some ya win, some ya lose

on another note..

Seems that everybody (?) is lauding the financial management of the current Admin in canberra, but this one is curious. They can't find enough moolah to support SBS or ABC , but $300 mill on ..
What???

Anybody wanna buy a house?

OK, threw 'best of intentions' to the winds, and bought a six pack of 'tallies' yesterday. Am a bit discombobulated at the moment (but not so far as to get stuck into the Port. That is reserved for when i feel 'safe'). Mebbe I should call on Anne's Faeries.

The first 'open inspection' was held yesterday.

Only for an hour and a half, thankfully. A dozen or so strangers wandering though my "private" space. Not my bloody choice.

Dunno how valid it is, but felt 'violated' somehow, glowered at them all and wasn't very friendly. Had a chat with the Real Estate Agent beforehand and half jokingly said "How about if I point out all the cracks, crumblings and iffy ceilings". He wasn't impressed, "Do that and I'll sue you. Best to say nothing." was his terse reply.

Unfortunate, in a sense, that the owners could not have waited until I'd departed, and they could have had an empty house to ''show''. Have, I suppose, been a bit "critical" of the owners, but they really are nice people. Mr. D is a pastor, or parson of some sort. Went to America (Arizona) some 15 years ago, and apparently don't have much money. The house requires much 'refurbishment' so the only option they have is to sell, but is still homely and livable, . (Please Mr. Custer, I don't wanna go ..).

They came to clear out their shed last week (has been locked for 15 years, needed a locksmith to 'break in', and contains much of their furniture and an old Morris Minor Panel van.). He has the same sort of problem as me .. what to do with it all. Not worth a pinch of shit to sell, and too expensive to buy back again.) Gave them a cuppa tea one afternoon. Mr. D. is very nice, and has developed a soft, rolling sort of American accent, but we sort of connected in a strange way. Mrs D. is the boss , harder accent, and seems to run the show. Frankly, I wouldn't give tuppence for the 13 yr old daughter. Arrogant little shit with big tits and braces on the teeth..

Am hanging on to the vague, and probably futile, hope that whoever buys it will let me stay on for a while. The consensus is that the estimated value ($3-350K AUD) is mostly land value and the house will most likely be bulldozed.

Am battling with too many multi-directional choices at the moment. Should I just throw up hands in defeat, sell everything and go "back on the road"? Have to admit that i feel a closer affinity with the 'lost and discarded' grit and gumption - than with the Stuffed Shirt, snot up the nose, Wall Street/ASX, tied by the necks, twin-set and pearls, botox and perms, sort of pretentious pontifical vacuous incompetent prickles.

Put all my stuff in storage and try to find another residence?

It took me six months to find this one. Close to my main work area, small enough to maintain, back yard to put 'stuff' in, and a driveway with no gate, which makes getting the trailer in and out hassle free.

One of the big problems at the moment is that it will probably take three to six months to sell my business. Where the heck am i going to stay during that time? Seems silly to move everything out, then find that the house sits empty for six months before they bulldoze it.

Have tea-chests full of stuff from 45 years ago .. Dunno how valuable all the books and LP's are... though could probably throw away the shoe-box full of the old test tubes, pipettes and ''chemistry set'' stuff. (um.. one vague option would be setting up a “Meth” lab .. heh heh.)

The ancient Box Brownies and Photo developing paraphernalia has to go. Bill Gates and his ilk have given us more digits than i can cope with. (not altogether true. Have been happily working all day with a freebie digital video editing system that i found on the web. British designed, simple, elegant, bloody marvellous.)

Ornaments and furniture inherited from mother (and father). Dunno. Who knows the value of 'antiques'. Most of the stuff is sentimental, not Sotheby's.

Tools. Sheesh, have pretty well every tool known to man pertaining to construction of basic habitat. All i need is an uninhabited fertile island somewhere in the South Pacific .. heh.

Something Phishey

An email arrived in my personal inbox the other day.

Now, I have several email addresses. One that I use for "signing in'' to various sites, and is more or less ''available'' to the internet. This one receives it's fair share of spam, which is cleverly shunted into the ''Junk'' file by Thunderbird, and I rarely see it.

