So I've spent the last week looking at houses, and on the phone to iiNet, looking at how possible it would be to move into a new place..

So far not looking too good - I'd need at least a 3br house with large 2 car garage, or 4br house with small 2 car garage. - either way it ends up costing a HEAP more than here..

Plus while moving the ADSL to the new house wouldn't be a *huge* issue (basically they migrate the DSL over, and just switch the account over to the new DSL when the new line is ready, so an hour or two of downtime at the most), it'd leave the guys here without internet for a week or two while they applied for their own DSL to replace the one I'd migrated..

At some prompting from a mutual friend last night, I ended up having a talk with josh, and it turns out that he and toby are moving out in a month or two anyway - they're just saving up for cutlery/crockery, a washing machine, new lounge furniture, etc.. Josh seemed a bit relieved when I pointed out that there would be 1200 worth of his and toby's share of the bond I'd be paying them if they were to shift out.. - would cover a good part of the bond on a new place (if not all of it..)

Went downstairs to tell Dave tonight, and it turns out that he's also shifting.. So maybe I won't end up needing to shift afterall..

Bought myself a work ute today - '87 Hilux Twincab with hard canopy on the ute section at the back.. Got it for a song on the Dominion Online Auctions, and it runs pretty darned well! Has 240k km's on the clock, but has full service history with grease every 5k km, and oil/filter every 10k km, so pretty happy with that..

Only hassle is it doesn't have Airconditioning, which the ad actually stated it did.. In discussion with DOLA about that, as legally they have to fit it, but well, that'd cost them a packet and I'm not that much of an SOB (I know they've already lost close to $1k on the sale, going on the Section 20 ownership transfer papers), so I'm looking to get them to pay for roof racks and the tongue for the towbar (who sells a car with a hayman-reese towbar without the tongue?!?)

Oh, and the mini is (vaguely) back on the road again - head still needs some work though :)

Well, about a two weeks or so ago I finally finished up at Adaptive (my decision), and now I'm out on my own. Doing hosting (primarily, regular income is good!), IT/Network support, web integration (lord knows I'm pretty shocking at actual design) and programming.

Got a fair bit of work going on already - doing IVR programming for integrated phone/web systems, IT/network support for a couple of companies, and have quite a few website integration and programming jobs on the go..

So far it's all working out well, and I'm sooooo much happier working for myself, dealing directly with clients, than I was at Adaptive towards the end there :)

We had a bit of a fight in the house the other day.. - I came home and found the bottom garage open, the alarm off, and the back door unlocked - and noone home.. It's a bit of a security problem, plus because things were left unlocked, it means our insurance doesn't cover it if stuff gets stolen.. So I sent an email to my housemates asking them to be more security concious, and also asked if they could try and keep the house a little more clean.. As whenever I bring clients over, I have to clean the lounge and kitchen first.. That turned into a huge fracas, which has now just turned into a quiet unconfortableness..

Sigh, I can see that living with friends, plus running a business from home isn't going to gel very well :(

It's been a hell of a week.

Friday I was in Sydney for Boky's memorial.. The Funeral was up in Warwick, QLD on the 6th of Jan, which I couldn't make due to work commitments. WHile I was there, I FINALLY got to meet Cat, who I've spoken to on IRC pretty much forever. She's only 5 foot tall, but she's the bubbliest happy person I've ever met.

Sunday, I rode up to Sydney for a bit of a get-together bbq at Tim and J5's place.. Monday morning we were up with the sun to assemble at Road warriors Cafe on the Old Pacific Highway for an hour and a bit ride to the Crematorium where Maddy's Funeral was to be held.. Maddy died in an accident on the way back from Boky's funeral in Warwick. The wake back at Road Warriors turned out really good. South (Maddy's Husband of 3 months) was smiling towards the end and looking close to his usual self, so being surrounded by friends and family was doing its job.

Now you remember me mentioning Cat above? I logged onto usenet Yesterday (Wenesday) morning, to find news that Cat was killed in a car accident in Tasmania on Tusday night.. Apparently a 75yo had a heart attack and somehow managed to come down the wrong way on the freeway and hit the car that she was driving. So she's now dead :(

What the hell is going on?!

Got back from Melbourne this evening - very cold ride down, and a somewhat wet one coming back!

Was good to be down though - spend Saturday with mum and dad (it was dad's birthday) - went to a train show, worked on mum and dad's computers, and sync'd the carbies on the bike..

Sunday headed down to Hastings and caught up with Gav & Simone. Little Ethan is crawling around and trying to stand up and stuff now - he's suuuuuch a little cutey :)

Glasses worked well - think they're a keeper!

