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  • Favourite instrumentals

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    @mn5 said in Favourite instrumentals:

    @crucial said in Favourite instrumentals:

    @mn5 said in Favourite instrumentals:

    Bass heaven, the groove in this tune is ridiculously good

    Sounds a bit like humans trying to play like computers to me. Rare moments of actual groove.
    Well played though and they look like they all enjoyed a sniffing craft beer afterwards 😉

    I’m sorry you feel that way. Perhaps you need to try the live version ?

    The crowd are actually singing that bass line, how good ?

    Reckon I've listened to this 100x since you posted. Just gets cooler every time.

  • Christmas!21

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    Forgot this holiday favourite:

  • RIP 2021

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    07E10B0F-E013-40AF-83CB-ACCBD956B10D.jpeg

  • Men. Pause.

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    @majorrage From memory said cousin has previous form?

    If she is raising a lil baitch and in denial then all the hormonal shit will exacerbate it, but yeah, where was the Dad during all this?

    It's difficult for me to identify what the change was like for my wife because she was going downhill fast with MS contemporaneously and she was / is a very private person but I remember long walks (to the pub) helped me - if not necessarily her.

  • Smart TVs

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    @machpants Must add a caveat that the price estimation for the 65" Sony is US$8000.

  • Scott Watson

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    In between wind down work I have managed to trawl through most of what I can find on the internet from during the original trial and some of the arguments since in the vain hope that I can gather enough info to form a clear opinion. This is probably a TLDR for most but I wanted to write down my thoughts.

    The character

    Watson did have his character presented in a negative way that possibly overstated aspects to draw a certain picture (as all prosecutions will). However, I can't find anything that remotely negates that he was a bit of an arse. I think it is quite fair to say he wasn't the most likeable person and he definitely had some bad traits. Was a creep around women and seemed to want to paint himself as some kind of bad boy by using gang language he had picked up. The flip side is that there was no evidence of violence or previous dodgy action just talk. He thought himself a bit clever and was mouthy, even telling people he was smart enough to get away with murder.
    Was he someone that could have done it? More like you couldn't say that he wasn't.

    One important piece that is often overlooked is that the court heard hours of phone tap evidence between him and an ex. The public has never heard this or seen a transcript but journalists that were at the court did. One wrote that the conversations were very damning not by anything he said but by what he didn't and by the way he talked about the subject. He never once said that he didn't kill them and his attitude was more 'they've got nothing on me'.

    The prosecution case

    A mess. They presented so much contradictory evidence that they tangled themselves in knots and had to change their whole theory at the last minute with no evidence to support it. There were a couple of things that saved them with the jury though. The DNA evidence and the lack of an alternative. In the juries minds it would have been too coincidental that this creep in front of them had never said 'I didn't kill them' and possibly had opportunity to both do it and dispose of the bodies added to some hairs on his boat.
    Most of the other so called evidence that gets picked though (sometimes quite rightly) can be stripped away and those things remain. Much of the evidence was contradictory or twisted and was a clear tactic of throwing lots of mud to create an impression of 'weight of evidence'. It's no wonder that conspiracy theorists have had a field day as so much can be disproved or heavily debated.
    The timings and 'eye-witness' evidence is really unreliable. Trying to pick out solid fact from muddled memories is really difficult and so many red herrings are created. There are no definitive sightings of Watson and the missing pair together and no strong evidence that they were offloaded at his boat. There is some very rough joining of possibles that he was the person on Wallace's boat with them but also to believe that you also have to ignore what are probably the clearest recollections and timings from all of the identification and movement evidence (The worker that dropped him off at the Blade alone in conjunction with two people from boats he was rafted to that confirm the timing). The theory off him then going back to shore has no supporting evidence at all.

    The Defence

    Consists almost entirely of arguing against the mass of unreliable prosecution evidence and trying to put up a mystery ketch scenario which isn't supported strongly.

    The outcome

    I can fully understand how the jury concluded guilt. If you strip away all of the disputed stuff (mystery man, mystery ketch, identification etc) to remove reasonable doubt you are left with the basic questions of motive, means and opportunity added to 'is this person 'the type'?
    Motive - he stated to people he was going there to pick up women, he spent the night unsuccessfully trying. Not that unusual in male behaviour and doesn't make him a rapist/murderer but there were also corroborated signs of him getting frustrated as the night went on and he hung around late as if waiting for opportunity.
    Means - he was on a boat that could 'isolate' itself very easily
    Opportunity - If the couple ended up on his boat he had a presented opportunity to isolate them. Who knows what then happened.
    Was he the type? Yeah. Not a great character as shown by behaviours both before and after for long periods of time.

