My Day at the Roadshow!

I am SO glad I was able to go to this event, and rather annoyed at myself for not asking for extra tickets, as so many others did - each person was allowed to ask for up to four tickets, but I only requested one. I was offered another ticket by a friend at 9 pm on Tuesday night, so I phoned five people who I knew would love to go, but they all had other commitments for today. And they all would have enjoyed themselves as much as me, I am sure. The weather forecast for Melbourne was very cold and rainy, with possible hail and thunderstorms. When I left home at 10.30 am it was blue skies and sunshine. When I left to come home at 5 pm, the same! As I was inside the nice warm Exhibition Building all day, I had no idea what was happening outside; apparently it was snowing in some parts of Melbourne!!
Ticket holders were warned there would be long queues, and there certainly were - just like you see on the English Roadshow! But the atmosphere there was so exciting and so much was happening that you just forgot about your cold and aching feet! Everybody in the queues were excited and wanting to talk to the next person about what they had to show, and of course the cameramen were setting up their gear in various spots, causing more excitement if it was near where you were standing! Most of the items that I could see being filmed were ceramics, furniture, or paintings - much like it is in England, so I knew it was most unlikely that I would be chosen. But some of the filming was near my queue, so I suspect I might be in the background in some of their shots!
I had two bites of the cherry on my linen. I was sent first to the queue for "Miscellaneous" items, as they didn't have a specific expert on linen. My 'expert' was the Englishman Tim Wonnacott - tall and dark with a moustache. He didn't really seem to know much about textiles, but he was very friendly and polite about my pieces, saying what I already know, and that is, it is difficult to put a value on them. So I trotted off to join the queue for "Australiana", and saw an Australian gentleman, who was surprisingly enthusiastic about my pieces. He had a close look at the stitching, commenting on the quality of it, and that the linen had been well preserved. He was of the opinion that individual pieces would not be worth a lot of money except to another collector like myself, but he felt that as a collection, it would be of great interest to the Australian Museum. That made my day!
Well, that is more than enough to write about my experiences today, but I am still on a 'high', so please forgive me, if you have actually read this far! I have had lots of lovely comments on my photos today - thanks to all of you. I will respond to them soon - possibly tomorrow when I have come down to earth :-) Footnote: There will be some photos on ebay Australia's collectables discussion board in the next day or so, but my own photos won't be ready to put on here until I finish the film in the camera. Don't hold your breath!