It usually rains in Adelaide on ANZAC Day (25th April for the unaware).

This has nothing to do with the washing of cars or anything else. As RR says it's tradition or an old charter or something.


Back in the good old days before even walkmen ity usually rained at Easter in Adelaide. The Oakbank picnic meet usually ended up, like a mudbath, but all that has changed since Pig Iron Bob left politics.

Awesome - you have a Biscuit Day - how cool is that.

RR?
The Oakbank Picnic Meet?
Pig Iron Bob?

Will be meeting relatives from Adelaide on May 16th - would be wonderful to be able to have a conversation with them. Perhaps I should stick to biscuits.

Do at least feel able to discourse at some length on the subject of Drop Bears.

I highly recommend Neil Gaiman's Booket The Wolves in The Walls, very creative!

Bunyip was there really a time before walkman?

Geg, Pig Iron Bob was also know as Ming the Merciless, and we think that the media are cruel about politicians these days. Who would think that he would rate a mention here. Oh, he was the Australian Prime Minister, Robert Menzies.

Geg,

The Oakbank Picnic meet is a 4 day horse racing carnival at a town named - guess what - Oakbank. It is a little town in the hills behind Adelaide and has grown over the decades into a well organised social gathering. The horse racing is a litle incidental now, but is a good excuse for barbecues and drinking.


Back in the olden days (the 1950s) the roads were less than adequate so going to Oakbank was a big achievement. Nowdays it is almost suburbia with snakes and millipedes. Not that the rest of Adelaide doesn't have snakes and millipedes, it's just they are more prevalent there coz it rains more often.

Adelaide historically gets about 30 rainy days a year giving about 24" (600mm) of rain. At Oakbank they get about 3 times this.


Adelaide also has the Christmas pageant - with an attendance along the street of about 250000 people - not bad for a city of 1,250,000.

And the Clipsal 500 V8 Supercar race which draw 250,000 over the 4 days and is another excuse to party.

Other important data:

1 there are lots of good wineries.

2 there are lots of good eating places

3 there are lots of melanomas

4 there are good cancer wards

5 we don't lose more than about ten people a year to snakes, sharks, spiders, blue ringed octopi, drop bears, bodies in barrels in banks, aliens, etc.

6 good steak costs about $A20 a kilo (about 3 pound 50p per pound in traditionalist money), BBQ snags about $A5 per kilo, onions cost about $2.50/kg (40p/lb) and tomato sauce is about $A1.60 a bottle. Barbecues come easily. (The rest of Oz has similar prices, but the quality of the tomato sauce varies)

And petrol is currently about $A1.10 per litre - roughly 40p sterling per litre or 1.80 pound per imperial gallon. (For US readers your gallon is about 3.9 litres and an imperial gallon is 4.54 litres.

On these figures it is @#$%& to migrate than eat in the UK.

Now you have some background information for you cope with your visitors.

PS: we have attack koala bears and possums. These creatures invade suburbia and pull human habitations to pieces. The more aggressive koala have taken to attacking cars on country roads and warning signs have been placed all over the country warning of the worst infestations of these attack koala.

There are also signs purporting to indicate that there are kangaroos that will jump on you car all over the country but these are really meant to indicate that QANTAS flies overhead so beware of falling aircraft pieces.

Your petrol is @#$%& than mine! Must be regional in difference.
<wonders how long it took Bunyip to work out all the information>

Am overwhelmed with gratitude and will set to to create briefing document for all other British attendees.

Will be sure to take a camera so that Mr Geg can record our visitors expressions of surprise/bemusement/shock/concern/fear as we attempt to converse with them.

and Bibwit could you let me know how much your petrol is? I know its a small point but Petrol Price Differentials between various regions might help fill any awkward silences during the serving of coffee.

Myself and BwH are in the same city,and we are enjoying prices anywhere between $1.09 and around $1.22 - so 40-50p/litre. I can't imagine that the vagaries of Antipodean fuel prices would stand much of chance against discussions about the likes of the A419, it's alternatives and eateries.

Drop Bears and Attack 'Roos would make much better conversation topics!

I haven't seen a Drop Bear around in ages. Did Bunyip annihilate them all?

In the interests of clumping, I'll check out fuel prices along the A419 to Cirencester tonight and report back.

I am not responsible for the apparent lack of Drop Bears in your region. I think it was the bushfires that had something to do with it as after cleaning up to 50,000 dead sheep, 45,000 barbecued bovines and several thousand bacon bits on legs they are probably up in the cave system that runs from near Lakes Entrance up to Cooma.

With the combined effluvial output from these I expect to hear of massive greenhouse effect over eastern Victoria anyday now.


Petrol has gone up to $A1.17 per litre here as of last night. I bought steak for the cats last night at $A9.00/kg as it was @#$%& than buying formal cat food.
Tomato sauce is still at $1.60 a bottle though. Tomatoes were $3.25/kg for greenhouse red ones.

But Cadbury's is cheating. Their new chocolates are coming out in cardboard boxed and cost $3.50 for 220gm as opposed to $3.89 for 250 gm before. this is backdoor price gouging, so I will buy Whittaker's from now on and maintain economic stability in the Land of the Long White Overdraft.

96.8p per litre leaving Swindon; 98.4p per litre approaching Swindon. Are people so worried about being stranded in Swindon that the petrol companies can charge an additional 1.6p per litre?

Is "1.6p per litre" similar that old favourite song from my youth: "The Purple p per litre"?

I would pay a lot not to have "Purple P" in any quantity!

Even the inhabitants of Swindon realise that it is almost impossible to reach escape velocity. Anyway wouldn't you be willing to spend more after you had been through the town just to make sure that you escaped the sphere of influence.

I found Sheb Wooley's classic version of the p. per litre here
[www.veoh.com]#
lip-synched with a rather bizarre anime.

This is why the A419 away from Swindon is on a steep, downwards hill - even in neutral you should be able to coast to the first petrol station.
Having said that ... Swindon - The Masada of the south west!

Don't know about petrol, but chocolate is 0,80 Euros per 100 g for standard branded qualities. Specialities, of course can go up to almost 2 Euros.

You run your car on chocolate Prinz?!

I'll try it this afternoon but can't see myself driving further than a block or two.

I tried it and got nuts fouled in the injectors.

Next time I try coconut and see if it affects the carburettors.

Or do you have to use plain milk chocolate?

Will dark chocolate give you more power?

It's complicated. Dark chocolate will give more power in a shorter burst, good milk chocolate will sustain for longer, white chocolate gums up your engine and does nothing at all, and whole nut causes bizarre burps and might induce a burping exhaust.

Engineer Egon.