Johnno

So what do I do?

2010-04-21T01:37:00.004+10:00

Do I click through all my old dusty links and see who's still around.....or start afresh?

Hmmmmm..... Actually I was looking through the old blog to find out some info on a post made quite a few years back. It's become rather a useful archive.

Had a look through the stats and 25,000 have dropped by to say hello. Thanks! Hope you found something of interest.

So perhaps it's enough on the writing sabbatical and time to jump back in.

Here's my latest

Bamboo through the window

2009-11-22T07:51:00.002+11:00

Almost two years.

I've been on Flickr.

Wind Combs

2007-12-23T01:39:00.000+11:00

I've done a bit of post processing work on a photo I took in October at San Sebastian (Donostia) Spain. It's in the heart of Basque territory and the artist Eduardo Chillida (Txillida in Basque) said it was one of his favourites.

It's an unusual sculpture, set in a smallish rocky cliff in La Concha bay........ rusting away 'til one day it will be gone. Nature taking its toll on art I suppose.

The pic seems to be popular on Flickr so I thought I'd post it here.

The Alan Greenspan Mask

2007-12-18T09:13:00.001+11:00

Radiohead - Reckoner (Thumbs Down Webcast)

2007-12-16T22:23:00.001+11:00

Smashed!

2007-11-26T11:02:00.001+11:00

National election downunder........ John Howard is dead, long live the new guy.

I was working on Saturday night with the election results on a TV in the meal room. The boys whooped it up when the Channel 7 animated "Tower of Power" whistled past 76. This was the magic number that meant that the conservative party had been booted out. "Take that you bastards." and a many more bluer expressions were thrown around. It was priceless.

The results were so good that it even appears that Howard has lost his own seat in Bennelong, a traditional white collar well to do area of Sydney.

And in a round up of newspaper editorials, Crikey has gathered the following:

The Australian: Rudd should stay on track
On Saturday, the Australian people voted the government out as much, perhaps more, as they embraced Mr Rudd. For all the assumptions of a bright new era that are being foisted on Mr Rudd by the green Left, and the desire for a return to the 1950s expressed by class-war warriors in the union movement, the prime minister-elect has given us every indication that he will deliver more of the same economic management strategies the previous government gave us.
The Age: Labor's ascendancy as the Coalition crashes and burns

AUSTRALIA'S political landscape has changed utterly. The Howard era is over. Emphatically it is over. Voters have delivered to John Howard and the Coalition a resounding verdict of renunciation. They did it across the continent and they did it personally. Mr Howard is likely to lose Bennelong, which he has held for 33 years. It will be only the second time that a prime minister has done so. Stanley Bruce was the other in 1929. Mr Howard will have to live with this legacy: that he will enter the annals of history as much for this ignominy as for anything he has achieved. He has no one to blame but himself. On Saturday night he took responsibility for defeat. He could hardly have done otherwise.
Sydney Morning Herald: Howard goes out a fighter, now for the aftershock
John Howard gave one of the great speeches of his career in signalling its close. Some may see the result in Bennelong - still in doubt, but likely to fall to Labor - as an ignominious end for one who has been a giant of Liberal and Australian politics. It is not. Some of history's greatest heroes have gone down fighting; so it was with John Howard. As successive redistributions transformed his seat from the blue-ribbon Liberal stronghold he inherited from Sir John Cramer in 1974 to a marginal proposition in 2007, Mr Howard spurned the temptation to move somewhere safer. His prestige will have helped shore up his party's support as Bennelong's voters started to look elsewhere; if it was not enough this time to hold the seat for the Liberals, it was not for want of leadership - or effort, or courage - from Australia's second-longest serving Prime Minister.
Courier Mail: Time to prove people’s choice
CONGRATULATIONS to Kevin Rudd and his team on an emphatic victory. It not only vindicated the stance of this newspaper and many others for a political renewal with a forward-looking government, but also reinforced the importance of Queensland on the national stage … The magnitude of the transfer in the power base from the traditional centres of Sydney and Melbourne and their entrenched networks should not be under-estimated. It is not so much an anomaly as a paradigm shift that says a lot about the future direction of Australia.
Herald Sun: Dawn of a new PM
Now Mr Howard is gone and the man we expected -- and the Libs needed -- to lead is also halfway out the door. Peter Costello, at 50, cites a need for "generational change" when the Coalition -- and the country -- most need his experience and talent to scrutinise the new Government. The Prime Minister-elect, also 50, is a 21st century leader. We can only hope his policy work will be for bedrock modernisation.
Daily Telegraph: The challenge is in the delivery
IT is Mr Rudd who has been given the opportunity to be at the forefront of "generational change". He and his party were elected on the basis of a promise of a better, brighter, fairer country, a country which - on Mr Rudd's own assessment - is already pretty good. So the challenge is before him - and every Australian will wish him success. But they will expect him to deliver.

Don't expect the Murdoch run newspapers to offer much in cloying support as they have done with the Bush and Howard regimes.

A cool way to fix neck pain

2007-11-17T20:39:00.000+11:00

I found this here at a Bowen Therapy website. I found it really works, especially for a shoulder blade pain I sometimes get....... which is (I think) neck related. I'm reasoning, the neck muscle tenses up and pulls the shoulder blade upwards and I think perhaps a nerve is getting pinched in there somewhere.

Sad thing is, I'm finding that I'm injuring myself whilst sleeping on the couch. If ever there was a sign of reaching the autumn years, that is it. WARNING: SLEEPING COULD BE INJURIOUS TO YOU HEALTH.

Anyway the words are here and there's some diagrams at the site above. Their reasoning seems to make some sort of pragmatic sense.

Figure 1 shows a person with pain that goes from just below the head and down the left side of the neck. The pain restricts the rotation of the head to the left.

The cause of the pain is usually a tight (hypertonus) muscle with a small knot deep within it. The knot is cramped muscle due to an accumulation of lactic acid. This impacts on the nerves within the muscle causing the pain. The aim of the exercise is to release the lactic acid without further aggravating the condition.

The anatomical drawing, Figure 2, shows the area of concern.

1. The area within the affected muscle (levator scapulae).

2. Shoulder blade (scapula).

3. Clavicle.

4. The head of the bone in the upper arm, (humerus).

5. A cut-away section of the major muscle that reaches across each shoulder and down from the top of the neck to the lower part of the back (Trapezius).

Area 1, though not apparently related to the neck pain, is the part that needs to be located and treated.

Figure 3 illustrates the position of the hand and fingers needed to relieve the discomfort.

The left hand is positioned over the right shoulder, the middle and index finger gently resting on the area just above the inner top edge of the shoulder blade. The right arm is supported in a relaxed position on the lap.

It is important that the two fingers of the left hand are laid flat on the skin and apply only light pressure. (See Figure 4.) Undue pressure will irritate the muscle and make the neck problem worse. (Paradoxically this inducement of pain can give relief for an indeterminate period as the body releases endorphins, the body’s natural painkiller. However, like many painkillers, it does not necessarily remove the root cause of the problem.)

Figure 5 shows the means of applying the release technique.

To locate the spot slowly turn the head, without going into pain, from right to left. A raised area about 2 to 3 cms across should be felt moving under the fingers. If not, relocate the fingers slightly and repeat the movement of the head until the area is located. Maintain the pressure and rotate the head from side to side, going further around the arc each time, until full pain-free movement of the head and neck has been achieved. Remove the fingers from the shoulder and check to see if full rotation of the head is possible. If not, replace the fingers and repeat the procedure. If the pain has not dissipated at the third attempt then seek medical advice. In order to balance the neck muscles treat the other shoulder in the same manner.

Copyright reserved. Roy Wilson - Time to Treat.

Back from Europe and back to blogging.

2007-11-17T18:14:00.001+11:00

Above photo was taken beside Lyn (Lake) Gwynant in Wales. Best of about 8 shots which I had to squeeze in.

So I'm back from Europe and still getting my "Australian legs", trying to get the house in order and dealing with working on night shift. Hmmmmm unfortunately this was put on the backburner so I'll have to go a-visitin' on some old blogging brethren and sistren and let you all know I'm alive. Sorry about that. Everything still seems out of whack two weeks later.

I read somewhere it is bad form to go AWOL and post semi-regularly. Thing is I've had so much to write about I haven't known where to start. Took advice from a friend of mine who suggested, "Just bloody type!".

So here I am typing and it seems to be going well.

I've been rather busy on flickr too. Catching up on a backlog of 1400+ photos, trying to create some semblance of order out of them. So THAT has been another prioiry but this has been nagging me to get back. Oh in good news I've been shortlisted by Mercedes Benz Germany for aa photo of mine to go in a coffee table book they are producing. Could be my first paid commision.

Anyway I'll try to get some sort of semi-regular deal going again. I promise!

Oh, changed the title of my blog seeing so many people were linking me as Johnno :)

Now off to stir the pot at Scruggs, Peter, Golby and other establishments of ill-repute.

Azure I

2007-10-27T22:48:00.001+10:00

Azure II

2007-10-27T22:47:00.001+10:00

Britain

2007-10-22T07:43:00.001+10:00

Britain, originally uploaded by johnno30.

Somewhere in Spain

2007-10-20T05:42:00.000+10:00

Hmmmmmm.....

Haven´t blogged much because I´ve been in Europe and the Internet cafes are few and far between. I´m currently in San Sebastian (I think an upward inflection or tilde should be there somewhere) where there about 250 bars in the old quarter and the tapas and red wine are flowing freely. Shame I can´t understand a word of it.

Anyhoo..... I´ll report in later when I get home. The laptop died, the mobile phone doesn´t work and the exchange rate is awful. Nevertheless I´m having a great time. I can´t upload photos and have about 800+ photos to share when I get back.

Nevertheless I know the basics. Uno Cerevas Por Favor........ I´m getting quite good at that one.

The APEC Fence

2007-09-05T16:58:00.001+10:00

The APEC Fence, originally uploaded by Jarod_Needs_Sleep.

This makes a rather bizarre contrast to the Adelaide parade by the Beatles in the 60's I posted below.

As the photographer Jarod_Needs_Sleep wrote.

"I'm not sure if this is on the good side or the evil side.

APEC 07: Welcome to (the cage of) Sydney!

2007-09-05T16:53:00.001+10:00

APEC 07: Welcome to (the cage of) Sydney!, originally uploaded by Rain.Forest.

This may give an idea of the cage around the city streets to keep the riff-raff out...... or the riff-raff in.....depending on which side of the fence one is on!

The Beatles in Adelaide

2007-09-05T15:53:00.000+10:00

Picked up a copy of Mark Haywards "The Beatles in Australia" which should be named "The Beatles in Adelaide". Hayward picked up a series of photos at Christies and Sothebys auction houses of the Adelaide concert. They really give a feel of the madness and mayhem that surrounded the Fab Four's whirlwind tour of South Australia.

Originally they were going to miss Adelaide however DJ Bob Francis (now a shock jock) saw fit to arrange a little bit of a detour from their Eastern Australian gigs. Francis recalls in an interview at the Australian Broacasting Commision.

You know, in 1964 I was working as a disc jockey, I had a bit more hair in those days, and we had some fabulous news -- The Beatles were coming to Australia. The bad news is they weren't coming to Adelaide and I had to get a little help from my friends. And we worked out that through the power of radio, we could change the course of history. The excitement of The Beatles was just amazing. They had five number one hits in the Top 40 chart. It had never been known before. And so when we had the information that The Beatles weren't coming to South Australia, that really got me mad. And I thought, is it worthwhile asking on air why don't we get some signatures together. Get some signatures together? We got 80,000 signatures in about three weeks, which was just marvellous. The telegram came back within a couple of days saying, "Beatles now coming to Adelaide." And that was just fabulous news. I'd never seen it happen before. People actually camped from the Friday night after work and the Monday morning the tickets were going to go on sale.

We set up a studio on the terrace to be able to have music playing out of the trees in speakers. Ah, people were bopping all over the place. It was just such a -- a fantastic atmosphere. And the lovely part was everybody behaved themselves. There was no booze, it was just a different era, a different time.

