Magic Bullet

I want to suggest a Road Toll magic bullet to follow on from Seatbelts and Random Breath Testing, which have both proven to be substantial decrements to the road toll.  I have alluded to this in recent posts, but want to go into a bit more detail today.

As you're probably aware the technique is regular driving tests for all motorists.  However if this is going to be too hard to administer, what I suggest is a series of tests that work a little bit like the defective vehicle notices already in place.

If police see a vehicle in their travels that is unsafe or dangerous due to mechanical problems, or indeed at the annual inspections for registration renewal, the vehicle can have a "defective vehicle" sticker applied.  These come in various degrees: the vehicle might be so defective it is dangerous to drive, and therefore a tow-truck is needed immediately, or alternatively the defect might not be so bad, and you're allowed to drive the vehicle for a couple of days in connection with its repair (the one I got a few years ago gave me four hours to drive the vehicle connected with its repair, which meant I could drive it from the RTA depot to the mechanic's workshop (about 750m away), but couldn't really make it home and back in time given that I would have taken quite a few hours to effect repairs).

Once you have a defect notice applied to your windscreen, it is necessary to have repairs effected, and the vehicle is then taken to an authorised inspector who can examine the vehicle and clear the defect notice.

I reckon a smilar process should be applied to drivers.  They don't necessarily have to be booked with traffic offences, but I reckon if a police officer (or other appropriately authorised official) sees a driver driving in a manner that is dangerous to the public, or simply indicates the driver's grasp of the road rules is astray, they should be issued with a "defect notice" which requires them to pass a driving test.

The test need not necessarily be immediate: it might be in the next (say) three months.  You don't impose any monetary fine on the driver, and you allow them to drive in the meantime.  You just require them to pass a driving test within a certain timeframe.  Of course this could be graded so that very dangerous drivers have to sit their test within a fortnight (say), while a driver whose ability is a little bit suspect might be given three months.

There would be no appeal from the requirement to sit the driving test: you'd simply have to be spotted doing something stupid that didn't necessarily amount to a traffic infringement.  (If you commit enough traffic infringements you'll be sitting a driving test anyway when you re-apply for a cancelled or suspended licence).  The reason for no appeal is that the test imposes nothing more on a driver than is required now: you know the road rules, can drive a vehicle safely and have all the necessary skills with which to carry out this task.  Every time you hop into a vehicle and drive, this is the implication of you having a licence.  It's just that you'll need to prove this ability to someone else.

Quite possibly the testing could be contracted out to suitable testers, given that the RTA might not employ enough testing officers already (eg Driving School Instructers themselves).  It will probably lead to increased employment in the driver training and testing industry, and it will no doubt save lives, as it'll force people to think about their driving actions, something that is just not happening enough these days.

I write this after hearing on the news tonight of an horrific accident on the Princes Highway (South Coast) where a vehicle slowed down substantially, was about to be overtaken, and actually did a U-turn fair in front of the vehicle overtaking it.  Why it is necessary to do a U-turn from the middle of the Princes Highway is completely beyond me.  I'd suggest pulling to the left, waiting for clearance and then doing a hook turn might be a more appropriate choice, or better still, pulling into a side-street and doing the U-turn there instead.

I heard Barry O'Farrell calling for more funding for the Princes Highway today, but really!  If a moron is going to chuck a u-bolt in the middle of a major highway, then why is the accident the government's fault?  This is the sort of driver who would be my candidate for the driving test within three months.  Justify your licence mate, and stop killing the rest of us.

Drive While Using a Mobile

Another thing I forgot to mention in yesterday's post was one of my pet hates.  People using mobile phones while driving.  I am reminded of this by our trip northbound where just near the Toronto exit, we came across a young green P-plate driver in the left lane obeying his speed limit.  Ah, very good, we thought.  Until we finally pulled alongside, and from my side (passenger) I could clearly see his mobile phone in his right hand, and he's watching the screen thumbing a text message into the phone.  He did occasionally look up at the road ahead, but he was travelling at least 95 km/h in moderately heavy traffic.  Need I point out the obvious danger of his practice?

A really crazy thing people do is to commence a phone call whilst on foot, then hop into the car, continue the conversation while driving off.  I saw a woman do this at the local shopping centre the other day.  This just compounds the error.  Fair enough, sit in the car, put the keys in the ingition and continue the call.  But you are ALREADY PARKED.  Why drive off before you've finished your conversation??

People really need to get things into perspective, don't they?  No phone call is that important is it necessary to take it whilst driving.  Surely the caller can be called back, or will call back if it's urgent.  Surely you can pull up?  And of course, surely you don't have to drive off if you are already parked!  I suppose some people actually INITIATE calls while driving too...  Sheesh!

The offence in NSW carries a $253 fine and 3 demerit points.  If you do it in a school zone, it's $338 and 4 demerit points.  But the enforcement of this one is rather hit and miss.

Mythbusters did a test of driving while using a mobile compared to driving whilst drunk and concluded that it was actually worse (safety wise) than driving while slightly over the limit.  It wasn't so bad if you were just chatting away meaninglessly, but once they started asking questions that required some thought (for instance mental arithmetical calculations) it got pretty hairy in the car, and a lot of witch's hats were knocked over in the process.
Again, it comes down to attitude.  I wouldn't dream of doing it.  Nor would I dream of drink driving.  I do care about my fellow road users out there, not to mention my own vehicle and safety.  However, a lot of us don't.  I think I've mentioned it before, but I am really quite surprised our road toll is actually not a lot higher than what it is.  We get there more by good fortune than anything.

Where are they all?

On Christmas Day, Sharon and I travelled about 250km visiting both parents' houses for Christmas Lunch (her parents at Clarence Town) and Christmas Tea (my parents at Kanwal).  I have referred to the Victorian Transport Accident Commision's Ad already in a post before Christmas Eve, and have also seen NSW's offerings of warnings about police everywhere and double demerit points.

