Wednesday, December 31, 2008

What I did on my holidays

While spending Christmas in Sydney with relatives, we went to the zoo. Taronga Zoo, to be precise. While the weather was pretty crappy (very overcast & occasional showers), it was a nice visit. Unfortunately, crappy weather equals poor lighting for photos. Bummer.

The below are probably the best pics I took. Enjoy!



Typical Queensland Summer

So it's warm.

Although, it's somewhat atypical for queensland by being warm and dry.

Yesterday it was warm and humid, as evidenced by this photo taken shortly before sunset. Temps around 32-33º, with apparent temps a few degrees higher.



Today, though, we only got to 36ºC. Right now, according to the Bureau, it's only 31.9ºC, but the apparent temp is only 28.1º - yup, it feels cooler than it is. Part of that is because it's windy (although it was windy yesterday too), but a large part is because the humidity is only 32%. That's a bit drier than yesterday, when the corresponding figures were 30.0º, 30.1º, and 67%.

So it's warm, but not too much so.

I wonder if we'll hit 40º this summer? We often get a week of weather approaching or exceeding that in mid-to-late January...

Friday, December 19, 2008

Goodness, gracious...



Via the wonderful Astronomy Picture Of the Day - go there today!

Best. Star Wars. Ever.



(via via)

Those crazy Japanese architects...


Designing houses like this must drive you crazy!

Lots more funky pics at Gizmodo.
(via)

From the "I can't believe someone made that" files...



I saw this earlier today on the Zazz site - one of those web sites where you get an option to buy a miscellaneous overstocked item each day, like 1-day or Catch Of the Day. I presume similar sites exist for the USA.

I don't know how many they had to sell, but as of 9:41pm AEST, they're all sold out. Yes, that's right, someone bought it. Possibly a lot of someones, depending on how many boxes they picked up...

This is not a problem we have in Brisbane...



No, seriously. It doesn't snow here, folks... our average mid-winter minimum temperature is 7.4ºC (45ºF). Our highest mid-winter minimum temperature is 19.5ºC (67ºF). Dayum. That's warm... I wonder what year that was in?

right now, at 8:05pm AEST, it's 25.7ºC, with an apparent temperature of 29.5ºC (that's 85.1ºF for our north-american friends), and 82% relative humidity. Apparently it was forecast to hit 37ºC today, but we only made it up to 32. Surprisingly, no thunderstorms around at the moment. We had one at about 3am this morning - when I really would have preferred to be sleeping, but it was a loud one.

Sunday, December 14, 2008

Why you should never talk to the police...





'nuff said.

Although I'd be interested in hearing what any other people who happen to be police officers (or are married to people who work for the police, hint hint) have to say...