Nassim
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[i}Munch and Frie are not your average one-year-olds. For a start, they’re three-foot-tall, covered in hair and named after packets of crisps. Munch (as in ‘Monster’) and Frie (as in ‘French’), two miniature Shetland ponies, are the newest arrivals at the Blue Cross Equine Rehabilitation Centre in Burford, Oxfordshire.
Two months ago, they were found belly-deep in a muddy back garden in Buckinghamshire, left to fend for themselves in the bitter winter weather. Malnourished, their manes matted and overrun by lice, the pair were afraid of human contact and on the verge of collapse when they were rescued from their filthy surroundings. [/i]
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/features/9175542/A-home-for-abandoned-horses.html
The whole idea of flexing one’s shoulders and arms to lift oneself like a bird is a bit of a give-away IMHO.
The best chance of getting a decent power-to-weight ration is by using one’s legs in a cycling motion – far more powerful muscles.
The current distance record recognised by the FAI was achieved on 23 April 1988 from Iraklion on Crete to Santorini in an MIT Daedalus 88 piloted by Kanellos Kanellopoulos: a straight distance of 115.11 km (71.53 mi).
Two weekends ago, we took a small break in Sydney. The weather was great – unlike before our arrival and after our departure.
From what I gather, there has not been that much sunshine in Sydney this past “summer”. Shame about the climate change. 🙂
Here is a link to Sydney’s current weather
https://www.weatherzone.com.au/nsw/sydney/sydney
As you can see, Sydney has had almost half a meter of rainfall so far in 2012 (454 mm to be precise). LOL
Personally, I see it as a simplification to an over-complex food supply system. Obviously, potatoes are a small part of what the farmers can eventually supply.
I can see a return to street-markets. It might mean that consumers can’t get hold of French cheeses and having to make do with local feta cheese instead. The same applies to lots of other products.
I was in Moscow in July ’98 and left two weeks before the financial collapse.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1998_Russian_financial_crisis
At a tiny supermarket a short walk from the Kremlin, I saw potatoes from the Netherlands and chickens from the USA (Tysons)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyson_FoodsI immediately realised that this was crazy and told my elder brother about it. He (a prominent world banker at that time) assured me that all was well with the Russian economy. 🙂
I have little respect for the middleman. It is the same argument as that used to promote military expenditure – what will these engineers and salesmen do otherwise?
Here in Australia, a handful of supermarkets determine the price that the farmer will get – a small fraction of what the supermarkets charge their own customers. Obviously, the whole set up is oiled by oil.
For example, I pay 2.60 dollars/litre for organic milk, and I doubt if the farmer gets half that. The margins on some other products are out-of-this-world.
This interesting discussion about boats was to be found deep down in the “Tsunami” thread. It has nothing to do with which boat can handle a real ocean tsunami best. 🙂
Am I the only one to miss a single discussion thread?
El G: please tell the lesson of the Kulaks in Russia.
alfbell,
I think El G is asleep. If you don’t mind, I will try to answer that one.
A Kulak was essentially a person, in the Soviet Union, who grew his own food and sold the surplus in the market or to traders who took it to the cities. Some were wealthy and owned lots of land, but the vast majority were not much more than doomsteaders. Eventually, anyone who could store food was considered a Kulak.
The Russian Revolution was largely driven by the urban population. The people in the countryside were much more religious and conservative (still true today). Due to the dislocation of the Revolution and the civil war (Reds versus Whites), the people in the cities got hungry and the communists blamed it all on the Kulaks – for hoarding food. The communists raided the country-side and took everything they could find and sent the males to concentration camps in Siberia – leaving their families behind to starve. In Russia, peasants stored food for the winter underground (still true today). Tens of millions starved – Solzhenitsyn estimated 60 million. Of course, the communists claimed it was under one million. Vast areas of the most productive agricultural land of Russia, Ukraine and Belorussia were almost depopulated. The communists used the unproductive peasants – who wanted the land of the more productive ones – to help in this carnage.
Nikita_Khrushchev, the guy who negociated with Kennedy, was the Kommissar for the Ukraine. He was Ukrainian, ugly and from an impoverished urban family. He must have been responsible for perhaps 20 million deaths in Ukraine. I hope you get the drift of what El G was getting at.
Suggested reading: Gulag archipelago (by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn)
Who was it who said that
Crime and evil does not pay in the long run, eh?
?
