Road Train life not for everyone
It takes a special kind of man, or woman, to drive in Australia's harsh outback where there are no towns and no backup when the chips are down.
Watch the video, listen to the Outback drawl and see if it's a job you could do. Australia needs experienced drivers, like the one in the video.
The advice about avoiding kangaroos is sound. I know from personal experience.
http://youtu.be/5gWFsFnswLs
The Asker Trilogy, Highway America, The New Zealand Tour Commentary, The Life and Times of Freddie Fuddpucker
Friday, July 20, 2012
Thursday, July 19, 2012
BERLIN WALL TO BE REBUILT
Cash-strapped Berlin stalked by
540-year-old debt
Reuters – 15
hours ago
BERLIN (Reuters) - The sleepy hamlet of Mittenwalde in eastern
Germany could become one of the richest towns in the world if Berlin were to
repay it an outstanding debt that dates back to 1562.
A certificate of
debt, found in a regional archive, attests that Mittenwalde lent Berlin 400
guilders on May 28 1562, to be repaid with six percent interest per year.
According to Radio
Berlin Brandenburg (RBB), the debt would amount to 11,200 guilders today, which
is roughly equivalent to 112 million euros ($136.79 million).
Adjusting for
compound interest and inflation, the total debt now lies in the trillions, by
RBB's estimates.
Town historian Vera
Schmidt found the centuries-old debt slip in the archive, where it had been
filed in 1963. Though the seal is missing from the document, Schmidt told
Reuters that she was certain the slip was still valid.
"In 1893 there
was a debate in which the document was examined and the writing was determined
to be authentic," Schmidt said.
Schmidt and
Mittenwalde's Mayor Uwe Pfeiffer have tried to ask Berlin for their money back.
Such requests have been made every 50 years or so since 1820 but always to no
avail.
Reclaiming the debt
would bring significant riches to Mittenwalde, a seat of power in the middle
ages, which now has a population of just 8,800. Red brick fragments of medieval
fortifications still dot the leafy town center.
The town's Romanesque
church was once the provost seat for Paul Gerhardt, one of Germany's most
prolific hymn writers. Gerhardt, who lived there briefly in the 17th century,
is the only noted Mittenwalde resident to date.
Schmidt and Pfeiffer
met with Berlin's finance senator Ulrich Nussbaum, who ceremonially handed them
a historical guilder from 1539. The guilder was put in a temporary display at
the Mittenwalde museum.
"This case shows
that debts always catch up with you, no matter how old they are," Nussbaum
told the Berliner Zeitung paper.
The debt-laden German
capital would have difficulty meeting Mittenwalde's demands anyway. According
to a report released by the senate finance administration in June 2012, Berlin
is already close to 63 million euros in the red.
(Reporting by Sophie
Duvernoy, editing by Paul Casciato)
Peter's Comment
So it's true. The Berlin Wall is to be rebuilt to keep out the debt collectors.
NO RECESSION IN PERU
Lima, Peru |
Peru
Economic Activity Increased 6.47 Percent In May
by Andean Air Mail & PERUVIAN TIMES Thursday, July 19, 2012
by Andean Air Mail & PERUVIAN TIMES Thursday, July 19, 2012
Peru’s economy grew by 6.47 percent
in May, which was higher than economic growth a month earlier, as domestic
demand remained strong and also the demand abroad for non-traditional products.
Peru’s national statistics bureau,
INEI, said the construction sector rose 15.8 percent in May, boosted by
domestic consumption of cement and progress in works in the mining sector,
shopping malls, industrial units and road infrastructure.
The agriculture sector gained 7.75
percent in May, while the restaurant and hotel industry rose 8.8 percent.
Finance and insurance sector
activity rose 6.83 percent, while transportation and communications increased
6.33 percent. Commerce grew by 6.47 percent and electricity and water rose 5.34
percent in May.
The manufacturing sector rose 2.69
percent in May, while mining and hydrocarbon activity gained 1.28 percent.
Fishing activity was the only sector that saw declines, down 7.63 percent in
May, according to the government.
In April, Peru’s economy expanded by
4.37 percent, while a number of economists expect it to grow 6 percent in 2012.
Peter’s Comment
Who said there is a worldwide
recession? I doesn’t seem to have hit Peru yet.
However, their figures appear a
little misleading. I’m sure it was never intending that the quoted monthly
economic growth rate should be multiplied by 12. The percentage increase for
May has already been adjusted to show an annual rate of 7.75%. That’s still
pretty good.
DRUG ADDICTION
Bottom of Form
Drug decriminalization in
Portugal decreases number of addicts
After 11 years, the effectiveness of the policy has been
measured.
