From: John Tserkezis 
Reply-To: Fidonet AVtech Echo 

Bob Lawrence wrote:

>  I keep thinking that there's a limit to the meddling that normal
> people will tolerate before they start punching these arsehole out,
> but our aceptance seems bottomless. They're going to ban plastic bags?
> How the fuck are we supposed to get stuff home from the supermarket?

  It's appearing in political circles now.  A short while back, my BIL said one 
town was geared to ban plastic bags after ONE bag blocked a drain and caused a 
major flood.  I said it was bullshit, and was probably popular political 
propaganda.
  Not one week later, a local pollie was 'proudly' stating their town was now 
plastic bag free.  Kachiiing.  That's gotta be worth extra points that.

>  I was actually operating in the era *before* plastic bags, but that
> was before supermarkets too, when the grocer put your stuff in a
> cardboard box, when he was just around the corner, and you shopped
> every day.

  Back in the old days when coles didn't run all the smaller grocers out of 
business?

>  I am *stunned* to see those wankers with their calico bags! Hasn't
> anyone told them where calico comes from? You need six calico bags,
> multiplied by 5 million families, 30 million bags that will last less
> than a year... $50M and the Gwydir River run dry to grow the
> extra cotton! Fuckn hell!

  That's ok, there's plenty of plastic to replace those expensive, now 
unattainable calico bags.

>  This isn't theory, it's the way our brain works. We don't see a TV
> picture - we see dark masses that grow in size (coming closer), red
> things (open mouths), white with black dots (eyes), slanted lines (for
> perspective), and our brain fills in the detail as required from the
> last stored memory. Our brain is slow (around 100mS) so we *focus* on
> what we expect and use an old image to fill in the rest. "Keep your
> eye on the ball" is how we play tennis, the rest of it is painted in
> because we *know* the background won't change... we focus on changes.
> As we run across the court, the brain just "moves" the court without
> looking. We "know" what happens to perspective when we move... maybe a
> glance at the base line.  

  Yeah, that's the small area where we can see sharply, everything else is a 
vague blur of shadows.  Your brain fills in the rest.  They warned us of 
"tunnel vision", to keep looking around.  It gives your brain a
chance to fill 
in the blanks with *usable* data, rather than make assumptions.

>  The weird part is that we "see" it as if it is continuous. When we
> move, the world moves with us, even what was behind us, unseen. It's
> all a fake. We see tiny parts of the world and our brain fakes the
> rest, some of the memory of a well-known room can be years old! We can
> fake sub-millisecond changes with a computer that runs in the
> 100-millisecond range. It happenswhen you drive fast... things slow
> down. They don't actually, and your brain doesn't speed up... it just
> ignores a whole lot of happening shit.

  You somewhat get better at this, but it only looks impressive that race 
drivers know where they're going, it's only that they've run around the track 
that many times, that they know it blind.  It's one less thing their brains 
have to fill in looking for, it reserves a bit of concentration for the useful 
things, like what the other runner is doing (or mistakes their making) giving 
you a chance to overtake.

  This doesn't apply to the road, where things are different ever time you go 
out there.  You can't make assumptions otherwise you start to hit things.  But 
that doesn't matter, because it's always the *other* guy's fault.

> JT> If I were to ride a white BMW with blue strips, I would
> JT> GUARANTEE they would notice me coming from three suburbs back.
> 
>  Maybe not. Ever been booked by a cop who just suddenly "appears"?
> Once noted, the cop would be flagged as serious shit and scanned
> every time you loooked that way.

  Like the one with the radar that hid behind a parked truck?  That nabbed six 
vehicles in close formation in a row?  Yeah, I know him.

> JT> Agreed. Predictability is important, everyone around you knows
> JT> what your next move is, and can work around it. Unfortnately,
> JT> not everyone can "see" this predictability. (and it's the 1%ers
> JT> on the other end of the scale that are oblivious).

>  (grin) They don't survive peak-hour traffic for long...

  Peak hour is the safest.  Everyone has the same objective, and can actually 
drive (even though they're not moving).

> JT> I've been speaking to an L plater recently, the RTA has changes
> JT> the laws regarding L platers. You need to keep a log book of
> JT> the date and time you go out, duration, distance, description
> JT> of trip, name and licence details of the person who's
> JT> supervising you.

>  What!! God! Is there no end to this creeping loss of freedoms?

