Marketing Greek Yogurt

Have you ever thought about how much Greek Yogurt packaging tells us about humans? Oh dear, what am I going to go on about now? Time for a good Boxing Day froth, me thinks.

Somewhere along the way, "pot set" yogurt became fashionable. "Pot set" yogurt is "is allowed to set in the pot in which it was sold, so has a firmer texture than other yogurts". This also allows for more precise control over the fermentation process, and in theory, a better probiotic content. Always willing to sell their soul to the highest bidder, marketers jumped on this and starting labeling all manner of yogurts (and likely dish detergents as well) as "pot set".

More recently, "Greek yogurt" has become all the rage. Greek yogurt is yogurt "which has been strained to remove its whey, resulting in a relatively thick consistency". Almost all of the recent growth in the yogurt market has been in strained yogurts. Marketer: "Greek is popular, Greek sells, let's say our yogurt is Greek so we sell more". Sadly, "there is no legal definition of Greek yogurt, and yogurt thickened with thickening agents may also be sold as 'Greek yogurt'", so they have tacked on the "Greek" label to anything white, potentially edible, and thicker than distilled water.

So, one day, Yogurt Marketer, Senior Grade, thinks to herself "Hmm ... pot set yogurt is good, Greek yogurt is even better. Now pot set Greek yogurt would be a killer product!"

And thus, we now are inundated with pot set Greek yogurt. I can't help wondering how they are straining yogurt that is set in the container it is sold in. Maybe they set it in a container, empty it out, strain it, and put it back in the container? That would definitely be disingenuous and not in the spirit of the definition even if it was within the letter, but they don't do that – it is obvious by looking at the "pot set Greek yogurt" that it is not strained. So, basically, they are lying to us. I trust you are not surprised.

Just to be clear: you can't have pot set Greek yogurt. You can't strain yogurt before it is yogurt, and you can't strain it after it is set in the pot it will be sold in. It can be one or the other, but not both.

Marketers may be evil, but they aren't stupid. If putting these labels on the containers didn't sell more product, they wouldn't put them there. So yogurt makers are selling more yogurt because they are making nonsensical claims on the containers.

Now I can write off marketers as a genetically inferior group of sociopaths. But what about the people who are influenced by these labels? Do they think "Wow, pot set and Greek, how great is that? Let's buy a 2kg tub instead our usual 1kg!" Maybe these are sort of people impressed by "gluten free" apples? What if they slapped on a "No herbicides were harmed in the manufacturing of this yogurt" label on? Would that impress the yogurt shoppers too?

What does it mean that people are so easily fooled/manipulated? I suppose it isn't much different than someone snapping up a new point and shoot camera with a 550 Gigapixels sensor – yeah, good luck with your low light shots with that one mate. When people are so easily tricked by a ploy your average cricket would see right through, what happens when folk are faced with a complicated decision? Like what politician to vote for. Oh, that's right, I guess I already know the answer to that one.

It will be obvious to my readers (both of you) by now that I'm always up for a good froth. But getting all spun up over yogurt labeling? You're thinking that perhaps I need to find a hobby or two, aren't you? Even S, who is usually totally into a froth over just about anything, thinks I need to up my meds this time. This marketing BS annoys me for a couple reasons: 1) it insults my intelligence to have to buy "pot set Greek yogurt" because there is no alternative, and 2) consumers aren't taking even a couple seconds to think about what they are buying, so we are all eating some crappy yogurt thickened with shredded old shoe leather instead of some decent strained yogurt.

I'd like to be able cruise through an unfamiliar town, drop into Woolies, and pick up some decent Greek yogurt. But no, I have take what I can get, and join the queue of all the other shoppers who are stoked to have picked up their 2kg tub of pot set Greek yogurt.

Nowhere Else on Earth

It was a stunning setting: the warm afternoon sun was still high above the sheer cliffs that sheltered Maria Island's Riedel Bay from wind and swell, and the incredibly turquoise waters of the Tasman Sea splashed onto the crescent of sand that stretched from our camp all the way south to the towering sea cliffs at the foot of Mt Perpendicular. As I strolled down the deserted beach, my usual anxiety at being camped on such an exposed coast was strangely abscent, and I felt a sense of overpowering contentment ...

