Wed, 12 Jul 2006

[16:11] I'm hired!
Earlier this week I heard back from the UK guys who offered me a job a couple of weeks back advising me that they would have to formally rescind their offer. I agreed and thanked them profusely for keeping it open for such a long time and kept my fingers crossed that I would get offered the other position I've been chasing...

Well, it's mostly official, although I've only got the electronic paperwork at this stage but it looks like I could have a good reason to be wearing this here shirt in the very near future (like I'd need a reason anyway):

Mon, 03 Jul 2006

[12:03] To brake or not to brake
I've been meaning to check/replace the brake pads on my bike for, well, quite some time now. My stopping distance has been getting gradually longer and longer and nearly ramming a taxi on the way home tonight reminded me that I needed to obtain some new ones. I stopped at Evans on the way home tonight and purchased two sets (front and back) of these. I'm not really a bike person ("knows enough to be dangerous" is the term I believe) so I dragged the bike into the shop to make sure I got the right ones and the look on the guys face when he saw my old pads said "I'm upset at the injustice being done to your rims and ex-brake pads" his vocal chords echoed the sentiment and chastised me as apparently I was long overdue for this.

I took them home and swapped them all over and once again I can stop almost instantly. I think the guy at the shop was right though, I don't think that brake pads are meant to be concave:

[09:32] Fearless - Rating 7/10
We went to see Fearless (aka Huo Yuan Jia) on the weekend for two reasons:
a) because it's a Jet Li movie
b) because I've been intrigued by the advertising on the buses recently stating that this was "Jet Li's last Martial Arts Movie"
I was wondering if somehow Jet Li had died and I'd managed to miss that, it seems not.

Fearless was an excellent movie on several levels:

• If you're a martial arts junkie then there are fight scenes aplenty. It had a fair chunk of wire-work, or what I assumed to be wirework, but it was pretty unobtrusive (I really hate the whole pseudo-flying/jumping that goes on in a lot of martial arts style movies these days) and there's a good mix of hand-to-hand as well as armed combat!
• If you like your movies to have a plot then, once again, you're in luck! The plot is easy enough to follow (although there are a couple of rather odd leaps through time right at the beginning) and doesn't seem to suffer from "translating the untranslatable" that impacts a lot of films with asiatic origins. The subtitles are easy to read except for a quick two-liner in the first five minutes. As an additional bonus the fight scenes are actually a an integral part of the plot rather than the plot being built as a vehicle for the fight scenes.
• It's real purty-like! The cinematography is excellent and both the action sequences and other scenes are beautifully shot and a pleasure to watch, with only one slightly cringe-worthy CGI moment, again right at the beginning.
• There's a moral to the story that you can take away at the end (although the movie doesn't end with a panning shot of everyone laughing at an inane joke).

Action and martial arts stories only use the form of martial arts. Kungfu represents a concept of time. You spend time practicing it, and you learn new skills. Martial arts are an overall concept, which also includes nurturing the soul.

Sun, 02 Jul 2006

[10:57] Transformers: The Movie
Hahahahaah! Get your drool ducts primed folks because a Transformers movie is coming!! OK, so it's coming next YEAR but it's still coming and the teaser is now out. You can check it out at www.transformersmovie.com.

I've done a little research and it seems that there're already a lot of annoyed fanboys out there so bear in mind that:
a) the footage from the teaser is NOT intended to be in the movie, nor is it meant to convey the plot of the movie.
b) this is a cinematic ADAPTION, not a remake of the cartoon.
I like the style and mood of the teaser and I'm hoping for the reasonably dark movie that this hints at....

[Posted at: 02/07/2006 18:57]

Sat, 01 Jul 2006

[13:58] A visit to the zoo Hamleys
We popped out to do a bit of shopping today. I purchased a beautiful "How to play Chess" book for Shona at the Embankment second-hand book market last week and I've been hanging out to get a chess set to start learning on and I've also been trying to locate a set of Ye Olde Styleie Jacks and Hamleys seemed to be the most likely place to locate such things so we boarded the number 3 and headed into London town!

The first hurdle of the day came when we found that our bus was not going to take us all the way in (as it normally does) because the EuroPride march had blockaded most of the city off and we were rather uncerimonisouly dumped by a somewhat shirty bus driver about 5 klicks down the road from our house and ended up walking over to the Westminster tube (which was a filthy skank-hole since the temperature was around 30 celcius). Anyway, we got into the city and managed to get a look at the parade which happened to be running down the road directly out the front of Hamleys anyway. As usual, Aussies had crashed the party (if you can find a good time going on in London guaranteed there'll be a bloke somewhere nearby with an Aussie flag and a beer) and in amongst the lady-boys and be-leathered gentlemen there was the rather incongruous flag:

Thu, 29 Jun 2006

[09:41] Death Cab For Cutie
Another concert! We popped out to see Death Cab For Cutie put on a show last night, supported by Viva Voce, this time back in the big auditorium at the Brixton Academy. Viva Voce showed promise but the speakers were up thumpingly high (yeah, I had the trusty Laser Lites) and it was difficult to make out the lyrical content of the songs over the rather energetic drumming - I suspect that they're worth a second look though...

Death Cab For Cutie are another pick from Shonas grab-bag of Things To See And Do. She was introduced to them by her brother who also played a CD for me but I must admit to not really having been taken by them (although the CD he played for me - possibly Transatlanticism - was interesting in that it had a twig wrapped in red thread encased in the spine of the jewel case). They're an American band from Bellingham, Washington and the odd name is taken from a song (obviously of the same name) by a band called "Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band", there's a bit more info on this over at Wikipedia.

