via *I Have Seen The Whole Of The Internet*

Please share any bits and pieces you have come across recently that have surprised, delighted, intrigued or otherwise positively engaged you.

NB: the weekly whimsy thread is a stoush-free zone

via BuzzFeed 60 Completely Unusable Stock Photos

a selection of weird stock images

Please share any bits and pieces you have come across recently that have surprised, delighted, intrigued or otherwise positively engaged you.

NB: the weekly whimsy thread is a stoush-free zone

Uluru helicopter view

As that shot clearly demonstrates, the grain of the sandstone shows that it lies on an 85 degree angle, which it has done for hundreds of millions of years. But change it does, in colour and mood due to changing light, as in this image:

Uluru image by Boh-deh

Now photographer Peter Carroll has captured the Magic at Uluru just after rain.

Simply stunning. Enjoy!

There’s more at Peter Carroll’s blog.

Groom’s Cottage provides accommodation for about 45 people, but 36 of the beds are in four rooms with nine bunk beads in each. Our group don’t usually sleep more than four to each of these rooms. The Cottage has a fridge, a kitchenette and common indoor and outdoor meet and mingle space. The fellowship is a bigger part of the experience for us than the bushwalking. You can bring your own grog and some don’t make it into the forest at all.

Margot and I finally got away at midday and decided to head for the Coomera Falls. Here is a happy trekker early in the walk.

Happy trekker early in the walk

It was a coolish day, probably a maximum in the low 20s, with some cloud and rain vaguely threatening, but the forecast was fine. I carried a light pack with a couple of salad rolls, bananas and an apple. You can’t see it but I started and finished the walk with a light flannelette shirt, open at the front. The jacket was in case of rain and I had a small travel umbrella in the pack, just in case. Margot carried two litres of water, which was about just right for what turned out to be nearly a six-hour trip.

We were going to do the return walk to Coomera Falls, only 10.8 km return, but didn’t have a map and missed the turn. We knew we had to bear right.

Sign

There was a seat there, people standing around, a lot of leaf litter on the track. We’d done Coomera Falls before but not for at least 5 years. Anyway we simply didn’t see the track at a sharp angle off to the right and thought the turnoff must be a bit further along. After about an hour we realised something was wrong. This was confirmed by some fellows with a compass and a map coming the other way. We were in fact on the ‘border track’ which didn’t have a sign as such.

I did some calculations and figured we could make it all the way by dark, so pressed on, doing the circuit in reverse. It’s a good way to do it as you wind over all the contributing creeks before descending to the top of the valley where the Coomera Falls are.

There are some 10-15 falls on the circuit and I’d estimate 20-30 creek crossings. These were the first falls we photographed:

Falls on Coomera circuit

Here’s a closer shot:

Closer up

The wet weather and storms can cause trees to fall over the path:

Fallen tree cut from the path

There are delicate flowers in the jungle:

Flower

I know the name of this one, it’s Gwongarragong Falls:

Gwongarragong Falls

Ignore the human being in the next one. The track follows the creeks for a fair bit of the time. Here it’s quite smooth, but much of the time it was quite rough with rocks and exposed roots:

Track following creeks

Here’s a creek crossing, neither the best nor the worst:

Creek crossing

The worst were where there was moss and slime on the rocks. You could easily fall and break a bone on some of the crossings.

Kagoonya Falls:

Kagoonya Falls

There are extensive stands of palms:

Palms

On this section the clouds had thickened and it was quite dark in the forest. These pics were taken with a flash. I was hoping it wouldn’t rain because the track was a little difficult to distinguish at times, especially coming out of creek crossings.

More flowers in the deep jungle:

Flowers

More falls, we didn’t record the name:

More falls

I had to edit some light into this pic, which rather gives the wrong impression about how gloomy it was. The track is cut through the buttress roots of the tree. Notice also the fresh green leaf litter which appeared in distinct stretches of the path. It changed from litter, to none and back to litter again in the space of a few meters. We thought there had been a recent lively storm.

Scene

A typical forest creek scene:

Forest creek scene

Nearing the head of the gorge where the Coomera Falls are located:

Approaching Coomera Falls

Close to the falls there is a sign telling you that you are on a steep bank and to be careful not to fall over the side for the next 500m.

