What if you lived in Australia?

[winebeavis]

I'm almost ashamed to admit that I know what is netball. My friend's girlfriend is from NZ and played a lot and found a recreation league in the Dallas area. Yeah, I've watched a few games of that bizarre game.

A tutorial on Netball for the rest of us yanks.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aBuxsRnU50A

[Grey Wolf]

Originally Posted by winebeavis

I'm almost ashamed to admit that I know what is netball. My friend's girlfriend is from NZ and played a lot and found a recreation league in the Dallas area. Yeah, I've watched a few games of that bizarre game.

Allow Me To Retort..
14 Ladies Bending, Stretching And Shooting In Short Skirts,,Bliss..

[palo5]

Well, it's simple

No, they don't need drugs, steroids or anything like that

They have just evolved - look!

[kennyjackson]

Originally Posted by palo5

It would be interesting to know what they make

I also want to know what snakecatchers make. Sometimes you see these guys on TV. They hold in their bare hands reptiles with enough venom to kill half of Sydney. I nearly get a heart attack watching. Look!



(Pic shamelessly stolen from snakecatcher.com.au)

Between giant spiders and roaming poisonous snakes living in Australia sounds a lot like a Syfy movie.

[palo5]

Originally Posted by kennyjackson

Between giant spiders and roaming poisonous snakes living in Australia sounds a lot like a Syfy movie.

That's what I thought

But people I met were all friendly, and from stats I read later almost no one - meaning really almost no one - is killed by beasts or insects. Australians are better at killing themselves than animals are at killing them

Obviously, no one knows how fatal a bite from Comrade Estreeter could be because no one can find bodies

Clearly it is better to drink beer with him

And share pics of his favorite pinup catwalk beauty. Here she is

[Tmee2020]

Originally Posted by winebeavis

I need to go to this Australia place. When is a good time?

My friend Sam who once worked in Oz says I'd love it because I speak Chinese. Pretty much everything Sam says is greatly exaggerated. So I thought I'd ask the experts.

A "good time" by winebeavis definition is when it's not typical tourist season --if one exists and nothing important, like the olympics or something similar, is going on. Is there really a problem with a Chinese influx (defined as however you like) and open hostility? Sam compared it to Mexican immigration in Arizona.

According to Kayak, the airfare prices drop in August.

The Chinese in Australia is a good story and well worth digging over when you get here winebeavis.

I'm not sure about airfares, but March-April and September-October are good times, particularly if you want to get out into the back country because it's not too hot.

Christmas/New Year is good in Sydney because a lot of locals leave town over the holidays. January-February here is a good time for concert tours too.

[Tmee2020]

Here are some of my favorites, from about 800 species. I have avoided introduced species. Some of these are large files, credit to the people who took the time to post these pics.

In order:

Emu, Cassowary, Brolga, Malleefowl

Wedge-tailed Eagle. Australia's largest bird of prey. Majestic to the point of overdoing it. Powerful Owl, in night fighter camouflage, plus Australian Masked Owl

Black Swan, Magpie Geese, Royal Albatross, Shy Albatross

Forest Kingfisher, Kookaburra, Superb Lyrebird, Bowerbird, Fairey Wren



Pied and Grey Butcherbird. The morning song of the Butcherbird is one of the most beautiful things on God's green earth.
Magpie, Black-backed and White-backed. There are about nine subspecies of the Australian Magpie, these are two common types on the mainland. Their territories overlap, but the Murray River is a rough dividing line and the White-backed Magpies live in Victoria and South Australia. Another beautiful songbird.

Pale-headed Rosella and Yellow-tailed Black Cockatoo



Here are three prints from John Gould's Birds of Australia, published in seven volumes between 1840 and 1848. John's wife Elizabeth worked on the lithographs for his books until her death in 1841. It was Gould and not Charles Darwin who noticed the variations in the finches that Darwin had collected from the Galapagos Islands. This was something that Darwin always gave him credit for.



Here is a link to a recording of the song of the Butcherbird, thanks to the British Library:

http://sounds.bl.uk/Environment/Soun...0000138-0200V0

[effCup]

Originally Posted by kananga

I'm straining not to get obscenely political ... sick of the hare clarke two party prefered system. where we are bound a 'Gilbot' government...

MMP's (umm, mixed-member proportional voting system) better than first past the post (FPP), but no panacea.

Binary blinkers: media remain fixated on 2-horse races... because every story must (& can only ever have) 2 sides: tweedledum & -dee.

where were our farm subsidies?... 'buy Australian' is fine when you can find it..

Interesting article in this week's Listener (er, non-West Island weekly mag.) about Dick Smith & his beetroot ambitions (1, 2--NB, not Listener links, sorry)... for a different world economy.

BTW, a former colleague used to term that veg. policeman's delight.

[effCup]

Originally Posted by greywolf2859

We Hate The Poms (Britan, English)" Cause They Were And Are Our Greatest Rivals
[...]
We Love The Brits

One theory was that POM/POME = Prisoner of Mother England, i.e. just the "most recent"/English-sounding additions, but that seems in dispute. /shrug/

We "Hate The Kiwis" Our Brothers To The East From New Zealand, They refer To Us As The Little West Island.

Never heard that expression before in my life... well, not the "little" bit, anyway.

We Play The hardest Rugby Leage/Union/Netball etc In The World For Our Trophies, We Bag Each Other

I thought Norma "team of slappers" Plummer had retired?

Sheep Joke Each Other

Never! Frank Moorhouse's as Sy'nny as anyone.

We Are A Nation Of Fun Loving People Who Tend To Laugh At The Rest Of The Because You Take Your Selves So Serious.

[Estreeter]

Originally Posted by tmee2000

Here are some of my favorites,

Wedge-tailed Eagle.

Only seen this happen once, but my favorite was one of those with one of these hangin' out of it's gob



Eastern Brown


Had one in my living room once also