The past: I was volunteering at the Hutt Expo today when a woman walked up to me (I had my name tag on) and asked me if I remembered her. It turns out we worked together for a couple of years in 1970.
What!!! Forty years ago. I couldn't remember her except the surname rang a bell somewhere in the back of my mind. It was great just thinking back and reminiscing.
Expo: The Expo was alright although less exhibitors but the real downer was the weather. It has been terrible.
Other matters - Delhi seems to have come right and we again came 4th in the Quiz..
In the Rugby the other night there was a terrific but really hard tackle. Next minute we see the Refs arm up for a short arm penalty. The commentators went berserk; it was a great hard legal tackle. Then they replayed it a couple of times and roundly criticized the Ref. I like them was disgusted that a penalty could have been given.
Then the laconic Maori voice of Rua Tupoki came on " I think he has awarded a mark, eh"
Duh - we are all thick.
30 September 2010
29 September 2010
Blogging and Change - why?
Blogger: Only 3 certain things in life - death, taxes and bloody change. I went to a friends place to show him how to start a Blog at blogger. I haven't looked at that side for several months as we have had no one wanting to do it at SeniorNet and my Blog just operates as always.
But I find it has all been changed (seemingly for changes sake as usual). It must be if you have the old Blog then that continues but any newcomers get the new version. Easy for them but it means the Course has to be re-written (and of course all the books written about it are now wrong).
I call it the Microsoft disease. If it is on the left move it to the right then two years later put it back on the left again!!
Madness.
But - I see they now have some statistics that give some information about where people who are visiting the blog are coining from which is interesting. Somehow I don't think that I have fans in places like China, Latvia and Moldova. By accident some US - UK may have stumbled across it. As for Australia - Nil. Hmmmmm.
My Soundsold music blog has the following figures.
Fiji competition: Got the vouchers for that BUT - as usual some stuff ups. The competition rules said you had until September next year to take it. Looking at the weather we thought May 2011. But although the hotel expires in September the air tickets expire in March. Emailed them. They no nothing and suggested we contact the airline. They are all hopeless. Our ex next door neighbours won a fridge but it took months to arrive as they had run out of stock . Why didn't they buy the prizes before they ran the competition??
CD Player: Got our CD player back and it seems to be working OK. The laser beam needed cleaning. So that is good news.
The Quizmaster: Rotary are going to run another quiz and I will be the Quizmaster. I was told the last lot of questions I set were too hard!! I didn't think so although I put in about one per round that was quite difficult but ones I thought were interesting. I suppose it is what you get used to.
But I find it has all been changed (seemingly for changes sake as usual). It must be if you have the old Blog then that continues but any newcomers get the new version. Easy for them but it means the Course has to be re-written (and of course all the books written about it are now wrong).
I call it the Microsoft disease. If it is on the left move it to the right then two years later put it back on the left again!!
Madness.
But - I see they now have some statistics that give some information about where people who are visiting the blog are coining from which is interesting. Somehow I don't think that I have fans in places like China, Latvia and Moldova. By accident some US - UK may have stumbled across it. As for Australia - Nil. Hmmmmm.
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My Soundsold music blog has the following figures.
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Fiji competition: Got the vouchers for that BUT - as usual some stuff ups. The competition rules said you had until September next year to take it. Looking at the weather we thought May 2011. But although the hotel expires in September the air tickets expire in March. Emailed them. They no nothing and suggested we contact the airline. They are all hopeless. Our ex next door neighbours won a fridge but it took months to arrive as they had run out of stock . Why didn't they buy the prizes before they ran the competition??
CD Player: Got our CD player back and it seems to be working OK. The laser beam needed cleaning. So that is good news.
The Quizmaster: Rotary are going to run another quiz and I will be the Quizmaster. I was told the last lot of questions I set were too hard!! I didn't think so although I put in about one per round that was quite difficult but ones I thought were interesting. I suppose it is what you get used to.
26 September 2010
Sputnikmania
Sputnikmania: Saw this documentary the other day. It was an epoch time when it seemed the advance of Communism was becoming, if not unstoppable, at least a real threat to Capitalism.
As it turned out it was a false dawn as I have often said in my Rubbish Tins story
However, one sidelight was the change of America into a nation more absorbed with science and education when they realised they may be falling behind. This meant that, as Eisenhower said, the religious nuts took a back seat. But they have changed and now the nuts seem to be in the ascendancy.
As I have got older I have become more of an admirer of Eisenhower as a sensible mainstream Republican. He would turn in his grave at some of those now declaring themselves as Republicans in the US.
