Leaderboard

The simple, over-riding feature of getting older is that the old body starts playing up, and needs regular repair and maintenance. And if you're 50 or 100 kms from medical care, docs, specialists, even ambulances - life gets a lot harder than it need be. I lived all through the wheatbelt of W.A. and the W.A. Goldfields all my working life, living in everything from rented farmhouses to dongas to caravans, and even old railway fettlers huts. I've never actually owned a house in my own name, I didn't place enough importance on that feature of life - much to my regret. I have no ability to purchase a house today. I part-owned various industrial properties, a mining lease, a farm, and a couple of houses, that I never ever lived in much, because they were largely occupied by my brother and his wife, while I was out in the boonies, working. But when I got together with SWMBO in my early 40's, she owned a house! - and she lets me live in it, and shares it with me - because she loves me, she likes looking after me - and because I fix anything to do with the house, or the car, or whatever else requires attention. We live in the city only about 5 kays from the CBD in a nice leafy, sought-after, quiet suburb - and we're close to 3 shopping centres, a number of major arterial roads, heaps of docs, dentists, medical centres and medical facilities, all within a few kays - and we've been here since 1990, and we don't look like moving until we get really fragile with age, or the bikies move in next door (highly unlikely). I could easily live anywhere in the country again, but SWMBO is a city girl and likes shops and theatres, and being close to where her daughter lives. Generally, most people select their living location according to how far away, or how close, they want to live to relatives (including children). Most parents want to live within a reasonable distance of children, but some don't want them close at all. Not having any children myself, and getting on O.K. with SWMBO's girl and boy from her previous marriage, makes any living area decision, easier. Of course, if we won lotto, we'd move to a nice mansion by the coast, but that's only a dream. I don't think I'd ever move into a high-rise apartment, even though that's the result for people many today - simply because I don't like living above other people, and not knowing what they're getting up to - by way of drugs, starting fires, and other aggravating risks. Good neighbours generally make people stay where they live. No neighbours often suits a lot of people.

Definitely agree with the good neighbours thing. We're lucky enough to live on 5 acres, 20 minutes from Hobart, and can't see any neighbours from our place. Mind you, we get on really well with our neighbours - about 5 other families we've known over 10 years, our kids caught the same bus to school together, and we still get together a few times a year for parties. If someone needs something they put it on the group chat and usually within 5 minutes someone is offering to help.

My entire point was that the Euro's have been constantly calling the USA warmongers for the past 50 years, but they are always the first ones to call the US President whenever there is a situation in the world that might affect their economies. They have been been neglecting their own militaries knowing that the Americans are stupid enough to keep bailing them out. The Euro's had a royal meltdown when Trump called them out for not keeping their pledge of committing a few percentage points of their GDP to military spending. The EU should be its own power. There are 29 countries in the EU and there is no excuse for them not making a joint effort to protect their economies and sovereignties. The US has done 75% of the heavy lifting in keeping the Persian Gulf open to world trade while Europeans and many other countries reap the benefits. Then the Europeans turn right around and bash Americans to appease their left wing voters. As far as my fellow Americans go, we should not be trusted any longer because there there is no continuity in foreign policy from one election cycle to the next. On top of it all, we are in a non shooting civil war right now. Might sound crazy to some but it's very true. We used to be country first.........but now days we are party first.

Old German joke: a man goes to a newsstand every day and looks at just the front pages of all the newspapers. The guy behind the stand asks him what he's looking for. "An obituary". "But Herr Mien, obituaries aren't on the front page!" "The one I'm looking for will be.""

Getting rid of Trump would be a massive improvement

I saw a good old Gardner 6LX on marketplace for $4,000. I love those old Gardners and used to like listening to them cruising at low revs out from the Mooloolaba port when I worked on a boat there for a year. Our little trawler has a noisy 2 stroke GM 671, but the Gardners had a beautiful sound.

Mrs and I bought in Central Vic 30 years ago, 40 acres. It was good until I got crook and couldn't look after the olive trees and sheep. Now living in "town" with a pub and post office, 20 minutes from the shops. Its good because she likes going to town most days. On my own I would probably starve.

I got a black eye from trying to slide on a G-string.

