Movember – please sponsor my MO!

If you sponsor me I will provide updates of what my mo looks like!

Happy Halloween

Guy Sebastian @ The Palms, Crown

I was able to get front row tickets (Table 6 Sect A) again for the upcoming acoustic Guy Sebastian concert at The Palms in the Crown Complex Melbourne on Sat 27th October. Nicole and I absolutely loved the last concert at Hamer Hall and can not wait until this one in October. I think that Guy is really underated, he is a fantastic entertainer and everytime that we have seen him, he always spends some time talking to my kids (Ethan and Jayde).

My son has a new blog

My son Ethan has been posting using Blogger since Feb 2006, but now he wanted to have a website that looked just like mine (but “…without the ugly photo of you dad…” – his words). So tonight I helped him move over to WordPress, import his posts and style up his blog just like mine (oh, and I got rid of my photo and put one of his cool photos – taken for his book fair at school where he dressed up as Doctor Who – David Tennant style). So check out the newest addition to the nerd arena Code Padawan.

CodeJedi meets the Simpsons

The guys at work have been getting creative with the Simpson Movie website, by creating their very own Avatars.  I also saw Frank Arrigo get into the act and create a funky looking Simpson like version of himself.  So I decided that CodeJedi also needed to become a Simpson’s character.

If you haven’t heard

This afternoon there were a few comic’s flying around the office and I thought that this one was pretty relevant to CodeJedi.

Anyhow, Grumpy Wookie decided to alter one of the comics and I thought it was definitely worth blogging about.

Photos with my new Olympus SP-550UZ

On the 21st May 2007 I posted about my new purchase, an Olympus SP-550UZ camera.   I thought I would provide an update.  This camera is fantastic, it has loads of features and a massive zoom.  I also purchased a 2GB Olympus xD memory card and now I am able to take Panoramic shots which can be stitched together using the Olympus Master 2 software that came with the camera. I have been playing around with taking shots of blades of grass, mushrooms, flowers, mountains, trees, the buildings in Clunes, my children and all manner of things (I just cannot seem to put it down).  My favourite shots have been of the Moon and Sun.

How did Microsoft name Windows Server 2008?

I was just sent a link (by GrumpyWookie) to quite a corny video on how the Microsoft product team decided on the name “Windows Server 2008”. There are some other interesting videos on the Virtual TechEd 2007 web site.

Microsoft launches Live Earth website

[via Microsoft Newsletter]

This month Microsoft’s MSN teams launched http://liveearth.msn.com, the exclusive online destination for Live Earth: The Concert for a Climate in Crisis. Live Earth will culminate on 7/07/07 with a global concert on seven continents with venues that include the US, UK, Japan, Brazil, South Africa, China, Australia, and Turkey.
Live Earth is much more than a concert – it’s designed to be a catalyst event to coalesce a worldwide community of people who share a single environmental vision and mission: to convert concern to action.

Visit the new Live Earth site now

Olympus SP-550UZ

Over the past few months our Cannon S50 has been slowly dying. I have always been happy with this camera, it always took a great shot and we picked it up for a great price. Nicole and I have been looking for a new camera for about a month and yesterday we made our decision and purchased an Olympus SP-550UZ. I have found this to be an extremely easy camera to operate and with the 7.1 Mega Pixel 18x Optical and 100x Digital zoom has some great features.

Out with my baby…

Saturday night was an extremely entertaining night. Firstly my Mum come down from Clunes to baby sit Ethan and Jayde. This allowed Nicole and I to step out on the town and party. We started the evening off with a walk through the Crown Casino complex, then made our way down to La Camera restuarant on Southbank. We ate our Main course while over looking the Melbourne skyline and the Yarra river. Then we progressed to Federation Square were we ate Cake and drank Hot Chocolate. We then took a romantic stroll down the yarra to the Melbourne Eye (Ferris Wheel).

