davechan.com - a slice of dave

Lack of posts

Apologies dear readers for the lack of posts since Boxing Day. I will make it up to you in the next few days.

Home sweet Sydney

I'm now back home. Sydney home that is! Now that I'm set up in Sydney for long-term living, it feels comfortable enough for me to call home.

Going back to Perth seemed like staying at a friend or relative's place. Although I was still sleeping in the same room with all my old crap there, I didn't have all my day to day stuff like my electric toothbrush, as they were all in Sydney. I also hadn't brought any clothes or towels with me, so I was wearing all different clothes to what I had been for the past two months.

In fact, when I got back into Sydney on Monday morning, walking into the apartment felt like home again.

It's very strange, now that home (Perth) doesn't really feel like home anymore. Now I know how all you travellers and overseas people feel like.

Christmas Day

Thanks to everyone that made the trek up to West Perth to see me yesterday. It was fantastic to see everyone again! It was the first time I'd seen the apartment lived in, and I was so happy to finally meet my new baby, my Fisher & Paykel fridge :) (Yes, I'm weird)

Today was spent mainly with mum and dad. Carmen treated us all out for lunch at the Esplanade Hotel in Fremantle, which was great. After that we went up to West Perth to relax a bit. It was the first time that my parents had seen the apartment, and it was good to show them around. Now my dad wants one too :)

I had a bit of a nap on Carmen's new $4600 bed (www.kingsdown.com), and yes, it is very comfortable. $4600 worth of comfort? Well, I don't know about that.

It was an easy-going, relaxing day, and good to spend some time with the parents.

Tomorrow will be a busy day, doing some tech support for some friends who I usually do that stuff for, and in the evening, having the big family get together.

I hope everyone is enjoying their holidays, and a merry Christmas to all!

Honey, I'm Home!!!

Yay, I'm back in Perth! In fact, right now, I'm typing this on my iBook at the West Perth apartment, waiting for the air-con guys to install the, well, air-con.

It's so good to be home again. Quite surreal though. It feels like I'm not that far away from my apartment in Sydney and that I could drive there from here. With air travel, Australia doesn't seem like such a big place anymore!

My flight was pretty good thank you very much. Nothing really to speak of, except that I was very impressed with the iBook's battery power. I watched the first half of "The Sound of Music" on the plane, and then proceeded to finish the movie when I got home. I still had power to spare.

It's going to be a very hot few days here, but I'm looking forward to it regardless. I'm so happy to be back with my family for Christmas. It's going to be great.

Going home

In about 5 hours, I'll be boarding a plane back to Perth! Although my stay will only be very short (I'm back Monday for work), I'm really looking forward to seeing everyone, especially my family.

All day tomorrow I'll be at the Havelock St apartment as I'm waiting for the air-con guys to come and install the bastard. So if anyone is in the vicinity, please do drop by and say hi. Give me a quick call on the mobile and I'll let you know the apartment number.

Danger danger

I bought a DVD on Sunday as a gift. Good thing I decided to open it up first, because there was no disc inside the case!

Back to Borders (a book/music/DVD retailer) I went to exchange it.

Another $80 later (spent just on books) I left the city and got home to complete the job of cleaning up the apartment.

Those stores are dangerous for me.

More iBook gripes

Well there does seem to be a common thread (bada bing bada boom) to my iBook troubles - the iBook gets in trouble whenever there are operations involving the optical drive.

It crashes when iTunes rips audio from a CD. It crashes (hard and soft) sporadically when playing a DVD. And last night, the whole machine powered down whilst burning a CD. However, if it's not using the optical drive, it's fine.

I called up my Apple store, and they've told me to bring the machine back in the New Year for them to have a look at.

So far my first Mac experience hasn't gone as smoothly as I'd hoped, but the first taste of what's possible (especially with the ease that it detected and was able to start using all my external peripherals) has definitely got me hooked!

Carols in The Domain

Tonight I went to Carols in The Domain. All my friends in Sydney were busy and couldn't make it, so I headed out to The Domain by myself. Myself and about 100,000 other people that is.

While on the bus out there, the sky was already looking ominous, and walking to The Domain, an occassional raindrop was hitting my nose. Walking into The Domain though, took my breath away. There was a sea of people, complete with candles in red Channel 7 candleholders. I was gob-smacked at the number of people there!

The production was rather elaborate. The Disney section was particularly amazing, as fireworks were coordinated to the rhythm of the songs. Very cool!

