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dead rats and farts
I left my home this morning to see several dead rats on the footpath in the surrounding streets. There was also a pervasive sulphurous stink emanating gutter. City living is so glamourous. I would
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a bad investment
After the indignity of having my toilet paper order stolen from the apartment building foyer during the Covid lockdown, I have recently been informed that a malevolent actor has accessed my personal information from Who Gives A Crap. This does not include payment details but it does contain my entire purchase history. So who gives…
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grimace scale
I have been reading current research articles about migraine treatments. I find the ubiquity of meta analyses and, systematic and narrative reviews rather exasperating but I have come across the occasional randomised controlled trial. In the holy grail of statistical soundness, the Methods section of an RCT details not only inscrutable descriptions of data analysis…
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port-rating
We did portrait sketching today. This inspired little fellow from kindergarten chose Mr. Mac as his subject, who sat dutifully still, head-forward whilst shouting encouragement, praise and occasional reprimands to a noisy kindy-Stage 3 combo. I was annoyed it was better than my worked example and pleased that its style had some bearing to my…
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GONB
Today I got a greater occipital nerve block. My neurologist said it would hurt as much as “3 motherfuckers” but I kept it down to one unimpressed “fuck” when then the needle went in. I asked if the trigeminal nerve could be blocked too but was denied this request. I left the clinic with a…
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armchair warrior
Winsome has commandeered my chair. What a startling beautiful creature. It didn’t take her long to co-opt the living room with Blacky gone.
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Welcome Winsome
Say hello to the new cat. She is a Bengal. She seems somewhat surprised to be in a house with a little woman, an enormous black greyhound and a fat cream Chihuahua. Winsome’s pedigree papers and her lineage feature some hilarious names. Her original name was RESOLUTE KOPY KAT, her papa was ENVE LAW AND…
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create a portrait of
Using AI in academic writing is a veritable no-no but we all know-know… Meanwhile, procrastination remains an irresistible force, with AI enabling poor scholarly habits if not academic misconduct.
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The Ageing Brain
Functional decline may result from synaptic changes rather than neuronal loss and the altered regulation of adult neurogenesis. A synopsis of recent studies at the molecular, cellular and functional level illustrates normal senescence demonstrates adaptation and plasticity rather than inevitable decline. Introduction Studies with ageing humans and animals have demonstrated that higher levels of fitness…
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ode to cat in cat news story
this morning on the news I watched the story of a lettered cat how about that?! Max Dow PhD from Vermont University his cotton paws pound the campus grounds the tubby tabby made my morning happy I wonder what Max’s progenitors would think of his academic testamur? or if his siblings will wish to reconnect…
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green eyes on blue
AF has a Russian Blue kitten and I am so envious. What a handsome fellow! I think I have to take the Mountain Pass with greater frequency…
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Psychological Attribute 1: Parasocial Interaction and Social Media?
In 1956, Horton and Wohl published a seminal paper on parasocial interaction. Parasocial interaction is the illusion of a real life, face-to-face, reciprocal relationship with someone you’ve seen in the media but don’t actually know, such as a performer like Justin Bieber. This is not a psychological aberration. The evolution and ubiquity of Internet access,…
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Inaugural Fair Day, Doggywood Parade
At Mardi Gras Fair Day, Victoria Park. They also featured in the Guardian coverage of the fabulous Fair Day! –https://www.theguardian.com/culture/gallery/2023/feb/19/paint-pride-and-pageantry-sydney-celebrates-mardi-gras-fair-day-in-pictures
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Antidepressants
Psychologist Says Antidepressants Are Just Fancy Placebos Irving Kirsh aims to “explode the myth” of Prozac and its ilk, arguing that there’s little evidence that they actually work for most patients. by Carlin Flora; photograph by Jared Leeds From Discover Magazine Brain special issue; published online June 9, 2010.
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calculating
I miss my giant desk calculator. iOS calculator sucks, MS Excel sucks, this free solar-powered pocket calculator I found sucks, working with pencil and paper sucks and my arithmetic abilities suck even harder. I want my oversized accounting calculator back with the clicky-sounding push buttons. Why didn’t I take it with me when ordered to…
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smelling my ass
fontpolice: I’m loving it McDonald’s in Yass, on the Hume Highway in NSW, Australia, needs to work on its spacing (between the Golden Arches and the text) and kerning (that YA pair has none, making it look like a space). Submitted by Cam Ban.
