The Sydney siege was handled totally wrongly.

The Sydney siege was handled totally wrongly.  

Terrorism is not directed at the immediate victims but at nurturing fear in the wider population.  The NSW authorities made sure that the entire nation shared the terror of the hostages.  They refused to communicate with him via public media, but it would have been better if no one knew what was happening till it was over.   In the end, the tragic deaths of two young people, one a parent of three infants, were not an isolated, tragic incident and became a frightening possibility for every Australian.   Public attention is giving oxygen to their deranged operations.  Nothing is likely to encourage more of the same acts than a total media coverage, worldwide, of the power of an individual.  Ironically, they are often not clearly aware of their own cause, for which they are pleased to die.  

There should have been a complete media ban on it until it was resolved.  One madman took an entire city hostage, not just a score of people.  There was no need to lock down and evacuate such a large area.  He could not have had a large bomb.  The police were in contact with him, but refusing to negotiate; even though the best response to a madman is to humour him.  Once they knew who he was, did they bring anyone from Lakamba to talk to him?  Apparently not.  Instead of a single operation, it appears many government departments besides the police were involved and a lot of effort went into co-ordinating them. 

Perhaps the greatest tragedy is how we, as a society, failed the perpetrator.  There are no bad people, just people who do bad things.  Certainly, he was a madman; sane people do not behave like that.  He is not alone in blaming others, or society in general, or “them” for our own failings or for imagined insults and self-inflicted damages; he was out on bail, but apparently there had never been a psychiatric assessment of him (though there had been on Gordon Bryant, for all the good that did) and should have been receiving psychiatric counselling, perhaps with regular group work that included re-examining his religious beliefs in a more socially acceptable way. 

  Herald Sun Police Report

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/national/what-was-really-going-on-in-negotiations-between-police-and-man-haron-monis/story-fni0xqrb-1227158546221?sv=2e362f26e03b91f90022fc32fd655e4c&utm_source=Herald%20Sun&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=editorial&net_sub_uid=17760267

The beginning of the end

12/12/14 Friday
What a depressingly wrong post last week, but things have gone worse since then.  Not with Billy, however, who has been quite supportive, though it must be horrible for him.  Till yesterday, I had been feeling quite well with no pain, and Billy must have been making extra effort to be happy and nice.  Then yesterday I had my appointment with Alexandra in Kew (lovely suburb) and I got there with no problem, with time for a coffee at the cafe where I used to have lunch when I saw her in the afternoons.  Anyway, she kept me waiting nearly half an hour.  I had said hello when I walked in, but then I saw a sign on the notice board in the waiting room that said to enquire if one was waiting more than ten minutes, which I had been; so I enquired.

Eventually she came out, full of apologies.  I wondered if I had done the right thing bringing a plant for her new room, but she was delighted.  It was difficult buying it, as they firstly wrapped it magnificently, and I was totally put off by the sight of it, but as I told Alexandra, whereas years ago I would have gone ballistic at them, yesterday, I just went speechless and backed away.  (I did the same today when confronted by the carpet seller who used to be opposite me in HS who nominated me, he said he had heard I god a low proce for me property, and I could not speak to correct him, as if it his business.  Who started that rumour, the purchasor, who wanted to be known to have got it at a good price.)  She chased after me, and eventually I bought an unwrapped one, not in the paper bag of the wrong size, but a plastic bag. 

The session went till 12.30, so I ended up being late to meet Barb.  That was good, except for the miserable arguments over her celebration of the hideous Xmas and her hatred of Jews.  She mentioned it when boarding the tram at the end, but I dismissed it as not thinking less of her for her beliefs.  She said she understood where I was coming from.  Actually, I think she has just absorbed a lot of Social beliefs without examining them, and to think, the poor dear thinks she has free will and her own ideas.  After we left the cafe, where we had sat for hours over just two coffees each, I felt the wobbly legs.  But it wasn't a problem as I went to the PO box and made it to the train and then home.  I did buy a samosa on the way, but I didn't tell Billy.

After I got home, the pain returned but it had faded enough by the time I went to Billy's that I could cook the gnocci he had bought, and the suace.  But I only ate some as the pain came back, and it lasted a long time.  However it was replaced by an overwhelming overall sensation of unwellness.  Not pain.  It lasted for hours.  I kept watching TV, went to the toilet, lay on the couch, threw up a little bit, and eventually made it home with Billy's help, after he had fed the possums alone.

This morning, I woke feeling 90% and made it to the office, but didn't do much.  Went to the Bank to start the new eTrade.  Shall I be well enough to go to the Opera tonight?



6/12/14
Today is the beginning of the end of me.  I think it is all over with Billy, and he was my only reason to keep going.  Today started as a normal Saturday.  I woke late after staying up on the InterNet after returning from the Opera last night.  I finally made it to the Iga, no pain.  Shopped leisurelyly.  There was an accident at the end of my street while I was in the shop.  I saw it on my return.

