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October 23, 2007

Some more photographs

I still can't say yet exactly what's happening with my scanning project yet, unfortunately, though it's heading along the lines of good news at this stage. In the meantime, here's some more photographs to keep everyone occupied and believing that I'm really alive still at Penn State. Really. Anyway, here they are:

  1. There's this really nice statue outside the Business Building at Penn State.

    I was rather taken aback by this statue outside the Smeal College of Business. The building itself uses a lot of glass windows, and methinks is quite pretty in places.

  2. There is some random fountain, outside the Forum Building.

  3. I was lucky to catch the sunset outside Sheetz, on North Atherton Street, State College, one evening.

    State College and University Park are very fortunate to have some very pretty sunsets through the year, sun or snow. Rain, too -- sometimes.

  4. Notice something about the bookshelf labels?

    I was at the local Barnes & Noble in State College, and the person with me and I noticed that Love & Sex and Sexuality were both next to Addiction/Recovery.

    Oops, maybe?

Anyway, that's probably enough for now. And I'm still alive. Yay! More photographs later!

September 26, 2007

Back already

Sometimes I wonder if I do forget that I'm back in the United States. Proof that I know I am, though:

  1. The first reason is that I visted Stanford University.
  2. I also visited Tempe, Arizona, which is incidentally one of Lower Hutt's sister cities. So here's a random photograph from Tempe.

I'll put up some more photographs soon, and hopefully I'm allowed to make some announcements on what I'm doing next for my book scanning work.

Hugs!

February 14, 2007

Finally! Snow!

Finally! There's a decent amount of snow in University Park/State College, PA, according to AccuWeather right now (and by my own observation, it's lots of snow), like real snow. Inches of it. Lots of it. Well, around 5 centimetres to 10 centimetres or so of it in patches. Enough to go walking through with a good crunch in places (when using some good boots, anyway). In sub-zero temperatures (that's metric I'm thinking of, by the way, though we've had sub-zero in Fahrenheit, too, on the odd day, if I recall correctly, though not today), too! :)

AccuWeather also say on their video forecast for State College there could be a foot of snow in places, too. This will be interesting, albeit for the first time if not the subsequent snowfalls! :) That said, their warnings page for State College at least looks serious on first impressions, though. (Some of the other videos are, uh, undescribable, though -- take the fun Confessions of a Weather Girl and their bloopers, for example. I'm not sure what I make of Battle of the Weather Girls, though. Something seems odd about it.)

I now know what snow can also mean -- WMNST 250 (Sexual Identity over the Life Span) is cancelled tonight. :( I was looking forward to tonight's class, but there's always next week. :)

Photographs of the glorious snowfall later tonight, methinks!

January 7, 2007

Dialup!

Well, dialup works. Photographs might take a while longer to put online. Oh well. Hopefully in-room Ethernet will be up soon, but it looks like that soon will be some time after the middle of the month. Sigh. At least dialup will do for now! :)

January 2, 2007

Celebrate!

It's not often one skips town temporarily to go to a conference.

I've been at the Celebrate '06 conference for the last few days. Amazing! It's interesting how from a (smaller) country that such a conference appears so big compared to a Student Christian Movement Aotearoa conference. I mean, we'd be like a front row of this one in comparison of numbers.

[Quick addition: Due to numerous requests of others attending, I now have a Facebook profile. Add me if you'd like if appropriate. Thanks!]

The sea of people was, well, huge:

Pre-dance dinner, Celebrate '06 conference: this was just part of the room!

New Year was fun. Fireworks on the waterfront. Lots of fun. Bourbon Street was confusing, though. I went to see the fireworks with a group of people. Here is one of them. Nice people all around!

Fireworks for New Year! The people I was watching them with, one of them in this photograph, seemed equally impressed as me.

The previous night, there were the 'Regional Olympics', I'm presuming for a bit of pride in one's region. Because ibiblio at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill provide room for my non-profit web concerns, I joined South. They won! Yay!

Fun after winning the Regional Olympics: yeah, this was the South team!

Of course there was lots of learning about how various churches' student groups work. Of particular interest to me was the National Catholic Student Coalition -- there's a national study body as opposed to the lack of any that I am aware of in New Zealand/Aotearoa (alas). I hope there really is one that I'm just not aware of. Would be a useful group.

There was a good reason that Sophie Snowfield Kenby-Bear of the Bear Committee showed up to the conference. Breaking gender and age roles for carrying bears. Seriously. Here's an example of what she was up to. More examples later on as I have time while in State College.

Sophie Snowfield Kenby-Bear meets humans. She enjoyed it, judging by this example.