There was one annoying thing though, and that was that because Carols was being broadcast live on Channel 7, they had "ad breaks" the same as on TV. What I mean is that when the broadcast paused for an ad break, the stage would also clear and the video screens would show ads until the ad break finished.

Being at a Carols by oneself is a rather sad thing. Sad in that it really gave me a lot to think about when looking out over the huge crowd. I think of all those families, sharing a wonderful evening together, and having a great time. All those lovers out there sharing a special moment and being serenaded by the voices of the 100,000 people. It's very lonely, even though I was surrounded by so many people. It made me realise just how lonely my life is, without a girlfriend, wife, or kids. Is this my paternal instinct kicking in?

Christmas Shopping

Christmas shopping is both fun and not fun.

It's fun going out knowing that you have to spend money and buy stuff. However, trying to figure out what to buy is the not fun bit. Well, it is and it isn't. I'm buying for my cousins, and they're all of different ages, running from about 7 to 27. Some of them are easier to buy than others. Specifically, the younger and older cousins are relatively easy, compared to the teenagers. Teenagers are very fickle, and you have to know what they're in to right now, because what is in right now may not be in a few months, even weeks.

I feel old when I have to go into a shop and ask the attendant, "So what are the kids buying these days? What's popular?". Because quite honestly, I have no idea! I've lost touch with what teenagers are into these days, because, well, I'm not a teenager anymore, and I rarely associate with any.

Anyway, today was spent wandering around the city trying to find presents, and I've succeeded for a few of the cousins, but I still have a lot of shopping to do tomorrow. I want to get all the presents out of the way before the close of the weekend, because I don't want to have to worry about it during the working week. I certainly don't want to spend any of my precious time in Perth having to run around shopping!

iBook Gripes

Well, the honeymoon is still going strong, but the two partners are now finding thing that irk them about the other.

I've already mentioned my iBook's dislike for my Ronan Keating CD. Well today it also opposed my Delta Goodrem CD.

As for me, I've found that Mac OS X is not only not crash-proof, but indeed, it's crashed at least once each day I've used it. I've just reinstalled the applications, and it seems to be fine. It might have been corrupted because when I originally had to run the setup program from the CDs, the computer died suddenly due to lack of power (I hadn't had the thing plugged in stupid me). I've also just updated to the latest version of iTunes, and maybe that is more stable.

The iBook is quite solidly built, except perhaps for the trackpad. Out of everything on the iBook, I think it's the trackpad that lets it down. I prefer my 4 year old Dell's trackpad. The iBook one is not very responsive, and no matter how much I tweak the settings, it's just not sensitive enough to respond to small nuances like rolling my finger to get the pointer to move just ever so slightly more in a certain direction.

That's the gripe list so far. I am still loving Expose, and the general ergonomics of the computer are very good. What I mean is that how you think things are done are exactly how they're done. Oh, and the DVD playback is pretty good too, except that speaker output isn't very loud, both through the internal tinny speakers, or driving an external pair of unpowered speakers.

Oh wait, it seems to be liking my Delta CD now...

Basketball

On Wednesday night I went to watch the Perth Wildcats play the Sydney Kings at the Sydney Entertainment Centre.

The Wildcats sucked. Besides from the demoralising 33 point loss, the team just lacked cohesion. This probably accounts for why they lost by 33 points, and are currently sitting at 9th on the NBL ladder.

Ricky Grace is still there, providing a solid bedrock. Perth have always been accused of relying too much on Grace. Tonight, I saw why they have said this. Grace just wasn't performing tonight. Don't get me wrong, he still racked up a reasonable set of numbers, but anything under 20 points and 10 assists is a bad night for Grace. He also spent a lot of time on the court, and no one else was there to pick up the slack.

Matt Burston put in an effort, quietly compiling points. James Harvey I swear wasn't on court, let alone put in an effort. Rashad someone or other sucks bigtime - he effected so many turnovers for it not to be funny. Someone needs to teach that man some ball handling skills. Tony Ronaldson seems to have slowed down and gone to sleep.

The guy that I did like was John Jackson. Although he doesn't quite have the skills (play was a bit sloppy), he's full of energy, and has a good feel for where he should be on court. I reckon he's going to get a cult following (if he hasn't already got one).

All in all, pretty disappointing, but for $12, it was worth it to see CJ Bruton in action. Man, was he hot! It was unbelievable just how destructive he was. I think he bagged more threes than the entire Wildcats team (and them not for lack of trying either!)

Never mind, we can put this down to a um, rebuilding year. Probably pretty true since I didn't recognise most of the faces out on the court.

