Blakomen's Public Toilet

2010-08-26T00:08:00.003+12:00

Really, visitors? Really? I don't get a lot of visitors, but is this *really* how random people I don't know come across this blog?

Touché, google...

In other news - henry-chong.com

Thats right

I have a proper site now - it runs on wordpress.com - it feels more "mature" :) (M for Mature)

I find more and more that I use this blog for random random ramblings; stuff that really is more suited for twitter and is not really much longer than 150 characters. So expect updates to become even more infrequent on here (such as they are), and instead move to twitter / my new shiny web presence

Some other dude took henrychong.com. It's okay though, I grabbed henrychong.info

Anyway. That's that; I won't be closing this blog, cause it's like a time capsule almost. Trawl through old posts, I dare you. See the sort of drivel I used to (and probably still do) type out...

You don't understand where you are without knowing where you were!

Be bold be brave be amazing (lol only Arron will get this)

till next time, cats!

2010-08-15T21:48:00.001+12:00

As cute as it is to find pawprints on the door handle and a cat sitting inside my car, all this long molty cat hair has pretty much made my day into a sneezing incomprehensible blur....

Watched Scott Pilgrim vs the world - awesome movie! I'm pretty sure the target audience was me, except the ending kind of ruins the whole film so just leave five minutes before the end and it'll be allll goood

2010-08-07T07:57:00.002+12:00

Ikea is awesome. As angry as I was over the Mykea delivery debacle (and I feel a little sorry for the dude who arrived to deliver the stuff, it was just one guy against the world it seems...in a rental van...)

once i started unpackin and putting together some of the stuff we'd ordered...its so awesome....the apartment smells like mdf, i love it

ah....ikea......

2010-08-06T10:38:00.000+12:00

On the surface, Mykea seems like a good idea.

But in *practice*, it's been nothing short of a massive fail. So not only are they about two months late with the order, with very minimal updates about what exactly happened, but now they give me a call on the day they expect to do the delivery, insisting that they can only deliver it either today or tomorrow; when I'm extremely busy both days and nobody will be around to accept the delivery.

So in terms of customer service...they are getting a massive FAIL.

Don't buy anything from them. Tell everyone you know; cause it's more trouble than its worth. (Ikea just open a store already!)

2010-08-03T21:54:00.000+12:00

wow this is seriously...like I can't actually put in words how to explain what or why or....

just watch and read the description...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GfGxBzbgFQ0&feature=related

2010-07-26T09:04:00.000+12:00

ffs i cant decide which i hate more, my sick body or my sick car, is there such a thing as ragesick

2010-07-25T23:10:00.002+12:00

its not often you play a gig on a sunday when your old orthodontist is in the crowd and its his daughters birthday who you know through the guitarist and you are a little sick because you like cats but are allergic to them and have a weird rash thing on your face and your car wont start for some reason, thanks sonny and dennis for coming!

2010-07-22T16:28:00.000+12:00

You know what all banks should let us do? HAve like a "virtual overdraft"

so thats where I can put in $100 or $200

and then its like emergency money, so if i ever DO have to go into "overdraft", it will take from that emergency money (and not charge overdraft feez)

2010-07-21T21:25:00.004+12:00

omg new design

I was getting sick of the old design so I just mucked around with it. Pretty easy click and do-stuff with blogger. NICE. Also, I took off adsense, cause I have earned $0.01 since I had them on.

lolz! Who was I kidding anyway, hardly anyone reads this any more. I've been putting off actually making a professional, serious site with like a proper about me and this is what Ive done and this is what I am doing etc etc etc but after coming home from work i just dont feel like doing anything

i was going to shove my silly microsoft logos (ie LOOK I CAN DO SHAREPOINTZ) but I couldn't figure out where to put it so I haven't...yet.

also, FFXIV beta is being stink to me and timing out on the login :(

hope everything is good with everyone!

2010-07-18T23:03:00.000+12:00

The worst part of a Sunday is around about 10pm, when you realise you are going to have to go to sleep soon, but in doing so the next thing you're going to have to do is go to work

If only we were all millionaires!

2010-07-13T17:59:00.001+12:00

lol so according to Arron, the last two years of FFXIV's development have been solely to get the installer down to 114mb by zipping the zip files that have been zipped repeatedly in a zip cycle

and its someones job to use win zip. all day.

and also they wanted to release it on floppy disk but they thought they would release ffxiv now, and then ffxvii will come out years later on floppy disk.

...lulz :)

2010-07-07T22:41:00.001+12:00

Ready for what, Microsoft??

2010-07-07T09:15:00.002+12:00

Activision's Robert Kotick:

"We've heard that 60 percent of [Microsoft's] subscribers are principally on Live because of Call of Duty," Kotick told FT. "We don't really participate financially in that income stream. We would really like to be able to provide much more value to those millions of players playing on Live, but it's not our network."

What he really meant was:

"We've heard that 60 percent of [Microsoft's] subscribers are principally on Live because of Call of Duty," Kotick told FT. "We don't really get any money from that. We would really like to be able to get more millions from players playing on Live, but it's not our network."

Which is fair enough, Activision is a business, but it doesn't make him any less of a dick.

2010-06-18T23:24:00.002+12:00

I discovered something absolutely amazing today.

The Christian Side Hug Rap video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m_Oj0-splZw)

Seriously, there are so many things that are just *wrong* with this video...

1) lame siren sounds

2) white talentless rappers

3) SIDE HUGS?! seriously?!! LOL!

4) do they realise they are rapping to the Imperial Death March???

i promise you, any rational person will not be able to stop laughing at it...

2010-06-07T13:33:00.001+12:00

Atrocious songs!

http://www.thesixtyone.com/s/yaBNT4lCTSc/
http://www.thesixtyone.com/s/7x58kulztWX/

I want to CRY

2010-06-04T20:42:00.001+12:00

Found this aweeesome music discovery site called www.thesixtyone.com that marries my two great loves, music and video games :D its like internet radio with rpg elements..totally totally awesome

2010-05-31T22:52:00.000+12:00

A chair is still a chair
Even when there's no one sitting there
But a chair is not a house
And a house is not a home
When there's no one there to hold you tight,
And no one there you can kiss good night.

