blueswirls wordpress theme
The theme this website is based on is called greymonger and it is released under the GPL- this means that anyone can play with it and modify the code. It also means that the code of the modification must also be released under the GPL licence.
The CSS, XHTML and design is released under GPL:
http://www.opensource.org/licenses/gpl-license.php
So here you go, the theme I use. It’s simply an archive of the theme folder, with the images slightly modified.
blueswirls.tar.gz This is just the theme folder, not the full website.
(update: 28 July 2009) Perhaps the best way to license this theme is under the Creative Commons “share alike” license.
big scary due things
So, it’s week 8. Around this point you can count on one hand how many weeks are left till the end of semester (5) and the assignments are starting to loom on the horizon. I thought I’d write them down here so I can get my head around them all.
- Algorithms and Data Structures:
- Prac every other week requiring about 4 hours of work.
- Final Exam on the 16th of June (this is a little ways away, I’m not so concerned about it.)
- Technical Documentation for Engineers:
- Assignment 4 due 15th May.
- Assignment 5 due 29th May.
- Final (Prac) exam 1st of June.
- English, Children’s Literature:
-
Test on Friday (1st May).went well.
- Artemis Fowl and The Book Thief left to read.
- 2,000 word Essay due 5th of June.
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- Spanish, Discourse Analysis:
- Tutorial every week requiring reading and proper preparation.
- Oral presentation in the last few weeks.
- Test 21 May.
- Final essay due 5th of June.
On top of this add Girls Brigade, family life + home renovations, and a social life… I’m going to be very busy!
So, Spanish-English-Algorithms-TechDocs-Algorithms-Spanish-English-TechDocs-Algorithms-Spanish-English-TechDocs-English-Spanish-TechDocs-English-Spanish-Algorithms looks like the general “work on this next” pattern.
I had a transport filled day today. I got a lift with my Dad (in my car) to the Railway Station, caught the train, then the bus to uni. Caught the bus to a different train station after uni, caught the train into Zone 1, got off, bought a ticket for Zone 1 (I have a month-long zone 2 ticket), caught the next train, attempted to catch a city loop train at Richmond Station. After the doors closed I realised I should have stayed on that train. Changed platforms and caught the next Flinders Street train. Changed at Flinders Street and caught the train to Melbourne Central. Met up with my family, rode in their car to dinner and home again. Wow!
If you’ve read down this far, my host is changing server set-up, so this is advance notice that I will soon be locking down this site in preparation for the transition. I’ll post again to inform everyone.
music to study to
I have recently bought an album of music that I am really enjoying. It is called Cardio Classics and I bought it from iTunes. At first I thought the cover image was the ribs of a skeleton, tastefully covered with a black bow tie bikini, due to my association of cardio being heart. Of course, it’s really a white running shoe, with a black bow tie to indicate the snazzy dress of an orchestra. (Cardio meaning heart-rate, obviously.)
![[ album cover of Cardio Classics ]](cardio.jpg)
Advertising and its effect on me interests me. The reason I bought the album is the fault of one song- O Fortuna from Carmina Burana. The first time I heard this song completely, I was in the UK watching The Last Choir Standing on the BBC. One of the competing choirs, of welsh high schoolers, called Ysgol Glanaethwy sang this song. Since then it has been in my head. On a shopping trip, I heard part of the song playing in the ABC shop, and decided to look it up. First I found it on YouTube, then looked it up on iTunes. I liked the sound of it, and bought it. It sounded so good I bought the album. I don’t recollect seeing the ads around much, and definitely don’t remember thinking “oh yes, must buy today” on seeing the adverts. It weirds me out a little to see that the ABC shop had a big factor in my decision to purchase this product, by playing the CD in one of their stores that I happened to be passing.
