On Formula 1: Profanity-laced Urbanity.

For a long time there was a group called Save Albert Park, arguing against the Melbourne Grand Prix. On the suburb’s street corners, bearded men (and women) sat on folding chairs distributing photocopied pamphlets and yellow ribbons.  But here’s the thing:  Albert Park is not all that.  It’s dreary and windswept.

The group could benefit from rebranding. One option I consider especially sonorous is: F1ck the Grand Prix.

Five reasons we should say ‘F1ck it’: Continue reading On Formula 1: Profanity-laced Urbanity.

Getting Rid of Aphids – From TTTE’s Gardening Department…

The little blighters were all over Mrs TTE's rosemary...

When the invaders first showed up, I had no idea what they were. Now we know that aphids are everywhere in the Bay Area.

They have a little mouth tube and suck the sap out of the plant until it’s dead. Not good. And they breed like rabbits, the week after spotting the first one or two, you have a serious infestation. So what can you do about it?

We like to eat the rosemary, so that rules out a lot of insecticides on the market. What we needed, in true Berkeley style, is an organic, non-toxic, fair-trade, locally grown, homeopathic, humane aphid elimination system.

The first research I conducted told me that the natural enemy of the aphid is the lady bug. Fantastic, I will go out into the wild, capture a few lady bugs and bring them back to the house as pets.

I dreamed of whiling away my time watching scenes of carnage like this: Continue reading Getting Rid of Aphids – From TTTE’s Gardening Department…

The US census incensed us: I sense a lack of consensus

TTTE loves surveys. As a student of survey design, I saw the chance to participate in America’s decennial census as quite an honour! Well it turned put to be a dubious kind of a honour, tinged with confusion and dismay. I do not consider myself particularly precious, but I cannot abide these seemingly pedestrian errors: Continue reading The US census incensed us: I sense a lack of consensus

Feeding the engine.

Take my word for it folks, breakfast is the most important meal of the day. If you have aspirations of being a skinny dude and want to skip a meal, heed not the words of Claudia Schiffer, skip dinner. Breakfast is holy. Continue reading Feeding the engine.

You are now boarding the Singapore Line. Mind the Gap.

The Chinese Government is full of money and strange plans.   The latest plan is a long long train line.  They’re reaching out all the way to London with a VFT.  That’s a Very Fast Train, like Japan’s Shinkansen or France’s TGV.

The thing will go at over 300 km/h (estimated speeds are 320-500 ks)  and soak up the 8000 km journey to London in a couple of days.

And that’s not all.  They’re extending the network out in the other direction too.  Vietnam, Malaysia, and on to Singapore. Continue reading You are now boarding the Singapore Line. Mind the Gap.

A deluge of density

I’ve written before about the Barcelona meets Bentleigh East plan.

Developed by Rob Adams, it maxes urban density without screwing up the city. Ninety-one percent of the city stays exactly the same, full of stand-alone suburban blocks. But the tram and bus lines are (mostly) free to be developed (heritage overlay areas would be protected).  The density is achieved without creating massive overshadowing towers and without wholesale sacrifice of the urban scape we know and (some of us) love.

However, now Rob’s plan is under attack by a couple of white-hot young philosophers whose radically incisive views the Fairfax press has seen fit to amplify… Continue reading A deluge of density

What is wrong with long distance train travel in the US?

I am excited by train travel, always have been. I like riding on trains (Ashby to Embarcadero or Beijing to St Petersburg), watching trains on film (my favorite Bond film is ‘From Russia with Love’) and playing with toy trains (gosh the memories). However, when a group of friends and I recently had the opportunity to ride the Amtrak from San Francisco to Salt Lake City, we decided on renting a car instead. Why is that? Continue reading What is wrong with long distance train travel in the US?

Blog-lite, Starbucks in Nevada

Looks good doesn't it...

TTTE was none too impressed when Starbucks started showing up in its home town. Mocking references to “double orange mocha frappucinos” and “Starf**ks” were made on more than one occasion. But your correspondent didn’t just talk the talk, (other than one frustrating attempt to steal their wireless internet) TTTE had never set a foot inside one of their their faux-local, espresso by numbers, globe gobbling outlets.

That all changed today, at Breakfast time. Continue reading Blog-lite, Starbucks in Nevada

Blog-lite, holiday edition. A microbrew review

Captain Frugal and his platoon of tightwads normally stick to supermarket cubes of generically brewed, watery beer. But when on holiday, and microbrews are around $6.99 a six-pack, penny-pinching gives way to experimentation and assessment. We sipped a selection of employee-owned, windmill-powered, carbon neutral beers, long on self-referential label spiels, and short on neon advertising.

