emunctory

91km Bike Ride.

2011-11-28T09:10:00.004+11:00

Starting from Marsfield at 6:30 AM

- Down to Browns Water Hole

- Kissing Point Road

- North Turramurra

- Bobbin Head, a big gorge with a 4km climb out

- Suburban roads to Galston

- Gaslton Gorge, a big gorge with a steep 4km climb out

- around the back of Dural

- Down to Berowa Waters, my top speed on a bike ever down the hill, but as with all hills you ride down ...

- Cross the river on the car ferry and then up up up out of the gorge.

- Back to Bobbin Head (via Mt Kur-ring-gai and Mt Colah just for laughs)

- Bobbin Head gorge again this time in the other direction.

- Back through North Turramurra - Kissing Point Road

Its the first big ride I have done in decades, and I did it on a mountain bike - with knobbly tires. Only the second time I have used cleats - the one other time was in the gym on a stationary bike. I ate like a horse about half way through, drank 4 liters of water and finished about 2kg lighter than when I started so I must have sweated 6L. Average speed was around 21 kph, 11 on the climbs. Total vertical was about 1km. The trip home from Turramurra was slow and my legs felt like wood. I was so exhausted I was swearing under my breath with every pedal stroke.

I still had to mow the lawn and do the gardening when I got home.

I slept well.

Today my bum, or rather the inside of my upper thighs is a little sore, as are my hamstrings behind my knee. Other than that I feel like I could do it again.

A ride mapped on 11/27/2011

Find more Cycling Routes / Bike Rides in NSW, Australia

Suburban Recovery

2011-10-22T21:55:00.002+11:00

I know I should be posting about the ski trip but I couldn't let my lovely wife's attempt to park the car in the garage go un-commented.

Perhaps we should let the pictures tell the story:

Ended up ripping a 10cm gash in the tire wall. These are armored tires mind.

Ten Years

2011-09-30T19:34:00.001+10:00

It's our tenth anniversary today.

Where has the time gone?

Long holls

2011-09-30T17:56:00.005+10:00

We've now returned from a fab trip to Fiji and then skiing in Australia.

Part 1, Fiji:
Qamea island is a little dot of land about an hours plane trip north east from Nandi - well to the nearest island with an airstrip at any rate - then you have to take the minivan to the opposite side of the island and then a boat trip across the straights and then finally to Qamea. Greeted with a bottle of bubbly - I knew I was going to like it. 10 days of intermittent diving and relaxing. We did our advanced open water course amidst the clownfish in some of the best diving in the world . For the drift dive, or diving in a current component of our course we did the aptly named "Swirling Coconuts" dive in such a strong current that the dive master later told us he was going to call an end to the dive the moment we got to depth as he had never seen the current so strong - we got whipped around in an underwater maelstrom - but apparently we looked comfortable so he continued. On reflection the vigorous current that was sweeping us over the underwater features with such velocity was probably spinning the blood out of my face - thus accounting for the calm look. Saw my first trumpet fish at 10 knots. So many memorable moments that it's hard to pick what to write about - the manta ray cruising past, diving through caves in the reef at The Great White Wall in the Somosomo Straights (regarded as one of the absolute best dives in the world), being attacked by nemo - don't believe the movie, Nemo is a vicious little beast.
But it wasn't all two hour massages and piña coladas - there was some hard work to be done. We had to choose between reading our books in the hammock or on the beach lounge - nobody should ever have to make a decision that hard.

Back in a month

2011-08-22T11:59:00.003+10:00

Married for 10 whole years so we are off on a long long holiday - Fiji without the kids and then Skiing with them (if there is any snow left).

Don't do anything I wouldn't do whilst I'm gone.

Surf

2011-07-25T09:58:00.003+10:00

The NSW coast has been hit by a series of big swells
I got out in it for a few hours last weened and this Weekend just passed.
Sitting in a giant swell whist mountains of water crash past you is fucking exciting. I'm not that good a surfer. I'm a good swimmer, comfortable swimming around in it but only a weekend warrior when it comes to negotiating the surf with a 1.7m pointy fiberglass board with blades (three of them for good measure). I caught some good ones, got smashed and rag-dolled through the washing machine a few times. I judged that my bigger 'fun board' was too big to duck dive easily in this swell and I needed to be sure I could get under the waves - the tradeoff is that as you select a smaller shorter board they are slower to paddle and when you try to catch a wave you have to be exactly in the right spot (you can't paddle in or out as fast to be in the right place) and you tend to end up higher on the face before you have the speed to 'pop' (i.e. stand). You do not want to be up high on the lip of a wave tied to a fiberglass block resplendent with points and blades as the wave breaks or it will throw you forward and you will get to experience water in a whole new way. Shorter boards are also less forgiving about body position on take off and if you are too far forward they will nose dive, catapulting you forward into the abyss only to be met by the lip as is crashes down and aquatints you with the bottom before it surges you around a few times. But short boards move over the water more nimbly once you are up and running.
I did a bit of both but still managed a few long and exciting rides on some of the biggest waves I have ever played on - certainly the biggest I have been on in the last 10 years.

I fucking love volcanoes

2011-07-05T13:45:00.000+10:00

Chores

2011-05-29T18:35:00.003+10:00

Just cleaning up again this weekend. Gardening, cleaning windows and bugs out of the outdoor lighting, replacing bulbs - that sort of thing. Entirely unremarkable.

Bushwalk

2011-05-15T23:02:00.003+10:00

Quite the loveliest walk.

Camping

2011-04-10T12:51:00.003+10:00

We got away for a bit of camping this month just gone.
The first was up to Stockton Beach, just north of New Castle for a weekend of driving with the Toyota club, the other was with friends a little way up north (at a nudist beach :-) The weather was not on it's best behavior. With enough rain to cause a decent flood in Sydney. The morning was made all the ore exciting with a little brown snake (v. deadly) sharing the camp ground with us.

Stockton

In the news

2011-04-01T18:13:00.001+11:00

This and This.

Buggered that I can't find picks of the later either.

In case of rapture

2011-03-24T15:33:00.002+11:00

If you find yourself left behind you may find these resources useful.

What - NZ Beats Us !*&%!#$

2011-03-24T10:47:00.001+11:00

Beaten by NZ where it counts - that hurts.

