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Graeme

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Everything posted by Graeme

  1. Oh, wow! I certainly didn't see that coming. Timothy just doesn't understand....
  2. A fascinating story and an intriguing setting. I'll have to go read that other story mentioned sometime soon. One of the things I enjoyed was the little touch of Kass using his island skills to make himself a bed for the night...and then setting the alarm on his watch. The collision of cultures somehow made the story so much more real. As for exactly what happened, who cares. I hope the boys do well and maybe we'll see then again in some of those future stories that Nigel mentioned
  3. ... And that's what I thought of the story. Well done!
  4. Okay, American kids are weird. Imagine being made to feel better by being told that they'll be going to school. Either that, or American schools are just so much better than Australian ones I really enojyed this story. I agree with Jeff on how his parents treated him, but I know parents aren't perfect Unlike fourteen-year-olds. Just for the record, I own a 64MB USB. I lent it to someone one day and they that made extra sure I got it back because they thought it was 64GB...
  5. I loved the twists and turns in this story, especially how one just flowed into the next so there was no break, no interruption to the enjoyable read. One thing I've always liked about Cynus's stories is the attention to detail. The little things like the wrought-iron stairway, or the fine detailed descriptions that never seem to be laboured. I guessed at least part of the ending before it was revealed, but that didn't change the enjoyable nature of the story. Thanks, Cynus!
  6. Being a Halloween story, I kept reading more into it than I should have...but that's obviously the author's intent. If that's so, he has succeeded wonderfully! The links at the end were the icing on the cake, so thank you! A well-told tale that lead me up the garden path, or maybe down the zig-zag lane, never quite knowing what was around the next corner.
  7. Wow! I loved it. The build up and then the confrontation with Luke...all done with just the right tone and uncertainty. A really enjoyable read and a great way to start the Halloween Collection. To be honest, I was wondering if Curtis was on the autism spectrum. Having said that, while he has a number of autistic traits, they're also common traits of shy kids and I don't believe every shy kid is autistic. However, I'm still inclined to believe he has high-functioning autism since he ticks so many of the boxes. Since I have an interest in the subject, that just helped make the story for me. Thanks, Gee Whillikers!
  8. It's well worth it. A little cliched in parts, but overall I loved it. I couldn't stop reading it once I started.
  9. I've just edited Chris's post and done what Bruin has suggested: selected all the text and then used the icon on the toolbar (the one to the right of the "Size" drop down list) to select "Automatic" for the color. It's now readable. Somehow, Chris's default text color has been set to the same as the background color, making it more challenging to read.... Hopefully, if he resets it to "Automatic" it'll remember it for the future.
  10. One thing I've said before but I'll repeat here: I don't believe the Australian solution will work in the USA. Australia has a very different gun-culture to the USA. To start with, most gun-related crimes are within the criminal community. That is, criminals tend to use guns each other and not on the general population. I believe this is partly because gun-crime has always been at low levels so any gun-related crime attracts a lot of police and media attention. The amount of resources thrown at someone who has commited a gun-related crime against the general population is very high. Criminals know that and generally avoid trying to bring that sort of attention to themselves. That's not the case in the USA where gun-related crime appears (from this side of the world) to be part of the society. While it's frowned upon, it's not a big news item if someone uses a gun to rob someone. Even firing a gun often doesn't make the news unless there's something special about the case. Also, as stated in the Snopes article, there's never been a high gun-ownership in Australia. I know people who own guns (my brother-in-law is a farmer, and a former neighbour was a keen hunter), but even they don't carry guns with them most of the time. Guns are used for a purpose: usually recreation or work. They're generally not used for defense. Again, that's very different to the USA where guns are much more common. In short, the USA has a unique culture (at least to me: I think some middle-eastern cultures may have a similar attitude to guns) and as such any solution to gun-crime will need a unique culture-specific solution. Don't look to Australia for how to solve any perceived problem. Our situation is too different and our solution isn't yours.
  11. And here's the link to official government homicide figures that provesdisproves the figures above: http://www.aic.gov.au/statistics/homicide/weapon.html As an Australian, I looked at what was written above with disbelief and had to check the figures. I wasn't surprised to find that while the numbers may have been accurate for an instant in time (I also noted that there's no references in that report, so they may never have been accurate), the overall trend is completely different to what's implied. Further investigation found the above 'letter' on Snopes.com: http://www.snopes.com/crime/statistics/ausguns.asp I'll let the reader review the Snopes article for completeness, but since I live in Victoria, the article states that the 300% increase in homocides in Victoria was incorrect. It should be 171%. Still sounds great until you realise that out of a population of 4.5 million, that was an increase from 7 firearm-related homocides to 19. That is, an increase of 12 in a population of 4,500,000 people. Is that really significant?
