Feral Boojay & bogan-breeding

I'm feeling massively lazypants, but I want to whinge a bit about my city, Canberra, so this post has been tweaked, rehashed and recycled from last year to become the writing masterblogpost you see before you.  Alas, not a lot has changed since last year.

Living in Canberra and working in the public service is just bollocks at this time of the year. Speaking of balls, this place is cold enough to freeze them off a brass monkey right now.  Canberra is getting it's arctic monkey on.

As if that wasn’t enough horrible, we may as well rename my town Boojayberra for a couple of days and cut out any confusion. 

When it comes down to it, the federal budget is all about a small group of people who move massive amounts of money around an imaginery monopoly-type board while the rest of us go to work and hope they don't send us directly to jail or give us an old boot to play with.

I unfortunately know at least half a dozen people who get all excited by the associated budgetary figures and statistics of this system of commerce, and they're not even paid to be enthusiastic about the nuts and bolts, or faux interested at the other end of the public sector spectrum.  One of them works in advertising.  It's really not right.

I find their overeagerness terribly tragic and deeply disturbing, and it also means that no-one wants to talk to me right now about more pertinent matters, like what's happening in the Daily Mail.  I love the Daily Mail.  Pure British tabloid trashiness.

I know not to watch commercial news stations EVER. I know not to do this. And this is why.  Why is a single mother with no income and five children under the age of five by five different fathers considered a ‘victim of the economy’, rather than what she really is, which is a completely irresponsible skank?  Why is she considered disadvantaged, and why does the Gillard Government support people like this with a sugar hit?  Well, skank, Wayne Swan says no more baby bonuses for you.

If you can't afford to have children then you probably shouldn't be having children. Is this really rocket science?  It shouldn't be an entitlement; it should be means-tested, and not only financially. While I admit that would be a win for the nanny state, it would also be a huge triumph for the rest of the community.  In reality, the only people who worry about whether they can afford children are the people who can afford to have children.

Bogan gingerbread housing estates

It is widely acknowledged that I am somewhat obsessed with all things Christmassy, but there is one thing that really gets my goat.  Gingerbread.  There's nothing like the smell of fresh gingerbread cooking in the oven.  It's been over twenty years since I last ate gingerbread, when I was suffering from glandular fever and hepatitis-A, and I must say the aroma still makes me want to run and barf into the nearest garbage bin.

The odour is utterly, utterly repugnant to me.  You may smell sweet, sweet candy; I smell warmed up old garbage bags full of vanilla and cinnamonny grossness with a hint of burnt hair.  I don't much care for the taste either.



For some unfathomable reason, people who like to rampantly bake things think it's a super idea to make mini-me houses from gingerbread and other confectionery at Christmas time.  I call this out as a stupid tradition. 

Although this dirty little baking activity would improve immeasurably in my eyes if they instead created bogan housing estates and the like, rather than pretty stand-alones in the suburbs.  Everyone knows the 'burbs are densely populated with middle-class bogans and not marshmellow men with carob bud garden beds.  Let's keep it real, Martha Stewart wannabes.

Given the tremendously traumatic experience faced by those two young hoodlums, Hansel and Gretel, you'd think that baking edible housing estates would be discouraged, and you'd think their self-inflicted tale of terror would be used as an example to show the kiddies that eating apartment blocks will make you fat.  The timely message is right there, ready to be rammed down the throats of those little cake overeaters.  Educating kids on obesity; you're doing it wrong, Federal Government. 

The Christmassy lollies that have me in a dither at the moment are Cadbury's Electrical Chocolates, which contain insulated conductors that are used to produce a charge through your brain when you chew them.  Totally true story; I wouldn't make this up.  Cadbury calls them Magical Elves, but I like my name better.  The current batch have a particularly high wattage due to what Cadbury determines as 'popping candy', but I think they are wrong and it is due to some super duper electrical wiring.  



I'm not letting this wattage thing go, Cadbury, so it's best you come clean on your sugary secrets.  It's probably a bit negligent of me to discuss these electric powered chocolates, given that Cadbury has copyright on magical elves, the ellipse device, the colour purple and probably the word purple for all I know.  I'm like the Julian Assange of the confectionery world.  I better watch my back or I'll be kidnapped by gingerbread men in licorice balaclavas.  

