The Waiting Man

Oh dear... it's enough to make you want to rent your home for the rest of your life & certainly never build yourself a new one - How to build half a house...

Imagine sinking all your money into your dream home & only getting half of it - actually literally!!



At least, back in the 1800s in outback mining towns, building a half-house was something you did on purpose, allowing you to add the rest of the place when you could afford it. Of course... some never could, or did


Taken during our road trip around our home State last year - when you couldn't go anywhere else!!

Some news... of the world

Have we been following the story of the container ship, longer than the Empire State Building, stuck diagonally in the Suez Canal? I have... & it's amazing. Not only that this is the first ship to get stuck in the Canal in its 150 year history, but also that the thing's so big it's going to take some impressive engineering & bloody huge machinery to get it free. The photos in the linked article of earth movers absolutely dwarfed by just the ship's bow are an exercise in perspective...

And... pointless as it may seem, here's an antipodean view of yet another mass shooting in the USA, written by an Australian journalist who lives over there. Apathy, hypocrisy, ignorance, selfishness, arrogance, fear, indifference... Inexplicable. Inexcusable...

I'm still holding off on my own, personal, year-in-review, as I won't believe it's over until the clock hits 12.01am just under 2 weeks from now. But the Sydney Morning Herald's Peter Hartcher has chanced his arm & opts for praising, with faint damns...

( 5 Australian Lessons From 2020 )

If the Great Pumpkin can be awarded a Nobel Peace Prize, then that's it... anyone can have one

Can I get one for mediating an argument between my Sister & Mother? At least I did that on my own, without a team of experienced diplomats, negotiators, advisors & a couple of useless relations contributing nothing useful from the sidelines...

Another deadly spider on the loose in Australia

This one's a Rock Spider, groomed, encouraged & protected by the Catholic Church, with whose power he not only committed his own acts, but helped to cover up & enable the acts of others like him - his 'Melbourne Response' to child-sex abuse by church officials served only to sweep the problem under the mat & allow it to continue unchecked

Unfortunately, it seems the evidence he was finally convicted on, hasn't stood up to the supposed scrutiny of Australia's High Court, which is a kick in the teeth for not only his victims, but victims of church-sponsored sexual abuse everywhere. Given the fact that 2 openly religious former Prime Ministers gave him character references during his trial, it's not much of a long bow to draw, that he has sympathetic ears in other High Court places as well

Even if...& I do mean if...he is actually innocent of the charges against him, he's certainly guilty as hell of aiding & abetting others like him to do incredible damage to children's lives. And if indeed, only god can judge him, can we get him to appear before that ultimate judge as soon as possible please?

... Shit! Maybe it is the end of the world as we know it. And if it removes a couple of the key players, that may not be a bad thing. I think I still feel fine...

From today's Guardian

"COVID-19 is exposing the frailty in autocrats and democrats alike

Confronted by the coronavirus menace, politicians and governments around the world are thrashing about wildly, trying to decide what to do for the best. “Politics isn’t working” is a common refrain among disaffected citizens in the modern era. But at this uniquely stressful moment, it really does appear to be true. While they mean well, most leaders haven’t got a clue.

The dawning realisation that national politicians cannot be relied upon to do the right or sensible thing, whatever that may turn out to be, has serious long-term implications for democracy and the principle of democratic consent. If the crisis is protracted, a catastrophic loss of confidence in the way the pandemic is managed could lead to unpredictable social disruption across many countries.

As is the case with victims of the disease, underlying conditions and vulnerabilities in politics too are being painfully exposed.

It’s becoming clear, for example, that healthcare systems, even in wealthy countries such as the US, are chronically under-resourced and unprepared. Confusion reigns widely, fuelled by conflicting official advice in different countries about public gatherings, travel, and self-isolation.

Some leaders may emerge with their reputations enhanced. For others, the opposite holds true. The virus has already made fools of the world’s two most powerful men. Xi Jinping, China’s president, has faced unprecedented criticism over his handling of the first recorded outbreak in Wuhan. He initially steered well clear of the problem – an early example of social distancing.

But Xi has struggled since to contain the political and human fallout. The death from Covid-19 of Li Wenliang, a young doctor who sounded the alarm in Wuhan in December but was gagged by Communist party officials, sparked an online revolt. Xi finally ventured to the city last week, lavishing praise on its beleaguered residents in what almost sounded like an apology.

Predictably, Donald Trump’s reaction has been all about him. Among other inanities, he suggested the pandemic was a fake Democrat plot to harm his re-election chances. Ignoring the science and minimising the threat, he claimed his Mexican border wall had somehow immunised Americans, and likened the “foreign virus” to an alien invasion. It’s embarrassingly obvious Trump is not up to the job.

