It looks like LG has been caught misleading consumers about the energy efficiency of their units. So much so that they have been ordered to repay up to $430 to consumers!!! In one case the A/C unit was advertised as four stars whereas it was only two stars. OOps.

Upselling is endemic. Take the case of Australia Post. I wanted some postpacks. I go through a heap in the business and normally pick them up in lots of 10. Today I visited another of the post offices in the area and decided that 25 would be more economical. To which the assistant says, after getting the 25 from out the back, why don't you get 100... It would be cheaper. Only four times as many postpacks. Very helpful though! And maybe not the greatest upsell ever, but a good attempt.

Also whilst I was out I noticed one of the supermarkets had changed from 'Food 4 Less' to 'Woolworths'. And they now have their 'ROLLBACK' meaning that they are winding back their prices. Interesting choice of words though... It is saying that the prices have just gone down after having gone up without the negative message of saying that we were recently making more money from you. When I see ROLLBACK I see them telling me that they used to be making a heap more money from me, but are now making slightly less.

Finally, why doesnt this ever happen to me?

Carl Scully, Police Minister of NSW is in trouble. The idiot decided to break a tradition that goes back to the English Civil War and brought a weapon into parliment in contravention of the directions of the speaker. He brought a TASER for a demonstration, which had been deemed out of order. Like many similar situations I doubt he will be punished.

Unlike prisoners in Guatamala who had their prison raided by 3000 police. There was corruption in this prison, so much so that one prisoner had a two story house on the side with ADSL and plasma TV, and there were restraunts running, and two churches.

The Simpson Archive has a list of all the references to US Presidents on This page.

Just before I went away I had an interesting meeting with the central office of an organisation I am involved with. This organisation is locally managed, and only has oversight from the central office. Anyway, the central office used strong arm tactics to force us to change the name of the organisation to fit in with their branding. Those tactics were used a few years back.

At the meeting a few weeks back I was discussing my ideas on a new constitution and said that as a matter of conciliation I would be happy to keep the name of the centre with a subscript giving local branding. The director of head office then said that we were required to use their branding under their bylaws. I asked if she was sure and she was adimant. We did NOT have the ability not to use their branding.

So I mentioned to her 'I thought your bylaws actually only strongly suggested that the branding be used, and it was not actually a requirement'. The response was basically 'yes, you are correct', but interestingly there was no comment along the lines of 'Oops, I had forgotten about that'.

I am really really exhausted. It is now 9:30pm, and the first meeting of the evening started at 5pm. And these were rather complex, stressful events. The first at leasst was called at really short notice. Right now I have not even had dinner, and I feel like falling asleep. But at the same time I know that it is just mental exhaustion rather than physical so I really do not need to sleep at the moment.

It was great to get back to Pymble today. Meet up with everyone and catch up. The presents that I brought back seemed to be exactly what they wanted. Sometimes it is the small things that people appreciate the most.

Pymble today. And because of some external issues I have not got much done...

A couple of quick links... Firstly, according to the NY Times, Google is looking at 12V inputs to motherboards as a way to save money on power supplies. Since other voltages are needed for HDD's and the like I am not sure where the saving is. And also ITpro has a story on the person who saved the world 23 years ago when he refused to launch a russian nuclear weapon.

Oops. A UK couple learned that leaving a computer available for a 3 year old to play with is probably not a wise idea. According to the BBC the child decided to use the 'Buy Now' option in eBay. The only problem was that the kid purchased a 9000 pound car! Thankfully the seller got a big laugh out of it.

Also LG tried to get Bloggers to talk about their phones with reviews. And Joel on Software did. After six months. And have an honest review. Which included detailing both dodgy MP3 player programs on the phone. One of which would not work without the phone being on the phone network. The poor user interface. The movie service that sells you public domain movies. Everything! Great review, if you were thinking of buying that phone that is!

OOps. It seems that Qantas has lost some more luggage. They lost the NRL Grand Final Trophey!!! Ouch. I have also found an article on how iPod integration is in many modern cars.

In news from the USA, the TSA has Allowed liquids back onto planes provided they are procured following security screening. Finally some logic with security. Of course the story suggests that the british are still being prohibited from all hand luggage onto flights. Nothing spoils a good story like the truth. Then again my travel agent suggested the same thing a couple of weeks after the restrictions were relaxed.

GideonTech has a story about the ten worst abuses of computing in movies which are not supposed to be science fiction. Great read. I have also found a review of the best BitTorrent sites... Great read.

Argh and D'Oh. YUK in fact. About 7am or so this morning Internet went down. Very strange. It has just come back up, about 30 minutes later. Given the various outages due to bad weather I am more and more suspecting that there is a power supply issue at the local exchange.

Very Very strange things happening here. My foxtel is out with no signal. But my Internet ADSL is working fine. So I went to ring up Foxtel this morning. Well, when I eventually got around to ringing them that is. First thing is that the cordless phone had crashed and needed to be reset. Then I could not get a dial tone. Nor could I get a dialtone on the other line in the house. So I just rang Telstra and they tell me that there is a problem with the exchange. And they do not have a resolution time.

My guess is that there is a problem with power at the exchange. ADSL is operating on Backup UPS batteries, but the generator for the exchange has failed and there is a blackout down in that part of town. I am not sure I will ever find out more of what happened at the exchange but that is my guess

Finally home... What fun. I almost drove into an Optus cable earlier. Thankfully someone had tied a piece of cloth to the cable so that you could see it when you were about to hit it rather than when you had.

Heaps of Ingleburn has no power at the moment, but things are inconsistant. Traffic Lights might have power but street lights and houses nearby do not. I do not understand. Except for the feeder all the power is underground so it would need to be a major thing. Also foxtel is down at the moment, probably for the same reason.

I slept much much better last night thankfully. I woke up twice but I went back to sleep. Maybe I am getting over this jetlag thing. That is my hope at least!!!

