At the airport

I'm now at the airport waiting to in through customs and then board etc.
In the queue waiting to order coffee, I realised that I'd left my serious coat at home, with my gloves and beanie in the pockets. Thankfully, the coat's now on its way. I just hope it gets here with plenty of time. I still need to visit the duty-free desk to get the money back on the tax I paid on my netbook.

Keyboard

Mogę pisać po polsku teraz z listami polskiego (i na nowym komputerze). Będę w polsce wkrótce i jestem bardzo szczęśliwy!
Hmm... I've just thrown that above sentence through google's translator to check the grammar etc and it's produced a rather interesting translation for the bit "będę w polsce". Have a go yourselves and see what you get for that. (Actually, it only seems to work if you put in the whole sentence above, not just that phrase. It does it correctly if you only put "Będę w polsce" into the translator".)

I would like to visit Greece one day, but I won't get time on this trip. I'll have to save it for a future holiday.

Je peux aussi écrire en français grace à la choix de clavier. Je pouvais, depuis longtemps, le faire sur mon autre ordi, mais je viens de changer la selection de clavier sur mon nouveau ordi. Et oui, je veux bien aller en Grèce un jour, mais je ne pourrai pas y aller cette fois.

Google chrome me demande si je veux que cette page est traduit en anglais parce que la texte est en français. Je sais que j'écris en français maintenant, mais parce que c'est moi qui l'ecrit, je pense que je peux le traduire moi-meme, mais merci chrome quand meme.

Je pars mardi! C'est bientot!

Edit:
According to google translator, "Będę w polsce wkrótce" = "I'll be in Poland soon" (which is what I thought it meant, so we're in agreement there), but "Będę w polsce wkrótce i" = "I'll be in Greece soon and". What a difference the word "and" seems to make here. I thought it was just a simple conjunction, but apparently it has geographical power as well as the power to join to ideas into one sentence. Amazing.

Macarons

It's Wednesday today, which means the markets are on in the square in front of the casino. This means that macarons are able to be purchased. I worked today and therefore had ample opportunity to purchase there macarons but I forgot all about the markets until I saw them from the bus window on the way home. Drat.
I got over my annoyance quickly when I remembered that I'll be in Paris in a week's time, where macarons are readily available, and delicious.

GOMA

I went to GOMA yesterday, as well as one of the exhibitions in the old art gallery next to GOMA. I thoroughly enjoyed wandering around the exhibitions and wish I had time over the next few days to go again. My favourite piece of art from my very first visit to GOMA was back - the infinity room. Last time I went there they had removed it for a special exhibit, which was good, but I missed the room.
One of the amazing temporary exhibits there yesterday was a room full of finches flying between perches suspended from piano wire which in turn was connected to an amplifier. I spent quite a long time in the finch room, and highly recommend the experience to everyone. The sounds from the perches combined with the finches' chirping needs to be heard rather than described.
In another room, the Jungle Book was playing, with each different character speaking a different language. The small kid spoke Spanish, the bear spoke Hebrew, the puma Arabic, and German, French and Greek were spoken by some of the elephants, etc. I liked it, and I found the concept interesting because each character spoke his/her own language but obviously understood what the others were all saying. My only criticism of this installation was that the volume was a bit low, which made it difficult to hear what they were saying, and so it wasn't initially obvious to hear that they were all speaking different languages.
I was amused by the video of a McDonald's store being flooded, and by the Chinese convenience store. The slippery slides were a bit of fun, but very bumpy.

New netbook

I purchased a netbook yesterday, an ASUS EeePC. I went for Asus because they seem to have a good reputation for netbooks in the online forums I checked and I had a couple of recommendations from friends too.
I'm writing this on the new gadget now. I like its weight (or lack thereof), size and general portability, as I intend to port it around quite a lot. I plan to take it to uni with me next year, and also take it on a mini tour of Europe after Christmas.
Before my purchase yesterday, I had planned to partition the hard drive and set up a dual booting system with windows and ubuntu, but I don't think I can be bothered doing that now, and I might leave that for when I format my laptop (which is long long overdue).

Prawn paste perhaps?

I went to a cafe at the weekend with some friends and we ordered a dip platter to share. These were tasty, and we were certain that the pink one contained roe and only roe, as far as animal matter was concerned. I should have asked the staff to confirm this, but didn't, and foolishly tried some of it. It was delicious, and I only ate a small amount, but there must have been some shellfish in the dip. I can point to the general discomfort and stomach cramps that I suffered on Saturday night and Sunday morning as experimental proof of this. I'm feeling back to normal now, but even yesterday, I felt as though I'd pulled a muscle in my lower abdomen. It seems like my reaction to shellfish is getting worse and worse; gone are the days when I could have tried just a little to test the taste and not feel too uncomfortable afterwards.

I wish I could swap this food intolerance for an intolerance to a food that I don't like to eat.

Here it is

Here is the article that I heard people speaking about on the radio.

Czekolada

I heard on the radio this afternoon that the world's chocolate consumption is unsustainable, and because of this, it may become as expensive as caviar. I have two things to say about this:
1. Gah!
2. Other people need to stop eating chocolate!

Rainy beach

I'm just after arriving at the beach, where I'll be until Monday, and it's raining. This is a pain as it's not good weather for walking along the beach with the dogs.
The unit's fantastic as it's just been renovated. It's a bit of a novelty here to have strange things like bedroom doors that close and an oven that doesn't need to be operated with a screwdriver.

Unfortunate ink

I was installed on one of the couches in the foyer of the cinema complex earlier today waiting for friends to arrive when a chap with a tattoo on his leg sat down on the adjacent couch, with his tattoo in my field of vision. The tattoo is a sentence, running almost the entire length of his lower leg, in quite large letter, proudly stating: Love Conquer's All
Yes, that's exactly how it was emblazoned on his skin.

Update

I have searched my room, as much as I could, and I'm fairly certain that the huntsman didn't go in there. To hopefully prevent this situation from happening again, I 'lightly' sprayed some surface spray over strategic areas, like my door and door frame. I also sprayed some in different parts of my room and managed to flush out two small and insignificant spiders who promptly died. I don't like killing spiders, but I can't let them stay in my room.
I'm now waiting for the room to settle down so that I can go to sleep without dying from the fumes. I've got the door and windows wide open and the ceiling fan's on.

Not an improvement

I've just checked my door to see if the spider is still there and it's not. The advantage of this situation is that it's not on my bedroom door. The huge disadvantage now is that I don't know where it is. Has it gone into another room? Has it gone out into the garden? Or has it moved into my room, closer to my bed and where I'd like to be sleeping?

Another spider

I'm definitely not a fan of coming home late at night to find a large huntsman spider on my bedroom door. I don't intend to kill it, but I don't know how to persuade it to find a better place to sit, preferably somewhere far away from my bedroom. I don't hate huntsman spiders, but I don't appreciate it when they visit my bedroom.
I also don't like it when they decide to cling to my bath towel, like a medium-sized one did just a few days ago.

Waiting again...

I'm currently sitting at a busway stop, with a 45min wait ahead of me because the bus I need has become hourly. On a Friday night. It really feels like I'm living in a country town at times. Maybe one day this place will develop a decent public transport system. In the meantime, I have to wait.

Stuff

It's been a while since my last blog post. I have been consuming coffee, but not posting about it for some reason. I feel that my hypothesis is correct, and therefore it's not necessary to continue the experiment. I have been consuming coffee, of course, although not on a daily basis as some days have been far too hot for a warm milky beverage.
Other than the coffee, I've been busy this month with a lot of extra tutoring (well, mostly just extra marking) and assignments that need to be completed soon, given that tomorrow heralds the last teaching week of the semester.
At this very moment, I'm taking a break from reading a chapter of a book describing error correction in microwave network analyser measurements and trying to work out how it applies to the measurements I took a few weeks ago with a network analyser. Because I've now read the appropriate chapter several times, it's not the most interesting book to wade through, so it's a bit of a slog.