Today I go on to State College, Pennsylvania, to go to Penn State for spring term only on exchange with my home teachers' college/university. This will be fun, I hope. Yay!

I'll write more about the conference and post more photographs as I have time as I settle in -- no time left. Hotel wifi at the Hilton New Orleans Riverside seems rather oddly priced. At least I can listen to some live Radio New Zealand streams -- ah, government radio -- well, National Radio.

October 29, 2006

$6 per month for Vodafone's 'BestMate on Supa Prepay'

Sick of the viral marketing that's making you say 'just bloody well tell me'? Well, some folks at a local electronics store (whom I'm guessing other locals will be able to identify from the pictures below) decided to put out their (possibly still embargoed) marketing collateral for Vodafone NZ's supposedly brilliant (I haven't I should add pass judgement on it yet, and I've got no idea if it is, really, but I'm not a marketer) new BestMate™ on the new Supa Prepay plan (yeah, they write it with the trademark symbol, even in the press release, heaven forbid), for their prepaid cellphone customers, a little early (as far as I can tell).

So, if the sign is to be believed, it's 'Call, video [call?] and TXT' one's nominated best friend for $6 per month. I'm guessing that the $6 wouldn't allow reciprocal calls or text messages back without the other friend person also paying six buckazoids to Vodafone as well. It doesn't suggest how many so-called best friends one can, uh, have. It might also be one of multiple options. I don't know. Heck, I've no idea how open a secret this is, anyway.

Makes it quite interesting for people who mostly send text messages to one other person, as it then effectively trumps Telecom NZ's 2007 $10 for 500 text messages plan.

[I would have uploaded the photographs as indicated, but all three of my usual points for uploading photos seem oddly broken. I'll try again later.]

[Update (6:18): Looks like I've managed to get one of the album sites to upload. Sigh. Took a while.]

Here's closeup of the operative part of the sign, which basically tells us to call, video call and send text messages to our 'BestMate' for '$6 a month'. And here is a detail from another of the photographs. The person holding another person seems rather odd to me. The full album might be useful, too. Lastly, here is a slightly blurry overview of the whole sign.

Yeah, the man holding the woman in his hand seems mildly odd to me. I'm trying not to make a resistant reading of that.

Would mobile number portability actually get around to happening? Vodafone claim that it's happening next year, but the same statement has been up for a while. Then again, Telecom says they'll have it sorted to launch, of all dates, on April Fool's Day next year.

I hope that's not a joke. I'd like just to see a few more points of competition. Portability would help.

August 14, 2006

Making it easy

Sure, some smart person cleaned the wrong house, but have they got the message that it isn't such a smart idea to hide a key?

Not to mention I'm now scared of running web applications that might get hacked.

On another note, last month I recently had a trip to Dunedin via Christchurch. The view on the way back was rather nice. Pity the airline (Origin Pacific) appears to have met an unfortunate demise. Sigh.

Here's a view from the plane on my recent trip from Christchurch.

July 30, 2006

Irn-Bru!

Yeah, Cool Britannia is still hitting the wallet, but not so badly this week. Just a 300-millilitre can of Irn-Bru soft drink (the Glasgow-made version of which is apparently banned in the USA!) this time. $3 (or, about £1 at the moment), though? I must be crazy, but then it's not like I do it once every month. :) Now, if only there were a similar American groceries shop around here too... hehe. And, on an earlier, slightly unrelated note:

For those who haven't noticed yet, the Bear Committee have previously got Kabecca Kenby-Bear the Kiwi to review a bottle of Irn-Bru purchased at New World Metro in Willis Street.

April 18, 2006

No disposables?

So this is why I can no longer get APS disposable cameras, huh?

I knew I should have stocked up on them... and it's taken me some time to catch on. Pity.

I guess I'll have to look harder for reusable APS cameras, then.

April 15, 2006

While I'm away...

While I'm away doing some other things, here's a nice picture I took while in Tasmania. More as I have time. While I'm busy doing other things. Go figure. Anyway:

Here's a cruise ship in Hobart, Tasmania, Australia.

March 20, 2006

Mona Lisa, nearly starkers, with paint strippers!

Yeah, looks like someone else thought it interesting, too.

Mona Lisa... Smile? Starkers?

But, strippers? Uh... right.

Continue reading "Mona Lisa, nearly starkers, with paint strippers!" »

March 13, 2006

Going to Blog Hui 2006

Yeah, I'm going to Blog Hui 2006.