This email arrived at the inbox of an address that I only use for private or official business, as it has my name on it, receives very little traffic and even less spam.

Dear PayPal Member,

This email confirms that you have paid INPHONIC (sales@inphonic.com) $239.95 USD using PayPal.

This credit card transaction will appear on your bill as "PAYPAL INPHONIC*".

PayPal Shopping Cart Contents
Item Name: NEW MOTOROLA V3 PINK RAZR RAZOR QUAD-BAND CELL PHONE
Quantity: 1
Total: $219.95 USD


Cart Subtotal: $219.95 USD
Shipping Charge: $20.00 USD
Cart Total: $239.95 USD


Shipping Information

Shipping Info: Richard McElroy
202 N Magnolia Dr.
Saco, ME 04072
United States
Address Status: Unconfirmed

If you haven't authorized this charge, click the link below to cancel the payment and get a full refund.

Dispute Transaction [active link in email]

Thank you for using PayPal!
The PayPal Team

Please do not reply to this e-mail. Mail sent to this address cannot be answered. For assistance, log in to your PayPal account and choose the "Help" link in the footer of any page.
PayPal Email ID PPxxx [real number in email]

Now, I haven't had any dealings with Paypal whatsoever, so immediately contacted my bank to ask if the transaction had been recorded. They say no (I also check transactions daily via netbank), so instructed them to flag my Credit card A/c, and inform me if there are any transactions involving Paypal or US dollars.

Very clever, but needless to say that i didn't click on any active links.

Very curious indeed.

Update 29-July-06: This site has valuable information regarding the various email spoofs and scams. DoShelp

2:2

Garn, dunno why everybody is getting all excited by a few blokes in fancy coloured shirts running after a ball in a small paddock. Heh .. heh .. heh. (supresses strange feelings of joy and excitement).

The Socceroos achieved a draw against Croatia. Italy next. Onwards, ever onwards. Guts, determination, fortitude, skill. Guus Hiddink must be a genius. Master magician with a brew of brilliant blokes.

Progressing slowly

Things aren't as bad with the computer situation as first thought. The computer had begun to play up some days before it finally crashed – sometimes refusing to shut down, then after had managed to get it to shut down, refusing to ''boot up'' properly.

Umm, think I, so copied some of the crucial data to CD. Then, last week, it refused to ''boot up'' whatever I tried. Rang my local ''techie'' shop last Tuesday morning to see if they had any suggestions, but they just said ''bring it in''. Duly unplugged the desktop Acer 3300 (1.4Mhz, (upgraded to)512 RAM, 20Gig HDD, (upgraded with DVD burner), shared graphics, 14 months from new .. (that brand, as well as LG, is now on my ''avoid'' list.) and ''took it in''.

They rang me Tuesday afternoon with ''good'' news'' and ''bad''news. The ''bad'' news was that the Hard drive was completely cactus, and there was no way that they could recover any data – the ''good'' news was that they could replace my original 20Gig HDD with an 80Gig one.

“How much?” Say I. “$200.00” say they. HO HO think I, so much for the ''good'' news. “Don't do anything,” say I, “am coming to have a chat.” Drove to see them on Tuesday afternoon and there, on a side bench, were several secondhand ''boxes''. One of them was a big (oldish) Compaq for $450.00. Umm, think I. Since I'd have to begin again with a clean Hard drive, made some enquiries, found that it was a better system than mine, did a deal which included swapping the DVD burner .. so now have a Compaq 2Mhz, 512 RAM, 80Gig HDD, DVD burner, Nvidia Gforce graphics card thingo – Win XP pro, AVG virus whatsit, and some other stuff, installed .. all for $400.00. (heh, talk about a ''throwaway'' society.)

An expense that I could ill afford, considering all the other problems at the moment, buuuut, what the heck.

Getting a ''clean'' Hard drive is a bit like acquiring a new-born baby. Have been slowly re-loading all the relevant programs, but find that all the ''tweaks'' and customisation that have been doing over the past six years have ''disappeared'', and I have to ''re-train'' the bloody thing back to what have been used to.

