Baggas’ Blog

Well last Saturday our back fence was blown down in a storm, but mercifully we missed out on the even worse storms that hit our area yesterday (see this story). I wasn’t really aware it was that bad until I heard the news last night, but apparently there was a Tornado wreaking havoc in Rockingham, with many houses badly damaged and residents evacuated etc. Tornados are something we don’t usually even think about here in Australia - it’s more something you associate with the USA. For example for our friends from Nashville, it was a very real possibility. I’m sure yesterday’s tornado here was still pretty minor compared to the big American ones, but maybe it’s a wake up that we’re not necessarily as safe and cosy here in Western Australia as we feel. We are pretty lucky though - no earthquakes, volcanos, no major storms or floods. Cyclones in the North-West have generally petered out by the time they reach us. I guess the one “disaster” we see with any degree of regularity here is bush fires but even those are usually fairly contained and not catastrophic. Perth is still probably a safer place to live than Kansas after all.

About a month ago, with the aim of working on my health and fitness, I visited our local bike shop and got myself a reasonably good bike. The last one I had was a cheap one that rusted from disuse a few years ago. Well I haven’t been doing so great thus far, being so busy that I’ve only ridden it 3 or 4 times, and only short trips.

Well tonight I went out for a ride along the cycle path near our house, and was well rewarded with some great views of a gentle sunset over the ocean. All too often we don’t appreciate what a beautiful place we live in. I need to work at getting out on my bike more often, and scenes like this are a great incentive to do so.

Time to update after a busy few days.

We spent the weekend down south in Manjimup visiting Jen’s brother. Stayed in a farm stay cottage which was nice for the kids, getting to feed and play with all the animals - donkeys, ponies, sheep, cattle, birds, an alpaca and others. Did a bit of four wheel driving in the Karri forrest down there and overall just had a good relaxing time. On the way back I trusted the GPS to take us the shortest route however this was not necessarily the quickest - we wound up driving along the “Blackwood River tourist drive” which was an incredibly beautiful winding drive along the river through hilly forest and farmland… but very slow. Lesson for the future : if the GPS says go one way and my judgement says go another, trust myself instead of the computer (assuming of course I have a fair idea of where I am and where I’m going).

The last few days have been busy with work and other things. Yesterday I got my car serviced and went to Perth to do a few bits and pieces. Sure glad I don’t live in Mandurah - the drive from Perth to Mandurah is just that little bit too long for my liking.

The other thing which may or may not be happening is that there is a chance I may be going over to Myanmar (Burma) soon to help in the relief efforts in the aftermath of the horrendous cyclone. Of course this is dependant on whether their government decides to issue visas for foreign workers to come and help. But my name is on the list with an organisation who are hoping to send a medical team in so we will see what happens. I would have mixed feelings about going and leaving Jen and the three kids including baby Mia, so it would necessarily be a fairly short trip but hopefully I would be able to do some good for people. For this sort of thing it’s Jen making much more of a sacrifice than I would be, by allowing me to go. So please pray for both of us, and the entire sitatuation over there.

Anyway for the time being there’s work to be done here and patients waiting to be seen, so I’d better get on with it.

Just waiting for my last patient to show up and then we’re heading off down south for a couple of days. Jen’s brother moved down to Manjimup earlier this year so we’re going down to visit them. We’ll be staying in a cottage on a “farmstay” type place which should be good for the kids - well the boys at least - even though this is Mia’s first holiday I doubt she’ll appreciate it that much. Look forward to getting the wood fire going for those cold nights. A cottage on a farm, wood fire, nice bottle of red - can’t wait to get going

Originally uploaded by baggas.

I’ve never spent a huge amount of time here, but for some reason this park has always appealed to me..

Any locals want to tell us where it is??

One thing you could say about the Howard government is that they were generally positively disposed to single income families and stay at home mums. Unfortunately our new, left(ish) Labor government does not seem to share the same priorities - they are all about trying to encourage mothers to get back into the workforce as soon as possible by focussing on child care and tax structures for double income families. I don’t have a problem with mothers going back to work if they want or need to but I do believe that those mothers (or fathers) who desire to remain at home with their children during those early years should be encouraged and supported in that choice. Sadly it seems the philosophy Rudd government is quite different. [Howard’s high earners to face cuts - National - theage.com.au]

Local Shots 1

Originally uploaded by baggas.

I’d prety much forgotten about remote posting via flickr until I notced ob1 doing it the last few days. Nothing like some fresh photos to keep things interesting.

So here begins a series of random photos of my world as I’m around the traps. To start with, the focal point of Rockingham, where I have spent many many days since I was a kid - Rockingham beach.

Was just about to leave our worship team meeting at church when I got a call from one of my doctor friends asking “are you okay?” I had no idea what he was talking about at first but apparently there was a fire not far from our house and they were starting to evacuate homes. As he described what the news had said to me I told him I was sure it was a fair way from our house. Nevertheless I hurried home….

