TEOTWAWKI And Tasmania

I should make you Google up TEOTWAWKI if you're so clueless that you don't recognise the acronym. But for the soon-to-be-Zombie-victims among you, I will remind the reader that TEOTWAWKI stands for The End Of The World As We Know It. Obviously, I am referring to the present outbreak of Swine 'Flu - or as our Israeli brethren apparently would have it "Mexican 'Flu".

I can understand how Jewish and Islamic folk would rather have a Mexican 'Flu than an Unclean Antikosher Stinky Piggy Flu, but... has anybody actually asked the Mexicans about this one? Do they really want their very own 'Flu?

Well, never mind.

My problem here is my wife's profession. I came down here to Taz to raise kids because frankly, Tasmania is

• off the global geopolitical radar
• not nearly as vulnerable to warming as mainland Oz
• not nearly so vulnerable to sea level rises as most of Oz
• self-sufficient in food
• self-sufficient in power
• self-sufficient in water
• not overcrowded
• not expensive (comparitively) to buy and live
• very strong in terms of social capital in comparison to most modern communities of Oz

Not to put too fine a point on it, Natalie wanted kids, so I looked into the Flinthart Crystal Ball and saw trouble a-comin' in the future. Given that Elder Son was born in 2000, I'd like to point out the Flinthart Crystal Ball was pretty f__king good... but to be honest, any damned fool who kept up with newspapers and journals could have foreseen the shitstorm which has only just begun to break over us all.

Anyway. I did the best I could, and here we are. But... I really don't know what to do about epidemics. I know what I'd like to see: Tasmania should shut the doors. Cargo in, cargo out. Nothing more -- and all cargo handling done with minimum human contact, maximum quarantine precaution. (No, not necessarily for this Piggy Flu. It doesn't look like a civ-killer... at least, not yet.)

I just can't see the government being smart enough to do that, though. And how would we prevent desperadoes from the mainland fleeing here in their boats? Be nice if we could whip the Bass Strait into a frenzy on demand, but we don't have a navy to help.

So -- if it comes, when it comes, the Next Big Plague, the long-overdue cull of humankind... I don't suppose it will miss Tasmania. And when it comes here, my wife will be out there trying to keep people alive. In contact with whatever-it-is for days on end. While I'm here at home with three kids, at least one of whom has an over-active immune system that turns even a simple head cold into weeks of painful symptoms

I know. I worry a lot. Sure. But this one... this is the one I can't do anything about. And every time I read about another outbreak somewhere, anywhere, I get a nasty shiver.

Sure hope this Mexican Piggy Flu peters out soon.

Told You It Was Cold...

Apparently, it was a 'student-free' day at school today. That doesn't actually mean 'students get in free'. Nor does it mean you get a free student if you show up. No, it means the teachers are there suckin' back the coffee and downing the iced vo-vos without the interference of the little grubs who make the whole 'school' gig such a pain in the arse.


I wish somebody had bothered to tell me, is all. Then I might not have gone through the routine of rounding up the boys, organising lunches, prodding them into dressing for school, etc. Of course, I'd have driven down to the school anyhow. Monday is the day the Mau-Mau and her best friend, whom I shall dub the Microblonde, go to day-care at the school based facility.

Happily, the day-care facility wasn't having a kid-free day. But I did have to turn around with two boys in the car. Mind you, once we turned for home, we noticed that the cold snap and the rain had resulted in a decent snowfall atop Mount Barrow.

Student-free day. Free snow on the mountaintop. Well, what else can you do? We fired up the Trusty Earth King, put on our warmest snuggies, and headed for the hills.


There wasn't a vast pile of snow or anything, but it's always nice. And from the snowy peak we had a hell of a view. More snow on distant mountains. Green lowlands beneath. The Bass Strait glittering like hammered brass in the distance.


We froze our arses off, of course. But then, that's the point, isn't it? Then we came home, and made hot bread. How good is that?

I'm going to make mulled wine tonight. Ha! Take that, you Saxon dogs!

Hey -- Did Somebody Order A Winter?

Holy sheepdip! That was fast. Where the flock did that come from? Couple days ago it was all shirt's off, snoozing under the sheet with the windows open. Then all of a sudden, it's Tasmania!

We've had a couple days of rain now. No -- three, actually. And not just rain: that cold, wet, insistent, continuous rain that characterises a Tasmanian winter. In keeping with the them, temperatures have plunged. We've got the wood heater going, and all the windows are misted up on the inside. When the clouds opened briefly this morning, I saw a fresh snowfall atop Mount Barrow. Thought about taking the kids, but the weather was too dodgy. I have no desire to find myself trapped on the mountaintop when the weather really closes in - and given that it only got worse all afternoon, I think that was a good decision.