Recently, in one of my lectures on medical imaging techniques, a lecturer was talking about taking PET scans of rats and other small mammals, and how for small mammals, they have a PET scanner and a CT scanner (aka CAT scanner) in one system. It's referred to as the PET-CT, or PET-CAT, and pronounced as 'pet-cat' regardless of which acronym is used. The lecturer spent quite some time describing how he put the rat into the PET-CAT, completely oblivious to how it sounded.

Je viens de voir quelqu'un ici (je me trouve à la fac) qui bien ressemble le propriéteur de l'école où je bossais en angleterre. C'était zarbie parce que je n'arrive pas à penser pourquoi il serait dans un batiment d'ingenierie. Bien sur c'est un autre mec mais initialement ca m'etonnait.

J'ai commencé à croire que j'avais été lancé à travers un trou de ver.

Back to uni

I've had a week away from uni which explains the lack of coffee-related posts, but I'm back now and I've got a latte. It's just like the previous lattes. I realised, after ordering my latte today, that it's been a while since I've had a flat white here so I should endeavour to keep that in mind when ordering future coffees.

Work today

I've been called in to work today. They called me at 8.40am, to see if I could start at 9, even though they apparently knew last week that I'd be needed today but someone forgot to call me. Right now I'm sitting at the bus stop. Obviously there's not a chance in hell that I'll get there by 9, given that it's after 9 now, but I might be able to make it in by 10, if the bus isn't running late.

Coffee and waffle

Today's latte was delicious and fit my theory perfectly. I was going to order a flat white, as it's been a while since my last one, but the barista knows I usually order lattes and offered me 'the usual' as I stepped up to the register. I also purchased a waffle with custard, which was also delicious.

Nie mam swój parasol

J'espère qu'il ne pleut pas aujourd'hui parce que mon parapluie est resté chez moi au lieu de se mettre dans mon sac à dos. Le ciel est gris, donc je pense que je ne vais pas rester sec.

Today's news

My latte is just as expected and the blueberry waffle was delicious.
Yesterday, I arrived at uni at about 3.35pm. This means that I had to share the first leg of my journey with school people. It was more annoying than I'd expected it to be. School students should remain silent on and near public transport.

Coffee

I didn't have coffee yesterday, and I was undecided this morning until I remembered that I was up to a free cup.
I ordered a latte and as usual, it has the expected amount of froth on top.
Today's coffee came with a free side order of banter with the barista, probably because I was alone and she wasn't very busy. I believe it was prompted by the free cup, and that things taste better when they're free. She added that they can also be free if they're stolen, but wasn't advocating theft from the coffee cart, of course, which I pointed out would be difficult as you have to pay before the coffee's made. I also learnt that her busiest day at uni is Thursday because she starts at 7am and doesn't finish until 6pm, though she is paid for part of that time.
Do other people converse with baristas?

A little rant

Just over two weeks ago we had the federal election, and I was thoroughly fed up with election propaganda by the time we voted. The following two weeks consisted of almost constant reporting and speculation as to who might be eventually able to form a government, and now, just as that question seems to have been decided, the student union elections have started their propaganda campaigns. The uni campaigns are in some ways worse because they're more visible, in your face, and difficult to avoid. So far this week I've been taking the environmental high road by refusing to accept leaflets on tree-saving grounds.

Australia is now moving forward

So it seems Australia has a government, and only 17 days after we went to the voting machines. Well, the voting paper. We don't have machines here for voting, which is a shame, as they'd make the counting process significantly faster.
I'm happy with the outcome, and more specifically, happy that the alternative wasn't the outcome. Another bonus is that we no longer have to put up with the media constantly talking about the independents chatting to various politicians and parties about who to support. J'en avais marre.

In other news, I didn't buy a coffee at uni today. It was too warm when I arrived there to drink a warm beverage. I apologise to those of you who were hanging out for another coffee post today.

Coffees

I had a latte this morning, and it was comparable to all the other lattes that I've recently consumed.
Yesterday I branched out and ordered a chai latte. I don't know if I should include chai lattes in the data for this test. Any thoughts?
In completely unrelated news, the girl who was sat behind me on the bus this morning was engaged in an unnecessarily loud phone conversation which seemed to centre around her issues with her current boyfriend. I wanted to turn around and tell her to dump him and shut up. Either that or move to the seat behind her, ring someone (or at least pretend to) and then loudly describe a nasty rash or infection.

Another data point

Another successful foray into my coffee experiment today with a perfect latte.
I also purchased a waffle, a mars bar flavoured one, and it perfectly satisfies my waffle theorem: waffles are delicious.

Coffee and news

Today's coffee is a latte and perfectly supports my hypothesis.
In other news, my underwear matches my socks today. I recently purchased 2 packs each which contained a pair of socks and some underwear, one black and one navy blue. I'm wearing navy blue today.

Kawa srody

Today's coffee is a latte, with ample foam (though less foam than one would expect of a cappucino), adding more supporting evidence for the previously-mentioned hypothesis.
I've used the present tense for this post because I'm currently in the process of drinking this latte. Oui, je suis en train de boire ce café au lait.

Make them stop!

I can't wait until Sunday, as Sunday is the day immediately after Australia's federal election. This means the horrid election campaign advertisements will cease constantly irritating me. I understand that each party wants to get its point and policies across, but I know who I'm going to vote for and therefore don't need to be tormented by these ghastly ads.
Also, a variation on what I said before the last federal election stands, when I said that I wouldn't return to Australia while Howard was still running things. This time I don't have quite the same level of choice because of my uni course, but having the Liberals* in power will speed up my departure from these shores.

* the Liberals are anything but liberal in their political views (for those unfamiliar with the misleading name of this political party)

Le café du jour

This morning, at 11.47am, I ordered a flat white from my usual coffee establishment. There was almost no foam at all on top, so fits perfectly with my theory. This flat white was delicious too.

In other news, I'm going to Europe (mostly France) for a holiday at the start of next year!

Another milestone number passed

It happened on the 7th of August and I didn't notice until today. Visitor number 12345 has been to my blog.

The visitor was someone from France, in Courbevoie, using Cegetel as an ISP (presumably neuf-cegetel). Strangely, the language of their computer was set to English(Singapore), and they use IE8, which is odd, as I assume people only use IE in order to download better browsers. This visitor found my blog through a google.fr search for "je suis un homme lyrics translation".
I suspect that it's not someone I know or have ever met. Oh well, better luck with the next momentous number, which will be 13000, which is quite a way off yet.

More from the bus

The passengers on certain routes must be a classy bunch if this is necessary.

Slow bus

The driver of the bus that I'm on is driving incredibly slowly. The bus was also 6 mins late leaving uni. I need to use some plumbing facilities. I'm sure he's driving slowly just to spite me.

I've been slack

I haven't been keeping you all up to date with my coffee tests at uni. This has been rather remiss of me and I'll endeavour to be more dedicated to the task in future.
I won't write about the coffees from last week because I can't remember exactly what I ordered each day.
At the moment, I'm drinking a latte, and this latte satisfies my hypothesis perfectly. I also ordered a waffle with my coffee this morning and it was delicious. The waffle was healthy because it contained products derived from the maple tree, so therefore practically vegetables.

Free coffee

I got a free latte from Mr Beans today because I'd bought 8 and filled up one of the rows on the loyalty card. It was the third row, so I now have a nice new card to start stamping.
This latte was delicious and had a decent quantity of foam on top.

Freecell

I've just completed my 600th game of freecell on my mobile. That's 600 completed games, not 600 wins. I've only won 592 of them.

A post! Hooray!

