The Mir Diamond Mine In Russia Is The World's Second Biggest Manmade Hole...

The disused Mir Diamond Mine in Russia's Eastern Siberia is 525 metres deep and 1.2 kilometres wide. There's restricted airspace above it because helicopters get sucked in by the enormous downdraft.
It's the second biggest manmade hole in the world.
The world's biggest manmade hole is the Bingham Canyon Mine in Utah USA. It's 970 metres deep and 4 kilometres wide.
Four kilometres wide!
Because the Mir hole is empty and abandoned and as I dislike waste, I thought the hole would be a good choice to accommodate all the world's dysfunctional, untrustworthy, dictatorial, greedy, egotistical, self-serving, incompetent, did I mention stupid, bureaucrats and politicians if we were to drop them all in it.
But this hole may not big enough, perhaps the Bingham Mine would be better...

Big Brother Got Me...

Well it was Big Sister actually.
Last evening was Census night in New Zealand and Jean was going to make sure nobody was left unaccounted for in her area.
It wasn't the first time I'd been in an isolated part of the country on census night and they've always managed to catch me in their bureaucratic net.
Not that I went to great lengths to avoid them.
I was just living my life and doing what I do.
One night many census's ago I was on my yacht Sofia in the beautiful Bon Accord Harbour at Kawai Island in Auckland's Hauraki Gulf.
The sun was going down and friends and I were toasting the fact that we had escaped the census when there was a put-put-put of a little outboard motor and sure enough, in the tiny dinghy was an intrepid census taker with their reams of paperwork. He came aboard, we had a few laughs and he went away happy and satisfied with a job well done.
Last evening I was sitting once again with a few friends at Tokerau Beach and we were wondering if we were going to be counted.
They were voicing their concerns about not existing. I'd just said they shouldn't worry,
someone will turn up.
And moments later someone did.
It was Big Sister Jean.
So I guess I'll continue to exist as a statistic.
Until next time...