Posts

Showing posts from December, 2011

Stephen Fry

This is my new years post, dont like it to bad lol... I just watched Stephen Fry live at the Sydney Opera house.  He was candid funny and intelligent.  But he was far more than that he was honest.  He talked in depth about Bipolar and what it is to have it, in a candid way.  It was confronting at times and deeply personal, bordering on uncomfortable for the audience. He was able to describe in detail what it is like to be BP and how devastating it is for those who have it and for those around them.  His honesty about mania, and the things that we think and do when we are unwell was refreshing.   He described having BP as like the weather, you wake up and its raining.  Thats what its like, you cant walk it off you cant think it away its just there.  He describes the actions of one man who was BP.  He was hospitalized, and managed to get away he stepped in front of a truck, it shattered both of his legs.  Steven went to see him a while later and he showed him his broken leggs that

Loss of Rights

Image
Have been contemplating a post about this for a little while.  Today I was prompted to act from a post by American Mercenary The post is short story that quite abruptly shows how far things could come. It is my personal belief, that many of the important rights that we had prior to 911 have been removed.  Including the right that your government cannot spy on you without permission of the courts.  Her in Australia it is my understanding that any electronic communications are at least scanned for key words by our government. They tell us all its in the name of protecting us against terrorism.  That may be true, or it may be that the government took advantage of the situation to get greater details of any individual they want.  Ultimately it removes our right to privacy. My issue here has two points.  (1) I never voted on or agreed to any changes that have been applied to my rights, and (2)  That the terrorists have won  a victory, because they have altered the way in which we l

A Slave to Medications

Image
I have stated here a couple of times now about my mental illness and how it has changed my life forever.  Before you read any further I haven't had a great day, but that doesn't make how I feel about medications change. As the header suggested I feel at times I am a slave to my medications, not only having to take them twice a day, but also remember to get scripts when I see the doctors then get those scripts filled. Remember to get new scripts when meds get low, and all the running around that is involved in it.  Every moment of every day is Dependant on the medications. Failure to take them is not an option, even reducing them down below the doses I have now bring about nasty nasty side effects that I simply cannot cope with. But its more than that.  Its this nagging feeling that I know I am addicted to at least 2 medications probably more.  It makes me feel cheap, like some 2 dollar junkie.  I worry about withdrawals. I have had serious withdrawals at least 10 time

How do Dragons Die

Image
Dragons have an endless fascination for me.  So I wondered how long does a Dragon live and how do they die. I found out the following THE GREAT WYRMS If a dragon lives past the age of 900 years, they are considered a Great Wyrm, and an Elder of the dragon community. All dragons will hold a great meeting to admit the new Great Wyrm to the society of dragons. Great Wyrms are highly regarded for their knowledge, their magical ability, and their prime wisdom. Elders are responsible for the teaching of past history of dragon kind, history of the world, and magic to the adult dragons. If there is an emergency that includes the dragon community, the Elders will call a grand-meeting to discuss the problem and what to do about it. These are the only two times in a dragon's life that they will see so many of their kind in one area. END OF THE LIFE-CYCLE A dragon rarely lives past 1,500. When the time comes, the dragon realizes his life-cycle has come t

Hard to take

Image
Think you will all agree not a bad place to spend an hour on Christmas day.  Its lovely and warm and a nice sea breeze this afternoon not making it to hot. Dinner is on at home have beef lamb and pork all roasting on the BBQ. In just over 2 hours i will add the chicken.  an hour after that the roast veges.  should see us sit down around 7.30pm tonight. I got MW3 for Christmas. I can see some serious gaming time coming up.  It has been a while since i played a game fully immersed. I was looking at a gaming headset for the xbox.  i have one for my pc and will readily admit that the 7.1 surround really helps with the game play. Ok signing off at Rowes Bay.

Merry Christmas

I know there will be millions of blog posts saying Merry Christmas so here is mine. To all who read my blog and for those who have commented thank you.  I hope this holiday period sees you catching up with family and friends.  Please stay safe and I hope to see you back in the new year. The Horse

Barbarity

Been pondering this post for a while, still not exactly sure what I will achieve by writing it, other than to tell others what I observe.  So here goes. Since the beginning of man, violence has been something that we have proven time and time again we are very good at.  However all this violence has a cost.  When we expose our young men and women to the conditioning for war, we eat away at their ideas of what is right and wrong. Let me explain what I mean.  The idea of training someone for war is to train them to kill someone else.  In normal circumstances that would be seen as outside the normal for most human beings.  Yes I know there is more to military training than that, but at its core its kill or be killed. I was reminded this evening after watch the documentary war in the pacific, of how the barbarity of war blurred the lines of what is barbaric and what is not.  They made the comment that people were not in anguish about dropping the bomb.  There had been far more destru

Blade Runner

Image
As a kid the first time I saw this movie it all but blew me away.  It struggles with complex ideas and scenarios.  It does this the whole while you are lost in the depth of the characters, it was one of the all time great SciFi movies.  The opening scene is amazing and one I can not get out of my head even all these years later. However there is one scene that I find amazing and delivered by the least likely of characters.  I suggest if you haven't seen this movie that you do, in a way it puts things in a different perspective.

