World's longest single word domain name.

www.llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwyll-llantysiliogogogoch.com

No, I can't pronounce it & see very little reason to learn. But hey, get along there & there're all sorts of interactive, fascinating things to do.

OK, I'm exaggerating.

And anyway, if it's a single word, what's that hyphen doing there?

Update:

It is possible to send emails from "yourname@Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwll-llantysiliogogogoch.com

What fun!

Further update:

Yes, if you got a plea from help from Elvis, stuck in Llan.. Lla... that place for the last 30 years... it was me.

But you know what really strikes me though, if this place is so neat, how come after you've visited the site & sent an email from elvis... it takes you to a page where you can book your holiday... in France!!

I'll take a punt then, that the site is funded by some local council:

"Hey, let's get a website for Llanf... but since its such a shithole, we'll use the site to peddle cheap hols in France. Brilliant!"

Woke up this morning

Got myself a gun...

Well not quite. I did go & look at guns today though, just airguns. I have wats & wabbits on my mind. I'm told that an airgun that exceeds 1000 feet per second is good enough to bowl a rabbit or a possum. There is a recommended brand called Gano, or something, cost around $500.

I was sorely tempted.

Then it occured to me that while I clearly have a pest problem, I have yet to actually see live rats & rabbits... which is probably a prerequisite for shooting them.

So I'll mull on it.

But on the other hand... does anyone know where you can buy decent crossbows?

Meanwhile, these shots were taken with my phone & do not do this morning justice at all, the sky was on fire.





And this one was taken a few weeks ago.

This deserves a wider audience!

Well... not that I'm providing it...

But hey there, it's local body election year & the bypass has just been implemented to delay traffic through & into the city (they didn't say that was the reason for it, but a city planner I met assures me I don't know what he knows & so I deduce from that that they did it on purpose. Wankers.) so why are the council luring cars into the city with cheap parking & putting up public transport fares all the while telling us we're becoming carbon neutral!??

WellUrban: How not to go carbon neutral

I have a question...

Watched the netball finals over the last few weeks, was very pleased to hear a new male commentator, didn't catch his name, but the point is, he knew the rules, the players, and seemed to be able to read how the play was going.

Then, for the final, Brendon Telfer was back.

What gives TV1? Does Telfer know where the bodies are buried? Because he knows jack shit about netball.

MPs to set strict rules on photos that poke fun at them - Stuff.co.nz

Please! That's Mr Retard to You.

Job website labels client 'retard' - Stuff.co.nz

There were rats, big as blooming cats

I know Alan will sympathise...

We have rats. At least I presume they're rats, haven't seen them yet, but I have seen their signs.

Actually, that's not true, Wilma found a dead rat last month. It was really big too!

Their sign (RatsRUS - no just joking), include hundreds of macadamia nuts with little holes gnawed in their shells, and gnawed apples, and avacadoes... and actually, I owe the birds an apology, I thought it was them pecking at the avacadoes. Now I think its the rats.

And in our "tack room", whatever that is (horsey people will know), which is traditionally where (before the drying room was built) nuts were left to dry, and where I had left 3 buckets of nuts, our practise run which I have kept separate from the commercial crop, there were nutshells all over the place, up high in recesses in the wall, down low in the very difficult to get corner behind the spa pool... the rats have been helping themselves!

And so I took those 3 buckets, and I dried the nuts in the ovens (over-dried them actually, I have probably ruined them, but anyway, they were the practise run), and hung them in an onion bag with last year's crop.

I also tripped down to Mitre 10 & bought a truckload of ratbait, some of it is stationed out in the orchard now, in a pet proof plastic thing, some of it is pushed into hard-to-get-at places in the tack room & stables.

War is declared on a big scale.

I suspect this will be an ongoing war & goodness knows what else in the way of pests will come to well, pester me. The carbaryl (wasp poison) in the shed may be a bit of a clue.

Oh, and explorers this weekend, found the legendary source of Lake SunnyO. Yes, about 18 inches down in the ground underneath the avacado tree is a T intersection in the white PVC piping that runs through much of our property, which has lost its tail. A plumber will have to be summoned.

BTW, somewhere I have photos, when I come across the camera again, in due course, I will upload them.

bicurious female librarian - Google Search

just leave your name in the comments, my procurer will be in touch.

bicurious female librarian - Google Search

Bwahaha! Excellent.

WellUrban: A subtle message

Note to the BBQ Factory

I do expect your junkmail to have more barbecues in it than spa pools.

Note to self: find a No Junkmail sign pronto.

SunnyO: Some Grills Will

Glancing at the Stars

Matariki Festival, Te Papa, 16 June - 1 July.

Glancing at the Stars | the wellingtonista

You Want Closure?

Spoilers for things that never happened (probably). I like the winning mashup - it explains the ginger cat.

