I have wondered why in the majority of USA States, the State capitol is not the largest city. Examining the maps of the States may help explain this. In nearly all instances, the State capitol is reasonably central, close to the middle of the State. Similarly, when you look at US Counties, the County seat seems invariably to be centrally located within the County in question. I guess this centrality allows governance to be geographically applied in a more equitable and even handed fashion, with less likelihood of places within a State or County being ignored. All this is supposition and I've done no research to back up my hunches.
I then thought of Catholic dioceses in my home State of Victoria. When I grew up, Bendigo was the head office of the Diocese of Sandhurst, and it extended as far as Wodonga, almost 300 kms away. However, back then, a place like Inglewood, only 40 odd kms away from Bendigo, was in a different diocese, and was part of the Ballarat diocese. As it happened, over the years, Inglewood had a succession of child molesting priests. It was relatively 'far flung' from Ballarat, seemingly away from their attention. I wonder if there was a greater preponderance of child abuse that took place in parishes like Inglewood, relatively far removed from their centre of clerical governance. I think it will be worthwhile for the upcoming Royal Commission to investigate this.
Saturday, November 17, 2012
Saturday, August 11, 2012
A whinge about rental car updgrades
"Congratulations Mr King, we've decided to upgrade you from a Hyundai I30 to a Volkswagon Golf!" I was told by the Europcar staff upon my arrival at Brisbane airport. What was I supposed to do, get down on my hands and knees like a supplicant and give thanks to people who had decided it seems on a whim to 'move me up' to a superior vehicle?! Why didn't Europcar just admit to me that they had run out of I30s and had plenty of Golfs in the shed!?
One of the reasons I'd booked an I30 was to go on a two day test drive,with a view to a possible future I30 purchase (as well as holiday recreational use) - golf is a game I want to play as often as a I can, not a type of car I want to buy! What is it about Volkswagon and its cars named after four letter sports? Polo as well!
Getting into a strange car in a strange city is better done in a vehilce you are vaguely familiar with. Not that I'm totally familar with the I30, but I have sat in one previously and I know it has the indicator switch and windscreen switch on the 'normal' sides of the steering wheel, where I am accustomed to finding them. And I'm pretty sure that I can easily find where the headlight switch is in an I30 (unlike the Golf) and I'd hope the I30's brake and accelerator pedal are more separated and suited to size 12 feet like mine than the cramped configuration of a Golf. And the Golf requires premium unleaded 98 ocatane whereas the I30 will run on 91 octane fuel. This move from an I30 to a Golf was more of an upsize than an upgrade!
An idea. If Europcar doesn't have the car you have booked, then they should offer you the car at the level below you have booked, at a reduced cost.
Another idea. To move away from the upgrade theme, why don't rent a car firms tell you on their website what reducing the excess will cost? Is this because it is 'secret rental car business', like the type of vehicle you actually end up with?!
A further suggestion for Europcar and their staff. When you issue someone with a damage detail sheet for the car and invite them to inspect the car before you drive away, how about offering a place where the illumination is more than a 30 watt (non energy saving light bulb), for that inspection to take place!?
So I've got plenty of material for a complaint letter to Europcar. I know I am a whinging consumer, but someone has to keep big business on their toes with constructive feedback and criticism.
Of course I wouldn't have minded being upgraded on the plane I flew to Brisbane, from cattle class to the pointy end, but that never happens nowadays. I remember it happened once early in the 2000s, when Qantas had overbooked economy and I drew the long straw and was shunted forward. Now that was a real upgrade!
Next time I want an I30, I shall book in for the car one level below it, possibly a Getz or a Yaris, and then maybe I'll end up with the car I want.
One of the reasons I'd booked an I30 was to go on a two day test drive,with a view to a possible future I30 purchase (as well as holiday recreational use) - golf is a game I want to play as often as a I can, not a type of car I want to buy! What is it about Volkswagon and its cars named after four letter sports? Polo as well!
Getting into a strange car in a strange city is better done in a vehilce you are vaguely familiar with. Not that I'm totally familar with the I30, but I have sat in one previously and I know it has the indicator switch and windscreen switch on the 'normal' sides of the steering wheel, where I am accustomed to finding them. And I'm pretty sure that I can easily find where the headlight switch is in an I30 (unlike the Golf) and I'd hope the I30's brake and accelerator pedal are more separated and suited to size 12 feet like mine than the cramped configuration of a Golf. And the Golf requires premium unleaded 98 ocatane whereas the I30 will run on 91 octane fuel. This move from an I30 to a Golf was more of an upsize than an upgrade!
