Upgrade

I've upgraded my wireless broadband, and received a Pendo Pad as a bonus. It is evil. EVIL, I tell you.

While playing around with it, I downloaded a couple of games - and then... it was hours later. The old "I'll just finish this level..." gambit. I am now addicted to the 'jewels' game; all those shinies and explosions, and whirling jewels. O_o

I need to focus on writing. So...

Woman's Arse Size study...There is a new study about women and how they feel about their arses...The results were pretty interesting.
30% of women think their arse is too fat. 10% of women think their arse is too skinny. The remaining 60% say they don't care, they love him, he's a good man and wouldn't trade him for the world...

And now, back to writing the last story for the marathon. Phew.

A Three Hour Tour...

I've had a busy few days.

The moozeum has an exhibition opening on Friday and one of the co-ordinators damaged an ankle and hasn't been able to do much; so, for some insane reason, I volunteered to help out. Sheesh.

Anyway, I was invited to a photo shoot bright and early on Saturday morning:

Hmm. Up before sunrise for a morning out on Jervis Bay. The photo shoot was for a local dolphin and whale watching company. A group of us boarded a fast tourist boat to scoot around in. This boat has the photographers aboard.

It's been years since I was out on the Bay and it was a beautiful day to re-acquaint myself - I've also never been beyond the Point. Fishing inside the Bay seemed a much safer option in a little runabout.

So off we went, across the Bay and out past Point Perpendicular - a name that speaks for itself and continues the Australian tradition of stating the bleedin' obvious:

Once you get to the Point, you can see the rugged coastline. Shelves of slowly eroding sandstone all the way with large chunks of rock littering the sea floor and towering cliffs. Abseilers love climbing up and down because of drop and the many handholds. Curiously, I didn't see any seabirds nesting in cliff face.

Of course, that might be because the Navy uses a part of the penisular for target practice.

And... since this was a dolphin and whale watch tour, and... since it is the start of the whale watching season, here's a whale:

A humpback whale, in fact, travelling north to the Great Barrier Reef for some R&R. They sometimes get a little confused and end up in the Bay, rather than continuing up the coast. But it's nice, safe harbour for the smaller whales. This one is moving in a circle - either to get away from the boat, or to come around and give us another look; I vote for the second. Overall, we saw five of them and a playful pod of common dolphins. The dolphins were too quick for the camera, unfortunately.

I don't think I've ever had three hours pass so quickly. And if I get another invite, I'm there!

Of cake and wine

Fortunately, I wrote my story this morning - thank you, Marina, for the inspiration.

A friend of my mother's, Ld, called up last week and said the third of the triumvirate, Lr, was heading this way for a Garden Club Reunion.

Now, all three have been friends since, ah, the late 1950s, so it's a long time friendship. Due to retirements, each moved hundreds of kilometres away.

Ld said to expect them on Monday. I made cack... sorry, cake; chocolate, in fact. ("Lr doesn't dobought cake," my mother said.) And so, we waited. No sign of them - and no, Lr isn't the kind of person to ring and say they'll arrive on such-and-such day at such-and-such time. I also arranged for a wine salesman to come on Wednesday, figuring 'if not today, the friend will turn up tomorrow.'

Tuesday, and we finished off the cake, made another. And so, we waited. No sign of them - and no, we didn't know where they were staying, nor their phone number.

Today. I made a nice butter cake, with cream and chocolate frosting - urg, licking the bowls gave me a monumental sugar rush. And we waited - my mother happily watching the television, me, curtain twitching. Two o'clock came and went, then three. I asked the parent whether she'd like to come into the other room to wait. I kept watch on the door while printing out some old photos for her, and we chatted. Finally, four o'clock arrived. My mother gave up and went back to her room, since the wine man was due at 4.30.

And lo, the weary travellers did turn up - at a quarter to five, while I'm sipping a rather bland French white.

The wine man wasn't sure whether to arrange another day, or stay and listen to the reminiscing. I urged him to stay and he settled back, occasionally pouring from a new bottle, that we briefly discussed while the other conversation continued. Lr's husband chimed in with comments every now and then about the wines he wasn't tasting.

Lr and husband declined coffee and cake, and stayed barely an hour. They left with promises of long letters. The wine man stayed another fifteen minutes or so, since he had another appointment.

I bought some rather nice Aussie wines, the story is written and all is right with world after my time with various wines - and there's still cake.

