OK... so Outlook mobile truely does run my entire life for me....

You see if something needs to be done, unless it is in there it will not get done....

eg.g From today.

Wifey, who is working in Wellington as an advisor to the minister of ACC, sent me a meeting request titled “Shut cat flap so cat can't get out”... I can just accept it and now I'll have no worries getting the kitty to the kitty summer resort tommorow.

Marvelous!

Ever developed in Cold Fusion.......????

Check this from the Daily WTF

<a class="user">Logged in as:a> #session.fullname# 
<cfif session.isAdmin EQ "yes">
  (Site Administrator)
<cfelseif session.isAdmin EQ "maybe">
  (Group Administrator)
<cfelse>
  (Member)
cfif>

OK..... the flair post from last night was really harping back to some stuff that Rory was going on about earlier in the year.

I posted the new flair (logo) to the left last night to see if anyone noticed... which they didn't... but now I can announce good and proper.

Someone, well Microsoft, in their infinite wisdom (or generosity) has decided to let me wear a Regional Director hat for a period. Which is all really rather cool.

It's quite an intimidating group to be associated with though Lots of names of people whose books I've read and looked up to when I was a little whipper snapper developer......

Anyway... it's all rather exciting. Will hopefuly give me more opportunities to work with the community and evangelise technology as I an want to do.

I got some new flair...... more on it tommorow

Still eating well. Onto home made lunches again this week.

Decent activity levels last week.

Gyming and Exerbiking.

Jogged/Walked up Flagstaff and mt Cargill on Sat and Sun respectivly. Rolled my ankle on way back down Mt Cargill. Quiet day today- at GYM with Personal traineer this arvo.

Weigh in tommorow. Not losing weight particularly fast by defn. toning up.

Rod has some stuff on NZ's First Class experience.

I'm inclined to agree that it's not super but I reckon the seats are actually that bad... Much better than NZ business.

The NZ inflight entertainment experience is LAME LAME LAME. When I fly to Seattle this week it will be the Fourth time I have seen the same bloody movies in NZ in the past few months.

Roll on the new business class... it looks IMHO to be about the best business offering around (bar maybe Lufthansa but only cos I want in flight internet.... which they have even in coach).

FWIW. Like Rod we have a back of the plane company policy..... but the odd upgrade is nice

Rod also comments on the lounge experiences...

IMHO the Air NZ lounges (Intl ones excepted) are pretty bloody good. Every other Star Alliance lounge I've been in recently has been pretty ass.... I mean in Singapore they even give you tyhe second class treatment by bouncing Gold Star Alliance to the 'Premiere Lounge'... Premiere my ass. I reckon Air NZs lounges and Koru Club in general spank the pants of most others...

Weighed in this morning. 108.2 Lost 0 kgs... oh well... patience I reckon.

No exercise last night. But 25 mins cardio and a weights circuit with Dave this morning.

Proteing shake for Bfast. BLAT for lunch.

Flying this evening... Must be strong and NOT much out on cheese and bikkies @ the Koru Club!

”Around 95% of those eligible for this stage of working for families got their entitlement automatically as they are on a benefit. So the $15 million advertising campaign is to reach only 14,000 families - this is a cost of over $1,000 per target audience member - probably the most expensive advertising splurge in history. “

From McCully

Yesterday was good. Until my little windows episode yesterday afternoon.

Got up and did 35 minutes up and 25 minutes down the Pineapple track. All in 130bpm to 150bpm.

Got home. ate some frozen leftover spagbol and pasta for breakfast. Had a sammie for lunch and conrded silverside with the in-laws for dinner.

Up this morning. Did 50 minutes at the gym- combination of arms workout and 25mins cardio.

Got to work- bit of cold thai chicken and veges from the other night and a protein shake.

Spilt my protein shake ALL OVER MY TABLET PC...... So I just rinsed it under the tap... gotta love those Toughbooks... More later.

Weigh-in defered till tommorow. Felling stronger/better though!

http://www.act.org.nz/item.aspx/27060

Rodney @ #1... no surprises

Pity to see franks above Shirley- not much into the conservative wing of the party me..... particularly not the foot in mouth variety.

Former Libertarian Lindsay Mitchell @ 10.

GREAT to see Willie Martin in @ 14. I gave him a good ranking in my selection form - looks like he is the top ranking young candidate.

And Gavin down @ #28...... We'll need that party vote up Gavin!

OK... so all who know me would probably say that I'm enthusiastic to the point of zealotry with regards to Microsoft stuff and the company in general.

