Government ministers hold long press conferences every day when under twenty cases of covid infection are recorded each day.  Contrast this with the thousands upon thousands overseas.   

It is entirely up to us to prevent the spread.  Sadly the theatre in the image should be closed, maybe it is, crowds should not form at all. No long term gain without a big effort. Look at the western world alone to see what can happen.  Are they in denial?  Too little too late.  Take heed!

 

 

 

ABC fm radio classics play Max Bruch's violin concerto every so often. It is always a winner.  Noah Bendix Balgley is terrific.   Interpretations become steadier, deliberate no less brillant, possibly as it should be. 

However, other faster versions remain with you, it is hard to forget them.  Jascha Heifetz is heard on YouTube. I guess he was one of the outstanding violinists of the past. 

To the left watching the sunrise is a tall stark tree who, once again, is striving for photosynthesis and the will to live.

 It wants to belong to the global forest legions who take up the offensive against dreaded carbon dioxide to liberate an oxygen rich life force. 

To cling to a number one role in global climate is a mighty purpose not easily given up but easily defeated and lost by  thoughtless land clearing. 

Australiana

Sunrise, Kulin nation and Taungurung peoples, Lake Eildon. 

literary moves

As an unusual activity i read a book. burnt sugar from avni doshi.

 On one side, this work has a rather negative air or does it? Who can say. There are matters to identify with along with glimpses into modern Indian life where, off hand, the protagonist held some unusual understandings of her lived experience - occasionally that is.

 Yes, simple yet complex, needs more time to digest if it is worth it.

A Beginning or a Farewell? One of many in the days of our lives. Bitter sweet moments. "Multinationals" and an airport.

the face of yesteryear in Newcastle

Pandemic: So far so good. Newcastle is ok that way.  The saga of the city is alive.

Uncomfortable place between two trains. Lines converge sure enough.  We are converging from near and far into a virus free or close to free space. 

In the last four weeks pandemic infections have numbered in the high  hundreds then  down again to round one hundred in the south and between ten and twenty in NSW.

The state borders are closed resulting in great inconvenience to many people all over the country and federal government looks on helpless - after all they are redundant.  Mask wearing is adopted far and wide. Other regulations are in use. Tight suppression of virus seems within reach. 

'Communists have no class' worn by an activist i know from in the day when activism was active...   now so infra dig? Disappointing.

"Anyone who thinks that the Communist regimes...are exclusively the work of criminals is overlooking a basic truth: the criminal regimes were...by enthusiasts convinced they had discovered the only road to paradise....they defended that road so valiantly that they were forced to execute many people. Later it became clear that there was no paradise, that the enthusiasts were therefore murderers.

Then everyone took to shouting at the Communists: You're the ones responsible for our country's misfortunes....

And the accused responded: We didnt know! We were deceived! We were true believers!...we are innocent!

Did they really not know or were they merely making believe?"

Orchids.

rich, soft, sweet, chocolate 🍓

double dose of statins before and after🏥

The topping looks like s### 🤣 

Food of love? 💝

Fathers day 🥳 

Oh! Thats next week! 

This text appears as usual and published on cue even while this mob needs attention as lately it wont accept any text input or is the big-name-search-engine out to get me because in anger and haste some access has been denied by myself. Well, good, it prevents some on-line shopping and form filling-in.

  E-mail is also a casualty along with comment writing not that that is undertaken very often. Will it get sorted and soon.

spring is in the air   

looks like summer but for the cold brisk wind 

Ms Enid circa 1950s

Final year of school circa 1940

Once upon a time we had the New age, the age of Aquarius, mysticism and counter culture.  It held promise, a Belle Epoque in the making. What happened?

Media, exercise, fitness, quasi-Buddism.

In any time or place there can be brief wonderment and powerful heightened awareness as a change.

On another tack, nothing explicit is heard about ethics and being 'decent' people. It must rest on example, legislation and fines or how will community ideals continue and why ever?

Some say we have inate right and wrong that undergoes maturity. Do we all shoulder efforts to further maturity? 

In the pandemic the young are reminded to protect the most vunerable. We expect to rely on them and somehow hope they know a worthy course of action.

from 7th century and Tang dynastry

The hair style is back in again. 

Federal gov is throwing money at the mental health 'silos', terrific if it is effective. 

It means more fragmentation of health services. EXISTING STATE funded services need significantly more assistance instead of the feds dabberling and justifying a role.

Thats the way, reinvent the wheel over and over.

a truly delightful work from the Jin dynasty 1115 -1234 Shanxi Prov.  Wood, pigment. 

preschoolers art: so what? The work serves a purpose sure enough but it is really very important for developing fine motor skills as I discovered.

Learning to write and hold a pencil requires skill from a big school child but it is not unusual to find, more recently,  that they do not have this ability.  

It is suspected that children who use touch screens from a very early age fail to exercise their fingers in a useful way and fail to prepare themselves for precise tasks.

Hence, in general terms to my limited knowledge, maximum activities best involve handling sorting building threading and painting from the earliest years to build strong competent fingers when screen time is best banned altogether. 

Aged care needs to change from Federal control to become the responsibility of the states and long before the recent interest began.

It makes no sense to have certain health services in federal hands. It seriously muddles up the dual areas of care for no good reason and is to their detriment.

And believe it or not, every resident in care is under the care of a GP.  What is the wider role of the G P?  How many G Ps have we heard publicly advocate for their senior clients?

