Since we don’t live by politix alone (I sincerely hope), what did people get up to this weekend? Join in, share some tales, regulars and lurkers all!
Life, Culture and Politics from BrisVegas
Larvatus Prodeo was an Australian group blog which discussed politics, sociology, culture, life, religion and science from a left of centre perspective. more»
Frist!……..I guess I should say something now.
Deep thinking about my personal near future (decision time), slept and walked, though not at the same time.
Recovering from handing out how-to-vote cards yesterday. My feet hurt. A lot. It took about 8 beers at last night’s post-election bash to ease the pain temporarily.
Still, we increased our vote again, and Tammy Jennings looks like being our second member of the upper house, so it was worth it.
Police chase kills family
It does seem to be another case of dreadful risk trading by the police. Four dead and what did they achieve?
They killed a suspected car thief and injured his accomplice. Well that was worth killing a family for. I know the relatives will be thinking of the bigger picture at the funerals. Sure they are dead, but we nailed that car thief. He learned his lesson before he died!
I suspect the police HP simply attracts people wanting to hoon about in cars with impunity.
Have spent most of the weekend writing chapter 5 of my book. Also reading a biography of General John Burgoyne.
Packed my [small] bag for hiking in Tasmania next week. Hard to guess the weather in a different climate zone especially when told to bring 2 changes of hiking clothes plus travel clothes. Generally at the end of a trip me and my clothes are clearly headed straight for the washing machine and everyone around knows it.
Pleased to hear David has done his civic duty and his candidate got past the post.
Just got back from hospital, visiting an old friend’s wife who is in a pretty bad way (but was even worse a month or so back).
Most of Saturday arvo was spent chatting while the coffee went cold with someone I haven’t seen for about 30 years.
And there was a quiet moment to remember my father, who died 13 years ago yesterday.
No work, as QR closed the railway yard at the Port of Brisbane so they could do some work on the track therein.
So it was a pleasant, lazy, reflective weekend.
But I really ought to have done some housework.
Reading James Hansen’s Storms of my Grandchildren – learning a lot but occasionally being challenged by some of the more technical detail (I don’t have a science background). The basic lines of argument are pretty clear, however, including the need to leave coal in the ground as an essential way to move towards the restoration of the earth’s energy balance and so halt rapid warming.
Also had a pleasurable wander through the junk-free pages of the excellent Guardian Weekly. Yesterday I listened to an interesting discussion of climate modelling on RN’s Saturday Extra program, on which I’ve commented at my blog. A bottle of Best’s shiraz also went down very nicely amid the usual domestic jumble of the weekend – lounging outside of an early evening and watching the bats fly over from Yarra Bend with a glass of red in my hand is nice.
Spent the weekend happy, as on Thursday my path crossed the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen — and the reason for my sudden interest in a northern archipelago — after three years since I last saw her.
Caught up with someone I haven’t seen for 30 years on Saturday, for a cup of coffee. The conversation lasted five hours.
Visited a sick friend in hospital on Sunday.
Back to work tomorrow arvo.
Have spent part of the last three hours wondering why my words don’t get up here.
[Moderator note: for some reason the spaminator decided that you were it's snack of choice for tonight. All released now. ~tigtog]
I abandoned the idea of report reading, and went to visit my Mum instead. We ended up going for a drive to Port Elliot, where we had fish ‘n’ chips for lunch and then went for a stroll around Horse-shoe Bay. Lovely weather today. We drove back through Parawa and Yankalilla…there’s so many great little abandoned stone farm cottages scattered along the back roads out there.
My partner is away, gallivanting around the US, so this afternoon, I took our girls down to Bracegirdles on Greenhill Rd, where I had a chilli hot chocolate, they had iced chocolates (2) and a sipper (1 – chocolate buttons melting in what looks like an incense burner, steamed hot milk, and a long handled spoon so that you can paddle in the mix), and we shared a fresh fruit chocolate fondue. Kid heaven. We all felt a little ill afterwards.
Saturday: caught up with a friend I haven’t seen for about 30 years. The coffee went cold as we talked for five hours.
Sunday: visited a sick friend in hospital. Internetted. Found a new Japanese teacher. Also rediscovered the most beautiful woman I’ve ever met, three years since I last saw her.
And the tax office caught up with me.
GAMSAT
The female half of my brace of hounds dug a hole in the garden so deep that I couldn’t see her until she came backing out with another blast of sand.