Microsoft has released some Vista User Interface Guidelines. The first set lists a heap of suggestions in words, including the suggestion to use goal orientied phrases rather than technology oriented ones. For instance 'Print both sides of the page' rather than 'Use Duplexer'. The second page lists a heap of graphical styles that developers like me should use.

And in the USA, there is a file sharing case with a difference. The defendant is arguing that since the RIAA did not download the songs from her computer they cannot be sure that the files are exact copies as claimed in the lawsuit.

Today I have been basically been vegging out, watching TV most of the day. Not the boring stuff, but pre-recorded stuff. All in all a thoughly enjoyable day really. I did not sleep totally well last night - waking up at 3:30 again. I hope that tomorrow morning the same thing does not happen... We will see

It is about 7pm, and I just found that the posting from this morning did not happen. It is there now.

As a way to get my sleep patterns to be somewhat normal I had a snooze about 2pm. I was not particularly tired but given the hours I have been sleeping I decided to have a sleep anyway. Probably a good thing - I eventually woke up about 5pm, making my short sleep three hours. I was obviously more sleep deprived than I thought.

4AM and all is well... Sort of. At 8pm I felt really tired again, and once again I fell asleep in front of the TV for half an hour. After watching TV for another half hour I found myself unable to stay awake and needed to get to bed. Of course this means that I woke up about 3:30am having slept for about seven hours. So right now I have no idea what timezone I am in, but it is not local time.

I have been thinking about the We Will Rock You musical, and who I would have performing in it. I think that Posh Spice would do a good job as Saramouche. And the guy from My Hero - the idiot who did too much LSD and is the superheros best friend - would be good as Pop who reads the secret writings...

In other news Richard Hammond is in serious condition after a car accident whilst working on the Top Gear TV show. He was driving about 280 mph when the vehicle lost control whilst stopping.

Last thursday I went to a steakhouse in Tucson. The food was fantastic, cooked over a hickory fire from memory. Amazing taste. Great food, great company. During dinner one of my friends asked me if I had read the Bill Bryson book on the country. We then had a great time talking about the book before he confessed that he actually went to school with Bill Bryson. What a small world.

I have the Soundtrack from the We Will Rock You musical playing on my iPod right now. It looses something in translation. I have seen reports that it is coming back to Oz in November for three months. I will have to find out where and book myself a ticket. I loved the musical.

Some links... Firstly there is a story in NewsDay about how Hezbollah cracked the codes used by Israel on their radios in the recent conflict allowing them to reduce their losses. I have also found a list of the default passwords in a huge collection of equipment.

I had tons of sleep last night, it was just that my sleep was sort of at the wrong times. Let me explain. About 8pm last night I fell asleep in front of the TV set. I am not sure exactly what time I went to sleep, but I was woken about 8:30 when I had a call from my father, and I started watching some TV, and then felt really tired so I started recording it, and promptly fell asleep again for an hour before waking up and going to bed. What this did mean was that I woke up refreshed at 2am. So I watched some videos that I had recorded from when I was away, and went back to sleep about 4am. WHere I had some more sleep. I guess I was exhausted... This is to be expected with international travel - particularly in economy class.

A few more gems. In Benson, Arizona, a small town south of Tucson and with a population of 3500 people there is a Radio Shack store. This is almost identical to our Tandy store, but it still sells components. But the other thing that I loved there was that they also sold paint ball guns and pellets. You just gotta love the south!

I have unpacked all my bags. Both bags had been inspected. One my the TSA in the USA, and the other obviously by customs on this end. And both I suspect had been fumigated just in case. Everything was present and accouted for, and I had a chance to get out all the T-Shirts I purchased and put them together. I did not realize how much they weighed! T-Shirts weigh a heap!

I did just have a phone call from the Qantas Baggage Courier to let me know that he was a bit late, with my bags arriving sometimes between 3:30 and 3:45. This is more like the time that I expected to get the bags in reality, knowing that 11:30am was a bit too ambitious.

Right now I am just trying to remember what I bought for various people, and what is where in my bags. I know I have a heap of DVD's and CD's, mostly travel videos. And T-Shirts. Oh, and two large coffee cups from the conference. Amd I mean large and heavy. I hope they have survived the number of flights. But apart from all that I am not quite sure what is there. All I can remember is that I brough back a heap of things. Too many in fact. I even brought back some shopping bags. After all sometimes the bag is enough. Getting a present with the name 'Buckingham Palace' on the plastic bag that it comes in just says something.

I have almost got through all my mail... Just a few more to process... And some orders too. Not too much thankfully.

I have just heard back from QANTAS. Mind you this was at 11:18am today. They were ringing to ask if I would be home between 11:30 and 2:30 when my bags were due to be delivered. Hmm... Yes, I will. But I find it unlikely that I will be getting the bags at 11:30. It is most likely to be closer to 12:30 at the earliest I would guess. And then I guess the washing starts in earnest!

I am catching up on my sleep. In the middle of the day yesterday I managed to get about 90 minutes sleep which was probably about the right amount. Then last night I got to bed just before 10pm and slept like a log, not waking until just before 6am. Probably enough sleep for the night I think. I will see if I can get my sleep patterns a bit more in line with local time tonight.

According to the QANTAS site, my bags have been located. I think they managed to get onto the flight to Auckland from LA 24 hours late. Which means they are due to arrive in Sydney at about 10:30am. But what is really strange is that the bags are due to come in on an Air New Zealand flight. And not a Qantas flight. Anyway I will be happy to get my bags again.

Back to the future. Tucson stuff. I have forgotten what I wrote somewhat so there might be some duplication. I was just going to check the schedule for the event but I then remembered that the schedule is in with the project proceedings which are in my bags. And these bags are not yet located according to the WorldTracer web site. Strange. How hard can it be... are not the bags checked before they go onto each flight? Maybe not.

