friday, two fridays ago, it rained and rained and rained. though not while we made our way to waffle on to break fast. i know purists — and monsieur waff — would strongly recommend the plain waffle, adorned with nothing more than a dusting of powdered sugar. but. the waffle with maple syrup is an amazing thing. the air around you tingles with a mapley, syrupy aura, and your teeth go soft. since before we left sydney, i’d been telling the kid about how we could go have waffles in melbourne. she was happy to play along, perched up high on a barstool, with her waffle in a brown paper bag; the waffleman thought it might be easier to eat that way. “are you leaving today?” he asked, because he remembered that we are from sydney. “tomorrow,” we replied. there was a sadness in the air. i was already a regular. “you should move to melbourne,” he said, “you will love it.”

as the kid slowed down at the halfway mark, we folded the bag over, popped it into my backpack, and headed off on another adventure. while the boy made a pilgrimage to the fred williams room at the ian potter centre, maeve and i wandered through the indigenous collection, picking out our favourite shell-studded, feather-adorned, hand-woven satchels; making faces back at the totems; looking for native animals hidden in the dots. there was a tale which accompanied a little family of colourful woven dolls:

a woman was out in the bush looking for food for her children. two men killed her. when they noticed that milk was leaking from her breasts, they realised that she must have children nearby. they found their way back to her camp, where they discovered her two children, and killed them too.

tops.

it was heaps more fun ambling down by the yarra, past the australian poster annual. in the shadow of the circus oz tent and a creaky old ferris wheel. we took a ride on “the grand carousel”, a small scuffed thing with a ring of tired animals jerking up and down and a soundtrack composed of the whirr and hum of machinery.

we walked on: the boy led the way up the green slopes into the botanic gardens. and it was fun for a while, even though it was bitingly cold, and even when it started to rain, because by then we were right by the tropical greenhouse, and i knew that inside it would be warm, if a little moist. the kid finished off the rest of her waffle surrounded by steamy exotic vegetation. and then we stepped outside because we thought the rain was easing.

but it tricked us.

it got heavier and heavier, and i got wetter and grumpier: why was there no place to take shelter? by the time i spotted the visitors’ centre and stomped off towards it, my shoulders were sodden, my hair saturated. i fingered the plastic rain ponchos in the garden shop, and gazed longingly at the fat sandwiches and wedges of cake behind glass in the cafeteria. truly, i would’ve been happy to stay.

but the boy had his sights set on a walk beside port phillip bay, and was leaning out the glass doors in the direction of the st kilda tram. fortunately, i had no such desire to slosh around the outdoors for an unspecified time, so me and the kid caught a tram in the other direction, and headed underground.

there is a cute little boutique in the pedestrian tunnel under flinders street, where cute skirts can be found. sadly, everything on the rack was either an 8 or a 14. so we went next door to sticky, floor to ceiling, wall to wall zines and other scraps of paper, and a desk with badge machines where you can sit and press out your own buttons. one of us came away with a little button with a black cat on it; one of us bought too many zines.

and we climbed the dark stairs back up to the street to find sunlight! and life! and the lord of the fries! twas a lovely picnic indeed, on the tramstop bench, with a crate of hot chips smothered in brown vinegar and tomato sauce, and two tiny forks.

and then you know, one thing led to another, and suddenly, one night later, we weren’t in melbourne anymore. we were in a stone-cold motel room in tumut, discovering that the advertised “free cable in your room!” was three sports channels. even the ones that on the handwritten tv menu were assigned to “lifestyle channel” and “fox-something” (not “fox sport”), had since been switched over to something with a football game on it.

we read the interesting takeaway menu that i’d picked up in reception, for a local chinese restaurant. there was an entire section titled “sweet & sour”.

and really, for a while we considered regional chinese for dinner. but then we thought that maybe a counter meal in a pub, or a slap-up feed in the bistro of the RSL club would be more “authentic”. the tumut bowling club is a big, concrete bunker, the inside of which is lined in spectacular carpet of a glitzy pattern you just don’t see anymore. we followed the corridor around several bends to the packed dining room, and it became clear from the laminated menu on the counter listing such classic australian cuisine as “honey king prawns” and “mongolian lamb”, that the tumut RSL bistro was in fact a regional chinese restaurant, albeit with a small selection of steaks and chips tucked away in the extended menu.

we were not really disappointed, but it was very hard to choose. in the end, we had sweet and sour pork — not as lurid and padded out with pineapple and celery as i’ve enjoyed in other country towns, garlic king prawns, and mixed vegetables with cashew nuts. the order took about an hour to arrive, during which time i tried without success to keep the kid away from my lemon, lime and bitters. and then minutes later — well, maybe 20 minutes; we are not swine — it was all gone.

and now, looking down the barrel of a surprise annual report to be designed in five days, these golden memories of melbourne are flashing before my eyes, taunting me, like a cavalcade of well-fried chips.