I learned this summer you cannot use a bicycle pump to short-cut blowing up a big wading pool - it has to be done the old-fashioned way. One hour and numerous dizzy spells later, the kids had their pool:
Dec 31, 2010
Summer by the Pool
Aahh, summer by the pool. No expense spared here!
I learned this summer you cannot use a bicycle pump to short-cut blowing up a big wading pool - it has to be done the old-fashioned way. One hour and numerous dizzy spells later, the kids had their pool:
I learned this summer you cannot use a bicycle pump to short-cut blowing up a big wading pool - it has to be done the old-fashioned way. One hour and numerous dizzy spells later, the kids had their pool:
Dec 23, 2010
Get over yourself Mum
My five-year-old called me out on high-mindedness last night.
We had a lovely night last night with some friends visiting, so we could catch up before Christmas and exchange gifts for each others' kids. After they left my girls were unwrapping the birthday gifts their godmother had given them, and I was using the large kitchen scissors to free the Barbies from the tiny, transparent but industrial strength plastic ropes that bound them in ten places to their cardboard containers.
As M stepped near me to get a closer look I said "Be careful of my scissors!" in that authoritarian voice mums use when we're running the show and sending a warning.
M was not having it. "No Mum, it's not me that has to be careful, it's you, because you're the one waving them around."
And she was right, of course.
We had a lovely night last night with some friends visiting, so we could catch up before Christmas and exchange gifts for each others' kids. After they left my girls were unwrapping the birthday gifts their godmother had given them, and I was using the large kitchen scissors to free the Barbies from the tiny, transparent but industrial strength plastic ropes that bound them in ten places to their cardboard containers.
As M stepped near me to get a closer look I said "Be careful of my scissors!" in that authoritarian voice mums use when we're running the show and sending a warning.
M was not having it. "No Mum, it's not me that has to be careful, it's you, because you're the one waving them around."
And she was right, of course.
Dec 16, 2010
We are family....
...though the number of family members is clearly a matter of opinion...
This one is by A.
It looks somewhat like one of those fake children's paintings you see in movies where you know that someone in the studio has really done it - but this is a real one, honest.
Apart from the colour that is quite an accurate depiction of my hair.
This one is by M. I love the way she always draws her people all over the picture like floating ghosts.
I think the blue and red figure at bottom left is the cat. I'd say Mum and Dad are in front (interestingly Mum on the left in both pictures...clearly the boss of the house, ha!).
Not sure who the extra kid is as I'm sure we only have two...
Dec 15, 2010
Not the right time for banking reform
I hesitate a little to put this out there because SURELY the men making the noise and the decisions know what they are doing and understand all this stuff better than us. Surely... Don't they? Oh that's right - they don't.
Background: Since the "end" (huh!) of the GFC, Australian banks have been moving their interest rates [on loans not deposits!] "independently" of the Reserve Bank. This mostly means that when the RBA raises the cash rate by a certain amount (usually 0.25%), the Big Four banks are these days raising theirs anywhere from 0.10 to 0.50 above the "official" rise.
This has caused shock and anger and there has been a lot of talk about banks gouging customers and price signalling, and the fact that there is limited competition in Australia among banks.
So first the opposition shadow treasurer and then the actual treasurer have proposed various measures to reform the banking system and force banks to be nicer.
All of which are wrong-headed in my mind and doomed to fail.
Now speaking personally, we have a hefty mortgage, which we have made precisely NO headway in reducing, and we are feeling the rate rises - but here's my view.
Yes no doubt the banks are taking advantage where they can - it's in their nature, plus they probably feel compelled to "catch up" for the low interest rates during the stimulus period of the GFC.
Banks face increasing funding costs due to the GFC and tighter credit in the global markets, blah blah blah insert bank press releases here - which is true but it is equally true that the funding processes provide a nice cushiony less-than-transparent way for banks to add a little extra without exposing this to their customers.
Those rate rises get smaller again - at some point the GFC will pass or abate, banks will get less jittery and the normal competitive urges between the banks [limited as they are] will re-assert themselves.
The GFC is a total, global, unprecedented, once-in-three-generations event which has had eye-popping and massive impacts which are still playing out like the ripples from a stone thrown in a pond (or a meteor slammed into the sea). Not a good time to legislate as a reaction to the fall-out.
Both our government finance ministers and the opposition ones are, well, somewhat new, shall we say, to
the worlds of banking and finance and perhaps are not quite qualified to make sweeping reforms...? (Though to be fair I will add that I don't think anyone can manage this very well)
We should keep in mind the law of unintended consequences here; on a small scale look at what happened when the Reserve Bank brought in the new ATM fee system which notified customers using a "foreign" ATM of the fee that would be charged. Transparency increased - but so did the fees. Where some banks decreased the fees or stopped charging them, they started charging others instead.
