The Archive

Here you will find everything from the "latest news" section which is no longer the latest news

1st January - 31st December 2006

 

26th, 27th, 28th December - Boxing Day

The English would do well to remember these three days. I was at the doctors recently getting vaccinated for my overseas trip and there was an older copy of time magazine with an "Ashes Preview" special. It was amusing. It was predicting the beginning of the end of Australian Cricket and how the English were finally challenging Australian supremacy in the cricketing world. Now down 0-4 in the 5 match series Flintoff has alot to think about, especially since they lost the 4th test by an innings an 99 runs - a considerable margin for a side which is supposed to be the 2nd best in the world.

19th December - Golfing

Today I played golf in China.T'was an interesting experience. With the help of Dad's golfing instructor, I have improved my strokeplay considerably though my putting still needs alot of work.The course was quite nice, as was the golf club there. The travel time, however, was ridiculous... which is why I should get a helicopter.

14th December - L'Atelier

Today I went to a restaurant called "L'Atelier de Joël Robuchon". For those of you who don't know, Joël Robuchon is a well-known (at least to those who know him) three-michelin-star French Chef. He married a Japanese woman and opened up a restaurant in Japan. Now he's expanded to Macau and Hong Kong. The food was very very good - right up there with Tetsuyas, Vue de Monde and Spoon. A Pierre Gagnaire has also opened in Hong Kong, and a Nobu is opening very soon... I must make some time (and some money) to go and eat at those places sometime.

12th December - Hermes

For those of you who are wondering why I haven't updated in such a long time, the answer is simple, I have a new laptop and have been busy installing programs and generally bringing the laptop up to speed with... well, me. The laptop's name is Hermes, because it is my new travel laptop. It is an ASUS S6F. I'm currently dual-booting Ubuntu Linux and Windows XP.

In other news, I'm back in Hong Kong and because the flight was so full, I was upgraded to business class. It may sound obvious, but business class is ALOT better than economy class. Not only do you actually get a whole lot more room, but you get a better video system and you also get much better food. I was actually able to get a decent sleep during the flight, something of a rarity for me on planes these days.

19th November - U2

Tonight was the night of the U2 concert. I was manning the Amnesty stall at gate 7 and we collected something like 2000 signatures on the night. Now going around asking people to sign a petition to bring David Hicks home so he can undergo a fair trial isn't exactly a difficult task, especially at a U2 concert, but it really irritates me when people are not just ignorant but OUTWARDLY IGNORANT. A simple "no thanks, i'm not interested" is a bit sad, but acceptable. "sorry, I don't agree with this" is infuriating and is second only to "Nah, he knew what he was doing, he deserves to be there" on the list of things to say to increase your liklihood of getting smacked in the face by moi. Dude, pay attention! I'm not passing judgement on whether or not David Hicks is guilty, I'm asking for a fair trial. Obviously some people who go to the U2 concert don't listen to the lyrics... and disagree with the universal declaration of human rights. I refer in particular to articles 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 and 30, in particular 9 - "No one shall be subject to arbitrary arrest, detention or exile", and 10 which is basically the right to a fair trial. U2 even scrolled the first few articles of the UDHR on the massive screen behind them just in case anyone forgot.

On a more positive note, the concert was very good. We got there at about 2pm, there were already queues to get in, some people had been there since last night. Gates opened at 5pm, the support act was on at 7:30 and U2 came on at 9. We were given blue armbands and "vendor" stickers which meant that we got access to the special fenced-off VIP section in general admission. Try to think of the maximum distance that one can hit a shuttlecock with a badminton raquet, that's how close I was to the stage.

Lets see... I went to REM last year, Coldplay earlier this year and now U2... I must say that the U2 concert was by FAR the best.

15th November - GRE

I just did a GRE. These are funny exams aimed at graduates who wish to apply for graduate study programs in the US. They're a little funny and they're all computerised, which I found very strange, especially for the essay bit. Anyway, they still need to mark my essay, but I got 600 for the wordy section and 800 for the mathsy section. I have NO IDEA what this means, so if there is anyone out there who knows how the scoring for the GRE actually works, could they please email me and tell me what those numbers mean?

3rd November - It's OVER!!!