I feel as though I'm neglecting this blog. I wrote a lot of posts in June, but July has seen a drastic reduction in the post-per-day count. One reason for this is that I've already used up half of my monthly quota on my mobile phone and I often write posts on my mobile and email them to blogger, but I've cut down recently.

I've been working all week too, which will be good for my bank account, and I'll be working all next week as well. The work rarely changes, so I don't feel like blogging about it, and I haven't been doing a lot outside of work since I got back from Canberra.

I did spend the morning at the French Festival at South Bank yesterday, and that was fun and interesting, not to mention delicious. I arrived early and had, for breakfast, a decent coffee and a freshly-baked pain au chocolat (or chocolatine) with crispy pastry. Delicious. The coffee was a latte, but as it was a different company to my collected data, I'm not going to add it to the list. We also stood in line for ages to get to buy delicious macarons. The guy working at the macaron stall was crazy, but in an interesting and amusing way, so it added to the experience. I only bought 5 macarons, and very soon afterwards I wished I'd bought 10, or 50. I considered going back for more, but the queue and the hot sun dissuaded me from doing so. I bought a Portuguese egg tart from the same bakery as the chocolatine, which I kept until last night. I was also delicious.

I think it's time for another one

1. English:
I think It's time to play with Google's translator again. Following the same method as last time, I'll pass this paragraph through several languages and post the results each time.

2. Icelandic/Íslenska:
Ég held að það er kominn tími til að spila með þýðanda Google aftur. Eftir sömu reglum eins og síðast, ég framhjá þessari málsgrein með fleiri tungumálum og birt niðurstöður í hvert skipti.

3. Estonian/Eesti:
Ma arvan, et on aeg mängida Google tõlkija uuesti. Samade reeglite järgi nagu viimane, ma sooritanud käesoleva lõike mitmes keeles ning kuvab tulemused iga kord.

4. Polish/Polski
Myślę, że nadszedł czas, aby zagrać ponownie w Tłumacz Google. Samych zasad, jak ostatnio, zdałem w niniejszym ustępie w wielu językach i wyświetlanie wyników za każdym razem.

5. Irish/Gaelige:
I mo thuairimse, tá sé in am chun imirt arís ar Google Translate. Na rialacha céanna go deireanach, tá mé sa mhír seo, i dteangacha éagsúla agus na torthaí a thaispeáint gach uair.

6. Portuguese/Português:
Eu acho que é hora de jogar novamente no Google Translate. As mesmas regras com a última, eu sou neste ponto, em diferentes línguas e exibir os resultados de cada vez.

7. German/Deutsch:
Ich denke, es ist Zeit, wieder zu spielen Google Translate. Die gleichen Regeln wie zuletzt, bin ich hier, in verschiedenen Sprachen und Ergebnisse anzeigen jeder Zeit.

8. Ukrainian/Український:
Я думаю, цей час, щоб грати знову Google Translate. Ті ж правила як і в минулому, я тут, в різних Мови і відображати результати кожен раз.

9. Japanese/日本語:
私は時間が再び、Google Translateを再生すると思います。過去に同じルールが、私はここにさまざまな言語や結果を表示するたびにしています。

10. French/Français:
J'ai maintes fois, Google Translate je joue. Les mêmes règles dans le passé, chaque fois que j'ai des langues différentes et les résultats exposés ici.

11. Croatian/Hrvatski:
Ja sam više puta, Google Translate igram. Ista pravila u prošlosti, kad god imam različite jezike, a rezultati prezentirani ovdje.

12. Filipino/Filipino:
Mayroon akong maraming oras, ang Google Isalin ang play. Ang parehong mga tuntunin sa nakalipas, kapag kami ay may iba't-ibang wika, at ang mga resulta iniharap dito.

13. Turkish/Türkçe:
Ben, Google Translate oyun daha zamanımız var. Geçmişte, farklı dil var içinde aynı koşulları ve sonuçları sunuldu.

14. Welsh/Cymraeg:
Yr wyf yn chwarae mwy pan fyddwn wedi Google Translate. Yn y gorffennol, mae ieithoedd gwahanol o fewn yr un amodau a chanlyniadau yn cael eu cyflwyno.

15. Vietnamese/Việt:
Tôi chơi nhiều hơn khi chúng tôi có Google Translate. Trong, ngôn ngữ trong quá khứ khác nhau trong điều kiện tương tự và kết quả được trình bày.

16. "English":
I play more when we have Google Translate. In, the language of the past in different conditions and similar results are presented.

It looks like it's been summarised.

I'm in Canberra now, after a few days in Melbourne. I've installed myself in a cafe, and ordered a hot chocolate only to discover that my book left itself on the floor beside my bed instead of packing itself in my landing pod backpack. Quelle dommage!

Accumulated data

Here's the data so far:

Lattes: 5
Flat Whites: 4
Cap: 1*

Total number: 10 (of which I'll count 9*)

8 of these were consistent with my hypothesis, so the experimental hypothesis seems successful so far.


* I had ordered a latte, but the product given to me was obviously a cappuccino, so I won't include it in the analysed data.

Very slack with coffee

I've just realised that I had another coffee post to upload and forgot all about it. I had a coffee at uni last Tuesday, the day before my last exam. I ordered a latte and the resulting product was exactly as expected. It was delicious and topped with a sensible amount of froth for a latte.

I won't be going to uni over the holidays, so I'll either have to finish my experiment here, or wait until the second semester starts in order to collect more data. I haven't had a chance yet to order a flat white and a latte at the same time, so I'm inclined to continue the experiment. I assume you're all fascinated by it too, so I can image that you'd all be distraught if I ended the experiment here.

Cake

And it's chocolate. It's been ages since I last made a cake, because of uni commitments, so I thought today was a good day to remedy that situation. I like cake and chocolate, so the combination is a logical plate of deliciousness because I'm not one of those weird people who like both chocolate and cake but who dislike chocolate cake. Weirdos.

Kiedy będzie?

Kiedy byłem na dworcu w Katowicach (i byłem tamte dużo razy), myslałem że dworzec Katowicki był najbrzydkiejszy budynek w swięcie, więc kiedy czytałem że Katowice będzie wkrótce mieć nowy dworzec, byłem bardzo szczęśliwy. Ale mój kolega w polsce mi mowił że może to nie będzie tak wkrótce bo to jest wielu fanów obecnego dworca w Katowicach, i oni myslą że dworzec jest zabytek architektury.
Też, myslę jeszcze że Katowice nie jest bardzo piękny i nowy dworzec kolejowy jest bardzo dobry pomyśł.

Jigsaw

Mum bought this at the markets. I think it's proof that she's insane. Also, there's no guarantee that all 1000 pieces are in the box, though considering it was only $1.50, that's not a huge issue.

I'm becoming slack with my coffee updates

I had an exam yesterday afternoon, and because of revision, and a desire to avoid drinking diuretics before an exam, I didn't have coffee yesterday. I did have one on Thursday after posting about Wednesday's coffee, so I should add Thursday's coffee's details to the blog to include them in the current coffee project. Thursday's latte was as expected; delicious and with a good amount of foam on top, but less foam than one would expect from a cappuccino.

Another interesting number is fast approaching

In other news, I can see another milestone (ish) visitor number on the horizon to pay attention to. Visitor number 12345 will be noted because it's a geometric progression. It's not immediately in sight, but there are only 215 views remaining (as of writing this post) until we get there. Exciting!

Yesterday's coffee

I forgot to post about yesterday's coffee. I obtained a flat white from the usual place and its level of foam was closer to that of a latte than a flat white. I'm beginning to think that the real difference is between different baristas rather than between the actual coffee.
I has been suggested to me that I alter the experimental procedure slightly in order to test this subtheory. If the opportunity arises that I go with another person to this coffee place, then one of us should order a flat white and the other a latte, as this would give us a good chance to compare the work provided by one barista.
I had thought of this method before, but I rarely go there with another person. Usually I visit on my way in from the bus, and I don't wish to buy 2 cups of coffee at once when alone.

