onetrack

Willie Nelsons tax debt was a long, long time ago (1990), and he settled it for only a bit over half what the IRS originally demanded. https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-country/flashback-willie-nelson-settles-irs-tax-debt-196254/ I think a lot of these performers keep performing because they haven't put enough aside for retirement, and they've established a high-cost luxury lifestyle, that must be funded with continual performing. Every "retirement tour" of old rock stars I've gone along to, has been a total disappointment, as they try to emulate what they were like 40 or 50 years ago, with a poor level of success. We're going along to see The Wailers in early November - Bunny Wailer died in March 2021, and Aston "Familyman" Barrett died in Feb this year, marking the passing of the last of Bob Marleys original band members. But the new generation of Wailers is continuing the reggae music!

When we had a big local manufacturing base, it was well-protected with major levels of tariffs. It was Whitlam who dismantled all the tariff protection for Australian industries and thus left them exposed to the "global manufacturing order". Car manufacturing is a horribly expensive business to be in, and you compete with huge nations and huge manufacturers who all have the advantage of large population bases and large markets that are easily accessible. In the 1930's to 1980's, Australia did alright out of manufacturing vehicles - because shipping in imports was costly (due to smaller ship sizes), and tariffs made imports expensive. Our local vehicle manufacturing was protected and subsidised, and we even managed to export quite a few vehicles to nearby countries. But the value of the Australian dollar was always a problem, it also fluctuated widely, meaning it was difficult for manufacturers to plan very far ahead. Add in the ever-increasing industry restrictions, compulsory safety features that were legislated for, vastly increased levels of manufacturing sophistication - and a small local market, with export-potential countries always a long way away, and often with limited purchasing capacity as well - and Australia was always behind the 8-ball. A lot more could've been done to assist local manufacturing, but easy money and big profits, in the form of property development, financial industry investments - and retailing, most of all - have all resulted in the money gravitating to these areas, rather than the high-risk areas of product development, marketing and production. A few Australian industries have taken advantage of overseas manufacturing for components for their locally-produced products, but they still always battle with trying to acquire funding for manufacturing - and also face the constantly-depressing fact, that no matter what you produce, China can produce it in volumes 10,000 times higher than you can, and at a fraction of the cost.

I know that middle property above, it's on Wattleup Road, in Hammond Park, in the Southern suburbs of Perth. The family have recently caved in and now have the 2.34Ha (6 acre) property on the market. https://www.domain.com.au/news/they-refused-to-sell-as-a-whole-perth-suburb-was-built-around-them-until-now-1317152/ I recently saw a similar property in East Cannington, a South Eastern suburb. It wasn't as big, maybe an acre, but it really stood out in a surrounding sea of new housing redevelopment. https://www.google.com/maps/place/94+Gerard+St,+East+Cannington+WA+6107/@-32.0077337,115.9550643,229m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m6!3m5!1s0x2a32be9b1f7eac69:0xf7c72f38e5ad6f58!8m2!3d-32.0074481!4d115.9554611!16s%2Fg%2F11c4nrsf_g?entry=ttu&g_ep=EgoyMDI0MDkyNC4wIKXMDSoASAFQAw%3D%3D

Our fortnight of stunning Spring weather returned to a good dose of Winter this morning, with wind and rain and black skies. We've had 12mm between 5:00AM and 2:00PM today, and the possibility of a few more mm before it all departs on Sunday. I had a dentists appointment at 11:45AM and zipping down Cambridge St, Wembley in my Hilux, approaching St John of God Hospital, I encountered a "Sydney driver"! There was a 3 tonne van body truck in front of me in the LH lane, and he braked to turn left into McCourt St. I couldn't see anything much past him at McCourt St - but as he slowed and turned, and I passed him - a dentist or a doctor in a big flash silver Mercedes, pulled straight out of McCourt street, into Cambridge St., without even a glance in my direction! What was worse - there was line of parked cars, and he promptly pulled into my lane without any indication - and I was 15 metres away, and still doing 60kmh!! It gets even worse at that point! It was raining lightly and the road was wet! I hit the brakes hard, the ABS started kicking in, and I could do nothing else, but swerve to my right, and mount the median strip!! There was traffic coming the other way, and I just managed to avoid a car coming the other way! I hung on the horn too late, as I was giving my avoidance skills 100% attention ! But then - he dawdled up Cambridge Street for 300M, then stopped, and turned right into a medical centre!! Sheesh!! Naturally, I pulled up on his left, and got a bit animated with my signalled message, about LOOKING before you pull out!!! Of course, he chose to ignore me, and turned into the driveway, obviously embarrassed, and maybe concentrating on his upcoming medical procedure. I just hope he pays more attention to his medical procedures this afternoon!! The last thing I need, is to write my Hilux off because another driver was totally switched off!

