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[darkelf9]

Afternoon all,

Well Jan 6th in America arrived and the only white stuff invading the capital was snow. Less likely to cause an insurrection but still just as unwanted. And surprise nothing happened cause the kids with the toys were happy with their nappy soiled cot and there aren't any adults in their house so you can pretty much bet they will be shitting in every corner of that house so it won't remain white for too much longer. Might need to get pest controllers in when they're done remodeling the place. Jan 6th here in Melbourne was a rainy day with nothing much happening. No insurrection, no chants to hang anyone. Unlike the America election system which gives power to the few thanks the electoral college bullshit system, here in Australia your vote counts and your votes are not given to the person you didn't vote for.

Rump is also pissed that the flags in the national capital will be at half mast for his inauguration as it is tradition for flags to fly at half mast for 30 days when a previous President dies. When Rump dies there will be lots of cheering and fireworks and burning of his image. Similar to what we recently saw in Syria when Assad fled. The Mexican President has started to troll Rump and has made fun of him again, showing that America should be called America Mexicana as it was known as such 400 yrs ago. I mean if Rump really wants to talk about history, why doesn't he give back Texas to the Mexican govt. It belonged to Mexico before it was taken by force as an American state. I mean Americans in general don't even know their own state geography so if one goes missing they won't even notice. The govt of Panama has told Rump to go fuck himself as has the govt of Greenland. The President of Denmark another women has also laughed at Rump for his suggestion of taking over Greenland as an American territory. What Rump cannot deal with is when people make fun of him.

The Gulf of Mexico is a recognised region by cartographers all over the world which also includes all military maps and sea charts in that part of the world, which also includes all flight charts and digital flight data for both commercial and military aircraft that cross that part of the world. It was the Spanish who named it back in the 17th century, not the Americans. It has been on maps and sea charts ever since. It also borders Mexico and Cuba so you would think both of these countries would have a say in any name change. They could take this all the way to the international courts just to piss off Rump. America does not get to name seas and oceans off it's coast. What's next trying to rename the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. The man is clearly of in fantasy land. So when Rump says he is going to change the name of the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America it needs to go thru many stages of approval and also will cost millions if not billions of dollars in changes to all those documents I mentioned plus all diplomatic documents and education texts from primary to territory education. Again he is talking out of his rather large arse. None of this bullshit is going to bring down domestic prices for groceries nor utility bills in the US. Given Republicans have the memory of gold fish, they will only remember his promises when they have to buy groceries, fuel, pay for utility bills and their healthcare.

Then we have the ill fated flight into Greenland by Don Jr who when told he was going to see white stuff thought he was going to where they make cocaine. Must of been a surprise to him they were talking about snow and not blow. It was like a comedy skit. He lands, forces some homeless people into a random cafe with the promise of a hot meal and they had to wear MAGA hats. One of the people Don Jr's team rounded up for the staged skit was living under bridge, but they scooped him up and promised him a hot meal. They then film one local saying Greenland wants Rump only for it later to be revealed the guy they filmed is a local drug dealer who has been to jail. May be Don Jr scored some drugs off the guy. Seems a long way to go just get some drugs. And the guy who accompanied Don Jr is a white supremacist leader who is an out and out racist and a Nazi sympathiser. All in all it was a rather dumb PR stunt that made Rump look rather stupid to the rest of the world. And they all left rather quickly after they arrived. Poo-tin must be laughing his arse off. He already thinks Rump is a pussy, now he must be thinking Rump is his bitch. All he is missing is the dog collar and lead.

The fires in California are devastating yet it seems Republicans want to blame even the fires on immigrants and women. The sexism from Republicans suggesting that the reason the fire department in LA didn't put out the fires is because the leadership are all women. They call them wildfires in the US were as we call them bushfires. We are having our own issues with bushfires here in Australia yet no political party is blaming the fires on the fact there are female firefighters. That shit doesn't fly here in Australia it is a unique thing to the US. Fox News even tried to link the fires to the Gov of California by saying it was due to not enough removal of undergrowth in the forests when in fact this fire in LA was started in the suburbs of LA not the hinterland. We don't get fires in our cities in Australia, apart from Canberra but that is because the trees and forests surrounding Canberra are on the edge of the city streets. For the rest of Australia we can't get bushfires in our suburbs because of the clearing between the edge of the suburbs and surrounding forests. LA had water but the water pressure was the issue. Again another Rump bullshit statement to talk to his cult of sheep.

Was going to spend my birthday doing a trip across the bay, instead was home with back pain and a heat pack which was annoying as it was a week of temps in the low to mid 30'sC. We got to 35C on Sat then got some rain late on Sunday. I'm only postponing the drive across the bay and will do it later in the month when I've recovered but also want to get some stuff done around the house once the back feel better. I've had this injury before so know it takes about week to 10 days before I'm full fit. It's nearly a week later and I'm still dealing with pain. At least I can get in and out of bed without pain now. But still doing the rub downs and apply the heat pack several times a day. I just get impatient with these types of injuries and try to do stuff too early then get re-injured. So just have to wait it out. I can't still for too long especially when I have a list of tasks I need to do this month. So for my birthday I settled for a dinner of friend rice with some ham of the bone and had an OS beer from the UK which fittingly was called Old Fart as with the back injury I feel like in my 80's rather than 63yrs old. For dessert I has some of the hand made chocs I bought just before Christmas. Was going to crack open the single malt scotch but it was too warm for that so I just stuck to the beer which I only drink during the Summer. Will open the single malt when the weather cools down later this week. Whilst we did get a storm and a day of rain yesterday on Sunday, the heat is back today with 28C and it will stay this warm till the next round of rain predicted for mid week. It was lovely and cool after the rain hit and there was some flooding in parts of Melbourne, the rain was a nice change from a week of temps in the 30'sC.

The Aussie Open tennis started on Sunday. They changed the start time due to the long hours of previous tournaments when the men were playing till 3 or 4am. It used to start on a Monday but due to complaints from the players having to get on court close to midnight in some cases and no getting enough rest between rounds, the management of the Aussie Open decided to change to length of the tournament and add one day by starting on the Sunday instead. It worked sort of last year will see how it plays out this year. The new innovation this year is also that coaches are now sitting court side rather in the stands. The tennis association has given up trying to police coaching of players and now just allow it openly. I won't be watching it as tennis is not my sport. I find it all rather boring.

Saw the first cricket game of the women's ashes which the Aussies won, but it was closer than the scoreboard would suggest. The multi-discipline format is unique to the women's game. Whilst it does provide lots of variety I think the women would rather play more test matches. There is plenty of T20 games now so not sure if including the T20 games in the Ashes is really necessary. They could probably drop that and increase the test matches as part of the format. I reckon 3 one day matches and 3 test matches would be a better format for the women's Ashes.

Hope the rest of the week is good for you.

 

[darkelf9]

Morning all,

With my back injury I've gone back to playing video games as it's was about the only thing I could do without causing more pain. I'm still on the PS4 waiting for a PS5 game I want to play before buying a PS5. Still going thru Skyrim the Anniversary Edition but this time around I'm taking more detailed notes as the game has become huge. I've decided that for the larger open world games I want to keep, that I'm going to now keep notes which I've never done in the past. I like to rely on my memory but with so much content in these games with extra DLC's and updates which sometimes include new quests, there is too much to remember. I also like to mix things up by playing a couple of games at the same time. I usually have 3 games on the go at any one time. Not a fan of on-line nor PC games. Much prefer the consoles and given our poor internet, the on-line option is annoying and I don't intend to get a super high speed internet just to play games. I noticed that more video games need an internet connection to play and access game content. I steer clear of those. Again I prefer the disc version with optional DLC downloads, but again because of our slow internet in Australia, I find downloads tedious because they take so long. To even download the larger DLC's I've had to start them and let them run overnight. We are probably the only country in the western world with shit internet thanks to the LNP when they were in power. They are the reason our internet in this country sucks. If they had implemented the Labor plan for the internet we would have much better internet connectivity and faster speeds. Downloading any major content is like the old dial up internet. I only live 30mins from the CBD and my area still has copper rather than fibre optic. One of the reasons is that I'm in a Labor stronghold. The LNP priortise their own electorates or those which they think they can win back. The main reason the LNP didn't go with Labor's plan for the internet is because Labor came up with it so it was purely politics and nothing to do with what was best for the economy nor the country. Albo's promising to complete the NBN to full fibre optic is only being considered because of the upcoming election. If the RBA cuts interest rates next month then Albo will call an early election in March. If the RBA leaves interest rates on hold then May will be the election month. If there wasn't an election this year, the nbn upgrade would not be an option.

I was surprised to see that Sony is still making games for the PS4. Last year was rather poor for new PS4 games and I was told Sony isn't making any more games for use on the PS4. So was surprised when I looked up the new game schedule for 2025 and found some new PS4 games, one of which I was going to buy for PS5 so it might just delay my purchase of a PS5. There are other games I want that are only available on PS5 but those aren't coming out till later this year. When I buy a PS5 console will depend on the game. I don't like the PS5 Pro because it doesn't come with a disc drive. It just seems nuts that Sony would not include a disc drive with the new console given how many games still come with a disc. The cost of the Pro version is $1,199 which is $400 more expensive than the Slim version that comes with not only a hard drive but a larger hard drive. Seems just to be a money grab by Sony and I don't believe the bullshit that most people play games on-line. Lots of complaints about the Pro version not having a disc drive. For the cost of the Pro version you can buy a PS5 Slim with a disc drive and get a 2TB SSD, so why would you buy the Pro version with less capability. Add the cost of the games now which are between $80 - $100 some are close to $130, that's lots of money to spend on an inferior console. Makes no sense to buy the Pro version. The only good thing about the PS5 is the expandable hard drive slot with is really needed due to the size of the newer games. I was constantly fighting for space on the PS4 and whilst you could use an external hard drive, switching between consoles was a nightmare and games were slower using the external hard drive. It is far better to have all he data on an internal hard drive.

The wildfires in LA continue to burn as are our own bushfires here in Australia it's just that ours are not making the news as much. The scenes of those areas of LA that are devastated by those fires are the same as scenes of houses and property destroyed by our own bushfires when fire ravaged towns both large and small in our countryside. If they didn't tell you it was LA when looking at those pictures, it could very well be a scene from here in Australia. After all the fires in the LA residential areas is dealt with, the question will be whether or not to allow the rebuilding of housing in fire prone areas. These areas are well known to councils and insurers. A lot of the houses that were lost were not insured for fires due the very high cost of insurance because insurance companies know the high likelihood of fire damage in those areas. The same goes for flood insurance in urban areas prone to flooding. Insurance companies will not insure houses where they know they is a high risk of a payout. Insurance companies are like casinos, a majority of the time they win and don't have to pay out. So just like flood prone areas, LA councils need to decide not to approve housing where there is a risk of loss of life because that is what it comes down to not the house burning down. What is the risk of people losing their lives in those fire prone housing areas? Stuff you have is not important when it comes down to a choice of your life or your house because when you die you can't take any of that stuff with you. You can't replace a human life.

Watched the first game of the women's Ashes and the second game was a nail biter. The Aussies were dominant in the first ODI but in the second one played here in Melbourne at the Junction Oval I really thought the Aussies were going to lose that one because of their low score. But the Aussie bowlers were excellent in bowling out England. The Aussies shouldn't of won that game but their bowlers were too good. It's clear that the English batters can't play spin and are not very good against leg spin either. Alana King had them completely at sea against her. I'm not just saying that because she is a fellow Melbournian and she was born in a suburb not far from where I am. I might have passed her in the shops and not know it. She is a pocket rocket.

Well I finally cracked open the single malt scotch albeit a week later than planned since the weather cooled down enough to imbibe. Decided to open the single malt I got from my nephew as a Christmas present. It is the cheaper one and I don't remember trying it before. It is the Glen Moray single malt scotch and it was nice. Could certainly taste the smoky tones and was easy to drink especially with some food. Went well with the chicken I had for dinner. Would I buy it? Probably not as I prefer older single malts these days the but it was is a nice option. It was a late celebration of my birthday and a week late but I was feeling better and almost back to normal but still a niggle in the back when doing certain things. Still have the 21yr old single malt unopened so that is next but it can wait a while. No rush to open that one. As I mentioned in a previous post I intend to go up the age range of single malts in the next couple of years.

We got a lot of rain mid week and a thunderstorm as well. I was in bed when I heard the thunder outside. It was very loud so must have been close buy. The rain was welcomed to cool the place down. We are now getting these cool changes that come in two stages a couple of days apart. We get the initial one which is weaker so the days remain humid then the second one is the proper cool change with cooler winds from the south. It has been a repeating pattern this Summer in Melbourne which is yet another odd change to our normal Summer. So I had the door open for part of the day yesterday to let the cool air go thru the house. Nothing like natural fresh cool breezes flowing thru the house. It is another cooler day today but is warming up again from tomorrow with 30's again for the weekend.

Just saw on the TV that Israel and Hamas has agreed to a ceasefire, not an end to the war. The deal was developed by the US back in May last year but rejected by Netanyahu to keep himself in power and appease the far right in his cabinet which he needs. In the second half of last year Netanyahu did a lot going after Hezbollah and Iran with massive backing by the US. As to why the deal is now being accepted well Rump is right in one respect saying the deal was agreed to due to him but not for the reasons he is claiming. It was clear to Netanyahu in his recent discussions with Rump that Rump is crazy and more erratic than his was when last in power. Also Hamas knows how erratic Rump is. The facts are that this ceasefire deal happened while JoeB was in power so JoeB gets the credit for this ceasefire because he is still President. So Rump can't take credit for something he had nothing to do with but that is just what he does. He can't make a deal on anything. Even his book The Art of the Deal was written by somebody else and all Rump did was put his name to it. The TV Show 'The Apprentice' was a fake reality show which he put his name to but was developed by someone else. He was just the dummy head of the show. Again Rump took credit for work done by someone else. So it is no surprise he would take credit for this ceasefire. When a terrorist group thinks you are the crazy one, that says a lot. The rest of the world is bracing for what is about to happen in the US from next week. The crazy is about to be unleashed on the world thru America.

Hope the weekend is good for you.

 

[darkelf9]

Afternoon all,

Well the Aussie women have secured the Women's Ashes trophy by winning the first of the T20's against England. After their clean sweep of the ODI's, England had to win all the T20's but they couldn't contain the Aussies to a low score on Monday night's game. The Aussies have so much depth of talent that two of their star players were missing, yet they still won. Alana King got the wickets at the right time again. It now seems amazing that she was looked over for any T20 games previously. Well done to our Aussie women. The rest of the games should be just for fun, but given the Aussies desire to win, they will go after the next two T20's. I'll be watching the next T20 tonight.

The heat seemed to go on for a long time here in Melbourne. Went on for 5 straight days, which again is not normal. We already had a week of temp's in the 30's in the previous week. At least the nights were not too bad but sleeping didn't happen till the early hours when things cooled down a bit. The heat also brought out the wasps wander under the house, so I called the pest control people this week after I confirmed there was activity I could see. I get lots of bees and other flying insects in my garden due to the flowering plants and trees so I'm used to working out there along side insects buzzing around me. This is the second time 12 months I've had to deal with wasps. There has only been a few so it seems they have found a food source rather than are making a nest under there. Always takes 2-3 days to get rid of them. Apparently having bees is worse due to the mess they leave behind which can be costly to deal with, especially if they are in your walls. So wasps are better to have according the pest control guy. The main issue is that can sting you multiple times but largely leave you alone. They do hate noise as I found out last time. You can even buy fake hornets nests which scares off wasps. The apparently are afraid of hornets. So once the wasps are gone the next task will be to close up any gaps in that area and may look into those fake hornet nests. Just another task to add to the list of things to do to sell up. I noticed the cost of the pest control has gone up by about $90 compared to last year.

My back is much better but still have a niggle if I move in a certain way. Almost back to normal but I'm not doing any proper physical work till next week. I tested out the back and felt ok the next day. This month was going well till I got the back pain two weeks ago at which point I could walk nor move without pain. Will see how I go doing the grocery shopping this week. Last week the short walks from the car to do the grocery shopping and going to the chemist, were very painful and I had to rest up for a couple of days afterwards.

Another one of my friends has joined the 60's yr old club. Lots of my friends are now in their 60's and the rest are approaching that age milestone quickly. Of course talk of retirement is always a topic of conversation once someone gets to their 60's. The retirement age in Australia is now 67 and the previous rule of women being allowed to retire at 60yrs old has also been scrapped. Previously women could retire aged 60yrs old and for men it was 65. This was the rule for a several decades. I remember this all the way back to the 80's when I first entered the workforce. The rules only changed in 2023. It was a phased in approach based on people's current age at the time of transition which makes sense.