And as I drove towards our street I beheld a huge red glow over behind where our house is. Fortunately the bush at the end of our street is not on fire thus far but it’s probably less than a kilometre from our house. The yellow pin is (close to) where our house is and the red one is roughly where the fire seems to be. But there’s not much wind so I’m sure we’ll be fine.

Actually the first indication was earlier this evening before dinner when a helicopter flew very low over our house with a big suction hose dangling out of it. It was the fire helicopter taking water from the lake in the park just to the north of our our house (the green circle on the map). But at that stage I thought it was for the fire that has been burning a few kilometeres to the east of here for a few days. Fortunately they didn’t try and take any water from our pool, but I pity the big Koi fish in the lake at the park. What a rude shock to be sucked out of your tranquil lake into a helicopter and then dumped on a fire. That can’t be a good way to go…

Anyway enough blogging for now. Time to go watch TV and try and avoid thinking about what stuff I would try and cram in the cars if they told us to evacuate… Mia, the boys, my guitars etc

All part of life in Australia I guess. Just never thought I would even be thinking about this sort of situation.

Time to rethink baby bonus | The Australian

It’s ironic that the Labor party has usually been portrayed as the pro-welfare, more socialist party in Australia, yet now we are seeing a raft of stories about various welfare payments that are being threatened by Rudd’s budget razor gang, including payments for carers of disabled people. The next payment on the list is the “baby bonus” of about $4000 paid on the birth of a new child. Although Rudd denies any plans to do so, there are calls for the payment to be scrapped or at least means tested. Now I don’t think this payment is necessarily a great “fertility incentive” - let’s face it, babies are very expensive little things and a few thousand dollars doesn’t cover all the costs of having one - anyone who decided to have a child purely because of the lure of this money would be crazy. But as a way of helping out families with these expenses and making things a little easier, it’s a good thing. In our case it’s enabled me to reduce my hours at work for a few weeks surrounding the birth of Mia so I can be home more and help out with the kids. If the payment was means tested then I certainly wouldn’t be eligible and would have to work a lot more (I don’t get any sort of “paternity leave” or in fact paid leave of any kind). All this assumes that we actually get the payment - Centrelink already (typically) have made some sort of mistake and we need to go in to the office and sort it out. But anyway, I hope Rudd sticks to his promise and leaves the bonus alone.

Great piece in The Australian about some of the key differences between Western Australia and the rest of the nation - How the west is winning. I wouldn’t agree with every single statement he makes (like retail trading for example) but overall he’s fairly spot on. Well worth a read, particularly if you hail from elsewhere and want a snapshot of the mood in this big state of ours.

US deal ‘to trigger airfare price war’ | Herald Sun

This can only be good news. Apparently the US and Australian governments have finalised an “open skies” agreement which removes limits on the amount of flights and airlines on the trans-Pacific route between Australia and the USA. And hopefully increased competition and availability will drive down prices of flights in both directions. It probably won’t be for a little while (due to the impending birth of our new daughter) but I absolutely loved visiting America last year and am super keen to get back over there again. So I was very pleased when I saw this piece of news

Here’s the second part of the video from our weekend in Denmark. It really is a beautiful spot down there - lovely countryside and some great coastal scenery.

It’s another long weekend here down under, this time for Australia Day, January 26th. We’ll be having the customary lamb dinner tonight with some chops before yet another public holiday on-call for me tomorrow.

So far this weekend’s been good though. Jen and I went out for dinner and a movie on Friday night - saw Charlie Wilson’s War which is an excellent cold war political drama starring Tom Hanks. Full of history, humour, and irony, if you like The West Wing (my all time favourite TV show) then you’ll probably appreciate this movie. I also like the understated way the movie referenced the USA’s failure to capitalise on its victory over the Soviets in Afghanistan - as the characters discuss the dangers of not following through with helping rebuild the country, you hear the ominous sound of a jet airliner flying over Washington in the background.

Saturday we took the kids to Garden City Shopping Centre in Booragoon to do a bit of shopping and see a movie. Our only choice was Alvin & the Chipmunks which was not the best but the kids seemed to enjoy it. While doing that I dropped our Prado into a hand car wash they have in the undercover carpark there to get all the dirt off it from our previous weekend down south. The beauty of that place is not only do they do a great job for a pretty good price, but it saves me having to drive around for 20 minutes looking for parking. Now the car looks like new again, or perhaps even better than new

Speaking of last weekend, I’ve posted a video on YouTube with some footage I took while we were down south. Have a look here if you like :

In the next few days I’ll upload the rest of the video. Also I’ve posted all the photos from the trip on my flickr page.

Business beckons as Birney packs in politics – for now : thewest.com.au

I don’t normally pay a lot of attention to WA state politics but this story grabbed my attention for a couple of reasons. Matt Birney, former leader of the WA liberal opposition, announced yesterday he will be quitting politics to pursue a career in business. This will be a huge blow to the already hopeless WA Liberal party - Birney is one of their few bright stars who at least can string a sentence together and look good on TV (unlike their leader Paul Omodei).

