How Much Would You Expect To Pay?

Looks like yet another excellent piece of software has been set free by the Big Boys. And it’s all good news.
I’ve been looking at ‘Konfabulator‘ for some time, because it’s such a cool way of putting your computer to work in a multitude of small ways, rather than in one big way (like Windows or Office). You download whatever widget you need, for activities like checking the weather, or keeping an eye on some hidden part of your computer, and it does the job. Simply, elegantly, and in new ways you hadn’t thought of before. Also, it’s able to work with both windows AND mac computers, so everyone wins.
Having been a commercial product for a couple of years, today, it’s been bought by Yahoo, and is now free. Free, I tells ya. Woo hoo!
It’s the latest in a long line of products which the big internet companies have acquired with their own money, and have offered to you and I for free, as a way of driving people to their way of thinking about the internet. Yahoo did it with Flickr. Google bought Picasa and Keyhole. Microsoft occasionally offer tools and programmes for free as tests of things they’re planning for new versions of Windows.
So, it’s no longer the case that in order to work with a computer ‘on the cheap’, you needed to put up with tricky tech tricks and freeware. These are really useful, commercial-grade products which you can get for free.
I highly recommend Konfabulator.

I Can See My House From Here

This is easily the most fun I’ve had with a computer for a looong time. Google have put their mapping technology to work to create ‘Google Earth‘, a piece of software you can use to ‘virtually fly’ anywhere on earth.
Seriously. You start with a view of the world, and you can keep zooming in to anywhere. For example, there’s a satellite photo of my place. Then I can tilt the camera so I can see perth in the background. Then I can fly to New York. Then back to Rottnest. All with fairly high-resolution images of each location.
The interface is slick, if you have a computer to handle it, and it’s dead easy to understand. And (drumroll)… it’s free.
I’m happily recreating all my last few years of travelling. It’s so nice not to have to fly economy.

More Cross-Cultural Mis-communication

It’s interesting to see the little things travellers find amusing about Australia (mainly because there are so many little, amusing things I find wrong with the US). I’m greatly impressed by the divine confluence which produced this marvellously unfortunate cultural translation. (Thanks, Bad Astronomy)
Donner Kebabs just don’t mean the same thing stateside:

The Donner party consisted of a number of families (90 total individuals I believe) who formed a wagon train to cross the Rocky Mountains of the American west. Through a combination of bad planning, bad luck, and bad weather the train became trapped in the Sierra Nevada in the winter of 1846-47. Due to the cold and lack of food people began to die off and some of those remaining turned to cannibalism to survive.

Gime? What's a Gime?

This is one of those “you won’t find time unless you make time” moments: I’ve signed up at the gym.
It seems I’ve served out my mid-life crisis at 34, by getting rid of the WRX, getting into a nice, comfy Forrester, starting to eat right(ish) and signing up for a couple of sessions of ritual humiliation per week. That’s how it goes, doesn’t it?
I’ve been assigned a Personal Trainer for a few sessions, presumably so I don’t make the place look bad by getting horribly mangled in some of the resistance contraptions.
I’ve never signed myself up for any structured exercise programme, ever. Apart from 10 years of soccer which evaporated in the heat of my misspent youth, and a season of getting my butt whipped around a squash court by a decent slice of Perth’s radio talent, I’ve never thought of getting into physical exercise. I’m blessed with a fairly speedy metabolism which means I can hammer away at computers on my fat arse without actually getting a fat arse.
But then, came Singapore: A couple of years ago, The Photo was taken. I shudder to recall it. It won’t be posted here. It was of me. Poolside. Fat.
So why wait until now? I had to wait for a few things to fall into place. The planets seem to have aligned this time, and Fitness First was in the right place at the right time to get my business.
Mark showed me the ropes. Or lack thereof. I love this place; it’s full of gadgets! There are treadmills that take your pulse. There are video screens aplenty. The resistance equipment operates on air pressure, so (ironically) you don’t have to mess around with weights in order to get some resistance exercise. I’m sure Mark doesn’t appreciate what a newbie he’s got here.
I’ll start my first proper session on Friday. Here’s hoping I’ll make it to a second session.

Things Kids Do

I love this story; about a kid taking the law into his own hands and climbing into the prize vending machine to claim his loot. I find the mother’s reaction interesting: she got a camera to record the incident. But the big issue is in the last line.
Saddest. Ending. Ever.

Equal Opportunity

Sad to hear today of the passing of George Dantzig, a guy you might have heard about in an ‘urban legend‘ about positive thinking. I heard this story a few years ago, and was amazed to find out it was true.
Cutting the long story short, a maths student ‘accidentally’ solves some famous ‘unsolvable’ math problems as homework without realizing they had been challenging experts for years.
The moral of the story is that he may never have solved them, if he’d been aware of their reputation beforehand and become discouraged. More than a few sermon illustrations have thereby sprouted forth about the inherent power of positive thinking. (Or the serene beauty of blissful ignorance).
I don’t know if it’s all connected, but lot of mathematica is being resolved at the moment. We’ve finally completed the Star Wars movie numbering sequence (by inserting a ‘three’), and there seems to be a truce between the hot dog sausage and bun manufacturers to finally agree on portion sizes.
I can feel the Force balancing beneath my feet.

The Sixth 'Sith' Flick's Wicked Sick, Isn't It? (Six times quickly)

Life was a lot easier before I went over to the Dark Side.
Ainslie and I and the team at CA went to see ‘Revenge of the Sith’ tonight. I think it’s the best film of the lot, and a very satisfying conclusion to the Star Wars story. Many things make more sense. Many other things make less sense.
But darn you, George Lucas, for turning the simple ‘good versus evil’ story of “A New Hope” (aka:: ‘The First One’) into part of a complicated web of lies, deceit and fuzzy morality. Finally, the ‘certain point of view’ lines trotted out in ‘Empire Strikes Back’ (‘The Second One’) make sense. Kind of. How dare you rescue nuance from the shambolic plot development of Episodes 1 and 2.
(Incidentally, I still haven’t figured out how Luke eventually balanced the force by destroying a lot of Imperial hardware in “Return” instead of just cutting the Emperor’s head off when he had the chance. Still some weirdness in the story there. But hey.)
And also, darn you, Lucas, for making Darth Vader a sympathetic character. I could rest easy in the illusion that he, like all despots and evildoers, was evil incarnate from the day he was born. It’s easier that way. Please don’t try to make me understand that people can decide to ‘turn’ evil, and are capable of being redeemed at some future point. That’s just not the way it works.
…In movies.
George, I’m still not convinced that you had a six story arc in mind. At least, not until sometime after ‘Return of the Jedi’ (The Third One) was in the can. But, darn you for turning the first three instalments (Episodes 4,5, and 6) into completely different movies. I’ll need to sit down this weekend and catch up. Can I bunk at your place?
UPDATE: If you’re being bugged by the younglings to let them see it, I highly recommend this ‘Parent’s Guide‘ about the movie. Beware the spoilers.