A quick (relatively) author calculation

After Andrea listed her female authors, I muttered foolishly that I should do the same as I've just reshelved all my books  (see below , and yes that is Jar Jar)...and now I feel just slightly pressured.

So since I have a database listing all my authors and books (or at least the physical ones.-I also own 2 different e readers that I'm not counting books on), I downloaded it to excel and deleted all non-female authors using the following (slightly flawed) criteria;

Obvious male names - remove (so females writing as males are gone - males writing as females are kept - unless of course I happen to remember these details)
any unclear names - google search - only keep if it states they are female somewhere... who is JJ Fortune by the way?
Keep any dual authors where one is female.

In doing this I realised my database is a little out of date.  I'm sure I've updated it, but somehow some data is gone. I wonder how out of date it really is.   More pressure to stick it all on Goodreads with a barcode scanner.  Except I'd have to pull them all down again.

Also note that not ALL of my fiction is Science/fantasy....just 99%+  and I've included it all.

So based on the above limitations;  I have 876 novels (see I know I was into the 900's last time I updated a pile) of which 457 are written or co-written by women  That's just over 52%

Whats the proportion of females to males on the planet? 

I considered uploading all the books as well as authors.....too big... authors only...all 117:

Josephine Angelini

Amanda Ashby

Kage Baker

Margaret Ball

Lorna Baxter

Hilari Bell

Holly Black

Laura Black

Alexandra Bracken

Kristin Britain

Karen Brooks

Mary Brown

Lois McMaster Bujold

Frances Hod. Burnett

Trudi Canavan

Diane Carey

Gail Carriger

Carmen Carter

Kristin Cashore

Kylie Chan

Cassandra Clare

Jan Clarke

Jo Clayton

Suzanne Collins

Dawn Cook

Susan Cooper

A.C. Crispin

Mary Janice Davidson

Gail Dayton

Monica Dickens

J.M. Dillard

Nancy & Fran Dorer

Diane Duane

Rosemary Edghill

Jennifer Estep

Lynn Flewelling

Kate Forsyth

Sally Gardner

Claudia Grey

Laurell K. Hamilton

Charlaine Harris

Zenna Henderson

Georgette Heyer

Andrea K Host

Tanya Huff

Eva Ibbotson

N.K. Jemisin

Kij et al Johnson

Diana Wynne Jones

Julie Kagawa

Sylvia Kelso

Celine Kiernan

Caro King

Angela Knight et al

Mercedes Lackey

Louise Lawrence

Ursula Le Guin

Sharon & Steve Lee & Miller

Madeleine L'engle

Joan Lennon

Shariann Lewitt

Jacqueline Lichtenberg

Johanna Lindsay

Holly Lisle

Elizabeth A. Lynn

Melissa Marr

Ann Maxwell

Katie Maxwell

Anne McCaffrey

Vonda McIntire

Patricia A. McKillip

Robin McKinley

Stephanie Meyer

K.E. Mills

V.E. Mitchell

Elizabeth Moon

Lyda Morehouse

Rebecca Neason

Lisanne Norman

Andre Norton

Naomi Novik

Jody Lynn Nye

Robin D. Owens

Tamora Pierce

Elizabeth Pope

Alis A. Rasmussen

Tansey RaynerRobert

Mickey Zucker Reichert

Jennifer Roberson

Veronica Roth

Jane Routley

J.K. Rowling

Lynsay Sands

Pamela Sargent

Elizabeth Scarborough

Lisa Shearin

Josepha Sherman

Kathleen Sky

Joan Slonczewski

Maria Snyder

Midori Snyder

Zilpha Snyder

Wen Spencer

Anne SpencerParry

Meagan Spooner

Caroline Stevermer

Tricia Sullivan

Sheri S. Tepper

Kate Thompson

Carrie Vaughn

Catherine Webb

Cherry Wilder

Liz Williams

Susan Wright

Janny Wurts

Sarah Zettel

Marion ZimmerBradley

mmm Bacon

I bought a bed which has finally arrived.  Its hand made and each piece has the serial number of the bed on it somewhere so everything fits the right way round.  Jacobean reproduction mahogany 4 poster.  Its not all together yet but I'll add a photo when I've finished putting the top on and have a mattress on it.

So, why the bacon heading?  I thought the delivery guy had eaten a bacon sandwich, the wafting of bacon was profound.  Then I thought the neighbour must be cooking bacon.  Then I realized, for some reason, to me at least, Mahogany smells like bacon.

Mmm bacon bed.  I fully expect to get lots of bacon cravings sleeping in it.

filing

I have a new bookcase (read garage put together shelving 2100 high by 1800 wide by 400 deep).  I thought I'd put books on it A-F, G-L, M-R and then S-Z.  Surely they'd average out to roughly the same volume per shelf...well maybe not the M-R shelf - how bad could it be though.

So far, with about 5 boxes of books to go, A-F is 2.5 layers deep, while G-L is only 1 1/3.
M - R is just under 2 deep, but I have yet to unpack the 2 boxes labeled McCaffrey and and Pratchett.  I forsee having to put 1/2 of M on the shelf above and QR on the shelf below.

Then I expect I'll be considering buying another shelf.  If I adjust them all I can fit one more in.  I hope the house supports can take the load :)

promotion

I got one...after six months of application work.  Now off home to put my feet up.

A record? maybe

Its been two months since my last online appearance.

I moved in, put a security screen on the front, pest controlled for termites in the palms and cut down about 30 trees.  Before you gasp in horror they were palms and trees that were leaning over the gutters rubbing them and I'm in the process of putting 15 different ones in at the moment to make a good hedge that wont grow over the house.  In the longer term I'll replace the trees on the other side as well with citrus.

Putting in the new trees requires I first remove the old concrete edging - 20cm deep.  Pick axes, shovels, crowbars and branch cutters to remove entwining roots have all come into play.  I'm 1/2 way through.

I've also booked someone to come clean the gutters.  I have to get quotes on replacing the back deck (or dodgy deck as it has been described), which I told my younger brother not to walk on in case of collapse.  Then the outdoor toilet will get an extra wall and door to internalise it. 

The next outdoor job is to pull out all the mother in laws tongue in the front bed under the veranda and replace them with sun jewels, and buy a yellow bushy rose for the octagon shaped bed.

I'm also painting the master bedroom (1/2 way through).  It was mocha/kahaki coloured and will now be a yellow cream.  In between I've pulled out the (sort of) in built wardrobe and am fixing the back, which was not put together correctly.    Has to be done before January when the queen bed arrives.

Hmm, also using a special dry rot hardener on the wooden edges under the cladding and then repainting, to avoid damage to the walls.

Long term plans:  remove unnecessary wall between lounge and kitchen which makes the space less usable, refurbish kitchen - perfectly functional at the moment, just old.

You know, maybe theres a reason I haven't blogged.  I haven't even mentioned all the uni work I'm lumped with right now.  I feel tired.

This is a first for me

I've never had a spambot comment before (see previous thread).  I always thought my blog too boring for them to find.  Is this part of the long slow slide towards...shudder...popularity and witty repartee?  Or is it just that no-one is blogging and the bots are getting desperate?

Settling in

My house settles today.

Interesting note:  there are no original house plans.  Apparently there were fires and floods and a chunk of the old ones were lost.

