Up Front: Ups and Downs. And Side-to-Sides.
155 Responses
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Sacha, in reply to
Turn on flight mode, draft all your responses. Turn off flight mode and send them all. Turn off.
Great advice - never thought of that.
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Every bridge over the Avon broken.
Didn't realise that. So good to hear from you again, Emma.
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SteveH, in reply to
So if you are near to a tower you use less energy than if you are far from one? Weird never thought it would work that way.
That's how the airlines are justifying microcells in planes: if the phones can connect to a station in the plane then they can transmit at low enough power to not risk interference with the nav equipment.
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recordari, in reply to
The Ericsson Cobra is a classic.
Yep, that's the one. In pale green. As you say though, would have to teach the under 10s, actually maybe the under 30s, in the area how to use it for it to be of any value.
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I'm just going to interrupt the geekery for a moment to say how glad I have been to hear from you, Emma, and from the other PAS people in Christchurch.
As you were then. Back to phones.
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BenWilson, in reply to
That's how the airlines are justifying microcells in planes: if the phones can connect to a station in the plane then they can transmit at low enough power to not risk interference with the nav equipment.
Yes. Further to Bart's query, I'm fairly sure that the power required is not linear on the distance, but more like a square law. At least electromagnetic signals typically attenuate on an inverse square law, so it's plausible. In other words, double your distance from the cell, quadruple your power consumption from the signal. But there's a lot more going on to chew power than that. Contention was probably the biggest factor on Tuesday. I don't know much about the maths of that
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I am so impressed that while Emma's off getting groceries (which I very much hope means gin + cigarettes) you've all managed to turn this into a thread about cellphone towers.
However, can anyone explain the ghosting thing? From both people in Chch, people in Wellington and Twitter, I've been receiving texts multiple times. Or is it unrelated and just my phone slowly dying?
On another note, has anyone seen any pics of Victoria Square? I saw a corner of a photo that looked like the statue had fallen, but couldn't quite tell.
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Jackie Clark, in reply to
I was listening to 1ZB on the way home, Megan (yes, I know, but) and this guy rang up who lives in Victoria Square. Actually, now I come to think of it, he was the owner of Le Cafe in the Arts Centre. Anyway, he was talking about how there was extensive damage - although he didn't say what apart from saying that a big glass building and his apartment building were kind of leaning toward each other.
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Megan Wegan, in reply to
he was the owner of Le Cafe in the Arts Centre
Le Cafe? Did he say how it is? I broke up with my first boyfriend there.
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Bart Janssen, in reply to
As you were then. Back to phones
That reminded me of Telethon
See I told you they were firing randomly
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BenWilson, in reply to
As you were then. Back to phones.
Aye. Silly anecdote here, but bear with me. An old guy I once lived with once described how during WW2 he was working in a control tower at an airbase, when he saw his best friend stuff up his landing, crashed and burned. He turned to the female officer next to him, and said "We better call the kitchen and tell them to cancel one of the lunches". She never spoke to him again, clearly thinking him incredibly cold.
I've thought about that many times since, and I don't think it was him being cold. He was coping the way a lot of people who have been in battle do, focusing on practical minutiae. He laughed about it when he was telling me, but there was a tear in his eye, he was laughing at himself, and how odd the war had made him. I expect the people digging up corpses right now are doing the same, following their drills and their instruments, taking care not to get too emotional about people they know are in there that they can't get to.
In some ways, it's what Emma is doing, blogging is normal for her, something she can do, like the gardening she mentioned. David's the same, I doubt he was writing on Tuesday night because he's going for a Pulitzer. It's a way of coping, a way of feeling normal when everything's gone to shit around you.
It's also how the wider PAS community is coping. We're feeling traumatized, to a much lesser extent, but still. Get on with it, help in ways that are practical. Keep the arguments to a minimum. That's abnormal, though, and actually hard to cope with, I feel a little stink for giving Deborah Coddington shit on Pundit. Maybe being an insensitive pedant was her way of coping. It was her excuse anyway.