After dinner we headed to Hamer Hall at the Arts Centre to attend the Guy Sebastian concert. Guy was performing with the Australia Philharmonic Orchestra and we were in for a great night. We made our way to our allocated seats (Front row, right in front on the conductor and centre stage) – Excellent seats. Guy performed a set of his songs then took a short interval. He then performed some tribute songs to the Beatles (these were excellent), Elvis Presley and Nat King Cole. After another small break he come back to perform some Gospel song including Amzing Grace – these were fantastic (very passionate and from the heart). After the concert (2.5 hours), Nicole and I stood at the back stage door and waited for the Conductor and Guy to come out. Around an hour and a half later he come out and did some signings for the many people who were also waiting (mostly women and children).

We eventually got back home in the early hours of Sunday morning and were tired all day Sunday. Thanks Mum for looking after the kids and allowing us to have a great romantic evening out.

Star Wars Day – CodeJedi style

Today is May the 4th and is commonly referred to within the nerd community as “Star Wars Day”

May the fourth be with you!

or as CodeJedi would say

May the source be with you!

Holiday picture from Queensland

As promised here are some holiday snaps from my trip to Queensland.

[rockyou id=64540244&w=426&h=320]

Sipping cocktails in Queensland

For those that know me, you will know that I have a tendency of collecting all sorts of things, but my main collection fetish is all things M&M related. I have in my collection some 40 M&M chocolate dispensers, some are classic ones from the 80’s and some are newer ones I got for Easter. I also collect M&M folders, pens, cups and stuffed toys. My favourite item is a mini M&M jukebox dispenser that plays the Lambada when it dispenses. For Christmas my mother in law got a hold of my four Star Wars M&M post cards and had them block mounted (very cool present).

So I was reading Chris’ blog and found that he had posted about a cool website that lets you design your own M&M character (www.becomeanmm.com). So I cranked up the site a created a character that is going to sum up my holiday in Queensland…so off I go to the warm sunny beaches to sip cocktails…see you when I get back.

Away in the Sun with my family

I am heading north to sunning Queensland on Saturday morning to spend some well deserved holiday time with my lovely wife and two wonderful children. I am not taking my laptop with me and therefore blogging will be just a little bit difficult. So my blog will be quiet for the next two weeks.

We are spending 5 or so days on the Gold Coast and will be doing Dreamworld, White Water World and lots of Direct Factory shopping at Habourtown Shopping Centre, before we head further north to Noosa where we will spend another 5 or so days.

I will speak to you all again and post some holiday snaps when I get back.

Will, the BBQ king!

My employer SDM just purchased a BBQ for our Melbourne office, so I just had to wheel it out the front of the office and test it out for my lunch…yummy snags!

Evil Raptor has gone

In November 2005, Andrew Buttigieg and I created our first (and only) epic adventure “MSDN Wars – Episode I Attack of the Raptor” as a practical joke (Check it out on MSDN Webcasts Weblog). It is a sad day for me as I say goodbye to Evil Raptor. My son Ethan has sold his beloved toy on eBay. May Raptor find happiness in his new home.

Happy Feet

I took my 4 year old daugther (Jayde) to see Happy Feet last night. The movie was very enjoyable, however, she was tired and fell asleep about 3/4 of the way through. When asked what her favourite part was, she said “All of it!”, well except for the bit where she was asleep…

Australia is in a drought

This picture was sent to me by my future sister in-law Deneale. It was taken at Lake Wendouree in Ballarat. Lake Wendouree was the venue for the 1956 Olympic Games rowing and is all but dry presently. This once full lake that was home to hundreds of birds and fish is now completely dry due to the drought that is affecting the vast majority of Australia. It is going to take a lot of rain to fill this lake again.

Free Willy

A fellow MOSSIG member Tim Wragg has written an article about my spoils at the recent TechEd event in Sydney. I would like to take this opportunity to highlight that the spoils have all but been given to charitible homes, my son Ethan, daughter Jayde and fellow collegues at SDM are all enjoying the many trinkets I was able to obtain at TechEd (I only kept the T-Shirts and memory of the XBox girls – no photographic evidence).

Also, Tim how are the Wireless mouse and the pens that you obtained going.