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

Jun ‘04 | Jul ‘04 | Aug ‘04 | Sep ‘04 | Oct ‘04 Nov ‘04 | Dec ‘04 | Jan ‘05 | Feb ‘05 |

01.10.2004 – Friday 1 October – Blurred & Erratic

• Spending all night at uni blurs two days into one – today feels like yesterday to me. It also makes me very sleepy and strange. I’m not sure which would be more productive – working hard and getting the last bus home, sleeping, and heading into uni as early as possible, or staying at uni working all night and then trying to work the next day while stupid. Once day had broken and the buses begun, I caught one into the city and bought a super shake from the Cold Rock to attempt to wake up, and then spent the rest of the day working on something or other. I went home in the evening and slept.

8:46pm

• For some reason, I feel sleepier than normal, so I think I’ll go to bed right now – much earlier than normal.

02.10.2004 – Saturday 2 October – Amberley Air Show

• Today I went to the Amberley Air Show. I caught the train into the city, then to Ipswich, and a bus from there to Amberley. It was very busy, very hot, and very dry and dusty. I managed to get a bit sunburnt. The air show itself was great. Every aircraft Australia has in operation was on display, and flew. I found the Caribou the most impressive. While F-111’s and F/A-18’s doing dump and burns and barely subsonic flypasts just a few hundred yards away are incredibly imposing, there’s something unutterably impressive about a full-size airplane dropping two tonne pallets from a metre above the ground, or landing within a few hundred metres, and taking off within another few. They’re absolutely amazing aircraft – there’s apparently not much else out there that can match them. Anything that can fly a metre from the ground without being able to hover impresses me no end, and their landing and takeoff seemed to defy gravity. A car dropped from a Chinook has a certain “coolness” about it as well. In fact, the whole show was quite good – the roulettes were spectacular, all the jets ooze power, Blackhawks and Super Seasprite’s are cool, Hercules are just big, and the rest had complicated names I can’t remember. We also got to witness an unplanned demonstration of airstrip fire fighting after an incendiary bombing raid unsurprisingly but unexpectedly caught the surrounding countryside on fire, creating dense smoke. It was quite interesting having a close look at fighter jets and helicopters too – they had several navy helicopters powered up showing some quite interesting avionics and scanning stuff.
  I dropped by uni on the way home, but didn’t stay long.

03.10.2004 – Sunday 3 October – Amanda’s & Shark Tale

3:44am

• I was quite tired when I arrived home last night, and had planned to go straight to bed, but somehow I didn’t, and it was approaching four o’clock by the time I did.

11:17am

• I awoke, refreshed, and was out of here and on my way to uni before one o’clock.

4:55pm

• I headed off to Indooroopilly, where Amanda and I saw “Shark Tale”. Unfortunately, it wasn’t anywhere near as good as the past few animated films have been, but it still managed to be watchful and a little amusing. I’d give it three somersaults. I stayed the night at Amanda’s place.

04.10.2004 – Monday 4 October – Back to Uni

• Amanda dropped me in the city, where I caught a bus to uni, and did the whole going to lectures thing. The mid-semester break hasn’t been a break at all for me. Uni is actually quite tough at the moment – I’m not sure whether it’s a coincidence with the courses I’ve chosen all consistently having assignments due at the same time, or if it’s just getting harder as I do more advanced courses. Either way, it’s now too hard to leave things to the last minute and cram them – it’s simply not possible to do that anymore. Time management skills – here I come. Actually, a more realistic statement would be – sleep, what sleep?

05.10.2004 – Tuesday 5 October – Wherein I discover I can no longer afford to sleep

• I went to bed shortly after three o’clock, and I left for uni around a quarter to seven – that’s less than three hours sleep, and it isn’t enough, but I had to be at uni by eight o’clock for my COMP2801 group practical. I then spent a normal day at uni, doing normal things. That is, I spent all day sitting in the computer labs programming. I wish UQ had an IT degree, so I didn’t have to do this crappy “Software Engineering (Lite)” degree.

