Do you remember when we had "department"

stores? You know the sort of thing I mean, one of those big shops which seemed to sell almost "everything". They were the sort of places where you could buy "bargains" in the basement and school uniforms on the third floor which you went to by passing the cosmetics and handbags on the first floor and the underwear and whatever on the second floor.

Our CBD had an entire street of them in the centre of the city itself. Women, dressed in a "good" dress, stockings, hat and gloves would spend "a day in town" and visit several at a time. It was where you bought what ready made clothing there was. It was where men who could not afford a tailor would go for their "Sundays and funerals" clothes. 

My maternal grandmother was among the first to get a "card" for one of the biggest of them. It was not a credit card as such but an "account" card. She would make purchases on it, often small purchases in the "habby" (haberdashery) area. She would have a fitting for her "corset" in the area which sold bras - always fitted bras - and other nightwear. Her Christmas shopping, such as it was, would be done there or in one of the neighbouring stores. At Christmas itself the footpaths would be crowded. Santa Claus was to be found in a "Magic Cave" - and elsewhere. Cars and buses could barely move along. It was our version of Oxford Street.

Then someone had the bright idea of turning the street into a pedestrian mall. Cars and buses were removed. The street was levelled and paved. Art work was put in.

And people went away. They went off to the "shopping centres" which were being built in the suburbs. The big stores tried to follow people there but they had to compete against the "chain" stores imported from America and Asia. 

Our CBD is dying. Whether it can be revived is anyone's guess. The mall might have seemed like a good thing but habits have changed. A very elderly friend who was here yesterday went into the city recently. She was wearing jeans and a casual jacket. She had no hat, indeed does not own one. She was wearing gloves but only because it was a cold day and she has issues with circulation.  We commented on how things had changed. She asked me when had I last been in to "the Mall". The answer was about three years before the Senior Cat died. I had to get him a pair of trousers and, after looking on line, I found a pair in one of those "department" stores...but it was no longer that sort of department store. It was one of many small stores within a big building. 

My previous visit had been many years before that and I felt lost. It was not a friendly place. It would have been so much easier to go to the place where he had bought all such things after his father was no longer working. They kept a record of every customer and their measurements. If you went in they would update the record. Their fabric and workmanship lasted for years. I had contacted them but it had all gone and that was their suggested alternative. Yes, good trousers but not as good as theirs.

It all seems to be like that. I know things change. I am not sure I would like it if things did not change from time to time but there are things I wish were still there. I have a voucher to spend in a little store in an arcade off that mall.  I am told it is a very nice place to visit. Yes, it probably is but I am not sure when I am going to get there...or even if I want to do it. Shopping is not the same now. 

Just when you thought it could not get any sillier

 or any worse a former Greens politician has come up with the idea that the government should run the supermarkets. 

Yes, you read that correctly he thinks it would be a good idea if the government took over the supermarkets and ran them. According to him it would bring prices down and make them more accessible and efficient.

If you have now stopped laughing...

We have Coles and Woolworths, Aldi and the IGA (Independent Grocers) as the main players in the supermarket game. Our local shopping area has three of those. They vary in what they have to offer. The clientele varies too.

I choose to do most of my shopping at the independent one. The prices are much the same. They offer a discount of 5% for anyone with a Senior's or pension card. They deliver locally at a much cheaper rate. The staff are generally very good indeed. I have the boys trained to reach to the top shelf for me if they happen to see me. If they are collecting trolleys and I am parking my trike they will hand one to me as they are going inside. They long ago told me to leave the trolley where I park the trike. "It's easy to pick it up on the way in Cat."

Now can you imagine having that sort of relationship with a government owned entity? No, neither can I. The idea that we would all have a greatly reduced choice hedged around with increasing regulations and the inevitable shortages and delays is something nobody in their right mind would want to contemplate. This was tried back in the early part of last century in Queensland. It failed. It is the sort of thing which has been tried in Communist states. It has failed every time.

And imagine now if the government also decided that they needed to do something about our diet and could do it through controlling what was available on a supermarket shelf. What if we were told "no more meat" or "some people are allergic to X so we won't be stocking it any more." For many people food is one of the pleasures of life. They may eat sensibly and frugally most of the time but they want to break out sometimes! 

I suppose it might do something for a black market and then the lawyers and the courts when people got caught...but if we were trying not to break the law but wanted to eat? Just how silly can things get?

The ambulance service is

something for which I have a great deal of respect - at least at the face to face level. I am less sure about the administration of it.

My first encounter with the ambulance service that I am aware of was as a very small child. Along with another child I was taken away in one with a kangaroo on the side. It was dim inside and I remember the officer trying to keep me calm. Why I was there is a mystery because there had not been an accident and I was not critically ill. It was alarming for a small child but I remember kindness.

