Jerry_Atrick

Sorry, Nev. I missed your post. I bought it with 40,200+ miles on the clock. Today, it sits 3 miles short of 45,000 miles. When you think I had the bike for about a month before I did my first ride to London (from memory), it has clicked up 3.700+ miles in 3 months. The original tyres were at about 1/2 life, so they lasted as expected. I expected a few bits to be needed to be done. And sure enough, they do. I don't have all the tools and the space to DIY, and even if I did, it would take me 3 or 4 times longer than if I got someone good to do it. The latest mechanics were OK, but I noticed a few minor things they didn't get right. The new tyres are excellent. But, they didn't inflate them to the correct pressures. I had since corrected that, and it rides really well. The rear brake/wheel still has a squeak, but I have checked and there seems to be an issue with the piston - somethign I would have hoped they picked up when changing the disc. So, they are going to look at next week. I gave it a good dose of brake cleaner and it seems to have quietened it down a but. The heated grips no longer work. They wired them into the fuse box, and I guess the fuse has blown. I am thinking there is a short somewhere, but I don't have the space to take the fuel tank off to trace the wiring. Since they were playing up before I took them in to be rewired, I am guessing it was the previous mechanic who has probably cut into the insulation or something. At the end of the day, these are minor things. The electrical system initially worried me, but it seems to be functioning well (touch wood). The engine purrs like a kitten, and the clutch and gearbox seem in good shape, if a little notchy at times. For an 18 year old bike, it is still hanging together well. Well, this weekend, it was great riding weather, if a little chilly in the morning. Yesterday was nice and sunny and we hit abour 17 degrees. Today was more on the grey side, with the odd ray if sunshing getting through and it was 16. My son and I went for a ride both days and covered around 130 miles between the two days. We found some nice twisties with excellent rolling countryside views as well as views to the Bristol Channel. We stopped at the local Harley/Indian dealer, and then the Triumph dealer, where a bunch of young fellas made a bee line to the son's bike and they all spun a good yarn. We pootled/bimbled around a bit more and then all of a sudden, on a country road (we aren't short of them around here) he decided to open up the throttle and got the little beast to 70mph, I did ask him to read back his speedo (we have intercoms). Today it was back to the twisties and some riding in town for practice, where he did stuff up navigating a roundabout. He was very disappointed with himself, but as I point out, even the most experienced riders make mistakes, that he wasn't dangerous, and as long as he learns from them, he is in the black. The Biffa (nickname for CBF1000's here) is an absolute joy to ride. Smooth and very positive acceleration, respectable handling int he twistes (knee didn't quite get down - and I don't have sliders, anyway). Only real complaint is that over the potholes it is a bit stiff. Maybe I should take a look at the rear shock. Bikers were out in force both days, and the convention here is a tilt of the head to the middle of the road, with a slight nod at the same time. Most people do it, and some quite pronounced. The alternative is a wave of the left hand with an extended arm. All in all a good day.. Next week, the Halse Angels will head to a beach on the Bristol Channel - most likely Minehead, which is only 14 or so miles away. Then the real test for the lad - a ride into London.. to the Aussie High Coommission for an appointment for his Aussie passport renewal (his old passport isn't one fo the new tech ones, so it is like a new passport application. Looking at doing it Wednesday week.

The Brent Crude price is still lower than it was at the height of COVID: https://tradingeconomics.com/commodity/brent-crude-oil I recall Australia feeling a bit nervous about dunny paper, but not petrol. I guess not being allowed more than 5ks from your home probably had something to do with it. Yes. the Strait of Hormuz was still open, but freight wasn't going terribly quickly between places and it was super expensive to boot. In Australia's case, it would appear our polliies since Howard may have had something to do with our current predicament:

I would hope very much that Albo (or whoever is in government) is going to negotiate hard for Australian interests in any demand from any government. Too many times it appears various countries, inclduing Australia roll over, especially for Chump on threats. If we clearly have an upper hand, we should use it to our advantage. I remember years ago when the US government decided to heavily subsidise and agricultural product to protect their farmers. I think it was sugar. Australia protested to the WTO as I recall, with little effect. I think ti was 3LO that had the US secretary for agriculture of the time on for an interview. The US offical repeatedly stated the US government has to do what is in the best interests of its growers and that the Australian government should do the same. When quizzed about how the US wwas pursuing open markets and it was hurting Australia's growers, he repeated the mantra. When asked about using their disproportionate economic clout to protect their farmers and their markets were also of disproportionate size, the US official repeated the mantra. Well, if Australia has the wood over the US in this, they should definitely negotiate hard to the disadvantage of the USA and claw something back, taking into account the bigger picture.

Yes.. and if you did read my post properly, your would recall I wrote that you can get your protest vote but still dend a preference to the least unliked candidate likely to get elected. Meaning it would still facour the dominant parties or the dominant dandidates in the electorate. My post started with I prefer proprotional sytstem of voting or some such words, but put forward arguments in a hopefully unbiased way. I suggest you read posts in the same vein.

Both quotes posted to keep context... Can you pls explain how a big community committee would work for all of the stuff government provides (and is expected to provide) on a national scale for a country the size of Australia, when there are many complex issues presenting and needing decisions on a daily basis? I am genuinely interested because, as I undestand (from my son and I haven't checked him), Lichtenstien sort of operates in a similasr way. Except that it is a country of 40,000 people and has a small geogrpahic area. It has a power sharing agreement between the monarchy and the elected representatives, and, as I understand, on items of political importance, it goes to a popular vote. Again, I am not sure how a system that works for a much larger country economically, in complexity and geographically. It's GDP is a tad under USD $9Bn; this is barely the budget of one department in Australia,m which as a GDP of a tad under USD$2tn. And, according to Google, Lichtenstein fits into Australia a little over 48,000 times. But, I am genuinely interested in how a community committee could scale to Australia.