[I am reminded here of the story of a daycare centre related in the first Freakonomics book which increased late pick-up fines to try and reduce the number of parents running late to pick up their kids. The result of the increase was more parents running late more often - because once they were paying a premium to be late they no longer felt so guilty about it and were happy to "buy" the right to come later when it suited them].
If banks are legislated against applying certain fees, they will just apply others, or increase costs to borrowers in less transparent ways. Obviously. John Locke pointed this out back in 1692.
Banks are entitled to charge some fees. Switching mortgages, paying out a fixed loan earlier than the maturity date, going into overdraft, or basically doing anything that requires extra funding by the bank can reasonably attract a fee.
However there is no doubt banks take advantage. In the old days you couldn't easily go into overdraft - the bank would not honour payments. Now they honour them and charge you an overdraft fee. People are reasonably angry about this. Under pressure, the banks have reduced (and in one case removed) these charges, and to my mind a small (single digit!) charge is reasonable for this "service". But a better way would be giving customers an option when they set up their accounts: do you want payments honoured into overdraft for a small fee, or do you prefer the bank to dishonour any payment which would send your account into overdraft (for no fee). Even better, charge different fees depending on the amount into overdraft, time taken to bring the account back into credit, etc. Most clients would pay minimal fees (a few cents or dollars a time say). Banks have very sophisticated systems and it is not difficult to set up algorithms to manage this type of charge. There is little administrative burden and the charges are not really designed to discourage overdrafts - at least this way the charges would be honest and useful (larger fees for larger overdrafts would serve to discourage overdrafts as well as cover the bank's risk, where the customer had chosen this option rather than the option not to honour payments).
Similarly for switching mortgages - yes the charges to switch are outrageous, but the government is correct to look for adding ways to make switching easier, rather than outlaw the fees. (Some sort of fee is reasonable unless another aspect of switching allows banks to recoup costs from each other - as remember when you pay out a loan early you are [in theory if not always in practice] disadvantaging the bank which has borrowed money to fund your loan using a rate based on the value and time of the original loan life). As well as the amount of the fee, one of the big disincentives to switch is "bundling" - the process banks have of getting you hooked up to linked transaction, saving, credit and loan accounts at the same time as you get your mortgage. Switching would be easier if "unbundling" was as easy as the "bundling". There should also be easier options to set up a mortgage and retain transactional accounts at other banks (though this is not necessarily advantageous currently, what if same-day transfers between different banks were possible without the cost?)
I do believe there must be legislation and watchdogs over banking - but the legislation has to be fairly "light". You can't legislate fairness completely. And you can't concoct fake competition into a market that doesn't have much. New Zealand chose to set up a state bank to increase competition - I'm not convinced that's a solution (and obviously neither is our government as they have ruled it out); we all know how nimble and competitive state-run institutions are (not)!
We do have to accept that there will always be costs associated with banking. There must be minimum legislation to keep basic fairness and retain competition, but in general when it comes to rules and legislation around finance, the required basic rules are already in place. You have to think very carefully about any new ones as after hundreds of years of commercial banking and finance, there is not really anything new and new rules and legislation are seldom actually needed. (Similarly, repealing or removing existing rules is not always a good idea either - there are reasons for rules that have been in place for decades or more).
Here is a great quote to finish off, on the law of unintended consequences:
"The law of unintended consequences, often cited but rarely defined, is that actions of people—and especially of government—always have effects that are unanticipated or unintended. Economists and other social scientists have heeded its power for centuries; for just as long, politicians and popular opinion have largely ignored it."
- Rob Norton, "Unintended Consequences", The Concise Encyclopedia of Economics - at:
http://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/UnintendedConsequences.html
Background: Since the "end" (huh!) of the GFC, Australian banks have been moving their interest rates [on loans not deposits!] "independently" of the Reserve Bank. This mostly means that when the RBA raises the cash rate by a certain amount (usually 0.25%), the Big Four banks are these days raising theirs anywhere from 0.10 to 0.50 above the "official" rise.
This has caused shock and anger and there has been a lot of talk about banks gouging customers and price signalling, and the fact that there is limited competition in Australia among banks.
So first the opposition shadow treasurer and then the actual treasurer have proposed various measures to reform the banking system and force banks to be nicer.
All of which are wrong-headed in my mind and doomed to fail.
