ajft

Half the weekend gone and I'm starting to feel human, by Monday morning I guess I'll be back to normal and ready to face the world again!

After breakfast we decided to go for a walk up the Erskine river, after checking out the newer houses going up higher and higher up the hill. Some of them are huge, I dread to think what they sell for! Balanced on poles three storeys up above the hillside, attempting to simultaneously blend in with environment and yet maintain the best view possible. Once we passed the end of the road and scrambled down the hillside to the river there were blackberries everywhere — great big juicy ripe blackberries, just waiting to be picked off and eaten, and unfortunately just waiting to be spread further and further through the bush, creating the impenetrable thickets first started by Baron Ferdinand von Mueller, the Victorian Government's botanist in the 1800's.

Poor people in times to come will bless me for my thoughtfulness.

Baron von Mueller

A weekend is too short, someone should decree that each week we only work four of the five days and have three days off for leisure. I guess the other approach is for me to become fabulously wealthy and then relax in sybaritic luxury...

All too soon we had to leave, stopping in at Geelong for a look around the waterfront, admiring the way that the old docks have been turned into a park. Even the old port authority building looks set for demolition, to be replaced by stylish new waterfront apartments. Dinner at the Sailors Rest, a restaurant that we went to the last time that Mark and Lesley came down to Lorne!

I'm supposed to be having a pleasant weekend at Lorne with some friends — instead I'm as grumpy as a bear with a sore head and unfit for human company, let alone that of my friends. All because of a week of stupidities of last-minute panics at work as everything that should have been done over the summer break suddenly rises up and faces us.

Did the usual Lorne weekend things, a leisurely breakfast, reading the paper spread all over the floor, down the hill for a walk along the shop-fronts, then out to the pier to watch the fishermen. Along the way I picked up some new CDs, a Sun studios Johhny Cash double and the new Paul Kelly double album. Good value for four disks, and finally I've got my hands on some Johnny Cash, after thinking for months that I really should...

Out on the pier we watched the seagulls squabbling over fish guts and bits of rubbish. In amongst the usual flock of silver gulls was a pair of very large dark birds. No idea what kind of bird they were, and too far away to get a good photo with my camera, all I can tell from the photo I did get was that they're dark grey, have light-coloured bills, and they're much bigger than the silver gulls! Maybe someday an ornithologist will read this and be able to let me know what they are...

Created myself an account at http://allconsuming.net/, added a couple of books, then had a look at Leigh Dodds' XSL transforms to turn the XML reading list from Allconsuming into RDF. I think that I've got it. RDF reading list.

...and then another new account. This one on http://del.icio.us/. A shared bookmark manager. Threw in a few of my scribbled-down URLs for all to see [http://del.icio.us/ajft], or to access via RSS.

On the one hand, these services are easy to use and to share... on the other, they're next to useless if they suddenly go away, or if I can't connect to them.

These random word lists in the latest batches of spam are getting quite weird. Sometimes they almost seem to be saying something. I wonder if I could rig up a script to repopulate a dictionary from them? From yet-another-online-bank-scam comes: blacksmith, glossed, papa, sarcasm, concession, riemann, arsenic, seacoast, chisel, dramatic, brent, synchrotron, stonehenge

Yesterday's events must have shaken me a little more than I realised. Couldn't get to sleep until well after 2am, being chased by a car kept replaying over and over in my head.

But so far so good... One successful pass along Cole crescent this morning without running into yesterday's road rager. I still can't make up my mind whether to try and pursue it with the police. I get the impression that all it'll take is for Mr Petrol-head to say “nah mate, I didn't do it,” and nothing will happen. Sent off an email to Bicycle Victoria to see what their legal advocacy says.

On the urging of Bicycle Victoria, I detoured around to Oakleigh police station on the way home. BV had highly recommend that I report it to the police, and to contact them if nothing comes of this. Nothing very impressive in the police response, my description of the events evoked the reply “we can't do anything about a guy swearing at you.” I made the comments that he had threatened to injure me, had appeared to be attempting to injure me, and that I was concerned that he would do so again as I had to ride along that street every day to and from work. The officer promised to phone him up and hear the other side to the story.