It came right down to the wire. I was still writing at 4pm... while the earlier pages of my thesis were simultaneously being printed. Despite the mad rush approaching 5pm, I actually managed to get the thesis in on time. Some of the other honours students got caught up with binder difficulties, but not me. My dexterity and ability not to flail and crack the shits when a binding machine was being stupid held me in good stead. With a sweaty brow and steely nerves, I bound both copies of my thesis in record time and submitted them before the due date (which is unusual for me).

For those who are interested, i have provided a copy of my thesis here (pdf, 489 KB). It is written in a way as to be easily understood (at least to those who understand it). I would recommend at least 2nd year algebra although 3rd year algebra would be an ideal base for being able to comprehend what I have written. It is 60 pages long so you might want to grab a drink. Its not particularly good.

Important note to those who read my thesis (my thesis examiner's excepted, of course): If you spot a mistake, typo, badly-drawn picture I DON'T WANT TO KNOW!

2nd November - The Crucible

In case any of you are wondering where I've been for the last week or so, I've been drowning in that wonderful piece of character-building which is known as the honours thesis. Drowning is a surprisingly good description of what it feels like. It is 4:45am and I'm still awake. In the last 7 days, I have had a total of about 40 hours of sleep (including naps). I haven't had a continuous sleep of more than 5 hours. The thesis is due 5pm on the 3rd of November.

14th October - Stand Up For Your Rights

Tonight was SUFYR night. It was very pleasing to be able to sit in the audience and not do anything for the duration of the evening. It was immensely satisfying. Obviously I maintain that SUFYR was better back in the day when I organised it, but this year's organisers did a very good job indeed and the outcome of the night was a very satisfactory result. It also made me feel very old for some reason. It seems somewhat unbelievable that I conceived of and organised the first of these at the age of 21 a whole four years ago. That at a time when I felt I had already done alot as president of the Melbourne University Amnesty Group.

13th October - Black Friday

Today was Friday the 13th. There was a trivia night in which our very youthful team (our oldest member was probably many years younger than ANY of the other teams' youngest members) came a surprising and close second. We lost out in the second tie-breaking round (after drawing the first). I managed to guess a "who am I" bonus round after a ridiculously small number of clues - born in 1908, seconded to work in Moscow by reuters... Ian Flemming of course.

6, 7th October - Sydney Weekend

Over the weekend, I went to Sydney for the wedding of a good skating friend Daniel Thomson. I had to participate in a strange ritual which involved bowing a bit and putting a veil on the heads of the bride and groom. I managed ok. The food at the reception was very good, which I was surprised about for some reason. The dancing was interesting... interesting in that nobody actually knew how to dance. Luckily this was compensated for by the volume of alcohol consumed. At the end of the night, we returned to the city via water taxi, which afforded us a very good view of the harbour (a 360 degree view, one might say) at night.

I opted to stay in Sydney for an extra day so that I could sample the best that Sydney had to offer restaurant-wise. Sydney is an interesting city, it looks great but 'feels' not-so-great. I'd prefer Sydney for a visit but I'd definitely live in Melbourne. Anyway, I digress, the two restaurants which were visited were Tetsuya's and Guillaume.

Tetsuya's is situated in a secluded spot on Kent St and they have done a fine job in creating a quiet Oasis in a very busy central location. Depending on who you read, this is either the best or second-best restaurant in all of Australia, the other contender being Vue de Monde. I would personally side with Vue de Monde, but only just. The general feel of the palate is a little lighter than that of vue de Monde and Tetsuya Wakuda's japanese heritage certainly shines through his french training and technique. Highlight of the meal - Italian white bread with TRUFFLE BUTTER mmmmmmmmmm

Guillaume is located in the Sydney opera house. The location is pretty special and the food is made to match. The quality is very very high and possibly the only thing truly lacking from the dishes is that sense of cutting-edge originality that you get at restaurants like vue. Nevertheless, a tried and true formula is still true and Guillaume lived up to its 3 chef's hat reputation.

3rd October - Some photos

Apologies for not updating more often. Maths honours is beginning to get very intense. For now, enjoy these photos from the recent Australian University Games in Adelaide. There is a brief commentary on the photos as well.