School of Rock

On Tuesday, I went to watch this comedy starring Jack Black. Mr Black is one funny guy. He's also manic, I swear. With an unbelievable energy and great comic timing, he manages to make what would have been an ordinary feel-good movie a pretty good one. Oh, and the kids are pretty good too (considering they're apparently musicians, not actors).

School of Rock is about a musician, Dewey, played by Jack Black, who has been kicked out of his own rock band. In a coincidental set of circumstances (are they ever any other kind?) Dewey accepts a position as substitute teacher at the best, poshest, preparatory school in town (would we expect a lesser school?). Dewey realises that the kids have some musical talent, and decides instead of teaching the syllabus (which he knows nothing about), to form a rock band as a "special class project".

Although it's a bit soppy and very predictable, I really enjoyed this movie. The antics of Black and his little co-stars were very amusing, and Black himself provides quite a few cringe-worthy moments.

I probably wouldn't go so far as to rush out to your nearest cinema to watch this, but I will say that it's a good movie for tight-ass Tuesdays and definitely one that pretty much everyone in a group will agree to go see.

Dave's verdict? 3 1/2 stars.

Slack

Apologies everyone for the slackness in updating the blog over the past few days. I've actually got lots of things to write about, but I need some time to sit down in front of a computer and type all this stuff that's going on in my head into the blog.

There will probably be a deluge of new postings in the next few days - don't get washed away!

iBook

Finally got it!!!

I love it, and Expose is the best invention ever!

Playing around with it now, but will report more as I get to use it more.

Oh, and it is crashable...iTunes crashed a couple of times (one hard one requiring a reboot) while ripping a Ronan Keating CD. I knew that Macs had personalities, but judging my musical tastes is just going a bit too far!

Weekend roundup

Time for Dave's weekly weekend roundup.

Friday night was a friend's birthday party, which was okay, and, as usual for these significant number birthdays (eg 18, 21, 30, 40, 50) ran well into the night. In fact, so late that I ended up crashing at someone's place at about 4:30am.

Almost 6 hours later I woke up to go shopping. Joe took me to this place called Victoria's Basement, in Alexandria. This place is one big store which sells just homewares. All homewares, at cheap prices. I'm not talking cheap and nasty homewares here, I'm talking the good stuff. Brabantia bins and storage, Global, Mundial, and Wusthoff knives, Riedel and Waterford glasses, Le Crousset and Scanpan cookware. As a kitchenware fetishist, I was drooling.

Walking around drooling for the better part of 3 hours in fact! The only thing that stopped me from maxxing out my credit cards here was that I knew there was no chance I could bring all this wonderful stuff back with me! I did settle my soul by picking up some odds and ends, but definitely nowhere near as much as my heart wanted.

By now it was early afternoon, and as we drove down to Broadway for lunch, I really started to appreciate Sydney in the summer (weather that is). Oh wow, so many cute girls! Mmm...

After grabbing a bite to eat, we drove down to DFO, which is the big complex of warehouse outlet stores I went to the first week I was here. Again we were overwhelmed by choice, and I ended up skipping from shop to shop, but thankfully didn't buy much.

We met up with Alicia and Louise (a couple of ADI people) at DFO, and Joe was good enough to drop us all off home. Where I promptly crashed. For too long as it turned out, as I woke up at 10pm that night, after thinking of having a quick nap. I was due to go to a party at about 7:30pm, and wound up fashionably late (as I do) at about 12:30am. By now, people were starting to trickle out, but I still managed to keep going until 3am.

All Saturday though, I had a bit of a tickling in the back of my throat, which indicated that a cold or sore throat was starting to come on, and on Sunday (after suitably sleeping in of course) I woke up with said cold. I felt like shit, and moped about home all day, doing laundry and just sitting around reading and feeling terrible. I did pop into work for a few hours that night, but my brain was too frazzled to do much thinking, and so I went shopping.

I got home and cooked up some Hokkien noodles with fish, egg, and vegetables. Yummy! And enough for another 3 meals (another 4 if I hadn't been greedy and eaten a double-helping).

On Monday back at the ranch, I wasn't feeling the best, but was still reasonably productive. Today (Tuesday) I was less productive, but by the end of the day I had a few things to look forward to...

Just crossing the street

There seems to be a compulsive need to press the button when crossing the street at traffic lights.

This morning on the way to work I was waiting at the lights (after I'd pressed the button), and a guy walks up next to me, and, invading my personal space, reaches in front of my face to press the button.

Hmm yes, good thing you pressed that button mate, because hell, I probably didn't do it, and anyway, the more times you press it the faster the lights will respond.