I’m very happy with this mix of up beat classical tunes- I particularly like Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro: Overture and Vivaldi’s Gloria In D, RV589: Gloria In Excelsis Deo. There are also “fun” songs as well, such as Flight of the Bumble Bee and an excerpt from the William Tell Overture. There are some intense serious songs, like the afore-mentioned O Fortuna and parts of Dies Irae. I suppose that someone who listens to more classical music than I do and has earned the “expert” hat might sniff at all the excerpts, there are no lengthy 10 minute complete compositions on this CD. I like it though. I like how mostly (if not all) Australian Orchestras are featured. I like how it is good as background study music that won’t put me to sleep. I like that it feels academic- more academic than some of my other music anyway.
I know this reads a bit like a review, but I’m not being paid in anyway by the ABC- I’m just very happy with this Album. More information from the ABC online website.
bushfires
A week on from the tragic bush fires, I have finally sat down to write about them. Though no one I know closely has been affected by the fires, we have seen and smelt the smoke, heard many sirens and seen helicopters, the fires at one point were not too far away. On the Saturday, we sweltered through the heat- listening to the radio as the various threat messages flooded in. I started following our Local Radio Station on twitter: 774melbourne. This meant that I had updates continually popping up on my screen. I have been checking the google map of the fires- seeing where they are and tracking the changes.
I have been feeling numb, watching the incredible devastation on TV, seeing the death toll rise every half hour to the terrible figure of 181, 80 still missing- the sadness yet numbness is real. Then I think of the people who actually were in the firestorm. My numbness, my emotion, is nothing compared to theirs. I still feel for them though. While this horrible tragedy unfolds in the hills and country side around my city, Melbourne, life goes on. This is surreal. We still have Doctors appointments, rubbish to put out, and the regular schedule of life. Surreal. Ash falls on our deck. And life goes on.
book list semester 1 2009
I’m taking ENH3991 – Children’s literature: A comparative study at Monash University this year. (This is the third year version of ENH2991, which is the same, but for 2nd year students.) I have managed to get the book-list from a friend of mine who emailed the professor. I thought I’d publish it here so I wouldn’t lose it, and also just in case anyone else was looking for it. Of course, this information might change, I am in no way an authority on the way the course is run, and it will most likely be different for 2010. So, here it is, the 2009 Children’s Literature book list.
![[ readingnook ]](http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3080/3256807199_2fc4e5520d_m.jpg)
- Mark Twain, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
- Louisa May Alcott, Little Women
- Terry Pratchett, The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents
- Maurice Sendak, Where the Wild Things Are
- Neil Gaiman/Dave McKean, The Wolves in the Walls
- Mem Fox/Julie Vivas, Possum Magic
- John Marsden/Shaun Tan, The Rabbits
- J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
- Eoin Colfer, Artemis Fowl (novel or graphic novel)
- Markus Zusak, The Book Thief
Of those, I have already read: Huckleberry Finn, Little Women, Where the Wild Things Are, and Possum Magic. I have heard of most of them, though I hadn’t heard of The Book Thief, or The Rabbits before.
I’m looking forward to reading these books very much. I’m not looking forward to the 3750 word essay that is worth 80% of my mark, considering:
3rd year students are required to demonstrate greater levels of theoretical reflection and analysis in their written work than students studying at 2nd year level.
oh dear! I’m resolved to be serious this year though and get a good jump on my assignments, and definitely not write them at the last minute. I might still be polishing them the night before, but not starting them then.
I’ve found Goodreads to be a fun way to record what I’m reading, another online tool I’ve found is Project Gutenberg, which is great if you want to read old, copyright expired books. Not so great for the newer stuff, but the library should be able to help there. I know that Little Women and Huckleberry Finn are freely available (according to USA copyright laws, check your locality… yadda yadda- Australia now follows the US model of copyright according to a recentish trade agreement. [source].)
I like reading. I know that some of the people that read this blog do too- what are you reading? What are you excited to be reading next? Anyone else doing English?
busyness
So, this week I’m going to be working on a program called urban summer, so won’t have a lot of time to update my website. On the upside, if you are in the area, come swing by the cafe, it will be fun! Facebook event for the cafe.
my degree, how it works. MISSING TEXT
I’m studying towards a double degree. Arts, and Computer Science.
