Holiday Plan Update

MON	TUE	WED	THU	FRI	SAT	SUN
JULY 2006				30 – Depart 16:00 Singapore 2105/2355	1 – Man'ster 07:00 -> L'rpool	2- LPool (Pick up car)
3- LPool	4- LPool -> Susan & Sean(2 b cnfmd)	5- -> Sheff	6	7	8-Cornwall	9-CWall
10-Cwall	11-Cwall	12-CWall	13-CWall	14- CWall	15- CWall -> Bham	16 BHam
17	18Dogs - Owlerton Stadium 7:30pm	19 Meal (J&M)	20	21 – Meal(Gary)	22	23
24	25 Beauty and the Beast	26	27	28	29 Depart 10:00	30 Singapore 0600/0933 Perth 1435

Illusion

Stare at the dot - the colours disappear...






It's hard to imagine these two tables have exactly the same shape of their tops. You don't believe me? Simply print this image, cut the first top with your scisors, and then place it above other table's top and you'll see they align perfectly. This magic trick can also be proven with Photoshop.

Last Drop Tavern - eugh.

Today was a really shocking start to a long weekend for me. I'm on call, tomorrow being the last on-call day of the week. Last night I was called at around 10pm, through to 3AM - so not much sleep. Then at nine this morning I was called in, and ended up having to work until 4pm. So I didn't really have much of a weekend.

This wouldn't be so bad, it I could get my time back, but our boss ("when I did...") has recently changed the rules, so if you are on call, then any extra work is hard luck - no matter how long. Of course this does mean that any voluntary maintenance work can no longer be done if you're on-call.

Anyway, we decided to go out for a meal - I'd been stuck on the computer for what felt like a 100 hours. We went to The Last Drop Tavern, a restaurant/pub in Kalamunda - not our first choice, but everywhere else was booked out. I can honestly say I had the worst meal I've ever had. It was really attrocious. The steak was cold and about 80% fat, the chips I'd ordered came as cold potatoe salad (with an apologie saying the waitress who took the order didn't know their was no chips - despite us later seening plenty of other people with them!). But honestly I just couldn't believe the steak - it was described as 'New York style' - surely they can't eat anything like that in the US - I know they like the fat, but nearly the whole thing, and stone cold.

So I left the lot, and bought a fish to eat at home.


The Last Drop Tavern - the last place I'd want to eat again!

Reading

Latest book from the book club is: "The Kite Runner" by Khaled Hosseini.

I'm not far enough in yet to say what I think of it, but it's quite passable so far.



Our last book The Jane Austen Book Club by Karen Joy Fowler didn't fair too well at the meeting this Tuesday.




It was readable, but a very thin plot (if any) and ended rather quickly.

PC's Back

At last I've got the PC back together. I suspect it overheated, living in its little wooden box in the office desk. Its main hard drive has now totally stopped responding, so with a new one fitted, I'm leaving the PC's sides off - lots of fresh air that way.

Funny that it got too hot, since the temperature here has taken a decided plunge.

Still, it's only 5 weeks now until we have the sunny heat of England once again. Despite the UKs predominantly chilly air, we are both really looking forward to getting there - it's the trip over thats not such fun.

Anyway with the PC together once again, I can post some photos - so here's a bunch. Starting with the finished wall upstairs (plus the two display units I mentioned in prior post). I don't think it looks too bad at all...


W's mum decided to take on an electric tred-mill - and she lost. It may be like a sketch from a low rate comedy, but she pressed the wrong button, it took off, and she didn't. As can be seen below, she hit the deck, and it ground her up. Still she's laughing about it now, and as she says - at least it got all the biddys talking.


Here's a bunch of photos as I put our Ikea kits together.














As you can see from the following photo, we're still missing some of the key units - so for now we've got some gapping holes. Appologies for the bad reflection from the glass.

And of course I can't post without another shot of Bingley...

Car Keys

Stuck at work - I've locked my keys in the boot. Hands full, glass draws, computer bag, Ikea box. Dumped bag in boot, keys attached to bag. Arghhhh!

Waiting for W to come and save me. Could call RAC but don't fancy the typical three hour wait.

Argggggggghhhhhhhhhh!

Dead PC

As I said earlier, my main PC @ home is dead, and I'm having a lot of trouble tracking down the problem. It appears that both the hard drives in it have died at once. Which I can only think indicates that something spiked them both, or they overheated together. Of course I now realise my backups weren't adequate - plus re-installing everything is going to take an age. And I've still got to buy a new hard drive, not easy in Perth where shops are only allowed to open at times when working people are working.

We bought a heap of furniture for the games room today. Only cheap stuff from Ikea, but it's still going to make the room look better, and gives us a heap more storage.

3 of these, one with full lenght glass doors, the other two with half height wood doors.

One of these


Three of these. (Still waiting for these to arrive - a real pain, as we've had to leave gaps to fit them later.

One of these.
A couple of these.

And two of these (for upstairs).

At long last we can get out all the ornaments, without having to worry about the cats breaking them all!

I'm still thinking if I should get some of these.

---

So most of the rest of the weekend was spent putting this lot together.

New room

Woo Hoo, The new room has been finished - in fact the whole of upstairs now looks new, thanks to R's giving it a fresh coat of paint.

We (W & I) didn't really want it painted, we were happy with the stenciling W had. However R didn't like it, so we had no choice since she offered to do all the hard work. So a few hundred dollars later we've got a freshly painted upstairs.

Although I say it myself, the wall looks like a real wall (not that it isn't). We spent most of Saturday cleaning up (R was starting to panic - OCD kicked in and she couldn't stand the thought of having an unclean room for another day). Then on Sunday it got totally covered in dust again as I planned the door to fit. So much of Sunday afternoon was spent cleaning it up again, so R didn't have another fret attack.

However despite the lack of a real weekend, it was good to see a real bedroom being formed upstairs - and in the unlikely event of it ever being needed - it's ready.

---

Meanwhile my main PC has died - I think it's the main hard drive, but that's still to be proved...

Engrish

Why my spelling is so bad...

Phoney Phonetics.

One reason why I cannot spell,
Although I learned the rules quite well
Is that some words like 'coup' and 'through'
Sound just like 'threw' and 'flue' and 'who';
When 'oo' is never spelled the same,
The 'juice' becomes a guessing game;
And then I ponder over 'though',
Is it spelled 'so', or 'throw', or 'bow',
I mean the 'bow' that sounds like 'plow',
And not the 'bow' that sounds like 'row' -
The 'row' that is pronounced like 'roe'.
I wonder, too, why 'rough' and 'tough',
That sound the same as 'gruff' and 'muff',
Are spelled like 'bough' and 'though', for they
Are both pronounced a different way.
And why can't I spell 'trough' and 'cough'
The same as I do 'scoff' and 'golf'?
Why isn't 'drought' spelled just like 'route',
or 'doubt' or 'pout' or 'sauerkraut'?
When words all sound so much the same
To change the spelling seems a shame.
There is no sense - see sound like cents -
in making such a difference
Between the sight and sound of words;
Each spelling rule that undergirds
The way a word should look will fail
And often prove to no avail
Because exceptions will negate
The truth of what the rule may state;
So though I try, I still despair
And moan and mutter "It's not fair
That I'm held up to ridicule
And made to look like such a fool".

(Stolen from http://www.spellingsociety.org/news/media/poems.php)