Now speaking personally, we have a hefty mortgage, which we have made precisely NO headway in reducing, and we are feeling the rate rises - but here's my view.
Yes no doubt the banks are taking advantage where they can - it's in their nature, plus they probably feel compelled to "catch up" for the low interest rates during the stimulus period of the GFC.
Banks face increasing funding costs due to the GFC and tighter credit in the global markets, blah blah blah insert bank press releases here - which is true but it is equally true that the funding processes provide a nice cushiony less-than-transparent way for banks to add a little extra without exposing this to their customers.
Those rate rises get smaller again - at some point the GFC will pass or abate, banks will get less jittery and the normal competitive urges between the banks [limited as they are] will re-assert themselves.
The GFC is a total, global, unprecedented, once-in-three-generations event which has had eye-popping and massive impacts which are still playing out like the ripples from a stone thrown in a pond (or a meteor slammed into the sea). Not a good time to legislate as a reaction to the fall-out.
Both our government finance ministers and the opposition ones are, well, somewhat new, shall we say, to
the worlds of banking and finance and perhaps are not quite qualified to make sweeping reforms...? (Though to be fair I will add that I don't think anyone can manage this very well)
We should keep in mind the law of unintended consequences here; on a small scale look at what happened when the Reserve Bank brought in the new ATM fee system which notified customers using a "foreign" ATM of the fee that would be charged. Transparency increased - but so did the fees. Where some banks decreased the fees or stopped charging them, they started charging others instead.
[I am reminded here of the story of a daycare centre related in the first Freakonomics book which increased late pick-up fines to try and reduce the number of parents running late to pick up their kids. The result of the increase was more parents running late more often - because once they were paying a premium to be late they no longer felt so guilty about it and were happy to "buy" the right to come later when it suited them].
If banks are legislated against applying certain fees, they will just apply others, or increase costs to borrowers in less transparent ways. Obviously. John Locke pointed this out back in 1692.
Banks are entitled to charge some fees. Switching mortgages, paying out a fixed loan earlier than the maturity date, going into overdraft, or basically doing anything that requires extra funding by the bank can reasonably attract a fee.
However there is no doubt banks take advantage. In the old days you couldn't easily go into overdraft - the bank would not honour payments. Now they honour them and charge you an overdraft fee. People are reasonably angry about this. Under pressure, the banks have reduced (and in one case removed) these charges, and to my mind a small (single digit!) charge is reasonable for this "service". But a better way would be giving customers an option when they set up their accounts: do you want payments honoured into overdraft for a small fee, or do you prefer the bank to dishonour any payment which would send your account into overdraft (for no fee). Even better, charge different fees depending on the amount into overdraft, time taken to bring the account back into credit, etc. Most clients would pay minimal fees (a few cents or dollars a time say). Banks have very sophisticated systems and it is not difficult to set up algorithms to manage this type of charge. There is little administrative burden and the charges are not really designed to discourage overdrafts - at least this way the charges would be honest and useful (larger fees for larger overdrafts would serve to discourage overdrafts as well as cover the bank's risk, where the customer had chosen this option rather than the option not to honour payments).
Similarly for switching mortgages - yes the charges to switch are outrageous, but the government is correct to look for adding ways to make switching easier, rather than outlaw the fees. (Some sort of fee is reasonable unless another aspect of switching allows banks to recoup costs from each other - as remember when you pay out a loan early you are [in theory if not always in practice] disadvantaging the bank which has borrowed money to fund your loan using a rate based on the value and time of the original loan life). As well as the amount of the fee, one of the big disincentives to switch is "bundling" - the process banks have of getting you hooked up to linked transaction, saving, credit and loan accounts at the same time as you get your mortgage. Switching would be easier if "unbundling" was as easy as the "bundling". There should also be easier options to set up a mortgage and retain transactional accounts at other banks (though this is not necessarily advantageous currently, what if same-day transfers between different banks were possible without the cost?)
I do believe there must be legislation and watchdogs over banking - but the legislation has to be fairly "light". You can't legislate fairness completely. And you can't concoct fake competition into a market that doesn't have much. New Zealand chose to set up a state bank to increase competition - I'm not convinced that's a solution (and obviously neither is our government as they have ruled it out); we all know how nimble and competitive state-run institutions are (not)!
We do have to accept that there will always be costs associated with banking. There must be minimum legislation to keep basic fairness and retain competition, but in general when it comes to rules and legislation around finance, the required basic rules are already in place. You have to think very carefully about any new ones as after hundreds of years of commercial banking and finance, there is not really anything new and new rules and legislation are seldom actually needed. (Similarly, repealing or removing existing rules is not always a good idea either - there are reasons for rules that have been in place for decades or more).