Comment by Mitchell – Monday 11 October 2004, 11:23 AM

  Umm. I think sleep would be a good idea. The delusion, hallucinations etc. are a sign of pyschosis. It's brought about usually by sleep deprivation && stress | smoking weed. I dont need you putting on a performance in Comp2502 lectures. Kevin is entertaining enough.

Comment by Ned – Monday 11 October 2004, 1:20 PM

  Hmmm.... purple elephants!

06.10.2004 – Wednesday 6 October

• Jan came and cleaned. I went to uni and worked on my COMS3200 assignment. It is turning into a nightmare. It is excessively complex for the marks given, and most of it isn’t anything to do with networking. I also went and got our marked assignment two for COMP2801 back. We’ve got eighteen out of twenty, while the average mark is 12.9 and the median 11.5 and only one other group got higher – at 19, so I think we’ve done quite well.

Comment by Mum – Saturday 9 October 2004, 7:43 PM

  Good on you. Am so pleased.

07.10.2004 – Thursday 7 October – Uni

• Uni all day. There really is nothing more to be said. All spare waking moments were spent attempting to do uni related things. Apparently it’s election time again at uni – all the weirdos are out promoting various stupid things. It seems one mob want a Subway on campus and who knows what the other ones want. I’m surprised none can think up anything useful.

08.10.2004 – Friday 8 October – Uni Again

1:17am

• I’m quite tired and worn out. I spent all day at uni, most of it working on my COMS3200 assignment that I was supposed to have finished by last night. I really can’t afford to spend any more time on it, as I’ve COMP3502 due on Monday, and haven’t even begun it yet. Everything sounds odd. For a while, I thought my music was playing fast, but it’s not – it just sounds odd. My monitor seems overly large and clear too. I don’t remember it being so big.

Comment by Reubot – Saturday 9 October 2004, 5:48 PM

  Either
  a) You are hallucinating
  or
  b) You've only just gotten enough sleep to wake up in order to take in things properly

09.10.2004 – Saturday 9 October – UQ Sucks

• I went to Govinda’s for lunch, and then to uni for the evening. Dommie the Narc drove Clint and Kipps to the nearest polling station, so I went along for the ride. I left my bag in his car when he parked, and waited with Clus while they voted. A while later we got a phone call to say that they had waited for ages for us and were leaving any moment. We headed out to the car park and couldn’t find them, so we caught a bus back to the Ville and met them there. It was fortunate I had some small change or we’d have been stuck. As it was, I had to buy an adult ticket, which is annoying considering I already had a valid ticket in my wallet. Apparently Dommie, Clint and Kipps are retarded, as they claim they walked out the same door where we were waiting without us seeing them and didn’t see us, and even waited an additional five minutes in the car park after phoning.
  I’m trying to research my COMP3502 assignment, but the network and computing facilities here are so crap they’re unusable. I am getting download speeds of 500 bytes per second, meaning it’s taking me half an hour to download tiny files. This makes it very hard to research anything as I’m attempting to get journal articles from online databases. I am sick of the crappy facilities and the crappy IT degree in general, and the crappy attitude of the people who (pretend) to run the whole thing. I don’t care why they’re crap, or why they can’t be fixed, or what the behind-the-scenes politics are – I just care that I am paying good money for a sub-standard degree backed by sub-standard facilities. I don’t know what, if anything, I can do about it (other than transferring to another uni), but I wish there was something I could do. Perhaps this is just how life is, everything falls below even the most basic expectations and no one else cares?
  Overhead in a foreign accent on the bus on the way home: “Your Dad just bought a car? When? Today? Where? Oh, in Australia? A BMW? A Ferrari? Like a hatchback? Like the Beatles? I am so confused”.

