My blog is currently not blocked by the Great Firewall of China, according to this test. How disappointing. I will be sure in future to say more subversive things about Falun Gong, Taiwan, Tibet and the Chinese government’s many, many human rights abuses.
Archive for July, 2008
Adventures in TV repair
22 Jul 2008Came home the other night to find the TV on and the house unusually warm. Suspected burglary, but nothing seemed to be missing. Figured the TV had caught a random cosmic ray and switched itself on, and it puts out a fair amount of heat.
Things got weirder on Sunday night. TV kept turning the volume up to 100 by itself. Suspected poltergeist with hearing difficulties.
Process of elimination: remove batteries from remote - still happening. Cover infrared port on TV, in case of random radiation source in the room - seemed to work at first, then didn’t. Twiddle with buttons in case one of them got stuck - non-sticky electronic buttons don’t appear to get stuck or to be capable of unsticking.
Evaluate options: take TV to repair shop, stop watching TV, dismantle TV and poke around the insides, call exorcist. TV is weird LCD thing from Chinese manufacturer nobody’s ever heard of, Konka. Possibly similar to Sorny or Magnetbox.
Pfft. I know a genuine Panaphonics when I see it.
Likelihood of parts availability: minimal. TV addiction too entrenched to consider breaking on a Sunday night before work. Don’t believe in ghosts.
Leaving option 3.
Unplug all cables from TV, lie it flat on dining table, unscrew 25 screws, remove back cover. As expected, button assembly is a discrete component connected to the rest of the TV with a small ribbon cable. Twiddle with ribbon cable connector, appears sound. Unscrew button assembly from frame, pull away from TV with loud glue-unsticking noises. Muck around with button area, twiddle with two additional ribbon cable connectors. Stick button assembly back in place, screw back into frame, twiddle with connectors again. Replace cover, screw in 25 screws, connect power cable to TV. Volume levels remain at preset level.
Plug cables back into TV, realise I’ve missed Dr Who. Watch 5 minutes of Foyle’s War before deciding I’m not in the mood for twee period drama, and besides, Honeysuckle Weeks has a weird name. Read book, retire to bed early.
Free to be annoying
15 Jul 2008The Federal Court ruled that the NSW Government’s ban on annoying World Youth Day pilgrims was invalid in law.
Justices French, Branson and Stone, said the laws “should not be interpreted as conferring powers that are repugnant to fundamental rights and freedoms at common law in the absence of clear authority from Parliament”.
It is, unfortunately, too late to order one of these from the US.
Barry Hall, motivational speaker
11 Jul 2008Barry Hall’s current suspension from the Swans may be the best thing that ever happened to him. If today’s article in the Fairfax papers is any guide, Barry has a promising future as a business motivational speaker.
Titled I must be proactive to get through these confusing times, Hall’s article is a cornucopia of corp-speak buzzwords: “on the front foot”, “source”, “going forward”, “timeframe”, “worst-case scenarios” and so forth.
You have to admire his honesty and he definitely has a commanding stage presence. A bit more coaching on the language - a few end-to-ends and a best practices or two - and he’s got it made.
Where is Hetty?
9 Jul 2008In 2001 and 2002, anti-child-abuse campaigner Hetty Johnston’s shrill denunciations and savvy media manipulation were instrumental in the resignation of Governor General Peter Hollingworth, over claims he covered up and mishandled complaints of sexual abuse in the Anglican Church.
In recent months, Johnston has done the rounds of media interviews and opinion pieces sticking the boot into Bill Henson’s photographs of nude teenagers. She has been all over the media calling for tougher sentencing of kiddie fiddlers and child pornographers.
Last night, Hetty was rabble rousing at a community lynch mob over convicted paedo Dennis Ferguson.
However, since Lateline two nights ago revealed that Catholic Cardinal George Pell covered up and mishandled complaints of sexual abuse in his church (gotta love the timing), Hetty has uttered not a peep on the subject.
Now why would that be?
How much user generated content can one user generate?
3 Jul 2008Things have again been a bit quiet on this blog. I must now divide my attention between this, my work blog, Facebook, Twitter and all the content I can aggregate on Google Reader. And the dozens of random links people send me on instant messenger.
What troubles me is that I know plenty of people for whom this is a fairly lightweight regime. There are people who blog several times a day and Twitter endlessly. And it’s not as though they get paid for it, as far as I can work out. How do they manage?