But most beer reviews are too wanky. Here are real unprepared comments sought from people actually drinking the beers in question.

Continue reading Blog-lite, holiday edition. A microbrew review

“And now no-one does not believe that Armstrong will not win this year’s Tour de France” – Thomas’ tribute to professional cycling and Phil Liggett

I am really looking forward to the professional cycling season kick off Continue reading “And now no-one does not believe that Armstrong will not win this year’s Tour de France” – Thomas’ tribute to professional cycling and Phil Liggett

The magic of Japan Rail

I was in Japan in February.  I caught the Shinkansen, various branch lines and a few subways.  It was so incredibly functional that I would have stopped and drooled all over the station floors, had there been time between our perfectly synchronised connections.

But I want to share one tiny anecdote that happened far from the centre of Tokyo, on a tiny little single -track branch line that gets as many as 8 services a day.

Continue reading The magic of Japan Rail

Does this man hate cyclists? The inaugural Thomasthethinkengine interview.

The debate regarding cyclists’ rights and responsibilities continues. On the one hand the ‘vehicularists’ believe cyclists should behave (and be treated) like cars – on the other hand – (the inexplicably named) ‘facilitators’ believe cyclists should take advantage of their unique attributes and since ultimately it is their own safety at stake, they should feel free to bend the rules at their discretion. You can read more about these various views here.

Today this debate will take a new direction, by considering the input of another road user. In order to protect his identity, we will call him Gerald. Continue reading Does this man hate cyclists? The inaugural Thomasthethinkengine interview.

A better, faster coffee shop

I can imagine a coffee shop that works better. I want to cross a Ford factory with a sushi train and a horde of lemmings…

I buy a cup of coffee in two situations. One is where I am ‘having coffee’ and I want to linger.  In this case, the 3 dollars is a low low price to pay to rent a chair in a nice public space and shoot the breeze with somebody.

The other situation is take-away, when I’m on my way to work, or somewhere, and I need to wake up.

In the second case, the 3 dollars is an negligible cost for getting my day going.

BUT.

Continue reading A better, faster coffee shop

Charter Cities – An Idea

Paul Romer has an idea people are calling crazy.  He was a Stanford Economics Professor, but now he’s quit to pursue full time the idea of charter cities.  Eh?

Paul Romer

Charter cities are based on the idea of charter schools.  These are schools in America outside the education system.  They are generally in poor black areas and have a ‘charter’ – a set of radically different rules.  For example they might do ten hour school days, six day weeks, compulsory uniforms.  They are like free private schools, and they have been extremely popular (59 percent have waiting lists for entry) and often successful (one meta-analysis found most studies of charter schools showed improved student outcomes).

Continue reading Charter Cities – An Idea

What makes a good hostel?

Youth hostels are like little cities.  You have private space and public space.  There’s common infrastructure like kitchens and bathrooms.

If you don’t look after the common infrastructure, you get a hostel that’s like Calcutta.  And if you design the public spaces wrong, you end up with a hostel that’s a bit like Canberra.

The reason to stay in a hostel (other than saving a few bucks) is that it creates a place where you can meet some people.  The great thing about a shared room is that it forces interaction.  Then, when you move to the common area,  you can meet people from other rooms too.

But how to meet other people? It depends on ambience.

In Japan we stayed in one hostel that had a great public space with a few couches, an open fire and a beer vending machine. But the people who sat there barely spoke. The reason? A huge flat screen TV with hundreds of channels. Sitting there, you felt like you might be interrupting if you started talking.

Continue reading What makes a good hostel?

Dodge Ram – A Review

what a car

The specs for the Dodge Ram 2500 speak for themselves: it has a 5.7 litre V8 engine, weighs almost 2.5 tonnes, the length is almost eight meters, it’s red. Driving a car like this is a quintessential American experience and one that has been the subject of a great deal of my rhetoric since arriving in the USA.

Luckily a recent trip to Lake Tahoe necessitated a car with enough space for five passengers and a few pairs of skis. When the local rental car agent offered a Dodge Ram, I jumped at the opportunity. Continue reading Dodge Ram – A Review

Let me tell you / how it will be / There’s one for you / nineteen for me …

Ooh-ooh I’m the taxman.

Ken Henry is a dude from Taree.  He likes wombats.  He is also the head of the Treasury.  The Treasurer asked him to do a big old review into what’s what in the tax system, and what we should do next.

Continue reading Let me tell you / how it will be / There’s one for you / nineteen for me …