Posts from 2007
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Laminate flooring and Udden bench and drawers
Today we got a lot done on the house. We laid a laminate floor in the kitchen and built an Udden bench with drawers. Above is the "before" shot. Note the disgusting lino and the oh-so-chic bachelor pa…
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Productive DIY day
I'm starting a new category, DIY, to capture improvements we're making around the house. I had a very productive day of DIY yesterday. I made and installed a couple of flyscreens for our bedroom and t…
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Wall fastening
A question for any DIYers out there. I'm going to be installing an Udden shelf tomorrow and I'm wondering what kind of fastening to use. Ikea are very coy in their instructions: "Choose screws and fit…
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Someone needs to set their clocks
Virgin Blue's clock is a little out...
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Mr Abbott, I'd like you to meet the pot
Tony Abbott, the man who would like to tell all Australians how to behave in bed, and wants to have control over womens' bodies, has called Krudd a control freak. That's a bit rich doncha think?
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All coppers are corrupt
I'm rather forthright with my opinions of our servants in blue. They're all bent as a peg. My reasoning here is that I've seen enough petty and very serious corruption, whether it's collusion to suppr…
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Bricked my router
Last night while upgrading the Firmware in my (otherwise excellent) Billion 7404VGP-M ADSL modem/router/wireless thingy, I managed to brick it. It lost connectivity at 20% through the upgrade (though…
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Car sharing
Mary laments the limitations of car share companies. Holly is in GoGet, so I thought I'd share our experiences. First up, "car share" is a misnomer. I'd consider that to be when you let people jump in…
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Blogroll is not a recommendation
Russell makes the assumption that linking to someone's blog is some kind of unconditional recommendation. Far from it! If you look at the standard version of my blog you'll see I've just added the tex…
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Moved into the house
We moved into our new house last Thursday and spent Friday and Sunday nesting. The move was pretty painless, with the removalists getting it all done in one truck load taking about two hours all up. W…
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Quite a week!
Quite a week. Australia signs Kyoto, we get our first (acting) prime minister, Howard is formally unseated. Oh and we bought a house! Holly and I had a poke around the house this afternoon, met the ne…
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Home owners!
Holly and I are now home owners. Settlement just happened and we are officially (part) owners of the house. We move in tomorrow.
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Good HTML beginners book?
I need to impart the holy word of HTML/CSS onto someone at work. Any suggestions for a good book?
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Australian Hi-Tech Crime Centre not so bright
James McCormack of the Australian Hi-Tech Crime Centre is quoted as saying: " go for WEP; it's an older form of encryption but still quite secure ". Mr McCormack was recommending that, if people can't…
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Some new photos
Finally got around to uploading the backlog of photos I've had. Sydney FC playing Beckham's LA Galaxy. A team so bad they made Sydney look good! Critical Mass crossing the Harbour Bridge in November.…
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Howie's Firefox extension suggestion
Howie suggested FireBug as a must-have extension. While I agree it is amazing for debugging web pages, the reason I've had it uninstalled is what I'd call a bug. When you have it switched off for all…
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FireBug tab opening delay redux
Ben, having read my last post about FireBug, notes that you only get the delay opening a new tab if you have FireBug disabled. if it's disabled it checks a whitelist to see if it should be enabled in…
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Testing Google Analytics
Google Analytics is a great tool for tracking users on your site, and it's incredibly easy to set up the basic features. You just bung a bit of JavaScript on every page in your site which, if your sit…
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Homebake 1996
Hey Homebake web designers, it's not 1996 any more! Jesus, Flash splash screens (complete with "skip intro") and frames. While you're at it, where's the Java applet navigation, blink tag and animated…
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Firefox extensions
So last week I promised Stig, a Norwegian living in London, that I'd get off the political blogging this week. Haven't achieved that yet, so here's a start. I use the Firefox browser constantly and on…
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Economic conservative
So apparently when the economy was tanking and interest rates were high, Brendan Nelson took out another mortgage and ran his business on credit. I bet he wasn't paying his employees' super or keeping…
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Memo to Liberal Party: welcome to the wilderness
You might want to take a seat. You could be here for some time. In case you haven't heard, the Tories just elected a man who believes "intelligent design" should be taught in schools. What is it about…
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Un-big-worded milk
Shopping late on Friday night, the only light milk available was this organic brand. Now organic milk is the only organic product that's been shown to have health benefits. The animal husbandry advant…
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Guess what's on an iced vovo?
Our new PM told his staff to limit their celebrations to a strong cup of tea and an Iced VoVo before getting down to work. I doubt he meant it this way, but the hilarious thing about this is that one…
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Ruddslide!
What an exciting time. Our new overlord, Kevin Rudd, wiped away 11 years of reactionary rule under lying rodent John Howard. The weather has brightened. The mood has risen. The future looks bright. I'…
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Remember one thing: Greens in the Senate
Tomorrow is the big day, Howard's End. Something I've been waiting 11 years for. The day his particular breed of reactionary politics is shown the door. There's really only one thing you must remember…
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It's the style, not the content
The 7:30 Report last night followed the campaigning in the so-called bellwether seat of Eden-Monaro, which is where I grew up. Watching the incumbent Tory campaign against the Labor candidate, I had a…
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Normal programming resumes next week
Stig asks if I have an RSS feed without all the political crap. The election is this Saturday, so by Monday I'll be over it and the realisation that Rudd is almost (but thankfully not quite exactly) t…
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Good Rid-Dance
A party in People's Republic of Newtown is planned for election night to celebrate the (expected) ousting of 11 years of Tory government. There's a MySpace page and in keeping with MySpace tradition,…
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No pork for Grayndler
When you live in a safe Labor seat the porky treats don't seem to flow so fast. The best local Labor ubergruppenfuhrer could muster was insulating the local high school against aircraft noise and clea…
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Predicting the federal election
It's always dangerous picking the winner of an election, but it should be pretty clear to just about everyone now who's going to win. The question remains, by how much. So going out on a limb somewhat…
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EPG at last
Seems that the TV networks in Australia are finally telling us what they'll be playing, something they've refused to do in the past. They've even sued one EPG provider for providing independently-crea…
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Is that a core promise Mr Howard?
