her deputy a rum bar) by cutting the ribbon for a new dental practice at Calwell.

He rather grandly pronounced that the opening of this new facility, with two principal dentists, “brings several new jobs to the south of Tuggeranong, along with increased economic activity for the region as a whole”.

ActewAGL vegetation inspectorsLaurie makes a point

IN case you are wondering what an ActewAGL “vegetation inspector” looks like the local power company thoughtfully attached a picture of two of them to a warning to owners or renters that it’s their responsibility to keep trees and other vegetation on the property safely 1.5 metres clear of powerlines.

This flushed out a tweet from reader Laurie Berry who sees a lot of them: “Every year I get a letter. Every year I ring them to say I do not have any trees or poles on my property. Every year they send a team to inspect my property. Every year the inspectors tell me that I have no trees or poles on my property.”

High flyers say thanks

CANBERRA Convention Bureau has presented Canberra Airport owner Terry Snow with “AirVolution”, a glossy, custom book of images reflecting the diversity of the nation’s capital and “thankful notes” from esteemed members of the Canberra community, as a communal thank you for everything the shiny new terminal has done for the city.

Bureau chief Robyn Hendry wrote that “Canberra Airport has well and truly surpassed the traditional definition of an airport” and Diplomat Hotel’s GM Rowland Fischer hailed it as having featured in “some of the most momentous and emotional times in mine and countless other lives”.

‘Bordeline’ art

Certified AustralianHERE’S an image from “Certified Australian”, a just-opened exhibition by emerging artists Martin James and Hardy Lohse that takes aim at the Australian Government’s policies on border protection. It’s at ANCA Gallery, Dickson, until November 9.

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Ian Meikle, editor

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