# THE REDGUM HOLLOW GAZETTE **Serving the district since before you needed to know that** *Edition 14 — Monday to Thursday* *Single copy: $2.50. Leave the coins on the counter, Lorraine is watching.* --- **WEATHER:** Dry. Still dry. Bone-dry, morally dry, the kind of dry that makes a man buy irrigation fittings. See below. --- ## WATER EXEMPTION SECURED: DEB DELIVERS THE GOODS The Redgum Hollow Bicentenary Festival will proceed with full water access, following confirmation this week that the exemption application lodged by Festival Coordinator Deb Forsythe has been approved — some three weeks ahead of the timeline circulating in pessimistic corners of this district. Deb announced it Thursday at the CWA, and Sharon Purcell had half the town informed before the biscuits came out. This Gazette will say plainly: credit where it is due. That exemption did not file itself. The mood in the hall was, by all accounts, the best it has been in several weeks. Stall planning resumed with what sources describe as *actual enthusiasm.* This paper looks forward to reporting the festival itself, assuming the district holds together until spring. Deb Forsythe is, at this moment, popular. The Gazette notes this without further comment. --- ## RAY CONNELLY AND THE EAST-SIDE QUESTION Ray Connelly was at the co-op and hardware Wednesday with a ute tray that answered several questions and raised several more. Irrigation fittings — substantial ones, by Bruce Patten's account — were visible to those present, which at last count includes most of the men in this district who have an opinion about water infrastructure. Bruce, who sourced the fittings through the agency, has offered his synthesis freely and often: *"Full-scale east-side restoration, if you ask me."* This paper cannot confirm Bruce's assessment, but notes that Bruce has been right about two out of three things this year, which is above the district average. The phrase "east-side Henderson work" is now in general circulation at the co-op. Shelley Poidevin has mentioned the old channel system in no fewer than two separate public contexts. The word *"serious"* is being attached to Ray Connelly the way weather attaches to a ridge line. This Gazette has, from the beginning, found Ray Connelly interesting. A Queensland man who pays cash, receives family law correspondence from Cairns, and proceeds immediately to bore testing and channel restoration is, at minimum, a man with a plan. What the plan is for remains the district's most productive open question. A separate and entirely unrelated observation: Deb Forsythe has now been seen driving slowly past the Henderson boundary on what several people count as three or four occasions. Festival logistics, presumably. --- ## STEVE-O, MARGARET MITCHELL, AND THE FLOUR THAT LAUNCHED A HUNDRED THEORIES Steve-o Mitchell was seen at his mother's place on Merton Road Tuesday afternoon for approximately two hours. This is the third or fourth such visit in recent weeks, which this Gazette has been watching with the quiet hope one develops when a young person keeps coming back. Margaret Mitchell was seen at Lorraine's store shortly after, purchasing flour. These two facts are now travelling together around this district as though they were cause and effect, or preamble and announcement. The Gazette will not speculate. The Gazette will simply observe that Margaret Mitchell stayed for tea after the CWA Thursday, which she does not do, and that Lorraine noticed, and that Sharon noticed Lorraine noticing. The flour remains unexplained. Watch this space. --- ## LETTERS TO THE EDITOR **From B. Patten, Hardware:** Marge — for the record, I said *"if you ask me."* I was asked. — B.P. **From Anonymous (handwriting identified):** The bread was gone before I even parked properly. I drove from Currawong. FRIDAY TIMES PLEASE. — *A Loyal Reader* **From Clarrie Burton, via telephone transcription:** *"Just put that the east channel hasn't run in twenty-two years and leave it at that."* — C.B. *(The Gazette has left it at that.)* --- ## AROUND THE DISTRICT • Tash's Tuesday run: sold out 9:43am. A Currawong woman ate the last loaf on the footpath. Times remain unconfirmed. Lorraine is unmoved. • Fuel up again at the servo. Nobody happy. No alternatives proposed. • Royal Hotel: open. Chops on Thursday reportedly very good.