Both Trump and Xi could pay a heavy price. The US leader may have survived impeachment, but come November many voters will not forget or forgive this failure of leadership in a crisis. Xi’s aura of paternal infallibility has shattered. Trust has gone. To restore his grip, it is suggested, he may resort to more intrusive social controls, surveillance and censorship. Yet increased repression could prompt a career-ending backlash.

Trump’s knee-jerk reaction in pulling up the drawbridge and blaming others is not unique. Fear not facts has led European leaders such as Austria’s Sebastian Kurz to act alone, hastily closing borders and barring people from specific countries. These divisions recall Europe’s chaotic response to the 2015 migrant crisis when governments failed to agree a collective approach.

For the European Union, the pandemic is turning into a political nightmare. The commission in Brussels is struggling to keep up, relaxing rules on deficit spending that have already been broken. Piecemeal, national-level policy-making is a gift to Eurosceptics, not least rightwing populists keen to exploit splits, and could have lasting consequences for European cohesion. Public confidence may take a big hit.

There’s no doubt politicians face genuine dilemmas. In Italy, Europe’s worst-affected state, the prime minister, Giuseppe Conte, was initially attacked for doing too much, by ordering widespread testing in Lombardy, and subsequently for doing too little. What is certain is that Italy has received little help from the rest of Europe – the subject of a bitter complaint last week.

Now that Italy is in total lockdown, it is being studied like a laboratory guinea pig. Boris Johnson, aware, like other leaders, that his reputation is at stake, treads a fine line between similarly drastic measures and “keep calm and carry on” stoicism. If it all goes wrong, his defence will be that he followed medical advice. Suddenly, experts are back on top in Britain – if only as potential fall guys.

Many look for leadership to Angela Merkel, Germany’s unflappable chancellor and Europe’s most respected politician. Yet her assessment last week, that Covid-19 would infect two out of three Germans and there was not a lot governments could do about it, was less than reassuring.

Merkel called for “solidarity, common sense and open-heartedness”. But her emphasis on Europe-wide cooperation carried a whiff of hypocrisy. Germany and France have limited exports of protective masks and equipment to safeguard domestic supply – hardly an act of solidarity with the neighbours. Nor is Berlin rushing to bail out floundering eurozone partners.

The parallel absence of an effective, joined-up global strategy is also casting multilateral institutions in an unflattering light. The World Health Organization, the lead UN agency that might be expected to wield decisive influence, appears strangely diffident at times – fearful, perhaps, of provoking a political backlash from heavy-hitters such as China.

Global financial institutions are not doing any better. The IMF has thrown $50bn at the problem. Interest rates have been randomly cut and emergency budgets announced. But compared with the 2008 financial crisis, when governments and central banks collaborated to stave off a banking collapse, international coordination to calm markets and reduce risk is lacking. Virus-related economic damage may thus be worse, and longer lasting, than might have been the case.

Despite all the angst, the WHO’s chief, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, complained about “alarming levels of inaction” by politicians – and it seems many governments remain in denial. That may be due to vanity (in the case of North Korea’s defiantly face-mask-free Kim Jong-un) or incapacity (in the case of poorer countries). Iran repeatedly denied it had a problem, until its leaders started dying. Now it is reportedly digging mass graves.

Unscrupulous politicians stand accused of using the pandemic as cover for furtive power-grabs. The timing of last week’s high-level purge by Saudi Arabia’s crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, and a constitutional coup by Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, may be coincidental. Or maybe not.

In Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu is manoeuvring to stay on as prime minister, despite his corruption trial and his lack of a parliamentary majority, in the face of what he now deems an exceptional national threat. It’s conceivable Trump could use new clashes with militia in Iraq to revive his Iran vendetta – and distract attention from his viral incompetence.

The crisis also raises the danger of governments taking so-called temporary emergency powers and imposing sweeping, illiberal constraints on citizens, journalists and social media that subsequently become permanent. That’s what happened after the 9/11 convulsion, when the US and allies decided to largely ignore international human rights protections in the name of fighting terrorism.

Looked at globally, the politicians’ performance to date has been mostly unimpressive. Yet the fundamental question raised by the pandemic is not one solely for them. It concerns each individual, community, and nation. Will the challenges posed by the virus be allowed to drive us further apart – or used to help bring us closer together? The answer hangs in the balance. It could go either way."

I'm surprised it took this long for the conspiracy theorists to join the dots in a whole new, loopy way...

So Covid19 isn't a serious virus, it's the perfect way to cover up symptoms from 5G network radiation... or something...