So Rump is President again and the stupidity has happened on day one. He has pardoned all those people who were convicted of rioting and assaulting police officers. If seems ironic that a felon is pardoning other criminals. America is in deep shit, when criminals get to absolve other criminals of their crimes and all this is perfectly legal in America which is fucking nuts, but as Americans like to say they are the greatest country on the planet. Well that is true in one sense, America is the craziest country on Earth and the most corrupt with the rise of Rump and the far right in America. The fact that the far right now has ultimate power in America is something you would never associate with America in the past. But this is now history in America. In the same way slavery and segregation is part of American history. The Rump supporters are going ape shit at their win and are gloating and seeking revenge on people they think are responsible for their sad lives. They will soon learn the costs of everything is not coming down. That went up because of COVID and we are all living with those increased costs, even here in Australia. No politician controls the price of consumer goods like groceries. With Rump's tariffs on Mexico, Canada and China it will be Americans who are going to pay even higher prices for goods. For example guacamole is made from avocado's. All avocados used in America come from Mexico so the cost of guacamole in America is going to go up as is the price of avo's. None of Rump's supporters have a clue of this fact. Then again they don't have many brain cells to begin with and are more sheep than people, so easily herded where Rump wants them to go. You only have to listen to Rump supporters talk and you can tell these people are not intelligent. So the next four years in America is going to be chaos and Americans can't blame any other country for what is going to happen them. They voted for it. Rump reckons America is going into a golden age with him as President. Well in some respect that is true, he is going to piss on everything and everyone that he sees as a threat. As part of those golden showers Rump is going to give everyone in the US, he had a big tantrum about the flags being flown at half staff on his big day because of Carter's death, so he bullied the house speaker to ensure the flags were flown at full staff for him. Rump is such a child. That he would piss on the grave of a former President.

Our news is going to be flooded with the insane Rump has done and going to do in the next two years. I'm sure why people are trying to rationally understand his actions and also why Democrats are being so polite about it. Republicans expect Democrats to be civil yet Republicans have no intention of communicating in a respectful way. When only one side is playing by the rules, that is not an environment that deserves respect. So Democrats need to get angry and fight back by treating Republicans in a similar manner. Only then will they get respect, otherwise Republicans will that civility as a weakness. The holidays showed Democrats not allowing their family who voted for Rump to come to family events. Which is how it should be. If someone does something to harm you, you don't invite them into your home nor continue to talk to them. I've seen this in the work place. The person causing the issue can't understand when people respond in a negative way and then try to play the victim which is when you need to give them a taste of their own medicine, otherwise they won't change their behaviour. I have seen on Youtube so many people posting videos of being a victim but when you actually listen to what they are saying, it becomes clear they are the problem.

I never thought of it at the time but had to laugh when someone referred to Melania as The Hamburglar. It actually fits. The only thing she was missing was the cape and mask as she already had the right colour scheme just not as many white strips. She obviously didn't want Rump anywhere near her face given the wide brim on the hat. You couldn't even see her eyes, but she is looking older. Anyway I thought that was funny. Also Rump not placing his hand on the bibles when taking the oath. It was like crossing your fingers behind your back as a way of say, I'm lying when I take this oath. One thing is for sure, Rump did have the smallest crowd at his inauguration in US history which was his choice. He could of done it outside. There were lots of people outside in the cold.

The weather cooled off late on Tues afternoon. I was out with the pest controller earlier that day and it was so damn hot and humid, but a couple of hours later the cool change came thru without any rain. The winds switched to the south which is where the cooler weather comes from in Melbourne. We are getting several cooler days till the heat comes back on Monday. The reprieve from the heat feels good and makes you want to do stuff.

Hope the rest of the week is good for you.

 

[darkelf9]

Afternoon all,

Given it's Australia Day I thought it only fitting that this post on the Aussie Thread be totally Aussie. And what could be more Aussie than going to Bunnings on the weekend. And no I did not partake of the sausage sizzle which has become a mixture of health and safety and PC. Who puts onions on the bottom of a sausage between a slice of bread? The only reason Bunnings does this now is because someone complained about slipping on some friend onions and Bunnings doesn't want to be sued. If Bunnings really cared about health and safety for the sausage sizzles, they wouldn't allow white bread to be used. That stuff will kill quicker than stepping on fried onions. Bunnings was busy although the traffic around that area was rather quiet. I also had a typical Aussie weekend with a little creature enter the house though a gap I found by following the little fella out. Never had a gecko come into the house before and especially here in Melbourne. The long stretches of heat we have had in Melbourne this month is causing more activity of the wildlife looking for cooler spaces. So I've added closing up that gap to the other list of small tasks to close up other gaps found during my wasps encounter. It seems the treatment for those wasps worked. Now the other larger task begins of fitting a fly screens to all those air flow vents at the back of the house. Never was an issue before but with these warmer Summers it could happen again and getting the pest controllers out is not cheap. I'm also going to try the fake hornets nest thing. But I'm going for the ultra cheap and easy version which is just a crumpled brown paper bag with some shredded paper inside to give it volume. The same pest controller guy who came out for this latest job, told me about it last time he was here. Apparently it kinda works. So will have to engage my craft skills from my school days. I also found it nearly impossible to find brown paper bags in the supermarket. All the lunch bags these days are plastic zip lock bags. The staff member I asked in Coles didn't have a clue. She was very young though so I doubt she even knew what I was talking about. It's only older people like me who remember having their lunches put in brown paper bags for school. And we used to call our morning tea snacks, play lunch. Not sure what the kids call it these days.

Had to ditch the old garden boots which weren't really proper garden boots, just an old pair of boots I had. I always try to give things a second life. So when I blew out the other boots which finally gave up, I splashed out on a proper pair of work boots with steel caps. They were only $39 so not a big outlay. Last time I wore safety boots is when I worked in a factory environment and had to wear them whenever I went through a workshop. But I had the fancy ones which looked like a normal pair of shoes and they were slip ons. I still have an old pair of safety shoes that they forget to ask for back. When doing the mowing I prefer boots to runners because of the bits of stuff that gets kicked up.

Watched the last two games of the women's Ashes T20 matches and the English were just not good enough. They might have won the second T20 as initially the rain helped them, then they lost too many wickets and the rain became another issue to deal with. But if they had done a better job of restricting the Aussies to a lower score they could of won the second T20. So now to get some pride back the English need to win the day night test match here in Melbourne next week starting on the 30th. I'll be watching that one as well. The Aussies have won everything and have 12 points compared to zero for the English. I don't understand the 4 day format of the women's test match. Why aren't they allowed to play a normal 5 day test? They play a lot of 4 day matches in the UK, but not sure why that should be the format for an Ashes test match. The women are fit enough to play 5 days. They are certainly as good if not better than the men's team. The Aussie women have been dominant for over a decade yet not given the same recognition as the men which is crap. The women's matches don't get enough support nor funding. The Aussie women are champions and at the top of their sport so should get equal billing with the men's game.

Another Aussie thing is Vegemite. So I purchased a box of those Shapes with the Vegemite and cheese flavour. I like a stronger taste of Vegemite so not really to my taste but ok. When I put Vegemite on toast I put on a thicker spread of it. Don't really use butter or marg either. Depends on the bread I use and no I don't use white bread. Every doctor you talk to will tell you it is not good for you and especially if you're over 45yrs old. I've also gone back to my childhood and purchased some Quick. It was all the rage when I was a kid. A teaspoon or two of Quick and cold milk. I liked to have two spoons of it in a glass of milk. That was when we called Nestle, "Nessiles", not "Nestlay" as they call it these days. Nestle has been around in Australia for many decades. Nestle condensed milk is world wide. The British were big promoters of it. And yes the Americans will claim they invented condensed milk, but it depends on who makes a product global that gets the credit. Ford didn't invent the car, he just found a way to mass produce it so he gets the credit.

Australia Day is officially today but the public holiday is happening tomorrow (Monday) so you could say we get two days for Australia Day. Which was not always the case. The LNP are dead set on not changing the date as they harke back to their supposed British heritage and still worship the Union Jack as the proper flag even though a vast majority of Aussies, even those with English heritage like me, don't identify with the Union Jack being on our flag. We associate the Union Jack with people from England not Australia so to us it's virtually meaningless for it to be included in anything Aussie. The Southern Cross is what we identify with more and other Aussies identify with the Indigenous Flag which represents the colours of the land which are uniquely Australian. If you see a picture or scene in a movie of Aussie countryside or the outback, you know right away it's Australia.

The discussion on Australia Day is always should we change the date. The more important discussion is why don't we include the entire history of the country in our learning. It's fine to have statues to Cook and other whitefellas who had an impact on Australian society. Until we are ready to include all the true history of Australia in our text books and history books, the discussion about Australia Day will not stop. It's not that indigenous people are asking for their own statues of their leaders, it's about acknowledging the past truthfully. Australia is not alone in these discussions. Every country which was colonised by the respective invaders, wants the same thing. Acknowledgement of the past and recognition of the actions of those who invaded those lands and countries. It is hard for white people to accept the truth because it's a reflection of the actions of their ancestors who took those actions because they thought at the time, things would not change and society would become less tolerant of those activities. They didn't care about the future. Which is why we are in such a polarised position today. The only thing that is for certain is change. Nothing stays the same. Your actions today will impact future generations of your family. The only thing you need to decide is which side of history do you want to be on. Because you can bet your arse you will be judged by future generations and you can't control that.

Hope Australia Day is good for you no matter how you choose to spend the day.

 

[darkelf9]

Afternoon all,

Well Rump is now declaring a trade war on every country. He's gone made with power. His base might be cheering but this is only going to hurt America. As for his call to drill for more oil in America, well the oil companies control the pricing so they don't want to keep drilling if the price goes down due to oversupply. The Arab states do the same thing to keep the price of a barrel of oil high. The price of oil and diamonds is artificially high because there is plenty of both but those who control these markets ensure the prices remain high. So American oil companies are not doing anything different, it's all about profit for private companies, they don't give a shit what politicians say. Rump is once again not in touch with reality nor it seems how market forces work and after all he is a failed business man. None of his businesses made a profit as he drove them all into debt.

Rump is also complaining that Europe doesn't buy American cars. Well why would they given Europe is home to a couple of large car manufacturers, plus American cars wouldn't fit down a large number of city streets in most European countries. If anyone has been to a European city you would of noticed how narrow the streets are. So trying to get a typical American car around those narrow streets wouldn't work. When I was touring through Europe and was in Paris I noticed they park their cars on the footpath because the streets are so narrow. Tour buses can't drive around some of those streets. Rumps comment also demonstrates a typical American mentality when it comes to understanding other countries. In short Americans are largely ignorant of other countries and other societies. Very much how the British were when invading other countries. No fucking understanding of foreign lands, just import British shit that doesn't work. Americans are much the same these days. Every dictator is only in power until the people rise up against them. The only thing with Rump is when will the rest of American society that didn't vote for him decide that enough is enough. The MAGA group are a lost cause so don't expect anything that resembles morality to govern their actions. They want a dictatorship provided it's on their terms. They don't want a free America. If you don't agree with their fucked view of the world well then you are the enemy and then they act out with violence. That is all the right of politics knows. When challenged and they lose an argument the right turns to violence.

Rump's edicts to get rid of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion is another sign of Amercia regressing to the 1950's. There would be no need for DEI if there wasn't discrimination by white men over several hundred years. DEI is there to ensure that non-white people and women have an equal chance of getting a job and progressing in white societies. If the discrimination and racism didn't exist in white societies there would be no need to have DEI, as the American's call it. It is not there to give non-white people priority, it's there to even up the chances of everyone in society getting a chance to progress in the job market. Keeping in mind these non-white people do the have the qualifications to get these higher level jobs. The right of politics seems to assume non-white people are just given job regardless of their qualifications which just shows how insure these white people are. The reason there are mandated quotas of DEI is because traditionally those at the top of these organizations only recruit white people to the top jobs to keep the control with white people. They are fine with non-white people getting jobs at the lower levels provided these non-white people can be controlled which is why white people now feel threatened, because they are losing control. And god forbid that a non-white person is in charge of a white person. Apparently that is against the natural world order. Hitler had the same view of society.

Here in Australia Diversity and Equity training is mandatory in all work places. Rump has signed edicts to sack anyone who is non-white and also women in positions of leadership. He has recently sacked yet another senior female military figure because she is a woman. These sackings of senior female military figures is due to jealousy from men in the military who don't believe a woman in the military can be at the top of the chain of command of men. The US is now at adds with the Human Rights laws overseen by the UN. So you can bet American groups will take Rump to the UN about his Human Rights violations that will come. Women are also the big losers from this idea of removing Diversity and Equity. Again it is ironic that women in America voted for this so let's not forget that fact. They voted for women to lose their jobs. Women in America need to be smarter about who they vote for. Women keep saying they are smarter than men and that they are strong and independent in the US. They forgot to add there are also millions of stupid strong independent women as well. Just as dumb as the men who voted for Rump. Gender is not a barrier to stupidity as Americans have proven.

In the latest stupid stuff coming out of America, Google Maps has decided without consultation to any other country nor international charting organizations to rename the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America but only for viewing by Americans. So if you are in America and you search the Gulf of Mexico you will get Gulf of America but if anyone from another country does the same google search they will see the correct name of Gulf of Mexico. So now America is just naming stuff on world maps for viewing by Americans only. WTF is going on in that stupid country? We all know that Americans are geographically challenged people anyway so this is just adding to Americans believing they are the centre of earth and that all other countries only exist if America says they do. America as a country is fast becoming a joke to the rest of the world. The EU has told to get fucked as have other non-EU countries. He has had made it clear he wants Gaza to be cleaned out of Palestinians. He tried to force Jordan to take Palestinians and they told him to go fuck himself and now he is trying to bully Europe into taking people from Gaza and they also told him to go fuck himself. The year is young yet and there are lots of other countries for America to piss off this year. Let's see who is next to tell America to fuck off.

Here in Melbourne we had one major day of heat on Monday when it got close to 42C then later the same day the temp dropped by nearly 20C in a few hours. We also got a thunderstorm and some rain which kept going into the early hours of the Tues morning. The rest of Tues was rather windy so not a good day to be out in the garden. Too much stuff flying around but at least it was about half the temp of the day before and we are having temps in the low 20's for the rest of this week. The heat is returning from Sat and we'll be back up to the high 30'sC by Sunday so good days for washing the clothes. Expecting three days in a row of 37C then a cool change late on Tues next week. So I'll be inside for those days. I spent a couple of hours today doing what I thought were a couple of simple tasks on the car. Replacing the wiper blade rubbers is an easy task which I've done lots of time before but not today. I bought the refills with the plastic backing and well they are shit. One went on but the other one didn't after I cut it to size. The plastic ended just crimped and I couldn't get it second one on. Tried all sorts of things but once that plastic end failed not matter what I did even cutting a bit more off. So I have to go back to Repco but this time get the refills with the metal inserts. The plastic version is crap. Never buying those again. Also did a bit of gap filing work on the oustide of the house. Ran out of time to finish it off so that is now a task for Friday along with some garden work. Was going to do this next week but the weather is going be too hot so cramming tasks in this week.

The wasps issue I had last week has been resolved so now the task of finding a solution to try an ensure it doesn't happen again. I think I have a solution but will see if it works. I also saw the back fence needs some attention so need to close up some gaps. It's not going to look pretty but it's more about maintaining the privacy than how it looks, plus when I sell up in a few months, they are going to demolish the back fence anyway and put up a higher one. All fences these day are higher. The other tasks I was going to do this week related to selling up are now on hold till I can deal with these new issues as they are more urgent. Jan for me apart from my birthday has been a rather crappy month. Will see what Feb brings apart from the heat. Feb in Melbourne is usually hotter than Jan and it is certainly going to start off that way.

Hope the rest of the week is good for you.

 

[darkelf9]

Afternoon all,

So a new month and speculation is high that the long awaited interest rate cut will happen this month. We'll see if the RBA agrees as they are their own entity and as we have seen in the past they aren't influenced by how people are dealing with costs. For me the only interest in whatever the RBA does is on bank interest rates. Also with selling up this year, the cut in interest rates is a positive for selling property. Either way it won't influence my decision to sell up. The decision by the RBA will govern when the Federal Election will be called. If the interest rate cut happens this month then the election will be called next month to go for an April election date. I also just found out that due to changes in election boundaries, I'm in a new Federal Electorate that has an independent MP so I'm no longer in a Labor held seat. Which is a change because ever since I've lived here the electorate has been a Labor stronghold so we never got any money as part of an election campaign. They only do that for marginal seats to win votes.

