With friends like this!

The Art of War – Kill your allies. Why do we bother?

I have just posted this on The Atlantic’s web site, a US news magazine:

I am an angry Australian. The Australian SAS are the among the very best, very toughest special forces in the world, but they are secretive. They usually NEVER talk about it. We NEVER see their faces. They fight and are disabled or die without telling. They have been in Iraq and Afghanistan for the past 12 years supporting the US in anti insurgent fighting.

In the past few days, a new documentary has been released where former SAS soldiers and officers have spoken on camera for the first time.

A former SAS officer spoke on TV here last night and said the greatest fear the Aussie SAS hold is not the Taliban, it’s the US! Blue on blue! He said time after time, they have been shot at, bombed or targeted by US drones or Predator gun ships. They fear the US more than anything else in Afghanistan.

He cited an example where a Predator targeted a supposed column of enemy armoured vehicles and was poised to fire on them. In fact, it was a line of 14 poplar trees behind which the SAS were sheltering. They got the strike stopped just in time and got out of there.

This goes right back to Viet Nam. Aussie casualties from US forces were rife. The gun culture – blaze away at anything that moves and look later.

Thanks a lot guys, and thanks for giving me the opportunity to vent so soon.

I added, “I expect now to be targeted by all the gun freaks and super patriots.”

http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/07/yes-sometimes-drones-are-actually-effective/260260/

Say goodnight, Dick

Jul26

Sanur January 2011

I have a “friend” who calls himself an electronics engineer. He’s Malaysian Chinese and admits he’s an out and out racist. He hates refugees.

He’s a permanent resident here in City Beach, living a life of great comfort on shareholders’ funds and he doesn’t see that any other immigrants should be let in. Do you, Michael? Not without rigorous tests and medical checks. “Who knows what diseases they are carrying?” Eh, Michael?

He also will not believe the science of Man-Made Global Warming. To him, it’s a natural sun cycle and we can’t and shouldn’t do anything to combat it. To him, the so-called Carbon Tax is just a government swindle.

This is the abstract from a scientific paper http://arctic-news.blogspot.co.nz/p/global-extinction-within-one-human.html If this won’t convince anyone, then say goodnight.

Although the sudden high rate Arctic methane increase at Svalbard in late 2010 data set applies to only a short time interval, similar sudden methane concentration peaks also occur at Barrow point and the effects of a major methane build-up has been observed using all the major scientific observation systems. Giant fountains/torches/plumes of methane entering the atmosphere up to 1 km across have been seen on the East Siberian Shelf. This methane eruption data is so consistent and aerially extensive that when combined with methane gas warming potentials, Permian extinction event temperatures and methane lifetime data it paints a frightening picture of the beginning of the now uncontrollable global warming induced destabilization of the subsea Arctic methane hydrates on the shelf and slope which started in late 2010. This process of methane release will accelerate exponentially, release huge quantities of methane into the atmosphere and lead to the demise of all life on earth before the middle of this century.

“… lead to the demise of all life on earth before the middle of this century.”

I’ll be gone before then. I’m going to enjoy the rest of my life. Sorry kids, it’s too late. We are at the tipping point, now!

This is how the world ends, not with a whimper but with a giant fart! Everyone will be exposed, everyone. Goodnight.

English pig dogs

Jul25

Poms

Just now I have posted the following on The Guardian’s comments about another double-dip recession in Britain:

English, I fart in your general direction. You do comedy superbly well. No wonder. You are such funny people.

As an Australian, I feel entitled to gloat. Yesterday, the RBA announced that Australia has chalked up 21 years without a recession, the only country in the world to ever achieve this

The RBA Governor: there is no mystery to this, we can expect growth to continue for the foreseeable future and it does not depend entirely on China. There is no need to fear a housing bubble or any bank failures.

We have sailed through FOUR successive financial crises from 1996 to now. It is not luck. I feel safe.

Today, Wednesday, we announced annual inflation of 1.4%, another new record. Growth is around 6% in Western Australia and we have a jobs crisis – we cannot get enough engineers and workers. Average wages in WA are about GPB 55,000.

Sydney ran the “best Games ever”. We can do it again, any time we are asked.

You bastards have looked down your public school noses at us for 200 years. Condescending, supercilious, snooty, snobbish, bastards. Very funny.

This is classic old and new. The UK is old and decrepit. Your living standards are falling, you are decaying, crumbling. You are not far from being a poor country. You can no longer sustain your military muscle. Your banks and financial institutions are riddled with failure and corruption, DUE TO ARROGANCE and greed. Looting, remember?

