When does the child become an adult?

There’s nothing unusual about a bit of parent-child tension over cleaning a room.

It’s not unusual for discussions to deteriorate and for the child to have a tantrum.

It’s not unknown for the tantrum to result in the child throwing a plate.

It isn’t, however, so usual for the parents to then to call the police.

It’s even more unusual when the child in question is 28.

 Andrew Mizak is an independent political consultant who lives with his parents but his father decided not to press charges in case it harmed his son’s political career.

 The story has gone round the world – you can watch reports on YouTube .

It  doesn’t say what Mizak’s political aspirations are, but he might have to grow up before he achieves them.

HatTip: The NZ Week

Whose money is it anyway?

I won’t be quite as blunt as Whaleoil nor as comprehensive in my critique as Kiwiblog.

But the suggestion of more public funding for political parties is one I’ll oppose vehemently.

Public funding makes it sound like it’s someone else’s money.

But public money is our money, taken from us in taxes to be used for the public good.

That’s things like health and welfare services, education and roads. It’s not groups of people who voluntarily come together in the hope of changing the world, or a small part of it.

In New Zealand we have a very low hurdle for membership to allow a group to register as a political party – just 500 people.

No other group which is so unrepresentative could justify tax payer funding to make its voice heard and there’s no reason to make a special case for political parties.

Tuesday’s answers

Monday’s Questions were:

1. Who wrote A River Rules My Life?

2. Who said, Oozing charm from every pore/he oiled his way across the floor?

3. What is roygbiv?

4. Why are the Mercury Islands so named?

5. What does Lang may your lum reek  mean?

The quiz attracted four answers:

Deborah gets an electronic bunch of flowers for the most points: half a point for reading the book, a point for being right about 3 another half for being on the right track with four and a bonus half for making me smile with her answer to 5.

Lou gets a point for being right about 1.

Swinestein gets a point for getting 5 right and Paul gets one each for correctly answering 1 and 3.

The answers follow the break.

What would a teetotaller know about making cocktails?

We read the news so you don’t have to sums up  what  The New Zealand Week does.

The weekly digest provides a comprehensive round-up of major news stories of the week which brings you up to date on anything you might have missed.

It also has a few off-beat stories like this one on holy sex from the Guardian.

Headlined Sex and God do mix – according to ‘Catholic Kama Sutra’ it says:

The correct Roman Catholic sexual position is not, as many might imagine, missionary, infrequent and with the lights out, but “saucy, surprising and fantasy packed”.

The bleak traditional view was St Paul’s injunction to the Corinthians: “It is better to marry than to burn with passion.” However, a Polish priest who has written a surprising bestselling sex manual dubbed the “Catholic Kama Sutra” believes it is better still to marry and burn with passion.

The first edition of the book by Father Ksawery Knotz, a Franciscan from a monastery outside Krakow, titled Seks (in very large letters) and “for married couples who love God” in rather smaller type, has sold out and is being hastily reprinted in Warsaw.

And how does a celibate monk get his information?

“I talk with a lot of married couples and I listen to them, so these problems just kind of sit in my mind,”

Wouldn’t that be a bit like someone on a diet listening to people talk about banquets?

And wouldn’t the resulting book be a bit like one of cocktail recipes written by a teetotaller?

User pays or council plays?

Environment Southland’s Long Term Community Plan proposes imposing a dairy differnetial of $1.08 million to finance more compliance staff, monitoring programmes, stock effluent disposal sites, land sustainability programmes and a new regional discharge plan.

Is this user pays or an attempt to get dairy farmers to finance more than their fair share of the council’s  expansion?

Federated Farmers’ submission says many of its dairy members felt the rate was the regional council’s way of expanding its programmes while insulating the general ratepayer against the effects of an increased rate take.

DairyNZ recommends a partnership between the council and the dairy industry to resolve resource management issues.

That would provide the council with resources from DairyNZ’s own science, local farmer knowledge and dairy industry policy staff, its submission says.

Dairy farmers must pay their fair share of the costs associated with the environmental impact of their business but this looks like the council is playing a growing game and wants farmers to pay for it.

DairyNZ’s proposal would get the results without the need for the regional council to expand its empire at farmers’ expense.

Wheels fall off TradeMe tractor sale

When the TradeMe auction for the International 574 Tractor and free farm closed on Sunday night, vendors Shelley and Allan Holland thought they had a deal for $250, 000.

Yesterday the man who placed the highest bid, pulled out because his bank wouldn’t finance the deal.

Who would make an agreement to spend a quarter of a million dollars, with the eyes of the world on them, without checking with their bank first?

Perhaps that was in the days when a deal was a deal and could be sealed with a handshake.

The Hollands took a gamble and gained worldwide interest because they took a risk and undertook to respond to everyone who asked a question or comment.

They also undertook to donate $10,000 from the sale to charity and their concern when the deal collapsed wasn’t for themselves but those they’d wanted to help.

It’s not just us. We’ve still got our land, we’re no worse off than where we started … but it’s all the people that we promised money to. We wanted to give $10,000 to some people that we thought really deserved it because people had been so overwhelming with the auction and we had such an incredible response.”

“And now what do we do? We are just absolutely gutted – totally and utterly gutted.”

The couple was disappointed for people they had offered to support out of their earnings, including one boy named Ollie whose plight had come up in the question-and-answer section of the auction. Ollie needs medical treatment in the United States.

 

TradeMe contacted other bidders informing them the sale had falled through and there’s a message on the sale page saying this item was sold to another member.

I hope it was for a sum close to the closing bid.

Hat Tip: Kismet Farm who left a comment on yesterday’s post about this.

NZSO – Aotearoa Overture

Day 26 of the tune a day challenge for New Zealand Music Month.

Time for something classical – the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra with Aotearoa Overture.

Round the other blogs:

Bic Runga sings Get Some Sleep at Inquiring Mind

Sisters Underground are In The Neighbourhood at Keeping Stock

Sweet Dreams from Split Enz at Rob’s.

and Nothing’s Gonna Happen from the Tall Dwarfs at Art & My Life.