Maggie, the station host, noticed a passenger who looked unwell. Really unwell. She tried to convince her to come into the office to sit down. The lady didn’t want to. She wanted to catch her train; she was going to see her doctor. Paraphrased: “Please come in and sit down. You look unwell. I think ... [More]
Month: May 2007
Categories
Windsor knot
My dad didn’t wear ties during the later part of his working life, and certainly doesn’t now he’s retired. So I was taught to tie a tie by Norm, who worked at Hattams in Elsternwick when we bought my first school uniform for Melbourne High, in summer ’84-’85. I’ve been thinking for a while about ... [More]
Been busy on a comparison of public transport fares between Australian mainland cities, which found Melbourne’s the most expensive for most trips: Age story… on the front page no less. Full data/graphs. The government claims it’s an unfair comparison. But they would say that, wouldn’t they.
I pick up catch-phrases from various places. One is “Shimasu!”, which I use as a kind of Japanese expletive, when struggling to wake up in the morning, or when exerting myself in some extraordinary way. shimasu.mp3 (MP3 format; 2 seconds; 9Kb) Said the right way, it sounds like something they might have said on one ... [More]
It’s great having a phone with a half-decent camera. It’s nowhere near as good as my “real” camera, but because I almost always have the phone with me, I can snap photos anywhere, almost no matter what I’m doing: And because a phone doesn’t look like a camera, even dogs of a nervous disposition, such ... [More]
Dishwashers: On the subject of water (I think Andrew or somebody mentioned this a while ago) in last Sunday’s Age M magaziney thing, there was an article noting that dishwashers generally use less water than handwashing. Dishwashers are in the 13 to 20 litre per cycle range, whereas handwashing is up around 40 to 60. ... [More]
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The magnet
A fridge magnet arrived in the mail. They’re always useful for sticking things to the fridge, and this one includes emergency numbers, which if could be potentially useful if there was ever an emergency in the house and I happened to be near the fridge and in the heat of the moment had forgotten that ... [More]
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Winter and water
Winter has arrived. The heating’s back in use, and I’ve started wearing jackets to work again, after some time of managing to avoid it. (Normally if the forecast high is at 20 degrees or higher, it’s not worth taking a jacket, since I only end up sweating on the walk from the station, and at ... [More]
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Follow-up comments
I get some terrific comments on this blog. Quite a few of them, too. The database reckons over 6000, though I think there might be some suspected spams in there. Then again, there are some old comments from 2003 that haven’t been imported into WordPress yet. Here’s some followups on some recent comments, and on ... [More]
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On the box
I don’t normally watch much TV, but I’ve got a few things earmarked for the coming weeks. Tony has reminded me: Life On Mars starts this Sunday night on ABC. Everything I’ve heard says it’s good. Series 3 of Doctor Who is hotly rumoured to be coming on Saturday nights at 7:30pm again, starting in ... [More]
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On the road
You don’t have to be a 4WD owner to drive like a moron. Even Prius owners do it sometimes. The other contender this week was red Mercedes TLH 385, zooming down Jasper Road with at least one indicator and brake light not working, tail-gating and generally driving like a maniac on Wednesday night. Also seen ... [More]
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Hello AGL
Hello to my readers at AGL. I know they’re reading because earlier this evening someone from their customer advocacy team rang me up, saying AGL management had found the whole name change saga (Googling “AGL”, apparently) and passed it to him. He explained what had happened (old data used by a mail house). I understand, ... [More]