Victorian TAC Christmas Ad revisited

We ran this last year.  Are you going to be driving again this Christmas?

You NEED to watch this.  Confronting I know, but if this gets the message home to one person I'll be glad.

Click Here to go to YouTube.  Need I say any more?

Wulfe HWS

It was uncanny that a few days ago I wrote "things happen in threes".  I really didn't mean it and have no time for superstitions generally.  Well, it sort of didn't happen in threes, but as I type, Michael from Mizu Plumbing is currently installing a new Vulcan hot water service in the cupboard under the stairs.

It's actually been leaking for years, but it has come to a head and we've been investigating where this mystical water leak is coming from.  It has destroyed the walls around it, the bottom plate and the skirting board.  But it hasn't been real clear exactly where the water has been coming from.

Well, it's been the hot water service and the reason why we haven't been able to identify it is that it only leaks when the electricity to it is turned on and the element is heating. And because that's on Off Peak Tariff 2, that's only really between 11pm and 6am of a night.

Night before last after I had removed all the damaged gyprock and skirting board to try to get to see where the leak was I went out and the channel I had cleared was full of water.  Given that it had been almost dry an hour before I reckoned I was in a prime spot to see the leak and I was right.  Yep.  The hot water service, which was thirteen years old and not a very good brand according to our plumber who has had to replace quite a few of them.  There was a sure and steady drip of water coming out from the base of it, and falling exactly where the water had been accumulating.  It had been running around the channels where the bottom plate had gone and wicking up the studs and into the gyprock.

So the third thing has been fixed within the last couple of weeks: the water tank pump, the personal video recorder and now the hot water service.  That'll do us for a while thanks.  Which is just as well, as I now have a lot of carpentry and gyprocking to do.  Here's the extent of the water damage:

Bianco Pump Back

Wow, things are happening in quick succession now - today a BRAND NEW Bianco Pump finally came into stock which the wife brought home after work, and not only that, I reinstalled it today as well.

We now have the toilet and washing machine connected to that completely full 5,000 litre rainwater tank in the back yard, and to celebrate, I flushed the toilet FULL FLUSH three times!  (Okay, I was clearing the air out of the lines, but it was slightly celebratory).

The new pump is quieter, and has a longer mains lead on it, which is great as the previous one only just reached the power point before.

Our next in-home repair is going to be a water pipe in the laundry which is looking like having tiny pin-prick corrosion holes in it, which is causing water to slowly drip into the laundry wall and rot the bottom plate out.  It is going to be interesting to see what happens.  If all goes well with our plumber, he's going to be here after lunch time when I get back from having an Xray done.

Homecast comes home

On Thursday the Homecast PVR returned home in working condition!  The electronics technician I dropped it into was fairly busy.  I dropped it in Monday, and then rang on Tuesday afternoon.  "Have you had a chance to look at it?" I eagerly asked.  Alas, no.  "Just so you know: we're missing it" and I left it at that.

On Wednesday I thought I'd leave him to his own devices and not bother a very busy man who has a phone glued permanently to his ear.  Well, every time I dropped in he was on the phone talking through procedures!

On Thursday morning he rang me.  Early.  "It was a couple of capacitors and a resistor, and it's all fine now - $99.  And I'm leaving early this afternoon at 3:30, so you can pick it up Friday if you want".

I interjected that I'd be there within an hour, and he said that'd be fine.  I'll say that'd be fine.  The thing came back home, I checked it out and re-installed it in its pride of place.

It had recorded a show at 8:30pm on the Saturday night, but it hadn't recorded "Insiders" which is on ABC1 at 9am on Sunday mornings.  So it failed between then and then.  Was there a power surge, Saturday night at all?  A couple of caps, a resistor and a pair of diodes in the power supply chain sounds suspiciously like a bit of a power surge to me.  Anyway, we'll never know, and the Homecast is back in heavy service as usual.  Didn't even get the VHS machine out while it was absent, although it was starting to look like it was going to be fired up again.  Sheesh, I wonder if it actually still works?

Bianco Pumpz

Things happen in threes, eh?  Well you know all about the Homecast PVR breaking down; yesterday it went in for repairs.  Yesterday I dropped off our rainwater tank pump in for repairs as well!

We got rainwater tanks installed about three years ago - we have a 5,000 round tank which is connected to a tap, the washing machine and the upstairs toilet cistern.  We also have a 2,000 tank for only watering the garden.

We use water from the big tank a lot more than from the small one, but due to the locations on the block, we can gravity feed from the 2,000 litre tank into the big one almost all of the small tank's capacity.  Well it will leave about 500 litres there.

We only have one pump - on the big tank, of course, so if we want to use water in the front yard, or at high pressure, we can hook up to the big tank and use the hose off the pump, and it comes out at a great rate of knots!  We can sort of pay it back, as technically the big tank is on Stage 2 restrictions, by "borrowing" water from it and the replacing it from the 2,000 litre tank which is completely unrestricted.  In any case, we've never had empty tanks since they were installed - there's always been SOME water in them from rainfall.  We did get low once, but again I topped up the big tank from the small one and we made it through all right.

That is until a few weeks ago, when the pump completely karked it.  They have electronic controllers which sense the back pressure, and turn the pump on or off depending on whether it needs to be on or not.  EG flush the toilet, and the back pressure drops, the pump senses it, and then operates the pump for a minute or so while the cistern refills.  It then turns off.

Sometimes, at random and for no apparent reason, the pump comes on.  This is because the pressure in the lines has dropped and the pump senses it has to recharge them.  It's certainly uncanny when you're out in the backyard when it happens!  Also, when we get visitors staying in the downstairs spare room, we'll often switch the pump off and use Town Water again for the toilet, as the pump is right outside the window and at 3am it can be a bit of a shock when I go to the loo as I am wont to do.

So the pump is in for repairs.  We have a dilemma.  The repair will cost $177; or we can buy a new pump with a fresh two year warranty (mind you, this one has died after 2-1/2 years) for $250.  I still haven't decided: there are pros and cons that are almost even.  The pump has been dead for a few weeks now (no chance of repairing it while the show was in production!) so another day or two deciding is not going to make much difference in the scheme of things.

If you, dear reader, are out there and pondering this, please suggest what we are to do.  Initially I thought repair, however more recently I have been coming down on the side of replace...

Not the Homecast again

We came home yesterday from an overnight stay in the Hunter Valley (doesn't that sound nice - in reality we stayed overnight at my in-laws') and lo and behold, what was to greet us on our arrival was a dead Homecast Personal Video Recorder.

This machine has been not totally reliable, although it is a very handy piece of technology and means we haven't used a video cassette for a number of years now.  But it simply wouldn't boot up.  It's not completely dead - it passes through the RF signal to the TV, and the hard drive spins up all right, but as for it proceeding beyond these rudimentary features, forget it.

It's been the subject of a few blog entries in the past, actually, if you want to go searching.  It cooked out its hard drive last year and that had to be replaced, which turned out to be quite a simple repair that I did.  (And the 320 gig drive was replaced with a 500 gig drive as it was cheaper to buy a 500 gig drive at the time).  For now, however, it's a little bit too technical and it's going over to meet an electronics technician at West Gosford in about ten minutes.  Fingers are crossed, as I'm all set up to use it now re software and cables and everything else.  The lovely thing about it is you can get digital broadcasts off the machine, on to a computer, edit them (top & tail and if on non-ABC cut the ads out) and burn them to DVD.  Download a DVD cover for a movie and with a digital input, your DVD is almost as good as a commercial number, minus the special features, of course.

I wish it well.  It's in the front seat of the car at the moment in its original box for transport.

Caught in the Net for the last time

Well, well, well.

On Saturday 20 November, Caught in the Net came to an end at Wyong Drama Group.  This was a project that had occupied virtually my every waking moment for the last month, and a substantial amount of time for the two months prior to that.  That's why there have been no blog posts for ages.

The show was, without doubt, the best thing I've ever directed, and it was the funniest thing on stage I have ever seen.  It's a real testament to both the cast, and my crew (Sharon, Scott, Josh and the rest).

To see more specific info, including a hundred and fifty photos, podcasts and videos, see the Drama Group web pages at www.wyongdramagroup.com.au/caught_in_net.htm and you'll be pleasantly surprised.

