Obscured by clouds, Sanbiki No Saru, and Mother Nature’s Lesson

Obscured by Couds is the instrumental first track on the album of the same name released in 1972 by the super group Pink Floyd which regular readers of this blog will know are one of my all time favorite groups. 1972 was also a good year for me as well.

The fact this album came to mind this week results from a number of issues coming to the fore in my mind. The first being the ever increasing problems resulting from the cloud of volcanic smoke and steam hanging over Iceland. This still growing and dangerous cloud is the aftermath of the second eruption of the Eyjafjallajokull volcano this month. The cloud has caused all kinds of chaos with the closure of European airports. Eight European countries closed their airspace last week and many Europe-bound flights have not been able to leave Australia and Asia. There does not seem to be any resolution to this in sight. The situation is fast moving from a humorous inconvenience to something more concerning. Rightly perhaps, the news reports have also grown exponentially to reflect these concerns.

The second story to use up news paper space, and TV time was the first live election debate held in Manchester this week. I am not sure what we gained from the experience and I was reminded of the three monkeys depicted in the old Japanese proverb principle to ‘see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil’. However, the coverage was immense and frankly quickly became tedious. Perhaps the programme producers, politicians and reporters have forgotten that the Japanese proverb sometimes also includes a forth monkey - symbolising the principle of ‘do no evil’. I won’t even comment on the media clamour that has accompanied the return to our screens of Britain’s got Talent.

The huge amount of time and commentary devoted to these stories nearly completely obscured the other dreadful natural occurrence, the earthquake in Western China. This powerful earthquake registered 6.9 and has destroyed the town of Gyegu in the county of Yushu. At the time of writing the loss of life involved has reached over 800 people. Providing aid and help has been made more difficult by the terrain and isolation of the town and the inaccessibility caused by lack of infrastructure and equipment.

Amidst the reports of such devastation were images of startling power and humility. As if in a Zhang Yimou film, photos of 100’s of Tibetan Buddhist monks clad in crimson cloaks and jackets illustrated the way in which they had flocked to join the rescue effort undertaken by soldiers and rescue teams.

Finally, for those of you who don’t know whilst the album Obscured by Clouds is a brilliant collection of music in its own right, it was also the soundtrack for the film La Vallee. This film tells the story of the wife of the French Consul resident in Australia, who joins a group of explorers in search of a mysterious hidden valley in the forests of New Guinea the world’s second largest island.

She hopes to find the feathers of an extremely rare exotic bird. As they make their way through the dense jungles of Papua New Guniea they come across the Magupa tribe, one of the most isolated groups of human beings on earth. This is a tribe who are completely in-tune with nature, the seasons, and have explanations for the unpredictable as well as the predictable. It is this encounter that allows and inspires them to explore their own humanity, unfettered by their own subjective ideas of ‘civilization’. It seems to me that as dreadful as the volcanic eruption and earthquake might be, it maybe Mother Natures way of allowing us to take a step back from the brink and reconsider what we understand our own civilization to mean.

" It's In Fashion " Is NOT An Excuse

Oh yea, i'm up on my fashion soapbox again. Lets face it - i'm no style icon - but i know what i like and i know what is not flattering. Which is, unfortunately, not the case with everybody else. Some people know what they like but what they like is bleh; some people think that just because something is in fashion means they should wear it, regardless of what it actually looks like on them; and some people have no clue, dont want one, and wear whatever they feel like, regardless of current fashions and/or flattering-ness ( which isnt a word, but who cares ? ).

I'm all for individuality, so if you're one of these totally awesome people that can shop at flea markets and op-shops and throw together the most gorgeous, vintage, rocking ensemble without the slightest hint of effort, than good for you. What i'm not for is slavery to fashion, and heinous crimes against said fashion - you shouldnt pander at the fashion alter, but nor should you ignore it so much that what you pass as an " outfit " could burn someone elses retinas. I'm also " anti " some apparently fashionable things, or fashion trends. My biggest bug bare? Leggings.