A room is still a room
Even when there's nothing there but gloom;
But a room is not a house,
And a house is not a home
When the two of us are far apart
And one of us has a broken heart.

Now and then I call your name
And suddenly your face appears
But it's just a crazy game
When it ends it ends in tears.

Darling, have a heart,
Don't let one mistake keep us apart.
I'm not meant to live alone. Turn this house into a home.
When I climb the stair and turn the key,

Oh, please be there still in love with me.

AAAH SUCH A GOOD SONG (not actually lyrics.)

2010-05-16T11:24:00.001+12:00

this one is better actually

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m6eXWW5N2v0&NR=1

2010-05-16T11:19:00.001+12:00

And I am telling you - duet by both Jennifers omgomg

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QtDFHXjJ7SU

2010-05-13T22:40:00.000+12:00

AVENUE Q WAS AWESOME PLEASE GO BUY TICKETS

laughter is totally a cure for sickness

2010-05-11T18:13:00.000+12:00

most disturbing yet funny michael jackson video ever

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nrsm5hne324

2010-05-08T23:38:00.001+12:00

hours of fun with the math writer and horrible horrible paint skills

courtesy of arron

2010-05-04T18:11:00.001+12:00

skylar says:
April 18, 2010 at 8:07 pm

justin bieber is not a girl u guys are just mad because girls like him better than you and im geting tierd of u stuped peaple makeing fun of HIM! geez y dont you just back off and shut up you stuped punks! HE never did enything to u! geez !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2010-04-29T17:42:00.000+12:00

MIA's latest video is seriously awesome and horrible in a single stroke

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xd2w3j_mia-born-free-video-official-real-a_music

2010-04-21T23:25:00.001+12:00

usability win - http://www.airbagindustries.com/archives/005675.php

2010-04-20T22:21:00.002+12:00

This is definitely the best pizza you can get from Dominos. Trust me.

Order online:

Deep Dish Godfather
with Alfredo Sauce
No Capsicum
No Fresh Tomato
Added mushroom
Added chicken

Pretty much the best pizza you will have for $6.90 ever.

2010-04-17T12:29:00.005+12:00

Google DOES find everything:

2010-04-16T10:16:00.002+12:00

Arron's dream:

Sue Sylvester is a serial killer. But not just a normal serial killer - she is the crazy high tech killer from the lousy book "Daemon", and has automatic driverless murder cars.

The Gilmore Girls are detectives, and along with Tina Fey and Arron they were trying to find evidence and arrest her. But then, Tina Fey died, randomly.

They confronted Sue, but she ran away quickly, and one of her murder cars came along. They were on Eastern Beach, and then Arron got pinned against a wall.

And then he woke up

L:OLLLLLL

2010-04-08T19:59:00.000+12:00

http://ac2clearing.whotookspaz.org/viewsaves.php

pretty interesting distributed cracking effort!

2010-04-07T23:30:00.000+12:00

Just watched That Face. Amazing play, really deep stuff....so drained from it all...the only thing wrong was some retarded people in the audience laughing at really inappropriate times (ie the entire time)

2010-04-05T08:48:00.001+12:00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sb9eL3ejXmE

lol watch when this kid gets told he is not a single lady XD

2010-04-05T08:33:00.000+12:00

Arron: "Why are these babies so hard to kill?!?"

lulz!!

2010-03-29T08:05:00.002+13:00

2012 is an incredibly awesomely bad movie, so bad it's good. The last lines of the film are this, I swear;

Female lead: Where have you been all my life?

Male protagonist: In the gift shop.

Male protagonist's daughter: No more Pull Ups.

Male protagonist: Nice.

WHAT. WHY WOULD YOU END YOUR DISASTER MOVIE ON A LINE ABOUT DIAPERS

2010-03-26T18:53:00.003+13:00

grrr my fish are sick again!!! Leonard has this random open sore thing which looks absolutely revolting, and Martha is catching it, I think, cause she's got one small white dot that I didnt see yesterday...

is it bacterial, fungal or just !@*% random?? Hopefully the people @ Animates can help me out tomorrow...

!@#%() fish they are supposed to be easy to keep!

2010-03-19T00:41:00.000+13:00

This. Is. The best. Chatroulette ever

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=32vpgNiAH60

SERIOUSLY WATCH IT

2010-03-10T19:57:00.001+13:00

Final Fantasy XIII is pretty friggin awesome so far.

I can see where Edge and Wired were coming from when they said the first hour sucks and is on rails and yes its true; you dont get exp for the first hour. But actually, it kind of makes sense from a storyline perspective (you will find out), and its not like you dont get drops from enemies and new equipment in that hour too...

its so pretty!

back to more of it!

2010-03-07T16:31:00.001+13:00

"Enough expository banter! Now we fight like men! And ladies! And ladies who dress like men! For Gilgamesh...it is morphing time!"

2010-03-01T20:55:00.001+13:00

Heavy Rain is an AMAZING videogame. Compelling plot(s), honestly the most photorealistic faces I've ever seen on any console ever, and also, the soundtrack is excellent. It's definitely a game everyone has to play at least once. :)

My only gripe is the R2 to walk - I understand where he's comin from in terms of the "driving" mechanic, but it comes across as clunky and occasionally gets in the way of where you are trying to go...

But yes! Play it! Sonny you can come play it after work! It's that good!

2010-02-24T19:42:00.002+13:00

Tried Japadeli yesterday. Pretty good! Very nice interior design etc etc, food was not bad (unfortunately not as good as Saika - or as cheap). Our waitress was a bit awkward but it was a nice meal; I ordered okonomiyaki, and I dont think ive seen many other places offer it.

Tonight I cooked dinner in like the first time in months - its like noodles, with surimi, mushroom and egg

it tastes better than it sounds.

2010-02-22T20:35:00.001+13:00

Chatroulette is the weirdest thing online in a long time.

really REALLY Not Safe For Work so you have been warned!!!

but funny and addictive, strangely...

http://www.buzzfeed.com/awesomer/30-more-great-chat-roulette-screenshots

2010-02-15T22:13:00.002+13:00

This week hasn't really been an awesome week for my health in general, what with flea bites all over my legs (seriously it is a little / a lot disgusting)...but just when that was coming under control, I managed to impale my right hand on a fork.

