Gai's deaf, I'm incoherent - but Singo says he has "moved on" from racing's great feud

Maxie has just started his usual 10.15pm attack of the rats.  He's in my tiny kitchen. Playing with a pipe cleaner.  He will sleep contentedly for several hours until about this hour, then gets a burst of energy and begins playing.  And racing wildly around the house.  He's a warty little toad when he does this after we've all gone to bed. I'm dodging sleep slightly tonight.  I popped another nerve in my neck at 4am this morning.  It shot straight down my shoulder and I was in despair.  Clearly jumping yesterday on the jarring horse didn't do me any favours.  My shoulder is sore to the touch, my neck is sore and sorry, and I was back to not being able to move much, so it's been tiring.  By the time I picked the kids up it was so bad that I phoned the clinic I've been seeing, and Andrew fitted me in.  As he figured out what was wrong I ended up in tears when it caught me again.  But it felt a lot better after he'd worked on it f...

Gai Waterhouse walks away from an angry John Singleton and a downcast Nash Rawiller What is the role of the Still Photographer?  Well, on track when working in a press capacity, it's to capture the news, and the story of the day.  It's also our job to objectively, accurately and sensitively record for the public record what happened. To capture the emotion, feelings and mood of the moment.  The skill of a truly good still photographer is so much more than just asking your subject to put their arms around each other, and to hold a trophy up, or to give it, or each other, a kiss.  John Singleton and Gai Waterhouse are in the middle of a spectacular and public fallout.  They have been friends for over 30 years, and it's been a highly successful and public friendship.  Their friendship undoubtedly revolved around trust and a belief in the other. I took this image shortly after More Joyous had run the worst race of her career to finish 2nd last in...

I'm stopped with Maxie at Lake George. We are having an uneventful trip home. I've been receiving many truly ace messages about the image of Gai Waterhouse and John Singleton that ran on the front pages of the Sunday Telegraph and Herald Sun. Maxie has worn his harness tied to the passenger seat so that he can sit next to me but not be a complete pest and a menace. And he is having a little look around at the rest stop as well. We will set off again shortly. Driving makes me reflective. And recall things good and bad. There was definitely some of each. Whether in equal parts I guess depends on whose perspective you look at it from. If the Waterhouse v Singleton drama tells us anything, it is that different people can have differing views on the same event or set of events depending on which end of the stick they were getting. I am under no illusions that this image, and its byline, will be differently received in different households in both Sydney and Melbourne where...

In a major drama owner John Singleton announced after More Joyous' unplaced run in the G1 All Aged Stakes that he was transferring all his horses from trainer Gai Waterhouse.  These images say it all. The image will run on the front page of tomorrow's Sunday Telegraph and hopefully in a number of the interstate News Ltd mastheads.   The editor of the paper just messaged me to say that the image is a definite award nominee and to make sure I enter it in all the awards (I only know of the Walkleys, what else is there???).  And yes, I still want to pick up the phone, and wanted to do so during the talks about it, just to check I was doing the right thing.  Old habits..  Dying hard... http://www.heraldsun.com.au/sport/superracing/john-singleton-and-gai-waterhouse-lock-horns-after-failure-of-more-joyous-in-all-aged/story-fn67tkww-1226630657653 On the way to the track, ABBA's Super Trouper came on over Dan's crackly speakers. "Tonight the Super Trouper....

After shouting his head off the whole trip, Maxie and I made it to Sydney.  Before setting off, I did check my oil and water, although I almost didn't do it, thinking 'but I only checked them only 3 days ago!!!' , but then decided I should do the right thing.  I did revert back to the usual cursory glance at my tyres though. Actually, I'm not even sure that I did this.. On arrival I read that champion colt Pierro's new home has been decided.  It was announced late today that he will stand at Coolmore Australia.  This will be a nice base for him, although I do find myself wishing just a little bit that he was going to Arrowfield or Darley, as I tend to spend more time at these farms as a general rule.  I like to hope I'll be seeing a bit more of this wonderful colt though over the coming years as a stallion at stud. I am going to try to head to bed soon.  I have been sleeping terribly and therefore staying up much later than I normally do or is good f...

Another famous and successful thoroughbred family that I have a reasonably complete library of is the family of the champion racemare, More Joyous.  She is a bay mare, foaled in 2005, which makes her a year older than Black Caviar. More Joyous is by the great American black stallion (and one of "my Boys") More Than Ready.  She's out of the Sunday Silence mare Sunday Joy, who was out of the grand broodmare Joie Denise (who died not all that long ago). Sunday Joy won the AJC Oaks in and is a half sister to Tuesday Joy. All 4 mares were/are owned by John Singleton and reside at his gorgeous Strawberry Hills Farm at Mt White, NSW. More Joyous and Nash Rawiller.  Futurity Stakes, on Blue Diamond Day.  26 February 2011.  One of my favourite images of the great mare. More Joyous, like her contemporary Black Caviar, is now closer to the end of her career than the beginning. But it is one I've chronicled in a similar fashion to the way I have documente...