Month: October 2007

New Poll: Let’s settle this Catch-22 business once and for all. I couldn’t help noticing that its only defender in the previous discussion was male. Is this is a gendered book? Vote down there on the right and give me your opinion.

The Blog of Unnecessary Quotation Marks. HA!

“How the moustache won an empire.” (Link, of course, courtesy of the Snook.)

Ooh, the Apple Store Sydney looks like it’s going to be amazing! Now I just have to decide whether I’m still dorky enough to camp out for the opening.

Bah. I was all excited about NaNoReMo until he announced the chosen book: Catch-22. I HATE Catch-22. I had to read it in college and I swear I had to restart it about six times before I could muster the interest to plow through to the end. I guess I’ll sit this one out. (Besides, I’m in the middle of Middlesex and I’m loving it. Thanks again for the recommendation!)

Rock on, Dear Abby.

There’s a major sh*tfight going on in the Ravelry forums today, and I’ve been watching with interest. It’s about privacy and the expectations people have when they join a social site. The owners basically announced that (as many of us hoped) once the site is out of beta, anyone will be able to visit the site and view your projects, stash, etc. You’ll still have to join in order to get your own Notebook, leave comments, send messages, or post in the forums. Fair enough. (This is exactly how Metafilter works.) The outcry is coming from folks who’ve contributed to groups and forums that they’d rather not be associated with their username (such as atheists, gays, etc.). I don’t get this. Who on the Internet still doesn’t know that you NEVER post anything in the expectation it will be private? It boggles the mind. And I don’t get their insistence that making the site password-protected will matter. Once they open sign-ups, anybody that wants to can join and “stalk” you that way. So what’s the point? *sigh* I’m just glad that Cassidy and Jess aren’t turning Ravelry into livejournal or Facebook. Down with closed communities!

Pumpkin Brownies. I finally got my Baker’s Edge pan, and this looks like a good recipe to try out!

From the NSW Office of Fair Trading:

Exchanging sale contracts is the legal part of buying a home. Before exchange, the agreement is usually just verbal and not binding. Up until you exchange contracts either you or the vendor have the right to change your minds.

In other words, once you’ve exchanged, it’s all locked in. AND WE’VE JUST EXCHANGED! Man, buying a house is a pretty glacial and frustrating process. We’ve had to wait two weeks just for one bank to fax a piece of paper to another bank. But we’ve just gotten confirmation that we’re locked in, and the house is definitely going to be ours. I suppose this means that we can stop being so cagey about its location… RIGHT NEXT DOOR to our current apartment. Ha! Easiest. Move. Ever.

So now we just have to wait for settlement. Default is six weeks, but we’re hoping to get it pushed through faster so we can move in sooner. Special thanks to Andrew and Fiona for their advice regarding buying into a strata building. Stay tuned for the housewarming party…!

Needless to say, I’m watching this Google court case pretty closely.