Old Koreelah

Those measures would work okey if everyone was about the same size. My cubit is quite a bit longer than most.

The dynamics of bird populations on our block are too complex for my feeble brain. Sometimes we see families of finches for weeks, then it might be wrens. A gang of currawongs arrive and you never see the little fellas. Same with magpies and members of the butcherbird/ kingfisher family. A few years ago it was said that a billion birds were displaced by the bushfires. They all came to our place. Our trees were loaded with strange new species fighting for territory and nesting space. A couple of times the aerial disputes got so violent that birds I’d never met took refuge near me. (That reminds me that I once had a black wallaroo blunder right past where I was working and retreat to a corner outside my shed to face the trio of dogs that had been chasing him. He must have known he’d be safer near me.)

We hear so much about the plight of renters, but the media never shows us the mess they left at their last place. Quite a few government housing tennants deserve to be tossed out, but use their kids as human shields.

I’ve seen similar congestion at Sydney airport and carried my bags up the stairs, overtaking lots of younger people standing on the mechanical monster- and getting a good heart/lung workout for free.

From the breakfast table we watch lots of species queueing up for our birdbath (if only we humans could show members of our own species such consideration and good manners). King Parrots, Green Parrots are tame as, and make lovely sounds.

With such handicaps, how in hell did the Brits ever have the Industrial Revolution?

Like the fish that doesn’t know about the water it’s surrounded by, some of us barely notice our wildlife until it isn’t there any more. I credit a niece with opening my ears to the beauty of Australia’s singing magpies. She had been living in London for over a year when she opened the video I made about my aircraft carrier. She cried with homesickness at the sounds of magpies happily warbling in the background. Magpies at the top of my list; horrible, screeching, destructive cockatoos at the bottom.

Which ones do you mean? Science is full of measurements that most of us will never use, but a decent education should at least expose us to their existance, just like we should know a bit about the world outside our little valley. When in high school I had no idea what a Mol was, nor a Candela, but at least I learned that there were whole fields of inquiry that required their use.

Two different stories illustrate the crucial role of parents in education: https://www.smh.com.au/lifestyle/life-and-relationships/why-are-teachers-struggling-because-your-children-are-awful-20230731-p5dsqn.html https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-07-25/tamworth-dolly-parton-imagination-library-730/102643392?utm_campaign=abc_news_web&utm_content=link&utm_medium=content_shared&utm_source=abc_news_web

We make the mistake of assuming the average American voter is reasonably educated. Sadly not. The level of ignorance is appalling and getting worse. Democracy is in real trouble.

Murdoch is already using AI to save on staff: https://journalismai.com/2023/07/31/news-corp-using-ai-to-produce-3000-australian-local-news-stories-a-week-the-guardian/

Voting there is optional. Many citizens have been conditioned to believe they can’t make any difference, so don’t even register. Many who want to vote are prevented by discriminatory laws, regulations, management decisions and blatant harassment. In Democrat-leaning areas, polling booths are few and far between. Expect to queue for hours. It is illegal to bring water to help those waiting. Laws have been framed to ensure a huge proportion of black males get incarcerated for minor crimes like smoking dope. If you’ve ever been to jail, no vote. Americans have been astonished at Australia’s recent change of government; how efficiently the election was run, how we all heard the result that night! And all with old-fashioned paper ballots!

…which is why Republican governments have been passing laws go make it hard for traditional Democrat supporters to vote. Blatant, obscene denial of democratic rights, but popular with the poor dumb whites who have been convinced that minorities are taking over their country.

Beyond evil.

Harry Truman is one of the best examples of that; promoted because of his outstanding ability, he found himself in the top job when FDR died. Nobody expected much from him, but he proved to be one of the best the US ever had. After handing over to Ike, he drove himself and his wife to his small hometown. Besides his small army pension from serving in WWI, he was broke. A grateful Congress created the first Presidential Pension and made sure it was also paid to Hoover, so Harry would not be embarassed.

It can only get worse, OME. Much of our best native forests were set aside for timber production and managed sustainably by people like my grandfather. Too much has now been converted to National Parks. It get votes for politicians, but cripples little timber towns. The sawn timber you now buy is likely to have come from a poor country which in not managing it’s forests sustainably.

Australia’s Gulf Country is similar in latitude and climate to Bangladesh, but with a tiny fraction it’s human population. Much of our inland is similar to heavily-populated farmland in Asia. That’s what they see, but they probably don’t realise how much our rainfall varies. Agreed. Even worse for us is the image we project of wealth and plentiful space.

In those at-risk countries are enough boats and ships to carry millions in our direction. It’s far too late to argue about the science. The court of world opinion is gonna be very hard on the Lucky Country. We’re seen as a rich, empty land and will be blamed for doing more than our share to cause this disaster.

This thread needs some good news; here’s one bloke who missed out being listed here:

Right now, some of Russia’s neighbouring countries are swamped with draft dodgers. Their welcome might be wearing thin. After this Special Military Operation is over, huge numbers of Russians are likely to go home. I doubt they’ll be too popular with those who stayed and especially those who fought. Hopefully, they’ll bring an overdue outside perspective to their country.

Let’s hope they put that plan into operation soon!