Sounds good, doesn't it?  Well, there is a nasty taste in my mouth from certain drama group members who seem to be a little upset that the show was as succesful as it was.  I normally DON'T produce farces, but this one was a real tour-de-force.  My respect for Ray Cooney jumped umpteen-fold after getting to know this play pretty well from a three month rehearsal period.  Whereas before I was dismissive of farces in general, I can see just how much detail Cooney has put into the play.  There are a number of setups where the payoff doesn't take place for ages.  For instance a snorkel and mask is dropped as a setup on page 27 when the wearer has to answer a phone.  This action is quite insignificant at the time.

Yet on page 43 the payoff comes when another character unseen to the audience, puts on the snorkel and mask and uses it to hide his identity in one of the (many) funniest moments of the show.  Sheer comic genius from Cooney, and the play was full of so many details that you can see it must have taken him over a year to write the thing.

With all these positives, why the negatives?  I can only put it down to jealousy.  You could see during the leadup to the show that the group wanted it to be a success, but just not TOO MUCH of a success.  The laughter emanating from the audience during the second act, and that final incredibly appreciative applause at the end for the Curtain Calls was an absolute joy to behold.  It made it all worthwhile.

But alas, not all is quiet on the Western Front.  At a committee meeting, four days after the play was over (I am Treasurer) several members of the committee saw fit to really put the boot in over absolutely petty issues that weren't even my fault.  I copped a grilling for an hour and ten minutes.  Whilst I did get support from a couple of committee members, the other four went out of their way to make things hard on me.  And they didn't really have to - they chose to do so.

Given the success of the show and all the positives that came about, it's a real pity that our Drama Group mission statement went completely out the window:  Wyong Drama Group Inc. strives to provide a variety of quality theatre for the community, and to support, nurture and showcase the diverse talents of its members in an atmosphere of fun, friendship and enthusiasm.  What a joke.

Maximum TWO visitors

When I was in intensive care at Royal North Shore there was a strict rule applied to all patients.  That was a maximum of two visitors per patient at any one time.  This was STRICTLY enforced, and for obvious reasons.  When Aunty Val and Uncle George came down from Brisbane, and were visiting with Mum & Dad and Sharon, they'd do things via tag team, with three waiting outside and two inside at any one time.  I must admit at very brief periods we would have had three people at the bedside, but this did not last for long and we complied with the spirit of the law at all times while in the ICU.

One unfortunate patient who was in a nearby bed had mesothelioma.  This form of cancer is one of the most vicious and horrible diseases you will ever get.  No-one ever survives it (compare testicular cancer which has a survival rate of over 95%) and it kills within a relatively short period after diagnosis.

It is also a horrible way to go.  Your lungs cannot absorb oxygen properly and it feels like you are always short of breath.  As Bernie Banton described it, it feels like your lungs are encased in a concrete silo.  You cannot take in a deep breath as there are restrictions on the outside.

This unfortunate chap happened to know about his diagnosis, and knew then end would be soon.  So he was tidying up loose ends and ensuring all was taken care of when he was no longer around to do it.  So one afternoon he had a visit from a couple of guys in suits and his wife was also at his bedside.  They were working out his will.  There was a solicitor and his assistant acting as a stenographer, the guy's wife, and the guy himself and they were in quite deep discussion as to what was going to happen.

A nurse walked in, noticed there were THREE visitors at the bedside and asked one of them to leave.  She had no idea exactly what they were doing, but she knew the two visitor rule was being infringed.  I think if she had asked exactly what was happening (his will was being prepared) she probably wouldn't have brought this up.  I'm sure her embarrassment was greater than the nasty taste it left in the mouths of those preparing the will.

Speaking on behalf of?

I recently posted an email containing comments about the proposed Wyong Shire Cultural Centre, and have published the spruced-up text of that email here on the blog.

Strange thing has happened.  It has been contended that my comments were purporting to be that of Wyong Drama Group.  How the hell this can be inferred is a little beyond me.  I reckon it's pretty obvious from reading the comments that the opinions are mine and mine only.

Granted, I am a member of Wyong Drama Group (I have been since 1987 and was made a Life Member back in 2002).  So I am sort of stuck with the brand.  In fact, I am probably never going to be able to cease being a member of Wyong Drama Group.  However, the way it's going, if I go down to the shops and buy a couple of litres of milk, I'd be not surprised to hear that I was speaking on behalf of the group - and I know at this point in time with about 4 litres of UHT milk in the Green Room fridge, Wyong Drama Group does not actually require 2 litres of milk!!!  Therefore I speak with forked tongue!!!  Okay, ridiculous, but exactly the point, it IS ridiculous to assume I speak on behalf of Wyong Drama Group when I simply mention that I am a member.

If I was not a member of the Drama Group then I'd say my association with Wyong Memorial Hall would not have been as initimate or as long, and I'd not know about the sort of audiences we get to WDG shows.  However guys, let's amke a deal.  Unless I specifically say "I AM SPEAKING ON BEHALF OF WYONG DRAMA GROUP" (and hell, to do so I will get a motion from a meeting to do so) then please assume that I am actually expressing my own opinion.  I mean, really.  Some of the words like "I reckon" and "personally" must surely indicate that the comments are opinions of the author of the opinion and no-one else.

Why have a government?

Why indeed.  This is a question a lot of people are now asking given we have a hung parliament.  There is a lot more interest in what a government does and why we have one.  Here is a very short answer, which is by no means complete.

A government is basically a mechanism where market failures are addressed. Generally, open markets can supply the needs and wants of a society. However, in many cases, certain goods and services would not be supplied or may be supplied at economically inefficient levels. Such services might include the extremely socially desirable areas such as health, education, roads, police and legal services and so on ad infinitum. Although some services previously provided by governments are now undertaken profitably by private enterprises (such as our national airline, the Commonwealth Bank and the like), there are large numbers of services that a government must still provide, such as health, social order and social welfare. These services are never provided by private enterprise.

Governments also go into the business of providing services that could be supplied by a private enterprise. There are two main reasons for this. One reason is to achieve economies of scale in an operation. Consider the Post Office, which is able to maintain an excellent distribution network because it is the only body performing this service. Private letter delivery companies do operate, but at far lesser efficiencies than the Post Office.

Another important reason is to avoid, or at least control, the development of a monopoly in a market. An instance of this is where a distribution network, such as a pipeline or an electrical transmission grid is required. This is funded and setup by a government organisation, which can then regulate who gets use of the network, whilst still achieving economies of the scale for the network. The rollout of the Foxtel and Optus cable television cable networks about ten years ago is a classic example of the inefficiencies of having two distribution networks for the one product, and corrective steps have recently been taken by Optus and Foxtel to solve the problem.

Another example is the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN) owned formerly by Telecom Australia. While the telecommunications industry was developing, the government was able to supply the services as a monopoly and fund the provision of the network. Now, external competitors to Telstra have access to the PSTN, and legislation determines its use. This would not be possible if the PSTN was owned by a private enterprise. After all, a business is hardly likely to give competitors free and full access to one of its privately owned income-generating assets.

Another major function of government is to stabilise economic fluctuations. Throughout the economy various measurements of the economic activities being carried out (such as the All Ordinaries Index) are subject to constant flux. In general, indices increase, but sometimes the movement is in spectacular gains, followed by equally spectacular falls. A government works to try evening out the peaks and troughs in various indices.

A government has a vast array of mechanisms it can use in order to achieve this. It can spend to stimulate demand, and bring an economy out of recession. It can increase interest rates and invoke a credit squeeze in order to slow demand, and bring an economy out of an overheated situation. It can also channel resources into sectors that may be deserving of them, such as into Health, Social Security, Defence and the Arts, areas private enterprise may be neglecting. It can perform these latter actions maybe in sympathy with the business cycle, or maybe to simply re-direct resources within the economy to more “deserving” areas.

In order to fund these operations, a government is entitled to raise taxes. Indeed, the raising of taxes is yet another way the government can influence the economic cycle, by controlling the incidence and amount of tax an economy pays. It can also direct taxation to various sectors of the economy, favouring one section at the expense of another. It can help to increase Research and Development spending, for example, by allowing favourable tax deductions for R&D spending. This encourages certain economic activities that are otherwise being neglected by private enterprise.

In all, the government is an important stabiliser of the economy, and ensures that society still receives the services it needs when there is a failure of the open market to provide them.

The Greens have been criticised lately due to their policies to introduce new taxes.  They certainly do have a number of new taxes they'd like to introduce, but their implementation simply serves as a mechanism for evening out the imbalances in society.  As a government, taxation is one of the most important tools at your disposal.

Wyong Shire Cultural Centre

I’d like to make a few comments about the proposed cultural centre for Wyong Shire and as a current user of Wyong Memorial Hall can speak specifically as to the needs and requirements it will need to address.