I have gone on to seeing children under my care in a special school being taken away in an ambulance on more than one occasion. As staff we never knew whether we would see them again. The ambulance staff were kind and caring and competent.

I have been in an ambulance tearing down the wrong side of the road in peak hour traffic with the siren going. It was terrifying but the driver kept telling me, "It will be all right."  Much, much later the one dealing with the Senior Cat stopped me in the local shopping centre and asked how he was doing. (He recovered.)

I have had the ambulance service pick me up on their way through to a hospital when I was needed there to act as "communication assist" for someone who was not able to speak.  I have always been treated with courtesy. 

There was only one I felt was not professional. Many of them were volunteers because that is the way the system works. 

Management apparently does not like this. There is word currently going around that one of the volunteers has been stripped of his duties not because he had done anything professionally wrong but because he failed to call the ambulance service by that name rather than the district it works out of and failed to provide a vegan meal for an officer from another district. There were complaints he failed to find cover for all the rosters he was responsible for too. That those who do it are a small team of volunteers apparently was not taken into account. 

If the complaints are true then they are administrative rather than ability complaints. The local people would refer to the service by the name of the town or the district. It is what happens out there. How on earth was he supposed to know about a vegan coming in? He might well not know what "vegan" means - many people do not. If there are not enough staff to cover a volunteer roster is that his fault? 

I suspect those higher up the ladder, those paid to do their jobs, are unhappy with his criticism of their roles. He might be outspoken but I suspect it might well be with good cause.

What has happened however is alarming. You do not bar a volunteer who is doing a good job and who is respected and supported in the community simply because he criticises the management - a management which should be supporting you. We need volunteers. This country would not run without them, particularly in rural areas.  

  

So we are "nutcases" in a country filled with

"white supremacist institutions" which are driven by "hypocrisy and cowardice"?  If this is what you believe then why would you accept an invitation to speak at Writers' Week...unless you plan on using the occasion to say more along those lines?

I still believe this state's Writers' Week should be about writing. It was about writing once. I looked forward to that biennial event, to meeting friends, listening to writers talking about writing, publishers talking about publishing, people asking questions, discussions about the development of plot or character and any number of other issues related to the art and craft of writing. I was fortunate and I know it. I managed to learn a great deal about writing. My failure to apply it all is entirely my own fault. I still have the bad habit of simply diving in and then paddling like crazy until I hit the end. The result is often a mess but I still do it.

What I no longer do is go to Writers' Week. I have occasionally slipped in to the live-stream of a session at the local library but I have not been to the many open air events. They may be free to attend but, if I am to spend time there, they must be potentially worth my time.

The problem? These events are almost always not about writing. The week has gone from being about writing to being about "issues". The sessions are about social issues, woke issues, political issues. Some of those who appear as "writers" have not actually written the books themselves. The hard work has been done by others. The writing may be grammatically correct but it often lacks style or life. There are not many "issues" writers or politicians who can write in such a way I will remember their words.

I try to read a diverse range of material but when someone is being deliberately provocative and holds views that are potentially harmful then why should I use my limited time to read that writing? This is how I feel about the person who has apparently said we are "nutcases" and that the country is filled with "white supremacist institutions". Even the editorial in this morning's paper is calling for her removal from next year's program. Her inclusion in this year's program caused the week to be cancelled altogether. It says something about the line up that so many "writers" withdrew in support of her. The first to do so were likely those who had not written the books they were there to promote. 

A little controversy is a good thing. It can stimulate ideas and add to the discussion. I see no harm in that at all. I would, and still will, encourage it. I will not encourage someone who uses an event like a week supposedly about writing as an event to call for harm to others. I will not encourage someone who deliberately repeats propaganda designed to do that harm. 

How is it that someone who apparently holds these views is able to retain a Research Council grant and a position as a "Fellow" and "Researcher" at a university? There are people who have lost their positions for holding far less controversial views. There are people who have not been able to obtain research funding because they have not supported the "correct" thinking on unrelated woke issues. How can this happen and yet someone who holds views many find offensive and distressing is able to obtain not only research funds but be invited to speak?

Research funding comes with responsibilities. Freedom of speech comes with responsibilities too. Failure to acknowledge those things will cause harm. We all need to take responsibility for that.    

Driving without a licence

is something you expect young fools and drunken idiots to do. You do not expect people in their eighties who have been told they are unfit to drive to do.

I know someone who recently lost her licence to drive. It was not unexpected and should have come much earlier than it did. She is not willing to accept the decision and is currently attempting to demand the return of it "at least for the local area". She tells me, "I know I can do it. I know I am safe." 

She tells me this although the last "accident" she had was backing out of her own driveway into the car of the neighbour across the street. I have seen her back into a tree. She is not safe on the road.

Yesterday she phoned me ostensibly about something else. I listened, heard the undertone and wondered what she had done.

