I've mentioned the thesis time and time again. I've also mentioned that it's not really getting anywhere time and time again. Well, not much has changed... still. I'm starting to get quite annoyed, more so than worried - but oh well.
I'm going to talk about some psychology. Something a bit different than what i'm used to posting. Anyway, i'm finding it quite hard to remain focused on work - I find myself procrastinating to the extreme. I'm posting on my blog, i'm reading lots of news, playing lots of sports, and bumming around the house.
I'm guessing that this is the case as i'm not really getting anywhere. The lack of progress leads onto the further lack of progress. Maybe this happens to others as well. I guess the only exception to the rule could be a looming deadline. A deadline usually is all it takes for progress to surge forward. Comments?
I need a holiday :(
On a final note - the fun that can be seen in student politics.
This little segment is from today outside Eastern Avenue Lawns.
Leftie: "Daddy's paying for your election campaign again is he?"
Rightie: "At least I know who my dad is"
ROFL! Slammed. Now that is a comeback worthy of votes.
Wednesday, September 14, 2005
Monday, September 12, 2005
Outrage at the Oval and Koizumi Wins
This weekend has been quite intense - i'm still not really getting anywhere with my thesis (i've tried, trust me), the Aussies have been rorted, and Japan's Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi has won comfortably in Japan's general election.
Skipping the thesis, i'm going to first talk about what happened last night. Australia screwed up bigtime - giving the game back to England by sheer incompetence. Incompetence in playing swing bowling. Going from 2/270 odd to faling short of England's total is really quite poor. It was time for England to have a bat... and what happens - the umpires decide it's too dark for the Aussie pacemen to bowl. Ok, fine.
So what happens? The master, Shane Warne, is brought into the attack - and dismisses Andrew Strauss, 1/2! Not too long afterwards the umpires have another chat and decide to stop play altogether. What the hell? Australia were going to bowl two spinners (only one of which is a real full-time spinner) ... the light wasn't so bad that you couldnt' see a ball being bowled slowly. The English batsmen seemed to be hitting the ball just fine.
I really don't see how Australia had an unfair advantage given the supposedly-low level of light. Rudi, the South African umpire, said that it was highly possible that the batsmen could lose sight of the ball when the ball was being bowled slowly. Really? I'm sure that if that was the case then it would be a loss of concentration rather than due to the light. Even if it was potentially hard to see the ball when batting... then it would be hard for the fieldsmen to see the ball as well? (Potential for drop catches and boundaries due to poor visibility). PLUS Australia was going to bowl a part time spinner - hardly advantageous to the Aussies. I find the whole situation ridiculous - we want a result here... win or lose. Keeping the fight going between Australia and England would have been the best thing for cricket - unfortunately the umpires didn't agree.
So there's my rant on The Ashes. Another thing i'd like to mention is the amazing victory of Japan's Liberal Democratic Party (LDP). The LDP, along with its coalition party New Komeito Party, has won 327 seats out of the 480-member House of Representatives. That's an amazing victory, approximately a two-thirds majority. This election saw the highest voter turnout in over a decade - 67.52%. A great turnout and a great result.
The early election was called due to the failure of the Japanese Diet (parliament) to pass Koizumi's bills on postal reform - that being the privatisation of Japan Post. Koizumi dissolved the Diet and called for an election (I think it's over a year before the end of term).
Why was/is postal reform such an issue in Japan? Well first of all Japan Post is a big mofo. It's one of the largest financial institutions in the world. Japan Post is not only a post office but it effectively acts as a bank as well. Having this behemoth being owned by the government is asking for trouble. A big cash cow for the government leads to lots of spending on useless projects (sounds alot like student Unions having a cash cow, the students, to waste money on things that people hardly use). Japan Post, as far as I could tell, was somewhat corrupted as it provided funding for politically-aimed projects... effectively "vote buying" in disguise.
Well done Koizumi.
Skipping the thesis, i'm going to first talk about what happened last night. Australia screwed up bigtime - giving the game back to England by sheer incompetence. Incompetence in playing swing bowling. Going from 2/270 odd to faling short of England's total is really quite poor. It was time for England to have a bat... and what happens - the umpires decide it's too dark for the Aussie pacemen to bowl. Ok, fine.
