Changing careers after 50 by Casey-Ann Seaniger. Reprinted with permission, 50-something magazine, National Seniors Australia, October 2009, p. 32 With so many negative stories surrounding rising unemployment and a bleak outlook for jobs, it’s refreshing to hear inspirational accounts of people who have taken a chance on their career and won. Making the decision to […]
“Chemo brain” by Fred Lane PhD After years of resistance, “chemo brain” (aka post-chemotherapy cognitive impairment, chemotherapy-induced cognitive dysfunction, et al), is gaining recognition in mental health and allied professional fields. Nearly all cancer patients undergoing powerful chemotherapy report this disorder and many surgical patients experience some kind of memory problem. Maybe 15 or 20 […]
Stamp out polygraphs CBS reporter Dianne Sawyer (left) easily beat this “lie detector” test on live TV after minimal training. “Polygraph testing for national security screening is little more than junk science, with results so inaccurate that they tend to be counterproductive,” said a long-awaited report released 8 October 2002 by the prestigious American National […]
Prince Alfred and Australia’s first Royal Tour by Mackenzie J. Gregory Prince Alfred, the Duke of Edinburgh (left), was noted for two significant events in the history of Australia. He was the first member of the Royal family to tour the colonies that became the Commonwealth of Australia and he was the first assassination target […]
Superstition and Silliness — the tale of the so-called HMS Friday By Tom Lewis Although sailors of the past, and perhaps the present, have been seen as superstitious, they are generally sensible, realistic people, as indeed dealing with the perils of the deep dictates. However, one story of a naval attempt to combat superstition goes […]
Swords “to carry” or not By Tom Lewis The naval sword and scabbard. There seems to be an oft-repeated story about our navy, and perhaps the Royal Navy too, that following some disgrace within the RN, perhaps a mutiny, an order was once given that naval officers could not wear their swords, as they were […]
An RAN midshipman in HMS Vanguard by John Jobson CDRE John Jobson describes his nine months aboard the last of the RN battleships, HMS Vanguard. These recollections are based on his Midshipman’s Journal notes. It was December 1939: England was at war. Sir Stanley Goodall, the Royal Navy Director of Naval Construction, proposed that the […]
Albert Medal Queen Victoria instituted the Albert Medal in 1866 to recognise those civilians who had attempted to prevent the loss of life at sea. A year later the warrant was amended to create two levels of the award, with the very Victorian wording: Whereas We, taking into Our Royal consideration that great loss of […]
Diver blown up, Sir By Bob STEVENS Another distinguished entry in the Naval Officers Club Literary Prize competition, 2001, this essay was published in the Naval Officers Club Newsletter No 48, March 2001, pp 4-5. I had often wondered what it would be like to put on one of those – now old fashioned – […]
John Paul Jones “letter” to the “Naval Committee” Since about the turn of the last century USN midshipmen training in their Annapolis Naval Academy were encouraged to learn and recite about 500 words from a reputed 14 September 1775 letter sent by John Paul Jones to the “Naval Committee of Congress” listing the attributes required […]
