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Year View| Summary| Highlights| August 2004 (Month View)

Apr ‘04 | May ‘04 | Jun ‘04 | Jul ‘04 | Aug ‘04 Sep ‘04 | Oct ‘04 | Nov ‘04 | Dec ‘04 |

01.08.2004 – Sunday 1 August – Joe’s Birthday

• A few of Joe’s friends came over, along with SSS and his girlfriend, and, just before I left, Tim and Michelle.
  I caught the train to South Bank, and then walked to the CityCat. It was late. By the time I arrived at West End, I had only five minutes to get to the ABC Ferry Road Music Centre, so I ran. It nearly killed me. I arrived, just on three o’clock, about to go into cardiac arrest – to find the doors closed. It’s a live broadcast, so no one is allowed in after it’s started. I asked if I could watch from the upstairs studio, which impressed the bloke I asked, as he wasn’t expecting me to know it existed, and so I got to watch from what’s got to be the best seat in the house, in my opinion. Moreover, I felt special, so, apart from the imminent cardiac arrest, all went well.
  After the concert, Raymond and I caught the CityCat back to UQ and went and visited the infamous inmates of Leo’s C-Block. They weren’t doing anything, so I caught the bus into Indooroopilly, had dinner there, and watched “Laws of Attraction”. Apart from being a silly movie, it was quite enjoyable and made a nice change from the (supposedly more serious) action ones I’ve been watching recently.
  I was nearly killed, for the second time today, after I got home. Joe forced me to eat many odd and unusual pickles, olives, strong cheeses and their kin.

Comment by DM – Monday 2 August 2004, 11:10 PM

  You seem to have this knack for thinking of the last seat in the house as that of the highest quality. Millions upon millions of years of evolution have served you well.

Comment by DM – Monday 2 August 2004, 11:11 PM

  Oh, unless you subscribe to creationism, that is.

Comment by Ned – Tuesday 3 August 2004, 12:09 AM

  I’d much rather sit up in the studio, overlooking the whole thing, with the sound engineers. Perhaps not always, as it’s debatably no longer a “live” performance from there – but as a one off thing, it was cool.
  And yes, it’s pretty obvious we were not “created” by an almost infinite and supposedly “random” series of evolutionary changes. Anyone who thinks a man was once a worm is patently stupid. A woman, on the other hand...

Comment by Mum – Tuesday 3 August 2004, 7:26 PM

  A woman, on the other hand..... is the holy vessel, from which all you ratbags sprungeth. A woman, on the other hand, is the mother who sat and waited and worried, whilst all you sprung ratbags cavorted until 2am. A woman, on the other hand, is the sister who patiently abided with the egoism of elder brothers who knew everything, been everywhere, done everything, whilst she had the socks, soup, soap, and key to the tractor. A woman waits.

Comment by DM – Wednesday 4 August 2004, 12:17 PM

  She had the SOUP? Now that's powertripping :)

Comment by Mum – Friday 6 August 2004, 8:54 PM

  Yergh. Soup. Would rather the tractor meselfn.

02.08.2004 – Monday 2 August – Sleepy & Late

• I woke up just after my train left, and decided, in my groggy, half-asleep state, that as I’d already missed my early lecture, there was no point rushing to my tutorial. Thus did Ned end up at uni three hours late, just in time for his COMP3502 lecture.

03.08.2004 – Tuesday 3 August – The Hero & the Mouse

• Woe unto those who awake early in the morning, for it is cold, and their toes may freeze. A pox upon those who set eight o’clock compulsory group practicals, for their fate is a sad one.

8am

• Wherein our righteous hero learns about CVS, and is reminded of the shortcomings of open-source UNIX based systems.

10am

• Wherein our valiant hero tutors 1501 for the first time this semester, with Mandy, and finds the labs mostly full, but has no major problems.

Midday

• Wherein our noble hero discovers he is too tired to sit through a two hour COMS3200 lecture, and has to alternate from eye to eye as he doesn’t have enough energy to power both at once – eventually resorting to closing both for only a minute at a time, to revitalize.

