onetrack

We've plenty of those drivers from that land, here already, unfortunately.

It's the older Johnny Young!

Yes, Bluescope were the crowd that produced unpainted and painted thickness specs as they were pissed off at imports undercutting them with thinner metal and thicker paint.

And at the end of the day - English stands out as the primary language of Science, Technology, Engineering and Construction. Many specific terms in these fields are English terms only, and have been specifically formed in English. If you can't read or speak or understand English, you'll struggle to reach any recognised level in the aforementioned fields. A friend of a niece in the U.K. was Italian and she would do translation work for technical manuals, such as converting Rolls Royce manuals into Italian. She would often run into problems translating specific technical English terms for some parts into Italian, as there was no equivalent term in Italian.

Australia has imported 8.15M immigrants since the year 2000. There's the major part of the housing problem - letting in more people than we have housing for them. Most boomers would be paying cash for properties because they've just sold their home or their investment property. I don't know that the "cash payment from overseas buyer" is a major problem, but I would expect it is a problem that needs examination. The black market from drugs, bribery, corruption, OMCG's, and general criminality could be up to $100B annually. There are moves to beef up AUSTRAC reporting requirements, to include real estate agents and accountants having to report cash transactions over $10,000. Our current "dirty money" laws are weak, and moves to strengthen them have always been stalled by the LNP. https://www.afr.com/politics/federal/money-laundering-rules-could-be-expanded-to-property-tax-and-law-20230420-p5d1zf

It's getting pretty bad when the paint coating thickness is nearly on a par with the metal thickness! Now they even give you coated and uncoated thickness specifications!

I dunno - have you seen the price of NEW colorbond sheeting?? And it's about as thick as tissue paper, too! That old CGI, you can rest each end on concrete blocks, and stand on the unsupported middle section, and it won't even bend!! You could slap a coat of Metalfix on that rusted section, and the old sheeting would still outlast the new stuff! New colorbond is only good for 20 years today,and they won't even guarantee it if you live near the coast!!

I was surprised to find that Romanian is a language closely related to Italian. I find them all hard to learn.

The Russians are crowing about taking out 2 Ukrainian Patriot missile launchers a couple of days ago, with Iskander missiles. Ukraine cannot afford this kind of loss, the Patriots are $400M apiece and it's virtually impossible to replace them in a short time frame. Add in the fact that the Republicans in the U.S. are blocking more support for Ukraine, and things just got a whole lot harder for the Ukrainians. https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidaxe/2024/03/09/a-russian-drone-spotted-a-ukrainian-patriot-air-defense-crew-convoying-near-the-front-line-soon-a-russian-hypersonic-missile-streaked-down/

Yes, the number is 38.

The Russians are taking a leaf out of the Nazis playbook and converting free-fall bombs into glide bombs - almost like V1 or V2 bombs, except they don't have rocket motors. They aerial launch them from a long way back, and they do enormous damage to the Ukrainian assets and buildings, with their 1.5 tonne of explosives. The only disadvantage to the Russians is they're limited to fixed-position assets. Even so, they have done a lot of damage to the Ukrainians, and no doubt seriously upped the level of Ukrainian casualties. https://edition.cnn.com/2024/03/10/europe/russian-guided-bomb-ukraine-frontline-intl/index.html

Robert De Niro being interviewed on Bill Mahers "Real Time" show, dumps on Trump, with the best 4 minute description of Trump and his style, that I've seen in months. https://news.yahoo.com/robert-niro-labels-trump-total-152142299.html

Ian, that really is a terribly sad story and just shows how puerile and shallow the media can be. As the Police - well, I wouldn't like to be that officer, but they're trained to use firearms when it appears all else is failing. However, many of these young policemen and women lack life experiences and good judgement, and are told to act fast to defuse situations. I'm sure the copper who sighted the mother being stabbed was totally unaware of the entire story, and had to act on just what he/she could see in front of them at that moment. Tasers are not as effective as many think they are. I've seen a violent criminal out of his mind on drugs being tasered repeatedly and he just shrugged it off and kept climbing a high chain mesh fence.

