One thing I've been loving about not having to go to school has been the ability to watch Question Time. It is no longer the boring talking people that come on before the kids programs- the view I held when I was 4 and 5- now it is an important and interesting, even entertaining, look into the runnings of the country.
It has got me thinking though, is one hour a day really enough? Question Time doesn't even go for an hour, it goes longer and the ABC only shows between 2pm and 3pm regardless of whether that is actually when Question Time is on, so on days when Question Time starts 10 minutes late you get 10 minutes or normal procedure before the questions actually start coming. This is of course just as important as Question Time, but you miss hearing the questions.
I think it would be beneficial for democracy in Australia if all of parliament were broadcast live to everyone in Australia free to air. All of both houses is filmed already so they can have it for the news if something newsworthy happens, it wouldn't be that expensive to put it to air. Two more free to air stations, not commercial or anything, just the live sittings of House of Reps and the Senate. When parliament isn't sitting those channels are just dead air like they are now that neither channel exists.
The reason I think it would be beneficial for democracy is that currently we elect people to run the country and then we don't get to see much of what happens. We can see 1 hour of Question Time each day, the budget, the opposition's response to the budget and anything that makes the news. Otherwise unless there is a special event like the apology to the stolen generations we don't get to see what happens. It is a democracy where to people don't only not get to decide on what happens, we don't even get to see what happens.
Now you can get transcripts of all parliament's sittings if you want to find them and read through them but reading requires a lot of time and it happens at a delay. By the time you've found out that something was discussed that you want to see, got a copy of the transcripts and read through it all chances are high that it is too late to do anything about it. Maybe not if you are working for a media company or a political law firm but if you are just a casual observer, as every citizen in a functional democracy should be, it is too much effort to achieve very little.
Live broadcast free to air of all sittings would mean that you could have it just running in the background or watch whatever of it you want if you are interested. It would be a quicker way of seeing what is happening and you would get it live so as soon as it is said you can act on it. Very few people I think at the moment would actually be interested in watching politicians talk all day because let's face it: a lot of the time parliament is boring. It would mean an extra 10 hours a day where Kevin Rudd can crap on without anyone caring.
But for the people who channel surf, why not add a bit of political awareness into the surf? It would be easier to educate people about political procedure. Imagine being back in grade 7 and instead of writing down how parliament runs, the teacher just turns on the TV and everyone takes their own notes from seeing it live in action. If you had interest but no time to invest in that interest now you could do it as easily as you would watch anything else. Above all, if something is on then more people are likely to watch it simply because it is there.
If we want to seriously say that we live in a democracy then people need to be as easily as possible access as much of the running of the country as possible. It seems to me that live, free to air broadcasts of both houses of parliament is an easy way of doing that, and with digital TV about to become the only TV what better time to introduce such an idea than now?
Friday, November 27, 2009
Thursday, November 26, 2009
Why We Need Daylight Saving
I was woken up yesterday morning at 4:30am when Turkey started scratching on the top of the shed roof. I opened my eyes and discovered it was light already. 4:30am and the sun is up and the turkey is already scratching the top of the shed. Turkey gets up and starts scratching at dawn, the same time all the other birds come out to start eating and generally making noise. It makes no difference to the birds whether it is 4:30am or any other time, it is sunrise so up they get.
The most absurd thing is that it is light outside at 4:30am and yet dark at 6:30pm. Most people don’t get up until 6am, so how does it make any sense to be wasting the sunlight in the morning like that? The animals are up and making noise but the humans are still in bed getting disturbed rest because they are too stupid to change the time to suit their environment.
If we had daylight saving then the animals would be getting loud at 5:30am, which would still be annoying if you don’t get up til 7am but at least you get in an extra hour of undisturbed sleep that you wouldn’t get if they were up at 4:30am. If you get up at 6am or 7am or whatever then the sun is still up when you get up, so you aren’t getting up while it is dark, the day continues as normal. Until the end of the day, where you finish work at 5pm then go home and it is still light as afternoon. You can work in the garden, go for a run, do whatever really because it is still light. You can have dinner outside or have dinner much later because it is still light. It would finally be dark at 7:30pm. A whole extra hour of sunlight in the evening.
Daylight saving is also cheaper and better for the environment because if it is dark at 6:30pm then you need to turn on all the lights before 6:30pm. If it isn’t dark until 7:30pm then you don’t need to turn on all the lights until before 7:30pm. You save an hour of electricity usage.
The way that free to air broadcasting is managed is also set up for daylight saving. If there is a TV program that comes on at 8:30pm then it comes on at 8:30pm everywhere. In Brisbane that means everything you watch is on a one hour delay. In the past this wasn’t such a bad thing because it didn’t matter, but now that everyone is linked via the web to discuss things in real time a one hour delay can determine whether you watch something or not. At 8:30pm on Wednesday night, Marc Fennel asks Twitter whether or not they liked Hungry Beast this week, but Spicks and Specks is only just starting in Brisbane. Q&A encourages live discussion on Twitter, most other news interview shows do a similar thing on their own forum, but if you are in Brisbane you miss all of that, which is sometimes a crucial part of the show, because it all happens an hour before the show.
I am writing all this from the perspective of Brisbane because it doesn’t make sense for Brisbane to not have daylight saving. The complication is that daylight saving is usually done by state and it makes no sense for northern cities like Townsville or Cairns to have daylight saving. If daylight saving were to be introduced it would only be fore South East Queensland, not the whole state. Most of the opposition then comes not from the, to be blunt about them, idiots who think that an extra hour of daylight will fade the curtains or confuse the animals. The opposition comes from people who are worried about splitting the state. Brisbane has more in common with the southern cities like Sydney or Melbourne than it does with the northern cities like Townsville or Cairns though. Splitting the state would make it no more complicated than it already is at the Gold Coast, where if you live at Coolangatta/ Tweed Heads then you live in two time zones during summer because the city is build on the border with New South Wales.
The Blight Government keeps dismissing the call for daylight saving by saying that they have already asked Queenslanders. No they haven’t. They ran a poll, which asks a small minority of the state and then has the results extrapolated. The last time a referendum were held was in 1992. Anyone who has turned 18 since then has not had a chance to vote. That means not only frustrated 17 year olds like me, but also frustrated 17 year olds from 1992 who are now 35 years old and have never had a chance to vote for daylight saving.
