Hot, sunny welcome in store for 2010.

Headline for The Dominion Post:

Good weather for ducks and small kids.

Compare:

A bright, sunny and hot day is set to welcome in the new year in most parts of the country, come Friday.

To:

Rain and high winds are set to lash the country on New Year’s Day as the lower North Island recovers from heavy rainfall and swollen rivers which threatened a bridge north of Wellington.

The NZ Herald expert seems oblivious to current weather events when predicting that the chance of rain anywhere in the country is “very low.” Weather warnings reported in the Dominion Post don’t get a mention in the Herald. The mixed reporting gets better though, as you find the Dominion Post’s official forecasts for New Years Day for the lower half of the North Island don’t mention rain at all.

I used to laugh at the idea of Groundhog Day in the good ole US of A, but given the level of weather reporting here in New Zealand, I’m betting the Groundhog is going to provide you at least as much certainty as our weather experts, without the prohibitive cost and the added bonus of Bill Murray induced hilarity.

Now, the lane line clearly shows where the parking ends, and anyone with half a brain could see how far their ass is sticking out into the space where cars will be trying to get past. To top it off, there were no less than THREE parking spaces available to the right. No, no, JAFA driving law says you still choose to park in an illegal spot that will cause maximum inconvenience for other drivers.

JAFA.

If you’re a poor excuse for a foodie like me you’ll have a hard time picking out all the flavours on the bottle. To me this was more juice than tea, there wasn’t the usual tea after taste you get with the likes of Lipton iced teas. Altogether though, a very pleasant drink. See below for nutritional information.

But if Hone Harawira makes an offensive statement against a strong majority with plenty of ability to stand up for itself, watch the backlash come thick and fast. It matters little that European colonisers did in fact do much raping and pillaging throughout their history.

Plenty of calls for Harawira to step down, huge controversy, nevermind the fact that he was democratically elected and did nothing illegal, which is Paul Henry’s prime defense.  The Maori Party gets hounded for comment, but TVNZ gets to hide from scrutiny by saying it’s going through the usual processes.

All this against the recent backdrop of people desperate for the right to smack their children. They’re no-where near present in the same numbers to defend the handicapped.

Hmmm… wonder where our bad domestic abuse statistics stem from, and the festering racial tension?

What’s up with that New Zealand?

It’s funny to watch people wring their hands like they really care about things like bullying. We have these marketing campaigns that take on violence and other forms of harassment like verbal and mental abuse that are often gateways to violence for people who like to victimize others. But when push comes to shove on the issue only the victims actually care to do anything to make people change their behaviour. Watch as Paul Henry again gets away with bullying people on national TV, probably with a fair few calls of support from the celebrity addled audience who love to back his every move.

Yep, we’ll march for the right to smack our children, even though the right hasn’t been taken away, but we don’t care about the bullying of people with mental disabilities. Well, maybe we care, but certainly not enough to do anything substantive about it. Where’s Family First on this? Apparently the mentally disabled in our family don’t warrant a defense, or perhaps it’s not as much fun as sampling porn in order to ‘complain’ about how it’s breaking down the family unit.

If citizens and action groups truly believe in reducing abuse that breaks down family units, perhaps they should stay consistently visible on all the issues. We can’t claim we’re strong on these issues if we fail to come out in support for some of the most vulnerable members of our families.

IHC spokespeople ought to be making a call to action, and should feel aggrieved that their efforts to increase awareness and breakdown barriers have been stomped on by someone glorifying the kind of behaviour that makes their work harder.

Can’t say I’m surprised Paul Henry has no regrets, there’s not much about his public persona that suggests he has the kind of compassion for the less fortunate to conjure such emotion. It’s emblematic of a country struggling with abusive behaviour in the homes that public personalities get away with bullying people without the same capacity to hit back at them. Oh but witness Paul Henry cry poor me with the little backlash he does cop. Classic bully behaviour. Gives it, but can’t take it.

The All Blacks could still do to improve in this area. Too many teams look like their in with a chance against us when they adopt these tactics. That said, it’s telling about the state of rugby that teams will resort to being so cheap because it’s too hard to beat a good All Blacks team otherwise. Better to ruin the game for the fans and win seems to be the mentality. Winning means a lot in the professional era, but surely not more than losing potential fans because you make the game so boring in doing so.

There’s a reason why sevens is such an internationally popular sport, if the powers that be can’t bring some of that spectacle to the larger format, they’ll struggle to bring new punters into the fold.

Winning isn’t everything in this case.

So I hit up Cantina Rialto for some Mexican food, and settled on the beef burrito with a side of fries.

Now, this isn’t exactly fast food. If you’re looking to zip in and out for a quick meal you’re better off going with someone else in this particular establishment.

Now when the meal came out I wasn’t sure about the look of the fries.

They actually look a little better in the photo. At first glance they appeared a little shrivelled. But looks can be deceiving. They were seasoned really nicely (just the right amount of pepper) and the sauce was about as good as you could have with fries, I didn’t even miss having tomato sauce. I would definitely go back to those again.

The burrito was pretty good too. Nice amount of sour cream, guacamole wasn’t really to my liking though. I like to have a little more and have it a little thicker. The refried beans look a little shady inside the burrito but still tasted great. All in all, not bad.

Verdict: *(BURP)* (pretty good).

So don’t look, it’ll only encourage him.

From all accounts he was full of grand claims but short on real specifics. Apparently USA healthcare is so fantastic that it doesn’t cause any deaths at all. One has to wonder then why citizens over there are so concerned about it when it’s so robust it never fails anyone.

Oh, except when you’re gay. The American healthcare system can deny family members access to you and leave you alone while you’re dying, or deny you health coverage period.

Don’t know about you, but I’d rather die because the system is overworked than die because someone’s prejudice decides that I’m not worthy of the same healthcare as someone else.

I suppose being white and rich Jon Voight doesn’t really see that. That’s probably why he doesn’t see how stupid he looks making flawed claims about our healthcare system.