Vacant Mind

Itchy Feet

My Itchy Feet

Things are packed
Bag on my shoulder
Excited thoughts, rather abstract
I realise on my return I will be a global roamer

As I look out the window and see the world pass beneath my feet
The engines roar as i sit in my seat.
I am full of excitement as i try to attempt my greatest feat.
Leaving home can be oh so ever bitter sweet.

As my adventure moves ahead
I hope to see a world unknown
Of lands that time has long fled
Spain, France, a Bishop’s Throne
Soon my bank will be seeing red

But not before I have had time to scratch my itchy feet
After all this is done maybe i could be among the travel elite
There is so much to see and do, even more people to meet
Different cultures to experience, travellers moving to a common beat

England, Spain, France and Italy
Each country will have a story to tell
I will wonder wide eyed, under a magic spell
Better or worse i will have to bid farewell
I will be sad to leave, these feeling i must quell

A Canadian family with many questions
Can only lead to trouble, and many suggestions
Quebec old and new I hope to see it all
Not to mention, the great Niagara Fall
It’s the next stop that my inevitable return will forestall
I long to see the city of my youth, Montreal

My return to my world awaits
To chat about my travels with all my good mates
My twisting plot will eventually come to an end
To return home to see the sights i love and adore
But not yet, once around the world, once more

———————————————-

I hope you have a good Christmas and a great New Year
And maybe i will see you sometime next year

1 Day to go

It’s not long before I leave, I am a little excited, but more nervous.
I think that this is because I still involving my self in the organisation process that is happening particularly with getting my pack ready and making sure that I don’t forget anything.
Once I hit the airport and I can’t don’t want to turn back the excitement will really kick in.
I suppose that being out of my comfort zone can be nerve wrecking sometimes.

It was actually a really good excuse to see some people that I haven’t seen in a while, which for me is really nice.
I really like these friends, it’s just that i can never think of a good enough excuse to see them more often.
This makes it kinda hard, I know that the obvious solution is just to call them up and ask them out for a catch up, but when you think that the other side doesn’t want to for various reason it makes it a little more difficult.
Then you get to thinking that…well if they haven’t bothered to contact you in this long, even though you have made numerous attempts will they miss you if you leave without saying anything. Truth be told, no they wouldn’t…it may sound cynical but it’s true, because I’ve tried it out, purposefully.
That said it was really actually quite good to see friends again, but I was a little disappointed that I didn’t get to see a few people, which again brings us back to the previous statement.

So why did I catch up with them? Mainly because I’m an a sucker and I actually like these people.
I’m never any good at relationships, I never seem to understand where I stand, and when I think I do, I am often blatantly proven wrong. Which in hindsight is rather funny, not laughable funny though.

My room is a complete wreck and will probably stay that way until i return.
I’m certain that I’m going to forget something, which is the reason that I’m here writing this message.

Well this is going to be my last message from Melbourne, tomorrow I will be on a plane and hopfully my next entry will be from overseas!

Beach

We went on a great walk and this is what we found

Party

I have an occasionally odd hobby, well I’m not too sure that it’s a hobby. When ever I get the chance I like to observe human interaction, it is the most fascinating thing to watch for many reasons.
If alcohol is involved it makes the situation both confusing and funny at the same time.

There are occasions where I don’t understand why two people would get together everything about them screams wrong.

It got me thinking about human attraction and what defines it, creates it and eventually sustains it.

It’s funny how it sometimes works, how it makes sense, all the bits of the puzzle match.
But then other times (from what I have noticed) the personalities and emotions are so out of wack it’s like watching an accident happen.

After a few days thinking on it, I decided that it was indeed to hard to define there are simply too many variables involved.
From the complex: I need someone, I want to be wanted, I want to tame them, rich, damaged.
To the simple: Cute, funny, simple, good looking, hey-why-not-I’m-not-doing-anything-anyway

I suppose one day I would like to think that I would work out a theory for myself that I would be happy with, but for now it leaves me with more time to observe.

I’m free

I have finally free from the shakles of my exams and Uni.
I had my last exam today, not be best but my last.
All that needs to be done now is concentrate on the trip to France.

I’m off to a party tonight to celebrate a little bit.
There will be some interesting scenes tonight that should be funny to comment on.

Intelligent Design

For those that don’t know schools in Kansas, America will now be required to teach this:

Science teachers will now be required to instruct their students that evolutionary theory is not proven, and will have to add that life is in fact so complex, it could not have arisen without the involvement of some external agent, or higher power.