Howard is categorically stating that there's no Workchoices sequel in the wings, should they be re-elected. I can't believe the opposition hasn't come out asking if that's a core or non-core promise.…
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Greens in London
Some of the Greens volunteers Voting started last week at the busiest polling place in Australian elections, Australia House situated on The Strand in London. The embassy is open all this week, includ…
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Recruiters just don't get it
Recruiters just don't get this "ethics" thing, do they? With this behaviour, Charterhouse Partnership have joined my recruiter blacklist. Yesterday I got this email from "Principle Consultant" Paul Ro…
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Why vote for minor parties?
The Greens have done a great short video explaining how parliament works, and why voting Green in the upper house is so important, regardless of how you vote in the lower house.
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Hanesy's film wins at Queens Film Festival
Hanesy's film, The Truth About Weapons of Mass Destruction, just won in the Best International Documentary category at the Queens International Film Festival. Congratulations Hanesy!
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A tax and spend election
This election I've spent some time making fun of the tax-dodging gun nuts, but they make an excellent point about Howard's campaign launch yesterday. While promising $4 million a second, the Liberals…
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That's an expensive stamp
One step closer to being home owners. We just paid our stamp duty. It's one hell of a stamp!
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Progressive electro funk?!?!?
Just heard Nicole Foote describing tonight's mix up programme as featuring someone playing progressive electro funk. With a straight face. WTF?!?!?
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Floating utopias
Easily Confused pointed me at this great article (via Danny) about floating libertarian microstates. It's a remarkably common theme amongst the tax-dodging no-such-thing-as-society fear-the-black-UN-h…
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Make blog is gone
I've been reading the Make magazine blog since it launched, but recently I've found myself hitting "mark as read" for it. The problem is one of volume and repetition. I just don't have the time to rea…
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All your blogs are belong to us
Those of you still living in the dark ages and reading my blog on the web page will now be able to see the full list of blogs I read. Yes, it's a lot, but most are pretty low volume. This is using a n…
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I'm such a type nerd
I just downloaded a documentary about a font. And I'm looking forward to watching it.
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A vote for a minor party is not a wasted vote
I was in Stanmore this morning handing out flyers for The Greens and yet again I had to explain our preferential voting system to a number of people. These aren't stupid, uneducated people, just peopl…
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Preferences are out
The Senate group ticket preferencing deals are out. These are the preferences that apply for the majority of voters who vote above-the-line. Some interesting things have popped up -- I'm looking at th…
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WTF is this Plaxo crap?
I just received a message from some social networking crap called "Plaxo". Subject: John added you as a connection on Pulse I'd like to connect to you on Pulse. Pulse is the easiest way to stay up-to-…
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Liberty and Democracy Party: some enthusiasts respond
So my previous post about the Liberty & Democracy Party got some responses. I had a long conversation with one Terje Petersen and he seemed pretty rational, a nice guy really. We disagree on a number…
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Planet Feed Reader bug
I've been trying to post to Planet's development mailing list because I've found a bug. It moderates posts from non-subscribers, and I can't see any other way to report a bug. So I'll report it here,…
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Got access to a photocopier in London?
The Australian federal election is coming up and this time around I'm not in London to coordinate for The Greens when the 20,000 or so people vote at Australia House in London. Instead we've got the v…
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Who's this Liberty and Democracy Party?
So anyone got any details of this new Liberty & Democracy Party? They push themselves as libertarians, but that often tends to start sounding like LaRouche nutjobism. So do these people talk about vas…
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Long Tail not that long
This really tickled my funny bone. In case you're wondering, The Long Tail was something a certain business nerd stick mag was trumpeting a few years back. The basic premise of it was that, with minim…
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Parties should show their commitment
Glen Turner has good things to say about political parties showing their comittment to a cause. Why aren't they out there building houses, paying doctors' bills, rather than just promising to use our…
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Wikipedia fundraiser annoyance
This morning Wikipedia started displaying an annoying animated request for donations. I block out ads because their animation annoys me when I'm trying to read content. Non-profits don't get an exempt…
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Howard: the grumpy old codger
I didn't see last night's "debate" (how can you have a debatge when they agree on almost everything?) as we went to see the absolutely amazing Control, about the life of Ian Curtis of Joy Division. Th…
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Crazy Egg rocks
Part of my job involves maintaining some of the reporting bits of various web sites. We use a combination of Google Analytics and WebTrends. I've just now discovered an amazing, but very narrowly targ…
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Crikey: I won't be renewing
I just got my renewal notice for Crikey, a daily email newsletter about Australian politics. I won't be renewing, even though there's an election coming up. My main problem with Crikey is Christian Ke…
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Scott 24 Hour mountain bike race
Last weekend Holly and I drove down to Canberra for the Scott 24 Hour mountain bike race. It's been described as the Glastonbury of mountain biking, and it's pretty amazing. Hundreds of riders all on…
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Disappointed with the Nexus internal hub gears
I bought my commuter bike specifically to have minimal maintenance. In the last month I've been unlucky enough to cop two punctures in the rear tyre. The problem with this is that removing the wheel a…
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Gutters and tanks
Dear lazyweb, we've just got a quote for some Colorbond guttering to replace the rusted-through guttering on our new house. I'm exploring other options, given aluminium and PVC don't rust, and shouldn…
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Flight of the Conchords
After a throwaway comment made by Steve about this band and tv show, I thought I'd download it and check it out. It's absolutely brilliant! Holly and I have watched the first couple of episodes and it…
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Torch as bike light
I'm doing the Scott 24 Hour mountain bike race this weekend with some mates. To mountain bike at night, you need decent lighting. The proper lighting kit is massively expensive and could easily be mor…
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T-shirt spotted on King Street
John Hunt is a Coward. I like it!
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iPhone is very impressive
One of the gadget freaks with too much spare money at work bought an cracked an iPhone to work in Australia. I just had a little play with it and have to say it's mighty impressive. Simple things like…
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Gen Yers: pah!
