jfw.id.au

I got a phone call from an Optus rep yesterday to thank me for my loyal patronage.  We’ve had our mobiles with them for a little over 2 years now, having moved over from Telstra after they got too greedy.  As well as the thanks for still being with them I was informed of the discounts available to us on optus home phone and internet if we were to have all services with them.  I told Optus-guy that the Optus internet plans were not good enough as they didn’t compete with the services from my current ISP Westnet.  The churn hasn’t compeltely gone through yet so I can still say my current ISP, can’t I?

This wasn’t enough for Optus-guy.  He asked me what those services were so I rattled off basically everything that had helped my decision to join Westnet, coincidentally the same features that they have just removed from their plans.  When he asked me to name the ISP I hesitated slightly before responding.  I figure if they use the information to check into the competitors plans that I would be sending them bad information by sending them to Westnet now that the plans have been made less attractive with the recent changes.  Luckily I did a bit of research before making the jump to Internode.  Netspace still have similar plans to the old Westnet ones so I pushed Optus-guy that way.

So I lied.  It was only a little white lie.  I would have gone to Netspace if I had any belief that the plans would have stayed as they currently are.  I doubt it will be long before Netspace change their plans as well.

Yeah so it’s not as extreme as all that, but meh.  I’ve had a fairly shit day at work today….

When I stopped for lunch I had to duck to the bank to get some money out so that I could eat.  On my way to the bank I was stopped by a group of 3 girls of about 16 years….

Lead girl: “Excuse me.  If we gave you some money can you buy us some cigarettes?”

Me: *blank 10 second stare* No.

I’m sorry, but just because I look slightly rough does not mean that I am about to go and enable you to poison yourself.  I’m not going to object if you wish to smoke, but do not involve me in the activity in any way.

Well, somewhat crazy at least.

Tomorrow is the Gold Coast Airport Marathon, and I’m participating in the 10km run. The run starts at 9:30 am on the Gold Coast Highway in front of Australia Fair shopping centre. My aim, to beat Rhino. In truth I’ll be happy if I just finish without collapsing and having a fatal athsma attack.

Each year my work encourages us to participate. Last year we took out the largest corporate entry award. I didn’t run last year. Last year I did the 7.5Km walk with my darling daughter on my back (all 11.5 kg of her) and my wonderful fiance by my side.

I’ve done no training. None at all. Unless you consider looking at the Marathon website to be training. I have done hardly any physical activity like this in the last 3-4 years so my chances of actually completing are, in truth, pretty slim. I’d like to think that I can do it, and indeed I’ll be happy to just complete the run, even if I don’t beat Rhino.

[censored]

Perhaps my heading is a little more sensationalist then the one that I just saw on news.com.au but at least I know from the 2 line story summary that my heading would fit.

As can be clearly seen from the summary - the victim of a bikie related shooting in Sydney got up after being shot and killed and escaped from the scene in a Taxi.

Two things are obvious from this brief summary

1. The Umbrella Corporation has decided to set up shop in Sydney
2. The person that did the shooting needs to take some zombie killing lessons from Alice

I’ve just read an interesting article on schooling that I came across on reddit.com by John Taylor Gatto. Obviously with Kira continually getting closer to school age (a couple of years yet thankfully) we are already thinking about schools and schooling. We’ve made a few decisions already that I believe we are both happy with.

If I were wavering at all on any of those decisions the article I’ve just read would have made my mind up for me. I can honestly say that in the last few years I’ve seen evidence of the points John makes in my generation and in post-school people that are younger than I am. It was this evidence that led us to the decisions that we have made.