The Arts one is made up of a Major (8 subjects) a Minor (4 subjects) a first year sequence (2 subjects) and two other random subjects- random because Computer Science stole one of them. “Ethics in the work place” etc. are my options there. The Computer Science is made up of a stack of core subjects and a few electives at second and third year level.
I have a minimum of four years, maximum of ten to finish my course, so I’m not worried about fitting it all in- I have plenty of time.
My year is made up of two semesters. I take 4 subjects each semester, two each from Arts and Computer Science. A first year sequence is a first semester class and a second semester class from the same subject. A minor is a first year sequence, plus two other subjects at second year level. A major is 8 units- a minor plus others.
green house gas = pollution?
The top green house gasses are: water vapour, Carbon Dioxide (CO2), Methane (CH4), and Ozone(O3. Besides Ozone, which is blueish, they are all colourless.
This, however, doesn’t make for very entertaining television. The television news delights in showing smog enshrouded high rise buildings, while shouting headlines of climate change, doom and gloom. Climate change is the new issue, global warming the new enemy- but our knowledge is outdated. What we are talking about is pollution.
There is a car advertisement that goes a bit like this:
What if the air was clean again? Would the grass be greener? Would you breathe easier, feel younger, live longer, feel better? What if every car was like the X with reduced green house emissions.
Pollution is adding pollutants; dirty, unhelpful, poisonous things to the natural environment, the air, the water, the soil. I seem to remember the anti pollution movement being big in the National Geographic Magazines I used to flip through as a kid. Athenian marble is coated in black soot- causing the ban of some cars on certain days. Asian cities, with people wearing masks. Smog. Fish floating in poisoned rivers.
It’s all very visible, obviously negative, but people have adopted the new buzzword- global warming.
Global warming and climate change are inadvertently becoming phrases to describe any environmental damage. This reduces the effectiveness of an already name-calling debate. Pollution is a problem- we need to deal with it. Global warming is a different issue. We need to deal with that too.
bad spelling and texting: is there a link?
“My Daughter’s such a bad speller! You look at what she writes, and it’s all text speak!” That’s a paraphrase of what I heard someone say at a social gathering. Even though “text speak” is similar to bad spelling, excessive texting does not cause bad spelling. Text speak has arisen out of necessity- the character limiting technology of the mobile phones. Text speak is not lazy- there is an art to learning how to put the right numbers and symbols in the right places. If used correctly, mobiles can in fact encourage better spelling.
Mobile/Cell phones (and more commonly the older models) restrict messages to a fixed number of characters. This is actually quite a small number, and this limitation forces the user to
- develop haiku-like skills
- spend extra money on multiple messages, at one thought per message
- lose extra characters (like vowells)
This is simple business sense- it costs the network to send messages, but they want to make them as cheap and convenient for you to use- so they make you do lots. Space is limited in a text message, and is partially responsible for words like R for are, U for you, etc.
However, there is still a conscious decision being made here- you aren’t trying to type something the right way and guffing up a couple of letters: you know that you are choosing the misspelling for space/less keys to press. Text speak isn’t l33t (leet) speak, but they are similar.
magic page changes
I’d like you to visit a webpage: Go on, click on it, open it in this window, don’t new tab it.
Well look at that! Right back here, reading this article. (Of course, if you haven’t read this till some time after it was written, you’ll be back at the front page.)
That little technique is quite useful when you don’t want other people to put up websites with names similar to yours with other material that people might associate to you with negative results.
It’s not magic, just a simple html tag.
<meta content=”5; url=http://www.creativehedgehog.com” http-equiv=”Refresh”/>
put it before your </head> tag. The content is the number of seconds to delay, and the url is the one you want to forward it to. Note that the the url is within the content parameter.