The upside in the US of the sudden concentration on education was the upsurge in inventions and technology that took place over the next 20 - 30 or so years as those highly educated people entered the workforce.
On a site (Reddit) I go to, the other day somebody stated they needed a a Preferential system to change the voting structure. As you could comment I pointed out the US needed a Proportional system. Then again the old rich white males here want to turn the clock back to FPP.
I hope not. Women should support MMP or they will go back to 1950.
The SheilaCommonwealth Games: What a mess in Delhi but I am confident it will be right on the day. The Chief Minister of Delhi since 1998 is the unfortunately named Sheila Dikshit, sometimes known as Sheila Dixit, which is a little better.
Rugby: Southland (The Stags) team are just fantastic. Is there a better hooker in the country than Jason Rutledge. On their day I suppose Mealamu and Hore maybe a bit better but Rutledge is the 3rd best in my view. Of course they say he is too old. How old was Frank Bunce when he became an AB - and he was a back. In this mornings Sunday Times they have a quote - 'Flynn is the 3rd best rake in the country - Yeah Right!'
Blogging: On Mediawatch this morning they told the true story of Jim Anderton saying ' it needs a seismic shift for me to win the Mayoralty'. What he said was along the lines of 'it needed a seismic shift for me to shift' when he was talking about his leaving the Labour Party when Rogernomics came along. Some bloggers changed it around and it then got picked up by the MSM (Main Stream Media).
24 September 2010
More Quake
This is good.Weather: Last Friday it was all thunder and lightning and many people lost PC's, TV's etc - even a friends stove was blown out. This raised the thought that if we leave our External Hard Drive plugged in even the back ups would be lost. So we are now unplugging them.
Went in a lift today that had a sign that it was being fixed as the 'lightening' had damaged it. Hmmm - maybe it was carrying a lighter load now due to the bolt from the blue. We were in Petone at the height of the storm and the bolt I saw was probably the biggest I have ever seen.
Other: Quiz - came 3rd but we had a different couple join us which helped with the music. The Fiji prize pack has arrived but the air travel expires 6 months before the hotel!! Will email them.
20 September 2010
More Travel - of the winning kind
Wow: Just had a phone call from North and South magazine.
We have won a trip to Fiji - worth $8000!!!
I was just complaining that I had been entering competitions fanatically especially at the DomPost but was winning nothing. Now this comes along. I was honest with them and said how it was Sarah that got the magazine but she didn't enter. You have to be in to win.We have to find our own way to either Auckland or Christchurch. An idea is that we may go to Christchurch a few days earlier and have a look around. With all the travel on at the moment - Oz next month, Turkey/Russia next June and our other non-profit commitments such as the Xmas Raffle coming up we are getting a full diary.
19 September 2010
Grab a seat
Travel: Have used the Air NZ Grab a Seat site to book our trips to Auckland and return to connect with our flight from the Dubai, Turkey and Russia trip we are doing next year,. Our friends daughter with her 8 month old boy is up from Christchurch for a week and a bit so she can get some sleep. We had dinner with them at Sarah's last night and he mentioned that the site had some cheapies. So we will fly up for $19 each and back at $50 each.
Have to say the Air NZ site was easy to navigate unlike Qantas.
We have also booked for the trip to Oz and I am filling up the Flashdrive with some music for Clive.
Twinges: A good word. Still getting them. Trying to work up to an hour a day walking - averaging around 20 minutes at present. Also the lousy weather is against it.
Shower: Our shower is leaking and we got the plumber around and he said there is a crack in the shower base. We are going to see if the insurance will cover it.
Garetted: David Garrett the ACT MP is all over the news having lied to get a Passport over 20 years or so ago then not telling the Court he had a conviction in Tonga for assault (although I think that charge was a jackup). Anyway he is it seems to resign from Parliment having resigned from the party. He spoke to us at Rotary about a month ago about his 3 strikes Bill, which I support (in its NZ form - not the US one).
His name for the passport fraud was suppressed but the media have been going on about it as if it didn't exist. The Whale Oil blogger was fined for breaching suppression orders - why not the mainstream media?
Surely their are not double standards!!
Rugby: A lot of talk about the five eight/midfield combination to go to the UK with such an excess of talent.
We have Delaney, Carter, Cruden, Slade, Brett, McAlister, Ben Smith, Sonny Bill Williams, Conrad Smith, Nonu, Sitivatu, Gear, Rocokoko, Toeave, Stanley, Ranger, Fruen, Donald (Kahui is injured) - who have I missed?
