Lacessit

Pre-Covid, I would walk into a Centrelink office and the staffer would confirm a concession card had already been posted to me. This time around, it was "Oh, you're here" and the card had not been posted to me, so I got a printout instead which expires in another 11 days. Hopefully Australia Post will be on the ball. You keep using the American spelling Centerlink. It's Centrelink, OK? "Scheduled maintenance is being conducted from 12:00am to 2:00am AEDT Wednesday 8 February 2023. Centrelink Business Online Services, the Child Care Subsidy ..." ( From the Services Australia website ) You may be right, it is up to clients to chase them now. Which is a pain on 132 300, given the wait times.

I have found Aldi is the cheapest by a considerable margin. As far as steak goes, I have found nothing in Thailand which comes within a bull's roar of Victorian eye fillet. IMO freezing meat prior to importation into Thailand ruins it. I tried Cape Grim eye fillet from Tops in Chiang Rai, it was tough as old boots.

You may be right, I had no concession card or PBS generated until after I attended an appointment. Perhaps I would also have continued to get the offshore pension amount, who knows?

Services Australia/Centrelink was not aware I had landed in Australia until I attended an appointment about a week later, and had taken no action to issue me with a new concession card. I obtained a temporary document at the office, pending the card issue. I can only post my experience, if people want to disagree it is not my problem.

I just shelled out $100 for pub meals in Australia for 3. I could feed 10 people in Thailand for that money and equivalent dishes, even more at a food court. Don't get me started on massages, any version.

I can only go by the advice the pharmacist gave me. I don't know if this is a recent change.

A bit off topic; however, the change made to the PBS by some bureaucratic genius has me quite gobsmacked. The PBS is only paid on the original prescription, any repeat is no longer subsidized. Which means I go to a bulk-billing doctor to get another prescription. Any cost saving generated by not subsidizing repeats is well and truly swallowed up by the cost of a bulk-billed doctor. I suppose it stops guys like me taking six months' worth of medications into Thailand, although the meds I buy in Thailand are quite often the same as the PBS cost. IMO whoever thought this one up should be on a dole queue. Paid $65 for 3 eye fillet steaks yesterday.

The pharmacist did that, and charged me $20 to do so.

A heads-up for people returning to Australia. Centrelink is now privatised under the name Services Australia. Before, when I landed in Australia Border Force would automatically notify Centrelink of my arrival. Now, Centrelink does not know I am here until I tell them, which has implications in terms of getting a new pension card, and restoration of supplements and the PBS.. Services Australia ( an oxymoron ) does not accept walk-ins anymore, one has to make an appointment. By phoning 132 200, where a wait time can be 1 - 2 hours. One other thing. Because I had all my COVID vaccinations in Thailand, Medicare had no record, so the vax I was offered was first generation Astra Zeneca. I had to have my Thai vax history uploaded to Medicare before the pharmacist would give me a bivalent Pfizer.

I gave up PPI's ( Pantoprazole ) a couple of years ago. IMO the key is changing one's eating habits. I eat a main course, low on fat, heavy on low-carb vegetables, for dinner. Dessert consists of fruit only. Alcohol only once or twice a week, before dinner. No coffee afterwards. I eat at 6 pm, won't retire to bed until at least 10 pm. I want a 3 hour gap between eating and sleeping. I have a raised pillow, and a bottle of water beside the bed. I drink half a teaspoon of baking soda in a glass of water about 20 minutes before going to bed. I have not had gastric reflux in the two years since I stopped PPI's. I am 79. I'm not saying my regime will work for everyone, it works for me.

35 - 40%, smart guy. Fat intake has nothing to do with weight loss, I am living proof. It's why I put you on ignore some time ago as an annoying troll, pick nits somewhere else.

Given the spelling and punctuation errors I've seen in a couple of your posts, permit me to doubt that.

Easy. Many of the far right capitalize on their profits, and socialize their losses. Just ask Alex Jones. Or Trump.

Netflix, Amazon Prime and Youtube Premium have taken over, along with USB's and external storage devices. I have a 1 TB drive that can store about 2000 CD's. Bluray and CD's have gone the way of bustles, drum brakes, and button-up boots.

I found the USD was gleefully accepted in Vietnam, preferred to the dong.

It is somewhat ludicrous Putin and his military think they can bombard Ukraine with waves of missiles, and be immune from any response. It's like asking someone to fight with one hand tied behind their back.

IME Vietnam is much more receptive to the USD. Changing baht to USD should not be expensive if one uses reputable money exchangers. Go to any bank, different story. I only ever used a debit card in Vietnam, with no problem. I can't say if the same would apply to credit cards.

Churchill once said “democracy is the worst form of government – except for all the others that have been tried.” No doubt the USA has made many mistakes in its pursuit of self-interest, all nations do. It's called realpolitik, get used to it. Having said that, IMO I would prefer living in the US rather than Saudi Arabia or Russia.

If one goes to a branch that has not seen the depositor before, one is always going to be scrutinized more carefully. Perhaps the real situation consists of the branch the OP goes to regularly, lets the rules slide. I have two accounts with Kbank, have never had a problem. But then, I don't have a company or a co-signatory.

I don't actually have any problems with all the cholesterol and HDL/LDL indicators, even before I went on the diet I developed for myself after researching on YouTube. I guess my genetic inheritance is lucky in that respect. Having said that, I eat as much as I want, but what I consider to be the right foods for me. My regime won't suit everyone, I eat lashings of cheese and yoghurt, a small amount of fat. I avoid sugar and restrict carbohydrates. Alcohol once or twice a week, not more than two standard drinks at a time. Absolutely no beer. The benefits of going from 93 kg to 77 kg, with an accompanying reduction in waistline, are I no longer need medications for gastric reflux, hypertension, osteo arthritis and sleep disorder. In fact, I can now afford to break out occasionally with bad stuff like ice-cream and cake, without putting weight back on.

When someone with my level of education and experience is told to be open-minded, I do find it offensive. Same situation as with idiot anti-vaxxers, moron climate deniers etc. History tells us negotiating with tyrants is futile. It only encourages them. Putin has an extensive record of reneging on formal agreements. You want to negotiate with a guy who poisons his opponents, and puts Russians in jail for even mentioning it's a war? Good luck with that.

No. The US saw making a country dependent solely on Russian gas and oil was a big mistake if Russia turned hostile, which has been borne out by events since 2014, when Russia illegally annexed Crimea. The US doesn't have a dog in that fight, they have all the oil and gas of their own that they need, and export some. If Putin had not had his brain farts about restoring the USSR etc., the Russians would be doing very well with their economy, even with rampant corruption.

Putin is the first leader since World War II to threaten the use of nuclear weapons in a local war. He is on record as wanting the USSR back, which presumably includes the partition of Germany all over again. He and his military are deliberately targeting civilian infrastructure in Ukraine, and deporting civilians to Russia in keeping with the Stalinist playbook during the Holomodor. That makes him a war criminal. You may not regard Putin as a threat, I certainly do.

I meant both, jail time and/or fines.