I'm guilty of this myself as a retired Navy guy. A very large percentage of other retired military from my era are of the same mindset. The hostage situation happened during my second year mark. Four years later, I was stationed in Roosevelt Roads Puerto Rico when the Marine Barracks blew up. The civilian secretary in my office came in one morning crying because CNN had just broadcasted that the Marine Barracks in Lebanon had just blown up. Her husband was a Lieutenant Navy/Marine Liaison living on the second floor of the barracks at the time. Luckily, he wasn't inside when the explosion occurred, but It took 4 days for the poor lady to find out that he was OK due to the confusion. I lost a good friend on the USS Cole. Engineman 2nd Class Marc I. Nieto He always called me "Dr. Diesel" and was constantly pestering me about technical issues with his gear. Great kid! So yeah, I'm still bitter.

Yes but... As usual, the USA has not proposed any plan, or perthway to a regime change. As usual, the old regime has a sucession plan to continue power. As usual, USA has no plan for what to do next. Just go in all gunz blazing and expect the locals to miraculously unite their mobs and create a whole new system of government. Never worked before, unlikely to now. P.S. With the present state of amazing intel, and amazing precision strike capability, why did they destroy a school full of kids?

Well, if the girl trap is successful, you'll be told what to do. Problem solved!

Trump will fix everything Ha Ha. It would have to be by accident. Nev

-I've been with AGL for a few years. We got a smart meter at least 6 years ago, way before my wife passed. The meter is read remotely. I can log onto my account, see the current accruing cost and an estimate of what the bill will be in X number of days. These figures are constantly updated. This helps my budgeting. I wish they could do the same with gas.

Dafuq?? Do you really think Trump gives a flying f**k about the welfare of anyone who isn't Donald J Trump? Especially foreigners. Once again the stupid bastard is being led by the nose by Netanyahu, who needs yet another war to keep in power and out of court. Peace prize my arse. The only prize the orange clown deserves is "Worst President Ever", possibly upgraded to "Person who has had the most negative impact on humanity 2016-2020, and 2024 to impeachment"

Good job GON. Even if you only save a small amount, it is good take action and feel that you have some control.

Had a good laugh about the latest American, "shoot 'em up, and ask questions later", mentality. It seems that U.S. Customs and Border control were running a drone looking for illegal immigrants near the Mexican border, and they strayed into a U.S. military area. The Pentagon ordered their latest laser drone-killer into action, to defend against the "military threat", and blasted the Customs drone out of the sky, no questions asked! 😄 Naturally, Customs is furious, and is raging about everyone doing their own thing with no consultation (led by the White House, of course) - and even the FAA is getting dragged into it, with their over-arching control of airspace, and no reference to any other Govt authority. What a typical, complete CF, of American gung-ho adventurism!! https://edition.cnn.com/2026/02/26/us/pentagon-shoots-down-cbp-drone

Our dog used to glare at me and roll his eyes when I farted. I think he learnt that from my wife. Life is so unfair sometimes.

This is one of my favourite old lanterns, a Dipti brand made in India. I don't know how old it is but I'd guess 1950's or 1960's. It's a great old lantern, very solid metal and thick embossed glass with the name Dipti Oriental Metal embossed on it. That's the old company name; they're Dipti Metal Industries these days. It also burns perfectly and never gives any problems. It's in the top three in lantern status around here. Fairly rare in this country and not easy to find one.

A lot of people believe that it was entirely a CIA coup taking down Mosaddegh, but that isn't the entire story. The CIA certainly played a role for sure, but it was British MI6 that initiated the coup because England was going to lose billions of dollars worth of oil machinery and oil contracts under Mosaddegh. It gets even more nuanced from there. Mosaddegh reneged on the deal it had for years with the AOIC and was going to take over the oil fields under the guise of nationalization. England protested to the International court. The International court (ICJ) sided with Iran on the oil fields because they stated that the AOIC was made up of civilian companies with no standing. The British government actually owned a controlling 51% of the AOIC and said "screw that". Britain was bankrupt at the time due to WWII, and it was losing the last of its empire as well. The country was deeply in debt and trying to claw its way out of bankruptcy. They were determined that there was no way that Iran was going renege on their deal with the oil fields and machinery. The oil was basically a life saver for their economy at the time. Meanwhile, the Soviets were waiting in the wings wanting to make a deal with Iran so they could buy into their oil. That was not going to happen if the USA had anything to do with it. The USA, Britain, and a lot of other European countries were in a panic about the Soviets back then. In the end........A lot of countries didn't cry all that loudly over the coup because of the Soviets and the creep of communism. And as a side note........some countries still resented Iran because they were a huge supplier raw materials to Hitler's Germany before and during the early parts of WWII.