So what happens? The master, Shane Warne, is brought into the attack - and dismisses Andrew Strauss, 1/2! Not too long afterwards the umpires have another chat and decide to stop play altogether. What the hell? Australia were going to bowl two spinners (only one of which is a real full-time spinner) ... the light wasn't so bad that you couldnt' see a ball being bowled slowly. The English batsmen seemed to be hitting the ball just fine.
I really don't see how Australia had an unfair advantage given the supposedly-low level of light. Rudi, the South African umpire, said that it was highly possible that the batsmen could lose sight of the ball when the ball was being bowled slowly. Really? I'm sure that if that was the case then it would be a loss of concentration rather than due to the light. Even if it was potentially hard to see the ball when batting... then it would be hard for the fieldsmen to see the ball as well? (Potential for drop catches and boundaries due to poor visibility). PLUS Australia was going to bowl a part time spinner - hardly advantageous to the Aussies. I find the whole situation ridiculous - we want a result here... win or lose. Keeping the fight going between Australia and England would have been the best thing for cricket - unfortunately the umpires didn't agree.
So there's my rant on The Ashes. Another thing i'd like to mention is the amazing victory of Japan's Liberal Democratic Party (LDP). The LDP, along with its coalition party New Komeito Party, has won 327 seats out of the 480-member House of Representatives. That's an amazing victory, approximately a two-thirds majority. This election saw the highest voter turnout in over a decade - 67.52%. A great turnout and a great result.
The early election was called due to the failure of the Japanese Diet (parliament) to pass Koizumi's bills on postal reform - that being the privatisation of Japan Post. Koizumi dissolved the Diet and called for an election (I think it's over a year before the end of term).
Why was/is postal reform such an issue in Japan? Well first of all Japan Post is a big mofo. It's one of the largest financial institutions in the world. Japan Post is not only a post office but it effectively acts as a bank as well. Having this behemoth being owned by the government is asking for trouble. A big cash cow for the government leads to lots of spending on useless projects (sounds alot like student Unions having a cash cow, the students, to waste money on things that people hardly use). Japan Post, as far as I could tell, was somewhat corrupted as it provided funding for politically-aimed projects... effectively "vote buying" in disguise.
Well done Koizumi.
Sunday, September 11, 2005
Season 2005-06 Begins
Yesterday marked the first day of the first match of the 2005-06 Cricket season, and boy was it an interesting day. In summary North Parramatta was bowled out for 230 and Kings Langley stood at 3/12 at stumps.
The day was sunny and hot, bloody sunny and bloody hot. In fact it was so damn bright that I regretted not getting a pair of prescription sunnies. I'll need to get some soon if I want to have some eyesight by the end of the season. The field was elliptical with extremely short boundaries on the sides and there was graffiti on the synthetic pitch. The location? Our home ground - Harold Park West Reserve.
The day started off with Tony, the captain, losing the toss (that's coin toss, for you non-cricket people). Interestingly enough the opposition captain chose to field. Personally, I thought his decision was terrible but since the opposition made the terrible decision... there's no need to complain. (Decision was bad because it was very hot and only half of his team were preset at the time of the toss).
North Parra (my team) got off to a sluggish start. The run rate was excruciatingly slow and we lost a couple of quick wickets (Dinesh out for 3). Then came a massive change. In comes Ajay, a big bloke that loves to swing the bat. The first ball delivered to Ajay was unexpectedly left. From then on, the game got very interesting. Ball after ball sailed over the witches hats (the boundary) ensuring that the run rate ticked along nicely. One spinner in particular felt the wrath of Ajay - with no wicket and conceeding 44 runs in just three overs. Slaughterhouse. Unfortunately Ajay's golden run came to an end at 79, a truly amazing effort - facing something in the order of 30 to 35 balls). After Ajay left the run rate really slowed down.
At approximately 3:20 pm I made my debut at number 7. Four minutes later I was back in the pavilion. Fantastic. I made a grand contribution of 1 run. Caught and bowled is how I was dismissed. I played at the ball early and the ball hit the bat, bobbed up and it was a simple catch for the bowler. Obviously my defensive game needs some serious work. Oh well, better luck next time.
One final thing to note however is that the final wicket partnership between Atul and Edmond was pure class. Atul and Edmond put on a 60-odd run partnership to ensure that we had enough runs to work with to secure a win. The team total: 230 runs.
