Category: Life and Associated Annoyances

Wokka Wokka

Halloween, Cruises and Golf

It was Halloween last week wasn’t it? I didn’t do anything, or at least didn’t do anything Halloweeny. I actually went up to the Maze in Bullsbrook with Fabes and Paula and (among other things) played mini-golf (I came last :)). There are photos up on my Flickr stream if anyone’s interested (not of the golf though).

We actually did a fair bit of other stuff as well.  We had lunch at an excellent kebab place, looked at a whole lot of Fabe’s photos from his trip to Switzerland, and had dinner at the newly opened Kingsway Tavern. I had the garlic prawns which were astonishingly good. Outstandingly good in fact. I think I could live on that sauce.

Then I got stuck at Stirling railway station on the way home, having got off the train with the expectation that the circle route buses would still be running – which they weren’t, meaning I had to wait half an hour for the next train. While waiting I did help out a couple of Danish tourists though, who borrowed my phone to call a taxi. They wanted to pay me, but I refused, so instead they made me promise to visit the Roskilde festival.

Did I mention that I’m going on a cruise? I’ve booked for a 14 night (I think it’s 14 night… I’ll have to check) cruise to New Zealand early in 2012, on the basis that I should at least try and have some fun before the world ends *grin*. I’ll be travelling steerage in the bowels of the Diamond Princess from Sydney to Auckland, taking in Melbourne, Hobart, the South Island and points in between. Should be a laugh. I’ll book in some time to do some sight seeing at both ends.

Finally, I’ve made another update to the FreakAngels Google Earth map. Enjoy!

Coinage

Silver coin allergy – am I a werewolf?

(Note: As will become clear in this post I am perfectly aware that Australian ‘silver’ coins contain absolutely no silver, instead being made of a cupronickle alloy. I shall nonetheless refer to them as such, as is standard colloquial usage…)

Over the last week or so I’ve started on my yearly change clean out.This is where I gather up all the silver coins I’ve been hoarding, sort and count them and run them down to the bank. Yesterday I deposited $150 in fifty cent pieces, today I’ve sorted a further $100 in fifties and twenties, and there’s still at least another $100 in tens and fives to go.

“How do I accumulate so much change?” you may well ask. Well it comes down to one of my many strange habits, that of never actually spending any silver. Every morning before heading out into the world I grab a handful of notes I judge sufficient to cover any expenses  I may run into, and throw in a few one and two dollar coins as backup (I do not carry a wallet, another of my strange habits). At the end of the day I empty my pockets of all cash, before repeating the process the following morning.

The quick witted reader will realise that this system will inevitably bring in silver coins while never taking them out, with the result that after a year or so I have several hundred dollars in silver change clogging up the place. So I put some time aside to gather it all together (it ends up in various places around the apartment), count, sort and deposit it, giving my bank account a nice jab in the arm in the process.

The down side of this system (apart from having piles of change all around the place, and the lost ‘opportunity cost’ of not earning interest on it all) is that I have to handle all the coins. And that triggers my own unique variation of nickle allery.

The standard symptom of nickle allergy is contact dermatitis – an itchy or even blistering rash where the metal has touched the skin. I don’t get this. I can handle nickle all day without my skin so much as turning even a slight shade of red. What I do get however is a burning sensation in my finger tips, a headache, and nausea, which means I have to limit my sorting to about ten minutes at a time, several hours apart.

Or I suppose I could use gloves. But then another one of my weird habits is a severe dislike of wearing gloves. You can see how doubly screwed I am here 😀

So I shall continue my coin sorting for the next few weeks, and end up a little the richer, and a little the sicker for it.

Oo! The mail is here!

Boxes boxes boxes!

In the last few days I have taken delivery of two packets of mixed Lego, three boxes of books from Amazon including one (for some reason) in a gigantic US mail bag, a box of three flamingo stools (stools that you sit on), a big wad of cruise brochures and a collectors edition of Fallout: New Vegas.

If it wasn’t for the fact that this place always looks like an explosion in a post office, I’d say it looks like an explosion in a post office.

Down at the Docks

Children are occasionally good for amusement I suppose

I was down at Fremantle this afternoon, and while wandering around the harbour noticed that Sea Shepherd’s Steve Irwin was in town. I was taking a photo when a family with a couple of small children wandered up behind me, and I heard the following exchange.