Wyong Memorial Hall was built in 1964 to be a major venue for events in the Wyong Shire. It was built at Wyong for a reason: it is the administrative hub of the Tuggerah Lakes area. After all, Wyong Council itself is firmly entrenched in Wyong township and has resisted the many temptations to move over the years.

The hall has reached the end of its useful life and needs replacing. It needs replacing IN WYONG. The same reasons for its initial construction still apply today.

The history of various theatrical groups on the coast needing a cultural centre venue is chequered. There have been quite a few other theatre groups over the years, but only three major ones REMAIN: Wyong Drama Group, Woy Woy Little Theatre and Gosford Musical Society. There are quite a few other groups around, but most cannot point to a history greater than ten years, and many have simply fallen by the wayside. Wyong Drama Group was founded in 1952. Woy Woy was the mid 1960s and Gosford Musical Society also from the mid 1950s.

The main factor contributing to these groups' longevity has been the existence of a venue (now provided by the local councils), for the groups. Woy Woy has the Peninsula Theate, Goford Musical Society has Laycock Street, and Wyong Drama Group has the Wyong Memorial Hall. When compared to the other two, it is immediately apparent that we are the poor cousins of the other two groups. The other theatres are worlds away from what we've been provided for some time in regard to standards and facilities offered.

The contention that a theatre should be provided closer to the southern boundaries of the shire would be okay if there were only one major venue on the Central Coast. Unfortunately that is NOT the case. Along with the Peninsula Theatre at Woy Woy, and Laycock Street Theatre at Wyoming, Gosford City also has a couple of other major venues, such as the Conservatorium in Georgiana Terrace Gosford, and Gosford High School Auditorium (GMS's former venue before Laycock). In addition, a 1,000-seat theatre is being planned on premises now occupied by the Central Coast Leagues Club.

It means that Gosford City has a preponderance of concert venues already, with an additional major one on the way. Wyong Shire, which has a population almost as large as Gosford City, has but one - the (decaying) Wyong Memorial Hall. This hall is the focus for people from as far away as Summerland Point, Wyee, The Entrance and Ourimbah. They centre on Wyong. To build a Wyong Shire cultural centre in the shire’s south at (say) Ourimbah or Tumbi Umbi means it actually competes with and does not complement the facilities in Gosford City. It also makes it harder for people living around the upper Tuggerah Lakes to get to the venue.

One element the new cultural centre is aiming to attract is touring shows and theatre companies. This is well and good, however if you are wanting to attract touring shows to a venue, you really need to have it FURTHER away from Laycock Street otherwise you'll find that a touring group will simply play at Laycock Street and then book their next show in Newcastle. To think they will play at both Laycock Street and then 15 kilometres to the north at Ourimbah on adjacent days is hopelessly optimistic.

A new cultural centre for Wyong Shire needs to be in Wyong, or indeed, thinking it through, even further north, (maybe the new Warnervale Town Centre). This is where the hub of the people will gravitate towards. Wyong itself is very much a transport hub of the coast, with a number of Bus Routes and the Railways Station all centring on Wyong itself.

It's quite simple - the Wyong Memorial Hall basically needs replacing. If you understand the audiences we get, where they live and how they are frequently restricted in their travel, you'd immediately recognise that Wyong is the ideal location.

I do have self-interest in mind, as a member of Wyong Drama Group, but I also can relate to the history of events. Obviously the question of where to site the venue arises validly, but note that our group has been doing shows in the hall at Wyong for 45 years. No other group on the coast has such a long association with a venue. And the reason for the long history is that Wyong is an ideal location to have a group based.

Personally, I live at Wyoming (and for ten years prior to that at Narara), and if I only had to commute as far as Ourimbah to a venue, it'd be a lot more convenient for ME. But for Wyong Shire Residents in general, I can instantly see the benefits of siting a new venue at Wyong itself. (Not to mention the need to breathe a bit of life back into Wyong post-Westfield days). Wyong Drama Group itself does not necessarily need to be favoured in the provision of a hall. It's just that if you site a hall where a group with a 50-odd year history is located, then SOMETHING must be right, and other groups will benefit from what's provided to us. IE what's good for a group with a 50-year history is going to be good for other users of the hall and other residents of the shire.

Incidentally, don't be too optimistic about touring groups hiring COUNCIL venues. A lot of touring groups will hire venues already existing in local clubs, and thus not provide much business for a council venue anyway. The council venue should be concentrating on servicing local non-profit groups in preference to touring professional companies from Sydney and Melbourne. Otherwise the council will be competing with existing local clubs raising their ire as well as forgetting the community it needs to serve.

Hopefully we can see reasoned sense and ensure the new Cultural Centre is located at Wyong. It would no doubt be beneficial to ask a few of our audience members with limited resources and travel options. Wyong Drama Group plays to well over 3,000 people per year, so we do have a bit of an affinity with the people using our venue. When we hear misguided conclusions about who will use the venue and where it should be it really gets us upset.

We can give good advice if people want to listen to it. Other conclusions may not be based on putting on shows (in my case since 1987) for local audiences, rather an optimistic prediction of what you'd like to happen rather than what will or indeed does happen.

Thanks for your time.

Vision for the country

The independents have all had their call for measures to improve the country.  I agree with most of them.  However they've missed a couple of very important measures which I think is a wasted opportunity.

These measures would be extremely popular amongst the community, yet constantly are put in the too-hard basket every time they come up.

I've already blogged about making voting not compulsory (see below).  This is one I reckon MOST people in the electorate would be in favour of, yet we hear nothing about it from the pollies, even the independents.  Let's put that to one side, however.

The other one is something everyone seems to agree upon and yet nothing is done.  It's something Bob Hawke and John Howard share a consensus with, and that is, if we were putting the country together again now, then we'd probably do it without having state governments.  Bob wants us to keep the state boundaries for the purposes of Sheffield Shield cricket and State of Origin football, but otherwise let's get rid of them.  It was Don Chipp who said they were "useless appendages that hang on to body politics - they should be cut off" (ref) (mind you, in that same interview he reckoned Mark Latham was a shoe-in to be Prime Minister).

So yeah, how about it Rob & Tony?  We're already going to have a referendum on recognising native Australians in the constitution next election thanks to the Greens.  How about we add in a "let's abolish State Government" clause as well?

And Steve:  yes I still maintain Labor lost the election.  Julia is going to remain as Prime Minister, but no longer with a majority in parliament, which is what she did lose.  Note my prophecies from August 24, however.  IE a Labor/Green/Independent coalition with Bob Katter being the loose canon.  Got that one right, I wonder now about the next bit how we're going to be back at the polls within a year thanks to an external event.  Nostradamus eat your heart out.

Stop the Waste

In a recent report it has been revealed that the cost to Australia of alcohol misuse is $36 BILLION per year.  This includes a lot of indirect costs, obviously, but is said to be a realistic figure.

So the Liberal Party wants us to "stop the waste"!  I say let's start looking at this problem of alcohol misuse.  It's sobering to think that if we all stopped misusing alcohol for just a year and a half, we could actually pay for the National Broadband Network, INCLUDING budget over-runs!

This puts a lot of things into perspective.  The coalition has long claimed that the NBN is a waste.  On this basis, it is, in reality, excellent value for money.  Why don't we see people appealing for the reduction in alcohol abuse with the same sort of vehemence they are opposing the NBN?

Barnaby

Who's that jolly dumb-fuck you've got in your cabinet?

Thanks to Andrew Hansen for absolutely cracking me up tonight on "Yes, we Canberra" !!

Why Labor didn't win

I can tell you why Labor didn't win if you'd like to know.  The answer is easy.  Labor gave up on itself, and therefore the electorate gave up on Labor.  Consider these points:

(a) Climate change was the greatest moral challenge of all time up until early 2010.  Labor gave up on its policy despite a clear mandate to do something about it at the 2007 election.

(b) The Home Insulation Scheme had problems.  Hell yeah, but most government schemes do have problems.  What happens?  The problems are identified and steps are taken to fix them.  Instead Labor gave up on the insulation scheme.

(c) The Henry Report, which was the most important review of the taxation system was written and released to the government and it was given up on.  It wasn't published for over six months, and when it was partially released the government gave up completely on explaining it.  We still haven't had the figures and statistics underlying the conclusions released to this day.  The government implemented about 8 of the 138 recommendations.  So can I say that the government 94% gave up on it.  And the bit that it did decide to go with (Mining Tax) was unpopular and pilloried by the miners and their mates in the Liberal party.

