Marathon des sables

Marc is a teacher at this school. He is running a crushing marathon in Morocco.

• http://ultramarathonien.blogspot.com/ 
  Map of Fès, Morocco
  Hotel Batha review *bad, they try the same old tour guide scam on all tourists it seems.
  Map of Rabat

• Fiche Marc Leclerc : http://darbaroud.com
  
• Français : Darbaroud : Marathon Des Sables & Desert cup
  
• English: Darbaroud : Marathon Des Sables & Desert cup
  
• competitor list, marc
  

Translate

English numbers to text: http://www.csgnetwork.com/num2texttranslate.html

Translate entire sentences:

• http://qc.babelfish.yahoo.com/
• http://translate.google.com/

A to Zee - A to Zed

Differences between British and American English

Memory upgrade to a ThinkPad r32

• Max 1GB and other specifications: 2 x $30 = $60
  Example: http://www.memorystock.com/memory/IBMThinkPadR322658xxx.html
• HOW TO VIDEO: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DC7E1TcdETE

Let's give it a go.

News of earth_hour_2009. Click the photos in this link to see them switch off.

What about the spiritual Japan?

What makes Japan tick? Shintoism and Zen Budhism. This is a good primer to read.

• Shinto
• Zen

Government forms for Rental accomodation

• Dynamique : tpz-1029.md.7.p(2009-05).pdf (a compléter à l'écran puis imprimer, signer, joindre le bail, poster). Pour Ginette
• Statique : tpz-1029.md.7.p(2008-05).pdf (imprimer puis compléter à la main)
• Consignes: tpz-1029_md_7_p.asp

keywords: formulaire crédit d'impôt pour logement

Cute show and tell story

Just a fun story in the line of "kids say the cutest things"

• Show and Tell "The Middle Wife": As told by the author
  
• Rumor mill comment by snopes.com: The Middle Wife

Cabane à sucre Milette - Spanish Maple menu

La Cabane a sucre Millette inc Sugar Shack in St-Faustin Lac Carre, Mt-Tremblant, Laurentians, Quebec, Canada.

La Cabaña de azúcar de arce Millette
El menú tradicional 
Servido en todo momento (a discreción)

Omelette de la abuela Millette
Tocino crujiente a la antigua
Jamon ahumado con almíbar de arce
Habas y tocino como en los viejos tiempos
Salchichas en almíbar de arce
Papas hervidas
Escabeche de legumbres casero
Pan casero

Tarta de azúcar y crema fundidas
Crëpe solo o con azúcar y crema fundidas
Huevos en almíbar de arce
Crëpe de trigo sarraceno
Almíibar de arce puro

Té, café, leche

Almíbar de arce enfriado sobre la nieve

Nuestros servicios
Recibimiento por la familia y sus 3 generaciones
Sendero peatonal con explicación por la plantación de arces

Gracias Carmen

Loco for Lego

Maybe I still love Lego, despite the pinched skin memories.

• Lego 5 business cards
  
• Lego's city 1962
  
• Lego's Taj Mahal
• Lego's Obama Inauguration speech
  
• Lego's Dali and lobster telephone
  

Red lentil recipe

Something to try out

• EGYPTIAN LENTILS Red lentil recipe with rice, try with noodles. Thanks mom
• Red-Lentil-Curry with rice

Buying a bent

Recumbent bicycle resources in the Greater Laval region:

Retailers

• Laval: Zone Haute Performance Z H P - 450-967-7767 2296, boulevard Industriel , Laval , QC H7S1P9 - They have a couple of "heavy" CCM semi-bents for under $400.
• Laval: Banco Argent Comptant - 450-967-2274 404, boulevard Des Laurentides , Laval , QC H7G2T8 - Heavy Quetzal for sale, tempting but expensive.
• Rive sud: http://www.velorizontal.com/francais.htm Pricey but specialized
• Montreal: http://www.1hpcycles.com/ No site: 1HP CYCLES 5995 Guin Ouest, Montreal, QC H4J 2P8 CANADA Phone: 514-633-62221-866-430-6222Fax: 514 337-0933 mailto:info@1hpcycles.comthttp://www.1hpcycles.com/
• Montreal: www.lespac.com/search/
• Vélos à Laval, etc.: http://canada411.yellowpages.ca/
• Texas: www.recumbents.com/home.asp
• A nice German site: http://www.hpvelotechnik.com/

