Why put birds in a box?

This expression 'A Box of Birds' seems interesting, although not very common. I can only find 2 references to it - 'How do you tell the difference between Kiwis and Aussies?' , and a page from a website full of idioms. Apparently the Aussie equivalent is 'Bonzer Mate', and while that sounds ridiculous, we can't really hold it against them because they are only descendants of criminals.

So essentially it means to be joyful or happy. So as for the question - 'Why put them in a box?', the answer is obvious - they must enjoy being in a box.

Onto more important things, it is Rugby World Cup time, and initially I was anxious because we don't have a TV, and after being rugby starved for the last couple years, I feel the need to catch up. So I bought a satellite capture card from trademe, attached it to the dish on the side of our flat, and after a couple weeks of fiddling around I finally have all (4) of the freeview channels working. And the best part is even though all the games are in the middle of the night, I can record them and wake up in the morning and catch all the highlights. And the even better thing? The rugby is in widescreen!

For make benefit of American viewers, I take a screenshot of a 'scrum' in action.

You Americans can follow the progress of your national side on the RWC website. Although they haven't got any points, apparently they put up a pretty good showing against England, the defending world champs...

Welcome to the social!

Although I refuse to use facebook for multiple reasons (facebook bullying and the fact that someday, the inventors will be very rich from it may be some of them), I have welcomed myself to the social by signing up to last.fm. You can cliky through to view my profile here. Unfortunately, I don't have any friends on it, which is making me feel really sad, so if any of you are last.fm listeners, please add me. And the best thing about that widget on the side is that you can click right on the songs and it gives you a live preview, so you don't even have to leave the comfort of our blogpage. Brilliant!

work space

Jono asked me to do a post on his workspace. I think he wanted me to do it so he'd not be embarassed talking about himself all the time.
So this is his workspace(the spare room):
And this morning i felt like having crumpets for breakfast, but we'd run out. So i thought in all my wisdom that if I can buy them, someone must be making them, so why cant I!
After about 2.5 hours in the kitchen, here's the result:

HOrray! And for all the americans, you can actually get crumpets from Trader Joes, they're probably next to the English muffin things. Crumpets from the store are nice when you put them in the toaster and then put jam, or syrup (maple, or NZ golden syrup) or butter on them and take a nice big bite. mmmmm yum.
Another news item: We SAFELY picked up all our shipping! And yes, Vaughn, it did arrive on our doorstep in one piece. So now all i need is a big hunky transformer for my sewing machine so i can get creative again!
Ps, our home is looking very homely and nice! I didnt think jono would be the type to tell you that, and probably only the girls would care anyway.

Aro Valley

So we are living in the colourful Aro Valley, somewhat different to San Jose, and I thought it might be useful for you California types to learn a bit about it. There are a few photos on flickr that give a good illustration of how it looks.

The entrance to our street, Boston Terrace. On the left I guess is our version of the 'Painted Ladies'

Looking up Boston Terrace, which is almost as wide as the 101, but not quite. Good luck trying to find a park!

The 'Philosophical Society' building that is a couple houses over

The small park across the road which seems to attract a lot of drunks and bums. And has also been labled by some as 'beautiful' - not sure what they were smoking at the time

Aro Valley's name came from the Aro Stream, which has since been replaced by a road which runs up the valley. It is home to an interesting mix of students (since University is close by) and working professionals who want to live close to town but would also like the sense of being out of the city. Sometimes a little squating goes on in the University-purchased-with-the-intention-of-expanding-but-currently-left-unoccupied-houses.

Most of the housing has a Victorian look and feel (where the feel is 10C [50F] inside temperature during winter). Some are extremely derelict, like our next-door-neighbours, some are retro and funky, and others are modern, tall and boring.

You can't really escape the Aro Valley community feel. They have a bunch of cool shops only a couple minutes walk from our house, and regular carnivals and other events. And for a prime example of the political-social feeling within the area, I leave you with a commentary of the last 'meet the [election] candidates' meeting held every time an MP is required for the electorate. It is quite amusing to attend, very famous for its heckling, and generally any candidate from the right is guaranteed to be eaten alive.

We are online, yippee

Being a bit of a nerd, I find it frustrating when I have my all my gadgets laid out in the lounge ready for use, yet crippled by a non-working internet connection. But this morning I finally convinced TelstraClear that it was a problem within their network, and the IP they gave me wasn't being routed properly, so they gave me a new one. In the process though I learnt that you can pick IP addresses at random, some of which will provide internet access and not even be billed against your account. I'm not really sure how that works, but it was an interesting find nonetheless.

And now I will give a shameless plug for my new-found interest: Human FM. Although the low-powered FM transmission won't quite reach our friends in California you can stream it as well!. At this point I should give kudos to the relaxed standards of the relevant New Zealand broadcasting association for allowing them to set this up; it seems Human FM only have to pay a nominal fee to stream online, which is far removed from the dillemas streamcasters are facing in the US thanks to the rediculous royalty hikes from SoundExchange.