Evening

• Wherein our gallant hero eats too much at Govinda’s and feels sick.

Comment by Mum – Friday 6 August 2004, 9:00 PM

  Oh gallant one, how is thy tum?

Comment by Ned – Friday 6 August 2004, 11:26 PM

  Wherein our unwell hero eats an extra strong mint because his throat is sore.

Comment by Matt – Sunday 8 August 2004, 11:46 AM

  while (Ned.isSick())
  {
  Matt.laugh();
  }

04.08.2004 – Wednesday 4 August – Relaxing & My Site Guide

• I slept in, relaxed, and created a new section of my site – “Ned Martin’s Site Guide”. I’ve put quite a bit of time into figuring out how to do some things for my sites, and, being the perfectionist I sometimes am, they usually end up being quite detailed solutions, complying to the appropriate RFC’s and recommendations – so I figured I might as well share a bit of this, and try for some Google Adwords revenue at the same time.

05.08.2004 – Thursday 5 August – Man on Fire

8am

• I had an eight o’clock start, which I didn’t miss. I sat through two hours of my COMP2502 lecture. He began the lecture we’ve already had – and didn’t notice. A student had to point it out. This is probably not a good sign. I then had a tutorial for the same. I didn’t understand the questions – even after having them explained. This probably isn’t a good sign either.

11am

• I tutored 1501, and met Julie, the other tutor. Not as many people came today – only around thirty, and everything went well.

Doctor’s Appointment

• I made an appointment to see Dr Caligaras at 2 PM on Thursday 12 August, regarding my lung.

Night

• I went and saw “Man on Fire” at Indooroopilly. It’s a movie that I’d recommend – much more realistic than the normal Hollywood crap. It was also quite busy.

06.08.2004 – Friday 6 August – A slow day

Morning

• I missed my train, by sleeping in, but still managed to get to my first lecture on time, due to there being an extra Brisbane Show train. I need to sleep more. This getting less than six hours sleep every night just isn’t working.

UQ

• From a UQ press release yesterday, “The University of Queensland has again received the best overall rating of all Queensland universities and one of the best Australian university rankings in the 2005 edition of the Good Universities Guide”
  “This is the eighth consecutive year that the Good Universities Guide has assessed UQ at being at the top of the State’s academic and student status hierarchies”
  “UQ received the maximum five-star rating for eight main categories: prestige, getting a job, positive graduate outcomes, non-government earnings, student demand, research grants, research intensivity [sic], and toughness to get in"
  “Our staff have earned more national teaching awards than any other Australian university”
  “Today 34,000 students are enrolled at the University, including almost 8000 postgraduates. The University offers more than 5000 courses and 360 programs.”
  In other words, it’s big, and it’s better than QUT.

Evening

• After two unexciting lectures and three unexciting tutorials, one of which I tutored, I went and phoned Sarah, who is now in Brisbane, and then went and saw Clint and his C-Block harem. Today’s 1501 tutorial was very un-busy. At one stage, there was only one student. I believe I’ve simplified and standardised the Apache, PHP and mySQL installation procedure as much as is possible now. I guess I had better test it on a clean lab machine just to make sure it actually works as expected.
  Clint had to go to BITS’ highly exciting “Meet the Exec” night, where a group of geeks go and discuss the latest Linux kernel while getting passively drunk from the fumes at the Royal Exchange, so I went home, via Govindas – a tasty habit which is beginning to get expensive.

07.08.2004 – Saturday 7 August – Sarah, Kickboxing & Cold

• I, after staying up almost all night, got up at eight o’clock to phone Sarah, and then went back to bed, waking in the evening. I am sick – my throat is sore and my nose runs. I don’t feel particularly good.

Night

• I caught a train down to Beenleigh, and found my way to the Beenleigh Arena, after asking for directions several times. I then spent the next few hours watching kickboxing with Sarah and Vince, who was judging. A few of the fights were quite good, although only one was a full Muay Thai fight. One kid also cracked his cheekbone, and it was apparently bleeding into the bone marrow or something exciting like that – not exactly pleasant.
  After the fights, some time around half past eleven, I walked back to the station. It was extremely cold – hopefully cold enough to kill my cold.