I hope we get a real winter this year. It's been a bit dry and warm for the last three in a row. We need a serious winter's worth of rain to bring the aquifers back to life, and refill the whole hydroelectric scheme, and generally remind mainlanders that the don't want to be here, no sir, far too wet and drippy and cold, that's right, ignore those flowers...

Indoors stuff today. No chainsawing for me. Just a lot of reading, editing and writing. I made hot chocolate for the kids, played Scrabble with Natalie -- and whipped her arse something terrifying! -- made pizzas, etc. With the woodfire burning and the world outside dissolved into a grey-green mist, gentle rain falling on the roof, the coziness of this house beggars description.

May winter treat all of you as kindly.

Chainsaw Chuckles

Got in a good session of work this morning. Natalie is having a rare (recently, anway) weekend home, so the kids are Not My Problem for once. I hammered away for several hours, then felt the need of some physical activity.

We had rain, yesterday. A lot of it. It was great, but we were supposed to get more today, so it was quite a surprise to see the sun this morning. Plenty of sunlight, too -- warm, strong and bright. Made it all the more enticing to go outside.

I figured I had a job to do with the chainsaw. Since we threw the cows off the property and took out the internal fences, I've been putting in fruit trees, nuts, a few natives -- and letting the wattles do their forest recolonisation thing. Wattles are fast growing. We've got seven-year-old trees that are thirty-plus centimetres through the base, and fifteen metres high.

Obviously, a tree which grows as fast as that can be a pain if it comes up where you don't want it. Also, wattles aren't particularly long-lived. Their job is to recolonise clear spaces in the forest, and to grow high quickly to take advantage of the light. However, after maybe twenty years they senesce, and frequently die. In their wake, you get the slower-growing species - species locally known as myrtle, sassafras, and blackwood among others.

Clearly, I can't leave something like a wattle right next to the driveway, for example. And in fact, we had one there -- about ten metres tall, maybe 25cm at the base. I figured I'd start with that one, clear it away, then move on and take out a few of the others which are becoming inconvenient or unsafe.

So, yes: chainsaw time. Sharpen. Oil. Refuel. Check the tension -- hmm, a bit loose. Tighten it. Whoops! Not much there any more. Hmm.

Take the chainsaw down to the driveway. Start the job. Hmm. Chain isn't pulling itself into the cut properly. By now I probably need to file back the rakers. Pity I haven't got a file for the job, eh? Bugger.

Oh well. It's cutting, albeit poorly. Have to do.

The tree falls perfectly: into the driveway, right into the centre, doesn't touch anything else. Now commences the job of cutting it into rounds suitable to dry out for firewood. One round. Two. Three. Cut away a few branches.

Hmm. Not cutting? Oh, look. The chain has come off.

Bugger.

I've tensioned it as far as it will go. What has to happen next is that I need to take a link or two out. But I've never done that before, and I don't have the tools, either. And now I've got a flogging great wattle tree across my driveway, and Natalie is on call for random baby delivery stuff... not that anybody's expecting anything, but you never know when the doc may have to leave the premises in a hurry.

This is NOT the time to learn how to tighten a chain.

Alternatives?

Just one.

I put the chainsaw away, and got out my bow saw. And then for the next hour or so, I proceeded to saw up the entire fucking tree and pile it along the sides of the driveway.

Yes. That was tiring, thanks.

Good Food And Mixed Messages

Mixed up sorta day, yesterday. It was a Home Day for Elder Son, but the Mau-Mau was home too, and Smaller Son was in da house as well since he had a cough that kept him up all night. It made doing the educational stuff with Elder Son quite challenging, although Godzilla helped for a while, by beating the shit out of MechaGodzilla to keep the younger pair entertained. Thank you, Big G.

Part of the problem was that Elder Son apparently had a report to write about a recent excursion. And unfortunately, his teacher has decided that the home days are perfect for him to catch up on report-writing. Which is entirely not the bloody case.

On top of that, she's assigned him homework. And it's -- well, it's fucking stupid busywork. This kid is reading Conan and Doc Savage and Discworld stuff for his own enjoyment, and for homework, he has to write three sentences using the words stop, with and blue. Then he has to arrange a list of twenty-six words in alphabetic order. They're short words, and it's no coincidence that there's twenty-six: each word starts with a different alphabet letter. Tough task, eh?

Then there's the clown picture on the back. It's a colour-by numbers exercise in which you solve little problems to figure out what colour to use. Problems like 20+10, or 30-5. Again: stupid, and way, way below the level of math he takes in his extension math class at school.

