The Dispossessed

Without wanting to sound like a pervert, a stalker or a free-range bunny boiler, I have to say that blipping is a bit easier when children are on school holidays. Every patch of green in the CBD that has been dignified with the name of 'park' is occupied by little whirling dervishes of energy. It's much better entertainment, watching the kids form gangs, mutiny and re-form into rebel forces, than anything on tv.

Although looking at the parents, hunching haggard and panda-eyed over their takeaway coffee on the fringes of the green, it may be that they can't wait for school to resume. After one and a half weeks of holidays, the kids'squabbles over cars, toy guns, bikes, and cricket bats...

"MUUUUM! Freddy won't SHARE!"

"But MUUUM! Daniel won't let me PLAY!"

... appear to be wearing down even the most resilient of parents.

Disgruntled city office workers (who have been unceremonially ousted from being able to sit or lie in their park during the lunch hour, take off their ties and shoes and wriggle their toes in the grass) will no doubt be equally thrilled when they can reclaim the bench, tree, paving or turf that they consider their own.