Global Warming Theory #47

(Caution, this post may contain tongue in cheek bullshit!)

Ponder This.... what if our Air Conditioners are the direct cause of global warming? An air conditioner works by transferring heat (a heat pump) from inside our buildings and cars to the outside world. As time goes on more and more of us are installing Air Conditioners.... and as time goes on average global temperatures are allegedly on the rise... see where I'm going? I know I have stood outside near a working Air Con unit and been blasted by hot air while inside is blissfully cool. Where does that heat go? Into the atmosphere is the obvious answer ;-) surely there has to be some effect if only at a local level? Think about a densely populated area with hundreds of air conditioners all pumping out heat..... 
Yeah yeah, I know Correlation does not imply Causation etc, but hey, I like my theory :-)


Reality:
A lot of us (Globally) are probably powering our air conditioners using fossil fuel supplied power which is more likely contributing to global temperature rise... and then there are the refrigerants used in said air conditioners that if leaked to the atmosphere are apparently more destructive than CO2...

Boring rules....

I couldn't find rules 1 to 4 ..... :-/

The Butterfly (and harnessing the power of Chaos)

This is our Butterfly that has resided on the front of our house for a few years now.

You might think it is purely decoration, but it has an alternate purpose (for me anyway).

Have you heard of (Random) Chaos Theory? A common analogy is of a butterfly flapping its wings in the Amazon causing a series of events that culminate in a Cyclone/Hurricane on the other side of the globe.

Well my theory is Harnessed Chaos , whereby I am harnessing the Chaotic Powers of the Butterfly to achieve a set goal. For example, I will snap my fingers in the kitchen to alert/wake up the butterfly and it will flap its wings to start the chain of events needed to make the kettle finish boiling and trip off so I can make my Coffee. Or I snap my fingers to alert it to the fact that my web page hasn't finished loading...

Other theories I have previously published:

http://pittsy.blogspot.com.au/2005/12/gravity.html

http://pittsy.blogspot.com.au/2005/11/stuff.html






Geoff

It's been a while....

Hi all, I haven't posted to this blog for several years, (nearly 5!!!) so I thought I'd best keep it going. Incidentally my Vegemite Moon Blog has been trickling along slowly in the meantime... A lot has happened in my world over the last few years, not all necessarily good mind you.

On a positive note I found a great job auditing/surveying for a company contracted to provide performance data related to Public Transport in New South Wales. It involves night work in Railway Yards and travel on Trains at all hours of the day! Completely different to anything I've done in the past, which may be why I enjoy it so much. That and the fact I've always liked travel and working in the field. I've certainly learned a lot about our rail system and passenger train rolling stock! I may be in danger of becoming a train spotter hahaha!

Our children are growing up fast, with 2 studying at University now, a third starting University next year, and one still at High School. The last few years has been a constant driver training school at our house and will continue with our last learner driver starting soon.

My own personal health has taken a double whammy, having suffered a heart attack late in 2015, requiring stents and then finding out mid 2016 I have bowel cancer. I am currently just over half way through chemotherapy, after spending 47 days in (2) Hospitals as a result of botched bowel surgery and complications. All is looking good at the moment and I hope to be back to "normal" by mid year!

Here's to a positive 2017! and hopefully some more consistent blogging.....

Westinghouse... soon to be out of the house?