Comment by Mitchell – Monday 11 October 2004, 11:18 AM

  Unfortunately UQ is crap. As far as I know, there is no way you can really launch an investigation into the state of the Uni, particularly the ITEE school. It's a poor Uni, and unfortunately looks like most people who decided to come here have been cheated. No matter what, they will win, wanking on about how good their Uni/School is.
  
  How about, we form a rally, get EVERYONE to leave the Uni/School and see what they do about it. Probably nothing, they won't have noticed because they will be too busy on their "lets re-invent the wheel slightly different" research projects.
  
  From what I see. Uni in the US looks the go. You pay a lot $$$$ but, they appear to be very accountable. None of the HECS rubbish, so that by the time you actually start earning enough money to pay it off, you r

Comment by Reubot – Tuesday 12 October 2004, 7:46 PM

  Why didn't you just go to the library?

Comment by Ned – Tuesday 12 October 2004, 10:41 PM

  How would going to the library have helped me?

Comment by Reubot – Wednesday 13 October 2004, 8:43 PM

  To download your files.

10.10.2004 – Sunday 10 October – All Night

• I have to finish COMS3200 and start and complete COMP3502 by tomorrow. COMP3502 is due at 2 PM, and COMS3200 at 10 AM. With this in mind, I headed into uni (via Cold Rock in the city) and spent the night working on them. I bought two litres of coke and a block of chocolate from the Coles at the Ville, which lasted me most of the night. Unfortunately, I’ve not had enough sleep last night to pull an all-nighter tonight, so it wasn’t much fun. Marcus and Lachlan spent the night in the labs doing COMP3502 as well, along with several Asians that I don’t know. I was surprised how many people spent all night there. I guess there are a few assignments due tomorrow.

11.10.2004 – Monday 11 October – Assignments Are Done

• Around four o’clock I began to feel really sleepy. Maz and I dropped by his place so he could get some new music, and dropped in at a twenty-four hour service station on the way back to uni where I bought some coke and chocolate to keep me awake. It worked, but by around six o’clock I felt amazingly bad. This has been a really bad all-nighter for some reason. I can generally handle them quite well, but this time it did not work. Still, I did manage to get all three assignments finished off and submitted, so I guess that is what matters, although I think I’ll try not to do it this way next semester. Around ten o’clock Maz and I, along with Clint, Clus and Kipps, went to McDonald’s for breakfast, after which I went back to completing my COMP3502 assignment. What a night. I think I shall give up drinking Coke too, it’s terrible stuff but it’s the only way I know to stay up all night without being engrossed in something. There has to be some other healthier way though. Ah dear, incoherence. Bed calls.

8:31pm

• I’ve just finished dinner, and I’m feeling very sleepy – I think I’ll take a shower and head to bed.

12.10.2004 – Tuesday 12 October – Of which little is said

• I had to be at uni by eight o’clock at the wrong end of the day for my COMP2801 practical, so I was. The rest of the day followed along, as if by clockwork, one moment at a time and never two at once. By the end, it was over and ready to begin again.

13.10.2004 – Wednesday 13 October – My day not off

• Today used to be my day off, back before I realised that uni is harder than before. Because I don’t have any lectures, I did sleep in, but still went to uni in the evening to do some work on my COMP2801 assignment. I had wanted to go see a movie tonight, but Clint and Maz convinced me to wait until tomorrow, so I stayed at uni until late instead.

14.10.2004 – Thursday 14 October – Shaun of the Dead

• Another exciting day of fun and study, but that is not all. Today, Maz, Clint, Clus and I went to the movies. We drove all the way to Indooroopilly, and saw “Shaun of the Dead”. The movie is a successful synthesis of British humour and American gore, managing to be both amusing and entertaining, and ranks around three quarters of a True Lie, although being incomparable and all makes such a ranking difficult to decide upon. After the movie, I started on my COMP2801 time management reflection, and that ends the uni portion of my day.