The coffee's back

I'm at uni again today and as it's a normal weekday, the coffee establishments are open, so I was able to buy a latte this morning. It adds to my theory - the amount of foam was consistant with latte expectations.

No coffee data today

Today is a public holiday in Queensland to celebrate the Queen's birthday, even though her birthday is actually in April. Because of this public holiday, the coffee establishments on campus are closed today, so I can't buy a latte or a flat while and add it to my current coffee data.
Shame, I could do with a warm caffinated beverage right about now. Or lunch. Maybe I'll go and get some lunch soon.

Yes, I'm bored

1. English:
I'm going to have some fun with the translator. I will translate this passage through several different languages and see what the output is when I get back to English.
I'll post each step along the way.

2. Polish/Polski:
Mam zamiar się zabawić z tłumaczem. Przetłumaczę to przejazd przez kilka różnych językach i zobaczyć, co wynik jest, gdy wrócę na angielski.
Ja po każdym etapie pracy.

3. Danish/Dansk:
Jeg har tænkt mig at have lidt sjov med en tolk. Oversæt passagen gennem flere forskellige sprog, og se, hvad resultatet er, når jeg kommer tilbage til engelsk.
Jeg arbejder på alle stadier.

4. Italian/Italiano:
Io vado a divertirmi un po 'con un interprete. Tradurre il passaggio attraverso diverse lingue e vedere che cosa il risultato è quando torno in inglese.
Io lavoro in tutte le fasi.

5. Finnish/Suomi:
Aion pitää hauskaa "kanssa tulkin. Käännä läpiajo eri kieliä ja katso, mitä tulos on, kun saan Englanti.
Olen töissä kaikissa vaiheissa.

6. Greek/Ελληνικά:
Πάω να έχει τη διασκέδαση "με διερμηνέα. Γυρίστε το πέρασμα μέσα από διαφορετικές γλώσσες και να δούμε ποιο είναι το αποτέλεσμα είναι, όταν έχω στην Αγγλία.
Εργάζομαι σε όλα τα στάδια.

7. Croatian/Hrvatski:
Idem se zabaviti "s tumača. Uključite prolaz kroz različite jezike i vidjeti što ishod je kad sam se u Englesku.
Radim u svim fazama.

8. Hungarian/Magyar:
Megyek szórakozik "a tolmács. Kapcsolja be a folyosón át különböző nyelveken, és mi az eredmény, amikor jöttem Angliába.
Én munka minden fázisában.

9. German/Deutsch:
Ich werde Spaß haben "die Dolmetscherin. Um den Gang in die verschiedenen Sprachen schalten, und was ist das Ergebnis, wenn ich nach England kam.
Ich arbeite auf allen Stufen.

10. Romanian/Română:
Voi avea distractiv ", interpret Pentru a activa coridor în diferite limbi,. Şi ceea ce este rezultatul atunci când am venit în Anglia.
Eu lucrez la toate nivelurile.

11. Back to English:
I'll have fun, "performer To activate corridor in different languages. And what is the result when I came to England.
I work at all levels.

Interesting. I don't know where the corridor came from. If you can speak/understand any of the intermediate steps, let me know your opinion of what it says in that language.

Сюжетната линия е на български език

Bu kedi için. Evet, senin ismini çevirdik. Bu dilin bir örnek sana ve tanımak belki anlamak mümkün olacağını varsayabiliriz olacaktınız. Dilbilgisi ve kelime ki zor ama belki kullandım. İstanbul'a baklava, lokum karşılığında istiyorum, ve börek. Elma çayı burada bulabilirsiniz olarak baklava ve lokum, tabii ki, ama zor Brisbane börek bulmak lazımdır.

(I ran that one backwards through the translator and I only understood it because I knew what I'd intended to say.)

Qui fait le chauffage?

Jestem, jeszcze raz, w uniwersytetu bo ja chcę zrobić zmian. Jest bardzo ciepło tutaj, w ten pokoju. Nie wiem dlaczego bo nie był tak ciepło piątek kiedy byłem tutaj. Mam swoja kartka dzisiaj, tak szans!

Aš turiu tam tikrą laiką pertraukos

Manau, kad aš vis priklausomas nuo "Google" išversti. Pažadu, kad tai bus paskutinis, bent jau šį vakarą, o gal tiesiog kol aš tapti nuobodu vėl. Būčiau labai sužavėtas, jei koks nors mano dienoraščio skaitytojai turėjo galimybę nustatyti, kurios vartotos kalbos, šiandien be programinės įrangos ar kitos trečiosios šalies lėšų. Norėčiau būti dar labiau atspausti, jeigu bet kuri iš jų galėjo suprasti visų trijų kalbų be vertimo prietaisas padėti.

Një gjuhë tjetër e pazakontë

Jam i sigurt se unë kurrë nuk kam shkruar asgjë në gjuhën shqipe para, kështu që ndërsa ka një shans shumë të vogla që postin tim te fundit nuk ishte postin tim të parë islandez, unë kam besim në pohuar se ky është postimi im i parë në këtë gjuhë. Shqiptar ka grupe bashkëtingëllore të çuditshme, por kjo nuk ka letra interesante që ju të gjeni në islandeze. Si një shënim anë, ato letra interesante Islandeze ekzistuar një herë në gjuhën angleze, por ata kanë qenë jashtë përdorimit për shumë vjet tani.

Sumir íslensku bragðefni

Ég held ekki ég hef nokkru sinni skrifað á íslensku á blogginu mínu áður, þannig að það er í fyrsta skipti fyrir allt.
Ég hef ekki hugmynd um hvort þetta er skrifað í rétt á íslensku eða ekki því þekking mín málið er í lágmarki og ég er með þýðanda Google.
Íslenska hefur áhugaverð bréf.

Nie mam swoja kartki

Je suis venu à la fac pour que je puisse étudier. Je me trouve dans la bibliothèque parce que j'ai oublié ma porte-monnaie chez-moi et dans ma porte-monnaie reste ma carte d'accès pour gps et ses labos, et parce qu'on est samedi, les portes de gps sont verouillées. Ce n'est pas mal dans la bibliothèque mais je n'ai pas d'argent pour acheter un mars ou un coca. C'est un peu bizarre (même zarbie) pour moi car normalement je ne sors jamais de la maison sans ma porte-monnaie, sauf quand je promene les chiens.
Szkoda.

I have a circle, a triangle and a round.

While wandering around the refec today trying to decide which of their fine products I would consume, I read the slogan on a tshirt being worn by a fellow patron. Obviously someone for whom the concept of fitness is a purely theoretical construct, this shirt proudly declared "I am in shape, 'round' is a shape". I've seen either this shirt or identical shirts before and not given them more than a millisecond's thought, but today was different. I felt something was wrong, and, as always, I was right. There's an error in the shirt's statement, for 'round' is not actually a shape. 'Round' is an adjective, not a noun (in this context, but the noun of round doesn't refer to shapes at all). Sphere, circle, polygon, dodecahedron and oblong are all shapes. Round, spherical, circular, rectangular, and polygonal are all adjectives.
Shirt slogans have no excuse for poor grammar.

Moja Kawa

Today I ordered a flat white as part of my ongoing experiment. The finished product was delicious and completely satisfies my previously mentioned coffee theory. There was only a tiny amount of froth on the top of my coffee.

For those of you who were concerned about my brioche, I ate it last night with a cup of tea rather than risk it being stale this morning. I definitely want to revert to my Parisian habit of having brioche and hot chocolate for breakfast.