Managed to get back in the garden at the end of last week but was feeling a bit of a twinge in the back at the end of the work. Being out there for 2 hours was possibly a bit too much too soon after the back issue. It was a cooler day so nicer to be outside and with the heatwave predicted it was the best option to be outside. So in hindsight it was the right call, just didn't need the pain at the end of that task. Also today since it we are only getting 24C I was back out in the garden in the backyard this time trimming up a couple of trees. The garden bin is full again. Was waiting for the recent hot spell to move on before mowing the backyard. But we are back up to 30C tomorrow so it's now a weekend task. The new boots gave me a severe shoe bite so will give that a couple of more days to heal up. Wasn't aware I was bleeding till I was in the shower and felt a burning sensation on my leg. Funny how it was just the left leg above the ankle. Nothing on the right leg. Just one more thing to deal with and of course more pain, which is a fact of life as you get older.

So we had another heat wave for Melbourne this week which started on Sat and went for 4 days. It is the hottest heatwave we have had this Summer. It slowly built up from Sat with 30C which doesn't seem that hot but the humidity was the main issue. Then things just got worse over the next couple of days with temps of 38 and 39C then a slightly cooler day on Tues of 34C but still humid. It go so humid that we actually had a thunderstorm in the evening of those hotter days and the temp dipped by 10 degrees but went back up again to 39C the next day. When the proper cool changed arrived later on the 34C day the temp dropped by 10 degrees in 30 mins. It was a quick turn around. Didn't get any rain with that system in Melbourne unless you lived in the northern suburbs and in northern Vic. And today it is a nice day but not much of breeze so that means of course it is warming up again. So the outside canvas awning stays down for another couple of days. We are getting a reprieve from the heat on Friday for a couple of days then come Monday the heat is coming back but not as bad as this week. Still warm enough to not be outside doing anything.

Managed to sort out the small drama about changing the windscreen wipers. Normally a very easy task that takes minutes but not this time. But I learned a lesson to stick with full rubber refills. The new ones with the plastic backing are crap. As I discovered not only are they difficult to cut to size but also the rubber can easily detach from the plastic. So I went back to the full rubber type with the metal inserts. When I got my car serviced one time I was asked if I wanted the wiper refills changed. They wanted to charge me $80 to do the change. The cost of refill is about $10 so the rest is just labour which as I said only takes a few minutes normally. That is a huge rip off. Same as when plumbers charge $90 to change one washer. A female friend of mine was charged $400 to change 4 washers. Another example of tradies taking advantage of women. Same thing happens when women take their cars in for a service. They talk to guys differently to when they talk to women. They just assume guys know more about cars than women which is a generalisation. If you are going to drive a car you should at least know the basics and always ask questions, never just accept what they tell you when you get your car serviced. I don't know a lot about cars but I'm good at asking questions to determine the bullshit from facts.

Well there has been some acknowledgement that Cardinal Pell raped two boys. Which is no good to the two victims one of which took his own life. While that predator Pell was alive, the Catholic Church rejected these claims and aggressively tried to discredit these victims. Even Little Johnny came out to defend Pell who is his mate. Little Johnny even tried to get Pell a state funeral saying he was an icon of society. Even though Pell was convicted he was released on appeal due to his medical issues which was not right. He should of died in jail where he belonged rather than being supported by the Catholic Church in a secret hideaway. Little Johnny was and is still a big supporter of Pell and has never acknowledged Pell was a child abuser even though there is plenty of evidence he was. In recent times we have stories about bishops in England being involved is sexual abuse cases so it's not just one denomination that has predator clergy. I laugh when I see mothers go apeshit over a man in a dress reading stories to toddlers who only see someone in dress up, yet these same mothers willingly hand over their children to men dressed as priests without an an objection. All these mothers who abide by this double standard call themselves Christians. Doesn't sound like something Jesus would agree with. Also these same mothers when single were probably trying to fuck anything with a pulse. They only got Christian when they had a kid. They all seem to turn into the Virgin Mary when they have kids.

The Aussie women dominated the English team in the test match at the MCG. Annabel Sutherland was amazing with her century and made 163 runs. She is another Melbourne girl in the team doing amazing work. She is only 23 and still relatively new to the team. First woman to make 100 runs in a test at the MCG. She comes from a sports talented family so it is in the genes and she was good at an early age. The last time a Victorian made a ton at the MCG was back in 1983 so that's over 40yrs ago. Victorians don't get much of a run in test teams which are dominated by players from NSW which is no coincidence given a majority of selectors have been from NSW. It is far easier to get into the Aussie test teams if you come from NSW. The Aussie men also won their match in Sri Lanka at the same time as the women were winning their test match. Never seen that before. It was hard to keep up with what was happening in both test matches at the same time. It may have been the first time a husband and wife were playing in a test match at the same time and playing in a winning team. Not sure if there are any cricket records on that in the history books.

Bushfires are still burning in Vic. The Grampians fire is still going and with the heatwave here in Vic, the fires are getting more energy to keep going. So whilst it might not be making the news any more the fire hasn't gone away. Whilst we are having fires burning here in Vic, in Qld their issue is floods. Which shows what a large land mass we have in Australia. We can have massive bushfires and floods at the same time of year.

So Rump was the first to blink in his tariffs on Canada and Mexico. A few hours before they were about to come into force he made a couple of phone calls to the leaders of Canada and Mexico to save face because Wall Street was losing money. He also didn't expect both Canada and Mexico to retaliate with their own tariffs on the USA which would of hurt US producers that send their goods to Canada. Things like fruit juice and Jack Daniels were being taken off shelves in Canadian stores. So for all his tough talk Rump has shown he is a pussy. If he wanted to be the tough guy he wouldn't have made those phone calls to get himself out a situation he created. Not the first time he has done that and won't be the last. He causes an issue then changes his mind and boasts he averted a crisis. One of his own making. The man is just a coward when faced with people who stand up to him. All the things he announced that Canada and Mexico had agreed to do, they were already doing so it was a total bullshit story from the guy who just help buy lie about everything.

Hope the rest of the week is good for you.

 

[darkelf9]

Afternoon all,

Another week in America and another week of the country being run by a lunatic. Rump is doing what he said he was going to do and the Democrats are just sitting back and letting it happen working at a snails pace. This is because most of them are old and set in their ways of being polite and working to a different set of social rules. Meanwhile there is a guy running around with a torch burning down the house and the Dems are debating on which organization to call to deal with both the madman and the demolition of the house. It seems they are waiting for the place to be in ashes before they consider any action. The younger Dems are going on the attack. Unlike our political system, in the US they don't have a co-ordinated leadership for the party not in govt. Sure they have leaders in the House and Senate but not an opposition leader so they have to hold a committee meeting on every fucking issue and come to a consensus which is a bit like the Trees in Lord of the Rings holding a discussion on what to do about the bad shit happening. Takes for fucking ever to come to a conclusion. So while the Dems are scratching their collective arses, the Republicans are shitting all over the constitution. America resembles for more Nazi Germany than America right now. If you're going to work in America in the next four years and you are not white, there is a chance someone will report you to law enforcement as an illegal migrant. Black people in America have been putting up with this shit for a couple of hundred years, now it's the turn of other non-white people to treated in the same way. And if you speak any other language than English and you are thinking of visiting America in the next for years, you could find yourself in jail, especially if you are in a Republican state cause some dumb white person is more than likely to either go vigilante on you or report you to the cops as an illegal migrant. If you are a white tourist, then you are far safer in this new America.

Rump has fired all the DOJ people who worked on his trials. So he is out for revenge which Republicans are cheering on. He has got rid of Inspector Generals there to have oversight of govt decisions. ICE is taking people off the street and locking them up including taking kids away from their parents. White neighbours are informing on anyone they think is an illegal immigrant in their neighbourhood. ICE are arresting Native Americans believing them to be illegal migrants which is ironic given it's the ICE agents who are descendants of illegal migrants. I mean who the fuck invited the white people to America. Sure as fuck wasn't the Native American tribes. So all white people were illegal migrants and therefore all white people are descendants of illegal migrants. ICE even tried to arrest a US veteran because he spoke Spanish. If you no speak Spanish in America and you are not white, someone is going to call the cops on you and you can bet that someone is a Republican. Saw the latest stupid act by a white Republican who harassed two council workers because they were speaking Spanish. And when the guy was arrested he was given bail because he was a white guy. If he was black, he wasn't getting bail. He would be going straight to prison. There are different laws for white people in America, especially in Republican states.

With Rump talking about DEI so much, does he realise his pick for the head of the FBI is a DEI. Kash Patel is not an anglo. Patel is not an Anglo-Saxon name. Does Rump know that? So just because Kash Patel kisses Rump's arse, he is not a brown guy? So with Rump you are only DEI if you are not loyal to Rump and not willing to bend over? I don't get it. As for women we know Rump has a type. They need to look like his daughter. If you notice, most of the women who speak for Rump are young and blond and most are not smart. Sure they have a degree and stuff but are not common sense smart. They love to be near power and Rump has the power which attracts women and it seems not smart women. They are all a bit touched in the head. You just have to hear them talk. His new press secretary isn't going to last long in the job. She had at least one dummy spit then ran away when the questions got too hot. Her social media name is now Press Secretary Barbie, because she is blond and plastic and every time she talks she sounds naive. This is frankly an insult to Barbie which is seen as an empowerment figure for women. It was the female reporters that went after her and she couldn't handle it. So I'm guessing it will end in her tears. Rump's last female press secretary couldn't handle it either. She only got the gig because of her dad being a former Republican politician. The other one ended up hiding in the bushes to avoid the press. This trend of Republicans having stupid people as press secretaries continues.

Rump's Chief of Staff was touted as someone who was strong and could control Rump's extreme behaviour, well that has turned out to be totally false. She is no better at controlling Rump than anyone else. In fact this time around Rump doesn't have anyone in his inner circle to control him, apart from a bucket of chicken which acts as a pacifier and then tell him he is a good boy. Given the crazy shit Rump has done and said, if he wasn't President, he would of been committed to an aged care facility because of his rants. Now he has signed a Presidential decree to put sanctions on members of the ICC which is just fucking crazy and laughable, given it is the International Criminal Court who very shortly might have to preside over Rump's proposals to do ethnic cleansing in Gaza. So Rump might find himself in their firing line. This is like him renaming the Gulf of Mexico. Means fuck all outside of the US. I doubt most of his supporters even know what the ICC is. They probably think it's a US govt agency. I mean his supporters are the dumbest people on the planet who have no concept of the rest of the world. I mean most of them think people from Puerto Rico are immigrants rather than American citizens. Which is why Puerto Ricans are the latest group being swept up in ICE raids. ICE are showing they are not very intelligent people which makes you wonder if ICE sees all non-white people in the US as illegal immigrants. When they do dumb shit like detaining US citizens as illegal aliens, it shows they are not competent in doing their jobs. If you speak Spanish in America now there is a good chance you will be arrested. How anyone can confuse Native Americans with people from South American countries is beyond stupidity. This is purely a white people issue and another example of racism in America.

Speaking of racism, I find it fucking funny that a white British cop got his feelings hurt by Sam Kerr when she called him a stupid white man. Given that Sam Kerr is an indigenous Australian she has had her fair share of being on the receiving end of racism here in Australia. The cop even admitted he pursued the issue because he knew who she was. So he was looking for a line item to put on his CV showing he put a sports star in her place. The British cops will not come out of this in a good light. Both her and her partner thought the taxi driver was trying to assault them. Probably until the taxi driver realised who Sam Kerr was. Again it seems interesting that the actions of the taxi driver has not been questioned in this story which led to the cops getting involved. If this cop can't take members of the public criticizing him, then they are in the wrong job. They have far worse things said to them. Again I find it extremely funny when a white person is complaining about being on the receiving end of racism, given how much white privilege there is in western societies, where being white and in positions of power is seen as normal and correct. When I was young I was continuously asked where I was from because people were surprised someone with my permanent tan could speak English so well. Even in my 20's I was being asked by white Aussies how I liked living in Australia. Never got that question by non-white Aussies. I spent my entire school years here in Australia. So white Aussies at the time never considered either I was born here or came here as a toddler. I was even told in school by a few teachers that I spoke very good English which totally confused me at the time given I only ever spoke English. In my early years I didn't know what racism was so was confused when I was on the receiving end of these comments. It was all due to the colour of my skin, nothing else.

Hope the weekend is good for you.

 

[darkelf9]

Afternoon all,

Saw the Super Bowl on Monday our time and well Philly deserved the win. They were the better team on the day and the underdog, which people love to see unless you are the other team or support the other team. The game was over by half time. The Chiefs couldn't keep their quarterback safe which didn't give him time to make plays. The Aussie on the Philly team now has a Super Bowl ring. And he wasn't a kicker but on the offence team. Previous Aussie players have mainly been kickers which have gotten the notoriety.

Sam Kerr was found not guilty in her court case and the cops have been left with egg on their face for bringing the stupid charge in the first place. They only focused on her actions but totally disregarded the events that led up to the incident in the police station. The cop thought he would get a pat on the back for bagging a sports star but now he looks the fool. The cop needs rethink his career and if he is this touchy as a cop, he is in the wrong job because next time he will take his frustrations out in a physical way and no doubt the cops will back him up again. The police protect the badge more than they uphold the law. The UK cops continue to protect cops who rape women. These are only the cases reported, who knows how many of the sexual assaults by UK cops has actually happened. Our cops here in Australia are caught up in this abuse of power with cops stalking their exes, using police computer systems to track their targets. The cops have access to all our private info such as where we live and CCTV so it is quite easy for a cop to target anyone in the community with relative immunity knowing the police force will back them up out of a sense of protecting the badge. So the people we have as cops needs to be people of integrity not people with a sense of power over others.

I think I found a solution to my backyard fence issue. Has taken several days to think up a solution that would be cost effective and not be too physically demanding as I'm still wary of my back. Don't want to experience another painful episode. Really should replace that fence but well with me selling up and I know the new owners are only going to demolish the house, so they can pay for a new fence. Plus fencing is not cheap these days either with the cost of materials. So it's off to bunnings again this time with the right fence measurements and a plan in mind. The end result will not look pretty as the fence pailings are on the other side of the fence, but hopefully my solution will fix the issue. Was going to do a larger job on that fence by covering a large area with new fence palings but I'm not sure my back it up to that task in the short term. So I'm settling for a smaller task with much less effort on my part. I don't have one of those nail guns which would make the job quicker. Now all I need is some normal weather once I get the items I need. Not quite lumberjack stuff but it's not the first time I've had to patch up a fence. I don't have a trailer or a ute but the hatchback really comes in handy when hauling stuff. Paying someone to the job would be difficult as no handyman wants small tasks where there isn't any money to be made.

The latest news here in Aussie land is the latest anti-Semitic actions, this time by two Muslim nurses in Bankstown Hospital who thought it was clever to go on-line with a Jewish influencer from Israel and say they would kill any Jews under their care. They later said they were joking and were obviously boasting to show how tough they are in support for Gaza, but that was a rather dumb thing for them to do and also while on their shift in the hospital wearing they nursing uniforms. They could do this in the hospital because they were on night shift so obviously no-one else was on the ward. Both of them have since have been put on leave and will be sacked once the inquiry is done which now involves not only the NSW govt and NSW police but also the AFP for anti-terrorism. Until the investigation is concluded they can't be sacked. So these two nurses are in deep deep shit which will not only spill over into their respective families but also the Muslim community in their part of Sydney. They could be part of a group who have these views and also people in their inner circle so more people could get caught up in this incident. No doubt the LNP will call for them to be deported even if they are Australian citizens.

The rise of anti-Semitic actions in Australia is happening in different states so this is not isolated to one state nor to one Jewish community in Australia. Again not doubt there is a social media group who is encouraging these attacks on Jewish communities. It all started with those rallies supporting Gaza which has now turned into attacks on Jewish communities as somehow those actions are going to impact what has happened in Gaza. Not sure how this forwards the cause of Palestinians in Gaza. It only turns the community against those efforts. Now Jewish people in that Bankstown area will not want to go to their local hospital for fear of being targeted by any other Muslim nurses sympathetic to their two medical colleagues. Even though nurses in NSW have come out against the actions of these two nurses in NSW, the fear is still there that Jews will be targeted by other health professionals in other hospitals and in other states. This is not what Aussies would consider acceptable and I'm sure it's not the last of protests against these nurses who have just killed their careers and could end up in jail on anti-terrorism charges. A majority of the actions resulting from hate speech is home grown as is most of the terrorist actions. People being radicalised here in Australia from what they see on the internet.

Speaking of idiots, I had to laugh at a recent post on Youtube of a group of Nazi dipshits in the US parading around a local community with their Nazi flags. The funny part was they did this in a mainly black community which didn't go well for them when the locals descended upon them and chased them back into their U-Haul truck. Their Nazi flags were taken off them as they ran away from a group of locals. Prior to this a local guy pulled up in his car carrying a hand gun and was mocking them at which point they got scared that he had a gun and started calling him the N word. The cops were already there and did nothing to defuse the situation. Then more locals showed up, all black people, which resulted in these brave Nazi's running away. Later more members of the local black community came out carrying guns patrolling the locals streets looking for more Nazi's. Well it is America and everyone has a gun. It is perfectly legal in some states to openly carry a gun in the streets and the cops can't do anything about it. Later on the leaders of these Nazi's were identified on social media. Might be a while before these idiots try to do this again in a black neighbourhood. I mean they are Nazi's so not many brain cells between them. Rather than people in America just sitting back and letting these idiots march in their streets, they need to take similar action to those locals in that neighbourhood. Just confront these arseholes and they will run away. They are cowards who aren't even brave enough to show their faces.

