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Wavo Bowlo too.

Haiku prolixia. Swallows swirling in a swaying sky, Yachts creak on moorings of rust,  Lycra clad grunts on swathes of green, and "Howzat?" intruding from far off fields. ' I declare that I reside outside a 5 km radius of this club ...' Do we sign?  Alan, master of the barefoot bowls, knoweth all mysteries here: sliced white, espresso, doily, egg, teapot, ditch and jack. Spiritual direction and art non-appreciation are our fare,  for gods would be present too. Thing achieved. Bob 15.11.14 

Wavo Bowlo

Since early days. Time, toast and labradors. Bob and me. Talking, laughing. Throat singing. Iambic pentametre melts on tinfoil. Tea grows colder. We grow older. Than we were.  Once. I am an author! Fiona 15.11.14

Capitalism; the price of freedom

This was a Sunday morning's musing. Why do so many of my friends hate capitalism? It is in a large part what is responsible for their prosperity and freedom, even if it is harsh and impersonal. Why not just treat it as a thing. An inevitable consequence of the responsibility of the luxury of choice.  Hell capitalism's infuriating indifference to our fate is the price we have to pay for having freedom of choice. It seems that many of us are not prepared to pay that price. They rail against it and plot its demise perhaps not realising that they are undermining the delicate fabric of freedom as they do so. Or am I wrong?

The greatest achievment in history

Yes. That's what this is being hailed as. Well, at least as the kind of achievement in history you've never heard of, since most of us have at least heard of Western Civilization and many of us (though we could now be a minority) still think that it is a pretty impressive achievement. So what's all the non-fuss about? See below.   Warning there is a terrible "C" word used that educated people in the West are taught to despise. . Extreme poverty fell to 15% in 2011, from 36% in 1990.  Credit goes to the spread of Capitalism.   Lid dip to Instapundit (again)

The Hexham Principle

"If you commit to a course, stay that course to its end."  This is not a new thought. As a heuristic it seems a tad trite, even old hat, so I have neglected to date to make any attempts to re-articulate it in writing. A recent lunch with some old uni mates breathed some new life into it however, as we fondly reminisced on its origins in our small circle. The tale of this old principle's re-genesis as the "Hexham Principle" seems worth repeating so it might not be entirely lost to posterity. Back in around April of 1979 two car loads of 4 uni students each set out from Sydney to drive to Crescent Head on the New South Wales north coast for a week's holiday. Each car had 4 passengers and it was decided to drive up in semi convoy so we would reduce the chances of getting lost. This was well before mobile phones and GPS navigators. The trip was expected to take 5 or 6 hours. The plan agreed to as we loaded up the cars, a Beetle and a Mazda, was "let&#

Necessary conflict in free societies

This week's freedom quote of the week on " ideas@theCentre ", the Centre for Independent Studies weekly email is:  " In any free society, the conflict between social conformity and individual liberty is permanent, unresolvable, and necessary ." Kathleen Norris                            I'd not heard of Kathleen Norris until seeing this, so I looked her up on Wikipedia. Turns out there's more than one famous Kathleen Norris. One's a living American poet and another is a popular dead American novelist and columnist from the first half of the 20th century. According to Wiki the latter Kathleen Norris:  "... used her fiction to promote values including the sanctity of marriage, the nobility of motherhood, and the importance of service to others....Norris became involved in various social causes, including women's suffrage, Prohibition, pacifism, and organizations to benefit children and the poor."  I'm assuming it's th