• I had a chat with Soon today. She has been asked to take COMP1800 next year, and plans to offer it second semester. She asked if I would be interested in tutoring again, which I said I was, and that I’m interested in helping redevelop the course, should she require any assistance. I also went and had a chat with Philip Machanick about what I should do. The way I see it, I have three options – continue with my current three year IT degree and try to get a job at the end, continue with my current degree and do honours, or switch to another, possibly dual, degree or a degree from another university. After a chat with Philip, the general consensus (within myself) is that I will continue with IT here at UQ, and consider honours at the end of next year, unless I have a good job offering instead. There seems to be little point in changing to a dual degree without a specific and applicable goal in mind, and it is hard to justify the extra time a dual IT degree with something such as computer systems or electrical engineering would take.

15.10.2004 – Friday 15 October – Reflections on Time & Jolt

• I woke up to go to uni, decided that I was sleepy, and didn’t. This means I missed both my lectures. I did eventually end up at uni, because I had to tutor and had an assignment due by evening. Ironically, I did not complete the assignment, which is a reflection on my time management, until five minutes before it was due. This, I believe, shows the precision of my time management. I also voted in the union elections, voting for “Jolt”, as they are more right, and hence less wrong, than the rest. “Focus” seems to be the most popular, but they are boring and stupid. I had dinner at Govinda’s on the way home, and the train stopped for ages, twice, due to powerlines over the tracks.

1:07am

• I would like to know why every single musk lifesaver breaks into four pieces when I remove it, even though I am into the third roll.

Comment by Reubot – Sunday 17 October 2004, 10:12 AM

  Who the hell were the other groups? I had no idea who Truth, Freedom, Bolt and Opportunity were....

Comment by Ned – Sunday 17 October 2004, 10:29 PM

  I have no idea – I don’t follow Union politics, and wouldn’t even belong to the Union if it weren’t compulsory, which is a travesty of democracy in itself.

Comment by Lucas – Monday 18 October 2004, 12:07 PM

  There is something so contradictory about compulsory unionism. I've ranted on about this so many times before before: http://blog.lucascosti.com/index.php?blogid=33

Comment by Reubot – Friday 22 October 2004, 7:14 PM

  Now Howard controls the senate (after June next year) I'd assume they'll push forward with VSU again, since it was part of the original Higher Education Package.

Comment by Ned – Saturday 23 October 2004, 12:21 AM

  In a country where voting is compulsory, it makes sense to have compulsory unionism – as neither concept is democratic.

Comment by Reubot – Saturday 6 November 2004, 1:59 PM

  SHAME!
  http://www.uqu.uq.edu.au/representation/newsitems/electionresults04

16.10.2004 – Saturday 16 October – Another Normal Day

• Another particularly normal and uneventful day, during which I present myself at uni in order to fully add colour to our COMP2801 program, fail to do so, and so on. I also read perhaps the funniest geek joke ever – two strings walk into a bar. The first string says to the bartender, “Bartender, I’ll have a beer. u.5n$x5t?*&4ru!2[sACCErJ”. The second string says, “Pardon my friend, he isn’t NULL terminated”. After a day of programming, that really is quite hilarious.

Comment by krait – Monday 18 October 2004, 1:46 AM

  Wow, that's one *old* joke. 1990, IIRC ;)

Comment by Mum – Wednesday 20 October 2004, 7:42 PM

  No savvy long dispel tok

17.10.2004 – Sunday 17 October – Rain & Little Else

• I slept in for a while and then caught a train into uni where I did my COMP3502 tute, some coding for COMP2801, talked to Kieran and Clint, and then headed home again, after buying a falafel roll from the kebab place down the Ville. It’s now raining and a bit cool.

Site News

• I’ve modified the search page on most of my sites so that it’s embedded, rather than linking to an external Google page. This is really pressing Google’s terms of service, so I hope they don’t mind.
  People write URI’s on the whiteboards at uni, which is often rather stupid but not really a problem, but when people write the URI of my site on the toilet walls at uni, and other people gouge it out again, I begin to wonder. This doesn’t happen to anyone else – should I be worried?

