Complainers, whingers, whiners

We're all allowed our fair share of whinging and whining and complaining I think. You know, people have to get that stuff off their chest every now and then. But hell, the number of times I hear people complain about the weather around here. I actually like weather in general. I like its unpredictability. The day we can control the weather is the day I'll start complaining about it.

But seriously, I can't even get people to sit outside when it's slightly humid. They'd rather stay in the air conditioned building and when they leave work they get into to their air conditioned car and when they get home they get into their air conditioned house. I constantly hear about it being too humid, too rainy, too hot, and they hardly spend any time outside.

Pause.

Deep breath.

IT'S FU#KEN FLORIDA! WHAT THE FU#K DO YOU EXPECT FOR FU#K'S SAKE?!?

Complaining about complainers. Hmmmm....

UPDATE: It was pretty hot the other night out though :-p

Recently

Recently something happened... I can't remember what it was...

nice one pk.

P.S. Although I haven't been making too many posts lately, I have been taking quite a few pictures. Like, the flickr badge to the right has been in a state of constant update, pretty much. Apart from that I've been pretty flat out. Some major stuff coming up in the next few months. Hope you're having fun y'all.

Peace out.
PK.

Weird Saturday stuff

Last Saturday was a pretty weird day, in that everything I had planned didn't work out. The original plan was to:
- go see Fiona Apple at Sunfest in West Palm beach.
- drop in at a friend's birthday party in Plantation.
- have dinner at Thai Orchid in Coral Gables.
- see Mimimal play at I/O lounge in downtown Miami.

That plan was pretty damn ambitious, since it involved traversing three counties in one day. I like the ambitious plans though, so I was all for giving it a shot. Unfortunately, as the day wore on, I realised that I just wouldn't be able to get to see Fiona Apple. I had to drive to Sunfest the next day anyway to shoot photos for another of Hilary's concerts. I couldn't be bothered. I also wanted to spend more time at the birthday party so I cancelled my dinner and told the people I'd meet up with them at the Minimal gig. No real drama.

The birthday party was next. I ended up arriving at the party precisely one week early. I haven't done anything like this before, but I'm sure it brought some laughs to the birthday girl. There is a good reason why I stuffed this up - I'm stupid.

So, not having a birthday party to go to I called up the dinner friends and told them I could come. One of them offered me a lift to the restaurant from his place so I took that offer up.

Later, after mucking around with some music stuff, we left for the restaurant. However, he'd forgotten where he put some flyers for the band that night. We ended up going back to his house and spent well over an hour looking for the damn flyers. They were absolutely nowhere to be found. I thought I'd seen him put the flyers on the car so I went for a pretty long walk to find any suspect flyers all over the road. I didn't find anything (apart from a few pairs of shoes, which I thought to be pretty weird actually).

We left his house, defeated. Calling the friends we were meeting for dinner, we were informed the restaurant was actually shut. Bugger! We made alternative plans and ate somewhere else. It was getting late and we all thought we'd missed the Minimal gig. We arrived at I/O lounge and discovered that they were actually still playing - although one of our group had forgotten their ID and couldn't immediately get into the lounge. Great! After some convincitroning (word?) we all got in and enjoyed a couple of Minimal songs. I guess that one thing sorta did turn out alright.

I took pictures on the night. I'm dragging my camera with me everywhere these days it seems. Click on the picture below:


You'll start working out pretty quickly who I hang out with here in South Florida.

I'm back

And I'm bloody exhausted. I had accumulated about 2 hours of sleep when I arrived in Miami last night - I just can't sleep upright. Period. Sleeping pills (which I tried this time around) made me feel very tired but then I couldn't fall asleep.

I watched some cool movies on the way over though - "House of flying daggers", "Capote", "Good luck and good night", and my favourite of the flight, "Enron: The smartest guys in the room".

I also have some pictures that I uploaded from the trip. They're not all up, but click on the cute cat below to get to what there is...

Seeya Australia!

I'm currently waiting in the Melbourne airport for the gate to open for my flight to Los Angeles. I've taken a quick picture of the plane I'll be flying back in so here it is:



Anyway, seeya to all the people I caught up with in Oz. To the people I didn't catch up with, I'll see you around sometime. I don't know when I'll be returning to Australia again, so I expect to see you overseas, ok? Good.

Chilling out in LAX

Back in Fort Lauderdale it's currently 1:13am. This means that pretty soon I should be getting some sleep... yerr, that's just not going to happen. A couple of more hours and then I catch this bastard economy flight to Melbourne. I arrive at 12:30pm in Adelaide to a spanking new airport! It is working now, right??? Last time they were having fuel problems or something and we had to use the old building. Well, whatever, I never really had anything to say for this post, I'm only writing something coz I was able to find a free wifi spot.

An up and down Monday

Monday started off like any other Monday. Check e-mails received over the weekend, catch up with other people to see what they got up to, think about what had to be done for the week. There was one thing in the back of my mind though: the flight to Australia. Now don't get me wrong, I was sooooo looking forward to going back to Australia and meeting up with everyone I possibly can, but it's that damn flight that I was worried about. If you read this mess of words often enough you'd know I got bitten by a red-back spider a couple of days before flying back to the US. The bite got completely mis-diagnosed, I thought I was ok to fly, but in the end I wasn't. It's the only time I really thought I was going to die, and I say that in all seriousness. Since then I've had dizzy spells and numbness like I had on the plane, but nowhere near the severity. They've pretty much gone *now*, but I was still scared of getting on the plane, whilst going through my Monday morning thought process.

I mentioned this to my friend at work and said that it would have really been good to go on a couple of rollercoaster rides before I left, just to test if I was fit to fly. What happened next was amazing. He looked up the weather for Orlando - awesome day predicted. Orlando of course has all the major theme parks, "Islands of Adventure" being one of them. "The Hulk", one of my favourite rollercoaster rides, is also there. Orlando is also 3 hours drive away from Ft Lauderdale. It was 11am. The park closed at 10pm. We decided to leave work for the rest of the day and ride on rollercoasters instead. Totally random. Totally impromptu.

We went on "the Hulk" three times. We went on "Dueling Dragons" four times. We also went on the "Spiderman" and "The Mummy" rides. It was an awesome day, full of adrenalin. At the end of the night, while on the "Dueling Dragons" ride, fireworks were setting an awesome backdrop to an awesome ride.

I am fit to fly.

Going mobile and lacking sleep

It's currently past 5am in the morning. I didn't head out tonight, but I am at a mate's place (some dodgy Nicaraguan) working out some music stuff. At this stage I have had a few beers - Sam Adams and Presidente. I am loving my new laptop. I know someone reading this laughed when I said that I *needed* to buy a laptop. Well, I probably could have done my music course back in Australia by borrowing people's computers here and there, but that would be so damn inconvenient. Plus, now that I have a laptop, I am becoming a true geek. If I really want I could be one of those geeks who sits at Starbucks all day and surfs the net with their ultra-expensive T-Mobile access plan. There are two bad things about that - first, paying for the wifi access when many other coffee places have free wifi. The other one, oh so much more important, is that I still think that Starbucks' coffee sucks. Their frappuccino is the only thing decent there and if I drank them all day I'd probably turn out to be a pretty fat bastard, for some reason.

I try to adhere to a policy of not making blog entries when I'm tired and especially when I'm emotional or slightly drunk (I haven't been adhering to that lately, obviously), but what the hey. This site needed an update.

Hurricane season 2006

Alberto
Beryl
Chris
Debby
Ernesto
Florence
Gordon
Helene
Isaac
Joyce
Kirk
Leslie
Michael
Nadine
Oscar
Patty
Rafael
Sandy
Tony
Valerie
William

I'm going to be getting familiar with some of these names, I think. I should start a pool or something as to how many, and which hurricane/s is/are going to hit the east coast of Florida. I will bet on three hurricanes: Ernesto, Gordon and Patty.

I think if a hurricane is getting close and dangerous this year I'll head up to Canada - and probably have a snowstorm hit. Ah well, the powder will be good for snowboarding then I guess.

Another thing, the 10 most expensive hurricanes to hit the US (source = Wikipedia) (costs are inflation adjusted):

Katrina ($75B)
Andrew ($44.9B)
Charlie ($15.4B)
Ivan ($14.6B)
Hugo ($12.6B)
Wilma ($12.2B)
Agnes ($11.6B)
Betsy ($11.1B)
Rita ($9.4B)
Frances ($9.1B)

I've watched 6 of those come through while I've been here in the US. Daaaaamn.