An idea. If Europcar doesn't have the car you have booked, then they should offer you the car at the level below you have booked, at a reduced cost.
Another idea. To move away from the upgrade theme, why don't rent a car firms tell you on their website what reducing the excess will cost? Is this because it is 'secret rental car business', like the type of vehicle you actually end up with?!
A further suggestion for Europcar and their staff. When you issue someone with a damage detail sheet for the car and invite them to inspect the car before you drive away, how about offering a place where the illumination is more than a 30 watt (non energy saving light bulb), for that inspection to take place!?
So I've got plenty of material for a complaint letter to Europcar. I know I am a whinging consumer, but someone has to keep big business on their toes with constructive feedback and criticism.
Of course I wouldn't have minded being upgraded on the plane I flew to Brisbane, from cattle class to the pointy end, but that never happens nowadays. I remember it happened once early in the 2000s, when Qantas had overbooked economy and I drew the long straw and was shunted forward. Now that was a real upgrade!
Next time I want an I30, I shall book in for the car one level below it, possibly a Getz or a Yaris, and then maybe I'll end up with the car I want.
Tuesday, April 24, 2012
The tyranny of pegs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8u5TlfOiFXo
Initially I dismissed this TV ad, for the pegless clothes line, as just indulging in what I call 'North Korean rhetoric', that is a ridiculous exaggeration of the supposed travails of everyday life, but a discussion with two members of the Oliver family (father and son Oliver) made me think that pegs could indeed be tyrannical.
As I say, recently I got to talking then arguing about pegs with both father and son Oliver. One or other of the Olivers (I can't remember who - we had had a few wines) is a taker down of pegs from the clothes line and then a putter of pegs into a receptacle, after you use them. This is my position as well. The other Oliver steadfastly chooses to leave them on the line. It seems his main problem is having to reach for them from a basket, while pegging out clothes etc. He believes you need both hands for properly hanging out clothes and other items, and this leaves no hands free for reaching for pegs - he refuses to become a peg and clothing juggler, while undertaking the boring but necessary task of hanging out washing. Somehow though, both the other Oliver and I manage this, admittedly with difficulty, and the contortion involved, ultimately, could more quickly compromise us in an occupational health and safety sense (i.e. back and muscle strains).
Of course the peg basket you use can make it easier or harder to store and retrieve pegs. One is advantaged by a peg basket, or indeed bag, that rests on the clothes line and can move easily along the wires or nylon strands, so it is always nearby for an easy peg reach, or peg deposit, if you are bringing washing in. Mentioning peg deposit is an important reminder and acknowledgement that problems with pegging stuff up are replicated or mirrored when you have to remove washing.
The leaver of pegs on the line Oliver admitted to a frustration with hanging washing among a predetermined peg pattern on the line, being faced with possibly having to shift pegs to best fit washing of differing sizes among such pre set peg arrangements. This is a dilemma that doesn't face the other Oliver and I. We come to the clothes line, to hang out washing, facing a tabula rasa or clean slate. The other Oliver and I, while of the put the peg on and take the peg off persuasion, tried to humour the peg leaving Oliver and envisage how we would work with leaving the pegs on the line and suggested one could choose small items and hang them among small inter peg gaps and put large items among large inter peg gaps. He rejected this notion, which to my mind shot holes in his position, betraying a flaw in the 'leave the pegs on the line' belief system. As alluded to above, you can of course just slide the pegs along the line to adapt and fit the inter peg gap you are presented with to the circumstances of the washing. But apparently 'leaving pegs on the line' Oliver holds such a fixed position (no pun intended) , that he doesn't even want to move pegs along the line to adapt to the size of his clothing; it would seem he would just rather hang washing around pegs left on the line, attached to nothing but wire or strand, and serving no purpose.
None of this discussion about pegs and pegless clothes lines has so far touched on how durable pegs are. And of course this issue is impacted by what you choose to do with the pegs when they are not doing what they are designed for. One might easily think that if you leave them out, they are more subject to wear and tear. The proverbial rain hail and shine will lessen the life of pegs one might think, but Oliver of the pegs on the line belief system, says that the action of putting them on the line and taking them off, especially if this is done quickly, can lessen their working lives. I've yet to see experiments that compare how pegs staying on versus pegs going on and coming off the line affects their lifespan, but my money would be on mother nature rending more deleterious effects on pegs' longevity than putting them up and taking them off. People who affix and remove pegs, putting them in a basket, while they are not being used, while at the same time leaving the peg basket on the clothes line, are to my mind asking for trouble and wearing their pegs out both ways. Interestingly the Oliver who I agree with about the need to put pegs on the line and then take them off, when not at use, chooses to leave his pegs in the basket on the line!
