Blogging Sueblimely

The reports of Sheila’s whereabouts are quite right, she has been visiting me in Melbourne.

Sheila in Melbourne – Source Flickr – poetic licence by Photoshop

She was a little shy at first, tentatively peeping around the front door when she first entered.

Once she found aspects of the house that she could relate to she soon started to feel at home:

More mug shots – Feeling at home among the other cups

Family members were impressed by her warmth and soon got close to her:

Victoria, my home state in Australia, is in the midst of its worst bushfires on record with 21 fires still burning. Temperatures cooled this week, after last week’s record high of 46.4C in Melbourne, but there is more hot weather ahead.. The death toll currently stands at 181 with more expected. Thousands are homeless and some towns and villages no longer exist; people who worked there jobless.

Photo: sunrise.seven on Flickr

What is heartening, in the midst of the tragedy, is the way individuals, groups and organizations have been so generously donating their money, time and efforts to help out those who have lost their homes and possessions and livelihoods:.

Sitepoint is offering five of its books for the price of one until the end of today – if you have a hankering to learn about web design, CSS, PHP, javascript or flipping websites for profit then you will find something to your liking among their selection. All proceeds are to go to victims of the bushfire appeal. So far they have raised $75,000 (the message of their donation spread quickly around twitter). and are now aiming for $100,000.

Here are but a few other examples of how others are helping out:

• The supermarket group Coles has pledged to donate all of Friday’s profits – I am going to do a big shop later today
• Hoyts will donate $2 for every movie ticket sold on Sunday.
• 24 hours of Power is a "24 hour tribute
  to help provide some form of relief, during a time of mass devastation" which has been arranged as part of the Yarraville Arts Festival. It takes place Friday 13th February 2009 8pm – Saturday 14th February 2009 and is being streamed live over the internet.
• A Bulldogs/Essendon NAB Cup Bushfire Appeal game is to be played at the Telstra Dome today February 13, at 8.40pm
• Dogs Victoria is hosting an International Virtual Dog Show .
• Bushfire Housing Org is matching those in need of shelter with those offering accommodation.

The response has been amazing so far:

• Our Channel 9 TV station very quickly gathered together a line up of celebrities and aired the Australia Unites bushfire telethon on TV last night. $21.5 million was pledged bringing the current total of bushfire donations to over $77million.
• The Sydney Spirit basketball team donated their last pay packet to bushfire appeal.
• Banks and department stores and businesses have donated millions of dollars, some stores such as Target, have offered baby goods and bedding.. Tabcorp is donating $2 million, IGA, the Independent Grocers of Australia, are going to donate $1.5 million in food vouchers to bushfire victims. Australian banks, NAB, ANZ, Westpac and CBA, supermarket chain Woolworths, Australia Post, News Limited and insurer AMP have each pledged $1 million. My son donated a whole 2 weeks pocket money!
• UNIONS have called on all working Australians and their employers to donate one hour’s wage to help the victims of the Victorian bushfires
• Sony has launched a fundraising album, "Bushfire Aid: Artists for the Bushfire Appeal" with tracks by Bruce Springsteen, Billy Joel, Midnight Oil, John Butler Trio, Hoodoo Gurus, Delta Goodrem, John Farnham, Jessica Mauboy and Wes Carr.

If you want to find out more:

• The Herald Sun has more details of those who have donated and upcoming fundraising events and fundraising events are being posted on The Age’s Bushfire fund-raisers page
• Thousands of Australians are wearing ribbons to show their support of the bushfire appeal. If you are wondering where to get them, they are being made and given out in Spotlight stores around Victoria.
• The main Bushfire Appeal is via the Redcross Victorian Bushfires Appeal. The Salvation Army is also collecting donations (specify you want donations to go the bushfire appeal and goods. Ourcommunity.com.au lists these and other places where you can donate and volunteer to help: The Victorian Bushfires: How You Can Help They also and have a page on organisations collecting donations online
• 3AW’s is hosting a Fire Assistance Directory

Online

• The 2009 Vic Bushfire Support Facebook cause has 479,014 at last count.
• ABC Radio Melbourne is twittering updates at @774melbourne and showing multimedia on its Bushfire Emergency Page and the
• The Salvation Army can be found at @salvos
• The CFA (Country Fire Authority) are updating on twitter at
  @cfa_updates ( the town of Healesville is under threat today)
• Messages of commiserations can be send via #firecomments

Although taken just before the latest bushfires, this photo of Sam the Koala drinking from firefighter David Tree’s drink bottle has captured hearts worldwide. You can purchase this picture from the Herald Sun website . All proceeds from this go to the Country Fire Authority www.heraldsun.com.au/shop 

Photo: sunrise.seven on Flickr

Here is the video of Sam and David:

The Aussie Bloggers Forums and blog have been running for over 6 months now and are going from strength to strength. Todays stats are showing 32810 Posts in 2465 Topics by 687 Members!