Comment by Reubot – Monday 18 October 2004, 11:34 AM

  Which toilets?

Comment by io – Tuesday 19 October 2004, 12:20 PM

  Ned lives only at GP South, so I assume it's those toilets he is talking about.

Comment by Ned – Tuesday 19 October 2004, 3:50 PM

  Yes, the toilets in GPS. Ironically, and perhaps worryingly, someone has now rewritten a gouged-out URI.

Comment by Mum – Tuesday 19 October 2004, 8:12 PM

  These things give me the pip. Cant you just try to be a nice ordinary nonentity, easily forgettable, bland, blase, boring as all shivers, so Mum doesna hae to worry, mon? (O' te greying hairs).

Comment by Ned – Tuesday 19 October 2004, 10:06 PM

  I haven’t intentionally done anything different to anyone else – although obviously I have somehow.

Comment by sef – Wednesday 20 October 2004, 3:44 AM

  What kebab store?

Comment by Ned – Wednesday 20 October 2004, 4:06 AM

  It’s interesting that you should ask.

Comment by Lucas – Wednesday 20 October 2004, 11:53 AM

  You should take pictures of the URI's and put them up, both gouged and non-gouged (if there are any).

Comment by Reubot – Wednesday 20 October 2004, 11:56 AM

  I kinda meant which toilet location, I did a good check of the 2nd-level male toilets and a semi check of the 1st-level ones in GPS but I couldn't find them...

Comment by Reubot – Wednesday 20 October 2004, 2:05 PM

  Alright, I went down to GPS and found it this time....Can you say NEDDAGE? (Maybe you could say the wall was nedded).

Comment by Ned – Wednesday 20 October 2004, 2:35 PM

  I always wanted to be famous, but I’m not quite sure if this was what I had in mind...

Comment by graham – Thursday 21 October 2004, 10:28 PM

  perhaps someone just wanted to get mentioned on your site, Ned. You are a celebrity, after all.

18.10.2004 – Monday 18 October – Lightning, Rain & Collateral

Day

• Insert exciting rant about uni and stuff like that here. It seems to be raining and there was lightning this morning so I couldn’t go to my first lecture of the day, which was just a guest lecturer so not actually about the subject. I also tutored today, something I don’t normally do, but we’re having a Monday tutorial this Monday and next Monday to handle anticipated increased demand.

Night

• Maz and I went and saw “Collateral”, at Indooroopilly, which was rather average, equalling three quarters of one Shaun of the Dead. It wasn’t the mindless action I was expecting and looking forward to, and couldn’t quite keep up the façade of anything more. Still, it was ok. Sadly my brain is fried, and I can’t think, let alone type.

19.10.2004 – Tuesday 19 October – Uni

• After four hours sleep, or something woeful like that, I had to get up and go to uni for my COMP2801 practical, during which my group cleverly divided the remaining tasks. I then rushed up to POD, photocopied my tutor evaluation things for students to fill out, tutored, attended the sleepy COMS3200 lecture, where I always get sleepy for some reason, and then got some dinner from Govinda’s on the way home.

• I discovered yesterday that the follow-on information security course I’d planned to take next year is no longer going to be offered, so, in a probably vain attempt to get the course reinstated:
  Request for Expressions of Interest – Proposed follow-on to COMP3502 “Information Security”
  I’m currently taking COMP3502, “Information Security”, which I am finding informative, well taught, and relevant, and I believe this is a field that will become increasingly relevant as more and more critical information is stored and managed digitally. I had planned to take a proposed follow-on course next year, but have recently discovered that this course is no longer going to be offered. I believe it is courses such as this, and not the standard run-of-the-mill programming courses, which will provide the knowledge necessary to build the skills that will produce distinguished and long-term employable graduates. Let’s face it – programming in Australia, per se, is a menial, dead-end, career choice – somewhat analogous to the situation Australian factory workers would have found themselves in, in the not so distant past. It is simply more economically feasible to outsource such menial tasks to a cheaper country – yet it is graduates suited to these tasks that UQ is producing, as they drop IT courses and focus the IT curricula on the perceived, and largely expendable, “basic skills” common to IT and engineering.
  I would like to graduate with the knowledge necessary to develop skills that are in demand, required, essential, and as permanently applicable as possible – which is the main reason I wished to take the follow on course to COMP3502.
  If any other students are interested in a follow-on course to COMP3502, I would be interested to hear from them, as I am planning to write to the head of school for reconsideration of the cancellation of this proposed course, should there be sufficient interest.

