Notes from the House Elf Rebellions

Congratulations to the Froggies. They will not put up with crap. Their new (and now discarded) labour laws look like a Sunday School picnic compared to ours in Oz which extends dismissal without reason not to a two year period for people under 25 but for 25 years plus for everyone from 16 year olds to 60 year olds. Nothing unfair about that ;) Equal opportunity unemployment
And what do the Aussies do? Riot in the streets? Build a guillotine? No. We just toss another shrimp on the barbie and shrug "No worries. Mate"


Pulp fiction
(The Sydney Morning Herald has a habit of zapping stories so that only subscribers can read them so Izzie has cheated and stuck the text under an lj cut)
( It's a jungle out there in juice land )

Amazing what a bit of publicity will do - the slimy smoothies of the Juice jungle offer Amber a pay rise but she is not so easily fooled

AMBER OSWALD has won a pay rise over the radio, but the 16-year-old will not accept it unless the same is offered to her fellow workers at Pow Juice.

In yesterday's Herald, the year 11 student from Narrabeen Sport High revealed that her earnings from a Sunday job in Warriewood Square had been almost halved after the Federal Government's new workplace laws came into effect on March 27.

But on 2GB yesterday, Amber's boss, Andre Dowling, said there had been a misunderstanding, and that her flat pay had been revised from $8.57 an hour to $10.28, on the grounds she was 17 and her status had become casual, instead of permanent part-time.

However, Amber and her father, Phillip Oswald, are perplexed. They insist she is still 16, and they say the new flat rate offer is largely irrelevant because most of her hours were on a Sunday, which paid her $14.27 an hour under her former workplace agreement. All penalties have been scrapped under the new agreement, although Amber never signed it.

On March 24, the Friday before the new workplace laws came into effect, all employees of Pulp Juice were made redundant after the company went into liquidation. On the same day, Pow Juice took over the business, offering a new workplace agreement to all redundant, yet now rehired, employees. It came into effect on the Monday.

Nick Wilson, the director of the newly formed Office of Workplace Services, said the Pow Juice deal was being investigated, but he made it clear that redundant workers rehired within two months of a liquidation should not be forced into a new agreement. The old deal would still stand.

According to the records of the Australian Securities and Investments Commission, the sole director and secretary of Pow Juice is Cherily Coad, born in India in 1960. When the Herald knocked on her door at Baulkham Hills yesterday, a woman said she was not Ms Coad, but someone else.

Last night, however, employees of Pow Juice confirmed that the woman in the Herald's photograph was indeed her. Ms Coad did not return calls last night.

The Python pigs out

Izzie has been a lazy serpent today. Went to our favorite supplies store and got ourselves lots of interesting munchies - cashew nuts and glace ginger for our choccies which we will be making tomorrow evening and Saturday, matzos and wholemeal turkish bread for two moonshine picnics and even a little lump of fresh yeast for the bread that we were supposed to be baking this evening. Was going to be both bread and hot cross buns but got two nice buns from a decent bakery today so that was one item to drop off the list

But by the time Izzie finally slinks into the Lair at 9pm and gets Petunia off the phone - around 10.30ish or so - just in time to hear all about "Satan - the authorised biography (It's the last twenty minutes or so of the program) it is well and truly too late to fire up hell's kitchen. Well - there's always tomorrow

Yesterday had the morning shift from hell - and came home totally zonked and ready to fall into the sack. But that's a waste of a gorgeous afternoon - especially before our day off and when there is a big fat juicy moonrise at 5.15pm
So indulged in only 40 minutes snoozing in the sun instead of the hours and hours we so dearly desired. There was also the minor matter of this week being Easter - would be missing out on our Friday fix at Annalakshmi - so switching to Wednesday evening would be not a bad idea especially as it was most conveniently just a short ferry ride across the moonlit river.

Pretty yummy stuff as usual. Izzie has never been a great fan of rice until being introduced to the delectable basmati that they have in this place - usually one pot of plain and the other flavored - sometimes saffron or tumeric - yesterday was with cloves, cumin and cardamom. They had the usual soup and spicy potatoes as well as what can best be described as curried mushrooms but which really does not do justice to the stuff. They also had dhal which you would expect to be always on the menu in an Indian restaurant but this place only does it occasionally.
Izzie loves buffets - you can try a bit of everything and then get more of the stuff you like. They make a point of encouraging people to take only small amounts and then come back for more rather than what so commonly happens in buffets where people pile up their plates and only eat about half. An awful waste.
There is also the sense of the lucky dip - you never know quite what you will get.
But bestest of all - it's all real food where you can actually taste the ingredients and spices are used to enhance rather than disguise what is in it.

Today was also at the Juicy Beetroot which also does curries, dhal, rice and stuff but more chunky and less refined but still damned tasty. So dining out two days in a row - total decadence. But tomorrow we will be bringing our own
Still need to decide between a moonlit picnic near the graveyard or indulging in some doom and gloom at the cathedral for the Tenebrae service at 6pm. In any case, got to get the 7.30 bus at the latest - being a public holiday - it's the last one of the day.

Brought the Preciousss today to snatch more podcasts and was relieved to discover that the Science Show does transcripts of all its stuff which suits the Izzie just fine. Quicker to read and take up less space and in most cases - except for plays, sounds and interesting creatures - you don't really lose that much in the written version of the program.
But slinking around with this thing is a bit of a bummer - especially when climbing up Memorial Hill for a bit of moon watching. Nothing like carrying extra kilos for making you cranky and tired (as the ma is so so fond of telling us) So - every second or third Thursday is probably just fine.