(d) The promise of fixing the health system by midway through 2009 was given up on.  Okay Kruddy got around to doing something about it, but they certainly gave up on the deadline.

(e) after a cumulative effect, of the above bad policies, the government did the ultimate capitulation, and gave up on its leader, resulting in Julia Gillard coming to power.

(f) In the campaign, the government gave up on announcing significant policies, gave up promoting itself, gave up countering ludicrous arguments from the other side, gave up pointing to its fine record in the GFC, and simply reverted to the line that Tony Abbot was a real risk and you should not vote for him.

After all this (and a lot more besides) the electorate gave up on the government.  And fair enough too.

Granted, the opposition gave us a bland and negative campaign consisting of the line that the government was incompetent and we should not vote for them (if there were any other policies used I must have missed them).  Their "action contract" said they'd repay the debt (what debt?  I know the dollar amounts sound impressive, but borrowing 6% of GDP is not a significant level of debt); stop waste (a party wanting to give $75,000 to a couple earning $450,000 a year for paid parental leave cannot lecture us about waste); stop new taxes (see the previous point resulting in a 1.5% tax levy on all big companies that sell us groceries, banking services and petrol and filtering through the economy); bring the budget back to surplus by 2013 (weren't we all going to do that anyway) stop the mining tax (might be a problem with the former unless huge cuts to government services are going to result) and stop the boats (thus ending a whopping 3.4% of the asylum seeker problem).

And yet, with this campaign, Tony Abbott emasculated the ALP, made them lose 15 seats and their majority on the floor of the parliament.

It's no coincidence that most seat losses for the ALP occurred in Queensland.  Kevin Rudd is a Queenslander.

How the ALP can say Gillard ran a great campaign and that if Kruddy was still PM they would have lost another ten seats is beyond me.  It is a case of believing your own spin.  It was Shakespeare that said "and this above all, to thine own self be true".  The ALP needs to take a page out of the folio, learn from the debacle and move forward in the real sense of the term, not the spinning sense.

Election Fever!

The federal election has brought me out of hibernation.  Firstly I must state that at the moment I am an ALP member, and have been for about fifteen years now.  Back in the mid 1980s I was in fact a Liberal party member, God knows what possesed me to do that.  (Actually it was Mum & Dad, but let's not go into that now).

I need to make quite a few comments on the election.  Firstly re the political process itself.  I absolutely hate it when people say they can't be bothered with politics, you can't trust politicians and they couldn't care less who gets in.  Probably the middle point is true, but we get the politicians we deserve.  They come from us.  They come from people who care enough to care.  If no-one cares any more, then obviously the standard of political candidate decreases and any old so and so can get in.  But whose fault is that, really?  All politics is local, and if you care enough about it, then there IS something you can do (ask me how - I won't go on about it here).

Secondly, consider the electoral process of "compulsory" voting.  As Mark Latham pointedly reminded us, we don't HAVE to make a mark on the ballot paper, we only have to turn up and get our names crossed off the roll.  However I think if you've bothered to turn up, get a paper issued to you and are in a polling place anyway, it'd be crazy not to vote.

That's not the crazy point.  The thing that drives me mad is that half the nation simply couldn't care less about politics.  They don't understand the processes, they aren't interested in the game at all, and they regard voting as an inconvenience.  In some countries, people have died (literally died) over the right to vote, yet half of us couldn't give a toss.  Just do a quick street poll and see if you can find out what proportion of people can actually name their local member.  I reckon you may be in for a big disappointment.  When Kruddy was toppled that fateful day a couple of months ago and Gillard was made Prime Minister, I actually spoke to people who had never even heard of Julia Gillard.  It says it all, really.

But in Australia we force them to vote and influence the outcome of the elections, yet their decisions as to who to vote for might be based solely on such factors as the colour of the candidate's hair, or the fact that their second cousin has the same surname as their local candidate.  These criteria, for some people, are the main basis of their decision.  More fool us for forcing them to vote.

Accordingly, the election campaign has to be pitched at a level that the dumbest Australian can understand.  Don't worry about giving them facts about economics, don't worry about giving them aspirations, don't worry about giving them foreign affairs and defence policies, it's a waste of time.  What you do instead is give them a sound bite with a juicy quote, or a picture, such as buying a pie from a shop, or chucking around a football.  This is what Australian politics has been reduced to, and it's not something that gives us a good government.  The sad thing is that instead of basing a political choice on the outcome of a debate, a lot of Australians might prefer to base their decision on the result of a bare-knuckle fight between a couple of political leaders.

So I say this: make it optional.  If you don't care, don't vote.  If you don't understand, don't vote.  If you hate having to interrupt your Saturday footy or fishing trip, or visit to the pub, don't bother, we're all right without you.  This way those who care enough to vote will be the ones making the decisions and the rest of the nation can just acept what those who did vote actually said.  This is the way it works in most countries in the world.  According to Wikiedia, only 32 countries have compulsory voting.  Notably USA, UK, New Zealand, etc, etc do not, yet people do not tend to argue these nations are undemocratic.

Thirdly, and I need to probably end this post on a positive note, isn't the outcome of this election great on the same basis as the second point?  To form a government, the independents and Green will need to be courted by someone aiming to form a government.  On this basis they need to convince not a dumb electorate, but some of the most wily and canny political thinkers in Australa.  I've been listening closely to what the non-aligned members have been saying (okay, ONE of them is a little disappointing with his parochialism - sorry Bob) and I am encouraged.  They WILL be making a government based on policies, aspirations and abilities, and not the colour of the hair, or the relative's names.  Won't this be a welcome breath of fresh air into the mix.

As a prediction, I cannot see either Tony Windsor or Rob Oakeshott coalescing with the Liberals.  Adam Bandt has actually come out and stated that he wouldn't.  I have no idea how Bob Katter will go (nor does anyone else, I'd say - even including Bob Katter, I'd reckon).

But the upshot of all this is I can't see Tony Abbott as Prime Minister this parliamentary term.  The numbers are so close, however, that I also don't think the parliament is going to be workable.  If a minister needs to go overseas, if an opposition member gets sick, if someone dies, or (more likely) someone has to resign due to either retirement or corruption, the parliamentary dynamic can change.  The fact that the governing side would probably need to give up a speaker who doesn't have a normal vote also makes it difficult.  So my prediction is a Labor/Green/Independent coalition for now, but it'll become unworkable due to an external factor and we'll be out at the polling booths again within a year.

Try to Remember (that kind of September)

The singer is Tamara Abbott, as part of Wyong Drama Group's show "Harp on the Willow" on Saturday 21 August 2010 at Wyong Memorial Hall.  The video speaks completely for itself.  One of the nicest renditions of the song you'll ever hear.

Vive le Tour

At last, tomorrow, the road warriors depart for three weeks of self-imposed torture.  And I'll be watching as much of it as I can.  Cadel Evans has a new team, hopefully he can get the support of it more than the old Lotto squad he has left behind - but is it really Cadel's lack of support, or Cadel's lack of just that little bit of extra true grit?

I find that when he's required to pull out all stops and push just that inhuman amount more than possible, it seems he leaves a stop in place, and just can't quite make it.

Anyway, this year, I'm going for Mick Rogers.  If anyone deserves a win it's ol' Michael - it may be the last chance he gets before he reaches the age of impossibility.

In all reality, however, I can't see anyone beating Alberto Contador this year.  Not even Lance.  My fingers are crossed for Mick, however, hopefully he can at least get a top ten in the GC.

Regards also to Stewart and Robbie.  Don't forget the website is probably one of the best sporting results sites around http://www.letour.fr/us/homepage_courseTDF.html

#@&%! Facebook

Hmm, I just have had the distinction of being blocked from sending further messages on Facebook because it detected my activities were abusive to others.

Sheesh!  All I was doing was trying to re-connect with a few friends from the 1990s Newcastle BBS world.  Okay, well, QUITE a few friends from the BBS world.  Still, the activity I was doing certainly WAS legitimate, private use of Facebook, for EXACTLY what the intended use was.  IE "Facebook helps you connect with your friends".

Well, I guess I'll just have to stop posting messages on FB for at least a few days.  I really have no choice!  If you reply to me on FB, please forgive the lateness of reply, as I'm blocked.  The block will last "from a few hours to a few days", whatever that means.  I'll try to use normal email for now anyway.

It's amazing how connection with ONE old acquaintance can lead to connections to a dozen old acquaintances.  But that's how it goes, I suppose.  We are all connected somehow.

Slow Progress

It was late last year when I started looking for old schoolfriends in various ways, and at the start there were precious few I could track down.  It is amazing how far and wide we have spread.  Some are not even still in the country.

