Brain dump mid flight

It's a strange thing my blogging habits, the more and more I have on (like at the moment) the less and less time I have to blog. I'm actually using the time on my flight to Townsville this morning to blog.

There is one nice aspect of the flying at the moment, I do it so infrequently that it's turned in to a nice time for me to catch up on my huge backlog of iTunes downloads and frivolous stuff like blogging. It's now a bit of a guilty pleasure not only for the catch up time but also because I'm also leaving the littleone and Vanessa to fend for themselves.

First of all on iTunes, I'm loving the whole Genius concept. A while ago a setup a few favourites Smart Playlists so I could easily managed all my music using ratings and genres on the iPod/iPhone/AppleTV. The downside is that I've not got over 500 songs in my "top favourites" and this means that if I'm in the mood something it's always followed by something I'm really not interested in. I threw on a genius playlist the other day and it was pretty much spot on although I've discovered that it seems to "like" some songs more than others. But on the whole it's become the way I listen to the songs on the iPhone. I love the fact that you can save them and even refresh them.

The last few weeks have been pretty crazy, stressful and exciting. I'm sorry if I've been not much of a conversationalist while I've been musing about things and life in general. There were some pretty big decisions to come to in the end which was pretty tough, especially over the weekend. In the end I've taken a bit of a risk but I'm pretty confident that it's the right move and will pay off in the end. I think I might make a few people unhappy in the process but I'm hoping that they understand that's not my intention. Well that's probably enough soul searching for one post.

I've been slowly but surely doing a few upgrades to my arcade table. Nothing major but the CRT that was in it was starting to go in the corners and I was also looking for a way to solve the side by side game problem with the cocktail style cabinet. In the end it was a disaster of viewing angles that generated the solution. I had a couple of 19" LCDs around that I wasn't using any longer (with my nice new shiny 24" in the house) and I put one in to replace the 19" CRT. The issue was it was unusable at the flat angle of the table top. To solve the problem I managed to slot the monitor in the table at the right viewing angle for player 1 but it completely obscured from player 2. Then it dawned on me I could dual mount the monitors one for each player. Result : Instant dual screen cabinet that still looks like and is every bit a cocktail cabinet but Aliens Vs Predator multiplayer is a reality. It's almost complete I've just got to source the VGA splitter to run the dual monitors and it's done. The Littleone already loves the cabinet and this way I'll be able to train him up as a wing man for double dragon.

and here's the descent... Well that's the end of this blog.... until the flight home.

Play-Asia how to take advantage of the high Aussie dollar

The Australian dollar is at the highest level against the US dollar in
a long time (92c as I'm writing this). As usual this had little if no
impact of goods that are typically controlled by the US market.
Obviously the key item I'm talking about is console games (key staple
for all individuals :).

When the dollar dropped against the USD the price of games was quick
to hit the $110+ mark. However, with the rise of the Australian
currrency those prices haven't returned to their original levels.

This post however isn't about complaining it's about a solution. Last
week I had a brief look at playasia.com and discovered that they offer
premium titles at US$49. The result it much more reasonable market for
gaming. I ordered Tekken 6 and Dragon age for a little over $115
including shipping. Certainly much more reasonable than the EB
alternative. Oh and I ordered Friday and they delivered yesterday.

That's it for my gaming community service announcement.

Sent from my iPhone

Just because ben refuses to read twitter

A photo of the bike

A new bike and a new riding partner

Yesterday I cashed in the profits from the sale of the Jamos and bought myself another bike. There isn't really anything wrong with my current bike but I've been looking for a way to ride around with Zachary. My road bike doesn't have any mounts that suit a child seat and the clip in shoes don't make it very practical for trips to the park.

I started looking for a cruiser style bike and settled on the Electra range for the bike. After a fair bit of shopping around and a few recommendations from the bike store I picked up an Townie 3 Speed model. The trip is pretty flat into the park or the botanic gardens in the city or even Southbank (apart from the bridge)

We took it for it's first ride yesterday and while I had loved the ride Zachary is not so sure yet. He doesn't hate it but he's not sure he loves it either. A few people we passed could coax smiles out of him so it's probably not all bad. The bike was really strange to ride especially when compared to the seating position on the road bike but once I settled into the easy riding style it was a fantastic way to get around. The low speed didn't even worry me, at one point there was a jogger keeping pace with us, it was just a relaxing way to travel along the river taking in the last of the afternoon light.

I think the biggest problem for Zachary is the helmet, knowing how much he loves hats the helmet is probably one step too far.

We'll probably a few more short rides to the park before we attempt a city or southbank run. But I'm looking forward to it either way

This I would have tweeted IF I'd had internet:

6:20 Apparently I can't bring my coffee on board with me. I'm so glad that I hadn't drunk any of it.
6:31 Didn't realise I had a premium economy upgrade have to be happy about that!
6:55 The VB staff seem to be as grumpy as bus drivers with giving change
7:07 I forgot it was 3 hours to SA I should have uploaded more video content to my #iPhone I think I'll be downloading some in the lounge
7:55 Turns out the blue screen earler corrupted my system for the workshop today. I'm hoping the 42% battery I have left is enough to rebuild
8:06 The #XPS strikes again.... yet another BSD... *sigh* in case you're wondering @tcns,  wish I'd put my emo today
8:34 #GMEE vs the #XPS 17% and 25mins battery left and the final import is on table 13/197 I don't think the import is going to make it
8:40 looks like the battery is dead, time for some wolfenstien on the #iPhone

Back on the plane....

It's been over a year since I've flown for work which has been a nice change. Today, however, is the beginning of the flights (with a few more ahead I'm sure). I'm off to SA for the day which is a big round trip. My Flight out is at 6:30 and my flight home returns at 11:30. I think I'll be trying to catch a few winks on the plane for sure!

One big surprise is that my lounge membership hasn't expired yet... I really must have done a lot of flights last year.

My own little vinyl revival

It's not much of a secret that I buy music on vinyl. However, Over the last year I've probably bought more new albums than the rest of my collection combined. The biggest driver by far is the addition of the digital media bundled with the 12" discs. For me it's a no brainer to pay a few extra coins to get the same album I can get from iTunes along with the tangible items.

This week though has been a bit of a glut. I had a disappointing shop for vinyl on Fathers day but after a killer of a week I stopped by Rocking Horse for a bit of retail therapy and picked up

The pinicale though was my pre order of the new Muse album Resistance that turned up today.... makes for one happy vinyl listener...

The Mission FS2-AV one week in (part 2)

After blabbing on about how nice it was to install, now... the important bit how it sounds.

In a word amazing... not that they are the most amazing speakers you'll ever here but considering their size (and what they replaced) and price they are an amazing buy.

The integration with the sub is seamless (once you've tweeked the sub level and "closeness to the wall" setting) and is weighty enough to remind you why you need a sub. One of my original concerns was that the single sub would be too light after the 15" Jamo (i even had another matching sub in my watch list just in case). While it will never be able to move the walls (or floor) to the same extent as the Jamo the Mission sub has enough presence to handle even the largest explosion scenes of "Iron Man" and even rattle a window or two.

The biggest difference I noticed was the level of clarity that the speakers have even at low volumes. While never having trouble producing the dynamic range the voices always seem to break through crisply.

The Missions have turned out to be the ideal set of apartment speakers with a perfect blend of sonic weight, clarity and discrete installation. I've probably watched as many movies on the projector since I've picked up the new speakers than I have for the rest of the year.

Of course I could still be in the new purchase honeymoon period so the real test will be when a few more sets of ears come around to critique.