FYI, Melbourne Uni placed 2nd overall in the Athletics competition and were overall winners of the 2006 Australian University Games.

15th September - Quotes of the Week

"I can't believe you use IRL in real life!"

On the practice of breathing heavily at grass flies to disrupt their flight paths: "One day, if I keep blowing these flies, one of them is going to accidentally come in my mouth"

Me: "Hey, how do you spell 'rational'?"
Innocent victim:"R-A-T-I-O-N-A-L"
Me:"Shouldn't it be R-A-T-O-N-A-L"
Innocent victim:"No, why would it be that?"
Me:"Because if it had an i in it, it would be in the complex numbers, not the rationals"

8th September - Formalwear Rant

The other day I got on a tram at about 6pm from uni to the city (home). I observed a group of young lads who were clad in formal gear. Fair enough, I thought to myself, they're probably from a college and are on their way to a ball of some description. What irritated me wasn't their apalling butchering of English, no. It wasn't even the fact that they were taking a tram to a formal dinner. It was the state of their attire. The suits were cheap and ill-fitting, I wouldn't have classed any of them as being dressed in "black tie". Black tie implies class, an element which this group was very sorely lacking. If I was enforcing the dress code at their function, I would've told them to go home. I certainly hope that they were renting this formalwear. Not only were the suits very ill fitting, they were mis-matched. One of the people was wearing a normal shirt, and another had his cufflinks in the wrong way. *shudder*. What disturbed me most was that the ringleader of this little posse was being all 'cool' and talking about how he aspired to get a tails-jacket. There should be laws forbidding people from wearing clothes that they don't know how to wear. One of my pet hates is the ready-made bow-tie. It would pain me less if the tailors who make these actually made an attempt to make them look like proper bow-ties, which they don't. There seems to be a whole industry built around hiring mismatched formalwear to desperate, classless teenagers who wouldn't know Supré from Sotheby's and it bothers me.

1st September - Deadline crunch

Today was an interesting day. I had two deadlines today, one of them was a discrete maths assignment and the other was a Rhodes Scholarship application. The assignment was the least of my worries as I had completed it a full day early (which is unusual for me). The scholarship application though, was another story. 1500 words of personal statement, six referees, 2 sides of A4 worth of CV and a partridge in a pear tree - all in all, quite an effort. I'll keep you all posted on whether or not I get shortlisted etc. I may even post my CV and personal statement here for your perusal.

Tonight was also the night of the Scotch College foundation day concert. Among the highlighs were the senior choir and the performance of the first movement of Rachmaninov's second piano concerto. However, everything else was rather poor. I suppose I can cope with the removal of some traditions (like the singing of "Goodnight Ladies") and even with the absence of the war-cry, but the quality of the performances was exceptionally poor. It was very sad really.

20th August - Melbourne Uni Open day

coming soon - photos

20th August - cats, bags, etc.

Ok ok ok, the cat is out of the bag. I'm not sure why, but I was trying to keep it quiet. I'm applying for the Rhodes Scholarship to do an MPhil in International Relations (at Oxford, duh) beginning in October 2007. I haven't a chance in hell owing to a truly disastrous academic record and my application is also short by one academic referee (any ideas? anyone?). There will be a party in the not-too-distant future to comiserate the not-making-of-the-shortlist.

11th August - Dance

Tonight was the annual Melbourne Uni vs Monash Uni intervarsity dance competition. I was a fairly insignificant feature this time around dancing in only one event - the jack and jill (random partnered) swing. Many styles of dance were danced including a new "showcase" event which allowed couples to be more... creative with costumes and choreography. When all was said and done, Melbourne Uni prevailed by a decent margin, sweet revenge after going down to Monash by a single point last year.

8th August - Census

Today was census day. It was exciting, I got to fill out a census form. I think that this is the second one that I've filled out. It makes me feel important.

Today is also the 18th Anniversary of the 8/8/88 massacres which happened in Myanmar. Surprisingly little has changed since then - The military are still in control, and Aung San Suu Kyi is still, effectively, under house arrest. I suppose a few small things have happened, she received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1991 and her husband, Michael Aris, died in 1999.