Billy was in his room when I went round at noon, as I usually do on Saturday.  He was in a mood.  We did not kiss, perhaps the first time in ages if not ever.  His family had phoned, but he could not speak because I was expected.  After I started cooking, he went you with the phone to the back yard to ring Reservoir.  I got on with the cooking, which I enjoy and which was going well.  I imagined I was being filmed for a cooking demonstration, with a lot of reference to smells.

When he came back he was annoyed because Edward has phoned to take him to the American shop.  He refused because I was making lunch.  I got annoyed and said he could have invited me too, and went on cooking.  It was nearly ready.  When I served up, I said we would have eaten soon so he could go.  He finished quickly, as he always does, but I am slow.  He was not ready with our dvd, flying doctors, a saturday ritual, but he rarely is.  Anyway, when I was three quarters eaten he said Edward was ready, not there but waiting at the IGA (presumably to avoid me), so I packed up the rest of my food and left.

I now feel it is over for us, finally.  How often have I thought that, but always stayed?  Anyway, I guess that is the end.  He can celebrate his birthday on Tuesday without me.  I will go and see Fallstaff.

I will miss the programmes we watch together.  I genuinely enjoy them but won't watch them alone, even if he gave me copies of the dvds.  I guess I will go back to taking my laundry to the cleaners.  Perhaps I will go back to going to Shul on Saturdays, and at least I won't need to desecrate the Sabbath for his sake each week.  

Miserable, doubly mysterious day.

It is a sign of how highly your Physician values you when he greets you with, "What can we do for you today?"  Then, he did not have my test results.  Then, when I described the onset of the pain in detail, he said he was mystefied by the symptoms, particularly the sudden start and stopping of the pain.  He said it could be neurological, all in my mind.

Then in the office, I couldn't check my emil.  I kept being thrown back to the log-on page.  I phoned the ISP, and spoke to Simon.  I spoke again after my return from the dr and reloading everything etc.  Then he talked me through deleting kookies and more but still it didn't work.  Eventually he said it was a connection problem, and I phoned Vodaphone.  What a saga getting through but eventually a nice guy helped me find out there was nothing wrong with the connection.  Another mystery.  It works fine on this computer.  What does that mean?

New view of pebble garden.

Today I feel brilliant. 15-11-14

Today should be remembered.  I have never felt this good, certainly never better.  If only I always felt like this, but the bouts of pain in the last week have been horriffic, but not today.  Just made it to the Cinema on Thursday and then hated the film.  Had no trouble last night at the Malthouse, except I had tix for next week by mistake, and the guy whose seat I sat in was on the committee and took me and got my ticket changed so I saw the show from quite a good seat of a woman too sick to come next to whose husband I sat. 

Today, shopped, with ghusto and carried everything pain free.  Made excellent lunch for Billy and me and then helped him paint and fix the gutters.  All went well.  Also saw a very good episode of Murder She Wrote, it is such a melodrama but the episodes starring Angela Lansberry are sometimes very good.

Every minute, I dread the return of the pain.  It has been cripling.  Ellen saw me in the office one Wednesday doubled over in pain.  I keep hoping that it is the residual effect of the operation as nerves grow back, but why just in my left hip, and then spreading from there?  Then I might hope it would end and I would recover.  It could be the Cancer in my bones.  My life alternates between feeling brilliant when I'm well, to totally depressed and terminal when I feel the pain.  Is it returning now?

Anthropic principle

The Anthropic Principle suggests importance that we, as sentient beings, know of our own existence.  The Universe exists in such a way that such entities have evolved.  One explanation is the multiverse, that suggests there are "symultaneously" or consecutively or overlapping in other dimensions, a multiplicity of universes, perhaps an infinitude, and we happen to exist in the one in which it is possible for us to exist.

However, if there is consciousness to the universe on some large scale, that is not carbon-chemistry based but exists in the energy interchange between galaxies, then it could have evolved from its earliest existence with the compaitibility of consciusness existing at all.  First came "mind" in a pure and universal form, existing as the dynamic superstrate of an energy exchange system that gradually precipitated into material existence, initially with a single, high-energy state that gradually divided as the system cooled, but all the while remaining consistent witht he existence of consciousness, till finally one or more planets like ours developed on which sentient creatures could evolve that could know all this.  The universe is aware of itself, but are we the first creatures to do this? Or are we fragmenatry consciousnesses and parts of a much greater "mind"?

In other words, the reason for the anthropic principle is not coincidence or statistical certainty, but was built into the universe from its earliest existence. 

Pluralism

"Pluralism thus tries to encourage members of society to accommodate their differences by avoiding extremism (adhering solely to one value, or at the very least refusing to recognize others as legitimate) and engaging in good faith dialogue. Pluralists also seek the construction or reform of social institutions in order to reflect and balance competing principles."

This from the WikiPedia entry on Pluralism.  Why have I only just discovered this concept?  I have read so much political theory, but never a mention of Pluralism, not that I can now recall.  Am I really losing my memory?   Am I discovering things I forgot?