Im much better

Just a quick note for those who are wondering, im feeling much better this evening, woke with a migraine, but its gone and so has all the strange feelings from the lack of sleep. Keep smiling

Christmas Parties

Well its that time of the year again, people leaving work, work Christmas parties etc.  I attended one with my partner this evening, and all I can say is I don't miss going out to these things. There is always a couple of groups of people you can be guaranteed to ruin the night for everyone. (1) Those that get loud.  People who get louder and louder the more drunk they get, really get on my nerves.  One of the girls that was out tonight is known for her volume, and true to form tonight you could hear here at least 2 city blocks away.  Worse she tried karaoke and she cant sing so she yells into the mic.  eeek double distortion. (2) The sleaze.  This is the person who checks out every female or male and works out which one they can talk dirty to.  Shame they always pick someone who is married or in a committed relationship.  My issue with this person is they always seem to do it within ear shot and worse they think its funny when they get told to f**k off. (3) The hyper socia

The Importance of Sleep

As per my last post, I am struggling for sleep right now.  There appears to be two main factors as to why this is happening. (1)  Full Moon.  Now before you go saying there is no proof the moon has an effect on anything I ask you to consider the following.  Psych departments at hospitals have very heavy traffic in and around the full moon.  Any ER room medic or doctor will tell you the same thing.  In aged care the residents require more one on one care during the full moon.  For me it makes me restless, my dreams are shadows of ghosts and things past.  They are self defeating and soul destroying. Add to that voices and delusions and you are sort of half way there. I know that without the meds I would be in full mania, with delusions, I would be a danger to myself and everyone around me.  My partner normally picks up on the behavior changes then looks up.  It kind of helps me knowing that the feelings I am having and that I am living will go away once the moons presence fades. (2

Awake/Asleep

Just had one of those really unpleasant things you get when you take the number of meds I do.  I get trapped between being conscious and being in deep sleep.  I cant wake up and the dream is horrible to say the least. Todays was every time I went to sleep a weight would fall on me and I couldn't breath, I would try to wake, and could just enough to breath then it would happen all over again. Whats weird about todays dream, is its about a place I have been to a 1000 times in my dreams, its normally a happy place but today it was foreboding.  Every time I got close to the house I could not breath.  I could feel this pressure forcing me into the bed. This is part of the reason I don't sleep without medication.  I wake constantly in fear like today.  Its not nice I am screwed up enough without taking some beautiful child hood memories and destroying them in a couple mins ( which felt like hours). Anyway I am off to bed again hope this time the drugs can keep me under deep e

I blame IKEA

Well after many years of fine service my office desk chair broke yesterday.  It was all worn in and comfortable as a good office chair should be.  So it was with the greatest sorrow that I went to find a replacement chair today. I went down to the local office works with a price in my head that I wouldn't spend over and sat on just about everything (yes I know that has a sexual connotation, but this is a clean post)  it turns out I liked a mid price ranged chair so I got one of those. Now this is where its all IKEA's fault.  Everything furniture wise is now in a flat pack.  Its usually short some vital bits and the hex key tool usually came out of a furnace from the dark ages.  No written instructions just bad drawing with arrows and letters that match screws.  Well they would match if the screw bubble pack had the letters printed on it. So you crawl around on the floor like a 5 year old with leggo trying to put them all together.  Tell me what ever happened to buying fur

More Printer Goodness

Hey all.  As you know I have a fully operational EPSON Workforce 840, using a CISS ink system. I know that there have been  a few articles written about this printer and its ability to print A4 high quality prints.  One person went as far to say that it was blurry and there was no use wasting the paper.  No I can tell you without a word of a lie, that using the CISS system, I printed some very high quality prints tonight in full borderless  A4.  The ink dried quicky and the color reproduction is very very good.  I will say it walked all over the canon printer that I had prior.  Now of course the great thing about this is that I can print as many as I like as the CISS provides far more ink than the standard cartridge did.  I had to reset the black chip this afternoon.  Which means I would have had to replace another black cartridge but I dont and I love the fact that I dont have to :) So if your still unsure or are worried I can assure you the printer inks provided do an amazi

The big Park in the Sky

Image
Connor and Stromolo together on the bed Hey all. As intimated yesterday, our old dog has been getting increasingly unwell.  We took him to the Vet this afternoon, and me made the tough decision.  He was in a fair amount of pain so we decided to end it. The old boy himself.  Will miss you mate My partner was very upset, after telling me yesterday he could do it on his own, he now knows why I said he couldn't.   He was a great dog quiet and ever so gentle.  But to keep him alive was the wrong decision.  It hurts to think of him gone, but Im sure he has gone to that big park in the sky with all the other great dogs.  Miss you Stomolo, but we will meet again. The Horse

I know everyone says their dog is cute but....

