Sydney life

You can do it

I love Arnie's "You can do it!, whenever I can, I shout it out (in a bad Arnie voice): "Come on, you can doo it!"

You Can Do It Sale

Winter in Tasmania (a 5 day trip)

Last long weekend (we made it a 5 day weekend :), we went down to Tasmania, not sure what to expect exactly. We didn’t have any real plans, only thing we planned was a cabin at the Cradle Mountain Lodge, and four consecutive nights in Hobart (which I booked before the cabin, which meant we were going to forfeit one night there), making Hobart our hub to explore the island.

We got up early Saturday morning (3:30 am) to fly with Virgin Blue to Hobart (passing through Melbourne). We arrived in Hobart around 10:15, and picked up our rental car from EuropCar. There was a queue because their computer system was down (tip ctrl+alt+delete :), so there was a bit of a wait. Not a happy start to our holiday. As expected, it was raining in Hobart, and from the forecast, it looked to be rain for five days...

Read on at halans.com. (there are 5 parts...)
Photo set on flickr.com.

E-toll pass rip off

We don't have a car, so whenever we want to go somewhere where it's hard to get to with public transport, we rent a car. I then register for an E-Toll pass on the RTA site to handle any toll roads, which is a lot easier then trying to avoid them. So, again, a couple of weeks ago, we rented a car, got an e-tag, and then get the invoice. You pay extra for the photo matching, no sweat. Now this week we got another invoice from Connector Motorways, for using the Lane Cove Tunnel. I immediately thought I already had paid for it through my RTA E-Toll pass invoice. But it turns out that the particular transit through the tunnel wasn't on that invoice. It's Connector Motorways (which favours RoamExpress over RTA) that should have let RTA know that I passed there again for that instance (they did for two other occasions during that same weekend). Instead they charge me an extra 10$ administration fee... I feel this is a sham. And, I guess as most would do, I just payed up because that 10$ isn't worth spending more time on a phonecall or an email. But I sure do write this 10$ blogpost complaining about it!

A new beginning...

We went to the world premiere of the new Star Trek movie at the Sydney Opera House yesterday (though there were screenings around the world the day before already - feel cheated out of my premiere). And it was brilliant, as a Star Trek movie.

There's a 2 week media blackout (no more), so you won't see that much just yet, but hey, I paid (a lot) for my tickets, and I didn't sign anything.

The story itself is a bit thin, but it was just a lot of fun to see young versions of the original characters again, Bones was great, Scotty (Simon Pegg - Spaced) was brilliant. I was also looking forward to Spock, as I thought he was brilliantly casted, but I found his "Spockness" timing a bit off, while the real Spock (yes, there is time travel involved) was spot on of course. Kirk was actually better than what I expected after watching the trailer. And Aussie Bana (unrecognisable) was badass, as were the ILM special effects.

JJ Abrams did a great job on reviving the Star Trek franchise, not an easy task. It remains to be seen what the legion of Trekkies think, but up till now all reviews seem to be positive (on Twitter for example). Getting a standing ovation at the end must have come as a big relief to him. I'm already looking forward to more adventures of the new crew.

The Opera House of course isn't a cinema, so they brought in the people who actually mixed the movie sounds, to do the sound in the main concert hall, and it was fabulous (Dolby, no THX). As was the projection (using a Barco projector, which, I like to point out, is a Belgian company!) JJ Abrams was present, as were most of the main characters (except Nimoy and Pegg unfortunately), who all got introduced at the beginning. At that point it was nice to sit on the second row. Once the movie started though, sitting 6 meters from the screen isn't practical. Paying a lot for tickets, I was hoping to get decent seats. It seems the sponsored seating (for contest winners or PR) were a lot better at the back, while I feel they should have been given these front rows. But I will definitely go watch it again (probably in a Gold Class cinema, that's one with plush seats and food).

For a Star Trek movie, I'd give it a 9 out of 10, seriously. Go watch it next month!

