Two more years between drinks!

Wow, doesn't time fly when you're having fun. Since I last posted on this blog more than two years ago, it's been taken over by Google, and I had to jump over several hoops just to access it again. Whether it was worth it remains to be seen!

It's interesting to read back over old postings and reflect on what has changed. The drought has certainly broken in eastern Australia, with devastating floods in Queensland and parts of rural NSW and Victoria. Here in Melbourne our water storages are now up over 50%, and the gardens are all looking much better. Still, June 2011 rainfall was well below average so I hope we're not heading back into a drought pattern again.

Climate change has become the 'issue de jour', with Prime Minister Julia Gillard staking her political future on a carbon tax, the details of which she will announce on 10 July 2011. Predictably there is a lot of opposition to the idea of any new tax, so it is a courageous move on the PM's part, and may well be her undoing. Julia originally favoured an Emissions Trading Scheme. The carbon tax was imposed on her by the Greens as a condition of their support in enabling Julia to form government, after the 2010 Federal Election resulted in a hung parliament. I feel strongly that the media have not given Julia a 'fair go' and have focussed on her personal qualities in a way that they don't do with male politicians. You go girl, don't let the bastards get you down!

Technology has certainly changed significantly since I first began this blog. Social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter have gained immense popularity and the development of mobile computing via phones, laptops and tablets has allowed us to connect to the digital online world pretty much whenever and wherever we want.