Museum decisions based on facts
There are many conversations occurring in Southland at present that relate to the Southland Museum and Art Gallery – its current status and its future.
The building has been closed because of safety concerns which are based on sound advice.
The Mayors of Southland all have an interest in the Southland Museum and Art Gallery Trust and all fully support the decision.
There have been many discussions over many years around the Southland Museum and Art Gallery Board, ownership of the building and the future of management and governance of same.
Questions have been asked, opportunities are being investigated, so please allow this very important process to occur before condemning a decision that has been made based on fact.
Gary Tong, Tim Shadbolt, Tracy Hicks positive or lend a hand, too many vested interests there in my opinion. William Stronach filthy habit but that this needs to be balanced against the rights of smokers.
We acknowledge his position, however, we must protect the rights of the majority of the population who do not smoke, and the rights of children and their future. We are not saying people can’t smoke. We want the rights of the 85 per cent of our Southern population who don’t smoke to be considered in the public outdoor spaces in our district.
Liz Smith’s work collecting cigarette butts is to be celebrated. What she has collected, however, is merely a fraction of what is currently leaking into our waterways and pristine natural environment.
The coalition encourages QLDC to develop Smokefree Environments policy – to create a smokefree Queenstown CBD, smokefree events booked in council parks including beaches, and smokefree outdoor dining.
We believe the time is right, and the public support for Liz’s work confirms this. The coalition looks forward to working with QLDC to develop Smokefree Environments policy for the health of both our population, and of the beautiful environment that brings thousands of people here every year.
Diana Power, Central Otago and Wakatipu Smokefree Coalition
Aren’t you pleased it’s Monday and all the PMT (Pre Markle-Tension) wedding malarkey is finally over? The noise emanating from a band of bogan hillbilly relatives running amok got so loud that doomsayers began predicting that the nuptials would turn into a rom-com horror flick entitled The Runaway Bride – Groom.
Yep, she’s a hard road finding the perfect bloke to walk his sheila down the aisle. Especially if your Dad has to lug all his baggage with him and the suitcases don’t have Louis Vuitton monograms on the sides.
Nothing can prepare you for the thrusting of pomp and circumstance upon one. No-one in their wildest white trash dreams would think – ‘‘I’d better get a life just in case one day I might get the call to walk my little princess up the aisle to her Prince’’.
Sorry, but I was under the impression that since the Queen made her 1992 annus horribilis speech, Her Majesty had given her subjects the royal right to feel OK and normal about having a dysfunctional family.
Back then royal marriages were on the rocks, toes were being sucked, a tampon had become an obscure object of desire, and Princess Di’s new best friend was the press.
Even the gossip gobblers were feeling filthfatigued by The Firm’s goings-on, and it looked like the final curtain was about to come down on the royal family. But they retreated, recovered and reinvented themselves, and the world got to understand how totes amazeballs Liz II really was and is when they sat down and binge-watched Netflix’s The Crown.
Yes, things were going along pretty smoothly and boringly with Wills & Kate, till Meghan met Harry and the Prince had the audacity to think outside the royal box. Unfortunately, the royal risk-take in marrying a bit of ravishing rough brought Markle family skeletons rushing out of cupboards in rude haste. There was such an abundance of black sheep that the press had a whole flock to choose from.
The proud wedding march up the aisle that should have been a dignified, straightforward and happy runway, became a path littered with vulgar fairground distractions. Interestingly, it wasn’t the royal family that tried to drag Meghan down and tell her she shouldn’t have ideas above her station, it was her egregious extended family who were hellbent on holding her back.
If you boiled down all the Markle debacle, all the vitriol and jealousies over those not invited to the royal wedding, the sound would be a load of old yarney. Or is it laurel?
These new mind-boggling ear twisters that have split the herd to bitterly argue what they have heard need an expert linguist to interpret why we are hearing two so very different words.
I suggest that the film-maker, director, artist and all round off-the-charts genius David Lynch, he who created a sub-conscious, surrealist patois for his characters to speak in his acclaimed television series Twin Peaks, is just the man for the job.
Perhaps the spooky-sounding yarney and laurel are breakthroughs from another planet or a parallel universe trying to communicate with us? Perhaps they are intimations from a higher level of perception attempting chit-chat with a lower form of beast? Perhaps it’s the microwave telling us it’s on the blink.
Or maybe what we are hearing is broken-up bits of a heavenly broadcast relaying the happy news that convicted sex offender Hopeful Christian has arrived at the Pearly Gates, and, as we speak, is being put slowly and agonisingly through the spiritual meat grinder. I fervently hope so.