A lonely wind is rattling the blinds of the house and as I gaze out of my kitchen window and look upon the majestic Brindabella mountains standing guard over Tuggeranong I see the billowing clouds and misty rain descending like the sails of a Man O War on our town. That lengthy opening line wasn’t quite as poetic as I hoped it would be but the words don’t roll off the keyboard with as much enchantment as they use to. Fact is the day is bleak and it mirrors my mood for the day as I bide time and chew up minutes before I start work this afternoon. Apart from a few drops about a half an hour ago the rain hasn’t come in at all-and we sure could use it. I cannot remember the last period of decent, prolonged rain we had. The plight of the local fauna, kangaroos laying dead on the side of our parkways and byways, is a testament to how dry it has been as they come down from the hills and in from the parks to try to find forage further inside the city. Poor blighters.
I’m tired and sore-from work mostly but I have been sitting up past midnight watching the Criterium du Dauphine (a one week professional road cycling race) from France each night this week which surely hasn’t helped. I was lucky to see the finish last night as I nodded off several times inside the last ten kilometres. Perhaps it’s Matt Keenan’s considered tone putting me to sleep (just joking, Matt is an excellent and knowledgeable commentator) but Team Sky dominating the race as they did last night, and as they usually do, certainly doesn’t excite me to the point where I am jumping out of my skin as I watch. I find them, and their erstwhile team leader who isn’t actually racing this particular event, to be a bit of a blight on the sport but it’s a controversial opinion to be sure and there are plenty who disagree with me.
I’ve finished university for the Trimester. I am still contemplating the fact that I am a university student; it seems quite surreal yet I have completed a unit of archaeology and have stitched up a unit of a foundations course which I hope will get me into a degree program. I went okay but I need to improve. Procrastination is a lifelong trait which impacted on my study and a lack of commitment to getting it 100% right will cost me marks on my foundation unit essay but I should scrape through that with a pass. I’ve learnt a lot about academic writing although referencing is a killer which I am yet to master and I do marvel at the intelligent people who preside over these courses, lecturers and teachers who have acquired so much knowledge. I can’t remember what I did yesterday! Much of the foundations course was focussed on critical thinking, something which I try to do often but had never really thought about as a method when interpreting information gained in this interconnected world we now live in. Of course everyone is different and character and temperament find different levels and outlooks in many of us and many people can look at the same thing and talk about it and think about it in different ways. Sometimes you wonder if we are all looking at the same thing!
I do wonder though when seeing many politicians on television talking about the latest relevant issues about how critical thinking is applied. Many of them, and this applies to both ends of the political spectrum, seem to not be able to see the forest for the trees and tightly held belief systems impact on opinion and cannot be prised away from their often belligerent holders with a jack hammer and crowbar. No wonder the average Joe in the street doesn’t know what is going on half the time. It’s why we get populist politicians. Knowledge is power. You don’t need to get a university education to have balanced and relevant point of view on issues facing us today. Just read a few books, get a grasp of an argument. Don’t necessarily believe what is written. Get a second opinion. Have an open mind and admit you might be wrong and be prepared to change your mind. Of course, I don’t think this is going to stop conflict and have a huge impact. Human kind being what it is will always be belligerent and disagreeable. Boy, I didn’t mean to get so deep and meaningful in this post. See what going to university does to a person!
For me now, all that is left for today is an eight hour slog through the mire of my work day. I’ve been unloading trucks on the forklift an hour a day and some might think that it’s a nice break from the drudgery but truth be known it’s just another chore that I could do without. It’s not necessarily difficult work, just exacting and you have to concentrate. Who wants to end up with a load of product on the floor?! But, as is the way with our organisation, nothing is particularly well organised. We are using more gas for our forklifts as we are doing more work on them and we seem to be churning through the bottles like there is no tomorrow. The gauges don’t work and you are never sure if you are about to run out of gas until the machine gives a bit of a chug and starts to hip and hop like the latest rap star. I went to exchange a bottle yesterday after my forklift gave up the ghost only to find a line of empty bottles (I could only tell they were empty by lifting them) barring my way and it was a little bit of an effort to find a full one. I should have known better but the bottle I took was right at the back of the cage and looked like it had been there for years. Caked in dust and looking worse for wear I carried it back to the forklift only to find the connections to the machine didn’t work. There is efficiency for you. The bottle must have been sitting in the back of the cage for years and never been used and is now disabled and worthless. Every day I find another thing to dislike about the job and after 31 years I think it’s time to take in some new horizons. But more on that later in the year.
So, be well and go softly. I’ve decided that life is too short to do things that bore you. It’s been nice to blog again after a few weeks of nothing but work and study and I hope to be back again soon. Take care.
Strange Notations From a Laborious Life 