In my mind the only considerations are Carter, Cruden, Slade (a kicking option who who can also cover wing/fullback) at 5/8th so a favourite of mine Delaney will miss. In the centres Conrad and Ma'aa are certain plus I would look at Ranger, Williams (we must see if his impressive form to date can stand up to more rigorous testing) and Fruen. Sadly we know what Sitivatu can do and I would leave him behind to recuperate.
Not in my team are Brett, Ben Smith, Toeava, Donald, Stanley (very steady but seems to be a journeyman at best) and McAlister, who seems to be coming into some form, but a bit late. Kahui is too injury prone even for the long term.
With it seems 14 backs we have Mils, Joe Rocketman, Dagg, Jane, Conrad Smith, Fruen, Williams, Nonu, Cruden, Carter, Slade, Weepu, Cowan. Do we then take an extra half (Mathewson). I think the fullback/ wing cover is within this lot (Nonu has also played wing). Why not leave Carter behind?. But they won't.
Buck Shelford favours leaving both McCaw and Carter at home with Reid to go as Captain. The forwards are an easier lot except the back up for Richie McCaw is a real problem. Be interesting.
Have to say the Air NZ site was easy to navigate unlike Qantas.
We have also booked for the trip to Oz and I am filling up the Flashdrive with some music for Clive.
Twinges: A good word. Still getting them. Trying to work up to an hour a day walking - averaging around 20 minutes at present. Also the lousy weather is against it.
Shower: Our shower is leaking and we got the plumber around and he said there is a crack in the shower base. We are going to see if the insurance will cover it.
Garetted: David Garrett the ACT MP is all over the news having lied to get a Passport over 20 years or so ago then not telling the Court he had a conviction in Tonga for assault (although I think that charge was a jackup). Anyway he is it seems to resign from Parliment having resigned from the party. He spoke to us at Rotary about a month ago about his 3 strikes Bill, which I support (in its NZ form - not the US one).
His name for the passport fraud was suppressed but the media have been going on about it as if it didn't exist. The Whale Oil blogger was fined for breaching suppression orders - why not the mainstream media?
Surely their are not double standards!!
Rugby: A lot of talk about the five eight/midfield combination to go to the UK with such an excess of talent.
We have Delaney, Carter, Cruden, Slade, Brett, McAlister, Ben Smith, Sonny Bill Williams, Conrad Smith, Nonu, Sitivatu, Gear, Rocokoko, Toeave, Stanley, Ranger, Fruen, Donald (Kahui is injured) - who have I missed?
In my mind the only considerations are Carter, Cruden, Slade (a kicking option who who can also cover wing/fullback) at 5/8th so a favourite of mine Delaney will miss. In the centres Conrad and Ma'aa are certain plus I would look at Ranger, Williams (we must see if his impressive form to date can stand up to more rigorous testing) and Fruen. Sadly we know what Sitivatu can do and I would leave him behind to recuperate.
Not in my team are Brett, Ben Smith, Toeava, Donald, Stanley (very steady but seems to be a journeyman at best) and McAlister, who seems to be coming into some form, but a bit late. Kahui is too injury prone even for the long term.
With it seems 14 backs we have Mils, Joe Rocketman, Dagg, Jane, Conrad Smith, Fruen, Williams, Nonu, Cruden, Carter, Slade, Weepu, Cowan. Do we then take an extra half (Mathewson). I think the fullback/ wing cover is within this lot (Nonu has also played wing). Why not leave Carter behind?. But they won't.
Buck Shelford favours leaving both McCaw and Carter at home with Reid to go as Captain. The forwards are an easier lot except the back up for Richie McCaw is a real problem. Be interesting.
12 September 2010
Me
Me - yes me. Went to the doctor as I was having a few chest pains on the left side, which is the alarm bells side. Had to have a couple of ECG's which revealed my left ventricle is larger than it should be due to high blood pressure. So I am now taking pills - one every day - for the first time in my life. I suppose at approaching 70 it was due, as I know very few people who aren't on some type of pill. Need to exercise (walk) more.
Rugby: AB's 24 Oz 23. I would have preferred they lost (which if Giteau had kicked even at 50% they would have) as they deserved to do so as they were not the best team on the field. Plus I am afraid they will now get overconfident. They will go to the Northern Hemisphere and as only the French have any real ability they will probably win easily and think they are simply the best. I hope not.
Politics: Jim Anderton now says he will resign from Parliament if he wins the Christchurch Mayoralty. Well he has now come to his semi-senses so instead we will have a By-Election at a cost to the taxpayer of over a million dollars. Oh well he will think, it is only the taxpayers money - they have plenty.
