Merry Christmas

My gift to you - a redesigned site.

We're off to see the Morrows in South Australia.

See you in 2006.

It's Hot

Kangaroo and Juliet

In honor of the Kangaroo's new culinary name, Australus, I have penned the following (slightly plagiarized) short play:

Juliet:
What's in a name? That which we call a Kangaroo
By any other word would smell as tasty.
So Kangaroo would, were he not Kangaroo called,
Retain that dear perfection which he owes
Without that title. Kangaroo, doff thy name;
And for thy name, which is no part of thee,
Take all myself.

Kangaroo:
I take thee at thy word.
Call me but Australus, and I'll be new baptized;
Henceforth I never will be Kangaroo.

FIN

Snack Attack Mo**** Fu****!!

This is now ubiquitous, and represents the first funny thing to come from SNL in years. "You can call us Aaron Burr, from the way we're droppin' Hamiltons" - Sublime

But, I'm still partial to Star Wars Gangsta Rap

Courtesy Newley & Tony

Australians on Race

Howard got it wrong on racism, poll finds

The Deneumont

Another weekend of racial riots failed to materialize this past weekend, due to sharp rhetoric from the New South Wales Premier and heaps of police on Sydney's beaches. The police declared most of the beaches around Sydney "No-Go" areas, and although they didn't turn anyone away, few showed up. Crowds at most of the area beaches were about an order of magnitude below normal, and some of those that did make their way to the beaches had to endure traffic stops and vehicle searches. Nevertheless, arrests were made, largely involving young dipshits. The most publicized arrest involved two teenagers, taken off of a bus en route to Bondi Beach, carrying two 1-liter bottles of gasoline (aka, petrol). In their court appearance they claimed to be busing in the gasoline from Liverpool (40 km away) for a mate who'd run out of gas in Bondi.

Conan Jailed

Conan the Barbarian (aka, Conan the Destoyer) was allegedly one of the many individuals arrested over the weekend by police in the continuing crackdown on racial violence in Sydney's south. Conan was carrying multiple weapons, pictured here, which were immediately confiscated.

More Hoff

Because I can't resist, here's a link to the Hoff's current ad campaign for Pepsi in Australia (get yourself a Hoff screensaver or desktop image).

Also, check out the Hasselhoff Ready for Action tour website. Brilliant!

Christmas with The Hoff

Saturday evening, Uta and I attended Carols in the Domain, one of Sydney's annual Christmas traditions (though repeated in various forms throughout the land), featuring a herd of B-list celebrities in a Christmas variety show. We spent three delightful hours people watching, eating Bratwurst und Broetchen (ohne Sauerkraut) served by authentic Germans, and listening to pop-revisionist performances of classic Christmas songs. The headliner was none other than David "Knight Rider" Hasselhoff (singing God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen, if I recall), who seems to have taken up semi-permanent residence in Australia, much to the delight of a few.

Combat Wombat

. . . best name for a hip-hop act ever!!!

And yes, they're Australian.

One Year Anniversary

The Dark Side

Sydney's seaside suburbs turned ugly over the past week as tensions between white and Middle Eastern Australians spilled over - complete with pro-Aussie (or anti-immigrant, depending on one's perspective) rallies, vandalism, violence, and riot police. The unrest kicked off last weekend, when two lifeguards from the Cronulla life-saving station were attacked by a gang of Middle Eastern youths, and an act for which some appear to hold the entire immigrant population of South Sydney accountable. A week later, thousands of white Australians arrived at Cronulla to "take back their beach", leading to summary attacks on anyone resembling someone of Middle Eastern descent. And since one good turn deserves another, gangs of Middle Eastern youths took to the streets last night vandalizing vehicles and attacking individuals in neighboring communities. The images on the news were a bit surreal and hard to reconcile with what is generally a very friendly country, but demonstrate that, like just about everywhere on Earth, one doesn't have to dig too deep to find resentment.

Update 13/12/05: The show goes on. . .Muslim youths rallied around a mosque last night in anticipation of retaliatory strikes. When those didn't occur, they appear to have gotten bored and went on another spree of vandalism. Meanwhile, Australia's politicians are red with embarrassment - this not being the kind of publicity Australia wants, particularly with the Commonwealth Games coming up in March. Much effort is being made to present the violence as something other than racially-based, despite the overt racial rhetoric. Meanwhile, calls continue to go out this week for a "race war", white nationalists are climbing over each other to take credit for the "social uprising", and allegedly Melbourne "patriots" are eager to stage their own little "hate-in". What a bunch of wankers.

