Friday, May 28, 2010

Will I ever find the gadget geek inside me?

So the new iPad launched in Australia this morning to a huge amount of hype and excitement. People cued outside the Apple stores in Sydney overnight to be one of the first in Australia to get their hands on one. 

Apple also launched its new store in Bondi Junction on the same morning - ambitious maybe, but from all accounts was a huge success.

I am an Apple fan by all accounts - proudly owning a MacBook, an iPhone, an iTouch and various iPods. It would be fantastic to own an iPad as well ......... but I just don't get why you need to queue in the freezing cold and lose precious sleep just to be the FIRST to have one, when you could wait until a decent hour and walk into JB Hi-Fi and get one in 5 minutes on the same day. Do they really think anyone else cares that they are one of the first to get a copy? 

Crazy I tell you ...... crazy! Maybe I haven't found the inner gadget geek in me yet ........ waiting to be unleashed perhaps? Hardly!

Wednesday, May 26, 2010

C'mon Blues - give us our dignity back!

Tonight begins another illustrious battle between the Blues and the Maroons, with the first of the State of Origin clashes set to be a very wet one in Sydney. Maroons have won the last four State of Origin's, so the Blues have to dig deep to try and regain their (and the rest of NSW's) dignity.

C'mon Blues - do us proud!

Monday, May 24, 2010

Celebrating Gran's life

Thought I'd share the eulogy I gave today at my Gran's funeral ........

Thank you all so much for being here today to farewell Gran. She meant so much to so many people, but to us she was our Gran. So I would like to take this opportunity to say a few words on behalf of all of her grandchildren – David, Philip, Andrew, Anneliese, Jessica and myself, Emma.

There is so much we would all like to say …… so many memories, so many good times and so many wise words. It is hard to put it all into such a small little speech but we will try to do it justice.

It seems there are a lot of memories that we all have in common from our wonderful time with Gran that we will never forget. From feeding the constant visitors to Gran’s kitchen window ledge – the lorikeets; to helping Gran tend to her roses and garden; to catching cicadas and collecting their shells in Gran’s backyard; to the wonderful Sunday roasts she use to cook – we all especially loved the novelty of the hole in the wall to pass the food through!

Then there were all of the naughty goodies she kept in her pantry that none of us were allowed to have at home (like cans of soft drink and yummy biscuits); enjoying pomme noisettes as veges with dinner; playing with her in the school grounds at Pymble Public; sharing her avid interest in jigsaw puzzles; collecting all the colourful souvenirs she bought back from her travels to Japan and other places; and finally there were the succession of Camira’s & Torana’s that she drove – always the Holden woman!

Of course we all have our unique memories from our moments with Gran – far too many to mention, so I’ll just share one from each of us.

  • David remembers taking trips to Melbourne with Gran, particularly the time they went to pick up his very first car together. On the way home David decided to see what his new car could do and sat on 140km/h for a while, surprised to see that Gran, who was following in her car, was happily putting her foot down too.
  • Philip use to love sitting in Gran’s sunroom playing with all the old toys ... particularly an old half broken metal forklift. He still has that old forklift today and his son Alex now gets the same enjoyment from it.
  • Andrew fondly remembers playing hide and seek in Gran’s backyard time and time again ….. she always seemed to find him in the same spot behind the compost bin in the far corner of the yard, but she always pretended that she didn’t know where he was hiding.
  • My interest in documentaries stemmed from being made to watch the “World Around Us” on TV every time I slept over at Gran’s on a Saturday night – of course at the time “Hey Hey It’s Saturday” or “Baywatch” would have been more fun, but it was always a good learning experience!
  • Anneliese remembers a time when she was playing chasings with her brother Clinton and took a shortcut on what she thought was moss-covered ground. It was in fact a large pond! Before anyone else had time to react, Gran had jumped into the pond, shoes and all, to fetch Anneliese out – she was always there when you needed her.
  • Jessica treasured the early morning moments with Gran when she stayed over – when everyone else was asleep, she would run into Gran’s bedroom, climb into bed with her and read the paper together until everyone else woke up.

Although we may no longer see her, we’ll always have these moments we shared with her. Gran will always have a special part in our hearts and we are thankful that we knew a special lady like our Gran. 

I’d like to finish today with a little poem to Gran:

Gran, you were just a girl,

So many years ago.

You had your loves and had your dreams,

You watched us come and go.

 

You watched us make the same mistakes,

That you had made before,

But that just made you hold us tight,

And love us all the more.

 

We haven't always thought about

The things that you have seen.

To us you've just been our 'Gran',

No thought of who you've been.

 

But we remember now in love,

Your life from start to end,

And we're just glad we knew you,

As our 'Gran', and as a 'friend'!

Sunday, May 23, 2010

Social networking overload

I think I am suffering from a case of social networking overload ......... too many things to update and I'm not doing any of it very well anymore!  

There's the four blogs I decided were a good idea at the time; Facebook - which was an absolute addiction for far too long; and for some silly reason I decided to join Twitter recently.

Of course I love all of them ......... just need to find a bit more time in the day!

Friday, May 21, 2010

Classic IBM blunder

Hilarious - IBM sent an email to AusCERT conference delegates today to inform each delegate that the USB devices they handed out during the conference contained malware and "we suspect that all USB keys may be affected." Ouch!

In case you are not aware, AusCERT is the biggest information security conference in Australia every year. Big oops!

Naturally most IT journos are having a field day with this one. Don't blame them really!