My father has suggested that I don't need to put a cover on the well.  Just put a beehive on top.  Nobody will come close enough to fall down it.  I'm not adverse to having a beehive, I just want to meet the neighbours and make sure none of them are anaphylaxis allergic before I do so.

Vague and uninformative statement 2

settling in 2 weeks.

Today I put a deposit on a house

annnd i think I'll leave it hanging there.  Yep.  Thats enough information.

annnd here are the gingerbread men

I shall actually eat one shortly - I forgot to take them to work today

mmm cookie.

posting due to poking

It was pointed out to me the other day that I had not posted since...hmm..ahem..May 11.  This was because I have been in the busiest time of my year.  The worst is over, I see light at the end of the tunnel.  No wait, its an oncoming train..maybe.  Anyhoo., its a local public holiday today and I only spent mumble 2 mumble hours at work and am now avoiding the marking I brought home.  Procrastination Away!
LAst night I made delicious rasberry and chocolate macarons - a big success - see below.  Today I'm off to make icing to decorate those gingerbread men I bought after Easter and haven't had time to make yet.  Photos of that to follow - if I remember

On another note, I bought myself a lucky dip from avon - always something interesting in it.  This time it was hair extensions...see below. longest hair I've ever had.

Cupcakes into darkness

I made some 18 cupcakes Thursday night and set my alarm early on Friday to ice them...see the glorious creations below (pre the little candy bees and butterflies I put on them).

Then I carefully packed them in my cupcake transporter and took them down to the car to take to work.  At which point one of the latches gave way and 15 of my 18 cupcakes ended up face down on the grass.


KHANNNN!!!!


Sorry, just went to see Star Trek into darkness.  Good movie.  Clever weaving of original story line into reboot.  Good special effects.  No cupcakes.

not trying it out at that price

I've been looking at bluetooth dongles & found one that looks sweet...the AZiO BTD-V400 Micro Bluetooth Adapter.  This is a US company & there's lots of sellers...in the US (from about $14 upwards..who won't sell to Australia.  I even found one on ebay.com.au which said won't sell to Australia.  Then an advanced google search led me to an Australian domain that just sent me back to amazon and the same companies I'd been looking at.  I finally found one who will send it, for $22US, plus $48 for the freight.  I'm just not paying that for a microdongle in a small sleeve of plastic.  You'd think someone would be buying in bulk and on-selling in Aust.  I wonder if theres some setting that aren't approved here.  It did have 80ft reach.  Interferance perhaps?

Back to officeworks to pick up a Targus version for $23.

On a funner note.  I learned to ice cakes fancily the other night

The top design is called Mr Whippy.  The bottom is called garden.  The missing one looked like a big pink rose with a leaf and ladybug on it...you missed it.  I ate it.

interesting weather we're having

Ive just read Germany has just had issues with mycotoxin in cows milk due to contaminated feed from Serbia (milk can't be consumed) and a New Zealand malter is rejecting barley due to the biggest ergot outbreak in New Zealand in over a generation.  In both cases, perfect weather conditions for the respective fungi to grow and produce toxins.  Since they picked it up there's no hallucinogenic beer for the Kiwis.

free time warning...

I downloaded sculptris...thanks Amanda.  My free time has fallen down the black hole of awesome software. 

I just tried to make a dodecahedron with a tail (the start of a phage).  So far (in 20 minutes) I've made something that looked remarkably like a duck head...which has now turned into a brain and spinal cord.  It all looks very, very cool, but not what I was aiming for...yet.

do not call

I put my mobile on the do not call register today.  I got an unknown call a couple of days ago that I missed and didn't bother ringing back, then today it rang, I picked up and missed the call (answer and it hung up).  I thought I might have messed up the answering and found this number had been calling multiple times a day  - ooh maybe its a sessional teacher needing to call me.  I did have one call at work today & he had called last year on my mobile and I'd ignored it as an unknown number.  I'll call back. ...Answering machine with if you are returning a call to "insurance company I will not advertise by naming here" and are interested in ....press 1.  I proceed to hang up as soon as they get to press one. 

I've never contacted these people, so some company that has my mobile has sold the list - bad company.  I did a search on the number and apparently there's a lot of complaints about them multiple calling people who never even contacted them. 

So, my phone won't block them without downloading an app that is allowed to phone out from my mobile and thus spend my money.....what the??  My phone service also does not provide this service.  They recommend getting on the "do not call" list.  So badda bing there I am. I also put them on my contact list labelled SPAM, so if the calls do come through, I will see and ignore them easily.

If do not call doesn't work, my friend, Spam, may end up having a lot of numbers over time.

note to self

Do not download books to kindle when you have jobs you should be doing.  I was going to work on some important paperwork today.  Instead I lazed around all day reading.  It was relatively pleasant in the morning and I could have got things done.  By the afternoon it was just oppressive & I no longer felt like doing anything other than finishing one novel and starting the second.

new games!

I installed guildwars 2 today.  It downloaded 16gig of update.  Seriously!  At least, that's how much I've used and that's all I asked my computer to do.  It may have also been updating windows & checking email on my ipad, which is now set to airplane mode.  Its a good thing my internet kicks over tomorrow to a new month, because I only have 500mb left on my month before shaping now.

doh

A year ago I transcribed 90% of a set of letters from a great great uncle who died at the Somme.  Then I went back to work & didn't get back to it.  Since then my computer has died, but thats ok, I had back ups.  So I thought I'd pull it up, finish it off and format it this break.  Unfortunately the only back up I can find only has the 1st letter  typed up plus the start of the second.  There's 17 pages of this stuff.  Let all go back to square one.  Pausing now to back up again.

While backing up, I found a backed up folder that was titled "manually backed up files" the date is post the transcribing of the letters....and I backed up the family tree stuff, but not the folder with the transcribed stuff in it - sigh.  

I'm sure I used to make gingerbread houses in 2 days

I still haven't finished.  One is almost done (sans chimney) and I ran out of royal icing.  The other is missing the roof completely.  I have been working on and off on them all day.  (In between swimming, taking my academic dress in to be dry cleaned, shopping and getting a photo with Santa)  Wait, maybe that's the problem.

urge to do stuff...waning

Day 3 of my holiday and I wake up foggy headed, with a dry tickling cough.

Yesterday I went for my first proper "go to the pool and swim (aka flounder, breathe water and powerwalk when my arms give way) for 1/2 an hour"

I then made a couple of gingerbread houses (or at least made the components) and got in a little shopping on the side.  Turducken anyone?  Our local award winning butcher is making them.  They have as of yesterday, a standing order to make over 90 more for next week - I just bought one of the frozen ones, since it was just going to come home and be frozen till next week.

I went to bed with good intentions to swim again this morning and then decided to minimise the chances of turning the cough into something worse.  So, instead today I will walk the strand.

In addition, one more trip to the shops to pick up a christmas present, do the decorations on the gingerbread houses, go to the graduation (I'm in the procession as I have some students graduating).  I'll walk after that, since the graduation is near the strand - though I may change out of my academic dress first.  Somewhere in there I need to list some houses to look at next week.

I think thats enough for a day when I'm only perking up after coffee.  So it won't last.

26oC at 8am - joy.

first day of annual leave

So I had a massage.  I was also going to make gingerbread houses, but the new fridge was turning up, so I didn't want to be doing stuff in the kitchen.  I also downloaded 8 books from Baen books, because I need some holiday reading AND THEY DON'T DRM!!!...hmm I'm sure I did something else.  Oh wait, I mowed the lawn this afternoon - for an hour.  How did that slip my mind?