I wonder sometimes if those buttons are even connected to the traffic light system, or whether they are there to make pedestrians feel better. Kinda like a stress ball.

Swiftel ADSL

A couple of weeks ago I got ADSL hooked up for the apartment in West Perth. I've gone with Swiftel, and from what I've been told by Carmen, the speed is pretty damn good. 512kb kinda ensures that.

Anyhow, if anyone is considering getting ADSL, I can recommend Swiftel and please list me as a referral! :) I get $15 for each referral, which would go some way towards defraying the costs of the curtains.

Swiftel have recently (as of 11/12/2003) revised their pricing again, and these can be viewed here. The pricing is damn good, and they've also reduced the price of their ADSL modems. Pricing is in fact so good, that after getting over the initial start up cost ($240) ADSL is now priced at a point low enough to seriously challenge dial-up internet, even before the multitude of benefits of ADSL. I do recommend you to go check it out.

Email me at dave@davechan.com to get my ADSL details you need.

Air-con

Another apartment blog...

About a month ago, I bought a 3.5 hp Fujitsu Inverter air-con split system unit.

Well, today they came and installed the unit.

Or should I say, tried to install the unit.

Or should I say, came and looked at the unit and looked at the power socket and said, "No way Jose".

The electrical system won't support such a powerful air-con unit. Shit!

Now Carmen's gotta go through the annoyance of going back to Retravision and exchanging the air-con for a smaller 2.5hp unit. But worst of all is that she's got to wait even longer for air-con!

I don't like the guy who told me a 3.5hp unit would be fine to be installed in the apartment.

Pub food

There's a pub down the road from me (about a minute's walk down Pacific Highway) called The Yardhouse.

It's a lovely little place, separated into three areas, the first with stools and high tables, the second with comfy chairs, and the third set up like a bistro with tables and chairs for dining.

The best parts though, are the specials. Sunday through to Thursday 5pm to 7pm are $6.50 cocktails. Sunday through to Thursday they have $15 special meals. For example, Sunday is a King Island steak and a Hoegaarden beer for $15. That's a damn good bargain!

So last night I went for a drink with a friend, and we had a couple of cocktails for $13 each and then had sausages and sauerkrout and a German beer for $15.

Fantastic value I thought! I'm going to have to check out these places more often.

It doesn't beat the cheapest place I've found so far though. There's this place in Broadway, near the uni, which has a $5 special. You have a choice of scotch fillet steak, chicken parmigiana, nachos, and some other things for $5 each. The only catch is that you have to buy a beer, wine, or soft drink for $3.50 at the same time. Still, that's $8.50 for a beer and steak!

Lots of food, lots of alcohol. How am I ever going to lose weight???

Curtains

For the past few weeks, Carmen has been looking at curtains for the apartment.

I'm not a big fan of blinds, so that never really was an option. There's always those timber blinds, but because the apartment faces east (thus the curtains/blinds have to fulfill some sun-blocking), and also there's one huge mother of a set of French doors on one wall, they're rather impractical.

So Carmen got a couple of quotes for the curtains.

$3500.

Holy shit.

Needless to say, she's now busy getting more quotes!

Are curtains supposed to be this expensive? I need them to cover the big-ass French doors (almost 3m wide, and just over 2m tall), a couple of bedroom windows, and a full-height single doorway.

The horrible wait

Last week I ordered my iBook.

This week I'm waiting for my iBook.

It's supposed to take anywhere from a week to two weeks, and of course, having itchy fingers to play with a new toy, I'm hoping that it'll come in the earlier of the two.

The result is that my mobile phone has never been paid so much attention before. I check it every so often to make sure that I haven't missed that all important call from my Apple dealer.

Damn this is excruciating!!!

Bharf

On Friday night, walking home from the casino, I noticed that the Novatel hotel which normally has a neon sign flashing "Novatel", had interspersed that message with "Noel":

Across the bay, the Cockle Bay Wharf must have had a similar idea. Except it's message wasn't quite so, um, Christmas-sy:

Saturday night

Warning! This is a long post...as usual, I've separated it into different parts. Enjoy!

The Morning After

I woke up feeling very happy after my casino winnings last night. Okay, so $75 wasn't much, but it's definitely better than a poke in the bum with a sharp stick! A blunt one might be fun, but a sharp one will draw blood. Aaaaanyway, moving right along....

Tonight was the Nigel Kennedy concert!!! I had been looking forward to this so much ever since I'd bought the ticket. To quote another big old fat guy, "I'm excited!".