Those Muslims in Deerborn in the US have gone all quiet after hearing that Rump wants to cleanse Gaza of Palestinians. Their bravado that was there prior to the elections seems missing now. Having a bit of buyers regret or more accurately they are getting a reality check of who Rump really is. They were going to send a message to Biden by voting for Rump, well all they have done is send a signal to their fellow Muslims in Gaza that they voted for the expulsion of Muslims from Gaza. Yet another case of dumb Americans doing dumb shit cause they want to exercise their freedoms. Freedom to be a stupid, plus they have very short memories of how Rump treated Muslims the last time he was in power. Even the guy who led the campaign against Biden to vote for Rump is now getting backlash on social media for misleading people about Rump. His name is now mud in his own community. This is another case of Fuck Around and Find Out.

The heat is back on this week but at least we are getting some rain later today at the end of another heatwave here in Melbourne. At the moment I'm just sitting here trying to stay cool till the cool change arrives and the thunderstorms hit later today. So far it has been an overcast day which has kept the heat down. Thankfully the rain will stick around for a few days to really cool things down. The prediction is that it will last till the end of the weekend, but well it is Melbourne so predicting any weather for longer than 3 days is difficult. Even when they predicted a warm spell the degree of heat always varies. It's not like the northern parts of Australia or even Sydney where the weather stays rather consistent. If you live in places like Darwin for Brisbane you know the temp every day as it only varies by a couple of degrees. So till next week I'll be inside the house rather than the outside. Next week we are expecting temps in the low 20's and much cooler nights so it will out of the shorts and back into the warmer gear. This weather has been good for washing the towels. They dry by the end of the day due to the heat. No need for a clothes dryer although when you take them off the line, they feel like they have been in a dryer, all warm to the touch.

Hope the weekend is good for you.

 

[darkelf9]

Afternoon all,

So we all know that Americans are geographically challenged, well Rump has taken that to a new level. His rant about cutting USAID and one of his examples was $50million for condoms being sent to Gaza. Well firstly the money allocated by USAID was being sent to a place with kinda the same name as Gaza, but it was Gaza Province in the southern area of Africa to help with reducing the spread of HIV amongst the local population plus other health care needs in that part of Africa. So not only did Rump and his dummies in the white house get the amount wrong they also confused a place in southern Africa with the Gaza strip where the Palestinians reside. I mean it isn't even on the same fucking continent which shows how illiterate Americans are when it comes to any geography outside the USA. Some Americans can't even remember that Alaska is a US state, some believe it belongs to Canada. As I've mentioned before a lot of Americans don't even know that people from Costa Rica are American citizens. It would be like us here in Australia not realizing that Norfolk Island is Australian territory. We aren't that stupid. So yet another example of America being run by a cast of clowns who were voted in by millions of dumb Americans. In fact there are more dumb Americans than the entire population of the UK which stands at about 79 million people. More people than that voted for Rump. Some Americans on social media are challenging people from other countries on social media for not voting for Rump. Like I said there are millions of dumb Americans and the second incarnation of Rump is showing how many dumb Americans there are.

I also find it funny that people who voted for Rump are now going on social media and trying to distance themselves from the dump shit Rump is doing. They voted for the fuckwit but now when it puts them in a negative light, they are trying to deny it's their fault. Other Americans who voted for Rump reckon what Rump is doing is great because these people hate their fellow Americans who didn't vote for Rump. Nor do Rump supporters care about anything else but their own needs. The shutting down of USAID has already resulted in the deaths of people relying on that money for local healthcare and some of those deaths are children who died because their local hospital had to shut down due to the money being stopped from USAID without any warning. People needing oxygen ended up dying because they couldn't get access to the oxygen to keep them alive. This was a direct result of Rump's action to shut down funding for USAID. Those people who voted for Rump are also responsible for the deaths of those kids but Republicans don't care. If children have to die to satisfy the ego of Republicans, they don't care. Which gives you a sense of what is happening in America right now. It is getting closer and closer to Nazi Germany pre-war.

Rump is also using the DOJ to go after govt officials who pursued prosecutions for Rump's crimes. He has threatened all those politicians who ran the Jan 6th hearings into his instigation of that coup. All these types of actions is how dictatorships start, then come the killings. Those Republicans who voted for Rump, voted for this chaos and history will remember what they did when it all turns to shit in America and there will a reckoning on Republicans when Rump's time is over. Rump is acting like a man who has no intention of giving up the Presidency and millions of Americans not only want that to happen they voted for it to happen. They also voted for America to become the most hated country on the planet. Americans will not be welcome anywhere except probably Russia. Here in Australia we sure as fuck don't want any dipshit who voted for Rump bringing their hate over here. We don't need American style politics in Australia. It is toxic just like the new Republican party. The way for the rest of the world to fight back is boycott US goods and yes even American booze. I bought some bourbon last week which is one I haven't tried before, but that may be the last bourbon I buy till Rump is removed. I saw some flat bread on sale in Woollies yesterday. I was going to buy it until I discovered it comes from the US so I didn't buy it.

And the hits to America keep coming. Now JD Vance has gone on the world stage in Europe and made an absolute arse of himself and of America. The VP showed his arrogance and disrespect to all European leaders who were attending that conference in Germany. He said that Germany should embrace the far right which means not only does Vance not know the history of WWII, he is telling Germany to embrace fascism. How dumb is this guy? He got smacked down by the German representative and in general Vance was seen as a dick head. He has shown that America is going to be an arrogant and aggressive country on the world stage for the remainder of Rump's presidency. America has traded on the fact it claims itself to be the peace keeper of the world, but now America is the aggressor and is acting and sounding very much like Nazi Germany before Hitler invaded Poland. Rump not to be out done has said that Ukraine is to blame for Russia's invasion and is to blame for the war. Now why would Rump say this? Well quite simply he is a fan of Putin and it's revenge on Zelenskyy because he wouldn't lie for Rump in the case of Hunter Biden. Rump wanted Zelenskyy to incriminate Hunter Biden and Zelenskyy told Rump he wouldn't lie for him. So this action by Rump is his revenge on Zelenskyy, it has nothing to do with the war in Ukraine. Rump is on a revenge tour. We now have America on the side of Russia and against it's allies in Europe. Not even Bush Jr was dumb enough to do that. Rumps first few weeks in power has all been about revenge and once again Americans voted for this and Americans will pay a price for their stupidity.

The truth about those Inspectors General has now come out. The reason some of them were fired was they were looking into Musk's business practices for corruption and fraud. So this was a purge by Musk to stop any investigations into this businesses. It had nothing to do with efficiency as he claims. Then again nothing Musk is doing has anything to do with efficiency. This stuff is right out of Project 2025. So you can bet in any court case, which these Inspectors General are now progressing with, these issues about Musk will come out in court and be put on the public record. Now I don't expect most Americans will care cause well they don't.

This week here in Melbourne we are having a nice cool week. Temps in the low 20's and we got some rain on the weekend as well which was nice to keep things cool. I've had a slow start to the week and been recharging my batteries although I did spend a couple of hours in the backyard mowing and trimming things back. Not quite sure yet how I want the backyard to look for sale as I like a natural looking garden so not a fan of everything being tidy and trimmed to the last mm. Nature doesn't do it so why we try to work against nature with our square and tidy gardens doesn't make any sense. The heat is coming back tomorrow after a cool start. Three days of temps in the 30'sC. Hottest day will be Sat with 37C being predicted then hopefully some rain with the cool change on Sunday. We get one cool day next week then we going back up to the 30'sC to end the month. Thankfully I don't have any more major jobs in the garden to do so I can ease off on that stuff and just get back to normal garden tasks. I now have some additional tasks to take care off which is purely maintenance after which I'll get back to task to sell the place so just taking things a week at a time. I also need to remind myself I'm not as young as I was and just keep that in mind when doing stuff. What they don't tell you about getting older is that pain becomes a regular result of actions. You have to learn to live and deal with it.

I have been playing some of the Mircosoft games on my PC while waiting for the next lot of video games I want to play. Will have to wait till March and won't need to buy a PS5 for this one as it comes out on PS4 as well. Not a fan of the in game payments for these Microsoft games so I'm avoiding paying for stuff which does limit how much time I spend on these games but they fill in time when I'm waiting for other stuff. When I was out doing the grocery shopping yesterday I also went down to JB HiFi and purchased the new season of the Darryl Dixon series so looking forward to seeing that one.

Hope the weekend is good for you.

 

[roomandu]

Hi guys

Laurel and Manu are tweaking the site, and some threads will be closed due to size ( see here -----> http://forum.literotica.com/showpost.php?p=50963514&postcount=236067 )

So, I have started a new one for us and sent the links for both this one and the old one to Laurel, as requested.
It's slightly annoying, but I completely understand why admin have to do this!

I will pm as many of you as I can with the new link, but if I miss anyone please let them know

WOOHOO
Finally found you other awesome people from the Grreat Southern Land
Rupert here from Perth, West Oz
Grew up in the Apple Isle, but been working on the Mainland since I was 16
How the hell are you sexy F%kk#rz??

 

[darkelf9]

WOOHOO
Finally found you other awesome people from the Grreat Southern Land
Rupert here from Perth, West Oz
Grew up in the Apple Isle, but been working on the Mainland since I was 16
How the hell are you sexy F%kk#rz??

Must admit quoting a post from 2013 might just confuse some people, given it's the first post from this thread, but welcome anyway. Had a couple of people from Perth on here. Just put the beers in the fridge. Yes that song from Icehouse Great Southern Land is now iconic and it's part of a tourist video. I'm waiting for them to turn "It's a long way to shop if you want a sausage roll", into an ad campaign.

 

[roomandu]

Now quoting that particular version of the song, @darkelf9, really would confuse the f$#k out of people... lol

 

[darkelf9]

Afternoon all,

Well if you didn't think America was a racist country then just look at the latest action by Rump. He has fired a General who is the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff because he is a black man and replaced him with a white General. Now this Rump appointed General told Rump previously that he would kill for him. So a respected General has been replaced by a General who has indicated to Rump that he will be Rump's personal executioner which is fucking insane, but when people have elected you to be King of America, you need people who will kill for you. We can't have military leaders that pledge loyalty to a politician above loyalty to their country. That is dangerous. The US in their latest stupidity has sided with Russia and North Korea against a UN resolution supporting Ukraine. When America starts taking the side of two dictatorships against democratic countries is to no longer a country you can trust.

Now that America and Americans have turned their back on the rest of the free world, America is now a country that can not be trusted by any of it's allies including Australia. America can no longer claim to be the leader of the free world because it now sides with Russia and any other dictator. Again Americans voted for this because they put Rump into power. Don't blame Rump he hasn't changed, the American people have allowed this chaos and destruction of western alliances that have stood since the end of WWII. The five eyes alliance is essentially dead because the other 4 countries in that alliance can no longer trust the US to not pass on intel to Putin. What Europe needs to do is re-arm itself. It can do it. Germany has the same capability to ramp up it's military output just like the US did in 1940 after Hitler invaded France. I mean when the President of the US gives a speeches where he repeats word for word Hitler's speeches then it shows America is not the nation we have come to rely on in time of conflict. The words that Rump used to talk about immigrants as vermin and that they are poisoning the blood of America, is the exact same words used by Hitler when he was talking about Jews in Germany. All this info is available on the internet and on public record for all to look at, except if you live in America where they are totally clueless to history or anything outside America. If Americans were not this clueless they wouldn't of voted for Rump the second time around so now he thinks he is King of America. He even put out a social media post proclaiming himself King and he wasn't joking, he actually sees himself that way now because he was voted back in to power.

The other consequence of what America is now saying on the world stage will give Japan pause to rethink it's strategy of now having a proper defence force which is a hangover from WWII. So the consequence of Rump's action could see a re-armed Germany which would make certain European countries nervous and by the same token if Japan decides it can't rely on America and therefore re-arms it's military to become a capable fighting force again, it will make countries in Asia nervous because of Japan's military capabilities of the past. They are not a big nation size wise but they have a large population and know how to use their military. China wouldn't want a stronger Japanese military as it knows what happened last time. So the dynamics of the military forces in a number of countries will need to upscale since the US is now a country that can't be trusted to be an ally, but instead be a disruptor around the world. America is now a country that demands tribute from other countries otherwise America will impose economic and military force on those countries, who for the last 80yrs have been seen as friendly countries. America is determined to wipe away the last 80yrs of history for it's own selfish gains. This is not going to end well for America nor for Americans. The rest of the world will just stop engaging with America and it will find itself isolated. Trade will be difficult because if a country doesn't kowtow to America, they will face tariffs on their goods which means less of their goods will be sold in America, which then results in traditional trading partners with the US seeking other markets such as Asia and Europe. Australia provides America with less that 1% of all the aluminium they import, yet Rump says he is going to impose a tariff on all Australian aluminium and steel as of next month. There is just no way America comes out of this on top. As I said previously countries need to send a message to America by boycotting American goods and see how long it takes the American economy to tank and the US dollar to plummet. If Americans want to be self absorbed patriots (fascists), then let them make and sell stuff to each other. If you look up the definition of 'patriot' you might be surprised of the actually meaning and not in a good way.

Well America is now running a protection racket the same as organized crime gangs. America has told Zelenskyy that America will continue to provide weapons and money to Ukraine if Zelenskyy signs over exclusive rights to America of Ukraine's mineral rights for a price that favours the US. The US is demanding at least 50% of the minerals in Ukraine which is not just blackmail but also stand over tactics. The VP of the US has told Ukraine in open forum to not criticise America and just sign the damn agreement or else. So now America is a stand over merchant. In the short space of a month America has gone from a defender of world peace to a thug country. A country that is willing to bully any western country who uses free speech to voice it's opposition to the US. Americans are big on free speech unless it doesn't favour them, then they want to shut it down. Again this falls at the feet of Americans who voted for Rump. They truly believe America is at the centre of the world and all countries must obey America and kowtow to what America wants. Yet another reason for the rest of the western world to turn away from America. Even if Rump leaves office, there is no guarantee another dipshit Republican will take up where Rump leaves off in America's attitude to the rest of the world. I was a supporter of the US, but I'm done with that now. I thought they had come to their collective senses by voting Rump out of power the first time, but they have allowed him back in for no logical reason apart from wanting to demolish the American constitution and putting America as the ruler of the world. America is a failed society and they no longer portray what the western world needs as a leader. Europe is now the power of democratic societies. As for us here in Australia our main pivot is to Asia and has been for a long time. We do very little trade with the US. Now we can't even count on the US military as part of our own defence. It's time for countries around the world to expel the US military from their countries and shut down US bases in the respective countries. These US military bases in other countries are not US territory and only exist because the govt's of these respective countries allow it. These military bases outside the US costs the US govt billions. So if Rump is looking to cut the budget well one simple cut to the US budget is to remove all military bases from other countries. That is easily done and can happen rather quickly as we saw in the M.E. It would reduce the US military budget and save billions, rather than cutting healthcare to US citizens.

Was just out in the front yard doing the mowing and doing some sweating as well. A touch on the warm side out there in Melbourne town today. Yesterday was a nice cool day, but I was not in the mood to be outside, just happy to have a cool breeze come thru the house after our recent hot spell. Given the amount of heat we have had this Summer the grass in the front and backyards looks rather dead. When doing the mowing it throws up the same amount dust as it does grass clippings. Which is a result of our rather dry Summer that is continuing. It's normal for the grass in the front yard to look like it's dead but the back yard usually remains green all year round, but not this Summer. We are going back up the mid 30'sC tomorrow then some light relief before a proper cool change on the weekend. Again that has been the pattern all Summer. The cool changes when they do come thru are rather weak and now comes in two parts. Again not a normal weather pattern for Melbourne. Normally when it cools off, it only requires one wave of cool weather not two. Not sure if this is how Summers are going to be from now on in Melbourne but our Summers have been changing over the last 4-5yrs to be hotter and with less rain. The Summer storms after a heat event that are usual here in Melbourne are getting fewer and fewer. And people continue to build double storey houses which uses more energy to keep the top floor cool on these hot Summer days. So whilst people my say they care about the environment most new houses are double storey homes requiring more energy to heat and cool than a normal home. The standard three bedroom house on one level is becoming a thing of the past. With people wanting bigger homes, they then bitch about the cost of their bills to service the larger home. A case of people wanting their cake and yours as well because they want other tax payers to fund their lifestyle with govt handouts.

Hope the rest of the week is good for you.

