"The Devil Wears Prada" in Fremantle

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Today we fly to Perth as we finally start to make our way home. The number of new COVID cases per day back in Melbourne is in the hundreds and climbing steadily, and the authorities have now conceded that they can’t get it back to zero. This means that we'll be locked up until everyone’s had their jabs, which won’t be for quite a few months yet. We keep asking ourselves who in their right mind would willingly go back to that. Well us it seems….. only because if we stay here for much longer we’ll go broke.

We stop at a petrol station to fill up our trusty hire car before returning it to Broome Airport. As often happens in these situations we can’t find the button to open the petrol cap. I push and pull every switch and lever I can find. I manage to open the bonnet, turn on the emergency lights and all the demisters, open and close all the windows, and adjust the angle of the steering wheel, but the petrol cap remains determinedly shut. I even manage to open a secret compartment where a previous renter's left behind their cute orange framed sunglasses. Time's passing and we’re now in real danger of missing our flight. As a last resort I tell Issy to look for the manual in the glovebox, but it's not in there. I don't particularly want to look like the stupidest male on the planet, so I ask her if she'd mind going inside and seeing if one of the attendants can help us. A bright looking young lass emerges from the shop, pushes gently on the petrol cap cover, and open it pops. Hmmm. I look on hoping that the tarmac will open up and swallow me, but no luck there either. We drive off quickly before things can get any worse, if that’s possible.

We land in Perth. It’s raining and it feels like we’re in the Antarctic. I used to come here a lot for work, and I don’t think I can ever remember seeing any clouds here, let alone rain, and the temperature was usually sweltering. It can’t be this cold back home right now.

We drive up into Kings Park to get a quick bite to eat. The local magpies don't seem to be having any trouble making themselves at home inside the cafe, and are quick to pounce on any tasty morsels that fall from the tables. Most of the magpies back home would have no hesitation in swooping down and pecking your eyes out at this time of the year; thankfully these ones seem a bit more friendly. We wander around the impressive cenotaph, eternal flame and other memorials to past conflicts, and admire the excellent view down over the Swan River and the Perth CBD. We’ve heard a lot about WA‘s famous wildflowers and they’re certainly out in force here - large swathes of every conceivable size, shape and colour.

We’ve arranged to have dinner with an old work friend of mine down at Fremantle. We head off early so that we can have a look around before it gets dark... well I can have a look around; Issy says it’s way too cold. The back streets of old Freo are very cute with a good supply of nineteenth century buildings girt with massive wraparound wrought iron balconies. I wander up a small hill in the half light to the old round prison. This was built in 1830 and is apparently the oldest building still standing in Western Australia. The first European hanged here was only fifteen years old; thankfully those days are long gone.

As I walk back to the warmth of the car I can't help but notice that my phone keeps dinging. It seems that we were right - no one in their right mind would want to fly back to Melbourne right now. Qantas has cancelled our flight. Hmmm. Pity they didn’t do it while we were still in the warmth of Broome.

Di's booked us in at a restaurant overlooking the harbour. The decor looks very nice, but it seems that someone’s forgotten to water the extensive collection of plants that runs right around the base of the windows on three sides of the room. We hear someone comment that they might be plastic. Huh? Pretend dead plants? I'm not sure there'd be huge market for that.

Di tells us that her last job was as the admin assistant to the CEO of a large engineering company; she was my admin assistant when I managed a bunch of engineers a decade or so ago. I used to get her to organise meetings, flights and hotel bookings, and type up minutes. It seems that her most recent boss had a slightly different view of her role. She had her doing random tasks such as picking up her kids from school, and arranging to get her dog groomed. She even got her to take her car in for a service, and then insisted that she drive it home for her even though the mechanic had told her that the brakes didn’t work properly. This all sounds like something straight out of “The Devil Wears Prada”. The boss was then shocked when Di told her that she was quitting. She's in fine form and it’s great to catch up with her again.

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