Just as it's not all about oil, it's also not all about Trump. He's a bit like smoke and mirrors. He has an incredible knack of getting under people's skin, particularly those on the left who get almost hysterical at the mere mention of his name. I think a lot of people think a madman just woke up one day and decided to blow up Iran on impulse, well, ok, dream on. While people focus on Trump, they forget the strategic interest the US military and security people (and some politicians) have had for decades in trying to bring Iran back into their fold. The situation now is that a president finally took the gamble to try to do it, and it is a big gamble. The desire has been there since the regime deposed the Shah.

Iran is often grouped with Arab nations, but it is not an Arab country. Its people are largely Persian. The Persian civilization, originating in modern-day Iran, was a dominant ancient superpower (c. 550 B.C.E. – 651 C.E.) renowned for vast territorial expansion under the Achaemenid, Parthian, and Sasanian dynasties. Founded by Cyrus the Great, it was known for its bureaucratic efficiency, infrastructure like the Royal Road, religious tolerance, and cultural influence across Asia and the Middle East. The Persian Empire is the name given to a series of dynasties centered in modern-day Iran that spanned several centuries—from the sixth century B.C. to the 20th century A.D. In other words, the Iranians are not towel-heads.

Leave your ex in Sydney, stay where you are, extend your place and get a dog. 😊

You can be just as lonely renting somewhere else. If everything is pretty good where you are now, apart from the distance to a larger town, maybe it's being on your own too much that's the main problem?

Hated to read that Rachael Carpani passed away. Beautiful lady, and I loved her as "Jodi" on McLeods Daughters.

Does Iran have oil? That may provide the answer to Chump's ultimate goal, I would think. Does Iran pose a threat to Israel? I would suggest that is Netanyu's motivation, as well as keepong out of court. Does that make Chump subservient to Israel? Hmmm.. I will leave that one to the court ofpublic opinion. Do Iranians want to be free of the Sharia based regime? I guess that makes them at least partially supportive. Will the civilian deaths directly resulting from the offensive be more or less than those by the regime resulting from what looked like peaceful protests? We'll have to wait and see. Is there a good chance it will get worse before it gets better? Definitely.# Is there a good chance it will eventually get better (by that I mean restoring Iran to its political place or better than it was pre-1979)? Andiwhat time would that good chance take? That is subjective, but based on history of these interventions, especially in the region, I would not give it 50/50.. Is it justified?

Having said the above, I'm probably not the best person to be giving advice. I'm retired, own my own acerage property debt free, on my own these days and can live comfortable enough on the age pension. I live in a little slice of paradise and don't have any factors pushing me one way or another. For someone still in the workforce with a career, there would be a lot more things to consider than what I have to.

This is a bit off topic, but I suppose it's slightly related to a previous discussion we had about noisy Harleys with straight through pipes. A mate received his new Verex slash cut drag pipes in the mail on Friday to fit to his two month old Bonneville Speedmaster. They make them in brushed, polished (bright chrome) and black ceramic finishes. He went for the polished finish as it will fit in with the existing chrome on the bike. I think they will get fitted on Monday. The photos show the drag pipes unpacked and the bike with the standard Triumph mufflers. It will be interesting to hear how loud it is; with the Triumph mufflers it sounds like a sewing machine. It's been a long journey. Me and the mate started out making mud pies and playing with plastic toy soldiers, graduated on to slot cars and now we all have bigger toys. Maybe we'll finish off with wheelchair races in the nursing home.

I live on the highway that runs to Warren. From my front gate it is about 70 kms away. Warren is on the Macquaie River. Although the Macquarie River doesn't have the deep gouge in the landscape that we associate with a "valley", the rain clouds seem to follow its course and that means it diverts away from my place. I drove into Dubbo yesterday for shopping. Dubbo is about 60 kms south from Gilgandra. As I got to about 20 kms from Dubbo I noticed that the paddocks were greening up. About 25 kms south of Gilgandra there seems to be a boundary between the catchments of the Macquarie and Castlereagh Rivers. This seems to split the path of storms. The radar often shows the storm cells tracking to the south of this divide, so the storms avoid the Castlereagh catchment. Since farming around here involves the growing of winter grain crops, most of the ground cover in summer is just dried standing straw. About the only greenery is the grass at the edge of the road that has been watered by the run off from small storms.

