1337-speak

I just discovered that with the recent interest rate cuts, my repayments are now leet dollars a month… Oh the amusements of being a geek.

On Bagels and Other Achievements

As I sit here, munching on my plain old ordinary toasted bagel with cream cheese, I ponder how someone first discovered the way of how to make these tasty delights.
Which brings me to the thought of a conversation I had yesterday (I originally typed yeasterday… Bread on the brain, perhaps) regarding the pinnacle of human endeavour (which itself stemmed from my partner’s musing on what was the best thing *before* sliced bread). I was presented with two options: The Wheel, and The Written Word.

Initially I thought the choice quite simple – but on further reflection, it was not so.

At the end of our discussion, we had established that they were of equal significance, but for differing reasons.

The wheel makes civilisation work; the word makes civilisation exist.

Anyone care to comment?

Musings

I’m a bit scattered this morning. It’s a Wednesday, but I keep thinking it’s Thursday. This is partially due to wishful thinking, and also due to an interruption to my normal routine. I regularly visit my family of a Thursday evening for dinner, but this week they are busy, so it has been changed to Wednesday, and hence throwing my schedule out of whack. (Where did that phrase come from anyway?) In a way it makes it easier for me, because I get the opportunity to finish my Christmas shopping on Thursday night (hooray for late night shopping) but the disruption is causing great confusion. All this tiredness doesn’t help either.

Fortunately, I’ve got two (ok, nearly three) days of work left before I’m on holidays, and I really need the break. The last few weeks have been rather stressful at the office, primarily due to the world economy going down the plughole.
As a consequence, our clients are cutting back on budgets and the like, and discretionary IT work is usually some of the first things to go. My team hasn’t been as hard hit as some of the others here, but we are still losing work, and the news earlier in the week that one of our major clients is taking one of their major systems back in house was cause for concern.

We were reassured that we’d be picking up more work in different areas and that the team wouldn’t really be affected, but I worry.
I worry about everything – I am a worrier.
I wouldn’t have been so concerned had I not be in the situation of having a home loan to pay off. ~sigh~

I’ve been very lucky in terms of jobs. I didn’t have much trouble finding a part time job before I started uni, and I stayed in that job the whole way through my degree right up until a few weeks before I started full time work in my current job. I landed this job before I even finished my degree. The thought of suddenly being without employment and having to go back to living with my parents so as to not lose my house is a great horror to me. Of course there hasn’t been any indication as to any possible job losses in my team. Yet.

Burn After Reading

Last night I had the dubious pleasure of watching the latest film by the Coen brothers, Burn After Reading. It’s only my second experience of watching one of their films (the first being the relatively normal Intolerable Cruelty) so I might be missing the quintessential Coen brothers’ style.

Whichever way you look at it, Burn After Reading is a strange film. The plot revolves around several characters: Linda Litzki (Frances McDormand), Chad Feldheimer (Brad Pitt), Harry Pfarrer (George Clooney), Katie Cox (Tilda Swinton) and Osbourne Cox (John Malkovitch).

The film begins with Osbourne Cox getting essentially fired from his job at the CIA. He doesn’t take this too well. Indeed, were someone to use this film as part of a drinking game (using ‘What the f***’ or just any variation of ‘f***’ as the drink trigger), Osbourne’s opening rant would remove quite a few participants, and those still standing wouldn’t last much longer. The very irate Cox then proceeds to write his memoirs, which somehow fall into the hands of Linda and Chad, two very vapid gym employees, and it is what happens next that sets the stage for the rest of the film. Chad suggests to Linda that they seek a ‘reward’ for being ‘good samaritans’ and returning Cox’s memoirs to him, aka blackmail.

The film continues on, getting more and more complicated and strange, and then suddenly everything stops, and we get a little interlude (if you could call it that) from the CIA guys, who are desperate to get themselves out of the mess that they still can’t figure out how it started.
And then – end of film.
To quote Osbourne Cox: “What. The. F***?!”

Let it be said that Brad Pitt puts in a very entertaining turn as the very very very empty-headed Chad.
There are a few laughs to be had in the film – primarily from Chad’s expressions, and the CIA guys.

I wouldn’t say it was a bad film, I’ve seen much worse (Yes, ‘Meet the Parents’ I’m looking at you), but I wouldn’t be keen on watching it again. I suspect a lot of my confusion and meh-ness about the film can be attributed to my lack of familiarity with the Coen brothers style of film-making. Pitt is hilarious though. Almost worth watching the film for.

Rating: 6 out of 10

Where am I again?

After a break of a few days I’m back with musings on the old standard small talk topic – the weather.

Here in Australia, it’s summer. Or, it’s *meant* to be summer at the very least. This does not explain why I wore a jumper and a cardigan to the movies last night. Or why I now have snow falling on my blog.

Having been told all week that Wednesday would be a scorcher and to expect temperatures around 35 degrees (celcius), I dressed accordingly. More fool me, as the temperature didn’t get higher than 25. I feel the cold easily and as usual, my office had the air conditioning cranked up to ‘Arctic’, so I froze.

This morning, I looked out from my balcony over the city and couldn’t really see much at all. It was rather misty. Low cloud hung over the whole area, even right out to sea. It’s still like that as I can’t see the mountains from my desk, only a wall of grey beyond the freeway.

The weather here lately reminds me a bit of a quote from Monty Python and the Holy Grail (one of my favourite films of all time).

A year passed: winter changed into spring, spring changed into summer, summer changed back into winter, and winter gave spring and summer a miss and went straight on into autumn…

I wonder what tomorrow will be like.