Sopranos endings you can live with. - By Timothy Noah - Slate Magazine

Some Grills Will

Some Grills won't
Some Grills need a lot of loving &
Some Grills don't

Following up on the last story of home renovations (somewhere below), let me share another!

A couple of years ago, we decided to get a car deck built (the trials & tribulations start somewhere near the beginning of this blog, if I were any sort of host, I'd provide links. But who ever said I was any kind of host?). First there were the architects' drawings. Then there was the builder's quotation. Then there were the amended drawings, and more quotes.

Then, bulldozers came in & removed our front garden. Then there were the complications, and builders started on the virgin site some many months later. And many more after that the deck was nearly finished (it'll never be finished, but it's close enough).

Anyway, back at the beginning, when the garden was removed by bulldozer, I remembered at the last minute to save our letterbox. This sat on top of our gas meter for some time, until the deck & a new fence were built.

At this stage, the intention was to get a new letterbox. But you know how it is, the old one, looking like a delapidated birdhouse, sat tacked to our garden fence for more than a year. Once or twice I retrieved it from down the road, presumably having been taken by passing students. A couple of times the wind just blew it to pieces...

Then, recently, I bought a new one over the internet. It arrived in pieces, a slot, a mailbox to be installed into the fence, and some street numbers.

Because our existing letterbox now only consisted of a base, two sides and a No Junkmail sign, some urgency was placed on istalling the new one.

Complications arose when I discovered that my skillsaw was somewhere else. But resourceful as ever, I hand sawed a recess with a Swiss Army knife. It only took most of the day. But now we have a lovely & discreet, working letterbox!

But it doesn't have a No Junkmail sign. A situation I have frowned upon for the last month or so - but I haven't yet found the "right" sign.

Although yesterday, I paused for thought about the No Junkmail... you see they delivered a glossy brochure all about the new BBQ factory in Lower Hutt. And if there's one thing to get me all excited... it's the new season's barbecues.

I'll keep you posted.

Meanwhile - do catch this clip before it gets pulled (lame pun). It's priceless.

Spare Room » Blog Archive » Cheeky Darkie Pulled On Holmes

A Headline you probably won't see in the newspaper.

Good news is no news, as they say.

Dog aggression hits all-time low - New Zealand Dog News

Wheelchair man gets highway ride

Would have been a remarkable sight, no doubt.

BBC NEWS | Americas | Wheelchair man gets highway ride

Grey Day

What was with the Skyline last night?

There are two superior locations for restaurants in this city. One is the Band Rotunda at Oriental Bay, the other is the Skyline complex in Kelburn.

Yet for some reason there has never been a decent restaurant in either location.

However, the Skyline does get used for private parties now & then - July 4th for example, I predict that the cul de sac end of Upland Road will be packed to the gunwhales with limos & sports cars, many of which will sport diplomatic plates, on Independence Day next month. That's what happened last year, residents had to stop & ask chauffeurs to move forward a few metres so they could park in their own driveways. I passed through & idly suggested to one of the policement on diplomatic protection duty that he should get a booze bus in for later on. he told me that there was no point, since the chauffeurs were all gathered outside, smoking, but not drinking.

But last night... I was shambling up Salamanca Rd, when an SUV coming in the opposite direction stopped in the middle of the road & a lady with a mid european accent asked me if I knew where the Skyline was.

I gave her directions "U turn, straight ahead, turn right up past the University, turn right at the roundabout, at the top of the hill, turn right again & there you are."

What I should have said was, "Give me a lift & I'll show you", because what she did was: a U turn, and the "turn right" must have stuck because she turned right immediately into the Met Office & disappeared over the hill.

I caught up with her a few minutes later, just before she descended to the Treehouse & main gardens in Thorndon & went through the directions again.

And this time, just as I walked past the Skyline, she turned up. Gave me a cheery wave, and turned into the carpark which was the fullest I have ever seen it!

And there were limos, and chauffeurs again, and a BMW Roadster, license plate DC501 (I think, possibly 5501), parked across our driveway. No police this time though to have a bleat about useless diplomats to.

And I rang Mrs Llew & told her not to exercise her road rage option when she got home & couldn't park on our car deck, because the diplomats don't care! But as it happens, by the time she got there, it was gone.

And so... anybody know what was going on there? Oh, and if you're wondering what's so cool about the Skyline spot, all the photos of the harbour that get posted here are prety much taken from beside the place.

Random link - borderline disturbing photo from the fieldays.

Bachelor farmers strut their stuff - Stuff.co.nz

Nothing to do with Sinatra, nor Santa.

MiramarMike: Sanatravious - your word of the week

I'll be trying to use it every 10 monutes or so.

meanwhile - Is Tony dead? Whacked by a sinister restaurant patron? Best theory I've heard is that Jamie Sigler (Meadow) tripped over the power cord on her way in.

If this makes no sense... tante pis!

Blue Day

Earlier today...