Looking forward to farm and hound sitting at Currency Creek in SA mid next month. The deerhounds love getting together and a chance too to test out their new wheels, a ute with a canopy to replace the one-tonner. Less room now although I can put my junk on the rack I’ve put on top. Home made air vents and strong side and back glass tinting has made the fibreglass canopy very comfortable, now all we need is for the gas powered ten year old to match it’s excellent economy with performance.
hey, some good news just now on the radio, but I can’t find anything online – the South Aussie Supreme court has thrown out the State Government’s appeal of Bruce Trevorow’s Stolen Generation case.
Zorronsky, I’m in the market for a new ute. They haven’t made much progress in the fuel efficiency, safety and stability of all those hilux/triton/courier etc etc, so I might have to find an old bomb to tide me over..the government was supposed to be raising the standards on this type of vehicle in 2011, but they seem to have gone very quiet on that.
Have a nice time at Currency Creek! The South Aussie autumn is lovely this year.
That’s beautiful land down around Currency Creek. Envy.
I spent Sunday worrying and fretting.
I love the vision of the deerhounds getting together and having a visit with each other.
I’m currently in Hong Kong for a conference, which sounds like fun, and it is. But I also have to try and find investors for a documentary project and all the public performing and schmoozing is just a little bit daunting.
Razor – Best of luck with GAMSAT. Had a relative who sat last year so have some inkling of the strain involved (plus the hard yakka).
Hope your feet are feeling better, DI(nr). Last Federal election one of the Greens’ volunteers at my polling booth spent her six hours shift standing in two-dollar-shop rubber thongs—she must have been in agony by the end. If there’s one thing I’ve noticed about your Party, at least in my State, it’s that it tends to under-resource and under-prepare its volunteers.
Sunscreen, fresh fruit and running shoes; the three things things I don’t leave home without on polling day.
And pockets full of beer money, of course.
SF of I. My arithmetic is astray, the one-tonner was/is 25 years old and it’s replacement is ten years it’s junior, 15 y.o. I am very impressed with the range of 2.5 litre common rail diesels across the brands and would have one if I could afford it. Mine cost 2k and I’ve spent a further 1k bringing it up to scratch. That to me is good value, 4 ltr on gas returns 7 and better clicks to the litre. P/steer. aircon, automatic, injected, no rust and all suspension, ball joints etc replaced.
Yes Fine they are so excited whenever I turn up over there and the old girl they visit, 9y.o., can still muster a gallop up the road in to greet us.
“Sunscreen, fresh fruit and running shoes; the three things things I don’t leave home without on polling day.”
Another party disguise will also be needed, from now on, to pick up preferences, Liam. Family First already have plans for a t-shirt. Working Australian’s (in very large letters) put family first (in tiny little letters, authorised by christ, heaven)
Zorronsky, sounds like a great deal you got. The new things are such big [and blokey looking] machines, their clearance seems greatly reduced to the old models…and yeah, they are incredibly expensive. I’ll just have to bite the bullet at some point, but I notice there are a lot of recently traded older models around, since the GFC stimulus, hence my indecision. We currently have a 2WD Hilux, but I really can’t do without 4WD much longer, it feels like I’m practicing to be a rally driver getting out of some of the places we’ve been lately.
Also, for anyone who’s interested, here is a report on the South Aussie Supreme Court ruling:
http://www.independentweekly.com.au/news/local/news/general/sa-stolen-generation-appeal-dismissed/1782806.aspx
Liam @ 19, we under-resource and under-prepare everything, because we lack the resources to do anything else. I had sunblock, apples and water because I brought them myself.
In SA, for instance, there are a bit over 500 members out of which we have to find candidates, booth volunteers, office staff (mostly volunteers), etc, and the money to run everything.
Given what we have to work with, we actually do pretty well. The State election was run on the smell of an oily rag in my branch (and I’d guess we’re typical), because we’re saving most of our resources for the coming Federal election.
Fran @ 3: rather harsh on the police who had to witness the carnage and clean up afterwards, don’t you think?
They didn’t make a certain little **** steal a car, fail to stop when requested, or speed away. Said little **** had already lost his licence after being convicted of stealing another car, crashing that, and putting himself in a coma, and had obviously learned nothing from that experience. He shouldn’t have been free to steal a car in the first place. Given that he was, committing suicide by car is bad enough, but taking out a few innocents with him and traumatising many more is utterly unforgivable. He, not the police, chose to do that.
We’re far too light on delinquent car thieves in Oz. Apart from the violation of personal space and property inherent in the theft, the idiots who do this then, in effect, convert the stolen property into a lethal weapon. If they were running amok with an automatic, we would want them pursued, stopped and removed from society as fast and efficiently as possible. Same applies here. Anyone who thinks that stealing cars and hooning around in them is just a lark, or a phase that it is acceptable for teenagers to go through, needs their heads examining.