Not Legolas
Today was fun: archery at Olympic Park. For AU$20, they give you a bow, three arrows, and a target to shoot at about twenty or thirty meters away. They give you a bit of a lesson, mostly safety tips (don't aim anywhere but at the target, please, mostly) and off you go. You spend a fair bit of time waiting for everyone to have fired so you can go retrieve, then waiting for everyone to get back on the line, but the pace picks up pretty quickly, mostly, and you actually spend a fair bit of your 90 minutes actually shooting, the final two-three sets including a balloon affixed to the target, so you get a bit of competitive spirit, if you're shooting with a partner or friends. I managed a couple of hits in the centre and only a couple over the top. My friend and I each hit the balloon once, so that was satisfying, even if it is a little silly.
The serious archers follow similar protocols, but their equipment is their own and their targets set much further back, naturally. Some of them bring scopes, so they can check how they've done or how they're progressing, while waiting for the retrieval phase. None of them looked elfen, either.
It was fun. My first three fingers still hum a little, and there's a slight ache in my left shoulder, but I think the spring sun was more an issue than any new athletic effort. I'd definitely do it again. The problem is not even so much when as how seriously do I want to make it regular. Other than the beginners class, there are only two casual shooters options, and the weekend one means buying gear. Frankly, as much as I had fun, I don't think I'm that serious. (On the other hand, carrying a bow and arrows on the train out to the park would be very crimefighter, wouldn't it?
02 September 2011
Robots & Magazines
One of those Groupon deals came through to my email account the other day, offering an iPad2 with a Phillips docking station for under a grand. A pretty good deal, even if the tablet discount wasn't where most of the value offered lay.
The iPad doesn't offer much to me: I've got a PC and a wired modem, and I already have a phone (that isn't an iPhone), but one thing I could have by buying an iPad is a reliable subscription to the New Yorker magazine, and for about half the price.
Every week it's a toss-up as to which issue will arrive in my mailbox: the current week's, last week's, maybe one a month old, or none at all. They arrive still in their sealed plastic, so I don't suppose the postman is reading them first, but how I can walk into a new agent's and see the current issue on time and not have received my subscription copy, well, I reckon it's either the distributor or the fact that the newsstand issue is $15 and my subscription would cost them money if they delivered it.
The potential for it to be a problem with the distributor is pretty high. Conde Nast was using Pitney Bowes, and the addressing slip included a "how's my distribution" website link, to which I regularly posted every week, highlighting for them their failures to be timely in delivery. At some point in the last year, a different distributor was chosen, still with a website to report problems to, but the delivery was nearly always on time. My updates to the website warmly congratulated them on their performance. So Conde Nast switched back to Pitney Bowes. And delivery is woeful once again. And there's no website.
If I bought an iPad, there'd be no issue with issues, but I can't really justify the spend for the equipment, although it would be only a matter of years and years before the subscription discount paid for the hardware. Assuming the software, i.e., internet connection for the weekly download, didn't eat that up.
And then there was Sony. They've got a new tablet, due to hit the market soon, and I like the sound of it. It's an Android-based tablet, for one thing, so it would be compatible with my phone, more or less. It's got a USB port, and its memory can be upgraded via SD card. It folds up. Folded halfway and turned horizontally, you get a mini-PC interface, screen on top and "keyboard" down. eBook pages can be presented verso-recto, just like a real book.
And Next Issue Media offer subscriptions to publications from five publishers, including Conde Nast's New Yorker. (The others are Time Inc., from whom you can get Fortune and Time; Meredith, who publish Fitness and Parents, and Hearst, for Esquire and Popular Mechanics; New Corp's in there, too, but not offering anything yet.)
My original dilemma became somewhat more acute when an online auction site started offering iPad's for bids starting at $40, but I like the sound of Sony's tablet, even though I don't give much of a stuff to games and movies and music on it. Since it's not even on offer until later this month, though, I can do some research. Like, how much can it be used to replace my aging laptop? With both 3G and WiFi connectivity, I could go WifFi only with my current internet provider and ignore the 3G calls in favour of my Optus account, maybe. Seems worth waiting for.
Now if the Atlantic Monthly would get on board. . . .
One of those Groupon deals came through to my email account the other day, offering an iPad2 with a Phillips docking station for under a grand. A pretty good deal, even if the tablet discount wasn't where most of the value offered lay.
The iPad doesn't offer much to me: I've got a PC and a wired modem, and I already have a phone (that isn't an iPhone), but one thing I could have by buying an iPad is a reliable subscription to the New Yorker magazine, and for about half the price.
Every week it's a toss-up as to which issue will arrive in my mailbox: the current week's, last week's, maybe one a month old, or none at all. They arrive still in their sealed plastic, so I don't suppose the postman is reading them first, but how I can walk into a new agent's and see the current issue on time and not have received my subscription copy, well, I reckon it's either the distributor or the fact that the newsstand issue is $15 and my subscription would cost them money if they delivered it.
The potential for it to be a problem with the distributor is pretty high. Conde Nast was using Pitney Bowes, and the addressing slip included a "how's my distribution" website link, to which I regularly posted every week, highlighting for them their failures to be timely in delivery. At some point in the last year, a different distributor was chosen, still with a website to report problems to, but the delivery was nearly always on time. My updates to the website warmly congratulated them on their performance. So Conde Nast switched back to Pitney Bowes. And delivery is woeful once again. And there's no website.
If I bought an iPad, there'd be no issue with issues, but I can't really justify the spend for the equipment, although it would be only a matter of years and years before the subscription discount paid for the hardware. Assuming the software, i.e., internet connection for the weekly download, didn't eat that up.
And then there was Sony. They've got a new tablet, due to hit the market soon, and I like the sound of it. It's an Android-based tablet, for one thing, so it would be compatible with my phone, more or less. It's got a USB port, and its memory can be upgraded via SD card. It folds up. Folded halfway and turned horizontally, you get a mini-PC interface, screen on top and "keyboard" down. eBook pages can be presented verso-recto, just like a real book.