Well, I had a number of friends on the same flight from Tucson to Dallas/Fort Worth. Two of them checked in together and checked in together and were catching the same connecting flight to Dayton. The pilot of that connecting flight said that all the bags had got onto the flight. Well, not quite. One of my friends had his bag missing in Dayton. For some reason it did not make the plane. Oops. Dunno why the pilot reported otherwise.

Friday night was a buffet 'social' snack. This is the first time I have ever seen a complete pig on a spit be used for a 'snack'. There was a collection of mexican and more western food - tons of beans, pork and fresh fruit. Amazing food, and too much left over.

Saturday morning was all about some new satellites. It was great to hear about what was going on with the satelites under development. And what the capabilities are going to be. The idea with all the new birds is that they will all be extending the 'state of the art'.

The afternoon talks were mostly on Software Defined Radios. Unfortunately I did not get to see most of this as I had an introduction talk to give - about two hours of it. Fortunately I cheated - I had a few people come in to give more expert updates and introductions and advertising. And this created some connections between the newbies and the suppliers.

Anyway that is enough for now. More later...

Ok. Tucson flight was delayed a bit. John Ackerman who was at the DCC with me was on the same flight and got an SMS from ORBITZ saying that DFW (Dallas Fort Worth) was stormed in. We boarded a bit late but then all got on the plane and gout onto the tarmac. And then we were informed that there was a ground hold for DFW, and that we could not leave. So the pilot waited on the tarmac so that he would be first if anything happened. And it did, but in the short time between the airport being reopened at DFW for pilots to fly into and starting the engines up the airport was closed again. So we were waiting for about 90 minutes in total in the Tucson heat (30+ but with A/C on) waiting for the flight to DFW

The flight was great for all except for the last 20 minutes which got bumpy. And wet. Really wet. I guess it was a 10 minute taxi to the gate in DFW. When we got there we were told that it would be a little while to exit as the gate was changed at the last minute and that the agent was still on the way. This took a little while.

My connecting flight to LA was also late, but it was boarding as soon as I walked to the gate. But this time it was about an hour after I boarded to when we took off. 30 minutes of that was waiting in a queue to take off at the runway.

The flight was fairly good, flying over Phoenix again. And Roswell.

At LA when they landed they said I needed to report to the agent at the gate. Here I was told that I 'was in the process of being rebooked to Auckland via Sydney' and that I should go to gate 41. I was at gate 48. In between the two I decided that I was not going any further than Sydney since Auckland was only a stopover for me to visit a friend. And I had been traveling long enough on this trip. And besides, I was not feeling totally well in all of this, having food poisoning overnight during my last night in Tucson.

So in LAX I rang my mother and asked her to ring appropriate people and let them know of my change in plans. My laptop was out of battery power so I did not even have the phone number for my friend from New Zealand who I was staying with. ARGH! This call was just before I boarded. All in all I was on the ground for about 60 minutes in LA. I just had enough time to make this call, get my booking to Sydney and go to the loo.

Then in Sydney I was quick through customs. But my bag did not come out. Once most people had their bags a Qantas person asked what my name was. He then informed me that my bag was not on the flight. Baggage information took my details and that was that. They gave me a WWW site to keep track of things. Then customs just coped with the fact that I had things to declare in my lost bags and just sent me on my way. Too easy.

I was home in under two hours of landing, including waiting for bags and waiting for a train and asking about what is left on my flight.

Ahh, yes. The flight. I think I still have a segment available. The Qantas Ticketing person said I was finished on the ticket. The Qantas WWW site is not so sure. That is what I will believe.

Oh, And I almost forgot. I found out at the baggage information that I was re-booked to NZ, even though the person in LA was told I was not interested in going further. The first thing the baggage person did was call Operations and let them know that I was not taking that flight since they were concerned I was holding the plane up. ARGH!!!

Yesterday was rather cool as an event. My presentation went really well, with probably five people so far wanting copies of my presentation. This was not bad, and I am guessing that more people will want copies soon. My talk was the first of the event which led me to be a bit nervous. There was one paper yesterday that I am still convinced has made an assumption that is quite incorrect. If it is, the paper will need a heap of more work to make it usable. I think I have a solution though.

We heard of one presenter who will remain nameless who flew into Phoenix looking for the Tucson Clarion Hotel. The problem is that the two cities are 100 miles apart. Oops. Another presenter talked about one of his experiments that had been removed from the International Space Station only eight hours before. How cool.

There have been so many conversations which have been so cool. Many of them have been off the record, unfortunately. I would love to talk about some of the subjects here but the subjects are too sensative to talk about. I will see what I can mention, but right now there is nothing I can do.


When I was in Bangkok I picked up a Simpsons T-Shirt with Homer Simpson eating on the front. The comment below is "Every time I learn something new, it pushes some old stuff out of my brain". The only problem. Stuff is spelt STUTT!

Last night I went out to a Steakhouse for dinner. Food was great and so was the company. Coming back via the hotel shuttle backroads were used, and I saw a strange sign. I really should point out here that Tucson is in the middle of nowhere. Even getting to Los Angeles from here on OneWorld airlines requires stopping somewhere, and there are certainly no QF flights anywhere nearby.

Which is why I found it crazy strange to see a Qantas sign on the side of a building here near the airport. What is going on? Hmm... What does google say. Ahh, the Qantas US Reservations Centre is based in Tucson. That must be what it is. Still, the poor employees cannot even get a Qantas flight out of town. [What I found at the same time was a Document describing a Qantas flight to Antarctica three years back for a solar eclipse. How cool. Some of the work on this trip was done by the Uni of Arizona]

I have been in a meeting all day here in Tucson. It has been really great catching up with people, and hearing about what is going on, both technically and personally. I just love hearing all the news. What I have not loved hearing is the F-16's that were causing a racket during Lunch. There were times when we needed to stop talking to wait for an F-16 to pass. I guess that is one of the problems when you are near an Air Force Base.