Fabulous time. Well, the stage was set. 11 June 1964, they said, "Bob, would you like to go to Sydney?" And I said, "Yes, sir." Off to Sydney, on a Fokker Friendship, to meet The Beatles. (Laughs) Just the greatest thing in my world had happened on that day.

And here's where it gets a little interesting in Johnno world. My Mum and Dad were dating and had not yet been engaged. Anyway, Mum wanted tickets and my grandmother obliged by being one of those who camped out. I took a browse of the book and found a photo of her in front of John Martin's on Rundle Street.

She's the old lady in the black overcoat at the front of the queue.

Here's the closeup. The old establishment type with the horn rimmed glasses, tie, tweed jacket and lapel pin looks remakably like my Grandfather too. I have no idea who the elegant dear in the white jacket is! Their persistance resulted in front row tickets for Ma and Pa Johnno, Dad was unimpressed by the concert, unable to hear anything due to the screaming of fans.

From an ABC website

Some 300,000 people, roughly one-third of Adelaide's population, lined the route from Adelaide Airport to the city to welcome the boys from Liverpool. John Lennon later described the Adelaide welcome as "the most exciting thing that's ever happened to us in the way of crowds and appearances...especially the drive down that road, the Anzac Highway, yes, I'll never forget that".

And here's a shot of the motorcade as it crawls along King William Street.

Here's another pic from the book John Lennon and Ernie Sigley with a copy of John's book "In his own Write". Current signed editions going for around US$6000 ! From Wiki

Sigley is especially remembered for his 1964 association with the Adelaide leg of The Beatles tour of Australia. His intelligent questioning of The Beatles during media meetings, was a relief for the group after the banal media probing.

In one famous press conference, Sigley's questioning of The Beatles about their rock influences, and being able to discuss them (e.g. Buddy Holly), bought about an enthusiastic response from John Lennon, which contrasted strongly from all the questions asked by other interviewers during the conference.

It is clear that Sigley knew what his fellow media associates didn't - The Beatles weren't a passing fad, and chose to treat them accordingly. Sigley's questioning allowed The Beatles, in 1964 at the height of their fame, to put on record, a rarely honest response to questions that are now historically more important than any of the questions being asked of them during their breakthrough period.

Lastly a shot of the guy responsible for pulling a lot of it together. A baby faced Bob Francis looking dapper in his tweed jacket signing autographs for some female fans!

Billy Bragg on Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson

2007-09-04T00:54:00.001+10:00

Rookwood Necropolis

2007-08-13T12:16:00.000+10:00

For some reason I found myself once again in the Catholic section of Rookwood Necropolis. It's the largest cemetery in Australia and for whatever reason I find some sort of peace there.

I had my camera in the car and the sun was just beginning to set so I took a few pics.

These two are my favourites. the one above has an IHS on it supposedly the first three letters in Greek for Iησους (Iēsous)...... don't see that spelling in the King James. It's also said to stand for the latin phrase in hoc signo, short for in hoc signo vinces (in this sign you shall conquer).....or Iesus Hominum Salvator (Jesus saviour of men).

Like most things Catholic the real meaning seems to be have lost in time.

The below is a nice image with the background out of focus.

The little guy bites back.

2007-08-10T21:15:00.000+10:00

Major bookchain sent out the following letter:

Angus & Robertson

30th July 2007

Michael Rakusin
TOWER BOOKS
Unit 2 / 17 Rodborough Road
Frenches Forrest
NSW 2086

Dear Michael

I am writing to inform you of some of the changes to the way we manage our business.

We have recently completed a piece of work to rank our suppliers in terms of the net profit they generate for our business. We have concluded that we have far too many suppliers, and over 40% of our supplier agreements fall below our requirements in terms of profit earned. At a time when the cost of doing business continues to rise, I’m sure you can understand that this is an unpalatable set of circumstances for us, and as such we have no option but to act quickly to remedy the situation.

Accordingly, we will be rationalising our supplier numbers and setting a minimum earnigs ration of income to trade purchases that we expect to achieve from our suppliers.

I am writing to you because TOWER BOOKS falls into this category of unacceptable profitability.

As a consequence we would invite you to pay the attached invoice by Aug 17th 2007. The payment represents the gap fro your your business, and moves it from an unacceptable level of profitability, to above our minimum threshold.

If we fail to receive your payment by this time we will have no option but to remove you from our list of authorised suppliers, and you will be unable to complete any further transactions with us until such time as the payment is made.

I have also attached a proforma for you to complete wand return to me, with your proposed terms of trade for our financial year commencing Sept 1st 2007. We have the following expectations:

All agreements contain a standard rebate, a growth rebate and a minimum co-op commitment to enable participation in our marketing activity.

Growth rebates activate as soon as our purchases with you increase by $1 on the previous year.

All rebates are paid quarterly for the previous quarter’s performance, you must make sure that your remittance, with calculations, is received by us by the 7th of the month following the preceding quarter. Any remittances not received by this date will attract a daily 5% interest charge.

I am also including a copy of our ratecard, and our marketing calendar, to enable you to begin planning your promotional participation now.

If you would like to discuss this with me in more detail, I am delighted to confirm an appointment with you at 1.00pm on Friday 17th August for 10 minutes at my offices at 379 Collins St, Melbourne.

Best Regards

[signed]

Charlie Rimmer
ARW Group Commercial Manager

Enc: A&R Ratecard
A&R Marketing calendar
Trading Terms Proforma
Invoice

Small publisher replied:

6 August 2007

Mr Charlie Rimmer
ARW Group Commercial Manager
14th Floor, 379 Collins Street,
Melbourne, VIC 3000

Dear Mr Rimmer

We are in receipt of your letter of 30 July 2007 terminating our further supply to Angus & Robertson. As you have requested, we will cancel all Angus & Robertson Company orders on 17 August and will desist from any further supply to your stores.

I have to say that my initial response on reading your letter as to how you propose to "manage" your business in the future was one of voluble hilarity, I literally burst out laughing aloud. My second response was to note the unmitigated arrogance of your communication, I could not actually believe I was reading an official letter from Angus & Robertson on an Angus & Robertson letterhead.

My reply to you will perforce be a lengthy one. I hope you will take the trouble to read it, you may learn something. Then again, when I look at the level of real response we have had from Angus & Robertson over the past six or so years, I somehow doubt it.

The first thing I would say to you is that arrogance of the kind penned by you in your letter of 30 July is an unenviable trait in any officer of any company, no matter how important that individual thinks himself or his company, no matter how dominant that company may be in its market sector. Business has a strange habit of moving in cycles: today's villain may be tomorrow's hero. It is quite possible to part from a business relationship in a pleasant way leaving the door open for future engagement. Sadly, in this case, you have slammed and bolted it.

More to the point, however, we have watched our business with Angus & Robertson dwindle year upon year since 2000. We had to wear the cost of sub-economic ordering from you through ownership changes, SAP installation, new management, and stock overhang. In summary our business with you has dropped from over $1.2 million at the end of 2000 to less than $600,000 in 2007.

You would be quite correct to question whether our offering to the market had changed in any way. The answer can be derived from the fact that during the same period our business with Dymocks, Book City, QBD and Borders continued to grow in double digits, our business with your own franchise stores has grown healthily, and our overall business during the same period has grown by more than 50%.

Six years ago we were allowed to send reps to your company stores and do stock checks. Then these were "uninvited" and we had to rely on monthly rep calls to your Buying Office. Subsequently even that was too much trouble; your Buying Office was too busy to see us, so we were asked to make new title submissions electronically. Every few months the new submission template became more and more complex. This year, we have been allowed quarterly visits to your Buying Office at which we were to be given the opportunity to sell to all your Category Managers. At the first, we did indeed see all of the Category Managers - but they didn't buy any of the titles offered. At the second, one Category manager was available, and again no purchases resulted. At the last (only last week), two Category managers attended. Through all of this, your overworked and under resourced Buying Department never got to see, let alone read, an actual book. While one may be forgiven for believing that Angus & Robertson is actually a company purveying "Sale" signs, I do believe you are still in the book business?

That Angus & Robertson is struggling for margin does not surprise me. It amazes me that the message has not become clear to your "management": there are only so many costs you can cut, there is only so much destiny you can put in the hands of a computer system, there are only so many sweetheart deals you can do with large suppliers. After that, in order to prosper one actually has to know one's product and have an appropriately staffed buying department. Most importantly, one has to train sales people of competence. You will never beat the DDSs at their cost cutting game, you will only prosper by putting "books" back into Angus & Robertson. And it would seem to me paramount to stop blaming suppliers for your misfortunes, trying ever harder to squeeze them to death, and actually focus on your core incompetencies in order to redress them.

How a business that calls itself a book business is going to do without titles such as the Miles Franklin Prize winning book or titles like Rich Dad Poor Dad (according to this week's Sydney Morning Herald it is still the fifth best selling business title in Australia nine years after publication) is beyond me. And how in good conscience Australia's self-purported largest chain of book shops proposes to exclude emerging Australian writers who are represented by the smaller distributors, is an equal mystery.

We too have expectations Mr Rimmer. We have had the same expectations for many years, none of which Angus & Robertson have been willing to deliver:

â€¢That we are treated with equal respect to the larger publishers within the obvious parameters of commercial reality;
â€¢That your Buying Department is able and willing to assess our books with equal seriousness to those of the big publishers and buy them appropriately;
â€¢That you recognise the fundamental differences between the smaller distributors and the larger publishers and stop demanding of us terms that we are unable to deliver;
â€¢That you would support and help develop Australian literature.

Had you made any effort to meet these expectations you would have found the niche we should have occupied in your business, as have all other book shops, and you would have found our contribution to the profitability of your business would have been dramatically different.

In summary, we reject out of hand this notion that somehow, even giving you 45% discount on a Sale or Return basis, with free freight to each of your individual stores, where we make less than half of that on the same book, puts us in the "category of unacceptable profitability". We have seen Angus & Robertson try this tactic before - about 12 years ago Angus & Robertson decided that unless we gave them a 50% discount, they would not buy from us any longer. We refused. Angus & Robertson desisted from buying from us for seven months. We survived, Angus & Robertson came back cap in hand.

We have seen Myer effectively eliminate smaller suppliers. We survived and prospered but look at the Myer Book Departments today.

We have seen David Jones decide that it had too many publishers to deal with and to exclude the smaller suppliers. We survived and prospered but look at the David Jones Book Departments today.

David Jones and Myer sell other goods; Angus & Robertson does not.

That the contents of your letter of 30 July are both immoral and unethical, I have no doubt. That they probably contravene the Trade Practices Act, I shall leave to the ACCC to determine. (Five percent interest PER DAY !!!)

If you wish to discuss any of the contents hereof you may call my secretary for an appointment at my office in Frenchs Forest. I shall be marginally more generous than you and at least allow you to pick a convenient time.

Michael Rakusin
Director
Tower Books Pty Ltd
Carpentaria, Alexis Wright : Winner of 50th Anniversary Miles Franklin Literary Prize, 2007

Copy: Graeme Samuel, Chairman, ACCC
Rod Walker, Chairman, ARW Group
Ian Draper, ARW Group Managing Director
Rickard Gardell, Managing Director, Pacific Equity Partners
Simon Pillar, Managing Director, Pacific Equity Partners
Barbara Cullen, CEO, ABA
Maree McCaskill, CEO, APA

Note: The ACCC is the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, a guvmint trade practices organization. The ABA is the Australian Bookseller Association.

The reply is worthy of a Miles Franklin award itself!

World Clock

2007-08-08T16:08:00.000+10:00

Poodwaddle.com

AnimaMundi Series I: Le moine et le poisson

2007-08-08T00:30:00.001+10:00

Paranoia or how to Effectively shut down a city.

2007-08-06T13:26:00.000+10:00

Sydney is holding the APEC(Asia-Pacific Economic Forum) from September 8-9 2007. I was thinking of going down to get some photos but there seems to be a general feeling of "STAY AWAY" in big red letters.