It was then Kings Langley's turn to bat, and it didn't look as though they were enjoying it. Their first wicket fell in the second over when Ajay trapped one of Kings' opening batsmen LBW (leg before wicket). The batsman played a defensive stroke late, allowing the ball to continue on and hit his pads. Gone! 1/0.
The second wicket to fall did not take much longer. Over number three, another Kings Langley batsman heading back to the pavilion. Bowled Atul, Caught Mark Homeming (me). An attempted drive went horribly wrong for the remaining opening batsman. There was a thick outside edge (ball hitting the bat), the ball flew into the air... ready to be caught. I ran to my right, hopped into the air, reached out with my right hand - full stretch, and caught the ball. Go me! Specialist fieldsman all the way.
A couple of overs later the luck of Kings Langley had not changed. Ajay bowled a fantastic ball. The batsman played a shot - I think it was an attempted drive - and missed clearly. The ball clipped the bail above middle and off stump - three wickets down. Not too long after this Kings Langley called for the halt of play due to bad light. As a result of this the days play ended with Kings Langley at 12 runs for the loss of 3 wickets.
An interesting day, hopefully the Aussies will be in a commanding position as well.
The day was sunny and hot, bloody sunny and bloody hot. In fact it was so damn bright that I regretted not getting a pair of prescription sunnies. I'll need to get some soon if I want to have some eyesight by the end of the season. The field was elliptical with extremely short boundaries on the sides and there was graffiti on the synthetic pitch. The location? Our home ground - Harold Park West Reserve.
The day started off with Tony, the captain, losing the toss (that's coin toss, for you non-cricket people). Interestingly enough the opposition captain chose to field. Personally, I thought his decision was terrible but since the opposition made the terrible decision... there's no need to complain. (Decision was bad because it was very hot and only half of his team were preset at the time of the toss).
North Parra (my team) got off to a sluggish start. The run rate was excruciatingly slow and we lost a couple of quick wickets (Dinesh out for 3). Then came a massive change. In comes Ajay, a big bloke that loves to swing the bat. The first ball delivered to Ajay was unexpectedly left. From then on, the game got very interesting. Ball after ball sailed over the witches hats (the boundary) ensuring that the run rate ticked along nicely. One spinner in particular felt the wrath of Ajay - with no wicket and conceeding 44 runs in just three overs. Slaughterhouse. Unfortunately Ajay's golden run came to an end at 79, a truly amazing effort - facing something in the order of 30 to 35 balls). After Ajay left the run rate really slowed down.
At approximately 3:20 pm I made my debut at number 7. Four minutes later I was back in the pavilion. Fantastic. I made a grand contribution of 1 run. Caught and bowled is how I was dismissed. I played at the ball early and the ball hit the bat, bobbed up and it was a simple catch for the bowler. Obviously my defensive game needs some serious work. Oh well, better luck next time.
One final thing to note however is that the final wicket partnership between Atul and Edmond was pure class. Atul and Edmond put on a 60-odd run partnership to ensure that we had enough runs to work with to secure a win. The team total: 230 runs.
It was then Kings Langley's turn to bat, and it didn't look as though they were enjoying it. Their first wicket fell in the second over when Ajay trapped one of Kings' opening batsmen LBW (leg before wicket). The batsman played a defensive stroke late, allowing the ball to continue on and hit his pads. Gone! 1/0.
The second wicket to fall did not take much longer. Over number three, another Kings Langley batsman heading back to the pavilion. Bowled Atul, Caught Mark Homeming (me). An attempted drive went horribly wrong for the remaining opening batsman. There was a thick outside edge (ball hitting the bat), the ball flew into the air... ready to be caught. I ran to my right, hopped into the air, reached out with my right hand - full stretch, and caught the ball. Go me! Specialist fieldsman all the way.
A couple of overs later the luck of Kings Langley had not changed. Ajay bowled a fantastic ball. The batsman played a shot - I think it was an attempted drive - and missed clearly. The ball clipped the bail above middle and off stump - three wickets down. Not too long after this Kings Langley called for the halt of play due to bad light. As a result of this the days play ended with Kings Langley at 12 runs for the loss of 3 wickets.
An interesting day, hopefully the Aussies will be in a commanding position as well.
Tuesday, September 06, 2005
News Watch 2005-09-06
I've finally managed to get something going with my thesis. Cheer! Plus I didn't have to use any dodgy hacks - i'm quite proud of myself. As I haven't really been following the news headlines too much recently i'll make a few comments on what i've seen around the world - and some of it is reasonably interesting.
