1. Watched The Walking Dead with Tim last night, and I thought back to what I wrote about in my blog post yesterday. Are there cases where killing a loved one (like a child or spouse) is a valid moral choice?
The TV show answered my question with a big YES. If your child, husband, wife, best friend, etc. turns into a zombie; it's perfectly okay to kill them. It's kind of selfish and weak not to do it, actually. If you hesitate, the zombie could go free and create more zombies. By not euthanizing your loved one, you're increasing the chance that the horror will happen to someone else.
2. Went to bed and dreamed that one of my blogging friends was a local friend. She comes to a party we have. Later I talk to my local homeschooling friend. She talks about becoming friends with my blogging friend. She's very excited about this. I'm not. I'm jealous about the whole thing.
I used to love the idea of my friends becoming friends with each other. I wanted a circle of friends. Then a few years ago, I had a bad experience with a clique/circle of friends. I wasn't part of the group, but I seemed to be sort of liked by the group. Then I had the wrong opinions, and I turned into their mutual target of hatred.
I think part of me began to worry that one day I'd be in a circle of friends, and we'd end up doing the same thing to someone else.
Of course there's benign circles of friends. But I do think having something (or someone) to hate together creates a stronger bond between a group.
3. Was going to say the jealousy thing is something that happens only in dreams. But that would be a lie. I have been jealous lately about a friend becoming friendly with another friend. The reason, though, is I have felt somewhat neglected by both of them. So there's that feeling, why would you have time for each other but you don't seem to have time for me?
If I feel secure in a relationship, then I have no jealousy about the other person having other friends.
4. Saw Rolf Harris mentioned in the book I'm reading. It's a British book called We Bought A Zoo. It's very good, so far. They've made a movie out of it, that's coming out in December. Unfortunately, they've changed it into a story about Americans. Why???????? It's ridiculous. It's not that I have a problem with movies about Americans. I love lots of them. But I think since it's a British book, it should be a British movie.
5. Remembered another case in which a true story's location was changed for the movie. Open Water. The true story took place in the Great Barrier Reef. For the movie they changed it to the Bahamas. In that case, it was probably a good thing—at least for Australian tourism. The movie is about tourists who go on a dive tour and are accidentally left behind.
6. Started to watch a video that was sent to me in an email. It's called "Red Room", and it's by goodbyemotel.
The song seems pretty cool.
7. Went to goodbyemotel's website, and learned they're a Melbourne group.
They have a page where you can listen to their music.
I'll listen to a few songs.
8. Went to look at currencies.
The Australian dollar is now worth .99 American dollars. It's the same as yesterday.
It's worth .63 British pounds. That's the same too.
It's worth 6.68 Swedish Krona. It's gone down a tiny bit there.
It's worth 75.70 Japanese yen. It's gone down a bit there too.
9. Learned from this article that today is Julia Gillard's 50th birthday.
Happy Birthday, Julia Gillard.
I'll be fifty in 2022. I sort of look forward to it.
I wonder if all my hair will be gray by then.
10. Saw a cute Twitter conversation between Kevin Rudd and some other guy.
Jakereazn said, Same flight to Syd as @KRuddMP! What's up!?
Then Kevin Rudd replied, @jakereazn too bad we're stuck on the tarmac. Got a pack of cards?
Hopefully they weren't stuck there for too long.
But I think Rudd did a good job there of portraying a regular bloke.
11. Read article about exercise equipment for toddler-age children. There're little weight benches, little treadmills, and little rowing machines.
Some people think it's taking the anti-obesity thing too far. Maybe they're right. But I think it's kind of cute, and young children often love doing what their parents do.
I'd rather a child mimic their parent's exercising than mimic their parents extreme dieting behavior.
I can't see how the equipment itself would be a problem, as long as it's safe. The problem would be if parents put too much pressure on their kids to use it. But if those types of parents don't have exercise equipment to force on their kids, they'll find something else to force on them.
12. Read article that says Australia has been named the 7th best country in the world for mining.
The top country is Finland. I didn't see that coming.
I really don't know much about Finland, except that it's near Sweden and Norway.
The United States is actually one notch above Australia. I didn't expect that either. I definitely see Australia as being more of a mining country than America. But that might be because I pay less attention to America than I do Australia.
Other countries in the top ten were Chile, Burkina Faso, Sweden, Botswana, Brazil, Canada, and Argentina.
