Archives for August 2010

iPad – I tried to play

August 31, 2010 by Jen

I started my new job nearly four weeks ago and one of the perks was that I get to play with the office iPad. Like a kid with a new toy I took it home at the end of last week after a short tutorial from my colleague.

The experience left me a bit disillusioned though. Let me explain.

I could logout of my colleague’s Facebook and Twitterific accounts and login as myself. Facebook played nicely but Twitterific still had my colleague’s tweets on there until mine started taking over. I did find a way to clear the cache – not that any of mine, or hers, are sensitive and we follow each other anyway.

But when it came time to update the applications I couldn’t because it wouldn’t let me logout of her iTunes account and login as myself.

iPad, as I discovered the hard way, is not multi-user.

After that I couldn’t be bothered adding any other apps because I didn’t want to spend half my Sunday night finding out how to log out of them.

I’m still to get my iPhone – long story – but I imagine they’re quite similar which I don’t see as a problem. But an iPhone is less likely to be shared. Sure, your kids might play some games on it but it’s fairly unlikely they’ll be using the same applications like Facebook, email, and so on, as you are.

iPad, on the other hand, I think is more likely to be shared. Come on Apple, multi-user would be nice.

I’m not alone in sharing this thought according to MacWorld and macenstein

The Tram

August 28, 2010 by Jen

Since I started my new job I’ve been catching the tram again. It’s ever so slightly more reliable taking me through the city than the bus can be with the traffic.

Usually the tram experience is pretty much the same. In the morning I can pretty much guarantee I wont’ get a seat because I’m reasonably close to the city and everyone else is trying to get in there at the same time. The other morning two full trams went past me before I was able to get on the third one. I wasn’t happy about that and it made at least 15 minutes late. To top it off we stopped at a non-stop behind two other trams that weren’t going anywhere. Nobody told us anything about what was going on. We all just hopped off the tram like a herd of sheep and went on our way.

On the way home I usually get a seat because I’m on early enough in the run before everyone else gets on. That’s nice at the end of a day. I realised the other day that I was sitting next to an ex-colleague so it was good to have a chat with him about our respective jobs since we left the same organisation.

But sometimes it’s not so okay to catch the tram. The other evening there was an obvious urine smell. I checked out the guy next to me and he looked ok and it took me a while to work out where the smell was coming from. An elderly guy had stood up nearby and I thought he was preparing to disembark but he stayed on. He had a walking cane and wasn’t too steady on his feet. I looked to where he had been sitting and over the course of my journey people who were standing there warned others not to sit in that seat.

Initially I felt disgusted that this man wet himself and a seat on the tram but then I felt sorry for him because who wants to wet themselves in public. It’s not something that adults do. But still, it stank and on the new trams there’s no way of opening a window to let some fresh air in. I hope that the seat gets cleaned.

This incident was cast out of my mind the other night on my way home from work. I had my seat and at the next stop a woman got on the tram holding her toddler on her hip. I ummed and aahhed, tossing up the possibility of giving up my seat. I didn’t really want to stand all the way home but I thought if I were her I’d probably like to sit down so I didn’t have to carry that heavyweight on my hip so I asked her. She said no she didn’t want a seat but she wanted to buy a ticket. I told her it was free till South Terrace and then she said to me that her son really wanted to catch a tram and that they would go to South Terrace and get off and come back. The joy on his face was infectious and it made me forget all my adult worries just for a moment.

I also felt good that I’d cast my selfishness aside and offered my seat and then had a really nice interaction with this woman and her son. She even got him to wave goodbye to the lady (me) when they got off the tram.

Tree planting

August 27, 2010 by Jen

A couple of weekends ago JJ and I went up to the Riverland to do our bit for the environment by planting some trees at Banrock Station and having a look around at their wetlands.

The tool above is a very handy instrument for digging a hole and making a water well around the hole so the water doesn’t run away.

JJ took to this with great enthusisasm.

We had a bit of trouble getting the tree seedling out of it’s little container but eventually got there.

Then it was planting time.

Nearly a bucket of water went on to help it along its way, some stakes to hold the protector in place. Fortunately we chose the only weekend in the last month or so when it wasn’t bucketing down with rain.

We planted a tree each as we were with a group and only the kids were supposed to plant one but JJ must have asked nicely to plant another one.

We then had a boardwalk through the wetlands and of course he had to pick up something that he could use as a weapon. He’s going through a I’ve got to shoot everything and make gun noises phase. Even when we’re driving in the car he’s continually shooting other cars to get them out of my way. Occasionally it gets to me and I ask him to stop because I’m not into the whole shooting thing.

Hopefully the trees we planted will be more leafy than this.

I love the textures of some trees.

JJ had been unsure about the whole tree planting thing but he ended up having a great time, and we spent the next morning at Monash playground. Photos to come.

PS: You’ve got a couple of days to enter my $50 ozstore.com.au giveaway.

Shopping, shopping, glorious shopping

August 20, 2010 by Jen

A Twitter friend recently got a job at my old work (not my old job) and she told her Twitter followers that she was going to buy some new job shoes, and maybe some clothes too. I chimed in and said that’s exactly what I’d done.

I also bought some clothes in Melbourne, cause you gotta go shopping when you’re in Melbourne – much to my son’s disgust.

So when I was contacted recently to try out an online shopping website I hardly had to hesitate. Read all about it here, and you could win a $50 voucher to go shopping for yourself.

