mike carey

Okay, so I'm a bit of an avgeek, don't @ me. I booked my flights for the Palm Springs weekend last year. Fast forward, and I've had two notifications from Amex that Qantas had changed my flights. The first was a two hour earlier departure from LAX on my flight to MEL. Amex insisted that I call them (or use their chatbot) to confirm I was happy with the change (note, IDGAF). I did so, and they were very thorough, going through the changes and making sure they worked for me, and they would have changed my connecting flight from MEL for free (and presumably the TPAC sector) if I wanted. All good. The second change they said wasn't material and I didn't need to call them. Took a while for me to find what it was, and it was a new flight number but the same time for my MEL-CBR flight. But there's more. The changed flight was on a different aircraft type *cue avgeek squeal of delight* onto one of QF's brand new A220s (they only have two so far). I had wondered when I would get to fly on one, and now I will be!

@BenjaminNicholas shows up at @nycman's house and it's not the guy @nycman saw in the ad, but he proceeds to allow him to rummage through his drawers and offer gratuitous advice on whatever he wants to. But you're right, it is off topic because it's a hypothetical not something that's actually happened.

Mid to late 70s. At the time it was required for overseas travel from Australia.

The clinician who saw me at the ACT government-run sexual health clinic asked whether I had considered the mpox vaccination (and HPV, which they will administer, but I'd have to buy for myself at a chemist's). She said they advise it's worth getting the mpox one, although it wasn't a hard sell. I had a vaccination against the variola virus (smallpox), which would provide some residual protection but I'm considering it.

Nice to see you here again, @AJDalton!

Moderator's Note Gentlemen, a reminder that this is a thread about Basstiann, and some earlier tangents notwithstanding, it's here for everyone to offer opinions about him. It's not a place to snipe at other posters about their opinions or to offer character assessments of each other. Please stop the sniping back and forth.

Following discussions between the Mardi Gras board and the NSW Police Minister and Police Commissioner, the NSW police will have a contingent in the Mardi Gras parade on Saturday night. It will a smaller group than in recent years and they will not march in uniform.

I've experienced 45 degree weather in western Sydney once (that's 113F) and it was not comfortable. My last three weeks deployed in Baghdad it was in the mid-40s every day, and that was surprisingly bearable. I wasn't on patrol or in a trench or anything like that. I'd prefer not to repeat either!

And probably more than a day's worth of sodium, and more sugar than you can imagine!

Nothing at all unseasonal going on here, mid to high 30s for the past fortnight and 40 forecast for tomorrow. Catastrophic fire weather warning for parts of western Victoria today, with one 22,000ha fire currently at 'watch and act' level and restrained for the moment in containment lines.

Fair comment!

Here's an article from the BBC on developments. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-68410026

BREAKING: The NSW police commissioner has just announced (Tuesday, 1530AEDT) at a press conference in Sydney that NSW Police have discovered the remains of two people at a rural property at Bungonia, about 200km south west of Sydney. Police searched the area, in the same general area as a previous search had been conducted yesterday, following up on information obtained from the accused.

And from the US, @Jamie21 is only a short flight away!

It does have the decided advantage over other globe trotting schedules reported here, that actually doing the travel and having time to work in the various locations would be feasible.

No, that wouldn't work. For a start, sharing the information has already been discussed so even with the name blurred out it would clearly be about him. Secondly, as a general point, even without any prior discussion, posting the exchange in a thread about a particular provider would be seen as being about them. To say that it wasn't about them but was about a random interaction with an unnamed provider would stretch credulity.

Don't. Posting private conversations with an identifiable other person contravenes forum guidelines.

This is an incredibly sad story, but one that in some respects is unsurprising, We have continuing public discussions and community disquiet about domestic violence in this country, and calls for more to be done in an attempt to rein in the number of murders of women and their children by their current and former [overwhelmingly] male partners. Advocates in that space have acknowledged the parallels in this case, and indeed cited it as further evidence of the same problem. The signs, as reported in the Channel 10 news item, that the alleged perpetrator displayed after his relationship ended are similar to behaviour recognised after other cases of intimate partner violence. The story has been in the news since the items were discovered in the skip at Cronulla on Wednesday and at the top of bulletins since Detective Superintendent Doherty's presser yesterday. What's struck me has been the matter-of-fact way the story has been covered in the local media, in a BBC item I read yesterday, and in the story posted above. There hasn't been a hint of salacious reporting nor comment on the gender of the couple, just reporting of Jesse and Luke and of the alleged perpetrator. As it should be. Just a senseless crime.

I'm sure anxious readers will be relieved to hear that shortly after 6pm AEDT on Monday Equestrian Australia announced that it had cleared Shane of any breach of the sport's code of conduct. He was interviewed on the ABC news channel after he was cleared. He said that the mankini was uncomfortable, and particularly so when riding a horse. The infamous mankini was not the only fancy dress costume he wore at the event, he also appeared in a Mr Duff Beer costume (something to do with 'The Simpsons' I'm told). Any publicity is good publicity (until it's not). Apparently he has been run off his feet with media interviews all day from around the world. Someone told him that they had never paid any attention to equestrian sports but now they had a reason to do so. So perhaps Equestrian Australia can look forward to more interest in its events and in the coverage of the Australian team in Paris.

I really think you should take stock of the things you post here.

The bridge was the clue I was going on.

Brisbane?

So, after all the sweet stuff about how wonderful Queens allegedly is, we finally see its real character? Lol.

It was in Spain, not Britain and the fine was 6,000 Euros, which is $USD6,435. (The GBP is USD 1.26.) As I read it the fine was imposed by Spanish civil authorities, the government's anti-violence commission, so the money would have gone to the Spanish state. I assume his ban from stadiums in Spain would place him on some sort of La Liga black list that could be checked at turnstiles or ticket offices. How effective the list would be is a separate question, but entering a stadium may well be an offence.

Bozo posted his comment in a new thread, but since @samhexum had already posted news of Mr Post's passing here, we merged it into this one.