I've been getting a heap of spam comments on my most recent blog post - so I hope that adding a new blog keeps the spammers at bay (if only they knew how small and stingy my readership is).

I've wanted to have an online catalogue of my DVDs and CDs for a while now - mainly so I could answer such important questions as "shit, I know I've seen that guy in something before, what was it?". Some could (and did) suggest that IMDb satisfies this requirement and they would be right. Then I remembered the other reason I have - to stop buying doubles of things at JB Hi-Fi. It is now much easier to check if I already have a certain DVD via my phone while at the "crazy discounts" bin.

I also wanted to pay more attention to writers and directors of films - to better predict whether I would like a new release.

Anywho - I finished it months ago and have filled it with my Movies, TV Shows and Music. I also have Video Games, but haven't been bothered enough to catalogue them all yet.

As usual, I love an elegant URL, so each item or section tries to do away with query strings or arbitrary IDs - which actually took a bit of effort. For example:

All movies: http://www.joeldixon.com/catalogue/movies/

All movies released in 2008: http://www.joeldixon.com/catalogue/movies/2008/

Movies with a genre of romance sorted by my rating: http://www.joeldixon.com/catalogue/movies/genre/romance/sort /rating/

I also calculate some stats (which I hope to expand at some point).

Sure, there's probably an online tool that already does this kind of thing, but certainly not with such attractive and functional URLs!

# Posted in the Technical section and tagged as: DVDs, Movies, Music, TV Shows

Bell and I were playing some Rock Band 3 tonight - and I got a pretty big score on the Blur song "Song 2" playing Pro Drums on Expert (Pro Drums refers to the cymbals and pads being shown as separate gems). I thought I was pretty close to getting the song 100% so I gave it a few shots:


Yeah - I'm that good.

Looking at the leaderboard - I appear to be equal first with around 100 or so people - so I assume we all got the most points available for Song 2. But that's 100 or so people in the world that have made that score - so I'm calling it a victory


The Ion Rock Drummer electric kit that I use

# Posted in the Gaming section and tagged as: Rock Band, Xbox 360

I completed the 10 things for 2010 with around 6 months to spare. Another desire for 2010 was to see a lot more live music - mission accomplished.

My enjoyment of live music will continue into 2011 (so far Stone Temple Pilots, Sia, Weird Al Yankovic and others have been booked) - so it's time to come up with a new goal for 2011. Quiero aprender espaņol (I want to learn Spanish).

Now Google Translate helped me with that last sentence - but I'm hoping by the end of 2011 - I'll be well on my way to speaking conversational Spanish on my own. A friend at work has started weekly Spanish lessons that have been going well. I'm hoping I can learn enough to justify a trip to Mexico sometime in the next two years.



# Posted in the General section

Time for more random travel, this time to Phuket, Thailand.

The Setup

Similar to our last random travel, the destination of Phuket came in a round about way. Jules had two weeks off from work, and decided he wanted to go skiing or somewhere tropical. I joined him on the trip to the travel agent - in case his holiday sounded fun enough for me to ride upon his coat tails. When one week in Patong Beach, Phuket was decided upon - I jumped upon the afore-mentioned coat and road along .

Flights

Jules asked if there was any chance we could sit in an exit row seat, for the added leg room, and it was granted. When we finally sat down on the plane - we saw that the exit row seat comes with about two metres of leg room! Coupled with the fact that the third in our row of three seats was unoccupied - I can safely say best flight ever! Oh - and I saw a great Michael Cera movie on the plane, Youth in Revolt. Go and watch it now, I'll wait.

The Resort


The fantastic view from the back of the resort

We stayed at the Impiana Resort & Spa on Patong Beach, and it was fantastic. One of the few resorts that opens directly to Patong beach, it has a fairly upper-class spa and restaurant on-site and the staff were polite and helpful.

We splashed out on the first night and enjoyed a fancy dinner at the award-winning Sala Bua Restaurant. It was a pretty incredible meal, but got a little too romantic of Jules and I when the candlelight came out.


The pretty love-heart shaped rice that Jules and I shared

I was getting a little worried about the room-service bill towards the end. We each had a 2-hour spa massage, our fancy dinner, a few normal meals and around 25 drinks charged to the room. In the end - the bill came to around $200 each - I was expecting far more!

