How can you dislike a man called Barnaby Joyce? With a name like that, he should really be a big fluffy bunny-rabbit. “Here Barnaby, come play with your friends Fiver and Pipkin”.
The fact that he’s a straight-talkin’, cowboy-hat wearin’, rootin-tootin’ farmer from Queensland who thinks the world’s problems can be solved by a bit of old-fashioned common-sense and “don’t you worry about that” attitude, well it only partially spoils the whole bunny-rabbit-ishness.
Many of his public comments go a long way towards proving my theory about common sense – ie. it’s not all that common after-all. Barnaby, as you would expect from a fluffy bunny-rabbit, Queensland farmer politician, is not quite of this world.
That’s a bit of a problem now he’s the Shadow Minister for Finance. The title sounds impressive, but I am assured it doesn’t give him any real power, unless we decide to vote for him in sufficient numbers. But it’s not a good look for the nation’s alternative leaders to be fruitcakes (Sarah Palin, take note).
Yesterday, Barnaby released his most recent musings, in which he suggested the country was up to it’s neck in debt and would shortly by missing mortgage payments and being evicted. To where, he didn’t say, perhaps New Zealand.
This caused a stink, partly because it was plain wrong, and also because it might damage our reputation and put us down with Portugal, Iceland, Italy, Greece and Spain as bankrupt no-goodniks.
I can see that being a problem. But really, how can I hold that against Barnaby? And he still makes more sense than KRudd.
Running
13.6 slow, sweaty kilometres this morning.
My masochistic streak has returned with a vengeance this morning. I set the alarm for 5:20am, in time for an early- morning run at the athletics track.
I should have known my stupid internal alarm clock would go off even earlier. Today it outdid itself in stupidity – waking me at 3:45 and refusing to let me go back to sleep. At least there was no problem getting out of bed at 5:20 – I was wide awake.
By 5:35 I was at the track and warming up. It was pitch black still, but luckily, navigation is quite easy on the track (this is one of the track’s few redeeming features, as far as I’m concerned).
I was very surprised to see a couple of women there before me, jogging around and around.
My session, such as it was, was 4 x 1200m with a 400m float. I remembered to bring my stop-watch, so now I now just how slow I am.
4:33
4:31
4:39
4:33
That third one was a bit slower because I was getting a bit tired and fed up with things, and also because a whole boot camp worth of people rocked up and decided to walk around the track, 3 or 4 abreast and completely oblivious to me, sweatily weaving between them.
Running
I also ran 20 warm kilometres on Sunday morning.
Sofias
If you were following my Facebook on Saturday night, firstly get a life, and secondly you would have seen my howls of rage, posted discreetly from a mobile phone hidden under the table at Sofias in Ringwood.
I’ve never been there before, and it was an experience. It was good there was a place for the kids to play, but it was past their bed-time and they were going absolutely spare.
But the food – I can’t believe how big the servings were. I had a chicken parma (sorry “pollo parma”) and I can’t believe that came from a chicken. A turkey, maybe, perhaps some sort of mutant dinosaur. They had to bring out a specially reinforced table to hold it up. And there was a whole potato plantation worth of chips.
My three year old son had some spag bol, the kids size, and it was too much for me to eat. We took it home in a doggy bag, and we’re still trying to eat it all.
How ridiculous. Who could possibly eat all of that food? And who is there heart surgeon? I swear the place is an secret audition for Australia’s Biggest Loser.
Natural remedies
I see that some popular natural remedies can be dangerous, even lethal. I have to say, I’m not surprised. I’ve often wondered why it is, that the people who worry about their diet obsessively, and take supplements left, right and centre, always look so ill.
At some point in the recent past, somewhere in the world, someone (probably a man) managed to take some pictures of a naked lady or two. That’s a little pervy.
He (again, assuming it’s a man) put the pictures on his computer and loaded it onto a website and/or emailed it some of his friends. His friends and/or random website visitors had a bit of a look at the pictures. That’s perving at one degree of separation.
Yesterday, someone working at a financial services firm in Australia opened an email and had a click through the pictures while pretending to listen to his boss talking. That’s perving at two degrees of separation.
Unfortunately for that banker (yes, if you like, that can be rhyming slang), his desk, and computer screen happened to be highly visible in the background of a nightly news finance report. Finance news viewers, if so inclined could perve at three degrees of separation.
This story was picked up on the 7pm project, who put it on their show, which makes four degrees.
I read about the story on theage.com.au – five degrees.
You’re reading it on my blog, so you’re the 6th degree of perving separation. Congratulations.
And if you read about this on an RSS feed or something similarly new-fangled and web 2.0-ish you’re lucky 7.
And the original naked lady, she is famous beyond all imagining. She – or at least, her naked form – is having her 15 minutes as we speak. I hope she enjoys it.
What a wonderful world we live in!