Anyway, the concert was pretty good with a lot of happy, poppie tunes and a few more moody pieces to broaden the experience. I enjoyed it even though I'm not a big fan (apart from when they pulled the damn "ooh we're finished....unless you clap and cheer lots in which case we'll come back and do an encore" trick) and Shona got to see one of her favourite bands live and reasonably up-close. The audience was pretty interesting, spread across the age spectrum and including a family with one quite small, shoulder-mounted child right down the front. Apart from one dick (there's always one) who briefly attempted to start his own mosh in the midst of all of us simple, stationary folks it was all nice and easy. The nice 'n easyness carried on all the way home since the 159 bus route runs almost directly past both our front door and that of the Academey - hoorah!

[Posted at: 29/06/2006 17:41]

Tue, 27 Jun 2006

[13:13] Job Huntin...
It seems that I'm still in the race for the job that I'm chasing. I heard back from the recruiter today that I made it through the technical hiring phase and now it's time for educational history to be verified and references/referees to be consulted, just to make sure that I really WAS telling the truth back in the interviews...

Ultra-big thank-yous go out to the folks who have agreed to provide me with good references (well, I ASSUME that's what you're doing). I understand the time that these things take to complete properly (I've done a couple myself in the past) and I really appreciate that you're willing to do this! The party is on me when I finally repatriate.

[Posted at: 27/06/2006 21:13

Mon, 26 Jun 2006

[15:53] Lior
We went out to see Lior play at The Spitz tonight. This was a Shona-organised event, I'm not really familiar with Lior, but she figured that for £8 it's got to be worth it dragging me along! You might know him as the talent behind This Old Love, a track that JJJ had on pretty high rotation last year (and which I "broke" my knee whilst listening to, riding home in the storm water drains...but that's another story) or perhaps Autumn Flow which made it into the Hottest 100 at position 43. I certainly had no real association of the name to the music before I went.

I'm certainly glad that I DID go. The Spitz is a nice, small venue - somewhat reminiscent of The Gypsy Bar or Tilleys back in Canberra - I doubt that you'd get more than 200 rammed into the wee attic that is the concert area (downstairs being a restaurant). The cosy venue provided a perfect match for the relaxed and personable gig that Lior played. I don't know if he's normally so interactive but he really had the crowd (me too) under his spell. Possibly this is because said crowd was something like 90% slightly inebriated Australians (he checked), and possibly he played to this by giving Albury a bit of a ribbing and generally slipping in little Australiana tidbits, but overall he just put on a great show that would have been appreciated by anyone who saw it!

Liors music is a blend of Mark Cohn-style lyrics with a Jeff Buckley-esque delivery, he's certainly got a good set of lungs on him. He has an Israeli background and he uses the musical heritage from that part of the world in a couple of his songs, specifically Bedouin Song and the closing "song" of the night, a Hebrew prayer. I'd highly recommend that you check him out if you get a chance.


[Posted at: 26/06/2006 23:53]

Mon, 19 Jun 2006

[15:34] PasswordSafe 3.01 is out
My favourite password storage facility, PasswordSafe, has just had a major version release. It's had both UI and behind the scenes updates including the ability to collect URL and general notes as well as normal username/password pairs, a brand new DB format and a switch from Blowfish to Twofish. If pwsafe would keep up then everything would be perfect!

[Posted at: 19/06/2006 23:34]

[15:14] Stinking SPAMwhores
Seems that some bastard has started spamming me via the pollxn comment engine. The IP's from the logs aren't really very helpful and my random sampling has ranged through Russia, Japan, Malaysia, Barbados and even the United States! I suspect that they're using a spider but perhaps it's just a search engine looking for common comment engines.
Step 1 in the anti-SPAM offensive has been renaming the pollxn.cgi script. If it's a spider and is even vaguely intelligent then this will do absolutely nothing to stop it so I'm hoping it's not!
I was thinking of implementing a gruesomely simple CAPTCHA for pollxn but I'll wait and see what happens next. I suppose this is a good time to think about whether it might be time to move back to a proper CMS. Blosxom is nice and simple and very easy to use but there's a lot more that I want to be able to do and I don't know if I really want to write my own CMS (which is essentialy what I'm now doing). It has been fun and interesting but I'm not really game to allow my non-web-savy developments out to play on the internet and with so many good packages out there written by people who actually know what they're doing maybe I should spend my time doing something more useful...

[Posted at: 19/06/2006 23:14]

Updated 20/06/2006 23:17: Day One - no sign of intruders so far...
Updated 21/06/2006 18:17: Day Two - BAH! Foiled. Picked up another six advertisements today. Going to have to do something about this. For now comments are suspended.

Sun, 18 Jun 2006

[12:02] Conquering "The Monument"
Shona came in to meet me for lunch on Saturday after she finished at the Gym. We had Vietnamese and, because I'd nearly finished at the office she came back and waited for me to finish. It was a REALLY nice day so we stopped for a juice and a laze in the sun in the garden of St. Boltophs, which is just outside where I used to work. London is surprisingly full of little grassy hideaways like this! Anyway, since Shona was so completely knackered (from the gym), we both had huge backpacks and it was such a hot day I thought that it would be a great time to cross another item off our "Things To Do In London" list and tackle the 311 steps that take you to the top of The Monument!

