bruncle

bruncle @ 2008-06-15T10:43:00

2008-06-15T00:35:07Z

Driving down my grandparents' street, The Finn Brothers' "Edible Flowers" was a little too apt. "Everyone wants the same thing, to see another birthday". I slapped the CD player off. I've never seen anyone that sick before. Even his glasses looked big on him. When he leant forward, his dressing gown flapped open and I could see every bone in his chest, only a thin layer of skin protecting them from my hurried glance. I'm just glad he's not suffering.

Racial profiling on the train

2008-04-01T01:23:55Z

To whom it may concern,
I was shocked to witness an incident involving your ticket inspectors last night on the 10:29 train from Flinders Street. At approximately 11:05 at East Malvern station, four plain clothes ticket inspectors boarded my carriage (I think it was the fourth from the back). One yelled out 'Tickets please', and naturally I and the other passengers pulled out our tickets. I was sitting right next to the door that the inspectors entered through, so it would be natural that I would be one of the first to have their tickets checked. However, instead, two of the ticket inspectors walked right past me and approximately ten other passengers and honed in on a black youth at the opposite end of the carriage. There was absolutely no doubt in my mind that this was racial profiling. There was no need for both of the inspectors to go directly to the other end of the carriage. Logically, if they wanted to cover all of the passengers before the train arrived at the next station, they (there were four of them) should have each started at one of the doors to cover the maximum number of passengers in the shortest time. They just made the assumption that because of his ethnicity, he would be unlikely to have a ticket.

I sincerely hope this kind of behaviour is not approved by Connex management. Our country has racial vilification laws, and I have no doubt that this behaviour would be considered actively flouting them. Is this a training issue? or were they simply rogue operators? Whatever the case, I'm sure I do not need to impress upon you the need to ensure that this behaviour does not continue in the future. If I do not receive an adequate response from you, I will consider taking this to some form of arbitrator. It was one of the most overt displays of racism I have seen in my life and I hope that I never have to see it repeated.

Yours sincerely,
Jeremy Nagel

bruncle @ 2007-12-31T21:31:00

2007-12-31T10:19:21Z

For anyone who's interested, I'm starting a travel blog for my trip to Germany.
http://journeymann.blogspot.com/

bruncle @ 2007-12-20T00:16:00

2007-12-19T13:05:05Z

Sucks to be this guy

Sunday Morning

2007-12-09T23:33:03Z

I ran the Sri Chimnoy Williamstown Foreshore run yesterday and really enjoyed it:). I usually do races with my dad, which is handy because he drives me and pays for my entry:P He decided to give this one a miss though because he had some work to catch up on. "No problems", I thought "I'll just catch the train". Went onto metlinkmelbourne only to discover that the first train I could catch would get me to Williamstown at 10:30 lol. I went back downstairs and pleaded with him to reconsider, but it was to no avail. So I got out the melways and tried to work out whether I could get to Williamstown on my bike. Crossing the Westgate bridge was going to be tricky. The punt that used to ferry people across had stopped operating, and I couldn't really see a way to get around it. Luckily my bike trail guide had a description of how to get to Williamstown from Flinders St station without relying on the punt. So after discussing it with my mum, who offered me a lift but in such a reluctant manner that I couldn't take it without feeling extremely guilty, I decided I'd get up at 4am to give myself plenty of time to get there. Before I went to bed, I was telling Schultz about it in a "aren't I nuts?" kind of way and mock invited him to come along. To my surprise he agreed at 11pm the night before to come along:D

So we met outside at 4:30am and started riding. At first it seemed like I'd allowed far too much time because we were cruising down the trail at 20kph when we only needed to go be going 13kph or so. We were joking about helping the Sri Chimnoy guys set up, we'd get there so early lol. It was lucky I did allow such a big buffer though because once we got to the city, the trail guide was outdated! The trail it directed us to was closed off because of a multitude of construction sites near the Maritime museum. We eventually figured out how to get back on to the trail it connected to and the rest of the ride was quite pleasant. Breathing in all the fumes from the oil refinery probably wasn't that great for our lungs, but ah well. We got to Williamstown at about 7.10 and with a little help from EarlyRunner, arrived at Sadler reserve and signed up.

The ride was actually a really good warmup. I could feel a bit of fatigue in my legs, but I was a lot more limber than I usually am. I managed to almost touch my toes when I was doing hamstring stretches:O Normally I can't get far past my knees hahaha!

I didn't do much of a warmup after that, just a short jog and a few striders and then walked over to the start line. It was nice to hear that Sri Chimnoy are going to keep on holding races into the future, I was a bit worried after he died that their excellent events might be postponed permanently:) When the race started I was caught off guard. I've never stood in the front row before, I'm used to shuffling along for a few seconds before I get across the line, so to have to sprint out immediately to avoid getting trampled was a bit of a shock. Good motivation though:P I didn't really have much of a race plan. I've decided I'm going to race by feel now (not really any other choice after losing my ForeRunner lol), so my plan was to get into about 10th place by km 1 and steadily pass people until I found someone going my kind of pace.

The first km felt really good, I was a bit worried that my quads wouldn't enjoy the first hill after the bike ride, but I barely noticed it. I went through km 1 in 3:30, completely in control. Not sure what place I was coming then, probably a bit closer to the lead than I had planned. When we got to the turnaround just short of km 2 (split was 7:08 or so), I counted the 5kers in front of me and was surprised to find myself already in 5th place. I was still feeling strong and passed a few more people. The pace felt ok until we got back to the start line, and then I began to struggle a little. I got passed by a blond guy about my age who said "I reckon I can take the two guys up ahead". His comment threw me a little, the guys up ahead were 10kers. I decided he was doing the 10k (tried to peer over and look at his bib, but couldn't see it for some reason) and let him go. At that point I thought I was in 4th place. The last km was punishing, I faded quite badly. I could feel one of the guys I'd passed on my shoulder and put on a quick spurt to fend him off, but apart from that I didn't have much of a kick.