 

[darkelf9]

Now quoting that particular version of the song, @darkelf9, really would confuse the f$#k out of people... lol

Yep unless you're an Aussie. We do have our own language anyway, so confusing people from other countries is kinda our playful nature. I mean we could have an entire thread talking in Aussie slang. It would be like us speaking Dutch which nobody understands.

 

[roomandu]

Lmfao
Yeahup... reckon yr quids on bout the lingo. That would get people totally confused

 

[darkelf9]

Afternoon all,

We are heading for our own federal elections here in Australia on a date yet to be announced, but unlike Germany's recent elections we don't have a second round of negotiations to determine the make up of who forms the new govt. The LNP, just like Rump, wants to cut public servant numbers because that is part of the LNP govt. Small govt is always what the LNP aims for but that is a false argument because what the LNP doesn't talk about is public service functions being replaced with private industry companies with costs tax payers more money and in some cases it doubles the amount of money need to perform the same public service functions. The hospitality industry is already looking to the LNP to cut or remove penalty rates for their employees. Much like the American system where you get the same pay regardless of which day of the week you work that is the system the LNP wants to implement here in Australia where people work for tips rather than a proper wage. The penalty rates have been around for decades. Even when I started working back in early '80's there were penalty rates for working on a weekend. I wasn't working in hospitality but the same rules applied to any industry that required employees to work on a weekend.

As for the seemingly lack of knowledge of people in the US that federal govt employees exist outside of DC, well the same goes for us here in Australia. All the large military bases and some of the smaller ones spread throughout Australia has federal public servants working on these bases. The largest federal HR organization doesn't reside in Canberra it is actually in Cooma which is a country town in the hills of NSW not far from Canberra. It was established to prop up the town of Cooma. There are federal public servants in every state and territory of Australia, so the notion that federal public servants only reside in Canberra or even in Washington DC is total and utter bullshit. So even here in Australia when Mr Potato Head talks about getting rid of federal public service jobs to pay for his pie in the sky nuclear program that nobody wants, he is talking of firing people who work in your city or your town and agencies that provide your local area with jobs from companies and private businesses that provide services to these local federal agencies. So the job losses are not just in Canberra, it's also to your small local business areas. The LNP will never tell you this fact.

The latest news media company to kowtow to Rump is MSNBC by firing two media commentators, one black person and one Asian who had their own segments. This was to comply with Rumps policy to get rid of any non-white people from leadership positions. If you agree with Rump well then your ethnicity doesn't matter. So in his eyes you are only black if you don't agree with him. But wait MSNBC went further they also removed anyone from their production teams who would be considered DEI hires. In other words anyone non-white was removed from a leadership role in the respective production teams. They are allowed in these production teams but only as a team member not say as a producer or director. CNN was the first news organization to not criticise Rump and they were called out on their silence. Then the husband and wife team from the Morning Joe show made a bee line to kiss Rump's ring with a visit to Mar a Lago after Rump won the election. When that reporter from the Associated Press was banned from the White Hose none of the other reporters stood up for that foreign reporter. Even now journalists are scared to hold Rump to account. They like to say their job is to hold politicians to accounts. Seems that is not true when it means their jobs are threatened. Now Rump's latest tactic is to decide which reporters can come to the White House briefings. Up till now that was the remit of the press not the President, but Rump doesn't play by the rules. So there is no free press in America any more because they are all shit scared of what Rump will do to them and the media outlets they work for. None of these media organizations nor reporters are even willing to say The Gulf of America is total nonsense. They all avoid the issue. This wouldn't happen in the UK. That press corp wouldn't bend the knee. So much for a free America. The only people on air or in the media who are willing to speak up against Rump are late night talk show hosts and social media content creators on Youtube. The press is missing in action in America and they are letting it happen to them. The press in America needs to grow some balls and that includes the women. The strong independent women are staying just as silent as the men, so where did all that empowerment go then. Seems they are just as bad as the men when put under pressure. Cowardice doesn't recognize gender nor caters for it.

So I have decided to forgo buying any bourbon for the remainder of Rump's position as King of US for however long that lasts. Given the lack of adherence of the Republicans to the constitution, I wouldn't put it past Rump to convince his Supreme Court to override the rules of the constitution to the two term restriction on incumbent Presidents. Rump could argue that it only relates to consecutive terms therefore he could get another 4yrs on top of his current term. The Supreme Court is in his pocket as they have proved previously and Rump knows they owe him for putting right wing judges on the Supreme Court for life. So I'll explore other whiskies from other countries and/or go for Jamaican rum. Got an email late on Thursday that my single malt scotch was on sale so I went down to Dan Murphy's an hour later and purchased another bottle of the sinlge malt scotch. With the sale price and the extra $20 off due to my membership, I saved $55. The normal price of this scotch is $334. Haven't opened the other one I purchased late last year. Can't have too much single malt scotch, plus given the normal price, any price saving is good, you know given the cost of living thing that doesn't impact me. If people with a million dollar home and earn over 150K can bitch about life, well then anyone can complain about stuff.

Well if it was in any doubt that America has turned away from the defence of democracy, the clash between Rump and Zelenskyy in the White House leaves no doubt America is being run by a fascist and America has a fascist govt. The tirade by Rump against Zelenskyy is a new low for America. Zelenskyy is a President on equal footing with Rump because he is the President of Ukraine, not a lackey. Zelenskyy is also a war time President. He was dealing with two men who have never seen war. Rump ran away when called up to serve his country and Just Dumb was nothing more than a paper boy when he served in the military. Just Dumb relied on actual soldiers to keep him safe behind the wire. The worst war wound he could get was a paper cut. So neither man can stand toe to toe with Zelenskyy as both Rump and Just Dumb would of run away from the fighting as the cowards they are. America is now a thug country on the world stage as demonstrated by this latest spat with a leader of another country. Rump tried to show his power over the French President who promptly put Rump in his place. It only confirms the rest of the world needs to turn it's back on America. Americans believe the world cannot exist without them, which is part of the American culture. America has sent a signal to the world, America is moving towards fascism and has turned into a gangster on the world stage, demanding protection money for it's support of another country. If you pay up then America will defend you, if you don't then they will work with your enemy to defeat you. After this recent incident I would not be surprised if Rump uses Ukrainian refugees in the USA as hostages or deports them back to Ukraine. I would not be surprised if ICE rounds up Ukrainian refugees in the next few weeks and sends them back to Ukraine via Poland as it is not safe to fly into Ukraine because of the war. Americans caused this and most Americans don't give a shit about the rest of the world. They only care about the price of eggs. Lets be clear, the world does not need America to keep going. America volunteered to get involved with the defence of other countries because it gives America influence in these countries and America has messed with the govts of many countries to the detriment of those countries. American companies have got rich by doing business with these countries America has influence with, so it has helped the American economy, now America believes they rule the world. Americans are totally deluded. It's time for the American empire to die. They are doing a good job of ensuring America becomes a faded power similar to the Roman Empire. And like the Roman Empire, it will be a slow death for America.

It is a nice weekend here in Melbourne town. The temps are nice with some warmth but not too hot as there is nice breeze. Might get some showers tomorrow but the temps will remains in the low to mid 20'sC. Finally got around to mending the back fence. It doesn't look pretty but the solution I came up with worked. Decided on a wider size of fence paling so I wouldn't need more and also reduced the work required. Will see how things go and if needed will repeat the solution. The main thing is that I've come up with a solution that works. The heat will be back on Tues when we are back in the 30'sC, so for now I'm just enjoying the cooler days. Will see what next week brings as we are now in March. The last 2 months have been slow at times but with the heat waves over the past two months it has slowed down the tasks I wanted to do to start off the year.

Hope the rest of the weekend is good for you.

 

[darkelf9]

Morning all,

It seems that someone in the US govt has tampered with security databases to flag non-white US citizens who are now being detained by US customs upon re-entry to the US. This has only been happening after Rump was put into power late Jan. The timing is suspicious. Two of the US citizens detained by US customs are both non-white. One is an ex-police chief and the other is a human rights lawyer who is well known to Republicans for fighting for human rights of migrants. The ex-police chief was detained because of his name that someone had flagged on the security database which he stated has never occurred in his life. So what you now have in the US are Republicans putting people on security databases as a security threat because of their ethnicity or people who oppose Republican views. Again another example of a fascist country. Now as to who in Rump's govt is doing this, well it would be somebody with IT skills and the only group that is messing with IT stuff in the US govt is Elon and his hackers. While at the same time Elon has been awarded new govt contracts worth hundred's of millions of dollars. A candidate running in the new Canadian elections has said if she is elected she will impose a 100% tariff on Telsa cars. There should be more of this by other countries. Americans also don't know that 80% of their fertiliser comes from Canada so farmers are going to pay more to grow their crops so the price of vegies will go up in America. The American stock market is also taking a dive which will impact the US economy and America will go into recession because of Rump's tariffs.

Been looking at the international news media both on the TV and on Youtube and well America is out in the cold. The international news media has blown up against America after Rump's rant against Zelenskyy who did well to keep his cool. Zelenskyy was defending his country when he responded to Rump and Just Dumb. For Just Dumb to lecture Zelenskyy on the war in Ukraine and say that Zelenksyy was only welcoming leaders from other countries as propaganda against Russia was not only disgusting it was insanity. Americans are in their own virtual reality right now which shows how the American culture is a toxic environment. None of the international media shows America in a good light apart from North Korea, Russia and Russia's allies. When your best buddy is a mass murderer and a dictator, you've got issues. America has provided $120 billion not $350 billion as Rump claims. But billions of that was spent domestically in America to pay private weapons manufacturers in the US. So again the US has lied as to how much money actually went to Ukraine. It is even less than the $120 billion and closer to $100 billion. The EU has provided over $140 billion to support Ukraine and some of that money was to purchase US weapons so America made a profit from the war in Ukraine. The hits to Ukraine from America keep coming with now Rump stopping all aid to Ukraine which means America is now Russia's puppet and well and truly in Russia's pocket so rather than Canada being America's 51st state, America is now a Russian province and Rump can't wait to give Poo-tin a blow job. What America is doing to Ukraine is nothing less than blackmail all to appease Rumps ego and Americans are ok with that.

The EU and NATO has turned against America now. America is being smashed outside of America by the rest of the democratic countries and Americans don't realise it. The EU is now on a path to move forward without the US. The amount on money they are now talking about spending on their own respective military forces is a staggering amount of money. The EU has relied on America for far too long for their military defences which has now come to an end so they have no choice but to spend big on increasing the size of their military forces. America has been assigned to the dustbin of internal military defence. In the latest backlash to America, a Norwegian company has refused to fuel US Navy ships. This is a large private company in Norway that has stopped supplying the US Navy with fuel due to what happened in the White House between Rump and Zelenskyy. There should be more of this type of reaction from other countries to America. The other thing countries could do is refuse entry to US citizens to their respective countries. There are millions of stupid Americans who believe they can enter any country because they are American citizens and any refusal to grant a visa by that country is a violation of their rights. They are very big on their rights in America. Meanwhile the rest of the world doesn't give a flying fuck about American rights as they don't apply outside the US. I also see that Canadians are choosing to not buy American goods also in protest against Rump and his actions against Canada. So America is making itself more isolated around the world apart from dictatorships. Perhaps Americans need to consider spending their vacation in Russia or North Korea given half the country wants to live under a dictatorship where only the Republican view of the world exists and free speech is shut down unless it praises Rump. They have the same system in Russia. The two countries are coming closer together by the week.

Americans need to be careful when travelling outside of the US from now on. Most Americans don't go OS so they really don't care what happens outside their borders. I mean any country that claims to be world champions in a sport that only allows it's domestic teams to participate in, is not right in the head. Americans also can't comprehend simple shit like Soccer is a world sport and gets a larger audience than the NFL. This fact seems to be incomprehensible to most Americans. Which again speaks to American culture of believing they are better than anyone else. This used to be the view of the British back in the day but they have learned their lesson. People in the UK now have a very honest opinion of their country. Americans are still deluded with their own egos. There is a big difference between being proud of your country and believing your country is superior to any other country on the planet, that's a cult not a country. With every week that Rump is in power Americans are giving away their freedoms, yet they continue to allow this to happen. What happened to the Philipinnes is happening to America. Firstly Duterte shut down the press by closing down the public broadcaster, then jailing journalists who didn't agree with him, then he took control of the Congress and Senate. The similarities of what happened in the Philipinnes is almost a carbon copy only in the case of the US, it's happening at a faster pace to becoming a dictatorship. The press in the US is now is a phase of self censorship to not upset Rump so phase number one of shutting down the press has begun. Rump next will shut down the public broadcaster by pulling it's licence to operate. He is also trying to this with commercial news stations like the abc. When he succeeds in doing that because he has the Supreme Court in his pocket, the last phase will be to neutralise the Congress and Senate and jail anyone in those two houses who opposes him and then rewrite the constitution since he will have no opposition to doing that. Meanwhile the American people will just sit back and let it happen because they are under the delusion that their written constitution will save them, but it is just a piece of paper than can be amended my whomever is in power. Americans take their democracy for granted which is why they are in this mess. They caused this fuckfest yet they want to blame someone else for their actions or blame the other side of politics. Well given over 80 million Americans did not vote in this latest election, shows a country with citizens that only care about themselves not about their country. There is already civil war happening in America, it's just that this time it is a war fought at the ballot box, not with guns. That will come next.

Finished viewing the second season of The Walking Dead, Daryl Dixon series and it was good. Wasn't sure if there was going to be a season 3 for this spin off but it seems there is, so will look forward to seeing that in the future. Was good to see Carol back with Daryl as a duo against the bad guys and as usual The Walking Dead series leaves you on the edge not knowing what is going to happen next which is why it has been such a huge success world wide. I prefer the DVD's for the extra content.

I've been keeping tabs on the TC coming to the Qld tomorrow and also impacting the northern areas of NSW. It is being touted as the largest TC to hit both Qld and NSW for 50 yrs. The last TC of this size was back in the '70's. The rain system as part of this TC will impact not just the coastal areas of Qld and NSW but will move inland a long way then track south thru the eastern half of NSW and even move further south to the east of Vic. Melbourne might even get some of that rain by the end of the weekend and into next week. The system is that big that it will impact 3 states. I have several friends who are in the path of this TC up in Qld. Can't do much except to hope that they all remain safe.

And to end on a typical Aussie note. The WA Premier in a rather honest moment called Just Dumb "a knob", which I found amusing. Even when the previous WA Premier was asked if that quote was appropriate he said of course it was. As in Aussies are honest. If we think you are dick head or you do some dumb shit we will call you out on it. The problem with a lot of politics is that politicians are not as honest as people want them to be. Which is why the right has got traction because the right has no filter, so if those on the left are more honest about how they feel about stuff they would get more supporters.

Hope the rest of the week is good for you.

 

[darkelf9]

Morning all,

Whilst Qld and NSW were in the throws of that TC, here in Melbourne we were and are still having a long stretch of temps in the low to mid 30'sC with sunny skies and no rain, except for this morning when we got some localized rain just in my area which was not predicted. No rain north or south of my area. It was quite strange. This rain was not part of the rain from the TC as it came from the west. That rain system from the TC is still in Qld and upper NSW. After the last heatwave came thru early last week, we had one day of somewhat cooler temps in the mid 20'sC, then it climbed back up to the 30'sC and has stayed there since and will continue till mid this week then the pattern will return of one cool day followed by temps back up in the 30'sC again. Fucking annoying as I can't get any work done outside unless I want heat stroke. I'm frankly fed up with this weather pattern of rolling heat waves in Melbourne. Never had this before. Yet another change to our weather due to climate change which the LNP would like say isn't real.

Apart from the rolling heatwaves here in Melbourne, the lack of rain has been another feature of our Summer and now the start of Autumn. It's normal for the heat and humidity to hang around in Melbourne till mid April at which point the humidity just disappears like someone has flicked a switch. I've spent many occasions painting in the heat of April, just sweating my arse off in temps over 30C. So we aren't done with the heat yet in Melbourne even though Summer is technically over. I also can't wait for daylight savings to end. I can see already that sunrise is happening later and we are getting less hours of daylight which is more noticeable during the morning as they are getting darker. I used to hate daylight savings when I was working because during Summer you got used to going to work in the sunshine, then come mid March till the end of daylight savings on April 4th you end up going to work in the dark as if it was Winter.

Moomba here in Melbourne ends today with the Moomba Parade down Swanston St and ending in the Alexandria Gardens just south of the Yarra River. Today being the Labour Day public holiday the kids are off school so lots of them will be at the parade. With the overcast conditions today it will be a bit cooler but we are expecting 35C today. When I was a kid Moomba used to run for a week but now it is a scaled back version which only goes for 4 days. They have even reduced the hours to 4pm - 10pm. It used go from 10am till late. There are usually a number of food stalls at Moomba apart from the rides and other stuff for kids, plus there is stuff for the adults as well. As with most things these days, these festive events are a shadow of what they used to be when I was a kid. Even our Royal Melbourne Show was a lot bigger when I was a kid. Now it's a lot smaller even though it is still held in the same area which has been reduced in size. It's a shame that things I experienced as a kid are no longer at the same level for the younger generations. The site of the Royal Melbourne Show is where they film Master Chef. It is a lot smaller in person compared to what you see on the TV.

