The end of 2020, the Year of the Rat, is finally in sight. It has been a difficult year, but that’s for another post. Right now, Pete and I are digesting an excellent Christmas dinner for two, cooked by us. We had intended to go on a little holiday this year, driving down to Adelaide…
It has been a momentous week in the world. Events in the USA are always of interest to those of us lucky enough to live in the “West” as the November presidential election looms. The American people or the electoral college – (I don’t understand the US electoral system – but it sure ain’t ‘one…
I’m worried about my country, I really am. Seems to me too many of the State Premiers are setting themselves up as petty dictators, proclaiming that everything they do is for the good of Queenslanders or Tasmanians, or West Australians or Victorians. As it happens, I’ve lived in several states over my lifetime. And first…
A few days ago I read something on Facebook extolling the virtues of how New Zealand had dealt with the covid-19 pandemic – harsh lock downs all over the country, no travel, and strict quarantine, resulting in no new cases in over one hundred days. It all sounded great but it occurred to me as…
As the pandemic surges on in Victoria, New South Wales, and the Australian Capital Territory, we inhabitants in the other states watch and wait. Even up here in Hervey Bay, well away from the corona virus hotspot in Brisbane suburbs, let alone Sydney and Melbourne, there’s a certain tension permeating the atmosphere. Our Premier has…
After a short period of smugness as we in Australia compared our covid-19 statistics with those of countries like Brazil, the USA, and the United Kingdom, the virus snuck up behind us and yelled “SURPRISE!” But we in Queensland could still afford a bit of hubris. After all, the mounting figures were in Victoria and,…
Things were looking so rosy. Australia was the envy of the world, with very few active covid-19 cases and very few deaths, mostly of elderly residents in aged care homes. Sport was happening, albeit with restrictions. Pubs and clubs were reopening. And then the wheels fell off. Hot spots flared in Victoria, with hundreds of…
I suppose we had to expect a second wave of the corona virus at some stage. And it has arrived in Melbourne. Cases have soared. A person arriving in Darwin from Melbourne has become the first case in the Northern Territory for months. The man in his thirties had spent two weeks in quarantine after…
It’s baby boomer bashing time again. It’s never too long before a new flare-up and the covid-19 pandemic has caused a resurgence. Adam Creighton penned an article in The Australian entitled Coronavirus: Perks and loopholes can’t endure as we run up debt. Be warned, the newspaper has a paywall. Australia, like most countries around the…
If life had continued as it used to, right now I would have been on the Danube in a riverboat, watching the scenery slip past as I sipped my champagne. But we’ve been handed devastating fires, massive floods, and now a plague. It’s almost like the story of Moses and the flight from Egypt. And…