I was alone with my beautiful and amazing life partner, in a place of staggering beauty. We had just finished a day of paddling down the spectacular east coast of Maria Island on Tasmania's East Coast - an exposed journey in a sea kayak that had taxed us both physically and mentally. Our trip had required skill, courage, and careful planning ... staying safe relied on lessons learned over a lifetime of adventures. The commitment required to get here was part of why I found this secluded spot so enchanting.

 At that moment, there was literally nowhere else on Earth I would rather be.

I have learned that moments like this are so powerful, so poignant, so moving, that they stay with me forever. In fact, I find some experiences, representing mere fleeting moments, vanishingly short in the context of my lifespan, receive unreasonably large allocations in my memory of my life. The red-point of that sport climb I thought was beyond me, success in style on that mountaineering route that had so scared me, that epic paddle to isles unknown, that remote vista so impossibly beautiful that it can't be real: these experiences never leave me. That afternoon on the Maria Isthmus will surely be one of those moments.

Sometimes life feels like a treasure hunt of euphoric moments. These activities I do and the adventures I chase are clearly pointless from any sensible perspective, but at the same time they are what fills my life with joy and provides me with a sense of purpose. There is always some scheming to be done, some training required, an objective to be worked toward. Always working towards the next big adventure.

I like to think of myself as a bit of a thinking man. Not too deep, mind you, but I do like to think about things. I carefully consider life decisions and always have a goal in mind, I enjoy figuring out how things work, I like creating new things, I like to find fault with conventional wisdom (fertile hunting there!), and resist social norms when they are silly (and sometimes just because it is fun). Consequently, it comes as somewhat of a surprise to me that virtually all of the most powerful memories of my life involve physical adventure. My adventures typically involve equal parts physical and mental challenge, but still, no cerebral accomplishments on my life's CV? I am much closer to the leading edge in my work than my play, but it is the hard-earned mountain peak that sticks with me.

Why is that? A known unknown I expect, and that is OK; it is enough to know that is the way it is. I am a compulsive goal setter, and physical adventure in wild and beautiful places really floats my boat. I can't image a life that isn't full of challenges. Otherwise, what's the point?

Carpe diem. I can't believe I am quoting something I picked up from a Hollywood movie, but nonetheless, words to live by, if, perhaps, not quite literally.

Gram This

I am pretty tech savvy, having made my living, such as it is, in IT for the last 20 years or so. I had a front row seat to the commercial explosion of the Internet, working as a software developer in the early 90s. The Web was cool and I wanted to a part of it – even going so far as founding a dot-com.

But when it comes to technology, I am not always, as it turns out, an early adopter. You see, I am pretty cheap, and buying first versions of consumer electronics is not a good way to optimize the household cash flows. Nor is buying the latest hot product when you're old one works just fine. Following the same logic, I would rather put hot pins in my eyes than buy an Apple product – just the fact they are super trendy and garner the highest profit margins of any legal product devised by man is enough to put me off for good. Yeah, I am a bit of a curmudgeon too.

In addition to being pretty savvy, and pretty cheap, I'm also pretty old, so can be pretty late to the party with whatever is the latest uber hip thing. I resisted Facebook for a long time (and sometimes still rue the day I caved), but now have admit it is great for keeping up with friends and family scattered around the globe. And, OK, it does offer a new and interesting perspective of a news feed.

However, for the longest time I just didn't "get" Twitter. In fact, I still don't get Twitter. What's with the 120 characters thing? Need more than 120 characters? Easy, type it into a Word document, take a picture, and tweet the image of your essay. Twitter is stuffed with such photos. Stupid. Or do eight 118 character tweets in quick succession, which are really just one long tweet. Also stupid.

Much to my annoyance, more and more bloggers in the business/investment world have started do their thing on Twitter. So now I have a Twitter account. But really, it is because this specific community happened to congregate there, and Twitter is just a really awkward way to apply a filter to my news and social feeds -  it has nothing to do with Twitter's technology,  and in fact the technology gets in the way more than it helps, hence all the tweets of pictures of text.

OK, so I've got a Twitter feed for finance, and Crackbook stream for friends and cat videos. But it never ends. I hear Instagram is trending well, and everybody who is anybody is on Snapchat. I definitely do not get Instagram, and don't even get me started on Snapchat. How is Instagram really any different/better than Flickr/Facebook/Twitter? I do not have an Instagram account, but I'm sure the answer is "it's not". Except all the really cool people are there. And apparently dedicating frightening amounts of time and money in the pursuit of the perfect selfie that will "trend" well and get them all sorts of new Instafriends. Can human culture get any sadder?