I've said it once, i'll say it again, as loud as the blog medium will let me: LEGGINGS ARE NOT PANTS. Leggings ( or tights, whichever you prefer ) are not acceptable as an alternative to pants. They are not interchangeable. I'm ok with wearing leggings are under skirts and dresses - hell, i'm even alright with leggings under shorts ( although its not entirely flattering ) - but what i am not ok with is leggings, on their ownsome, worn as one would wear a pair of pants. Witness:

Stolen from www.domestica.typepad.com

You will  notice that these are leggings - NOT pants. I can see every contour of this girls body - hell, she's naked enough to be able to rest the support pole between her butt cheeks. Pants would contain hardy fabric which would make this little disappearing trick a little, well, trickier. Also - notice that poor old Pop there does not know where to look. Probably because if he looks down he will not only be able to count the individual dimples on this girls thighs, but he'll also be able to tell how good a job her waxer does. Seriously, a little mystery would be so much more attractive. AS WOULD SOME PANTS!!

My other pet fashion hate the moment ? Boys in tight jeans. Tight jeans are awesome for legendary 80's rockstars ( see, please Bon Jovi, Jon and Micheals, Brett ). They are not so awesome for every pimply, teenage skate rat i see skulking around the mall. Especially when  the tight pants are accompanied by a visible underwear waistband. I dont wanna know what brand of underwear your mum buys you, and i dont want to get the  hint of your adolscent plumbers cleavage. I feel like a grandma but.... for God's sake, pull your bloody pants up!

Ok, rant over. I just had to get that off my chest before i go through my wardrobe and figure what still fits my post-pregnancy body ( baby boobs are an issue... ) and therefore prepare myself for what fashions may confront me at Tar-jay and Big W ( oh yea, unpaid maternity leave is also a wardrobe issue ... ).

You Gotta Be In It To Win It

The lottery that is. And i'm not usually - i might buy a lottery ticket once or twice a year, so its highly doubtful that i'll ever win the big bucks but, for the sake of a blog post, lets just pretend that i did win big. Say $50 million dollars big. What would i do with it ? ( NOTE: i totally stole this very simple idea from Erin @ Motherhood Y'all ).

#1: Umm, boring - i'd pay off my debts. Which, for me, means my mortgage, my car loan and a couple of hundred dollars on a credit card. I'd also pay Mickey J's debt and our immediate families. Way to get in the good books right ?

#2: Pay for my wedding and honeymoon - we still havent set an official date yet but Mick and I plan on getting married sometime around September or October next year. My parents have a bit of money set aside to pay for it all but i'd much rather pay for it myself. Either way, whether we had $1000, $10 000 or $1 million dollars, it wont be an extravagant affair. We're just not that kind of people. Beautiful dress ? Yep. Pretty location? Yep. Good food? Yep. Should it cost the price of a new car ? Umm - nup.

#3: Buy a new house - for my little family ( we currently live in a two bedroom duplex that i - or the bank - own ) and one for each of our immediate family members. That way, after having already paid off their debts, they could have a new home to live in and one as an investment property to earn them money. Tricky....

#4: Set some aside for my children - well, i only have one at the moment but i will have more in the future ( i'm like 99% sure ). So i'd set aside a big lump sum as a trust fund, say one that couldnt be touched til they were 25. I would hope by then that they'd figured out their priorities in life and then they could put the money to good use. You know, instead of blowing $50 000 on booze and parties and sexual liasions. Which is all fun, just not what me as Mum would want the money spent.

#5: Investment - i dont really know how the investment market works so i'd have to get some help with that, but i wouldnt wanna blow all my moolah on junk. I'd be smart enough to put some into stocks, or into the property market ( or, you know, whatever ) so that i could make money off of my money. I don't mean for that to sound greedy, but you'd do that too right?

#6: Give to charity - maybe a $100 000 or so. I'd give to a few different causes : Westmead Childrens Hospital in Sydney, Careflight, The Jane McGrath Foundation.... things like that. I might give some to a foreign aid charity, but only after i'd fixed up some Australian interests first. I'm not against foreign aid ( i've sponsored a child through World Vision for 9 years... ) i just would like to give to a charity this is going to help in my community first, thats all.

#7: ( Lucky last ) Living allowance - i'd quit my job so i could be a SAHM for a while ( until Flynn and any subsequent children were at school ) so i'd need to allot some money to the day to day running of our house. Maybe $80 000 a year? Thats more than what we live off now but its not flashy - enough to cover bills and neccessities but with a little extra for luxuries and holidays. Yep, that sounds about right.