If I wanted to be mean I could say that the Bligh Government is ignoring democracy by refusing to answer the pleas of those wanting daylight saving, but what is the point when we can’t get rid of them until the next election and the LNP are certain to win that anyway.
Anyway, yesterday afternoon I flew in to Sydney and landed at sunset at 7:50pm. I love you daylight saving.
The most absurd thing is that it is light outside at 4:30am and yet dark at 6:30pm. Most people don’t get up until 6am, so how does it make any sense to be wasting the sunlight in the morning like that? The animals are up and making noise but the humans are still in bed getting disturbed rest because they are too stupid to change the time to suit their environment.
If we had daylight saving then the animals would be getting loud at 5:30am, which would still be annoying if you don’t get up til 7am but at least you get in an extra hour of undisturbed sleep that you wouldn’t get if they were up at 4:30am. If you get up at 6am or 7am or whatever then the sun is still up when you get up, so you aren’t getting up while it is dark, the day continues as normal. Until the end of the day, where you finish work at 5pm then go home and it is still light as afternoon. You can work in the garden, go for a run, do whatever really because it is still light. You can have dinner outside or have dinner much later because it is still light. It would finally be dark at 7:30pm. A whole extra hour of sunlight in the evening.
Daylight saving is also cheaper and better for the environment because if it is dark at 6:30pm then you need to turn on all the lights before 6:30pm. If it isn’t dark until 7:30pm then you don’t need to turn on all the lights until before 7:30pm. You save an hour of electricity usage.
The way that free to air broadcasting is managed is also set up for daylight saving. If there is a TV program that comes on at 8:30pm then it comes on at 8:30pm everywhere. In Brisbane that means everything you watch is on a one hour delay. In the past this wasn’t such a bad thing because it didn’t matter, but now that everyone is linked via the web to discuss things in real time a one hour delay can determine whether you watch something or not. At 8:30pm on Wednesday night, Marc Fennel asks Twitter whether or not they liked Hungry Beast this week, but Spicks and Specks is only just starting in Brisbane. Q&A encourages live discussion on Twitter, most other news interview shows do a similar thing on their own forum, but if you are in Brisbane you miss all of that, which is sometimes a crucial part of the show, because it all happens an hour before the show.
I am writing all this from the perspective of Brisbane because it doesn’t make sense for Brisbane to not have daylight saving. The complication is that daylight saving is usually done by state and it makes no sense for northern cities like Townsville or Cairns to have daylight saving. If daylight saving were to be introduced it would only be fore South East Queensland, not the whole state. Most of the opposition then comes not from the, to be blunt about them, idiots who think that an extra hour of daylight will fade the curtains or confuse the animals. The opposition comes from people who are worried about splitting the state. Brisbane has more in common with the southern cities like Sydney or Melbourne than it does with the northern cities like Townsville or Cairns though. Splitting the state would make it no more complicated than it already is at the Gold Coast, where if you live at Coolangatta/ Tweed Heads then you live in two time zones during summer because the city is build on the border with New South Wales.
The Blight Government keeps dismissing the call for daylight saving by saying that they have already asked Queenslanders. No they haven’t. They ran a poll, which asks a small minority of the state and then has the results extrapolated. The last time a referendum were held was in 1992. Anyone who has turned 18 since then has not had a chance to vote. That means not only frustrated 17 year olds like me, but also frustrated 17 year olds from 1992 who are now 35 years old and have never had a chance to vote for daylight saving.
If I wanted to be mean I could say that the Bligh Government is ignoring democracy by refusing to answer the pleas of those wanting daylight saving, but what is the point when we can’t get rid of them until the next election and the LNP are certain to win that anyway.
Anyway, yesterday afternoon I flew in to Sydney and landed at sunset at 7:50pm. I love you daylight saving.
Friday, November 20, 2009
A Final Favour To Education Queensland
Today I graduated from year 12. I now move into the larger second stage of my life, having completed my formal education. From now on the lessons I learn, studies I undertake, all depend on what I choose to do. They will vary from institution to institution and from type to type. Graduation is both a celebration and a time of sadness; I have loved school and will miss it and don’t want to leave, but at the same time I eagerly await the next big thing and am happy I survived to finish school. Of the things I will miss most I suspect not having the guarantee that 50% of my friends will be together in one place at one time will be the main thing. The steady routine and protection of such a routine will be another. The school tuckshop will certainly be one. But there will be things I won’t miss too, such as having 8 hours a day taken up to do just over 4 hours of work, the intense mandatory workload that I may have no interest in, and of course being a student under Education Queensland.
I will probably miss Education Queensland a little bit, I mean I’ll have to find someone else to complain strongly about now. As a final parting to Education Queensland I am writing this, my final favour to them: I’m going to tell them how to run their own department.
The most important thing to remember when running an governmental education department is that there are 4 levels to the department. The first and least important level is the top- the politicians- these are the government employees, the minister, the members of parliament and everyone else who runs the governmental side. As far as I am concerned this level shouldn’t be here. The government should be there to provide funding and ensure standards, by which I mean things like benchmarks for the national testing. They shouldn’t even set the national testing, they should just over view it to make sure it happens. This is of course unless there were to be an independent national body to take over this task and I would support that fully. As far as I am concerned the less government interference the better.
With the government out of the picture the least important level becomes the management level. This is where the people who just work for EQ are, the people who have been promoted so their colleagues don’t need to tolerate them any further or who were never teachers in the first place. This is also the level where the IT department is, if that helps clear up my feelings for this level.
The next level is very important, it is the teachers. Be they permanent, contract, substitute or specialist, these are the people who are trusted with educating the coming generations. These are the people who have direct contact with the students 5 times a week. These are the people who have the relationships with the students as people and not as overlords over statistics.
The final level and in my opinion the most important is the students. The thing I find most people, and tragically most education department people and government officials, and to my horror sometimes, though thankfully only rarely, parents, tend to forget is that an education department is ALL about the students. If you aren’t doing it in the interest of the students then you shouldn’t be doing it. Politicians are by far the worst offenders here which is why we got the stupid traffic light healthy eating scheme.
