mike carey

I WUV Australian consumer law! Here, the price on the menu has to be the amount on the bill (and the total has to be the sum of those items, not with some 'surcharge' added). And like all retail outlets, GST has to be included in the list price, not added on, as sales tax is in the US. The law even applies to Sunday or holiday surcharges. They can't put a note at the bottom of the menu saying they have such a surcharge, they have to have separate menus with the higher prices. Being accustomed to Australian tip levels, I'm nervous about getting it right in the US, but not obsessively so because most likely I'll never be back to the same restaurant. I'm a hard 'No' on tipping for takeaway purchases, although when cash was king I would sometimes throw the coins into a tip jar if they had one.

Haven't done that flight although I think it's still on the (dormant) timetable as a daylight flight. I've flown AKL-SCL on LAN (as it was) but it was overnight for the relevant part of the flights both ways. My only SYD-JNB flight was with SAA/SAL with stops in Perth and Mauritius so no icebergs! Ed: Qantas CEO Alan Joyce is talking about adding SYD-CPT as one of its ultra-long haul flights. That would go further south mid-flight (ETOPS diversions permitting). (Counter-intuitively, CPT is actually a 21 miles shorter flight from Sydney than JNB.)

And here is today's Qantas release about the flight. It includes a link to a photo gallery. https://www.qantasnewsroom.com.au/media-releases/qantas-repatriation-flight-lands-in-history-books/

I think the Australian meaning of the word 'root' would be applicable in this case.

OMAAT article about it. https://onemileatatime.com/news/qantas-flight-over-antarctica/

This afternoon a Qantas B787 repatriation flight landed in Darwin in Australia's Northern Territory after flying non-stop from Buenos Aires. It was the longest commercial flight the airline had operated. The flight overflew the Antarctic continent en route. The route is not as long as Singapore Airlines' Singapore-Newark service, and it's not the longest flight that Qantas has ever operated with their B787s. Before Covid they had done trial non stop flights from New York and London to Sydney, and a few months ago they operated a charter flight taking the Australian cricket team from Brisbane to Saint Lucia in the West Indies. Today's flight was commercial, with tickets sold to Australians in South America who wanted to return to Australia.

Another international comparison for milk here, where two-litre bottles are the most common size. The two big supermarkets have a *store name* brand, typically A$2.30, a 'fake brand' where they each have a 'brand' that only they sell, about $3.30, and real national (or state) brands, usually about $4.50. (So about US$3.15, $4.50 and $6.15 per US gallon.) The price per litre is only slightly different for one- and three-litre bottles. There are also specialist and modified milk varieties that are more expensive. In Canberra we used to have socialist milk (by that I mean the government set up contracts to buy, process and deliver milk in the city and set the prices) and now Canberra Milk ($4.60 when last I looked) has more shelf space than any other brands, and is the most likely to run out first. They are also the main sponsor of the Canberra rugby league team in the national competition. Prices haven't spiked over recent months. People tend to buy the mid- or higher priced milk if they can afford it. Three or four years ago the supermarkets introduced $1 a litre milk with great fanfare, but when it became clear that dairy processors were stiffing farmers to supply it at that price there was a backlash, and a lot of people stopped buying it for that reason.

Bank transfer is certainly an Australian thing, and I'm not surprised it's a UK thing as well, although in our case it's domestic. I'd be surprised if there were a simple international bank transfer process, so unless you have a UK bank account ... I've had two recent hires who preferred that and as I had my laptop with me in one case, that's what I did (I don't have a bank app on my phone otherwise I could have used that instead). Privacy is still an issue if you have a partner who you don't want to see the transaction, but at least here and in the UK there isn't the legality aspect to worry about. Here, only a bank branch identifier and account number are needed, and the guy read those from his phone for me to type in. Australian banks also have 'PayID' which enables you to make an instant transfer using just the payee's phone number from your bank's app or internet banking.

Yep, I posted about this last night (Australia closed until late 2022 in the Travelling Members forum), but said there that I wasn't ready to book any travel until it was clear how it would work in practice. I'm suspicious that there will be hidden obstacles. But I'm hopeful, and I might move sooner rather than later because I know INNdulge is booking fast and, as I mentioned elsewhere a few weeks back, I've seen a good JAL J class fare on Amex travel.