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iso-dinner
Dinner! Of course, this sudden decline of culinary effort is definitely due to the unprecedented circumstances of COVID19 self-isolation…
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background checks
For my first team video conference I used my toilet as a background image as a joke. Colleagues thought I was actually taking a meeting on the can. Still, look at all that TP! And yes, I have an avocado-green toilet.
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public health message
You can guess the rest. Meanwhile an open bar tab was awaiting…
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ordering trash from refuse site
Why does UberEats register my work address as a public toilet? Who orders dinner from a public toilet?
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heart beets
Heart beets. Actually kumera or sweetie-pie potatoes. I pulled this sole specimen off a solid square metre of vine, I must be doing something wrong.
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underfoot but unforgotten
At risk of extinction from being very forgettable. Zieria prostrata from Australian Plant Image Index Australian National Botanic Gardens Australian National Herbarium
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uninvited guests
Redleaf, Qld, dropping in for Christmas. This is not a regular dude – he’s a professional snake catcher who doesn’t worry too much about WHS.
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ah wha?
Well, well, well… who found the gift chocolates from a Woollies “personal shopper” and helped herself to supper? Next stop – the dentist!
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somnambulistery
Unless someone has been in my kitchen, I must be going crazy. At least there’s no deep freezer for other storage surprises.
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pairing par excellence
Celebrating: a busted back, moving a tonne of firewood up a hill, a flooded bedroom and being cut-up by blackberries with triple-filtered 1980 Grange in a carafe from the local tip. Pictured here with the pocket nail file that opened it and the locally sourced dinner. Country life, here we come!
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growing fungus
Blue oyster mushrooms in a holy old mayonnaise bucket. Stir fry tonight!
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war games
Scarlett wages war games with Legacy Bears. Never too early to learn strategy.
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lactarius deliciosus
Yumrooms. Saffron milk caps and Yoko’s indifference.
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Health food fail, suspected terrorist attack
Last night, at approximately 000 hours a loud explosion was heard coming from an apartment building in the suburb of Darlinghurst. At the scene, pieces of green glass and plastic shrapnel were found throughout one of the residences. Thankfully, none of the occupants were harmed, although one is being treated for shock. A bottle of…
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pink oysters and pup
First flush in blush! Yes, I took a bite out of it. Needs oyster sauce and some braising but a promising lobster texture. No interest from Yoko, so the tubs can go on the floor.
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windfalls and other finds underfoot
I went foraging this morning. Saffron milk cap risotto tonight! Persimmons aplenty, but it seems even the birds find them bland.
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the mother of all days
Aye! Call your mother and clean the house! Happy Mother’s Day yummy mummies, baby mamas, materfamilias, grammies, -in-laws, steps-, et. al.
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mini-jardinage
The semi-belated Sydney 16-17 summer brought in a scorching hot afternoon sun that inched past the surrounding buildings and gingerly dipped its golden rays into our tiny subterranean balcony. I really miss you already, I will line the walls with aluminium foil to have you back.
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saffron milk caps
Oberon saffron milk cap – http://www.oberonaustralia.com.au/visitor-information/things-to-see-do/mushroom-picking/ Galangal and dandelion in the background.
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I award the Bravery Medal, to my valiant Red Wrigglers, who have not only survived the hottest Sydney summer in decades but have indeed thrived. The Red Wriggly Army (RWA) have been steadfast, despite a black soldier fly larvae invasion (which I maintained as a gross experiment for the birds), a sudden glut of kitchen…
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vertically challenged
Vertical herb planter: Native mint bush and lemon cress are going gangbusters and Yoko likes chewing on the lemongrass so I’ll keep the chilies on the top deck…
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evil aunty
It is Christmas Eve and the children have turned me into a mutant vampire-zombie grinch. I cant wait for them to see their presents. Ho ho ho….
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lost of note
Does anyone have my copy of Letters of Note and Lists of Note? I have lent these two volumes out and I can’t remember to whom as I also purchased them as gifts and I am very forgetful. If you are the borrower, can you please return them to me please? ¡Muchas gracias!
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spiros
Araignée du matin – chagrin, araignée du midi – souci, araignée du soir – espoir. I finally caught Spiros and transported him across the road. Immediately after his release he was chased by Tom, the building cat. Spiros is unlikely to be a lone huntsman but I am hoping he was the one who evaded…
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Ode to Familiarity
It was a festive thirty degrees in the midday heat of the first ‘summer’ day in spring and I headed down to the Phillip street bookshop. It was nearly 2pm but Martin place was still busy, office workers were seated on the orange and yellow outdoor chairs that had been placed across the wide steps of the sloping mall:…
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Mother Night
Despite reading a lot of Nabokov this year, Mother Night might be the best book I have read all year.
