Grahame's Video Christmas Message

As this will be my last blog post before Christmas, I would like to extend my wish for you to have a great Christmas with your family, enjoying good food, good wine(beer) and great company.

We are doing something a little different this year - spending Christmas on a houseboat on the Murry river at Wentworth.
The common misconception is there is no water in the Murry /Darling - Reality there is plenty, just watch the video.
Ros has always loved the river and fishing so after what has been a challenging year for her and our family we decided what better way to spend Christmas.
Whilst we are yet to catch an eatable fish the carp are still good fun to catch.

If we catch the BIG ONE - I will post it on the blog.
Here is a short video for you to see a little bit of the Houseboat and River.

If video stop/starts, press pause to let it load.

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If you would like to email me

peneena@gmail.com

Incredible Photos from a Box Brownie -1941

Isn't is amazing how a film could last so long in a camera without disintegrating?
Fantastic photos taken 68 years ago. Some of you will have to go to a museum to see what a Brownie camera looked like?

I missed the actual date but these photos are extraordinary on the attack on Pearl Harbour on Dec 7, 1941.

THESE PHOTOS ARE FROM A SAILOR WHO WAS ON THE USS QUAPAW ATF-11O.
I THINK THEY'RE SPECTACULAR!

PEARL HARBOR
December 7th, 1941

Pearl Harbor
On Sunday, December 7th, 1941 the Japanese launched a surprise attack against the U.S. Forces stationed at Pearl Harbor , Hawaii By planning this attack on a Sunday, the Japanese commander Admiral Nagumo, hoped to catch the entire fleet in port. As luck would have it, the Aircraft Carriers and one of the Battleships were not in port. (The USS Enterprise was returning from Wake Island , where it had just delivered some aircraft. The USS Lexington was ferrying aircraft to Midway, and the USS Saratoga and USS Colorado were undergoing repairs in the United States .)
In spite of the latest intelligence reports about the missing aircraft carriers (his most important targets), Admiral Nagumo decided to continue the attack with his force of six carriers and 423 aircraft. At a range of 230 miles north of Oahu , he launched the first wave of a two-wave attack. Beginning at 0600 hours his first wave consisted of 183 fighters and torpedo bombers which struck at the fleet in Pearl Harbor and the airfields in Hickam, Kaneohe and Ewa. The second strike, launched at 0715 hours, consisted of 167 aircraft, which again struck at the same targets.
At 0753 hours the first wave consisting of 40 Nakajima B5N2 'Kate' torpedo bombers, 51 Aichi D3A1 'Val' dive bombers, 50 high altitude bombers and 43 Zeros struck airfields and Pearl Harbor Within the next hour, the second wave arrived and continued the attack.
When it was over, the U.S. Losses were:
Casualties
US Army: 218 KIA, 364 WIA.
US Navy: 2,008 KIA, 710 WIA.
US MarineCorp: 109 KIA, 69 WIA.
Civilians: 68 KIA, 35 WIA.
TOTAL: 2,403 KIA, 1,178 WIA.
-------------------------------------------------
Battleships
USS Arizona (BB-39) - total loss when a bomb hit her magazine.
USS Oklahoma (BB-37) - Total loss when she capsized and sunk in the harbor.
USS California (BB-4 4) - Sunk at her berth. Later raised and repaired.
USS West Virginia (BB-48) - Sunk at her berth. Later raised and repaired..
USS Nevada - (BB-36) Beached to prevent sinking. Later repaired.
USS Pennsylvania (BB-38) - Light damage.
USS Maryland (BB-46) - Light damage.
USS Tennessee (BB-43) Light damage.
USS Utah (AG-16) - (former battleship used as a target) - Sunk.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Cruisers
USS New Orleans (CA-32) - Light Damage..
USS San Francisco (CA-38) - Light Damage.
USS Detroit (CL-8) - Light Damage.
USS Raleigh (CL-7) - Heavily damaged but repaired.
USS Helena (CL-50) - Light Damage.
USS Honolulu (CL-48) - Light Damage..
-------------------------- -- ---------------------------- --------------------------------------------------------------
Destroyers
USS Downes (DD-375) - Destroyed. Parts salvaged.
USS Cassin - (DD -3 7 2) Destroyed. Parts salvaged.
USS Shaw (DD-373) - Very heavy damage.
USS Helm (DD-388) - Light Damage.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Minelayer
USS Ogala (CM-4) - Sunk but later raised and repaired.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Seaplane Tender
USS Curtiss (AV-4) - Severely damaged but later repaired.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Repair Ship
USS Vestal (AR-4) - Severely damaged but later repaired.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Harbor Tug
USS Sotoyomo (YT-9) - Sunk but later raised and repaired.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Aircraft
188 Aircraft destroyed (92 USN and 92 U.S. Army Air Corps.)

