The *evails* of vaccines

Interesting post over at Mamamia today about childhood vaccines. I weighed in on the discussion (with the point of view that science proves nothing to those not wanting to believe in science) and almost immediately was insulted, so I retaliated in what I hope was a fair and educated manner. The discussion (so far) is below.

ginger_nut

All well and good but unfortunately you’re preaching to the choir (so to speak – most people who respect science don’t have anything to to with preachers). A lot of people have problems with science and think it is a great big conspiracy. Creationism, anyone?

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  October 5, 2011 at 10:29 amBusted ! ! !

  I was waiting for an atheist comment against Christians. This is an extension of the Yahoo (and other) group, who gets paid per post for hijacking vaccine safety discussions. Are you the same group paid to say global warming doesn’t exist?.

  My job is done.

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    October 5, 2011 at 10:31 amThread copy complete

    Thank you.

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    October 5, 2011 at 11:58 amginger_nut

    Actually – I wasn’t labelling anyone, such a shame you couldn’t extend me the same courtesy.

    I was merely stating that there are people who choose to put their faith in scientific fact, and that there are people who choose to disregard scientific fact when it is at odds with their faith. Whether that faith is in a higher power, the “evils of vaccines” or a literal interpretation of the bible that says the earth is only 6000 years old so dinosaurs must have shared the earth with Adam and Eve.

    I rather resent the implication that I am not a free thinking adult and am getting paid to put forth someone else’s opinion. I do find it rather amusing that you finished your comment with the line “My job is done” – are you being *paid* to insult anyone who does not agree with a “Vaccines are evil” agenda?

'scuse the silence

Sorry for leaving you in the lurch there when I was supposed to post my next Tamora Pierce review - 

...but first I got distracted when I got an email from Morris and Sons (aka Tapestry Craft) saying the new Melbourne store was open - so I just had to dash into the city. Unfortunately, the announcement was a little premature, but the love shop assistants let me in to have a look around - the Morris and Son yarns are divine. The should be open next week, just in time for the yearly May/June sale. For a better sneak peak at the store check out my flickr page (after they so graciously let me have a peek I took photos from outside the shop with my new super duper telephoto lens) 

The store is at 234 Collins st (right above Dymocks mecca) and the will be having weekly s'n'bs on Thursdays from 7-9pm (tho I am assuming they will start after the sale finishes)

...then due to parental units being in town I was out and about and busy busy busy for a couple of days

...and I got stuck down by some lurgy (not to worry, no curly tail a la Dudley, so it mustn't be swine flu. If I start oinking I'll let you know so you can disinfect your computers, because with all this panic about swine flu I am sure it must be contagious via the interwebs)

...but the best news - I got me a new macbook :) oh yay! Quick Q for all you mac pushers users out there - anyone used google chrome? It's now my preferred browser, but I am not sure how well it will work on the mac.

Hopefully tomorrow I'll be back into it with the Pierce book reviews.... for now I am curling up in bed and catching up on my blogs :)

This is for the Disco Knitter...

Happy Birthday Lara - and if you haven't seen this yet, you should get a kick out of it...

Kingsford Goes to the Beach - 

I wonder how Pierre will cope with one running round the house...

boo to cadbury

I am rather vexed that Cadbury have repackaged the 'family sized' block of chocolate so it looks the same size but is in fact now only 200g. 

And that Safeway is merchandising these new carboard covered blocks at the end of aisles with the $3.99 in big numbers and bright pink 'new' signs in the candy aisle so people think they are getting something for a good price. 

Of course - I wondered what happened to the old 250g blocks. I found them hanging from a special display in the soft drink aisle on clearance for a dollar less than the new smaller blocks. 

Well done Cadbury - thinking your clientelle such fools that they won't realise that they are getting less of a product for the same price.

Of course - I only buy the Cadbury chocolate when it is on special* - I much rather prefer the Green & Blacks or Lindor Lindt chocolate.

*Me as a chocoholic is like a wino to metholated spirits... when I get desperate just about any cocoa will do...

some good, some bad...

the bad news first - 

• I got made redunant from my job at the start of March
  
• I am still unemployed
  
• I hate dealing with Centrelink
  
• The Man and I split up
  
• I need to find new digs  - somewhere pet friendly (for the pupster and I) to live 
  
• Currently I am 'between' fixed addresses, crashing at my parents and couch surfing in the interim

the good news - 

• I finally paid off my car loan with the paycheck before I got made redundant
  
• I entered The Australian Wool Fashion Awards....
  
• ...and I am a finalist !
  
• check out the details here - if you make it to the Royal Easter Show look for a green dress with purple i-cord 'piping' - very fitted and very 40s. I don't have a picture because I can't find the dang camera I used :( However, it is knit completely in one piece (apart from the belt) in gorgeous 8-ply / DK / Light worsted merino yarn :)
• I had a fairly good interview for a retail management training position last week so hopefully will be gainfully employed (and not reliant on centrelink) very soon...
  