There's more, but it's all much at the same level. And frankly, I'm not going to get him to do it. I've read the research on homework. It's value is limited, at best, and is most effective at a secondary school level. To be any use at all, it has to be of an appropriate time-length, and it absolutely can't be stupid-ass busywork. The researchers are all in agreement there. If the homework is to be any good, it has to extend or reinforce classwork, or the kids rapidly come to see it as a punitive waste of time.

I'd like to just ignore it, but Elder Son already gets in trouble with his teacher because he doesn't work in the manner she's after. I can certainly agree with some of her issues; his disorganization and his lack of listening skills are a pain in the ass. But that report... I had him sitting down for over an hour to write it, and when he was done, it was complete - but flat and dry. Natalie tells me his "draft version" (and yes, apparently they're all expected to do a 'draft' and a 'final') was three pages long, not one page, and it was highly creative and imaginative.

I did see a couple paragraphs. He wrote as though he was a spaceman, exploring a strange world and going out on a trip with the creatures that lived there. So why didn't he complete that version of the report?

Well -- he says that his teacher doesn't respond any better if the report is long and interesting and creative. She just wants it done.

I can see her point. He does need to learn to finish projects. But it seems to me that a little encouragement for the complex, interesting version might have seen it completed. Instead, it became a chore that we had to grind through, spending time we could have spent on more interesting things.

I'm not happy about this. And it's confusing, because at the same time, I've had a note from the school requesting permission for Elder Son to go on a science excursion to Bridport and the beach next week. They've got folks from the Vic Science museum along, and they'll be examining life in the intertidal zone, sampling micromolluscs, identifying algae, and discussing tides in relation to centripetal force and planetary movements -- according to the note, anyhow. Kids from three or four different schools in the area are going, but it's mostly about year 5 and 6. There will be one year 4 student from Scottsdale, but Elder Son is the only year 3.

And I know he'll enjoy it, and get a lot out of it. So why is his homework suitable for a kid two grades lower than he is?

I can't answer that. But I can say categorically that he's not going to be wasting his time at home colouring a clown by numbers. So there's going to be a bit of an issue coming, I suppose.

The evening went well, though. Mike the Historian came by for a drink and a talk, and as it happened, I was making a bit of a surprise meal for Natalie. I can't do the full range of Yum Cha dumplings, but I can do a decent mix of steamed dumplings -- chicken and ginger, chicken and mushroom, pork and ginger, pork and mushroom... add a couple platters of steamed buk choy and carrots with oyster sauce, and a dozen slabs of prawn toast, and you've got a pretty decent meal.

So - I just made a lot. I mean, a whole lot. And Eddy came down, with a bottle of bubbly that matched the one I had in the fridge already, and she brought a six-pack of beer, and Natalie brought home a couple six-packs, and the evening went really nicely. Even the Smashed Banana Custard 'Tard was good. (It was meant to be a banana custard tart, but I was too impatient about getting it out of the baking dish, and it all went to hell, shapewise.)

Nice end to the day, anyhow.

Dress Code Fallout

I believe I mentioned that the other day, Smaller Son went to school with a decidedly non-standard outfit on. His school shirt was inside out. His socks were wildly mismatched, and he wore blue gumboots. I mentioned the shirt to him, and he just shrugged, and said, "I know." I didn't bother mentioning the socks or the boots. They're pretty much standard for him.

However, on that particular day he also wore a folded newspaper hat, after the fashion of Calvin & Hobbes. The boys have been reading a lot of Calvin & Hobbes ever since we bought the hardbound complete editions. (I regret to say that while I think it's a marvellous comic, it's a bloody awful role model for growing boys.)

Anyway: Smaller Son had a newspaper hat on his head just to top off the ensemble, and he was blithely off to school. I admit it: I had visions of a school full of Nelson Muntz lookalikes pointing at Smaller Son, and saying, "Ha, ha!" But I figured, you know... he has to learn someday, right?

Of course, by that afternoon I'd forgotten all about it. I didn't think to ask him anything until yesterday evening, when he folded himself a new paper hat. "What happened to the old one?" I said. "What did they think about it at school?"

"Well, a couple of kids laughed," he said, very calmly. "At first. But then our whole class made paper hats and decorated them, and we wore them for the rest of the day. Everybody really liked them."

"Yeah," his brother chimed in. "They were all wearing them in the playground. I had to show some of my class how to make them too."

Okay, fine. I know when I'm beaten!

Pride And Prejudice And Zombies

Well, courtesy of Mr Bruce of the Cool Shite Team, I've now had the opportunity to read the eagerly awaited "Pride And Prejudice And Zombies" by Seth Grahame-Smith (and Jane Austen.)

For the rest of you eager awaiters, I regret to announce I was less than captivated. Full review by your faithful scribe to be found here.