Nevertheless, there will be people going for a sticky beak and protests and all other types of things they normally wouldn't be doing if the spotlight wasn't on Sydney for those couple of days. Sunday that would normally be spent in a cafe, browsing a bookshop, nursing a hangover, making love, or mowing the lawn....... seems to hold a certain attraction to some of getting arrested singing Kumba Yah. I think I'll stay away.

Anyway, I did a quick round up to see what I could find on the security measures to look after those leaders in the free world; the word "paradox" comes to mind.

SOME of Sydney's biggest hospitals will postpone or cut elective surgery for five days during the Asia-Pacific leaders' summit in a health disaster plan being implemented under a veil of secrecy.

The presence of heavily armed SAS (Specal Air Service) troops could complement unprecedented powers for police to manage security at September's Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in Sydney. HEAVILY-armed SAS troops could be ordered on to Sydney's streets to maintain control during the APEC summit later this year, a military law expert has warned. This move, which includes orders for the troopers to shoot to kill..........

More than 300 high definition CCTV cameras have been placed in potential terrorist targets in the lead-up to Sydney's APEC Summit, acting Premier John Watkins says. The new cameras bring to 6,400 the total number of cameras watching people using buses, trains and ferries. The cameras, 200 of which use cutting-edge facial recognition technology, have been installed across the city in buses, ferry and train stations

Three Sydney train stations and sections of the CBD will be shut down for three days in September during the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit.Three city circle train stations - St James, Museum and Circular Quay - will all be closed for the three days.

Holiday packages with special deals for various attractions will be used to lure Sydneysiders away from the city during the APEC long weekend.

Last year the NSW and federal governments declared Friday, September 7, 2007, would be a public holiday for employees who work in the Sydney metropolitan area, to help minimise disruption during the APEC summit.

Mobile phone calls in Sydney's CBD will be blocked by a sophisticated counter-terrorism measure to prevent bomb attacks during US President George W Bush's September APEC visit.

Concrete barriers to be set up in Sydney's CBD during next month's APEC meeting are intended to protect world leaders and divert traffic, says the head of the summit's police security command.

State Transit buses have been converted into "mobile holding cells" to be used during the summit in September.The buses have a regular capacity of about 70 sitting and standing passengers. The conversion has involved placing a panel over the back window, replacing passenger windows with wire mesh and installing what amounts to a mini-prison inside each bus.

High performance jet skis and rigid hull inflatable boats (RHIBS) have been provided by the Howard Government to NSW Police to enhance marine security arrangements for APEC, Attorney-General Philip Ruddock announced today. (There's a harbour exclusion zone apparently)

In a decision branded "pedantic" and "overkill" by recreational flyers, all aircraft - including remote control planes and model helicopters - will be banned within 80km of the Sydney CBD.

The Australian Defence Force has said it will deploy Black Hawk helicopters, F/A-18 Hornet fighters and naval ships to intercept any aerial and seaborne threats during the conference. The Chief of the Defence Force, Air Chief Marshal Angus Houston, said a force of 1500 full-time and reserve troops would assist the security operation, which is being overseen by NSW police.

THE SPP from Moff

2007-08-05T21:09:00.001+10:00

Moff muses. Same stuff is being tried in Sydney during the Apec Summit. Closing down the whole damn city.
I dunno the paranoia in the "free world" seems to be catching.

Concrete fence to encircle Sydney for APEC
Thursday Aug 2 06:00 AEST

By ninemsn staff

A huge concrete wall will be built around Sydney's CBD in a bid to protect potential targets from terrorists and protestors during next month's APEC meetings.

Dubbed the "ring of steel", the 2.8m high concrete-reinforced fence will shield well-known businesses such as McDonald's and Starbucks amid fears they could be attacked by demonstrators.

Cranes will begin installing the fence around the Hotel Inter-Continental at the corner of Bridge and Macquarie Sts over five days from August 31. The wall will surround much of the city's center, according to the Daily Telegraph.

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The idea of dividing a city with concrete is reminiscent of the Berlin Wall, an iconic symbol of the Cold War which split the European city for 28 years.

The wall is just one of several radical security measures being taken ahead of US President George W Bush's arrival in Sydney on September 5 for the annual summit.

As Bush's presidential motorcade makes its way through the city, a helicopter equipped with signal-jamming equipment will shut down mobile phone calls in the area to cut down the risk of a remote control bomb.

Forty permanent loudspeakers are being installed around the city to inform residents what to do in the event of a terrorist attack.

Police have bought a $600,000 water cannon for use if protests get violent and more than 30 buses will serve as mobile detention cells.

Chief executive officer of the NSW Business Chamber Kevin MacDonald said the decision to build the wall is understandable.

"Given the experience of other major meetings of world leaders in recent years, I can understand why the police have decided to erect a temporary fence," Mr MacDonald said.

"The fence is temporary and hopefully will not be needed."

Galah for Peter Le Other

2007-07-24T20:11:00.001+10:00

Here we have a Galah (named by the aboriginals) or Eolophus roseicapillus (named by the scientists) which are usually found on the flat plains feasting on all manner of grass seeds. Don't very often see these in the mountains.

Lovely plumage!

Woodford Academy and Gum Tree

2007-07-22T18:02:00.000+10:00

"Hello I'm Johnno and I'm a blogger.....it's been three weeks since my last post." Thanks Golby!

This was very difficult to post process, I tried about ten versions before getting a version I was semi-happy-with. Either the stars and lens flare disappeared or the sky turned a very noisy speckled sort of effect with a bright yellow gum tree due to the strong yellow spotlight.

Large version is here

I may have to go back and try again. OK I'm off to post some comments.

Woodford Academy

2007-07-22T18:00:00.000+10:00

Three images -/+ 2EV then desaturated and given HDR treatment.

Hazelbrook Bridge

2007-07-22T17:57:00.001+10:00

The new Olympus camera is wonderful for night shots. No post processing required, this is a raw image taken basking in a strong sodium street light. 4 second exposure.

Victory

2007-07-22T17:53:00.000+10:00

Statue of Spyros Louis (the Greek with the French surname) who won the first marathon in the modern Olympiad. The statue is down at Brighton-le-Sands on Botany Bay Sydney.

Restoring Le Jardin Pt 2

2007-07-22T17:14:00.001+10:00

Well here's the garden in Panoramic view, doesn't look like I've done much but I've dug out a heap of Fishbone Ferns (the link is from sydneyweeds dot org dot au!) which were growing wild near the maroon car. The big patch of dirt near the tree was where they were, the roots form a matted clump approximately three inches thick.....it was heavy going!

I've levelled out the general area and added a couple of lavender beds and a new rose bed which was once a pond.

There's still a log to the right of this picture which will require a chainsaw taken to it.....it's pretty much immovable (or is that un-movable......I'll just say inert)

Here's a pic looking East. There's a couple of Lavendar beds. Inner bed is French Lavender and the outer one is Lace Lavender (lavandula stoechas). At present I'm just getting the bones together before doing some fine touches such as borders and levelling frames etc.

Whoops......

2007-06-26T15:28:00.000+10:00

Went and took a look at the aground ship Pasha Bulka at Nobby's Beach yesterday. Took a few snapshots of it too.

Restoring le jardin.

2007-06-19T17:16:00.000+10:00

A lamish excuse for not blogging....I've been doing a spot of gardening.

I was trying to find a "before" shot of this rather awful patch of mountain jungle which I am trying to transform into its glory days. Some of the folks who have been around here for a few decades said the original owner had a wonderful garden. There seems to be a lot of gardeners around here so I'd thought i'd better do the community thing.

So anyway, here's the best photo I could find of the garden before..... it was so bad that I never took a full photo of it. It was basically a heap of rather invasive Kikyu grass, some equally as invasive Fishbone fern and some other sort of horrible tuber on some pretty poor soil. We had some rain around here, so it was the perfect opportunity to dig a lot of this crap out whilst the soil was moist and loose. I've been rather used to digging in rock hard soil the past few months.

So, when I was digging around trying to get out a largish Cypress Pine (you can see the rootball in front of the car) and replacing it with the smaller weeping Japanese Maple pictured above, I discovered an old brick path underneath about a foot of soil. Digging it out was particularly difficult, nevertheless there seemed to be a pattern there. With the rain, scooping off that top 12 inches was considerably easier although one of the previous owners (a builder) decided to bury bricks in the bloody garden. In total I've found about twenty, laid flat neatly in the soil. Anyway after digging out bricks and other assorted building site refuse, here's what I found.

So, I've thrown in some roses and bulbs and some smaller shrubs around the maple, I've also made a small rock border around the maple which looks kind of hokey at this stage. Topped the whole lot with some sugar cane mulch which smells good enough to eat. And here it is so far.

Apologies for the winter light. You can just make out the maple tree bereft of leaves near the hose. The sugar can mulch is extremely thirsty, so a good three days rain has fixed that. Notice I've also hacked back a big bunch of fishbone fern in the background. the stuff is horrible with a two inch thich mat of roots underlying the whole deal, will take a lot of digging out to bring it back to some sense of order.

I should have some more photos of le jardin come spring!

The roses list: Just Joey, Fleuro, Bettina, Blue Moon, Olympic Torch, Canary, Chrysler Imperial, Sylvia, Fragrant Plum, Chicago Peace and Pristine.

HDR Pepsi

2007-06-19T17:13:00.000+10:00

Not my photos......

2007-06-18T19:18:00.000+10:00

.....but cool anyway. Click them for a larger view, theres a demotivation poster opportunity there somewhere.

Nobbys Beach: We operate from Nobbys Beach as it is the safest beach in Newcastle. This location offers a perfect beach break for learn to surf, we nestle in to the corner that faces north east which provides consistent waves protected by a southern headland, sheltered from prevailing winds and larger swells.

Ummmmmm..... Now they have a bloody big ship in their way.

Small Waterfall

2007-06-13T08:26:00.000+10:00

Australian Magpie

2007-06-12T20:59:00.000+10:00

I was putting in some roses after the recent rains when this fellow (an Australian Magpie Gymnorhina tibicen) decided to dig around for worms and grubs in the newly turned soil.

Banksy

2007-06-12T18:26:00.001+10:00

Cool! Still trying to find the original photo of this one, unsure if rioter was tossing a rock, a bottle or a Motolov Cocktail.

Palestinean side of the Israel/Palestine separation wall.

Subverting flea market prints.

Classic Banksy, much in the tradition of Keith Haring (one of my favourites) and Jean-Michel Basquiat, Banksy started off doing grafitti. Working mainly around Bristol and London. He's had his first exhibition in Los Angeles.

And from Wikipedia.

In addition to his artwork, Banksy has claimed responsibility for a number of high profile stunts, including the following:

At London Zoo, he climbed into the penguin enclosure and painted 'We're bored of fish' in seven foot high letters.

At Bristol Zoo, he left the message 'I want out. This place is too cold. Keeper smells. Boring, boring, boring.' in the elephant enclosure.

In January 2001, he travelled to the areas controlled by the Zapatista Army of National Liberation in Chiapas, Mexico, and in sign of solidarity with their movement, painted murals with scenes depicting the struggle and also made stencils on the walls of San Cristóbal de las Casas.^{[citation needed]}

In March 2005, he placed subverted artworks in the Museum of Modern Art, Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Brooklyn Museum, and the American Museum of Natural History in New York.^[18]

He put up a subverted painting in London's Tate Britain gallery.

In May 2005 Banksy's version of a primitive cave painting depicting a human figure hunting wildlife whilst pushing a shopping trolley was found hanging in the British Museum, London. Upon discovery, the museum added it to their permanent collection.^[19]

Banksy has sprayed 'This is not a photo opportunity' on certain photograph spots.

