We hired a boat from "Pelican boat hire"
Chris Driving
Amazingly we caught a fish.
a fish
and of course it was undersize.
At the end of the day, we met the Mawhinneys who collected Callan and continued their trip North.
Saturday, September 24, 2011
Noosa River Cruising
We hired a boat from "Pelican boat hire"
Chris Driving
Amazingly we caught a fish.
a fish
and of course it was undersize.
At the end of the day, we met the Mawhinneys who collected Callan and continued their trip North.
Casting Practice
A very important role - The untangler.
Jemma: "I've got one. Squeel, eeek, I've got one"
Luckily Callan was able to identify it as a Bream. I was unable to make much of it without a coating of crumbs or batter. I did have to however remove the hook. Luckilly it did actually swim away.
Mudjimba
Tuesday - Megan packs the car and heads off with Chris, Callan, Dan & Jemma to Mudjimba. Marcus has vanished off camping with Fergus and family.
Now if the name Mudjimba conjures up images of Sangate at low tide then just hold onto that thought. This place is a bit off the track and so has not had the same level of development as Coolum just to the North.
I drove up on Thursday after work.
Saturday breakfast. Actually before this photo was taken and before anyone else had awoken, I walked the 200m to the coffee shop on the esplanade. Bought a coffee and chatted to some locals.
Chris sitting at the front of the tent he shares with Callan.
The caravan park is nice and clean and we have a shady spot at the western end. The only down side is no bikes, trikes, scooter, roller blades. Remember the days when you went to caravan park so that little kids could learn to ride. Fear and lawyers I guess.
Chris and Callan
Megan and Jemma
Megan
Jemma
During the middle of the Day, Megan and I went and looked at real estate. We went to an auction at Coolum where a house and land were sold for $576k in Frank st. BTW it was a dump (roof obviously leaked) and rented at $280pw.
They may be smiing now but with no refrigeration, the ice cream must be eaten now. You know how Megan is with throwing away leftovers. The astitute among you will calculate that 6 of us have to dispose of two two litre containers of blue ribbon ice cream. We did home made cold rock. Mushing in white kit kat, Violet crumble, flake, milo and topping it off with Maple syrup.
Fill up on dessert.
Real heart attack stuff. I feel sick now.
Megan and Jemma had to stand in the sun to warm up. The Sugar is already having an effect on Jemma.
Now if the name Mudjimba conjures up images of Sangate at low tide then just hold onto that thought. This place is a bit off the track and so has not had the same level of development as Coolum just to the North.
Saturday breakfast. Actually before this photo was taken and before anyone else had awoken, I walked the 200m to the coffee shop on the esplanade. Bought a coffee and chatted to some locals.
The caravan park is nice and clean and we have a shady spot at the western end. The only down side is no bikes, trikes, scooter, roller blades. Remember the days when you went to caravan park so that little kids could learn to ride. Fear and lawyers I guess.
Megan and Jemma
During the middle of the Day, Megan and I went and looked at real estate. We went to an auction at Coolum where a house and land were sold for $576k in Frank st. BTW it was a dump (roof obviously leaked) and rented at $280pw.
They may be smiing now but with no refrigeration, the ice cream must be eaten now. You know how Megan is with throwing away leftovers. The astitute among you will calculate that 6 of us have to dispose of two two litre containers of blue ribbon ice cream. We did home made cold rock. Mushing in white kit kat, Violet crumble, flake, milo and topping it off with Maple syrup.
Fill up on dessert.
Real heart attack stuff. I feel sick now.
Megan and Jemma had to stand in the sun to warm up. The Sugar is already having an effect on Jemma.
Wednesday, September 21, 2011
Power Outages in China
In recent weeks we (work) have received emails from two different subcontractors in China advising production delays because the mains power is going off for typically two days each week. I gather it is some form of power rationing where the companies are told in advance what days the power will be off.
While we are on the vein of overseas issues, we buy stainless steel screws which it turns out were previously manufactured in Japan. We buy through Australian resellers and they are saying that the Japanese factories are still not operating after the tsunami.
While we are on the vein of overseas issues, we buy stainless steel screws which it turns out were previously manufactured in Japan. We buy through Australian resellers and they are saying that the Japanese factories are still not operating after the tsunami.