Name lag

I'm halfway through the marathon, and I've finally resorted to the baby name book.

Seventeen stories so far, with an estimated 51 characters, and just over 40,000 words. Why, if this was NaNo, I'd be well on my way! But, I digress. The stories have no fewer than three characters in them each, and that is a lot of names to come up with.

Sure, I could jumble up the letters of simple names to come up with fanciful ones, but, like any marathon, the middle is where you drag and you wonder why you bothered. In fact, I think I've used a couple of names twice, but I'm not re-reading to find out - that will come later.

So. Fourteen more stories to go and I'm hoping for some easier prompts. I think I need to watch some sci-fi, or read a fantasy book to get the creative juices flowing a little better. Some stories just arrive, waiting to be told; others hang on to obscurity until you pry them loose.

I want the former, but it feels more like the latter. Ah, well, tomorrow is a new day, just waiting to be explored.

Stop, go

Well, that little experiment failed utterly.

I figured I'd reduce my time on the internet and limit my book readin' in an effort to boost my concentration on writing and editing and creative stuff.

What I found was that staying off the 'net gave me more time to write, but reducing my novel reading also reduced my creativity. Worse, I began to have editing issues, wondering whether something was right, when I knew it was.

I have found that, if I watch a movie, the imagination sparks; if I watch the news or documentaries, or sport, empty-headed blandness is the result.

All I need do is read what I've written for the story-a-day marathon to see the best stories have been written after watching something fun.

I have felt vaguely lost and out of sorts, as if something was missing. Now, I know what it was: the imagination of others.

So, while I'm writing these stories, I'm also working on my historical piece for the museum, a book I promised a beta reader some time ago, and, in my spare time, I'm going to find something to post - it's been too long and I need the adulation of my fan... If I still have one.

Spoons and garlic

Writing a short story every day does have it's interesting moments; starting with the prompt.

It takes a while for the issues - theme, character, where, when and an important item - to jell into a cohesive idea for the beginning of a story, but there is always something I bumped up against later on.

For me, this is about free writing from the prompts, but I have to wonder where some of these ideas come from.

I thought today's story fine at the time, marinating my heroine in a vat of crushed garlic to escape the villains. But then an important question arose: how do you get rid of the garlic smell?

And off I went to research appropriate methods. Ah, the wonders of the internet.

Colour me surprised by the answers. A stainless-steel spoon rubbed on the garlicky area? Wow, I'll have to try that one, but not appropriate for the story. Personally, I'm not using coffee (it's precious to me), or lemon juice (what if I'd cut my finger chopping the garlic?)

So I found my solution and carried on. It has taken me nearly ten days of writing to complete a story I really like. Since I'm writing thirty-one, that means a month of work for three worthwhile stories.

Not much of a success rate, as it stands, but I hope to improve that number.

Word up

Okay, I'm over the rush of triumph from yesterday's news, and it's back to work on the marathon.

It's day three and I'm one story behind. Worse, or better, depending on how you look at it, the two stories written so far are fairly long. It can't possibly be a hangover from Nano, so I guess the stories just need that long to be written.

I'll have to work harder to catch up. Like Nano, I prefer to have extra work done - just in case I can't write on a day or two.

There are plenty of generators to chose stories from. The Seventh Sanctum is my favourite. It has plenty of variety and complexity.

Time to write another - maybe not so long, with a little humour? Joss Whedon suggests at the darkest hour for a character, to have something funny said or happen. I'm still working on that.

O BLah

For too long have we seen pictures of Muslims celebrating the deaths of so-called 'infidels', of Jews and of victims of suicide bombs.

Now, it's our turn to celebrate.

I've been watching Al Jazeera and listening to a man who interviewed OBL (I didn't catch his name). He said that with every success, OBL became more vain, began to believe he was a new Messiah.

To me, he became a coward who believed his own press, who sent brain-washed people out to kill innocent people with only the promise of better things in the afterlife and for no other reason than they believed in different things. For ten years he hid - some hero - spent time in caves and on the run, but always with a 'do as I say, not as I do' attitude.

What he has caused to be done in this world is abhorrent; all the murders, the violence, the terror. All because the Saudis didn't want him to go after Saddam and chose the U.S. instead. All because he thought he single-handedly defeated the Russians and therefore Moscow. Thought himself special enough, he could destroy the U.S. and Washington. Yeah, not so much.

