onetrack

We went to the Guggenheim Museum and a "famed" artist was putting on a display of his "art". He was regularly firing big cans of red paint at a white wall with a homemade cannon. Of course, the dribbles and runs of paint down the wall, were his "artistic expression". What a load of crap. And art idiots fawn over this kind of stuff. The fact that they pay huge money for this stuff, shows too much money is in the wrong hands.

Gee, "You Can't See Around Corners" brings back some memories of the 1960's. I wasn't aware the story was originally written by Jon Cleary in 1948. The plot was based on a WW2 deserter, and the storyline was later modified in the 1967 TV series and the 1969 film, for the "hero" to be a Vietnam War deserter. Cleary had a tough life, and I didn't know his father was jailed for 6 mths in 1928 for stealing £5 from his employers (bakers) money bag to feed his starving family. They were tough times.

Can we send both Elon and Donald to Mars, on the first of Elons spacecraft to the planet? That's the best way of saving this planet from their destructive, self-serving rampages.

The bloke with the damaged MG ZS looks like a real "backyarder", I'd be investigating his business "model" and be very wary of buying anything from him. https://www.gumtree.com.au/s-ad/regents-park/auto-body-parts/2021-mg-zs-ev-electric-car-/1327744196

I don't reckon that's a photo of an Australian Raven, our Ravens have white irises.

I was hoping the COVID parties had cleaned out the gene pool, but obviously they missed some. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/jul/13/30-year-old-dies-covid-party-texas

But just look at the number of elbows they saved, doing it this way!

Kerry Stokes and his son Ryan run Channel 7.

The richest people in America all bought this election result. Musk spent $118M of his own money to ensure Trump got elected. We don't have any idea, how much all the other billionaires spent on getting Trump elected. Let's just watch the "rewards" handed out to the rich, now - major tax reductions for high earners, and Govt handouts to their companies, and highly profitable Govt contracts awarded to them as well.

I've owned a grand total of 52 Holden utes, and bought almost all of them new, between 1965 and 1985. They were a great workhorse, cheap and reliable. I drove all of them, but employees also drove a lot of them. The best ute I ever bought was a new HJ Holden Sandman ute. It was bright yellow with black stripes. GMH only built 380 Sandman utes, but they built thousands of Sandman panel vans. Sad to say, I wore it out, and ended up using it as a bush-bashing, roo-shooting ute! - then it ended up on the local rubbish tip, when I sold the farm in 1995, and the new owner wanted all the "farm rubbish" removed! Not surprisingly, someone grabbed the wreck within hours - the VIN plate alone is probably worth more than I originally paid for the ute, new!

Breakfast, because it ends in FAST.

I must say the vast majority of the officers in the Australian Army were good, and competent. But as always, there were a few who were just a PIA, and up themselves, and incompetent with it. There were several incidents where infantry troops became enraged at officer incompetence, and poor treatment of other ranks, and this resulted in none-too-subtle warnings such as a grenade rolled into their tent. In those cases, the officer was normally shipped out pretty rapidly, and replaced. Australia has few Generals because our military forces are few in number. In fact, senior officer positions are very limited and anyone wanting to further their career usually leaves the military for a position in civilian life. Engineering skills are in demand in civvy street, and I know more than one Vietnam veteran RAE officer who made a successful transition to civil engineering. John Tick is one such individual, he runs an engineering consultancy business here in Perth. He was formerly Capt John Tick in Vietnam, and CO of 2 Troop, I Field Sqdn, RAE. He's taken a leading management position in MIVAC, Mine Victims and Clearance, a very worthy non-profit organisation that cleans up residual mines in Vietnam and Laos, and which assists mine victims and communities affected by the huge number of residual mines in the region. https://www.aprodem.com.au/home.html https://www.awm.gov.au/collection/C1159948 https://www.mivac.org.au/2012/10/john-salter-and-john-tick-visited-ban-xai/ https://www.mivac.org.au/about-mivac/

Of course, when you're worth $300B (and increasing), and have the ability to buy any home you like, it must feel good to develop homes for those you've shafted to gain your wealth. I'm talking about PayPal fees, just for starters.

I can see where armed groups of MAGA supporters will try to enforce the removal of illegal aliens, on the basis that they're "patriotic Americans" - which could result in bloodshed if the aliens fight back. Just the term "patriotic American" is enough to produce a visual image of an armed MAGA adherent spouting hatred and divisiveness. I wonder how long before all the Jan 6 rioters are released from jail? That was a Trump promise that he really can carry out. Some of his other promises are just in his imagination.

The bottom line is that corruption is endemic in every society and only those countries with laws to try and control it make any attempt to rein it in. However, despite all the laws we have as regards secret commissions and corruption, every day brings up another story of someone in a position of power who has been discovered to be corrupt. The anti-corruption laws only drive corruption underground. But only a small number are discovered, because the other parties involved in the corruption - the facilitators - are not going to squeal, because they know they'll face penalties as well as the corrupt person they've been paying off. Corruption can range from petty demands for payment for "assistance" right through to public servants fabricating invoicing, and determining the awarding of jobs, right through to politicians taking secret payments from lobbyists to ensure important decisions go the lobbyists way.