Monday, September 12, 2011
Soccer presentation
Here we see Dan in a green tee shirt.
Here is Chris with his wonderful coach Alan.
This year Chris played goalie. Always a difficult position because if a goal is scored against the goalie, there is a tendancy for other players to forget that before the ball gets past the goalie, it has gotten past the other ten players. None the less, during the year, chris gained confidence and skill.
Sunday, September 11, 2011
Childrens Talk Matthew 18:21-35 The unforgiving Servant
Today I am doing the children's talk. Some time ago, I was given the bible readings and they included Matthew 18:21-35 and psalm 23. Now Psalm 23 is all about sheep lying down in green pastures and since our Church has a red dais, I could not really see how to leverage off it. So I went with the Matthew reading. Having read the reading and not noted any explosions or opportunities for things to catch fire, my inclination was that this was a good reading to make into a sort of "off the cuff" drama. where I narrate and just grab the kids and get them to act it out and repeat their lines. I had thought of modernising it. maybe have a kid lend some toys to another kid who on lends one to each of several kids. The first kid then demands the second kid return them but of course he cant because he forgot who he lent them to and there is too many. So the toy owner forgives him but later finds him demanding just one toy back from some hapless individual. Problem there I thought was possibly too close to reality and we may have preschoolers all over the suburb throwing their little mates in the sin bin until they find that piece of Lego they loaned them 6 months ago. So I went for more of a period piece. A much easier way to facilitate gratuitous violence in the church.
Children's Skit on Matthew 18:21-35 The parable of the unforgiving Servant
PREPARATION -
Gather props
King - Crown
Servants x 2 - 2 Aprons.
Invite kids down the front.
Explain: One of the bible readings for today comes from the book of Matthew and it starts with a person called Peter asking Jesus a question. Peter said
" Lord if my brother keeps doing wrong to me do I forgive him 7 times". Jesus answered "not seven times but 70 times 7".
[cut away] Who can multiply that - whats the answer (hopefully some 10yo will answer 490).
Jesus told a story to show this and I thought we would reenact the story.
I am going to narrate and we will get people to be actors as the story unfolds.
Narrator: Once there was a king. Ah we need a king. Who is going to volunteer to be the king.
Get king. Put crown on king.
Narrator: Once there was a king who loaned his servants lots of money. One day he decided he wanted the money back. He called in his servant
Organise a volunteer to be a servant:
We need a servant. who wants to be a servant.....
OK where were we.....
Narrator:
He called in his servant “Hay servant come here”
Instruct king you repeat the Hey servant come here bit
King: “Hey servant come here”
servant walks over
Narrator:
The king said “You owe me a million dollars”
King: “You owe me a million dollars”
Narrator: “Give it to me now”
King:....
Narrator: The servant replied I don’t have it.
Servant: "I don’t have it."
Narrator: The servant said "I need time to save up so I can pay it back".
Servant: "I need time to save up so I can pay it back"
Narrator: The king got out his calculator and punched in some numbers. Then the king said “ You will take 400 years to save up enough money".
King: "You will take 400 years to save up enough money".
Narrator: Now the king knew that the servant could never ever save up enough money to pay him back so the king decided to forgive the servants debt. So the king said “I will set the amount to zero"
king: “I will set the amount to zero”
Narrator:
The servant was really quite happy and left with a little skip.
As he was skipping along happily, the servant came across a person who owed him a small amount of money
Organsie second person. Another apron.
Narrator: The servant said to the person. “You owe me $1 I want it back now”
Servant: “You owe me $1 I want it back now”
The second person dug in their pocket and said “I don’t have a dollar on me right now”
Second person:I don’t have a dollar on me right now"
Narrator: The second servant said "I need time to save up"
Second: "I need time to save up"
The servant got really angry and jumped up and down saying give it back now. The second person begged the servant
How do you beg (On knees)
Ok so we have the servant being angry and having a tantrum and the other person begging.
The servant then organised the police to throw that person in jail.
Organise the police.
Narrator: So the police dragged the second person off to jail. Is the pulpit a suitably symbolic place to use as a jail? :)
Narrator: Now the king heard about this and he was not happy
Why?
