mike carey

The heritage of Al Andalus obviously still runs deep!

Very few Australians in the 17th and 18th centuries spoke French, or engaged in diplomacy. I suspect that the British, here from 1788 did, and the La Pérouse expedition arrived here the day after the First Fleet and spent six weeks in the new colony. Nicolas Baudin and his expedition in the Géographe and the Naturaliste that was sent to map the coast of New Holland did encounter British mariners (in Encounter Bay, in South Australia) and visit Port Jackson (Sydney harbour), but that was not until the first years of the 19th century.

Puts a whole new slant on 'pay wall'.

No, not 'crickets'! I realise the sport of cricket is so much not a thing in North America that there is little that happens in the sport that might interest, much less excite most people in the forum. (Although Canada has competed in four of the 50 Over World Cup competitions, and the US will co-host the 2024 Twenty Over World Cup with the West Indies.) I've made the topic title general so it can be the place where anything about the game can be posted rather than make it about one particular cricket-related subject. Why now? I'm glad you asked. (OK, so you didn't, but I won't let that stop me.) International 'test' cricket, the longest version of the game has been played for almost 150 years since the first game between Australia and England in 1877, and in that time about 2400 tests have been played. In a game, the player who bowls the ball when a batsman is given out is credited with that wicket (what the 'out' is called) when they are out in the process of playing a shot (so not when they are dismissed by being run out, the equivalent of a baseballer failing to reach a base). In the current game between India and New Zealand being played in Mumbai, the New Zealand bowler Ajaz Patel took all 10 wickets in India's first innings. Bowling in cricket, unlike pitching in baseball, is rotated between usually four or five players in each innings, so that is not an easy feat to achieve. In fact this is only the third time in the history of test cricket that it has been done. Poignantly, Patel was born in Mumbai and emigrated to New Zealand with his parents when he was eight, and members of his extended Indian family were in the crowd. Understandably this has been the talk of the cricket world for the past 24 hours. (It turned out not to be New Zealand's finest day, they were bowled out for 62 runs in their first innings, India had made 325.) Now, back to your scheduled sports coverage.

Is that the real McCoy?

You got me with that one!

Posted without comment!

MOT is the UK annual safety checks for renewal of car registrations

One can be aware of the vicissitudes of flying steerage without having to actually endure them.

Well, that took be by surprise, I'd never seen long haul flights with baggage not included in the price, but then trans-Atlantic flights are not what I usually search. And yes random LAX-LHR and JFK-LHR searches for next month showed most fares didn't include it, and that was irrespective of whether the fare was labelled Economy or Basic Economy. At least on American my OW status should get me a free bag, but that's all theoretical as it's not a trip I'm likely ever to take.

I can't wait till my next trip to London! That sort of engagement with clients is guaranteed to maximise their satisfaction with the meeting experience. Bravo for adopting modern marketing. If you reply to this post you will receive my automated engagement assessment questionnaire.

The headline was clearly wrong. I've never seen a car that was wearing flip flops and an apron!

That's true. At the moment it's not an issue as he's not in the Socceroos squad. However, he faces a broader dilemma. Australia has to qualify in the Asian Confederation, so many of its games are in the Middle East. In a 'normal' qualification round we potentially face home and away games in Saudi Arabia, Oman, the UAE, Qatar and Iran, and this year due to Covid travel restrictions we have also played 'home' games in the UAE. Granted they are fly-in fly-out encounters not the six weeks that the finals could involve but if he's not prepared to travel to those countries it limits his value to the squad. I have to wonder, however, how much real danger do the laws in those countries pose to members of visiting professional sports teams. Is it likely to be any more dangerous than Russia, host of the last World Cup where there are aggressively homophobic policies and public attitudes, but homosexuality is nominally legal.

And I suspect that holds true whether you intended 'cultivated' as a verb (past participle) or an adjective.

My similarly antique French did not include this quirk, or I had forgotten it, but even Google Translate when tweaked with an obviously feminine object confirms this, «Omar m'a tuée» it should be.

Shouldn't it have been, «Omar m'a tué»?

Quite so, @Unicorn, and not much chance of a pharma-funded study. More likely a country (or sub-national jurisdiction like a state/province or city) with a robust system of health data collection will track immunity levels over time after boosters are administered and use the results to inform decisions on which vaccines to use and for whom. For example, Israeli data is currently informing much of the decision process on boosters.

The issue had been discussed for some time. The federal government had said they would consider allowing unvaccinated players entry to the country, but that the Victorian state government would have to request an exemption. The Victorian Premier basically said, nothing to do with us, international borders are entirely up to the feds. At the time the Premier had said that he couldn't in good conscience tell Australians they couldn't attend the AO without being fully vaccinated but ask for players to be able to be there without confirming their vaccination status. Regardless of the merits of vaccine mandates, it's pretty clear that mandates will still apply in Melbourne until at least the end of January. If players had been allowed in, there would have been virtually nothing they would be able to do outside the tournament itself without proof of vaccination.

It's a reasonable hypothesis, and one which I have heard immunologists cite, that a different class of vaccine stimulates the immune system differently so having a different booster to the original course of vaccine could provide a complementary effect. Separately there is a school of thought that the existing vaccines should have been released as three dose vaccines. With more time clinical trials could have been conducted to determine whether two or three doses was better. Instead we are conducting observational experiments to see how immunity persists after third doses of like and unlike vaccines. I'll eventually be part of the 'unlike' cohort, AZ and BioNTech/Pfizer.

Yep, it's on now although it's past the peak eclipse (that was 97%). It's cloudy here unfortunately. The moon rose here at 1945 local time (an hour ago). (That's the evening of the 19th.)

So you named your dog after a tennis star?

'You have the stamp of genius!' 'Philately will get you nowhere.' I guess I should try flattery in case I'm ever in London.

Unintentionally funny encyclopaedia titles. https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FEOBzs1VIAcIHtA?format=jpg&name=large

Yeah, I know (although not uniquely, as @Epigonosattests). In the context of an Aussie school playground, Vegemite definitely falls into the 'Anglo food' category.

The sandwich thing reflects something that is shared in immigrant communities. There are often stories of Italian or Asian students from immigrant families in this country trading their lunches, of items common in their cuisine (think of salami and pickled vegetables for people from Mediterranean countries) for mundane and dare I say boring Anglo food like processed cheese, peanut butter or Vegemite sandwiches. What you eat three tines a day is less attractive, particularly for children, than something that is rare or uncommon. Even lobster for every meal could become boring. I suspect for me it could take quite a while for that to happen, though!