One of the reasons Birney gave for quitting, in his refreshingly honest announcement was that politics is “an expensive hobby that did not pay the bills.” This drew a bit of fire from the West today, since the $125,000 base pay plus allowances of a backbencher is far above the average wage in our community. However I must say I agree with Birney here and always find it annoying when the media complain about MP’s salaries. The fact is that although MP’s get a pay that is considerably above the average wage, they have to work incredibly hard and make a lot of sacrifices for it. And more tellingly, the pay of even a senior federal minister working incredibly long hours in a high pressure job, is still far below what can be earned in corporate management. If we want the best quality people running our country we should be prepared to pay them adequately. Leaders in business, law, medicine and other professions are unlikely to be able to take a huge pay cut in order to enter the risky arena of politics. Especially in these boom times where unskilled young people can be earning well over $100,000 in the mining industry, we should be paying our government leaders more. And in reality, even if we were to double the salary of all the MPs in the country, the impact on the federal and state budgets would be minimal - a small price to pay for potentially attracting the best possible candidates to run our governments.

Well we had a great Christmas Day yesterday. Plenty of time just relaxing with family, an excellent church service, and time in the swimming pool. It was a pretty hot 40.7 degrees Celsius (that’s 105.26F) yesterday but today looks like it’s going to be even warmer 41 degrees! Might be a good day to spend inside in the air-conditioning watching the cricket, and maybe jump in the pool or take a run to the beach later in the evening. The only potential problem with that is that I am on-call for obstetrics, and already have at least one patient in labour…

Anyway, here’s a taste of our Christmas Day 2007!

EDIT : just had a newsflash while watching the cricket. Apparently Perth has it’s hottest Boxing Day on record - 44.3 degrees Celsisus (according to the BOM site) - that’s 111.174 degrees Farenheit. In fact it’s the hottest ever December day also. Yesterday was the second hottest ever Christmas day 40.7, but certainly the hottest in my lifetime since the previous was in 1968.

Looks like I’m a day behind the news, but I only just saw this story - Peter Costello has decided to not stand for the Liberal leadership. I’m a bit surprised but you can’t really blame him. Realistically it’s unlikely Rudd will be defeated at the next election, and the chance of Costello surviving as opposition leader for 6 years is pretty remote. I think it’s a sad loss for the party - I’ve always thought Costello would make a good Prime Minister, but I can completely understand why he’s doing it. Will be interesting to see who’s next though…

Many times during the recent election campaign I found myself wondering why there were no articles from my favourite journalist - The Australian’s Matt Price - one of the most insightful and entertaining writers in Australia. Well now I’ve discovered why - unfortunately he died yesterday after being diagnosed with brain tumours in September, according to this article. I, along with many others I’m sure, will definitely miss him. My thoughts and prayers go out to his young family. A sad loss indeed…

One day to go before the election, and here’s a cool you tube clip I found. Admittedly it’s a bit biased, casting the Howard government in the role of the Empire defending against Rudd and his band of rebels, but I still found it pretty funny, and well done. Don’t know if it was intended or not, but the father vs son parallels here are interesting. Apparently if you get tired of (or depressed by…) the election coverage Channel 10 is just showing Star Wars so it’s something to keep in mind…

In other election related news, I just read The Australian’s final editorial, which ultimately in a close decision between two “worthy opponents” advocates a vote for Mr Rudd. This is surprising from The Australian, which usually sticks to a relatively conservative line in contrast to leftist media like the Melbourne Age. What is even more surprising is that they advocate a change to Rudd without any compelling reason why. The discuss the many similarities and minor differences between the parties, highlight the key difference on IR and mention some of the potential economic dangers in Labor’s IR policies, yet choose to put their trust in him nonetheless in what is almost a leap of blind faith. Seems like the editors at The Australian have fallen under the spell (or force) of Labor’s messiah, Kevin Rudd. Seems like he’s pulling off some kind of immense Jedi mind trick on the whole country…

These aren’t the droids you’re looking for…

EDIT : ok a little more browsing YouTube and it’s full of these kind of things. Here’s another one - Kevin 007 - The man with the golden jaw. I also found a Kevin Almighty clip, but the execution is not a clever as the idea. Anyway, enjoy Kevin 007…

ALP wins the high ground on economy | Paul Kelly Blog | The Australian

Well it looks like we are set to have a new Prime Minister in a little over a week’s time. Just when there were some slightly promising signs that Howard & Costello might be able to miraculously twist last week’s interest rate rise and the accompanying economic angst in their favour, they have been blown out of the water by their lavish spend-a-thon campaign launch and especially by Kevin Rudd’s shrewd response in his. None of the Coalition promises the other day were deal-breakers, so Rudd’s decision to not try and outdo them but actually spend billions less was visionary. It’s the ultimate irony that offering less money to the voters is possibly the final straw that seals Rudd’s election victory - by negating the coalition’s arguments that Rudd is an economic risk and they are the safer choice. This still may be true, but their statements don’t look as solid now. You’ve gotta give kudos to Rudd - this is a very very clever strategy. Time to start getting used to the idea that our government will be changing soon…

Well as predicted, the reserve bank has lifted interest rates, for the first time ever in the midst of an election campaign. Some commentators have stated that this might even be a positive for the coalition, since increased economic uncertainty may incline voters to stick with the economic managers they know, rather than taking a huge risk on Labor. John Howard, whilst acknowledging people’s pain, is trying to spin it this way - blaming the rate rise on a mix of a strong Australian economy and economic instability overseas (esp the US) and predicting that things would get a lot worse with a Labor government in charge, particularly with their industrial relations policies.