Our bleeping Westinghouse refrigerator is having it's annual spack attack!  Seems to be a yearly event that we have to have major repairs done to it.... This time it's the hinges on the Fridge side... worn out. Causing the door to drop and set the fridge's alarm off at all hours... it's like having to get up to a baby in the middle of the night!!!!  No big issue you say... just replace the hinge?... No can do.. as we learnt with our Westinghouse Oven, the hinges do not come as a separate replacement part... you have to buy a whole door! a costly exercise.... particularly when the door contains the control panel for the fridge!
Last year when the ice maker shit itself, for the second time in the fridge's (relatively) short life we vowed that next time it needed repair we would turf it and get a new fridge.. we are now at that point.
The disappointing aspect of this is the apparent lack of quality of new appliances. Our old fridge (a Westinghouse) was inherited from Michelle's mother and was eons old and still running fine when we renovated the Kitchen and thought that one of those two door jobs with an ice maker/ water dispenser would be a good idea.... The old fridge was donated to son #1 and as far as we know is probably still soldiering on!
The dilemma now is what to buy to replace it.. obviously we are burnt by Westinghouse's latest offerings, also we have a few LG appliances in the house, some of which have worked trouble free for some years, some not.... How do I know what is crap and what will last? I tend to think there are probably not any appliances truly built to last any appreciable amount of time.
In the meantime all the shelves in the fridge door have been removed to lighten the load on the door and the top bracket adjusted in an attempt to pull the door upright a bit to stop the door switch actuating and setting the alarm off. But its days are numbered as I can see with every opening of the door, more "shavings" appear on the floor due to the state of the bottom hinge...
......lets just hope it doesn't fall off!!!!

Chirp!

...just a quick post to mention I am toying with the microblogger Twitter at the moment....@ CessPitts.
Can't say whether I'll stick with it ..... see what happens...




Cecil

spitting image

I had to laugh the other day when Jimmy Buffett "walked" ( OK fell!) off stage. The doctor who just happened to be at the concert and came to his aid was a Dr Gordian Fulde. He apparently escorted Buffett to hospital and treated him also. The funny bit is that I think he is the spitting image of Walter Bishop from the hit sci-fi show Fringe, which I am quite partial to watching....

So has anyone seen them in the same room together?  ..... and how freaky would it be if you were a fan of Fringe and you woke up to see Dr Fulde looming over the top of you, ha ha ha....

Dr Fulde...













... and Walter:












...freaky

cecil

Apply yourself

.....following on from the last post re. android apps. I can now list a few favourites:

games... angry birds, fruit ninja and anoduko ...yes I'm a bit of a Sudoku tragic, my last phone had a sudoku game and it was the most used game...

fun stuff... Flight Deck Artificial Horizon...uses the inbuilt accelerometer sensors to give an artificial horizon display... great fun in the car with the boyz, seeing how much "Bank and Pitch" we can create whilst cruising in the Forester. Another personal fun favourite is the iBeer free app. and the boyz get a "buzz" from one called Spark which turns the phone screen into something akin to a plasma ball where  sparks follow your finger on the screen whilst the phone vibrates.

In terms of useful apps?... the WIFI analyser app gives a good graphical representation of the local WIFI access points, showing the signal strength and channel overlap etc. ...could prove handy if you are trying to pick the best channel to use at home if you live in a crowded WIFI area.... I find most AP's in my street/block are on channel 1 or 6 with at least 4 different ones visable on each at different places around the house, and I'm in "suburbia", hate to think what medium to high density housing is like !

cecil

Androids

Ok, so I've finally got an android smartphone. A Nuvifone A50 to be precise, which has an inbuilt (satellite not mobile phone tower) GPS. This is great - as it mounts on the windscreen (mount supplied) and not only allows me to 'navigate' but take calls hands-free concurrently (the phone reception has to be better up there on the windscreen too I would suspect!). Much better than having the phone in your pocket or sitting in the console or sliding around the passenger seat ....   other niceties are geotagging for pictures and videos taken with the inbuilt camera and with mobile internet you can get "google street view" from the GPS map screen.
I'm still exploring all the available 'apps' (so many to choose from ...) and will comment later on any particularly handy ones I come across.
Cecil

Tool bars

Dilbert recently commented on people who crowd their browsers with useless toolbars at the expense of browser window space.