I have made a few phone calls today on my Laptop with the VoIP phone. The quality is great, and the people on the other end are often amazed to be hearing from me. After all, I am in the USA and calls must be really really expensive. They feel like they are getting special treatment. If only they knew :-)

Right now it is about 4am local time, and I am starting to get tired again. I woke about an hour ago, and after not being able to get back to sleep I decided to check my email. And work on my presentations for the conference. My first presentation is almost done, with probably 10 minutes needed to tidy a few things up. The second one needs more work, but an hour or so should do I am hoping.

I forgot to mention someting about the Titan Missile. The reason it is in Arizona is that there was a missile silo available. The smithsonian, and the Dayton Airforce Museum also wanted this missile but Pima Air and Space Museum won since they had the silo. The thing is that the missile in the silo never had hydrazine fuel so it is 'safe'. Hydrazine is highly poisonous.

More on todays trip... To get to Tombstone I hired a car. I was somewhat aprehensive about driving in the USA given that they drive on the incorrect side of the road. By inferenece, we in Australia drive on the correct side. The car rental company was a short walk from the hotel, and they gave me a 2.8L sedan. I ordered a small car - and I can only guess that this is a small car.

Strangely I did not find it too bad driving this car - it just seemed to be almost natural. Reversing it to get it out of the car spot was a bit strange, but I had no problems at all. The issues had to do with spacial dynamics rather than hitting anything. It took me a KM or two to get used to things. This was not a problem in Tucson. What was a problem was that I forgot what was left and what was right. My brain started swapping directions, and I actually found a side street to turn around when I thought that I had turned left when I had really turned right and was wanting to turn right.

Getting onto the interstate was not hard, nor was driving on it. Everyone seemed to be behavng themselves, acting responsibly. I ended up driving about 200 miles today, and felt that it was enough given my lack of sleep. I have certainly got over my phobia of driving in the USA. The one place I did have issues was in shopping centres where there are no real lanes. Working out where to drive there was the problem.

The last of my London photos. Here is the view from my Hotel room looking into the square.



Here is one of the shops at Paddington Station. So cute.



Now onto the USA, and Tucson. Boot Hill is the part of Tombstone, Arizona where the bodies are buried. Literally.



The weather was generally fine, but in the distance the rain was coming down with a big thunder storm.



This is the Graveyard at Boot Hill.



Here is the OK Coral where the famous gunfight was.




Here is the Street of Tombstone. Just look at the street. Yes, it is dirt. And this is how it was at the time.



Dont you just love the bank below. The bank has an ATM.




This is part of the road back to Tucson.



Below is some rain up ahead. And it was really heavy!



The next photos are from the Titan ICBM missile museum. And yes, I did get to go underground.



This is the tunnel from the control room to the missle silo


This the is the control room as the person sitting down was about to do a simulated launch of the missile.



The missile silo.





The beige behind me is the sliding lid for the SILO. The concrete blocks to the left are required as part of the START treaty to ensure that the silo cannot open fully.





And the following photos are from Tucson Airport

Back from a day out... Visited Tombtone and the Titan Missile Museum. I didnt get to the Sonora Desert Museum as I was starting to get tired. The photos and story will be online soonest.

I am very much in Tucson, having arived here about 1am, well at the airport at least. Then it took a little while for the bags to come out, and then a bit longer to walk to the hotel. After all that time in the air I needed to walk.

Anyway it was amaing taking off from Las Vegas at Night. Imagine the start from the TV show CSI, but from a distance. The casinos are really impressive from the air - there are just so many of them. You can also see the greenish-blueish light from the hugh video screens from some distance away even if you cannot see the screens themelsves. Just as we were taking off I saw the midnight fireworks in the distance. Not bad. Vegas really is a city that never sleeps (As oposed to Canberra which is a city that never wakes :-)

The flight took off a bit early, and the cabin crew were somewhat laid back. At the end of the flight they made comments about everyone getting off the plane because it was past their bedtimes. Yes, maybe, but it was past mine too. Thankfully the beds in the hotel are really comfortable. I am still somewhat jet-lagged though with my body not quite sure what time it is.

Finally, TravelPost has a list of Wifi in a heap of US Airports

I am now in Las Vegas on free Wifi. I do not have much power left, but I will try to post some information now. The flight was good from O'Hare to Las Vegas. I slept through much of it... Much of the flight did. Coming into the Airport I did see the Luxor pyramid with the great light coming out of the top. By seeing the pyramid, it was more seeing where everything else was, and seeing the outline and the light from above as it is completely black.

I am getting rather tired, and it is still an hour until boarding. YUK. There are the slot machines in the background, and in fact everywhere here. And for the time of night this place is really really busy. Anyway, time to get some email looked at! And no photos. I packed my camera in my checked bag :-(

I am in the American Airlines Admirals Club in Terminal 3 in London Heathrow. I was rather impressed with this lounge. Previous AA lounges I have been in I have been somewhat yucky. This one is probably closer to Qantas Club lounges to which I am grateful. I have not seen any food available, but frankly that is not a major concern for me at the moment.

I was surprised at the checkin process. It was really fast. Not many people there either. More like business class checkin. The agent had some issues with my ticket as the computer was saying that a paper ticket was needed. That was fixed quickly.

The line to go through security frankly shocked me. It must have gone well over 50m, and probably closer to 100m. This line moved really fast. They did not bat an eyelid at my bag. Then again I really do not have much in it. Mostly the laptop, ipod and power cables. I soon removed the jumper and pillow from the bag until I needed to remove the laptop from the bag for security.


Now it is 7pm Chicago time, and I am waiting to go to Las Vegas. Yeah. I bet no one knew I was going there did they? Guess What! Neither did I. There has been really horrible weather all around the north east USA, and various flights have been cancelled. So they put me onto a flight to Las Vegas, and then another after that from Vegas to Tucson. It gets in rather late! ARGH!!! Still, at least I will be getting in there today.

