wow factor

Canberra sunset livened up by vapour trails.

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Renovations to the Musée d'Orsay post-impressionist galleries provide a once in a lifetime opportunity for The National Gallery of Australia in Canberra.

Musée d'Orsay is loaning the Canberra NGA 114 works by Vincent van Gogh, Paul Gauguin, Paul Cezanne, Georges Seurat, Pierrre Bonnard, Claude Monet, Maurice Denis and Edouard Vuillard.

Via: ABC News

This blockbuster follows The Triumph of Landscapes held last year and proves there are some benefits to living in Canberra.

Update: [17th June 09] Today's edition of the Chronicle was delivered in a sealed wrapper. Lets hope this persists.

Canberra's sole newspaper, The Canberra Times, distributes a give away called the Chronicle. They are responsible for gross urban littering on a regular basis.

They pay distribution walkers to deliver unbound Cronicles into every letterbox.
Letterboxes are made for letters, not folded loose sheet newspapers.

With the slightest breeze, these papers are blown from one end of the street to the other.

A couple of points...
1. If anyone paid good money to advertise in these throw aways, they just blew their money on our street.
2. If I caused this degree of littering I would be charged on the spot.

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The Chronicle byline is Where Your Community Unfolds... over and over and over again.

My email to the powers that be at the Chronicle...

Subject: The Chronicle and Canberra Times Litter Canberra
I have contacted your paper before on the issue of Chronic(al) littering and got one edition delivered wrapped in a rubber band and one shrink wrapped.
But now your back to your negligent littering ways, showing scant regard for civic pride in a town where you have a monopoly. [...]
I invite you to respond to my post on this issue... http://wow-factor.com/index.php/the-canberra-times-litters-canberra ( apologies for the low quality phone camera photos, your lucky day. )
and look forward to your solution to your problem in my neighbourhood.

As a guitarist I couldn't resist the Canberra Rare Guitar meet.

This sweet Mahogany 1938 Martin caught my eye. Thankfully I reminded myself that it's all about making music, not collecting and caring for rare wood.
I left impressed, empty handed and solvent.
The Martin fell into the lower price bracket of the weekend's fine collection.

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This morning it's -4c in Canberra. Cold enough to focus my mind on how warm our new house might be in comparison to our current renter.

All houses in Canberra must have an Energy Efficiency Rating (EER) and it's astonishing how many properties are so inefficient.

The house we rent has a score of 1, the house we are buying has a score of 3.5

What that means in potential energy dollar savings....

We can easily achieve a score of 5 simply by installing drapes with pelmets and sealing door gaps on 3 doors.

In an age of Global Warming and diminishing resources I'm stunned that the National Capital of Australia is commissioning a new Power Generation Plant worth millions instead of providing a retrofit service for current houses.