How much is too much?

Communication I mean. Sure, these days we seem to have higher levels of communication as we have more and more ways to contact each other. Phone, text, email, Facebook to name a few. Per person though, how often is enough? Too little? Too much? For me, I’d have to say once a week is enough. I’m not that big of a communicator (says the woman keeping a blog). The art of conversation somehow eluded me as I grew up. Being interesting instead of annoying, talking instead of babbling. These are things I never really learnt.

Anyway, veering slightly off track here. The reason I bring this up is because my mum seems to think that if I don’t call everyday that I must not care. ‘What if I’m dead?’ is her favourite saying. Much worse if she is actually sick and I don’t call in the mistaken belief that I’m letting her rest. (I actually ignore the phone if I’m sick.) The thing is, I’d know if something really bad happened to her and in general, I don’t have much to talk to her about. Not if I call every day. It’s be, ‘Hi mum. How are you? Good? OK. Bye.’ To me, when we used to stay with her every Friday night, that was good. I’d have a week’s worth of events to talk to her about.

So, am I doing it wrong? How often do you keep in contact with family and friends (those that you don’t see daily anyway)?

Curiosity killed the... curious?

We had an announcement at work a while ago not to venture near the street behind our building. Doors were locked. We were advised that if driving and we normally went down that street, we had best find another way and most ominous of all, "You'll be in no danger if you do not go near H Street". WTF? What's dangerous down there?? Anyway, I merely puzzled over the mysterious message and went on clicking through pictures on imgur. More predictably though, many of my co-workers flocked to the windows to see if they could see anything happening in said street. Apparently there's some yellow police tape and an officer standing about, but no one could really see much else of what was happening.

This reminded me of accidents. Either doing the 360 when you're supposed to be driving because there's been an accident on the road or even pedestrians looking madly about when they hear a crash. What is it that makes people have to look? OK, I’ll react to the sound. Screech of tyres, hand held on horn for far too long in my opinion, but then I continue on my merry way. If I’m driving and I drive past an accident scene, then my brain will fleetingly think, ‘Oh, there’s an accident. Poor person. Thankful it wasn’t me though.’

I’ve noticed other drivers though slow down to about 5kmp/h and practically have their necks twisted out the window trying to get a good look at the whole scene.

Is it just me? Does curiosity overtake you? Or does it not bother you apart from noting what has happened?


                                                                                                             
Update: Apparently it was a chair from a nearby apartment balcony that got stuck on one of the protrusions under the windows. http://media.smh.com.au/news/national-news/highflying-chair-closes-sydney-street-2659944.html

Besotted Wednesdays 14 Dec 2011

Bringing you things that have me drunkenly infatuated. Or is it infatuatingly drunk? Either way, it's things and places I love. 

For (probably a long) while, some of the links may seem like old news. This is because I currently have a backlog of pure awesomeness to sort through.

Whovians rejoice! Two more of the ‘missing, presumed wiped’ episodes have been found! One being with the First Doctor and the other with the Second Doctor. The BBC have released small clips from each episode.

Keeping in line with finding missing things, scientists believe that they are closer to finding what is commonly called ‘the god particle’ in their efforts to find out how life, the universe, and everything started.

From one scientific field to another, new species are still being found. Psychedelic chameleons and monkey’s with Elvis-like hair-do’s amongst them.

Is anyone excited about seeing another instalment of Men in Black? I loved the first two, but so few movies do well with a sequel, let alone * sequels *. The trailer looks pretty cool though and I guess after saving the planet from aliens, they needed another angle.

Ever bought a knock-off product? How close were they with the details? Many knock-offs seem quite obvious, but there’s the odd one that is almost a perfect replica. A museum in Germany offers some of the more outstanding knock-offs a place, exhibiting the counterfeit next to the original.

Love it or hate it, it seems that Comic Sans is going to be sticking around for quite a long time. You may have seen it used in newsletters, passive aggressive notes at the office, your flatmate leaving you a note, but what if popular brands abandoned their well-known fonts and just used Comic Sans?

Are you looking to raise your offspring to be good little geeks? For their first book this Christmas, why not buy them the My Little Geek ABC book? Naturally, you can also get the accompanying iPad app.

Deadlines. Can’t live with them, can’t live without them.

Deadlines are something that I need. Otherwise projects/work/whatever sits around for ‘tomorrow’. Sometimes though, deadlines can be annoying. Like this time of year. Every year, my work shuts down for a couple of weeks and every year, I frantically try to clear the pile of paperwork on my desk and every year the same thing happens.

About a month before holidays, I look at my pile and I think, ‘Yep. I’ll get it all done.’ And every time, I get more and more work. Each morning on my way to work, I run through what I want to get done. Each December, I especially want to tackle that pile and every day leading up to the holidays, my daily plan gets shot down in flames.

I know that we all just want to get everything cleared before the holidays, but everyone seems to think what they want me to do is more important that what I need to do or anything that anyone else has given me to do.

These are the times that I wish I was still paid overtime like my old job. I don’t mind staying back a bit to get more done, it’d just be nice to be paid for it.

Does anyone else find that the more you try to get something done, the more other ‘important’ things pop up?

You *have* to learn that!

A conversation in the lunch room one day got me thinking. One of the girls was talking about her sons swimming lesson and somehow it got around to me never having learnt how to swim properly. She looked at me in shock and said, “But you have to learn how to swim! What happens when you go to the beach with your friends?”