The flight once we hit the north American continent was a bit bumpy. So much so that they came across much of the time at 32,000 feet, and had the seat belt sign on for ages.

I just whipped down to Maplin to pick up a Laptop adapter for use on some of the flights. It was only 20 pounds. The only thing I have just found out is that the adapter that I thought would work on my PC was too small. I will see about picking up another adapter in the USA or at the airport. Right now I am just waiting the other 40 minutes until 10:30 when I will check out and get to Heathrow.

It HAD to happen... Finally! A damp and overcast day outside. I will upload the photos later, probably when I am in the USA. My heel is feeling a heap better, but I will not be doing a heap of walking on it since I would rather not be having to limp through trying to make my connection in Chicago. I am slightly concerned about that connection. In the 2:15 I need to clear customs and get to my next flight.

I am not sure if I have mentioned this but I have ordered an upgrade to Business Class on the LA to Auckland trip. I do not know yet if this has come through. I may not know until I get to LA in fact.

Also, one of my clients has asked if it is possible for me to drop by FiJi on the way through. There are a lot of things up in the air at the moment, but this is a possibility. Some other things need to be sorted out first before that decision is made. Anyway I am almost packed. All liquids have been removed from my carry on bag, and it will only contain the bare essentials (iPod, Laptop, DVD's, Power Cable, Charger etc)

Windsor Castle...



Looking down the hill. St George's Chappel on the far right.



Time Team ditch in the centre of the courtyard. The private apartments are on the other side too where the Queen lives.



A man made water fall.



Changing of the Guard



The window of St George's Chappel.



More changing of the guard.





The Guild Hall where Prince Charles was married the 2nd time.



Stonehenge.




Bath.


The BATH at BATH.




The River Avon





Bath City

It has been a long day... But let me update things from yesterday afternoon first. I was planning to see Blue Man Group, but I neglected to buy a ticket until it was so late I would need to get a ticket direct from the theatre. And here was the problem. Yesterday my left heel was quite sore - I am assuming that I bruised the heel earlier in the day. Anyway, I decided that it probably was not in my best interest to go downtown when it was not certain that I would get tickets. So I stayed at Padington instead and went to the Abberdeen Steak House for dinner.

Frankly I was rather disappointed with the steak. It was 'soggy', and did not taste as good as I would have hoped. It was an experience I guess. The other thing I did last night was book todays tour of Bath, Windsor Castle and Stonehenge.

The bus picked me up from outside the Hilton a hundred metres away from my hotel about 7:30am and took me to Victoria bus depot where a heap of people who had been picked up by various busses got put onto their respective busses. We ended up leaving Victoria just before 9am, and went onto Windsor Castle. We actually parked in the carpark of the railway station which is what most people do. Windsor and Eton are just on opposite sides of the Thames River, making them effectively a single town.

Anyway we were shown into the castle, which was amazing. It is sited on the top of a hill, and has been built up above that. Apart from looking outside the castle the first thing we did was look at Queen Mary's 1/16th scale dolls house. This is actually quite amazing, with working appliances and the like, but frankly I felt it was over-hyped. Following that the tour went into the castle itself with the state rooms.

No photos inside unfortunately, but I did get a DVD and Guide book. Quite amazing really. Just the sheer amount of decorations on the walls. Pistols, swords, everything. Seeing St Georges Hall and the room at the end of the hall that were almost destroyed by fire in 1992 was amazing. You could see how much work went into the rebuilding. And there were a few places where you could still see fire damage where they decided to clean the wood rather than replace it. Looking out the window towards the private apartments, you could see the Time Team trench.

Then onto St Georges Chapel. Once again, it is quite amazing. So many monarchs are buried here. It was going to be where Charles and Carmilla were going to get married, but eventually that deed was done in the guild hall just outside the gates. One of the stain glass windows just by the gift shop was for the centenary of federation in Australia.

After that I saw the changing of the guard, which once again was somewhat impressive. I just do not know how else to decribe it. Once that was over, I rejoined the bus for the trip to stonehenge. This went via Royal Ascot Racecourse, which is just a few miles from Windsor.

Stonehenge was good, but it was not as impressive as I thought it was going to be. It seemed somewhat smaller. I guess that has to do with late 20th and early 21st century architecture making an impression on me. I took tons of photos as will be seen soon. I can only guess what this would be like at sunset at the solstice.

Then onto a pub for lunch. I sat across from a woman whoes daughter was formerly with the Four Non Blondes which had one hit song a few years back.

The onto Bath. This was good, but our tour missed out on the Royal Avenue. It more concentrated on the Roman Baths. Once again I grabbed some great photos, and also some photos of the river and the outside of the Bath Church. We were given the chance to buy a glass of Bath water for 50p, but after hearing the list of ingredients as trace elements I declined. The Lead, Copper and other heavy metals did not sound good.

Coming back to london we had some heavy rain - the only rain during my entire time in the UK. This must be a record! When I got back to london it had not rained at all.

Tomorrow I will be visiting Windsor, Bath and Stonehenge. At Windsor I will be visiting the Windsor Castle State Apartments, Queen Mary's Dolls House and St George's Chapel. It should be a great day. I paid extra to get lunch at a 'traditional english pub'. Ok, I know this is probably just an up-sell, but frankly I do not care.

Last night I ventured down to Picadilly Circus and Oxford Circus for lunch. The number of people down there are amazing. I picked up the Cast Recording of We Will Rock You. The advertising in the first screen is not actually static. It is a video screen, and the colours are really amazing. So pure.



As you can see the place is somewhat busy.



This morning I wandered down to the Palace. Since I wanted to be there early to get tickets I left the hotel about 8:15am. Not bad for a sunday morning. I walked to the palace rather than taking the tube - probably a bad move since I now have a bruise on the heel of my left foot for some reason. On the way there I saw the memorial to animals in war.