And Next Issue Media offer subscriptions to publications from five publishers, including Conde Nast's New Yorker. (The others are Time Inc., from whom you can get Fortune and Time; Meredith, who publish Fitness and Parents, and Hearst, for Esquire and Popular Mechanics; New Corp's in there, too, but not offering anything yet.)
My original dilemma became somewhat more acute when an online auction site started offering iPad's for bids starting at $40, but I like the sound of Sony's tablet, even though I don't give much of a stuff to games and movies and music on it. Since it's not even on offer until later this month, though, I can do some research. Like, how much can it be used to replace my aging laptop? With both 3G and WiFi connectivity, I could go WifFi only with my current internet provider and ignore the 3G calls in favour of my Optus account, maybe. Seems worth waiting for.
Now if the Atlantic Monthly would get on board. . . .
27 August 2011
Dance Theatre
I used to go see Pina Bausch what seemed like every year at the Brooklyn Academy. I have to say I never really knew what story I was being told, but part of that is the number of stories at work in each set and each dancer and often more than one in each separately and together. Pina Bausch's choreography explored so much of human nature and expressed all the contradictions as well as all the coincidences and congruencies, for human beings individually and as social beings, micro and macro. A visionary not just of dance but of people.
So I had to see Pina, the new Wim Wenders film. And I'm so glad I did. Even though, with the music and settings, it differed radically from the shows I went to, the feelings were there, the humour and drama and sensitiveness to character, all very German, I suppose, too, but not something you couldn't relate to in any other cultural context. I think that's part of the triumph of Wenders' film: so much of it is shot outdoors, in urban and other man-manufactured settings, as well as indoors and in more theatrical sets. The 3D, well, I'm still not entirely convinced of this as necessary, but it worked, at least after the first few minutes, when, as usual, it had that layered 2D feel, peering past a translucent sheet into another and another, not giving anything rounded. I think the dance helped add that sense of a true third dimension. These people in motion, with passion.
I was a little . . . not put off, but not accepting entirely of the little soulful-look voice-over interviews of the company dancers reflecting on their time with Pina, but in the end you have to walk away with a true sense of what she did for them, as a leading artist, for their own lives as artists, and how well they loved her.
Pina Bausch, as I recall, always appeared in her productions, not as a principal necessarily, but more as a matter of principle, which, somewhat obliquely, I got the sense was not entirely her own idea. But her presence in these pieces, based on what I've seen and the footage in the film, always supplied a kind of grounding element, felt by the other dancers.
My recollection of seeing Tanztheater productions doesn't include music, at least not much, but the addition didn't distract, maybe enhanced. There's a slight tendency to watch the dances with a sense of them as "interpretive dance" with the music present, but that would be a mistake. Merce Cunningham made dance and music separate, but that doesn't mean they can't be complementary, even when one has, essentially, nothing to do with the other. The music's more present because we're dealing in movies than in is required for the movements, but that's o.k.
I used to go see Pina Bausch what seemed like every year at the Brooklyn Academy. I have to say I never really knew what story I was being told, but part of that is the number of stories at work in each set and each dancer and often more than one in each separately and together. Pina Bausch's choreography explored so much of human nature and expressed all the contradictions as well as all the coincidences and congruencies, for human beings individually and as social beings, micro and macro. A visionary not just of dance but of people.
So I had to see Pina, the new Wim Wenders film. And I'm so glad I did. Even though, with the music and settings, it differed radically from the shows I went to, the feelings were there, the humour and drama and sensitiveness to character, all very German, I suppose, too, but not something you couldn't relate to in any other cultural context. I think that's part of the triumph of Wenders' film: so much of it is shot outdoors, in urban and other man-manufactured settings, as well as indoors and in more theatrical sets. The 3D, well, I'm still not entirely convinced of this as necessary, but it worked, at least after the first few minutes, when, as usual, it had that layered 2D feel, peering past a translucent sheet into another and another, not giving anything rounded. I think the dance helped add that sense of a true third dimension. These people in motion, with passion.
I was a little . . . not put off, but not accepting entirely of the little soulful-look voice-over interviews of the company dancers reflecting on their time with Pina, but in the end you have to walk away with a true sense of what she did for them, as a leading artist, for their own lives as artists, and how well they loved her.
Pina Bausch, as I recall, always appeared in her productions, not as a principal necessarily, but more as a matter of principle, which, somewhat obliquely, I got the sense was not entirely her own idea. But her presence in these pieces, based on what I've seen and the footage in the film, always supplied a kind of grounding element, felt by the other dancers.
My recollection of seeing Tanztheater productions doesn't include music, at least not much, but the addition didn't distract, maybe enhanced. There's a slight tendency to watch the dances with a sense of them as "interpretive dance" with the music present, but that would be a mistake. Merce Cunningham made dance and music separate, but that doesn't mean they can't be complementary, even when one has, essentially, nothing to do with the other. The music's more present because we're dealing in movies than in is required for the movements, but that's o.k.
14 August 2011
Seasonal
Another City2Surf gone by, this year with low training, bad tendonitis, and a poor result that will see me relegated to the back of the pack start next years (I can hope to get back into the greens again if I can get a regular training schedule underway and avoid injury). Too many half marathons last year, so I'll stick to the Bridge Run in September and build back.
One of 85,000 entrants: it's amazing how organised this race is and how little congestion, on a comparative basis, there is, although runners with headphones on really need to start behaving as if not being able to hear anyone else is the same as not being able to see them.
Another City2Surf gone by, this year with low training, bad tendonitis, and a poor result that will see me relegated to the back of the pack start next years (I can hope to get back into the greens again if I can get a regular training schedule underway and avoid injury). Too many half marathons last year, so I'll stick to the Bridge Run in September and build back.
One of 85,000 entrants: it's amazing how organised this race is and how little congestion, on a comparative basis, there is, although runners with headphones on really need to start behaving as if not being able to hear anyone else is the same as not being able to see them.