I spent the day shopping with Joe, and I got home to prepare for the concert. That morning, I'd had a call from a friend, and I'd arranged to go and meet her after the concert so we could go party together. I said I'd send her a message when I knew about what time the concert finished. The concert was scheduled to start at 8pm, and so I thought it would be finished perhaps 10ish. This is a classical concert, and so there is a set programme. Also, classical concerts always start on time. I picked up a programme, and inside it said "The performance is approximately one hour and forty minutes long including a twenty-minute interval". So I messaged my friend to say it would be finishing at 10pm, but that we should meet at 11pm.

Fun with Tickets

Before all this though, I picked up my ticket from the box office. What had happened was that I originally booked to see this concert on Friday night, forgetting that the Christmas party was on that night. Hurriedly I called up the box office again, and managed to change ticket date to Saturday night.

Through a series of snafus (theirs, not mine) I wound up being called by the Sydney Symphony's box office manager, who apologised for the snafus, and offered to switch my tickets for the Saturday performance. He couldn't guarantee that the seats would be as good as the ones I originally booked, as the Saturday night performance was very full already, but I said that it would be fine. He actually mentioned two tickets, and I corrected him and said that no, I only booked for one ticket. I didn't give it a second thought.

So anyway, I rocked up to the box office and asked for my tickets, which were duly handed to me. I opened up the little ticket folder and found two tickets. Wow! Cool! But hang on, by this time it was about 7:40pm, and the performance was due to start at 8pm. I didn't know anyone who would be interested in going to the concert, let alone someone within 20 minutes of the Opera House on a busy Saturday night! I decided that I would give the extra ticket away. After all, I only paid for one ticket, so I was happy with that, and besides, I was so hyped about the concert that I really wanted someone to use this ticket, rather than letting it go to waste.

Heading back to the box office, near the concierge's desk, I found where the scalpers and hopefuls were gathered. I found an American lady who was looking for two tickets, but so far had only been able to find someone selling one (besides me). They were looking at taking my offer of a free ticket and buying one that a lovely old gentleman was selling. Unfortunately this would mean they wouldn't sit together though.

So I said to them, I don't really care where I sit, as long as the seat is better than the tickets that I had in my hands (I had paid for an A-reserve seat), I was willing to exchange my two tickets for the one. We hurried over to the old gentleman and had a quick check of his ticket. The first thing I looked at was the price, and it was indeed less than what I had paid. So I said no.

I had a quick think about it for a bit more, and thought what the hell, why not? These two ladies really wanted to go see the show, and I had a spare ticket for which I had no use. So I said okay, they bought the ticket from the gentleman, and I swapped my two tickets for their one.

I was feeling quite happy that I'd been able to make someone's day (well, two people's day) and to see that my spare ticket hadn't gone to waste. Okay, so the price on the ticket was less than what I had paid, but who cares, I'd still get a good seat anyway.

I ran up the stairs and into the concert hall itself. Wow, it is really awe inspiring. There is seating on all four sides of the stage, with the majority at the front of the stage and less at the back and sides obviously. I noticed though, that there were a series of microphones suspended not very far above the stage. Strange, I don't remember there ever being a need for amplification at a classical concert.

My seat was actually really really good. I was in the stalls, row M, seat 19. That's in front and centre and 14 rows back. Funny I thought, this is a fantastic seat, and yet the old gentleman had paid less than what I had for my ticket! I looked at the ticket again, and what I hadn't noticed was the letters "CONCESS" on the side of the ticket. This was a concession ticket! Which the gentleman (a retired doctor from Hungary) confirmed for me - he was supposed to be attending with his wife, who unfortunately was ill that night. Ah! It explains it. When I got home later, I saw that the seat I had in row M was actually 7 rows better than what I had originally booked for on Friday night in row T. The tickets I gave away were pretty crappy by comparison.

There is karma in this world :)

The fact that I had great seats were confirmed by the person sitting on the other side of me. She was on the council of the Sydney Symphony, and obviously must be given great seats. I was very happy.

Okay, enough about tickets. The show must go on...

Maestro, Music Please!

Well, no, it didn't. By 8:15pm everyone was wondering what was going on. An audible murmuring went around the packed hall. The council lady whispered to me, "He is getting away with murder, but he is the world's best violinist". There was definitely a hint of sarcasm there.

It wasn't until about 8:25pm that the lights dimmed and Nigel and the Sydney Symphony Orchestra walked onto stage, to rapturous applause. He is definitely the most un-classical looking classical performer I've seen. For tonight's performance, he was wearing street clothes. Not a tux, or even a suit. He was wearing a T-shirt with a shirt on top, cargo pants, and black lace up boots. Looking pretty grunge actually. And his haircut matched. His hair was shaved around the sides and back, and the long top bits were spiked up. Cool I thought.