I Come To Bury Howard by David Archibald 10 February 2026 Certainly not to praise him. The evil he did as Prime Minister has gone on for too long. Howard’s last dark deed, after he lost the September 2007 election, was to pass the National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting Act. To put that in context, when he was a teenager Howard used to cross Sydney to sit at the knee of Sir Philip Baxter, former head of the Australian Energy Commission, and hear of the wonders of nuclear energy. As an elected politician, he became a one-man sleeper cell of nuclear advocacy. In private conversations, Howard used to call global warming nonsense. Nevertheless, he worked towards bringing in a carbon tax. He wanted Australia to adopt nuclear energy. To force Australia to that result, he needed to make coal-fired power generation more expensive. He was being two-faced and too cute. The National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting Act was the accounting basis for the tax. The idea was to bring it in, settle it down over a couple of years and then start taxing. Some 1,000 Australian companies continue to report their carbon consumption under that act. The total cost of employing all the accountants for this may be of the order of $500 million per annum. All of which is wasted. Close to $10 billion has been wasted over the years, for nothing. Fifteen years ago I used to be invited to give speeches at anti-carbon tax rallies on the east coast. After one such rally in front of Parliament House, I went in to meet Senator Nick Minchin, then considered to be the hard man of the Liberal right. I said to the Senator that the National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting Act should be repealed. He replied “Why would we do that?,” which meant that he had no idea how the world worked. He also said that nobody in cabinet asked Howard why he was proceeding with the carbon tax. Not that they weren’t curious about doing something so stupid, they were afraid of upsetting him. They would rather national self-harm than lose their spot in cabinet. Abbott won the 2013 election on a platform of getting rid of the carbon tax. Three days later Greg Hunt, then Liberal member for Goldstein and a Klaus Schwab protégé, talked him out of repealing the National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting Act. Why get rid of the carbon tax but keep the accounting basis for it? So stupid, but he did it. The carbon tax came back in other forms. The price of electric power tripled. Businesses and whole industries are closing. Last year the Liberal Party formally abandoned a commitment to carbon taxes, but they still yearn to remain in the Paris mutual suicide pact of 2015. This confused position means they don’t believe the words coming out of their own mouths. The electorate have noticed and are now looking elsewhere for the promise of rational government. But there is an easy test of any party’s grip on reality. If their platform does not include repeal of the National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting Act, they don’t understand anything and their professed concern for the future of our country is only performative. So far, no political party has undertaken to do so and the country remains on a glide slope to oblivion. In the meantime, as our standard of living keeps falling, curse John Howard. Curse him in living and curse him in dying. He could have killed the global warming monster in its crib but chose instead to live a lie. We continue to suffer because of his contempt for the Australian people.

He and Netanyahu are more interested in triggering regime change than getting some kind of agreement on nuclear development. In his statement justifying the attack Trump listed all the Iranian attacks on US interests snd personnel going back decades. Putin won’t be happy because he may not get some of the drones he needs.

Trump's mantra is to prevent the Iranians from ever having nuclear weapons. He says they have been given opportunities to come to the table to negotiate but have failed to do so, therefore he is determined to raze their nuclear processing facilities to the ground.

Hmm.. thinking about it, if he succeds and restores a government that is democratic and/or representative of the people, maybe he should get a peace prize. For some debate on the amount killed over a month, it has ranged from the official 3,000 purely civilian population, to up to 30,000: https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2026/jan/27/iran-protests-death-toll-disappeared-bodies-mass-burials-30000-dead That article is a month old; Wikipedia quotes different sources with wildly different estimates: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026_Iran_massacres So I think 15,000 a month is not unreasonable. To put it in perspective, if it were to continue, it would equal the number of Palestinians claimed to have been killed by Hamas (currently around 76,000) after 2 years in 5 months. Also, there is the veil if not reality that Israel is targeting th emilitary that hide behind its civilians, and Hamass has not yet differentiate the number of cilvilians and mitilarty/terrorist personnel killed. But, for the sake of the argument, let's assume they were all civilians and Hamas doesn't release its military killings. Given most Iranians are Persian and not islamic, and the definition of Genocide (at least according to Google AI is: "Genocide is the deliberate, systematic destruction—or intent to destroy—in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group... " and incl;udes destruction, which is not necessarily killing... would it not seem that the Iranian regime is on that path against anyone who doesn't give the pretence of converted to Islam, or wants their own self-determination? I have no idea of Chump's objectives, but if an unintended consequence is the re-impostiion of a government represntative of the people, preferably democratic, and disollution of state sponsored terrorism, then, well, it does deserve a peace prize, does it not?

