http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/ Sat, 10 Sep 2011 13:03:18 GMT BirdBlog http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1016 Sat, 10 Sep 2011 13:03:18 GMT General http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1016 It seems obvious now, but at the time when we had really bad reception in the new house, I tried all sorts of things - like changing the cable from the wall to the TV, re-tuning the TV and other things like earthing the cables. We had terrible problems with all the Channel 10 channels (Ten, One, Eleven) and with SBS channels also having problems. Some nights it was unwatchable, where the broadcast would go blocky and then there would be squeaks, pauses and complete stopping of the image for a second. It always seemed to stop at the crucial bit of dialog or when something important happened. Last night it was so bad that I watched a movie instead of what I wanted to watch on TV. Then this morning I took a look at the antenna on the chimney and it had parts hanging down and looked like a tangled mess. So, being a Saturday, I headed straight for the hardware store and bought a new antenna. Out came the ladder, I put on my tool belt and loaded it up with everything I thought that I would need, and then scaled the roof and started to take down the old bits of metal. Luckily the old aerial was the same model and so had the same fittings as the new one, so all I had to do is undo 14 rusted bolts and unravel the old bits of twisted metal to get rid of the old bit of junk and then put up the new one. I then found that the wire that connected it to the house was a very old and so I replaced that too, with some leftover coaxial RG6 wire from a previous TV installation at the old house. I feel so proud of being able to do it all myself, and to not need to call in a professional who would probably charge through the nose and try to replace (or charge for) more parts and brackets and cables instead of using my leftovers. http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1016 http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1015 Sun, 21 Aug 2011 13:05:50 GMT General http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1015 We decided to go for solar panels. It's been very popular recently, but the Federal Government has stopped some of their incentives, and we are in the run-down period where shortly their incentives will be gone. Earlier this year, if you bought a solar system, the government would subsidise the purchase price - but this stopped on June 30th. Then, on September 30th 2011, they will stop new people taking up the "feed-in tariff" of 44c per KWh, and instead drop it to 18c per KWh. Fortunately, we got a quote before June 30th, and [url=http://www.solardelight.com.au/system_packages_details_tn_494kw.php]Solar Delight[/url] have kept their prices low, and we got them installed last week. In the first day, our 5KW system was in the sun for about 4 hours, and during that time it generated 10KWh - which means that on average it was generating 2.5KW every hour - that's about 50% efficiency. That's not bad for the winter and an overcast day. On Saturday it was a little sunnier and we got 14KWh, and on Sunday it generated 20KWh. We don't yet have the extra meter installed that will credit our bill with 44c for each KWh that we generate more than we use, so at the moment all that is happening is that the electricity meter is spinning backwards, and so next time the guy comes around to read the meter, it will have a lower value. http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1015 http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1014 Sun, 21 Aug 2011 12:28:06 GMT Family http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1014 Our 'old' neighbours from the old house had just had their second child - Daniel was born 4 weeks ago, and we had some presents for them. We dropped in for a coffee and a cuddle of their new child. Baby Daniel was very quiet and has been sleeping well, much to the pleasure of his parents. It was interesting to go back to our old neighbourhood, the house across the street got solar panels, and the new owners of our old house had not mowed the front lawn or kept the front of the house tidy. We asked our old neighbours if they had met the people who moved into our house, and they said that they hadn't seen or heard from them. Then, we were hanging around the front of their house when the new owners' children came out and we invited ourselves over. Thomas and our Daniel played with their children, and I took great pleasure in speaking to the new owner and taking her through the way that some things worked in the garden, explaining some plants and answering questions. Then, later on Saturday afternoon, we had a dinner party with our new neighbours at our new house. They have three children around the same age as Thomas, and they invited a family from across the road, who have two children around the same age as Daniel. We were expecting just drinks and nibbles, but instead we had a slap up sit down meal, and the children played together very well. It was entertaining for all of us when the children went through the dress-up supplies and came out as various super heros and characters, rushing out to show the parents each time they tried something new. http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1014 http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1013 Tue, 09 Aug 2011 11:26:55 GMT Traveling http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1013 The next day we went straight to the closest theme park to our appartment in Surfers Paradise - [url=http://seaworldresort.myfun.com.au/]Sea World[/url] http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1013 http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1012 Tue, 09 Aug 2011 10:56:43 GMT General http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1012 The ongoing battle with China has been ongoing for the last few days. It's like I am standing with my finger in the dyke, trying to stop the flood that will saturate the website. I contacted my hosting company who look after the systems that provide this website, and they