I’m just not getting it, I have kids dressed up in ghoulish costumes banging on my front door asking for “trick or treat” celebrating some American tradition I know nothing about apart from seeing it on television. Now I have no issues with Americans although I do have issues celebrating American traditions and forgetting our own history.

At dusk on the 31st of October 1917, the 4th Light Horse Brigade of the Australian Imperial Force charged the Turkish defenses at Beersheba in a decisive battle. These guys were mounted infantry and not cavalry; they would ride their horses to the battle, dismount and fight as standard infantry. The battle had raged all day and a decision was made around 5pm to stage a cavalry charge as the wells were still in Turkish hands.

So with their bayonets in hand as they didn’t have swords; their rifles were strung across their back, they charged the Turkish trenches under heavy fire and actually took the town. Now we blindly follow some American tradition wrapped in commercialism handing out lollies and scary stories. I could think of nothing more scary of charging dug in Turkish defensive positions on horseback with only a bayonet in my hand. How quickly we forget the real sacrifices made 90 years ago to embrace foreign traditions at the expense of our own history – unreal.

I read about initial public offerings, share buybacks, share splits and rights issues; I see these are financial instruments designed for sophisticated investors and I ask myself, what exactly is a sophisticated investor?

For me, I would suggest trading ordinary shares on a regular basis, trading exchange traded options, warrants, futures and foreign exchange would tend to indicate sophisticated investor behaviour. This would include margin trading utilising leveraged strategies to supercharge profits, naturally the downside of supercharged profits could be supercharged losses should you misread the market.

Ok, so I need to do some more searching for a definition and the corporations act provided me with some answers. To be classified as a sophisticated investor you must acquire a certificate from a qualified accountant stating that you have net assets of $2.5 million AUD. That and/or that your gross income for the past two financial years has been at least $250,000 annually. Oh wow, that is a pretty exclusive club, you would be considered wealthy by most criteria.

Now, this certificate must have been obtained within six months of accepting any wholesale offer to acquire any form of securities. This means this class of investor that can be offered securities without the usual product disclosure requirements that apply to everyday mum and dad investors.

I have to ask, but why? This means you lose all the protections offered to standard investors and you have the ability to lose big with no recourse. What it also means is you have access to products offered by institutions that do not wish to offer products to the general public without having to meet normal market product disclosure requirements.

These days, I prefer to remain a fairly unsophisticated investor as opposed to my former activities as a trader where I would buy and sell ordinary shares on borrowed funds. Because of studies and other commitments, I don’t have the opportunity to engage in through market research to justify the risk of margin trading. So remaining as an investor utilising equity instead of debt financing is a far more cautious strategy for me now. I am looking forward to early retirement when I have the time to pursue such activities.

The Singapore Sling is my favourite gin-based cocktail after the basic gin & tonic which I really refer to as a mixed drink. I prefer this long drink to be served in a highball glass as opposed to the cocktail glass as it is sometimes done. According to legend, the Singapore Sling was first mixed around about 1915 by a Hainanese bartender working at the Long Bar in Raffles Hotel in Singapore named Ngiam Tong Boon.

What I have noticed is the Singapore Sling mixed throughout South East Asia is remarkably different from the Singapore Sling mixed at the Long Bar. I have to ask myself, why not? This pre-mixed cocktail served at the Raffles Hotel costs a bomb, I nearly passed out when given the bill for two pre-mixed drinks. That’s right, they don’t even mix it for you, it is poured straight from a container so it lacks the romantic notion of a bartender mixed drink.

I went searching for a definitive recipe for the Singapore Sling, to the best of my knowledge this is the Raffles mix. In our home mix we generally leave out the Benedictine liqueur and unfortunately we do not count out the 6 drops of Angostura bitters, especially as the night wears on.

60 ml – a double shot of gin
30 ml – a single shot of cherry brandy
15 ml – a half shot of Cointreau liqueur
15 ml – a half shot of Benedictine liqueur
250 ml – 1 cup of pineapple juice
1 tablespoon of fresh lime juice
6 drops of Angostura bitters
Crushed ice cubes

I have had the opportunity to try these smartwatches on at a promotional show when I was in Manila. The TAG Heuer is an android operating system that sets the face of the watch with a Carrera dial – ok, that’s good.

