Liking: funky modified bicycles

There's a nifty story and slideshow over on Wired about some cool mods that people have made to their pushbikes - everything from sticking the front half of a shopping trolley on to this funky lit up number.

LOLing: Internet people

Sorry, just another short one today - trying to get my head around a uni assignment that isn't even remotely interesting and also a little fraught with marking danger.

I have to analyse two of the online activities we've done this semester - frankly for a subject that has been about learning exciting and funky new ways of teaching online, there's been a huge gap between what we've been learning and how it's been put into practice.

So many - "read this article, summarise it and post your thoughts on the discussion board" - type activities, which have sparked virtually no discussion at all and so few "here's a cool new approach/tool, try it out" ones. (We did have one where we had to upload a picture which demonstrates collaboration to flickr, that was ok but most of the group ran into trouble because they didn't have the necessary five images in their flickr account to get the pix to show up.

So what's the problem? Frankly, I'm not sure that I'll get the good marks I've gotten a little hooked on if I tell my teacher I think she's phoning it in.

I think the best approach will be to emphasise the ways it could have been improved (which is in the template)

Anyway, enough of my whining, some people don't even get to use the internet.

Unlike the people in this video by the meth minute 39, which sums up pretty well all of the web fads of the last few years. (I got about half of them)

LOLing: The Office (US)

I'm happy to say that I think that the US version of The Office has matched the original UK version. The UK version still has a slightly more melancholic tinge but both capture the funny minutiae of office life.

This clip says it all.

Remixing: ACTU election stickers

I found this nifty election sticker at the station last night and thought I'd have a go at putting my own touch on it. (I toyed with another version - Put Howard where he Bennelongs - but the photoshopping was a bit fiddly and I have work to do)



(Just in case you were wondering, I'm not a fan of the man - more on my specific reasons for this soon)

Understanding: the true meaning of Top Gun

Great rant here from Quentin Tarantino that explains that Top Gun is in fact the story of a man coming to terms with his homosexuality.

Looking forward to: Destroy all humans - Path of the Furon

Counting down: 40 days til the Federal Election

Please Kevin 07, don't screw this up. Keep your cool, don't count your chickens and don't get sucked in to the PM's upcoming nasty games.

On the plus side, the Liberal party dirt unit seems to be doing a good job of shooting itself in the foot with yet another personal attack on Julia Gillard in the Daily Telegraph - this time going via her partner, Tim Mathieson.

They bandy the word flamboyant (tabloidese for gay) around twice (just in case you missed it the first time) because he sells hair products and take glee in pointing out that he lost his license for 8 months for hitting a fence while drinking driving 6 years ago and fathered a "love child" as a teenager. (Not that he or she were cheating on anyone at the time - I'm thinking that "love child" in this case is a dog whistle to anyone who might think that sex outside marriage is a problem)

Absolutely pissweak.

The last time the Daily Tele ran a Gillard smear, even their own readership roundly bagged out the Libs for it.

Watching: So you think you can dance

I've never entirely understood dance - I mean, obviously with my innate poise and style I'm awesome at it but I guess I've never really seen what all the fuss was.

This is why I was a little surprised to find myself hooked in to So You Think You Can Dance last night when the PC decided to watch it over Inspector Rex.

It's a slickly put together programme that takes that whole art-as-competitive-sport reality show thing and showcases some pretty impressive moves (sadly to some pretty mediocre mainstream music).

Nothing is left to drag on for too long and by mixing up the styles (quite a few of them I couldn't tell the difference between though) they keep the show moving at a brisk trot. Most importantly it manages to avoid that classical reality show filler tactic of telling you what's about to happen, what's happening and what just happened for each event.

None of the personalities (judges or dancers) were overly annoying or prattish - I seem to be praising it here for not being crap, so I guess it's not a ringing endorsement but in short, it wasn't bad. I wouldn't say I'd rush to watch it again but it was ok.