The fundamentalists will turn him into a martyr and continue to kill in his name. The West will continue to fight and kill the fundamentalists in the name of justice.

But for now, the scum-sucking bottom-feeder is dead.

Osama Bin Laden, is now O BLah.

Marathon time

I am back from sunny Canberra, and missed the rain on the coast.

It feels like I've been away for longer than ten days, but we had a good time.

I spent some quality time at the National Library fondling century-old documents. I love history, especially touchable history; snuggling up to Hadrian's Wall, walking the WW1 battlefields, kissing the Blarney Stone, touching Roman antiquities... or is that just me?

I'll get over the squealie fan-girl in a moment.

So. It's time for the Forward Motion story-a-day marathon.

I've written half a story so far. I spent yesterday morning cleaning up and the other half driving with the end-of-the-school-holidays traffic (unbelievable amount of idiots out there) that added an extra hour to the journey.

I confess to being ill-prepared to write. The first story the generator came up with seemed like a good idea at the time, but now... not so much. It might have been because of tiredness, but I shall persist and finish the story and another later today.

A good shot of caffeine should help the neural synapses spark.

ANZACS

Today is ANZAC Day. It is a day of two halves: the Dawn Services around the world at various points of military import, and the afternoon games of AFL, NRL... and two-up down the pub.

The morning is for commemoration; the afternoon, for celebration. One for death, one for life.

It sums up the ANZAC spirit, where we will lower our heads to think of those who fought in foreign lands for freedom and never returned; then, it's a wake, the telling of tales of battles long won or lost and keeping the memory of fallen mates alive.

At the end of the First World War, the discussion turned to reparations and the punishment of Germany.

President Woodrow Wilson (who won the presidency on the promise not to enter the war) advocated generous terms for reparations. In a moment of supreme arrogance, he said to Australian Prime Minister, Billy Hughes (who once punched out a heckler during a campaign for conscription and was as aggrieved as any Australian over the catastrophic losses), "But you only speak for five million people." The offended Hughes snapped back, "I speak for 60,000 dead. For how many do you speak?"

There is no hierarchy on who lost more, every nation involved lost too many due to the military incompetence of those in charge. If Douglas Haig had actually seen the ground on which he sent thousands to fight, he might have developed a different strategy. But he didn't, content to stay at a chateau behind the lines and study out of date maps.

It is the bravery of those men who did their duty, even knowing it meant certain death, that we commemorate today. The sacrifice is not forgotten. As the warriors of all wars are honoured, we salute those who are still in the field, in Iraq, in Afghanistan, in East Timor and elsewhere.

And thank them all for their service.

Far and away

And... here I am in down town sunny Canberra. Okay, not so much 'down town' as in out in the 'burbs.

Good Friday traffic from the coast would have tried the patience of a saint; I settled for grinding the molars as cars consistently slowed to take in the mountain view, or slowly edged around corners that don't need it, then accelerated so no-one could overtake. sigh A three hour trip took four-and-a-half hours - and most of the traffic was going the other way, ie, down to the coast.

I'm here to do some Denman research at the National Library, then take in the new exhibitions at the War Memorial; I haven't been since completing my final year History extended essay way back in 19**. This weekend is also Anzac Day with commemorations around the country.

I can also find stuff to make my aged parent's life much easier - stuff I could not find in a rural shopping hub. I guess for specialist stuff, you have to go to a major city.

I don't think the library will be open tomorrow - shame that - so... I shall just have to shop. No, don't try to stop me, it must be done or I shall be bookless; and what a tragedy that would be. This is, after all, a working holiday.

Don't Honk at Old People

Go the Ninja-Gran!:

Don't Honk at Old People

Just another scam, ma'am

Cool! The laptop has booted perfectly for two days in a row!

Still, I got another phone call from a company claiming to be an outsourced computer maintenance group while wrestling with the problem. I think that's four this year.

Maybe it's just me, but I'm not turning on my computer, logging on to the internet and giving remote access to a complete stranger with an accent I can barely understand. Especially when the name of the company calling is garbled, with only the word 'Microsoft' clear. I have defeated the virus causing problems, reset all my security - which is now legion, cleared out junk files, defragmented the drive, backed up and sorted out the Black Screen of Death from a software download. I don't need some putz to then tell me I have the same problem as three months ago.