Just before I move on I’ll explain the healthy eating scheme. The state government banned tuckshops from selling junk food, which is classed as red, while allowing them to continue selling ok food like pies, which are classed as amber, and encouraging them to sell healthy food, which is classed as green. Twice a term the school can have a “red day” where they can sell anything, the rest of the time only green and amber can be sold. The government said this would help cut down on childhood obesity, but it didn’t it just means that students now buy their junk food at the supermarket on the way to school. Kids are still eating junk but now the school doesn’t get the money from it, supermarket companies get the money from it. Everyone protested against this legislation and said it wouldn’t work, but the government doesn’t care about kids, they care about political points scoring which is the only real reason they introduced the policy.
So that covers the structure of the department, how do you run it? The management level of the department is to be removed and replaced with teachers. If you aren’t a teacher then you are not qualified to work for Education Queensland, it is that simple. Admin staff are to be admin staff who have worked in schools before, every other position must be filled by a teacher.
Teachers must have completed 10 years of service before they can work at the departmental level and nobody can work at this level for more than 5 consecutive years. After 5 years at this level they must go back to a school and fulfill another 5 years of teaching before they can come back.
That is all. See it doesn’t actually take that much to fix a completely screwed department. Sure the overhaul I am suggesting is major, it is enormous, but it is simple. I explained the whole system in 10 lines simple. Let me explain why this is how Education Queensland should work.
The students, the most important level around whom the entire department is based, are the lifeblood of the department. The teachers, the ones who have direct contact to the students, are good people and know how to run the department because they can see everything, what works, what doesn’t work, but most importantly they are the ones who know how best to run things in order to benefit the students. The people at the departmental level, the managerial level, these people don’t have contact with the students, they run the department without knowing what benefits the students. To these people the students are an anonymous group of statistics. They know the stereotypes, they might know their own kids but they don’t know how to run a school, they know how to run a government department. While Education Queensland is a government department it cannot be treated as such because education is a special case where it is simply too important to be left up to the government, and as a good socialist you can trust that I rarely consider something to be too important for the government.
If everyone who works at that departmental level is forced to never go any more than 5 years without direct contact with students without having to spend another 5 years with direct contact with students the problem of not knowing how to run the schools disappears. Instead the department is run by people who do know what problems need fixing, who know what works and what doesn’t and most importantly who know what is most beneficial for students. And before they have a chance to lose touch they are forced back into it to be refreshed and relearn what needs to be done.
No model is perfect and this one certainly isn’t. Once in a blue moon you come across a teacher who has the job either because they never wanted to leave school themselves, because they weren’t able to do anything else or because they found the degree in a cornflakes packet and thought they’d give it a shot. These hopeless cases exist as they do in any profession and anyone who thinks a class can’t tell their teacher is incompetent obviously hasn’t seen just how quickly twenty-five 13 year olds can tear into a teacher who they know hasn’t got a clue. Naturally these hopeless cases will get into the departmental level, but these people are a small minority and whatever damage they could do would be minimal to negligible in the time they are there.
Education is too important to be left to people who don’t understand the best interests of the students. Not people who think they know what is in the best interests of students, the people who UNDERSTAND what the best interests of the students are and know how to run a system with these best interests at heart. The teachers are these people, the departmental bureaucrats, politicians and public servants are not. So there you go Education Queensland, that is how to do your job, straight from the blog of someone who has spent over a decade at the receiving end of your current system.
Positive hopes for the valuable education of cohorts to come,
Boy - Class of 2009.
I will probably miss Education Queensland a little bit, I mean I’ll have to find someone else to complain strongly about now. As a final parting to Education Queensland I am writing this, my final favour to them: I’m going to tell them how to run their own department.
The most important thing to remember when running an governmental education department is that there are 4 levels to the department. The first and least important level is the top- the politicians- these are the government employees, the minister, the members of parliament and everyone else who runs the governmental side. As far as I am concerned this level shouldn’t be here. The government should be there to provide funding and ensure standards, by which I mean things like benchmarks for the national testing. They shouldn’t even set the national testing, they should just over view it to make sure it happens. This is of course unless there were to be an independent national body to take over this task and I would support that fully. As far as I am concerned the less government interference the better.
With the government out of the picture the least important level becomes the management level. This is where the people who just work for EQ are, the people who have been promoted so their colleagues don’t need to tolerate them any further or who were never teachers in the first place. This is also the level where the IT department is, if that helps clear up my feelings for this level.
The next level is very important, it is the teachers. Be they permanent, contract, substitute or specialist, these are the people who are trusted with educating the coming generations. These are the people who have direct contact with the students 5 times a week. These are the people who have the relationships with the students as people and not as overlords over statistics.
The final level and in my opinion the most important is the students. The thing I find most people, and tragically most education department people and government officials, and to my horror sometimes, though thankfully only rarely, parents, tend to forget is that an education department is ALL about the students. If you aren’t doing it in the interest of the students then you shouldn’t be doing it. Politicians are by far the worst offenders here which is why we got the stupid traffic light healthy eating scheme.
Just before I move on I’ll explain the healthy eating scheme. The state government banned tuckshops from selling junk food, which is classed as red, while allowing them to continue selling ok food like pies, which are classed as amber, and encouraging them to sell healthy food, which is classed as green. Twice a term the school can have a “red day” where they can sell anything, the rest of the time only green and amber can be sold. The government said this would help cut down on childhood obesity, but it didn’t it just means that students now buy their junk food at the supermarket on the way to school. Kids are still eating junk but now the school doesn’t get the money from it, supermarket companies get the money from it. Everyone protested against this legislation and said it wouldn’t work, but the government doesn’t care about kids, they care about political points scoring which is the only real reason they introduced the policy.
So that covers the structure of the department, how do you run it? The management level of the department is to be removed and replaced with teachers. If you aren’t a teacher then you are not qualified to work for Education Queensland, it is that simple. Admin staff are to be admin staff who have worked in schools before, every other position must be filled by a teacher.
Teachers must have completed 10 years of service before they can work at the departmental level and nobody can work at this level for more than 5 consecutive years. After 5 years at this level they must go back to a school and fulfill another 5 years of teaching before they can come back.