I'm also presenting there (Blog Hui, that is) too -- look for From Eternity to Here: Or, Starting One's Career (though I see it's Informing Learning Through Diarising on the conference programme). It's about an example of informing one's career through online diaries. Uh, I mean blogging.

February 7, 2006

Another sign of silliness

Signs I spend too much time in the SCM office now include my wishing I were back in the office, with a view like this of the library next door:

Here's a picture of the Rankine Brown Building at night.

And again!

Again, the Rankine Brown Building at night, but with a bit more exposure time on the camera.

Sigh.

January 11, 2006

Back from leave

Yeah, it's the bottom of a Qantas Airways inflight plastic cup.

Yup, I'm back from leave. May the fun of working on my ibiblio collections again this year soon begin! :)

January 5, 2006

Bear naming contest!

Hi!

The Bear Committee (see http://greta.electric.gen.nz/~nikster/bearcom.html if you're not familiar) has decided to run a fun competition to name their newest bear cub minion/crony/ally that signed up over here. Answers please to either nikster@greta.electric.gen.nz or www.flickr.com/photos/ahkitj/82419215/ -- a prize of a Committee-endorsed lunch (bought from The Kiosk at VUW, or other Committee-approved establishment of course) with Nikster, Little Albert Kenby-Bear, new cub and their hēkeretari is on offer to the winner. If the names are good.

In order to help you select the best name, fourteen photos (taken with Tiny Albert Kenby-Bear, one of its brothers) is attached; [the] new cub is the white-furred bear with the blue scarf. Deadline for entries is when the bear's named. Which could be in the next five minutes, so you'd better hurry.

Good luck!

Bear hugs,
Nikster's hēkeretari (for Nikster, who's actually on holiday somewhere in Wellington).

NB: no shaggy fur from [the] new cub was lost in the shooting of the pictures. Just so you know; new cub wanted that mentioned.

[Selected photographs in full entry.]

Continue reading "Bear naming contest!" »

January 2, 2006

More of the same

  • I haven't travelled further than HK or Australia for some time, but I've noticed that payment receipts shops give out in HK tend to not blank or zero out some of your credit card's digits. Indeed, I've even had my name printed on them. That's not good if you tend to be someone who throws out (or loses) their receipts pretty rapidly and not hoard them until the statement comes in (as I've almost always been told to do).
  • Hong Kong has pretty fountains.
  • In Hung Hom, Kowloon, the SmarTone-Vodafone shop is, like the ship concreted in as a marketing gimmick, a really good landmark when you get lost.
  • Those advertorial-based LCDs on buses and trains get rather annoying for a while. At least the train operator with them has done the quiet cars thing where they at least mercifully turn off the speakers. But still leave them blasted screens in the carriages.

With some luck, I'll be back from leave soon.

December 16, 2005

Some photos already!

And, less than half an hour later, there are some photographs on Flickr. Enjoy!

Here's a selection. More commentary later; I'm in the Launceston reference room of the Tasmanian State Library right now.

Tiny Albert eats Hungry Jack's/Burger King.

Hobart, Tasmania from Mount Wellington.

A cruise ship in Hobart harbour.

And, finally, a toilet sign that I think could be rather badly misinterpreted. Sadly. :(

Toilet sign, Highway 1, Hobart to Launceston.

See you all in a few days! :)

On leave

I'm currently on leave, taking Tiny Albert Kenby-Bear around some interesting places. I'll be posting some interesting photographs of his travels on Nikster's photo album on my return!

December 3, 2005

I want coffee!

Sigh. I want coffee. Now!

Even if it's that crazy stuff they pour out free on air planes.

Coffee, Flight QF4004 (2 of 3).

November 2, 2005

More advertisements!

I've published more photographs of advertisements mostly targeting women from around Wellington. The prize for oddest element would be a morning-after pill billboard that has a radio station's web address in the corner. Then there's the Dove Firming 'as tested on real curves' billboard on Lambton Quay. But this text on a billboard I saw on Willis Streethad me kind of speechless. I'm not sure what to say.

Girl available for only $3.50. [Vodafone advertisement on a bus, Willis Street, Wellington.]

Yikes.

greta.electric.gen.nz crash

Just when I'd nearly finished migrating content from greta.electric.gen.nz to ibiblio, greta needs a complete rebuild. Which is probably just as well, anyway. Most of the web content that fits ibiblio's collection policy has already been moved, such as the teddy bear satire and humour websites and the dr-fun-changes mailing list.

And in the process, some new content has been added to what was migrated from greta, such as some photographs related to women's studies topics.

I hope they're of use to some people. Enjoy!