To do

I came in early to hose out the freezer part of my office fridge before turning it off for the christmas break – berry juice leaked in there when it partly defrosted & if I leave it one and the power goes off while I’m away, magenta coloured  ice will stain the carpet.When I sat down at the computer I found an email with some information that I can now send onto some students (I enquired about this yesterday moring) so now that’s done & now I’m going through my to do list to clear up some more jobs before I leave.  

1.      Discuss some student results (nope, needs someone else to be here)

2.      Hand over some grad student reports (nope, needs grad student to give me one more form)

3.      Write promotion stuff (nope, waiting on some paperwork I need to analyse to grind through someone elses hands)

I’m noticing a trend here.  Now looking on my to do list for stuff that doesn’t require anyone but me.  I really am not a team player.  Give me stuff to do that doesn’t depend on other people.  I’m much happier.

Now finishing this blog post after spending the whole day setting up an online resource for undergrad students.  This didn’t require anyone but me.  Glee and satisfaction.

new rule for my sony ereader

No buying DRM books through the Sony Store till I can figure out how to strip the drm before I put it on my Sony reader.  Sorry bookstores, you're out of luck.

Once again, I've had the waiting circles freeze my ereader mid book, requiring a reset and another sync with the desktop app to get the reader to recognise I have the right to read these books.  Maddening.  And what do I do if this happens on holidays when my computer with the downloaded rights is not available?

I must try a drm book on my kindle and see if it happens there too.

In comparison, I've read 30-40 books on both platforms that weren't drm'd and I've had zero problems.

Go Baen and Smashwords!

saw this on kickstarter

This looks interesting - watch the video - I really like the USB sticks near the bottom of the page.  I have a soft spot for steampunk.

2nd Solar eclipse

I have seen the 2nd solar eclipse of my life, with fine blue skies in a zone where it was about 94% total.  Normal cameras just blow up sun.  Taking  a photo through welding goggles produces a crescent though.

star wars memories - quality free commentary

I remember in high school, all the rumours, and gossip that there would actually be 9 star wars films, 3 before the orginal trilogy and three after.  The general conclusion from those who actually read up on the more reliable information was that there were only 3 more to make...the 3 prequels...if they ever were made.  Then, eventually, they were. 

And now!  On the new owners site - release date for Star wars VII - 2015.  Seriously, I'm counting decades from the original conversations! 

In the words of Winston;

“Never, never, never, never give up.”

 

[refraining from adding quality judgments to any of the situations above, since that's not what this post is about]

Related to royalty!

Well, if you trust someone elses family tree work...and you track back to 1000AD via my mothers paternal Grandmother..and then forward again via a sibling.

It seems I am related to Jane Seymour, wife of Henry the 8th.

I've had a look at her paintings and I don't think we look alike at all.

gaming

soo many games where this would have been handy.

Another attempt at an ebook

I have been slowly reading through some of my old books again and found a couple by Ann Maxwell; Dancers luck and Dancers illusion.  I once again really enjoyed them, so I looked up the author.  Sadly, although the story was well and truly set up as a space romp series, Dancers Illusion was the last one written.  I'm missing Fire Dancer, the first book.  Now, Ann Maxwell has written a fair chunk of books in various Genres, so I decided to see if some of the other sci fi was in ebook format.  I looked up Timeshadow rider and yes, yes it is.  Unfortunately, the sites I could find want me to download "download manager software"  ??? I don't need this for a simple ebook file.  Or they want me to become "a premium member" of their site, pay money and probably give them my contact details.  Or they just look really dubious and I'd want to scrub the file with all sorts of malware/virus checkers.  I'm not a team player, I'm dubious about joining anything.  Just let me paypal a one off book and I'm happy.  BTW One of my sony shops briefly pops up the book before it goes on to say 1-0 of 0 books....hmm.

urge to buy ...waning

I was rereading a book called orphans of chaos by John C. Wright.  I never bought the next two in the series, but thought "you know what?  I'm enjoying this.  I might buy the next one.  I'll buy it as an ebook".  Off I go to look at the sony shops.  They only have physical versions.  I'm trying for an ebook so I go wider.  Nothing on Smashwords, google only has hard copies.  Then I find a US site that sells ebooks in epub (though I have a kindle too, so it doesn't matter that much) version.  Its there!  I go through the process of signing onto the site.  The author has said no DRM, so thats always good.  But I can't buy it because its only allowed to be sold to US people.  ><  Apparently author rules (or perhaps authors publishers rules).  So I go to the kindle store...this edition is not available for Australian buyers.

Why? 

It can't be a price import thing.  I would have bought it locally using the Aus Sony shop by preference...but they didn't have it.  They have a physical copy for not much more than they charge for ebooks, so its not that they can make a bunch more from the physical copy.  Since they HAVE a physical copy, its not that the book can't be bought here.  I can't figure this one out.

Now I could buy the physical version.  But I just don't feel like it at the moment.  If there hadn't been an ebook anywhere I probably would have and thought myself lucky it was still in print, but I feel like I'm being offered a digestive biscuit, while everyone else is offered a chocolate biscuit.  I find my appetite fading under those conditions.

spending money too fast

I've had about four things that were serious sums of money (for me) in the last couple of weeks, all at once a couple were christmas related).  I'm trying to increase the money in the bank, but timing wise, putting any of them off would seriously inconvenience me, or stop me spending it at all as my window would close.  Sigh, I like to spread these things over one thing per pay fortnight, it looks better when the bank wants to see if I can live within my means when I get that house loan. This now means I have to act like a pauper for the next six weeks to get back on track.  No...More..Spending. 

rereading

With a few ereading exceptions (written by people I know), I've been rereading some of my old books.  They are really degrading fast.  I see the day when I'll have to replace them with digital versions.  Some even have odd stains that I assume were made by food/drink that I thought I'd cleaned off.

I won't talk about them all, just a couple that I made some new conclusions about.

There are two novels by Lyndon Hardy in my collection:

Master of the Five Magics and Secret of the sixth Magic.

I always get excited when I'm about to read these and then struggle with the characters, none of whom I like.  Every time I wonder why I remember the books with such fondness.  This time it hit me.  Its the world building.  The ideas in the book are so novel to me and so well described, that my logical mind spends all of the time I'm not liking the characters figuring out the universal rules.  I always end up with my mind just a little stretched.  Having made that realisation, I stopped trying to empathise with the protagonists, ignored their opinions as dumb, and just wallowed in the world building.


Speaking of picking up some ereader versions, I'm thinking theres a few prolific authors I'd like to get the "complete works of" digitally. - one day when I'm on holidays - I need to be organised about these things.  I must have lists.  I must tick them off.  I may also be finally ordering some sony ereader stuff through the ereader store - I'm not sure when it became available, but the link is there now when I sync my reader on my computer

LOTRO horse

One of my alts won a PAX Prime steed on LOTRO.  I've doen this before with another alt too.  Its never my main that wins the rare horses..but I'm not complaining.  I just need to level these guys up now.

up down up

I had a high, low, high day today. First I got to help lift a couple of 100kg turtles, one of which is being released back into the wild. I also got to hold its head to calm it down during the move (very cool). Then I had to deal with a negative email about something that could have been handled in other more positive ways. Short fume before I decided that I have more important things to do and moved on. Then I got a phone call to say I'd won the set of pipettes from the display that had been held the day before. Woohoo! 10-100ul, 100-1000ul and 1ml to 10ml, plus a stand, some tips, a usb stick and a pen. I've immediately loaned them to someone who's going to do some work in PNG next week, because he needed some more for his training trip.