Shutterstock/Aleksandar Stojkovic

Keeping up with this madness means staggering from one site to another, each with their own special shtick tailored to self-obsessed narcissists (is there any other sort of narcissist?). What goes without saying, but I'll say anyway, is that by the time most of the wannabe hipsters have Gram accounts, all the cool people will have moved on to Vacupost, Narcissite, or Selfies-r-us, which are all seeing their traffic volumes explode. No doubt they'll all be unicorns by next year.

In life, there comes a time when you have to accept that things must change for you, and you can't go back. In my twenties, I avowed to never drink to excess again. In my thirties it was never work to in an office again. In my forties ... well mostly I just skied a lot and didn't bother with life-changing resolutions. So it is high time to put my foot down.

I just say "no" to Instagram and the long line of putrid, vapid, narcissistic, and pointless web-based social pits that are sure to follow.

Gram that!

Smug Doug Productions “Storm Action” Sail System

In the Antipodean autumn of 2013, after a chance encounter on coral-fringed Kent Island off the north Queensland coast, we hooked up with a fantastic group of sea kayakers in Cairns. They foolishly invited us, virtually sight unseen, to join them on their upcoming epic paddle from Cooktown to Lizard Island.

The trade winds on the north Queensland coast blow pretty reliably, and at times quite strongly, from the southeast. Most paddlers use this to their advantage by doing one-way trips from south to north with sails mounted to the front decks of their yaks.

Sailing to Rattlesnake Island

Taking the old saw “when in Rome ...” to heart, Sandy and I borrowed Pacific Action sails for the trip to Lizard. The very far north Queensland coast is famous for its strong winds, and seeing as our trip had lots of big crossings, we were lucky to have light to moderate winds all the way from Cooktown to the tranquility of the Lizard Island lagoon. We had minimal problems managing the sails in the modest winds, and even managed to the keep our boats slippery side down the whole way.

Having crossed to the Dark Side, there was no turning back – much to our surprise, any delusions about reverting to "pure" paddlers quickly fell by the wayside, as we had to admit kayak sailing could be an awful lot of fun, and added a whole new dimension to the sport. But the fun really starts when the winds push north of 20 knots. We have pretty tippy boats (Prijon Marlins) and being sea kayaks, they are without keel or even dagger-board. The heeling force generated by even a 1 square metre sail can be hard to handle, especially with a lightly loaded boat in heavy seas. And even more for a couple of aged mountaineers recently transplanted from The Frozen North. We have sailed in winds gusting over 30 knots, but it is pretty much hang on for dear life, and once the sail is up, I've got Buckley's of getting it back down without capsizing. At that point, it is clearly a bit too much of a good thing.

Sailing to Lizard. PC:SM

Our sails, made by Pacific Action in Sydney, Australia, are a well made two-masted sail designed specifically for kayaks. The two-masted design works well, allows sailing a moderate amount into the wind, and means you don't have to worry about the boom swinging back and forth clocking you on the side of the head.

I have, however, found there to be a couple weak points in the Pacific Action design:

1. The shape of the sail puts the widest part of the sail on top, which maximizes the heeling force for a given wind speed.
2. I find the sail very difficult to pull down in high winds/heavy seas. In hairy conditions I can't let go of the paddle with both hands, and pulling the sail down with one hand is almost impossible. If you do manage to start pulling the sail down, the first thing that typically happens is the sail catches the wind in a more beam wind orientation, thus dramatically increasing the heeling force – and it is time for a cooling dip in the drink.
3. The sail can not be reefed, so depending on conditions, becomes generally too much to comfortably handle above 15-20 knots, depending on boat and sea conditions.

I like fiddling with my gear and making it better, so I took this as a challenge. I made a couple of key modifications to our sails.

Dedicated sail pull-down line.

I have run an extra line from one mast's mid-point D-shackle through a carabiner clipped to the other mast's D-shackle (acts like a pulley), and then through a cam cleat mounted on the kayak deck just in front of the cockpit. This line is used exclusively to pull the sail down.

Anchor point of pull-down line.

Carabiner "pulley".

Full pull-down including cam cleat.