• I am surprised at how resiliant I have become - I had quite a bit of crap land on me at once and am dealing rather well. Yay for minimum black dog issues in a time of crises!

Anyway - please excuse the lack of blogging recently... didn't really know how to start telling the negative stuff.

Mum and I will be in Sydney about the 15th of April (next Wednesday) for the presentation night of the Australian Wool Fashion Awards - if anyone wants to catch up while we are in town drop me a line :)

tree pretty, fire bad

fire real bad...

if only tears could put those raging fires (that are yet still flaring) out...

New Year, New Me?

So I'm not completely with the idea of resolutions, and particularly new year resolutions, but sometimes you know that if you want to make a change its good to a metaphorical starter's pistol go off in your ear and hit the ground running. 

One of my big goals this year was inspired by a kooky dream I had -  

I was in an op shop, looking thru vintage knitting patterns when I decided to make a purchase. The sales assistant said she couldn't take my money as she had no change, but there was another way. She opened up a huge big book of appointments and told me I had to give blood. The appointment she gave me? 01 January. 

I know that the red cross blood bank is bleeding for donors (couldn't resist the pun) but I haven't quite been brave enough to bleed for the cause myself. I took this dream as my subconcious telling me to 'harden up, princess' and start donating this year. 

I happen to not be overly fond of needles (the non-knitting kind:). 

In order to face my fears I got a small tattoo in 2003 to 'beat the fear of needles'. However, lately I have been beginning to feel unworthy of such a tattoo if I am still giving into the fear when it comes to donating blood. 

I did get really close to donating once - I went in the door, filled out the questionaire and then got the finger prick test to check a few levels. It happened that my haeimoglobin was right at the bottom of the healthy range - and would have dropped into the unhealthy range if they had taken a couple of pints out of me. 

The plan to see this one thru comes with a little help from The Man - who is a regular donor. We are going to make appointments at the same time (as soon as he can donate again) and he will be there to hold my hand. He is also planning to feed me a heap of red meat the week before so I can get my iron and haemoglobin levels sky high so I don't work up all that nerve and then fail at the last minute.

If you would also like to join me in bleeding for a good cause check out the Red Cross Donate Blood webpage.

My second goal is to get moving - and start running a little more. This has been partly inspired by webgoddess and brave-and-slightly-crazy and partly inspired by a quote I read somewhere about "the black dog is lazy, if you exercise he won't bother to chase after you" (lucky Pierre hasn't a lazy bone in his body and enjoys runs with me in the park!)

I am aiming to do the couch-to-5km, but may do a couple of the sessions for more than the usual 1 week. The aim isn't to go fast, but just to get moving and build up a bit of endurance. If you're keen to see how I am going I have added my nike+ mini to the right sidebar. (the mini is also on my facebook profile.) So far the running is going well - although the forecast in Melbourne on Wednesday was for 39C, so I got up and went for a run at 6:30am when the temp was 31C (it only dropped down to 28C overnight) so I wouldn't have to worry about going to a run in the hottest part of the day when I got home from work. Ironically, the cool change came through at 9am and we dropped down to 21C. My desire to avoid the hottest part of the day had me running right in the middle of the heatwave :)

And the third wish for the new year? To get a haircut. Seriously. It has been more than 18 months since I last got a haircut so I am a little overdue. The plan was to go to the verrry cool gothic hair salon down the road and get the type of haircut that would dishonourably discharge me from the military (seeing as I no longer have to conform!). There were pipe dreams of dark, dark brown hair with blue/magenta and fire-engine red accents, but that will have to be put on hold for a while. Due to the office closing over the new year I ended up having to take over 45 hours of unpaid leave - so my paycheck was more than a week short this month. I may have to go somewhere for a bit of trim in the interim until I have some play money I can splash out on lavish haircuts. 

Try MOO for Cheep!

I love Moo's stickers and minicards - if you wanna try Moo yourself, check out the offer below! We like making new friends at MOO... And any friend of yours is a friend of ours, so, we'd like to offer you all something good. If you forward the following unique-to-you code to friends who have never bought from MOO before, they'll get 20% off any 1 MOO product. Your unique friend referral-code is: H94A9K

Drowned rat puppy...

The Man finally got the pictures off his fone from when the pup when for his impromptu swim...

Me the Adulteress

Okay - I'll admit it. I have been cheating on PTYS and posting a bit on a LiveJournal account.The stuff I post over there is a tad bit more personal than here. It's kinda more like the angst filled diary I kept when I was a teenager (consider yourself warned) but if you want an insight into another aspect of me feel free to check it out. Some of the posts are private, so if you wanna read those you'll have to friend me (I'm GingerThomas over there - bonus points if you can figure out why hint: think literary characters)

As well as facebooking, I have also started plurking a bit if you wanna find me over there.