Je veux ma brioche

Hier, ma mère m'a acheté une petite brioche et je pensais que je pouvait la manger à la fac ce matin avec mon café. Une bonne idée, n'est-ce pas?
Oui, sauf que j'ai oublié de la prendre quand je suis sorti de la maison ce matin. Donc, j'ai dû boire mon café sans brioche et la brioche reste dans la cuisine. J'espère que ça sera toujours bon à manger demain.
Je sais que mon café quotidien est normalement sans brioche, mais le problème ce matin, c'était que je buvais mon café en sachant que j'avais une brioche qui n'était pas aussi à la table.

Coffee!

Today's coffee post is here for those of you who were waiting with baited breath.
I am wondering, however, if I can truly count this one because I think the barista accidentally made a cap instead of a latte. There's more foam than usual and chocolate powder was dusted on top. Sounds like a cap to me.

More coffee

For those of you who are desperate for news of my daily coffee, I must apologise for the lack of a coffee-post yesterday but I didn't actually drink any the whole day. I did have 2 cups of tea.
Today's flat white was delicious but once again, I can't include it in my current coffee experiment because I'm at home and I made it myself.
In completely unrelated news, I want to learn how to fly a helicopter.

Another coffee

I ordered a flat white this morning from my favourite coffee establishment on campus. The amount of foam on top was more than my recent flat whites, but still slightly less than the lattes. This coffee was in danger of being an outlier in my experiment, but I think the amount of foam was low enough to still claim that it supports my hypothesis.

Yesterday's coffee

I forgot to post yesterday after I bought my morning coffee because I was sidetracked by a conversation about our current assignment.
Anyway, I need to report that I purchased a latte and it did come topped with froth. So far, that's 3 out of 3 that support my hypothesis.

All 3 coffees were created by different baristas, so I shall need more data points to cover the discrepancies that may occur due to this difference.

Lost a shoe?

On my way to the bus this morning, I passed a lone shoe beside the footpath. I assumed that someone must have been carrying it, as you'd surely notice if a shoe fell off while you were walking. On the way home from the bus, I passed the orange boot in the photo and noticed that the first shoe had disappeared. Is there some sort of secret footwear exchange programme going on near the bus stop?

Coffee log

Today's latte was topped with a good amount of froth, thereby supporting my previously-mentioned latte vs flat white hypothesis. 2 data points and counting!

Mr Beans

I previously believed that the take-away lattes and flat whites were the same (taky sam, or la meme chose) but my flat white this morning is distinctly different from the latte that I consumed yesterday. The coffee is the same, oczywiscie, but there is noticeably less froth on top of my flat white. As a true experimentalist, I shall have to significantly increase my sample size while decreasing, as much as possible, other external factors such as differences due to different baristas etc, before coming to any final conclusions, but I have formulated my hypothesis.
Let the experimental fun begin!

Eurovision in Deutschland

Well, Eurovision's over for another year. In 2011, it'll be held in Germany, which is good and bad. Good that Germany won because in spite of the singer's horrible accent, the song wasn't bad. The bad side of it being in Germany next year is that I'd love to attend but I won't be able to get to Europe in May because of study commitments. If only Germany had kept onto this song until next year, or even the year after.
The UK came last, which was well-deserved because their entry was ghastly.

Nigdy nie widzał

Tak. Byłem na fryzjera czwartek i teraz moje włosy są blondynką jeszcze raz. Piątek, jechałem do uniwersytetu i mowiłem z dużo kolegym ale nigdy nie mowił, że moje włosy były na inny kolor.

Mam kolega polski kto mieszka w Anglii teraz. Wczoraj, on wysłał mi linka do strony internetowej, i ja czytałem nowy trudny słow: bezwzględnie. Jak się to wymawia to słowo? Czy to jest trudniejszy niż źdźbło? lub dźdźwonica? Jak polaków mówią po polsku?

12000!

That's an exclamation mark following the number in the title, not a factorial sign. I definitely haven't had 12000! people visiting my site, only 12000.


Anyway, the 12000th visitor to my blog seems to be a German, or at least someone in Germany. This person's ISP is based in a place called Kirchhain, Hessen. The computer used was a Mac, using MacOSX and Safari 1.3.
In this instance, there's a chance that the person wasn't an entirely random reader, as this visitor came to my blog via a link from Nat's. So, Nat, who do you know in Germany?
It was 2:10:24am on the 29th of May when this person visited my blog, in their local timezone (GMT+1), so it would have been 11:10:24am on the 29th here (in my timezone).

Photographic evidence

Here's photographic proof of the deposit the bird made on my backpack.

Eurovision!

The spectacular festival of tacky and hilarious attempts at music that people in Europe (except the UK) take seriously is on this weekend! The first semi-final is being televised tonight, the second tomorrow night and then the final on Sunday night. Of course I'm going to watch all three nights - it's too 'special' to miss.

Damn bird!

At some point on my walk from the bus to uni, or perhaps between the bus stop and home on Wednesday, a flying creature decided to drop something decidedly unpleasant in my general direction. The object landed on my backpack instead of on me, which is definitely better than on my head, but still not a desirable outcome. Damn bird.
Dzisiaj, lub sroda, ptak robil kupa blisko do mnie, wiec, teraz moja torebka ma kupa ptaka.
Aujourd'hui, ou mercredi, un oiseau a décidé de faire un caca au dessus de moi. J'ai eu un petit peu de chance parce que la merde a arrivé sur mon sac à dos. Quand meme, c'est ennervant.

Dzisiaj.

Dzisiaj, byłem na fryzjera. Moję włosy są teraz blondynką jeszcze raz. Chciałem jechać do fryzjera bo moje włosy były długi.
Nie byłem w uniwersytetu bo nie miałem lekcji. Miałem lekcja ostatny tydzien ale profesor zakonczył tematów. Jutro, muszę tam jechać.

Game

There's a football game on tonight, the first of a trilogy. It happens annually, every year. It seems to be regarded as an important event by people from Queensland and New South Wales and essentially ignored by everyone else. Even though I'm from one of those states, I have an amazing amount of apathy for the outcome.
I can overhear the commentators and I really think the only way to listen to them without your brain turning to mush is the press the 'mute' button.
I have never been able to understand how people manage to get so excited about watching a bunch of guys run around grabbing each other.
On a similar note, why do people feel that yelling at the television in any way alters the outcome of the game? Really, the players can't hear you, and even if they could, I doubt hearing advice like 'run run!' would actually make the player think 'oh, good idea, thank, I'd never have thought of that.' while already running towards the magic piece of grass at the end of the paddock.

Ktora godzina?

It's almost half nine here. Some people would say nine thirty, others half past nine. I initially didn't like the 'half nine' method when I first encountered it in England, but I grew accustomed to it and now I find it more convenient, and more efficient, than the other options. Fewer syllables.

Fryzjer gratis

I'm just after being accosted outside the uni hair salon by an employee or perhaps manager of the salon. She is apparently training a new hair dresser to do men's cuts, so offered me a free cut. I declined the offer, partially because I don't have enough time right now to do it. Walking away though, I started to wonder if she asks every male wandering past or if she only chooses those who need a cut. Does my hair look like it needs some attention?

Ein Schtamp?

I had coffee yesterday, as usual from my usual place, and I've just noticed that I must have forgotten to get a stamp on my card (buy 8 get one free).
How annoying.

New hard drive

I've spent most of my day installing a new hard drive in a laptop* computer. The physical installation was quick and easy but re-installing the software is time-consuming and tedious. This new hd had better last a while because this really isn't something I want to do again soon.

* technically it's a notebook computer but I can call it a laptop because I'm not stupid enough to burn my genitals with it.

Free coffee

There's a barista competition on at uni today, so for the simple task of rating a coffee, we get a flat white for free. I've got a break and I like coffee, so I'm writing this in the queue. I intend to perform my civic duty and take part in this optional coffee jury.

Eurovision

Is going to be upon us soon!
How many toilet-roll dollies will there be this year?
Who'll be the worst act?
How many artificial wind machines will they need?
Who can squash the highest number of costumes changes into their allotted 3 minutes?
Who'll win the WTF award?