Another flower:

Flower

Here are two photos of the Coomera Falls at last:

Coomera Falls

Coomera Falls

The high falls on the right have a different name and wouldn’t always flow. The Coomera Falls are further down than the photos show and are not particularly photogenic. I found the two photos above on the net. In fact this was the only photo Margot took at the Falls:

At Coomera Falls lookout

You’ll note the wet trouser legs. At one creek when I was in the lead and we approached a difficult crossing Margot suggested a better place to cross a bit further upstream. She was wrong and I had squelchy shoes for the next hour.

A little up the track from the Coomera Falls (it’s seriously uphill for the next 3.5 km) we met two young foreign women who were a bit grumpy, having walked two hours to find nothing. We told them the Coomera Falls were just around the corner, that there were nicer looking falls further on, but recommended that they definitely came straight back after seeing the Coomera Falls.

They were clearly ill-prepared for even that little walk, had no water or food or extra clothing. If it took them two hours to walk 5.4 km mostly downhill they would have to shake a leg going back or they might be walking in the dark. But they didn’t seem too interested in anything we had to say.

So perhaps some more disappointed overseas tourists looking for something more accessible and spectacular.

I think the best-looking falls were the last before we came to the Coomera Falls, but we didn’t get a shot as you can’t always get a good perspective.

I had only ever done the full circuit once before, many years ago at the speed of knots when we were seriously short of time. It was well worth the nearly six hours. And as a bit of serious exercise for a couple of oldies it certainly filled the bill.

The other general comment I’d make is that I think there never were fire regimes in this forest. I reckon even in a dry spell it wouldn’t burn.

The New Farm festivities kicked off with a deeply spiritual mood before Midnight Mass (Italian style, described here) @ Casa Bahnisch. Surrounded by angelic presences we were! You can see the Holy Spirit church steps where we enjoyed pannetone and sparkling wine here at flickr.

<img src="http://larvatusprodeo.net/wp-content/uploads/2008/12/christmas1.jpg"

And the next day was lovely and relaxed on a back deck somewhere in the leafy Western suburbs. Turkey, more turkey, desserts, turkey sandwiches and pressies – including (but not limited to) a bottle of Bowmore Islay Single Malt.

<img src="http://larvatusprodeo.net/wp-content/uploads/2008/12/christmas-2.jpg"

Boxing Day saw a road trip to the Sunshine Coast, visiting rellos of my friends, and then a fine pitstop in Mooloolaba for some restorative briney air and healthy vego food at Raw Energy Cafe (which I thoroughly recommend). And then topped off with some beers and good company and a storm on another New Farm back deck.

The pictures that emerge are of ambivalent participants, and clunky principles that demand attention. The winning photograph is a local solar installer in a residential project in South Africa. The photographer has tried to use an on camera fill flash, but doesn’t seem to have applied any exposure compensation, so the subject – an installer awkwardly crouching – is rather underexposed. The third placed photo, ‘Indian Sugar Power’, also feels like an uneasy moment has been captured. A boy is holding a loose sugar cane on a (presumably moving – we can’t tell because the shutterspeed is set too high) truck and glaring, unemotionally into the camera. The four placed photo, ‘Mount Bagasse’, actually shows some aesthetic effort, though it’s hardly in line with the intent of the competition – to showcase the way the CDM is ‘changing lives’. Instead, the subjects are thoroughly dominated by technology and the flattened by the landscape as if in an ironic homage to the romantic modernists.

Though the aesthetics of industrial waste gas destruction are conspicuously absent from the photo contest (they make up a disproportionate number of Certified Emissions Reductions), the GAO provides a nuanced view from experts on the issue. Some believed it a good move because it probably wouldn’t have happened anyway, and these cheap ($1, sold on for $25) offsets are finite and rapidly diminishing.

