Work

I think we can all attest to the phenomenon known as the Teddy Bear troubleshooting.

I think we all probably need our own Teddy Bears in each of our human office box cubicles or work desks.

So next time you need to do some serious troubleshooting or some heavy lifting when debugging - try pulling out the Teddy Bear.
Even better, you can hug something after it's solved!

The Australian Federal government announced the $12.2 billion Household Stimulus Package in the wake of the Worldwide Financial Downturn.

Payments are to have commenced during March, and the Tax Bonus for Working Australians in April. As yet I don't know anyone who has received them?

These payments are made up of:

• A Tax Bonus for Working Australians of up to $900 for eligible taxpayers, depending on income thresholds.
• A Single-Income Family Bonus of $900 to provide additional assistance for families that have one main income earner and may otherwise receive less assistance from the package than dual income families with similar household income.
• A Farmer's Hardship Bonus of $950 which will be paid to farmers and others receiving Exceptional Circumstances related income support.
• A Training and Learning Bonus of $950 to assist students, those returning to study or training, and some income support recipients.
• A Back to School Bonus of $950 per child to assist low- and middle-income families eligible for Family Tax Benefit A with school-age children.

Whether you are for or against them... they are coming.

Has anyone out there received their 'Bonus'?
From all reports they are to be staggered out... yet I don't know an individual yet that has received them.

Would be happy to hear from someone that has got that 'cheque in the mail' so to speak.

Excellent Free Paid Parental leave!

Thanks Kevin!!!



You can find out more about it at : http://www.free-mp-babycare.com.au/

Yesterday saw Sol Trujillo the CEO of Telstra resign to go and join his former exec mates (Greg Winn and Phil Burgess) back in the US of A. So come June 30, all of the 3 amigos will have left the country and resigned from their positions.

It will have been 4 years to the date when his last day at Telstra occurs. Let's take a look at what he's achieved in that time:

• Taken a company that had a shareprice above $5.06, to hover now around the $3.68 mark. (Shaving of over 25%)


• Earnt $13.4 AUD million dollars last financial year, and likely walk away with a golden handshake of $20AUD million dollars.
  


• Managed to be pig-headed over the NBN, and ultimately ensured the joke of a proposal Telstra submitted was thrown out. Sol by his own admissions, claims it probably cost the company around $2 AUD billion dollars.
  


• Consistently fought with the ACCC and both Liberal and Labour governments on regulation issues. The management style used in the states of bullying governments into submission didn't rub well with Australian federal politicians, and worked against Telstra in the end.
  


• Used their monopoly against competitors at the detriment of Australian consumers; with lock outs of Telephone exchanges (so they could install their own equipment), delayed the rollout of ADSL2+ (left equipment sitting there for at least 18 months), anti-competitive pricing of back-haul charges across the country, and over inflated prices at both wholesale and retail levels.
  


• Clashed relentlessly with the Communications, Electrical, Plumbing Union on his way to sacking 10,143 employees (he's still got 3 months to go, expect more heads to roll before then. He stated 12,000 to go in 5 years, and he's been pretty much on target there, not ideal in the current economic climate. Industrial action since Sol came on board has been ongoing. The majority of call centre staff and IT staff are now outsourced from cheap labour countries like India.
  


• Over simplified the business transformation process which will grossly exceed budget and stretch out for at least another 3 years. With the departure of the 3 amigos, the job they commenced will not be finished, and some poor bunny will be left with egg on their face when the true details of the projects emerge some years later.
  


• Disregarded a vote by shareholders at an AGM not to raise company execs salaries. They rose them anyway.

Surely we can find someone as dreadful in Australia to run this country and don't need to import another 'know-it-all' yank who thinks he knows what's best for us.

I wonder what Jodee Rich is doing these days?!
(Answer: Working on PeopleBrowsr)

Don't you love it when you find out your entire weekend is on the scrap-heap because you need to work.

I love hate the way projects are handled at this place.

1. Project is given 3 months from start to finish
2. Design Architects spend 2 months stuffing around with the design, which they always get wrong.
3. Cablers and networks take 2-4 weeks getting the infrastructure in place (most of the time).
4. You're left with whatever crumbs are left to actually build the OS, harden it, install your regular tools, configure users, configure up the SAN disk, and deploy the various host applications required.. (You can read this as normally (-1 day -> - ∞ days)
5. Project manager can't understand why he is now running behind schedule and decides that escalating you is the best solution to resolve the issue.
6. As a result someone high up thinks the best way to resolve the issue is to insist on bloody hourly updates... taking you 30 mins each hour to complete. No-one seems to realise that this only leaves 30 mins each our to actually do the work!

Right... I feel better I've got that off my chest.

Now back to the joys of this weekend.... I've already worked past midnight most nights this week and running on empty.

I dunno why I whinge, it's a process rinsed and repeated over and over. It's not like we get recognised for the crazy hours demanded of us (or even really compensated).

The levy imposed on fresh milk is about to be abolished on the 23^rd February 2009.

