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Water engine

Run your car on water. No, really...



Holy shit that's awesome.

Liveblogging the budget

No not me. Well, not here anyway. Check out our liveblogging... uhm... live... at GreensBlog, starting after 7:30 tonight.

Language Footprints

Over at Hoyden, there is a fascinating post by Lauredhel on language footprint. Personally, I'd never heard the term before, but it is an interesting one, and definitely one I'll keep in mind to address in the future.

We Australians aren’t really much for learning languages other than English. We’re quite comfy in our dominant language, and when travelling overseas - or to areas of Australia where English isn’t the vast-majority language - many of us expect others to cater to us linguistically, not the other way around.

Via Jane Simpson’s report on Endangered Languages Week 2008 comes the idea of a “Language Footprint“. This concept is an alternative to the ideas that linguistic dominance is benign, that there is nothing individuals can do about it, and that endangered languages are doomed to die no matter what.

read on here

Off the grid

I'm going down south, to Margaret River, this weekend. We're taking the van and driving into a sea of rolling hills and frolicking wine.
Therefore, I will be away from my computer, and the wide world interwebs, for at least two days.
Don't panic - I will be heavily medicated, and ready for a serious webilicious session upon my return.
Don't let the InterTubes go anywhere in my absence.

Yes! Nice work!

A SOUTH Australian MP who delivered an eight hour speech to state parliament says he could have spoken for twice as long.

Greens MP Mark Parnell's oratory marathon - aimed at delaying a Bill he opposes - may well be the longest filibuster in a state parliament.
He can't claim an Australian record for filibustering - one senator spoke for more than 12 hours in 1918 - and his effort pales in comparison to some others overseas.
However South Australian parliamentary officials and MPs suggested that before Mr Parnell, the longest speech in the state's parliament was probably a mere three or four hours.
Speeches of three to four hours were also recalled in other states, with one eight-hour address delivered to the New South Wales Legislative Council in 1897, although that included an overnight break.

Debating changes to the WorkCover workers' compensation scheme, Mr Parnell got to his feet in the SA Legislative Council yesterday morning and, except for breaks for lunch and dinner, held the floor until late last night.
He was followed by independent MP Ann Bressington, who spoke for five hours, before debate on the Bill was adjourned at 4am (4.30am AEST) today.
The pair had teamed up to stall a vote on the WorkCover changes, which would cut payments to some injured workers, and to get union and worker concerns on the public record.

In his monologue, Mr Parnell read the entire WorkCover Bill, presented his own analysis and then related the submissions from the union movement and stories from injured workers.
Suffering from little more than a sore neck for his efforts, he said today he could have gone on for another eight hours, but knew he was testing the limits of his parliamentary colleagues.
"Yes, I planned to speak for a long time. I didn't know how long it would be but in the end I cut it down,'' he said.
"Had I gone through all the material that I could have, it would have been twice as long.
"But I knew I was pushing the boundaries of parliamentary convention.
"No-one goes for that long, it's not normally regarded as polite.''

Mr Parnell said he was not concerned with whether or not his speech was a record and would "not bother to find out''.
But the Parliamentary Library in Canberra said he had fallen well short of the longest speeches delivered at a federal level.
In the House of Representatives the record was held by Labor MP William "Jawbone'' Webster, who in 1909 spoke for 10 hours and 57 minutes.
In the Senate, Labor's Albert Gardiner held the floor for 12 hours and 40 minutes in 1918.
But even those were well short of the 24 hour and 18 minute filibuster by US Democrat Senator Strom Thurmond in 1957, while debating the Civil Rights Act.
Unions today hailed Mr Parnell's efforts as heroic and a staunch defence of the rights of injured workers.
Opposition Leader Martin Hamilton-Smith, while supporting the Government's Bill, also defended his right to speak.

But Premier Mike Rann was less than impressed, describing Mr Parnell's and Ms Bressington's speeches as time-wasting games.
"I think that it's totally shameful, what we saw last night,'' he said.
"They chose to play games, and I think that shows contempt for the state.''
Mr Parnell said he made no apologies for taking as long as he did.
"Yes, I'm sorry that it had to be late at night, but that's the parliamentary process,'' he said.

via Courier Mail

Yay for E

The many benefits of Ecstasy. Particularly in your political persuasion.