I still repair peoples computers from time to time and can't get over how many people do this! I suspect some are piggybacked onto some dodgey software download and the user is clueless as to how it got there or how to remove it. They are only more of a nuisance now we are being pushed into using you-beaut widescreen monitors that effectively give you less vertical space than your trusty old CRT monitor!
I hate 'em, don't use 'em, and if I find them on someones PC I'm fixing, I remove them! (No, I don't ask!) As far as I'm concerned they are a blight on the face of your browser and I treat them as you would any malware or virus......
Love your work Mr Adams

Our one eyed arab

...Garfield (our ginger Persian cat) is recovering well after having his right eye surgically removed by the Vet, a result of an out of control lesion on his eye. The eye was removed Thursday week ago and the stitches will be removed Thursday this week. He is not impressed at having to wear a conical collar to stop him pawing at the stitches.... He really appreciates human intervention such as a scratch behind the ear where he can't reach!  I think he's a bit frustrated at not being able to bath himself properly too...he bends around and starts to lick but realises he's just licking the cone!  doh!
Not sure why he had the lesion, but we suspect the KGB!,..."Claude" our Russian Blue, as he does pick on Garfield a bit! They have been separated since the operation, only allowed near each other under direct supervision until Garfield is fully recovered.
....me thinks Garfield won't like the Vet ever again.... that's three "balls" he's had removed now!

*Update*

Garfield is doing really well. He was glad to get that cone collar off after two weeks of frustration at not being able to clean himself and bumping into stuff with it!
The fur is starting to grow back now and his eye socket now looks a bit like a teddy bear thats lost its button-eye. I suggested to the family we get the Vet to sew on a teddy bear eye but didn't get a good reception... I'm now thinking that I'll raid the Daycare craft cupboard and stick a "googly" eye on him ;-P

cecil

another company flogging my idea!

...yet another "people power" generation copycat... this one will give you a free meal if you generate enough power on a cycling power generator.... see I wasn't mad, you could turn your Gym into a power generation enterprise!

From the ABC news website......

"A Danish hotel is pioneering a pedal-power electricity generation scheme it hopes will catch on in other countries.

The Crowne Plaza Copenhagen Towers, 15 minutes from the centre of the Danish capital and five minutes from Scandinavia's main airport, is installing two exercise bicycles hooked up to generators.
Guests will be invited to jump on and start pedalling - and if they produce enough electricity they will be given a free meal.
From June, they will be able to race against the 366-room hotel's solar panel system in a bid to produce the most electricity.
"Anyone producing 10 watt hours of electricity or more for the hotel will be given a locally produced complimentary meal encouraging guests to not only get fit but also reduce their carbon footprint and save electricity and money," the hotel said in a statement.
Hotel spokeswoman Frederikke Tommergaard said the free meal offer applied only to paying guests, not passers-by.
The value of the meal - any one of the main courses on the hotel restaurant or lobby bar's menu - is about 240 Danish crowns ($44), she said.
The electric bikes will be up and running from April 19 and the plan is to test the idea for a year with a view to expanding it to more Crowne Plaza hotels, part of the InterContinental Hotels Group."

cecil

new ubuntu out soon.....

ubuntu 10.04 LTS 'Lucid Lynx' ...coming soon......

LTS (long term support) versions are supported for 3 years (desktop) and 5 years (server) whereas other releases are only supported for 18 months....

and then there were four . .

Sadly we have lost another of our long lived pets, Jack the Budgerigar. He passed away around midday today after 12 well lived years. Not a bad knock for a budgie! Jack was Michael's pet that he got for his 1st birthday in 1998. He will be remembered for his cheeky wolf whistles, constant chatter (yes he talked), and in your face attitude when he wanted fresh seed or water...(he would hang upside down on the side of the cage and stare at you walking past so you would notice him!)

When he was a bit younger Jack would distinctly imitate our voices, ....and also the Teletubbies which used to be on every day out the back in the playroom where he lived.("Hello Tinky Winky"..etc.)
We're going to miss the little fella heaps....  'night Jack

Cecil

Rogue app.