Had a ''panic attack'' when I reloaded the Accounting software, as it refused to read the data files that had saved to CD. Six years of accounts, including a list of ''unpaid'' invoices totalling $2K .. errrk!! Fiddled with it with mounting frustration for a while, then eventually caved in and called an Expert.

He turned up within half an hour, opened and closed several screens at the speed of light, then Hey Presto! .. Accounting system restored to full glory. He also installed ''OpenOffice'' to replace my (origin dubious) copy of MS Office 2000. One thing he did recommend, though, was ''backing up'' to a Flash Drive. (yer, O.K. fer those who know about these things, but self had never seen one.) He pulled this little gadget slightly smaller than a cigarette lighter out of his pocket, plugged it in to the USB slot. After he'd left, I went along to Big W and bought one. 128MB .. $23.00. They did have 1Gig ones for $49.00, but thought to start small.. heh.
Brilliant little gadgets! Stores all sorts of stuff, waterproof, shockproof and y'can carry it on a key chain.

Am definitely in the wrong business. He charged $65/hour for sitting in a warm comfy office tickling a keyboard and here's me heaving machinery around all day, battling heat, dust, flies, rain, cold, smells .. for roughly $7.00/hour. Bah! Humbug.

Can now concentrate on figuring out what to do with the business and where to go next.

Aaaaaaaarrghhhh!!!!!

#%&*##))@! F**K!! S#!t!! FARKK!!! Sheiss! Merde! Bugger Bugger Poop BUM!!! (is that 'speaking plainly'enough?? or are the alternative characters classed as obfuscation).

Hard drive crash last Monday morning. Complete shutdown, irretrievable data recovery. Cumpruters are the curse of modern mankind! However did we get along without them?

Not only do I presently have to try to figure out what, where and how the rest of my my life should proceed, but my only link to an 'intelligent' universe (you lot ..heh) collapses in a silent heap. Aaaarrgh! At least I have my priorities right. Am back online .. now begins the bloody long, painstaking process of restoring all my programs, links, email adresses, and settings. Two or more years of tweaks, fiddles and customisation. At least I have all my "stored" user-names and passwords written on a piece of paper on the wall. (oops, mebbe I shouldn't have said that .. heh), and a filing cabinet full of bits of paper.

Does make one think, though. Can imagine a future where computers or electricity is rare, and I hand to a grandchild a shiny little CD. "There you go, laddie. On this disk is all my research and family history. Invent something to read it with."

Australian republicanism

I hear the whiffles, the stirrings, always have. BUT if it happens it will be OVER MY DEAD BODY.

During the next few weeks, will try to come up with a concise and coherent reason WHY THIS SHOULD NOT HAPPEN.

Sleepwalkers

Oh boy .. Oooo dear. Is it despair that induces me to get lost in litres of Port, or a genetic predisposition to excess. Cannot buy a block of chocolate. Some people have the self discipline to nibble, one square at a time. Me? .. I scoff the lot. Same with booze.

Woke up the other morning with an empty two litre cask on the desk. 'Now where did that go?' irrational mind asks, to be answered by rational mind .. "You fool."

Is there another persona hiding inside the taciturn, uncommunicative body. A soul that escapes when I'm not looking. Who is the person I call me.

"children should be seen and not heard," was the mantra infused by my mother, so perhaps I never grew up. And yet, unguarded, I begin to reach out; fingers clutching the empty air, seeking .. what? Knowledge? Affirmation that I exist outside of the collection of organised cells contained within the bag of skin that I walk around in?

A child masquerading as a man.

I know I began as two half formed cells. Two people created a condition where those two cells conjoined, and my life began. Nine months later rejected, ejected; squalling and bawling I discovered independent existence. For what purpose? Was it simply to live and breed or, having the capacity to learn - collect knowledge. But what happens to it after I'm gone? Are my offspring and those who come after destined to endlessly repeat the same tawdry cycle. Birth, reproduction, death. 60 or so years of endless repetition.