Samuel
Blackstone, Business Insider July 18, 2012 16:50
On July 1,
2001, Portugal decriminalized every imaginable drug, from
marijuana, to cocaine, to heroin. Some thought Lisbon would become a
drug tourist haven, others predicted usage rates among youths to surge.
Eleven years
later, it turns out they were both wrong.
Over a decade
has passed since Portugal changed its philosophy from labeling drug users as
criminals to labeling them as people affected by a disease. This time lapse has
allowed statistics to develop and in time, has made Portugal an example to
follow.
First, some
clarification.
Portugal's move
to decriminalize does not mean people can carry around, use, and sell drugs
free from police interference. That would be legalization. Rather, all drugs
are "decriminalized," meaning drug possession, distribution, and use
is still illegal. While distribution and trafficking is still a criminal
offense, possession and use is moved out of criminal courts and into a special
court where each offender's unique situation is judged by legal experts,
psychologists, and social workers. Treatment and further action is decided in
these courts, where addicts and drug use is treated as a public health service
rather than referring it to the justice system (like the US), reports Fox News.
Peter’s Comment
The drug
policies of most countries, including New Zealand, are not working in spite of
billions of dollars budgeted worldwide trying to beat the problem.
Perhaps Portugal
has the answer. A radically different approach is certainly needed.
Treating drug addiction as a disease is an enlightened policy and most people would understand that no amount of punishment will ever cure sickness or disease.
Wednesday, July 18, 2012
TOMBSTONE, ARIZONA
The Gunfight at the O.K. Corral
Tombstone, Arizona |
If you are cruising Interstate 10 in Arizona just east of
Tucson there is a great little scenic detour that you can take when you get to
Benson.
Tombstone founder Ed Schiefflin |
Go south on Route 80 for about 20 miles (31 kilometers) and
you will come to historic Tombstone, famous for its Boot Hill cemetery and the
1881 Gunfight at the O. K. Corral.
Tombstone was founded in 1879 by mining prospector Ed
Schieffelin. He was warned that if he ventured into areas occupied
by Apache Indians the only stone he would get would be a tombstone. So he
called the place Tombstone.
Schiefflin found
silver, a town sprung up and by 1881 there was a population of 14,000.
Tombstone had two banks, three newspapers, 110 saloons, 14 gambling halls and
an array of shops and theaters.
But there was
conflict in the town and county. The town and the county each had its own
cowboy enforcers with the Earp brothers (five of them) on one side and the
McLaurys and some ring-ins on the other side.
The conflict
quickly escalated into open warfare with a climax that became famous as The
Gunfight at the OK Corral. Within 30 seconds Tom and Frank McLaury and Billy
Clanton were dead. Surviving the shoot-out were the Earp brothers; Virgil,
Wyatt and Morgan. Morgan was later killed and Wyatt was injured in reprisal
raids.
After the Earps
left Arizona Territory the next year the county sheriff hired 15 year-old
gunslinger Burt Alford to bring order to the town, which he did for three years
until overtaken by drink.
The main industry in Tombstone now is tourism.
Boot Hill
cemetery got its name from the fact many of its now quiet residents were tough
guys who died with their boots on.
A famous epitaph
stands over the remains of Les (Lester) Moore and reads:
HERE LIES LES MOORE,
FOUR SLUGS FROM A FORTY-FOUR,
NO LES NO MORE
Photos courtesy of TombstoneWeb.com: http://www.tombstoneweb.com/
HOW TO BE A BETTER MANAGER
The Essential Psychology Books for Business Students
You may have aced your courses in finance,
business law, and management, but that doesn’t mean you’re ready to head out
into the business world just yet. A well-rounded business education should also
include the study of psychology, because an understanding of the human mind and
human behavior can make the difference between success and failure in any kind
of business venture, from finding investors to managing employees.
Knowing how to be persuasive, make hard
decisions, motivate others, and work within a group are all essential skills in
the business world, and they’re practices that have been the subject of much
psychological research and writing, the most accessible of which can be
incredibly enlightening for future businesspeople. If you don’t have time to
take a course in business psychology, consider reading one, a few, or all of
these books that are related to the topic. You’re bound to find some powerful
insights into the human mind that will make it easier to get where you want to
go in your career.
Knowing how to
persuade others is at the heart of being successful in business. You’ll need
the skill to get funding, lead, and sell products and services, so read up on
some of the most revealing studies on influence and persuasion in this classic
pop-psych tome.
·
Business Psychology and Organisational
Behaviour by Eugene McKenna: If you need a textbook on the ins and outs of business
psychology, this is a great choice, regardless of whether you’re enrolled in a
business psych course. It’s a great place to get foundational knowledge and
could give you some business-focused tips on understanding human behavior and
motivations.
