Starting again, at the end
August 18 - 24, 2010
I HAVE died and gone to the Swan Valley it seems. Strange, as in hindsight, it probably isn’t the mix of Pleasure Dome and Pebble Beach that I thought I would have chosen, but I must say it isn’t too bad.
Lessons from the land of Borat
July 14 - 20, 2010
FIRSTLY, a little apology in advance. If during this week’s Australian v Pakistan test match at Lords, Ponting is bowled by one that keeps a bit low after hitting a suspiciously shiraz-like red patch on a good length at the nursery end... um, well ... it’s a long story.
Fear of fear itself
June 16 - 22, 2010
JUNE 15: ABOUT mid afternoon most trading days, the afternoon papers and the news feeds start to come out with the trading moves for the day – what is up, what is down and thankfully of late, a little less of what has imploded in a torrent of subprime debt. I often wonder why they do this as I can clearly see this for myself and with the introduction of the internet, so can every day punter.
No matter who you vote for a politician always gets in
May 19 - 25, 2010
I CAN remember as a kid in my home town, the local member of parliament was always someone you knew, or at least someone your dad knew and more than likely had enjoyed a few beers with.
Growing up is hard to do
April 28 - May 4, 2010
THANK god it’s over – winter I mean, it was a grim one. The days are getting longer, the golf clubs have been dusted off, it’s sunny outside, the Sunday roast is in the oven and I have just knocked the scab off a splendid Barossa shiraz. Notwithstanding the meltdown of the euro and the horrific prospect of a hung parliament in the UK, all is well with the world. Unless of course you are the CEO of a major mining company.
Size does matter
March 31 - April 6, 2010
RISK and reward, no pain no gain, you can’t make an omelette without breaking eggs, there’s no such thing as a free lunch, only dead fish go with the flow, etc, etc, etc. I am sure we can come up with plenty more tired clichés to reflect the same underlying premise – risk is a necessary part of life, or at least any life worth living.
Was I born yesterday?
March 16 - 22, 2010
MARCH 15: I HEARD a great saying the other day, ascribed to some wise old mining guy: “Only invest in mining projects that an idiot could run, because eventually one will."
The art of communication
March 2 - 8, 2010
FEBRUARY 23: MANY years ago as a young geologist, I packed my satchel, left the cosy comforts of West Perth and headed to Kalgoorlie to "do my time". Doing one’s time was still expected back then before today's young geos learned to do it all by remote control - popping out bush for the odd week here and there in a swag was one thing, but to be taken seriously as a geo you at some point had to up sticks and actually spend a few years in a mining town.
Picks and shovels
February 9 - 15, 2010
THAT old adage that in a gold rush it is best to be the one selling the picks and shovels has never been truer.
All is calm, all is bright
December 21 - 27, 2009
CHRISTMAS is a time of certainty, at least in this country. The weather will be foul, the shops will be packed to bursting, the second half of December is little more than a hazy drunken blur of client lunches and a bunch of brain dead, overstuffed socialist Neanderthals will go on strike. This year it’s BA’s turn, perhaps next year the FSA. One can only hope.
The barbarous relic
December 7 - 13, 2009
NOVEMBER 30: I WAS playing golf recently in some corporate day or other and was paired with an American chap who, apart from being pretty decent off the tee, over a sausage sandwich at the half-way hut on discovering I was in the mining game, admitted that he was a gold bug. He didn’t just come straight out with it of course. He skirted the subject for a bit, as if being a gold enthusiast was a bit like having a penchant for cross dressing – not something you admit to unless you feel you are in like-minded company.
What's in a name
November 9 - 15, 2009
NOVEMBER 2: IT IS a matter of historical record that the Newmont exploration team who carried out the original work on the giant Telfer gold deposit in Western Australia during the early 70s, at the time colloquially referred to the place as Fanny Hill – not as you might imagine because of a yearning for some distant loved one, but because from the air, the lozenge-shaped doubling dipping anticlinal structure looked like a giant ...
Keep it simple comrade
October 19 - 25, 2009
AS Australians we tend to sometimes think we deserve bragging rights on some issues, especially when compared to the Europeans. Australia is a rather pleasant place, the lifestyle is much to be admired, the wine is bloody good, and we have plenty of space to allow us from time to time to get away from the annoyance of our brethren. Furthermore, we take it as read that we know all there is to know about mining.
Political risk - it's a game played everywhere
September 28 - October 4, 2009
RISK is relative, in that we all have our own view of what is sensible, proper and fun, and what is just plain stupid. I, for example, am happy to do some things that others may regard as an insane gamble, such as visiting malaria infested war zones, eating at KFC or taking on a water hazard with a 4 iron, but would draw the line at otherwise mundane activities such as parachuting or bungy jumping.
They're back
September 7 - 13, 2009
Thank god we finally won something, I was beginning to despair.
The trouble with people
August 24 - 30, 2009
I HAVE an MBA! Well of course you do, I hear you say. Someone with their finger so firmly on the pulse of the global economic zeitgeist is surely the product of the finest business schools, surely someone who has a seat at Davos and the ear of the mover and shakers; someone who helps plot the course of the fiscal flow.
What have we learned?
August 17 - 23, 2009
AUGUST 10: AS A kid, I was pretty much the same as every other Australian country kid. I was an idiot.
We’re from the government, we’re here to help
July 27 - August 2, 2009
JULY 20: AS A young man, recently married, gainfully employed and still sans children, milestones seemed to be important, and in that vein, with a few years to go we had made plans of where to spend my 40th birthday. I can't remember the exact details, but I seem to recall that the main themes involved a villa in Tuscany and lots of red wine.
The pace of things
July 6 - 12, 2009
JUNE 29: IN THE words of Robert Louis Stevenson, “there are no foreign lands, it is the traveller only who is foreign”.
And so it ends
June 15 - 21, 2009
I COME to bury Rio, not to praise it.