Personally, I don’t love carrying my garbage around with me, but I recognize that it wouldn’t exist without my intervention. Nobody ran up and asked me to hold an empty cup. I thoughtlessly bought something. Thoughtlessly consumed it, and now I have to hold onto the detritus for a little while? Great. It’s easy. Easy to embrace that modicum of responsibility for your own waste. This is my protest song, the world’s lamest: I will attend to my garbage without complaint.

About three years ago I bought a new otoscope and ophthalmoscope set from Welch Allyn. (An otoscope is the thing doctors and other healthcare workers use to look in your ears, and an ophthalmoscope is the same but for eyes.) They're fairly simple devices conceptually, just a light source plus various lenses and filters. Welch Allyn is probably the best-known manufacturer of these and generally considered a reliable brand. You'll find their diagnostic sets on the walls of many hospitals. Like most reputable medical manufacturers they charge a premium price; I think my set cost about $600 Australian dollars, and it was one of the cheapest available.

Within two years the switches on both devices were flaky. They wouldn't turn on at all, or would only turn on when I pressed and moved the switch in just the right way with just the right pressure, or they would flicker. Supremely frustrating when trying to examine a patient under time pressure, and galling that I paid so much money for a pr

The SMH published this article today about a proposed 'change' to the road rules:

“The solution is simple,” Pieglowski said of an idea he is championing at next week’s Sydney Summit, inspired by his son’s question: change traffic rules so anyone travelling along the main road – either walking, cycling or driving – has the right of way, and anyone wanting to intercept is forced to give way. It’s what he describes as “an imaginary zebra crossing on every road and intersection”.

Maybe I'm missing something, but isn't this already the rule? There are diagrams in Australian Road Rules reg 72 and reg 73 that seem to show pretty clearly a driver already has to give way in this situation.

The SMH article later says:

The change would mean pedestrians walking in the same direction of traffic as the roads would, whe

I’ve seen what look like stopping markers painted on platform edges, but at the two stations I frequently use (Mitchell Park and Tonsley) it often seems like they just stop at a random point along the platform. It’s especially noticeable at Tonsley where people often gather where they expect the rearmost carriage to be, then chase the train up the platform as it sails past.