Chicks. I saw this little blurb on the news.com.au website saying that gentlemen no longer prefer blondes over brunettes as a result of gentlemen looking for brains and sophistication. Very interesting indeed - the blurb can be available here. I'd like to hear some comments on this one.
Weight loss. Those Americans, damn they get fat. What's happening in the US is that some people are turning to hypnosis to lose wait. Really... now i've heard everything.
RIP Kazaa. It looks like Kazaa, the peer-to-peer file sharing software application has been slammed. The Australian federal court ordered Kazaa to filter out copyrighted material from its network. The Guardian reports on it here. The claim by Kazaa and some others that this is a death blow to file-sharing is a bit of a joke. Everyone loves free stuff, I sure do. But sharing of illegal stuff isn't something that should be promoted. People work hard for their material, they shouldn't be rorted out of gaining the benefits. However, I'm not saying that i'm an angel that has done no wrong, just making a comment on this Kazaa issue.
Socceroos Victory. Well i'd hardly call it a victory. Australia beat the Solomon Islands in an away match 2 - 1. Hardly convincing. I expected more from the Aussies, consdering I was present at the 7 - 0 slaughter at Moore Park on Saturday.
The proverbial has hit the fan in America. It's a real tragedy what's happened in America and i'm talking about Hurricane Katrina. Tens of thousands suspected to be dead in and around the city of New Orleans - that's absolutely horrific. It looks like water is slowly being pumped out of the city but it'll take months for a full drainage. Very sad indeed. Read the article here. Hopefully the citizens that are still around the area get out and get out fast, because the situation really does not sound so good.
Petrol technology. The price of petrol sucks. Anyone with a car knows this. I mean just the other day I paid $50 bucks at $1.40/litre. WOMG. So anyway, felt like looking around for anything that would save me some money. I didn't find anything that could help me now but there seems to be several things around the corner which would reduce our dependance on oil, save us money and be better for the environment. What a deal. Read, read.
Tax. It turns out that many of the 'richest' in Australia avoid paying a substantial amount of tax - something in the order of 25%. Confused? Read this - quite interesting indeed. My opinion on tax is that the top rate should be reduced, as a percentage, and that the cut-in rate should also be higher. Why? 47c in tax, wtf? - half of everything you earn over the threshold goes to the government... what a bloody rort.
Telstra. It looks like Queensland Senator Barnaby Joyce is happy with the new Telstra bills as mentioned here, about bloody time. I agree with the full sale of Telstra as it sounds very dodgy to me how the government is both the industry regulator and the majority owner of the biggest player in the industry.
Ok that should be enough news for you to read. I guess i'll finish off with a bit of a brag - and it's hardly news. Played a set of tennis against my sister on Saturday. It was a close one! I won 6 - 5 after a tiebreaker (7 - 5). Close indeed. Plus, 2 aces for me, w00t.
Chicks. I saw this little blurb on the news.com.au website saying that gentlemen no longer prefer blondes over brunettes as a result of gentlemen looking for brains and sophistication. Very interesting indeed - the blurb can be available here. I'd like to hear some comments on this one.
Weight loss. Those Americans, damn they get fat. What's happening in the US is that some people are turning to hypnosis to lose wait. Really... now i've heard everything.
RIP Kazaa. It looks like Kazaa, the peer-to-peer file sharing software application has been slammed. The Australian federal court ordered Kazaa to filter out copyrighted material from its network. The Guardian reports on it here. The claim by Kazaa and some others that this is a death blow to file-sharing is a bit of a joke. Everyone loves free stuff, I sure do. But sharing of illegal stuff isn't something that should be promoted. People work hard for their material, they shouldn't be rorted out of gaining the benefits. However, I'm not saying that i'm an angel that has done no wrong, just making a comment on this Kazaa issue.
Socceroos Victory. Well i'd hardly call it a victory. Australia beat the Solomon Islands in an away match 2 - 1. Hardly convincing. I expected more from the Aussies, consdering I was present at the 7 - 0 slaughter at Moore Park on Saturday.