08 August 2011
Downgrade
Standard & Poor’s has a helluva nerve, downgrading the US’s credit rating. The US should have downgraded S&P, not to mention the other credit-rating companies, all of whom were at the very least complicit in the financial crisis the country went further into debt to get through, bailing out all those crooks at Goldman Sachs, for example, whose products S&P etc. rated.
Repuglicans have a helluva nerve offering any rebuke when it was their gamesmanship that put the country on the brink of default, all so they can keep the top 1% of the country from having to pay their fair share of tax.
China’s got a helluva nerve opening their yap to tell us to spend less on the military (although we damn well should), when they’re not going to do anything but buy more debt anyway, let alone adjust their own currency to reflect their economic realities.
This whole debt monster debate should be a non-starter. Debt itself isn’t bad, and government debt is often a good thing. If we can get out of Afghanistan and Iraq sooner rather than later and avoid getting in a new war, we’d start saving all kinds of money. Let the Bush tax cuts expire and we’d actually start getting some revenue back. Then maybe we could spend something on jobs creation, something neither the military nor the tax cut-beneficiaries are doing much of, at least not internally. (The military seems to be doing a helluva a job on creating jobs for illegal arms merchants and drug smugglers, and those tax cut magnates are sending jobs overseas as fast as they can, to China, among other places.)
Let’s do something right about the financial services sector. Call it revenge, and why not, but it couldn’t be so hard to put something in place to ensure that the credit rating agencies are required to be independent of the products they rate. There are valid ways to create non-compete clauses in employment contracts. Something similar could work. How about a five-year moratorium on employees of financial management companies being employed at a ratings agency? No funds to be managed by an agency engaged in issuing ratings? And let’s put some teeth into the regulations we have and start enforcing them.
Standard & Poor’s has a helluva nerve, downgrading the US’s credit rating. The US should have downgraded S&P, not to mention the other credit-rating companies, all of whom were at the very least complicit in the financial crisis the country went further into debt to get through, bailing out all those crooks at Goldman Sachs, for example, whose products S&P etc. rated.
Repuglicans have a helluva nerve offering any rebuke when it was their gamesmanship that put the country on the brink of default, all so they can keep the top 1% of the country from having to pay their fair share of tax.
China’s got a helluva nerve opening their yap to tell us to spend less on the military (although we damn well should), when they’re not going to do anything but buy more debt anyway, let alone adjust their own currency to reflect their economic realities.
This whole debt monster debate should be a non-starter. Debt itself isn’t bad, and government debt is often a good thing. If we can get out of Afghanistan and Iraq sooner rather than later and avoid getting in a new war, we’d start saving all kinds of money. Let the Bush tax cuts expire and we’d actually start getting some revenue back. Then maybe we could spend something on jobs creation, something neither the military nor the tax cut-beneficiaries are doing much of, at least not internally. (The military seems to be doing a helluva a job on creating jobs for illegal arms merchants and drug smugglers, and those tax cut magnates are sending jobs overseas as fast as they can, to China, among other places.)
Let’s do something right about the financial services sector. Call it revenge, and why not, but it couldn’t be so hard to put something in place to ensure that the credit rating agencies are required to be independent of the products they rate. There are valid ways to create non-compete clauses in employment contracts. Something similar could work. How about a five-year moratorium on employees of financial management companies being employed at a ratings agency? No funds to be managed by an agency engaged in issuing ratings? And let’s put some teeth into the regulations we have and start enforcing them.
26 July 2011
Norway
What to make of this? I don't doubt the murder of Oslo describes himself as "Christian", but I doubt he says he's "right-wing", more likely "conservative", and here we have the possibility of definitions. When this angry, hate-filled person says he's Christian, he means he's not a Muslim. Perhaps not a Jew or a Hindu, but I doubt he's ever taken his thinking as far as that. He has defined himself as the opposite of the Other of the day, and we all know who that is. In another time, before or yet to come, that could have been different. But he's no Christian, that's certain.
As far as being "conservative", well, that's come to mean something other than what it once was. Instead of trying to preserve something good, to slow reckless progress, conservatism, as we've seen in the U.S., perhaps especially lately, really means trying to roll back the clock to a idealised fantasy age: the 'fifties, the 'forties, the nineteenth century in more than some cases. This bastard is no different from the tea party crazies or the English Defense League or the National Front or whomever else you'd care to name. They want a different age, but have no understanding of what was truely at work in that age and why it cannot be.
I mourn Norway's losses, both the people and the sense that such madness was not part of their culture. It's in us all, unfortunately. Please let us find our way to a better relationship among ourselves sooner than it seems we have in us.
What to make of this? I don't doubt the murder of Oslo describes himself as "Christian", but I doubt he says he's "right-wing", more likely "conservative", and here we have the possibility of definitions. When this angry, hate-filled person says he's Christian, he means he's not a Muslim. Perhaps not a Jew or a Hindu, but I doubt he's ever taken his thinking as far as that. He has defined himself as the opposite of the Other of the day, and we all know who that is. In another time, before or yet to come, that could have been different. But he's no Christian, that's certain.
As far as being "conservative", well, that's come to mean something other than what it once was. Instead of trying to preserve something good, to slow reckless progress, conservatism, as we've seen in the U.S., perhaps especially lately, really means trying to roll back the clock to a idealised fantasy age: the 'fifties, the 'forties, the nineteenth century in more than some cases. This bastard is no different from the tea party crazies or the English Defense League or the National Front or whomever else you'd care to name. They want a different age, but have no understanding of what was truely at work in that age and why it cannot be.
I mourn Norway's losses, both the people and the sense that such madness was not part of their culture. It's in us all, unfortunately. Please let us find our way to a better relationship among ourselves sooner than it seems we have in us.
11 July 2011
Gas
Australia's got a carbon tax, until 2015 - according to the plan - when we get a emissions trading scheme. I'm not opposed to either, but have my doubts about the overall efficacy of the plan on actually reducing emissions, although still willing to support positive efforts and evaluate whatever outcome is achieved, howsoever little that will be in my lifetime, especially with the Chinese, the Indians, and the U.S. unwilling or unable to act. For that matter, aren't India and China still among the developing nations, i.e., lumped in with Africa et al., and therefore those that will be on the outer with developed nations acting, not acting, and requiring their participation.