Then surprise, surprise... the quickest way back home is to go on down Drummond street, around into Cole crescent, up onto the bike track and off to the west. Who should I meet as I turn into Cole crescent but a white station wagon, same number plate, I might have got the make of car wrong though, tearing up the road and howling around the corner to head back the way I'd just come. As he passed I got a filthy look out the window, not sure if he recognised me or just does that to all cyclists...

Maybe my gravestone will end up with a list of number plates written on it. Maybe then the police will be able to do something.

Today was going so well until I turned right from the bike path into Drummond street in Chadstone, a street with a 50km/hr limit, and was riding towards my normal left-turn into Cole crescent. As I got to the corner, Mr aggressive petrol-head in a white ford falcon station wagon (Vic. PIT-058), came flying over the speed hump behind me, half overtook me then attempted to go screaming around the left turn into Cole crescent. At the last instant he decided that he would have hit me so he hit the brakes, slid to a stop, then commenced screaming abuse out the window — telling me “get off the f###ing road,” “the f####ing bike path is over there you f###ing C##T.”

I quickly decided not to go left into Cole crescent — no point in deliberately entering a road that has this idiot in it — so I kept going straight, yelling out to “READ THE BLOODY ROAD RULES!” Unfortunately that was a big mistake. Mr road-rage executed a howling u-turn and then chased me along Drummond street, screaming abuse and threatening “how about I knock you off your f###ing bike, and then see how you f###ing like it.” He chased me all the way down Rae street where I escaped onto the end of the bike path, then he sat at the end of the path screaming abuse as I rode off.

Do I go to the police or not? Will it just antagonise the idiot and make him even more aggressive against the next cyclist he meets? Will not going to the police just enforce in his mind that cyclists don't belong on the road? Unfortunately the nearest police station I could think of at the time was in Oakleigh, and that would have meant going back up the street past him. Equally unfortunately, Cole street is almost a dead-end, so he probably lives there and I'll have to go past it again and again on my way to and from work..

The two weeks of thirty-degree or higher weather broke overnight with the arrival of a cooler change and a tiny amount of rain. We woke up to a cool house — at last — and a pair of absolutely crazy dogs. Both Boris and Scarlet were suddenly full of boundless energy, racing back and forth and sniffing at all the wonderful wet garden smells.

After breakfast, Mum and Dad and Jo and I headed out to Braidwood for the morning, an ex-gold-mining town two-thirds of the way from Canberra to the NSW South Coast. The town always seemed to have two claims to fame; it was where Ned Kelly was filmed, and it slowed down people down on their way to and from the coast. Now it seems that every second shop is a gallery or a coffee shop, and on the weekend at least, the place is thriving.

The best find of all was a small sign that I spotted half-way up an alley, pointing off to the Braidwood brewery — a micro-brewery hidden away in a shed at the back of a shop. Dragging everyone inside, a strange conversation ensued. The owner/brewer/head bottle-washer remarked that it was always the visitors from Victoria that came inside for a look around, Victoria seems to have a thriving micro-brewery culture, while NSW residents pass on by or refuse to drink anything that isn't mass produced and mass-marketed. I pointed out that we lived five minutes walk from the Goat brewery, and he asked where in Richmond we lived, when I said “Westbank Terrace” he knew the street! Prior to his life as a brewer, he had worked for Channel 9, five minutes walk from our house in the opposite direction to Goat beer.

Canberra airport security decided to randomly pick me and scan me for traces of explosives. Bit my lip and refrained from any jokes, security staff being reknown for their total lack of any sense of humour. Small things were wiped over my clothes and inside my luggage, then inserted in an interesting looking machine. I assume that it gave the all clear, nobody seemed to want to take me away and ask me nasty question!

Leaving Canberra airport we had a magnificent view down over the city, the plane took off to the north and then turned 180° banking over the suburbs of Hackett and Downer, then flew straight over the centre of town, as it was banked over we could see all the streets and suburbs where I used to live, the dirt roads through the nature reserve where I rode to work, and even make out the roof of my flat.

I couldn't work out where I was this morning, at first I thought it was still only Friday and that I was home in bed and had to go to work! Waving my arm around in a half-sleep I managed to hit the rough old plaster of the wall — very quickly woke me fully and brought me back to Bungendore!

It's been around 30°C here for a about two weeks, today is no different, nobody is doing much around the house except sitting around or moving slowly, trying to stay cool. The only excitement was when mum and dad showed us where the BMW sportscar had halted and caught fire out on the road, starting a grass fire in their paddocks. A few molten chunks of alloy are all that remain of the car...