However the sense that the CDM, in a Frankenstein-esque move has overtaken its original role as provider of, well, finance for some clean development projects and devoured other development pathways (such as direct legislation) is perhaps the most notable punchline of the GAO report, which notes that

… using the CDM to involve developing nations in efforts to address climate change may not always have positive effects. For example, some experts said the mechanism encourages host countries to rely on external funding from industrialized nations. Others went further, saying the CDM can dampen or delay efforts by host countries to reduce emissions on their own. The CDM does not credit emission reductions that result from newly imposed policies or standards, in part because it would be difficult to demonstrate that emission reductions were a direct result of the law. This may pose a dilemma for host countries that want to implement low-carbon policies but also want to attract investment through the CDM. Given these considerations, many experts and researchers have said the CDM would best be used as a temporary tool to help transition countries toward broader commitments (p.38).

Which isn’t to say that policy insiders are aware of this problem. Flows through the CDM will almost certainly be explicitly pulled if developing countries don’t signal an intent to get on board an international mitigation effort down the track. Perhaps the most telling data from the work of the auditors was this graph which shows the inherent ambiguities in the notion of ‘additionality’:

The CDM isn’t just asphyxiating alternative technological development, but propping up industries that were well on their way too:

According to a review of available research, between one-third and one-half of CDM projects involve some type of technology transfer. Such transfer is much more common in certain types of projects, such as industrial gas projects that utilize “end-of-pipe” technologies developed in Europe and Japan. Apart from industrial gas destruction, the project types most likely to involve technology transfer appear to be wind power, landfill gas capture, and agriculture (biogas). However, one expert pointed out that most of the wind power capacity represented in the CDM project pipeline is sited in India and China, countries that have supported domestic wind industries prior to the CDM (p.44).

In Australia, of course, has devised its own solution to the question concerning technology. Cars in, wind out. One might be forgiven for thinking that our debate is completely arse backwards if we can’t even figure out how to transition away from fossil fuel dependent stationery energy, let alone what some abstract carbon target should be. Howard was a denialist through and through, but at least he put his priorities on the table – like looking after Australia’s natural advantages. Like having babies. and digging things up.

On a more positive – if entirely unrelated – note, get your daily does of hope and the sublime in one hit from Sarah Wilson’s extraordinary documentary slideshow of Texas School for the Blind prom.

Update: Point Carbon is reporting that a ruling on whether to include new HFC-23 production in the CDM has been delayed until June. Looks like it’s part of a broader trend of delays to hit the process.

Elsewhere: Kevin Smith in New Matilda: Money Can Save the World:

The winners are energy intensive companies, whose profit margins have benefited enormously in the short term through the lucrative trade in the credits themselves. Because of fundamental flaws in the design of the CDM, industry has been able to buy cheap carbon credits to meet their emissions commitments and avoid the cost of shifting to low carbon technologies. Add these savings to potential windfalls from new trading options in derivatives and other exotic financial services and it’s no surprise there is such a gold rush for this lucrative market.

Conversely, Southern countries have lost out enormously. Many projects, such as the waste incinerator in India, have been imposed on communities without their prior, informed consent…

Political will must instead be directed at ensuring that Northern countries meet their commitment to providing finance to the South that isn’t tied to undemocratic institutions like the World Bank and that doesn’t lock those countries further into the spiral of debt.

Here are some images licenced under Creative Commons from flickr. Two aren’t actually of the most recent storms, but for those who aren’t used to a classic Brisbane storm, they might provide a bit of a lightning flash of illumination. Over at Circulating Library, there are also some contemporary photos to look at. Taking photos might be a tad risky, actually, as one of the two deaths from the storms has been a young man who unwisely tried to photograph a stormwater drain at Chermside on Sunday night. Via Stilgherrian, you can also have a squizzy at archived radar images of last night’s storms here. When I checked at around 5pm it was impossible to get on to the BOM site to check tonight’s storms on their way, and the site also couldn’t cope with the traffic just after the ABC weather at the end of the news.