"Oh and I needed a couple of things from the supermarket so I got the car out and went. I needed to prove I can still do it. It was perfectly safe."

I tried reasoning with her. I pointed out all the potential consequences. She disagreed. She was "safe" and, if anything had happened, "It would not have been my fault. I was being very careful."

To say that I was appalled would be an understatement. To say I am worried would be an understatement too. What really alarms me is that she has a gopher she will not use. It would be the answer to her local appointments. She has reduced taxi fares for those further away appointments. It would all be cheaper. Yes. it is not as convenient but she has nothing else to do with her time. Other people do her cleaning and essential gardening. She spends her days watching television and doing jigsaw puzzles.

There is nothing I can do. I know she is not "my responsibility" but it does worry me when she tells me these things. Why does she do it?

I hope I can be sensible when I get to the "I cannot do this safely" point...but losing your independence is infuriating.   

Selling things on the internet

is not something I do. I am not one of those people who takes photographs, writes glowing descriptions of "almost new", "never been used", "no longer wanted", "only used once" items and places them none too gently on a website where people might find a "bargain".

As such I am more than grateful to my good friend S... who arrived fully equipped with the tools and the knowledge to do this. S...came yesterday afternoon and we began the task of, hopefully, moving the craft materials which have been left with me. Let me explain.

Last year I was left a large quantity of craft materials. The woman who left them with me no longer runs the business she once ran. She is dying and, with her husband, has moved interstate to be closer to their daughter. Rather than simply pass on the remainder of her materials to a local charity shop, places she does not care for, she told me, "I am giving these things to you. You can sell them for your Africans. I know what it is like there. Most people here don't really need it the way they do." 

It was typical of her attitude towards many things. K... told people rather than asked people. Indeed the first load arrived via her husband who asked me, "Do you know about this?" I did not. We looked at what he was delivering and decided not to upset her. I had vague ideas about parting with it all by delivering quietly to the local charity shop but of course she wants to know what I am actually doing with it.  

I put it off for months, went away, came back and let Christmas slide into Easter. S... offered to help as she is very experienced but she was also unwell. It was not until yesterday we started to deal with it. S... amazed me. I am in awe of her skills. She photographed. She wrote descriptions. She priced things. She was even kind enough to ask my opinion as she went ahead. 

After almost three hours we had made a start. S... went away with three boxes of things like metal bookmark findings, hair clip findings, wreath bases and beads. There are still things like unclothed dolls, paper patterns, acrylic blanks and bag making materials to go but we have started. I may once again be able to move safely around my little space. 

I hope people will want to buy these things, especially at those greatly reduced prices. K...will tell me we did not charge enough but people expect a "bargain" and it will simply be good to be rid of some of it at least. 

The best part for me will be seeing some money in the "school" account for the girls. An extra year or two of schooling can make a huge difference there. I am not sure I will ever understand how big the difference is but I will keep trying.  

Writing an essay without using AI

is apparently "difficult". I am not sure how else to put it but the two boys talking about it assured me this was actually true.

I was in the local "cheap" shop - the sort of place which sells the sort of things you can buy from companies like Temu or Shein but are there for you to actually see and feel before you buy. For me it is a useful source of things like glue and rubber bands and refills for the stapler. 

It is also full of "keen young people" who need part-time employment. This has been more so recently as the place changed hands. Currently it is a good deal tidier and, in some ways, useful than it was. As I was looking for what I needed I overheard the two boys stacking the shelf in the next aisle and talking. It was clear they were students.

"You know I could just have put some terms in and come up with an answer..."

"Same here..."

"And I reckon some of the others did. They all came up with the same sort of arguments."

"Same in my group..."

"Did you try asking..."

And so the conversation went on. I stopped trying to pretend I was not listening because these two boys really are very nice lads indeed. One of them told me to stay where I was and fetched me a trolley the other day. The other asked if I would like him to reach something from the top shelf. 

They saw me and guessed I had been listening. Then they told me they had both been in groups which had been set the same question. They had written answers without consulting AI and then by consulting AI. The differences were obvious. It is clear both boys are very intelligent and one of them in particular had tried testing AI to see how far he or it could go. 

"It looks like it's thinking but it isn't thinking. It sounded a bit weird ...if you know what I mean? one of them told me.

I think I do know what he means. I had to come up with a way of putting a counter-argument last week. In order to do it I had written notes and put them into a Venn like diagram. Then I wrote what needed to be written. It worked for me. Out of curiosity I then tried to see if I could get a similar result by putting the same terms into AI.  It might have been convincing if I had not known what I was doing but it did not come across in the same way.  As the boy put it, "it sounded a bit weird". It sounded artificial. It was artificial.

The problem is going to be training us to recognise the difference between the real and the artificial...and how we deal with it.  

"I