In August 2005, Banksy painted nine images on the Israeli West Bank barrier, including an image of a ladder going up and over the wall and an image of children digging a hole through the wall.^[20]^[21]

In April 2006, Banksy created a sculpture based on a crumpled red phone box with a pickaxe in its side, apparently bleeding, and placed it in a street in Soho, London. It was later removed by Westminster Council. BT released a press release, which said: "This is a stunning visual comment on BT's transformation from an old-fashioned telecommunications company into a modern communications services provider."^[22]

In June 2006, Banksy created an image of a naked man hanging out of a bedroom window on a wall in central Bristol. The image sparked some controversy, with the Bristol City Council leaving it up to the public to decide whether it should stay or go.^[23] After an internet discussion in which 97% (all but 6 people) supported the stencil, the city council decided it would be left on the building.^[23]

In August/September 2006, Banksy replaced up to 500 copies of Paris Hilton's debut CD, Paris, in 48 different UK record stores with his own cover art and remixes by Danger Mouse. Music tracks were given titles such as "Why am I Famous?", "What Have I Done?" and "What Am I For?". Several copies of the CD were purchased by the public before stores were able to remove them, some going on to be sold for as much as £750 on online auction websites such as eBay. The cover art depicted Paris Hilton digitally altered to appear topless. Other pictures feature her with a dog's head replacing her own, and one of her stepping out of a luxury car, edited to include a group of homeless people, which included the caption 90% of success is just showing up.^[24]^[25]^[26]

In September 2006, Banksy dressed an inflatable doll in the manner of a Guantanamo Bay detainment camp prisoner (orange jumpsuit, black hood, and handcuffs) and then placed the figure within the Big Thunder Mountain Railroad ride at the Disneyland theme park in Anaheim, California.^[27]^[28]. More recently his work has appeared on Melrose^[c

Great stuff! Take a look at flickr or Google images to see some more of his work.

Chrome

2007-06-12T18:25:00.001+10:00

Monty Python - French Sketch

2007-06-05T23:57:00.001+10:00

The Pythons take a sideways stab at the Concorde under development between the British and French in the early 70's.

Morning at Rhodes Sydney

2007-06-03T15:26:00.000+10:00

Took a few pics this morning, this one seems to be the best after HDR.

This one combined with Photomatix and tonemapped using QTPFSGUI

This one done solely with Photomatix.

Go stick that in your pipe Golby................. Friggin' ingrate :)

New bit of kit.

2007-06-03T14:36:00.000+10:00

Not blogging much, photographing instead :-)

Bought myself a newish Olympus e-500 digital SLR which I have been trying to get the hang of. Well it's sort of new....Olympus are upgrading this to the E-510 so this is the last of the series and Olympus are doing end of product runouts (just like the car companies). I was looking at the very popular Canon EOS but they were about $1400, so instead of the Beemer I went for the SAAB of cameras after reading a LOT of good reviews on it. Picked up a refurbished one from E-Bay and it seems to be like new.

Not only do I have to get my mind around the controls and menu but I've two lenses..... which means focal lengths, white balances and other such things to now deal with. So far it's been pretty good..... I just leave it on auto or pick a couple of the "scene " modes. I took it to the Olympic Stadium on Wednesday night and took it down to Parramatta River this morning to get some shots for more HDR.

It's better for HDR as the files are bigger, the sensor is better and thus images come out crisper with less noise. The downsize is my poor old computer is really groaning at Photomatix, Photoshop and Windows XP all crunching away at pixelorial data at the same time. Think circa early 90's internet speed rates!

So far the results seem a lot better than my old Fujifilm 5500s.

Nightshot using the "fireworks" scene.....either that or a 13 second exposure on a tripod. No adjustments made to pic.

Shot done this morning I "auto adjusted"' on Photoshop and that was it.

Another nightshot using the "fireworks" setting. Needs tilting back to normal, don't ask me how I managed to get a tilt on a tripod!

Concentration

2007-05-24T21:27:00.000+10:00

My favourite photographic portrait ever. Ed Ruscha photographed by Wayne Shimabukuro.

Broken Pailings Rusted Roof

2007-05-23T19:49:00.000+10:00

A Touch of Blue

2007-05-23T19:47:00.000+10:00

Lighthorse Interchange Pics

2007-04-22T22:07:00.000+10:00

As promised, here's a few pics I took this afternoon which hace been manipulated using the HDR program Photomatix.

Cool Mistake

2007-04-21T22:11:00.000+10:00

Click the above for the hi-res shot.

HDR photos.

2007-04-19T21:08:00.000+10:00

This.........................

becomes..............THIS!

Click the photo on the bottom for a better look at Conrod Straight on the Bathurst racetrack.

Using an HDR (High Dynamic Range) program called Photomatix which I've just discovered. The technique is great for photos with differing contrasts where you'd normally lose resolution. Bit of messing around but the results seem to be very good.

You can really go to town making the photos look really other-worldish.

I'll post some others of done on Sunday.

Purple Haze's second trial.

2007-04-19T20:32:00.000+10:00

Got a call yesterday from the guy who runs the horse syndicate I'm in. Horse aka "Purple Haze" would be trialling at Penrith paceway. Would I be interested in turning up?

You betcha!

Ok so "Purple Haze" never got the name "Purple Haze" but the more Gaelic "McMahon", however will be Purple Haze to me. The actual owner who we are leasing it off got in the naming rights ....so McMahon it is. Bummer, it's rather a dull name IMHO.

I forgot my camera, however took a few snaps with my camera phone. This was his second trial, first one he did well coming first out of six.

I'm no longer posting photos of the cat....now it's the horse!

Couple of things I noticed at the paceway. The owners were all just trialling, so things were pretty relaxed. Casual clothes, people standing around doing a lot of talking, grooming and gearing up. Food available at the track consisted of hot chips, pies and hamburgers and black brewed coffee with not a double frappe soy mile latte in sight.

Mc Mahon at the left and a heap of other nags behind.

Most of the trainers either had their children or grandchildren around, so there were kids having a ball on the grassy knoll overlooking the track, high on sugar from the cola that seemed to be the only thing to drink. Wives of trainers were yelling very loudly at children who didn't seem to be listening.

There were heaps of horse floats towed by large 4 wheels drives and American pickups. Monstrous bloody great things made to tow and tow pretty fast. Didn't get a pic but I'll get one next time.

Onto McMahon's trial, the seventh for the night. The trainer wanted him to start late and just stay behind to get a feel or racing, which the driver did. Started way back and stayed there. He did the mile in 2.03 which is good for second time up. He's the blur on the left hand side.

Better photos later when I take my camera!

There was even a race caller for the trials which was a hoot, I think he was practising for the real events, nevertheless...it added a bit of atmosphere to the night. Next trial will be next week.

Most viewed photo at Flickr

2007-04-15T18:00:00.000+10:00

This is the photo at my Flickr account which has had the most number of views. No comments or "favourites" as yet as as it is blown up, it really is a pretty non-descript bland shot. I think people are going off the icon pic which looks better.

However in term of interestingness which is comments, favourites and views combined. This one comes up tops, which I like much better. I remember taking this shot and almost breaking the USB port trying to see what it was like in full size, I knew it was that good immediately.

This means the parrots are in with the squirrels BTW.

Those Nigerians have moved

2007-04-15T11:12:00.001+10:00

Hmm, received my first French scam spam today. Seems those guys in Nigeria now live on the Ivory Coast.

Bonjour très cher,
Comment allez vous ? Bien je le pense !
Je m’excuse de cette instruction mais je viens par ce mail vous confier un sujet qui m’est très cher et confidentiel.
Tout d’abord j’ai eu après de long prières le temps de réfléchir avant de vous confier cette affaire. J’ai une proposition a vous ; de cet affaire je tiens a vous expliquer la nature de mon problème.

Etc etc etc.

Public Symphony- Breakthrough

2007-04-11T09:10:00.000+10:00

For some reason the software is chopping this off at the intro.

Full (better?) version is here

http://www.yourspins.com/johnno/mixes/PUBLIC+SYMPHONY/Breakthrough/Emerald+Tablet

Bagged it.

2007-04-09T16:00:00.000+10:00

Terminated with prejudice with my weapons of choice. A Chinese made water pistol with no serial numbers and an Irish Mattock of undetermined origin.

Taking a leaf from the GW Bush/Rupert Murdoch book of International Relations, I set about ridding my garden of a rogue Cypriot Cypress Pine that was determined to subvert the local natives with hard line Islamo-Funtamentalist dogma.

Now here me out here. Cypress sounds like Cyprus.......and Cyprus is in the Mediterranean... and the Mediterranean laps on the Middle Eastern western shores....... and the middle East has Iraq in it........ and Iraq was responsible for the Twin Towers and the death of baby Jesus.......and anyway they are only after our freedoms.

So I had an Iraqi terrorist disguised as a Cypriot to contend with. The aforementioned Iraqi terrorist had to go with some hard line coalition of the willing can-do action.

It was going to be a slow, hard exercise.....

The softwood branches were no match against some good ol' fashioned Aussie steel.

You never know with these buggers, when you think you've got them broken, they dig in harder. The roots were a different story........the insurgent had an strong underground supply network.....this was going to take a little longer than expected. However, it was possible by cutting off lines of supply by thwacking out the secondary roots utilising the services of an Irish mattock and wetting down the soil with a high pressure hose to gather intelligence on further supply networks.

It wasn't giving in easily...... however using several methods from the Joint Task Force Guantanamio Field Guide, the blighter was soon broken. Not that it admitted to being an Iraqi terrorist but I knew it was.

And for a replacement, I have a Japanese maple, from one of the more friendly countries. I read a theory today that war has never been waged between countries with McDonalds reataraunts in them. Japan has McDonalds.....so Japan is good.

So........God bless the Golden Arches and God Bless Australia...... I'm off to go and get Fox News connected now.

Strange Addiction

2007-04-08T23:18:00.000+10:00

Did this one today. Enjoy!

Will this work?

2007-04-06T13:55:00.000+10:00

Here's a mix I did of Faithless' "Bombs" track over at yourspins using digimpro software, I called it the "Quiet Night in Baghdad" mix. I got a nice trancey ambient feel about it, perfect for a drizzly Good Friday morning.This v2.0 web is something else, I notice Moff is broadcasting deeply though out ponderings on Youtube. Fantastic, I now have purpose.

I came across the site whilst reading about Moby and how he released a track at yourspins and encouraged wannabe mixers to do their thing. His track Lift Me Up was the first track listed there back in February 2005.

Right Where It Belongs

2007-04-05T22:07:00.001+10:00

The artist who produced this video is Andrea Giacobbe. Music by Trent Reznor.

Some spooky pics

2007-04-04T21:22:00.001+10:00

Taken around Rookwood cemetery in Sydney.....(Largest one in the Southern Hemisphere) and made even more sombre with photoshop.

The crow.....I had to airbrush out a tree in the background and added a "moon"......original pic here.

Maher Cross

2007-04-04T21:21:00.000+10:00

The Maher Cross. I've done a post about this some time ago. It almost looks out of place in an Aussie cemetery. It was commisioned by the Maher family and carved from a single piece of marble by a Mr Angelo Bertozzi, research shows Mr Bertozzi was a stonemason from Carrara Italy.

One can imagine it sitting on some part of the Irish shoreline awaiting some Vikings to leap out of their longboat for some heavy duty pillaging. The below "meanderings" are gorgeous.

2007-04-04T21:20:00.000+10:00

Some flowery masonry detail above a door on a church.

Stained Glass Window

2007-04-04T21:19:00.000+10:00

This loses something smaller..... looks better bigger.

Tombstone

2007-04-04T21:18:00.000+10:00

I love the effect of the sky in this one once the colour has been stripped out, looks like swirling marble in the background.

2007-03-29T21:18:00.000+10:00

Renovator's Delight.

2007-03-28T21:53:00.000+10:00

I came across probably the most heartfelt piece of writing I've seen in a long time today, it would make a good Bruce Springsteen song. You can read near the end of this long post.

But first...........

There'a joke in the Australian real estate industry, that if a house is an absolute shambles in an almost ready to be demolished condition, the cliched positive spin applied to the advertisements for the wreck is a "Renovator's Delight." It's become a phrase that is ridiculed and somehow again been reclaimed tongue-in-cheek by witty real estate agents country wide.