Skype-ing it. Finally.

Sometimes it takes me a while to get around to stuff... like Skype for example. For those of you I know back in Oz, England, wherever you've gone, my Skype handle is daecks. So anyway, add me to your contact list! Or, let me know what other VoIP networks you may use. Or, continue thinking "PK, I don't really want to talk to you...". This stuff should be all operational within the next few days.

Brief return to Oz

I'm heading back to Australia for nearly 2 weeks at the end of this month. I'll be in Adelaide from the 22nd April till May 2nd. During the weekdays I'll actually be working but my weeknights should be relatively free. On the weekends I have to fit in a bachelor party, wedding and probably a 21st and a 50th as well. It would still be awesome to catch up any friends back there! Let me know if you'll be around by sending an e-mail to daecks@gmail.com. Due to me losing a lot of my contacts, it's probably pretty likely I don't have your number.

Some ultrafest pictures

are now online here. I don't know what I'm going to do about the movies yet. I'd like to post them but having a sort-of permanent hosting site for them is difficult. Well, perhaps I could try Google video or something.

Anyways, Ultrafest was awesome. I actually had to take my shoes off at one point because my feet hurt from jumping around so much.

There was only one thing that pissed me off that whole day and you know it's going to be one of those weird things that just get to me. In the Carl Cox tent there was a guy with some really expensive looking DSLR camera, much more expensive than mine. You know, he had the whole proper camera bag thing, the big hot-shoe flash arrangement, the I'm-too-cool-for-skool stance, a posse of fairly attractive women around him. I'm there with my point and shoot wishing I had my DSLR with me but knowing one had to have a special pass to bring such cameras in. Anyway, he was standing around the middle of the room, probably around 40 feet from the front of the stage. He brings out the camera to get a shot of the DJ, bear in mind it's pretty bright in the tent because of the insane lighting...

He uses his bloody flash. Looking down at the photo he's taken, and I could see the image result too, he sees some bright heads in the foreground reflecting the flash and not much in the background. The DJ couldn't reflect the flash coz he was just too bloody far away, wasn't he!?! I nearly went up to him and said "mate, forget the flash. Crank your ISO up. Set your shutter speed to something like 1/60. See what results you get". But I didn't, I thought I would have looked like a dickhead or something, or maybe he had a meat cleaver stored somewhere that he would have felt like using. Every shot he took he used the flash. Anyway, point is that's one of my pet peeves: people using flash for objects further than 10 feet away (perhaps 20 feet if it's a more powerful hot-shoe flash). It pisses me off. It almost pisses me off more than people who pull up at stop lights and are always moving forward trying to predict when the lights go green. Then, when the lights actually *do* go green, they stay there for like 5 seconds. That really pisses me off.

Pissed (the non-drunk meaning) Kristian signing off.

New guitar

PK can rock out now.

GET MOTIVATED!

Today I attended a motivational business seminar as part of a team building activity for work. In a nutshell it was one of the weirdest experiences I've had while over in the US. The end result is that I'm not really any more motivated than when I got up this morning but I did learn a few interesting things.

The speakers that I saw today included Steve Forbes, General Colin Powell and Zig Ziglar, apparently the #1 motivator in the US. There were other speakers I didn't get to see including Rudolph Giuliani, Don Shula and Jerry Lewis. I wasn't feeling too well (6 days straight of going out finally got to me) so my friend and I left early.

Basically the whole thing was very American. Duh. When a speaker got on stage to talk there was a massive blast of music accompanied by pyrotechnics. This brought on many a raised eyebrow by myself. There was also a lot of 'patting America on the back', where the speaker would mention how great the country was, how free it was, how it was the greatest democracy ever, how it brought freedom to other countries afar, and there were a few compulsory 9/11 references to boot. At *any* of these references the crowd would go completely wild and insane which caused me to shrink down in my seat and think to myself "I don't belong here..." If you know me then you know I totally and completely disagree with the whole Iraq thing and I think America's foreign policy stinks. A lot of the stuff mentioned simply did not fly with me.

So the whole thing seemed to be a little Republican convention. It was about being successful and how you can best serve your own interests. Just from what I've seen over here so far that seems to fit the Republican psyche very well. It also showed how effective the speakers were at instilling these belief systems in the general American public. There is so much pomp and fanfare and glitz and glamour that I nearly found myself getting caught up in the moment.

The whole day also seemed to be an telemarketing campaign where you actually paid (I didn't of course, my company did) to get advice from people pushing their own agendas. "This tool is the best... you can see when the three green arrows come up and that's when you buy stocks... this whole program is normally $7000 but today you can get it for only $1000! Hurry! This is a limited offer only available today!" While I don't doubt the effectiveness of the tool, the whole thing did seem to be very late-night telemarketing-ish. It also brought back memories of the timeshare experience I had a while ago.

An interesting day, that is for sure. I learnt a few things, although the things learnt were not intended to be sent across by the presenters, I'm guessing. I'm actually keen to go to a full-on Republican convention now. Call me a masochist, but I just want to see more of this sort of stuff to see how bad it can *really* get.

I think I should move to Miami

Don't get me wrong. I love the Ft Lauderdale pub scene and the general laid back feeling that you get in most of the places. However, if I start from Wednesday night I was at the Hotel Victor for a Hilary McRae gig.

Thursday night I was at The Road for another Hilary gig.

Today I had a lunch meeting at the Ritz-Carlton in Coconut Grove for a breast cancer walk I'm participating in with friends.

Tomorrow I'm going to Ultrafest, which I am pretty bloody stoked about.

Sunday is the NASDAQ-100 tennis open. I'm hoping to get some good pictures there... I'll be sitting in the VIP section ;-)

All this leads to the conclusion that I really should be living further south than I am now.

One heck of a cool movie

V for Vendetta. Just go see it. I can't remember the last time I've wanted so bad to go and see a movie again. If I can get to see another session tomorrow night I will. It genuinely had me shaking in a couple of scenes due to the just how powerful they were. What an amazing film.

The things that surprised me the most though? There were teenagers afterwards debating if what V planned could be classified as a terrorist act. It actually got people talking. I actually caught myself thinking that maybe there was some hope still... sometimes I feel that isn't the case. Sometimes I think I just need to chill out.

What I especially liked about the movie were the parallels one could draw to the current administration over here in the US, but I guess any movie that talks about using fear and the media as a means to get what they want from the general population would draw such parallels. It's nearly 2am. I'm out of here.

Star-spotting

It's always cool to see famous people out and about. I had great difficulty getting a picture of this guy, coz the damn bouncers kept on getting in the way...




P.S. You do know who it is, right?

News reporter of the millennium

Sorry Sandra Sully...

Melissa Theuriau - bonjour!

http://www.ryoni.com/news/123/ARTICLE/1099/2005-01-07.html

Gallery of the day

Goes to NBA cheerleaders.

I dream of the day I'll be allowed to take my telephoto lens into a basketball arena. *sigh*.

Calle Ocho

As I type this I am absolutely buggered. I have been running on a minimum of sleep for a while now. This, of course, is entirely my fault.

I can't remember what I did Friday night anymore... something.

Saturday night we headed out to the lovely South Beach area to check out some cool places. There were a few spring breakers about but not as many as one would expect since South Beach can get bloody expensive. We ended up at a really, really cool hotel on the beachfront called the Shore Club.

Sunday was spent at Calle Ocho where I saw a heck of a lot of hispanic people walking about (of course) and Santos Renuentes were playing there too. I of course have some pics from their gig that I'll put up later. I didn't get too many pictures of the crowd... I'm getting pretty paranoid these days about taking pictures of people. There were some angry looking hispanic dudes walking about in this case.

Sunday night was awesome. We headed to Nikki Beach, where I got some great movies and some pictures. They'll be put up online later as well. That place is awesome and oh so relaxing and there is *always* a bewdifal crowd there.

Coldplay and Fiona Apple

On the weekend I got to see Coldplay and Fiona Apple play in Orlando. Actually, ha, let me correct that. I got to see a bit of one Fiona Apple song - "Fast as you can" - and you can bet I was running as fast as I could to get to my seat when I arrived at the venue.

It turns out we had a bit of bad luck with the traffic that night. What should have been a 15 minute drive to the venue turned out being over an hour drive. Whilst sitting in bumper-to-bumper traffic we had to get to exit 83B on the I-4. Fiona would have already started her set, and being support act, would only be playing for 45 mins or so. Anyway, we came up to exit 82A... 5 mins passed ... exit 82B ... another 5 mins gone ... exit 82C... at which point I stated "ha, wouldn't it be funny if there was an 82D exit!" Nobody in the car really appreciated the humour.