The proverbial has hit the fan in America. It's a real tragedy what's happened in America and i'm talking about Hurricane Katrina. Tens of thousands suspected to be dead in and around the city of New Orleans - that's absolutely horrific. It looks like water is slowly being pumped out of the city but it'll take months for a full drainage. Very sad indeed. Read the article here. Hopefully the citizens that are still around the area get out and get out fast, because the situation really does not sound so good.
Petrol technology. The price of petrol sucks. Anyone with a car knows this. I mean just the other day I paid $50 bucks at $1.40/litre. WOMG. So anyway, felt like looking around for anything that would save me some money. I didn't find anything that could help me now but there seems to be several things around the corner which would reduce our dependance on oil, save us money and be better for the environment. What a deal. Read, read.
Tax. It turns out that many of the 'richest' in Australia avoid paying a substantial amount of tax - something in the order of 25%. Confused? Read this - quite interesting indeed. My opinion on tax is that the top rate should be reduced, as a percentage, and that the cut-in rate should also be higher. Why? 47c in tax, wtf? - half of everything you earn over the threshold goes to the government... what a bloody rort.
Telstra. It looks like Queensland Senator Barnaby Joyce is happy with the new Telstra bills as mentioned here, about bloody time. I agree with the full sale of Telstra as it sounds very dodgy to me how the government is both the industry regulator and the majority owner of the biggest player in the industry.
Ok that should be enough news for you to read. I guess i'll finish off with a bit of a brag - and it's hardly news. Played a set of tennis against my sister on Saturday. It was a close one! I won 6 - 5 after a tiebreaker (7 - 5). Close indeed. Plus, 2 aces for me, w00t.
Thursday, September 01, 2005
The Lotto Question
Ok. I spent all of today working on my thesis - therefore the day sucked, bigtime. One piece of software doesn't work because another piece of software is too new... too new? what the hell happened to backwards compatability - down the toilet if you ask me. So anyway, enough of my rant and onto my question of the day.
The scenario conatins four people: Jill, Stella, Bill, and Morris Iemma (ok, i couldn't get anything to rhyme with Stella... so relax :P). Please note that the scenario and all names are fictional and anything that matches in the real world is purely co-incidental. (Don't want to be sued :D).
Jill, Stella, Bill, and Iemma decide that they are going to buy a Lotto ticket. It's a big draw and the jackpot is some $25 million dollars - not that the value of the jackpot is important.
Stella goes out and buys the ticket on behalf of the group, a week before the draw. Before the draw Jill and Bill both pay their share. So three out of the four have paid their fair share of the ticket. By the time of the draw Iemma has not paid (yes, Morris has the capacity to pay but did not pay immediately).
The draw concludes and surprise surprise the group has the winning ticket - $25 million dollars! The big question is: does Morris Iemma deserve a share of the winnings minus what he owes to the rest of the group or does he deserve nothing because he did not pay?
This is a very interesting question, and i'd love to hear comments on this one. My perspective: Morris Iemma doesn't deserve a cent. Being capable of paying he was unfairly hoping for win. Morris was most likely hoping for this scenario: "If the ticket wins I won't have to pay at all.. i'll be making money".
So what I say is that.... if you're not in - you don't get a cut, simple.
The scenario conatins four people: Jill, Stella, Bill, and Morris Iemma (ok, i couldn't get anything to rhyme with Stella... so relax :P). Please note that the scenario and all names are fictional and anything that matches in the real world is purely co-incidental. (Don't want to be sued :D).
Jill, Stella, Bill, and Iemma decide that they are going to buy a Lotto ticket. It's a big draw and the jackpot is some $25 million dollars - not that the value of the jackpot is important.
Stella goes out and buys the ticket on behalf of the group, a week before the draw. Before the draw Jill and Bill both pay their share. So three out of the four have paid their fair share of the ticket. By the time of the draw Iemma has not paid (yes, Morris has the capacity to pay but did not pay immediately).
The draw concludes and surprise surprise the group has the winning ticket - $25 million dollars! The big question is: does Morris Iemma deserve a share of the winnings minus what he owes to the rest of the group or does he deserve nothing because he did not pay?
This is a very interesting question, and i'd love to hear comments on this one. My perspective: Morris Iemma doesn't deserve a cent. Being capable of paying he was unfairly hoping for win. Morris was most likely hoping for this scenario: "If the ticket wins I won't have to pay at all.. i'll be making money".
So what I say is that.... if you're not in - you don't get a cut, simple.
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