The Monument, or more correctly The Monument to the Great Fire of London, is a sodding great pillar that was built to commemorate the 1666 fire that consumed the considerable majority of the city (more details here). The pillar itself is 61 metres high and contains 311 steps that lead to the (extremely cramped) viewing platform at the top. It is topped by a golden urn that symbolises the fire and, were it to fall over (I think in an Easterly direction) without snapping into little pieces, the urn would land on the spot where the Great Fire was kindled!
There's actually a lot of interesting info on the Wikipedia site that they DON'T state either inside the column (granted there's not a lot of room) or on the fancy pants certificate that they give you if you make it back out the bottom. Apparently the architect, Sir Christopher "cop a load of my hair ya bastards" Wren wasn't just going for looks but designed it as some kind of swiss-army knife of scientific laboratories - it's worth the very short Wikipedia read and a bit more study!

Here now are some photographic proofs of the journey: Shona on the staricase, me at the top with one of the ubiqitous security cameras and a gherkin coming out of my head and finally, to give you some scale, me with the certificate underneath the plaque that's in the tiny little picture of The Monument at the top of this entry.

[Posted at: 18/06/2006 20:02]

Wed, 14 Jun 2006

[16:34] Tool and the art of mosh infiltration
Due to my friends crazy penchant for oversupplying themselves with concert tickets I was offered the chance to go and see Tool play at the Hammersmith Apollo tonight. I didn't really enjoy the last Tool concert I attended (back in Canberra at the National Convention Center) because it was really, really, REALLY loud. It was so loud that when the guitar started up and synched in with the drums the air was forced from my lungs - seriously. However, since I've really been enjoying their latest album, 10,000 Days, I accepted and I'm rather glad I did!
For starters, these English folks really know how to build a music venue. In a similar fashion to the Brixton Academy (where I saw NIN about the same time last year) the floor is nicely sloped so that those at the back can still see over the squalor bunched up against the barriers at the front and the mid-floor barriers were also present to prevent too much crushage.
The speaker stacks were of a decent size - not the towering monsters that I saw last time and the music was great (I used my last pack of Laser Lites though)! They played a lot of my favourites including Sober, 46 and 2 and a pretty credible version of Ions(!) before finishing up with one of my all time favourites, Aenima. Off the new album they cranked out Vicarious, The Pot and an impressive rendition of Rosetta Stoned, complete with the burbling "stream of conciousness" lyrics - I was well impressed. When the time came for the end of the concert the band stopped playing, threw various accoutrements into the crowd, said goodnight and left. I can't say how refreshing it was to not have to go through the wankery of the whole "encore" performance thing.

It's been a while since I attended a "rock concert" and I realised tonight that it's not so much the live music that I enjoy as the opportunity to get to the front of the mosh (although the music does give you something to concentrate on once you reach the front)! I made it down to the barrier tonight as I usually do, and I really enjoyed getting there. The crowd was quite mellow (no elbows, knees or finger prying near me anyway) so I could pay more antention to what I was doing than normal. Mosh infiltration is an art that requires the application of psychology (to pick your "targets") and body mechanics (to get past them) that you can't really practice in any other environment and I recommend it to those who like to study human psychology, social interaction and get soaked in other peoples sweat!

I would also like to say a big thank-you to the mob doing security at the gig (ICMB I think). I've never come across a nicer bunch of security guards. They were kind, courteous and friendly (are you paying attention you bastards at the ANU bar). Judging by the accents I suspect they are travelling with the band.

I managed to top the night off with the best chips in the universe (with mayo and chilli) from the Waterloo Kebab and Burger house to provide sustenance for the walk home. Life is good!

[Posetd at: 15/06/2006 00:34]

Mon, 12 Jun 2006

[09:20] Hello from Dublin
I'm sitting in Dublin airport on an eircom internet kiosk (with a browser agent of "Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.1; SV1; .NET CLR 1.1.4322; SiteKiosk 6.2 Build 51)" and an IP of 83.71.63.166 in case you're interested). I'm sitting here because I came over for a job interview yesterday and I'm heading home now, post-interview.

The trip over was a bit of a disaster, I left London Heathrow at 1530 and got into Dublin airport 15 minutes early which was nice but unfortunately my bag didn't. It rocked up at 2249 after a getting drunk at the bar back in London and losing its passport, or that's what it told me anyway. I suspect the more likely explanation is that it's free-flowing straps got caught in the baggage transporting mechanisms and they had to send a trained ferret in to free it or something. Take note! Stick straps down with tape or chuck the whole damn bag in a pillowcase or something.
So anyway, I got my bag and got the bus into town and had Burger King for dinner because it was the only thing still open at 2350. I then walked up to my hotel. It was a very nice and quiet and not at all prepossessing. In fact it was so un-prepossesing that I walked twice around St Stephens Green before I finally found it - yay. So I got checked in at about 0008 and went to bed so I could be "fresh" in the morning.

I did get up on time and do all the morning things although I elected not to have breakfast, mostly because the hotel was of the opinion that breakfast was worth 14 Euros and I was not. Your probably better off on an empty stomach anyway - at least that's what New Scientist told me anyway.
The interviews (four of them) seemed to go well but I've given up trying to gauge such things. No-one spat on me or tried to bang my head against the table for speaking heresy so I'm chalking it up as a positive experience! At very least I met some really cool people, got some new books/authors to check out (Vernor Vinge/Rainbows End) and learned a few things about non-stateful firewalls and STP!

Fingers crossed....

[Posted at: 12/06/2006 17:20

Fri, 09 Jun 2006

[04:45] Ethereal is now WireShark
It seems that everyones favourite network protocol analyser Ethereal is now known as WireShark. It's allegedly not a fork because the entire dev team is following the project lead and creator (Gerald Combs) to his new job. It's all explained in the WireShark FAQ, in this Ethereal mailing list post and on the WinPcap news page.
I'm finding it a little odd that this is addressed as "...almost (but not quite) a fork..." on the FAQ and nowhere is there any mention of Ethereal ceasing development!? I wonder if it will actually fork and what that will mean. Hopefully it means that we get two really free open-source good programs instead of one!