Out of all the ‘extra curricula’ blogging activities I have participated in, being active in these forums has been the most satisfying and rewarding. It is a true community, where I feel right at home. I know I will always get an answer to any questions I may have because of the wide range of experience and knowledge of the members and their friendly, helpful attitude. This has been a pleasant surprise to me after searches for information have taken me to so many forum messages over the years that have no answers or responses that are downright rude and unhelpful.

Because it is not all serious blogging talk there is an avenue to get to know others better. The general chat forums are always buzzing, the Random Thoughts and How Was Your Day threads being particularly lively. Out of the blogging specific forums Blogging in General, WordPress and Promote Your Blog have attracted the most responses.

A new feature on the Aussie Bloggers site announced today is the “Lazy Bloggers Post Generator” – give it a try when you are short of ideas or need to explain why you have not been posting:-)

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Congratulations to Jon Pfeffer and his father Steve on the completion of their mammoth bike ride, starting in Brisbane 4th May and finishing today in Broome. The Journey from east to west Coast Australia was over 5,000km so this is no mean achievement! Training and planning the event began back in October 2006. Jon’s stepbrother-in-law, Nick, joined them for the first 1,000km of the journey.

View Larger Map

Steve and Jon have been riding to raise awareness for BeyondBlue and and awareness and funds for Plan Australia, which respectively work to fight depression and child poverty. They have been blogging about their preparation and journey on their Brisbane to Broome Charity Bike Ride site.

Romance was in the outback air when Jon proposed to his girlfriend Emelie, when he met her at Mt Isa airport on 30th May. The sign on the ground says “Will you marry me?”.  Many congratulations Emelie and Jon.

If you want to offer your congratulations you could do so via the Brisbane to Broome Facebook Group. Donations to show your appreciation of the effort and dedication of these intrepid travellers and to support the work of Plan can be made on the Brisbane to Broome Everyday Hero Page.

Absolutely nothing to do with the subject of blogging, except that this is a topic on many Aussie blogs today. Today is “Australia Day“; a day of celebration in this country. The 26th January is the date of arrival of the First Fleet in Sydney Cove in 1788, which brought the first contingent of convicts, soldiers and sailors to Australia. I would hope that if the date were to be chosen these days it would not be a date linked to the first British Settlement of Australia.

The reason – It is thought that immigration to Australia commenced around 50,000 years ago, its first inhabitants arriving via the Malay Archipelago and from New Guinea via a land bridge. Subsequent to the British arrival, the Gold rush, which started in 1851, brought other Europeans, Chinese and North Americans.

After WWII Australia’s population increased rapidly; hundreds of thousands of displaced Europeans emigrated to Australia. Many more English arrived under assisted passage schemes and were colloquially called the”10 pound poms”. My own family was almost one of them. Other major points of origin were Greece, Italy, Germany, Yugoslavia and the Netherlands. After Australia’s discriminatory “White Australia Policy” was abandoned in the early 1970′s many immigrants from Asia and Africa were also able to call Australia home.

I arrived here 27 years ago from Yorkshire, England, on a working holiday and decided to stay. My father’s family were Irish. I love Australia’s for its multiculturalism; its rich diversity of culture, beliefs and experiences; My own neighbors hail from Europe, Africa and Asia. The “I am Australian” song by the Seekers sums up Australia’s rich and very long history for me. I have played it at least 5 times while writing this post.

Loz of Midlife Journey reminded me of this song in his own post about Australia Day – he talks about his own familiy’s history in our country which dates back to the First Fleet’s arrival 26th January, 1788 – an interesting read.

Colin Campbell commented “Australia Day is very like the 4th of July in the US. Great weather, lots of family and friends and just hanging out.” Thanks Colin – That pretty much sums it up.