old man emu

I strongly doubt that what the Israelis are doing is having any sort of negative effects on the morale of the Arab people who may not be members of the targeted military groups, but who are bearing the brunt of of the "collateral damage". The Palestinians have been coping a serve from the Israelis for seventy five years. That's five generations which have grown up in those conditions. Over the same period, the Israelis have had their culture shaped by similar factors which they believe affect their survival. We happily accept the physical evolution of a species in response to their environments. Surely there must be an evolution in the cultural mindset of a group which is subject to constant circumstances which affect its survival. Perhaps if the British hadn't done the dirty and failed to live up to the the British government agreed to recognize Arab independence after the war in exchange for the Sharif of Mecca launching the Arab Revolt against the Ottoman Empire. (Lawrence of Arabia's bit), a situation of peaceful co-existence between the three Abrahamic religions of teh area might have been maintained.

I'm wondering if my Mum will. She's got 59 weeks to go.

Perhaps in the future a DNA sample will be taken from a baby at birth, analysed, and a lifetime health plan developed. Sounds good from a public health perspective, but seems it would remove the uncertainty of a person's lifetime health, which is a big part of the gamble of life. I don't decry doing these sort of DNA analyses when the provide enlightenment about the evolution and migration of Mankind, but applying it to the creation of a person's health plan is. to me, taking the information too far.

Yes. That's the one I was thinking of. I got the country wrong.

Hooray for wind turbines! They let us generate electricity without burning carbon-based fuels, thereby reducing the amount of extra CO2 being put into the atmosphere. However, these blades do wear out and have to be replaced. So what do you do with the old blades? Here's one solution. Watch until the end and then decide if it i actually an environmentally sound solution.

In the 1950s or so, there was an airplane developed which was able to carry a detachable shipping box, about the size of a small seatainer. Without the box attached it looked like a fixed-wing Sikorsky CH-54. It was designed to transport military supplies in the container, like the CH-54 on the left, which was detached at the destination and the aircraft flown back to base looking like the CH-54 in the foreground. Then it would pick up another loaded contained; fly out and drop it off and come back with the empty one it took out first. In flight trials, the aircraft flew nicely with the container attached, but was a handful without it. I'm pretty sure that it was a British project. Sorry that I can't remember its name so that I can load a ling to the video about it.

Talking about decking timber, I was told that it was wrong to lay the boards with the grooved side up, which a lot of people do in the belief that is prevents slips. However, the reason I was told to put the grooves down was that they were there to allow airflow to keep the wood dry where it was in contact with the joists. With a bit of regular light maintenance, a deck should not get slippery. That's caused by allowing dust to accumulate, which encourages microorganisms to flourish.

I hate Burt Bacharach and Hal David and Richard Carpenter and Karen Carpenter. They are responsible for that the earworm song, Close to You, to start in my head as soon as I step away from my hovel, and the bloody flies start zeroing-in on me. Why do flies suddenly appear, Everytime I'm not near? Those damned flies, They long to be Close to me.

So he Lindt her the gear?

I think a basic reason for fast growth is simply water. You don't realise how wet parts of the USA are compared to Australia. I suppose the closest equivalent would be western Tasmania, which cops so much rain. But with fast growth in a moist environment the vessels within each year's growth ring there is a lot of empty space when the wood is harvested and dried. That means that after it has been made into something, it will still take in water, or dry out with the seasons with the varying heat and humidity. That then leaves the woodworker with the need to allow for shrinking and swelling in the finished product. If not allowed for, timber in the product with split.

As I stepped out of my car in the supermarket carpark, I spied a twenty cent coin on the ground. The old rhyme came to mind. But it was a twenty cent coin. That's inflation for you.

Bertie Beetle must be a Victorian thing. I don't think I've seen them in NSW, and only know of them through the bloke, Russell, who was on Hey Hey. I think the NSW equivalent is the Freddo Frog.

I don't know if Israelis kidnapped any civilians, most likely not, but the civilian death and casualty numbers, as well as cutting off food, power and medical supplies strikes me as what is known as "unreasonable force". In our law, one can use force to stop an attack or to subdue an attacker. However, if the force used is beyond what is reasonable in the situation, then the person using that force is in the wrong. What the Israelis are doing is using unreasonable force. Now, I think that the way they sabotaged the pagers was a quite fair thing to do, as the goal was to strike at members of the organisation. I don't know if the reported casualties were simply organisation members who were wounded but not killed, or if they included innocent bystanders. However, blowing up whole buildings, which may and probably were used in part as operations centres, resulting in "collateral damage" is unreasonable.