[Posted at: 09/06/2006 12:45]

Thu, 08 Jun 2006

[15:04] That's no ORDINARY bus!
There was a bus parked out front this afternoon with a most impressive display of icons on the back window which, I assume, were advertising it's amazing attributes and abilities. Here's what the back window display looked like:

• Our driver has a spiky beard and wears a cycling helmet - beware!
• I assume this pertains to passenger refreshment - All Beers and Spirits. It could be the drivers refreshments of course, which would explain the helmet.
• Licensed to seat 66, with an Enhanced Concubine Enclosure that seats 66. Concubines for all!
• When you're all beer and spirited out and you've finished your concubine - have some freshly brewed coffee...
• and relax with your own personal entertainment system!
• I'm not sure if these means "We have Super levitating seats!" or "Caution: Inhaling the Stench of stockinged feet could cauterise your nose!".
• Should our be-helmeted driver be overcome by the sock stench and drive off a cliff, this bus is equipped with parachutes! Tell Ma that you're going to be OK!
• You're going to have A Super Ride

[14:15] More Unicylcing
I've been out nearly every night this week getting in a bit of practice and I'm reasonably comfortable with general pavement riding now. I can cruise without fear of decapitating a small child if I suddenly lose balance and I've barely lost a pint of blood from gouges this week so I decided to step up the difficulty and tackle my first wall today.
Obviously my jumping skills aren't that great yet so I have to start by stepping up onto the wall (it's only about half a metre high) but I CAN ride off and land without causing too much damage! It's amazing how much harder riding in a straigt line is when all of a sudden you HAVE to ride in a straight line or plummet to ashphalty death!
All-in-all I'm really loving this whole unicycling thing; I'm not moving at light speed or anything but I can approach a mild jog as opposed to walking-speed and it's got the added bonus of turning almost any surface into a magical bouncing playground. It's a very similar feeling to the one I used to get when I was a wee nipper and I used to take my bike out for a cruise. I look forward to when I can get down an entire flight of stairs, and back up, without dismounting.

[Posted at: 08/06/2006 22:15]

Wed, 07 Jun 2006

[14:01] Presents!!!
I've been studying for my CCNA for a while now and I'm pretty happy with my theoretical knowledge but I'm not so sure about router/switch configuration and I am very unimpressed with the way the router simulatior that came with a book I bought works (or doesn't work as the case may be). With that in mind I hit the eBay and got myself a Catalyst 1900 switch and a couple of 1601 Series Routers plus all the cables to practice on. They turned up this morning and I'm looking forward to having a play.

Tue, 06 Jun 2006

[11:59] Avenue Q
I completely forgot to mention that we went to see Avenue Q last Friday at the Noel Coward Theatre. The theatre was nice and cosy, it was all red velvet and brocade with all sorts of little nooks and crannies that ended up being box seats, not to mention three seperate bars!

The production Avenue Q is a musical told via puppets of the Sesame Street ilk. It tells the story of a university graduate (Princeton) and follows him on his first day out in the real world (kicking off with the song "What Do You Do with a B.A. in English?") touring through the various problems that befall one on the way to ultimate wisdom (housing, money, girls, lucky pennies) before finishing up with....well I don't want to spoil it, suffice to say that it IS a moral tale but manages not to be preachy. Or maybe I'm getting too old and I just THINK it wasn't preachy...uh, hang on...

*time passes*

...sorry about that, I'm back. There were some damn kids out the front playing with a ball and making far to much noise. I went and yelled at them, and then I forgot what I was doing and trimmed my nosehairs on the way back. That's why I took so long.

Anyway, I did really enjoy the show and I thought it was pretty cool the way they made no pretence of hiding the pupeteers. It was interesting watching them and their facial expressions/body language and comparing that to what they were manipulating the puppets into doing. A good time had by all!

[Posted at: 06/06/2006 19:59]

Sun, 04 Jun 2006

[23:47] Unicycle bites man - pictures at 11!
Well, I won't make you wait. You can have the pictures now:
Not content with merely lacerating my shins, my unicycle has moved on to chewing on my socks as well!
Apart from the obvious cuts 'n scratches the weekend went pretty well. I managed to ride from my house, across the road, around the Imperial War Museum and partially down a flight of reasonably gentle stairs without too much death and destruction. I think I can safely say I've acheived UIF Level 1 and can move on with Level 2.

[Posted at: 05/06/2006 07:47]

Fri, 02 Jun 2006

[09:45] Unlocker is the shiznit!
I've been playing with a piece of software called Unlocker recently and I've decided that not only is it the bee's knees but I'm prepared to swear that it's also the bee's thighs, hips and abdomen (or thorax possibly, whatever bees have)!
Unlocker basically locates whatever processes are locking a file (thus preventing you from deleting it/moving it/etc) and, if possible, removes the lock. This is GREAT for getting Windows to release a USB thumbdrive for instance and much nicer than the old way I've been using of looking for processes using ProcessExplorer and then manually removing the lock.
If for some reason it can't remove the lock then it gives you the option of marking the file for deletion on the next reboot (before anything can get it's grubby hooks into it)

The only way this program could be better would be if it was free. Oh wait, it is! What are you waiting for? Go get it NOW! Huzzah for Cedrick Collomb!