08.08.2004 – Sunday 8 August – Sarah & an hour late I am

• I went and met Vince and Sarah at the station, and showed them around here for a bit, before heading into the city, where we ate lunch, walked around, and I eventually left them at the station on the way to the airport. I was planning to get to the ABC’s Ferry Road Music Centre before three o’clock, so I left Central Station around three, but must have had a brain blockage, because that seemed fine at the time. I decided to try and take a shortcut, and ended up down near QUT’s Garden Point campus, and had to race the CityCat up to North Quay – so I was very puffed when I got onto it. I’d just about recovered by the time I got to West End, ten minutes before four – so I ran all the way to the ABC Music Centre, arriving on the border of cardiac arrest, as usual, only to find the place locked. It wasn’t until a few minutes later when Raymond, and everyone else, came out – that I realised I was an hour late.

09.08.2004 – Monday 9 August – Clint & Clus on Fire

• Clint, Clus and I went and saw “Man on Fire” at Indooroopilly, the second time for me – but it is a good movie. We had to run for the bus, and it was very full so we had to stand most of the way. I think that about sums up my exciting day, although there was a bit of uni in there somewhere too.

10.08.2004 – Tuesday 10 August

Morning

• I had to tutor, and attend an eight o’clock group practical for COMP2801, so didn’t want to be late. I had also stayed up most of the night, as usual, so had to use my psychological trick to wake up – setting the computer’s alarm to play something loud five minutes after my alarm, so when mine goes off, I have to get up to turn the computer’s one off before it goes off.
  It was very cold – one of the coldest mornings so far I think.

Day

• Lectures, the practical, my tutoring – it all went well.

Night

• I came home via Govindas. Once home, I dialled up, as usual, but wasn’t able to access anything external to uni. It ends up that Clint has used up his entire quota downloading stuff after reinstalling Windows a few times, which in turn means the dialup portion, even though it’s unlimited, is now essentially disabled. I eventually managed to connect using Mum’s Dodo account, and uploaded the new, semi-finished “Demon Wheels” site.

11.08.2004 – Wednesday 11 August – Ned Relaxes, Shops, Discovers Cure for Common Cold

• Ned doesn’t go to uni today. He doesn’t do anything else either, if he can help it. Unfortunately, he had run out of food and clothes, so he had to do his washing and go shopping. This cost him quite a bit of money, and he’s now quite broke. On the up side, he did have a relaxing day. On the downside, tomorrow is Thursday.

12.08.2004 – Thursday 12 August – Walking Tall

Earlier

• For an eight o’clock start, well it went, and there I was. To be feared are Algorithms & Data Structures, for suck they do. Impossible was the tutorial, and wholesome the answers thereof.

Later

• Clint was visited, and Clus was on fire for great hilarity – “Codename Eagle”, it is so good. Oh, and the zeppelin, funny he was, and so big.

More Later

• Run we did, catch the bus we did, and to Indooroopilly we went. “Walking Tall” was seen, and too short it was. But fun we had, Kieran, Clus, Clint and I.

Much More Later

• Moreover and furthermore, to bed I shall go – for whosoever cares, tired I am.

Comment by richard strawman – Friday 13 August 2004, 2:05 AM

  GO AWAY SAM I AM

13.08.2004 – Friday 13 August – No Power, Many Doors

• I had a normal day at uni, and came home afterwards. Once it got dark, the power failed – for nearly two hours. It was a disaster. I could not do anything. I was half way through adding cacheability to my journal when the power failed, and we’re so dependant on electricity down here – I couldn’t shower because it was dark, I couldn’t cook dinner because the stove is electric, I couldn’t think, play, or enjoy myself, because the computer is electronic. Luckily, Tonya had some candles so we could sit and complain about the power failure without walking into doors.

