Moggy Musings [Archived material from Boy the Wonder Cat]

An Easter Bunny musing:

It was a bit of a shock to the Easter Bunny when on Easter Sunday the ABC TV Landline program ran not one but three stories on rabbits - involving killing by poisoning, trapping, blowing up burrows and preparing for the pot.

Who won't be getting a chocolate egg next year?

A New Puppy musing:

Finally those Obama girls are getting that dog. A 6 month-old Portugese Water Dog that they are thinking of naming Frank or Moose.

An escapee musing:

Yakini is a 9 year-old gorilla living at Melbourne Zoo.

In early April 2009 he managed to take an unsheduled stroll around the pathways of this zoo before being lured towards waiting zoo keepers by a bunch of bananas. Next stop Africa if this young gorilla can resist the fruit in future!

A Very Happy Ending musing:

A big welcome home to four year-old Aussie blue heeler cattle dog Sophie Tucker who has been found and reunited with her owners after being swept overboard from the family yacht and surviving for 2 months on a tropical North Queensland island. Story and video here.

Dewey Readmore Books musing:

Clarrie Rivers sent me this link leading into a loving tribute to a ginger library cat called Dewey Readmore Books, who was found in the books return shute one morning and lived for 18 years at Spencer Public Library in the USA. Dewey's bio.

Iz ded wiv shames musing:

In the middle of the night Clarencegirl saw me running away from a big, fat cane toad which hopped into the living room.

At first I tried to pretend that I didn't see the warty monster, but then in jumped on me. Eeeewwww!

I was brave enough though to watch my hero put that toadie in the freezer for a painless death.

A quiet victory over adversity.....

From Biddle and Taylor's 2009 working paper Indigenous Population Projections, 2006–31: Planning For Growth:

Between 2006 and 2031 the Indigenous population is projected to grow from just over 517,000 to almost 848,000 (Fig. 3). This growth is reasonably steady over the period and it represents an annualised rate of 2.00 per cent. By way of comparison, between 2001 and 2006, the Indigenous population was estimated to have grown from 458,500 at an implied annual growth rate of 2.43 per cent (ABS 2008a). Clearly, the model projects a decline in the rate of growth. Over the same period to 2031, the non-Indigenous population is projected to increase from around 20,179,000 to around 25,621,000. This represents a lower growth rate compared to the Indigenous population, resulting in an increase in the Indigenous share of total population from 2.5 per cent to 3.2 per cent (Fig. 3). An interesting point to note from Fig. 3 is that a continuation of the growth trend shown would result in one million Indigenous Australians by 2040.

Nudists want undercover female police officer to flush out perverts

Today's Northern Star reports that a nudist beach near Byron Bay has become a haunt for perverts and weirdos, and locals want to see it cleaned up. ..........

Women say they no longer feel safe to walk there alone because of the atmosphere and the unwanted advances they receive from men.

Less than two weeks ago a woman had to call police after a man began to follow her and act suspiciously.

“It used to be a family-friendly nude beach, but in the last few years it's got a real seedy element,” Tyagarah resident Cyd Saunders said.

The mother of two regularly takes her children, two and five, to the beach but said it was becoming impossible to relax..........

Mitra Ardron said he would like to see more enforcement from police and rangers to 'catch people in the act'.

“If they sent a female officer down there undercover that would fish them in straight away,” he said.

“And you don't have to catch many for the word to get around.”

Inspector Owen King, of Byron Bay police, said officers from Mullumbimby and Brunswick regularly patrolled the beach and with greater frequency in the summer months.

He said the recent complaint from the woman at Tyagarah Beach had been followed up immediately, but police were unable to locate anyone on the beach that matched the description given.

Inspector King encouraged anyone who witnessed offensive behaviour to report it to police.

Cyd Saunders agrees.

“The community needs to make more of an effort to report (offensive behaviour) to police and to be proactive in telling these people to move on. I am not against nudity on the beach. I just want to feel safe,” she said.

Source: The Northern Star

North Coast Voices Administration: Apologies for changes made to this post after publication. Unfortunately the original Northern Star article contains words which are often blocked by filtering software.

And the winner is - Stephen Conroy!