Anyway, at the start I had managed to contact eight or nine of you, and it stayed reasonably static for a few months.  In the last few months, however, the contacts list has steadily grown, and now I have email addresses for 23 of you.  It seems to be snowballing.

One of the best tools for doing this is, of course, Facebook.  I didn't quit on "World Quit Facebook Day" on 31 May past.  Why would I want to do that, just as the quest for former schoolfriends is getting interesting.  Anyway, things don't happen overnight, I have planted some more seeds, and they will probably germinate over the next week or so.

Incidentally, I have been given about eight class photos in the last DAY to add to the Gorokan High Website.  I'm pleased to say they are all online now as we speak.  See http://my.integritynet.com.au/wdgi/class_photos.htm

Newcastle BBS History

Just came across an old notebook I kept when first using Bulletin Boards in Newcastle.  It contains some historical records I want to put down for later use and to get on to a Google Search for other people's reference in the future.

In January 1990 I noted these Bulletin Board Systems in the Newcastle region:

Communication 2000 run by Ian Mason.  Based in Toronto, this was probably my favourite system.  Ian started off using QuickBBS, then went to Remote Access.  He got sick of running a BBS for nearly a year, then returned with a vengeance with software called BBS-PC, which he paid big bikkies for and renamed the BBS to \/ector X BBS.  Unfortunately the user-friendliness of this system was not up to scratch, although it had a lot of power.  The problem was many commands required several letters to execute (almost a command line interface at times) and while I found this a brilliant facility, not many other users were into it, who preferred the usual one-key commands.  After suffering from diminishing call rates, Ian pulled down BBS-PC and returned to Remote Access.

Ian was a consummate sysop who setup his system with the users in mind, and was very attentive to detail.  His day job was as a school teacher.

Cybertron was run by Brett McKenzie on QuickBBS, then made the transition to Remote Access, like probably everyone else at the time.  Brett was located at Georgetown.  Brett, like me, had several problems paying his phone bill and was off the air for some months at a time.  The BBS disappeared after a few years of sporadic operation.

Mega Technology TBBS was the biggest and oldest system in Newcastle.  It was a three-line system, with the biggest hard drives, and offered that incredible facility of the day of multiline chat!  It used TBBS (or The Bread Board System) which didn't allow the operation of standard Remote Access BBS doors, and the ones available for the TBBS software were pretty lame, in my opinion, although they all had multiline capability.

The sysop was Stan White and the system operated out of Boolaroo.  Stan used to also run a computer shop at Boolaroo.  The system was probably the first to offer online CD rom access, which meant there ended up being a massive lot of files online.  I remember Stan saying at one point he could no longer add any more devices as he'd used up all the letters of the alphabet in drive names!

Bill's BBS was an interesting system at Broadmeadow, and run by Bill Mastrippolito (AKA Mastro).  This system ran on an Apple //e system on a 5 megabyte hard drive, and was quite basic, although it was normally up most of the time.  Naturally it didn't offer network messaging or all that much in the way of file downloads, but Bill persisted with running it for quite a few years mainly to prove a point that an Apple //e COULD actually run a Bulletin Board.

The Local BBS was located at Tighes Hill, sysop was Tony Dodds and ran Quick BBS (later Remote Access).  I didn't use this system very much and have precious little in the way of notes on it.

Small Business BBS must have been near Lambton somewhere (from the phone number I have) and I don't have any notes on it at all.  If I can recall correctly the sysop was Geoff Bilborough and the system was aimed at providing a network for small business owners in the local area.  It didn't get much action, and was frequently offline.  I think Geoff had a lot more to do than ensure his BBS hobby was well-maintained.

Newcastle Microcomputer Club (which was founded in October 1976) met twice a month (2nd & 4th Monday of each month in 1990) at the University.  NMC BBS was run by the clubp and the long-suffering Sysop was Tony Nicholson.  The system was on a phone line at the uni, and so used to operate outside business hours - ie 5pm to 9am Monday to Friday and 24hrs on Saturdays and Sundays.  I have an extract from Tony's section of the NMC newsletter (Jul/Aug 1990 issue):

"A hard disk failure put the system off the air from about 19:00 Friday 1st June until 17:00 on Tuesday 5th June.  Some files and messages entered in the system on 1 June have been lost. "

"We've had two hard disk drive problems lately.  Firstly, the old 20 Mb Miniscribe (which used to be in  the old CP/M BBS System) started giving lots of errors and making a whining noise.  It has been retired.  Then (just after doing a lot of work getting the network software going) the newer 32 Mb drive stopped with a "general failure on drive C:" message.  I could not do anything on the weekend (it happened on Friday night) so the system was down for four days while I did a low level format and ran drive diagnostics.  Luckily I had made a full backup only hours before the failure so only a few messages were lost".

Other Systems existant in Newcastle included the Hunter Schools BBS, Sysop name was Troy Harper which was a small system based in Newcastle West, operated by some local education establishment and run by students.  Also there was a BBS called the Novocastrian Computer Link (sysop was Matt).

On the Central Coast there were a couple of systems.  Coastal Opus at Kariong was run by Kevin Mann, which used the Opus-CBC BBS program, which wasn't really good for games and downloads, but Kevin was a dedicated mail mover who was later to become both network and region co-ordinator in Fidonet.

Another very interesting system was The Round Table BBS which was run on an Amiga out of Koolewong and used a Skypix system.  This wass software ahead of its time.  As well as being able to use ANSI graphics, both monochrome and colour (like almost all other systems at the time), Skypix also allowed users to download a set of what we would now call avatars - full graphical pictures that were displayed instead of ASCII characters.  This was well before the invention of HTML (hypertext markup language) and the invention of the world wide web, of course, but the system was before its time.  For a start, you needed an Amiga computer to be able to use it, so the 5% of computer users at the time with an Amiga would have been happy.  Unfortunately this BBS was at STD rates for me, and I didn't login all that often.

I suppose I need to add that Inquestor BBS started at some point in 1991, and operated for many years.  The sysop was Peter Deane, operated on an Amiga and concentrated on mail distribution.  We always had troubles paying the phone bill and finding hard drive space, but the hobby was extremely rewarding and introduced me to computers in no uncertain terms.  I used a number of software programs to get the system running (rather than an integrated package our IBM friends would have used) and ended up modifying the existing BBS code of Metro BBS (which I called OzMetro) and wrote an entire message section called Plutonic which was a powerful *.msg message editor with a number of utilities.

Three things killed Inquestor.  My move to Toukley from Newcastle, which meant my regular callers all became STD calls to the system; the rise and rise of the internet and world wide web; and (of course) the bankruptcy of Commodore Business Machines and the failure of the Amiga computer to remain with a viable user base.  As I have mentioned before, Inquestor still exists.  I will drag out the old A2000 it lives on in the next few days, and dump all the files from the hard drive via a serial cable to this machine.  With the Amiga Emulator, it might even be possible to get it running on the IBM PC, but at least if that is not possible, the message bases and text files will provide interesting memorabilia.

Old Friends Reunited!

Well, despite the best intentions, time has been the killer in posting to the blog.  Did I not promise to try posting every second day at least?  One post in the last two months has not been a good record!

One thing that has become apparent, however, is my quest to track down prior friends, acquaintances and relatives.  I have setup a website of school memorabilia at http://my.integritynet.com.au/wdgi but the problem with that is it is not interactive.  People can reference the material there, but cannot interact.

What better mechanism for providing output and a forum for input than this very blog we are looking at now?  In the next few weeks I will be publicising the existence of this site and hoping to get not only a few responses from users to me, but possibly some interaction between old acquaintences.

I'll also not stop at former schoolfriends.  In a former life, back in the late 1980s I used to run a Bulletin Board System called Inquestor BBS on an Amiga computer in Newcastle.  At one point it held a record for being the longest continually-running bulletin board in the Newcastle region.  Note how many qualifications were needed in order to assert that record!  In the early 1990s, however, two things happened.  Firstly I moved to Toukley from Newcastle meaning the number of people in the local calling area diminished substantially, and secondly technology overtook bulletin boards, and this thing called the internet seemed to become a lot more significant than the esoteric academic/military plaything it had originated from.  Our worldwide Fidonet Nodelist went from a size of well over 2 megabytes to what is now about 150k.

Hopefully we can catch up with a few Inquestor users over here as well.  If you'd like to add your comment, PLEASE DO SO.  You know how.

