Cost of living

[onetrack]

There can be a problem with the appearance of pathogens in fruits and vegetables grown in untreated sewage.

 

So it's important that the sewage is properly treated with processes that kill off the pathogens, before the sewage is used as fertiliser.

 

I learnt this long ago, we never ate tomatoes that grew around the edges or banks of sewage ponds, even though they looked perfect.

 

https://inspectapedia.com/septic/Septic_Food_Contamination.php

[Old Koreelah]

On 26/6/2022 at 11:07 PM, onetrack said:

There can be a problem with the appearance of pathogens in fruits and vegetables grown in untreated sewage.

 

So it's important that the sewage is properly treated with processes that kill off the pathogens, before the sewage is used as fertiliser.

 

I learnt this long ago, we never ate tomatoes that grew around the edges or banks of sewage ponds, even though they looked perfect.

 

https://inspectapedia.com/septic/Septic_Food_Contamination.php

Useful. I have long considered our septic trench would be an ideal base for a small chook run or vege patch, but was concerned  that dangerous viruses, etc might make their way back into my food.

[nomadpete]

I'm out of my depth when it comes to using second hand sewerage.

 

However, I'm guessing that the bigger hazard comes from some bacterium that may have originated in the lower digestive tract. These are useful in their proper place, but cause major illness if introduced to the uper digestive tract. That is my guess. We need some microbiologist to chime in here with facts.

[facthunter]

Your good gut bugs displace the bad guys.  Powerful broad spectrum Antibiotics destroy the good bugs. When you try to restore  them with PRObiotics, the acids in the stomach ruin most of them. They have to be in capsules that last till through the stomach till they get where needed.  Nev

[Yenn]

The cleaner our living conditions and the more we try to clean up and kill pathogens, the less likely we are to succeed.

I have never tried to be ultra clean or avoid nasties and I have always had a very strong ability to fight off infection. My belief is that you need to encounter infectious pathogens to be able to build up an immunity.

[facthunter]

You won't sell that idea to many nurses in hospitals Did you go through the Polio Infection period I did. The latest strains of TB are virtually incurable. You don't need golden staph either. Nev

[Old Koreelah]

1 hour ago, Yenn said:

…My belief is that you need to encounter infectious pathogens to be able to build up an immunity.

Yenn I totally agree- like everything else, our immune system needs regular exercise…

 

54 minutes ago, facthunter said:

You won't sell that idea to many nurses in hospitals Did you go through the Polio Infection period I did. The latest strains of TB are virtually incurable. You don't need golden staph either. Nev

…but I also agree with Nev that some nasties are best avoided or combatted with outside help.

[onetrack]

There are many pathogens you certainly don't want to encounter. The ones carried by rats and fleas and other sewer-dwellers and rubbish-tip dwellers. I got gastro-enteritis in Vietnam from rats running through our cookhouse in our compound, and I spent 4 days in hospital, crook as a dog. It's not something I want to revisit.

The rats there were bloody awful, our swags were in sandbagged Armco culverting, and you'd wake up in the middle of the night, to find rats running over you.

The cook got properly reamed out by the CO for running a dirty kitchen, but I don't think he was very aware of the massive rat problem we had.

[spacesailor]

They burnt London to get rid of the rats & their fleas.AND

The plague was broken.

spacesailor

[facthunter]

Army cooks are a health problem. Ever seen one with good skin?  Nev

[Yenn]

The army I was in didn't have cooks. It had men who pilfered the rations to suit their own ends, except in one camp which was Ordinance Corps and for some reason the food was first class.

[onetrack]

We always had cooks, because we were Construction Engineers, and the Construction Engineers did all the construction work that an Army needs to have done.

We built huts and ablutions, plus any other building requirements projects, ran the quarries and crushers, constructed and repaired the roads, laid down hardstand where required, installed water points, windmills, and dams, cleared the Jungle to stop the VC and NVA from hiding in it, ran a readymix concrete operation, operated any plant and equipment that was needed, including some heavy transport equipment, and carried out civil works that was all part of the Govts Civil Affairs projects to help get the civilian population on side.

 

That sort of civil works included building civilian marketplace buildings, accommodation for the South Vietnamese troops, and generally helping out the locals with community improvement projects.

Whilst doing all this, we still carried arms, and we were regularly under attack from mortars, booby traps, mines and small-arms fire, just like the infantry.

Then we also had to do fairly constant picket (sentry) duty (2 hrs on, 4hrs off all night), and carry out infantry-type jobs such as standing patrols, where as an NCO, you took two other men, and set up a "listening post" in enemy territory after dark to ascertain any enemy movement.

About the only time we took Army ration packs, was when we were working in small groups well away from the base or compound. In bigger working groups we had our meals delivered by chopper in "hot boxes", that kept the food hot. This saved us a lot of time, and enabled us to keep doing our allocated jobs and operating machines.

 

The infantry have to carry everything with them, but they have time to cook ration pack meals over a hexamine stove. The worst part of being in the infantry in 'Nam, was they went on patrol for 3 weeks, and they got issued a new set of "greens" (clothing) on leaving base - but they never showered in that 3 weeks of patrolling (just a quick "ABC" wash - armpits, bum and crotch) - and when they returned to base, the greens were thrown out! They were nearly rotten by then, anyway.

