Down and Out In A Brave New World

Our very own little oil spill

2011-08-31T01:42:00.001+10:00

A bit over a week ago someone (we can - probably -guess who) poured a bucket of oil and snail pellets over the fence into the creek that runs through our block.

Not a nice action, but indicative of the level of thinking of the people in this town. I assume that the perpetraitor was upset with us for something, but they didnt bother to explain what.

Its going on for two AM here and I am in bed in the cottage as I am unable to sleep, listening to the frogs croaking in the creek. It is heartening to know that the selfish bastards of the world havent managed to kill all of the wildlife.

On a lighter note: bathroom rendering underway

2010-06-21T11:29:00.000+10:00

I managed to get our electrician in last week to extend a wire. Now the bathroom is ready for final rendering and then fitout.

So yesterday we spent five hours applying the top coat lime render to the walls in the bathroom. It's hard work, but the results are looking pretty good. Hopefully today we will complete the job.

Autoimmune disease and your retirement fund

2010-06-21T11:26:00.000+10:00

Autoimmune diseases are nasty. Just take a look at the Wikipedia description:

Autoimmune diseases arise from an overactive immune response of the body against substances and tissues normally present in the body. In other words, the body actually attacks its own cells. The immune system mistakes some part of the body as a pathogen and attacks it. This may be restricted to certain organs (e.g. in chagas disease or involve a particular tissue in different places (e.g. Goodpasture's disease which may affect the basement membrane in both the lung and the kidney). The treatment of autoimmune diseases is typically with immunosuppression — medication which decreases the immune response.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autoimmune_disease

Today I came across an article in the New York Times blog that outlines how pension funds in the US (who are heavily invested in BP shares and have taken a big hit since the Gulf of Mexico oil spill began) are starting law suits to sue the corporate officers of BP

http://green.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/06/18/as-bp-staggers-pension-funds-skid/

There is a rather striking similarity here between autoimmune disease in people and these law suits. Basically, one part of our societal body is attacking another part that is vital for its survival: the oil industry.

It's almost funny to see the people running pension funds scrabbling to find some way to get their money back while at the same time jeopardizing the very foundations of all of their other investments. It's about as short sighted as it's possible to be. It's very much like an autoimmune disease.

This is why I have zero faith that technology is ever going to solve the predicament that we as a species are in. Technology runs on two things: oil and money. If there is less investment in oil companies (because of the risk of being sued, or having to clean up a big spill) then the companies can't invest in the incredibly expensive technology required to extract oil from beneath kilometres of water and of rock.

And we now know what happens when oil begins to limit economic activity (2008 GFC).

So, what we have is the beginnings of a self perpetuating downward spiral. Less money, less technology, less oil, means less money ...

You get the idea.

At the same time we have companies like Goldman Sachs who are acting like cancer, eating up the stored wealth of our society (see my blog post: http://downandoutinabravenewworld.blogspot.com/2010/04/cannibals-of-wall-street.html)

So, now it's a race: which will get us first? The cancer or the autoimmune disease?

I don't have an answer to that, but I will say this: the chances of our collective societies slowly declining over the coming decades to a new point of balance and sustainability are practically zero.

Just look at how we react to challenges. Not by rational assessment, strong leadership, and practical action. We react with recrimination, law suits, finger pointing, threats, and hostility.

No, we will do everything we can individually to hold onto our power and comfort, even if it leads to their total loss.

Tortoises on the slow road to oblivion

2010-06-04T22:34:00.000+10:00

I have a huge soft spot for turtles and tortoises. Whenever it rains around here the native snake neck tortoises (actually a turtle) take to the hoof for reasons unknown and gallop across roads.

If I see one on the road, then I stop, pick it up, and either deliver it to a nearby river, or put it over the fence in the direction that it was headed.

What really ticks me off is the people who deliberately run over them. You see it all the time. Wrecked snake necks, their shells shattered, dead not by accident, but by someone who deliberately swerved hit them in the centre of a lane, or the middle of the road. Bastards all.

Then this little gem drops in my in box tonight from New Scientist:

http://www.newscientist.com/blogs/culturelab/2010/06/tortoises-on-the-slow-road-to-oblivion.php?DCMP=OTC-rss&nsref=online-news

Our snake necks (which are turtles) are not endangered. But you can see how tortoises have reached that point, given the total lack of compassion shown by our local drivers (and apparently shared by nearly everyone else).

It's times like this that I am filled with impotent rage. I can't stop this. No-one can.

Mean while the CEO of BP Tony Hayward wants his life back (because it's just too hard earning $4.5 million per year AND dealing with massive environmental cock-ups).

This article has a selection of his more choice "words of wisdom".

http://climateprogress.org/2010/06/01/bp-ceo-tony-hayward-i%E2%80%99d-like-my-life-back/

“What the hell did we do to deserve this?” [New York Times, 4/30/10]

“The Gulf of Mexico is a very big ocean. The amount of volume of oil and dispersant we are putting into it is tiny in relation to the total water volume.” [Guardian, 5/14/10]

“I think the environmental impact of this disaster is likely to be very, very modest.” [Sky News, 5/18/10]

So there we have it. Some people will mourn the loss of tortoises (and many other species too). But most of us will keep driving our cars, buying our toys and generally shitting on the planet until there is nothing left but the all consuming amoeba of humanity.

Sweet dreams ...

Why "Top Kill" didn't work

2010-05-31T09:09:00.000+10:00

Unless you live under a rock (like me) you have probably heard that BP has declared their "top kill" attempt to stop the oil well blowout in the Gulf of Mexico a failure.

See: http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5gIXWYBTpLtSayJtg41LKXpxSxVPAD9G0SRFO0

Frankly I am not surprised. They went about it entirely the wrong way (which is surprising for such a clever bunch of people). They were injecting the heavy drilling mud into the wrong location.

What they needed to do was bore an access well through the top of the BP board room (and every other oil company for that matter) and inject a few hundred ton of heavy drilling mud at hight pressure into the top of the organisation.

Granted, this wouldn't have stopped the oil flowing into the gulf. But it would have been satisfying to me and probably just as productive!

So, anyway, listen up people: anyone who wants to whinge about this oil spill fouling their beaches, or kill wildlife, or destroying wet lands also needs to accept the fact that they are also responsible for this disaster. Unless of course they have taken dramatic steps to reduce their direct and indirect use of fossil fuels.

Do you get it? As long as we demand fossil fuels to drive our cars and heat our homes and grow our food, this sort of thing will continue to happen. The harder the oil is to extract (tar sands, deep water etc) the more likely these disasters are to happen.

We caused it. We are responsible for it. No legislation, or preparation can EVER prevent it (because it is enormously complex and there are so many things that can go wrong, and everyone is trying to do this work with less money). So either get off the oil train, or stop your complaining. It's our own fault.

What's that you say? We need oil? We can't feed and shelter 6.9 billion people without it? Yes you have a point. That's called a Catch22.

No-one is prepared to limit their consumption, or their breeding, so here we are. Forced to drill for oil and ruin our environment because humanity is too greedy to say:

"I have enough. One child will do. I should leave enough for the plants and animals"

So enjoy your disaster, I expect that we can look forward to more of them. Probably in poorer, less visible places in the future.

Pies

2010-05-05T21:55:00.001+10:00

Today I made filling for pies ...

Ground beef, ground kangaroo, onion, gravy (made from tallow, flour, water, and stock), soy sauce, and pepper.

It's very tasty. Tomorrow: pastry.

Kangaroo - WARNING: ANIMAL CRUELTY AHEAD

2010-05-03T18:13:00.000+10:00

IF YOU DON'T LIKE HEARING ABOUT INJURED ANIMALS, THEN DON'T READ THIS POST. I AM SERIOUS.

It hasn't been a good day. On our walk this morning Sam and I came across a kangaroo on the side of the road. It had been hit by a car some time in the night and had a badly broken leg (really badly). And it wasn't dead.

So who hits a kangaroo and doesn't bother to stop and check what state they have left it in? The answer is, I don't know, but there is a good chance that I have met the person.

When we found it, it was sitting quietly in the table drain as if just sunning itself.

There was nothing that I could do for it, so we continued our walk home and I rang the local number for WIRES (wildlife rescue group). This seemed like the sensible thing to do. The response was: "call the police in your area".

Ok, no worries, so I look up the phone number for our local police station and call. No answer. Phone diverts to nearest large town. Sorry the person says, your local police station is closed today as the officer is away doing a course, please try the nearest town instead. Ok, look up that police station's number. No number listed. Call back, get number. Call nearest police station, no answer. Call back about ten times over the next hour, still no response.

Call back large town police station and they tell me that nearest station is definitely manned today, do I want them to pass on a message and have the officer there call me back? Yup, that's good, please do.

Fast forward to midday. Still no answer at nearest town. The kangaroo has now been lying in a ditch in pain without water for many hours. So I take the decision to resolve the problem myself.

Having grown up on a farm I have had to kill animals in the past. But I can honestly say that this was an unpleasant thing to do. The kangaroo is now dead and no-longer suffering. I believe that it had a quick and relatively painless end, but that's small comfort for a smashed up animal that NO ONE SEEMS TO CARE ABOUT.

I got a phone call at about 4.00pm from someone at the large town police station apologising for not having been called back. Frankly I didn't really understand what they were saying. Anyway, yes the kangaroo is now dead. No, there is no need for any action, thank you very much; goodbye.

Today, I really hate our society. Everywhere I look I see animals (domestic and wild) being mistreated by people who only care about their own gratification; half starved horses, dogs that live on a chain in freezing cold and burning heat, sheep on denuded pasture, black alpacas standing under blazing midday sun.

I saw the following in an article about the Deepwater Horizon oil spill today. I think that it sums up peoples' attitudes toward animals nicely:

After the huge oil spill of the coast of California in 1969 the president of Union Oil Company, Fred Hartley, was quoted:

"I don't like to call it a disaster, because there has been no loss of human life. I am amazed at the publicity for the loss of a few birds."

Yup, no human lives, just a few birds ... We still see human life as the most "precious" on Earth, that it should be preserved at all cost. That is ironic when it's the animals and ecosystems that we devour and destroy that are the single most important thing for our own survival long term. Just a few birds, just a few kangaroos, just a few rivers, just a few forests, just a few mountains, just a few oceans ...

Every animal gives something back to the ecosystem that it lives in, from earth worms fertilising the soil, to whale poo enriching the ocean with iron that is vital for phytoplankton. Every animal that is, except human beings. We import our food and water and goods from far off places, then send the waste and rubbish to landfill, or the rivers and oceans to poison them.

We take, take, take every day, but when an animal needs help, even if it just to receive a quick and humane death, we can't even take the time from our busy schedules to do that.

Damn us all to hell.

Of twisted nails and hardwood

2010-04-24T19:53:00.000+10:00

I spent much of today nailing planks to the deck in front of the cottage.

A friend of mine in Sydney did a deck about 20 times larger a while ago. He was complaining that the (expensive) stainless steel "gun nailed" nails he had used were starting to pull out a bit as the decking timber started to cup from the sun exposure. Since the nails weren't "twisted", the warping hardwood was just ripping the nails out - very slooooowly.

For anyone wondering, a twisted nail has a square shaft that is twisted along its length. That means for it to pull out it has to rotate. Makes for a REALLY strong fixture.

Problem is that you can't use twisted nails in a nail gun. Now I have just hammered in about 60 twisted nails by hand (including a bunch that bent and could only be removed using extreme claw hammer prejudice). I can really see why you would not want to make a big deck using twisted nail.

It's a Catch22. Fast and easy (but not secure), or slow and painful (but never coming out). I think that in the future (when I have some money!) I will build a bigger deck using twisted nails, even if it does take a month of banging to put them all in.

History of the "novel" it's enough to make we want to study literature

2010-04-24T16:07:00.000+10:00

I may have mentioned in the past that Sam usually reads (out loud) while I prepare meals and clean up. It's a great way to make washing dishes fun.

It's also a great way to learn things. As an example: today Sam and I were talking about our respective libraries of novels and the value that they provide. Which led us, in a round-about way, to discussing the history of novels.

Neither of us knew the history, so Sam hit Wikipedia and for half an hour or so read out their article describing the history of the novel. You can see it here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Novel

It is a fascinating story.

I love the Internet and I also love Wikipedia. I love reading too. Now I know a little bit more about how all of the great stories that we have access to, came to exist.

Save the whales! Why?

2010-04-23T22:58:00.000+10:00

Whales are media-genic. It's pretty hard to hate a whale. But when someone says "how are they different to sheep and cattle?" it's difficult to give a better reason than "I just like them and don't think that we should kill them". Which is a pretty lame reason.

Well, here's a REALLY good reason:

Stephen Nicol of the Australian Antarctic Division believes (based on studying whale poo) that they are (surprise, surprise) an important part of the Antarctic eco-system, recycling iron in the food chain and encouraging the growth of phytoplankton.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn18807-whale-poop-is-vital-to-oceans-carbon-cycle.html

So, it's a virtuous cycle: more whales = more phytoplankton = more krill = more whales. This cycles up until you have a stable maximum of whales and a lot of carbon tied up in plankton, krill, and whales.

Then humans come along and wreck it all by killing most of the whales. Now we are talking about eating the krill too.

Then some genius thinks of the idea to salt the oceans with iron to encourage the growth of phytoplankton (because it would be a good way to sequester atmospheric carbon ...)

The irony is just to great. The pun is too awful.

----

Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

Thermal performance of our straw bale cottage - part 1

2010-04-21T13:05:00.000+10:00

Late yesterday afternoon we finally got to start nailing down the planks on the deck in front of the cottage. Before starting work I popped into the cottage to grab some tools and the twisted nails.

The doors had been closed all day and it had been quite sunny. The indoor temperature was up to 24 degrees (just from the sun shining in through the windows). It was really too hot, which was not surprising.

So we left the place closed up and checked the temperature again this morning when taking the dogs out for a walk: 22 degrees.

Granted, it wasn't a really cold night, but there is a pattern emerging here. The building (if left to its own devices with doors closed) only gets about two to three degrees colder over night.

It is seriously looking like sleeping with a door open a little bit is going to be necessary. Which is staggering.

The Cannibals of Wall Street

2010-04-21T12:53:00.001+10:00

Yesterday I wrote a post talking about how "The Market" doesn't work. Today I read James Howard Kunstler's latest post about the Goldman Sachs prosecution and thought that it would make a good follow up.

Kunstler makes the following points:

He saw the collapse of the housing market coming in 2002 / 2004 - so it shouldn't have been a "surprise" to anyone in the industry, particularly those at the top
There is a colloquial industry term for what GS has been up to (so don't try to say that this is anything new in the industry)
There are laws available to prosecute the people involved, but they are not being used.

The questions therefore is why is this happening?

To my mind, the answer is basically the same as the conclusion to yesterdays' post:

THE MARKET DOESN'T ACTUALLY WORK

We live in this delusion that "The Market" works for us. This is not true. The Market just wants more entropy (i.e. more stuff to be consumed). I get the feeling that some time in the past few decades, when the US, UK, Australia and many other developed nations sent all of our manufacturing to places like china that our economies ran out of real things to consume to "create wealth". Their response was to start eating themselves. They are busy eating all of the real value of our society (the equity in our homes, the free time of our citizens) that we built up when we had real economies that actually did stuff.

Our economy is a cancer that is rapidly devouring the very host that it depends upon for survival.

As the first comment on Kunstler's article notes:

"We live in a world in which bankers deliberately destroyed their clients' wealth."

Let's just reflect on that for a moment: bankers are deliberately destroying their clients' wealth.

This is not new of course. Just look back at my post: Machine gunning children in the name of our society and in particular the link in it to a Rollingstone Magazine article:

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/32906678/looting_main_street

Goldman Sachs and its ilk have been raping the dead body of the global economy for years.

And you know what? We can't stop it.

We can't stop it for the very simple reason that it has to continue for us to be able to pretend that everything is ok and that business as usual can continue. If we stop GS and its buddies then economic activity slows down or ceases. If that happens, then our collective economies will fail in short order.

So here we are, facing the final predicament. Do we continue to "eat" ourselves to keep the party going for a few more years? Or do we put down the knife and starve to death tomorrow?

There is only one answer to this question: eat as much as you can, as fast as you can, because if you don't, then the guy next to you will.

The rich and the powerful appear to have understood all of this, since they are freely destroying the lives and economies of the very customers that they depended upon in the past. There is no long-term future to this strategy. Just a desperate rush to grab as much of the remaining wealth available as possible.

Our global economy is like the biggest stranded whale in history. The blubber of this beast will keep many scavengers (like the executives of Goldman Sachs) fat and happy for a time. But in the end the bones will be picked clean and even the wealthiest will have to face the future.

Of haiku and garden implements

2010-04-20T11:23:00.001+10:00

My partner Sam just made a blog post of haiku poetry about gardening.

The theme of the last poem was my rather tatty, but much loved garden fork that went missing many months ago. It (and the wheelbarrow) were "taken" by the children of the tenants who rent Sam's house. The wheelbarrow was "found" and returned not long after, but the fork seemed to be gone for good.

I was NOT HAPPY as the fork had much practical and sentimental value. The head was a $1 bargain from the local tip shop, while the handle was a branch that Sam found in the bush and cleaned up for the purpose. It was a kick-arse tool for turning the compost piles with. Then it was gone.

Sam was mowing yesterday and spotted the long lost fork lying on the ground beside the tenants veggie garden. Apparently it had been hiding somewhere nearby ...

So, I reclaimed my fork and can now turn compost at will. Needless to say I won't be leaving the fork, or anything else out where it can be borrowed again.

Haiku on pitchfork
==================
Bent tines, worn handle.
Lost, and sorely missed. Now found,
in the neighbours' yard.

and if you would like to see the others:

http://apostrophe-now.blogspot.com/2010/04/i-haiku-do-you.html

Apparently "The Market" doesn't actually work

2010-04-20T07:43:00.000+10:00

People around me regularly say "don't worry the market will deliver a solution to Peak Oil when the need arrises".