Incidentally, Inquestor still exists - last time I booted up the amiga last year it did, anyway.  I might see what I can lift off the hard drive that might still be useful.  In the meantime, another really useful website is http://fidonet.ozzmosis.com/ which contains a few posts even YOU may have typed!

Return of the Prodigal

I can't believe I haven't blogged since day 7 of the New Zealand Trip!  This was nearly two months ago.  For the first couple of weeks after coming back I was rather crook and didn't even turn the computer on; I started to get a little better later, but have just had so much else to do.  Looking back at the New Zealand posts everything looks really nice - some of the best looking blog entries posted here.  I can't believe they were made under such adverse conditions in hostel internet cafes!  (Mind you the Wellington one was typed up on the laptop and then cut and pasted into the blog, rather than created online at exorbitant internet access rates.  Amazingly, Wellington was the only hostel we stayed in that had WiFi internet access).

In the last couple of weeks I have been creating a commercial website, and so typing for pleasure is not what I've been looking forward to.  However that site is now getting to a decent level of completeness (finally) so I have a bit more time to myself.  I'll try to do a blog post at least every second day from here on.

I suppose I should plug the website I've created if you'd like to see what I've been doing instead of blogging.  The URL is http://www.optimumair.com.au/ and it's for Optimum Air Conditioning on the NSW Central Coast.  I'll add it to the list of my websites over on the right hand side for future reference.

Oh, by they way, I'm after any commissions for websites.  As you can see from my sites they are done in Frontpage and aren't full of magical graphical whizz-bangery.  However I do try to provide USEFUL CONTENT in a very personalised and customisable form.  I aim for a website that users will keep coming back to in order to learn from, rather than one that looks flashy but once you've seen it once or twice it serves no more purpose.

I'm cheap, too!  So if you reckon it's just about time to get your business a web presence, just drop me an email via the blog link at the top of the page, or add a comment here.

Wellington, not the Duke

Well, it’s day eight of the trip, and we are in Wellington. We have visited a LOT of the countryside so far. I think we left the blog on Day 6 at Taupo. Day 7 was at New Plymouth and now, as we said, Wellington.

On Day 6 we saw the Orakei Korako thermal pits, which were intriguing. According to the Lonely Planet, after the destruction of the Pink & White Terraces, this is the most interesting thermal field in New Zealand, and possibly the world. We saw all of it, and for $38 (each) we were ferried over across a lake via boat, dropped off and given a map. After an hour and a half walk I’d taken quite a few photos of the thermal fields, and saw a small geyser going off. This was a relief as on the day before at Te Aroha the geyser wasn’t co-operating. There is a spa operated below it which taps into the waters and seems to have zapped the life of the geyser. At least at Orakei the geyser went off, albeit only tamely.

Night 6 saw us staying at Taupo on the northern shores of a massive lake, which was the result of one of the world’s biggest seismic events. The lake just blew up, al la Krakatoa, leaving behind a massive crater which is now filled with water. Taupo is a very commercial area with vast numbers of accommodation facilities and tour operators, such as helicopter rides, para-sailing, bungee jumping and the like. However it is a remarkably beautiful area.

Day 7 saw us do the mountains of Ruapehu. This is the first active volcano I’ve ever seen. It last erupted in September 1995, and the local guides were saying it was probably due to go off again, as it had erupted in 1969, 1975 and 1988. He did resist the urge to look at his watch, but I was almost expecting him to. Apparently in a 1953 eruption, 153 people were killed. We forked out $23 each to go up a long way on two of the chair lifts, which took us a long way up the hill. It was a magic experience, and from the top we could see Mt Taranaki (Mt Egmont) which was 230km away, and where we would be staying that night. A lot of driving saw us land in New Plymouth at the Egmont Eco Lodge, which was fully booked due to the Womad festival being held there for the last three days. Apparently this is a youth Arts festival, but from the looks of those staying in the hostel, the minimum age was 55!

Today we’ve done a lot more driving, all the way around Mt Egmont via the coast and down to Wellington, which is probably about as far south as we’re going to get. We are here for at least two days.

More later. We are not finding it easy to get internet access all the time. New Plymouth’s terminals were down last night. Today, here at Wellington, which is a massive hostel, I actually have the laptop going and have wi-fi access which is pure luxury.  We're more than halfway through the holiday now, and am getting used to the hostelling to a certain extent.  The worse thing is the packing up and repacking every day.  Now we get two days in the one spot!  Luxury!!!

Foreigners, not

Well, we've been in New Zealand now for five days, and it's been heaven.  For a start everyone over here seems to pronounce "kilometre" correctly (ie killer meter) and the street signs, notices on walls and articles in papers all seem to be spelt correctly and the apostrophes are even in the correct places!

We were told New Zealand was like Australia, but just twenty years ago, and they are right.  Although today we drove through a few towns that were probably Australia FIFTY years ago!  The place we have seen so far is very rural.  However we have seen a few pockets of native bush.  Crikey, when NZ was settled there must have been a rampant effort all up to clear the land.  Of what we've seen so far, there are mainly cleared areas used for agriculture or forestry, with occasional bits of bush.  Nothing like the East Coast of Australia anyway where there are huge expanses of native uncleared vegetation.

The places we have stayed in so far are day 1, Auckland, where we landed and had the afternoon/evening.  We went up to SkyTower, which is shown here from the YHA room itself.  Not a bad view (click on the pic for a bigger image). We acclimatised ourselves on Day 1 and got slightly used ti thi uccunt.  Random vowels abound.

On Day Toe (that's how they pronounce it) we headed north and stopped at Paihia.  We saw some magnificent bits of coastline on the way.  The shot on the right here is where we had lunch.  It is an absolutely magic location, but is also home to New Zealand's sole oil refinery.  Over to the right you can see the storage tanks and the incoming ships, and in the background the unspoiled bits!!!!  They need petrol, I suppose, but maybe the refinery could have been better placed.  Speaking of petrol, it's quite different.  The oil companies set a price and it seems all the servo's stick to it.  When we arrived it was $NZD1.77.9 everywhere.  But two days later Shell and Mobil put it up to $1.80.9 and BP and Caltex to $1.82.9 so we bombed out there.  Also, it's weird.  You pull up in a servo and start putting petrol into the car, and they come out and grab the hose off you and finish it off.  We've only been to ONE self-serve station so far, and I'm not used to it  (as I was saying, Australia, but twenty years ago).

Day Three saw us at Paihia in the morning where we went on a Bay of Islands cruise all day.  The cruise was called the "Cream Trip" and goes around visiting all the islands making a few deliveries and allowing us all to swim with the dolphins if we want to.

The pic on the left is the "Hole in the Rock", which we actually did sail through in our reasonably large twin hulled cruiser.  You can't go through on all days when the swll is big, but we were lucky.  The boat ONLY JUST fitted.  The captain, who was Dutch but with a combo Dutch/Kiwi accent was quite a talented seaman, and he slipped through without a problem at all.

In the evening we travelled further North to Ahipara which is the most northerly YHA hostel in NZ.  Next day (Day 5) we started by travelling North to Cape Reinga, which is as far as you can drive in NZ (not exactly the most northerly point, but close.  It's also the most westerly point, so I suppose it's as close to Australia as we're going to get for another week and a half.

Here's the view north from the northern tip of NZ:


The maoris reckon that all the souls travel north upon dieing right up the northern tip of the country and beyond.  After all, they originally came from islands around Hawaii, so it is only natural for them to return.  Sheesh, we got bored on the three hour plane trip over from Sydney - imagine canoeing here from Hawaii...

Day 5 saw us drive for a huge distance, as once we had hit Cape Reinga we came down the highway, back through Auckland and actually made it to Hamilton.  The YHA at Hamilton was full, and we didn't think we'd make it as far south as we did so we hadn't booked.  But we did, so we stayed in a cheap motel on the north side of Hamilton.  Day Six wasn't quite as exciting, as we toured around Hamilton and it was not as interesting as the North.  However along the way we did see this interesting animal constructed from corrugated iron!  The things they do.  So many drivers were stopping for photos, the shops were doing a roaring trade.

Day 6 we've seen the largest tree of some species I can't remember (walked for miles to get there and back) and walked around a thermal springs field.  We are now at the YHA in Taupo, almost at the geographic centre of New Zealand.  Haven't got photos for today as they are on the camera still up in the room.

We took 40-odd photos on Day one.  On Day 2, 130, Day 3, 180 Day 4 only 110, Day 5 a mere 67 and today I haven't looked but it's possibly going to be three hundred.

