Palegoldenrod

I’ve just returned from the ANZAC Day Dawn service at the local beach. It was a good service, as usual. At least I think it was. It was difficult to hear over the pouring rain on the umbrellas of those around me and the wind.

Despite people being packed in fairly well and almost all people having umbrellas and/or rain coats most of us still ended up with soggy shoes and soaking wet trousers. Ah well, it could have been worse

What was funny to watch was the mind games that occurred because of umbrellas. You see, if you are in close to other people and you put your umbrella up first,� the edge of your umbrella is going to be over someone’s head, and he will almost certainly be dripped on. So then he puts up his umbrella (with the edge underneath yours) and then the edge of his umbrella is near your shoulder and you get the run-off from both yours and his umbrellas.

There is also the knock-on effect, because now his umbrella is also dripping on someone else’s shoulder and so it goes on. You might try to outmanouvre him, by closing your umbrella for a short time then putting it up again (so your edge is under his and your roles are reversed, him copping the run-off from your and his umbrellas). Or you might try to lift the offending corner of his umbrella to encourage the drips to run off elsewhere, or you might blatantly push the corner of your umbrella under his, not even trying to hide your tactics.

The worst thing is that if all of the people around you put up their umbrellas and you don’t, rather than being safe from the rain you are just more likely to have them all dripping on you! But if you don’t get in first then you can’t really politely put up an umbrella in crowded company with 4 or 5 already up around you, so you are stuck.

If you are like the group of young guys who were standing near me, you might even take this opportunity to attack your friends, positioning your umbrella to deliver a cold gush directly to the neck of your best mate.

In any case, it was a strange, amusing thing to watch – umbrellas going up and down, pointed looks being passed around. Me in the middle of a sea of umbrellas but not game enough to put up my own in the press of the crowd, glad of my wet weather gear but still in soggy shoes.