The WA elections showed Lib's and Nat's getting their collective arses kicked. Labor has a massive majority. It was a blood bath for the Nat's and Lib's who are not in a coalition. They did win a couple of seats back but they might as well not show up to the WA Parliament. Even with a change of leadership for Labor prior to the election they romped it in. It was basically over 90mins into the counting. It was also good news with the TC in the end missing Brisbane but it has brought with it a massive amount of rain which will move further south into more of NSW. The front of that storm was about 200km wide. Brisbane got about 300mm of rain overnight. The TC itself tracked north of where it was predicted and reduced to less than a Cat 1 thankfully when it eventually did hit the mainland north of Brisbane. It could of been far worse. The regional parts of Qld and NSW and are getting a soaking with some places getting over 450mm of rain in one day. Some of that rain is will track south and even get to us here in Vic, but mainly in the east of the state before heading out to sea again. They rain system is doing an anti-clockwise sweep from north to south. Melbourne might get some of it but our rain mainly comes from the west like the quick burst of rain we got this morning.

So Microsoft is closing down two of its software options. Skype is shutting down in May and Windows 10 is being wrapped up in Oct this year. So I'll have to transition to Windows 11 by Oct, not that I want to. Of course I will lose software that I want to keep and will have to re-install drivers for other software that I have. Every time I update to a new version of Windows I lose access to some software. My PC is compatible with Windows 11 as I keep getting messages to update from Windows 10 to 11, which I just ignore. There also could be an issue with security software. It should be ok, but with Windows upgrades you never know. As for Skype well I don't use it. Even when I was in the workforce we used Zoom on secured networks. All those people with Skype accounts which is mainly older people will go into panic mode and will have to get their grand kids to help them transition to another platform like Zoom. I don't do that stuff at the moment but will have to when I move out of Melbourne this year. Not sure what the internet is like in regional Vic so that will be a new adventure to come to terms with.

Just Dumb has also pissed off veterans by disrespecting both the UK and French military forces saying that they couldn't fight a war. I find this rather funny given that Just Dumb never fired a shot in anger and his boss is a draft dodger. Both men never saw any actual war, yet they both try and belittle military forces that fought along side America in various wars. American veterans are also pissed about this. Any military alliance with America is now also dead due to America's disrespect to the military forces of it's allies. Just Dumb is too much of a coward to go to the front line of the war in Ukraine. He would shit his pants. As for Americans being stupid enough to believe Rump will tell Poo-tin what to do, they don't seem to understand Rump is Poo-tin's bitch. Poo-tin will not stop and Rump can't do a fucking thing about that. In fact America has given Poo-tin the green light to do what he wants in Europe. After America allows Poo-tin to take Ukraine, he will march on the rest of Europe. He wants the Baltic states next. Why would Poo-tin stop since he knows the US will not stop him because Rump is his rent boy that he can fuck in the arse any time he wants. Americans are just too stupid to understand what is really going on. They only care about the price of groceries. They don't care if Ukraine falls to Russia. Americans don't care how many more Ukrainian men, women and children die so long as it's not American kids that are dying. That star spangled banner they sing about in the US, now has the hammer and sickle replacing the 50 stars and the their flag is also being dragged thru the mud with blood splatter from dead Ukrainian men, women and children. All this to get cheaper eggs. How fucked is American society. Americans are not humble people and that will be their downfall under Rump. When their ego bites them in the arse, nobody should feel sorry for Americans. They chose this path.

When Rump gave his speech to Congress, one of the lies he told the American people was that the big three car manufacturers in the US were on board with his plan to implement a 25% tariff on Canada. Well that was until he imposed the 25% tariff on Canada which caused US stocks to go into free fall and US stocks are still going down. It was quite funny when Rump had to do a 180 on those tariffs for car parts coming from Canada cause those same car manufacturers called him up saying he needs to back off. The same has happened with the other tariffs on Canada when Canada hit back with their own tariffs on US goods, Rump backed down. Rump is a pussy. If you stand up to him like all bullies, he backs down.

Hope the rest of the week is good for you.

 

[darkelf9]

Morning all,

The Aussie Grand Prix is on in Melbourne this weekend with the race happening on Sunday. The weather for the race itself will be rather wet but humid. By the time the race starts it could be raining so the day will start out dry but will end with a thunderstorm. We did get one cooler day this week and by that I mean it was 25C yesterday which is cooler than the 6 days of temps in the low to mid 30'sC. Even though it was 25C yesterday, it was rather humid and it felt like it was 30C. Today it's warm again with little no breeze and we are going for 27C which might sound ideal but with the humidity it might be a good day to sit on the beach but not in a crowded stadium out in the sun. So those going to the Grand Prix today sitting out in the sun, it will be very warm and given it is Australia, it's a good day for skin cancer. Tomorrow it's going up to 37C then another warm night before the predicted cool change and break the humidity we have had since late last week. Next week will a lot cooler so I'm set to get outside and sort out the garage for a final clean up to get the rubbish pile finalised. Looking forward to the cooler temps as I don't know if the run of heatwaves will continue into next month. Hopefully not as it's stopping me progressing tasks I want to do.

The Canadians are going all in to remove US goods from Canadian stores. They now have 3 apps to show Canadians where to buy Canadian goods rather than Americans goods. Canada has also cancelled all contracts for American booze. American towns that border Canada are now feeling the pinch with Canadians choosing not to cross the border. In some of these American towns, 90% of their customers are Canadians crossing the border to shop and buy cheaper petrol. That cross border trade is drying up and businesses in these American towns are looking at closure. The costs of gas and oil from Canada to America is also going up. Electricity costs from Canada to America are going up as well even though they are on hold now. So regardless of what Rump does, Canada is raising prices for Americans. The price increases on most American goods will hit Americans some time this coming week. Basic stuff like vegies is going up for two reasons one is that Americans import lots of it's fresh produce from both Canada and Mexico the other is that 80% of the fertiliser used in the US comes from Canada, so that cost of growing crops in the US will go up and will be passed on to the consumer. The people who are going to be hit the hardest by these increases are Republicans who voted for Rump cause most of them are not well educated therefore not only are they easy to fool but also they can't get high paying jobs and many are also on welfare. So the pain that Americans are going to get from Rump's actions are only just starting. Once countries like Canada pivot to exporting their goods to other countries, America is not going to get those contracts back. The Premier of Ontario has already cancelled millions of dollars of US contracts to provide goods to America. He also has stated he will cut the power to three American states. The power supplied by Ontario to these American states covers some 1.5 million homes and businesses in the US. Other Premiers in Canada are following the lead of Ontario. All the Canadian provinces are united against America. American booze if being removed from stores across Canada. The cost of removing all American goods and contracts from just Ontario is worth about $200 billion to the US economy. Americans don't understand the shit they have coming their way. As for Tesla well the Germans are not buying Teslas any more so Musk is losing money in just Germany. If the rest of Europe gets on board, Tesla will go bankrupt. I reckon it is too fucking funny that Americans will learn they can't fight the world and impose their will on other countries. It's a lesson they need to learn. Americans will have to eat humble pie and I hope they choke on it.

As for the Democrats well they are week as piss. They had a chance to send a message to Rump during his speech to Congress. They decided to voice their opposition to Rump by not applauding and wearing pink, plus hold up paddles with different words on them like they were at a Christie's auction. It was a pathetic reaction. Only one Democrat showed any fight when he stood up to tell Rump he was lying in his speech. And he was removed. It took five men to remove a 77 yr old man with a walking stick, then whilst he was talking to reporters the cops tried to push him out of the foyer but were told to back off by a member of the democratic party which was shown on live TV. What the Democrats should of done to show some fight against Rump was let him talk for 5 mins then section by section walk out every 5 mins. That would of showed some resistance to Rump, but instead they just sat there and took it like lemmings. US citizens who are Democrats should be angry at their politicians for not showing some resistance to what is happening. They are the only group playing to a set of rules that no longer exists in US politics. It's like bringing a bow and arrow to a tank battle.

Space Laser Lady's boyfriend who asked Zelenskyy why he doesn't wear a suit which Just Dumb laughed at and laughing at Zelenskyy, well that guy has got a lot of backlash. He has received backlash on social media, got death threats and personal phone calls telling him he is dumbfuck. The only reason this dipshit was part of the press on that day in the White House is because he is the boyfriend of Space Laser Lady, otherwise he is a fringe dweller with his own little social media channel. I mean you have to be an absolute fuckwit to be Space Laser Lady's boyfriend. I wouldn't even call her a bogan cause bogans are far above her level of human. These are the people that now represent America which is why the rest of the world, apart from those aligned with Russia, are turning against America. I guess Space Laser Lady's boyfriend got a taste of what happens when you say dumb shit in an open forum and think you are clever. The mob will turn on you, as Republican politicians are starting to understand. Not only did Just Dumb have to move his family to another ski resort, he also got heckled by Republican voters at his own rally. I think it is all fucking hilarious that Republican voters are turning on their own politicians. All we need now is the popcorn and sit and watch America burn its own house down. This is true reality TV. As for that dumb bitch American influencer taking that baby wombat away from it's mother and causing distress to the mother and baby, well we should give her two options. One option is deportation the other is drop her in the middle of the Aussie outback with a bottle of water and leave her there to find her way back. She'll be dead in 2 days. What she does represent is the typical American attitude to other countries, which is a general lack of fucking respect.

Even with our so called good relationship with America, we are not out of the firing line with tariffs on our steel and aluminium in trade with the US. Which isn't really an issue given we don't send any steel to the US and only about 1% of aluminium that enters the US comes from Australia. The real hit to us will be the importation of American cars. So if you own an American car the cost of replacement parts for Americans cars is going up. We don't have our own car industry any more so all our cars are imported. So if you own a Ford or Holden which are the two most popular US car brands in Australia, then the cost to maintain your vehicle just went up. Toyota out sells the US brands so anyone like me who owns a Toyota is not going to be in this situation. My next car purchase will be another Toyota and if US cars imported into Australia go up by 25% this year, there will be less people buying these cars which means less revenue for US companies. Rump is a pussy which shows in his latest back down on the 50% tariff on Canada. The stock market and his big money backers have got to him. Lets not forget Rump is a failed business man. All of his businesses went bankrupt because he is basically shit at doing business. Now it seems he is doing the same to the US economy. Tesla is losing money every day and it's on the nose in most countries outside the US. People are boycotting Tesla cars in protest to Rump's actions. If you own a Tesla now you show that you support Rump and your car will be targeted. So you either keep it in the garage or sell it.

Hope the weekend is good for you.

 

[darkelf9]

Afternoon all,

So a couple of weeks ago I heard that DOGE headed by Elon had flagged any stories or pictures on DoD websites in the US referring to DEI. So what has obviously happened is one of Elon's uni graduates who has come from the insulated world of a university (college for our Americans), developed a search for anything that could be DEI on the DoD websites which are freely available to the public. Caught up in that stupid and rather lazy way of finding DEI items, these numbnuts have flagged one item in particular for deletion that is iconic in American modern history, and that iconic thing is the plane that dropped the first atomic bomb. Now why was that plane flagged by these young and obviously lazy uni grad's, well the name of the plane is the Enola Gay which is the name of the pilot's mum. So these uni graduates who have degrees and possibly PhD's are so fucking dumb that they wrote a computer program to search for DEI references that they not only put the word "gay" in the search, they couldn't distinguish between people's names and words related to the term DEI. Caught up in this list of bullshit is also a veteran who's surname is Gay. His story and photo has been flagged for removal from the DoD website.

So my little idea of boycotting anything imported from the US is also what other Aussies are thinking about. One small local business in a country town here in Victoria has decided to raise the cost of anything American owned because of Rump. The price difference is being sent by that shop to the Red Cross to support OS work by the Red Cross. My little idea to boycott US products is only for items imported such as US booze. Not going to stop drinking Coke for the next four years because it's made here so that supports local producers same goes of Macca's and other American food chain stores. All their produce is sourced from Aussie farmers so boycotting that would hurt the local producers. The whole tariffs thing on Aussie steel and aluminium is not a big deal for us. If America doesn't want our high grade aluminium then we'll just increase the flow to Asia. None of our steel goes to America anyway so Rump can kiss our arse on that one. If Rump is threatening to put tariffs on our food and booze exports to the US well then it's Americans who are going to miss out. We'll just send that stuff to another country like Canada. Canadians drink a lot of beer just like us so we can just bypass America. Not really a big deal for us and it will increase our trade with Asian countries and also Europe who like their booze and food. So with Rump's war on Australia with tariffs it's not such an issue for us because the quality of our food and wine is superior to anything America can produce and we can easily compete with America on those items with whomever they currently do trade with. America is the big loser out of this trade war, not us as we could take away America's trade with other countries.

The other leverage Australia has is that we are very rich in minerals and we are a mining nation so we know how to mine for not only basic stuff like iron ore but also for critical minerals used by America in it's computer chips and smart tech. America needs access to countries with these critical minerals as has played out with the minerals deal with Ukraine that America was desperate to get. Not only do we have those critical minerals in abundance here in Australia, we have the expertise to dig the stuff out of the ground. So rather than mining our traditional minerals like coal, Australia could be the world leader in mining for critical minerals which is an untapped natural resource. We just need to find the markets for it. America doesn't have these natural resources in the same quantities nor can America produce enough steel and aluminium within their country to satisfy their local market, therefore American industry is dependent on imported steel and aluminium. Making imported raw materials too expensive only hurts local American industry. Countries like Australia that has abundance of raw materials can find other markets given the quality of what we have. If you have a premium product you can always find a market for it. So if Americans don't want our superior quality products we can go elsewhere. The business leaders in Australia need to stop pissing themselves and start finding other markets for our products. COVID showed we were lazy when it came to finding new markets for our imports and exports which made us vulnerable and that comes down to private industry being lazy and relying on traditional ways of doing business. They keep telling us they are innovators, well it's about fucking time they showed us. The problem is private industry is not what they claim to be. They love profit and cower in fear to try new things that might cost money. Private industry here in Australia is risk averse which is why they don't support Australian designed product. But if you don't take a risk, you'll never leave the house.

There is so much being made by the Republicans that American tax dollars should not be spent on the defence of other countries. This is total and utter bullshit. Europeans might have believed that America was spending money to defend their countries by investing in US military bases in these countries including nuclear weapon bunkers in Europe. In reality those military bases in Europe are there to defend America not Europe. All those military bases are the front line against Russia for the protection of America as an early warning system so that potential threats from Russia don't make it to the shores of the US. So America willingly spends money for those military bases in Europe for it's own defence not for the defence of Europe. Same goes for us here in Australia. The US spy base we have here in Australia is not for the defence of Australia, it's for an early warning system to any potential threat to America. Same goes for that now permanent US troop deployment in the NT. They are not there to defend Australia. They are in the NT as a first response to China. So Americans need to understand any removal of these US troops from these countries reduces America's ability to defend itself. The problem has been is that these other countries have pulled back on spending money on their own military because they have believed that America will defend them because of these US military bases in these various countries. What Rump is doing is showing the real reason these military bases are there which costs billions in US dollars. A price America has been willing to pay for it's own defence. So de-funding these military bases makes America more vulnerable to attack, not stronger. A fact Americans don't seem to grasp. Then again Americans are ignorant when it comes to what happens outside the US. Given they think only America counts in the world and other countries should bend the knee to America. 341 million people trying to tell the remaining 7.6 billion people what to do. Even Americans maths can't make that work.

That American influencer ran away from Australia before she could be arrested for snatching that baby wombat away from it's mother and then being dumb enough to have a friend film her doing it. I'm sure that social media will track down the Aussie bloke who helped her since she lives her life on social media. Her response on social media to the hate she deserves it what you'd expect from an American. In that typical American manner she decided that she as an American was going lecture Australians about our own wildlife. Saying dumb shit like we cull wombats which is laughable. How fucking dumb is this bitch? She is not the only dumb tourist that has done dumb shit like that in relation to our wildlife. I've seen Chinese tourists harass an Echidna until myself and my friend told them to fuck off, but I was polite about it. Actually if that influencer ever wants to come back to Australia, our crocs have acquired a taste for tourists. They'll even eat a Republican as they don't have any political affiliations. They probably wouldn't mind chomping on a Proud Boy either. We could sell this as a tourist attraction.

