Daily-Column

This article prompted me to remember that I had a neglected blog: Blogging is Healthy: It’s no longer the white-hot center of controversy it was in 2005; now it’s part of the establishment, and if you look at the numbers from the popular platform providers like WordPress and Blogger, still growing quite nicely thank you. Freshness Matters: When you don’t update a blog, it gets stale fast. The natural tendency of the human mind to favor what’s fresh is reinforced by search engines leaning the same way. ...

2010! I remember as a kid thinking 2000 was far away, and then a little older thinking by 2010 I would have this, or that, or the other thing over there. 10 years seems like a stupendously long time when it is as long as you’ve lived, or more than half your age. If you asked me what I’d actually done in a whole 12 months, I think about the only thing I could say without qualification was that I changed jobs. It really has disappeared in a blink - I started off the year thinking I was on the verge of buying a house. I had a decent paying job, I had a loan pre-approved, and I was hunting houses. I even went to an auction or two, and even put my hand up for bidding… and was promptly blown away, my budget puny in the face of the realities of the house market. ...

It says a lot for this election that I’ve waited until Election Day to say anything about it that goes beyond 140 characters. It has really been that kind of election campaign - a dearth of substance from all sides in an effort to come to power by attacking the other side. It’s not a contest I want to engage in. Gillard (how could I not have written about this before?!) came to power under circumstances best described as controversial - though far from unprecedented. You don’t have to explain to NSW voters that the leader can be replaced at the drop of a hat. The Liberals have gotten good running out of this. ...

Yessir, I’ve been just a tad bit busy with things, so here’s a consolidated update: I have an iPad! It is gorgeous and it’s replaced a subset of tasks my laptop once stood in for. The battery life is amazing and everything that’s been promised, and it’s great for general web stuff, though I’d kill for a basic adblock or something. More on this at another point. iOS 4 was released this morning, and I reluctantly let go of the jailbreak in order to play with it. The decision was difficult in some ways, as I’d gotten quite comfortable with my modifications, but the temptation to play with shiny-new-thing was too much. (Maybe I’ll get the best of both worlds shortly.)The main things I’d had jailbreak for were: ...

At the Cinema Cost of two movie tickets to a standard session of latest hit: $36 Cost of a medium popcorn and two drinks: $16 (Optional) Internet booking fee to guarantee seats: $1 per ticket At Home Cost of a DVD on your giant flat-screen TV on your very comfy couch: 3 months from cinematic release date + $15 Cost of medium popcorn and multiple drinks: $3 (Optional) Seat guarantee: $0 ...