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carrot and donald.mp4

I've had two big gum trees fall on the house in a severe storm earlier this year. They were not even our trees. They were on the road verge but were tall enough to reach the house and cause a lot of damage. Not a nice experience.

As usual, Melbourne's weather has been all over the place. Sunday was hot, Monday (Men's Shed BBQ heavily overcast and freezing wind. A lazy wind that goes through you rather than around. Wednesday oppressively hot, yesterday humid, today a bit more moderate. There is a side effect. The neighbour has a huge gumtree in his back yard, which if it blew down, would take out the back of our house and the neighbour on the other side. And the photo below shows what happens when it is hot and windy. Bark all over the place.

You may have noticed that over the last 7 days, I have added 27 aircraft profiles in the AP site. I had a few problems with the last one, screwing up the photos and having to do a number of edits to the basic profile. Wherever possible, I include 5 photos on each profile, header and gallery. That may require searching through up to 100 thumbnail images for each aircraft, selecting the best ones to illustrate the aircraft. I try to select different angles and illustrations of features such as cabin access, folding wings, etc. I expand the thumbnail to the full size uploaded to get the best quality image and download that into a folder, one folder for each category - 3 axis, GA single engine, etc. With 1968 profiles completed, and a few more in preparation, that means about 10,000 images. However, a lot of these are far from acceptable. Most are too large, and a few are too small. I standardise all photos to an aspect ratio of 16:9, and a width of 750 pixels. ie., 750x422 pixels in size. This requires resizing and cropping. I am amazed at how badly exposed some photos are, very dark, detail in places like under wing indistinguishable, and if taking off in front of bushes or hedges, the background is a sold block of black. There are often odd items which distract from the image, such as tiedown ropes dropped on the ground, ropes and balustrades around the aircraft which I clone out of the photo. The original image is saved to an Originals subfolder attached to each category folder on my external hard drive. Therefore at least 20,000 images, just for the AP site. Here are a few examples from the last lot. They have been further reduced to 400 pixels wide, originals first, edited second.

Shot guns are meant to fire multiple Pellets ,called shot. Short range, scatter and lots of soft tissue damage. Plain or sometimes choked barrel. Rifles have "rifling" A slow spiral of flutes to spin the Projectile for accuracy. Snipers rifles have heavier Barrels. Pistols don't have range accuracy Barrels are too short. If the Point is filed off the projectile will do more damage. Some times called dum dums. These shotguns were firing solid material so presume they were for being more Lethal. Nev

Getting back to the oriinal idea of this thread - the governmental knee-jerk to firearm possession, it is becoming obvious that governments have been resting on the laurels of the original gun buy-back and the laws made in the late 1990s. That was thirty years ago. Are you still using the mobile brick phone you had back then? Are you still using dial-up ADSL? BY the same token, firearms have developed a lot in that time, but the classification of them for licensing purposes has not. I was watching a video about the point of the failure of firearms classification to keep pace with firearm development. As with all laws and regulations, the devil is in the definition. Let's look at teh shotguns used at Bondi. How was it that they, in particular, are legal under the classification system? The types of firearms permitted in Category A, the most commonly held licence, are: Air rifles; Rimfire rifles (other than self-loading); Shotguns (other than pump action, lever action or self-loading), and Shotgun/rimfire combinations. The type of interest from Bondi is the Shotguns (other than pump action, lever action or self-loading. One thinks of the break action shotgun, single or double barrel. We see pump action shotguns in movies and news videos from the USA, so we are aware of how they are operated. Lever action shotguns operate in a similar way to what we see as rifles in cowboy movies. Self-loading means that a fresh round is loaded by using the recoil from the round fired before the round to be loaded. However, firearm manufacturers developed another means of rapid reloading from a magazine using a loading lever similar to the idea of a bolt action rifle. This is the type of shotgun used at Bondi. As of that date, bolt action shotguns were Category A and legal to own. I believe that these have a 6-round magazine + 1 in the spout. To see what I'm talking about, watch this video from the 17:00 to 20:00 time marks. The problem with any knee-jerk response and regulations made on the fly will have consequences that firstly will financially affect firearms owners and later affect lawful activities such as feral animal control. Feral animals such as pigs, foxes, deer etc are becoming a greater problem because landowners are denying permission to recreational hunters to shoot on their properties. And yes I know all about tthe horror stories of idiot shooters. While it is good to hear politicians on both sides joining together to attack the problem, one must encourage them to keep at it, but not make flash in the pan decisions.