Frankie Valli - looking every bit of his advanced age. It's pretty sad seeing these old entertainers unable to bow out gracefully, when age decline sets in.

Jerry - Peter wrote $840M, not $840B. The problem with Govts spending big on large projects, is that it's rare that the cost/benefit returns in the long-term, ever match up with the initially-projected figures. Then the project becomes a millstone around the taxpayers collective necks for decades to come - and long after the politicians who incurred the scheme and the costs, are gone. I can recall that the loans taken out to finance the construction of the railways in W.A. in the 1880's to the 1920's, were still being paid down in the 1990's. Many of the initial loans were interest-only loans. The only reason these loans were able to be serviced was because of the amount of gold the State produced. When gold mining slumped, wool and grains and other agricultural exports usually rose to compensate. Victoria has long been dependent on a large manufacturing base to produce its wealth. I don't think that manufacturing base is anything like the size it used to be, and I can't see any high-tech manufacturing providing the level of State income that's needed to service large debts on public transport infrastructure, because public transport is always a loss-making exercise. Add in a loss of Govt revenue from declining fuel excise, as a result of a major increase in EV's, and the State Govt in Victoria will be looking for a whole new raft of taxes.

SWMBO and I are making a point now of paying in cash, whenever there's a CC fee. It means quite a few dollars in savings annually, and it's money I prefer to keep in my pocket, rather than lining banks already-bulging pockets with it. And I find many businesses are very happy to accept cash rather than cards. Most of the food trucks/vans at markets, often have signs advertising that they prefer cash.

Well, at least you've got no worries about damaging expensive props or propshafts on underwater obstructions! The nephews bought a Skicraft ski boat about 1985, it was a gorgeous beast, red metalflake and 350 Chev. I was tooling up the Swan River in it one sunny day, at a low speed (8kts is the River speed limit), about 600 or 800 metres upstream from the Maylands Yacht Club. Not far off the centre of the River, I hit something in the River with an almighty BANG and thump. Straightaway, I had a driveshaft vibration. I returned to the boat ramp and inspection found a damaged prop and a bent driveshaft! To this day, I still have no idea what I hit. Possibly a large submerged tree stump? There were no markers in the area, but it was just outside the navigation channel. The Swan River isn't very deep in many places. We did get a lot of pleasure out of that boat, but I gave up waterskiing around age 41, after incurring too many torn lower back tendons from mostly deepwater starts. That 350 Chev had some grunt. I think the most fun I had with it, we had a circular flat disc of 10mm Marine ply, and we'd use that as skiboard. You couldn't get over about 12-14 kts with it, the friction on the water surface was too high, and the boat would pull you off it. But you could do lots of low-speed trickery with it. One of the tricks was carrying a wooden kitchen chair with you, you'd get up on the piece of ply, then swing the chair under you, and sit on it! - skiing neatly along, sitting like a monarch on their throne! 🙂

Yes, they're still made, but the newer ones are much lighter gauge steel than the older ones.

I can understand a rough bush camp, but even in the roughest bush or site camps I was in, it was always a priority to have hot water for showers. One time I set up a cut-open 60 litre drum with a firebox under it. Filled the drum with water and when it got hot, a hose from a 12V pump was dropped into the drum, and the water pumped through a conveniently-strung shower rose. The pump was battery-powered. The Glind exhaust system/heat exchanger showers for vehicles are good, too.