Meanwhile, for old times, of the content that's probably gone from her that (most likely) won't be migrated to the rebuilt greta is an entry in a previous incarnation of this diary, tph, from 12 October, 2003:

A quote on Maurice Sendak’s supposedly wild ‘stance against literacy’…

Spotted on an English lecturer’s door at WCE:

What is the significance of Max standing on the books on the first page of Where the Wild Things Are? Is this a stance against literacy by the author? — Signed two satisfied SCKEL 102 graduates.

On another related topic, check out the English Exemplar sheet I Was Sad When My Cat Died. Hrm.

With some luck, the rebuild of greta will be completed by mid-December.

Hopefully sooner, though, of course. :)

October 13, 2005

Permanently misspelt

Car park sign, St Mary of the Angels, Wellington.

Ouch.

October 8, 2005

Keeping New Zealand beautiful...

...by eating sausages. Really, you can do so, too! Or so this advertising billboard might be interpreted as saying.

However, I'm trying to give it a sympathetic interpretation, but it still looks rather odd.

The Max advertising billboard on the corner of Willis and Mercer Streets, Wellington. Another Max advertising billboard, this time near Feltex Lane, Wellington.

My resistant reading asks why there's the need for the cheerio sausages, the way they're held and eaten, and the use of the tomato sauce bottle.

But then, I'm new to this academic discipline, so time will tell. :)

September 29, 2005

Nikster moves home

Sorry, no new photo shoot, as it only involved a pile of tarballs transferred over SSH and the usuall tinkering with a text editor. But to cut the story short, after poking through ibiblio's collection policy, Nikster's pile of humorous photo shoots have moved from greta.electric.gen.nz to www.ibiblio.org.

(At least I wouldn't consider it a vanity site, anyway. It's mostly a pile of satirical cuisine and travel reviews. When I remember to put in captions.)

The main collections, though, are the Section 27(1)-related materials. I haven't had much time this term to scan and upload any new books, but with my plans to start honours next year studying the books, things should get rather interesting.

August 13, 2005

Hunter Building exterior

Hunter Building exterior

Hunter Building exterior

Originally uploaded by Jonathan Ah Kit.

Well, I decided to work from home today instead of in the SCM cabin, so here's a tribute to another (far more famous) landmark at school, the Hunter Building. If I recall correctly, that's a view of the stained glass window of the former library, which is now the council chamber.

August 12, 2005

View of Frank Kitts Park, Wellington

View of Frank Kitts Park, Wellington.

View of Frank Kitts Park, Wellington.

Originally uploaded by Jonathan Ah Kit.

Well, I wish I were there right now. Yes, I posted this here at the end of May, but I want to be sitting down there. Right now.

Even though tonight it's rather windy.

July 31, 2005

Cotton Building stairwell

Cotton Building, Victoria University of Wellington.

Cotton Building, Victoria University of Wellington.

Originally uploaded by Jonathan Ah Kit.

Here's another sight, though probably far less commonly noticed -- the stairwell on the northern end of the Cotton Building.

Easterfield Building

Easterfield Building, Victoria University of Wellington

Easterfield Building, Victoria University of Wellington.

Originally uploaded by Jonathan Ah Kit.

It looks rather nice on a sunny day. Not so great inside there all day, however.

July 28, 2005

The mystery of the free university-provisioned metropolitan daily newspapers

There's stands of free daily newspapers at Victoria University of Wellington at the moment.

With compliments of Victoria University, there's stands of free copies of the Dominion Post at the university at the moment, albeit during the week. I've posted some neutral thoughts at http://www.flickr.com/photos/ahkitj/29149096/ for the keen.

Students at the Lady Norwood Rose Garden (2 of 2)

Students at the Lady Norwood Rose Garden

Students at the Lady Norwood Rose Garden

Originally uploaded by Jonathan Ah Kit.

And here's the other one. Actually, I think the first snapshot works better:

Students at the Lady Norwood Rose Garden (1 of 2).

Students at the Lady Norwood Rose Garden (1 of 2)

Students at the Lady Norwood Rose Garden

Students at the Lady Norwood Rose Garden

Originally uploaded by Jonathan Ah Kit.

I think the other one was nicer, but it's a matter of perspective, really. (No pun intended.)

July 14, 2005

Jack Ilott Green, Wellington Civic Square

Jack Ilott Green, Wellington Civic Square.

Jack Ilott Green, Wellington Civic Square.

Originally uploaded by Jonathan Ah Kit.

Too bad it was late in the day when I took this photograph.

June 27, 2005

Friday night at Jet Bar

Wine glass and lamp shade, Courtenay Place.

Wine glass and lamp shade, Courtenay Place.