  No, next they're going to tell us that speed cameras are placed at 
statistical "black" spots, not statistical speeding spots to make
more money. 
Never mind the RTA web site notes the 85th percentile speed over their camera 
loctaions, coincedently all well over the limit.  Concord Road is a prime 
example.  Used to be laced with cops all over the place.  One camera later 
(obviously that exact location was the root of all deaths in concord) not a cop 
to be seen.  Well, actually, I lie, I've seen one cop, off-duy with no radar 
attached, probably on their way to stock up on doughnuts.  However, I may be 
mistaken, the lack of cops in the area may be just coincedence that about the 
same time, the last doughnut shop in Concord closed down.  Not sure, plausible 
reasons either way...

  On the other hand, that camera is placed directly opposite that small park, 
could be lots of children crossing to get to that park right?  Not that I've 
actually SEEN anyone in that park EVER, but obviously the RTA statistitians 
know more about that than I do.

>  Everyone knows that driving is risky at the speeds we travel, but
> we travel at a speed where we can accept the risk. Now we have
> bureaucrats *dictating* our degree of risk, and when we ignore them,
> first they spend *our* money on spin doctors and propaganda, and then
> they invent new restrictions.

  The spin doctors are funded by taxes, no wait, that wouldn't be popular, lets 
fund it with cameras, combined with the spinners, it's all politically correct, 
and there's money left over for us pollies.  Whoo hoo!

>  The other weekend I drove out to Camden, and on the back road around
> Oran Park I let the Skyline have its head. The spped limit was 90,
> which is pathetic, but I didn't top 120. That's all I'm good for now.

  You're getting old Bob. (couldn't resist that stab)

>  You'd see it coming, whoops... gentle, foot off, cut the entry as
> close as possible, gentle, let it drift scrub off speed... straighten,
> don't run off it's better to spin... okay. Whew!

  Driver inability has nothing to do with road death statistics.  Everyone 
knows that.  Duh, the RTA and cops keep telling us that.

>  Bad driver, probably panicked. But the fuckwit cops put it down to
> speed. Durr... *every* crash is caused by speed.

  I love the "there's no such thing as safe speeding" cry.  True,
the only safe 
speed is 0.  You can't hit anything if you're not moving.

>  I don't actually disagree with the P plate, but I can't see how
> a two-stage P makes it safer. I had the *only* crash that was my
> fault, in the first two months of driving. I always drove too fast,
> but that wasn't the problem with me. It takes a while as a new
> driver to know where to look, to get the idea of defensive driving set
> in your head. At first, you're struggling to drive your own car... it
> takes experience to realise that you have to drive everyone else's
> too, to expect them to do totally stupid things, and adapt.

  It makes it harder if you ask me.  I can't remember that far back to my car P 
plates, but while on the bike P's, I remember "losing" my P plate on the 
freeway, (no really, I DID loose it on the freeway, I just didn't notice till 
four months later when I was fully licenced and tried to remove the plate).
  Anyway, it was amazing that overnight, everyone stops aiming for you, and 
actually treats you like every other road user, more or less indifferent.

> JT> Time will tell if it works.

>  Of course it won't work. In fact, I'd be happy to argue that even
> P-plate restrictions make it worse. When my nephew got his licence, my
> millionaire brother was really clever (I thought) and bought him a
> Suzuki 4WD. How could he possibly get itno trouble with a Suzuki
> Sierra? He rolled it at 120K on the expressway. Then John bought him
> an Nissan EXA (the early 200SX) and Clayton never had an accident in
> that one.

>  Beats me.     

  Sheeze Bob, everyone knows that four wheel drives are the safest vehicles 
around.  That's why every mother picks up her kids from school in landcruisers, 
and never take them offroad.  Why would anyone take their landcruiser offroad?

  Actually, yesterday we went 4WDing and stopped off at a carlovers type 
carwash to high pressure wash all the mud and shit from the underneath of my 
BIL's landcruiser.
  We spent about $15 worth of high pressure water, to get the mud off, he 
washes it by hand at his own leasure later.

  While he was in the middle of it, I was looking at the kilos of brown muck 
lying around the ground and falling off the car, (the mud was very sticky that 
day) and then at the guy behind us waiting, another white landcuiser packed up 
with the family (carwashing is obviously a family event for them) that  looked 
as though it hasn't seen even a mere gravel driveway.

  Recycled water my arse.  After the shit we left behind, these other cars can 
only possbily get dirtier.  He probably spent five bucks worth of water hosing 
off the ground after us just so he doesn't get his dress shoes dirty. (we were 
all covered in mud)

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