Brian Rogers Rogers Rabbits www.sunlive.co.nz

Welcome to your same-look tabloid newspaper. You'll have noticed that there aren't any changes because it was already excellent.

You'll also see it isn't 'compact”; in fact it has a lot of pages of great reading and superb advertising that works. Better than that, it's free. And you can get the most up to date daily news on our SunLive.co.nz – also for free.

You won't need a compact unless you're off to the little girls' room to powder your nose.

We've just completed our census forms and have finished quite disappointed.

There was so much more I wanted to tell them, but just didn't have the space.

Such as: how often we change our underwear, or whether we go commando.

And that there is really only one local paper and it's the Sun, the rest are overseas owned, or worse, owned by Australians, and their adverts are made up in India or other exotic locations. In contrast, the Sun has its own graphic design people, keeping jobs here in NZ. And that we haven't sacked any paper boys and girls for the sake of changing our delivery time.

More than that, we wanted the census people to know that keeping local people employed is very important to us. We get our ads made up here. Upstairs. At No.1 The Strand.

And that the Sun is a tabloid. We aren't so stuck up that we have to call it 'compact”, purely because of the stigma that some precious people attach to the term tabloid. Well, you could put a tail on it and call it a weasel, but it's still a friggin tabloid.

I don't think the census people did a very good job of promoting. They should have put a video on Facebook, and got the mayor (if he's still there) to narrate it. He'll do it for anyone and say anything.

Meanwhile, the census people asked how many people live in the house. So I thought I better go look. I couldn't find the little man in the fridge who turns on the light. But I did find the evil little voice in the back of my head. You know the one, who often writes this column. Typically, he refused to answer any questions. Also in the house we found several missing rebellious socks that were forming some sort of breakaway drawer movement.

There was no sign of the Swedish massage twins that I asked for at Christmas, so will be having a few words with Santa about that.

Finally, we felt the census people needed to know about SunLive, which is the fastest, most accurate local news service in the region. Staffed by locals, who know and care about our region. Best of all, it is free. So readers don't have to pay for a 'compact” with old news in it.

Also the Sun doesn't have the need to 'relaunch” itself every five minutes. That's because the concept works; great for advertisers who are getting top results – and readers who love it. In fact, the Sun continues to top the Nielsen survey readership polls, year in, year out.

So there, census people. You can count on us to keep a lot of local people ticking those boxes, including having a job locally.

What's up on our turf

We had a call this week from Clyde who manages Tauranga Hockey, bringing us up to speed with the exciting developments there. The first of the new hockey turf is done and work proceeding well on the second. We've a Blacksticks game coming up, which is great news for the region. We'll be keeping you updated on the progress here at the Sun and on SunLive.

Disneyland book keeping

I'm not an accountant – and in the words of my former maths teacher, 'Lord help this country if that ever happens”. Mind you, that was back in the days when teachers were given money. These days they are probably too stressed out wondering if there's enough in the account for the mortgage, to focus on the job – teaching kids to count and spell.

One thing that doesn't add up – the bizarre things going on with the Art Gallery profit.

Now correct me if I've got this wrong, but doesn't the City Council tip in half a mill to the gallery coffers every year? Yes.

Yet some magical accounting has the gallery showing a 'normalised surplus” of 30-odd grand, because the $420,000 you ratepayers kindly donate is recorded as 'income”.

This is startling success, and even I could be an accountant if it was really that easy. Alas, it is not, and this sort of Disneyland Book Keeping is an insult to all ratepayers.

A real accountant has his say on the matter this week, along with some other excellent letters on pages 48-49. Check out Ian Stevenson's letter 'The Art of TCC book keeping”.

Exclusion zone

I knew a girl in Taranaki called Rena. I would like to have known her better. Unfortunately she too had a formidable exclusion zone around various parts. Sources there tell me it was a lucky escape, she is described, 30 years later, as being a bit of a wreck herself.

Back in the Bay, the zone around Astrolabe is coming under increasing pressure, with 39 reported breaches of the area already this year. It's being patrolled by the tug Maui 1 which is cruising the perimeter, keeping strays two nautical miles out from the reef…

There is a growing discontent among local fishers who think half a mile should be enough, and some who say it's time the zone was dis-established completely. It's not helped by stories circulating of how great the fishing is, and how the reef is crawling with crayfish; rumours of some salvage personnel reporting they don't taste oily at all.

Parting shot:

A $54 million boring machine has been purchased to drill the tunnel for the Waterview Connection in Auckland.

What a shame they have bought one, they could have ours. The TCC is a $400 million boring machine, we could have sold it and paid off the debt.