Those of you from Gen X will be as shocked as I was when I discovered that many Gen Yers haven't even seen the best of John Hughes' filmic output. How you could think of yourself as a well-rounded ind…
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Suddenly it's Summer
All of a sudden we've gone from bundling up with a blanket in the lounge room to full-blown Summer. 29 degrees over the weekend and 32 forecast for tomorrow! Just in time for a visit from Beth, who ar…
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GetUp buys ad space on the AFL Grand Final
Australia has four popular "football" codes, most of which involve more hand than feet, but the most popular nationally is Aussie Rules. It's a very strange game for anyone who hasn't seen it before,…
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Raise the bar
NSW has retarded liquor licensing laws. You can drink all day and all night in venues that don't serve food, but you can't order a glass of wine to drink with your meal in most restaurants. Contrast w…
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Lunch at the Googleplex
/> Ben invited me over to have lunch with him at the Google Sydney offices today. Nice place to work it would seem: stunning water views, make-your-own pizzas, free food and drink, a day a week to wor…
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Need cheesy, upbeat techno
I've started going to the gym to get me fit enough for this bike race I'm doing in a few weeks. My music is all a bit cerebral. I used to listen almost exclusively to techno, but these days I only rea…
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Anonymous policing
Surprise surprise, coppers taking their identification badges off during the APEC summit won't be punished. Supposedly they'll have velcro name tags in future. I'll believe that when I see it! The sam…
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What's with the RAR compression on torrents?
Why is it that some torrents of video files come as mutiple RAR archives? I just don't get why they force us through the extra step. For example, I just got the latest episode of The IT Crowd (the sec…
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Puy Lentils
I've been hunting for decent lentils since returning to Australia. In London I used to buy the lovely Puy Lentils (lentilles vertes du Puy) which are amazing green lentils. The key is that, unlike oth…
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How not to respond to negative claims online
Some obscure accounting software company called 2Clix is suing Whirlpool for comments made in its forums. I suspect their problem is that a search for 2Clix gets lots of threads Statement of Claim, I'…
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How not to respond to negative claims online
Some obscure accounting software company called 2Clix is suing Whirlpool for comments made in its forums. I suspect their problem is that a search for 2Clix gets lots of threads Statement of Claim, I'…
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Ad blocking is a moral issue now?
There's recently been a bit of talk about Firefox and Adblock Plus, with wild claims about it being immoral to block ads. For those of you who haven't worked it out, the web doesn't have to be a place…
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Opel contract a sign of impending election writs?
Senator Coonan spent the weekend signing contracts with the Opel consortium for rural broadband. This despite pending legal action, and no real need for hurry. Could the haste be a sign there's an ele…
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Cops removing badges
News that cops removed their name tags at the APEC protests should come as no surprise. This tactic has been around since the Vietnam War protests, allowing the coppers to get away with beating hell o…
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Because I said so
Lawyer for the police says "a full-scale riot was probable because in a crowd a mob mentality easily takes over." I couldn't agree more, and considering there will be more coppers than protesters, we…
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Birmo: Sydney is an insufferable ho
Has the time come to bitchslap this vacuous, self obssessed ditz of a city and say, "Grow up, princess. It's not all about you." Birmo hits the mark, as usual.
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1-bit browsing
Hunting through Google Analytics, one of the stats reported is screen colours. It seems there's been a number of hits using 1-bit browsers. That must be a pretty poor experience. The two hits with a 5…
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So that's what all the noise was
So all that noise last night wasn't a trial run of the motorcades for next week's visit by monkey man. This would've been just up the road, and we had the windows open last night, so that would explai…
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Prices for bespoke products
Holly and I were talking about various things we'd like to buy for our new house and the usual grumbles about Australian web sites came up. Searching for things like fitted wardrobes or kitchens bring…
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Rip off Australian booksellers
What planet do these people live on with book prices in this country? Why certainly I'll buy William Gibson's new book from Angus & Robertson for $44.95 + postage when it's available from the US from…
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Black Sheep
We just got back from seeing this great film. In the great Kiwi splatter tradition that brought us Derek (Dereks don't run), it's a zombie flick. With sheep. There's even a lawnmower homage. And Weta…
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Lunar eclipse
Holly and I went up to Sydney Park to watch the total lunar eclipse. Pretty amazing sight, even in the middle of a very light polluted city! Loads more photos.
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A good week's snowboarding
Holly and I just got home from a week's snowboarding at Perisher with Holly's brother Ben and his mate Warren. It was a great week with brilliant weather, a deep base of snow and even a mid-week topup…
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Each man will be issued a pamplemousse!
Some words are inherently funny, as regularly exploited by many great comedians. One of my favourite web comics explores this concept in the latest edition. PS, the RSS feed for this comic.
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Bring on the lifetime of crippling debt
Today Holly and I exchanged contracts on a house in Marrickville. Yes, this is the neighbouring house to the one we bid on a couple of weeks back. For those of you in the UK who seem to be able to hav…
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Great online customer service, in Australia?
Since returning from the UK, I've been massively underwhelmed with the way Australian business has embraced the Internet. While most companies now have web sites, they're invariable brochureware of th…
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Rudd stands for something: SHOCK!
Kevin Rudd has actually taken a stance on an issue, this time the sale of uranium to India, a nuclear-armed country that has not signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. Amazing! Is this the first…
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How?
Earle just posted the search terms starting with "how" used to reach The Open Guide to London and I thought I'd check it out in my Google Analytics account for my own site. Quite enlightening. The fir…
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Photo scene completion
While we were travelling through Europe, the sign that a building was truly old was that it was covered in scaffolding. Sure, these buildings really need their maintenance, but it's kinda annoying. I…
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GBBF 2007: lucky bastards!
Just in case Holly and I weren't missing all the great stuff going on in London, Scott sent through this photo of him and some other mates enjoying the Great British Beer Festival. Bastards!
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Kevin Andrews must resign
Kevin Andrews, Australia's minister of immigration, has defamed an innocent man and tarnished Australia's reputation as a country of fair dealing. He must resign. You can also demand he does.