野菜からなされる楽器

Weird Japanese guy who makes awesome musical instruments out of vegetables. Brilliant. Thanks Tim H.

Screen crushes

Isn't it funny how you can be so attracted to someone from a movie or TV show, even though you're only ever given a scripted character to be enchanted by? Nine times out of ten, the actor/actress is never like their character, and even if they were, it's incredibly creepy to ogle over someone you know nothing about.

Fan sites in general weird me out, and people who obsess over actors to the point of stalking need some serious help. That said, I found myself pondering all the screen crushes I've had over the years, and what they say about my own psyche.

Claudia Wells
Jennifer Parker - Back to the Future I
I can't start the list off with anyone else other than Claudia. I love Back to the Future. It's been my favorite movie since I was about 10, and of course, I always had a crush on Marty's girlfriend Jennifer Parker.

I'll admit that a large part of that was my desire to BE Marty, but she was still very cute. Even with the awesomeness of the 80s dressing her in tight jeans, boots and a puffer jacket, she's still cute. They replaced her in the other two films, but I'll stay true to the original.

Stacie Mistysyn
Caitlin Ryan - Degrassi Junior High
C'mon - who didn't have a crush on Caitlin. Again, it was vicarious - I wanted to be Joey Jeremiah so badly. But aside from that, Caitlin was the normal, nice, pretty girl. She had a great smile, but mostly she would mope, whine and worry like all characters on Degrassi, and that was hot.

I think it was her coyness that always got me. She was so damn coy. Mmmm coy.

Marley Shelton
??? - Grand Canyon
I don't really know why I always fancied Marley in Grand Canyon. I had no idea who she was, and I don't even think her character had an lines. She was the young girl that Roberto meets at summer camp. Yeah, can't really explain this one.

She was pretty, that had to be it. She was pretty, and was about the same age as me when I first saw Grand Canyon (about 14). Then she was the cute blond girl next door in Bubble Boy. Apparently she's in the new Rodriguez Grindhouse film. Pity I ain't ever gonna see that...

Sarah Michelle Gellar
Buffy
Hot. Sassy. Kicks butt. How can you go wrong? Ignore that Freddy Prince Junior thing. Buffy was hot. Way hot. The way she kicked demons' asses was even hotter.

Sarah was the all-American dream. Blond, big haired, little nosed. She had everything going for her physically, and the character of Buffy allowed for just the right mix of wit, humor and sarcasm. Just generally hot.

Mia Sara
Sloan Peterson - Ferris Bueller's Day Off
Again, another one of those stereotypical 80s crushes. Everyone wanted Sloan. She was Ferris' all suffering girlfriend, who was overall very sarcastically cute. She rolled her eyes at everything, nothing seemed to faze her and she fulfilled the requirements for a girlfriend in the 80s - follow the boy around and don't say anything.

She also looked French, and anything French was hot. Well, back then it was...

Elizabeth Hurley
Vicky Prentiss - The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles - Season 1, Episode 2
I know - weird huh? Except I didn't even realise it was Elizabeth Hurley until I looked it up just now. .

Indy meets Vicky in London in 1916 when she was working as a bus conductor. Hurley was only 27 years old, and had only really done TV work in the UK. She had that incredible youthfulness and an awesome British spunky attitude.

Now that I know it was her, it seems less attractive, but I'm sure if I dig out the episode, I'll still be turned on. Plus it was all set during the blitz, and everything seems hotter when there's a war going on.

Kate Beckinsale
Selene - Underworld
Another one that is probably on everyone's list of hottness. Kate has that dark brooding look that is made all the better with her British accent. Plonk her in a vampire film, and I'd be begging for her to suck my blood. Ok, now that I've used the sexual metaphor...

Kate is hot, in a traditional Germanic/British way. Dark hair, dark eyes and a tendency to keep her mouth slightly open makes it hot. Didn't hurt that she spends the whole time leaping around kicking the shit out of everyone in a black latex suit. Hot.

