here be dragons
Jan. 19th, 2008 10:51 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
miriam_eHad a visit from a water dragon.
I've seen them down at the creek but never around the house. There are bearded dragons around the house, though I haven't seen them at the back door like this water dragon. Noting its bright red chest I wonder if it might be mating season. This was one was about a meter long, maybe more... a bit hard to judge with that long tail.
(I've resized and cropped the pics so they hopefully don't mess too much with your view or your download time. And I've stuck them behind the link.)
Cute, huh?
This last one is a bit foggy because I shot it through my kitchen window and I rarely clean them. The tree is less than a meter from the window and I had the camera almost up to the glass. So the dragon was in arm's reach.
I've seen them down at the creek but never around the house. There are bearded dragons around the house, though I haven't seen them at the back door like this water dragon. Noting its bright red chest I wonder if it might be mating season. This was one was about a meter long, maybe more... a bit hard to judge with that long tail.
(I've resized and cropped the pics so they hopefully don't mess too much with your view or your download time. And I've stuck them behind the link.)
Cute, huh?
This last one is a bit foggy because I shot it through my kitchen window and I rarely clean them. The tree is less than a meter from the window and I had the camera almost up to the glass. So the dragon was in arm's reach.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2008-01-24 11:17 pm (UTC)I'm so poor I generally don't end up paying taxes in the end. I pay about a 10th of my income as tax even though I'm below the taxable threshold, so that at the end of the year if I've had any well paid work (I live in hope) then I don't have to cough up extra money. Usually I just get a big refund cheque back each year. I don't mind paying taxes (so long as they use it properly) and it is a way of saving money.
This year might be a bit different because I'm hoping to start an energy efficiency business with my sister. If we start earning good money then I'll be paying far more in taxes. However start-up companies attract some significant tax concessions so we might be able to still survive the first couple of years.
The tax rate looks pretty high in Australia, but it isn't really. It is pretty unrealistic because some of the richest pay almost no tax because of the the tax concessions and refunds (I can't think of the proper word). In the end most of the tax burden falls on the low income workers, which is a bummer, but seems to be the case in most countries... except some places with, unsurprisingly, the highest standard of living in the world (e.g. Sweden).
Very few people pay the face-value tax. It is difficult to work out a fair tax system though. Most of the tax rebates are an attempt to make the system more sensible, though with each layer of adjustments the system becomes more unwieldy. Our tax system seriously needs reworking, though I don't envy anyone the job.