This article from New Scientist demonstrates rather nicely that "The Market" actually doesn't give a toss what anyone wants (like cheap energy).

Nuclear security push bleeding cryogenic science dry

Right now, The Market is lying in the gutter in a coma having drunk a couple of litres of moonshine, then been beaten senseless by a bunch of crack heads from Wall St.

The truth seems to be that The Market just consumes as much stuff as it can, aiming for maximum entropy with the available resources. That's all. It doesn't care about maintaining the way of life that we have, or the things that we want. It just consumes.

So the sad joke is on us. We trust The Market to give us what we want. What we don't realise is that what we want and what the market needs have so far been the same. Now however, the two are departing. The Market needs consumption. We need restraint. If we don't give the market what it needs, then it can't give us anything. And that's the scary part.

Our life - A photographic journey - Part 4

2010-04-16T09:17:00.000+10:00

Over the last few years we have been working at growing more of our own food. Some of our efforts have been very successful. Some not so.

You can see the photos here:

http://picasaweb.google.com.au/115256418774888026728/HarvestsPast#

Our life - A photographic journey - Part 3

2010-04-14T20:02:00.000+10:00

Sam took some time out this morning to take some photos in the mist and dew. The results are really quite spectacular.

You can see the photos here:

http://picasaweb.google.com.au/115256418774888026728/2010Autumn

First frost and the straw bale cottage

2010-04-13T18:26:00.000+10:00

Well, today was our first frost of the year. It was about 5 degrees C in the unlined part of our shed (where the office is) and closer to zero degrees outside.

Temperature in the (un-heated, un-occupoed) cottage: 17.5 degrees C, down from about 20 degrees C during the day. So on a night when the outside temperature got close to freezing point it was still quite acceptably warm inside the cottage.

I just can't say how impressed I am with the cottage. With the cold weather coming on, I am looking forward to getting into it as soon as possible!

Our life - A photographic journey - Part 2

2010-04-13T13:53:00.000+10:00

Sam has just posted photos of some of the critters that we share our land with including lizards, and insects at this time.

You can see the photos here:

http://picasaweb.google.com.au/115256418774888026728/Critters#

Our life - A photographic journey - Part 1

2010-04-13T13:49:00.000+10:00

Sam has been busy putting photos of the things that we have done and seen up on Picasa. This first album is from a trip that we made to Sri Lanka back in 2004. It was an incredible trip (for many reasons), not the least because Sam ended up in hospital having major knee surgery there!

You can see the story here:

http://picasaweb.google.com.au/115256418774888026728/SriLanka2004#

Q. Why did the chicken cross the road?

2010-04-12T21:19:00.000+10:00

A. To get to the other half acre.

Sam discovered something quite startling (via Google) the other day about chickens. On average, for a free range chicken to be as productive laying eggs as one that is fed supplementary food, each chook requires half to one acre of land to "free range" on to get their required amount of protean and carbohydrate.

Lets just stop and think about that for a moment. Very productive land can support about two laying chooks per acre. This just staggered me. I had no idea that the requirements were so high.

Now think about this: imagine the average farmer on 1000 acres of land trying to pay the mortgage from the eggs produced by 2000 chickens ...

Nope. I can't imagine it either. Just goes to show where we would be without fossil fuels!

It really starts to put into perspective just how much land it takes to feed one person anything more than basic survival calories. The block that our house is built on could probably support only one chook.

It brings home the fact that even as we do things to reduce our dependence on oil and our globalised economy, that it really is very hard to break away from that dependence.

Sam and I don't have anything like the money we would need to become truly self sufficient while the economy holds on. So our plan is to develop the required skills, amass the tools and when the time comes be ready to put all of the newly deserted land around us to use (it seems likely that when the egg truck stops coming, that plenty of people are going to be forced to move somewhere else).

So here's to preparation and a big thank you to all of the people who spend so much time making blog posts about the your experiences and ideas preparing for an uncertain future.

New story posted to Stranger Than (Science) Fiction

2010-04-12T20:41:00.000+10:00

I just published a new story on my other blog. Here's the synopsis:
----
The Devil May Care:

The modification date on the original file says that I wrote this story in May 2003. Honestly I thought that it was only a few years ago, not seven! This story was inspired entirely by one of the most vivid dreams that I have ever had in my life. When I woke up the core ideas were fresh and clear in my head. All I had to do was create a context and the details, then the story almost wrote itself.

The story is set in a far distant future, possibly on Earth, in a time of extremely advanced technology. Sadly, I think that this is a time that place that humanity is very unlikely to reach.

This was the first story that I ever submitted for publication. I can't remember which zine I sent it off too, but it was also my first rejection. The reviewer wasn't happy with the ending (said that wasn't dramatic enough from memory). I haven't changed the ending though and frankly, from having read a lot more short works of science fiction since then, I think that the ending is ok. You of course can judge for yourself.

-----

You can find the story here:

http://strangerthansciencefiction.blogspot.com/2010/04/devil-may-care.html

Deck and kitchen - Cottage progress

2010-04-11T21:33:00.001+10:00

You know that you are really making progress when you start building cabinetry. This weekend was a big one for the cottage. It started on Friday afternoon with beginning to construct the deck in front of the main doors. You can see it here before I dug the holes for the legs, attached the legs, propped it all up and poured the concrete. We are also waiting for bearer protector strip and some more decking timber offcuts. It's only a little deck, but one day it will become a bridge over the creek and we will build something larger. The decking costs $6 per meter, so it's not cheap stuff by any means. A large deck would be quite expensive.

After I had done as much as I could of the deck, I went on to cutting out the parts for and, sanding and assembling the kitchen. I splashed out and bought a jig-saw (not the puzzle, the power tool) to help with the cutting out of corners. My skill improved markedly as I went along, but all in all, the result is pretty good. Here's the finished result.

The hardware store didn't have all of the materials that I need (again), so I couldn't put in the second shelf, back, and other vertical supports. Hopefully it will all arrive this week and I can have a bloody good go at finishing this all off then.

I also got a nice little bench top for a matching cupboard and the laundry tub out of the offcuts.

No building job is complete with out some assistance from the dogs ...

In the Days of the Reaping Hook

2010-04-08T19:45:00.000+10:00

My partner Sam recently completed editing and anotating a memoir written by her Great, Great Uncle Terrance P. Rogers, who's family were pioneer settlers of the area that we now live in back in the mid 1800's.

I have posted a link to the book in PDF format for easy download on my other blog (Stranger Than - Science - Fiction) for anyone who might be interested to hear his story, which is both fascinating and entertaining. You can find the download link here:

http://strangerthansciencefiction.blogspot.com/2010/04/in-days-of-reaping-hook.html

Stranger Than - Science - Fiction

2010-04-07T20:15:00.003+10:00

Yesterday was a crap day (to say the least). The existential angst I experienced when confronted by pure barbarity was profound.

So I decided today that it was time to do something fun and entirely frivolous. To that end I have created a new blog to allow me to start publishing, bit by bit, the various pieces of short fiction that I have written over the years.

From the blog description:

This blog is a project to publish and share some of my creative short fiction. Make of it what you will. I have written mostly science fiction as it is a genre that I love to read (and it lets me do stuff in my imagination that I won't ever get to do in real life). Of late I have been doing some writing around near future socio/econo/enviro-apocalyptic scenarios. The first post appears to combine the two.

You can find my stories here:

http://strangerthansciencefiction.blogspot.com/

Machine gunning children in the name of our safety

2010-04-06T20:42:00.001+10:00

Today has been a REALLY bad day. It started with this:

http://www.boingboing.net/2010/04/05/wikileaks-video-of-u.html

Video that has been leaked to the world of a Reuters journalist and a photographer being shot in Baghdad by an American gunship at very long range. Then a passer by (with children in his van) stops to help the wounded photographer. The aircrew fire on this man and his van, killing him and injuring his children.

I can't describe how this sickens me. I can barely think straight from the horror of it, especially the aircrew laughing when a humvee runs over one of the corpses and urging the wounded photographer to pick up a gun so that they can shoot him again, then shooting un-armed civilians and children trying to render medical aid.

Fast forward to another article:

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/32906678/looting_main_street

This one is about how Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan and a bunch of greedy elected representatives of Jefferson County, Alabama (USA) commited a $5 billion dollar fraud on the county and its approximately 600,000 residents. Then raped the corpse.

And these finance companies have done thousands of similar deals around America and the world.

This is what drags me down. We fight wars of aggression in Iraq and Afghanistan (supposedly to make us safer, so our politicians say) while they let these corporate criminals rape our communities. And then bail them out when they go broke anyway.

As I said in my comment on the murder video: every soldier should go home to their families and then hold their leaders (government and business) to account.

There is no sanity in this world, we aren't fighting to protect anything good, or valuable. We are fighting to allow the rich and the powerful to play their games while ruining the lives of everyone else in the world, not to mention the environment.

Thermal mass, masive insulation, double glazing

2010-04-06T17:35:00.000+10:00

When we went out for our walk this morning we checked the temperature of the cottage: 20 degrees C.

It got up to only about 17.5 degrees C today. It has been raining all day with thick cloud cover.

Sam just went and checked the temperature in the cottage now at 5.30pm, result: 20 degrees C

Not one degree of heat lost across an entire rainy day! And that is without any active heating (and no one in the building). Bring on winter. I want to see what this baby can do when it gets down to zero (C).

Love that rain!

2010-03-30T09:32:00.000+11:00

When we haven't seen rain for a while I always seem to end up feeling that it might never rain again ...

But it's raining today. It absolutely poured last night and yesterday afternoon. Living in a tin shed means that you know in no uncertain terms when it's raining because it's really LOUD.

This is spectacular timing since yesterday we put out some lucerne seed with our "cob starter" system (seed embedded in wet clay/sand with heaps of straw mixed in to create an environment that will stay moist, smother competing plants and provide nutrients.

Now I just wish that we had our water tank plumbed in and the swales in place to stop all of this water just running off into the creek.

Greenpeace, what are you thinking?

2010-03-29T22:31:00.000+11:00

Have a look at this article:

http://www.rainforestportal.org/issues/2010/03/fb_alert_release_protest_green.asp

In short, it is claimed that:

Greenpeace US and International, as well as Rainforest Action Network, are censoring comments of concern regarding their support for "sustainable forest management" of old forests including primary rainforests [read "logging of"] on Facebook and their blogs.

Comments were (apparently):

deleted, blocked and reported to Facebook as terms of use violations

You know that an environmental organisation has gone right off the rails when it can't take direct criticism of it's policies and actions. I mean come on! Deleting criticism? Reporting it as "terms of use violation"? This is censorship worthy of Nestle.

I have to agree with the sentiment that "sustainable forest management" is an oxymoron. Anyone who thinks that taking a chainsaw to old growth forests is in any way sustainable deserves to have their arse kicked. Any environmental organisation that supports this kind of environmental rape deserves the same.

Lift your game Greenpeace.

The (my) problem with Earth Hour

2010-03-29T21:06:00.000+11:00

A blogger, Mia, who's work I rather like made a post about Earth Hour today. I can understand why people like Earth Hour, and the World Wildlife Fund, and all of the other decent organisations out there doing the work that they do to raise awareness of the problems in our society and even to try to implement change.

Personally though they don't excite me. In a word, my problem is "hope".

Organisations that arrange mass festivities like Earth Hour may do something to raise awareness about an issue, but I don't see evidence that these festivities are actually doing anything to change people's day to day behaviour in any significant way.

For instance, there wasn't one comment in Facebook about Earth Hour among my family and (my friend) Sam's friends. Earth Hour didn't even rate a mention and I am guessing that it wasn't because everyone felt that they have this climate change issue under control.

They do however give people a sense of "hope" that the predicament we face can be handled, that people care, that governments will listen and do what has to be done in time etc, etc.

The truth of the matter is that we don't need hope, in fact hope is down-right dangerous because it says to people that the predicament isn't theirs, it isn't immediate, and it can be fixed (with the implication that life can go on as usual).

So, I don't like Grand Gestures like Earth hour, because they require nothing real of us. They don't instil the real (gut wrenching) fear for the future that is (in my opinion) the _only_ thing that people will respond to - probably badly and in the worst possible way (other than doing nothing that is), but at least it would be doing something, as opposed to sitting on our thumbs hoping that it will all just go away.

The truth of the matter is that we our society can't go on in anything like its usual way and the longer that individuals wait to respond to society's predicament the worse it will be for them. Mia for one has seen the writing on the wall and is doing A LOT about it. So, Mia's enjoyment of Earth Hour I can accept and understand.

John Michael Greer (another of my favourite bloggers) wrote a really good piece a while ago about Problems versus Predicaments.

http://thearchdruidreport.blogspot.com/2006/08/problems-and-predicaments.html

In short a problem is something that can be solved to allow things to stay the same. A predicament cannot be solved, it can only be handled in a way that makes it less painful.

This is why I am addressing you now as an individual, rather than saying "we all need to do X". "We all" can't go on the way that we are. But since most of us insist that we can, I say to you the individual: be like Mia, get the real fear, get the motivation, find a solution for yourself and your family for the problem of our society's inevitable decline.

It's only a predicament if you try to maintain business as usual. For people prepared to think and cast off the assumption that you actually need iPods and McDonalds to be happy there is a bright future.

So enough of the grand gestures and turning the lights off for an hour. The message has been sent. If people don't get it then your wasting your efforts. Time to do something more direct. I am doing my bit to end the debt economy and government parasite that clings to it by earning as little money as I can manage to live on, and so paying little or no tax (legally). Having no money also means that I don't buy "stuff", so I am not feeding the machine that is carrying our society towards a collapse.

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Images:

The image in this post comes from Wikimedia Commons. The original can be found here:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/58/Colosseum_Earth_Hour.jpg/800px-Colosseum_Earth_Hour.jpg

One more failure of the "free market economy"

2010-03-29T12:27:00.000+11:00

We hear almost constantly that the "free market economy" can solve any problem of supply as long as there is demand. It's a pretty simply idea: if people want something badly enough, then some clever person will find a way to provide that product or service, because they can make money by doing so.

Living, as we do, in a finite world though is problematic for this theory. For instance: right now, what I would really like is a dodo sandwich (with mayo please). See the problem?

Finite world, finite resources, theory breaks down eventually.

What is really unexpected though is that running out of resources isn't the only problem. Take this article:

http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/natural_resources/article7078858.ece

The UK needs more electricity. There is a whole industry out there dedicated to generating electricity and delivering it, so there shouldn't be a problem. We have uranium, coal, wind, sunshine, waves, gas, any number of ways of satisfying the demand.

But the director of one of the biggest power generators in the UK says this (from the article):

"The government faces the biggest challenge in Europe," said Beckers, whose company supplies power to 6.4m British homes. "In a world where capital is scarce and the economic case is unclear, it’s not an easy sell to my board. Right now, I can’t do it."

So, we have growing demand, an industry who wants to sell, but soon, there will be shortages. Where is the free market economy? Why isn't it solving this problem?

The answer is that the FME can't solve this problem because doing so requires money (to build power plants). To get money from investors they have to have confidence (of a return). To have confidence you need a growing economy. And there's the problem right there.

We don't have confidence, and as world demand for oil increases, but production fails to follow (that's peak oil) prices will spike again, then we will have another economic crash. So basically, we are stuck with a dud economy. It's fundamental tenants (demand driven supply) no-longer works for one of the most important products that we all consume: energy.

Take away the free growth of energy supply and you take away the growth, no growth, you loose confidence, no confidence and soon you find that you can't even maintain the level of economic activity that you already have (because things wear out and need replacing).

Where this is leading is no-where good for any of us. Especially those of us who live in places that get really cold, or don't produce enough food to feed everyone, or rely on energy dense agricultural inputs to create the food.

My advice: get out of town and start relying on your own two hands. This isn't possible for everyone to do sadly, but that is the truth of the situation that we have put our selves in. Most people don't (and won't ever) see the requirement to provide for their own basic needs (like food, water, and shelter). Right up to the point where the food stops coming and the "government" seem strangely absent.

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Images:

Coal fired power plant thanks to Wikimedia Commons. Original image can be found here:

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Meri-Pori_coal_power_plant.jpg

Acrid taste in my mouth after eating - I have the answer, at last

2010-03-28T20:58:00.000+11:00

Here's one for the X-Files. Since Friday morning, every time I eat something I get a weird acrid/acidic taste in the back of my mouth. The first time it happened I thought that the food I was eating had been spoiled some how.

The taste was really foul, like acidic chemicals.

Since then the effect has been slowly reducing in intensity, but it is really unpleasant and goes a long way to spoiling meals.

Thankfully Google had THE answer.

The good news: it's not a tumour!
The better news: it's going to go away.
The best news: I know what caused it, so I can avoid it ever happening again!

What I have is known as "pine nut mouth". Google the term and you will get about 29,000 hits.

Remember that rather delicious pesto dish that I made for lunch last Thursday? (and blogged about here)

Of course it contained PINE NUTS. It wouldn't be pesto otherwise ...

It turns out that the globalised market for food that we live in means that a wide variety of pine nuts (up to 29 different species are used for food) now get sold under the generic name. Many of these, you may not have eaten before. Some of them seem to cause a reaction of sorts in some people (like me!) that creates a really, really unpleasant taste when you eat anything else for the next seven to ten days.

It's only a new phenomenon, so the "how" and "why" of "pine nut mouth" are not understood at all. But I tell you what: it's just one more reason to EAT LOCAL and EAT ORGANIC.

The pine nuts that I used in the pesto were Sunbeam brand (this is the bag in question). Purchased in Australia. The ingredients on the label just say "imported pine nuts", so I have no way of knowing where they came from. This leaves me wondering if there isn't some source of pine nuts out there that us human's shouldn't be eating.