Jo and I borrowed mum's car and headed in to Bungendore for a look around, carefully parking in the coolest patch of shade that we could find. Up to the railway station to look at the local arts collective and their wares — laughing at all the cosy woollen caps on display in the 30°C temperatures.

Down to the old village square and to look through the gallery of Michael Scott Lee's photographs. Fantastic panoramic prints of Australian scenery, I'd love to have one — but which one? Alpine scenes, outback desert, forests, or nearby Lake George... Sadly, the catalogue listing all the pictures of the old alpine huts notes that about eight of them have been destroyed in the last year's bushfires.

Off to Canberra for the weekend — and flying up for once! The seven hour drive is just too long for only a two day visit, and cheap (almost) airfares make flying a possibility.

It seemed very strange to be sitting in the bar in the airport departure lounge, sipping a very expensive beer and thinking that in an hour or so we'd be in Canberra — none of the mind-numbing boredom of the drive up the Hume. I barely even had time in the plane to open my book and find my place before we were descending again.

Canberra airport has changed significantly since I last saw it, but that may well have been ten years ago. A mass of buildings, all part of a new business park, has sprung up around the carparks. Looking just like new office buildings the world over, apparently the ACT government's planning laws can be bypassed because the airport is on Commonwealth land — this business of Australia having a federal government and eight state governments is only good for duplicating services and empire building, I wish the states could be got rid of!

Exiting the airport, Majura lane has changed too. Previously an almost forgotten back road, it's now a major thoroughfare from Gungahlin to Tuggeranong. There's a flyover at the intersection with the Federal highway where used to be just an old gravel turning lane! In true bureacratic fashion, hundreds of thousands of dollars have been spent in upgrading the road, and the speed limit has been dropped from 100km/hr to 90!

More RDF and FOAF things today. Too many of the tools out there in the big wide world don't seem to be able to handle people that have more than one email address... and that's a big problem, since many of the people in my FOAF file do have more than one address. There's just not enough smushing going on!

Ouch — another head-on on the bike path this morning, but thankfully it wasn't me. One of the guys that I see fairly frequently in the mornings heading the other way, today he wasn't heading anywhere, just lying on the ground while two other cyclists phoned for an ambulance. Same stretch of narrow bridge with steel railings under the freeway wheve I've had a few close calls and one elbow to the head...

[http://www.getoutofthebikelane.com/]

Photos of motorists illegally blocking bike lanes. Maybe I should send them some of my favourites; like the truck, or maybe the police car.

An amazing thing happened today though. I had a phone call from the St George bank; they were proactively checking that the credit card transactions placed yesterday were all really from me! I guess the two phone transactions and one over the 'net tripped an alarm somewhere.

Further in the Bicycle NSW saga — I finally received a response to my enquiries, but it seems that Bicycle NSW have no idea of the reality of attempting to travel by public transport with a bike in Sydney. “Just catch a station wagon taxi from the airport.” I politely pointed out that the combination of the LPG tank and the steel luggage safety mesh prevents a bike from fitting into the station wagons, gave up on their transport entirely, and booked a seat on the train direct to Gloucester! Even with the $10 per leg surcharge for the bike it was still cheaper than trying to catch BNSW's buses — doubly so when I got a 50% discount for booking a month in advance!

Bicycle NSW managed to raise my hopes then drop them back down again all with the one email. There I was assuming that the item in my inbox from Warren Saloman, the RTA Big Ride even directory, was a response to my enquiry last week — the one where I was told “Warren will call you back,” - the one that I haven't heard from yet. No, of course it wasn't, its just another advertising brochure, telling me to enter! Sent off a reply, asking yet again, if they have any suggestions on how interstate visitors are meant to get to the start of their ride.

Strange things appear serendipitously when searching through the house. Today we ransacked every room in the hope of finding some glue that we know is in there somewhere... It could not be found, it might just has well have vanished off the planet. What we did find was the spare key for my motorbike disc lock! Now if only I could have found it two years ago, there would have been no need for MarkO's universal key.

We went to the chilli festival, we sat in the sun, we drank the beer and we ate the chillis. It was good.