If I didn’t love Britain so much I would crap on you even more. I am 7th generation Oz, but I go back to 13thC Britain, yet you make me line up with “other passports”, with the Poles and Turks (sorry guys).

You even fu..ed up the Thames Jubilee Procession!

Your queen (she gets no capitalisation from me) has awarded our former PM John Howard the OM. This is an appalling error of judgement. Howard = Blair. He is hated here, for good reason, yet Liz awards him the OM. (I think Tony Blair is a good guy.)

I am angry. Serve you right, Poms. You are old and in decline. I exclude Scots from my diatribe.

I expect to get flak. Too bad.

How does this happen?

Jul25

What is it?

I have been noticing coincidences, the increasing incidence thereof, for years, but sometimes I just fall back open mouthed.

Two days ago I was emailing with someone and thinking of saying “we are on the same plane”. That led to the thought of plane, plain and possibly plein. It’s pronounced the same as the others, but it’s French for full, replete, e.g. je suis plein, I am full, had enough. Not a common word. Never see it in print.

Tonight on Ch 44 West TV there is a program called “Plein Air Painting TV”.

How does this happen?! I swear I have never seen this word in print on a TV screen before, ever. Yet it occurs twice in three days. I am psychic. I’m convinced of it.

Yet week after week I buy Lotto tickets and I haven’t won the big prize. How can this be?

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Nearly forgot – last week I had a haircut at a barber in Duncraig. When I looked at the till docket several hours later (to enter it into my Expenditure notebook), I noticed the name of his business is Joe and Co. What brand T-shirt was I wearing? Joe and Co from BigW.

I’ll have to go back and ask him, where did you get your name?

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Today I heard reference to the deadly nature of the current flu season and the need to have Tamiflu available. I asked at the chemist if they had supplies, but not yet, next week. If the packet I have in the fridge has passed its expiry date, she said, it’s probably useless.

Mine is expiry 12/2009. Huh! I took it to Europe in 2008, too, so it hasn’t been kept cold all the time.

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I’m feeling better, noticeably better. My legs are improving. I don’t feel the need to use my stick as much. I can walk more easily. I feel brighter and the doctor said he could see it yesterday, without me saying anything.

I know why. I know exactly why, and I can’t tell you. If only, if only I’d known this 10 years ago!

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There is a fashion for time-lapse video on the net at the moment, particularly for astronomy and night star scenes. To be honest, I’d become a bit blasé about them.

But! But! This is the best thing I have ever seen:

http://www.univers etoday.com/96432/passing-through-a-beautiful-iceland-timelapse/#more-96432

I can’t say any more than See It!

All clear, matey

Jul24

Ships going away, escaping. © PJ Croft 2012

Prostate check today: all clear, no problem.
Blood pressure check: 135/70 in the doctor’s surgery, therefore lower away from ‘surgery syndrome’.
Small pain: on lower left that I had been told was “referred pain” from gallstones ( gall bladder is upper right! ) may be a particular type of diverticulitis. No need to worry unless it worsens.
Weight: slowly falling.
Health: I’m in remarkably good health. I look good, he can see it in my eyes, brighter.
I feel good, except for my weight.
Didn’t need my stick today. Circulation Booster is slowly working.

So, I am fine. No-one need jump to any conclusions about me. Mind your own health.

Additionally, I think I know why I’m feeling and looking better. I’ve taken a chance on something, and it’s paying off.

Not this: Complete new carpets through the house on Friday. Ready to sell.

Efexor/Edronax

Jul23

Some small idea of what it feels like to be on a bad medication.

[Edit: 3 August 2012 – see item Headed Holy Shit – Anti-depressant!

I’ve found it was 8-12 August 2003, and specifically Sunday 10 August 20003 that is described below and the drug was Edronax ]

[Edit: since writing this, I’ve found it wasn’t 2007, but it did happen and I’m not sure which year yet. I may be mistaken about the drug too, but I have yet to find the diary entries. I’ve gone back through the ABC’s search engine and I can find references to Robert Drewe’s book, Shark Net, which was the program I saw, but not the year it was broadcast. Watch this space.]

Hol-ee-smoke! Good grief! Did you see the ABC’s 7:30 Report last night?

It was about an anti-depressant called Efexor. It is strongly suspected to cause compulsive gambling addiction, completely out of the control of the people who take it.

I should know. I was on Efexor for a week or two, in about 2007 I think. I have diaries, I’ll look it up.

I don’t blame the doctor who prescribed it – he was trying desperately to find an antidepressant that worked for me. I tried them all, including Efexor, all the SSRIs, NRIs, tricyclics, MAOIs and I dunno what else.