I went through the finish in 18:42, which I was really happy with:). I really wanted to crack 19:00 this year and I certainly did that:) I'd written off my chances of getting a medal because I thought I'd finished fourth and the guys in front of me all looked like they'd be in the 18-39 age group, so I was very surprised when they called out my name for 3rd in the award ceremony:O I must've been coming second for quite a while. I would've fought a bit harder to keep up with the blond guy if I'd known that:P I was also a bit shocked at how close behind me 4th was - 18:43. He must've put on a powerful finishing sprint!

The 10k winner was very impressive, he finished in 33:20 or thereabouts. He was waaay ahead of the 5k leader (who was way ahead of me haha 16:52 or something). Schultz did very well for his first race - 27:20 and he would've gone a lot faster if he hadn't done a craazy negative split (1-5% works well, but 30% is a bit too big haha).

The ride home was quite torturous. I was doing fine for the first 30k, but the last 10k up steep hills trashed my legs so badly that even first gear felt impossible haha. It was a good workout though, 80k cycling plus a 5k race, over 6 hours lol. When I got home it was all I could do to keep from falling asleep until my grandparents had left:P

Now there's just one more chance to PB again for the year! I reckon I might be able to do it if I catch the train instead of riding in:P

Holy shit

2007-12-04T03:02:21Z

When I was eating breakfast this morning, I found a letter from Commonwealth bank on the bench. I opened it up to discover a new PIN info slip. I was like "Whaaat! I didn't order a new PIN!" and then I remembered that I'd applied for a credit card online last week.

It's pretty fucked up, they gave me a $4000 credit limit without even looking at my pay slips. It seems like you could just apply for one online and make up everything about your income and expenses. I had about $300 in my account at the time, so it wasn't like they looked at my balance and decided I was raking in the cash. Shows how easy it is to get credit at the moment I guess.

It's not a very responsible thing for the bank to do, because if I were to overdraught my card, I'd have to borrow money from my parents, essentially making them the underwriter of the loan. They had no part in applying for the card, so I don't think it's fair to give people in my situation (who are still largely dependent on parents, even if they have their own job) a loan without their parents' approval. All they'd have to do is have a prompt come up if you check the 'living at home with parents' box, saying that you need signed approval from your parents to secure the card. Sure you'd have to go into the bank, but I'm not very comfortable with the idea of applying for things like credit cards online (even though it is very convenient).

I suppose the banks would say that it's not their responsibility, but it is in a way, because by assuming my parents could back me up, they're increasing the risk that I will default on the loan. In conclusion, credit is evil, but necessary if you're going travelling.

Whoopee

2007-11-30T14:35:53Z

Haha the mX published my letter. Pity they don't give any prizes for letter of the day anymore.

It was in response to the letter of the day on Wednesday, which was basically saying that climate change is entirely to do with fluctuations in the sun's output, which were completely natural, so we don't need to do anything about greenhouse gas emissions. I know that the readership of mX aren't the brightest bunch, but it just really annoyed me that a lot of people would believe his pseudoscience.

"Dear MX,
May I congratulate you on having the courage to publish the truth on the climate change conspiracy. Neal’s excellent letter (mX, Wed), showed clearly and succinctly, that the trend towards increasing temperatures since the industrial revolution is solely due to fluctuations in the sun’s output. The world needs maverick thinkers like him to expose fallacies, which threaten to bring the global economy to a screeching halt. The truth of the matter, is that the so called ‘Greenhouse effect’ theory is a vast conspiracy engineered by the CSIRO and its sister organisations around the world. Scientists have long languished in the dark pits of reduced funding and in desperation came up with the idea of creating a global climate change scare in order to secure funding for their petty research projects. And by golly it has worked like a charm. Investment in science has never been this strong since the Space Race. Let’s save our tax dollars for more important things and end this whole debacle once and for all!

…If only it were that simple. What Neal’s letter really shows is the great extent of scientific illiteracy across the Australian community. Either his letter is a hoax, designed to poke fun at Australia’s pitiful science education system (I don’t doubt that many people will find some truth in what he wrote), or it is the work of someone who has sadly failed to keep up with the pace of climate research. The Schwabe cycle, which he references, does indeed have an impact on the earth’s climate. However, it is an extremely small effect, smaller than that of the ‘Greenhouse Effect’ and is an 11 year cycle, compared to climate change, which has been going on for the last century. Temperatures may increase at the peak of this cycle, however, things return to normal by the end. There are other long term cycles in solar output, known as the Milankovitch cycle, however, these operate on a time scale far wider than the climate change we are experiencing. In other words, scientists know about these cycles and have taken them into consideration when designing the Climate Change models, and the consensus of an extremely large majority of scientists, is that Greenhouse Gas emissions are a far more important contributor to climate change.

It might be nice to think that climate change is a natural process that we can’t do anything about, but it is '95% likely' according to the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) that it is our own fault that we’re in this mess. That is also a comforting thought because it means that although Climate Change is a huge problem, it is something that we can fix because we created it. Humanity has already been through many disastrous problems, which seemed to spell the end of the world as we knew it at the time, however, we pulled through then and I believe we can pull through now.

- Jeremy Nagel Mount Waverley
Environmental Science student at Monash University
"

They edited the crap out of it (no trace of the first paragraph at all:s), because it was too long I guess, but it was still kind of cool to see something I wrote in print, even if it was in the lowliest publication there is:P

Haha my last train was cancelled tonight due to 'extensive vandalism', so Steph and I hitched a ride with Tien who was 1. on his L's and 2. had already had at least 1 drink. I was clutching my seat belt rather tightly, but apart from a few overly sharp turns, it was fine:)

GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR

2007-11-08T23:45:25Z

I'm so fucking pissed off. I lost my GPS last night:S:S:S It's not just the idea of $350 down the drain, I really loved that thing. It filled the hole in my heart that only running geekery can, and without it..I'm lost:( I can't even go for a run to make me feel better because I couldn't deal with not having split times and KM markers:( And more than the pain of losing it, I'm angry at myself. The number of things I've lost is mindblowing! I really don't deserve expensive things..