May the poppiest, catchiest, most annoying ear-worm win!

It must be Tuesday again

I'm sitting outside the lecture theatre listening to music in German and reading a book in French. I think my head will be linguistically confused before long. It's probably a good thing that I can't understand much of the German lyrics. Hast du etwas zeit fur Mich...

Exams

The draft exam timetable has been released for semester 1. I checked it with a little trepidation given my exam timetables for the previous 2 semesters but I was pleasantly surprised to discover that my 2 exams this semester would not be held on successive days. In fact, I have 5 days between them. It sounds positively luxurious.

Alpine Hot Choc

I'm sitting at uni once again waiting for a class to start. This upcoming lecture starts at 4pm, which I find a bit late in the day considering my last class today finished at 11am. Anyway, the point of this post isn't to rant about my timetable but to comment on the beverage that I'm drinking. Alpine hot choc, which is Mr Beans way of referring to a white hot chocolate. It's delicious and it's been such a long time since I last had one because I usually feel the need for something caffeinated when I order a hot beverage. It also contains a marshmallow.

Update

He's in a really groovy bit right now, and his feet have joined in.

I like coffee*

I'm at uni, drinking coffee and listening to music on my mp3 player while waiting for a lecture to start. There's a guy sitting near me who's reading and also listening to his mp3 player. He seems to be slightly dancing or moving his head and occasionally his upper body in time with the music that I can't hear. I wonder if he's aware that he's doing it or if it's a subconscious action, and I'm also curious as to what he's listening to. It's evident that some songs or sections have more of an effect that others, and his mini-dancing isn't in time with the music currently playing on my player.

* Yes, I'm aware that the title doesn't have much to do with the content of this post but it's true, I like coffee.

A joke?

The music has stopped, temporarily, I suspect, and now I can hear someone talking to the crowd. I can't understand a word of it as my Hindi* isn't exactly fluent, something was definitely amusing, judging by the crowd's reaction and his own laughter. Now they're cheering. It could be exciting.

* I'm guessing the language, and while it sounds like Hindi, it could be something else. Punjabi perhaps?

Sounds like bollywood

I've been listening to Indian music all day. Not really by choice though, as there seems to be some sort of Indian festival on at the Mt Gravatt showgrounds. The music isn't bad, but I've been hearing it for quite a number of hours now and it's starting to sound rather repetitive and I'm really starting to get over it.

Bloody possum

I'm a little bit tired this morning because the dogs started barking and growling just after midnight last night while I was trying to sleep. They kept it up, on and off between instructions to shut up, for about half an hour. The cause of their barking was a possum that had decided to climb through the large tree in the front yard, directly outside the bedroom window. Eventually the possum scampered off along the power cables and order was restored allowing me to get back to sleep but I'm in dire need of coffee right now. Thankfully, there's a decent choice of locations on campus to find coffee.

Annoyingly early today.

My Thursday timetable is a bit annoying to begin with. I have one class at 10am and then nothing until 4pm. This is, in theory, a good chance to get assignments done, but Thursday also seems to be the busiest day for the computer rooms with all of them booked out for classes most of the day. Today has decided to be extra annoying. My tutor didn't turn up for the first class, effectively meaning that I arrived at uni at 9.30am for a 4pm class. Unfashionably early perhaps?

Exam's done

I've just walked out of the exam room and I'm confident that I've at least passed the test, and hopefully scored a few more points too. One strange point was that the note about the exam being 'open-book' actually meant that it wasn't open-book. It was just a typo in the email that the class was sent about the exam. As it turned out, I think having access to notes would have just bogged me down anyway.

Impending exam

I have an exam in about 45 mins. It's only worth 10% and while it might be difficult to do extremely well on it, I'm fairly confident that I'll at least pass the test. The subject has a requirement that you need to achieve a non-zero score on all assessment pieces in order to pass the subject. I doubt it'll be difficult to do that in this case as it's an open-book exam with 100 questions, 80 of which are true/false statements, so surely I'll get at least one of them correct. I had the first of our 3 practical tests for this subject, with each worth about 8% and I scored 100% for this prac test. It wasn't at all difficult.

Food in the library?

I remember back when there were signs all over the libraries at uni prohibiting all forms of food and drink in the library, and when the same libraries reluctantly agreed to allow bottled water only. Now, as I'm currently, right now, at this moment* studying in one of the uni's libraries, I can see a sign that says cold food and covered drinks are permitted, with examples and pictures to show you want you may consume in this building: sandwiches, sushi, cake, and covered drink all have big green ticks next to them while burger and chips, pizza, noodles, and open drink are given big red crosses. When did this happen? Is it only a matter of time before a cafe installs itself in here? I feel like purchasing some food just to experience the novelty of eating in a library.

Free Coffee

I'm just after getting a free coffee from Mr Beans because I had a sufficient number of stamps on my loyalty card. I like free coffees, and while the effect is probably only psychological, I think the free ones taste just a little better. The paid ones are still good, of course, otherwise I wouldn't endure them simply for the sake of an occasional freebie.

Barbarella

I have now seen Barbarella, a classic film from the 70's. It's definitely in the category of so-bad-it's-good. It was entertaining and I'm glad I've seen it. Everyone should watch it.

Il fait ce qu'il fait

Quand je me suis reveillé ce matin à 7h, il faisait froid, mais maitenant je me trouve à la fac, il est 9h20 et il fait chaud. Je me demande si je suis à Melbourne, parce que ca arrive souvent là-bas.
Il me reste 35 minutes avant que je doive aller au cours, donc je peux boire un café de m. Beans.

Comments

I've had to turn comment moderation on for this blog because I've had to delete some pointless or useless comments recently, including two left this morning by 'anonymous'. This just means that comments won't show up until I've approved them. I will only delete comments that are spam, or offensive, which is exactly how I've been operating recently except that now I'll be deleting them in advance rather than after they're posted.

Laird Sean?

I know it's an old thing and they've been around for a while, but I think I'd like to get myself a Scottish Lairdship.
I could be Laird Sean of Lochaber. And for only 30 GBP.
What do you think? Should I get one?

'Tis Brillig

I've been thinking about the Jabberwocky recently, due to having recently seen the new Alice in Wonderland film, which includes a Jabberwocky and a scene in which the Mad Hatter recites the first verse of the poem.
It's a verse that I know well, though the pronunciation of it has always been a bit iffy. Take, for example, "gyre and gimble"; I'm certain that they should be alliterative, and therefore either both hard g's or both soft g's. Together, they conjure up the idea of movement, in my opinion, and 'gyre' seems like it should come from the same basic root as words like "gyrate" and "gyroscope", which suggests that the g should be soft. According to Wikipedia, Lewis Carroll once worte that it should be a hard g in both cases, and while his opinion on the matter is an important one, is it possible that he was wrong? I feel that the poem flows and sounds better if one uses soft g's.
On the other hand, "gimble" is apparently related to "gimlet", a small hand-tool for drilling holes, which is pronounced with a hard g.
Personally, I'd prefer to pronounce gyre with a soft g and gimble with a hard g, rather than use the hard g versions of both words in spoite of the loss of alliteration.

(By the way, it is currently brillig, at least at the time of posting this.)

Toe update

Sometime ago I wrote about the injuries my foot sustained in the course of walking the dogs on the beach at Sunshine and Sunrise Beaches.
The first injury has all but cleared up and returned to normal, but the second injury still has some work to do.
I injured the nail, which is the sort of thing that does take some time to heal. At the weekend, I noticed that the nail had become very loose, to the point of hanging by little more than the gravitational attraction between the nail and my toe. I've kept the nail there with the help of band-aids acting as duct tape to hold the nail in place in order to protect the ultra-sensitive flesh underneath.
I hope a new nail grows quickly.