Sun, 28 May 2006

[07:16] X-Men: The Last Stand - Rating: 6/10
X-Men: The Last Stand is pretty much your standard blockbuster fare, very much a sit back, tune-in, turn-off kinda deal. Which is not to say it's a bad movie! The majority of the X-Men morality tale was taken as being dealt with in the previous two films and the stage was left clear for the special effects.
The special effects were well-implemented, the acting was mostly good, the plot was not mind-snappingly contradictory and I didn't have to sit there constantly thinking "must willingly suspend disbelief" so all in all - a successful movie! My only gripe was the glaringly obvious continuity errors (the daytime/night-time switch was the "best" of these).

Two things more to mention:
1) Don't forget the post-credits snippet; and
2) If this is the last X-Men movie then I'll consume some form of inedible headgear.

[Posted at: 28/05/2006 15:16]

[06:12] The culture, the culture!
Another rockin' week of excitement and culture in London! Let's break it down:

Tuesday - Musical Culture Another classical concert, this time it was the Philharmonia Orchestra (again) at the Royal Festival Hall (again) playing a selection of Mozart. The selection included:

• Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart - Symphony No.36 (Linz)
• Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart - Sinfonia concertante in E flat for violin & viola, K364
• Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart - Symphony No.41 (Jupiter)

Sun, 21 May 2006

[10:43] How about some classical music then...
Since we're on a bit of a classical binge at the moment we went to see the Lambeth Orchestra play last night. They're a community-based orchestra that "...pursue a policy of performing minor works of major composers and major works of minor composers...". The main reason that I wanted to go and see them is because they played one of my favourite pieces, Rachmaninovs Isle of the Dead. The complete playlist was:

• Bruch: Scottish Fantasy
• Liszt: Mazeppa
• Rachmaninov: The Isle of the Dead
• Elgar: Crown of India

Thu, 18 May 2006

[15:23] An Eventful Day
I got a call today from the folks in London who I've been interviewing for, offering me a position. This puts me in a bit of a quandry because it's the second of two jobs that I applied for, the former of which (I'm pretty sure) I'd prefer to work for but that I've not finished interviewing for yet (a process whos outcome is by no means a foregone conclusion). If I decide to wait for the interview process to run its course then I lose the option of this job and possible end up destitute. Some heavy thinking for the weekend.

Luckily I was able to cast my cares aside as we had tickets to see the Philharmonia Orchestra play at the Royal Festival Hall so we rode the bikes up and went out to dinner at Wagamamas on the South Bank before the concert.

I think this is the first time that I've gone to see classical music played, certainly as an adult anyway and I really enjoyed it. The menu consisted of:

• Richard Wagner: Tristan und Isolde - Prelude to Act 1
• Richard Wagner: Tristan und Isolde - Liebestod
• Benjamin Britten: Serenade for tenor, horn and strings
• INTERVAL
• Sergey Prokofiev: Romeo and Juliet, Op.64 - excerpts

Wed, 17 May 2006

[09:46] What do you call a man with no legs who climbs mount Everest?
Mark Inglis!
It's not funny because it's not a joke. I read today that Mr Inglis (who lost his legs to frostbite whilst stuck on top of Mt Cook in what he described as "a very public hiccup to my climbing profession") reached the summit of Mt Everest on Monday (15 May, 2006) under his own steam.

I think this is particularly interesting, nay amazing, for two reasons:

1. A guy with prosthetic limbs climbed the highest mountain in the world!
   I've not got a massive interest in prosthetic limbs because, so far, I've still got all of mine but I am interested in the concept because it's people who need the crappy prosthetics that we have today who are going to be among the first "proper" augmented humans. Look at the Rheo-Knee or listen to the interview with Jesse Sullivan who has prosthetic arms and is currently actively working with his doctor (Todd Kuiken)to make them a lot better. All of this is REALLY cool technology.
   
   There's a guy who I sometimes ride past on London Bridge on the way to work in the morning who has a leg that looks very similar to those that Mr Inglis is sporting in a couple of pictures on his site. How long before he's powering past me with some kind of exo-skeleton?
   
   
2. He was in near-constant telephone and e-mail contact with his wife and able to update his blog whilst up the mountain!
   I'll admit that I've not been actively on top of how satellite technology has been progressing (I assume that's what they're using because the websites are unfortunately skimpy on technical details) but I still think that's pretty cool that in some of the most extreme environments on Earth you can hang out in your tent and surf the 'net!

Sun, 14 May 2006

[11:03] Unicycle Update
It's been a bit tough to fit some practice in but I think I've racked up about three or four hours this week and, if I do say so myself, I'm getting a lot better. I can now free-mount and even "ride" for several meters. Ride is in quotes because I'm not at liberty to choose which direction to go in just yet, still some work to be done! I have ventured forth from my rubber coated play-pen and have been riding on the road and pavement around my house. I also put in a good hour and a half yesterday and I can now ride down stairs, up is still a considerable challenge.

Unfortunately this means that I've not yet achieved Level One of the Unicycling Society of America Skill Levels but I'm oh so close...

The weeks damage roster stands at:

• Reopened wounds on both shins,
• Scratches to left calf (that's right, I managed to hit myself in the back of the leg!),
• Ashphalt punctures to right palm,
• Considerably less steel on both pedals,
• Smashed reflector on right pedal.