Originally uploaded by Jonathan Ah Kit.

Friday night, downstairs, over at Jet Bar in Courtenay Place, Wellington.

In unrelated news, Judgments of the Court of Appeal of New Zealand on Proceedings to Review Aspects of the Report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into the Mount Erebus Aircraft Disaster and Safe Marriage: A Return to Sanity got posted to Project Gutenbery today as 16130 and 16135 respectively. Yay! The Section 27(1) pages will also get updated this week with the links.

June 18, 2005

Gate latch, Kelburn

Gate latch at the front entrance to a house on Salamanca Road, near Kelburn Parade, Kelburn, Wellington.

Gate latch, Kelburn

Originally uploaded by Jonathan Ah Kit.

And, here is the last photograph of mine that I intend to make a note about today.

This is one of my favourite photographs so far this year that I have taken. I was surprised at the level of detail that I got from the rust on the latch. It's unfortunate that Flickr's recompression routines don't let you see it on their copy of the photograph. Alas.

No, the Bucket Fountain is not a public toilet

What to use the Bucket Fountain for (apparently) ...

What to use the Bucket Fountain for (apparently) ...

Originally uploaded by Jonathan Ah Kit.

And no, I didn't do the abovementioned map of the Bucket Fountain. Even if Elijah Wood allegedly did do something of that ilk. (The map was spotted at school.)

Waving a flag behind King Dick's back

Richard John Seddon and the New Zealand Flag, Parliament.

Richard John Seddon and the New Zealand Flag, Parliament.

Originally uploaded by Jonathan Ah Kit.

I took this last year. Fun things to see at Parliament, now and again!

May 31, 2005

Expensive ways to get a transistor radio

Well, I checked out the RRP today for the transistor radio I recently got to get some amusement. The Sony Walkman SRFS84S/SRF-S84 I got a few weeks ago on Fly Buys points to avoid getting around to buying an iPod or similar device has a recommended price of roughly $60 on Sony's website. I'm told by a family member that similar products are available from The Warehouse for around $2. Maybe Sony makes money off putting the Walkman logos and Mega Bass on the front.

I was expecting a rather high price, but not that high.

From the Computerworld site: wireless price gouging in local hotels, and -- with Telecom -- at your local Starbucks, Telecom competing with itself (apparently), the Wanganui Computer goes and Keith gets another hat at InternetNZ.

[Listening to: Big Yellow Taxi -- Counting Crows -- Hard Candy (03:46)]

[Listening to: Fallen -- Sarah McLachlan -- Fallen (03:51)]

[Listening to: Drops Of Jupiter [Album Version] -- Train -- Drops Of Jupiter (04:20)]

May 30, 2005

Wind turbine

The wind turbine at Brooklyn, Wellington, New Zealand.

The wind turbine at Brooklyn, Wellington, New Zealand.

Originally uploaded by jesstherese.

So... the wind turbine's blades are taking a break. But it looks kind of 'naked' without the blades on the turbine. At least they're on the ground, and not too far away. This photo by someone else I found today on Flickr; I really should visit the Brooklyn windmill some time soon to take a look for myself.

May 29, 2005

You are getting sleepy...

View of Frank Kitts Park, Wellington.

View of Frank Kitts Park, Wellington.

Originally uploaded by Jonathan Ah Kit.

You are getting sleepy. You want to generate heaps of foreign exchange receipts for Wellington and the Hutt Valley by visiting. You are going online to some reputable online travel agent and booking a flight and accomodation to visit this place. Hmmm -- noone sleepy yet? Guess the bridge wasn't tempting enough, then.

(I wonder how much electricity this uses, come to think of it...)

[Listening to: some random radio station on my new transistor radio, purchased in an effort of apathy to be not to be getting around to buying an iPod.]

May 20, 2005

Student political activism on blackboards

Student political activism at Victoria University of Wellington.

Student political activism at VUW.

Originally uploaded by Jonathan Ah Kit.

I don't know about other universities or colleges other than VUW, but here (well, at least everywhere at VUW but the former WCE, it seems), but here, there's a lot of blackboard (not usually whiteboards, oddly) political graffiti in lecture theatres. Otherwise notices about gatherings and 'advertisements' for commercial websites are put up, but I find it's usually political rants. Anyway, this was a rather odd one to turn up to at a GEND 101 lecture; I'm sure any pun wasn't intended. Ugh. From what I gather, it was probably written yesterday (Thursday) about student aid in the 2005 government budget presented at Parliament yesterday. I guess after the student protest at Parliament earlier this week people weren't too hopeful for all the youth undertaking tertiary study.