I guess it's one of the advantages of the Australian government's setup, that we can put through this kind of legislation, without having to have a "mandate", and without having to deal with a just-say-no opposition capable of siphoning off members of the party in power. Party-line voting can be trouble, too, but here's Australia taking action when the big players can't get it together to have it on the agenda even.
Sure, we have the usual suspects proclaiming doom, but, quietly, in other areas, you've got businesses and people looking for a way to make it work, and to make a profit, too. Will it cost jobs? Maybe, but it'll probably create some, too. Will it kill off entire industries? Please.
Australia's got a carbon tax, until 2015 - according to the plan - when we get a emissions trading scheme. I'm not opposed to either, but have my doubts about the overall efficacy of the plan on actually reducing emissions, although still willing to support positive efforts and evaluate whatever outcome is achieved, howsoever little that will be in my lifetime, especially with the Chinese, the Indians, and the U.S. unwilling or unable to act. For that matter, aren't India and China still among the developing nations, i.e., lumped in with Africa et al., and therefore those that will be on the outer with developed nations acting, not acting, and requiring their participation.
I guess it's one of the advantages of the Australian government's setup, that we can put through this kind of legislation, without having to have a "mandate", and without having to deal with a just-say-no opposition capable of siphoning off members of the party in power. Party-line voting can be trouble, too, but here's Australia taking action when the big players can't get it together to have it on the agenda even.
Sure, we have the usual suspects proclaiming doom, but, quietly, in other areas, you've got businesses and people looking for a way to make it work, and to make a profit, too. Will it cost jobs? Maybe, but it'll probably create some, too. Will it kill off entire industries? Please.
12 June 2011
Auckland, Again
I'm spending a lot of time in Auckland these days, but I don't mind. It's a nice little city, although I wonder what it would be like to live there? I hear the transport system is pretty bad, and travelling to and from the airport supports this.
Although it seems every city aspiring to some notability put up a needle at some point, I rather like this one.
I'm spending a lot of time in Auckland these days, but I don't mind. It's a nice little city, although I wonder what it would be like to live there? I hear the transport system is pretty bad, and travelling to and from the airport supports this.
Although it seems every city aspiring to some notability put up a needle at some point, I rather like this one.
29 May 2011
Festivals
The Vivid festival is one. Can't say the line-up is particularly interesting to me, but I still enjoy the lights.
The Customs House display was very animated and closely tailored to the elements of the facade, which made it quite a drawing card. The crowd on that side of Circular Quay was substantial.
The Vivid festival is one. Can't say the line-up is particularly interesting to me, but I still enjoy the lights.
The Customs House display was very animated and closely tailored to the elements of the facade, which made it quite a drawing card. The crowd on that side of Circular Quay was substantial.
25 April 2011
Up the Rainbow Bridge
Happy Easter! To celebrate this most holy of Christian festivals, I went to see a movie about a pagan god: The Mighty Thor. Of course, they've made him an alien and Birfrost a wormhole, but all the mythological characters and structures are otherwise largely intact, including Sif and the Warriors Three, Volstagg, Hogun, and Fandral. I've never been much of a fan of the Thunder God, but with the Hulk and Iron Man already out there and Captain America coming up next, it's obvious we'll be getting an Avengers movie before long, so it's important to keep up.
Kenneth Branagh did a good job, and Anthony Hopkins makes a good Odin. This Australian kid they found to play Thor was beyond perfect, and engaging in just the way the movie is overall. This is light entertainment, as it should be. There's a lot more humor than we've seen out of Marvel Studios in general, and just enough of the various other dramatic elements to keep things moving right along. The spectacle of it all is not in any way underdone, but I have to question the 3D.
I'm not unhappy with it, entirely, but there wasn't much reason to bother, really. Standard 2D would have been enough. Funnily enough, movies have always been effective at deceiving the eye into a 3D experience, without the glasses. In this case, the illusion of depth was, I think, counteractive to this illusion. The different planes in which the action took place seemed flat layerings of one image upon on another, with none of the rounding binolocular vision affords in reality and our brain has supplied in movies over the years. Some of the faster action sequences seriously suffered in this respect. I'm hopeful they'll start leaving it alone if they can't make it any better than this just yet.
Happy Easter! To celebrate this most holy of Christian festivals, I went to see a movie about a pagan god: The Mighty Thor. Of course, they've made him an alien and Birfrost a wormhole, but all the mythological characters and structures are otherwise largely intact, including Sif and the Warriors Three, Volstagg, Hogun, and Fandral. I've never been much of a fan of the Thunder God, but with the Hulk and Iron Man already out there and Captain America coming up next, it's obvious we'll be getting an Avengers movie before long, so it's important to keep up.
Kenneth Branagh did a good job, and Anthony Hopkins makes a good Odin. This Australian kid they found to play Thor was beyond perfect, and engaging in just the way the movie is overall. This is light entertainment, as it should be. There's a lot more humor than we've seen out of Marvel Studios in general, and just enough of the various other dramatic elements to keep things moving right along. The spectacle of it all is not in any way underdone, but I have to question the 3D.
I'm not unhappy with it, entirely, but there wasn't much reason to bother, really. Standard 2D would have been enough. Funnily enough, movies have always been effective at deceiving the eye into a 3D experience, without the glasses. In this case, the illusion of depth was, I think, counteractive to this illusion. The different planes in which the action took place seemed flat layerings of one image upon on another, with none of the rounding binolocular vision affords in reality and our brain has supplied in movies over the years. Some of the faster action sequences seriously suffered in this respect. I'm hopeful they'll start leaving it alone if they can't make it any better than this just yet.