All of this talk from commentators, and from Howard, makes sense and is logical. But the problem is I doubt the voting public will think things through in such a fashion. Although the shine has faded from Kevin Rudd in recent times and the polls are narrowing many people will still view things simplistically and the combination of “tired of Howard,” “interest rates bad => blame government,” and ill-founded Work Choices paranoia will see the Liberal ship sink. I’ll just be glad to have the election over with.

I know my postings have turned a bit political of late, and I’ll try to avoid this blog being too narrowly focused, but I couldn’t resist linking this piece from The Australian :

Howard Must Go | Janet Albrechtsen Blog | The Australian - “Howard must go” - there’s been no shortage of that kind of talk recently but what makes this so notable is that it’s from the pen of Janet Albrechtsen, who is probably one of the most pro-Howard journalists in Australia. Even in this article she’s effusive in her praise of the man, calling him the finest Prime Minister we’ve ever had…

But then she goes on, with a heavy heart, to say why she thinks Howard should pass the baton to Peter Costello, which she introduces with this wonderful line “The last rabbit Howard should pull out of the hat is Peter Costello.”

What an amazing turn of events that would be! But I can’t see it happening. If nothing else Howard’s tenacity and persistence would stand in the way of him making such a move, and realistically I don’t know if it’s the best thing for Costello or the Liberals to do this right now. It’s a move that should have been made probably 6, 12, 18 months ago. The leadership now, for Costello, would be a poisoned chalice. I can’t see him, in the space of a few weeks campaigning, turning things around enough to beat Kevin Rudd. Costello’s best chance of being PM (for more than a few weeks) is for Howard to win an improbable victory and then hand over within a year of the election. His second best chance is for Rudd to win and then for Labor to stuff everything up - if the economy goes pear shaped and the unions muscle back in then in 3 years time the electorate  may well be ready to welcome back with open arms “the best treasurer Australia has ever had” to come in and straighten things out. So while a Rudd v Costello battle now would be a fascinating ride and a huge gamble, I doubt it’s gonna happen. Regardless of what happens, Australian politics is the most interesting it’s ever been right now - a PM on the ropes, an ascendant opposition leader showing off by making speeches in Mandarin, and a bunch of global heavyweights like Bush, Putin, Abe, and Hu cruising around Sydney. Hold on to your seats!

WesternAustralia.tv

It’s often hard for locals to get enthusiastic about Western Australian tourism. We love living here but if you ask us to tell someone why they should visit we don’t find it particularly easy. I’m not sure why that is but I know I felt a little bit of that feeling when talking with our friends in the US recently. I think a couple of the big challenges to WA tourism stem from our geography - firstly our isolation means you really have to have a good reason to go the extra mile (or 2000 miles) to travel here when visiting the Eastern states, and secondly the vast distances involved within WA mean many of the potential tourist draws may be thousands of kilometres apart.

The above site (which I found on Rodney’s blog) goes a long way towards addressing this ineptitude on our part. It’s ostensibly a tourism advertising site, but features heaps of cool videos which demonstrate what a great place WA is. If you’re a local, check it out and remind yourself of how lucky we are to live in a place like this… and if you’re not a local, check it out and you’ll want to become one

Here’s a sample…

It’s good to see political announcements being followed by real, and fast, action.

I just received an email from the AMA calling for doctors to be involved in the outreach to Aboriginal children in the Northern Territory, following the Prime Minister’s recent announcement of an action plan to address the serious problems of abuse and other health issues in these communities. They are looking for doctors to head to the NT in the second week of July - just 2 weeks from now.

Obviously I can’t take part since I’ll be in Uganda then, but it is really pleasing to see that this call has gone out. I hope that our medical profession can show leadership in this matter by giving a strongly positive reponse to the call.

Arnhem Land - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Arnhem Land is an area of 97,000 km² in the north-eastern corner of the Northern Territory, Australia. The region was named by Matthew Flinders after the Dutch ship Arnhem which explored the coast in 1623.

Declared an Aboriginal Reserve in 1931, it remains one of the largest Aboriginal Reserves in Australia and is perhaps best known for its remoteness, its art, and the strong continuing traditions of its Indigenous inhabitants. Northeast Arnhem Land is home to the indigenous Yolngu people, one of the largest Indigenous groups in Australia, and one of the few groups who have succeeded in maintaining a vigorous traditional indigenous culture.The area extends from Port Roper on the Gulf of Carpentaria around the coast to the East Alligator River where it adjoins Kakadu National Park. The major centres are Jabiru on the Kakadu National Park border, Maningrida on the Liverpool River mouth, and Nhulunbuy (also known as Gove) in the far north-east, on the Gove Peninsula. Gove is the site of large scale Bauxite mining with an associated alumina refinery. Its administrative centre is the town of Nhulunbuy, the fourth-largest population centre in the Northern Territory.  [..read more..]