TAG Heuer is a luxury goods manufacturer, you know you are paying a premium for quality Swiss engineered products and if you are good with that – no issues. The question then is, does the Connected smartwatch meet the criteria for luxury goods? Watch guys, or watch snobs love mechanical movements, they love old style, intricate, hand produced machinery – that is a mechanical movement. 

But this is when it gets tricky, the android operating system is open source software and isn’t exclusive to TAG Heuer. When you purchase a TAG Heuer timepiece, you are paying for a pretty intricate movement and TAG Heuer has a distinct style. I have heard these are great a $300 smartwatch for six times the price.

So what you have here is a bunch of electronics replacing an intricate movement, an open source software program available to anybody, a body and band with the TAG Heuer marketing department and their reputation for quality and style, so maybe it is just me – I just didn’t get it. I see where TAG Heuer is going, they are looking to break into the smart watch market with a high value reputation

A recent Facebook post by a former high school friend was less than confronting, she was informed by an emergency doctor that she is dying and needs to give up smoking. She also added on her post, it’s hard. What I was unable to determine from her post was, is being confronted with death hard or giving up smoking is hard?

She is about 45 years old and from my estimates smoking from about 15 years of age; so she has been smoking for around 30 years. Is she really finding it difficult giving up a 30 year habit or the threat of premature death brought about by 30 years of smoking difficult? She is weak willed, anyone who meets her quickly works that out, she brings her problems on herself. 

We all stack on the kgs as we age due to metabolic factors, you can exercise for a lesser effect in your fourties as opposed to your thirties and twenties. At some stage, you need to take your health seriously as you don’t bounce back as you did in your early twenties. I really hope she does give up smoking and gives herself the best chance at a long life, I fear the damage has already been done. 

What I do know is she has never exercised a day in her life, she always ate poorly and was extremely lazy. As far as I can tell, she was always grossly overweight; she has been obese all her adult life. This lifestyle coupled with smoking doesn’t promote a long life so whilst it may appear I am somewhat belligerent with her medical issues, this isn’t the case. However, I do ask myself, what did she think was going to happen?

We are constantly lectured on climate change brought about by global warming. As a population, we are constantly berated about the effects of carbon on the atmosphere due to the burning of fossil fuels, yet we destroy the greatest carbon absorbing resource on earth with hardly a mention. 

We want to implement carbon trading, carbon taxes and other similar blunt instruments yet discount the impact of deforestation and the ability of trees to absorb the very carbon we are more than happy to tax. Are we going about this the wrong way?

How badly was Simon Katich shafted by Cricket Australia? Yes, there was an aging team with Ricky Ponting and Mike Hussey electing to play on, but we all know the real reason why Simon Katich was dumped was his 2009 altercation with future test captain Michael Clarke at the SCG. It had nothing to do with form, if anything, it was Ponting’s form that was on the wane – he was finished.

The decision to axe the most accomplished test batsman of the previous three years was highlighted when Katich also lost his Cricket Australia contract at the time of his dumping. I have to question the abilities of chairman of selectors Andrew Hilditch, he was unduly influenced by Clarke who appeared unwilling to play with him after it was reported Simon grabbed Clarke by the throat. It has been said of Katich that if you don’t get on with him then you just aren’t a good bloke. He is that type of guy – I don’t doubt that for a minute.

When Simon Katich retired from leading the Perth Scorchers T20 team in 2014, his cricketing career has come to an end. He played on a long time after his test axing for Lancashire, New South Wales and the Perth Scorchers. He took up a post as the development coach for Greater Western Sydney football club missing Perth Scorchers champions league T20 campaign in India, the side really missed his leadership ability. Now he has some experience in coaching Aussie rules football, let’s hope he brings some of his experience back to coaching cricket.

I stepped onto the wide body aircraft and weaved my way past people busily stuffing their luggage into the already crammed overhead lockers and made my way to my window seat. I had to climb over a gentleman sitting in the aisle seat who was unwilling to get up and let me through to my window seat – no problems though.

As I squeezed past, the unmistakable odour of stale alcohol struck my senses and nearly laid me out; this was a 9.10 flight and this guy was clearly heavily intoxicated. That is way too early in the morning to be this drunk and he wasn’t just topping up. While we were still boarding and he became very chatty; I was thinking at least an empty seat separates us, maybe someone can come and sit in the seat and act as a buffer. I was in no mood for chatting, I had caught the 1:10 flight from Perth to Singapore after spending the previous day at work.