Anyway, I have eight minutes of internet access left.  It's been a good catch up, we are nearly halfway there already.   Bye for now

Bay of Islands

Day two sees us at Paihia, a little town in the Bay of Islands.  We have decided to head north from Auckland, and tomorrow we are off on a cruise around Bay of Islands, which will take up the entire day.

We wanted to stay a second night here at Paihia, but they are full tomorrow, so we are off to (err) Ahip Ara, which is further north.  The day after tomorrow we are hitting Cape Reinga, so we will be at the most northerly point of New Zealand, and also the most westerly point of the North Island.

We DO plan to do the geographical extremes OF THE NORTH ISLAND, but who knows how far we will get.

The main thing about New Zealand is it does NOT feel like you're in a foreign country.  Everything is soooo like Australia.  The currency is different, there is a difference in opinion on how vowels are pronounced, but the terrain, the roads and everything else looks all too familiar.  Auckland doesn't half remind me of Brisbane.  And the areas we drove through today look so much like northern NSW it's not funny.

Anyway, we aren't getting much down time, so these blog entries are on stolen time.  I will see what we can post tomorrow - we have taken a hell of a lot of pictures at least, I'd like to get some online eventually.  Please be patient.  We are all well.  We are flipping exhausted after today's efforts, but we are safe and well.

Arrivee Auckland!

So we survived a three and a bit hour flight from Sydney to Auckland.  Across the dutch as they said when we landed.  We hope the dutch weren't too put off by that.

So we are safe and well in Auckland.  We have gone up to the Sky Tower already, which is higher than Sydney Tower at Centrepoint.  Today we are heading North and will stay at Paihia tonight.

This is a QUICk blog entry as we have to check out in 15 minutes.  Parking at Auckland has been pretty hard to come by, and we have to move the car.  Apparently, the enforcement of traffic rules is pretty strict over here.  Today we are going to find out as we have to drive about 4 hours worth.

Ao Tea Roa Bound!

Well, the time has finally come and we are off to New Zealand for a fortnight.  We fly out of Kingsford-Smith airport at Sydney on Monday morning at some ungodly hour.  (8am).  We need to be ready to check in from 6:30am.  What a drag.  We are staying at a hostel the night before so we only have a twenty minute journey to the airport rather than a plus-2-hour one from here.

We are driving around the North Island for two weeks in a hire car, staying at YHA hostels.  There hasn't been much planning done, the itinerary will be devised on the go.  We are told there's plenty of stuff to do and we'll not get a chance to see the South Island if we want to properly explore the North.

Hopefully, I can manage to get access to the net sufficiently to blog most of the journey.  In any case, just about every YHA hostel has a few internet terminals in the front foyer.  We are going to take LOTS of pictures and we have the laptop with us, so blog posts can be typed up and then just cut and pasted online while at the internet cafes.  Hopefully I can manage to get some pics up as well, as that sort of thing will look interesting.

I have a gmail address where you can contact me if need be.  It is:

bustopher.deane@gmail.com    (God help me re spam posting that here.  Ah well.)

I cannot guarantee the regularity of posts for the next couple of weeks, but I can probably guarantee an increase in the interestingness!  This is my first real overseas trip (my parents & I did a cruise to Fiji, the New Hebrides (now Vanuatu) and Noumea, New Caledonia back in 1979.  For that trip we didn't even need passports then.  Since I lost the opportunity for the Europe trip last year due to the ruptured oesophagus this sort of thing is well overdue and at last I can use the passport!

Tenzing fostered out

We took Tenzing up to the mother and father -in law's today.  Tenzing, of course, is our small mainly white himalayan rabbit.  We have only taken him out in the car once before, and that was only to the vet's in the same suburb.  He travels quite well, as he's quite an intelligent rabbit (as rabbits go, of course).

Tenzing is to be baby-sat for the next two weeks as guess what?  We're off on holidays to New Zealand, leaving tomorrow!  Sharon drove up and back, while I nursed Tenzing in the front seat.

Today he went very well while we were on the smooth roads.  He's a bit "clingy" generally, and likes to hug you high up on the chest.  Unfortunately it's an effort to hold him there for a great length of time, and eventually I managed to get him to sit in my lap.  One thing's for sure, he hates roundabouts.  Fair enough, too.  The drive is about an hour and a half, and he'd done very well up the freeway and the main roads, but as you get through Seaham and on to Clarence Town Road the surface quality deteriorates noticeably, and the poor thing was NOT impressed.

When we got up to the folks' place I stayed in the car with him for at least ten minutes, and he was still shaking.  I took him inside, and sat down on the lounge and eventually he stopped shaking.  Poor soul.  Perhaps we worry too much about him.  Not much we can do I suppose now until we get back.

Our thoughts are with you, Tenzing.

A Blast with Microwave

I heat up my hot water in my mug for coffee in the microwave.  I've been doing that for years.  Last year we finally got a microwave with a digital timer, rather than a knob you turn with minutes marked on it - it's far more accurate.  Gee, the old one it replaced could go either 90 seconds or 150 seconds if you'd set it for two minutes.  It was always a bit of a lottery.

Anyway, my mug takes 2:20 to heat up to the ultimate temperature.  So for ease of use, I enter 2:22 and press go.  The number of times I've keybounced on the "2" and gone to put the coffee on for 22 hrs and 22 mins is amazing.

I'm wondering why the microwave doesn't have a failsafe check in there.  After all, what on earth would you ever want to microwave for nearly an entire day and night?  What would be left of it after being subject to such a treatment?  We're talking a microwave oven here - the capacity of which would be limited to something about the size of a shoebox.  Even if it was that big I shudder to think what would become of it should it be subjected to a microwave bombardment for that long.

I've always managed to catch the error and re-enter the time so far.  Ever may that be the case, as even leaving it on for half an hour would have dire consequences.  Although mind you I'd probably be wanting my coffee before then!

Caught in the Net

Wyong Drama Group had a play reading of a Ray Cooney play "Caught in the Net" last night, and it worked out well, with ten women, four men and myself attending.  There are seven roles in the play, so we were able to pull off the show with enough bodies for the roles.

Overall, the play was well received.  It's amazing how many lies you can tell in order to cover an existing deception.  One lies to another and the grave being dug gets deeper and deeper until the final conclusion which had an interesting twist.

In all, I think it'll be a very appropriate play for the Drama Group and it is proposed as the November production.  We need to ratify it at a meeting first, so let's wait for then with fingers crossed.

Even Steven!

Last night was the AGM of Wyong Drama Group, and yes! I was elected unopposed as Treasurer.  I've done it before a few years ago so I know the work I'm letting myself in for.

Most of the other positions were filled by the incumbents.  However we had to have a vote for the two vice-presidential positions (three people were nominated), and for Committee members we had to select three out of six nominees.

What we did was distribute ballot papers with all six candidates and ask people to circle three.  After this process the ballots were tallied, and there were two winners, but there was a three way tie for the final position!

Okay, we thought, we need ONE person out of this three, so we distributed bits of paper asking members to write down one candidate on them.

We tallied the votes again, and you wouldn't read about it!  Another three way tie!!!

At this point we decided to put the three names into a hat and draw out one.  What else can we do to separate them! What an incredibly even split of opinion that was.

Tolerance and Love?

On Sunday Night, Compass on the ABC showed a riveting show called "For the Bible Tells Me So" which concerns the attitude of the Christian Church (actually quite a few Christian Churches) to homosexuality.  Obviously they know the Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras was on the night before!

The show is highly critical of literalist biblical interpretations.  After all in Leviticus it quite clearly states homosexuality is an "abomination" and anyone participating in it should be treated quite mercilessly indeed.  Mind you the bible also says anyone working on a Sunday should be stoned to death and a father can sell his eldest-born daughter into slavery, no worries.

As is quite clearly pointed out, the bible contains details of customs and practices WE NO LONGER ADHERE TO.  The Old Testament is OVER two thousand years old, and things change a bit due to the change in societal norms.  I would have thought this was blindingly obvious.

However, in the USA (and no doubt in all ostensibly Christian societies) there are vast numbers of people who persecute homosexuals, and one of the worst things they do is to contend that homosexuality is a lifestyle CHOICE that can be suppressed by the "victim" and you can convert people from being homosexual into heterosexual.

If homosexuality was a choice - why would anyone choose to be a member of a minority that's being persecuted, hassled, bashed and otherwise discriminated aginst in often violent and distasteful ways?  Why would anyone choose to put themselves through this willingly?

And conversions!  Huh.  There are cases of people being in heterosexual relationships for twenty years or more, and they'll give the appearance of being straight to all outsiders.  But really, they are supressing deep inner feelings which is not good for their psychological well-being at all.

