Carnival

The Obsessive Diary · Aug 30, 2026 · 3m

The thing about carnival is it begins long before it begins. And I’m talking for us, the receivers, the partiers and dance-abouters not the givers, the great families of carnival, the community leaders and organisers whose floats and costumes and pans and rehearsals have been at it for months in advance. But for me, who only sees the result, it started with council signs going up that parking is suspended.

Then the boards go up on shops and across stucco fronts; the tourists and influencers who come for the bookshop and blue door and ice cream coloured houses melt away before plywood…