But on this trip which included quite a long way on the F3 between Ourimbah and Black Hill in both directions, WE DID NOT SEE A SINGLE POLICE CAR!!!!!  We saw a lot of traffic, and despite it being Christmas Day, the incredible selfishness of drivers was so prevalent.  People tend to not drive courteously these days.  The attitude is "I'm all right Jack, Bugger you, mate".  The main problems we saw were:

  * People not anticipating the road ahead sufficiently.
  * The frequency of tailgating
  * Inapproporiate lane choices
  * Pointless speeding in traffic areas (we catch up at the next traffic light anyway, guys)
  * Travelling far too closely on the freeway (both fore and aft and left and right).  Why travel in a bunch???
  * Speeding up after being passed on multi lane roads

We didn't see any accidents, nor did we come close to any collisions, so I can be thankful for that.  There is an incredibly low standard of driving out there, however.  People need to be tested more than once in their lives, and I reckon that'll be the next magic bullet to reduce the road toll.  The first was seatbelts, the second Random Breath Testing.  The third will be Regular Driver Testing.  Let's see how long it takes for it to be introduced.  Maybe every ten years at the start, but preferably increasing to every five.

Season's Greetings

Greetings everyone.  Here's my christmas message to you all, hopefully it might influence at least one person.  We are all on this planet together.  It really helps if you consider everyone else's feelings in everything you do.  Having gone out to the shopping mall these last couple of days, it is all dog-eat-dog (mind you, that's a strange expression as I've never ever seen a dog eat another dog).  There's fighting on the roads getting there, fighting over parking spots, fighting over products in stores.  Fortunately I live in Gosford, and it's just fighting.

In other countries this same attitude is taken further.  We have the example of a gun being drawn at a snowball fight in USA two days ago; and of course in Afghanistan they use car bombs instead, so the fighting has more dire consequences.

If we can only get rid of the upmanship that goes on in the world, it's going to be so much better.  It appears to be a deep seated human trait, however, so I'm not really sure how far we're going to get.  It seems to me that two thousand years ago a bloke whose names are both swear-words today had the same sort of idea.  I wouldn't call myself a Christian by any means, but I tend to agree with a lot of what he was saying.

So may I just leave you today with the cliched expression:  Peace on Earth and Goodwill to all Men (and Women).  Have a good one.

Retailers come to the party

Well it must be the festive season because the two retailers mentioned in the previous entry have both come to the party (at least figuratively).

Firstly, the simple problem of a calculator not working was easily fixed: I swapped it for one that did, and the girl at the counter was extremely cheerful about it. I had the receipt and original packaging, and there is a sign up at the checkout saying refunds and exchanges are only given for goods with a manufacturer's defect (ie not if you change your mind for some reason). This is strictly not true, as under the Trade Practices Act you are entitled to a refund in four cases: (1) if the product is defective (2) is not fit for the purpose it was sold (3) was incorrectly described or (4) does not match a sample showed to you. These rights cannot be abrogated by anything the retailer does or says.

The second problem was a measuring spoon set bought from a kitchen accessories retailer setup in the walkway in very temporary premises. Firstly they were still there and as a bonus, the same sales representative was on duty. When I bought the measuring spoon set I specifically asked for one which contained a tablespoon that was as per Australian Standards and therefore 20 mL.

Have a look at the measuring tablespoon(s) in your kitchen drawer. In almost all cases it will be 15 mL, as this is the English, American and even New Zealand standard for a tablespoon. We have two sets of measuring spoons both with 15 mL tablespoons, so to correctly comply with Australian standards you need to use a (15 mL) tablespoon and a teaspoon (5 mL all around the world, thank goodness) to make up the extra 5 mL.

I'm not really sure if any countries other than Australia actually use a 20 mL tablespoon. A quick internet search reveals we are indeed the ONLY country using a 20 mL tablespoon, so no wonder they are so hard to get, as all the units made in China are catering to the UK/US market.

Anyway when I was wrapping up the presents last night I had a look at the tablespoon I had been supplied and worse luck, it was 15 mL. I didn't actually look at the spoons when I bought them. The sales lady simply said it was 20 mL and I relied on this to purchase them. Again the Trade Practices Act comes in and the goods are not as described.

When explaining the situation, the lady remembered me and immediately offered a refund. I still had a look around hoping to get a 20 mL tablespoon, but alas, no such thing was possible. I took the refund as I certainly don't want a third set of US measuring spoons. She said I'd have trouble getting such a spoon and I agreed with her, although I had seen one in the past somewhere.

However, I did manage to find two spoons in the entire Erina Fair (both in the same shop). Not only that, they were stainless steel, not plastic, and were $1 cheaper! We now at last have a 20 mL tablespoon! There is now only ONE 20mL tablespoon in the entire shopping mall. I know where it is if you're looking for it and it hasn't already been snaffled up!

Victorian TAC Christmas Ad

I think everyone needs to watch this before setting out in the car this Christmas.  Click Here to go to YouTube.  Need I say any more?

Christmas Shopping

Today I hit the local shopping mall (Erina Fair) and was there from about 3:30pm until 7:15pm shopping.  I can't really recall ever spending that long engaged in retail therapy in the past, and it was quite an exhausting process.  My legs are going to be killing me today - they are already aching severely even as I type.

I did not completely finish my Christmas shopping, but came very close.  I'm also going to have to go back as two products I bought are not right.  One, a calculator, simply does not work and another was not as described.  The sales representative either fully misled me, or at least was horribly mistaken.  Anyway, I have the receipts and original packaging, and the Trade Practices Act is with me on both counts.  I'll let you know how it goes, dear readers.

Yesterday, I head from Margy Osmond , spokesperson for the Retailer Traders' Association that there was a quick poll taken of consumers.  They were asked "have you completed your Christmas shopping yet?" and 70% replied they hadn't.  Of those 70%, a whopping 30% stated that they HADN'T EVEN STARTED!

I commenced my shopping a few weeks ago, and judging by how taxing a pastime it is, I'd hate to be in that situation only four days before Christmas.  I guess a lot of people like to literally leave things to the last minute.  I am one to always sail close to the wind with regard to deadlines, but even I wouldn't like to be THAT close!  As I mentioned, I have two purchases to rectify.  If I'd left it until the last day, there'd be no chance of rectification at all...

No Matter How Simple You Make the Lesson

... some people never learn.

