Dog Wallpaper

Here are two "wallpapered" versions of photos of our new family member.


Majestic (Look at his huge paws!)


Sitting

Rain Check

Presenting the rain script. A must have for Canberra commuter cyclists.

#!/bin/bash

# check the probability of rain.

# Bom URL http://www.bom.gov.au/cgi-bin/wrap_fwo.pl?IDN10035.txt

wget -q -O - http://www.bom.gov.au/cgi-bin/wrap_fwo.pl?IDN10035.txt | \ 
grep ^Probability\ of\ rain

Example ("$" is the prompt):

$ rain
Probability of rain:  20% today.  

Virus eh?

It seems that a computer virus has resulted in the shutdown of a car production plant. I wonder why. :p

Mt Ainslie Ride

Once again, beautiful weather this weekend. So what did I do? Go riding, what else.

At the entrance to the reserve behind the suburb I live in, I found two lost dogs. The white one is Daisy and the other is William. I didn't know what to do really. Luckly two old folks came by to walk their own dog -- a big dog. It was quite scary when the big dog came over and I thought it was going to attack the little guys. Nothing happened though. Old folks are wise. They read the collar tags, and found a number to call. So I left the dogs in their able care and continued my ride.


Daisy


Daisy and William

Today's aim is to find the track to Mt Ainslie. Not too hard really as there were not many to choose from and when you do come across a junction, just choose the one that goes up. On the way, I had my first fall/crash today! This happened while going down a rocky section on the left of the path and I decided that the right side of the path would be better. The front wheel slipped while "changing lanes" and I PKed! Well, the bike PKed and I just jumped off and ran over it. So the bike was injured, not me. Now the right handlebar grip has got some damage :(.

Soon after I arrived at a junction and, following the "junction rule", took the path that headed up. This was too steep to pedal so I had to push. At the top of the seemingly never ending slope was a little light tower. "WHAT! Did I just climb up the wrong hill!", I thought. From where I was, I could see the light tower that stands on the peak of Mt Ainslie. Up on this unknown hill, there was another path that went some where else. After a couple of minutes deciding whether to go down this other path or go back down where I came from, I decided to check the new path out. And it did lead to the road up Mt Ainslie!

Rule Two: If there is only one option other than backtracking, it's not a junction!

Half way up Mt Ainslie

The rest of ride was by the road. At least until by the road didn't exist and I was forced to ride on the road. After all the rocky hill climbs, followed by the "by the road" hill climb, the tarmac "on the road" hill climb was a piece of cake. So smooth! This lasted only for awhile before the fact that it is still a hill climb became apparent (especially in the thighs). Thankfully, the peak was near. :)


Me at the peak of Mt Ainslie


Canberra Triangle


View of Anzac Parade from Mt Ainslie

The great part about climbing a hill is to go down later. Going down Mt Ainslie was a breeze. And what a breeze it was! I took the road all the way down (I've had enough of off-road for one day). On the way down, I reached a top speed of 63Kmh. I also learnt, as I pedaled from 50+ Kmh to 63Kmh that the RPMs required were very high. Looks like reaching 61 Kmh on Northbourne Ave might be impossible. At least not on my current bike. :(


Max Speed 63Kmh

Max Speed 50 Kmh

A new personal cycling record has been broken yesterday! 50 Km/h! To add icing to the cake, this was achieved on a residential road with a 50 Km/h speed limit. My only regret is not putting in that little bit (or a lot) more... so I can say "I was speeding"!

My target is 61 Km/h along Northbourne Ave southwards from the Dickson exit to the traffic lights after the Pavilion. That's where the cops often set up their speed cameras; also the gradient is in my favour. In fact they were there yesterday, but I was only doing 40 Km/h. :( ... 40 to 61... long way to go man! However, if I reached 60 Km/h, I'd be going as fast as the cars on the road. Wow... that would be something.


New personal top speed.

Are ducks immortal?

One notable attribute about the Australian National University is the presence of ducks. Lots of them. There are big ducks, baby ducks, and "teen" ducks. But there is something missing. Call me sadistic if you want, but where are the dead ducks? Apparently I'm not the only one who has never seen a dead duck in ANU. Or shall I put it this way none the people I've asked have ever seen a dead duck. Even my supervisor who had been here for a long time has never seen a dead duck. I've seen dead kangaroos, possums (I knocked one down :p), magpies, and wombats; but never a dead duck! Are ducks immortal?

Below is a photo of a duck family out for a walk.


Mr and Mrs Duck take their kids out for a walk.


Student ducks taking a break from the hectic ANU course schedules.


Lectuer ducks taking a break from the hectic ANU teaching schedules.


The Vice Chancellor "Ian Duck".

Life long learning

While tutoring a class yesterday, a student pointed out something in my solution that was wrong. After so many years of Maths, I discovered that my notation was wrong (at least not conventional). Given the following for example:

5 = 2+3
  < 5+1
  < 6
  < 8

The problem is line 3. By my erronous convention, line 3 read as "5 < 6" (which is true). But I learnt from the student yesterday that it means "5+1 < 6" (which is false by the way). Thanks for that! Now the Algorithms book makes a lot more sense! So it seems that the above is nothing more than "5 = 2+3 < 5+1 < 6 < 8" (which, by the way, is still false).

