People object to high-rise on the beachfront, but I don’t know why. This is the Gold Coast in Queensland. Looks good to me.  ABC News phto.

Ooops, missed three days. I’m still here, still fine, just getting a bit lax. Helped by this beautiful weather. It’s an autumn like spring, or a spring like autumn. Nice 23deg yesterday and again today. I’m still having cold showers – it’s like an addiction, like sucking ice, I suppose. I have a gas-fired storage hot water system but I wonder if I need it. OK, dishwasher and washing machine. Better leave it on.

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Bryce, the lawnmower guy, came yesterday and fixed the water leak in my retic pipe at the front, the T-junction. Now that it was dry, he got it apart and showed me a small hole in the brass fitting where it screwed onto a plastic fitting. It’s clear that a small leak developed some time ago (months) and gradually enlarged itself. Water can be surprisingly abrasive and this hole had enlarged to about 2-3mm diameter. It was half in the brass fitting and half in the plastic fitting.

He also found that a solenoid was showing signs of bad corrosion and swelling, so he replaced it. Then he remade the complicated plastic pipe junction and glued it all together. He left it overnight to harden, then came back this morning and covered it all again with the soil. Cost was $35 for the solenoid, $25 for the other pipework and 1½hrs labour at $60 an hour = $150. Fair charge.

I’d been offered a possible rebate by Water Corp, but it depended on the work being done by a licenced plumber or a licenced reticulation guy. I think they would have charged me a lot more and because it’s a reticulation fitting, it’s unlikely the Water Corp would have taken any responsibility, so I reckon it’s better this way. No notional rebate, but a much lower cost of repair. Job done.

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I must admit I’m feeling a bit complacent about going out now. The infection rate in WA is so low that the chances of picking it up are infinitesimal so I feel a bit blasé. I wear nitrile rubber gloves and sanitise the shopping trolley handles and stay away from other people (but they don’t stay away from me!). I tend to have the attitude, “Well, I haven’t noticed any infection, any sore throat or cough or fever” but by the time you notice this, it’s too late, and you were probably infected nearly 14 days ago.

No, I have to tell myself not to be stupid, to follow the rules. I’m bloody certain that if I got it, with my age and co-morbidities, I’d be a goner.

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A few days ago I showed the switching desk I used to work on at Channel 7:

I mentioned the paper “log” we used, shown in front of Tom on the desk. Here’s a sample of the actual log from 25 September 1965:

This is a typed log from before they had any computer printers. You can see that the station didn’t go to air until 4pm on a Saturday afternoon!

The second program at 4.28.18pm was Sing, Sing, Sing which I think was a Bobby Limb thing. Then the first commercial break at 4.30.57pm was just Pellews 30secs (remember them?) followed by a 6AM PM (radio station) 30secs commercial. That’s all. The second break at 4.41.09pm was just Mills and Wares 20secs (biscuits), then at 4.49.23pm Kolotex 30secs (hosiery).

If I’d been the tape operator I would have needed to be really quick and skilful to switch to local control, shuttle the heavy one-hour reel forward, listening to the sound track for the countdown pips to know when to stop shuttling then take the tape back a bit to just before the pips started, play it until I saw the start of vision of the next segment, note the time on the real-time mechanical tape counter, then subtract eight seconds from that time and take the tape back, park it there and switch it to remote control for the program controller to roll the tape remotely. We all became expert at subtracting 8 secs from any time.  Another page:

This was before my time, Sept 1965 whereas I didn’t start until April 1966.

I still have these pages right here on my shelf just a few feet away, and more. I wish I’d kept the other physical items I salvaged when I left. Not valuable things, just mementoes that would have gone into a bin if I hadn’t taken them home. But the turmoil when I moved here in 2013 saw me give almost everything away. I had a set of manuals for the Bosch VTRs that I specialised in – they went into the bin! They had no value and I don’t know what I’d do with them now except let them take up shelf space and collect dust. Oh well.

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Sydney 2000 Olympics  © PJ Croft 2020

I found a folder (literal folder, plastic) on my shelf that I’d forgotten I had containing a CD and the actual film of my visit to Sydney for the Olympics in 2000. I have a folder on my hard drive of some images from that trip, but these are ones I’d forgotten about. Bonanza.

Circular Quay “big screen”  ©  PJ Croft 2020

I’d guess Svanen is Danish for Swan.  ©  PJ Croft 2020

It was a fairly big deal to have a cruise ship tied up.  ©  PJ Croft 2020

The entrance to the wrestling at Darling Harbour.  ©  PJ Croft 2020

I’m very annoyed that the Contax G cameras I was using with their Zeiss lenses produced slides and negs that are mostly soft in focus! I have two bodies, a G1 and a G2, and I don’t think I’ve ever had a sharp shot out of them! They’re autofocus but it just doesn’t work. I’ve had to apply heavy sharpening for these images. Two bodies and three lenses, all duds. Very annoyed. Time to sell them.