Mood:  chatty

Another not so cryptic photo from a grovelling lawyer's existence:

Posted by editor at 12:29 PM EADT

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Mood:  sad

If there is no evidence of a sinister crime, could a 3 year old child walk such a long way and die of dehydration? Trying to find where the planes fly? Or even be abducted and released get lost and similarly die of heat and dehydration?

From our uni science classes we always recall the surface area volume ratio of living things. Smaller volume (as for a small child) means relatively bigger surface area to lose heat and perspire. Some UN and other web pages discuss dehydration mainly in respect of global problems of Acute diarrhoeal diseases:

The symptoms become increasingly severe with greater water loss. One's heart and   respiration rates will increase to compensate for decreased   plasma volume and   blood pressure, while body temperature may rise because of decreased sweating. Around 5% to 6% water loss, one may become groggy or  sleepy, experience headaches or  nausea, and may feel tingling in one's limbs ( paresthesia). With 10% to 15% fluid loss, muscles may become spastic, skin may shrivel and wrinkle, vision may dim, urination will be greatly reduced and may become painful, and delirium may begin. Losses of greater than 15% are usually fatal. [1]http://rehydrate.org/dehydration/index.html

We actually walked from Melbourne Airport in January 2010 all the way to the first tram stop which must be about 5 km. It was hot dry flat country. We did find a tap along the way. We had bad shoes we threw away the next day.

Our purpose was to learn more about the layout of Mebourne complete with compass. We walked to and from Kingsford Smith airport in Sydney same trip partly to avoid the outrageous premium on the train ticket.

We've done similar at Avalon to train line at Lara in Victoria in 2006 or so. A bit eccentric but it's also quite interesting.

Posted by editor at 10:03 AM EADT

Updated: Saturday, 6 March 2010 10:06 AM EADT

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Mood:  don't ask

Child death is a terrible thing.

Here is this story leading the web press today:

Boy drowns walking dogs

SHANNON TONKIN Luke Selwyn, 6, fails to return after going for a walk with his family's two dogs as police find his body in a dam.

Posted by editor at 9:09 AM EADT

Updated: Friday, 5 March 2010 10:30 AM EADT

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Mood:  chatty

The blurb sent through reads:

"According to Peita Gardiman, the founder, one of the main aims of Ethikl is to promote and support the ethical consumer movement and encourage shoppers to make positive buying decisions, such as favoring ethical products, be they fair trade, cruelty free, organic, recycled, re-used, or produced locally.  

 

"One of our goals is to change the way the economy works and begin to change people’s consumption habits. Many people are tired of mass produced, chemically- packed products and want to get back to basics,” says Peita.

 

“We live in a culture of excess, we want more and more and then throw it away faster and faster. When you buy something from Ethikl, there’s a story behind it. There’s a person behind it. If people start to rediscover handmade, natural products, they will learn to treasure them and become more ethical consumers.”

 

While there is nothing like the experience of going to a farmer's market, smelling the fresh produce, tasting samples, and interacting with producers themselves, not everyone can afford the time, leisure, or access to do so ,  but now you can explore  Ethikl’s online marketplace and discover handcrafted jewellery, clothing, homewares, unique gifts, specialty foods and more at www.ethikl.com.au"

 

SAM is agnostic about this commercial enterprise except it does look idealistic (and beyond our humble budget). We do like industrial hemp products as a concept and rainbow coloured nappies are novel (shown above).

Posted by editor at 12:51 PM EADT

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Mood:  energetic

As previously reported here, Rod Day aka Dimmy, an Australian has the world record for arcade game Pengo, now available since 2004 as a PC game. Dimmy has 1M plus if you go to wikipdedia, and refer down the bottom of the listing.

Adding to the difficulty is keyboard directional keys instead of a retro joystick from those 1980ies dissolute student days. Not sure if our chuckles are nostalgia or the current sport of the game.

After a week or so we have a score board of 50K plus, not counting all the crash and burn. With a top of 102K above (this morning listening to the news, Macca Australia All Over radio show - our version of Prairie Home Companion. Notice the speedo turns over at 100K but our top score really is 102K. Shoulders and hands have had a heavy workout offsetting swimming laps at the local pool to offset the screen time.

Posted by editor at 10:19 AM EADT

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Mood:  mischievious

It actually requires a retro joystick via USB socket to really appreciate (not available in any modern computer store it seems). We have been madly teaching our selves the directional keys of a standard keyboard to kill those carnivorous snow bees. And we even played around with some home made toggle assemblies but its just not responsive enough.