Apologies to anyone who tried to access my "Vegemite and the Dark Side of the Moon" blog recently,  seems the "asteroids" gadget (game) I had at the bottom of the page had turned nasty and was redirecting viewers to an advertising site. I checked the Blogger site and it is a "known problem" they are "working on".....

Thanks to Peter for alerting me to the issue!

cecil

stole my xxxx'n idea?

There is an ad on tele currently that appears to have borrowed my musings regarding treadmill power production, see my blog entry 18th April 2009 . Admittedly they use a dog to generate the power for the teev instead of a "pothole" but still, same idea!  ... perhaps I should point this out to them...I wonder if they'd send me a slab as compensation.... then again  they probably wouldn't give a XXXX.. ;-)

cecil

RIP Bingo

It is with a great sadness I have to inform of the passing of our oldest pet, Bingo.
Not totally unexpected considering her age (17 years) and her health was slowly declining.
We will miss her immensely.

Rest in Peace old girl.

Pardon?

You'll have to speak up .... went to the AC/DC concert last night. . . My ears haven't recovered fully yet!!!

Talk about a powerhouse of a show! Angus Young (well he's got about 7 years on me so he'd be old, right?) was simply unbelievable. For a man (schoolboy) of his age to perform his "stage act" solidly for 2 hours ...and every second day on tour is just simply awe inspiring! I'd had a little heads up on his 20 minute guitar solo prior to going to the show which really didn't do it justice . .
..oh yes, and I'd guess by the amount of light, sound, guitars (let there be rock...sorry) that Energy Australia had to bring another turbine on-line, else the entire state's lights would probably have dimmed with each piece....
The staging and effects / props / lighting etc were world class . . . if you haven't seen their Black Ice tour show and you're a bit of an old headbanger like myself, do whatever it takes to get a ticket . . you wont be disappointed !!!!

The main support act, WolfMother, was well worth seeing too, and quite popular with the crowd...
. . . but the same can't be said for the first group Calling All Cars who insisted on sucking up to AC/DC every second song . . "once again we'd like to thank AC/DC for letting us play, we are really honoured for the privailage...etc" fair dinkum guys, we don't want to continually hear that BS...just play and let us hear what you can do!!!

..sorry? . . still can't hear you! ...

cecil

Lights out!

Earth hour again approaches....
...time to spend an hour with the family in the dark (or candle light)



...hmmm has anyone looked at the birth rate to see if it spikes in December since this earth hour thing started?

update:... I've had a brief look at the birth statistics from the Australian Bureau of Statistics and my first impression is that there is NO noticeable spike difference Dec/Jan since 2007 compared to the other months.. Perhaps everyone is playing cards/monopoly!

Queensland Education System Failure?

....just received a pic sent via MMS from Macca who must be on holiday in Rockhampton....

 

.... apparently it's the other left!

Hey Kiso! hope you've got yer eye on what them banana-benders are teaching yer young'uns!!!!!

Cecil

Movember update

...it's been nearly two months now since the Movember mens health fundraiser and today arrived on the doorstep a prize that I won through an associated site...the Schick Boonie MO-montage. (When I just checked the site was no longer up....)
I won a Schick Quatro Titanium Freestyle pack as my photo I uploaded won a weekly prize! ...no excuse for me looking like a scruff now!

The razor end is a 4 blade disposable with an extra blade for edging.....must be for gardeners!

The other end has an electric (battery) trimmer with adjustable comb.

also came with a 4 pack of spare blades and a small bottle of Shave Gel.

Not a bad pick up for just uploading a photo!

cecil

Not long now to the big Four Seven !