·
Start With Why: How Great Leaders
Inspire Everyone to Take Action by Simon Sinek: Ever wonder why some leaders can get people to
do what they want while others struggle? It may boil down to simple psychology,
as you’ll learn in this book from Simon Sinek. Sinek offers insights into what
communication methods great managers and business leaders use that really
deliver results.
·
The Winner’s Brain: 8 Strategies Great
Minds Use to Achieve Success by Jeff Brown, Liz Neporent, and Mark
Fenske: Your brain is more
than just another organ in your body, as it controls everything that you do
from breathing to complex mathematical calculations. Yet your brain can also
hold you back, as these authors demonstrate that a large part of success is
really all in your head.
In business, you’re
going to have to make a lot of choices, some of them pretty tough, but do you
ever stop to think about why you make the choices you do? This book examines
the psychology behind choice and may help you to be more conscious of even the
small decisions you make, as they can have far-reaching consequences.
·
Switch: How to Change Things When Change
Is Hard by
Chip Heath and Dan Heath: Get advice from this dynamic brotherly duo on how to make
difficult changes in your life or your company with greater ease, defeating the
innate predilection for comfort to help you make changes for the better.
·
Drive: The Surprising Truth About What
Motivates Us by Dan Pink: You might think you understand what motivates you and your
employees, but this book will likely show you that you don’t know the whole
truth. The psychology behind motivation is often much more complex than we
allow for, and this book offers some great lessons that will help you be a more
effective leader and manager.
·
The Human Side of Enterprise by Douglas McGregor: This management classic was first published in
1960, and despite all that has happened since, it still holds a lot of wisdom
for modern managers. This expanded edition holds not only McGregor’s original
text, but also stories of how today’s business leaders are applying his
strategies, based in motivation psychology, with great success.
·
The Wisdom of Crowds by James Surowieki: We tend to think of the mob mentality as being
a bad thing, but this book will show you that that’s not always the case. Your
employees, when working together, can often be a much wiser, more powerful, and
productive force than when working independently.
·
The Happiness Advantage: The Seven
Principles of Positive Psychology That Fuel Success and Performance at Work by Shawn Achor:
If you’re not familiar
with positive psychology, this book can be a great primer, showing you how to
apply many of its central principles to your life at work, making you happier
and ultimately more successful, even when the going gets tough.
·
Power, Influence, and Persuasion: Sell
Your Ideas and Make Things Happen by Harvard Business School Press: This is another great read on understanding
the psychology of persuasion. Let Harvard Business School experts teach you how
to command attention, change minds, influence decision-making, and more.
·
The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do
in Life and Business by Charles Duhigg: While patterns and habits get a bad rap, they can be a boon for
businesses that are savvy enough to realize they exist. Duhigg explains how
some of the most successful businesses and products simply capitalized on or
transformed existing patterns, making this an enlightening read for any
prospective entrepreneur.
·
The Psychology of Selling: Increase Your
Sales Faster and Easier Than You Ever Thought Possible by Brian Tracy:In business, you’re always selling something,
even if you’re not a salesman. You sell your ideas, your expertise, and even
yourself to potential employers, so you had better be good at doing it. Learn
some of the essential psychological tricks behind successful sales from Brian
Tracy in this book.
·
Mindset: The New Psychology of Success by Carol S. Dweck:It’s not hard to see how what you think can
influence your reality or at least your perception of it. In this book,
psychologist Dr. Dweck explains how establishing a positive mindset is as
essential to success as talent and ability.
·
The Silent Language of Leaders: How Body
Language Can Help–or Hurt–How You Lead by Carol Kinsey Goman:
You might not be
saying anything, but your body language may be speaking volumes. Drawing on
neuroscience, psychology, and management theory, Carol Kinsey Goman can help
instruct you to be more aware of your body language and to be better at reading
that of others.
·
Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive
and Others Die by Chip Heath and Dan Heath:In order to get a business off of the ground,
you have to have your idea stick, yet it can be hard to figure out just what
makes an idea so “sticky” in the first place. This book will shed some light on
the matter, using the theory of memory, the human scale principle, and a little
something called curiosity gaps to explain why some ideas live on while others
die.
·
Predictably Irrational: The Hidden
Forces That Shape Our Decisions by Dan Ariely: Think your decisions are perfectly rational?
Think again. Dan Ariely explains some of the unconscious factors at play when
we’re trying to make decisions, which could have a big impact on your success
(or failure) at work.
·
The Upside of Irrationality: The
Unexpected Benefits of Defying Logic at Work and at Home by Dan Ariely:In this sequel of sorts to his previous book,
Ariely explains why being irrational isn’t always a bad thing, explaining some
of the surprisingly positive effects (though some negative, too) that our
predictably irrational decisions can have on our lives.