New Whig long ago was advocating the Unity Government.  A single Cabinet made up of the best of both sides, all working towards the common good.  It happens during times of war, which we are perhaps close to now anyway, so should be prepared.

I am so seriously thinking of standing again for Parliament as I did twelve years ago.  If I felt really well I would.  I am so recovered from the pathetic trauma I suffered as a child that kept me introverted and lacking in initiative for over sixty years till just recently, thanks to Donovan and Alexandra.  Now I am ready to do the things I never could.  Perhaps just one chance to contribute one term to the future of Victoria. How I would change this state.  The three free Bs. Consensus rules.  Close identification with Country.  I have till next Friday.  I could again go to Malvern Central and just approach people.  I could walk up the street here.  That could be a hoot.  Anyway, I could do it.  Then get lots of publicity as the oldest candidate, especially as I have original ideas.

Mr O'Brien will resign if his party loses, in my opinion, and go into private enterprise where he could make a large fortune, before returning to Politics when the pendulum is about to swing back in his direction.  He might be pleased to be beaten by me, than hang around as an opposition, powerless anything for another term.  I would be doing him a favour.

My great conceit

My great conceit is that I am actually like the Prophets in the Bible, and I am the one who does have the knowledge.  Years ago I started avoiding Yom Kippur because of the story of Jonah they tell that day, and I always felt like him, perhaps an ancestor.  As if I knew this story that I was supposed to tell everyone, that I had lain in bed sick and dying and promising I would tell if I recovered, except I became well and never told, and now it is too late, I am old and sterile.

The message is simple: the unity of G-D.  End the divisiveness of every religion thinking their idea of the single ultimate mind is the correct one, and more important the ideas of other religions are wrong. Yet that leads to a duplicity of deities.  Everyone must come to the agreement that there is only one G-D and even if other people appear to be worshiping something different, it is really the same deity, by a different name and with differently listed attributes. 

So why, if this is not so, did I not stick with the religious life-style, the two separate years I approached it?  I feel it is a denial, like Jonah running away.  I need to have proved myself a wicked sinner, at least in my own eyes, to prove that I am not a special person in any way.   Even when I thought of writing one of my many imagined books, I always got caught up in the preface asserting my ordinariness, and explaining that these insights that I present are not due to any superiority on my part or any privileged connection to the universe, but just because I am an introvert who has been observing the world and humanity for half a century and now has a good idea about what is and what could or should be.  I am certainly not special, indeed, I am wicked which proves it.  

Now I have had this terrible operation, with the core of my manhood cut out.  And just this week an article in the paper testifies to the idea I wondered some years ago if my enlarged prostate was not caused by my lack of sexual activity.  

If there is an energy system, with lots of component parts, it will rattle along in harmony with itself, being all part of a universal whole as well as being interconnected sub-systems.  If some part is dysfunctional, or not developing in parallel with the rest, the shaking and the energy interchange will shuffle the recalcitrant part into harmony with the whole.  It will feel like Divine Intervention to the other sub-systems.

Queen Maxima and King Willem-Alexander on state visit to Japan - hellomagazine.com

Queen Maxima and King Willem-Alexander on state visit to Japan - hellomagazine.com



This is so different from how the Dutch and other European colonial powers swept into the East, including Japan a couple of centuries ago.  In historical terms, with the long view, this is a telling and touching photograph.  East meets West very cordially and as equals.  

In terms of international diplomacy, this shows the closest bond at the highest level between a representative of the European Union and Japan.  The Chinese must be feeling very left-out.  Perhaps if they re-instated their Emperor things might be different.  It is a much more polite way of expressing it publicly than shared military exercises, which probably do happen but in private, or meetings between military leaders, such as the head of NATO and the Japanese PM.  The existence of Monarchy serves a useful purpose.  Perhaps we will see the world line up as Monarchies versus Republics.  It could develop without anyone really noticing the correlation.

Tweeting Queen

Here is a picture of Her Majesty tweeting.  It gives HM verisimilitude in the virtual realm.

The Plan to resettle Palestinian refugees into Sinai and the unity of Jerusalem.

The first issue is the future of the so called Palestinians, the descendants of the Biblical Philistines. Many are crowded into the tiny Gaza Strip. Many of them, and many more in Jordan and other surrounding countries genuinely believe that Israel will soon cease to exist, the Jews will all be gone, perhaps exterminated, and all these Refugess and descendants of refugees will be able to return to some mythical, ancestral lands. This is the true policy of genocide but with clever publicity for persuasive oratory many people are duped into believing that it is the Israelis who want to destroy the Palestinian Arabs. Another similar reversal is the charge of apartheid, even though Arabs who stayed or returned to Israel now enjoy full citizenship rights, in excess, particularly for women, over people in any other Arab or Moslem country, but Jews are forbidden to live in any Arab or Moslem country, including a putative future Palestinian State. The riots against a few Jews in an Arab neighbourhood of East Jerusalem is not seen as the apartheid that it is, but Israel is accused of the same thing, with no evidence, yet it is believed.