    Then you have the lack of a viable alternative. I'm not saying that there wasn't another explanation but no one came up with any other well evidenced explanation. The police could show a lot of effort into the ketch theory including interpol, satellite picture analysis, etc etc with no results. The defence couldn't show anything strong to indicate that the police failed or didn't do their job.

    Prosecution case was weak but the DNA evidence was the real nail.

    Since the trial

    I fully expect the DNA evidence to be debunked or have a lot of doubt placed on it. Not to the level of inadmissibility but because it is weaker and the only solid incriminating evidence presented at the trial there may be a desire to see if a re-trial finds that the prosecution case is still strong enough to convict.
    On the other hand over all of this time no one has 'solved' what happened if it wasn't Watson. There is plenty of doubt thrown on parts of the prosecution case but if you remove all of that stuff and place doubt on the DNA what are you left with? That person(s) unknown had motive, means and opportunity to commit the crime but not one lead, hint or leak has since emerged

    My opinion

    The police work was quite single focused too early, that some of the evidence (witness identification) was manipulated, stretched or omitted but that this is noise that be removed. I would rather that they were told to make a better case and remove some of the bullshit from the start. They were under pressure to get a result and career climbing rule benders were in charge.
    Time however has also been their friend. That no alternative has emerged over all of this time is quite a strong point.

    Then there is one thing that although circumstantial bugs me. The fact that clearest alibi Watson could have had would have been if he didn't disappear early in the morning (at best four hours sleep after a night on the piss). I can see that he may possibly have woken and couldn't be arsed going back to sleep but so much of his other documented behaviour around people was him trying to impress them to the point of beig a piston wristed gibbon about it. He may have been a loner in some aspects but around others he was a try hard. The situation doesn't really add up.
    What does add up though is him taking an opportunity to sail off and be in control over these two kids that hopped on his boat. What happened after that is anybodies guess but I suspect that it didn't go down they way everyone thinks which has increased his arrogance about the 'truth'.

    All in all a clusterfuck.

  • Jumping Castle Tragedy

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    @catogrande said in Jumping Castle Tragedy:

    I saw this happen at a kids day at my rugby club years ago. No one on it at the time but a freak twister came out of nowhere and it took off. Never allowed my kids near one since.

    Had a scarry incident a couple of years ago too at an event with a bouncy castle. Wind got up out of no where. Fortunately no one badly hurt, but enough to freak me out. Not allowed my kids on an outdoor one since.

    My condolences to everyone in Tasmania. Terrible news.

  • Pleasure and Pain Balance

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    @nostrildamus said in Pleasure and Pain Balance:

    I'm afraid games are typically designed to fed addictive and compulsive behaviours. I have a doctor friend overseas who said he himself has an addictive/obsessive personality and the only solution for him is to avoid them entirely.
    Me as well, but luckily I get bored quickly.

    They do say if you have addicts in your family you have a far greater risk of becoming an addict also. I can vouch for this personally.

  • Pike river

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    @nzzp said in Pike river:

    @hooroo said in Pike river:

    @nzzp said in Pike river:

    @hooroo said in Pike river:

    @aucklandwarlord said in Pike river:

    While we can collectively be saddened and outraged that this happened and that so many people died while working, society and the politicians who are pushing this should also remember than mining even in the most regulated societies is inherently dangerous work, often involving enclosed spaces, heavy machinery, dangerous goods and exposure other health and safety risks.

    All of those 29 men would have turned their minds to the danger when signing up for the job or while doing it, but did so anyway. The risks involved with mining is one of the reason why miners are paid significantly better than an above-ground equivalent labourer. Some jobs attract an element of "danger pay", and mining certainly seems to be one of them.

    I'm not saying we shouldn't be sympathetic of the plight of the families, because we should. But the reality is, sometimes dangerous things happen in dangerous jobs.

    While I agree with this overall, it is the responsibility of the company to mitigate all those risks as largely as possible.

    I don't believe that happened here and that is why we see such higher overarching reasonability of MHF's etc

    It's an outcome of the Pike River failures

    and why there is specific mining regulation, and mines inspectors. I mean, Pike River had an 'award winning' H+S plan, inspections, etc ... but still didn't tackle the main risk present that couldn't be mitigated.

    Here it was gassy mines with inadequate venting. Arguably controllable, but damn hard.

