During the 8am news I received a text message from my bank with some nice news. I was paid overnight, and for the first time since early January, my bank balance is in positive territory. That’s some nice news which is sure to put a smile on one’s face.
That said, much like last time I had a positive bank balance, it won’t last long. This afternoon there is a very high probability of a … err, how can I put this to avoid giving specific details … I have a “major infrastructure investment” which will take my bank balance back in to negative territory for the time being.
That doesn’t really bother me though, because there is much more to life than the bottom line on a balance sheet. I was reminded of that this morning when I caught a bus in to the station … (hmm, a bus, a clue to the “major infrastructure investment” … what? No! No I am not buying a bus!)
When I caught the bus this morning I had the same bus driver as usual…late as always, miserable as always. He’s certainly earning more than I am, and if you ever needed proof that money is not the key to happiness…then that’s it.
I was on a situation like that once. It was clear that I shouldn’t be doing the job I was doing at the time. Why else would I be unhappy in what I was doing?
I took the hint. Financially I’m much worse off, but emotionally and spiritually I am much better off. It hasn’t been easy, but it is starting to prove fruitful.
One of Channel Nine’s few decent rugby league commentators has reportedly “stormed out” mere hours before he was going to join the commentary team for tonight’s State of Origin clash in Melbourne.
FORMER Queensland State of Origin star Ben Ikin has stormed out of Channel Nine only hours before he was supposed to be commentating on tonight’s showdown in Melbourne.
A furious Ikin phoned Nine’s director of sport Steve Crawley early this afternoon to resign from all his commentary duties.
[..]
Ikin, who is the son-in-law of super coach Wayne Bennett, is angry that Channel Nine’s A Current Affair is doing an investigation tonight into a business owned by his father on the Gold Coast.
[..]
Steve Crawley confirmed Ikin had quit but refused to comment, other than saying, “”At this stage I’m just concentrating on getting the telecast right for tonight.’’
Ah well, it just makes the already superior coverage on 2GB that little bit better. Best wishes to Ben, I hope he pops up on Foxtel or radio in the near future.
I received an email today claiming to be from the Commonwealth Bank, informing me, as a customer (I don’t recall opening an account there, but I have been known to forget these things) that my account has been suspended, and that I should call 08 7123 3018 to “update my account” as soon as possible.
I rang the number to see what would happen. It rang twice, and I was then informed by the Telstra woman that “we regret that the number you have dialled is disconnected or unavailable”.
Intent on facilitating the theft of my identity, I decided to reply to the email, but alas it is “from” service@commbank.com.au with a reply-to address of no-reply@commbank.com.au
The wreckage of the missing Air France jet has been found, however there are no signs of survivors.
A five kilometre path of wreckage has been found in the Atlantic, confirming the missing Air France jet has crashed into the ocean carrying 228 people.
Brazilian Defence Minister Nelson Jobim said on Tuesday the discovery “confirms that the plane went down in that area” hundreds of kilometres from the Brazilian archipelago of Fernando de Noronha.
He said the strip of wreckage included metallic and non-metallic pieces, but did not describe them in detail. No bodies were spotted in the crash of the Airbus in which all aboard are believed to have died.
[..]
A French ship equipped with two mini-submarines is on its way to scour the bottom of the ocean but it is not expected to arrive until tomorrow.
The sparse remains – which included an aircraft seat – were located 650km northeast of Brazil’s Fernando do Noronha island on Tuesday.
Meanwhile details of the plane’s final moments are starting to come to light. Apparently the plane sent more than just the single “electrical fault” message which we had been told about until now.
While the cause of the disaster remains a mystery, Air France chief executive Pierre-Henry Gourgeon said the aircraft had sent a series of error messages before it vanished.
“A succession of a dozen technical messages” sent by the aircraft around 0215 GMT showed that “several electrical systems had broken down” which caused a “totally unprecedented situation in the plane,” he said.