One solution is to extend Gaza into Sanai, which is huge and largely uninhabited. The Palestinians could have a country of significant size, perhaps retaining sovereignty over most of the West Bank. This suggestion was supported by Egypt's President al-Sisi but he dropped the whole idea when it was rejected by the Palestinian representatives, presumably because it recognised Israel's right to exist. The un-resettled refugees, now into their third or fourth generation, are testament to the policy that Israel is only temporary and will soon be gone.

It is also perpetuating the problem by continuing to let the Palestinians define their "two state solution" as including half Jerusalem. Israel has endlessly made it clear that Jerusalem is now never to be divided, and that the Palestinian exhortations are merely an ambit claim and that in private discussion it is agreed that Jerusalem will remain Jewish and undivided. However, publicly this claim for half Jerusalem still resonates, especially with extremist Islamists. If it is not going to happen, it should be dropped. The Australian Government should separate the claim for half Jerusalem from the claim for a State under the "Two State Solution" and agree to one but not the other. The Australian Government could make this clear by building an Australian Embassy in Jerusalem, perhaps from land bought at inflated price from departing Arabs in East Jerusalem, also perhaps coming with an offer of resettlement in Australia with a clear progression to full Citizenship.

Thank you for reading this. I don't know how many of the many hundreds of previous likers of this page will still receive messages. Perhaps it will lead to a flurry of unliking, but I hope everyone who has ever read my messages supports the existence of Israel as a Jewish State in the Biblical land that Jews have venerated daily since the expulsion by the Romans. I am attempting to add a link to an article about the issue, so you can see it is real.

Naum Tered



Is There a Plan to Force Palestinians into Sinai? | Global Research

Saving Albert Park: Round and round we go

Host Barbara Clinton introduces the guests. “Tonight we’re devoting our programto the state government re-signing the Formula 1 Grand Prix in Albert Park for a further  five years,” Clinton announces.
“Firstly, I’d like to ask Peter Goad, was this a surprise to us at Save Albert Park? What was your immediate reaction?”

“Well, Barbara, we’ve been protesting against this event now for 20 years,” Goad, the group’s president, replies.

Saving Albert Park: Round and round we go

What God does to your brain - Telegraph

What God does to your brain - Telegraph

Appeal court upholds oath to Queen in citizenship case - The Globe and Mail

Appeal court upholds oath to Queen in citizenship case - The Globe and Mail

The Queen makes all the construction workers laugh.

The Queen stops for photo with Reading station construction workers | Mail Online

Last Thursday, 19th June was a most traumatic day.

Last Thursday, 19th June was a most traumatic day.
On the previous Sunday (a week ago today) I had swum for the first time in ages and it went well.  And then I had enjoyed The King and I, so it was a very good day.  On Tuesday I went to see the Physician, as I had been on the BP medication for a month and was due to go back.  I had felt a lot of arrhythmia in the preceding few weeks.  I had had a long talk with Krista from BUPA on Saturday about it, and repeated it all with Dr Langdon.  Anyway,  by then things were settling down, so I was optimistic in his visit, and my BP was down and everything looked good.
Thursday I swam again, and felt really good afterwards, just a little bit exhausted, but that did not last.  then I got lunch to take back to Billy, like I used to do, but not for him as he had a pie already.  After lunch I had a really intense phone conversation with someone from the Royal Commission into Childhood Abuse.  Then I helped Billy prune the front hedge.  The day was going well, I thought.  When I got home I had another call from another Royal Commission woman, this time about having more counselling, which I think I need.  Anyway, later I felt not so good and my BP was way up again, like 180/90 or something like that.  It has gradually come down since.  I have had a little bit of the arrhythmia since, but it hasn't lasted long each time.

I am so depressed about it all.  I keep thinking that surely my life is soon going to be over.  How much longer can this last.  I have moments of optimism, like thinking once the counselling takes hold I will get better, because surely this problem is due to the stress.  I also have stress over 1209 High Street, who have not paid their rent again.  Con is coming in Monday.  After Brian Smith comes in, so I am not looking forward to a busy morning tomorrow.  I am more upset by the bad treatment from Joanna Kordos, my new tenant.  If she had treated me politely and asked for another rent free month, I would have said yes, but she ignores me and manipulates me and just takes what she wants without asking.

It doesn't rain but it pours.  Just now 11.30, I had a call and now someone is coming in Monday at 9.30 to sign a paper. So three people that day.  It is Con I am dreading. 

This afternoon is another Neon, experimental play at 3.00 with the MTC.  Perhaps it will be good, the one two weeks ago was brilliantly funny.  I started a Facebook page to discuss plays a while back, but gave up on it quickly. 

Oddly, I don't feel too bad right now.  If my BP had not been still up a bit this morning, and hadn't been so high in the last couple of days, I would have gladly swam again.  I really miss it, despite it being boring and tedious.