And while we're on the subject of confectionery, I'd like to make a comment or two on Cadbury's lack of attention to detail when making their Flakes.  I have been one of their clients for many a year; indeed I imagine my purchases of their products have put some of their CEOs children through years of private school education.  But I to say that my disappointment - my DISMAY! - in their packaging has boiled to the surface.  The Flake bits FALL OUT IN MY HAND!!!  They are making my life a misery.  Can't they teach the people in their factories to seal the foil properly?  How hard can it be?



You callin' me a fackin bogan aye?
Gingerbread this, aye!



Nanny State

Labor Governments have always been sensitive to those in society who are more foolish than the rest of the community.  I have noticed this week that the Feds have their nanny state fingers in many palliative pies at the moment and feel it necessary to point out the small print (see: bleeding obvious) to these mindless citizens.

Listening to the radio the other morning, I heard that there is a new sunscreen SPF rating - factor 50+.  Why the hell do we need a factor 50+?!  Who goes out in the sun anymore?  I guess those who choose to sit outside for hours and hours tanning their skins into a leather three-seater sofa in the Australian summer sun might care about that piece of information. 

And then a spokesperson of a cancer charity came on and said that it's not so great, because some people will get a false sense of security that their skin is protected and sit outside for longer.  Um, yes, idiots may have that problem.  I'm pretty sure kids should learn the dangers of skin cancer when they are two days old in this country.  Oh, that's right, it's the government's responsibility to tell them...

And then there are the warnings that will be voluntarily printed on alcohol labels; warnings that the Australian Medical Association say will be useless unless the labels specifically offer the range and severity of possible health problems associated with getting sloshed.  I don't know; I'm pretty sure they will be useless regardless. 

I'm not sure too many pissed, randy teenagers will care, let alone scan the fine detail of the terms and conditions in their drunken stupour or at any other time.  Teenagers should already know that alcohol is bad for them.  If they don't, then it's not the government's role to tell them.  Oh, that's right, it IS apparently the government's responsibility to advise them...

And then there's the Federal Government's Tobacco Plain Packaging Bill, which will make it an offence to sell, supply, purchase, package, or manufacture tobacco products for retail sale in Australia in anything other than the plain packaging requirements set out in the Bill and regulations.  Oh noes, the glamour's gone for smokers. 

I'm pretty sure those grown adults who venture outdoors in the freezing cold to light up, and the kids who hang outside shopping malls on a Friday night, won't give a rats about the packaging.  Shouldn't parents be telling their kids that cigarettes will kill you?  Oh, that's right, they think that's the job of the government...

As annoyed as I get with governments behaving like nanny states, I suspect it is a necessary function of the state for a lot of douche bags in the community. 

If people don't want bureaucrats sticking their noses into their fake designer handbags, drunkard social habits, bedroom antics, calorie-laden fridges, parenting skills etc, then they should occasionally do the right thing by themselves / their kids. 

A lot of people like to think they can look after themselves, but, in reality, it seems about 20% of the population require a sort of pre-palliative care just to get through the day. You know the ones; you probably see at least one every day. They don't really care for speed limits, they walk across a road without looking, and this is just the stuff that happens on the road.

Not stopping at stop signs is one that always has me vexed.  Yes, I know there are no cars around, but the sign says STOP. Which means you should friggin' stop moving.  All that is required of you as a responsible and reasonable citizen is to stop your car for a couple of seconds. That's it. 

Is it really that complicated to get your head around?   Maybe they need some small print placed on the sign that reads, "not stopping at the stop sign may kill you".  Oh wait, we DO have those signs.

Space and Military technology in safe hands

Imagine a laser beam so powerful and precise that it could push space debris the size of a pin head out of the path of a satellite. Or a war-zone hotshot being defended by a remote controlled system, mitigating the risk of casualties. While these fictitious ‘star wars’ settings belong in a Hollywood movie, the concepts make good business sense for Canberra-based business Optic Electro Systems (EOS). Their laser technology products are hot property and have the attention of the biggest players in the global space and military sectors.

An unremarkable brown brick building in Griffith is home to EOS, a quarter of a billion dollar success story and a world leader in the niche field of laser imagery technology. While the nearby dirt car park belies their success, the building interior is sleek, polished and minimalist, befitting a company whose key business partners include NASA and the U.S. Military.