SwoOosch,
I agree with much you say about Sweden. However, anyway you look at it, Sweden is just as much of a Ponzi as Ireland ever was. The lessons of the Nordic property crash of the ’89-’91 were quickly forgotten and Swedish banks are heavily involved in property-lending in Eastern Europe. For example, Swedbank has assets of 1800 billion kronor on equity of 100 billion kronor. As 5% drop in asset value (which has probably already happened) would wipe them out.
Sweden is hugely dependent on trade with the rest of Europe – and we all know what is happening there
I am not convinced that the state paying some mothers to look after the kids of other mothers and pretending that they are both working and creating wealth is such a great idea – but then that opinion is based on my experience in Norway. I guess we will find out in due course. I am not suggesting that the American system is any better – quite the opposite.
<< The sabotaging of Conduit infrastructure by Have Nots is already occuring in places like Egypt. That is what all those Gas Pipeline explosions are about.>>
That is an interesting example. Essentially, Egypt has limited gas. The Egyptian PTB’s have resorted to two tactics to get that gas into cash/gold in Switzerland.
1- They opened cement factories – using almost free gas as fuel. Egypt has unlimited supplies of limestone and clay. This is then exported by those paying almost nothing for the fuel and much of the money disappears abroad.
2- Almost free gas is exported to Israel and Jordan. The Israelis and Jordanian pay a very cheap price which is nevertheless largely kept abroad and almost nothing reaches the Egyptian Treasury.
The destruction of the gas pipe-line is one way of getting at TPTB of Egypt. Easy and effective.
PS
Can someone please tell me how to shade in grey quotations by others?
Reverse Engineer,
I have no doubt that the those in charge would love to move all financial transactions – even the most trivial – to mobile/cell phones. It has been largely achieved in Japan, BTW.
However, as is usual with technocopic solutions, it is quite easy to waylay them. How exactly can they stop people from sabotaging local cell phone towers. I mean, if one cannot get food to eat, why should anyone else?
As soon as local towers are damaged, no one will be able to carry out any financial transaction legally. People will be forced to either barter or use gold/silver or revert to nominally worthless FRN’s
Can someone please tell me about the gold crash?
I checked the price and it was USD 1,420 12 months ago and is now USD 1,720 – a 20% increase. It seems that when it goes up 20%, it is a bubble and when it goes down 5%, it is a crash. A sort heads I win, tails you lose situation. 🙂
https://www.bullionvault.com/gold-price-chart.do
I am only presenting the data here, not encouraging anyone to buy or sell.
Personally, I would not be surprised if it were to go back to USD 1,400 before heading to USD 2,000+, but that is only my opinion.
BTW, I have been reading the autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini – the goldsmith and sculptor who worked for popes, kings and nobility.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benvenuto_Cellini
He spent quite a lot of time making the dies for making gold coins. Fascinating. It is clear to any reader the great importance that was attached to such a task in the Middle Ages. The rulers saw the importance not only of having genuine gold coins, but the importance of presentation. The coins had to look good too.
It is equally clear that our current crop of rulers don’t have any aesthetic sense whatsoever. They have no respect for money. I expect money will get its own back on them.
There is also a real possibility – on a human time-scale – of a Carrington Event.
“One-in-eight chance of solar megaflare causing trillions of dollars of damage in next ten years, scientists warn”
Clearly, in such a catastrophic event, having direct access to resources (including PM) would make quite a difference.
It is always fun to read what el g has to say. Thank you. 🙂
However, I could not help asking myself this time why he was doing this great favour to Mr Bernanke. Treasury Direct reminds me of the corral outside the slaughter-house through which the sheep are made to file for their one-way trip:
“Behavioural Principles of Livestock Handling”
https://www.grandin.com/references/new.corral.htmlhttps://qurban4lifesg.files.wordpress.com/2011/10/sheep21.jpg?w=300&h=300
Nothing is simpler than putting limits on withdrawals from Treasury Direct. I mean, they can pin-point an awkward individual and say “not him”. It is like handing the executioner the pistol. The mind boggles.
Personally, I have had the misfortune of having been through a bank crisis and having had my account frozen – like everyone else in Iran at that time. By the time I was able to return to reclaim my cash, under a year later, it must have devalued by 80%. As a kid, my dad once had an account frozen on him due to a court-case – most painful. Luckily, not all of it was in that account as he had no income. However, drastic spending cuts had to be made.
