Category: Self-ish

Flying Tomorrow

Tomorrow morning I’m on the plane to the UK for two glorious weeks of London, Winchester and Edinburgh, including the reason for the journey: the wedding of The Most Revered And Regal Leon, King And God, to the wonderful Laura.
I’ll be back in a few weeks. Blogging will be low. Anyone in London who doesn’t already know about the Weds post-work picnic catchup, give me an email. Plans in Edinburgh are still disorganized.
And following the discussion and extensive advice I received here, just now I finally got off my backside and carbon offset my flight at CarbonZero.com. Total carbon emissions 7867.54kg CO2-e; offset cost $270. Worth every cent. They even gave me a certificate to prove it.
Next task is to pay back the good soul who loaned me money for the tickets…

Oh dear.

I just became one of those people who withdraw money at the ATM and then walk away without the money.
Its all downhill from here, folks.

Grah, computer!

[this cry for help also appears on LJ]
Help! Computer people!
I woke up yesterday and my laptop was unable to make use of the internet. I figured this was some passing issue at the service end and didn’t stress too much, but here I am 24 hours later and the problem continues.
Caroline’s laptop is doing just fine on the same wireless connection – I’m typing this on her machine, which is sitting right next to mine which stubbornly does nothing.
I just can’t figure it out. My machine says it is connected, and all the checks and diagnostics I know how to run say everything is working fine, but it just isn’t *doing* anything. There’s no packets coming in. It can’t connect to a website, it can’t ftp, it can’t make any sort of connection to the world outside.
I won’t have a chance to call any Support people until tomorrow at the earliest, so in the meantime I ask of you, my computer-wise blog-reading friends – WTF? What has happened, and what can I do?
Grah!

History of an ORC

ORC, the roleplaying club I started in Edinburgh in 2003, had its fifth anniversary this weekend gone. I allowed myself a moment of pride for kicking the whole thing off, then felt even better that so many wonderful people had picked up what I’d done and taken it even further.
Over on Gametime, the NZ groupblog of roleplaying discussion, I’ve been talking about the process of getting ORC going in the first place. It was quite an important time of my life, putting into practice something I’d only talked about before. Its something that is still important to me, and I’m sure it isn’t the last time I do something like this.
One thing I don’t talk about in those posts is the commitment involved, though. It was a big deal – for the first year, nearly every Saturday afternoon I’d be down at ORC teaching people how to roll a d20. Even after the first year I still attended far, far more than I missed. While other Kiwis on their OE took weekend trips to Europe, my weekend trips were to the Fantastic Realm (a.k.a. the Caffe Nero on Rose Street). Bless Cal for putting up with me!
Anyway, if you want to read about my experience starting a club from scratch, the first part is here, and the second part is here, and the third part isn’t written yet.

First Assignment Complete

So that thing GMail does where it autocompletes the email addresses? Handy, except when it tricks you into emailing an assignment to the wrong person.
But imagine my surprise when the wrong person replied, attaching an assignment that was completed by their 6-month old son…
See how Dom did here

And we’re off!

The 2nd year Social Psyc class I’m TA for just had its first lecture.
My intention is to try not to get thrown off the racehorse. Staying on track = bonus.

New Job Rumpus

Just signed contract for my new job. I’m now the manager of the Centre for Applied Cross-Cultural Research at Victoria University, very conveniently located in the same department where I’m doing my Masters.
So the freelance gigs and casual stuff are now thoroughly on the backburner. I start Monday. It’s only part-time of course but, yeah. New job! Neato.
I shall be celebrating on Saturday night at Rumpus 08: Rumpus vs Episode. You should come too, if you are in Wellington this weekend. The Rumpletron lives again!
(Have I ever admitted that the name Rumpus comes, not from Where The Wild Things Are, but from Miller’s Crossing?)

On My Knees

Last few blog entries, and this one, composed in a few minutes and hastily posted. This is, safe to say, not my blogging golden age. Thank heaven for the friday linky that keeps you all coming back, I suppose…
Doco season chez morgue + cal has continued. Watched Rats in the Ranks a few weeks back, splendid nailbiter about a local body election in Oz. And Jesus Camp the other night, great wee film, Cal and I talked most of the way through it which is usually the sign of a good doco for us. Much I could blog about it but I won’t just now. Anyone out there seen either of these gems?
Sad that George Carlin died.
I am currently in the habit of kneeling, instead of sitting, while working at my computer desk.
(It occurs to me that I studied for exams in high school standing up.)
Make of this what you will.