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We bought a house! (nearly)
Holly and I last night negotiated the details of our purchase of a lovely house in Marrickville. It's next door to the place we bid on last Saturday. The process here is quite unusual. At the end of t…
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emusic.com are spam friendly
A long while ago I signed up to try out emusic.com as it seemed like someone doing the right thing with non-DRMed music files. Their business model didn't really suit me, what with it being subscripti…
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Auction: sheer terror
Holly and I went to a house auction this morning and placed some bids. It has to count as one of the most terrifying experiences of my life. In the end, the house went over our price limit and the two…
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The downside of hub gears
Last night I discovered the downside of hub gears when I went to ride off from work and discovered my rear wheel was flat as a pancake. Getting the wheel out is quite an operation on my commuter bike.…
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Estate agents lie: SHOCK
Estate agents who willfully underquote houses going to auction will apparently get big fines with a new investigation. It won't be hard for them to find examples. Say, a 2-bedroom house quoted as "ove…
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Dealing with terruhists
So Haneef is out and heading back home. I suspect he's going to be a rather wealthy man by the time his lawyers are finished, but then again he's now on every blacklist under the sun and probably won'…
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Stop the jihad on badly-behaved RSS
Following up my earlier jihad, after discussing it a bit with Martin of the khymos food nrrd blog, then doing some investigation when it happened again on Rozie's blog it appears that it's Bloglines t…
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Jihad on badly-behaved RSS feeds
I've had it with RSS feeds that spontaneously reload the entire backlog. It's surprising how common this is, and I'm unsure why it happens as it's never happened on my blog. One that just did this see…
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Brave freecycler
This just came through on freecycle: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freecycle_Network Have an extra one of these that came with a phone upgrade last year. Expires in November. Pack opened but unused. (P…
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Great weekend in Wamby
Had a great birthday weekend up the coast in Wamberal. Laura, Lillith, Emma and Holly came to stay in the beach house, Jacinta, Mat and Eamonn dropped by, and Ben and Kaz joined us for birthday dinner…
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Rudd sells out Tasmania's forests
With both the logging companies and pro logging unions supporting Rudd's just-announced forestry policy, you can be sure the one thing it doesn't do is protect any trees. Yet another sellout from the…
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Seek you numpties!
Seek is one of the job sites in Australia. Like most big Australian sites, it seems to have been built by people still living in the bad old days of 2000 web design. Someone, probably in a suit and wi…
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Seek responds
Carey Eaton, Product Director at Seek responds to my post from this morning: Thanks for alerting us to this issue - its obviously not supposed to work like that and this is the first complaint we've h…
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What happens when you piss people off
While tweaking my site, looking through Google's stats for keywords hitting my resume, I noticed a couple of people searching for "Acumen Envision". It sent me down memory lane a bit. Back in 2001, wh…
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I guess I'd fail the character test
So I guess I would also fail the character test by having associated with convicted criminals. After all, I've met a man who was jailed today, and probably have met others. I guess this means all crim…
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Hint for terruhists: make it look professional
Tip for budding terruhists: put your improvised explosives inside a jiffy box, use some shrink tubing and otherwise make it look professional. They're not looking for explosives, they're looking for t…
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If Hitler had died of cancer, would he get obits like this?
The obituaries for the taxi driver's choice of right-wing shock jock Stan Zemanek are sickening. By dying of cancer he seems to have been rehabilitated as some kind of lovable, mildly eccentric but ge…
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I bought a PS2: I'm so up-to-date
After playing Guitar Hero at my brother-in-law's place last weekend, I went out and bought myself a PS2 for cheap on eBay. I've done this before, buy a console when they're nice and cheap at the end o…
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Peter Garrett: liar as well as sellout now
So he's not just a sellout with no morals any more, he's now willing to lie in a very obvious way. But Mareike puts it better than me. On a related note, you can't see that photo and tell me Daniel is…
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Tranny cops: masters of disguise
As you can see the Tranny Cops are masters of disguise. Clearly our police overlords had trouble distinguishing them from regular plods. Fortunately our eagle-eyed judges were able to spot the imposte…
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Am I missing something?
Job ad here touting the company as " One of the Insurance industrys most patented solutions provider ". WTF?
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How bad decisions get made
Here's a little anecdote from personal experience about why bad decisions sometimes end up happening, then staying around. I'm not quite sure how big companies can institutionally resolve this kind of…
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MTB training
Yesterday I went up to Gosford with Majella (Marion's sister) for a mountain bike ride with Ben (Holly's brother) and his mate Warren. We're all in the same team for the Scott 24 Hour Mountain Bike Ch…
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Chutzpah is...
Second in my series of posts about the great word chutzpah. Chutzpah is... running a series of concerts highlighting global warming and having one your sponsors be... well, a a manufacturer of cars th…
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Estate agent idiots
This one is the most creative I've seen in a while. "Aura of St Peters/Newtown". That's just brilliant! Now if only they applied some of their creativity to filing their ads in the appropriate categor…
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Tufte goodness
Being the end of the tax year, I ordered a full set of the books by Edward R Tufte last week. I've owned The Visual Display of Quantitative Information before, but it went walkabout somewhere. Now I h…
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The wit of The Economist
I'm a big fan of The Economist as a foil to the hopelessly biased, provincial papers in Australia. Their clipped, accurate prose and quality proofreading make it a joy to read. They're also not above…
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Nice printer
I picked up an old HP laser printer a while back and got it running. Problem was, it just kept jamming and driving me nuts. I'm sure if I wanted to spend a few hours with some cotton buds and metho I…
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Great educational products
For some reason the old "SRA cards" we used to do in primary school, reading comprehension tasks, came up in conversation. So I looked online for them. And found this page. Those of you who've done pr…
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Cynicism is the default when talking about transport in NSW
Ben Fowler is right to be cynical about the NSW government's planned metro railway. After all, Action for Transport 2010, launched in 1998, was supposed to see us have a railway line from Chatswood to…
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Howard's right: it is our hurricane Katrina
Howard has been quoted as saying the "emergency" in Australian indigenous communities is "Australia's own hurricane Katrina" and I think he's right. Just as Bush did nothing for years knowing about th…
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Apparently I'm a poet
WTF?
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Sydney has a long way to go on transport
I've been out to Telstra Stadium in the Olympic precinct twice in the last few weeks. The first for the Australia vs Uruguay football match and last night for the Swans vs Collingwood AFL match. They'…
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Regional broadband plan
Peter Lieverdink blogs on the government's regional broadband plans. I actually think they've done a pretty good job of balancing service provision with cost. It's never going to be easy to provision…
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Great photo from Glastonbury
The Grauniad has this great photo and caption taken by Billy Bragg at Glastonbury. Very jealous of all the people there, even with the mud!
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Useless fields
Do you see the problem with this form? Now I don't know about you, but when I'm looking for jobs I've never thought Hmmmm, I'd love to take that job but it's paying too much. How about you?
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Thieving scumbags
Two "news" sites have stolen one of my photos from the last Glastonbury. Fortunately Google News makes it easy to find such infringements. Does this or this look familiar to you? They'll be receiving…
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How not to land a design job
I'm looking aroung my Linked in network vaguely looking for a graphic designer to work on a project I'm pitching for. Anyway one of my network knows someone who calls himself a designer. I go to his s…
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$5 steak!