Accosted by the Christians ...

2011-03-16T19:38:00.002+11:00

Accosted by the Christians at uni and invited to a bible study class I was asked by a young lady what my favorite bible passage was.

Ezekiel 23:20 I replied, giving her lovely flat chest a healthy amount of attention before I walked off.

Accents

2011-03-15T09:15:00.001+11:00

If the sound is out of sync blame youtube.
Ute et al meamed me to do this.

Natural Disaster Levy

2011-02-02T15:43:00.002+11:00

The poor cunts in Queensland: the paper today says don't panic if your roof blows off. WTF? I think that you are entitled to a tincey tiny little panic if your fucking roof blows off. Keep a raincoat handy - It's a fucking cat 5 cyclone. You'll need something a little more prophylactic to keep the rain off than a rain coat. Hide in the toilet they say - sensible advise at least - you can bet that if I was in the path of cat 5 cyclone that was taking my roof off I'd need a visit to the loo.

Now these pricks that are contesting Julia's Flood Levi should pull their right wing heads in. Me - I'd be happy to contribute to a permanent Natural Disaster Levy to help rebuild and recover from fire, flood etc - to buy rescue equipment and rebuild national infrastructure. Not to be used to insure against marginal or unsafe development and protect people from the stupid but to be used in ways that help all of us or a whole region.

Current temp: 40.7°C

2011-02-01T17:27:00.004+11:00

I know, I'm a soft city boy now, gone are the days of working as a geo out in the Western Desert where it was routinely 47 and occasionally it would touch 50 C yet you still put in a solid days work. But these days steeping out from the aircon into 40 something heat is stunning. It is an experience that is hard to describe - it's not like a sauna that you can get out of - everywhere you turn it is that same heat.
I'm looking at some photos a blog friend send me (thanks btw) of a backyard covered in snow that I want to fall into and spend all day making snow angels.

I'm limping a little, damaged by a surf session on Sunday at Avalon, where I got brutalised by the cyclone swell from the last storm that crosses the Qld coast. As I write this I'm playing my tongue across the chips in my teeth earned by being stupid enough not to close my mouth when I got barreled playing beyond my ability.

Meanwhile Yasi is knocking on the Queensland doorstep. This bastard is bigger than NSW:

(clickety click) - from here

'Stralia Day

2011-01-26T15:43:00.005+11:00

What could be more Aussie than getting blasted by a few bluies down the beach on 'Stralia Day?

A misty but hot Australia Day spend down at Freshwater Beach. Bit squishy in surf due to the carnival taking up most of the beach.

Fucking Floods.

2011-01-20T09:04:00.001+11:00

'Av a listen to what the Fat Aussie Bastard has to say about food prices in Queensland..

This bloke has a great story.

A bucket of prawns in the sun.

2011-01-01T19:47:00.005+11:00

New Years Eve was spent with mum, Alex and the kids enjoying the tunes belted out by a local chick in the beer-garden under the country club. It has a casual beauty, sandwiched as it is between the bowling green and the golf club car-park it overlooks the ocean, dunes and lakes, kangaroos pause in a mob around the t-off just below the fence and a strong sea breeze brings a briny haze. A few locals are trying to make a go of a burger business, barbecuing up the scotch fillet stakes for filling the local fresh "still warm from the oven" focatcia style buns, the local market gardens providing the salad so fresh it still drips sap.

Entree is a bucket of prawns, literally. Enjoyed with a chilled sav blank and a Coopers or three.

It's a picturesque 3k walk back around the lake to mums house.

This is country.

It's bark is worse in this light

2010-12-24T09:25:00.004+11:00

Eucalyptus saligna forms a continuous hybrid with E. pilularis

The three 50m trees in our backyard are probably slightly towards the saligna end of the spectrum as the branch forks are more open than the pronounced, upright V's of the blackbutts and the perminant bark just covers slightly more than a quarter of the main trunk. The rest of the smooth bark (an infra-red reflecting adaption to frequent fires) sheds annually.
Why the science lesson?:
Our backyard is covered in a substantial layer of bark.

These photos were taken the day after we mowed - less than 24 hrs.

Off on holls down the coast - I'll take some photos for you so you know what you are missing out on.

Any way, Merry Xmas, and a 'appy new one.

Chat next year.

Cheers

Dilemma

2010-12-19T11:53:00.002+11:00

My daughter who does gymnastics at a fairly well regarded local gym school that has turned out several international (i.e. Olympic level) gymnasts is building its international level coaching and, a week ago invited my daughter to try out..

She has been has been asked to train with their International Development Program.

This is a big deal. The gym is, as I said, well regarded, families relocate cities to give their kids the opportunity to train in these programs with these international coaches. It just so happens that it is the most local gym to us. We only ever intended for gym to be something fun for our kids to do that would give them a good basic kinetics and help develop them physically. We've watched the elite kids training and said over and over to ourselves that we will never get involved in that - the tens of hours a week that those kids train, the injuries, the childhood lost.

And now she has been asked to try out - and been asked to continue in the highest stream, we don't know what to do:

On the one hand this could be a fab opportunity for her to develop her confidence and physicality, on the other hand it's an enormous ask of a 6 year old, the time commitment, the opportunity cost, the family focus and commitment required, all for what exactly? The chance to compete on the world stage and the minuscule chance that it would be rewarded .... do you deny your child a chance like this when offered?

A dilemma

Conversation with a 4 yearold

2010-12-10T14:39:00.002+11:00

4 year old: "Dad! I found a worm crawling outside."

Me: "Hold on, I'll get a knife and fork for us."

I get the knife and fork and run outside with him.

4 year old, looking up at me, puzzled expression: "Why didn't you get two plates??"

The Antikythera mechanism (in Lego)

2010-12-10T09:58:00.004+11:00

The Antikythera mechanism is a mechanical computer thought to have been built around 150BC or slightly later. It accurately predicts a range of astronomical phenomena such as eclipses. Mechanically it is more than a thousand years ahead of it's time. Which makes me think yet again where would be we technologically today if not for the decent into religious fundamentalism of the dark ages.