(I'd put a youtube clip up but the producers of the show seem to be pretty quick off the mark in getting them taken down)

Watching: (Shaun Micallef's) Newstopia

I mentioned last week that I was excited about this show coming up and now that I've seen the first episode, I'm still excited.

I'm a believer that you need to give any new show a grace period of a couple of episodes to find its feet - and when you're dealing with a show that is heavily reliant on the news events of the week you could probably even give it a little longer.

The good news is that Newstopia is pretty well up to speed already - there were a few bumps and jitters - Micallef didn't seem 100% at home just yet and some of the pacing was a tiny bit off - but seriously, this is all stuff that comes with practice. When it was good it was very very good and when it was bad it was still ok.

There's nothing up on YouTube just yet but you can watch the full episode (minus the ads, which is nice) here on the SBS website.

A few of the highlights - off the top of my head - were:

• making the connection that Wallabies is a cross between wallies and wannabes


• an interview with an ACTU rep who interrupted the first question with her answer and then proceeded into a spectacular asking yourself the question then answering it then asking yourself another question then answering it etc monologue that is becoming a popular media tactic these days (made famous by Donald Rumsfeld)


• a 3way interview where the Liberal and Labor party reps frantically searched for reasons why they are the underdogs in the upcoming election, most of the points revolving around how good the other side are


• a trick sbs drama promo - first one into the "ad break" that turned out to be Inspector Herring (hopefully they won't over-milk this gag)


• and a good swag of Kevin Andrews Sudan stuff

(Might have to take another look as there was a lot more to it - including the usual Micallef shattering the fourth wall stuff)

Just for a taster, here's the promo

Touring: The Lodge

Once a year the Australiana fund runs tours of the two Canberra homes of our nominal leaders - the Prime Minister (the Lodge) and the Governor General (Government House)

I travel past the Lodge on the way to work every day so the opportunity to take a peek past the normally high walls and guarded gates was too great a temptation to resist.

Like most special events in the Can', there was a big old line of people waiting to get in and after a little to'ing and fro'ing with the PC (I had an assignment to work on), we decided to stick around. After an hour in line (most of which was spent in the grounds, so there was still gardens and whatnot to look at), we made it in.

Unfortunately there was a ban on photos inside but I was still able to snap off some shots around the place. A few highlights for me were:



the oddly shaped cushiony looking hedges outside,



the very ugly and militaristic looking sculpture that John and Janette chose for the garden



the 1960s municipal park looking water bubbler outside the tennis court



the slightly incongruous basketball/netball hoop bolted to a gum tree



and my personal favourite, the sign outside the door banning, among other things - child stollers. Is this a reference to the stollen generation perhaps? Maybe the Howard government is actually opposed to the practice of child stolling after all?

Here's the full slide show of the outside part.


Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.

As for the inside, it very much had the look of a 1920's kind of house - high ceilings, wood all over the place - I read somewhere that it's done in American Colonial style (which seems sadly appropriate). There were a lot of Australian historical knicknacks from the last 100 years or so and some nice antiques.

The upstairs part was blocked off and guarded - which was disappointing as who doesn't want to see what John and Janette get up to rumpy-pumpy - so it was pretty much just the entrance hall, dining room and a couple of lounge rooms.

Interestingly, there were photos of John Howard and (actual) world leaders all over the shop - which had a slight sad/desperate air of "look at me" about them. He looked particularly excited in an older one with Margaret Thatcher. (His idol and fellow hater of society). I think I saw the missus tucked away in maybe two out of a couple of dozen and there may have been one or two of the Howard spawn as well. But there really were a LOT of pix of Johnny and world leaders. Makes you wonder what kind of pix are up in the "official" residence at Kirribilli.

If you're in town when this rolls around next year, it's worth a look.

Making: a game about how to play games

My housemate Eric would probably tell you that I'm the least qualified person to tell anyone how to play games - but he's a stinkin, cheating, smug Frenchy bastard :) who I will one day beat at Fifa World Cup 2006.