Now this makes being back in Sydney quite worthwhile. Last night we went for dinner at The Lansdowne and I ordered a $5 steak. Could you imagine what a £5 steak would be like? Well the $5 steak was de…
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ABC redesign looks good
The ABC launched their redesigned news site today. Poor timing as there was downtime around 13:00 on the day of a really big story but first impressions look good. You can add a bunch of "tags" to a "…
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Tip for people thinking of returning to Australia
If you're thinking of moving back to Australia from London after an extended stay, check the El Nino-Southern Oscillation and if it looks like we're headed into a La Nina phase, stay in London. It'll…
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Why are worm farms so expensive?
Worms farms are pretty simple pieces of equipment. You have a few layers of trays where you put your veggie scraps and worms, separated by a perforated mesh that the worms can move through. The top an…
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J2ME Jabber client that doesn't suck?
Now that I can do GPRS at only mildly extortionate rates ($0.0058 per kb from Exetel, thanks to Graeme's tip) I've been playing with Jabber clients on my mobile. It can be kinda handy, and it's kinda…
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Safari for Windows: that didn't last long
I just downloaded Safari, Apple's web browser, and installed it on the Windows machine here at work. It didn't stay on my hard drive long. First problem is it doesn't support proxy servers. Presumably…
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A lesson on why you should use free software
Much of my work uses Skype for instant messaging and since the development is in completely the wrong timezone, I have to run it. This meant I installed it on my laptop at home. Recently though it's b…
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Did I miss the memo?
When did web site become a single word?
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Church sticks nose into state
A delusionary man who believes in fairies has stuck his nose into NSW politics threatening our representatives with "consequences" if they support a law expanding stem cell research. Evidently this th…
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Spotted
Spotted on the corner of St Johns Road and Ross Street, a little poster advertising " Chester drawers ". Brilliant!
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Telstra could use existing infrastructure
Things are hotting up with the FTTN (fibre to the node, a technology that puts a fibre to the end of your street and uses high-speed copper for the rest) debate in Australia. It's quite worrying becau…
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Fuck you Virgin Mobile!
Where on this page does it say that you can't get 3G internet access with this company's pre-pay SIM cards? That's right, it doesn't. I churned over because $5/month for 50 megs would be much cheaper…
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This does not inspire confidence
Just tried to transfer some money from one of my bank accounts to the other using St George and got this message: Your transaction may have been unsuccessful. Please logout of Internet Banking and log…
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More reason why I don't have comments on my blog
61.238.244.86 - - [30/May/2007:06:55:35 +0100] "POST /blog/index.cgi/me/Comment_less_Blogs.html HTTP/1.1" 200 7516 "-" "-" This is someone randomly trying to post spam to a post I wrote ages ago about…
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I'm all for the resumption of whaling
Last night on the news the Japanese delegation to the International Whaling Commission proposed a compromise that would see commercial whaling start up again. They want to allow coastal whaling in Jap…
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Stuffed
Just spotted while riding through Sydney Uni: a big bearded bloke wandering along Western Avenue carrying a stuffed and mounted chicken. Hmmm...
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Agile: NOT!
Today's DailyWTF is The Great Pyramid of Agile which is really an attack on crappy analogies rather than agile methodologies. I don't have a lot of experience with agile development. I have a lot of e…
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Dawkins is right, if a little abrasive
There's been a lot of criticism of Richard Dawkins and his anti-theist, with him being compared to fundamentalists and proselytizers. Yes, he can be a bit abrasive and he can certainly offend people,…
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Matt and Maz wedding photos
We went to Matthew and Marion's wedding last weekend. Loads of fun. After the reception, lots of people ended up at our place for the after party, including the bride and groom. Much fun had by all. P…
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Fajita
Last night I made fajita for dinner. Apparently it's supposed to be the diaphragm muscle of a cow, but we had some rump steak in the freezer that needed using, which I cut into strips. I marinated the…
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Telstra moaning: the media finally catch up
It seems the media has finally caught up with the real story behind Telstra's rants and raves. If I were a conspiracy-minded person, I'd suspect that the proprietors were waiting until Telstra had boo…
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TAFE needs to lift their game
I want to learn how to weld, as I think it's a useful skill to have. So I go to the obvious place for tertiary education, TAFE NSW who provide exactly this kind of thing. Sure enough, they have what l…
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Real estate dictionary
We're looking at houses and we've encountered plenty of real estate jargon. Here's some handy descriptions to benefit others. cute and cosy: tiny easy maintenance courtyard: concrete courtyard stroll…
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This is just nuts
My colleague just pulled out one of these health food bar things called Just Nuts. I was skeptical as it looked like more than that. When I turned over the package, the first item on the ingredients l…
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A better explanation of the HILF statements
Huw Lynes has a much better justification for MILF, sorry Hilf's comments: In my more charitable moment I imagine Bill dragged around south-east asia by a brutal MSFT minder, forced to say things he d…
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Hilf is right about one thing
The community if abuzz about Hilf's provocative comments. Let's be realistic, comments like "The Free Software movement is dead" are solely designed to get headlines. Nothing more, nothing less, and a…
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Matt's bucks night
We went out for Matt's bucks night on Saturday night, and a good time had by all. We started in the Australian Youth Hotel in Glebe, then headed to the dogs at Wentworth Park. After the races we had a…
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The Truth About Weapons of Mass Destruction
I've built a web site for my mate Hanesy's film, The Truth About Weapons of Mass Destruction. Check it out. I'm still working on getting the blog embedded inside the design properly. And Hanesy hasn't…
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Telstra's astroturf campaign backfires
Telstra's Astroturf campaign has had a bit of a hiccup. When they ran a poll asking "Who do you think is blocking high-speed broadband for Australia?" the result came back an emphatic "Telstra" with 9…
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Private health insurance redux
James Hamilton points out that the government has a new site for comparing health funds, kind of on the road to what I described. The problem is, the information it gives you is extremely limited, and…
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Budget speech as tag cloud
Crikey has rendered last night's budget speech as a tag cloud which is a very clever thing to do. Interesting to see that the word "reform" doesn't even make it into the cloud. Nor "environment" or "g…
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How out of touch is the Treasurer?