A six year old boy, Bangoang Tut has been killed yesterday thanks to the actions of a moronic low-life scumbag.

A driver, coming home from a Christmas party, allegedly over twice the legal limit, and doing burnouts in a residential street, has claimed the ultimate victim of innocence: a six year old child playing in his front yard.  Superintendent Neville Taylor said of the accident, that it should never had happened.  And isn't he right on that score?

Alcohol is a sedative.  It slows down the reflex actions of the body.  This is what it is "designed" to do.  If you happen to be driving a motor vehicle at the time of being influenced by alcohol, you are just plain dumb.  If there is one thing you do NOT want to happen whilst in charge of a tonne or more of metal moving at a lethal speed it's to have your reaction times slowed.

Hey, most of the time you'll make it okay: you won't be required to react quickly.  But just occasionally something unexpected will occur - maybe a cat will dash out in front of you, or a driver in front will brake sharply because he's missed his turnoff, (note that neither of these examples is of your own doing) and you are then called to quickly respond.  It helps if you CAN quickly respond, and your action is appropriate and timely.  If you're drunk, this ability is substantially impaired.

To make yesterday's situation worse, the driver in question was not only well above the legal limit (no questions of slight miscounting of drinks, etc) he was actually doing burnouts in a relatively quiet residential street - whilst drunk.  Okay, he's twice the legal limit and attempting to drive home.  Dumb and stupid.  But now he's also doing burnouts in the street.  My thesaurus isn't sufficient to deal with this one...  Can you actually get any more stupid, I wonder?

Now a completely innocent six year old is dead.  Will people learn from this incident?  I doubt it.  It has happened before and will happen again.  What does it take for people to realise that there are other forms of transport than driving themselves in their own vehicles?  There ARE buses, taxis, hire cars, walking, lifts, and probably a few more ways of getting home when you are drunk.  Please consider...

Global War

An old game I used to play when I frequented Bulletin Boards was called Global War.  It is based on the commercial board game, Risk, and the object of the game is to dominate the world by conquering every country.

It is certainly my favourite online game even now, despite it using what current users would call very primitive graphics, and a very simple display.  However the strategy is what I'm interested in, and it's certainly got that.

I've been managing to play the odd game or two of late, thanks to the fact that there are a number of sysops STILL OUT THERE who allow access to their BBSs via the telnet function.  I would have loved this years ago.  Instead of having to pay for a phone call to call each BBS, you can now contact telnetable BBSs with just one internet session.  In fact, most systems have other BBSs available as a function on their own BBS!

To do this you need a Telnet program, such as PuTTY or even HyperTerm which comes standard with Windows.  You'll also need an ibm-type font which displays drawing characters using the hi-ascii set (essential for such BBS games as Global War).

I suppose the main reasons sysops have their systems online is nostalgia; because what's available through the internet using html is far superior to what you can display on an ANSI-ibm terminal (essentially a colour VT-100 implementation).  But some of the functionality from a BBS is fantastic, and the screen displays are orders of magnitude faster than anything you can see on the net!  There are a lot of old BBS users re-discovering their hobby, so if you want to join in, feel free.  I'm happy to answer any questions you might have - simply drop me an email.

Peacock Pets

After our house fire the tenants left behind virtually all of their possessions.  We bent over backwards to give them the opportunity to come and collect the stuff, constantly asking them when they'd pick it up.  We gave them about a month, I suppose before finally wading in and throwing everything they left here out.  Mind you, they did come back several times to collect some things, and in reality there was not one thing left that anyone would have wanted to keep.

The strangest thing they left behind was their peacocks.  Yep, abandoned in the back yard, were three birds, two female and a male.  Apparently they make excellent pets, and they're certainly a talking point!  They had been left here for a week or more before we realised they were there.  After all, at this stage we were only dropping over to the house occasionally, as there wasn't much here to come over for.

The peacocks were roaming the neighbourhood.  Early in our visits they weren't in the backyard, but after a few trips over we noticed them in the backyard.  A visit later they had gone, so we though they'd been picked up, but on the next visit two of them were in the backyard.  Eventually we realised there were three of them using the backyard as a base, but not always here.  They can actually fly, so had no trouble clearing the six-foot fence both inwards and outwards.

We ended up having to provide food and water for them, as they were not being tended to at all, and after several weeks we contacted WIRES who were told the birds had been abandoned and to come around and pick them up.  A couple of volunteers dropped out to pick them up, but were told by the tenant not to get them.  By a strange quirk of fate, the tenant was working as a builder's labourer, and at this time he was actually working on a house directly opposite our house that had burnt!

WIRES volunteers made several visits, apparently, because we'd see that the peacocks were still there, ring them up and ask them to pickup the birds again, and they'd come out to the house only to be told by the tenant not to pick them up again!  This must have happened three or four times.

Eventually the tenants made arrangements for them to be re-homed and finally one afternoon we came around to the house and the birds were no longer there.  We've had a few strange pets over the years (eg rabbits and rats) but never peacocks.  It seems we have a lot to learn about looking after peacocks.  What they eat, for a start!

TV Antenna Problem Solved

Well, we fixed the TV antenna problem a couple of days ago, and by gee, the signal I am now getting at the TV set is degrees of magnitude better than before.

I can state that I'm in a really good signal area. Rabbit ears would actually work rather than an external antenna, as we're up on a hill, direct line of sight to the transmitter and about 2km away from it.

It was the coaxial cable run, which was done by an electrician. I can only speculate and say the electrician has let his apprentice have a go at it. Why not? He was busy wiring up the rest of the house, it's good experience for a young lad, and he's not going to kill himself with 240volt whilst hooking up a TV antenna!

Already I had mentioned in a previous post, the connection at the wall plate was a dog's breakfast.  The Antenna Man finally got up on the roof today and re-connected to the antenna.  Another big problem.  Also, the coax came into the roof cavity and was connected to a splitter (with only one output connected to it) and the job there was also pathetic.  In fact the cable fell straight out of one end of the splitter as soon as he picked it up! So the splitter has been replaced with a joiner, and the coax re-connected properly.

