First Taste Of Bushfire Season Leaves 12 Homes Destroyed, And The Scorcher Has Just Begun
Darrian Traynor
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Australia has traditionally been a highly successful and prosperous nation. On almost every important business index, we are accelerating. The stakes -- the financial, social, environmental and political consequences -- similarly are rising.
Michael Moore
We are all children of God (or nature or whatever you believe in), part of the human family, and nothing you say or do can change that fact one iota. If you don't like living by these American rules, then you need to go to the time-out room in any one of your Towers, sit there, and think about what you've said.
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Every year I tell my husband I'm not doing it again. I'm not doing Christmas. I tell him we should all pack a bag and fly far, far away and not return until January and maybe that could be the family present this year.
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Young children are egocentric by nature. As any three-year-old knows only too well, the world revolves around them. "I want...", "Give me...", "It's mine!" and other variations are the mantras of this age group. This self-centred behaviour is developmental, which means it's something they grow out of... or they're supposed to.
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It's the most wonderful time of the year, but what they forget to tell you is that the feeling disappears as you enter your teens and you spend the rest of your life trying to reclaim it.
I'm one of those crazy people who swim every single day, even through the winter. I first learned that I could actually do it, that my body wouldn't protest, that I could in fact swim on cold days and not catch the flu or die of hypothermia, from a group of women and men ranging from their sixties to their nineties at Avalon ocean pool.
Stu Spence
This week's three photions include a coffee shop where everyone orders a double shot whether they want to or not; the dangers of keeping gnomes indoors; plus a sight to behold for rusted-on Republicans.
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When I heard President Hollande mention the critical goal of 1.5°C I knew this would be a different COP. He was the first world leader from a developed country to utter the ceiling of 1.5°C. And the world took notice.
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Heatwaves receive less media and public attention than other extreme events such as flood and fire, but they kill more people than any other natural disaster and cause significant damage to ecosystems, agriculture and infrastructure.
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Most who claim to be atheists generally admit that while they don't know where the first atom came from, they're pretty sure it wasn't from a creator. This position sounds very much like the view of an agnostic who doesn't know whether or not there is a god. Perhaps we need a new term for this position, like 'agnathiesm'.
ASSOCIATED PRESS
MOSCOW -- The majority of Russians have followed recent conflicts passively; they mostly voice the positions that were communicated to them by state TV channels and their support of Russian military actions in Syria is more reflective of the power of popular TV shows than the actual mobilization of the society.
BBC
I live in a big house with my husband and two kids. I turn up at school most days in lycra pants and sneakers, and, in cold weather, a sleeveless puffy jacket. I like lattes and green smoothies and chia seeds. But before you pigeonhole me as a posh, trend-following, Lorna-Jane-wearing yummy mummy, read on.
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Because every time we sulk about the cost of kale and our distance to the coast, we have less space in our hearts for the children growing up with hungry bellies and dirty floors, the people for whom Christmas is not a celebration but a reminder of what they're missing.
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Many commentators have said since Saturday that this agreement is not enough. No climate negotiator would disagree with that. But this agreement contains everything it reasonably could to pull our emissions curve downward as fast as humanly possible.
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It's date night tonight. Woohoo. School ended yesterday, the kids are having a sleepover and my lovely wife and I are having date night. Hooray for date night. The only problem with tonight's date night is that it coincides with the start of the cricket season.
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So although Sydney was on tornado alert yesterday and Adelaide is having a heatwave of over 40oC predicted this week, what is a given in Australia are the people.
Listen. I hear you. You're a few pounds heavier than you like. I completely understand how you feel. Isn't it amazing we can see the beauty in our best friends, sisters, mothers, and aunts without the slightest thought to their flaws... but can obsess for hours on our own imperfections?
Ximagination
I thought choosing a name would be the fun part of parenting, apart from the construction phase. But some parents get so stressed about finding a name for their newborn they end up calling each other names.
Fairfax Media/Peter Stoop PAS
Lights flashing, sirens blaring, it's 8.54 am and I'm in the back of an ambulance hurtling its way through traffic on the Monash Freeway to the scene of an accident. Truck vs. motorcyclist. The early information doesn't sound good.