We arrived, sat down, and Fiona left the stage. Excellent. I can't really express how much I was looking forward to seeing Fiona play live. I guess I'll have to wait another 5 years or something now.

Coldplay were awesome again though. It was cool to see all the massive yellow balls fall down again during "Yellow". Afterwards we were supposed to meet up with some people who were going to get us into one of the cool clubs. Unfortunately, one of them had a bit too much to drink and she was getting sick in the bathroom HALF WAY through the Coldplay set! Awesome.

Downtown was also bumper-to-bumper traffic so we decided to grab some grog and drink up at our hotel. I can't remember much after that, although I do remember us watching my copy of "You shoot, I shoot" for a little bit. It's pretty difficult to concentrate on subtitles when you're not exactly sober.

More photos please

Some "different" things have been going on in my life recently. People recently saw these photos from the CD release party. Actually the person who saw them was Fernando, who apart from playing for Santos Renuentes also plays for Hilary McRae (among many other groups).

I was asked if I wanted to further practice my photography and take pictures of Hilary's first ever gig. Those pictures are here. They liked those, so since then I've taken pictures of another concert by Hilary (photos are not yet online) and another Santos Renuentes gig.

I had heaps of fun taking the pictures, but what's even better, I got to take pictures for some awesome artists. Hilary, without even considering it was her first gig, was just absolutely outstanding.

How to kill a RAZR

Last week was an up-and-down week. I was doing this new photography stuff and had lots on my mind. I had gotten back from the gym and decided to put a load of washing on. Sitting down to relax I went to check my phone for messages... I couldn't find it. A bit unusual I thought. I looked everywhere for it. Still nothing. I tried calling the phone using my friend's mobile and it was going straight to voicemail. "Damn" I thought, "I've switched it off". But then I thought about that some more. I clearly remember NOT turning it off. More thinking. Going to voicemail.... phone must be off... why is phone off?... flat battery... no, it's fully charged... load of washing... battery dead... load of washing... load of washing... LOAD OF WASHING!

I absolutely flew downstairs and emptied the washing machine. Down the bottom of the tub was a very clean looking RAZR phone. HOLY SHIT! It was off. NO SHIT! I took it into work the next day, dismantled it (nice instructions on how to do that are here, pity the people taking the pictures didn't know that if they used a high f-stop value then everything would have been in focus) dried it out with alcohol, and tried resuscitating it a day later. It didn't work. HOLY SHIT! All my contacts were stored on my phone and not my SIM. HOLY SHIT! Ok, so I did have a backup of contacts from a few months ago and I do have e-mails from people who have changed their numbers, but hell, this is a stupid process to be going through.

Proof #1764743347 that PK is very human. I love reverse engineering my reactions to stuff like this though, and how I cope. How did I cope? I went out and bought a stack of stuff, like a point and shoot camera (always needed one of these, just required the right excuse), flash kit for my Nikon D-70, oh and a stack of clothes.

Right now my awesome friend Maha has lent me a phone, a Motorola A630. I don't mind the little bugger, it's starting to grow on me. I definitely don't want to get another RAZR. They're too bloody common for my liking, everybody has a RAZR. I'm sorta leaning towards a PEBL. If anyone has some spare PEBL parts from which I can build a phone, that preferrably isn't tied into a carrier, pretty please send them my way :-)

A warning

If I ever happen to call you and get your voicemail, and I'm within reach of my computer or iPod, you will get a power ballad left on your voicemail. I promise. Recent victims have received Michael Bolton's song mentioned previously, Heart's "Alone", Pat Benatar's "Love is a battlefield" and Def Leppard's "Love Bites".

Ho hum

I'm bored at work, well, it's 6pm and I feel like dribbling on my blog. You're reading this so you must be bored too. Or maybe you're finding something to kick start your day. Look elsewhere!

I like to start my work day with a bunch of questions and my objective is to get answers to all of them by the end. Today is not one of those days as I haven't answered any of the questions and I actually have more questions than I started with. yay!

Michael Bolton. Now that you're awake, it's weird how you hear a name and then it keeps popping up. I hadn't heard of this guy for ages and last night I watched "Office Space" and have been hearing his name ever since (Michael Bolton is the name of one of the characters in the movie). This morning I listened to the Chris Moyles show on BBC Radio One and the lead in was "How can we be lovers?", i.e.


How can we be lovers if we can't be friends
How can we start over when the fighting never ends
Baby, how can we make love if we can't make amends
Tell me how we can be lovers if we can't be,
Can't be friends


What a power ballad! Whoa. I've posted up lyrics to a MB song on my blog. I could imagine Cartman from South Park singing this song...

Onto other stuff, I get along well with a couple of people here at work and we're always finding stupid stuff on the internets. Has anyone seen the VW Golf GTI "Fast" commercials? "Fast" is a little devil sort of thing in guys that influences how we drive, if you girls didn't know. I'm sure at some point they'll tailor the ads for the ladies, but at the moment it's a guys only affair. Here are some links to the ads:

"Hair"
"Take out"
"Streamlined"

Fellas, make friends with your fast. By the way, nice marketing VW.

More google videos that I'm enjoying:
Wicked electricity arc
More wicked electricity stuff
Substation explosion

Yay yay for Valentine's Day!

Hold on... this is sounding a lot like last year.

Actually, this year was a little better. I ended up giving someone a Valentine's gift, and I dropped it off at 7am on their front porch on one of the coldest Florida mornings I can remember. Of course, we ain't getting blizzards down here so I can't really complain.

So last year I actually listened to some Rammstein. Maybe if I listen to the right sort of music, I can actually convince myself that everything is ok. How about "I feel loved" by "Depeche Mode"?


It's the dark night of my soul
And temptation's taking hold
But through the pain and the suffering
Through the heartache and trembling

I feel loved
I feel loved

As the darkness closes in
In my head I hear whispering
Questioning and beckoning
But I'm not taken in

I feel loved
I feel loved

From the depths of my emptiness
Comes a feeling of inner bliss
I feel wanted, I feel desired
I can feel my soul on fire

I feel loved
I feel loved


Yeah, that'll do nicely.

Lou, the goldfish battler

UPDATED: Lou is actually looking normal now! He/she/it got rid of the buoyancy problem and is discovering the bottom of the fish tank.

I've posted about this fish before, but Lou's resilience and battler attitude has impressed me. It's a sign that even though something bad in your life may have happened (in this case, the swim bladder is all screwed up), then you can still keep charging along.

Or maybe the fish is just thinking "when the hell are they going to let me f#%ken die?"

CD release party photos and geeks

There are online here. I kind of stuffed up the gamma in Photoshop... things were a bit iffy there for a while. Also the pictures were taken from the same perspective the whole night. There were lots of people in the club and some stupidly placed VIP tables. It was the best spot I could get.

Hey has anyone seen "The IT crowd", a British take on geekism? I've just watched 5 minutes of the second episode before posting this. It's not that bad! It reaches out to the geek lust buried deep within my tricuspid valve.

The Muse, it is good.

I have just rediscovered a group that I first listened to 5 years ago. Ah, I remember fondly the days blasting out some 'Muse' in one of the project labs at my university, trying to figure out how to warp pictures into spherical coordinates so I could form a panorama. Those were the days *sigh*.

Fast forward to today and I have rediscovered them. Recently I played Muse's first album and thought "damn those guys are good". They have since released two more albums and both are effin fantastic. Definitely some good listening, definitely one of my favourite bands.

Santos Renuentes' CD release party

Woohoo! This is one thing I've been looking forward to for a while: the CD release party for Santos Renuentes. Awesome. To those in Australia reading this, you have approximately 5 hours to get down to South Beach. Sorry for the late notice...

Updates

Have been made to this post. I somehow got my iPod working again and another third of the pictures have been processed and the ones I like uploaded.

Pics from the phone

Ok, here are some other weirdness pics I've taken with my crapola RAZR camera...

This fish looks like it's dead, but it's just got an airbubble in it's tail so has to spend most of its day upside down. Poor bugger.


Nice car, eh? Take a look at what is hanging near the rear view mirror - a disabled parking permit. Ok, so maybe the driver really is disabled... ya.


This is from a dart game (called "F#%cker", or at that stage it could equally have been pirate darts) I was playing down at the "local" with some mates. Look at the dart that has lodged itself in the other dart - the spider strikes again.

