Back up …

Apologies for any friends and followers who misunderstood my recent post. My bizarre sense of humour leads me to pretend to be whatever McGee is making world headlines. The punchline is hidden in the link, that section of text that changes colour when your cursor passes over it, click on that and you get to visit the web page that fills in the missing detail.

And on personal stuff, congratulations to Andrew Mids and his dearly beloved who have a beautiful baby daughter, and a there is also a very proud grandfather in the background.

Burn, baby, burn …

Book burning (also biblioclasm or libricide) is the practice of destroying, often ceremoniously, books or other written material … Book burning is usually carried out in public, and is generally motivated by moral, religious, or political objections to the material.

Book burning can be emblematic of a harsh and oppressive regime which is seeking to censor or silence an aspect of a nation’s culture. In some cases the works destroyed are irreplaceable and their burning constitutes a severe loss to cultural heritage. Examples include obliteration of the Library of Baghdad, the burning of books and burying of scholars under China’s Qin Dynasty, the destruction of Aztec codices by Itzcoatl, and the Nazi book burnings. Wikipedia.

sjsu_bookfire

Here we have Drs Bridger and Clements from the San Jose State University Meteorology Department showing how its done. I’m unsure whether their motives are moral, religious, or political. The author of the book, Steve Goreham, also had the temerity to publish an article in the Washington Times. I guess the good doctors couldn’t find an argument to match it … so they just found a match.

Consensus …

When the truth of an issue is easily knowable one would expect consensus to be at a high level. When an issue is complex, observations difficult to interpret and the conclusion untestable one would not expect consensus to reach 97%.

Entire industries face extinction as the world’s governments seek to impose trillions of dollars of taxes on carbon emissions. The New York Times’s Thomas Friedman approvingly writes that Australian politicians—not to mention public figures through the world—now risk “political suicide” if they deny climate change. But if carbon dioxide turns out not to be the boogey-man that climate scientists have made it out to be, tens of trillions will be wasted in unneeded remediation. Much of the world—billions of humans—will endure a severely diminished quality of life with nothing to show for it.

Click the link to read an interesting essay by BRUMBERG and BRUMBERG.

Hookers …

It’s a long time since I read it but I do recall that Guy Du Maupassant wrote a very elegant and touching story concerning a young man, a courtesan and a raffle.

Compressed into 25 words or less it goes something like this. Nearing the end of high school the boys put in a franc each and the one whose name was pulled out of the hat got to spend the jackpot on a high class hooker at a high class bordello. Once the deed was done the lucky winner explained the means by which he had come by such a princely sum. The lady, both touched and amused, declared that she couldn’t possibly take his money … and gave him back one franc.

Perhaps the first known case of crowd sourcing for hookers. If you’re inclined you can contribute to the modern version <HERE>.

Debtski …

Total tax revenue last financial year … $317 billion.

Projected for this year … $340 billion.

Increase over last year 7.25%.

Yes, I said increase. Mr Swan and Miss Gillard are crying woe is us because of an unexpected fall in government revenue. If you expect more than a 7.25% increase in annual income you may well be disappointed!

There are three things to consider expenditure, expenditure and expenditure. These are the key to the budget black hole.

And the government continue to promise plenty of expenditure …

Autumn advances …

Back from the dacha, and for any that are at a loss as to where that is, it’s in the central goldfields of Victoria.

Autumn is a splendid time of the year, nights are cold but if there’s not much wind days are generally warm.

First thing in the morning, I resuscitate the fire, take the lovely Gayle (name changed to protect her identity) a cup of coffee and then a walk around the house, through the vineyard ending up at the stable as the sun comes up. Until a couple of weeks ago there were two retired ponies to feed, sadly Taffy has shuffled off this mortal coil, so now it’s a moment shared with Katie. Whilst she begins the long chomp through a manger of chaff, Fifi the fox terrier checks out the storage and tack areas for rodents. Katie and Fifi have a relationship that would lead to divorce or even murder between humans. When Fifi was a pup Katie actually landed a kick on Fi that those who saw it could never imagine she would survive. Katie keeps trying but the dog is pretty quick and always careful. I have no idea what offence she started the war with, but Fifi McGee is, these days, the epitome of good manners, no barking at the pony, no nipping at heels.

The change of seasons brings a change of birds. I always look forward to the arrival of the Flame Robins. They have been back for three weeks now, the boys are resplendent in red from in front or black with striking white wing bar from behind. Numbers are not big this year and I anticipate that it will stay that way because of the lack of rain since December.

Despite the dry the eucalypts are flowering strongly, the nomadic nectar feeders are making the most of it. In the last couple of weeks the regular Musk Lorikeets have been joined by both Little and Purple-crowned Lorikeets, beautiful flashes of green dashing about, easily heard but often difficult to get a good look at. On Saturday a group of Purple-crowns decided it was time to present themselves for a photo shoot. I have never had such close views. The light was splendid, they were apparently unconcerned at my presence … all I needed was the camera.

Today I took the camera and the birds reverted to form, beautiful flashes of green dashing about, this was the best I could manage …

Purple-crowned Lorikeet

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