Yes, lol, a fork. One of the prongs went into my hand and out of it again, helped by the natural curvature of the thing. Surprisingly, while it looked horrible for the one or two seconds it was in my hand, it doesn't hurt as much as it should...although I have a feeling it will slowly hurt more and more and more as my stupid stupid hand finally realises what it's done to itself.

Note to self: next time just let the bloody fish finger hit the carpet.

---

Also finished watching Long Way Round! It's like the two awesomest things in the world, Ewan McGregor and Motorcycles, in one show - all sorts of crazy shenanigans in a round the world trip/ I would love to be able to do something like that one day, but it must have cost them a shit ton and there's no way I would be riding through Mongolia / the Road of Bones! I'd maybe go to South East Asia and then to Australia, New Zealand, then USA instead.

Go watch!

2010-02-14T17:25:00.000+13:00

yay got my two preview tickets to Avenue Q :D

2010-02-07T22:18:00.000+13:00

Which is worse; flea bites or having your dad remind everyone how you used to be really fat?

Hmm.

2010-02-04T10:12:00.000+13:00

When moving house, do you ever remember to bring a belt? Or scissors?

...so tired!!! Thanks William 4 helping yesterday 3 days before your wedding oooomg :)

2010-01-26T20:59:00.002+13:00

lol so today my boss said I looked like Gok wan and sent this around in an email

lol and the other grad looks like keith urban

discuss

2010-01-25T00:28:00.002+13:00

:( was in too much of a rush today and broke one of hte bits off of a glass table...pretty old glass table that. the break is pretty clean though so maybe someone can fix it...or could sell it on trademe to someone who wnats lots of glass?

who builds a glass table, anyway?!

I am mostly to blame but I would like to pass on some of that blame to:

1) people who build glass tables, they are just asking to be broken
2) my apartment for not having a parking space for me, which led to me parking in the driveway with my hazards on and wanting to get back to the car as quick as possible.

:F

2010-01-19T19:56:00.002+13:00

just did another les mills class, Body Combat

much funner than body jam cause you spend less time on beinglike omg what am i doing i dont know what a marenge is, and more time on punch punch ahah slice tai chi jump kicks kick pumnch jab uppercut hoookkkkkk HAH!!!

also.

big news:

Founda new apartment!!! yay!!!

big pluses:

full size kitchen
carpark
bedroom HAS A DOOR
building HAS A LIFT

ok :) moving in around feb which is not really that smart cause its williams wedding arund then but

FUN TIME OK GO

2010-01-16T17:01:00.002+13:00

Epic cleaning session in the bathroom today.

Seriously epic, I should have used protection so that my hands and feet don't tingle from the caustic products...but that's another story altogether!

Removed the mildew/mould from the ceiling/high walls of the bathroom; accomplished with an office chair, Easy Off BAM mould edition (it worked reallly good, spray was not as wide as i'd hoped though so it was a little annoying) and an old cloth. And balance (please do not attempt to do any sort of cleaning of walls while on an office chair, you are just asking for trouble.)

Removed all the....pink? stuff? from the shower. what the hell is that? I have no idea but it comes off easy enough with a wipe so away it goes

Removed all the...black stuff from the shower floor. This was a little weirder. Bleach did nothing, and a cream cleanser didn't either. I eventually stumbled upon the fact that I could scrape it off with my fingernails, and then tried to brush but it wouldnt come off. So I scraped off about half of it, and then for the rest of it I worked out that cream cleanser + brush while not perfect was good enough and heaps faster than...my fingernails....my suspicion is that the black stuff is really old adhesive/dried glue stuff from a shampoo bottle or something, it has the same sort of feel as when you are removing the old bits of sticker from the back of a book.

Bleached the toilet - still needs a pretty good clean though, esp. under the rim.

Floor still needs to be cleaned, as does the vanity and mirror and maybe some glass stuff for the shower door.

I put the floor mats into the washing machine, knowing full well I will not be around to hang them up to dry until tomorrow, possibly night, but to be honest if it shrinks or becomes useless I am not averse to throwing it away.

Why am I posting about what I just did, cleaning the bathroom? It's probably the fumes.

2010-01-16T00:36:00.003+13:00

Big Day Out was AWESOME

Highlights -

Muse!!! awesome as always, great laser and light show, v. talented, obvious win
The Decemberists - most charismatic frontman performance i've come across in all BDO performances, very clean and polished sound

Lowlights -

Lily Allen. The lazy slut took a smoke break DURING her set.
Fat sweaty disgusting smelling guy standing next to you while muse is playing. you dont know whether to laugh or cry.

---

some things to take away for dinosaur club - could give Thomas (keys) a floor tom to play with; we could totally do muse-like random improv inter-song fillers

2010-01-04T13:51:00.000+13:00

Why can't my goldfish play soccer too?

http://mockingwords.blogspot.com/2008/05/smartest-soccer-playing-goldfish-ever.html

2010-01-01T07:19:00.007+13:00

Oh yeah, year in review.

Everyone's crazy about lists right now - top ten, best of decade, etc etc. Instead of that, here are three cool pictures from December 30, 2009 off Flickr (by Mark Valentine, Jesse Estes and Natalie Kucken respectively, even though I have no idea who they are I figured I could at least attribute):

Okay, I couldn't resist; here's some "best ofs":

Best ice-cream of 2009: Ferrero Rocher Gelato from the Gold Coast

Best TV show of 2009: Glee

Best lolcat of 2009:

Bestest pal of 2009: Hmm whats his name again I think its Aaron did i spell that ryte!?

Best Dinosaur Club gig of 2009: Kings Arms, photo by Allan Xia

Best concert of 2009: Dream Theater

This decade has been very exciting and eventful etc etc etc bring on the next one (but please don't go so fast you make me feel so old)

PEACE OUT!

-Henry

2010-01-01T07:14:00.002+13:00

Happy new year everyone!

Auckland City Council thought it best to wish me a prosperous new year and good wishes for 2010...by giving me a parking ticket.

