©åmpß?££'s¸ £Ïvêjõurñä£

No, I havent gone to the darkside of Apple and want to get an iPhone, Renee on the other hand (she says that if she gets one I can have her "hot pink" Motorola V3 Razor. Anyways, just thought I would discuss my views on this new gadget I heard about this week.

Yes, I am impressed that the device will supposedly be running OS X (or at least a variant of it, a la Windows Mobile 2005). It is also very interesting to note that Apple have decided to get into the phone sector with just one phone tied to just one carrier (for now). Does Apple really think their product will to steal market share from the likes of Nokia and Motorola and the likes? I can only imagine that there are more iPhones in the pipeline, somewhat mirroring what happened with the iPod, but hey I could be wrong.

As for the device itself, it sure looks great but I hope, for the consumers' sake, that they have sorted out the battery life, I know the PPC/Smartphones have some issues with that. That huge, bright touch screen LCD panel looks like a power-drain to me.

Don't get me wrong, I personally think that Apple is finally becoming a serious competitor to Microsoft, in the PDA mobile/smartphone consumer market. Dont get me wrong, Mac OS X is a fantastic operating system for consumers, I like it a lot. It's very elegant and with a decent level of abstraction from the underlying UNIX kernel. In fact, it's my preferred OS for all non-development tasks. Mind you, I only used early versions of Xcode and Eclipse, have yet to play around with XCode 3.0 but sure looks good. Now I need a Mac. hee hee.

Anyways, must get back to this.

Sir Isaac Newton (1642 - 1727) invented the first known cat flap. While he was in his attic trying to conduct light experiments, his cat kept nudging the door open and letting the light in, spoiling his experiments.

I would like to add at this point when I told my friend of this interesting fact, he replied with firstly "where did Issac Newton buy the cat flap from" and then after I explained he invented it "who did he invent it for"

Why do I bother?

Mr Miyagi, Daniel LaRusso (okay I can believe that one) or anyone else in the cast of Karate Kid didn't know Karate, can you believe it. Mr Miyagi (real name Pat Morita) was in fact a comedian.

Here are some facts from IMDB on Karate Kid from here

Pat Morita was initially turned-down for the role of Mr. Miyagi because there was a "no comedian" policy when looking for an actor. He was later given the role because he was best for it after reading.

The last spin kick that Daniel is hit with before he is saved by Mr. Miyagi actually hit Ralph Macchio and hurt him.

William Zabka (Johnny) had no martial arts experience prior to being cast in the film. However, he was an accomplished wrestler.

The scenes in this film where Mr. Miyagi is using chopsticks to catch flies in midair is an obscure reference to the film Miyamoto Musashi kanketsuhen: kettô Ganryûjima (1956) where a very similar scene is used.

The yellow classic that Daniel works on in the "wax-on/wax-off" training scene was given to Ralph Macchio by the producer and he still owns it.

Cool huh?

Well, its that time of year to wish all my mates a Happy and prosperous New years, hope you all had a good one. As you can see, Renee, Ella and I made it home safe and sound. Granted, it was a very long trip there and back but (apart from a few dramas with Dad) it was a good holiday and all the kids loved Ella. Will post photos very soon (when I upload them).

Back at work too, Darren is on his way over soon, so Appraisal and Evaluation time coming up, should do okay I hope.

Quick birthday wishes to Nathan, Renee's bro, hope he likes his pressie and card we got him. Nice dragon sword/dagger/scabbard thingy.

Wishing Nola a Happy Birthday, knowing her, she got heaps of Happy Feet bizzo and merchie, so *raises a glass for her*

Type again soon peeps. Hang in there.

Well, I might as well start this by saying, "dont buy the Hokkien Mee from Wok in a Box" as I just have had a severe case of the @#$%'s. Lucky that my sinuses are playing up and could not smell a thing of it, but I sprayed the toilet sufficiently.

Now that is out of the way, I would like to wish all my friends and collegues a very merry Christmas and a prosperous and happy new year. We all will be in Victoria as you all may know, with mum and dad and my sisters. Should be fun, Ella will love her cousins I bet but I think she will miss our cat (Stussy) a lot. Lucky Renees mum is looking after her.

Will start loading up the car tonight and tommorrow we have a lunch at Renees family and then a BBQ at dinner at one of our mates place in Salisbury.

Hope all of you take care, be kind to your peoples and be sure to know that Jesus's birthday is a time for being with the ones we love.

See you all on the flipside.

Well, Ella and Renee been sick, both with stuff that is very disgusting, plus I had a bit of a dose of it all myself, so yeah, we all been sick. Ella is now being a good girl and squirming around all the time, getting up to mischief, grabbing anything in reach, annoying mum with her constant chatter of dad dad dad dad, which hey its cute but annoying at times, playing with phone cords that have been badly placed (not our fault, the builders), and sometimes refusing to eat etc.