Weather

Yahoo! Weather reports have been so wrong the past two days. Firstly, it was supposed to be "mostly cloudy" on Tuesday; but it rained. Then, it was supposed to be "showers" on Wednesday; but it snowed. It what?!!? Yes! It bloody did snow in Canberra! Finally I see snow in Canberra!

Driving home at night was most pleasurable. Especially with the high beam on; it looks just like a scene from one of the snow rallies in the XBox rally driving games.


Snow in Canberra

(If you see a lot of snow in the photo, wipe the dust off your monitor.)

Explosive Chemistry

Last Friday (5 August 2005), there was an explosion and fire at Chemistry in The Australian National University. Part of the campus was evacuated because it stank real bad!

Soon after the explosion, the police closed off the road into the campus from Barry Drive (by ANU Tech). I was going for lunch then on my bike. On the way back, I realized that they mean no entry whatsoever, not just for motor vehicles. Oh well... I just backed up and entered via Toad Hall into the Union area. As I had been away, I missed all the evacuation notices and really didn't know what to do. So I just cycled about campus and met some friends I had not met for some time. It's like everyone finally came out of their caves at the same time and... hey! long time no see!

After about an hour of aimless riding, and exploring unknown parts of the ANU, I decided to ride home before it got dark. I had no gloves and no lights as I only intended for a short ride to lunch. And that was it. Boring huh? It was interesting while it lasted though.

I took some photos on Wednesday...


Damaged building


Damaged building


Damaged window


Broken glass

Kangaroo-like Creature

Here's a kangaroo-like creature Singapore guy, Singapore girl, Malaysian guy, and I spotted on the way up to the Square Rocks (6 Aug 2005). Yes! We did something different!


Kangaroo-like Creature

Different Perspectives

Firstly, there's the issue about driving. Driving is supposed to be comfortable relative to walking, cycling, or taking the bus. It's a privilege and a luxury. Now, Singaporean guy's job requires him to work with clients at the clients' place. So one week, he had to go to the suburb beside mine. My suburb is about 6 KMs from the city. He lives on the other side of the city, probably another 6 KMs. Where he was going would have to be at most 2 KMs from where I live. He doesn't need to take a detour into my place before going into the other suburb. So I'd say he needed to drive about 13 KMs one way. He thinks that is "so far"! Now mildly overweight Indian guy (who is now Australian) runs that distance once in a while for exercise.

I go for a drive to Lake Jindabyne one day. This is round trip of about 400 KMs. Malaysian guy says that's very far. Australian guy (not the Indian guy above) says that's a nice distance for a drive. Yes! That's what driving is about. Cutting through valleys, climbing mountains, passing little towns, etc.. And when you reach the crest of the hill and you see the Sun's rays reflecting off Lake Jindabyne, a lake in the mountains, you know it was all worth it.

Now, cycling. When I bought my bike, one of my objectives was to ride on the trials in the Cotter and Namadgi reserves. So I asked Malaysian guy about bike racks for cars about 1.5 months ago. Should I buy the 3 slot rack for $120 or the 4 slot rack for $150. He says go for the 4 slot one; so there would be enough for everyone. I finally bought it today and he tells me he wouldn't go with me! FUCK! Apparently, on our first and last and only ride round half of Lake Burley Griffin, I went too fast. He says he likes slow leisurely rides.

In stark contrast, during tree planting last week, Australian guy and I climbed up to the top of Mt Macdonald and saw all the "fire trails" snaking about the Cotter reserve. And instantly we agreed that this would be a good place to ride.

After dinner today, we were discussing what to do? Singaporean girl says, "let's do something different." Good I thought. "Let's go for a drive", I said. That didn't work. Apparently, going to different cafes each week is considered doing something different. Fuck! We ended up renting a DVD again! Well, it was a different movie so that must have been doing something different! (Unfortunately, we chose a really crap movie too. Damn!)

What's with these Singaporeans and Malaysians! They fly all the way across the ocean to Australia, with its great distances, views, reserves, and cool winter weather, and all they want to do is go to cafes and rent DVDs!

Very different perspectives indeed...

(I'd probably need to duck for cover after they read this. Ha ha!)

Blackbird

I'm in the office listening to internet radio off Smoothjazz.com and twice I heard this familiar song by the name of "Blackbird". Now it just hit me that Blackbird was in the movie "I am Sam". "Ah..." such a beautiful piece. A midi version (12KB) is available at this page.

What you need to win the Tour de France

lance's legs
Originally uploaded by fraying.

Car Computer

In light of the recent revelations that car computer systems may be "capable" of catching viruses, what does it mean when you say "my car crashed"? :) As car makers are taking the risk "seriously", car "crash tests" will now probably include crashing the car's computer. Also, there used to be a joke about how computers were unreliable and needed to be rebooted all the time (you know who's fault that is), and that if the auto industry had the same quality standards, we'd see many more traffic accidents. Now... heh heh heh. Anyway, I'm puzzled why entertainment and navigation systems should be intertwined with critical engine control systems. Keep it separate, keep it safe. Like my windows box never needs patches or anti-viruses as it's not on any network, and is not used for anything other than one game, and storing digital photos. Oh... what a waste of a 2.8 GHz machine!!! If only they had Picasa for the Mac and/or Linux. Grr!!! (hmm... would it work with an Mac-Intel machine?)