But as soon as I get paid on Thursday, I'm gonna fork out $235 on the newer model:D It doesn't seem like an indulgence to me, I _need_ that watch damnit!:P In the mean time, I'll have to steal my old Nike watch back from my brother.

Free rice!

2007-10-29T11:36:38Z

My friend just told me about this cool site. Go to www.freerice.com. It's basically an online vocab test with a twist: for every word you get correct, they donate 10g of rice to the UN World Food Program. There are advertisers on the bottom of the page (very unobtrusive, I don't really see what's in it for them besides improving their triple bottom line). I've donated 440g of rice so far and I'm on level 39 vocab hehe. It's really addictive, give it a try!

First day

2007-10-01T09:27:05Z

So I was offered a job at Computershare last week:) I didn't really expect to get it, because the phone interview caught me completely off balance, but I must've done pretty well in the actual interview/team activities/aptitude tests:)

My first impressions are "this place rocks":D It's a massive organisation - they have 1200 employees at the site I'm working at alone and they look after some crazy amount of money along the lines of 1.7 trillion US dollars! The whole operation is so streamlined:O They've got this high speed document scanner that can process 150,000 letters per day:O The sight of a process working so smoothly appeals to the geeky side of me:P

Apart from the intrinsic coolness of what they do, they also have all these employee perks:)
- They have a company gym, that only costs $20 a month compared to like $80 at most places.
- You can salary package pretty much everything including your lunch rofl.
- I get a computer and this awesome phone (can't wait to call up like 10 people at once and put them all on hold:P)

And yeah, it's really cool:) All the people seem really nice - lots of people my age, which is always good.

Today they just took us through what the organisation does (looks after share registries mainly and some unrelated stuff like running the 1800 kellog hotline for people who didn't get their pedometer in their special k packet:|) and the different departments with their crazy acronyms. Apparently I work in TSG and it's part of COS, which is part of CPU, which is listed on the ASX and blah blah:P Pretty boring stuff, but when you're getting paid $20 an hour to half listen, it doesn't seem too bad:P

It sounds like I'll be getting quite a few hours too:) I have to do 2.5 weeks of full time training (I won't actually do it full time though) before they let me start, so that's like 50 hours at least:) And then in November, when I've finished uni, I'll be able to work probably 30 hours per week because that's their peak period apparently:) My money problems could just be solved:)

Questionable content

2007-09-10T12:24:57Z

I just thought I'd alert you to the most awesome web-comic out there: Questionable Content. In the past 3 days, I've read at least 600 of their strips:P

Here's my favourite so far:

and then there's this one:

What is the point of my life?

2007-09-04T13:36:51Z

I've been sick the past few days and it's given me a lot of time to think. Tonight I realised that I'm not happy with the way I'm living my life. For a long time - for my whole life even - I have been drifting with no destination in mind, letting the tide take me where it will. This has led to me feeling quite unmotivated. I go through the motions but with no idea what the point of it is. I have been alive for 19 years, but it feels like it has gone through in the blink of an eye. I imagine I will feel the same in another 10 years, in 20 years, in 60 years, when I will be an old man. I don't want to get to that age and still feel like I have drifted my whole life.

If there's one thing I have learnt about myself, it is that I need goals. I am happiest when I am working hard, and that only happens when I have a goal to motivate me. I want to go to sleep each night feeling utterly exhausted, having worked hard all day. I want to wake up, full of energy, ready for the day. What I don't want is to screw around on the internet for hours at a time, like I currently do. I don't want to get to the final year of my university degree and realise that I really have no clue what I want to do when I am finished. I want to make these decisions now. I know that I will change my mind as I gain more life experience, but what is important is that I give myself something to work towards.

I want to devote myself to a cause. Right now, the thing I find most pressing is climate change. Until now, I have viewed it only abstractedly. I have been aware that it is an issue, and I chose a uni course that would allow me to do something about it, but I have never felt passionately about it. I think that might change now. I realise now that studying is important not to achieve academic results, but because everything I learn now will be critical when I leave uni.

My other cause will be running. I am happiest when I am training hard. Running is a catharsis for me and without it, I feel flat. I am going to start taking it seriously and get up in the mornings to run. I don't have the genetic talent to ever become truly successful at it, but that is not the point. The act of running allows me to get in touch with my thoughts and to reflect on who I am.

I don't care about money or success. I only need enough money to live off. The rest I will give to charity. I don't wish to leave a legacy behind me. I will live for perhaps 90 years if my genetic stock is anything to go by and then I will die. There is nothing more to it. I just want to live a life that will keep my satisfied while I am still on the mortal coil.

I want to be happy, but I don't want to have to rely on mind altering substances or other people to have a good time. True happiness comes from within and until I am satisfied with my life, I will never be truly happy.

I have often thought along these lines, but until now I have never expressed it as words. Maybe having this as a record will serve to provoke those thoughts more often.

Of course this could all be a product of being sick (I've been having some weeird ideas lately), but I don't think so. On the topic of sickness, I think this is the sickest I've been since I became a vegan. Usually I bounce back within a day or two, but I've been sick for five days already and it just seems to be getting worse. I only have one lecture tomorrow, so I can safely take the day off:)

I hate my essay

2007-09-02T12:42:50Z

I have reached the point where I have gone over my essay so many times and stripped so much from it in an attempt to reach the word limit (still 20% over:P) that I now abhor it. At times like these I wish I were doing arts so I could write an essay that's actually somewhat accessible and fun to read.