Dear Russell Crowe
I started attending Rabbitohs games as a member the year before Peter Holmes a Court and Russell Crowe bought their controlling interest, having learned to enjoy the sport since moving here, adopting them as my team out of a sense of loyalty to my ex (who only ever cheered for them because of a soft spot for small animals) and because, c'mon, any team with such a fearsome mascot is worth supporting. (Yes, I know, that's sarcasm, not irony, the sense of humour that Australians think American's don't get, so maybe we don't.)
But for all the investment Mr. Crowe has put in - especially the addition of Sam Burgess and David Taylor last year, and Greg Inglis this year - how am I left with such a win-less team? Granted, it's only round seven, but the only performer on the side is the littlest guy, Chris Sandow, who's kicking wonderfully well, not to mention scoring tries that seem to galvanise the squad, if only for ten minutes or so.
People talk about players being "80-minute men", but I'd say the Rabbitohs manage about thirty per half, before fading into irrelevancy. The Bulldogs didn't just manage to off-load the ball whenever they needed to, they also managed their passing in a way that suggested South Sydney had collectively taken a blow to the head that left them unable to follow the movement, letting Canterbury penetrate the defense easily.
The score, 36-24, suggests a closer game than it was.
On the station platform on the way out, a local wag remarked, "next year, brother, next year". Seems like maybe that's the way this season will turn out. Do I need to think about a new loyalty?
I started attending Rabbitohs games as a member the year before Peter Holmes a Court and Russell Crowe bought their controlling interest, having learned to enjoy the sport since moving here, adopting them as my team out of a sense of loyalty to my ex (who only ever cheered for them because of a soft spot for small animals) and because, c'mon, any team with such a fearsome mascot is worth supporting. (Yes, I know, that's sarcasm, not irony, the sense of humour that Australians think American's don't get, so maybe we don't.)
But for all the investment Mr. Crowe has put in - especially the addition of Sam Burgess and David Taylor last year, and Greg Inglis this year - how am I left with such a win-less team? Granted, it's only round seven, but the only performer on the side is the littlest guy, Chris Sandow, who's kicking wonderfully well, not to mention scoring tries that seem to galvanise the squad, if only for ten minutes or so.
People talk about players being "80-minute men", but I'd say the Rabbitohs manage about thirty per half, before fading into irrelevancy. The Bulldogs didn't just manage to off-load the ball whenever they needed to, they also managed their passing in a way that suggested South Sydney had collectively taken a blow to the head that left them unable to follow the movement, letting Canterbury penetrate the defense easily.
The score, 36-24, suggests a closer game than it was.
On the station platform on the way out, a local wag remarked, "next year, brother, next year". Seems like maybe that's the way this season will turn out. Do I need to think about a new loyalty?
22 April 2011
11 April 2011
The Feminism Mystique
I don’t think Paul Sheehan understands women or feminism, a condition that usually sees men avoiding the topic and letting women columnists and pundits to argue that feminism is wholly at odds with femininity. The idea that wearing high heels proves that Betty Friedan was an opportunistic middle class hack with no foundation for her argument is ludicrous. Blaming women for the social ailments of women is just blaming the victim, again. Short skirts don’t make rapists and they don’t preclude men making more money for the same work than the women. How is calling models “giraffes” not objectification, one of the very things Friedan – and other “Jurassic Feminists” – wrote and raised our consciousness about? If we look more closely into the fashion machine, how many of the houses are run by women? How many of the leading designers are women? I don’t follow this stuff much, but leaving aside the power of Anna Wintour at Vanity Fair – which isn’t nearly as much as The Devil Wears Prada would lead you to believe – the only one I can think of is Donna Karan, a perennial also-ran in the high-price/high-profile stakes. Ralph Lauren spends more effort on projecting idealisations of body type to women than other women do. But that’s all right, because really we’ve just survived a “demographic deformity caused by World War II”, not a great awakening to the possibility of changing power relationships that had women unable to easily obtain a divorce and without control over their own bodies. Yeah, the Pill had nothing to do with the changes wrought or the “distortions” initiated by Rosie the Riviter and elucidated by Friedan et al. It’s all about the babies, folks, and women need to get back to their real jobs.
Why does Fairfax pay for this guff?
I don’t think Paul Sheehan understands women or feminism, a condition that usually sees men avoiding the topic and letting women columnists and pundits to argue that feminism is wholly at odds with femininity. The idea that wearing high heels proves that Betty Friedan was an opportunistic middle class hack with no foundation for her argument is ludicrous. Blaming women for the social ailments of women is just blaming the victim, again. Short skirts don’t make rapists and they don’t preclude men making more money for the same work than the women. How is calling models “giraffes” not objectification, one of the very things Friedan – and other “Jurassic Feminists” – wrote and raised our consciousness about? If we look more closely into the fashion machine, how many of the houses are run by women? How many of the leading designers are women? I don’t follow this stuff much, but leaving aside the power of Anna Wintour at Vanity Fair – which isn’t nearly as much as The Devil Wears Prada would lead you to believe – the only one I can think of is Donna Karan, a perennial also-ran in the high-price/high-profile stakes. Ralph Lauren spends more effort on projecting idealisations of body type to women than other women do. But that’s all right, because really we’ve just survived a “demographic deformity caused by World War II”, not a great awakening to the possibility of changing power relationships that had women unable to easily obtain a divorce and without control over their own bodies. Yeah, the Pill had nothing to do with the changes wrought or the “distortions” initiated by Rosie the Riviter and elucidated by Friedan et al. It’s all about the babies, folks, and women need to get back to their real jobs.
Why does Fairfax pay for this guff?
01 April 2011
Zeds
It's amusing (to me, anyway) having learned to consistently spell and even speak according to the Australian vernacular, to find myself stumbling over "New Zealand", inevitably calling it "New Zedland", because, of course, Z is not Z, it's Zed. The New Zedlanders I speak to don't mind so much when I say "N Zed", and seem to take it in good humour (sic) when I say "New Zedland", but I do seem to be the only one falling into this.