It's a levy we've all been slugged with since 2000 under the Howard governments wisdom in funding deregulation of the milk industry.
The levy collected some $240 million a year. Dairy Australia has came out to say that this levy never actually made it's way to the farmers. So where has $2 billion in money actually gone?

GST under Howard was supposed to remove the multiple layers of taxation.
It's amazing that levies have still been a popular hidden method of indirectly taxing the population.

Now if only more levies would start to be removed...

Most people don't realise that we have levies buried in just about everything in this country. From the containers holding your plants from the nursery, to lamb meat and citris fruit just to name a few.

Whilst it can be argued many of the organisations involved in that industry pay the levy, it's likely to be passed down the line to the end consumer.

Levies often are quoted as providing funds for R&D and other improvements, however it's not uncommon for a large percentage of these funds to be eaten away in administration, marketing and other such activities. I would love to see some accounting transparency of the bodies involved in the collection of levies and producing concise reports on just how much money is collected and where it's been spent versus the proposed allocation of funds. It would certainly make interesting reading.

Collection of levies is such big business in this country, we even have a Levies Revenue Service area in the Dept of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food! Unfortunately food and agriculture is just the tip of the ice-berg.

In December we moved into our new house.

Like any new house there are a million tasks that need to be undertaken to make that house into a home.
Slowly but surely Pauline and I are undertaking these tasks.

Whilst the majority of the house is now set up as we desire inside (albeit a few pieces of furniture and moving boxes that seem to continually appear!), the outside has been relatively untouched. Looking out on dirt, rubble and left over building materials wasn't too inspiring.

We laid down approximately 24 metres (yup 24 metres!) of top soil over the Australia Day weekend after removing most of the rubble from the yard. Six hours of bob-cat work and we had it laid out and levelled. Whilst the top soil provides a great foundation for lawns and gardens, it also is a wonderful way to introduce a massive amount of dust and dirt into the house. We also laid about 2 metres of gravel with the bob-cat laying it out for the commencement of a side driveway for us.

I took last week off on work to put in a front garden. This would provide a few solutions:

• Limit the amount of dust being brought in the front door.
• Provide us with some inspiration.
• 'Complete' the front of the house and making it much more appealing to the passing eye.

We started by drawing up a rough plan of what we were after. We wanted a low maintenance garden, but something that was pleasant to look at, but also something that attracted native birds. As the front yard can be seen from the bedroom and Pauline's study, we were also after something inspirational.

One item I did want was a 2nd driveway, to provide access to the rear of the property. We have a 2.5m side gate, and a gravel driveway would be ideal to separate the garden from vehicles and machinery needing to get around the back. I wasn't overly keen on having the garden being stomped on by earth moving equipment. In addition, we could put an area behind the gate to store our trailer.

So after many, many hours in the last week, we've produced a garden we are extremely proud of. It's our first attempt at any serious gardening (do growing herbs and potted plants count?), so we actually surprised ourselves.

Here is a run down on the various stages we undertook. It should also help provide some steps to those wishing to undertake something similar.

Stage 1 - Starting point We had previously had the bob-cat operator in a few weeks earlier. He had laid down and levelled the top soil and some crushed rock for us. This was our starting point.	Stage 2 - Preparing the area We started by laying some treated pine (H4) as a boundary between the side driveway and the proposed garden. 3 additional metres of gravel was then placed on the driveway, and we shoveled and raked this out by hand. (in hindsight -- using a bob-cat would be recommended) Moving this much by hand isn't advised! Weed mat was then applied and pegged down to cover the proposed garden area.
Stage 3 - Laying the chip bark We ordered in 3 metres of chip bark and raked it out. It's about 4-6 inches deep, which helps reduce water evaporation and also provides another barrier against weeds. Now the chip bark is down, the defined areas of the garden can be made out.	Stage 4 - Creating a feature point A feature point in a garden is important, as it draws the viewer in. We decided on a centre feature point to utilise the shape and area we had defined in the garden. ¼ a metre of 20mm tuscan pebbles and another ¼ of a metre of 40mm tuscan pebbles where mixed together to create variety and randomness. The ½ metre of pebbles was then laid out in a 'pond' style shape and curved to break many of the straight lines in the garden.
Stage 5 - Adding garden pieces Garden pieces add curiosity to a garden and often provide the charm. Whilst the plants are the main aspect of a garden, it is often a good idea to add non-plant items to a garden to break up the garden and generate some interest. As we were going for a native/bush garden we added some 'rustic' elements such as the tree stump and the log (a disused/broken old fence post). In addition we wanted to attract native birds to the area, so we added a bird bath to the garden. The tree stump is strategically located so curious birds can fly/land on the tree stump and survey the surrounding area before venturing in for a drink/splash.	Stage 6 - Planting Now that the base of the garden has been established, we planted the succulents, trees, shrubs and flowers. We were after a native bush style garden, so natives and drought tolerant plants were used. We were also mindful of colour, shape, texture and foliage of all the plants selected. Doing so meant that we didn't create a static looking garden but one with visual depth and appeal. Many of these plants when established will grow out to 1-2 metres in width and height. This will provide a rather populated garden and one rich in colour, foliage and shade. Due to so many native plantings, it's likely to also be a hit with local bird and animal life.