If you want a pro saw, you buy a Stihl. All others are cheap imitations. Husvarna would've had the alloy casting provided by the cheapest tenderer, from anywhere in the world. Despite saying that, I've got a 2000psi Husqvarna 240V pressure washer which I bought during COVID and it's not too bad. But it's made in Italy, where all the good pressure washers are made. I've a got a Stihl 028 chainsaw I bought new in 1988. It's made in West Germany. It's done a heap of work, and it still runs like a top. It's gone through about 3 bars and 5 chains. All I've done to it is give an occasional clean, replaced the spark plug several times, and I had to replace the anti-vibration rubbers between handle and body when they buggered up a few years ago. They don't make 'em like they used to! But the Stihl cost me $799 in 1988, and that was serious money, back then.

A Statutory write off is only applied to a vehicle where the SWO Damage Assessment Criteria are met. There's a booklet put out by Austroads, that advises what those criteria are. If the SWO criteria are not met, the vehicle is a Repairable Write Off and can be repaired. Many "insurance salvage" vehicles are sold as RWO's, and then repaired and put back on the road, legally. You cannot ever repair a vehicle that is declared an SWO, the 17 digit VIN number stamped in the body is physically destroyed, so it can never be repaired or re-registered. Smashed headlights do not meet the SWO critieria, so the vehicle must be classed as an RWO. The link to the Austroads booklet is below. Good quality aftermarket headlights for the Subaru XV are available ex-Taiwan, off eBay, and from aftermarket parts suppliers, and they run to about $500 for a pair. http://carsafe.com.au/assets/AR_NMV_LV_Tech_Guide_Dec_2019.pdf

You need to practice your rain dance and rain chants. Or perhaps the rain gods have deemed you a worthless entity, because you failed to worship them in the past.

I carry anywhere between $100 and $300 on cash on me at all times. It's very handy for the times you spot a bargain item you need, for sale, and you want to grab it before someone else does. It's also useful for when the power goes out. Waving cash also gets you better pricing on many retail things. A mate says he always carries about $200 in cash, and his adult children are always putting the bite on him for some cash for some need of theirs, and they never have any cash on them.

Spacey, eBay owned Gumtree, not Facebook/Meta - but eBay sold Gumtree to the Norwegian-based Adevinta, in 2021. Regardless, Gumtree is utterly useless today, all the site does is constantly change your search terms to look for something you DIDN'T request - and you can't make it search for the term you DO want. In addition, Gumtree redirects you to eBay constantly, they just want to keep dumping tonnes of new Chinese s*** on you.

You got to how old? - and you still can't use a knife without slashing yourself?? Remember the old adage - "cut towards your chum, not towards your thumb!" 🙂

The Chinese EV industry is in major turmoil and I can't see clearly as to what the end result will be - but one thing I can see, is a major "restructuring" of the Chinese EV production, and a lot of brands will simply disappear. The Chinese car dealers are wrestling with enormous losses. https://www.scmp.com/business/china-evs/article/3279679/chinas-car-dealers-struggle-us20-billion-losses-amid-price-war

Bo Derek?

It's the Lumber Capital Log Yard babes that make my day! They'd give any man, wood! 😄

So... when in London, there really IS a place where you can crap on people from a great height??

6

A DNA examination of the Aboriginals would more than likely find they're descended from the Indians and the Javanese. Many of the Northern Aboriginals possess skulls that are very Javanese in shape. A family friend is John McGuire, the Aboriginal footballer and cricketer. I remember how furious he got, when he was regularly mis-identified by sport commentators, as one of the Indian cricketers!

Any rain coming will be far too late for the poor buggers trying to grow grain crops in South Australia's and Nth Eastern Victoria's Mallee regions. Their crops are practically total failures, and most are being cut for hay. One old farmer the journos interviewed said his worst drought year previously was 1967, when he only got 180mm for the growing season. This year, he's had only 150mm. On top of that, they've endured vicious frosts. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-09-18/failing-crops-frost-drought-mallee-grain-farmers-hay-rainfall/104358994 That was a ripper of a tornado in the Victorian High Country. Seeing the CCTV vision makes you realise how weak roller doors on buildings really are. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-09-23/bom-tornado-victoria-wild-weather-high-country-mansfield-pirires/104355906

They sure wouldn't be hardwood trees, with that amount of logs on each bike!

I don't know if you blokes and gals noticed, but the Spring Equinox was at 10:43PM, AEST tonight. For the next few months, the days are going to get longer and hotter! It's good to get some nice fine, warm days - this Spring so far, for us in the West, has been perfect.