I'm old enough to know that I don't have any answers, but that won't stop me talking
It’s now about 18 months since I returned from my most recent trip to Italy and about 4 1/2 years since my first trip there. These happy snaps are from inside St Peter In Chains, one of the many amazing churches in Rome I visited in August 2016, each of which has works by the …
Continue reading “I feel nostalgic about my first trip to Italy this morning….”
Just over two months ago I wrote a post about Liberal Party donor Huifeng ‘Haha’ Liu, who is accused by ASIO of being a threat to national security: Stop Laughing – This is Serious! Why ‘Haha’ is not funny. At the time, the only news media I could find reporting on this topic were the ABC …
Time flies. It is now well over thirty years since, in History 101 (Medieval and Renaissance History), I first read Machiavelli. I not only read The Prince, but also an abridged version of The Discourses. I then wrote an essay on the cyclical nature of history in The Discourses, which got me a distinction, and …
I am not usually inclined to watch the press conferences of politicians. I tend to regard politicians as a necessary evil – democracy being a better system than any of the alternatives, but still laden with insincerity and demagoguery. So why validate the individuals any more with attention than they already get? I did make …
In the golden age of exploration, when Dutch ships came home to Europe laden with spices from the Far East, the Netherlands became a place of great and somewhat unexpected wealth. A large middle class, keen to enjoy its newfound riches, emerged. The recently introduced tulip, a beautiful and fascinating flower (I personally am more …
Yesterday, I surmised in my posting that the alleged rapist who is now a Cabinet Minister was from NSW, given that the rape did occur in NSW in 1988. I conceded that it was a long shot that it might be someone visiting NSW. Information has now come to my attention that the long shot …
Two major news stories over the past few days have gripped Canberra. The first is the alleged rape two years ago, in the office of a government minister in Parliament House, of Brittany Higgins, a junior press secretary, by another employee in the ministerial office, after some major social occasion. Since then, two other women …
Continue reading “Sexual Predators in the Corridors of Power”
I have been working from home most of the time the past 10 1/2 months, with the occasional day each week in the office until the hard lockdown was suddenly imposed in late July, and not too many days back in the office since then. Now we are easing back into what semblance we can …
Continue reading “Home Separation Anxiety, or… Old is the New Normal”
The news today that counterfeiters in Communist China are making fake bottles of Penfolds wines to rip off the gullible locals with more money than sense is unsurprising. It has been going on for ages. The cringeworthy new faux-premium labels based on the Penfolds font are named ‘Penfunils’ and ‘Benfords’. If I did not own …
This is way too funny not to share.
Lost For Words!