“It is probable that it was shortly after these messages that the impact in the Atlantic came,” he told reporters at Charles de Gaulle airport
This is an utter tragedy. My thoughts and prayers are with the families of those on board, and I can only hope that a black box recorder can be salvaged from the wreckage, and that useful information to prevent a similar tragedy in the future can be retrieved from it.
I just noticed today’s schedule on the 2GB website. Alan Jones is away again, and has been since Monday. Drive presenter Jason Morrison has been filling in for him, and Andrew Moore has been filling in for Jason, however Andrew is in Melbourne today as he is calling the State of Origin match tonight…which leaves 2GB with this:
If accurate (and one can assume that 7pm-10pm is not, as it fails to mention tonight’s State of Origin match), Jason Morrison is going to be very very tired by the end of the day, and will be facing an early start once again tomorrow. Sydney-siders who only listen on their drives to and from work may also be wondering if they’re stuck in a time warp.
As much as I’m sure that Jason can handle the extra workload, I do hope that 2GB move Luke Bona from the evening slot to Drive for the day. I will be tuning in at 3pm to see what happens.
All of this reminds me, I owe Jason some chocolate biscuits.
Update 2:30pm: The schedule has been updated with tonight’s rugby league coverage, however Jason is still doing a double shift.
3pm here we come. End Update
Update 3:11pm: It’s Jason…and he didn’t get any sleep as he explained at the start of the show!
[audio:https://samuelgordonstewart.com/wp-content/2GBJasonMorrisonNoSleep.mp3] Download MP3 End Update
Further Update 4:20pmAlan Jones is back tomorrow, so Jason gets to sleep in tomorrow. I think he’ll need it! End Update
I can understand the reasoning behind this decision, but I wonder if it will be applied consistently?
A U.S. court says a kindergartner’s mother cannot read Scripture during show and tell, even if the Bible is the boy’s favorite book.
Monday’s ruling is a victory for the Marple Newtown School District in suburban Philadelphia.
The 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals says the school’s decision does not violate First Amendment rights given the nonpublic nature of the classroom and the tender age of the children.
The mother, Donna Kay Busch, argues the students heard stories related to Passover, Christmas and other religious holidays.
The appeals court says there is a “significant difference” between identifying those holidays and reading from Scripture.
I can understand the theory that reading extracts of a book which pushes a specific agenda to young children is some form of indoctrination, although I disagree in this case as I think the Bible is, linguistically, too challenging for young minds without a degree of interpretation, and I doubt that the kids would grasp the meaning of much of it…I also doubt that they would be particularly interested unless they happen to live in a devoted Christian household.
My thoughts on this specific case to one side, the ruling here is, effectively, that books which push an agenda which is not shared by all (or at the least, a vast majority) should not be read to young children in public schools. This makes me wonder what would happen if a mother were to claim that one of Barack Obama’s numerous books were her child’s favourite reading material, and then proceeded to read extracts to her child’s class…would the court rule that such activity is not permissible considering that 47.1% of the country voted against him, and his political views are therefore not shared by enough people in the country to warrant them being read to young children?
The answer should be “yes, the court would not allow such an activity”, but I would like to see it tested as I’m not confident that this ruling will be applied consistently.
Time will tell, and I’m sure that this ruling will be tested many many times in the future.
Defence minister Joel Fitzgibbon has corrected his entires on the Register of Members’ Interests once again. As ABC News points out:
Earlier this year, Mr Fitzgibbon apologised for not declaring trips to China paid for by businesswoman, Helen Liu.
Prime Minister Kevin Rudd ordered him to check his records for any other undeclared gifts.
This evening Mr Fitzgibbon has told parliament his staff have discovered that he had not declared a night’s accommodation that was paid for by the NIB Health fund.
However what ABC Online omit from this story is Joel Fitzgibbon’s bizarre explanation for failing to declare the accomodation on this occasion. Thankfully, it’s AAP to the rescue:
In a brief personal explanation to the House of Representatives, Mr Fitzgibbon said his staff had identified an occasion in June 2008 where he accepted accommodation paid for by NIB Health Funds, of which his brother is chief executive.