Their "argue against your ticket" form is pretty retarded; mainly because it has the following layout:

Title: Mr
Date of birth: 5th September 1987
First name (in full): Henry
Last name: Chong

Surely it would make more sense to have the title with the first/last name?

Also, what is a ticketing officer doing scalping the streets for money at 10.25pm on new years eve?

I love the city council SO MUCH.

2009-12-30T16:31:00.002+13:00

Gaming usability fail - Borderlands.

- Inconsistent actions available on down/up arrows in menus. Some are clickable, while others are not (i think it's the quest detail screen, as opposed to some stuff in the menus)

- Holding the action button down to swap out your current gun for one on the floor - I don't think I have ever actually wanted to do this, compared to the huge number of times that I did this by accident because holding it is also what you do to pick up ammo/money in the vicinity...

- Useless and utterly pointless "Press start" menu (when are they going to get rid of this? All it does is slow me down before playing your game. why?! WHY!? Rockband 2 has this also. It serves no purpose but to remind me what game I am playing - which you can ALSO tell from the following screen anyway (claptrap = borderlands, rock band 2 menu is pretty distinctive....) The only exception to this was the starting thing for inFamous, which was really cool when you hit start and the city blows up

Gaming usability win - Torchlight

Automatic money pickup when going near it. Best feature in a Diablo-like game, ever.

Automatic inventory/equipped item statistics comparison (unlike borderlands, which relies on clunky button presses to achieve what Torchlight does with a very natural mouseover)

Torchlight also has some really good ideas for diablolikes, like sending your pet to sell stuff (awesome)! And what is more satisfying than leveling up? Obviously, leveling up more (ie the Fame levels)

So yeah they are quite different games...but they are both "lets collect a lot of things and level up and level up and clickingheaps = shooting heaps....so really they are also similar in a lot of ways. Except torchlight has (so far) better usability.

Come on Borderlands, you can patch this stuff for Mad Moxxie or whatever DLC #2 is.

2009-12-29T17:14:00.002+13:00

I find that being alone in the office is infinitely more productive than being one of two people in the office...

Also, don't you love it when something you thought was going to take three days gets 80% done in like 2 hours?

What's everyone doing for new years? Anyone having an awesome party? Should we do paperclip new year @ old house? Go to the beach? Find some fireworks?

Between all this work and all the christmas eating and rock band 2 (oh you addictive little !@%*) there has not been much time for anything else let alone thinking about new years!

2009-12-23T16:18:00.002+13:00

Email from Playstation Support as part of my epic quest to get Rockband 1 songs exported to Rock Band 2 here in New Zealand:

Dear Henry,

Thank you for your recent email.

Regarding your
query about PlayStation Network Cards in New Zealand, these should be available
at selected stores. Unfortunately, we cannot list every store that stock the
cards.

In relation to using them on a European PlayStation Store, the
cards themselves are restricted to the country that they were purchased in. This
means that a PSN card that you purchase in New Zealand, would only be compatible
with the New Zealand PlayStation Store.

Regards,

PlayStation
Support Centre
REF: KW02596604

Couldn't...even...list...one....but at least they gave me a helpful answer for the other question I asked.

2009-12-14T13:56:00.001+13:00

Yay! totally owned the Moss 2007 sharepoint exam with 92% :)

was way easier than i thought it would be, didnt really go into any sort of detail at all...

but im not complaining :)

2009-12-13T10:49:00.002+13:00

So I should be studying RIGHT NOW but I'm taking a very short break (before I start, naturally) to share my impressions on the latest Apple Tablet video.

I don't think it will work. Why?

1) The "Segway" effect will come into play - that is, no matter how cool/useful a gadget it is, you look like a tard using it. iPhones dont have this problem because they aren't quite big enough for you to look stupid using them. The prototype in the video is big enough to make you look like you are playing with a big piece of plastic.

2) Shaking the tablet to shuffle is a really bad idea. Why would you even implement it? I can't imagine how useful it would be and don't see the benefit outweighing the annoyances (such as it triggering on bumpy bus rides). I imagine it will require developer/coder support to be implemented? Which means it will either end up as web slices on IE8 have (something which nobody ever uses), or blinking marquees back during the days of Netscape (inserted not because it would be useful or functional, but because they can).

3) You can't use it one handed while holding it because it's too big.

So really, my main point is that you can't just blow up an iphone and call it a tablet pc without seriously rethinking what works and what doesn't at the new size. It seems like you don't really get much more out of it, but lose a whole lot in translation.

OK! DISCUSS!! :)

2009-12-04T12:41:00.002+13:00

Played at the Kings Arms last night - I'm pretty sure it was the best and tightest we'd sounded live, but was a little bit of a tough crowd (really awkward when nobody clapped after our first song...lol!)

but who cares it was fun :P

2009-12-02T00:06:00.003+13:00

Finally! I can cross off seeing Dream Theater live off my list of things to do before I die...

Awesome bits are:

mike portnoy (come on lol such a show off!!! TOO GOOD TO BELIEVE)
jordan rudess vs john petrucci, keytar vs guitar showdown!
amazing lighting crew (they must have the most rhythmically gifted lighting techs ever)

please come back earlier than 20 years this time.......

2009-11-21T21:59:00.002+13:00

Got one of those Inland Revenue student loan summary things in the mail, which I'm sure all of you are familiar with;

Currently I have $5,349.98 left on my student loan. Every month, I pay about 190 dollars off that. So at this rate it will take me about 28 months, or 2 years and 4 months, or until February 2012. (i think my maths is right)

Coincidence, or the end of the world?!?!?

You decide.

2009-11-21T11:09:00.000+13:00

This is awesome, my fish went into a panic when they saw food coming down into their fishtank...

wtf stupd fish lol

2009-11-15T23:12:00.002+13:00

Finished Borderlands

its fun, but there a ton of UI problems,which is quite depressing considering there are like at least 6 people listed in the credits for UI...

its been fun but this quote says it all abut borderlands

"I’m a merc sent to find pieces of a key on an alien planet that opens some giant vault that’s supposed to make me rich and famous. Along the way there are crazy bandits from Mad Max and evil soldiers from Fallout 3 to make things more difficult for me. I open the vault and instead of getting rich, a giant monster comes out, and I kill it and it never drops any good items. The end." (from http://unrealitymag.com/index.php/2009/11/05/the-borderlands-journal-day-15/)

having said tat though - i still had a great time, abnd will definite ly get the dlc

2009-11-08T09:18:00.002+13:00

Gym Explorer

Okay, so me and Arron have decided to join a gym recently - I mainly wanted to counteract the lethargic blah-ness of sitting down 8 hours a day so we joined Les Mills last Tuesday as part of their current promo (gym membership free until January 2010, but we did sign up for a super long 3 year term, yay for contracts...)