Some cleaver bunny has built it out of lego:

(p.s. I'd put $100 bucks on it that it was built by a bloke, a chick would-never be gh33ky enough to do this)

Human tails for young fairies

2010-12-09T08:25:00.002+11:00

On some of the longer car trips we have been undertaking recently we have been listening to the first of the Harry Potter audio books. For the most part they are beyond my little man (he's 4) but he's been asking some fairly detailed questions that show he's been getting more of it than I thought. It's unusual for our kids to get any TV but last night we played about half of the first movie as a treat. Having listened to the story and now seeing it it's been great to see how they've really got into a fairly complex story.
If they don't have nightmares I may give them my version of Snow Wight and the Seven Dwarfs.

A few days down at the beach house

2010-12-02T12:19:00.007+11:00

We were going to go up to Fingle Bay for a friends 40th but the starter motor on the $x$ carked it and couldn't be replaced in time so instead we headed south to the beach house at Rosedale. We copped a fair bit of rain and a huge swell - and me w/o my board :-(
I made do with the old shark biscuit and managed to catch a few although the swell ended up being so big I was too tired to fight it and ended up missing even the easiest of waves. Photos for those inclined or with a fast connection are here else these ones are prolly the best:
I love the look on his face when I try to catch him

She smiles most of the time regardless.

Me on the esky lid

And finally a shaky cam of me not catching any waves - too busy watching the dolphins swimming past. The surf here was about 1m, through the day it built to over 3m of pounding crunching nastiness.

The Propper Car Wash

2010-11-17T00:30:00.006+11:00

And other picks from our trip with the Toyota Landcruser Club out to the Wollondilly River via the tracks south east from Oberon.

Violence against women

2010-11-15T11:22:00.002+11:00

25 Nov is White Ribbon Day

Men are good.

Regardless of the emotional abuse and thoughtlessness many men are subjected to throughout their lives, men are still good.

Hurt and frustrated that many of their basic needs are marginalised and emotionally isolated in many ways men still endeavor to do everything right. Men have pored their energies into their families, through work, (often in dangerous and stressful and difficult jobs) and at home they have protected and provided, been there for their kids and wives. These are good men.

Whilst we can draw a line through Greer and Wolf through to the present day which heaps the ills of the universe on the backs of men there is no ribbon to recognise the good men do, no sympathy for the powerless frustration they feel.

I support White Ribbon Day, and Pink, Red Rainbow and every other fucking Ribbon Day. But to the implicit misandry in this particular day I say fuck you, because men are good.

Armistice Day

2010-11-11T10:55:00.001+11:00

We shall remember them.

How many inches ???

2010-11-02T17:35:00.004+11:00

It seems to me that no matter how big it is - chicks are never impressed.

Good pizza but:

Storm at Balmoral

2010-10-23T17:35:00.001+11:00

Saturday sushi and storm.

SLSA

2010-10-21T10:50:00.003+11:00

Many years ago I volunteered as a surf lifesaver and did patrol at Tamaramma, North Bondi and Freshwater beaches for a few years. Any way - I saw this add recently - made me a little nostalgic. If you don't know CPR please make an effort to go learn.

The only inaccuracy in this vid is the lack of vomit.
They always vomit.

Fi fi foe fum

2010-10-15T15:32:00.003+11:00

_{(image shamelessly pinched from The Sun)}

That most erudite of English publications, The Sun, ran a campaign after the last Olympics celebrating their victory over us in the medal tally by driving billboards around London and Sydney with the respective gold medal counts.

Shall we take a look at the results after the recent Commonwealth Games in India..
Oh look - 74 to 37. So. to the English: Stick that up your bum.
And it's not a fluke, shall we take a look at the over all tally since the inaugural Commonwealth Games?
Oh look - 803 to 612.
You Pommies best be careful come Manchester - oh, and you probably need to bolster your numbers by competing with Scotland, Ireland and Wales.

Beating the Poms is almost as enjoyable as beating the Kiwis.

Alternate National Anthem

2010-10-06T11:11:00.001+11:00

To the drunk bloke with the half finished tats laying on the grass outside the pool this morning - The lyrics are thus:

Traveling in a fried-out combie
On a hippie trail, head full of zombie
I met a strange lady, she made me nervous
She took me in and gave me breakfast
And she said,

"Do you come from a land down under?
Where women glow and men plunder?
Can't you hear, can't you hear the thunder?
You better run, you better take cover."

Buying bread from a man in Brussels
He was six foot four and full of muscles
I said, "Do you speak-a my language?"
He just smiled and gave me a vegemite sandwich
And he said,

"I come from a land down under
Where beer does flow and men chunder
Can't you hear, can't you hear the thunder?
You better run, you better take cover."

Lying in a den in Bombay
With a slack jaw, and not much to say
I said to the man, "Are you trying to tempt me
Because I come from the land of plenty?"
And he said,

"Oh! Do you come from a land down under? (oh yeah yeah)
Where women glow and men plunder?
Can't you hear, can't you hear the thunder?
You better run, you better take cover."

HIp hOp

2010-10-05T13:36:00.009+11:00

Never liked it. Rap distilled everything I hate in music into a polished easily avoided product. I'm sure in the vein of Spear Head there is a great tradition of intelligent, thoughtful, clever, lyrical rap and beats in the States but American rap and hip hop's stupendous ego and self promotion, gun worship, focus on money, cars and sexism shrink wraps it all into one putrid pile of shit.

But I'm now slowly coming around - Over the last few years I've been discovering Australian hip hop. It's not a facsimile of the American product. It has grown up and now has roots firmly planted in Australian culture and unashamedly, unselfconsciously reflects and comments on the Australian social and political landscape. Tunes you can really listen to and bop along with. Tunes and lyrics that are so Australian I don't think non Aussies could appreciate just how local and relevant they are. Australian hip hop has something to say. Rap has always found fertile ground in personal self reflection and Aussies have never feared talking about their failure (Matty B, I'm looking at you), and personal pain, Bias B missing his mum brings me to tears. When he's not taking the piss fist fucking freedom that is.

Loving The Heard, whether it's wrapping political lyrics around a traditional Australian shanty, the soft target of AWB and Australia's involvement in the Middle East or shaking up the cunts and dancing on the pricks head - contemporary lyrics with a truly Australian cant - "got your arse played in mandarin" aha ha ha, sorry Johney. They do a tops recut of Redgum's classic (<- XL Mate, that's for you). Urthboy, the MC for The Heard has a bunch of good tunes but I particularly like this one taking the piss out'a the local evangelicals

According to voting on various JJJ (the yuff station) hit lists the Hilltop Hoods have the most popular AHH tune.