On another front, lots of things happening, no word from Justin so I am in a loss of where I stand there. Work has been quite abmismal to say the least, so I have been doing a lot of R&D on stuff I would like to learn etc.

Xmas we (Renee, Ella and I) will be in Victoria from the 18th Dec to the 2nd Jan, so hope you all (those that actually read my blog) have a safe and merry Christmas, as it is Ellas first one, we plan to spoil her rotten and do heaps of cool stuff with her cousins and grandparents.

Might update before we head off. Later peeps.

For those that like Simpsons that is!

For those that actually read my blog, all of us here have had a bad batch of gastro. :-( Not nice, yeah, Ella the little tacka had it too, in fact she is the first one that had it. Poor little one had to go to hospital to get re-hydrated, but hey, we are all okay now.

My favorite news article of the week I was sick, "Ian Thorpe announced his retirement"

I happened to catch part of his press conference during the news... and my first thought after watching him speak and play the pronoun game about this "person" who helped him make the decision? I'll give him six months to a year before he comes out of the closet. Hey, I could be wrong... media reports are saying that the "person" is actually a sports administrator (and a woman)... but hey, he does act a bit THAT way, if you know what I mean.

To be honest, I've thought this about Thorpey for YEARS... and I figured there's no point in saying, six months down the track, when he does finally announce it, "Oh, I always knew it"...

Time will tell I guess...

Well, back to the grindstone.

At work, I been delegated the responsibility of helping roll out the intranet. Sure, I can do it. I like this stuff, but I decided I would create a simple checklist for those people that do not know the things to consider when making an intranet.

( Checklist )

Ella was seven months old the other day. She's rolling over like a champ, trying to stand against objects, and almost getting to the point of crawling. Oh and grabbing anyting and everything within reach, especially mum's hair. Not to mention her scratching, like my work shirt and all.

Once she is mobile, everything will change and I have a feeling watching her will be a lot more work (no more plopping her down with a few toys and doing something else nearby). I've heard from friends that mobile babies are a lot happier but she's fairly content as it is.

As some of you know, I am a big lover of mathematical symbols or equations and physics in general. When I come across universal constants and equations which change the entire way humans think of nature, it amazes me. One of the most famous equations of our time is certainly E=mc^2, which explains the mass-energy relationship. Though I have always wondered about it, only this time, I thought I will sit down and crunch some numbers.

If we assume a mass of say 1kg, the energy equivalence is approximately 90000000000000000 joules or 25000000000 kilowatt-hours or 21 megatons of TNT. Imagine how much energy we potentially have. The word potential is important, since the above energy assumes that mass is at rest...:).. This got me thinking, how much energy do we really consume per day in order to sustain. One way to calculate that would be to find the calorific value of the food intake. Assuming our mass doesnt change upon the food intake and we survive, one could say that the energy expended is just equal to energy consumed. Being a conservative person, I assigned 3000 calories of food intake to show a good number for the amount of energy we make use of. 1 calorie is around 4.184 joules, which would mean 3000 calories is roughly 12000 joules. Comparing that with the energy equivalent (still assuming 1 kg mass since multiplying it by 50 or 100 is not going to significantly affect the equations...again being on the conservative end of the spectrum), the fraction of energy consumed to keep our body in tact is around .000000000013333333 %. This is quite amazing from 2 aspects. One can look at it and say that our entire system works with such a low energy battery or that we probably are expending only a very small proportion of our energy equivalence.

Switching gears a little, I have heard from people who meditate and who are spiritually oriented that nature has a lot of energy. I often hear people saying that, when they go to a park or beach, they could see a lot of energy. Now, thinking back, based on the energy equivalence, one could say that, wherever there is a lot of mass, there is a lot of potential energy stored in that place. Obviously, forests, mountains, rivers and oceans have a lot of energy associated with it and thus the entire universe. Also, when there is a place, like a social gathering with a lot of people involved, you will still see that there is a lot of energy in that place. The only place where I couldnt find this correspondence to work is with obese people. We dont call all fat people as being energetic, do we? When someone oozes with confidence and optimism, we call them energetic. How is that energy defined? So, can one say that energy is not just a "mass" concept but rather a "mind" concept when it comes to people? I dont know...

Been a while I know, but basically we have been busy. My birthday was okay, got some cool pressies. Got a DVD from Ella Chicken (Shrek 2), Dustbuster from Renee (needed one for ages), a board game from Renee's mum (pretty cool too), some boardshorts from Nathan and Leanne (I needed these too, as the ones I had were 1. kids size and 2. needed for swimming lessons). We all went out for dinner, minus Mole and Leanne, supposedly very sick but not sick enough for the next day to go to Arndale. Go figure. Grrrr.... Anyways, like usual the Albion's cuisine was quite the delight. I had the Schnitzel Parmigana, Renee the seeded mustard schnitzel. Mmmmmm, delightful.

Anyways, on exciting news, Ella went swimming for her first lesson on Saturday just past (14th October) pity my mum wasnt there, but was heaps funny and fun for all. Although pity Renee was told off for taking photos of her and I in the pool, considering there was no signage saying that was the case. Grrr.... again.