  12. Rainbow Bridge: Mother and son start social club for LGBTQI youth with intellectual disabilties I just saw this and I think what they're doing is wonderful. Being intellectually disabled is tough enough when it comes to finding a boyfriend/girlfriend. Being intellectually disabled and gay must be that much worse.
  13. I grew up at the end of the typewriter era. I've used one (we had one at home when I was a kid) but not very often. My first year at university was also the first year that they had online terminals for the students in the computer lab. Of course, they were held down to 1200 baud, which was painfully slow, but it was still much easier to type and edit things on those computer terminals than it was to use a typewriter.
  14. I used to do race walking as a pre-teen. I was actually quite good, making the district finals one year (the last year I raced). I was, sadly, disqualified -- something I didn't find out until the end of the race (three warnings was a disqualification and I had two judges give me warnings, but I then learnt that the chief judge's warnings count as two, so instead of finishing 6th and qualifying for the state finals, I was disqualified). My father was also into race walking (he was my coach), though I didn't find out he'd competed in the Australian championships as a race walker until it was mentioned at his funeral. He had to give up the sport due to a heart condition. Coming out in any public arena isn't easy, so best of luck to Tom Bosworth. I hope it all works out for him
  15. I first read this story many years ago. I really need to find the time to sit down and read it again once it finishes posting here It's a great story.
  16. The village where girls become boys at puberty Life is a lot more complicated than many people think. I'm sure there's a story in there somewhere...
  17. The article I read this morning in one of the NZ newspapers said that he showed it to his first teacher who appeared appreciative, but told him not to show it to any other teacher. It was when the alarm went off in another class and the teacher of that class saw it that things escalated. A pity that the first teacher wasn't able to speak up before things went too far.
  18. Not according to this study. Personally, I think it's more than just stereotyping or a static visual image. It's noticing, maybe subconsciously, who the other person finds interesting, and whether they're male or female. It's how people react to different stimuli. I don't assume a guy who is effeminate, who lisps, who likes shopping, who dresses smartly, or who sashays is gay. It's a possibility, but none of those are indicators for being gay. Yes, a large percentage of effeminate guys are gay, but not all of them. That's a factor in making a judgement call, but it's not the only one. Gaydar, to me, is adding up all of those things and then making a judgement call. And even then, I realise that it's only an educated guess and I'm almost certainly missing a lot of people. But it's all I've got
  19. Actually, as I understand it, her current husband is her third, not fourth; she recycled one As others have said, the politicians who are coming out in support of her don't seem to realise that by doing so they are also supporting the application of Sharia Law. After all, if a person's religious views can be imposed on others as part of their job, then that's not just restricted to so-called Christians. (I'm someone who considers himself to be a Christian, so that's a dig at those who don't seem to understand that Jesus taught love and inclusion, not hate and discrimination. After all, he was friends with tax collectors and prostitutes...) I saw a comment online that when asked about her view of signing marriage certificates for people who are divorced and she replied along the lines that that was between them and God. Why can't same-sex marriage be between the couple concerned and God, too? Just another example of hypocrisy in my opinion.
  20. Last Week Tonight is currently showing on the Qantas long-haul flights. I think they're fairly old episodes, but it'll be interesting to see if this one is shown at some stage. I wouldn't be surprised; they have a documentary on transgender issues on the list of shows currently available.
  21. Thanks, Mike! Options for watching AFL matches: Australia: http://www.afl.com.au/broadcastguide International: http://www.afl.com.au/tv-radio/international-broadcast-partners If you're willing to pay: http://watchafl.afl.com.au/ Just so any readers know, what's happened is that my work commitments have really cut into my writing time, so I wasn't going to be able to keep going to the end that I originally wanted. Instead, I've decided to bring Leopard Spots to an end with chapter 57, and then I'll continue the next part of the story as a new story (Book 3 of the Lilydale Leopards). Unfortunately, because of those work commitments, I'm not going to be ready to start posting the new story anytime soon...but I do promise I am writing that story
  22. I'd heard of this before, but this article provides a lot more detail.
  23. Sadly, the problem is that it isn't the stuff of lawsuits because no laws are being broken. In the states in question, there's no anti-discriminating laws. The people involved are quite able to fire someone or decline to renew their lease. Even if you could prove that it was because the person is gay, there's no law against that.
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