Jack David Zipes - George Tabori and the Jewish Question - Theater 29:2

Jack David Zipes - George Tabori and the Jewish Question - Theater 29:2

Our world: Pope Francis’s unfriendly visit | JPost | Israel News

Our world: Pope Francis’s unfriendly visit | JPost | Israel News

Ice use drives rise in drug crimes: Victoria Police

With a drop in real crime, the booming Criminal Justice System is fed by the continued criminalisation of recreational drugs.  With "soft drugs" still illegal, the increase is inevitably in "hard", more dangerous drugs like "ice".





Ice use drives rise in drug crimes: Victoria Police

Support soars for the monarchy

Support soars for the monarchy

view.php (JPEG Image, 300 × 300 pixels)

view.php (JPEG Image, 300 × 300 pixels)

Candidly Speaking: Beware of those promoting fake interfaith relations | JPost | Israel News

Candidly Speaking: Beware of those promoting fake interfaith relations | JPost | Israel News

War with Israel is inevitable

This appears to be the tragic future.

Abbas-to-PLO-council-Palestinians-will-never-recognize-Israel-as-Jewish-state

The demands from both sides are irreconcilable.  Israel will not cede half of Jerusalem which the Arabs want to steal.  There is no such thing as ethnic Palestinians, just Arabs who want to live in the geographic area called Palestine.  Their claim for a little state is bogus and temporary because they want all of Islamic lands to be a single Caliphate, and they already have Jordan, where most so called Palestinians live.

There is growing anti-Semitism in the West, particularly in France, but visible in most countries including Australia where the Boycott movement is growing in power.  It will not be long before Israel is alone; but what has changed in Jewish history?  Presently, the current Australian Government supports Israel, but how long will that continue?  Similarly, the USofA continues to support Israel, but clearly a growing part of their population are "lefties" who support Israel's enemies.

The move to water down the defamation laws in Australia could be a back door, under the guise of
'free speech' to permit Holocaust Denial and other racist rants.  It is all very worrying and depressing.

The Sydney Morning Herald is now endorsing our Monarchy.

The Sydney Morning Herald is now endorsing our Monarchy.


"The Queen has outlasted and exhausted the republican movement in Australia. The polls show that support for a republic is fading, not growing. The more young people see the way politics is devolving, the less they will want to install another layer of elected politics and all the egoism, fund-raising, electioneering and public expense that a presidential system would produce.

"The republican movement failed because it has never offered a better system than the one that has served Australia unobtrusively and well for more than a century. It also failed because it became infected by a sneering negativity that has poisoned that well for a generation."


BUT, The Age is persisting with their moaning and yearning for a Republic:

"How does a country as big and successful as Australia still find itself so cravenly tied to a monarchy that prevents one of our own from being head of state?"

 They are still missing the point about the Governor General being our 'head of state', it gets worse:

"And why does a dynamic multicultural country that is perfectly located on the cusp of the Asian century have the Union Jack in the corner of its flag?"
What do they want?  The Chinese, Communist symbol on our flag?
Gradually people are learning, but it is still taking time.

Pesach (Passover) 5774

For some reason, tonight I am missing "family" even more than ever.  It would even have been good having a Jewish boufriend, but of course Billy just buys chocolate eggs and bunnies, thought what they have to do with Easter I have never understood.  Anyway, it has been my stupid choice to fall out with cousins, never marry etc.  So I have no one but myself to blame.

As usual, I bought some motzah so I can eat some alone and remember how we were slaves in Egypt.

Lately, the press is full of discussions about former Foreign Minister Bob Carr and his recent published diary with its claims of the Jewish lobby's powerful influence.  He is obviously anti-Semitic and his claims, though blatantly false, will have a bad effect by encouraging bigots.  He refers to the lobby being in Melbourne, and as he was NSW Premier, he must know no such lobby existed in Sydney and obviously if it existed at all would be equal in both states, so he thinks it is only here.

My health is not good.  My blood pressure is very high, 180/100.  It was much lower when I woke this morning.  I'm half expecting to have a heart attack at any moment.  But despite that I feel quite well, and almost happy. 

Sans Shanti

In my secret diaries on past years, I noted that it was so many days "sans shanti", a combination of French and Hindi, that I knew was too obscure for anyone to discern the meaning.  Even here and now, I cannot bring myself to write exactly what I mean.

Most of last year I kept thinking of starting again.  I put it off till after The Ring, because I knew those long operas would be difficult if I was craving, but only a week or so after it finished, I was back into it.  By then I had been seeing Donovan regularly, and progressed from the Friday at St Kilda to Tuesday at East Bentleigh.  Was it a return to "shanti" (peace) that stuffed up my progress?  I felt it was helping, but perhaps the opposite was the case.  It certainly helped with the massage treatment, but that is a different thing.  I have been going each Tuesday for acupuncture also, and I don't know how it affects that.

