The Wairoa Loop Track

As part of our regular ZeeClub events, we went and did the The Wairoa Loop Track. The Wairoa Loop Track is situated just south of Hunua Falls in the Wairoa Valley. This walk will be a mix of open air country, walking an historic road, and a very scenic mild trek through forest dominated by tall kanuaka and tanekaha trees clothing the landscape in attractive mottled bark.

We met at the beginning of the track at around 10:30am this morning. The total distance of the walk is 6.5km with an estimated walking time of three hours. The grade is described as Easy to Moderate. The track begins at the park at the end of Otau Valley Road. Some of the ZeeClub members met at work while Anisha and I came by car directly. I put the location in my GPS and found it without issue.

I have to say that the first part of the trip was hard-going. It was a steep incline going up the hill. I must have been dehydrated. I had not drunk anything before the walk. I was much better after having some of the bottled water that we brought.

During the trip we stopped at the lookout that overlooks the Wairoa Dam and reservoir. The view was fantastic as you can see in the attached photos!

After the walk back, we had a BBQ with a variety of food including Sausages, Chicken etc. Anisha had made a selection of muffins which we shared with the group.

Afterwards, I dropped Anisha off home. Nigel came over and we had several games of Command & Conquer: Generals.


Video: The Wairoa Loop Track - The BBQ

Useless Information: The sound made by the Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe is so loud that it can be heard 40 miles away.

An after work dinner with friends

Anisha and I went to the food court at the Force Entertainment Centre for dinner (The Sky City movie place on Queen Street) with Jolene and JR. I didn't have the butter chicken my mum complained Ive been having too much off. I had a Chicken combo (Leg of Chicken with Chips and Salad), which was probably just as bad or even worse. All the food in that food court is unhealthy crap.

At dinner I saw Jared that I worked with when I contracted with Peace Software. I gave him my private cellphone number and business card. He was in a rush for one reason or another. JR is on Myspace, Bebo, and Facebook. Jolene is on Facebook. I should make sure that I add them. JR dropped Anisha and I back to my car, and I dropped Anisha off home.

I was lucky as hell I didn't get pulled over by a cop on the way home. I was driving at 80km in the 50km zone on Allens Road (Off Highbrook Drive). Cop car came past me, switched his siren and lights on, but didn't pull me over. I felt completely naked without my Radar Detector. I haven't had it affixed for some time because of its inconvenience and risk of theft.

I also got a chain letter email from Jonathon Side. Not updates about his trip in the USA unfortunately.

In complete contrast to my previous attempts to get Anisha to join Facebook, she only did so tonight after finding out Jolene and JR were on Facebook. Go figure.

Earlier today I pointed my webcam out the window at work. I connected into work via VPN and remoted into my computer when I got home after dinner out. Unfortunately, it was too dark and could not see any image at all.

On the advertising front, I'm Considering ditching the Kontera advertising I run on this blog for three reasons:

- I have earned a total of 28c ($US) since I begun carrying these adverts
- The adverts often fail to load correctly when moused-over
- The advert relevance to the text in my blog is often questionable

At least with Google AdSense I am standing a chance of making some money.

Useless Information: The police of Thailand have been banned from carrying their water guns during the New Year's festival in Bangkok. The reason for this is because of the fear of them taking out their revolver instead of the water gun.

The Weather ruins our Mission Bay plans!

During the day I received a call from Anisha. She wanted to got for a walk in Mission Bay after work and have dinner. Unfortunately, what seems to have been the worst weather in a while did not bless this event. At work, the thunder clapped and the windows shook. This is not weather you wanted to be in. I remembered leaving my umbrella in the car. Fortunately it is a short walk to my car.

In response to the horrendous weather conditions, I suggested we went to Nandos (Silvia Park). Hayden said lets go to Nandos, and it was done. As a spur of the moment thing we went to look at the movies that were on. Nothing that interested me there. Later I was to find out that Anisha wanted to see one of the other movies.

We went to Nandos Silvia Park. I had a basic chicken burger combo. The Nandos burgers never seem to fill me up, so as I have done many time in the past, I went and ordered a second burger. The second burger was no lemon and herb pasting. I went the whole hog and moved up in class to mild Peri-Peri sauce.