No one should be able to act BEYOND the LAW "Including" some bosses. Check out the countries where Unions are Not allowed. You wouldn't want to Live there. Collective representation is a RIGHT Under UN declaration. Left unchecked Wages would be driven down by the Wealthy to increase Profits . Also corners get cut and safety standards Lowered. Nev

The shooters and fishers have had too much influence in NSW Politics Permitting. Shooting in National Parks is not something I Like. Responsible Gun Owners would agree some Limits must Be imposed and enforced. The Permit holder can't LEND guns or it's Meaningless. Accidents with Guns have always killed people AND they Must be safely stored. That's not easy. Being like America is not the Answer. It's INSANE over there. Nev

The new gun laws are classifying everyone to be potentially violent, including all the muslims and all the Jews. Gun license for Bondi muslim dad shooter delayed ...... until Labor won the election. His son was already a red flag. https://sportingshooter.com.au/gun-law/police-delayed-terrorists-gun-licence-for-years-why-was-it-issued/

I grew up in the shadow of the Barrier Industrial Council. School bullies became union officials. It was oppressive, but now it all seems so tame compared with the deep corruption and underworld ties of some of our unions nationally and here in Victoria.

Maybe you hate unions, but the changes Aussie unions led - 8 hours sleep, 8 hours play, 8 hours work led to the miggest productivity gains excluding technological improvements. I agree that unions went too far at times.. Norm Gallagher being one.. and of course, the CMFEU or CMFUE, or whatever they are called but generally speaking, absent of corruption, those countries that are unionised and respect progressive labour laws are far better places to live than the two I can think of that don't - Good ol' USA and Chy-nah! (trying a Donald Chump accent). In fact, would you want to live in the far too many places that oppress their workforce (and the majority of their population)? Nah.. Australia ain't so bad after all and you can still make a decent living as an entrepreneur (sp?) like yourself, but don't have to have the workforce being supplimented by welfare.. like the UK, for example. And then you would complain about the higher taxes. In terms of hating Labor, that is cool. .but on balance, would you prefer SFM or Albo.. I guess form mining, Albo is a little less appealing, but if you were into rare earth stuff, maybe not so... Kindest regards, The Devil's Advocate (or Avocaat) , Esq.. with a NZ mate of mine (Wolfie has made himself so rare these days).