Comment by Reubot – Thursday 28 October 2004, 9:27 AM

  As someone planning to move into an ITEE based program next year, I'm wondering which courses you mean as the ones you wouldn't recommend people do because they are not theory based enough?

Comment by Ned – Thursday 28 October 2004, 12:25 PM

  A lot of things are changing next year, so it is impossible to say.

20.10.2004 – Wednesday 20 October – The Football Factory

• I went to sleep around six o’clock in the morning. In retrospect, this wasn’t a particularly good idea, as I then didn’t wake up until one o’clock in the evening, and still felt stupid all afternoon. After eventually waking up, I headed into the city and got something to eat from Govinda’s, and a Cold Rock Super Shake, before heading into uni. I went to Clint’s room but half the block appeared to be having some type of domestic, and they all left just as I got there, leaving me a little confused, so I just hung around wasting Clint’s Internet quota and helping Dommie with some coding. They eventually returned, all still alive, and I got a lift to Indooroopilly with Sméagol, where I watched “The Football Factory”, a rather rough, but partially tongue-in-cheek, look at British football hooligans. The movie had a lot of potential, which it didn’t manage to live up to, and was quite good in parts but very average in others. It wasn’t a bad watch, so I’ll give it one “Collateral”, although it did make me miss the train, meaning I didn’t get home until after one o’clock.

21.10.2004 – Thursday 21 October – Sleepy

• I went to bed around four o’clock, and got up two hours later to get to uni for my eight o’clock lecture. Strangely, though, I felt quite sleepy, and managed to convince myself that I should skip my lecture, and its following tute, and get an extra hour or so sleep. While this helped a little, I still felt rather like a zombie while tutoring, and didn’t do much for the rest of the day.

Evening

• Maz drove Clint, Kieran and I to Umart, where I bought a 200-gigabyte Western Digital hard drive.

22.10.2004 – Friday 22 October – Very Hot

• Despite going to bed at a reasonable hour and getting a full seven hours sleep, I didn’t wake when my alarm went off, meaning I missed my lecture. Fortunately, however, I didn’t miss tutoring, which was quite busy and went an hour longer than it was supposed to. After tutoring, I went and wasted some time down in c-block, which always makes me feel intelligent. I then went and watched HMAS Tobruk presenting arms at King George Square, and had dinner at Govinda’s, before heading back to uni for a little while.

1:47am

• It is remarkably hot. I don’t like hot nights.

23.10.2004 – Saturday 23 October – Incredibly Hot

• It’s very hot, once again. I made my way into uni in the evening, in order to prepare for our group’s COMP2801 presentation on Tuesday, but due to another of the speaker’s assignments refusing to compile and being due yesterday, no preparation was done. I did, however, manage to fix up a silly bug I’d had with my colour support, so the time wasn’t wasted. This hotness is ridiculous – there’s voluble waves of heat rolling in, one can feel them hit. Perhaps it is the end of the world, as we know it.

24.10.2004 – Sunday 24 October – Satanism, Gauls & Arguments

• It is a sad day when satanic rituals are officially endorsed onboard royal navy vessels – according to the BBC, “The British Armed Forces has officially recognised its first registered Satanist, according to a newspaper report”. How anyone, religious or not, can believe this type of behaviour, basically officially recognising “evil” as “acceptable”, is in any way normal or acceptable is beyond me.