Anyway, I've now returned from there, Auckland, specificially, for a business trip, and my first non-US overseas excursion. Auckland is a nice city. Small, easy to get around. Naturally we were staying right in the heart of the CBD, and just around the corner from the main office, so I can't say really what it might really be like to live there. The harbour is much different from that of Sydney or New York or San Francisco. It's big enough, and the hotel had a view of the container port, which was pretty much non-stop all night and day, even when there wasn't a ship to load/off-load. Fun to watch for a while.
I'd like to get back there and explore a bit. Christchurch seems to have quietened down now, but it'll be a long time before it's ready for tourism. The Rugby League World Cup commences soon, but that would be a bad time for me, even though I do like the code, and hotels likely to be sold out already. I'll have to do some research. It seems to me you could do a lot in just a week.
It's amusing (to me, anyway) having learned to consistently spell and even speak according to the Australian vernacular, to find myself stumbling over "New Zealand", inevitably calling it "New Zedland", because, of course, Z is not Z, it's Zed. The New Zedlanders I speak to don't mind so much when I say "N Zed", and seem to take it in good humour (sic) when I say "New Zedland", but I do seem to be the only one falling into this.
Anyway, I've now returned from there, Auckland, specificially, for a business trip, and my first non-US overseas excursion. Auckland is a nice city. Small, easy to get around. Naturally we were staying right in the heart of the CBD, and just around the corner from the main office, so I can't say really what it might really be like to live there. The harbour is much different from that of Sydney or New York or San Francisco. It's big enough, and the hotel had a view of the container port, which was pretty much non-stop all night and day, even when there wasn't a ship to load/off-load. Fun to watch for a while.
I'd like to get back there and explore a bit. Christchurch seems to have quietened down now, but it'll be a long time before it's ready for tourism. The Rugby League World Cup commences soon, but that would be a bad time for me, even though I do like the code, and hotels likely to be sold out already. I'll have to do some research. It seems to me you could do a lot in just a week.
27 March 2011
Out
The predicted swing to the Liberals showed Labor the door in a big way, but nothing for the Greens, not even their expected win in Marrickville, although Jamie Parker remains neck-and-neck with Verity Firth, so maybe one seat. Nice to see Clover Moore, who also serves as Lord Mayor of Sydney, retain her Independent seat. Honestly, her departure from the Labor ranks ten years ago should have been our first warning that the factionalism was out of control. Can Barry O'Farrell make the trains run on time? And cheaper? We'll see.
Shame about Kristina Keneally stepping down as Labor leader. It gives credence to the tale of her being nothing more than a puppet, and the party could have done worse than to support her in attempting full-scale reform of how they operate.
Speaking of women in politics, Geraldine Ferraro has died. Her selection as VP candidate in 1984 stands in stark contrast to John McCain's choice in 2008 of Sarah Palin. Although scandal involving her husband was a big part of what sank the Democratic ticket, she herself was capable and competent. She opened the way for Hillary Clinton to mount a credible campaign for the Presidential nomination, and we could do worse than to hope for more like her.
The predicted swing to the Liberals showed Labor the door in a big way, but nothing for the Greens, not even their expected win in Marrickville, although Jamie Parker remains neck-and-neck with Verity Firth, so maybe one seat. Nice to see Clover Moore, who also serves as Lord Mayor of Sydney, retain her Independent seat. Honestly, her departure from the Labor ranks ten years ago should have been our first warning that the factionalism was out of control. Can Barry O'Farrell make the trains run on time? And cheaper? We'll see.
Shame about Kristina Keneally stepping down as Labor leader. It gives credence to the tale of her being nothing more than a puppet, and the party could have done worse than to support her in attempting full-scale reform of how they operate.
Speaking of women in politics, Geraldine Ferraro has died. Her selection as VP candidate in 1984 stands in stark contrast to John McCain's choice in 2008 of Sarah Palin. Although scandal involving her husband was a big part of what sank the Democratic ticket, she herself was capable and competent. She opened the way for Hillary Clinton to mount a credible campaign for the Presidential nomination, and we could do worse than to hope for more like her.
26 March 2011
You Pad
On Friday, I passed the Apple store on George Street, to find a line of people camped out waiting to buy the iPad2. The line extended around the block, and by six, when I left work, had gone even further. Appple guardians were managing the crowd, which I found beneficial. I had to come to work on Saturday, too, and the line was still there, if smaller. Interestingly, because it was raining, Apple had provide umbrellas to those without. I didn't ask if they'd have to give them back, but they looked like those special wind-proof umbrellas, and I'd guess they weren't gimmies.
But I don't get it. What's the iPad got that's so essential? It's bascially a hypertrophic smart phone, as far as I can tell, and only half a laptop, if that. There must be something that makes it worth such attention, but if I can't upload to it or download from it, it's just eye candy and Facebook updates.
Whatever.
On Friday, I passed the Apple store on George Street, to find a line of people camped out waiting to buy the iPad2. The line extended around the block, and by six, when I left work, had gone even further. Appple guardians were managing the crowd, which I found beneficial. I had to come to work on Saturday, too, and the line was still there, if smaller. Interestingly, because it was raining, Apple had provide umbrellas to those without. I didn't ask if they'd have to give them back, but they looked like those special wind-proof umbrellas, and I'd guess they weren't gimmies.
But I don't get it. What's the iPad got that's so essential? It's bascially a hypertrophic smart phone, as far as I can tell, and only half a laptop, if that. There must be something that makes it worth such attention, but if I can't upload to it or download from it, it's just eye candy and Facebook updates.
Whatever.
16 March 2011
Nuclear Safety
The situation in Japan continues to be worrying, and you’d have to wonder what can be done and what’s next. Reading about six-inch thick steel containment vessels and explosions capable of damaging them shows both how much effort has gone into safety and how much can still go wrong.
Power generators are dealing with tremendous forces, and things can go badly wrong with any of them, nuclear or otherwise. The BP Gulf spill is evidence that just dealing with the substances is risky enough, let alone refining them, and then utilising them.
