the STAR of the Melbourne Commonwealth Games is Ping the duck

At the opening ceremony of the Commonwealth Games in Melbourne, many visitors to Melbourne were confused by the appearance of a boy (Sean Whitford) and his duck (and the poem #).

#
With a bit of luck a duck will come into your life
When you are at the peak of your great powers
And your achievement towers like a smoking chimney stack
There'll be a quack and right there at your feet
A little duck will stand
She will take you by the hand and lead you
Like a child with no defence
She will lead you into wisdom, joy and innocence
This little duck
I wish you luck


Sean Whitford with Ping the duck

Well, they also appeared at the closing ceremony (briefly) to wave goodbye.

The reference to the duck might have been too obscure.

But readers of The Age newspaper would recognise it as one of Leunig's characters. Michael Leunig is a cartoonist for the newspaper. The poem is also his.



And with political comment...


The only duck that we see in this house looks like this.


Or this.


Hmmm.... the weather is starting to cool down for autumn, I wonder when my human will next cook duck braised in red wine, porcini, pancetta and chestnuts?

*As always, please check out Cooper and Camilla who always have interesting things to say.

........ooooooooOOOOOOOOoooooooo........

Today was another quiet day. I napped on my mat on the deck for most of the day, even while my human was watching the The Ice Storm on DVD.

But we had a visitor. Woohoo! The great danes' human Martin, neighbours from the back, came over in the afternoon for some help on another job application and I sat up on his lap while he was typing on his lapdog computer. We hope he gets a job soon.

Hmmmm... duck...

keisercat@wildmail.com