General information about Recumbents:

• http://www.ihpva.org/
• Nice article introducing bents: http://www.hpv.on.ca/recumb.htm
• French wiki article: http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/V%C3%A9lo_couch%C3%A9

Maps

• http://www.mapmyride.com/find-ride/canada/laval
• http://www.bikely.com/listpaths/country/43/region/35/city/13112
• http://www.canadatrails.ca/tct/qc/laval.html

References for 461-134 for groups 81, 83 and 86 lab B202 B205 -209

Liens - BI - TICFP

1. Speedtest - how fast are you?
2. TypingTest.com - Test gratuit: Testez votre frappe au clavier gratuitement
3. Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
4. Kiran's Typing Tutor Download

File: 461-134 Letter outline - plan de lettre & time management - gestion du temps.doc

Grammar rules: comma

Tests de niveau gratuits en anglais
LEARN THE NET: Test Your Net IQ: Quiz I https://websitebuilders.com
Microsoft Office Templates Home Page - Microsoft Office Online

Pratique de terminologie et concepts informatiques de base: BingoFR

Main Page - Gutenberg



QBTA - Accounting QBTA - Accounting - Book List
QBTA - Secretarial Studies (new) QBTA - Secretarial Studies - Book List


Lanschool is very intuitive. Trial Version LanSchool Guided Tour LanSchool

How to permanently delete your Facebook account

You may want to temporarily deactivate your account,


However if you are sure, and want everything to be removed (photos, comments, etc.)

How to permanently delete your Facebook account. Irretrievably!
http://www.facebook.com/help/contact.php?show_form=delete_account
Warning! There is no return from this procedure.

Note: this procedure has reportedly not worked (Thanks Ivo), and so you may want to simply delete all images, texts, applications and then deactivate the account. (Thanks Sonya)

Upon reflection: A trip to Talking Trees

• This is not a trip back to Australia.
• It is a trip to a place of ecological living, respect for nature, mindful presence, voluntary simplicity, worldliness, vegetarian living, connectedness.
• It is also a trip back to a time, long long ago, where Alex and I woke up as brothers every morning and just did stuff, before time and lifestyle kept us apart.

How do spiders do it?

To see a simulation of webcrafting 101 watch this beautiful animation. Merci Jeanine.

It's so cold in this house.

The first thing I did after dropping my bags was crank up the heat in the bathroom to 30 and enjoying a little comfort. It will be days before I sleep a full night and stop feeling cold all the time. It really should be 24 to 26 in a proper house!

Dog tired, but finally back in Laval

Left Brisbane Monday the 16th at 4:30 AM to catch the train and plane to Sydney. By Noon I'm off to Vancouver, Toronto then Montreal. I'm finally home in Laval after 28 hours in transit.  I could hardly keep my eyes open on the last leg to Montreal, the last cup of coffee kept me aware till bedtime. Ginette picked me up at the airport, but my luggage was delayed 45 minutes. Thankfully this didn't happen at one of the previous transfers.  For example, I had 3 minutes to find my gate at Toronto (well then I had a 20 minute boarding wait).

Movie - The day the earth stood still (2008)

This new verson is certainly preachy but is adapted to the current mindset. It feels like a small movie.

(spoiler alert) 

She saves humanity from extermination, but does it all happens in secret, so does it save the planet from humanity?

• http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0970416/
  
• wiki: The_Day_the_Earth_Stood_Still_(2008_film)
  

Movie - Slumdog millionaire

I would have to call this a "dirty Disney" style movie is both harsh, tearful and happy. Certainly worth seeing.  I found myself expecting the flashbacks at every question. This movie works.