The brothers FIL (Jim) worked as an assistant in a butcher shop in Pingelly, W.A., just after WW2. The butcher shop owner Fred, was known as a regular practical joker and wisecracker. One day, Jim told us, a brass ring that was part of the mincing machine fell out of the machine, and ended up in the batch of mince, and no-one noticed. What was even more amazing, one of the towns old biddies came into the shop, and bought a couple of pounds of mince - and the brass ring ended up in her mince purchase, and still no-one noticed! She got home and was unwrapping the mince when she came across the brass ring. She went back to the shop, and Fred was on the counter. The woman produced the brass ring and said to Fred, "Mr XXXX, I found this big piece of metal in my mince purchase!" Fred, quick as a flash, spun around and addressed Jim in the back of the shop, and yelled out, "JIM!! Didn't you take the collar off that dog, before you put him through the mincer!?" Jim reckoned the old biddy gasped in horror, spun around, and ran out of the shop, before Fred could even speak to her!!

Pies, the legendary home of "mystery meats".

I haven't eaten a cereal breakfast for decades, and I don't have a huge breakfast. Most cereals are at least 30% sugar, unless you're eating plain, raw oats. It is a "break-fast" after all, and you don't eat a huge meal straight after a fast. I have a piece of toast (sourdough or ciabatta) with butter only, or a crumpet with butter, and a cup of tea with milk and sugar, and that's it until morning tea time, when I have another cuppa, and a snack of some sort. I rarely drink coffee now, I find it makes me "edgy". Lunch is my main meal of the day now, evening meals are generally lighter. I find large and heavy meals at dinnertime makes for a disturbed sleep.

Obviously a cereal offender, when it comes to reading at the breakfast table, and ignoring a partner.

It's because they lead such busy immediate social lives, that you aren't part of, because you aren't immediate.

Property prices overall are right out of kilter against all other measurable and historical standards. I fear we will eventually have a property crash, but I have no idea when that might be. A former farmer client in the W.A. Wheatbelt, about 300kms SE of Perth, just sold the family farm that his father started in the 1930's. His Dad and Mum are long dead and the son must be in his late 70's. It's good wheat, canola, coarse grains and sheep country with a reliable 14" (355mm) annual rainfall and only a few droughts in the last 120 years since the area was developed. Around 20 years ago, I would've estimated the 7000 acres in his farm was worth around $2M. He just put it on the market for $21.2M (no offers), and it sold within a month, for his asking price.

OME, the only "hoisting" she was around was from the lecherous males she worked with, who constantly saw an attractive divorcee as "fair game", and they all wanted to hoist her skirt. SWMBO has a keen BS detector, and a "hidden aims" detector, that is always on high alert. She was always amazed at the approaches of the married men though, who were true Lotharios.

We do have the "For Sale by Owner", and "No Agent Property" groups here, but they're constantly under pressure from Real Estate groups, seeking to get rid of the websites and groups, claiming they're illegal, non-compliant with a raft of regulations, etc., etc. SWMBO is a former real estate agent, and she knows the ropes inside out. https://www.forsalebyowner.com.au/ https://www.noagentproperty.com.au/

I found an interesting YooToob video where a bloke who is obviously a Bible-basher, claims Trump is actually the Antichrist, as described in the Bible. Maybe he's right, his arguments are certainly interesting and thought-provoking. The scary part is knowing that Trump will almost certainly be the next U.S. President, simply because Biden is not up to it.

"Metres thick" for runway concrete is a bit of an exaggeration, Nev. Boeing state that 17-20 inches (432-508mm) is an adequate depth for runway and apron concrete thickness for their biggest jets. Once again, proper sub-base drainage and compaction of the sub-base is a major important factor - as well as the sub-base material selection.

The sub-base has to be properly compacted, that's why I said compacted material such as road base - gravel, limestone, or the local preference. The load stress on surfaces is shaped like a pyramid, as you go deeper into the base materials, the more the load stress fans out, and the less the pressure is, at depth. So the Rombus grid and concrete infill blocks are taking the maximum stress levels, but below the Rombus grid, the pressure is reducing, the more you go downwards.

The Ukrainians have had more success with another destroyed Russian patrol boat - the Sergey Kotov. They've released video of their V5 marine drones attack on it. The Sergey Kotov was only built in 2017, and was previously hit by a Ukrainian attack in Sept 2023. This time, the Ukrainians say they sank it. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_22160_patrol_ship https://kyivindependent.com/media-russias-sergey-kotov-patrol-vessel-hit-near-crimea/