<img src="http://larvatusprodeo.net/wp-content/uploads/2008/11/brisbane-storm-1.jpg"

courtesy of Garry’

<img src="http://larvatusprodeo.net/wp-content/uploads/2008/11/brisbane-storm-2.jpg"

courtesy of supernicko

<img src="http://larvatusprodeo.net/wp-content/uploads/2008/11/brisbane-storm-3.jpg"

courtesy of Michael Henderson

We’ve been fairly lucky here at New Farm – although getting off the bus just before I experienced the hail and the alarums and the torrential downpour and the water rushing down the streets first hand. Things have been fairly tough for folks in The Gap and now Paddington and some of the other Western suburbs, and other parts of South East Queensland, particularly around Ipswich where the Bremer River is at levels not seen since the 1974 floods. Most people I talked to today had a story about the downpour that hit at around 1am last night, and a lot of people seem to have slept very badly… but certainly one of the outcomes of these sort of events is a little more chatting to and smiling at people in the neighbourhood than happens routinely.

The authorities appear to have been responding well – much better in many ways than the last (isolated) freak storm in 2004. But given the flooding of the inner city bypass tunnel and also the closure due to flooding of the King George Square bus station this morning which had me and a friend hiking up to Roma Street station to get the bus to CI at QUT, Campbell Newman might like to reconsider the tunnel obsession. Contingency plans for transport don’t appear to have been ideal, and again – I’m as little of an engineer as I am a climatologist, but you do have to wonder whether the design of recent transport infrastructure really anticipated what occurs when heavy rain falls. It might not happen with the rather ominous regularity and intensity we’ve seen over the last few days and nights, but we are in the subtropics after all. My flatmate and I were just discussing how well our building – put up as were so many New Farm apartment houses in the 1960s by Italians – has coped. We’re of the view that the garages would have been flooded had it not for basically very well thought out design.

There are no doubt tons of links and stories around, but I’d be very interested in local people’s stories, and any photos and personal blogs people might have seen or written. Anyway, fingers crossed that if we are hit by another wave of water late tonight, it doesn’t add too much to the wreckage and destruction a lot of people are already coping with.

Although it’s been uni break over the last week, I’ve been a busy boy. I now have a date with destiny for my doctorate – I’m presenting to a final seminar on 30 October. This is the internal examination stage of phd completion according to the QUT rules – it’s a bit like a viva voce where you talk about what you’ve done and found and are questioned by a panel of senior academics (and the audience!) – in my case from QUT’s Humanities Program (once was a Faculty…) I more or less wrapped the thing up on Friday, did a little revision yesterday, and lazed around last night and watched Maggie Cheung movies on dvd, and today and tomorrow before the teaching and marking onslaught resumes, I’m giving the thesis a final spit and polish.

So I’m very chuffed!

Folks might also remember I’ve been doing a bit of travel writing – of the insider’s guide to where you live variety. I filed my copy for that and sent in the invoice on Tuesday arvo, and it was a really neat gig. On Monday, I went for a wander around Paddington and took some photos – not for the project itself – but as an aide memoire. It turned out to be a dodgy day to be walking – 35 degrees maximum. But it did also prompt me to decide that walking for about an hour a day was a good custom to be revived – so I’ve been doing that ever since – in the late afternoon on cooler days and at night on hotter days. Anyway, here’s the photographic record of my Paddo perambulations. It’s a really nice part of the world, and somewhere I wouldn’t mind living. But the real estate market would really have to collapse before I could contemplate buying there!

White picket fence II by *phenomenologist on deviantART

If you’d like to see a larger image of the photos, click on them then click on “full view” once you’re inside the gallery.

Steep streets by *phenomenologist on deviantART

Miss Posh Poodle I by *phenomenologist on deviantART

Miss Posh Poodle II by *phenomenologist on deviantART

Colourful cottage by *phenomenologist on deviantART

Paddo house II by *phenomenologist on deviantART

Sassafrass by *phenomenologist on deviantART

Kiln gallery by *phenomenologist on deviantART

Paddo houses by *phenomenologist on deviantART

Spring by *phenomenologist on deviantART

Grey shop by *phenomenologist on deviantART

Kookaburra Cafe by *phenomenologist on deviantART

Paddo shops by *phenomenologist on deviantART

Colourful shop by *phenomenologist on deviantART

Check out Vincent Laforet’s overhead shots from the 10m platform. If you’re hoping to reproduce something like that on your next trip to the pool, Laforet has a photoessay on his gear here. Then check out the amazing array of remote cameras for the 100m final here.