It's been a while since I last posted anything because I tend to forget to write when I have a decent internet connection - hence why I posted a lot when I was up at Noosa.
So, what's happened recently? Uni's gone back for the semester, and I've started tutoring again. I like tutoring at uni, but why do I always seem to get tutorials in the worst building on campus; Hartley-Teakle? Other tutors get allocated sensible rooms in the more civilised area of the uni, like James Foots, Frank White, or even Hawkin. But, for the rest of the semester, I'll be in HT, in a room devoid of air-con. Merde.

House of Wax

I watched house of wax last night. Not the recent version with Paris Hilton, but the original version, made some time ago, in the past. The storyline was significantly different, though there were parts in the newer version that were references to the original. The acting wasn't wonderful, and a few things were unrealistic, but I've seen it now.

I've just watched 'House of Wax'. It was a horror film, and I usually don't like horror films, but this one was worth it for the deaths. It definitely wasn't worth watching for the dialogue, which was utterly appalling. I can't say I'm surprised that it wasn't up for any oscars.

Jestem chory

I went to the doctor this morning with a flu. I knew it was probably just a common flu, but wanted the doc to check, just in case. He wrote me a script for antibiotics, in case it gets worse, while saying that they'd useless against what I've got. I felt a bit like he was prescribing me some placebos.
In the meantime, I hope it doesn't get any worse because my throat's a bit sore from coughing.

11,111

Visitor number 11,111 has been to my blog. There's a chance that this visitor was a regular, or at least semi-regular, reader because he or she came to my blog directly, rather than following a link from a google search, which suggests that this reader knew my blog's address.
S/He was an Australian, and the ISP is apparently based in NSW, but that doesn't really mean much because often people from Brisbane appear as though they're in Alice Springs, or Melbournians come through Adelaide, etc.
So, who was it?
Someone with and unknown domain name, WinXP, IE7, on the 10th of February at 9:50:05am. I'm not sure which timezone that's using, so you could add or subtract an hour depending on how it's using daylight savings if you think it could have been you.
Anyone feel like making a claim?

Je n'aime pas boire des chaussettes

J'ai bu le plus mauvais café du monde, il y a 2 jours. Je pensais que je devais boire au moins 50% du café parce que la vielle serveuse était très gentille et elle avait un grand sourire, donc je ne voulais pas la faire triste. Je pense que le problème était la marque du café, parce que je ne pense pas qu'on ait brulé le lait, le café avait assez chaud, donc je crois que ça n'était pas la faute de la serveuse.
Même après avoir ajouté 4 sachets de sucre, le goût me rappellait des chaussettes muettes.

Poll and Profile

The poll has closed and the results are in: 50% of the two votes received want the blackout screen removed and the other 50% like chocolate. 0% would like to see the blackout screen remain.

I've also updated my profile to reflect changes in my life that occurred almost 1 year ago. Yes, I've finally changed my location. I'm no longer in Paris.

Visitor 11,000

It seems visitor number 11,000 was just another random who came to my blog via a google search for "witty comment"

Unfortunately not a regular reader. Oh well, better luck next time... there's always number 12,000 coming up!
Or even being number 11,111 would be cool, and that number's not too far off.

Blackout Screen

Technically, the blackout protest week has ended, so I should remove the protest screen from my blog, but I kind of like it. What do you think, my faithful readers?
Should it stay or should it go?

There's a poll on the right-hand side of my blog where you can vote!
Exciting!
It's like a democracy, except your vote might actually count this time!

Allergies

I spent a week allergy-free at the coast, but now I've only been in Brisbane for 2 days and my allergies are going haywire. Maybe I'm actually just allergic to Brisbane and not allergic to Australia in general, as I previously thought. Anti-histamines are my friends again.

Another green milk!

I've been drinking a lot of green milk lately. This isn't a bad thing.

Home and internet quota

I'm back home now after my week at the beach with the dogs.
I got home last night ready to quelle the withdrawal symptoms I was experiencing from lack of real internet only to find it had slowed to a snail's pace here at home because someone had downloaded a LOT during my week's absence. Gah!
At least I only have to wait until tomorrow, but it's still very irritating.

Il pleut en français aussi

Il pleut. Il pleut comme si on a renversé des piscines, et il y a beaucoup de vent: il pleut presque horizontalement. Il y a un peu de tonnère qui a fait peur à une de mes chiennes. On était à la plage quand il a commencé à pleuvoir* mais on est rentré avant la renversement des piscines, heureusement.
J'aime les tempetes ici, mais seulement quand je me trouve à l'interieur de l'appartement.

* ou pleurer? J'ai oublié.

Wet walk

We took the dogs for an earlier walk today because it looked like rain. We were on our way home when it started spitting and by the time we got back, we were all drenched, and now I'm showered and dry, sitting on the lounge looking out at a pretty decent storm. I'm glad we made it home before it started bucketting down. We get rather impressive storms up here, being all coastal and sub-tropical. There's a little bit of lightening and thunder, so it's nice to be off the beach and away from it, and Lucy hates thunder.

My toe again

I hurt my toe again while clambering over some rocks with the dogs who were following a really interesting scent. The dogs are fine but my little toe is a bit bloody, the same toe as my first injury. I really must take a photo of it in its current state.

Another one hochgeladen

Ihr Post "11000" wurde erfolgreich in Ihr Blog lettherebeblog.blogs... hochgeladen.

11000

According to the statistics meter, visitor number 11000 is fast approaching. Hopefully this arbitrary round number will be a known person rather than a random who'll never know.

My toe

My toe, the one that got caught in an extender-lead a few days ago, is still sore and hasn't healed at all. The wound is still open, and it seeps a little. I've been putting anti-septic powder on it, and that dries it up a bit and leaves it a rather disgusting colour, but it doesn't appear to have sped up the healing process. I should take a photo of it.

Australia Day

Happy Australia Day* to those in Australia, it's a public holiday so definitely worth observing.
I'm not celebrating in the traditional way, as I don't have a radio up here, aside from in the car or my mp3 player, so I can't listen to Triple J's hottest 100.

In other news, I was bitten by a bull ant yesterday. It was an unprovoked attack and, I suspect, not premeditated. The ant was such a bully. I say 'was' because the ant is definitely an insect of the past.

* I know it is also known as Invasion Day, but it seems odd to wish people a happy one of those. The two words, happy and invasion, seem a bit incongruous together.

Emails?

I know that I'm on holidays and therefore slightly out of regular internet access, but the number of email in my inbox has dwindled to basically zero - even the regular almost-spam emails haven't been coming through. Strange.
In other news, my battery is almost flat. I shall have to take drastic action and charge it.

Dutch, I think

Another blog notification came through in a random language:
Voltooid! Je More on ye... bericht staat op je bloglettherebeblog.blogs....

Bbq, beach and sunburn

I went to Noosaville for a bbq along the river today, followed by a swim at the beach with J and E. It was a great day, except that parts of my legs ended up a little sunburnt and now they're slightly tender. My legs aren't really enjoying the holiday up here, as they seem to be collecting injuries and discomfort. I hope they stop collecting now, as the current collection is more than sufficient.

Blackout screen

I like my internet filter blackout screen. I'm glad all my regular readers appreciate it.

More on yesterday's walk

I forgot to mention in yesterday's post about the walk that I sustained two foot injuries due to beagles: one on my right foot from Lucy's paw/claws, and one on my right foot from Molly's lead getting tangled just as she tried to bolt after something. The latter was, and still is, the most painful, but neither injury was intentional.

À la plage

Je suis à la plâge. Il y a 1 heure, je suis rentré après une promène sur la plâge avec mes chiens, qui aiment bien la plâge, et qui étaient très content de s'y trouver, et maintenant elles sont fatiguées. Elles avaient assez d'energie pour manger leurs ailes de poulet, bien sur.

I'm at the beach. An hour ago, I returned from a walk on the beach with my dogs, who really like the beach, and who were very happy to find themselves there, and they're now very tired. They had enough energy to eat their chicken wings of course.

