Today I lost my Vista-inity

As a software developer and gadget lover I typically try and keep myself electronically up to date. It is second nature to periodically check for software upgrades and driver enhancements, and with one exception I feel I do a pretty good job of being across the relevant latest and greatest.

My one exception is no more, as today I lost my Vista-inity!

I’m not sure if it was all the bad press during release, the decision to migrate to Mac OS X at home, or maybe the absence of a compelling reason to switch to Microsoft’s Vista operating system but until today I’d only really observed it from afar.

As I’ve noted before I’m new to my company and have been hired as a Software Consultant. I’m currently working on an internal engagement helping one of the larger project administration teams with some in-house systems. As the role is really only a couple of days I’ve been floating between workstations and today just happen to land on a box with Vista Professional.

I can honestly say after 8 hours experience I don’t know what all the fuss is about. Granted I didn’t have to install the software. Sure a companywide user policy might have set some of the more annoying defaults to manageable settings but all in all my productivity wasn’t affected at all.

I quite liked the Vista Score section under the equivalent to the ‘My Computer’ properties and must confess that the machine I was using wasn’t exactly a slouch scoring pretty reasonably in most categories. I did turn Windows Aero off as I didn’t see a need for the desktop to be that graphically enhanced.

Ironically after I’d finished all my customisations it looked almost like Windows XP ...

Aussie Rules

Just a small post today but one to lay the foundations for many more to come. I'm an Australian and more importantly a Victorian and this implies an inherit language when I talk sport. I won't mention it again but it needed to be said once.

Footy is and always will refer to the great game that is Australian Rules Football. On the odd occasion that I need to talk about other codes I'll call them Rugby, Soccer or Gridiron ...

Adventure to Lake Mountain well everywhere but

I learnt two invaluable lessons yesterday. The first one is that you need snow to ski. The second is you make your own fun.

A group of eight of us decided midweek that a trip to Lake Mountain was worthwhile. Lake Mountain is a popular cross country skiing resort around 90km from Melbourne. For the knowledge curious there is no lake at Lake Mountain, but rather the area was named after ‘George Lake’

It seems yesterday a lake wasn’t the only thing missing as the last solid snow coverage landed a week ago. Conditions had deteriorated to poor tobogganing and snow play and reduced visibility which negated sightseeing. I’d like to thank the honesty of the ski hire attendant at Marysville who winced as he explained to eight potential customers than it wasn’t worth our while.

Disappointed, but not discouraged, we hopped in our rides and headed to a neighbouring town also devastated by the Black Saturday bushfires. The other reason for heading to Lake Mountain was to support the rebuilding communities affected by the fires. Having had breakfast in Marysville, heading to Kinglake was the obvious choice.

It is the second time I’ve headed to the affected area and not having experienced the fires but remembering the weather conditions on the day it is almost impossible to imagine what it would have been like. Kilometres and kilometres of flora and Australian bush show signs of burning but now six months on a plethora of new life has also sprouted everywhere.

Arriving at Kinglake we completed the obligatory stroll down the main drag and settled ourselves in the local wood-fire heated pub. After a couple of quiet frothies, a few games of pool and a hearty lunch we decided it was time to hit up the wineries, so back in a convey formation we rolled out. One boutique and one commercial goliath of a winery with grand views and its own helicopter later we were back in the car heading to Warburton to - you guessed it - the pub for dinner.

So a day of cross country skiing and exercise turned into to a marathon of eating drinking and being merry. At the end of the day, the same amount of fun was had ...

ponder this 02

If your soap is dirty how to you clean it?

Your eBay item sold!

Well it might have taken me three years and four months but I've finally joint the millions of people worldwide to sell something via eBay.

The argument I had with myself when I decided on a whim to buy an iPhone 3G S at launch, was that I must immediately sell my original iPhone 3G to compensate the cost. It seems 'immediately' is a month long process but in fairness it took me two weeks to list and the default auction length is 7 days so it doesn't take long to add up. I'm pretty happy with the iPhone's ability to keep its value selling it twelve months later for around 60% of its original cost.