Very early.

Crossblogging Again - Pruning With The Stars.

Pruning With The Stars! Sunday 17 June | the wellingtonista

Augie - Auer & Out

Probably just coincidence that the day after the death of Augie Auer, weatherman & global warming denier, is pretty much the coldest day so far this year.

Weatherman Augie Auer dies - Stuff.co.nz

Man's Inhumanity to Dog

Which if memory serves, is a phrase stolen from Charles Schulz.

Dog starved, hanged from tree in Manukau

Bastards.

What do they call the guys..

At the front of pipe bands? The guys who swing a long stick with something metal on top. Actually, they don't seem to contribute much. Maybe they own the rest of the band.

Anyway.

There're a shitload of kids marching past my window behind the aforementioned pipe band at the moment. They're dressed in fluoro orange & wearing matching orange dunce hats.

I surmise they're celebrating school patrols & promoting road safety...

...which is pretty ironic actually, given they're marching down the middle of Lambton Quay in the middle of a working day. Watch out for those buses!

And now, a carbon-neutral* gag:

Exactly one year ago today, Wim Binliner was an unknown 18 year old Swedish tennis player.

Today he's 19.

* 100% recycled from a Not the Nine O'Clock News calendar from decades ago.

Who in the world is Gilda Kirkpatrick?

Must be an Auckland thing.

The name "Gilda" evokes for me this 1946 Rita Hayworth/Glenn Ford classic film noir.

IDLE VICE: Trashion

So in 25 words or less, can any Aucklander tell me WTF* she is? And what on earth was Ian thinking?

*this has been a google-free post.

While we're on the subject

I guess if you're Sir Paul, you can persuade Natalie Portman to get jiggy in your video... and I don't suppose that was supposed to look like a lapdance... ewww...

Rock Town Hall - Minute-by-Minute Review of Paul McCartney's Memory Almost Full

WARNING!!

Um... conmsider yourself warned.

The Long & Winding Road

For reasons too silly to mention, I found myself embarking on a 2.5 hour round trip to SunnyO yesterday afternoon, to pick up a cat & bring him back to town.

There's nothing at all interesting in this, save I was planning to use the reflection time driving, to dream up some proverbs for NZBC. Sadly, the muse was absent.

Happily though, I had one of those wonderful bogun moments, having stopped briefly at New World Waikanae, having travelled thus far listening to Jim Mora & some boring guests, I was turning left back onto an oddly deserted State Highway One, when Jim, brightly announced "And here is Alice Cooper".

And it must be that I haven't heard No More Mr Nice Guy since the 1970s. Yet I remember every lyric (except the name of the preacher that punches him in the nose).

And I blasted North in my Euro Planet Muncher (TM) bellowing:

I used to be such a sweet, sweet thing.
Till they got ahold of me,
I open doors for little old ladies
I help 'em find a seat.
I got no friends 'cos they read the papers
They can't be seen
With me, and I'm feeling real shot down
And I'm, gettin' mean!

Honestly, Marilyn Manson is a wannabe.

But from the sublime to the ridiculous, just a little earlier, navigating the borderline chaos that is Centennary Highway, Mora was pleasant enough to treat us to Paul McCartney's new single, which (have you been reading Doonesbury recently?) was launched yesterday in every branch of Starbucks in the world. Non stop Macca. In fact, non stop very mediocre single song Macca.

This in itself is unremarkable, I'm sure Sir Paul has churned out many, many songs that are not destined for the greatness of some of his earlier work. The strange thing is that I heard this one.

What IS remarkable though, is that later last night, we chanced upon a biopic of John Lennon on Rialto. We missed the first few minutes so I have absolutely no idea who played the main roles, nor what the film was called. They looked kind of like the Beatles if you squinted. Although whoever played Astrid Kirchher looked JUST like Sheryl Lee, who played Astrid in Backbeat.

Well. Maybe not THAT remarkable. All I'm saying is it was poignant, seeing a dramatisation of the glory days, juxtaposed with a boring ditty released that very day. Wonder what Lennon would be doing if he was still around?

Oh, and the biopic played no actual Beatles music, not even when they got to the bit where they were making their own.

Maybe Michael Jackson would only give them the music rights if they let him play Astrid.

Anyway, after all that, skip the Rialto movie, watch Backbeat.

Men With Fire

What I love about all YouTube-like movies of people being stupid with fire, are the little touches, like the slow-mo replay of the very moment that the rubber meets the road, or more accurately, the flame meets the accelerant. That "You dumbass" moment that someone funnier than me coined, which is the moment that you realise that you're standing in the middle of high explosive, about to flick... the BIC.

Spare Room » Blog Archive » How To Make A Fireman Very Angry

I also love how, at the end, the very concerned mate approaches, one hand in pocket, the other clutching a pint. It must have looked like a close one.

:)

Hat tip to the Spare Room