"A YouTube video with the title "WUHAN CORONA VIRUS IS A 5G L.E.D SMART STREET LIGHT TEST BED" is also popular in this group and others. Other YouTube videos share complex conspiracy theories including a suggestion that the Diamond Princess cruise ship whose passengers had to be quarantined was affected by the virus because it used 5G technology for its connectivity."

The world is a dangerous place... especially with people like that out there... & I mean really out there!

This morning, I listened to a radio current affairs program devote about 30 minutes to Chinese students complaining about Australia's bio-security measures to prevent the new Coronavirus spreading here. The students' gripe was that they have to be quarantined for 14 days, before they are tested again, screened & then will be allowed in to resume their studies here. It's apparently unfair that, given they've paid for their courses, Australia won't just open its gates & let them in, no questions asked &, especially, no health checks done

So, you have been living in the country that is the origin & epicentre of a global epidemic, with more diagnoses & deaths every day... & you think it's unfair we won't let you just walk back into our Universities without making sure you're healthy??

Fuck off... Seriously, just fuck off, you bunch of whining, self-entitled brats. To then compound your arrogance by claiming it's racist treatment, devalues the legitimate claims of racism that are, unfortunately, still occurring

Certainly, Australia has some pretty strict quarantine regulations... it always has - that's why we don't have rabies here, or foot & mouth disease, or Creutzfeldt-Jacob (Mad Cow) disease (All of which originated in Europe, not Asia... & we still don't let some Europeans give blood if they were in the UK at the time of CJD). It's why we were barely affected by the SARS outbreak in the early 2000s. It's why there was such a kerfuffle when Johnny Depp tried to bring his 2 dogs into the country without quarantining them... or even declaring they were coming with him. We are an island continent, which afforded us some natural immunity for a millennium or 60, but this modern world brings lots of stuff to our doorstep by plane, or boat... Not all of it is good for us, or our flora & fauna. Hence... Quarantine & lots of seasons of Border Security

Two things these students should know... Australia isn't China. And you're not special

China's Chernobyl??

If the recent docudrama about Chernobyl illustrated anything, it was how an authoritarian regime that rules by fear - especially the fear of failure & the repercussions & consequences of it - can be the instrument of its own downfall. Mikhail Gorbachev said that the Chernobyl incident was the catalyst for the Soviet Union's demise. The reactor staff were all so afraid of their relevant superiors, that the denial of anything having gone wrong went right from the bottom to the top of the command chain... until it was too late to either do anything about it, or hide it any longer

It seems that same culture of fear of failure is well-entrenched in China. Doctors & others who spoke out & warned about the new Coronavirus, were arrested & silenced, lest they cause trouble for officials... & now hundreds of people are dead, thousands are infected & the virus is on a world tour

Someone needs to sit President Xi down in front of a television & make him watch the Chernobyl series...

And it comes, as no surprise, from the Murdoch global media 'empire'...

Global warming is fake, climate change is fake, 'Greenies' are communists, coal is good, greed is better...

Proof that, as Terry Pratchett often wrote in his books, 'A lie can get halfway around the world, before the Truth has got its boots on...'

Can be explained by reading these 2 articles...

Our Current Climate Policy Will Protect You says PM

23 Fire Experts Snubbed By PM 6 Months Before Fire Disaster

Is it any wonder the insensitive, greedy, blinkered, fat shit was abused & virtually run out of town when he visited a fire-affected area yesterday?

His defence of a woefully inadequate climate policy is as incredible as his blinkered focus on getting the budget "back in the black", while presiding over a stagnant economy which every qualified expert is telling him needs infrastructure spending to get it going, but he just sits there, clutching at his balance sheet, squawking about how responsible economic management is all about clearing national debt at all costs & repairing the'damage' the Labor Party did when it was in power... 8 years ago... I think that paltry excuse for political point-scoring has reached its expiry date, Scott

And may I remind you, Scott, that's not your money you're sitting on... it's ours. Some of it even belongs to the experts you refuse to listen to. It's the height of arrogance to think that, just because you were Federal Treasurer for 5 minutes, you know better than people who have spent years... decades... both studying & working in both the national & global economies & are trying to HELP your sorry excuse of a government do the job we mistakenly elected you for...