Attempting to find out some more details on Bicycle NSW's Big Ride; details like when the bus transport from Sydney to the start leaves, where it leaves from, and how on earth someone from interstate is meant to get themselves, their bike and their baggage to this place. They haven't answered email enquiries so I rang. Fun and games — the bus leaves at 06:00 in the morning — so a night's accomodation is required — and from somewhere that has no public transport access! “Most people get driven there.” Then BNSW suggested I catch a taxi, but in the past I've found that a bike box won't fit in any of the taxis in Sydney, since they've all got LPG tanks in the boot, and the station-wagons have mesh gratings bolted across the luggage space!

The costs of the bike collision keep creeping up... Investigating why my seat was still wobbling, I found that the bolts aren't loose — the whole top of the seatpost has cracked, and only about 10% of the metal was holding it together! I've lost track of when I bought it, but I think it was sometime in late 2002. So much for the Sonic brand seatpost.

Initially I thought there was no damage to the bike, unfortunately there's a lot of things to check, and shock doesn't help. So far, for a crash where the other guy insisted that it “wasn't necessary” to exchange details, and refused to give me his name and number, I've found:

• New seat post, about $30
• Broken zoom-button on my camera, can't repair, $600 to replace!
• slight buckle in the front wheel
• loose headset

All this interest in RDF, FOAF and annotating my photographs — today there was a Slashdot article on one of the Microsoft Research projects — World Wide Media eXchange [http://www.wwmx.org/]. Amusingly enough, their server fell over under the slashdotting. Even more amusing are some of the Slashdot comments “Is Microsoft, therefore is bad.” First impressions are that it's a very slick interface, but typically Microsoft — all the data and photos are uploaded to their server.

I think my bicycle has ears — or something. Half way to work this morning I met a girl walking along, pushing her bike. It was a scruffy old town bike, one of the pedals had sheered off at the crank, so she was walking home. I mentioned that there was an old-style bike shop in Oakleigh, the kind of place where the owner was likely to have a box of old pedals and could make a cheap repair. I also mentioned that I only knew of it because after breaking a seat-post bolt, I'd had to ride there standing up to get a replacement... Five minutes later as I was riding along, there was an almighty CRACK and my seat fell off — you guessed it, one of the seat bolts had snapped!

Yet again I find myself having to ride along standing up, seat stuffed in my bag, convinced that every passerby is wondering why I'm riding a bicycle with no bicycle seat. A quick detour into a very large Bunnings hardware store, a lengthy rummage amongst the shelves, a small pack of high-tensile bolts later and I'm back on the bike, off to work to start the day!

One less bike in the house — the “Colnago” has gone to a new home at the Salvation Army's recycling centre. To be sold for $20 or so and make someone happy, I hope... On the way I dropped in to Ray's shop to show him the find — he was especially impressed by the paint-job over the top of the brake cables.

Riding up the street it occurred to me that the bike would make an ideal pub bike, if only we had a shed to keep it in, but sadly, it had to go to clear up the front room. This did remind me that I still hadn't completed my collection of pub photos, so it was a roundabout trip up to the Salvo's, passing by D.T.s, the Kingston, the All Nations and the Prince of Wales — I think that's the lot, except for the Cherry Tree.

Finally got a round tuit, then I got sick of making bad jokes and took Mr Damage off to see the mechanic for new fork seals. With his eagle eye, the mechanic quickly spots that I am not mechanically minded, and points out that a new set of front brake pads would be well received also.

$332.90 later, I have new fork seals, new front brake pads, and a shiny front end of the bike where its all been washed and cleaned. I then rode out the front of the shop and promptly chugged to a halt at the next set of lights as the clutch dragged itself to a stop! It must have known that I'd visited the mechanic...

Just my luck, after struggling through last week feeling almost well, finally whatever cold virus I've found has got the better of me and I felt like crap all weekend.

What else to do in the evening than to watch the DVD of Ladyhawke, a joking comment while shopping last week that I'd never seen it resulted in it appearing as a thank-you gift. Jo says it was one of her favorite movies, but long ago when she was in high-school. Like many old favorites from the past, sometimes they are better off not being revisited! The over-done Alan Parson's 80's soundtrack had us almost giggling through most of the film, and the sword fights and acting were woeful. Incredibly shiny though, I'd never known just how much chrome the knights of the middle ages used!