Perhaps it's something to do with the variety of tree, or the way that they are grown (are chemicals used? Who would know? Who would care? And how could you ever find out?).

So, for now, I will be steering clear of pine nuts. I have absolutely no desire to go through this experience again.

Building update

2010-03-28T19:31:00.002+11:00

It has been a weekend of building. Not as much complete as I would have liked, but it's progress none the less.
We got two rows of plaster board up on the dividing wall yesterday which reminded me of just how much I hate working with industrial chemicals and building materials.

Then today I made up the form work so that we can pour the concrete pedestal for the kitchen cabinets. That's right, concrete. We decided that concrete was the most appropriate material since it will match the skirting boards and the floor and will allow us to echo the curves of the walls in the kitchen design.

To reduce the amount of concrete that it will take I have made up some extra "boxes" that will sit in the middle of the pedestal and create holes. It took a while to work out how to disassemble them once the concrete sets up, but I think we have a good solution. You can see here that the sides are not all joined, but just held apart by some screws. Once the concrete sets we should be able to take our the screws and remove the boxes.
Once the concrete is "green set" meaning that it is basically solid, but not hard yet I will take the outer form work off and carve the curves on the corners. Hopefully we should get the concrete in tomorrow and I will be able to post some more pictures.
Louis takes the position that building work is borrrrrrrring (especially when you are not allowed to walk on the plaster). Still, better to be bored in company than bored alone.

Life on ten litres (of water) per day

2010-03-28T00:06:00.000+11:00

For various complex reasons, I have been living without running water for the last 18 months. I collect water in recycled plastic milk bottles (about 100 litres at a time) to use for drinking, cooking, cleaning, and washing.

It's basically unheard of not having running water in a house in Australia, but then that's more like the norm for many people in the world.

I actually find it's quite strange to go to someone else's place and they have taps that water comes out of (hot and cold!). Besides that I really don't notice it much any more. Filling up is a bit of a hassle, but the neighbours are friendly and let me use their tap. That's another blessing, I don't have to walk far to get my water.

Flushing toilets are also startling to me these days. I use a composting toilet system which requires no water, so flushing a toilet with drinking water seems like absolute insanity. One flush of an average toilet uses about 12 litres of water. That's more water than I use in a day, just for one flush!

So, every year I use about 3650 litres of water (approximately 910 gallons). Compare that with Sam's tenants (an average family of two adults and five children) who use about 70,000 litres PER PERSON (that's 17,500 gallons) each year. Almost 20 times as much water as I use.

Here's something else of interest: after 15 months some of the water bottles started to wear out and develop leaks. The vast majority of these sorts of bottles are used once, then thrown away. I have used each of these bottles upward of 40 times each so far. Better than recycling any day.

Living on minimal water has some unexpected benefits.

A shower, or bath isn't an option, I use a sponge bath instead. Just a small plastic tub with some hot water from the kettle in it, topped up with cold, then some soap and a washer. Rinse with fresh water. It's really quite an effective way to wash and uses at the most a couple of litres of water. It also discourages the frequent use of things like face scrubs. Result: my skin (all over) has never been so clean and clear. Lesson learned: stop messing around with your skin's chemistry, wash it with water and maybe a little soap occasionally (if you actually get dirty) and it will stop getting blocked pores and acne.

The same applies for hair, just rinse it with water. Shock horror, not using shampoo doesn't make your hair fall out, it actually improves its health and your scalp. You also make a real saving on shampoo.

Washing up dishes becomes an interesting task when you want to conserve water. I use a square plastic bucket in the sink (since it's a bit smaller), put in some boiled water from the kettle, then some cold. All up, about 2 litres, then perhaps about another 2 litres is used to rinse off washed items as they come out (rinse water goes into the tub, so my wash water gets topped up as I go along). Compare that to the water required for an efficient dishwasher of 12 to 16 litres per load. And I am ahead on energy as well. I had to laugh looking up the statistics that people throw around for hand washing of dishes. How could anyone use 63 litres of water to a load of dishes? That sounds very much like greenwashing to me. Well, perhaps if I used a firehose ...

So there you have it, my water use is about as minimal as it can be without going thirsty, or risking my health. In fact, I don't feel that only using 10 litres of water per day really restricts my life in any way at all.

Once I get the 20,000 litre tank that I bought for the cottage hooked up and filled up (if it ever rains again) then I will have approximately three years reserve of water for two people. Now that's what I call water security.

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Images:

Thanks to Wikimedia Commons for the great image on this page. It can be found here: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Wassertropfen.jpg

Fit out underway

2010-03-27T20:53:00.000+11:00

Today we put up the gyprock lining boards on the wall between the living room and the bathroom in the cottage. Suddenly, the rooms are starting to take on their real character. The bathroom feels enclosed and like a bathroom. The living room has it's shape and is suddenly a lot lighter (pale wall reflecting more light).

One thing that I didn't like much was the "stud adhesive" that you have to use to glue the plaster sheets up. It smells awful and reminded us of just how good the rest of the materials that we have used on the project have been. Very few nasty chemicals in this building.

We also laminated together two big thick sheets of ply wood to be used as the kitchen bench top. Currently they have about 540kg of clay in bags left over from the rendering pressing them down. Hopefully we get good adhesion and a flat sheet. Tomorrow we should be able to cut out the bench top from the result.

Hopefully tomorrow I will get to form up the pedestal for the kitchen cabinets and and pour the concrete. Oh yes, we are making the cabinet pedestal from concrete so that it matches the rest of the building, rather than the kitchen just being this blob of alien laminate, or timber jambed in the corner.

People can change ...

2010-03-27T12:35:00.002+11:00

A (very intelligent) friend of mine put himself on my "list of people not to bother with" a while ago. That is people who will always find a way to brush off what you tell them about the coming crises derived from population growth, Peak Oil, and environmental degradation.

I was more than a little bit surprised when I received one of his group mailouts today not pushing the usual denialist spokesmen (like Lord Monckton), but a series of Youtube videos that I saw some time ago by a gentleman called Dr Albert A Bartlet. The eight part series just runs through the basic maths of geometric growth and what that means for any population in a finite environment.

It is talking about our destiny (given our current political and cultural attitudes).

The first part is here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F-QA2rkpBSY&feature=PlayList&p=6A1FD147A45EF50D&index=0&playnext=1

If you haven't seen it and you don't know what geometric growth is, then please watch it. Consider what it means for our society. Don't just walk away afterwards. Act accordingly (which is the really hard part, but you can do it).

So, here's to my friend Bruce. Well done for applying rational though. The question is: will he change his life as a result?

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Images:

Thank you to Wikimedia Commons and NASA for the beautiful image above.

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Earth_Eastern_Hemisphere.jpg

I love the fact that you can just see the atmospheric layer of our world in this image

I love science (and bees)

2010-03-27T10:37:00.001+11:00

I love science. No, I really, REALLY, love science. I also love bees. Check out this article:

http://www.smh.com.au/environment/secret-life-of-bees-reveals-inner-glow-20100326-r32e.html

It is a really good example of why science rocks (as do bees).

A friend of Sam's said on Facebook today (in response to a waily-waily thread about selective schools and extra tutoring of children) "what happened to children learning about physics by falling off their bike?"

I'll tell you what happened: we (as a species) figured out the basics a long, long time ago (thanks to very clever people like Newton). And we wrote it down. Then we realised that we could raise everyone to a higher level of understanding by teaching all of that basic stuff at school, then letting people build on that older work. Now we have mobile phones AND we have discovered that some bees job in their hive is to run really hot and literally warm up parts of the hive, thereby determining the purpose of the new bee pupae that are growing in the combs (both things are really impressive achievements).

From the article:

"By creeping into empty cells, one heater bee can transmit heat to 70 pupae around them. It is a central heating system for the colony.

'Now we know that these empty cells are important, then bee keepers can try to avoid selecting for queens that don't leave these cells empty.'"

Right there is why you don't try learning physics by falling off your bike. This stuff is complex. So complex that people who have been doing it for generations never figured it out.

So, the next time that some moron tells you that "the science is all rubbish" on some subject (like climate change), slap them down. They deserve it for sloppy thinking. Then tell them to go talk to the real experts on the subject (the scientists who dedicate their lives to studying the topic) and get a real education before expressing an opinion on the subject.

Scientists may be wrong sometimes (or even often), but you can be sure that if they are, one day someone will figure out the mistake and the record will be set straight and our knowledge will move forward. That's what I love about science, it's self correcting, unlike religion and "the man in the street" its assertions are based on the best evidence available and is always open to questioning and correction.

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Images:

Thank you to my partner Sam for the great image of the bee above. She has a really good eye for wildlife photography, especially for the small scale.

Politicians, their not (all) stupid, but they are VERY bad for your Internet connection

2010-03-27T00:14:00.003+11:00

The topic of "authoritarian regimes" (or possibly fascisms) has been cropping up a lot recently. Dr Peter Watts arrest, trial, and conviction in the US [1], UK police harassing photographers, Ottawa's new transport security campaign [2], Australia's planned internet censorship legislation, France's proposed sanctioning of government hacking of private computers [3] and now: the EU is planning it's own Internet firewall [4], to "protect the kiddies" (from child porn or something, possibly stupid politicians, who knows?).

My problem here is this: so often we look at the stuff that politicians (everywhere) do and laugh (despairingly), because it is blatantly corrupt/homophobic/sexist/environmentally unsound etc, etc. Yet, these are not, for the most part, stupid people. Many are nasty, greedy, self-obsesses, uninformed, narrow minded, yes, but not stupid (except for George W. Bush perhaps). You don't get to be an elected representative in high office (I'm not talking about local government here) without some degree of intelligence (or puppet masters with some).

When Senator Steven Conroy rams through legislation in Australia that is clearly unworkable and doesn't do what it says it will you call Conroy and idiot, laugh it off, shake your head and get back to trying to earn a crust.

Then the EU goes and does the same thing.

WHAT THE FUCK?

The EU as a group of countries arguably have the most liberal attitudes in the world. And they are going to censor the Internet to "protect the kidies"? I can imagine the backward arse conservatives in this country (Australia) falling for this sort of crap, but it shouldn't even get a start in the EU. Who knows, perhaps I am being too generous to the EU.

Anyway, this stuff shouldn't happen in a sophisticated liberal society. Really stupid harmful legislation should never be passed (note I said should!). When multiple countries start proposing the same legislation, all with equally implausible aims it makes me wonder: are these people (like Conroy) stupid? Or are they really the smart, tricky politicians that they have to be to survive in their chosen career? If it's the latter, then hard questions need to be asked. Clever people don't push bad policy without a good reason (even if the reason is convoluted and completely obscure to the likes of you and me).

So why do it? The obvious answer is that it gives these people control. Once this technology is in place, then it can be used in any way that they choose in the future. In the case of Australia, without any independent over-site.

Now combine this whole mess with a few other global issues like Peak Oil, Climate Change, water supply, and food supply to name a few. Are politicians SO stupid that they don't understand the significance of any of these things? Perhaps, but frankly I doubt it. There must be dim awareness at the very least that there is the mother of all shit-storms on the horizon (and that's just Peak Oil). There are so many highly visible people out here on the Internet yelling about these issues nowadays that anyone with a keen eye on their own political future would have to be a total moron not to be concerned about the way things _could_ go in the future.

How convenient then would it be to have a tool already in place that can black out any section of the Internet that you choose at a moments notice, simply on the strength of it being "an issue of national security"? Like blocking sites that attempt to organise protests and resistance to unpopular government actions. Like happens in Iran right now.

Conspiracy theories are built of dreams like these, I know. But you don't keep you ability to speak out AND be heard by giving people (who ARE smarter than we give them credit for and definitely very self interested) a handy "mute button" on the voice of descent.

We live in a world where, in recent years, the reaction of our societies to any threat (real, or imaginary) is reflexive and prohibitory, authoritarian even, not measured, debated, and well considered.

I for one find this scary. Our governments deny the dangers that are evident to anyone who cares to look around, while tightening their grip on our ability to travel, communicate, and protest.

What can you do about it? Probably nothing, but as I said in a recent post here:

http://downandoutinabravenewworld.blogspot.com/2010/03/taste-of-things-to-come.html

All it takes is to motivate 12% of a population to act together and you will carry the rest. You can change governments, change laws, change the world. But you need to stand up and be heard. No easy thing of course and as Kiddy Porn Conroy and his ilk gain more and more control over the channels of communication, less likely to succeed.

So, sweet dreams ...
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Images:
Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons and Tarale, Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Adelaide_internet_censorship_protest.jpg

References

[1] http://www.rifters.com/crawl/?p=932 (start of the thread)
[2] http://feeds.boingboing.net/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/Ee6vj7kRctg/ottawa-joins-the-war.html
[3] http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20100217/2335238217.shtml
[4] http://feeds.boingboing.net/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/tVzUkHnwotk/child-abuse-survivor.html

Electric cars will save the world (apparently)

2010-03-24T23:58:00.000+11:00

Sam has long said that the only thing worse than Peak Oil for our planet and our species is finding a solution to Peak Oil that will let our global economy continue to grow.

I have to agree.

I just read this article: http://www.physorg.com/news188543729.html

The author gives five points about myths relating to electric vehicles. All good points, yes they go fast, yes they are cleaner than internal combustion, even when they run on coal fired electricity etc etc.

The problem though, is that fast, affordable electric personal transport is a solution to only one problem: personal transport.

It doesn't solve any of the other myriad problems that we face, especially if our population continues to grow, and our consumption along with it. Worse though is that successful electric vehicles will just allow the continuation of suburban sprawl and consumption of resources. Continuation of business as usual.

Electric vehicles don't take us closer to sustainability. They just let us hold on to an unsustainable lifestyle for a few more years.

Given that I trained as an industrial designer and love all things technical and gadgety, it is really hard for me to say this stuff, but it has to be said.

Croissants. Fresh. Home made

2010-03-24T23:32:00.001+11:00

Yesterday Sam made croissants for breakfast. What can I say but Oh My God. They were very, very good.

Ready for their "rise", then the oven.

Fresh from the oven, looking golden and delicious!

On the plate and about to meet some rasbery jam and a cup of tea.

We live such a horrible "reduced" life. I don't know how I handle it sometimes.

Fresh pasta with basil and spinach pesto. Or as we call it Lunch!

2010-03-24T23:08:00.001+11:00

Having perfected our recipe and technique for pasta, we made fresh pasta with basil and spinach pesto for lunch today. The result was (if I do say so) fantastic. Thought I should share some photos.

Fresh ingredients from the garden and a nice wad of pasta dough ready for rolling.

Rolling out the dough. I nearly ran out of bench space! I have found that leaving the dough half rolled (to relax) for a while helps a lot. Much easier to roll out flat and it dries a little which makes it a breeze to handle (along with lots of flour).

I love a sharp knife. I love fresh cut pasta ...

Finished result with some fresh tomatoes from the garden and some pine nuts tossed over the top, with cracked pepper. Sigh. Lovely.

The end is in sight, well sort of!

2010-03-24T22:54:00.000+11:00

Momentous day today in the cottage. We moved all of the tools and building materials out of the living area in the cottage and CLEANED THE FLOOR.

Much of the floor has been about an inch deep in straw and clay ever since the rendering began. Today we chipped it all off and swept up. I have to say, it looks great. The render is about 90% done (will finish it tomorrow morning). Then we can start work on the kitchen fitout WOO HOO!

I will try to post some pictures tomorrow and possibly a video.

Fighting SPAM and inconvenience Part II - Turkey spam

2010-03-24T14:24:00.001+11:00

The anti-spam measures that I have put in place for my client are still working well. So well in fact that they haven't even gotten past the first trap that I have set up for them. It's almost a let down. Almost.

I was expecting some sort of heroic battle with the spambots, where a technological arms race ensued, each of us becoming more and more cunning with each battle. Nope. For over a month now the same bot network has hammered away at the blog posts with their crud, apparently not even caring (or even checking apparently) if they are having any success.

It's Turkey Spam!

I have spent a few lazy hours watching the site and spam logs rolling by. Trying to get more of an understanding of how the bots work and what tricks they employ to hide their actions.

The most effective is that they use a wide variety of IP addresses. This is not surprising as anything else would be plain dumb. There is however repetition, I have seen a few addresses pop up multiple times.

So, if the bots ever get smart enough to slip something through my first layer of defence, then I will implement "black holing" of the IP addresses that they are using. Probably something subtle like not accepting form posts from those IPs. It would be easy enough to include a message explaining the situation (i.e. your computer is infected with spambot malware that is trying to spam my website - by now your bank account details, credit card numbers, and identity have probably been stolen too. Have a nice day)

I love the next bit. After submitting its comment the spambot then "clicks" every link in the main menu (within a few seconds) I assume to make it look like there is a human being on the other end. Hmmm. If every page load takes about 3 to 5 seconds, then clicking on all of the links in the time it takes to load one page is rather more of a give-away than a smoke screen.

It does give me another idea though. If the bot indiscriminately just clicks links in the hope of looking human, then I can trap it easily enough and black hole it.

This in itself is actually a good enough reason to implement this system now. These bots are stealing my client's bandwidth and server time. Better to just black hole them and be done with it.

There is another interesting point to note: I was just comparing what a "real" request looks like compared to a spambot request. The main difference, is that the bot doesn't request images. It just grabs the page, posts the form, then calls some more pages. This may be something to do with performance, avoiding creating too high a load on the victim's computer, or just plain laziness (on the part of the bot author and the site developer). So there is another option to block these parasites.

The bottom line here is that I am REALLY disappointed by my industry. Why, when it appears to be so easy to trap spam automatically are we relying on clunky horrible "captcha" systems (where you have to type in a word or two that is almost incomprehensible) to prove that our readers are human?