• Abel Tasman on discovering Tasmania, “Too far south for spices and too close to the rim of the earth to be inhabited by anything but freaks and monsters”.

Comment by Mum – Wednesday 18 August 2004, 6:59 PM

  What! Good heavens! I thought all the freaks were up here!!

14.08.2004 – Saturday 14 August – Walking Tall Again

• Joe wanted scratch-its and chips, but had already opened the bar, so I drove down to the local shops. The traffic signals weren’t working, so the drive was a bit more complex than normal. When I got to the shops, I discovered why the traffic signals weren’t working – there was no power. No power means no chips and no scratch-its, so I had to drive to the far away shops. There was lots of smoke too, it appears that somewhere is burning down and, apparently, 80% of the houses there have been evacuated.

• Matt, known more appropriately as “scruff”, insisted I come and see a movie with him. I tried to say I couldn’t afford it, but he pointed out it would cost me only $5.50 for entry, as I already had everything else I needed. I tried to say I couldn’t make it because it was too late, but he pointed out that I could, so I ended up catching a train into Southbank and watching “Walking Tall” (again) on Australia’s biggest screen. I also bought Pringles and a frozen coke look-alike, so I’m broke again.

15.08.2004 – Sunday 15 August – Percussion & Chocolate Frogs

• I actually managed to get up, onto the train, and into the city in time to catch a CityCat to West End in time to walk to the Ferry Road ABC Music Centre in time to get in. In fact, I got there before Raymond, and had time to buy a felafel roll from Southbank. Today’s concert was the Isorhythmos Percussion Ensemble, which was quite different to most other things. Anyone who can play those wooden whacky things with four fuzzy-ended-sticks at the same time, while only possessing two arms, earns my respect, and an ensemble who can have sixteen fuzzy-ended-sticks playing two wooden whacky things while only possessing eight arms also earns my respect. Nevertheless, there’s no denying the similarity between percussion and dishwashing time at a school for the gifted. It just doesn’t quite have the same effect as, say, a guitar virtuoso who can play lead and bass at the same time – that’s not to say they weren’t quite impressive.
  After that, I went home after dropping into uni, where everyone was, as usual, totally bored and boring. I did manage to support some good cause by buying two large chocolate frogs though, so I guess that was good. One was strawberry, and the other was green flavour – peppermint I suppose.

16.08.2004 – Monday 16 August – The Joys of Uni

• A COMP2801 lecture was had, as was a COMS3200 tutorial, followed by a gap and then a COMP3502 lecture and then a reading of several very boring PDF’s from IEEE about trusted computing. Such is the exciting day I have.

17.08.2004 – Tuesday 17 August – Fear of Examinations, Meteors, Vampires

• I woke up about fifteen minutes after my alarm. This is bad because I allow half an hour from alarm to ready, and then fifteen minutes from ready to train. I can, however, get ready in less than ten minutes, and get to the train in less than five – although the health risks are probably not worth it except in extreme cases, such as examinations and meteor strikes. Anyway, enough of that – the point is that it’s not good waking up late because I don’t allow long to get to the train and running straight out of bed makes me feel sick and unwell.

8am

• We had a group meeting for COMP2801 during our prac, which went quite well. We managed to delegate tasks to ourselves in a way that seems to make everyone happy, without really meaning to, while telling lots of doubtful jokes and stuff. It seems Flash is Mr CVS, Stephen is Mr PowerPoint Designer, and Lachlan and I are your presenters – with Lachlan being more comfortable talking, and me being less comfortable talking, so I’m Mr Click Things and he’s the inimitable Dr Voice. It’s all going good.

Daytime

• I proceeded to tutor, and then to relax, and then to attend a lecture, late because I went to POD to print notes, and then the same lecture, second half, late again because Matt and I went to the refectory for sustenance. I was then going to read many things about the trustworthy computing initiative, otherwise known as “pirates are bad arr”, but it sort of didn’t happen. I ended up going to Umart with Marcus and Clint to purchase geeky hard drive brackets, and then to Marcus’s place to install said hard drive brackets, and by the time we got back to uni Clint had to go eat dinner. Marcus and I went down to the labs to study, but ended up playing around with Eclipse, a Java IDE. Then Clint and Kipps came down and we all went to Indooroopilly to buy stuff to eat, because college doesn’t serve edible food anymore. After that, it was dark and stuff, so I had to go home for fear of vampiric lab dwellers.