This pull-down has a few advantages:

1. When I pull on the line, the first thing that happens is the two masts get pulled together, taking the wind out of the sail. Long before I've got the sail down, most of the heeling force is gone.
2. As this line doesn't go through an intermediate clip like the trimming line, I have better leverage to pull the sail down quickly.
3. As this pull-down line runs through the cam cleat, I can easily pull the sail down one-handed. I generally get the sail completely down in 2 to 3 good pulls, and if I need to throw in a brace part way, no problem, I can let go of the pull-down cord and the sail stays partially stowed and mostly not catching the wind.
4. Once the sail is fully pulled down, the pull-down cord through the cam cleat keeps the sail more-or-less stowed on the deck so if things are really hairy, I can focus on staying upright and wait until I've stopped wetting myself before properly stowing the sail.

A reefable sail

Modification #1 notwithstanding, I find a 1 m² sail too large to comfortably handle with a beam wind > 15 knots; with > 20-25 knots from any direction, or a confused sea, the odds of a capsize start to become uncomfortably high.

With a key suggestion from a shady character in the paddling world, who goes only by the moniker "Kev Kayaker", I came up with a design to allow the sail to be reefed. It is effectively three sails for the price of one.

The stock “1 square metre” sail is 129cm tall, 22cm wide at the bottom, and 126cm wide at the top; by my calculations it is about 0.95 m². It slides onto the two masts with sleeves on each side of the sail.

The Smug Doug “reefable” 3-piece sail system is comprised of three separate sails that “stack” onto the masts. The storm sail is 70cm tall which makes it about 0.35 cm². The sail has full-height (129 cm) sleeves on each side so it slides onto the masts the usual way but the main area of the sail is at the bottom. The sail is secured to the bottom of the masts by a bungee, just like the stock sail.

Storm sail (clear).

The next size up is a sail section 38cm tall which slides onto the masts and “stacks” on top of the storm sail. A horizontal strip of Velcro along the top of the storm sail matches a strip on the bottom of the middle sail that secures the middle sail to the bottom sail. This makes for a sail of about 0.7 m².

Middle sail.

Middle sail installed.

Finally, the third sail stacks on top of the middle sail in a similar manner to bring the sail area back up the stock 0.95 m².

Full sail.

After completing the design, I simply handed the drawings off to Sandy and said “Make it so”. With some assistance from Gary at Pacific Action and Mick at Flat Earth Sails, and a few prototypes that gallantly made the ultimate sacrifice, my seamstress skillfully produced some reefable sails.

We have been very happy with the performance of our reefable sails, and haven't used the stock sails since trying out our new ones. Once the wind is 20 knots or better, we find it is considerably less effort to sail with the 0.7 sail (less bracing, easier to keep on track), and we go just as fast (straighter, more efficient track and/or approaching hull speed). The sail area is reduced by about 26%, but it feels like the heeling force is reduced by at least double that – presumably because the sail area is lower, making for less leverage.

If the wind picks up some more, or if the seas are large or messy, we drop down to the 0.3 sail which still works amazingly well in strong winds. The sail area is reduced by about 63%, but again the heeling force is reduced by much, much more than that.

The only drawback to the reefable system is that it does not sail into the wind quite as well as the stock sail. The Velcro joins are much stiffer than the sail fabric, so the sail doesn't fill out to the optimal airfoil shape as well. Also, the smaller the sail, the narrower it is, and the storm sail is too narrow to properly fill out the ideal shape, so again, less optimal sail shape results. But in practice, by the time we're down to the storm sail, we wouldn't have any sail at all if were using the stock 1 m² sail, so it seems like a pretty fair trade-off.

Overall, these two mods have made a huge difference in our enjoyment of these sails.

I'd like to thank Gary Housley at Pacific Action sail systems who provided a factory “second” sail for our project, and Mick MacRobb at Flat earth kayak sails who sold us some quality sail making materials at a very reasonable price.

The Madness of Bureaucrats

I've been on a bit of an anti-government rant lately, and I feel I am just getting warmed up, so will continue with the theme, and throw in a bit of big business bashing for good measure - which is always worth the effort.