That is all. See it doesn’t actually take that much to fix a completely screwed department. Sure the overhaul I am suggesting is major, it is enormous, but it is simple. I explained the whole system in 10 lines simple. Let me explain why this is how Education Queensland should work.
The students, the most important level around whom the entire department is based, are the lifeblood of the department. The teachers, the ones who have direct contact to the students, are good people and know how to run the department because they can see everything, what works, what doesn’t work, but most importantly they are the ones who know how best to run things in order to benefit the students. The people at the departmental level, the managerial level, these people don’t have contact with the students, they run the department without knowing what benefits the students. To these people the students are an anonymous group of statistics. They know the stereotypes, they might know their own kids but they don’t know how to run a school, they know how to run a government department. While Education Queensland is a government department it cannot be treated as such because education is a special case where it is simply too important to be left up to the government, and as a good socialist you can trust that I rarely consider something to be too important for the government.
If everyone who works at that departmental level is forced to never go any more than 5 years without direct contact with students without having to spend another 5 years with direct contact with students the problem of not knowing how to run the schools disappears. Instead the department is run by people who do know what problems need fixing, who know what works and what doesn’t and most importantly who know what is most beneficial for students. And before they have a chance to lose touch they are forced back into it to be refreshed and relearn what needs to be done.
No model is perfect and this one certainly isn’t. Once in a blue moon you come across a teacher who has the job either because they never wanted to leave school themselves, because they weren’t able to do anything else or because they found the degree in a cornflakes packet and thought they’d give it a shot. These hopeless cases exist as they do in any profession and anyone who thinks a class can’t tell their teacher is incompetent obviously hasn’t seen just how quickly twenty-five 13 year olds can tear into a teacher who they know hasn’t got a clue. Naturally these hopeless cases will get into the departmental level, but these people are a small minority and whatever damage they could do would be minimal to negligible in the time they are there.
Education is too important to be left to people who don’t understand the best interests of the students. Not people who think they know what is in the best interests of students, the people who UNDERSTAND what the best interests of the students are and know how to run a system with these best interests at heart. The teachers are these people, the departmental bureaucrats, politicians and public servants are not. So there you go Education Queensland, that is how to do your job, straight from the blog of someone who has spent over a decade at the receiving end of your current system.
Positive hopes for the valuable education of cohorts to come,
Boy - Class of 2009.
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
Storm Season '09/'10: Storm 5 Review
I’ll concede today that the weather in Brisbane wasn’t pleasant. It reached 37 degrees at Archerfield which is hot even in my mind, but what really made it unbearable wasn’t the heat so much as the humidity. Great fan of the heat as I am I can’t stand the humidity and for the first time all year I was actually eager to spend time in air conditioning. The heat and humidity was tolerable only with the consideration of the promised storm, though by 3pm there were still only a few updrafts on the horizon while the majority of the sky remained as clear as could be.
This changed as I made my way home and the sky was more cloud, or at least humid haze by about 4:30pm. I had work to do with computers but even with the ceiling fan on and the house insulated it was too hot and the computers were monitored carefully as I did my work. There were storm warnings current and the radar showed cells moving in our direction, but we at first miss interpreted the warning. When we got our minds cleared up we were sure a cell was heading straight for us.
At 5:30pm the family gathered in our usual storm watching position and just talked for about an hour. The wind had come and it was cool, even cold outside. The wind wasn’t spectacular though, it was just enough to bring in the cool. The rain fell, but to call it rain would really be a bit too generous, it was more a gentle spray. As a storm it was really disappointing, yes there was a little bit of wind but not much and the rain was a gentle spray and the lightning was good but it wasn’t spectacular. As a recess from the heat and humidity it was fantastic. Ok, not so much the humidity as it was raining, but it didn’t matter so much because it wasn’t water vapour in the air, it was actual water. Cold water too. The conditions weren’t enough to stop you from running around an uncovered oval, but they were enough to allow you to run around an uncovered oval.
At about 6:20pm the wind picked up a great deal and the rain fell with great intensity. The surrounds became much darker than they had been. The lightning was about the same it had been. This was a storm. The gentle spray of water feeling was sort of still there in the way that heavy rain sometimes forms a steady fall of earthbound water. If the storm had ended at 6:30pm, the point at which the family headed inside, then I would have been satisfied with it. Sure the storm wasn’t spectacular and it would have scored lowly in this review, but it fulfilled its purpose. It was a very practical storm, we needed something to take down the heat, the storm did just that. The last ten minutes gave us the storm part of the storm, our money’s worth, and then it finished.
That isn’t where the storm ended though. At about 6:40pm it started again, only for a brief time as another cloud that had changed direction during the previous part of the storm now drifted over bringing a reprise of 6:20pm’s excitement, but like 6:20pm’s excitement it was only short lived. On the radar though another cell was heading straight for us.
As the cloud drew closer on the radar, the sky in the south-west turned black. Or at least would have been black but for the constant flashes of white as the cloud’s enormous electricity erupted within and to the sky. As the cell continued to move closer it became apparent that the lightning was worth watching, but almost too soon it was immediately overhead.
Despite the lightning we kept the internet running and could check the radar which showed this cell had actually changed direction and was now heading away to the south. In an unusual move though, the cloud split and we actually got some. Normally they split and miss us, not split and hit us. Because it was just a splitting part that got us it was much less dramatic than it could have been had the main cell not changed direction, but it still brought with it a good amount of rain and wind and of course that lightning.
There is still a storm warning current but the storms have pretty much moved off shore now, or are over the coast and will be offshore shortly.
Final Statistics:
Wind: yes
Rain: yes
Lightning: yes
Hail: no
Blackout: no
House damage: no
Car damage: no
Human damage: no
Side yard: wet
Car-tracks: wet
Breezeway 1: flooded
Breezeway 2: wet
Front Yard: wet
Carport: wet around the edges
Inside the house: dry
In the sense that this storm was practical and brought a break in the heat and humidity it was a success. The spectacular 10 minutes at the end of the first cell, the reprise shortly after and the break away at 7:20pm all provided some good entertainment, even if I wasn’t game to continue my work on the computer while it happened. The final cell turning and splitting was disappointing though, it would have been good to get the full grunt. Also the first cell, as revealed by the radar actually had a large amount of hail in it which all fell/ evaporated/ melted before it reached us, and while you don’t want your roof to cave in under the ice, a bit of hail is always fun and would have made it even colder. You can’t have everything though I guess.
