Gems (re)discovered

Two (2) completely random, yet amusing things I have recently (re)discovered:
[This is from My Career, p 7 28/06/08, by Margherita Larne-Jones]
What is a 'dream workplace'?

"A dream workplace is one where you encourage people to establish challenging
yet realistic goals, work for a sense of accomplishment and people know that
their efforts make a difference in a tangible way. It's a place where you value
creativity, quality over quantity, both task accomplishment and individual
growth, and where people act with integrity. You manage in a participative and
person-centred way, and people are encouraged and expected to take
responsibility for their actions. In addition, a high priority is placed on
constructive interpersonal relationships and people are friendly, open and
sensitive to the satisfaction of their team. This emphasis on co-operation and
collaboration ensures results and outcomes are achieved.You can spot a dream
workplace by asking potential and future employers questions such as: how do
decisions get made and how do people learn in this
team/department/organisation?"

Ray's winter Tuna Delight(ful):

1. Tuna (or similarly firm white fleshed fish), 150-200g/person. This is panfried/grilled quickly, so that slightly pink in centre;
2. Cous-cous, 100g/person. Mix with equal quantity of boiling water (plus a dash more), then stirred with fork to mix in bowl;
3. Sauce (1/2 medium red onion (finely diced), 1 small red chilli (deseeded and thinly sliced), 2 tbsp mayonaise, 1 tbsp ricotta, 1/2 lime juiced, squeeze of lemon, squeeze of honey, and 12 capers, diced);
4. Mix ingredients in bowl, let sit whilst frying fish, then spoon over fish/cous-cous on plate, and serve with a cheeky little dry Australian white

Sadness from rumours

Am sad to be told that I am no longer floor walking because I showed homosexual predatory behaviour, and that a complaint had been made to Chris.
Or so Vineet tells me he was told by Kelly.
Not that he was able to tell me who this person was.
Or when.
Or why I knew nothing of this ...
Such an aberrant behaviour, so fancifully manufactured, and yet so effective in removing any opportunity for discussion or denial. After all, why have I never had any feedback or discussion with anyone in regard to this matter previously or since, and more specifically, nothing at all from Chris?
Most saddening was the way that Vineet reacts as if to say explicitly that he does not give any credence to such an unfounded accusation, yet implicitly does by the way that he then goes to drag me outside to make this revalation, even though he himself acknowledges the poison that Kelly drips, having been the victim of her machinations himself ...
Rumours about rumours, and the rumoured effect that rumours are runoured to have ...

A test to see who reads this shit

This would seem to be a doable situation ... pack everything up, put it into boxes, put into back of truck, send it up, and then jump on to a plane, to meet the goods there ...
Alternative would be to do the road trip with PM, go see Nik as excuse for travels. But may be unfair in terms of making him do the return trip alone ...
As for what to do with stuff, the boxes on a truck may also work best if unable to part with any furnishings?
Still very unsure what to do about Michael and the flat ... horses and water, etc.
Wonder how long before places get wi-fi around here? Seems to be a few networks which can connect to, as they do not have security, but must learn how to go about doing that ...
Am sitting here in Gobble, the site of John's old butcher shop, and it is very, very popular, albeit it being lunchtime, especially amongst a certain type of power broking bored women who have perhaps not much else to do?
Be that as it may, returning to my earlier cogitation, will the furnishings/crockery be alright to 'recycle'?
Productive use of this time would be to do up a few letters of application (+ update resume) to send off, more concrete r/e enquiries, and maybe even some preliminary assessment of transport options ...
Would it be useful to take as much as reasonable/possible, or to cull for the purposes of travelling light? Of course, this may as much be dictated by the transport options, as anything else?
This not having any coffee in the house is costing me way too much money - the cost of principles, hey?
Be nice to lob into Ray's with bunch of flowers, wish 'Happy birthday' ... but could be a forlorn hope, we must conceed, so need to acknowledge the requirement for other sustainable implications ... and in one sense, running away to WA has a certain panache ...
Who ever said that a secret is the hardest thing in the world to hold onto spoke a reflective truth ...
So, home to watch 'No country for old men' and a 10 pack of Red bear (disgusting as it sounds), with first impressions being 'Blood simple' (same people) ...