So I am still around - it's just a matter of knowing where to find me :)

A really important care label

y

knitting for psychos

stumbled upon this mildly disturbing website today...

Beeched ez, broo!

Because it's beach season, and it makes me giggle*

*yes, us Aussies are so simple that the mere mispronunciation of vowels by our cousins across the Tasman has us collapsing in giggles.

Plinkten.... hehe
chups...hehe
i can't choo, broo...hehe
teeheeheehee :)

More cute modcloth...

Re-usable toothpicks...




and cute kitchen utensils...




Oh...
and I so WANT this dress - even the name is cute - the Carmen Sandiego Dress!

rockin xmas tree

rockin xmas tree, originally uploaded by pierretheyarnsnob.

I got this teeny tiny table top xmas tree when it was no longer needed at work. Turns out it is the perfect size for my emergency sock club keyring 'ornaments'!

I LUFF my knitters xmas tree!

cccxiv - Kate Hudson gets crafty to cut costs at Christmas

hmm.. this article was obviously written by a muggle - everyone knows that these days you don't save any money by knitting.

Sure you get better value by knitting - but saving money? Unless you are re-claiming yarn from op-shops you're not really 'saving' money by knitting. And then wouldn't the bigger story be "Kate Hudson goes bargain trawling at the thrift store"??

I like that when I knit I can spend approx $50 on (somewhat budget) yarn and get a lovely pure wool sweater, made to high standards that completely suits me. But if I really wanted to save money I could buy clothing made in China much cheaper (obviously not made out of the same quality fibre, but it would still perform the function of clothing me and keeping me warm).

Perhaps I should write in and explain the value of knitting.

I can buy a months worth of socks for the price of a really purdy skein of sock yarn - or at least 3 pairs for the cheapest ball of sock yarn. And that's before you add in all the hours labour - even at minimum wage you're looking at looking at about $200 for a single sock...

The loss of a colleague

No longer a close friend of mine, but someone I went through all the stages of my interviews, recruitment, basic training and some of my application course with him. Sometimes he was pure mischief, trouble or a headache - but he was always good for a laugh. The world shall miss out on many a joke with the loss of him.

NAVY MOURNS LOSS OF SUB-LIEUTENANT JAMES BENNETT

Royal Australian Navy Officer, Sub-Lieutenant (SBLT) James Bennett, has been tragically killed in an accident at Devil’s Pool, Babinda Boulders, 70 kilometres south of Cairns.

SBLT Bennett went missing on 30 November 2008 when he fell victim to strong currents while swimming at the popular tourist destination. He could not be reached by the other members of his party.

An extensive search involving the Queensland Police, the North Queensland Fire and Rescue Service and an Emergency Services specialist dive team located a body on 2 December, which was today confirmed as SBLT Bennett.

“Our deepest condolences are extended to James’ family and friends during this very sad time,” Chief of Navy, Vice Admiral Russ Crane, AM, CSM, RAN said.

“This is a tragic accident that has touched many of our Navy family. James was a promising young junior officer full of potential. He will be sorely missed.”

SBLT Bennett was serving in the Mine Hunter Coastal HMAS Norman, which was visiting Cairns before returning home to Sydney, NSW.

Norman was returning from a very successful South East Asia deployment, during which he participated in Exercise Bersama Lima in the South China Sea and the Minor War Vessels Fleet Concentration Period in the North Australian Exercise Area.

Media release taken from the DOD website

cccxi - contact...

Trying to track down snail mail addresses for everyone. It seems you can find out everything else about everyone else in facebook except this. Funny how ppl live such public lives but still don't want to share this...

If you don't think I have your snail mail address please send it too me :)

CCCVIII - Want to own your own home during these tough economic times*?

Starting at just $80 (plus postage) I am certain some husbands would find this to be 5 star luxury...

This sturdy and weather durable wooden Dog Kennel with Balcony is double level for double the comfort!

Constructed from robust wood, this double story doggy home consists of two sections. There is the snug downstairs bedroom where your pet will be protected from all weather conditions. Then there is the upstairs open-air balcony with stair access!

Spoil your canine best-friend with this luxurious Dog Kennel with Balcony!

FEATURES:
Dog Kennel with Balcony.
Double story doggy home.
Enclosed downstairs bedroom.
Upstairs open-air balcony with stair access.
Constructed from robust wood.
Sturdy and weather durable.
Dimensions: 57 x 50 x 65cm.

I particularly like the use of the term "bedroom". I guess enough families are replacing traditional breeding with furkids that the cubby house needed to be updated too.

I think that if we got this for Pierre he'd need a little doggie suit of armour (or chain mail) so he could complete guard duty on the upper turret...

*or, it's monday and I'm feeling silly...

CCCVII - switching it up..

Decided I needed a second sidebar - and while I was there I had a play with the 'boring' colourscheme, opting for something a little more high contrast.

I lost a couple of my widgets, so it may take a while to get things back to normal.

Anyway - let me know what you think of the changes...