Granted 9.0 earthquakes and tsunami incursions of over 4 kilometres aren’t common, but if a building designed to withstand a direct hit by an airliner in a country with earthquake building codes second to none can fail as dramatically as these reactors, the question of how safe is safe has to be asked. Are we really prepared to continue using nuclear power? Is this just an old, flawed design that has been superseded elsewhere, even in Japan – where one of the reactors was already scheduled to be decommissioned?
I hope for the best, that the situation gets under control soon, and without catastrophic radiation release.
Elsewhere: Germany is now thinking ahead.
The situation in Japan continues to be worrying, and you’d have to wonder what can be done and what’s next. Reading about six-inch thick steel containment vessels and explosions capable of damaging them shows both how much effort has gone into safety and how much can still go wrong.
Power generators are dealing with tremendous forces, and things can go badly wrong with any of them, nuclear or otherwise. The BP Gulf spill is evidence that just dealing with the substances is risky enough, let alone refining them, and then utilising them.
Granted 9.0 earthquakes and tsunami incursions of over 4 kilometres aren’t common, but if a building designed to withstand a direct hit by an airliner in a country with earthquake building codes second to none can fail as dramatically as these reactors, the question of how safe is safe has to be asked. Are we really prepared to continue using nuclear power? Is this just an old, flawed design that has been superseded elsewhere, even in Japan – where one of the reactors was already scheduled to be decommissioned?
I hope for the best, that the situation gets under control soon, and without catastrophic radiation release.
Elsewhere: Germany is now thinking ahead.
15 March 2011
News
When I was in the US in January, a lunatic shot a member of the House, down in Arizona. For the next 48 hours, that was the only topic presented on the 24-hour cable news stations, Fox, MSNBC, and CNN, notably. Broadcast national news took a wider view, if only just, and if only because with 30 to 60 minutes available had much less disposable time than that required to run a day-long news cycle.
Mind you, the news was that Gabrielle Giffords had been shot, that a judge and a nine-year old girl were among the killed, the number of wounded, and that the perpetrator had been arrested. In the following hours, the news grew to include the prognosis of Representative Giffords and, to be honest, very little else. Yet the analysis – no, that’s too strong – the discussion never stopped. If I switched on the television, I would learn nothing new. But why did I expect to?
This is the 24/7 news program’s trap. You keep hoping to hear something you missed, something that would make sense, would add to your store of knowledge, that would help determine a course of action or imbue a sense of progress. This is what they are selling, little different from the endless news “updates” that are nothing more than advertisements for a program that will have little content in the end beyond what you’ve already gleaned from the ad or from an earlier program.
And now we have Japan’s 9.0 earthquake and the devastating tsunami that followed. This is certainly producing a lot of valuable new information, especially in regard to the nuclear power plants situations. Anyone paying even the least attention to these events and their development is eager to receive new information.
Typically, however, we have an opportunistic attempt to deride the Australian national broadcast company’s relatively recent launch of a 24-hour news channel. And, as usual, it’s coming from the Murdoch empire.
Mr. Blair lists the programming content of ABC News 24 on the Saturday following the destructive events in Japan, up until 5:30 p.m.. He makes no mention of any coverage they did offer during this period or afterwards, so maybe he just wasn’t getting his tsunami jones satisfied.
Why? Because he’s been led to expect non-stop coverage of whatever major event has occurred in the last 24 to 72 hours, regardless of whether there’s any new information? Or because it’s the ABC, a public service that he’s decided is fair game so long as Labor is in government, rather than the Coalition? It can’t be that, because during the Howard era, when Mr. Blair got his start as a semi-public figure and now a columnist in the tabloids, he’d be just as critical whenever a story or program aired critical of the Liberals.
I want to know what’s happening in Japan, because it’s important. It’s important on many levels, not least to the Japanese themselves, who are presently undergoing, for me, unimaginable hardship and trauma. But it isn’t something I’m interested in so I can play the tall poppy card in a one-sided political smear campaign, and that's what appears to be the intention. There are bigger things than the ABC, whether you think it’s working to its job description or not.
When I was in the US in January, a lunatic shot a member of the House, down in Arizona. For the next 48 hours, that was the only topic presented on the 24-hour cable news stations, Fox, MSNBC, and CNN, notably. Broadcast national news took a wider view, if only just, and if only because with 30 to 60 minutes available had much less disposable time than that required to run a day-long news cycle.
Mind you, the news was that Gabrielle Giffords had been shot, that a judge and a nine-year old girl were among the killed, the number of wounded, and that the perpetrator had been arrested. In the following hours, the news grew to include the prognosis of Representative Giffords and, to be honest, very little else. Yet the analysis – no, that’s too strong – the discussion never stopped. If I switched on the television, I would learn nothing new. But why did I expect to?
This is the 24/7 news program’s trap. You keep hoping to hear something you missed, something that would make sense, would add to your store of knowledge, that would help determine a course of action or imbue a sense of progress. This is what they are selling, little different from the endless news “updates” that are nothing more than advertisements for a program that will have little content in the end beyond what you’ve already gleaned from the ad or from an earlier program.
And now we have Japan’s 9.0 earthquake and the devastating tsunami that followed. This is certainly producing a lot of valuable new information, especially in regard to the nuclear power plants situations. Anyone paying even the least attention to these events and their development is eager to receive new information.
Typically, however, we have an opportunistic attempt to deride the Australian national broadcast company’s relatively recent launch of a 24-hour news channel. And, as usual, it’s coming from the Murdoch empire.
Mr. Blair lists the programming content of ABC News 24 on the Saturday following the destructive events in Japan, up until 5:30 p.m.. He makes no mention of any coverage they did offer during this period or afterwards, so maybe he just wasn’t getting his tsunami jones satisfied.
Why? Because he’s been led to expect non-stop coverage of whatever major event has occurred in the last 24 to 72 hours, regardless of whether there’s any new information? Or because it’s the ABC, a public service that he’s decided is fair game so long as Labor is in government, rather than the Coalition? It can’t be that, because during the Howard era, when Mr. Blair got his start as a semi-public figure and now a columnist in the tabloids, he’d be just as critical whenever a story or program aired critical of the Liberals.