I love how much Aussie hip hop is about having a few (too many) with your mates:
Dialectrix - Pieces Of A Puzzle, Bliss N Eso - Down by the River the reddest red neck local tune I know of, Matty B - Aussie Weekender, Funkoars - The Hangover are all good tunes.
The Brits aren't half bad at over consumption either.

How about this anthem to low rent living: My whole life needs a coat of paint., and I laugh at the cow bell hidden away in Nothing To Lose.

AHH is heaps good

I just hope the cunts don't put their caps on backwards or I'm going back to Flame Trees.

p.s. If you've got issues with posts full of youtube clips you can get fucked.

What a month

2010-09-22T09:32:00.006+10:00

Big things at work, big enough that my job is changing - in a good way - i'm just going to be very busy.
But that's on top of an already hectic schedule.

Fuck we are busy.

Normally between parents in law, two aunts, a sister & brother in law, my wife and I, we manage to get through the week with all the kids getting to and from school / day care, nobody starving, cloths washed and enough slack to do get a car serviced or arrange for a fridge to be repaired, pool pumps fixed etc.

This last few weeks between my wife going oversees for work here and there, sister / brother in law divorce, parents in law and aunt traveling for 6 weeks or so Everything is at a constant run. I'm particularly missing Maria (wife's aunt) who helps us with the heavy lifting of child care, school and laundry and tidying around the house mid week (what's so good about traveling to Egypt and Europe any way?). There are some really good things happening in life at the moment but I just don't feel I've got the time to really enjoy it all. Selfishly took some time last night, forgot to make a kids lunch this AM which blew out the already stretched morning schedule. Missing ideal trains, means have to start / leave work later therefore be back at home later.

I've also more than halved my drinking but it's been a bit bingy with all the 40ths and parties - perhaps I'm not sleeping so well.

Any way - don't expect much creative from me, I'm feeling a bit rushed.

Last day of my 30's

2010-09-04T08:29:00.001+10:00

A moment to reflect perhaps Think I've done everything and everyone I had planned.

The Lodge

2010-09-01T06:34:00.001+10:00

Preperations for my 40th are well underway

2010-08-30T11:57:00.002+10:00

Are 18 bottles of campaign enough?

Narraburra Ski Lodge

2010-08-26T11:48:00.002+10:00

Thanks once again dad for building a Ski Lodge with your mates.

Back

2010-08-22T09:48:00.001+10:00

Back from skiing. Had a really nice time. I've a heap of photos and some vanity movies we took that I'll upload over the next few days.

The Australian Sex Party

2010-08-13T11:14:00.001+10:00

For Realz
Do you think they'll attract the swinging voters?

---- Edit ----

This was on their website, and it's legit!

P.S.

2010-08-11T09:07:00.001+10:00

What do you think of this Grindr app.

I think it would totally take off in the straight world too. Absolutely everybody would get on board looking for casual partners.. Except the girls.

Skiing

2010-08-11T08:51:00.002+10:00

It's all a bit busy here to post. Second week of semester, packing, organising my 40th etc.

Taking the kids down to the lodge next week - A week on the snow (what of it there is) should be good. One of my good mates is coming down too. He's a boarder tho' - guess he can't help it.

Expect photos in a week and a half or so.

That time of the year

2010-08-03T09:20:00.002+10:00

First week of semester. Students back. All the enrollment systems that I run have been working overtime for the last week. The second busiest time of the year for me, long hrs and all that.

Oh and wife is away for a fortnight. Just in case I thought the pressure was not enough already.

On the bright side I'm going skiing in two weeks.

Sheeps Head Soup

2010-07-20T16:24:00.003+10:00

We found a hundred year old cookbook at the holiday house. "The Goulburn cookery book", compiled by Mrs Forster Rutledge.
First published: 1899

Life in the Australian bush was remote and difficult. The population was low and spread thinly over vast distances. The difficulties of obtaining materials, storing and preserving food and facing the daily challenges and dangers of life created the "Australian Character". This was a classic book of that era. Check out some of the recipes

Cover:

Preface:

Sheeps Head Soup

Nina Persson

2010-07-13T09:58:00.002+10:00

I have no fucking idea what you are saying - but I sure like her head - If anybody ever wants to make me a robot this is the kind of head I like.

Pot Noodle

2010-07-12T16:14:00.001+10:00

How many years can it be out of date and still be edible ?

Cold snap

2010-07-07T15:38:00.002+10:00

Cold enough to play in the frost

Cold enough MY VODKA FROZE !!!!!

Life's sometimes not quite what you expect..

2010-07-01T14:27:00.008+10:00

I always wanted to be a great dad. Really actively involved with the kids, teaching, guiding them. I always thought that by being there that they would be great kids too.
I still think I am and that they are. Just perhaps not in the way I thought it would be.

The way it was imagined.	The way it turned out
Happy school kids running to mum or dad's arms after school, over sized school bag bouncing from side to side.	Parent: "come on, we have to go" Child: Parent: "come on, bring your drawing, you can finish it at home" Child: Parent: "If you don't come now [insert threat now]" Child: "coming" Parent: "Where's your school bag ?" Child:
Happy kids eating eating a huge variety of nutritious food. No junk food	Having to bring our own cheese to any sort of nibbles tpe get together because our kids will devour a block of brie and eat every olive in site, however when it comes to healthy foods one will eat one, perhaps two vegetables and the other will eat anything - but only ever half of what you put in front of her (except brie)
Happy kids playing together	Child 1: "it's mine" Child 2: "it's mine" Child 2: "it's mine" Child 1: "it's mine"
Happy kids happily doing what their parents ask	Parent: "It's time to [insert task]." Child: Parent: "Come on, It's time to [insert task]." Child: Parent: "LISTEN !!!!, THIS IS THE LAST TIME, [insert demand] or [insert threat] ." Child:

This is why I had a happy child at dinner last night, eating vegies, finishing all their food and not getting rice everywhere (strapped to their chair with two parents yelling).