Brisbane storm 17th November 2009:
6/10
This changed as I made my way home and the sky was more cloud, or at least humid haze by about 4:30pm. I had work to do with computers but even with the ceiling fan on and the house insulated it was too hot and the computers were monitored carefully as I did my work. There were storm warnings current and the radar showed cells moving in our direction, but we at first miss interpreted the warning. When we got our minds cleared up we were sure a cell was heading straight for us.
At 5:30pm the family gathered in our usual storm watching position and just talked for about an hour. The wind had come and it was cool, even cold outside. The wind wasn’t spectacular though, it was just enough to bring in the cool. The rain fell, but to call it rain would really be a bit too generous, it was more a gentle spray. As a storm it was really disappointing, yes there was a little bit of wind but not much and the rain was a gentle spray and the lightning was good but it wasn’t spectacular. As a recess from the heat and humidity it was fantastic. Ok, not so much the humidity as it was raining, but it didn’t matter so much because it wasn’t water vapour in the air, it was actual water. Cold water too. The conditions weren’t enough to stop you from running around an uncovered oval, but they were enough to allow you to run around an uncovered oval.
At about 6:20pm the wind picked up a great deal and the rain fell with great intensity. The surrounds became much darker than they had been. The lightning was about the same it had been. This was a storm. The gentle spray of water feeling was sort of still there in the way that heavy rain sometimes forms a steady fall of earthbound water. If the storm had ended at 6:30pm, the point at which the family headed inside, then I would have been satisfied with it. Sure the storm wasn’t spectacular and it would have scored lowly in this review, but it fulfilled its purpose. It was a very practical storm, we needed something to take down the heat, the storm did just that. The last ten minutes gave us the storm part of the storm, our money’s worth, and then it finished.
That isn’t where the storm ended though. At about 6:40pm it started again, only for a brief time as another cloud that had changed direction during the previous part of the storm now drifted over bringing a reprise of 6:20pm’s excitement, but like 6:20pm’s excitement it was only short lived. On the radar though another cell was heading straight for us.
As the cloud drew closer on the radar, the sky in the south-west turned black. Or at least would have been black but for the constant flashes of white as the cloud’s enormous electricity erupted within and to the sky. As the cell continued to move closer it became apparent that the lightning was worth watching, but almost too soon it was immediately overhead.
Despite the lightning we kept the internet running and could check the radar which showed this cell had actually changed direction and was now heading away to the south. In an unusual move though, the cloud split and we actually got some. Normally they split and miss us, not split and hit us. Because it was just a splitting part that got us it was much less dramatic than it could have been had the main cell not changed direction, but it still brought with it a good amount of rain and wind and of course that lightning.
There is still a storm warning current but the storms have pretty much moved off shore now, or are over the coast and will be offshore shortly.
Final Statistics:
Wind: yes
Rain: yes
Lightning: yes
Hail: no
Blackout: no
House damage: no
Car damage: no
Human damage: no
Side yard: wet
Car-tracks: wet
Breezeway 1: flooded
Breezeway 2: wet
Front Yard: wet
Carport: wet around the edges
Inside the house: dry
In the sense that this storm was practical and brought a break in the heat and humidity it was a success. The spectacular 10 minutes at the end of the first cell, the reprise shortly after and the break away at 7:20pm all provided some good entertainment, even if I wasn’t game to continue my work on the computer while it happened. The final cell turning and splitting was disappointing though, it would have been good to get the full grunt. Also the first cell, as revealed by the radar actually had a large amount of hail in it which all fell/ evaporated/ melted before it reached us, and while you don’t want your roof to cave in under the ice, a bit of hail is always fun and would have made it even colder. You can’t have everything though I guess.
Brisbane storm 17th November 2009:
6/10
Sunday, November 15, 2009
60 Minute Preview
I’ve just finished watching an episode of Castle on Channel 7 and this has lead me to think many things.
First of all, Nathan Fillion is awesome and who cares that he just plays the same character he did in Firefly, we all love Malcolm Reynolds.
Second of all, I am quite certain that it isn’t just that I watch very little commercial TV but that it is, from an objective perspective, that all ads are insane.
Third and most interestingly, the role of TV is changing.
As great as it would be to post about how much I love Firefly and how much of an injustice that it was that it was cancelled, especially appropriate for discussion seeing as Fox have only in the last week cancelled Dollhouse, that is a post that will have to wait for another time. Similarly while I have in the past and should again post about the insanity of TV commercials, that isn’t what I’m here to do either. It is that I find the role of TV is changing and I would like to suggest that watching a show on TV is now more a promo for the show than the show itself.
Castle is supposed to go for an hour and starts at 9:30pm on Channel 7. Tonight it didn’t, it started at 9:40pm and then Channel 7 cut out the opening titles and the credits so they could fit in more ads. There are ad breaks so close together they go for longer than the program itself and then there are ads on the bottom of the screen anyway. Nobody in their right mind would watch this crap seriously.
Yet last Sunday night for some reason I’m not entirely sure of the TV was on Channel 7 at the appropriate time and so we watched Castle. It was this that got us in on the show and encouraged us to research it on the internet and now my sister has the DVD on her Christmas wishlist. Getting the DVD is the sensible thing because then you can watch the whole episode, not just what remains after Channel 7 has hacked it half to death and you get no ads and you can watch it whenever you want.
But without the show being on TV last week we’d never have been tipped off about it, so even though commercial TV is like watching something in televisual hell, it still provides the important service of finding new shows. Like hearing the radio edit of a song on the radio. You then take note of the name of the song and look it up on iTunes or Wikipedia and buy the album. TV is filling that spot now for TV shows. Instead of thinking of TV as where we watch TV shows we need to think of TV as where we find out about TV shows and DVD as where we watch TV shows.
