The Great Australian plight (Column No.1458)
The Great Australian…way.
Come on Aussie, come on.
We like to do things the Australian way. Swashbuckling Aussies wandering through life with a swagger and ne’er a care in the world, fixing things with a hammer and some old fencing wire.
And so it is with climate change, says the PM. We’re doing it the Australian way.
Strictly speaking that means if the clock is ticking on the planet, we’ll take a sickie on Monday, allow technology to pick up the slack and she’ll be right mate.
We are going to meet and exceed our goals - um, well, which one is it, meet or exceed…hey, let’s not get distracted here – with technology.
Okay, the technology needed to achieve our goals hasn’t been invented yet, and to be honest, that carbon capture and storage thingy isn’t looking all that flash, but hey, good old Aussie ingenuity will pull us through, like it did in the war…no, not Vietnam…what? No, not Afghanistan either, the big one, remember?
Yes, it is a bit of a gamble, but hey, guess what? That’s the Australian way.
All we need to do is grab half the country’s GDP and take out a quaddie with Ladbrokes, whatever that is, and Bob’s our uncle.
We’ll win a motza which we can give to the mining industry to spend on marketing to make that bloody carbon capture and storage shit go away, and hey, our goal isn’t until 2050 anyway, so who’s going to remember who gave what to whom and why we didn’t achieve our goals?
If there’s one thing I have learned in life from my learned friend Ricardo, it’s that if you get an email or message demanding urgent action, just leave it for three days and chances are that urgency will have disappeared.
Okay, okay, in this instance a few species might disappear along the way, but hey, that’s the Australian way too, most notably, National Party policy.
“Technology is going to solve everything,” the Nats said, except methane, so let’s not do anything about that, and conveniently ignore the technology already available to solve it, which is also National Party policy.
And this is the astonishing part, the truly amazing prescience of the Coalition. How do they know which future technologies are going to work and which ones won’t?
With that quality crystal ball, why not give the whole GDP to Ladbrokes and take Monday off?
“Pass us another chardy Shirl,’ and call the boss would you? It’s the Australian way.”
Lemon Villa Orange Region Chardonnay Sparkling Wine, 2017. Lemon Villa sounds like something from a CWA fête, and with Orange on the label you can almost hear the bells of St Clemens. Not unexpectedly with so much citrus, this is bright and refreshing and perfect for Friday arvoes on the veranda at the villa. 9.2/10.
Lemon Villa Orange Cabernet Sauvignon 2019. Don't be dissuaded by the kangaroo on the label, treat it merely as a suggestion that it would make a fine accompaniment, which is true. 9.1/10.
R. Paulazzo Southern NSW Sauvignon Blanc 2020, $10. 8.8/10. Sauvignon blanc is somewhat of a forgotten grape of late, but then again, I'm forgetting a lot of things lately, so we are a good match. 8.8/10.
R. Paulazzo Riverina Ëlevage Cabernet Petit Verdot 2020, $10. Anything with this much French on the label is worth the $10 alone, the interesting and solid petit verdot is a bonus. 9.1/10.
Angullong Orange Region (Sangiovese) Rosé 2021, $26. Rosés are getting subtler and paler and altogether more palatable, which is fine by me and just in time for summer. 9.3/10.
Angullong Orange Region Fossil Hill Sangiovese 2019, $28. It's great to try the red version of the same grape by the same maker and would make a great themed dinner party wine list, if only they made a sparkling sanga and a sticky for afters. 9.3/10.