I grant you that if everyone did what I am doing (implementing some basic common sense blocking techniques) then the bot masters would improve their techniques. But that has a cost. Every time the bot master has to make his software more complex and change it on an installed base of millions of computers it is costing him time, money, and profit.

Make it hard enough and you will choke out the most of the spammers who aren't rich enough, or clever enough to keep up. Spamming of blogs then just becomes a minor nuisance, rather than the plague that it is.

--

Image thanks to Wikimedia Commons: http://commons.wikimedia.org/

A taste of things to come

2010-03-22T23:44:00.000+11:00

WARNING: THIS POST CONTAINS SHIT THAT YOU WON'T LIKE.

NO APOLOGY FROM ME THOUGH, BECAUSE OUR SOCIETY NEEDS A WAKE-UP CALL. IF YOU CAN'T HANDLE IT, GO AWAY AND JUST WAITE FOR IT TO COME TO A STREET NEAR YOU. I DARE SAY YOU WILL GET THE MESSAGE THEN.

IF HOWEVER YOU CARE ABOUT YOUR LIFE AND THE WORLD THAT YOUR CHILDREN ARE GROWING UP IN, THEN YOU NEED TO HEAR THIS (AND ALL OF THE OTHER MESSAGES THAT PEOPLE MORE CLEVER THAN YOU AND ME ARE SENDING ABOUT THE STATE OF OUR WORLD).

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Picture this: you are a 35 year old man, you lost your job as a factory worker and as a result you have also lost your house and car, and your family are now homeless. You and your wife and your two children are queueing outside a privately operated, government funded soup kitchen waiting for a meal. The security guard closes the door just as it is about to be your turn. You and your family (and the other people in the queue) haven't eaten all day, you call to the guard, plead with him, you try to stop him shutting the door.

The guard calls the police, who turn up and order you to disperse, your wife tries to plead with them because her children are hungry. The police feel threatened and tell your wife to lie down on the ground and put her hands behind her back so that they can arrest her because she is interfering with their lawful directive. She's crying now, begging them to help her children. They shoot her three times with a taser (you are punched in the face and beaten with a baron when you try to help her). You are both charged with resisting arrest, you are also charged with assaulting an officer (because you raised your hands to defend yourself) . You are both found guilty and your children are put into foster care.

Now picture this: you are a 60 year old woman with a mental illness, having an episode that disorients you. You are approached by a policeman. He orders you to move on because you are causing a disturbance. When you don't (because you are mentally ill). He orders you to lie down so that he can hand cuff and arrest you, and when you doesn't, he shoots you three times with a taser to force you to "comply". You are charged with resisting arrest and assaulting and officer for good measure.

Now picture this: you are 17 years old, and walking home drunk from the pub. You fall off a bridge, 10 meters to the ground and break your back. The police have been called because you were walking funny along the road. The police find you lying on the ground talking and yelling incoherently. They tell you to roll over on your front so that they can hand cuff you. When you don't (because you have a broken back) they taser you 19 times to make you "comply".

Critical surgery is delayed for two days while your white blood cell count comes down enough (caused by the tasering) for the operation to be safe. The police tell the public that you were shouting about killing police, while you lay helpless on the ground and claim that it is sufficient justification for the use of the taser. No-one questions this, or investigates policemen's conduct.

Two of these stories are true. One of them is made up. Can you pick which one?

See here:

http://www.boingboing.net/2010/03/22/vermont-cop-tases-an.html

and here:

http://is.gd/aSExi

to find out which ones are true.

All however are completely insane uses of force. Western society is failing all around us, but most of us refuse to acknowledge the fact. If you are reading this blog, then you are probably aware of the way that things are going.

Even so, I still think that most of us would expect that "as long as we are innocent" that at least the police and the courts would not unjustly arrest and prosecute us (I have heard exactly that said). Sadly, in Australia, the USA, England, and other "democratic" nations, who are meant to respect human rights, that respect is being replaced by authoritarian rule. Rule by force. Compliance through pain, fear, and social dislocation.

Still, you can reason that you are a quiet peaceful person, who doesn't get into trouble, so you will be fine. But then you see an article like this:

http://www.boingboing.net/2010/03/20/peter-watts-may-serv.html

A peaceful, innocent man was turned into a criminal by a bunch of border guards. By deliberately treating him like a piece of meat (rather than a human being) they goaded him into committing a criminal act that he wasn't even aware of (failing to follow one of their orders). Then they beat him, peper-sprayed him, made false statements about him attacking them (they lied), and sent him to court where he has just been found guilty by a jury.

This is the reality of the world that we now live in. Mentally ill people in Australia are shot to death because police don't have the training, or skills to give these people the help and care that they require. In the US, law abiding tourists (in the case of Peter Watts) are made into convicted felons. In the UK, tourists and professional photographers are harassed by police for photographing tourist attractions and landmarks (they could be terrorists planning a bombing).

Now lets wind the tape forward another three, or four years: it is likely that our "recovering" economy will crash again around 2012 as the price of oil rises higher (driven by China and India's growth), so we are back in another depression, this one deeper than the last. Millions of people unemployed, millions more under employed, even more unable to provide for themselves and their families.

In an increasingly desperate society, the government and the police will not react by softening their stance on "crime". They will get tougher.

And where does this sort of thing end? Making criminals out of ordinary people just because they are unable to follow the rules. Rules that, for many, because of age, race, religion, health, social skills, or just bad luck they are unable to follow?

It ends with people in cattle trucks, going off to somewhere that we don't ask about, because asking could cause you to end up on the next train. Or ethnic cleansing by gangs with machetes, or soldiers with rifles and mustard gas.

If you think that it can't happen, you are wrong, it has happened before in places like Rwanda, Germany, and Iraq. If you think that it can't happen to you, then you are wrong, because ordinary people are caught up in this insanity every day right now in our own countries.

Here's the good news: if you can mobilise just 12% of your population, then you have a good shot at changing your society. So to answer the question of "so what can I do?", I say just that, talk, organise, demonstrate. And be prepared to feel the blunt end of the "authorities" justice as they protect the peace.

Whitewash success

2010-03-22T22:13:00.002+11:00

We set about whitewashing the ceiling of the cottage a couple of weeks ago. Now after about four layers we have success!

The whitewash is a dense white layer, that (now that it has cured properly) is very solid. We have read that whitewash is often dusty, but as you can see from the photos of Sam brushing the ceiling with her hand, nothing really comes off at all.

When the lime in the whitewash reacts with the CO2 in the air it turns back into lime stone (think White Cliffs of Dover).

Whitewash. Cheap, easy, non-toxic, effective.

Much better than stinky plastic paints any day.

Skirting boards. The final frontier ...

2010-03-22T19:56:00.000+11:00

Skirting boards are one of those things that you really take for granted. The builder just whacks them on once the plaster is up and everything is complete.

Well, hah! Try that with a straw bale house and you will find yourself in a world of pain. Just exactly how are you going to get the skirting board to follow those nice curves in the corners? Or sit flat on the ever so slightly undulating render?

Luckily Sam had an idea. A very good one: make skirting boards with concrete render.

It's robust, it matches the colour of the floor, it suits the style of the build, and it's waterproof. Perfect solution. Now to make it work.

Turns out it is not that hard. Before rendering the walls, we nailed 35mm x 70mm pine "render stops" to the wall foot plates. This gives you a guide to work to when building up the render. So out came the hammer and chisel and off came the render stops. That left me with a gap at the bottom of the render all the way around the wall.

This is me carving the curved flourish over the door step. You can see the reinforcing mesh that is used to give the render more strength being exposed as I carve away the dried render.

I added some artistic flare where the skirting boards met the main doors by curving the board up over the doorstep. The result is quite delightful (if I do say so my self!).

It was then a (relatively) simple job to make up a batch of cement/sand/lime render and squash it into the gap, then trowel the face flat. I made it about 5mm thicker than the clay render above so that the final clay render coat has something to stand on and the bottom of the wall will end up flat.

Here I am pressing the render into the curved section over the doorstep. This was rather harder than I expected as the render wasn't quite stiff enough to stay in place and kept wanting to fall out. I ended up doing it in a couple of stages and it worked out fine.

I pushed the cement render up the wall a short way as it is basically impossible to get a square corner when it's wet, then came back and trimmed the top off. Gives a very neat result.

You can see the little step that has been left for the final render coat to stand on in the image above.

I used a paint scraper sitting on a piece of timber to cut back the top edge of the render once it had "green set" (meaning stopped being runny and started firming up, but still crumbly and workable). Once it was fully set I went back and scraped off the remaining cement above the skirting board in preparation for the final coat of render on the wall.

If I was doing it again, I would probably mould the skirting boards before I rendered the walls.

Corners are difficult, no two ways about it. As you can see here, the result doesn't look perfect, but at least as the render sets up you can go back and work it a bit flatter if you need to.

Here's the north west side of the door with the skirting board render neatly trimmed and shaped. Love the curves. It has a real art deco feel to it.

This is the north east corner taking shape. One of the things that I really love about this technique is the sinuous flowing feel of it.

We have most of the top coat render on it now and it looks even better with the render and skirting boards flush and smooth.

Sam has started to polish the render (using a little piece of plastic cut from a milk bottle. This smooths and flattens the render, taking away the sandy feeling that it has from the trowel. It also leaves a very faint sparkle from the faces of the sand particles that are exposed and pressed flat as you polish. yes, it's a slow process. Takes about an hour per square meter to polish. But then, it's only a small building. The average McMansion would be a daunting task.

So there we are. Getting very close to the final touches on the walls in the living area. Next comes fit out, including building a concrete bench top for the kitchen. That is going to be a real adventure.

If you're going to have a cloths line, then it's got to be a Hills Hoist!

2010-03-22T12:00:00.000+11:00

While out walking the dogs I noticed a Hills Hoist cloths line lying on it's side in a back yard. I have been keeping an eye out for unloved Hoists, since we have to put up a cloths line as part of the cottage development and they are hard to come by out here. They are also expensive to buy new (and the new ones are no-where near as robust as the old ones).

So I dropped in on the owner (Rita - who turned out to be the sister of the lady who we are building next-door to) later that day and enquired if the clothesline was surplus and could I buy it.

It turned out that the one on its side was due to be put up and the old one torn down. So I offered to put up the new line and take away the old one, plus $50 cash. It was a done deal.

The next weekend Sam and I took some tools and a few bags of cement down to Rita's, dug a hole and planted the new cloths line for her, then dug up the old one.

The old line had a block of concrete on the bottom about the size of a rubbish bin, so it took some very hard work with a very big sledgehammer to break it all off. Once that was done, as friend came down with his ute and we loaded it up and took it home.

Once the earth works are complete then we can dig a hole and concrete it in. It will be great to have it installed.

It is quite an old model. From what we can tell, it is probably over 60 years old, possibly one of the first models of cloths line that Hills ever made.

Kangaroos

2010-03-17T20:48:00.000+11:00

It was a beautiful morning this morning. Crisp and clear. Just perfect for our eight km morning walk. We had a really nice surprise at one point when a mob of kangaroos crossed the road just behind us.

Most of the path that walk is through farm and bushland, so it is common for us to see kangaroos at a distance grazing. It was a big surprise though to see such a large mob of roos (about 14) on the move and crossing the road.

Thankfully none of them got hit by a car.

The really interesting part was that I only heard them when they were crossing the road. In the bush they were virtually silent, but when they hit the road they made a loud "thud", followed by a "clack" of their claws as they kicked off.

It was all quite remarkable and a nice way to start the day.

Building milestone achieved!

2010-03-16T16:41:00.002+11:00

Today is a momentous day. We finally finished the skim coat on the living room. That means that the entire interior is ready for its top coat of render!

Above is the absolutely gorgeous curves of the render around the door ways. The whitewash ceiling is also a real stand-out. It has cured really well, and is very solid (not coming off as dust if you touch it).

The building may still be pretty messy (sorry about all of the tools and equipment in the shot!), but it's all coming together. It won't be long before the cement mixer can move out permanently and we can start the interior fit out.

TV-B-Gone

2010-03-16T13:27:00.000+11:00

Continuing on with our television theme from yesterday, heres a lovely piece of undermining activity for the average citizen:

http://thesietch.org/mysietch/keith/2010/01/15/monthly-undermining-task-january-2010-the-great-tv-turn-off/

Just take one of these universal TV "off" remotes:

http://www.tvbgone.com/cfe_tvbg_main.php

And start freeing your fellow citizens from the enslavement of their minds to corporate media in public spaces.

If I spent more time out and about, I would have one of these in a heart beat.

The television is controlling your mind. No seriously, it is

2010-03-15T23:06:00.000+11:00

Here's a cheery thought for you: your life is ruled by your television.

Don't believe me? Think for a moment: do you schedule things in your life around your favourite show? Do you stay home, or put things off, or eat in front of it rather than at the table? Do you watch different things to your partner, or family on another television so that there is no conflict? Have you ever been in a public place and found that the television on the wall (even with the sound down) constantly draws your eye?

If you answer no to all of those things, then well done, you either don't own one, or never turn it on. If you answered yes to any of them, then you are compromising your life for your television. You are loosing time with your partner, children, family, just so that you can sit there and give your time to the corporate advertisers in exchange for what is probably dubious quality entertainment (or mind-numbing shit as I would call it).

I turned off the television a few months ago.

Now I have my life back. I do what I want, when I want. I don't have the pressure to be anywhere at any time. I read more, I write more. I think more.

Try it out. You might like it. As the inimitable Morpheus said:

"I'm trying to free your mind Neo. But I can only show you the door. You're the one who has to walk through it."

Population. If you don't fix it, then you can't fix anything else

2010-03-12T13:27:00.002+11:00

I have been meaning to write something about population for a while. An article that I read today has given me the incentive.

The article is called: Urban Resilience For Dummies (parts 1 and 2)

http://www.postcarbon.org/blog-post/82383-urban-resilience-for-dummies-part-2

I made the following comment, which may or may not be published:

It's great to talk and to plan. I am not going to discourage anyone from doing that, except when all of the talking and planning is fundamentally flawed.

This article states that population will continue to grow.

From the article: "Merely developing a list of topics that need to be addressed--the "check-list" approach--will not prepare regional economies for the complexity of new dynamics, such as energy or water supply shortages, rising population, extreme energy price volatility"

That is probably true (as long as there is energy available to support the growth). But as has been said many times by many people: "this is a finite world".

Where is the exhortation to communities to work out how to stop growing? All of the efficiency and resilience in the world cannot make up for geometric growth. One percent growth per annum means you double your population in about seventy years. You can't improve your efficiency at the same rate, period. Therefore, your population is locked into a future of more and more scarce resources.

So, we can talk all we like about resilience and future-proofing, but it won't mean a thing until we can (at the very least) stabilise the world's population. Everything else (worthy as it may be) is just re-arranging the deckchairs.

It is frankly astounding that someone like Warren Karlenzig, the author of this article, who advises governments and states about "sustainability" could write an article so fundamentally flawed. Even more astounding that the Post Carbon Institute would publish it.

Please Warren, tell me this: how many people can this planet sustainably support? And since you don't appear to be encouraging people to stop population growth any time in the near future (in this article at least), how do you propose growth be stopped once we hit your population limit?

Or does this fundamental issue clash with your role as an international consultant and "world's top experts on urban sustainability strategy and metrics"?

Excuse my sarcasm and disappointment, but - IN MY OPINION - making a living from giving people false hope (that we can grow forever if only we are "resilient" enough) is pretty callous.

Just to be clear: it is my strongly held, personal opinion that we as a species need to stabilise our population. I also believe that anyone who doesn't address this issue, while claiming to be an expert on the subject of "resilience" and sustainability, does the species a disservice, as they are misdirecting the people who need to hear the message (like politicians) and therefore wasting time and effort in responses that can never resolve the cause of our problems.

The gastric banding death sentence

2010-03-11T16:48:00.000+11:00

Gastric banding. It's one of those bad ideas that only people who really love making money out of other people's misery could come up with (and only people with no self control would want to use).

As if the dangers of the procedure itself and the risks associated with blockage etc weren't enough, have a think about this:

What happens to all of the gastric banded people (who depend on high calorie easily digested food) when cheap oil and the cheap easy calories that it provides become expensive? Or in the case of the food, perhaps non-existent?

It's a very nasty thought.

There are going to be thousands of people out there who may literally starve to death, even with abundant "real" food (like legumes, cereals, fruit, and vegetables) simply because that food doesn't have the calorie density required to sustain them, or it keeps blocking up their banded stomachs.

I expect a lot of people to happily meet their "goal weight" and then keep on sliding, right to the point of starvation.

It's one more example of how short sighted we are as a society and of how utterly convinced most people must be that things will always be at least as good as they are now. Of course it's a bit rough to just pick on the users of gastric banding. The vast majority of the (Western) world has it's own dependency issues (like Las Vegas and its completely artificial water supply for instance). But the banding example is just one special case that stands out.

The worst bit is contemplating what lengths these people will go to, to be rid of the band if they find themselves starving in a society either crashing, or in decline?

The sub-contracting of culture

2010-03-07T22:18:00.000+11:00

If you ask an Australian like me what our nation's culture is like, we would probably talk about things like sport, mateship, the food of the world, the beach etc.

The sad fact though, is that while once upon a time we embraced these things as the foundations and "cream" of our lives, we no-longer do.

Sport is a good example. We see ourselves as a sporting nation. When I was growing up my whole family participated in competitive sports (including tennis, netball, field hockey, football, swimming, cycling, and running) as did the majority of families I knew. Now people are more likely to watch others participating in sport on television, or as spectators.

We may still love sport, but in a very different way: as consumers of sport as entertainment.

Food is much the same. We used to grow a lot of our own food and my mother cooked almost everything from basic ingredients every day; rain, hail, or shearing. Bread and fish-fingers were two of the few things that I can remember that came pre-processed in a packet.

Not any more. Just cast an eye over the average shopping trolley in a supermarket and it is likely to contain an abundance of pre-packaged processed food.

