And the winner is . . .

My not very foolproof method of picking winners proved its unreliability again.

The winner of the 2012 Melbourne Cup was Green Moon.

Fiorente was second and Jakkalberry came third.

Jabba wins an electronic batch of meringues - his fast donkey came second.

Word of the day

Cribber – a horse that habitually grips objects with its teeth and sucks air into its stomach.

Grammarly, smothery mothering & culinary prime

Discussion with Jim Mora on Critical Mass this afternoon was sparked by:

* Word fun at Grammarly.

Scroll down to page three to seen the difference between fighting with someone and fighting with someone.

Below that you’ll find bookworm problem # 37 – pronouncing a word incorrectly because you’ve read it but never heard it spoken.

I was in my 30s before I learned that badinage was not pronounced ban dee age (as in bandying words).

I was well into adulthood before I realised it was halcyon and not halycon which I pronounced haley con through an association with Haley Mills and happy, summery times.

* Smothery mothering in is too much mothering bad for you at the Virginia Quarterly Review.

Why do these studies look at mothers or children but not both together and why do few mention fathers?

*  Women master cookery at the age of 55  at the Telegraph – hmm, this means I must be in my culinary prime which I’m not sure I’m happy about.

Rural round-up

Times they are achanging – Gravedodger:

As a child in the 1950s, the Amuri Basin on the northern border of Canterbury  was often almost a desert due to low rainfall, NW winds and soaring summer temperatures, as was the case for much of the east coast of both islands.

The “Red Post”, just north of Culverden Village (which incidentally often rates a mention as a summer hot spot on evening infotainment shows), was in an area of pastoral grazing country that struggled to sustain one sheep to an acre.
Today it stands in a sea of green grass and productive farming that makes my memory seem improbable. . .

Our agriculture’s much more than the sum of its parts – Pasture Harmonies:

Too much, arguably all the time, we look at all the individual components of our farm production systems……and beat ourselves up about them.

We could use less fertiliser, our use of water isn’t that optimal at times, occasionally there’s animal welfare issues, and as for degradation of waterways……

And that’s just on-farm. . .

 

Optimistic signs for coming season’s red meat trade - Allan Barber:

After some harrowing experiences last season for the meat industry, both processors and farmers, 12 months on things are looking up. This sense of optimism hasn’t yet been reflected in prices from the meat companies, but statements from those in the know strike a perceptibly more positive note.

Last year the lamb kill was down by a million, there was drought in significant livestock areas, the dollar was too high and so was the procurement price for lamb. While beef remained relatively unaffected by the hype, the price really not changing much in a year, sheep meat was a completely different story. Driven by the unholy combination of scarcity and tight shipping deadlines for the Christmas trade, the procurement price hit $8 a kilo and struggled to get down from that level. . .

Trading Among Farmers reality at last – Allan Barber:

The day when outside investors can apply for units in the Fonterra Shareholders Fund to be listed on the NZX and ASX has arrived at last. Getting to this point has been a long and tortuous process during which Fonterra has consulted its members, finally gaining the required majority vote in favour of establishing Trading Among Farmers (TAF).

TAF will enable those Fonterra’s shareholders that wish to free up some capital to deposit shares in the fund, provided they retain enough shares to match their milk supply. These shares can either be bought by other shareholders who would like to increase their shareholding or exchanged for the units with rights to dividends and share price value changes.

Melbourne Cup sweepstake

Let’s not incur the wrath of Internal Affairs which warns any sweepstake with a prize worth more than $500 would be breaking the rules.

But let’s have some fun with an electronic sweepstake for this afternoon’s Melbourne Cup with an electronic batch of meringues for the winner.

TV3 has a downloadable sweepstake form which includes the important detail of jockey’s colours.

I’m picking:

#9 Sanagas for first place – the jockey is in blue with a horseshoe on the front of his shirt.

# 20 Zabeelionaire for second – the jockey is in blue and gold, which are Otago colours and its a New Zealand horse. The only other New Zealand horse’s name is Maluckyday which appeals but the jockey’s shirt sleeves are pink.

#1  Dunaden for third sounds similar to Dunedin, the jockey’s in blue and gold and it’s a previous winner.

P.S.

The form includes the jockey’s weights. Some of the heroes in Dick Francis books mutter about constant hunger and taking saunas to reduce their weight. But how do you have the strength to race when you’re not eating enough?

Environment Southland audit

Environment Southland is undergoing an independent legal audit of its compliance processes:

Chief Executive Rob Phillips said today that in light of recent allegations in the media, it was essential that there was public confidence that all of the Council’s regulatory practices were sound, and that the processes for taking compliance action were robust.

“Prosecutions are an essential part of our compliance activity, particularly where there has been a serious breach of the law, a regulation or a rule,” Mr Phillips said. “Everyone needs to be confident that compliance action is based on sound processes that have been carried out with integrity.” . . .

And what were those allegations in the media?