Debut album out

Santos Renuentes have finally released their self titled debut album! It's in stores now all around the US, but in short supply as there were only 5000 initial albums pressed. Here is a link that contains their first single and music video, "Marcha". This video is on rotation on local latin MTV-like station "Mun2" alongside Coldplay and the Darkness to name a few. For me the great thing is that the CD sleeve contains all the words to the songs which will help in my learning of Spanish. I can't wait until the CD release party next Wednesday night at Macarenas in SoBe. Awesome.

Spiderman

I could not stop laughing when I came into work last week and found that someone had modified a Spiderman poster in photoshop by replacing Peter Parker with an image of myself. Hats off Mark!

More photos uploaded

Slowly yet surely I'm returning to normal, so here are some photos! None of them have any comments yet, but whatever (update: some do). This is the result of me going through a third of the photos I've taken. There is still another third I cannot get off my iPod (unknown device problems which I just can't solve - update: I've fixed my iPod and have uploaded those photos) and the other third is in Wagga. God knows when I'll be able to get stuck into them.







This is the Australiana photo set which will have a lot more added to it in the future.
Here are some from the Boxing Day party.

Revenge of the redbacks

I had the absolute, without a doubt, worst flight back from Australia ever. There were times - and I say this with all honesty - that I thought I wasn't going to make it. Allow me to explain.

Whilst watching "King Kong" with a couple of mates I noticed that the inside of my left leg just above my ankle was hurting a little. My sock had folded over a couple of times but I thought it extremely wussy of my body to be complaining about that so I ignored it at the time. Later on that night at Garage club whilst playing some fussball I noticed the pain had increased and the left side of my groin was also starting to hurt. Standing in the line for the Vodka bar I felt my left leg go extremely numb and more of a general numbness over my whole body. My teeth started chattering, my pulse was racing and I was finding it difficult to stand up. I pretty much said "I have to go... to the hospital"

In the hospital I was put on a drip and given pain killers. By that stage my temperature was 38.5 Celsius (not that high really), my heart rate was 110 bpm (or thereabouts) and I was generally not feeling nor looking the best. Here is evidence:

I was diagnosed with SVT (superficial vein thrombosis) ... somehow. In hindsight such a diagnosis completely ignored all my other symptoms and only focused on the red patch, about 3cm diameter, just above my left ankle. I spent about 4 hours in the emergency ward before being discharged and by that stage I was feeling pretty good, in comparison to when I was admitted anyway.

I spent the next day generally laying about watching my left foot to make sure it never got too swollen. I was still fairly red though so that night on my mum's insistence I checked back in to the hospital to see if I could fly the next day. This doctor was different and was more or less scratching their head about the previous night's diagnosis. She was leaning towards more of some sort of bite, since the swelling on my upper leg was my lymph node. She drew an outline around the bite area and said if the redness exceeded that line in the morning that I do not fly.

Morning came, I thought I was feeling well enough to fly, the redness was contained within the line, I still have a little trouble walking but I caught the flight back to the US anyway.

Biggest mistake I have ever made. But there was still some stupidity on my part.

The flight from Adelaide to Sydney was fine. My foot was still a bit swollen but other than that I could not really complain about much.

Sydney to LA flight: the absolute worst flight experience I have ever had. Period. I had been doing my regular exercises and walking around the plane but around half way through the flight I suddenly felt lightheaded. My left leg was really swollen now and my left foot was bulging out of my shoe. I told an attendant that I didn't feel too well so I got up and lied down at the back of the plane for a while, did some walking around and got a lot of air onto me. I must admit though I really did play down how I was feeling. I felt worse than I stated. I sat down again and that's when it really happened. I had massive difficulty breathing and I was nearly falling unconscious. Every time a "wave" hit I tried meditating to pull myself through. I nearly called for more attendant attention but thought I could pull myself through it. I'm a bit stubborn like that sometimes. I got over the waves and was able to enjoy a viewing of "40 year old virgin" until I started getting them again. Not as bad as the first time but still pretty bad.

In the end I made it to LAX, of course, and I was deciding whether I would check myself into hospital or continue the flight to Fort Lauderdale. I had a 4 hour lay-over and decided to sleep a while and see how I felt. I chose a nice corner at my gate and once I woke up I felt ok again. The plane lifting off was a little horrific, and I spent a little time fighting the waves again, but I was able to get to sleep and I felt good again after that.

I'm convinced now I was bitten by a redback spider. The symptoms I had both on and off the ground are absolutely consistent with such a bite. That day I had been working in the garage and had been moseying about a bit, so the potential for a bite was there. Oh, here is what a redback looks like (image from Victorian museum website)

I've felt relatively well since. I have had a light headed feeling and my arms and legs don't really feel like they're there. The swelling in my foot has gone down quite a bit and the redness of the bite area is nearly gone. I was in the emergency room last night at a hospital here in Florida getting more blood tests done as well as some ultrasounds. My blood tests indicate normality everywhere as did the ultrasound. The doctor compared my symptoms with that of a redback spider bite and agreed that they matched, but without actual venom tests there is still some uncertainty. Plus, they don't have any antivenom for such a bite over here anyway.

Right now as I type this I'm high on antibiotics, pain killers and anti inflammatories. Every night I still wake up with my bed soaked from sweat but I'm not sure if that's from the antibiotics or not. Here is a pic of my little pill collection:

If it was a redback spider bite, and I'm pretty convinced it was (the symptoms just matched up perfectly from the intense pain at the bite site to the swollen lymph node to the numbness, difficulty in breathing, fever, high heart rate... everything) then I'm just plain curious as to why I got bitten visiting Australia rather than when I actually lived there for my whole life. Weird. If I had known it was a redback spider bite before leaving Oz I would never have left, since the symptoms can be recurring, as I experienced. But I was also feeling ok on the morning I left. Next time anything goes wrong on a plane I'm not going to be so quiet about it, that is for sure. I also remember thinking at the time that I just wanted to get back to Florida.

There are two people I have to really thank who looked after me when I first got the symptoms: Mary (not Mazza) and Ben (the guy with the girly smile here. Hehe). Thanks! I owe you. And of course my Mum, but she already knows that.

Anyway, it's 9pm and not surprisingly, I'm tired. Time to look forward to another 12+ hours of sleep :-)

Xmas in Loxton

Ahh, good ol' Loxton. How can I describe this place? How about this...

Heart rate anywhere but Loxton: **********************
Heart rate in Loxton: .....*.........*.........*........

Well, something like that. Loxton has changed a little this time around. The high school has undergone a massive overhaul and a lot of the buildings I had classes in are gone. My primary school has also changed a bit in that "the mound" has been demolished. Ahh, the mound. Such fond memories of rolling down that thing and trying to stop from falling off.

I went to the Loxton Club on Christmas eve with my bro not expecting to catch up with that many people in my age group. How wrong could I be? I still can't believe that I met so many of my old classmates there. It was awesome.

Today I'm crusing to meet some family over in Barmera and then I'll be heading to the annual Boxing Day party in Adelaide. Awesome.

Back in Adelaide

Cool. I am now back in Adelaide after spending a couple of days in Melbourne with my fantastic hosts Steve and Jen. I had an awesome time back there even though I was as sick as a dog (as in really bad cough, earaches) and still getting over jetlag.

But none of that matters as I am back home. I'm just waiting for my brother to finish the dishes (shock! horror!) and then I'm heading off for a walk down Rundle mall for old times sake. After that I'm going to head off to Loxton for Christmasy stuff, and I'll be returning to Adelaide on Boxing day at which point I'll catch up with all the Adelaideans.

Hooroo!

Knight rider

This is awesome. iTunes has picked up some classic NBC shows and one of them is Knight Rider. I couldn't really remember what happened in the episodes anymore - all I can remember is enjoying watching the show as a kid. It's so 80's, it's awesome, I love it.

Scared

Last Saturday (as in Dec 3rd) I had my birthday party and unfortunately, people got to see the bad side of me. Well that's if you call throwing water at people and cursing in German *bad* *things*. I also spent a bit of the night dancing around a sombrero and throwing packets of tim tams at people.

Problem with all the above is that I can't remember doing any of it. I can remember up to the short cricket game we played outside (short because we were hitting neighbours' cars with the tennis ball and decided to get back inside before the police got called), but after that the night is pretty much forgotten as far as I'm concerned. Forgotten that is if it were not for cameras. Some people got pictures of me doing these things and looking rather unwell and I'm scared. I haven't seen any of these pictures yet. God knows what I'm doing in them. I have a feeling that pretty soon I'm going to get some pictures in my inbox and I'm going to think "ha, what a dic.... hold on, that's me."