Some of you may know I have this particular affinity with the number 47. This began many years ago when I was 19/20ish years old in the very early Eighties when I was living / working in Grafton. I was in a Rover Crew at the time and we were heading out one Friday evening on a weekend camping trip. I had taken on the responsibility of transporting one of the other crew members who was to say the least "a bit of a character". Being new to the area I commented to "Robo", didn't we cross that same creek a little while ago?....the reply that came back was "yeah, we cross that creek 47 times on this road!"  "Forty Seven times eh!" I replied...This induced some humour for the rest of the trip as Robo had this number stuck in his head for some reason and it cropped up again at camp...It didn't take long for the whole crew to join in. We subsequently never let go of this number....quoting everything to the nearest 47  ie I'll be there in 47 mins or I worked 4.7 days this week..etc.....
Over time I started to notice how this number cropped up out of the blue in everyday life, in the news "47 killed in plane crash" ... " etc. even the 'average contents' listed on a matchbox mysteriously changed from 50 to 47 at one point!
Little things like  glancing at the clock to check the time and noticing you have just happened to look at 9:47 etc...
Now, many years later, I still have this thing about 47...My favourite NRL team, I discovered, entered the competition in 1947!  and I have joined the '47 society' on the internet, a group of similarly '47' obsessed humans whom also have noticed that it's not just any old number!...see this link too.
....and now I am on the brink of turning 47 years of age. I mean, this will be the big one! forget 50...this is the year of all years for me! So excuse me if I have a huge grin on my face on Tuesday...it means a lot to me to get to 47!  and excuse me if I get even more obsessed with 47 this coming year as I'm sure I am going to notice it even more!

cecil

Different

I changed the template for this blog....thought it needed a change.

I'm not restricted now by the fixed column size of the old template so my posts can now utilise more screen width :-{)

ceceel

Update on Holly

...continuing on regarding our sick dog.
Since my last post about her condition I found some info regarding feeding hints for dogs with the same condition. We have been hand feeding her with some supplements , one being Nutrigel, a vitamin supplement in the form of a paste you squeeze out of a tube onto your finger and smear on her tongue.... she likes that one! and the other product is Biolac, which appears to be like baby formula for puppies (same look / smell) which we feed via syringe into the side of her mouth. She's not real keen on it but when it's squirted into your mouth when your owner has your nose pointed up at 45 degrees you have no option but to swallow it!
Then last night (Thursday) whilst I was at TAFE, Michelle offered her a couple of McDonalds burger patties (which she herself (Michelle) does not eat) and she (the dog) ate them!....after which Mikey gave her some tinned dog food which she also ate.
Looks like she has some appetite back, but she is still on the pills and still obviously has balance issues.
We're a lot happier here now! and hoping she keeps eating without us having to force feed her.
Cecil :-)

Vote Earth

Earth Hour are running a campaign at the moment , counting down to the UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen.
Vote Earth and show you want action on climate change!



ceceel

Sick as a Dog

..not me! the dog!

Holly to be precise.
Friday morning noticed one of the dogs had vomited up their dinner from the night before...I assumed it was Holly as there was a thunder storm that night and she is terrified of them!...probably unsettled her a lot.
Friday afternoon we noted she was unsteady on her feet, seemingly not able to use her legs properly.
hmmm I thought, summer, vomit, loss of mobility....must be a tick!....of course I couldn't find one could I !
So off to the Vet....
They were initially thinking along the same lines as we were, but with a closer examination after they failed to find a tick, revealed she is suffering from "Geriatric Vestibular Disease"
Geriatric eh!, yeah well, at 14 human years she probably is geriatric in Dog years!
The vestibular disease affects the dog's sense of balance basically, ...according to the vet she feels like the world is spinning constantly, a bit like seasickness, hence the upset stomach and wobbly walk. (looks drunk!)...Her eyes flicked from side to side and her head was tilted most of the time.
Come Monday we had her back at the Vet as she hadn't eaten any food at all over the weekend but the other symptoms hadn't worsened , if anything seemed a little better.
She's had a cortisone injection which can sometimes increase their appetite (wouldn't hurt her as she's been a little arthritic anyway) and having "Vivitonin" pills twice a day to improve the blood circulation to the brain which may improve the function of the vestibular (balance) system and reduce the sick feeling hence making her feel like she can eat!
...so I'm looking on the web now for ideas to get some food into her stomach...I'm thinking liquid diet at this stage as she still drinks water (thankfully)
The reality is if she doesn't improve the best we can do is "make her comfortable" and make the "hard decision" when it's obviously too uncomfortable for her to go on!
....Of course we are all hoping she improves!