So how about you guys? Where would your Lotto winnings go ? ( Oooh, and speaking of winning things, head over to Blog This! and vote for me in this weeks poll. Please!?! )

Taxing Situation

My wife is ticked off. She finished preparing her taxes and I haven’t. Our dining room table has been covered with my papers for weeks. The printing calculator sits in the midst of slips and invoices for deductible things I paid for in 2009 and I’ve been working on it all when I can find a few hours between jobs. I’ve always hated paperwork, but it’s particularly hard to motivate myself with government paperwork. She did all that for her private counseling practice weeks ago, but I’m still at it for my writing and property-management business and she can’t file until I’m ready.

“Make sure you tell the accountant it’s your fault and not mine,” she said. I filed for an extension and wrote checks for the amount we paid last year - about $11,000 for state and and federal taxes. That’s in addition to what is taken out of my teacher salary for which I claim zero deductions - and I have them take out an additional $150 per pay period. The tax code is much too complicated to figure out, so we pay $3-4 hundred each year to have a CPA do help us with it. Sometime over the next six months, we’ll sit down with her and hope she can show us ways to avoid paying so much.

Half of all Americans, however, do not go through this because they pay no federal income tax. And, according to Derek Thompson at The Atlantic, because of college tuition credits, child credits, and something called the “Earned Income Tax Credit,” rather than write a check to the government, government writes them a check! These are not refunds I’m talking about here. They get more back from the government than was ever deducted from their paychecks - assuming they actually work. They don’t dread April 15th like I do. They look forward to it because it’s a payday. This time every year, money goes out of my account and into theirs.

During the first few years of my 35-year teaching career, government had me under the poverty line because I made less than $10,000 per year with a wife and four children. I cut firewood. We grew a garden, raised animals, drove clunkers, shopped at Goodwill, and ate a lot of soup. We got by and we even look back on those times as among our happiest. The kids are grown now and my wife works. I’m still a teacher but with a little business on the side, so now we’re “rich.” The left moans that “The rich get richer and the poor get poorer,” but I don’t think that’s necessarily the case. Maybe it’s time to coin another phrase, such as “The ‘poor’ are getting richer while the ‘rich’ are getting poorer” because of the confiscatory power of government.
The Earned Income Tax Credit alone costs $50 billion a year. For months, I’ve been hearing radio ads in which a Spanish-accented woman tells us how fulfilling it is to work for the United Way telling more and more people about the EITC so they can get money from government too. In his latest column, Mark Steyn cited Congressman Paul Ryan’s claim that 20% of US households get about 75% or their income from the federal government. Another 20% get 40% of their income from federal programs. That’s four out of ten households. Throw in another 11% who are guilt-ridden, trust-funded, limousine liberals and you have a solid voting majority in any national election.

To keep this gravy train on the tracks, government goes further into debt by $1.5 trillion each year. We’re $12 trillion in the hole now, but with Obamacare, we’re frantically digging deeper. The McClatchey Newspapers write that since it passed, “Questions . . . have flooded insurance companies, doctors' offices, human resources departments and business groups. ‘They're saying, “Where do we get the free Obama care, and how do I sign up for that?” ’ said Carrie McLean, a licensed agent for eHealthInsurance.com.”

During the week before election day in 2008, a supporter at one of Obama’s rallies named Peggy Joseph said, “[When he’s elected] I won’t have to worry about putting gas in my car. I won’t have to worry about paying my mortgage.”
The top 25% of earners pay 85% of federal income taxes, while the bottom 50% pay only 3% - and that’s after those tax cuts for the “rich” they whine about so much. No wonder they vote for Democrats.

Next on the Democrat agenda is amnesty for about 20 million illegal aliens. That will make voters who don’t pay income tax an even more solid majority. Mark Steyn asks: “If 51 percent can vote themselves government lollipops from the other 49 percent, soon 60 percent will be shaking down the remaining 40 percent, and then 70 percent will be sticking it to the remaining 30 percent. How low can it go?”

Good question.

