LinuxQuestions.org - Blogs - cs-cam

Eat lamb on Australia Day

cs-cam — Thu, 26 Jan 2006 03:44:22 GMT

Here is the script of a TV advert that has been playing here the last few weeks. This is very much tongue-in-cheek humour, it's advertising lamb but cracks me up and fits into our image so well I had to post it.

Fellow Australians,

The incidents of un-Australian behaviour over the past year was down to one thing, not enough lamb. For example, lamb could have prevented the boofheads perpetrating violence on our beaches. You can't bash someone with a cutlet. And we might not have lost the Ashes if our cricketers picked up lamb chops instead of mobile phones. Why on Earth did they dispatch lurid text messages to English trollops when plenty of Aussie sheilas would gladly target their middle stump.

Yet as mishaps spread across the land like bird flu through a Chinese chicken coop, what were we doing about it? Bugger all! It's time to remind outselves what lies at the core of our national identity. A lamb chop and a barbie. Being Australian doesn't mean you have to call the opposition captain a wanker, even if he is. Or spend every Friday night on the piss until your best friend looks like Elle McPherson.

To be as Australian as I am, just whack some nice juicy lamb chops on the barbie and invite everyone over. If you can't pronounce their name, just call them mate, and celebrate living in the best bloody country on Earth. So don't be un-Australian, serve lamb on Australia Day. you know it makes sense.

Source: Meat and Livestock Australia

Australia Day

cs-cam — Mon, 23 Jan 2006 03:33:51 GMT

Australia Day
--------------------

So Australia Day is coming up on Thursday, how exciting! BBQ in the park, mass celebrations in all the capital cities, the works. My question before we start is, do we really have as much to celebrate as we all think?

Hold on, now before I have people banging down my door over that last comment let me explain. I am a fierce Australian, I love what our culture is and the freedoms our country provides, it just saddens me to see that some of those qualities that we've revered over the decades as being truly "Australian", well, I'm not seeing them exhibited as much anymore.

One thing that hit home big time was the riots in Sydney, the wog bashing days. Come off it, how can those idiots rationalise the rubbish that is coming out of their mouths? If a gang was terrorising and bullying kids near where I lived, I'd be more than happy to get a bunch of guys and go punch their heads in. They'd have deserved it. Bringing race into the mix though about as un-Australian as you can get. There were people walking around wearing their "Ethnic Cleansing Squad" shirts and an Australian flag wrapped around their shoulders... Guess lowering ourselves to the same level of the bullies or even lower must have sounded like a good idea at the time or something. Yeah, I can see how a group of 30+ bashing 2 Uni students on a train is tough and clearly a step forward in claiming Cronulla Beach back from the gangs. Not.

Is Australia losing it's culture? In Who We Are, the author David Dale comments on how in the last 50 years our culture has changed so dramatically. Our national drink seems to have gone from a cold beer to a hot cappuccino, we've gone from watching sports to watching Lost and Desperate Housewives. The essence of patriotism has been replaced by a urgent need to keep up with world trends and this constant rush of multiculteral acceptance has left some of the die hard Aussies feeling like the nation has rejected its own culture in favour of another. Don't get me wrong, change is a good thing. Change is what moves us forward and our ability to welcome change is what makes us great.

Our shortfalls are that we are still a young nation, still finding our feet all the while having the problems of the world thrown at us. My hope is that we continue to band together and while it's our nature to jump straight into any situation that presents itself to us, we retain the ability to keep a level head. The world is in a place I'm sure many of us never wished to see it in. Terrorism has gotten to a level where it isn't shocking to hear about it anymore, it's almost commonplace. But we are larrikins, we are visionaries and we have a fantastic sense of humour. We are resourceful, we have some of the brightest minds on Earth and we know exactly how to use them. We have a great fighting spirit and when times are tough, we band together as one to stay strong.

If anyone needs a celebration it is us. We have had a year of ups and downs, but how is that different from any other year? We need to savour the times when we stand together as one, and remember them during the times it seems we stand alone. I'm proud to be Australian and I'll be celebrating this Thursday, how about you?

Media violence, is it ruining our youth?

cs-cam — Sat, 21 Jan 2006 04:34:49 GMT

This seems to be a too often debated topic, perhaps the answer is simpler than people think? Violence in video games was recently raised here on the forums and followed up by a comment on the difference between what kids see in games and what they see on TV.

Violence in video games first made it's appearance in the old DOS shoot 'em ups like Wolfenstein 3D and Doom and games like Carmageddon. These games spawned an entire genre of games with the phrase "Doom-clone" being the predecessor of "first person shooter". Another condemned video game is Grand Theft Auto, this puts the player in the shoes of a criminal in a big city. They are encouraged to steal cars, sell them for a profit. They receive jobs from local crime bosses and are paid hansomly for their successful completion which can involve robbing a bank, murdering a "snitch" or stealing a sports car.