Edit: it turns out the young woman is none other than Miranda Kerr, well-known “supermodel”. That still doesn’t make it right.
Running
I’ve run 3 times this week. All three have been fairly uninspiring efforts. I’ve been tired and just generally blah. Oh well.
Blog
This blog has been feeling a bit down-at-heel lately, needing a bit of a pick-me up. So, I’ve lashed out for a bit of plastic surgery, some judiciously applied makeup and a bit of primping and plumping. Also, I applied a new theme – Monochrome. I’m not sure I like it, but I’m sure it will grow on me.
I woke this morning at 4:30am, a full 45 minutes before I’d set my alarm and at least 90 minutes before my normal body clock kicks me out of bed.
Stupid malfunctioning internal alarm clock!
I spent the next 45 minutes pleasantly dosing, and coming up with increasingly more convincing arguments as to why I should just go back to sleep and forget the run I’d planned. Here are a few:
It was hot yesterday, it’ll probably still be hot (not true)
I ran quite a bit last week, perhaps I should have an easy week now
I can always run tonight instead
What does it matter if I don’t run today? I can always run every day for the rest of the week.
Perhaps I’ve been overdoing it – I should give my knee a break.
If I don’t sleep properly my work will suffer
I don’t want to wake the kids or the wife
I don’t want to wake the dog. She’ll get upset if I don’t take her.
In the end, the alarm went off and after a dicey couple of minutes I got out and ran. I’m glad I did, I felt tired, sweaty and Monday-morning-ey but virtuously so.
Myki
Our new ticketing system has been seriously trying my patience today. After two weeks of the card not functioning and endless attempts to fix it, including by putting more money onto the thing, it still does nothing.
I ended up ringing the call centre again today, to be told that “Customer Care” would call me back within 24-48 hours.
I thought I was already talking to Customer Care. God knows what the real people will be like if they ever call. I also have no confidence that they will call, given the website says it will deposit my funds onto the card within 24 hours, yet they took money from my credit card last Wednesday, and it has still not arrived.
As far as I can work out, they’ve sold me a card that doesn’t work and that isn’t supported, stolen $25 from me and then told me I should buy a metcard. I declined, on the grounds that I refuse to pay twice for the same service. I can feel a complaint to the Ombudsman coming on.
The young lady on the phone (who was quite nice) nearly copped a 4-letter-word spray. Thankfully I’m a perfect gentleman.
I realise this is going against the grain at the moment, here in Melbourne, what with the Australian Open being in full swing and apparently doing great business, but tennis is such a bore.
It’s exactly the same game as they played 80 years ago, only with bigger, stronger rackets and more colourful clothes. Players are either stoic, iron-faced Eastern Europeans or petulant spoilt brats.
Women’s tennis is a little more watchable, if only for the chance you might see Maria Kirilenko. But it says something about women’s tennis when the most interesting thing about the sport is speculation about the nature or existance of Venus Williams undergarments.
In the men’s game, now that Nadal has slipped a bit, Roger Federer is so far ahead of everyone else, in almost every way, that the game is approaching levels of boredom not seen since Michael Schumacher ran formula 1.
That said, I do think it was a bit of risk for Jake Niall to write a glowing article in the age saying “There’s only one Roger Federer”. A year ago, Gillette was running ads with Thierry Henri, Tiger Woods and Federer clutching razors with the air of being the 3 most admirable people on the planet. Now two of these paragons of virtue have stained their escutcheons. Who can guarantee Roger has no dark secrets?
Running
A long run this morning, for no other reason than I could. It was from home in Ringwood East into the city. 27km at right on 5 minute km pace.
I quite admire Apple, as a company, yet at the same time I find them vaguely distasteful.
I think they’ve been extremely effective, especially in the last 5 years, at tapping into a number of undercurrents in western society.
Thin is beautiful
One of the first thing Steve Jobs said in today’s launch of the iPad was that “so…. let me give you a little overview: it’s very thin”. Not “it’s very powerful” or “it’s very useful”. The most important feature of the product its skinnyness. Thinness in itself is seen as something desirable and virtuous. Strangely, it’s only this dimension that is so important. Height, breadth, weight, are all secondary considerations. So the iPhone is stick thin and we’re supposed to drool over it, despite the fact it’s too long to fit in your pocket.
Texture is a problem
Another thing Apple have raised almost to fetish level is the objection to buttons, knobs, dials or any kind of external texture on their objects. The ultimate Apple item would be entirely without buttons, textures and almost entirely without colour. Apple products feel very simple, very uncluttered, very pure. Something like a Blackberry is anathema to Apple – black and chunky, cluttered with buttons for everything, tactile.
Of course, the irony is almost everyone has to buy a chunky cover to avoid scratching that beautiful unblemished surface, and the covers are anything but lovely.
