Posts by DCBCauchi
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Cracker: On the trail, pt 1., in reply to Patrick Reynolds,
We will get a no result on the night.
Labour and National are virtually indistinguishable. I don't understand why they don't go into coalition together, combine the best things about each other's ideas, and discard the silly rhetoric.
Could someone please explain?
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Cracker: On the trail, pt 1., in reply to Danielle,
What about if you’d like your ‘responsibilities’ when you retire to be sweet FA? I find this new obsession we seem to have with older people continuing to ‘contribute economically’ pretty creepy myself.
Those two sentences do not appear to be related in any meaningful way. I do not think Ben meant 'responsibilities' to mean 'contribute economically'. Nor that retirees should have jobs.
But he can tell you that himself.
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Cracker: On the trail, pt 1., in reply to BenWilson,
The process of getting old and becoming useless is a horrible industrial offshoot, totally at odds with human nature. Instead, the old should be slowly changing their responsibilities, dialing down the more intense ones, and falling back to roles that are less about power and technical ability and more about helping the next generations through, and preserving the history of their times. They should feel valued until the day they die. Which in many cases, is well before 65.
When my dad turned 70, I laughed and pointed out that, if he were an Aztec, he still wouldn't be able to sit around and drink booze whenever he liked, cos he only met half the criteria: he didn't have a grandson to be a warrior for the state.
He didn't want to sit around drinking anyway. He took up learning Spanish and Maori, which involved living in relevant places for periods of time, and read a whole lot of books he'd always meant to. Extremely interesting conversations. It's not what books you read, but how you read them. Benefit of experience and all that.
There's 'work' and there's 'work', and there's 'retirement' and 'retirement'. I don't accept the redefined 'work'. I reckon your work isn't whatever you can find to earn a crust. Nor do you 'retire' when you can't find any more.
We get told our work doesn't matter, only our incomes and lifestyles. I reckon that's arse backwards. Your income and lifestyle doesn't matter. It's what you do with your life that counts.
I'm not interested in propping up other people's cosy arrangements. Yes, it suits some people to have us all chasing some mirage. And of course we want to be comfortable and to live like kings. It seems heaps better than the other options, no matter what you have to do to get it. But does it really suit you, your lifestyle, when all the actual costs and actual benefits are honestly weighed?
The concept of my work being finished and it being time to retire makes no sense to me.
Ramble, ramble, sputtering stop.
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And guess which country, with a remarkably similar history to ours, we based our bill of rights on?
The bill of rights with the careful ignore this if it’s too hard provision. Not sure whether that was in the original.
Not sure we want to make laws the way the Canadians do either. Drafting in two languages simultaneously to ensure no translation mishaps! Who’d’ve thunk it?
Actually doing what you said you'd do. Too hard?
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Oh look, the Stuff thing on the Hobbit has changed. Not improved, changed.
And there in a nutshell is a key difference between electronic and print publishing. It is really hard to recall all the printed copies of a paper and have another go at something masquerading as journalism.
Which is why people wishing to control things advocate getting rid of print in favour of electronica. Who controls your ebook? If it changes can you tell? Can you even check whether it has?
Spot the paranoid.
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Hard News: Occupy: Don't call it a protest, in reply to Steve Barnes,
John Key could have made blocks of cheese to hand out as election bribes.
A particularly pungent cheese. A pungency that reminds you of something else...
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Hard News: Occupy: Don't call it a protest, in reply to Carol Stewart,
Having to dump 11 million litres of milk is not insignificant.
No doubt that was the easiest and most economic option, but I wonder what else they might have done with it.
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Hard News: Occupy: Don't call it a protest, in reply to merc,
First reference I have seen in paper media, electronic version.
Speaking of valiant journalists telling the truth in the public interest, check out what Stuff’s decided the most interesting news about the Hobbit is today.
I wonder. Is that really how best to serve the public interest on the subject of working conditions for film workers on what is probably the world’s biggest film project at the moment? Not to mention the possibly relevant relationship between Jackson, Key, and other interested parties.
Does anyone else wonder whether there might be other stories Stuff could’ve told instead? How would I find out? Whose job is it to tell me?
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OnPoint: If Wishes Were Horses..., in reply to Islander,
I dont, and havent, for the past decade-
you fellas are entirely out of my non-income bracket-They live in a completely different world!
(By which I mean that people like Keri and me have a slightly different business model than most other small business people. An uneconomic business model. We don't pay ourselves as employees for a start. Not enough money for that.)
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Hard News: Occupy: Don't call it a protest, in reply to Hilary Stace,
and be snapped up by people who would appreciate them
And there’s the core of the preservation strand. Out of private libraries will the restored libraries of the future be built. The problem at the moment is that you need to be part of a personal network to access them.
Kind of like the Irish monks of old.
Oh, and if you belong to an institution that has an old printing press and trays of type on the premises, I reckon you should take immediate steps to secure it, then get someone who knows what they're talking about (like my dad) to tell you what you need to do to get it working again. Easily removable parts have probably been taken as souvenirs, because of your neglect.
My 2c.