I've had a laugh at Americans posting stuff on-line about breaking the law in other countries then getting pissed at the country they are visiting for not following American laws. Driving for Americans in foreign countries is apparently a big deal for their American brains to handle. The rule they have in the US about turning on a red traffic light is something so ingrained in their minds that they think other countries have the same rule. They also think speeding in another country is not an issue. They also have massive issues with adjusting to temperature readings in other countries. I mean everyone has a fucking smart phone right so what the fuck is the issue. I didn't have a smart phone back when I was travelling OS, but then again I didn't travel OS thinking it was Australia. Americans seem to be challenged by life when leaving America. May be they should just stay in their own country. The rest of the world might be a safer place.

Hope the rest of the week is good for you.

 

[darkelf9]

Afternoon all,

The latest attack by America on Australia is regarding our PBS which ensures Aussies pay less for important medication especially for chronic conditions for which there is no cure. These medications are expensive. So for example a medication coming from OS could cost $100 but on the PBS that same medication currently costs about $30. What Americans call "big pharma" is using Rump's time in govt to lobby the US govt to impose tariffs on Australian pharmaceuticals (drugs) that are imported into the US, but the cost difference between imports and exports is once again in the favour of the US so America is benefiting from this trade. Now Australia is not going to kowtow to the US on this nor are we going to get rid of our PBS to kiss America's arse. They can go fuck themselves. If any political party here in Australia was to suggest downgrading the PBS or trying to eliminate it there would such a massive backlash against that political party it would cease to exist. In the US "big pharma" is as powerful as the gun lobby. Both of these organizations are in the business of killing Americans by hooking their customers on their respective products. The only difference between the gun lobby and "big pharma" is that American drugs just kill people slower than a gun. The other less known attack on Australia by America is the suspension of research funding to Australian universities which benefits US companies. The tech companies in the US are also going after Australia for our restrictions on their technology such as kids accessing harmful social media posts. This is yet another example of Americans trying to impose their laws on other countries. America is showing it is a friend to no other country, they just want to bully other countries to agree to America's demands. The real America is showing it's stripes and how fucked up American society has become. We don't need American laws in Australia cause well you see how fucked up America is with it's current laws. That shit needs to stay in America. As I've said before American democracy is not something other democracies should aspire to. In fact it is the complete opposite.

Another act of racism by the current US govt was to remove all references to black people on the DoD website including a famous icon in America, this time in American baseball. Jackie Robinson's story was removed from the DoD website including his service in the US military, after Elon and his frat boys searched for more DEI stuff. Also removed were the first all black aircrew who served in WWII and flew some 15,000 missions during that war. Also removed were the Navajo code talkers who were yet another famous group of veterans serving in WWII. The Japanese couldn't break their code as they spoke in their native Navajo language. All these stories of these famous non-white veterans were removed from the DoD website cause Elon thought they were all DEI hires therefore not valid to be on the DoD websites. Obviously there wasn't a human in this loop otherwise the mistakes would of been picked up. And once again after backlash these web pages were re-instated. America right now is just a bad reality TV show. We are waiting to see the next dumb fucking thing America does. It seems ironic that America is using a white South African to remove non-white content from govt documents and websites. It's as if he was born for this racism. Must be in his blood, after all white South Africans have a long history of racism in South Africa. Seems they haven't lost it even when moving to America.

The news about reducing PBS medication to a maximum of $25 down from the current $32 is a good election promise which we know Labor will commit to unlike the LNP even though they have said they will match it but when in power the LNP didn't do anything to lower the cost of the most expensive medication. In fact if it wasn't for the election of Labour those drugs would be close to $50. Now even though the promise is to lower the cost to $25 it doesn't last long because the price of medication is reviewed every 12 months which means they go up in small increments. Such as the promise of the cost of $30, well that didn't last long as those drugs are now close to $32. Some of that cost is also due to the value of our dollar which has not recovered from the low of 62cUS, which is a hangover from late last year. Our dollar was worth 68cUS mid last year then it fell in the 4th quarter of last year which is evident if you have purchased anything from a US website like Amazon, which can easily add and extra $50 to any purchase above $200. So if you are planning a trip to the US then the cost of your trip is more expensive and your spending power as a tourist is far less. A 6c difference might not sound much but if you multiple that by a $100 or $1000 it makes a big difference. The current price of the Aussie dollar only benefits exporters who would be loving the lower Aussie dollar.

Thankfully we only have to put up with daylight savings for another couple of weeks. It ends on April 6th. The lack of daylight in the morning is very noticeable now which as I've said before is a time I used to hate when I was working. It was like driving to work during Winter. So other annoying factor of having daylight savings going on for so long is that once we get back to normal time, you get about a month of going to work in daylight before the mornings turn dark again which is a sure sign Winter is on the way.

I watched the landing of the space capsule live, as for once something happening OS was not in the early hours of morning like it usually happens. It was interesting to see how they now recover the space capsules compared to the early days. They take more care now about the astronauts health. Space is one place I would like to go but given my age and health I wouldn't get a seat. I wouldn't mind spending months in space just for the adventure or even better spending time at a space base. Sure it's dangerous but it's about the adventure which can be dangerous to your life. With all this DEI stuff happening in America I wouldn't be surprised if Sunita Williams is photo shopped out of any official pics on the NASA website. They will claim she was never in space and all images of her on the ISS were fake. It's only a matter of time before Elon and his frat boys delete any images of her on govt websites.

Did some more work in the garage today to finish off the tidying up and sorted out what I need to get rid off. Boxed up all the other stuff I have to get rid of like paint and chemicals. Have to find the local sites were I can take these items to for disposal. Since I finished the task in the garage early I've decided to do my delayed birthday trip around to the other side of the bay this weekend, probably Sunday. Wasn't able to do this trip on my birthday back in early Jan due to my back issues which took nearly 3 weeks to clear up then the heatwaves started and other tasks took priority. The weather this weekend is predicted to be nice and sunny with cooler temps so I'm taking advantage of the good weather while it is here as I don't know when the next hot spell will hit. As for the current weather, we had a lot of rain yesterday which has continued into today. Was still drizzling this morning when I brought in the rubbish bin and also a lot cooler today at just 20C. In the northern suburbs of Melbourne they had more rain but then they always get more rain given they are in a thunderstorm corridor.


Hope the weekend is good for you.

 

[darkelf9]

Afternoon all,

So there is a new trend at all ports of entry into America which is that tourists are being arrested and put in chains without any charge. This is happening to tourists from all countries. Even white people are being arrested if they have a foreign passport entering America. There is now a war happening by the US on the citizens of countries who don't kiss the arse of America. Canadians and Germans have been detained without any charge and shackled like hardened criminals then put into detention without being told why. EU and Scandinavian countries are now issuing travel warnings to their citizens if they are thinking of visiting America as a tourist let alone if you are going there on a working visa. I can't remember in my life a time where America is on the list of countries with travel warnings just for general travel. It's normal to have countries on that list with high corruption or violence to be on that list, but now America is on the same list as places like Bogata in Columbia. And for our American people yes Columbia is a country not the place in the US. I would of said American friends, but now Americans are not our friends. Americans are walking away from their traditional allies.

Then there is the case of a student who has a green being taken and held in an unknown place without a charge simply because he exercised his free speech rights. Americans like to going on about how great their free speech is in America well that is now not true. If you exercise your free speech against Rump in America now, you will get arrested and thrown in jail without any charge. It seems America is now a country where free speech is granted only if you praise Rump. America continues to show how fucked up that country is. Why would anyone want to visit the US on holidays especially if you are treated as a criminal for simply wanting to visit the country as a tourist. America continues to move to a dictatorship where people are being detained without any reason. So basically if you are thinking of going to America in the next 4yrs there is a good chance you will be arrested and detained. Find another country to visit where tourists are not arrested for merely wanting to visit. America is fucked. What other countries need to consider is giving as good as they get. If America doesn't allow the citizens of a particular country into the US then that country needs to have reciprocal bans on Americans. That is the only way America will learn that they are just another country not the ruler of the world. You have to stand up to a bully otherwise they will continue to bully you. I learned that a long time ago where I kicked the shit out of kids who were trying to bully me in both primary and high school. They never tried it again. Even when I entered the work force I stood up to bullies in the work place and they always backed down once they saw I was not intimidated. Other countries around the world need to push back at America and take their trade away from America to weaken the American economy. Americans are under the illusion the rest of the countries in the world can't function without them. Totally and utterly delusional people. It's time for the rest of the world to leave America behind and become more self reliant. America can't survive without trade.

Well with America now wanting to put a 200% tariff on EU wines and French Champagne, I guess the EU will send its wines and spirits elsewhere. Rump even said that America will make it's own champagne which it can't do because the French have a trademark on champagne because it's a place in France, so if Americans try to produce champagne and call it Champagne, the French will take them to the international court and win. We have to call our champagne Sparkling Wine. Not sure how America is going to go about producing all the stuff Rump wants the US to produce given they don't have the resources to do so. Now Rump reckons the EU was set up to screw over the US. The guy it totally bonkers. The EU wasn't even considering the US when it was formed. It exists to make trade and travel between EU countries easier. If anyone has travelled thru Europe it makes sense to have a system and common passport where you can travel easier thru these countries as the borders in some places don't really exist. The only thing marking the border is possibly a boom gate. So the formation of the EU had fuck all to do with the US. Then again Rump's Republicans are not smart people so they probably believe everything he says no matter how untrue or bonkers. Then again Americans are geographically challenged at the best of times. They probably think Estonia is in Asia and that Baltic States are actual states like in America. And if you think I'm being too harsh on Americans well just go to any social media site and see for yourself. Their stupidity is everywhere and there is lots of it. I've seen lots of just idiotic shit Americans post on social media just by watching Youtube. You don't have to dig too deep to find this stuff.

On Sunday I did my delayed birthday trip across the bay since the weather was rather nice even though it felt a lot warmer than the predicted 23C. In areas where the wind wasn't blowing as much it was quite warm. Had to use the air con in the car for at least half of the trip. So for those who might know areas around the bay here in Melbourne, I went from the city to Geelong then down to Barwon Heads where I had a nice seafood lunch and some sticky date pudding. There were lots of people out and about and the lunch spot was rather busy but getting a table was easy. Then travelled across the bridge to Ocean Grove which is now a rather expensive place to live. A house down there can easily reach a couple of million due to the ocean views and close access to beaches which face either Port Phillip Bay or Bass Strait. Then made my way over to Queenscliff for a another photo op. Not much in Queenscliff apart from the ferry terminal. I noticed the ferry terminal is looking rather swish these days. Not happy about the metered car parking though. Wasn't like that back in the day. The ferry is a car ferry and also takes day passengers across the bay to Sorrento. So if you are on either side of the bay and don't want to drive the 3hrs all the way around, you can just take the ferry with your car or just as a passenger. But as I said there isn't much to do in Queenscliff. Queenscliff and Sorrento are essentially the heads of Port Phillip Bay where all shipping passes between when entering Melbourne ports. After Queenscliff I made the short journey up to Portarlington. Again not much there but it is a nice spot if you like fishing off the pier or just want to get some seas breezes. It is a working port for the fishing industry as well. Other things to do there is take a luxury cruise out on the bay plus there is a ferry you can take to Geelong or the Docklands in the city. It is cheaper to drive from Geelong to Portarlington which is about 30km. The ferry from the city which leaves from the Docklands area which is just behind Southern Cross Station on Spencer St. You can take the free tram in Melbourne down to the Docklands area and jump on the ferry. The only warning I will give is that the bay can get rather choppy even on a sunny day. But if you are tourist in Melbourne and have the funds to spare, the ferry is a way of seeing more of the bay without having to hire a car. The ferries that run across the bay are all part of the Port Phillip Ferries network and you can book all that stuff on-line. When I was young the only option was to buy a ticket on the day and the ferries weren't that flash. The car ferry is obviously a larger vessel and looks more like a proper ferry rather than the catamaran style they run as passenger ferries. Same type of ferry they use in WA between Fremantle and Rottnest Island. After Portarlington it was the long journey home which took about 2hrs since I live on the other side of the bay and the fucking road works around the West Gate Bridge added to that time. I couldn't imagine having to deal with those road works around the West Gate everyday. And yes for those wondering, the West Gate Bridge connects the western part of Melbourne to the CBD without having to drive around the top of the bay hence the name of the connecting bridge.

Just spent a couple of hours in the front garden hacking at stuff and just about filled up the garden bin. It was supposed to be a cooler day today but the lack of wind made for a rather warm day once the sun hit its peak. I also managed to book in the big rubbish collection for Monday. I was surprised I could get it booked so quickly. Went for the private company as there are things the local council will not take in it's hard rubbish collection. Councils are becoming very picky as to what they will collect. Will have to disturb the possum in the loft of the garage to get down some of the larger items. So that should be interesting. But I'm happy to get rid of this stuff so I can move onto the final tasks. After the big clean up of the garage last week, it's looking bigger. Funny how you tend to just let stuff build up when there is no priority to move out. Really should do a big clean out more often than every 20yrs.

Hope the rest of the week is good for you.

 

[darkelf9]

Afternoon all,

Americans keep bringing up the 24hr clock and call it military time. Ok firstly the 24hr clock shown on your mobile(cell) is not military time because if for e.g. your mobile(cell) says it's 15:00, the military will not use the colon between the numbers so when the military use the 24hr clock they will always just use the numbers such as 1500 hrs. They always add the 'hrs' after the numbers. Secondly the military use the UTC time, formerly known as GMT, which is useful when planning missions meaning you don't have to convert to local time. The military call this UTC time, Zulu time. So for all the Americans out there the 24hr clock is not military time it is just a 24hr clock which has become more prevalent because of digital clocks. For example you will never see on your mobile(cell) 15:00 am or pm. The 24hr clock means there is no need for the 'am' and 'pm'. If you want to convert to the 'am' and 'pm' just subtract by 12. Also if the 24hr clock freaks out your brain, just change the setting on your phone to show 'am' and 'pm' and stop posting this dumb shit like it's the end of the world. Now I know Americans are challenged with maths which is short for the word mathematics, so when Americans call it "math" the word makes no sense because if it did make sense then "math" would be short for mathematic which is a spelling error regardless of which fucking spell checker you are using. So not only are Americans challenged by maths, they also find English fucking hard. It's a fucking wonder they can put their own pants on without looking it up on the internet. Americans even believe they invented cars.

The new tax cuts touted by the current govt is a little sweetener which while it isn't much at an extra $10/pay starting in the 2026/2027 FY, it will attract votes. These will be followed by an extra $20/pay in the following years. So the govt is proposing two tax cuts. People need to think about this as a CPI indexation for pensions rather than an actual tax cut. These new tax cuts caught the LNP on the hop. They were not expecting this move from Labor. Also the additional energy payments for the rest of this year is for everyone. The new reduced price of $25 for medication on the PBS will be a big hit with those who require to spend money on this medication on a monthly basis. Plus people on these medications are usually taking multiple medications. The other innovation by Labor of having a double quantity on a script for the same price as a single is a huge saving for people who rely on these medications to keep them alive.

The election is now set for May 3rd so we now get 5 weeks of political adds and mailbox leaflets. Unlike the US which has months of campaigning we thankfully only get about 4-5 weeks of this stuff. I'll be doing early voting as I find that much quicker. I'm now in another electorate thanks to the changes in the electoral boundaries so will see if the early voting locations will change. Will know 2 weeks before the election. The up coming election will see millennials and the children of boomers with the voting power. So boomers will no longer have the power to decide which political party wins an election and forms govt. It will be interesting to see now that the shoe is on the other foot, who will these other two generation groups will blame when govts fuck up. Till now it has been easy for both the Gen X and Millenials to blame the Boomers for everything in their lives. It is very easy to proportion blame to others, but when you are in charge and things fuck up, well that is on you. Any complaints from this year onwards by Gen X and Millenials is on them, not on Boomers. Now Boomers can openly criticise their kids and grand kids for when pollies do dumb shit.

The military leek by the US govt just keeps growing legs. Firstly they opening talked about a top secret military operation on a social media app which is fucking nuts plus it is a massive security breach that would lead to criminal charges and jail time. The reason apparently given by these bunch of amateurs in govt is that the current military tech used to share highly sensitive military info is too restrictive. Yes it is a pain in arse to deal with and is not as high tech as what civilians use for communication but the tech used by the military is also much more secure than an app on your phone. Also lets be clear, a politician doesn't get to determine what is and what is not top secret nor any other military classification. That is determined by a 'needs to know basis' and the content. You can have a secret or top secret security clearance but if you don't need to know about a particular operation or topic then you do not get access to this info. So there are multiple levels of security even within a security classification which is for a fucking good reason. A security classification are not a free for all. You only get access to stuff you need to know with any security classification. That is how that system works. So when the current US govt says that the Secretary of Defence (Minister for Defence in Aussie) gets to determine a security classification, that is total and utter bullshit. Yet anther lie the US govt is telling Americans. There is a process that you have to go thru to change a security classification of any document or file containing classified documents. Not even the President of the US can change a security classification by himself. It is illegal. What you have now in the US govt is a bunch of fucking amateurs in charge of not only the lives of Americans but the security of the US. This is dangerous not only to America but also any allies of the US who share military classified info. All America's allies will now be wary of sharing this info with the US, not knowing if this info will shared on a social media app with the general public and the enemy.