He said the original plan was to share accommodation booked by his brother.
Mr Fitzgibbon was attending a State of Origin match in Brisbane.
“Due to a last minute change in his plans, my brother was unable to join me. As a result I paid for the accommodation,” he said.
“Shortly thereafter I learned that NIB had contacted the hotel and cancelled my payment and substituted it with their own. I can only say that it is this confusion that led me to overlook the need to declare the sponsored accommodation.”
Mr Fitzgibbon said the hotel bill was $450.
MPs must declared any hospitality from a private source worth more than $300.
A couple points here. Firstly, in my experience, it is quite normal to pay for accommodation as one leaves a hotel, often by credit card, in which case the debt is effectively settled on the spot even if the payment takes a little while to show up on one’s statement. Why any sane hotel would go through the administrative hassle of reversing a completed payment only to substitute it for another payment, and deal with the associated bank/transaction fees, and not bother to inform the original payer, let alone seek their consent, is beyond me.
Secondly, if we assume that the story is true and Mr. Fitzgibbon found out “shortly thereafter” about the musical chairs act with the payment, why did he take nearly a year to disclose it?
I suppose that I should also echo the point made by the federal opposition’s spokesman on emissions trading, Andrew Robb, on Lateline tonight. Why wait until 9:30pm, when half, if not more, of the politicians and journalists have gone home for the night, to make the apology?
One wonders what Mr. Fitzgibbon will remember to apologise for next.
I don’t begrudge Mr. Fitzgibbon these gifts, but it’s a pretty simple task to disclose them, and quite frankly if you aren’t capable of disclosing gifts, I fail to see how you can be considered competent enough to be the minister for defence…and if you insist on keeping secrets, don’t be surprised if your underlings start spying on you again.
Brazil’s Globo TV quoted a ham radio operator who reported hearing air force radio traffic that debris possibly from the plane, that was carrying 228 people, had been spotted about 435 miles north of the Brazilian archipelago of Fernando de Noronha.
And the Web site of the Folha de S. Paulo newspaper says air force radar has detected signs of oil and metal in the same area.
An air force spokesman says authorities cannot immediately confirm the reports. He spoke on condition of anonymity, in keeping with department policy.
ABC TV’s Lateline (which I was watching for unrelated reasons) reported a few minutes ago that the sighted wreckage includes seats.
I suppose that’s a good sign. If seats have survived, then there is a chance that people have survived.
It’s a car which was arguably ahead of its time, but probably hasn’t been treated too well by the passage of time…The 1894 Ford Fiesta!
It is believed that the Fiesta line was abandoned a short time after this car was built and relaunched nearly 100 years later…considering the design flaws which needed to be fixed, I’m not surprised:
Black Ford Fiesta, spacious 1 door hatchback (hatch not included), back is also gone.
Features include:
-Aircon standard (has no windows)
-working seatbelts (bonus point)
-playboy seatcover, other 3 added for a cost or BYO
-Steering wheel
-Brake lights
-Working brakes (except on hills or roundabouts or over 40kms and hour)
-Keyless enrty (just go througth the windows)
-6 speaker stereo (speakers not fitted come in empty box, u can just pretend like we do)
Bonus offer – 4 Alloy wheels (3 tyres with little or no tred…okay no tred)
This is def a ‘classic’ vintage style automobile.
Two lady/man/anyone who needs to borrow the car owner (dog also sat in front driver side picking me up from the pub)
Dont miss this amazing opportunity to own one of the classics….
It’s the second of June, which makes today my 22nd birthday, and Nattie’s 9th (63rd in dog years) birthday.
It only occurred to me that my birthday was coming up about a week ago, and the first thing which popped in to my mind when I thought of the number 22 was Manuel from Fawlty Towers.
Incidentally I received an email from Maritz earlier today titled “Dear to hello and the days of birthday”. I will ask Maritz if I can share it with you.