I arrived at Buckingham Palace at about 8:45, and waited for tickets. The ticket booth opened at about 9:15 and I got into see the first tour session for 'walk ins' of the day at 10:00.



The tour was amazing - self guided with a free headset giving commentry. You actually wore the headset, and it worked really well. I was amazed at the palace. Unfortunately there were no photos inside - but the guide book contains most things. They had clear perspex over important things to protect them from damage. In addition there were guides everywhere. What I had not realised that most of the work on the palace was done by a theatre designer, and as such the building contains much in the way of theatrics.

So, why have I included this photo in the collection? Has someone been playing Cricket out the back of Buckingham Palace? No. This was from the TimeTeam dig of the back garden about a couple of weeks back. Once I get home I am going to watch the TV show that goes with this. Basically they did an archealogical dig in the grounds, and they have now covered up the pit.



This is a view in the gardens behind, looking towards the main building. What I did not know was that the palace is actually a square with an empty centre.



A photo inside the grounds.


And another. I did not even notice the reflection until later.


Walking back to the Tube Station I came across this monument. It is for Police Officers who have died in the line of service. The monument is made out of slats of glass on top of each other.



This house is in the area behind downing street.


Big Ben of course.



The Tower of London.

The view from Tower Bridge to the Tower of London, from the top.

The view from the Tower Bridge looking east...
And West
This is the mechanism for the bridge.
And more of it.


The gate house in Kensignton Gardens/Hyde Park.

Peter Pan in Kensignton Parks.





The Diana Memorial Fountain.
London Science Museum - the rebuild of the Babbage Difference Engine.


A Spitfire in parts. From WWII.



I have heard signs like this, but never actually seen it. This is in the Science Museum in London.



Harrods in the Distance.



This is inside Harrods. the glass is from Dodi's and Diana's last meal together. And in front of that is the engagement ring that Didi bought the day before he died.



The Shirlock Holmes Statue.



And the view in the Sherlock Holmes Museum.



A bear who needs looking after in Paddington Station.

Just back from a few hours out and about. From the hotel I walked to Hyde Park/Kensignton Gardens where I saw the sculpture of Peter Pan, and the new Diana memoria fountain. The fountain was interesting, and unique. It is also continuously refilled with bore water. Then onto the Science Museum, where there was an exhibition of the spitfire.

Then on to Brompton Road. This is in Knightsbridge, where I went to Harrods. I think there are tours of the place. It is big, and expensive. I picked up a few souvenours. There is also a memorial to Dodi and Diana, including the engagement ring he bought for her the day before. Then past Harvey Nicks to Hyde Park Corner tube station. I then caught the tube to Baker St Station, where I decided that 60 minutes to get into Madame Tausades was a bit long. So I only went to the Shirlock Holmes Museum and then back to Padington Station. Once at the station I found the bear himself and took a photo. I will have to get a photo of me with him. All in all a facinating little jaunt. Pictures to follow.

I will include some photos later - tomorrow my time. Right now I just want to detail some of the day I have had. First I needed to do a tiny bit of work. I think I ended up doing about a couple of hours of various things meaning that I missed out on breakfast in the hotel. Not a problem. I decided to visit Portabelo Rd and have a look there, so I caught the tube to Notting Hill Gate. Portabelo Rd is full of antiques shops, and markets. I ended up picking up a brass sextant used for navigation pre-GPS for only 10 pounds. I could have got a larger one for 18 pounds, but it was a bit bigger.

Then I wandered down Kensington High Street and Earls Court Road. Amazing shops there, with lots of very expensive stuff. I didnt buy much. At Earls Court I caught the train to Tower Bridge where I did the tour of the bridge, including walking over the top. Then I took the light rail to Docklands and looked around. After all that I then came back to the hotel. That was a lot of walking.

Then this evening I caught the tube to Oxford Circus and had a look around. Unfortunately I found Hamleys, and bought a few things there. This is an amazing toy store. There was an amazing Steif Padington Bear and Pooh. But at 100 pounds each for 4-6" bears the price was a bit high.

Then I went to see Phantom of the Opera. I was really disappointed. The performance was not as dynamic as I was expecting. It did not compare to the recording of the cast, nor to the movie. I know this is a stage show, but still. Some of the production design was amazing, just that the performance did not live up to it.

Long day yesteday. I was on my feet so much of the day. I just walked from paddington via Oxford and Regent streets down to Westminster, then up past the Old Bailey to the Museum of London, through the Barbican, over the Millenium Bridge to the Tait Modern, then caught the tube to Tottenam Circuit Road and walked via Euston to Barker St where I caught the tube to paddington. And then went out to see We will Roch You.

Photos... This is Marble Arch.



And the Trocodero Nightclub... Very Historic.


I think this is Nelson.

Lawrence of Arabia.




Admiralty Arch.



And this next one is a find. It is a memorial to the Bali Bombing, and is behind Downing Street. It has not yet been unveiled.




This is what Downing Street looks like these days.



And this is Temple Church from the Da Vinci Code. It is being remodelled and refurbished.




St Pauls


This is the Museum of london - a recreation of a water wheel from roman times. There is a TimeTeam show on how this was built. When I was there I guy saw me take photos, and said he was intrigued and now wanted to know what it was. And I was able to explain it, in my aussie accent.

Memorial to John Wesley.


Part of the Roman Wall I think at the Museum of London.


St Pauls and the Millenium Bridge on the way to see the Tate Modern. At the Tate I saw my first ever Andy Wahol in person - Maryln Monroe.



Inside they were preparing for some event, inside the turbine hall that is.



This was in the War Cabinet Room, leading to a secret phone room. The phone was encrypted using phonograph records which were destroyed as soon as the conversation was over.