I don't know which is worse: Nigerians telling me they'll give me a percentage of a deceased estate - if only I would help them get the money out of the country; French/Canadian/Cameroonian e-mails telling me I've won the lottery in Spain, Holland or the UK, or sub-continentals with poor English skills wanting access to my very English laptop.

The tragedy is that many people will believe the scams, will send money to help out a Nigerian, will send their bank account details on the promise of wealth, and who will give these people access to their computers and find their identity or banking details stolen.

The solutions are to delete the e-mails and tell the callers you're a computer technician or there's one in the house and you'll just go get them. No one should be asking for remote access to your personal computer unless you absolutely trust them.

I'm sure this won't be the last time they call, but the next time, it will be.

Damn you, Murphy!

Still having problems with the computer.

The last thing I want to do is buy a new one, even as I know this laptop is considered ancient at five years old. (But the rapid turnover of technology is an argument for another day.)

Fortunately, I haven't lost anything. Everything has been backed up, a lot.

The Forward Motion story-a-day is coming up from 1 May and my schedule is tight enough. Still, Murphy's Law dictates that any annoyance you have, will worsen the closer to a deadline you are.

And it does no good to try to outsmart Murphy, he'll only sneak up behind you.

So. Time to reboot and hope the fixes have... ah, fixed the problem, or try fix number four...

BSD, or, WTF happened to the laptop???

I have been suffering from the dreaded Black Screen of Death.

It is definitely one of those things that sends a chill of fear down the spine. The white cursor arrow adrift in a sea of dark grey, like a lost glow in the never-ending night. Fear for all the work I've done this week. Gah!

I did a back up two days before the gloom arrived, and had an automatic download the morning of the big black - and that's what caused it. The f*&£$9 download.

The worst of it is wondering if you'll ever get Vista back, the thinking of the work lost, the inability to go online... and spending hours patiently watching the computer operating system search for the key to unlocking the madness.

Okay. I didn't watch, just set the system running and went off to visit with family - but it did take hours.

Finally, after, hmm, six hours or so? I came back and there was Vista, sitting innocently on the screen as if it hadn't caused me twenty-four hours of angst. The first thing I did was back up everything again, then run Spybot S&D as an administrator, then the anti-virus software and finally, searched on-line for a solution should it happen again.

All I can hope is, when I shut down, everything will boot cleanly tomorrow. At least all my important files are copied to an elsewhere should the worst happen.

Close encounter with ick

Summer time is over and the clocks have gone back; trouble is, I'm still waking up at the same time, except it's dark.

This morning, I don't think I mind too much.

It's a rainy morning, and a heavier burst of showers woke me. I'm one of those people who, once awake, cannot go back to sleep, or doze. I've just got to get up. So, I rolled over and reached out to the lamp - it still being near dark and all - and stopped a couple of inches from the switch.

The mind just does not work well before six a.m. In the pre-dawn gloom, I'm feeling like an idiot, with my hand stretched out to the lamp, trying to work out what the hell that darker patch is on the shade. Touch the tip of your index finger to the tip of your thumb and that's the size of the darker patch.

Discretion being the better part of valour, I rose and turned on the overhead light. Yeah, a spider. Hairy, with it's legs curled in camped out on the lamp shade. Watching me sleep. Plotting. Planning. Waiting...

Now I've squicked myself out. The spider is still there. I backed away, out of the room for my morning cup of tea. I know I sprayed for bugs, but I guess it's super-spidey. I figure I'll get paranoid about it later, when my thought processes become more focused.

What? Again?

I don't know anyone who's been called up for the jury pool and I thought I'd done my bit way back in... 2006? So, when I saw a letter from the Sheriff's Office, I had to think back to whether I'd done something nefarious (love that word: ne-fare-ious).

Nope. Damn it, nothing criminal at all to warrant a summons, but an alert that I'd been added to the jury pool - for a year. Again. Am I lucky or wot?

The first time was an attempted murder case - and I was all set to do my civic duty (and pay attention to the finer details of how a legal case is presented, you know, for research purposes) - but we were discharged after three days due to a witness opening his big trap about a previous incident. Me, I'd already condemned the accused purely on the police evidence already presented. Oh... wait. I was supposed to withhold judgement until the defence had finished? Well, the accused was convicted a year later, so the defence must have been weak.

Anyway. I'm interested in how the process works, as well as studying all involved - including fellow jurors who, at the time, seemed quite... listless and uninterested in the proceedings, unwilling to create much of a discussion in the jurors' room. But I chatted away, explaining my thoughts on the case and lo, interest increased.