Hopefully some kid will volunteer that it is because the king had forgiven the first servant.
So the King sent the police to throw the first servant in jail and let the second person out of jail.
Let us pray: "Jesus help us to follow your example and to be fair to the people who owe us and to forgive people who do wrong to us"
Go back to your seats and sit quietly and then jump up and dance in the hymns.
:)
Here we see me (Frank) holding the mic so that the chief servant can say his lines before being lead away to prison by the police in blue hats with swords and bicycle pumps masquerading as truncheons. Queen Jemma with her crown of feathers stands to the left and Michael the second servant in jail in the pulpit.
Children's Skit on Matthew 18:21-35 The parable of the unforgiving Servant
PREPARATION -
Gather props
King - Crown
Servants x 2 - 2 Aprons.
Invite kids down the front.
Explain: One of the bible readings for today comes from the book of Matthew and it starts with a person called Peter asking Jesus a question. Peter said
" Lord if my brother keeps doing wrong to me do I forgive him 7 times". Jesus answered "not seven times but 70 times 7".
[cut away] Who can multiply that - whats the answer (hopefully some 10yo will answer 490).
Jesus told a story to show this and I thought we would reenact the story.
I am going to narrate and we will get people to be actors as the story unfolds.
Narrator: Once there was a king. Ah we need a king. Who is going to volunteer to be the king.
Get king. Put crown on king.
Narrator: Once there was a king who loaned his servants lots of money. One day he decided he wanted the money back. He called in his servant
Organise a volunteer to be a servant:
We need a servant. who wants to be a servant.....
OK where were we.....
Narrator:
He called in his servant “Hay servant come here”
Instruct king you repeat the Hey servant come here bit
King: “Hey servant come here”
servant walks over
Narrator:
The king said “You owe me a million dollars”
King: “You owe me a million dollars”
Narrator: “Give it to me now”
King:....
Narrator: The servant replied I don’t have it.
Servant: "I don’t have it."
Narrator: The servant said "I need time to save up so I can pay it back".
Servant: "I need time to save up so I can pay it back"
Narrator: The king got out his calculator and punched in some numbers. Then the king said “ You will take 400 years to save up enough money".
King: "You will take 400 years to save up enough money".
Narrator: Now the king knew that the servant could never ever save up enough money to pay him back so the king decided to forgive the servants debt. So the king said “I will set the amount to zero"
king: “I will set the amount to zero”
Narrator:
The servant was really quite happy and left with a little skip.
As he was skipping along happily, the servant came across a person who owed him a small amount of money
Organsie second person. Another apron.
Narrator: The servant said to the person. “You owe me $1 I want it back now”
Servant: “You owe me $1 I want it back now”
The second person dug in their pocket and said “I don’t have a dollar on me right now”
Second person:I don’t have a dollar on me right now"
Narrator: The second servant said "I need time to save up"
Second: "I need time to save up"
The servant got really angry and jumped up and down saying give it back now. The second person begged the servant
How do you beg (On knees)
Ok so we have the servant being angry and having a tantrum and the other person begging.
The servant then organised the police to throw that person in jail.
Organise the police.
Narrator: So the police dragged the second person off to jail. Is the pulpit a suitably symbolic place to use as a jail? :)
Narrator: Now the king heard about this and he was not happy
Why?
Hopefully some kid will volunteer that it is because the king had forgiven the first servant.
So the King sent the police to throw the first servant in jail and let the second person out of jail.
Let us pray: "Jesus help us to follow your example and to be fair to the people who owe us and to forgive people who do wrong to us"
Go back to your seats and sit quietly and then jump up and dance in the hymns.
:)
Here we see me (Frank) holding the mic so that the chief servant can say his lines before being lead away to prison by the police in blue hats with swords and bicycle pumps masquerading as truncheons. Queen Jemma with her crown of feathers stands to the left and Michael the second servant in jail in the pulpit.
Saturday, September 10, 2011
The council giveth
I went to a streetparty meeting on Wednesday evening and was reminded once again of why I no longer enjoy that activity. The reason is well and truly the Brisbane City Council and their stupid petty yet all controlling rules and regulations.
The issue tonight was that the council is requiring us to have a footpath closure permit.
