In lieu of posting one of the many threads that are running around in my brain, I am taking the easy way out and posting another photo that I pushed onto flickr. This is an old shot, taken from the passenger seat of Shaju’s car while driving around somewhere in Alberta. It happened to cross my radar as I was rebuilding my photo database¹ and thought that I could get some interesting colour/texture out of the clouds. I kinda remember taking the picture, but I only really have the details embedded in the EXIF data. Metadata to the rescue!

¹ f-spot decided to eat its database for some reason. This happened to also highlight some timestamp problems that have been bubbling below the surface. I may get around to writing about it. Maybe.

Over the past few weeks, I’ve been adjusting to the new training schedule for Richter City Roller Derby. The new venue is nowhere close to home and I can no longer count on getting there quickly and easily. We’ve adopted a car-pool scheme that has me grabbing a bit to eat after work in Petone before being picked up. Unfortunately, Petone seems to roll up and go to sleep after 5pm and restaurants are slow to open for dinner. This leaves me hunting for good, light food on a time constraint.

I’ve tried Lone Star and I don’t want to repeat the experience. Overpriced and overly rich food, accompanied by horrible music – no thanks. For round 2, I went to the cafe at Lighthouse Cinema. It wasn’t bad, but I got zero 3G coverage inside the building, which cuts my options for futzing around. It’s not the end of the world, but I’ll keep searching anyway. I may try one of the pubs next week.

The wind woke me up last night – that never happens. I had to get up and shut the window because the wind was knocking the blinds against the window frame. Winter has blown in with all its turbulence. As a tribute to the coming storm, I offer this photo. It was taken on a rainy night last week, the poor umbrella having been sacrificed to the season.

If you look closely, there is a bit of an ugly smudgy thing in the shadow on the footpath. I have no idea where that blemish comes from, but 3 of the pictures on that roll have similar problems in different locations on the photo. It’s a bit bummy, but there is nothing I can do about it.

I booked my flights last night for my next vacation. I will be spending several weeks in Eastern Europe later this year. Having been reading through the travel guides for a few weeks, the excitement levels are building. International flight prices are fairly low right now, so my budget will be used more as being-there money rather than getting-there money, which I am thrilled about.

There is a ton of stuff to do before I go—travel insurance, rail passes, itinerary, and so on—but I still have a few months to get it all going. Not long, but a long time to wait.

I have been off work for two days as a result of being sick¹. I think that I am showing signs of improving, but it is never easy to tell from the first person.

Being drained is boring. I now have a solid plan for my upcoming European vacation and have been fixing some nagging computer problems. However, I suck at actually resting. I snuck out of the house for a bit today to try to track down a single fold-out map for the countries of choice – no luck there. I assume that doing some language study is also not resting. So it goes.

I should be back at work tomorrow. If not, I will be pounding on the door of our IT department to get us some real work-from-home options. This is silly.

¹ I am reasonably sure that I have not contracted whatever swine flu thing that is causing the media to panic. The person I caught the cold from only had a cold. So there.

I missed my bus this morning. I arrived at the bus stop at 7:18, according to my Nokia E65. It wasn’t due to leave for another 2 minutes, and the bus was neither parked and waiting or driving off in the distance.

There happened to be a Go Wellington bus, with GPS-driven clocks, stopped in front of me when my phone showed 7:20. I was 3 minutes and change behind that clock – the first time I have noticed any significant deviation. What annoys me about this is that I use Nokia’s phone management software and it refuses to keep the time on the phone updated properly. Gammu manages to do it, so why can’t Nokia figure it out?

I took advantage of a day of great weather to go skating along the waterfront over the Easter long weekend. I had left the bulky stuff in a locker at Fergs Kayaks and went to put my skates on. A few minutes later, I was doing a quick warm-up lap around the wharf and I was… stopped by the weirdest sensation that I was forgetting something. My wallet and mobile phone were not in my pockets. I’d left them on the bench where I’d changed into my skates.

When I returned to the bench, one of the staff ushered me inside. My stuff was waiting for me behind the counter. Cheers guys. I’ll bring you as much business as I can.

In what appears to be a bungy-policy, NZ Bus , owners of Go Wellington and Valley Flyer, are re-restricting drinks on buses. It’s only been a few months since the little blue signs appeared, giving the thumbs-up to lidded drinks.

Boarding the bus that takes me to work in the morning, I was told that my coffee, lidded – as required by the current policy, was not allowed and I would be refused passage next time. Never one to let mis-information get in the way of a good coffee, I emailed Metlink for clarification.

It seems that just recently information has come to hand that we will be removing the old notices and replacing the buses with new ones regarding drinks etc. Drinks – even with lids – will not be permitted on our buses. Might pay to have your coffee fix before you get on the bus. Hope with clarifies things for you.

Yes, it does. Bummy, but clear. Bummy because I won’t have time between going to the gym and catching the bus to drink a coffee. Not comfortably and probably not safely. Not without ice cubes.

My computer at home is about 5 years old now. It’s served me quite, and continues to do so, but a few niggles are starting to get on my nerves. I’m a bit limited by the small-form-factor case which provides very little expandability, but I’d also rather not just dump the machine outright. It’s got spark left in it yet.

• There is an intermittent source of distortion on audio from the on-board AC97 codecs. I haven’t spent too much time trying to isolate this. It doesn’t matter which output port I take (front or back panel) and I’ve cleared the mixer/amplifier section. I’m starting to consider an external audio device. Given that I lack PCI expansion slots, this one would have to ride on Firewire or USB. Nothing has been decided here.

• The on-board video adapter is a bit less than capable. Something changed about a year ago, which I’ve never fully gotten to the bottom of, causing some videos to refuse to resize. Watching a DVD where the image is barely larger than my hand is painful. I’d also like a bit more viewable real estate. 1280×1024 is a bit scant. I’ve got an 8x AGP slot that I can work with and it looks like I’ll be best served with an ATI device. I’m weighing my options and favouring the Radeon HD3850 or HD3650.

• To go with a new video card, a new monitor is appropriate, especially with prices having come down. Given the amount of photography stuff that I’ve been playing with lately, it makes at least a bit of sense to have a monitor that doesn’t suck. I haven’t been able to apply a colour profile to my current monitor, but I know that it’s nowhere near as bright as it was in past years. Jumping from a 17 inch screen to a 24 inch might be a dangerous jump, but I think I’m willing to take that risk.

That’ll probably be it for now. If I replace anything else, I may be better off buying a new machine after all. Can I even get Socket 478 CPUs anymore?

This morning, Wellingtonians were called on to Walk2Work. Supporters received free coffee, tea and breakfast for their efforts. People came from near and far, mostly into the central city. I walked into to town to catch a train to Lower Hutt, continuing my walk to work from a nearby station.

Not without political overtones, Jeanette Fitzsimons has a few points to make to Transport Minister Stephen Joyce regarding his opening speech. And so she should. Mayor Kerry had one short-lived heckle as she spoke on pedestrian safety, as in don’t jump in front of cars.

All told, Wellington is a great place to get around on foot and getting together for breakfast like this was a nice touch.

Edited later on: Adding image of the sticker I was given.