I might add, our far reaching discussion on pegs, event went as far as considering how one might lessen the problem of weather induced wear and tear on pegs in a basket, left on the clothes line, and on all three of us agree that in actuality, circumstances look after them self - the mere actions of putting on and taking off pegs, mix them up within the peg receptacle, and ensure the same ones aren't always in the top layer and thus exposed to the full forces of mother nature.
Any discussion of pegs and what wears them out and/or breaks them, needs to consider what to do with pegs that are seemingly broken. Here filial bonds hold and both Olivers agree with each other and disagree with me. When springs become detached from the other part of pegs, let's call them clasps, the Olivers just disregard them or throw them out. They scoffed at my commitment to rehabilitate pegs. To lovingly and carefully search on the ground for broken peg parts, and then retain and restore them, if not to their full former glory, at least to a sense of purpose and functionality, so to delay for a long as possible their journey to their ultimate destination of rubbish bin.
I see one of the Olivers as essentially being lazy in his 'drying the washing' practices, wanting to cut corners and not giving a tinker's cuss about how this relates to the efficiency of peg use and care practices. But if one is to recognise that all the foregoing discussion about pegs, this conjecture, this toing and froing, this analysis of the pluses and minuses of pegs, then this deep rumination about their proper use can ultimately make you to question the value of pegs, and make you seriously consider other options for clothes line arrangements. As such this Oliver's position of leaving them on the line, as an apparent permanent fixture, most closely matches the radical pegless alternative. And while I find myself in agreement with most of the other Oliver's peg practices, I find an internal inconsistency in his peg belief system, which while I respect, I would like to change, both so I could find someone who I am totally at one with, around pegs. I fear though, with pegs, everyone has their own belief system. Ultimately, humanity will only be uniform and find unity with pegs, when ironically we are without pegs - the future with its pegless Ezyline clothes line beckons.
Initially I dismissed this TV ad, for the pegless clothes line, as just indulging in what I call 'North Korean rhetoric', that is a ridiculous exaggeration of the supposed travails of everyday life, but a discussion with two members of the Oliver family (father and son Oliver) made me think that pegs could indeed be tyrannical.
As I say, recently I got to talking then arguing about pegs with both father and son Oliver. One or other of the Olivers (I can't remember who - we had had a few wines) is a taker down of pegs from the clothes line and then a putter of pegs into a receptacle, after you use them. This is my position as well. The other Oliver steadfastly chooses to leave them on the line. It seems his main problem is having to reach for them from a basket, while pegging out clothes etc. He believes you need both hands for properly hanging out clothes and other items, and this leaves no hands free for reaching for pegs - he refuses to become a peg and clothing juggler, while undertaking the boring but necessary task of hanging out washing. Somehow though, both the other Oliver and I manage this, admittedly with difficulty, and the contortion involved, ultimately, could more quickly compromise us in an occupational health and safety sense (i.e. back and muscle strains).
Of course the peg basket you use can make it easier or harder to store and retrieve pegs. One is advantaged by a peg basket, or indeed bag, that rests on the clothes line and can move easily along the wires or nylon strands, so it is always nearby for an easy peg reach, or peg deposit, if you are bringing washing in. Mentioning peg deposit is an important reminder and acknowledgement that problems with pegging stuff up are replicated or mirrored when you have to remove washing.
The leaver of pegs on the line Oliver admitted to a frustration with hanging washing among a predetermined peg pattern on the line, being faced with possibly having to shift pegs to best fit washing of differing sizes among such pre set peg arrangements. This is a dilemma that doesn't face the other Oliver and I. We come to the clothes line, to hang out washing, facing a tabula rasa or clean slate. The other Oliver and I, while of the put the peg on and take the peg off persuasion, tried to humour the peg leaving Oliver and envisage how we would work with leaving the pegs on the line and suggested one could choose small items and hang them among small inter peg gaps and put large items among large inter peg gaps. He rejected this notion, which to my mind shot holes in his position, betraying a flaw in the 'leave the pegs on the line' belief system. As alluded to above, you can of course just slide the pegs along the line to adapt and fit the inter peg gap you are presented with to the circumstances of the washing. But apparently 'leaving pegs on the line' Oliver holds such a fixed position (no pun intended) , that he doesn't even want to move pegs along the line to adapt to the size of his clothing; it would seem he would just rather hang washing around pegs left on the line, attached to nothing but wire or strand, and serving no purpose.