Surely these are not the words of a sober man... '... in my great & unmatched wisdom...'

realdonalddrunk

Overnight (Australian time), we won the Ashes by beating England on their home grounds for the first time in well over a decade. We've beaten them here in Australia, but a win over there is something a bit more special

For those who follow cricket, the Australian team have had a pretty rough 18 months. 3 of our players were implicated in a ball-tampering incident, using sandpaper rather unsubtly & stupidly, in an age where TV cameras see everything!!!. So the 3 players admitted it, didn't argue or defend their actions, just accepted 12 month suspensions & other penalties & served their time. This Ashes series against England was their first game 'back'... & given it was against England, we all knew their reception would be less than polite & there would be teasing, name-calling & probably some abuse from both the English team & certainly the English crowds. The English team have been quite cordial, actually - maybe some 'banter' in the field, but nothing over the top. The English crowds... not so much. They've been pretty merciless, but our 3 transgressors have taken it all in their stride & with relatively good humour - then gone out on the field to play the best they can. Which has proved to be better than the English team on this occasion... certainly in the case of our former Captain Steve Smith, who has had a phenomenal Ashes series with the bat, scoring runs when nobody else could & making it look easy, when it plainly hasn't been. He's still been booed every time he walked on, or off, the field, but obviously hasn't let it get to him, certainly not as far as his game is concerned, anyway... He has never complained about the crowds, or opposition players, never made a big deal about his success this series & even when he was concussed by a 150km/h ball to the head & missed a match, has simply gone on to make more runs, helping the Australian team to victory in the series

Ever since the 3 players returned, there has been much hand-wringing in the Australian press about whether we have forgiven them versus those who think the suspensions were a bit over the top, considering the much lighter penalties players from other countries have copped when they've been caught doing much the same thing. By the time this Ashes series started, I think we'd pretty much decided they'd done the crime, done the time, now let's move on & play some cricket... Pretty much the Australian attitude to many things in the end - possibly the result of the place being colonised by a bunch of convicts who went on to build lives & careers for themselves in the new land they never could have back in the old country... For all that our media try to hype things up, in the end, we're pretty laid back about most stuff. Even when we lost the 3rd game in the series, from a seemingly unlosable position (somehow we managed it though...) & the English were ecstatically rubbing our noses in it, almost all the commentary you heard down here was about how good a game it had been... just a shame about the result, but there's always the next one... Which, I remind you, we won... & the series with it

However, it seems the English fans & their media, don't like us being so laissez-faire, lackadaisical & so downright reasonable about it all. This series has seen markedly more & worse baiting by the crowds of not only the 3 returning players, but others in the team & now that the series has been won, the first international article I've seen was by Steve Harmison... a retired English player who basically sniffs at the victory & says that no matter how good Australia were, Steve Smith will always be a cheat. Well, Steve, watch out for that glass house of yours... Every cricket team in the world has tampered with the ball one way or another, at one time or another. Some got caught, some didn't. It's an interesting side-fact that reverse-swing bowling, which was what the Australians were trying to get the ball to do when they were caught, has largely disappeared from international cricket in the year since the Australians were busted... suggesting that the only way you could get the ball to perform that way was to illegally tamper with it...

Still, it's reassuring that the English press have also been so quick to turn on their own. The game was barely over before Geoff Boycott, another retired player, was calling for the English captain's head.... Steve Harmison's from Newcastle, Boycott's a Yorkshire man... all they prove is the old cliché about miserable Northerners is 100% accurate

So the Star Trek logo has been 'found' on Mars...

Perhaps the Next Generation of Enterprising explorers can discover who this lost Voyager was... & if they came from Deep Space... 9

Reading the Sunday papers online... blah blah Royal baby... blah blah Met Gala... blah blah Federal election... blah blah Kardashian... blah blah weekend sport controversy & commentary... blah blah Ugly Reality Of Insta-famous Tourist Hot-spots... Hmmm, hang on...

So, among young tourists/travellers, a place's 'Instagrammability' is a determining factor in going there - usually to then stick your head in the middle of the photo of the place/thing. This is after you've battled through/over the horde of other people all trying to do the same thing. Reading this article, I don't think I ever want to visit the Trevi Fountain in Rome... I'll stick with the B&W image of Anita Ekberg splashing through it, thanks all the same. And I think I'll just look at the Mona Lisa in art history books - it's not that much bigger anyway...

When I take photos, I mostly try to keep people out of the shot - like a lot of those Instagram posts of those locations... The difference is I'm, if not physically, then certainly psychologically opposed to getting up before dawn to get the shot - which is, it seems, the only way to get those people-free images of the Taj Mahal, among others. So, most often, I resort to higher camera angles, tighter cropping, or just plain Photoshop gimcrackery to keep the great unwashed out of my scenery

Exhibit A:



Sunset through the Window & Keyhole Arches at Arches National Park, in Utah. Not a person in sight... except the reality was:-



Get the hell out of my sunset!!!!!

Exhibit B:



Rattlesnake Canyon Utah/Arizona. Taken during a private guided tour specifically for photographers. Trouble is... other photographers:-



And sometimes, even after editing I find something, or someone I missed:-



Or parts of them , at least... See if you can spot it. I didn't!!!

If this is the kind of thing that happens in the middle of the desert, I can't imagine having the patience in Rome, or Agra, or the Louvre, or...