Musings of a sexual camel…

I’m getting used to all things that crawl, slither or walk about the place. Apparently my house appears to be a wildlife mecca for anything slightly unsavoury. It keeps things interesting…

Today I thought it might be a good idea to get a cool drink from the fridge. I removed the bottle from the fridge and found my eyes focusing on a brown and black object just to the rear of the fridge by the compressor. Now at this point, I should point out, that already I’ve had 1 rat, 1 mouse, 2 possums, 1 huntsman spider, 100s of cockroaches, literally millions of ants and numerous (as yet unidentified) other spiders.

So todays surprise, lurking in the dark was a snake.

Yeah, I know. First thought, what the hell do I do now! So I did what I did last time - research. The Queensland Government has quite a comprehensive section on their website about snakes (and from reading quite rightly so). So anyway, I’d decided it would probably be best to call a commercial snake catcher seeing as I had no idea if this baby was venomous. Also as the snake was in a confined space, thought he might get a little grumpy if I tried to pull the fridge out! That’s a hard lesson to learn I’m sure if suddenly you find out that he is venomous.

I managed to sit at my laptop in the kitchen googling commercial snake catchers whilst keeping one eye on the general fridge vicinity. I heard movement and saw the blighters large body dissappear through a hole in the wall behind my cabinets - so that’s how he got in!

I guess in the end he did us both a favour, I’ve now temporarily blocked the hole up and I’m waiting for the landlord to attend to do this permanently. Phew!

In case you’re interested I think it was a spotted python (non-venomous), you can check out his vital stats here (scroll down the page to find Spotted Python). The Queensland Government page also makes for some very interesting reading about some the spotted pythons not so friendly cousins.

Ever been tempted to murder someone?

Not your usual post opener, I know, but I mean really, have you?

I’m sure most of us have gotten annoyed with somebody and promised them, in a moment of pure idiocy, that you’ll be reaching for the kitchen knives any moment now.

This is different though.

A 16 year old boy from Maryland was caught plotting to murder his parents. It gets better. He was caught “in the act” by an undercover police officer masquerading as a hit-man. The boy was reportedly taken to the meet by one of his friends parents, apparently that person wasn’t too keen on the parents either!

There will undoubtedly be the usual crap associated with these cases, you know what I mean don’t you. People scrambling to place blame squarely on video games, movies or TV. Maybe, just maybe he’s a screwed up kid, an article on the Times online gives the full story so I’ll let you make up your own mind. It does state however that this kid had been in trouble with the law before, surprise, surprise.

More and more frequently I am receiving e-mails with the following subject matter;

“Mr X has written on your funwall, to send a response, click here”

Immediately I’m reaching for the delete button. You see it’s not that I don’t like to get e-mails from people, I love to get e-mails from people, its just, well - Facebook.

There I’ve said it, am I the only Facebook loather in the world? (haven’t reached the hate stage in my relationship yet). The problem is simple - I don’t understand Facebook’s place in the world. In face I’m irritated by it, am I turning into a grumpy old man?

Maybe I’m annoyed at myself, I am after all a member myself (more out of constant nagging than anything else). Note to self, have more will power to say “no!”

I spend a lot of time on the internet I read a lot, research a lot and use the tools available to me to communicate with other people. I find Facebook frustrating however because I don’t feel it gives me anything in return for my efforts, to me its an unbalanced equation. On the one side you have annoying little web apps (built using Facebook APIs) which do nothing but waste time, whilst on the other you have a huge corporation (yes it is a corporation) which WILL make heaps of cash from the crop of information it “harvests” from its users. No, I’m not anti-capitilist or anti-corporate, but its all about give and take. Facebook is all take.

Legal Andrew has summed this up perfectly. Have you read the Facebook Terms of Service (ToS)? I know not many people do but you should, check his blog for the juicy highlights, it makes interesting reading believe me.

I do consume other services of a similar nature, but I get something out of them;

• MySpace - awesome, great community builder, very useful for checking out new bands or looking info on existing ones
• Messenger (and other IM’s) great, good for communicating with the other side of the world, fast and efficient
• There are more but I think you get the point

Bottom line, I don’t mind having info recorded about me, my activities etc if I feel I’m getting something out of the relationship.

Understand?

You don’t do you.

Alright, now to reply to that funwall message.

