Movie madness

 And by madness, I mean the prices!

It's been a long time since I went to the movies, and longer since I actually bought tickets. Out of idle curiosity, I looked up some prices at my local cinema to see the prices of going to the movies.

Twenty three dollars! Per person!

And on top of that, it wanted to tack on a three dollar "booking fee". What on earth? Why is there an extra charge for them to do less work? I know cinemas don't exactly have huge profits at the best of times (and they would have taken a hard hit with Covid) but I think FIFTY DOLLARS for two people to go see a 90 minute film is outrageous. And that's before snacks. And for a couple only - how bad is it for the families with two or three (or more once you add in friends!)?

That's a very hard pass from me.

For $50, we can go down to the local shops, pick up a DVD (or an older movie on blu-ray) and have $20 left over to go buy a bunch of snacks from the grocery store.

No wonder they aren't as popular as they used to be. And then they get all shocked and dismayed when people prefer to go on the dark webs and pirate stuff.

So hungry

Hard going all week, pushing hard and bouncing back and forth. Not been getting enough nourishment. Makes me grumpy. Had pretty much zero time to do preparations, so going to have to hammer that Sunday night, in order to be ready for Monday morning.

More endless paperwork

The joys of government work. Can't do anything just because it needs to be done, or do it the quick and easy way.

Everything has to be twenty forms, on paper (go environment!) and frequently lost so it has to be done again.

But have to jump through hoops to get things done...

Tv antenna's...

...the bane of my existance.

Be nice if I could just throw a handfull of money at the problem and make it go away!

Those few annoying ones

By and large the people I work with are pretty good people. Help you out when you need it, do the job they need to do.

But there's a few, just a few that have that annoying slacker trait. That annoying habit of doing as little work as possible and putting more effort into getting out of work than just getting on with.

That in itself doesn't bug me that much. But when they come over to where I'm working to slack off, when they get in the way and slow me down, when they actively discourage me from working because "we'll be knocking off in an hour or so anyway" - then that really bugs me.

If they don't want to work - fine. It doesn't bother me. But at least don't get in the way of my work.

Stupid vending machine

Was busy yesterday and missed dinner again. Bit annoying but not the end of the world. Since I had a bunch of spare change floating around, I figured I would get rid of it and go grab something from one of the vending machines.

Stupid thing wouldn't take my money!

I don't normally eat chocolate or chips and stuff, but I'd gotten the urge since I was hungry. The machine said it accepted all coins but all the ones I pit in just dropped straight out of the coin return.

#SadPanda #BedNoDinner

Missed meals

Grr - hate it when plans are made for me and I end up missing out on food.

And I really hate it when it happens several times in one week!

First page

Not in the sense that I'm starting something, more along the lines of you have no idea what will be the first page someone sees.

Let me back up a little. I've been reading webcomics since... I have no idea, at least a decade. I had a go at my own webcomic in ... 2003? Maybe even before that, and I read a lot of them before I tried to make one myself.

One of the things an artist needs to be keenly aware of is the limitations of their art. And for an online comic, one of those limitations is that you have no idea which page will be the first one a reader sees.

So make every page count, dagnabit!

Homeward

Trying to get home in September. And it's never easy. Stupid paperwork...

Endless paperwork

Weren't we moving towards the paperless office? Like, two decades ago? Seems like we're churning through more dead tree emails than ever!

First update in a long time...

Wow, it's been a while since I updated this! So many changes in the last couple of months and been so busy I haven't had time to blog about it. Not that anybody reads this anyway! At the moment I'll have more free time as I've just finished with my prior job. I'm planning to relax and recover and gain some weight back for the next two weeks until the end of the financial year here in Australia. After that I'll need to kick my backside into gear and get to work. I'm engaged!

Not time poor ... just need discipline

It is a common complaint that almost everybody makes at some time or another - I haven't got enough time.

Be it for family, creative endeavours, the cat or whatever - at some stage there will come a time when 24 hours just does not cut it.

In my case it is for writing. However, my biggest problem (as I have identified it) isn't that I don't have enough time. It's that I have poor time management and don't have the discipline to focus on what I want to do when I have the time.

I'm hoping that by getting myself making more updates to this blog (even though I don't have much of interest to say) I'll be able to get more into the habit of writing. I'm aiming for every day, though I've already missed one day - and I'm only three days into it. Though having said that, there's no reason why I couldn't update twice in one day. Assuming I actually had something to say!

Ideas are the start...

...not the end!

At the moment I am trying to do a bit more writing. Annoyingly - every time I sit down to get something written down, I just end up dawdling and doing other things. The problem I have is that I want the results without putting in the effort. And the is not how it works!