    At White Island, it was the increasing risk tolerance of running tours on a live volcano, and not really understanding how good our ability to predict eruptions is. Again - award winning H+S systems there too.

    Those Pike H&S systems are laughing stock now in comparison of current regulated requirement.

    absolutely.

    But remember, you have to assess it 'for the time'. The whole change in HSE legislation was triggered by Pike.

    YEah fully agree this

  • Robo mowers

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    @victor-meldrew yeah I think the ones I was looking at are Bluetooth/ gps, but are some that I saw mentioned wires and boundaries.

    I can't see me ditching the ride on that soon and expect the pricing and tech will improve in the next couple of years too.

  • Crap presents

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    @rancid-schnitzel said in Crap presents:

    My birthday is in January, which is of course not long after Christmas, so my parents (or more specifically my mother) decided to divide my Christmas present in two. The problem with this strategy was that the present was golf clubs. So I got the irons for Christmas then the woods for my birthday. God bless her.

    Ha! My mate who was an avid Liverpool fan got a season ticket from his wife. She gave it to him on Christmas Day…

  • Animal Stories

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    @virgil said in Animal Stories:

    @MN5 how many did you want.

    2 have gone, 7 left so best hurry.

    I can’t travel to Auckland under the current alert levels. I’ll take them all if you chuck them in the courier though.

  • Photography

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    @machpants said in Photography:

    The thread title started with p, then had an o, and ended in 'ography'

    My disappointment is endless

    Well at least the thread does seem to be all about pussy..

  • Cleo Smith

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    This is a little weird. As yet no suggestion of assault (may yet come out but Cleo seemed happy enough in the footage I've seen). Dude had lots of Bratz toys which she was apparently playing with when they found her.

    Reminds me of this that happened up the road from here:

    Apr 16, 2019 Man jailed for abducting 3yo girl through window while she was sleeping Man jailed for abducting 3yo girl through window while she was sleeping

    A man who climbed through a window to abduct a three-year-old girl from her Childers home while she was sleeping, then keeping her at his house for two days, is sentenced to four-and-a-half years' jail.

  • Woo

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  • Best Live Albums

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    @crucial said in Best Live Albums:

    @godder to start off with their biggest song was a masterstroke. Gave the audience no chance but to get into it and had them eating out of Freddie's hand for the rest of the set.

    Great live band and showmanship but fuck they had some trite songs.

    I agree and it's not surprising, Freddie was the most prolific of them and his theory on songs was that they were essentially disposable - to be listened to and enjoyed a few times and then basically discarded. Some songs like Bohemian Rhapsody got an enormous amount of work and time spent on them, others nothing like as much.

  • Gin

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    @bayimports said in Gin:

    nothing says Christmas ...like umm gin?

    its on its way, will let you know how it tastes when it arrives..4 pillars xmas gin

    https://www.fourpillarsgin.com/products/four-pillars-australian-christmas-gin-2021

    4 pillars do some nice gins. I finished a Tanqueray Sevilla orange gin the other day which was quite nice. If I see another bottle I'll pick it up again.

  • DCEU

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    Ok, so I started to watch the vid. I actually thought before watching it that it was Sly because I thought the host looked a bit cut scene too. 🤦🏾♂

  • Speeding

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    What continues to surprise me in regard to road trauma is peoples inflated belief about their own abilities. 94% of crashes occur because a human made a mistake. If we make a mistake at high speed, we kill ourselves, our mates and other road users.

    The death messages I delivered after people hit trees, power poles etc still haunts me today and the scenes I attended will never leave me. If many of those drivers had been going slower it could have prevented a lot of trauma, including mine.

  • Covid Free Positivity Thread

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    @nostrildamus said in Covid Free Positivity Thread:

    @nepia said in Covid Free Positivity Thread:

    I'm about to head to Atomic Brewery in Redfern, then to axe throwing in Alexandria, then dinner and drinks nearby.

    Not sure it is such a good idea to go to the brewery first ...

    Then try
    1 Dinner and drinks
    2 Brewery (not sure I'd go to an Atomic Brewery, samples sounds rather miniscule)
    3 Axe throwing?

    If it is indoor then where is the challenge? Oh I see, Group Axe Throwing...sounds great for change management consultants...

    None of us are change management consultants. 🙂 Also, the order was down to when we could get bookings at the various places.

    But can report everything went fine, no limbs were lost. I had three wins on the trot to make the final and then lost without a point in 5 throws. In general was fun, would do it again.