Insider is cool
Apple does have a long history of being the underdog, the small company producing products that were used by a fairly elite bunch of users – graphic designers, architects etc. Their users are far cooler than average, if a little on the geeky side (and they’re aware of it). To buy an Apple product still has a certain cache. It says “I am not one of the masses. I am discerning and clever”, despite the fact millions of iphones are sold every year, certainly not exclusively to inner city trendy types.
Don’t make me think
This is one of the main commandments of the web design industry. Websites should be instantly navigable and understandable, without having to learn their workings. Apple products are like that too. The whole Apple experience is one of incredibly honed usability, to the point that the user never needs to learn how the product actually works. You never have to learn code, or command prompts to use an iProduct. Apple products let you feel that sense of superiority, but without you actually having to learn anything, or have any expertise at all (unlike Linux, which also attracts fanboys, but which is far more technical and difficult to use).
Everything can be bought
The “Brand” is a very powerful thing these days. It’s not what you do with it that counts, it’s just the fact that the laptop you use on the train is a Mac that marks you out from all the other schmucks with their Vaio and other Windows machines.
All of this culminated this morning, with the launch of the iPad. It’s a product that no-one needed, or even really wanted. It looks beautiful, in an Apple sort of way, but has some major design problems and really isn’t all that practical when you think about it.
No doubt millions will be sold, and then upgraded in 12 months time when a newer, larger, more powerful version comes out with features that should have been included in the original version.
And on it goes.
I do like this video, though, if only because it pulls Mr Jobs down into the muck with the rest of us.
Running
13.2km yesterday. A long run tomorrow morning.
Events conspired against me, and in a positively un-Australian disaster, I’ve ended up having to work on the Monday before the Australia Day holiday.
Not overly happy.
Anyway, we went down to the place at Venus Bay on Saturday morning and came back to Melbourne last night. We had a good time, in quite glorious weather.
Long run
I’ve run from Inverloch to Venus Bay a few times. It’s a nice distance (around 25km) for a long run, and has some nice hills and views, and the last 5km is dead flat and fast. On Sunday, I decided to do it the other way – from Venus Bay to Inverloch.
I talked my self into it on Saturday, but woke feeling a bit nervous about it. It’s by far the longest run I’ve done in months, completely ignoring the 10% rule. Also, it was sunny and relatively warm, and there was absolutely no water on course.
But I did it anyway, taking the camelback and taking it really easy. The first 5km to Tarwin Lower were taken at an consciously restrained 5 minute/km pace. The hilly bits between km7 and 14 were taken at a comfortable pace. I had enough energy to climb the worst hill at 20km and then coast into Inverloch with plenty of time to spare before the meeting time.
I was quite happy with the run. It was a proper LSD – long and steady, and a nice balance to Friday’s track session. 26.43km in 2 hours 10. Here it is on mapmyrun.com.
I’m sure I can, and will, do it a bit faster in the future, but that’ll come.
I’ve been a relatively early adopter, for once, of the latest thing here in Melbourne: our whiz-bang billion-dollar ticketing system, Myki.
It’s fair to say it’s not been an altogether smooth experience. Myki is the curate’s egg of “smart” ticketing systems – good in parts.
For one thing, the website is appalling. It appears to be designed only for Internet Explorer AKA “The browser of the beast”, which all sensible people avoid like Sam Newman with an extra-infectious case of the plague. Also, as far as I can tell, it uses table layouts, which were the latest thing back in 1996. There are also several rookie mistakes right the way through the thing, the kind of mistakes that would have been picked up in basic user testing.
Sigh.
I managed to order a card, despite obstacles, and it came exactly 2 days too late, meaning I had to buy another weekly Metcard to make it through.
It was only today I managed to put it to use.
This morning it worked like a charm. I “touched on” and it went beep appropriately, and super-quickly. I was pleasantly surprised, which is lucky as there is absolutely no-one to help you at Ringwood East, and nowhere to buy tickets within about 200km. At Parliament, it was even better. I got to work and sent a tweet about it all being perfect.
Sadly, the trip home was not so smooth. At Parliament, the same ticket barriers that bent over backwards to accomodate my shiny new card in the morning, flatly refused to acknolwedge my Myki at all. I may as well have been waving a limp piece of lettuce in their direction. I tried every gate, feeling progressively more humiliated. Eventually I asked one othe Myki mates what was happening. He said it was my card, and I should go online to check.
Good one. Very helpful.
So, my card works perfectly in the morning, and mysteriously turns into a turnip in the afternoon? I don’t think so.
My afternoon facebook status update was composed on my mobile, and was not so glowing, believe me. I think I used the phrase “steaming pile of crap” and I would have carried on in that vein at great length if I didn’t have to use my phone’s frustrating, dinky little keyboard.
Running
Another “speed” session bright and early this morning. It was the same as last Friday’s session – 4 x 1200m with 400m float recovery between reps. Add in warm-up and cool down, and it was about 8km. I could be imagining things, but it seemed a touch easier than last week. Hard to tell, really.