Anyway, now our regular supply has dried up.  So I have stopped again.  My heart is irregular again, which I noticed in January when I stopped for a few days.  Lately, it has been on and off again, and that has really stuffed me around.  I can either do it all the time or not at all.

Friday.
I'm a lot better today.  I went to Barbs yesterday for lunch and to get something for Billy.  She could be the access to our new supply, though I don't think any will be for me.  I had pains in my lower gut which I was sure were either bowel cancer or prostate cancer.  I finally found a chemist that stocked the bowel cancer test kit, which I will use at the weekend, then we shall see.  I might still go to the Urologist and insist on an operation rather than another biopsy, but that won't be till after Pesach at the earliest.

Just now, I thought I was on a tram with good time to connect to the bus, but we had to change trams at Tooronga Road.  (I always think: some things are wrong, some are wronger and this is too wronger.) I had just two minutes to run down the hill, with the lights against me, but I ran to the other side of the road, crossed against the lights, ran down the hill and saw the bus had already left, but it was stopped at the traffic lights across the freeway, so I ran over and he opened the door.

Tonight is a MTC play that won awards in Sydney.  I don't expect I shall enjoy it!!

Saturday
Feeling better today, but still had some pains in lower abdomen last night.  Not acute pain, but felt something.  It is a worry.  I did the first of the bowel cancer tests this morning and will do another tomorrow.  I think that part of me is fine.  My prostate is the problem.    I piss so often and so slowly.  Perhaps the acupuncture is making it worse.  I will give it another couple of weeks, then if I still feel bad like this I will insist on an operation.  I suppose there is no desperate rush because if the cancer were spreading, I would feel generally bad, wouldn't I?

Saturday afternoon:
When I got to Billy, he showed me how Edward had helped him last night rearrange the kitchen.  I have been replaced.  I felt so bad, I cannot tell you.  I was on the verge of tears.  I couldn't say anything. I just made lunch and Billy put some things back.  But he has thrown out a lot of things that were familiar to me there.   Now, he is off with Edward to go shopping, that I pay for, of course.  He won't go places with me, won't visit me.  Just tolerates me being there sometimes so I will keep paying for everything.  It is such a fraud.

The sooner I have a heart attack or get cancer, the better.

Monday.
It is a week now "sans shanti".  The irregularity has ended, but for the last day or two I have had very high blood pressure.  (I have a machine)  Right now I feel fine, but earlier I felt like I was on the verge of a heart attack.  Slight shortness of breath, a bit of pain in my chest and left arm, not very noticeable, but there.

Tomorrow I go for the acupuncture again.  I haven't mentioned anything to him and now I wonder if it was rank foolishness to indulge in the last few months.  Did it make all the cost of the acupuncture worthless?  More important, is that why my visits to Donovan have gone nowhere.  This morning again I went to the office with the intention of finishing "the letter", but again couldn't face it.  So I still have not made a formal complaint about being raped.  I was going to write to Dr Wayne and report how hopeless Donovan has been.  I was going to cancel tomorrow's visit, but I will go ahead with it.  I keep thinking about how I will tell him it is my last visit.  I sent him a copy of my letter to Val, and imagine they talked about me, but I am sure they didn't.  What can anyone do?  Nothing.  I must just go on alone, if I survive, as I guess I shall.

Tuesday:
That was beyond wierd.
This morning I woke feeling nearly as bad as yesterday.  I managed to shower etc and walked through the "forest" as usual up to the acupuncture.  Afterwards, I did feel much relaxed and got the bus to Donovan.  To my surprise I was calm and rational, and spoke of myself as if everything was fine and I had coped with everything.  I didn't tell him how I nearly cancelled, but shook hands at the end and thanked him for all his help etc.

Then I bussed back to Billy, and enjoyed a Revenge with him and a couple of Phineases alone.  Then came back here.  I could feel the old feeling of exhaustion returning as I walked back.  I looked around to see if there was at least one thing I could put out for the hard waste collection, but couldn't find anything.  Instead I looked at the detritus of my life, which overwhelms me.  I started to practice the keyboard, but had no enthusiasm for it, and came back here.

Somehow, I feel as if I have passed through something significant and am a new person in some way.  But I don't know how to get on top of my house or make something of my dysfunctional life.

Saturday:
Where has the week gone?  Yesterday I woke feeling really bad, again, with blood pressure over the top.  (190/100)  Being a holiday, Billy wanted me to go there to make lunch.  I think he is trying to be very nice to me, in his vague way, perhaps to compensate for his friendship with Edward.  When I got there, he told me he had already been to Joe's and Edward had driven him.  I don't know what to make of that.  Anyway, as the day progressed I felt better, By the evening I was OK to go out and went to the Muppets show I had a ticket for; it was OK, silly but funny and clever impro.  As soon as I got home, Barbara phoned, so I talked to her for a while.  Now off to Billy again.

