jamezpolley.com

(dlsspy): Has anyone seen XKCD #404? 403′s there, and 405′s there, but I can’t find 404.

Oh Randall Munroe, you wily sexy funny man. I want to have your babies.

Bloody hell, I’ve been tagged.

The Rules

1. Each player starts with eight random facts/habits about themselves.
2. People who are tagged need to write a post on their own blog (about their eight things) and post these rules.
3. At the end of your blog, you need to choose eight people to get tagged and list their names.
4. Don’t forget to leave them a comment telling them they’re tagged, and to read your blog.

Random Facts about Me

Well, thank goodness this doesn’t have to be 8 random things you don’t already know.

1. I was raised in an Open Brethren church. Well, not raised so much, that mostly happened at home, but my family attended the assembly religiously. My father was an elder (and I think his father was too).
2. Bob’s my uncle. Actually, Bob is three of my uncles – my mother’s brother, my father’s sister’s husband, and my mother’s father’s brother.
3. I have a 2.5-greats grandmother. Let’s call her Betsy, as I don’t remember her real name. Betsy had a daughter out of wedlock, and later, another daughter in wedlock. The second daughter had a son, who married the first daughter. I’m descended from this union…
4. I’m hideously unsymmetrical. I have a Darwin’s Tubercle on one ear, but not the other. On one foot, my third toe is longer than my second toe, but on the other foot it’s the other way around.

SMH is running a lovely slow-news-day story today, about oddities in the latest Google Maps/Earth imagery in Sydney harbour.

The article as a whole is a lovely bit of fluff, but what really upset me was this paragraph:

The ferry “collision” appears right beside a giant cruise liner – either the Queen Elizabeth 2 or Queen Mary 2 – which was docked at Sydney Cove when the photographs were taken.

Fucking hell. If you want to pretend to be a journalist, spend a few seconds doing some basic research.

Here are some hints that might help you figure out whether it’s the QEII or the QMII:

* The ship is displaying an odd string of letters. Due to the power of the interwebs, it’s trivial to figure out which of the two ships this is.

* Just in case there’s any doubt, search for “qmII sydney circular quay” – the top hit makes it clear (in case you weren’t in Sydney at the time and don’t remember) which one of the ships is too big to dock at the OPT.

I’m too angry to continue writing. Bah humbug!

First to ditch legacy keyboard/mouse ports in favour of USB.

First to ditch parallel and serial ports.

They’ve ditched processor architectures, not once, but twice.

Now they’re the first to ditch ethernet.

–

Once I got over a burst of Jobs fanboyism, it makes perfect sense. The only reason I use ethernet any more is because large file copies are faster – but with N, that’s not relevant any more. My N800 and iPhone both have no ethernet ports.

Looking at the specs, it looks like it’s not going to be most peoples primary machine – but as a portable terminal to view the content on your network, it looks gorgeous.

A rant to be proud of.

I was really frustrated this morning. I’ve seen the new Gmail interface, I like it, I love some of the new shortcuts ([ and ] rock my world)… but it still wasn’t enabled on my gmail account.

Just on the off-chance it was a problem, I checked my language setting. Yep, I had English (UK) selected – as soon as I switch to English (US), I’ve got the new interface version.

If you’re also frustrated, you might want to try twiddling your language as well.

Some light, fluffy, sweet, but lacking in substance is what we need.

Ah, I know:

A few years ago, all it took to shock us was a quick look at tubgirl or the Goatse man.

Today standards have changed – today, to shock us, it takes two girls and one cup. Today, it’s not enough just to be shocked, but we have to capture our responses and broadcast those as well.

WARNING: Only the last link is safe for work. The first two links are not safe for work. The last link is not safe for home – unless you have a video camera ready and are going to upload your reaction.

dictionary.com:

sor·ry [sor-ee, sawr-ee] Pronunciation Key – Show IPA Pronunciation

–adjective, -ri·er, -ri·est.

6. (used interjectionally as a conventional apology or expression of regret): Sorry, you’re misinformed. Did I bump you? Sorry

John Howard:

(John Howard) said he was sorry the rise happened but was not apologising for it.

“I said I was sorry they occurred. I don’t think I used the word apology,”

Right. Sorry, but not apologising. Can anyone explain that to me?

Later in the article, J-Ho claims to be “proud” of the interest rate rises. Is that a bit the same as “the recession we had to have”?

Then there’s this gem:

The latest unemployment rate is a stunning figure, Prime Minister John Howard says.

Mr Howard said there had been sustained low unemployment for 20 months, and the human dividend of full employment was more important than anything else.

Full employment? Unemployment figures say nothing about “full employment”. If you work 65 minutes a week for $15/hour, you’re considered employed. If 100% of the population did that, we’d have 0% unemployment, but we’d be a long way form “full employment”.

People who are not employed, are seeking work, but not available to commence a job on the date the survey was taken *because they are sick with a minor cold that day, but could start tomorrow* are not considered unemployed. People temporarily stood down from their job because of insufficient work, even if they’re seeking other work to tide them over, are considered employed, even though they’re receiving no pay and would like to be employed more.

There’s a lot of information about the definitions of unemployed, long-term unemployed, and so on, at http://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs@.nsf/featurearticlesbyCatalogue/C9268F9DB356D154CA256A950080B3E3?OpenDocument – including graphs and charts detailing how changes that were made to the definitions of “unemployed” and “long-term unemployed” in ’01 reduced the numbers in both categories, without actually finding anyone new work.

just…. Absent. I’m in Mountain View, having the company brain slug fitted. I’ll be back in Aus in a while.

In the last day, I’ve stood in front of Facebook, seen company shuttle busses for Apple, NASA, Yahoo, Citrix, and of course my

own.

But, right now I’m tired and overdue for bed. G’night!

Ps. Can you guess what’s special about this post?