Adventure Ausrama Blog

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It is about time the Government informed the public about the true rate of inflation and increased payments to those who are entitled to it. Okay, unemployment is low but those living in rural areas depend on it to survive. They can continue to to rely on the unemployment benefit, or they can move to the city. That is the last thing we want - more people living in the major coastal cities. The problem is that non-essentials are included in the CPI. This offsets the real inflationary increase in the necessities of life. Many do not know that essential goods have increased by a massive 8 per cent over the past year. The high dollar is "hiding" this by making imported non-essentials cheaper. Prices of such goods have actually fallen. Those on low incomes spend a higher proportion of their income on essentials like food, electricity, water, fuel and rent. Oddly, interest rates are not in the CPI package. Curiously, it was taken out in 1998. In other words both politica

"We are not mere kats , man ." http://vistacomputersolutions.blogspot.com/ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Funny Animal Photos

The sweet potato is a hotel counter-lunch filling. It is something you have when there is no other vegetable left. Most people eat it because it is on the plate. It's flavour can be described as sugary. The only vegetable anything like it is fresh baby peas that can be quite sweet. The sweet potato, however, is far too "sickly" for most palates. This humble vegetable is being revamped. Researchers in Queensland are trying to find varieties that can be grown more economically and which are more suitable for consumers - diametrically opposed goals one would assume. They are looking for more brilliantly coloured kinds, a silly aspiration considering people don't eat colour. It is the taste that is the problem. Seeing pretty red, purple, orange and white skin while you are peeling them is hardly, well, "appealing". Scientists are saying the colours are exciting. Wow! They are also saying that there are interesting flavours. This claim is not soundly

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Evidence of the existence of specialised ancient marsupials have been found in Australia. They had teeth that were "hammer-like" for crushing snail shells. Lizards living today in rain forests have similar teeth. They had premolars like the teeth in humans located between the molars and canines. Researchers could not determine at first what the strange teeth were used for. It was the first time that such teeth had been found in marsupials. Like the Tasmanian tiger a marsupial which filled the role of native dog in Australia, so this marsupial more than 10 million years ago, lived in the niche that the pink-tongued skink holds today. This wet rain forest lizard is quite large, about 40 cm in length, so it's ancestor would have been a tough competitor. The extinct marsupial became extinct when the weather changed in Australia and inland rain forests receded toward the coast. Lizards could survive in the new environment. The marsupial could not. Riversleigh in norther

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Why is Australia in such a bad way? The country is exporting at record levels. China is paying up front for these exports. Interest rates are not too high. Remember the Keating days of 14 per cent? We do have a "dual" economy with manufacturing doing it tough due to the high dollar, but Australia never has been a strong exporter of manufactured goods. Retailers are saying people aren't spending. You would think that people can only spend what they earn and no more. However, due to the multiplier effect, according to economic theory, when a person spends a dollar that one dollars turns over about five times. In other words the money supply, the real paper dollars out there, is actually only about a fifth of the money on the books in an economy. So what happens when a consumer saves? Think about it. The money in circulation "shrinks" by four more dollars. This is what is happening in Australia. We all envied Japan in its good years when they had very h

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Ten years ago the ozone layer was a major topic. "The ozone is decreasing," headlines proclaimed. Then, it was just as quickly forgotten. It may not be growing so much but the ozone layer is still causing problems. The weather has been altered. Wet and dry extremes are the result. Desalination programs have been put on the backburner for now. They will be needed soon as the cycle swings back to dry. The ozone hole shifts high-altitude wind circulation southward. Most notable for Australia has been the movement of the Southern Hemisphere jet stream to the south. This has severe effects. For example, in the north Britain has got very cold winters in recent years due to blocking of the Northern stream. Estimates are that Australia's weather has changed by a magnitude of 35 per cent. More rain has been brought here. With the impact from greenhouse gases this water evaporates very quickly, so the overall impact is dryness. With the combination of ozone, greenhouse

"There is not enough for two son." http://vistacomputersolutions.blogspot.com/ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Funny Animal Photos