Here is a great quote to finish off, on the law of unintended consequences:
"The law of unintended consequences, often cited but rarely defined, is that actions of people—and especially of government—always have effects that are unanticipated or unintended. Economists and other social scientists have heeded its power for centuries; for just as long, politicians and popular opinion have largely ignored it."
- Rob Norton, "Unintended Consequences", The Concise Encyclopedia of Economics - at:
http://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/UnintendedConsequences.html
Dec 14, 2010
The Working Through It Spag Bol
I was very impressed with myself today so have decided to share with the lucky internet my delicious recipe for a sort of spaghetti bolognaise, invented and ingested today.
Inspiration: We are only a couple of days back from a short break away, and there is not a lot of fresh veg in the fridge, but there were 2 tomatoes and an eggplant sitting there which were about to turn.
I made this this afternoon while working from home and it passed all my just-invented busy-working-mum tests: it used enough fresh ingredients to make me feel virtuous, used all ready-at-hand ingredients to make me feel economical and clever, was easy to make, incorporated a good serve of veg, and was liked by 3 out of 4 family members - that's good enough for me!
Ingredients:
Method:
Inspiration: We are only a couple of days back from a short break away, and there is not a lot of fresh veg in the fridge, but there were 2 tomatoes and an eggplant sitting there which were about to turn.
I made this this afternoon while working from home and it passed all my just-invented busy-working-mum tests: it used enough fresh ingredients to make me feel virtuous, used all ready-at-hand ingredients to make me feel economical and clever, was easy to make, incorporated a good serve of veg, and was liked by 3 out of 4 family members - that's good enough for me!
Ingredients:
- olive oil
- 400g lean mince
- one eggplant, diced
- 2 very ripe tomatoes
- bottle of commercial bolognaise sauce or other variety (mine was Dolmio Red Wine pasta sauce) (and cut me some slack on the sauce, I'm busy)
- one celery stick, chopped (I buy celery and cut up each stick and put them in ziplock bags and keep them frozen for soups and sauces - so in my case this is one bag of frozen celery pieces)
- one packet of frozen spinach
- one sachet, or about 2 tablespoons, tomato paste
- squirt of tomato ketchup (if needed)
Method:
- Heat the oil in a heavy pot over medium heat
- Add the mince and brown it
- Add the eggpant, celery, spinach and pasta sauce; mix so the frozen vegs are in the middle of the pot covered with sauce. Turn down heat to low, cover and simmer for 40mins plus, checking and mixing occasionally to make sure the mixture doesn't reduce too far.
- When the sauce and veg are well cooked, mix in the tomato paste and leave on low heat uncovered while spaghetti is cooking.
- Cook and drain spaghetti, mix in with meat sauce in the pot, and taste.
- If a little extra flavour is needed, or if kids need enticement to try it, then at the table add a squirt of tomato ketchup.
Where are my jacaranda flowers?
We have a beautiful jacaranda tree in our back yard, which flowers every October. Every springtime like clockwork, as a lovely birthday present to me (!), beautiful clusters of purple flowers appear all over the tree, and each day over the next few weeks are shed to form a gorgeous lilac carpet over our lawn.
Except this year.
All through October, November and into December, we had no flowers!
I tried Google and Ask.com. I googled "Jacaranda flowers" and asked Ask.com "why hasn't my jacaranda tree flowered?" Unusually, both let me down - no info other than a summary of where Jacarandas come from (South America and the Carribean) and when they flower (spring).
 |
| This is not our tree - but you get the idea Image by Thierry Caro, from Wikipedia, copied under license Creative Commons |
All through October, November and into December, we had no flowers!
 |
| THIS is our tree :-( |
Can I blame global warming? The end of the drought...? Are we in an El Nino year? (On that - what happened to El Nino and La Nina? Not many years ago they were all the rage, an El Nino was identifiable and talked of every 3 to 4 years - now very seldom discussed. Have they really disappeared? Or do they not fit the climate change paradigm...?)
I have heard since that there is a bit of a thing in Melbourne this year, where jacarandas have flowered later than usual, and no one knows why.
This week, we have got a few flowers - a very tiny number, but perhaps we'll see a full flowering soon. Fingers crossed.
 |
| Our tree with this year's first flowers - two months late! |
 |
| What Jacaranda litter usually looks like Image by Peter Greenwell, at Wikipedia, copied under license Creative Commons |
 |
| Our jacaranda litter - not exactly the sea of purple we were expecting |
ADDENDUM, 1 January. We got our flowers - in mid-December?! Tree looking more respectable now.
