I recently finished reading “Mercy” by Jodie Picoult. It is a great book, but it made me quite depressed because I chose the wrong time to read it. The book is about a man convicted of murder after the mercy killing of his wife who in in the last stages of cancer. It was on the top of my “book to read” pile which is why I read it. At the same time my father died of cancer, so it was all a bit close to home. I finished reading it and then looked at the next book on the pile. It was called “1001 Places to see before you die”. I have moved it down the pile.

During the week Sue went crazy on Ebay, and as a result we now have a kitchen and most of a bathroom in the shed. Of course, it is not yet wired or plumbed up, as Sue quickly remembered as she poured a bucket of water down the sink and into a cupboard.

It was finally time to get the mighty Husqvarna out for a run (a mower not a motorbike) and test its capabilities on the long grass. It worked well and gave the dog lots of exercise as he chased me around the paddock.

We have also installed some bookshelves (acquired for free through Freecycle) and have started a small reading collection. Sue was moving the books and let out a scream about a spider on a book. Given that the book was on dangerous Australian animals and had a picture of a reb-back on the cover, it was not surprising, except this was a real spider. A huntsman had come inside to feast on the flies and was sheltering among the books.

The trees planted the previous fortnight had a low attrition rate and although 15 of the 100 plants had died, it was mainly those furthest from the shed, which had missed out on supplementary watering. There is a  lesson to be learnt there.

The next big project is to connect the water and get a sewer system happening. That should be fun.

It is my sad duty to inform the world that after travelling 27,740km around the globe, the furry travel bug called “Robeart Actually” is officially missing in action. The bear began its journey in New South Wales on 26 February 2003 with the destination of Switzerland. It has since travelled to New Zealand, Queensland, Singapore, California, Oklahoma, Arkansas, and Tennessee.

The highlight of the trip was being photographed outside Graceland, but this would be one of the last times we would hear from Robeart. He was picked up alongside a highway in Tennessee in July 2006 and has not been seen or heard from since. The map below shows the bear’s journey.

On a happier note, my other travel bug, “Horse with No Name”, continues its journey around the world.

It is currently in Denmark having traveled 22,973km.

The subtle attempts by the Howard Government to take Australia back to the White Australia Policy have led to the introduction of a test for new citizens. It is designed to make sure that prospective citizens know something about the country to which they are about to pledge loyalty. By letting them know about “Australian Values”, it might make those people who don’t support “The Australian Way of Life” think twice about moving here. (Not) 

As someone born in this country I would never have to sit the exam, but if I did I wonder if I would pass without a bit of coaching.

Follow the link, have a go and see if you have got what it takes to pass the Australian Citizenship Test.

The other day I was listening to the classic Irish folk tune “The Fields of Athenry”. The song is about a man who is transported to Botany Bay after stealing “Trevelyan’s corn”.

In 2000, we moved with the family to Ireland to look for work and settle for a while. The town we went to was Galway, outside of which is the village of Athenry. Things didn’t work out and we returned to Sydney, originally to Coogee, but soon moved to Botany (Bay) and the name of our street is Trevelyan. (Cue Twilight Zone music).

I awoke on Sunday morning to find the some complete and utter mongrel had tagged my fence. It is an attractive white/cream picket fence with a lovely garden in front of it and does not require any “beautification” by some mindless Bozo with a spray can. I can understand why they might paint on an ugly brick wall in a back alley, but not on my bloody fence.

This is one of those crimes where the Saudi idea of chopping off hands is required!

This is what our property looks like now, or at least in 2005 when Google took the photo. In total there are about four large trees, plus lots or blackberry and thistles. This weekend we started to redress the balance. Sue and myself planted 100 trees and bushes. They are all tube stock and although 100 was a very ambitious number, they do get quite cheap when you buy that many. Of course, by the end of the weekend every muscle in our bodies was hurting.

Many of the trees were fast growing Acacias. These are pioneer plants and in a natural forest environment they prepare the soil for the plants to come. We hope they will do the same here. We want to start a tradition where every visitor to the property has to bring a tree. That way, not only do we get lots of trees, but each time that person visits they can see how their tree is progressing. The trees should provide shelter from the winds and attract bird life which in turn will bring small amounts of natural fertiliser and help spread seeds. This is the start of a very long term project.
For the record, the plants were:

• Acacia buxifolia (10)
• Acacia decurrens (10)
• Acacia mearnsii (10)
• Acacia myrtifolia (10)
• Eucalyptus crebra (5)
• Eucalyptus fibrosa (5)
• Eucalyptus gummifera (10)
• Hakea salicifolia (10)
• Leptospermum scoparium roseum (10)
• Angophora floribunda (10)
• Kunzea ambigua (10)

No, I’m not talking about the yahoos and yobbos that run up and down my street, I’m talking about Yahoo the software company.