The digital picture is now perfect.  The ANALOGUE picture which was previously snowy and really horrible is now rock-steady. It can even be mistaken for digital quality!!!

And the real clincher is that from Wyoming, I can get quite a viewable picture on the analogue TVS (UHF CH-31) community television station from Sydney! It's a bit snowy, but it's in colour and all there. Previously it was usually not present, and a ghostly image when it was coming through.

So the problem has been the coax connections all along. Four of them simply done by an incompetent operator, and losing so much signal between the antenna and TV set.  And out of this, in practice, I get an extra TV station.

The Central Coast is probably the best area for TV stations in the country, as not only do we get Sydney stations, but also Newcastle Regional Transmissions (which are almost identical to Sydney, but not quite.  They still break out for local content occasionally, particularly NBN).  It is quite an interesting area indeed.

Memories of another era

Yesterday I had a visit from an old school friend who I last saw in late 1982 when we graduated Year 12.

Yep, it had been 27 years since I had seen Steve, and really, he hasn't changed a bit.  He's a mining engineer now living in central Queensland and operating his own company.  Certainly a lot more succesful than myself financially, and working long hours to keep up.

I suppose when you do own your own company it is very tricky to get someone to fill in for you if you are indisposed or simply want a break.  They won't have the same dedication that you have, and might be able to keep things running briefly, but since their efforts will be rewarding the owner of the business rather than themselves, you really can't expect them to work as hard as what probably needs to be done.

But Steve was down for a few days and I feel honoured he decided to catch up with me.  Of course there weren't enough hours to catch up with everything, but we did venture out for lunch, and I reckoned it'd be nice to go to our local Gosford City Art Gallery and Japanese Gardens. It just so happened (I had read about it in the local paper but it wasn't on top of my consciousness) that a selection of paintings from the Archibald Prize competition was on display at the time.  The paintings included not only the winner, but the People's Choice award winner.

Steve had his nine-year-old son with him, and it was a bit of a cultural dawning for him, and certainly worth the look.  We had a very nice lunch, and had to part company as he had to get back for a family do that evening.  He flew out of Newcastle this morning back to central Queensland, and back to the grind.

The object is to not leave it another 27 years until we catch up again, I suppose!

Wreck of the Hesperus

When I was driving cabs in Newcastle in the 80s and 90s a lot of the fleet was (how shall I put it) rather old.  Car 7 was a 1972 HQ Kingswood; 23 and 33 were XC Falcons (of a similar age to Car 7).  Some of these vehicles had, in fact, travelled well over three quarters of a million kilometres and were quite tired indeed.

It is a tribute to their manufacturers at how cars can get such a flogging, and yet still remain roadworthy and operational.  One of the contributing factors is that a taxi engine very rarely gets cold, and so all the wear and tear from cold starts you get in a normal car doesn't happen in a vehicle operated for such long periods.

However, as one of my passengers informed me, "I'm not too keen on paying 70c a kilometre to get carted around in a twenty year old clapped out Kingswood".  At the time I think he was getting carted around in a fifteen year old Kingswood, and I could easily see his point.

I was glad when in the early 1990s, the RTA brought in a new rule that any vehicle to be operated as a taxi had to be less than six years old.  This meant far greater safety for passengers, probably lower maintenance costs for the owners, but a much greater capitalisation on their part.  Nearly every taxi in Newcastle needed to be replaced.

There was a transition period in place for existing vehicles: I think everyone got two years to comply.  The base owned a number of Special Purpose Vehicles, which were modified to carry wheelchairs.  There was a four-year phase-in period for these cars, as they represented a substantial inverstment on the part of the base, and the RTA didn't want to inconvenience the wheelchair bound users of these vehicles.

But it was a BIG change to the system, and certainly one I welcomed.  It is a lot nicer not only being a passenger in a newish vehicle, but also DRIVING the things.

Smoking is bad for you

The picture is the scene from the master bedroom of our home in October 2006.  At that stage it was a rental property and we had a family of 6 staying here.  Their 15 year old son had taken up smoking, apparently, but didn't want his family to know about it.

This was his bedroom where the fire started.  Apparently he set fire to his mattress earlier in the evening and thought he'd put it out.  Naturally he didn't share this info with anyone else as they'd know he'd been smoking.  Alas, he was wrong about the extinguishment of the butt.

A few hours later he was woken up by a mattress fire and it was too late to do anything much about it.  The fire had taken hold, it had gotten into the roof cavity and it was well alight.  Naturally the neighbours were alerted, the family cleared off out of the house, and while waiting for the fire brigade to arrive, started working with garden hoses from the outside.

I remember my next door neighbour, whose house was perilously close to the seat of the fire, saying he spent the longest hour of his life using the hose on the bedroom, waiting for the fire brigade to turn up trying to protect his own home.  It apparently took them ages to get here, which is interesting given that the fire station is actually in the same suburb as us!

At the time, Sharon was staying up at her parents' house in the country, and I was on my own at home at Narara.  At about 3:45am the phone rang.  It was the police.  They asked me "are you the owner of {address}?"  I replied yes.  They then told me they had some bad news.  There had been a fire and there was extensive damage and I should get around to inspect the place as soon as possible.

The first thing I did was fish out the insurance policy from the lever arch file.  It was landlord's insurance with NRMA Insurance, and it was most definitely current.  So I drove over to the house, and you could see the pall of smoke clinging to the valley which got worse as I approached.  I parked somewhere nearby as there were fire appliances, police vehicles and an Energy Australia truck all over the place.  There wasn't much I could do, and in fact the firies simply told me to stay out as it was dark and rather unsafe in the house.  I spoke to the tenants briefly who said their dog had gone missing, presumed dead.  Fortunately he turned up a day or two later.  He had obviously run a mile, petrified of the events.

After about ten minutes, in which I gave permission for fire investigators to take samples later on, I went back home.  In reality the visit to the property was a waste of time.

The funny thing was, despite receiving such horrible news, I was not in the least bit surprised.  The tenants were five weeks behind in the rent, and we were thinking very seriously of evicting them anyway.  This at least gave us a perfect excuse for us to get them out of the house!  And everything was insured anyway.  So it wasn't too much of a catastrophe, although it was quite a large inconvenience.