One of the most jarring points made by smirk-meister Costello in last night's Budget was his comments about part-time workers. It really shows a man out of touch with the real world. People who are wo…
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Lost galah
Now here's something you don't see every day. This lost galah poster was spotted on Australia Street in Newtown. So if you see a galah answering to the name "Choppie"...
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A lifetime of crippling debt
Holly and I have decided to enter into a lifetime of debt. That's right, we're planning to enter the Sydney housing market. Eek! Scary shit eh? Now we, too, can bore everyone by talking about real est…
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Private health insurance is a joke
I've just signed up for private health insurance. The system has changed so remarkably in Australia that you're effectively forced to sign up to one. If I didn't I'd end up paying an extra 1% income t…
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Anti-phone spam list opens
The Australian Do Not Call register has finally opened so you can register to not have phone spam. Of course our government in their infinite wisdom has exempted charities, organizations peddling supe…
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Why nukes? Making sense of the political equation
I've been thinking about this great push to nuclear power in Australia, and wondering why it's happening. Modern politicians don't push hard on something like this without a reason. They'll either thi…
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Shiny new bike
Note: one year on, I've blogged about my experiences with this bike. I just picked up my shiny new bike. It's a Giant CRX City Pro which features Shimano Nexus internal eight speed hub, carbon fibre f…
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Radioactive Garrett
Well to match the radioactive rodent I've made a radioactive former human being with a conscience. That's right, Peter Garrett fresh from his sell-out tour of the Labor conference.
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Radioactive Howard
Davyd has made a few very cool graphics related to Howard's plans to build nuke power plants in Australia. Mind you, we might need a Peter Garrett one shortly too, given his recent sell-out. What a fu…
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Bulk egg poaching: success
Yesterday I asked about this bulk poaching method in McGee. No responses so I had to go with it anyway. Turns out I was cooking Eggs Benedict for eleven people. The bulk method worked beautifully, as…
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This interweb thingy is great
I need to buy a suit for a wedding I'm helping MC. I've got some cheap, nasty suits, including two I had made in Vietnam, that tend to come out for weddings, funerals and occasionally job interviews.…
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McGee's bulk egg poaching method
I'm cooking breakfast for our little food co-op tomorrow. Once a fortnight, we send someone out to Flemington to buy fruit and veg for the 11 households. This means we get a staggering quantity of stu…
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I'll vote Labor if...
It's almost ten years after the Bringing Them Home report about the Stolen Generation. The report has been mostly ignored. I will preference Labor as number 2 on my ballot if they make a clear stateme…
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Howard Photoshop challenge: my cracks at it
Nowhere near as good as the one anomalous did, but here they are.
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Howard Photoshop challenge
George Michaelson has thrown down the gauntlet for aspiring Photoshop/GIMP manglers with this photo taken from the Smage. Anomalous has already responded with this great Mad Max III one. We want more!
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The Conspiracy has now left the building
I'm very upset about this. My favourite radio station, The Global Pop Conspiracy has shut down. It was such a brilliant station, always playing new and interesting music. I discovered a few really gre…
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A solution to Sydney's water problems
If you're not in Sydney you probably don't know this, but it's been raining solidly for the last 36 hours or so. Of course none of this rain is going to reach the catchments of the dams that supply Sy…
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The Tourist Engineer is back
My OpenGuide site, The Tourist Engineer is finally working again. Thanks to Kake for prodding and fixing the database format. That made all the difference! The site is a tourist guide for geeks, looki…
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Happiness is a firm mattress
Holly and I ordered a new mattress for our bed last weekend. We've not been sleeping well for a month or two now, due to the crappy, saggy old mattress. The new one arrived on Saturday and it's amazin…
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Farmers: Spare change?
I couldn't help imagining my local bum's plaintive "spare change" request when I saw Ben Fargher (now there's an unfortunate surname), CEO of the National Farmer's Federation on the telly last night.…
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The Truth About Weapons of Mass Destruction
My mate Hanesy's film, The Truth About Weapons of Mass Destruction, after a long and tortuous birth, is about to hit the festival circuit. I haven't seen the final cut but the earlier cuts were great,…
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When prototypes attack
Here's a tip for newbies. When someone asks you to knock up a "quick prototype", be very very afraid. Your "quick prototype" could well end up as a production system. And guess who's gonna be supporti…
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Gun control saves lives
Howard has talked about my post on gun laws, and talks about the laws and their effect in the UK. There's been a massive increase in gun crime in the UK in recent years, fuelled partly by smuggling fr…
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The Chaser recording
We went to see the recording of this week's Chaser. Now it's time for me to ruin all the jokes for you. Just kidding. Was quite fun, though they kept us waiting around in the lobby for an hour, which…
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Gun laws are good
Back when the Port Arthur Massacre had just happened and the debate raged over gun control, it was common to hear about Texans saying things like "never woulda happened in Texas". They'd say this beca…
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Geek-only on Planet Linux Australia
Hmmm, looks like whoever runs Planet Linux Australia decided to only grab my geek category after my What's appropriate on the Planets? post. That kinda misses the point, but it's their decision really…
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Need a new bike
Just got a call from David at Cheeky who's been working on my bike. The spokes on both wheels were very loose, and the wheels were pretty badly out. The first spoke he touched broke off at the nipple,…
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What are they smoking at Channel Ten?
Was just watching a Simpsons episode from earlier in the week and caught a promo Channel Ten ran for Lost in Translation. The promo started with "One of the funniest movies in recent years". WTF? It's…
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Free as in beer!
My case of free beer just arrived. It's the James Squire Porter, a lovely drop. Only trouble now is getting it home from work. I think it'll have to be one six-pack at a time.
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Free beer!
I'm subscribed to the Malt Shovel Brewery's (of James Squire fame) email newsletter. The latest one had what I thought was a pretty condescending comment for something sent to self-identified beer lov…
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Brewing again
Now that the weather has cooled down to reasonable levels, I put a brew on yesterday. Nothing spectacular, a Cooper's Mexican Cerveza kit with a kilo of Cooper's "Brew Enhancer 1". I'm planning to put…
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Organizing geek stuff
Someone recommended those shoe rack hanging things for keeping geek bits and bobs. I bought one last week and just spent some time putting all my shit in it. I can now see my desk! Brilliant idea. Eve…
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The Wasp Nest Principle
I've been listening to a great radio play called The Department from Radio 4. It's very sharp satire. This afternoon I listened to the episode where the team tackle terrorism, and it had this brillian…
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The Beer Box
Last night I finished my woodworking course at Sydney Community College (old Leichardt High School). My project was to make a box that will keep my beer fermenter cool, as our house gets to very high…
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What's appropriate on the Planets?