·
Everyone Communicates, Few Connect: What
the Most Effective People Do Differently by John C. Maxwell: It’s easy to talk but much more difficult to
really be heard; at least that’s the lesson that Maxwell is trying show here.
He offers up some great practices that can help you take advantage of human
nature to become a better communicator and leader.
·
A First-Rate Madness: Uncovering the
Links Between Leadership and Mental Illness by S. Nassir Ghaemi:
Sometimes, qualities
that come along with mood disorders or other mental illnesses, also lend
themselves to great leadership, especially under pressure. In this book, you’ll
learn about the connections between mental illness and greatness in some of the
world’s most famous leaders, perhaps changing how you think about qualities you
had previously regarded as weaknesses.
·
Here Comes Everybody: The Power of
Organizing Without Organizations by Clay Shirky: In today’s world, it’s impossible to operate
without harnessing the power of the web. In this book, you’ll learn more about
the new ways that people are organizing, cooperating, and joining up by using
the Internet, changing some of the basics of social interactions. A great
primer for anyone looking to learn more about marketing.
·
Linchpin: Are You Indispensable? by Seth Godin: Sometimes, becoming indispensable at a
business has a lot to do with being able to think differently than others. In
this book, you’ll learn how to set yourself apart and what qualities you can
cultivate to change how others see your role in a business.
·
Entrepreneurial DNA: The Breakthrough
Discovery that Aligns Your Business to Your Unique Strengths by Joe Abraham: Entrepreneurs are a much more diverse group
and there’s a much wider range of talents and abilities that lead to success
than we are often led to believe. Learn how your brain is hardwired for
entrepreneurship and how you can capitalize on your own talents for business.
·
How to Click with People: The Secret to
Better Relationships in Business and in Life by Rick Kirschner:
One of the benefits of
knowing a bit about psychology is getting better at interacting with others in
personal and professional relationships, and this book offers some helpful
guidelines for doing just that.
Peter’s
Comment
From my experience, men and women aspiring to be managers
must first know how to manage themselves.
In management there will always be pressure and when the pressure
is on, logic and reasoning can quickly fly out the window.
Some people have a natural ability to manage, while others
have to make an effort to learn their management skills. But every manager can
be a better manager with study.
Tuesday, July 17, 2012
A SCARY ROAD
The
Shimla-Himalayan Road
Posted on Facebook by author James George
The Shimla Road |
Shimla is the capital of Himachal-Pradesh Provence in
Northern India and the road from there to the Himalayas is one of the oldest
and most primitive on the planet.
The city is located at 2,200 meters above sea level (7,200
feet), was the summer capital of the British Raj and on one of the many
alternative Silk Roads. From Shimla the road ascends quickly to over 5,000
meters.
A short distance away to the northwest is the Karakoram
Highway connecting Pakistan and China. It is the highest paved road in the
world.
The City of Shimla |
I traveled the Karakoram Highway in 1995 leading a group of tourists from New Zealand and Australia. It was an unforgettable experience.
Travel the highways of America in this wonderful EBook
Travel the highways of America in this wonderful EBook
From Amazon or Smashwords
Happy reading
NEW ZEALAND TRUCK CRASH
Driver dead after truck 'embedded' in RSA
By Hayden Donnell
New Zealand Herald
9:46 AM Tuesday Jul
17, 2012
The driver died after his
truck and trailer unit crashed into the RSA on SH1 at Bulls. Photo / SNPA /
Ross Setford
A 37-year-old Dannevirke,
New Zealand, man has been killed after crashing his truck into the Bulls
Returned Servicemen’s Association building on State Highway 1.
Emergency services were
called to the crash on High Street in the Bulls, North Island, town center at
about 3.38am.
Senior constable Chris
Craig said the driver had failed to negotiate a slight bend before slamming
into the RSA.
Bulls chief fire officer
Brian Carter said the driver was crushed inside his cab when the truck became
"embedded" in the building's outer veranda.
Fire crews freed him
from his cab and performed CPR but he was declared dead by paramedics arriving
on the scene, Mr Carter said.
They had to work
carefully because the truck was carrying potentially flammable containers of pressurized
oxygen and LPG, he said.
Mr Craig said police
were investigating whether fatigue was a factor in the crash.
State Highway 1 had been
reopened by 9 am, but drivers were being cautious of debris from the crash, he
said.
Peter’s Comment
Fortunately accidents
like this are fairly rare, but never-the-less is an occupational hazard for
drivers who are generally overworked and under-paid.
While the cause of this
accident is still to be determined, one thing is evident in the transport
industry. Employers and customers insist that drivers work to conditions that
would not be tolerable in an office or factory. And what is worse is that
governments approve.
If you are wondering why
a driver is on the road at 3.30 am, it is so that others can work in offices
and factories during the daytime.
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