The company is split into a space and military division, with offices in the United States and Europe. Although it began in more humble surroundings, in the industrial sector in Queanbeyan. EOS Group General Manager Ron Thompson says Queanbeyan’s appeal was the cheap rent and handy facilities, but the choice of location was also strategic. “No-one in Australia, let alone Washington, knows where Queanbeyan is”, says Mr Thompson.  The close proximity to Canberra means an assimilation with funding by an arm of the Federal Government.

The company was created in 1986 by current CEO, Dr Ben Greene. At the time, the United States President Ronald Reagan was espousing a new defence initiative, known as 'star wars'.  One of the roles of this initiative involved shooting down missiles in space. The Australian Government was opposed to this application of technology and abandoned its support.

“Space debris is the reason our Government of the day moved away from supporting star wars”, Mr Thompson explains. Dr Greene was a Commonwealth employee, working in aerospace, and saw a unique opportunity to take the technology that had been created in the government environment and turn it into a private enterprise. He predicted space debris would pose a big problem in the future.

Twenty years on, while experts around the globe are challenged by the environmental degradation on earth, EOS are confronting the issue in space. “We are working hand over fist to correct the mess in space”, says Mr Thompson. The company’s technology will enable them to locate space debris, catalogue it and, in the long term, to demonstrate the ability to move debris out of its current orbit and into the earth’s atmosphere where it will burn up.

In a star wars analogy, Mr Thompson explains, “the laser will give a glancing blow; it’s like pushing someone in the shoulder, it pushes you off track. You don’t need to use a lot of energy”.

It is a very advanced and costly program, but one EOS say is necessary. “We have environmentally screwed space”, Mr Thompson said. referring to the estimated 30 million pieces of man made debris that NASA say are orbiting earth, ranging from 1 millimetre to metres in size.

And the recently exploding Chinese satellite created an estimated 2 million pieces. “Space is now more valuable real estate than anything on earth. And unless we can do something about it (debris), then the demise of earth will only happen quicker”, says Mr Thompson.

Today, the approval process to launch a satellite is stricter than the cold war days. “Every satellite has to be launched into a particular orbit and there are treaties that impact, affect and control all of space; we all work in a very controlled environment”, says Mr Thompson. He believes that the data will invariably be of more interest to the insurance industry, as a risk mitigate, than it might be to other nations.

The military division of EOS is also heavily involved in global technological developments. Last year, the company earned wide recognition after winning a contract to supply the Australian Army with forty-four remote control weapon systems to support Australian troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. The product, called CROWS (Common Remote Operated Weapon Station) allows the operator to locate and identify the enemy and fire the weapon from a protected environment, not unlike a playstation.

The ADF wanted them because the U.S. had them and gave rave reviews. “They are so common with the US, there is commonality of operational training. They have the ability to understand the product of the other party quite well”, said Mr Thompson.

The company’s relations with the U.S. military began when the U.S. discovered EOS’ weapon systems research and wanted to test it in Iraq. “The U.S. troop carriers were armour plated and protected from underground explosion, but when they had people jumping out from behind a tree with a granade launcher, they had no defence mechanism for protecting themselves”, says Mr Thompson, and adds, “mobile granade launchers are now a real threat to people in conflict zones as they can be hoisted over the shoulder”.

EOS have designed and will soon test an anti-granade launcher weapon system. As the enemy gets smarter, the defence mechanisms need to be just as clever to counteract. And EOS knows, as well as any Government, that maintaining credibility with the customer means keeping troops out of harms way.

If the military world stopped fighting tomorrow, the world’s money would be focused again on space research, and EOS has that side of the game covered. “Our core technology is lasers and they are applied in two environments where they will always be in demand, space and military, although one maybe more so than the other”, Mr Thompson said.

While EOS compete for contracts with U.S. technology giants, part of the company’s appeal is its nimbleness. “We can change quickly to suit the end users needs, and we are usually aware of the need before they know that they have one”, says Mr Thompson.

Last year, EOS was recognised by the ACT Government as the Top Exporter of the Year, for their unique expertise in defence technology. “Not only has the company contributed millions of export dollars to the ACT economy, but through its Washington office it has also supported other Canberra businesses looking to break into the American market,” Chief Minister John Stanhope said. The future and security of international space and military technology is in safe hands.

For more information on Electro Optic Systems (EOS) go to http://www.eos-aus.com/.