Thu, 11 May 2006

[03:37] Final Interview?
I had my final interview for the UK job last night. It consisted of two parts. The first was about an hour with the CIO and the second was a social event, drinks with the team whom I'd become a part of.
I think both parts went well and I'd be surprised if I didn't at least get a offer (considering the amount of time these guys have put into interviewing me now). The interview was pretty good, the guy obviously knows what he's talking about which is nice - management with a clue! - and I'm told that the only guy who failed the social test did something unmentionable on top of the bar with his underwear in entirely the wrong location.
Although this started off as being my second choice job, after meeting the team (through the interview process) and seeing the work that's to be done I'm actually quite keen on working with them! The management structure is really quite flat (about four hops to the top I think) and they're really open to new ideas - especially from us techies! After yet another year in the EDS bureaucracy jungle (about 400 hops to the top I think) I'd really like to work for a smaller company and actually achieve something. Working for larger companies, especially doing outsourced administrivia, means that although the work is essential it's basically a thankless task - somewhat akin to painting the Sydney Harbour Bridge; By the time you've finished it's time to start over on the other side again.
I should hear back from them late this week or early next week and I guess I'll also be hearing from the other mob again soon (my recruiter is on a weeks holiday). Hopefully there'll be some decisions to make soon...

[Posted at 11/05/2006 11:37]

Tue, 09 May 2006

[10:01] The Shredder
EVERYTHING that comes through the post box in this country seems to be personally addressed to me, even the junk mail! Bills turn up consisting of four pages, one with the bill and three with advertisements, each with a full name and address emblazoned across the top. Identity theft has become such a problem here in the UK that there's an entire website devoted to it (although it's run by a mob calling themselves the "Home Office Identity Fraud Steering Committee" which makes it sound like they're the ones behind the whole caper) and there are little stickers and posters all over the place exhorting constant vigliance.
With this in mind I've finally procured a shredder, this one to be exact. It's a cross-cut shredder that spits out confetti in the shape of 4x36mm rectangles. Cross-cut shredders are basically strip shredders (your standard "cut paper into ribbons" style shredder) but with an extra cutting edge that cuts each strip into about 7 pieces (assuming you fed it an A4 sheet). The cross-cut seemed like a better idea because it's pretty easy to put the ribbons back together if there's not too many of them. I actually had a go at piecing some of the stuff I shredded back together and I've dicovered that you should definitely shred from top to bottom rather than edge to edge. Edge to edge means that you end up with strips of sentence and I managed to put my name and address back together easily! I also heard a tip on the In The Trenches padcast that suggested sealing half a cup of milk in a bag with your shreddings and leaving them in the sun for a day before disposing of them but I'm not so sure if I need to go to such extremes just yet...

[Posted at: 09/05/2006 18:01]

Mon, 08 May 2006

[00:34] Stolen Bodies?
Whilst reading my New Scientist in bed last night I came across the article Putting bodies on display regarding the "Bodies...The Exhibition" exhibition that we went to see last week.
According to the article, and contrary to what the staff told me when I asked, the people (or bodies I guess would be more correct) on display did NOT give their consent to be stripped of their skin, eaten away by acid or otherwise folded, spindled and/or mutilated. The article states that: ...all the specimens used in Bodies were obtained legally from the Dalian Medical University and they are the bodies of unknown people, or people whose families never claimed them for burial. There's more in an article entitled Who is running man? from the St Petersburg Times when the exhibition visited Tampa.

[Posted at 08/05/2006 08:54]

Mon, 01 May 2006

[12:08] The Whirlwind Weekend Of Fun
Yet another weekend off! This weekend is Microsoft patch weekend so I've been kicked outta the building for the duration (don't want too many changes occuring at once). So, it's been another weekend of crossing off things on the "Things to do in London" list. First up, on Friday night, we went to the Blue Man Group production (for want of a better word) at the New London Theatre in Drury Lane. The walk there was an entertaining experience as we negotiated the hordes of brawling pre-teens screaming obscenities and traffic cones at each other, interesting neighbourhood. The outside of the theater was pretty un-preposessing but the inside was nice enough and the seats were pretty comfy. Our seats were in the fourth row but, since we booked so late, were on the far right-hand side of the stage. In the end we were actually able to see nearly everything. Because of the nature of the show and our proximity to the stage our seats had disposable ponchos waiting for us - they came in handy!
I don't know how to describe the show really. I guess in the simplest terms it's a (semi-?)scripted combination of comedy and percussion. They describe themselves as:
"...a creative organization dedicated to creating excitement-generating experiences for our audience and ourselves."
which pretty much sums it up. I highly recommend that you go and see this show if you get a chance.

On Saturday we headed off to the London Butterfly House which, as the name suggests, is the premier spot for butterfly watching in London. It wasn't as spectacular as the Australian Butterfly Sanctuary in Kuranda but, given the location and complete lack of funding they're doing pretty well. There was no shortage of butterflies and there was also a really cool leaf-cutting-ant house. I also saw the biggest bodied butterfly I've ever seen anywhere, being ported around by a 6 year old touting for pictures. I was greatly amused when the butterfly voided itself down his leg (it was a seriously large butterfly). We lay outside in the sun for a while because it was a GREAT weekend (sunny and clear) before adjourning to the attached nursery refectory for lunch. The lady we were with ordered a coffee with her lunch and received a rahter odd setup: a ceramic cup with a second, plastic cup perched on top. This turned out to be a coffee filtration system - the boiled water percolates through a wad of coffee in the bottom of the plastic cup providing freshly filtered coffee. Upon closed inspection this filter turned out to be disposable! I've included some pictures so you can see just how large this thing is, I was (and still am) incredulous that someone's made this thing to be thrown away:

• Probably the freakiest bit was the cabinet containg a "skin suit" basically one of the bodies skins had been removed in one piece and put in a case - very odd to look at
• The nervous system exhibit was quite bizzare looking as well - it consisted of the brain, eyes and the major nerves all in one unit - as Shona pointed out, somewhat reminiscent of the aliens from "Mars Attacks"!
• There was a skeleton leaning back, arms outstretched supported by a muscle-suit in a similar pose leaning the other way. The skeleton was actually removed from inside of the muscles before they were put into position!
• The variety of circulatory system exhibits was probably the most technically challenging and beautiful to look at. They basically pumped blue liquid into the veinous system and red into the arteries, let the liquid cool into a solid and then ate away the body with acid. They did this to various things ranging from kidneys, hearts and lungs all the way up to an entire body. This leaves you with a thing shaped structure made up of the blood vessels - the whole body display was simply berath-taking.