So, while we may claim that our culture is about sport and food and the beach and such like, we have gone from participating in the creation of these things to just being consumers of them. Companies now own and run our sport. They prepare our meals and feed our children. They turn a trip to the beach into an event that requires the height of fashion and every portable convenience imaginable.

We have subcontracted our culture to the corporations. As a result, it is no-longer culture, its just consumerism. Culture is something you get from participation, appreciation, and co-operation. You can't buy culture, you can only buy a habit.

But not being able to buy "culture" is a fundamental problem for our economy. Culture and cultural pursuits reduce the time and attention that people have for earning money and buying "stuff". The economy has to grow every year to allow last years debt to be paid. So, allowing families to indulge in activities like baking cakes from raw (read low profit margin) products using a 30 year old mixer is bad for business and the economy. But if you sell them a packaged cake premix and a new food processor you can have a double benefit: economic growth continues and you kill a little more of the culture that impedes that growth.

Call it "convenience" and "labour saving" so that people can feel good about abandoning their culture of home made food for mass produced pap in fifty flavours and you have an economic winner (for now).

The CWA (Country Women's Association - http://www.cwaa.org.au/about_us.php) with their annual Land Cookery competition is culture.

Sam and I gave a presentation about our small business (manufacturing chocolate) a couple of years ago at the local CWA meeting. What was most noticeable about the audience was the total lack of young women members. Women who I see loading up their shopping trolleys with pre-cooked meals, soft drink, and ice-cream. Women who could learn a lot about how to make cheap, tasty, nutritious food for their families from the CWA members we met.

So, once more I despair for what we are. We have no culture, just (mindless) consumption. The bright side is that it cannot go on forever. The "Limits to Growth" are real. The debt that drives our economy can never be paid back, meaning that one day the system that it drives must collapse - it's a finite planet that we live on after all.

After the collapse of our current economy, "culture" will naturally return, because culture is what you create in a society that has to value the things that support it.

You don't need to create community, you just need to prepare for community

2010-03-03T21:04:00.002+11:00

It seems that everywhere I look these days people are talking about "community" and how we need to create it, or make it "resilient" or whatever. Because that is the ONLY way that you can survive the coming [insert collapse disaster of choice].

Then you have this insight from Dmitry Orlov:

"Communities - of people and animals - form instantaneously and rather effortlessly, based on a commonality of interests and needs"

From his blog: CLUBORLOV

I am with Dimitry on this one.

In my youth I lived on a farm. All of the neighbours were friendly, but we didn't interact that much. Except on the occasions that there was a bushfire. When that happened, then it was "all hands to the pump" so to speak. Everyone worked together to protect each others properties, and the local chapter of the CWA (Country Women's Association) organised the tea and sandwiches.

A "fire fighting community" spontaneously evolved, did it's job, then disbanded when it was no-longer needed.

By way of contrast there was a local CFA (Country Fire Authority) group that people volunteered for and went to monthly training sessions with but not everyone was a part of it, (or wanted to be a part of it). There was real effort required to create and maintain that particular "standing" fire fighting community.

That is not unlike the situation with Peak Oil and trying to get people to organise in preparation for it. No-one really wants to build a parallel community, and I can understand why. Because we are all tied up in the debt/consumer economy. We don't need, or want a community that serves no immediate purpose. That is just more work, in a world that already works us hard.

So, back to collapse. Everyone says that we need communities that are resilient to be able to survive whatever it is that is coming.

And here lies a big problem. What is coming? Simple answer: we don't know and can't predict it. Therefore, we can't possibly know in advance if we are building the right kind of community to deal with it.

The example above says to me that what we really need is to be prepared to make the most of whatever community emerges as our current society changes, or collapses in some way, at some time in the future.

This we can do because we can have a pretty good idea of what is going to get harder in the future. Things like:

Food and water production, processing, and distribution
Waste management
Transport
Heating, cooling, and cooking
Health care

All of these things rely (currently) on cheap energy (which really means cheap oil) and our massively industrialised economy. Oil is no longer cheap and will probably get more expensive, or unpredictable as time goes on, which threatens the stability of that economy that we rely on.

So, you can bet your bottom dollar that knowledge and experience in those areas, and most importantly the mental preparedness to step up and provide the leadership to make them happen when the time comes is going to be valuable to whatever community you end up as a part of. Not everyone needs to know how to grow potatoes, but if someone does and they share that knowledge with their new community, then the other people will learn fast.

To summarise:

You can't force people to create a community. There has to be a compelling reason for the community to exist
When a need arises, communities will spontaneously form to deal with the need
The best way to expend our effort as individuals is to be physically and mentally prepared to give these communities every advantage that we can to help their survival.

The advantages of this approach are:

You don't expend time and effort trying to build a community that is preparing for the wrong thing
You can always cover the fundamental needs of your community (water, food, sanitation etc) regardless of what is happening to the greater society around you (i.e. fast collapse, slow collapse, something else)
You can't be wrong footed by things not working out the way that you thought they would.

And the best thing is: you can do it yourself, right now (today!) without having to motivate anyone else, raise funds, organise groups, fight competing ideologies, change minds, or fight bureaucracies. You just become the ultimate Boy Scout (or Girl Guide) in your area. Ready to leap into the gap when the time comes.

People like strong leaders. People NEED strong leaders. When the time comes, regardless of its shape we are going to need a lot of them.

Love those calories ...

2010-03-02T23:04:00.001+11:00

Well, here's a surprise. For the last week and a half our morning walk with the dogs has been extended to 8km (over various terrain, with hills and valleys, roads, tracks, and railway lines).

For the last couple of weeks I thought that I was just sick, recovering from some bug picked up at the movies or something in Sydney. I have been almost constantly tired, had trouble working, concentrating on anything for long.

Last night I was having a particularly bad bought and thought "this is crazy" I was hungry, had a headache and total lethargy. The thought occurred, perhaps I have just been feeling the effects of being deprived of calories from the extra exercise? I was definitely sick from Sydney, but perhaps that had just eased into this general lethargy?

The test was pretty simple: I raided the emergency calorie supply (meat pie and can of coke).

A short time later I felt a lot better.

This morning I woke up feeling quite ok, despite a power failure at about 6.30am and having to get up and power down the file servers in the office.

Walked again this morning (felt fine and more energetic). Then had a big breakfast (sausages, egg, onion, beans, toast). Still feel fine now at 2.00pm. Have gotten more done so far today than I did all of yesterday.

The theory is far from proven, but I have a suspicion that I am on the right track. I weight about 76kgs, am 6'2" tall, with an "athletic build", so my weight is pretty much ideal for body type.

Not a lot of body fat to consume ...

It has left me thinking back to age 17 when I used to train around 25 hours per week for triathlon. I don't do anything like that much exercise now, but I also eat only a fraction as much food.

Back then (1988) I was eating approximately $120 worth of food each week. And this was all unprocessed foods like rice, vegetables, bread, fruit, meat etc (that my mother very generously cooked every day for me). It was a huge amount of calories which I then burned off in the pool, on the bike, and on foot.

My dinner was occasionally served on two regular dinner plates ...

Fast forward to ten years ago and my desk job and insufficient exercise had me gaining 10 kgs that I didn't need. Regular exercise saw to the extra weight easily enough and I have kept it off ever since. But it has left me with the mind set of minimising what I eat and maximising the exersion.

Well, it's 11.00pm and like the energizer bunny I am still going ...

Will have to keep an eye on the waist line for a few weeks, but I think that eating a bit more is paying off. I have definitely had a better day today than I have had in weeks.

A little touch of creativity with my favourit Lego ...

2010-03-02T12:05:00.000+11:00

I came across this BoingBoing. Well worth a look, even if you don't live in New York.

http://niemann.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/02/02/i-lego-ny/

Nuclear weapons and oil shale

2010-03-01T11:33:00.000+11:00

You know that there is truly no hope for humanity when people start talking (seriously) about using nuclear weapons to aid in extracting oil from shale deposits:

http://www.theoildrum.com/node/6249?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+theoildrum+(The+Oil+Drum)

This sort of insanity says one thing: we are way, way too dependent upon cheap oil.

Perpetual growth + dependence on fossil fuels = limited future. Nuclear weapons can't change that whether they are used below ground or above.

It's a dirty job, but someone's got to do it ...

2010-02-28T10:10:00.000+11:00

Did you know that Australia is the third largest producer of uranium? I didn't, I thought we were the biggest. Still, we are big enough, producing about 8500 tons of the stuff last year. We also have the largest reserves in the world (recoverable reserves of about 1.243 million tons).

These figures come from: http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/inf23.html

There is a rather interesting graph at the bottom of that page. It shows world reactor consumption of uranium along with uranium production. Consumption is about twice production. My understanding is that the masive shortfall is made up for by the US using up former Soviet nuclear material in their reactors. This is coming to an end as that stockpile has (I seem to remember reading in New Scientist) been all but consumed.

So, I am betting that the uranium mining industry is going to have to double in size in the near future to keep up with demand. And that's not even considering all of the new power plants that various world governments are talking about building to help pick up the load and mitigate coal use.

Which brings me to my point: waste.

We still don't know what to do with it, no-one wants to deal with it, but we are planning a future that will have ever more of the stuff.

As a citizen of Australia, a major exporter of the stuff, I seems to me that we (Australia) have a duty to take and store spent nuclear fuel. There are a several reasons:

If you dig up this poison and sell it to the world, then you have a moral obligation to take responsibility for the mess it creates. Just as we hold drug dealers responsible for the effects of their wares, we should hold ourselves responsible for dealing with spent nuclear fuel that we have created
Australia is the most geologically stable continent on the plannet. Basically, there is nowhere that you will find that has a more stable geology. So, once again as a producer, if we have the best chance of storing the stuff safely, then we have an obligation as a producer to clean up
Economically this is a no brainer. If digging up uranium is a growth industry, then waste disposal is going to be even bigger. In uncertain economic times it is easy money. Other people have worked out the technology for deep storage (Norway from memory has a very advanced design) all we have to do is license the technology, build the facility and watch the cash roll in for as long as we have a global industrial economy. You could probably name your price and most of the worlds' governments would pay without even thinking to have this problem taken away from them
It would be doing the right thing by the planet. One day we will reach a point where we won't have the energy / money available to take waste that is currently stored in "temporary" facilities and put it into safe long-term storage. This will be an utter catastrophe for the environment around those temporary storage sites, given that reactor waste has a half life measured in hundreds of thousands of years at least. The earth can heal it's biosphere of a lot of the things that we are doing to it, but nuclear waste is a legacy that will kill and kill and kill for an inconceivably long time. It is our duty to every other living thing on the planet to deal with this problem that we are creating.

So, there you go. Four reasons why Australia should be storing nuclear waste: 1. it's the right thing to do 2. we have the best chance of doing it safely, 3. we make a shit ton of money in a declining world economy, 4. we ensure that we don't leave an incredibly toxic legacy for future species to deal with.

Someone HAS to do it. It should be us.

We vote for a government With axes in its eyes

2010-02-27T12:43:00.000+11:00

Peter Garret made a mistake. That mistake wasn't offering Australian home owners free insulation, it was thinking that he could effect change by entering politics with the Australian Labor party.

I listened to Midnight Oil's Blue Sky Mining album this morning while doing breakfast and it nearly bought me to tears. The songs and message of Midnight Oil are clear and direct. They tell us what is wrong with our society and how we live.

They are also immensly popular (at least in Australia).

I don't know why Peter Garret went into politics, especially with a mainstream party like Labor, but his experience should be a lesson to us all:

You can't change the system from inside. It is too broken.

Perhaps Peter Garret felt that he wasn't having enough impact through what he and Midnight Oil were doing. I beg to differ. As part of The Oils his message has been a defining part of my life.

Peter, please leave the system that is robbing you of your credibility! Go back to what you do best.

From the song Mountains of Burma:

We vote for a government With axes in its eyes

By joining any mainstream political party we endorse that same system. A system that can defeat even the very best of us.

Beware the man with something to hide (especially when he controls your access to information)

2010-02-27T00:07:00.000+11:00

It seems that Senator Steven Conroy of the Australian Labor government is so keen on censorship that he will even censor himself.

Apparently code was implemented on his website to remove references to "ISP filtering" from the tag cloud that helps people see what he has been talking about.

From: http://www.news.com.au/technology/conroys-website-removes-references-to-filter/story-e6frfro0-1225834474153

Conroy appears to know that his policy of filtering all Internet traffic is unpopular, so hides references relating to it. The only possible reason for this behaviour is that it is beneficial to his cause to hide this information from the public.

On one hand Conroy say: "trust me to censor - secretly - what you can and can't see on the Internet" and on the other, hand he says: "I will censor any information that I have control over if I think that it will help me to achieve my goals".

This is the action of a despot, not someone who truly cares about "protecting the children".

And we have put this man (and his friends) in charge of our country and our access to the Internent - the most powerful tool we human beings have ever created. We are fools. We deserve whatever these fools give us.

So, Steven Conroy, let me make it clear:

I value a free and open Internet more than the infective protection that you think your scheme will offer us
Your scheme will not protect one child from "inappropriate" material on the Internet. Only responsible adult supervision will do that
Your attack on my freedom does nothing to make our society better. In fact it will make it a worse place to live

YOU DO NOT HAVE MY SUPPORT IN ANY WAY.

Post prosperity Europe looks like it will be a scarey place (again)

2010-02-26T23:46:00.000+11:00

Since the end of World War II and the rise of cheap energy and the prosperity that it brings Western Europe has been a pretty cool place (assuming that you ignore the former USSR and the Cold War). It's member states got along nicely, everyone made buckets of money, the living standard was high and no-one was trying to annex the neighbours.

Sadly though, the Greek sovereign debt crisis has very quickly brought old tensions to the surface.

"Greece's political elite has been outraged and hurt by hard-hitting German media coverage of the debt crisis. The cover of a German magazine, Focus, which showed the Venus de Milo making a less than complimentary finger gesture under the headline "Swindlers in the eurozone" has triggered widespread fury.

In an extraordinary tirade, the deputy prime minister, Theodore Pangalos, said Germany had no right to judge Greek finances after wreaking havoc on the economy during the four years that the country was under Nazi occupation in the second world war. Worse still, he said, Germany had failed to make adequate compensation.

"They took away the Greek gold that was at the Bank of Greece, they took away the Greek money and they never gave it back. This is an issue that has to be faced sometime," he told the BBC."

From: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/feb/24/greece-strikes-protest-euro

It is a sobering reminder to all of us that when people are backed into a corner, you can't rely on them to be rational. In fact, you can probably rely on them to do something monumentally stupid. The Greek deputy prime minister is a case in point, but so are the union bosses and their members in Greece who are protesting about the austerity measures that the government has been forced to put in place to try to save their economy.

Greece it seems is like a microcosm of the world. No-one in their country wants to face up to the fact that their society is bankrupt and will have to live with a lot of harsh changes to their lifestyle if they are to avoid complete economic collapse. Just like the rest of the world refuses to accept that Peak Oil, over population, climate change, and the limits to economic growth mean that we need to change our way of life pronto and accept a lot less than we have, if we want to keep anything at all.

No, everyone wan't the party to go on forever and for someone else to pick up the bill. The problem comes when, like Greece, the party ends abruptly. No-one has had a chance to get used to life being just a little bit harder each week, it's just bad all of a suddenly.

So, out comes all of the anger and hostility that everyone can put aside when things are good and you have protesting, riots, and international name calling.

This is the danger period. People who feel entitled are apt to try to take what they want when it is withheld from them. This is really bad when it's entire nation states with shit loads of military hardware that feel entitled.

So, for what it's worth, here's a plea: leaders of the world (whomever you might be), look at Greece, see what just a little economic upset is doing to that country and think about the consequences of over population, growth, and resource depletion for your country and the world.

It's time that we, the affluent people of this world choose sustainable survival over feelings of entitlement. If we don't then we will end up with neither.

There's nothing sadder than a sick dog ...

2010-02-26T23:07:00.000+11:00

A few weeks ago while out for our morning walk Kai (the Doberman) was stung or bitten by something that she had a very nasty reaction to.

At first it was just the top of her nose that started to swell up, but it rapidly spread to her whole head. You have never seen a sadder looking dog in your life ...

Thankfully I discovered (via the wonderful service of Google) that the antihistamine tablets that I keep on hand for myself for this kind of emergency are also safe to use on dogs. I even found a table giving the correct dog dosage! You just have to love the Internet.

It took a couple of days for her face to fully deflate and for her to get her zest back, but it worked out ok thankfully. At the time it was a near run thing and it seemed likely that she might die.

Amayonnaising

2010-02-25T17:36:00.000+11:00

About five months ago I made a large batch of mayonnaise using egg yoke, vinegar, garlic, herbs, and sunflower oil.

It was really yummy. But I had more than I needed for the meal. So the rest went into a jar in the fridge and was promptly forgotten about.

It became one of those things in the fridge that take up space but everyone is too scared to touch (expecting that it has gone rotten)

Five months later Sam hauled it out of the fridge to throw out. Upon opening the jar she found that far from having gone off and mouldy it actually looked and smelled fine. It had dried out somewhat, but that was not surprising.

Neither of us was about to try it, but it certainly looked and smelled ok.

This is an interesting demonstration of natural "old fashioned" preserving techniques. Vinegar is a very effective preservative (not to mention refrigeration of course), as long as it is strong enough and in the right quantity. Combine vinegar and oil and you get a very effective medium for preventing the growth of bacteria.

The time is right for a new order in politics

2010-02-24T20:57:00.001+11:00

I have been watching with contempt the machinations of Australia's government (Federal, State, and Local). The thought occurred to me this morning that the time is right for a complete break from what has become a two party system beset by corruption and incompetence.

