Theodore Roosevelt

“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again; because there is not effort without error and shortcomings; but who does actually strive to do the deed; who knows the great enthusiasm, the great devotion, who spends himself in a worthy cause, who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement and who at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly. So that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat.”

 

Theodore Roosevelt quotes

Walking the Dog

OWNERS who don't walk their dogs at least once a day face punishment under animal welfare laws proposed by an RSPCA chief

I so hope this will be discussed properly. At the moment it is outrageous. I fully agree with dog owners looking after the health and welfare of their dogs. There are several things you  have to take into account before you slap fines on people. The health and happiness of the dog. The health and happiness of the owner. The neighbourhood. The other dogs in the neighbourhood.The working hours of the owner. The weather. A random once a day walk which is enforced by law is ludicrous. It is inflexible and takes nothing into account. I have a dog with cancer. She is not going for a walk. She is not a dog who is walked regularly anyway because I have a very erratic neighbourhood and I would not want to be out there some days with my dog. 4 different vets have seen her and have all been astounded at her level of health and happiness. We play a lot. I have a big garden. We play ball, we play hamburger ,we jump and we do do all sorts of things to keep her fit and well. My last dog had lymphoma which I was unaware of until he had to be put down but he didn't like walks. He liked to play and then have a bit of a short wander with me. People have to adjust their activities according to who they are. Not everyone walks everyday. Some go to the beach and swim. Some to the pool. Some go to the gym and some have a gym at home. Anything which encourages dog owners to get out there is probably a good thing because people on the streets keep us safe. We have joggers, walkers and dog and children walkers. It has helped...but you cannot tell people to put themselves at risk and you cannot tell people how to manage the health of their dog. What you can do is ensure people are looking after their pets.

Tony Abbott

One vote, eh? Lights, action, camera...popcorn...let the games begin.

Net Free Zone

24 hours without internet access is the pits. Some monumental stuff up out there brought it about. I was totally impressed with my ISP. I rang twice to see what on earth was going on and twice the menu navigation was quick and I got HUMAN contact within a minute. Those humans were very helpful and very human...they were quite soothing because I was going mental! I was like a lost sheep...bills to pay, emails to send, facebooking to do...and maybe blogging. I was also going to look up Windows 7 because I got a new desk top at a BARGAIN price and was ready to go....What I did do was tidy all my old computer so my sister can have it and then tidy up my computer stuff so now I can find things...but oh boy, it's hard without he Net.... I did bake a lovely orange poppy seed cake, though!

Richard Herring

Fresh Air

He says people appear to work better if they can get fresh air.

Architects are having a conference about improving the quality of office air to help workers work...opening the window is a suggestion. Our new buildings at work do not have windows you can open!   We also have offices without a view to the outside and that is soooo depressing. I shall be glad to move soon to an office with a window to the outside...but it doesn't open and the air conditioning is appalling. It does not circulate anything. probably not connected. No one should be put into a work area without a view to the outside and without a window they can open. No wonder people get sick or go bonkers. It is largely overlooked that it is important for people to have control over their environment. That in itself lifts spirits and then people like to see what the world looks like. It does animals no good to be cooped up...why should it be good for us and what were they thinking?

Funi and Wang Wang

The pandas are coming! Tomorrow! Adelaide Now has a great gallery of pictures and we are excited. Adelaide has done a lot to grow bamboo and raise money for the upkeep of the pandas. Some people wonder why we are so excited but we are. Very Adelaide. We love animals and we like something like this. the Pandemonium events have been hugely popular and so many people have supported this. It'll be hard to get in and visit them once they are settled. Tomorrow Adelaide will celebrate their arrival and those schools and businesses which have been behind this can be proud of such a positive achievement. It's good to see people unite in such an amicable way but the organisation of all of this has to be applauded too.

Dual Booting

The more I think about it and experience it, the more I think dual booting is the go. It is just something which has happened this year and I have come to appreciate it. I  have also come to appreciate the different experiences different operating systems offer and then how different hardware can add to your life. My daughter is often on her iPod on the Net. When she can't be bothered getting out her laptop or she is travelling, then the iPod touch does everything she needs to do and she is a big computer user. I fancy what is now called a web PC. I am trying to find an excuse to buy one of those dinkie things. I think I'd use them for travelling, but I am wondering if I would really need one or could use one. You don't know until you have these things. I am not a pocket surfer. Hate it. With the dual booting I have choices and that is what it is about. My work MacBook dual boots Windows and MacIntosh with the default as MacIntosh. The Mac side runs to easily and efficiently in French, it's very visual, has some good gadgets which I use all the time but the down side is the Office suite which ought to be compatible with Windows office but I get data loss and annoying things. I always back up. Good habit! The photo and image stuff is also easy on the Mac side. Windows, though, offers a wealth of experiences which I like and gives me a chance to operate more broadly. The Mac doesn't always manage the media files and video files on web sites and it just doesn't have the range of programmes which run with it but it is much improved.  My other laptop now runs Ubuntu and Vista. What a piece of cake that was. Ubuntu is wonderfully uncomplicated and the screen is clean and lovely and the downloads and updates are a breeze and then it is well and truly MY laptop when I use Ubuntu without all the security interference of Windows. Ubuntu also has some neat little open source programmes which I use and like. So there is an operating system for every personality and every mood. The world needs to take note of that because cross platform capabilities increase your capacity to be engaged with technology and those who don't like one thing suddenly find themselves in an environment they can appreciate. No one likes change but others adapt rather quickly. They just absorb and absorb new ways of doing things and new experiences. Those people push the developers by showing them ideas of how thinks can be used. Windows is very popular because we all know it, but there are a lot of Mac and Linux users out there and the dual boot encourages me to be more adaptable and , more importantly, more adventurous. I have a system I am very used to and then I have a system to explore. It means I am willing to look around more to see what's available and what is possible. That means growth. That's good!!!

