Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all who reads this.

I’ve been too busy and too tired to put any post here:

Too much to do at work, too much waiting while my wife does the shopping, too much cleaning after the mess of the kids (they are at home and not at school/childcare), too much lack of sleep also, too much spending.

Between by last post and this one there has been a few birthday parties, Christmas parties, and visiting new places.

I went to see the latest Harry Potter and the Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe last Tuesday.

I'll write more when I feel a bit more creative.

Is non-functional brake light illegal?

That’s the second time I followed a car with non-working brake light.

Are the drivers of those cars unaware that their lights are not working or they don’t care enough to get those fixed?

Should those people be fined or crashed into from the rear?

Storewide sales

There were quite a number of stores having storewide sale last week. So I decided it was time to buy a kite which I promised my daughter a long time ago.

How long did we enjoy it? 15-20 min before it plunged to the ground and broke.

I bought a $9 piece of junk, should I ask for a refund?

11 November

Today is Armistice day, I wish to express my respect to the fallen soldier of WWI, and to wish to say that John Monash was the one best General during the WWI.

My mailbox was vandalised Wednesday night; I had to buy a new one.

My home phone is disconnected because I did not pay the bill which was not sent to me. I found out that they are still sending it to my old address, and I have to pay a surcharge for them to send it to my current address.

How can they be so unprofessional as not to have updated my billing address when I relocated?

Why can’t we all use the same system?

What does 4/11/05 mean? 4th of November 2005 or 11th of April 2005.

What is 97 F? Is that almost the boiling point of water or normal body temperature?

What’s 150 mph of wind speed?

What’s dollar per gallon for the price of fuel?

Why are most pdf documents in Letter paper size instead of A4?
Where can you purchase Letter paper size in Australia?

Etc, etc.

Remote controlled car lock

Last week, my nephew stumbled on a lost car key in a shopping centre car park. It had remote controlled car lock, and by just pressing the button, he found to which car the key belonged. It was a quite nice new car without immobiliser.

But being an honest person, he gave the key to the shopping centre security. Imagined if someone else found the key instead.
No matter how convenient it is to have put you car key and the remote control car lock on the same key ring. If you lose it, let’s hope it is an honest person who finds it.

The truth about women

Women, as every body knows, talk among themselves. Sometimes they talk about what special thing their boyfriend/husband did for them, or what present he gave them. Then one day, your wife picks a tantrum at you because you did not do the same for them.

Another of the problems of being married for years is you drop your guard on what you say to your wife. When your wife asks you your opinion, and you reply the honest truth, and she will get angry with you because you do not tell her what she wanted to hear. Worse still if you state your opinion without being asked. Never tell your wife that what she is telling you is not interesting, nor she is boring you, nor what she just cooked doesn’t taste good. Never tell her the truth in those circumstances. She can’t handle the truth. As for me, I remind myself, speak the truth with love, that is sensitivity.

Pozieres (2000)

Yesterday was my documentary night. Besides what was already on ABC, I borrowed the documentary “Pozieres” from the local library. Pozieres was where the Australian soldiers were fighting on the Western Front during the Somme Battle of World War I.

It was an excellent documentary and good history lessons for me. There were a lot of facts that stirred my emotions.

Some example: of the 60,000 who attacked on the first day of the Somme Battle 40,000 died that same day. General Haig considered it was a reasonable lost, and ordered for the the attack to continue the next day with what was left, and the next day for the next 6 months.

Aboriginal soldiers who volunteered to fight were citizen of no country.

During the war, towns with German names in Australia were renamed.

John Curtin who was against conscription during WWI introduced conscription when he was prime minister during WWII.

The prime minister Billy Hughes created the AFP (Australian Federal Police) because the Queensland police refused to obey his order to arrest someone who threw an egg at him.

Australians of German origin were kept in detention during the war and deported after the war.
Etc.

Australian Television

The more I watch Australian commercial television the more frustrated I get with it. There are so many things I don’t like about it.

There are too many noisy low quality commercials, actually wasting my time just to watch them.
The news is too Australian-centric. If anything happens in the world, if there are no Australian involved, it is not news worthy. E.g. Hurricane Wilma hits Mexico, all the news talks about is the number of Australian that were in Mexico. Why don’t they talks about the locals? This is something I would like to hear your views on.

Australian Idol is unashamedly wasting our time: Everything after the break. I don’t watch Australian idol anymore. Australian idol lost a lot with the departure of Dicko. I’ve lost my respect for Mark Holden, he is so un-entertaining.

Current affairs are just gossips. I wish they were more of the investigative television type programs like “Four Corners” on ABC.

I think a solution to this is to tape what you want to watch and watch it afterward, where you can fast forward though the commercials.

However, ABC and SBS are different. There are so many interesting documentaries worth watching these days, especially on Mondays, Thursdays, and Sundays.
Yes, I love to watch documentaries, I hate soaps and police-detective shows.
Documentaries worth watching are “Fact or Fiction”, “Auschwitz” (Thursday on ABC), “The history of Gold” (Sunday on SBS). If you’ve missed the first parts of those documentaries, make such you don’t miss the final parts. I also liked “The life of Nat King Cole” on ABC yesterday.