My blog is syndicated on quite a few Planets: GLLUG SLUG Linux Australia Linode During my recent exchange with Erik de Castro Lopo about Fred Nile and racism, I got a few emails from people asking us…
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Turnbull says something intelligent: Shock!
Malcolm Turnbull yesterday said something I find difficult to disagree with: " I think religion is a very poor guide to public policy. " Can't argue with that! Doesn't mean I actually like the Vauclus…
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SMH shows some tact
The Herald has shown its tact with this teaser about "Big wave surfing" alongside the story "Tsunami: 'move to higher ground'".
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Smug is...
When some warns you about the latest Windows virus and opening a particular type of email and you don't run that buggy heap of crap. Apparently there's some new virus out for Windows/Outlook. If you r…
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A Winter after two Summers
Last night I actually got a little chilly at the pub. We haven't had a Winter since we left the UK in April last year. Two Summers in a row was pretty luxurious, but we're actually looking forward to…
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How useful!
A job ad from realstate.com.au led me to their site, where you have to register to apply for a job. It helpfully tells you this: I can guarantee you, my password isn't made up of asterisks. Further hu…
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Justifiable homicide?
Does having an annoying, very loud ring tone on a phone that rings every five minutes in an open-plan office qualify the owner for removal from the gene pool? Is that qualification increased when he's…
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Real estate agent making threats
I had a couple of phone calls from the real estate agent who got us into this house yesterday. He made vague threats about my web page, which details our troubles with them. Fortunately the defamation…
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Fred Nile: racist (part three)
I thought I could have a reasoned debate with Erik, but his latest post's first argument quotes me out of context and ignores the entire point. Thus, not much point continuing as it will just descend…
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New tuner and anyone got a crappy AGP video card?
I slotted a new tuner card into my MythTV backend last night. This time it was a KWorld "Dual Hybrid" from Dick Smith Powerhouse. Once again it's an SAA7134-based card, so it Just Works. Nice to have…
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Fred Nile racist, or just playing politics?
Erik de Castro Lopo has responded to yesterday's post about Fred Nile's recent conversion to racism. Erik makes the pedantic claim that Islam is not a race. In this era of the dog whistle I thought th…
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Lovely morning for a ride
Sunny when I left home. Sunny as I wheeled into the office. Pissing down the entire journey. Reminds me that I need to get some mudguards.
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Fred Nile: racist
I don't suppose I have too many hardcore Xtians reading my blog, what with me thinking it's perfectly okay to ridicule adults who still have imaginary friends. Just in case I do, it's worth pointing o…
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Beach and beer
We had a great weekend up the coast at my parents' holiday house. We drove off on Friday night and watched a film when we arrived. Saturday morning we slept in, had a lazy breakfast reading the paper.…
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Chutzpah is...
I figure the word " chutzpah ", as mentioned in Mediawatch last night, probably isn't the most familiar term to Australian gentiles. It's a fantastic word so I thought I'd start a series of examples.…
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Costello: all tip, no iceberg
Keating's still got it. The prime minister who made question time worth watching still has his acid tongue. "The thing about poor old Costello is he is all tip and no iceberg." Brilliant!
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Loving MythTV
We've been using MythTV over the weekend using my shiny new silent front-end. Turns out, surprisingly to me, that the front-end has enough grunt to play Xvid encoded videos just fine, so we've been wo…
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Green lightning?
Last night there was a huge storm in Sydney. Given how hot it was all weekend, that's not terribly surprising. Was a pretty cool storm, going from about 23:00 until well after midnight, as it kept swi…
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MythTV front-end in the lounge room
We've finally got MythTV up and running properly. I have a fanless Via EPIA system sitting on top of the telly as the front-end running MiniMyth. It's very very nice! I had trouble getting my existing…
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Looking at Google's badware notifications
Today's Crikey asks if perhaps Google knows something about Quadrant magazine. It seems Google is flagging the site as a crapware site. I also noticed this when searching for the Good Vibrations Festi…
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Ethical dilemma: "defence" industry employers
I've just received a job description for a contract at a software company whose customers include a bunch of organizations in the killing business. Australian, New Zealand and Malaysian Navy, Australi…
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Myth finally running
I finally got MythTV running under Xen last night. It was quite a bit more work to get it running under Debian than Ubuntu which works out-of-the box, but Ubuntu has problems installing using debootst…
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Sex shops sell porn: SHOCK!
Our ever-smart coppers have made a shock revelation in the Sydney's red light district. The sex shops there sell porn! Australia's film classification system allows for a bunch of different ratings, w…
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Rupert recycles far-right scare stories
Dave Cross pointed out a scare story in Britain's Daily Fascist newspaper. Seems Rupert's Daily Terrorgraph has stolen the story wholesale, though the sub editor amusingly "corrected" the spelling of…
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DNA testing shows Hanson is a mongrel
This is just too funny. DNA testing has shown Pauline Hanson is of mixed race, including some middle eastern blood. That's just too good! Of course a smarter racist would have expected this and refuse…
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Flooding from the storm
There's rivers running down the roads near our place. Crazy stuff. At least some has hit the dams!
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Lordy that's real rain!
Just tried to get to work and was turned back by being soaked, head-to-toe, at about 1/3 of the way to the bus stop. This was with an umbrella. I'd got used to London rain where it's constant but does…
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Great party
We had our housewarming party last night and it was loads of fun. The theme was "Departure Lounge" and we had some fantastic costumes. Lots of boogie board bags with suspicious additions. Trolly dolli…
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Keith Urban: you're an arsehole
It seems crappy country singer Keith Urban is is sueing oil painter Keith Urban for owning and using the domain name of his own name. Nowhere on his site does painter Urban claim to be a country singe…
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When did this become Emo Planet?
When did Planet Linux Australia become emo planet? WTF?
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Loving the beach!
My family has dinner together most Mondays. Last night we went out to Bronte Beach for a surf and barbecue. This is probably the best thing about being back in Sydney: getting to the beach regularly.…
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Why I hate Macs
Charlie Brooker has a highly entertaining sneer at Macs and, more entertainingly, Mac users. The Mac users then descend on the comments to prove him right, point-by-point.