Scarlett Johannson
Charlotte - Lost in Translation
Everyone is after Scarlett these days, but I'm talking about specific instances here. Lost in Translation had her hanging around a hotel room in her underwear, just being everyday and normal. That is so much hotter than the over the top sexy stuff she's doing now.

The opening scene of the film pans over her body as she lies on a bed reading a book. Nothing sexual about it really, aside from the subject matter. Just very ordinary and very hot.

Eve Myles
Gwen Cooper - Torchwood
Sweet jesus, Wales produces some hot women. I don't know if it's the eyes, the accent or something else, but Eve has got it going on. I do love Torchwood - it's a great series, just geeky enough to tickle the sci-fi edge, and self-referential and witty enough to make me giggle.

But lately I've found myself unable to follow a storyline, instead keeping my eyes pinned on Eve. She's got a girl-next-door cuteness about her that's so attractive, and she looks damn good running around the streets of Cardiff. I also just found out something that makes Myles even hotter. She's half Scot, half Welsh. That's hot.

The interesting thing I find about the women on this list is how they fluctuate. They don't really have much in common, and aside from Eve, I'm not really that into them anymore. Anyway, here endeth the lesson on Tim's fantasies.

Hype that mile!

I'm fascinated by the phenomena of hypermiling. With the increased cost of petrol worldwide, people are turning to *shock*horror* economical means of transportation. This means finding the best possible way to get the most out of your gas, and in some cases, it's a little extreme.

There's even a MPG challenge held each year as part of HybridFest, where contestants aim to get the most out their cars. (the winner was William Kinney of Kennewick, WA, who managed 168 MPG, (223% over EPA estimate of 52 MPG) driving a 2005 Honda Insight 5-speed.

Some of the techniques are fairly common sense. Keep your boot empty, avoid bad weather and keep your tyres inflated. All the good advice your grandpa used to say. But how about conserving momentum by avoiding all stop signs, and coasting around corners at high speeds in order to avoid braking? Make sure you keep the windows up at all times to avoid air drag, and don't even think about flicking on the A/C.

Check out this list for all the various ways in which you can hypermile. Unfortunately, for those of us living in the 12st century and using a metric system, hyper-kilometring doesn't sound as cool. I prefer Hyperdriving. Makes it sound all Back to the Future and shit. Yeah...

Tea. Good British Stock.

During the Second World War, it was, according to Winston Churchill, "more important to the soldiers than munitions", while George Orwell considered it "one of the mainstays of civilisation". Now it has emerged the role of the great British cuppa was so important in the 1950s that one of the main fears was that the country would run out of tea.

In documents released today under the Freedom of Information Act, Whitehall officials wrote that the tea situation would be "very serious" if there was a widespread attack on the UK by A bombs and H bombs.

Such was the severity of the situation that officials – drafted in to draw up contingency plans for food supplies in the event of a nuclear war – recommended that tea was rationed to just 1oz per week, half the ration imposed during the war and enough to make one or two weak cups a day.

via The Scotsman

I do need some new shoes...

A Step in the Right Direction is a sneaker based wearable technology project designed by mstrpln in collaboration with Ubiq boutique. The idea of footwear was pushed further by converging elements of digital culture with fashion and design into a wearble technology. The end product is a sneaker designed to detect Wi-Fi wireless internet hot-spots wherever the user may roam, with every step.

The ASRD shoe is equipped with an integrated wireless internet detection unit embedded under the flap of the left shoe. Once the pressure sensitive insole is activated, the unit scans the surrounding area for Wi-Fi signals and displays the result through LEDs. The three LEDs on the flap enclosure represent the signal strength of any wireless internet signals within a 50 meter area. A blinking LED represents no signal, while a solid LED shows that there is a signal present.



via SnkrFrkr

Trawl the web

Addictomatic searches the best live sites on the web for the latest news, blog posts, videos and images. It's the perfect tool to keep up with the hottest topics, perform ego searches and feed your addiction for what's up and what's now.

via Presurfer

Scent of Buswell

In light of the delight that is Troy Busswell, leader of the opposition in WA, sniffing women's chairs, I just had to do this one.