I must admit, for the last couple of months I’ve been a bit news-starved. I rarely catch the TV news and my newspaper abruptly stopped coming a while back (I didn’t bother chasing it since I knew I’d have to cancel it for our trip anyway)

So I get most of my news online, which is a bit of a patchy way to read the news because you can pick and choose which headlines are of interest. Often reading the Opinion sections of the news sites (esp The Australian) is the best way to get a handle on things.

So here’s a couple of opinion pieces that caught my interest today

A crawl to prosperity ain’t money for jam | Matt Price | The Australian - Matt Price is perhaps my favourite Australian journalist. Often humorous, always insightful, generally fair though perhaps with a very slight tilt to the right. And as an added bonus he comes from Perth, which means he gets it in a way that journos from the East don’t. The above article takes a step back and looks at why Kevin Rudd is so popular in the polls, how even in an environment of unprecedented economic prosperity, voters’ fears for the future, especially the future of their children, have a profound effect on their politics. Although Rudd certainly doesn’t have any better answers for these fears than Howard, it is his clever exploitation of these issues that may see him elected.

Noel Pearson: Politics aside, an end to the tears is our priority | Opinion | The Australian - this gives the perspective of an Aboriginal leader on John Howard’s extraordinary moves to address child abuse in indigenous communities. Pearson is broadly supportive of the Howard plan, however offers some important warnings about where it may fall short. For an analysis of the politics of the situation, check out this piece from Glen Milne - PM’s haters parade their own defects. Few people disagree totally with what Howard is doing, but many of the left-leaning journos are lining up to find dark, politically inspired motives behind it (aka the new Tampa) - Milne adroitly takes them to task in his article. I thought Kevin Rudd was very clever not to get “political” or criticize Howard much on this issue - he didn’t need to. All he needs is for the leftist press to sow the seeds of political doubt about Howard’s motives, and he can stand innocently to the side with his principled support. This issue will not be a new Tampa - sadly there are less people whose votes will be influenced by the plight of indigenous children than there were whose votes may have been affected by their fear of a wave of illegal immigrants and “terrorists.” Which hearkens back to the pointin the paragraph above - fear is a key political motivator. Howard (might have) used it in his favour in 2001, and it is Rudd who can use it to the opposite effect now.

CoffeeGeek - Cafe Culture Downunder

The above is a fascinating article from Coffee Geek, discussing Australian cafe culture and how (among other things) the Australian European immigration regulations following World War II contributed to the uniqueness of the Australian market.

What is unique is that, outside Italy, the Australian and New Zealand café markets are the only other 100% espresso-based markets in the world! The US and other countries are dominated by filter style, or brewed, coffee. You cannot give filter coffee away in Australia or New Zealand. Furthermore, the Australian and New Zealand markets are unique in that the espresso based coffees are nearly always served with milk - approximately 98%, compared to 5% milk based coffees in Italy.

As an indication of the highly competitive, sophisticated and quality-driven nature of these markets, we must look at some interesting statistics.

The ratio of espresso machines to population in Australia and New Zealand is approximately 850 people to 1 machine, only bested by Italy. In comparison, in the US, there are roughly 20,000 people per espresso machine. With such a limited number of customers per machine to draw on, cafés in Australia and New Zealand must use quality as the biggest drawcard.

In addition, less than 6% of small businesses in Australia and New Zealand are franchised, as compared to over 40% in North America. The sheer number of franchised stores in North America only serve to reduce the average quality of espresso-based coffee, not improve it.

I never realised how blessed we are here in Australia to live in an espresso-based market.  Even dodgy cafes and shopping mall donut stores here will have an espresso machine and most will serve a tolerable milk based coffee (”flat white”, cappucino, latte etc) - even our petrol stations now have proper espresso machines! As the quote says “you cannot give filter coffee away in Australia or New Zealand” - the only places I have seen filter coffee served are in people’s homes (where filter machines are rapidly being superseeded by home espresso machines), some businesses, and McDonalds.  But even in Maccas they now have big automatic espresso machines and the filter pot now sits unwanted in the corner, although the McDonalds espressos are of variable quality - I’ve had some pretty decent cups and some that are wretched, but then again if you want coffee at 4am on the way back from the hospital you don’t have a lot of choice.

Anyway all this talk about coffee makes me want to get home and fire up my machine. I got it back from being repaired yesterday but was far too rushed last night and this morning to get it going. This evening will be rushed as well as I have a stupid meeting to go to but I’ll make it a priority to fit in a couple of cups

Queen’s Personal Australian Flag - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Queen’s Personal Australian Flag, sometimes known as the Royal Standard of Australia is the personal flag of Queen Elizabeth II in her role as Queen of Australia. The flag was approved for use in 1962. It is only used by the Queen when she is in Australia, or attending an event abroad in her role as head of state of Australia. The Queen’s representative, the Governor-General of Australia has their own flag.