Useless Information: Many years ago, a fish was caught that was 33 inches long and seemed to be heavier than it should. When they cut the fish, fishermen found a full of bottle of ale inside it.

The Paradigm shift of Focus

With all the excitement and involvement with building my blog, I have tended to neglect my homepage at http://www.nztechie.com

Tonight I did a tiny bit of work to enhance access to my photo blog. It's actually a workaround to a problem that has existed since I required directory level authentication to access my photo gallery. Now when people open my photo gallery, they will be required to authenticate themselves only once, not twice as they have been forced to up until now.

Useless Information: In 1972, a gorilla by the name of Koko, was taught ASL (American Sign Language) for the deaf. By the year 2,000 the gorilla could understand approximately 2,000 English words.

Skype and Windows Live! Messenger

With the introduction of instant Messaging integration into Zeacom Communications Center, I brought my Veo Webcam and one of my many headsets to work. I installed the camera on my Windows Vista Ultimate computer. Unfortunately, there are no drivers for the Veo Advanced Webcam for Windows Vista, and the Veo website appears to now be defunct.

On insertion of the Veo Advanced Connect installation CD, I am advised that the driver is only compatible with Windows 98, ME, 2000, and XP. Fortunately, I was able to get around this. I used the Windows XP SP2 compatibility mode on the installation application and it installed without a problem. I had a quick video-conference with Jason Roberts over Skype.

Whether video-conferencing with your customers, or with people within your own company becomes commonplace, is yet to be seen. Further integration of Video Conferencing into our application is a future possibility. It would however be encroaching on our friends at Cogent who already have video-conferencing solutions on the market.

In relation to video conferencing, Alex Wilson (Zeacom Installer) has been talking about using this as a tool for use in the field to talk with our support desk. Ive let him know I'm ready for testing, and I'm waiting for a response from him.

I include greater details on how I installed the Veo Advanced Webcam at the following link:

How to install a Veo Advanced Webcam on Windows Vista
http://hayden-tennent.blogspot.com/2008/01/install-veo-advanced-webcam-on-windows.html

Veo Advanced Connect Installation CD-ROM & Bundled Sofware [Version: AdvCntV008-VIM]
Nero Image [Mirror 1] | ISO Image [Mirror 1]

Useless Information: Bill Bowerman, the co-founder of the shoe company Nike, got his first shoe idea after staring at a waffle iron. This gave him the idea of using squared spikes to make the shoes lighter.

International Talk Like a Pirate Day

Today is International Talk Like a Pirate Day. It is a paraodic holiday that was invented by Mark Summers and John Baur in 1995. On Talk Like a Pirate Day, everyone in the world should talk like a pirate. September 19th was selected because it was an easy date to remember, being the birthday of Summers's ex-wife.

The day was popularised by American syndicated humour columnist David Barry in 2002. Baur and Summers had sent a letter to him about the holiday.

Anisha sent me a photo of all her colleagues at Cogent dressed up as pirates. At Zeacom, we wernt so organised, but an excellent effort was made by Blair. He had the eye-patch, dressed in black, and had sword paraphernalia.

Useless Information: In 1926, a waiter in Budapest committed suicide. He left his suicide note in the form of a crossword and the police had to get help from the public to solve it.

The week continues

I know I have been rather slack recently with my posts. Unfortunately, nothing of great significance has happened recently. Today, I will cover the weekend up until today. Lets call it a roll-up update, like the kind you get from Microsoft after you install a new OS.

Going back to Saturday, Anisha and I did a big house cleanup. We have been house sitting mum and dads house for three weeks now. Later that night we went to pick up mum and dad from the Airport. Mum got me some shirts from Ozzy.

I have been tinkering around with Microsoft SBS Server 2003 and ISA server over the weekend too. I finally put the evaluation copies of said applications to use. The installation is complete, but I think I should get a book on complete administration.

Today I received my first issue of M2, The complete lifestyle magazine for the New Zealand Man. This was courtesy of Auntie Carol. I sent her a text message to let her know it arrived and thank her.

Anisha let me know today that on Wednesday it is Talk like a Pirate Day. She told me how she was cutting out eye patches and parrots at work.