Work is going well, nearly done the ASH thingo, already 1 week ahead of schedule, just waiting on a few things from Wales team and need to do some more coding for the backend backup/saving of data. Well, off to do some more coding.

Yes, it was the long weekend over here in South Australia, and the weather was meh, nice three quarters of the time. Renee, Ella and I decided that we will go to Storybook Cottage and Wacky Wood in Tanunda (just near my work) and bring Renee's mum and her brothers kids etc. We got the brochure from this other cool farm we went a few weeks ago in the hills. Silly me forgot to update that weekend. That was heaps worth it.

Anywayz, so we drove and got there around 12pm, just in time for lunch. Lets just say, no offence to the owners, but for seven bux entry, wouldnt hurt for you to do some maintenance of the place for starters. Well, sure they had little diaoramas of all the kids stories we all grew up with, (including Miffy - sad but true) but the main part, which had supposedly "games" were just old car parts welded together trying to make things. For example they had two old metal milk jug thingys with welded legs on them and a bar for you to hold onto. (yes there was 2) and you had to race them on a concrete strip about 10m just by jiggling side to side. Nathan and I tried it but damn, sure hurt your butt.

Also there was a big bit of iron bent into a celtic knot with string on it, you had to try get it off. Renee did it in 10 secs. Sure, she is a genuis with those things but hey, bit harder wouldnt hurt. They had oversized chess, checkers and snakes and ladders but the upkeep was not the greatest.

Now, the animals, they all looked malnourished, not fed in about 3 months, especially the donkey. And to make matters worse, we were on our way out and Renee got pecked on the leg by the male duck and made her leg bleed. I was pissed, so I got them to put it away and get her a bandaid etc. Just imagine if it was either Ella or another kid. Grrrr...Not going back there.

Well, back to work now.

Well, it was everything I could have dreamed of....NOT. On a random boredom exercise, I started comparing the popularity of different spellings of the canonical pirate interjection "ARRRRR". I did this systematically, doing Google searches on the letter A followed by any number of R's.

Obviously, the word "a" (the trivial case, which no one would ever use as a pirate interjection) was by far the most popular, with 19 billion hits. "Ar" (still not a common pirate interjection, but the standard abbreviation for arrrrrrrrgon, Arrrrrrrkansas, and Arrrrrrrrgentina) was also very popular, with 622 million. "Arr" is also an abbreviation for various things, and got 16 million hits. With "arrr", we enter pirate country, which continues with "arrrr", "arrrrr", and so forth.

After doing a number of these searches, it became clear that there was an monotonically decreasing, possibly exponential relationship between the number of R's and the number of Google hits. I tried to plot the data on a logarithmic scale.

I noticed, as the number of hits steadily decreased, I figured I'd keep doing these Google searches until I reached a spelling that got no hits. I clearly underestimated the number and diversity of pirate imitators on the Internet. There were substantial numbers of hits for "arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr" (32 R's) ("Did you mean: grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr") "arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr" (55 R's) ("Did you mean: rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr"), and it just kept on going and going. After googlewhacks (1 solitary hit) at 101 and 104 R's, I finally reached the elusive goal at 105 R's. At that point I said enough is enough.

If anyone would like to do further analysis, I'm happy to send you the raw data - just email me.

Here is Ella famous online, turn up your speakers.

http://www.youtube.com/v/1qjhJ7_1EAM

Is it one that begins with a 52km commute to work and ends with a 52km commute home? Is it one that finds the analyst satisfied with his day or frustrated and/or angry? Does this analyst sleep peacefully or dream of blue screens or wireframes and URS's? Does the morning find the analyst excited at the prospect of new challenges or hoping that the day goes quickly?

My days include all of the above possibilities and more. Some are more interesting and enjoyable than others. But the reason I keep at it? As an analyst, I often find myself loosing track of time and place as I:

1. Learn to use new software to answer old business questions
2. Discover the source data that causes the problems downstream
3. Uncover simpler ways of doing things
4. Forage through rows of data, realizing patterns
5. Build new reports that answer unusual end-user questions
6. Modify reports to correct longstanding problems
7. Listen intently to a person, translating what she says into data fields
8. Design SQL queries for different legacy databases using multiple packages
9. Figure out how to make these queries yield actual data
10. Present reports to customers that elicit good questions and no doubts

I have managed people and projects, and sold products and relationships. All of these activities have proved challenging, but none has captured my attention in the way data analysis does.

That's me, an analyst, staring at a computer screen, feeling that this user's question is the most important thing. A thrill charges through me when I discover how the *!$%#@! (innacurate) data is getting into the database. I enjoy a brief sense of confidence when I identify a business trend that is built on (relatively) clean data.

BTW, today is a reminder of two things, Happy Birthday Ilona and 2nd, peace to all those families that were affected by the WTC disaster of 2001.