A funny thing was that the tenants were quite religious people in spirit.  (They drank to excess, gambled, took illicit drugs and weren't remiss about not paying their rent, but they were devout Christians).  There were  Christian icons all throughout the house.  We have a lot of pictures of the fire damage to the house, but the adjacent one shows the protection offered by his lord Jesus Christ:

I suppose the punch-line to all this was a few days later when I was asking them about arrangements for their possessions still in the house and arrangements for their future accommodation.  After being five weeks behind in the rent, and causing over $100,000 in damage to the house I was asked, if a little sheepishly, "When, do you think, can we get our bond back?"

I'll blog further on the house fire, as it wasn't all cut and dried.

Xmas Party

I've just returned tonight from the Wyong Drama Group Christmas party at the house of a couple of our members.  We arrived at 3:30pm, aware the start time was 3pm, but knowing full well we'd have quite a few hours to go.

We were actually the FIRST to arrive, and we got a bit worried that we might have had the info wrong.  Originally the party was planned to be at 6pm in the Green Room at the hall, but this venue is not really suitable for a party of the sort we are into (goodness knows we hang out there quite a bit anyway before, during and after shows).  Fortunately our members kindly volunteered their place for the venue.  We've had drama group functions there before: indeed it is a fantastic venue, right on the edge of Wyong River, and overlooking Tuggerah Lake.  A magic site indeed.

As is always the case with these things people come and go:  Gosford Musical Society was also having its Christmas Party the same day, along with Wyong Musical Theatre Company, so the three major groups on the Coast clashed (what's unusual about that, you may cynically ask?)  Some people wanted to actually get to at least two of these functions, so we said goodbye to them early on.  Others had started at the other locations (and one or two had also been to work parties) and ended up finishing with us.  I suppose that is the best compliment.

We all had a lovely tea, made up of meat supplied by the group; salads brought by people from A-L and desserts from people M-Z.  It was quite a generous affair and we all probably over-ate.  We had some interesting discussions, and suddenly one guest, whose 9-year-old girl came up and sounded quite groggy explained "No wonder she's feeling so tired, it's a quarter past ten!"

Time had just flown, and in the next half an hour, most of us left.  An uneventful, but rather enjoyable day catching up with lots of friends.  Isn't that what Christmas is all about?

I feel for the couple who provided their venue, there'd be quite a bit of putting stuff away and cleaning up, although we weren't too grotty this year.  But R & L:  it was greatly appreciated.  A real pity our house wasn't quite as large and accommodating, as we'd seriously think about hosting it here if it were practical.

Playing God?

One of the most memorable events of my stay in intensive care was the "treatment" of an old guy who had respiratory problems in the bed next to me.  He was definitely of the "old school" and was brought up in an era gone by (probably just as well).  He was most definitely a racist bigot, and he had something against Asians which may have been developed during the war.  This was unfortunate however, as this was St Leonards in 2009, and quite a few of the nurses were of a cosmopolitan background, and yes, a fair number looked Asian.

A lot of them had been to school in Sydney.  Someone may have an Asian appearance - that's difficult to hide - but often they'll open their mouth and sound like Kylie Mole, indicating they are, if not actually born here, certainly bred here.

The old gentleman in the bed next to me was quite troublesome.  They had him hooked up to a respirator which required him to keep pressure on his mouth and not to speak in order for it to work properly.  He was resisting the thing, and would often throw it off.  In Intensive Care you have a number of monitors hooked up to you giving instant readings. One of them attached to your finger will be a blood oxygenation probe indicating the percentage of oxygen in your blood.  They aim to get the reading at around 94% or higher - any less and they will put you on oxygen to get the levels up as high as possible (I am accutely aware of this as I was on oxygen in various forms for over a month).

Apparently he had been a smoker and his lungs were in a bad way - he was managing to get readings around 80% or so, indicating quite a dire need for a respirator.  But he hated it, and kept throwing it off, much to the chagrin of the nurses.  There was a constant running argument.  He'd say he's better off without it, and at one stage the nurse was pointing out to him that his oxygenation levels were much higher with the respirator on than without it.  It seemed to no avail, as the machine WAS quite uncomfortable, and he kept throwing it off.

I remember at one stage, one nurse made him a promise.  She said if he'd wear the respirator for an hour, she'd make him a cup of tea.  To someone on nil by mouth promised a cup of tea that would be a strong incentive.  I would have done anything for a cuppa at this stage, wearing a respirator for an hour would be most definitely worth it (mind you MY problems were a bit different and consuming anything via the oesophagus at this stage would not have been wise).  Despite him being nil by mouth the nurse was still prepared to make the offer - she may have gotten in trouble for it later on, but she figured it was a calculated risk, and if it got him to use the respirator the benefits outweighed the problems.

One night, a young nurse came in to do the dogwatch shift.  In Intensive Care there is a high ratio of nurses per patient.  For the first week or two, I actually had ONE nurse for only myself, and at most a nurse looks after two patients.  Our gentleman friend was also allocated one nurse (indicated by a special sticker they'd put on your shoulder) for that night.  The young nurse was definitely Australian (very likely schooled on the North Shore), but of Asian appearance.  The old guy didn't get off on the right foot making a tasteless racist remark to greet the poor girl.  Let's get this clear, he was most definitely a racist bigot.

For the first hour there was a hate-hate relationship between the two, and he threw his respirator off at least eight or nine times, meaning the nurse had to re-fit it under very trying circumstances, handling not only physical resistance, but also hatred racist remarks from the old guy.

The poor girl wasn't handling him well at all.  Some of the nurses dealt with it through a carrot (such as the one who promised him a cup of tea, which he DID get incidentally), others would use a stick, and simply yell at him to put the respirator back on, and not taking any crap from him.  This method seemed to work the best: I think this was the sort of discipline he would have been brought up with.

