Old Koreelah

Every culture develops in different directions, to meet their immediate needs. It doesn’t surprise me that the harsh Scottish environment produced whisky and a host of inventors. China and then Europe became more technologically advanced than others, but those societies couldn’t match the spiritual or cultural depth of people like our own Aboriginals.

Delve deeper into colonial history and you find White fellas- from all parts of Europe- behaving quite badly. We could argue till the cows come home about which European nationality committed the worst atrocities. It's become politically correct to overlook the often horrendous barbarism of other races when they occupied new lands.

Although her term was brief, Maxine earned her place in history for unseating one of our most intolerable PMs.

Given the cost of getting anything into orbit, I think they’re crazy to even consider dumping the ISS into the Pacific graveyard. What’s wrong with refurbishing it section by section and re-using the materials? Now there’s a challenge as big as Kennedy’s Moon Shot.

A whole other topic to delve into; what makes a great partnership? My motorcycling mates from student days all stayed with the one they first married. I suspect a wild youth is good foundations for a stable life.

Even in his old age, my dad had amazing hearing. One still night he said "hear that? A truck just started up the hill out of Killarney". Minutes later he reported that it had turned south at Legume. Another quarter hour and I finally heard it as it approached.

Jerry your approach to selecting a retirement location reminds me of how some modern people find a mate: heavy on logic. Following checklists, priorities and predetermined prejudices might work out fine, but if you just tour around with an open mind, you might stumble on your little Eden.

Don’t spoil the story with facts. I feel sure those mysterious columns are made of a metal unknown on Earth and emit an etherial hum...

Decades ago I went to an exhibition of Russian Paintings (in Sydney, from memory). One canvass spoke to me so profoundly I was moved to tears. It shows a poor peasant, hat in hand with his young son close by, at the door of a grand house. Haven’t been able to find it since, but it was entitled “Going for the Medicine”.

One of the secrets of Britain’s endurance has been allowing the pressure cooker of dissatisfaction to vent. Across the Channel, the French are currently in their 5th Republic and the pressure is rising...

Retire? Why? Being near the most important people in your life is high on my list of priorities- but not too near. Having access to wide open spaces, some bush and hills to walk in or fly over. The coast is nice to visit, with lots to see and do, but I wouldn’t want to live there; it’s rapidly filling up with refugees from the Big Smoke. Each time I visit, another pleasant rural valley has been converted into yet another Human Feedlot. Land is poisonously expensive, some of it in danger from big storms and rising seas. West of the range we have much more room; almost any budget can afford a block large enough for some trees, chooks, maybe a horse or two. Compared to the coast, we do get much bigger temperature variations, but that just makes life more interesting. Heat waves rarely lasts more than a week and the inevitable cooler change is enjoyed like the breaking of a drought. Thru summer we put aside fallen branches for winter firewood. The larger ones we push together to make a bigger bonfire than the neighbour’s. Half our Aero Club members have their own strip. We enjoy far better flying weather; sometimes we go weeks without cloud or big wind. It’s also much safer to fly west of the divide, with less Yowie country to cross and open paddocks if the engine (or bladder) dictate a stop.

OME that might have been the same winter I rode my Ducati home from the Alpine Rally thru that area, at about the same time of night. The fog condensed onto my fairing, screen and helmet until the ice was too thick to open my visor. Must have been mad.

Most predictions underestimate the speed of societal and technological change. In that movie it takes 500 years to run down our society. I suspect Murdoch, Trump and others are well on the way after a decade.

Are there any parallels to the blind loyalty of Trump’s rusted-on supporters? They remind me of British motorcycle fans reacting to Japanese machines swamping the market in the 60s and 70s. We threw all sorts of criticisms against these new Jab bikes: poor quality metals, unreliable, crappy handling... We found it easy to overlook the atrocious brakes, electrics, oil leaks and quality control of our cherished Beezas and Triumphs. As Jap bikes rapidly improved, we die-hard supporters of Brit bikes shifted our positions, quietly abandoning one foreciously-defended line-in-the-sand after another. Some of us migrated to other European brands. Some completely lost their way and adopted American heavy metal. Others weakened and rode the shiny new, ultra-reliable types (but always waxed lyrical about great British marques). Let’s hope Trump’s “deplorables” put their guns away and find some way to adapt.

Taiwan and Vietnam have both apparently been very successful. https://www.devex.com/news/behind-vietnam-s-covid-19-success-story-98257