What is a chimera? You can be a chimera and not know it. A chimera is the product of two embryos in one individual. A person with this "complaint" is absolutely normal and can live most of their lives without knowing they are "afflicted". They are usually diagnosed in a medical examination. A case in point was a woman who was found not to be the mother of one of her sons. Tests indicated that genetically the child was not hers. Further test, however, showed that she a chimera and the child was hers. Human chimeras are not common. In some species they are more the norm. In dahlia anemones, for example, it was noticed that their larvae were fused together like conjoined twins. Out of a batch of 27,169 young, 120 were visibly chimeric. Most of these died. The true chimeras live don undetected. It is believed that 90 per cent of young can be affected There may an evolutionary benefit from this. It appears that chimeras grow faster and are more aggressive than

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There is danger from future widespread use of nanotechnology. It is seen as the new savior to save the world from food shortages and so on. But like bio-fuel production it could do more harm than good. CSIRO is calling for more study of nanotechnology. This is despite the fact that no country has yet examined safety issues involved with it. Nanotechnology creates "micro-fine" products that have no safe disposal system. If they get into the environment there is not telling what damage they could do. Risks are seemingly endless: use by terrorists; environmental damage; self-reproduction (goo everywhere); even the future of Mankind on this planet could be under threat. Once a material has been modified or a new nano-product created it becomes a permanent structure. It must be chemically altered to make it safe. A nano-substance is not inert. It will act on the environment if it can. At the moment there are no restrictions. Developers can do what they wish. Let's h

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Pharmacists should stay out of health treatment and do what they do best - glorified clerks. They have no training in curing disease. Their education is solely based on chemical analysis. They are scientists not physicians. Ask their advice and they tell you what is written on the packet. Now the Pharmaceutical Society of Australia is saying pharmacists are qualified to treat people with mental illness. They may "give" drugs to such patients but they do not prescribe them. Heaven help us if they get involved will-nilly in advising those with mental disorders. Having someone continually talking in your ear about how to take your prescription medicine it not going to help one recover. Doctors need direct contact with a patient to give the greatest assistance. Having a pharmacist in the middle is only going to mess things up. A mental patient is already stressed. Saying pharmacists will reduce medication errors is implying that they have qualifications to oversee physi

"Since we agreed to stop fighting you've become a real pain George." http://vistacomputersolutions.blogspot.com/ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Funny Animal Photos

More silly research comes to useful conclusions. A survey has found that older people, men and women who go shopping "frequently" live longer. This is true for Taiwanese anyway. Subject women were 28 per cent less likely to die in the 10 years after the study. Men were 27 per cent less likely. Apparently, going shopping once a week is absolutely no good whatsoever. One has to shop, shop, shop to have a positive outcome. Researchers reached the following conclusion: "Shopping captures several dimensions of personal wellbeing , health and security as well as contributing to the community's cohesiveness and economy, and may represent or actually confer increased longevity." This conclusion is not soundly based on the data, however. It is just drawn "out of the air". In other words it is just an opinion. Maybe shopping is an ideal way of getting regular exercise. Note, those who lived longer were healthier to begin with. And poor health meant les

"Oh hello. I was just looking." http://vistacomputersolutions.blogspot.com/ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Funny Animal Photos

It seems odd for the Government to compensate Telstra for building the National Broadband Network considering fibre optic cable is a modern version of old copper. If a rival company in the market place builds a new factory with modern equipment established firms are not paid a cent. Besides, the copper was funded by Australian citizens and not by Telstra per se . Selling Telstra was a stupid idea anyway. People who bought shares should have known that the monopoly would eventually die. Perhaps John Howard saw the writing on the wall and decided to sell it. In recent times Testra has barely made a profit so it could no longer be relied upon as a cash cow. The Australian Government is paying Telstra $11 billion in compensation. Laws should have been changed to prevent this public liability taking place. Telstra's ownership of the copper should have been changed before the sale. It's control should have been altered to protection of the copper network which was paid