One interesting thing I did get out of it was an opinion that organic farming is BS Urban myths of organic farming It's a nice idea but all too often oversimplified and unscientific. Our society seems to think that all 'chemicals' are bad and everything coming from a plant is good. In reality it's nowhere near that simple. We're all made from chemicals and without them we wouldn't have the bottles to put those 'chemical free' facial scrubs into. On the other hand, pretty much every plant has compounds, which are designed to screw up any animal that ingests them. It's stupid to make those kinds of black and white judgements.

Is sustainable agriculture achievable in an Australian context? By Jeremy Nagel

Background:

Agriculture in Australia has had a short history relative to other countries. Until European settlement in 1788, there was no large-scale cultivation of crops, but soon thereafter, farming sprung quickly into existence, building on the experience of these ‘pioneers’. Unfortunately, their experience was of a European landscape vastly different to that which they were confronted with. Such was the disparity between the ‘old’ and ‘new’ worlds, that the process of growing food involved fighting against Mother Nature rather than working with her. Such an attitude is inherently unsustainable, but persists largely to this day. Only now is it being realised that agricultural sustainability is important enough to jeopardise not only Australia’s food supply, but also the future of human civilisation on planet Earth.

Sustainability requires that agriculture be productive not just in the short term but also in the distant future. Unsustainable practices lead to a host of problems including climate change, soil degradation, water shortages, destruction of communities and economic issues. Although some of these effects are not immediately felt, they will eventually have dire impacts on humans and the natural environment if not corrected. However, there are techniques available to make farming practices more sustainable, and much research is currently being conducted into how these techniques can be implemented in a practical and economical manner.

Scope:

This essay will examine the state of agriculture in Australia and discuss ways in which it could be made more sustainable. Two of the main impacts of unsustainable agriculture: climate change and soil degradation, will be examined and measures suggested to reduce the effects.

Climate change:

Agriculture is a major contributor to anthropogenic climate change. Figures from the Australian Greenhouse Office (2007) suggest that agriculture contributes 22.93% of greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) in Australia. This is not only due to the use of fossil fuels to power mechanised farm machinery, but also from the production of fertilisers and pesticides, which are often derived from petrochemicals. Another major contributor is the livestock industry, which is responsible for 18% of global GHG emissions alone (Steinfeld, et. al 2006).

Scientists are currently examining ways in which the contribution of this last factor can be reduced. Cattle and other ruminants emit methane through the role of methanogens in the digestive process. Methane is 21 times as potent a GHG as CO₂, and hence it has a very large impact on climate change (McCarl B and Schneider U 1999). It is also cycled out of the atmosphere much more quickly than CO₂ (CO₂ has an atmospheric half life of 123 years compared to only 10.5 years for Methane – Hope C 2006), so changes made now will almost immediately help to alleviate climate change.

Changing the diet of ruminants is effective in reducing methane emissions. Research from the CSIRO (Hegarty R 1999) shows that protozoa can be eliminated from the rumen of ruminates through a low starch diet. Protozoa are out competed in this rumen environment and the methanogenic bacteria contained within them no longer have access to H₂. This not only reduces methane emissions, but also increases the yields from the livestock because more of the digested food is converted to saleable biomass (Hegarty R 1999). McGrabb G, et al (1997) conducted a field trial, where an antimethanogenic compound was included in the feed of a random sample of Brahman cattle. The methane emissions from the treated cattle were reduced almost to zero (0 ± 2·4 mL/min) compared to the control group (205 ± 5·2 mL/min). These techniques could improve the sustainability of Australian agriculture by both reducing GHG emissions and improving profitability.

Soil degradation:

Australia is the continent with the oldest identified rocks in the world. This is a consequence of its geologic history. While other continents have experienced periodic building up of massive glaciers, particularly in the last 1.8 million years, Australia has never had much glaciation due to its lack of high terrain. Glaciers are responsible for the renewal of soils as they slide their way across entire continents, scraping off large amounts of soil and rock in the process. Without this abrasive action to uncover fresh bedrock, Australia’s soils have become very impoverished in nutrients.

This means that great care must be taken in crop selection for Australian soils. European settlers have taken little regard of this paucity and have attempted to grow European crops like cotton, which have very different nutritional needs due to their largely separate evolutionary history. As vast tracts of land were cleared to make way for these plants, topsoil blew away, leaving the soil devoid of nutrients. Today, farmers cope with this legacy by replacing these nutrients with fertilisers. Unfortunately this comes with its own set of problems, including GHG emissions, soil degradation and the pollution of water systems from runoff. Sources of chemicals for fertilisers are also a declining resource, with reserves such as the superphosphate mine in Nauru being completely tapped or heading that way.

Clearly, this cycle of nutrient depletion and overuse of fertilisers cannot last. A sustainable system of agriculture must be one, which places great value on its soil and nutrient resources. Integrated farm management (IFM) is a set of techniques that attempt to combine conventional farming practices with modern technology. In many ways, it is similar to organic farming, but with much more emphasis on scientific evidence rather than blind ideology (Trewavas A 2001). Soil management is a crucial part of IFM. Methods such as targeted use of fertiliser, genetically modified crops (which can form symbiotic relationships with Nitrogen fixing bacteria), composting, mulching and no-till farming seek to improve soil structure and nutrient density.