What's Behind the "No Animal Testing" Claims

There is an interesting discussion going on about environmentally friendly products and products that hasn’t been tested on animals on Hammy’s blog.

There is also that new ad with some celebrities to promote products that does not use animals for testings.

I believe that ad is misleading. It shows animal in pitiful state, but how do we know those are animals used for testing. They could be pictures from an animal pounds.

The claim found on some products that mentions “Not tested on animal” can be misleading or false. This is because the company selling the product may not have conducted any test on animals itself, but some other companies many have tested on animals the ingredients the product is made up of.

Is there any regulating body to check the claim?

Then what does no testing on animals mean? No test at all was conducted, tests were conducted on human only, tests were conducted on non-living things only. How do we test for allergic agents and reactions on non-living things?

If a product hasn’t been tested on living organisms, how can we be sure it is perfectly safe? All its potential adverse effects are actually unknown. The company is actually selling a potentially unsafe product. The company is judging it is better to put humans at risk rather than the animals. If any adverse effects is discovered the product can always be recalled. In this case the market has been used as guinea pig.

“No animal testing” claim is just another marketing ploy to get the money of a segment of the customers. It is a marketing strategy that relies on emotions, and misinformation.

Why should we think that any testing on animal is always animal cruelty? Why should we think that animals used for tests are poorly treated or kept in uncomfortable cages? Why should we think that animals that are used for testing are going to suffer enormously and have an agonizing death? Why should we think test on animals are conducted in poorly lit unhygienic laboratories? That’s what the advertisement is trying to convince us of. They are just trying to enforce the stereotype of animal testing which is not totally accurate.

Personally, I’ll be cautious about using new products with the label, “no animal testing.” It is safer to use products that has been around for years or using generic ingredients known to be safe.

What happened since Friday until now

Last Friday, our project manager organised lunch at a restaurant. I had to choose something from the menu. Well, I was not going to have a salad, again. I chose grill chicken with so and so. What I end up having was some Macaroni pasta with small bits of chicken and white sauce and some herbs. The chicken tasted more like roast chicken rather than grilled chicken. I could have made the same at home by buying a roast chicken, a pot of pasta sauce, and pasta at the supermarket.

I fixed the air flow through the door problem by installing draught excluders. Coming from a tropical country I did not know what those were. Any way I know now. I borrowed a book called “Maintaining your home” from the library. I have got to start buying some basic tools now.

Yesterday I watched “Oil Storm” and found it was very interesting. Well, the US said they are not going to sign any agreement on the reduction of Carbon dioxide because they need to put the economy of their country first. I don’t see how the figures of their economy is going to add up if their country is going to be hit more than once by super strong hurricanes every year from now on.

Kerry Emanuel, an expert at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, has tracked hurricanes over five decades and found that they are getting stronger and lasting longer.

Finally, I am doing my bit in beating the petrol price rise. I went to work on my bicycle this morning. The weather was great and it took me 35 min to ride 10km.

Keyboard layout creator

Have any of you wished their keyboard layout were different? Like the position of the “A” was somewhere else, or wonder what it would be like using Dvorak Keyboard layout. Well I have found that Microsoft offers a free software that allows you to do that. It’s called Miscrosoft Keyboard layout creator. I downloaded it and started to “improve” on the default keyboard layout. It is also possible to reposition keys of a keyboard by removing it and putting it elsewhere.

I did change the location of some keys to experiment. I had to give up the experiment because not only my mind does not like the idea of having to press at a different place for a character. It made typing very slow, but worse of all it also gave me pain in my wrist, and a headache.

Soymilk Maker

Spring is almost here, and people are starting be more health conscious, and coincidentally lots of the health clubs and products are starting put out their advertisement.

My wife, like most women, every now and then reads something and gets very excited about certain products. This time it is about the goodness of eating soy products. So we end up buying a soymilk maker.

The soymilk maker cost $169. 1 Kg of Soy bean cost about $6. 100 g of soy make 1.5 lt of soymilk. So 6/10/1.5 = $0.40, 40 cents of soy bean to make 1 litre of soymilk. I will add another 15 c for the water, electricity and cleaning cost. So 55 c for 1 litre of soymilk.

1 lt of commercial soymilk cost about $1.8, so the saving is about 1.8 – 0.55 = $1.25 per litre. To recoup the price of the soymilk maker I need to make 169/1.25 = 135 litres.

The taste of the home soymilk is not too bad, it just lack the extra vanillin flavour, the preservative and the sugar.

Then my wife tried to make tofu, it took 4 hrs to make 400 g of tofu, and you can buy 400 g of tofu for about $2.50 to $3.00. I think it is not worthwhile to make home tofu, unless we have too much time. The amount of effort is too much for the little gain.

Now I am interested to add spices/flavour to the soymilk, eg. Almond, vanilla, oriental spices. Does anybody have any suggestion about how to make the soymilk taste better?

How does one stop cold air from getting in through a close door?

I have discovered that a reason why my house is not keeping the heat in is because cold air is getting in through the slit between main door and its doorframe while it’s closed. This became obvious on a windy day like yesterday. Now I need to find a way to stop the air from flowing through a close door. Does anybody have a suggestion?

