Asleep on a Train

Well, nowhere really. I have started a blog several times, on the train, at work, at home (both of them) but nothing publishable of late. This one should be different. February flew past, followed quickly by March, and now it is one day away from my brother David's birthday ie Mid April, and I am not happy with not submitting stuff to this site. February & March saw me spending a lot of time in Sydney and at the office, interspersed with weekends down in Geelong helping Dee tidy the house for a seemlesly endless series of "Open Homes" Each time was like a "Backyard Blitz" / "home improvement" show, with Dee, the girls and I throwing baskets of household items into clothes baskets and stuffing them into the shed, and the boot of the car, with 5 minutes to go before the Real Estate tossers arrived. Then we would drive around Geelong for 45 minutes, come home to a tidy, sparkling house, only to instantly begin messing it up again by making a cup o...

For many many years, I have had a little statement rolling around in my head. I can't recall where I heard it, but I know it was not an original idea of my own. It goes something like this... A man's weekly wage can buy a bicycle or a good suit of clothes A man's monthly wage can buy a reasonable car A man's yearly wage can buy a luxury car A man's Half yearly wage will allow him to take a family of four on an overseas holiday Three years of a Man's wage could buy a small house/home ...and all this was from 100 years ago. Since then, I have sporadically and randomly searched for this type of reference on the internet but I've come up mostly empty, however I recently read another statement along the same lines, in that an ounce of gold could buy a pound of bread (or about 600 loaves) This has prove to be a lot richer vein to follow, if you can pardon my pun. This thought can be traced as far back as 2,500 years, so maybe after all the wondefull chan...

Ten years ago I took myself off to driving school and got my Heavy Rigid driving permit . I have used it for two jobs, once was driving a flatbed delivery truck , and for two years I drove a passenger bus locally, meaning three bucket items got ticked off. After recently becoming unemployed again, I applied for a Truck Driving role and I was contacted by the advertising organisaton to come in for an interview (it was a chat really). Needless to say, I did not hesitate getting in to see them. Among the roles available, several of them required me to upgrade my licensing or driving permits, and this organisation had a training arm, and I was/am eligible for government sponsored training, so I signed up immediately. Last Monday was day one of my driving training. I spent most of the day learning about Driver Fatigue and the penalties for breaking the rules. It is very expensive...breaking the rules that is. The next 3 days involved learning more topics, such as safe handling of goo...

This is a bit of a deep and meaningful post, as I try to work through my mixed feelings about being once again looking for work, with all the ongoing issues faced by a reasonably healthy, but older male in today's dog eat dog job hunting world. Those who know me well, would be aware of the various jobs and roles I've had over a long period of my working life. I will now attempt to list them in some kind of chronological order. Left School (Moved to Patea NZ) Stock Clerk at a Abottior Labourer in a Fellmongery (Moved to Christchurch) Costing Clerk at a Freezer Company office (Meat exporters) (Redundant #1) Trainee Computer Operator Computer Operator (Married, and first child (a beautiful daughter) Senior Computer Operator 2nd Child (a son!...the Bohan name can continue)(built a house = mortgage) COBOL Programmer (Redundant #2) (Dad dies) Not looking for more Computer Work as industry was stuffed. Insurance Salesman. (couldn't make it, struggled with col...

For this story, you, the reader will need historical context to understand the punchline Historical Context bit (if you have lived in Melbourne recently, and understand the recent changes in the Public Transport system you can skip this bit) In recent years, through a combination of, and since the great influx of people moving to the "World's Most Livable City", the Western Financial Crisis (aka GFC) and the general price of car fuel, inner city car parking, and worsening Traffic congestion, many people have started using the trains to get to work. The increased usage of trains forced the Train management team to change the way trains get into the City Loop, meaning more passengers now have to 'change trains' at outer lying stations in order to get to the inner city "loop" stations. I choose to be one of those disadvantaged public transport users, needed to change from the city bound Werribee train at the North Melbourne station, in order to catch a ...