What I remember is the most disturbing, anxiety filled, terrifying week or more of my life. I can pinpoint it because it was the week that the ABC screened the documentary on Eric Edgar Cooke, the Nedlands serial murderer, on a Sunday evening. I can look it up.

What I remember is that I’d been out that day to a friend’s place and it was a cold, dark, wintry day. While there, I was feeling almost out of my body, out of control, trying desperately to hang on, to appear normal.

I must have done, because she didn’t notice anything and I guess I kept myself together. But I do remember I had to make an early excuse to leave.

I drove home along the Freeway (yeah, it was a Sunday) feeling very disturbed, very disembodied, very anxious, very strange. I was fighting to keep hold of my anxiety, but I did. I have some experience in this.

(Yeah, and I was driving at 100Km/h on the Freeway in this state. I absolutely had to get home, that’s all there was to it. It was a cold, dark, wet, windy day. In fact, I remember having trouble controlling the car in the wind. What was I supposed to do, pull off the Freeway and lie down and succumb to this fear? Not possible. I had to hang on. Obviously I made it without incident.)

I got home and had tea, then some beer of course, (yes, I know, but that’s my routine and I wanted comfort) and sat down to watch the doco. But my scalp was crawling, my shoulders were tense and aching, I kept seeing odd things in my peripheral vision. I was sitting next to my back door and I had to close it as I was scared. I was in fear, a strange kind of fear.

The doco was all about dark places and a murderer, and I was feeling weird – I can’t fully remember what else I felt but it wasn’t an urge to gamble, just an urge to stop this awful drug!

I must have stopped taking it and went to the doc and we tried something else, but … ugh!

I will have to consult my diary but I do know I never want to see that drug again. How this could have been properly tested before release is beyond me. Obviously now, it wasn’t, but how many people’s lives have been ruined? Luckily mine wasn’t. I don’t gamble.

Good paintbrushes!

Jul23

Rainy Loch. One of my best. © PJ Croft 2008, 2012

I had the classic photographer’s situation today. While waiting for Barry, Pawal the carpet salesman was looking at my photos on my walls. I took the opportunity to show him a few prints, including one of a close-up of beautiful blue-eyed dragon fly on a stalk.

“Gee,” he said, “You must have good camera.”

No, no, no! I said, would you have said to Rembrandt or Picasso or Leonardo, “Gee, you must have good paint brushes.”

It’s not the camera! It’s how you use it.

Ya wouldn’ be dead for quids!

Jul23

I call this my mundane shot – nothing special, just my backyard in interesting light.

What an amazing day! What an absolutely fun, amazing day! Anyone who thinks I would be dead has got the wrong guy.

It started off with the rainbows in my post below. That got me in a good mood. Then I fixed the big PC – that got me feeling even better. Then I fixed my DAB+ radio (new speaker). Better still.

Then I got some good writing done, including my blog, writing to congratulate the ABC 7.30 Report on last Friday’s episode and then commenting on the US/Australia economic situation on The On-Line Photographer http://theonlinephotographer.typepad.com/the_online_photographer/2012/07/open-mike-how-rich-do-you-have-to-be.html#comments . The guy who writes this, the best photography blog on the web, Mike Johnson, is a deep thinker, philosopher, excellent writer and all round nice bloke (despite being an American!).

So that took me to 1.30pm when Pawal, the carpet guy arrived to measure up and show me samples. I’d been to Carpet Call on Saturday and he was supposed to come at 11am, but asked if he could come at 1.30pm. Yeah, no problem because it gave me time to fix the PC and print my drawings out.

I showed him my drawings and measurements, and he went around verifying them and calculating, then brought the samples in.

I had said, and I reinforced, it’s not my decision what the carpet should be – I’m leaving it to Barry as he’s the one who has to sell the house. I don’t care how bland the carpet is, I won’t be here. It’s rental material.

At that stage I called Barry and told him the carpet guy was here. “I’ll be there in 5 minutes”, Barry said, and he was.

This is Barry Wood, Bazza.

What followed was one of the funniest, most interesting hours I’ve ever seen or had!

Here I had two salesmen battling each other. Pawal is Indian. Bargaining, haggling is in his blood and he won’t mind me saying that. Barry is the consummate salesman, cars and real estate. He fights tooth and claw for the client. In this case I was the client.

I laughed until tears were streaming, but I had to shut up and let Barry handle it. It was like Yes, Minister last night – Sir Humphrey said to Jim Hacker, “Please Minister, just be quiet and agree with me” when talking to the French Ambassador. This was just like that.