18.08.2004 – Wednesday 18 August – CT Scans

• I headed into the city, and out to Indooroopilly – nearly missing the connecting train at Roma Street because I went to the doughnut shop and got a milkshake. At Indooroopilly, I had a quick meal of rice and dhal, before going to the CT scan place, for what I thought was going to be “a CT scan”. It ended up being around sixty CT scans over a half-hour period, during which I wasn’t able to move – at all. I was asked if I’d have trouble holding my breath for twenty seconds, as I’d have to hold my breath for that long for the CT scans. It didn’t sound like that long, but it’s actually quite a long time – doing it many times in a row is a good way to become very light-headed. The Medicare rebate is somewhat funny – I paid $234.45 by EFTPOS at the clinic, and then walked across the road to the Medicare office, and they gave me the same amount in cash. It was sort of like an extended EFTPOS cash withdrawal. The prints took about an hour to be analysed, printed, and whatever else they do, and then I caught the bus to uni.
  It was really cold and I had forgotten to bring my jumper, having slept in and had to get ready in a hurry and run for the train. I photocopied the prognosis thing that the doctor at the clinic wrote, and dropped the prints off at the doctor’s for tomorrow.

Chest CT

• History: Past history of recurrent pneumothoraces on the left. Had talc pleurodesis 2 years ago. Since then has had frequent episodes of left upper pleuritic chest pain in the left axillary region ? cause.
  Technique: 1mm scans were performed every 10mm with fine scans through the apical region.
  Findings: There is fibrotic change present at the left apex anteriorly. There are several small bullae present at the extreme apex antero-medially on the left ranging in size from 10 – 20mm, located on the pleural surface of the lung and there is a little adjacent pleural thickening posterior to this. No other bullae were identified elsewhere in the lungs. There is also a small fibrotic stand at the left apex postero-medially. There are also some fibrotic strands present anteriorly and laterally in the left upper lobe and in the lingular segment. There is no evidence of hila or mediastinal adenopathy and there are no pleural effusions.
  Impression: Several very small bullae left apex antero-medially and associated fibrotic change. There is scattered fibrotic change elsewhere through left lung in keeping with the previous surgery.
  Dr Jennifer Schnell.

19.08.2004 – Thursday 19 August – Doctor & Sleepy at Uni

• I’ve an eight o’clock lecture today, which isn’t the best fun. Tutoring was quite busy today too, the lab was full and both Julie and I were flat out the whole time. I spent the evening reading PDF’s about this trustworthy computing stuff that I need to know for my report I need to have written before two o’clock on Monday. I’ve some type of annoying psychological sleep problem. When I study, I get sleepy. After reading the PDF’s for a while, I got too sleepy to continue and had to go home. But once home, I managed to stay up for a few hours online relaxing, before getting sleepy enough to go to bed. It sucks, and is quite detrimental to my study.

4pm

• I went and saw Dr Anne-Marie Caligaris again. She explained the CT scan a bit, but it is not her area of expertise, so she has referred me on to another doctor more qualified in the area of lungs and so on. Her educated guess, but still only a guess, is that one or some bullae burst from time to time – the event that would normally trigger a pneumothorax, except that I can no longer, or it is highly unlikely that I can, suffer a pneumothorax in that lung. However, I shall have to wait until I see someone more qualified in the thoracic area to get a more qualified answer.