Image
Ok I know every dog owner on the planet says their dog is the cutest.  There are some really cute dogs out there, but plenty that only the owner could love to.  I havent shared any pics of our baby boy so there a couple below.  He is not only cute but quite a character. Next one is of him and old dog, unfortunately old dog may be leaving us very soon, he has been loosing weight constantly for a couple months, he isn't eating much and is showing signs of kidney failure, will take him to the clinic on Saturday.  I don't expect him to come home Now you tell me is that dog cute... :)

Aussie Muscle

Image
I have intimated in other posts here that I have owned a few, how shall I put it, performance cars in my life.  Over at Flimsy Cups Mr e.f. bartlam, was talking about being a road warrior.  I certainly know how he felt, for over a decade I was on the road constantly visiting customers and suppliers for my own businesses. Traveling on the road has some down sides and some up sides and is an experience to say the least. Anyway I commented on his post about my performance cars I got to drive, so I thought I would post a couple pictures I could find on the web about one of the cars and some specifications for a great piece of Aussie Muscle car. Ford AUIII Tickford TS50 Specifications TE50 / TS50 Base Price, AUSD 57,350 / 66,950 Engine Type OHV 16-valve V8 Powertrain Layout Front engine, RWD Displacement, cc 5602 Horsepower@rpm 335@5250 Torque, lb-ft@rpm 368

Things to Consider before using Linux

Image
As you have probably gathered from my previous posts I have been doing a lot of investigating into the current Linux distributions and building 3 servers based around them. The server editions of Centos 6, have been stable and secure the way I expected them to.  To be honest now that we have the servers installed at the proprietary software running, I feel one hell of a lot less stressed about being hacked and viruses.  I have also been looking at a desktop distribution of Linux that I could replace my windows desktop with.  Therefore removing yet another entry point for hackers and or spy ware etc.  I mentioned BSD and it ran great as did quite a few others.  But I learnt some things you need to take into consideration before diving in. Do you have another machine for windows or can you dual boot for the programs that don't have a Linux version Are you prepared to try new programs What desktop do you want to run, as there are several out there. Try and find out if your

Have we reached a Concord Moment

Its a saying that is bandied around a lot these days, sometimes with no real meaning or direction.  In this post I hope to argue that maybe we have reached our concord moment, with motor cars. You see as fuel prices continue to rise car manufacturers are being forced to find more power more cleanly.  Not only this but because of global warming big engined high performance cars are becoming less and less relevant.  In the last 5 years we have seen cars like the Bugatti Veyron designed and built because they could.  Lexus builds a super car that takes the words out of your mouth, and every other performance version of the car has arrived or will arrive soon.  Why is it that they build cars that they can never make money out of?  Its simple. they genuinely believe this will be the car they are remembers for.  The last of its type to be assigned to history.  I cant see 16 cyclinder giants being built in the future, its more likely a blood prius. Objectively from the outside you can see

Brothers to the End

Image
Game releases these days are a theatrical event, with games making more in the first weeks than some blockbuster movies.  I have been an avid gamer most my life.  I had to take a break for a couple years after I got sick, found I was getting anxious and unsettled.  The line of reality is so blurred now that one can fully immerse oneself into the game the outside world for all intents and purposes vanish.  To me that is the ultimate, and its what I game for. Unfortunately this year one of my favorite franchises comes to a close.  Gears of War 3 was released recently to great fanfare and huge sales numbers.  I admit I have been playing it pretty solidly.  But I am sad, im sad because it has to end. Below I have inserted a youtube clip titled Brothers to the end.  One of the blogs I have been following posed the question. "You have just locked your last clip into your weapon of choice, you are surrounded and there is no way out.  What music would you want to play as you empti

Being a horrible Friend

Image
Well i suppose the header says it all.  One of my best friends is in the middle of a major project to bring a business on line.  Now I know lots about the web and computers, I have used just about every version of operating system known to man, and fixed problems that have had others perplexed to the point of replacing systems. So how am I being a bad friend.  When my friend came to me with the idea, I thought it was great.  I convinced him it was worth the effort.  Then the wheels fell off on my end.  I got sick for about 8 weeks and left him in the breeze.  No matter I gave him the guys I use when I have to much work and he has been dealing directly with them.  Cut to this week.  He has just about finished his stock and the website is far from complete.  It needs someones size nine fair up the backside of the main web designer, and a warning about non payment should his lax attitude to this project continue.  It comes down to this.  In essence the project is none of my busi

Urban Decay

How the world has changed, once proud industrial cities, in a slow endless decay.  Buildings abandoned and dreams with them.  It easy to see how people loose faith in the system when there is high unemployment, and little prospects at getting ahead. Me I find photography of the decay touching and in a way beautiful.  I find buildings in general to feel tight conforming and but dead, no life or feeling.  Cold steel, glass and tile.  The decay of urban buildings ads a life to a building, it makes you imagine what once was.  It makes me feel for the things that were.  The buildings maybe a metaphor for how the world is today, but it is also a direct link to better days. I think that the urban landscape is full of things that we just don't see until a photograph is taken.  I think we choose not to see these things.  Yet when confronted with a still image we see something as if its the first time. Something wondrous in our world.  The photographer sees the world differently to all o