It's spread into the Australian vernacular. A "Renovator's Delight" is a basket case; something that will will require a lot of capital and effort to restore to its former glory. Recently one of the duopoly supermarket chains downunder which is in the financial doldrums had the "Renovator's Delight" badge pinned to it.

I was tidying up my bookmarks on the PC and I came across a strange link to a one page blog at the Journal Times in Racine County, Wisconsin where I had left a comment in January. From memory, this one page document somehow found its way onto Google News and 45 comments were left from around the planet. There was a real global exchange and a lot of incredulity from the other side of the pond as most of us from other countries, pretty well take health care for granted.

The article was about the "Renovators Delight" that is the American health care system has become; the original piece originated from the Washington Post.

Here's the article.

http://www.journaltimes.com/nucleus/ind �� emid=10362

WHO WILL HELP?

01/22/2007: Universal Health Coverage Attracts New Support
Category: General
Posted by: Editors
By Christopher Lee
(c) 2007, The Washington Post

WASHINGTON �� Harry and Louise have had a change of heart.

Thirteen years after television ads from the insurance industry featuring the fictional middle-class couple helped kill the Clinton health-care plan and make universal coverage politically radioactive, comprehensive proposals for expanding coverage to millions of uninsured Americans are flowering again inside the Beltway and around the country.

And this time, advocates hope, the political climate is right for the best ideas to grow, in large part because many business groups that opposed earlier efforts now agree that rising health-care costs and increasingly tougher access to insurance are unsustainable trends.

Whether Washington will do more than talk about the problem, however, remains to be seen. Money is tight, and some experts say major shifts in federal policy are unlikely until after the 2008 presidential election, in which health care is expected to be a major focus.

Many are not willing to wait. Karen Ignagni, president of America��s Health Insurance Plans �� the same industry association that once funded the ��Harry and Louise�� ads �� was among representatives of 16 business, medical and consumer groups that last week called for Congress to spend $45 billion over five years to extend health coverage to most of the nation��s uninsured children. After that, the groups said, lawmakers should direct billions more toward covering uninsured adults, mostly through a mixture of tax breaks and expanded federal programs.

��On this issue, the polls show that Democrats, Republicans and independents want progress,�� Ignagni said. ��The most expensive course is to do nothing.��

John Castellani, president of the Business Roundtable, an association of chief executives of 160 U.S. companies, issued a similar call at a separate news conference last week with leaders of AARP, the politically powerful seniors organization, and the Service Employees International Union (SEIU). ��Our soaring health-care costs put American goods and services at a significant competitive disadvantage, and they slow economic growth,�� Castellani said. ��Policymakers must act.��

In recent weeks, proposals for dramatically expanding coverage have been floated by Ignagni��s industry group, the Children��s Defense Fund and Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore. Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., and Rep. John Dingell, D-Mich., who lead important congressional committees, plan to pursue legislation to allow Americans under 65 to enroll in Medicare or in the health coverage enjoyed by Congress. And a bipartisan group of two senators and three House members introduced legislation last week to help states fund innovative ways to cover more people.

��Health care has been poked and prodded for years,�� said Wyden, who wants to replace employer coverage with a centrally financed system of private insurance for all Americans. ��I believe it is time for diagnosis and treatment.��

Much of the activity in Washington is being spurred by a wave of experiments at the state level, particularly Massachusetts��s decision last year to require all residents to obtain health insurance, through state-subsidized policies if necessary. This month, California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R) proposed a similar plan for all 36 million Californians, funding its $12 billion cost partly through fees on employers, hospitals and doctors.

In Pennsylvania, Democratic Gov. Edward Rendell last week proposed creating a program of state-subsidized private insurance to help many of the 767,000 uninsured people in his state. The plan would impose taxes on tobacco and on businesses that do not offer coverage, and it would phase in a requirement that people earning more than 300 percent of the poverty level (about $60,000 for a family of four) obtain insurance.

��It is no longer a question of whether we can afford to act,�� Rendell said, noting that treating Pennsylvania��s uninsured costs $1.4 billion annually. ��The cost of inaction is far greater in terms of individual health consequences and from the increasing burden on taxpayers.��

Vermont enacted legislation last year that seeks to expand coverage so that at least 96 percent of residents will have insurance by 2010. Illinois began a major expansion of coverage for children in 2005. That same year, Maine began implementing a plan whose goal is to cover all of the state��s 130,000 uninsured residents by 2009.

Other states considering expanding coverage include Connecticut, Indiana, Iowa, Louisiana, Minnesota, Missouri, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, North Carolina and Wisconsin, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.

All the state activity is adding pressure on politicians in Washington to act on a problem that grows worse year by year. Recent census figures show that a record 46.6 million Americans, including 8.3 million children, had no health insurance in 2005, up from 39.7 million in 1994. Employer coverage is more expensive and less available.

��As usual, Washington is behind the rest of the country,�� said Andy Stern, president of the SEIU. ��We��re ready to have a very bipartisan solution. What you are seeing now that you didn��t see in 1994 is that everyone is on the same side saying, ��We want universal coverage.�� The only question is, ��How?��

Ah, yes, ��how�� and how to pay for it.

Expanding coverage is a costly proposition, and Democrats, in control of Congress for the first time since 1994, have pledged not to pass major new spending proposals unless other programs are cut to avoid increasing the federal deficit.

While there is bipartisan support for reauthorizing the decade-old state-federal Children��s Health Insurance Program, which covers more than 4 million children at a cost of $5 billion a year, experts say at least $12.7 billion more is needed over the next five years just to keep covering the same number of kids.

Moreover, President Bush has given no sign of departing from his advocacy of special tax-favored savings accounts and changes in the tax code as the best ways to make health insurance more affordable. In his State of the Union speech this week, Bush plans to propose more such changes and to announce a new initiative to help states get more residents into private insurance.

��We must address these rising costs so that more Americans can afford basic health insurance,�� the president said Saturday in his weekly radio address. ��And we need to do it without creating a new federal entitlement program or raising taxes.��

Despite the new enthusiasm, in the short run, most attempts to expand coverage will probably continue to happen at the state level, some lawmakers said. Federal efforts will be largely incremental and devoted to helping the states find their way.

But ultimately, Washington will have to do more, said Charles N. Kahn III, president of the Federation of American Hospitals.

��At the end of the day, I think the federal government and the federal taxpayers have a responsibility,�� said Kahn, whose organization was among those calling for $45 billion to cover children. ��Clearly, there are states that are looking into this. They can come up with some resources. But we feel that in order to get the ball rolling from where we are now, this is the role that the federal government needs to play��

Why did I leave a comment in such a pretty bland dry article?

Well it was more to do with the responses from people who also managed to catch that article on Google news on the day. The first really riled me.

Juan wrote:
I can't afford health care. Please make my neighbor pay for it.
01/22/2007 11:31:15

You could write an entire essay on those two sentences. It covers so many issues, the growing divide between the haves and have nots, the ridiculous amount it costs to have basic surgery in the USA, the litigation, the ideal of the individual in USA society....one could opine for a few pages.

Then there's this.

Trust but Verify wrote:
Cancel ALL third party coverage including the government system and give everyone wage increases and tax cuts to buy their own plan. When people have to pay out of pocket for coverage you will see competition because people will shop around for health insurance/care just like they do for everything else.

I do not want the government in charge of my health care!
01/22/2007 11:53:42

Hmmmm. Give people more money by increasing wages and dropping taxes....... that even BIGGER big screen TV is lookin' kinda good.

Then this,

Otto wrote:
Our cost at the hospital would drop 30% if you kept the illegals out. When they go in and can't pay, that cost gets put on our bill.
01/22/2007 14:46:13

Yep, those darn "illegals"...... there's an essay or two in that one as well regarding this rather maleficent term that has crept into the American vocabulary.

However, it wasn't all hard nosed Fox watchin', redneckin', taxpayin' banter though. Some of the 45 comments included:

Denny Beck, Toledo, Ohio wrote:
I tried to get freelance writing work from a global business news resource in the UK. I was told my fee was much higher than proposals coming from the UK. Of course, they did not have to include health insurance in their overhead costs. Manufacturing workers in China get a free ride with their health care, too. If other countries won't change to help level the playing field, it's time we change.
01/22/2007 16:19:36

Which was a welcome bit of objective observation rather than opinion.

Another added an article on medical BANKRUPTCIES which I found astounding when I first heard of it a few months previously from an American friend.

I liked this comment

Cate wrote:
One more thing. A French doctor said to me: "Why don't you have health coverage for everyone in your country? Don't Americans feel loyalty to each other?"
01/22/2007 16:40:19

And this (the last comment) was another that appealed to my bleeding heart liberal tendencies.

Li Tai Fang wrote:
There is a difference between capitalism and profiteering.
I'm all for corporate profit and capitalism. No one who has argued for universal health care is arguing for socialism, so please no more straw man tactics.
I have no problem if a software company or a real estate broker is making a load of money and a lot of people get rich from them. I have no problem if a football player is making $10 million a year if the system is able to come up with that kind of money.
However, there are certain fields where responsibility comes before profit, and people's health and life should be one of them. In fact, the government already engages in many not-for-profit operations precisely for that purpose: police force, fire fighters, military, scientific research, etc. Why not individual health care for her citizens?
01/24/2007 18:34:12

And there were other comments. Singapore has a good health sytem apparently covered by a 6% percentage of wages. Now, for my bit of piety and moralizing. Embarrassing and to an extent laced with opinion looking back today.....it even has a typo or two. Nevertheless I'll stand by it.

Aussie Readerwrote:
To this Australian "illness bamkruptcy" is a term that seems comedic if it were not so tragic. 1.25% of my wage goes towards Australian nationial health care which seems to be working rather well.

Travel Insurance to USA is more expensive than anywhere in the world.

Some of the hard-nosed comments regarding caring for others rings of some sort of "moral bankruptcy" to me.
01/22/2007 16:25:13

Nevertheless, it got one God fearing Christian thinking.

Good Points From Europe wrote:
Reading the blogs from the folks in Europe who have Universal Healthcare make me think it is Americans who have it all wrong.

These foreign bloggers are telling us that their universal healthcare systems are fine. Some of them even seem troubled that we Americans don't have loyalty to one another.

That was evedent in the comment byAussie Reader, who posted: "Some of the hard-nosed comments regarding caring for others rings of some sort of "moral bankruptcy" to me.

Does anyone want to tell Aussie that we are a Christian nation -- One Nation Under God and we don't have to do a damn thing as "Our Brother's Keeper?"
01/22/2007 17:58:08

But it was this comment from a guy in Michigan who was really in the economic battlezone on this one. I felt for him, half a planet away. The spelling and punctuation need a polish but it's one of the best pieces of frontline reporting from the economic trenches I can recall. He's included some of the problems the most powerful country in the world is in. Broken & expensive healthcare, unemployment and the black hole of military spending.

Unemployed Worker from Michigan wrote:
I lost my job because my boss and owner of a small manufacturing business had cancer. His business did not make enough profit to pay his medical bills for cemo treatments he needed. He had to apply for state or medicade assistance. He was a strict republican and did not believe in a nation health program. His shots to fight cancer where like $4000 dollars every two weeks. He did not have health insurance at his business. My boss died 2 weeks ago. In some cases the alternative too no health insurance is a hole in the ground. I myself have had to have a hynea surgery about the same time of the plant closing. I was told it would be a $5000 doctors fee for the operation. With asistance that i applied for the surgery would be aprox. $1000. I said go ahead and we had the surgery. The first bill i recieved was for 10,000 dollars hospital fee, 109 dollar tissue exam fee, 765 dollar anesthesiologist fee plus some pre-op visit costs. They then applied the discount of 80% for assistance to the hospital fee and 50% discount to the anesthesiologist fee and i owe aprox. $2,462 for the expected $1000 dollar operation. The rest must go for a tax carity write off that is passed onto the government. Meanwhile i have 3 weeks unemployment left and looking frantic for a new job. I had to have the operation as no one would hire anyone with a hynea or lifting problem. We are healed now and have many skills including cnc vmc milling and turning experience. We live in the Upper Penninsula of Michigan where there are not many jobs listed for machinist. Most the jobs listed are for the National Guard and Army that amount to about 30% of the jobs listed at Michigan Works, for people up to age 40, military cut off age. We are age 54. I have not seen it this bad since the last recession. We need a unemployment extension badly here. Listing Army jobs on a civilian job service postings is not showing the true extent of the joblessness in upper michigan. Just looks good on paper. People have many needs that are not being met now days and health care is one of the largest ones.
01/22/2007 17:12:59

I'm not sure who you are "Unemployed in Michigan" but I hope there has been some glimmer of hope in that Renovator's Delight that you've found yourself living in.