What is "spirit"? What means these words 'spirited' or 'dis-spirited'. High spirits, low spirits. "Aspiration".

Have noticed a quibble on various blogs about the validity of the words 'atheism' and 'agnosticism'.

Bigot: One blindly and obstinately devoted to a particular creed or party. (O.Fr. origin unknown)

Atheist: Disbelief in the existence of god. Godless. (Gr. atheos - a- , priv. and theos, god.)

Agnostic: One who holds that we know nothing of things beyond material phenomena - that a First cause and an unseen world are things unknown and apparently unknowable. (coined by Huxley in 1869 from Gr. a-, priv. And gnostikos, good at knowing. gignostikein, to know.)

Gnostic: An adherent of Gnosticism - having knowledge, knowing, cunning. Gnosticism: the eclectic doctrines of the Gnostics, a syncretistic religious philosophy, esp. in early christian times, that taught the redemption of the spirit from matter by knowledge, and a process of emanation from original essence. (Gr. gnostikos, good at knowing.)

Lie: a false statement made with the intention of deceiving; anything misleading or of the nature of imposture: to utter falsehood with the intention to deceive or give a false impression. (O.E. lyge, léogan; Du. liegen; Goth. liugen; Ger. lügen.)

Idiot: a person so defective in mind from birth as to be unable to protect themselves against ordinary physical dangers: one afflicted with severe grade of feeble-mindedness: a flighty fool: a blockhead: a foolish or unwise person.
(L. idiõta. Gr, idiõtes, a private person, ordinary person, one who holds no public office or has no professional knowledge - idios; own, private.)

It is the paradox of human consciousness that I claim to be ALL of the above.

On the one hand logic tells me that there is NO god. It is purely an emotional fabrication by the ignorant. Began when Australopithicawhatsis first had time to stop stuffing their bellies and wonder what that big orangey hot thing was that regularly passed overhead. From there the myths began.

From there, knowledge and exploration of the physical world has progressed (albeit in fits and starts .. resisted by the shamans with a power trip agenda) to a point where we have Hubble telescopes, and foot prints on the moon. (am not including probes to Mars and other planets .. there is always the possibility that the data could have been manufactured via 'PhotoShop' or Madison Avenue.)

Personally I find it difficult to comprehend, wrap my mind around the concept of 'infinity' and 'eternity'. . my mind is 'conditioned' to see 'limits'. A backyard fence, four walls or, when on the boat, the defining line between the 'earth', 'horizon' and sky.

It is quite possible that there was no "big bang" defining the beginning of the galaxy. Or rather, if there was a "big bang" when this galaxy began, it is just one in a series of such. Just one of an infinite many in an infinite universe. All pulsing, coming and going over infinite time.

Have always been curious about this word "god", given the various interpretations by diverse collections of tribes, until I came across the notion of this bloke.

Democritus (c.500BC):
As to when this Greek philosopher existed, it is not certain. Tradition characterizes him as a person who was continually laughing at the follies of mankind. Only very few fragments of his work have come down to us. According to Chambers, "Democritus's atomic system assumes an infinite multitude of atoms." That all of these atoms exist for no particular reason, and, from "their multitudinous combinations springs that vast and varying aggregate called nature ..." Nature, Democritus further supposed, conducted itself by a definite set of laws; but followed, and follows, no design.

Democritus gives a little more background on a 'forgotten' philosopher. (Five HUNDRED YEARS B.C. and he gives us the word 'atom'?)

There is also a book "The Sleepwalkers", by Arthur Koestler, that explains in 'non technical' language much of what is driving this post. I cannot recommend it highly enough.

We are forgetting ancient history. The world is too much with us. Getting and spending.

And yet, there is an ancient hunger to 'call on the gods'. That emotional need to influence that which is beyond our individual power to change.

THE world is too much with us; late and soon,
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers:
Little we see in Nature that is ours;
We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!
The Sea that bares her bosom to the moon;
The winds that will be howling at all hours,
And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers;
For this, for everything, we are out of tune;
It moves us not.--Great God! I'd rather be
A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn;
So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,
Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn;
Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea;
Or hear old Triton blow his wreathed horn.
William Wordsworth 1806.

