My neighbour has a Vote Liberal Zak Kirkup sign on her front garden. Obviously she likes incompetent losers, fraudsters, conspiracists, nasty party infighters and all round idiots. She thought Trump was great.

It’s a coincidence because on Thursday the local branch of the Labor Party phoned me and asked if I’d do How-to-Vote cards on 13 March. I said I can’t stand for long periods, sorry, so they asked if I would put a Vote Labor sign on my front garden. I said yes. Maybe I might swap my sign for next door’s one dark night, and hide hers. Heh heh.

The McGowan Labor government have proved themselves to be excellent administrators. We have zero community transmission of the virus in the state, the state budget is back in surplus after the disastrous mismanagement of the previous Liberal rabble and the WA economy is not just recovering, it’s booming in the middle of a pandemic. Labor are going to romp home.

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A Little Knowledge Department: in Thursday’s West Australian an article said that a local fast money entrepreneur has bought a ticket on Jeff Bezos’s SpaceX rocket for one of the first sub-orbital flights. It said it will rise about 100km to the edge of space and (I kid you not) travel at more than the speed of light.

I think he’d better get a money back guarantee because (a) you simply cannot travel faster than light – not even close to the speed of light; and (b) even assuming you could, he’d theoretically get back to Earth before he left, so he wouldn’t have done the trip (I’m being very loose with the physics here).

As I understand it, there are no sub-editors at the West these days, since cost cutting started, so tripe like this gets through. Their grammar is atrocious too. There are a few good journos there trying to do serious work, but the paper is a rag. I buy it to read with lunch at the shops, but mainly for the ads and local news. I knew nothing until Thursday of the violent attacks at City Beach earlier in the week, for example, even though I read the internet/national news avidly.

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I must add my hearty praise for several women here. The first is Amanda Gorman, the 22 y.o. black woman who read out her poem at President Biden’s swearing in. What a powerful, moving performance that was. She’s going to be a star, and she’s only 22. I was very impressed.

Next was our own Australian of the Year, Grace Tame. Groomed and repeatedly raped by her maths teacher at age 15, he only got a 2yr 10month jail sentence and boasted about his exploits on Facebook when he got out. But Ms Tame was prevented by law from speaking about her experiences! She fought to get the law changed and won. What a woman! I admit I find her incredibly attractive in the physical sense, but also for the sheer power of her presence. I think she’s got a bright future ahead.

And third, it looks as if Tanya Plibersek might have overcome her misgivings about being a possible future leader of the federal Labor Party, and hence a possible second ALP woman to become PM. I think she’s outstanding and I would love to see her replace “Albo”. I’m sure he’s a good bloke, but as a leader, he’s embarrassing.

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I finished Fermat’s Enigma by Simon Singh. I think what I said previously here about Andrew Wiles finding the link between elliptic equations and modular forms via the Taniyama-Shimura hypothesis was as hard as the maths got, so although I don’t pretend to understand it, at least that was the crest of the hill. The rest of the book was just about Wiles’s further search for the missing link to finally nail the proof.

It’s a good book but like the next one, is padded out with long, detailed biographies of every mathematician who ever had any bearing on the result, dating back to Pythagorus. It got a bit tedious.

My next read is Prime Obsession: The Reimann Hypothesis and the author admits that he does the same, provides long, detailed biographies and descriptions of the lives and times of all the characters. At least he tells us that almost all the non-mathematical stuff is in the odd numbered chapters and all the maths is in the evens, so he is a bit apologetic about it. However, I’m in chapter 3 at the moment and I’ll keep going.

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Phew, it’s ‘ot! I’ve been out to the shops for lunch and to buy the paper and a few groceries and I burnt my fingers on the car when I closed the boot. There was no breeze and the sun was on the back of the car, despite the shade sails.

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It’s a bit over a week since my heart operation and I’m noticing a subtle improvement. It’s a bit easier to move around and I don’t tire so easily. No more chest pains, either. There’s a psychological lift too, a result of the physical improvements. It makes me want to walk a bit more, which can’t be a bad thing.

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I got my new pension card in the mail last week and it included a reminder that I’m entitled to one return or two single direction free trips on state government transport each year. I used my entitlement for a trip to Kalgoorlie on the Prospector in 2019 with my friend but didn’t do anything last year. I think I might do it again this year, like, soon. I think this time I’ll go for two nights instead of just one. I see the York Hotel in Hannan St is offering a room for $104 so it looks good. I’ll do the same as we did, rent a car for the two days as well. I saw all the old shops in the main street and I want to do some photography of them.

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I’ve said before that I enjoy, no, prefer dressing as a woman and it’s becoming my way of life now, every day in other words. Therefore my trip to Kalgoorlie will be 100% en femme, no male clothes at all. It will be easy and fun. I’m totally comfortable this way now, no nervousness, no embarrassment, just enjoyment. I don’t leave the house as a bloke any more, only as my female self. Why? It makes me feel happy! It’s so enjoyable. So there!