But yeah, it's been quite exciting! I have never really properly set foot in a gym before but Les Mills has made the introduction quite easy.

Did the cardio explorer on Thursday (where they show you how to use the bike, the rower, the cross trainer, the treadmill, and a couple of stretches using the beam), then weights explorer on Friday (lat pull down is the only machine i remember the name of but there were heaps), and then yesterday we took a group fitness class, which was like sort of a Dance Aerobics sort of thing with latin and hip hop moves or whatever, pretty hard to actually follow and do the moves so we looked like douches but it was a good workout...

As a result though I am pretttty sore today! Was pencilled in to do some more today but dont know if that is agood idea.

ANYWAY yeah to summarize

for some bizarre reason i am exercising and going to a gym now

i wonder how long this will lassst????

2009-10-30T18:23:00.002+13:00

Why ACC Levy increases are, frankly, a crock of shit

1. Email from Jim Anderton

Thank you for your message regarding the proposal to increase the ACC levy payable by owners of motor bikes, in some cases by several hundred per cent.

I am opposed to this for two principal reasons:

The first is that it is not necessary. The ACC fund is not in a financial crisis as the current National led government claims. The scheme as originally constituted was a ‘pay as you go’ scheme i.e. the levies received in any one year meet the requirements for payments in that year. In fact the recent history of the scheme has been that the income more than meets the payment requirements. The same applies to, for example, national superannuation. In that case the identification of the effect of the ‘baby boom’ generation coming to retirement and creating a demand ‘bulge’ on the commitment to pay universal pensions at a reasonable level can be anticipated and planned for ( the so-called ‘Cullen’ fund). If the ACC funding was in crisis this could be handled in the same way, but it is not in crisis and no amount of insisting that it is on the part of the present Minister can make it so.

The problem arises because the current government insists that all of the future financial obligations of the fund must be funded in the present. That would make sense if the ACC was an insurance scheme - which it is not and was never intended to be. It makes even more sense if the government has a hidden agenda - which looks increasingly likely - to privatise the ACC or farm parts of it out to insurance companies. In those circumstances, a fully funded scheme in which the fund has been paid for by taxpayers would look a very attractive proposition to a private insurer, but it is one to which I am entirely opposed.

The second reason is that the ACC scheme was never intended to be a user pays scheme in which those who allegedly incur specific costs must, as a group, also meet those costs in full. The scheme is intended to draw upon the overall resources of the community to ensure that those who suffer an accident do not find themselves disadvantaged because they cannot afford treatment or rehabilitation, or meet the expenses associated with a lengthy court case. I note that Sir Owen Woodhouse, whose report led to the setting up of the scheme in 1973 has very recently said precisely that. Saying that motor cyclists must pay much more than presently because they are ‘responsible’ for their accidents not only breaches the principal behind the scheme, it also re-introduces the notion of fault into the scheme when it was set up in the first place to avoid it.

Please be assured that I will be opposing the proposed increased levy and that we in the Progressive Party are committed to restoring the scheme to its original basis when we return to government.

Warm regards,

Jim Anderton
MP for Wigram
Progressive Party Leader

2. Read this: http://www.thestandard.org.nz/first-manufacture-a-crisis/

(but if not, then well you jsut need to know that "the cost of new claims isn’t rising (steady at $1.7 billion for the last 2 years)." and pretty much they are increasing the levy because they are attempting to change the acc model from pay as you go to fully funded, which requires a massive amount of savings if they are trying to do it by 2014...

3. Car drivers are not subsidising motorcyclists as much as you are being led to believe

"ACC said that in 2008/09 it paid more than $62 million for accidents involving motorcycles. It collected $12.3m in levies from motorcyclists in the same period." (NZPA 16th Oct) This has also been quoted by both Nick Smith and John Judge and means there is a $50m shortfall which must be funded from other means.

"Dr Smith said motorcyclists were 16 times more likely than car drivers to be involved in accidents yet car owners were currently subsidising their ACC bills by $77 each."

The MOT Annual Vehicle Fleet Statistics for 2008 states there are 2,584,509 light passenger vehicles in New Zealand (light passenger vehicles are defined as cars and vans) - See here:

http://www.transport.govt.nz/research/NewZealandVehicleFleetStatistics/

So here is the problem.

$77 x 2,584,509 = $199,007,193 which means car drivers are paying $149m more than the total ACC cost supposedly incurred by motorcyclists.

THIS FAR EXCEEDS THE $50m SHORTFALL claimed by ACC for 2008/09. Given this is supposed to be a fully funded model of compensation one would hope motorcyclists are NOT paying for the tail of accidents hanging over from 1999, an aberration caused by the National Government’s 1998 change to ACC.

4. what about cyclists

In 2008 there were 1,475 motorcycle accidents and 50 deaths, and motorcyclists paid approximately $12.3 million in levies.

In 2008 there were 1,170 bicycle accidents and 36 deaths. Cyclists paid no ACC levies.

5. motorcyclists causing all the accidents

well for a start, ACC is a "no-fault" system, but ignoring that:

"From research conducted at the Australasian Institute of Motorcycle Studies (AIMS) based at Lincoln University 67% of all accidents involving motorcycles involve other vehicles. Sixty percent of those (or 40% of all motorcycle accidents) are caused by the other driver. "

---

so yeah i am pretty certain that acc levy increases are dumb.

most of my info is obviously heavily biased and comes from http://www.bikersagainstacc.org.nz

FIGHT THE INCREASEEEEE PLZZZZZ :( ITS SO RIDICULOUSLY EXPENSE++ ;_;

2009-10-21T22:36:00.000+13:00

Playing on the radio tomorrow morning :)

Thanks bfm :)

Listen in 9:30 am if you are interested :)

2009-10-06T19:26:00.002+13:00

What is up with this ridiculously cold weather in October? It was promising for a while, warming and stuff, but then BAM today and yesterday, supercold. At work, our toilet is super cold, which is great; just great.

