Just use an ordinary grade 2 bolt.

Thanks guys, I did use a regular bolt I found (ssshhh.. its a secret) but I still need a spare.

what if you took the regular bolt and just sabotaged it with a hacksaw, weakening it at the place you expect it should shear?

Heck. make two, now there's your spare.

I'm thinking its not even necessary to weaken it if I use grade 2 like fargon suggested which the interweb tells me are bolts with no markings on the heads.

It's bloody hot.

41 today, 44 tomorrow, but the promise of a cool change in the late afternoon.

Bloody bad bushfire weather, had good rains until about 3 months ago, so there is lots of fuel about, but now it is dry as a dead dingo's donger.

I looked it up. 44 = 111 degrees F.

Hoooooooooly Fuck! You poor Aussies!

It's currently 58F/14.5C here, with 99% humidity and an unrelenting, fine, misty drizzle. I don't know you guys elsewhere deal with this kind of weather all the time! Winter always kicks my ass -- I don't know how I'll ever leave Florida.

58% with 99% humidity is really good for your skin (not that you need it!) but get out there and soak it up. girl!

For the past two weeks I have been in Brazil

90 degrees every day was amazing. :cool:

Wow.

pics or it didn't happen, right?

Most of my photos involve other people so I don't want to post those, but here are some decent ones. Unfortunately, I only have postable photos of a small portion of the trip so there is much more to Brazil than this. It truly is a beautiful country.

Spare a thought for the 250 or so people silly enough to live in Oodnadatta:

Today, it's going to be 43 degrees in SYDNEY. It the worst day for bushfire conditions in NSW in recent memory.

Bugger this.

Pretty much the entire country is scorching hot, completely dry, very windy, and there is no relief in sight beyond a weak cool (but dry) change moving through today.

There are something like 200 fires, many uncontrolled or uncontained, all over the place. Hundreds of houses have already been destroyed in Tasmania, but today NSW is copping it worst. The cool change is a double-edged sword, cool is nice, but it comes with winds at 60 kph gusting to 90.

The best hope for real relief is a cyclone brewing up over the far north west, which *might* send a band of rain south and west across the continent, but that will take a week at best to arrive.

Tell me again about this "snow" stuff, will you?

Good news is that no lives have been lost yet, as far as anyone knows.

115 F. Damn...

It's official.

But heck, tomorrow it is only going to be 25 here! Then it'll start climbing again...
I think the cool(ish) southerly change is pushing the heat up towards Ali in the Brisbane area, they're in for about 38 tomorrow.

Enjoy the purple & pink, embrace it, make it your own.:sweat:

I presume you are referring to this:

See the GIF at http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-01-0...if-map/4458006

About half-way up the west coast, the town of Winslow is about to get grazed by a category 3 or 4 cyclone.


That's not for a day or so yet, so in the meanwhile, here's a beer tsunami after a humungous explosion at the brewery crazy dust storm complete with thunder and lightning, rain and hail (according to FB posts) that drifted out to sea.

Attachment 42409

These are from a screenshot of the gallery at https://www.facebook.com/perthweatherlive. More and better pics there.

Wow!

Winslow? I think you mean Onslow.

that's an impressive dust storm!

eta:

39F high today, icy windshield.

Thanks, V, I just noticed that then.


Uhh, umm, I couldn't read the sign properly because of all the dust! Yes, that's it....

Just another remake of the Poseidon Adventure.

crazy

Baked.

We're hoping for snow on Monday.
It's unlikely to hit us until after school, but I might get to walk to school in it on Tuesday morning. Yay! New peacock wellies all set and ready for action.

We've got the fog eating snow thing happening here. :yeldead:

Just remembered this. :)

http://cellar.org/showthread.php?t=1...now+eating+fog

Rain. Slow, steady, soak things down rain. ooohhhhh yeeeaahhhh baby. It seems pretty local around Adelaide at present, I hope it drifts slowly across the whole South East of the country.

Send some to Sydney, the ocean dried up. :eek:

What a great thread!

Wow, is that HLJ on the bike??!! Now, if only there was a picture of Zen hiding somewhere....

The weather/news people have been screaming all day, literally all day long, about ice. "Ice is coming, ice is coming!!" They used the phrase "Travel, of any kind, is strongly discouraged."

We'll see.

Yeah we're in the middle of a 'weather event' apparently. And there was I thinking it had merely snowed.

Talking of which: it could fuck off for me now. Pet owners are being warned about the dangers of rock salt and antifreeze. Antifreeze spilled onto the kerbside, and rocksalt spread on the roads gets onto their feet and when they lick it off they can be poisoned.

So it's washing paws every time we come back in now. Can't even create a salt free zone for quick wees as I don't have a garden. As soon as we step out of the mews and into the lane there's rock salt everywhere. 2-3 walks a day, plus a couple of 2 minute trips out back, rinsing and drying paws now 4-5 times a day.

Buy Carrot booties?

Waste of money. I and Mum have tried them with various dogs for various reasons over the years (Pilau had a problem with his pads sometimes, Wellybobs had eczema on his toes, Dan cut his paw open and needed it kept clean and dry on walks) and they have always come off.

I don't think they make booties out of carrots....wouldn't hold up.

Laughed? I nearly started :p


Actually I did, loudly.

Aw, piss.