Now i'm going home on a high note. Thus dodging the second down I'm due.

latest Game

I played secret world for 5 hours yesterday...It reminds me a bit of skyrim. I think because of the realistic graphics. I also thought the movement on the screen looked a bit similar, but no nausea - I must retry skyrim when I'm feeling particularly well & see if it was coincidental nausea.

I love the puzzles. I love the "no pressure to rush through and grind" because you have to stop and think.

I'm glad I played for a couple of hours on my own before hooking up with A&C, because I worked out what combat worked for me. When i joined up, the combat style changed completely. Then when they got off (with warnings of, now you are on your own expect to die a lot)...and I died in 5 minutes. Then I remembered my solo combat style and only died twice the rest of the day - I love being able to do combat moves while moving. Going back to "plant your feet, wait till the induction finishes, run out of the way" other games is going to frustrate me now.

must figure out how to do this

People are still hitting my matryoshka limit blog entry. Which is interesting given there's usually only two people who read this blog. The latest one suggested I graph the number of hits on my blog vs the position that a search on Matryoshka limit put my blog on over time.

Anyone (out of the two readers of this blog) know how to find out the latter? I can get the former easily.

its been a hard month

Hence its been over three weeks since I blogged...but while the next week will also be very busy, I see light at the end of the tunnel.  I'm also going to the show tomorrow - yay!

The reason I'm blogging tonight is I want to say how fantastic an author Patricia McKillip is.  I'm re-reading the riddle master of Hed series and she just writes so well.  Her characters have such dignity, warmth and personality.  She writes the small (and large) tragedies of life so well. 

It may also help that I've been reading some fiction that seems whipped off in a hurry, trying to get through events with scant regard for the characters, few of whom struggle with the right thing to do.  And if they make hard decisions, don't suffer from the regret it causes.

Of course, if I could write better, this would be clearer.

next books

Books to get;
Quiet:The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking  By Susan Cain

I saw this reviewed at the link above & thought it might be an interesting read.  I've been thinking lately about the pressure society places on people to be extroverted.  I was going to ebook it, but I have the feeling this one is one I might loan out to people, so I'll look for a physical copy.

Some thing else I can't find again....I saw a link to a novel on a webcomic advert.  I thought it looked interesting and was purchasable on smashwords, so off I went, only I was on a computer away from home and couldn't remember my user or password.  I thought I emailed myself with the link...but no, I didn't & now I can't remember book, author or even which webcomic it was.  bummer.

Edit:  aannnd found the book:  The house of Yeel which i am carefully linking here so i can go off and buy it at a convenient time.

thats right, May is over

So now, to my books of May..almost all of which were box sets;

All the James H. Schmidt novels that came free from baen books (ebook), the last of which I don't think I'd read - ah, good times

Tamora Pierce Songs of the Lioness series - the first Pierce novels I ever read & the author who introduced me to the young adult section of Dymocks.

Lloyd Alexander:  Chronicles of Prydain - a lot closer in style to Lord of the rings than much of what I've read fantasy wise, but also a lot closer in date.

I had family visiting for 1/2 of May so that's all I got through this month.

I haven't been playing computer games because I've had guests - I've been outside, having barbeques, eating fancy ice-cream and fantastic coffee, panning for gold, nipping up to Cardwell for a Jessies' pie.  But they've gone now : (  So tonight I finally cleared up the backlog of other things enough to think I'd like to play...and both my online games are patching - doh.  I did consider skyrim but I haven't played for a month so its likely to want a long patch too (and it made me queasy last time).  So I thought I'd reinstall sims medieval...now it's taking its' sweet time to load.  Sigh.

Writing - sometimes I have to.

I just finished my first assignment for a grad cert subject that I'm doing (annotated bibliography).  I estimate it took me 20 solid hours to write about 2500 words.  I did have to find and read and assess articles prior to writing which is included in that time.  Now I have another assignment to submit in another 14 days - worth twice as much for the same word count, and another one 14 days after that worth as much as this one. 
I have some concerns about getting them done as well as editing two theses for grad students, teaching a 3rd real time PCR and writing the assessment and updating the practicals for an intensive subject I'm teaching in 5 weeks.  I'm planning on having a little melt down after the intensive.

Google is trying to take over

Hmm. My very common browser is no longer being supported by blogger. They suggested using Google Chrome. I wonder who runs blogger...oh wait, thats who. I'm all for companies getting bigger due to better service provision. I'm not fond of companies getting bigger due to making it hard for you to use brands other than their own...must look at independant blog providers. I tried google chrome and didn't like it.

This may be a first

I've started several books this month that I gave up on, for various reasons. Yesterday I found another pile of half read books under the bed that I lost track of and look at now with a feeling of meh. I think I'll give them all away half read.
Sherrilyn Kenyon: Born of ice (also born of night). Scifi romance - Ive read some of her novels and enjoyed them. I think these got a bit samey for me & I couldn't empathise with the characters
Paul Stewart & Chris Riddell: Vox - too kiddy  
Carol Berg: The spirit Lens - I think this is actually a good novel but I just could not get into it.
Cassandra Clare: Clockwork Angel - its a prequel to a series I found interesting, but none of the characters or the story particularly grabbed me or held me  
Johan Harstad: 172 hours on the moon - horror masquerading as scifi (I just don't enjoy horror as a genre, it makes me itchy)
Robert J Sawyer: Watch - I did enjoy the first one in the series, but the main character explaining her point of view to the audience got monotonous - story line please. I don't remember the first one having quite so much in it.

 Theres a couple I finished, but I won't be keeping
 TC McCarthy: exogene - interesting idea and viewpoint, very violent, never really could fit myself in with the heroine.
Galen Beckett: The magicians and Mrs Quent - rip roaring storyline and very Georgette Heyer in style (I like Georgette Heyer) but I struggle with books that run parallel storyline where the different groups of people barely interact (and some of them I quite disliked). I may get the second book anyway, as there may be some long term plan top have the characters join together more.

Theres a few I read and will keep (some came from my bookshelf)
Robert Buettner: Orphans alliance - less original now I'm at book 4 but still good hard war sci fi
Pittacus Lore: The power of six - I'll be reading ther rest of this series to see how it turns out. This is book 2  
Tamora Pierce: Tortall and other lands - I never used to be a short story reader. I found them unfulfilling, but as I get more busy, I appreciate the small bites of time. Particularly in a unverse I'm familiar with already. This lead me to pulling out a couple more of Tamora's books and buying a new one.  
Tamora Pierce: Terrier, Bloodhound, Mastiff - I bought mastiff on Saturday and read it last night and today. I was doubtful as it had been savaged a bit in the reviews, and yes, there's some treachery that could have been subtly forshadowed a little better without giving the game away, but it sucked me in and kept me reading well past lights out. So I feel a bit off today - need sleep (had a nap). I actually liked it better than Bloodhound. I think Terrier is the best. The treachery is very well done in that.

Thats it for April. Off to do some gardening so i don't feel guilty about the computer games later :)

The human spell checker

I spend so much of my time marking reports, that I can't read anything without mentally circling the typos. And yes, I do recognise that I spell atrociously myself - mainly due to the two finger typing (looking at the keyboard), followed by immediately hitting the enter key. And no, that doesn't mean you can send me your writing to check it for you.