• Today has been another really hot day. I spent the morning in bed asleep, and the evening at uni. I met up with Flashpix and Insomnix, two indomitable Gauls still holding out against the house drawing, team project and sprinkler-mapping invaders that have overtaken all the other labs. We did much great COMP2801 teamwork, which can be summarised roughly as “Hey yeah, so we better do stuff, but Coles shuts soon and I haven’t had breakfast yet so I’ll see you later ok? Yeah, I’ll do some work tonight and we can compare tomorrow. Cool, see you then”. There was also something I was supposed to do tonight, so that we can compare it tomorrow, but I can’t remember what it is so I shan’t be doing it.

2:16am

• I was going to go to bed several times, but the ongoing, and now rather vindictive and melodramatic, argument has kept me awake, so I’m running my backups onto the new hard drive.

2:29am

• All seems quiet now, and my backup has less than half a minute to go, so I might try to get some sleep.

25.10.2004 – Monday 25 October – University is as University Does

• I spent the morning attending lectures and tutoring, and the evening with Lachlan preparing for our COMP2801 presentation tomorrow. Nothing of any great interest occurred, although Clint and Co have begun an anti-Kipps campaign, which I am supporting by linking to their page from each of mine in an attempt to Google bomb Rhett’s name – not that anyone would ever search for it other than himself.

26.10.2004 – Tuesday 26 October – Presentation Woes

• After a little less than four hours sleep, I got up and headed into uni so I’d be there by half past seven, to finish preparing for our COMP2801 presentation. Not surprisingly, I didn’t feel fantastic, and I don’t think Lachlan had had anymore sleep than I.

8am

• Our group was drawn out of a hat third place, meaning we presented third. The first group had a comprehensive and highly detailed slideshow – there was probably too much information on it, as they didn’t cover it all. The second and fourth groups had what I’d call average, but good, presentations, although the second group was too pre-planned and choreographed, as they were in the first presentation. Our presentation went terribly, I felt. Despite Lachlan and I having done a reasonable amount of preparation yesterday, coupled with both our lack of sleep, it simply wasn’t enough. I don’t know what our presentation looked like from the observer’s perspective, but I was very aware that we didn’t cover much of what I’d hoped to cover, and what we did was confused. I am, however, very impressed with Lachlan’s ability to make up stuff on the spot, something I don’t think I could do. All I can do is hope, vainly I fear, that Doug is also impressed.

Afternoon

• I tutored from ten o’clock through to noon, and then attended the first hour of my two-hour COMS3200 lecture, going back after and tutoring from one o’clock through to three o’clock. Ironically, the one hour I didn’t tutor, I was meant to tutor – from noon through one o’clock, but wasn’t aware of this. TO make it even worse, Mandy, who was also supposed to tutor, didn’t realise either so there were no tutors in the labs at all. Hopefully not too many students turned up and found no one there.

Evening

• I had planned to do things, but got suddenly tired and hungry, so walked down to the Ville with Clint, Clus and Maz, but once there didn’t feel like eating anything anyone sold, so caught a bus into the city, went to Govinda’s, and then caught the train home. Now that’s it’s just gone one o’clock, I’d better head to bed.

Comment by Mum – Wednesday 27 October 2004, 7:13 PM

  You dont sleep enough. For goodness sake, when I was your age, I.....I....er...well.... I didnt sleep enough. And look what it did for me! (It really annoys me that I have to get out the microscope to find the exclamation mark on this keyboard). Just about all the things I could plague you with on this journal site need lots of exclamation marks. Just gotta remember that they are linked with No. 1. Shouldnt be hard, I guess. Go away Mum. Yerrs, okay.

27.10.2004 – Wednesday 27 October – Sleepless in St Lucia

• I got less than four hours sleep again last night. The clouds are pretty; they float along like sheep, but without the legs. No eyes either. This heat is bad – I don’t like hot weather. People that sauna need their heads checked – does boiled cabbage appear healthy to you? I vaguely remember going to uni, where I wrote a two thousand-word addition to my team journal, mainly by pasting stuff from this journal and slightly rewriting it. Now for some two minute noodles.