I have no desire to enter into politics myself, because I believe that we (as a society and a species) have travelled so far down the path to our own destruction that it is not possible for all of us to transition to a sustainable way of life.

However, if someone were to ask me the question: "how would you fix Australia's problems?" I think just at the moment I would give them the following answer:

I would start a new political party to run at all three levels of government in Australia with the following platform:

Complete transparency of all government planning
Complete disclosure of all government contracts BEFORE they were signed
Complete transparency of all government spending. EVERY CENT
Provide a forum for public debate of planning, spending, and contracts
No donations of any sort to political parties
All government planning to be guided by the best science available
Only appoint ministers to portfolios that they have the relevant qualifications to manage
Rebuild health system entirely, starting by providing only the services that the country can afford and making them the best in the world
Institute a zero population growth goal
Institute a Peak Oil strategy to move Australia completely to renewable energy within 10 years

I have a feeling that a political party with those goals (minus the last two!) would be a rather popular choice.

Sadly the last two items would be the most important to give this country (or any country) a real future and they would also be terribly unpopular.

So, long story short, the problem can be solved, if we all pull together. But the chances of that happening are non-existent

Not too proud to whitewash*

2010-02-22T22:05:00.001+11:00

* Too poor to paint, too proud to whitewash ...

Let's start by saying that whitewash is not paint. It's really not like paint at all.

We decided to try whitewashing the ceiling of the cottage, rather than painting it. After all, we have tons of lime still sitting around from the rendering (more than we will need to finish the outside). So the first job was to scrape the render over-spray off the ceiling. Being such a small house, it didn't take long to scrape it back around the edges and then putty up the screw holes.

The next step was to mix up the whitewash. It's just hydrated lime with water. I mixed it up in a clean bucket with a paint stirrer and a drill (thanks for that to The Natural Paint Company, whose products we really recommend. We love their casein based paints. They are fantastic).

The recipes that Sam found said to make the whitewash about the "thickness of cream". This is pretty in-concise as far as directions go. Here is what we found:

You should probably go for something about the consistency of milk. So, pretty thin. If it looks or feels at all like paint, then it is way to thick and you will get a blotchy finish.

People recommend wetting down the surface before applying the whitewash. I did this with a squirt bottle and a paint brush. Brushing the water around after it was sprayed on.

Then the whitewash was painted on. You can see (above) that it goes on quite translucent, but as it dries, (the white square to my right) that it dries up white. The trick is to not put it on thick. Thick is very bad, as you end up with a blotchy chalky result.

Using a brush is hard work on the ceiling, so we switched to a roller. Everything that Sam had read said not to use a roller, but frankly I can't work out why. The roller gave a much more even, clean result as seen above. The whitewash on the right was brushed on, roller on the left. This is the first coat (the idea is to put on multiple thin coats for best coverage).

All in all it hasn't been a success yet, but we will stick with it and see what can be achieved. One thing it has done already is increase the amount of light in the building, which is always appreciated.

This is why I have chosen to rely only on myself, not on my society

2010-02-22T21:58:00.000+11:00

"Lifeboaters" - People who prepare themselves so that they can live in a self sufficient fashion regardless of what happens to the rest of their society. Usually in relation to issues like Peak Oil.

Well, call me a lifeboater if you like. I certainly fit the bill. But there is a good reason for it. Take a look at this article by Myles Peterson, a former employee of the Australian Federal Government:

http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/yes-minister-meets-alice-in-wonderland-20100220-omsa.html

It's hard to sum up the totality of the awfulness of our government and public service that this article shows. There is one quote that may do it justice:

"After four months, I walked away and did not bother telling anyone why."

I have always felt that our governments (at all levels) were incompetent and self serving, but this article takes it to a whole new level. I had never really dared to think that they might just be making the whole thing up as they go along ...

They spent nine years in opposition (Australia's federal Labor Party) and they hadn't bothered to come up with a real plan of how to run the country when they got elected?! WTF?

So, here we are. A dysfunctional government, lead by the nose by a psychopathic industrial economy, that is fast running out of oil, water, and everything else it needs for its very survival, with a population growing geometrically and a crashing biosphere.

And people wonder why I want to be self sufficient? I can't understand why anyone would risk being dependent on these fools.

Mark my words, this will end badly.

This is my life ...

2010-02-22T17:36:00.000+11:00

I love this cartoon. I feel it rather reflects my life ...

http://xkcd.com/308/

Fighting SPAM and inconvenience

2010-02-22T10:48:00.000+11:00

My "day job" is building websites and other stuff like that.

As anyone with an email account knows spam is the stuff of nightmares. It is a constant torrent that you need real solutions to. This is especially so if you write or operate a blog, or a forum. Spammers love them because they can inject their crap at will and get good exposure.

I am currently building a site for a client that has a blog. So when it came time to implement the comments feature I spent some time looking into the options for "captcha" systems (you know, those very annoying hard to read words that you have to re-type to prove you are human and not a spambot).

I stumbled upon a couple of articles by people asking the questions: why do we put the onus on the commenter to prove that they are human? Shouldn't we as programmers take that responsibility?

My immediate answer was: "I agree, it shouldn't be up to the commenter".

So, rather than implement a captcha solution, I dreamed up my own method of checking if a post is made by a person, or a robot. When you stop and think about the problem there likely to be a bunch of clues, such as:

How fast the user posts
What fields they fill in
How many posts they make

And that's just a start.

Initially I have implemented a "honey pot" field (that's a field that a person can't see, so won't fill in, but a spambot will see and complete) and a speed check. No human being can fill in the whole form and post it in just a few seconds, so that is an obvious one.

The results have been GREAT. Last week my client's new blog post got hit with over 200 spam posts all in one go. Every one of them was trapped and dumped without exception. All had the honey pot field completed, so they were a dead give-away, but looking at the server logs it was clear that each post had taken less than five seconds to complete, so if the bot had figured out the honey pot field, then the time check would have caught them anyway.

It's an arms race this fight against spam, but so far we are doing ok.

Ouch.

2010-02-22T09:34:00.003+11:00

We spent the weekend working on the cottage and achieved quite a lot. I also managed to whack my head pretty badly on one of the dumping handles of the cement mixer while reaching for the power cord.

It hurt like hell. The ice pack hurt even more. 24 hours later and the lump is much the same. No bruising though thankfully, so the ice did some good.

You can see the culprit in the picture above. I hit the end of the lower arm straight on. I didn't see it coming because the arm is just a thin bit of metal bar that is practically invisible when viewed end on.

It's a cheap mixer with no consideration of safety, so the arms don't have any padding either. We had some re-bar caps sitting around, so they went on the ends to prevent this from happening in the future.

Thankfully this is about the worst injury I have had in any building project. I aim to keep it that way.

Give up your iPod (for a day) and help save the world ...

2010-02-18T13:37:00.000+11:00

A quote from the article below:

"Instead of giving up chocolate for Lent, why not fast for justice ... to help those suffering from the effects of climate change," said Jones.

http://www.smh.com.au/digital-life/mp3s/brits-urged-to-give-up-ipods-for-lent-20100217-ob5g.html

This is what I love about Christianity, this idea that you don't really have to give up anything. Just "fast" for a day and your all up to date on your "ethical behaviour" budget.

The only thing that will help anyone suffering from the effects of climate change will be the end of our industrial economy. And that won't be a pick-nick either.

Someone needs to explain the Jevons Paradox to these fools (or perhaps just common sense).

38% of the world's land is (apparently) at risk of becoming desert

2010-02-16T22:46:00.001+11:00

Here's a nasty thought for you: what happens if 38% of the world's surface ends up as desert? A new study reported here:

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/02/100209183133.htm

concludes that 38% of the land area of our planet is under threat of becoming desert. Just stop and think about that. More that one third of the planet is at risk of becoming desert.

Now contrast that with our expected population growth of a couple more billion people over the next few decades.

Sound like a good combination? Nope, not to me either.

I have had conversations about population growth and individual's choices about how many babies they have with a couple of friends. The usual response (verging on hysterical in tone) is something along the lines of:

"how dare you tell me what I can and can't do! It's my life, yada, yada, yada, you want human beings to go extinct!"

Like that's about to happen ... At least the whales (and every other creature on the planet) would have some peace.

Seriously though. Any person who starts a family now without having a REALLY hard think about the what may be in store for their children is just being plain selfish.

Reproducing is fundamentally selfish anyway, but as long as you aren't condemning your own offspring to a life of misery and the rest of planet to a painful death by consumption of every available resource, then there is no harm in that selfishness. Go ahead and have fun.

But it seems that not a day goes by that I don't come across some story in the media reporting that issue X is worse than the people who have been studying it and warning us about it thought.

Greenland's glaciers are melting faster, huge chunks of the Antarctic ice sheet are becoming unstable and heading for the sea, Russian sturgeon stocks have crashed from over fishing (that's where caviar comes from). The list is long and depressing.

And now, the threat of desertification looks set to cut our planet's carrying capacity by more than a third if we just continue on with business as usual, which is what almost everyone wants. Including all of those people who are happy to blindly push out baby after baby, without a single thought for anything other than their own biologically driven desire to have them. Least of all what sort of world their children will inherit one day in the future.

I had "the snip" almost eight years ago. I will not be contributing my genes to anyone. I am sure that the world will get along just fine without them, because there is no shortage of people ready to step up and take my place. More's the pity.

Rendering again

2010-02-16T22:07:00.000+11:00

Finally we are picking up speed again with the interior rendering of the cottage. Made a lot of progress today.

I still had half a batch of clay render in the mixer from the weekend, so I continued on with putting a cover coat over the badly cracked mid-coat on the south wall. It went up pretty quickly. Sam had the camera out, so we have some photos of today's work:

This shows the what the mid-coat looks like once it has dried. The mid-coat is up to 25mm thick in places, so it cracks quite a lot when it dries. Even the reinforcing mesh can't prevent that, but it does reduce the problem significantly.

That's me applying the render skim coat. Top left in the mid-coat waiting to be covered. Right is skim coat that I applied on the weekend. Bottom left is new skim coat applied today. It's hard work, especially since the sand that we have been using is contaminated with a bunch of small stones. It doesn't matter when you are doing a thick layer, but for skim coats that are just a couple of millimetres thick, it's makes it hard to get a neat thin finish.

The really hard bit is corners (top of wall and between walls). We put a render stop (like a skirting board that tells you how deep to make the render) at the bottom. If I was doing it again, I would put one at the top as well to make it easier to get the top edge nice and neat and flat. No help for the corners of walls though. Just have to work away until it's flat and neat.

Here's the really fun bit: (above) building up the render at the corner of the main doors. This is a mid coat of clay render with the fibreglass reinforcing mesh just being worked in.

And this is the finished product! right is the existing mid-coated wall (waiting for it's skim coat) centre is the newly rendered section. Top left is the base coat and cob section over the door. Hopefully tomorrow I will get the mid-coat all the way across the top of the door.

While I was busy rendering Sam mixed a couple of loads of render, then got to work with cob (render and straw mixed together) filling up the gap between the door buck (that the rough frame that takes the load of the walls and roof) and the door frame (that holds the door in place). Cob is fantastic stuff. You can fill just about anything with it and once it is dry it is very strong.

So, time for bed now. It's been a long day.

Oz government defends Japanese whalers

2010-02-16T16:24:00.000+11:00

It is sad, but not surprising to see the Australian Government's response to Peter Bethune of Sea Shepherd boarding a Japanese whaling security ship to effect a citizens arrest on the captain for sinking his ship the Ady Gil.

From the Sydney Morning Herald:

http://www.smh.com.au/environment/whale-watch/oneman-boarding-party-faces-voyage-of-discovery-20100216-o5v2.html?autostart=1

"The Australian government calls on all parties to show restraint," a Department of Foreign Affairs spokesperson said in a statement.
"While we are opposed to whaling, we are also strenuously opposed to violence at sea.
"We do not support any violent or unlawful protest activity against the Japanese whaling fleet.

Ok, so what about violent and unlawful sinking of Peter Bethune's vessel the Ady Gil by the Japanese? Or is it only protesters who have to show restraint (whalers can do whatever they want)? What our government is really opposed to is taking a stand on this issue and hurting relations with Japan (just like New Zealand).

The Herald seems squarely on the side of lazy reporting with this article:

It [Japan] hunts hundreds of whales, mostly minkes, which are not an endangered species.

Ok, so what are the other whales that have decided to allow themselves to hunt? In the 2010 whaling season the Japanese are also hunting humpbacks and fin whales. Both are listed as "endangered" by the endangered species act. So, Sydney Morning Herald, why not tell the full story? Or would you rather that people like Peter Bethune were condemned out of hand by your readers?

Presenting the full picture takes time, effort and money. Something which journalist often lack, but these quote above is clearly designed to misdirect readers.

Therefore, I am glad that Sea Shepherd are doing what they are doing in keeping the media spotlight on the Japanese whalers. Extremism (like Japan's continued whaling) can only be fought by an extreme opposite (like Sea Shepherd). Good for them. Thank you. Keep it up.

Governments like mine in Australia should be ashamed of themselves for preaching peaceful resistance on one hand (don't upset the whalers), but supporting wars in Iraq and Afghanistan on the other. Hypocrisy I think that's called.

Most people just don't "get" science

2010-02-15T19:48:00.001+11:00

My friend Sam told me once that when she was young she never felt comfortable with not knowing where the water that came out of the tap actually came from. So the fact that she ended up studying science is not really surprising.

What is surprising is how few people have any idea (let alone actually care) about all of the science that they depend upon from day to day for their lives and conveniences.

I laugh regularly at the religious fanatics who insist that the Earth was made in seven days and is only several thousand years old, while yapping on their mobile phones, or spamming the net with their rubbish. These people, and just about everyone else in the world seem blissfully happy to take the bounty that science has given them like mobile phones, sanitation, medicine, water etc, etc while at the same time decrying evolutionary theory, which is a product of the exact same scientific process. It's hypocrisy at best.

Nowhere though does this sad trend of denying the merits of science become more strident and irrational than when man made climate change is mentioned.

It's like American politics, suddenly everyone is an expert and actual science (and reason) goes out the window. Just take a look at any article about climate change on the New Scientist website if you don't believe me.

What I have come to realise over the last few years is this:

The science of climate change (and just about anything else) is so complex that unless you have spent your career studying your field you have no possible basis to make meaningful comment on. The only people who can add anything useful to the debate are the people who actually understand (and hopefully work with) the fundamental science that underpins the predictions and recommendations.

On occasion I have seen people involved in climate research make a comment in New Scientist. The complexity of the discussion of statistical analysis techniques (for instance) leaves the stratosphere within a couple of sentences, never to be seen again. This is science and mathematics that the average man in the street can't comprehend, let alone have any meaningful grasp of. These discussions and comments are usually followed by some moron saying "hey it's snowing here today, I guess global warming is dead and buried!".

Which brings me to my point:

What we need to do as a society is:

Hold science and scientists to the highest standards. Make sure that they know that fudging stuff to get funding, or to bolster a case is not acceptable
Hold politicians and each other to the science. BECAUSE NONE OF US ARE QUALIFIED TO DO ANYTHING ELSE
Look at the worst case scenarios that the science tells us are possible and act accordingly to protect our planet and its ability to sustain us. Anything less is shear negligence.

Of course this will never happen, but in light of that fact, it does clearly illuminate the path that we need to take as individuals: we need to be able to look after ourselves without support from our society, because that society is not rational enough to ensure it's own survival.

Here's the best bit: when you make that realisation and start acting to secure your future, you will find that life outside the grind of our growth economy can be really fun, rewarding, and most of all can make you happy in a way that no amount of money ever will.

A 12-year-old boy has died after being stabbed by another teenager at a private Catholic boys' high school ...

2010-02-15T13:57:00.001+11:00

Next time a Catholic person tells you just how morally superior their religion is (because they are all such peace loving people) feel free to point them to this article:

A 12-year-old boy has died after being stabbed by another teenager at a private Catholic boys' high school in Brisbane's north.

http://www.smh.com.au/queensland/boy-dies-after-school-stabbing-20100215-o06b.html

I have frequently heard the argument that atheists (like me) have no moral compass because we don't believe in God. Theists will say things like: "they [some atheist] realised that there were no consequences for their actions, so they decided that they could do anything they wanted to"

Here's another view on that:

Catholics realise that they can be forgiven for anything (including murder) so they can commit any moral outrage that they feel like because (as long as they confess and are repentant) they believe that "god" will forgive them.

Sounds like an open door to me. As mentioned in previous posts, I make my moral decisions based on Science, Logic, and Compassion, rather than a conflicted, arbitrary set of rules.

My sympathy goes out to the family of the murdered boy.

It's just one more example that religion and religious institutions don't make good people, in fact it can be quite the opposite.

When you support religion you support the bad things that it does as well as the good things. Often the former outweigh the latter significantly.

Captain Pete Bethune Boards Shonan Maru 2 to Arrest Japanese Skipper

2010-02-15T13:33:00.001+11:00

Just when I thought that Sea Shepherd couldn't surprise me, they have done it again:

Captain Pete Bethune Boards Shonan Maru 2 to Arrest Japanese Skipper

http://www.seashepherd.org/news-and-media/news-100214-2.html

Frankly I am amazed. It's embarrassing for the Japanese in oh so many ways, firstly that someone can just hop onto a "security" ship unobserved and then hang around waiting to be found, secondly that they are there to make a citizens arrest of that ships captain.

The whalers must be extraordinarily frustrated by all of this. Used to having their government sheltering them from any interference it must be a very rude shock to have Sea Shepherd come along and spoil their party.
I wait with interest to see how this move plays out. No doubt the captain of the Shonan Maru 2 won't be turning himself and his vessel in to the New Zealand police. But once again it brings the media spotlight on Japan and their commercial whaling operations.
Sea Shepherd's actions in the Southern Ocean will never drive the whalers away directly. However if (as Sea Shepherd are doing) they continue to prevent the whalers from making money, then one day the political and financial backing for the whalers will dry up and the ships will no-longer sail.