Wick trimming

Just now, filling my lamp, I had a debilitating memory: suddenly I was struck by a powerful ennui, and felt the exhausting tedium of feeling I had been doing this self same thing, not just for years but for centuries.  In past years, I amused myself by thinking how I was sharing a common experience with ancestors and people gone bye through my use of old fashioned lighting, pre electricity.  Those games of imagining I were living in those past times must have seeped into my memories in a way that now I remember them not as make-believe but a memory of experiences.

Talk about shooting yourself in the foot. In... - Australians for Constitutional Monarchy

If a lie is repeated often enough, it will become true. 

Also, fighting Republicans makes them more determined to win out of principle. Having a better argument is like having a bigger sword: it doesn't automatically make you the winner.

That is the comment I left on this WWWeb Site: 


Talk about shooting yourself in the foot. In... - Australians for Constitutional Monarchy

 The way to ensure the succession into the future of the Australian Crown is to take all the seperatge arguments in favour of a Republic, in particular the Social Ideals that are represented by the collective concept of the ideal Republic, but which need not be, and show they can all be achieved better under the Crown, and any changes that might still be needed can be achieved quicker, more smoothly and with wider community consultation and acceptance than via the change to a Republic.

If the change is not intended to achieve any real social change it is just cosmetic.  Changing a symbol just because we like the look of the new one more might be valid, but should be seen for what it is and not be treated as an irrelevant side issue, hidden under a lot of other pretend issues that are actually not issues at all, like Australian Independence, which we already have totally.

A debate about symbolism is really all that it is about, because one would hope that any genuine social change that is desirable would have been achieved by now or be in the process, such as gender equality, equal representation under the law and Aboriginal Reconciliation.  Were Australia to become a Republic, looking at how social interactions and rights and duties, nothing should change, although an enormous change in the Bureaucratic manifestation would be necessary, requiring the rebranding of every piece of stationary and every title in the entire Public Service; the cost to do effectively nothing but a name change would be vast, though arguably it would be a good Economic Stimulus like the boost from the introduction of the GST.

Queen meets Pope and promotes women's rights in Rome.

Her Majesty the Queen continues to make history, this time by meeting His Holiness in normal clothes instead of the traditional black for repressed women.  Canterbury and Rome are becoming ever closer, and it is surely just a matter of time before they are in communion with each other, when the exact relationship between the Head of the CofE and the Bishop of Rome is resolved.  


Thanks to that lilac dress, 'Queen meets Pope' was a surprise win for women | Joanna Moorhead | theguardian.com

With mouse unplugged.

The cursor entered jump mode again, or that is what I call it when the cursor randomly jumps to the top left corner of the screen, or else it either does not register at all or it sticks to what ever it was clicked on and needs to be unclicked or what ever it is will drag to somewhere else.  These things do not follow a sequence but sometimes happen.  They do not appear to happen if I use the little touch pad, but I have never been proficient at the touch pad, and mostly have had it turned off as my hand sometimes touches it accidentally, unless I keep my fingers off the pad.  Actually, I think I can do it now.  I suddenly notice I don't actually have my fingers resting on the keyboard as I used to do, keeping the hands in position, but I can type just as well with my hands hovering over the keypad.  It could even be slightly more regular and quicker.  Who could know how different life could be.  I hope it stays, and it probably will.  Only by thinking about the key pad did I notice I wasn't touching it any more and felt my fingers going to the keys as if they knew where they were without me looking at them.  Of course the answer is easy to explain, due to the recent key-board practising, where I have been making an effort to learn to play without looking, which is a bit spooky.

I keep thinking about organising an event for the Queen's Birthday Public Holiday.   Why am I writing this here?  Because the reason I don't is because I am feeling so unwell a lot of the time.  I helped Billy yesterday move a lot of concrete blocks from the back to the front.  I should have taken photographs of the before and after.  It was a sort of bar-b-cue, but now it is a decorative fence between Billy and the people next door.

Also thinking of Jerusalem.  I should learn Hebrew so I can write my treatise in it, both for current Israeli readers and also so it will be linked stylistically with the previous Two Temples.  

The Third Temple in Jerusalem should not be an attempted reconstruction of the Second.  This is a mistake that present reconstructionists fall into. 

Pageviews

I've had four page views today and seven yesterday.  Who are you?  I wish someone would leave a message.  How do they find me?  Why me?  The idea that some random, unknown person is reading this totally excites me.  Even one person, somewhere, who by accident typed in exactly what I call one of my posts, or sees a line of mine quoted in some list somewhere.  Anyway, hello!

Scheme du jour.

My new idea to make millions is to be a Theatre Producer.  I know, I know, it is risky, but heck, a big return requires calculated risks.  If Jeany Pratt can do it, so can I.