Electricity prices are very high Down Under. My previous home town was Nelson, BC. Nelson lies in the heart of the interior rain forest, with plenty of hydroelectric power generation nearby; electricity rates were raised in 2014 to $0.09/kWh. In contrast, I've spent the last 5 months near Hobart, Tasmania. Tassie also has lots of mountainous temperate rainforest and hydro power - in excess of state demand in good years. That's where the similarity with BC ends however: Tassie skiing sucks, and peak electricity rates are $0.26/kWh.Yes, really, three times as much as in BC. I don't know what the Aussies have done, but they've sure made a real cock up of it.

Oz, however is blessed with remarkable renewable energy resources. When considering full-cycle project costs, wind power generation has been cheaper than fossil fuels for some time, and now photovoltaic (PV) solar is too (2, 3). Recently, the investment bank Deutsche Bank predicted that solar systems will be at grid parity in up to 80 per cent of the global market within 2 years, and is already there in Australia (4).

Wind generation capacity has been increasing 25% per year for the past decade, and now generates 2.5 GW, enough to power a million homes. Currently planned projects will increase this by 500% (1).
Australia was a bit slow to get going with the PV solar thing, but lately have been making up for lost time. Installed PV solar has increased by a factor of 20x in the past 5 years, with 4.1 GW of capacity having been installed on over one million household rooftops by the end of 2014, making the per capita rate of solar installations in Australia one of the highest in the world (5).

Australia is on the cusp of a major shakeup in energy generation and production. Wind power is big, and despite Tony Dinosaur Abbott's preference for clean coal over wind turbines, will only get bigger. But from an electrical distribution perspective, I think the big disrupter will be household solar. Today, in most places in Australia, it is cheaper to put some solar panels on your roof and some big batteries in your garage, than it is to buy your electricory off the grid (amortize over 10 years, say). Amazing. I, for one, am not interested in investments in Australian electrical utilities. I think we're going to see a classic case of "disruptive innovation" play out in a very public way in this land down under. It is no coincidence that one of Tesla's first moves outside of the US for its Powerwall home battery system is to Oz, with availability later this year (6).

This is all good, and progressive government regulation has supported the uptake of alternate energy in recent years. But it is high time to get back to my promised froth.

Now that the electrical utility companies are about to take a serious shot between the eyes with a ball peen hammer, they are starting to wake up to the risks. And the natural reaction of any large organization, when faced with economic challenges, is to lobby the government for some protective legislation. And for the Queensland electrical utilities, the Queensland Competition Authority has been very obliging. In recent years Queensland has had a program offering generous feed-in tariffs for households feeding solar energy into the grid, and this gave the PV movement in Queensland a big boost. However, the Queensland Government, no doubt encouraged by the utility companies, has decided this program was maybe working a bit too well. In their finite wisdom, they have decided to phase out the incentive program (7), and have strategically adjusted the regulated electrical rates: the fixed cost is up 100% in 2 years while the usage tariff has actually dropped (8, 9). The "fixed cost" is a unfamiliar concept to a Canadian: a charge you pay every day your home is connected to the grid, whether you use any power or not. Both actions - increasing the fixed cost, and decreasing the rate tariff - are designed to make coal-generated electricity more competitive.

So now that they have encouraged many state residents to install PV solar on their roofs, they've decided they had better protect the utilities. Not only are they moving the goalposts on all the folks who invested in PV panels their roofs, but they are doing the exactly wrong thing if they want people to use energy efficiently. You might think that would be a consideration seeing how climate change is on the agenda. But you would be wrong.

And who said dinosaurs went extinct?

What the utilities and the regulators should be doing, instead of rushing to build a doomed levee just as the tsunami arrives, is using their very expensive distribution network, combined with centralized storage, to optimize the state's household solar resources that have been installed over the past 5 years. But no, stupid is as stupid does, so they can only think about the old ways and protecting their turf. They'll put up a fight, and will try all manner of anti-competitive, counter-productive, harebrained schemes to attempt to save their bacon. But it won't work. And the unintended consequence will be millions of small lithium ion battery installations hung on garage walls. While that is a fair sight better than power from coal, it doesn't seem optimal to me.

Last post I was afroth about allowing free markets to run amok to the very serious detriment of our environment. This time around it is stupid regulators that has me all spun up.
The tragedy of the commons, or the tragedy of the government - they're both hell on my hypertension.

