Draw Two Skips

It's been a rainy few days, so what better time for a game of UNO? And what better hand could I expect?

I'd played two number cards, and picked up the red and yellow Skips when a Draw Two was played at me.

For a rainy day, that was a fairly exciting moment.

Smaller on the Outside

I've recently started a new job. My colleague had this on her desk, and I was very excited. So excited that she gave it to me.

Turns out that you can download and print these foldable designs from various websites. Apparently another work colleague printed them out, and it was a short 'team-building' exercise to construct them (long before I started here).

I get the impression that my colleague it didn't value the finished item as much as I do.

Related link: Exterminate

Trick of the Mind

My state, Queensland has optional preferential voting. Voters choose how many preferences to allocate.

Which means at elections you get extra signs like these:

They look official. They're in the colours of the voting authority. They don't mention any candidate. You might think they are official signs.

But you'd be wrong. If you have a magnifying glass handy, you can see a party name in the tiniest print. And what each party suggests will favour that party.

I think it's a bit sneaky by both of these parties - to trick people by posing as official advice.

A voter at my local voting place complained to the officials. The funny thing was that he only complained about only one of them.

The Mind Trick
Perhaps coloured by his party preference he thought the other sign was perfectly fine.

What do you think?
Are they both unethical? If just one is dodgy, which one?

Who Gives A Crap?

What if helping really poor countries was as easy as going to the toilet?

Now it is. Social enterprise Who Gives a Crap gives half its profits to build toilets in the developing world. From the moment you receive your (home delivered) box of toilet paper, you feel good about it.

The box has various encouraging phrases, including their main slogan "Good for your bum. Great for the world." Each roll is also encouraging, reminding you of the benefits.

Also, as you unwrap it, there's another inspiring message inside, like:

or

If all that wasn't enough, they've come up with the ingenious idea of the emergency roll. Store it in a different place. Should you ever need to grab it - you know it's definitely time to re-order!

Of course, being Christmas - and having ordered the Christmas themed set - I just had to arrange them as a tree.

It shrank over time - especially as I gave many away as novelty gifts.

Sunrise

There are benefits to getting up early. Skies like this morning's is definitely one of them.

OK it's not the most scenic photo ever. But it's a great start to the day to see this out the window.

Earth Hour 2014

Some of the candles from our Earth Hour celebration.

Lettuce In

One of my latest things to grow on my balcony is lettuce.

It's not type that you traditional spherical-shaped lettuce. This is good because I can just pick off as many leaves as I need for a meal, while letting the rest keep growing.

Ride for Refugees - the extras

Once I (and the other riders) were out on the course, there was a mini-ride for kids involving a few laps of the circuit. Obviously I didn't get to see it, but it looks so cute, with even preschool age children taking part - training wheels and all.

Meanwhile, I'd been out on the course (which feels very country-like) and was glad to discover a drinks and snack station around the 7km mark. I was pleased to see a selection of muesli bars, fruit and lollies :)

Ride for Refugees - the start

For those who sponsored me in the 25km Ride for Refugees (and for others who are interested) here are some photos from the day.

Ready to go and awaiting the start:

Underway! Just 24.985 km to go ;)


The ride started with a lap around the criterium circuit before heading out on main part of the ride.

Ride For Refugees

I'm a fan of helping refugees - and of bike riding. So signing up for this year's Ride for Refugees seemed like an obvious move. I'm going to be riding (at least) 25km - and can imagine that this will be somewhat of a shock, given that my normal bike ride is 6-7km tops.


To add to the challenge, if i get more than $221 of sponsorship, i'll double the ride to 50km!

Why $221 precisely? A refugee in the community has to live on $221 a week (including paying rent) and is not allowed work to earn any extra. (I hear that's 40% less than the dole).

Anyway, the groups that are supported by the ride do things to help refugees with education, learning English, medical and other issues.


So if you'd like to sponsor me, or ride yourself, that would be great. :)

Lending to Ali

Today i started a new loan through Kiva. This time it is to Ali in Lebanon. Ali lives with (and takes care of) his elderly parents. An experienced and reputable carpenter, he is looking to start his own business, and needs to stock up on wood and get some tools.