And you wonder why I ride?

If you are ever wondering about the beauty of a bunch of cyclists in motion, this is a perfect example of this - a bunch heading over Pete's bridge on the way back from Torquay, along HorseShoe Bend Road on Sunday afternoon.
And, yes, that is me in the blue, scooting along, about to run up the back of Simon (down low on the recumberant) as we start the climb up, and he swerves to the side to allow the faster riders past ... where as I took the inside, as I tend to be one of the quicker climbers ...
But they then go and make up for such antics by publishing the photo below ... and, no, that is not my regular weekend stubble - was a huge spray of road dirt as we came down past Deakin uni earlier ...

[These are all from the excellent capabilities of John from the GTC site. Thanks]

Riding into the mud

Went up to Melbourne yesterday, and tried to melt the plastic ...

Managed to get a new little utility knife, made by Kamati;

Decided on a little Knog microlight for the rear;

Invested in a suitable Crumpler bag, the Seedybar (described as "Holds 2x A4/legal size folders in style with plenty of pocket space to store accessories, tools, food and daily essentials", the image shows a 6 pack of VB shoved into the bag), over the Yee-Ross, for even though the latter had a dedicted laptop pocket and was smaller, realised that did not leave much space for anything else, such as the daily necessities! As a bonus, the girls there also gave me some nice Crumpler stickers (one of which is now on Ristretto), instructions for usage, and a box of micro matches;

Rediscovered the Hard Techno 7 cds in JB, turns out the the cds with mixes on them are pretty pumping, but the others are just tracks, as if you are to do your own mixes? Most amusing was that it turns out to be a French Techno label;

Had coffee at Pellegrini's of course, but managed to pretty much not have anything to eat up in Melbourne apart from a vegetable pancake thing; and

Whilst at the Drug display, which was pretty much exactly the same as the one had seen in Sydney all those years ago, at the Museum, found some little gelati spoons for Bub. Whilst there also grabbed the final year design students booklet/cd, as it was a really intriguing little display ...

Also managed to get some footage on the vidcam of adventures, so I had better learn how to edit and produce ...

Came home, grabbed a bottle of cheap Deakin Estate shiraz, and cooked up a kangaroo + mushroom stew, but rest of bottle not really both drinking afterwards ...

Today was day to drag out of bed on GTC 'medium' ride run by Simon, meandered out to Moriac (included the hill run down past Deakin Uni, where I managed to get myself all splashed with mud flicked up from the road, which led to much amusement when the others saw me when we stopped at Moriac), headed towards Torquay along Hendy Main, helped Herbert repair a blowout, refreshments at Panache cafe, and then home along Horseshoe chatting with Simon.

All up about 75km, but no real hurry, so started at about 9, got home around 2, via a stop at F&V shop for bread where a rather buxom kiwi babe said that I was cute, to which I could only reply that it took years of training, as I was rather flummoxed by such things ... chance would be a fine thing. Or at least seizing it, anyway ...

A few of my favourite things

Oh there is so much to enjoy in the current environment ... cash is king, credit is easy to get, and there are so, so many things to obsess about ...
Already have the laptop to go, so know a little camera to go with it ...
And all in good time (well, another month (oh, why so long???) anyway), a phone could also come in handy too ...
but most important of all, there is love, friends, and self gratification ...
climbed out of bed this morning to go riding at 7 - decided to pull on the red skin suit that I had originally given Michelle to get her started, was a funny fit - to got 5 minutes down the road, and the heavens opened, but I kept going. Interestingly, the arm/leg warmers stayed damp, albeit warm, whilst the suit dried out real quick!!!
Stats were: 40' 44", 28.8 avg (WOW!!!), 47 max (in sprint past Apco too - also WOW!!!), and 19.59km distance, on the circuit-
Impressed, very impressed ...
Just a pity that the coffee I had at lunch to celebrate is still hanging around, and I will probably be so wired tonight that I will not get enough sleep, and will use that as an excuse not to ride in the morning ... and you wonder why I complain so loudly about giving up drugs, hey?
Anyway, best to try to sleep anyway ...

