Posts by Sacha
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Hard News: Floating the idea, in reply to Che Tibby,
can i register my intense dislike for "resanded beaches". there's no sand on them because there are no waves to carry sand to them.
Part of the justification (by Council engineers, naturally) for resanding the eastie beaches was protecting Tamaki Drive from erosion after the protective sand had been swept away. The Chev though is probably meant to be a mudflat, yes.
all that sand just washes out into your estuary, then out to sea somewhere.
Oh, you did say that. As you were.
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Hard News: Floating the idea, in reply to Paul Williams,
Perhaps someone knows to what extent public primary schools still have pools and provide swimming lessons as part of the normal curriculum?
From Orsman's story, though no breakdown by school level:
School swimming pools are disappearing as trustees sacrifice the expense of water safety to meet tight budgets. Since 1999, school boards have closed 127 pools, and another 158 pools have closed due to school closures.
It must be more work to get children to a pool that's outside school grounds, so the cost arguments must be compelling at school board level.
The Herald's line of argument so far is the usual level playing field fantasy. Works really well for some.
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Hard News: Holiday Open Thread 2:…, in reply to recordari,
We are all too often a slave to freedom and ignorant of our strength.
Oh, and thank you Ian for the Marie and the Atom. Has been a while.
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And I suppose a related question - which parts did you find especially persuasive/accurate?
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Give us a clue. What aspects do you think I'm reading wrongly?
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Hard News: A few (more) words on The Hobbit, in reply to Islander,
Sacha, I think your interpretation of the Goldfarb article is strangely skewed.
Please do explain how - I was quite specific and provided quotes to support my reading of it, including that a generation only counted as such if it experienced a single large event like a war or Depression. His reasoning didn't impress me and I've heard enough individualistic "there is no society" tosh to have little patience for it.
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That BBC article by Michael Goldfarb seems shallow and poorly-argued compared with say Gladwell. It's focused on an individualised explanation of the world and a notion that only some generations count. If anything, the tone says more about boomer stereotypes than the content does.
The idea that people have something in common because they are born in the same approximate time period is akin to newspaper theories of astrology.
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For an American, there is something quite dangerous in lumping everyone born between 1946 and 1960 together - and it is not just evidenced by the maniacal, anonymous postings on newspaper comment threads.
The boomer obsession takes away from accurate historical knowledge of a remarkably turbulent period in American history, one that is not focused on a single clarifying event, such as World War II, the great Depression or the Civil War.
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I'm sorry, I cannot see what our lives and world views have in common beside coincidence of birth year.
And coincidence is all those of us born after the war have in common.
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Or the "support" act who blew them off the stage:
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Or bringing it *home*, one of my fave local driving soundtracks (may not make as much sense on underpowered computer speakers):
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But a little black secret technology also led in this direction: