Ah ha!!! a trick (just kidding)....I was in Melbourne 3 years ago during the Commonwealth Games (not intentional timing!!). I love it when the are all blooming. Once my new bulbs bloom, they all go outside and work out their own schedule for blooming. Seems like March/April here near Houston, TX is there favorite time. Since I got so many new bulbs last year, it will be interesting to see which of them bloom again this year. Kristi

I am forty five, truth be told, I am close to 400 lbs and yet just yesterday I out ran a cow tring to get away...the day before I had to chase a pig down and catch it.....100lbs+ pig Want to play, I don't even need a uniform.... Yeap. only big briliant strong men can play AMERICAN FOOTBALL....any ol skronny dweeb can chase a black and white ball up and down the field...sad, what a waste.....Almost as usless as Hockey....

On the weather forecast at the end of the national news they said it was 28 degrees in Sydney today. One day last week it was 35, which is 10 above average for this time of year. Missed the local news but we've been in the high 20's to low 30's lately. I've seen composting toilets a few times. I think there's one at Orroral Valley, just outside Canberra. It was the site of a tracking station. Kind of amazing that in the sixties and seventies there were three tracking stations in the Canberra region. Tidbinbilla is still operating. It has four active dishes and several other ones. One of them was transferred from Honeysuckle Creek, where it had received the first pictures of Armstrong walking on the moon (the movie The Dish wasn't entirely accurate, although the Parkes dish featured in it was used to receive pictures also). Honeysuckle Creek and Orroral Valley were closed years ago and eventually the buildings were pulled down because they were getting vandalised. The foundations were left and signs put up to indicate what had been there. And Orroral Valley got a composting toilet fot the hikers and picnickers who visit. I don't know if they'd allow them in the suburbs. Then again the drought has been changing attitudes. Water tanks will soon be compulsory for new homes. Energy ratings were introduced a few years ago. New homes have to be built to a minimum of four stars. Advertisements for houses for sale must include the energy rating. One new suburb is going to have a requirement that households with cats keep them in cat runs or indoors. One thing Canberra has always had is a ban on front fences! It was intended to encourage Canberra to develop into a garden city. The government nursery which grows plants for parks and public areas also gave each new block that was built on a free allocation of plants. I'm determined to reduce my collection of potted plants by next summer. Most aren't potplants as such, they're just waiting for a permanent home. Some are cuttings, some are bought, sometimes I have some sitting in pots awaiting relocation. Do you think if a plant has been waiting for about twenty years it qualifies as a real potplant? Can plants have dual citizenship? It spent a while unhappily in a garden bed, was put in a pot to recover while we decided on a better location, then we moved house so it came with us, then we moved again, and again. It has moved around this garden and seems reasonably happy where it is now, but where it is now is not a garden bed, and we have enough to do without expanding the garden bed over there. We're halfway through expanding a couple of other garden beds, the purpose being to reduce the lumpy crunchy yellow stuff we used to call lawn. As I write, The Amazing Race is on tv. Everyone is gathering at a sports stadium. Acres of green. Mmmm.

I agree with cindydavid that we have lost something in the shift towards more literature from other countries and traditions. Yes, it's a good idea to learn more about other cultures, countries, and traditions. However, this shouldn't mean that what used to be taught should now be excluded. I don't know -- I think I might be from a different age but correction and being left back sounds, to me, to be more correct than being allowed to continue without earning the right to do so. I guess to me it's more of a reward/effort thing -- if you put in the effort, then there's a reward. If you get the reward without the effort, then that cheapens the reward or, worse, gives the student a feeling of entitlement to something he may not be entitled to. I do realize that maybe the whole issue is that of using a single approach to all students. Not all students learn the same way nor do they learn at the same pace. Perhaps it would be best if a tailored approach was taken for each student. Of course, finding the resources for such an approach opens up a whole new can of worms ..... And I also agree with astrokath. In talking to that teacher friend of mine, I've realized that her hands were tied with respect to a lot of things regarding the students. I don't blame her (or any of the other teachers) for the results -- the policies and direction from their superiors (and the politicians who directed those superiors) should shoulder the blame. Rambo -- good luck with the teacher's college. I have another friend who is entering the teaching profession this September and she's really looking forward to it. My other teacher friend still loves teaching -- she's just getting annoyed at all the politics that comes with the job.