Archive for January 6th, 2007
Occasionally I get emails from people who want to send things to me via the post, and with the exception of a select few people who I actually know, I have had to turn them down as I did not feel like giving out my home address.
For that reason, and a few others (including missing/stolen mail in my neighbourhood) I have taken out a post office box, and I have added the address to the contact page. But to save you going there, I will copy it in here as well.
Samuel Gordon-Stewart
PO Box 1272
Dickson ACT 2602
Australia
“Why Dickson?” I hear you cry…well quite simply Dickson, unlike Civic, is not deemed a metropolitan town centre post office (or something along those lines) by Australia Post, and as such it is considerably cheaper to get a post office box there than it is at Civic…or an even more expensive GPO box at one of the main post offices. Dickson isn’t too far out of my way (actually it’s quite close) so a post office box there is quite convenient.
Samuel
January 6th, 2007 at 05:15pm
As three people have now informed me by email, the weather information normally seen on the right of the home page of this blog is currently not appearing. Weatherzone, the people who provide this service, currently have the following message on their home page:
Weatherzone
Saturday 11:42 EDT
Due to a catastrophic hardware failure Weatherzone is temporarily offline.
Our technical staff are working to correct the problem.
We apologise for any inconvenience.
Hopefully they will be back online shortly…in the meantime the Bureau of Meteorology says it is currently 30.3°c in Canberra, which is in excess of the expected maximum of 29°c, and we are in for a shower or two. The wind is coming from a North-westerly direction at 20km/h.
I do not intend on providing further “current” weather reports, although I might provide a forecast if the Weatherzone service does not come back online soon.
Samuel
January 6th, 2007 at 03:57pm
Many people, even those who have had no contact with this website, would be aware of my views on Summernats from last year.
My main issues were with the apparent lack of proper safety procedures following a rather silly accident during a drift race, and the excessive amount of noise that a minority of attendees seem to think the northern part of Canberra wants to hear in the wee hours of the morning.
I would like to take this opportunity to commend Summernats organiser Chic Henry, and the Australian Federal Police, for addressing the majority of my concerns. It would appear that Mr. Henry has done a lot of good work in not only addressing safety issues, but also making the event a more family friendly event, whilst retaining plenty of room for the adult activities which apparently make Summernats more than a car show, and awfully attractive to an awful lot of people.
Mr. Henry’s partnership with the Australian Federal Police, in which the AFP announced that they would confiscate vehicles taking part in illegal or anti-social behaviour outside the Summernats venue, is also a good move, and has for the most part worked. I was woken up a couple times last night by some rather obvious sounds of street racing along Limestone Avenue, and a lot of screeching tyres, but hearing the sirens shortly afterwards made it all worthwhile!
Overall the noisy and naughty post-midnight activities are much less frequent than they were last year, they still happen, but not much more than they do during the rest of the year, which is a vast improvement on last year.
I still have no interest in attending Summernats, but I appreciate the work which has gone into this year’s event to make it better for attendees and the public who live in nearby suburbs.
I don’t know if Mr. Henry or the AFP read my comments, although I dare say they would have been hard to miss in some form after a number of websites, including local car enthusiast websites, took quite an interest in them.
I will be sending this editorial to Mr. Henry to ensure that he is aware of my pleasure with the changes.
Samuel
January 6th, 2007 at 01:10pm
Hello again Glenn,
Just on the topic of those ads with doctors endorsing cigarettes, I've got a copy of a newspaper from January 1st, 1901, and it is filled with those ads. I couldn't believe it when I saw it. Unfortunately the newspaper is in a storage box to help preserve it, and I can't remember which one it is in, so I can't remember which newspaper it is. I remember getting it as a souvenir in one of the newspapers on January 1st, 2001.
Regards,
Samuel Gordon-Stewart
Canberra
January 6th, 2007 at 01:00pm
Hi Glenn,
If Dominic is right and we are going to be talking about our Ashes winning Cricket team in 50 years time in much the same way we talk about "The Invincibles", then we are going to need a name for them…it must be time for the media dubbing machine to kick into action again!
Regards,
Samuel Gordon-Stewart
Canberra
January 6th, 2007 at 01:00pm