Well, this is all very sudden, one could be forgiven for thinking the prime minister wants to demonstrate progress before election time. Morrison announced today that the ban on vaccinated Australians travelling overseas will end on 14 Nov, and caps on vaccinated Australians returning to the country will be lifted. No news on when foreign travellers will be free to come here. The details on whether there will be limits on places we can go have not been announced, nor whether there will be different rules for arrivals who've been in different countries, as happens elsewhere. The trigger for whether this will happen on 14 Nov or be moved forward or back will be one state reaching 80% of its eligible population (≥16) being fully vaccinated, which on current projections will be NSW (the ACT might get there first, but there are no international flights here). Additional states can open up as they reach that threshold. Returning travellers who are vaccinated will no longer have to enter 14 days' supervised quarantine but will instead, for now at least, have to home quarantine for seven days. Details are subject to confirmation, including whether domestic connecting travel to a place of residence will be permitted, or if it has to be in the port of arrival. For travel purposes, Sinovac and the Indian-manufactured AZ will be recognised as well as the ones already approved here. Qantas had been selling international tickets to a limited number of destinations from 21 Dec, and within a couple of hours had announced (and had available for sale on their web site) three weekly return B787 flights each to London via Darwin, and LAX non-stop (all seats in all classes are available as award tickets) from 14 Nov. Fares are about precovid normal in Y. Qantas will require a negative PCR test within 72 hours of departure irrespective of destination country requirements (from 4 Oct the UK won't). All very promising, but it's still a bit too early for me to be booking flights yet, I want to make sure that it's working smoothly before I do that.

Stands to reason in the middle of summer, and in the tropics! And that's the wet season, which makes it feel hotter,

I'm in love with Eric (not really, he is just a great guy) and have had lunch or dinner with him whenever I've been in NYC. I can't wait to be able to travel there again, and seeing him will be top of my priority list. Bryan is also on my list of men to see. Oh, how I want to be able to travel again!

Yes! He sent me a link to a good airfare deal yesterday, and we had a brief exchange. Nothing about this hobby though.

Yes, but this thread is about 'What are you reading', not 'where are you getting your news'.

This series had passed me by, I must check it our on 7.

Sorry, Dallas, I wasn't dismissing your comments, they were good points. I was adding to them (I hope). I acknowledge one has to pick the right escort but they are out there.

While all that is good advice, don't down-play the ability of an escort to be a companion in any social setting. Not all of them can do it, but many can and will. If you think it through, hiring a man to go to dinner or the opera with you is no different to hiring one to fuck you. There is a risk that they can't do what you want. You choose the man who can carry off that scene. It requires you to firmly accept the mind set that you are paying for their time, not for what they will do with (or to) you. Ask them. If you've met them before, build on that. Some escorts in this very forum talk about travel, film, theatre and music. And sex, saunas and bathhouses. I would be confident hiring such a man in any setting.

I most certainly don't want to shower where I have just defecated, but that isn't what it has to be. I have a shower attachment (silicon that clips onto it, not one that is bolted onto the shower outlet) and I charge up in the shower and 'dump' the contents into the toilet at first and only 'vent' in the shower when I'm confident there will be no solid matter. Seems to work most of the time.

Yes, him! Matt was discussed a couple of days ago in another thread. I have met him but haven't hired him yet. He's a nice guy and I can't wait until I can travel to the US again.

We are making a lot of progress on first doses, but it will be longer before we get close to the US on fully vaccinated. A higher percentage of people in the US have had their second does and they had significant numbers of J&J which is one-shot. Figures vary between states with the current four zero-case states having fewer vaccinated people. The stat that appears on the evening news here is the percentage of the population 16 or over that is vaccinated (doses only became available for 12-15 recently) and NSW and the ACT are in the high 80s first doses and low 60s second. Queensland and WA are about 20 points behind on both counts. Yesterday (Sunday) 2% of the ACT (total) population received a vaccine. To the topic of the thread, we are on track for the SE corner of the country being at least partially open to the world (T&C apply), with the rest of the country closed to the world and to us. NSW and Victoria are talking about a big relaxation of internal restrictions but only to fully vaccinated people until at least early December. The ACT plans to reduce restriction, but more modesty, however the chief minister expects our vaccination rate to be high enough for them not to need to treat unvaccinated people differently.

In Australia, the term 'common law union' is not used (and marriage law is federal). The term 'de facto relationship' is what is used here, and all social welfare and similar entitlements are federally administered so there not any differences between the states. To receive benefits, for many years if you cohabited with a person of the opposite sex, you were presumed to be in a de facto relationship unless you could demonstrate otherwise, but same sex relationships were not recognised under any or the entitlement provisions. So, both members of a same sex couple were entitled to single person benefits, and any assets each member owned did not affect the benefit payable to the other. That provision was changed before equal marriage was enacted. Marriage automatically activates survivor benefits for retirement pay (if there are any such benefits available), but you have to establish to your retirement payment provider that you are in a de facto relationship. That may still be possible even after you die (by the survivor, clearly, not by you), but it is not all that difficult while you are both alive. My retirement pay has such a provision as it's being paid as a life-time annuity by the military superannuation scheme. I could have moved the lump sum I had accumulated to another superannuation fund, where what happened to any residual amount would depend on the product I had placed it in. (If an annuity dies with you, you and the fund both gamble on whether you will reach the actuarial death date or not, so it's not necessarily better to place it in a product that will survive you.)

Sounds like an amazing trip, @IronMaus!!

It does indeed! We are, of course, the home of all sorts of animals that will kill you, but many of the birds (and other animals) are engaging, kookaburras included! As for the deadly animals, they are easy, for the most part, to avoid.