Dec 13, 2010
Sixty (Off Topic)
This questionnaire comes by way of Princess Pandora Queen of Denial, Blurb from the Burbs, and The Plastic Mancunian. Filling this out was a nice way to keep posting while I was on holiday and my mind had turned a bit mushy.
1. Are you happier now than you were five months ago?
Oooooh, yes. Definitely. Five months ago I was on the verge of a nervous breakdown, stressed and sad and yelling at my kids, and wondering what was wrong with me. Since then I have had a very helpful prescription, had stress leave from my job, talked to a psychologist, had a holiday, and am a different person.
 |
| Image: Wagner Machado Carlos Lemes at Flickr Creative Commons |
1. Are you happier now than you were five months ago?
Oooooh, yes. Definitely. Five months ago I was on the verge of a nervous breakdown, stressed and sad and yelling at my kids, and wondering what was wrong with me. Since then I have had a very helpful prescription, had stress leave from my job, talked to a psychologist, had a holiday, and am a different person.
Interesting Dangerous Idea
More on a topic I love, correlation vs causation.
Michael Agger from Slate Magazine has been soliciting ideas for how to use data from online sources such as social networking sites, for making improvements in our lives.
One of the suggestions was The Correlations Project, which proposes:
"I want to see a website that lets me keep track of something simple for a set period of time, and then compares it to a database to search for correlations. For example, over the course of a week or month or year, or even on an ongoing basis, it could ask, "What did you have for breakfast today?" or "What color shirt did you wear today?" or "How many calls did you get on your cell phone today?" Maybe a daily e-mail would remind you to log in with the answers. Then it would compare the answers to other things that are already tracked such as the stock market, phases of the moon, sports scores, etc., and spit out some correlations. It could tell you "On 93% of the days on which you ate eggs for breakfast, the stock market went up." Or, "When the moon is waxing, you are 88% more likely to wear a green shirt than when it is waning." Or, "On days when you get more than 7 phone calls, the Yankees win their games."
Agger explains: "The point of the correlations project, according to the submitter "IronicSans," is to demonstrate the axiom that correlation does not imply causation." He points out the ubiquitousness of coincidences and our tendancy to see links and cause where none exist, and he quotes the case of Paul the Octopus as one example.
A really interesting idea. I have a feeling though that the correlations brought up would become the point in themselves, the site would become a mecca for people believing in its power and accuracy, and in the end it would achieve the complete opposite of what it set out to do!
Michael Agger from Slate Magazine has been soliciting ideas for how to use data from online sources such as social networking sites, for making improvements in our lives.
One of the suggestions was The Correlations Project, which proposes:
"I want to see a website that lets me keep track of something simple for a set period of time, and then compares it to a database to search for correlations. For example, over the course of a week or month or year, or even on an ongoing basis, it could ask, "What did you have for breakfast today?" or "What color shirt did you wear today?" or "How many calls did you get on your cell phone today?" Maybe a daily e-mail would remind you to log in with the answers. Then it would compare the answers to other things that are already tracked such as the stock market, phases of the moon, sports scores, etc., and spit out some correlations. It could tell you "On 93% of the days on which you ate eggs for breakfast, the stock market went up." Or, "When the moon is waxing, you are 88% more likely to wear a green shirt than when it is waning." Or, "On days when you get more than 7 phone calls, the Yankees win their games."
Agger explains: "The point of the correlations project, according to the submitter "IronicSans," is to demonstrate the axiom that correlation does not imply causation." He points out the ubiquitousness of coincidences and our tendancy to see links and cause where none exist, and he quotes the case of Paul the Octopus as one example.
A really interesting idea. I have a feeling though that the correlations brought up would become the point in themselves, the site would become a mecca for people believing in its power and accuracy, and in the end it would achieve the complete opposite of what it set out to do!
Kids spoiled much??
Somehow my kids have ended up with three birthdays this year.
Being mid-December babies, birthday parties are a bit difficult. December is very tricky for birthday parties - you have to schedule around your own family/work/friends parties and year-end events, plus everyone else's committments, and also make sure you don't set up anything on the same weekend as the Wiggles concerts. I learned this the hard way...
Being mid-December babies, birthday parties are a bit difficult. December is very tricky for birthday parties - you have to schedule around your own family/work/friends parties and year-end events, plus everyone else's committments, and also make sure you don't set up anything on the same weekend as the Wiggles concerts. I learned this the hard way...
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