Veronika Wild

Historic British Child Immunisation Poster from the 1950s issued by Glaxo Laboratories Ltd., Greenford, Middlesex; designer unknown.  -Image from the Antikbar Original Vintage Posters collection What short collective memories people have. I have just been going back over old posts to label them before Google disappears them forever and came across one from 2011 when we were utterly distraught because our newborn granddaughter had caught Whooping Cough in the hospital. She had to be resuscitated at least three times while there and twice more after being allowed to go home, where she had to remain on an oxygen monitor. I also had to have the ‘Grandma Booster’ before I was allowed to hold her for the first time. Until I was revaccinated against Tetanus prior to helping out with a penguin rescue (after an oil spill), I had no idea that even the vaccinations we had had as children, could become less effective over time. Now I was reminded again, so make sure you are up to da...

The Carillon, Canberra  Had an impromptu trip to Canberra last week. Although I had originally said no, because I still wasn't in great shape, I dragged myself out of bed at 4.30 a.m. and caught the 6.25 a.m. flight out of Hobart and arrived in Canberra just in time for morning tea on Grandparents' Day. While I was resting on a bench, another grandma doing the same remarked how shocked she was that the children weren't doing more writing exercises and rote learning of tables and so on, as we were doing in Grade 2 (does anyone remember getting pen licences?), and were instead building mini shelters and, in one granddaughter's case, writing about foxes. I tried to explain that many schools now teach through hands-on projects alongside the basics, on the assumption that children learn and remember more by doing and learn to write and research at the same time. In the course of her exposition about the fox, my littlest granddaughter had really come out of her shell too, ha...

Hot dogs and cool cats: keeping pets cool without blowing your energy bill Pets suffer just as badly as their humans in the heat. Robert Occhialini/Flickr , CC BY-NC Yolande Strengers , RMIT University ; Cecily Maller , RMIT University , and Larissa Nicholls , RMIT University As the weather heats up, Australian households won’t just be cranking up the air conditioning for themselves. Some households will be turning it on for their dogs or cats. Our research on energy demand and household cooling highlights a recent trend towards air-conditioning rooms or homes for pets. As well as cooling homes occupied by both humans and their furry friends, air conditioners may be left on when dogs or cats are home alone. Some pet owners also leave doors and windows open for their dogs and cats to move between indoor and outdoor areas. This means that air conditioners have to work harder and use more energy to maintain indoor ...