Well, I don’t go to the beach with my friends. I’m not really a beachy type person. Even when I had a boyfriend that loved going bodyboarding soon as the sun was up, I was quite happy to stay on the sand.

Then that got me thinking about why she thought I had to learn how to swim. I know that there are plenty of things that society thinks you should learn and I don’t understand why. Unless you’re inclined towards something and/or do reasonably well at it, then why do others think that you have to learn something? I mean, I’ve gone through over thirty years of life and my non-learning of swimming hasn’t affected anything. I don’t feel that I’ve missed out or wished that... I don’t know, wish I was more athletic or something.

Is there anything that you’ve come across that people expected you to have learnt? Or expect you to learn?

Besotted Wednesdays 07 Dec 2011

Bringing you things that have me drunkenly infatuated. Or is it infatuatingly drunk? Either way, it's things and places I love. 

For (probably a long) while, some of the links may seem like old news. This is because I currently have a backlog of pure awesomeness to sort through.

I can’t quite place my finger on it, but there’s something about typewriters that I just love. Sure, I used to use my dad’s one pretending that I knew how to type while filling up paper with enormous amounts of gibberish. Sure, I can type way faster on a computer, but I still like them. Apparently so does this guy. Although, he’s decided to see if he can paint with his by coming up with what he calls a Chromatic Typewriter.

OK, you’ve got the presents sorted, but what about the cards? GeekSugar have come across some awesome handmade geekified cards for us.

Presents, cards, what about the cookies?? I’ve seen Star Wars themed cookie cutters, but what if you want to make them, but don’t have the cutters? Well, as long as you do have holiday cookie cutters, you should be fine. SweetSugarBelle shows us how to make Star Wars cookies out of regular cutters.

I knew there was a reason I ditched the mini’s and midriff tops. Apparently we’re more attractive when we cover up. I thought it was just my age showing when I tut-tutted girls in revealing clothes!

I love the style of the propaganda posters and apparently so does someone else! He’s taken that style and created social media propaganda posters.

Do you fake it? Or keep it real? These guys love to fake it.

They take popular media and create some awesome imagery.

One of my favourite places to keep up-to-date with technological news. GeeksAreSexy not only keeps me informed, but also amused (and reminds me that I am sexy !)

The Fun Theory

Working in the city, I see so many people just going through the motions of daily working life. Like automatons making their way to work, to lunch, back to work and home again. Rarely noticing anything else going on. Barely even noticing other people around them. This is why it was such a pleasure to come across thefuntheory. They implement ideas, not just to make things fun, but to change people’s automatic routine.

These ideas benefit us emotionally and physically, and in one particular case, the environment. I was really wishing that they would bring their ideas here. Who wouldn’t love ‘playing’ a piano as you walk up and down the stairs, or gain points for recycling? I’m sure it would brighten up your day. Especially if your day at the office wasn’t a particularly good one.

It reminded me of when I came across an adult-sized version of a McDonald’s playground. It was setup for the purpose of a commercial and it was lovely to see so many office workers interrupt their rush to work and have an absolute ball. I felt a little sad when they took it down. It would have been a nice permanent fixture, but of course there’s no real room for things like that in the city.

Do you think people need more fun in their lives? What would you like to see in your area?

Physical photos vs. digital photos

Does anyone actually keep photo albums like the old days? I still have my albums from pre-digital days, but printing out photos I’ve taken with digital cameras, not so much. I still love my photos, but I just never seem to get around to printing them. I currently have an old reminder on my phone to print some blasted photos and there’s a folder on my computer called ‘PRINT THESE NOW!’ I just seem to keep putting it off.

I noticed in my local shopping centre that the two photo shops have gone, but then there are others in the city that are still enduring. So I’m guessing not everyone is like me.

I know there are the advantages of knowing exactly what you’re going to print. You have the knowledge of which shots didn’t turn out well compared to paying to develop a roll of film that you’re not sure if they all turned out well or not. I guess I’m just as happy flicking through files as I am pages. Plus I like my digital photo frame. Much more flexible than being stuck with one photo for a period of time.

What would you prefer? Print out all you photos and have the physical albums or store them digitally?

Besotted Wednesdays 30 Nov 2011

Bringing you things that have me drunkenly infatuated. Or is it infatuatingly drunk? Either way, it's things and places I love. 

For (probably a long) while, some of the links may seem like old news. This is because I currently have a backlog of pure awesomeness to sort through.

I love pictures from space. Every now and then I check out NASA’s website to see what they’ve come up with recently. Then there are the amateur shots that are impressive in their own right. Like this one who managed to capture a whole other solar system.

Still panicking over Christmas presents? I know I am! Geeks are Sexy have kindly provided us with another geek gift guide. 4 awesome ideas and one very disturbing one!

Hands up who still likes paper? Writing down notes, not having a screen glaring at you. Now, who likes itty bitty things? (Me!) Introducing, Little Printer. Wirelessly connecting with your smartphone, you can print out little ‘newspapers’.

We’ve been promised a lot of things that were supposed to happen ‘in the future’. Who else is wondering if we’ll have hoverboards in 2015? Wired gives us a list of a few things that we were supposed to have already compared to what we actually got.

Need a kids activity for the weekend? How about making some good old fashioned paper snowflakes? And introduce them to some Star Wars characters while you’re at it...

Looking for an alternative to the iPad? ASUS have brought out the Eee Pad Transformer Prime. GeekSugar give a rundown on some of its finer points.

Think you know your movies? Love puzzles? How confident are you that you can crack the code on these movie mashup posters?