The criteria for the ranking wasn't just about who has the most stuff to mine. It was about lots of other things such as natural disasters, financial risk, land access, civil unrest, labor relations, etc.
13. Read article that says there were major storms in Melbourne yesterday. That's probably why Kevin Rudd was stuck on the tarmac.
The article says one plane was stuck on the tarmac for five hours. Shit! I would hate that.
I understand they want to keep the planes in line in case they have a chance to take off. But I think there should be a 1-2 hour limit. If the plane can't take off in that amount of time, people should be able to get off. They shouldn't be trapped for five hours.
On the bright side, both Qantas and Virgin paid for passenger's accommodations so they wouldn't end up having to sleep at the airport. That was very nice of them.
14. Read article that says there's a rule now in America. Airlines will be fined if they keep passengers trapped on the plane for more than three hours.
However, the rule only applies to domestic flights. There was a Virgin Atlantic flight taking people from American to London. The passengers sat on the plane for four hours without any air-conditioning. They were hot and panicked.
Hopefully all countries will one day have a rule against keeping people too long on the tarmac.
Yes, the plane might lose it's place in line. But I would rather spend hours waiting at the airport than hours waiting in a plane seat. I've heard it's horrible sometimes—no air-conditioning, no food or drinks, overflowing toilets, etc.
I especially feel bad for parents of very young children.
15. Read scary article about a woman in Brisbane being attacked by bats. She was on her balcony when it happened.
Bats don't usually attack people like that unless they have a rabies-related illness called lyssavirus. To prevent the woman from getting fatally ill, they had to give her nine shots in the face. Then she'll have to get more in her arm.
16. Read website about the rabies vaccine. They said it used to be very painful, but they've improved it, and now it's less painful.
Lord Wiki says sometimes cheaper and older vaccines are used.
The woman attacked by bats said the shots to her face were very painful. I wonder if she got the old shots. Or maybe she has a lower pain tolerance than usual. I don't know.
I talked to the vaccine-man yesterday about it. I remember shots being painful as a child—especially the tetanus one. But in the past few years, none of my shots have hurt at all. The vaccine-man said it's because these days they make the needles much thinner.
Then I think back to Jack getting his vaccines. He's always hated them; although the last shot he got was Hepatitis A, and he said it didn't hurt at all. Maybe they changed the needle size between that and his previous shots?
My guess is it's more about the anticipation. Even if shots are painful to some, they're probably less painful than a lot of other injuries—getting scratched, stubbing our toe, getting a paper cut, etc. But it's that feeling of waiting for the pain, seeing the nurse come at you with a needle.
Yesterday I was nervous as the vaccine man did the rubbing alcohol part. I thought, It hasn't hurt before, but maybe this time it will.
It didn't. Fortunately.
17. Went to Tallygarunga.
Today I'm going to read the continuation of Ahoy, Matey.
This is the story thread with young Camryn and Thatcher playing sword fighting games in the tree.
There's been one new post added.
18. Finished reading. It was pretty short, but cute. The kids are having fun play-fighting together.
19. Went to the YouTube channel of Addictive Breed. They're a musical group—maybe heavy metal.
Well..... they look heavy metal.
The channel has a message video from one of the band members. Apparently, they were all on a break, but now they're back to performing together.
20. Watched Addictive Breed sing "Dust to Dust".
It's not really my type of thing.
21. Read the description on their YouTube channel. They call themselves a hard rock band. Is that different from heavy metal?
Lord Wiki gives examples of hard rock bands: Aerosmith, AC/DC, and Van Halen, and Bon Jovi.
I sort of like some of that stuff sometimes.
Lord Wiki has a long entry on both heavy metal and hard rock, so I'm assuming there are differences. However, he says the terms have often been used interchangeably.
22. Listened to Addictive Breed do their song "Warning Sign".
23. Saw that my Australian of the day is William Charles Angwin.
As far as I can see, he's not related to yesterday's Angwin.
24. Saw that William Charles Angwin was born in England in 1863.
William's mother died when he was a baby, and his father remarried.
Hopefully, his stepmom was nice.
25. Saw that William became a carpenter.
In his early 20's, he and his wife migrated to Victoria.
They lived there for five years, and then moved to Fremantle.
Eventually, William got himself a seat in the Western Australian parliament.