23rd July - Soccer in Princess Park

Today we played soccer in Princess Park. I would've taken some photos but the weather was not great for taking photos, or doing anything really. I was sporting my new France No. 10 Zidane top. I even scored a goal... probably partly because everyone was tired and wet and freezing cold and couldn't be arsed stopping me. I'm hoping to make Sunday afternoon soccer a regular thing. I'm also very tempted to make French crepes for Sunday lunch a regular thing as well.

So... how about it? Anyone reading this in Melbourne who is interested in some very informal soccer and likes crepes. Crepes at Breizoz at 1pm followed by soccer at Princess Park at 3pm. Contact me if you're coming along.

22nd July - Australian Rules Football

Today I went to my first ever game of AFL. The game was between the Collingwood Magpies (the team that I support) and the West Coast Eagles (the team that Peter McNamara, my current flat-mate supports). The game was fairly close throughout with the difference being a mere 12 points (two goals' worth) until the final quarter where the 'pies stepped up and widened the gap to 37 points by full-time. The final score Collingwood 127, West Coast 90. Yay!

21st of July - Diplomacy

Diplomacy is a board game which is a bit like Risk but with no dice and more talking, the objective is similar in that you are trying to take over the world. It is a very interesting game. I, unfortunately, lost out very early on because I was Austria-Hungary and got sandwiched between Italy, Russia and Turkey. It didn't help that the three people in the group who had actually played this game before (and were quite experienced at it) were Italy, Russia and Turkey... bleurgh. It was a fun day nonetheless...

14th July - Grossi Florentino

Today me and Liliana went to Grossi Florentino. Grossi is a very nice restaurant, but not quite as nice as Vue de Monde. Still, the meal was exquisite and we had truffles. TRUFFLES!!! Interestingly, the stand out dishes were the scallops and the duck. Liliana rather liked the pork belly.

10th July - The World Cup

Everyone seems to have an opinion on this, so I thought i'd join the bandwagon.

Yes, I watched most of the games. Yes, I believe that Australia got robbed because it was a smaller footballing nation. Yes, I think the refereeing has been appalling all-around and that FIFA should really do something about it.

Italy vs Australia - Italy went a man down in the form of Materazzi, in the end a pivotal player in the world cup. The send off was not a fair one. Australia dominated possession but failed to score against a 10-man Italian side. The Italians looked far more dangerous when they were attacking. Grosso, another pivotal player in the world cup, went down for a penalty which was another characteristically shocking refereeing decision. Totti made no mistake with the penalty and that was that.

Holland vs Portugal - Truly ridiculous game, enough cards for a casino. I can't believe they let this guy referee the final.

France vs Brazil - replay of the 1998 World Cup final, but not quite. Zidane leads an older and more experienced team to a comprehensive victory over the defending champions. Brazil haven't looked the part all tournament, but then again neither have Les Bleus. France found form in their match against a fancied Spanish side and thumped them 3-1. Cool class wins the day over fancy individual flare. Zidane can do no wrong when he places a beautiful free kick onto the foot of Thierry Henry for the game's only goal

Italy vs Germany - Fairly close all around, Italy probably slightly stronger throughout. Germany fought gallantly but from the starting whistle for extra-time, there was little doubt that Italy would emerge victors. A class finish from Grossi sneaks just inside the far-post and an easy finish on a counter coming from Del Piero puts the nails in the coffin.

Italy vs France - Quite close at the start, slight advantage to Italy. Lots of stoppages including what looked like a concussion for Henry. Very early penalty, another questionable refereeing decision. Zidane strikes true for his third of the tournament. Materazzi puts a thundering header into the goal off a corner kick to equalise. Second half much more one-sided, in favour of Les Bleus who are dressed in Les Blancs 'away' uniform. Good play from France unable to break the Italian defence. Extra time and France are very dominant, it seems only a matter of time before a goal is scored. Zizou is playing beautifully and is lifting his side. A clever one-two sees a header rocketing off Zizou's head towards goal only to be saved by possibly the world's current geatest goalkeeper - Buffon. A brilliant strike which took a brilliant save. Then disaster - Materazzi provokes Zidane into doing the unthinkable, he headbutts Materazzi in the chest and puts him on the ground. Another thumping header, the ball is nowhere in sight and the red card is shown. Zidane leaves, the French are a man down yet they still dominate the attack. The Italians are waiting for the penalty shoot-out. After 120 minutes of play the Italians become the first team to score 5 from 5 penalty shots with Grosso being the hero who shoots the 5th. Trezeguet, the golden-goal hero of Euro 2000, hits the crossbar and breaks the hearts of the French nation.

