Month: March 2005

On Saturday a young boy in Perth loses three limbs and by Easter Sunday his life is resurrected.

The 10-year-old Perth boy who had three limbs surgically reattached after they were severed during a game of backyard basketball was awake and smiling yesterday, despite still being in considerable pain.

The dangers of ‘slam dunking’ are well known with three teenagers killed in Victoria within recent times. It makes sense that a basketball hoop secured to a brick wall with a couple of dyna-bolts would never pass an OH&S audit but unfortunately most parents aren’t aware of this.

The basketball hoop.

What started as a birthday party, then moved on to unspeakable tragedy, has now progressed, through the wonders of medical science and it’s practitioners, to hope for a full life.

A hospital spokeswoman said Terry was being released from the hospital’s intensive care unit yesterday.

I’m a bit confused about the tense of the sentence but happy with the result. He had one leg and both hands amputated by falling masonry on Saturday and now, only four days later he is released from the ICU.

Amazing.

I heard on radio that the doctors operated in teams with the boy spread like an ‘X’ so they could operate on all effected limbs simultaneously.

The boy – Terry Vo

Full credit to the medicos. Their families and the nation should be proud of their efforts.

I normally subscribe to the rule of law but in the case of Michael Jackson I just wish they’d fast-forward the trial and lock him up so I don’t have to risk seeing his unsettling weird face on my tv.

For years, known in family circles as the fastest channel surfer ever, anywhere, I’ve never had to view his weirdness for any longer than half a second as my reflexes flick past the danger. Must have made it hard for any of my kids who might have been fans in their youth however it would have been a very bad lifestyle move to ever ask me to hold so they could look at him, or listen to his ‘music’.

He’s even visiting his sickness on us Aussies

In a blow to Michael Jackson’s defence, a judge has allowed prosecutors to introduce evidence about five other boys – including two Australians – the pop star allegedly molested or got too cozy with.

Sick bastard.

My son Stuart phoned up and ask if I could babysit his dog while he and Jane went south for a break.

Sure, son. He won’t be any problem.

His name is Reg and he is a ADH inflicted, amphetamine consuming, red cordial drinking teenage male Staffordshire Terrier with a disposition not unlike the Tassie Devil from the old Walt Disney cartoons .

When he visits, my 11 year old Retriever just sits and blinks. All the frantic activity is too much for her and when I came home tonight, her whole neck was wet from Reg ‘worrying’ her. She is too slow to hide

She’ll adjust and if not there is always the meat hook.

No running around up there, Reggie boy.

Note for signed up PETA and/or Green members or children: He’s hanging on a full double ‘D-ring’ harness, not his collar. I wouldn’t want him to vomit on my courtyard.

Photo from a mate just about 200 km north of here. Not unusual in colder climes but in the tropics it’s a rare sight.

Hail

…and a lot of it.

CAN’T get out of bed in the morning?

Scientists at MIT’s Media Lab in the United States have invented an alarm clock called Clocky to make even the doziest sleepers, who repeatedly hit the snooze button, leap out of bed.

After the snooze button is pressed, the clock, which is equipped with a set of wheels, rolls off the table to another part of the room.

“When the alarm sounds again, simply finding Clocky ought to be strenuous enough to prevent even the doziest owner from going back to sleep,” New Scientist magazine said today.

Don’t you just love it?

Reminds me of my early Army days when I was often obliged to play Reveille. Wise counsel from the Pipe Major suggested I move while piping…make yourself a harder target, Kevin.

I was an infantry NCO but had made the huge mistake of admitting to bagpiping skills. This foolish statement come to the ears of the Colonel who loved bagipes, thus everytime the band performed I was dragged into the lineup.

Once, we decided to do a full-band reveille at the Officer’s Mess at the traditional time of 06:30. more commonly referred to as oh-dark-thirty. Playing, in single file up though the Officer’s quarters, was poorly received to say the least. We knew that they had a Dining-in Night the evening before and few, if any of the Subalterns would have been in bed for more than an hour before the skirl of the pipes woke them from a sherry/beer/white wine/red wine/port and more cleansing ales type troubled slumber.

Tee hee hee.

Later, in Vietnam, Pipers were called upon to play ‘The Flowers of the Forest’ at the Fire Support Base on any evening that we had lost a soldier. For reasons of prior engagements, ie being on patrol, I never had to do this, but it certainly gave the Piper reason to remember the advise…keep moving

Cpl Cameron, Piper, 7RAR, hoping ‘Charlie’ misses…moving target etc

Just like ‘Clocky’ above

Legacy, that unique Australian organization that helps widows and children of deceased war veterans has taking up all my time this last week odd and promises to be as demanding after Easter until the next antique militaria auction scheduled for April 10.

As I sit, often alone, in an office assessing, valueing, data entering and generally establishing and maintaining a database to allow us to auction some 600 items to help widows and their children I often wonder why I am doing it largely by myself.

The old principle of giving back some of what you have enoyed over your life seems old hat and whereas many join, few come forward and actually work.

If you are a veteran and mildy offended by my words, good. Go and join up and do some work.

Particularly if you live in Brisbane.

Due to a cronic shortage of veterans, Legacy now has a “Friends of Legacy’ classification for membership, so you don’t have to be a veteran, just have a desire to help Australians doing it tough because their husband or father is now deceased due to war service.

email me or leave a comment.

NEW YORK: John DeLorean, the flashy automotive executive whose equally flashy car of the same name proved a financial folly but burned its way into pop culture with the Back to the Future films, has died at the age of 80.

Delorean had a checkered life but one of his great achievements has to be the DeLorean DMC-12.

The striking vehicle, with its gull-wing style doors, sleek design and metallic finish was one of fewer than 9000 produced over three years before the company failed in 1983.

Despite its failure, the car achieved a permanent spot in pop culture history when it was used as the time-travel vehicle in Back to the Future, a huge movie hit starring Michael J.Fox that spawned two sequels.

Here’s another, this one is gold plated with zero miles on the clock. A typical Texan understatement.

Try this Google for more

That would be right. A 6 metre great white pointer is big enough to take a human in one bite and as we know, they have a long range and it could be hundreds of miles away by now. They have been tracked with satellite receivers from their home in South Australia to two-thirds of the way up the East Coast.

Which makes me wonder, who was the game person who tagged the satellite receiver on a white pointer?

Local Police believe the predator is long gone by now.

POLICE have said there is little hope of finding the body of a catamaran skipper killed by a shark at the Abrolhos Islands, 500km north of Perth.

Geoffrey Brazier, 26, from the Perth suburb of Bicton, was snorkeling with three others on Saturday when he was attacked by what is thought to have been a 6m white pointer.

Poor bugger. I’ve been sailing in the seas over there in the North West and not lowering myself in the food-chain order was a priority.

6 metres, or 19.68 feet is big. The stuff of nightmares.

A White Pointer eating the cage and looking to eat the boat.

A small Great White Pointer

People will want revenge but I can’t see much point. Like the 6 metre crocodiles in that part of Australia – if you enter his space you’re putting yourself on the menu. You can hardly blame him for doing what he is programmed to do.

Sgt Miller said the situation would be assessed before any shoot-to-kill order was given.

He said that the geography, tides and winds around the islands would hamper the search.

West Australian Fisheries regional manager Russell Dyson said calls for the shark to be shot on sight were a knee-jerk reaction.

As terrible as it sounds, that is most probably the end of the matter.

Footnote: Googling ‘white pointers’ is interesting.