None of this discussion about pegs and pegless clothes lines has so far touched on how durable pegs are. And of course this issue is impacted by what you choose to do with the pegs when they are not doing what they are designed for. One might easily think that if you leave them out, they are more subject to wear and tear. The proverbial rain hail and shine will lessen the life of pegs one might think, but Oliver of the pegs on the line belief system, says that the action of putting them on the line and taking them off, especially if this is done quickly, can lessen their working lives. I've yet to see experiments that compare how pegs staying on versus pegs going on and coming off the line affects their lifespan, but my money would be on mother nature rending more deleterious effects on pegs' longevity than putting them up and taking them off. People who affix and remove pegs, putting them in a basket, while they are not being used, while at the same time leaving the peg basket on the clothes line, are to my mind asking for trouble and wearing their pegs out both ways. Interestingly the Oliver who I agree with about the need to put pegs on the line and then take them off, when not at use, chooses to leave his pegs in the basket on the line!
I might add, our far reaching discussion on pegs, event went as far as considering how one might lessen the problem of weather induced wear and tear on pegs in a basket, left on the clothes line, and on all three of us agree that in actuality, circumstances look after them self - the mere actions of putting on and taking off pegs, mix them up within the peg receptacle, and ensure the same ones aren't always in the top layer and thus exposed to the full forces of mother nature.
Any discussion of pegs and what wears them out and/or breaks them, needs to consider what to do with pegs that are seemingly broken. Here filial bonds hold and both Olivers agree with each other and disagree with me. When springs become detached from the other part of pegs, let's call them clasps, the Olivers just disregard them or throw them out. They scoffed at my commitment to rehabilitate pegs. To lovingly and carefully search on the ground for broken peg parts, and then retain and restore them, if not to their full former glory, at least to a sense of purpose and functionality, so to delay for a long as possible their journey to their ultimate destination of rubbish bin.
I see one of the Olivers as essentially being lazy in his 'drying the washing' practices, wanting to cut corners and not giving a tinker's cuss about how this relates to the efficiency of peg use and care practices. But if one is to recognise that all the foregoing discussion about pegs, this conjecture, this toing and froing, this analysis of the pluses and minuses of pegs, then this deep rumination about their proper use can ultimately make you to question the value of pegs, and make you seriously consider other options for clothes line arrangements. As such this Oliver's position of leaving them on the line, as an apparent permanent fixture, most closely matches the radical pegless alternative. And while I find myself in agreement with most of the other Oliver's peg practices, I find an internal inconsistency in his peg belief system, which while I respect, I would like to change, both so I could find someone who I am totally at one with, around pegs. I fear though, with pegs, everyone has their own belief system. Ultimately, humanity will only be uniform and find unity with pegs, when ironically we are without pegs - the future with its pegless Ezyline clothes line beckons.
Thursday, January 26, 2012
A rave about a raven
Crows are one type of bird you normally don't need to worry about hitting with a car. They always scamper off the road and as such 'out of the road' avoiding collisions with heavy fast moving objects. However a crow I saw on Australia Day 2012 seemed to be putting itself in mortal danger. It wandered about in circles on the busiest highway in Australia not knowing where to go next and with little awareness of what vehicles were in the vicinity. The reason for this was there was a take away cup 'caught' over the crows head and beak, which covered its eyes. As I saw this, I wondered whether (i) I should stop and try and remove the cup and/or (ii) I should try and take a photo of this scene.
The next thought that came into my mind was it would be (a) difficult to remove a cup off a crow's head because I've never wrangled a crow in my life, (b) it could become agressive if I attempted to grab it, and (c) dodging semi trailers and cars as I tried to deal with the crow and its problems might endanger me. I quickly realized to undertake the crow rescue safely would require in the very least a net, but I was bereft of a net.
Furthermore, I decided it was not ethical to take a photo of the cup on the crow if I wasn't prepared to try and remove it from its head and beak
So I continued on my journey wondering what fate would befall the crow, whether it would somehow manage to prise the cup off its head and if it didn't what would happen to it. I also wondered how the cup became attached to its head - was it feeding on something in the cup and its beak pierced the bottom or was the cup somehow snuggly trapped on its head by just its rim? (Later I ruled out human intervention re. the cup getting on the crow's head - as mentioned above, it was Australia Day, and I had somehow become caught up in the feeling of national euphoria, and as such believed my fellow countrymen were not capable of such avian malfeasance)
Sometimes I envied birds their wings and felt such apparatus that allowed most of their number to become airborne, a fair swap for upper limbs, hands and fingers. But now I realized how important something to clasp something was and if I was armless and had a bucket stuck to my head, I would need the suppleness and flexibility of feet and legs or assistance from another to take away the view removing head gear.