Ali's face is pixelated (like many Lebanese and Iraqi borrowers) to protect his privacy for "political and social" reasons. I'm guessing that people fear what might happen to them if they are seen as being connected to 'the west'.

The average wage in Lebanon is $5,900 a year ($16 a day) so the loan of $2,000 is the equivalent of 4 months pay. Obviously, most people would be scared to lend $2000 to someone overseas, but by each putting in $25, we can achieve things that would be impossible otherwise.

[Related link: Investing the Phillipines]

UPDATE: On March 17 2014, Ali made the final repayments. His business is presumably now going well, and I am satisfied to know that I could be part of helping him.

Lifeline Bookfest

This is what (half of) Lifeline Bookfest looks like. There's the same amount again, just out of shot.

This was taken from the volunteer break room (where volunteers are provided lunch/dinner if working through that time). During the day there's way more people - picking up great value second-hand books, all for the benefit of a great charity.

[My other Bookfest photo]

Top pics of 2012

Here are my photos of 2012 that you viewed most:

5. It was a tie between two food related pics - the unbelievably cheap meals, and the macadamias i harvested. (If picking them up and cracking them with a hammer is called a harvest :)

4. My unrelated post about democracy in Queensland rated quite highly. I might continue to throw in the occasional non-photo post.


3. I really enjoy funny photos, so i'm glad that the memory card photo was popular with you too.


2. My photo of the enormous number of Da Vinci code books donated to the Lifeline Bookfest.


1. The Eclipse photos from the Solar Eclipse viewable from eastern Australia in Novmber.

All the best for 2013!

Eclipse 2012

The total solar eclipse on November 14 was visible in Queensland's north. Here in the south 86% of the sun was covered.

This was my method of seeing the eclipse without looking directly at the sun.

Closer to the time of maximum eclipse, this is what it looked like.

As you may have seen on the news, one of the TV cameras filmed me when i moved the crescent to around the face area of my shadow - such that it looked like a big smile.

I think science only makes it on commercial news if there's pretty footage - or a corny line like "the eclipse brought a smile to everyone's face". (Sigh!)

Cheap Meals

This is either a simple error, or this place is being very generous ;)

Just One Day

One of the joys of growing food is seeing plants spring out of the soil. Classic case is my current experience with beans. Having planted the seed (almost jellybean size) a week before, i took this photo on Tuesday morning:

And this one on Wednesday morning (with finger for scale):

Pretty impressive for one day's growth. Let's see if any beans come from this. :)

(The debris in photo 2 is the shell of the original seed)

Investing in the Phillipines

I've just joined Kiva - the online community that makes interest free micro-loans (as small as $25) to people in the developing world.

This is Carolve, who i've lent some money to. She's 25 and runs her own rice farm.

I'm quite excited about this way of helping, because (i) it's helping people help themselves and their community, and (ii) the one $25 can be used over and over again to assist different people in different communities.

I should mention that the loans are interest-free - so you're not going to make money out of it, but you can get a bunch of warm fuzzy feelings from helping someone out.

UPDATE: We're now in March, and the final repayment (of $1.93) has been made. That doesn't seem like a lot of money to us, but to people in places like the Phillipines it is huge. The average wage in the Phillipines is $1175 per year. So the $250 (from me and 9 other lenders) was significant. Even the $1.93 repayment is around half a day's wages.


In you want to experience what it's like to make a big difference, why not sign up for a FREE trial at http://www.kiva.org/invitedby/david17104460?

A Cracking Time

A few weeks ago i showed the macadamias i collected. After some 'hammertime' i had myself a jam jar full of ready-to-eat macadamias.

Clearly the jar wasn't full by the time the pic was taken. Some got eaten during the cracking process - and a few later on (with some icecream and melted chocolate). Mmmm.

Winter Sunset

Saw a brilliant sunset developing while on the bus home this afternoon, and took this shot from the pedestrian bridge.

... and the bit that didn't fit in the first shot...

Macadamias

Our neighbour has a macadamia tree. Having grown to quite some size, it generously shares its produce over the fence. This is what i collected. Now to crack them open!