The Locals

On our first day we met two groups of locals that really helped us with suggestions for eateries and night-time activities.

We firstly walked past a Fisho Spa, where little fish nibble on your feet for ex-foliation purposes. The fish-spa was fun, but the girls running the place were quite nice and provided helpful tips on places to eat and shop.


The Fisho Spa

Also on that first day, we decided to have drinks at the Aussie Bar so we could play a few games of pool. The bar staff were quite nice (and not the type of "bar girls" you find in most of the places there) and we ended up drinking and playing pool at Aussie Bar for most night we were in Thailand.


Aussie Bar became our local

Phi Phi Island

We spent a day doing a speed-boat tour of Phi Phi island, which was fun. The weather wasn't perfect but we got to see some amazing islands, and cheeky monkeys. We also played a bit of beach volleyball, which was fun - but reminded me that I hadn't done much exercise lately


We went past some really nice looking islands that would be fun to retire to


At monkey beach the monkeys knew how to get their bananas


The monkeys were cuter before the tour guide told us they all had rabies

Summary

It was a great week, nowhere near as relaxing as I thought it would be - but I had a lot of fun!


Ronald doing a traditional Thai greeting

# Posted in the Travel section and tagged as: Phuket

(geddit? Mashups)

This is awesome! My brother's girlfriend, Carmen posted a link to some amazing Mr. Potato Head designs, made with modelling clay. Another excellent example of how great the Internet is. The Flickr Set is here - but here are some of my favourites:


Bender


Garfield


Yellow!


Another Futurama one - but Zoidberg is great in this one.

# Posted in the General section and tagged as: Web

Jules has a few weeks of annual leave coming up - so wanted to do another random travel experience. After getting approval for a week of leave from my team leader ("Well Joel, I guess I won't stop you - put it that way") I joined him on his trip to Flight Centre in-case his trip sounded like something I'd want to join in on.

His brief to the travel consultant was not incredibly focussed ("I'm thinking of skiing or something tropical") but with a bit of discussion Phuket, Thailand was decided on. It did sound pretty fun - so I also decided to join in on the adventure. So it's a week in Thailand for Jules and I in about three weeks time

# Posted in the Travel section and tagged as: Phuket

When Belinda and I discussed our separation a year ago, our babies (our two dogs and two cats) were an early concern. We decided that Belinda would keep the dogs, and I would keep the cats.

But as it's looking like Belinda will be staying in our current house I've realised that it's unfair to take the cats out of this environment. Belinda works from home, they get Bell's attention all day and have grown to depend on human interaction. They also love the size of this three-bedroom house, constantly running up and down the long hallway.

I'd hope they'd get used to any environment I put them into given enough time - but I love them enough to know they'd be happier here with Bell.

I'll miss my little kitties - but I'll be visiting them at least once a week before basketball games, and Belinda will just have to take more photos of them



# Posted in the General section and tagged as: Pets

I administer a website that is used by high school students in support of their studies. I was looking through the search log tonight and found the following four searches that all occurred within a few seconds of each other:

gentil
genitil
genitals
balls

I sure hope that student found what they were looking for.

# Posted in the General section and tagged as: Funny, Web

The second meal for my vegetarian week is Caramelised Pumpkin Risotto:



Ingredients
Pumpkin, 500 gram
Canola oil, 2 tbsp.
Onion, 1 medium finely diced
Garlic, 3 cloves minced
Arborio rice, 250 gram
Sage, 2 tbsp. chopped
Salt and Pepper to taste
Parmesan, 4 tbsp. shaved

Method
1. Dice 250 gram of the pumpkin into 1cm-wide pieces. Place in a non-stick frypan with 1 tbsp. canola oil and cook over medium to low heat.

2. Periodically toss and continue to cook until the pumpkin is cooked and the outside is darkened. Set aside.

3. Dice the remaining pumpkin into large pieces and cook in 2 cups of simmering water.

4. When tender, puree the pumpkin with the water in which it was cooked. Add more water to bring the total pumpkin liquid to 1 litre.