I used to use a great music player called Musicmatch JukeBox. Although occasionally a little memory hungry it used to do everything I wanted. About a month ago I had to rebuild my computer from scratch and went to download the program again. To my surprise I found the company had been bought out by Yahoo, but according to them it was business as usual and users would be able to migrate to the new program.

Since the old program was not installed anymore, I wasn’t able to migrate, so had to reinstall. The install program from Yahoo didn’t work and kept sending error reports to Micro$oft. The program needs Windows Media Format Runtime to run and although the installation for this was part of the install program, it was failing to install. I found a separate instance of the program, installed that and then was able to install the Yahoo Jukebox. (But of course the program installs an annoying Yahoo toolbar as well).

Now, I had also been using a new browser based player called Songbird, which is still in development, but needed some functionality that the old Musicmatch Jukebox had. Specifically it was the ability to rename music files according to their MP3 tags and vice versa. Well guess what, in the “upgrade” to Yahoo Jukebox this functionality has been removed. F@#k you very much Yahoo. I am just spent an hour getting your stupid program to load and you have stripped it of the great functionality it once had. Time to find another player. Any suggestions?

Oh, as a PS. I just went to uninstall the offending programs. The Yahoo Jukebox was 30MB and the Yahoo Toolbar was 43MB. What? 43MB for a toolbar? What sort of bloated crapware are they writing here? Grrrr.

(Oh, I was not being prudish with the F-word, it’s just that the filter at work won’t let me get to my homepage if that word is intact.)

Geocaching is a high-tech version of high and seek using a GPS. “Caches”, which could be anything from a film contained to a 40 litre drum are filled with goodies (mostly stuff from the $2 shop) and hidden around the world. The GPS co-ordinates of the location are posted on the internet and anyone with a GPS can try to find it. When you find the cache, you sign the log book, take an item, leave an item and register your find on the web site.

Bookcrossing is a pastime whereby books are left lying around anywhere (in pubs, on the bus etc) for people to pick them up and read them. In the book is a unique code number and instructions on how to register that you have found the book. The idea is that someone will read the book, note it on the web site and then leave the book somewhere else. Ideally, you should be able to track the book as it travels around your city or even the world.

Last weekend I set up a Bookcrossing Geocache. To find it, you need to search through the bush with a GPS, but instead of the usual $2-shop junk, the cache is full of books which people can take and release. As I write this, two books have already been released and I hope to be able to track them soon.

The local cafe has also gotten in on the act and has a bookshelf where you can release books.

Psychologists are a weird bunch of people at the best of times, but what about one that studies the strange quirks of people. That’s exactly what Richard Wiseman does and his research methods are quite novel.
For example, if you want to know how honest people are, don’t ask them because they will all be as honest as the day is long. You have to test their honesty without them knowing. In one experiment he sent bogus refund cheques (claiming to be a refund on a piece of furniture the recipient never purchased) to two distinct groups of people. They were priests and used-car salesmen. Half of the used-car salesmen cashed the cheque, while half returned it saying there had been a mistake. What was the ratio for the priests? Exactly the same.
He holds fake séances and records how the people react to various “supernatural phenomena” and how even non-believers are fooled by simple conjuring tricks.
Interestingly, he explains how people can be persuaded to remember events that never actually happened. (I remember once having a discussion with some poms who swore blind that the characters in Captain Pugwash had names like “Roger the Cabin Boy”, “Master Bates” and “Able Seaman Stains”, when in fact it is an urban myth.)
He also discovers that women who have men write their personal ads have more success at attracting a man than if they wrote it themselves.
All of this and more is in a great book called Quirkology. Dr Wiseman also has a Quirkology website and be sure to watch the videos. “The Prediction” might keep you guessing for a minute or two.
Why the sudden fascination we psychologists? My daughter is studying to be one and my wife is just about to enrol in a similar course. I look forward to being there guinea pig.