https://www.steptember.org.au/fundraisers/mikejones

With the weather improving, now is an excellent time to get out and about and rack up those legendary 10,000 steps per day.

But if fitness is not a thing for you, I can help you feel virtuous by doing your share of steps and raising funds for the Cerebral Palsy Alliance.

I have friends working in the Cerebral Palsy Alliance Research Institute attached to the Sydney University Med School. This group is the world leader in cerebral palsy research and they’ve been a major contributor to reducing the incidence of CP in newborn babies by 30% in the last ten years.

They are doing pioneering work in the genetics of CP, early intervention, immunology especially the impact of cytomegalovirus (CMV) on the foetus, new treatments including stem cell research and engineering for movement as well as MyVoice – a project recording speech of people with CP, informing engineering to improve communications for people with CP who have speech difficulties.

TODAY is a great day to make a donation. A generous benefactor will match every dollar we steppers raise – doubling my puny attempts to raise a few bucks for such a worthy cause.

Funds raised can also support other CP Alliance services – physiotherapy, speech therapy, mobility assistance devices and family support, for example.

So if you’ve got a few lazy dollars lying around idly, why not chip in !

https://www.steptember.org.au/fundraisers/mikejones

Many thanks
MJ

Warning ! This is real !!

I tried unsuccessfully to repair Robert (our vacuuming robot). Robby baby refused to charge his batteries. They are pretty old, so I googled and ordered some new genuine Electrolux batteries.

So now I get daily hot deal spam about bloody vacuum spares. And sadly I don’t unsubscribe because I think I’m getting an addiction to vacuum machine parts as a new way of life. But I digress.

Robert-friendly batteries come in pairs. I installed them.

Nothing.

I think I measured the output of the charger with a multimeter. It looked OK but still nothing.

It turned out to be cheaper and easier to buy a new robot vacuum cleaner (not an Electrolux). Choice said that the Roomba was the go. We called him Stuart – after FM’s ex. And indeed he is waaay better than Robert, reflecting more years of R&D. (Except for the time I left the courtyard door open and he attempted to vacuum the garden, he’s really smart). Stuart maps the rooms and learns how to do the job more efficiently – and when he gets tired it ALWAYS returns to it’s charging station has a rest and finishes the job later – unlike Robert who we often found snoozing under the lounge. Stuart is connected to the internet so we can see how he’s going, start him up or stop him from anywhere there’s an internet connection – like everywhere – using a mobile phone.

Why we might want to do this I have no idea, but Stuart goes and gets new software himself – from time to time. So he actually gets better and better at the job – not suggesting he did a crap job in the first place. Unlike Robert. I should say however, that Robert could vacuum in the dark, but Stuart’s eyes only work when it’s daytime or we leave the lights on.

Anyway, just this month, Amazon bought out iRobot (Stuart’s manufacturer) for $1.7 billion.

What evil do you think Amazon will do with Stuart’s floorplan of our place ? And since Stuart has artificial sight, how about question two – what will Amazon do with the images of our furniture and everything else ?

I can see it now – an Email … Dear Emmjay, Your lounge is looking a bit tired – we can send you a new one for five grand today… just say the word. And you know those pesky fine print terms and conditions that you agreed to (OK we know you didn’t read them. Nobody reads them. ) Well you agreed that we can sell copies of your original artworks, royalty free. We don’t even have to ask first, or pay you or the artists anything, because this would reduce our intergalactic profits.”

Message 3 – “We suggest you buy top cover home and contents insurance because he who can deliver same day, can also take away same day.”

Holy fuck. I’ll have to revert to dear old dumb Robby and rearrange the furniture and paintings or better still, move. 😦

https://stashwyslouch.bandcamp.com/album/plays-and-sings-bluegrass-vol-ii

Emmjay wrote this for the ABC’s Unleashed a million years ago.

Knowing how one’s life will ultimately turn out is supposed to cause a depressing feeling of pointlessness, but we’re all interested to take a quick gander into the future – and maybe gain a small insight into what’s coming up next.

Future-gazing is clearly dangerous, but it can be extremely productive – if you get onto the right predict-a-scope and manage your crystal balls carefully.

Futurology started for me at an early age. I figured out that if I climbed onto the garage roof, I’d be able to see over the horizon. However, I failed to envisage the kind people at the hospital with a seemingly endless supply of plaster.

And with hindsight, I can now see that examining giblets during little lunch (showing off to my mates in the playground) was a mistake. The principal was not interested in my point that I didn’t actually kill the chook myself; the innards came in a plastic bag shoved up the (let’s not go there).

A safer approach was to consult the oracle in Mum’s Women’s Weekly or New Idea. But that was fraught too. You see. I was born a Virgo, and there was a price to pay for getting caught in that condition. I quickly learnt that to avoid taunting and more likely having my head punched in, it was safer to be “on the cusp of Libra”. That was until some thoughtless massive pharma released a line of feminine hygiene items under that banner.

