TG83

Hi Everyone, I am a close friend of dc and we are all struggling very hard with this, his girlfriend especially. Although most of you may not know her, I would like to invite anyone who knew dc and could spare the time to please PM me with any letters you may want to send her about your connections and relationship with him. She loved his knowledge of plants and related topics, as this was a huge part of his life from very early on. She has also expressed strong interest in seeking knowledge from this community and has been left with a lot of trich cactus cuttings and peyote to take care of, along with many various seeds collected through the years. She plans to create a garden dedicated to him and would really appreciate any beginners advice that could be offered to help her achieve this. The array of seeds is wide, if you would like to offer seed raising advice for specific seeds feel free to PM me with details of the plant and I'll see if they are in the collection. In time she would also really like to attend one of the Melbourne meetings to gain further knowledge and better understand his love and connection with both plants and this community. Godspeed to you all

Same happened in the suburbs, friend's car got hammered with them. First time I've seen hail this size in Melbourne.

Not all are hypocrites, there is people elected who have served quite well in other areas, and even some who have come along in high positions and tried to move drug laws in a direction towards decriminalisation of use, most of those laws have been reversed now however by following governments. Today it just seems they are so scared of their own party and public response against the party that once they finally get in power they are in too much fear to stand up for their own personal opinions or even attempt to bring in any rational discussion of how things actually work in the real world. Not just in Australia either, it's happening world wide, there is a few who stand up and speak their own words but they are largely outnumbered by those who are in too much fear to be an individual voice.

Was watching the federal government question time a few days ago, the family first senator was pushing for these to be banned, although he was still calling them synthetic cannabinoids. What I found the worst was when they mentioned the brand name "Kronic" about half the people in the house had a bit of a chuckle to themselves, they obviously have smoked cannabis in the past and to laugh at something like that shows they themselves personally don't condemn the use. The whole drug war has got to a seriously delusional point, where many of those making the laws in government do not see a problem with the drugs and even use them, yet still allow laws against them to pass without any defence. Reminds me a bit of the NSW ecstacy incident a year or two ago, with one minister buying a pill and being caught, all the premier said at the time was that she condemned the over indulgence of her staff, which is exactly what it is, not a criminal offence but simply somebody wanting to indulge themselves in something enjoyable. Still it was condemned basically everywhere as a criminal action regardless of her statement not implying any real offence being committed. Really frustrates me how the personal opinion of basically everyone in government is totally opposite to the laws they create and allow to pass.

I have to say I've had my fair share of that kind of stuff when I was a kid, in the end I snapped too and ended up on the end of police inquiries. After the school basically attempting to remove me from the school instead of those who were responsible, and basically no family support at all during the whole time, I ended up taking it to court at 16 years old, against both the kids involved and the school themselves. I succeeded and the judge was very supporting towards me during the whole process, but it was basically the end of my education, nobody would accept me after that so I began a new life teaching myself how to become a web programmer, now at 26 I'm working full time in my own web development business. In a way it shaped me for good and bad, the scars still exist no doubt, but it opened a new opportunity to do something I never would have considered before, so I am lucky in a way. That footage is all too familiar for me also, I'm glad this has actually made it to the internet, because it's caused a huge reaction against both the kids who are causing the trouble and the school itself. Without the internet I can imagine the whole thing would still be ongoing and likely nothing much would change. It does worry me though, that just after this happens I see a news headline like this appear: http://www.smh.com.au/technology/technology-news/law-proposed-against-uploading-violent--images-on-the-internet-20110316-1bwye.html It's a bit of a double edged sword in my opinion, but I could imagine it would likely be for the worst. A lot of crimes of this nature become solved and people charged because it goes on the internet, by placing a state ban on it, sites like youtube will likely reject any content of that nature, while possibly destroying the evidence needed to prosecute the offenders. I'm all in favour of people placing charges against anyone who posts such things with the intent to humiliate and cause trouble, but having it as a general criminal law simply for posting could mean incidents like this never become noticed. It could stop innocent bystanders or even victims who manage to film this kind of thing, when they only wanted to lodge it on the internet to start public debate and get action because no other route has worked. The video above also means the school would likely be forced to change their policies for the better, and possibly even the state education boards. While making others think twice about doing similar things after seeing the aftermath of the whole situation. If the video was banned from going out, it could end up protecting schools and the education system from humiliation.

I've been running encryption ever since the filter was proposed, won't be changing any time soon either, you loose around 25% of your actual connect speed but the encryption is the highest I know of at 2048bit, it also can route via any of 16 countries and thousands of IP's. We have also boycotted the NBN installation here until they release details of what will be in the filter. Sooner or later it will be brought back up, provided a change of government doesn't force it's closure (although that didn't stop the GST so probably wont change this either). Italy has a system of internet filtering but it's range is SOLELY for child pornography, we should have that here too at the absolute most, not simply an RC block. The range of RC material in Australia at the moment is already extremely broad and heavily restrictive, should the filter be passed on the basis of RC the internet will quickly head towards solely a place for business alone, they've already forced the business only lifestyle on us in daily life and killed off most of the communities social life with thousands of new laws passed in the last 10 years, the internet is the only freedom we have left and I definitely will be doing anything I can to avoid a RC filter at all costs, even if it means having super low connect speeds and using military level encryption. The past levels of freedom of speech and information in this country has lead to a lot of positive changes and movements in modern society, the release of the stigma for the gay / bisexual community being the most dramatic change I've seen, but also separation of state and relgion, freedom of / from religion and recently a slow change in perception and building of respect in most of greater community regarding the aboriginal people of this country. With freedom of speech being tightened further each year, the only way for future movements like this to occur and succeed is via the internet as a free unmoderated source of speech and information, the filter puts all this in jeopardy when used under a refused classification method for controls on all internet content.