Get this, we are closing the entire street and now the council want yet another application submitted for closing the footpath. And its not free. Oh no. $117 plus $3.20 per square meter.
http://www.brisbane.qld.gov.au/laws-permits/roads-footpaths/footway-fees-charges/index.htm
I guess the council would say, well we give you money so you can deal with our regulations and charges.
We have decided to move the stall holders onto the road.
I just can not believe that this permit even exists let alone being applied to a festival where the entire precinct is closed to traffic.
Let us remember:-
Another example - Apparantly if one is going to collect doations at this festival or any other festival one has to have tamper proof bucket to collect the money. Now that is all well and good but why does the government need to be involved. If we as a festival have sloppy procedures and someone nicks the money then surely that should be our problem. Why do we need the government involved?
The issue tonight was that the council is requiring us to have a footpath closure permit.
Get this, we are closing the entire street and now the council want yet another application submitted for closing the footpath. And its not free. Oh no. $117 plus $3.20 per square meter.
http://www.brisbane.qld.gov.au/laws-permits/roads-footpaths/footway-fees-charges/index.htm
I guess the council would say, well we give you money so you can deal with our regulations and charges.
We have decided to move the stall holders onto the road.
I just can not believe that this permit even exists let alone being applied to a festival where the entire precinct is closed to traffic.
Let us remember:-
- Absolute power corrupts absolutely
- The golden rule - He who has the gold makes the rules and
- Regulation stifles innovation.
Another example - Apparantly if one is going to collect doations at this festival or any other festival one has to have tamper proof bucket to collect the money. Now that is all well and good but why does the government need to be involved. If we as a festival have sloppy procedures and someone nicks the money then surely that should be our problem. Why do we need the government involved?
microphones
I am considering buying a couple of hand held mics and some choir mics.
It would appear that the pro gear is around $1k per unit in some cases. I wonder what is available at the low end of the market and I wonder what its tech performance is.
What would be really nice would be to measure some of this. But for that, I would need a calibrated microphone. I think I could use other gear that I have access to generate and transmit the signal and then to analyse the received signal.
At the end of the day, does it make any real difference anyway.
Takstar PCM6100 $US27.99 +$9.99 = $US38
http://www.buytakstar.com/product/takstar-pcm-6100-professional-condenser-microphone
The pattern seems the same as the 6110 so why would one buy the 6110. Also the peak is about 8dB. That seems a lot.
Takstar PCM6110 $US54.99 + $19.99 = $US75
http://www.buytakstar.com/product/takstar-pcm-6110-professional-recording-microphone
So what does a somewhat more expensive mic cost and look like
Brisbane Sound sell this mic. Its a Neuman KM184 for $AU1649.00 (inc GST but at that price who's counting)
http://www.brisound.com.au/Retail_Catalogue_page/1206_item.html?ref_cat_id=WIRED
From the plot, it seems to have a much flatter response.
Takstar 5600
Behringer C2 $AU89 for two ($44.50 each)
https://www.storedj.com.au/products/BEH-C2
I could not find a official Behringer freq resp plot.
The freq response plot comes from
http://www.gearslutz.com/board/attachments/low-end-theory/235834d1305962431-behringer-c2-mics-world-greatest-sdcs-behringer-20c-2-20stereopaar-20cardioide_1-messkurve.jpg
This looks to have only about a 2dB peak around 7kHz. I assume the top trace is freq response.
Behringer C4 $96.99 Cranbourne $109 Store DJ
http://www.cranbournemusic.com.au/cstore/resultsql.html?prod_group=MICROPHONES&category=CONDENSOR%20MICROPHONES
Again, no freq response plot available.
This web page describes a home made apparantly flat mic
http://www.speakerbuilder.net/web_files/Articles/diymic/diymicmain.htm
Why is a $2 electret mic so flat?
This is a Panasonic WM-64 from digikey
http://search.digikey.com/scripts/DkSearch/dksus.dll?Cat=720968&k=9958
It would appear that the pro gear is around $1k per unit in some cases. I wonder what is available at the low end of the market and I wonder what its tech performance is.
What would be really nice would be to measure some of this. But for that, I would need a calibrated microphone. I think I could use other gear that I have access to generate and transmit the signal and then to analyse the received signal.