Wed, 26 Apr 2006

[11:03] Unicycling...not as easy as it looks
Here's me and my beautiful unicycle, post-practice:

Tue, 25 Apr 2006

[13:27] Interview II, part two
I just had my second phone interview for the original job I applied for. My first interview went pretty damn well but this one was definitely not as impressive. I was pretty tired due to getting up for ANZAC day this morning (I'd been up for about fourteen hours when the interview started) and I think I was a litte fuzzy and not as articulate or energetic as I'd like to have been.
I think the fact that I'm applying for jobs with companies that are good, and know it, mean that they can be a bit more meticulous about the whole hiring procedure and actually do all they can to verify that what they get matches what was written on the packet. If nothing else, I've certainly enjoyed the whoel interview process - I've picked up a couple of cool ideas and reading suggestions from all of my interviewers so far and it's been good talking to people who obviously enjoy what they get to do every day!
I'm going to keep my fingers crossed because this is really my dream job but I'll begin to prepare myself for a "No thanks" I think....

[Posted at 25/04/2006 21:27]

Mon, 24 Apr 2006

[22:52] Lest We Forget
We just got back from the London ANZAC Day ceremony. There was a pretty good turnout and it was interesting to see a truly ANZAC ceremony (as opposed the Australian ceremony that I'm more used to) - I've never actually heard the New Zealand national anthem before today! It wasn't the quiet ceremony that I'm used to, with all the traffic blocked off around the Australian War Memorial service; this one was at the major intersection that is Hyde Park Corner with buses and taxis and the occasional wailing siren throughout that make a quite a difference to the magpies and cockatoos that accompany the service back home.
The ceremony was considerably more religious than the ones we've had over the last few years in Australia and the "standards" like In Flanders Field and Lest We Forget were, for me, noticeably absent. Also, it seems that candles are not de rigueur over here, so we were the only two that had them.

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.

[Posted at: 25/04/2006 06:50]

Sun, 23 Apr 2006

[12:46] The Return Of Jason
Jason is back in the country and to celebrate his return he came down to London for an evening of fun and frivolity. I had to work during the day so he went out to Ikea with Shona ('cause he's got a car) and they went shopping. I also snuck out at lunchtime and bought my unicycle (yay!). I got pulled over by the cops when I left, about a kilometer from work, asking for proof that I'd bought my unicycle and, once I produced the receipt, querying why I was carrying it like a dickhead (I had the wheel balanced on my handlebars and the seat resting on my shoulder). I assured it that in future I would be riding the thing rather than transporting it and he was happy enough to let me go.

When I got home there was some Ikea construction work in progress and I was rather impressed with one of the tools included in the chair kit. The tool was, of course, the ubiquitous allen key, but with a twist:

Fri, 21 Apr 2006

[11:06] Job Interview II, but no unicycle
I had my second interview for one of the two jobs that I'm applying for at the moment. I'd have to say that as far as interviews go, this has been the most thorough that I've ever had. It started at 1230 and I didn't get out until 1803; That's right, five and a half hours of interview! It was split up into four different groups who asked questions ranging from the technical through to general social/public knowledge and trivia. They covered everything I claimed I'd had anything to do with, basically my resume was ransacked! I guess they're trying to pick out the people who are inclined to a bit of BS to make themselves look more suitable. I'm glad that I don't subscribe to this sort of thing because if I did I think I'd be feeling quite foolish right now - as it is I'm thinking of making a few modifications.
I'm really keen to get away from where I'm working now and I'm fortunate enough to be being considered for, what I consider to be, two awesome jobs. The only problem is going to occur if I get cleared for both of them but, to tell the truth, I'm not sure if I'll get either. I'm feeling semi-confident about this one, several of the mini-interviews went quite well (I think) but at least one of them was quite unspectacular. We'll see what happens next.
One of the cool things was that the floor I was interviewed on was glass-walled and appeared to have a ring of binary "code" at the height normally reserved for those white "Warning there's a wall here" stickers. Whilst waiting between mini-interviews I decoded the binary down to text and it turned out that the last guy to interview me was the one who designed the floorplan and the stickercode. I got it all right except for one character (I blame it on the fact that I had to work it out on a piece of toilet paper) and I figure that's gotta be worth something right?

Unfortunately I didn't get out until post-closing time for the shop I intend to buy a unicycle from so I'm going to have to try and get over at lunchtime tomorrow.

[Posted at 21/04/2006 19:06]

Mon, 17 Apr 2006

[12:01] Happy Birthday Shona!
Today's a holiday in the UK, in honour of Shonas birthday (it's also been hijacked by religious zealots who are claiming it's some "Easter" holiday as well). We went book shopping at the local second hand book store, "My Back Pages". I love second hand bookshops and this was my favourite sort, the kind that looks like it organically grew and consumed the surrounding shops. It's got little hidden corners and enclaves and staircases, all full of the most esoteric collection of books. I managed to snarf Homicidal Psycho Jungle Cat: A Calvin and Hobbes Collection, A Brief History of Time : The Updated and Expanded Tenth Anniversary Edition and, because it had related but different information, A Briefer History of Time. I've always wanted to read that book and, for £5, why wouldn't you! We also bought Shona a couple of books, one on squishing up plants to turn them fabric dyes and one on cooking fabulous meals with two pieces of off ham and a cabbage. We then retired home to do some hardcore reading!