• http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1010048/
  

A Sunday in Brisbane

What a beautiful day! Just the simplest of sandals, a light shirt and shorts; I'm off to visit the Queensland Museum (I love the 45 m Museum Zoo and the Aboriginal display), the Sciencentre and the State library. Then a walk down Queen street and back to the room. Beauty everywhere.

From Drop Box

Museums really should always be free everywhere. Just like streets and sidewalks.

Goodbye to Alex

Alex and John wait for the 9:54 train with me, only to realize that it's PM not AM. They kindly drive me to Namboor where I can catch the 11:54 train to Beerwah and the Australia Zoo.

Brief "Hug & Kisses" and were off our separate ways.

I probably could have hitchhiked since trains are very comfortable but feel slow. But since it is raining intermittently, I'm glad to be inside. Besides they wouldn't have heard of it.

While waiting I saw my first real Red Heeler (dog).

Australia Zoo is all I expected. They set asside 1500 acres for future development of a drive through section. For now it's a lovely walking zoo presenting an excellent cross section of Australian fauna. They point out the absence of male red kangaroos because they jump over 3 meters high and can't be contained. I'm in heaven, with half a dozen Kukkaburras at arms length and without cages.

From Drop Box

Tonight I'll be staying at Joseppes Hostel on Roma street, right next door to the YHA. At only $ 30 for a full room I'm happy they "chose" me. They are very selective about their clientele. So it was very quiet. Considering the neighbours raucaus parties.

A little stargazing pays off, I found Orion on it's side. The astronomical explanation.

From Drop Box

Bought this webcam in Australia at a garage sale

Leadtek BioCam usb works on Windows XP or older. No 64 bit drivers for Vista

Leadtek BioCam LTB-3700, 0.3 Megapixels, USB 1.1, Blue, Fingerprint Scanner

WinFast BioCam USB LTB-3700 1.6 MB

WinFast BioCam USB LTB-3700 50 MB

A morning out with Alex and John

After breakfast we head out to Cooroy for a random walk. We find ourselves next to a house size black cube straight out of science fiction lore. It turns out to be a server building but it stands in stark yet integrated contrast with the pionneer style setting of the rest of the street.

From Drop Box

We check out the art galery, and see some well excuted memories of Greece paintings. Then we bump into the artist in residence next door at the Cooroy Butter factory Arts Centre. Mal Butterworth is a tall handy guy who produces all kinds of sculpture in papier maché and ceramics. We chat for an hour as his drooping coffee cup turns cold.

This afternoon I deal with a defective printer that will have to be returned to HP for replacement, 30 minutes on the phone; ewe!

30 mm of rain today.

I call a gas heater technician about our Instant gas water heater disable switch, he sais we don't have enough head at 1.5 m and will have to resort to tank heating.  Lucky for us Alex has such a beast, and so we proceed with the installation in the shower. We get it running half an hour before John arrives. I'm the first to test the unit; I'm in heaven with my first GLORIOUS HOT SHOWER! 

It's still raining, John was delayed, Alex is concerned he might be stuck in the muck. I don't care, I'm super clean thanks to the Glorious Hot Shower (sic).

40 mm of rain today.

Alex is off to a party this evening. He reports back that Noosa beach is gone. A wave swept into a restaurant. The last of the cyclone is messing things up.

We plan my outing to the Zoo and Brisbane.

News from Oz

It's raining quite a bit today. The cyclone nearly made it to Noosa. The entire beach is gone, large waves are crashing into the protective barriers. One restaurant caught a wave right in the dining room! 

We have finished the electrical enhancements by wiring switches to the "gaslight style" porch lights. They look pretty, with their vintage style.

70 mm of rain today

Breakfast 2 1/2 slices of bread with melted cheeze. 

We pull the Internet antenna through the roof to the kitchen island and end up with enough cable to reach the floor. 