Interestingly, the U.S. military found that using "comic-book" style instruction was a very important educational tool during WW2. This style of education seems to have taken a back seat to more intensive text-based education in many areas since the end of WW2. However, I'm always amused by the number of Americans who claim to have a "college education" or even a degree, but they lack the ability to spell properly, and they're "just plain dumb", in many other areas of knowledge. I've always believed the University of Life and Hard Knocks is your best educator.

After being in business for many years and dealing with many clients, business partners and associates, and employing (and also training) a lot of people, I can only say that every person has a peculiar and individual set of skills pertaining to "intelligence". Some people are fast learners, some are slow learners, but they often end up better at their job. People take in instruction and teaching in different ways. Some are good at graphics, some are good at written communication. Some people need things explained to them in different ways, so they can grasp the principles. I can remember learning a huge amount as youngster simply by watching, and I think many others do, as well. I struggle with deep, abstract ideas, and written teachings. I'm slow to pick up on them. But in my military training, when I did the (standard for the time) military testing to determine aptitude, problem-solving abilities, and general intelligence, I was marked as "highly intelligent, suitable for highly skilled training". Of course, as a "Nasho", I never got anything like a recommendation for a Commission, because very few Nashos got Commissions, and the primary requirement for Officer training was being in possession of Tertiary qualifications, which I never acquired, because I left school at 16 to go into business for myself. I would imagine that Officer training was very useful, as all the blokes I knew who went through Officer training, ended up in major positions.

I was a little surprised to see that PhotoScape is designed for all the earlier, and now essentially obsolete, MS Operating Systems - such as Windows NT/2000/XP/Vista/7/8. They have a version for Windows 10, called PhotoScape X, but no mention of Windows 11. As MS essentially now only supports W11, I'm surprised that the PhotoScape programme only caters to obsolete MS Operating Systems.

The Dems should be appalled at the level of voter support they lost and they need to go back to square one and figure out why they lost so badly. Kamala would never make a leader or stateswoman, and I stated that from Day One. Obviously inflation and the cost of living has hit a lot of Americans badly - but it won't get better under Trump, it can only get worse as he brings in a huge level of tariffs, and ring-fences the U.S. from the rest of the world.

Meanwhile, cryptocurrencies will boom under Trump, and the Wall-building construction companies will be clinking the champagne glasses.

They're all just crossing their fingers, and hoping it all goes to plan!

The safety levels of vehicles today is so far in front of the 1970's vehicles, it's not funny. In the old days, we had crap crossply tyres, drum brakes, no airbags, no crumple zones, and metal projections in the cabin everywhere. But the old vehicles still went fast - and the roads were narrow and twisty. In those days, you could repair anything and put it back on the road. A mate is restoring an FJ Holden sedan - it was written off 3 times in the 50's, 60's and 70's, and rebuilt each time! The amount of body filler in the car is amazing! And the body is twisted out of shape, no-one ever checked it for twist of alignment ( and yes, the manufacturers had data that you could refer to for twist, and diagonal measurements, and all sorts of reference points - but many smash repair shops ignored them). Today, cars are made of high tensile steel and it's thinner than ever, and if it's torn, and a "structural component", it cannot be repaired - both legally and physically. The metal is too thin to weld or braze, and heating via welding ruins the heat treatment of the metal. With todays high-technology in cars, even immersing in as little as 150mm of water over the floor means the vehicle is a statutory write-off - because many electrical components associated with safety devices are mounted in footwells or under seats, and once they're immersed in floodwater, they can stop working, or only work intermittently.

When I used to canvas around the farms for contract earthmoving work in the Wheatbelt of W.A., and a woman answered the door, in my youthful brashness, I always asked for the boss! More than one I got told, "You're speaking to her!" 😄

E. The letters are the first letter of the words for consecutive numbers, starting from one.

Trump won? This must be the biggest Trumped-up election ever held!! 😄 Isn't it interesting how Joe Biden conceded the loss? A gracious outgoing speech, and an orderly handover in the transition. No screaming and ranting about fraud, illegal voters, stacked ballot boxes or even any attempt to rally backers to stop the handover in a violent fashion. That'll come with the next Presidential election, no doubt. https://thenightly.com.au/politics/us-politics/us-election-president-joe-biden-calls-for-unity-after-ramrod-vice-president-kamala-harris-loses-election-c-16677592 I guess winners here are the wall builders, I bet they're lining up to get a piece of the action making America into one huge gated community - because they're all terrified of the invaders at the border. Fear and loathing were the winners in this election. Imagine what's going to happen to the DOJ, it will be gutted, and Trump appointees will take their place, to hunt down all those criminal Democrats. No doubt Ivan Raiklin, the scariest murderous criminal I've ever seen, will be appointed to run the DOJ. He has a list of 300 Democrats he's going to jail and execute. Calls himslef the Secretary of Retribution. He's another Timothy McVeigh, the Oklahoma bomber, in a sheep costume. How this threatening criminal thug Raiklin, ever got to be an Intelligence Lt Col in the military, and a lawyer, is a mystery to me. Meantimes, every Jan 6 criminal now in jail will be pardoned and released, and probably given special medals, because they're actually wrongfully-jailed heroes!