FUNNY .. rEALLY..

So .. can someone tell me how philosophy fits within?

another personal note

Funny, really.. life. The 'other boot has fallen' .. clumped onto the floor. Was waiting for it after being 'informally' informed some three or four weeks ago that my tenure in the house that i exist in was insufficient. The Owners have decided to sell.

Have kept the faith of this beautiful, comfortable cottage for 5 years. Loved it's 'low maintenance' garden, refused to 'repaint' without some minor compensation, lived and loved within it. But now it's gone.

Back to the drawing board. How much of the collection of "Stuff" that now fills four rooms can I afford to keep.

How much of it do i NEED to keep. Have a few weeks to make those decisions. Have already rung the few family that can contact... 'come get yer stuff' THIS HOUSE OF STORAGE IS NO LONGER VALID.

Will keep those small items of meaning and go 'back on the road', so to speak.

( the 'owners' of the house that i live in are 'christians' who have lived 15 or so years in America.)

Petrodollars by the numbers..

For those who have a head for numbers, and a week of rainy days, a thorough read of the following links may give a rather different picture from that forced down our throats by the mainstream 'MEEJA' propaganda (s)trumpets about the "nuclear threat" from Iran.

I don't fully understand the in's and out's of International monetary exchange, but it seems to me that the American administration is shit scared.

NOT of 'terrorists' with guns and nukes, but of so-called 'rogue' States who are threatening to change the "petrodollars" from U.S. Dollars to Euros.

Backtracking a bit - these quotes are from a long and informative essay.

"Saddam sealed his fate when he decided to switch to the euro in late 2000 (and later converted his $10 billion reserve fund at the U.N. to euros) -- at that point, another manufactured Gulf War become inevitable under Bush II. Only the most extreme circumstances could possibly stop that now and I strongly doubt anything can -- short of Saddam getting replaced with a pliant regime.

"Big Picture Perspective: Everything else aside from the reserve currency and the Saudi/Iran oil issues (i.e. domestic political issues and international criticism) is peripheral and of marginal consequence to this administration. Further, the dollar-euro threat is powerful enough that they will rather risk much of the economic backlash in the short-term to stave off the long-term dollar crash of an OPEC transaction standard change from dollars to euros. All of this fits into the broader Great Game that encompasses Russia, India, China."

"It would appear that any attempt by OPEC member states in the Middle East or Latin America to transition to the euro as their oil transaction currency standard shall be met with either overt U.S. military actions or covert U.S. intelligence agency interventions. Under the guise of the perpetual `war on terror' the Bush administration is manipulating the American people about the unspoken but very real macroeconomic reasons for this upcoming war with Iraq. This war in Iraq will not be based on any threat from Saddam's old WMD program, or from terrorism. This war will be over the global currency of oil. A war intended to prevent oil from being priced in euros."

The present "No Nukes" propaganda campaign against Iran is a smokescreen.

Given the massive 'current account' deficit in the U.S. methinks the American economy would implode with spectacular results, if oil was traded in Euros.

Read first.
The Proposed Iranian Oil Bourse

Peak America – Is Our Time Up?

George W. Bush and Peak Oil: Beyond Incompetence

Australia: Low oil warning: planning starts now.

Am not surprised that "little johnny" is promoting "discussion about nuclear energy".

Imagine a world without oil and petrochemicals, plastics et al. Travel is by what?? . Steam? Horses?

A question

Seriously, if somebody comes into my house and threatens to kill me ..my first question is .. What are you going to do with it?

You take my life. So? Does that make you a greater or lesser person than me?

If you take my life away from me, does that make you greater?

Or lesser?

If you kill me, take my life away.. you are then responsible for whatever i might have done in the future.

Time constraints

Went for a long drive over to Yorke Peninsula yesterday (400 klm in total) looking for some place 'far from the madding crowd' to rest my world weary head. Only 200 K or so from Adelaide, but had never been there before. Beautiful countryside, but already the "developers" have latched onto it, and land prices are skyrocketting.