Tonight was a night of Vivaldi. 4 Vivaldi concertos, intermission, followed by The Four Seasons. For the concertos, he and the Concertmaster (and lead first violin), Michael Dauth together led the rest of the orchestra.

The first concerto, in A, was alright. For the second one, in C, he called up the cellist, Catherine Hewgill, to perform alongside him and Michael. Maybe it was so everyone could see how hard she had to work. Because Nigel decided to fly through this piece, and it was obvious to everyone just how hard Cat had to work to keep up with him. She did, barely, manage to keep up, which is to her credit.

The third concerto was again pretty good, but Nigel really nailed the last one. Fantastic.

It was at this point though (or was it after the third?), that he decided to mix things up a bit. He introduced some music which was not in the programme. Um okay, cool, I thought, this should be interesting. And it was interesting. I can't remember what it was, but it wasn't too bad. I think it was some 19th century compositions.

My observations in the first half was that yes, Nigel made some great music. He also really loved to show off and over-emote. By that I mean seriously over-exaggerate movements. For example, he would be constantly wandering around the front of the stage, and very often would be in the face of the second violin of the 1st violins. I was starting to think maybe he had a thing for her.

The worse thing though, is that in addition to wandering around like a guitarist in a rock band, he had a propensity to lift his feet up in particularly anguished parts of the music. And for the really really anguished parts, both feet would leave the ground and he would quite literally be jumping up and down. The banging sound of his boots striking the wooden stage resulted in a series of dull thuds that was completely audible to myself, in the 14th row. God help those that were listening at home - the mikes I mentioned earlier were actually broadcasting the performance live to listeners at home. So if you were at home listening, and wondered what the thuds were, it was Nigel jumping up and down. At least it was in time to the music.

Anyhow, intermission came and went, and again the audience packed into the concert hall for the second half.

Finally I thought, we'll get to hear what I estimate about 75% of the audience had come to hear. But no. Not yet. Nigel had another treat for us. Bach inventions, arranged for violin and cello. Thankfully Nigel only subjected us to 4 of these short pieces, originally written for piano. I think the original is always the best.

Finally though, the first strains of Spring filled the concert hall, and a relieved audience relaxed to the fantastic music that was being made. For a few minutes anyway. Nigel and the SSO were blazing away, doing fantastically well, with rich full tones and a very happy rhythm going, until they hit a bit in the music where there is supposed to be a brief rest for about a half second or so. Which they proceeded to fill in with a very loud, "Hoi!", Latin-style.

Oh dear God I thought, what the hell??? Had I come to see a classical concert, or should I have prepared myself for some salsa dancing?

Thankfully the rest of Spring went according to script, and all was well again.

Until I checked my watch to see how time was going. Oh shit, it was almost 10:30pm!

The rest of the seasons flowed by merrily, and Nigel showed us why he is considered one of the best violinists in the world, with some brilliant passages. Mind you, after more than 10 years playing these concertos, you'd think he'd have nailed it by now. Still, he is good.

Just wish he's stop that bloody jumping up and down though.

Loud applause greeted the final bars of The Four Seasons, and deservedly so, Nigel directed everyone on stage to take a bow. Well, a few actually.

Nigel Kennedy. Brilliant performer and one has to admit, innovative in his interpretations. The SSO were faultless, and Michael Dauth, Concertmaster, was superb. I think I'll have to go watch Michael perform more. He is simply fantastic, and produces a very stately sound.

After the applause died down, Nigel asked the audience, "Do you all want to hear one more song before you go home tonight?" in his Cockney accent. The response was a resounding "Yes!". I looked at my watch. It was almost 11pm. NO!!!

I think I was right in thinking this, because Nigel and the orchestra then started off on our musical journey into Jimi Hendrix. An orchestral version of "Purple Haze". Hmm...

Nigel finally did what he wanted to do though, and that is, during the looooong performance of this song (I think it would have gone on for a good 15 minutes) he walked down from the stage and started greeting people at the front, and then wandered up amongst the audience. He duly returned to the stage, though, and himself and the SSO left the stage, while still playing "Purple Haze".

Well, I have to say, that was definitely an unforgettable concert! It was much like a rock concert, with Nigel as the frontman, except they were playing classical music. Nigel Kennedy is definitely a character, although right about then, knowing that I was late for my meeting with my friend, I seriously loathed the man. It was all his fault!