No-till farming serves to improve soil health as well as to offset the greenhouse effect. Instead of tilling a field every year with a plough, the soil is left undisturbed. This preserves soil structure, reduces top-soil loss, and importantly reduces the loss of carbon stored in soil to the atmosphere. Globally, soils store 3.3 times as much Carbon as is stored in the atmosphere (Lal R 2004), however, agricultural land has a carbon-sequestration ability of only 50-66% of that of uncultivated land (Lal R 2004). When soils are disturbed by conventional tilling, carbon stored under the surface can escape the soil and combine with oxygen to form CO₂ (Peterson et al 1998). No-till farming can reduce Carbon emissions by 30-35kg per hectare compared to conventional farming (Lal R 2004). In addition, no-till farming improves the overall health the soil. Carbon is a soil’s ‘life support system’ (Lal R 2004) because it traps water and nutrients and is used as an energy source by micro-organisms. Increasing the amount of carbon (in terms of organic matter) in soil through a combination of no-till farming and crop-residue mulching can result in large productivity gains. A field study conducted in North Dakota, US, showed a 27kg/ha gain in wheat yields after 1 tonne of organic carbon was added to the soil (Bauer A and Black A 1994). This is especially relevant in Australia due to its nutrient poor soils.

Conclusion:

Australia is currently facing great challenges to make its agricultural sector more sustainable. There are a variety of measures that can and should be taken, however, it is impossible to say whether this will be enough to maintain food production into the future given the uncertainty of the impact of climate change on Australia’s climate.

References:

· Asanuma N, Iwamoto M, and Hino T (1999), Effect of the Addition of Fumarate on Methane Production by Ruminal microorganisms In Vitro Journal of Dairy Science 82

· Australian Greenhouse Office (2005), National Inventory (of greenhouse gas emissions) by Economic Sector

· Bauer A, Black A (1994) Quantification of the effect of soil organic matter content on soil productivity Soil Science Society of America Journal 58:185

· Dalal R, Wang W, Robertson G and Parton W (2003), Nitrous oxide emission from Australian agricultural lands and mitigation options: a review Australian Journal of Agricultural Research 41(2):165-195

· Hegarty R (1999) Reducing rumen methane emissions through the elimination of rumen protozoa Australian Journal of Agricultural Research 50(8):1321-1328

· Hope C (2006), The Marginal Impact of CO2 from PAGE2002: An Integrated Assessment Model Incorporating the IPCC’s Five Reasons for Concern The Integrated Assessment Journal 6:19-56

· IPCC (2007), Fourth Assessment Report: Climate Change

· Lal R (2004), Soil Carbon Sequestration Impacts on Global Climate Change and Food Security Science 304:1623-1627

· McCarl B and Schneider U (1999), Curbing Greenhouse Gases: Agriculture's Role Choices, First Quarter 1999:9-12.

· McCrabb G, Berger Magner T , May C and Hunter R (1997) Inhibiting methane production in Brahman cattle by dietary supplementation with a novel compound and the effects on growth Australian Journal of Agricultural Research 48(3):323-329

· Peterson G, HalvorsonA, HavlinJ, JonesO, LyonD and TanakaD (1998) Reduced tillage and increasing cropping intensity in the Great Plains conserves soil Carbon Soil and tillage research 47 (3-4):207-218

· Schink B (1997) Energetics of Syntrophic Cooperation in Methanogenic Degradation Microbiology and molecular biology reviews June 1997: 262–280

· Steinfeld H, Gerber P, Wassenaar T, Castel V, Rosales M, de Haan C (2006), Livestock’s long shadow Food and Agricultural Organisation of the United Nations

· Trewavas A (2001) Urban myths of organic farming Nature 410:409-410

bruncle @ 2007-09-02T13:08:00

2007-09-02T02:58:41Z

Hahahahahaha
"In the summer months a buddy of mine would stash gatorade bottles along his route.

Apparently one of the mornings he discovered someone had dumped the G-ade and peed in the bottle. Since the flavour was lemon-lime he never knew what hit him until the first mouthful."

I hate being sick, but at least it means I've had the chance to catch up with some work:)

New job:)

2007-08-15T10:46:13Z

I had a job interview today for this place in Port Melbourne. It's pretty far away (took me an hour to get there today), but the pay is awesome ($19/hour) and they want me to work a minimum of 11 hours per week:) That works out to be exactly what I need per week to save up for Germany:) There was no way I could raise that just by working at Coles, where I'm lucky to get 6 hours a week (and the pay is worse).

The interview was quite funny. I got there half an hour early, but I thought that was a bit tooo early, so I went and sat on the beach (the place is literally on the beach:D) and read Shakespeare for a bit. Then when I walked in, the guy I had to see was nowhere to be seen, so I sat down and read some more. He eventually showed up, but explained that he had some business to take care of and rushed off again. All in all, I waited half an hour, and then he said that if I had only come in a bit earlier, he would've been free hahaha.

He didn't really seem to know what to ask me. We small-talked for a few minutes and then got onto the serious questions. It went something like this:
Him: So you worked at Coles for a year right?
Me: Yeah, well it's been about three years now
Him: Ok, so you'd know how to do everything?
Me: Yeah
Him: Cool, I'll just get some forms and we'll get you on the books

Haha he didn't even ask me for my references, which is good because I didn't bother finding any:P It's a bit of a haphazard way of recruiting someone, because even though I'll have no problems when I do the trial shift next week, I could be the type of person who steals from the till and he'd never know because he didn't bother contacting Coles.

I have to sign an AWA, which he seemed to think I might have a problem with, but when the pay's this good, I don't mind giving up penalty rates at all:)

Best day's skiing ever!

2007-07-22T12:25:26Z

Today was so awesome! Lake Mountain got a massive (50cm) dump on Wednesday, so the average snow depth today was 70cm:O It's more than I've ever seen there. Normally, on a good day, you'll get 30cm. We all woke up fairly late, so we didn't get up to Marysville til about 10:30, so we had to queue for ages to get skis and to pay for entry. Then when we got up to the Mountain, the carpark close to the snow was full so we had to wait like 20 minutes for a shuttle bus. Normally this would be extremely aggravating, but nothing could dampen our spirits on a day like this. The sun was shining for the first time all week. You can't imagine how good that is. More snow than I've ever seen before and a nice sunny day, that meant I was too warm with one skivvy on:O

When we'd sorted ourselves and strapped our skis on, it got even better:) Normally at the start I'm a bit rusty and my skating is a bit sloppy. Not today - I powered up this hill that normally leaves me winded and had 5 minutes to enjoy the scenery while my sister and dad caught up (this also gave me the perfect opportunity to position myself to photograph them). When they came up the hill, I got shots of both of them. The one of my dad was really good - there was even a bit of snow flying up from the side of his ski, but my sister has a grumpy look on her face (probably had something to do with her saying "Jem, don't take a picture you dickhead!").