I'm scared. I'm really, really, scared.

Christmas and New Year's in Oztralia

I'm going to be there ;-)

I'll be arriving in Melbourne on Tuesday 20th December. I have a Visa interview on the 22nd and then I'll be heading off to Adelaide on the 23rd, arriving some time around lunch. At some point along the way I'll be in Loxton, probably for Christmas but otherwise I'll be in Adelaide catching up with all you fine people back there. I'm going to try scheduling some golf, tennis, bowling and some other stuff with some of you guys back there I think. Also, Savvy is crying out for some attention, as is the Botanic and even Worldsend. Awesome. I can't wait to get back there!

Shameless plug for...

my birthday! Yay!

Good on ya December 8th.

Hello Australia?

Some of you may know that I'm trying to get back to Australia for Christmas. To those of you who didn't know, now you do. There are some major complications that have arisen which may prevent me from doing so, but just to let you know I'm trying to work through those and I'm also trying to figure out a stack of alternative plans. I really, really want to catch up with y'all there.

Fingers crossed...

Sunrise in Florida

I've just confirmed occurs at 6:45am, or thereabouts. This has been a pretty good thanksgiving weekend, and although I didn't originally plan on going out at many nights as I did it's always good when things work out for the better.

I'd like to thank Starsailor for getting me home this morning with their cranking new album. Guys, I didn't like the second album too much - couldn't get into the choones - but it's nice to see that you've fully redeemed yourself with this third album "On the outside".

I'd also like to thank South Florida for putting on some pretty awesome weather for the past few days. Thanks.

I'd also like to thank the cop for not picking me up for speeding on Wednesday night. I didn't know the police would really care that I was going 70 in a 65 zone, but apparently they do during thanksgiving. Actually, I should really thank the other driver who drove past me while I was being tailgated by a policeman, which of course resulted in them getting a speeding ticket and not me. Thankyou for helping me execute operation ticket evasion.

Javi and Glenda - thanks for putting on that awesome thanksgiving dinner. Scott and Matt (or whoever it was) thanks for starting the darts drinking game. I ended up drinking a heck of a lot of that rum (I'm pretty sure I had 1/2 bottle to myself) and I can confirm that thanksgiving dinner tastes better on the way down.

One thing that concerns me over here though is the number of people who drink (and I mean drink a LOT) and then drive. Don't do it. It's pretty dumb you know. They should really start random breath tests or something to act as a sort of deterrant at the very least.

Getting off my soap box now, going to bed.

You might be a redneck if...

You go and watch NASCAR! Which is exactly what I did on Sunday.



I came away from NASCAR not really getting drawn into the whole thing that much. In fact, I left half way through because I was bored couldn't get into it. The tickets that we got were free, thank goodness, because at $90 a pop I really would have felt ripped off slightly disappointed had I actually payed for them.

I did enjoy the crashes though, they were fun to watch.



Of course we also had a flyover and the airplanes actually had weapons equipped!



I also enjoyed watching a redneck guy with bad teeth and a rat-tail calling out smart remarks to people as they walked past him. He was doing that for a while and then someone looking for their seat asked him if he was sitting in the correct seat. He was actually in the wrong section and had to move... nobody's perfect, right?

What I found amazing was the patriotism shown before the race started. Three trucks drove around the track with an American flag in tow and the crowd went absolutely mental with a deafening noise.



What was even more amazing happened after we had to stand for the American national anthem and remove our hats, which I expected of course. But then we were asked to bow our heads in prayer as Miss Florida read a prayer praising God about various things and asking for the protection of various people in faraway places. At the end of the prayer there was a resounding "Amen!" and people here and there followed that up with "Praise the Lord!" It was at that point I really felt like a foreigner and very, very out of place. It hit me I was in the company of real southerners at that time and I was very glad I had not worn my t-shirt that said "BORING" in the style of the NASCAR logo.

Anyway, I didn't really enjoy the whole NASCAR experience. I thought it paled in my comparison to the V8 Supercars in Australia or rally car driving. That's my opinion of course. It would probably have been much more enjoyable had I been wearing the headsets and listening to the commentators and had I actually chosen someone to go for and/or worked out what the hell was going on with people getting ahead and then losing their lead again. It's like that computer catchup thing on racing games they have for people behind the leader.

I did find this website which is a response to people who claim that NASCAR may not be that exciting. But, if you go read that site, you'll find that what they claim is great about NASCAR is pretty much in every other sporting event in existence so I don't see the 'that's special' part of the whole thing. Plus, the part about them seeming to make up rules as they go along... I'd find that downright annoying.

Something I heard about later was a pilot of one of the helicopters at the event was killed. Damn. We were long gone by that time though.

Hot chicks

Now that I have the attention of half the people reading this, I will write hot *nerd* chicks. There is something about an attractive girl and maths equations that I find particularly alluring. I'd write a maths equation to describe the relationship but I think these equations are better.

oZomatli pics

First off, BIG PROPS to Johanna, who was visiting from Puerto Rico, for taking these pictures at the Ozomatli concert in South Beach recently. BIG PROPS to Arlene for passing them on to me. BIG PROPS to me for posting other people's pictures!! But I know there are a couple of Ozomatli fans out there who read this little site-o-mine so I had to share them.

Asdru shouting it out to the crowd. Take particular note of the shirt he is wearing...
Yes, it says 'Womadelaide'. I get bagged for harping on about Australia and in particular Adelaide all the time, but anyone who bags me hasn't been to Australia yet and just doesn't understand...
Wil-dog on the bass.
Jabu - awesome vocals...

Shef with DJ Spinobi in the background...
Raul and Jabu...
This part was awesome: after the set had finished oZo came into the crowd and continued to play, battling with the DJ's at the nightclub who were trying to spin some musak...


Ende!

Farewell

Back in February I made this post about a picture I had located from a night out in South Beach. That night was excellent and I've had other good nights out with people in that group since then. I learnt today that Azadeh, the girl in the green top, died in a car accident last night. A person driving under the influence (in fact he had been convicted of DUI 3 times prior) was driving the wrong way on an interstate highway ramp and hit her car head on.

I had not seen Azadeh for a couple of months so I wasn't a close friend but I'd always have a chat when I did see her. Ha, I remember well being in Voodoo lounge in downtown Ft Lauderdale for Sean's birthday party a few months ago. I offered her my shoes because her feet were sore from dancing in her shoes and she could not dance anymore. There I was standing on the dancefloor with no shoes on saying "c'mon! there is still dancing to be done! you can wear my shoes!" and she just stared back at me with those eyes. That will always be one thing I will remember about her: her eyes. They were just amazing.

I spent tonight talking to Sean who was a close friend of Azadeh. He's a bit overwhelmed by the gravity of the situation and things will take a while to sink in.

I have found that time and the comfort of family and friends will help you learn to live with such a loss. Eventually you learn to live for them, and every so often you do or say something that reminds you of that person and you smile to yourself and you say: "I hope you don't mind, but I borrowed that from you". And for them, you go on.

Seeya later Azadeh.

A road safety notice for Floridian drivers and bicycle riders

Part 1: The flashing traffic lights.

This has really been getting to me recently and in a lot of cases is making driving more dangerous than just after Wilma when we had virtually no working traffic lights. Some lights at intersections are still not working properly and as such the lights flash yellow for one flow of traffic (eg northbound/southbound) and flash red for another flow (eg eastbound/westbound). If you are travelling and encounter a YELLOW FLASHING traffic light you may proceed with caution. If you are travelling and encounter a RED FLASHING traffic light you must treat it as a stop sign, hence, you must ALWAYS give way to those drivers who are encountering a YELLOW FLASHING traffic light, who by the way should be travelling through the intersection with caution.

What have I seen so far? Drivers have been stopping at the YELLOW FLASHING traffic lights and allowing the people who have RED FLASHING traffic lights to pass on through. However, there have been drivers in other lanes passing through a YELLOW FLASHING light who continue through and nearly hit a driver who shouldn't be in the intersection. Then again, they should be driving with caution anyway.

To sum up: people are treating the flashing traffic lights as a 4-way stop sign when they should not be. You only do that when they are not operating at all.

Part 2: People not wearing seatbelts.