UPDATE: Today I heard that Facebook costs businesses an estimated $5billion a year from lost work hours! Aside from the cost there is a potential security risk to businesses from all this activity, not to mention the risk to your own job security! Check the article from the Sydney Morning Herald here.

You know every now and then I have a “this is why I’m here” moment.

That moment occurred a couple of weeks back when I visited Mount Tamborine National Park, this place is nothing short of beautiful and as such can’t be accurately portrayed with words.

So I’ll let the photos do the talking, enjoy.

http://photos.myhappymedium.net/mttamborine

So I just (attempted) to serve an eviction notice. Why? Because last night another possum moved in.

Yet again it came down the chimney and yet again it went on the rampage looking for food. Fortunately not too much damage inflicted this time and the cleanup was small compared to the last visit. Also somehow it got back out because I can’t find it in the house anywhere.

Curious, I know possums are good climbers (they’re tree dwellers after all) but I didn’t think they’d be able to climb back up the chimney. Everyday’s a school day

Oh dear, some people have waaayyy too much time on their hands and not nearly enough sanity.

Techcrunch have run a story stating that a Pensylvania resident has filed a lawsuit against Google, why? because when turned upside down and scrambled his social security number spells Google.

No this is not a joke (though it should be) and yes the filings are valid, there were 8 in total. Do you think Google’s lawyers will be worried?, methinks not!

1. Get home from work and realise you’ve had an attempted burglary
2. See step 1
3. Agonise over step 2

Had an interesting case of “I thought that was you” syndrome today, you see I noticed this morning that the window was open and naturally assumed that it was my aunt who opened it. Needless to say got home tonight and mentioned the fact only to find that she hadn’t opened the window, someone else had!

Bugger

Some f**k head has defintately tried to get in through the lounge window, what is wrong with people? Oh well off down the police station tomorrow, followed by a visit to the hardware store to buy some window locks.

Could have been worse, they didn’t get in after all. Happy days

Well is it?

Take a look http://www.cheddarvision.tv/

Amazingly the site has had 1.5 million hits according to The Times newspaper

Ever get the feeling you’re in the wrong job? Sometimes I do, I was recently reading in the Courier Mail about the costs of hosting the APEC summit here in Sydney, Australia. Obviously its been all over the news and yes obviously its a big deal but I had no idea the costs associated with a conference of this kind. Check these;

• $170 million for security
• $7 million for entertainment
• $105,000 for the cost of the APEC ‘leaders photo’ where the 21 heads of state don the host nations national dress. Thats 1 photo. Yes just 1.
• $2 million for signage all around Sydney, some of which was allocated to banners hung in Sydney airport welcoming the APEC leaders on their arrival. They’re going to see those for what, 2 minutes.
• $20,000 to take some VIPs to a crocodile park
• $3.7 million for the hire of the Darling Harbour Convention Centre
• $500,000 for uniforms for the APEC guides

I could go on and believe me that’s just the tip of the iceberg. I remind you that most of this is being spent on 21 (yes just 21) leaders from around the world. I’d encourage you to read the article in full.

So you see, we are all in the wrong job. Should have gone into politics.

Today I received a telephone call on my mobile from Ray White. Ray White in case you don’t know is the name of my real estate agency, so they pester me for annoying things like rent. I’m sure in order to justify their fees they insist that every 3 months they do an inspection of the house to ensure everything is in order.

I have a problem with this company anyway which I won’t go into here, however my confidence in them sank to a new low today. Here’s a summary of the conversation;

• Me: Hello
• Agent: Hello Mr. Homewood, we were supposed to be conducting an inspection of the property at 11 Mannington Street today…
• Me: OK
• Agent: …however we can’t find it
• Me: Sorry I don’t follow
• Agent: Well we’ve looked in Mannington Street but can only see high numbers
• Me: Hmm, well first of all its Mannington Road
• [Ruffling of papers] Agent: Yes, OK but we can’t find the house, we’ve driven up and down the road several times but can’t find it. Do you know the name of the road next to Mannington Street?
• Me: It’s actually Mannington Road. The house is at the bottom of the road next to the ABC nursery
• Agent: Oh yes I know exactly where that is. Thanks

It’s not that I mind people ringing for directions, I sometimes have to do it myself for work, but you’d think that the real estate agent would know where one of the properties that they mange is. Wouldn’t you?