Commerical TV networks who are still shaking their ad break filled heads and wondering why nobody watches their crappy little networks won’t be pleased to hear that they are now just there to promote a show that people watch for two episodes before buying the DVD, because if you only watch two episodes you only see 2/ 26 episodes worth of ads and the station loses 24/ 26 episodes worth of ad revenue. To combat this of course TV networks need to start producing much more of their own programming content so they get the profit from the DVD sales. I doubt this will happen though as the investment into an inhouse production is greater risk than just buying an American sitcom and promoting the guts out of it to your existing, albeit dwindling, audience and hoping for a ratings miracle.
Of course if the networks want to hold onto the current model where TV is where you watch TV programs they will need to show less ads, not hack around content, not change the timeslot every third week, show less ads and show more things worth watching. Unfortunately I know of only 5 stations that do this and 3 of them are the ABC and the other two are SBS. When even the 24 hour sports channel can’t help but change the timeslot of things for no reason you can figure there is a problem.
Also while Go is the most popular TV station on Free to Air the future is doomed. No really, doomed.
On a different note now. During the last week I watched more TV than I normally watch in an average month, the reason being I had much more time than normal and felt like checking out iView. This revealed to me that maybe my tongue in cheek Facebook bio of “I don’t watch TV, I’m to busy doing FTV assignments” wasn’t as far off as it seems. It also got me thinking that the future of TV was online replays. iView is the ABC service and for iiNet and Westnet users it is quota free so you can watch 5GB and still come off on your lightest internet usage figure in a month (I checked this morning, I watched 4.5 hours of TV on the internet that day and the download quota for the whole household was 174MB) but Channel 7 and Channel 10 both have an equivalent service for catching up on programs you missed during the week. These aren’t quote free so I haven’t checked them out and as you may have guessed I’m not enthusiastic about commercial TV to say the least, but I’m guessing they work much the same way, as, I imagine, does the Channel 9 service which I assume exists although I haven’t looked for it. (Mind you it is Channel 9 so maybe I shouldn’t assume that they have one.)
I was just about ready to post an article about how catch up online programming is the future of TV when all my hopes and dreams were crushed by an excellent article at New Matilda by Jason Wilson about the Pwned Nudie Run. I actually agree with everything he said but it is best not to go to far publicly expressing contradictory views. Actually I do that all the time, but whatever. You should read the article, it is very good but be aware there is some blurred nudity.
First of all, Nathan Fillion is awesome and who cares that he just plays the same character he did in Firefly, we all love Malcolm Reynolds.
Second of all, I am quite certain that it isn’t just that I watch very little commercial TV but that it is, from an objective perspective, that all ads are insane.
Third and most interestingly, the role of TV is changing.
As great as it would be to post about how much I love Firefly and how much of an injustice that it was that it was cancelled, especially appropriate for discussion seeing as Fox have only in the last week cancelled Dollhouse, that is a post that will have to wait for another time. Similarly while I have in the past and should again post about the insanity of TV commercials, that isn’t what I’m here to do either. It is that I find the role of TV is changing and I would like to suggest that watching a show on TV is now more a promo for the show than the show itself.
Castle is supposed to go for an hour and starts at 9:30pm on Channel 7. Tonight it didn’t, it started at 9:40pm and then Channel 7 cut out the opening titles and the credits so they could fit in more ads. There are ad breaks so close together they go for longer than the program itself and then there are ads on the bottom of the screen anyway. Nobody in their right mind would watch this crap seriously.
Yet last Sunday night for some reason I’m not entirely sure of the TV was on Channel 7 at the appropriate time and so we watched Castle. It was this that got us in on the show and encouraged us to research it on the internet and now my sister has the DVD on her Christmas wishlist. Getting the DVD is the sensible thing because then you can watch the whole episode, not just what remains after Channel 7 has hacked it half to death and you get no ads and you can watch it whenever you want.
But without the show being on TV last week we’d never have been tipped off about it, so even though commercial TV is like watching something in televisual hell, it still provides the important service of finding new shows. Like hearing the radio edit of a song on the radio. You then take note of the name of the song and look it up on iTunes or Wikipedia and buy the album. TV is filling that spot now for TV shows. Instead of thinking of TV as where we watch TV shows we need to think of TV as where we find out about TV shows and DVD as where we watch TV shows.
Commerical TV networks who are still shaking their ad break filled heads and wondering why nobody watches their crappy little networks won’t be pleased to hear that they are now just there to promote a show that people watch for two episodes before buying the DVD, because if you only watch two episodes you only see 2/ 26 episodes worth of ads and the station loses 24/ 26 episodes worth of ad revenue. To combat this of course TV networks need to start producing much more of their own programming content so they get the profit from the DVD sales. I doubt this will happen though as the investment into an inhouse production is greater risk than just buying an American sitcom and promoting the guts out of it to your existing, albeit dwindling, audience and hoping for a ratings miracle.
Of course if the networks want to hold onto the current model where TV is where you watch TV programs they will need to show less ads, not hack around content, not change the timeslot every third week, show less ads and show more things worth watching. Unfortunately I know of only 5 stations that do this and 3 of them are the ABC and the other two are SBS. When even the 24 hour sports channel can’t help but change the timeslot of things for no reason you can figure there is a problem.
Also while Go is the most popular TV station on Free to Air the future is doomed. No really, doomed.
On a different note now. During the last week I watched more TV than I normally watch in an average month, the reason being I had much more time than normal and felt like checking out iView. This revealed to me that maybe my tongue in cheek Facebook bio of “I don’t watch TV, I’m to busy doing FTV assignments” wasn’t as far off as it seems. It also got me thinking that the future of TV was online replays. iView is the ABC service and for iiNet and Westnet users it is quota free so you can watch 5GB and still come off on your lightest internet usage figure in a month (I checked this morning, I watched 4.5 hours of TV on the internet that day and the download quota for the whole household was 174MB) but Channel 7 and Channel 10 both have an equivalent service for catching up on programs you missed during the week. These aren’t quote free so I haven’t checked them out and as you may have guessed I’m not enthusiastic about commercial TV to say the least, but I’m guessing they work much the same way, as, I imagine, does the Channel 9 service which I assume exists although I haven’t looked for it. (Mind you it is Channel 9 so maybe I shouldn’t assume that they have one.)