TMNT

Can I still use an image of the teenage mutant ninja turtles on my point mutation lecture? What if it doesn't make sense any more? Maybe now I'm inferring the aliens are involved. These are the things I think about while writing lectures.

my poor computer

I tried to fix it, gave up and sent it into my repair guy. He thought he'd fixed it but i couldn't get back to him Friday, so it sat there over the weekend. Called him Monday and he said he turned it on Monday and got new error messages (after installing new hard drive and sata cables). I really hope i didn't corrupt the motherboard in some way. It all sounds very connections related. Anyway...still in the shop.

Edit: back now - new load of windows on new 1TB hard drive. So I'm updating the few things that didn't get swapped across. They did remarkably well, vent has been copied across & kept the passwords and logins - as has firefox. I'm also doubling the ram - but it wasn't in stock so when they get it, they'll drop by and install it at my place. Must remember to make bed that morning and make sure there's nothing embarrassing lying around.

Lotro needs a slight update, doing that now....SWTOR needs a new download of the installer. Guess whats not available right now.

new computer monitor

Most of my blog posts start with 'I'. This has nothing to do with the title, I just noticed it. It's not surprising since this is a purely narcissistic blog I write about me...and the weather. Hmm, Most of the weather blogs don't start with "I". Perhaps I should start using the royal "We" as variation.

We bought a new computer monitor today because SWTOR on a 19 inch monitor is tricky in group fights - too much HUD to click on the action. We were planning on 22-24 inch, but they either had shiny screens (yuck - much prefer matt) and/or didn't have the DVI cable option (only VGA). So, since it was on a $100 off sale, We now have a 27 inch screen. It doesn't have the 2ms refresh rate of the old one, lets see how long an LG lasts, but they set up skyrim on it and I couldn't see any difference in the quality with the character doing fast battle moves. This is as big as we can go and still fit the monitor and computer together on the desk.

We had to go back and correct all the accidental first person wordage in the paragraph above.

March Books

I doubt I'll read another one today. Too much to do, sp here they are...some with a 1 line comment! I like to ensureyou have enough feedback.

Wen Spencer : tinker – attracted by the bright pastel cover colours, stayed for the story
Garth Nix and Sean Williams: Trouble twisters – a little young for me I think, I couldn’t relate to the main characters
Rick Riordan: The throne of fire – OK book number two in a series I haven’t read # 1 of, so I can’t judge too much, it may require #1 to set the scene
Gail Carriger: timeless – enjoyed it. I really can’t see the issue with the dominant male thing – the female lead justs blasts straight through it
Kristen Britain: Green rider and first riders call – good books, I recommend the series
Orson Scott Card: The lost gate – book one in a series – looking good

Plus what I read at Andreas’
The Secret Notes of Lady Kanoko
- Psi High and Others
- Diving the Wreck
- City of Ruins
- Boneyards

Edit:
OK, so much for not reading another one

Garth Nix: A Confusion of Princes - very good, read it in one sitting.

skyrim nausea

I have just come to the conclusion that the way skyrim is interfaced makes me nauseous. I played it a few times when I first got it and felt off afterwards. Then I played it again tonight and I feel distinctly off again. I think its the way you change direction with the mouse. Its too randomly floaty. Queasy now so off to bed.

The things they make..

I bought Bertie Botts every flavour beans from my local lolly shop the other day. The soap flavoured beans actually taste like soap, the dirt ones taste like dirt, the vomit ones taste like spaghetti bolognaise (which I think smells like vomit anyway). I think I'll pass them round the tea room this morning.

Last night I had the strangest dream

I dreamt I was participating in a bike race, underwater, in canals..I think there was scuba gear involved, but we could have just been holding our breath. Then I was teleported to Antarctica and was hiking through the snowy wasteland looking for people to save me when I came over a ridge and there was a large, green mossy field with Mawson's hut at the front and a huge industrial complex behind it. I wandered up and the surprised employees got me to wait out front while they figured out what was going on. I remember looking down at the light jacket, shorts and cloth shoes I was wearing and thinking "I should be colder than this".

What did I eat last night? There was no cheese.

Power is back

we have the electricity back on. Its not all cleaned up yet. I've been hearing chainsaws all morning and every time I drive to and from work the roads/lanes that are closed have changed as they work on powerpoles and debris. So lots of interesting meandering routes to work

next pic

Did I mention, shortly after the storm we started hearing the sirens, I thought it might be one home...until daylight

tornados now

What next?
I was woken at 5:10am this morning to huge winds and thunder and rain going sideways into the house and what i thought was my parents closing windows loudly and banging on my door. In retrospect, they hadn't shut anything by the time i got up to close my window, so it must have been the sound of roofs being ripped off nearby.

I shut my window and then did a double take because there was still rain getting on me...through the wood panels between the casement windows. the rain hit the bathroom louvres and sprayed in up on the ceiling. At least the fly screens are clean now. The ceiling isn't.

My budgies are traumatised and we lost an eggplant bush, and nearby there are fences and brick walls and gates down..but the cross treat is worse.Not far away theres a house where the roof came off and all thats left are the beams and another where they lost the roof and half the walls (see piccys above). A road was closed nearby & they used roof panels as part of the road closed sign. Apparently there were no houses in that area that didn't lose their roof and some houses in Townsville have been completely demolished - though i haven't seen the evidence yet.

February books

and it took me till 1/2 way through March to list them...March may be difficult because I inhaled some of Andreas books while visiting and didn't make notes of the titles.

Neil Gaiman: Anansi boys
Sylvia Kelso: The moving water, Everran's bane
Rick Riordan: The son of Neptune
Misti Wolanski: Driven by the deadline
Selena Fenech: Memories wake, emotionally chraged
Kristine Kathryn Rush: The white mists of power

On other news I joined goodreads, but it seems to upload my database of just under 900 novels requires I have the ISBN numbers...the only information I don't have. There is a barcode reader at work. Perhaps one day I'll borrow it and resort all my books using the scanner...or one week.

Sydney conference

I managed to have a conference in Sydney on the wettest day they've had in 25 years...and it was at its worst at rush hour when I was travelling. I had to wade through the summer hill station underpass. Unlike the locals I didn't take off my shoes..and I waited for someone else to wade to be sure there weren't any potholes. Then I had to catch a taxi. Nobody was answering their number so I went to a taxi in the street which was in a traffic jam - cars everywhere. He was letting off a client at the station because they couldn't get across Parramatta road which was shut due to flooding. We took a long detour, which still should have only doubled my 7 minutes taxi ride, but the traffic jams were so bad, it took 50 minutes. The rain was tropical during the taxi ride and we went through some flood waters that I wouldn't go through in a sedan at home.
I was only 1/2 an hour late for the conference. It was very good btw. I'm taking some ideas home & I met lots of interesting people.

no wonder I felt blah today

I have a bit of a scratchy throat & an eye strain headache & by 1pm I was had it for the day & went home sick at 2pm (it took an hour to get through everything enough to be able to walk out the door). Then I realised I hadn't eaten anything since 6 am., hadn't drunk anything since 8am and had worked solidly since 7am with 3 hours of lectures thrown in...no wonder I felt bad...and I'd worked almost a full day before I left. So, after painkillers for the headache. ease-a-cold and gargle for the scratchy throat a drink of juice and a piece of cake for lack of sustenance and a nap...I feel somewhat better

Cranky day

And it started well, then someone changed a protocol and didn't tell me till the last minute...well, 5 minutes before I was supposed to teach it. Not happy Jan. I don't like other people changing things I'm supposed to be in charge of without consultation. Enough said.