We buy electrical supplies from the local hardware store. They are so friendly, you just want to spend all day with them.  

I see an "Ozzie" moment at the counter where a client sais we had 7 mm of rain and alex responds we had 43 mm.  It seems everyone measures the rainfall in their backyard. 

By 11 we are wandering back and walk past a cafe. Tony and Rocky buy us coffee and tell us their tales. Tony just visited Saskatchewan (where his daughter lives), Alberta and B.C.. 

It's 12:30, we are pulling more cable to feed the extension light (gas light motif). It looks very cool and lights the boardwak to the shower.

Light lunch at 2 PM.  Pasta, celery, greens and almonds.  

Now for the serious pulling of 30 m of power cable to the bathhouse. This means attaching the cable under the house, along the boardwalk and burrying it in a conduit. The job goes supprisingly well. I peel off 6 leeches. I tore my knee on the earth under the house but not to worry.

By 4 we are ready for a nice Gin and Tonic. Then Alex prepares his famous Avocado Smoothie (Avocado, soy milk, vanilla and a little sugar). That little hand blender is wonderful.

I'm getting hungry so I have a plate of tomatoes, oil, pepper and oregano for supper. 

Now I configure the BlueTooth hands free headset for his cell phone. It works like a charm and he can take a call 3 m from the phone. Hopefully, no more missed calls. 

Give Ginette and Bev a Skype call since they are just waking up. I don't know why Bev's connection is so much better than Ginette's.

40 mm of rain.

10 am install 1933 electrical switch in bathhouse. It looks great with the Gas Lamp style lighting fixture. These are very difficult to install but look cool.

12:30 we clean out the shed attic. Then travel to Gympie in search of the right pump to solve the gas heater problem.

2:30 Tea with Ron and Jen at the motel in Gymnpie. They train Alex while I watch TV (same as here). I'm saved by Jen who tells me how they have been going round Oz in a camper in 12 months at age 60.

Back in the RAIN.

We have a lovely dinner of vermicelli, celery, almonds, garlic, olive oil. Toasted with white wine.

Teachers wishing to move to paradise

For adult education work in Australia first call TAFE, then get a work visa .  Sadly immigration will only consider people under 40 years of age.  

Older teachers can move there on a retirement visa (valid for 4 years) and then sneak in some occasional work.

Waiting for corroboration here.

An outing to Alexandria bay nude beach

Shopping for projects around the house.

• 8 w bulbs
  
• wire clamps
  
• power cable 30 m
  
• outdoor outlet cover ($59? never mind)
  
• 8 m light cable

Croissant & coffee at Noosa Farmer's market. Upscale and pleasant.


Pull cable pair for 2 way switch, but we decide not to continue. I'm learning bits of the Ozzie electrical system. The colour coding for power wires is Red: Active, Green: Earth, Black Neutral.


2.3 km walk out to the beach.

• Spend the afternoon at the Alexandria bay nude beach. A 1 km stretch of perfect sand. The Adam & Eve Social Group inc are hosting an event today so 300-400 people gathered. Nudity didn't bother me as much as I expected, but it did make me very aware of body care.
  
• The sand squeeks when you walk on it. Apparently because it is so clean and fine, which it certainly is.
  
• The airplane won the family sand castle competition. Alex didn't win the Bum competition, in fact 3 bubble bums won. An incredible "over 65" woman ran the 2 km marathon.

2.3 km walk back from the beach.

• Met Robert the poet and fixed his printer & configured his TV, his poem "The golden boy" is very thoughtful and touching. Also met Jim.
  
• Back at Talking Trees, Alex makes wonderful avocado smoothies with soymilk, vanilla and brown sugar. For carbs: toasted pita with smears of garlic and olive oil.

