McBlog

Avalon airshow finished on Sunday and I finished up on Monday – all went well and I got to experience things you just can’t buy. Things like clambering through warbirds, walking out to the wingtip of a C17, taking Nykolai through the warbirds and around the combat jets (on the tarmac where the public couldn’t go – had to get an escort and everything), etc.

I’ve got about 300 photos to wade through and sort out so it might take a while to load them all, but keep an eye on the site and they’ll be there.

For now, it’s back to the office and catching up on the work that piled up while I was “away” (if coming in some nights for various things, doing remote work from home and fielding phone calls counts as being “away” :)

I’m still down at Avalon Airshow and having a blast working with the aircraft. A few of us have started judging the performances of the various aircraft during their routines, holding up the scores for the pilots to see as they come back in. It’s getting great results from them and we’re having a hoot too :)

Still trying to juggle things at the office as well so between all that and family, there’s no time to spare for writing it all up and loading photos. I’ve got 189 pix to name, review and load. Plus, I’ve been logging the days highlights and just need to load them as well.

So, don’t expect to see everything until next week. Sorry – just the way it goes…

When is the worst time for a network switch to die? How about when the big bosses are in the office trying to work, it’s a public holiday and you’re out marshalling aircraft.

I managed to talk people through to a point where they could work again and came in this evening. Working through the systems, I confirmed that yet another WISE 10/100 fast network switch had died. This is the fourth one in just over a year so I’ll be replacing it with something bigger and slightly better.

I’m currently working down at the Avalon Airshow as a Ground Operations aircraft marshal. Yup, that’s right, I’ve got the bats and I’m out there telling bloody great jets where to go. The section I’m in gets a lot of traffic and includes the combat jets, warbirds and a lot of the heavy jets transit through on their way to the keyhole.

Keep an eye on my flying section as I hope to have that up and running soon with a log of what’s been happening out there. Photos will be loaded in the Aircraft Photo section as and when I have a chance.

Between Avalon, my work for the AWU (network switch failure today – DOH!) and my family, there’s not much time for updating web sites…

Some friends went to see The Goodies live show in Melbourne last night. Apparently it was a great show and some of them hung around to say “thanks” to the lads, get autographs, etc. I’m a tad bummed that I missed out on going as I grew up on their shows. Nykolai’s already seen some of their shows and really enjoyed them so hopefully he’ll keep their craziness going into a new generation :)

You can check out JC’s report on the show for more details and some pix as well. Stephen’s holding back on a full report until after his partner’s had a chance to see the show in Brisbane on Friday.

We’re just setting up a new client, Wendish Heritage. They’ve seen the work we did on the Rowville-Lysterfield History Project and want us to help with something similar for them. I just got the domain set up and running so now JC’s working on the site itself.

I picked up the new hose for Binky’s radiator system ($44 plus $20 for a black RX-7 cap – yes, I’m a sucker for punishment :) then went down to Greg’s workshop to work on the car. We installed the hose, refilled the radiator and tried to fix the power-windows. Yes, they shut down on the Friday afternoon – the driver’s side stuck in the up position (not a bad thing) and the passenger’s side stuck down (oops). Kitt and I put some clear plastic on it on Saturday morning before the rains hit and that let me get out to Greg’s place.

Fortunately we were able to a) figure out that it was only the switches that were stuffed and b) get the passenger’s side window up. Now I just have to get down to Allmaz Wreckers and they’ll repair the switches for me. I have a funny feeling that I’ll be visiting these guys quite a bit in the future :)

I figure it’s like when you first get on a horse to ride it – it spends a bit of time mucking about and trying to see where it can be “the boss” so you have to be firm and bend it to how you want to ride. Eventually, the horse and rider meet somewhere between at a point where they’re both willing to work. Sounds a lot like what’s happening with Binky at the moment :)

Still progressing through things – the new campaign is kicking in although the gang probably haven’t really realised it yet. They’re trying to get over to another major city where they’ve been asked to help find out what’s happened to one of the resistance members. Still trying to get over there as they’ve been sidetracked a bit by a cult with delusions of granduer :)

Been too busy with flying and working to get any DJ’ing in. There was a weekend where a bunch of us went to Mount Hotham for a fun time away – I wound up spinning for most of it, doing my best to keep everyone happy. Much fun.

Am working on a few new mix CDs, but that’s about it. It’s really hard to juggle DJ’ing with early morning starts to go fly balloons :)

A few months have passed since I started coming to the office all day everyday. I’ve loaded new systems and stabilised a lot of what goes on around here. Of course, just when things look good and “normal,” along comes a few proverbial spanners to foul things up.

Our email provider, Hotspace have been having all sorts of problems with their systems. This, in turn, has been causing us no end of grief. Email delays, servers not responding and problems delivering email to AOL ‘cos they’ve put a Reverse DNS block in place (still can’t believe Hotspace don’t have a reverse entry for their mail server – like, DUH!). Add to this some problems getting our antispam/virus trial with Message Labs up and running (Hotspace’s problems delaying the changes to the mail server & MX records plus initial emails from Message Labs being blocked by Hotspace for some reason) and there goes my stable world.

There are other issues that are stuffing things up, but hey, that’s life around here, no? :)