I wondered, though, whether they were trying to think of ways to be excused - isn't that what most people do? Sure, it's an interruption to your own life, but it's not just about doing your duty as a citizen, it's a fascinating insight into the legal system a lot of the population don't see, or try to avoid because it's inconvenient.

I'm rather excited about being a juror again and I solemnly vow to study the evidence before me, without fear or favour, and reach a verdict I believe is true.

And then file the experience away for future use...

Three lights out

Over the past week, we've lost three leading lights:

Film legend, Elizabeth Taylor. Liz won two Oscars and was named as the American Film Institute's number seven on the list of Female Film Legends. Her career spanned more than fifty years and she starred in films that were truly epic: Giant (1956), Cleopatra (1960), Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958), Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1966), The Taming of the Shrew (1967), and so many more. As an actress, she brought glamour to screen, as a private person, she worked diligently on social issues, like AIDS/HIV and transcended the scandals that surrounded her. She leaves behind a portfolio of impressive, timeless work.

Diana Wynne-Jones, author of Howl's Moving Castle which was made into a gorgeously rendered animated film by Hayao Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli. Her fantasy works have influenced many of today's writers, including the brilliant Neil Gaiman. She will be missed.

Geraldine Ferraro, Democratic congresswoman and the first woman vice-presidential candidate. She was a staunch supporter of women's rights and broke through many gender-based barriers and stands as an icon for those rights.

These three women all blazed their way through life and work with determination and enthusiasm for their chosen trades, regardless of hardships. We can all learn something from their lives and careers, and, if nothing else, never forget what they achieved, nor the influence they've had on generations of people.

Out with old, in with the new

Monday morning and there's finally the chill of Winter in the air. The humidity of Summer has been swept away with the rain and I'm feeling like I'm getting on top of things. Who knew a two-storey house could hold so much crap? (Family, don't answer that!)

And while I'm gleeful at the slow slide towards cold nights and fresh days, I seem to have misplaced my Winter woollies; I put them away before the shifting of stuff and can't quite recall where I put them...

Seems like a good opportunity to buy new.

Speaking of new, we have a new State Government. Australians are notorious for voting out governments they feel have been in for too long - I don't think it has anything to do with political leanings, just that it's time to give the other side a go. Sixteen years is a long time to have one party ruling.

The tragedy is that former Premier Kristina Keneally was sacrificed by the Labor powerbrokers - the third time a woman has been handed the poisoned chalice of power. Carmen Lawrence of Western Australia and Joan Kirner of Victoria were both given the leadership when there was no hope of their party winning another term. During Keneally's fifteen-month tenure, at least twenty state members decided to retire or not contest this election; a clear signal they thought the seats unwinnable - or rats leaving a sinking ship (the cowards).

NSW Labor politics has become known for using the halls of power for their own purposes rather than for the people and has tainted even the Federal Government. The backlash against the Left became apparent very early on but not even the pundits could have predicted just what a landslide win the Coalition would achieve.

Will it make a difference? I hope so. I'm tired of Sydney-centric politics, of the country being abandoned and infrastructure left to run down. Hopefully, the new conservative government will be different and be proactive in solving the mess that is New South Wales. If not, then we'll have to wait for the Left to get it's house in order and have another change of government.

Earth Hour

Tonight, at 8.30 pm, we're turning off our lights in support of Earth Hour.

It all began in 2007, in Sydney, with more than two million people switching off lights and lighting up candles. Businesses also got involved. Since then, Earth Hour has gone from a local event to a global one with 128 countries joining in during 2010.

Started by the World Wildlife Fund, Earth Hour seeks to bring attention to climate change and our role in it, but their over-arching mission is to 'build a future where people live in harmony with nature'. (A noble, but ultimately impossible goal, unless repressive population control is introduced on a global scale.)

When we turn off the lights tonight, we won't be thinking about climate change, but an hour's worth of lighting we won't be paying for. (Reading by candlelight is hell on the eyes.)

I think Earth Hour still has a new and shiny sheen to it. An hour by candlelight instead of electricity also has a romanticism. Sixty minutes is long enough for people to know they've 'done their bit', but not so long as to be irritating. And while the website urges people to keep the lights off for longer, their call comes across as vaguely Luddite-ish.

But my question is this: candles emit smoke from the burning wax, if everyone in the world returned to the days of candles, what effect is this having on the environment?