5. Heat 1 tbsp. oil in a pan, add onion and garlic. Sweat for 30 seconds and add rice.

6. Toss for 1 minute and add 1 cup of pumpkin puree. Cook over a low heat.

7. As the liquid is absorbed, add another cup. Stir constantly and keep adding pumpkin stock as necessary.

8. After 25 minutes, the risotto will be cooked. Remove from the heat and toss the diced caramelised pumpkin and sage through.

9. Season with salt and pepper and serve with shaved parmesan.

# Posted in the General section and tagged as: Recipe

The final item on my 10 things for 2010 list is to be vegetarian for a week (well, from Monday breakfast to Friday lunch). I've left this one until last because it was the one I was least looking forward to. But the friend that came up with the 10 things list also gave me a few recipes, which is only fair after all. The first of which is Malaysian Vegetable Curry:



Ingredients
Red Thai chilies, 2 chopped coarsely
Fresh ginger, 2 tsp. grated
Garlic, 3 cloves quartered
Coriander root, 1/2 cup loosely packed coarsely cut
Ground turmeric, 1/2 tsp.
Ground cinnamon, 1/2 tsp.
Ground cumin, 3 tsp.
Coriander seeds, 1 tsp. crushed
Whole peeled tomatoes, 1 can (400 gram)
Coconut milk, 1 can (400 gram)
Kaffir lime leaves, 6 leaves shredded finely (I just used lime juice)
Palm sugar, 25 gram shaved (I used dark brown sugar)
Pumpkin, 2 1/2 cups chopped coarsely
Potatoes, 3 medium (600 gram) chopped coarsely
Green beans, 200 gram chopped coarsely

Method
1. Blend or process chili, ginger, garlic, coriander root, spices and seeds until smooth.

2. Add undrained tomatoes, process for 1 minute or until tomato mixture is well combined.

3. Transfer tomato mixture to medium saucepan. Add coconut milk, leaves and sugar and bring to the boil.

4. Reduce heat, simmer tomato and coconut mixture uncovered for 5 minutes.

5. Add pumpkin and potato and cook, covered, for about 10 minutes or until just tender.

6. Add beans and cook for 3 minutes or until tender.

Serve with brown rice and roti.


# Posted in the General section and tagged as: Recipe

This past Easter weekend, a friend and I decided to spend the weekend in Malaysia. This is our story:

The Setup

Last Wednesday I was at farewell drinks for a co-worker, I was chatting with other work mates about living life and being spontaneous. How I should stop waiting around for things to happen (like when I can afford to travel overseas, etc) and live life for the now.

The next day, we were having a few drinks at my manager's apartment (notice a pattern?) and I was still thinking on that theme. I had two more items to go on my 10 things list, and decided to knock one of them off. I then pronounced "I'm going to Singapore this weekend!"

Everyone was positive towards my idea (everyone was drinking), and I eventually realised that I'd prefer to go to Tokyo. Julian decided that he liked the way I was thinking - and said he'd join me. So I left the night early to go home and plan an impromptu Japanese holiday. As pretty much all flights to Tokyo were booked out for the next two days - we settled on Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia as our destination. We also decided that staying in a backpackers hostel would be a different experience, so we booked a few rooms at the Green Hut Lodge.

Everything was booked on the Thursday night - and we left for the airport Friday night to get into KL around 6am Saturday morning.

Arrival

When we first arrived at the hostel, we questioned our accommodation choice immediately. We went for a quick walk and saw the penthouse suite at the hotel across the street was only around $140 a night. While on our walk we also saw a heap of 7-11s, and heard a heap of car horns. I guess we looked weak-legged - as 75% of the taxis passing us would honk their horn and yell "Taxi!" out of their windows at us. We'd heard enough about dodgy taxis to remain pedestrians.

When we got back from our walk we decided to stick with our hostel for the first night - and upgrade the next night if needed.


I really don't understand the colour scheme for this room - maybe it's better I don't


The room could only just fit the bed, but the air-con worked and it was pretty clean

City Walk

We decided to go for a walk around the city, and went on a treasure hunt in a local shopping pavilion (just try to find some chalk in a very high-class shopping centre). Outside the pavilion there was a guy with a "Free Hugs" sign that I couldn't resist, but I was surprised to hear that I was the first person that took him up on his offer that day.