I wonder if what has been done to improve pastures in Australia has had a beneficial effect on native birds. I was looking at the seed-eating birds in the paddock beside my place. The clover which grew there this winter has gone to seed. Clover is a legume, like peas and beans, so is pretty nutritious. Then there is the grain that either falls to the ground during harvest, or blows from the back of trucks transporting it around the place. There's plenty of self-sown canola along the roadside. The nutritional value of these introduced seeds would be much higher than the native grasses that these birds evolved upon. Then I saw the insect eaters. Insects eat seeds, so would their populations in the paddock have increased? Of course there is also those accursed mice which eat seeds and which are meat and drink to the raptor birds. So I wonder if, with higher quality food and more of it, these native birds are stronger and healthier and more numerous than their ancestral populations were.

Years ago, in relation to some other organised use of force to achieve a political gain, it was said that if you are the one using the force, it's patriotism, but if you were receiving the force, it was terrorism. And again, history is written by the victorious.

I wonder if the leadership of the two Arab "H" mobs were not the young firebrands of the 1960s, and have remained in power in their organisations in much the same way as many undemocratic leaders of organisations have. If that is so, these blokes are getting on in years. One wonders if they introduced any sort of succession planning since we all gotta die sometime and if those leaders did, who would take over the running of the organisation, which has a large body of younger persons to carry out the plans of the leaders. Will killing those old blokes cut the head off the Hydra and destroy it, as Hercules did to complete his second labour?

It's funny - odd - but I have lost interest in chocolate as used in confectionery. I still like my evening desert of a chocolate muffin, ice cream and chocolate sauce, but as for buying a block of chocolate or chocolate coated biscuits - not interested, In fact I was looking at the chocolates on special in the supermarket today and there wa not the slightest spark of interest. It's not that I've gone all health nutty. They say that the desire for chocolate is related to one's emotions. Stress can drive the desire for it. Well, since the stress of my wife's illness has, unfortunately, passed and I moved to where I am, I think my emotional status has calmed markedly. I don't need whatever the "feel good" chemical is in chocolate anymore. So, even looking at blocks of chocolate reduced in price doesn't move me anymore.

Remember when you were a kid and your birthday was coming up? You made sure your parents knew what you had your heart set on Then there was the emotional tenseness of waiting for your birthday to arrive. When it did, and you were given your gift, you could tell by the size of the package that it must contained the very thing that you wished for. Tearing open the package your heart skipped a beat as what you would have sold your soul for emerged from the gayley coloured paper. Its was much the same for me today as I carefully pulled off the masking tape I had applied to the walls for the boot room to make the delineation between the colour of the walls and the faux cornice I painted. The edge of of the tape had sealed securely so that there was no seepage of white paint onto the colour of the walls. I had a nice, crisp line that needed no touching up. I'm one very happy Vegemite.

Not named. It's a nice solid bit of gear. I've just spent some time filing the casting seam excess from the spine of the handle. I am going to polish it to ee if I can get a chromed-like finish. To bad my nickel plating stuff is packed away, or I would plate it.

Isn't it against international law for aircraft to enter another country's airspace without approval? Makes it worse when the aircraft involved are fully armed military aircraft. And sure, you can look at the boot on the other foot, but the Israelis possess weapons to take down drones and rockets. Lebanon and the Palestinians don't. And they don't have similar military aircraft. In the absence of advanced fighter aircraft, the Lebanese air force currently relies on a helicopter force, a squadron of Embraer EMB 314 Super Tucano, and three Cessna AC 208s for the reconnaissance and ground attack roles.

I know it is the World we live in now, but I am heartily sick of turning on the news and all I hear is that Israel is blowing up Arab cities; Russian and Ukraine are doing the same to each other, and some woman has died in a domestic violence incident. A mob of people got drowned in flooding in some country. The Mayor of New York City has been caught with his hand in the till. Trump claims to be the protector of women. The death and destruction news is so depressing that this morning hearing that the Swans were thrashed by 60 points was almost a boost to the spirit, despite the fact that I would have preferred the result to be the other way around.

Will you take a look at where they were made and tell us?

I reckon it would be a great idea. We could get Ian to move Jerry's, Litespeed's, the jet boat one, and mine to it so we don't have to go searching other topics to find the one we want. Also, we would not need to restrict it to building renovations. I bought this old adjustable wrench from the Men's Shed have started to restore it. That would be a way to show the techniques involved.

I heard that the bloke who was instrumental in creating the game grew up on the land. The local Aborigines played a kick and chase game using a "ball" made from animal pelts. The thing was that the Aborigines' game had no scoring system. They just enjoyed the activity. The bloke adopted the kick and chase pat and added a scoring system to make such an activity acceptable to the European culture wich requires a victor.

Christ! Misread that the first time.