Have they got the right Rudd for the job? pic ABC

Mike's Pith & Wind - Bureaucracy
I would define a larrikin as somebody who can see through the bullshit, ignore petty obstructionism, bypass the niceties of convention and get the job done – in other words, an Aussie. As Aussies we still like to think of ourselves as larrikins, thumbing our nose at authority and carrying on regardless. Trouble is these days, courtesy of a groaning bureaucracy, there’s an awful lot of authority going around, and our arms have long since tired of holding a cocked snoot position.
I’ll give you a couple of minor examples of unrestrained bureaucracy gone mad. My favourite was the law that, until recently, forbade overflow outlets in our Victorian baths, basins and sinks. This no doubt had the effect of temporarily reviving the local basin and bath making industry, but equally it led to serious water damage in every second elderly person’s home or unit when Beryl absent-mindedly left the bathwater running. The reason for this arbitrary hole banishment? Harmful bacteria could multiply in this formerly ubiquitous orifice that could, in theory, cause someone to get quite ill. The fact that nobody in recorded history on the face of the earth had ever contracted even a sniffle from this functional outlet meant little to our busy little bureaucrat and his cronies, or apparently to the government committee that considered the legislation, or subsequently the government that passed it into law.
It seems our Victorian government has a thing about bacteria. I didn’t see the original article on this issue in The Age’s Epicure, but it stirred up some indignant correspondence. It seems a certain Angel Cardoso has been sent packing back to Spain by read more

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Dick's Toolbox - Food
There is a major difference between the state of my garden and the local supermarket shelves. My garden is a desiccated dust bowl, a few brown twigs supported by bamboo stakes and some febrile leaves of rhubarb on life support. Even the rosemary is looking sad, depressed and unworthy of its hardy Mediterranean roots. The rabbits and possums no longer visit for a nocturnal feast; there are no berries, fruit or nuts for the birds to peck and destroy. It is a Silent Autumn.
If we were attempting to be self sufficient - an unlikely prospect on reef rock, clay and twenty-four millimetres of mineral deficient top soil - we would have attracted the attention of the Salvation Army, as we starved to death after having eaten a few remnant tomato roots.
This is a very severe drought and it has done no good - especially where we live. The read more