The garden is quite attractive from all angles:

Here is some close ups of some the plants we planted:

We're extremely happy with the results, particularly seeing this is our first real attempt at gardening. Whilst it's daunting starting out, there is so much information available on the Internet, in books and at hardware stores/nurseries that it really isn't hard to locate the information you require.

Pauline now has a beautiful view out of her office window, and we wake to a lovely garden each morning.
It's definitely not a weekend job, and it did take us the entire week to do. (Though a very warm summer and not being the fittest people going around probably dragged that out). In addition we had to go get supplies on a regular basis which ate into 'gardening time'.

So if you are wanting to put in a garden and remove that dead brown grass I highly recommend it. It's much more pleasant and lively to look out on, and will help attract native birds into your part of the world. Whilst we could have also paid a landscaper to come and do all the hard work for us, we ended up saving thousands and have a great sense of accomplishment. It's well worth the investment in labour and time. On the finance side, we hit just over $500 which is quite cost effective.

Finishing Touches
We are going to put in a pathway from the side gate to the front door. I'm picking up a bunch of red gum sleepers and will be cutting them in half and burying them into the chipbark to provide a nice rustic path via red gum steppers. Even better, I'll pick them up for free after a barter was undertaken (configure up a Samba server for him, and access to the sleepers I would like). Now that's using Linux in ya garden!

We have some garden lights that we may eventually run down the driveway/path to the front entrance. We do have a sensor light there, so I'm undecided at this stage if we need them out the front (we also have a street light opposite us, which provides a lot of night light). If I don't use them around the front, we will redeploy them around the backyard.

There is one way to measure failure. Visit the Connex Transport website.

Can't get to it?!
Ohh... that would be due to the fact that all Melbournians are attempting to find out what the hell happened to their bus/tram/train today.
Expect a long walk home people.

The website should return sometime next week.

So far Connex officials have blamed everything this month for the rash of cancellations... with one exception - themselves.

Thank goodness I'm outta Melbourne and their woeful public transport (it's an oxymoron -- nothing is being transported at present).

.... and not happy about it. (Here's a link for those readers that don't know what March South is all about).

Though it's a two part reason for it:

1. Saving every penny. We just moved into a new house, and I think it's built on money quicksand.
2. Due to #1, there is oodles of work here to do. Any spare moment is also disappearing into that.

Though on a brighter note, I'll be happily working in my new office. I've decked it out with a new desk and whiteboard and I think the results look pretty good (and yes I'm biased).




Now, to plan world domination! (queue evil laughter).
^{Tip: You'll understand that statement better if you view the larger version of the first message on the white board.}

I was under the belief that most people were aware of the Dial before you dig service, particularly when digging up on public land.

How wrong I was.... a 'contractor' decided not to use the service and it resulted in taking most of Geelong and surrounding suburbs (50k-75k population) off the air for 24-48 hours earlier this week.

MY ADSL connection was effected in Bannockburn (approx 20kms out of Geelong).... meaning that the backhaul links from Geelong were severed (I guess those that go from Geelong <-> Melbourne). (ADSL Nazi said: "No ADSL Authentication for you!"). We were luckier than other however, we still had a working phone line, many residents didn't.

We lost service around midday on the 12^th and service appeared restored around 10:30am on the 13^th. In effect it was just under 24 hours. You don't realise how much you rely on the Internet until it's not there!

As I work mainly from home, it meant almost a full day I was not working... wouldn't you know it, I ran out to purchase a Wireless Pre-Paid Broadband kit -- and the silly thing came up not 10 minutes after I left the house. Anyone looking for good mobile coverage look at the E169 USB wireless from Optus. It works well under Linux, is pre-paid so it doesn't cost an arm and a leg every month, and coverage now using the 'YesG' areas is quite reasonable now. This will only improve with Optus claiming that 98% of the population will be covered by 2010 (and speeds upto 42Mbps). Today they already cover some 85% of the population. Optus 3G has certainly calmed down now that they hype around the iPhone has started to dissipate. (I suspect many Optus iPhone users have now got their first few months of bills!)


To complicate matters we were upgrading our Telstra ADSL1 8M link to the newly-on-offered ADSL2+ via Internode at the same time. (Was scheduled for the 13^th).

After returning from the Optus shop with a shiny pre-paid wireless broadband and thinking I would need to configure that (via Network Manager -- yaya Wireless Broadband support now), I discovered our ADSL connection was back.

Even better ADSL2+ was enabled. I am dragging down at about 1.6MB/sec now.

Line sync speeds are pretty decent as well: DownStream Connection Speed: 16445 kbps UpStream Connection Speed: 953 kbps

So it seems the outage for us at least was worth it! We've effectively doubled our speed.