The flag consists of a banner of the coat of arms of Australia, defaced with a gold seven-pointed star with a blue disc containing the letter E below a crown, surrounded by a garland of golden roses. [..read more..]

Diggers ruled out for Darfur | News | The Australian

Good news that the world is finally taking some action on Darfur, but it’s a shame that our “over-stretched” military can’t send any sort of contribution. It’s not all that far from Iraq to Sudan, perhaps some of our troops in Iraq should be moved to somewhere where they might actually be able to achieve something…

Perth cements spot as Australia’s priciest city : thewest.com.au

I was interested to read in this morning’s newspaper that Perth has crept into first place as Australia’s most expensive place to buy a home. It’s not a huge surprise given the way house prices have gone up over the last couple of years, but it’s still pretty amazing when you compare it to a few years ago. Certainly less than 5 years ago I can remember looking at prices in Sydney and wondering how on earth regular people could afford to live there, and being thankful that our prices in Perth were half the amount. Not so anymore - the median house price in Perth is now $508,900, just passing Syndey’s $507,400. The median monthly mortgage payment is now $3009, compared to $3000 in Sydney. Now that amount seems quite a lot to me, and I’m on a reasonably high income - I don’t know how people on average wages could manage that.

Looking on a broader scale, let’s review the List of most expensive cities from 2006. Back then Sydney was 19th [20th in 2005], and Perth was 93rd [93rd in 2005]. Assuming that housing is one of the biggest expenses to be taken into account, and assuming relative stability of the rest of the list (and these are big assumptions I know!) then this news might catapult Perth into the top 20 most expensive cities in the world! How crazy is that? Especially considering we are the most isolated capital city in the world, but then again maybe that’s part of the charm for some people (that and maybe the little fact of the large supply of well paying mining jobs in this part of the world..)

This is interesting to compare to house prices elsewhere in the world. Jenni showed me the other day some pictures/prices that she had been sent of homes in Nashville. Compare the house on the left in Baldivis (not far from us, 44km from Perth) for A$499,000; with this house on the right from Nashville for A$455,000. I know which one looks better to me! Now I know there’s a whole lot of other factors to take into account when performing such a comparison aside from price and looks, but as a simple visual illustration of how crazy the house prices here in Perth have gone I think it’s quite telling. I’ll be very interested to see where Perth actually ranks on the next list of most expensive cities (FYI - Nashville is not even in the top 144) and if we do make it up to the top 20 or not. Though I guess it’s not a climb we want to be celebrating too much. Anyway I suppose I’d better get back to work so I can afford those mortgage payments…

Tuesday night Jenni and I went and saw Keith Urban in concert in Perth. For those who are not in the know Keith is an Australian country music artist who moved to Nashville in the 90s, was hugely successful over there, and ultimately married Nicole Kidman. I’d never listened to any of his music until a few months ago when we first started thinking about going and visiting friends in Nashville - since then I’ve bought 4 of his CDs and I really quite like them. And from there I’ve gone on to explore a bit more of the country genre.

Keith is nowhere near as popular here in Australia as in the USA - he probably gets more publicity here because of his marriage and rehab problems than he does for his music. So I was interested to see what sort of demographic the crowd would be - would it be just middle aged women, hard core country music fans, or teenage girls? In the end it was a mix - not too many cowboy hats in sight, but there were plenty of 30-50 year olds and a sizeable minority of younger people. Women certainly far outnumbered men.

The warm-up act were West Australian band The Waifs who played a tight and enjoyable set, however most of the crowd were impatient for the main concert. Keith did not disappoint. Visually the show was great - he had a great lighting setup and they made good use of the video screen including live video and synchronized video clips. But most importantly the music. Keith is a very talented musician. He sang a good mix of mostly up-beat songs from his last few albums. He’s got a good voice and is a surprisingly good guitarist. He played the majority of the lead guitar and solos for most songs although was backed up by a very able band playing a range of instruments including electric and acoustic guitars, mandolins, and banjo. Keith himself brought out an impressive armory of guitars including Gibson Les Paul and SG, Fender Stratocaster, Telecaster, and Jaguar and a couple of acoustics. He probably favoured the Gibson SG and Fender Tele most of all though. Keith seemed friendly and relaxed although he didn’t talk a whole lot between songs. I was surprised at how strong his Australian accent was when speaking - I expected it to have more of an American twang to it after so many years in the USA, so that was nice. Overall it was a very enjoyable show. As Jen remarked, he’s definitely one artist who comes across even better live than on his albums. I would certainly go and see him again if I had the opportunity.

Since the concert was at Burswood we stayed at the main Burswood hotel overnight (where the service was not as good as one would have expected from “Perth’s Best Hotel”), lost a bit of money at the casino and then went into Perth the next day to do some shopping.  Was nice to get a bit of a midweek getaway from work and the kids.