I have just got back from seeing the musical We Will Rock You on the West End, and all I can say is WOW. I really loved it. I am certainly glad I saw it. The show started at about 7:30, and finished at about 10:20 including an interval. The show itself poked fun at Queen, the rock music business, life in general, celebrities and even itself. The use of video screens was not only novel but well implemented. I was impressed. There were selling T-Shirts there for Freddie's 60th birthday party yesterday. Guess I went the wrong night.

My seat was in the 5th row dead centre. Fantastic position. I was slightly concerned at getting back to the hotel so late at night. I need not have bothered. The Tube was still quite busy. And seemed to be really safe. I guess that is what happens when you get a city the size of London.

Tomorrow I have Phantom of the Opera, and I am thinking of seeing Blue Man Group on Saturday night. We will see. Right now it is bed time.

Couple of things to begin with. In Bangkok in the Landmark Hotel there is a Bank. I think it is called TMB or something like that for The Military Bank. I cannot remember exactly what it is and what it stands for. It is a BANK! Anyway looking into the office they have the normal PC's with their flat screens. But they also have two or three typewriters set up too. And these are not electric typewriters. They are manual ones. How do I know this? Well that is the more concerning thing.

The window of the office is clear glass. And the workstations for staff go right up to the glass. I could see credit applications from outside. That is quite amazing. Not only are there privacy issues, there is also fraud and identity theft issues.

Also, this morning I needed to call Australia. It was really simple. I installed the X-Lite software onto my laptop, and configured it with the Faktortel VoIP settings, and I made calls for 10 cents each. And the sound quality was great. Also people could call me if they knew my number. And these calls would be free. Amazing really.

I am staying about 100m from Padington Station. This is the railway station that Padington the Bear was named after. So of course the doctor below is called 'Milne House Medical Centre', named after A.A. Milne who wrote the story.



These swans were swimming in Hyde Park. I was not able to check into the Hotel when I arrived there at 8am, so I decided to go to Bletchley. But I did not want to spend an extra 30 pounds on a ticket, so I needed to do something else first so I walked through Hyde Park to Green Park station. These swans were in the lake in Hyde Park.



The ticket to Bletchley was only about 16 pounds return. Not bad really. It took about 40 minutes to get up there. I saw the new Wembly Stadium in the distance. This is the one the our friends at Multiplex are having troubles finishing.

When I arrived at Bletchley park I found some rather strange things. One was a number of satellite uplink vehicles like the one below. There were also what appeared to be a number of german officers from WWII. For those that do not know, Bletchley Park was home to about 7000 people during the war, and it was a facility that the Germans did not know existed. The movie Enigma is a fictional account of the place. It was a code breaking establishment, and they probably shortened the war by about two years and saved a heap of lives. A news story from the BBC on Bletchley from today is here



The main house below was used as the office. There are about seven different generations of building work done there. In the distance on the left is 'Hut 1' where naval codes were broken during WWII. The other address of this place was POBox 111, London.



This is a closer view of Hut 1



Below is Hut 6 and I think Hut 2. The huts are in better condition than they look. The main problem is that paint does not stick to the wood so it always looks like it is peeling off.



You can see the blast wall below. The germans did try to bomb the place once during the war, but it is assumed that they did that by mistake.





This is the BOMBE that was used in the movie ENIGMA.



A Plane in the grounds.



And here is the submarine from the movie too.



This machine is called Collusus. It is a working replica of the machine that was used during WWII to help crack some of the code. Just like the BOMBE above.



The lake in thr grounds. You can just imagine what this place was like in WWII. The guide tells stories of how even today people who worked there take a lot of convinving to talk about their work. They were sworn to secrecy. Not until the 1970's did anyone know this place existed, and even now not all the details have been released.



In the distance is the BOMBE replica. This is the machine that won WWII. It will not be on display until next year, but we were given a very rare chance to see this view as it was commissioned on live TV earlier in the day. Amazing really. This machine was rebuilt mostly from plans obtained under the Freedom of Information Act.



Bletchley was really amazing. I will have to go again. And when I get back I am putting in an order for stuff.

When I got back and I had checked in and had a snooze I went to Queensway to do some shopping. I found this church in the area and thought it looked cool.



I found another great story on News.COM.AU about how Steve Irwin was about to visit Thailand with a project on elephants, and how the news of his death was front page news over there. Unfortunately I did not get to see a paper when I was there...

I am running a bit late. Given what I have done in the last few days I have an excuse.

Firstly on tuesday I did a bit of work, dealing with a client in Fiji. So easy to do when you have internet access. Actually, the first thing was to do an online checking to get my seat allocation for the flight. Then I decided to go into the centre of Bangkok to look around again. Strangely I met up with one of the people from my hotel who was on the River Kwai tour the previous day on the platform. So we decided to go around the MBK centre together.

Each of us purchased too many clothes. The funny thing was that the prices in the MBK shops were at least 60% cheaper than the prices on Sukumvet Road. Well, maybe it was not surprising. We spent hours looking through the place. It really is an amazing place. The guy from the hotel got a couple of cellphones unlocked for almost nothing. Then we got some lunch. Two types of thai food on a plate was $1.20, and the rice was 20 cents. And a water was 28 cents. Amazing prices really.

Following lunch we went back to the hotel, and I had a rest. About 6pm I needed to check out, but just before I did I arranged to meet one of my clients for a drink. It was great to hear from him, and hear where he is coming from. Then I grabbed the car to the airport.

Dropping my bags off was really quick. Then I want to qantas club, only to realize a couple of things. Firstly, I packed my power adapter so I could not charge my laptop. And my laptop was hot having turned itself on in my bag. This meant that I only had a short amount of battery life to do a heap of things with.

Then the flight. Flying with British Airways is a bit different. They are not as focused on the customer I dont think. But their headrests are great, and allowed me to get a good sleep. So good that both I and the young woman sitting next to me both slept through whilst the woman in the window sleep climbed over us twice to got to the toilet apparently without disturbing either of us.