Adventures in Mush and Toothy-Pegs

So.... i've started my little Flynn on rice cereal. He is almost 16 weeks and will be 4 months old going off birthdate on the 27th of this month. Which means that yes, i have started him on "solids " just shy of 4 months of age, which is the youngest age they should be ( at a minimum ) according to health recommendations. So anyone who wants to use the comments to tell me that " you cant start solids before 4 months! Midwives reckon you should wait til 6 months! " or something to that effect, feel free. I welcome debate in the comments section ( see my post entitled " I'm No Mummy Hater... " - mummy-debate galore! ). Basically it came down to this - my baby boy is getting increasingly hungry and by our second-to-last and last feeds of the night my booby juice is starting to almost run dry, which means Flynn is pulling himself off, after 40 minutes between boobies, and he's crying 'cause he's still hungry. I figured it was either top him up with formula and get him addicted - thus rejecting mummies milk and making her sad - or just starting him on one rice cereal feed a day, a week or two earlier than recommended. A boy has to eat right ?

Right. And so we've started ourselves on rice cereal. Mmm.... looks like mush and i'm pretty sure it probably tastes like soggy cardboard, but Flynny has taken to it pretty well. We've only had two nights on it so far - the first night i'm pretty sure most of it ended up on his bib and he thought the spoon was a bit weird, but last night he settled into it a bit better. In fact, when everything was gone out of the bowl and i popped the bowl up on the table ( he sits in his bouncer and i sit on the floor ), he turned his little head and kept staring at the bowl, as if magically trying to will it back. Clever little fella - only two nights of proper mush and he's already figured out mush comes from the bowl and the purple spoony thingo.

Also - i think my little dude is teething. He's pretty much the King of the Dribble-Guts anyway, but he's been extra dribbly, extra rosy-cheeked and extra snuggly the last few days. I'm loving the snuggles but i'm not enjoying the huge screams every now and then, especially when he's finished feeding ( apparently all that sucking makes the gums swell, or something, making them more sensitive ). I cant see any tell-tale lumps popping up yet but when i give him something to bite on or rub his gums for him he settles a bit. I gave him some baby Panadol last night to calm him down but i'm thinking i should get some gel or something when i'm next at the shops. I know my little man is in some kind of pain, but honestly - i'm just excited to see a tooth pop up!

Ah - my little man is growing so quickly! ( Cliche yes, but i have to acknowledge its truth - i want him to be a chubby cheeked bubba forever! )

Letters, Chewing Gum and Communication

Gordon Brown sent me a letter this week. I wondered why he chose me to communicate with. We have never met, we hold fundamentally different political views and beliefs, and Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath is to be found on the opposite side the part of the Scotland I love to visit. In the interest of fairness and equal opportunities I expect I will also receive a letter from David and Nick – it is of course Election time again. Whilst I have voted at every opportunity there has been since I came of age, my interest, has since May 1997, being rather perfunctory. Since the 6th April this year I have become fed up with the wall to wall media coverage of an event that like the Olympics, the World Cup, and who wins Big Brother, frankly doesn’t do anything for me at all.

Clearly the Legacy Projects post Olympics are worthwhile, and the competition itself provides an opportunity for personal achievement, team working and at times an almost jingoistic level of support for competitors. Likewise I was able to see the huge developments and improvements to many areas of the fabric of the South African infrastructure as they prepared for the World Cup. As for Big Brother, the TV reality show named after George Orwell’s dystopian book 1984, and which some would say provides a new opportunity for sociological study, the incessant media hype that has usually accompanied the show turns me off Big Time.

Possibly it is TV as a form of communication media that I find is the rub. Of course, like everyone else, I have the ubiquitous flat screen TVs scattered throughout my house. I like watching the news, and indeed start my day at 5am watching the BBC News, and I try and do so wherever I am in the world. I am immensely interested in the human condition and the relationships that make up our everyday worlds. But I wouldn’t watch Coronation Street, EastEnders or Emmerdale to feed this interest, in fact I wouldn’t watch them at all. Whereas I would go out of my way to watch and or record Outnumbered which I think brilliantly captures and observes everyday family life, and of course who could miss Have I got News For You or Top Gear, both of which connect with my sense of humour. So in many respects I am no different from others, perhaps just have different tastes.

As I observed last week, respecting difference is important. Thanks to those of you who took the time to make a comment. I waited until this post to respond to the question raised in one of these comments. This was around a concern that Blogs as a form of communication were being discouraged by the University.