But this night, she was trying to use reason and appeal to his good side (which was, if not non-existant, quite miniscule).  And it wasn't working at all.  Finally after another rejection of the respirator she simply walked out.  Some of the other nurses tried to reason with her, but her clinching comment was "why should we bother to save him?  It takes a lot of time and effort to treat these very sick people and it takes a lot of resources to do so.  If he's going to be like that, why should I have to put up with it?  He can just lie there without a respirator and if he dies, so be it".  She walked out, went home and I never saw her again.

The nurses didn't quite know what to do in this situation.  By this time it was well after midnight, and management were quite absent at these hours.  Fortunately the old guy mostly slept that night, and didn't require much help.  The nurse allocated solely to me, who was sitting at the foot of my bed during all of this, did spend a bit of time looking after the old guy when required.  Her caring mode kicked in and despite it not being her job, she went over to fix up a few things that went wrong as the night went on. 

We got through the night and the Nursing Unit Manager was prowling around next morning asking questions and trying to get to the bottom of the issue.  As I said, I never saw that nurse again.  I was in ICU for probably another three or four weeks after that, and would often see the same nurses again on different shifts.

So for the actions of one old beligerent man on one fateful night I am wondering whether a fine nursing career has been ended?  You don't get to be a nurse unless you are caring and dedicated.  It most certainly is a well-paid profession, but it involves work that is quite difficult physically and emotionally, plus it's hard on the stomach.  I had to be cleaned up of faeces, urine, vomit and blood quite a number of times during my ICU stay, and my hat is off to the wonderful souls who did this for me.  Plus there were a few deaths, which to a nurse must be the ultimate occupational reinforcement that something has gone wrong.  I reckon you'd constantly be thinking if only you'd done something differently perhaps the outcome would not have been the same.  You'd always be blaming yourself for the result.

I hope she has managed to return to the profession, although I don't think it'd look good on your resume.  Fortunately nurses are in high demand so if she takes a few months off, she might be able to continue her careeer given her qualifications.  I certainly hope so.

The old guy was discharged from the ICU well before I got out, so I'm not sure of his ultimate outcome.  The prognosis was not good - smoking causes so much damage to your lungs their chances of oxygenating the bloodstream decreases sharply as age increases.

Freedb.org

I decided a couple of days ago to rip all the CDs in the collection to the hard drive.  Perhaps I'll get an mp3 player for Christmas, or maybe another 1 terabyte hard drive, so having all the CDs in mp3 format is going to be very handy indeed.

It's a gradual process, but I'm a long way towards completion tonight.  I have ripped 253 CDs so far, which is totalling 4,460 individual files on the disc; and roughly 9 gigabytes.  About 20% of them had already been ripped, but needed consistently renaming.  I also have put both ID3 version 1 AND 2 metadata into the mp3s.  This will come in handy when I finally get a programme to run over them and create a database of them for searching (I'll probably use Windows Media Player for compatibility I'd say).

During all this I have been accessing the freedb database to get filenames for the mp3 files and it has saved an inordinate amount of typing.  I am absoloutely stunned at the comprehensiveness of the database.  It has contained listings for every CD so far except for four.  They are:

Col Joye - Most Requested
Shakin' Stevens - This Ole House
Barry O'Dowd - Best Loved Christmas Songs    and
The Ventures - The Very Best of the Ventures Disc 1

Mind you, the Ventures' Disc 2 was actually listed, surprisingly enough.  Funny that someone has typed up the second disc, but not the first.  And I can't believe the ole Shakin' Stevens CD isn't in there!  Poor ole Shakin' Stevens - has no-one typed up "This Ole House" for us?  The other two are reasonably obscure I suppose and no-one's gotten around to typing up track listings for them yet.

I am going to find out what's required to send away submissions, as I've typed up the titles and info for these four CDs and for the sake of completeness, would really like to send the listings up to freedb.

I have probably another forty or fifty CDs to go before the project is over, so I'll wait to see what else might be missing and chip in my 2c worth for possible use of others out there.

The surprises never cease in that despite Barry O'Dowd's Christmas CD not being listed on freedb, when I went and played a song or two from the album, Windows Media Player was able to access the album art and download an image of the album cover for it!  So someone out there knows about it.

The Antenna, Tenzing and A or An Historic

Well, just a couple of quick updates to post, and then a question inviting comments.

The antenna man was held up at work and hasn't returned yet!  We had a few dropouts watching the T20 cricket on "One" last night, but it wasn't terminal and we got to see all of the match.  For those unaware, Wednesday Nights are One's T20 cricket nights, and they will be replaying some earlier T20 games each Wednesday night during summer.  As a diehard fan in the non-ratings period, this seems like a great service to us viewers.

The Wife LOVES the name Tenzing.  The rabbit even LOOKS like Tenzing:

So I think we've struck a win there, thank you Balmain Boy!

Finally, I've been having an extended conversation on Facebook (me and quite a few others) re the usage of A or An as an article in front of a soft h.  A user pointed out that Channel 10 News used the expression "An Historic Occasion..." and that was a grammatical error.  I went into bat for Channel 10 and said with a soft "h" at the start, the article "an" was correct.  Naturally we have gotten nowhere, although research has shown Stephen Murray-Smith is on my side, and in any case my contention is "an historic" is not wrong, NOT "a historic" is not right.  Doing a Google Search universally gives 32% to "An" and 68% to "A".  But if you choose the domain .au, there were 139,000 hits for "An Historic" just shading "A Historic" which came in at 138,000.   So in this country we're dead on 50/50 (Well, almost. Probably by the same margin Federal Elections are decided!)

Anyone want to add their 2c worth?  I've read MOST of the Google results on this, so I'm really interested in what you guys have to say rather than technical grammatical analyses.

Antenna Woes

Digital television is something we've had for quite a while now, and finally today I have gotten around to doing something about the antenna deficiencies we've had.

We got a digital Personal Video Recorder in April 2008.  It's a nice unit although it has broken down once.  Last night we were watching "Red Dwarf - Back to Earth" on ABC2 and ten minutes into the show the transmission dropped out, and the screen stayed black for about ten minutes.  We DID get to see the end, and had seen the start, it was just the middle bit we missed.  Such is life.