Gaming confession

I am not a platform gamer. I have always sucked at platform games. I do not have the right hand eye coordination to jump over a box while ducking under something else...on an angle with one foot in the air. Or at least, that's how it feels to me. In the past, if there was some sort of manual dexterity jumping scenario, I would either hand it to someone else, saying "get me past this part" or give up on the game. My little brother is good at this. Unfortunately he lives on the other side of the world now.

Which brings me to the point of this post. SWTOR has some really cool easter eggs in the format of datacrons. Now, I love puzzle games. I will happily spend an hour figuring out how to get to one of these gems...so long as there isn't some hideously long path with multiple fall off and go back to the start points. At least the latest one I tried didn't kill me every time I fell. One of the first ones did. I'm still giving them the 3 strikes and I'm not trying again. But its so maddening even when you don't fall to your death when jumping up a series of boxes can result in multiple fails before I get to the top...sooo datacron near camp 27 on Nar Shadaa...even though you have a stat I want, I'm turning my back on you...at least till my brother comes to visit.

I feel obliged now

Dave listed the books he read in January...and reviewed them - I'm not that enthusiastic, but at least I'll list them. Most of them are paperbacks I bought at Pulp Fiction (while on Holidays in Brisbane in January) I think the only ebook I read in Jan was the Gratuitous epilogue. I may even keep up my list through the year. I fully expect the number to plummet by March. While my reading has been strictly sci fi and fantasy, I've been enjoying the variations in styles. Beuttner was definitely the hardest Sci Fi.

Robert Beuttner
Orphanage
Orphan’s Destiny
Orphan’s Journey
Gail Carriger
Heartless
Kylie Chan
Heaven to Wudang
Jasper Fforde
One of our Thursdays is Missing
Mercedes Lackey
Werehunter
The Sleeping Beauty
Intrigues
Andrea Host
Gratuitous Epilogue
Sharon Lee and Steve Miller
Mouse and Dragon

left handedness

I just got a left handed keyboard at work - ah - so much easier to work with...except for the long pause looking at the keyboard trying to find the delete button.

ereader update

If you've read below you'll see there are two main issues I have with the ereader
1. Its really sensitive and holding it with the cover closed can result in pages turning (I fixed this by tapping the power key as I close the book. It goes to screen saver (and requires a power tap to turn back on - no nasty page turning.

2. when you swipe to change pages, it occasionally thinks you want to look at a word in the text, highlights it and gives you options for dictionaries, google etc.

I just popped the ereader on my computer to sync it with the reader for PC to download a new book and it pops up "would you like to upgrade your software to fix (problem described above)". Yes, yes I would. Lets see how this goes.

SWTOR - everyone has a twin

My mum thinks my smuggler on SWTOR looks like my little brother. And except for the bald with horns bit, she's right. I didn't see it till she pointed it out. Now I'm going to look for other people in my alts - perhaps its all subconscious.

ereading

I've now read 4 books on the ereader (guess which 4, Andrea) and have discovered how to stop the annoying page turning while the cover is shut. Tap the off button and it goes into screensaver mode - this will cause it to be be unresponsive till you tap the power button again. I dropped a crumb on it one day and it just kept flicking pages till I removed it! Hows that for sensitive! Most of the "my hands are used to knidles (I just can't type Kindle without being dyslexic)" issues are over. I think the Kindle may be a little faster (or smoother) on the turn, but I should put them side by side on the same page.

On other news, Brisbane was fun for a week - no computer meant I had a chance to rest my computer induced tennis elbow. I had a photo taken of me with a python at Lone Pine Sanctuary and it wasn't till I got home that mum mentioned that she'd had one taken about 50 years ago at the same place - I've seen that photo! She's skinnier than me in it. The snakes looked the same though.

Not looking forward to going back to uni - sigh.

kindle vs Sony ereader

I've read all of one book on the sony & so far I find it much easier to do things -the touch screen is intuitive & having had a smart phone for a while, I instinctively want to touch the screen. The down side is that the touch screen can sometimes be too responsive. There have been occasions when I turn pages only to have the dictionary function activated because I've somehow lingered on a word. This usually happens for several pages before my fingers remember how to work it. This morning I found that my floaty sleeves will also turn the pages if the fan blows them over the screen!

I like the computer reader that the sony can install on your computer. It syncs automatically and you can play around with storage as well as read on your computer - I do my manual reading on the computer while playing with the ereader.

Big plus for sony - it tells you the page you are on like a normal book - and adjusts when you have changed font size and type - I did this in seconds without looking anything up! The kindle is set up with % through the book - maybe you can change that, but I haven't found out how. Its harder to get back to places in the kindle.

I haven't played with collections etc yet on the sony, so I can't compare that..and there is no australian sony store (unless its started since last I checked). So far not an issue for me as I get my books from smashwords.

Covers (mine are the ones with lights)
I like the light more on the sony case. The kindle light set up makes me think I'm going to pull it out too far and break it & its non-adjustable, though in a good position.
I like the elastic strap on the kindle case, which case keep it shut in transit, though I have yet to have the sony one open up.
The biggest issue with the sony case is that it has a softer cover than the kindle - I often pick up books by the bottom and I find that I auto forward a couple of pages because there is also a forward and backward button at the bottom of the ereader. This shouldn't be an issue as the ereader insets into the back cover, so a firmer front cover would avoid the problem.
The sony comes with a stencil since you can write on the screen (fingers work too), but there's nowhere to store it. I was slipping it over the top of the book cover, but I lost it once that way. Perhaps a compartment for it would help.

Overall so far, the sony seems looser and more flexible, the kindle is more rigid and controlled - steps to get to places take longer, but I am much less likely to do something accidentally.

And lastly,
Having two different ereaders is resulting in me trying to page forward by pressing the non-existant bottom right button on the sony and touch the screen on the non-touchscreen kindle.

So, I'll be doing a little more reading on the sony & determining whether I get over the sony paging issues or whether it drives me nuts. I should also try getting books from a few more sites & determine whether one ereader is easier to get books for. I also need to put some journal articles on the sony to check how good it is with reading science articles - and annotating!

SWTOR

The physical game came today. They have my account details, I have the game. Now to play, knowing I won't get booted tomorrow.

Yay!

Frivolous

And the purchases continue.
I got my leave loading for christmas, so I'm now spending it on things that I've wanted for some time but are now at a decent price;
1. A pod coffee machine (came with the milk frother and a bunch of pods included)
2. a terabyte plug & play back up device - I want to convert all those burned CDs of pictures over
3. a decibel meter (not a particularly good one, but its a nice toy)

Hmm, I'm sure there was something else other than the last of the christmas presents...I'll think of it later I expect.

The one thing I didn't get but would like to is a digital microscope (circa $100). I saw one but I wasn't too sure of the quality - it didn't look quite as good as one someone at work is using. They only go up to 400x (so no good definition of bacteria, but fine for larger structures). this one looked a bit like they had dodgy magnification. I'm told logitech makes one but I have yet to find it on the web, so the student may be talking through their hat. I'll keep looking.