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What has happened to Australian society that the support for a carbon tax, so high when Kevin Rudd was in charge, has vanished? It seems everyone thought that a tax on pollution wouldn't really mean a financial burden. With the sudden hits from water and electricity price increases they know that it will cost - a lot. Kevin is crying into his handkerchief saying they made me do it - his cabinet told him to give up his push for a carbon tax, so he says. Julia Gillard has apparently had a change of heart and it is now her baby. Australians will have to accept that they will get less for their money in the near future. All countries will have to join the carbon club eventually. Not using as much petrol is a possibility, but doing without air conditioning particularly the wealthy that will be difficult. It seems the pillars of capitalism will be challenged. This is the kind of post-capitalism that twenty years ago hardly anyone would imagine. A society that really cares for th

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It makes one wonder how much money is wasted on research into seemingly trivial and irrelevant issues. Nonetheless, some of this research does result in useful findings. Why would there be tests on old cars to find out whether they are healthier than new vehicles? Well, research has been done and older cars are healthier largely because they let more air in through seals that do not fit anymore. Most drivers and passengers jump into the modern vehicle and turn the air conditioning on, thus locking themselves into a sealed capsule. This may be comfortable but it can cause illness. To make the air conditioner function better it is common to choose the recycle setting, so we breath stale air. This is more damaging than taking in pollutants from outside. When you go for a drive in future you should be careful about who you are travelling with. If a passenger has the flu, everyone else will probably get it. Set the air conditioner to the ventilation setting or leave a window slightl

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Ian Mcfarlane the Shadow Minister for Energy and Resources says Australia should still consider nuclear power. He must be off his bonnet if he thinks Australians will have a bar of this dangerous form of electricity generation. If a Coalition government seriously suggested a move to nuclear energy people would be protesting in the streets. Then there is the " not in my backyard " syndrome. No community would accept such a potentially toxic plant in their area. For Mr Mcfarlane's information lessons have been learned from the impossible situation in Japan where there in no solution to the problem. Australians do not want nuclear and will never want nuclear. Japan's economy is severely damaged and the Japanese will have chronic illnesses into the future. Much of the country will have to be fenced off, never to be used by humans ever again. Australians like everyone else in the world will have to pay much more for electricity as systems of clean coal power generat

"And I told him we needs a bigger house!" http://vistacomputersolutions.blogspot.com/ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Funny Animal Photos

A fly is a fly and a mosquito is a, well, mosquito right? The difference isn't as distinct as that. A CSIRO research team has reached the conclusion that in evolutionary terms they are very close. They are both on the same main evolutionary branch: flies splitting of this line 175 million years ago, mosquitoes 50 million years. Flies make up a tenth of all animal species on Earth. There are 152,000 fly species in total. Flies are very interesting having three evolutionary attempts at flying until evolving with the flying method of today. Earth has had very different climates in the past. Despite dramatic changes flies survived. They can consume any nutrient rich substance available. http://www.adventure--australia.blogspot.com/ http://www.tysaustralia.blogspot.com/ http://www.feeds.feedburner.com/AdventureAustralia http://www.technorati.com/blogs/http://adventure--australia.blogspot.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Science

"And I said look at me I've done alright." http://vistacomputersolutions.blogspot.com/ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Funny Animal Photos

A NASA space vehicle, New Messenger, has reached Mercury and is beaming back information to CSIRO's Canberra Deep Space Communication Complex. It has taken nearly seven years to get to the hot inner planet. A Mercury day is six Earth months long while its year is only 88 days. There is no possibility of humans landing on this little planet as the temperature reaches 430 degrees. Its minimum is extreme as well, minus 180 degrees. The sun would look three times bigger than on Earth if you could stand on it surface and look at it that is. An earlier exploratory vehicle, Marina 10, only gave a cursory look at the innermost planet. The whole planet is to be mapped this time. It will show whether there is ice at the poles. The sun never shines into pole craters. A mystery to be solved is why Mercury is composed mainly of metals. http://www.adventure--australia.blogspot.com/ http://www.tysaustralia.blogspot.com/ http://www.feeds.feedburner.com/AdventureAustralia http://www.technorati.com/