made a few changes and it turns out that the reason all my efforts were not working was because they had not done something... grrr.... Anyway, they have now 'flicked the switch' to make it all work and now I am able to block these Chinese hackers. Their support was really good, and they even gave me another 3Gb of free data for this month, so the website should stay up this month! Have a look at this graph [img]http://www.wickham.id.au/images/MonthlyStats12months.JPG[/img] This shows the growth in traffic to my website, with big white chunks where the site has been shut down when all the 3GB of data was used up. http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1012 http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1011 Wed, 03 Aug 2011 12:33:01 GMT General http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1011 In the new house we have a 45,000 L salt water chlorinated pool. It's an informal kidney shape with a pebblecrete finish, with no corners on the inside, so you can't really see the bottom as there are no edges. When we moved in, everything was working fine and the pool was clear and clean. Then autumn leaves started to fall in it and then it started to go green. We called in the pool man and he gave us some advice and instruction on how to clean and care for the pool, and he gave a diagnosis on why it was green. It turns out that for a saltwater pool, the salt (sodium chloride) is converted to chlorine gas by electrolysis, and this is controlled by a unit that has a fuse - and the fuse had blown. As a saltwater pool has very low levels of salt and chlorine, this meant that for the week or so that it was not working, it didn't take much for the algae to start to grow. We were advised to add another 80 Kg of salt, litres of some chemicals to kill the algae, and "flock" to make all the dead algae to fall to the bottom so I could vacuum it down to the drain. The control unit for the chlorinator electrolysis cell was taken away for repair, and returned with a new fuse and a $30 bill. After a couple of days of hard work, I got the pool clear again, and it stayed sparkling ... for a while. More leaves fell, and I got them out quicker, but then I noticed that the little green light on the chlorinator was no longer on, and little bubbles were no longer appearing on the metal mesh of the electrolysis plates. I decided to save $30 and went and bought a pack of fuses of the right size and rating - $2 for 6 fuses. I put in a new fuse, and it lasted for a couple of weeks! So far, I have changed the fuse 5 times, so something is definitely wrong there. Thomas has (occasionally) helped out with skimming off leaves and cleaning the pool, but because he is not a strong swimmer and has never been in the deep end, we can't leave him by the pool by himself. . http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1011 http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1010 Tue, 02 Aug 2011 12:04:09 GMT Traveling http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1010 A lot has happened since the blog was offline, so I will try and cover it a bit now... In mid July, we all went on holiday to Australia's equivalent of Florida - the Gold Coast. Its a sunny playground with 50Km pure sandy beaches, vibrant cities, theme parks and stunning countryside including rainforest, mountains and rolling plains. We had to book a limosine to take us to the airport, as Daniel still needs a baby seat and they offer the facility to keep our seat for the return journey - it was only $10 more than a taxi, so worth it. We checked in and dropped our bags, and then went straight to the lounge, as I have [url=https://www.prioritypass.com/]Priority Pass[/url] membership (although they have pulled out of Australia, so this was our last free visit), and we had breakfast. By the time we arrived in Queensland and got to our apartment, it was nearly lunchtime. We had a quick look at our 28th floor 2 bedroom apartment with views over the sea, and then went down to Surfers Paradise to find something to eat. Ann had done a marvelous job as usual, finding an apartment that was right in the centre and just right for what we needed. Thomas wanted to go to the pool complex that is on the 6th floor of the [url=http://www.chevrontowersresort.com.au/photos.html]Chevron Renaissance[/url] resort, but the weather was a bit chilly and so we didn't last long in the main pool. . http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1010 http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1009 Mon, 01 Aug 2011 10:52:47 GMT General http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1009 It's been a couple of months now, but finally the site is back up and running! Hackers had used all my allocation of data transfer for the month. I only get 3GB per month that people are allowed to download from me, and it got used up very quickly by hackers - those are the people who leave gibberish comments with lots of website links in them. Each month, the website would be up for a few days, before this 3GB got used up. It started to get used after 26 days, then 14 days, and last month it got consumed within 8 days. I started looking into it, and found that most of them were going to the page that does searching of the site - this is a standard searching page that appears on many websites with the same address, and so the hackers knew that it was there and were trying to use it! So, the search page is gone now - but that won't affect many real people! Also, I noticed that the web browser being used by 96.8% of visitors was not Internet Explorer or Firefox or Chrome, but "Unknown". So, I did some fancy configuration (a file called .htaccess) to stop those connections from ever getting in to the site. Hopefully, the site should stay up a bit longer this month, and maybe we will even see a decrease in the spam postings in comments - but then again the hackers are very clever and may find a way around my measures soon. UPDATE I found that yet again, they had managed to find a way in... Interesting to see where they are all coming from - these statistics are from the last 3 days [img]http://www.wickham.id.au/images/Stats.JPG[/img] At this