Whenever I see stuff like this on tv it annoys me, seems like whenever its going to be a slow news week they have to target something random to blow their propaganda horn as usual and get the ratings through until the next actual news story comes along. If anything, the original HHH saved my youth back in the days and introduced me to interesting herbal plants, pulling me out of the typical mayhem and trouble that goes with being 18 in the city and getting me into something productive with gardening and research. If they are targeting JW specifically, it's sold everywhere, you will be able to get it in any shopping centre if you look well enough, although there seems to be pressure on now as a few have moved it behind the counter out of sight. HHH range has been severely cut over the years since they have been targeted multiple times in raids here in Melbourne (they operate under a new name now), but if they are targeting the chain owner in NSW for JW they should really learn that a shop blatantly called HHH isn't going to be stupid enough to be the sole source or creator and won't be selling anything specifically illegal, they are only one of what is probably 1000 shops currently stocking it. Personally I've never had any ill effects from jw at all, and find it not addictive at all, I've had a bag of the stuff for almost a year now and still haven't gone through it, used it maybe 10 times in total over that time. Find it quite nice and a pleasant alternative compared to the normal stuff with no anxiety or paranoia associated. Heard the legal 'herb' pills are a bit of a different story depending which you get, the one's I've tried seemed ok, that said I've never gone back for them again after the first time testing them out. The no name blokes in NZ are geniuses when it comes to this kind of thing though and have been for many years, a single chemical will be targeted and legislated and they already seem to have another two completely new ones ready to come out, there is no end and if they were serious about harm reduction they would decide to do tests on each new one to determine safety and whether it should be banned or taxed, which is usually the process in new zealand where they have some common sense left, here they prefer to simply ban it outright without any research causing another unknown to come out and replace it over and over again

Only have experience with maidenii and obtuse, but a 50% peatmoss and 50% seedling mix has proven the best bet so far, plus holds moisture more so can mist them once a day or skip a day or two on cold days without any problems. Did a bit of a personal experiemnt this year with them, mixed up 6 different kinds of soils to see which would germinate and sustain them the best. So far the 50% peat moss and 50% seed raising mix mentioned above is doing the best, but the others (clay based soil, commercial cactus mix, 50% sand 50% soil, potting mix and seedling mix alone) are still a close second. So not really much difference in any soil base, even ones with very minimal nutrients. Always been able to germinate them by putting a single seed in a shot glass, pour boiling water over the top and cover with glad wrap, within a few hours to two days all of them swell / sprout, some will occasionally be stubborn but I find leaving them in the water a bit longer or re-soaking with boiling water again gets them going. Planted mine about 2cm deep which is a bit over the recommended, they take about a month to rise from that level but I find they seem to be much hardier once they do surface that way. Previously grew from 1cm deep but found a few needed a fair bit of care by keeping them correctly watered early on to sustain them, so now go with the 2cm method and mist daily until they show up. Everyone will probably have a different method, for me in Melb this is the best method I've found so far.

Friend of mine's wife is hooked on it, she's a moderator for her local area so gets lots of first listing benefits by calling for good stuff before she approves the posts lol some of the random stuff she comes home with is amazing though, they got a windows tablet pc last time I was there, time before that a old windows cube pc for a media center, her husband jokes that when she gets older she will be one of those hoarders like from the simpsons, the crazy old lady who throws cats at people lol

Haven't heard much of the toads down this way for awhile, was some scare awhile back they would invade the farmlands here, but Melbourne's outer suburbs are beginning to get more and more of the mutant locusts appearing around here, fair few friends now have found some inside their homes and around their gardens. About 50km north the farms are infested with them, hopefully they don't make a home here too.

x 2 Great movie, huge line up of well known (at the time) british and australian actors / singers who make an appearance

Wow never really knew much about wasps, haven't seen documentaries on them before but amazed at this information about them. Only ever really knew to avoid being stung by them but amazed to hear how they breed and survive. Been living in a box here in Melbourne, reading some reports at the moment from the CSIRO stating there is some 14,800 types of ants, bees and wasps in Australia. Haven't really ventured much out of Victoria to get an idea of the biodiversity in this country, family owns a few farms in VIC and the most we see there is few different snakes, feral cats, heaps of mosquitos, honey bees and the european wasps. All the farming must have driven the more native species into other areas. Speaking of common ones, got stung by a honey bee this morning while potting up a few seeds, thought doing it at 6am before the sun was up would avoid them but I was wrong, first time it's happened so glad I'm not allergic to them. The amount of honey bees and european wasps around here at the moment is higher than I've ever seen, they are literally outnumbering flys. Probably not a good thing seeing as they're introduced and their lifestyle of taking out other insects, huntsmans have been taking cover inside the house over the last week too, after reading the above I don't blame them either!

Thanks for that MORG just had a bit of a read up and seems they are common in Australia, in Melbourne though I've only ever seen the European wasps, never even knew other kinds like this existed in other parts of Australia

Well got a surprise today when I opened the mail, one of these fellas found their way into an express post bag: Anyone have any idea what kind of wasp this is? I've never seen one of these kind before, all the photo's I've found of them on the net seem to come from South America, can't figure out an ID for them though and the package came from within Australia Whatever he is he's a monster, about an inch and a half long and no idea what that thing is on its tail but hopefully not a stinger lol

Can just see it now, a black market in bio diesel, olive oil and hamburgers