We had a look at the Petronas Twin Towers, checked out the monorail, drank some American-style root beer floats and ate a genuine KL lunch.


He wasn't that bad a hugger to be honest


The Milo nuggets are what I wish our Milo Bars resembled!


Our Malaysian lunch, very nice


Mono-d'oh!


The Petronas Towers. Tickets are free - and you can go at any time you'd like - but you need to line up from 7am to get the ticket.


Not Malaysian at all - but I love my root beer floats!


Almost more than motorcycles, Malaysians love their high-priced watches

Batu Caves

Although not too enthused - we decided to check out the local Batu Caves, mainly drawn to the promise of monkeys. We had great difficulty finding the bus to get us there (buses in KL don't actually run to a published schedule), then the bus took ages to reach the destination.

But when we finally arrived - I was so happy we decided to make the trip - the place was beautiful. Firstly, it was hard to not notice the giant statue of Murugan - but it was the cheeky monkeys that I enjoyed the most. They were running around everywhere, stealing food off tourists and climbing everything. The inside of the cave was pretty impressive as well, although a bit of a shame that people had scratched their names in the walls.


Even the giant statue of Murugan would struggle climbing all of these steps


The inside of the caves, really pretty!


"Milo the Monkey" stole my empty drink container


... and immediately dropped it when he discovered it was empty


Monkey on a post

Dinner

Dinner on day 1 was a huge highlight for me. We decided to eat at one of the street restaurants, and it was amazingly good food for the price we paid. It was also a thrill to see half the road blocked by the tables and chairs of the restaurants.


It must have taken a long time to drive down this street when dinner was on


Jaz, a local beer, was cheap and went down smooth


Sambal rice and chicken ginger, onion - very nice - and no annoying side effects

Night Time

We went for a few beverages at one of the local tourist bars. It started a little slow, but around 11pm or so the bars really started filling up. We weren't taking advantage of the cheap Malaysian beer, drinking a "fresh" German brew - Starkers. Because it needs to be drunken within 7 days there's no preservatives and apparently reduces the chance of hangovers (apparently).


The beer comes in it's own keg and is tapped onsite. Pretty classy, and the fact that the beer is served by a Japanese waitress in a German uniform classed it up some more

The night was pretty hilarious but we didn't get ourselves into any trouble, which I was happy with. Getting home around 3 am (having about 2 hours sleep in the past two days) we both slept for about 12 hours straight.

Day 2

Day 2 was pretty tame by Day 1 standards. We still had some fun, visited the KLTower, had an incredible meal at an Indian restaurant and had some drinks sitting outside the hostel for the end of the night. We decided that the hostel was actually pretty good as part of our whole experience. Cheap and clean was the motto - and they were true to their word.

Summary

Malay words learnt: 1 (restoran - pretty obvious)
Souvenirs bought: 0
Fun had: plenty

More Photos
Here are some more photos from Julian's camera


My free hug.


Getting towards the end of a long day


The German-attired girl serving us booze


We said hello to some random Belarus chick

# Posted in the Travel section and tagged as: Kuala Lumpur

The green light has been given for my favourite book series to be turned into a HBO drama. Considering how much I loved Rome, The Wire, Flight of the Conchords, etc, etc - I'm excited!

Here's the announcement from the author.

# Posted in the General section and tagged as: Books

Was stopping the mysql service on my laptop when I had an idea for a xkcd-style comic:


Alt Text: sc interrogate ex_girlfriends offers no hints either

Super geeky, crudely copied from a previous xkcd strip, and not very amusing - but it made me chuckle. A little bit.

# Posted in the General section and tagged as: Web

I decided to enter the 2010 Run for the Kids 14.6 km event, and will probably stuff up my knees again. But I'm racing a friend from work - so it shouldn't be all bad.

How about you donate some money to sponsor me? Or don't.

# Posted in the General section and tagged as: Running

That's right - I knocked off items 2, 3 and 9 from my 10 things for 2010 list.

Feta and Sushi have been eaten (not as bad as I remember them), and I feel I'm now ambi-jock-drous.

That's 5 items out of the 10 down, half-way there. But it also means I'm running out of the easy wins (or low-hanging fruit as managers like to say).

# Posted in the General section and tagged as: 10 in '10

I'm flying through my 10 things for '10 list, wearing a hat at number 8 has now been crossed off.

