Wednesday, December 18, 2013

Odds and Sods and Bits and Bods

Hello and welcome to the blog...and today just a dot point round-up to catch up with various issues as they bubble along...and apologies for mis-labelling yesterday's post with the same title as a previous post...I was bound to repeat myself eventually...I've made yesterday a 'Part II'.

But First: the entire title would also nicely summarise a day at the races...I am inspired to verse sir...
          For hopeful punters we have good odds,
          From pounding hooves come flying sods,
          To eager steeds champing their bits,
          To fashionable young fillies showing off their great...(whoa, whoa, whoa...I'm going to have to stop you there champ...you can't say that-Ed)...what?...many women and some men go to the races deliberately dressed to show off their bods...

For crikey sake, early in 2012 (late 2011?) there was a specific, official public decree at one of the major race meetings that women had to wear underwear because so many were going to the races sans modesty...anyway, what's wrong with saying 'great bods'?...(yeah, I thought you were going to say something else...let's move on shall we?-Ed)...say what exactly?...(moving on-Ed)...

Odds: are that gambling will be on the rise, as Pokie notes now have a new size...two new sizes in fact...it is reported that there will be a massive increase in 'problem gambling' in New South Wales as they have just raised the note limit that Poker Machines will accept from $10 notes to $20 and $50 notes...this will reportedly mean that those 'addicted' to Pokies will be able to chew through their pensions, family inheritance, etc, even faster...as you can probably guess, I'm not a fan of 'Pokies' because they are very carefully researched and applied to separate addicts from their cash asap (as soon as possible).

There has also been a lot of criticism in Mt Gambier for the negative effect that hoteliers operating Pokies has had on the availability of live music venues...I appreciate the argument that purely as a business decision a quiet regular income via pokies wins out over providing live music which requires costly extra service staff and security personnel, and can result in damages to toilets, etc...but the social problems caused by Pokies are absolutely undeniable.

I acknowledge that not every person who plays a Pokie is an addict, but also remind readers that 8-10 years ago, Mt Gambier was reported as the per capita Poker Machine capital of the world. There would no doubt be concerns from Support Provider services that the closing of the Holden Plant in Elizabeth (Adelaide) will lead to the social disruption and dysfunction that exacerbates problem gambling with Pokies

Sods: are for turning and so are cheeks, but the sods running SACA are a pack of freaks...I'm not sure if 'sod' as an abusive term stems from 'Sodom and Gomorrah' or 'Sodomite' or whatevs, or from the supposed worthlessness of a lump of dirt...don't know, don't care, so long as it gets the point across that I ain't happy ma'...(SACA is the South Australian Cricket Assoc)

'Oh, the Adelaide Oval Redevelopment is just so great...national Australian Rules Football (AFL) will be back there and to protect the crickety bits we've got super-dooper 'drop-in pitches'...hooray for us'...very, very expensive drop-in pitches thanks very much...(what's a 'drop-in pitch'?...for that matter, what's a pitch?-Ed)...the actual strip of specially compacted earth and lawn where the batters bat, the bowlers bowl, etc at the centre of the oval...(ah-Ed).

A 'drop-in pitch' is removed en masse at the end of the cricket season to protect it from the rough and tumble of AFL and stored and maintained elsewhere...(so removing it, storing it, putting in some other turf, and then I assume replacing the pitch again 6 months later...isn't that going to be very expensive?-Ed)...very...(and then doing that year after year-Ed)...astute observation my learned friend...(and does that make the pitches themselves 'sods' because they're technically just super-sized, extremely expensive lumps of dirt?-Ed)...nice...('super sods' perhaps?-Ed)...no need to over do it...(sorry-Ed)...

So, moving super expensive sods round and round and round...over and over and over...(the same ground covering the same ground in replacing itself-Ed)...unfortunately that makes perfect sense.

A 'pitch' is also the spiel that one presents to promote an idea or project, eg, the Rann/Weatherill Labor state government's 'pitch' to the SACA to get SACA approval for the Adelaide Oval included the promise to write-off SACA debts nearing $90million...(ohhh, so a 'pitch' is a bribe-Ed)...hilarious.

Bits: of course are for exploratory drilling and the looming environmental disaster of chemicals spilling into aquifers and leeching, seeping Methane pollution as we seek a solution for all our problems at the bottom of a dirty great hole...(witty Wilde, witty-Ed)...ta...and the problems that the demise of manufacturing at General Motors Holden will precipitate for the South East and the rest of regional South Australia as 'jobs' becomes the sole basic justification for pretty much everything mining...and that sees the minimalist environmental restrictions currently in place, duly shredded...and that means frickin' Fracking.

Fracking (Coal Seam Gas Extraction) exploration drilling plans for the Penola area has drawn a muted opposing response, but that has to be better than none at all...and that could be a 'lack of reportage' as opposed to an abundance of apathy...at least it was featured recently on ABC TVs Landline, including interviews with a couple of locals...and any publicity is better than none.

Unfortunately I don't think that the Labor or Liberal parties give a fat dead rat's fundamental when it comes to the rights and welfare of Regional South Australia, and they have both already committed to CSG Fracking...so where do citizens turn at the March 2014 state election if they wish to vote against the insanely ludicrous proposition of pouring tons of untested chemicals into the ground in the middle of one of the world's premium wine producing regions?

Bods: are us it's simple as that; bods fry in the sun so wear a hat; bods on the ground do a presence make; bods on the ground to Lock The Gate...LTG is the movement that grew from opposition to CSG Fracking in the Eastern states, but has had little effect dealing with the highly corrupted pro-mining attitudes and legislation in place in those states...and nothing is different here.

And yesterday's Melbourne Inner City Tunnel protests also saw plenty of bods on the ground, courtesy of the police who attacked peaceful protesters exercising their allegedly democratic right to oppose...the footage was almost hilarious as police came jogging in single file from around the corner where they had been hiding...(you could almost here them going hup, hup, hup, hup-Ed)...not so hilarious as they immediately ripped into those just standing there, grabbing people and flinging them to the ground.

Given the current spate of 'one punch deaths' where people have died after hitting their heads on the ground, how is it appropriate for police to enforce the law and restore the peace by assaulting unarmed people who legally are powerless to even protect themselves let alone retaliate?...anyone of those people violently thrown to the ground could have suffered a serious even fatal injury.

It puts me in mind of the Coolamdiddie Drain (spelling?) protests where SAPol turned out a dozen armed officers to deal with a handful of peaceful protestors...and hopefully this is what happens in the South East...(what?-Ed)...hopefully there is so much resistance to Fracking that they have to turn out the Peelers to deal wif' 'em uppity peasants...more power to the people in stopping frickin' Frackin'.

Tomorrow: Hypocrisy - Thy Name be Politics

Politicians accusing other politicians of playing politics, ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

I am Nick Fletcher and this is my blog...cheers and laters.


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