onetrack

That reminds me of the old joke. An old bull and young bull were by themselves in a paddock, and in the distance was a fairly large hill. The young bull said to the old bull. "Do you know what's on the other side of that hill? "Nope, never been up there", came the reply. "Well, let's go and find out!" said the youngster. So they tramped up this long sloping hill, and as they crested it, a paddock full of heifers came in view. Hundreds of them. "Gee, would ya look at that!!", exclaimed the youngster. "Let's run down there, and f*** a few of them!! "Nope", said the old bull. "Let's walk down there, and f*** the lot!!"

Yeah, I'd really like to see my own death certificate, so I can take steps to avoid the problem that caused my demise.

Hi Ric, it appears the Australian Venue Co do a pretty good job of making sure their venues keep up an acceptable standard of food and drinks. As with all businesses though, there is a variation between venues, with the venues that have had recent upgrades seeming to provide better service and food and drinks. However, even these vary, as it all comes back to the staff employed, and the staff turnover is pretty high in many of these places as a lot of workers in the hospitality industry are relatively transient, and often see the job as a "fill-in" to something better. We found that when nearly all the backpackers disappeared during COVID, the service levels for food and drink venues fell right away for around 3 years, and even staffing levels went down, as it was obvious employees became harder to find. Since the pandemic has been declared over though, it seems things are returning to normal, and the backpackers (who make up a lot of the hospitality staff) are starting to return - resulting in an improvement in service and staff levels.

Paul Keating wasn't in any political power position in 1981, although he was an elected Labor Party politician at that date. He didn't become Treasurer in the Hawke Govt until March 1983. I doubt whether Keating had any control over interest rates in the world-wide major recession that occurred from 1980 to 1983. The reason for that recession was the massive, nearly four-fold increase in global oil prices that started with a reduction in Iran's oil output in 1979. The massive increase in fuel prices led to world-wide high inflation, and official interest rates were increased to try and control the runaway inflation. That period was a terrible economic period for most people, and most businesses. As to the "recession we had to have", that was Keatings famous saying in response to the mild recession we endured in 1993-1994, as a result of inflation and major current account deficits. He simply remarked it was something that had to happen, due to multiple global factors.

This is the Wikipedia photo of Michael Landon, taken in Sept 1990, just 10 mths before he died.

I love the way Trump didn't even know there was a Federal election being held in Australia. I bet he knows what golf tournaments were on here, though.

It's not Michael Brandon or Michael Landon, it's an internet con photo. Michael Landon died aged 54 from pancreatic cancer, he never became an old man. 90% of internet "truth" is pure BS, produced by scammers.

GON seems to relish harbouring and feeding longstanding bitterness and grudges, turning them into his sole reason for living. A wise old Auntie told me once - "As you age, you can Better, or get Bitter". GON is obviously a bitter old man, concentrating all his energies into pursuing grudges and hatreds, and I'll wager he lives alone and has few friends. What a sad case he is. He also has a very selective memory. He seems to forget that official inflation rocketed to 17% under the "leadership" of Gough Whitlam. It was a terrible time, the mid-1970's, as everyone kept raising prices as fast as you could blink. I can recall a meal were having with a business associate, and he remarked, just looking at the condiments and food items on the table, as to how much they had inflated in price in such a short time. A new, basic Holden Belmont sedan cost just over $2000 in 1972. By 1977 the cost of that sedan had gone to $3,200 - an increase of 60% in just 5 years.

The W.A. Govt clamped down on wood fires over 20 years ago. Not a ban as such, just regular encouragement to get rid of them. Unsurprisingly, there are still plenty of houses in the Darling Range and the S.W. of W.A. still using wood for heating and hot water. You can tell where these areas are on cold still mornings, the choking wood fire smoke hangs around in the valleys for hours, making them quite unpleasant to drive through. We have electric RC A/Cons, best thing since sliced bread, we got rid of the previous oil heater in 2005. The oil heater was installed in the original (wood) fireplace by the previous owner, so that was a long time ago, we've been in this house for 35 years in early June.

13°C to 22°C here today, quite cloudy, with the odd light shower. It's fining up though, with 15° - 31° and 15° - 30°, and sunny, forecast for Thursday and Friday. We had a very small amount of rain on Saturday, but nothing more in sight for a week or more.

He got all the power without any knowledge - just rat-cunning and deviousness.