Once we landed in London imigration was fast. I was on the train in under an hour after landing. And then at the hotel about 30 minutes later. It was too early to check in unfortunately so I went straight to Bletchly. More on that soon.

Very Quick Post....

1. Calls from Thailand mobiles to Australian Mobiles in Thailand do not work well at all...

2. I love Qantas Club. It is the only way to fly. Allowed me to have a shower at the airport.

I have to go... Battery is about to die. Long story :-(

More on the Thailand Burma Railway. I caught a train which lasted about 90 minutes for a ride. I opted to go to the foreign tourist first class carriage for only another B150, or A$6. This turned out to be a good move - as a different experience.



Use of the toilet at this station was B3, or 12 cents. The photo below looks like a catch for a mailbag. But since the train stops I am not sure what it is for. The person was installing the loop when the photo was taken.



This is inside the first class carriage. All wood, with padded seats. Very colonial. With cool drinks included free (Coke), and a tea/coffee about half way in. I can just imagine a railway like this in india before independance.



Wooden Bridge. I think this is POW built.



Signalling is unique.





The river. What a beautiful landscape. Provided you do not need to actually build it yourself.



At times the jungle was so close to the train that you needed to get back from the window else you would be hit by plant matter. Wow.





All in all it was a wonderful trip. Quite moving too. You can see POW hospitals and camps as you go through the journey. The entire trip would be amazing.

Following that we then had a trip on the river in a speed boat. All wooden construction with a 2.8l engine behind. Wow.

Right now I am in Thailand on my way to Arizona. Yeah, I know. I am sort of taking the long way to get there. Still, it is a nice way to break up the trip. Yesterday for something different I visited the River Kwai. One of my great uncles died here during WWII. Another posting describes the visit to the cemetry. This entry is more looking at the Thai Burma Railway.

This first photo is of the steel bridge that was moved to the site from indonesia, and was then bombed by the allies at the closing end fo the war. The bridge has been reopened and you can now walk over it. Carefully.



Notice the health and safety standards. It was a sheer drop off the side. They dont loose too many tourists aparently. The photo below give a better idea of the sheer danger.



The next photo is kind of blury, but it came along the bridge going the wrong way... All the people went into the culverts.








Look at this next photo with the people on the bridge as the train goes past.

Today I did a tour of the Allied War Graves in Kanchanaburi in Thailand and saw the Bridge on the River Kwai. There is so much to say, so I had better start at the beginning. I was picked up at about 6:30 by a MiniBus, and we were then taken outsize Bangkok where another MiniBus met us, and everyone from both busses joined onto a bigger bus for the tour of Kanchanaburi and the River Kwai. The first stop was the Allied War Graves and the Thai Burma Railway Centre. The latter is a museum to the people who died building the railway and overlooks the allied war graves.



This following plaque stands at the entrance to the site. And to me this is more important than the other grave military sites I have seen, from US Civil War to War Memorial in Canberra. You see, one of my great uncles is buried here.



I found it rather sobering walking into this place - I was almost in tears. Russell West had only ever been a name to me until now. He died in Thailand at the age 30 defending his country by defending another country. For me just visiting this single site has made the entire trip worthwhile, and made this person real to me.



There is a register there of all the people who are buried. I did not need to see his name in the register, just the plaque. That was enough.





Following this we then visited the Bridge. This was one of the bridges that was bombed by the Allies in 1945 I believe, and has since been reopened.


It is not what I would call the safest bridge to be walking on. It certainly does not have the safety features of climbing the Sydney Harbour Bridge. I was a bit scared at times since the water was moving quite quickly. I can see why there was so much effort put in to building the bridge.








More to come on the train ride.

Just got back from the River Kwai. Really moving since I saw the grave of my great uncle who died in 1943. Much more later. Tons of photos to come.

That will teach me not to turn my phone off at night. Just before 8am Sydney time I had a phone call from Australia. This would have been fine except it was just before 5am local time. Too darn early to be up. I would have gone back to sleep had the phone call not completely woken me up. Similarly I forgot thirty-something years of reading the time earlier when I looked at my watch and saw it said 6:15, and I knew I needed to be outside the hotel at 6:30 for my tour of the River Kwai.

The only thing - my watch really said 2:30. Oops!

Stupid security on the flight to Bangkok. When we were coming in to land it was announced that those who were staying on the flight could leave their bags on the plane during the stopover, but that the flight would be cleaned. They were warned however that any bags removed from the plane would need to be screened for liquids and gels. And it was pointed out that there was no problem if you had either in your bag on the plane - the only problem was if you took it off the plane. Oh, and there was no security screening for liquids in Sydney apart from the normal screening. Of course there have been the stories in the media indicating that the XRay machines at Sydney would have detected the substances that they were concerned about, but I am not so sure.

Pad Khe Mau Gai for dinner tonight. It was different from what I am used to. Maybe the 30 or 40 spheres of unground pepper still on the stalk was part of it... I do not know. But for B60 ($2.40) the meal was good value.

I have an early start in the morning - 6:30AM pickup to visit the River Kwai and the war graves. I will post more on that tomorrow.

I dont think I have mentioned this before by my legs are so sore. Apparently this is not uncommon. You tend to do a lot of walking. And there are stairs everywhere. Just so many of them. Even with the skytrain where there is often an escalator to go up they will only have stairs coming down. Which all means that there are different muscles being used. By the time I get to london I do not expect to have any problems with sore feet - I will be well and truely used to walking a heap by then.

Oh, and I had a strange email a couple of days back... From one of the writers from Law and Order. The guy was looking for a person with a name similar to mine, not me unfortunately. My brush with fame for the week.

I have just got back from what I can only describe as a most interesting day. Please let me explain. What I attempted to do today was visit the 'National Science Museum', followed by the Grand Pallace and then Jim Thompsons House and then back to the hotel. It did not quite work out that way. I gra