20.08.2004 – Friday 20 August – Woefully Busy

• I slept in a bit, having stayed up too late last night as usual, but still managed to get to my lecture just on time. Tutoring was quite busy today, with all three of us tutors marking people, and I still ended up going twenty or so minutes overtime. After tutoring, I had a group meeting for COMP2801. I almost forgot about it, and because tutoring ran overtime, I was late. After the meeting, Clint, Clus and I went into the city for an exciting night of Cold Rock and Hungry Jack’s.
  I am so busy right now – it’s not good. I have an assignment due before 2 PM Monday, another due during my two-hour eight o’clock practical on Tuesday and another due on Friday. I also have a fourth assignment that I should be doing, but I haven’t even looked at it so don’t know when it’s due. Then, on top of that, there’s a few things relating to my tutoring that I have to do, several little things around here I need to do, paperwork and computer stuff, and I need to go shopping and do some washing.

21.08.2004 – Saturday 21 August – Study, or lack thereof

3:49pm

• After a guilt-filled but relaxing afternoon during which I realised that I am psychologically unable to study, I headed into uni, figuring I might be able to study there. I did manage to read quite a few PDF’s about trusted computing, but I didn’t manage to write anything.

22.08.2004 – Sunday 22 August – During which my sanity leaves uni before I do

• I went into uni, and spent the rest of the day working on my COMP3502 assignment, trying to write 1500 words on the Trusted Computing Group. Marcus came in after a while, and he and I didn’t end up leaving the labs until after four o’clock in the morning. After our sanity had left, and after Ian had arrived, it was almost fun. Hyperactivity is helpful for some things, although writing coherent reports isn’t one of them. I ended up sleeping the night at Marcus’s place.

23.08.2004 – Monday 23 August – Last minutes & Hilarity

• Maz and I got to uni sometime after eleven, and spent the next few hours finish off our assignments – getting them handed in a mere few minutes before their two o’clock deadline. I remember the rest of the day as something of a comic pantomime, although I did manage to sit through the first hour of my COMS3200 lecture, and then remembered I was supposed to hand in my COMP3502 tute two hours ago and had to get my timesheet signed off for tutoring, so I left and did that. I then went home, and had an early night, getting a whole seven hours sleep. Surprisingly, I woke up by myself a few times before the alarm went off.

24.08.2004 – Tuesday 24 August – Presentations & General Stupidity

7:30am

• I headed down to the labs, via the refectory where I bought a terrible pretending pizza thing that was so bad I had to throw it out. After a little not-preparing for our group presentation, and hmm, I dropped chocolate into my keyboard, so I turned it upside down and shook it, and now the “T” key is stuck down. More shaking is needed. gfrttgv5r6grrg6ttttttttttttttttttttttrrrffggtttttttttttttttttttttttytyttythhththttttttteyteutyweutyhdsjthdjtytytttt – it seems to be fixed now. So, after three quarters of our group finished not-preparing in the labs, we went up to the other lab and, after the fourth quarter arrived we presented our program – “UMLet”, a Java based UML drawing program, which I insist is pronounced as “omelette”. It was a ten-minute presentation, during which Lachlan spoke and I cleverly manipulated our PowerPoint slides and the actual program. This was followed by rapturous applause (or so I insist on remembering), and then Stephen (the Gordon one) took a break from losing sleep over Slashdot to demonstrate his immeasurable CVS skills – and that was that. The rest of the groups ran through their presentations ranging from one who had a simple script and read it out without any computer involvement to one who had a fully scripted presentation with all four participating. We were the only group who ran to time, and successfully covered all points on the criteria sheet with a live demonstration of the program, so I’m hoping for marks. We might even get an excellence and innovation mark for Stephen’s installation and run script.

• I spent the rest of the day tutoring, talking to Clint, and going to a lecture – but didn’t do any of my COMS3200 assignment that’s due on Friday. I can’t believe how stupid I am.
  On the way home, via Govindas, I walked to the video store and shops, buying some noodles and a cheesecake. I had wanted to get “The Bourne Identity” on DVD before seeing the sequel, but all copies are, not surprisingly, out.

Comment by Mum – Friday 27 August 2004, 9:48 PM

  I can believe how stupid you am

25.08.2004 – Wednesday 25 August – Woe

10:49am

• Woe is the word. I am supposed to have today off, but due to not starting my COMS3200 assignment yet, I had to head into uni.