MIchael Moore's next movie is on this subject......should be a doozy.

Moving House

2007-03-25T06:50:00.000+10:00

New world, old world.

Well.....

It's been about a month since I've blogged, reason being I've moved house up the mountains where you can really feel the chill or the mountain air in the morning, the term "bracing' came to mind this morning.

I'm on dial up and realised how slow this page loads without the luxury of dial up. It's bloody slow. It took me 10 days to get a phone line to the house and another three to get broadband which for some reason or another isn't yet operational. Internet phone technician guys have been called in to sort the non-service out.

Moving was an experience packing stuff, losing stuff and on the positive side finding stuff. And the above photo is one of the things I found which I thought was long lost. I remembered this image and tried to locate it for months. I searched for it on the internet "fat lady photographing a skinny black lady" etc etc al to no avail. I tried everywhere: photo award sites, google, Reuters, AP, flickr for months. However, going through my filing cabinet, I saw a copy of the Sydney Morning Herald dated September 15th 2001, wondered why I had kept it and had a browse through it. Thought it ay have been for a 9/11 aftermath story.

And there she was.....in all her glory, the fat lady in her fitness trainers photographing the skinny lady with the basket on her head. Found out it is an AP photo but I'm unsure who by. Nevertheless a classic.

I see Peter at the Loose Poodle is sorting out the moving/renovating too, thankfully I don't have to worry about the renovating as the owners previously were builders and had done all the work inside. There's a little landscaping to be done out the front which won't be much of a drama, I've picked out a few plants already and given one tree a good hard prune already. The weeds have been thoroughly sorted, however there's a lot more to do.

So..... when I finally get broadband I'll upload some more pics, including one of a pile of stuff including a surfboard piled up on the living room floor.

Who said the kids don't do protest songs anymore?

2007-02-22T13:14:00.000+11:00

Driving into North Sydney on Monday and I had one of those rare moments of pulling over the car, turning off the motor and listening to the song playing. At first I thought it was Nick Cave who had finally after all those years come up with his masterstroke. Then I find out it's some early- 20 somethings from Quebec.

The song was titled"Intervention" and it's available here in recorded off the radio format.

http://www.ezarchive.com/show/jweiss24/Intervention.mp3

Their new album "Neon Bible" will be released on 3rd or the 8th of March......gorgeous. They're currently touring churches through the midwest.

2007-02-07T09:30:00.000+11:00

I was looking through some old children's books of mine and came across this wonderful portrait of Roger Lancelyn Green in the 1974 Puffin Annual. I loved this photo even when a child, the cosy library alcove is almost womb-like in its appeal. Green looks kind of serious in his oh-so british vest and tie....however there's a hint of rebelliousness there, he's wearing black tennis shoes.

About his library he wrote:

Although I have been to most of the places about which I write- Greece and Troy, Egypt and so on-I can't get back to them when I'm actually writing, except with the aid of books. And I'm lucky to have a positive magician's cave of books, an old library which was built and started nearly 300 years ago by an ancestor of mine, but which now holds mainly the books which I have collected, and which I read and reread, an use again and again when I am writing. Books about ancient Greece and books by ancient Greek authors, who wrote the tales which I retell; but also books by favourite authors such as Andrew Lang and Lewis Carroll, Richard Haggard and Rudyard Kipling and C.S. Lewis; and many others whosse lives I have written or whose books I have selected and edited; for like Lang himself, "The books I loved, I love them still"

Green died in 1987 so Amen to that and thankyou for that thought. Proof of his retelling of Lewis' observation is that I still love the 1974 Puffin annual some 33 years later. Reading a litle more about Green I find he was a student of C.S. Lewis and was in The Oxford "Inklings" along with J.R.R. Tolkein, C.S. Lewis and Owen Barfield.

The New Volvo 240 Wagon

2007-02-05T18:49:00.000+11:00

From Sheeshoo on Flickr.

You used to see swarms of these in semi-affluent suburbs in days gone by. Leafy suburbs where Vicky and Justin went to the right private school in prep for law/medical school, tennis on Wednesday at Pru's house (with cucumber sandwiches), a charity committe meeting on Thursday and perhaps go and watch the boys playing rugby over the road on Saturday. Hubby was either in a company supplied 7 class Beemer, Porsche or an Alfa.

The Volvo was a big safe box to haul the attorneys of the future in.

I was around leafy Willoughby this afternoon and didn't spot too many Volvo wagons. However the BMW X5 seemd to be in profusion. I spotted around 7 of 'em.

Through the Esses

2007-02-04T10:19:00.000+11:00

Well, I was up early this morning and a little bored. Decided to head up the mountain and have a little fun. There's a section of road called the Woodford Bends which is about a 2km section of double laned esses. You pick the straightest line and have a hoot trying to stick to it. Terrific fun and of course frowned upon by the nanny state at the moment.

I enjoy driving and enjoy driving enthusiatically even more. At 6am when I shot up, daylight was just approaching. The coppers were changing shift and the roads were almost empty. A good change to open the old girl up and try out some of those glorious left and right hand sweepers. I may have been speeding a little but not much.

I know about understeer, oversteer and how to get out of a skid after learning to drive on pebbly gravel roads. I've done driving courses on closed roads with skid pans and traffic cones. Raced for a little bit in some pretty scary pine forests and on mud tracks. My car is cared for and in top notch condition.

So I can get out of trouble.

The purchase of the new house has seen people ask at work, "But isn't that too far away?" .....if you love driving and have a good bit of road and a half decent car. The trip home becomes a joy.
And if driving is a hassle in peak hour, load up your i-pod or stereo with your favourite music and r-e-l-a-x.

Which reminds me I've wanted to throw up an article from Michael Stohl at Australian Wheels magazine. I've had this saved since January 2005 and never got around to putting it up or write to Michael praising him for a great bit of motoring journalism. He describes this enthusiasm so much better than I have.

Saw a remarkable thing a couple of weeks ago: a Volkswagen. A real Volkswagen, I mean, a little-'b' beetle. This vee-wee was mildly modified. It was subtly slammed and knockkneed with negative camber, a couple of skatewear stickers on the back window. Alone inside was a mid-twentyish guy at the wheel.

It was bucketing with rain, not much traffic on the road; I was tucked in behind him as we rumbled along a broad, three-lane arterial. We approached a long, armco-bordered, constant radius left that I knew was there. Something told me that he knew it, too; we were going 60 or so, quickly enough that you'd need to have a clue.

Dak-dak(volkswagen) dude merely blipped it back a cog, drifted out a little on the entry, loaded it up nice and gentle, and turned in.

And here's the even more remarkable thing :because this was a young guy in a preened and cared-for car, I stayed with him, admittedly hanging back a couple of
car lengths. Had this been your average cardigan-wearing, motorists' association member in his six-cylinder shitter, I'd have flicked on my hazard lights, set up a
reflective triangle, banana-chair and phoned the nearest newspaper to pre-sell photos of the impending accident.

Instead, I watched the Volksy's rear end ooze ever so slightly outwards, skate-dude smoothly and quickly feeding on the opposite lock, calmly holding a constant throttle, the car drifting just-so through the entire length of the corner. The guy had it nailed beautifully.

My heart sang. I don't know how long it had been since (outside of a Wheels comparison test) I last saw somebody driving enthusiastically - let alone well - on an Australian road. Here was somebody who clearly knew his car, and was calmly in control.

Sure, it's not totally cool opposite-locking in the 'burbs, but this wasn't luck; this was practice.

Gee, or maybe it was all down to something that I remember reading in the traffic authority's handbook; something about steering into the direction of the skid. There you go, then: it works.

It got me to thinking about all the things one is required to do when driving a car, and how (to quote the handbook), "because learning is a gradual process for everyone, it takes time for a new driver's confidence to build". Practice, as they say, makes perfect. Unless you want to practise something that might one day save your life.

Umm, reverse parking, seems like there's a technique to be learned. Should I practise that? "Oh, yes, most definitely."

And, uhh, this lane-changing, looking in the interior mirror, then exterior, then a glance over the shoulder ... Sounds like I need to be conscious of that, keep doing it until it becomes a habit? "Why, yes, certainly."

Well, gee, this panic-stop scenario; sounds like it could actually be life-threatening. You reckon I ought to find somewhere safe and supervised, even the Police Driver Training School, and ... "Don't even think it."

Michael had some quips added in text boxes at the end of the article which in his (an my) opinion go against the grain of enthusiatic driving.

Some handy hints from the Australian Driver Trainers Association. the representative body of professional driving instructors.

• Steering technique:

"With the introduction of airbags it is better at speeds over 30km/h to use pushpull steering (shuffling the steering wheel), as this will allow the airbag to deploy
without interference from your forearms. At lower speeds where the airbags would not deploy handover-hand steering is acceptable ... "

• Cornering lines:

"In days gone by ... people were taught to try andgot out mystraighten out a corner. With modern cars this cornering line is not only unnecessary, it is potentially
very dangerous ... For our modern traffic environmement much safer line is to simply slow down and keep left.

Images of Tehran from Flickr

2007-01-30T09:05:00.000+11:00

http://www.flickr.com/search/?q=tehran&m=tags

Turf Farms around Freemans Reach

2007-01-28T18:20:00.000+11:00

I think this is some Buffalo Grass (Buchloe dactyloides) stretching off into the distance.

Turf Farms...........

What could possibly be exciting about turf farms? Well if they're on the floodplains of the Hawkesbury River about 70km (40 miles) from the heart of Sydney, they're in an area which was once the "food bowl" of the infant settlement. If you dig photography, the area has the lushest green colour against the pale and sometimes deep blue sky....and it's dead flat, the views go for miles.

Add to that, there was once a thriving dairy industry in the region which has given way to the more profitable agri-business of turf/grass/lawn..... call it what you like. The remnants of the one-time milk industry can still be seen in places, rotting cattle stalls, rusting milking sheds, falling apart holding yards, hay sheds on their last legs ......all decaying away as the new economy takes over. More interesting subjects for this amateur photographer.

Mike Golby and I were discussing how the light is different and harsher in the Southern Hemisphere. You'll see some sky which looks very blue and others it will seem almost pale, depending on which angle I was photographing from as UV photons streak their way through our ozone layer hole and create havoc with my northern hemisphere designed camera. The northern hemisphere conspiracy is Golby's idea......and I agree.

Anyway here's some pics. I enjoyed taking them.

How I wish you were here.

2007-01-28T18:19:00.000+11:00

A little Pink Floyd-ish. There were a few of these strange old school chairs sitting at the end of irrigation pipes on a few farms. Not sure if they acted as some sort of marker to put signs on, or a place to put equipment on or a place to have a sit down in the sun.

Kinda surreal anyway.

Sprinklers

2007-01-28T18:17:00.000+11:00

I got wet taking this....all in the name of getting the shot. The camera stayed dry.

Farm workers watched the dude with the camera taking some very strange photos, none dared approach him.

Milk Churn Letterbox

2007-01-28T18:16:00.002+11:00

Old hay/milking shed.

2007-01-28T18:16:00.001+11:00

What I thought were old unused cattle yards in front of this old hay shed is actually a driveway to a farm, the green in front is Lucerne (alfalfa) for hay. I didn't spot a single cow in my travels.