Now, off to eat san choy bow sausages (also an impulse buy from our local award winner butcher)

Superfluous

When I first wanted to buy an ereader, I held off because I decided the sony version had more of the bells and whistles I wanted for reading and commenting on research articles. But it wasn't available, so I bought a kindle and generally loved it. Now sony has a new version out, with all the bells and whistles. So I bought it. The plan is to test it out for all those work things as well as rereading Andreas touchstone novels on it.
In my short reading of things so far I think that the kindle will be more useful for generic reading (I am suspicious that I'll be able to get a wider range of stuff as mobi files - unless its on smashwords of course) and the sony will be easier to make the sorts of impulse notes over documents that I want to make on my pdf's - and its touchscreen - glee!. The sony store in Australia is not yet up, so I have to download from my computer....but since that's what I do with the kindle anyway, its not a great loss.
Anyhoo, at some point if I'm diligent, I'll put up my personal pros and cons for the two. If it turns out that the sony does everything the kindle does just as well (including book variety), my little brother might get an unexpected kindle present.
For the people for whom the cover is important; I have a black kindle with blue case and a red Sony with red case - red goes faster, don't you know.

A book printed...just for me

I've been reading Andrea Host's books as ebooks & my favourite series just finished. I asked Andrea if there was going to be a hardcopy of the whole trilogy together & she organised one just for me...and now you too can buy the Jenny Edition.

Christmas...Arrrrgh!

I just collated the christmas presents I've bought for this year. Andrea's is about the only complete one (and I have her birthday present for next year done too. Everyone else is a bit spotty...though I do have a theme idea.

A first for today

I was down the back cleaning up all the dropped mangoes (mainly eaten by flying foxes) when I noticed the awful smell...Dead flying fox in the back yard. We've had trees for 40 years, had flying foxes visit and eat them for almost as long and this is the first dead one. I'm a little dubious given the spreading Hendra zone this season. It could be natural causes, but I aint picking it up with anything but a long shovel straight into a pit.

New power supply!

My old supply died last night in spite of technically being above the level required for my new card. My computer guy put in a new one for me without labour fees since he'd just put in the video card. Its a gigabyte superb 720 (which gives me some wriggle room for other upgrades). He also suggested I get a bigger case, mine's a bit old and not really designed for big gaming components and max airflow. Since he has a similar set up, in a similar not air-conditioned environment, I'm thinking hew understands what I need best. He suggested I look around and find the one I like most (he'll do the swap over if I want). I was going to get a couple of suggestions off him today but I forgot.
Anyhoo - I have a power supply replaced with something nice in about 2 hours with no labour cost. I like my computer shop :)

now off to reading up on case brands :D...I may wait till another couple of pays to buy one.

new card!

I just replaced my old Geforce 8800 video card with an Asus gtx560Ti. With no load, its running over 20oC cooler! Now, lets start up LOTRO....heh 25oC cooler than it was - and the fan had to be on 100% for the other one. This one is on 44% speed tops!

So far, so cool.

Incorrect assumption

There's a book in my cupboard that Andrea gave me in 2000. Spindle's End by Robin McKinley. Every time I've been thinking about reading an old book, I've brushed past it thinking "thats the one with storyline X" I'm not in the mood for that. I pulled it out the other day thinking..mmm.. storyline X, that'll do. And its Not!
All this time I was mixing it up with another book - which I'll now have to find. Its also been so long since I read this one that the story was completely new to me. It didn't ring a bell at all!
I like Robin McKinleys books, so its not that I skimmed through it and didn't actually read it...I think I must have read it only once however and somehow got my brain wires crossed...perhaps its been written over in my long term storage because I lost the link to it.

checkout the new link

funny - on the places to go list

Apparently this is not unique

I have no dial tone on my home phone, but my internet works. I've spent a couple of days with looking for the fault and so far no dice. Wednesday they come and check the lines in my yard. I finally thought to google "no dial tone but internet works fine" and lo, I am but one of many. Apparently one line can break and the other will carry the internet (or something like that, I choose not to understand any more than that) but both lines are needed for a phone call. Alternately, some sort of connection at the exchange may have lost contact with my phone line but still be contacting my ADSL. I'm expecting the former since a tech has already apparently looked at the outside my home things. I've tried 3 separate phones and combination of direct into the wall and in via the internet splitter - so its from the wall onward somewhere. I know theres an old line under my house that we don't use, but its split off after the main entry point (I think) so I'm hoping thats not interacting with it.

Wildlife carer! - not!

As I drove in my driveway today I noticed a car swerving up the street & something white and pink on the road. The next car also swerved and I thought... that looks like a galah - why isn't it flying away. Then a car backed out of the driveway right next to it and it did a weird - my wing is broken-flail to avoid turning into a recently deceased parrot. They didn't even see it. So I walked up the road thinking - "I should have got a box and a towel - this is going to hurt - large, injured wild bird with big beak - but there's too much traffic - I'll just shoo it off the road and then come back".
Another car saw me walking towards it and just stopped on the road to give me time to get there. When I got there it let me walk right up to it and just edged a bit away, then it let me touch it, so it was either really badly off or a tame bird.
I picked it up and carried it off the road and it only bit me gently before it got out of my hands. Then it made a "I've learned human speak noise" and I picked it up again more stably. The lady drove off and I thought "great, now I'm going to have to deal with an injured bird and find the owner" (at least I have some big empty cages at the moment).
Luckily a guy walked out of a yard before I had a chance to walk home and said it belonged to a neighbour who lets it wander. Apparently the wing break is old. Anyway I handed it over and it walked up his front onto his shoulder, so he took it home to care for until the owner came home.
If he hadn't I would have had to take it to a vet to check on the wing & there aren't many bird savvy vets here. (plus I expect they would have charged me).

The owner is very lucky the backing car didn't go right over it.

Ye old family reunion

I'm going to a family reunion this weekend. In anticipation, mum has had me scan some (many, many, many)old letters that she's had in storage (handed down from her mother and her grandmother). Its been an interesting experience putting them in order and getting some of the back story on bits of them. They were prolific letter writers.

It was an eye opener seeing how poor one side of my family was. I had been told, but seeing the letters saying that James was off looking for work or one of the children who are off working is sending money orders home, really emphasizes things.

Theres also a series of letters from an uncle who went off to Canada and then signed up for WW1 - he died in France. I was able to read about his life from 1906 to 1916 when he died & the letters afterwards from the military, informing his family of his death.

There are also a bunch of WW2 letters from several brothers. Wow, they are interesting (and some have bits cut out)Lots of "somewhere in France" addresses, or desert areas. There's also telegrams from the military with messages monitored from Japanese propaganda radio, purporting to be from them saying they were alive and well in POW camps, and similar from private individuals monitoring radio after the camps were liberated (they listed names and who to get the message to).

What I should do - if I could find some time - is collate them properly and find out some of the surrounding information & then epublish them. I could call it "The Chalmers Letters - snapshots of 3 generations of Australians"

Minor Plug

I just remembered to add Autumn Write to my places to go,people to see list. One day I might update it to separate comics from other interesting and useful sites....but not today.

Shameless plug for putting links on your blog - when I lost my bookmarks on my computer, at least I had my favourite comics linked and didn't have to go searching.

Maybe I should spend the time and put a whole list of lists on here :)

The downside to owning a Kindle

When you've found a CD full of books and decide to read the series on them, its very easy to keep reading. My vain "I might go swimming this afternoon" thoughts were abandoned and my "I might have an early night" was thwarted. Must...develop...more...discipline. I feel tired and un-exercised. And I over-ate on the weekend. Bleh.