With Digital TV, you either get the signal or you don't.  Back on analogue you get varying degrees of picture quality from "rock-steady" to "quite snowy", etc, etc.  But with digital it's basically all or nothing.  So when you do get a dodgy signal, often the last picture you've received will freeze on the screen, and then it picks up when there's next a signal.

We had a lousy signal ever since the repairs to the antenna were done after the house fire (more on that later); but with the coming of the digital TV, it improved enormously and I haven't really done anything about it, despite knowing the quality was not 100%.  Occasionally we'd miss programmes due to dropouts, but it's just one of those things you mean to do something about but never get around to.

Anyway, I had a visit from an antenna installer yesterday who has measured the signal strength, informed me that it is quite good, so there's definitely a problem with either the antenna or the connection.  We may need a new antenna, the existing antenna properly connected, or re-wired.

Anyway, he's coming back this afternoon as he didn't have a long enough ladder with him.  The price you pay for living in a two-storey house!

Turn of phrase, no?

I recently left a comment on Adrian Neylan's blog where he had an 87 year old woman in the taxi who was a real inspiration.  I typed "Adrian, she's 87, no?" quite unwittingly.

Another reader has taken offence at the expression "... , no?" and this is naturally his right.  But it has gotten me thinking what the alternatives are.  Quite clearly the construction is designed to be egging you on to agree with me, no?  The same can also be indicated by the opposite term, yes?  It is one of several cases in the English language where "yes" actually means the same as "no", no?  Yeah, no, yeah, no...  (Forgive me for answering my rhetorical questions)

Years ago we would have simply said, "eh?".  Sounds like what my Uncle Dudley would have said, eh?  Modern expression has turned this more colloquial linguistic form into a more formal form, and instead of using the slang form "eh?" we've converted to using the actual words "no" or "yes" instead.  It is a phenomenon not only in Australian usage, but quite definitely English as well.  I'm not too sure how common it is in American...

Like it or not, it seems to be quite a prevalent occurence in modern parlance, and is here to stay, no?  I'm sorry, I should stop using it, yes?  I'm glad you all agree with me on that one, eh?

Enough!  While on the subject, however, I am reminded of an old TV commercial for NRMA Finance with Doug Scroope in it.  (This is pre-de-mutualisation of course).  NRMA Finance had been awarded a triple-A credit rating.  The last line of the ad from Doug was "NRMA, AAA?, Eh?"

It's a boy!

We took the rabbit down to the vet today.  We haven't really ever been a user of the services of a veterinarian before, so we simply went to the closest one.  The experience was quite painless, I rang up and asked whether they had dealt with rabbits a lot, whereupon they said yes, and I asked what sort of vaccinations are recommended.

Apparently you cannot get vaccination against myxomatosis in Australia, and it's quite a rare event anyway.  However you certainly can get vaccination against rabbit calicivirus, which our bunny has now udergone.  We also got the vet to give it a once-over and checkup.

Firstly, we must report it's a boy.  Fairly obvious when you know where to look, in fact.  It's probably a year or two old judging by his teeth, and almost certainly full-grown.  He was very brave when injected with the vaccine, and seemed quite unperturbed by what would have hurt a bit.  In fact he's a very active and curious rabbit in general, always investigating and looking out for things.

The cost for the visit to the vet and vaccination was $49.60, which as a prolific consumer of medical services, seems to be quite reasonable.  We had a large budgie cage to transport him down to the vet and back, which we formerly used as a holiday cage for the rats.  The unsuitability of it came to the fore as we were leaving the vets, and the bottom fell out of the cage completely.  Fortunately he was well-behaved and I was able to pick him up before he went gallavanting around the floor in the waiting room of the vets.  When we exited the front door, a family had a nice-looking dog waiting for attention, who proceeded to growl at the rabbit.  Probably just as well there were no greyhounds in at the time!

He is still un-named.  Given that he's a male himalayan rabbit, are there any suggestions from you, dear readers?  We were thinking perhaps something geographical from the region.  We were thinking of "Katie" after the mountain K2, but this was, of course, before we found out she was a he.  Thinking caps on, please!

Murphy's Helicopter

My transport to RNS on that fateful day involved a NSW ambulance helicopter.  Or should I really say TWO NSW ambulance helicopters.  I actually remember the pilot turning up at Gosford, and saying "We've got an hydraulic leak in the chopper we just arrived in, so we can't take you in that, we'll get another one".

This statement may, in fact, have been the last thing I ever heard, given the seriousness of my problem, and the prognosis.  Fortunately it wasn't, but I can't remember much after that.  They went ahead and sedated me, as the replacement helicopter wasn't going to be long.

What ended up happening was fascinating.  Since the first chopper had landed on the helipad at Gosford Hospital and couldn't be moved, the helipad was therefore out of service!  The second chopper had to land down the road at the oval in Showground Road, and I had to be carted down there in a road ambulance to be loaded on to the chopper.

Sharon says she can recall me being taken down on a stretcher and driven off in an ambulance.  She didn't actually come down - earlier on I had told her to ring my parents and get them to come down to Gosford, pick her up and carry on to Royal North Shore Hospital.

Apparently it took almost as long to get me from Gosford Hospital to the oval in Showground Road than it did to actually take me from there to Royal North Shore!

It just goes to show, though, if you are going to get sick, NSW is probably one of the best places in the world for it to happen to you (especially if you are close to Sydney).  The speed and scope of everything they did for me was absolutely brilliant. I really cannot praise them enough.  When I was triaged at Gosford Hospital Casualty I must have been assessed at an incredibly high rating, as they basically dropped everything and took me in.  I jumped the queue in front of quite a few other patients, and at this stage I hadn't actually been diagnosed.  However severe chest pain coming from the left hand side (which is exactly what I had) does rate up there with the most serious of concerns.

Reading about oesophageal ruptures on the net lately, the speed of treatment is a big factor in the success rate.  If you let it go more than 24 hours, the result is almost always fatal: get treatment in less than an hour and the fatality rate drops to a mere 10%.

I have really no idea how long I had let the rupture go before I got Sharon to take me into hospital, but we figure the oesophagus probably ruptured at about 8-9pm at night, and I arrived down at Royal North Shore at about 7am next morning...