[Jerry_Atrick]

When I was in the cadets at school, we went to. I guess it was Pucka for a camp (couple of weeks).. This was in about 1978 and I recall the date on the tinned potatoes was something like 1946. They tasted better than a lot of tinned stuff today.

 

But... I rarely eat potatoes now (well, except for chips).

Edited June 29, 2022 by Jerry_Atrick

[Jerry_Atrick]

Back to the cost of living... My sis-in-law and niece visited for a couple of days, from Aus (they are here for a few weeks, but roaming the country). When they told me how much their flights were, I almost had pick myself up off the floor..  Something like $6K each economy.,.. I just looked up flights at the beginning of our holdiay season, and they are c. £2K, ($3600).

 

But, QANTAS came in at £2800, and Signapore (normally my favourite) came in at a whopping £6K... Let's hope the oil prices drop soon-ish

 

[facthunter]

Hope it's not a Sign a more price hikes, Nev

[old man emu]

It seems that air fares FROM Europe are always cheaper than airfares TO Europe.. Maybe its becasue going to Europe is uphill all the way and the plane uses more fuel.

[nomadpete]

You are onto something OME. It always takes us a quarter of an hour longer to fly from Hobart to Brisbane than it does from Brisbane to Hobart, which is obviously downhill.

[facthunter]

Yes you have to push the stick forward to not drop off into space..  Nev

[old man emu]

18 hours ago, facthunter said:

Yes you have to push the stick forward to not drop off into space..  Nev

Is that the modern take on the Medieval sailor's warning that you have to turn the rudder to stop the ship going over the edge of the World?

[willedoo]

On 29/06/2022 at 9:48 PM, onetrack said:

The infantry have to carry everything with them, but they have time to cook ration pack meals over a hexamine stove. The worst part of being in the infantry in 'Nam, was they went on patrol for 3 weeks, and they got issued a new set of "greens" (clothing) on leaving base - but they never showered in that 3 weeks of patrolling (just a quick "ABC" wash - armpits, bum and crotch) - and when they returned to base, the greens were thrown out! They were nearly rotten by then, anyway.

My father was in the 2/9th. AIF Battalion, part of 18 Brigade, 7th. Division AIF, when they were in the Balikpapan area. After the initial landings, they were operating on the western side of Balikpapan Bay, doing enemy clearance in jungle and river areas. He had often told me about the blokes who suffered badly from heat rashes from the humidity. He said they were red raw from the armpits to halfway down the rib cage and also extensively in the groin region. Some could barely walk and had to be sent back to the field hospital.

 

My dad almost met his end there having a splash bath. The company was camped on a rise and the men used to go down to a native well to wash in groups of three at a time. They stripped of and started to have a bogey when they heard a couple of rifle shots ring out from up at the camp. When they got back to the camp, they found out a couple of Japanese armed with bayonets were spotted sneaking out of the scrub toward them. The rifle shots scared them off, but my dad and his two mates were blissfully unaware the enemy were right behind them and about to stick them in the ribs.

[red750]

[pmccarthy]

Labor's emissions reduction plan has been estimated to cost $300b in new infrastructure. The interest bill on this will increase the unit cost of electricity forever. So much for cheap renewables.

[old man emu]

42 minutes ago, pmccarthy said:

Labor's emissions reduction plan has been estimated to cost $300b in new infrastructure. The interest bill on this will increase the unit cost of electricity forever. So much for cheap renewables.

But the Labor Government doesn't own the electricity system. The LNP sold it all off to their backers. So you can't blame Labor for Conservatives' price gouging.

[onetrack]

The W.A. Govt still owns all virtually all the electricity network in W.A. - and has no intention of ever selling it off. A plan has been produced to build offshore wind turbines in W.A., located a few kilometres offshore.

While I understand that the winds there are nearly constant, and can provide plenty of energy, I can see some potential opposition to the "visual pollution" of wind turbines and associated works located in the sea, that will be highly visible from the coast - where many wealthy and opinionated people choose to build their expensive, coastal, million dollar homes. 

 

What amazes me is the period that was allowed for public discussion was a mere 10 business days back in March. I'll wager a lot of potentially affected people didn't even know about the planned development - let alone the short submissions period. Then there's the angle that a recent Danish start-up is going to be given the contract. Surely we can build this kind of stuff in Australia?

 

https://reneweconomy.com.au/plans-unveiled-for-australias-biggest-offshore-wind-project-by-danish-company/

 

My personal view is that pumped hydro energy, utilising a number of the thousands of huge, abandoned, open pit mines that are now scattered across the Goldfields and Pilbara regions of W.A. would provide a better option for power generation than endless numbers of wind turbines.

The potential solar power available in the Eastern and Northern interior of W.A. is huge - use the solar power to pump the water up to the of of the reservoir during the day, then let it run turbines during the night as it runs back to the bottom of the pit - which is when the power is needed.

 

In addition, these interior locations provide power transmission balance to a generating network that is currently unbalanced, by generating nearly all its power at Western coastal locations, and having to transmit that power over enormous distances inland, thus needing multiple transformer setups, and costly HV transmission lines.

 

Edited August 6, 2022 by onetrack

[facthunter]

France has run out of water and people still worry about  the "LOOK" of wind farms and powerlines??  Nev