25. Learned that William had been against Western Australia joining the Federation.
26. Disgusted and angry because I was searching through Flickr for new a new account to stalk; and I came across very pornographic pictures. This was by using the keyword "Australia" and then going to recent photos.
I'm totally fine with pornography if people consent to it. I did NOT consent to it. I wasn't expecting to see it, and I didn't want to see it.
I flagged the photos, and when I did, I got a message from Flickr saying the photos are classified as "safe". My guess is you can put porno photos on, but you have to give them special labels, so they're not open to the general public.
The porno people, who put these photos up, made them public, and didn't use the appropriate filters. I'd like to think they did it on accident, but I'm doubting that's the case.
27. Saw that now it's going to be Sydney's turn for huge storms. That's happening today. Then this weekend it's going to be cool.
28. Found a Flickr account to stalk.
It's the porno one actually.
I've decided to give consent. And now I'll enjoy some naked people.
I'm joking.
I'm going to look at baroo42's photos. He went to Australia...sometime.
The photo set says the pictures are from April 2007 to February 2009. Was he on a really long holiday? Multiple holidays? Or maybe he lives in Australia?
29. Got idea from this photo that baroo42 may have stayed in a hostel.
Maybe he was a backpacker?
30. Saw that baroo42 and/or his travel mates have a Bill Bryson book. I can't tell if it's the Australian one or not.
I like the blue and white glasses.
31. Wouldn't want to be a chicken in this picture. It's so crowded in there. Is that comfortable for them?
I doubt it.
I think this is what we could be getting when we buy cage free eggs. Yeah. They're not in a cage. But that doesn't necessarily mean the birds are living a nice life.
32. Watched video of Baroo42 or his friend eating a piece of bread. They talk a bit in the movie.
I don't think they're speaking English.
I wonder where they're from.
33. Enjoyed watching this driving video.
34. Thought the rocks in this photo looked a bit sinister.
It kind of looks like there's a zombie man in there, leaning against the rocks.
35. Thought this picture looks quite lovely.
36. Liked this picture of The Big Banana in Coffs Harbour.
37. Saw some banana souvenirs. It reminds me of the pineapple place in Hawaii, except that one obviously had pineapple souvenirs.
And here're even more banana souvenirs.
38. Saw some banana stuffed animals.
The TV show answered my question with a big YES. If your child, husband, wife, best friend, etc. turns into a zombie; it's perfectly okay to kill them. It's kind of selfish and weak not to do it, actually. If you hesitate, the zombie could go free and create more zombies. By not euthanizing your loved one, you're increasing the chance that the horror will happen to someone else.
2. Went to bed and dreamed that one of my blogging friends was a local friend. She comes to a party we have. Later I talk to my local homeschooling friend. She talks about becoming friends with my blogging friend. She's very excited about this. I'm not. I'm jealous about the whole thing.
I used to love the idea of my friends becoming friends with each other. I wanted a circle of friends. Then a few years ago, I had a bad experience with a clique/circle of friends. I wasn't part of the group, but I seemed to be sort of liked by the group. Then I had the wrong opinions, and I turned into their mutual target of hatred.
I think part of me began to worry that one day I'd be in a circle of friends, and we'd end up doing the same thing to someone else.
Of course there's benign circles of friends. But I do think having something (or someone) to hate together creates a stronger bond between a group.
3. Was going to say the jealousy thing is something that happens only in dreams. But that would be a lie. I have been jealous lately about a friend becoming friendly with another friend. The reason, though, is I have felt somewhat neglected by both of them. So there's that feeling, why would you have time for each other but you don't seem to have time for me?
If I feel secure in a relationship, then I have no jealousy about the other person having other friends.
4. Saw Rolf Harris mentioned in the book I'm reading. It's a British book called We Bought A Zoo. It's very good, so far. They've made a movie out of it, that's coming out in December. Unfortunately, they've changed it into a story about Americans. Why???????? It's ridiculous. It's not that I have a problem with movies about Americans. I love lots of them. But I think since it's a British book, it should be a British movie.
5. Remembered another case in which a true story's location was changed for the movie. Open Water. The true story took place in the Great Barrier Reef. For the movie they changed it to the Bahamas. In that case, it was probably a good thing—at least for Australian tourism. The movie is about tourists who go on a dive tour and are accidentally left behind.