At the end of the day, does it make any real difference anyway.
Takstar PCM6100 $US27.99 +$9.99 = $US38http://www.buytakstar.com/product/takstar-pcm-6100-professional-condenser-microphone
The pattern seems the same as the 6110 so why would one buy the 6110. Also the peak is about 8dB. That seems a lot.
Takstar PCM6110 $US54.99 + $19.99 = $US75
http://www.buytakstar.com/product/takstar-pcm-6110-professional-recording-microphone So what does a somewhat more expensive mic cost and look likeBrisbane Sound sell this mic. Its a Neuman KM184 for $AU1649.00 (inc GST but at that price who's counting)
http://www.brisound.com.au/Retail_Catalogue_page/1206_item.html?ref_cat_id=WIRED
From the plot, it seems to have a much flatter response.
Takstar 5600
Behringer C2 $AU89 for two ($44.50 each)https://www.storedj.com.au/products/BEH-C2
I could not find a official Behringer freq resp plot.
The freq response plot comes from
http://www.gearslutz.com/board/attachments/low-end-theory/235834d1305962431-behringer-c2-mics-world-greatest-sdcs-behringer-20c-2-20stereopaar-20cardioide_1-messkurve.jpg
This looks to have only about a 2dB peak around 7kHz. I assume the top trace is freq response.
Behringer C4 $96.99 Cranbourne $109 Store DJ
http://www.cranbournemusic.com.au/cstore/resultsql.html?prod_group=MICROPHONES&category=CONDENSOR%20MICROPHONES
Again, no freq response plot available.
This web page describes a home made apparantly flat mic
http://www.speakerbuilder.net/web_files/Articles/diymic/diymicmain.htm
Why is a $2 electret mic so flat?
This is a Panasonic WM-64 from digikey
http://search.digikey.com/scripts/DkSearch/dksus.dll?Cat=720968&k=9958
Sunday, September 4, 2011
Facetime
Apple Facetime problems
Apple has a video conferencing app called facetime.
Dan has an Ipod touch 4. This is the min required hardware because it has a front facing camera.
We had the Manthey I touch 4 here as their family was here for Jemma's birthday party. Bob was keen to get the facetime app running so the two kids could video conference.
But it was not a happeing thing. Each phone would come up in 'facetime' with the picture from the front facing camera live on the screen but neither seemed to be able to 'call' the other.
Bob set about making the contact details and settings to be absolutelyt identical on the two devices. We changed settings and rebooted. We searched the net and read posts by others that professed various solutions. But it all turned out to be kwakery.
I hope apple fix it in some future os upgrade.
Apple has a video conferencing app called facetime.
Dan has an Ipod touch 4. This is the min required hardware because it has a front facing camera.
We had the Manthey I touch 4 here as their family was here for Jemma's birthday party. Bob was keen to get the facetime app running so the two kids could video conference.
But it was not a happeing thing. Each phone would come up in 'facetime' with the picture from the front facing camera live on the screen but neither seemed to be able to 'call' the other.
Bob set about making the contact details and settings to be absolutelyt identical on the two devices. We changed settings and rebooted. We searched the net and read posts by others that professed various solutions. But it all turned out to be kwakery.
I hope apple fix it in some future os upgrade.
Friday, September 2, 2011
New Floor
Recently Premier Bligh kindly gave our family some money to help with the rebuilding of our flood damaged home. We spent it on a fact finding mission to investigate the effects of climate change and discovered it's all true. We went skiing peak season and it rained. Rained. Peask season. What is the world coming to. Global warming. Thats what it is.
So being a good greenie, we have planned on reusing the wood from the flood damaged floor. The new floor is underway thanks to Ian.
Ian lays the first board.
The plan is build the new floor only out of hard wood so that if it gets wet again that it will all expand at the same rate.
While Ian lays boards, I (frank) am de nailing the old boards and inspecting them. The pile front left are the poor quality boards that form the bearers. The pile back left are the good boards and they will be used as floor boards.
So being a good greenie, we have planned on reusing the wood from the flood damaged floor. The new floor is underway thanks to Ian.
Ian lays the first board.
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