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Jackie Clark, in reply to
He said that there is are huge cracks running all down the facade that faces, I think, onto the tramlines? But he didn't say it like that. I just thought that was what he meant because he said the museum looked okay. He wasn't sure when they would reopen, or even if they would. Last time I was down, I had lunch there all by myself, and it was, I have to admit, a very lovely spot to people watch.
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Jackie Clark, in reply to
Oh Ben, apart from being directly involved in disasters like the earthquake, there is never any excuse for being a miserable shit, really. Working with kids reminds me of that.
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Megan Wegan, in reply to
Last time I was down, I had lunch there all by myself, and it was, I have to admit, a very lovely spot to people watch.
It is, kind of my default cafe in Christchurch. When I am down there, Emma and I always organise a drinks at the Dux, which looks like it might be gone too. :(
It's also how the wider PAS community is coping. We're feeling traumatized, to a much lesser extent, but still. Get on with it, help in ways that are practical. Keep the arguments to a minimum.
It's also, for the record how the media copes with it. Head down, do your work, don't think about the horrible stuff. It's why we drink so much.
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When I am down there, Emma and I always organise a drinks at the Dux, which looks like it might be gone too. :(
It kind of sounded like it from what that man was saying, although I hadn't thought about that till you mentioned it. And it makes me a bit sad that, even though I've never been there, I will miss that experience when I go down in June.
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Craig Ranapia, in reply to
I've thought about that many times since, and I don't think it was him being cold.
No it wasn't. I caught part of Enoch Powell's interview with Parkie on a monitor in Marbeck's this avo, and he said something chilling yet enormously moving: That until very late in the war, he never expected to survive. Five or six years living like that, a rather grim sense of gallows humours and a genius for disassociation would be the least you'd have to do to remain sane I suspect. Especially when you were in a position where losing your shit could be quite literally a matter of life or death.
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Megan Wegan, in reply to
And it makes me a bit sad that, even though I've never been there, I will miss that experience when I go down in June.
And it is quite the experience. Those days at the Dux have made me completely re-think how I feel about my hometown, thanks to Emma and David and Isabel and Megan C and a bunch of other people.
Now, I am going to have to re-think how I feel about it again. But hey, all those people are ok, and are gonna need my smiling face to cheer them up again. Maybe I will surprise Emma like I did in October. Though, then she'll call me a bitch again.
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Though, then she'll call me a bitch again.
Rest assured, no matter what happens, at some point I will call you a bitch again. Because I love you.
And do carry on with the phone geekery. You know I adore geekage. Also, this kind of knowledge is very handy.
Also, can I suggest that if anyone wants books from David, they use the Amazon link? He'll still get a cut, without having to actually do anything.
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Megan Wegan, in reply to
Rest assured, no matter what happens, at some point I will call you a bitch again. Because I love you.
I just typed a one word reply, nearly hit post, and thought, 'you know, maybe that's not appropriate.'
What the hell is wrong with me?
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recordari, in reply to
Bless.
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I believe this might be what Megan was trying to say.
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SteveH, in reply to
However, can anyone explain the ghosting thing? From both people in Chch, people in Wellington and Twitter, I’ve been receiving texts multiple times. Or is it unrelated and just my phone slowly dying?
I’m guessing here: I think what is going on is that the acknowledgement messages from your phone when it receives the txt are not getting back to the system so it keeps resending the txt on the assumption that it didn’t get through the first time.
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I caught part of Enoch Powell’s interview with Parkie on a monitor in Marbeck’s this avo, and he said something chilling yet enormously moving
Thank you for mentioning this. It made me look up his Wikipedia Page ( that Enoch Powell?), and I learnt yet another lesson in not judging people by the single thing I know about them.
Conservative … but strongly opposed to the death penalty, and co-sponsor of homosexual law reform, etc. Who knew? Clearly not me.
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recordari, in reply to
The thing is, had she actually done it, I think it would probably have made your day. I have no evidence to support this assumption, so please forgive my presumption.
Now, about them phones….
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Megan Wegan, in reply to
Oh, MY. That would be the moment when, as you mentioned on a thread earlier in the week, your son had his head in his hands?
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