WEDNESDAY 7 JUNE – MONDAY 12 JUNE     LITCHFIELD

These were mostly routine days, occasionally enlivened by the shenanigans of boss 1.

One morning, I turned up in the kitchen at the usual 8am. He was there and called M in from her usual tasks, because he had decided to dismantle and clean the stove and oven. So we both had to scrub away at the rather revoltingly dirty parts, while our normal morning work waited. It put us both behind for the rest of the day, and I didn’t finish until 6.45pm. On well, at least on an hourly rate, he was paying for it!

That boss, when he cooked the fish poached in cream and garlic, for evening meals, had a bad habit of letting the cream boil up out of the pan, all over the stove. He never cleaned it up, but left it for whoever happened upon it, next morning. As M had gotten into the habit of cleaning up the kitchen, first thing, ready for the coming day, this was usually her.

Another morning, he told M to clean something that involved the use of heavy duty bleach, which he informed her was on the top shelf of the store room. She went to get it down – and the top had not been screwed on, just rested on the top. Bleach spilled all down her front. Fortunately, most of it went on her apron – my green one – which was thus rather ruined. She was convinced that he had done it deliberately. Had it gone on her face, would have been extremely nasty.

There was a bit of a cat and mouse game going on between them. M would stand up to his tactics and tackle him back, so she was a challenge for him! A couple of days after she had started work, he came storming over to where she was working, telling her the fern baskets along the front of the cafe were wilting, and why hadn’t she watered them? She replied that no-one had told her that was part of her work, and now that he had bothered to do so, she would, in future, water them. Challenge on.

I had noticed for a while that the bulk pasta salad  was not very popular with diners – there was often a lot left, even after all the others had been used. So I decided to try making up a rice salad and see if that was better. Cleared it with boss 2, who said to go for it.

So I used boiled rice, put some orange juice on it while it was still hot, so this soaked in. Then put in peas, corn, chopped red capsicum and red onion, and dressed it with a little sesame oil. This was very well received, with M reporting that people were going back for seconds of it. Boss 1 was not happy about it when he got back for his duty turn, but by then it was a proven addition. From then on, I did not make the pasta salad, though he sometimes would.

Helicopter in day wear

Helicopter at work. The art display rotunda that boss & John built is to the left

It was a long weekend, so we were exceptionally busy. We sold a lot of cheesecake!

TUESDAY 30 MAY     LITCHFIELD

Our day off. We spent it very quietly, relaxing at the van, although I did have to do our washing and clean up the van.

Boss 2 did had to make an early morning dash out from Darwin with hamburger rolls!

After lunch, I went for a little walk down around the back of the cafe’s large block area. There was a tip down there, in the rather scrubby area. Boss had done some burning off down there fairly recently and I was intrigued by things starting to sprout green shoots again.

Pandanus seem well able to cope with cool season burning

There were some self sown watermelon vines – seeds escaped from the tip rubbish, no doubt – but some critter had chomped into the ripening, hanging fruit. Feral pigs? Or large birds?

Something ate a big hole in the watermelon

No two termite mounds are the same

John took his laptop into the cafe, when it was quieter in the afternoon, and did an internet download via their line. We received some photos of baby grandson. I thought he looked like his mother’s brother – definitely resembled that side of the family.

John did an internet deposit into house sitter’s bank account. $180 of that was to cover an electricity bill she had paid – we would have to sort out later what proportion of that was hers, and what was ours, accrued before we departed from home. He added $300 for ongoing cat care costs – that should last for some time. He sent her an email too.

There were lots of birds around our camp, which was quite delightful. Today, I noted a varied trilled and an olive-backed warbler.

Well camouflaged insects

Since we hadn’t worked today, I felt a bit more like an evening meal, so raided the cafe for decent plates of cold meats and salads.

FRIDAY 26 MAY – SATURDAY 27 MAY     LITCHFIELD

Friday was busy, but within the routine that I was used to, by now. After the lunch rush died down, made quiches to stock up the supply in the fridge, which was getting down.

Boss and B left for their spell off in Darwin, in the afternoon, and other boss arrived out from there.

On Saturday, I made apple pies, in the individual pie tins that were usually used for quiche making. These were to sell in the cafe, in place of the usual cheesecake. I could not make cheesecakes, because there was no cheese, but there were some tins of pie apple.

Cafe serving counter

The getting  of supplies for the place was proving to be rather erratic. Apparently, the usual wholesale suppliers and/or transporters, would not deliver to the cafe, because of some big disagreement boss had with them. So the bosses and B had to go round in Darwin, buying what was needed, in person, and bring it out. There was a whiteboard in the kitchen, to record what was running low and needed – but that only worked if whichever boss was going to Darwin actually looked at it! It also meant that the quite bulky supplies of sliced bread and burger rolls had to be frozen, rather than arriving fresh every day or two.

I finished at 6pm on both days.