So for the next hour we skiied around, with everyone improving heaps in that time. I managed to outdistance the others quite substantially (because I brute forced my way up hills and didn't bother slowing myself down on the downhills:P), so I had time to ski up and down the same hill to practise my telemark turns for about 10 minutes.

After that, we stopped for lunch at this lookout with a gorgeous view across all of the other mountains (snow capped courtesy of Wednesday:)). I took off my skis prematurely and had first hand experience of how deep the snow was. I was trying to move myself about 10m to where the others were sitting, but it took about 2 minutes because every time I took a step, I'd sink about half a metre into the snow and have to struggle to extricate myself therefrom:P While we were eating lunch, we heard this yelp from the people sitting across from us. I looked over to find the reason for the yelp, but couldn't see anything. Then they yelled "Mouse!" and I saw this little brown blur running up her jacket. It was really funny. This mouse just didn't know when it wasn't wanted. They tried everything they could to get it away - even kicking the snow under it, so it went flying - but it wouldn't leave them alone lol. At one stage it ran up a ski stock and hung there for about 10 seconds, probably scouting for food:P

We skiied for perhaps another hour and a half, by which time everyone was really tired. I would've happily stayed until the last bus, but I was outvoted:P So, we went down the 1km downhill stretch to the carpark. It was crazily icy - most people had taken off their skis and were walking down. I don't know how I didn't fall over - I kept on trying to do telemark turns, which was really quite stupid considering how icy it was and that I didn't have any edges on my skis. My skis just slipped away from me and I'd have to do massive flails to get myself balanced again haha. The last section was being lit by the sun and was nice and soft, so I managed a few down there. Then since I had some time on my hands while the others caught up with me, I went up and down the last hill and actually pulled off a few teles:) Haha these boys were watching me, and one of them eventually asked "..Hey, my friend wants to know..Are you Daniel Radcliffe" That amused me, but unfortunately I was too tired to think of a decent line. If it ever happens again, I think I'll use Luke's suggestion: "Yes. Yes I am. Now you kids stay in school and keep off drugs."

The car trip home was nice and relaxing and I fell asleep:)

Photos will be posted on my myspace.

New national anthem

2007-07-17T11:06:04Z

Advance Australia Where?
Australian folks let us rejoice,
for we are young and free.
We'll sell uranium overseas
to boost economy!

So other races as you die
from dread plutonium,
Australia's flag will proudly fly
We'll beat you in the end.
In joyful tunes, let us sing,
Advance Australia Where?

Old "Pig iron Bob" sold off the scrap,
to help them make some bombs.
Now good old (John) sells yellowcake
to anyone who comes.

And as they choke in nuclear waste
well, we'll be laughing hard.
We'll charge 'em more to let 'em store
it all in our backyard.

Oh nuclear power, our finest hour.
Advance, Australia Where?

(From The Honeymoon Songbook: "A songbook for the occupation of the Honeymoon Uranium Mine. May 1982")

QM + Uni results:)

2007-07-12T15:52:28Z

Busy evening tonight. I worked until 9.15 then went to quiet man with only $5 in my pocket:P I thought I was going to get away with only having one drink, but one thing led to another and I ended up begging for change:P Then to make matters worse, the bartender chased after me because my pint actually cost me $7.20 instead of $4 (..it was like 1 minute after 11pm the bum) and I had to break a note:P

On the train ride home I was half asleep and absent-mindedly staring out the window at holmesglen station, when I saw a two-wheeled vehicle through the rain. "Hey that looks like my bike.." "Wait a minute, I rode my bike to Holmesglen, shit I better get off" haha.

My uni results came out this morning as well (finally):) I got 3 HDs and a D, which I'm really happy with:)

bruncle @ 2007-07-08T22:03:00

2007-07-08T11:56:28Z

I realised today that one of my favourite activities in the world is falling asleep in a moving car on a sunny afternoon:) There's something very satisfying about waking up a long way from where you were when you fell asleep. For some reason, I also like the dry mouth feeling that accompanies such an experience:P

XC Skiing is also one of my favourite activities and if you combine the two, it makes for a perfect day:)

Yay my camera works again

2007-06-24T11:48:33Z

My camera has recovered! A couple of months ago, I killed it by spilling dishwashing liquid (haha my brother made an artistic looking bottle of it for me for christmas, and I had it on my desk, directly over the camera:S) on it. Tonight I was thinking 'Gee I wish I still had my camera..', so I pulled it out to test it...and it works:D The liquid has probably dried in there now haha.

Don't believe me? Here's proof!

bruncle @ 2007-06-23T03:03:00

2007-06-22T17:09:42Z

Ok, so I was at this bar on Thursday night, and I met one of Georgia's friends. We started having these crazy debates about apathy and socialism and all kinds of stuff and eventually (inevitably), we got onto veg*nism. He said he had no interest in becoming veg*n (I wasn't preaching, he said this as soon as I said I was vegan) because he didn't care about anyone besides himself. 'Fair enough', I said, 'but what about climate change? If you don't act selflessly now, you're going to get fucked over later. That's pretty much the main reason why I'm vegan.' He scoffed at this, refused to acknowledge that 18% of global emissions was worth worrying about, and accused me of being a hypocrite because all the vitamin supplements I must be taking would have a huge impact on climate change! Well I knew it was bullshit, but I didn't really have any way of disproving him because I'd never actually looked at the figures. (BTW, don't get me wrong, I thought he was interesting not annoying) So today, because I was so bored without any study to do, I wrote an essay on it:P Here are my results: "Producing B12 supplements commercially required 54.179g of CO₂ to be emitted per milligram of Vitamin B12. This is 385,924.4357% more efficient (in terms of Greenhouse gas emissions) than obtaining B12 from animal sources (milk was used in this calculation as it was the more favourable value)."

