Sobriety never gets in the way of a healthy strewing of debris and police tape to chalk road fatalities across the Christmas and New Year's period. Two down from last session and it's a tidy cut of 48 bleeding out.
Hanging with the ever reigning champions, New South Wales, despite dropping three from the year before, take it out and take them out at 15 lives. Written across the board, their churn, their might, can it be stopped? Only time and a stuck clicker will tell.
Right back on its heels, in a double shot of same, both Victoria and Western Australia hold on to something strong. Both here 9 and 8 respectively. It was a day of boxing after Boxing Day near Perth when they climbed up halfway their mountain of misery. Holding steady is not declining.
South Australia nips away at their heels in turn with a close 7, a four door increase from 2011/12. Let it not be forgotten that the accounts are always open during the festive season as a pedestrian dying in 2013 counts for 2012. Like spending the rest of the money in the budget at the end of the quarter lest you are doled less in the next, bullish counting against the high hopes of low numbers.
Going at a half and coming at a cost of standing in fourth, Queensland slips back behind the road sign you didn't see to net 5. And, where others have dropped, Tasmania picked up a deuce, hitting their stride with a 300% increase to tally 3. Northern Territory's range is lone, a single shot of 1.
Once more unto the rear and telling the nation that everyone in the ACT marks a severe exodus from the nation's capital well before the start of the counting season, in this pair of paint, fatality free again.
So shy of the full average 50 and here ends the count from 23 December 2012 to 3 January 2013.
Written on Sunday, 6 January 2013