First choice is the Sentimental Bloke, which I remember from my childhood and has never been repeated.  Australia is bound for another wave of National Sentiment and re-discovery of our identity, and I can be at the forfront of it.  Perhaps make Doreen aboriginal, oh no! that has been done in the new Wentworth.  All ways to get into the public consciousness.  It can be a big and popular show, playing to sell out audiences for months, filling unsold seats with the poor and incapacitated.  Not only would I play on the name "Doreen" with its associations with Prisoner and Wentworth, clearly the nature of our interpretation must be in accord.  There has never been a more heart-wrenching sound on Australian Television than Frankie's anguished cries for her girlfriend who had been taken away from her, and in whose arms she would not long thereafter die.  But that was a different Doreen.  I should first book a theatre, perhaps Her Majesty's in about two years.  Then sell presales.  It is all hype.  If not that show, then perhaps "The Maid of the Mountains" with a Reality Show to find the new "Our Glad". 

蛇城 Snake City

蛇城

 

Snake City

新的城市扩张是发生在中国的方式是在欧洲和北美，在那里城市街区被提出谁柱高耸在他们的各个块个人拥有的老工业国发展方式的城市的结果。有可能是一个更好的方式来设计城市的未来。在中国的城市发展是一个奇迹。从来没有在这样的速度增长巨大的城市。在过去，这种想法是异想天开，只是为了逗我建筑的想象，没有暗示，这将永远不会建造。现在，快速，大规模的发展正在发生在中国能够建立不同类型的城市在一个动态的方式。

The way the new urban expansion is happening in China is a result of the way cities developed in the old industrial countries of Europe and North America, where city blocks were owned by private individuals who raised towering columns on their individual blocks.  There may be a better way to design cities for the future.  Urban development in China is a marvel.  Never before have huge cities grown at such speed.   In the past, this ideas was fanciful, just to amuse my Architectural imagination, with no suggestion that it would ever be built.  Now, the rapid, large scale development that is happening in China makes it possible to build different sorts of cities in a dynamic way.

他们是摩天大楼的城市，建成一个城市的传统观念。这也许是有效的现有特大城市，如上海，但我建议它是城市设计的老式机型。中国已经移动到城市发展的一个新的，未来形式的能力。还存在另一种模式是尚未实现。

They are sky scraper cities, built to a traditional concept of a City.  This is perhaps valid for existing megacities such as Shanghai, but I suggest it is an old fashioned model of civic design.  China has the ability to move on to a new, futuristic form of Urban Development.  There is an alternative paradigm that is yet to be realised.

多年来，我一直想象我打电话给我的巨型建筑。当我离开学校我学建筑，但放弃了，因为当时流行在六十年代，经过四年半的时间。其中之一是在一个单一的建筑物一座城市，而是一个能够继续增长。如果从远处看，也许是飞机，它不会是一个很大的矩形尖顶，随机聚集在自然风景，因为我们看到现在到处。相反，我想象无尽的蛇形建筑，也许是30层楼高，并尽可能广泛的城市街区。它会在蛇的景观，下面的轮廓线。弯曲建筑物的稳定性远比直的更好。也许是龙是中国的一个更好的形象，除了龙往往跳来跳去，但蛇只线圈和幻灯片。

For years I have imagined what I call my Mega Buildings.  When I left school I studied Architecture but dropped out, as was fashionable in the sixties, after four and a half years.  One of them was for a city in a single building, but one that can continue growing.  If viewed from a distance, perhaps by plane, it would not be a lot of rectangular spires, clustered randomly over the landscape, as we see everywhere now.  Instead, I imagine an endless snake-like building, perhaps thirty stories high, and as wide as a city block.   It would snake over the landscape, following contour lines.  The stability of a curved building is vastly better than a straight one.  Perhaps a dragon is a better image for China, except that Dragons tend to jump around, but a snake just coils and slides.

Windows on the outside would not be the only sources of light and air.  I imagine within this city a Rapid Transit System and a High Way, running along it, like a spine in a living snake.  All the services and communication would similarly run along it, within it.  Separately, running through the building would be an open void, that varies in size and shape, is open to the exterior in some places, and provides an atrium for surrounding people on many levels, with vegetation. 

Such a building could keep growing, after starting in a small area.  As it progressed, it would keep building from its end.  As with most new and quickly growing cities, the first residents would be the people building it, who would move out for permanent residents and businesses as the building progressed and moved.  A lot of the construction could be mechanised.

Internally, the building would be largely self contained.  To some extent it would resemble an underground city, where people live and work completely indoors with no contact with the outside world.  However this Snake City would be different as it does have sides and a top.  Fibre Optics can bring natural light inside.  The great advantage is that it is impervious to weather, including the worst predictions for the future.  

The large anthills of central Australia have an inbuilt air-conditioning system within the interconnected, internal tunnels because of the differential temperature of the two sides.  Existing buildings, including sky scrapers cannot take advantage of this process because they are like columns, but a Snake City building could.

Starting for example at a coastal port, it would snake inland.  In time, with the development and success of this concept, the Snake City could split into different directions.  It would be perfect for sparsely inhabited and inhospitable regions.  It would also be a way of linking existing cities. Perhaps, with a growing population, the world will be covered by a network of linear cities.