In my own humble opinion I firmly believe that religion has no place in science, the two are at complete polar opposites, not to say that religion has no place in society it does, just not science.

This is probably one of the craziest things that I have heard, why you may ask, well for anyone with half a brain will realise that “Intelligent Design” is just the creationism theory repacked, they just don’t mention God, but it’s fairly easy to see through the vail. If you look up any definition of the theory you will notice that they clearly make this agent as ambiguous as possible as not to incite the fact that they are pointing towards a higher being.

Intelligent Design supporters may say that the evolution theory is not complete but at least science doesn’t pass the buck and say “we don’t know how to explain this so will will just chalk it up to a higher being, because it’s just too complex” no science says “the theory isn’t complete but it’s the best fit and has the best explanation, until we find another one which we are always working on”

Any self respecting scientist knows, and I agree with them, that the evolution theory, along with natural selection, is the most comprehensive explanation of how life on this planet has reached its present stage, until a time comes when another theory backed by tangible evidence and repeatable experiments the evolution theory is the strongest explanation that we have.

And George Bush seems to be part of it as well probably pushing his evangelistic ideals again

Kansas Science Standards
Evolution In Court

It’s a good thing that they board that decided to teach this nonsense good voted off.

This is certainly something that I hope never happens anywhere where I live.

I know that what I have said sounds like a complete rant, but it just made me angry.
An I assure you that i’m not bible basher either, I’m one of those people who makes it to Church every week but I also base my world around scientific theories and explinations, because tangibility is the best way to prove something, not blind faith.

RoundCube Mail

Finally something to shout about, while I was doing some random searching I stumbled upon this GoodBye squirrelmail, Hello RoundCube

After reading that It lead me to the RoundCube
Basically it’s a Web based IMAP client and unlike Squirrlemail it has a fantastic interface.
In terms of web IMAP clients there is little choice out there and kudos to Squirrlemail, they do have a good product but something needed to be done about the interface it just didn’t hold up.

I think that we might have Google to thank but probably more specifically Gmail with it’s AJAX interface and then Yahoo following suit with it’s interface and the Yahoo Photo Mail (need internet explorer)

I’m just happy that there is something else out there to try, and considering that it’s still in alpha release i’m estatic with it, i think that it’s fantastic.

There is one more webmail client that i will try out, ilohamail seems promising but we will see how it goes.

The internet has been a buzz about RoundCubeMail as well and rightly so, I think that this is defiently one opensource product to keep and eye on. I certainly will be.

Main HowTo
Alternative HowTo

2 Down

Well I’ve got two exams down now and there are two more to go.

Also there are some decisions to be made about France considering the current state that it’s in.

Sky News Australia

For those that know MediaWatch is one of those must see shows that I try to catch every week and if not I see it on the internet.

I think that it is important that news should be news and not backed by some agenda, unbiased and trustworthy.
This is often not the case and can be very hard to find considering how big and influential media companies can be, granted we aren’t as big as some other countries but do remember that Rupert Murdoch was born and raised here.

Now some of our big 3 media players are trying to get a slice of one of our better run broadcasting stations that run in Asia.
I would highly recommend that you go and watch or read this article.
Sky’s push for Asian subsidy

A few quotes:

So why was ABC boss Russell Balding being given the opportunity to spruik the ABC’s Asia Pacific Television Service?

Well because some of the most powerful media players in Australia have been bagging it behind his back.

They want to take it off the ABC, along with the $18 and a half million dollars a year that Foreign Affairs pays to fund it.

But everyone is again being coy about spelling out exactly who is involved.

Web’s never-to-be-repeated revolution

I think that this article : James Boyle: Web’s never-to-be-repeated revolutionv is important to note.
It makes some extremely relevant comments such as:

…there are three things that we need to understand about the web. First, it is more amazing than we think. Second, the conjunction of technologies that made the web successful was extremely unlikely. Third, we probably would not create it, or any technology like it, today. In fact, we would be more likely to cripple it, or declare it illegal.

and

…The lawyers have learnt their lesson now. The regulation of technological development proceeds apace. When the next disruptive communications technology – the next worldwide web – is thought up, the lawyers and the logic of control will be much more evident. That is not a happy thought.

The Internet is augubly the greatest engineering feat we have created to date, it has and will continue to change lives in ways that we are yet to imagine as it did 15 years ago.

We can only be greatful that 15 or 20 years ago corporations did not have the control that they do today.