6. Started to watch a video that was sent to me in an email. It's called "Red Room", and it's by goodbyemotel.
The song seems pretty cool.
7. Went to goodbyemotel's website, and learned they're a Melbourne group.
They have a page where you can listen to their music.
I'll listen to a few songs.
8. Went to look at currencies.
The Australian dollar is now worth .99 American dollars. It's the same as yesterday.
It's worth .63 British pounds. That's the same too.
It's worth 6.68 Swedish Krona. It's gone down a tiny bit there.
It's worth 75.70 Japanese yen. It's gone down a bit there too.
9. Learned from this article that today is Julia Gillard's 50th birthday.
Happy Birthday, Julia Gillard.
I'll be fifty in 2022. I sort of look forward to it.
I wonder if all my hair will be gray by then.
10. Saw a cute Twitter conversation between Kevin Rudd and some other guy.
Jakereazn said, Same flight to Syd as @KRuddMP! What's up!?
Then Kevin Rudd replied, @jakereazn too bad we're stuck on the tarmac. Got a pack of cards?
Hopefully they weren't stuck there for too long.
But I think Rudd did a good job there of portraying a regular bloke.
11. Read article about exercise equipment for toddler-age children. There're little weight benches, little treadmills, and little rowing machines.
Some people think it's taking the anti-obesity thing too far. Maybe they're right. But I think it's kind of cute, and young children often love doing what their parents do.
I'd rather a child mimic their parent's exercising than mimic their parents extreme dieting behavior.
I can't see how the equipment itself would be a problem, as long as it's safe. The problem would be if parents put too much pressure on their kids to use it. But if those types of parents don't have exercise equipment to force on their kids, they'll find something else to force on them.
12. Read article that says Australia has been named the 7th best country in the world for mining.
The top country is Finland. I didn't see that coming.
I really don't know much about Finland, except that it's near Sweden and Norway.
The United States is actually one notch above Australia. I didn't expect that either. I definitely see Australia as being more of a mining country than America. But that might be because I pay less attention to America than I do Australia.
Other countries in the top ten were Chile, Burkina Faso, Sweden, Botswana, Brazil, Canada, and Argentina.
The criteria for the ranking wasn't just about who has the most stuff to mine. It was about lots of other things such as natural disasters, financial risk, land access, civil unrest, labor relations, etc.
13. Read article that says there were major storms in Melbourne yesterday. That's probably why Kevin Rudd was stuck on the tarmac.
The article says one plane was stuck on the tarmac for five hours. Shit! I would hate that.
I understand they want to keep the planes in line in case they have a chance to take off. But I think there should be a 1-2 hour limit. If the plane can't take off in that amount of time, people should be able to get off. They shouldn't be trapped for five hours.
On the bright side, both Qantas and Virgin paid for passenger's accommodations so they wouldn't end up having to sleep at the airport. That was very nice of them.
14. Read article that says there's a rule now in America. Airlines will be fined if they keep passengers trapped on the plane for more than three hours.
However, the rule only applies to domestic flights. There was a Virgin Atlantic flight taking people from American to London. The passengers sat on the plane for four hours without any air-conditioning. They were hot and panicked.
Hopefully all countries will one day have a rule against keeping people too long on the tarmac.
Yes, the plane might lose it's place in line. But I would rather spend hours waiting at the airport than hours waiting in a plane seat. I've heard it's horrible sometimes—no air-conditioning, no food or drinks, overflowing toilets, etc.
I especially feel bad for parents of very young children.
15. Read scary article about a woman in Brisbane being attacked by bats. She was on her balcony when it happened.
Bats don't usually attack people like that unless they have a rabies-related illness called lyssavirus. To prevent the woman from getting fatally ill, they had to give her nine shots in the face. Then she'll have to get more in her arm.
16. Read website about the rabies vaccine. They said it used to be very painful, but they've improved it, and now it's less painful.
Lord Wiki says sometimes cheaper and older vaccines are used.
The woman attacked by bats said the shots to her face were very painful. I wonder if she got the old shots. Or maybe she has a lower pain tolerance than usual. I don't know.
I talked to the vaccine-man yesterday about it. I remember shots being painful as a child—especially the tetanus one. But in the past few years, none of my shots have hurt at all. The vaccine-man said it's because these days they make the needles much thinner.