Milk Churn Letterbox from below.

2007-01-28T18:15:00.000+11:00

Poor old thing is just about rusted out. I got a grass allergy from the lawn below this taking this shot. A guy with grass allergies photographing turf farms?

Old Farmhouse

2007-01-28T18:14:00.002+11:00

This is a very Charles Addams type farmhouse still being lived in by someone. Light was facing the wrong way so I missed the spooky front which may be visible if you click the pic. I'd say this would have once been the pride of the Hawkesbury Flats, even has a small worker's cottage out back.

Old dairy sheds

2007-01-28T18:14:00.001+11:00

Like most of the corrugated iron and timber around this area, it was slowly rusting and decaying away.

Old Tyre Shop Mechanics.

2007-01-28T18:13:00.000+11:00

The guy here used to sell oil, petrol and tyres...... don't think he sold Slush Puppies in big paper cups.

Aussie Water Cannon

2007-01-28T18:12:00.002+11:00

Used to disperse rioting turf farm workers.

It's actually a bloody big sprinkler.

Tractor on the Wilberforce road.

2007-01-28T18:12:00.001+11:00

I dig this tree.

2007-01-28T18:11:00.000+11:00

Looks like an old warrior that has come off second best to a lightning strike, wind storm or termites. There's an old truck in the yard too.

This like a few other shots was hard to get mainly from a parking perspective. The roads were quite narrow and as the turf farms had gradually been dug out over time. thus there was about a 12" drop on the roadside in places. I had to park about 200 yards down the road and contend with some fast moving traffic along the way.

Lawn Bowls Club

2007-01-27T20:53:00.000+11:00

Here's some photos from up the mountains around Hazelbrook. (up 300mtrs altitude, up about 15kms by road and up about 15 mins by car) .

The above is the Hazelbrook Bowling and Sporting Club. Main activity is Lawn Bowls which remains the bastion of those usually elderly Australians with a bit of a sporting streak left in them. Think a) ten pin bowling under the influence of b)Mandrax played on c) grass as smooth as a billiard table. The more competetive grades go all out for the flag, the less competetive have a beer on either end waiting for them.

If I ever take up lawn bowls, I'll be the guy drinking beers from the sidelines.

Cricket Pavillion

2007-01-27T20:52:00.000+11:00

Original cricket pavillion was demolished due to white ants and age, second pavillion burnt down, this solid-as-a-brick-shithouse construction is reincarnation number three.

Tennis courts in the background give a further idea of the sporting ethos of the town...... I think there's a library somewhere?

Single Lane Bridge

2007-01-27T20:27:00.000+11:00

Wooden fence and tin shed

2007-01-27T20:26:00.001+11:00

This was taken at the back of the Selwood Science & Puzzles Museum, reminds me a lot of where I grew up with old timber fences and rusting corrugated iron sheds. I can almost hear the chooks clucking away in the background.

Australia Day

2007-01-26T19:07:00.000+11:00

It's Australia Day today, much like any other, you really wouldn't know it. I suppose I identify with being an Aussie, not out of any rabid nationalism but out of not really knowing anything else. I've spent two months in Europe as an adult but all my life of growing up on this island isolated from the rest of the world with a heavy cultural input from the USA and the UK.

I suppose this has formed in a way who I am.

Five things that are cool about Australia.

1. Meat pies, I still indulge in these awful things described as "a bit of minced meat in gravy wrapped up in pastry of an unknown origin."..... which are absolutely delicious! The trick is to find a pie shop has pies with flaky pastry and a tasty filling. There happens to be one down the street.

2. The Health system. Last year a growth formed under my nose after a particularly stupid accident with a razor shaving before a wedding. The scar would not heal and formed a growth. I saw the GP who referred me to a plastic surgeon and I had plastic surgery within a couple of weeks. All free (sort of.... I pay 2.5% of my tax towards medical) and I now have the kudos of having a card of "my plastic surgeon" and the dubious honour of having a nose job.

3. Wine. Cheap and plentiful. My current Fave is Jacob's Creek Reserve Label which I picked up for something like $120 a case. My laundry is stacked with some Aussie "big reds" which occasionally see the light of day.

4. A reasonably equitable wage system. Americans spin out when they hear that waiters here make a minimum of around $18 an hour sometimes more. I'm on a disproportianate amount for what I do compared to other countries except probably Germany and France. The current Howard conservative Govt is attempting to dismatle this to send the moeny the shareholders way.

5. The impact of the post WWII immigration boom. Before this, Australia was a meat and three veg kinda place. A rather strange British outpost with the entrenched class system and a beige sort of existence. The Europeans and more recently Asians and Middle Easterners have injected some colour into the landscape. They usually start with the food and take it from there.

Five things that are not so cool about Australia.

1. Like it or not there is still an underlying conservatism verging on the xenophobic in parts. Case point, a pick up truck with Australian flags on the rear window as well as "Australia, Love it or leave it" in cut out vinyl lettering. Evangelical churches are popping up like mushrooms on the landscape offering instant salvation for the unworthy.

2. Real estate prices. Average price for a house in Sydney is around $450,000, this has something to do with the equitable wage system as well as the low estate agents fees IMHO. Agents here make 3% or less on a sale which may force up the price long term. I'm not sure how young people with a minimum wage can afford it.

3. Oligopolies. Media, supermarkets, oil, politics, airlines. There aren't enough players and those willing to take the risk and start up a new venture in Australian the oligopoly industry are shut out with some fierce competition until they are broke. Politics is under a mainly two party system which have gradually drifted into the "right" and "centre right" over time.

4. Ridiculous speed limits, traffic fines and penalties. A three lane motorway here has a speed limit of 110kmh( 65mph) in France it's 130kph(around 80mph). The speed limits haven't kept up with road and automotive technology. If I was to be caught at 30kph over the speed limit on a motorway, I'd have to hand over my license to the polite copper and somehow get a lift home.... and face a fine of up to $1000.

5. Going for a swim or walk and not coming back. Sharks, crocodiles (in the north), bloody poisonous spiders, snakes, jellyfish, octopii (or is that octopuses?), stingrays, stonefish. One becomes aware that nature isn't the fuzzy warm image that Greenpeace throws up when being swallowed by a noah whilst going about your job.

Hello Possum

2007-01-23T09:52:00.000+11:00

Snapped last night.

The Common Brushtail Possum (Trichosurus vulpecula, from the Greek for "furry tailed" and the Latin for "little fox") is the largest possum, and the Australian marsupial most often seen by city-dwellers, since it is one the very few that thrives in cities as well as a wide range of natural and human-modified environments. Despite its resemblance to a fox's brush, the characteristic tail is prehensile and is naked on its lower underside.

Like most possums, the Common Brushtail is nocturnal. It is mainly a folivore, but supplements its usual diet of leaves with fruit, invertebrates, flowers, buds, and whatever else is available. In most Australian habitats, leaves of Eucalyptus are a significant part of the diet but rarely the sole item eaten. This is probably because of the tannins and other chemical defences present in eucalypt leaves. Around human habitations, Common Brushtails are inventive and determined foragers with a liking for fruit trees, vegetable gardens, and kitchen raids.

They are highly inquisitive and live in troupes of about a dozen individuals with a complex social structure not dissimilar from wolves and primates.

During the day, Common Brushtails sleep in a den in a hollow tree or any other convenient place, notably ceiling spaces that are not securely sealed. Although primarily aboreal and not found in places without trees to provide refuge, they spend a good deal of time on the ground. They are able to stand upright.

This brushtail possum is about the size of a large very muscular cat. I can tell it's arrived by the big "Thump!" nightly on the balcony or the handrail. And from the intial landing, it tends to jump, climb and land all over the place. A quick look with the flashlight reveals one guilty looking possum having a good poke around.

This one rather likes sunflower seeds which I leave out at night from time to time. It's an inquisitive creature, getting stuck in a drainpipe leading from the roof which I had to undo so it could make a welcome escape. I think it's had a fight with amy rather territorial large cat at one stage, cat came off second best and avoids Mr. Possum at all costs!

As useful as ........................

2007-01-22T21:05:00.000+11:00

..... screen windows on a submarine.
......a wheel on a crutch.
......an ashtray on a motorcycle
......a one armed wallpaper hanger.
......a one-legged tightrope walker.
......a chocolate teapot.
......a hat full of arseholes.
..... tits on a bull.
..... a three dollar note
..... an ejection seat in a helicopter.
..... a map of the Sahara.
..... a wet towel.
..... a sundial in a mineshaft.
..... a Volkswagen radiator.
..... a bicycle to a fish.
..... a toothbrush to a turtledove.

I couldn't find a collation of these, so decided to do it myself. Additions welcome.

The Snake

2007-01-22T06:32:00.000+11:00

The toothless old gummy black cat jumped in the front window last Friday night with his "meow, meow, meow" of "I'm so clever here's what I have caught for you!". I turned to take a look at the rat, mouse, lizard, mouse that is the usual. However this time it seemed a little LONGER than usual and it head seemed to be wriggling around. "JEEZUS, IT"S A BLOODY SNAKE."

I was sitting here at my desk and put my feet up on the desk at once, looking down at the cat who had let the wriggly thing go and was watching it with interest as it slid behind the desk. I was perched there looking down in horror to see how long it was...... it was only small about two feet and skinny.

I now had a snake in the house (albeit a small one) and had on a pair of shorts and not much else. First priority get some thicker clothes on so if it did bite me, it wouldn't do much damage. Second thing, get it outside.

Third consideration. Downunder we have 8 out of ten of the world's deadliest snakes, thus every snake is treated as something that will potentially send one to one's maker in rather short order.

So I gently pushed the chair on wheels away from the desk with me with my legs up in the air. Then, when a suitable distance away, raced off to get some heavier clothes on whilst the cat looked after the snake, I was contemplating veterinary bills in the meantime, the last case of $900 for some gas. This one would be even more if it got him.

Then a method of attack to get the snake.

I remembered that a snake is essentially on the lower level of the intelligence scale so it would be a matter of guiding the serpent towards a "something" that would hold it, covering it and sending it on it's way outside. Man has the advantage in this case, one can safely make a dumber creature go in the direction he wishes.

So I returned in a thick pair of pants, leather boots and some gloves. I found a small storage tub and got a 12inch ruler. The snake meanwhile had ended up under the sitting room chair. Cat was peering underneath waiting for it to come out.

Cat was put outside not to further complicate things. Snake looked rather quiet as it was night time and his blood was cold. I poked him towards the tub and he was in. Threw my swimming towel over the top and held it down TIGHTLY so the bloody thing wouldn't slither out.

I then RAN outside to the bush and CAREFULLY removed the towel, tipped the tub and the side and the snake slithered away into the night. I had a look at it in the torchlight and it seemed to be a bright irridescent green so was probably a small tree snake or grass snake. Someone told me later the bad ones are usually dark.

Unfortunately no photo, I was not in a clear and present state of mind at the time.

There was news from last week about a teenager down in the"flatlands" in the Western Suburbs in Sydney around 7 miles away, who was bitten by an Eastern Brown Snake and sadly, later died. The Eastern Brown is 8 times more poisonous than an Indian cobra..... jeust to give you an idea.

The young guy's mistake was to run back home from where he was bitten. I don't think he knew that the faster you run and more blood that is pumped around your body, the more effect the poison will have on you. The poison is fed back through the body through the lymphatic system where it then attacks the bloods coagulation properties.

I heard at a First Aid course of a forest ranger who was bitten by the same snake after being airlifted in and stayed still for a week in bed until the chopper came back to get him out. He survived although he was rather sick.

Sunrise.

2007-01-21T06:19:00.000+11:00

There's an angry sun sitting on the horison(that's a pun not a typo) telling me, "I'm on my way.....and I'm going to kick your ass today buddy.". It's going to be something like 42 degrees today, hot , hot, hot, hot. That's about 106 or something in the Fahrenheit scale so I'll probably use my season swimming pass to great effect during the heat. Either that, or skulk around some air conditioned shopping malls and hardware centres, looking interested and keeping cool.