It's a superior maze game for so early in the arcade genre. For those new to the experience, kick the wall, it freezes the snowbees temporarily. Kick the blocks around. Kick a block to crush it. Extra points for squashing multiple bees with one block. 10K bonus for 3 diamond blocks in a row. 5K if on the side. 

Just think of them as politicians.

We are pleased to see one Australian fellow Rodney Day, whom we recall as Dimmy way back at Ursula College, Australian National University, in the official wikipedia entry as the world record holder at 1 million points plus. Given we are struggling to get 20K on said keyboard set up that's a big score.

PS Special note for Mr First Dog OTM - we know there is no such thing as real snow bees.

PPS Curious that freeware Linux operating system developed around 1991 also features a ... penguin as the hero. Could these disparate factoids be connected?

Posted by editor at 10:37 AM EADT

Updated: Monday, 25 January 2010 11:14 AM EADT

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Mood:  rushed

Precocious talent and upstart tennis player Bernard Tomic says it's "rediculous" to be playing competitive tennis at 1 or 2 am in the morning during the Australian Open. 

Bingo. You are so right young talented Mr Tomic. You may be a brat. You may be loud. You may be a star.

But children say many true things. The emperor has no clothes: Professional tennis and camp followers want us to believe that tv driven tennis events are in the category of ocean yacht racing, and mountaineering, where the sport dictates night time action. (Yachting because there is no clock off in the middle of the sea, and mountaineering because the ice is more stable and safer in the cold of night, less avalanche danger).

Every other sport, Olympic, World Cup, AFL football here, and so on  don't do this. No one schedules for the middle of the night. Get over yourself Big Tennis.

What a joke. Tomic gets our vote. It is rediculous. And the big media who joined in the press conference scorn are w*nking and honking like gooses.

Don't you love democracy. Now the accusation has been levelled by 17 year old Tomic the words can't be unspoken, mainly because its true.

We did get on talk back radio and suggest it's agist and bad form to be promoting 17 year olds up at 2 am in the morning, but on reflection comparison with other world sports tells the real story.

Posted by editor at 9:12 AM EADT

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Mood:  lyrical

It's all hierarchical nonesense and chutzpah. So why not join in the fun here at SAM micro news? 

On the weekend The Australian pictured PM Kevin Rudd as "Australian of the year" for amongst other things preventing Australia from falling into recession after the Global (really western) Financial Crisis (as per Gittins economics editor Sydney Morning Herald).

Trouble is Rudd was just doing the bidding of Treasury Secretary Ken Henry who has more economic credibility than any minister in the federal govt including Rudd himself: Hence the personalisted targetting of Henry by the coalition Opposition. So Rudd as choice is gross sycophancy by a broadsheet on the media policy make - not least a future 24 hour ABC news service which will further cramp their influence.Even if it must have caused Rudd's rival Tony Abbott to groan with heartburn at the front page last Saturday.

No the real heroes of 2009-10 are Australian taxpayers and by this we mean all goods and services tax payers from the unemployed to the rich mansion dwellers. Because it's that regressive 10% impost on most, but not all, consumables that has boosted the public coffers from 1998 or so putting the federal budget in good shape. Yes over the same time we have seen major increase in private debt (along with economic expansion) even as public debt was slashed but crucially it provided the funds for the huge stimulus #1 and #2. And this prevented widespread social pain and suffering.

So Australians who go shopping and pay GST this last 10 years - take a bow. You saved the economy in Oct 2008-Jan 2010. Only the structural unsustainability of affluenza remains and there can be no more big stimulus payments, not for another 10 years of GST payments anyway. Meanwhile the structural debt burden is right now not 10 years away.

Posted by editor at 8:13 AM EADT

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Mood:  lyrical

We lived in Bondi 8 years and noticed some things on a recent visit. Unusually a chunk of the main strip shop area on Campbell Pde was missing in December 2009, like front tooth missing. It must be 20 years since a gap like this has appeared so we thought to record the scene.

 This site is next to Bondi Hotel and takes in the previous rear drive in bottle shop - no great loss. One assumes a big set of units possibly like that pictured further below.

Posted by editor at 9:41 AM EADT

Updated: Wednesday, 20 January 2010 11:16 AM EADT

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