 

Ammonium nitrate is not uncommon in our  Port city. Large quantities are transported to coal mines in the valley. Relax.

Shocking but the pandemic can save our world but at exceptional cost.  Is it the price we have to pay? Lock downs and supression result in a society that will curb the issues that lead to climate change.  

Latest is that a covid vaccination may not be developed and even if there is one the inequalities and the anti-vacs mean that many would remain unsafe and a threat to the rest so the risk would be prolonged with society adjusting to a more sustainable lifestyle.

A social deep-freeze strongly backed by government is ideal.  Unwittingly climate change is addressed at long last.  Enforced sustainability will reign.

 

the joy of vegetable soup...the estatic...    simple binary form soup is very tasty but in compound time almost any ingredients may be added.  Parsnips are in, turnip, celery and celery leaves may provide enough sodium before they are retrieved or not, sprinkling of  rice, quinoa which still has to been checked each time it is reached for as to what exactly it is. 

 Oriental flavours can transcribe the soup and orchestrate it with colour and warmth you as maestro....

Old pop song..... How much is that doggie in the window? The one with the waggerly tail....

Anyway, the shop in Hunter Street Mall is very successful with retro print textiles used in handmade items. Interesting masks are stocked. The dog keeps the seamstress company. Front paw is bandaged.

During July the covid infections increased in Victoria despite the usual preventative measures in place and every effort at control. Concerns are growing. The infections have been as high as the 700s daily. 

Where the Newcastle Knights play league this afternoon. Steady rain is a pain.

Pacific Maru in Newcastle Harbour.  A big coal carrier.

Lyric theatre, Newcastle. Only both ends remain and must be for preservation. Challenging.

Classic British pictures could be seen there on Friday nights on their release. J Arthur Rank and the male striking a blow in black and white.

The Strand, Lyric, Victoria, Tatler, Civic and Royal Cinemas were in the city.

The past is simultaneous with the present 

 Citroen deux chevaux and Picasso and surrealism. Or is it cubism? 

Service NSW dept has superceeded the old motor registry office demolished recently in Parry street. Difficult to place the original office.

Earlier on traffic arrangments were made at a small old miners cottage style police station on corner of Scott and Pacific near where the new light rail terminates. 

A police person took a nervous applicant on a driving test round the inner city. Driver hand signals (not indecent) were de regueur along with trafficator use. 

The budding motor cyclist was simply asked to ride a short way down the street and back again under observation. So licence fees are life long till a person gets 'really old' when the fees cease.

The dept advisors will tell the elderly to use the safe and quiet routes. Really? Bluff.  Choose that advice and lose more driving skills. The elderly can to be accepted on the roads like everyone else. 

But still everything in moderation it pays to be cautious. So irksome. True the elderly get 'wiped out' and there are age related shortcomings - maybe like everyone else. A safe return from every journey is not lost on me.  The age statistics would be interesting and very scary. 

Masks sewn in a shop in Hanbury Street.

 a cynical streak

Seen.. latest 'iso' rule: 'please wait to be omitted'

Sea spray or waves reached close to homes on Stockton foreshore during rough seas that rose over a nature strip onto the road.

Newcastle Baths were swept by large waves, some reaching the upper deck. The water was way deeper than usual.

While only on the edge of an East Coast Low  rough seas resulted and at high tide Wednesday afternoon the water was threatening and eating away at the edges of the suburb of Stockton. In the second photo the sandy beach reappears in between the big waves. 

the Newcastle scene

Port of Newcastle.... near restful waters he leads me. ...the plague has been calmed locally......the lull before the storm?

Newcastle, mid winter and mid virus.

Does education narrow the mind?  The cost of an Arts degree has risen maybe making it more of a sort of luxury. 

 How could a scholar confine themselves to one discipline? Engineering..science..business or the like. It is dismaying. Narrow.

Very often one would really like to hear again 

whats behind the latest world movements, ethical questions,  histories and much more from some obscure unfathomable thinkers likely found in arts.  It is just a pipe dream.

Some years ago, 'lived experience' and related theories sounded very interesting. Not widely liked  -  i bet. But there is gradual change and 'lived experience' is bandied all around. 

The virus is moving in with 134 cases that are of serious concern in Melbourne and the whole city is locked down.

coronavirus testing.  In the last two weeks, infections have occured in Melbourne and some suburbs and high rise are in lockdown. Today 127 cases from record breaking testing rates with 2660 total active infections.

The border will close tomorrow between NSW and Victoria. 

Social distance, hand washing, isolation while ill are uppermost responsibilities as well as mask wearing and heeding regulations about gathering. 

wind turbine....this blade has an edge. A bird expert has spoken about huge loss of bird life caused by the blades. It is understood that birds in flight look down and to the sides more  than ahead.

Wind turbine blades then bolts that hold things together.

Nationally, the incidence of Canovirus is minimal except for 288 active infections in Melbourne which is under vigorous investigation.

An innovation is making it easier to test in the community. An alternative saliva virus test has been introduced in a small number of cases. The test developed in Melbourne at Doherty Institute and validated by overseas researchers processes a small amount of saliva by the same method as the existing throat PCR test according to a local principal  researcher today. Comparison to the throat swab test is in process.

  The throat test itself is not totally effective yet best there is while the saliva test is 87% effective due to fewer virus in saliva but is easier and useful in those who have objections to testing or have other difficulties. The processing is done within three hours of collection.