But anyway, this is a training level that I'm working on for the Exploring the EDC game I've mentioned before.



I'm making it as simple as I can because one of the things I've found with using these kinds of games with some of the uh more senior people at work is that they have never played a 3D game and find the whole experience pretty confusing. When you think about it, there is a degree of coordination needed to navigate 3D space by combining movement with the keyboard and camera control with the mouse.

If you're interested, you can read the full design statement with all the educational theorising and such over here at my edublog.

As ever, it's built using FPS Creator, which inspite some bugginess and dubious advice from people posting on the boards, is a very nifty tool.

Reading: Crazy guy on a bike stories

The PC and I are planning a cycling holiday around France next year (or from France to Spain or France to Belgium - basically France will be involved in some way anyway) so it seemed like a good idea to look at where others have been before us.



This is where Crazyguyonabike.com comes into things. Crazy guy on a bike has been going for around 7 years and contains nearly 2000 journals that people have kept on cycling road trips in a range of places around the world.

I've never been to Europe (or been much of a traveller since I hit 18 for that matter) but I've always felt that to get a good idea of a place you need to do more than just hit the designated tourist hotspots. Ideally it would involve living in a place for a while but obviously that's not always an option so the thought of getting the full panoramic slow-motion perspective of the countryside and small towns seems like a pretty good alternative.

One of the stories I've been really enjoying has been that of an American guy called Stuart Rosner, who took a 5000+ km scenic route from Charles De Gaulle Airport to Paris over 60 days.



Clearly, we're not looking at quite such a degree of madness but are looking at spending a good 3 - 4 weeks roaming around and given that this guy has made it to a fair part of the country, his adventures are informative. Lots of pics as well, which is nice.

I'd really like to figure out a way to video the ride (from the rider's perspective) - I've done a little bike videoing before which has generally involved a fair degree of gaffer tape and a camcorder but think there is probably a better way - possibly a helmet mounted lipstick camera of some description.

Of course, I also have another plan to do a fair part of the ride (or at least take a series of photos) wearing one of those stripey navy blue and white tshirts with a beret and a string of onions around my neck. (and a big baguette in a front basket).
The PC isn't so excited about this plan.

(I should mention that the pictures came from Stuart's journal on the site - the dark road is on the way to Vezelay)

Watching: Web 2.0 - the machine is us/ing us

My mate Jerry reminded me about this video the other day - it's a pretty clever examination of how the internet (and the way we use it) is reshaping our society, hopefully for the better. (Of course, this is unless SkyNet decides to use all this information for nefarious purposes :)

Hope you have a great weekend, the Lodge (official residence of the Oz Prime Miniature) is having an open day on Sunday so hopefully I'll be able to share something about that next week - not sure what their policy is on cameras though. (Just wish I'd thought to order a Kevin 07 tshirt before now)

Looking forward to: Jerry Seinfeld's Comedian

I know virtually nothing about this movie as a result of this trailer but I want to see it.

Looking forward to: Shaun Micallef's Newstopia

Shaun Micallef is a bit of a hero of mine - brilliant and hilarious and seemingly a genuinely decent person, he's been doing tv comedy in various capacities in Australia for more than 10 years.



This is why I was pretty happy this morning to read that he has a new news satire/review programme starting on SBS next Wednesday called Newstopia. The prospect of Micallef in some kind of Jon (The Daily Show) Stewart role gets the mind a-boggling.

There's a pretty decent interview with him about it in The Age today - here are a couple of quotes of note:
Firstly about the show -

Enter Newstopia. Screening every Wednesday after Anton Enus' World News Australia, the half-hour satire will take aim at politicians and other bigwigs, and at the way we see ourselves on the world stage. Are we part of Asia? The 51st state of the US? Or do we still cling to the apron strings of Mother England?

"The conceit of the show is that Australia is the best possible place to judge the rest of the world because we have no control over it," Micallef says. "But we're desperately concerned about what the neighbours think of us."