Comment by Mum – Wednesday 3 November 2004, 7:15 PM

  You don t get enough sleep

28.10.2004 – Thursday 28 October – Doctor’s Appointment

• Mum reckons I don’t get enough sleep, but I don’t know why she says this.

Hospital

• I had to be at Prince Charles Hospital by 9:40, which meant a train and bus ride. I only slept for around two hours last night, so didn’t feel hugely alert and joyful, however nothing at all happened – I had the de facto respiratory tests and saw a doctor, who made an appointment for later, and then I headed into uni.

Uni

• I wrote a Junit test for my Colour class, which is nearly more complex than the class itself, walked down the Ville and bought a kebab, gave Igor my new hard drive, and very little else.

2:15am

• I had better go to bed, partly because I need to get up at eight o’clock tomorrow, but mainly so I am not banned from the university newsgroup. In a (successful) attempt to prove to Clint that I’m a far superior troll, and because I’m intolerant and sick of inanity, I posted a flurry of blatantly provocative posts, which drew the expected response from the usual suspects. However, I don’t want to press the point too far, so I shall stop now.
  It’s sad – there are so many interesting topics in the IT field, but the most that the average geek student seems to be able to handle is arguing why their favourite operating system or browser is better than life itself. Do computer-related degrees attract the intellectually inept, or is this the state of humanity in general?

Comment by Mum – Wednesday 3 November 2004, 7:16 PM

  You dont get enough sleep

Comment by Mum – Wednesday 3 November 2004, 7:18 PM

  "I only slept for around two hours last night...." You dont get enough sleep.

29.10.2004 – Friday 29 October – End of Semester & The Manchurian Candidate

• At uni, I proofread and slightly modified our COMP2801 document, before handing it over to Insom for the final addition of UML diagrams. That’s the last of this semester’s assessment, and marks the end of semester – only the exams remain. BITS had their annual general meeting today, although apparently it was a special general meeting due to some obscure reason or other, and elected next year’s exec. Insom is president, with Grit and Tim taking up positions, so perhaps next year’s society will actually be worth joining.
  After that, Maz and I went and saw “The Manchurian Candidate”, which ended up being an interesting, but not fantastic, movie, getting around the same rating as “The Football Factory” in my opinion.

Comment by Mum – Thursday 4 November 2004, 7:14 PM

  You dont get enough sleep

30.10.2004 – Saturday 30 October – Sleeping

• I awoke at four o’clock in the evening. Hopefully this monumental sleep has caught me up after my previous sleepless weeks. Not surprisingly, the rest of the day was ruined as far as doing anything goes. Around midnight I felt like lunch, and went to bed some time later.

31.10.2004 – Sunday 31 October – A Man’s Gotta Do All Hallows Eve

• Maz and I went and saw “A Man’s Gotta Do” at Indooroopilly. It’s a great Australian comedy, and overall good movie. Every time they got to a place where a normal Hollywood movie would make some stupid plot choice, they made the right choice. I’d give this movie a whole two Manchurian Candidates – making this the first movie I’ve rated higher than “True Lies” (at forty and a half cat women or one and a half Shaun of the dead, for those counting). I went via uni to see if Clint wanted to go, but he was otherwise engaged or unable to get ready in time or something, so missed out on the best movie in a while.
  On the train home, we met a group of spunky American boxing kangaroos, with pouches full of candy, attempting to introduce some American Halloween culture to us Aussies. Halloween is an odd tradition – I fail to comprehend how all the conservative American Christians can dress up their young children as ghoulish demons and monsters in an apparent glorification of evil on All Hallows Eve, the evening before All Saint’s Day, and not think anything unusual of this. I’m surprised that handing out candy to small children in the dark is seen as something to be encouraged too, it almost makes me think of a Michael Jackson joke...

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