A week later and I was still thinking about the crow on Australia day. I remembered I had seen crows show a level of intelligence that allowed them to remove a bag of fantail chocolates from a golf bag, open the bag and then unwrap the chocolates. As such I became more confident that the crow escaped from the prison of the cup. Maybe it was a metaphor for the Australian character - getting into trouble, but somehow through ingenuity and persistence, solving the problem.
The next thought that came into my mind was it would be (a) difficult to remove a cup off a crow's head because I've never wrangled a crow in my life, (b) it could become agressive if I attempted to grab it, and (c) dodging semi trailers and cars as I tried to deal with the crow and its problems might endanger me. I quickly realized to undertake the crow rescue safely would require in the very least a net, but I was bereft of a net.
Furthermore, I decided it was not ethical to take a photo of the cup on the crow if I wasn't prepared to try and remove it from its head and beak
So I continued on my journey wondering what fate would befall the crow, whether it would somehow manage to prise the cup off its head and if it didn't what would happen to it. I also wondered how the cup became attached to its head - was it feeding on something in the cup and its beak pierced the bottom or was the cup somehow snuggly trapped on its head by just its rim? (Later I ruled out human intervention re. the cup getting on the crow's head - as mentioned above, it was Australia Day, and I had somehow become caught up in the feeling of national euphoria, and as such believed my fellow countrymen were not capable of such avian malfeasance)
Sometimes I envied birds their wings and felt such apparatus that allowed most of their number to become airborne, a fair swap for upper limbs, hands and fingers. But now I realized how important something to clasp something was and if I was armless and had a bucket stuck to my head, I would need the suppleness and flexibility of feet and legs or assistance from another to take away the view removing head gear.
A week later and I was still thinking about the crow on Australia day. I remembered I had seen crows show a level of intelligence that allowed them to remove a bag of fantail chocolates from a golf bag, open the bag and then unwrap the chocolates. As such I became more confident that the crow escaped from the prison of the cup. Maybe it was a metaphor for the Australian character - getting into trouble, but somehow through ingenuity and persistence, solving the problem.
Wednesday, January 11, 2012
Saga of the cock
“To sleep perchance to dream” – for me, in recent times, I would have been satisfied with “To sleep, perchance to sleep”. Unlike some of my friends I can mostly get to sleep; the problem is then I re-awake prematurely with a mind full of stuff and at a different temperature to the one when I entered the land of nod. Anyway, that is just background to a recent interrupted night of being horizontal, as when dozing off, a cockatoo made sure entry to sweet repose was temporarily barred.
There is a myriad of bird life in my neighbourhood and in the main I’m very neighbourly to these feathered friends. I’ve learnt to recognize calls and plumage, as well as groupings. I’ve made guesses at hierarchies and noted feeding patterns. Seasonal fruit on trees has been left for anything with the ability to cling to a branch to help themselves to – no nets for me or ridiculous scarecrows.
But I do cross the line in the sand re. tolerance, as far screeching from a cockatoo at midnight is concerned. While I lay awake and find these anomalous noises puzzling and muse at the avian motivation that underlies them, I feared they might go on for a significant period of time. As it happened this instance of after-hours squawking must have worn Cockie out and it subsided, and apparently I fell asleep soon afterwards.
A very small number of hours later I awoke with a start. Inside one of my nostrils – because of the tumult I can’t remember which one – I felt a strange feeling. A tickling. Like most tickling a faint pointed friction without decibels. Quickly I was no longer supine, becoming in the blink of an eye, a fully participating biped again. I turned on the bed light just in time to see a cockroach, not large but smallish, emerging from one of my nostrils. Not being a flying insect it fell to the floor and scurried away as most of their brethren tend to do. Foolishly it made a beeline, under a chest of drawers. But there I’m almost sure it met its maker, gassed by liberal supplies of crawling insect killer, a brand Evonne Cawley once claimed in a TV ad “was kind to sensitive noses”.
Regaining whatever composure I could find, I blew my nose, resumed the attempt at shut eye, and wondered what motivates a cock roach to enter a nasal cavity. As I lay down once more, my heart rate slowing and other metabolic processes hopefully moving into night time mode, I pondered the coincidence of the word ‘cock’ and how I had been kept awake and awoken by two creatures bearing this prefix. A couple of days later, when rounding up a rooster and corralling him into his nocturnal hutch, I realized that in the past, I have been woken me up or kept me awake by two other types of cocks.
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