Here’s something for those that read the article Rudd’s nephew clashes with Connex in the Sunday Age this morning online, without the benefit of the photos in the paper edition. Unlike Jen I’m a frequent user of the Degraves St Subway/Campbell Arcade, the quick non-traffic-lighted way out of Flinders Street Station. The Platform group displays ... [More]
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Did the earth move for you?
It was just before 9pm last night. I thought at first it was a ruddy big truck moving down my street. Or a really strong gust of wind. But the whole house was shaking. It passed after a few seconds. Nothing had cracked or fallen. I looked outside. Silence. No thunder, no wind. Twitter and ... [More]
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Informative
Informative The driver I got during last Monday week’s afternoon mess on the Dandenong and Frankston lines was jovial, frank, and informative. I’m paraphrasing here: “There’s another train broken down at Southern Cross, so we’re being changed to run directly to Richmond… as soon as I can get to the other end of the train.” ... [More]
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The Credit Crisis
A great little video (about 10 minutes long), illustrating in a very Hitch Hiker’s-like style how the financial system (in the US particularly) got into such deep do-do. The Crisis of Credit Visualized from Jonathan Jarvis on Vimeo. Making-of information
There’s now proof that the introduction of Myki will actually slow down trams. The Libs FOI’d the test figures, which found that: …if 20 passengers join a tram and another 20 alight at the same stop, the predicted average time a tram would be stationary was 38 seconds under the new myki smartcard compared to ... [More]
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Frugality part 2: spreading the load
My Yearly Metcard is almost up for renewal, and I was pondering if I can somehow organise to stagger it and my other biggish expenses for the year? Yearly ticket — $1065. Mine expires in April, so if I want the cheap price I need to order in early-March — about now. If I pay ... [More]
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Frugality
Just so you know, this is not me: Brazen Careerist blogger Daniel Bowen talks about the seven effective habits of highly frugal people. He says frugal types go out of their way to take care of every purchase and spend money on maintenance, as that’s cheaper. Instead of buying, they make things, they set a ... [More]
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Discovering colours
Years ago I wrote a short piece for Toxic Custard about the discovery of a new primary colour: The art world was rocked yesterday at the announcement of Professor Hans Von Fabre of the discovery of a new primary colour. The fourth primary colour, to be known as hans, will revolutionise art and technology all ... [More]
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Snacks
Just comparing some of the snacks I regularly take into work, or buy from the charity boxes or fundraiser boxes. Snack Sultanas 40g Banana 118g Apple 182g Giant Freddo Frog 40g Carmans Apricot & almond muesli bar Mars Bar 60g Energy 536 kJ 440 kJ 396 kJ 884 kJ 796 kJ 1150 kJ Protein 1.1 ... [More]
Sunday afternoon, waiting for the 6:40. Yes, people with grey hair use laptops too. “Mind the gap” is something familiar to Londoners (where some of the gaps really are worth minding), but this warning has recently shown up at Footscray. Monday the 16th was not a good day on the Frankston line. I didn’t have ... [More]
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Fiddling with the web server
Fiddling with the web server. Comments will be disabled for a little while, and you may notice some other glitches in the next little while. Update. Moved to new server. Consolidating hosting plans. Not as smooth as I hoped. WP2.7.1 broke some bits of it. 2.7 looks better. Thursday morning. Just waiting for the DNS ... [More]
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Deprecated
I always used the term depreciated, but according to Wikipedia it’s deprecated. It’s not trying to say it’s lost it’s value; it’s trying to say you’re discouraged from using it. In computer terms it generally means something that has been replaced by something better/newer, but it’s still kept around for backwards compatibility. I officially launched ... [More]
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Snake tales
A story I heard a while back… Friend of friend driving along an unsealed country road. As is common in dry weather, the car was causing the dirt and rocks to go flying around. Driver had his arm out the window. Something hit his arm. At first he thought it was a stick. He glanced ... [More]
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The iron
I just dropped the iron. No, it didn’t cause any kind of comical foot injury, but it did cause a crack in the iron. Time to go shopping for a new one. It’s a Sunbeam iron. Lasted 15+ years I think. I’ll happily buy another one. I wonder if they’re on sale anywhere this week? ... [More]
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That picture again
That picture showed up again, this time in an article I wrote for Planning News. I like the blur they’ve put on it.
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Medicinal reasons
I’d been meaning to write about this anyway, but one of Richard’s Twitter posts reminded me: If only more medical problems could be solved by simply ingesting more caffeine. The world would be a better place. Indeed. The cluster headaches I suffered from last summer did return this year, but happily the medication has been ... [More]