Ozsale bargains and a $50 voucher to giveaway

ozsalewebsite

A colleague came back from lunch the other day and told us all that she’d bought a pair of runners and they were a bargain because she saved nearly $100. There was a bit of back and forth teasing from her male colleagues about the amount she’d spent, not the amount she saved. They just don’t get it. I’m of the belief that if you needed something anyway, then why not try for a bargain. When I go shopping for clothes, shoes, electronics and the like I rarely pay full price. There always seems to be a sale on these days, so much so that I’ll wait for sales for particular items from particular stores because they have them so regularly.

I’d heard about websites where there were online sales of designer type stuff, and I mean sales – 70-90% off the retail price of most things. I’ve even bought some things – cosmetics – from one of these sites and was really pleased with my purchases.

Recently I was contacted to try out Ozsale.com.au, and to offer a $50 voucher to spend on the site for one lucky commenter.

A couple of things to note, each brand is an individual transaction so you need to do one lot at a time, with separate delivery charges. I’d prefer to lump everything in together but I can see why they do it. Using the website is very simple and intuitive and I whizzed through my order in no time. I feel like it’s a bit of a lucky dip when ordering clothes online but the descriptions and photos are usually pretty good.

ozsalecheckout

And as for what you can buy: clothes (for men, women and kids), accessories, watches, makeup, shoes etc.

I do miss the tactileness of shopping in person so I don’t think I’ll ever give that up, but shopping online is exciting because you get a parcel in the post and it’s like unwrapping a present. I can’t wait till I get mine.

To enter to be in the draw for the $50 voucher, please comment on this post before midnight on Sunday 29 August. This is only open to Australian residents. Note that the voucher does not include delivery.

UPDATE: My random number picker, ie my son, picked comment number 2, so Joyjoyc, it’s you. I’ll be in touch.

Trip to Melbourne

August 14, 2010 by Jen

When I found out I had a new job I wanted to have a week off between the old and the new jobs to mentally prepare myself and rather than hang around home and do the routine stuff here like school, I decided to go somewhere.

Melbourne is relatively close to here if you fly so I spent some time on the internet booking cheap flights and a hotel room to stay in that was central. Both were achieved and off we went.

I really like Melbourne and was looking forward to spending some mother/son time together. We arrived at the hotel mid-afternoon so just spent the rest of the afternoon walking around the place, finishing up with a hot chocolate for him, coffee for me and a cake to share. This became a daily habit and I must say that more cafe’s should get marshmallows on hand to put in their hot chocolates. The only places that had marshmallows were the chocolate specialty places that there seem to be a lot of in the city centre of Melbourne.

We spent the next day at the Melbourne Museum, starting off with the Titanic artefact exhibition. I’ll do another post on that later but for now, we really enjoyed it. I was also really impressed with the museum. It was modern and interesting and you could easily spend a whole day there. We weren’t too far off by a whole day’s worth by the time we went through the Titanic exhibition, and had a look around at other exhibitions in the museum. We finished off by going to the Imax to see the Titanic artefact diving film that James Cameron made.

After a shaky start to the next day – mother/son clash stuff – we made it to the Tim Burton exhibition in Federation Square. I didn’t take any photos in the exhibition itself. I stood real close to Johnny Depp’s Mad Hatter costume and imagined him standing there actually wearing it. I just saw the film a few days beforehand and I think he’s a fantastic actor and played a really good Mad Hatter.

I hadn’t known much about Tim Burton’s early career so it was really interesting to read all about it. While I was off soaking in all the drawings and film bits and pieces JJ sat down and watched Hansel and Gretel, a weird Tim Burton version of the story. There were other films showing also, or bits and pieces from various films. There was also an activity room where you could do a drawing and pin it up on the pinboard if you wanted. Both JJ and I did a drawing – I must scan and share as we took them home.

Like the museum, there were other exhibitions that we hung around and had a look at too.

JJ really wanted to visit the aquarium so off we went. The first thing you see is a bunch of penguins in a manmade icy environment. Even though all animals in zoos and aquariums don’t have heaps of space to roam around in I felt the most sorry for the penguins for some reason.

However, there were plenty of photo opportunities and it gave JJ an opportunity to find more out about sea and water creatures.

We visited a place I’d been to on one of my last visits to Melbourne where I really liked the food. JJ ordered a ham and cheese toasted sandwich – not very adventurous but I’d rather he eat something than not.

I snuck this photo of him in while he was stretching his legs out in the laneway.

All in all we had a good trip together and our three days went pretty quickly. We flew with one of those budget airlines with only carry on baggage allowed and shock of shocks they weighed it on our way through to the gate. Mine was three kilos overweight so I had to redistribute. It didn’t help that my DSLR camera was in the bag so that pretty much got it down.

We had a day to unwind before heading off for a weekend school excursion in the Riverland. So it really wasn’t a relaxing week leading up to my new job but fulfilling nontheless.

View the rest of the photos here.

Jen has left the building

August 8, 2010 by Jen

This week has been a week of lasts for me. Fortunately in this case the lasts also mean a new beginning as I finished up my job this week to start a new one in a week’s time. UPDATE: It’s now a week later and I seriously thought I’d published this post!

Yesterday was an unseasonably warm winter’s day and I enjoyed my last walk with my colleague around the River Torrens. I took my mobile phone with me to capture some images because the trees look glorious in their winter bareness and with the sun shining on their naked branches, well I just wanted to remember that.

I’m moving to work on the other side of the city so this part of the river won’t be as accessible to me.

I’ll really miss this walk. It’s a good chance to get out of the office, get some exercise and get back to work feeling renewed and refreshed.

It’s also baby swan season. I don’t know how a baby swan could ever have been mistaken for an ugly duckling.

I start my new job tomorrow and while I’m kinda nervous I’m really excited too. I have been busy in the last week and stories about that are to come.