Text 7878, 97 rader
Skriven 2008-05-27 09:12:42 av Glen Jamieson
     Kommentar till en text av Michael Loo
Ärende: BEYOND OUR OWN NOSE 80527
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 -=> Quoting Michael Loo to Glen Jamieson <=-

 GJ> banner headlines concerned the viability of a local footballer's knee,
 GJ> while disasters resulting in mass deaths in India were relegated to
 GJ> page 3 or thereabouts.
 ML> At least they make page 3.

There are enough Indians in Australia to justify Murdoch publishing
some news about their country of origin.

 GJ> But even a death toll of 75,000 (later estimate, and rising) is not

 ML> I was unaware it was that many, but I'm not surprised. The quake was
 ML> in a fairly populous area.

I was thinking of the Burmese cyclone, but the total of that and the
Chinese disaster at about the same time certainly exceeded that.
 
 GJ> great compared with the numbers killed by cars, which in USA are in
 GJ> the hundreds of thousands per year.

 ML> I was unaware it was that many. That puts it even beyond the heart
 ML> attack and cancer range, no?

As Dale pointed out, due to my ignoring the presence of an independent
variable (introduction of seatbelts and puff bags) when extrapolating
from 1960s figures. I was out by a factor of two.

 ML> Having a transportation system that didn't rely on cars wouldn't be
 ML> a bad idea; making the cars safer is also not that bad of an idea.

As cost is the main mover in such matters, world fuel price increases
will result in greater effort being spent on more fuel efficient means
of transport than cars - or jet planes.  Roll on the trains and
trolley-buses, running on nuclear generated electricity!
 
 GJ> used coal gas for cooking.  That contains a large proportion of CO and
 GJ> H2.  Before it was lit, all that CO poured into the kitchen
 GJ> atmosphere, but it didn't harm me.  This toxicity was well known, and

 ML> Are we completely sure of that?

By comparing my mental state with people who grew up in places outside
the influence of coal gas, for example Kevin, I can see that I am very
normal indeed.
 
 GJ> exploited by those people who preferred a nice, quiet suicide by
 GJ> kneeling down with their head resting on the middle rack in the gas
 ML> "He turned on the gas and he went to sleep" - Simon and Garfunkel,
 ML> A Most Peculiar Man

Coal gas was used a lot for cooking and suicides in UK in the past.
 
 GJ> oven.  That achieved a lethal concentration, but everything, including
 GJ> the suicider, could explode if a spark from a light switch ignited it.

 ML> The H2 explodes; don't think the CO does, at least not to that
 ML> degree.

Coal gas, which is produced by heating coal in retorts, contains
aromatic hydrocarbons, hydrogen as well as the carbon monoxide, which
is the inactivating ingredient used by Most Peculiar Men.  The overall
mixture of those gases with air is highly explosive.  CO by itself, as
made in gas producers by burning carbon (coke, charcoal) with
restricted oxygen, was used by cars as a fuel during WW2.
 
 -=> Glen Jamieson said to Carol Shenkenberger <=-
 
 GJ> About 20 years ago I dined in a small Italianate restaurant in
 GJ> Adelaide which had very tiny - about 4 cm long - octopuses which had
 GJ> been deep-fried.  Apparently marinated first, then quickly cooked in
 GJ> hot oil to crunchiness.  They really did look like dead spiders, but
 ML> Perhaps they were in fact dead spiders, which are supposed to
 ML> taste pretty good anyhow. Deep-fried big baby octopuses would
 ML> probably be kind of mushy inside.

It is easy to tell arthropods from cephalopods, by the joints, or lack
of same.  The bodies were tender and tasty.
 
Yesterday I visited the Macro Meats processing works a few km away, and
found their "shop" to be a couple of display cases in a room with the
receptionist at the main entrance.  There were various cuts of kangaroo
in packs - roasts, steaks with several kinds of marinade, mince, and
Kanga Banga sausages including a new line, flavoured with "bush tomato
and mountain pepper leaf".  Also on display were goat legs ready for
roasting and wild pig fillets at $11/kg.  Prices of 'roo meat were
about 2/3 that charged by supermarkets, so were probably wholesale.
The young lady receptionist, who was taking orders by phone when I came
in, was quite friendly, and seemed to be running the front office side
of this, the largest 'roo meat business in Australia, without trouble.
I asked where the pig meat came from, and she said it came from all
over the state, "anywhere we can get it", but all from the wild.  That
is something I might experiment with in the future.
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 * Origin: Braintap BBS Adelaide Australia (3:800/449)