No, not literally. But I feel as if I was hit by a succession of blows from lunchtime on.

• I received an email from a “friend” which was a stupid American redneck “joke”, but with Bill Shorten’s name inserted in a highly derogatory way. I guess after all this time he still hasn’t realised that I’m a committed Labor person. I don’t think he’s up to the job of lecturing me about stupid. I was upset. I’ve drafted a reply, but … if I send it, relations will be strained. Damn. I’m upset. I’ve never sent anything comparable to him.
• I went to MacDonalds for lunch (and left without buying because my favourite wrap is discontinued), and was very slowly easing out of the parking area onto the side street. One car went slowly past me and stopped, so I eased forward. The traffic slowly moved so I went forward at well below walking pace. Next thing – BLAAAARRRRRRRP! A woman driver on my right who had just arrived didn’t think I should be allowed out so she leant on her horn. I could see it was a woman. Bloody hell!!!
• I went on to Hungry Jacks and turned into the parking lane in front of all the fast food shops. There was a big delivery truck parked in the lane blocking cars coming toward me. I was slowly easing past them but another woman driver (yes) in a 4WD decided she would pull out and come past the truck, leaving me with nowhere to go. I waited for her to reverse but she wasn’t going to, coming towards me on my side of the road, forcing me to reverse, which was difficult as there was a queue of cars behind me. I had no choice, she was going through and too bad about me. Bloody hell!!!

All these in quick succession left me feeling shell shocked. Bloody inconsiderate damned people.

Hmmm, my quite expensive Skagen watch has stopped. I assume the battery has died, but it’s only just over a year old and batteries should last longer than that in my experience, so it’s a bit disappointing. However, I’ve been noticing condensation on the inside of the glass, which is definitely not good. I haven’t been wearing it on my 100m deep sea dives (;-) . The only thing is, I don’t take it off when I wash my hands so it gets a little bit wet then. That shouldn’t bother a modern watch. I’m not sure how long the warranty is – I’d better check before opening it up.

Meanwhile, I’ll use one of my eight or so other watches. I have watches going back 30 years and many (all!) of them are quite nice. None of them was very expensive – this one at about $349 was my most extravagant. I like a nice watch and I’m always on the lookout.

PS: huh, it failed around 5pm yesterday, but now it’s 08:15am and it’s started working again. I hope it’s not an intermittent fault. They’re the hardest to nail.

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The car saga continues. I’m quite specific about what I want now. First choice a CL500, this one –

Second choice an SL500:

Third choice a CLK500 or CLK350:

The top first choice, the blue CL500 is on the Gold Coast, 2003 model, $39K, 118,000Km, a 5.5L AMG with supercharger. Everything’s right about it, but I worry it’s been thrashed. Why? Supercharger on a high performance 5.5L V8! And 2003 is a bit old. Probably worrying about nothing.

The next choice, the SL500 is outstanding but it’s done 145,000Km and is priced at $48,880 which is way above what I want to pay. Really nice car, though. It’s a convertible, but a hard top so my security worries don’t apply.

Finally, I thought the CLK was going to be a good compromise, but I’ve gone off them. The styling doesn’t grab me the way the other two do.

To make a deal I’d have to go to either Melbourne, Sydney or Brisbane and I’m not sure I’ve got the stamina to do it these days. Very tired all the time. Lots of daytime sleeping. Diabetes? My blood sugar is quite well controlled – avg. 10. Leukemia? How would I know? Could be. Obesity? Definitely could be, and I’m having some success in reducing my weight. I’ve dropped around 8Kg from a year ago, but to do it I’m practically starving myself and I can’t seem to get any lower. Damn! It’s a vicious circle – I need more exercise, but I’m too tired to exercise.

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My position on same sex marriage? I don’t really care, it’s none of my business what other people do. That’s the point: it’s their business, no-one else’s! So kids might be affected by having two parents of the same sex? Kids are adaptable, and the effects would be far worse if the hetero parents were the bogan neanderthals we see so often who don’t know how to raise kids anyway. I cringe at some of the abuse parents shout at their kids in shopping centres. Poor kids. No wonder they grow up with development problems, and they’ve been raised in a hetero household.

Herr Abetz says it’s the thin edge of the wedge and will lead to brothers marrying sisters and utter rubbish like that. Shut up, Herr Obersturmfuhrer Abetz. It’s none of your business!

Barnaby “Bugger off” Joyce says we’ll be looked down on by our Asian neighbours. Barney, they don’t care about a trivial thing like that! You think they take any notice of silly Australian news things like that? Don’t be ridiculous. Anyway, we can take the high moral ground very easily when it comes to capital punishment and corruption. I don’t think we have anything to worry about in that regard. So Barnaby, shut the f..k up and bugger off. Mind your own business.

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When the ABC Q&A furore arose, I thought the ABC had just made a mistake by including that guy in the audience without knowing he was going to speak up and ask that question. It was a simple mistake, I thought, and they shouldn’t be crapped on.

But I realised that it wasn’t a simple mistake. The producers asked him to be in the audience and they supplied him with the question! It wasn’t spontaneous – the producers told the Muslim guy what to say and ask. That’s completely different and I think the ABC deserves a lot of the criticism it’s received. That was wrong.

But the government’s response has been way over the line. It’s obvious that they are taking the opportunity to try to damage the ABC, as they always do. It’s good to see the polling that shows that the ABC is held in high regard and the government are seen as in the wrong. Good.

It is so disheartening that the government attacks the ABC simply on the basis that they don’t like the criticism and aggressive interviewing they receive, but they utterly, completely ignore the vast output of the ABC on radio and TV that is top quality and adds so much to life in this country. Abbott and company neither know nor care about The Science Show and similar programs that are so rich in information. Yet all the budget cuts are damaging these small programs and the ABC’s news coverage. I condemn this awful government.