Tonight, I had debating at school. The topic was about health, but it was pretty hard. My team put up a very tough case, but the team from the other school, just got the better of us, but not because of how they spoke, but what they spoke about. Anyway, I took the loss fine and we should be doing well next debate.The real story comes after. I was in the common room having snacks and talking to friends. Then this woman comes up to me and asks where is the toilet? I didn’t know, then… well I forgot what I said.  A girl who was chairing the debates took her to the toilet.OK. In all honesty, why ask a guy where the girls toilet is? It is WRONG!!! Guys only know where the guys toilet is. Girls know where everything is. Cool with that?!!Now I have put this rant on paper, I hope I can get some sleep and get up tomorrow to go to work. 

First of all, I would like to apologize for not posting for so long. It turns out that Year 11 is giving me a much larger workload now. But I will do my best, to post as many times as possible.Last Wednesday as you may have heard, Apple have released a major update to their notebook lines: MacBook and MacBook Pro. They have put in newer processors and offered larger hard drives in their notebooks. The day after the announcement, I ordered one low-end MacBook Pro. It’s going to be used as my main computer, as well as for my friend’s and my professional photography. Dad’s going to be pretty happy as well; he has a portable to take with him to the office when he needs it.It’s all going well in regards to technology. I am expecting to receive my new Nikon D80 next week, when mum comes back from Hong Kong. After this small glimmer of joy, it’s back to work. I have assignments to do. 

Thursday was Valentine’s Day, and love was certainly in the air. People were giving roses to others, it was a happy mood. I had always looked upon Valentine’s Day as a big woop.

Until this year.

This year I went through with giving someone a rose. I’m not that rich, so one was enough. As a meticulous planner, I had planned every detail from when to buy the rose to when to give it to her. That plan was thrown out the window on the day, but not to worry.

It was lunch that day, and I had planned to meet at the end. I was held up with a big meeting well after lunch. That opportunity was gone, but I has one more: after school. That happened. She was absolutely surprised that , a geek, would give a rose to her. It had attracted many stares, and many people I knew were surprised that I did the deed.

Even today, people were asking me about it. I wasn’t surprised at all. It reminded me of this xkcd comic. I guess that making people happy is something that I am good at doing.

Well, I have gone back to school now. It will be a very busy time for me especially with lots of music and other commitments. I will try to write to much as possible, although I can not guarantee one post a week.

Thanks for all your support!

… until I go to music camp. For me, music camp is an annual thing. A time when all musicians from my school gather somewhere out of school to enjoy music. My friend Tom says it is “the best camp of the year.”

Music camp is held several days before school officially starts. You could say it cuts my holiday short. I don’t find it that way. I see it as an opportunity to get back into school routine, especially after two months of holiday. But what has been bugging me more than ever is knowing that summer has ended and it is only 300 or so days before the next summer.

Summer is a time where I rest after a (successful) school year. Each day, I feel that I have not fully recovered from the year (and why should I?, I have two months off!). But all good things must come to an end, and so here I am.

Over the years, I have tried to find a way to ease back into normal life. I still haven’t found the perfect solution but I have managed to do some things.  Have you got any suggestions on how to get back to normal life after a two month holiday?

Well, on Sunday morning at about 9:30, the power failed. At first I thought, this is odd, a power outage in the morning! However as the hour went on, this was not an ordinary power outage.

I was cooking breakfast for my parents and I, as I usually do. Suddenly, the kettle stopped working. I stopped and saw that everything else wasn’t working. It has looked like a fuse tripped, so I went outside and checked. The fuse was still on and the safety switch didn’t trip. Ok, so its not only us, it’s the whole street. The power’s out! Now I was only cooking breakfast, but that was difficult now. No power, no stove, no kettle, no fridge, and eventually, no breakfast. Luckily, Dad has a contingency plan, use the barbecue, and so we did.

For about half an hour, Dad cooked on the barbeque. Breakfast was almost ready until, yes, the power was restored. This was when the penny dropped. Our alarm system sounded, and it had ‘forgotten’ the code. Minutes went by, the alarm sounding randomly. Dad eventually turned the alarm off at the wall switch. Even then it still bugged us. There was a battery inside the control box. We took it out and the alarms fell quiet. That was the end.

When we have (rare) power outages, it is hard to imagine life without electricity.

On Wednesday, I went to Sydney Observatory’s “Jazz Under the Quarter Moon Cloudy Skies”. The clouds rolled in very quickly in the afternoon, so there was nothing to see. There were a couple of demos and shows in place of the moon viewing, but the jazz music was amazing.

A trio called “Music with Panache” played for the night. It was made up of saxaphone, bass and guitar. They were improvising many popular tunes and standards.

Tom and his sister and my Dad were also there. We enjoyed the night really much.

I’ve posted photos on my flickr of the event. Tom also took some pics too. I will post a link when he uploads them.

Well, I was up at 4am AEST this morning to follow the liveblogs of Steve Jobs’ Keynote at Macworld. There was a lot of anticipation for many of the rumours to come true. And one did.

There were (as I counted) six new things that were released today. They are:

1. Time Capsule: A networked storage device and wireless router in one
2. iPhone Software 1.1.3
3. iPod Touch update (that costs US$20)
4. Movie Rentals (Rumour come true) (US only (as usual))
5. Apple TV Take 2 (New UI)
6. MacBook Air (Rumour come true!)

This offering of products and software is very good. It brings features that are long overdue and new ones too. Time Machine over the network with Time Capsule is a useful feature. Movie Rentals are long overdue. I (and many other people) weren’t too happy with the $20 software upgrade for the iPod Touch. It should be free. Heck, could you copy the apps over via SSH from the iPhone? The MacBook Air (MBA) is a welcome change and also shows Apple entering another sector of the notebook market.

Gee. I can’t think of anymore to write about. If I have more, I will write more.

Today, I got another reply to my “Who’s in Sydney???” email. I sent this email out to all the people I know have email addresses to. I mentioned it in my last post! Anyway, this particular person (sorry, no names!) ended the email with ” x x x”. It got me thinking, what does it really mean?

XOXO is common use for the phrase, Hugs and Kisses. Wikipedia also notes, that the origins and meanings of X and O are highly debatable, stating many meanings for the letters. It says that X symbolizes the lips of the kissers, but also the crossed arms of the huggers. O can be seen as the four arms of the hug and the puckered lips of a kiss. The Wikipedia article also goes on to give religious origins of XOXO.

After reading and interpreting the article for some time, I gave up, left the meaning open to interpretation and then read about XO Sauce.

So, yesterday, I sent out an email to people who were in my address book asking whether they were in Sydney. As of the time of writing, only three people out of about 10 replied. It got me thinking, who reads their email?

As of lately, I’ve turned into an email junkie. I keep Outlook open all day, and I check very very often. I find that those people with desktop mail apps (Mail, Outlook, Thunderbird etc…) check often. Those who don’t use them check several times a week. The majority of my friends don’t check often.

I sometimes think that email is dead among teenagers (like me). They like to use their cell phones, talking and texting, not much computer. This is ironic though, as they also like to be on social networks (like Myspace). This leaves me thinking (again), What is the best way to communicate?

Is it email, IM, SMS, talking on cell phones/telephones? Tell me.