It really pisses me off as a driver when people do not buckle up. Put your god damn seatbelt on and don't complain if I tell you to. Contrary to your own beliefs, you're not invincible. Your chances of proving that you're invincible pretty much fall to zero when you fly through the front windscreen.

Part 3: People not using their indicators.

I like to know what you're doing, fellow driver, so I can work out what action to take should something weird happen. You may think you own the roads but in fact you don't. Shock! Horror! Actually you only "own" a small fraction of the road and I'm pretty sure we passed that a while back.

Part 4: People on bicycles riding against the traffic.

ARE YOU FREAKING MORONS? Ride with the traffic you idiots.

Yes, it's Monday.

Frobros

I was browsing through my computer and found some pictures from what seems like another lifetime. Ok, it's actually only a couple of years ago and these pics are from one of the infamous social club nights my company had. This one had a blues brother theme and stars the Chief and CJB as my fellow fro-bros, da Boss, and Nav. I've only got a few pics and they are here.

CJB-1000 was created from one of these pics.

An apology

I have an apology to post to this blog. It has been brought to my attention that I've been using "cell phone" instead of the correct term "mobile phone". I'm sorry.

I would like to point out though that I still like the letter U and I use it whenever possible to honoUr my upbringing in the proper spelling of words in English. I would like to apologiSe if I have accidentally left that little bugger out.

I would also like to point out that I still think it's a 350 ZED and not 350 Zeeee as is so often pronounced around here. It's just not catchy pronounced as the latter.

Furthermore, I still don't like how Nissan is pronounced (Nee-sahn), nor Mazda (Mars-da), nor Mitsubishi (Meet-su-bishi) nor Hyundai (Hunday). Maybe that's their proper pronounciation (although I'm pretty sure it's all day, every day, he-yun-dai at the very least). But anyway, whatever.

So that should wrap that up. When I come back to Australia next (more about that soon), if anyone points out from now on that I have misused and abused the English language (not by simple grammatical and sentence structure errors, which I'm sure are rife throughout this blog, but by using the Yank equivalent) I will buy them a pint of their choice of Cooper's beer. This offer is a once only per mistake thing so first in best dressed and most drunk. I may even put some intentional errors in just to check who's still reading this site. Jajajajaja. (that's Spanish and I count it as legit).

Get to know your neighbours

This is what I was able to do during Wilma, and this was one of the conversations I had.

(I'm babbling to my flatmate about something)
Neighbour: Hi! Where are you from?
Me: Australia.
Neighbour: Where in Australia?
Me: South Australia
Neighbour: Where in South Australia?
(I'm starting to raise my left eyebrow at this point)
Me: Adelaide.
Neighbour: Adelaide? Really? I used to work there on the railway lines.
Me: What? You're kidding me!
Neighbour: I used to work there back in the 60's for a little while. I'm from England originally and moved to Australia for a while and then back home to England. I wanted to move back to Australia but they wouldn't let me back in so I moved here instead. I really want to go back there.
Me: Wow. I didn't think I'd be living next to anyone who knew where Adelaide was.
Neighbour: Yeah, yeah. Lleyton Hewitt comes from there, right? Tennis player?
Me: Yeah, that's right.
Neighbour: I also did some work for the railways out in the bush.
Me: Oh really? Where abouts?
Neighbour: I used to work in a town called Barmera. Lake Bonney.
Me: WHAT? You know about Barmera? My Grandma lives there.
(Barmera has a population of around 4000 people. It's not huge, so I'm amazed at this point this guy knows about Barmera).
Neighbour: I also used to work in this little town on the way to Barmera coming from Adelaide. You had to go past Kingston and then you had to turn off not far from there.
Me: You mean Moorook?!?
Neighbour: Yeah, that's it, Moorook.

It's at this point of the conversation I started to feel a little light headed. Moorook at most has a population of a couple of hundred people. People in Moorook who had to go to highschool went to the same one as I, Loxton High. What the hell were the chances that on the other side of the world I would meet someone who had lived/worked in Moorook? Diddly squat.

Must stop, must stop...

The partying has taken its toll. I've been out every night since Wednesday now and I pretty much finished up on Saturday night by going to Voodoo lounge in downtown Ft Lauderdale. They were actually playing some pretty decent dance music, what I mean is, they played some Mylo which makes them about 7 or 8 months late. Well, whatever. Good vibes that night and good people.

I decided to finish the weekend by visiting a friend's place last night for an excellent BBQ. I was pretty stuffed and they decided to watch "Revenge of the Sith". They're real hardcore Star Wars fans, that's the only reason I could think of why they'd do that. Normally I'm complaining about the acting every 5 minutes and the only way to shut me up is to either gag me or promise to show me scene 14 from the movie "From dusk till dawn" afterwards. I was so tired and exhausted though that I only complained about the acting once; that part where the Stormtrooper hands back Obi Wan's lightsaber just before order 66 is executed. "Oh, here, I found this" or whatever the hell he says. That acting is primary school play quality but without the parental attachment that makes it watchable.

Stargazing in Fla

While the power was out during Wilma there were fantastic opportunities to do some stargazing as most of the street lights were out in the 'burbs. Although there is some overlap between the constellations I could see in Australia there are of course many new ones to look at. Below is a shot I took out the back of my apartment with my camera mounted on a tripod. This pic has notes so move your mouse over a box to read a description of the constellation. You can see the original without lines or notes here.

Hurricane Wilma photos

Most of them are online here.

Calling all can't stoppers!

I'm going to take Annie Mac's "can't stopper" tag and run with it here for a bit. I've been going freaking crazy lately. After the whole hurricane business and getting cabin fever and so forth I've decided to make up for that. Wednesday night I went to see Youssou N'Dour with an Egyptian orchestra backing him. That was just simply amazing. Thursday night I went to see Depeche Mode. Might I add that they weren't playing in Fort Lauderdale - that concert got cancelled - but they were playing in Tampa which is over a 3 hour drive away. Not bad for a Thursday night. Big props to the driver for keeping us all awake with the cool music. Tonight is Ozomatli in South Beach. Tomorrow night I've been given a tip that "La Covacha" would be a good place to check out. It's a full-on Latin club and I'm wondering if they understand Australian there.

Could I do any of this stuff "when I'm sixty four"? Probably not, so I gotta do it now.

*And I just can't get enough, I just can't get enough*

Anyway, gotta go, can't stop.

Back at work

Most of this morning has been spent catching up with workmates and what their experience with the hurricane was. Although many have had their power restored, some haven't (including myself) and it actually shows. I made a fairly good effort to make it look like stuff was normal by shaving this morning and this has fooled people into thinking that I have power back. It is taking me a while to get any sort of intelligent thought back into my head though.

I've got drinkable water back now in the house but it looks like I'll be eating out for a while until power comes back. I must say though I don't mind not having electricity so much as I've been occupying myself with other things like playing guitar. The great plus with having electricity though is that I could edit and post pictures I've taken online, but in the interim you could always look at these pictures of destroyed major transmission lines from the Florida Power and Light website. Oh and it's not like I'm the only person who's taken pictures of Wilma's effects.

In Orlando and out of south fla

I've just arrived in Orlando for a halloween festival and I must mention just how glad I am to be out of South Florida. Hurricane Wilma was the first real hurricane I've experienced. From watching amazingly stong winds blow down trees early Monday morning to living without electricity, phone or drinkable water until I left this afternoon, it is something I don't really want to experience again. The experience was worthwhile, yes, but that's enough thanks. One of the most dangerous things I've had to do is drive around without working traffic lights. The traffic lights weren't working not only because there was no electricity, but because in a lot of cases they just weren't there anymore. Trees everywhere were down. Powerlines were strewn across roads. The scenery changed so much that I drove past an entrance to a street because I didn't recognise it anymore - and of course a lot of the street signs had been blown down. There were massive lines for car fuel at the few pumping stations that were working (there was no power to pump the fuel so some stations had to get backup generators in). The only time I really bothered with a car was to visit friends and to find reception for and to charge my cell phone. All the other times I travelled about was on a mountain bike to pick up water or get cell phone service.

Forget all the rest of the hurricanes I've been through, they were nothing compared to Wilma's effects on South Florida. For the photo curious I have lots and lots of pictures but I don't have the tools to post any of them yet to my flickr account.

So now I'm looking forward to a hot shower, decent water, hot food, working traffic lights and no curfews... and hopefully when I return to Fort Lauderdale Sunday night I'll at least have some of those little conveniences back.

Adios.