This result was particularly unjust, not only because I like France, not only because I'm a big fan of Zinedine Zidane, not only because I don't like Italy for how they won against Australia... no. I didn't like this result because this was one of the games that I watched where the team which was clearly better on the day did not win.

2nd July - Amnesty International Australia's National AGM and Youth Summitt

I gave a welcoming speech featuring economic social and cultural rights which can be found here.

There is a brief and bland report I wrote for the human rights defender magazine here.

I also took lots and lots of photos which can be found here

24th June - Adventures in Cake

There were actually three distinct adventures in cake. First there was Peter's cake, which we constructed for his birthday. Then there was Peter's second cake, which was a goodbye cake. Then there was... wait for it... Han's cake, constructed with similar materials as Peter's first cake, was made for his birthday. View the cake adventures here.

18th June - Stop-gap update

No, I haven't died or gotten lost on my way from the bedroom to the computer room, I'm currently being snowed under by exams and assignments. I promise that I will update when it has all blown over.

In the meantime here is a very insightful and interesting link that someone sent me recently - click me

7th June - Telemarketers

I am beginning to acquire a reputation for talking to telemarketers for an extended length of time for my own amusement. Today I got a call from India... er... Sydney trying to sell me telecommunications services. My reply began with "well sir, that's very nice but have I GOT A DEAL FOR YOU!", and I proceeded to sell him life insurance. That's right... life insurance.

5th June - Marios

Today we went to eat dinner at Marios on Brunswick st which is, incidentally, also the restaurant that Liliana's dad works at. We = Peter, Joanna, Liliana, Me. It was very nice and they forgot to give us a bill... *sigh*

Here is a photo of us!

1st June - Vue de Monde

I went to Vue de Monde with lovely Liliana. This is what she thought of it. I rather liked it. They didn't have any truffles. I was mortified. They almost made up for it with the Wagyu beef served with chips which had, at some point, come into contact with truffle oil. MMmmmmmmm... truffle oil.

26th May - OSCA dinner and trivial matters

Today was the last day of classes... we had a MUMS trivia night. My team built a good bridge, but they changed the rules halfway through the game but we still came second. In the end we won by a considerable margin despite me having to leave about halfway through. I had to leave ealry to go to the Old Scotch Collegians Association's (OSCA) annual dinner.

19th May - And The Award Goes To...

The Melbourne University Athletics Club had their annual dinner and awards ceremony tonight. Its pretty cool being part of a club which has been around for such a long time. This dinner was a sumptuous black-tie affair and I, not surprisingly, wore my tails jacket. It was a surprisingly fun night... surprising because I got an award! I am the 2005-2006 season's best first-year male athlete (try saying that ten times in a hurry). The award itself was pretty cool, it was one of those things where the box that it came in was, in many ways, cooler than the award itself (it was purple and fuzzy). The reason for the award? Apparently they think it is pretty cool that I got into the clubs season rankings in the 100m, 200m, 400m AND 800m.

17th May - Victorian Schools Conference

Today we had the annual Victorian Amnesty International Schools Conference, which basically involves a bunch of workshops, some speeches and other assorted fun stuff to teach school kids about human rights and human rights activism. I was a workshop facilitator for the third year in a row. I had fun, here are some photos.

12th May - Happy Birthday To...

...I wonder who this is... I wonder if she liked her present

10th May - Hot Lap

Today I went for a fairly quick run. Me and Nick ran a lap of Princess Park which is about 3.2km all the way around. We did it in 14 minutes. This is what my heart rate monitor said. bpm is beats per minute, the first two vertical lines represent the start and finish of the lap itself, the big dip just after the end of the lap was just us waiting at traffic lights. Can someone tell me if I'm some kind of freak?