Then I think back to Jack getting his vaccines. He's always hated them; although the last shot he got was Hepatitis A, and he said it didn't hurt at all. Maybe they changed the needle size between that and his previous shots?
My guess is it's more about the anticipation. Even if shots are painful to some, they're probably less painful than a lot of other injuries—getting scratched, stubbing our toe, getting a paper cut, etc. But it's that feeling of waiting for the pain, seeing the nurse come at you with a needle.
Yesterday I was nervous as the vaccine man did the rubbing alcohol part. I thought, It hasn't hurt before, but maybe this time it will.
It didn't. Fortunately.
17. Went to Tallygarunga.
Today I'm going to read the continuation of Ahoy, Matey.
This is the story thread with young Camryn and Thatcher playing sword fighting games in the tree.
There's been one new post added.
18. Finished reading. It was pretty short, but cute. The kids are having fun play-fighting together.
19. Went to the YouTube channel of Addictive Breed. They're a musical group—maybe heavy metal.
Well..... they look heavy metal.
The channel has a message video from one of the band members. Apparently, they were all on a break, but now they're back to performing together.
20. Watched Addictive Breed sing "Dust to Dust".
It's not really my type of thing.
21. Read the description on their YouTube channel. They call themselves a hard rock band. Is that different from heavy metal?
Lord Wiki gives examples of hard rock bands: Aerosmith, AC/DC, and Van Halen, and Bon Jovi.
I sort of like some of that stuff sometimes.
Lord Wiki has a long entry on both heavy metal and hard rock, so I'm assuming there are differences. However, he says the terms have often been used interchangeably.
22. Listened to Addictive Breed do their song "Warning Sign".
23. Saw that my Australian of the day is William Charles Angwin.
As far as I can see, he's not related to yesterday's Angwin.
24. Saw that William Charles Angwin was born in England in 1863.
William's mother died when he was a baby, and his father remarried.
Hopefully, his stepmom was nice.
25. Saw that William became a carpenter.
In his early 20's, he and his wife migrated to Victoria.
They lived there for five years, and then moved to Fremantle.
Eventually, William got himself a seat in the Western Australian parliament.
25. Learned that William had been against Western Australia joining the Federation.
26. Disgusted and angry because I was searching through Flickr for new a new account to stalk; and I came across very pornographic pictures. This was by using the keyword "Australia" and then going to recent photos.
I'm totally fine with pornography if people consent to it. I did NOT consent to it. I wasn't expecting to see it, and I didn't want to see it.
I flagged the photos, and when I did, I got a message from Flickr saying the photos are classified as "safe". My guess is you can put porno photos on, but you have to give them special labels, so they're not open to the general public.
The porno people, who put these photos up, made them public, and didn't use the appropriate filters. I'd like to think they did it on accident, but I'm doubting that's the case.
27. Saw that now it's going to be Sydney's turn for huge storms. That's happening today. Then this weekend it's going to be cool.
28. Found a Flickr account to stalk.
It's the porno one actually.
I've decided to give consent. And now I'll enjoy some naked people.
I'm joking.
I'm going to look at baroo42's photos. He went to Australia...sometime.
The photo set says the pictures are from April 2007 to February 2009. Was he on a really long holiday? Multiple holidays? Or maybe he lives in Australia?
29. Got idea from this photo that baroo42 may have stayed in a hostel.
Maybe he was a backpacker?
30. Saw that baroo42 and/or his travel mates have a Bill Bryson book. I can't tell if it's the Australian one or not.
I like the blue and white glasses.
31. Wouldn't want to be a chicken in this picture. It's so crowded in there. Is that comfortable for them?
I doubt it.
I think this is what we could be getting when we buy cage free eggs. Yeah. They're not in a cage. But that doesn't necessarily mean the birds are living a nice life.
32. Watched video of Baroo42 or his friend eating a piece of bread. They talk a bit in the movie.
I don't think they're speaking English.
I wonder where they're from.
33. Enjoyed watching this driving video.
34. Thought the rocks in this photo looked a bit sinister.
It kind of looks like there's a zombie man in there, leaning against the rocks.
35. Thought this picture looks quite lovely.
36. Liked this picture of The Big Banana in Coffs Harbour.
37. Saw some banana souvenirs. It reminds me of the pineapple place in Hawaii, except that one obviously had pineapple souvenirs.
And here're even more banana souvenirs.
38. Saw some banana stuffed animals.