Rockinghamgateway Photo Gallery

Here’s a collection of photos from our local area at the Rockingham Gateway website, which I discovered whilst browsing some blog comments. Plenty of good shots of our great beaches and more.

Zazz! One Day. One Thing. One Chance.

A friend told me last night about this cool site called Zazz. Rather than try and describe it myself I’ll quote from their FAQ (or wtf?) I especially like the last paragraph…

Q:  So what is Zazz?
A:  Zazz is a very special internet-based store that only sells one item a day, at a large quantity. Zazz will continue to sell that item until either it sells out, or the 24 hours ends. Should it end prematurely, you’re more than welcome to hang out but a new item won’t be available for sale until midnight the next day. Beyond this, Zazz is also a community of people who love gadgets and buying cool things they’ve always wanted but could never afford, until now.

Q:  That’s ridiculous. Are you guys insane? Why on earth would you do something so stupid as to sell one thing a day?
A:  In answer to your first question, No. In answer to your second question, we feel that online stores are too bogged down with items. You know what it’s like, you go to a major internet department store and unless you know exactly what you want it’s near impossible to find something suitable for your 3rd cousin’s 65th birthday. And if we were going to just sell one thing for the rest of the company’s lifetime we don’t think we’d make very much money, so we keep things fresh by selling new things every day.

Q:  That sounds an awful lot like impulse buying, is that the case?
A:  Look, Zazz really is impulse buying, but at it’s best. We’re willing to say that. A lot of the stuff we sell you DO NOT NEED. But that’s irrelevant; because last time I checked, the things I want (a new plasma tv, swiss army knife and coffee grinder) are much cooler than the things I need (air and water).  

These products go on sale at Midnight Australian Eastern time each day, which is cool for those of us in Western Australia since it’s only 10pm here. They also offer an sms alert service via twitter which I am yet to check out. Looking through their list of past products it seems most of them have been selected to appeal to the geeks and the gadget freaks. This may not have been such a timely discovery for me since I’m currently saving towards our upcoming trip and hopefully a new guitar, so I shall have to be strong not to give in to the temptation. I was even tempted by today’s $988 computer system, which is an awesome deal, even though I already have a relatively new PC. Anyway, check it out at your own risk!

Well they say Christmas only comes once a year but for the last few years in Australia it has seemed like we were developing a tradition of “Christmas in May” at least in the greedy, consumeristic sense of Christmas. May is federal budget time, and in these recent times of economic boom there has been a continuing series of tax cuts and handouts to the average Australian. Despite all this there are always some who find reasons to whinge and complain.

This year is no exception - Peter Costello has once again managed to deliver significant tax cuts whilst spending additional money in key areas like infrastructure, education and defense. Even though this is an election year it seems the budget is fairly financially responsible and should avoid inflationary and interest rate pressure, which is a noteworthy achievement. There is no doubt that many of the initiatives in this budget are politically motivated to try and neuter some of Kevin Rudd’s strengths, but overall it seems Costello has been reasonably restrained (although he’s got plenty of cash in the kitty to buy votes closer to election day).

So overall I’d say that this is a pretty good budget. Last year’s was more explosive with tax cuts and super changes, but he seems to have struck a fair balance here. There’s not a whole lot under the tree for me this time - just a very small tax cut (though a slightly bigger one next year) and no extra Medicare spending that I can see. Hopefully if he can survive the election Costello’s next budget will risk some more bold reform of the taxation system, such as the eradication of the 45% tax rate, but the Liberals have some big hurdles to jump before then. The other thing I would truly like to see is a massive increase in foreign aid - although they have boosted it a little this year it pales in comparison with the extra $2 billion devoted to defense. If even a quarter of that amount was spent on foreign aid it could make a tangible difference to many people worldwide and set a good example to other nations. If only Peter’s brother Tim Costello had a bit more say in the matter…

Saturday was a perfect day, and we spent it at the Perth zoo with our friends and their kids. As you can see in this clip, it was a lot of fun…

Paul Kelly: A bizarre blast from the past | The Australian

It’s bound to happen in every TV show and perhaps every political career. And it looks like Kevin Rudd’s dream run has finally come to an end - he’s hopped on his water-skis and jumped that shark. A Labor leader taking his party to the center, standing up to the unions and moving into the 21st century in Blair-like fashion sounded too good to be true … and indeed it was. The commentators are having a field day following the weekend Labor conference, and Paul Kelly’s article above is right on the money…

At this point Labor loses the goodwill of big business, the hope of winning small business and the dream that it stands for entrepreneurship. Rudd’s election strategy is to pitch to working families with the claim that an arrogant Howard has abandoned them.

The stage is set for a bitter election over the industrial model that Australia needs for its open economy, an issue unresolved for a generation that now approaches showdown time.

In his speech, Rudd said Howard had launched “an assault on Australian family life” and that Labor would “restore the balance”.

This is neither a credible nor accurate statement about the totality of Labor’s policy. This policy goes far beyond any family friendly test. It is better described as union friendly. The details and the scale of Labor’s package transcend any effort merely to restore fairness to the workplace.