Could be worse, I could end up on this list.

Driver Training

2010-06-29T10:54:00.006+10:00

Alex and I completed the Driver Training and Recovery modules of the Toyota Land Cruiser Club over the weekend.
Rain, frost, fires, mud - it was a hoot.
If I get 10 spare mins I'll edit up some of the other picks and vids and but raw stuff is here

Stripper on the rock

2010-06-29T09:24:00.003+10:00

To climb or not to climb.

I'm a geologist - I've made my living through understanding the very earth that makes this country, the past life, fossils, and earth shaping events that have changed it over billions of years.
Tho genetically I'm ultimately from the UK, my great great grandparents were born here. The atoms that make my body are from the wheat and sheep and other plants that grow and graze on this land.
I am made of Australia.
I am Australian.
Aboriginals are no more connected to the land than I and have no greater claim than I.
It is my rock too.

And I wish to climb it. For me it is a near spiritual experience - to look out over the vast desert it commands and be Australian.

This chick's behavior insults the grandeur of the place and is disrespectful to everyone. However, the argument that the rock should not be climbed is still not valid. The rock is symbolically important to European and all other Australians as well.

Whatever Aboriginal Australian's my wish we are here to stay now. We are 'sorry' but we can't apologise for being here - we to have sacred sites to which we make our pilgrimages in ways appropriate to our culture and identity.
Aboriginal Australia needs to come to terms with the fact that locking people out of picturesque and majestic places will not engender non-aboriginal people with a will to protect and conserve our fragile landscape.

Stuff white peopel like

2010-06-23T09:09:00.002+10:00

So we recently joined a different $x$ club. Nothing against the old club, just that this new one is for people with bigger cars. The Toyota Land Cruser Club is the biggest in Oz, they do heaps of stuff and happen to own some great land not far out of Sydney. This should make it easier to get the kids used to camping without having to drive for-ev-ah to get out into the proper bush.

We joined a few months ago as provisional members but to become a full member you have to complete their driver training course. The theory section was last Monday and this weekend we head away for the practical. Two days of track driving and vehicle recovery.
I'm hoping too that we meet some like minded people. Memo too self - Don't be a know all kunt.

I just fitted an an awning to the alloy roof basket: the idea being to be able to quickly set up a rain or sun shelter for a brief stop or a big undercover area.

Overnight temps in Goulburn near to where we are going are dipping below freezing. Pack a warm jacket me thinks.

Irony

2010-06-18T18:25:00.003+10:00

Shallow cut and past caz I'm shallow and tired and just don't give a shit tonight and have to go to a 5 year olds ballet concert tomorrow.

Attributed to Maddow Blog, via huffingtonpost

Guitjo

2010-06-11T09:42:00.003+10:00

Guitar practice is going well, sort of. I have earned myself some calloused tips - I can manage Twinkle Twinkle and the first phrase or two of Classical Gass. I know where all the notes are, can read simple music wo thinking about it.

Right now aspirations far exceed talent.

How do you tell the difference between a 6 string banjo, a guitjo and a banjitar, and what is the tuning of said chimera?

Picks over the next few days

Divide by zero error

2010-06-01T13:50:00.003+10:00

Someone in Guatemala tried to divide by zero on their calculator.

Picks from the Guatemalan Governments flickr.

82% un-pure, but less than half weird.

2010-05-28T15:57:00.005+10:00

I answered "yes" to 82 of 100 questions, making me 18.0% sexually pure (82.0% sexually corrupt)
My Weirdness Factor (AKA Uniqueness Factor) is 41%, based on a comparison of my test results with 1219397 other submissions for this test.

Let me know how you go: Purity Test

Hot August Night

2010-05-25T15:43:00.002+10:00

I recon Neil sounds better now then he did in the 60's

The iPhone is good but...

2010-05-24T08:37:00.003+10:00

... now my dear wife emails me the shopping list when I'm out taking the kids to gymnastics, you know, just to fit in on the way home:

Here is the shopping list - I think it is pretty much in the order that you would walk up and down the isles.

If you see some vegies on special which would make good soup, then get some.

4kg potatoes
6 tomatoes
4 bananas
fresh ginger
1 bag mushrooms
1 rockmelon
2 carrots
1 green capsicum
1 red capsicum
2 small cucumbers
1 bunch shallots
1/2 celery bunch
1 baby cos lettuce
1 avocado ( if you can find a nice one)
big tub of dried apricots
1 punnet of baby roma tomatoes
1 punnet of the "mixed" cherry tomatoes (inc orange/ purple etc)
1 punnet of strawberries (if they look nice and not too expensive)
1 brocoli
2 zucchini
1 eggplant
2 leaks
1 kumera
1 bunch chinese vegies
1 packet of dry rice noodles

I will let you know if I think of anything else

----
What would you add / subtract from your vegie list ??

Who said:

2010-05-21T14:44:00.000+10:00

I'll sing the Bach you sing the Gounod?

The prize - kudos.

Australian Customs will now search you for porn

2010-05-20T14:44:00.005+10:00

Apparently Australian Customs can now search phones and computers for porn.

I'm going to declare that I'm carrying.

They can search me all they like - I hope they find my giant pornographic cock hidden in my pants.

Conroy is a fucking prick.

Can you stick your hand in liquid nirtogen?

2010-05-18T08:46:00.001+10:00

Leidenfrost protect me.

40th

2010-05-17T13:31:00.003+10:00

Not mine.

Not quite yet. you have to wait about 16 weeks for that.

It was a surprise party for one of my most dear friends, Brad. We got him out of the house to arrange the party on the pretense of going go-carting.

Man those things fly. Average speed was something like 55kph top speed was in the mid 80's. They are rockets - all night I was deeming of the line through the hairpin at the end of the straights and the line through the S's.

I highly recommend it.

Driving home the normally excited Ford Focus felt like a slug.

Brandenburg

2010-05-13T09:49:00.003+10:00

Went to see the Brandenburg last night. The Australian Brandenburg Orchestra play 16th and 17th century Baroque and Classical music on period instruments. Gut strings, harpsichord, theorbo, sackbutt - the works, All period instruments or the best available replicas.