It was definitely worth 7 hours work;) haha

Contribution of commercial B12 synthesis to climate change by Jeremy Nagel

Background:

Vegetarianism and Veganism (veg*nism) are lifestyles, which are becoming ever more prevalent in today’s society. People choose to become veg*ns for a number of reasons, including health, animal welfare and the environment (the first two reasons are outside the scope of this study).

A common claim is that because veg*ns consume fewer animal products, they will reduce the impact on climate change. Livestock are directly (Methane and Nitrous Oxide emissions) and indirectly (production of feedstock, deforestation) responsible for 18% of global greenhouse gas emissions according to the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO, 2006). This is a huge contribution to climate change, larger even than that of global transport.

However, a counter argument to this is that the production of dietary supplements for veg*ns will result in an equally significant contribution to climate change. A veg*n diet is almost nutritionally complete, lacking only a source of cyanocobalamin (B12). For this reason, many veg*ns take B12 supplements. B12 supplements are produced commercially by the cultivation of bacteria, which produce cyanocobalamin as part of their metabolic processes. This of course requires energy

Scope:

This study will investigate the assertion that the production of vitamin and mineral supplements necessary for a nutritionally complete diet for vegetarians and vegans leads to more greenhouse gas emissions than from obtaining the nutrients from meat. Vitamin B12 (Cyanocobalamin) is the only nutrient, which is impossible to obtain from plant sources, and hence this study will analyse the effect that the synthesis of this vitamin has on greenhouse gas levels.

Vitamin B12:

Vitamin B12 is a name given to a number of compounds containing cobalt, which is an essential mineral for animals. Cobalt cannot be directly digested by animals, and must hence be consumed in an intermediate form – vitamin B12. Many animal products, such as meat, dairy and eggs, contain nutritionally useful amounts of B12. There are some plant sources, which appear to contain B12, however, it is likely that these are simply ‘analogues’, which cannot be utilised by the body and may even be harmful because they can compete for B12 receptors in the body (Carmel, et al., 2003).

This should not be taken to mean that it is impossible to obtain B12 through a veg*n diet. B12 is not strictly part of any animal product - it is actually a contamination of the tissue of the animal from which it is derived. The vitamin is produced by bacteria, which reside in the digestive tract of all animals, including humans. There is a debate over whether B12 produced by gut-bacteria can be reabsorbed by humans (Herbert, et al. 1984), so the consensus is that B12 supplementation is sensible.

Cyanocobalamin:

The most common form of B12 found in supplements is cyanocobalamin. This compound is stable unlike some other substances, which could be absorbed as B12. It is produced commercially for vitamin supplements by growing bacteria (almost exclusively from the genera Propionibacterium) in an amino acid and cobalt rich medium (Murooka et al., 2005). With the right attention, these microbes can yield as much as 1.68mg (milligrams) per litre of organisms (ibid.).

A side effect of this production process is that Propionibacteria convert nitrates into nitrous oxide (NO₂). NO₂is the most potent greenhouse gas known to man and as such, the production of B12 supplements could represent a large contribution to climate change. To calculate the impact, a range of industry figures will be used.

It is known that each milligram of Propionibacteria produce 2.5 nmol (nanomole) of nitrous oxide per hour (Dodds, Collins-Thompson, 1985). According to United States Patent 6878534: “Continuous fermentation process which is useful for the simultaneous optimal production of propionic acid and vitamin B12.”, a desirable cell density for Vitamin B12 production is around 75g/L. Therefore, every hour, 187,500 (2.5nmol x 75,000mg) nmol of NO₂ will be produced per litre of bacteria. The production of B12 under the process outlined in the aforementioned patent takes 36 hours, so in all, 6,750,000 nmol (or 0.311g) of NO₂ will be produced to obtain 1.68mg of Vitamin B12. Converting the NO₂to an equivalent amount of Carbon Dioxide (CO₂), a figure of 54.719g of CO2 per mg of Vitamin B12 is obtained.

B12 from animal sources:

Vitamin B12 may be obtained from animals for human consumption in two ways: through their flesh and through their milk. Both methods will be investigated in this study.

The type of meat with the highest B12 value is beef (other forms of meat, eg. crab or salmon have higher values but are not consumed on a regular basis by many people and will hence be excluded from this study), with 23mcg (micrograms) of B12 per kg of flesh (USDA database). According to Casey and Holden (2006), for every kg of beef produced, an amount of greenhouse gases equivalent to 11.1kg of CO₂ is emitted into the atmosphere (NB. This is actually a very conservative value – the authors had a range of 11.1-13.3kg CO₂ per kg of live animal, not all of which will be sold as meat.). This means that for every mg (milligram) of Vitamin B12 produced, greenhouse gases equivalent to 482.609kg of CO₂will be produced.

Dairy milk (other types excluded because they are not commonly consumed) contains 4.40mcg (microgram) of B12 per kg of milk (USDA database). Casey and Holden (2005) calculated that for every kg of milk produced, 0.92kg of CO₂ are emitted (again, the most favourable value possible was chosen – the emissions ranged from 0.92-1.51kg CO₂). Therefore, to produce 1mg (milligram) of Vitamin B12 from milk, 209.09kg of CO₂ equivalent are released into the atmosphere.

Comparison:

Producing B12 supplements commercially required 54.179g of CO₂ to be emitted per milligram of Vitamin B12. This is 385,924.4357% more efficient (in terms of Greenhouse gas emissions) than obtaining B12 from animal sources (milk was used in this calculation as it was the more favourable value).