This works well on a small scale and for local management, but could you really organise it for the defence of the realm or the provision of hospitals, justice, etc?

I don't seem to be able to find the swing across the state at the moment, but is seems the LNP are bearing the brunt ov votert dissatisfaction. https://www.abc.net.au/news/elections/sa/2026/results?sortBy=margin&filter=all&selectedRegion=all&selectedParty=all&partyWonBy=all&partyHeldBy=all With 63% oif the vote counted and 9 seats in doubt, Labor seems to have romped it in. But, some of the biggest individual seat swings at present are to Labor. For example, Waite has an 18.3% swinf to ALP. Note, in Kavel, there is currently a 17.4% swing to Libs from the independent. Until the vote is counted, we won't know across the state, but it will be interesting reading You can thank Abbott for that. At last look, Australian internet was slower than Khazakstan's on the whole. In London, you can get gigbit internet unlimited for £20/month, including a landline. We are getting in the sticks early 2027.

It sounds like NZ has a pretty fair system as I was wondering how the independents would fair in a national vote under proportional representation. I think the idea the the proportion of representation based on peoples' first preferences is the better one. If 30% of the nation has PHON as their first vote, well, then that would be significant enough to warrant a decent representation in parliament. You or I may not agree with it, but why shold 30% of the population be deined representation of their preferred politicians/party. You can no longer call them fringe if that was the primary vote proportion. In the same way that it is argued their should be representation proportionally on diversity/ethnic grounds, surely the same applies on ideology/protest grounds, regardless of whether or not one agrees with them. That is the tenet of a democracy. One of the possible benefits of proportional representation is that it may lessen the protest vote, too. If you know that your vote is more likely to end up in some representatio of your protest party of choice, you may think twice before casting that vote. This should result in a moderation of the protest vote. However, I see this as a drawback against preferential voting. Under preferential voting, if you are tha pissed off, you can cast a vote for your protest party and then give your second preference to the party more likely to get in that you would prefer over the other (except for ultra-safe seats). This sends a clear message to the parties that you really are pissed off with them, so they better take notice. In that way, you get more for your vote than a simple proprotional representation. You get to say, "hey we're really not happy with you" without eelcting people who would destroy the place, but still have your vote count towards the party/representative that is more likely to get in and would better represent you. Which one is better is a matter of opinion/values. My guess, or at least hope, is that most of the vote to PHON is protest and they don't really want them anywhere near the levers of real power. If that is the case, then preferential voting has the better outcome in terms of sending a clear message to the parties, giving PHON some reason to continue as a protest party, but utlimately landing representation where the bulk of the population want it. If the votes who put them number 1 on the ticket really want them there, then proportional voting would be the better representation of what people want, regardless of what comes next. While the political parties may get the message that voters are unhappy, one of the problems is they think they have to mimic the protest party de jour. This is proving in the UK to be the deat knell of the conservatives, and the LNP may well follow suit. The problem for them is the electorate are wondering why vote for the imitators when you can have the real thing, and that the parties that lurch with the protest parties are of no sunstance or vision - they don't stand for anything except getting votes. And that costs them.

I haven't done one for over 30 years. They are popular here.. The offer all sorts of different prizes and themes. You can stand behind someone at the counter who chooses them like kids at a lolly shop. Amazing how much speople spend on them both in money and at the counter selecting them.. the latter being a pain.

Part of the fun is anticipation, though

Yep. That was the first day with those gloves and I can only think in that case I just plumb forgot, or hit the switch, but not properly (neither would be the first time). A couple of times since, I have pressed the button to stop the indicator but it not registered.. Small thumb (and fingers).

On another note, one of the interesting things to come from this was our refugee system, which is considered one of the worst ones in the development world and freuently is the subject of intenational condemnation, including from teh UN: https://www.unhcr.org/au/monitoring-asylum-australia Despite the reasons for our asylum system, and despite the need to ensure all apoplications meet the criteria required that they are not a risk to Australia and that if returned to their homeland, they are likely to be persecuted, killed, etc for the people they are (e.g. activitists, gay, etc). OK, the Ausssie government could easily identify them, but how could they in a day determine their status and likely safety at home? Yeah they are footblallers, yeah they are women.. Did that make them eligible or able to be ualified as not being an undue rrisk? Yes, you could argue they were to go back to a war zone, but there are many refugees in camps and detention centres in that position, so why wouldn't it apply to them. As it turns out, they themselves deided they no longer needed asylum and it was safe to return.. to a war zone. Of course, there could be something more nefarious at operation - they may well have received threatd or legitimately been concerned of the ramifications them staying in Australia would have on their families by the regime. But now, it beckons the question - if it is good enough to turn around anylum claimes very quickly for some footballers, then why is it good enough for us to virtually torture our Asykum seekers? Yes, we shoiuld be diligent with applicants and make clear economic migrants should be sent back to go through other routes of migration. But waiting up to 4 years before one can even get permission to apply for asylum is cruel.

It would seem the honourable thing to do; she may decline, in which case, aa weekend away for her (and her partner/husband if she has one) or a good night out would be great options.

Not to mention they are too large for our more shallow regional waters. I posted a YT video of war games where one of our "noisy" Collins class subs easily accounted for one of their nuclear subs... (and ours was commanded by a native Brit... How is that for irony in an AUKUS context).

Hmm. I think it was the high court's that held up uncompetitive Practises implemented by Mercedes Australia that implemented anagency model removing competition between dealers.. in fact it was the dealers that took them to court for breach of contract. Chrysler are a ship show and have been for a long time.. Others have been crap to Aussie consumers for ages. And they are only calling it out now with the Chinese?