Relabelling Removable drive - Ubuntu

Easy when you know how! Didn't have to go to Terminal. I tried the disk Utility and could rename my flash drive from there. I tried altering permissions and obviously hadn't got that right. So I just reformatted the drive and there you go...a space comes up for you to rename/relabel the drive. Took 30 seconds!! So now I am a happy lady. Ubuntu 9.10 doesn't have such a choice of screen savers though so I couldn't find my favourite one form 9.04. I have settled for the snowflakes! The interface for choosing software is etter and there are some lovely photos fro the desktop if you want them. I also customised my theme so it's a bit easier on the eye.

Wubi

I have just installed a dual boot Windows Vista and Ubuntu 9.10 thanks to Wubi. This is my idea of a good time and a perfect computer. I am running Ubuntu now on my Dell Inspiron 1525. It took 30 mins because it is all automatic. Wubi just does it all for you and I have a lovely floral background (!) and a pretty nice theme but I confess it is not as nice as my chocolate theme under 9.04. On my to do list. Why dual boot? I get fed up with Vista. It's like dragging the whole world around. Ubuntu is wonderfully light and straight forward except for the daft thing I came across this morning where I cannot easily rename my newly acquired flash drive. I can follow all the Terminal stuff and will do that eventually if I have to. In terms of security , it's not such a bad thing. Maybe relabelling flash drives should not be so easy as a couple of clicks. So now I'll keep you posted on how I go. I confess the dual boot interface is not as cruisy as my MacBook dual boot which is visual. Ubuntu dual boot is text based and might put our visual users off. Ubuntu is like coming on holidays...I really like it and the world ought to be able to have choices these days. Choices are very this millennium

Cruisin' Ubuntu

I got a friend of mine to change to Ubuntu..in the way we'd all like to...dual boot with Windows. He mastered that whole thing quite quickly. I gave up on the dual boot but he has been more thorough and so it worked really well. I have a dedicated Ubuntu laptop and I haven't been on it in ages for all the reasons my life came up with...so here I am and it is grand. Just lovely. I came on here because my daughter had a flash drive which was playing up and it really was the spawn from hell  and would stop Windows and kill it. It was new a while ago and she had never said. Well...what a load of tripe. So I thought I'd try it on Ubuntu and this bolshie flashdrive is behaving itself perfectly. My problem now is how to rename it. That is not a click away in Ubuntu. Doesn't seem to be and I am looking for an easy fix. I have a non easy fix and will get around to it... but Ubuntu is choofing along just nicely and has now got me a nice little flash drive!

Garden Groans

I am not totally certain we are angry but we are certainly dismayed and put off. We slaved through the cooler weather to repair our gardens from the heat and drought. The impact had been devastating and we had been traumatised. But we worked long hours to repair the damage and tried to put in changes to help. What a joke. Two weeks of heat and then a 43 degree burning day with a dry wind and the gardens were trashed. So on my street, no one has been out to do anything and we are very responsible and reliable with our gardens. Bugger it! I have great tall weeds and that’s the thing...I have never had so many weeds. We have just left them. The lawns are patchy and need mowing but they’ll dry and we have curtailed our lawns to help with water supplies but even what we have is unmanageable. Build up the bricks and concrete and you built up the heat and dry. Our plants are dried out, our trees and shrubs have dropped leaves in the millions. So it is just a mess and we have thought... why? We did all that work to no avail, so unless someone can give us hope...Adelaide gardens will be left and you know...Adelaide gardens are the thing which help us all deal with stress and bring us a bit of pleasure. We love our gardens...some have gone the way of brick and concrete, but busy Bunnings and nurseries tell you just how much we love out gardens. It sucks, big time. I am still sitting here instead of mowing and sweeping. What’s the point? One more lot of heat and it is crisped.

Water!!

Dripper systems and hand-held hoses fitted with a trigger nozzle can be used for a maximum of 5 hours a week between the hours of 6-9am or 6-9pm on any day.

Good news!