Break-Up

Australia seems to have split with the United States over post-2012 international greenhouse gas mitigation efforts. Australia has opted to back Canada's proposal for two more years of discussions toward a post-Kyoto agreement, although OZ is clearly not supportive of the Kyoto-style way of doing business and is increasingly advocating a different "more flexible" approach. Meanwhile, Paula Dobriansky, US under secretary of State has stated, "It is our belief that progress cannot be made through these formalised discussions." While the U.S. chief negotiator, Harlon Watson, stated "Formalized processes. . .are, in fact, negotiations." So, just to translate all this - the U.S. State Department is against any discussions about whether or not there should be further negotiations regarding the potential for another set of post-2012 emissions reductions, because such discussions (when formal) are unproductive and just plain old negotiations in disguise. You know what - it doesn't make any more sense when it's translated. What a bunch of rubbish. So does this suggest a new strategy for the U.S. - informal discussions? I envision a future of climate change pool parties and pub crawls, where negotiators can finally let their hair down and tackle the climate challenge without all the hassle of diplomacy, international law, commitment, responsibility, equity, and compromise that the U.S. State Department finds so objectionable. I'm sure if everyone would just chill out and meet up at Paula's for some cold beers and Yahtzee, we'd get it all sorted in no time.

New Orleans Takes Another Blow

This article in the Washington Post highlights yet another group of victims of Hurricane Katrina - New Orleans' universities.

Thumbsucker

Last night, a bunch of us science types went to see Thumbsucker, a film which I was almost entirely alone in liking. I found quite a number of scenes absolutely hysterical, but I often found myself laughing alone, which made me a bit uncomfortable. We followed the film with dinner at Sweet Basil, a Thai restaurant at the South Yarra/Prahran interface. Dinner was good despite Donna's discovery of glass in her food, which obviously led to some protests on our part.

World Cup 2006: Where Everyone Scores!

A proactive entrepreneur in Berlin appears to have opened Europe's largest brothel in anticipation of millions of World Cup fans looking for entertainment between games.

Rain

After an entire day of pouring rain, such as Melbourne experienced yesterday, you'd think one would be a bit more cautious when driving one's car through areas posted with signs saying "road subject to flooding".

Big Shark

A "monster" shark went shopping for humans along Sydney's famous Bondi beach yesterday, prompting fits of screaming and panic among beachgoers.

Out of Africa

In other climate news, new evidence suggests that climate change may have been one of the driving forces that led to the initial migration of Homo sapiens out of Africa.

With Friends Like These. . .

Newley posted an article re: this poster from Friends of the Earth. Newley's already eloquently covered the issue of oversimplification, but I found something else rather odd. On the FOE website, they have an email campaign associated with this poster that allows you to send a form email to unnamed leaders "at all levels of government" about the dangers of global warming and hurricanes and the various actions that should be taken to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Interestingly, none of those actions include anything to actually reduce human vulnerability to such storms. All the greenhouse gas mitigation in the world would do nothing to reduce the vulnerability of cities like New Orleans to hurricanes. Now I can only assume that FOE knows this, particularly given the fact that in their statement re: Hurricane Katrina, dated September 7th, they attribute the damages in New Orleans to failed flood control measures, and make no mention of global warming whatsoever. So why the mixed messages? Because, I imagine, a campaign featuring deadly megastorms is more sexy and more scary (and thus attracts more donations), than a campaign featuring more robust engineering for flood control projects overseen by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. In short, it's about money.

America Rules

As the parties gather once again for the international negotiations associated with the Kyoto Protocol (and its potential offspring), American continues to lead the pack in the Fossil Awards - awarded each day during negotiations by the Climate Action Network to countries taking particularly unproductive or obstructionist stances. America's tally over the years stands at 170, compared to Canada's (#2) 89. Australia makes the top five, with 67.

Hot Springs

Uta and I got out of the city on Sunday for an outing with my CSIRO colleagues to the Mornington Peninsula, and specifically, the relatively new Peninsula Hot Springs, which were allegedly started by a guy who spent years drilling holes in the peninsula in search of hot rocks. We started with lunch (and several drinks) at Leanne's country estate in the peninsula's wine region (which explains the plethora of Italian and German sports cars in the area), and hit the springs at around 5:00 pm, allowing time for all the riff-raff [a phrase which appears to have its origins in Medieval French] to clear off. The springs were indeed hot, no doubt about that. We were given the boot promptly at 7:00 and headed back to Leanne's to pick up where we'd left off with eating and drinking (with some grudge-match table tennis and darts for good measure).

From Russia with Love

Russian squirrel pack 'kills dog'

Squirrels have bitten to death a stray dog which was barking at them in a Russian park, local media report.

W(iggles)TO

Last night, Trade Minister Mark Vaile named The Wiggles as Australia's Exporter of the Year.

Not sure what this says about the status of Australia's economy, or, given the greatest importer of Wiggles gear is the USA, the status of American taste.

Check this out. . .

Click on the image below to see it in motion.

If you stare at the black + in the center, the moving dot turns green.

If you concentrate on the black + in the center of the picture, all the pink dots will slowly disappear, and you will only see a green dot rotating.