Plantagenet Penguinista

I used to write articles for computer magazines, but am wondering if there’s anything else you know of which is begging to be written about? For a random example, I get on well with all children, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that I’d be good at writing for them. For another, I enjoy reading a wide range of SciFi, but again that doesn’t mean that I’ll be much chop a creating same. So, if you have a favourite obsession which you reckon is begging to have more writing done about it, please drop a comment with some key words. (-:

I have bought myself exactly two expensive toys in the last year (well, technically, it could be called three). One was a Canon 40D DSLR camera kit including a Sigma 50-80 lens (the lens was about half of the cost of the kit proper). The other was an 18-200 lens, featuring nine-fold zoom. Bought just in time, too, from a rather special staffer at the Northbridge shop, who also goes photographer for Heavy Metal concerts, & is amused by the security dudes literally catching idiots leaping the fence at her. The price has just risen about 15% (not due to AU$ falling, due to suppliers being hammered by the global recession), & is due to rise another 15-20% about now. I’ve had opportunity to take a few real photos with these, but also managed to have a little fun. Fun is actually quite important — from a functional perspective — & quite a significant achievement at the moment. Yesterday, en route back from Lesmurdie Falls , I ran across Honey Rd . Rather than pu...

Today, I was able to sing a brace of duets with my girlfriend in Wisconsin... except that she was in the next state, a bit over 3 hours from home. Never mind, duets it was. The site which enables this modern wonder ties you to it by only publishing the songs as a Flash video... so, with the DownloadHelper plugin for FireFox, I was able to capture said video clips... Now, more modern technology starts to kick in. Using FFmpeg plus lame , I can rip the sound-track from the FLV file, cramming it into an MP3. All of this software technology so far is completely Free & portable, it runs on Mac & ’Doze as well. Next, we jam a $10 exHardlyNormal MP3 player into the USB socket, to copy on those MP3s. Now I can listen to us singing as I wander around the local foodWorks store... hmmm... should pick up a set of $3 mini-headphones to replace these ghastly earbud thingies... a set of the SuperBass ones from King Kong Innaloo should do...

Borrowed from someone else’s ’blog, but this really hits my sense of humour. A gynæcologist had become fed up with paperwork, rules & malpractice insurance, so was burned out. Hoping to try another career where skillful hands would be beneficial, he decided to become a mechanic. He went to the local technical college, signed up for evening classes, attended diligently, & learned all he could. When the time for the practical exam approached, the gynæcologist prepared carefully for weeks & completed the exam with tremendous skill. When the results came back, he was surprised to find that he’d obtained a score of 150%. Fearing an error, he called the instructor, saying, “I don’t want to appear ungrateful for such an outstanding result, but I wonder if there is an error in the grade.” The instructor said, “During the exam, you took the engine apart perfectly, which was worth 50% of the total mark. You put the engine back toge...

I took a ’phone call today from a bloke whose company was once neighbours for a customer of mine. Their Linux server, after sending me statues emails every day for over 8 years, & not being touched at all in the last 5 years, had stopped working. SecureSHell will be your friend. The /var partition is completely full. So... axed a few log files which were not being rotated, restarted the services involved, working in about 40 seconds. I arranged with the IT bloke to get a new IDE hard drive, will drop in to spend half of an hour copying the partitions across (but making bigger /var & /usr partitions en passant ), done. It does in fact have a virus scanner. Inbound mail is pumped through it. Otherwise, no worries. The server, built on common-or-garden hardware, has not blinked in 8 years.

It turns out that I had not been on said Pension for 2 weeks at the time of my last post... nice of CentreLink to say so... I eventually saw paperwork dated 23Jan, advising me to destroy cards on 12Jan due to termination on 16Jan... d’oh? I have found a potential ThingToDo, short-term at least, namely set up wireless Internet connectivity for the small country town of Kellerberrin. This town (205km east of Perth in Western Australia) is kind of unique. It is the only WA country town to have grown in 2008. It sees Prospector trains 9 times a week, each way (at 160km/h), plus AvonLink trains (3 times a week, each way, cheaper) plus coaches. It has a hospital, swimming pool, a few excellent shops, 7-day IGA supermarket, many sporting clubs, numerous tourist attractions (like Shark Mouth, a very special rock, & some impressive salt-lakes). Champion Roadhouse in the area goes to neighbours Tammin. I am thinking of hooking it up through a flat-strap ADSL1 link, with local DNS, we...