Friday night

Ah yes, another late night for Dave. It wasn't meant to be this way...

A bunch of us went to the office Christmas party pretty much after work, with a quick detour to my apartment to drop stuff off. After battling traffic (it was already 6:30pm and still heaps of traffic!) we finally made it to the party, which was at Cockle Bay Wharf.

As with all office parties, the food was okay, and the alcohol flowed freely. As usual, not many people got up to dance, and it took until about 10ish before people started getting pissed enough to venture out and tripping the light fantastic.

To say that all the people dancing were drunkards would be to take away the superb dancing skills of a select few. Our project's technical manager for instance, was really burning up the floor with his partner, engaging in some mean swing dancing. Very cool, yet another thing for me to learn!

Anyhow, it got boring towards this end of the night, as people either started getting up on the dancefloor or leaving. We were hanging around the tables, and ended up going to have a bit of a dance because we were rather bored.

We made a detour to a little club on Darling Harbour, but it wasn't really happening (although there was this weird girl invading my personal space with her dancing) and so we headed off to the casino.

Star City (it's not *just* a casino, but a complete entertainment hub...) was humming with people. Gamblers, pretenders, tourists, and everyone else. There's a cool bar up on the 17th floor, Alteni's or something like that. From here, there's a great view of the city. Oh, and the music ain't bad either, with a live DJ mixing up some moody lounge, at a good volume for chilling out and having a good conversation to.

Unfortunately, there weren't any tables! So instead we headed on down to the gaming floor. Like any other casino, Star City is very lavish, and yet at the same time so tacky. I'm not quite sure how casino outfitters manage it, but with so much money at their disposal, you'd think it'd be a lot better. I guess some people would find it looks great (and they do have to cater to a lot of different people's taste), but plastic palm trees aren't really my scene.

At Star City, you can sign up for membership, which is free, and they give you $10 complimentary credits to use at either the pokies or the tables. Myself and another guy signed up, and duly received our membership card loaded with the $10 free credit. At this point, while wandering around looking for cheap pokies, I managed to lose everyone else. Oh well.

I lost the $10 free credit and another $2 on the pokie machines, which are just so unbelievably boring. You sit there, you press some buttons, the computer does some processing, and you lose more money. So I headed over to the tables.

Ah yes, what defines a casino more than rows upon rows of gaming tables? Here is where the action is! I do enjoy watching people gamble. There is a bit of a buzz watching people (who know what they're doing) playing cards. As usual, I floated around different tables looking over people's shoulders and seeing how the table was performing.

At casinos, it is everyone against the house. Everyone at the table is helping each other to beat the house. It's kinda like helping other people find (legal) ways to minimise tax. Anyhow, because of this, in a lot of cases, it's true that the players at a table are either winning or losing as a collective group.

I love watching blackjack, and so I wandered around the blackjack tables. I rarely play myself. Too much stress. So much stress in fact, that the last time I went to the casino they were actually handing out stress balls. I made good use out of mine that night! Tonight though, I happened upon a $25 table where the people playing were doing fantastically against the house.

It's true that in most cases, the people at the $5 or $10 tables are hacks. They don't want to bet much because they either don't want to or they can't afford to. Which is good, because they are aware of how much money they are prepared to play with. However, this does not make them good blackjack players. Inevitably, betting on someone at a $5 table will result in lost money because they players generally don't know what they're doing.

The real players are at the more expensive tables.

Unfortunately, so are those that have too much money and aren't afraid of losing it. That's why I watched the $25 table very intently. I would have been there for about a half hour, through a change in deck, and also a change in dealer. And yet the table was still performing strongly. The players were smart and knew what they were doing. They took calculated risks, and weren't being stupidly aggressive, and yet also being bold when it counted. It was definitely time to place a bet.

Two bets actually. Each of $25. One each on two of the players. $50 on the table, all on the one hand.

Now when watching the more expensive tables, I find that watching people betting large sums of money really scares me and fills me with wonder. I mean, betting a few hundred dollars on a single game of blackjack is just crazy. What's crazier is losing, and then getting right back up into the saddle, and putting up that same money again. I guess most of these players know what they're doing, but it's still a funny feeling watching people bet on one hand what it would take me a few days to earn.

I won that hand though, and I was really happy. I'd just won $50! Yay!

I should have quit at this stage. Before I pulled out my wallet, I had told myself that should I win, I'll just walk away, and I'll be happy. But no, I took my $50 winnings, and left my original stake of $50 on the table, to put on the next round.