So thanks once more to Sea Shepherd and Peter Bethune for your ongoing efforts. Give 'em hell and save the whales.

Police and double standards in Australia

2010-02-15T11:27:00.000+11:00

It is a semi-regular occurrence in Australia that one of our state police forces shoot dead a mentally disturbed person. There have been plenty of cases documented in recent years. The police always justify this by saying that either the public, or their officers were at risk, so shooting was justified.

So it strikes me as a double standard that when police officers are attacked and (legitimately) in fear of their lives like this incident:

http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/police-car-burnt-in-party-mayhem-20100214-nzl0.html

When they arrived, 20 people armed with bricks confronted them and started smashing the panels and windows of their car.
The mob turned on police who tried to stop them.
Two police left the area on foot, and their car was set on fire and destroyed.

The police do not draw their side arms and shoot people dead, they just run away (very sensible).

Four police officers surrounding a man on a deserted Bondi Beach and then shooting him dead is an indictment on our society.

The fault here lies with under-trained officers being sent to do a job that they are not suited for.

Lets show the people in our community with mental illness a little more consideration by protecting them from themselves when they need it, rather than shooting them dead.

The contrast with how police handle an aggressive group of party-goers is illuminating.

Rendering moves forward

2010-02-14T20:08:00.000+11:00

The persistent rain today prevented us from putting up the rest of the fascia and gutter, so we moved inside and got on with rendering the walls. It is starting to look really good.

I am putting a skim coat of clay render on the living/kitchen area walls to cover over the cracking in the mid-coat. These layers have one part clay to three parts brickies sand, so the high clay content can cause the render to crack when it is thick (just think of the bottom of a dam when it dries out and you get the idea).

I also discovered that the brickies sand has a lot of little stones in it (up to about 5mm in diameter). This was exceedingly annoying as they made it hard to make the coat thin. So, lesson learned, I will go with the beach sand next time.

Hopefully tomorrow we can get the remaining straw bales off the floor and up on the top of the south wall to complete the ceiling insulation on that side. Having the fascia on there means that it can't get wet any more, so it brings us another step closer to a completed building.

It's amazing how the "little jobs" that take you half a day start to mount up when you are getting close to finishing the building. Still, the results are looking great.

Making progress on the cottage

2010-02-14T14:23:00.001+11:00

Before the rain set in yesterday we made a start on putting up the fascia and guttering on the front of the cottage. Sam had painted up the fascia boards in preparation and I had picked up some new screws and nails.

I nailed up the first boards while Sam took photos of some critters in the grass ...

It turns out that this colourful beetle actually has tiny hairs all over its wing casings!

You may have noticed that the beetle is standing on an ear of wheat. We have a lot of wheat growing up around the building site that has come from the straw bales that we used in construction.

Since the rafters of the cottage are 10 inches deep I couldn't get a piece of fascia board big enough to hide the whole rafter end from our local hardware store. So we have settled for using two boards instead. It should look ok, but time will tell. In the picture below you can see the north face of the building with the first fascia board in place and the guttering brackets in place.

Nails have been punched in and filled over, so we just need the rain to stop for a day or two so that we can sand off the filler and paint it up. The photo below shows me having just finished screwing on the last gutter bracket.

Peak Oil preparation "Scouting" badge skills

2010-02-14T13:02:00.000+11:00

A blogger that I follow (here) recently made a post about Scouting badges and skills, which got me thinking. I have listed a few badges below that I think would be great to have ticked off when our economy and society goes pear shaped.

Mental Preparation badge: if your going to sit down and cry when your iPhone stops working, then this badge is for you. Mental toughness is going to be your best friend in the future. If you can face up to the changes that are on the way without feeling lost and helpless, then you are well on the way
Composting badge: you can't do without this one. If you can't build a compost pile and keep it ticking over making rich new soil for your (all important garden) then you won't get far. Your future happiness depends on getting a good crop of potatoes and compost will be a big part of that
Composting Toilet badge: now this one is just vital. If you have ever spent any time in "developing nations" you will know that human beings (unlike every other animal) have no idea how to deal with their personal waste. If the sewers stop working you really have to know how to build and run a composting toilet . This gentleman would be ideal for testing anyone seeking this badge: http://www.omick.net/composting_toilets/composting_toilets.htm
Kitchen Chemistry badge: do you know how to make raising agent from two cheap and easy to buy chemicals that will last almost for ever? Do you know the difference between aerobic and anaerobic bacteria and what they can do for you in the kitchen? The best part of getting this badge is that you get to eat some REALLY great things as you learn ...
Leadership badge: this one is important and so sorely lacking in our society these days. Hmm. If we made this one mandatory right now, we might even be able to avert the impending economic/environmental/population crises. Mind you, it would have to be combined with the Common Sense badge and the Overcoming Your Biology and Self Interest badge as well to have much effect

There are lots more badges that I can think of, I might post some more in the future. If you have any to add, or want to share some of your skills that you think could be useful in a post oil society, feel free to post a comment.

Thank you Sea Shepherd

2010-02-13T18:49:00.002+11:00

I am in awe of Sea Shepherd. They have an image of being total hardcore activists, which is pretty well deserved. Just take a look at some of the stuff that they have done on Youtube.

But here's the important bit:

Captain Paul Watson of Sea Shepherd claims that they have never been convicted of any illegal act (I can't find any evidence online to refute that, and I am sure that his enemies would be shouting about it if he had been)
Sea Shepherd only pursue vessels that are doing something illegal under international law or treaty (like illegal Japanese drift netting of tuna, or hunting of endangered or protected whales in a declared whale sanctuary)

A lot of people seem to get very upset about Sea Shepherd and their direct action against people doing illegal stuff. I say: GOOD ON THEM. Someone needs to uphold the law. If the Australian government won't, then I will say thank you to Paul Watson and his crews for doing so instead.

Currently Sea Shepherd are busy harassing the Japanese waling fleet in the Southern Ocean. They seem to be doing very well despite the sinking of one of their three ships by the Japanese whalers who (in their desperation) are becoming more and more aggressive.

The latest bit of foolishness from the Japanese is just too choice:

They tried to shoot Sea Shepherd crew with pepper spray guns. You can see the video here

http://www.seashepherd.org/matilda/video.html

However the guys with the guns must not have been true sailors (possibly some sort of stupid security guards?) because they forgot the first law of the sea: don't piss into the wind.

If you have spent more than a day on a ship or boat at sea, then you will have learned (possibly the hard way) that when you take a leak over the side, or empty a bucket you do it on the downwind side. You only make this mistake once.

The two clowns in the video apparently hadn't learned that lesson and fired their pepper spray into the wind (toward the Sea Shepherd vessel that is taking the video). The predictable result is that the "sailors" got a face full of the stuff. Seems like poetic justice.

The Japanese however really showed their true colours and stupidity by publicly announcing that Sea Shepherd were responsible for the injury to their crew, when the entire pepper spray incident was captured on video.

I can only imagine that the Japanese have gotten soft and lazy as a result of getting their way in the International Whaling Commission for so long. Perhaps if Peter Garrett rammed the Japanese whaling delegations desk occasionally during negotiations and blocked them from accessing the coffee pot during breaks he might make some progress!

What I would like to see is the Japanese come clean on whaling. If they are going to kill whales for meat, then at least have the balls to say so. Don't hide behind this "scientific whaling" bullshit. Say straight up that you don't give a toss what everyone else says, you are going to hunt and eat whales.

After all, we hunt and eat kangaroos and just about anything else that doesn't run fast enough, so they would at least be justified in calling us hypocrites. As it is, they just look stupid and insincere.

So, well done Paul Watson and crew. Keep up the good work. I don't have the balls to do what you are doing.

A solution for anyone driven to breaking point by bullying

2010-02-13T12:59:00.000+11:00

Preface: if you have a serious bullying problem, I want to help. I may not be able to solve it for you, but I can listen, and I will do what I can. See the bottom of this post for my invitation to leave bullying behind forever.

A young woman (Brodie) in Victoria (Australia) killed her self recently because she was bullied so badly by the people she worked with. My friend Sam experienced work place bullying in every job she ever worked in (probably because she was educated, honest, and tall) before we started working together.

Here is an article about Brodie and work place bullying currently available in the Herald:

http://blogs.smh.com.au/small-business/workinprogress/2010/02/12/workplacebully.html

The problem as I see it is human nature. No amount of crack-downs, or blitzes on bullying will ever fix this problem. Bullying is part of the culture of our work places and our society. From schools, to religion (see my previous post) to employment, you can't escape it.

What you can do is leave the society that creates and supports it.

Sam and I have made an invitation to a better life to anyone who shares our values and wants to join us. We are laying the foundations for a society that rejects things like bullying, the unending rape of the environment, and the headlong charge toward oblivion that is the only way our current economy can persist.

So if, like Brodie, you are a victim of bullying and can see no hope, here is a solution for you:

Talk to us.

Join us.

Create a new life free of bullying.

Remember this: if you have reached the point where you feel that suicide (or just accepting your fate) is the only option, then you have nothing to loose by walking away from this poisonous society that we are trapped in.

There are options. Ask me. I have escaped from it and I am a happier, healthier person now.

All comments on this blog are moderated, so if you want to make contact with me privately, feel free to post me a comment with an email address and I will respond directly and not publish the comment. I will guarantee your privacy, because I know just how bad bullying can be.

The little rover that could ...

2010-02-13T12:40:00.000+11:00

I posted the original cartoon a couple of days ago I thought that this follow-up was pretty neat.

See: http://blog.xkcd.com/ for more from this great blogger.

How to piss away the future by arguing over the make-belive

2010-02-13T10:28:00.001+11:00

I love it when religious people defend the Old Testament. It's a very slippery slope given the psychotic nature of that particular document.

For instance: does anyone in their right mind actually think that Lot's daughters got him drunk and raped him (because there were no other men in the world)? Or is it more likely that Lot got really pissed after Sodom and Gomorrah was destroyed (by God) and raped his daughters because there were no other women available (his wife having been turned into a giant salt lick for the local livestock - again by God) - then made up a story about it to cover his own arse?

Or perhaps the whole thing is a bunch of rubbish that religions use to control their followers and keep them thinking about things other than how ridiculous the whole concept of the Sky Daddy is.

Either way it verges on funny to see people like this guy:

http://www.smh.com.au/national/pastors-ban-sparks-unholy-anglican-stoush-20100212-nxm4.html

suing his church because (he says) that they have defamed him because his make-believe story disagrees with their make-believe story.

What is not funny is the damage that religion does to people like the person in this story and our society as a whole. He has ended up in the Supreme Court of Australia because of an argument over something that cannot by its nature ever be proven, or disproved which has lead to him not being allowed to hand out pencils and stack chairs ...

PEOPLE, COME ON! There are bigger things at stake in the world than this. Real things that matter, like a population that is heading for infinity (on a finite planet), critical resources like oil that will become too expensive to buy in the near future, and an economy that is the greatest ponzi scheme in history.

Arguing over shit that you can't prove that makes no difference to the real world verges on a criminal act of negligence in the face of the problems that beset our society. Religion is not the "opiate of the masses", it is a nasty head cold that makes people ignore the things that really matter while giving enormous power, wealth and privilege to a select few.

Time to grow up people.

XKCD No. 625

2010-02-12T15:30:00.001+11:00

I am trying to limit myself to one post per day of XKCD comics.

From: http://xkcd.com/625/

I happen to love Terry Pratchett's writing and the philosopher here is spot on ...

Justice is only for the predatory

2010-02-12T12:32:00.001+11:00

I have recently come across two copyright cases that make a neat contrast, showing just how distorted justice is by money.

If you listened to music, or watched television in 1984 you are probably familiar with the Australian band Men At Work and their hit song Down Under which became the theme song for the Australian win in the Americas Cup.

Men At Work have recently been in the news because the famous riff used in the song has been the subject of a copyright battle that was won by the copyright owner.

In short, the woman who created the riff and owned the copyright when Men At Work published Down Under never complained, or tried to sue Men At Work for infringing her work. The copyright was subsequently acquired by another organisation in the mid nineties. More that fifteen years later the new owner has successfully sued Men At Work for copyright infringement.

Strictly speaking you could say it's fair under the law, but there is a pretty rotten feeling to all of this. If the original copyright holder didn't object then the new owner should have no grounds. I can see a whole new industry of parasitic companies buying up copyrights with the express aim of suing infringer for the proceeds.

The second case can be found here:

http://www.boingboing.net/2010/02/11/artist-chases-paperc.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+boingboing/iBag+(Boing+Boing)

In brief: a large paper company has used copyright material without permission from the creating artist and are refusing to cease and desist. The artist does not have the money available to fight a big legal battle, so has few options available to protect her work.

The moral of the story: if you can afford to hire expensive lawyers then you can live off the proceeds of other people's labour. If you can't then the chances are that other people will be living off the proceeds of your labour.

Needless to say, I won't be crying for the demise of this economy. I am looking forward to seeing the parasites getting to grips with digging potatoes and carrying water (if they are lucky).

Just because your Catholic doesn't make you a good person

2010-02-12T12:04:00.000+11:00

There seems to be a misapprehension among Catholics and Christians in general that their religious beliefs automatically make them "good" people. Here's a nice example of why relying on religious dogma to guide your morality is about the worst way you could work out right from wrong

http://www.smh.com.au/technology/technology-news/sex-workers-slam-hookers-facebook-page-set-up-by-catholic-school-pupils-20100212-nvhj.html

From the article:

"The page, called "Killing your hooker so you don't have to pay her", has now been removed by Facebook.
But not before almost 18,000 people joined the page, believed to have been set up by Catholic school pupils in Queensland."

Given the Catholic church's intolerance and fear sex, it is no real surprise that a bunch of Catholic school boys (I assume they were boys) would follow their leaders' example and vilify people who work as prostitutes.

After all, (according to the church) sex outside marriage is bad, so prostitutes are bad, so vilifying them must be good, even righteous? Right?

I can only imagine that was something like the thought processes (for want of a better word) going on in these boys heads when they set the group up.

Lets contrast that with the Science/Logic/Compassion approach:

Science:

sex is a natural act, shared by all mammals. It can't be termed "bad" in any quantifiable way, other than arbitrarily (for instance on social or religious grounds). Bonobo monkeys even use sex as a means of group bonding and to reduce stress and fighting within their groups.

There is nothing inherent in the act of prostitution that makes it bad or wrong, assuming that prostitutes are afforded physical and social protection in their work. Again, only social custom can define prostitution as "bad"

Logic:

Prostitution is jokingly referred to as "the worlds oldest profession". It may well be that. Logically, men (even some Catholic men) are always going to offer women (and men) payment for sex. So vilifying prostitutes for meeting the demands of their customers is about as bad a form of hypocrisy as you can get and completely illogical

Compassion:

There is no conceivable way that encouraging people to kill prostitutes that they employ for sex can be seen as a compassionate act.

Summary:

So, is setting up a Facebook group called: "Killing your hooker so you don't have to pay her" a moral act ?

Science: no

Logic: no

Compassion: no

The fact that prostitution is legal in Australia and many places throughout the world, and that the group has been removed from Facebook supports the above conclusion. So, we have:

Science/Logic/Compassion: 1

Catholic education: 0

Therefore in the interest of raising well balanced law abiding children it's time for the Catholic church to have a rethink of it's dogma, ooops, that's right, it's dogma, you can't change it ...

You have to love geek humour ...

2010-02-11T22:37:00.000+11:00

It's just too poignant http://xkcd.com/695/

Steven Conroy is drunk on power and has no clue

2010-02-11T13:24:00.002+11:00

From: http://www.smh.com.au/technology/technology-news/google-baulks-at-conroys-call-to-censor-youtube-20100211-ntm0.html?autostart=1

Senator Steven Conroy (a member of the Labor government in Australia) wants to censor the Internet.

He won't listen to anyone who tells him that it can't be done. He won't listen to anyone who tells him that it shouldn't be done. In fact, it seems that he won't listen to anyone at all.

I wrote to the senator when this issue first came up last year and gave my opinion (as an industry professional) that the plan would not achieve the stated aims (it's too easy to circumvent). The response was a few pages of boiler plate rubbish from his department that didn't address anything I had said and (get this!) it was delivered by snail mail.

It seems that the senator can't even figure out how to use email and we have put him in charge of Australia's access to the Internet.

Here are my predictions: the filtering system will ...

be abused by this or some future government
block legal sites that should be available (too easy, this has already happened)
be easily bypassed (I sure as hell intent to bypass it)
cost tax payers a sh*t-ton of money

So, what are we (the tax payers) going to get for our money Steven? Hmm? Basically nothing.

You get your fat pay cheque, and your government funded pension. I get my freedom further reduced, continuing poor broadband performance and my industry gets further restricted.

Your policy is a joke.

Gastric banding insanity - Or: why scientists shouldn't take money from big businesses

2010-02-11T12:19:00.001+11:00

From: http://www.smh.com.au/lifestyle/wellbeing/study-backs-gastric-bands-for-obese-teens-20100210-nsct.html

THE benefits of losing weight during the teenage years are so great that severely obese adolescents should be offered stomach-restricting surgery, according to the results of Australian research.

It is indicative of just how totally f*cked our society is that this sort of tripe can even pass as science (let alone common sense).

Children do not need surgery to control their weight. What they need is parents who feed them modest amounts nutritious food and make them exercise.

It's not hard; no, really, its not, (most children love to play games, so you won't even have to prod them with a stick). My parents managed it for all four of us. But it does take real consistent effort.

A friend recently made the comment that her son (who loves kicking balls around) won't ever have a chance to be a sports star because they can't be bothered putting in the effort required to take their son to sports training and games.