(NB. The energy involved in packaging and transporting the vitamin supplements was not included in these calculations, however, the same is true for the figures for milk.)

Conclusion:

The results clearly show that the assertion that the manufacture of vitamin supplements to provide essential nutrients to veg*ns is more energy intensive than obtaining an equivalent dosage from animal sources is completely unfounded.

References:

- Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (2006), Livestock’s long shadow.

- G. Loeffler (2005). Basiswissen Biochemie, 606.

- Carmel R, Karnaze DS, Weiner JM. Neurologic abnormalities in cobalamin deficiency are associated with higher cobalamin analogue' values than are hematologic abnormalities. J Lab Clin Med. 1988 Jan;111(1):57-62.

- Herbert V, Drivas G, Manusselis C, Mackler B, Eng J, Schwartz E. Are colon bacteria a major source of cobalamin analogues in human tissues? Trans Assoc Am Physiol. 1984;97:161-71.

- MUROOKA Y, PIAO Y, KIATPAPAN P, YAMASHITA M (2005). Production of tetrapyrrole compounds and vitamin B12 using genetically engineering of Propionibacterium freudenreichii. An overview. EDP Sciences.

- United States Patent 6878534: “Continuous fermentation process which is useful for the simultaneous optimal production of propionic acid and vitamin B12.”

- Dodds K, Collins-Thompson D (1985), Production of N20 and CO2 During the Reduction of N02- by Lactobacillus lactis TS4, APPLIED AND ENVIRONMENTAL MICROBIOLOGY, Dec. 1985, p. 1550-1552

- Casey J, Holden M (2006), Greenhouse Gas Emissions from Conventional, Agri-Environmental Scheme, and Organic Irish Suckler-Beef Units, J Environ Qual 35:231-239

- USDA nutrition information database. Accessed at http://usda.gov 23^rd June 2007.

- Casey J, Holden M (2005), The Relationship between Greenhouse Gas Emissions and the Intensity of Milk Production in Ireland, J. Environ. Qual. 34:429-436

Yay my CPU isn't fried

2007-06-17T12:22:24Z

I finally got around to cleaning the innards of my computer. It's a good thing everything's fairly tough because I had no idea what I was doing rofl. I kept on trying to pull the cpu out until I realised that you had to detach these hooks first:P Luckily it still works:) Hopefully it'll stop shutting down randomly too:)

This morning I did the Run to the G. I had a radical race strategy: dash out the front and take the lead for the first 500m so I could get in the paper:P I had a priority start, so this was entirely feasible:) When the gun went off (figuratively:P) I scrambled past the people with the sense to not destroy their race after it had barely started and shared the lead with this exceedingly tall, skinny guy who looked like he'd run about 15:00 for 5km (4 minutes faster than me:P). After 300m, we'd passed the photographers, so I dropped back to where I belonged and slightly more out of breath than I should've been, but with a big smile on my face, got into a decent rhythm and ran the rest of the race. Next time, I will have to wear a funny costume:P

Unsurprisingly, I'm very sore after subjecting my body to not only the 5km race, but also an extra 8km because I got bored waiting for my dad to finish, after having not run for 6 weeks lol. It is a good kind of sore though:)

bruncle @ 2007-06-15T01:29:00

2007-06-14T15:23:37Z

Yay I'm drunk without ill-effects:) I think my palate has matured since the last time I drank beer:O I had a kilkenney and a guiness (both spelt horribly wrong) and they actually tasted fairly decent:O Of course I had to have a cider as well and that has made me deliciously tipsy:)

An added benefit is that I no longer remember much of my bio exam, which was H.A.R.D.!

Paris Hilton is dead

2007-06-12T13:59:49Z

http://abc.net.au.newsitems.200706.999584001215588457.851154.html.macksfoto.com/s1942069.htm

*booom*

I'm an idiot

2007-06-08T10:11:04Z

Haha I am such an idiot. I had two exams today and managed to do something very stupid in both of them.

My german exam started at 11am...or so I thought. I rocked up at 10:50 and checked my diary to see what room I was in..to discover that my exam had actually started at 9:30 and was going to finish in 40 minutes! Breaking into a cold sweat, I tried the door to the exam room, hoping, praving that it was still open. Luckily it was, and I quickly grabbed an exam paper off my surprised lecturer and sat down. My hand was shaking, but I still managed to finish the exam in 15 minutes, in the process inventing a new literary theory ("The theory of 'litterature'" by Stephen Jacobs (1989)):P

So that worked out allright, and I still had plenty of time to cram for my geology exam, which started at 2:30. I did my cramming and made it to the exam on time, raced through the multiple choice and short answer section, and then, when I was on my third long answer question, someone left. "Damn", I thought to myself, "I won't be the first one to leave. Oh well I've still got 45 minutes." I was quite surprised when 20 minutes later, the invigilator announced that there were only 10 minutes left. "Shit! I've still got two long answer questions!" I didn't really know how to answer the second last question, so I just wrote "...and then some stuff happens and you wind up with a pelitic gneiss, which is uplifted by mountain building. The end.":P For the last question, I couldn't remember any theories for the creation of the solar system, so I just made up my own:P I finished with 5 minutes to go, with a sore wrist from writing 15 pages in 2 hours.

As we walked out of the exam room, I said to my friend "How'd you go on those last two long answer questions? They were really hard!".
"Oh I just question 1 and question 3."
"What do you mean? Didn't you have to do all of them?"
"Nah, don't you remember? Marion's told us like 5 times that we only have to do two. It even said in big writing 'Only do two long answer questions'."
In short, I'm an idiot:P But luckily both mistakes had positive outcomes:)

I'm home alone until Tuesday! I have to babysit my dog and he's getting really bitchy cos there's no-one watching TV for him to stare at. I just threw him a pillow to play with - hopefully that'll keep him occupied long enough for him to fall asleep.