Almost dropped the bike last night! Heading home from seeing The Day After Tomorrow with Kel, Sim, and Josh - Coming around the fold-back from Monaro Hwy onto Lanyon Drive, turned out the road was iced over (couldn't see it!), so as I get into the point where I normally lean the bike over and open the throttle around the apex of the turn, both wheels start sliding!

OH CRAP thinks I, and shoves my foot down to catch the bike. Only a) I'm doing 30k/h, and b) the road's iced over, so I can't get any purchase, and instead i'm bearing the weight of the bike, without being able to actually get a grip on the road to throw it back upgright... Then finally my foot caught on the road and threw the bike back upright. 'Woohoo' thinks I. Then the pain hit.. eeeeek. Actually didn't turn out as bad as I thought - this morning it's rather stiff and aching, but doesn't actually hurt (though granted getting on/off the bike isn't fun as I'm having trouble putting all of my weight on the one leg.)

Ahh well, at least I didn't actually bin it! Hmm, gonna be a *censored* of a winter :(

Well, went back to OPSM, and apparently there's actually some big differences between my current glasses and the new ones.. So they've sent off for MORE new lenses which will be closer to what I have now..

Fingers Crossed...

Well I got my new glasses back on Thursday afternoon.. They seemed a heap better when i first tried them on.. Then once i'd got used to them friday, i realised they were actually worse - now instead of crystal clear vision in my left eye for about 30% of the lense, and then tapering off to extreme fuzzyness not far off that 30%, it's now crystal clear at the EXACT centre of the lense, slightly fuzzy for about 60% of the lense, and really really fuzzy for the outer 30% of the lense.. And of course, the right eye is identical to my previous glasses.

So I've gone back to my old glasses, and I'll go into OPSM on Monday morning and get a refund. I'd rather have only-slightly-fuzzy vision in both eyes, where i have exactly the same fuzziness at all points on the lenses, than get constant migraines from changing fuzziness as i look away from centre..

Will probably have to fight to get my refund - the optician lady that messed with the new frames when i put them on and they were still fuzzy was making grumbles about how I must have obviously not answered questions right when I was in with the optometrist, and if these lenses were no good, i'd have to get another optometrist appointment.. *censored* THAT. - Unless they're planning on paying me for my time, I've had enough.

I find it hard to believe that I've had so much trouble.. Growing up, I went through a LOT of different pairs of glasses.. Now sure, every time I got new glasses, I had trouble judging height/distance/etc for a couple of days, but I NEVER had a varying fuzziness problem. This morning, I pulled my last five pairs of glasses out of their cases and tried them on. now sure, they get fuzzier as I go further and further back in time, but up/down, left/right around the lenses, i have exactly the same amount of fuzziness. It really makes you wonder - while growing up, I was getting healthcare-card-funded glasses, and never had a problem with them.. Now I'm paying for them myself (and at $600 they're bloody expensive), OPSM have had two goes, and haven't got them right yet!

Finally went and got new glasses a couple of weeks ago! (Yes, decided these HUUUUUUUGE-framed ones really do look waaaay too dorky) Went this new high-index glass, so the lenses are only 3-4mm thick instead of the usual 7-8mm for my prescription. What OPSM never told me was that it's 'normal' to get blurring if you go off centre on the high-index glasses. Oh, and you get this really freakish colour shifting going on.. They've been telling me for a couple of weeks that it's just my eyes have to become accustomed to the higher index glass, and i'll get used to it..

Finally went back today to tell them to just re-make the prescription in normal-index glass, and the lady I got this time told me that it's not that my eyes would get used to it, and not be blurry anymore - it's that I would get used to it being blurry.. Would probably be ok if i didn't need my peripheral vision.. - but there's the whole riding a motorcycle and ALWAYS using peripheral vision (mirrors, headchecks, etc), plus the three-monitors-on-my-desk thing that also makes heavy use of pheripheral vision.

So they're re-making the prescription, only problem is, with the thicker glass, the sunglasses attachment for the new glasses (a schmick pair of raybans) won't actually attach anymore - so they're going to do the lenses up as the ones that go really dark when exposed to UV. But the combination of that and the anti-glare coating you need on high value prescriptions means they have to be custom-made rather than being a standard blank, so it's going to be FOUR WEEKS before I have my glasses back.

So now i'm back in my dorky old frames with their not-strong-enough-anymore prescription, and man are the migraines annoying from the change back to the old prescription..

sigh, thanks OPSM. If they'd been truthful with me from the start and told me I WOULD have problems with the high-index lenses, rather than not telling me a thing, I would have chosen cheaper frames (Seriously, $500 for new glasses is a little steep if you're not gonna get what you wanted anyway..), and gone normal glass.

Oh, and did I mention I had to buy a new helmet, cause the new frames were too wide for my existing frames?

So I'm now $1100 down and i'm STILL wearing my old glasses!