Today I wanted to get a bit of writing done. I got as far as setting up a few folders (nothing in them) and then I had to duck out and do the shopping. Then set up the new set top box. Then move a bunch of stuff around. Then do a spot of cleaning. Gah!

I just keep putting things off, for no good reason.

There's a reason why my so-called writing site hasn't been updated in over a year. And it's all me baby. I can't blame anyone else other than me. So I either need to knuckle down or throw it overboard and stop attempting to write...

Super8

It's a blend between Cloverfield and ET... not surprising considering it was made by JJ Abrahams and Steven Speilberg.

Not liking it...

And... the flashes arrive

So I'm back in the game!

I ordered two Yongnuo YN-460 II flashes at the start of the month and they've arrived. Tested and working, I now need to get on with it and take more photos. I know the 460's are a "cheap and nasty" type flash but they are so cheap and easy to work with.

Well, I find them easy to work with. They will pretty much only work properly in Manual mode which is fine by me, but someone who wants to use Auto or one of the Creative modes then they would struggle with manual flashes.

On the Agenda: I want to get back into writing. Not sure why nor do I have too many ideas (I keep thinking I'm creative and then proving myself wrong) but every time I listen to Writing Excuses I get the urge to write more.

Next video clip

Hmm, this is getting harder and harder...

At the moment I am trying to get a sample video clip together, both as a shakedown of the camera in video mode and to break out the editing software. I'm being hampered on the "getting footage" side by not being able to line up dates when everything is available at once (cast, crew and location) and the editing computer is off-line.

Gah!

Why is nothing ever easy? Well, I suppose if it was easy then everybody would be doing it. Well, this is where we put up or shut up. If it isn't happening then the fault must be mine because I don't want it badly enough. Time to get crakin'.

Fireshot Firefox add-on DON'T USE

What a shame too, Fireshot used to be such a nice program.

What I find really annoying is that it was working fine, then the developer changed it remotely so it no longer works on my system...

Here's the skinny: Fireshot (used to be) a great program for doing screen captures. Very useful, very flexible. What it does now is demand an update, which does not work via the proper channels. It demands that you go  get an update directly from their site (http://screenshot-program.com). On their site there is a "friendly" click here to check your computer message which is a huge red flag right there!

If you are unfortunate enough to use the site's update, it buries malware so deep in your system that it is very difficult to dislodge and the program won't work - it demands payment!

Fireshot is deceptive. Fireshot is a fraud. Don't use Fireshot!

And I use this program a lot too. None of the other "screenshot" programs available as add-on's for Firefox were as good because Fireshot was the only one that I've found which was able to reliably capture flash elements on a site.

Trip out to a mining town?

Well, not had much luck yet.

Looks like the best way to get a job out on a mine is to know someone who is working out on a mine.

Which I don't. :(

Since sending out a mess of applications hasn't been working out so well, I might need to drive out to a mining town and ask in person. The only down side would be that any job I'd get out there is likely to be a job in and around the town which would mean living out there. Which could be a bit of a pain as rents are quite high out there.

It's the usual - lots of jobs being advertised but everyone wants people with experience. Where do they expect people to get experience I wonder?

Even the supposed "entry level" openings are looking for people with experience, which does not really make them entry level. The only ways that are "easy" that I have seen are exploratory drilling assistants. Not too sure how I feel about roughing it out in the middle of nowhere.

Well, keep hitting that brick wall until it breaks...

Or I do.

Need a good ass-kicking!

Have really got to get into gear.

In the last 22 days haven't sent out anywhere near enough applications to get a hit. If you want a job in the mines you either need to know someone in the business (I don't), send out thousands of applications or get very lucky.

I ain't that lucky.

So got to get down and get those applications sent out. They've gotta hire someone and they aren't going to hire me if they don't know about me!

What the hell is wrong with Google

Well, looks like Google are finalizing their sell-out.

Oh wait, no - they were always in it for the money.

My complaint is that Google's search engine facility used to be pretty good for locating information. Let's say you wanted to buy something and wanted to read up some reviews on that product. You'd go to Google, type in the product name and "review" and you'd get a bunch of pages which people had review said product.

Today, it has become painfully obvious that this no longer works. I was trying to get some reviews on a UHF CB radio and all Google gave me was page after page of links to shopbot, getprice, myshopping and all these other crap "find the best price" sites. The worst thing? None of those damn sites actually had the product I was looking for! Just a page with "your search did not find any results - try these" and would then suggest a bunch of random stuff that had nothing to do with what I was looking for.

What. The. Hell?

Do these sites really think that if I come to their site looking for something and they don't have it, I'll say "well, I'm here - might as well buy something"? Or is the rest of the world finally retarded enough that this actually work for them?

Gah, why bother looking for intelligent life out there - there's none down here!