1	http://www.cleanenergycouncil.org.au/dam/cec/technologies/wind/fact-sheets/Wind-Energy-Fact-Sheet-Theres-Power-in-Wind-National-Snapshot.pdf
2	http://bze.org.au/media/newswire/australia-wind-power-already-cheaper-fossil-fuels-and-solar-right-behind-130211
3	https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Growth_of_photovoltaics
4	https://www.db.com/cr/en/concrete-deutsche-bank-report-solar-grid-parity-in-a-low-oil-price-era.htm
5	https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Growth_of_photovoltaics#All_time_PV_installations_by_country
6	http://www.teslamotors.com/en_AU/powerwall
7	https://www.energex.com.au/residential-and-business/solar-for-customers/queensland-government-solar-bonus-scheme
8	http://www.qca.org.au/Electricity/Electricity-Prices-2014-15/Electricity-prices-2014-15/Electricity-Prices-Residential-Tariff
9	http://www.qca.org.au/getattachment/b02c2245-e6e7-43fe-ae96-4d59e7f1ef10/Residential-regulated-electricity-prices-from-1-Ju.aspx

The Insanity of the Free Market

I am a card-carrying capitalist, and have been for as long as I can remember. In an interconnected world, if it isn't a market-based system, it must be centrally planned, and there, clearly, madness lies. And the prospect of anything but a meritocracy chills my soul.

Frothing, smarmy lobbyists notwithstanding, surely a species capable of decoding the genome and disassembling the atom can see that a unconstrained free market is a path to ruin. The free market must be regulated.

I just listened to an NPR Planet Money podcast on the drought in California. Sheer madness. In prime agriculture areas, that don't receive adequate rain for crops other than peyote or gravel, they have been drawing down the groundwater aquifers at a shocking rate. And now wells are running dry.

photo credit

Funny thing is, this isn't bad news for everyone. While some poor saps no longer have running water at their homes, the scarcity of water reduces supply of water-hunger crops (like almonds and pistachios) which drives up the market price and makes those crops very valuable - a field of pistachios will fetch 10x the price of a drought tolerant crop like flax. Which is an opportunity for those with means.

Via what an economist would call "price discovery", the free market is generating an insane result. Since water hungry crops become more valuable in a drought, and farmers don't pay for the water they take out of the common aquifer, the market rewards those who grow almonds and pistachios, not flax and grapes. Hedge funds come in, buy prime farm land, pump millions into new, deep wells, and plant acres and acres of new nut trees. Market forces are causing a scarce common resource to be used up with no consideration for conservation. A classic case of the tragedy of the commons.

The hedgies will make out like bandits for a while until they completely deplete the aquifer, and then take their massive winnings back home to Wall Street, leaving devastated communities and ruined agriculture land in their wake.

The aquifer is a non-renewable resource within the context of a human lifespan, and in the pursuit of profits, some far-away speculators will squander a precious resource that should belong to everyone. The free market is delivering the worst possible outcome to society.

So the poor go without drinking water, and the rich plant water-hungry crops, get even richer, and expedite the exhaustion of the region's only water source.

Yet again, it is demonstrated that high intelligence is no protection against acting foolishly.

The Irony of Public Newscaster

"... it has been said that democ­racy is the worst form of Gov­ern­ment except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time ..."

Winston Churchill

Like a good joke, that has more than a little bit of truth to it. We certainly do get the governments we deserve. The more I get to know my fellow voter, the less surprised I am. The more I observe politicians, the more I despair that this is not going to end well.

As a card-carrying capitalist (which means cutthroat competition, creative destruction, and yes, wealth inequality), I find myself appalled at the efficiency of a typical government agency. Just imagine any free market business going up against a similarly resourced government agency ... it would hardly be a fair fight. Humans respond to incentives and government departments and employees don't face competitive pressures that threaten their very survival. That makes a difference.

It is safe to say I'm not a huge fan of most democratically elected governments, nor do I find that most government bodies can be accused of exuding competence.

So it strikes me as a great irony where I go for my TV news. For as long as I can remember, it has been either the BBC, the CBC, or the ABC (the "A" for Australian, not Amurican). I am as much of a conspiracy theorist as the next guy (1984, The Matrix, ...), and as explained, generally hold everything governmental in very low esteem, but have you watched a private news show in last 10 years? God what awful stuff. Chitchat, sensationalist drivel, right-wing propaganda mandated by the owner of the station, and sport (which, for me, rates below the chitchat and drivel). Now I'm not saying there isn't room for improvement on the public broadcasters news programs -- far from it -- but so long as I've got a mute button handy for the sports, I still find them worth watching when I'm in the mood.