As part of my birthday outing, Bell and I went shopping for some clothes for me. Firstly - it's brilliant to have jeans that don't require a belt to prevent panty flashing. I also made sure we added a hat to the shopping trolley, and I'm now the proud owner of a pinstripe fedora.


Proud owner might be too much. Maybe a resigned owner

To be honest - it's clearly not something I would normally wear - but I guess that's the point of my list. I got a bit of crap for wearing it - but I actually didn't mind the look of it, especially when I have it at the rakish angle that Bell taught me.

So that's two down, only eight items to go. Too easy!

# Posted in the General section and tagged as: 10 in '10

Well - number 1 has been successfully crossed off from my 10 things list.

I really loved the Chai Latte - but don't think I'd have it often with all that sugar and milk. When I tried a normal Chai (sans milk and sugar) yesterday I still really enjoyed it. I love cinnamon - so I don't know why I never gave Chai a try before.

I've also started some of my longer term items such as getting more sun and boxers or briefs - but I'm not ready to cross them off yet.

Wonder how long I can maintain this pace

# Posted in the General section and tagged as: 10 in '10

At work I'm often accused of resembling a grumpy old man. It's partly because I don't like many other people (they generally shit me), and partly because I'm very resistant to change. An example of this is that I eat the same meal every night, because it's easier to prepare one large batch each Saturday. (I personally believe I'm just sacrificing variety to gain ease, price and healthiness).

So to expand my horizons and teach me that change is not always bad, a list of 10 new things were drawn up for me (and neatly laminated). The intention is that I will slowly try these 10 new things in 2010. Here's the list:

Things To Eat

1. Chai Tea / Chai Latte

Chai - apparently Chai means tea, so Chai Tea is like saying PIN Number or My Cute Ragdolls

I don't drink tea or coffee, so we thought Chai would be a good start. I've actually almost achieved this one already, as in the afternoon I tried a Chai Latte. It may have something to do with the copious amount of sugar - but I really liked it, I'm looking forward to a proper Chai.

2. Sushi

Knitted sushi

I'm not too happy about this one. I've been told I don't have to try the crazy raw-fish sushi, but my main problem with sushi is the seaweed. I really dislike the taste. But who knows, my taste buds may have changed in the last few years so I'll give it a go.

3. Feta

Is feta better? No whey!

I'd really like to enjoy this new thing - as I absolutely love cheese. Cheese is right up there with onion as my co-favourite edible ingredients. I like pretty much every type of cheese I've tried. Some I like more than others - but I've often said that cheese will improve most meals.

My problem with feta is illustrated by the above image. At the deli, the feta is sitting in water. Apparently the water is actually whey, but I just don't enjoy seeing my cheese sitting in a water-like liquid. I think after I try it - I'll quite like feta.

4. Vegetarian

Thankfully it's only for a week

Another one I don't really agree with - I'm going to be vegetarian for most of one week (Monday breakfast to Friday breakfast inclusive). It's supposed to show me that meals aren't necessarily bad without meat - but I assume it will prove the opposite. I predict a lot of canned baked beans during that week.

Things To Do

5. Get more sun

Sunbathing Turtles

It is no secret that I am a very pasty-white individual, most of my family is. Our mixed-basketball team's name of The Clag-Eaters is a reference to this. So one of the list's contributers thought that 10 minutes of sun, three days a week for a month would be a benefit for me.

I predict I'll fry within a week.

6. Take Drum Lessons


I kinda snuck this one in - as I've been wanting to learn the drums for a long time now. Once I sell the house, one of my first purchases will be a drum kit and drum lessons. Surely my countless hours at Rock Band has made me a rock god by now!

7. Overseas Trip

U R Gay [tee hee]

Another one I'm not too upset about - who doesn't want to go on a holiday. The idea behind this one is that I'm not allowed to go to the US or Canada - I need to step outside of my comfort zone. I would like to visit some Asian countries - or maybe Europe. Another one that needs to wait until the house is sold.

Things To Wear

8. Hat

The awesomeness is clear

I've lost around 15 to 20 kilos over the last 6 months - so most of my clothes don't fit me anymore. I've been planning on doing a big shop soon to re-stock my wardrobe, and maybe trying to buy clothes that the young people might call trendy. Part of this effort would include buying a hat that is not a baseball cap. But probably not a knitted mustache hat either.