Band practice is pretty regular! This is the way Fist Full of Fives should have been; just need a bit of new material now. Radio show on bFM tentatively booked in for 22nd October Thursday morning ~9.30am (listen in! I think they stream it live; or listen to the recordings later), then recording an EP the weekend after that. I think my drumming has gotten a little better; obviously still a lot of room for improvement, but the drumpart for Lazybones goes from like double time to half time to normal time to what is going on

I am flying down to Wellington for the day for work tomorrow, which means a super early wakeup (pretty much a bad thing) but also means I get some time to study on the plane, cause I totally won't be tempted to play PSP, no, not at all.

How is everyone? Does anyone still read this friggn thng? I am not really that sorry thatmost of my stuff is on twitter now; I really only joined cause my boss had one, and now it's just so much easir to txt something to twitterthan to make a post here.

But the great thing about this (or the bad thing about twitter) is that you can (can't) do THIS

And I'm too lazy to undo it. Okay, anyways, hope everyone is doing well!

2009-09-27T18:58:00.002+13:00

Awesome trip down to Tauranga and the Mount; Saturday was a bit of a crap weather day, but today was sunny as and the views from the top of Mt Maunganui are awesome - it's such a random mountain as well, like it was plonked on randomly to the beachy peninsula.

Academy also played my piece and it sounded 900% better this time than the last time they played it; I got to conduct bits of it and it made me smile :D

I hate daylight savings cause now I'm sleepy as

2009-09-08T17:50:00.000+12:00

Also; why would you have a website but not an email address?? DIE

2009-09-08T10:57:00.003+12:00

You know what reallly needs to stop?

Website login forms which auto-focus on the username field when the page finishes loading. I can't remember how many times I've entered my password into the PLAINTEXT username field because someone was trying to "save me time". All 'autofocus on pageloads' should die, because lets face it nobody waits for the page to finish loading before starting to type.

2009-09-06T11:09:00.000+12:00

One table is occupied with a group playing Magic: The Gathering, a card-based game that requires a 20-sided die and, evidently, the ability to make voices in the high-pitched style of Monty Python. Magic is an RPG, or role-playing game, and the guys in the cafeteria morph into elves and trolls and other sorts of fire-breathing characters.

This is wrong, right??? (from http://www.seattleweekly.com/2007-07-11/news/testing-video-games-can-t-possibly-be-harder-than-an-afternoon-with-xbox-right.php/2)

2009-08-28T12:07:00.000+12:00

Epic epic sql working today.

This little thing calculates the first day given a year and week number, and the start day of the next week. I have no idea whether it's US week number compliant or ISO...whatever the number is...

but this is what im using anyway;

DECLARE @iYear AS INT = 2010
DECLARE @iWeek AS INT = 1

DECLARE @compareTo AS Datetime = CONVERT(datetime, CONVERT(varchar(4),@iYear))
PRINT 'Date from given year: ' + CONVERT(varchar(100),@compareTo)

print '---------'
print ''

PRINT 'First day of week of specified week: ' + CONVERT(varchar(100),DATEADD

(week, @iWeek - 1, @compareTo))

DECLARE @oldYear AS int = DATEPART(year, DATEADD(week, @iWeek - 1, @compareTo))
DECLARE @oldWeek AS int = DATEPART(week, DATEADD(week, @iWeek - 1, @compareTo))

PRINT 'Year + month of old week: ' + CONVERT(varchar(10),@oldYear) + CONVERT

(varchar(10),@oldWeek)

print '---------'

DECLARE @newYear AS int = DATEPART(year, DATEADD(week, @iWeek, @compareTo))
DECLARE @newWeek AS int = DATEPART(week, DATEADD(week, @iWeek, @compareTo))

IF (@newYear > @oldYear)
BEGIN
PRINT '## a year has been skipped, so specifying date as first week of

next year'

PRINT 'First day of week after specified week: ' + CONVERT(varchar(50),

CONVERT(datetime, Convert(varchar(4), @newYear)))
END
ELSE
BEGIN

PRINT 'First day of week after specified week: ' + CONVERT(varchar

(100),DATEADD(week, @iWeek, @compareTo))

PRINT 'Year + month of new week: ' + CONVERT(varchar(10),@newYear) +

CONVERT(varchar(10),@newWeek)

END

2009-08-24T22:35:00.002+12:00

Exclusive Meet and Greet with Dream Theater
Personal photograph with the band
Autograph session (includes 8x10 photo)
Official Meet and Greet Laminate
Exclusive Dream Theater Bandana
Set of Dream Theater Guitar Picks
Collectible Dream Theater “Black Clouds & Silver Linings” Patch
$25 voucher to the official Dream Theater online store

$250.....,.....do i want it? HMM SO UNDECIDED

A reserve tickets $120, IM SO THERE

but why is it a Tuesday night :z

maybe im not extreme enough of a fan for a meet and greet i dunno what i would say to them anyway (oh ya i luvv ur musizzkks, hey mike portnoy can i steal your talent)

2009-08-22T13:09:00.001+12:00

so for some reason in vista all of my usb devices started failing and shit

so i installed windows 7. YAY! :)

2009-08-21T15:47:00.001+12:00

If you've ever wondered how to get a different footer/header in a Word 2007 document on anywhere other than the first page, if you create a section page , you can unlink the header/footer so that the content for them is unique (instead of coming from the previous section) - then you can edit it to your hearts content!

Yay for word! (took me way too long to work this out)

2009-08-19T12:33:00.000+12:00

Lol so this morning I got woken up at 7.40 by NZBus (who Metrolink fall under) following up on a complaint I made about yesterday and the day before's incident....

so they get points back (some)

but the bus driver's still a tard

2009-08-18T09:00:00.001+12:00

Metrolink Bus Driver Fail - I was in line and got on the bus as usual, but this driver for some reason decided that it would be okay to shut his bus doors on the last person in line, and drive off, citing 'I'm late' as a suitable excuse (even though it was him who was late to the stop.) That's bad enough on its own, but this was even worse because it was just a child that was waiting.