Cost is relative

Back in 1988 when I used to run my Bulletin Board System I was unfortunate in that the host system was located in the United States, and the maximum speed of the modem was 2400 bits per second.  As a result I had to make fifteen or twenty minute calls to the USA to get software, such as new doors for the board or indeed new revisions to the BBS software itself.

At this point in time (pre-Optus in fact) the cost to call USA was $1.79 a minute peak, $1.19 a minute off-peak (after about 10pm to about 7am, Australian time).  I ended up becoming the Australian distributor of the BBS software (fat lot of good that actually did me, in reality) so was the main gateway of stuff from the USA into Australia.

So after a few months of doing this, it arrived.  That is: the phone bill.  At this point in time they were sent every three months to private subscribers.

Opening it up I knew it would be large.  A twenty minute call would cost maybe $25 or even $35 if I hadn't waited to off-peak hours.  And I'd made quite a few of them.

I couldn't believe it when I opened the bill and it was a whopping $750!!!  Since most of the calls were international, even then they were itemised, so I went through it with a calculator and added them all up.  And despite it not looking anything like $750 when you looked at the individual calls, it sure enough added to the given total.  (Gee these computers are good at arithmetic).

As a full-time university student on TEAS (Tertiary Education Assistance Scheme - the forerunner to Austudy) which was at the time, even less than the dole, there was going to be a little bit of trouble paying the bill.

The time for paying the bill came and went, and the inevitable happened, of course, Telecom cut the phone off, putting the BBS off the air.  Eventually thanks to cries out to my users, some of whom generously chipped in with small contributions, a loan from my girlfriend and a loan (which ended up becoming a grant) from my Mum, I managed to pay the bill.

So I applied to get the phone re-connected.  All was fine until after a few days there was still no dial tone on the line, so I rang up and made enquiries.  It seems that since my account had been delinquent, Telecom required a $250 security deposit before they'd re-connect the phone.  The hadn't told me about this at all when I applied for reconnection after paying the bill.  And if they had, I'd say the full cost of reconnection would have been apparent, ie $1,000, not $750!  So in order to recommence, I had to fork out another $250 after I'd had so much trouble scraping together $750...

After another couple of weeks I managd to pay the security deposit and the BBS was back on the air, finally!

Now I look at call costs to the USA, and if you shop around it's possible to get these same calls for 6c a minute!  Plus the modems we are using now are twenty or thirty times faster; although I'd in reality be using ADSL to do the file transfers at probably sixty or seventy times faster at no actual call cost above the monthly subscription fee!!!  I was using telecommunications far too early, it seems!

Wascally Wabbit

A couple of days ago, my wife Sharon (who goes for an early morning walk with more regularity than my blog posts) came back asking me "are you awake?"

It turns out she'd found a stray RABBIT hopping around outside the house.  My wife has been a small mammal enthusiast since her high school days, having a succession of rabbits, guinea pigs, rats, mice and other similar things.  She's often alluded to getting a ferret, but hasn't made good on her threats.

Anyway, since the rats have died (this time last year) we've had a large empty cage in the living room.  That cage now has an occupant (although only on a temporary basis as it's quite inappropriate for a mammal the size of a rabbit given that it was custom made for rats).

The thing is SOOOOO CUTE!!!!  It is very tame, and we have made some efforts to contact the original owner, however this hasn't worked so far.  At this stage its probably not what we want, anyway :-)  The rabbit will sit in your lap and just take pats en masse.  It is very docile, and loves being loved.

So naturally we are trying to come up with a name for it.  For a start we don't know whether it's a boy or a girl.  I have tried to determine it (rats are VERY easy to tell) but to no avail yet (I suppose that's what the internet is for).

I suggested the name, "Tony Rabbit" after our newly appointed Federal Liberal Leader.  Then if we get the sex wrong the name won't have to be changed.  However my wife cannot abide calling a pet after a politician, and I tend to agree after a few moments' thought.  So good readers, are there any suggestions from you??

Enough, already!

See all those brochures on the right?  That's what arrived in the mailbox yesterday.  22 individual flyers! 

I'm all for freedom of the press, and I don't have a "No Junk Mail" sticker on the letterbox.  Hell, a number of years ago, I actually used to deliver the things, and I also have a good mate who used to be an area supervisor for one of the main printing and distribution companies.

How I can even get through this much information in a day or two I do not know.  And in the last few months it has been very similar, at least fifteen, maybe twenty brochures on some days.

I am simply going to have to resort to chucking the lot in the recycling bin.  It is a simple case of overwhelming me with information I can no longer possibly keep up with.  And don't the advertisers know it?  Their advertising dollar is simply going to waste, because unless you are retired and/or have absolutely nothing else to do with your life, it'd take a couple of days to carefully consider all the offers provided in this little lot.  And if you did have the time to peruse the offers comprehensively, your economic situation wouldn't make you a member of those able to afford the offers anyway, if you get my drift!

I used to browse the brochures.  In fact I even need to get a Christmas present for my mother who is the most difficult person on earth to buy presents for, and there might be something appropriate here.  But due to the sheer volume I don't find this useful at all.

When I used to deliver this stuff (when I was fresh out of High School, before I started driving cabs) we rarely used to get to deliver more than one brochure at a time.  When my mate was an area supervisor, I actually went out on a few delivery runs with him to give him a hand when his regular deliverers had let him down or he needed an area covered urgently.  At this time we'd sometimes get to do four or five brochures at a time.  But the time when you'd be doing twenty-odd brouchures simultaneously is mind-boggling.  The logistics are crazy - you'd be battling to physically carry more than about 50 sets of brochures in a backpack, so you'd need to be constantly returning to the car for refills.  And you'd need to spend hours collating all the brochures into sets of twenty-odd.

I did see one brochure deliverer using a newspaper rolling machine at one stage, given the number we got yesterday, it would have come in very handy.

The whole concept must be an incredible use of resources and environmentally damaging.  I hope the number of brochures returns to a manageable level, otherwise I am going to have to resort to the sign!  Maybe as Christmas comes and goes it'll be all right again.

                         

Finally, may I apologise for missing the blog these last couple of days, when you have a bad few days, even blogging becomes out of the question!