The burning sun

I got sun burnt yesterday. No-one else in the family did. Just me. I put sunscreen on in the morning and it was a semi-cloudy day. I had my hat with me and wore it intermittently but it was windy and kept blowing off or in my face. I have considerable sun damage to my skin already in the form of sun spots (a.k.a liver spots) and white spots, countless freckles and the plucked-chicken look to my neck. Almost every summer as a child I can remember getting burnt with subsequent blisters and peeling to my back and shoulders. I obviously have to stay out of the sun completely between the hours of 11 and 4, or is it 10 and 3? Alternatively I could invest in a burqa. Oh, how I miss the northern hemisphere.

I met a New Zealand woman the other week who has recently returned to Auckland after living in London for a number of years. I asked her what brought her back and she said the quality of life here: she likes being able to get in the car and drive everywhere. Is that what people mean when they talk of the quality of life in Australia and New Zealand? The freedom to jump in one’s wanker wagon and drive the kids from McMansion to school and then back again. Evidently for some, it is.

So in my endeavour to avoid the sun, we spent today driving from home to shopping mall and then back again and I did not get sun burnt.