[Posted at 17/04/2006 20:01]

Sat, 15 Apr 2006

[10:57] A shopping we will go
Work finished early today so we took the opportunity to go shopping in Camden to pick up a pressie that's "on the list". We met up at Bank and caught the Tube together up to Camden (how romantic!). It occured to me that the local comic shop (MegaCity Comics) might stock the Spider Jerusalem comics I was looking for mid last year. Turns out they did! I'm looking forward to reading Back on the Street this weekend. We also bought the present so that's another item off the list!

Whilst browsing the through the juggling shop (because I can't go to Camden and not go through this shop) looking for an extra juggling ball (working on four balls) I stumbled upon what I think is going to be my new obsession: Into The Thunder Dragon - Mountain Unicycle Odyssey) and I'm pretty keen to give it a shot. I used to be able to see a guy commuting to work on a unicycle from my window back in Canberra and that always appealed to me. I'll sleep on it for a week and see if I'm still keen.

[Posted at 15/04/2006 18:57]

Wed, 12 Apr 2006

[11:45] Padcast vs Podcast
I've developed quite a dislike to the word "podcast", mostly because of the Apple connotations that it invokes and thus the implicit advertising they receive everytime someone uses it. I HATE advertising for things and I always strip labels from bottles, pens, hats and other miscellany.

I don't object to Apple selling over-priced and unusable gizmos (what the hell was whoever came up with iTunes THINKING). Nor do I object to them, or anyone else, using the word 'podcast'. What I object to is every gimboid in the universe referring to any internet-sourced piece of media as a podcast. A podcast is a piece of media made specifically to be played on an iPod, OK?

I've been convolutedly referring to "internet-sourced media" as Mediacasts but, lets face it, that word sucks quite a lot. On the weekend the word 'padcast' occured to me whilst observing folks on the Tube and their Personal/Portable Audio Devices. As those words crossed my lips I wondered why I'd never thought of them before (yeah, I'm slow). I'm certainly not the first but when I remembered to look it up today there were only 422 hits from Google and even less from the IceRocket Blog Search. What's worse, the Wikipedia podcast entry is attempting to subsume the padcast entry!

Help prevent rampant commercialism and the evil trend of subliminal advertising. I urge you to join the incredibly catchily named 's/podcast/padcast/g' campaign today by adding this incredibly crappy button I just smushed together to your website immediately:

Sun, 09 Apr 2006

[13:42] Hittin' the Mueseums
Due to DR testing at work this weekend, I've had quite a holiday. We decided to try and work through some of the items on the "Things To Do In London Before We Go" list. Because we're currently based in the "Gateway to the South" it takes a little longer to get back into town, about 30 minutes on the Northern line (assuming that the bastards running).

Yesterday we went to the Science Museum which was both interesting and sadly neglected. I liked the idea behind the place - making science "hands on" and relevant with lots of new exhibits but sadly a lot of the exhibits suffered from pretty obvious neglect. I was pretty impressed with the Boeing 7x7 wheel assembly that's right inside the front door, I've always wanted to get close to one of those but there was a section inside on the second floor called "Communications". This would have been interesting if I hadn't had to break out my torch to read half of the information panels due to the lights (both overhead and inside the display cabinets) being out. One of the monitors mounted on the wall showing various little spiels was broken and had so much dust on its screen that someone had managed to write "clean me" in the dust.
There was also another exhibition being hosted by the Museum, Pixar: 20 Years of Animation. This cost an extra £10 to get in but I thought it was worth it. Amongst various working drafts and character references they had on display a collection of storyboards for all of the movies. The concept behind them being to describe the major emotions felt during each segment of the movie. Each movie was covered by two to three A3 sized canvases that were most spectacular, although stylised, you could follow the whole movie really obviously and easily! The other static highlight was some of the art that had been done to get familiar with the medium they were trying to portray, some of the light studies from Finding Nemo were fantastic. There was also a Rotoscope style exhibit, except in reverse. Instead of a whole lot of stuff inside a cylinder they put everything on a plate and strobed the lights instead. It consisted of a wheel (about 1 meter in diameter) that had a whole lot of Toy Story characters in various positions (bouncing on a ball, parachuting from a toy bin, lassoing themseleves, etc. Finally there was a short film that featured all of the static items from the exhibition and made an end to end animation of them all. If you're a Pixar fan then it's well worth the entry fee!

Sunday brought the Natural History Museum. Since all of the museums over here are (generally) free, I don't mind paying the extra entry fee to the value-adding exhibits, besides it was only £6! There were some pretty awesome photos involved (as you'd expect) and on the way out there was a "film" that displayed the previous years winners as well. Luckily I'm not a photographer or I might have been quite discouraged by the amount of winning and runner-up photos submitted by folks in the 10-14 year age bracket!
On the way out we checked out the lower floor of the museum, covering mammals. There are a lot of stuffed animals, circa 1960-something I suspect. Most of them are fading quite badly and there are notices all over the place noting that they are aware of the fact but that it's not considered polite to go around killing things so you can stuff them in a glass box to look at - very progressive!

[Posted at 09/04/2006 21:42]

Fri, 0