The good news of course is that Parker will win easily (one would hope). They say often from the bad comes the good. It means Anderton (who they say was 20 points ahead in the polls - why I can't fathom) will go down the gurgler and save us a million bucks and we will all be better prepared for the next big one.
Always back up: In my post of 27 August I said how our small External Hard Drive had problems and we thought we had lost it. The good news is that when our Guru took it home it booted up OK. Christine thought it may have fixed itself when the power was turned off. Anyway we have now bought a new 2TB machine and will back up fanatically - I hope!
Rugby: AB's 24 Oz 23. I would have preferred they lost (which if Giteau had kicked even at 50% they would have) as they deserved to do so as they were not the best team on the field. Plus I am afraid they will now get overconfident. They will go to the Northern Hemisphere and as only the French have any real ability they will probably win easily and think they are simply the best. I hope not.
Politics: Jim Anderton now says he will resign from Parliament if he wins the Christchurch Mayoralty. Well he has now come to his semi-senses so instead we will have a By-Election at a cost to the taxpayer of over a million dollars. Oh well he will think, it is only the taxpayers money - they have plenty.
The good news of course is that Parker will win easily (one would hope). They say often from the bad comes the good. It means Anderton (who they say was 20 points ahead in the polls - why I can't fathom) will go down the gurgler and save us a million bucks and we will all be better prepared for the next big one.
Always back up: In my post of 27 August I said how our small External Hard Drive had problems and we thought we had lost it. The good news is that when our Guru took it home it booted up OK. Christine thought it may have fixed itself when the power was turned off. Anyway we have now bought a new 2TB machine and will back up fanatically - I hope!
10 September 2010
Making Plans
Travel: We have booked and paid the deposit for a trip to Dubai (2 days) Turkey (14 day tour) and St. Petersburg to Moscow river trip (12 days) next year.
Also we have used our Air Points to fly to Perth this year. What a mess with Qantas Air Points. You can't book together unless the cards are linked. Why didn't they do this 10 years ago when we opened the account? Then we find you can't transfer more than 100,000 points!! Luckily we had the points to book on one card, which we did.
Who makes these idiotic rules. People who are on tens of thousands a year.
The Quake: A friends daughter who has a young (about 6 months) son left the city and flew to Wellington so they could get some sleep. You would have thought it would have been the other way around with us being the Shaky City. It was ironic that about a week or two prior to the quake the Mayors competitor for the job, Jim Anderton (the would be part time MP) said it would take a 'seismic shift' to get him elected.
More Lunacy: The lunatics are everywhere. In Wales as a guy went past a Scientology centre he 'twitted' a comment that they were stupid. The Scientolgists complained and he is now being investigated for not showing respect for their 'religion'. As he said if it is obvious lunacy why should you not be able to say so. Meantime in the US another nut, a so called 'Pastor" with a church of around 50 followers, threatened to burn the Koran. Instead of ignoring it the news media, people like the President, the Pope and all the Muslims get upset. The population of the US is over 300 milion - he has 50 people. It is not news.
But again it shows the Islamic religion up as intolerant - they should just ignore it as we would ignore any small group of idiots who wanted to burn the Bible. On TV1 Paul Henry said as a generalisation the Muslims are intolerant. He is right.
University's: Cambridge has now moved to displace Harvard as the top. The top 10 are 6 US 4 UK. We have moved down the list and the heads of ours compare us to Queensland where they spend nearly double on higher eduaction. NZ spends 51% on tertitiary education against the OECD average of 81%. So our Uni's were surprised we weren't lower. Auckland came 68th as our top one.
Not a surprise that the best are from the Anglo nations.
University of Cambridge, UK
Harvard University, USA
Yale University, USA
University College London, UK
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, USA
University of Oxford, UK
Imperial College London, UK
The University of Chicago, USA
California Institute of Technology, USA
Princeton University, USA
06 September 2010
A Kiwi Kwake
CHRISTCHURCH
4.30 AM SATURDAY 4 SEPTEMBER 2010 AND 7.1
4.30 AM SATURDAY 4 SEPTEMBER 2010 AND 7.1
The Pak n Save warehouse
Not often we see soldiers deployed on our streets. At least they are not armed.
The earthquake skateboarder.
Night time descends. They had pictures of the main centres on the Weather forecast at news time and Christchurch looked like North Korea. No lights. 
The Deans homestead, 154 years old
Earthquake: Christchurch. I woke at what was according to my bedside clock was 4.38 AM Saturday morning - it seems it is 3 minutes fast - to a rocking side to side motion as if in a small boat. No noise and only a very slight aftershock. Hmmmm - Christine slept through it (as did Joe and a few others I know) so I thought I would wait a while and see if there were any other aftershocks.