Keep the brain alive: what you don't use you loose

It is said that to keep one’s brain alive, i.e. not get Alzheimer disease, one must keep exercising it.

My wife is currently taking a Physics unit at university and is asking me to help her understand it because I did Physics before. I am surprised by how much I still remember and how much I have forgotten. I still remember principles, and have forgotten a lot of equations. E.g., I can’t remember the quadratic equation. It is disappointing that the brain puts aside information that it does not need or use on a regular basis.

Learning and education is not something that anybody can take away, but what you don’t use does goes away by itself with time. It is up to us to keep our brain and our memories alive by exercising it.

Telemarketing

How many of you have ever been called to be offered some specials on house alarm installation?

What did you tell them?

Do you realise that you’ve just revealed to the other guy on the phone, whoever and wherever he is, that your house is or isn’t equipped with an alarm?

Here is a tip to stop them bothering you all the time: I was being called by some major Telco every week until I told them I was eligible for their concession rate. I never heard from them again.

Saturday lunch, improvised curtains, car service, attachment

It was great to have Hammy for lunch on Saturday. We had curry, and I know the curry will taste different to Hammy, but for me this is how curry ought to taste because I grew up have curry tasting like that.

I was also impressed how a tidy teddy bear in a tin box could my 4-year-old daughter, Sophie, so happy. She is taking it everywhere she goes. She even hid it somewhere and took it to school with her.

We have improvised some curtains with blankets, and this works well. It takes less time to feel comfortable when we put the heater on.

Yesterday, I lost half a day of work because the kindy school teacher called me around 11:00 to come pick Sophie because she has runny nose. She had no runny nose in the morning, and I did not see any runny nose in the afternoon. I am wondering if it is that little amount of toothpaste on her shirt that made the teacher thinks it is something else.

Any way, I use the afternoon for having my car serviced. The car runs a bit better now. I spent an afternoon with my daughter.

I also feel that my 1 and half year old daughter is developing some attachment to me these days. She used to cling to her mummy all the time, especially at night times. Now she seems to feel ok being with me, which allows time for my wife to do her studies.

Quiz

A new car manufacturer advertises that their
car can go "from zero to sixty in 8 s". This is a
description of
A) average speed.
B) instantaneous speed.
C) average acceleration.
D) instantaneous acceleration.

Dangerous drivers are also rude

This post may not change anybody’s behaviour or save lives. But I have to shout this one loud:

Do not follow the car in front to closely: leave 2 sec distance. This is done by counting 1001, 1002.

Do not overtake and then show the finger to the drivers who drive within speed limit.

The freeway is not for slaloming lanes. The 2 second distance is not for cars to move into, maybe it is.

No naming names

Hammy, you commented that I should be naming and shaming some people. Well I have decided not to write full names and company names on my blog.

I think it is not a good thing to shame people in public because:
I don’t want other to do the same to me,
I don’t want to antagonise people,
I don’t want be get sued,
I might 'use' the ‘service’ of those people in the future.

SiteMeter

I’ve just added site meter to my blog. A site meter records how many people visit this blog. It wasn’t too hard to setup, given everything was automated for us. I did not have to play with the html. However I am a bit concerned to have given my blog’s password to SiteMeter. Well, I can change it later.

When I say I was relieved not to have to play with html, it shows how often I forget that I am a computer professional and have been web programmer. I am not doing much html stuffs these days.

I think it is always interesting to know how many people read my blog.

Let’s try the public transport

I wanted to try the public transport today.

I left home at 6:30, walk to the bus stop, the bus came at 6:37, changed for the train at Bayswater, waited for the train for 4 min, reached work at 7:10. By car I would leave the house at 6:45 and reach work at 7:00. So if I take the public transport I loose
50 min (40*2-30) per working day.

Is it worthwhile to take public transport? The fuel cost and the bus ticket come to about the same, and I lose 50 min.

In my case, I think it is not worthwhile to take the bus.

I will try going to work by bicycle when the warmer seasons are here.

What’s an extra hour per day for?

I have found that by just moving house I have gained 1 extra hour per working day in my life. I don’t have to drive around town during peak hours to drop and pick up the kids at childcare/school anymore because I now live at walking distance to those services.

1 extra hour is great: I use the extra hour to rest, do nothing, walk to pick up the kids, but I still have to think how to make better use of my time. Ah, I use it to earn money, because I now work 30 min more per day.

Brick veneer house

The real estate agent said: brick veneer that’s how all houses should be for Perth weather. Some brick company convinced us double brick is better just to make us use more bricks in construction.

Well, I find it hard to maintain a constant temperature in a brick veneer house. It gets cold and very cold at my new place. The temperature drops to 12-13 C inside the house in the morning. At my old place I would be surprise if the temperature goes below 16 C if no heater is on, with a little bit heating I can maintain the temperature inside at 20 C

If you hate feeling cold, a brick veneer house is not where you would like to live in.
I don’t know yet how it will feel like inside the house on a 40 C summer day.

My first blog

This is my first post, more to come later.