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Xen and Myth coming along
I'm making slow but steady progress getting Myth and Xen going. Cabled up the spare bedroom yesterday so it's now got a TV aerial port. Plan is to put the computer behind the door fo the spare room, w…
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Pop covers in metal
Stig followed up my recent post about covers but got it wrong. He's enjoyed the pop and acoustic people covering metal songs. What I meant was the best ones I've found so far are metal/glam bands cove…
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Great covers
I downloaded a giant directory full of covers last week and have been working my way through them. I love cover versions of classic songs, but only when the cover finds a new angle on the song. So if…
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Smugmug rocks!
I always wonder why everyone raves about Flikr. It's slow, the interface is clunky and unless you pay big bucks, they don't store your photos in the original resolution. I've been very happy using Smu…
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Good Invasion Day weekend
For those of you outside Australia, Invasion Day is Australia's national day. Officialy known as "Australia Day", it commemorates the day white people took over Australia. Hardly something to celebrat…
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Grubby deals and doings between Liberals and crazy Jesus freaks
It's starting to come out the grubby links between the Liberal Party and the extremist separatist Christian cult Exclusive Brethren. Expect the story about their ads being billed to the Liberal Party…
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Best Herald byline evar
Last night I was reading Saturday's Snidey Moaning Herald and came to the best byline I've yet read in that esteemed publication: "Miranda Devine is on holiday". Can't get better than that! And whatta…
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The right reason to ban the flag
The Big Day Out are discouraging people from taking Australian flags to the festival because they're worried about boneheads draping themselves in the flag. A better reason would be because our flag i…
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Comet McNaught
We went to Sydney Park to look at the comet last night after Jeremy and Emily's wedding reception. It was incredibly bright and I took some great photos.
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Actually I can get digital?!?!?
Now this is kinda weird. When I was up the ladder moving around the aerial for digital television, I was trying to tune in the UHF frequencies of the Kings Cross transmitter. This is sensible because…
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A reason for software development sucking?
Last night while talking to Raz I recommended he work for my former employer in London. The reason I'd recommend working for them is that they seem to have got the critical balance between rigid proce…
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LCA open day
I went along to the linux.conf.au open day last night and had a great time. Lots of really cool projects, particularly the OLPC (heavier than I expected), RepRap (homemade fab) and the very cool open…
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Scalpers are killing live music
Saw a hit on my web server from an eBay auction selling tickets to see Razorlight and using a photo I took at Glastonbury. Since the arsehole couldn't be bothered serving his stolen photos himself, I…
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Aerial problems
Last night I got up a ladder to install my shiny new TV aerial that was expected to get us all the digital channels. Problem is, we only ended up getting the ABC and SBS digital channels. This is odd…
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Real broadband at last
Internode just upgraded me to ADSL2+ with Annex M. It's very nice! On the best line profile, I get 10463800 kbps down and 2039400 kbps up. This is using the "MAX24-HS-M" line profile. Internode allows…
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Killed by a popunder ad
I'm compiling a list of resources for customers of a major ISP. The kind of thing that will be displayed when they use the bundled CD to install their internet connection. Anyway for the reference sec…
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Hearing booked
I've booked a hearing at the Consumer, Trader and Tenancy Tribunal, regarding our dodgy real estate agent's non-payment of our bond. I did this last week and just now got a call from their "Property M…
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Have a great conference folks
Today is the first day of linux.conf.au, the biggest free software conference in Australia and generally regarded as one of the better conferences of its type in the world. There's a bunch of people I…
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Homebrew shop in Newtown
I've just paid a visit to my homebrew shop in Newtown and I'm quite impressed. They're very nice guys and very knowledgable. Served me a lovely example of their brews too. Just about to put a wheat be…
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New server is very nice
Plugged in the new server last night and it's a vast improvement on the old one. Fan noise is almost non-existent when it's idling, and no matter how much CPU I used, it didn't seem to power up the fa…
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New server arrived
My new server, to replace the jet-engine sounding one, just arrived. It's another dual-Xeon system, but this time it's a workstation model so should be quieter and should be a little more accepting of…
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El Nino winding down: Lake Eyre visit?
It seems that the current El Nino cycle is winding down, which should end the severe drought much of Australia is currently experiencing. It's common to assume that these droughts are somehow worse th…
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Catania Medrano Real Estate: ethics free zone
I know, I know. I shouldn't be expecting ethics from estate agents. It's like trying to find a vegetarian shark. They're scum. All of them. They make used car salesmen seems like paragons of virtue. W…
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Bloody tired
Don't think I've been this knackered since my last bout of jetlag. Last night was one of those hot, still, humid evenings we get to look forward to in summer in Sydney. At 2am it was still 22° and I w…
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DVD menus: why oh why?
Last night I installed my grandmother-in-law's (is that a real term?) shiny new telly and DVD player for her, and was tasked with showing her how to use it. The telly is probably going to be okay, des…
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Digital antenna installation
I'm planning to put up an antenna for digital TV reception this weekend. Being in St Peters, I should be right in the Kings Cross transmitter's footprint. I sure as hell hope so because I'm going to b…
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Decibels
In response to yesterday's post about acoustic noise measurements, Matt Palmer, Rog and Michael Greb have pointed out that a "bel" is the base unit of "decibel", with a decibel being a tenth of a bel.…
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Acoustic noise levels
The reason I sold off the server I'd bought on eBay is because of the noise it generated. I already live right under the flight path to Sydney airport, so I don't need my own jet engine noise inside a…
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Server gone
Okay the server I I advertised yesterday has sold to a mate of my brother-in-law. Looks like it'll be doing service as a (very capable) file server. Now looking for similar-spec hardware that doesn't…
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Buy this Afghan girl now!
Am I the only one who finds this a little disturbing? Spotted on this New York Times page.
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For sale: NEC Express dual-Xeon server with 288GB RAID
Hi folks. I bought this server on eBay a couple of months ago and have decided it doesn't fit my purpose. It's an amazing piece of hardware, but it's as noisy as a jet engine and is a bit finnicky abo…
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Drought? What drought?
Australia is apparently experiencing the worst drought in living memory. You could've fooled me! Since moving back to Sydney from London it's rained more than it ever did in London, and that's the cit…