Night

• I spent half the night in the labs with Marcus, attempting to do my COMS3200 assignment. I ended up staying the night at his place.

26.08.2004 – Thursday 26 August – More Woe

• Marcus and I managed to get to uni early-ish, and spent the majority of the day working on our COMS3200 assignments again. I had to tutor from eleven to twelve, and Maz had a group presentation to attend in the morning, but other than that, we spent the better part of the day buried in the labs coding. Kieran came down and did a lot of work as well. I once again spent the night at Marcus’s, it being too late to get home.

27.08.2004 – Friday 27 August – Woe Again

• Back down the labs again, working on this crud assignment again.

3pm

• The deadline for my COMS3200 assignment is four o’clock, but as I’m tutoring from three to four it’s essentially three o’clock for me, and I’m not finished. It’s disheartening to spend two whole nights working on something and then not manage to get it submitted on time. I lose ten percent per day late, but the weekend is taken as one day, so if I can submit it before Monday I’ll only lose ten percent. I am not overly happy – but this is what I get for starting late, coding asleep, not taking anything seriously, and wasting phenomenal amounts of time. I just wish it wasn’t worth twenty percent of its course – which I don’t agree with either as only a portion of the assignment deals with networking and I have all that part working just fine. Most of the problem comes from being burnt out. I’d been weeks without sleeping enough, surviving by sleeping all day once or twice a week and bugger all the rest of the week, and then stayed up all night working on my COMP3502 assignment – and now this. Oh well. An annoying thing about the COMP3502 assignment – the assignments weren’t collected until fifty-two hours after the deadline, so I didn’t need to rush.

Night

• To celebrate not handing in my assignment on time, I went and saw “Around the world in eighty days”, which is quite funny, although quite stupid too.

Comment by Mum – Sunday 29 August 2004, 10:13 PM

  Just go to bed earlier and do not be tempted by chat or whatever it is that you get up to on internet. Simple. It is your own fault.

Comment by moi – Wednesday 1 September 2004, 10:01 PM

  Ned, quit whinging. I work a full time job, about 55-60 hours a week, and do comp3502, coms3200 and comp3402, and I'd coded in Java once (infs3202 last semester) before this. And I got it finished by the deadline and working perfectly, but yes, it was a lot of work. Oh, and did I mention I live interstate and thus I have almost zero access to tutors, lecturers, etc apart from the netnews. But hey, that's my problem.
  
  So, no offence but you can do it. Be pragmatic - most of the coms3200 assignment _was_ involved in the RPC calls and so on, and the rest of it was handling a datastructure with merely a treemap (doors) and a hashmap (or whatever, for your cards). Oh, and some java.util.regexp parsing. Perfection is the enemy of done.

Comment by Ned – Thursday 2 September 2004, 11:18 AM

  Very little of the COMS3200 assignment actually involved networking, and the parts that did I had finished and working within hours, basically by copying and pasting his example code. I then spent days parsing text, figuring out what to output where, ironing out ambiguities in the specifications, learning about Array Lists, Sorted Tree Maps, and various other non-networking things.

28.08.2004 – Saturday 28 August – Riverfire & Happy People

• After sleeping in, I headed into uni and spent the latter parts of the evening realising what a disaster my assignment has become. I was obviously asleep when I wrote it.

7pm

• Clus came down to GPS, where we met Matt and some of his friends, and went up to the top of GPS to watch the “Riverfire” fireworks and an overfly by some air force F111’s. Once there, however, we decided that the top of the maths building would be better, so we ran over there, collecting Kieran, Clint, Maz and Kipps on the way.