Surfing the Net earlier today and thought North Coast Voices might be interested in this.

Among the British ISPA Awards 2009 winners was:

Internet Villian: Stephen Conroy and the Australian Government

The Internet Villain category recognises individuals or organisations that have upset the Internet industry and hampered its development - those who the industry loves to hate.

Maudie's Ex
Yamba

Guest Speak is a North Coast Voices segment allowing serious or satirical comment from NSW Northern Rivers residents. Email ncvguestpeak at live dot com dot au to submit comment for consideration.

Nationals desperate to erode Saffin's Northern Rivers electoral base?

Out of federal government and obviously hurting, the National Party of Australia is rumoured to be making a concerted effort to undermine Labor's sitting Federal MP for Page, Janelle Saffin.

To that end the Nationals have suggested to the Australian Electoral Commission (AEC) that it undertake a little tidying up of the current boundaries between Page and Cowper which is currently held by Nationals MP Luke Hartsuyker.

It is no accident that the town it wants to tidy up into Cowper is Yamba, which co-incidentally strongly supported Saffin at the 2007 election and predominately voted Labor consistently over the last few state and federal elections.

The exchange the Nationals are suggesting to compensate for Yamba's removal is to include in the Page electorate a couple of areas with what are believed to have traditional Nationals profiles.

The Nationals seem to believe that Luke Hartsuyker would easily win over Yamba hearts and minds if Yamba voters were to find themselves in his electorate at the next federal election and, that Janelle Saffin would find it difficult to maintain her seat in light of such a voter loss.

It is interesting to note that the Liberal Party submission proposes no changes to the electoral boundaries of Cowper, Page and Richmond. This flies directly in the face of the Nationals wish list for the NSW North Coast.

Unsurprisingly the Labor Party's counter move, to the Nationals attempt to place more Nationals-leaning areas in Page, is to lobby for Maclean to be removed from Cowper and placed in the Page electorate.

National Party of Australia submission to the AEC, May 2009
Liberal Party of Australia submission to the AEC, May 2009
Australian Labor Party submission to the AEC, undated
Full list of submissions on proposed 2009 federal electoral boundaries redistribution
Comments on submissions

Woke up with a vacant sensation between your journalistic ears? Then publish a viral email!

Click image to enlarge

The editor of that APN newspaper The Daily Examiner of Grafton in the Clarence Valley was obviously having a lazy day when he decided that those paying top price for the Saturday issue should be treated to the re-publication of one version of a hoary old copyright article from last century, which has become over time one of those ever-adapting viral emails which clog our PC inboxes from time to time.

At the time of writing this it had last turned up on a blog on 18 June 2009 in what appears to be the version Peter Chapman used.

Unfortunately a hard copy newspaper doesn't have a handy delete button, so a prolonged groan rang out across the valley from the many who had already read the supposed London Times obit in various forms over the years.

Common sense may not actually be dead but there is certainly a dearth of it at The Egg Timer these days.

2009 NAIDOC Awards

Awards encompassing Elders, youth, art, education and training, and sport were announced at the National NAIDOC Ball in Brisbane on Friday night.

Professor Larissa Behrendt (above, left) was named 2009 Person of the Year while Professor Lowitja O'Donoghue (above, right) received a Lifetime Achievement Award.

The other award winners were:

* Doris Eaton of Perth and Elsie Heiss of Sydney - Female Elders.

* Frank Lampard from Adelaide and Reginald Knox of Brisbane - Male Elders.

* Chelsea Bond (below, left) of Brisbane - Scholar of the Year.

* Gemma Benn (below, right) of Darwin - Youth of the Year.

* Danny Sebasio of Thursday Island - Apprentice of the Year.

* Andrew McLeod of the AFL Adelaide Crows - Sportsperson of the Year.

* Wayne Quilliam of Melbourne - Artist of the Year .

Image credits:
http://www.services.unimelb.edu.au/cie/community/Alumni/alumni.html
http://www.crcah.org.au/educationandtraining/chelsea_bond.html
http://www.koorimail.com/
http://www.theage.com.au/news/education-news/generations-torn-apart-by-indifference/2007/02/16/1171405447732.html