WEDNESDAY 12 – MONDAY 17 JULY     LITCHFIELD

The usual sorts of days. But busy, though – there were a few days when I had no time for lunch.

Boss 1’s temper kept getting worse. One morning, when M went in to the cafe at 7.30am, the basket of little jam sachets had been upended all over the floor, and serviettes thrown all about the place. A temper tantrum, obviously. Of course, he hadn’t picked them up.

I felt sorry for his lady, who would get quite flustered when he was on the rampage.

There was a BBQ lunch group in on Thursday. Boss 1 was bringing bowls of salad, butter sachets and the like back from the BBQ area, when he tripped on the path and dropped some of what he was carrying. He really lost it then and proceeded to dump everything – good food, butter containers, bowls, baskets, the lot – into the nearest bin. M and John were doing the washing up and watched on in silence. When he had stormed off, M set about retrieving the bowls and butter baskets from the bin. Later, she observed him fishing around in the bin, presumably looking to retrieve what he could. She did not say anything.

The wife of boss 2 lived at their home in Darwin, although she occasionally came out and stayed for a weekend, sometimes with her teenage daughters. They all helped out serving in the cafe, if we were really busy.

It seemed, from talk with boss 2, that they were planning to go away for a month’s family holiday, from about 10 August. For that month, boss 1 would remain full time on site.

M, John and I did some serious discussing, over a couple of happy hours. We decided that there was no way we could continue to work here, if it meant working with boss 1, full time, instead of having the 3-4 days respite from him that we currently got. We decided to give notice that we would finish up in early August. We had already been there considerably longer than any previous employees, who had only ever lasted a few weeks.

I thought a change would be pleasant. We spent some time discussing what we might do next, but apart from heading off to Darwin for a while, had no other ideas.

On Monday, two old friends of John’s, from his Teacher College days, came to visit him at the cafe. He had earlier realized, in discussion with boss 2, that the latter’s sister had gone there at the same time, and had married one of said friends. So, through her, they knew John was working with her brother. They were with a group of friends who were staying around Pine Creek, gold fossicking, so decided to pay a surprise visit. John was suitably amazed, but did not have too much time for a catch up. So he arranged for them to meet us at the Rum Jungle Bowls Club, that night.

I went without a lunch break, so I could finish at 5.15 and join the bowls expedition. M, John and I went. The friends were there, so I met them for the first time. They joined us for what I could only describe as a hit and giggle game that passed for bowls on the very rough green. It was a fun evening though.

We put 20 litres of fuel in Truck at Batchelor, on the way to bowls – $1.56cpl.