Ok, right there, that person has declared that they are unfit to be a parent. It is little surprise to find that this person happens to have an ongoing weight problem and has had gastric banding themselves because they are unable to control their own weight. What chance does this child have? Deprived of exercise and living in a household where the "responsible adults" can't even discipline themselves.

My parents on the other hand (and the parents of most of my friends when I was growing up) fed us nutritious food every day, and sacrificed their weekends every week to take us to sports and training.

In short, they put their children's needs and happiness before their own. The result is four children who were fit and healthy who grew into adults who will never, ever need gastric banding.

Then the article gets even more ridiculous:

The study leader, Paul O'Brien, director of the Centre for Obesity Research and Education at Monash University, said he understood some people would find the idea of operating on teenagers abhorrent, but it was important to consider the effects of not treating them. ''Their life is going to be pretty much determined by whether they can or cannot lose weight,'' said Professor O'Brien, whose results were published yesterday in the Journal of the American Medical Association. ''They are crippled by their obesity.''

No shit! This doesn't mean that you go and cut them open and shrink their stomachs. It means you have to give their uncaring, self-indulgent parents a smack in the ear and tell them to lift their game.

Any child can loose weight. You just stop them eating junk food and make them go play outside. It's that easy. Unless of course you have spoilt them so rotten that they will scream the house down because they can't have what they want. Then it's all too easy to give in ... then the idea of surgery really starts looking appealing, because it's so much easier than doing what you as a parent know you should be doing ...

Lastly we have the conflict of interest:

His centre receives about one-third of its funding from US-based manufacturer Allergan, which provided the devices for the study. The rest of the funding came from the National Health & Medical Research Council.

Medicare statistics show more than 13,000 weight-loss operations were performed last year, three-quarters of them on women. But fewer than 800 were on people aged 24 or younger.

So, Allergan can see an opportunity to grow their market by having a "reputable" scientist study the benefits of their product for childhood obesity. Nice. Children are an opportunity for this company to increase it's profits.

It's sick. It's wrong. It's unnecessary in every sense.

At every turn our society chooses the easy option and refuses (like a bunch of spoiled obese children) to take responsibility for itself. Little wonder that we are charging toward about half a dozen different crises at once.

Gumblar,

2010-02-10T22:07:00.000+11:00

Chances are that you are reading this post on a computer that runs one of Microsoft's Windows operating systems. If that's the case, then when it comes to security you just can't win. Basically Microsoft has (through its successful monopolization of the market) painted a great big "KICK ME" sign on your backside.

No operating system is completely secure, not even Linux (which I am using to write this post). However Linux and Mac OSX have a great big advantage over Windows when it comes to security: they are not popular enough for hackers to target.

Windows however is a great target. Older versions are easy to attack, there are lots of windows computers out there and most users of windows have no idea about security, or even caution.

Do you have anti-virus software installed? When was the last time it was updated? Chances are that you don't have it, or that it is out of date. Even if it's not, the hackers are always releasing new code that can defeat the AV software.

The war will never end and your Internet banking details are at serious risk if you just ignore the problem.

I work in IT developing websites. Today a company that I am working with on a project cancelled a meeting because over night one of their clients was hit by the Gumblar virus. I won't explain it in detail, but it's a pretty clever piece of software.

When I heard about the hack I went and gave myself a refresher on it. Gumblar first showed up in May 2009, so it has been around for quite a while. Most anti-virus software should pick it up. What became clear straight away was that you only get hit by Gumblar under the following conditions:

You use windows for your desktop computer
You don't have up-to-date anti-virus software
You are a web developer / website administrator
You store the passwords for your clients' website in your FTP program (really sloppy)
Or you use unsecured FTP (risky)

So basically this company (who proudly told me that they weren't responsible for the security of the web server that had been hacked) must have screwed the pooch badly in at least a couple of ways.

I can forgive this sort of thing when it's not your job. But it is amazing how few professionals take the threat seriously. I have never had a server, or a workstation hacked successfully. It's not luck, but natural caution and doing things that minimise the risks.

So, here's the lesson: if you use the Internet and you use Window, then you need to understand how to keep your computer (and hence your money and your identity) safe and secure. It's not hard, but it requires that you take time to learn, and spend money to keep very strong anti-virus software running and up to date on your computer.

A good starting point is to stop using Internet Explorer and swap it for Firefox with the NoScript addon. This will protect you from a lot of the nasty stuff, (including Gumblar), but it can be inconvenient at times.

But then that is the whole point really. If you aren't prepared to expend some effort protecting yourself, then you will pay the price one day. The Internet is not a safe and friendly place any more.

The burden of being the conscience of you society

2010-02-10T13:48:00.000+11:00

If you have read my earlier posts you may remember that I started this blog after leaving Facebook because of the complete lack of meaningful discussion to be had amongst my "Facebook frineds". I posted lots of stuff that I found interesting, awful, or important. The usual result was either total silence, or stupid self justification from the Catholics that seem to infect my life.

If you're a blogger you will be familiar with the hard work required to make useful interesting posts and the often zero response that you get for them. But that's ok, because this is a blog and you do it to have a voice, even it it is lost in the wilderness.

So I left Failbook and trekked into the wilderness of the blogosphere.

So far two people have noticed (and commented) that I have left Facebook (my mother and my younger sister). Not a peep from anyone else, which I thought at the time was indicative. My sister's response (via my partner Sam who still has a Facebook account) today was interesting. She said:

"That's a shame. What he says may not necessarily be what we want to hear but someone needs to say it!!! Good on him for having the courage to express opinions that are 'unpopular' with the masses. I'm disappointed that he has gone :("

My sister was one of the silent majority when I frequented Facebook, but I put that down to the fact that she is a single mother with two kids and a corporate job. I can understand that she doesn't have time to be weighing in on my debates.

It made me feel good that someone at least appreciated what I was saying. But at the same time it highlights a real problem with our society: if the people who add value to your life don't know that they do, then don't be surprised if they get tired of shouting into the void (or cooking your dinner, standing up for the freedoms that you take for granted, protecting your ecosphere etc).

I try to let the bloggers that I read know that I really care about their efforts by posting comments for them, not because I am looking for reciprocation but just because I want them to keep doing what they are doing (adding value to my life).

It is a sad reality that in this day and age money seems to be by far and away the most common way of showing other people that you value them. Last year I miscalculated my budget on a project and couldn't pay a contractor in full. I had to make payments as I earned the money. As a result, he is not very happy with me and not keen to work for me any more. My mistake and loss.

It highlights how dependent everyone's happiness is on money. This contractor and I have worked together half a dozen times and gotten along really well. He is a smart person, reliable, very good at his job, and very observant. I have enjoyed his company, but all of that has been lost because of a mistake with money.

Money is the only currency that really matters in our society and you are only as good as your last payment. Which bodes ill for the important people in our lives who do stuff that we value just for the love of doing it.

Avatar - Not subtle, just very Insightful

2010-02-07T21:01:00.007+11:00

I went to see Avatar on Friday night as part of a trip to Sydney. This post isn't meant to be a review, so I will just say that I enjoyed the movie. It's an amazing piece of work.

== If you haven't seen it, then be warned that there may be a spoiler or two in what I write. I don't want to ruin it for you! ==

What I really want to talk about is just how perceptive a piece of art it is.

I have been avoiding the advertising, hype, and reviews as I always try to with movies that I want to see. I would rather walk in with no expectations, and not having seen all of the interesting parts.

However it has been hard to avoid Avatar gossip. There were three things that I had heard:

It was some kind of parallel to America invading Iraq
People (men and women) want to have sex with the female lead character
People come out of the movie depressed because they want to go and live on the planet Pandora (where the story is set)

These responses are so superficial I am left wondering if these people even saw the same movie as I did. I have since read that James Cameron deliberately made the Navi women attractive to humans, so perhaps number 2. is not so surprising.

But the idea that the average popcorn eating, mobile phone toting couch potato would last five minutes in a place like Pandora (let alone understand, enjoy, or respect it) is laughable. I have spent some time in the Amazon a few years ago. Anyone who thinks Pandora would be a fun place to live should take a trip there and live with a native tribe in the jungle for a week or two before they get depressed about not being able to go to Pandora.

The Amazon is an incredible place, but I wouldn't try to live there if I was paid. It takes a special person to live that kind of life.

When I left the cinema I felt pretty emotional. The story is a mirror alright, but it's not so small and narrow minded as to be about America and its barbarities in the Middle East.

Avatar, to me, is a montage of all of the worst aspects of industrial human culture, contrasted against the best aspects of simple tribal culture. It made me think of the American Indians and their country before white settlement, of Australian Aboriginals and their country before white settlement, and any other tribal people whose culture we former white Europeans have destroyed.

In Avatar everything is simple and obvious, the plants and animals can literally connect with each other and share thoughts and emotions. Their interdependence and relationships are right there to see for anyone who cares to ask, or look. Which of course the greedy Earth men don't.

The magic (and pain) for me in Avatar is that we have everything here and now on our planet that James Cameron put into his movie. Only it's even more amazing and complex.

American Indians didn't (and don't) need direct nerve connections to their horses to be able to hunt buffalo with bow and arrow while riding bare back at a full gallop. Human beings can develop exquisite connections with each other and with our natural world if we are prepared to subjugate our own egos and listen and learn.

There are more wonders in our natural world than anyone could ever hope to understand, like a grove of trees communicating with one-another when they come under attack by pests, or the virtual miracle of yeast and the things that it can make for us.

What is Avatar? It is the faintest and most scratched mirror held up to our own world and how we treat it and each other. It doesn't make me want to have sex with aliens, or emigrate. It makes me want to cry for the plants and animals and people of Earth that are lost every day to the greed of our (Western) culture.

Internet Explorer just won't get better

2010-02-07T20:30:00.005+11:00

A few weeks ago when I was still posting stuff to Facebook I made a post about the vulnerability of Internet Explorer and recommended that anyone concerned about their online security should be using Firefox with the NoScript addon.

At the time I was strongly criticised by a Facebook friend for my recommendations (incidentally this person works for a company that is a big user of MS software and develops applications for Windows, so I guess that he felt he had to protect his turf).

The main thrust of his argument was that Adobe Flash applications are now the biggest security vulnerability for web browsing. I hadn't heard that, but it made little difference. My suggested combination of Firefox and NoScript blocks Flash apps too, so really he was just validating my recommendation.

I note today that there is yet another vulnerability been discovered in IE:

http://www.smh.com.au/technology/security/microsoft-probing-new-hole-in-ie-security-20100205-nha0.html

This whole issue just highlights the fact that security by obscurity (hiding your source code) is no security at all.

Open Source software however (like Firefox) is picked over, tested, and strenghtened on a continual basis. Security vulnerabilities do arise and when that happens they are fixed quickly.

I can't emphasise enough how big the risks are if you use Internet banking but you don't take real measures to protect you computer from being hacked. It's a serious matter and one that is getting bigger all the time. It's too tempting a target for criminals to ignore.

The Catholic church protect its own (and itself) - Right or wrong

2010-02-07T19:26:00.003+11:00

If you are in any doubt that the Catholic church is a corrupt organisation then here's another example for you:

http://www.smh.com.au/national/priest-who-faked-cancer-resurfaces-20100206-njwj.html

From the article:

"A CATHOLIC priest who lied about having cancer to raise money from his Sydney flock has been quietly moved to work in the church in Perth."

This is no more than I would have expected. This priest has been caught out lying twice now, but the Catholic church just hands him on to another city.

"But Father Flader was confident Father Abourjaily would not lie a third time. "We can never be sure and we are all human but I think in any serious matter he knows the serious consequences and he will not lie about anything serious again," Father Flader said."

This statement is just a load of crap. There are no "consequences", this priest just got moved to a new city and given a new job. That's not a punishment, it's an indulgence.

The Catholic church once again shows that it cares more about looking after its own than it does about dealing with the criminals in its midst.

Finally, here's a question to finish with: why wasn't he charged by the police with fraud? Any other person defrauding people of their money would end up in front of a judge but not so a Catholic priest.

Denial - it's becoming our new global sport

2010-02-04T20:37:00.003+11:00

I am watching our society become more disfunctional every day, or at least sink deeper into denial.

Once I felt outrage when ignorant people said things like "it's very cold in Europe this winter, so Climate Change is all rubish" (for the record the leader of the National Party here in Australia has just recently offered up this nonsense to the country). The ignorant people are becoming a large majority. They want to believe that their lives can go on un-interupted for ever, so they post comments to blogs and write letters to the editor that demonstrate both their inability to understand science and their desperate desire for nothing to change.

Then you read something like this:

http://thearchdruidreport.blogspot.com/2010/02/endgame.html

From John Michael Greer:

"Scattered among the statistical noise that makes up most of today’s news are data points that suggest to me that business as usual is quietly coming to an end around us, launching us into a new world for which very few of us have made any preparations at all.

Here’s one example. Friends of mine in a couple of midwestern states have mentioned that the steady trickle of refugees from the Chicago slums into their communities has taken a sharp turn up."

Greer has a number of observations to make in this post that highlight problems in the US economy that are reaching a point where they can't be hidden any more. The only direction for them to go it seems is down. Hyper-inflation looks like a real possibility some time in the future.

The question for us here in Australia is: what will be the knock on effects of the US economy really going down the toilet? Right now it still looks like business as usual in Australia, but our globalised economy means that the US will take us all down with them.

Personally I am not concerned for myself and my partner. We have a lifestyle that is low on debt and high on self suffiency. If the economy goes south then we will be just fine thank you. My family and friends are another matter. They will be in the same boat as everyone else, which is not an easy thing to accept.

The bottom line is that regardless of what people want, the world will give us what we deserve. Very few people are ready for that and denying that things could ever change is just plain arrogant.

The wild card here is the use of military force. I have made a number of comments on Facebook, then here when I opted out of Facebook about the very strange way that the US is provoking China. Almost like they are looking for a fight with China. There can be no sane reason for starting World War III, but then who knows what a deranged dying super power will do to try to hold onto that power?

I really hope that they choose to stay home and die quietly rather than going out and shooting up the neighbourhood looking for loot.

You can't beat a dog for making the most of any situation

2010-02-04T12:41:00.005+11:00

We can learn a lot from dogs. While we (humans) are busy working every hour we can spare to earn money to buy stuff to do things ... dogs are masters of enjoying what they have right now. Just take a look at Louis:

A dusty old armchair and a pair of tracksuit pants that smell like me and he is happy. That is the way to be.

Over the last year I have been working hard to adopt this policy. Do I want "stuff" (like an iPhone, or new computer, or xbox, or a new car)? Yes.

Would those things actually improve my quality of life and enhance the things that I value most (like good food, intellectual conversation, low stress)? No. In fact they would actively detract from the things that I enjoy most since I would have to work harder to get them.

So there's the lesson: what gives your life real meaning and value? I am betting that it's things like good friendships, food, sport, and shared time. Not work.

Why religious gay bashing is not alright under any circumstances

2010-02-04T11:17:00.005+11:00

Over a couple of weeks before I started this blog I had a number of debates with Catholic Facebook "friends". These people maintained that it was fine for the Catholic pope to openly denounce gay people and call them "a danger to creation". They said that they weren't responsible, or that it didn't hurt anyone. I left Facebook (deleted my profile) because of the complete lack of objectivity and compassion of these people.

Now consider this:

Uganda's principal religion is Roman Catholic (42%), Protestant (36%), Islam (12%) - based on a 2002 census
Uganda is proposing a new anti-homosexual law (original pdf document) that would allow gay people to be imprisoned for life, or sentenced to death because they are gay

This is the problem with Catholics (who may themselves not be prejudiced against gay people) allowing their leaders like the pope to call gay people "a threat to creation".

Because it give psychopathic governments in places like Uganda a legitimate religious foundation for abusing and murdering its citizens!

When people of any religion turn their back on the consequences of the dogma that they support, then they are just as responsible as the people who right the laws, pull the trigger, or turn the key of repression.

So here's a message for the faithful:

You are not "good Christians", or "good Muslims" you are part of an organisation that supports hatred and cruelty.

Unless you speak out. Only then can you personally regain a shred of the moral high ground that all religions seem to believe that they occupy.

Lack of "faith" healing - Or why I will choose antibiotics before "trusting the lord"

2010-02-03T15:05:00.003+11:00

You have to feel sorry for the children of people like these:

http://news.smh.com.au/breaking-news-world/faith-healers-jailed-over-sons-death-20100203-ncpx.html

Their blind faith in their church has lead to the death of their grandchild and their son because they failed to seek medical assistance for these children when it was required.

This is a demonstration of why "faith" is such a dangerous thing. Faith is like having no home insurance, while everything is fine you can believe whatever you like without consequence. However, when you house burns down, (or your child gets sick), faith just doesn't cut it. It won't build you a new house and it won't save a child's life.

Christians bang on about "saving the children" at every opportunity (just witness the Christian child kidnappers in Haiti), but when it comes down to it, their blind enthusiasm for religion is far more important to them than actually doing the right thing.

So remember people, when your trying to make a hard decision (like whether to take your sick child to the doctor): Science, Logic and Compassion are your best friends not the Sky Daddy, who apparently doesn't care about the sick children of the most devout Christians.

It's time to grow up and leave this superstition behind. Children deserve better than parents who will let them die for their own beliefs.

Sell your soul, or sell your body?

2010-02-03T12:27:00.003+11:00

I expect that there will be a hue and cry about the 19 year old New Zealand woman who has decided to sell her virginity to help pay for her university education.

See: http://www.smh.com.au/technology/technology-news/new-zealand-teenager-auctions-off-her-virginity-for-36000-20100203-nbkq.html

So here's a question for the moral police: why is selling your entire adult working life to pay for a life of consumption that oppresses people in the developing world and contributes to the destruction of our environment morally superior to selling your virginity?

My point here, is that we "normalise" and accept the things that suit us (like destroying the ecosystem that we all depend upon) while stigmatising something like having sex that ultimately has no significant impact at all.