Australia’s summer time zones,
showing hours ahead of UT (GMT).
The unofficial red +8 zone only
applies to me and my home.

Is it possible for an individual to live according to standard time while everyone around him adopts daylight savings time? I’m not sure, but I’m going to find out.

Yesterday Western Australians put their clocks forward for the start of daylight saving. We don’t normally have it here in WA, but we are in the second year of a trial period before yet another referendum to see if daylight saving will be adopted permanently.

We’ve already had three trial periods followed by referendums, and have voted against daylight saving three times over three decades, but our politicians clearly don’t like the decisions of those they allegedly represent. Last year I blogged about it - see “Democracy in Western Australia?” for the full story.

If a majority of my fellow citizens had voted for daylight saving, I’d accept it and reluctantly conform. But they didn’t. I object to the undemocratic way the government is forcing the issue against the demonstrated wishes of its people, and I’m feeling a little recalcitrant.

Last year I adjusted my clocks (all 14 of them) but managed to remain in my standard-time routine. This year I’ve not changed any clocks at all. I’ve declared myself and my home “daylight saving free zones”, and continue to live according to Western Standard Time as far as possible.

Of course there willl need to be some adjustments where I interact with society around me. I’m a student, and my classes now start an hour earlier (by my watch). No problem - I won’t need to get up much earlier as I already allow spare time at the start of the day. The timetable changes caused by daylight saving will just rob me of that spare time in the coolest part of the day (making it daylight robbery, not daylight saving!). My life is relatively uncluttered by appointments, and I’m not currently working, so I don’t expect any great problems with being an hour behind everyone around me. Keeping the time that better suits me and the climate should offset any inconveniences.

How practical will it really be to operate in my own time zone? Will it make much difference to anything? I don’t know, but I’m giving it a go, and will blog about the outcome. It’s my own subtle protest against goverments who ask their citizens what they want then disregard their answers.

Update: After writing this, I saw a story in the West Australian newspaper (see “Protesters glad to be behind the times“) about a Murchison couple who are ignoring daylight saving, as they did last year too. It seems many others in rural WA are doing likewise, so I’m not alone.

I normally prefer to write about more positive things, but feel compelled to indulge in a brief whinge after the latest display of hypocrisy by Channel Seven’s current affairs program, Today Tonight.

I felt irritated a couple of weeks back, when Today Tonight aired a story about half the contestants in the finals of Australian Idol being Christians. They made a big deal of this, as if there was something sinister or wrong about it, and alleged that the pastor of Hillsong Church had encouraged its members to vote for some of the Christian singers competing on the show. The allegation was unsubstantiated, and denied by the church, but the truth apparently wasn’t important to the story.

Bill Muehlenberg wrote a witty response in his blog (see Danger! Danger! They Are Taking Over!), highlighting the anti-Christian bigotry often shown by Today Tonight. He points out that in a recent census 64% of Australians identify themselves as Christian. Also, Christians sing a lot in church, increasing the likelihood of developing their talent. The fact that some of those doing well in a singing contest are Christians is therefore a perfectly logical outcome, not a scandal.

And even if a church did encourage its members to vote for certain entrants, they wouldn’t be alone. Clubs, social groups and even businesses do exactly that. Last year an Australian Idol contestant from Albury-Wodonga had the local pub raise money to pay for phone votes, but Today Tonight didn’t run a story on that. Even Today Tonight has been known to promote individual contestants, as they did with the Perth couple competing in “My Restaurant Rules” a few years ago. The couple won, thanks in part to the free promotion Today Tonight gave them.

What pressed my button though was last night’s program. There was a story having a go at a group of Christians hoping to influence the approaching federal elections by expressing their opinions to politicians (how dare they use their democratic rights, like everyone else!). This was followed by another reference to churches “stacking votes” in the Australian Idol contest.

Immediately following this was a story about a Perth dancer doing well in the “Dancing With The Stars” TV show. Apart from being shameless cross-promotion of one of their own TV shows (which was to air later that evening, what a coincidence!), it stongly suggested that Perth viewers support (ie vote for) the celebrity paired up with the Perth dancer. So it’s okay for Today Tonight to solicit votes in talent contests, it’s okay for other groups to do it, but if they think a Christian group might be doing the same thing … it’s a scandal, worthy of a critical “news” story.

It is often said that churches are full of hypocrites, and they have their share. As a church member I can readily admit we’re not perfect. My observation, however, is that more hypocrisy can be seen outside churches than in them, and Today Tonight is a shining example (see this article for more details). They’ve lost one semi-regular viewer, and if Christians are anywhere near as numerous as the census suggests, they stand to lose a lot more.

Now that I’ve got this off my chest I can forgive Today Tonight’s hypocrisy and turn the other cheek … while turning to another channel.