9. Boxers or Briefs?

Nice!

My little sister bought me a crazy pair of novelty Domo Kun jocks, all brown with Domo's unmistakable mouth in the crotchal region. I thought they were hilarious, but I've worn boxers exclusively since I started high school.

Boxers or Briefs is my attempt to become ambi-jock-drous (i.e. wear either boxers or briefs, as the situation requires).

10. Sandals

Eww!

Thongs disgust me. I do not own a single pair of thongs, and I do not remember ever owning thongs. I may have had some when I was too young to know better - but I hope not. I think it's mainly the rubber thing going between the toes that offends me. And as far as footwear goes, thongs are quite dangerous.

When it gets hot - I still wear my normal shoes which can get uncomfortable. I would not budge on the thong issue - but I did agree to give sandals a try.

Hopefully I'll achieve all 10 new things in 2010 - there shouldn't be too much holding me back. It would be a good result if I found a few extra things I could enjoy in life - but I'm not holding my breath!

# Posted in the General section and tagged as: 10 in '10

With the most recent New Year ticking us over to the year 2010 - it made me think back to the millennium (hard to believe it was 10 years ago).

This made me remember a pair of Coke bottle I've kept since the year 2000 - pictured below:


Party into 2000 - and beyond!

I had a quick look on the Intertubes and found a site that was selling these bottles for $50 each, although the site is currently "Account Suspended" if you don't view it through the wayback machine.

Thinking I'm sitting on a gold mine here I took some photos and went straight to eBay. During the sale listing process it shows you some similar items, which is where I saw the exact same bottle as mine being sold a few months earlier. For $18.95.

Thinking about it now - I wonder if it's worth going through the hassle of listing, selling, packing and sending of the bottles even if I was going to score $50.

Maybe I'll just wait until 2020.


That's genuine 2000-vintage Coca Cola in that bottle!

# Posted in the General section

The Internet doth provide. Literal Music Videos are classic video clips re-dubbed with more literal lyrics. Here are my favourite examples:

Take on Me


Total Eclipse of the Heart


# Posted in the General section and tagged as: Funny, Web

I had never been to a live music show. No concerts, no festivals, no high school recitals. I never had the cash in high school - which is when I wanted to go to The Offspring, The Chili Peppers, Foo Fighters, etc. When I started to earn enough money to afford such events, I started to feel like the first concert I went to would need to be worth the wait. So I just never went to anything (stupid, I know).

Green Day postponed their second Melbourne show, which had been planned for Tuesday. I had nothing on Wednesday night - so I thought I'd try to get tickets. Fortunately, someone had just returned their front-row lower seating tickets before I got to the ticket office - and my first concert was planned.


The slightly off-yellow tickets

Jet was the support act - and I was pretty happy to be able to see them live. Cold Hard Bitch sounded great and it was good to hear Look What You've Done again. For some reason about 5 male strippers joined the band for Are You Going To Be My Girl. I guess there was a fair few women in the audience - but it just seemed weird.


This is Jet - just take my word for it

Then, before too much waiting, Green Day took the stage. I really did pick a great act for my first live show. They played for two and a half hours pretty much non-stop. The set list was incredible. They played seven songs from 21st Century Breakdown, a good number from American Idiot, Minority, a few from Nimrod (Hitchin' A Ride was awesome), a few from Insomniac and most of their hits from Dookie. A kid was pulled out of the audience to sing Longview. While it would have been good to hear Billie Joe sing it - it was great to see how happy the kid was to sing with Green Day backing him. He did pretty well too, pacing the stage and pointing to the crowd at times.

It was an amazing show and the 150+ minutes just flew by. It's done two things to me. Made me want to buy a drum kit and graduate from Rock Band, and see many more live acts in 2010. Here's hoping Daft Punk tours again soon. Or Boston decides to visit Australia.


Green Day - A surprisingly good picture - considering it was taken from my phone


# Posted in the General section and tagged as: Music

I was planning on running in the 15km Great Australian Run today. I did a 5km 4km run about 6 weeks ago and loved it - so trained up for the 15 km.