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Bathurst Bushfire

Bathurst has been in the news with the bushfire to the west.Coming from the flat country it is certainly different in these hills.When I saw the smoke I knew Steve and Tammy would be not far away so headed out - It was just south of Steve and on a place being leased by Rob a KLR graduate.We were able to get his sheep in the yards only a few minutes before the fire was right there.
Steve was able to stop a lot with his plough before the calvary arrived with more flashing lights than a Christmas tree-not so sure we have progressed with all this new approach.

Here is as short video I took with my phone - damn did not have a battery in my video camera.

If video stop/starts, press pause to let it load.

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Where were you on Dec 8th 1980 ?

John Lennon

Where were you on Dec 8th 1980 when John Lennon was taken from this world ?

I distinctly remember being with my friend Mark renewing the gears in a Southern Cross windmill.We had 2RG radio playing, I was 40 ft up on the tower and Mark was shovelling dead pigs out of the tank.

Email me if you remember where you were @ peneena@gmail.com

Birth name : John Winston Lennon
Born : 9 October 1940(1940-10-09)
Liverpool, England
Died 8 December 1980 (aged 40)
New York City, New York

John's influence on music even to this day is quite something.Here is a classic that is a favourite of mine and always leave me moved to Imagine If ???

Imagine

If video stop starts, press pause to let it load.

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Rees Asked the Hard Questions of NSW Govt

Nathan Rees NSW Premier until last night, came to Bathurst last week to hold a jobs Summit & being not a NSW labour supporter I have to say I was impressed with his desire to ask the HARD questions.
He touched on a couple of reasons why the leader of NSW should be doing that -
eg. Health - The NSW health system would need the entire NSW state budget by 2035 if we conitnue the way we are.Over the life of a person the health system costs $330,000 per person.

His desire to bring productivity and jobs to regional areas was very clear.
Having the same surname(no relation) I kept an eye out for a good headline during his reign but sadly the press never seemed to write some thing like "Rees is a Great Leader"!!

A week in politics is a long time and in this case I think people just did not like to hear the questions they were being asked.Put on the fog goggles and stumble on.

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December update on 100 day steer trade

In November I came across an article in a rural newspaper describing a strategy being put in place by a grazier on a mob of cattle he purchased.

He said : "I care about 2 things; getting my money back and the kilos they put on".

Now I take that to mean he wants the same $1.83/kg he paid for them at 250kg in 100 days at 350kgs.

Here we are in December and they are now 280 kg @$1.58 quite a discount on the pruchase price.

As I said in November this could prove to be profitable for him in the Buy /Sell Paradigm, however there is the risk of prices may remain at present levels or less.The market is certainly confirming that.

By using the KLR tools you can easily identify a profitable trade.

So I ran it through the KLR 30 Second market Report and spreadsheet - we will follow this over the next 70 days.

Watch the video: ( click on bottom right corner to see full screen.)

Gold Reach's for the Sky

Gold has hit $1217US an oz as the $US continues to plunge - gold has moved from the low $800 in January giving a return in $US of around 50% for the year - who would have thought ?
Silver is close to $20US rising from around $11 this year a return close to 100%.
This has not been as great for those of us who have $AU as it moves higher.

If the response to my previous post is anything to go by a lot of you are interested in following the yellow metal.

Jim Sinclair answered some questions on his blog about what he sees playing out.
The US fed has exceeded it's limit of $12.1 Trillion technically but last minute rule changes have said it does not include some billios of dollars which will last another month !!

To read Jim's post


Questions On The Timing Of The Gold Bull Market And The New Monetary Systemr>

Did we just have Summer b4 Spring ?

Grass is on the mind of many people right now, here in Bathurst it seems climate change has really happened.We seem to have had Summer over the last 3 months, with hot dry weather and here we are on the first day of summer it is cold !!!

We drove from Bathurst to Mildura on the weekend and saw a very dry 900 kms, water dams nearly dry, crops around West Wylong not worth harvesting.

Not sure what is happening in Qld but even the good grass managers have been suprised with the speed in the change of their grass inventory.

The question on everyones lips is Christmas going to be wet ? Well as I said to someone this morning it could prove a difficult period if you find yourself with animals that are running out of grass over the Christmas period - markets closed.

I beleive one farmer not far from here a couple weeks ago was running out of water and held on hoping it would rain.Unfortunatly it did not and he had to totally destock everything in one day as the last drop dried up.

Now is the time to check you 3 Inventory's of Grass,Money and Livestock.

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