Feigning Cuteness for Attention

This cat is the master.

Sickly

Please have sympathy for Lewk of Lewk's Photos, who has been poorly for a week. So ill and weary and stuffyheaded that he was taking his night and day medication the wrong way around. So ill that he has lost all interest in wine and cider. So ill that he has cut back his tennis to 4 hours this week.

You are advised to leave this blog immediately, before this infectious virus spreads to YOU !

Roses?

Not being good identifying flowers, I'm gonna say that these are roses. They were growing in a plaza in Northbridge.

Cactus Attack

Seen in Forrest Place in central Perth yesterday. I jazzed it up with my iPhone's HDR option.

Multiple Hellos

I need a way to remember whether I've said "good morning" to people. It's such a faux pas to greet the same person more than once, so what I need is an icon floating above their head, much like you see in online role-playing games (see below). Could someone please add this functionality to the new glasses from Google for me? Thanks.

Another Boring Day at the Beach

Four straight months of perfect beach weather is so tedious. Look at these despondent people just lounging around listlessly on the boring sand of Cottesloe or floating in the tepid water.

Doll Family

Spotted on Cottesloe Beach this morning.

Rollover

Also at Cott, some of the blobbies seen earlier escaped in this car but lost control and hit a stand of grass trees.

Squished !

These poor blobbies are being squished under a rolling pin, at Cottesloe Beach this morning. What a terrible fate.

Triple-Packed Tea

It's interesting to see Lipton's latest attempt at packaging tea bags, adding yet another layer of protection between the tea leaves and the dangerous outside world. To reach an actual tea bag, you need to:

1. remove the outer layer of plastic around the box and open the lid
2. take out an individual carton of tea bags and rip off the gold foil
3. find a tea bag within  

After nine minutes' work I've found a tea bag. Sadly my tea break is now over.

Second Stargate

Through the Portal

This evening, intrigued by the possibilities, I leapt through the portal. There were no special effects, no whooshing noises, no pyrotechnics, just a mundane jump through the ring and onto a regular patch of grass on the other side. Obviously I was disappointed, but in truth my hopes of travelling through a wormhole back in time or to another part of the universe were slim. I hadn't even bothered bringing my emergency undies or survival shortbread.

Oh well. I might try a different one tomorrow.

Local Stargate

Taking a new route home on Friday at dusk, I entered an unknown precinct. It was deserted apart from a series of mysterious rings, such as this below. I didn't have time to explore further but there are a few explanations.

1. This is the One Ring. It didn't in fact fall into Mount Doom with Gollum.

2. It's a Stargate. If I jump through I'll find myself on the set of a cheesy science fiction series with Richard Dean Anderson.

3. Some workmen have played a prank, and have propped up some cabling.

Shortcut to Nowhere

Driving to work this morning, I saw congestion ahead and did a quick u-turn and darted into a side-alley that would let me slip past three sets of traffic lights in the blink of an eye. And this is what I found: a rubbish truck completely blocking the alley way with a single bloke manually emptying bins one by one. Can you imagine the excruciating wait of several minutes as it crawled along that alleyway with no space on either side for passing. Aaaagghh. My journey took 16 minutes when it should have taken 8.

This photo is actually from Chicago, but to convert it to Perth, imagine the bloke is wearing shorts.

 

Infiltrated by Chinese Hackers

First the New York Times, the Washington Post and the Federal Reserve. And now I'm sorry to report that this blog's critical infrastructure has been infiltrated by Chinese hackers. They have clearly picked on a high value target such as Lewk's Photos for reasons that are too obscure for me to comprehend. All I know is that spam comments have been posted repeatedly over the last few days in response to some of my postings, and the dubious English language skills plus my paranoic intuition have led me to identify their source as a Chinese military operation. But I won't be silenced. I'm not unnerved. In fact, I'm planning to eat Chinese this weekend. Can't wait.

Translation Please

I received some documentation today but I have no idea what it's about. See if you can work it out. Here's the introduction.

This Guide is designed to help your organisation through the initial stages of gaining access to our systems to a successful, continuing identity management experience. It describes our systems' delegated identity management model, several ways of implementing delegated management, and the steps required to set up your identity management system.

I look forward to my successful, continuing identity management experience, whatever it may be.

Lady Day

Did you know that the first day of the year used to be 25th March, Lady Day ? In the northern hemisphere, this date is approximately the vernal equinox, and marks the first day of Spring. I'd like to revive this tradition, although I don't know how you would designate years. Would the year 2013 span 26th March to 25th March next year? It could be somewhat confusing, but I still like it.

And for symmetry, I'd like to create a Gentleman Day to mark the other equinox. So on 25th September each year, a celebration of male pride would be held. Hang on, that's already a significant date - it's when the Western Australian Football League Grand Final is held.  We'll just leave it at that.

Mmmm, vino

They were both mine. Mwahaha.

Catherine's Wheel of Fire

Why Health and Safety didn't put a stop to this hazardous display at UWA at few weeks ago, I'll never know.

His Majesty's

At the theatre last night to see The Secret River, photography was strictly forbidden. Hence I present here a watercolour sketch I drew.

The Rule of Doors

If it's not your door, then leave it as you found it. 

It feels terrible when I stuff this up. When I poke my head in a room for a quick word with someone and then the word becomes a sentence and then a discussion, I lose track of whether the door was open or closed before I entered. So I have to guess on my way out how to leave it and I'm gonna get it wrong much of the time.

The solution: a memory door. Someone please create a door that automatically returns to its default state after someone uses it, be that closed, open, or ajar.

Official Meal-Times

I've recently learnt that some family members have contravened one of the iron-clad rules of meal-times, and started lunch before noon. I would like to  re-iterate that mealtimes can not start earlier than these times:

Breakfast: 7am and later
Lunch: noon and later
Tea: 6pm and later

It may be an ordeal but it's essential that you fight the temptation to eat before you reach these times. It is one of the fundamental precepts of civilisation. If you succumb then we have anarchy: mealtimes will gradually move earlier and earlier until lunchtime is at 10am and teatime is 2pm. Then we're faced with a bleak ten hour stretch in the afternoon and evening without an official meal. We don't want that.

I will mention that dogs are also bound by these rules.

Rokeby Road Dude

Seen on a first floor window in Rokeby Road a week ago, another guy with projected thoughts.

More from King's Park

Glowy Bulbs in King's Park

This Perth International Arts Festival installation in King's Park comprises thousands of light bulbs. And animatronic children who walk beside them. They are eerily lifelike.