I certainly had preparation covered last night. Laid out my clothes, pre-pinned my race number, packed a bag with toilet paper, band-aids, drinks etc and pre-attached my registered baggage tag. I analysed three potential methods of travel and decided on a primary and backup strategy (train / tram or car if I slept in). I then went to bed for an early night.

Of course, I slept through an hour and 45 minutes of my alarm and had almost no chance of making it to the race. Bell offered to try to drive me in - and I accepted - knowing it was probably too late.

I skipped my shower, breakfast and my morning good-luck toilet stop. Somehow we made it into the city in under an hour, and after dropping off my bag just made it to the starting area with one minute to spare. No time for a proper warm up - I just had enough time to remove a stone from my runners. But I was happy the last six weeks of prep wouldn't go to waste.

I actually felt really good over the first 5-7 kilometers, until my knee started to act up. As I've been training for this my left knee has been getting progressively worse - and today it was very sore. Had it not been the big race - I probably wouldn't have kept going. But I wanted that medal!

I suffered through the knee pain, the cramps and the rain, and I eventually crossed the finish line. The last 500 meters felt great, but as soon as I cooled down again I had great trouble walking. I think this is my last run for a few months!


It looks like my sore knee was also affecting my times - or I just got too tired after the first 5 kilometers


I like the yellow ribbon, stylish!

The run would be the 14.1 km Run 4 The Kids, which I'm certainly starting to second guess.

# Posted in the General section and tagged as: Running

About two months ago, I had been going to the gym for a few weeks and started to really enjoy the treadmill work I was doing. So, of course, I went too far ahead of myself and said to Bell "I want to complete a marathon before I turn 30". This was partly because I think running a marathon is a good bucket list goal - and partly because of Hamish Blake's effort.

So I signed up for the 5km event of this year's Melbourne Marathon. I chose the 5km distance because I was still new to running - and just wanted to see how much harder running would be when not on a treadmill. Over the last few months I've found that 5km isn't that long - and I predicted I'd finish the race in around 30 minutes, maybe 25.

The race started a little annoyingly - I was so far back at the starting line - I just stood there for a full minute while the long line ahead of us got started. But when I got running it was great fun! The weather was excellent - and spectators were littered around the course offering encouragement.

By far the most enjoyable part of the race was the final 800 meters - a semi-lap of the MCG. Running in through Gate 3 of the 'G to apparently 10,000 people sporadically cheering was amazing. Sure - most of them were there for the proper runners (half and full marathons) - it still felt pretty good.

After the finish we all received a participation medal. Sure, it sounds like "everyone gets a medal day" - but it was a really nice quality prize. In roller hockey, I've won grand finals, team and league MVPs and various other sporting trophies - and none have looked as nice as my 5km participation medal. The longer distance ones looked much nicer too!


My bling

I had a look at the online results - and I actually finished in 19 minutes and 51 seconds. I'm pretty surprised at that - it's an average of 15 km/h - I guess I've been slacking off when on the treadmill. My official position is 400th (out of around 4,000) - but my net time (i.e. discounting the time it took me to get to the start line) puts me around 300th. I'm pretty happy with that - especially for my first race.


My Results

In the end - I wish I had have run the 10km race. 5km isn't enough to see if I have the right kind of endurance to get a full or even half marathon. I'm going to give the 15km Run For The Kids a go next March - should be a better challenge.

To top it off - our mixed basketball team won our first non-grading game by 38 points tonight. I scored 12 points - meaning I wasn't allowed to score anymore. The "can't score more than 12 rule" is one that I thought would never need to be applied to me during a game. Perhaps I should go for a 5km run each morning before basketball!

# Posted in the General section and tagged as: Basketball, Running

I love funny cat videos, and this one is pretty good:



On the site a caption says "This cat successfully figures out the least efficient way to drink from a faucet" which pretty much sums it up. Still - you can't say it's stupid - he does get a lot of water.

http://www.break.com/index/dumb-cat-cant-figure-out-how-to-d rink.html

# Posted in the General section and tagged as: Funny, Web

I went to see a District 9 at the movies last night and it was pretty awesome! Go and see it.

I really hope they are already working on a sequel!

# Posted in the General section and tagged as: Movies