It will all melt soon, right?

:)

They reckon itll thaw in a week or so.

So, I know you are unhappy with the snow, but this Brit loves it....

This was in the local paper: alas it's only an ikkle pic

http://www.halifaxcourier.co.uk/webi...2550408183.jpg

In my part of the country we're expecting up to 400mm of rain over the next few days. some areas have already had over 600mm (that's a foot and a half of rain for those of you metrically challenged).

Anyway, I hope we get a lot of rain. It's very dry here. The wet season has not even started, and we it should have started almost 2 months ago at the latest.

Good news, the drought has broken*!


Attachment 42554

Rescue was completed successfully.

More at http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-01-2...-coast/4481494


*Coastal Queensland and Gulf of Carpentaria regions only, rest of the country still hot, dry and probably on fire.

Not much rain here so far, but it's on the way. Very slow moving system, which is good in a way, but probably would be better if it'd do its thing then bugger off a bit sooner.

You reckon they've opened the gate on Wivenhoe dam yet? :p

Apparently so. Not so sure that was a good move though. The higher tides coming up could wreak a bit of havoc trying to cope with that and a storm surge.

saw a bit this morning on TV about northern Oz being flooded while southern Oz is burning up hot and dry.

they showed some kid clinging to a tree in the middle of a flash flood---he was saved but the guy who saved him was almost killed himself while doing it.


Kids just lucky a dropbear didn't get him first.

follow up Oz question: how come you guys celebrate things (like, oh, I dunno, a bank holiday or something) but NSW never does it the day you guys do it? On my calendar it'll say such and such celebrated except for NSW. What's with NSW? Too good for the rest of the continent?

NSW is New South Wales.
The clue is in the title.

The Welsh never did anything to suit the rest of the country ;)

What's more current than the weather outside my house rfn?

Just got back from carrot's last walk. About 4 hours ago as I was getting home, though a small amount of snow was falling it didn't seem very much. There was already some compacted snow on the ground from earlier in the week, but the roads were all clear and so were the paths in the main.

Anyhoo, here are a few pics from our walk around the village. Apols for the picture quality, the snow was blowing about a bit.

http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8236/8...0e46fec4df.jpg

http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8225/8...e9f7ae2d6f.jpg

http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8236/8...fe69bb092d.jpg

http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8360/8...feaab91a36.jpg


http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8092/8...e88acb386f.jpg


Ahhh....back home again. This is my little street. Note that the snow is getting heavier ;P

http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8517/8...ab31f9281f.jpg

We've got a near full moon on the breast of the new-fallen snow.

OMG Dana, I thought Australia was bad, but look at that cobweb. :eek:

C'mon now, it's an old country.

Took Carrotchops for a walk and the snow is sooo deep! Bad enough on the pavements, but over on the field he all but vanished lol. Let him off the lead to go play with one of his friends he looked like a dolphin leaping through the snow. Vanishing and surfacing, vanishing and surfacing :P

that's a great image! and thanks for the pics----you live NEAR Hebdon Bridge?

And that does seem like a lot of snow for you guys. I read about the winter of '63 in England and it was quite a dump of ice and snow. Are they comparing this one to that?


and Sundae--thanks for the answer. I should've known the Welsh thing----they are a bit different now, aren't they? LOL ;)

Quite near Hebbers, aye. 'Bout a 25 minute drive. That's where the two Js live :)

We've had as bad and worse in recent years. Don't forget I'm basically in the foothills of the Pennines between Lancashire and Yorkshire. If it's going to snow anywhere it's likely to be here, and likely to be deeper than on flatter ground.

It was worse Sunday-Monday. I had to cancel my classes for Monday afternoon and arrange alternative sessions. The roads in and out of the village were all but locked down. Also, this is unlikely to stick around long. That mad snowfall last night was the last hurrah, the thaw is already setting in amid flood warnings.

Won't be sorry to see it go. I've been having to wash Carrot's paws after every outing (3-5 times a day) for the last couple of weeks.

I feel like such a horrible dog owner when I hear you take carrot out 3-5 times a day-esp. in this kind of weather. I don't walk Autumn unless it's nice out...and I feel very bad mommy-ish for it. She IS nine, though, and more accustomed to a cozy life-but I KNOW she needs to walk. I just can't make myself do it in cold snowy weather.

Bear in mind I don't have an outside space to let him go do whatever he needs to do. If he needs a quick wee, I have to take him out of the shared garden space onto the road or the lane. If I had a garden I'd walk him once or twice a day and let him in the garden the rest of the time.

He's also only 13 months old and not allowed walks of more than 20 minutes at a time, currently, because of his hips. When he's doing well with is walking, he can go up to 30 mins, but no more than that.

That's not a lot of exercise for a young bearded collie. They're an active, outdoor breed. So, I have to break his exercise down into multiple walks. that way he gets the same amount of walking in a daybut not all in one or two chunks leading to him fall back on his tired walk (which damages his hips) for the last third of each.

It rained here last night.
Cleared most oof the snow and ice.
Quite warm today, sun is shining.

Wish I lived in Dani's part of the country.

Oh, yeah; his poor hips.

but still. You are such a good doggie mommy.

what have you been up to, missy?


Miss size 18! fanfuckingtastic! You look great-even if you feel a bit ill. Are you feeling better?