So now we’re on "daylight savings" time for the coming summer(*), which of course is the time of year when we don’t really need daylight savings, because the days are longer. What about if we stayed on summer time all year so we could get a little more light in the winter evenings? Is that ... [More]
Around some school crossings you’ll now see the acronym "SLLT" painted on the footpath, a reminder to Stop, Look, Listen and… umm… do something else I can’t remember at the moment, before you cross the street. It’s probably backed up by a primary school education campaign of some kind. Wait a moment, "SLLT"?! I’m sure ... [More]
A few weeks ago we found ourselves heading home after dinner at a friend’s place, a few hours spent stuffing ourselves with food and wine. Not too many hours though; with a small child called Isaac in tow it’s not quite so easy to paint the town completely red, so we were heading back to ... [More]
<RING RING> "Hello?" "Dean." "What?" "Dean." "I think you have a wrong number." Don’t you love the way people try to argue the point with you? Until it’s proven otherwise they refuse to admit that they’ve misdialled. No way, my fingers are very co-ordinated. This guy must be wrong. Dean must be there. I don’t ... [More]
Phew, it’s good to be home. Two days away on a business trip/getaway/team building exercise/workshop thingy, out in the sticks. Well, okay, out in Eltham, which used to be the sticks and is now the outer outer suburbs. So not quite a getaway from the city, but almost. I got a lift with a workmate, ... [More]
I’ve been trying to avoid this, but I don’t think there’s any way around this. I think we have stupid neighbours. It’s the garbage collection. Granted, it’s not the ideal set-up. For our block of six flats we have: A set of six small bins for bottle and can recycling. Paper recycling collected from the ... [More]
Last Friday morning I was making my sandwich for lunch in the customary manner. I’d forgotten that I wouldn’t actually need one as we at work were all going out for lunch, but that’s another matter. I decided on my favourite recipe (if you can call it that) of ham, cheese and lettuce. Actually "decided" ... [More]
I think I got the travel bug during our US trip in April. It’s so refreshing to go somewhere different. But for small doses of that kind of experience, perhaps it’s not necessary to go flying off to different continents, and with it the risks of travelling – crashes, hijacks and the most dangerous, airline ... [More]
It’s good to see the Dalai Lama getting a good reception on his current visit to Australia. I wonder anyone will tell him the joke someone said on Good News Week last week, about "Dalai Lamas in Pyjamas"? It has possibilities… D2: "Are you thinking what I’m thinking, D1?" D1: "I think I am, D2!" ... [More]
We just bought a new pram. Oh, sorry, a stroller. It’s so much different from a pram, you know. The old one is on its last legs, that is to say, on its last wheels. Okay, so it’s not quite that far gone, but it’s getting there. We treat our prams rough. So we splashed ... [More]
With the bulk of people on my project at work departing at the end of the month, a plethora of social activities have been scheduled to make sure we miss each other all the more after September. Lunches, barbecues, wine tours, cancelled ski weekends… and this week, indoor soccer is scheduled. And when I play, ... [More]
Clearing out some old uni notes over the weekend I found in a margin this gem of creativity that you might enjoy. Or perhaps not. "Earless Dead Geriatric Destitute Teenage Mutant Ninja Bignosed Cowboys Who Need Dental Treatment" Most of the other scrawlings on my lecture notes seemed to either be related to being extremely ... [More]