This time I would expect them to get a more friendly reception from the hosts South Africa given its Government's socialist leanings, but I wouldn't expect them to get past the first stage of competition. Just for fun it would be good to see North Korea drawn in a group with USA, or England, just to rub their politicians face in it.
I have a large slide collection and am now in the process of scanning the best to show on the web and to archive some ancient slides from my childhood to serve as a safeguard. This mountainous task looks a bit easier now.
For web publishing I've been playing with Jalbum, which isn't to difficult to use and you can publish up to 30MB on their server. Flickr allows you more space but is slower to organise and you are limited in the number of albums.
I've just been to a couple of Historic Racing meetings at Phillip Island
Good weather for the bikes but wet for the cars. Ginger Molloy is still racing Bultacos. He looks old and doddery as he strolls around but he is as tightly tucked and effortlessly streamlined on the bike. His flowing lines are majestic, even artistic, and he is still at the front!
Adam Treasure and Chrissie Clancy weren't able to display artistic lines after they're Honda DeWith stopped at turn 1. These photos need a caption like 'I thought you had the keys,' or 'I've dropped my sunglasses into the carby." Despite this, the sidecars still put on a great show. Many of us in the crowd just go silent in admiration of the swingers placing their heads millimetres from the ground.
The international challenge saw another batch of Poms venture down south to be crushed like flies. The Aussie and Kiwi camps have too many ex pros in their ranks. Next year I'll just have drape a St Georges Cross or two over the fence to lend them some support.
The historic car racing took place in tricky conditions and when it was deemed too slippery out came a safety car. Not exactly in keeping with history to see 1930s skinny tyred open wheelers forming up behind a 2008 Mustang with flashing lights. Still, the drivers and crowd had a lot of fun. This might just inspire us to venture to Historic Winton at the end of May.
Saturday Feb 7, 2009 l'inferno. A ferocious wind, a record high temperature of 46 degrees for Melbourne, a tinder dry state, and a sudden tornado of fire brought a hellish death to nearly 200 Victorians trapped in the inferno's path. Unfortunately this isn't the first time and it won't be the last. We have just past an anniversary of Ash Wednesday, 1983's firestorm fury, and in January we passed the 70th anniversary of the legendary Black Friday. News of the recent fires prompted me to read about Black Friday 1939 . These fires are the stuff of legend, burning almost a quarter of the state of Victoria. Fires that had been burning for some time, took hold on a scorching day and ripped through vast tracks of bushland. There are tales of sawmillers caught and killed in the open, charred unidentifiable bodies, scorched remains near cars on forest roads, people just lucky enough to make it inside a dugout or river to survive. Interestingly 1939, 1983, and 2009 were all preceded by dry Springs and a succession of 40 degree days, and on the day in question all had severe hot Northerly winds. In excess of 70 people died in each firestorm. Royal Commissions followed each (yet another has been called for this year) with countless recommendations. Despite all our knowledge and documented experience, the death toll still rises. I suppose they'll come up with a name for the day like Roasted Saturday. We are running out of apocalyptic days, we've already had a Black Friday, a Black Sunday, an Ash Wednesday, a Red Tuesday. History does repeat!
Dr Tim Flannery (the Future Eaters) wrote of the role fires played in shaping the Australian bush. Plant species best equipped to regenerate or germinate after fire will dominate and in the case of eucalypts, whose high flammability promotes fires, are winning this evolutionary arms race. In fact I'd say that on this continent the order of species goes, eucalyptus first, and us hominids a distant second.
The picture is one of mine, prepared in the chemical darkroom days of 1989, to capture mans fear of and fascination for fire. It is simply called 'the Horror.'
I saw Massetti ride his 1957 Gilera at Phillip Island 8 years ago at the Historic races, glorious sound. With talk of changing 250cc to four-stroke 600, maybe those great Gilera sounds will return.
Great players don't always make great captains, and a great captain doesn't make a great team. Talented players peaking in performance and sticking to good strategy will be required when the Aussies return to seek revenge for 2005.
The more we hammer them the stronger they get. The Taliban will not cease to exist. The very forces that seek to destroy them are precisely what motivate them. Now there is talk of sending foreign troops into Pakistan to take the Taliban on in their homeland, in order to prop up the failures in Afghanistan. Pakistan have enough instability problems to deal with as it is. Eventually western powers will see that it will be politically expedient to forge a secret peace deal with the Taliban, giving them control of the border region. It will also be necessary to guarantee that they will be left alone in their mountain retreat in Pakistan. This will return Afghanistan to a state of perpetual unease where a peace exists only because each of the waring factions can't defeat the others. This will provide the West with the easy way out, and the 'Mayor of Kabul' will take his tiny empire and retire in the south of France, or wherever he can maintain his elegant dress sence.
After the 9th stage of the Tour de France Aussie Cadel Evans will wear the leader's yellow jersey for the first time. Using the 'get injured to get inspired' technique, Evans fell off in stage 8 and had to ride for his life in stage 9 up the Col du Tormulait to claim the maillot jaune by just one second.
Now for every day he remains in yellow, Australians will start dusting off their old bicycles and hitting the road. There is nothing like Aussie sporting success to motivate amateur 'give it a goers' in this country. Hopefully this cycling surge will ease transport congestion and reduce greenhouse emissions. Maybe, if we ever reach our greenhouse reduction targets, we will be able to point to Cadel Evans and say ' he started it!' Unfortunately I can only forsee an increase in physiotherapy visits as unprepared bodies try just a bit too hard (especially if they get inspired by the upcoming Alp d'Huez stage).
Go Cadel.
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