cecil :-(

Font

I reloaded my Linux box yesterday with the latest ubuntu release. (from scratch so as to format the drive using the new ext4 filesystem)....so far so good.
But I just wanted to highlight my favourite extra fonts that I generally download after a fresh install.

First there is the obligatory "ttf-mscorefonts" for (my) 2 reasons:
-1. better look to websites...they often look better than with the standard ubuntu fonts as they were probably designed with these microsoft fonts in the first place.
-2. conformity to font requirements for my TAFE assignments. As some teachers are very specific!...(even though I use Open Office instead of M$ Office)

Secondly I like to grab a font package called ttf-aenigma which has 465 free fonts included...which are quite handy for when you are looking for something a bit different.

Both are available via the synaptic package manager.

ceceel

Multi Cultural (Pet) Society

The Pets in our house currently outnumber the Humans and on top of that the majority are minorities!

The only true Aussie is Jack the Budgie. A bit off the wall is our Jack! with some quirky attention seeking ploys, like hanging upside down staring at you if he thinks his seed tray is a little low on tucker or giving you the chat if you don't cover his cage at night!

Bingo is a DSH Cat, lineage unknown but probably British or American....We like to think of her as our English Rose as she has poise, grace and beauty (and a beauty spot on her face) Has an annoying obsession with me....I can't sit anywhere without her wanting to claim my lap!

Garfield is a Persian Cat, our "mad arab" Iranian. He leaves "Bombs" around the house...particularly in Mike's room!!! (don't know exactly why he picks Mike!). Attitude cat with a Capital A.... Frowns a lot!..."Don't touch me!"...getting a cuddle is a rarity from this one!

Claude-Aspen is our Russian Blue Cat, ..obviously originally from Russia, acts like a KGB agent often slashing anyone who he doesn't like at the time (Human or Feline)...but all the same loves to snuggle up to Michelle (Mummy's Boy)

Holly, the Border Collie, originally from England / Scotland border area (Northumberland). The noisiest of the bunch, as she's going deaf in her old age and doesn't realise how loud she is actually barking ....(particlarly at 2am in the @#*!+$ morning ... and she can't hear you yelling at her to shut the @#!% up!)..maybe shes more Scottish...they're brash and loud aren't they?

Douglas, (who doesn't dig as much as Holly) is a (technically miniature) Poodle, popularly thought to be from France (but before the French "standardised" them, apparently from Germany.... no wonder he's so confused!). I don't doubt that Paris is covered in Dog Doo if Doug's toilet habits/placements are a guide.

so there you have it, a brief insight into our multicultural menagerie, ...it's a nuthouse!

ceceel

Movember

I have joined my brother John in team Danger Mice to grow back my moustache to raise funds for Movember, the mens health fundraiser supporting Prostate Cancer and Mens Depression.

I shaved off my old mo around May this year, so I'm ready to grow it back (albeit for a month) for a damn good cause!

That old mo was with me for a long long time, and even though its been off for fiveish months, I'm still not used to the smooth top lip!


If you wish to support these worthy causes please follow the link:

http://au.movember.com/donate/your-details/member_id/266844/





Thanks and Cheers !

Geoffrey

Million Mark Reached

For those following the Danger Mice Folding @ Home progress:
I was reliably informed by email (thanks Pete) that we have surpassed the Million Points milestone.
This is a fantastic achievement and a worthy contribution to the research being performed by Vijay Pande and the team at Stanford University through the Folding @ Home distributed computing program.



The Danger Mice Team welcome any friends and family to join our folding team.