Captain Fantastic Movie Review

Hmm.

Initially one sees this idyllic rustic lifestyle.  Fantastic scenic shots and a family living off the land.  Kids obediently following dad in a cult like fashion.  Nice and fit and well read.  Experts on every subject from quantum physics to political systems.

As the movie progresses we see the family have morals that I for one disagree with. 

• Happy to steal and lie.  
• Somehow the mothers Buddhist faith belief is to be defended to the hilt but Christians are to be made fun of and of course in this day of political correctness the Muslims are not even mentioned.
• Father is at least willing to kill someone else's sheep. 
• Walk around naked in the caravan park.  (Do it at home if you like)
• Disrespecting the lifestyle of a family that they stay the night with.

We also discover that all is not well in the family dynamic.  At the start of the movie we discover that mom is in hospital with bipolar or something and has been there for 3 months.  Then slits her wrists.  3 months and no visits from the family that she so loves?  Later we discover that mom has been going behind the not to be disobeyed dad and helping oldest son to enter university. 

So is he really a fantastic captain or a man with a utopian dream that is perverted by the power of being god of his own little kingdom.




 

Falcon gear shift cable repair

2003 BA Falcon ute column shift cable disconnect & repair

A week ago I went to drive the ute home and the column shift was all floppy.  The ute was in reverse and that was that.  I called a mobile mechanic who said that they were not really set up for fixing this sort of thing.  He said that it was possible that the cable end had popped off the lever.  I jacked up the ute and had a look and indeed that was the case.  I wired the cable on and was able to drive the unte into the shed at work so I could jack it up and work on it in more comfort.

I undid the M8 Nyloc nut from the shaft.
This is the actuator arm lever.  To remove the nipple, I ground the back of the nipple down and the bashed it out with a M6 bolt that was then chucked out.

The hole was a good fit for a M6 bolt.  I held it in place with a spring washer and a M6 Nyloc nut.

I had to drill out the hole in the attachment piece to fit on the M6 bolt.  It would fit on M5 but just not quite on M6.
Then a flat washer and a second Nyloc nut to attach the cable.

Chris BGS Pre Formal

Travel Insurance

Turns out our credit card does not have travel insurance associated with it.  My recollection is that these days most credit card travel insurances only cover international so I suspect we kind of ignored that in exchange for low fees.

The main contender is the QBE multi trip insurance and apart from the medical evac on this trip the other handy feature is the rental car excess of about $4k.  This saves about $30/day when hiring a car so it does not take too many work trips to make a significant saving.

QBE Single Trip $143.91

Annual Multi Trip 
QBE            incl USA  $965.25+ $468 Snow =$1433
QBE            ex USA    $580.91 +$468Snow  =$1048
QBE via Qantas incl USA  $675    +$500Snow  =$1175  Excess unknown
QBE via TUH     ex USA   $451.82  $364Snow  = $815  $200 Excess  
QBE via TUH    inc USA   $750   + $364Snow  = $1114 $200 Excess 

Ah a new consideration.
Can a second adult on the same policy travel independently and be covered?
QBE        - YES
QBE Qantas - NO  <- br="" surprising="">
QBE TUH    - YES
Conversation reference: 1100685318

P1 Campfire cooking 2016

Friday Night.  P1 is now grade 6 (Used to be Gr7).  I'm organising the campfire cooking.  The leaders have not been particularly communicative and I'm not sure if I am alerting the fire brigade or if I'm buying the ingredients.

Had a look on google for the Hangi Hotline.  Cant find any reference on google.

Qld Fire & Rescue “Hungi Hotline” 1800 017 029 – to notify of campfire.

Risk Matrix


Camp Fire

Perceived Risk	Likelihood of occurrence	Severity of Consequences (IF it happens)	Action being undertaken to minimise risks and consequences
Person falls into fire	LOW	HIGH	Prevention - Warn kids no mucking around or running or fighting near the fire.  Enforce this!
Burn hand or leg from touching something hot or hot coals on ground	MEDIUM	LOW	Prevention - Warn them of hot coals and embers.  Show them the bucket of cold water and instruct them to dunk burned bits in it. First Aid - Bucket of cold water nearby.
Burn or poked eye from kids playing with fire sticks	LOW	HIGH	Prevention - Warn kids - no fire sticks.  Enforce this.
Something else catches fire.  (Building or neighbours garden for example)	LOW	HIGH	Prevention - The fire is several meters from anything else and the ground around the fire is mowed green grass. Water available in the unlikely event that the grass starts to burn. Fire not so large as to present a risk to other structures.
...	...	...	...
...	...	...	...

Installing Tascam US-122 on Windows 10

http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/1649-73-install-tascam-window


1.  Note:No drivers for win 8 or 10
2 Driver down load is http://tascam.com/product/us-122/downloads/
3 Down load US122_Win_3.40f.zip
4 unzip it
5 Disconnect the US-122 from the computer.
6 Right click, select properties, click the compatibility mode box, choose Windows Vista (service pack 2).
7 Double click it.  Click the usual acceptances.  Note the dialog with "finish" came up directly under one of the earlier ones.  The only way I could find to click the finish button was to use Alt-Tab.
8 Plug in the US-122
9 Plug in a mic
10 Run Audacity & try out.

This is what the device driver shows when the US-122 is plugged in without the driver program being run.
















Right click, select properties, click the compatibility mode box, choose Windows Vista (service pack 2)

After driver has been installed it shows up under Audio inputs and outputs.