Finally, my NOD32 Antivirus subscription expired on the 10th of September, and ive been a lazy bum and have not renewed it yet. I briefly looked at Norton 360, but decided against it in the end. If you believe the Virus Bulletin antivirus reviews, then Eset NOD32 is the cream of the crop. Since owning my first PC, I have only ever had one serious virus incident that I managed to contain effectively.

Useless Information: The children's nursery rhyme, "Sing a Song of Sixpence," was used by members of a pirate ship as a coded message.

Butter Chicken for Dinner

On Thursday I went to Noel Leemings to make use of the voucher from Fly Buys to get my new 5.8ghz Uniden Cordless phone. It doesn't seem to interfere with my wireless security camera like my previous one did. Anyone want to buy a secondhand 2.4gh WDECT Uniden Cordless phone?

We invited Lydia over for dinner. Anisha made some butter chicken, and Lydia bought some pudding and custard for dessert.

Useless Information: A chicken once had its head cut off and survived for over eighteen months, headless.

Anishas Birthday

Today is Anishas Birthday. First thing this morning, I gave her the birthday presents that I had got her. I got Anisha the latest Rihanna CD, a Photo Frame, and a cooking book from Ainsley Harriot. Anisha really likes Snickers bars so I got her a couple two.

She often buys me Tic Tacs when she gets me presents, so I returned the favour somewhat.

I made breakfast in bed for Anisha. I Made some scrambled eggs, with some Hash Browns, and toast and some juice. I had similar, except I swapped out the Hash Browns for Chicken Bacon.

I picked up Anishas birthday cake today. I ordered it last week from Eves Pantry in Botany. An 8 inch Chocolate Mud Cake with "Happy Birthday Anisha" on it cost $NZ38.00. We saw Kim Susmilsh there two. She is in New Zealand for a while.

I took Anisha to the Botany Downs shopping Centre because she wanted to spend $NZ50 on a present for herself. She bought a Cheese Knife and Board, and a Pasta Bowl set from Stevens.

Anisha wanted to invide Alan and Jolene over for dinner, so we are expecting them at around 7pm. I will blog further on that later!

Useless Information: The song "Happy Birthday" brings in about $2 million in licensing revenue to Warner Communications who hold the copyright to the song.

An exoborant amount of Flybuys points

I have 710 Flybuys points at the moment, and I decided to use some of them up (not that any were due to expire or anything). Flybuys are running 'specials' on the number of points required to get a reward at the moment. I decided to go for a Uniden DSS7815 Cordless phone. The phone is a 5.8ghz DSS phone, which should eliminate interference with my 2.4ghz wireless security camera setup. It has a 20% discount on points required to get it at the moment.

I redeemed 610 points. I am due to receive a letter in the mail which I will take to Noel Leemings to get my reward. This is the second time I have redeemed my points. The first one was for a more modest Guinness Book of World Records.

Of other note, I watched Target on TV3 tonight. I was particularly shocked by the dishonest practises of Taxi companies in New Zealand. The Target program had an actor test ten different Taxi companies. The rides should have cost ~NZ$25, however the actor gave the driver NZ$70 and asked if that was enough. Of the ten taxi companies, 6 of the drivers took the money and offered no change.

Remember when I said I saw that guy from Target filming down the road from work? I saw the episode today. It was in relation to a car insurance claim. Refer to post http://pickledhamster.blogspot.com/2007/08/on-target-for-television.html

Useless Information: In 1958, the Crayola crayon colour "Prussian Blue" was changed to "Midnight Blue" by the request of teachers as kids could not relate to Prussian history.

A weekend back at home

This weekend is the first weekend back from our trip to Greymouth. The first week back at work was quite difficult to adjust to, even though it was only three days in length!

Major highlights of this weekend were making homemade pizza and renting out the movie "Miami Vice on DVD". We noticed that the Blockbuster Botany Downs is going through a major internal refit.

We didn't get to see Die Hard this weekend because Anisha wasn't really interested.

Useless Information: Actor Richard Gere was considered to play the role of John McClane in the movie Die Hard. Bruce Willis played the part instead.