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that explains the penis
I guess we might be missing something, even though the picture already seems pretty full. Steed http://www.newyorker.com/contributors/edward-steed, my all time favourite:
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mugshots
Somehow, my favourite coffee mug (as shown in promotional image above) has been lost in the office relocation. It is extremely upsetting. Other personal mugs that have been displaced have resulted in varying degrees of displeasure (rated on a scale of 1-10). Displeasure score of 4. It is not that upsetting because I got it…
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Oh hell – diet time.
Food logging starts today. 2 x slices soy and linseed toast, butter and orange marmalade 0.5 breakfast wrap, white bread, egg, bacon, baby spinach and tomato chutney flat white with low-fat milk 0.25 lemon tart 0.5 chocolate pastry
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imbibing orange blossoms
lelarosestudio-blog: Vital information! Orange blossoms… Too good to drink.
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Sisyphus
Karlu Karlu-Devils Marbles Conservation Reserve, Davenport, Barkly, Australia
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dog-eat-dog world
It’s a dog-eat-dog world in corporate. The working dog eyes off the corner office…
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top tip from takeaway
Home delivery order just arrived and I love the Pacman container-lid hack. Keep those vego-nest spring rolls crunchy! Viets rock the plasticware.
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plus ou moins de fracas
Super-sized phở và nước dừa for dindins at Marrickville and wearing a slightly incompatible mix of Petit and original Fracas on a black linen dress as this east coast Indian summer wilts the inner-west well into the evening. A post-glut-gut tonic was formulated extemporaneously: 1 part vodka (any will do); .5 Campari; .5 part Aardmore (it…
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shades
OMG I think I’ve found sunglasses I like. In Brisbane of all places.
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Pizza Rat Caught on Film by Upright Citizens Brigade Member
ucbcomedy: Proud moment, or proudest moment? Thanks Matt Little. Pizza Rat Caught on Film by Upright Citizens Brigade Member
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playa del carmen
cecelia: Included in my list of exciting discoveries, such as the wifi network by the water and the Canadian sleeping tablets and dental floss (unused) I found beach-combing at sunrise, is this pano function on my phone camera. Viven las vacacciones!
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Reading a first work and reading a last work. What’s is the better introduction to an author?
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Nigel Slater’s perfect coq au vin recipe
This recipe was pretty tasty. The coq found the pinot noir a bit insipid, Côte du Rhône à la prochaine! Nigel Slater’s perfect coq au vin recipe
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lots of livin
I got a whole lotta television viewin’ to do… I got a whole channel of golden oldies, talkies and elaborately choreographed musical interludes to eat sandwiches to… Swing it!
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I’ve started this edition of Anna Karenina on my Kobo but I remain baffled by the cover. What is it? Is that the cleft of two buttocks? Or two knees pressed together? Or some strangely squared breasts? I think I need to buy the book to work it out.
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lonely no more
Even the saucy, overripe Gina Lollobrigida could not save this. 1972 film version of Nabakov’s King, Queen, Knave is a ghastly slapstick version of an ardent and unlikely love affair. However, in equal measure an indifferent waste of my idle time. Oh well!
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The greatest writer of rapture and a comic genius to boot.
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It’s my birthday! Don’t guess my age! Guess my life expectancy!
As it is my birthday. I woke up this morning, had a cup of tea and decided I would re-calculate my life expectancy. I tried this quacky US-MD website – “Living to 100”, which was resaonable enough although some correlations are hard to take seriously as predictive factors e.g. How do I like my barbeque? Medium rare?…
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Happy Birthday! I’m half-way, not half-arsed.
Indeed I may be approaching my middling years. It’s all approximate, give or take a few years, but based on the incredible bio-metric tool, that is, a freely available survey found online from the University of Pennysylvania, my Life Expectancy has been calculated to be: 76.61 years Analysis Results If all of the above choices are adopted,…
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encircled
Curvy pretty dry and simple. Everything of interest in the interstices. Triangle structures frame the concentric rings. But as Parliament House is to the pleb, these machinations of government and bureaucracy, the order and its administration, are rendered faintly absurd and fully opaque.
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Camp Coving
New cement wall remains un-graffiti-ed. This is sill my favourite beach despite the boats and dreadful parking.
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inter-retro-net-kitty-revival
Inter-retro-net-kitty-revival elbow destiny’s child independent woman
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