On December 9, 2019, New Zealand's White Island erupted .claiming 22 lives and leaving survivors with injuries that will follow them for the rest of their days.

What began as a routine tourist adventure to the country’s most active volcano turned within seconds into a desperate race for survival, as visitors and guides were swallowed by searing ash, scalding steam, and toxic gases. The world watched in horror. 

Time has not softened the tragedy of White Island, nor has the legal system provided the closure many hoped would come.

In early 2025, a High Court ruling overturned a key conviction linked to the disaster - another twist in a story that never seems to settle.

So let us revisit that terrible day… and then look at what has happened since.

They say the pen is mightier than the sword, and nowhere is that truer than in the world of political cartoons.

With a few strokes of ink, cartoonists have toppled reputations, challenged authority, and sparked revolutions...all while eliciting a chuckle,  a gasp or a laugh or two.

These satirical sketches called cartoons turn complex issues into powerful, often humourous images, proving that sometimes a well-drawn caricature can wound more deeply than any blade.

No wonder they are seen as enemies of the establishment these days.  But then again,  they always have.  

In a world where the news often feels stranger than fiction, we need the sharp, exaggerated truths of political cartoons. As Mark Twain apparently said, “Against the assault of laughter, nothing can stand.”

Before the sun had fully risen over Hawaii, a chain reaction had begun — one that would sweep across the Pacific and pull nations far from the attack into a single tide of war. Pearl Harbor was an American tragedy, yes—but also an Allied turning point. 

The memory of Pearl Harbor lives on as a powerful reminder of courage, sacrifice, and the sheer patriotism of a nation tested by tragedy. On December 7, 1941, a surprise attack by Japanese forces thrust the United States into World War II. 

More than 2,400 American lives were lost, countless others were wounded, and the mighty Pacific Fleet lay crippled. Yet from the ashes of devastation emerged a profound resolve to defend freedom and ensure such aggression would not prevail.

Remembering Pearl Harbor is not just about honouring the fallen or the bravery of those who stood their ground that day; it is a sobering reflection on the cost of complacency, the value of vigilance, and the unyielding spirit of those who rose to meet the challenge of war.

“Minor Problem: I Identify as a 73-Year-Old Tabby, Therefore I’m Legally Entitled to X (and Werther’s Originals)”
By [Little Johnny], definitely not a cat

BRUSSELS/SYDNEY.
Last week the European Union and Australia simultaneously banned under-16s from social media to “protect children.”

This week I solved the problem for every teenager on the continent and Australia:
I came out as a cat.

Not in the cringey 2016 Tumblr way.

In the 2025, fully compliant, legally airtight way.

Dusty Gulch Gazette – Special Duck Census Edition

By Roderick (Whiskers) McNibble – Foreign Correspondent, Rodent Division
Filed from beneath the bar at the Dusty Dingo, where the floor is sticky but the truth is clear

Dusty Gulch has survived bushfires, floods, rat plagues, ( yours truly was a survivor of the last one ) locust waves, and a brief but memorable outbreak of interpretive pirate dance in ’92. But nothing -  nothing -  prepared the town for Duck Day.

A new national directive, written somewhere far above sea level by people who panic at the sight of soil, had declared that all future population metrics must be duck-based.

Not Dusty Gulch Day. Not Eureka Day. No, this was the day the bright lights of bureaucracy descended, clipboards quivering, to announce that from now on, only ducks count.

You could hear the silence fall across the Gulch like a dropped stubby.

Even the roos stopped mid-chew. Even the crows paused mid-criticism. Even Trevor the Wallaby -  whose titanium-and-tungsten cyber-knees can hear electromagnetic storms three postcodes away - went very still.

And at Moonlight Manor, the temperature rose six degrees.

Flysa spent some of the early years of his life managing construction projects in the northwest of Western Australia to assist in the transportation of iron ore. The projects comprised railways, bridges, and wharves. But how did the iron ore get there? To answer that question, we have to go back a few years.

About 4.5 billion years ago, the Earth was formed as a sphere of molten rock from gases emitted by the Sun. Over millions of years, the surface gradually cooled and formed a solid, uneven, crust with constant upthrust from the molten interior (magma). Volcanic emissions from the molten interior, which broke through the crust, released water vapour into the atmosphere, which gradually condensed and fell as rain, covering the lower depressions in the earth’s surface with water by the force of gravity, thus forming the oceans. Cometary impact also contributed water to the oceans. That all occurred about 3.8 billion years ago. All the time the mountains were pushed up by the magma at the rate of a few millimetres a year, which continues to this day.