Vegemite blues

Social media without electricity, a brilliant Michael Leunig’s cartoon.

valdek — Mon, 21 Feb 2011 01:31:17 +0000

Aurum Cres and Craig Rd, Ringwood North, Victoria

valdek — Sun, 16 Jan 2011 03:07:02 +0000

Montalbo Rd after recent rains, Ringwood North, Victoria, Australia

valdek — Fri, 14 Jan 2011 04:51:23 +0000

Try to walk in such conditions.

Children going to school, Montalbo Rd, Ringwood North, Victoria, Australia

valdek — Sun, 09 Jan 2011 08:56:47 +0000

Montalbo Rd, Ringwood North, in the meantime the Council is attending to meetings.

valdek — Thu, 11 Nov 2010 00:06:17 +0000

Montalbo Rd, Ringwood North

valdek — Wed, 03 Nov 2010 10:34:07 +0000

A common picture near a busy intersection of Montalbo Rd and Loughnan Rd,

Smart meter – another “brilliant” and costly idea of our govenment.

valdek — Sun, 31 Oct 2010 06:24:44 +0000

Victoria will lead the national roll-out of smart meters with its 2.5 million homes and businesses the first to be equipped with the infrastructure. You can find more information on the Smart Meter website: http://new.dpi.vic.gov.au/smart-meters.
You would think that replacing manual reading with an electronic one will save you money but you might be surprised. This year the consumer will pay $68.00 extra (officially but they added $23 plus GST to my electricity bill for a 3 months period) for the privilege of having such a smart meter installed. Additionally the Victorian government will spend 2 billion dollars financing the project.
I talked to a guy who used to work as a meter reader and averaged to take readings of 500 meters a day, that’s less than a dollar a meter in a metropolitan area, that’s $4 a year for quarterly bills. I understand that previously service to property charge included manual readings of the meters so why are we paying now extra for the new meters, shouldn’t that be done by energy companies to save them money in the future?
There are other services provided and metered: water and gas, is the government planning to introduce smart water and gas meters and at our cost?
Couldn’t the manual reading of all the existing meters have been simplified and made more cost effective, I saw 3 different guys reading 3 different meters? They will lose their jobs, we will pay more, and the government will spend 2 billion dollars of our money. Where is the logic in it?

Footpaths of Ringwood North.

valdek — Thu, 28 Oct 2010 04:01:36 +0000

Back in Ringwood North and what can we see, new freeway completed, but no footpaths in Montalbo Rd. Two years ago Alex Makin commented on my post “A draft of Council’s principal pedestrian network was adopted at the July council meeting. This plan will identify areas that need footpaths and will lead to a higher level of maintenance in areas that currently have paths.” but nothing has changed. Kids go to school like in Africa, the footpaths are not there but the mud and long grass are. Maybe the council needs more meetings. I have noticed that they love meeting in Australia, such a social nation. There seem to be less cars parked on the footpaths/nature strips, at least some locals comprehended that they were occasionally blocking the poor children on their way to school.

Try this link if you want to be updated on Hydrofil Australia

valdek — Tue, 26 Oct 2010 05:04:37 +0000

http://facebook.com/hydrofil.com.au

Another side to a year out of the country.

valdek — Tue, 26 Oct 2010 02:41:37 +0000

Sadly my return from Europe meant something else as well, my business closure. Well it is understandable that I couldn’t attend to the business when out of the country but the real reasons were of slightly different nature, I have lost my suppliers. To keep things short this is the message I have put on Hydrofil’s website:

I would like to thank my customers for their support and provide a few words of explanation.
The business suspended trading due to a number of problems:
Problems with suppliers:
Last cases:
1. Supplier from Adelaide sends cheap compatible filters instead of ordered ones. After numerous interventions I get the money finally refunded with a comment from the company director I quote “ No waste of time anymore!”. I have never received the original filters or information when they are going to be available. In such circumstances I cannot obviously rely on the supplier.
2. Coincidentally alternative supplier from Tasmania doesn’t respond to my requests for quotations.
3. Coincidentally my UV equipment supplier from NSW when asked for a quote never comes back to me, during telephone intervention I am informed that he is still waiting for a quote from his “Adelaide” warehouse. That was a few months ago.
Previous cases (just a few examples):
1. I put on the market inexpensive desalination kit which heavily relies on an US supplier who is normally able to deliver required components in a couple of days. Strangely my US supplier suddenly stops responding to my requests to supply the parts, no response to emails, and silly telephone conversations follow. The most likely explanation- somebody put pressure on the supplier to stop cooperation.
2. Supplier of water dispensing units – after a while starts to supply the big chains at prices that I would be better off buying the same units from Big W for example.
Unfortunately the list is longer.

Transport problems:
Periodically I have been receiving overnight express shipments with a few days delay, and what initially seemed like accidental event after a while started to look more like an arranged and quite premeditated action.

Money (the very serious problem):
The business while very professional and supplying quality service, innovative products and solutions due to its size was generating negligible income. Running business on your credit card has its limitations especially when it comes to importing goods, marketing and planned growth. You can have brilliant solutions but you are trapped in a vicious circle, if business brings less than five thousand dollars a year in income (no super), that doesn’t create any basis for further expansion and after a few years drains all your savings, if you had any . The business was started as a response to my prolonged problems with finding a job, so it was terribly undercapitalised from the very beginning and after a short time created a serious financial crisis forcing me even to sell my car to keep things going (the Ford Falcon I occasionally use doesn’t belong to me and obviously my use of it is limited).

Possible Solutions:
Not easy at this stage, probably a formal partnership could resolve the stalemate, so anyone interested in providing the public with quality solutions to their water supply problems would be welcomed, especially if a person or a company could provide a strong financial foundation for further expansion, the possibilities and challenges are unlimited considering the sort of problems you would deal with. Waiting for your email – info@hydrofil.com.au and will keep my customers updated on the outcome .

Note to my supporters:
I would like to thank my “supporters”, and at the same time point their attention to existence of two distinctive factions which quite often are acting in opposite directions what eventually creates a terrible mess and leaves me totally confused, so my suggestion is you check what the other faction does behind your back, prego, adesso!