Why are people frightened of homosexuals?  Might I say from the outset that I am not, but I don't feel threatened at all by them, nor do I consider that society is doomed by their existence.  What does worry me is the outward display of hatred to other Christians by Christians, in blatant defiance of Christian principles.  Universal love is one of the fundamentals espoused by Christ.  He did NOT say love everyone except homosexuals, he said love everyone.  Or have I got the whole thing wrong?

Lots of people certainly have, anyway.  There are vast numbers of extreme right-wing moralists who bay for the blood of homosexuals and would deny them all societal rights if given the chance.  Doing so seems to be quite a profitable operation. The show quoted figures of several churches turning over half a billion (US) dollars annually, based on preaching a non-tolerance of homosexuals.

And worst of all was the story of a mother, caught up in the hype of denying homosexuality, who refused to accept her daughter's position and basically disowned her, only to have her commit suicide feeling that the major cause was her mother's lack of ability to accept her.  This woman has since realised that what the church taught her was plain wrong, and had she not been so dogmatic, her daughter would now still be alive.  Problem is, it's a bit late now.  If there is an afterlife, she can apologise to her daughter.

Prejudice and discrimination is such an evil human trait.  It leads to death, war, genocide, etc, and is such a negative use of human endeavour.  I wonder why it is so innate in many members of the human race?  And why so-called preachers can use it to summon up these hostile feelings in members of their congregation.  They probably think they are doing the right thing.  If only someone with some clout could come down and explain it to them...

ACMA giveth and ACMA take away

A few months ago I had work done on our television antenna so we could get better reception on the digital set-top box (actually a PVR but the same concept applies).  It worked so well, that about a month ago I re-tuned the PVR and picked up ten new channels from Sydney!  They are 4 (a programme guide) 40 (national indigenous television), 41 (ABC News text service), 42 (announcements page), 44 (TVS Sydney Community TV), 45 (Teachers TV), 46 (Christian Channel), 47 (House of Reps), 48 (Senate) and 49 (Expo - flogging stuff).

These are currently transmitted as a trial service from a transmitter at Gore Hill in Sydney's North Shore on the above digital frequencies.  We do well to get them from Gosford, but is exactly what digital TV is about: despite a 2% signal strength, which is pretty lousy, we get an almost perfect image on the screen.  (Mind you in a storm, they drop out, but we are well out of the intended service area anyway).

I've really enjoyed seeing parliamentary transmissions other than question time, the Christian Channel sometimes has reasonable stuff, and the NITV channel is absolutely briliant.  TVS is also finally on the digital spectrum after transmitting on analogue for many years.  TVS is a community television channel run by a non-profit collective rather than a media mogul.  And there is plenty of room for these broadcasters on the ariwaves!  After all, in 1956 when television was introduced, up until only a few years ago, there were stiull exactly the same number of channels, despite a massive population increase.  In reality, there is more than enough room for a new full-blown commercial television network, but try telling that to the powers that be and the existing operators!  In the meantime I'll settle for the extra community channels.  Anything to give us more choice...

The horrible thing, though, is apart from TVS on Channel 44, all the other channels are slated to be discontinued from April 30!!!

I've only just started to enjoy the stations, and they are only going to be with us for another couple of months!  It is hard to believe!  I reckon a lot of people won't even know these services exists as they (a) won't have digital television or (b) won't have them tuned in on their set top boxes.

To register your protest (like I have) you can see the website of the Minister, Stephen Conroy or the Australian Communications and Media Authority.  As always, a WRITTEN or FAXED protest carries more weight than an email one, however feel free to email one as well, it's better than nothing.

If you want to save some typing, here's the text of the letter I sent to the Minister for you to cut and paste:

Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy
Level 4, 4 Treasury Place
Melbourne Vic 3002

Fax: 03 9650 3251

Dear Senator Conroy,

I wish to protest strongly about the planned discontinuation on April 30of the digital fortyfour services on digital television in the Sydney area.

I have just found the digital fortyfour services on the digital tuner after getting an antenna upgrade and re-tuning the set-top box. I live near Gosford on the NSW Central Coast and prior to the antenna upgrade we just didn't have enough signal to receive these new channels.

In the last couple of weeks I've really come to enjoy the services of parliamentary telecasts, the Christian channel offerings and especially the nitv services. (I am not a christian or indigenous person, but some of the programming on those channels has been exceptional).

Yesterday I was absolutely thrilled to see TVS added to the services.

But I was also horrified by the announcement of the suspension of the trial services on 30 April. Why on earth is this necessary?

Despite their existence for years, I have just started to get to like the new channels, and they are now going to be removed... At least I've been lucky. Many many people are not going to have even SEEN these services before they are discontinued. Digital TV uptake in this country is slow, and I know many non-technical people won't be re-tuning in their equipment to take advantage of the new broadcasts. They will not be protesting about the dropping of the services, because they won't even have known they existed.

Please record my strong protest about dropping digital fortyfour services, and my plea to have the services retained.

Yours sincerely,

etc, etc.

All these years

I was just browsing around on wikipedia the other day and finally found out what a song means that I was completely oblivious to for a very long time.  We even used to play the song back in my high school band, and I certainly had no idea what the title really meant.

Anyway the song is "Turning Japanese" by the Vapours, which came out in 1980.  Lyrics include gems like "everyone avoids me like a psyched lone ranger" and "I want a doctor to take a picture so I can look at you from inside as well".  Who'd have ever thought it refers to what it is alleged to refer to!??  Wanna guess?  Maybe in certain regions this expression is common, but I sure hadn't heard of it until a few days ago.

If you can't guess what it means, and want to be put out of your misery, here's the link.

MP3 Player

Struth, am I behind the times!  This year sees me finally getting a mobile phone, and thanks to an Aldi special I just got an mp3 player.  It's quite strange how people jump to conclusions about me, as I've had a computer since age 15 (now 30 years ago), so they expect me to adopt technology quickly.  I took ages before getting a CD player and DVD player.  I was a lot quicker getting a video recorder as at the time I was living in Newcastle and working shiftwork.  Both NBN and the ABC used to close transmissions at about 1am, so I'd come home from work at maybe 3-4am and not have a thing to watch.  A lot of people in Newcastle used to put up 100 foot TV masts to get the prized Sydney TV reception, and I know exactly why they did so!

The not having a mobile concept has been interesting.  Everyone asks me for the mobile number and I used to simply reply "I haven't got one" and watch the jaws drop in disbelief!  Now I have to answer that question.  Fortunately my mobile number is pretty easy to remember.

And thanks to an Aldi special a couple of weeks ago, I picked up an mp3 player for $19.95.  What's more I've actually been using it and it has chewed up 2 AAA batteries already (although they were cheap ones that had been on top of the fridge for a fair few months).  Yesterday we bought a couple of rechargeables, as it appears this thing is a reasonably heavy load on the batteries.  I can at least have one in the charger, and one on the go.

Is my experience correct?  Are mp3 players really a battery hog?

Paracentesis again

Sheesh, I've had another injection straight into my left eye again (called paracentesis) so I'm all sore and re-eyed at the moment.  The process involves dilation of the eye, then application of a lot of lignocaine drops.  The next step is for a disposable plastic sterile adhesive fenestrated drape to be stuck over the eye, and along comes the ophthalmologist with the syringe of avastin.

It's weird getting injected, as you can see the syringe actually going in, and when the liquid is injected, you can actually see it wash over the front of the eye.  A bit like a wave hitting a porthole and looking out.  At this point it hurts so much the assistant says "All Done" and you instinctively shut the eye anyway.  An eyepad is stuck on with micropore and then you get up and fork over $750 for the privelege, of which Medicare will generously refund about $280.

What generally happens then is after about four or five days the vision in my eye improves noticeably, but after about 3 weeks it's back to how it was before (worse luck).  We have been trying, I must say, to get vision back, but I'm not real sure it's working.

What happens later is you get an OCT (occular coherent tomography) which is a special computer-enhanced photo of the rear of the eye (for which you pay $100 and Medicare doesn't give you back a cent) and this is used to check the state of the retina.  My last one I had about two weeks after the avastin injection.  This one showed a massive improvement, and yes, at the time, I was seeing a lot better from the eye.  However after another couple of weeks the vision got noticeably worse.

This time we're going to wait two months before doing the OCT, so we can check what happens after a fair bit of time has elapsed.  I think it may perhaps be time to give up on these treatments, as they're very expensive and don't seem to be doing all that much for my vision.