We are promised 100-150mm over the next three days. Could be interesting.

I've been offline for most of the day, so you beat me with the report of Neil Sedaka. But there is a local one today. Lorraine Bailey, Grace Sullivan from the Aussie TV show The Sullivans, passed away today aged 89. A number of other TV and stage roles, and two Logies.

USA is a Joke in front of the entire world. Choose your Leader wisely next time. IF there IS a Next time. Nev

I do understand your comments Nev, and appreciate them. One thing with this project is that it's about the journey, not the destination. In regard to adding to challenges, I do a lot of that on purpose. It's the challenge of projects that attracts me, not so much the end result. Yes, there's easier way of doing things and if I just wanted the end product I'd go out and buy it and save myself a lot of time. But that's not what this project is about. All good advice from you Nev, and starting off with something good would suit some. In this case, I'm neither starting with something good, nor am I resurrecting a pile of junk. It's a scratch build; I'm building a pile of junk from scratch. That's the basic idea of it at ths stage. It will be a good challenge. I've done a lot of restoration work, but always restoring something to original condition. There's a lot more freedom in this project.

Nev, do you mean 32 volt? That's what all the properties ran when I was growing up. Still got the generator in the shed. I just wish I still had the Southern Cross diesel we ran it with.

I think it's whatever floats people's boats. I think golfers are mad, but golfers don't.

Why do you want all that Power? You can't use it. Mass low down makes it safer. Reverse can be an Electric Motor. How far do you go in reverse? Blip that engine and you will tip the bike up sideways Nev

You can check the facts on that IF you want to on relative costs. Old Coal is unreliable. That's WELL understood. The Grid infrastructure needs Work no matter what we do. You may be in an area where you nave no choice in who your Provider is. IF you are in a very remote area others will be subsidising you. Every Person with a solar and battery is helping you.. Old Coal was Amortised The costs of setting it up written off long ago because it's now beyond it's useful Life . When it fails it's usually under high Load on a hot day. Backup is costly. because it's inactive till it's needed and has to respond immediately. Battery and Pumped hydro and gas in that order. Nev

I haven't been there for at least 15 years but I've driven past it 2 or 3 times a year for the past 15 years when I am heading for Noosa. I did go there a couple of weeks ago but the only reason was to leave it for NZ via the airport. Populated by the very wealthy with all their flash toys who could not care less for the environment. Very pompous & lacking of any good taste in architectural design. A slum for the wealthy. It was named for the high cost of real estate & rapid development in the late 50s. Used to be the South Coast with Southport, Coolangatta & Burleigh Heads the main centres. It was probably quite nice back then.

Trailers develop places where a Wire can have the Insulation rubbed through.. Some trailer wiring is shoddy. You also may have a FAULTY RELAY, The original fuse may not be big enough to carry the extra stop Lights current draw. Nev

In my experience, the only fuses that fail for no reason, are the glass tube ones. Never had a modern moulded plastic type fail without real overload. Twice I have had difficult to track down overloads in vehicles, caused by unsecured wiring that vibrated or moved against bodywork. One made my headlights (only rarely, but that was too often) go out on left hand corners. The other made the engine fail, but only on right hand corners when accelerating hard. In that case the engine loom moved a certain way that it rubbed on the firewall. Intermittents are the worst to fix. Do not start fitting bigger fuses unless you wish to replace an entire loom or deal with a fire when the fault returns.

I love 💕 gargner engines in big boats.

Friends won a house on the Gold Coast. They moved there but couldn't stand it.

There's a man who has never suffered the excrutiating pain of a paper cut.

The evidence looks damning, but what happene until innocent until proven guilty? Somehow the orangutan, who has about the same amount of evidence as Mountbatten seems to be immune.. from that and many other alleged crimes. Many others implicated as badly.. but nary a word about them. At least Mendleson has been arrested on suspiciopn of misconduct of public office. He will take Starmer with him.