I'm chuckling over some of the election comments. Jacob Greber's quote (ABC), re the shocking Liberal loss - "It's like one of those gory horror movies, where half the headline cast gets decapitated before the first act is over..."

The part of this election that gives me huge satisfaction is seeing Clive Palmer get his Trumpet shoved up his arse, and seeing him spend $60M for nothing - and sighting a major collapse in his share of the vote, from a former 4.1% to just 1.8%. That, despite his party promising a 15% tax on iron ore exports to help reduce the national debt. Just goes to show, how voters don't trust a word he says. https://www.abc.net.au/news/elections/federal/2025/results/party-totals

I stand by what I said previously - Labor will win, and any swing to the Conservatives, will be minimal at best. As with the W.A. election, the Greens and Independents will pick up the swing that would have gone to the Conservatives in previous decades. The Liberals need to take a long hard look at themselves, with their Trump alignment, stepping back into fossil fuels, clamping down on migration, and generally wishing for a return to the 1950's, where White Anglo-Saxons ruled, and women knew their place - in the kitchen. We live in the 2020's and things have changed in a big way - and we won't be going back to manufacturing in Australia any time soon, either.

I lived in Casula for 9 mths during 1970, I didn't think the climate there, was all that bad. Maybe 1970 was a very pleasant year.

There's been more than a few crooked, corrupt and downright evil popes. Perhaps he's getting ready to align himself with Pope Urban VI (1378–1389), who tortured Cardinals who had conspired against him.

When I first started in earthmoving, I knew a rough, tough and crusty old WW2 Veteran, who was a local Shire Council Foreman - and his version, which possibly predated WW2, was the message to any girl - "Do you believe in the hereafter? Because if I don't get what I'm here after, you'll still be here after I'm gone!"

Turning yourself into shark shit is another favourite way of departing this planet.

There's an interesting article in the link below, that explains precisely why manufacturing of everything on a large scale in the U.S., to try and beat China, is never, ever going to happen. A big part of the problem is that a huge percentage of Americans want manufacturing returned to the U.S. - but only 25% of Americans would choose to work in a factory job. https://www.inc.com/jessica-stillman/steve-jobs-quote-on-american-manufacturing-still-applies-today/91181530

I'm looking forward to placing Clive Palmer last.

Spacey, forget about acquiring a Storch for a low price, Slatterys are as devious as all the other auctioneers, they fail to advise the item has a reserved price, and they will keep auctioning it month after month, until they get what they want for it. Either that, or they will flush out the bidders and then call them, and try to get them to pay the reserve price.

Oh, but it gets better! The would-be chopper pilot suffered from Parkinsons disease, and senile dementia - and he'd previously had a stroke! Plus, he was taking a range of medications, some of which were listed as "Do Not Fly" medications! When he purchased the Robinson (as an "investment") in 2016, he apparently quizzed an instructor if he could teach himself to fly it! The instructor related how he strenuously insisted that the Robinson purchaser get proper chopper pilot training. https://www.globalair.com/articles/ntsb-93-year-old-non-certificated-pilot-likely-conducting-ground-run-when-r22-became-airborne-crashed?id=8922

We've been having discussions with a number of local youngsters, and how they're going to vote. The word is, that young voters are going have a major impact on this election. Hardly without much variation, every one of the youngsters we spoke to, expressed great concern about the altering climate, increased pollution, and general environmental destruction - and they nearly all said they were going to vote Green or Labor. I think the Federal Conservatives are going to get a shock when their much-vaunted swing to them, turns out exactly the same as the recent W.A. election - a slight swing to the Conservative parties, but not enough to make a measurable dent in Labors hold on Government. https://www.9news.com.au/national/federal-election-2025-yougov-poll-predicts-labor-majority-coalition-losing-seats/5a0ccacb-f753-4c5e-bd01-de9243d495c8

It looks like the apartment owners have a good case for a class action, under misleading and deceptive conduct under Consumer Law. It seems obvious people have signed documentation without the ramifications of the contract being explained to them, in clear and unambiguous terms.

I can recall reading a local story from early WW2 when some pilots in an RAAF fighter or bomber flew at extremely low level over a farmers horse team working a paddock. The horses went berserk and took off in all directions, the threw the farmer off his seeding rig, and damaged his horse handling equipment. He was outraged, and contacted the military authorities to complain, but not surprisingly, the offenders "couldn't be identified". It was Wartime, after all. The poor old farmer got no satisfaction, and no compensation, but the aircraft crew probably thought it was all great fun.