Miss Eagle, however, has put up a series of posts that mostly reflect what I would have written yesterday if I had brains and time. Have also pinched (recycled) this poem from her site.

Recycled- a water poem

The water you are about to drink

Deserves a second thought, I think;
For Avogadro, oceans, and those you follow
Are all involved in every swallow.

The molecules of water in a single glass
In number at least, five times out-class
The glasses of water in stream and sea,
Or wherever else that water can be.

The water you're about to taste
No doubt represents a bit of the waste
From prehistoric beast and bird,
A notion not at all absurd.

The water in you is between a' betwixt
And having traversed you is thoroughly mixed;
So someone slaking a future thirst
Could easily drink what you drank first.

The fountains spraying in the park
Distribute bits from Joan of Ark
And Adam, Eve, and all their kin;
You'd be surprised where your drink has been.

The water you cannot retain
Will some day hence return as rain,
Or be beheld as the purest dew,
Though long ago it passed through you.

Dr Verne N. Rockcastle

Gerry has an amusing post about a feral squirrel .. are the animals fighting back? Must remember to put stronger bars on the cage for my canaries. (or let the canaries out, and hide in the cage myself).


And -SHOCK, HORROR! SBS are being forced into placing Advertisements IN THE MIDDLE of programs. As Barista infers, a bit like halting a production of Hamlet every ten minutes for "a word from our sponsor". "Krispy Kreme Fluff Bikkies NOW have 20% more Chocolate FLAVOUR!!!". GarDammit! I hear the Gummint is spending 10 mill on another pointless PROMOTION campaign. Why don't they just give it to SBS?

(this post has been re-edited and fine tuned 6 times since it began.. may be an evolving excercise mebbe not.) )

Semantics

This one's been around for a while, but worth a run.

Having chosen English as the preferred language in the EEC, the European Parliament has commissioned a feasibility study in ways of improving efficiency in communications between departments.

European officials have often pointed out that English spelling is unnecessarily difficult; for example: cough, plough, rough, through and thorough. What is clearly needed is a phased programme of changes to iron out these anomalies. The program would, of course, be administered by a top level committee from participating nations.

In the first year, for example, the committee would suggest using 's' instead of soft 'c'. Sertainly, sivil servants in all sities would reseive this news with joy. Then the hard 'c' could be replased by 'k' sinse both letters are pronounsed alike. Not only would this klear up konfusion in the minds of klerikal workers, but typewriters could be made with one less key.

There would be growing enthusiasm when in the sekond year, it was announsed that the troublesome 'ph' would henseforth be written 'f'. The would make words like 'fotograf' twenty persent shorter in print.

In the third year, publik akseptanse of the new spelling kan be expekted to reash the stage where more komplikated shanges are possible. Governments would enkourage the removal of double leters whish have always ben a deterant to akurate speling.

We would al agre that the horible mes of silent 'e's in the languag is disgrasful. Therefor we kould drop them and kontinu to read and writ as though nothing had hapend. By this tim it would be four years sins the skem began and pepl would be reseptiv to steps sush as replasing 'th' by 'z'. Perhaps zen ze funktion of 'w' kould be taken on by 'v', vish is, after al, half a 'w'.
Shortly after zis, ze unesesary 'o' kould be droped from vords kontaining 'ou' Similar arguments vud of kors be aplid to ozer kombinashuns of leters.

Kontinuing zis proses yer after yer, ve vud eventuli hav a reli sensibl riting styl. After tventi yers, Ze drems ov z guvermunt vud finali hav kum tru.

Zer vud be no mor trubls, difikultis and evrivun vud find it ezi to understand ech ozer.

Zer iz, ov kors, furver modifikashun updates kreatd by teknologi. In ze interst ov speding up comunikashun sum letr grups kud b replacd by numbrs. Zis is 1drfl and gr8ly asists cre8v riting. I w8 wiv b8d breth 4 th next Tolstoy or Shaksper.

Hav a gr8 day, m8s. c u l8r.