I don’t know if our University is becoming less keen for colleagues and or students to write blogs. I would hope not. Blog's, as a form of communication can be very effective. Of course there will be boundaries that get set, challenged and re-set from time to time. I have noted in previous blog’s the tensions I experience from time to time in feeling able to present issues that others might feel bring my organisational position or professional standing into disrepute. In response to the other part of your question, I am a nurse and proud to be known as one. I understand the responsibilities to the profession that come from making such an assertion. However, as noted above, I also have views about a whole range of issues, concerns and phenomena that often have nothing directly to do with nursing. I have been fortunate to find many avenues to get my ideas and thoughts into the public domain and have benefited from the resultant discussion as other agree or disagree with what I have said.

Personally, I would suggest that anyone thinking about undertaking a degree which would lead to a professional career such as nursing, medicine, law and so on, should be more wary about their use of more main stream social networks such as Facebook, than writing blogs. Arguably such social networking sites may unintentionally provide a record of personal experiences that would perhaps best be kept private and personal and not given an airing in the public domain. It also seems to me to be a rather sad enterprise that is masquerading as communication. It was Frank Lloyd Wright who once remarked that television is chewing gum for the eyes. This was modification of Karl Marx’s observation that religion was the opiate of the people. Perhaps we need to find a new metaphor for social networking. And finally, I note that Gordon, David and Nick have said they would be happy to make video responses to questions sent via Facebook and UTube about their polices and plans for the future. So perhaps Gordon does know me after all, and hence the letter he sent me on Friday.

You Want Freaky?

Time again for another Blog This! challenge. This week i have to:
Tell your readers about a weird co-incidence, freaky story or a six-or-less degrees of separation moment! I'm going to cheat a little on this one by re-posting a story i have told before. So if you've been reading my blog for a while now you needn't bother reading this time. If you have no idea what i'm talking about, then brace yourself - this one is an epic!!

For those of you who are not up on your geography or world heritage sites, that is Machu Picchu, an ancient Inca city built into the Andes mountains. You may recognise it from Lonely PLanet guidebooks, National Geographic calendars or any of the 1001 travel shows being broadcast around the globe. It is, undeniably, a popular tourist destination - and the best way to get there ? On foot. Yes - foot: a four day trek through the Andes, starting at an outpost known as KM88 and finishing at Machu Picchu ( hopefully at either sunrise or sunset, if you time it right ... ). So that's we're i'll start my story - on the Inca Trail, on the 2nd day of the trek.

I'm not going to lie - the Inca Trail is no easy slog. Its not like i was some kind of ultra-fit, athletic superwoman . I was a slightly-larger-than-I-am-now trekking novice who'd never done anything at altitude before. But it promised to be the adventure of a lifetime, and who was i to turn that down ( even if it did feel like my lungs were going to explode ) ? Just making it into camp on the first day - accompanied by my all-male encouragement troupe, 3 guys i'd only known a few days before who insisted that singing " Eye of the Tiger " would motivate us up the mountain - was a Godsend. Day two promised to be harder. By mid mornng we would be ( slowly, painfully ) making our way to Warminwayusca, or Dead Womans Pass. This pass is 4500m above sea level and, as the highest point on the trek, is considered the toughest part of the journey. With the whole group having reached the summit, we stopped for a snack and a photo opportunity. It was from here that everything went downhill- both literally and figuratively.

My boys, after the trek - i believe they had moved onto Spice Girls songs by then

When our guide said it was time to pack ourselves up and get on the move, i tired sitting up but i felt all lightheaded and lethargic - it was like all the energy had been completely drained out of my body. I took a minute and tired to gather myself together but, when i looked a little wobbly on my feet, my guide and one of the other guys volunteered to walk at the back with me. Within a half an our, not only was i wobbly on my feet but i could barely seem to lift my arms - rather than walking with my walking sick, i was dragging it behind me in the dirt. My trekking buddy, Lachlan, said he'd carry my pack for me and my guide Jugo supported me on one side. I'd been drinking water and we'd only just eaten, so i should have all the energy in the world, but within another half hour, my vision had gone blurry and i was now being supported on both sides. I wasnt so much as walking, as being slowly dragged up the mountain side by an ex-Army recruit and a small Incan man. Mind you, all the guides are trained in first aid and a nurse in our group mentioned she thought i might be dehydrated or could possibly have altitude sickness.