The move follows stories in the The Southland Times involving two separate incidents – one surrounding allegations that Environment Southland compliance officer Chris McMillan altered a statement from police after a stock truck sting, and the other where senior Invercargill lawyer Rex Chapman told The Times Mr McMillan effectively acknowledged under cross examination in court the council’s original written case against a farm owner and manager it was prosecuting contained statements that were not true.

Regional councils act as environmental police and wield wide-ranging powers.

Their processes and staff must be above reproach.

 

 

 

 

 

No consensus, no change

Justice Minister Judith Collins is consulting all parties about the Electoral Commission’s final report on MMP and she wants to get as much of a consensus as possible.

I think it’s important that we have electoral reform of this sort of magnitude that has  . .. not just a straight majority in parliament but a very substantial majority in parliament. . . .

I well remember what happened when the Electoral Finance Act was rammed through . . . and I know that that caused a lot of angst in parliament and in the public. . .

She is right about both the importance of consensus and the angst caused by the EFA. The then Labour-led government didn’t have much support in or out of parliament but rammed it through anyway.

Electoral law is too important to be treated that way. It should be enduring and it is more likely to be so if it has broad support in parliament.

Wellington constitutional lawyer and former Vote for Change campaigner, Jordan Williams  says the government should reject the recommendations and stick with the status quo.

Unless the government can get strong support for changes that is good advice.

If there is no broad consensus there should be no change.

October 6 in history

105 BC Battle of Arausio: The Cimbri defeated the Roman army of Gnaeus Mallius Maximus.

69 BC Battle of Tigranocerta: Forces of the Roman Republic defeated the army of the Kingdom of Armenia led by King Tigranes the Great.

68 BC Battle of Artaxata: Lucullus defeated Tigranes the Great of Armenia.

1600  Jacopo Peri‘s Euridice, the earliest surviving opera, received its première performance in Florence, signifying the beginning of the Baroque Period.

1683  William Penn brought 13 German immigrant families to the colony of Pennsylvania, marking the first immigration of German people to America.

1762  Seven Years’ War: conclusion of the Battle of Manila between Britain and Spain, which resulted in the British occupation of Manila for the rest of the war.

1769 Ship’s boy Nicholas Young received a gallon of rum and had Young Nick’s Head named in his honour for being the first aboard the Endeavour to spot land.

1789  French Revolution: Louis XVI returned to Paris from Versailles after being confronted by the Parisian women.

1849  The execution of the 13 Martyrs of Arad after the Hungarian war of independence.

1854 The Great fire of Newcastle and Gateshead started shortly after midnight, leading to 53 deaths and hundreds injured.

1884  The Naval War College of the United States Navy was founded in Newport, Rhode Island.

1889  Thomas Edison showed his first motion picture.

1903  The High Court of Australia sat for the first time.

1906  The Majlis of Iran convened for the first time.

1908 Austria annexed Bosnia and Herzegovina.

1910 Barbara Castle, British politician, first woman to be First Secretary of State, was born (d. 2002).

1914 Thor Heyerdahl, Norwegian explorer was born  (d. 2002).

1927  Opening of The Jazz Singer, the first prominent talking movie.

1928  Chiang Kai-Shek became Chairman of the Republic of China.

1930 Richie Benaud, Australian cricketer, was born.

1939  World War II: The  Polish army was defeated.

1942 Britt Ekland, Swedish actress, was born.

1945 Billy Sianis and his pet billy goat were ejected from Wrigley Field during Game 4 of the 1945 World Series (see Curse of the Billy Goat).

1948 Gerry Adams, Northern Irish politician, was born.

1973  Egypt launched a coordinated attack against Israel to reclaim land lost in the Six Day War. The Ramadan War Yom Kippur War started at 2:05 pm that day.

1976  Cubana Flight 455 crashed into the Atlantic Ocean after two bombs, placed on board by terrorists with connections to the CIA, exploded. All 73 people on-board were killed.

1976 New Premier Hua Guofeng ordered the arrest of the Gang of Four and associates and ended the Cultural Revolution in China.

1976   Massacre of students gathering at Thammasat University in Bangkok, Thailand to protest the return of ex-dictator Thanom, by a coalition of right-wing paramilitary and government forces, triggering the return of the military to government.

1977  In Alicante, Spain, fascists attacked a group of MCPV militants and sympathisers, one MCPV sympathiser was killed.

1977 The first prototype of the MiG-29, designated 9-01, made its maiden flight.

1979 Pope John Paul II beaome the first pontiff to visit the White House.

1981 President of Egypt  Anwar al-Sadat was assassinated.

1985  PC Keith Blakelock was murdered as riots erupted in the Broadwater Farm suburb of London.

1987  Fiji became a republic.

1995 51 Pegasi was discovered to be the first major star apart from the Sun to have a planet (and extrasolar planet) orbiting around it.

2000 Yugoslav president Slobodan Milošević resigned.

2000  Argentine vice president Carlos Álvarez resigned.

2002  The French oil tanker Limburg was bombed off Yemen.

2007 Jason Lewis completed the first human-powered circumnavigation of the globe.

Sourced from NZ History Online & Wikipedia