But enough about the iPhone, lets talk about the selling process. It really is a wonderful service but it doesn't come freely, I'm an advocate of you get what you pay for so while I'll highlight the cheeky charges I won't go so far as feeling hard done by.

I should point out that the eventual winner opted to pay via credit card with PayPay and from a seller point of view I think this incurs the most handling charges. To list an item with four images on the listing page and a duplicate image on the gallery page ended up costing me $4.84AUD. I was then charged an additional $15.43AUD from eBay once the item sold. If I add to this the $12.50AUD that PayPal charged me to accept the credit card payment I'm looking at a cost to sell of $32.77AUD

So for a national and even worldwide audience I sold my item at a cost of 6.5% commission to third parties and I don't think anyone can complain to much at those numbers.

A final word for those planning to sell something be very wary of the international buyer trying to purchase your item for a son in a different country. They are pretty much scammers and should be avoided at all costs ...

What is irony?

The universe can be a cruel task master sometimes and today I was given a sharp swift reminder.

The new job is city based so I decided to take advantage of the location today over lunch, and took in my Sony @200 Digital SLR to measure it up for a new camera case at Crumpler Designs . After a disastrous start where my assumably beloved iPhone sent me up the beaten track to the wrong address, it quickly redeemed itself with a 'Goggle' search to find the actual address and I begrudgingly re-navigated the three city blocks that I'd overshot my mark.

A longer than expected stop had me fitting my DSLR into the various offerings and I finally decided on the '4 Million Dollar Home' the only decision left was what colour. A drab black and a light blue/orange combination where my options and although I guess I'd already decided I sent an MMS to the wife to confirm. Fearing picking the wrong one and not hearing back from my wife I left the store empty handed with the intention of visiting the next day to pick up the new bag.

Heading back to the office but having already been an hour I grabbed a fast bite to eat. As I sat down I flung my backpack over my shoulder but lost track of it letting it free fall the last foot to the ground. The landing thud had me cursing profoundly in my internal monologue, as I released the beanie wrapped camera body and protection-less 75-300 ml lens where not snugly stuffed in a brand new camera bag, but rather the opposite in a bag no thicker than a T-shirt.

A nervous unpack of the bag and examination of the camera body and lens realised my fear. The lens hood was cracked. A little discouraged I took solace that I was smack bang in the middle of Camera Shop central so after work I began the quest or replacing the maligned part. Three shops, and three apologetic nods of the head later I was sent in the direction of the 'Sony Centre'.

Confident that the Sony shop would be obliged to stock it. I made my way there only to find out my pocket will be $50 lighter and according to their system the part wont be delivered until freaking October 7th! I've got a 'speedy spares' business card and will be calling them tomorrow.

The moral of the story is buy the protective camera case colour you like and be done with it ...

Zitching!

I’ve taken it upon myself to try and generate enthusiasm for this wonderful driving game. When driving the first person to yell ‘Zitch Dog’ upon seeing one of our canine friends is credited with a point. A tally is kept for the day or drive and bragging rights are immortalised in the memory of the gods.

I’m sure it has deeper origins but my wife and I came across the phenomena during the US sitcom ‘How I meet your Mother’. I’ll admit our version is pretty tame but with other variations allowing free slaps or even one sided boxing it has scope to rival extreme sports with the right community backing.

There are currently two know ways to earn a slap the first is false ‘Zitching’ a word I’m claiming as my own describing when a participant preaches ‘Zitch Dog’ only to fail to provide adequate proof of a canine in the immediate proximity. The other is when one player gets a 10-0 lead on a supposed competitor.

Given I play with my wife and society and law enforcement don’t really agree with physical violence against one’s spouse I’m sure we’ll keep playing the bragging rights version but all you gen-y folk get slapping ...