You don’t often hear “good customer service” and “bank” mentioned in the same sentence. In Australia, banks are commonly viewed as greedy and heartless organisations which ruthlessly bleed their customers dry. Sometimes this sentiment is justified, and bank-bashing is popular. Today, however, I was pleasantly surprised to receive good service from my bank in spite of its public perception.

I was depositing a pile of coins, and only had to queue for about two minutes. Not content with just being prompt, the teller was observant enough to notice that my home loan interest rate seemed higher than she thought it could be. She asked if I’d like to talk to a lending officer to see if they could work out something better for me, and I agreed. Another very helpful and knowledgeable woman appeared within minutes, and she went to some lengths to understand my circumstances and see what the bank could do to make me better off.

Having previously compared banks and accounts, I’m familiar with assessing fine print, fees and charges, and am good enough with numbers to weigh up benefits with costs. That’s why I hadn’t already changed to a cheaper home loan - usually the savings are offset by disadvantages and higher costs in other areas, such as credit card and transaction accounts (these came fee-free as part of a package with my existing loan). The woman I saw today was able to sort out a combination of home loan and other accounts which really do work out cheaper for me. I felt she wasn’t merely doing a job; she appeared genuinely keen to do what was best for the customer.

Saving money obviously pleased me, but equally impressive was the way two bank employees took the time and effort to provide very good customer service … not what we are conditioned to expect from banks. Especially in a busy bank, on a friday.

It got me thinking about the negative image of banks, government departments, and other large organisations. Much dissatisfaction stems from procedures, policies and prices: things determined by management. Customer service problems often arise through lack of staff or training: something management is responsible for. The bulk of the employees, who do the work - the ones we deal with - are regular people trying to do as good a job as they can in their circumstances.

Today’s experience was a reminder not to let an organisation’s bad image prejudice our judgement of its staff. Good customer service does exist … yes, even in a bank!

(For the curious, the bank I refer to is the Dianella branch of BankWest)

Spring has arrived, and my regular walks around Perth’s Lake Monger are less comfortable. There’s more sweating, the pollen in the air requires hay fever medication and eye drops (for me at least), and the flies have begun their annoying return. It’s not all bad though, as the lake at this time of year has some treats.

One delightful sight is all the freshly hatched baby birds that start popping up at this time of year. Yesterday I found the duck in the photo taking her new chicks for a swim, which they seemed to be enjoying. The pitter patter of other tiny webbed and clawed feet should arrive soon, including the fuzzy brown balls that grow into black swans. It’s hard to imagine anyone not finding them cute.

Lake Monger in March 2007 (left) and October 2007 (right)

Another pleasant sight is the healthy rise in water levels. Back in March the lake was drier than it had been for many years, with large areas of mud, algae, and exposed lakebed. A winter of near-average rainfall, consistent enough to maintain good runoff, has filled the lake again. The surrounds are green and lush, and there’s a feeling of abundance that was hard to imagine just six months ago.

I may not enjoy the walking conditions as much in spring, but I can appreciate the lushness and baby birdlife. As the young ducks grow up during the coming dry months I’m sure they too will be grateful for the extra water in the lake this summer.

It was in the pipeline for a long time but has finally been completed - a redesign of my website and blog.

For those not familiar with how it looked before, here are two before and after screenshots of my navel fluff page. The left one shows how it looked before my redesign (click on it to open full-size in a new browser window).

With a few exceptions the content remains essentially the same - the changes mostly concern the organisation and structure, appearance, and some behind-the scenes coding improvements that benefit me but don’t affect the appearance. The changes can be summarised as follows:

• Revised the text of the Snow in WA section and split it into smaller and more manageable pages.
• Added a page about my collection of bakery bags.
• Added a header, consisting of a header image with title and tag-line superimposed, and navigation links.
• Centred the content (was previously left-aligned) to look better on a wide screen.
• Retained the white content background but added a pale non-white background to set the content apart from its surrounds.
• Changed the default font from Arial to Trebuchet. Nothing wrong with Arial, but I think Trebuchet looks a little more stylish while remaining readable. If complaints roll in, it’s easy to change back!
• Increased spacing between lines to improve readability.
• Divided the site into five sections (Blog, Snow in WA, Photography, Writing, Collections) to provide logical structure and better organisation of content.
• Added a contents page for each of the sections, accessed using the links in the header and footer.
• De-cluttered the navigation column on the left - instead of listing every page on the site, it now only contains links to the other pages within the section being viewed (except the Home page which still lists all).
• Improved page printing by adding a print style-sheet - now simply hitting Print button will print the content without the header, footer or left sidebar (check Print Preview to see what I mean). Previously it was necessary to find a “printer friendly” icon, click on it, then print the resulting odd-looking page, which didn’t always work.
• With minor exceptions, all page layout is now controlled using CSS instead of tables. That won’t concern anyone else, but it helps me because the page code is more up to date, standards-compliant, and easier to maintain.

Everything still seems to work, as far as my testing has shown. However if anyone comes across any page that doesn’t seem to display right, or has some other problem, I’d be grateful to hear about it.