Games like this attract attention across the board, from kids wanting to play them to the media to various levels of governement. Doom was directly blamed for the Columbine High School Massacre when it was revealed that the two students involved were players of the game, they were also fans of Rammstein and into the local gothic scene, how tragic. Isn't jumping to conclusions fun?

Video games don't make decisions for people, they're a passtime. A comment was made in the forums that blaming video games is a way for parents to blame their childrens faults on something other than their upbringing. I don't know if I agree with this fully but to an extent I say it's possible. I think perhaps parents have far too much faith in their children. I don't have any kids myself but I currently work in a high management position and I worked my way there from the bottom so I've got some input on this. When I was a junior manager, I had 80 or so people under me to supervise. That's a tough job, particularly without a bunch of experience under your belt and I know how easy it is to talk your mind into thinking - "Nah, they're too smart to make that mistake, I'll leave them going by themselves, I've got plenty of other stuff to worry about". Given the time to stop and really think about it, I'd have realised that when I was new like them I made that same mistake a few times myself and chances are they'd do it too unless I was there to catch things as they happened. Naturally, I was off worrying about other things and had to come back, clean up their mess and explain to my boss where things fell apart.

While I know that for 99% of people out there, an underling at work would never get as much attention as that persons own child, however I see things like this happen with the people I know far too frequently. People spend too much time focusing on material objects while relationships suffer. All the people who spend their days criticising media violence should stop and think a bit before opening their mouths. Sure, something in the media may have pushed that person over the edge but something far more important to them than what they saw on TV or a computer screen had to put them on the edge to begin with. Find the cause of that and finding the solution just might not be as hard as you think.

zomg idiots

cs-cam — Fri, 13 Jan 2006 11:42:22 GMT

I hate stupid people. They are everywhere and the number of them is growing at a freakish rate! Not even getting started about what I see online as a lot of people don't take that seriously, I'll start about people I've run across lately. I am a big car person, I have a great old little Ford RS Escort in fantastic condition. There aren't many of the original RS series getting around anymore down here so I drive mine occasionally but I'm continualy tinkering with it, my latest venture was converting it to fuel injection with a manifold and injection from a Ford Sierra Cosworth.

I got a Haltech ECU to run the injection system and after speaking to a Haltech rep, I was advised to take the car to Allstar Tuning to be put on a dyno, he reckoned they'd get the most out of it. They were about 30mins drive away so I booked it in for a Saturday, they were to dyno it that day, keep it (locked up they assured me) over the Sunday when they were shut and they'd do the cold start on Monday morning ready for me to pick up around lunch. Monday lunch came and went with no phone call telling me it was ready so I rang them about 2pm to find out what the story was. Well they hasn't started it. I gave them a bit of a serve and I was assured it would be ready to pick up the next day. Five mimutes later they called me, reckon the key I left didn't fit the door. It does, it just takes some jiggling, it's an old car. But hang on! If they're just trying the keys in it now, where did it sit over the weekend? In their f'ing car park! This is an old car but the reason I keep it rather than do up a newer Subaru (that would work out cheaper) is because of the attention it gets, I get an offer to buy it at least once a week and almost every time I put petrol in it someone at the servo comes up to me with questions, I love it! These guys don't have a clue though so we'll just leave it outside. Idiots.

Next day, they still haven't started. They're are the Haltech experts and they can't get their computer talking to my brand new ECU. Tuesday about 4:30pm they finally get the car on the dyno and everything working. Hurrah. Now I should mention, I tried tuning this ECU before we took it to them as putting a car on a dyno is not cheap and if I could avoid it I was gonna! It drove average but I had the cold start awesome, didn't need any throttle and it idled perfectly. Went to pick the car up and it wouldn't even start. He had to pull out his laptop and fiddle even more and the car just wouldn't start. Finally it started but then it wouldn't idle. I told them not to worry, I'd take it home and play with it, they'd done enough. Oh, and the whole experience cost me an extra $100 because of the mucking around that was their fault.

This is my second workshop (different place) experience and it'll be my last. The first time, they had to to some cutting around the back of my car to get the old leaf springs out, reset them and add an extra leaf and they cut a fuel hose with the oxy. That didn't cost me extra but it really REALLY pissed me off!

Now, I have the cold start much improved, it will idle great and it starts first go with a touch of throttle but I think I've even figured out how to fix that. I've found a place that is about 45mins drive away that will teach me how to tune my ECU for myself and I've decided that I'm never putting my car into the shop again.

Isn't that the way the world works, and doesn't it suck? There are people who are the "professionals" in their field, but if you want something done right you really do have to do it yourself.