10:30pm

• I left the labs, ran to the bus stop, caught a bus to Roma St. Station, and a train home. There were only two other people on the bus, right up until we picked up what appeared to be a large, and well-imbibed, party from some obscure bus stop. The train, on the other hand, was quite full because of “Riverfire”. I am not sure if I’ve just fried my brain attempting to fix the mess my assignment has become, or what, but everyone in my carriage – at least at my end, seemed nice. They all seemed happy, but not just happy because they were drunk as I think they were sober, and somehow nicer than I’ve become used to. I usually sit on the train and sleep, but tonight we were all smiling, laughing and joking together. It makes a nice change to meet people who are nice, and who can make a joke out of their surroundings without resorting to crudity.

1:51am

• I need to get to bed, having finished the last of my chips and eaten a quarter of my cheesecake.

29.08.2004 – Sunday 29 August – Regrettably Wasted

• I spent yet more time at uni, working on my hapless COMS3200 assignment. There’s nothing more to say. Working at uni on a Sunday is sad.

30.08.2004 – Monday 30 August – The Bourne Supremacy

8:30pm

• The Bourne Supremacy started with a scene in Goa, which immediately brought back memories of what was, perhaps, the most carefree period of my adult life – so far. So, from that point on, my opinion of the movie was biased. I actually recognized a few places that I’ve been to, particularly the bleak Panaji Bus Interchange, which is sort of cool. Apart from that, the movie is good, but not amazing. Jason Bourne, who, as you might guess, is the main character, has flashbacks to some disturbing event in his past, but is unable to remember exactly what it is – or even who he is. Fast forward a few scenes and he’s running for his life – or driving as the case may be. Then, in predictably typical Hollywood fashion, his girlfriend is killed instead of himself, and dies in his arms – or as close to that as you can get when drowning underwater. This sets the mood for the rest of the movie – the classic man who has lost everything theme, and Jason sets out to find out who he is, and why. Being fit, highly trained, and sought after by the omnipresent CIA and the Russian secret service means that the movie is, even if sadly predictable, not boring. The Bourne Supremacy falls into its archetypal Hollywood mould all too familiarly, which is a shame although to be expected, but it was just different enough to avoid being entirely predictable, and managed to be an enjoyable and interesting watch.

Morning

• I handed in my ill-fated COMS3200 assignment, did my COMP3502 tutorial and emailed that off to whoever has been randomly chosen to mark it this time, attended a two-hour COMP2801 lecture, and then skipped a COMS3200 practical to drive out to the airport with Maz, to drop off Tracy. I then went to the first hour of my COMP3502 lecture, and skipped the second half, as I had to see Soon about assignment marking, and then became sleepy and eventually found myself in Indooroopilly, at the cinemas, having been unable to convince anyone else to come.

31.08.2004 – Tuesday 31 August – Asymptotical Avoidance

• I arrived at uni in time for my eight o’clock prac, which was supposed to teach us how to use Rational Rose – an awful and overpriced program by the looks of it. I had considerable problems getting it to do anything useful, and many other people couldn’t even start the program – although, admittedly, this was a problem with ITEE’s setup, rather than Rational Rose itself. Following that I did an hour’s tutoring, attended two hours of COMS3200 lecture during which I learnt a grand total of three things, three of which weren’t related to COMS3200, and then spent the evening coding stuff for my COMP2502 assignment. Actually, I got a lift to Domino’s Pizza in Taringa with Maz first, bought a cheese pizza, and caught a bus back to uni, stopping at Coles for coke and chocolate. Thus suitably equipped, I managed to code all the code portion of the assignment, and arrived home shortly after midnight. It’s been wet and raining most of the evening, so was quite cold. This COMP2502 assignment looks like it might not be as hard as I’d first feared. The code portion is almost trivial, although I’ve gone overboard and done it as well as I can – it is entirely modular and object-orientated, and about as good as Java can get I believe, so that’s a guaranteed 25% I’d hope. Now I just have to figure out what “asymptotic analysis of algorithms” actually means, and what I’m supposed to do.

Comment by Mum – Friday 3 September 2004, 8:07 PM

  algorithms are the things you get in your guts to torture you after foolishly eating cheeze pizza (did you have greens?) followed by Coles chocolate and Coles coke. "Thus suitably equipped" you managed to get algorithms. Good boy! i think....

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