Pelican beach outing

• 6:30 AM start soaking laundry for 4 to 5 hours, then wash, rinse and spin dry then hang out in shed. Everything here is ecological and low impact.
• Browse the Sunshine coast Daily ($2). Garage sales are not so interesting today. The GPS helped us find them more quickly.
• Drive to Noosa to buy supplies at the hardware store.
• Have a lovely melon each for lunch and a small ice cream cone during our long walk.



From Drop Box



• Today we install the lighting in the shower room (3 m x 3 m). We had to dig a 6 m trench and pull 35 m of light cable. We got very dirty dragging cable under the porch, but a quick dip in the pond and were back in shape.
• We experimented with the solar heated shower hose and spend some time draining air from the hose.
• Supper on the patio tonight. 4 tomatoes, crackers with pesto, humus, 2 short glasses of wine.
• We chat about plans to develop a beautiful Tent Structure in Cairns.

It was 16 last night. Not comfortable at all.

• 8 AM toast with honey and muselix
  
• Call about the instant water heater, the service technician tells us of the switch, but it still doesn't flow gas.
  
• Telstra sais for $10 extra the phone can be used for internet. But the 3G internet can't be combined with the phone.
  
• SMS can't be sent.
  
• I learn about PREDICTIVE KEYBOARDING on Alex's new phone. It's FAST, the trick is to ignore the screen until you see the word you are typing.
  
• We find 3 pumps in Corroy: turbine $295, 12 v $170 and submersible $180.
  

Finding the 3G Internet sweet spot at Talking Trees.

8 AM call everyone at home. Learned that Santiago died.

9 AM RACQ pick up car and tow it to Cooroy. Presumably to change the alternator.

Found a great regional map and add a few to the clipboard in my camera.

Found a signal strength meter in the Internet modem software.  -98 dBm

Relocate antenna a little.

As forest dries the signal improves to -94 dBm, but drops to -106 dBm for no apparent reason. 

I type up documentation in "instructions for PC.doc"

Got the hotwater heater to spark and click but no gas flow.  It needs a minimum of .025 Mpa which equals 3.625 psi which is 100 inch water or 2.5 m head. None of this helps since we have far less on this gravity fed system.

2 hours of phone calls on skype only seems to have used 61 MB of his 1000 MB per month allowance. Excellent!

Low pressure water heater background

Chinese instruction to metric pressure conversion .025Mpa = 2.5 m head = 3.6 psi

pdf brochure

The bottom line gravity fed is very low pressure. We tried to create 2.5 m head without getting gas to flow. I called a technician and he recommended going to a batch heater for such low pressure.

Bike ride into Pomona

Read on a card at Alex's: 

• "Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, 
  but by the moments that take our breath away"

Bike ride into Pomona to check out supplies and for excercise.
Power cable is $1.95 per meter

No trip to Noosa, the car won't start since battery is flat empty.  We call RACQ

DAHL for supper is delicious 
-Fry together cummin, tumeric, currypowder, red lentils, onions, garlic, oil.

-Houghton Cardonnay 2007 wine. Thanks Paul.

Nice shots of bathhouse

The morning starts with a wander about the pond, washup and photo session of the gardens. 

From Drop Box

We go on an outing to Pomona by bike.

From Drop Box

We replace the paper wall over the patio.

From Drop Box

 

Bike ride to Cooroy and Pomona

We went into Cooroy and Pomona to do a little shopping. It's about 23 km. I was tired, but Alex was in fine shape. Did I mention it was hot? 32C. So I had a nice nap this afternoon. We worked on the water heater and repositioned the Internet antenna with great success, we now have 250kbps speed; which is excellent. We performed a test on the water tank and achieved 330kbps and so will buy an extension cable tomorrow at Noosa.

Steve "works" in Oz

Yes we spend a few hours on the road watering some plants and trees. Alex does the weeding and checks the condition of the plants. Nice job when the weather cooperates.
We also check out antennas at Testra Gympie.
Lunch at the local mall I only ate half the sandwich.

Sunday morning at Talking Trees

Wonderful conversation, photography, walking. A perfect day with my brother.