month of vegan - prologue

Some time in January, I got into a discussion about veganism. I was extolling the virtues of meat, while the other party was of the opinion that we didn't need the stuff.
At some point in the (drunken) discussion, I said that I would go vegan for a month to see what the big deal was all about. Deb had her triathlon during February, and didn't want to have any drastic change to her diet before then, so we agreed on March.

Sunday the 28th of Feb was Deb's triathlon and also the last day of meat, seafood, eggs or dairy for 31 days. Shame we didn't do it in February, because March has 31 bloody days! To prepare, we loaded up on fruit and veges at the market, and spent an hour at the supermarket reading the backs of packets. I had NO idea that milk solids were in damn near everything we eat. Check out the ingredients for most chips.

Go on, I'll wait...

No doritos, marshmallows, regular coffees or anything with fish sauce in it (which rules out a fair chunk of asian dishes). No jellybeans, salami, cool mints, kebabs or chcolate milk (or any milk chocolate for that matter).
Actually, listing that stuff out makes me realise how much shit I eat.

Ok, we're off.

This is the last meat we're allowed until April:

(not the guy on the left, I meant the barbeque)

picasa and google earth are still awesome

I hate the idea that my parent's photos are trapped in a cupboard and run the risk of never being seen again. There's also the problem that those photos are unique, and have no backups. That actually bothers me more to be honest.

This is why whenever I go home for a visit, I try and scan at least one album. On my last trip, I decided to copy all of the photos from their computer (including these scans) and get them into some kind of order.

Picasa again made this really easy, because now you can edit an image's exif data direct in the application, without having to install a third party app.

Of course, now that I've got my parent's photos as part of my photo library, I've been overwhelmed with the compulsion to tag everything. I've already done all of the faces, so I'm now in the middle of geotagging. Let me tell you, trying to find out where a photo was taken in 1975 is a lot of fun.
This is my best effort I think.

Mum and Dad's photo:


I knew it was in England somewhere because of the bus, and the side of the road the traffic was on.
There is a Grovenor Hotel on the left, and Walton's Jewellers on the right.
The only place I could find that could fit the description was here:


I opened the Panoramio layer on Google Earth to check out photos that people had taken in the area.
I think this one comes pretty close, considering they were taken over 30 years apart.
edit: the original photo was deleted from Panoramio, so this is a similar one.


And just a quick comparison:



So, in summay: No. There is nothing that you can't do as long as you have the internet.

xmas in lakes entrance

Deb and I decided to spend Christmas at Lakes Entrance for a bit off a change of scenery.
The weather was a little rough to start with, but we both managed to get a bit of sunburn, so it must have cleared up a bit! We had a proper Christmas dinner with homemade pavlova, roast chicken and a crazy amount of wine.

Anyway, here's a couple of pics.

Our temporary Christmas tree:


Our homemade pav about to go in the oven:


... and the pav after we realised too late that the recipie was quoting temperature in farenheit:



Breakfast champagne:



Christmas Lunch:


Pav No.2:



Moreton Bay Bug @ the Ferryman's Seafood Cafe

From Xmas 2009

benn & julie's wedding in hawaii

There's not a whole lot to write, except that this felt like a real holiday. One day of sightseeing (though driving around in a convertable isn't much of a chore) and the rest of the time was either spent at Benn & Julie's wedding or just lying around on the beach.

I sprained or cracked my thumb climbing back in the boat after snorkelling, which was the only adventurous part of the trip.

A++++ would travel again*.

Here's some pics:




* ebay gag.

viewing stats finally live in picasaweb

I was happy to use Picasaweb instead of more popular sites (ie Flickr) because it integrated beautifully with the desktop version of Picasa and Google Earth. The one thing that I was disappointed with was the lack of viewing figures.
That has finally been remedied, albeit in a very simple form. There's now a view count at the bottom right of the photo. I don't know how much metadata Google is saving behind these figures, but it might be nice to see it broken down by month/geographical location one day.

The stats started being captured on 30-Jun-09, so they haven't been running long. Maybe after they get some real data to play with, Google will be able to give us more granular details about who is looking at our happy snaps.

I have no practical use for these figures, but it doesn't stop me wanting to know!

make it worth my while

Kmart has been running ads recently stating:

"If you find a cheaper price, we'll match it"

Ok. So I've been shopping around for and have found a place that sells x for $100.
If I decide to not buy it from this store, and instead go all the way back to Kmart, they will lower their price to match it. Not make it cheaper. Match it.

Now why the hell would I bother doing that? Make it worth my while! Give me another 5-10% off. Give me a $10 gift voucher. Offer to polish my bloody shoes. Something!

Step up or fuck off. Cheap bastards.

barcelona

And finally, the last instalment.

At Park Güell






Can you spot the kiwis?








Sagrada Familia














Barcelona's arc de Triomf


Mmmmm, pig legs.



And that's it! This was the last photo we took before getting back to Melbourne tired, happy and jetlagged.

provence

Wow, I really went slack once we got back to Melbourne. I've finished Geotagging all of the photos, so I thought I'd better get my favourites up before I forgot what everything was :)

Here's where we ended up staying. It was a nice wee place (and yet another place that promised a washing machine but never delivered)


The main square in Arles


Theatre Antiques, Arles (and two tans that virtually washed off in our first shower in Melbourne)


Inside the Amphitheatre, Arles


Neat; 150 year old graffiti


Some back street in St Remy


The Papal Palace (Palais des Papes) in Avignon


and again


and again (with clouds)


yet again. Ok, I liked the sky.
>

...


The sunset on the way back from Avignon to Arles


Nice. Literally.


A secluded beach with bugger all parking (we had to walk a couple of km downhill to get here)


French beaches are neat

paris

Photos now, text to follow.... well, probably not.
If you're after details, Deb's got it covered here.

From Berlin, we caught a quick train to Mannheim to connect to an even quicker train to Paris:


The apartment was still being cleaned when we arrived at 6pm, so we went for a wander to fill in an hour.

The Louvre was still there. No golden arches over it as yet.




We went to a local bistro for dinner (steak tartare thank you very much) and after a few hours watching the world go by, we finished our wine and called it quits for the night.

The next morning we took off to Montmartre for the day.

Sacre Coeur


And a bit of exotic foreign culture for good measure


We had lunch at romantic Montmartre cemetery, beers somewhere else and ice creams at yet another place before wandering home and out again for more food.


The next day it was overcast and rainy, so we went to the laundromat, and had pastries for breakfast while we waited. After checking out some local scenery, eg:

Notre Dame



we hit the shops (read: Deb hit the shops)

It was raining again that night, but instead of staying inside, we went Space Invader hunting.







We had a crack at some night photos of the Eiffel Tower as well.


I think Deb managed to step in every puddle between our apartment and here, so it was time to head back in preparation for Day Four: Proper tourist day.

Pompidou Centre


Pont Notre Dame


And Notre Dame itself, sans rain.


We cruised up to the Pantheon, and had lunch in the Luxembourg gardens:


A lot of the more familiar paintings at Musee d'Orsay were surrounded by people trying to get a photo. Most barely even looked at them first, so this photo is dedicated to them. In case you're wondering, it's Renoir's Dance at Le Moulin de la Galette.


This was taken on the museum roof while we were drinking our €3.30 ($6 AU) Cokes:



The obligatory Eiffel Tower shot (with space invader for good measure)


Then a (long) walk to the Arc de Triomphe to try and see some cars crash into each other. It never happened, so instead here's a photo of us, with my holiday jowls starting to creep in. Why is bad food the tastiest?


The next morning we caught the train to Avignon. More to follow soon...