Kudos to Cameron for the idea.

Tim: 1 iPod: 0

I didn't blog about it at the time, but a few weeks back, my beautiful 30Gb iPod died. Just died. I was using it as a portable hard drive, ferrying data between laptops, and didn't realise that one laptop wasn't charging it during transfer.

Didn't Apple tell you - if your iPod battery falls down near zero charge, it cannot be charged back up again. But of course. If your iPod has no charge, it cannot be charged. There's some deep philosophical shit going down there.

There are a multitude of techniques scattered around the interwebs aimed at fixing this *little* glitch in the iPod armour. Some go from the absolute crazy - "Shake your iPod vigorously for 20 seconds" - to the downright dangerous - "Put your iPod on a hot bar heater for 10 minutes." Instead I chose the rather daring internal inspection technique. I snapped the bastard open.

It's relatively easy to open an iPod, and incredibly difficult to get it back together. A combination of battery, video screen, circuit board and wiring are very neatly slotted in together, and as soon as you open the back, it all falls out. It's actually a very economical design, but obviously one that is not designed to be tampered with. (Yes, I realise I've voided my warranty. I don't care.)

In actual fact, opening the iPod didn't allow me to fix anything, but it did offer a sneak peek into how the little bastard works. Magic. Now that I know that, I closed it up and went back to finding an actual solution.

I found my saviour in the form of a random post on a geek forum somewhere. It's actually quite simple. The iPod can't charge from a computer (or iPod slotted radio or dock) until it has been recognised as an iPod. It needs power to do so. Power it don't have. So you're stuck in the deadly loop. Solution? Power it from a direct mains cable, thus bypassing the computery bit.

Hoorah! My iPod restored it's battery power, and with a quick refresh and wipe from the Mac, it's as good as new.

Now that I've got it back up and running, it's time to put it to the ultimate test, with this list of over 75 iPod tutorials for everything from turning your device into a recording studio to running Linux on the little bugger. Hopefully it won't explode.

via DIY Happy

Mmmmm blood

I just got back from giving blood down at the Perth Hospital, and as always, I was struck by just how normal an act it really is.

I grew up with my dad diligently trotting off to give blood every month, pumping red liquid out for the good of all Australians, so it's really no big deal to me. I know some people are squeamish about the whole blood/needles/creepy nurses thing, but if you're ok with that, you really don't have any excuse.

It seems to me some kind of duty, which is weird, because any duty to humankind is the least of my immediate worries. I'm far too busy whining about my white, middle class angst to worry about anyone else.

But giving blood is the one thing I'm more than happy to do. I just get a bit sad when I go down for my appointment, sit in the chair, get hooked up to the little swaying machine and look down a room of empty chairs. Maybe it's a coincidence that every time I go, there's a group of 100 people who've just left?

I doubt it. Give blood, people. They give you food, a milkshake, a keyring and a sense that you're better than everyone else.

Just FYI

I've been told someone has been commenting on various blogs under the name 'Bob', linking back to my blog. Apparently they've been saying some rather unpleasant stuff.
Ain't me.

Bad ad placement

Get Money! Do Good!

Do you have an eye for composition and colour, and a heart that cares about making the world a better place? If so, don't miss out on Sappi's Ideas That Matter grant program.

Sappi is a global producer of fine paper that believes designers' talents can be used for more than what simply looks good. The company has put out a call for graphic designers to create a printed communication campaign for an organisation of their choice. Whether it's a humanitarian cause or an environmental issue, the topic doesn't matter—as long as it's something you're passionate about.

Last year, designers created snazzy new materials for a diverse palette of fifteen organisations. New York's Innocence Project, which provides legal assistance to those who could be proven innocent with DNA testing, and Chicago's Creative Pitch, which redistributes unwanted art materials, were just a couple that received a portion of the total $1 million in prize money.

Drawn to this contest and want see your name in print? Make sure to submit your entry by May 31st.

via Idealist Home

Ahhhh Todd

Oh c'mon. Tell me you weren't all thinking it too.