Riding out the storm

Hopefully I'm able to hit "publish post" before the power goes out this time...

Wilma is nearly upon us (as in, the worst is yet to come) and not long ago I was woken by the howling winds outside my bedroom window. It's still pretty dark outside. I added another notch to my belt of experiences in the US, that of putting up hurricane shutters. I was able to convince my flatmate yesterday that this would be a good idea so we spent a few hours figuring out how the shutters got put up. That was a downright pain in the arse but we got the big windows on the bottom floor shuttered up as well as a top floor window that was pretty large.

This hurricane is also pretty interesting as it's the first strong hurricane that has come through these parts since I've completely moved to the US. So, my feelings about hurricanes are a little different this time. I'm not as excited about them this time around because I'm living in my own place (well, I rent) and I have my own car which I worry about.

I did get the opportunity to have a hurricane party with a couple of friends Saturday night. We had lots of good food and drank a few hurricanes. It was a fantastic night and I even learnt how to dance a bit of salsa and meringue as the host of the party was also a latin dance teacher.

Wow, it's getting really windy out there now. I can hear debris being blown about and when it was dark before you could see a massive flash of light as a transformer blew and the power cut out. The power always seems to come back on though.

This is the 6th time I've attempted to post this update due to power problems. I'm going to hit that "publish post" button quick smart as I think power around here ain't going to be on for much longer.

Friday morning therapy

Ok, so I've just arrived at work and I'm feeling a little better this morning, but I think I need some music medicine to get the rest of the bad demons away. I'm going to see if this little concoction will work:

Writing to reach you - Travis (to match my mood)
Easy - Faith no more
I feel loved - Depeche Mode
Sweetness and light - Itchy and scratchy (classic track that one)
I still haven't found what I'm looking for - U2 (awesome, awesome song)
Last train to trancentral - KLF
Anything but you - Way out west (awesome dance track)
No leaf clover - Metallica
Hold your colour - Pendulum (wickedly awesome DnB from some Oz guys)
Feelings - Shy FX and T Power (nice DnB track)

Yeah, I reckon that'll do quite nicely.

Florida Panthers, Hurricane Wilma and other stuff

I've just gotten back from another Panthers game, and this time they won! This doesn't happen that often when I go to watch a game. It seemed for a while there that I was not going to see a Florida team win in any of the baseball, basketball, college football or ice hockey games that I went to watch. One thing I was hoping to see was a bit of fighting action. Call it the neanderthal in me but there is a saying that goes: "I went to watch a fight and a hockey game broke out" - and a bit of a fist fight always adds a bit more to the game. Yes, how primitive of me. However I must let it be known that I do not enjoy watching boxing. Not in the slightest.

Onto other stuff, hurricane Wilma apparently has its sights set on Florida. There is a lot of talk around work about this one. Maybe Wilma won't amount to much but I can say this: I really hate the name Wilma. Anyone who names their child Wilma should get some therapy in my honest opinion. I can't take a hurricane with the name Wilma seriously. I'm really getting sick of the whole hurricane thing as well.

The whole blog thing. Originally this blog was created to update people back home with my journey to the US. This journey was only supposed to last 3 months but it of course ended up lasting a lot longer and now here I am living in the US. Newsflash: That was my original intent. At some points I really wanted this blog to be a venting spot for things that frustrated me. Relationship oriented. Work oriented. *whatever* oriented. But I have a fair idea of who reads this so I don't feel compelled to write down everything I want to because at the end of the day I'm a pretty secretive person and I really don't want people to know me that well. Maybe I want to keep up some sort of illusion that there really is more to me than it seems.

But you know, that's where music helps out because right now I'm going to go play the piano and then play the guitar and then perhaps I'll sing a song about an ex-girlfriend from a couple of years ago who really screwed me around. I've got like heaps of other songs in various stages of being completed at the moment. I just need more skills to get them to a point where I can say "I'm happy with that". The thing is, they range from classical to house and I don't really know how to finish them. Yet.

Now that I've been writing a while I feel compelled to hit "Save as draft" or maybe even just close the page to delete this whole post. But you know what? I'm just going to hit "Publish post" and let the chips fall where they may.

Whatever and ever, amen.

PK is still in da house

It's 12:20am, I'm in a writing mood. I actually went to see Santos Renuentes play at a place called Hoy Como Ayer in Miami. The section of Miami this place was located in is known as "Little Havana" and it lived up to its name as I was surrounded by Cubans and the place had a very Cuban-like atmosphere (well, that I could imagine anyway. I haven't actually been to Cuba yet). But hey, the DVDs they were playing before Santos Renuentes began sounded a lot like Buena Vista Social Club. Santos Renuentes were good again of course. So I won't elaborate any more on that.

I did get a bit tipsy at the start of the night before Santos Renuentes came on. They were supposed to start at 8:30pm sharp - that's exactly what the flyer said. I got there 8:30pm sharp, got let in at 8:45pm and then they didn't actually start until 9:30pm. I had to fill in the time with a couple of beers of course... on an empty stomach. Hello PK!

Anyway, Omar the bassist asked me to send a message to his girlfriend who could not make it to the gig. So I wrote this:

"¡Hola! ¿Como estas? Anyway, it's PK here. Not Kristian. Kristian left the building a couple of drinks ago. Truth be known, I ordered a presidente but they gave me two. Maybe they heard me say "duo presidente". They couldn't understand the accent or something. Hope your study is going well and all. Damn, Cubans have no concept of time. 830 sharp my arse."

But, it makes me a little sad. People actually prefer to see and talk to PK than Kristian. PK is more fun apparently. Whatever.

DISCLAIMER: I really don't have a split personality or anything else like that. I just use the alcohol as an excuse so I can act like I really want to without people raising their eyebrows *too* much. Really, it's true! :-p

Coldplay in Adelaide?

Nah, just messing with ya. I think it unlikely that Coldplay would visit the fine city of Adelaide for one of their tours in the near future. I thought there was hope though when I received a Coldplay newsletter stating more shows in Australia, only to find that they were scheduling more shows in Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne.

Bugger.

At any rate, I'm not in Adelaide and I got to see Coldplay a month ago. They were pretty damn awesome of course and I don't know why I didn't mention that fact on my blog. Perhaps I did... I dunno. Here are some shoddy pictures from the concert taken with my phone camera:




and would you like to see a picture of a wankerchop? Here is one:



Pre-coldplay (during the Rilo Kiley set) this guy was more interested in playing a game on his phone than talking to his girlfriend. I award the "tosspot of the month" award to the wankerchop above.

Congratulations Steven and Carrie!

My long, long, long time friend Steve W called me from Australia just before I was due to leave for New York to inform me that he was now engaged to Carrie. This didn't come as a shock to me at all of course. But heck, it does make me smile a bit when I think back a few years to a particular pub crawl... Steve did you really know what you were getting yourself into? Haha! I kid, I kid :-)

Again, congratulations!

Updated photo sets

I've been going along and updating photos in various photo sets, mainly because I've visited those places more than once and I've been hauling my trusty DSLR along with me. Sets that have been updated are:

Around Florida
The Keys
The Everglades

Oh, quick point about the Everglades, I noticed this story a couple of days ago about a python taking on an alligator. Wow.


Sailing boat along Key West waterfront
Originally uploaded by daecks.

Performer in Key West
Originally uploaded by daecks.

New York City roundup

All I can say about New York City is "wow". What a city. I found myself not wanting to return back to Florida after spending time in NYC. Here is a quick summary of what was accomplished:

- Helicopter flight around Manhattan
- Boat cruise around statue of Liberty
- Saw an off-broadway production "Slava's snowshow"
- Saw a lot of of the districts in Manhattan - Soho, Meatpacking district (nightclubs are big there), Harlem, Times Square, Chinatown, Financial district... the list goes on and on
- Walked across Brooklyn bridge
- Saw comedy acts at Dangerfield's club
- Jazz at a place called "Smalls"
- A funky salsa-like band at a place called "Cafe Wha"
- Museums including the Intrepid, Guggenheim and museum of modern design.
- Walked though Central Park
- Went up the Empire state building
- Tour through NBC studios
- Whilst travelling on the subway, saw the following: some guys doing flips in the middle of the car; some mexicans playing some mariachi-like music; a guy with a bass guitar playing "my girl"; a preacher woman telling us all to repent.

I did not in fact get to see any of the shows like Dave Letterman, the Daily Show nor in fact did we get our mugs on the Today show (that turned out to be way too early in the morning). The shows actually required a little more planning to see. There is always next time I guess, and there definitely will be a next time. Hopefully for an even longer time :-)

Photos have been uploaded here

Start spreading the news...

