Meandered to a Cars and Coffee this morning thanks to @davidwengier letting me know about it. It was packed! So many cars! All marques and eras. Here's some pix.
I got an #idea to make "Once in a lifetime #trip to #Australia and/or #NewZealand. One of my friends promised to come along if I drive the car. (She doesn't have a driving license). There is a left hand traffic in both countries!! How will I cope with that? I heard that the spring time is worth seeing in both of the countries, so maybe we'll travel in Nov/Dec 2024! What do you think? #travelling
On: Thursday 18 January, from 6pm
At: The Quiet Man pub, 271 Racecourse Road, Kensington
PT: Newmarket Station or Tram 57 (Stop 24).
We can meet for a drink in the front bar, and there'll be a table booked in the dining room from 6.30pm. (Find menu etc here: https://www.thequietman.com.au/)
If you can definitely make it, could you let me know by replying below? Then I can get the numbers right when booking the table.
It's time for another history/museum thread. This one starts in Australia then goes to the Netherlands. It's a long one and it's going to take quite a lot of posts so get comfy.
Peter Dutton's nuclear plan is just terrible public policy.
The truth is that, in an Australian context, with nuclear power more expensive per kilowatt hour than either grid scale solar & storage or coal, nuclear just doesn't make economic sense.
The UK has a mature nuclear industry. Its new Hinkley Point C plant, started in 2016, is now expected to not be complete until 2031, and costs £35bn.
So how much would it cost to replace all of Australia's coal power plants with nuclear ones?
We'll, at current exchange rates, £35bn — that's the cost of just one Hinkley Point C sized reactors — works out to A$67.6 billion.
So building just 10 nuclear reactors the size of Hinkley Point C costs $A676bn, making the AUKUS subs look like Home Brand corn flakes in comparison.
(Just for comparison, ScoMo's AUKUS subs cost $368bn, and Daniel Andrew's Suburban Rail loop is estimated at around $100bn.)
That's assuming Australia, starting from scratch, could build nuclear plants as quickly and cheaply as the UK, which was one of the first nations on Earth to split the atom.
So is it debt & deficit to fund this? Big new taxes? Even by the LNP's own measuring sticks, it's a crap policy!
The big thing that's changed since it was published is that grid solar + storage is now cheaper than coal or nuclear power.
So would you support holding up the closure of coal plants for 15 years until nuclear plants are completed, then paying substantially more on your power bills, while the federal government pays hundreds of billions of dollars in government subsidies, while also hiring thousands of additional public servants to regulate it all?
I was vacationing with a friend on Scotland island, off Sydney, #Australia in this amazing B&B. We were having breakfast at the verandah when the host approached us hesitantly.
"I hope I am not offending you if I ask this, but we were curious why you were speaking #English after we have left."
Are QR code payments common in the #US and #Eurooe or #Australia? I really like to know, so do tell me.
"For the past several years, the central banks of these countries have been attempting to connect their systems, allowing their residents to use QR payments for cross-border transactions without any fees, generally at better conversion rates than those set by payment processors like Visa and American Express."
Not again! BoM issues Flood warning for Qld and NSW.
"A major rain event will engulf most of eastern Australia during the next 48 hours, prompting the Bureau of Meteorology to issue flood watches from southern Queensland to the NSW South Coast.
"Greater Sydney could be soaked by up to 200mm from late Thursday to early Saturday, potentially leading to major flooding along the Hawkesbury-Nepean River, while Brisbane and Canberra also face the prospect of heavy rain."
Is self-employment/entrepreneurship really the only way for #ActuallyAutistic folks? (Thread)
I’m 22, recent graduate (BSc in Chemistry) in a foreign country (#Australia), and unlike the vocal majority of #neurodivergent folks, don’t really feel like I have a special interest I can monetise on. I just want to clock in, clock out, spend my salary on little treats.
Now it can be revealed... this weekend I'm off on 707 Operations' 'Grainlander' train to the Mallee, featuring silo art and the added treat of a movie projected onto wheat silos at Quambatook. Should be fun. :)
Is the Swooping Season upon us? Anyone been swooped by magpies yet? I think I was mini-swooped by a bird in a park in Collingwood last week; gave that space a wider berth next time I walked through it.
So I'm off to Australia soon (Perth > Sydney > Melbourne) to see if it's a place where I could potentially live. 🥳
Since I'm in the region it's a perfect opportunity to visit new Zealand AND the Cook Islands 🏝 Obv expensive, but a lifelong dream (the Cook Islands, don't really care for NZ sorry). Should I do it? Or should I rather stay in Australia longer?
While Australia punches well above its weight when it comes to performers, there have been comparatively few locally written and developed shows that have become successful. This may be changing. Over the past 18 months (since the start of 2022) there have been at least thirteen Australian musicals that been either produced...
Contentious? Supermarket Roast Chooks put to the test. (www.smh.com.au)
Good Food tastes and rates six supermarket roast chickens to find out which rules the roost.
OC Australian musicals - an overview and recent developments
While Australia punches well above its weight when it comes to performers, there have been comparatively few locally written and developed shows that have become successful. This may be changing. Over the past 18 months (since the start of 2022) there have been at least thirteen Australian musicals that been either produced...