Small Child 1: Look! That’s Bindi’s Dad’s boat!
Small Child 2 (excited): Is he on it?
Small Child 1 (with relish): No! He’s dead!

Ah kids!

Burgers

Caught up with Rebecca after work yesterday. We ended up at the new branch of burger joint Grill’d at Subiaco railway station.

Now, for a while the place for burgers in Subi has been Jus Burgers. Well I’m sorry to say it, but as far as I’m concerned Grill’d has blown them out of the water. I had the mustard and pickle burger on a panini bun and it was one of the best things I’ve ever put in my mouth. And who knew you could make chips with rosemary? (Shepherd Book was right!)

After Grill’d we went to Chocolateria San Churro for desert. I’ve never tried churros before – I can see why they’re so popular, although I wouldn’t want to eat them regularly (I’d probably keel over dead from the sugar rush).

Um yeah. Nothing else to say really.

Ow! My Brain!

Super-Pump of Doom

Woke up this morning feeling like half my brain was missing (is this how the average IQ people feel all the time!? How can they stand it!?). This may have something to so with pushing my bike for 7 km through Midland in the blazing (well, warm anyway) sun yesterday looking for a cycle shop after Ryan insisted on pumping up my tyres with his fancy super-pump of doom, causing the rear one to explode.

(To be fair it wasn’t his fault. The jokers at the bike shop put the tube in at a funny angle the last time I got it replaced, resulting in the valve pressing against the rim in such a way that when it was properly inflated, it ruptured.)

Needless to say, it being Sunday and Midland, not one of the cycle shops we walked to was open, and my plans for visiting various Midland sites for Abandoned in Perth were pretty much scuppered.

Oh well, another weekend then.

Collingwood won the Grand Final. Boo, I suppose.

A Played Out Picture Show

There’s nothing more boring than reading about other people’s dreams.

As is fairly normal when sleeping I had a dream last night. It was the usual incoherent mess that my dreams generally are, involving a 25th birthday party, cows, a storm, a magic book, people possessed by the spirits of ancient wizards and several episodes of Doctor Who. But it also featured a song.

In context of the dream it was by Sparklehorse, but on waking with it still in my memory it sounded a lot more like Everclear. I was able to remember one verse of it, which goes as follows…

Is it a forest in a wood? A burnt out bedroom mansion?
Is it a played out picture show? Is it a happy ending?

I have no idea what that could possibly mean, but it’s easily as good as anything Nik Kershaw ever wrote 😉

Stitch Cloud and Cleanse Feather

Nocturnal ramblings

The phrase “Stitch Cloud and Cleanse Feather” popped into my head as I was falling asleep last night. I have absolutely no idea what it means (well, a cleanse feather could be some kind of feather that cleans things I suppose) but I like the way it sounds.

You see, now it’s quick and easy for me to blog things you’re going to get a whole mess of pointless Twitter-like entries like this…

Dawn of a New Era

We are go for launch!

I’ve been hinting a bit lately that change is coming to the Wyrmlog. Well today it’s arrived!

If you’re reading this on the old, iNews powered Wyrmlog (the one that’s all green) it’s the last post you’ll ever see here. Maintaining a custom blogging application may have given me almost 10 years of smug independence, but it’s become increasingly annoying as time has worn on. Added to that is the fact that I’ve never had the time to set up a robust commenting system, which in this Web 2.0, wired, user generated content world made the Wyrmlog even more irrelevant that it would otherwise undoubtedly be. So a few weeks back I decided to damn it all to hell and set up a spiffy, new, open source WordPress blog – the Wyrmlog 2.0!

(Actually it’s probably about 6.8 with all the revisions the old one went through, but hey, who’s counting?)

The old Wyrmlog will be maintained in it’s current location, although no updates after this one will be made.

So where can you taste the literary rainbow that is the new Wyrmlog? Here!

wyrmlog.wyrmworld.com

Now, the new Wyrmlog is still being set up. All the content (9 years worth! I’ve been spewing out this crap for 9 years?!) has been ported across but some of it (particularly the old stuff) is looking a bit dodgy. I’ve also got to get it all sorted properly into categories. The skin also needs a complete revision (what’s with that tree?) so don’t worry about the messed up menus up the top. But hey, it makes blogging a lot easier for me, and it has comments! Yes! Comments! Wow!

So yeah, it’s the start of a new era. Or something. Enjoy my children!!

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