This was two professionals slugging it out. This was theatre. I tell you, if it had been left up to me, as I said to Pawal, I would have said, go away, I want to get another quote or two, because his initial price was way, way above the “whole house for $2,000” advert. It was close to double that, and I’m only talking 85 sq. m. of carpet.

But Barry saved me about $1,000 today. It was a battle royal! Barry knows Pawal’s area boss, so he asked to talk to the guy when Pawal checked back with the office. Haggle, haggle, haggle – Indian against professional salesman. It was classic theatre. I wish I’d been able to record it!

As a result, I’m getting underlay and nail strips, whereas I would have buckled and said nah, no underlay, glue strips. AND I’m getting my 2nd bedroom recarpeted in that price, whereas I would have let it stay with old crappy carpet.

So I’m paying nearly 50% more than the $2,000 advertised whole house price, but that was with no underlay, and I’m getting quite a lot more area than I thought I needed.

While all this was happening, the weather changed from the blue sky day it had been to this:

It’s still blue, but thunderstorm blue. Minnie had been outside:

But she came inside and stayed inside. The tree I saw this morning all golden became this:

I think the conifer “leaves” have changed their direction because it’s not as gold, more green.

Then Barry stayed for a single beer and went through both the St Ives sales, to see what the history of the villas is, and then my street and the Trigg area sales on the REIWA website. This is agent only info, not available to me, so now I have printouts of the history of both areas. Invaluable.

And finally I phoned Mike and Troy to ask if they can come on Thursday afternoon and Friday morning to move furniture around while the carpet is laid. Yeah, no problem. Phew! Very grateful.

What a day! Just shows – I had no idea when I awoke this morning listening to the gloomy world news.

Oh, and now I’m listening to Rossini.

And PS: no-one will read this. I have two “friends” in particular who have pointedly said, No Pete, I will NOT read your blog. See what I mean? I am sloughing them off. I don’t think they actually know the meaning of that word, let alone how to pronounce it. Hah, pah.

Who’s a clever boy, then?

Jul23

I said I can fix anything?

The carpet man is coming today so I needed to get the big desktop PC back and running. I upended it, took cards out and reseated them, took the memory sticks out and reinserted them, tightened screws, tidied cables away, pressed the CPU down into its socket, connected cabled keyboard and mouse and powered up again.

Good as gold. I give Windows credit – it offered to do a repair and roll back and up came the system, solid and stable again. SO FAR! Enough to get my drawing printed out anyway.

Therefore I’ve been able to print out exactly where the carpet is to go and calculate the area – 73.36m2, which is almost exactly what they offer for $2K. Bob’s your father’s brother.

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I have also scanned the floor plan from the villa I saw yesterday, flipped it L-R to the layout I saw, and I’m now going to vectorise it and redraw it with interpolated dimensions for the sales lady, as well as myself.

The supervisory woman said to me yesterday, “Oh, you know computers, do you?” I said, lady, I can do anything, including fix them. She said “And teach them?” I said yes, and I like doing that. She looked pleased and I think I will fit that village like a glove.

I have rediscovered my classical CD stocks as well recently. My eight year old Pioneer DVD player gives a particularly sweet CD sound, so combined with my wonderful old Tannoy Mercury speakers, I’m listening to a lot of music now, as I used to do.

I would love to hold music appreciation sessions in this village. I have absorbed a lot of knowledge of serious music in 50 years of listening and I can tell almost straight away what a piece of music is, ie name and composer, the period it was composed in, and a bit of the background of the times. In fact, one of my favourite things is musical quizzes – ie play a piece, even as little as one chord or one note, and name the piece or composer etc. I admit it’s an ego thing!

That was the hard part when I first started all those years ago – I didn’t know where the composers fitted in the musical spectrum, who was who. Now I do.

I’m listening to Richard Strauss, Metamorphosen at this moment. I feel as if that’s what I’m doing, metamorphosing.

In fact I’d use the words phase transition, a change from one state to another. My only worry is that I’m going to run out of time, that I’ll be struck down by some disease before I’ve had time to do all the things I want to do. I think I’d better have that colonoscopy after all.

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PS: I’ve discovered WordPress blogging software and it seems far superior to this Blogger bucket of bugshit. I will be transferring all my stuff over, slowly. I’ll put up a link.

It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven

Jul23

Fortune favours the prepared.

I got up a little earlier this morning, just as the rising sun in the east was illuminating the western sky. This is from my back patio. I was standing there clad only in my jocks, shivering, afraid to stop photographing and go inside, because I know from experience that the light can change and things can happen suddenly.