Comparting Islamist fundamentalism and Jewish Zionism to quantify and defend against allegations of systemic violence in a population is quite disingenuous as they are fundamentally different. Maybe saying something liek not all Jews wanting toi unilaterally wipe out Arabs would be a bit more accurate a statement.. and the difference in the two populations not wanting to unilaterally wipe out each other is going to be significantly different - and probably in a way that would not support the disigenuous comparison you make. I am not sure how you came to the conclusion that the majority of violent crime is carried out by white Anglo Aussies. Statistics are not collated by ethnic background - only by whether the perpetrator is forieign born or not. However, AI, which you have to take with a grain of salt in these cases, has an interesting answer (this is Google's AI): ------------------------------------------ Official statistics in Australia generally report crime data based on country of birth rather than self-identified ethnicity, and comprehensive, recent national data comparing all ethnic groups specifically for violent crime offending rates is limited. General Trends and Statistics Australian-born vs. Overseas-born: Overall, historically, first-generation immigrants have had an overall lower rate of crime than the native-born population. The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) reported data indicating that migrants were just over half as likely as the Australian-born population to be victims of physical or threatened violence. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples: This group is significantly overrepresented in the Australian criminal justice system. As of June 2024, they accounted for over a quarter of all prisoners, despite making up a smaller proportion of the general population. They also have much higher rates of homicide offending and victimisation compared to the non-Indigenous population. Migrant Groups: Migrants from non-main English-speaking countries generally reported lower rates of violence victimisation than those from main English-speaking countries. Historically, individuals born in certain countries (e.g., Russian Federation, Romania, Vietnam, New Zealand, Turkey, and Lebanon) have shown higher arrest rates than the Australian-born population for various offences. The highest proportion of alleged offenders processed for violent offences in a specific Victorian study were Fijian-born individuals. Studies have found that while there may be overrepresentation of some migrant groups in crime statistics (e.g., Sudanese-born in Victoria), Australian-born offenders still account for the vast majority of actual crimes, including serious assault. Data Limitations It is important to note the following limitations in the data: Ethnicity vs. Country of Birth: The primary data collection method used by agencies like the ABS is country of birth, not specific ethnic group or cultural background within the Australian-born population. This makes precise breakdowns by ethnicity challenging to obtain. Media Portrayals: Criminological research often highlights that media coverage can create a misperception of a link between certain ethnic minorities and crime ("African youth crime wave") that is not supported by overall statistics, which show that white Australian-born offenders commit the majority of crime. Complex Factors: Statistics often reflect complex socioeconomic, historical, and systemic factors, rather than a direct link between ethnicity itself and criminal behaviour. For more detailed statistics, you can refer to reports from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) and the Australian Institute of Criminology (AIC). --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Interestingly, it found some evidence to say that rates (i.e. per capita), white Aussie males may not be the worst of them... My point is don't demonise people to support a point of view when there is no evidence of it.. it is part of the reason groups of people are mobilising in ways that are not positive.

The 7 Islamics who were arrested in Sydney on suspicion of organising to carry out another terrorist attack, have all been released without charge. The Police couldn't find any evidence of wrongdoing, no firearms and no explosives - and obviously, no record of online threats to kill Jews. But NSW Police chief, Mal Lanyon, stated the 7 "were known to Police", and homemade IS flags were found in one of the cars the 7 Islamics were travelling in. https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2025/dec/19/we-did-nothing-wrong-seven-men-released-from-custody-in-sydney-deny-islamist-links

Thanks Peter. Will try to drop in from time to time to make sure you're all behaving yourselves. I've tried to cut down on screen time but it's easier said than done. Have been co-administering an inyourfacebook group so that's taken a bit of effort and tended to drag oneself back online. So all good, still breathing in and breathing out and wearing my trousers the right way round.

I'm happy to be in the bush away from it all, it's very peaceful out here, nothing to bother us. I'd never go back to the big city, it would drive me insane. The bush is much better for your mental health.

GON, Not all Muslims are violent or fundamentalist, just like not all Jews are Zionists. The vast majority of violent crime is still by white anglo Aussies. Not all Aussies are racist, but you seem to be happy to be one.

Just stating facts is not hate speech. I moved to the bush to get away from muslims who have guns and knives. A muslim with six guns? What could go wrong? Senator Fatima Payman would say, It's Australia's Voice.

GON, hate speech has been outlawed. Be careful what you say.

Former police officer claims he warned of Bondi terror attack a decade ago https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-12-19/nsw-former-police-officer-bondi-beach-terror-warning/106157580 He wasn't the only one, hundreds if not thousands of perceptive citizens have warned of future Islamic attacks for years, but for some strange reason, the warnings are never heeded. If we ever change our national flag, a plain red flag will suffice. Jews and Muslims mixed together in Australia under major party politics = spontaneous combustion.

Kind of looks like the Police interrupted a peaceful gathering of Islamic scholars, intent on discussing Jewish problems. They haven't got one firearm, or one explosive device, between them! https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-12-19/nsw-seven-arrested-liverpool-bondi-victoria-police/106161610

Correct Marty.

Nobody puts Baby in the corner

Well done.

At this stage I think nobody cares about Trump. The world (yes even MAGAts) has got Trumpfatigue. And the world has now started to develop a vague fear of finding out what a naked unrestricted republican party might do, post Trump.