As always it was outstanding.
The Italian soloist Federico Guglielmo was simply stunning

Pachelbel Canon and Gigue in D Major
Telemann Concerto for Violin in G Major, TWV 51:G8
J.S. Bach Orchestral Suite in D Major, BWV 1068
Vivaldi Concerto for 2 Violins in A Major, Op. 3 No. 5
Handel Concerto Grosso in F Major, Op 3 No 4
Handel Passacaglia from Concerto V, HWV 310

All great but the cracker of the evening was Guglielmo virtuoso solo performance

Vivaldi Violin Concerto in D Major, RV 222

I've never seen a performance like it. His fingers were a blur.. It was simply stunning.
I've found a nice version of the third moment here but Guglielmo made it, I don't know - come to life. It sparkled.

Future words to my son

2010-05-11T13:59:00.001+10:00

Your a man.
What are you going to use your strength for?

May the 4th be with you

2010-05-04T09:17:00.002+10:00

Today is International Star Wars Day - Why did nobody tell me. I feel like a failure as a gh33k not to have know of this.
penance
penance
I shall go home and write some more background around my 2nd level 4E Elf Ranger as penance (Twin Shot - round after round, can't go past rolling damage on a d10 twice every round)

Last few weeks

2010-05-03T16:38:00.002+10:00

The last few weeks since dad's death have been a bit up and down.
Thanks to my mates for coming to the funeral and all your support since.

but life goes on.
Particularly enjoying the last of the warm weather.

Hay - Over here ! e-dis-o-dar

2010-04-29T09:35:00.002+10:00

Just trying to get Ekaterina Gerasimova's attention.

The three year old recomends...

2010-04-23T08:26:00.002+10:00

Son and I listen to tunes in the car for the half hr trip from work / day care to home.
I load up the iPod with the recommendations iTunes suggests but he vetoes the songs after listening to the intros and a few seconds of the first verse or so.
The conversation goes something like this:
Son: "put the music on...put the music on...put the music on" X 50.
Dad: ShitAlrightSettelDownImDriving
Son: "put the music on...put the music on...put the music on" X 50.
Dad: puts the music on
Dad: "New songs or ones you like already?"
Son: "New ones."

- songs play -

Son: "No."
- next song -
Son: "No."
- next song -
Son: "No."
- next song -
Son: "No."
- next song -
Son: "More"
- song finishes -
Son: "Again please."
- song repeats -
Son: "Again please."
- song repeats this time he's humming the tune and asks about the words -
Son: "Again please."
- song repeats this time he's singing along complete with bopping head and facial expressions like he's squeezing lemons with his eyes when he hits the high notes -
Son: "No more. Next song please."
etc.

Based on these trips I now bring you three songs he recommends over the last week:

- Sequel out me some skinny love
- Howl out at the moon with furr
- then hit me with that magic beam Sandman

I just burried my dad

2010-04-15T16:29:00.002+10:00

Well - crematorium service ...
I have never cried so much...

To everyone who came - thank you so very much. Dads old friends, new friends, my mates, family, the ski club crowd, all of you, thank you so very much - it meant so much to me to to have you there to help say goodbye.

Odd time to meet my sisters husbands Italian mother for the first time.... Italians seem pretty comfortable with that sort of thing.

I had to do a speech:
Thoughts on dad

I've agonized about this speech for years. And I still don't really know what to say.
There is a well worn path of children burring their parents. But it doesn't make it any easier to accept his death.

Dad never did anything by halves. He quietly ( and often not so quietly ) set about achieving the goals he set himself in life.
By any measure his youth was an adventure. I loved the stories he would tell me of his childhood and as a young man:
- He told me, still with the excitement of that little boy written all over his face, of digging for buried treasure in the back yard of the house and finding a small cash of rusty old guns - treasure for a little boy.
- Of sneaking away as a child and hanging around the neighborhood army barracks in Naremburn where he was sort of a mascot, and the cook would pick him up and put him in the big dirty pot where he would scoop and eat the custard from the walls, and his mum could never figure out why he was still growing but never ate any dinner.
- His toe partially severed by a quarry train where he used to play
- He still, right now has a bullet in lodged his neck, apparently too dangerously situated to be removed, from when he was shot in the back at Artomon oval when wagging school with his mates one day.
- He's also got a bunch of holes drilled in his scull to relieve the pressure on his brain from a surfing injury.

Thankfully he mellowed with marriage and fatherhood but he still had that same drive.
Holidays were awesome, we would go everywhere. How many kids can say that there dad built them a ski lodge?
We'd go camping at the beach, we traveled all around Australia, How many times? two or three trips right around, up and down, through the center and everywhere else.

Childhood with mum and dad was fantastic.
He was always very involved in what we were doing. When we took up competitive swimming he did whatever the study was and became an official time keeper.
He loved soccer. As soon as I was old enough he had me playing for Hornsby RSL. And of course he helped coach. When I played for Kissing Point - he was the coach. When I played for St Leo's - he we the coach. And again he did whatever study was required and qualified as a FIFA coach and as a Soccer Ref.

In a big and busy life He really put in a lot of effort to make sure we kids had the best opportunities.

I asked him a few weeks ago "when was the best time" expecting him to talk more about his mates - the self proclaimed Randy Rovers, Uni, or Nurraburra but he said the best time was "the time with you kids - the family years - with mum and you kids"

He loved being a dad.

I treasure the years we had with him.

Thank you dad for the all the guidance and chats over the years.

I can't believe that I can never pick up the phone and chat to you again.

good by mate - I will miss you terribly

he was my dad

Sad

2010-04-10T16:09:00.001+10:00

I don't have a dad any more.
I'm gutted.

Free advice

2010-03-29T11:41:00.003+11:00

Some free advise.

I had been advised by some cyclist to wear a male g-string type thing under the padded bike pants, that it would be much more comfortable etc....

don't

Do nothing, unsuccessfully

2010-03-24T11:38:00.002+11:00

This is unashamedly a filler post - one I've had here in the drafts for about two years to fill in a dry patch.

UNIX is an arcane and unusual tool. Unix exponents cast spells with magic words such as: PERL, pipes, vi, man, korn, bourne, bin, bash, sed, awk, and grep

But my fav command is

/bin/false

Which by definition does nothing.....
unsuccessfully

No looking on Google - OK

2010-03-18T12:23:00.002+11:00

What do you recon a Jaekelopterus is???