His thoughts on John Howard (Oz Prime Minister, not his Seachange co-star) are an indicator of his insight:

"I've met him a couple of times and found him to be a man of enormous charm," he says. "His greatest strength is that everyone seemed to underestimate him. You can see how Kerry O'Brien's attitude towards him has changed over the past 10 years. He's getting on quite well with Howard now and even having a laugh. He understands he'll never break down that impenetrable wall. But if you get a crack, you've scored a point."

Not that he endorses Howard's spin-laden sound bites. "He's extremely conscious of how his words will read in the paper the next day. It's like he's always got one eye on that history book, on that series of biographies, which is not a great way to live. He's like a dad who watches his kids play through the viewfinder of a Handycam instead of engaging in the moment. But he's survived as a politician partly because he is so careful."

His work on his ABC programme - The Micallef Program is probably his best, here are just a couple of examples if you're wondering what the fuss is about

Updating: Day 107 of the No Shampoo challenge

It's been a little while since I've updated my progress on the no-shampoo front but I'm happy to report that things are still going well. It's still thick and shiny, soft and healthy and I'm assured it doesn't smell. I've also found that it seems to get itchy less than when I was using shampoo.



I rinse it thoroughly each day and try to give it a good brush most days as well - I've been bike riding a fair bit more recently too and this doesn't seem to be making a difference.

In other news, the PC tried valiantly for something like 8 or 9 weeks before packing it in - she has longer hair and it just wasn't coming good. So I guess it's not for everyone but it's definitely at least worth a go.

Enjoying: Raymond Crowe's shadow puppetry

Sometimes the simplest forms of entertainment are the most effective - this is a beautiful video by Raymond Crowe, a guy who calls himself Australia's only unusualist.

Nice, different, unusual.

Playing: songs for Monday Sunset

Like the 309 Johnny Cash 4:35 American V: A Hundred Highways
Jealous Girls The Gossip 3:39 Standing In The Way Of Control
Rosa The Devastations 5:10 Yes, U
Dream In Color Grant-Lee Phillips 4:26 Strangelet
Perfectly Ordinary Rastawookie 4:01 Perfectly Ordinary
Binary Love The Rakes 3:45 Capture/Release
Apple Blossom The White Stripes 2:13 De Stijl
Troubled in mind Konrad Lenz 2:20 Living with the spirits of the dead
Swampland Scientists 4:10 Blood Red River
Young folks Peter Bjorn And John 4:39 Writers block
I love my leather jacket The Chills 2:54 Topless women talk about their lives
The Ship Song Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds 5:14 The Good Son
If Looks Could Kill Camera Obscura 3:29 Let's Get Out Of This Country
The Beast I Came To Be Beasts Of Bourbon 2:14 Little Animals
In Front of Me Tzu 3:37 Smiling At Strangers
Indecise Coralie Clement 2:35 So Frenchy, So Chic (Disc 2)
Jolene Dolly Parton 2:41 The Very Best Of
Black, White And Dead Zombie Ghost Train 2:51 Glad Rags & Body Bags
Chinito Chinito Ry Cooder 4:52 Chavez Ravine
Being Followed Rocket Science 3:53 Being Followed
Fuzzy Grant Lee Buffalo 4:59 Fuzzy

Enjoying: the labour day long weekend

Hope you are too (if you're having it)

Attending: Scientific Lense opening

A workmate of the PC had some photos in a new show that opened at PhotoAccess last night so we cruised along to check it out.

The show combines work from five scientists and is intended to show that even though science and art generally aren't spoken of in the same breath, the extensive use of photography in science can result in some particularly beautiful/interesting art.

There was a fair bit of variety in the work, some was was impressive and other images were a little average and felt like filler. Putting the photos into an art space brings some expectations I guess and given the explosion of images that you get at your fingertips now through Flickr and the ilk, you expect to see something extra special if it's stuck up on a wall in a gallery. I did particularly like a number of the turtle (tortoise?) pics though.



It's well worth a look if you like science, nature or just photography in general.