The worked weekend

Another beautiful weekend where an extra day made no difference to what got done!!!
Managed to get a lot of the game done :)
Went for a ride (but only one)
Still managed to drink copious amounts of alcohol :O
Cooked some great food - roast chicken rubbed with dukkah and then used the carcass to make a stock to have with noodles
But not much cleaning or washing, I am afraid
Spoke to Michelle + siblings - turns out "No' does not have the meaning it used to have, as brother had booked a ticket 'just in case' ... not too sure how that works!
Other than that, lots of playing with new toy(s) and seeing what the possibilities can be
Another exciting phone conversation with Telstra,trying to get my billing resolved, as there was a small discepancy with the previous bill that bled over ... managed to get $142.57 out of them, so not too bad, I suppose?
Hopefully now it will all play out properly, and no further dramas? Or at least not for these same things ... ;)

starting the weekend afresh

Is Certainly a winter's day o/s, which should not be that surprising given that it is June,
which is traditionally the first month of June ...Have decided to upload the Office package to the dektop instead - seems Ristretto is too
underpowered? But there are other things on this which are much more versatile and usable -
one of which is the Sun version of OpenOffice for XP ...Cooked up my chicken last night with a stuffing of herbs, bacon, and bread, then covered the
skin with olive oil and dukkah - seems to have worked out well enough?Wonder if I was supposed to have said 'no' to the loading of hotfix for .net on the
computer???Microsoft, the evil empire ... all this to set up the 'Business Contact Manager' ... suppose
you need this to conduct your business sucessfully? Pigs arse! But is all good fun, I tell
you, all good fun ...Well, that seems to have worked ...

first day of the another beginning

seems to be a day for the security ...first we have the ongoing responses from the local lollipop boys up the road nodding and winking as i pass each day, and then it turns out that today is BP Security day at the office ...Not that I have anything in black or white these days ... so am left to wonder about in the baggy comfortable look - Levis + polo shirt + glofing jumper ... least I think I look good though ;)Oh, it is also Environment Day, Queensland Day, and also the last day of one of the most grinding weeks in recent memory ...Have survived since Monday morning without coffee or alcohol ... bought Ristretto last night, had brandy to celebrate ... now sitting at Rimini's supping on espresso, typing this, about to go back to team meeting ... suddenly life begins to look more rosy - oh, and three (3) whole days to be slothful, energetic, and even recover ...Must say that the owner sure does know a lot of uses for 'fuck' in his random conversations ... connections, always the connections ...Oh, and good to see that there are quite a few wireless connections to be picked up ... even if all of them are security locked ......And here we are later on the day ... rain has set in, the wind is cold, but there have been some sales, so some people are happier ... hey! must remember that new bottle shop is opening up just down the road today, so should go and check out after work ...Oh so much to do/see, so little time ... but wait-there are three daays to explore and enjoy ... so let us see what may be?Tried to log into Deakin site, but seems you need a certificate, which I do not have at present ... let us try this instead ... nope, no loading of IE either ... is all such an adventure, I tell you ...Talk about boys and their toys ... best get back to the happy people again ... ;)

A new eeePC beginning

This is a few words about the eeePC 900 that appeared at JB's so I rushed down to have a look, and ended up cancelling my original order, as they had the XP model in store ... and somehow got talked into purchasing a TV tuner card, as well ... Hmm ...
Because it is so small, it does not rest on the lap very well ... the keyboard is smaller, but the real challenge is that some of the other keys are in different positions than larger keyboards ... oh so light however ... gives off a few bit of heat as well - good for winter lol
Looks like a new bottle shop is opening down near where the pet grooming store used to be ... opens tomorrow, so could give me someting to check out after work tomorrow??? Although there has been some talk of going out with the boys tomorrow (OR sATURDAY) NIGHT ... hmm, see how easy it is to hit the CAPS LOCK button suddenly became apparent ... lol
One of the greatest attractions of this is that the keys are very firm, clicking as you stumble over the keys ... And the glide pad allows multi directional movements, something which I am more used to from the Apple environment ...
In other news, have really been burning a hole in the old credit card, all in time for the financial year ... lol but will write of what later ...
wonder if anyone else reads these postings?
but is certainly better for longer ramblings than the twitter site ...