So the battle lines are drawn - the scene is set for the next election. Either Rudd has shown his true colours or has shown his weakness in this capitulation to the union movement - either way he’s jumped the shark as far as I’m concerned (and to think I was starting to like the guy!) The big question remains though - will the Australian public be fooled by this “family values” line and maintain Rudd’s high ratings, or are Kevin Rudd’s Happy Days drawing to an end? Stay tuned…

11:55pm last night and I was in theatre at the hospital for a Caesarean section, and the soon-to-be father was saying “wait five more minutes and it can be an ANZAC baby.” Such is the importance of ANZAC day in Australia - the most important national holiday in which many of us stop to reflect on how lucky we are living here, and more importantly to remember the sacrificies made to make our country what it is today.

Rather than post at length about this special day, let me direct you to a couple of people who have covered it better than I ever could.

Firstly Craig at These Infinite Spaces has changed from his usual single line linkage style of posting to a full and detailed post on ANZAC, and I’m glad he did - read it here.

Read the rest of this entry »

So it’s the start of yet another week. We had a pretty good weekend. My illness that I had on Thursday and Friday resolved fairly quickly and by Saturday I was fine - I put it down to the fact that I dosed myself on just about every drug I could find on Thursday! Spent a lot of time outdoors on the weekend, had some meals in our patio while the weather is still good, went for bike rides and visit to parks, swam in the pool. And then on Sunday afternoon we got some decent rain as well so had some nice inside time with the rain pelting down on the roof.

Spoke to the insurance company today and was told that repairs have been authorised for our car. Still haven’t heard from the repairer though and I imagine it will be quite a while before we get the car back. And when that happens I’m planning to probably trade it in and get a new model, since I’m not sure I want to hang onto a car that has that much damage to it, no matter how good a job they do on the repairs.

This week is a split week since Wednesday is ANZAC day - for anyone overseas who doesn’t know, ANZAC day is the holiday in Australia and New Zealand where we honour our soldiers who have fought and died in the various wars over the last century or so. It specifically commemorates the landing of our forces on April 25, 1915 in Gallipoli, Turkey in 1915. I’ve always found it somewhat fitting that our national memorial day for the armed forces commemorates what was ultimately a great defeat at Gallipoli. It’s a good thing that Australia honours our soldiers no matter whether they won or lost… One of the traditions for ANZAC day is eating ANZAC biscuits, which are these yummy oatmeal biscuits. Jen and the boys made up a batch on the weekend and they didn’t last long at all.

I don’t know a whole lot about cartography but I like looking at maps and atlases. Because mapping a round world onto a flat map necessarily involves some distortion of actual size it can be difficult to visually compare the sizes of different countries/continents. For example on many maps Africa often appears to be not as large as it actually is. This map helps give a better idea of just how vast Africa really is. I discovered this map at a brilliant blog called Strange Maps. They have a panopoly of unusual and quirky maps. They are so brilliant it is tempting to post a few of them up here but I’ll refrain and let you explore the site yourself.

Also interesting to read is the blog post that accompanies the Africa map, and some of the heated discussion that ensues. Who would have thought that the topic of Alaska could be such a sensitive one? It’s interesting how even the subject of cartography can be prone to accusations of politico-cultural bias. I don’t know if this was an intentional thing, but it is true that many of the maps we have are distorted in such a way that the wealthier northern countries appear larger than poorer and southern nations. An interesting map to view is the Peter’s Projection, which attempts to give a more actual visual representation of the relative size of parts of the world than the familiar Mercator projection.
Once again I don’t know if this reflects an intentional cultural bias, but I was quite taken aback the other day whilst watching an episode of The Gilmore Girls with Jenni. On the wall in a scholl classroom was a world map, but instead of the usual map which is approximately centered on Europe and the Prime Meridian this map was actually centered on the Americas, thus necessitating a bit cut through the Eurasian continent on each edge of the map. I know we often jokingly say Americans see themselves as being at the center of the world, but I thought that was taking it to extremes. It’s almost the same as if us Australians (and South Africans and Argentinians) were to adopt a map like the one below (which is actually an inverted Peters)…

If you’re not from Australia (especially Western Australia), you probably won’t get this cartoon from today’s Weekend Australian newspaper, but I thought it was one of the most incisive I’ve seen in a while, considering how toxic former WA premier Brian Burke is at the moment. The biggest question about this scandal is whether it will ultimately force a state election, but the sad thing about that is that even if an election were held, the Labor government would very possibly still win, considering how inept our state Liberal opposition are. Anyway, it makes for interesting news, if nothing else.

(I don’t think it comes through clearly on the image, but the prisoner in orange is David Hicks…)

Australian Word Map

Just discovered this. It’s a map/dictionary which aims to catalog “regionalisms” - that is words that are unique to particular parts of Australia, or which have differing meanings in different places. I wouldn’t say it’s entirely accurate, but it’s worth a look. Not a bad way to waste a bit of time.