What's womjep? "Woman in jeopardy," in which our heroine is beset on all sides by untrustworthy men, and is (usually) saved by her own nous but also seen and unseen heroic men. [I think I may owe it to Christopher Buckley, in his awesome 'Thank You for Smoking'). The go-to example is the Julia Roberts... Continue Reading →
With the benefit of hindsight – final paragraphs of 9 year old books about #Australia and #climate
You've slaved over the book (either as the writer or the reader!). There have been bits where you've wanted to scream (as either the writer or the reader...), bits where you've gotten bored and skimmed over what should have been taken slowly (either as...) or gone slow when you should have gone quick (...). There's... Continue Reading →
Of eagles and geese – capitalising Aesop’s fables for capital accumulation
The word 'natural' is one of the busiest and slipperiest in the English language. One of its many shades of meaning is that something 'natural' is 'right' and 'normal.' Naturally (!), powerful actors hoping to become still more powerful will try to convince those who might constrain them that they are 'natural', and should be allowed... Continue Reading →
Judging books by their covers, or ‘act naturally’- Australia’s Coal Export Industry
Young folk today, eh? They think if it isn't on google's first or second page, it's not worth knowing. Fossils like me, fueled by the thrill of the chase, pace the library shelves. And you stumble across the greatest stuff. So, I didn't know that the Federal Government, for a period between 1993 and 2001,... Continue Reading →
Australian Coal Association advert and also awesome librarians again
I've said it before, and no doubt I will say it again - the librarians at the Barr Smith library (University of Adelaide) are awesome. They fossicked out hard copies of the Business Council of Australia Bulletin from the early 1990s. I spent a few hours today systematically going through them for any articles even... Continue Reading →
Technology and the PEBCAC problem, as elucidated by Lee Child’s “Jack Reacher”
No system, as the adage goes, is fool-proof to a sufficiently determined and talented fool. Computer help-desk people have an acronym for it - 'PEBCAC', which stands for Problem Exists Between Computer And Chair. A serious amount of mental effort gets spent on human-computer interfaces (there are journals, conferences etc etc). In another life, I'd... Continue Reading →
Of Garnaut, geosequestration and the (non)belling of the neoliberal cat
Professor Ross Garnaut is a highly intelligent, tenacious and formidably well-informed public intellectual, and I’m not just saying that because I want to interview him for my PhD research. Because look, in my very next sentence I say ‘I think he is wrong about the future of energy.’ He was speaking tonight in Adelaide, giving... Continue Reading →
Awesome librarians and mining industry conflations…
First thing to say is this - the librarians at the University of Adelaide (Barr Smith) Library are fricking awesome. One of them has gone above and beyond the call of duty and dug up some stuff I didn't even know they had, which is going to be very useful for my thesis. Huzzah!! Definitely... Continue Reading →
Taking the piss: Vietnam and who learns what….
"I remember the moment when I knew we were going to lose the war. Frustrated by our inability to find the elusive Viet Cong, we had developed a top-secret program to locate enemy troop concentrations. It was called a “people sniffer,” a device sensitive to the presence of ammonia in urine; could be hung from... Continue Reading →
Images of our green future; from politics to platitudes in 29 short years.
What hopes do ‘we’ have for the future? What choices do we think we will have to make, or perhaps seek to avoid? What do our old hopes tell us about our new fears? All good questions, which I can’t really answer particularly well, until I’ve had a longer think/looting of other people’s thoughts. But while... Continue Reading →
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