SATURDAY afternoons in the Lithgow CBD are far from the busiest spot in town. Come midday there's not much to generate foot traffic apart from pubs and cafes and the Main Street sidewalks are sparsely populated as shoppers head off to sporting fixtures or to prowl the off-street shopping centres.
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But thanks to one lateral thinking, community minded Lithgow woman and her friends there has been a welcome change.
Last weekend a busy market day in Cook Plaza injected new life into a CBD Saturday.
And it worked well, not in competition with the popular farmers markets at the Gang Gang Gallery (they're on Thursdays) but offering an eclectic mix of clothing and curios, garden items and stuff you'd never realised you needed.
It was the first full on market day after the previous attempt was wrecked by abysmal weather. Now it's planned, apparently, to be a monthly event to truly test the fortitude of patrons in mid winter.
Anyway it was a good initiative for Lithgow and we wish it success. Just don't mention those long term empty flower beds in the plaza that represent Council's interest in the place.
Now how about a regular trash and treasure market. They're always popular as the Show Society discovered a few weeks back.
Windfall
MUCH excitement in Lithgow this week when a division two lotto win came our way. It was a $40 million Oz Lotto draw that had three winning entries so our win netted a cool $13 million plus some handy loose change for some lucky punters. Whispers coming from the coal face suggest the happy holders were a 15 member syndicate. The winning ticket was dispensed by Vin and Zen at the Top End Newsagency.
So far so good
SO Winter for 2024 arrives tomorrow but with the glorious late Autumn experience of the past couple of weeks you could be forgiven for hoping that this would be the new norm in the era of climate change. Warm sunny days were unseasonably suited to outdoor activities until the late afternoon chill and freezing nights jolted us back into reality. Alas, if the consistent forecasts are correct we'll be getting soaked by the time this edition hits the streets and those daytime temperatures will be back to what we normally expect. Such is life in the mountains. And in case you were going to ask, the shortest day (aka the winter solstice) is now just three weeks away.
Out in the coal
WHEN you have a friend in need it's accepted that you help if you can. So what's going on with Albo's lot in dodging an urgent Ukraine request for a shipment of Australian coal? In fact we were downright rude in not even replying to the first request back in December. They're not asking for guns. Not asking for bombs. Just coal and we've got plenty of that. All very peculiar and no way to treat a friend in need.
Insomnia?
YOU really had to sympathise with the residents of Coalbrook and Albert Streets this week with council's night time re-sealing program, complete with glaring floodlights and the inescapable rumble of machinery. Why it was necessary to do the job at night (several nights) is something of a mystery to us but there's surely a good reason.