Lait Vert

I'm drinking green milk again. It's delicious, and I know you're all jealous.

Blackout Week coming soon

As you may have noticed, I've added the blackout protest code thingo to my blog. I know the readership of this blog isn't particularly large and none of the regular readers would ever be insane enough to support the Australian government's stupid idea of implementing an internet filter, but I'd still like to show my support.

You can find more information here if you haven't already found that page from the black info screen that came up when you loaded this blog.

It's a bit early for the protest week at this stage, but I'll be away for the start of the week, and while I'll still post an occasional update on what I'm doing or where I am, I won't have enough internet access to play around with formatting and html code.

Damn sinuses

I'm currently suffering from a sinus and/or hayfever attack. I've taken an anti-histamine tablet but it hasn't yet taken effect, so my nasal passage is trying to convince me that it's actually a waterfall.
Damn allergies. Another reason to return to Europe: I don't seem to be allergic to any plants, pollens, or flowers over there.

Mes Annales du Disque-Monde sont arrivées

La Poste m'a envoyé un colis qui est arrivé aujourd'hui, que j'avais commandé il y a une semaine. Le colis est allé de France en Australie dans une seule semaine. Pas mal, pas mal du tout.

Ici, c'est ce que j'ai acheté:


(ou en anglais, si tu le préfères: La Poste sent me a package which arrived today, that I'd ordered a week ago. It only took 1 week for the package to come to Australia from France. Not bad, not bad at all.)

I can't be bothered thinking of a title for this post

I'm watching tv in my room at the moment because I'm watching SBS and due to the time zone in the southern states at the moment, the tv shows come through an hour earlier when they're transmitted through the cable tv system. This means that if I miss the hour early start, I can watch it at the normal time on my tv with my digital set-top box. The downside of doing this is that when there aren't many others home, like this evening, I feel guilty because I know that there are two beagles lying on the floor just outside my door, waiting for me to reappear through the door.
Before you ask, the dogs aren't allowed in my room because of my slight dog allergy issues and the fact that I sleep in this room and I'd like to be able to breath while sleeping.

Fin

C'est le week end! Je n'ai pas besoin de travailler demain.
J'ai bossé aujourd'hui et c'était le dernier jour de la cours que j'ai enseigné pendant les 4 dernières semaines. Les élèves étaient assez bien, mais quand même, je suis content de l'avoir fini parce que c'était fatigant.

My post has been hochgeladen?

Normally when I post a blog to this site from my phone I get a reply saying something like "Your post [title] has been uploaded successfully" or words to that effect. I sent an email while on the bus this morning, my last post, and this is the reply that was sent to me:

Ihr Post "Damn buses" wurde erfolgreich in Ihr Blog lettherebeblog.blogs... hochgeladen.

I'm surprised that it came in German - I'm quite certain that I've never chosen German as a language on any website, considering my lack of knowledge of Hochdeutsch (though I'm fluent in my own dialect, Seandeutsch).

Damn buses

I think it's ridiculous that I had to stand at a bus stop for 15 minutes waiting for a bus that ended up being 13 minutes late, in peak hour. The service from Brisbane's public transport system is crap, and they somehow think the recent fare increase is justified.
Okay, that's my rant out of the way.

Delicious

I don't see these often, but green milk is delicious!

Defriended

According to my facebook page this evening, I have 360 friends. This morning, I had 362, so obviously 2 people have defriended* me (only 2, as I haven't had any new friendings of late). The annoying thing about this is that I can't work out who the newly ex-friends are. Evidently they're not people with whom I have a great deal of contact as I'd notice if one of them were missing. They're also not one of the 2 or 3 people I'm considering defriending myself, which is a shame as it would have saved me having to do it. I don't actually care that this has happened except that it has made me curious and therefore I would like to know.
I'll possibly notice it in time when someone who used to be a friend comments on another friend's photo or status and it tells me how many friends we have in common, which is how I discovered the identities of other people who had defriended me at some point in the past.
Well, time now for bed. The question of the identities of these ex-friends definitely isn't worth losing any sleep over.

* I realise that unfriend it the word that has made it into one of the more respected dictionaries but I prefer defriend.

Yes, I'm bored

I'm waiting for another staff member to finish up talking to my students about an admin issue, which is important. In the meantime, however, I've essentially got nothing much to do aside from wait until she's finished, or until lunchtime comes. I'm starting to suspect the latter will come first.

Another test

This is a test to see if i can send pictures from my mobile to my blog. It's a photo of the carpet and lifts at work.

Test

Let's see if this works... This post should appear on my blog.

3

Three! Three new posts in one evening! Ha ha ha ha ha ha*.


* to be read in the voice of the Count from Sesame Street.

Mobile blogging

I attempted to write a blog post on my mobile phone to see how easy it would be but I was unfortunately unsuccessful. The phone browser closed itself when I tried to log in. I don't know what the problem is but my phone browser has been closing itself more often lately than when I first got the phone. Or it could just be my imagination.
Either way, I'll try again to post from my phone, just for the novelty value, but when it's not so late and I'm not so tired.

That buzz

I had barely started to commence the preparations required in order to start shaving when I heard a horrible noise in the bathroom. The unmistakable buzzing sound that can only mean one thing: Mosquito. I decided that I had to hunt down and destroy this foul creature because I could get on with things because it would annoy me, probably try to steal my blood, and continue making its special buzz, which was amplified by the tiles in the bathroom. I started following the sound as it whizzed past my head, no doubt on its way to feast on my delicious blood. On the second pass, I turned around to face the sound, and hopefully the miniature vampire itself, when the buzzing instantly stopped. I thought, from the sound of the buzz before it was abruptly halted, that the mozzie must be rather close to me, or on my skin somewhere; landing on me would have accounted for the sudden break in the sound. I looked in the mirror to try and find it, only to spot it, not quite on my face but very very near. The stupid creature had become stuck in the shaving foam that I had recently applied. It was then a simple matter of picking it up, killing it, and sending it on its way to a watery grave.

Trois Soeurcières

Je viens de finir à lire Trois Soeurcières (Des Annales Du Disque-Monde)*, qui était originalement écrit en anglais par Terry Pratchett et traduit en français par Patrick Couton, qui doit être un bon traducteur parce qu'il a obtenu un prix pour ses traductions des annales du disque-monde. J'avait déjà lu la version anglaise il y a quelques ans avant commencer à lire la version française, donc je connaissais assez bien l'histoire pour savoir si j'ai bien compris le sens en français et la version anglaise appartient à moi aussi, donc je pouvais, de temps en temps, la lire pour verifier si j'avais raison. En anglais, c'était la deuxième histoire des annales du Disque-Monde que j'ai lu, la première c'était Mortimer. Je suis content que c'était une bonne traduction parce qu'on m'a dit que les traductions en allemand ne sont pas au même niveau.
Et maitenant, il faut que je décide quelle histoire sera la prochaine.


* C'est Wyrd Sisters (a Discworld Novel) en anglais.

Yes, I'm still here and Browsers

I know it's been ages since my last post, but I've been either busy or not near an internet connection.
My last post was last year! Egads!
So, Happy New Year to all.

I don't really have much of a reason to write other than a prompt from a friend reminding me that my blog still existed and therefore I should consider publishing something.

In my quest to find a browser that I like, I've tried Mozilla Firefox, Opera and Google Chrome, and at the moment I'm using Chrome. I think I'll stick with it for a while because as yet I've only discovered one thing that it has issues with, and that issue, when it pops up, is usually easily resolved. I liked the layout of Opera though, and in some ways it's a shame that Opera wasn't suitable for a lot of things, especially facebook pages and google wave. Before this experiment with different browsers, I was a happy Firefox user, but over time, it seemed to show more and more problems and develop issues with more pages.