Had an interesting day out yesterday which ended in me purchasing a PS5. Also got a good deal on sheet sets. Only went there to buy one set at $120 off the sale price and decided to buy two sets so saved $240. One thing my mum taught me is what are the quality brands in purchasing manchester. That purchase kind of set the scene for the day. Went to JBHiFi to buy a new game on PS4 but discovered it was only available on PS5. Even though you might see new PS4 games on websites, stores are not stocking these games on PS4. JBHiFi and EB games are two of the larger games stores yet both are not stocking any new PS4 games. In fact if you go in-store you won't see a PS4 display any more. I wasn't intending to purchase the PS5 till later this year given the other games I want are only available on PS5. The other thing that persuaded me to buy the PS5 now was the sale price which as $100 off the normal price. The reduction in price paid for the game I purchased. Only had the game and console for a day so still learning about both.

The weather this week has been deceptively warm even though the temps have only been in the low 20'sC. The humidity has been high all week but the nights thankfully have been cool. Main reason for this humidity but low temps has been the warm winds coming our way from the north. Even today which is supposed to be 30C, I discovered when brining in the recycling bin that it rained either early this morning or late last night. I I didn't hear any rain. So it has been kinda funny weather this week. This humidity will probably break with the rain tomorrow. That weather system currently dumping all that rain in Qld and NSW will come down to Vic this weekend and Melbourne will get some of the wet stuff on the weekend and into Monday. Monday is also the big rubbish day so will see if I get wet. Got a couple of things to do this weekend to get ready for Monday including breaking down the exercise bike as it's too heavy to carry outside in it's assembled state. I can't use it these days due to my knee so no point keeping it.

Hope the weekend is good for you.

 

[darkelf9]

Morning all,

You know that the Olympics are going to be in Australia when you hear that the venue for the rowing of the Brisbane 2032 Olympics is a river that has fresh water crocs living in it. I mean how Aussie is that! The locals of course will be like, "yeah mate it's all good, the freshies won't bother ya, just don't fall out of the boat". I had a laugh when I heard where the venue for the rowing is going to be held, which would scare the shit out of other competitors from other countries. And whilst yes fresh water crocs are not as aggressive as the their salt water cousins, they can take a bite out of you. They are mainly fish eaters and have a smaller narrower snout, but still have sharp teeth. They are also not known to attack humans unlike the more aggressive salties who will even come into your tent if you camp by a river and try to pull you back in the water. There are known attacks on humans sleeping near rivers and they will also take you if you are swimming in their river. But freshies are more shy and not known to be aggressive unless you hook a fish they want.

So the annoying political campaigning stuff has started. Can't turn on the TV without some news spot about what each of the major parties are offering as a bribe for votes which is why I'm now glad that I purchased the PS5. So Mr Potato Head is offering to cut the fuel excise by half which doesn't mean that petrol prices will reduce by the same amount. The last time a govt tried this the petrol companies held on to most of extra profit and only reduced the price of petrol by half the excise reduction because govt's can't control the price we pay at the bowser. If any political party was serious about reducing petrol prices they should stop allowing petrol companies to use the Singapore price for petrol here in Australia. Singapore is not Australia so why is our petrol price linked to the price in an Asian country? That's what govt's should tackle, not the petrol excise. I remember when petrol was under $1/L. When it went above $1/L the immediate impact was that a lot of people stopped driving to work and took public transport for either all or part of their journey to work. The flow on impact was that public transport became more crowded and services needed to increase to cope for this massive increase of patronage which meant public transport fees became more expensive. Most public transport these days is privatised due to the high cost of running it so state govt's now just pay a contractor to manage the respective systems. Public transport never runs at a profit. These days if you can find petrol at between $1.60-$1.70/L you think that is a great deal. Most of the time the price is closer to $1.80/L which most people are willing to accept, but when the price goes above $2/L there is outrage. It was similar when prices went above $1/L, there was also outrage. I would prefer to have the minor long term tax cut to a 12 month temporary reduction in petrol prices.

Had the big rubbish collection on Monday which went rather quickly. They were done in about 45mins all up. Two young Kiwi guys showed up who are only doing this job till their ideal job comes along. I helped the young blokes and I think they were a bit surprised a guy over twice their age was carrying the same stuff they were. Well I had carried the stuff around to get it into the two main piles. I also lent them my adjustable trolley that converts in into a flat bed cart. One of my best buys from Bunnings. They were impressed. But for me it was about working smarter not harder. The garage inside is looking bigger now and I've got the other space in the backyard back from that second junk pile being removed. Now I just have to do another clean up in those two spots. It feels a bit like getting a haircut.

I saw a story late last week of farmers in Red states in the US complaining on the TV about losing most of their workforce due to the ICE crackdowns. Apparently 65% of farm labour in Red states are illegal immigrants, mainly from Mexico. This has been an open secret in the US for many fucking decades. These farmers pay them less than what they would have to pay an American worker to keep costs down plus they couldn't get white Americans to pick crops for those low wages. We have the same issue here with most of our labour for crop farms being from Pacific Island countries, plus backpackers who mainly pick fruit up in Qld because Aussies wouldn't do those jobs for the wages which are still higher that what you would get in the US for doing the same job. So anyway, farmers in Nebraska are now shitting themselves that they can't get workers because their illegal workforce packed up and left Nebraska for a Blue state where there is less chance of getting caught and deported. Farmers from these Red states voted for Rump as they vote Republican regardless of which dickhead the Republicans choose. I don't have any sympathy for anyone who voted for Rump now facing either financial hardship or losing their job. They knew that a vote for Rump was a vote for chaos. Well now that chaos had kicked them in the arse. I find it fucking hilarious. If these dipshits lose their farms because of what they decided on voting day then it's the shake up they needed to next time vote for their country and not for revenge. People who voted for Rump wanted revenge on other Americans and now that decision is kicking their arse.

So Rump has imposed his world wide tariffs on all countries outside the US and his table of tariffs that he proudly showed everyone is a table of bullshit. None of his percentages makes sense. For Australia to get a 10% tariff on everything is not based on fact as we don't have a tariff on US goods. We actually have a free trade agreement with the US. The US is now going after our beef which again is stupid given only 5% of our beef goes to the US and a lot of that goes to make American hamburgers so when Americans go to Macca's in the US or Mickey Dees as they call it, that hamburger is going to cost Americans more. Australian beef is far superior to American beef so why would we import an inferior product. America is attacking Australia on everything so why would we be friends with Americans. We don't import American raw beef because of Mad Cow Disease in their beef. Our biosecurity is very tight which means it keeps lots of diseases out of Australia. And just to show how dumb Americans are, included in the countries hit by reciprocal tariffs are 5 Australian territories these include: Norfolk Island which was a penal island and now a tourist spot; Christmas Island which is known for two things one is their red crabs and a detention centre; Cocos Islands which is another tourist destination. These are not countries as America has stated they are part of Australia and none of these islands do business with the US, so reciprocal tariffs on these islands is just stupid. And just when you think Americans couldn't get any dumber, they have imposed reciprocal tariffs on two other Australian territories in the Antarctic that are home to penguins and seals. Yep, America has imposed reciprocal tariffs on penguins and seals because they don't import American goods. I'll say that again, America has imposed reciprocal tariffs on penguins and seals. How fucking dumb are Americans? Well it turns out they are probably the dumbest people on the planet which is being shown by Rump and his cast of fuckwits. No this is not a comedy, this is real life in America.

Daylight savings if finally ending on Sunday. Thank fucking Christ. The mornings are now so dark that it might be 7am but it feels like the middle of the night. Down here in the south of Australia the lack of daylight in the morning is very noticeable. Not so much in northern parts like Qld. Even Sydney gets more daylight at this time of the year than we do here in Melbourne. After we go back to normal time will get about another month or so of daylight in the early morning hours before we are back in the dark again. You also know it's Winter in Melbourne when you start losing daylight at 4pm and by the time it's 5pm you are driving home from work in the dark. Then that winter chill sets at about 4:30pm each night. We are got some rain late this week and it will continue into the weekend, but I usually take weekends off from doing any tasks so will invest the time in the new video game which is not what I was expecting and whilst I will play it till the end, it won't be a keeper. I prefer a game that you can actually fight back rather than just try an avoid the enemy and your character sucks at taking a hit. So it is a trade-in game for sure.

I have been looking at the series 'Rogue Heros' and just about all the music is from Akka Dakka. I even heard Bon Scott on one of the songs who was the original lead singer. So that goes back to the 70's. So that was interesting to see a UK war series using Aussie music. Might consider buying the DVD's. I purchased the Band of Brothers DVD's years ago.

The rain arrived yesterday evening and it's still wet outside. Just brought in the bins and noticed the ground is still damp. We didn't get a lot of rain last night but expecting more this afternoon and into the weekend. Which is fine as I don't normally do any work on the weekend these days. Spent last weekend finalising the stuff for the hard rubbish collection and it was a fine weekend so the timing was good. The weather seems like it has turned away from the humidity and our temps are more reasonable mainly being in the low 20'sC. I will wait another week before packing away the fans and portable air con. Next week I'll be back in the garage to do another clean up and prep it for moving stuff out of the house to de-clutter it.

Hope the weekend is good for you.

 

[darkelf9]

Morning all,

So the very next day after Rump announced his tariffs, the American stock market lost $3 trillion and then lost $10 trillion by the end of that week. That is a massive amount of money to lose and more than some economies of other countries. America went from liberation day to liquidation day in less than 24hrs. A lot Americans lost a lot of money in their retirement funds as all retirement fund companies put a good % of their customers funds in the stock market. So those funds lost millions. The American stock market is again in free fall today and America is on the path of recession and possibly worse. It could get as bad as the US stock market crash of 1929. Lots of Americans have already lost their jobs and more will lose their jobs because private industry will sack people rather than lose profits. Because our dollar is also tied to the US dollar, our own dollar lost another couple of cents down to 60c US which is the lowest I've seen it at. With Rump causing a massive change to the world economy, it's time for the world to leave the US dollar behind and move to the Euro as the world currency. Europe is now a far more stable economic environment than the US. The main reason the economy of all other countries are hurting right now is that the US dollar is currently the default world currency which all other currencies are judged by. This even applies to Asia and Africa, so it's not just western countries that are impacted with a weakening US dollar.

I finished the PS5 game Atomfall and my initial reaction hasn't changed. Not a game for me as it was too slow and the main character can't take a hit. Two blows and you lose all your health. Whilst it is touted as a survival game, I thought there would be more options for weapons and it would be similar to The Last of Us, but it's not. The hype around the game wasn't warranted, plus it is a rather short game for the price. So for me at the price of $89, it's not worth the price. I prefer an open world game with the option to gain strength and armour so you can take on the enemy rather than just hide and hope they don't engage. You never gain enough of anything to actually gain any strength against an enemy. I find that rather boring just waiting for stuff to happen and a character that is just as week at the start of the game as they are at the end of the game. So for me Atomfall is a trade-in game. If you are looking for action and lots of options well then Atomfall is not the game for you. If you want a game where you like just hide a lot and a story then it's possibly a game for you. Then again you probably like non-combat games. Not my thing. I purchased Kingdom Come Deliverance II on Monday but discovered that Big W was the cheapest at $89, but they don't do trade-ins. I played the original and it was interesting but I thought too short for a proper open world game. This next chapter is very involved as in there is no lack of stuff to get and the info is extensive so you have to spend time just reading things which is fine. I prefer more info than less. I forgot that it doesn't have manual saves without using a potion. So at the start it is really annoying dying every few minutes if you get in a fight. The fighting mechanic requires some time to get used to so it is challenging. It is going to be one of those marathon games where it pays to take your time and have patience. I'm also learning more about my new PS5. Didn't realise I hadn't gone through all the set up. It is fast though. The downside is doing big updates as our internet sucks so downloading takes ages. Doesn't help when the game update is essentially the same size as the game. The update was 84G which took fucking ages to download, close to 7hrs. One of those where you start it overnight and let it run till the next morning. Didn't realise the update was so big so didn't start the game till nearly 11pm on the day I bought it. Next PS5 game on my radar is Doom: The Dark Ages, out later next month.

Spent a few hours on the weekend sorting out my photos from my trip across to the other side of the bay. Posted the info from that trip previously. I learnt on my first holiday trip in my 20's to take a small note pad with me to write down the places I took photos. I couldn't remember what some of the photos were and we didn't have the internet back then either. Anyway I learnt from that first experience so I always take a pen and small note pad with me now. Might sound nerdy but it saves lots of time trying to remember where I was when showing photos to my friends and family. Even if you use google maps now, you can't rely on the pics you see. Even on this recent trip I noticed a number of the photos on google maps are over a decade old. So when I have photo for example showing a breakwater, it doesn't exist on google maps. Then you look at the photo details and see the pic on google maps is from 2010. I have the same thing when viewing my house on google maps. In the street view it still shows the old house next door that was demolished. This is one of the reasons govt organizations don't rely on google maps for govt mapping. It is just not accurate enough yet everyone relies on google maps to view and find stuff. I use Whereis rather google maps to look a street maps as it is more accurate. We still have Melways here in Vic and I still have a Melways street directory which comes in handy as a planning tool. I only use google maps to get a street view of places, but always look at the photo data.

I didn't realise it was so fucking hard to find replacement oven globes. Previously I could by the Philips brand globes in Coles and Woollies now the only brand they stock are those shit Mirabella brand globes. Sure they are cheap but also poor quality and don't last as long. I've always used the Philips brand because they are quality globes. Now the only place I can find them is in Bunnings as Mitre 10 doesn't stock them and they are snapped up quickly. I find it fucking annoying when a companies' websites says they stock an item only to find out you have to order it on-line then pick it up from the retailer which they don't tell you on the fucking website. The guy at Mitre 10 told me they have those Philips globes in the warehouse but they are not a stock item. Like why the fuck do they have it in the warehouse but then not in the store. If so then why not state is it as on-line item only. Supermarkets are going for cheap shit rather than stocking quality items. It is a pain having to go to Bunnings just for one item as they are never close. I used to go to Mitre 10 before they became more tradie focused which means they don't have the variety of stock that Bunnings has.

So the latest dumb stuff coming out of the US trade wars is that their trade person has now complained that Asia doesn't buy US rice. I mean how stupid do you have to be to not realise punishing Asian countries with tariffs because they don't buy American rice is like getting angry at Italy for not buying American pasta. Republicans are fucked in the head. Asia has been growing rice well before America as country even existed, in fact they have been growing rice in Asia for thousands of years all the way back to the BC times that's close to 4000yrs ago, so why the fuck would Asian countries want American rice? America has used it's bullying tactics previously on this rice thing when Clinton bullied Haiti by saying America would provide aid if Haiti purchased American rice which meant that locals then couldn't afford to buy rice because the cost of American rice was very expensive. The local rice growers in Haiti went broke and the poverty levels in Haiti increased due to this American intervention. It seems America now wants to do to this same thing to Asian countries. We grow rice here in Australia but I only buy rice imported from either Pakistan or India which grows the good stuff. Aussie rice might be good for puddings, but not good for curries. I like long grain rice for meals and like I said the good stuff comes from Asia. I'm not actually sure why we grow rice here in Australia given our lack of water on the continent. Like cotton, rice is a thirsty crop which is why it is grown in countries with high humidity and high rainfall. Most of the rain in Australia falls to the east of the Great Dividing Range apart from rain from tropical cyclones of course which happens north of the Tropic of Capricorn. But those places are dry for 6 months of the year. Unlike down south, the northern parts of Australia only has two seasons, the wet season and the dry season. There is no logical reason for Australia to grow cotton and rice as it doesn't suit our weather patterns. We also can buy rice cheaper from Asia than grow it ourselves. Economically it doesn't stack up. Having water for people is far people important than growing a commercial crop like cotton. Rivers are running dry to due water being diverted for commercial crops like cotton. It is not a sustainable farming practice for Australia.

The warm weather is making a come back later this week and into the weekend so not packing away the fans was a good idea. We are going back up the 30'sC on the weekend and it will stay up close to 30C into next week. Compare that to today with a morning temp of 12C and getting up to 22C. Has been a cool start to the week so you might be fooled into thinking the heat had gone, but not so. The heat always hangs around till mid April, so give it another week or so and that humidity will be gone for good as we get closer to May. The second half of April is always cooler. Some of the leaves in my garden are already turning yellow whilst the roses continue to bloom. I've had roses blooming in my garden all Summer and they are still going strong with no help from me.

Hope the rest of the week is good for you.