I wonder what Orwell would think. I figger he got it 180 degrees wrong.

The developed world is controlled by the rich, and the rich like to control public opinion. Controlling the media is a part of controlling public opinion, so it should come as no surprise that public broadcasters are not favourite projects of the world's power brokers. In fact, public broadcasters are facing existential threats in both Canada and Australia, and are definitely under attack in the UK. And - shock! - Mitt Romney promised to slash PBS funding should he be successful in his Oval Office quest. Surely there is no need for publicly funded news rooms anymore - Fox and CNN have us covered.

In huge, sparsely populated countries like Canada and Australia, public broadcasters serve two purposes. One is supplying programming that is not dictated by advertising. I think it is hard to overestimate the importance of national programming that is free to examine issues of little interest to business, or even in conflict with business (Go, Catalyst, go!). Without a free press, there is no democracy, and I don't consider private media to be free. Secondly, public broadcasters provide programming relevant to rural areas that simply is uneconomic for private companies. I think this second role is critical for maintaining the social and cultural fabric of a sprawling land like Australia.

I am a fan of capitalism, and I am a fan of democracy. But asking to have both, at the same time, is a tall order. Lately, the former has been getting its way to the detriment of the latter. And we only have ourselves to blame.

Long live the public broadcaster.

Seasons Greetings from The Antipodes

It is our third festive season Down Under, and the sounds of Christmas carols under a baking Australian sun is just as discombobulating as ever. However, after so many years of obsessively tracking the fall weather systems in the Gulf of Alaska, the habit endures, and since we've been checking out the snow conditions back “home” for a while now, it must be time to put the annual Xmas letter together.

Sunset at Paddle Bay, Whitsunday Islands

It was another whirlwind year living homeless in this magical land. We started the year house sitting Rose and Andrew's lovely garden home in Cairns in Far North Queensland. The North Queensland wet season has quite a reputation, and we were prepared for the worst, but in truth, it wasn't nearly as painful as imagined. It was hot and sticky, but not too bad, and we slept well every night without air conditioning. Camping was out of the question, but with stinger suits on, we continued to paddle our yaks in the warm waters of the Coral Sea near Cairns. Doug also took the opportunity to do some work for his long-suffering client in Calgary.

Paddling at dawn in the Whitsundays

In January, we had a nice visit from Doug's cousin Kathy, her husband Gary, and daughter Emma. This makes two meetings in 20 years – this craziness has to stop.

Nawp and Kathy at Barren Falls (credit: Gary)

Rose and Andrew returned from their trip down south in late March, so we said goodbye to all our new Cairns friends and headed off for some wonderful sea kayaking in the Whitsundays and other islands on the Townsville to Mackay section of the Queensland coast.

Pinnacle Point, Hook Island, Whitsundays

In between trips, we were holed up in our little caravan in Bowen when the eye of cyclone Ita passed directly overhead. It was a good thing it had weakened from category 5 to category 1, as it was pretty exciting as it was, with very strong winds and intense rainfall – Doug went outside to move the car during the peak of the storm (in his bathing suit), and it can only be compared to standing under a fire hose – unbelievable.

Sunset, Gloucester Island

Once the weather was looking like it was set up for a good long blow, we packed up the paddling gear and headed inland. The whole east coast of Australia is generally pretty green and hilly, but once you head inland, things change quickly. The Great Dividing Range gives way to the flats of outback Queensland and NSW, and the magnificent eucalypt and tropical forests give way to open woodland, savannah, and scrub.

Boodjamulla Gorge

Outback Queensland and the Northern Territory are to home to some extraordinary places – imagine walking across a scorching hot savannah, disturbing a few kangaroos and lizards, passing by some ancient Aboriginal rock art

Boodjamulla Gorge

until you encounter a crystal clear waterfall cascading into a beautiful warm water swimming hole rimmed by towering red rock cliffs

Katherine Gorge

and you'll have the right idea. Unfortunately, these oases are typically separated by long stretches of fascinating fly habitat.

Enjoying another NT sunrise

There is no winter in the lineup of NT seasons, only “the buildup”, “the wet” and “the dry”. The only time to visit is the dry, and that's when we went, but even though it is winter for the rest of the country it is by no means “the cool”. We experienced temperatures as hot as 36C in the coldest period of the year, although we also had long stretches of high 20s, which is as cold as it gets.

