Only real people on this forum?

[Greg Beetham]

I'm approaching 66 now Barry, so that info was a bit out of date, and yep I spent a long time matching automotive colours for a paint dealer. A very difficult and mostly thankless job actually, if you've ever tried matching colours you'd probably already know.
It's strange that you would get a 'Paddy' nickname with a name like yours, but then you ended up in Ireland anyway which is a sort of odd conjunction in reverse you might say.
Greg

[bfitzgerald]

The name is common here, but not in the UK hence the "paddy" thing folks assume it's an Irish native name which it's not.
Funny thing is 12 years ago I was offered a job in New South Wales and was stupid enough to not accept the offer (things were booming in Eire back then)
Now down under things are on a roll.

I believe I made an error on that!
Nothing wrong in mixing paint I had a re-spray on a car a few years back!

[Greg Beetham]

Goodness graciousment Barry not NSW, that’s some foreign place down south that support the blues footy team. Well it’s not all bad they do speak English there so you could blend in until you make it across the border where we support the maroons…yay.
But seriously things are chugging along ok I guess while China wants to buy stuff off us but we are in a similar boat to the Middle East when the oil runs out sometime soon.
Not that commodities are going to run out in OZ in a hurry but the only reason why the price went through the roof was because China’s demand far outstripped our capability to supply. There has since been massive increase in infrastructure to ease the potential bottlenecks, which in turn will make sure the prices won’t escalate to such levels in future when demand increases again, and that means less profit per ton for the big miners, and maybe less tax payable too but hey the customer will be happier.
None of which means a hell of a lot for the guy in the street I guess except the government/s might have to learn to balance budgets that include more meaningful stuff and a lot less window dressing.
The job you had lined up might that have been in tourism? Whatever it doesn’t matter, but since the OZ kopek went from 60 cents US to $1.05 the tourism industry has taken a hit, the main thing I think now is backpackers and those on casual working type holidays (farm work mostly) where those who earn a few bucks don’t get registered but that allows them to be taken advantage of a bit I think but still apparently a lot still do it for some extra petrol money, (you can never have too much petrol money in a place where it’s hundreds of kms to get to the next town you want to go too sometimes).
The building industry is complaining about a downturn but then they always complain about a downturn, there seems to be construction work happening here at least, more mega storied unit blocks getting built in the previous railway marshaling yard in Townsville.
Apparently the retail sales have gone way up in the first two months since xmas so now the reserve bank is tipped to leave interest rates as they are, the building industry won’t be happy…again.
Greg

[bfitzgerald]

Here we go again:

Email today...
I just wanted to learn more about your photography, books, and you. So, I looked you up and found this site.
Anyways, I still watch your show with my sister. We love it. Really.
I was wondering, is alright if I ask you some questions because the web isn't very helpful...


Sigh...