At around 4:00 the breakfast service starts ready for the 6:30 arrival, no time for sleep. This was the three and a half hour flight from Singapore to Manila, I was hoping to get an hour or possibly two of sleep before my Friday night out in Manila – this was looking less likely now. The middle seat passenger arrives, after a robust discussion with the steward and my new friend, he shuffles into the middle seat complaining heavily and proceeds to tell me all about the injustice of airline seating.

I learnt that he flew from the UK to Singapore where he devoured as much alcohol on the plane as possible. They must have cut him off at some stage because he rummaged through his carry-on luggage, opened his duty free and consumed the bottle of whisky mid-flight. As the flight stewardess handed the inflight menu out, he complained loudly they didn’t serve beer on the flight. I stupidly pointed out that Singapore’s very drinkable Tiger Beer is served on Singapore Airlines flights.

So he immediately proceeded to order a beer even though they were not serving yet, the ever helpful Singapore Airlines dutifully obliged. Naturally this was followed by another can and in short time, a third can of beer. The meal cart appeared and breakfast was served, I asked for a glass of red wine with my brunch, yes it was still morning, well before midday, but what the hell, I was on holidays. A glass of wine with lunch is acceptable – maybe even a second.

Naturally my neighbour ordered a beer with his meal that slipped right through his hands as the stewardess handed it over. As the can rolled around on the floor, she handed him another – I was becoming a little uneasy now. He glanced over at my glass of red wine and proclaimed loudly that red wine was a great idea and was poured a glass of red wine. So here he was clutching a glass of red wine in one hand and a plastic cup of beer in the other.

He alternately sipped from the left and right hands and forgot about his meal. Three more of these mixed beer/wine orders arrived before he finished the red wine decided to set his beer down on his table, one presumes to start eating brunch. I can only presume his coordination was somewhat impaired as he knocked the full beer all over his tray table and onto the guy in the aisle seat. Beer was running everywhere and the staff had to clear the tray tables away before he could get up.

Somehow I remained immune to the beer bath from my vantage point of the window seat, I found some humour in the situation as I handed my napkin over without looking at him, so there wasn’t even a need for an expressionless face. When he stood up the beer had soaked into his lap giving the appearance that he had pissed himself, the look of horror on the other passenger’s faces was hilarious. Everyone in the immediate area was well aware how drunk this guy was, he was pretty loud.

The seat cushion was also soaked, the faces of the people who walked up and down the aisle could see the huge wet stain on the seat cushion and his wet groin, the expressions of disgust was laughable as he exited the toilet. There was no secret as to where all these alcoholic beverages were going. He was escorted to the rear of the aircraft where the staff presumably found this gentleman a dry seat – one hopes the rest of his flight was dry too.

It took me ages to get my martini right, all my cocktail books informed my a 2:1 gin/dry vermouth mix was correct – yet, my martini tasted terrible. I was reading the MASH novel by Richard Hooker who wrote extensively about life in The Swamp.

This is where I found the best example of the Gin/Dry Vermouth 5:1 ratio; after that – my martini really grew in stature. Naturally, no party at home was complete without a martini mixed up and served in the classic martini glass. Purchasing the martini glass was a feat in itself, I searched for ages to correctly present my martini mix at parties and I am glad to say we succeeded.

As training and development practitioners embrace technology to deliver just-in-time training ensuring workers remain productive, delivery methodologies have expanded to mobile devices. Any traditional educator knows students of all ages will not put their mobile phones down during traditional lectures and tutorials so the question is, do we fight mobile phones or embrace the technology to deliver training?

The proliferation of mobile phone technology has led to the latest incarnation of learning methodologies; mLearning is mobile learning and defined as learning through social and content interactions across multiple contexts using personal electronic devices on demand. As mLearning is asynchronous learning, lessons are accessed by learners on-the-job at their time convenience when required.

Utilising portable technologies allows the for the creation of learning tools to aid informal learning focusing on the mobility of the learner through formalised processes outside of the classroom. As such, mLearning differs from eLearning insofar as the emphasis is on chunking bite-sized learning interactions with micro-lessons utilising interactive tools such as short videos, images, charts and diagrams. Learners are empowered to take control of their own learning needs utilising andragogy principles of motivated adult learners. Hopefully businesses and individual learners embrace mLearning to create quality learning interactions and outcomes.