I was just about ready to post an article about how catch up online programming is the future of TV when all my hopes and dreams were crushed by an excellent article at New Matilda by Jason Wilson about the Pwned Nudie Run. I actually agree with everything he said but it is best not to go to far publicly expressing contradictory views. Actually I do that all the time, but whatever. You should read the article, it is very good but be aware there is some blurred nudity.
Sunday, November 8, 2009
Yes, Nowhere
It is a dark, Sunday night. There has just been some rain and the humidity is high but the temperature is tolerable also thanks to the rain.
Someone in the neighbourhood is having a barbeque and I can smell the smoke really strongly. I am sitting in my room, studying with an elaborate set up to allow myself to use one computer while at two desks.
Still Run - BrotherSister is playing in iTunes.
Why do you care? You don't. So I make this small observation about my life at this exact moment in time. So what? This is of no consequence to anyone but me and even for me this experience is so minor, so insignificant in the broader scheme of things that once it is over I won't remember it or care about it any further.
So why am I taking the effort to post this moment on my blog? Nobody cares, even I won't care in about half an hour. The reason is this: for some reason I just thought for a split second that this is a great experience. The smoke, the dark, the rain, the music. Something about these factors came together and suddenly I feel like this is the most perfect place in the world.
And what would life be if we didn't all have these random moments where for even no more than 10 minutes the world just seems perfect. Where all the much better possibilities for how life could be at this moment just don't seem so exciting compared to the dull yet magical experience we have here.
In a recent XKCD comic, Nowhere, this idea is ridiculed. The guy says there is nowhere he'd rather be than here with his girlfriend, his girlfriend pictures herself riding a dinosaur. I found that comic hilarious, but I still disagree with it because just now I could honestly think of nothing I'd prefer to do than be right where I was.
It is strange, it makes not much sense because really studying, smelling someone else's barbeque and being stuck in a small humid room aren't the most appealing things in the world. But there is still honestly nowhere I'd rather be.
You don't care about what has made this experience for me, in fact you might not care I had the experience. The fact that the experience exists is why I am sharing it. It is just another very human moment saved for the archives of the internet.
Someone in the neighbourhood is having a barbeque and I can smell the smoke really strongly. I am sitting in my room, studying with an elaborate set up to allow myself to use one computer while at two desks.
Still Run - BrotherSister is playing in iTunes.
Why do you care? You don't. So I make this small observation about my life at this exact moment in time. So what? This is of no consequence to anyone but me and even for me this experience is so minor, so insignificant in the broader scheme of things that once it is over I won't remember it or care about it any further.
So why am I taking the effort to post this moment on my blog? Nobody cares, even I won't care in about half an hour. The reason is this: for some reason I just thought for a split second that this is a great experience. The smoke, the dark, the rain, the music. Something about these factors came together and suddenly I feel like this is the most perfect place in the world.
And what would life be if we didn't all have these random moments where for even no more than 10 minutes the world just seems perfect. Where all the much better possibilities for how life could be at this moment just don't seem so exciting compared to the dull yet magical experience we have here.
In a recent XKCD comic, Nowhere, this idea is ridiculed. The guy says there is nowhere he'd rather be than here with his girlfriend, his girlfriend pictures herself riding a dinosaur. I found that comic hilarious, but I still disagree with it because just now I could honestly think of nothing I'd prefer to do than be right where I was.
It is strange, it makes not much sense because really studying, smelling someone else's barbeque and being stuck in a small humid room aren't the most appealing things in the world. But there is still honestly nowhere I'd rather be.
You don't care about what has made this experience for me, in fact you might not care I had the experience. The fact that the experience exists is why I am sharing it. It is just another very human moment saved for the archives of the internet.
Thursday, November 5, 2009
Storm Season '09/'10: Storm 4 Review
The day began at the ludicrous time of 4:54am, which was sunrise given our government hasn’t seen fit to introduce daylight saving. Because I was asleep at sunrise, as were most people because it is so ridiculously early, I have no idea how it started other than unconsciously. As the day progressed however it became hot and humid. I actually found it quite pleasant.
As the day continued more cloud covered the cloud, but it wasn’t anything special. You could possibly extrapolate a storm from the clouds but it was more likely that everyone knew there was going to be a storm tonight anyway.
In the afternoon there was a huge storm that wiped out most of west South East Queensland. I’ll be waiting eagerly for the email from the relative in what used to be Warrick for first hand reports of the 7cm hail they got there. As for me in Brisbane though- nothing. Jut heat and humidity.
That is pretty much how the story went for the day. There were lots of big storms and storm warnings and the warning even had an arrow pointing to one cell to say it was very dangerous- as if its representation as a huge red mark wasn’t enough to suggest that. But none of this came remotely close to us.
It was beyond the end of the day, which happened at the foolishly early time of 6:09pm because our government is too stupid to wind the clock on one hour, when the promise of a storm that dared approach was seen. It came in the form of a huge barrier of red moving East across the radar. There was no way it could possibly miss us. There was at one stage a large black spot in the cloud but it faded out as it approached. When the storm came near to hitting, at a time I foolishly didn’t take note of but I think it was some time around 8pm, the first drops of rain were large and isolated which suggests the formerly black spot on the radar was in fact hail that melted out.
The storm didn’t start with these heavy drops though, in fact for a while there it didn’t start at all. We went out to observe the calm before the storm and then when it finished we eagerly watched the next stage- the calm before the storm. Ultimately there were three calms before the storm finally blew open the doors. The unusually long calms built quite the excitement. The sky was constantly a light with lightning, but there was scarcely any thunder to be heard. This silent light added to the eeriness created by the perfectly still environment.
Next there was a series of false starts after the calm finally cracked with an almighty gust of wind and the heavy drops began to fall onto the tin roof… and then stop after a few seconds… and then start again… and then stop. The storm’s engine seemed to have stalled just after Ipswich and it was now unsuccessfully trying to kick back into gear.
The radar was still showing a looming red mass so the family had shut all the windows, and under the astonishing silent lightshow had also shut down most of the electronics. We lined up chairs and ate dinner in front of the storm.
The rain eventually did come, but it seemed somewhat undramatic. The build up to the storm was over done and this was pathetic. We’d lost internet so we couldn’t see the radar any more, but something was going wrong. The storm tired itself out already perhaps?