I also used to live in an African country where 20 piastres was the pay for one labourer working hard for one day. Last time I was there, it would not pay for a single cigarette.
The fact that they are making it so difficult for Americans to keep their money abroad legally strongly suggests that they want to be able to pick and choose who gets to be able to access his savings – and who is left out in the cold. It is a typical totalitarian move and I can offer plenty of examples of that happening in the past. Do you think the Jews who were lucky to get out of Germany after 1933 were allowed to take their savings with them?
By all means put most of your money in Treasury Direct. However, it would be foolish to not keep at least 10% of it in cash and 10% in physical gold.
Thank you Beguine. I must make a bigger effort to find these things. Personally, I find the breadmaker indispensible – I must be congenitally lazy. 🙂
Here is a better link to this video
https://www.nfb.ca/film/sunshine_eclipse
On my browser (Firefox), the right side seems trunkated.
rapeen,
Interesting.
I use a bread-machine here in Melbourne. Unfortunately, I don’t seem to be able to find a place that sells proper wholemeal or proper sour-dough flour. I am obliged to buy the standard mixtures to be found at Coles – made by “Lauke”. It makes a nice loaf – but not at all as rough and tasty as the loafs that I could produce in the UK.
If you have any suggestions, please let me know 🙂
Hello scandia,
In my case, I am not sure that “love at first sight” is the appropriate description. 🙂
However, I assure you that he is definitely a non-conformist – he kept on wondering off and Stoneleigh had to keep a maternal eye on him.
Quite an unusual day. I met both Stoneleigh and Ilargi and we went for lunch in Williamstown. They had not seen the bay so I thought it might interest them.
Williamstown is across the bridge from Central Melbourne and is the original settlement in the area. A lot of the houses are quite old – relatively speaking.
I finally know what Ilargi looks like. I have a picture or two, but I think it is best to maintain a little bit of mystery on this site. 🙂
Good to see you guys are still around.
Yesterday, at the Melbourne Sustainable Living Festival, I had the pleasure of seeing Nicole Foss (I was about to type Nicole Kidman). 🙂
Sadly, I only got to see her from a distance as she seemed to be overwhelmingly popular and I could not hang around as I had to feed the parking meter.
Here are a couple of photos from the festival:
https://fotosaver.com/ae/sus_festival2.jpg
https://fotosaver.com/ae/sus_festival1.jpg
I tried the “Add File” button but it did not seem to work.I think the problem with font-size has been partly fixed – I no longer can see the ants on the screen. 🙂
However, when I drag an emotion to this space, a link appears which does not show the emotion in the resultant message. I am not sure whether it is a feature or a bug. Here is an example:
https://theautomaticearth.org/components/com_kunena/template/default/images/emoticons/w00t.png
Hi martin,
If it is melting an awful lot less than expected, or not at all, that must must be good news in my book.
Would it please you more if it were melting far more than previously estimated?
Be careful what you wish for … 🙂
https://www.elyricsworld.com/careful_what_you_wish_for_lyrics_eminem.html
I hope to see you at Federation Square on Saturday. 🙂
Also, there is some good news on the “Climate Change” front
I popped this link in here because the article above mentions your interest in climate.
Hi jal,
I have given you some karma – since you seem to need it 🙂
I don’t feel sorry for myself – only for my kids. I wish I had the ability to think “Après moi, le déluge”, but I can’t.
I know that the bit about font-size seems like nitpicking, but I am being quite serious – in my own way. If it is too difficult to read, people won’t read it.
ZH understands that a huge share of thinking and moneyed web-users are over 50.
“Knights in White Satin” is a timeless classic. We loved it in the discos of Cataluña at that time.
Here is another unforgettable one from that epoch:
Procol Harum – A Whiter Shade Of Pale – 1967
Like I said earlier, it is unreal to expect Russia to increase gas supply by anything like that – consumers are supposed to get excess gas during summer and use it in the winter.
The tendency of people in the West to compare Russian leaders with American ones is somewhat depressing. Putin is entirely different from Obama, Bush 2, Clinton, Bush 1, Reagan, Carter, Ford, Nixon, Johnson, Kennedy …
The Russians are always thinking a few steps ahead and they are not unduly influenced by short-term factors. The idea that Putin is putting pressure on Europe by reducing gas supply is nonsense. He has no earthly reason to put pressure on the Italians, Greeks, Germans and so on. It is a bit like playing chess using the Queen for most moves – silly.
