Meekatharra - the end of the earth

Well I am off again to Meekatharra tomorrow morning. I thought I might take a little time and let everyone know about the Magic that is Meekatharra. It's not all shredded tires, emus, kangaroos, and bullets.... but it's close.

As you can see from the map, Meekatharra is a "Shire" in the Mid West of Western Australia. It's named is derived from an Aboriginal work meaning "place of little water". I can't think of a better location for a town than the place of little water. The average annual rainfall is 237 mm. However, most of the rain is due to infrequent heavy storms. Temperature wise, the mean average maximum temperature for the year is 28.8 C. But during the summer months, it can easily climb into the mid to high 40's.

The population consists of about 950 people, and I'm really not sure why these people choose to live there. The town was settled during a gold rush in the 1890's, but the good times did not last long. The reason it has survived is it became an important location in the Western Australia Government Railway system. Meekatharra is now the major supply centre for pastoral and mining for the surrounding region.

Also of note, Meekatharra is home to the Royal Flying Doctor Service. This is an air ambulance service for those living remote areas of the outback. They provide emergency assitance, primary healthcare, and assist with distance education. The runway in Meekatharra is over 2km long, and is a diversion airport that can support emergency landings for major jumbo jets. This runway was used in a famous emergency landing of the then Prime Minister's plane in the 1980's. After spending a few hours there, his wife described the town as "the end of the earth".

Daylight Savings Update: The curtains have yet to shown significant signs of extra fading. Will continue to keep a watchful eye on them.

Daylight Savings. You Fall Back, but I....

Spring Forward!!!!! Wahoo! I can't wait for Daylight Savings. I am aware of the fact that I already "sprang" forward in March in Canada, and now I'm springing forward again, thus losing 2 hours of my life. If I end up back home before March. Then I'll lose ANOTHER hour. However, the extra hour of sunlight in Perth is going to be life-altering. No longer will I come home from work, and have about 30-45 minutes of daylight left. It's going to be almost 2 hours of sunlight (for now). This means I will be able to bike down to the beach, and go for an evening swim. Or catch in a quick nine holes. Or take a leisurly strole to the grocery store to ..... wait, no, grocery stores close at 6pm.

Perth, and WA (Western Australia), is a little behind on the times. This is actually just the 2nd year they have ever tried Daylight Savings. It's the second year of a 3 year trial, at which point, Daylight Savings will go to a referendum. The previous 4 votes have all been unanimous in "NO".

I decided to read a few comments on a "Your Say" page on http://www.thewest.com.au/ . Here are some of the reasons Perthites give for being anti-daylight savings:

• The roads will get busier in the morning as people won't want to drive in the dark (remember that the sun will still rise at 6am).
• Kids will stay home and watch tv and eat junk food after school because it will be too hot (right, there is a big difference between the temperature at 3pm and 4pm)
• Kids won't know when to go to bed (never remember this being a problem back home)
• It will cause Perth to have 30 minutes longer daylight than the east coast (not sure who came up with that one)
• People will have to walk their dogs and exercise in the dark at 5am .... (what do these people do in the winter????? not only is it dark then, but it's cold)
• Criminals will prosper as everyone will be at the beach at night
• Too difficult to change all those damn clocks
• The curtains will fade due to the increased sunlight (my personal fav)

Perthites have come up with several suggestions. People might understand Daylight Savings better if its name changed:

• Clock Changing Day
• Daylight Transference .... because we aren't really saving daylight.
• Daylight Robbery ... since they have stolen our "cool" mornings

My absolute favourite though is one person suggested "why don't business just change their hours of work for 1 hour earlier. That way only the people working will be affected". Oh my, that wouldn't be confusing.

Well I can't wait for it to kick in. The only issue I have is that I'm flying to Meekatharra again on Monday for a 7am flight, which means it's technically at 6am, which means Jonny is going to be getting up very very early.