A deep ford in Umbrawara Gorge - lucky the water is warm.

We ambled our way north, exploring the gorges and waterfalls in our kayaks and on foot. Australia is famous for animal hazards: encounters with snakes, spiders, jellyfish, sharks, and crocs being the popular ways to buy the farm. While playing up the dangers is a national passtime, I actually find Oz less threatening that the Frozen North: I'll take the snakes, spiders, and sharks over avalanches and grizzlies any day. Crocs, however, are a different story altogether. Swimming in a river with a known croc population is like slathering yourself in raw chicken guts and entering a lion cage full of felines who haven't been fed in two weeks. Any nearby salty will quickly remove you from the gene pool – no joking matter. Luckily the National Parks clears out the salties from certain rivers at the beginning of each dry season, and then declares them safe for paddling and swimming.

Sandy Camp Pool on the Jatbula Trail

After walking and paddling many iconic Australian gems such as Boodjamulla, Katherine Gorge, Jatbula Track, and Kakadu, we rolled into Darwin and setup the van under a giant banana tree on our sister-in-law Janice's driveway. Sadly, and much to our dismay, the bananas didn't quite ripen while we were there, but nonetheless we so enjoyed Janice's hospitality, that we spent two weeks in Darwin, getting a much needed break from life in the caravan – and after 26 years, Doug finally met Sandra's brother Keith. Darwin is a nice town on a tropical sea that is obviously experiencing a boom with much natural gas related construction ongoing. There are beautiful beaches right within the city limits, which enabled us to add the Timor Sea to the list of oceans we've swum in since our arrival Down Under (4 and counting).

Wangi Falls, in Litchfield National Park, near Darwin

After Darwin, a lap of the Tabletop Track in Litchfield National Park was followed by a week of rock climbing at Hayes Creek. Next stop on the Magical Mystery Tour was Alice Springs in the “Red Centre”, which is pretty much the geographic centre of the continent. We really liked Alice and loved the Red Centre. In late winter, when we were there, the weather is pretty dreamy: endless cloudless days with cool nights and warm days. Alice is a surprisingly clean, neat, orderly, and well maintained town. It is situated amongst the Macdonnell Ranges and actually quite a pretty place. If it were a few thousand kilometres closer to the coast, we might have just stayed. Instead, we spent the next six weeks exploring the ranges, gorges, and monoliths of the Red Centre, including the stunning 223 km Larapinta Trail.

Razorback Ridge on the Larapinta Trail

Sandy at Kings Canyon

By the beginning of September, things were starting to heat up in the Alice, and we had been in-country for two years without yet visiting Mt Arapiles, Australia's most famous rock climbing area. It was time to remedy that, so we steeled ourselves and over two weeks made the long drive south to Victoria.

Lake Hart, a normally dry salt lake in South Australia

Arapiles has been called “The Best Cliff in the World”, but our experiences with Australian rock climbing have been pretty checkered, to be diplomatic, so we were rather guarded in our expectations for the place. In the end, we spent nearly two months there and found it one of the best climbing areas we have ever visited – an absolute nirvana for aging, untalented traditional rock climbers. The place absolutely rocks.

Mrs Dolittle leading pitch 4 of 'Beau Geste'

Nawp leading pitch 2 of 'Panzer'

In the middle of our Arapiles stay, we were ecstatic to receive our first Canadian visitors – our good friends Roland and Murielle from Nelson came to Australia for a couple months of road biking in Victoria and Tasmania. They took some time out of the saddle to join us for some bushwalking in the Grampians and a week long sea kayak trip on Gippsland Lakes in SE Victoria.

Storm Point

After we finally tired of Arapiles, we headed south once again, hiking in the Grampians

Stapylton Cirque in the Grampians

and paddling and walking on the SW coast of Victoria.

Bridgewater Bay

If you've made it this far in this long missive, consider yourself up to date on Sandra and Doug's Excellent Adventure. We're well into our third year of being homeless, and don't seem to be inclined to do anything about that anytime soon. Where will we be next Christmas? We have no idea.

Discovery Bay

As the sun sets on another circuit around our star

Sunset at Point Wilson

we wish our friends and family health, happiness and all good things in the year ahead.