I lost. Dealer drew 20 and beat everyone. It was a surreal feeling watching the croupier calmly sweeping up hundreds of dollars worth of chips, with my $50 in there somewhere. In the same time it took me to win $50, I'd lost it again.

I still had the $50 I started out with of course, and so with a shrug I put that down on the table, again $25 each on two different players.

The first player I was backing drew 20. Excellent.

The second player I was backing had 10 showing. He doubled. I pulled my wallet out again, and handed over another $25 to double with him. This increased my stakes for this hand up to $75. I had $75 riding on this one hand.

When you're playing with chips, the reality of how much money you are betting is strangely abstracted. It doesn't feel like much. After all, it's only a few discs of plastic. Well, I had $75 of plastic on the table.

The croupier dealt a 9, giving my second player 19. Great! Play continued around the table, and I was in a bit of a trance (mind you I was also pretty sleepy). I only had $5 in my wallet, which was okay because that was enough for the bus fare home.

The croupier got back to himself, and dealt himself 18. For the players at the table, who had played hundreds of games during the time I'd observed them, it was good news that they'd won, but certainly nothing to get excited about. Me on the other hand was just relieved. I'd not lost all my money! Yay! The croupier dealt out the winnings, and I took my $150 in chips and immediately left the table, after thanking the two players that had helped me win my money.

Feeling very happy, I cashed in the chips, and was $75 richer than when I had walked in. Thank you Mr Star City!

I walked past the table again, but by now, things weren't looking as great. After almost continually winning for the past half hour or so, the tables had turned (sorry, bad pun) and now the house was starting to claw back some of its money.

Phew I thought, it's a good thing I left when I did! No sense being greedy. The fact I was given a second chance to walk away from the table with more money than I started with was definitely a sign to get the hell out of there.

I walked back over Pyrmont Bridge to the city, and to my usual bus stop, and caught the bus home.

A good night.

Weekdays, weekends

Yay, it's Friday!

As those of you that have been reading my blog entries in Sydney have probably found, I tend to find things to do on the weekends, but on the weekdays it's pretty sedate.

On the weekdays, the routine runs like this: wake up, go to work, come home, cook dinner, eat dinner, chat on net, maybe go to gym, go to sleep. Repeat for the next day until Friday.

I'm finding I'm living for the weekends at the moment. Especially so since I've been working pretty hard at work (laugh all you want), and have been pulling long days (until 7, 8, and even 9pm) most days. The deadline is just going to be so tight and there is just so much work that it's quite unavoidable.

Some pressure is good. It gives one a sense of purpose and drives one forward.

So it's the weekend now! Tonight is the office Christmas Party which should be fun (free food and drinks, how could it not be?) and tomorrow night is a concert. Nigel Kennedy performing Vivaldi's Four Seasons. I am very much looking forward to them both!

You are, we are, 20 million Australians...

Officially as of today, the population of Australia is 20 million!

Yay to us.

Eye twitching

The last few days I've had a twitching in my left eye. It only occassionally happens, but when it does, I can feel it and my sight out of that eye jiggles around a bit. It's a very strange sensation, and I've no idea what causes it.

Geek warning - Apple iBook

A couple of days ago, I ordered a 12" Apple iBook. For those of you that have unfortunately been a target of my all too often drum-banging about the great things that Apple Computer are doing, this might be a relief. After all, Dave's going to actually discover the reality behind Apple computers, Mac OS X, and all things Apple. He'll discover that yes, it does crash as often as Windows, trying to do simple things are just as frustrating in OS X as in Windows, and that the reality just doesn't match the hype.

Or hang on, maybe he'll discover a new utopia of computing. Maybe Macs really are every bit as good as the hype. If this happens, expect a lot more drum-banging...

Of course, I've been lusting after a Mac ever since the original "Bondi Blue" iMac was released, and now, 4 years later, I'm finally going to buy one :) It took a lot of time, but I finally got there.

Expect another long post when I actually get the machine in a couple of weeks!

Sleepless nights

Last night I had a lot of trouble sleeping.

I was physically tired but my head was still buzzing. I guess it might not have been such a good idea to go to the gym at almost 10pm.

I got to bed at just past midnight, because I was wandering around doing ironing and then decided to give the bathroom a quick clean. However sleep did not come, and I got up again at about 1am. I pottered around a bit more, doing random things, and reading through marketing material until about 2am, upon which I crawled back into bed and blissfully was able to sleep.

Weird thing was, I woke up this morning at 7:30 without a problem. Half an hour earlier than normal.