This morning, the same child was there and it was also the same driver, and when accused of driving off yesterday which I clearly saw him doing, he denied it all.

Already knowing he is in the wrong, he then decides to accuse the mother and child of not paying the right fare, which is quickly disproven when he looks at her ticket.

His demeanor was generally rude and confrontational, and puts a black stain upon Metrolink's reputation - a bus driver that does not look out for the welfare of its passengers, and especially children, should not be carrying passengers.

METROLINK FAIL

2009-08-04T11:01:00.003+12:00

So this has taken me like...an hour to figure out at work so I thought I'd share with everyone;

The problem is, I have to select things from a database, and they always have a start date assigned, but not all have an end date. So how do you properly select everything that falls within those ranges?

THE RULES FOR DATE SELECTION
============================

If there is an END DATE

The Date you are selecting from has to be before or equal to the data's StartDate
The Date you are selecting to has to be greater than the data's EndDate

If there is NO END DATE

The Date you are selecting from has to be before or equal to the data's StartDate
The Date you are selecting to has to be greater than the data's StartDate

To be honest this is more a reminder to myself so I won't forget something so trivially simple made me feel retarded. Yay for solving problems!

2009-07-30T22:53:00.002+12:00

So I was lookin on Youtube and found a video of PSP emulating a DS (yes. very slow and shitty but it does do it), but below the video was the following in the comments:

YOYOSEBSOSSY (4 hours ago)
0
Reply
I don't have a brother but u have a ***** and a big one.

]
sim424 (11 hours ago)
0
Reply
Wow, 2 comments, I'm touched, I'd guess your Korean.
sim424 (11 hours ago)
0
Reply
Don't play with your brother's ****.
YOYOSEBSOSSY (14 hours ago)
0
Reply
Don't play with ur *****.
YOYOSEBSOSSY (14 hours ago)
0
Reply
Who is this ************ ?
this is a crazy lttle girl whose ass is ****** up
sim424 (16 hours ago)
0
Reply
Wow, your *** and a rapist, your gonna **** me?? That's sick, and your english still sucks.
YOYOSEBSOSSY (1 day ago)
0
Reply
you are the one who begain with the ******* so you should be responsible for what will happen to u . I mean that if i were u i would sit in my home and shut my mouth because if i know ur ******* house i will come and **** ur little ******* **** and I am sure if i looked down on u i won't find any ***** nor ****** bec. ur a ******* girl and i will **** u both and ur mommy.
sim424 (1 day ago)
0
Reply
Wow, great come back, your just saying all that stuff because you know I'm correct, and plus, your english sucks donkey balls, I mean, are you even American??? And since you are replying my comment, of course its directed at me so u don't have to put my name in it **** tard. This is how you do it: **** you little *****, I'm gonna **** your mom until her ****** falls of, ****** little kid who hasn't even reached puberty yet, tell me where you live and ill come kick the **** out of you, ******.
YOYOSEBSOSSY (1 day ago)
0
Reply
**** u son of a ****** **** sim424 he is a ***** **** ur *******
ilusianeagra (1 day ago)
0
Reply
to aces the touch screen hold r and use analog (sorry for bad englesh XP)

2009-07-27T20:01:00.001+12:00

Whoa; Boston Dynamics robots are seriously freaky and you have to see this.

Crazy awesome machines...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W1czBcnX1Ww
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wIuRVr8z_WE&feature=related

2009-07-24T13:00:00.001+12:00

another programming tip:

in C#, XmlAttribute.Value will automatically convert entities, but .InnerXml will preserve them.

so if you have an attribute "blah <", attribute.value = "blah <" but attribute.innerxml = "blah <"

woot

2009-07-19T13:14:00.002+12:00

I have three fish now!

Joining Rufus the comet are two shubunkins - Leonard (about the same size as Rufus) and Martha (smaller), both shubunkins - leonard is black and gold while Martha is mostly white with a bit of red.

EXCITING

I only wanted one, but they had buy one get one free at animates, and i asked if i could just have the one fish, but the lady seemed to think that 3 fish would be ok in my 21 litre tank; flying in the face of all the people on yahoo answers et al, who are all like OMG PLZ HAV 60 L PER FISH OR ITS INSIDES WILL BURST

Hopefully all three will stay alive longer than a year this time - they sem to like each other and are sticking together in the tank which is quite cute, although rufus semi-bullies them by swimming into the other two occasionally.

good thing they dont have teeth!

so cute, love fish

2009-07-18T16:53:00.001+12:00

HOLD IT

you two dont seem to have any pokemon with you

WHAT IS THE MEANING OF WALKING INTO THE TALL GRASS?!

2009-07-11T00:18:00.002+12:00

Just watched "Thirst", movie by Park Chan-wook, the director of the famous Korean film Old Boy.

And it is quite possibly the BEST vampire movie i have ever seen. Its not too outlandish, has plenty of balance in terms of light and dark moments, and some really beautiful shots.

Awaesome. AWESOME. (not sure if i like it more than the host but DEFINITELY you have to see this film, just be warned there is some nudity - but the main dude is a vampire so what do you expect :P)

2009-07-10T12:01:00.000+12:00

Awesome! So I'm going to the gold coast with my family on holiday - wooooooo

see you all when i get back awooo

also. check out the new tepapa website: http://www.tepapa.govt.nz/

i had a hand in building that!

which was much more enjoyable than another project i worked on which shall remain namelessssss

2009-07-01T22:39:00.000+12:00

kiwibank just updated their internet banking website, and i am SOLD. i love it.

why is kiwibank totally awesome?

1) they have a debit visa (okay sure lots of others too, but they weren't late to the party like BNZ, or missing out like TSB)
2) they have a free account
3) they have a visa with no account fee (as long as you use it every three months)
4) their internet banking is awesome - has secure mail (like National Bank did), search your transaction history, and most importantly, save payees for free.