I found those horoscopes disappointing. There was mostly the prediction that I would meet some kind of tall dark and handsome man. Fair enough, but I was hoping that he would deliver unto me a new bike, or preferably a Corvette Stingray or a 1963 Ford Mustang. Promises of a challenging new job (like being a milk monitor or getting to ring the bell) remained elusive through my primary school years although I sometimes got to mix the powdered ink with water. I suspected that the future might be racing up in a modest series of fairy steps.

High School demanded something a bit more hard core. Ouija sessions led to some mysterious spellings associated with imaginary occurrences of sex, pop music bands and the use of recreational drugs, but if one invited more tightly-wound school mates, God and salvation or maybe the cadets had a far better chance of appearing from the dim candle light.

Lenny’s Tarot cards represented a major investment in futurology. I think he bought them at a now long defunct magic shop called “Weirdo’s” in an obscure Sydney haunt – Piccadilly Arcade. After we had perused all the medieval cartoons, nobody could be bothered with the rigmarole of dealing the cards out and interpreting the pictures. Lenny had a standard patter – “Ah, the King of Cups. That means you have to steal one of your Dad’s beers and give it to me. And the skeleton – that means that if you don’t, you’re dead meat”.

I was finding looking into the future increasingly risky.

This gave way to the Uni years where living in the present and labouring under the illusion of making the future with both hands was the go. Then the actual real job (still no Corvette Stingray or Ford Mustang).

And then came the upheaval of the stock market crash in ’87. Nicely protected from that future by being too poor to afford shares, but cashed enough to be chained to a mortgage and with a small share of a large bank’s real estate, I was easily frightened by shadows.

I think when the babies came, concern about the future grew. Not much help from the magazine horoscopes then. “Virgos still have no hope of romance with grandmas in their house this month”.”Sagittarians will decide to introduce the baby to solid food and Leos will get their first full night’s sleep in two years”.”Jupiter is in the ascendency of the third house of Saturn and the Monaro will need a grease and oil change and a new set of tyres to pass rego”.

More of the future has receded into the past and we now face our latest in-life crisis. The IGFM (Intergalactic Financial Meltdown). Well, seeing into the future has become pretty damned important again, hasn’t it?

But this time, I have uncovered the most powerful scope for seeing the future. I found it in the supermarket amongst the Asian foods.

Fortune cookies.

These are without a doubt the most reliable gems. First, the packet you select is pretty random. Second the cookie you select is pretty random. But incredibly, the person who made up the message and the person who put it into the cookie knew that you and you alone would receive this treasure, and they made it precisely for you to open and receive the wisdom today.

Better than that, they knew somehow that the message itself was precisely what you needed to know just this minute. And the one you will pick tomorrow is waiting patiently in line to deliver the future to you too. They can even anticipate when you are going for a gluttony attack and they will have several ready for you. Uncanny.

So I wondered from which Asian mountain monastery this source of Confucian wisdom sprang. A little research (reading the packet) revealed them seeing the future emerging from the swirling mists of Botany.

And then the brand began to resonate in the brain. Kong Foo Sing.

“You will be awarded some great honour.” “Your life will be happy and peaceful”.

Kong Foo Sing.

Time to get back onto the garage roof.

In a near perfect piece in The Politics, titled “The Phantom of the Opposition”, Rachel Withers highlighted the childish buffoons now warming seats on the opposition benches opposing every one of the amendments and the climate change legislation itself.

Take a long hard look at these men. I repeat, men. They present themselves with the aplomb of a gang of schoolboy smokers who’ve just been sprung behind the boy’s toilet block – and are facing six of the best cuts of the cane.

Clueless nonces too dumb to see that they are far far and away on the wrong side of history and that an Opposition is supposed to hold the government to account. Not just oppose everything – including an amendment aimed at assisting regional voters. So much for being a coalition.

Perhaps the most pleasing schadenfreude is the obvious discomfort of the so-called Leader of the Opposition and former PM’s pit bull terrier trying like buggery to appear to be nice. His exhaustion in this endeavour is palpable.

I think it’s time for the good father to rock over and give this shadow of its former self a hand. Stay tuned for the next exciting episode “Father O’Way’s advice for struggling former bush copper leaders of Her Madge’s Opposition”. And the sequel “Know Your Bench”

This was in response to a post about how the two contenders to the British prime minister job. Author – Anita Kennedy and Comment by Gary Honey

The original post said that both would be culled without an interview if it was a normal job selection process. Here’s my comment that LinkedIn found too offensive…

Worse than incompetent, these people are nut jobs.

And what a run of D-graders Americans have elected !

Puppets and members of the western oligarchy.

Fortunately Australians have finally removed a government led by corrupt and incompetent nitwits after 10 years of achieving nothing. We have this time broken the shackles of habit and voted for individuals rather than parties.

In the face of disastrous climate change, previous governments persisted in protecting fossil fuel interests. Ten lost years.

Sadly it took that long for Australians to finally vote for record numbers of independents and greens and a Labor government led by a man who is no oil painting but is a true statesman. With an A-grade front bench.

We voted for people rather than parties.

Like the rest of the world, we face huge challenges, but for the first time in a decade there is hope.

May your countries wake up at the next ballot box too.

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