7th May - MUMS AGM

The Melbourne University Mathematics and Statistics Society had its AGM last Friday. As outgoing education officer, I had to deliver a report. Not wanting to bore anyone to death with a long-winded report, I made it short and sweet and... in iambic pentameter. Here it is.

1st May - A new toy!

Today I got a new toy, meet Mr. Whiteboard.

29th April - One month

actually, its been a little longer... but for those of you who don't know what I'm talking about... click here

In other news, I just got a call from India. This time, India was trying to sell me cheap travel vouchers or something. I started by telling them that I didn't take holidays. This did not dissuade them. Then I asked for them to put me up in a hotel in Bolivia. When they finally found me a hotel in Bolivia, I asked for Afghanistan and Turkmenistan at which point I was palmed off to "the supervisor" whose name was "Amy Jones". After speaking for an additional 20 minutes I finally made my exit by tearing apart a bad analogy about umbrellas (ask me if you're interested).

21st April - Relay action

The relays were today. Owing to the fact that my right foot was not complete skin-wise, I wasn't able to skate, damn. The senior men got a bronze medal, it helped that there were only 3 teams competing but still, it would've been nice to get a medal. However, I was able to encourage our relay teams and formulate intricate plans to outsmart the New Zealanders (ok, they don't have to be that intricate to outsmart the New Zealanders). In any case, we did a pretty good job as our single junior girl team came 1st and two of our junior boys teams came first and second. I will, unfortunately, miss out on the marathon so no more Oceanias reportage for me.

Oceanias photo diary

Oceanias full results

20th April - Captain Blood

Today I failed to make it into the final of the 1000m and I also managed to rip some skin off the heel of my right foot - no more skating for me. So, during the 10k points elimination races I was recruited to help count people's points and yell orders. I took my job very seriously. A little too seriously. Very quickly I became notorious for my enthusiastic encouragement. Lines such as "Anna, get on the back of number 92 and make her your bitch!" and "Brooke, make her PAY! Break her! Break her! Make her bleed for her medal" garnered me much attention.

19th April - D'oh, D'oh, D'oh!

300m Time Trial - sucked. 500m - sucked. 15000m elimination - sucked. Today was not a good day of racing.

I was fortunate enough to expand my vocabulary today. Skunsuit: noun, it is what happens when one takes a cheese grater and a skinsuit and combines them. Only found in New Zealand.

18th April - Rearing and ready to go

Today was the last day of warming up for Oceania championships. If anyone is wondering, (and if I can get some internet access before I get back) I am in Christchurch racing for Australia in the 2006 Oceania inline speedskating championships. We finished off the day at a restaurant named "Spag's" which is quite possibly one of the worst restaurants I have ever been to (and I've been to a few). Not only did we wait almost two hours for our food, it wasn't very good. In fact, it was pretty bad. On the positive side of things, we all seem to be skating well and are in good spirits going into the first day of competition.

A certain junior boy, who shall remain nameless, has also been stalking our room... we have a plan to deal with him.

14th April - Good Friday

A very good Friday indeed... finished off with a meal which can only come under the category of "Orgasmic". But that wasn't even the best part of the day...

11th April - Framed!

For some time, I have been in possession of two very groovy signed posters from certain comedy nights which I was involved in organising in a previous life... if anyone was curious to know what they looked like, I finally got them framed, and here they are

poster1, poster2

6th April - Random...

I was sorting through some old photos today and I came across this gem. Me and a friend were out on a sushi adventure and we spotted a sign that made us giggle...

...and here are some photos of the wine bottle from Sunday night... and a close up.

2nd April - Fine Wine

A little while ago I went out and bought a bottle of wine which was... expensive. 1979 Penfolds Grange, bottled in 1981. We had dinner to celebrate my graduation and my parents' 35th wedding anniversary. We dined at a lovely French restaurant called France-Soir and I had a fish soup, foie gras and a nice juicy steak. The meal didn't quite cost half of what the wine did...

29th March - Rant

What are you afraid of? I am occasionally gripped by fear, though I like to think that I am generally good at controlling it.What are we really afraid of? Failure? I would like to think that I was afraid of failure, but I am afraid that I am not. And not just because I fail very often. No. The most terrifying thing is success. Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate, our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.

