Pool Progress

Posted on August 27, 2022 by Lachlan Wetherall

The replacement of the Lambton pool water slide looks to have been completed this week.

Lambton Pool water slide. 27 August 2022.

Lambton Pool water slide reconstruction, 14 August 2022.

Spring 2022

Posted on August 19, 2022 by Lachlan Wetherall

Despite what seems to be a lingering winter , the budding of our mulberry tree this year has come earlier than last year.

The furnaces of the world

Posted on July 10, 2022 by Lachlan Wetherall

I’m currently researching and writing my next article for The Local, on the subject of the “baby” coal mines of Lambton and Waratah. [Now published here.] These were small operations, involving a few men hewing coal out of primitive shafts and tunnels to be sold directly to householders in the area.

There was great concern in Newcastle in 1922-1923 about the deleterious effects of these unregulated mines on the local environment, with respect to safety, undermining of streets, and damage to water and gas pipes.

In researching this history on the local impact of coal mining I was reminded of the most recent season of the podcast “Australia, If You’re Listening”, on the history of the climate change debate in Australia. Matt Bevan opens the podcast with a quote from the Maitland Mercury in 1912, which shows that concern about the global impact of coal mining has been around for a long time.

The Maitland Daily Mercury, 5 Jun 1912, p5.

“The furnaces of the world are now burning about 2,000,000 tons of coal a year. When this is burned, uniting with oxygen, it, adds about 7,000,000 tons of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere yearly. This tends to make the air a more effective blanket for the earth and to raise its temperature. The effect may be considerable in a few centuries.”
The Maitland Daily Mercury, 5 Jun 1912, p5.

The 7 million tons of carbon dioxide emitted in 1912 from coal is miniscule compared to the 14.8 billion tons of CO2 emitted from the burning of coal in 2021. With this 2000 fold increase in emissions, it won’t be a few centuries before the effect is considerable, it’s here now.

EOSWebcam utility causing problems with Zoom video

Posted on May 28, 2022 by Lachlan Wetherall

For several years at our church we’ve been using Zoom to live stream our church services, using a Canon digital SLR camera as a webcam connected via an Elgato video capture interface. Recently we started having problems where the video feed would randomly stop during the Zoom meeting. The indicator at the bottom of the screen would show that the video was stopped, and clicking on it would start it again. This would happen at random intervals, sometimes every few minutes.

At first I thought it might have been the length of HDMI cable we were using between the PC and the camera causing an unreliable signal. I tested with the camera located adjacent to the PC with a short HDMI cable and the problem persisted, so it wasn’t the cable.

I checked in the Windows event log and discovered an “Information” message from EOSWebcam was appearing at the same time that the video had been cutting out.

A quick Google revealed that the EOSWebcam utility is software from Canon that allows the camera to be used a webcam by plugging the camera directly into the PC with a USB cable. As we were connecting via HDMI into an Elgato capture device, we didn’t actually need the EOSWebcam driver. After uninstalling it, the problem of the random dropouts of video during our Zoom livestream was solved.

Location of Waratah Town Hall in Hanbury St

Posted on May 21, 2022 by Lachlan Wetherall

Thanks to Cath Chegwidden and the resources of the Historical Land Records Viewer, I’ve been able to correct a minor error in my Waratah Council page, on the exact location of the final Waratah Town Hall in Hanbury St. Mayfield. It was located where the current Ex Services Club is now, on Lot 8 Sec 2 DP8673.

Third Waratah Council Chambers/Town Hall. Hanbury Street, Mayfield. Newcastle City Council, Hunter Photobank.

Lot 2 Sec 2 of DP8673, the location of Waratah Town Hall, 1926-1938.

Vol-Fol 44-8, resumption of land for the Waratah Town Hall. Lot 8 Sec 2 in Hanbury St Mayfield.

Popped Off Again

Posted on April 8, 2022 by Lachlan Wetherall

I’ve been roasting coffee beans at home in a popcorn popper since 2006. I thought I was doing well when I had a popper machine that lasted for 3 years. Today my popcorn popper burned out after 9 years of service, having done over 1100 roasts.

Thankfully I had a spare machine ready in the cupboard to replace this stalwart of roasting goodness.

Changing the iCloud account on an iPad Mini

Posted on March 6, 2022 by Lachlan Wetherall

I just had a slightly confusing experience changing the iCloud account on an iPad mini. I was helping out a family member who had recently changed their Apple ID email address recently, due to a change in ISP/email provider. In the iPad settings the ID showing in the “iTunes and App Store” section was correct, but the ID showing in the iCloud settings was the old ID. This wasn’t a problem until recently when the iPad started prompting for the password for the iCloud account every 30 seconds, rendering the device unusable.

It wasn’t at all clear how to change the iCloud ID. Clicking on the ID at the top of the page only gave the option of entering the password for the old incorrect ID, with no ability to change the ID.

Eventually I discovered that I needed to scroll the page up to reveal the “Sign Out” button at the bottom of the page. After signing out, I was then able to sign-in with the new correct Apple ID. Simple once you know what’s going on.