Well, I actually leaving tomorrow, but *finally* I am heading off to New York. This ain't a real short trip either as a friend and I are going to be there for 6 straight days. This is also the most unprepared I've ever been for a trip as well, in terms of planning what things to see and do. But I really don't think too much preparation is needed, right? Apart from the obvious places to visit (statue of liberty, times square, empire state building, yadda yadda yadda) these are some of the other things I want to do:

1) Watch "The Daily Show".
2) Watch the David Letterman show.
3) Get our mugs on NBC morning news.

There are other things, can't remember them at the moment, maybe I should plan this better...

Florida Panthers

The NHL ice hockey season is back and so I went to go watch the Florida Panthers play the Carolina Hurricanes. Unfortunately the Panthers lost in penalty shoot outs 1-2 but it was still a pretty good game. There was even a fight where gloves came off, as did helmets, and some fists got thrown about. All in all, just what I expected :-)

Pics from the phone

Errr, unusual welcome message:



How icecreams die:



How is this pronounced?



No comment required.

Takeaway Hooters

What's the freaking point?

Old skool

I just learnt that Ministry of Sound have released a new album called "Back to the old skool" and it's got some wickedly old tracks on it. Saying that though must mean I'm getting old. Is 26 really that old?

Anyway, I think this album would be most appropriate for a rollerskating farewell party.

I now have my car

I finally picked up my car last Friday. Over the weekend I've been pinching myself because it really doesn't seem true. It took such a long time to get the car, mainly because the title to the car got lost for a while. Without that title I could not do a damn thing.

As it turned out even though the title arrived on Friday, I nearly didn't get the car that day because I forgot about state tax on the car and didn't have enough cashola on me. I had to go to an ATM and withdraw more cash. I had hit the limit for that day on my US bank card so I tried my Australian bank card. It did not work. I tried it in several more ATMs. Still no go. I had to go back to my bank at work and withdraw more cash from my US account. Over the weekend I found out why my Aussie card was not working. Apparently the bank had blocked the card because some wankers in Malaysia were fraudulently using my card details. Nice.

So to summarise, this is what I had to go through to get my car, starting from 5 weeks ago:

1) Inspect the car and shake hands with the previous owner to agree to buy the car.
2) Get a bill of sale signed by the previous owner, myself and a witness so I could get a loan through my bank.
3) Wait a couple of days for the bank cheque to be ready and then send it to the lien holder via USPS express.
4) Get a call from the previous owner a few days later that the lien holder had not yet cashed the cheque.
5) Find the tracking number for the bank cheque and verify that it had been received by the lien holder.
6) Verify with the bank that the cheque had been cashed. It took 2 weeks for the lien holder to cash the cheque.
7) Get my insurance ready and going as I was expecting the title any day.
8) Receive a call from the previous owner that he had received details about the transaction from the lien holder. I had not received anything. Waited a week (my bank insisted they would contact me if they received anything).
9) Check with my bank if they had received the title. Nothing had yet been received.
10) Had to put my insurance on hold for a while.
11) Check with previous owner what address the previous lien holder had sent the title to. Initially they said the wrong address. Check again. The second time around they stated the correct address.
12) Check with bank whether they had received the title. They had not.
13) Start a process for getting a duplicate title since the real title was considered lost.
14) Found out this process didn't need to be started, as the bank headquarters said they had received the title and had sent it to my local bank 2 weeks prior.
15) Check with local bank whether they had received the title. They said they hadn't, although in the next week it just turned up.
16) Got my title! Put my insurance back to previous levels.
17) Went into the county offices to get my car registered. Forgot about the state tax. One of my cards had been fraudulently used and was barred. Had to go back to the work bank to get more money out.
18) Went back to the county offices and got my new number plates.
19) Went and picked up my car that same day, last Friday.

And now I will have to post up a picture, so let me put in a reminder:

INSERT PICTURE OF FIRST OVERSEAS CAR HERE!!!!!!

Photos from Chicago

UPDATE: Doh! I forgot to set the proper viewing permissions on the photos. They should all be viewable now.


Are now online here

They include pictures from:
- a downtown Chicago river cruise (Chicago has some awesome architecture)
- a visit to a blues bar on the first night of my trip
- Northwestern University in the Evanston area (the monarch butterfly and squirrel pictures)
- A Baha'i faith house of worship
- Pictures taken from Sears tower
- Pictures of Millennium park
- Subway pictures

and I think that's about it.

There are no pictures of a chocolate milkshake from Wiener Circle, a place where at about 4am in the morning you can get a Chicago-style hotdog, verbally abused and shocked. There is no change from a $20 note for a hotdog and a "milkshake" that you can get from an African-American woman. The milkshake, by the way, is not listed on the menu.

Chicagoland

First off, I'd like to thank Su-Yin and Chi-Hoong for being fantastic hosts and laying the groundwork for an absolutely bloody awesome weekend in Chicago. I had a blast. I can't write about everything that happened because that would constitute a best-selling book, and this is but a blog. I'll post updates when I haven't got writer's block.

UPDATE: Before I hit the sack tonight, I must share the lack of luck I had when journeying back from Chicago to Fort Lauderdale. I was feeling pretty damn sleepy when I arrived at the airport and thought I could use the extra space afforded in Economy Plus class - a whole 5 inches of extra leg space! - to help me get to sleep. For the privilege I had to pay an extra $30.

However, when I got to my seat I could not believe the size of the guy sitting in the window seat next to me. He was massive. He was so big that his arms rested horizontally on his stomach. There was no way in the world that the arm rest that should have separated us could have been pulled down because a fair bit of his body was on my side of the seat. While I had some extra space to stretch my legs I had very little space width-wise. Fantastic. Not only was he big but he also seemed to be putting out a lot of body heat. I couldn't get enough air conditioning on myself to cool down.

Needless to say I did not get a lot of sleep on the flight back. I would have taken a picture of this "little" scenario with my phone but the field of view of the camera was too narrow.

Farewell Robbie

This is somewhat of a sad post. I just learned that an old friend who I went to primary and high school back in Australia died in an motorcycle accident last night. Although I didn't keep in contact with Rob much since I started Univerisity, there are things that come to mind when his name is mentioned:

- Him not allowing me to play on the play equipment with the other people in my class back in early primary school. I don't know why he did that, but I remember standing up to him one day and saying something like "I will play with my other friends because I want to!" We got along fine after that.

- His brother Brian elbowed Steve in the stomach during a (was it 300m?) lap around the oval on sports day in primary school. I was asked if this ever occurred and I said "no". I could have said "I didn't see it" or I could have actually stood up for Steve but I didn't. I'm pretty sure I did see it happen, and told Steven I saw it happen, but I said the opposite anyway. What character I had back then!

- His ability to get on Damo's nerves in highschool. Rob knew exactly how to pi$$ him off. Awesome.

- Him playing in our hockey team in the early days. Yes, that fantastic 1987 grand final picture of me with the big head. I'm pretty damn sure Rob was there.

- Him working at the winery.

- His 21st birthday party. I recall watching a Marilyn Manson concert or something like that there.

- The fact that he rode a motorbike.

- And last, but most certainly not least, his obsession with video games. I remember Chad and I went to visit him at his place but pretty much the whole time he was playing the Playstation 2 while we were talking to him. He loved his video games.

- Did I mention he liked video games?

This is the one thing bites the most about being all the way over here. Whatever happens to someone back home I feel so completely displaced. I would love to be back in Australia right now and just be with my friends to chat about Rob.

RIP mate.

Chicago

I've been looking forward to this afternoon for a while now, for it is this afternoon that I fly off to Chicago to visit "Choza" and "da Boss". I've got a list of places I want to see and a lot of things I want to do. Hopefully I can forget about the backlog of work I have to do at the moment. There is so much stuff I have to get done it's incredible. Ahh well, such is life.

The return

This is the first post from my new apartment in the US. My flatmate and I just got the wireless network up and running and everything seems to be working a-ok.

From the gap in the blog postings you may have thought that I had run out of steam. Not so. I've just come back from a long weekend of partying in Key West, frolicking with alligators and having an awesome sing-a-long/play-a-long session at a friend's birthday party. Prior to that I very busy with work and trying to tie up loose ends over here in the US. To those of you I have promised things or have e-mails to reply to - you know who you are - you'll be hearing from me in the near future.