But I had windows issues today..... here is a link to my 'Your server shut down so give us a reason' log entry... if you are offended by colorful language please continue for the problem and resolution....

windowserror.jpg (62.05 KB)

So anyway... our domain controller ran out of disk space- one of my lovely team memebers decided to check WinXP SP2 plus a few other goodies into source control

So no major you say.... but it was.

You see windows (server 2003 SBS) decided to make some registry tweaks when it ran out of ram. Now these were just GUI tweaks...

So no major you say.... but it was....

You see these GUI tweaks involved making my whole #%^#&^ing user interface black. Yes. EVERYTHING was black. Text boxes were black, text was black, buttons black everything was black. The result was not being able to see the login box- but I could work that much out by groping the OS under it the sheets. It's when it threw up the 'why did you boot your machine' dialog that I had no idea what it was doing.... I mean I could see the nice SBS logo on all the dialogs but no *UI elements.

So of course I stressed out... this server does

Domain Controller, Source Control, DNS, Exchange and DHCP... all pretty critical. I fumbled around, in the dark so to speak, for about 1.5 hours. Pulled the drive out of the machine, changed gfx cards. But I had better things to do with my time.

I rang my mate Wraz (paul@metasys.co.nz) who is a chain smoking former DEC uber tech (and general good bastard)... I dragged the poor man away from his wife and loungeroom fire and he managed to find and resolve the issue in under an hour... WRAZ you are a GOD

Details on the issue can be found here.....

So now I have to waste my evening working on the tasks I was going to do this afternoon..... So. If the bloody Windows shell team ever read my blog they should really really really really fix this issue.

[UPDATE: Wraz has commented (below) on how he f1x0r3d my fux0r3d b0x3n.]

“Architect Certification - has promise, but i don't ever see myself getting in. not that i've even been in the game long enough (7 years full time). but the real question is ... what about Ingo. he's a Solutions Architect MVP, but isn't he something like 25? would they make an exception?”

*nods*... I know others who are in the 'holding pattern' without quite the 10 years (I don't think... well they're not THAT old and grey yet)... 10 years as a pure architect is pretty tough....

MCE - moving into "20 new markets, making 30 countries and 17 languages by the end of 2005". sweet!

NZ should be one... I've gone back to Snapstream for the moment but NZ support might get me to shift back to MCE.

Visual Studio and SQL Server - release dates. ... i cant wait! Biztalk 2006 ... is somebody ever going to write a good Biztalk book? been interested in it since 2004 ... but all the books suck. plus the certification exam needs to be refreshed

Has he tried one of Scott Woodgates books?
It's gonna be cool... lots of cool new stuff in the BizTalk spce

Sean McB has a announced an NZ only competitin around VSTS.

Coolest thing is the “I never thought of using it to do that!”... category.

Don't think my schedule is going to give me time to have a crack at this one..... but... get onto it now closing date is 12 August.... and see you all @ Tech Ed!...... W00T!

OK... SO yesterday was pretty average.

Poor eating, stressed, no exercise.

I ate rubbish (Chicken Roll with Hollandaise for lunch and kebab for dinner!... Bleh.) I had Thai Soup (takeaway) Thursday night too but followed it up with a good long bike ride and a session of Pilates with Zosha et al. Watched the rugby with Matt from Fortress and pigged out on cheese.... bleh.... altogether bad.

Not going to make excuses. Fell off the rails.

Back on track today. Did a 60 minute run with Toby (the Dog) this morning and then did a clean up of my bach. pad.

Protein shake with Bannana for breakkie. Going to head in and do some work soon.

Found a great new running circuit... need to know Dunedin to understand instructions...

It's a figure 8 loop around Ross Creek. You start at the entrance to Ross Creek on Cannington Road and take the track that runs along the edge of the golf course around to the lake. Run across the dam then up the hill and along the northern boundary. Run right along the northern boundary until you get to the booth road entrance right at the top corner of Ross Creek. Cross ver the road and head up the Pineapple Track. Keep climbing the track and you will go past the water tanks and treatment facility and eter into a closed in bush track. Head up this for about 200m and you will get to a signposted track for McGouns(sp) Creek. This is the apex of the run distance and climb wise.

Head down the McGouns track until you hit a 4WD track. Head left down this track back towards Booth Road but just before you cross over the bridge take a right onto another 4WD track. Follow this down until you hit the sealed road. Cross the road and you are back into ross creek. RUn down the southern edge of the lake this time and cross over the track you run up on. Run down the dam face, to the footbridge. Then down the creek for about 250m when you get to a stream crossing. GO across the stream and up the hill.... you'll be back at ya car.

The DCC says you are meant to have ya dog on the lead here... but mine preferes to be off and the fine is only $100 bucks or something so I reckon it's worth the risk. Not been caught yet and everyone else does it.