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The LambCutlet Disorganisation

狗年進步﹗

Posted by Jonathan at 12:02:18 UTC on the 29th of January, 2006

「恭喜發財﹗祝你狗年身體健康,心想事成,萬事如意。」 Wishing you a prosperous New Year! Hope that the Year of the Dog brings good health and for the myriad wishes of the heart to come true!

Time is such a strange thing… it’s hard to comprehend that the last Chinese New Year I spent back in 香港 (Hong Kong) was really one (lunar) year ago, yet the last time I was in 香港 (Hong Kong) was only back in November of last year as part of my World trip which now seems so distant.

It’ll be interesting how this year works out, though I think I have got a temporary victory in terms of stubbornness over my father as he now has a wish of doing a little bit of travelling (despite the fact he considers himself “too old”)! In particular to Canada… landing at Ottawa, Ontario and travelling on land by train to British Columbia with I guess a hop on to the ferry for the Vancouver to Victoria leg so as to visit his elder sister, Aunt Jean to me. The cost per person is about £1200… so with some blood, sweat & tears on my part plus a little dash of luck, I’m sure this could work out. :D

As for you eagle eyed phpBB monkeys, may well have already noticed that I’ve stepped into the boots of “Project Manager” to stand alongside James to ensure such matters as clients wanting to advertise on phpBB.com get seen to quickly and efficiently! I still (for now) head the Styles Team and from the recent team meeting hope to have the “minor” backlog of yet to be validated styles sorted out as soon as humanly possible. ;)

Regarding this little blog & gallery of mine, not much has changed though I do have information for those of you that discovered something you enjoyed or found useful, to send some monetary love. I know I haven’t (to date) received anything personally, though if any of the good causes as mentioned in the preamble have benefited, then I’m happy. :)

Oh and for the Koreans, Vietnamese & Tibetians amongst you… a happy 설날 (Seollal), Tết Nguyên Ðán & Losar respectively! :D

Filed under: Meta, Personal

“Infamy! Infamy! They’ve all got it in for me!”

Congratulations to the Liberal Democrat Party in politically assassinating the only person anyone takes seriously (though Kennedy did enjoy his tipple), likes (not just by the “grass roots”) and knows (I’d admit I am acquainted with Matthew Taylor, though as for the rest of you?). My hunch is that you’ll miss the ex-drunkard that has given the party the best results in the last 80 years or so, only to cry over spilt milk as your Blair-Cameron clone fucks it all up royally. So long and thanks for all the fish!

Johnny Five Alive!

Posted by Jonathan at 19:22:31 UTC on the 5th of January, 2006

LEGO® MINDSTORMS™ NXT A New Year and another bout of CES madness! Considering that men never grow up and that all geeks have been brought up with LEGO®, playing with them before they could walk; LEGO Group’s latest product announcement is bound to cause some serious lusting… I’m pretty certain it’ll be relegating 250+ cm (100+ inch) flat-panel displays to second place for a lot of 2006 Christmas lists! ;)

From the press release it is quite apparent the robot is an advanced piece of kit:

The heart of the new system is the NXT brick, an autonomous 32-bit LEGO microprocessor that can be programmed using a PC, or for the first time in the retail offering, a Mac. After building their robots, users create a program within easy-to-use yet feature-rich software, powered by LabVIEW from National Instruments.

Downloading programs to an invention is easy. Users with Bluetooth®-enabled computer hardware can transfer their programs to the NXT wirelessly, or anyone can use the included USB 2.0 cable to connect their computer to the NXT for program transfer. The robot then takes on a life of its own, fully autonomous from the computer. The inclusion of Bluetooth technology also extends possibilities for controlling robots remotely, for example, from a mobile phone or PDA.

The little guy is going to be available online at www.LEGOshop.com and at selected electronics retailers come August 2006 for a fairly reasonable US$249.99 or CAD$379.99. Despite LEGO being a European, or more specifically a Danish company, there is nothing regarding the price of the NXT in Europe. However an educated guess of should put it somewhere between €200 to €250. :D

Filed under: Technology

2005 Redux via Metapixelgasm™!

Posted by Jonathan at 23:33:31 UTC on the 4th of January, 2006

2005 redux in photographs - For a just as varied 2006!

This idea was inspired by (read: blatantly stolen from!) Dave and having spent the last few days prodding about with the Opensource metapixel using a cropped Buckminster Fuller Projection map of the Earth as the source, I’ve finally got something I’m not embarrassed to show everyone in its naked glory! ;)

The library of images which make up this photomosaic are all my photographs from 2005 starting with meeting Inese & Arta in London back in January, then my first visit to 香港 (Hong Kong) after 15 long years over Chinese New Year in February all finished off with the 5 month long round-the-world travelling trip which spanned from June till December!

Of course not all the 2005 photos are up yet and I promise I am working through them as fast as the 24 hours each day allows me to! Everything from Ísland is already online with Canada in the form of Vancouver and Victoria on their way.

Hawai‘i; Australia (Brisbane, Melbourne, Alice Springs & Uluru-Kata Tjuta); Singapore; 香港 (Hong Kong); 中華人民共和國 (People’s Republic of China) (麗江 (Lijiang) & 昆明 (Kunming)); 澳門 (Macau); دبي (Dubai), الإمارات العربيّة المتّحدة (United Arab Emirates); Berlin, Deutschland; Wien, Österreich and lastly Frankfurt am Main, Deutschland will follow… You all can play “spot the picture” in the mosaic till that time comes! ;)

Filed under: Meta