28th March - Personal Best 2:09.77 800m

25th March - Commonwealth Games Athletics

Today was exciting. Not only did I sleep in until silly-o-clock, but I got to go and watch the final night of athletics at the commonwealth games. It was good. Here are some photos.

25th March - Ooh! It feels so good!

It feels so good to sleep in until 2:30pm. Why? What did you think I meant? Get your minds out of the gutter...

23rd March - Graduation *yawn*

Tonight I graduated. It was arguably the most boring 3, 4... 5 (I lost count) hours of my life. A word of advice, if you can get out of attending your own graduation, do it. Here are some pictures... (where "some" actually means "one")

17th March - MUMS seminar

Today I gave a seminar on Cryptography. It was called "Victoria's Secrets" and featured Brazillian hottie Adriana Lima on the posters. The title was only really intended to get people's attention. It worked. It was a very well-attended seminar. Here are the slides, and here is a mathematica notebook that I used to demonstrate some of the techniques of cryprography.

14th March - Rematch

Some of you may recall that at about this time last year, I was challenged to a race of 1500m with my Columbian friend and occasional house-mate Juan Carlos Valencia. The result of that race was a loss of about 50m. In my defence, I felt a niggle in my left thigh and stopped because the Oceania speedskating championships were only a few weeks away and I didn't want to risk injury. I had to cop alot of crap for my sacrifice, even though I did set a PB of 17.931s and place 4th in Oceanias time trial.

Just yesterday, we had a rematch. The distance - 800m. The conditions weren't great this time around, but we still raced. I sat on my planned splits which meant that I basically ran on his shoulder for about 500m. I kicked with 300m to go and won by 100m. Not a bad result, and I didn't even feel the normal throwing-up sensation that ordinarily accompanies an 800m race. The time 2:12.64 (which, to my surprise, was a season's best).

12th March - An announcement

Some of you more dedicated readers of danielyeow.com are probably sitting there wondering about what big project I will be taking on this year. Well, it certainly won't be Stand Up For Your Rights, I can tell you that for nothing. No. In fact, I have decided that this year, my number 1 big project/priority will be (drumroll please...) ME! Getting myself through honours, making sure I eat properly etc. etc. You are all witnesses, and I expect you to remind me of this announcement everytime (and there will be times) I look like I might forget.

11th March - A few milestones

Today was exciting. I ran for Melbourne Uni in the Athletics Victoria Division 1 Shield Final. It was fun. I ran a PB of 52.755 seconds for 400m, a time with which I am well pleased.

Later that night, I was front of house manager for the third night of the Vagina Monologues which were hugely successful. How hugely, you ask? We sold out all three nights. How do you like them apples?

4th March - What colour is the internet?

I got a call from India today. Someone wanted to sell me dodo internet services and I wasn't really interested in internet services but WAS interested in having a conversation. So I pretended that I had never heard of the internet. It was quite amusing. I must've talked for at least 30 minutes and I also got to talk to his supervisor. These Indian fellows aren't very good at describing what the internet actually is. As a result, I was able to lead in with questions like "how big is this internet" and "what colour is the internet". The conversation was so amusing, that I just HAD to post about it for all of you to read.

In other news, I ran 11.6 for the 100m and 24.0 for the 200m at today's athletics meet.

3rd March - a busy day

Today was a busy day. I handed in my final take-home exam from AMSI today. That was a relief. We also had our first MUMS seminar today by the ever-amusing Marty Ross. After that, I had an audition for a musical "Working". I'm not sure why, but it didn't occur to me when I signed up that I would actually have to sing at this audition. I sang Peter Allen's "I Still Call Australia Home". I think I did ok...

28th February - PBs Galore

You know what's the surest way of getting a PB in track and field? Do an event which you have never done before. I set two PBs and a season best today - 8.46m in the Shot Put and 10.75 in the triple jump. Then the coach of the Melbourne University Athletics Club told me to stop dicking around otherwise I'll injure myself. Oh, I ran 24.08 in the 200m as well.

18th February -D'oh

I have just realised that, even though I have been updating this page for the last two hours weeks, I've actually managed to forget to *upload* this page to the internet for quite a while. I would like to thank all my loyal readers for being so patient with me...