Yeah seriously, they dont charge you $2. And why should they? The convenience is so much better - dont have to memorize my brothers bank account number, and my sisters, and the family account, etc - just select from the list.

The only thing that sucks is the lack of atms. but if they ever start working on that; all every day banking: sorted.

Time to ditch your old bank and come to the dark side >:)

2009-06-25T18:45:00.001+12:00

lol The Lonely Island: Incredibad is an awesome album, if only because of "I'm on a Boat" and "Dick in a box" (featuring...justin timberlake)

uberlolz

2009-06-22T18:00:00.000+12:00

lol so yesterday, we ordered a hawaiian pizza online on Dominos Pizza...

and on the pizza we swapped the ham for smoked chicken,
swappeed the pineapple for bacon
and changed teh sauce from tomato to barbeque

best hawaiian ever

2009-06-14T17:09:00.002+12:00

So today, we did a big clean of our apartment (loooooong overdue), and before any of this could start, I needed to empty the vacuum cleaner's dust bag...so I proceed to do this.I pulled out matted clogged dust ball things through the hole that the vacuum tube goes in, and lots of dust flying everywhere and obviously i inhaled heaps of it and now im really sick etc

lol

but the funniestest thing issssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss i later reread the instructions, and realised the bottom of the bag could have been unclipped and i could have avoided inhaling 9000x more dust than i had to.

lol...

2009-06-13T20:35:00.001+12:00

yusss i managed to get http://www.facebook.com/henry.chong

2009-06-03T19:45:00.001+12:00

https://boards.cityofheroes.com/showflat.php?Cat=0&Number=13273070&an=0&page=0#Post13273070

lol

2009-05-28T22:29:00.000+12:00

lol...my dell laptop has now died, so that makes all THREE computers in my apartment have died in the space of two months...so im posting this from myPS3, which I guess is the most stable "computer" now...

...lol....

@#%)(!@)%(!@%

2009-05-27T13:24:00.000+12:00

wow lol the magic of SEO

google "Client server database" if you dare

2009-05-24T23:09:00.001+12:00

why bother with car alarms that just go on and on and get ignored by everyone?

install a flamethrower instead

http://www.cnn.com/WORLD/africa/9812/11/flame.thrower.car/

2009-05-22T21:12:00.002+12:00

back in auckladn now; a little bit sick :(

watched the first episode of "glee" - awesome! the music is sweet. i love the little like "segue" music, like vocal moonlight sonata etc etc. cant wait for the next one!

2009-05-13T10:17:00.002+12:00

can you believe it, a bug in Firefox 2?? :o :o

if you've got a div with overflow:auto and a border, the border redraw is really slow and will "bleed" while you scroll down over the div. Dastardly!

at least i think thats why its dying

i fixed it by using overflow:hidden but this might not be a solution for everyone...

---

Oh yeah I'm in Wellington, and I have been asked to stay on an extra week also! There goes band practice lol ><

2009-05-08T22:12:00.000+12:00

argon is swimming even more STUPID

ARRRRR

im sooo saddd:(

2009-04-29T10:48:00.000+12:00

So we all know that Internet Explorer is a dog when it comes to CSS and styling, etc. Here's today's problem and solution:

My Checkboxes in IE have padding which I can't remove in CSS.

So if you're trying to get things to look consistent between Firefox, IE AND Safari, the last thing you need is IE adding padding which setting margin:0px and padding:0px doesn't seem to remove.

The solution?

margin-top:9px; padding:0px; width:13px; height:13px;

I believe giving it a specific width gives it the hasLayout property in IE, which reminds it to stop being stupid and do things properly.

I might be totally wrong though, but at least it works.

2009-04-28T18:50:00.002+12:00

Today I got my first foodbox :) And I must say I'm pretty happy with it.

While realistically you can never expect it to be ever as cheap as buying from the supermarket yourself, I am very impressed with the quality of the fruit and veg that's come in. The mushrooms don't look depressing, the vine tomatoes look really fresh and vibrant, the gourmet potatoes are cute, the carrots look good! It's like in ads, when you see fruit; its like that. And they DO also deliver to you, and if you tried to order that amount of fruit and veg online through something like foodtown online, the delivery charge is pretty hefty.

Also, they seem to like throwing in random things to spice things up. This week, I got choko.

What the hell is that?

I don't know! It looks kind of like a bittergourd to me, on the outside. Wiki says: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chayote
There's also a recipe to try; though it does need lemon which didn't come in the box.

Because I live in an apartment, I requested them to give me a call to pass the foodbox to me directly, and they did just that - very polite, and yeah.

The final proof though, is in the eating - I had a mandarin and it was really delicious, and I guess we'll see how a cooked meal with foodbox veg turns out! :)

2009-04-26T16:59:00.002+12:00

So finally, the "Media Computer" which I put linux on has died. Either it couldn't handle the upgrade to Ubuntu 9.1, or the graphics card finally ate crap, but it wouldn't go back to installing Ubuntu 8.10, or completing Windows 7's beta at any rate or fashion. So for now, it's sitting in the corner along with my laptop in what I like to call the "Technology Graveyard"...

Somewhere along the line, I want this though. Seems pretty decent!
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16883229090&nm_mc=AFC-C8Junction&cm_mmc=AFC-C8Junction-_-Desktop+PC-_-CyberpowerPC-_-83229090
But for now, i've moved the laptop to use the HD tv as a monitor, and we've got a wireless mouse and keyboard - it's pretty awesome! I'm gonna try some gaming on it :P

The only downside to this is that it'll be harder to share the TV and the PC. Although really, could just move the laptop away again by unplugging it so its not such a big deal.

Still though, why all three computers dying on me at the same time? Don't need the stressss

2009-04-25T01:14:00.002+12:00

So some of you will probalby know my laptop likes dying on me periodically. Yesterdayy, while trying to install The Last Remnant, I managed to destroy the Vista install, so I thought it would be a good opportunity to try out Windows 7.

So I did. It's not bad, although I think the UI takes a bit of getting used to. I don't have much except for first impressions of it, that and the fact that it allowed me to recover all my documents and stuff (whereas Vista didnt seem to want to install over itself)

It also has a new calculator program (yeah, not just the XP one with Aero borders!)