So this morning a group of kookaburras are teaching their baby kookaburras how to laugh, a lyrebird is in the valley below warbling away and the weird summer insects are clicking and buzzing before it gets too hot to go through with any energy sapping courtship rituals.

The heat throughout this summer has resulted in me being extremely busy at work in the beverage factory, hence the woeful number of posts over the past few weeks. Add to that, I am in negotiations to buy a new place a bit further up the mountain. So like Peter I'm now back in the land of the mortgaged! It isn't as Parisian chic but it sits high on the mountain and there lots of birds around (not sure about the wallabies) Here's a pic.

Anyway, later today(or this week) I'll write a bit more about my tales of house hunting and about a course in "management" which I am currently undertaking which is further keeping me from le blogs.

Roger Ramjet: Dumb Waiters

2007-01-08T07:49:00.001+11:00

One of my favourite cartoon series which is still played on Australian TV from time to time on the ABC.

Tommy Seebach

2007-01-06T03:34:00.000+11:00

I posted the Youtube below and for some reason blogger doesn't allow Youtube edits.

Anyways.... i found some info on the artist Tommy Seebach and the Seebach band. Apparently this clip did the rounds in 2005. I missed that boat so here it is for anyone else that missed it.

Danes dressed in buckskins playing disco music with scantily clad women dancing around in bikinis has a certain cultural value IMHO.

Tommy Seebach (September 14, 1949-March 31, 2003), born Tommy Seebach Mortensen, was a popular Danish singer, composer, organist, pianist and producer. He is considered Denmark's pop king. He was married to Karen and they had three children: Nikolaj, Rasmus and Marie.

Tommy was born in Copenhagen. He started his musical career as an organist in his own group "The Colours" at 14 years of age, and in the years to follow he played in many pop and beat groups. He played piano with various orchestras and groups, sometimes going under the name of "Boogie-Woogie-Tommy". He broke through when in 1965 he became a member of the group Sir Henry And His Butlers, writing many of their most popular hits. In 1976 he also began performing solo, and with great success. His hit album "Tommygun" was released in 1977. At the same time he was in high demand as a producer at his record company EMI, and was involved in projects for among others Lecia & Lucienne.

He really hit his stride in 1979 when he won the Danish Melodi Grand Prix with Disco Tango (Danish lyrics) (English lyrics) which he coauthored with Keld Heick. It became a megahit both in Denmark and in other European countries. He represented Denmark at the Eurovision Song Contest 1979 with the song, and ranked number 6.

He participated in the Danish Melodi Grand Prix again in 1980 with "Bye-Bye", and once again he won the competition in 1981, singing Krøller eller ej (Danish lyrics) (literally "Curls or not", but translated as "Straight or Curly Hair") with Debbie Cameron. It ranked number 11 at Eurovision Song Contest 1981. This song was also coauthored with Keld Heick.

He participated in the Danish Melodi Grand Prix a number of other times during the 1980s (1982, 1984, 1985 and 1987) without winning the competition. He had a big hit in 1989 with the duet Du skælder mig hele tiden ud (translated, "You're Always Yelling at Me"), sung with Annette Heick, Keld Heick's daughter. They followed up this success with two more singles and a Christmas album.

Top success was once again his in 1993 at the Danish Melodi Grand Prix when he performed Under stjernerne på himlen, another song coauthored with Keld Heick. However, the success was fleeting, and the tides turned for him at the Eurovision Song Contest 1993 when the song received only 9 points, giving him a ranking of 22 out of 25. The poor ranking caused Denmark to be disqualified from the following year's contest. Tommy was blamed for Denmark's defeat, and he suffered greatly as a result.

The 1990s were lean years for him as a performer and recording artist. He had a comeback of sorts on account of a disco-version of Krøller eller ej released in 1999, as well as the release of a compilation album. He toured the country's discotheques at that time and found cult interest in his old hits among a new, younger public.

Ohhhh yeah

2007-01-06T03:19:00.001+11:00

Xmas wishes from the Blue Mountains Balcony

2006-12-25T16:14:00.000+11:00

From Johnno and his black cat (Bagels).

Xmas Reading

2006-12-13T09:20:00.000+11:00

Godel Escher and Bach by Hofstadter. I first came across this whilst sharing a house with an IBM hacker. I thumbed through it in the early 90's and my brain went into meltdown, perhaps I'm ready for it now.....I dunno. It promises to be challenging and thought provoking. I'll see if I'm capable of wading through it this time round. An aquaintance from the States sent me a lovely old dog-eared copy that had been obviously well used and at one time well loved.

Beelzebub's Tales to his Grandson by Georges Gurdjieff. Currently on my second "reading as if you are reading to another person" pass which is solid going in this 1200+ page book. Seems to be touching something. Gurdjieff recommended reading it three times, once as you would normally read a book, again reading it as you were reading to someone else and the third pass to think about what he is saying. This way the book is read through the three centres: doing, feeling and thinking.

I-Ching or book of changes by Richard Wilhelm. Haven't really gotten into the rationale and meaning behind the I-ching and I believe this to be a good start. Foreward by Carl Jung so it can't be that bad. Picked this copy up at the wonderful Gertrude and Alice bookshop in Bondi.

Modern Text Book of astrology by Margaret Hone. I'll just be browsing this, however it seems to be quite good, well researched and minus a lot of the fluff one finds in most atrological books.

Le Loose Poodle

2006-12-13T08:13:00.000+11:00

Peter has done a great job of describing the pitfalls of 62 Euro pensions overlooking St Germaine on the Parisian Left Bank. He'll be the owner of his own pad there very shortly....... and not have to worry about such things!

And speaking of things French, Air and Daft Punk are on high rotation in the Blue Mountains at the moment. Jean Michel Jarre gets his fair share too.

A study of Sulfur Crested Cockatoos.........

2006-12-11T21:45:00.000+11:00

Took these this afternoon as a cool change worked it's way across the Blue Mountains, taking the oppressive heat out of a very sultry day. Had a mob of cockatoos join me so I thought I'd take a few pics up close.

Hope you like them.

Growing old disgracefully.

2006-12-06T18:18:00.000+11:00

Photo coutesy of the BMW R90S Site

I was getting my mail from the post-office today when I spotted a lovely 1970's BMW-R-90-S, similar to the one pictured above but in brown and white instead of orange. It as we say downunder "stood out like dog's balls" in the car park. Absolutely gorgeous, I love exotic preserved machinery and this was indeed a rare sighting. I prefer Ducati's but still appreciate a bit of German two wheeled engineering.

Looking at the mailboxes I saw the owner, a greying auto-electrician who lives just around the corner sporting his waxed moustache, dirty white overalls and a bike helmet. I took a quick look at the machine and noticed the Ulysses club number plate. "Aha", I thought, "Another one."

Probably the best way to describe the Ulysses club is a group of older people who go on rides after getting tired of being treated as "mobile chicanes" by younger riders. (I read that in a founder's interview in the Sydney Morning Herald a few years back) Strength in numbers!.

They were formed in 1983 and have adopted the motto "Grow old disgracefully". In a few days I'll be able to join as a "junior" member at age 40, full members aren't accepted until age 50. The local auto-elctrican would fit that bill easily.

Their club page has a better synopsis.

About The Club

How it all began

The Ulysses Club for older motorcyclists, the largest organization of it's kind in Australia, is now a familiar part of this country's riding scene. The original suggestion for a club for over 50's motorcyclists was put forward in a letter by Stephen Dearnley published in the August 1983 issue of Bike Australia. This drew two significant responses: one from Rob Hall, a reader at Albion Park NSW, who suggested the present name and motto for the club: the other from Peter Thoeming, then the editor of Bike Australia who sketched the logo and offered support from his magazine if Stephen could get the club off the ground. This was done at an inaugural meeting in Sydney on 6th December, 1983 when the five people present approved a basic constitution and the Ulysses Club was duly formed.

From that tenuous beginning it has never looked back and the club now boasts a large and extensive network of members throughout Australia.

Why Ulysses

The name comes from a poem of the same title by Alfred, Lord Tennyson. It tells how the great Greek hero Ulysses, now middle-aged and securely in charge of his kingdom of Ithaca, is getting bored with things around him and longs to go adventuring again with his shipmates of old. It describes very well indeed the sort of person who still has enough spark to go on riding into middle and later years. Too long to quote here, you will find it in any good poetry anthology such as the Albatross Book of Verse.

You often spot their bikes parked in a row outside pubs located on winding twisty roads on weekends. Kangaroo Valley, The Putty Road and Bells Line of Road seem popular. Lot's of interesting twisty bits, long sweepers to accelerate through and some straights for some flat-chat fun. A good pub with cold beer and fine staeak also seems to be a must! And bikes of all sorts are featured, usually Japanese tourers and sometimes older pieces of exotica as the one above. BSA's, Nortons, Harleys of all ilks, Ducatis and Moto Guzzis.

Some of the bikes I would say have been dusted off after years of dis-use in the shed, others are bikes one wanted to have when they were younger and now they can buy them.

Never know, soon I might one day go and buy a Ducati Pantah (my dream bike) one day and join them they seem like a likeable bunch of blokes.

I'm feeling "visual" this morning......

2006-12-04T08:12:00.000+11:00

So a couple of photos. One photograph, one phone-o-graph(above) and one scan. Not much else going on here, not many opinions to spout forth.....Monday is a pundit free zone.

Above shot is from Saturday night, it's the blackboard and lurid paint in front of a pub in Sydney that still supports bands, The Bridge Hotel in Rozelle. I went and saw a band called Transtar who a friend at work is managing. They write complicated songs without the usual verse, chorus, verse chorus, bridge, verse, chorus, deal. Some industry bigwigs were along for the gig to see if they're worth the time and investment, haven't heard how it went yet. But they're very good, remind me of early Radiohead.

Honey eaters

2006-12-04T08:11:00.001+11:00

Another Japanese Postcard

2006-12-04T07:43:00.000+11:00

Weed inspector guy.....

2006-11-30T19:42:00.000+11:00

Some weed inspector guy from the Blue Mountains City Council has peered over my back fence and found Crofton Weed (Ageratina adenophora) in my back yard. I have two months to get rid of the blighters. They were always there, I just had no idea how offensive the council rearded them. Poor unloved things.

They sent a most informative guide with the pictures of the offending plant. These things have reproductive systems underground and require the removal of the woody roots, should be a couple of days hard work. I've done this once before with a similar weedy plant with woody roots everywhere.

I might plant some roses once they are out.

Darren Hanlon

2006-11-29T16:03:00.001+11:00

This young guy Darren Hanlon (is his myspace) is getting a lot of Airplay on JJJ this week. A poet who writes songs. Young and upcoming Aussie music is in good shape.

The Unmade Bed

(Little Chills - Track 5)

I've chosen to remember you exactly as you are
If looks could be pickled and stored in a jar
1997 trapped inside a conversation
That party was so loud I felt like an abbreviation of myself

Finally got around to vacating the nest
But my knowledge of survival was pedestrian at best
Now I'm holding down a job penning poems by the kilo
Our guest is dressed by hand-me-down, hair designed by pillow

Tie shoes in bows
Walk tall in those

Don't start counting your pennies, the night is but a pup
There's things happening above you, you must remember to look up
And you will marvel at how it's so easy to forget
A moon that hung so bright you could've lit your cigarette

The light that it throws
Smash through windows

We're singing words, the meaning's long forgotten
Corroded over time
The air's so thick you'd swear you're breathing cotton
Assuming your own nom de plume
Invite someone back to your room

The light that it throws
Smash through windows

We're singing words, the meaning's long forgotten
Corroded over time
The air's so thick you'd swear you're breathing cotton
You're falling down on mine

We're all singing words, the meaning's long forgotten
So every person and their spouse
Lay entwined throughout the house

While meanwhile on another couch
I've the pleasure of finding out
The difference between north and south
The mechanical moving mouth

He said "These are my principles
If you don't like them I got others
This is my opinion
If you don't agree I've got big brothers