rate, the website will become unavailable on 18th August... http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1009 http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1008 Sun, 12 Jun 2011 11:03:11 GMT General http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1008 Today we went for a walk to the local park. Well, Daniel and Ann walked, but Thomas and I cycled along the footpath and I carried our tennis rackets. When we got there, the courts were busy, so Daniel and Thomas played in the playground and then had a go on the court when it was free. I don't know who was running around more! We were as bad as each other so we had to chase the ball around when it left the official confines of the marked tennis court. Back in the house, yesterday Thomas and I squeezed behind the shed to chop down some woody weeds, and spent quite a while raking up leaves from autumn. I even managed to get on the roof to clear out the gutters and then realised that Thomas was missing... only to find him hiding under the pile of leaves. Other excitements for the boys have included the cellar - now kitted out with a 80 bottle wine rack and shelving, and the [url=http://www.insinkerator.com.au/]InSinkErator[/url] which is a food disposal in the sink - they both get very excited when Ann puts it on. Unfortuantely the old owners lost the plug/grill that prevents other stuff from falling it down into the grinder, so we have had to warn the boys about putting anything into the sink that would be destroyed! I need to sort out so much in the house, but that is what I love doing. Ann, on the other hand, is a little frustrated at the crooked walls where funiture touches the wall at the top, but not the bottom - or the other way where one side is right up to the skirting. Ann is trying to find places to put everything and struggling to make things look 'just right'. I am getting stuck into the garden and the pool, but I don't have much confidence in the shed as it is full of cobwebs and decay - and I don't really want to leave my tools to rust and I am tempted to take over the spare bedroom to store my tools until I can knock down the shed and build a workshop and garage. http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1008 http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1007 Wed, 08 Jun 2011 13:17:00 GMT General http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1007 We have been in the house for a little while and are starting to get most of the boxes unpacked. I have a bit of frustration with the office furniture - I ordered a desk and when it got delivered it only had one leg. The study is just a pile of boxes and it's been a bit of a nightmare to find anything. We got some furniture from Ikea, and so Ann has more space in the kitchen now, but we still have lots in the cellar that should really be in the kitchen. The Ikea furniture that we have bought for the boys' rooms is still in it's box. The electrician installed network cabling for me throughout the house, but in two rooms he had to cut a slot into the wall to chase the wires away. Unfortunately this has left a few big holes that I need to patch up. I have put the computer sockets on the ends of the wires and tested that all 136 wires are correctly connected (each network wire contains 8 wires), which was fun for me. The boys are loving it too, they race their bikes around the house and garden, love playing in their play room upstairs and it's hard to contain their excitement sometimes. The commute time is considerably less, and so we get more time together as a family, and the meals table is not within sight of the TV, so the boys actually eat their dinner. http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1007 http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1006 Wed, 01 Jun 2011 12:07:30 GMT Family http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1006 It is hard to describe how tiring it is to be constantly walking up and down stairs, carrying heavy boxes. It's physically draining, emotionally taxing and quite stressfull. One part of it is that the removalists need to be told what is to be taken, and things like which table has a loose top. Another part is that all the small bits need to be packed or individually loaded. Another stress point is that the removal men are relatively fast and it is hard to keep up. Loading was one draining effort, but even worse was the unloading at the new house. We had 4 men and 2 trucks, and they constantly wanted to know where each item or box needed to go - I could not even remember what was in each box, let alone make a snap decision around where it was to go! We had written on the boxes, but unless we had a complete inventory it would still be hard - particularly as we will need to re-arrange the contents into the new room layout. http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1006 http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1005 Wed, 01 Jun 2011 11:44:26 GMT General http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1005 In Australia, the houses for sale are opened up to public viewing for an hour (or half) over the weekend and thus is when prospective buyers can view the houses. Of course there are a large proportion of visitors who are just having a look and have no intention of purchasing - after all, we have done it ourselves many times. We have been preparing our house for the open inspection for the last couple of weeks, and last weekend we had our first open on a Sunday, and this weekend we had the second open on Saturday. We had 21 groups of people visit on the first weekend, and 14 groups on the second weekend. So, on Sunday, we packed the house and on Tuesday we moved to the new house! We were a little concerned that we would have an open inspection with the house empty of furniture, but after we had such a good response, we felt that we would have caught all the people who were serious buyers in the first couple of weeks. It turned out to be OK after all, as we got an offer on Monday which we accepted. So, soon the 'old' house will be sold and we will be able to settle our 'bridging loan'. http://www.wickham.id.au/birdblog/comment.php?entryid=1005