Bulletin of the Rotary Club of Ocean Grove Inc.
www.rotaryoceangrove.blogspot.com
Volume 26 No 29
January 29th 2008
Notice for the meeting at the Ocean Grove Hotel, Tuesday 5th February, 6.00 for 6.30
Subject The Queenscliff seafood festival and the part we play in it Speaker Grant Talbot
Chairman Geoff Ford
Assistant Cashier & Thanker Anne Brown Greeter & Assistant Sergeant John Calnin
Birthdays & Anniversaries
31st Jan John Wynn [also Franz Schubert 1797, Zane Grey 1872 and Queen Beatrix [Netherlands] 1938.]
1st Feb. Peter Hawthorne [ also Clark Gable 1901, Boris Yeltsin 1931 and Lisa Presley 1968.]
3rd Alex Magee [also Felix Mendelsshon 1809, Norman Rockwell 1894 and Val Doonican 1927.]
3rd Tim & Karen Kemp. On this day in 1967, Ronald Ryan, the last person to be executed in Australia, was hanged in Pentridge Prison.
*********************************
Notice in a cemetery. ‘Persons are prohibited from picking flowers from any but their own graves’.
Notice for the meeting at the Ocean Grove Hotel, Tuesday 12th February, 6.00 for 6.30.
Subject Rotary ‘shelter Boxes’. Speaker Peter Kavenagh and assistant [Highton Kardinia RC]
Chairman Tim Kemp
Assistant Cashier & Thanker Bill Steains Greeter & Assistant Sergeant Tony Haines
Birthday
6th Feb. Ken Fleay [also Babe Ruth 1895, Ronald Reagan 1911, Eva Braun 1912, and Natalie Cole 1950.]
*********************************
A hotel notice in Yugoslavia ‘The flattening of underwear with pleasure is the job of the chambermaid.’
No, it’s got nothing to do with Rotary, but we all live near it, we all use it, and it will affect us all!
Much has been written and discussed about the dredging in Port Philip Bay which starts next week, [in about 8% of it.] The initial estimated cost of $670M is confidently expected to blow out to $1B by completion, and that will permit ships with a draft of 14 metres to access Melbourne port. The dredging will be undertaken at the ‘Heads’, the south east curve of the south channel- opposite Rosebud, and from the Frankston beacon to the docks. And in a few years, depending on re-silting and ship sizes, it will all have to be done again.
If trucking magnate Lindsay Fox is worth listening to, Hastings should have been the target in the first place, although the problems of land infrastructure would, initially be, [and will be more so in the future] enormously expensive, at perhaps $10B. You can’t get shipping containers two high on rail trucks under Federation square, so using the existing rail route through Frankston is impossible. A new rail link from Hastings to Dandenong is envisaged, then the existing rail to Campbellfield and beyond. But it’s going to happen, in perhaps 30 years according to Port of Melbourne Authority, but in about 12 to 15 if Lindsay has his way.
The existing channel to Hastings through Westernport Bay is already deep enough to match the proposed dredging of Port Philip, and how about the 12,000 trucks daily which already clog the roads from the Port Melbourne docks through such suburbs as Yarraville and Seddon? That will be doubled within 10 years.
Ed. Comment; Read Saturday 26th January’s edition of the Melbourne Age ‘Insight’ section.
Why is the proposed acquisition of the Great Western property so controversial?
So far, your editor has heard only adverse opinions about this proposal. “Great western is too small, it has no growth potential, it has no Rotary club, it is too far away, etc. etc.” Frankly, having re-read the DG’s newsletter on the subject, I don’t give any credence to those arguments. My readers are traditionally loath to offer any opinions in the form of ‘letters to the editor’, but I challenge you once again. The following is a verbatim reproduction of district Governor Rick Robertson’s para. in his January newsletter.
“For some time the District has been looking for a suitable headquarters to serve as a meeting place as well as a place for storage of archives and the district trailer. After some years of looking we have found a site at Great Western – the centre of our district – and the purchase is proceeding. It is a five acre site in the town and has a 4 bedroom home which has been established for about twenty years. The building commenced life as a restaurant so there is a large room suitable for meetings. District Management Meetings and District Committee Meetings can be held there. There is a double lock-up garage where the trailer can be housed and much of that room can be used for storage of archives. The building is also suitable for family accommodation. A letter has already been sent to your President regarding the purchase and we look to your support in this exciting development.”
Incidently, the price is $267,500.
I look forward to your contribution, for or against.
***********************************
Seen on an advertising poster- “Are you an adult that cannot read? If so, we can help.”
Southampton RC Pres. Keith Nixon reports on his new supermarket
A new supermarket has opened near his home. It has an automatic water mister to keep produce fresh. Just before it comes on, you hear the sound of distant thunder and the smell of fresh rain. When you pass the milk section, you hear the cows mooing and you experience the scent of freshly mown hay.
In the meat section, there is the aroma of barbequed steaks and onions. In the egg section you hear hens cluck and cackle, and the air is filled with the pleasing aroma of bacon and eggs frying.
The bread department features the tantalizing smell of fresh baked bread and pastries.
Keith doesn’t buy toilet paper there any more. Fair dinkum.
***********************************
This day tonight
Four recalcitrants have not returned their car raffle books to Fordie. He must get them back urgently.
Marion Walton suggests we meet at the Geelong Botanical Gardens 5.00 PM Sunday 10th Feb, for a social picnic and musical evening. BYO food, drinks, sitons and $10 per person or $25 family.
The joint project in the Philippines with RC Southampton looks like a nono. Boards will look at Fiji.
First aid refresher course will commence 6/2, and CPR one night stand on the same date. Contact Noel.
Applications for this years RYLA course for 18-25ers will close on 15/3. Suggested applicants to Paul.
For those members rostered for the Portarlington Triathlon, the ETA has been put forward to 6.45.
There will be another ‘donations –in-kind’ collection soon. Watch this space.
Our joint speakers tonight were Judy Balmer and Paul Gleeson, who have entered into a joint venture titled ‘Training Essentials’. Judy is an OG resident, formerly from Diamond Creek and qualified in commercial fields. She and Paul have established a training program loosely described as ‘Training the trainers’, a highly specialized area for the ever-increasing interest in professional development. It’s a pity that our venue, cramped into a tiny space with lousy acoustics, did not do the subject justice. The hotel has promised us exclusiousity next week, since the ‘terrorists’ appear to have gone home.
*************************************
A sign posted in Germany’s Black Forest:
‘It is strictly forbidden on our Black Forest camping site that people of different sex, for instance, men and women, live together in one tent unless they are married to each other for this purpose.’ Say that again?