For about 3 seconds the power went off. Enclosed in darkness the family gave a great cheer at the sign of something entertaining, however the people at Energex must have been particularly on the ball as the power came back on again immediately. A few minutes later it went off a second time, and as with the first time there was a great cheer. As with the first time also it lasted only 3 seconds before the lights came back.
There was a show for a while, but it was nothing notably exciting. It looked like a storm would look if you weren’t as obsessively excited by them as I am. The family retired inside and turned back on the internet and checked the radar. The storm had changed direction just before it hit us and gone south. We only got the very edge of the storm, while the Gold Coast got hammered. The storm must have headed south where they have a decent time zone I guess.
The storm is over now and BoM has cancelled warnings accordingly, but there are thundery showers sitting over South East Queensland. The thunder in these showers- ooh there was a strike just then- is ironically better than that of the actually storm. One rumble as loud enough to shake the glass in my open window. These showers are expected to last all night.
Final Statistics:
Wind: yes
Rain: yes
Lightning: yes
Hail: no
Blackout: yes
House damage: no
Car damage: no
Human damage: no
Side yard: wet
Car-tracks: wet
Breezeway 1: wet
Breezeway 2: dry
Front Yard: wet
Carport: wet around the edges
Inside the house: dry
This storm had a lot of tension to start with, the long series of calms added anticipation, the long series of false starts added frustration. The blackouts added happy distractions. The most exciting part was probably watching cars drive past during the storm and seeing in their headlamp light that the road was steaming, the cold of the storm taking affect on the hot bitumen from the day. Overall though this storm was bitterly disappointing. Other than the things I’ve just mentioned and the spectacular albeit silent lightshow there was really nothing interesting. Yes there was a storm. There isn’t much more to say though. It is Guy Fawkes Day, and with this storm was a poor substitute for fireworks.
Brisbane Storm 5th November 2009:
5/10
And if you can’t tell, I think South East Queensland should have daylight saving.
As the day continued more cloud covered the cloud, but it wasn’t anything special. You could possibly extrapolate a storm from the clouds but it was more likely that everyone knew there was going to be a storm tonight anyway.
In the afternoon there was a huge storm that wiped out most of west South East Queensland. I’ll be waiting eagerly for the email from the relative in what used to be Warrick for first hand reports of the 7cm hail they got there. As for me in Brisbane though- nothing. Jut heat and humidity.
That is pretty much how the story went for the day. There were lots of big storms and storm warnings and the warning even had an arrow pointing to one cell to say it was very dangerous- as if its representation as a huge red mark wasn’t enough to suggest that. But none of this came remotely close to us.
It was beyond the end of the day, which happened at the foolishly early time of 6:09pm because our government is too stupid to wind the clock on one hour, when the promise of a storm that dared approach was seen. It came in the form of a huge barrier of red moving East across the radar. There was no way it could possibly miss us. There was at one stage a large black spot in the cloud but it faded out as it approached. When the storm came near to hitting, at a time I foolishly didn’t take note of but I think it was some time around 8pm, the first drops of rain were large and isolated which suggests the formerly black spot on the radar was in fact hail that melted out.
The storm didn’t start with these heavy drops though, in fact for a while there it didn’t start at all. We went out to observe the calm before the storm and then when it finished we eagerly watched the next stage- the calm before the storm. Ultimately there were three calms before the storm finally blew open the doors. The unusually long calms built quite the excitement. The sky was constantly a light with lightning, but there was scarcely any thunder to be heard. This silent light added to the eeriness created by the perfectly still environment.
Next there was a series of false starts after the calm finally cracked with an almighty gust of wind and the heavy drops began to fall onto the tin roof… and then stop after a few seconds… and then start again… and then stop. The storm’s engine seemed to have stalled just after Ipswich and it was now unsuccessfully trying to kick back into gear.
The radar was still showing a looming red mass so the family had shut all the windows, and under the astonishing silent lightshow had also shut down most of the electronics. We lined up chairs and ate dinner in front of the storm.
The rain eventually did come, but it seemed somewhat undramatic. The build up to the storm was over done and this was pathetic. We’d lost internet so we couldn’t see the radar any more, but something was going wrong. The storm tired itself out already perhaps?
For about 3 seconds the power went off. Enclosed in darkness the family gave a great cheer at the sign of something entertaining, however the people at Energex must have been particularly on the ball as the power came back on again immediately. A few minutes later it went off a second time, and as with the first time there was a great cheer. As with the first time also it lasted only 3 seconds before the lights came back.
There was a show for a while, but it was nothing notably exciting. It looked like a storm would look if you weren’t as obsessively excited by them as I am. The family retired inside and turned back on the internet and checked the radar. The storm had changed direction just before it hit us and gone south. We only got the very edge of the storm, while the Gold Coast got hammered. The storm must have headed south where they have a decent time zone I guess.
The storm is over now and BoM has cancelled warnings accordingly, but there are thundery showers sitting over South East Queensland. The thunder in these showers- ooh there was a strike just then- is ironically better than that of the actually storm. One rumble as loud enough to shake the glass in my open window. These showers are expected to last all night.
Final Statistics:
Wind: yes
Rain: yes
Lightning: yes
Hail: no
Blackout: yes
House damage: no
Car damage: no
Human damage: no
Side yard: wet
Car-tracks: wet
Breezeway 1: wet
Breezeway 2: dry
Front Yard: wet
Carport: wet around the edges
Inside the house: dry
This storm had a lot of tension to start with, the long series of calms added anticipation, the long series of false starts added frustration. The blackouts added happy distractions. The most exciting part was probably watching cars drive past during the storm and seeing in their headlamp light that the road was steaming, the cold of the storm taking affect on the hot bitumen from the day. Overall though this storm was bitterly disappointing. Other than the things I’ve just mentioned and the spectacular albeit silent lightshow there was really nothing interesting. Yes there was a storm. There isn’t much more to say though. It is Guy Fawkes Day, and with this storm was a poor substitute for fireworks.
Brisbane Storm 5th November 2009:
5/10
And if you can’t tell, I think South East Queensland should have daylight saving.
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