As nothing happened I went back to sleep not thinking that it would be centered elsewhere.
I had forgotten all about it when Christine said there had been a big one in Christchurch. I then recalled what had happened and told her what time etc but said it wasn't too bad.
But of course that was us - not down South.
What a mess; but what good luck no real injuries. Friends have two daughters in the city and they got woken up by phone just after to be told that they were alright. A bit of damage to one place with the other OK.
One of the biggest at 7.1 but the luck was that it was early morning and most people were asleep and not at work.
Insurance: Again simple. Make insurance to the Rateable Value compulsory. We will now have all the bludgers who don't have insurance wanting a payout and the PM has said we must help. Again the useless get assisted.
Civil Defence: The reaction this time seems to have been excellent although they were lucky with low personal damage and the weather. Mayor Bob Parker seems to be on the ball.
In the coming Local Body Elections the local MP Jim Anderton is also standing for the Mayoralty. He wants to do two jobs as he intends to stay an MP. Talk about double dipping and how the hell can he do both jobs. If being the Mayor of our second biggest city and being an MP is not considered a full time job (and I believe they are) then cut their pay to that of a part-timer.
We will end with something a bit more pleasant - the 3 Musketeers or more likely the Terrible Trio.
This was taken at Easter this year.
02 September 2010
Start with Telecom
Telecom: As I have blogged before we used to have unlimited internet but because of a few who downloaded terrabytes they, in their usual fashion punished us all. Anyway we reached our download limit and in their, again, usual fashion they said they may lower the speed. Well so far their interpretation of 'may' is 'will'. I see the other day that some firm was mentioned as 'service was almost as bad as Telecom.
South Canterbury Finance: Down the gurgler and the taxpayer is to pick up the tab. I can understand principal, but picking up the interest is crazy. Another company, Allied has also gone down and as one sharebroker said, delay the repayment claim as long as possible as you are getting 9.75% guaranteed by the Crown.
We have a couple that have gone bad (including SCF) that are subject to the Guarantee (and others gone bad that are not subject to the Guarantee!!). I got the forms the other day and they just about want to take your body. All the paperwork they want is mad. I even phoned them as I couldn't believe that they were wasting the country's resources like this. They said yes they want everything and she even said 'remember you are dealing with the Government'.
And of course they haven't got the time (it would take years) to look at everything. Then again it is only the taxpayers $$$$.
Drunk again: Another again. 17 previous convictions and now he kills and gets 4 years for what should be classed as murder. He will be out in 2 and back on the road.
Quizzes: Went to Sarah's Kindergarten fund raiser quiz. We had pirate hats and decided to call ourselves 'Rape and Pillage' but they put our name up as 'Rape and Spillage'. Didn't matter much as we did no good but tragically we used the name again for the PWMC Wednesday quiz and again no good (4th).
Various: Kipp hasn't been well and we have had him a couple of times this week which has been good. Went and got my eyes tested and new glasses today. Also we looked around for a new CD player as the old one (a Sony) has gone bad after over 20 years. They laugh as it seems 'rack' systems don't really exist now except in the very top of the range.
South Canterbury Finance: Down the gurgler and the taxpayer is to pick up the tab. I can understand principal, but picking up the interest is crazy. Another company, Allied has also gone down and as one sharebroker said, delay the repayment claim as long as possible as you are getting 9.75% guaranteed by the Crown.
We have a couple that have gone bad (including SCF) that are subject to the Guarantee (and others gone bad that are not subject to the Guarantee!!). I got the forms the other day and they just about want to take your body. All the paperwork they want is mad. I even phoned them as I couldn't believe that they were wasting the country's resources like this. They said yes they want everything and she even said 'remember you are dealing with the Government'.
And of course they haven't got the time (it would take years) to look at everything. Then again it is only the taxpayers $$$$.
Drunk again: Another again. 17 previous convictions and now he kills and gets 4 years for what should be classed as murder. He will be out in 2 and back on the road.
Quizzes: Went to Sarah's Kindergarten fund raiser quiz. We had pirate hats and decided to call ourselves 'Rape and Pillage' but they put our name up as 'Rape and Spillage'. Didn't matter much as we did no good but tragically we used the name again for the PWMC Wednesday quiz and again no good (4th).
Various: Kipp hasn't been well and we have had him a couple of times this week which has been good. Went and got my eyes tested and new glasses today. Also we looked around for a new CD player as the old one (a Sony) has gone bad after over 20 years. They laugh as it seems 'rack' systems don't really exist now except in the very top of the range.
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