Censoring the Internets

I was inspired by this post on an old friend’s blog to put forward my thoughts on the insanity that is internet censorship.

For those of you who aren’t aware, the nutcases that are the Australian Government have decided that attempting to filter/censor the internet is a good idea.

Ahahahahahaha.

No.

Seriously. How can anyone think that a) this is a good idea or b) that it would work?

There are so many things wrong with this plan that I don’t even know where to start. So many others have put forth their opinions, and I believe they do a much more eloquent job of it than I would, so I shall borrow from them here.

It’s a bit crazy that something put forward as a ‘save the little children from the nasty real world’ measure is not even supported by some child welfare advocates.

“I take issue with the minister’s perspective that children are themselves the danger in a sense that we have to make this decision for them because they are not capable of making it for themselves – I think there’s very little evidence to support that and plenty of evidence to show that children are responsible decision makers given the skills and information.”

This from the SMH website.

Live trials of the controversial internet filters, which will block “illegal” content for all Australian internet users and “inappropriate” adult content on an opt-in basis, are slated to begin by Christmas, despite harsh opposition from the Greens, Opposition, the internet industry, some child welfare advocates, consumers and online rights groups.

Another concern, raised by David Vale (executive director of UNSW’s Cyberspace Law and Policy Centre) is this:

Another aspect was the potential for the filter, once in place, to become the subject of a repeated bidding war, depending on which minor politicians had balance of power in parliament, or who had the ‘moral panic of the day’

Welcome to Australia, the nanny state.

Someone obviously wasn’t thinking…

Thought I’d post up two amusing snippets from e-mails I’ve received at work.  All identifiying details have been blacked out for obvious reasons.

Obviously someone wasn’t thinking when they named that application.
12 months on, and the subject line of that e-mail *still* amuses me.

Obviously, they just aren’t a CAT person.
This is what happens when you don’t put the full name of the application in the email.

Fleeting Amusements

I’m going to start off this blog with some comments on things that have amused me in the last 24 hours.

1. “Member for Stuuuurrrt”

Listening to the ABC news last night giving their usual run down on the state of government in this country, I was very amused to note the Speaker of the House of Representatives chastising the Member for Sturt (Christopher Pyne  – can’t stand the man) for whatever reason. It was all very serious, the Government going on about something or other, and then suddenly, there is this  “Member for Stuuuurrrt” going on in the background from the speaker.  Yes. I am easily amused.

2. Insults that amuse the insulted.

Also on the subject of politics, I was bemused to read on the SMH website this morning a piece by Annabel Crabb on our Deputy PM’s comments about members of the opposition auditioning for roles in the next Batman flick.  Her article implies that it was all very snarky, but looking at the footage (again on the ABC news) everyone was terribly amused/pleased, even those supposedly attacked by the comments. Taken in context (the quote used by Ms Crabb cuts half of it out), it wasn’t as bad as you’d think from the article.  And really, when you think about it, Julie Bishop *would* make a good catwoman.

3. Martin Pearson’s Tribute to LotR

It’s called The Unfinished Spelling Errors of Bolkien and it is *rather* amusing. You could almost call it The Lord of the Rings: The Musical. And it is Good.  I was introduced to this a couple of months back by my partner (many thanks, dear one) and came across the cds again in desperation for something to listen to in the car a couple of days ago (I refuse to plug the iPod back in until I’ve updated the music on there).  Here are some quotes on the man and the show, kindly provided by google (more specifically, here)

Martin is a multiple choice performer, please pick one or more of the following: a) Stand up Comedian b) Satirist and parody writer c) Folksinger d) Poet e) Debater f) Storyteller g) A cricket ground in Melbourne.

Martin is a comedian with a keen eye for making everyday events so mundane that they are laughable. A parody writer of renown and a singer of some notes. Martin is also a folk singer, who longs for serious recognition in much the same way as a flatworm longs for reeboks. He can on occasion, and in the true folk tradition, sing songs so maudlin that audience members may attempt to end it all by throwing themselves into a pint of guinness.

Pearson’s tongue in cheek re-telling of the story is interspersed with hilariously incongruous musical parodies, which give all the characters (including the Balrog) their turn in the spotlight. There’s a rendering of “The Road goes ever on and on” done in the style of John Denver, while Legolas and Gimli sing a Cole Porter duet….Pearson’s thoroughly affable and engaging stage presence is a delight to watch. It’s suitably supported by his fine vocal performances, and spiced with moments of superb mimicry. “The Unfinished Spelling Errors of Bolkien” is certainly a show worth seeing; especially if, in an idle moment, you ever wondered what an all orc chorus of “My Fair Lady” would sound like.

So what is it? It’s hard to describe. It’s basically this fellow Martin Pearson retelling the story of LORD OF THE RINGS in his own manner. With songs. When I describe it like that it sounds incredibly lame, but it’s really one of the funniest things I’ve heard all year. Pearson manages to casually mention differences between the books, the films, and even the extended editions, but does so without laboring points or getting tedious. In fact, the points at which the film’s liberties are highlighted are generally the funniest parts. The best parts, though, are the songs. There are roughly three per film, and they’re all very funny. Whilst “The Loo Break Song” (the final ROTK wrap-up) and the Nazgul-themed “Ghost Riders In The Sky” are excellent, the clear highlight is “The Balrog Song” at the top of the Two Towers disc. Not just very funny, but very catchy; I’ve been humming it consistently for the past few weeks.

Needless to say, I’ve had many of those songs in my head for the past 48 hours.

If anyone knows where I can get (purchase) a copy of the discs, let me know!