seandc

I remember doing the time-warp...

The last few days it's been feeling like a couple of hours have just vanished - I hardly felt like I've done anything at all, and suddenly it's an hour later than it "feels". Guess I just freaked out a bit at having so much to do and no time to do it - I spent the last week at work manning the library all on my lonesome. No one to ask about stuff, and no choice but to take every call myself (especially when I'm covering the other desk as well). The others are back now, at least, so I can leave at least some calls. Now if I can remind people that they don't need to leave everything on my desk...

Sorry I've been so tardy in replying to comments and posts. I just haven't been able to think up much to say, at least in anything that resembles passable English. Call it, say, blogger's block *is rolleyed by everyone on the planet who thought it up before me*. And on top of that I've been getting distracted by adding new things to the family tree/finding new references. You know, "just one more for now". An hour or so later, one big new line of folks, or links sent to... where I can print stuff ;). But still, must do better.

On the topic of research, I just got a couple of books from www.archivecdbooks.com.au - they put the old books, directories, cyclopedias onto CD - the kind of things that you might be lucky to find even a facsimile edition of, let alone an original. Anyway, old reference books for history of the states and the towns/people within. The main one was the Biographical Index of South Australians 1836-1885, and another couple with a voucher means I only spent $5 more for two more books. Anyway, I've already found the Index most useful, having my own copies (plus sequel) will be *so* much handier than remembering which entries to copy next time at the State Library.

And crawling, on the planet's face...

Monday morning, leaving the house for work, I checked the letterbox to see if there were any fliers. I saw there were, just not what I was expecting. I was expecting the usual half-a-tree crammed in. What I got was a flock of cockatoos flying down the road just at that moment. :D

This follows on from an encounter on Friday afternoon. I'd just left work and walked across Wellington Square Park to wait for the CAT bus on the other side. A minute after I get to the stop, a large flock of black cockatoos flies *directly* overhead, barely high enough to make it over the trees and buildings :) (and I decided the bus was taking too long, and walked back to town instead). At least, I thought it was a big flock. Tuesday afternoon. The bus had just gotten across the Narrows Bridge, and I've got my nose stuck in my book until I register a "whee-ah" sound. I look up, just in time to see the sky just above my window seemingly blackened by the largest flock of cockatoos I've seen in a long time, flying across the freeway just at that time. And this isafter having seen a large flock of cormorants flying like a black cloud across the surface of the river in the morning (with still more still loafing about in the water).

Rose tints my world...

And I broke my sunglasses today. Ok, so they had a small crack in the frame before, but today was just the end of the line. Tomorrow I'll have to venture out into the world, and see it as it really looks... Of course, you get what you pay cheaply for, especially when everything is designed to fit Smurfs from your point of view...

Also picked up the second season of Enterprise for half-price ex-rental today - hey, beats paying full retail. Should hopefully be a few more movies ready for the ex-rental treatment soon. Maybe around the 25th, when I'll be off work and in the video store area anyway ;) (what, you don't expect me to wait until the weekend when I can see X3 on opening day ;) not that I wait for the weekend, I take movie days off anyway.....)

Oops, time to update again. First I'd just like to say sorry about not being so good on the replying to comments front this week. I've been feeling rather... well, it's not quite "untalkative", more of a "can't think up smart reply" feeling. I mean, more so than usual. It may be part of this tired feeling I've had all week - Dream wasn't willing to let me go back into the waking world, so my mind stayed in Snoozeville while my body lurched around zombie-like...
*tries to resist, but it'd disappoint calliopes_pen if I didn't say it*
brraaaaaaiiinnsssss...

Anyhow, once again the week was spent doing a little bit of this and a little bit of that. And the strange questions, like someone wanting to buy textbooks from the early 70s that the Department printed. Let's see, we're at least three major curricular overhauls past then (that I know of even - from Achievement Certificate to Unit Curriculum to Curriculum Framework to Outcomes and Standards Framework), apart from the normal changes-over-time of such things. Even if we were a bookshop (may the people who discontinued the bookshop keep losing their new magazines for years), the chances of getting any copies to buy are buckleys and none!

Got last minute requests yesterday after was all alone, actually managed to get it all done (they were normal requests, but at half-an-hour-til-closing on Friday? The movie's over people, go home!), but had to stay behind a bit to look something up for myself (more later). Left work 20 minutes later, and was lucky to have a CAT bus come along soon. Or was I? The first part of the trip around East Perth / Waterloo Crescent was ok, but once we got to the Police Traffic
Branch, the intersection where that becomes Wellington Street? Bad. Traffic was stuck, and once we crested the hill, I saw a line of cars like so many shiny beetles as far as the eye could see.

I hopped off the bus (ironically, the stop that's closest to work on the other side...) and hoofed it along Hay Street to the comic store (on the other side of the CBD). Only took about 25 minutes, but it felt like a longer time (I'm not used to walking around at all of almost-6 at night :P) I thought I'd be smart and stick to the north side of Hay Street all the way along - guess which side had roadworks for extending the Central Law Courts. There's a fancy entrance to an old building left at that intersection - I *think* it might have been for an old theatre or something, just the columns and front doors were left when it was demolished many years ago. There is a plaque there to say why they were left, but the time I think about it, I couldn't get near it, since it's now part of the construction site! They've kept one of the facades on the Hay Street side of the new Central City development is being maintained (while the old Toys R Us has been completely demolished). Judging from what we can see from the St Georges Terrace side, this'll be at least the second new building built behind this shopfront.

Anyway, I have a week off now (domp-domp Ohh yeah!). I should've remembered the "I'm not speaking to you for a week" line (from an episode of Real Ghostbusters) for my out-of-office reply...

I had something I wanted to post about memory... but I forgot what it was.

I found an interesting little widget online for seeing aerial shots of Perth's central city area : http://www.mapimage.net/city_of_perth/ , so now I can at least use that instead of Google Earth for the city (I didn't bother upgrading that when it said I *had* to to keep using it - I don't like it when programs say that, and who knows how big the file would've been). And it has street names and the lot-info available too.

DVD buying continues to bring in the greatness of 80s Shows I Grew Up With! :D I'd forgotten what was coming out when locally, so I went onto the Ezydvd site on Thursday, and lo and behold 'twas the day MacGyver's second season was released. "Hmm, must leave early today." A couple of hours and a few notes later, that season is in my paws, along with the first season of 21 Jump Street - I wasn't planning on getting it, but thought "what the hey" and so far it's a good thing I did.

*BLEEP!* I only just saw now how close one of the legs of my chair was to coming out! Luckily it's good, sturdy contruction (hey, I've had it for nine years, my mum had it for longer than I can remember, possibly before I was born), so I was able to push the pins back in where they belong on the two joins.

Anyways, more later, I've got at least three other posts just waiting for the writeup.

Have a good weekend all. :)