I want to know what’s happening in Japan, because it’s important. It’s important on many levels, not least to the Japanese themselves, who are presently undergoing, for me, unimaginable hardship and trauma. But it isn’t something I’m interested in so I can play the tall poppy card in a one-sided political smear campaign, and that's what appears to be the intention. There are bigger things than the ABC, whether you think it’s working to its job description or not.
State of the State
On a national level, I consider the Liberal Party increasingly modelled on the Know-Nothing basis. Opposition Leader Tony Abbott standing up in public to declare that carbon dioxide is not the villain it’s portrayed as in the “[unsettled]” science of global warming is fatuous disingenuousness. How long Abbott can last in his role is unknown. The Liberals appear to like having a vicious unprincipled attack-dog as leader, but when the next election is called, will they still want him, or will they go for someone more measured?
The question is sort of more acute at the State level, insofar as New South Wales is less than two weeks from going to the polls, with the Liberals highly touted to take the government out of Labor’s hands. In their case, I can’t say as I’ve heard much from their leader, Barry O’Farrell, either before the election was announced or since. I have started to see some attack ads on television, but only one where O’Farrell himself stands up to say anything about policy, and I find his statement regarding the proposed Federal Carbon Tax hard to fathom. (If the tax is implemented nationally, how can a State Premier rescind it?) Regardless, despite the silliness in the advertising, O’Farrell has been very different from Abbott, mainly as he hasn’t been much of a presence at all, and when he does show up in the news, hasn’t got much to say. Well, the big stuff gets done in Canberra, anyway, I guess, not Macquarie Street.
I’m pretty well convinced that the Liberals will take government, though, and not looking forward to it. Although Labor have undeniably been inept, my own experiences don’t suggest they’ve been as bad as the newspapers and television programs say. I ride the buses and trains and travel throughout the city pretty extensively, and it all works well enough often enough. I haven’t had any bad experiences with the hospitals, although the horror stories that occasionally surface are pretty horrible. The MP for my area, Verity Firth, hasn’t been bad (although her husband getting picked up buying a tab of ecstasy was pretty stupid, especially for his timing), so I don’t have any motivation to vote Greens, let alone Liberal. So if Labor have been bad, it’s been mostly literally political. Their leadership spills, portfolio hand-offs, various scandals and, more recently, abundant resignations have tainted the brand. Is there any reasonable expectation that it won’t be much the same for the Liberals?
There’s an opportunity for the Greens, which I doubt will come to any substantial gain, let alone the government (which I have my doubts they’re ready for). Out in the western suburbs and rural NSW, the Greens are evil institutionalized, so their only shot exists in the eastern and inner west suburbs. The east will vote Liberal, is my prediction, and the inner west, often safe seats for Labor, will stick it out or go Liberal, but I anticipate that any gains made by the Greens will be here. Newtown, Marrickville, Glebe tend to lean harder left than other suburbs. If Verity gets dumped from her seat of Balmain, it’ll be because of her individualized campaign slogan: “Keep Verity” (i.e., Labor is awful but it’s not Verity’s fault). I know it motivates me.
But I’ll have to live with whatever government we do get, nevertheless.
On a national level, I consider the Liberal Party increasingly modelled on the Know-Nothing basis. Opposition Leader Tony Abbott standing up in public to declare that carbon dioxide is not the villain it’s portrayed as in the “[unsettled]” science of global warming is fatuous disingenuousness. How long Abbott can last in his role is unknown. The Liberals appear to like having a vicious unprincipled attack-dog as leader, but when the next election is called, will they still want him, or will they go for someone more measured?
The question is sort of more acute at the State level, insofar as New South Wales is less than two weeks from going to the polls, with the Liberals highly touted to take the government out of Labor’s hands. In their case, I can’t say as I’ve heard much from their leader, Barry O’Farrell, either before the election was announced or since. I have started to see some attack ads on television, but only one where O’Farrell himself stands up to say anything about policy, and I find his statement regarding the proposed Federal Carbon Tax hard to fathom. (If the tax is implemented nationally, how can a State Premier rescind it?) Regardless, despite the silliness in the advertising, O’Farrell has been very different from Abbott, mainly as he hasn’t been much of a presence at all, and when he does show up in the news, hasn’t got much to say. Well, the big stuff gets done in Canberra, anyway, I guess, not Macquarie Street.
I’m pretty well convinced that the Liberals will take government, though, and not looking forward to it. Although Labor have undeniably been inept, my own experiences don’t suggest they’ve been as bad as the newspapers and television programs say. I ride the buses and trains and travel throughout the city pretty extensively, and it all works well enough often enough. I haven’t had any bad experiences with the hospitals, although the horror stories that occasionally surface are pretty horrible. The MP for my area, Verity Firth, hasn’t been bad (although her husband getting picked up buying a tab of ecstasy was pretty stupid, especially for his timing), so I don’t have any motivation to vote Greens, let alone Liberal. So if Labor have been bad, it’s been mostly literally political. Their leadership spills, portfolio hand-offs, various scandals and, more recently, abundant resignations have tainted the brand. Is there any reasonable expectation that it won’t be much the same for the Liberals?
There’s an opportunity for the Greens, which I doubt will come to any substantial gain, let alone the government (which I have my doubts they’re ready for). Out in the western suburbs and rural NSW, the Greens are evil institutionalized, so their only shot exists in the eastern and inner west suburbs. The east will vote Liberal, is my prediction, and the inner west, often safe seats for Labor, will stick it out or go Liberal, but I anticipate that any gains made by the Greens will be here. Newtown, Marrickville, Glebe tend to lean harder left than other suburbs. If Verity gets dumped from her seat of Balmain, it’ll be because of her individualized campaign slogan: “Keep Verity” (i.e., Labor is awful but it’s not Verity’s fault). I know it motivates me.
But I’ll have to live with whatever government we do get, nevertheless.
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