17th February - MCG

Sense of occasion... hmm... let me see... how about running on the MCG?

For those of you who aren't aware, this year's Commonwealth Games will be held in Melbourne. The main venue for track and field athletics will be the Melbourne Cricket Ground. For this purpose, an athletics track was laid on the ground. They put it down sometime last year so someone had the bright idea that Victorian Championships for Athletics should be held there. And it was so. For some reason, despite technically qualifying for the 100m, 200m and 400m (yes, I am the black sheep of the middle-distance squad), I only got to race the 100m - not really my event.

They must've had a bit of track left over, because they put it in the basement. It sort of got in the way, but it was great to warm up on. After being marshalled through a bunch of 'holding pen' arrangements (which I presume was practice for the commonweath games) we got out onto the track. Then we raced. Being a middle-distance runner, I got comprehensively owned buy all the specialist sprinters, but I still set a PB of 11.72s (those who have been paying attention will note my previous PB, set six days ago in Olympic Park is half a second slower) despite coming sixth. The guy who won got 10.5 or something. The track was pretty fast.

11th February - Olympic Park

Today I ran at an all-comers meet at Olympic Park. When I was a schoolboy, running at Olympic Park was a big occasion. The sense of occasion has diminished somewhat since then. The track is still one of the fastest that I have run on. I set two PBs, which ain't bad for two races. 12.22s in the 100m and 53.74s in the 400m.

9th February - AMSI dinner

The AMSI dinner was lots of fun. So much fun, in fact, that I managed to fall asleep sometime in the middle of it. Nonetheless, there was much merriment. Lynne McArthur, one of the coordinators came around to all the tables and asked if anyone would like to give a speech. I think my speech made her throroughly regret doing that. You see... we were playing a drinking game, every time someone mentioned the words "future", "success" or the name of a sporting star, we would have to have a drink. I spoke briefly on the commonwealth games and the future success of many of our sporting stars. (hehehe)

4th February - Fancy a run?

Today I went running. Despite windy conditions, I ran three personal bests for the season (and had there not been a head wind down the finishing straight, it would've SO been four). The PBs were in the 100m, 400m and 60m. I missed the 200m by a about two-tenths. As a side issue, I won the 400m and the 200m and came second in the 100m and the 60m, and I still suck royally at starting out of blocks. My new sprint-spikes rock! Who would've thought that sprint spikes would be more suited to sprinting than distance spikes?

30th January - Summer intensive

They weren't kidding when they said intensive. Today was a prime (indivisible) example of this. I had a whopping 7 hours of classes today! Now these aren't just your normal, run-of-the-mill classes, these were intense. Two hours of mind-bending Measure Theory, three hours of Cryptomathematics (where I found a fixed-point in the keyspace of the DES cipher) and two hours of Spanish (sing: one of these things is not like the other, one of these things just isn't the same...). AMSI summer school is now into its third week and my four-week intensive Spanish just started. How will I cope?

In other news, I won $30 in last weekend's Southern Cross interstate inline speed skating competition.

21st January - A hot day

Today was a hot day. I think we maxed out at something like 41 degrees celsius. That is hot. So... what did I do today? I went training for athletics. I'm not sure why we needed to warm up as we were actually quite warm to start with, but I lost almost 3 litres of sweat. Our coach, Kevin Prendergast, was so proud of us for actually finishing training (and believe me, there were moments when I didn't think it was going to happen) that he took a photo of the squad at the end of training. Here it is.

7th January - January Hororscopes

sorry about the delay, had to wait for a few clear nights to make my astrological observations.

5th January - Golf

Golf, a four-letter-word which inspires so many other four-letter-words. James, Thara, Nick and I went to play 9 holes today and it too us four hours! Two shots stood out for me. One was James' strike of a tree - he hit a tree which was all of 10m in front of him, the ball bounced straight back, narrowly missing him (and us!), rolled across the fairway of a diffrent hole and 'clinked' the flag (but was going to fast to go in). The other shot was my tee off the 9th hole, landed about 3m from the hole and opened the opportunity for a birdie. I made par. (birdie = 1 shot under par, par = a score on a hole that only pros can consistently get)