And so we stopped. Jugo radioed ahead for one of the porters to come back with some blankets and he sat me down on a very comfy rock on the side of the trail. He gave me me water and put me on an oxygen tank for 20 minutes. He also made me inhale some foul smelling yuck, which apprently alleviates the symptoms of altitude sickness. All of that and - nada. I could barely breath, by this time could barely see, and felt like both my arms and legs were being weighed down by concrete. To be quite honest, i wuld have been perfectly happy to curl up on that there rock and die. Obviously, leaving me to die on a barren hillside isnt wasnt exactly part of Jugo's job description so... they carried me. Yes, you read that right - Jugo, Lachlan and Alejandro, the young guide who came back with the blankets, carried me. On their backs, They tied me on with the blankets, just like Peruvian women do with their babies.Hell, they even ran! Lachlan was a big guy, but Jugo and Alejandro were typically short, small, Incan men, and they ran with my whole 60kg/150lb of weight on their backs. I was slipping in and out of conscious - the only thing i do clealy remember is catching up to the rest of our group and Jugo telling them they had to get me immediately to camp.

Which is where i woke up. I woke up with Jugo leaning over me, stroking my head, telling me i was going to be okay, not to worry, he was sending someone into see me. Yep, no worries - zzzzzzzzz. Next thing i know there is a " Hola, senorita ? Hola ? " at the opening to my tent and in comes this really old guy. Here comes the cool part - he props my head up and starts muttering, kind of chanting, in the local Incan language. I was already almost completely out of it, too far gone to make any objection to what he was doing anyway. So the old guy keeps up the muttering and then he lights up something a bowl until it starts smoking. Once he had his smoke going, he blew it all over me: directly into my face, over the top of my head, down the front of my shirt, everywhere. He rubbed whatever he'd crushed up in his bowl over my face and arms, finished up with his chanting, said " Buenos noches, senorita ", and disappeared. Two of my female trekking companions them came in and helped me put on more clothing layers and then - blackness. I passed out or fell asleep for a while and then rested very fitfully ( i;d say slept, but i dont think i really did ) for the rest of the night.

Morning comes and .... i feel awesome. I wake up feeling great, go out and eat breakfast with everyone - albeit while copping some very strange looks from my trek buddies. Everyone wants to know how i feel and Jugo takes me aside to make sure i'm feeling okay. And that was it, we set off for the day. No-one rally talks much about the day before, except to say that i looked terrible, all limp like a rag doll and one of our older members thought i might have been dead. No-one bothers to tell me what may or may not have been wrong with me, but it didnt really matter because i was doing fine. It wasnt until our first snack break that anyone decided to let me in on what went on the previous night. So, take a deep breath people, here it comes : I WAS POSSESSED. Don't re-red that to see if it makes more sense, it wont. Apparently, whilst i had been laid up in my tent, delirious, Jugo had taken everyone else aside and told them what was going to happen, because he didnt want them to think i was being taken advantage of or anything. He, and the other porters - all Peruvian indian men - thought i had been taken over by a mountain spirit, spirits that the Incan people believed kept guard over their trail. The elderly gentleman, who turned out to be one of our porters, was also a kind of Incan medecine man, was going to go in an perform some kind of exorcism ritual, and expel whatever spirit it was that had taken me over.

And there you have it - when all the scientific medecines didnt work, when i only continued to get worse, it was decided that i must have been possessed and only pagan magic could save me. And you know what ? It did. The oxygen, the foul smelling inhalant, the water and pills, none of that worked but the chanting and the smoke blowing had me feeling as fresh as a daisy. Not only did i not struggle with the rest of the trek, but i was the second person to make it to the gateway to Machu Pichhu. It was like i'd been suddenly blessed or something. When we had finished our tek and met back up in town with our other tour guide, Jonathon, he told me in full what had gone on. He said he had only heard of two other women in 15 years of leading tours who had got so sick, so suddenly, and in the same spot on the trek ( straight after Dead Womans Pass ), and the same smoke blowing, chanting, praying-whatever worked on them too. You can believe what you want but, having lived the experience and being of a hippie-dippie spiritual mind anyway, i'm like 95% sure something otherworldly happened to me up there.
Either way, it sure beats the hell out of most peoples vacation stories....