On the upside, I'm getting to read all the Honor Harrington books in order one after the other.

reading glut

I just remembered I had a cd of BAEN books that I got as a freebie at world con last year. I hadn't read them as I didn't have an ereader and I just don't like reading on computer screens. I just downloaded them to my Kindle Or at least all the Honor Harrington ones - the rest can wait till I'm through these. I put them all in a file (in the right format) on my computer, so its easier to transfer them. I've also gotten online at Baen and found a couple of other books that I'd like to get. Maybe next weekend. My reading has gone up a lot with the ereader. I'd slowed down because of
1. Lack of space to put new books (and I don't like to assume I'll read once and give away)
2. Price of books - if I'm not sure whether I'm likely to want to reread, I'd rather not pay $100 for only 4 books.

Zombies...oh wait, just the reporter not understanding what the words mean

I was cooking my own mix of glass noodle, seaweed soup, roast chicken slices and fried egg strips tonight and overheard the following from the TV in the other room;

"The hospital was over run by dead bodies"

What they meant to say (I think) was that a lot of bodies had been found stored at a hospital.
Of course my mental image immediately went to the other place.

oh - that computer issue I talked about?

It was a ram problem - Bad RAM! Bad! Sit!

I have loaner ram while my lifetime warranty ram is away being replaced... though I only have 4 gig not 6 atm - so I'm wondering whether one popped out - the easiest thing to do would be to open the box....but I cant build up the enthusiasm right now.

new technology

I'm being involved in my first webinar. Its very cool and actually seems to be working! Yay. Though all I'm going to do is listen.

My kindle has arrived.

I am most pleased,though I haven't done an awful lot with it yet. The cover is blue.

And my first typing of kindle was knidle - perhaps the K should be silect.

coming up for air

I have been silent for a while as the thought of being even half way coherent on my blog was beyond me. This was mainly due to setting up for a 2 week intensive subject I ran, followed by a 4 day conference. I've now had a week back "in the office" and my brain has settled down again. The course went well. I had lots of complements. The conference went well. I think I've finally figured out how to get something useful out of going to a conference. I'm now dealing with trying to get reday for semester which is only a week away and 3 days of that will be spent in another courshttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gife that I'm a student in.

In other news,
Somewhere in there I had another birthday & we've been eating birthday turkey for 8 days so far.
My computer is getting weird again. I'm downloading the latest video card driver to see if that imporves things. I have doubts about my power supply though since my DVD drive is "vanishing" on occasion. In an unrelated matter, my headphones died too - I had a new pair and plans to change over, but I wasn't expecting to do it just then. Or maybe it was the computer port playing up too. The new headphones plug in differently.
I finally bought a kindle - it hasn't arrived yet. I did the easy thing and bought from Amazon with a case with a light - so many colour choices. I chose blue. Pink would show the dirt, I don't like orange, green seemed a bit off & I seem to by everything in red, so this was a novel colour for me...As soon as it turns up I'm buying Andreas novels - all of them - in a great glut. Speaking of which Thanks for the tea, I'm off to have some momentarilly.
Ok. Off to install a video driver. This could be a long night. The tea will help.

Long weekend?

I don't have time for a long weekend. I had plans that involved me coming in on Saturday at least. And plans for working Monday. Hmm maybe I'll come in anyway. At least no-one will interrupt me.

Oh...really..that was unexpected

Yesterday I went to see an ophthalmologist about an itchy eye that hadn't really gone away for a year. I was concerned that I had something in my eyelid scratching my eye. I can also see a strip across my eye when looking down a microscope. The doctor couldn't see anything and thought it best to refer me on to someone with better equipment. The expert told me I have an allergy response, that might not be to anything specific & I can take drops. He then had a look for the strip and didn't find it, so its probably floaters or something like that.

Oh, and by the way, while looking he also found the tear in my retina, a precursor to my retina detaching. so 1/2 an hour later I was sitting in front of a laser having laser eye surgery to fix it!

The phrase "dodged a bullet" was mentioned.

everyone is sick

It seems that I'm surrounded by the unwell...and not just the usual colds. Nooo; suspected pneumonia, fighting 3 separate influenza strains at once, whole families going down together. I feel threatened by it all - I can't afford to get sick right now.

Its been ages since I've done one of these

I'm a yellow magic drafter!

Take the quiz at Brent Weeks.com

Weirdly, this was my favourite colour when I read the book

And since it soesn't show up, heres what they said about it;

Yellow luxin is most often a liquid that releases its energy back into light quickly, allowing its use as a torch or a trigger to ignite flammable materials or explosives. Yellow nourishes other luxins, extending the durability of luxin structures or tools. Like water turning to ice, when yellow is drafted perfectly, it loses its liquidity and becomes the hardest luxin of all. Yellows tend to be clear thinkers, intellect and emotion in perfect balance.

The results from your color matching test have also shown that you are one of the elite, a superchromat. The magic you do will almost never fail. Satrapies will compete to recruit you, and you will have a wide latitude in what work you choose to do once you finish your studies. You can expect your patron to lavish praise and honors on you. As a monochrome, you will master your color, and only have to defer to bichromes and polychromes and, of course, the nobility and the satraps who support us all.

I laughed and I laughed

I walked past mum as she rolled an icecream cone in what looked like crushed nuts. mmm. Then as I walked away I heard her tell dad "its the biscuit crumbs left over from the tart". Then she made her own icecream cone, shortly followed by a cry of disgust. The biscuit crumbs were garlic granules. Bwah ha ha ha.
What makes it even funnier is that this is the second time something like this has happened. Some months ago she gave dad some eye drops that turned out to be the ant rid in the dropper bottle next to the eyedrops in the fridge. Suffice to say, they aren't stored in the same place anymore. FYI - ant rid stings, but doesn't appear to do any damage if washed out quickly.

Oh, and dad was happily eating the garlic icecream, having not noticed.

new toys

I bought myself a HTC wildfire phone. I was wanting another one in the HTC family, but it was only available on a network I didn't want to use and the next closest one was very expensive. I got it on sale, set the internet to wifi access only and am now happily doing prepaid. If needed I'll switch my prepaid to the version that has a couple of meg of download in case I need to use maps somewhere, but in the short term its a cheap way to have a smart phone with lovely, lovely apps. The wifi isn't as great here as it is in the UK. My brother has the same phone and showed me how to set it up this way. Almost everywhere he goes in the UK has free wifi access.

My next toy, should it ever come back into stock anywhere, will be the Sony PRS650 ereader. After extensive reading, I decided it was the one that did the most of what I most wanted....then its not available.

well that was inefficient

I had to get up before dawn yesterday & didn't find out till later that that was the best day to see the 4 planets align in the predawn eastern sky. (Mercurey, Venus Jupiter and Mars). Not that they were is a straight line, but they are clustered. They'll still be there till May 30 (when you can draw a line between them, but they are further spread out). So tomorrow, I'll be getting up before dawn...again.

Check here for the video

sad to see you go

My brother is leaving today. He's been visiting from Britain & we've been doing lots of socialising. I've been crab potting at Giru, to Ayr for high tea, to multiple coffee shops and having lots of barbeques on the strand. More in two(ish) weeks than we normally do in a year. Now I need to work very long days and catch up on the huge workload at work - lots of deadlines.