Write down in the comments what your best guess is before you satisfy your curiosity with Google.

Inquiring minds want to know

Shadows

2010-03-16T12:59:00.001+11:00

I was thinking over the weekend how the events of youth can cast a long shadow into adulthood. Or if shadow is too negative a term, how strongly we are influenced by some of those now far distant events.
I had a nostalgic poke through dads old record collection - much as I used to… Who could forget discovering the Tull - Aqualung and Boureé, Fleetwood Mac, Rodriguez floating in the bubble on the Cold Fact cover or floating away with Heikki's Suburbia Bus Tour ride. The warm fuzzy of finding the burnt hombre cover of "Nancy and Lee" . I remember lying on my bedroom floor listening to Lee Hazlewood trying to hit the high notes and tapping my finger to Jakson. Did anybody actually take off their cloths to Peter Starstedt?.
Probably feeling a bit sad about dad had me reaching back in time to happy childhood days and thinking just for a moment how my kids may never have the pleasure if flicking through my record collection - It's all on the iPod.
(p.s. - I was trying to do the iPod silhouette but you can't see the iPod headphone wires in the pic. FAIL)

Bloody good dinner

2010-02-19T00:18:00.001+11:00

Why girls suck

2010-02-17T15:39:00.002+11:00

Well, the good ones at any rate:

Bric A brac

2010-02-10T13:24:00.002+11:00

Busy time of year starting around now
Just booked Ski holiday for Aug
Oldest kid just started school - like proper big school
Dad is doing ok - in that he is not doing any worse
Broken stereo has been fixed
My arthritis has got worse and makes me feel crap - the drugs make the arthritis better but make me feel crap
I've become an old man - I'm growing tomatoes in the garden.
Megan Fox is a mutant - I'm never going to be able to look at a picture of her wo looking closely at her mutant thumb.
The Australian government is soon to enact its ban on pornography and anything else the fuddy duddy wowsers find offensive. This includes making it illegal to show/have/covert an image of a flat chested woman as clearly - who would want to look at a flat chested woman unless they were a pedophile. Depiction of female ejaculation is also deemed illegal. I'm thinking of picking up sticks and moving to a more lenient country - like Saudi.

Just purchased 70 of these

2010-02-04T15:01:00.000+11:00

Dinner, Surfing and Tennis

2010-01-28T17:41:00.003+11:00

I apologise for being a slack-arse and not getting back to all your comments. I'm down south with my dad at the mo and it just doesn't seem right to go hide in the study and surf the net when I can talk to him and surf the point.
I'll get back to you all in a few days.
Watching the tennis more closely this year as we are going to see both the men's and women's finals over the weekend.
Anyways - got to go - leaving in 5 to take dad out to the slap up Chinese down the coast at Bodella. Then flying out tomorrow to Melbourn to catch the women's finals.
I'll 'av a spring roll for ya.

View Larger Map

Australia Day

2010-01-26T11:40:00.002+11:00

Today's Australia Day.

It has been aptly spent fishing and surfing and it's nt even 11:30 in the morning yet.
Went out on the boat with Pat last night and again at sparrows fart this morning and managed to land a large flat head and a few fighting taylor. With salad in a light beer batter I'm go'na 'av 'em for lunch on the deck.
Don't have my board here this time so I went out body surfing and mixed it with the surfers in a pumping 2m swell. Caught some crazy waves. The sea mist kept coming in making for an eerie ambiance. Foggy grey-yellow clouds hugged and swirled around the crystal clear waves. We were out 60m or so, far enough that with the misty you couldn't see the shore or sometimes even the other surfers around you. Out from the mist you'd see the dark green face of a wave and with a few strokes and a kick of the fins you'd be set - carving down the face of one, fast enough that I was wholly skipping across the face. 10 seconds or so later they'd fatten out in the channel and you could either kick to stay on or give it up and ride the rip back out.
Beaut rides.

This arvo I recon I'll go out for another fish with Pat. See what we can catch. I think mum's got a rack of lamb for the barbie tho so no drama if we don't manage much.

Dad's ok - he's mostly sitting around the house as the large skin cancer he had cut from his face yesterday is giving him a bit of trouble today.

's Australia day - so 'av a good one ay!

Body swap

2010-01-22T10:54:00.004+11:00

As an extension to my response to Smacks latest post I considered what I would do to help her out of a predicament were I able to take control of her body. An oft used theme in movies. I pose the question. What would you do were you able to inhabit my or another blogger body - presumably one of the opposite sex?

Me: I'm taking Steph... woooh ho baby. First thing I'm doing is finding out where Spiky lives

Dances With Smurfs.

2010-01-20T10:50:00.003+11:00

Saw Dances With Smurfs last night. There was enough blue side boob to kindle within me a fetish for a naked 3 metre tall action hero Smurfet. The 3D WETA magic didn't quite suspend my disbelief enough to take plugging my hair into a botanical Internet seriously. The mood devise of the Celine Dion esque soundtrack was perhaps a bit too overt and the "saddle up, lock and load" catch phrase militarism never let you forget that this cowboys and indians flick, like everything else in the scifi genera is unapologetically aimed at pleasing low IQ American teenage males. But is was good. Three hrs of near total immersion in an alien landscape… perhaps not the best movie I have seen but certainly up three in the top few.
Now I need rishathra.

Taking a deep breath

2010-01-13T16:04:00.002+11:00

OK, so, how to begin???
Had a shit of a Christmas but it was awesome... I think that just about covers it.
The kids had a great time - spent a week with mum and dad just down the south coast at Tuross in their amazing house on the lake. We then drove about 40 kays up the coast to the Family's beach house at Rosedale. Both amazing, breathtaking places on unspoiled beaches. We spent so much time in the water that despite my preference for neck to knee bathers, surf hats and sunnies I'm now supporting a fairly striking wetsuit tan.

Way sexy

I spent as much time with dad as I could and I'm going back down to see him again in a fortnight if he lasts that long. I was with him with the doctor when he outlined his prognosis. It was a brutal moment. In a half dozen careful compassionate professional words a life was ended. Treatment from here is to keep up the chemo to stop things running away but with his marrow now all but gone he's living on borrowed time - quite literally as he's getting by transfusion to transfusion. After each one he's got the energy to go for walks, go to trivia, bowls etc then after a few days he gets tired until the next transfusion. We're holding out for the miracle, for the door to open that tiny crack...