You don't agree? More reviews of peeps on the red carpet:

• Neerav
• Flynn

PS: "A new beginning..." yes, I know my scifi... 'nuff said

Macbook Pro for sale

I have a 2 year old Macbook Pro for sale on eBay:

It is a April 2007 Macbook Pro in great condition.
It got replaced with a new unibody Macbook Pro, so it's looking for a new home.
It's a non-glossy one, which I definitely miss on the new one!
I mainly used it as a desktop and only carried it around occasionally to a conference or workshop.
Comes with original OSX (Tiger) and iLife06 DVDs, and with OSX Leopard installed and on DVD. Comes with original box, original MagSafe power adapter, remote and dvi-to-vga adapter.

Details:
2.16Ghz Core 2 Duo
4Gb (2x2) installed (3.25 accessible)
120Gb hdd
15.4-inch 1440x900 - non-glossy
ATI Mobility Radeon X1600 128MB GDDR SDRAM
6x SuperDrive
1x FireWire 400, 1x FireWire 800, 2x USB 2, ExpressCard
DVI (DVI to VGA adapter included)
10/100/1000BASE-T Ethernet
Airport Extreme (b/g/n)
Bluetooth 2.0 + EDR
Backlit keyboard
Model No: A1211

I prefer pick in North Sydney, or we meet up in Sydney CBD.

Check it out!

Watchmen

We went to see the Watchmen movie yesterday. Unfortunately they were no longer showing it at imax. But we did the Gold Class (George street) experience in stead, which is "different":

• very nice seats (so comfy that there was actually someone snoring...),
• it's nice to have a bottle of wine,
  
• the food was nice, though expensive,
• but eating in a dark theatre isn't really practical
• and in quiet parts, you could actually hear the projector, which isn't too good.
  

But once a year, maybe for a special occasion, it's worth it, I'd say.

Thoroughly enjoyed Watchmen, though it is pretty long.

What rental crisis?

We're moving house in a couple of weeks. All in all signed, sealed, delivered in 4 days. Sure, it's not the cheapest place you can get. But it's a lovely place, water view, really close to the ferry, closer to my work, all internal mod-cons (except airco though). And the rental agency was really helpful and forthcoming, though we did tighten the screws on them real hard, as we weren't really desperate for another place (just a bit sick and tired of the noise around here at the current place, after 2.5 years). All in all pretty happy with how things worked out. You see all these doomsday scenarios around Sydney on TV, about 30 people showing up at a viewing, bidding up rent,... We just made an appointment for a viewing, liked what we saw, and negotiated over email. We didn't like the deal we were getting, said bugger that, and got a better deal: more money longer in our own pocket. Signed today, moving in two weeks.
We did see another place, cheaper but smaller and older, at the same day. But that was kinda crap (we thought). But again, available, and certainly livable.

Van for sale

Friends are leaving back home to Belgium, after a long working holiday trip around the east coast. They are selling their traveling van now. It comes fully equipped as a camper van. They are in Sydney now.
Check out the details at Gumtree:

Campervan

http://sydney.gumtree.com.au/c-Cars-for-Sale-van-ute-Mitsubishi-Starwagon-92-W0QQAdIdZ101454669 

New Year's resolution

One of the common resolutions of the new year is loosing weight. Well, I'm happy to announce that I lost 2.2Kg in just one week. How cool is that? The main thing different is my dinner. We had salad each and every day for dinner (as evident on Flickr). I still had small pieces of dark chocolate, one slice of banana bread, a glass (or two) of wine a couple of days. Went running only once, and played weekly soccer on Wednesday. But it used to be that I had two big meals a day. That is foodcourt lunch and again a warm cooked dinner. That wasn't too clever.
So, yeah, happy about that. I'll keep going at it. (though, I'd really like a pizza for change)

Looking for a new job?

Looking for a new job, with good pay, for doing nothing, sitting on a beach? Sick and tired of Sydney or NSW? Looking northwards to Queensland? Maybe this is a job for you:

Caretaker of the Islands of the Great Barrier Reef is a newly created position with a few minor tasks that need to be taken care of. The most important duty is to report back to Tourism Queensland (and the world) and let us know what’s taking place on the Islands of the Great Barrier Reef.

Great PR stunt of Queensland Tourism!