... more later

Back - Start work tomorrow

2010-01-12T17:50:00.001+11:00

Things are... moderate.
I'll be at work this week then back down to see dad again next week.

Mid hols report.

2009-12-30T16:25:00.002+11:00

It's somewhat sureal to be surfing 5 hrs a day whilst the kids splash in the shallows whilst dad is back home slowly dying in his bed. The chemo knocks him out for most of the day so there is no point trying to spend time with him. His marrow is 80% cancer so there is no production of new red blood cells so he has no energy to get around.
There is hope... perhaps the new 6 thousand dollars a week drugs will help... who can say. The die have been rolled this one last time. If not he can't have more than a few weeks left.
Son has recovered brilliantly from his op and is having an awsome time down here. No photos yet as I'm on a dial up connection.

Me. The 20kg I've lost through the hundres of weights sesions I've packed into the last two years have not quite been enough to get me shreeding on the short board so I took my wallet into the surf shop and committed fassion suicide by buying a minny-mal... that is a longer more boyant board. Being nearly 40 it's about time to put the short bord away. I shoyuld have done it years ago. I've caught some amazing rides. It's 7 foot 7 inches and with my strenght I can push it around like a short board cracking turns off the lip and reentering over a closeout. Great fun.

We are leaving mum and dad's house tomorrow and heading up the coast a few klicks to the house at Rosedale. I'll take plenty of photos for you.

Stay well

2009-12-24T08:51:00.001+11:00

On hols

Back later

Good and Bad

2009-12-09T22:29:00.004+11:00

Good:
3 year old is doing well today after his surgery having had his ears done and his tonsils and adenoids out. Having the back of your nose cut up and bits of your throat cut out is a big deal when you're three.

Bad:
Dad's not doing so well. It responded to chemo for a while but looks to have taken an aggressive turn over the last few weeks. Transfusions, drugs, therapy: not your normal Christmas cocktail.

I lol'd

2009-12-02T13:28:00.002+11:00

What's the last thing that made you really laugh out loud.?

More fun to destroy than to create.

2009-11-30T14:34:00.002+11:00

A few weeks ago Diego helped me remove the sauna.
It's hammer time....

Lawn

2009-11-26T10:16:00.005+11:00

Not sure I'm cut out for it.

I now have a lawn or rather two lawns - one out the front and one out the back.
I must have missed the 'how to maintain a lawn' classes when I went to man school because I don't seem to be able to get it to grow soft, vigorously - green yet bindi free. I suspect I'm mowing too short - not sure about that but the bindis are enthusiastically in favor of whatever I'm doing.

Apparently the lawn is buffalo but I reseeded the bare patches with tall fescue. The buffalo safe weed killer is also bindi safe but evidence suggests that it's fescue unfriendly.

I need to mow at least fortnightly as the bark and leaves from the three enormous gun trees are sufficient to fill two large dumpsters once mulched!

Quote of the day

2009-11-23T10:25:00.003+11:00

"See, the problem was [long pause] that everything I tried on - fitted so well !!"
- so that't why she spent over a grand on dresses.

Everybody needs a friend.

2009-11-16T11:16:00.002+11:00

I used mine to hold up a tarp and keep the sun off our backs at a kids party.
Didn't want some of the cold blooded guests from getting to warm and frisky:

---------
Update: I've had several emails about the first pic - It's a bit of rock climbing hardware called a 'friend' or a cam that you use to help stop yourself hitting the ground when you fall. It's an indictment of what has become of my life that my friends are now used to hold up a tarp rather than out on a wild crag some place.

Fantasy

2009-11-11T16:37:00.001+11:00

In D&D I usually play an elf.
Now I know why

Camping - Indian / Diamond Head

2009-11-04T15:48:00.003+11:00

100 km of sand to ourselves (nearly)

read the last line of a file in PHP

2009-10-29T16:00:00.003+11:00

If your not a gh33k just move along.
move along, this is not the post you are looking for.

Had a hard to track down bug today where some code that was supposed to return the last line of a log file failed - the logs had recently been rotated and the new file had no lines in it yet. I modified it to create a pointer to the beginning of the file and break out of the infinite loop if the pointer cursor ever gets back to the beginning of the file. With a few minor changes it will work in C C++ C# or Java as they all have something similar to fseek, ftell fclose etc


/**
*
* Reads the last line of a, presumably large, logfile 
* without loading the whole file into memory
* Safe to use for 0 or 1 line files
* 
*
* @param string
* @return string 
*
*/
function readlastline($fileName)
{
  
       $fp = @fopen($fileName, "r");
       $begining = fseek($fp, 0);      
       $pos = -1;
       $t = " ";
       while ($t != "\n") {
             fseek($fp, $pos, SEEK_END);
             if(ftell($fp) == $begining){
              break;
             }
             $t = fgetc($fp);
             $pos = $pos - 1;
       }
       $t = fgets($fp);
       fclose($fp);
       return $t;
}

Rock Climbing

2009-10-22T10:04:00.004+11:00

My mad french friend has returned from Europe so last night we met up again for a climb.
Today my fingers feel like an arthritic old mans.
It always amazes me how tenuously small the little features on a rock wall can be yet we are still able to get purchase and climb steep and run out cliff faces, in climbing parlance steep = overhung, top photo. I'm going to try and get some of the slide film I took in Thailand 20 years ago scanned digitally. Hopefully the picks will be as good to laugh at at these of my skinny arsed youth. In the case of the last three photos here you can see my skinny arse in all its out of focus harness warped glory as the picks were taken when I climbed the last pitch of the three sisters naked.

Political interest.

2009-10-09T15:19:00.001+11:00

I used to date one of these people, unfortunately she did not look like Patricia Patersen, Hajnal Ban or "Kate Ellis".

Who do you think and who would you date?

Guess Her Muff hits 1000 posts

2009-10-08T16:46:00.001+11:00

That's a lot of muff

http://guesshermuff.blogspot.com/

:-)

Are thoes the latest edition D&D rule books?

2009-10-02T09:47:00.001+10:00